-----Original Message-----
From: Slim Virgin [mailto:slimvirgin@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, March 30, 2007 05:38 PM
To: 'English Wikipedia'
Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Getting hammered in a tv interview is not fun
On 3/30/07, Daniel R. Tobias <dan(a)tobias.name> wrote:
I think even the Wikipedia Review crowd realizes
this, as evidenced
by a recent message by Somey that says:
WP is going to have to accept the notion that on an anonymous,
publicly-editable website, the very existence of a biographical
webpage can and should be considered a form of attack ...
... Since such a change would
be clearly unconstitutional in the United States (under the First
Amendment), he apparently wants a global dictatorship (run by the
UN?) that can overrule national laws, courts, and constitutions.
Is Somey's argument such a bad one? Wikipedia biographies can be the
cyber equivalent of putting a person in the village stocks. Does the
Foundation have a duty of care toward people who end up with
biographical pages, in virtue of offering the website, the tools, the
policies, and the inadequate policing? Is it foreseeable that our
policies and the way we enforce them could harm people? Do individual
editors have a duty of care toward people when they create bios about
them?
We don't know what a court would decide, and so it might be wise to
act before we find out.
Within broad parameters, we do know what courts will decide. The two watchwords are libel
and malicious editing.
But beyond that is a duty to be helpful and kind to those who are victims of the structure
of our information system. There are many thousands of people who have only received press
coverage due to some unfortunate incident. There is no published information about any
other aspect of their life. It is grossly inappropriate to have an encyclopedia article
about such persons.
Fred