In a message dated 6/16/2003 8:48:31 PM Eastern Standard Time,
zoecomnena(a)yahoo.com writes:
> --- koyaanis qatsi <obchodnakorze(a)yahoo.com> wrote:
> >Two points: one purely logical, the other political.
> >
> >1) the logical:
> >
> >Our goal is, and let me reiterate this for those of
> >you who have forgotten, to make a complete, factual,
> >NPOV encyclopedia. The only viable, though tedious
> >and laborious, option in implementing filters on
> >wikipedia would be to cite who believes what about
> >which article--e.g. "George W. Bush believes this
> >article was written by an anti-capitalist scumbag."
> >"Osama bin Laden says Allah will strike down the
> >infidel who gave voice to these words." "Robert
> >Mapplethorpe says this article is less explicit than
> >the dreams he had when he was 12." Otherwise, when
> >we
> >decide what is "explicit" or "controversial," we
> >will
> >be labeling the articles with a POV. It may be a
> >common POV, or an uncommon POV, but it will be a
> >POV.
> >It will, furthermore, be the "official" wikipedia
> >POV.
> > Wikipedia is not supposed to voice a POV. Voicing
> >a
> >POV = bad. Contrary to mission. Not voicing a POV
> >=
> >good. In keeping with mission.
> >
> >Wikipedia is not your mother, or your thoughtful
> >well-intentioned son. It is an encyclopedia. In
> >keeping with the general purpose of encyclopedias,
> >it
> >presents information. Some of you will not like
> >information. Those of you who do not like
> >information
> >will be at the wrong site. Don't complain to
> >Firestone because they sell tires and not pizza.
> >
> >2) the political:
> >
> >And, since you've brought the children into it when
> >they're not relevant, let me bring *you* into it
> >when
> >you are: There are people throughout the world
> >dying
> >of starvation, some of them so desperate for food
> >that
> >they look through feces for undigested kernels of
> >corn. Already I hear you saying "Whoa! Hey! the
> >details of your miserable life are too 'explicit'
> >for
> >me and my 200-pound 8 year-old son, driving down the
> >street in an SUV eating a McRibs Deluxe." I say to
> >you, you are the posterchilds for miseducation, for
> >fear, for censorship and everything wikipedia
> >doesn't
> >stand for: you've so come to love the weight of
> >your
> >own ignorance, that yoke on your shoulders, that you
> >miss its caress when it's gone. Go in peace, but
> >please do go.
> >
> >kq
>
Thanks, KQ. Well said!
By conseding to him what I don't believe, I've gotten
on Joe Canuck's good side. I think it'll only be a
little bit longer until I can get him to stop
uploading pictures, since that seems to be the
ultimate root of all of the problems with him. As long
as we don't talk to him much, he can be a great
contributer.
--LDan
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
Hi Steve -
Funny you should mention the Bill and Monica thing. First, I'd like to
point out that I'm not in favor of any tags or wiki-imposed filtering.
Just looked at the article in question and, although I'd phrase some of
it differently (since part of the moral outrage of the vast right-wing
conspirators was based on the fact that he'd committed adultery), it's
nothing one couldn't find in the mainstream news media. On the other
hand, if tags *were* to be employed, I suppose one might flag the oral
sex article accessible from the Monica page. And I'm iffy on the sexual
intercourse page, because it gives a bit more detail than your average
reader might be expecting - e.g., I might be fine with my 8-year-old (no
longer exists) to look up sexual intercourse, but I wouldn't be
comfortable with her knowing details of how it's done until she's a bit
older - unless she asks. The reality is, most kids that age don't ask
till they hear or read about it, and then don't quite get the attraction
and say, "eeew, gross." But sometimes the images can disturb them. And
I am personally not comfortable that we link to a site with "graphic
explicit animations." However, that's me. And that's why I like a
clear disclaimer, rather than trying to tag things for filtering. The
value of the preponderance of the information found on the pedia far
outweighs the "objectionable" stuff. That's why I don't think tags for
filtering are really feasible.
