---- Sarah slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
On 7/9/06, Erik Moeller eloquence@gmail.com wrote:
On 7/10/06, Sarah slimvirgin@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
Almost without exception Media sources outside the Internet have well established codes of ethics and other standards that the individuals and institutions must follow.
For example: when a media outlet publishes or broadcasts some new piece of information about a person or an agency, it is expected per ethical and industry standards that some one will make contact and get a response before publication/broadcast.
Wikipedia has no way to verify information, seek clarity, or simply get a response. For this reason it is essential that we stick with reliable third party sources and sparingly use primary sources to fill in details for already verified incidents.
Sydney Poore aka FloNight Georgetown KY
On 10/07/06, poore5@adelphia.net poore5@adelphia.net wrote:
Wikipedia has no way to verify information, seek clarity, or simply get a response. For this reason it is essential that we stick with reliable third party sources and sparingly use primary sources to fill in details for already verified incidents.
The problem is that here we have an interdiction against using a medium for a primary source ("...as is demonstrated by the fact Smith made a post to Usenet in June [1] stating he still held that black was white...") which *also* prevents us using anything published through that medium as a tertiary source ("...as has been shown by Smith's extensive research into monography<ref>"Summary of recent work". Smith. Post to sci.research.black-white</ref>").
This guideline is foolishly thought-out at best, and actively problematic at worst.
--- poore5@adelphia.net wrote:
Almost without exception Media sources outside the Internet have well established codes of ethics and other standards that the individuals and institutions must follow.
If by "ethics" you mean fulfill the role of flooding the airwaves with Ronco commercials, crime dramas, and celebrity news shows, then yes, what you say is true. If by "ethics" you mean local newspapers which are 80 percent ads, serve the public only as promotional sustitute for the reportage on news events, then what you say is true.
Otherwise... nonsense! Do not confuse media (aka. "the trade") with journalism (aka. "the profession").
Stevertigo
__________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com
On Sun, Jul 09, 2006 at 07:19:04PM -0400, poore5@adelphia.net wrote:
Almost without exception Media sources outside the Internet have well established codes of ethics and other standards that the individuals and institutions must follow.
I propose that these "codes of ethics and other standards" are largely marketing foofaraw. The sellers of news have an obvious interest in the public *perceiving* them as ethical, neutral, unbiased, and so on. That is quite different from those sellers of news actually *being* these things.
We can draw our own conclusions about the reliability or ethics of various media sources, or indeed of specific writers working for said sellers of news. We should not take it for granted.
Consider: There is almost certainly some field in which you consider yourself well-trained, if not an expert. I have no idea what that field is. However, I ask you to think about the way your field is reported and discussed in the mainstream news publications. It is my experience that the more a person knows about a field, the less satisfied they are with the competence of mainstream reporting about that field.
(And if you think that competence and ethics are separable, well, I hope you will think again. It is, I suggest, unethical to report on a subject on which one is not competent to do so -- to pretend to deliver well-judged facts on a topic where one is not capable of judging the facts due to lack of care, study, or background knowledge.)
For example: when a media outlet publishes or broadcasts some new piece of information about a person or an agency, it is expected per ethical and industry standards that some one will make contact and get a response before publication/broadcast.
It would be comforting to think so. However, consider the number of articles you read which claim that a concerned party "could not be reached before press time." That frequently means that the reporter *may* have tried to phone the party once ... or may not have done so at all.
It is simply an error to believe so highly that The God Of Professional Ethics will protect you from malfeasance or nonfeasance on the part of so-called professional journalists. A Wikipedia featured article is held to far higher standards of quality of sources and reliability than is a front-page article in any major newspaper.