On 15 Oct 2007 at 09:23:38 -0700, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Will Beback wrote:
Daniel R. Tobias wrote:
On tonight's Simpsons episode, an imprisoned criminal tells his visiting girlfriend to kill the guy who's been editing his biography in Wikipedia. Gasp... harrassment of a Wikipedian! Stop linking to that evil show right away!
Are you unaware of the difference between mentions of Wikipedia, criticisms of Wikipeida and its editors , and harassment of editors?
Harassment is a different thing from criticism.
Strongly seconded. Daniel is committing a pretty clear straw man fallacy.
Smartass humor is a different thing from straw man fallacies. :-)
On 16/10/2007, Daniel R. Tobias dan@tobias.name wrote:
Smartass humor is a different thing from straw man fallacies. :-)
As in a humorous jibe at people on Wikipedia going crazy every time anyone anywhere criticises them in the least, and indeed who denounce all such sources of criticism and exorcise them from Wikipedia?
Really, I do think to some extent people have lost the plot with regards to this, so I don't know that it's entirely a bad thing if people post replies; both those who did and didn't see the OP as a joke. I.e. I would barely be surprised if some Wikipedians actually took a critical line towards the Simpsons just on this.
Look at the response to The Register's criticism for example. Seriously, IMO they are perfectly justified in continuing to even troll in their criticism as long as Wikipedian reactions are so OTT - El Reg's reporting is fairly innocuous medicine for Wikipedians who need to learn about the real world and Wikipedia's not having an exemption from it or higher moral ground - i.e. Wikipedia is just as flawed in different ways as any other project, and entirely possibly even more flawed than some others!
Zoney
On 16/10/2007, Zoney zoney.ie@gmail.com wrote:
Really, I do think to some extent people have lost the plot with regards to this, so I don't know that it's entirely a bad thing if people post replies; both those who did and didn't see the OP as a joke. I.e. I would barely be surprised if some Wikipedians actually took a critical line towards the Simpsons just on this.
Look at the response to The Register's criticism for example. Seriously, IMO they are perfectly justified in continuing to even troll in their criticism as long as Wikipedian reactions are so OTT
Ah, yes. "Is the Register ever considered a reliable source per WP:Notability? Is there some way we can list it as being unsuitable for referencing?"
And we veer back into self-parody again...
I've written before about the project sliding deeper and deeper into a 'siege mentality' - us versus them, the outsiders are big and evil and scary, we must protect ourselves, we must build bigger walls, etc. Both the response to external criticism and the "attack sites" thing are examples of this - but they're also both the sort of thing that *perpetuate* it, help drive the community into a more and more insular, paranoid, unhappy state.
on 10/16/07 7:18 AM, Andrew Gray at shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
I've written before about the project sliding deeper and deeper into a 'siege mentality' - us versus them, the outsiders are big and evil and scary, we must protect ourselves, we must build bigger walls, etc. Both the response to external criticism and the "attack sites" thing are examples of this - but they're also both the sort of thing that *perpetuate* it, help drive the community into a more and more insular, paranoid, unhappy state.
I agree with you, Andrew.
Also, there are those who would warn us about the "enemies within". The persons who have arrived later to the party seeing things from a different perspective; a perspective they would rather we not explore.
Marc Riddell
Andrew Gray wrote:
And we veer back into self-parody again...
I've written before about the project sliding deeper and deeper into a 'siege mentality' - us versus them, the outsiders are big and evil and scary, we must protect ourselves, we must build bigger walls, etc. Both the response to external criticism and the "attack sites" thing are examples of this - but they're also both the sort of thing that *perpetuate* it, help drive the community into a more and more insular, paranoid, unhappy state.
Self-parody is only a problem when we aren't aware that we are doing it. Naming someone like Stephen Colbert to the Advisory Board could burst a few balloons.
Ec