[WikiEN-l] A war on external links? Was: Inside Higher Ed: Does Wikipedia Suck?

[Fred Bauder]

I think the point is to use editorial judgment with respect to what
external links and further reading are worthwhile.

My experience is that very good links regularly get axed. And there is
little you can do other than to fork the project if you don't like it.

Fred Bauder

> On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 4:39 AM, Charles Matthews
> <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
>> Of your three points, I don't really find anything to agree with.
>> Taking
>> the attitide that "External links" is the name of a "Further reading"
>> section for reading that happens to be online, what exactly _are_ you
>> arguing? That trawling through the first hundred hits on well-known
>> search engines will always produce those links? That is easy to refute.
>> For many sites of high academic value, precisely no (zero) SEO is done.
>> I can easily think of examples. Very good links can be very hard to
>> find, unless you have a good reason to suspect they are there.
>
> High value links should always be provided.  Can you provide an
> reference to a Wikimedian arguing that links to the most useful
> additional resources shouldn't be provided?   I'll gladly go and
> disagree with them.
>
>
> But I do believe that  a list of, say, 50 links tagged onto the end of
> an article typically has negative value for the following reasons:
> * Readers will be inundated, no one is likely to follow more than a
> couple so the very high value links will be lost in the less valuable
> ones.
> * Wikipedia editors are unlikely periodically review links in a large
> collection (supported by the high density of dead links, and the
> malicious sites I've found in prior scans of our internals links).
> * Long lists provide plausible denyability for someone attempting to
> profit by placement, as additions to link soup doesn't look suspect.
> * Someone looking for a large collection of assorted links on a
> subject can find a larger and more current list from any of the search
> providers.
>
>> Given your style of argument, which is that we should be relying on the
>> utility of commercial entities over which we have no control at all, to
>> help our readers find the further information that we know (because WP
>> does not aim to give complete coverage) they will need, I would say
>> that
>> Fred's worries are amply justified.
>
> I bothered making the argument here because I believed that Fred was
> likely mischaracterizing the nuanced position people have taking in
> trying to balance the value of additional links vs their cost as a
> simple "war on external links", when no one was likely carrying on any
> such war:  Just because someone has decided on a different benefit
> trade-off than you doesn't make their activities a "war on all X".
>
> I wish there were a usable non-commercial search engine. But Wikipedia
> clearly isn't that.  Wikipedia's value is in human editorial review.
> A search engine's value is in enormous scale automation, "machine
> neutrality" (not the google results are neutral, but it is resistant
> to many kinds of bias which wikipedia is not), and automated updates.
> Everyone on the internet already has access to high quality search
> engines. I just don't think that making Wikipedia into a poor search
> engine at the expensive of diluting the selectivity is a net positive
> for the reader.
>
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