I submit that this is a terrible standard for WIkipedia to aim for, and the day Wikipedia starts doing that is the day Wikipedia as we know it has died a horrible death. When the government of PRC censors content critical of them, they say those content were banned because they are "not in the public interest".
IMO, none of the two criterias you mention are good criterias for inclusion in WIkipedia. Wikipedia does not report the Truth, only the NPOV. As for public interest, let the public decide what is in their interest, wikipedia is not the appointed moral guardian of the society (and in case Jimbo received that appointment letter I hope he has burned it).
Molu
On Wed, 24 May 2006 13:40:28 +1000 Mark Gallagher wrote:
I submit that this is a good standard for Wikipedia to aim for (even if we don't need to). If something is not true *and* in the public interest to know, we should not be saying it about anyone, in particular living people. That's not a legal decision, it's an editorial (and, if you like, moral) one. We should be displaying more discretion than simply "oh, it's true, chuck it in". Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of facts.
-- Mark Gallagher "What? I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!"
- Danger Mouse
--------------------------------- Ring'em or ping'em. Make PC-to-phone calls as low as 1¢/min with Yahoo! Messenger with Voice.
Molu wrote: [Still top-posting, I see]
On Wed, 24 May 2006 13:40:28 +1000 Mark Gallagher wrote:
I submit that this is a good standard for Wikipedia to aim for (even if we don't need to). If something is not true *and* in the public interest to know, we should not be saying it about anyone, in particular living people. That's not a legal decision, it's an editorial (and, if you like, moral) one. We should be displaying more discretion than simply "oh, it's true, chuck it in". Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of facts.
I submit that this is a terrible standard for WIkipedia to aim for, and the day Wikipedia starts doing that is the day Wikipedia as we know it has died a horrible death. When the government of PRC censors content critical of them, they say those content were banned because they are "not in the public interest".
Our definition of "public interest" is not the same definition as the PRC's. While we're flinging about the "slippery slope" argument with gay abandon, I could argue that you are in favour of us throwing away all editorial standards. We would no longer be able to argue that such-and-such is irrelevant, because That's Censorship, And Censorship Is Bad. We would have to print everything we could get our hands on; we could not decide not to include something of no import, because if it's negative and we leave it out we'd be as bad as the Chinese government ...
IMO, none of the two criterias you mention are good criterias for inclusion in WIkipedia. Wikipedia does not report the Truth™, only the NPOV. As for public interest, let the public decide what is in their interest, wikipedia is not the appointed moral guardian of the society (and in case Jimbo received that appointment letter I hope he has burned it).
Wikipedia does not and should not report lies as truth merely because some filthy rag has published them. Being truthful is an inherent component of neutrality --- if we do not report the truth, we are showing bias towards those who want to spread lies. I use Lyndon LaRouche a lot in my examples, because he's just so gosh-darn crazy that he's a good candidate for this sort of thing. So let's take Lyndon LaRouche.
Example A: "Lyndon LaRouche is a popular and powerful American politician. He has become famous worldwide for his exposés of Dick Cheney's plan to flatten Iran with nuclear weapons, the Queen of England's secret Satanic connections, and the influence of Masonic Jewish Bankers in international politics. He earned critical acclaim in 2004 after finally completing the construction of the Eurasian Land Bridge, and has been hailed as a modern-day Marco Polo. His critics, however, deny this."
Now, as far as I'm concerned a paragraph like Example A would be utterly unacceptable, both because it's biased and because it's a pack of lies. Obviously we can't just say that all LaRouche's "achievements" are in fact the fantasies of his diseased mind, but we can sure as hell point out where the truth lies.
While we're talking examples, I'd be interested to hear how you and the Chinese government view ...
Example B: Lyndon LaRouche once had sex with a 15-year-old girl while he was 16 (or 17 while 18, or insert your own age of consent laws here). So far the authorities have refused to do anything about this accusation since it surfaced in 2005, sixty years after the fact, but a small group of dedicated Internet slander-mongers are working hard to bring this troubling issue to light.
