-----Original Message----- From: Ken Arromdee arromdee@rahul.net To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@lists.wikimedia.org Sent: Wed, 15 Apr 2009 10:24 pm Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Lies, damned lies, and statistics
I've found the "to improve Wikipedia" clause in various rules to be an odd loophole. Usually it gets abused in BLP and privacy discussions: "that helps the individual named in the BLP but doesn't improve the encyclopedia". The idea that we must improve the encyclopedia is *not* a blanket excuse to avoid our responsibilities to get things correct or not to cause harm.
In fact, this is almost the same as the BLP and privacy abuses. Sanger is a particular named individual that Wikipedia is making claims about. He says the claims are wrong. It's up to us to get them right, whether it "improves the encyclopedia" or not--and if getting them right doesn't improve the encyclopedia, what are we doing making *any* claims about *anyone's* founder status?
(Moreover, Sanger has pointed to particular things he claims aren't true, above and beyond the founder/cofounder issue.) ---------------------------
I didn't get the impression that he was complaining here about Wikipedia, but rather just about Jimmy. I looked at the article and it seemed to present them both as co-founders.
I think Larry was just complaining that Jimmy, as an individual person, has been saying this or that about him or about the early history of the project that Larry didn't like. Not that those things have been incorporated into the project.
Will Johnson