2008/12/31 Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com>om>: False dichotomy. BLP only works insofar as it doesn't contradict NPOV. What part of valuing individuals do you consider requires violating NPOV? - d.

On Wed, Dec 31, 2008 at 7:03 PM, Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com> wrote: Actually, I do see it as a false dichotomy. We're presenting it as "rights" against publication of verifiable, reliable, already-published material. These rights do not exist. I do not have a right to tell you that you may not talk about me or publish information about me, provided what you say is true. People do, to some degree, have a right to privacy, but not nearly as extensive of one as most would believe. We already cover that with NOR, V, and RS-digging through someone's tax records and synthesizing a conclusion is already unacceptable, and if no other reliable source has seen fit to publish what's found in those records, we shouldn't either. However, once something is already -in- public, and reliable sources with ethics departments and legal departments have already published it, it's no longer private information. At that point, there is no BLP issue other than possible neutrality violations. How do we avoid neutrality violations? We follow, rather than second-guess, reliable sources. In every case, every time. That's what NPOV means. Imposing our own viewpoint, including "They SHOULDN'T have published that!", is the very definition of a violation of NPOV. NPOV is still a pillar and the founding cornerstone of our project. BLP is a necessary reaction to a bad incident (Siegenthaler) that was originally well done but now has gotten way out of scope and way out of control. There should be no question about which is primary. The fact that there is any question is unsettling at best. -- Freedom is the right to say that 2+2=4. From this all else follows.

2009/1/2 Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com>om>: You're resorting to hypothetical hyperbole. This does not convince. - d.

On Fri, Jan 2, 2009 at 8:42 AM, Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com> wrote: The problem with this statement is that the fact that few of these things are known publicly and the inappropriateness of publishing them in Wikipedia are correlated. My telephone number is already on the internet where any idiot with ten seconds to spare can find it (http://www.411.ca) which also tells you my street address. The rest of these things simply aren't available, which is reflective of the fact that publishing them is seen as inappropriate - Cheers Brian

On Fri, Jan 2, 2009 at 6:42 AM, Ian Woollard <ian.woollard(a)gmail.com> wrote: I would have a problem with that if all that information weren't already publicly available. On the other hand, if it had already been published on the front page of the New York Times, I probably wouldn't much care-that information would already be out, and I'd already be in the process of changing those numbers and the like. And sometimes sexual history -is- genuinely relevant to an article (see [[Monica Lewinsky]] or [[Gary Hart]] for examples). Of course, a simple factual real name is a bit different than publishing someone's telephone number, SSN, or phone number, none of which I've ever seen in an article (at least not for very long). Nor do reliable sources tend to publish such things. An accurate comparison would more be like saying that my real name is Todd Allen, were there someday to be an article on me. I would expect that such an article would have my real name in it, and you can see how little I mind if that's known. The rest is hyperbole, and no one is arguing to include such things. I can't think of a possible scenario in which someone's social security number or bank account number would be relevant to an article, nor can I think of any circumstances under which a reliable source would publish them. Names are not the same. "Who" is one of the 5 W's that is taught in elementary school writing. An article on a subject that does not answer that question is inherently lacking. The same is not true if it does not include their credit card number. People are readily identifiable by the information given about them anyway. How hard is it to find the Star Wars kid's name, even from our article, where all the sources we use readily publish it, or a google search on the article title brings it right up? If something is in public already (which it by definition is, if reliable sources available to the public have published it), it is no longer private. You can say that's good, or bad, or simply inevitable, but it's still the fact, and to think we can stuff genies back in bottles (even provided that to do so would be desirable, an odd position for a project specifically dedicated to making information available to take) is monumental hubris. We're big, but we're not -that- big. I don't want to see BLPs that protect this notion of privacy, that we should not make people identifiable, because in the end, such an article could say exactly nothing. Giving enough specifics to be worthwhile makes identifiability inevitable. -- Freedom is the right to say that 2+2=4. From this all else follows.

The idea is that we do the right thing regardless of what anyone else does. Fred

On Sat, Jan 3, 2009 at 6:40 AM, Jussi-Ville Heiskanen <cimonavaro(a)gmail.com> wrote: And note that none of those numbers, -even when protected by law-, stay a secret. -- Freedom is the right to say that 2+2=4. From this all else follows.