On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 1:56 PM, stevertigo stvrtg@gmail.com wrote:
Ian Woollard ian.woollard@gmail.com wrote:
Long-term, we're aiming to compile all knowledge into one freely-accessible location. We shouldn't infringe on that mission, even if we displease some easily-upset persons along the way.
Notable here is this oft-repeated and rather weak-excuse-for-an-argument personal attack that characterises the opposition as just a bunch of "easily-upset people."
The Free Culture argument is a valid one, try using it. The "easily-upset people" meme doesn't do it justice, and just sends out the signal that the unnecessary is being angrily defended.
I am not easily upset. Yet some material on the wikimedia projects is deeply upsetting to me.
We preserve these things because we have made, both implicitly and explicitly, a decision that the unadulterated flow of knowledge is essential to the advancement of mankind... That only through a comprehensive understanding derived from factual information can we, as individuals, promote the good things and prevent the bad things according to our own personal values and priorities.
Without this underlying agenda "the sum of human knowledge" would seem to be a worthless, even harmful, goal.
This decision is not at all neutral or universal. It may be currently fairly common in some cultures and social circles, but it's only recently that you could say that this kind of thinking was at all widespread. NPOV deals with the content of the projects, but not the basis for having the projects. Neutrality, free content, our preference for rationality... these things are very specific points of view and they are axiomatic to our operation and underlie everything we do.
It's okay to admit this, to claim otherwise would be dishonest. Any system must have some axioms, and it's important to know when the limitations you are encountering are due to the axioms.