oops, meant to send to list as well
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com Date: 29-Aug-2006 20:44 Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] WP:LIVING and "sensitivity" again To: Sydney aka FloNight poore5@adelphia.net
On 29/08/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
I note that one of the talk page responses is that a "sensitivity" policy would reduce editor arguments. So would Sympathetic Point Of View and article forks, and that isn't a reason either. Perhaps I'm worrying about nothing. But it really sits wrong having that there.
I should point out also: that although the big fuss is about negative articles being libelous, the serious *quality* problem with our pop culture articles is that they are hagiographies. The fans are the main people interested in those articles, and they guard them jealously. This makes our pop culture articles *really bad*. Neil Gaiman commented at length about this in his (widely read) blog, for example. Our pop culture articles are rubbish, and they definitely need no more encouragement toward a hagiographic point of view.
- d.
On 8/29/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Our pop culture articles are rubbish, and they definitely need no more encouragement toward a hagiographic point of view.
Very much agreed. I am very against any suggestion that strongly sourced, accurate negative information that is relevant to the person's notability/notoriety should be removed from articles for 'sensitivity'.
I am in favor of being very tough about the 'well sourced' part, though, and about the notability of life details. Not everything about their private lives that has been e.g. dragged out in divorce court is really notable.
-Matt
On 8/29/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:
Very much agreed. I am very against any suggestion that strongly sourced, accurate negative information that is relevant to the person's notability/notoriety should be removed from articles for 'sensitivity'.
I am in favor of being very tough about the 'well sourced' part, though, and about the notability of life details. Not everything about their private lives that has been e.g. dragged out in divorce court is really notable.
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
On 29/08/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
Yes. Bluntly, most of our articles about pop cultural figures need an enema.
- d.
On 8/29/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Yes. Bluntly, most of our articles about pop cultural figures need an enema.
Evedences?
On Aug 29, 2006, at 6:37 PM, geni wrote:
On 8/29/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Yes. Bluntly, most of our articles about pop cultural figures need an enema.
Evedences?
Have you ever READ a popular culture article?
Particularly one about a fictional character, where you've got better- than-even chances of being right to add {{cleanup fiction-as-fact}} to it before you even start to deal with its other problems, of which there will be many.
Best, Phil Sandifer sandifer@english.ufl.edu
You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. There is a small mailbox here.
geni wrote:
On 8/29/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Yes. Bluntly, most of our articles about pop cultural figures need an enema.
Evedences?
People keep adding badly-spelt one-liners to them.
At 22:19 +0100 29/8/06, David Gerard wrote:
On 29/08/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
Yes. Bluntly, most of our articles about pop cultural figures need an enema.
- d.
You mean like
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amanda_congdon
perhaps?
***
Nurse! The screens!
***
Gordo
On 8/29/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
I think it already *is* stated. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind the bit about not including birthdate information for fear of "identity theft" being removed - sheer paranoia.
Steve
On 30/08/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/29/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
I think it already *is* stated. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind the bit about not including birthdate information for fear of "identity theft" being removed - sheer paranoia.
The *what*? That's bloody stupid.
- d.
On 8/30/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
The *what*? That's bloody stupid.
Fortunately it seems to have been removed. It read thusly:
Privacy of birthdays
Wikipedia includes exact birthdates for some famous people, but including this information for most living people should be handled with caution. While many well-known living persons' exact birthdays are widely known and available to the public, the same is not always true for marginally notable people or non-public figures. With identity theft on the rise, it has become increasingly common for people to consider their exact date of birth to be private information. When in doubt about the notability of the person in question, or if the subject of a biography complains about the publication of his or her date of birth, err on the side of caution and simply list the year of birth rather than the exact date.
Steve
On 30/08/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 30/08/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/29/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
I think it already *is* stated. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind the bit about not including birthdate information for fear of "identity theft" being removed - sheer paranoia.
The *what*? That's bloody stupid.
It may or may not surprise you to know that that is a surprisingly common reason for asking "please do not list my birthdate"...
On 8/30/06, Andrew Gray shimgray@gmail.com wrote:
On 30/08/06, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 30/08/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/29/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
I think it already *is* stated. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind the bit about not including birthdate information for fear of "identity theft" being removed - sheer paranoia.
The *what*? That's bloody stupid.
