[WikiEN-l] Proposal: limited extension of semi-protection

[Stephen Bain]

On 5/26/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> geni wrote:
> > On 5/25/06, Jimmy Wales <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:
> >
> >> But, she has a stalker.
> >>
> >> The stalker posts longwinded ranting criticisms and insults of her.
> >>
> >> Do we cite those?
> >
> > Depends. Who is the stalker? Who reported on the stalking?
>
> Precisely my point.  It is an editorial judgment.  We can't say "just
> because it is true and verifiable we should post it in wikipedia".

We do have a simple test to guide us:

    * If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to
substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;
    * If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should
be easy to name prominent adherents;
    * If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited)
minority, it doesn't belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some
ancillary article) regardless of whether it's true or not; and
regardless of whether you can prove it or not.

So the first bar to get over is, is the stalker "prominent"? I take
this to mean "could the person have an article written about him/her"?
If not, then the viewpoint doesn't need to be included.

Thoughtful judgement helps out when the test fails to give a simple
answer, for example it may be decided that the views of someone shown
to be a stalker should not be included at all, even if they were
someone notable.

-- 
Stephen Bain
stephen.bain at gmail.com