stvrtg wrote:
On 3/8/07, William Pietri <william(a)scissor.com>
wrote:
For me, the external problem went well beyond the press. Essjay claiming
he had a couple of doctorates was not so good,
and using them in content
disputes was worse.
Would somebody please provide a source for the claim that he used his fake
credentials to "strongarm people" or to influence "content
disputes?"
I was hoping not to rehash this stuff anytime soon, but strictly because
you asked on the list:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Community_noticeboard/Essjay#Outside…
both the items at the top and other ones mentioned in the endorsements.
In particular, this is the one that I found most clear:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Imprimatur&diff=12614544…
It's his fourth edit, where he defends his very first edit. In it he
says, "I believe the entry to be correct as it reads, and I offer as my
reference the text Catholicism for Dummies" [...] This is a text I often
require for my students, and I would hang my own Ph.D. on it's credibility."
Note that I personally don't think part was a huge deal; as I mention
elsewhere, this is not an uncommon thing for a teenager with a shiny new
identity to do, and from there it looks like he just let it get out of
control. Since he didn't do it a lot, and since we are famously
uninterested in credentials anyhow, I think this did little harm. It was
the lies to real professors and real journalists that were more of an
issue for me, and the coverup on top of that that suggested Essjay had
not developed the character that I look for in somebody holding such
positions of trust.
This is nonsense. Essjay's standing was never
based on his academics, it
was based on his
work and community involvement. Wikipedia's credibility doesn't rest on
credentials, but on
its content. Which suffers not thanks to its many anonymous and
knowledgeable contributors, credentialed or otherwise.
Essjay's internal standing was not based on his academics. However, his
standing when he wrote to professors as a "fellow professor" and his
social standing in the New Yorker article were based his claim of high
academic success. Whether or not people should have taken him more
seriously because of that is an interesting question, but not one that's
relevant. They did, and they will continue to hold professors in high
regard no matter what we think about it.
If we have this problem again it will be a pattern, which will look
especially damning. Although I don't think PR should be the main driver
for anything, keeping the trust of our readership is important to me. To
the extent that credential fraud will make the public trust us less, I
think it's important to address it.
William
--
William Pietri <william(a)scissor.com>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:William_Pietri