Jake Waskett wrote,
On Monday 07 February 2005 00:25, AndyL wrote:
Perhaps we need some sort of intermediate form of ongoing protection for certain pages. Perhaps some pages should only have registered editors able to actively edit them with non-editors only able to make suggestions on talk pages? Perhaps other pages should be protected on an ongoing basis and only have admins able to edit them based on proposals on talk pages which have achieved consensus or passed a certain standard?
Andy
Superb idea. I'm not sure that Wiki has the facility to have "registered" editors, but a nominated admin could be responsible for a page and apply changes that have been voted upon.
This is a very dangerous idea. I agree we need a strategy for dealing with massive organized assaults on Wikipedia, whatever the source. I hope we can come up with something better than putting an administrator in charge of a site and taking votes.
This brings us back to an issue I and others have raised: we have mechanisms for resolving disputes over behavior; we do not have, but need, mechanisms for resolving disputes over content. I think Jake is basically suggesting just such a mechanism. But it is a mechanism I oppose -- I don't trust putting any admin. in charge of a page, and I don't think votes are a good way to resolve issues of conflict (especially when 43,000 storm troopers are threatening Wikipedia! Let's not forget that Hitler took advantage of votes as well).
So: I do agree that we need mechanisms to resolve conflict over content (even though I reject this particular mechanism). I believe that such a mechanism, along with vigorous enforcement of NVOP, No Original Research, and Verifiability will be enough to protect ourselves against any small-scale assault.
But Jay's point is that none of these mechanisms will protect us against a 43,000 person assault. Fred might be right, that our worst-case scenario will not happen, but I tend to agree with Jay that we need to consider this and think of ways to deal with it. But I do not think that the solution to this kind of problem will be anything like the mechanisms we currently rely on.
Steve
Steven L. Rubenstein Associate Professor Department of Sociology and Anthropology Bentley Annex Ohio University Athens, Ohio 45701