Karl Krueger wrote:
What's wrong with censorware tagging? Where to start? Here's the biggie: tagging is incompatible with Wikipedia's existing commitments.
No system of tags is compatible with Wikipedia's commitment to neutrality. The dimensions, biases, and extremes of any system of tags are created from a particular non-neutral point of view. Wikipedia is categorically forbidden from taking on such a point of view as its own.
Well, actually, there is a system that *would* work while maintaining Wikipedia's commitment to neutrality: an *external* tagging system.
Imagine a separate website with a domain name of, say, "ob.noxio.us." Like del.icio.us, it would be a tagging system that lets anyone post their own bookmarks, with keywords. The difference would be that whereas del.icio.us tags web pages that have content they LIKE, ob.noxio.us would tag pages with content they DISLIKE. This would create a sort of censorware folksonomy. It would then be a fairly simple matter to design a system that filters content on pages (not just on Wikipedia but on the entire web), according to whatever categories they choose: nipples, images of excrement, the face of Bill O'Reilly, whatever.
If people are really concerned about the content on Wikipedia, I think they should devote their energies to developing an external solution along these lines. After all, the problem they're describing isn't just a problem with Wikipedia. If you're worried about your boss getting mad when your web browser displays nudity, Wiipedia isn't the only (or even the most likely) place where this is likely to happen. A web-wide solution would be more appropriate to the scope of this problem, and it would allow Wikipedia to continue doing what it does best without worrying about yet another layer of administration and contention.
--Sheldon Rampton
Sheldon Rampton said:
Imagine a separate website with a domain name of, say, "ob.noxio.us." Like del.icio.us, it would be a tagging system that lets anyone post their own bookmarks, with keywords. The difference would be that whereas del.icio.us tags web pages that have content they LIKE, ob.noxio.us would tag pages with content they DISLIKE. This would create a sort of censorware folksonomy. It would then be a fairly simple matter to design a system that filters content on pages (not just on Wikipedia but on the entire web), according to whatever categories they choose: nipples, images of excrement, the face of Bill O'Reilly, whatever.
If people are really concerned about the content on Wikipedia, I think they should devote their energies to developing an external solution along these lines. After all, the problem they're describing isn't just a problem with Wikipedia. If you're worried about your boss getting mad when your web browser displays nudity, Wiipedia isn't the only (or even the most likely) place where this is likely to happen. A web-wide solution would be more appropriate to the scope of this problem, and it would allow Wikipedia to continue doing what it does best without worrying about yet another layer of administration and contention.
Hear hear!