Just when I thought the English Wikipedia had enough noticeboards, I
happened to see this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard
I have to say I'm not optimistic about it. Looks like it could turn
into the recruiting point for every content dispute slash witch hunt
of the week.
I don't think it's very ethical, and definitely not in the project's
interests to invite others to jump into edit wars involving events
they know next to nothing about, particularly if it's something they
had never heard of until ten minutes before they reverted back to some
government's official explanation of it.
I'm not saying that doesn't happen already, but I doubt making it
"part of the job" as an official wiki-process is going to help
matters. Surely there are editors in good standing (and maybe even
some admins) who really don't care who shot JFK or what happened that
night in 1947. Just like there will be others like myself who, as
readers, would prefer to learn about all the viewpoints and draw their
own conclusions.
We should respect that, rather than pointing the "closet conspiracy
theorist" finger around, if this is actually going to work.
The question should not be "lol, you mean you actually believe
_____?", but more like "Is there a compelling reason not to
acknowledge that many people do believe _____?".
Last warning though, if I see something like "How do you feel about
WP:FRINGE theories, and will you <s>help patrol the following
articles</s> assist us at WP:FTN if we support your RFA?" become a one
of the 20 non-standard standard questions I will seriously cut myself.
—C.W.
I wish I could agree with Jimbo's summary of this unfortunate account, but
he is wrong on one vital topic: It took several days for an explanation to
be provided, & only after the matter was raised at WP:AN/I. According to
the page history, the article was protected 18 June 17:33, then blanked
sixteen minutes later. No explanation appeared until 21 June at 02:28 when
a thread had been running for a few hours. Admittedly, based on the
datestamp of a question left on the talk page, apparently no one noticed
this action until a few hours before the WP:AN/I thread started, but I
would have expected a notice on the Talk page shortly after the action had
been taken.
I still don't understand the reasoning that justified blanking the page as
"the best solution". Wikipedia has a number of articles on subjects with
trademarked names -- I assume that names like "Ford Mustang", "Microsoft
Windows", "Spam", etc. are tradmarked & the ownership rights adequately
protected. If Wikipedia received a letter from a corporate lawyer at Ford
Motors about the Mustang article & their trademark, would the appropriate
action in that case be to blank *that* article?
And maybe it's because I happen to have a couple of lawyers in my family,
I don't find them all that scary. This email (who serves legal notices by
email, except shady lawyers on the payroll of criminal organizations?)
should have been replied to with a request that he deliver in hard copy
proof of the ownership of the trademark & proof that ownership of this
trademark has been adequately protected. Only after that had been
delivered would I have considered blanking the page. And maybe not even
then.
The point is that this entire incident made Wikipedia look foolish. We
didn't need anyone's help to do that -- be they a scurrilous website or a
news organization known for its quality around the world.
Geoff
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Guy Chapman aka JzG [mailto:guy.chapman@spamcop.net]
>Sent: Sunday, July 8, 2007 05:26 AM
>To: 'English Wikipedia'
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] FredBauder"clarifies"onattackkk site link policy
>
>On Thu, 5 Jul 2007 22:30:08 +0100, "James Farrar"
><james.farrar(a)gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>The active remedy from MONGO applies only to ED, not to WR or any
>>other site that someone decides is an "attack site".
>
>Wikilawyering, I'm afraid. The active remedy is based on the
>following principles:
>
>
>Links to attack site
>3) Links to attack sites may be removed by any user; such removals are
>exempt from 3RR. Deliberately linking to an attack site may be grounds
>for blocking.
>
>Support of harassment
>7) Users who link to webpages which attack or harass other users or to
>sites which regularly engage in such activity are responsible for
>their actions Wikipedia:No_personal_attacks#Off-wiki_personal_attacks.
>
>Outing sites as attack sites
>11) A website that engages in the practice of publishing private
>information concerning the identities of Wikipedia participants will
>be regarded as an attack site whose pages should not be linked to from
>Wikipedia pages under any circumstances.
>
>
>
>Tell me how WR does not fit these criteria.
>
>Guy (JzG)
>From time to time they discuss issues in a more or less sane way.
Fred
Dear wiki community member,
This message comes to you from fellow travelers who want to advance open
source creativity. Our particular focus is moving the current OS online
focus from a strictly textual one to a richer multimedia, full motion video-
and-audio experience. As a first step toward that end, we have set up a wiki
about wikis...a wiki wiki, if you will.
At http://globalvision.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page, our goal is work with you
to gather information
on all things wiki, and then to make an open source documentary a
'wikimentary' about the overall wiki phenomenon. As you know, novel uses
of the wiki are appearing almost everyday, in areas as disparate as
politics, humor, medicine and banking... We've already begun assembling
information and links about as many applications as we can find -- but we
need your help to know more. So PLEASE share your wiki experiences with us
at globalvision.wikia.com to and let us know what you know. (You might also
consider shooting and posting some video of your own!)
We want to hear from as many of you as possible to help us determine what
routes we should take, both creatively and logistically. So any advice,
contacts, links or suggestions you may contribute will be greatly
appreciated.
If you wish to be personally subscribed (your individual email address
instead of this mailing list) to more emails featuring updates on the
Wikimentary (via your individual email address instead of this list), please
respond directly to arosner(a)globalvision.org. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Rory O'Connor and Ariel Rosner
PS Keep an eye out for the our rough cut 'video stub' at Wikimania 2007!
On Tue, 10 Jul 2007 08:19:39 -0700 (PDT), Ken Arromdee
<arromdee(a)rahul.net> wrote:
>Non-reliable sources get linked in talk pages all the time. We
>don't delete them.
