[WikiEN-l] BLPs: Wikipedia entry nearly scuppers rugby player's career

[Philip Sandifer]

On Oct 1, 2008, at 5:37 PM, David Gerard wrote:

> 2008/10/1  <WJhonson at aol.com>:
>> In a message dated 10/1/2008 2:31:37 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
>> dgerard at gmail.com writes:
>
>>> He's  famous for the
>>> science, the personal life is not particularly relevant to  that and
>>> probably shouldn't go into the article.)>>
>
>> *Unless* it's been cited and sourced for 20 newspapers and his ex  
>> was on
>> Oprah dishing him right?
>> The Johnson and Johnson family is well-known for being wealthy, but  
>> they  are
>> also well-known for having one of the largest will-contests in   
>> history.
>> I'm sure we wouldn't want to advocate hiding information that is  
>> already
>> well-known among those who know anything about it in the first place.
>
>
> Well, no. If a scandal was clearly noteworthy, it's clearly
> noteworthy. BLP really kicks in for the minorly notable.

Though also tricky is the extended public meltdown Britney Spears is  
clearly notable in part for her lengthy and public difficulties. We  
could easily narrate those at length - after all, every bit is well- 
sourced, and it's clear that scandal is a part of her notability.

The problem is often not even one of deliberate POV, but of a lack of  
understanding of the process of summary. It's the same problem we have  
in our fiction articles as we get grotesquely long plot summaries -  
people narrate things event by event instead of tracing major threads,  
and treating the article like an argument with a thesis statement and  
evidence to back it up.

Which is to say, Wikipedia is written by people who never took or  
passed a basic composition class, and it sometimes shows. Go figure.

-Phil