[WikiEN-l] Just to throw this out there...

[Erik Moeller]

Jimmy-
> Search Engines like google deal with this problem all the time.  You
> can find any sort of thing in Google, but you can also search with
> 'safe search' turned on, which presumably helps a bit with that
> problem.

Of course, it is nowhere documented what criteria or algorithms are used  
to filter the sites which are "unsafe", and we all know that these filters  
work terribly -- they either let tons of material go through, or they  
censor tons of legitimate content.

On a wiki, we risk "flagging wars", and by defining what "can be  
considered offensive" we are leaving NPOV behind. Daniel Ehrenberg  
suggested a similar thing a few weeks ago and said that he thought the  
goal of getting Wikipedia into all schools would be worth ignoring the  
NPOV issue. I do not agree. By implementing a "family filter" we may  
convince some parents to use Wikipedia -- and convince others who want  
their children to be raised in an open, progressive manner to ignore it.  
Let's not pretend that the standards of morality that may be predominant  
in the United States are also as common in Sweden or the Netherlands.

Still, I am not fundamentally opposed to filters on Wikipedia, but I think  
whatever solution is used should be NPOV - i.e. allow filtering by all  
types of content, not just one specific one. So, for example, if I want to  
filter *everything BUT* the sex content, that should also be possible.
At which point I refer you to my pet project, team certification :-)

Regards,

Erik