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

[WJhonson at aol.com]

In a message dated 10/6/2008 10:01:30 PM Pacific Daylight Time,  toddmallen at gmail.com writes:

"If  these are really important enough to be in the article,
why hasn't any  other source reported on them besides you?" I think our
content policies  still do quite well at preventing character
assassination or dirt digging  here, but we should be careful not to
exclude well-sourced information  while prohibiting such practices.


-----------------
Sure that was *an* attempt to scuttle research in primary sources.   But after much back-and-forth, we finally settled on a characterization that  allows both secondary and primary sources.  This is especially true in the  case where a particular subject has been opened up by a secondary source.   So as an example:
 
Brad Pitt paid well over five million dollars for his house (People, "Brad  Pitt Interview", 8 Apr 2003) County records show that he paid 5.4 millions (Land  Records Office, Los Angeles County, Reel 52, page 203).
 
The issue where a primary source does not "clarify or add to" but rather  contradicts a secondary source is a bit more touchy of course.  In that  case, we at Wikipedia, do the exact opposite of what source-based researchers  do.  That is, we ignore the primary source contradiction, and allow the  secondary source statement without comment :)
 
Typically in source-based research, like biographies, you would do the  exact opposite.  But hey, I can live with it.
 
Will Johnson



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