On 9/10/06, Jason Potkanski electrawn@electrawn.com wrote:
On 9/10/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 10/09/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Amgine wrote:
For these and other reasons, en.wp should develop policy limiting living persons articles to primary career facts and academic achievements, current positions held or endeavors, and minimal personal facts. By presenting a minimal set of biographic facts the community can circumvent a large number of internal and external conflicts, whilst avoiding maintenance issues and keeping the articles relevant until such time as the subjects may be viewed in historical context.
I think that way of putting it seems a bit extreme. In the example under discussion [[Tom Delay]], it seems pretty clear that the article is much stronger due to the inclusion of much more than some minimal set of facts.
Yes. One bad example is not a reason to adopt a policy with the specific goal of making living bio articles as useless as possible.
I wonder what the readers want from Wikipedia bio articles.
Hard to say, but...
- Legally, can't be libelous/defaming.
- Probably don't want to read like a tabloid journal
- Probably don't want to be like a book biography... "Mr X took a
number 2 on Nov 5th, 1985 in the 2nd floor bathroom...he usually goes to the 3rd floor bathroom."
Compared to a who's who or book biography.
- Shouldn't be completely Positive smiley happy happy - all negatives scrubbed.
- Should touch on recent events/litigation - up to date as of now.
- Learn something interesting or unknown - trivia.
- Make the person look human - care.
That last one is the tough one...Not only do editors need to be civil with each other, they need to be civil with the subjects they right about. Underneath, they have families and bleed red just like you. Using [[Tom Delay]], you would think the guy belonged in the same class as Sadam Hussein or Slobodan Milosevic. (Not quite hitler or bin ladin).
-Electrawn
right->write. Embarassing, but in retrospect, a good pun.