JHK
>I'm sure the rest of what you had to say, Julie, was
>relevant and important and interesting and I probably
>agreed with it. But you really don't know jack about Ayn
>Rand, so best not to say such nonsense about her in
>public. It's unscholarly at best, to issue snippy
>proclamations on a subject about which you apparently
>know nothing.
>
>--Jimbo
Whoa Jimmy - that wasn't exactly following the principle of WikiLove (or did
you just forget to place in a bunch of smilies? ;). At the very least I don't
think it was too appropriate for a public list. JHK deserves much more
respect than that - even if she was way off base with Ayn Rand.
Again avoiding the "f-word" (filtering) and using the "s-word" (sorting)
should help tone down the rhetoric on both sides since sorting is far more
general and /is/ something we need to do before RC becomes useless.
KQs last post on this got me thinking again that this will be very difficult
since a tag is an on/off thing that /cannot/ be NPOVd like article text
can....
I guess our only recourse is to tag things based on what they are instead of
the type of emotions they may evoke in certain people. So "objectionable,"
"explicit content," PG-13" would /not/ be a valid categories. But "sexual
practice," or maybe even "obscure sexual practice" (for felching, golden
showers, fisting etc) would.
There still will be a great deal of conflict over this; would oral or anal sex
get the tag of "obscure sexual practice"? Perhaps another tag in between
"sexual practice" and "obscure sexual practice" would be needed to give
parents the ability to sort out oral and anal sex if they so choose (but I
wouldn't tag these as "obscure"). But that is just my POV which is based on
my culture - thus the main problem KQ is talking about.
And there should /not/ be any sorting by default. Let each logged-in user
should set their own preferences.
Sorting IMO is going to be absolutely essential in the future to prevent
information overload for searches and for special pages like RC. But the
devil comes out in the details when we deal with controversial subjects - or
even conflicts between lumpers and dividers.
Peace be with you. :)
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
I've got a pileup of work to get through on other projects, so I'm going
to take a week off from Wikipedia. (If I can -- wikipediholism runs strong
in my veins! ;)
If anyone really really needs to contact me for some technical emergency,
mail or IM me directly, as I won't be watching the wikis or the mailing
lists.
(If I finish up other things sooner than I think maybe I'll have time to
finish that conversion script for the old wikis, but don't bet on it.)
Don't go censoring everything and locking it all down to sysops while I'm
away, now. ;)
I'll return around June 23.
-- brion vibber (brion @ pobox.com)
>....
>Someone at TiVo might have argued thusly: "People should
>watch a variety of shows, and not be such prudes, or such
>anti-capitalists, or such anti-religionists. They should keep
>all channels accessible at all times. So we must not build into
>the system any tools to allow people to "filter". If they want
>filters, they can build their own device for doing it. But we
>aren't going to help."
>
>That'd be silly. And it's just as silly for us to not flag content
>with some meta-data, even if we think people are silly
>(and I don't) for using it.
>
>--Jimbo
For the sake of having a sane discussion can we avoid the use of the "f-word"
please? "Filtering" has a bad name and is almost always something that is
done to "protect" impressionable eyes by excluding only certain types of
material (and often blocks legit things such as websites on brest cancer and
safe sex). I for one get a bad taste in my mouth each time I hear the word.
"Sorting", however, is a database thing and doesn't have the negative
connotations of the "f-word." I would like to sort Wikipedia based on a wide
range of categories and have a Recent Changes that only displayed certain
article categories and had the option to explicity not show others. This is
needed anyway to prevent information overload.
The default should always be to show /everything/ though - it is not our place
to make a value judgment on what a user would include or exclude in their
*own* preferences. It should be up to them, not us, to make choices that suit
their own likes and dislikes.
