[WikiEN-l] What we need

[Larry Sanger]

An open letter to Jimbo:

We really need your help.

These messages from Ed and KQ are really disturbing to me:

http://www.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2002-November/000018.html
http://www.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2002-November/000038.html

They and I suspect others are feeling weariness at having to deal on the
list (now wikien-l; see:
http://www.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2002-November/date.html ) and
on the website with a small but tiresomely droning cadre of what can
probably most accurately be described as anarchists.  They've basically
taken over Wikipedia-l and drone on and on, engaging in what I think is
really offensive political posturing and forcing old hands to defend
policies long decided.  At this point, it probably isn't necessary or
helpful to name names, but the people reading this will be able to guess
who I'm talking about.

Jimbo, many of us have put in many hours on the project, and who have
left, want clearly enforceable standards--I think I'd be speaking for
Julie Hoffman Kemp and Michael Tinkler, who are long gone, as well as Isis
and many others who had less patience than they had.  We, and many people
who *haven't* left but who have toyed with the idea, are fed up with
constantly having to deal with vandals, trolls, and idiots, and for that
matter with the anarchists who defend and embolden them.

I know you strive very hard to be fair, to be slow in making potentially
damaging decisions, and you rightly want to keep this project open and
free.  I totally agree that this is an excellent management policy.  I
also know that you're busy with money-making activities.  But you really
could help, I think, if you took a public stand on a few things.

For both of us and for most people reading this, these things should go
without saying; but because they're constantly being hammered away at by
the anarchists and some newbies, those of us who are defending these
policies need your moral support.  It would help if you somehow conveyed
such things as the following:

* We will not tolerate biased content.  The neutral point of view is not
open to vote; it's decided.  If you don't like it, go somewhere else.

* There are certain other policies as well that basically define us as a
community.  We have arrived at them by broad consensus, and they should be
respected.  Wikipedians working in good faith should feel empowered to
enforce those policies.  They shouldn't have to apologize for doing so!

* We will not stop banning vandals.  We should seek out the best ways we
know how to make sure that non-vandals are not lumped in with the vandals,
but please stop talking as if we'll just stop banning them, because it
ain't gonna happen.

* We try to help newcomers who want to contribute but don't quite
understand the body of good habits (and rules) we've built up.  But we
should not and *will* not tolerate forever people who are essentially
attempting to undermine the system.  See below.

* To whatever extent we are or are not, or should be, a democracy, the
following is also true.  We are a benevolent monarchy ruled by a
"constitution" or, anyway, a developing body of common law that is not
open to interpretation, but not vote.  This has been the case from the
beginning, and we aren't going to change that.

Again, you might think these things shouldn't need saying.  You might not
want to say all of them.  But I really think these points need
reiteration, and from *you*.

In addition to this, it would help a LOT for you to solicit draft
statements of policy regarding clear circumstances in which people can be
banned for being really egregiously difficult.  There has to be a
*reasonably* clear line drawn that distinguishes difficult but
on-the-whole useful contributors, on the one hand, from contributors so
egregiously difficult that the project suffers from their continued
presence.  The policy should codify, for example, the reasons why we did
ban 24 and Helga, and the reasons why we might ban Lir.  Let's have a
discussion about this, bearing in mind that one option that is *not* on
the table is that we might decide *not* to ban people for their trollish
behavior at all.  We definitely will, so let's make the policy clearer.
You could start the discussion and make it clear that at some point soon,
we *will* determine a policy.

I don't mean to put words in your mouth of course.  I'm just saying that,
IMO, Wikipedia is really suffering, and even losing people.  You're in a
position to help embolden the most productive members of the project, who
it seems to me are, in at least some cases, getting very discouraged.

Larry

P.S. Folks, if you agree with me, maybe it would help to say so publicly
or privately to Jimbo.
-- 
"We have now sunk to a depth at which the re-statement of the obvious is
the first duty of intelligent men." --George Orwell