On 7/9/06, Erik Moeller <eloquence(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 7/10/06, Sarah <slimvirgin(a)gmail.com> wrote:
Erik, the important point about newspapers is
that all but the tiniest
have processes in place to detect errors, and particularly legal
problems, prior to publication. We can only hope they use the
processes correctly; if they don't, that's not our fault. But
Wikipedia has no such process, which is why we rely on what we call
"reliable sources" who do.
Our own history is an example. Virtually all of it is documented
through electronic mailing lists and edits to the wiki. It is possible
to fake mailing list posts just like it is possible to fake them on
Usenet. So, are we going to dispute that Larry Sanger wrote the "Let's
make a wiki" post on those grounds?
We need to be very careful that dogma does not take the
place of common sense.
The policy is based on common sense, not dogma. When you send a letter
to a newspaper for publication, you're expected to supply your name,
address, and telephone number so that someone from the newspaper can
check that you really did send it. Nothing like that exists for
Usenet. It's all very well to say that if X didn't write the post, and
we quote from it, X will tell us soon enough. But what happens if X
claims that, in purporting to quote him, and in leaving that unchecked
quote on Wikipedia for months until he spotted it, we have damaged him
in some way? Newspapers have processes in place to avoid this
scenario, and they have libel insurance for when things go wrong. We
have none of those things, which is why we piggy-back on other
people's, by using only material that has already been checked.
Sarah