[WikiEN-l] Harassment sites

[joshua.zelinsky at yale.edu]

Quoting Will Beback <will.beback.1 at gmail.com>:

> joshua.zelinsky at yale.edu wrote:
>> Quoting Will Beback <will.beback.1 at gmail.com>:
>>> 'm not proposing removing all external links, I'm proposing removing a
>>> small number of links.
>>>
>>> I hope that you aren't saying that all external links provide value and
>>> we should never remove any external link that a well-meaning editor (or
>>> greedy website owner) adds. If we stopped deleting external links and
>>> removed the spam blacklist I predict we'd have more links than text,
>>> especially in some topics. We include a large variety of links because
>>> they provide encyclopedic value. If we determine that they don't provide
>>> that value then we delete them.
>>>
>>> Will
>> This is a strawman. The point is that we shouldn't be removing links from an
>> article unless those links are somehow damaging to the content. The
>> distinction
>> between a random blog or a spam link to buy cars and Michael Moore's 
>> personal
>> website should be obvious.
> There are many ways of damaging the encyclopedia, and by extension the
> content. Harassing Wikipedia volunteers indirectly harms content and
> disrupts the community. (Yes, I know that the pat response is: "But
> removing the links causes even more disruption!", to which my response
> is "If we have a policy with a procedure then there needn't be any
> disruption involved in handling harassment links).
>
> Spam links don't damage articles, at least not individually, nor do
> blogs. Are you saying that a link to buying cars is worse than a link
> urging people to call an editor at work to complain about his editing?
>
> W.
>
The problem with spam links at all is that even a few of them make people less
likely to trust whether the external links provided are useful. And speaking
frankly, one of the first things I try to do when learning about a
controversial topic is see what external links Wikipedia has. I doubt I'm the
only one who does that. As long as the page which happens to have an attack on
the Wikipedian is a relevant external link it is better and doing less damage
to the article than a link about buying cars or a random blog. And the vast
majority, most likely all, the damage from harassing links will occur whether
or not we link to the website. The end result of this also is to remove more
and more to prevent harassement. For example, if someone keeps harassing an
editor until the person's article is deleted, do we delete it? No, not 
any more
than we would if the person in question had politely asked for their 
article to
be removed as one of borderline notability. Nor do we make convenience
alterations and remove pertinent information of notable people simply to stop
their little campaigns on Wikipedia. We do remove information when the 
sourcing
is questionable, but that's basically it. And there's no substantial 
difference
changing that policy whether we change it for birthdates, external links,
sourced criticism or anything else.