Charles Matthews wrote:
Ben Kovitz wrote:
"The site's other major flaw is its incompleteness. Wikipedia was able to answer only 40 per cent of the drug questions Clauson asked of it. By contrast, the traditionally edited Medscape Drug Reference answered 82 per cent of questions. 'If there is missing safety information about a drug, that can be really detrimental,' Clauson points out."
The good news is that the template {{missing}} exists. The bad news is that it appears hardly to be used (backlinks for [[Template:Missing]]). Could we do more to make clear to the public that there is such a template to add? They have caught on quite well to {{fact}}.
Hmm, I didn't even know about {{missing}}.
One way to popularize it: just use it a lot. When people see the tag a lot, eventually they start thinking to use it, too. Using it also the most direct way to teach others how to use it.
A difficulty: Missing stuff is not there. It doesn't call attention to itself. A factual claim that sounds unlikely sets off an alarm in your head. But missing information doesn't call attention to itself, so it's much less likely to get tagged.
One way to get around this would be a project to add a Safety Information section to lots and lots of articles about drugs. A narrowly focused campaign to consistently add a certain type of information to all articles within a certain category will likely produce better results than a broad campaign to make fuller use of the {{missing}} tag.
Generally speaking, though, do ordinary readers (non-editors) pay attention to tags? I know it's 2009, and I know tags will never go away, but most tags still strike me as both anti-wiki and page clutter. If a page has a problem, fix it. For example, if a factual claim is unsupported b.s., don't insert {{fact}}, just delete it on the spot. If you want input from others before editing the main page, post on the discussion page.
And then again, it does seem like a mass posting of {{missing | safety information}} tags on drug pages would quickly set a lot of editors to digging up the missing information. It would get the attention of editors faster than starting a Project. Despite my objections, that might be the most effective way to go.
Ben