[WikiEN-l] Good writers always welcome (was A tidy way of handling "popular culture" references)

[Gregory Maxwell]

On 8/24/06, Erik Moeller <eloquence at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 8/23/06, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 23/08/06, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > Follow De's lead and retire the text that says 'anyone can edit' in
> > > favor of 'Good writers always welcome'?
> >
> >
> > OH YES PLEASE.
>
> Please not. See the earlier thread:
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2006-June/049731.html

I didn't throw it out as a really serious suggestion, but I don't
agree with your argument.

The disadvantage of the words "anyone can edit" are threefold:
1) It's not completely honest: If you are emotionally handicapped, or
otherwise mentally disabled, and cause problems as a result you will
ultimately be asked to leave. It's not hard to argue that there are
some people who can't edit, at least not for long. This must be the
case, because while being inclusive is valuable, it can not override
our primary goals.
2) It's too handy an excuse: We frequently get arguments from people
who argue that they should be able to do whatever they want (spam,
violate NPOV, etc) because they see anyone can edit as a permission to
do anything.  Changing the words won't stop their bad actions,
perhaps, but it will remove this demoralizing exchange that our good
editors must suffer.
3) Most importantly, it's a matter of respect. Everyone knows that the
world contains a lot of harmful people... and increasingly "anyone can
edit" is viewed as in invitation for the worst that humanity has to
offer. As I've argued elsewhere, we must show the greatest respect for
our own project if we are to expect others to respect it. So while a
message saying that we're only interested in good writers will not
directly stop bad ones, I believe retiring the words "anyone can edit"
will indirectly discourage bad behavior by increasing the overall
respectability of the project.

 I think this thread has been productive... the proposed alternatives
are quite interesting.