On May 3, 2006, at 10:51 AM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
The philosophy that NPOV is achieved by warring parties is one that I have always rejected, and in practice, I think we can easily see that it absolutely does not work.
Sometimes it *does* work, if there is a commitment to Wikipedia content policies.
In my experience in editing [[Prem Rawat]] ((Disclaimer: I am a student of his), and not-withstanding the sometimes contentious nature of the exchanges and the obvious lack of talk-page disciple, the article has amassed more than 130 citations over the two years it has been edited, most of which from scholarly articles, books and other reputable sources, making this article one of the best referenced articles in WP. If it was not for the efforts of interested parties, this would not have been achieved.
If editors (interested parties or not) abide by policy and make efforts to improve articles to make them more encyclopedic and NPOV, I see no problem.
I would argue that most articles are edited by interested parties, after all most of us got attracted to WP to address articles and subjects that we knew something about. In the beginning, and until one learns the ropes, one may do more harm than good, but in the long run and if the commitment is there, editors learn the power of NPOV and of the WP community to assert it and protect it against undesirable bias.
Finally, I personally don't see a way to enforce a ban on interested parties, rather prefer that we trust the power of the community of editors that care about this project to contain these situations and to welcome and coach newbies on the best ways to contribute.
-- Jossi