Even in the Land of the Brave, we can be sued for publishing defamatory statements about people, if those statements aren't true. Therefore (if morality is not sufficient), we should be concerned about whether what we say is, in fact, true. If Wikipedia were hosted in a country like Australia, we could also be sued for publishing defamatory statements about people, if we haven't taken reasonable steps to ensure those statements are true, or if what we have to say is something we have no business saying (like the LaRouche example above which, being something I just made up, really did the double here).
We have a moral obligation to treat the people we write about with some sensitivity, and not publish stuff just to scream "FUCK YOU" to these people, or anybody who would dare suggest we adopt a modicum of responsibility. We also have some measure of editorial discretion. These two things go hand-in-hand.
On May 24, 2006, at 12:07 AM, Mark Gallagher wrote:
We have a moral obligation to treat the people we write about with some sensitivity, and not publish stuff just to scream "FUCK YOU" to these people, or anybody who would dare suggest we adopt a modicum of responsibility. We also have some measure of editorial discretion. These two things go hand-in-hand.
If only this would be properly understood by contributors (newbies and not so)... No matter how mmany policies and guideline we have, nothing beats common sense. Unfortunately common sense such as what you said in your post, gets usually lost behind the trivialization of WP's principles of "anybody can edit".
-- Jossi
I think we should be thoughtful about our responsibilities and exercise good editorial judgment in all cases. This is not a violation of NPOV, it is what NPOV is all about.
Reporting unsourced allegations with a bogus "some say..." or "critics have said..." when the only such critics are random hate sites on the Internet (for example) is hardly neutral, in that it creates the impression of a controversy where none exists.
Let me give a more detailed hypothetical to explain what I mean.
Some minor celebrity, a television star, has a relatively uncontroversial public persona. Just the usual, starred in this television show which was in the top 50 television shows in the US from 1997-2001, appeared in 3 television movies, etc. She is not super famous, so the total number of traditional verifiable sources about her is rather small.
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those? Here I would come down with Mark Gallagher, quite firmly. It may be true that thus-and-such blogger has said whatever, but so what? Taking what would otherwise be a bland 5 paragraph bio, and turning it into a mouthpiece for a stalker is not neutral.
Not every truth belongs in Wikipedia.
Because there are no rationalistic or simplistic rules for what counts as information we ought to be providing to the public, editorial judgment is necessary. That's what Wikipedia is really good at.
Molu wrote:
I submit that this is a terrible standard for WIkipedia to aim for, and the day Wikipedia starts doing that is the day Wikipedia as we know it has died a horrible death. When the government of PRC censors content critical of them, they say those content were banned because they are "not in the public interest".
IMO, none of the two criterias you mention are good criterias for inclusion in WIkipedia. Wikipedia does not report the Truth™, only the NPOV. As for public interest, let the public decide what is in their interest, wikipedia is not the appointed moral guardian of the society (and in case Jimbo received that appointment letter I hope he has burned it).
Molu
On Wed, 24 May 2006 13:40:28 +1000 Mark Gallagher wrote:
I submit that this is a good standard for Wikipedia to aim for (even if we don't need to). If something is not true *and* in the public interest to know, we should not be saying it about anyone, in particular living people. That's not a legal decision, it's an editorial (and, if you like, moral) one. We should be displaying more discretion than simply "oh, it's true, chuck it in". Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of facts.
-- Mark Gallagher "What? I can't hear you, I've got a banana on my head!" - Danger Mouse
--------------------------------- Ring'em or ping'em. Make PC-to-phone calls as low as 1¢/min with Yahoo! Messenger with Voice. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those?
Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
geni wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those?
Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
--Jimbo
Who is stalking who? Sorry I missed the start of the convo
If you're talking about Amorrow again, I can get rid of that crap, but I just don't think it would have any change on his behaviour - maybe a verbal restraining order or something could be a good move.
-Selina
On 25/05/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
geni wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those?
Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
--Jimbo
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
G'day Selina,
[Would you please consider not top-posting? That'd be tops!]
Who is stalking who? Sorry I missed the start of the convo
If you're talking about Amorrow again, I can get rid of that crap, but I just don't think it would have any change on his behaviour - maybe a verbal
Jimbo was making a hypothetical example. Well, sort of. It was eerily similar to a real-life case of a Boing Boing editor that someone has taken a disliking to, but for our purposes it was hypothetical. In any case, the stalker in this case wasn't amorrow, unless he has a lot more time on his hands than I first thought. I mean, there's only so many hours in one day --- so there must surely be a limit to the number of creepy stalkers who turn out to be amorrow.