It may or may not surprise you to know that that is a surprisingly common reason for asking "please do not list my birthdate"...
Of course the fact that it's not useful information combined with the fact that it's almost never an easily verified fact is an equally good reason.
IOW, ask Jimbo to see his birth certificate some time...
Anthony
On 8/30/06, Anthony wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Of course the fact that it's not useful information combined with the fact that it's almost never an easily verified fact is an equally good reason.
Agreed. However, if the birthdate is already public information, I see no point in censoring Wikipedia about it. Verifiability works quite well in this regard; if it's already in reliable source material, then the cat is out of the bag and deleting it from Wikipedia serves no practical good.
-Matt
On 8/30/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:
Agreed. However, if the birthdate is already public information, I see no point in censoring Wikipedia about it. Verifiability works quite well in this regard; if it's already in reliable source material, then the cat is out of the bag and deleting it from Wikipedia serves no practical good.
-Matt
But we include a birthdate for [[James Randi]] when it is no secret that certianly the normal sources include false dates.
On 8/30/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/30/06, Anthony wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Of course the fact that it's not useful information combined with the fact that it's almost never an easily verified fact is an equally good reason.
Agreed. However, if the birthdate is already public information, I see no point in censoring Wikipedia about it. Verifiability works quite well in this regard; if it's already in reliable source material, then the cat is out of the bag and deleting it from Wikipedia serves no practical good.
I think the instances where we have a reliable source for someone's exact birthdate are very low, however.
On 8/30/06, Anthony wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Of course the fact that it's not useful information combined with the fact that it's almost never an easily verified fact is an equally good reason.
It's extremely useful information for the purpose of disambiguating. How do you know that semi-notable Jim Smith who lives in Sydney, born 1957 is or isn't Jim Smith (born Australia 1957, lives in New York)? Knowing their birthdates helps a huge amount.
Also, you don't need a birth certificate to source it. Any published source is a pretty good start.
Steve
On 8/30/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/30/06, Anthony wikilegal@inbox.org wrote:
Of course the fact that it's not useful information combined with the fact that it's almost never an easily verified fact is an equally good reason.
It's extremely useful information for the purpose of disambiguating. How do you know that semi-notable Jim Smith who lives in Sydney, born 1957 is or isn't Jim Smith (born Australia 1957, lives in New York)? Knowing their birthdates helps a huge amount.
The disambiguation page for [[Jim Smith]] seems to handle this fine without mentioning any birthdates.
Also, you don't need a birth certificate to source it. Any published source is a pretty good start.
It's a good start if you don't really care about whether or not it's correct, which is the case with birthdates. But if you don't care about whether or not it's correct, why bother.
Anyway, a published source can be better than a birth certificate. In the case of Jimbo, the Wikipedia article has a different birthdate than his birth certificate, and I'd guess that the article is probably the correct date.
Of course, it brings up questions about truth vs. "wikitruth" when you think about how easy it is to get information into Wikipedia - just tell some news reporter to publish it.
Anthony
On 8/30/06, Steve Bennett stevagewp@gmail.com wrote:
On 8/29/06, Sam Korn smoddy@gmail.com wrote:
I don't think anyone is contesting these issues. The only issue under contention is whether this should be stated explicitly for fear of causing even more hagiography.
I think it already *is* stated. On the other hand, I wouldn't mind the bit about not including birthdate information for fear of "identity theft" being removed - sheer paranoia.
I equally don't think that it *is* is under question, just that whether it *should* be. :)
On 8/30/06, Matt Brown morven@gmail.com wrote:
Very much agreed. I am very against any suggestion that strongly sourced, accurate negative information that is relevant to the person's notability/notoriety should be removed from articles for 'sensitivity'.
I am in favor of being very tough about the 'well sourced' part, though, and about the notability of life details. Not everything about their private lives that has been e.g. dragged out in divorce court is really notable.
The term "sensitivity" is somewhat awkward, and needs defining. To me it's a manifestation of the undue weight problem recognised by NPOV, the problem that comes when well sourced, accurate negative information is given disproportionate attention.
I'm sure we've all seen bios on WP which consist of not much more than negative information, which people have trouble editing down, or editing back into context, because it's sourced and thus sacrosanct.
Undue weight happens everywhere, and we want to correct it everywhere, we just like to say what we're doing is "sensitivity" on BLP articles because it's a little more human.