On 9/10/06, Rob <gamaliel8(a)gmail.com> wrote:
On 9/9/06, Jason Potkanski
<electrawn(a)electrawn.com> wrote:
Greetings, Electrawn here. I think this is a
perfect opportunity to
introduce myself since I am being flamed on the list here without a proper
invite
I don't feel that I've flamed you, but I have raised questions (in
what was, I admit, a rather strident tone) about your judgement and
your interpretation of policy, which is a different thing entirely and
I'm sorry if I offended you. In my original message I chose not to
identify users by name to avoid this becoming a debate about
particular personalities. I also chose not to be specific about what
articles I was referring to as I was interested in discussing the
broader issues affecting all articles instead of the minutiae of a
particular article, which belongs on that article's talk page.
Instead, you've chosen to personally attack me and drag out the
details of a single article, neither of which is particularly
productive here.
I am not offended. I don't feel I was personally attack, nor was the
response a personal attack. The post was framed to a single point of
view, designed to solicit yes men drum beating. We agree to disagree.
I do want to clear up some of your misstatements regarding the Jeff
Gannon matter. I am not "in arbitration" regarding this matter, or in
anything at all except in a dispute with another user (more about him
in a minute). An op-ed piece (one which I personally haven't read and
have not proposed using for a source) was not the source for calling
Gannon a prostitute, but was merely one of many mainstream media
sources presented by multiple editors as substantiating the fact that
Gannon advertised his sexual services. The "repeated reversions" I
have made were reverting that user who wished to remove all mention of
this from every WP article that mentioned Gannon.
Personal: If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck...quacks like a duck...
Real World: (My opinion, legal expert needed) If not true, this is
libel. Big...center of the bullseye in the dartboard Libel.
Wikipedia BLP Articles: When in doubt, keep it out...when not in
doubt, bring back in. Don't revert.
Wikipedia Other Articles: Let eventualism ring. Do revert.
Analysis:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=jeff+gannon+prostitute .
Actual Prostitute:
- Primary Reliable Source:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1416370,00.html, a
reliable UK source, dares call him a prostitute.
- Primary RS: The Independant, another UK reliable source, possibly
calls him a hooker in an article title. I am having trouble finding
the article text.
Numerous Unreliable primary sources such as blogs make the claim.
Involved with prostitution:
- PRS: NY Daily News,
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/279556p-239417c.html
"after left-leaning Internet bloggers discovered possible ties to gay
prostitution."
- PRS: Washington Post,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36733-2005Feb18.html .
"naked pictures have appeared on a number of gay escort sites"
Deeper:
AP Archives have nothing on "Jeff Gannon" AND prost* or "Jeff Gannon"
AND escort.
LexisNexis alacarte for "Jeff Gannon Prostitute" turns up 500 hits.
Now we have some real meaty RS all over the place, some claiming he is
a prostitute.
No secondary sources were easily located.
Conclusions: Big mainstream US media doesn't dare make the jump to "A
prostitute." They hover around escort and involved with prostitution.
Mainstream UK Media seems to jump right out and say "a prostitute."
Smalltime US media, but still many reliable sources, seem to
occasionally say "a prostitute."
Questions:
* What is right for wikipedia: ...a prostitute? alleged prostitute
(Note:No charges filed)? involved with prostitution? involved with an
gay escort service? involved with an homosexual escort service? nude
pictures on a escort service website? Leave out alltogether?
-(I personally say leave out all together, lack of journalistic
credentials enough is to tell the story. Parading as a prostitute is
notable and widely reported, however, the guy is human and needs to
make a living. Does this need to be in a biography, especially when
defamation considerations are in play?)
* How many sources is enough to back up potential defamation? One? Two? Three?
-(I say at least three.)
* United States versus British media as defamation backing sources?
Basically, if the US big boys aren't going to stick their necks out,
can wikipedia? Are foreign backed sources enough? Are smalltime US
sources enough?
However, if all these sources are relying on just one source, thats a
big hmm for another discussion.
Final: Before searching Lexis Nexis, I was pretty sure that prostitute
should stay out. After, I feel its use may hold weight.
And thank you for mentioning the issue of the Southern
Voice, which is
perhaps the most appalling of your policy interpretations, which would
prohibit all LGBT publications from being used in Wikipedia. Would
you propose the same thing about Ebony? Univision? If not, why not?
What is the difference? Even if you subscribed to the ludicrous idea
that all LGBT publications are too "partisan" and thus "unreliable",
the proposed use of the Southern Voice was not to provide facts about
Phillips, but to substantiate the fact that some LGBT organizations
criticized Phillips. We do, of course, want to consider issues of
undue weight and prevent WP articles for being overwhelmed with
criticism, but the things you have proposed would serve to eliminate
legitimate criticism from Wikipedia articles and disqualify many
mainstream, reputable sources from being used in those articles.