On 5/26/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
geni wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those?
Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
We do have a simple test to guide us:
* If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts; * If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents; * If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it doesn't belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some ancillary article) regardless of whether it's true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not.
So the first bar to get over is, is the stalker "prominent"? I take this to mean "could the person have an article written about him/her"? If not, then the viewpoint doesn't need to be included.
Thoughtful judgement helps out when the test fails to give a simple answer, for example it may be decided that the views of someone shown to be a stalker should not be included at all, even if they were someone notable.
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
geni wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
Do we cite those?
Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
--Jimbo
So you believe that ranting criticisms on blogs constitute "verifiable" information?
Anthony
On 26/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
So you believe that ranting criticisms on blogs constitute "verifiable" information?
Ranting criticisms on blogs certainly constitute verification for writing "It has been claimed he eats babies". They do not constitute verification for "He eats babies".
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
On 26/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
So you believe that ranting criticisms on blogs constitute "verifiable" information?
Ranting criticisms on blogs certainly constitute verification for writing "It has been claimed he eats babies". They do not constitute verification for "He eats babies".
Not according to [[wp:V]] they don't. "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources."
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
Anthony
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
On 26/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
So you believe that ranting criticisms on blogs constitute "verifiable" information?
Ranting criticisms on blogs certainly constitute verification for writing "It has been claimed he eats babies". They do not constitute verification for "He eats babies".
Not according to [[wp:V]] they don't. "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources."
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
I would assume this means they're not acceptable as sources for facts that they claim; it seems hard to argue that they aren't credible sourcees for the statement that they made said claims. The main purpose of putting this policy in was to avoid people adding weird things like "Mint cures cancer [source: some random website claiming so]".
For example, I would see nothing wrong with our article on [[Richard M. Stallman]] citing something he wrote on his personal website and attributing it to him. His personal website saying "[x]" is not a reliable source for the statement "[x] is true", but it *is* a reliable source for the statement "Richard Stallman has said [x]", much as a company's official website is not necessarily a reliable source for what a company actually does, but *is* a reliable source for what the company describes itself as doing.
With the personal websites of people less famous than RMS, I don't think the verifiability issue changes; what changes is that the statement "Some Guy has said [x]" becomes insufficiently interesting to merit inclusion in any article.
-Mark
On 5/26/06, Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
On 26/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
Precisely my point. It is an editorial judgment. We can't say "just because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".
So you believe that ranting criticisms on blogs constitute "verifiable" information?
Ranting criticisms on blogs certainly constitute verification for writing "It has been claimed he eats babies". They do not constitute verification for "He eats babies".
Not according to [[wp:V]] they don't. "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources."
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
I would assume this means they're not acceptable as sources for facts that they claim; it seems hard to argue that they aren't credible sourcees for the statement that they made said claims. The main purpose of putting this policy in was to avoid people adding weird things like "Mint cures cancer [source: some random website claiming so]".
For example, I would see nothing wrong with our article on [[Richard M. Stallman]] citing something he wrote on his personal website and attributing it to him. His personal website saying "[x]" is not a reliable source for the statement "[x] is true", but it *is* a reliable source for the statement "Richard Stallman has said [x]", much as a company's official website is not necessarily a reliable source for what a company actually does, but *is* a reliable source for what the company describes itself as doing.
I disagree with this - both the premise and the example. Besdies just the lack of verifiability, I believe this is engaging in original research. In my opinion there's no need for encyclopedia editors to do this. If the quote from RMS is important enough to the RMS article to be included, then someone else has probably already reported it.
That said, I do believe RMS (and any websites we can definitely attribute to him) are a reputable source in articles like the [[GPL]], [[free software]], etc. But random Joe Blogger wouldn't be.
With the personal websites of people less famous than RMS, I don't think the verifiability issue changes; what changes is that the statement "Some Guy has said [x]" becomes insufficiently interesting to merit inclusion in any article.
