The link is to the NPR article and the comment below is worth reviewing. How can this perception typical among the NPR commentators be over-turned?
" Boe D (Dajoe) wrote: "People: If you are knowledgable enough to find a fault in Wikipedia--Go fix it!"
Boe, are you kidding? it's because of the hubris and tenacity of the ignorant that we cannot fix it. we have only finite energy and time, and the self-appointed "editors" who elect among themselves the "administrators" (who wield the real power), will just revert any fix that doesn't fit with their POV.
if you take them on, they will run to an admin friend of theirs and you will be blocked. if you stand your ground, they will "community ban" you indefinitely and then you either get another login ID or you edit anonymously, but in either case you must fly below the radar or be accused of sock-puppetry.
you can be a noted expert in your field, but if you are outnumbered by two self-appointed editors that disagree, any time you spend contributing to the project will eventually be wasted.
the second pillar of Wikipedia has crumbled to the earth. it does not exist anymore except as rubble."
if Jimbo only knew.
Links send out this morning to 1000s of librarians.
Wikipedia Irks Philip Roth With Reluctance To Edit Entry About His Novelhttp://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/09/07/160776104/wikipedia-irks-philip-roth-with-reluctance-to-edit-entry-about-his-novel
comments
On 11 September 2012 10:11, Kathleen McCook klmccook@gmail.com wrote:
The link is to the NPR article and the comment below is worth reviewing. How can this perception typical among the NPR commentators be over-turned?
" Boe D (Dajoe) wrote: "People: If you are knowledgable enough to find a fault in Wikipedia--Go fix it!"
Boe, are you kidding? it's because of the hubris and tenacity of the ignorant that we cannot fix it. we have only finite energy and time, and the self-appointed "editors" who elect among themselves the "administrators" (who wield the real power), will just revert any fix that doesn't fit with their POV.
That's kind of not the case. An admin who reverts well-referenced edits as
a POV pusher is riding for a fall.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2012-09-10/In_the_...
has a sane discussion of what actually did go on in the Roth business. You can get this other kind of explanation any day of the week from the troll boards, naturally. But the agenda there is to make WP unmanageable on any terms.
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
Charles
On Tue, 11 Sep 2012, Charles Matthews wrote:
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
If someone who could reasonably be seen as speaking for Wikipedia told him that Wikipedia needed secondary sources for his claim, they are wrong, and Wikipedia failed.
It completely misses the point to explain how Wikipedia's actual policies are reasonable. The policy that Roth was told about is not reasonable; if it doesn't match Wikipedia's actual policy, he shouldn't be expected to figure that out.
It has nothing to do with celebrity power, except that when celebrities run into bad admins, people learn about it.
That comment sounds like it was written by Peter Damian. Not everyone, even Wikipedians, recognize or keep in mind the fact that there is a subversive principle (or really, many) underlying the Wikipedia model. It intentionally does not offer deference to editors with credentials in the fields they might choose to edit. There are obvious practical reasons for this, but there's also an element of democratizing information and the curation of knowledge.
This strikes many self-defined experts as wrongheaded; they expect to be treated as authorities, and are often upset when they are not. While unfortunate, that doesn't turn this feature of Wikipedia into a bug. If anything it suggests we need to do a better job educating potential editors and readers about the principles of the encyclopedia.
On 09/11/12 8:23 AM, Nathan wrote:
That comment sounds like it was written by Peter Damian. Not everyone, even Wikipedians, recognize or keep in mind the fact that there is a subversive principle (or really, many) underlying the Wikipedia model. It intentionally does not offer deference to editors with credentials in the fields they might choose to edit. There are obvious practical reasons for this, but there's also an element of democratizing information and the curation of knowledge.
This strikes many self-defined experts as wrongheaded; they expect to be treated as authorities, and are often upset when they are not. While unfortunate, that doesn't turn this feature of Wikipedia into a bug. If anything it suggests we need to do a better job educating potential editors and readers about the principles of the encyclopedia.
