Actually, Eric, I disagree.
Trolling is a form of vandalism. This could justly be interpretted as
trolling. (I am reminded of the constant edit wars with Helga, which cost
Wikipedia quite a lot in terms of time and people who were disgusted and
left)
For me to just ask some other "neutral" sysop to do it instead of me is
hardly a neutral step.
I was not involved in an edit war. It was not an article that I care too
deeply about. I was protecting it from what I (continue to) perceive as
trolling.
Given the situation with Lir/.Vera Cruz/Susan Mason as well as Michael/Weezer
and 172, perhaps its time sysops took more steps to limit trolling and not
just the "George Washington had big balls" kind of vandalism. I open that for
discussion.
Danny
>>Brion:What would such a policy need to say that the Neutral Point of View
policy does not?
Well, Daniel once again has got the feel for the issue... that is that NPOV
and being sued for libel are two different things... I can understand what
youre getting at Brion.. that they are related, with regard to an editors
point of view, But still, we here are involved in making policy and crafting
some general ways of dealing with related (even outside in the legal world)
issues so that later, when these things might come up, they've been thought
through somewhat beforehand.
NPOV is a good general policy.. but when Libel really means someone trying
to edit Wikipedia through a legal interface, rather than the normal one.
Here, of course, as I've said on the T:W:Libel page, theres a burden of
responsibility automatically placed on someone to make a change themselves,
if something is incorrect... Im sure this has been said before, in similar
words.. So, I dont think WP has much to worry about at all... If its true,
and the tribe sticks to it... and yet they want to sue... fine... That would
be one of the easier cases to argue... lawyer or not...
So, yes its an issue.. and having a foundation would inevitably mean a
policy with regard to being sued. And whatever policy that is.. simply by
nature of being solidified into some guide, would have some minimal bearing
on the freedoms Wikipedians enjoy in editing articles.
Funny enough, a major Libel case - Richard Perle is going to sue Seymour
Hirsch (and The New Yorker) for his column... not here in the US, but in
England... go figure... the laws there are apparently more favorable to him,
despite the fact that neither lives there, and the circulation there is a
sliver of what it is here. -Steve
Danny did nothing wrong. I intend to follow his example.
If I see people fighting over an article, I'm going to protect it and tell them to chill out.
AND I reserve the right to choose which "old version" to revert to.
AND FURTHERMORE, if I can figure out a neutral way to fix the article, I see no ethical reason not to:
* make ONE edit
* describe it on the talk page
* and report what I did to this mailing list
Ed Poor
-----Original Message-----
From: daniwo59(a)aol.com [mailto:daniwo59@aol.com]
Sent: Monday, March 31, 2003 10:36 PM
To: wikien-l(a)wikipedia.org
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] 172--what happened
Actually, Eric, I disagree.
Trolling is a form of vandalism. This could justly be interpretted as trolling. (I am reminded of the constant edit wars with Helga, which cost Wikipedia quite a lot in terms of time and people who were disgusted and left)
For me to just ask some other "neutral" sysop to do it instead of me is hardly a neutral step.
I was not involved in an edit war. It was not an article that I care too deeply about. I was protecting it from what I (continue to) perceive as trolling.
Given the situation with Lir/.Vera Cruz/Susan Mason as well as Michael/Weezer and 172, perhaps its time sysops took more steps to limit trolling and not just the "George Washington had big balls" kind of vandalism. I open that for discussion.
Danny
He has not at all headed the advice or warnings of anybody and continues to
not even attempt to accommodate other users. He has yet to answer and
follow-up on /a single/ question or plea on his talk page about his behavior.
The closest he has come has been a response to Tarquin about the the KROQ
articles. But most of the time he just blanks his talk page or says "OK",
"fine" or "whatever" and then continues to do the /same/ things he was asked
not to do. Now he just replied to another suggestion;
:Yeah, yeah, yeah. ''WHAT'' ''FUCKING'' ''EVER!'' - Michael
I'm fed-up with watching other contributions get worn-down by this
unrepentant, unreformable, anti-social behavior. Everything this user
"contributes" has to be checked for accuracy and a good deal of it is just
plain wrong. Worse, after he is informed that it is wrong he has /reinserted/
the same "information".
I have seen no improvement since Jimbo's warning and I think it is now to kick
Michael off the island (in fact, his response to Jimbo's message was to blank
his talk page). He does edit each day with a different IP but we have learned
with 142.177 that simply reverting everything he posts soon after posting it
(SoftSecurity) should do the job (an IP block would be nearly useless here
since he edits in the 64.175.xxx.xxx range)
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
WikiKarma
The usual at [[March 23]]
I am not going to justify protecting the page. Rather, I will relate my perspective as to what happened.
