Fred Bauder writes:
> Turning articles in the area of communist history over
> to the tender mercies of 172 is not a solution. It's not
> a matter of experience, although newbie POV warriors are
> pretty bad too. It is a fact, that in practice, a
> determined (and experienced) POV pusher can get their
> way just by wearing down any opposition.
> Robert, who started this thread, is another major
> offender.
Huh? How did I getinserted into this? In any case, how
can you make this statement, after I have been working so
hard to comes to turn with you of late? I especially have
been trying to find areas of argreement with you on the
Chiropractic medicine article. Why won't you take "yes"
for an answer?
I find the same odd attitude from Danny and others. They
claim that they disagree with me, and that I push my views
too much. However, if you check the Talk pages of the
articles in question (as well as the recent archives of
this very list) you will see that I constantly invite
others to add their own points of view. In fact, one can
reasonbly say that I have been begging Danny and others to
contribute to several articles, on several topics, on
precisely the points that they disagree with me on! That -
by definition - is the best sign of good faith one can have
from a Wikipedia contributor.
My problem with Fred Bauder, Danny and others is that they
demand that I add material they agree with, and they want
me to write their own POVs for them. As I have been
repeating here many times in the last month, if you have
some information that is useful for an article, by all
means please add it, in NPOV fashion.
Just stop attacking me for not writing the articles in the
way that you want to. Is this so much to ask?
Robert (RK)
__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Address AutoComplete - You start. We finish.
http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail
In a message dated 10/11/2004 8:41:03 PM Eastern Standard Time,
rkscience100(a)yahoo.com writes:
Huh? How did I getinserted into this?
Then he continues in his next paragraph with:
I find the same odd attitude from Danny and others.
I can only reiterate his comment: Huh? How did I get inserted into this?
Danny
At 05:48 AM 10/11/2004 -0700, Poor, Edmund W wrote:
>We should clearly indicate that the consensus version is just a
>MILESTONE along the path of article development. We should remind our
>readers that any article can be edited any time, and that newer versions
>of this article are likely to appear.
Ooo, I like that! Simply changing the name from "stable version" to
"milestone" conveys a whole new sense of what this special version of the
article is - not something that's fixed and unchanging, but rather
something that's been clearly identified as a good waypoint along the
article's never-ending journey towards the unattainable Perfect Version.
Terminology is important, it sets the tone of discussion and creates "first
impression" assumptions that mold how people consider the issue. I'm going
to use "milestone" from now on, unless an even better name comes along.
Rebecca rather ambivalently wrote:
> This would be one solution - and thank you very much for
> proposing one, instead of saying "I don't care if people
> leave, so nyah!"
Well, I think I hold the record for leaving Wikipedia more times than
anyone else. My longest time was 6 weeks.
When Wikipedia was smaller, and what I did or didn't do actually seemed
to have some effect *bowing modestly* I hardly dared announce my
departure, because vandalism always rocketed up immediately (!).
Or I'd get several messages imploring me to come back. Grin: the last
time I quit, only Bcorr even noticed...
But I always think of solutions, because I'm a software engineer:
solving problems is my job.
Ed Poor
Problem-causer or problem-solver? (You decide!)
With all respect to Andrew and Charles, I think they're both missing the point.
No one is disputing that there are many areas of Wikipedia that work
brilliantly, such as mathematics. Both these answers seem to be along
the lines of "well, lots of it works, so don't criticise it at all!"
The problem lies in the controversial articles. Saying "let them burn
out, and hope someone comes along to replace them" is a really, really
bad idea - both for the growth of Wikipedia (losing good contributors
who were making other contributions), and for the articles (they then
become unusably bad, without someone willing to fend off the
POVpushers).
I've suggested solutions, and so have numerous others. Attacking the
messenger doesn't make our handling of controversial articles any less
problematic.
Cheung sounds like Korean. Should I try? Or maybe we could ask that
contributor who writes about [[Korean language]] topics (I forget the
name right now).