-Mark
I don't think "sufficiently interesting" is a clear enough criterion to be at all useful in a wiki. While it's true that "reputable source" can lead to its own disputes, I think it's a lot more clear what is meant by that term, plus it separates the issue of the source from the issue of the fact.
Essentially, I thought that's what the NPOV, V, and NOR rules were all about.
Anthony
On May 26, 2006, at 4:41 PM, Delirium wrote:
For example, I would see nothing wrong with our article on [[Richard M. Stallman]] citing something he wrote on his personal website and attributing it to him. His personal website saying "[x]" is not a reliable source for the statement "[x] is true", but it *is* a reliable source for the statement "Richard Stallman has said [x]", much as a company's official website is not necessarily a reliable source for what a company actually does, but *is* a reliable source for what the company describes itself as doing.
I see this as a good rule:
When X is a person, anything known to be published by X is a verifiable source about X. (This is more of a heuristic than a law, as there are no doubt counterexamples.)
On 5/27/06, Philip Welch wikipedia@philwelch.net wrote:
When X is a person, anything known to be published by X is a verifiable source about X. (This is more of a heuristic than a law, as there are no doubt counterexamples.)
Verifiable source that X stated Y, you mean. We can't trust them to be telling the truth, as was pointed out.
There still seems to be no consensus on whether Wikipedia requires verifiable information, verifiable sources, or both.
Steve
Delirium wrote:
I would assume this means they're not acceptable as sources for facts that they claim; it seems hard to argue that they aren't credible sourcees for the statement that they made said claims. The main purpose of putting this policy in was to avoid people adding weird things like "Mint cures cancer [source: some random website claiming so]".
You never know for sure!
"Common thyme, which was recommended in whooping cough three or four years ago by Dr. S. B. Johnson, is regarded by Dr. Neovius ('The Lancet', May 9, 1891), as almost worthy the title of specific, which, if given early and constantly, invariably cuts short the disease in a fortnight, the symptoms generally vanishing in two or three days. He gives from one ounce and a half to six ounces perdiem, combined with a little marshmallow sirup. He never saw any undesireable effect produced, except slight diarrhoea. It is important that the drug should be used quite fresh." -- 'Scientific American', Jan. 9, 1892 ;-)
Ec
On 27/05/06, Anthony DiPierro wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Ranting criticisms on blogs certainly constitute verification for writing "It has been claimed he eats babies". They do not constitute verification for "He eats babies".
Not according to [[wp:V]] they don't. "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources."
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
However, the existence of that blog is a valid source that "X has a blog called Y". I think we're talking a bit at cross purposes here, since I certainly agree with the unspoken "reputable". The existence of something, and it being accessible to all, is grounds to verify its *existence* - if for some reason our normal editorial processes feel we should mention the cranky blog exists, then we can point to it without worrying that we need to find a footnote in a newspaper mentioning the URL. We don't need to refer to a secondary source which says "X exists and writes about Y" in order to say that, yes, X exists, and has an article on Y.
Verifiability of existence of a statement and verifiability of validity of a statement are different but slightly intertwined concepts. We can't write "John Smith eats babies (see smith-baby-killer.blogspot.com)" - we can't verify the existence of the fact - but we can write "It has been claimed by [some member of the lunatic fringe] that John Smith eats babies (see etc.)" - we can verify the existence of the claim.
Of course, this is all essentially moot - whilst we can say that the "claim of a claim" is verifiable, we do have a vast community reserve of editorial discretion, good taste and common sense to draw on. And with those, we can say "yes, I suppose you could legitimately say that so-and-so thinks such-and-such. But writing that here is not appropriate for our article, so bugger off".
The more of that I see the happier I am. (I removed a bit of gratuitous nudity from an article yesterday; it was exceptionally tasteless in context. It's cheering that no-one has yet accused me of being a crazed censor...)
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
However, the existence of that blog is a valid source that "X has a blog called Y".
Well, what I'm saying is that no, it isn't, or at least that it shouldn't be.
Anthony
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
However, the existence of that blog is a valid source that "X has a blog called Y".
Well, what I'm saying is that no, it isn't, or at least that it shouldn't be.
