Daniel Mayer wrote:
> Sadly it now seems that Jimbo's declarative and unmitigated comments have
> resulted in Danny leaving the project. Jimbo should realize the great weight
> his comments have and mix criticism with some sort of mitigating/less sharp
> comments.
>
> I don't think that Danny's absence serves the big picture goal of having NPOV
> over many Middle-east subjects.
>
> I am very sad to see him leave.
That is true. Danny was a valuable contributor who made a large number
of excellent contributions. Unfortunately I can't say the same about
RK. Danny deserved better treatment than this. A sad day for
Wikipedia.
Mirko.
> Diagrams instead of photos would probably be better.
I would favour diagrams, not for reasons of prudishness (for christ's sake,
nearly everyone has one or the other) but because they have the advantage of
not having any skin colour or ethnicity. It seems a little odd that all of
the body parts we have photos of, to my knowledge, are photos of white
people (except the 'eyes' article).
Matt
> However, wiki-markup has no convenient way of representing footnotes and
> citations.
Not only wiki markup: Footnotes aren't easy to display and to use with html
pages and computer screens. PSs aren't useful anymore in e-mails, as one can
edit inside the text (what wasn't possible in hand written letters). I guess
that footnotes go the same way: they aren't useful anymore, as additional
info can be added inside the text itself or simply linked on.
If I do recall well, inline external links are bad because their targets can
change after a while and become obsolete. In a perfect world, citations
wouldn't point on, say, a newspaper article, but on a cached copy, or on
some archiving (and trusted) web-site, and not only carry an URI, but a
date. On wiki editor pov, this could be done simply by coding like this:
As Untel said in LA Time, "bla bla bla" [[Citation:http://blabla.bla]]
After edit, the thing could become [[Citation
11/1/2004:http://blabla.bla]], will simply display as [1], and would be a
link on whether the cached page or the original one (maybe depending on
whatever the original page has been modified or not). I don't know if
wikipedia could handle the caching of those pages, but I suppose this to be
legal, as google already does.
(Only a little idea poping in my head)
dpbsmith(a)verizon.net writes:
> I would really like to see more use of attributions,
> references, citations within Wikipedia. Traditional
> encyclopedias don't do very much of this, but I think
> this is a serious weakness on their part. The
> traditional encyclopedia simply speaks _ex cathedra_,
> and the only reason you have for believing it is
> that "they wouldn't print it if it weren't true."
> ...
> I remember being shocked in high school when I learned
> for the first time that an encyclopedia could not be
> referenced in a scholarly article because it didn't meet
> scholarly standards for attribution.
I agree; this is why I usually try to cite sources,
articles, interviews, etc. This fits in well with our NPOV
policy. Person X says Y about subject Z.
See, for example, our article on [[The Bible and history]],
which has a fairly extensive bibliography. More Wikipedia
articles need to refer readers to primary sources.
> I don't know why print encyclopedias don't choose to
> reference their sources. Presumably it's limited space,
> and/or a desire not to clutter up the article with
footnotes.
I am sure that this is precisely the problem they faced.
However, Wikipedia has no limitations on text; we have room
to document every important point in every article. We don
not even need to clutter up the main article to do so; if
footnotes or references ever get too long, we can add them
as a footnotes page, such as (proposed):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_footnotes
or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History (footnotes)
or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History/footnotes
Robert (RK)
__________________________________
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ja, yah, yeah, yea, hear ye! The following is a quote from another subscriber:
"He who shouts the loudest wins on Wikipedia. This is the reason that
it has not evolved into real storehouse of knowledge. It is more like
USENET groups but in a more academic tone. In other words, it is full
of urban legends and anyone who relies on it for facts is walking a
dangerous path."
Susan Allen
PS I am really disappointed in this poor encyclopedic attempt.... it
is so terribly lame!
--
Susan Allen, Associate Dean
Instructor of Harp & Improvisation
School of Music
California Institute of the Arts
24700 McBean Parkway
Valencia, CA 91355
phone (661) 222-2780
fax (661) 255-0938
Founding Director, Susan Allen's Summer Harp Course, Inc.
and from Paris to the Pyrénées: the Harp and Art in France & Spain
email: susie(a)shoko.calarts.edu
websites: http://shoko.calarts.edu/~susie
and http://www.summerharpcourse.com
The essence of censorship, and of social thought control, is the suppression
of alternative points of view to the point where the average member of
society literally does not know that the point of view exists. Orwell,
insanity is a minority of one. The goal is to get people with doubts or
tendencies to inquiry to believe "I am _the only person in the world_ who
believes this."
