|From: Oliver Pereira <omp199(a)ecs.soton.ac.uk>
|X-ECS-MailScanner: Found to be clean
|Sender: wikien-l-admin(a)wikipedia.org
|Reply-To: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
|Date: Sun, 19 Jan 2003 01:35:28 +0000 (GMT)
|
|On Sat, 18 Jan 2003, Tom Parmenter (Ortolan88) wrote:
|
|> Look at what he she or it has contributed to [[Talk:Isaac Asimov]],
|> dragging people into debates over pointless subjects, subtly shifting
|> ground from one tiny truism to another while everyone else fumes,
|> engaging in look-at-me-I'm-horrible ploys, and generally poisoning the
|> well. So I don't want to drink from it.
|
|I don't want to get involved in any discussion right now about the merits
|or otherwise of Vera Cruz's edits, but here is one of my conclusions from
|the Isaac Asimov argument.
|
|As a general matter of principle, I think that any Wikipedian should be
|prepared to back up any of their additions - if specifically asked to by
|another Wikipedian - by pointing to some reference source. I do not think
|that saying that "everybody except you agrees", which some people (not
|Ortolan88, I hasten to add) were doing, is at all acceptable as a
|response. Of course, people will not always have their references to hand,
|but they can always just say on the Talk page that they will check. Then,
|once they have a reference, they can put their addition back in, with the
|reference. Just reverting things back and forth doesn't help anyone. If
|someone is not able (or simply refuses) to back up an addition to an
|article, then they should not complain about it being removed. Otherwise,
|the Wikipedia will never be a reliable reference source, as it will always
|contain unsubstantiated statements.
|
|I also think that removed sections should always be placed on the relevant
|Talk page, with a note saying why it was removed. It's quite tiresome
|having to look through an article's history to find out what people have
|removed, and since there are often no comments explaining the removal, I
|never know whether I should just put the sections back in or not.
|
|As I say, I don't want to get into an argument about Vera Cruz's edits,
|but do let me know if you disagree with my general principle!
|
|Oliver
|
I certainly agree with this, both with the principles pronounced and
with the suggested practices. However, I have to add two points:
1 -People just plain get tired of arguing over and over as the ground
shifts beneath their feet, as, in this case, a discussion of "the
best known short story" turns almost undetectably into a discussion
of "the best known work in any genre" and they lose their manners
and good sense sometimes.
2 -Vera Cruz *never* documents or justifies his her or its changes in
any way and trolls just as hard in the talk pages as in the
article.
Tom P.
O88