Phil Sandifer wrote:
We should nuke [[WP:CITE]] and [[WP:RS]]. They are not working. They have never worked. It is not a feasible project to go and add sources to everything, and new contributors who are editing casually are never going to be willing to do the extra work of having sources. The result is a rule where we are always going to be playing catch-up.
In all honesty if that happens I will probably walk. As someone who edits in an arena of pop culture, comics, I don't think I could stand it if these crutches were taken away. Comics have been published for over 70 years and I would seriously have no other stick with which to beat the people who think Wikipedia can readily summarise the plot of every single character and adventure depicted. Why does that matter? People need to ponder how maintainable six billion articles on comics would be. Think I made that article up? People quite reasonably believe the batarang deserves an article. Extend that to Moon Knight's throwing arrows, which I could quite happily add an article on the basis of West Coast Avengers #18-24 or thereabouts. The best stick we've got at the moment to cut away at this is reliable sources. Now I know that there's a split in what Wikipedia is, and I know there are a lot of grey areas. I will defend any article I believe is well written regardless of source issues, and if there are such articles at afd please give me a call, but I will more readily defend the ideal Wikipedia was founded on. We need to focus on the general reader and focus on getting those books into the hands of those African kids that Jimmy often mentions. What value are those books going to be if they contain facts sourced from my webpage? And if you abandon reliable sources and citing, why on earth do you think we'll have quality articles? How are you going to do it. Sorry, but I'm battling POV pushers on too many fronts to even entertain this idea humourously.
Nor do the pages prevent incidents like Siegenthaler, which was a problem with exactly one cause, which is that nobody had ever actually looked at that page after it was created. No policy in the world will fix a page that nobody is editing.
Actually, that's a flawed argument. We don't know if they haven't prevented more examples like Siegenthaler.
Yes, we need to ensure that people do not add crap information. This can be covered easily with "Information that people doubt the validity of should be sourced."
Ugh, no. People doubt the validity of? What on earth is validity? Well, it's stuff that people of note have said, or, well it's stuff that is of importance to the subject. It's just more looseness, and it's too loose. Wikipedia either has to have standards or throw of the pretence of being an encyclopedia and allow original research. Hey, want your stuff in Wikipedia? Chuck up a web page and then source it. This applies to popular culture as much as it does any other field. Want to posit the idea that reading comics makes you gay? Chuck up a website and then cite it in Wikipedia. Well no, don't even cite it, just put it in and stick to your guns, because hey, it has validity.
And we can then leave the community
to deal with issues on a case by case basis with the direction that they should be careful to make sure that information is accurate. And we should shoot people who continue to add dubious information over the objections of other editors. Which is basically how we wrote an encyclopedia that has proven pretty trustworthy, and, more to the point, is how we actually operate now on the vast majority of our articles, since [[WP:CITE]] and [[WP:RS]] are not actually useful pages.
Okay, I realise here I'm going to get shot at, but it is my understanding that it is not enough for information to be accurate. It has to be relevant and it needs to be . Wikipedia is simply too big now to be built like it was in the old days. America doesn't operate the way it did in the Wild West, Wikipedia can't operate the way it did back then. Enforce mob rule and then watch as we lose the battle to the mob. We're walking a tight line as it is, at the outer edges like Siegenthaler. I'd hate to see the centre go.
But to have a pair of policies that cannot be honestly implemented serves only one purpose: causing debates among editors that waste time and good faith.
Look, I agree that there are issues, but those issues aren't with the policies. They are with the editors who can't seem to apply, what for better words I'll call common sense to the policies. They can't seem to grasp that there is a need to compromise, a need to facilitate other opinions and a need to deal. They can't grasp the concept of collaboration, they can't grasp the idea that life is not black and white. They can't see the future is reached by groping about in the dark as much as it is reached by walking clear lit corridors. Too many times an obvious decision is delayed due to one person in a far off field crying out "Process". What we need is a way of enforcing the idea that it is the spirit of the rules that are observed, not the words. Too many people are invested in the fight, not the book in the hands of that African kid.
What we need is perhaps better management. Kelly used to talk of an elected chamber which would debate issues. I'm starting to see the value. But that's a whole nother can of worms.