The date of the Wikinews interview with Mark Bunker of XenuTV is scheduled to take place on Saturday February 16, 2008 at 4:00 p.m. (eastern time) or 1:00 p.m. (pacific time) (21:00 UTC) on the irc.freenode.net server in the channel #wikinews-interviews irc://newyork.ny.us.undernet.org/%23wikinews-interviews.
Jason (Dragonfire1024)
I would like to make a personal request that since this is a high profile topic, with a lot of controversy, that a special effort be made to solicit participation and questions from pro-Scientology community members wherever you might find them.
My general sense of things is that at a personal level, most of you would not be very much in agreement with or sympathetic to the claims of the Church of Scientology. If that's true, then it is important to try extra hard to look deep into your own heart in search of NPOV.
We are here to give information, not to guide people to conclusions. And even if you think poorly of the Church, you can understand why a firmly neutral interview of a critic, one which does not simply hand him softball questions, is actually stronger in the long run than allowing an easy one sided story to develop.
Jason Safoutin wrote:
The date of the Wikinews interview with Mark Bunker of XenuTV is scheduled to take place on Saturday February 16, 2008 at 4:00 p.m. (eastern time) or 1:00 p.m. (pacific time) (21:00 UTC) on the irc.freenode.net server in the channel #wikinews-interviews irc://newyork.ny.us.undernet.org/%23wikinews-interviews.
Jason (Dragonfire1024)
Wikinews-l mailing list Wikinews-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikinews-l
If we can get pro-Scientology people who aren't batshit crazy and refer to us as the "Jimmy Donal Wales Chronicle" then they're welcome to submit questions.
I'm sorry to have to put it as bluntly as that, but we've been trying to get the Church of Scientology to talk to us from the outset. They won't. We'd interview Tom Cruise or David Miscaviage as a counter to the other stuff we've done, but they're simply clamming up and not talking to anyone who won't use the term "cyberterrorist" to describe the 'Anonymous' stunts. We've had random IPs come along and periodically try and insert that into our articles, but it gets reverted out as an excessively POV term.
Incidentally Jimmy, the guy who keeps posting crap on your Wikipedia talk page about us and our coverage was the subject of a Wikipedia arbitration case for similar issues. I'd have to excuse myself from sitting on a judgement on him on Wikinews but I have been told were he to be subject to a permaban on Wikinews the en.WP arbcom would review the case with a view to a similar block. He is a single issue person who has contributed nothing to Wikinews and I'd welcome being notified whenever he pesters you about this. I'm happy to bring a case on cross-project disruption and POV warring about this guy.
Brian McNeil
-----Original Message----- From: wikinews-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:wikinews-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org] On Behalf Of Jimmy Wales Sent: 10 February 2008 15:27 To: Wikinews mailing list Cc: scoop@wikinewsie.org Subject: Re: [Wikinews-l] Interview with Mark Bunker of anti-Scientology Website XenuTV announcement
I would like to make a personal request that since this is a high profile topic, with a lot of controversy, that a special effort be made to solicit participation and questions from pro-Scientology community members wherever you might find them.
My general sense of things is that at a personal level, most of you would not be very much in agreement with or sympathetic to the claims of the Church of Scientology. If that's true, then it is important to try extra hard to look deep into your own heart in search of NPOV.
We are here to give information, not to guide people to conclusions. And even if you think poorly of the Church, you can understand why a firmly neutral interview of a critic, one which does not simply hand him softball questions, is actually stronger in the long run than allowing an easy one sided story to develop.
Jason Safoutin wrote:
The date of the Wikinews interview with Mark Bunker of XenuTV is scheduled to take place on Saturday February 16, 2008 at 4:00 p.m. (eastern time) or 1:00 p.m. (pacific time) (21:00 UTC) on the irc.freenode.net server in the channel #wikinews-interviews irc://newyork.ny.us.undernet.org/%23wikinews-interviews.
Jason (Dragonfire1024)
Wikinews-l mailing list Wikinews-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikinews-l
_______________________________________________ Wikinews-l mailing list Wikinews-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikinews-l
Brian McNeil wrote:
If we can get pro-Scientology people who aren't batshit crazy and refer to us as the "Jimmy Donal Wales Chronicle" then they're welcome to submit questions.
If you are unable to find people who are pro-Scientology to submit questions, then write them yourself! :)
Incidentally Jimmy, the guy who keeps posting crap on your Wikipedia talk page about us and our coverage was the subject of a Wikipedia arbitration case for similar issues. I'd have to excuse myself from sitting on a judgement on him on Wikinews but I have been told were he to be subject to a permaban on Wikinews the en.WP arbcom would review the case with a view to a similar block. He is a single issue person who has contributed nothing to Wikinews and I'd welcome being notified whenever he pesters you about this. I'm happy to bring a case on cross-project disruption and POV warring about this guy.
I understand, any my comments were more philosophical in nature.
My point is that this can be a point of deep personal challenge for a good journalist: to write fairly, to interview fairly, when you have a difficult topic.
In a dispute you can have one side feeding you exactly what you want, i.e. open to interviews, talking about how crazy the other side is, ethwatever. And then the other side, shocked and offended by the whole thing, and refusing to participate, *as is their right*.
A bad journalist will let that set of facts carry the day, and end up letting one side push an agenda.
A good journalist will dig deep and look at all sides critically.
--Jimbo
Where can I submit questions?
Jimmy: You can submit any question, as well as anyone else, straight to the article in the making here:
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Wikinews:Story_preparation/Wikinews_interviews_M...
I welcome any question pro or anti Scientology. And brian is right. We have written and written to the Church to no avail. But yes, we can ask our own too :-)
Jason (DragonFire1024)
Jimmy Wales wrote:
Where can I submit questions?
Wikinews-l mailing list Wikinews-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikinews-l
wikinews-l@lists.wikimedia.org