[WikiEN-l] WikiEN-l Digest, Vol 71, Issue 74

[Matt Jacobs]

>
> Message: 6
> Date: Mon, 29 Jun 2009 17:03:33 +0100
> From: Sam Blacketer <sam.blacketer at googlemail.com>
> Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] News agencies are not RSs
> To: English Wikipedia <wikien-l at lists.wikimedia.org>
> Message-ID:
>        <e75b49f70906290903m485a5e6bo285d4216cc2dc993 at mail.gmail.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=windows-1252
>
> On Mon, Jun 29, 2009 at 4:55 PM, geni <geniice at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > 2009/6/29 Gwern Branwen <gwern0 at gmail.com>:
> > > ?We were really helped by the fact that it hadn?t appeared in a place
> > > we would regard as a reliable source,? he said. ?I would have had a
> > > really hard time with it if it had.?"
> > > ...
> >
> > The question is though is is
> > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pajhwok_Afghan_News genuinely not a
> > reliable source?
>
>
> What was that underlying principle which was codified after the Brian
> Peppers deletion debates? Ah yes, 'basic human dignity', now to be found at
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Basic_dignity.
>
> This case is more about basic common sense. If someone's life may be
> endangered by what is on their wikipedia biography but is not widely
> reported elsewhere, I would expect that anyone sensible would find some way
> of applying policy so as to keep the life-endangering stuff off it. And
> that
> would take precedence over secondary arguments over whether obscure news
> agencies were reliable.
>
> --
> Sam Blacketer
>

Thank god common sense won out over the egotism of those who insist they
must know everything as soon as it happens, and also to tell everyone in
every forum possible.  It would be utterly absurd to even take the
self-centered whining regarding censorship seriously.  Waiting several
months for the conclusion of the incident in no way harmed WP.

It really doesn't matter what policy administrators used to keep it quiet,
or even if they abused the rules.  The information had a very real
probability of affecting whether a man lived or died, so that takes obvious
precedence over internal rules on an online website.

Sxeptomaniac