Ed
> -----Original Message-----
> From: KNOTT, T [mailto:tknott@qcl.org.uk]
> Sent: Monday, October 11, 2004 6:38 AM
> To: English Wikipedia
> Subject: [WikiEN-l] User talk:Cheung1303
>
>
> It has just occurred to me that the reason this user keeps
> ignoring please for copyright info on the various pictures
> he's uploaded is because he doesn't understand them. He has
> contributed articles in English but his grasp of the language
> might not be good enough to understand what we require. I
> don't know what country he is posting from (perhaps someone
> with a knowledge of buses can tell?) but even if I did I
> don't know any Asian languages anyway) Can someone else give
> it a go please? He doesn't look like a vandal, I don't think
> blocking him is a good option, but unless he is willing to
> communicate with someone I don't see any other option.
>
> Theresa
>
>
Charles wrote:
> Figures: around 360 articles marked as NPOV disputed, out of
> 360,000 on Wikien. That's 0.1%.
Can we make "NPOV disputed" into a category flag? That is, don't just
expand the boilerplate text, but let someone click on the NPOV-disputed
category and automatically get an alphabetically-sorted,
automatically-generated list of disputed pages.
Ed Poor
Elian wisely wrote:
'Of course, that's an ideal. You can never completely leave your
personal
views aside. But the important [thing] is: you can try. People who
openly work
for pushing POV in an article, shouldn't be allowed to edit that article
at all. NPOV policy is not about "I insert my propaganda into an article
and let others do the tedious task of neutralizing it", it's "do your
best to write from a neutral point of view. And if you are unable to do
so, leave the article alone". And this policy should be enforced by the
community.'
This is the best description I've ever read about the problem of writing
a Wikipedia article on a contentious subject. I want to highlight the
points Elian made:
* You can never completely leave your personal views aside.
We all know this is true. Some of us even abstain from editing "certain
articles", because we KNOW that we can't write neutrally about them. The
desire to be RIGHT takes precedence over the desire to conform to
policy. I generally leave the environmental controversies alone, because
I don't have the necessary detachment: I KNOW that I'm right about
global warming. And I really WISH that I could set aside my personal
feelings, but I just have not been able to. It's puzzling, but I'd be
crazy (or at best, a highly anti-social pest!) to deny the fact that I
just can't write neutrally about global warming. Sigh.
* You can try.
I really love the Unification Church, and it's HARD for me to write
neutrally on it. Somehow, though, I've been able to step back and
appreciate the POV of critics. Maybe because my best friend is the VP
for Public Relations, or maybe because after 27 years in the church I
know it so thoroughly that I don't feel threatened by other POVs. "Oh,
they think that? Ha, ha, how silly! Here, let me explain it to them..."
Anyway, I've been able to pace myself and avoid edit wars by delaying
any reverts for days and weeks at a time.
* People who openly work for pushing POV in an article, shouldn't be
allowed to edit that article at all.
There are people who don't try. And I agree with Elian: just ban them
from that article. The software change is not too hard, and it's
something Jimbo has put his seal of approval on too. I'd like to see a
formal vote on this, if there's enough consensus to put it to a vote.
And if the arbcom bans me from editing [[urban heat island effect]], I
might be a bit disappointed but I will STILL support the idea of
per-article bans. (Of course, I'd like to think that a warning or two
would get my conscience to kick in. ;-)
* NPOV policy is not about "I insert my propaganda into an article and
let others do the tedious task of neutralizing it"
This is the key point!! Articles are not for promoting propaganda. They
are for NEUTRAL DESCRIPTIONS OF POVs. Not, 'the UN is right about this',
or 'Israel is wrong about that' -- but:
=> The UN's point of view is this, and Israel's POV is that.
It looks like a subtle difference, but it's a crucial one: endorsing a
POV vs. describing a POV.
I want to thank Elian for reminding us how hard it is to deal with
personal views. Elian is one of Wikipedia's finest writers. We disagree
diametrically on Middle East topics, but have never had a reversion war,
because Elian SETS A GOOD EXAMPLE FOR ME when it comes to NPOV writing.
I hope we can come to a community consensus on enforcing the Wikipedia's
NPOV policy.
