[Foundation-l] Is a research banner "advertising" of the evil sort?

[Nathan]

On Fri, Dec 9, 2011 at 9:52 AM, Bod Notbod <bodnotbod at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I haven't seen the banner and am not taking a position on it but some
> of your "objections to the objections" seem rather odd.
>
> 1. You say "it's for users who are logged in, not all readers". I am
> not going to take this to mean that you feel advertising McDonalds
> would be fine if it were a) only to logged in users and/or b) only
> displayed to some users. But it is possible to read it that way.
>
> 2. You say "users actually get money out of it" and, again, I will not
> take this as you saying that McDonalds could place ads on Wikipedia if
> they a) allowed users to click through activating a donation to
> Wikipedia and/or b) were given a small sum of money if they clicked on
> it... but, again, you rather leave yourself open to these
> interpretations.
>
> So, if you'd like to fight for the right for the banner to appear,
> fine. But the way you're positioning yourself on the issue seems
> rather flakey.
>


I don't accept your false equivalence between Harvard/Science Po and
McDonalds, nor do I believe you misunderstood my point: that
advertising is commonly rejected for its potential for various harms,
while even those who object to this banner have not rationally
presented any possible harm that could result.

For what it's worth, Beria Lima (as a meta administrator) switched the
banner off unilaterally.

Nathan