On Mon, 19 Jun 2006 01:42:18 +0800 John Lee johnleemk@gawab.com wrote:
Huh? How is accepting that those with high edit counts (and thus more experience editing) are more likely to know what they're talking about than someone who just arrived yesterday making "social networking" more important than writing the encyclopaedia? Believe me, if someone had 6000 edits in userspace and nothing else, nobody would respect him or her, but if the 6000 edits are well-distributed, it's a likely indicator that the fellow either knows what he/she is talking about. (It's never an infallible one, however; some of our worst POV warriors, and of course edit warriors, will have high edit counts.)
The problem here is when the actual dispute is being reduced to "edit count" and social networks. Imagine a new user makes an good addition to a controversial article, that you and I would find, while favoring one particular POV, is factual and well sourced, and do not make the article violate NPOV as a whole.
Imagine the situation when an experienced user simply reverts, criticises the new editor for POV pushing. The new editor is confused - he can either himself revert again, only to be himself reverted and now being accused of revert and edit warring. Then, on the talk page tries to explain that this is in his opinion in no way an invalid addition to Wikipedia, details why, and that removing it would equal censorship.
Next thing the newbie knows is that he's blocked from editing on Wikipedia for "being a disruptive POV pusher, edit warrior, and personal attacks such as calling 'experienced user' a censor."
And everyone goes "hey, the guy with the 6000 edits sure must know what he's talking about, that other guy is a disruptive newbie"
<sarcasm> But of course that does never happen on Wikipedia </sarcasm>
And do define "responsible journalist / scholar". If you arrive at Wikipedia with preconceptions of how things should be done from past experience, and don't adjust these preconceptions, then you will of course have a difficult time fitting in, especially when our editorial norms are established for good reasons.
I would say a responsible journalist / scholar is capable of reducing or negating his own bias, researches the topic he writes about, understands that Wikipedia is not a soapbox and makes responsible decisions when it comes to writing. You know, essentially respecting WP:NPOV / WP:V / WP:NOT. In addition to that, he should try to debate, understand and arrange with people of a different point of view, instead of trying to bully them away from the article or trying to get opposing opinions blocked, which is what WP:CIV and WP:NPA partially try to achieve (but fail).