I guess you must be using some jargonish meaning of "verifiable" that is not in keeping with the standard English meaning of the word? I find it difficult to claim that the existence of a website at www.foo.com stating "foo.com is run by bar" is not a reputable and verifiable source for the statement "the website www.foo.com claims to be run by bar". The source is indeed verifiable (even into the future, thanks to archive.org), and leaves little room to doubt that the statement it's supporting is true.
I think the issue is one of notability---the statement "the website www.foo.com claims to be run by bar" is only worth including if foo.com is a famous website.
As your other post notes, this makes "notability" an issue, but it always has been. When we choose to publish facts on private people versus public people, for example, is a judgment call about how "notable" they are---not anything to do with verifiability, as many private/non-notable people have information about them verifiable from e.g. phone books. And I think a bit of subjective good judgment is better than redefining words to mean strange things.
-Mark
On 5/26/06, Delirium delirium@hackish.org wrote:
Anthony DiPierro wrote:
On 5/26/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
I've always taken "verifiability" to mean verifiable *in a reputable source*. Some people disagree, of course (apparently you're one of them), but I wasn't aware that Jimmy Wales was one of them.
However, the existence of that blog is a valid source that "X has a blog called Y".
Well, what I'm saying is that no, it isn't, or at least that it shouldn't be.
I guess you must be using some jargonish meaning of "verifiable" that is not in keeping with the standard English meaning of the word?
Yeah, pretty much. I'm talking about the definition as it applies to Wikipedia.
As your other post notes, this makes "notability" an issue, but it always has been.
Actually, notability is a fairly recent issue with regard to the history of Wikipedia. Verifiability isn't.
And I think a bit of subjective good judgment is better than redefining words to mean strange things.
Fair enough. I should have been more clear that I was talking specifically about Wikipedia's verifiability policy.
Of course, the initial question I asked was in response to a statement made by Jimbo, and I had assumed he *was* talking specifically about Wikipedia's verifiability policy. In fact, I'm still not sure whether or not he was.
Anthony
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
After posting them to his blog, he adds them to Wikipedia. That, at least, seems to be the usual way in which we receive these "criticisms", which makes it rather easy to justify removing them. I have yet to see the case where the _community_, after looking into a matter, has erred on the side of inclusion of bad, incoherent material. It sometimes happens that small groups build a consensus to accept certain material, but once it receives community attention, I think our processes generally work fine.
Semi-protection together with listing a page in a well-watched category is a perfectly fine method for dealing with problem articles and, as has been stated many times, much preferable to the hard protection which we would likely be using instead for the same purpose if semi-protection didn't exist. It's a community method which is open to all serious existing contributors, and reasonably open to new ones (they just have to wait a few days).
The only thing we need to be cautious about is silent creep of permanently semi-protected pages, not out of maliciousness, but simply because people forget to unprotect, esp. after the label is removed. Maintenance categories and the like can hopefully take care of that, though.
Erik
Erik Moeller wrote:
On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales jwales@wikia.com wrote:
But, she has a stalker.
The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
After posting them to his blog, he adds them to Wikipedia. That, at least, seems to be the usual way in which we receive these "criticisms", which makes it rather easy to justify removing them. I have yet to see the case where the _community_, after looking into a matter, has erred on the side of inclusion of bad, incoherent material.
Agreed. As I said, judging things like this is something that we are quite good at, as a community.
The point of my example was to show that there is no simple binary answer to questions like that. Each case requires judgment of thoughtful editors.
--Jimbo
On 5/25/06, Erik Moeller eloquence@gmail.com wrote:
Semi-protection together with listing a page in a well-watched category is a perfectly fine method for dealing with problem articles and, as has been stated many times, much preferable to the hard protection which we would likely be using instead for the same purpose if semi-protection didn't exist. It's a community method which is open to all serious existing contributors, and reasonably open to new ones (they just have to wait a few days).
The only thing we need to be cautious about is silent creep of permanently semi-protected pages, not out of maliciousness, but simply because people forget to unprotect, esp. after the label is removed. Maintenance categories and the like can hopefully take care of that, though.
Since we don't want to add potentially confusing messages to the user, but want to have a template that would give us a tool to link semi-protected articles in a category, how about placing a semi-protection notice in the Talk page instead of the main article page?