The subversive principle lies in making reality a victim of group-think. This subjects truth to a wholly flawed mechanism of verification that is immune to any kind of reality check. Wikipedia has a perverse history when it comes to dealing with expertise. It substitutes it's own bureaucracy for recognized experts in a field. These admins are the wrongheaded self-defined experts that expect to be treated as authorities. In circumstances of law they are quite willing to evade responsibility with a strategic "IANAL" while they run to the acknowledged experts in that field. Understanding and good judgement are not the product of rules.
If we note the wording, "There’s no way Roth could have tackled this subject without thinking of Anatole Broyard," It doesn't state Broyard's influence it speculates about it. The innuendo works for all but the most careful readers. In the underlying incident instead of treating the word "spook" in its ordinary meaning of a ghost, the crowd willfully mischaracterizes the word in a more obscure sense. In the famed Seigenthaler incident the writer did not make a blunt claim that Seigenthaler had been involved in the Kennedy assassination, he merely stated that he had been cleared of any such charges. That claim may have been outright vandalism, but, judging by the reaction, it was effective. How we fail to read accurately is frequently a big problem.
I tend to be very critical of experts in any field. I still like to give them the prima facie benefit of the doubt in the absence of evidence to the contrary, or other basis of conflict. Similarly, I also read "reliable sources" with the same criticality.
Needing "to do a better job educating potential editors" sounds to much like the politician who thinks that the only reason the public hasn't agreed with views is that he hasn't explained them well enough. It doesn't occur to him that there might be something wrong with his views, nor to us that our epistemology might be flawed.
Ray
On 11 September 2012 16:23, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
That comment sounds like it was written by Peter Damian. Not everyone, even Wikipedians, recognize or keep in mind the fact that there is a subversive principle (or really, many) underlying the Wikipedia model. It intentionally does not offer deference to editors with credentials in the fields they might choose to edit. There are obvious practical reasons for this, but there's also an element of democratizing information and the curation of knowledge.
This strikes many self-defined experts as wrongheaded; they expect to be treated as authorities, and are often upset when they are not. While unfortunate, that doesn't turn this feature of Wikipedia into a bug. If anything it suggests we need to do a better job educating potential editors and readers about the principles of the encyclopedia.
The anti-expert idea is not really related to "democratizing information and the curation of knowledge." Especially as Wikipedia specifically identifies as *not a democracy*!
The point in not deferring to experts is a hack to get around the problem that on the internet you could claim to be just about anyone. Who knows if you truly are an expert in theology (*cough* Essjay *cough*).
However; it's a bad hack because in many fields you need to be an expert to be able to properly write about the subject.
I have a deep interest in religious history; you couldn't call me an expert, but I have studied the subject to undergraduate level in my spare time. I look at the editors working on religious history topics on Wikipedia and they are, often, incapable of scholarly authorship, or driven by their own viewpoints.
This is just one data point.
The "all editors created equal" thing is a misnomer; being an admin people *do* defer to me, even though I try to avoid it. I see many admins using their authority.
So perhaps it is time to allow experts to be seen as such.
Tom
On 09/12/12 2:32 AM, Thomas Morton wrote:
However; it's a bad hack because in many fields you need to be an expert to be able to properly write about the subject.
I have a deep interest in religious history; you couldn't call me an expert, but I have studied the subject to undergraduate level in my spare time. I look at the editors working on religious history topics on Wikipedia and they are, often, incapable of scholarly authorship, or driven by their own viewpoints.
This is just one data point.
The "all editors created equal" thing is a misnomer; being an admin people *do* defer to me, even though I try to avoid it. I see many admins using their authority.
So perhaps it is time to allow experts to be seen as such.
I think a lot of what happens on Wikipedia is a result of the computer science mindset where everything can be reduced to a series of zeros and ones. In the humanities young editors too easily fall into the trap of a the first year university student who has taken a Psychology course and is ready to analyze everyone around him.
