On 12/13/02 1:25 PM, "Fred Bauder" <fredbaud(a)ctelco.net> wrote:
on 12/13/02 11:06 AM, The Cunctator at
cunctator(a)kband.com wrote:
We can try that, but I'm not sure what good
that would do. A lot of it
depends on who the approvers are. Their biases/likes would determine who
would participate, and what kind of participation that would be. And by
creating a contrast between wikipedia-l and wikien-l we're implying that
they're somehow different in tone and content, rather than focus.
Hopefully
the moderators will consciously suspend their bias (those that
they are aware of) and hopefully Jimbo will choose folks who have some
self-awareness. This ought not be a way to continue the struggle by other
means. It should be a list issue if that is the behavior we see.
It's the biases they're not aware of that are the problem. The simplest
mechanism for tackling these biases is putting every decision made by the
moderators to the light. If someone's post is blocked or delayed, they (and
possibly everyone) should know who made the decision (and possibly why).
There would
need to be a clear determination beforehand of what will be
moderated. And things like "no personal attacks" are too vague to be a clear
moderation guideline. Even "avoid topical discussion" is hard, because some
degree of appeal to specific entries/topics is necessary for discussion of
broad points.
Like pornography, one knows it when one sees it, a typical attack will
generally include "stupid" blah blah, scatological references etc. Posts on
topics are the same, when they start getting into the details, the debated
issues, we all know it belongs on the discussion page of the article.
Pardon me for saying it, but the U.S. judicial standard on pornography is
not the kind of standard that we should be using. We don't need to emulate
the braindead handling of sex and pornography in the U.S.
Rather, if we *can't* explicate clear guidelines of what is not acceptable,
then we shouldn't be moderating. I'm not saying that all judgment should be
removed, but that such judgment should be clearly defined.