In the morning, there was an email to the list saying that 172 has returned and that we should be wary of his edits. Upon opening Wikipedia, I saw that he had just removed chunks of text from the Mugabe article. His edits were clearly POV. For example, the article said that he had killed political opponents, and he changed "killed" to "suppressed." I reverted that (and this was the source of my comment "Call a spade a spade.") He also removed any text that was critical of Mugabe. I restored the text, and he removed it again. This seesawing went on for quite some time, with him commenting that the text wasn't worthwhile. (The history shows this). Rather than spend another hour reverting back and forth, I protected the page and informed the list. It was immediately unprotected, and 172 began making charges of imperialism, etc. and saying that the criticisms of Mugabe were unfounded and should be removed. He also began adding text to the article, which Eric Moller pointed out was plagiarized. As the morning progressed, Eric, Jtdirl, and myself were going back and forth restoring texts that 172 decided to delete because they did not meet his POV. The whole thing went on for over four hours.
I am not justifying the original block. I simply regarded it as a way of stopping a form of vandalism--and yes, I believe that forcing POV on an article and erasing text because it does not conform to a particular POV is a form of vandalism. I also added material to counter claims that 172 made. Frankly, I don't care if they are in or not. I do, however, have a problem with taking an individual who is obviously controversial and removing all material that sheds light on the background to the controversy. I also have a problem with plagiarism, and expect more from someone who claims to have a PhD in history with a field of specialization in that field.
Danny
I can't stress enough how much I would like for a
discussion of the war in Iraq to take place somewhere
other than the mailing list. Why don't the interested
parties decide where to hold the discussion, announce
which page that is, and then continue the discussion
there?
thanks
kq
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We need to come up with a neutral, timeless name for the war
in Iraq. Forgive me for the length of this post, but I
believe it's important enough to warrant your attention.
I object to the incessant labeling of the war in Iraq as
the "invasion of Iraq". There is a lot more to the war than
the fact that 2 or 3 countries have invaded it.
Regardless of our personal feelings about how right or wrong
the conduct of any nation in the war has been, the
*articles* should:
* have neutral content
* have neutral titles
Let me lay my cards on the table, so you don't
misunderstand. My church opposes the US campaign: Bush was
wrong to attack. I agree with that POV. Many others do,
also, although perhaps not for precisely the same religious
reasons as Rev. Moon.
However, even though I'm "right" about my POV and most
Wikipedians happen to agree with me...
WE ALL AGREED TO ADHERE TO JIMBO'S NEUTRAL-POINT-OF-VIEW
POLICY
Excuse me for shouting, but several of us have been
confounding neutral-point-of-view with other things. I'm not
naming names and not engaging in prolepsis or other Roman
rhetorical tricks. I just want to fix the problem, so let's
all pitch in, please.
The war started in 2003, and it's taking place in Iraq
(which is near the Persian Gulf), so we might call it:
* the [[2003 war in Iraq]] or [[2003 Iraq War]]
* the [[2003 Gulf War]]
There are various military campaigns. I know of 4 countries
fighting against Iraq (the "allies" or "coalition"). We
should write about the war from the standpoint that there
are two sides in the war:
* Iraq
* US, UK, Australia & Poland
(I might be wrong about Australia or Poland; if so, that's
an important detail and please correct me.)
(There might be other countries which are parties to the
conflict. Maybe Iraq has a military or other ally which I
don't know about; if so, we should write about that ally!
There are up to 4 dozen countries in various degrees of
opposition to Iraq, and we've begun an article or two on
them.)
Also, I think "coalition of the willing" is a purely
political phrase: propaganda, i.e., a slogan. I don't think
it makes a good title for either of the following topics:
* the countries which oppose Iraq in the 2003 war, or
* every country which has made a statement or taken action
FOR OR AGAINST IRAQ
The latter topic, especially, would be just plain stupid to
call [[coalition of the willing]] because by design it
includes opponents.
I started dividing the [[coalition of the willing]] article
into:
* a short article about the slogan "coalition of the
willing"
* a longer article, tentatively called [[US-led coalition
against Iraq]]
But the "...coalition" article lists every nation in the
world which has ever made a statement or taken action on the
war. Roughly, there are around 2 or 3 dozen nations ranged
against Iraq (in word or deed) and maybe 5 dozen speaking up
for them or providing aid.
Shouldn't we have an article which lists the positions of
each nation of the world on this war? If so, what should we
call it? How about [[national positions on the 2003 war in
Iraq]]? Can we think of a shorter or more accurate title?
I hate to keep taking discussion off the talk pages, but
this is the only central place I know of, and talk gets
fragmented and overlooked too easily when discussing
multiple articles.
Ed Poor