On Oct 28, 2008, at 6:00 PM, WJhonson@aol.com wrote:
No body was stopping you Phil from doing so.
If I had been aware of it at the time, I would have.
There is no big brother here, who evaluates all unsubstatiated claims made to talk space or edits to article space. Lanier (or somebody claiming to be him) made edits, claiming to be him. They were rightly reverted, based on the Good Faith we give to original editors that they are properly citing their sources.
Well, more accurately they were rightly reverted because they consisted of blanking the article and replacing it with a note criticizing the article.
His claim to be the subject should not color our view to remove non- negative claims merely based on unsubstantiated claims that they are inaccurate. That would be a giant leap in our BLP methodology.
Again, nobody has said that we should have removed the information "merely based on" those claims. I have said that those claims should have been sufficient cause to look at the information, which would have fallen apart under even the slightest scrutiny.
On the other hand, should you wish to form an action-patrol to do just this thing, then go ahead and see how it goes. I feel no compulsion to act on unsourced claims (or claims of bad sourcing) by anonymous editors VIS A VIS good faith that previous editors did a good job writing up their sources.
Well then, I hope you'll consider leaving the project, because that attitude is unhelpful and destructive.
-Phil