Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:49:26 +0100
From: Charles Matthews <charles.r.matthews(a)ntlworld.com>
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] A war on external links? Was: Inside Higher
Ed: Does Wikipedia Suck?
To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l(a)lists.wikimedia.org>
Carcharoth wrote:
That probably misses the flux. How many links are
added and then
almost immediately removed? That won't be picked up in something like
that, I don't think.
Anyway, the point is not that external links are systematically
persecuted (they may be patchily persecuted); but that they now have few
actual rights.
Charles
And why should links have any particular "rights"? External links should be
justified in the same way as any addition to the article. They may not
require the same verifiability standards, but they should be judged to be a
recommended place for further reading. In some way or another, they should
add content the editors judge to be useful, and not simply be about the
subject. Considering that for every good link I've seen inserted, I've also
seen one that was useless or even misleading or libelous, why would they
need any special protection?
I see no reason why we need additional policy and bureaucracy specifically
for links.
Sxeptomaniac