Ec
On Tue, 11 Sep 2012, Charles Matthews wrote:
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
If someone who could reasonably be seen as speaking for Wikipedia told him that Wikipedia needed secondary sources for his claim, they are wrong, and Wikipedia failed.
It completely misses the point to explain how Wikipedia's actual policies are reasonable. The policy that Roth was told about is not reasonable; if it doesn't match Wikipedia's actual policy, he shouldn't be expected to figure that out.
What is our actual policy? What should he have been told, and how?
Fred
The easiest solution would have been to ask Roth to write a blog post (or something similar) detailing the inspiration for the book -- as far as I know, that inspiration was not publicized until the open letter was published. Another option would have been an interview with basically any website.
While I'm sure someone will chime in saying "that's against WP:RS!", it's actually not. See WP:SELPPUB: "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information *about themselves*, usually in articles about themselves or their activities" (emphasis in original)
--Ed
On Tue, Sep 11, 2012 at 12:03 PM, Fred Bauder fredbaud@fairpoint.netwrote:
On Tue, 11 Sep 2012, Charles Matthews wrote:
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
If someone who could reasonably be seen as speaking for Wikipedia told him that Wikipedia needed secondary sources for his claim, they are wrong, and Wikipedia failed.
It completely misses the point to explain how Wikipedia's actual policies are reasonable. The policy that Roth was told about is not reasonable; if it doesn't match Wikipedia's actual policy, he shouldn't be expected to figure that out.
What is our actual policy? What should he have been told, and how?
Fred
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If someone would say this is a good idea but against policy x, so we shouldnt do it, and that argument were taken seriously, we have a far larger problem than even the most negative reading of the Roths issue. On Sep 11, 2012 6:32 PM, "Ed Erhart" the.ed17@gmail.com wrote:
The easiest solution would have been to ask Roth to write a blog post (or something similar) detailing the inspiration for the book -- as far as I know, that inspiration was not publicized until the open letter was published. Another option would have been an interview with basically any website.
While I'm sure someone will chime in saying "that's against WP:RS!", it's actually not. See WP:SELPPUB: "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information *about themselves*, usually in articles about themselves or their activities" (emphasis in original)
--Ed
On Tue, Sep 11, 2012 at 12:03 PM, Fred Bauder <fredbaud@fairpoint.net
wrote:
On Tue, 11 Sep 2012, Charles Matthews wrote:
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
If someone who could reasonably be seen as speaking for Wikipedia told him that Wikipedia needed secondary sources for his claim, they are wrong, and Wikipedia failed.
It completely misses the point to explain how Wikipedia's actual
policies
are reasonable. The policy that Roth was told about is not reasonable; if
it
doesn't match Wikipedia's actual policy, he shouldn't be expected to figure that out.
What is our actual policy? What should he have been told, and how?
Fred
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On 11 September 2012 16:14, Ken Arromdee arromdee@rahul.net wrote:
On Tue, 11 Sep 2012, Charles Matthews wrote:
The Roth situation was WP between a rock (celeb culture with its ohmigod you dissed X) and a hard place (academic credibility requires that, yes, you do require verifiable additions and don't accept argument from authority). It would tend to illustrate that celeb power can potentially be deployed against serious discourse. Countervailing "admin power" is always a questionable analysis.
If someone who could reasonably be seen as speaking for Wikipedia told him that Wikipedia needed secondary sources for his claim, they are wrong, and Wikipedia failed.
That is what I have described before as the point of failure, if the inference is correct. There has been plenty of discussion on the premise that there was a failure of courtesy, which I don't see.
It completely misses the point to explain how Wikipedia's actual policies are reasonable. The policy that Roth was told about is not reasonable; if it doesn't match Wikipedia's actual policy, he shouldn't be expected to figure that out.
It has nothing to do with celebrity power, except that when celebrities run into bad admins, people learn about it.
Without the whole mail being made public, I don't see how we can conclude "bad". Selective quotation is what we have in the New Yorker letter, together with some over-interpretation. Which is rhetoric. But the bulk of Roth's letter is much more interesting than that rather scanty intro.
Charles