On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Hmmm. No, I think the question is, can we assume that paid edits are good edits. If there is a paid editor, what we actually have to do is
Of course we can't. We can't assume that *any* edits are good edits. That's why we have patrols.
shadow them to check for subtle bias - if I were paid to write an
Why? There are plenty of edits being made with blatant bias. Subtle bias is the least of our problems.
article I would not be 100% confident I could write without subtle bias, especially if sources were spoonfed. How do we know that the sources have not been carefully selected to present a desired perspective? It would be rather naive to believe they had not been so
You mean they provide sources? Fantastic! That's a huge step forward from most edits.
I don't know. Companies have disgruntled employees and enthusiastic evangelists. Would it matter if they were paid to write? Yes, because only the evangelists would be paid.
Oh, you must mean like how on many ethnic conflicts, representatives of one ethnicity editing are outnumbering the others. Or how for an article on a famous singer, there are more supporters editing the article than detractors. Yes, it's a problem.
No, worse. I live in Reading, Berkshire. I feel no particular loyalty to the town, it's just a place where I live.
So one of my 6 examples doesn't apply to you.
What if Reading paid me to edit their Wikipedia article? Would I
write that it's a
boring drug-riddled self-obsessed town with a terrible shopping centre and extortionate house prices, or would I write something a little more flattering?
Hopefully something more flattering.
No articles should be written on commission. I believe Jimbo Has Spoken on that issue.
Me too. See my original post. I believe Jimbo's point of view was "the appearance of conflict of interest would undermine our credibility". Not "paid editing always produces bad edits".
Steve