I am not sure you are following me correctly. LGBT sources and other
narrow audience sources should be used quite sparingly and are not a
reliable source for MOST articles. An LGBT papers Field Of View is on
LGBT people and LGBT issues. This makes it great and reliable for LGBT
biographies and LGBT pages. Articles on say...a CNN journalist push
use of such a source, in my opinion, towards unreliable. Overreliance
on these as primary sources may make articles have a POV.
I think we can agree on:
- Use of advocacy journalism primary sources should be replaced with
objective journalism sources where possible.
As for your LPU, you mention (while taking a moment to
attack me) that
you invited "all sorts of people" to participate. You invited 17.
They included the user who wished to scrub all mention of Gannon's
former occupation from WP, who mentions on his user page that he's
from a conservative messageboard and declares his mission here is to
"correct" WP's "liberal bias". Another was an editor who uses
his
user space to denounce about 20 or so editors by name and until fairly
recently had them under a "list of weasels" or somesuch. These were
the people you thought would be good to recruit, and of course they
eagerly signed up. I thought the small number of members and the
relatively high proportion of problem users among them was alarming.
This was the main reason I thought it was imperative to bring your
project to the attention of more users.
I suppose, humorously (and should be interpreted as), to quote Dennis
Leary: "Thank you, thank you, thank you and ..."
Justice is(er, should be) blind. Treat editors with blindness (and
good faith and civility) until malice. Most of the people invited were
recent contributers to NPOV, BLP, LIBEL, BLP noticeboard talk pages as
well as Kyra Phillips. More metapedians needed at BLPP.
Catch-22, I think. The framing of the post sends people on wikien to
BLPP with a chip on their shoulder, without the framing though, there
would be no interest.
Several times in your long message you repeat the
acronym soup, to, in
your words "beat this in like a headon commercial." We're not idiots
here, we are aware of these policies. What is needed is a thoughtful
application of these policies, not a simplistic mantra. Chanting BLP!
BLP! BLP! doesn't automatically make you right, or does it mean those
who disagree with you want to stuff WP with libel. (Now with 20
percent more libel!) Mentioning reliably sourced unflattering facts is
not libel. Mentioning criticism of the subject of the article is not
libel. But you've recruited a bunch of POV warriors to go around
stripping WP articles of unflattering things about their fellow
political party members (BLP! BLP! BLP!) with no oversight and no
means to watch the watchmen. This coupled with your wildly
over-expansive interpretation of BLP makes me conclude that you should
not be playing a key role in interpreting the policy or implementing
how it is enforced.
Then why I am I seeing quick reversions from adminstrators when
defamation and reliable sourcing are being raised? Both these things
seem to have been much agreed upon to keep out till in and for editors
who want to keep them to prove it? What is needed is to educate most
editors that actions on defamation issues run contrary to prominient
wikipedia philosphies, hence the use of a simple mantra. Chanting
BLP,BLP... is designed to get eyeballs on the problem and the severity
of its nature. Most editors are acting in good faith but are generally
unaware of defamation laws and various journalistic and historical
codes of conduct. When defamation is in play, reliable sourcing needs
to be rock solid and in generous quantity. Depending on the
seriousness of potential libel, verifiability may not be enough, the
standard may have to be truth! Criticism is good but most belongs
outside of wikipedia. I have recruited a bunch of editors to help
build consensus on how to handle problematic BLP articles. If editors
are off willynilly editing articles under a BLPP mantra without
consensus, shoot them and ban them. I am sorry you think I am unable
to play a key role, but I think you misunderstand how I actually think
about this.
Underneath, mostly, I am quite moderate. I am frequently stepping into
zealot shoes and taking devils advocate positions to bring up
defamation issues that need to be addressed NOW. Not only do BLP
articles requires immediatism, the wikipedia policies behind it
require immediatism too. The run a red flag up the highest flagpole
and aim those hollywood spotlights at it kind of immediatism. Its a
ticking bomb.
As for qualifications, over my career I have been a journalist, beat
reporter, opinion columnist, editor, web editor, read AP stylebook,
code of ethics and various ethics textbooks. I have been a political
scientist (mm...SCOTUS!), parlimentarian, read Roberts Rules of Order
cover to cover. Have been a business/technical analyst, where six
sigma, TQM, BPI, scientific management, taylorism and most other
process management buzzwords come into play. Also a computer
programmer: PHP, Perl, Java, C/C++, ircbots like eggdrop and TCL/TK,
to use of mediawiki with xoops on a personal wiki.
So not only do I fully understand the ethical issues and the
significance of the legal ones, I understand political culture and how
to create and enforce processes and policies alike. From a technical
standpoint, I know the limitations and potential of mediawiki and
other software well.
-Jtp Electrawn
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