WikiEN-l March 2007

wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org

181 participants
397 discussions

Re: [WikiEN-l] Accountability: bringing back a proposal I made nearly 2 years ago
by charles.r.matthews＠ntlworld.com 06 Mar '07

06 Mar '07

Bryan Derksen > I probably won't bother to get verified myself. I'm satisfied that my > edits stand on their own merits and they mostly aren't related to my > degrees anyway. I pretty much agree. I think it is defensible, as part of our general approach, to continue to 'assume good faith' about people. That isn't naivety so much as an 'honor system'. Exceptions for positions of trust, yes; but not just to be an editor in good standing. Charles ----------------------------------------- Email sent from www.virginmedia.com/email Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software and scanned for spam

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Essjay RFC deleted
by charles.r.matthews＠ntlworld.com 06 Mar '07

06 Mar '07

"George Herbert" wrote > What's ended up happening is, perhaps both typically and tragically, > Wikipedia standard controversy reaction - it's up, it's down, it's > back up, it's moved, it's moved again, it's speedy deleted then > restored then deleted and up for DR and sideways with sugar on top and > can I please have a little more, sir? >From Raul's Laws (at [[User:Raul654/Raul's laws]], though if you all don't know that, I really don't know where you've been): Rob Church's first law: There is no smoke without fire. There is no cry of unilateralism without an action rooted in common sense. Charles ----------------------------------------- Email sent from www.virginmedia.com/email Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software and scanned for spam

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Conservapedia
by charles.r.matthews＠ntlworld.com 06 Mar '07

06 Mar '07

"Steve Bennett" wrote >Or does it imply that > a conservative stance is actually a neutral one, and therefore that > Wikipedia is biased simply because it does not adopt that same > conservative point of view? There is this basic point: the NPOV concept is more subtle than the concept of 'bias', as is freely thrown around in analysis of media. In fact 'bias' is a really bad concept to use for WP; it in practice application often amounts to people reading down the article to the first thing they object to, and trying to get it edited out. Charles ----------------------------------------- Email sent from www.virginmedia.com/email Virus-checked using McAfee(R) Software and scanned for spam

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Is editing for payment a fundamentally problematic conflict of interest?
by Jaap Vermeulen 06 Mar '07

06 Mar '07

I posted the following here - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Conflict_of_interest#Editing_fo…: "I have recently been approached by an organisation to improve articles related to the organisation in question (not create new ones). I would receive money for doing so. I am an administrator and am aware of the policies and guidelines that govern Wikipedia. The organisation understands that it is not acceptable to whitewash any articles and that criticism should be included in the article. For them it is a matter of improving the quality of the articles, not to whitewash them. Is this acceptable? Should I decide to go ahead with this I would do so in full disclosure, since I believe doing so without the community being aware would not be ethical, especially since as an admin the community has placed trust in me that I would not want to abuse." I'd appreciate further feedback, since I'm not sure how I should proceed here. Jaap Vermeulen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jacoplane

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Study finds that Wikipedia has evolved from an oligarchy to a ...
by Bartning＠aol.com 06 Mar '07

06 Mar '07

My two cents: Actually, Plato thought democracy was a step below oligarchy in _The Republic_, one step above anarchy. Remember, his good friend Socrates, the main character in the book, was killed by a true democracy. He argues, as does Madison in the _Federalist Papers_, that pure democracy has very serious flaws. It should be "devolved" to democracy, though democracy also provides freedom and has its place, and we should remember Plato's republic also had "philosopher kings." Vincent Bartning User: John Wallace Rich ************************************** AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at http://www.aol.com.

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Re: [WikiEN-l] a final word on Essjay
by SonOfYoungwood＠aol.com 05 Mar '07

05 Mar '07

I find it sickening that he lost his job at Wikia over this issue. | Tyler | Zorin Deckiller | | Wikipedia Administrator | Former SWU member | | _http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Deckiller_ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Deckiller) | | _http://www.myspace.com/redsectora_ (http://www.myspace.com/redsectora) | ************************************** AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at http://www.aol.com.

