On 3/28/06, charles matthews charles.r.matthews@ntlworld.com wrote:
WP is quoted by top-quality media sources. That's being taken seriously.
That's called living dangerously :)
Well, you are leaping to the conclusion that a subtraction (to appease some group offended) is an improvement.
Yes, I am leaping to the conclusion that making Wikipedia an attractive resource for teachers for use with kids is an improvement. What would you call it?
More assumptions. I think parents are more likely to be 'shocked' than kids; especially those naive about what one can google for.
Yep. And what do parents do when they're shocked by something their kid saw on Wikipedia? Anything pleasant, useful, or beneficial to the Wikipedia project?
Not that high, clicking Random Page. High enough, if you look in the sexological categories.
Even higher if you type "sex" into the search box, which most kids probably at some time or another. I agree with your point about the random page though (Britannica was way off the mark with "large proportion").
'Only risk'; I think you forget how many sites WP links to. I think you forget that interwiki links may (within Wikipedia) take one to pages not subject to any scrutiny by us, the English Wikipedia.
That's a lower risk, to me. I think it's significantly less likely that a person would stumble onto a pornographic site by clicking interwiki links. Hell, the chances of your "average" English speaker clicking on an interwiki link at all are fairly remote, let alone one that took them from a "safe" page to an "unsafe" one.
You're right. No warranties. But warnings, and the option to "opt out" with suitable software. Just like with every other site of which "a fairly large portion is pornographic". :)
A fairly small proportion of WP is 'explicit', and little is pornographic.
I know that, and you know that. "They" don't though.
Steve