On Sun, 8 Jul 2007 20:36:21 +0100, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
I am one of them, I know a lot of others, all we actually want is for people to be prepared to wait a while for things to be cleared up.
Being able to enforce this is office level powers.
Not having to "enforce" it is evidence of maturity in the project. We received a complaint, naturally some people will automatically react by pushing as hard as possible for inclusion of the material the subject wants excluded, but these people are not likely to be our finest contributors.
Step 1: remove the offending material to forestall legal action;
Um I suspect that may be problematical in some situations because it could be used as admission that there was a problem.
Maybe. But probably not. Leaving it in despite knowing that it is contested is, in my view, far more likely to result in a real problem.
step 2: tell people as much about why as you can.
given the level of legal qualification on OTRS what makes you think you know what that is?
You want to put your hand in your pocket to hire qualified lawyers? Great! The donate button is on your left. In the mean time, volunteers is all we have. Yes, I know, having an encyclopaedia run by unqualified volunteers is never going to work, God alone knows why we even try.
People are genuinely upset when Wikipedia says bad things about them. Sometimes the bad things need to be said, albeit sometimes with somewhat less obvious spite, but it does us no harm to demonstrate at every point that we have listened respectfully to their concerns, even if we ultimately dismiss them as baseless.
Removing verifiable material is harmful.
And leaving it in may well be more harmful. Sometimes "verifiable material" amounts to a tabloid story from a couple of local papers being elevated to worldwide prominence on a top ten website by some folks whose motivation is less than pure. Attempts to portray such issues in black and White terms are rarely productive.
As with any trusted position in Wikipedia, isolation and burnout are a risk. Do be sure to be as kind and supportive as you can to the volunteers, because there are barely enough to keep on top of the flood of email, some of which requires a very great deal of work to get to the bottom of.
So get more people. En.pedia got seven new admins last week. How many have been invited to OTRS?
Everybody is invited to OTRS. You don't have to be an admin. What happened when you volunteered?
Or of course you could always stand on the outside pissing in, but since all that will do is increase the siege mentality about which you appear to be complaining I don't consider it a smart alternative.
False dilemma logical fallacy
False dilemmas are indeed a logical fallacy. But you are on the outside pissing in, here. You are bitching about the system and not actually offering any practical help in fixing it. And no, "do nothing" is not an option when hurt, upset people contact Wikipedia. Just ask that nice Mr. Wales.
Guy (JzG)