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AFDs on featured articles
by Ron Ritzman 05 Mar '07

05 Mar '07

[[Memory_alpha]], which is a previous featured article, is up for deletion. Putting the question of wp:snow and wp:point aside I was wondering. Has a featured article ever been deleted? The only way I can see it happening is if the article is later revealed to be a hoax or a copyvio.

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Larry Sanger weighs in on the Essjay incident
by Keith Old 05 Mar '07

05 Mar '07

Folks, Larry Sanger has weighed in on this on the Citizendium blog. http://blog.citizendium.org/2007/03/01/wikipedia-firmly-supports-your-right… "Now this is very sad. As Slashdot reports <http://slashdot.org/articles/07/03/01/1313251.shtml>, someone calling himself "Essjay" was interviewed for last year's *New Yorker * article about Wikipedia. At the time, he gave *The New Yorker* the same story he gave to the Wikipedia community: he was a tenured professor of theology with some very impressive degrees. Recently he revealed that he had been using a fake identity, and *The New Yorker* apologized to its readers <http://www.newyorker.com/printables/fact/060731fa_fact> (see the bottom of the article, "Editors' Note") for having reporting his lies as fact. It turns out that, far from being an overeducated religious thinker, he is (if we believe his latest story–skepticism is obviously warranted) 24 years old and degreeless, a kid named Ryan Jordan. He also apparently thinks his lie was pretty clever, as well as quite morally justified, as edits on his user page show. Now, this is pathetic, and yet more evidence of the broad moral decline of Western civilization and all that is holy, but in itself is no big deal. No doubt Wikipedia's ranks are chock full of people who have misrepresented themselves. That's not big news, if you know much about Wikipedia. No, the fascinating and tragic thing is Jimmy Wales' reaction. *The New Yorker* reported that he said: "I regard it as a pseudonym and I don't really have a problem with it."" There is much more where that came from. Sanger probably sees it as a fillip for Citizendium which was starting to look like the encyclopedia equivalent of *Chinese Democracy.* *http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_Democracy* Regards to all, *Keith Old* ** ** Jimmy, say it ain't so.

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As if AOL wasn't annoying enough before...
by Daniel R. Tobias 05 Mar '07

05 Mar '07

On 4 Mar 2007 at 11:45, Bartning(a){gag,vomit,retch}aol.com wrote (or, rather, AOL (bleccch) appended): > ************************************** AOL now offers free > email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at > http://www.aol.com. As if AOL wasn't already a hive of scum and villainy, now they're inflicting the above stupid ad footer on all sorts of mailing lists, complete with idiotic HTML tags even in the plain text version (which is what ends up showing up on text-only lists and digest versions). -- == Dan == Dan's Mail Format Site: http://mailformat.dan.info/ Dan's Web Tips: http://webtips.dan.info/ Dan's Domain Site: http://domains.dan.info/

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Re: [WikiEN-l] Is editing for payment a fundamentally problematic conflict of...
by Bartning＠aol.com 05 Mar '07

05 Mar '07

In a message dated 3/4/2007 12:30:11 A.M. Pacific Standard Time, jaap.vermeulen(a)gmail.com writes: I'd appreciate further feedback, since I'm not sure how I should proceed here. Jaap Vermeulen I brought up Wikipedia on a nonprofit org list. It was after I was unfairly blocked, and I get a lot of awkward and/or inappropriate arguments from those in power at Wikipedia, but I also get ignored and see them elsewhere - or something like them. However, the subject came up regarding how corporations pay and even involve their legal teams on Wikipedia articles. I do want to say that it's questionable to have good faith when you see a lot of stuff wrong, including using good faith like a religion. However, from what I see, at least you have ethics as an editor (and administrator no less). I think Wikipedia needs more checks on admins, and there's a lot of unfairness in the process right now. Vincent Bartning UN: John Wallace Rich ************************************** AOL now offers free email to everyone. Find out more about what's free from AOL at http://www.aol.com.

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WikiEN-l March 2007