[WikiEN-l] We need a policy against vote-stacking

[BJörn Lindqvist]

On 5/4/06, Erik Moeller <eloquence at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 5/4/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> > A bridge expert knows that it *is* an important bridge.
>
> Then again, loving bridges, he may not find it in is heart to delete
> _any_ article about them that has sources. Which, to a certain extent,
> is fine with me, but it does have the potential to significantly
> change the whole "deletionism/inclusionism" balance. Imagine the same
> concept applied to Star Trek experts. "Tribble Rebellion of 2280?
> SPEEDY KEEP!"

I don't see the problem? Wikipedia works because autonomous persons
and communities can work on their areas of expertise without having to
go layers of bureaucracy. Except for a few global rules; Wikipedia is
an encyclopedia, Wikipedia is not paper, it is those communities and
their ability to work autonomously that is shaping Wikipedia. That
work process scales very well and is the reason why Wikipedia contain
millions of articles. Centralized processes (like AFD) does not scale
very well at all. Therefore I think it makes sense to avoid
centralized processes.

The more decentralized, the less people involved, the more easy it is
to form consensuses. So if there is a consensus among the group of
Wikipedians working on Star Trek articles that "Tribble Rebellion of
2280" should be kept, then that is what should be done. I think it is
perfectly clear that those who work in the topic area knows best what
articles belong in it. The last thing THEY need is a centralized
process involving clueless opinionated people interfering in their
business.

> Topical AfD is not a bad idea as long as these subcommunities are as
> open as the general AfD, and the only process by which they
> distinguish themselves is one of self-selection. That is, my opinion
> on a topical AfD should not count less because I have not worked in
> that topical AfD before.

In theory yes. In practice, people are more likely to listen to
someone who has credentials.

--
mvh Björn