Ed Poor
I was deliriously happy to read what Mark wrote below, because it gave
me an idea:
> the wiki method means that any random POV pusher can come in and
> mangle the article, which has happened on [[Anti-Zionism]] on
> numerous occasions. Unless a group of knowledgeable people are
> willing to waste their time baby-sitting an article, which usually
> amounts to revert-wars (since rarely are the additions even
> remotely helpful), the articles go rapidly downhill, wasting the
> effort of the people who painstakingly put together a quality
> article on a contentious subject.
>
> I'd have to say I agree with that criticism. I've wasted some
> time myself on some of these contentious subjects, only to come
> back a few months later and find an abysmally horrid article in
> its place.
I propose that we agree upon a scheme for marking a particular version
of an article as "the consensus version". And then show this by default
to new users and to search engines like Google.
We should clearly indicate that the consensus version is just a
MILESTONE along the path of article development. We should remind our
readers that any article can be edited any time, and that newer versions
of this article are likely to appear.
Indeed, we could have a colorful flag or icon letting them know
something like, "A more recent version of this article is available" or
"This article has been edited X times since the milestone was set.
Also, we should give every user the option to keep "consensus versions"
as their default, or "latest versions".
I believe that this is in keeping with the Wiki Way -- and that it
supports Jimbo's NPOV policy -- and that it will preserve the value of
hard-won compromise, give and take, and consensus formation. Yet it
poses no handicap to those who want to improve the article.
Magnus and Timwi have created software that can do this, and I'm sure
they would be able to adapt it to work whatever way we need.
Ed Poor
Bureaucrat and Developer Emeritus
Hello
With several prominent editors (Adam, Zero, and Viajero) declaring their
intention to cut back their edits, quite a few thoughts spring to mind. I want to
share them:
1. This is a great loss. In their own way, each of these people contributed
significantly to Wikipedia, and really helped improve the quality of articles,
especially in controversial areas.
2. I can understand their frustration. I myself have stopped editing most of
the articles in which my professional expertise lies quite a long time ago. It
can be annoying to argue with people who are not as invested in subject
matter as we, who have devoted a large part of our professional and personal lives
to, are.
3. In the end, no one is irreplaceable. People come and go. It is the nature
of the Internet and of life. I say this with the deepest respect to the above
contributors, and in the sincere hope that they will reconsider their
decisions in some way or another.
4. The points they raise are real, and should be addressed.
5. It is inevitable that there will be controversy over the articles they
write. There is such heated controversy over them in real life. I laud their
efforts to dive into the fray (Zero and Viajero on the Middle East question; Adam
on a broad range of topics)
6. One person's NPOV is another person's bias.
7. Many newcomers, who will shoot down the compromise materials and reopen
old wounds, are totally unaware of the hours that went into forging an
acceptable compromise.
8. Some people, unfortunately, are here for the sole purpose of pushing their
POV, whether this is known to them or not.
9. The solutions that we developed to these kinds of problems when Wikipedia
was smaller may not be effective at our current size.
10. Nevertheless, people have recognized that the problems they point to are
inherent in the system from quite a while ago.
11. Resolving these issues is vital if we are to really grow--they are
certainly questions that potential funders will ask.
12. Lots of creative suggestions have already been made. See for example,
[[Article validation]] on meta for some ideas.
All that said, I urge Adam, Zero, and Viajero to rethink their decisions. I
also ask them to contribute more actively to the discussion about validation
that is taking place on meta, so as to help us find a solution to their concerns
that is both viable and in keeping with Wikipedia's renown for openness.
Flagging peer-approved versions may be one such option, but there are certainly
others.
Until a method is reached, I urge you to continue contributing to your other
areas of expertise: Adam--Australian and ancient history; Zero--mathematics;
Viajero--opera. At the same time, I also urge you to participate in more
intense discussion of validation options, reform of arbitration procedures, and
creative handling of rogue users. These should help to reduce the issues you
raise.
I am posting this to Foundation as well, because I think that many of the
issues you raise apply to other projects, and not just English.
Danny