[WikiEN-l] Arbitration Committee Seeking Comment

[Gregory Maxwell]

On 6/6/05, JAY JG <jayjg at hotmail.com> wrote:
> it was never intended. When it is pointed out that obvious arguments will be
> cited *somewhere*, the response is that some things are so obvious (e.g.
> "like the fact that the sun rises in the east") that it would actually be
> hard to find someone specifically stating them!  

Hm. I'm the only person in recent memory who has made such a claim, so
should I be offended that you appear to be binning me in with crackpot
theorists?

For the record, I've never been a party to a content dispute on wikipedia.

I've discussed NOR because I believe it's a fundamentally weak idea at
its core but it functions as a bandaid to solve many problems *now*...
but long term we need process in place to accept and reject new
research in a way which keeps out most of the crackpots (or at least
mitigates their harm) and doesn't break NPOV.

Already wikipedia has become a better (more complete, more neutral,
more verified and reviewed) corpus than some of the sources we cite,
simply because our process are our contributors pretty good for some
things... or alternatively, because other places are so bad. :)  In
any case we're weaving an odd world where wikipedia will become a
default source of reliable general material... but to insert something
new you must first publish it someplace less reliable.

... The point is that in the process of reinventing the encyclopedia
we are also reinventing peer review. The logical conclusion is that
while the encyclopedia should not be a repository for original
research (because it's an encyclopedia), we will ultimately end up
building such a repository because our process is superior and because
we will eventually need it as a reference once we've put everyone else
out of business. ;)    Which is why I proposed wikiviews as a first
cautious step in that direction.