This sort of censorship can exist even when more than one point of view is
represented. For example, in the United States, there is a tendency by the
mainstream media to give the impression that everyone is _either_ a
Republican or a Democrat. (I often think it comical, fa lal lal, fa lal lal,
that every boy and every gal who's born into this world alive is either a
little Liberal or else a little Conservative...) Or, that everyone is either
a Catholic, a Protestant, or a Jew.
The strength of this sort of thought suppression is almost entirely sapped
when even the slightest hint of the existence of the suppressed point of view
slips through. Many of us have felt the intense liberating effect of the
discovery that we are _not_ the only [agnostics, Democrats, people who can't
abide twelve-tone music, whatever] in the world
The important thing is that the points of view be presented. And, that they
be labelled and attributed so that the reader has an opportunity to judge
their credibility.
Whether the presentation is balanced is _far_ less important. The reader can
see and judge the balance for himself. If the article gives great weight to
one set of views and little weight to another, that will be obvious to the
reader, who will be able to sense the author's point of view. That's OK. It's
not important that the author's point of view not leak through (and it's
impossible to prevent). What's important is that the other points of view be
present. _Even if_ they are given short shrift, or accurately or inaccurately
presented as less authoritative. "You'll believe this, and no authority
supports it, but there IS this kook named Copernicus who thinks the Earth
isn't the center of the universe" is more than enough to open the mind and
trigger the "Wow! is that _possible_?" response.
An article that truly presents a single point of view ex cathedra is bad.
But I think even a sentence or two labelling it "this is the XYZ point of
view put forth by ABC. QQXXZZ, however, counters (one sentence summary)"
"neutralizes" it almost completely. Later, if someone wants to write a longer
section dealing with the QQXXZZ viewpoint, they can.
That's my point of view, anyway.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slogan_%27The_science_is_settled%27
I may have left some things out, or made some mistakes, but at least
until shown otherwise, I think this type of edit is a model of what we
ought to strive to do, i.e. find a way to characterize an issue in a
way that both sides to a dispute can agree to, and refrain to the
maximal extent possible from writing things that we know will only
inflame passions on the other side.
--Jimbo
From: Jimmy Wales wrote:
>VfD is completely broken. I say that here for emphasis because I
>think we really should get rid of it entirely.
So do I. The very idea of deleting people's work, that they have freely
given, is insulting, off-putting to newbies, and non-collaborative. I
suggest that we delete VfD and use cleanup instead.
Theresa
> Have you looked at the crap that's been deleted lately? Much of it
> *was* on Cleanup first, sometimes for over a month, and most of the rest
> either doesn't belong here, or is such terrible nonsense as to be
> useless as a savageable starting point for a future article.
>
> A sampling:
> [[JumpTheCroc]], an idiosyncratic term coined on Wikipedia
> [[Mac OS XI]], a made-up mac rumor that even the mac-rumor sites don't carry
> [[The mo]], an animal invented by the submitter with a somewhat amusing
> backstory
> [[Soylent Greens]], a fictitious political party invented by the
> submitter
Look at [[List of nicknames for George W. Bush]] that article was also
deleted. :-(
> So I disagree; I think VfD is working perfectly fine. Do those who
> think otherwise actually read and participate in it (The Cunctator
> excepted, because I know he does)?
Some chose to work inside the system others outside it.
BL
> In an NPOV encyclopedia, we do not take sides with one
> group or another. Rather, we show the range of positions
> that exist, we document these positions with quotes and
> sources, and allow readers to make up their own minds.
Which is the problem when it comes to facts. If flat-earth theory
is given the same legitimacy as what science accepts the shape of
the earth to be, Wikipedia loses its credibility.
Wikipedia is full of conspiracy theories and claims which science
would consider to be rubbish.
He who shouts the loudest wins on Wikipedia. This is the reason that
it has not evolved into real storehouse of knowledge. It is more like
USENET groups but in a more academic tone. In other words, it is full
of urban legends and anyone who relies on it for facts is walking a
dangerous path.
It is several weeks since Ed Poor and Angela tried mediating on
at least one issue (their mind was made up already but they were
pretending to mediate), but when I confronted them with FACTS and
EVIDENCE, they quietly withdrew from the mediation. This is a
clear case of dishonesty, but never mind.
The point is that Wikipedia is full of errors (even in areas where
I wasn't involved in any confrontation) and the reason is that it
allows those with the loudest voice to win.
How about new words - Wikipolice and Wikicop? A Wikicop is one who
solves problems by judging someone a winner in a shouting match.
-libertarian
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