Gesh... Another post about something I've done. I'm
sure Jimbo is becoming convinced that I am a troll or
even worse. :(
What I wanted was either a statement why this person
was important (so that it could be included in the
article) or for someone else to review the darn thing
and see if I wasn't crazy in thinking the thing was
not encyclopedic. Sorry, I wasn't here for these
earlier discussions and was therefore working under
the premise that wikipedia at least was trying to
become an encyclopedia in some modern sense of the
word. That definition being; "The circle of arts and
sciences; a comprehensive <i>summary</i> of the entire
range of human knowledge, or of a branch of knowledge;
esp., a work in which the various branches of science
or art are discussed separately."
Usually in a summary we leave out the non-essential
parts and players. But then you do have a point in
noting that we have articles on each of the Simpsons
characters and nobody really finds this too
objectionable. Heck, I have even contributed to some
of the Star Wars character pages! BTW it was <me> who
wikified [[Max Weismann]] right after it was created
(so let's not get the idea that I'm trying to be an
overbearing censor here -- I'm not very keen on doing
work and then having it removed <unless> it is best
for the project ;). JHK later wrote why this person
was at least marginally important - which was good
enough for me - so I changed my vote from removal to
rewrite for clarity (before I read this message BTW).
I guess I can now write that article about my boss
that I have been wanting to write for several months
-- she isn't widely known outside of her very narrowly
focused field but has been very important in trying to
advance the application of a particular type of
transit-oriented smart growth strategy by working from
within California's bureaucracy. I never wrote it
before because I thought others would think that it
would be un-encyclopedic and delete it. But if
allowing the minor players is allowed, then I'm all
for it -- but I think that the people and things we
cover <i>do</i> have to be players in at least some
sense (I don't think we want to become geocities or be
responsible for spreading misinformation or
propaganda, right?).
maveric149
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup
http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
The current software maintains a history list for each article. I
think at the moment all revisions are kept permanently; at various
points in the past very old versions were archived off somwhere (and
this will likely happen in the future as well. The current article
and each revision maintains information on who made the edit when.
I propose adding a few fields to the description of each revision:
these fields are "approval" fields of various types.
Wikipedia "editors" will have access to a form with checkboxes where
they can indicate "I believe the content of this article is correct
and complete", "I believe the text of this article is well-written",
etc. These flags are maintained with the _revision_ to which they
were applied. In the history list of each article, they appear as
flags as well, so users and administrators can look at the history
list to see which revisions have been approved for what reason.
Article revisions with _any_ approval flags set will not be archived,
but always kept in active history. Articles with _all_ approval
flags set will be specially treated as "complete" for use in
collections and such.
At some later point (if at all) we may add features to allow users to
view "lastest approved" instead of "latest" by default, but that
won't be useful until a large number of articles have approvals. At
any rate, we can start collecting the information now and figure out
how to use it later.
0
On the talk page for Max Weismann maveric wrote the following...
And what has this person done to warrent an encyclopedia article? There are A
LOT of presidents and directors of entities and a lot more editors -- why is
this one so special? --[[user:maveric149|maveric149]]
Now I'm not criticising Dan at all here, simply exploring the issues that this
comment raises.
It is a question that strikes at the very heart of the Wikipedia project... who
decides what deserves to be here and what doesn't? The article in question does
not contravene any of the Wikipedia rules, it does not advertise, it's not
offensive... it's just boring and trivial, and probably of no interest to
anyone except his close friends.
But IMHO, it deserves to be here. Mainly because choosing to get rid of it
solely on its lack of "significance" (as opposed to its violation of 'pedia
rules) would severely damage the project.
Unfortunately "boring and trivial" is what I would say about a lot of Wikipedia
content. So who decides? I think the ultimate standard is "If someone feels
that an article needs to be written, then it deserves to be here". I know we
have an entire series of articles on central mexican hip-hop bands, including
ones without recording contracts. They stayed for the very reason that someone
bothered to write about them.
To extend our authority into the realm of "deserves to be here or not" is to
open ourselves to a cabalism and disenchantment by the community. For example,
if I had "MY" way, all of the articles on all of the sub-characters of the
Simpsons would go, you'll never convince me they have any merit at all. Ditto
for the articles on the minor characters from Star Wars. However, I personally
regard the individual musicians who played with Frank Zappa on his various
tours to be far more interesting, and one day I might write about them. I
suspect some of you would disagree... etc etc etc.
So who will decide which of these articles "deserve to be here" ? To do so
means answering the question: "Are the Simpsons more important than Frank
Zappa?" How can you answer that question from a NPOV?
I am aware we have standards for articles such as advertising content, these
are fairly black and white. But discriminating on "significance" is much more
dangerous.
