[WikiEN-l] Getting hammered in a tv interview is not fun

[Fred Bauder]

>-----Original Message-----
>From: Slim Virgin [mailto:slimvirgin at gmail.com]
>Sent: Friday, March 30, 2007 05:38 PM
>To: 'English Wikipedia'
>Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Getting hammered in a tv interview is not fun
>
>On 3/30/07, Daniel R. Tobias <dan at tobias.name> wrote:
>> I think even the Wikipedia Review crowd realizes this, as evidenced
>> by a recent message by Somey that says:
>> WP is going to have to accept the notion that on an anonymous,
>> publicly-editable website, the very existence of a biographical
>> webpage can and should be considered a form of attack ...
>>
>> ... Since such a change would
>> be clearly unconstitutional in the United States (under the First
>> Amendment), he apparently wants a global dictatorship (run by the
>> UN?) that can overrule national laws, courts, and constitutions.
>>
>Is Somey's argument such a bad one? Wikipedia biographies can be the
>cyber equivalent of putting a person in the village stocks. Does the
>Foundation have a duty of care toward people who end up with
>biographical pages, in virtue of offering the website, the tools, the
>policies, and the inadequate policing? Is it foreseeable that our
>policies and the way we enforce them could harm people?  Do individual
>editors have a duty of care toward people when they create bios about
>them?
>
>We don't know what a court would decide, and so it might be wise to
>act before we find out.

Within broad parameters, we do know what courts will decide. The two watchwords are libel and malicious editing.

But beyond that is a duty to be helpful and kind to those who are victims of the structure of our information system. There are many thousands of people who have only received press coverage due to some unfortunate incident. There is no published information about any other aspect of their life. It is grossly inappropriate to have an encyclopedia article about such persons.

Fred