On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG <guy.chapman(a)spamcop.net> wrote:
Hmmm. No, I think the question is, can we assume that
paid edits are
good edits. If there is a paid editor, what we actually have to do is
Of course we can't. We can't assume that *any* edits are good edits.
That's why we have patrols.
shadow them to check for subtle bias - if I were paid
to write an
Why? There are plenty of edits being made with blatant bias. Subtle
bias is the least of our problems.
article I would not be 100% confident I could write
without subtle
bias, especially if sources were spoonfed. How do we know that the
sources have not been carefully selected to present a desired
perspective? It would be rather naive to believe they had not been so
You mean they provide sources? Fantastic! That's a huge step forward
from most edits.
I don't know. Companies have disgruntled
employees and enthusiastic
evangelists. Would it matter if they were paid to write? Yes,
because only the evangelists would be paid.
Oh, you must mean like how on many ethnic conflicts, representatives
of one ethnicity editing are outnumbering the others. Or how for an
article on a famous singer, there are more supporters editing the
article than detractors. Yes, it's a problem.
No, worse. I live in Reading, Berkshire. I feel no
particular
loyalty to the town, it's just a place where I live.
So one of my 6 examples doesn't apply to you.
What if Reading paid me to edit their Wikipedia
article? Would I
write that it's a
boring drug-riddled self-obsessed town with a terrible
shopping centre
and extortionate house prices, or would I write something a little
more flattering?
Hopefully something more flattering.
No articles should be written on commission. I
believe Jimbo Has
Spoken on that issue.
Me too. See my original post. I believe Jimbo's point of view was "the
appearance of conflict of interest would undermine our credibility".
Not "paid editing always produces bad edits".
Steve