What criteria will be applied?
How do you (and who will) create the criteria?
How do you apply them without bias?
Is the winner of the Uzbekistani Fish-slapping championship "trivial"? Says who?
I could go on, but you get the idea.
Damn I can't wait to get out of India :) I hope they don't nuke Bombay as my
flight connection is through there, and it's so hard to change your flight to a
different city.
Cheers
Manning
Hello,
While trying to bring new people to internat.
Wikipedia, I have been asked what was the validation
process in terms of reliability for the article...
I don't exactly know where to find an approach to this
question (there's much to be said) and I don't know
either where to ask the question :-)
Is it possible to have a "short" answer to it and to
be provided help to find the right pages where this
point is raised ? There are so many pages on the
english wiki, and I can't read them very quickly. I
don't know whether he speaks english (I YM_M4I5S3S_6
hope he does, the en YM_M4I5S3S_7 contains great stuff
!), so I maybe will have to translate a minimum for
him (and the next ones ?) to understand the concept.
I guess if the guy answered, he is interested in some
way, and I would like to avoid answering to him in two
weeks. Could somebody help me here please ?
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! - Official partner of 2002 FIFA World Cup
http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com
I think what we decided before was that since disk space is cheap, we could feel free to write about anything that merits an article (that's of course subject to opinion).
I wouldn't question anyone else's article unless it had no google results, or almost none. I remember one of 24's contributions turned up only four domains that mentioned it, and I questioned that as an attempt to coin a term rather than describe existing topics.
kq
>> It is a question that strikes at the very heart of the Wikipedia project... who
>> decides what deserves to be here and what doesn't? The article in question does
>> not contravene any of the Wikipedia rules, it does not advertise, it's not
>> offensive... it's just boring and trivial, and probably of no interest to
>> anyone except his close friends.
>
>[snip]
>
>Hmmm... IMO, if you can write at least three interesting paragraphs
>containing valid information on a subject/person/thing, then it deserves
>to be there. To take Star Wars as an example, I don't think we need a
>page for say characters who said two lines in Attack of the Clones, or
>for the actors who played them. There just isn't enough to say about
>them. But if there's a character who says 2 lines in AOTC and pops up
>again in the next one whatever it's called and was also in the first
>one, well then there's something to say about them.
>
>I guess it's a matter of personal taste more than anything else.
>
>--
>
>Karen AKA Kajikit
>
>You can take the dragon out of Alfandra, but you can never take Alfandra
>out of the dragon (or the Kitty)...
>
>Come and visit my part of the web:
>Kajikit's Corner: http://Kajikit.netfirms.com/
>Aussie Support Mailing List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AussieSupport
>Allergyfree Eating Recipe Swap:
>http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Allergyfree_Eating
>
>Love and huggles to all!
>[Wikipedia-l]
>To manage your subscription to this list, please go here:
>http://www.nupedia.com/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l
>0
Below is a copy of the most recent talk on [[talk:Reciprocal System of
Theory]]:
Responding to some positive posts, maveric149 wrote:
Fantastic! I have been waiting for somebody else to chime in. Now maybe we
can continue the discussion so that the longer version can be tweaked some
more so that the people advocating the shorter version will be satisfied or
at the very least be able to live with a modified longer version. I would
like to hear from them -- especially since they have more complete knowledge
of the subject matter and arguments against it (which will be needed to make
the longer version closer to NPOV). I would like to second 130.94.121.26's
(is that you Jimbo?) statement about not simply replacing the current version
with the longer one until a compromise is reached. Perhaps if those with
knowledge of why this theory is pseudoscience heavily edited the longer
version, then it might be acceptable. I wish I had the appropriate knowledge
to edit the longer version myself -- but I don't. My goal all along with
protecting the page was to put, at least, a temporary stop to the outright
replacement of one version with another (a forced truce, if you will). Maybe
this can now be done. Although we might still decide that an external link to
a more complete treatment is more appropriate (which still tends to be my
vote -- especially if nobody has the time or energy to make the longer
version NPOV). Hopefully the authors of the shorter version can help us
decide what to do. --maveric149
The proponent of the longer version, Doug, responds:
I'm not sure I know quite what to say. I'm pleasantly surprised, certainly
pleased, and even somewhat moved by the show of reason and understanding
evident in these comments. I think what you chose to do maveric was the right
choice. I'm grateful to see the end of the brutal deletes, and the
expressions of a real desire to get to a genuine NPOV are certainly
encouraging. I'm ready to help all I can. I have reread the Wikipedia policy
and articles on etiquette and NPOV writing. I know I need help on writing so
as to restate the various views while not asserting the one I happen to agree
with, I've found that it's not as easy to do as one might suppose.
