[WikiEN-l] Policy on putting email addresses on wiki pages

[Fastfission]

I don't think he's asking whether or not people can post their OWN
e-mail addresses on their OWN user pages (something which no one would
oppose -- you do so at your own risk, of course); the question is
whether Wikipedia articles should have the e-mail addresses of their
SUBJECTS posted.

Here's my take on it: Should they contain their post-office addresses
too? Probably not, even if it is just a P.O. Box or some other address
which is not a physical location of where they live. Of course,
generic addresses (so-and-so lives in Washington, D.C.; so-and-so
works in the Chamber of Commerce) are fine, but I don't think specific
addresses are a good idea. Whatever the privacy issues, they are
simply not fodder for an encyclopedia article.

(I think in the case of political figures the privacy issues are
minor, but I think it is also a bad habit to start. People *do* get
touchy about addresses, even if they are technically in the public
domain, like yellow and white pages.)

I think it is better to link to their homepage on the web -- if they
want people writing to them by e-mail or any other methods, they will
post that information themselves. People who want that sort of
information will be able to find it without Wikipedia's help. If they
can't find it without Wikipedia's help, it probably isn't something
that belongs on Wikipedia in the first place (that is, it probably
isn't meant to be accessible).

FF

On 1/31/06, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 1/31/06, Tom Steinberg <tom at tomsteinberg.co.uk> wrote:
> >
> > Is it permissable to put email addresses on wikipedia, if they're
> > already public?
> >
>
>
> Of course it is! How on earth are people to be able to communicate
> with one another if their email addresses are hidden?
>
> I profess profound distaste for the practice of concealing, mangling,
> and distorting email addresses.  I myself have had an email address on
> my userpage for well over a year and can count the amount of spam that
> has gotten though on the fingers of one hand, so there's no excuse.
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