bobolozo wrote:
We now have about 1500 articles in Category:Semi-protected, which new editors and IP addresses can't edit. I picked a few at random, and most I checked were entirely uncontroversial articles which had briefly had some trouble from an IP address, which was over months ago and there was no reason to believe it would ever occur again.
This is in violation of one of our basic principles.
What basic principle is that? I thought Wikipedia's basic principles were a) to be free (as in freedom), and b) to be an encyclopedia. Everything else is a means to that end, not a "basic principle."
Anyone _can_ edit any Wikipedia article, because anyone can create an account. And the account name can be pseudonymous.
And, anyone _can_ edit any WIkipedia article, because they are all licensed under the GFDL. What they cannot do is:
Edit a Wikipedia article --without creating an account --and host that edited version --on the Wikipedia website --in the main namespace.
--- "Daniel P. B. Smith" wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
bobolozo wrote:
We now have about 1500 articles in Category:Semi-protected, which new editors and IP addresses can't edit. I picked a few at random,
and
most I checked were entirely uncontroversial
articles
which had briefly had some trouble from an IP
address,
which was over months ago and there was no reason
to
believe it would ever occur again.
This is in violation of one of our basic
principles.
What basic principle is that? I thought Wikipedia's basic principles were a) to be free (as in freedom), and b) to be an encyclopedia. Everything else is a means to that end, not a "basic principle."
Anyone _can_ edit any Wikipedia article, because anyone can create an account. And the account name can be pseudonymous.
And, anyone _can_ edit any WIkipedia article, because they are all licensed under the GFDL. What they cannot do is:
Edit a Wikipedia article --without creating an account --and host that edited version --on the Wikipedia website --in the main namespace.
Try making a new account and editing a semi-protected article and see what happens.
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On 3/28/07, bobolozo bobolozo@yahoo.com wrote:
--- "Daniel P. B. Smith" wikipedia2006@dpbsmith.com wrote:
bobolozo wrote:
We now have about 1500 articles in Category:Semi-protected, which new editors and IP addresses can't edit. I picked a few at random,
and
most I checked were entirely uncontroversial
articles
which had briefly had some trouble from an IP
address,
which was over months ago and there was no reason
to
believe it would ever occur again.
This is in violation of one of our basic
principles.
What basic principle is that? I thought Wikipedia's basic principles were a) to be free (as in freedom), and b) to be an encyclopedia. Everything else is a means to that end, not a "basic principle."
Anyone _can_ edit any Wikipedia article, because anyone can create an account. And the account name can be pseudonymous.
And, anyone _can_ edit any WIkipedia article, because they are all licensed under the GFDL. What they cannot do is:
Edit a Wikipedia article --without creating an account --and host that edited version --on the Wikipedia website --in the main namespace.
Try making a new account and editing a semi-protected article and see what happens.
While it's true that newly registered editors can't edit semi-protected articles, I'm sure that Daniel is aware of this. I agree with him that it's not really violating basic principles by placing reasonable limits on editing .1% of our articles. I also agree that it would make sense to modify the protection defaults so that admins don't inadvertently semi-protect articles longer than intended.
ChazB
On 28/03/07, Chaz B chazbeck.wp@gmail.com wrote:
While it's true that newly registered editors can't edit semi-protected articles, I'm sure that Daniel is aware of this. I agree with him that it's not really violating basic principles by placing reasonable limits on editing .1% of our articles. I also agree that it would make sense to modify the protection defaults so that admins don't inadvertently semi-protect articles longer than intended.
I'd say "anyone can edit" as a base rule is a major part of Wikipedia's success: being as absolutely open as we can stand to be, and possibly a bit more, and cleaning up the rubbish after the fact rather than trying to limit it before the fact. Everything Wikipedia's gotten, it's gotten from being as open as possible. Most of the actual content appears to be written by newbies. Regular wikicrack addicts frequently start as trepidatious anons. As such, keeping pages as unlocked as possible is important to the health of the wiki.
- d.