[WikiEN-l] [Foundation-l] Lobby takeover of wikimedia projects, particularly English wikipedia

[George Herbert]

I frankly am extremely confused at why so many people are reacting
significantly worse to this than prior incidents.

The effects were not more severe this time, if anything they were less.

The number of people involved was less not more.

The group being more mainstream lessens the danger that their edits
are further off base, though it does make them harder to detect
sometimes.

This is not comparable to issues where we have large on-wiki disputes
between competing factions, such as Pakistan/India.  There is little
risk of policy subversion when the issue is so contentious that
everyone is watching all the time.  That is not to say that those
areas are not hotbeds of contention and problems - but they're not the
same.

The only explanation that makes sense to me is that those who feel
very strongly that this was uniquely severe are those who also are
very strongly opposed to CAMERA's viewpoint on the Palestinean/Israeli
conflict.

Is there anyone who either is neutral on that point or pro-Israel who
thinks this was a terrifically bad incident, beyond that of other
advocacy groups incidents we've had?


-- 
-george william herbert
george.herbert at gmail.com