Unless they violate copyright, or privacy, or contain transparent
bigotry, or any one of a dozen other good reasons. Talk pages exist to
serve the encyclopaedia, after all.
Guy (JzG)
+++++++++++++
Guy, could you cite a guideline or policy, on Wikipedia, that supports this
claim?
I believe that Wikia.com has numerous copyright violations throughout many
of its fan sites, yet thousands of links to that domain are supported within
Wikipedia.
Greg
--
Gregory Kohs
Cell: 302.463.1354
On 10 Jul 2007 at 10:50:55 +0100, Guy Chapman aka JzG
<guy.chapman(a)spamcop.net> wrote:
> If people don't want MONGO to snap at them they might consider not
> baiting him. The ED trolls (of whom there have been several) are not
> gentle cuddly fluffy types. Neither are the conspiracy POV-pushers.
I think that one can say with similar validity that if MONGO wants
people to stop attacking and trolling him, maybe he and his friends
should stop the acts of incivility that bring on such attacks, and
the feeding of the trolls that eggs them on to continue it? It takes
two to tango.
--
== 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/
On 10 Jul 2007 at 9:38, "Fred Bauder" <fredbaud(a)waterwiki.info>
wrote:
> Bottom line, our main responsibility in this area is to support
> our productive users and administrators by taking reasonable steps
> to protect them from harassment either on the wiki or by external
> attack sites.
Except, of course, when it is the admins and other favored clique
members doing the harrassment, as seen for instance when anybody
dares to criticize MONGO (as in the recent attempt at an RfC that
spawned an AN/I thread), and gets piled on by admins who ignore the
substance of their complaint and instead ridicule the complainer, and
anybody else who supports their side, in a style reminiscent of a
gang of schoolyard bullies.
--
== 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/
On 10 Jul 2007 at 00:59:34 +0100, "Andrew Gray" <shimgray(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
> The one that always amazes me is how many legal firms think it's
> helpful to send a raw .doc or .pdf file without even putting a
> sentence in the email to say what it's about... very irritating by the
> tenth time around.
Given that I've been getting a whole rash of spam lately that
consists of unexplained PDF attachments (something that seems to get
right through Bayesian spam filters because there are no plaintext
keywords to filter on), any such things are likely to be trashed
unopened by me.
--
== 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/
>-----Original Message-----
>From: James Farrar [mailto:james.farrar@gmail.com]
>Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 09:25 AM
>To: 'English Wikipedia'
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] FredBauder"clarifies"onattack site link policy
>
>On 10/07/07, Fred Bauder <fredbaud(a)waterwiki.info> wrote:
>>
>>
>> >-----Original Message-----
>> >From: Ken Arromdee [mailto:arromdee@rahul.net]
>> >Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 09:19 AM
>> >To: 'English Wikipedia'
>> >Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Fred Bauder"clarifies"on attack site link policy
>> >
>> >On Mon, 9 Jul 2007, John Lee wrote:
>> >> > >If WR links were only deleted for not being reliable sources, we wouldn't
>> >> > >be *having* this fuss. Most of the questionable deletions of WR and
>> >> > similar
>> >> > >links are under circumstances where reliable sources are irrelevant--talk
>> >> > >pages, Wikipedia signpost, etc.
>> >> > Why post a link to a site which engages in harassment and outing, if
>> >> > it's not even a reliable source? In what way is that not dickish?
>> >> Because different people have different interpretations of the phrase
>> >> "reliable source". It is not dickery to disagree on what constitutes a
>> >> reliable source; it is a content dispute. How the dispute is resolved, of
>> >> course, may result in dickery from one or both sides.
>> >
>> >In this case, a better answer is "because reliable sources don't always
>> >matter". Non-reliable sources get linked in talk pages all the time. We
>> >don't delete them.
>>
>> True, but most unreliable sources do not also contain material which abuses our editors and administrators. Protecting productive editors and administrators from harassment both on and off the wiki takes priority over keeping links to attack sites active.
>
>How much time has been wasted by so-called "productive" editors and
>admins repeatedly defending this appalling policy?
That is our work, to create a supportive environment for productive work on the encyclopedia. It is not a waste of time at all to patiently explain that supporting our productive editors and administrators and protecting them from harassment both on and off wiki has a high priority.
Fred
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Ken Arromdee [mailto:arromdee@rahul.net]
>Sent: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 09:19 AM
>To: 'English Wikipedia'
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Fred Bauder"clarifies"on attack site link policy
>
>On Mon, 9 Jul 2007, John Lee wrote:
>> > >If WR links were only deleted for not being reliable sources, we wouldn't
>> > >be *having* this fuss. Most of the questionable deletions of WR and
>> > similar
>> > >links are under circumstances where reliable sources are irrelevant--talk
>> > >pages, Wikipedia signpost, etc.
>> > Why post a link to a site which engages in harassment and outing, if
>> > it's not even a reliable source? In what way is that not dickish?
>> Because different people have different interpretations of the phrase
>> "reliable source". It is not dickery to disagree on what constitutes a
>> reliable source; it is a content dispute. How the dispute is resolved, of
>> course, may result in dickery from one or both sides.
>
>In this case, a better answer is "because reliable sources don't always
>matter". Non-reliable sources get linked in talk pages all the time. We
>don't delete them.
True, but most unreliable sources do not also contain material which abuses our editors and administrators. Protecting productive editors and administrators from harassment both on and off the wiki takes priority over keeping links to attack sites active.
Fred