New subject: Getting hammered in a tv interview is not fun

30 Mar 2007

Stan Shebs wrote:

...
  Isn't it interesting how nobody ever complains
 about inaccuracies in articles other than the ones about themselves?
 Egos, geez... 
Actually, people *do* complain about inaccuracies in other types of  
articles. Moreover, there are good reasons other than ego for people  
to notice the inaccuracies in articles about themselves. For one  
thing, we all know our own biographies in a lot more detail than  
other people. I'm willing to bet that no one on WikiEN-l other than  
myself knows off the top of their head what city I was born in or my  
date of birth. If someone other than myself were to read that I was  
born in 1961 in Toledo, Ohio, it's unlikely that they'd know it was  
incorrect, whereas I'd notice the error immediately.

In any case, the people who complain about inaccuracies in articles  
are doing Wikipedia a favor, not a disservice. Complaints help  
Wikipedia learn about errors and improve. It may be momentarily  
embarrassing for Jimbo to have an error pointed out to him during a  
TV interview, but that's a small price to pay for useful feedback.

Slim Virgin wrote:

...
  The other solution is to stop publishing biographies
of living
 persons, or at least to offer subjects deletion on request.

 By hosting living bios, and by inviting anyone in the world to edit
 them, we're encouraging bad editing in a quantity we have no hope of
 controlling. 
Actually, hosting living bios probably helps improve fact-checking  
and accuracy more than publishing other types of articles. If there's  
an error in an article about some dead guy, he's NOT going to point  
out the error. Without the feedback from live people, Wikipedia would  
know less than it knows now about the accuracy of its articles and  
the validity of its editorial policies.

--------------------------------
|  Sheldon Rampton
|  Research director, Center for Media & Democracy (www.prwatch.org)
|  Author of books including:
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Re: [WikiEN-l] Getting hammered in a tv interview is not fun