On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 21:45:45 -0700, Mark Williamson node.ue@gmail.com wrote: [snip]
He seems to think that you were directly suggesting Ant fork, which is definitely not the case. (as far as I can tell, you are saying that she is at odds with foundation philosophy and that if she really wants to have a Wikipedia where it doesn't follow philosophy, she can make a fork; rather than a suggestion that she really should)
This is quite correct... In this case it my be a matter of my debate style, which usually works exceedingly well in person (more indirect communication channels), but sometimes fails miserably in email.
I think it's useful to extrapolate past any unknowns, draw some conclusions related to what I care about most, and let discussion refine the accuracy of those conclusions. This usually results in everyone's position being accurately determined in a minimum number of exchanges.
The statement about the fork was by large a trueism... if someone actually disagrees with the fundimental goals, they should fork.... At the least it's an *option* for someone who is upset about the continued inclusion of offensive images.
I think it's a reasonable additional option for any group that is upset about the content of the wikipedia that is not removed because we are making an effort to impose our values on the articles.
I don't want anyone to fork, but I think that preserving core goals is much more important than avoiding forking.
There are a million ways I could have been (and most likely was) wrong with my assumptions, but it would be dishonest of me to end my statement with a wimpy 'this doesn't sound like the type of policy that we want' ... I believed certain views were being proposed, and pointed out what I thought they would or perhaps should result in... I think it is better to completely expose my assumptions, and the seriousness of the matter right away so that the other side has the chance to put me in my place as quickly as possible.
Now that we've gone off on a tangent because I was too hasty with my statements....
This still leave us, I think, with Anthere proposing that differing languages should have differing limitations on permitted content because of cultural norms.
Lets ignore the problem of mapping cultures to languages for a moment... I still think that this leaves us in a position of deciding about content based on a (perhaps mob rule driven) value judgement of good vs bad knowledge, rather than the simple basis of deciding based of the ability of the information to inform and educate. I know censorship is a hot word, but I think it applies well to this situation, no matter how noble our goals are.
I think this is worth discussion.