Doug
- end -
We should probably now continue the specific issue of what to do with this
particular article on that talk page. However, some framework on what to do
<in general> in these cases should be discussed here (again in a limited
fashion so that we can get on with more interesting matters).
-- maveric149
On Sunday 26 May 2002 12:01 pm, Jimbo wrote:
> I looks like maveric149 protected the page. I'm tempted to remove
> your sysop status, mav.
I have emailed Jimbo directly concerning this statement.
maveric149
On Sunday 26 May 2002 12:01 pm, : lcrocker wrote:
> There's no real conflict; there's one anonymous crackpot with a
> pet theory, and the rest of the reasonable community. The crackpot
> doesn't even /try/ to follow our guidelines here--he simply wants
> to make that article an advertisement for his pseudoscientific
> bullshit, and when we try to make a useful article out of it, he
> just restores his crap. I don't think we should "lock" the article,
> but only because that prevents other reasonable people from editing
> it. I /do/ think we should ban the crackpot if he doesn't give up.
>
Hum, I don't know about banning his IP; that seems to be a drastic measure
given that the "crackpot's" focus is on a single page. However, I think we
should at least try to make his version closer to NPOV by editing it and
placing in appropriate qualifiers. Such as; "Larson says X, however working
scientists in the field say Y." The protection on the page has been lifted
and Doug has already been warned <not> to simply replace the current version
with his own. We should consider a ban <If> and <only> if, he reverts the
article again. Otherwise I think we should at least try to make his version
more NPOV.
> In general, though, I think we should not make hard-and-fast rules
> about use of sysop features. We should use judgment, and do whatever
> is good for the project. A content war between reasonable people
> who disagree is one thing, and we should treat such a conflict with
> respect. But a crackpot spreading total nonsense is another, and we
> should use whatever tools we have to defend against his damage.
Well since I was the one who protected the page, I guess I have to agree with
you Lee. ;) Actually, I totally agree with you - within the context of a
general framework, we should be able to exercise case-by-case judgement as to
when we use our sysop powers to do what we feel is the best <for the good of
the project.>.
With that said, I do think that a slightly different protocol for protecting
pages needs to be devised (otherwise the question would not have been posed
in the first place). Should we bother the list with requests for protecting
particular pages? If so, then it would also make sense to bother the list to
ban IPs since I feel this is even a more drastic measure than <temporarily>
protecting a page. However, a lot of damage can be done during the delay....
This may not be as much of an issue with protecting a single page though
(since it can just be restored later). On the other hand, others may make
valid edits to the POV version inputed by a troll which causes versioning
issues that would have to be worked-out later. My view, is that the sysop
doing the protecting should list the reasons why on the talk for the page and
the lock should be limited in duration (unless it is on the main or one of
the policy pages). It would also be nice to have a comment field on the
protection page and and an easy to find log of 'who has protected what' and
why.
In this particular case, I looked over the edit history of the page, and read
both the talk and old talk. After that, it was my personal <judgement> that
Doug's actions bordered on vandalism since he was replacing an agreed upon
version with his own biased one. But I did not feel that it would at all have
been appropriate to consider banning his IP <because> his actions were only
directed at a single page. This may have been an error in judgement on my
part since this had the effect of not allowing <anybody> but sysops to edit
the page (it would be nice to have the ability to limit certain classes of
contributors from editing a protected page - <only> blocking non-logged-in
users would have worked in this case). All I wanted to do was to force a
truce in order to stop the version war <so that> a compromise could be
reached.
I could have <easily> protected the page and not tell anybody about it.
PS PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE lets limit this discussion so that we can discuss
the FAR more interesting ideas on beta/stable. I fear that this will become a
red herring and trump that discussion...
maveric149
> My opinion would be no, because I thought we were never to use
> sysop privileges in a fight over content. I would like to hear
> what others think, though. I know there's been some conflict over
> the page.
There's no real conflict; there's one anonymous crackpot with a
pet theory, and the rest of the reasonable community. The crackpot
doesn't even /try/ to follow our guidelines here--he simply wants
to make that article an advertisement for his pseudoscientific
bullshit, and when we try to make a useful article out of it, he
just restores his crap. I don't think we should "lock" the article,
but only because that prevents other reasonable people from editing
it. I /do/ think we should ban the crackpot if he doesn't give up.
In general, though, I think we should not make hard-and-fast rules
about use of sysop features. We should use judgment, and do whatever
is good for the project. A content war between reasonable people
who disagree is one thing, and we should treat such a conflict with
respect. But a crackpot spreading total nonsense is another, and we
should use whatever tools we have to defend against his damage.
0