But disabling links in articles based on category sorting preferences may be
too much of a strain on the database so there may be technical reasons
limiting just how far we can go with this - at least in the near term before
donation and grant money starts to flow-in from the Wikimedia Foundation
(hint, hint on getting this set-up ;). Which is fine by me because I want to
do this in a slow managed and thoughtful fashion if we are going to do it at
all.
-- Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
>on the isue of Joe Canuck possibly being DW, Daniel Ehrenberg wrote, I'll
>go talk to him.
To Dan's message, which read
Hi, Joe. I've realised that you seem to be threatening people with lawsuits
at least twice, and I wonder why you're doing it. While I understand you're
a lawyer, I don't think you'll get very far on Wikipedia threatening
people. Since you're threatening them, some people think you're an other
user who has since been banned from Wikipedia, named DW, but I know that's
not true. But if you lighten up on the threats, I think they will stop with
these false accusations. LittleDan 18:39 16 Jun 2003 (UTC)
Joe Canuck replied
Re your comment: I never have, and never do, under any circumstances, make
threats to anybody. Please retract your false accusation. Nor have I ever
said I am a lawyer, sanitation worker, truck driver, horse manure hauler, or
any other occupation. In fact, I go about my business making worthwhile,
detailed, accurate, valuable and needed contributions to Wikipedia, in my
humble opinion. But, if my work is not EXACTLY what Wikipedia is all about
(and there are those who play without really contributing anything here),
then please advise and I will leave immediately. Note, I never bother
anybody, ever. I only respond when I am targeted for discriminatory action.
Are you suggesting that discrimination is an acceptable policy at Wikipedia
and that anyone being discriminated against should shut up? Joe Canuck
18:54 16 Jun 2003 (UTC)
DW is on many ways an excellent contributor. It is a pity that his response
to users is bullying threatening language. We all on occasion use strong
language in edit wars, etc (I know I have done so) but DW in the past and
Joe Canuck in the present seems to write nothing but accusations, ''how dare
you?'' comments, and bullying hints at recourse to law, etc. I think Jimbo
should have a word with him. No matter how polite someone is in talking to
him, his response is to verbally abuse them. Such contact should take place
straight away. The more articles he contributes, the more likely people are
to contact him about things and the more likely he is to spew bile back at
them. This needs to be stopped at the very start before it becomes a major
problem and drives away good users. That is particularly so when one
considers that there are users on wiki who are quite young or are retired
people who are doing their best to contribute in a non-aggressive manner and
risk getting verbal bollockings from Canuck and being intimidated by him if
they simply ask him a question.
JT
_________________________________________________________________
Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*.
http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail
Hi, I'd like to ask a developer to open up a spot on
Wikipedia to start developing Wiki textbooks. I have a
physics book that is part written and bits of an organic
textbook that I started on Wikipedia before it was deleted
("Wikipedia is not the place for textbooks"). Maveric149
suggested I write to the developers asking for a blank spot
to be opened at http://textbook.wikipedia.org until a
permanant name for the planned Wiki textbook site could be
arranged.
I would be honored and grateful if you could fulfill my
request. Thanks!
Karl Wick (User name:Karlwick)
>When I came accross Wikipedia I thought that its
underlying software and concept would be great for putting
my physics book on the web. If other people have a similar
idea I'd rather be part of the larger effort. Maybe my
organizational or "visionary" ideas are not of use to you
right now but if you can help me have a place to start
getting stuff on the web, I'll do it, and it wont be bad
stuff. (I dont have much IT background so it would probably
take me a real long time to figure out how to do all of the
technical part anyway). BTW I think that hypertext
textbooks will eventually be even better learning tools
than the traditional ones ... and am eager to start proving
it. ---Karlwick
>If you are eager to get to work then ask a developer via
the mailing list to set-up http://textbook.wikipedia.org
with a blank Wiki. We can use what you have already to work
out organizational issues and hopefully in time we can
think of a snappy name that will help draw-in contributors.
The worst thing that would happen is that nobody will be
very interested in the idea and that wiki will be a lonely
place (like our Sep11wiki). --Maveric149
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com