[WikiEN-l] "Corporate Representatives for Ethical Wikipedia Engagement"

[George Herbert]

On Mon, Apr 16, 2012 at 1:38 PM, Sarah <slimvirgin at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, Apr 15, 2012 at 10:18 PM, David Goodman <dggenwp at gmail.com> wrote:
>> It would be better to have a rule to never take the views of the
>> subject in consideration about whether we should have an article,
>> unless an exception can be made according to other Wikipedia rules, in
>> particular, Do No Harm.  People have the right to a fair article, but
>> not to a favorable one.
>>
> David, a major problem with BLPs is that marginally notable people
> sometimes find it quite creepy to be at the centre of apparently
> obsessive attention from people they don't know, who in addition may
> be editing anonymously (and therefore may be people they *do* know!).
>
> A lot of people who commented on the recent case of the radio
> presenter missed this point. They focused on whether the article was
> in good shape, and that the presenter wouldn't explain exactly what
> was wrong with it.
>
> But what was wrong with it was its existence *and* its continued
> editing. If a journalist writes about you, you're going to have that
> person in your life for a few hours or days (unless you're involved in
> something protracted or high-profile). But on Wikipedia, there could
> be obsessive tweaking for years, accompanied by talk-page discussion
> about "should we, shouldn't we, add a date of birth," and "are we sure
> the date is correct," and "maybe we could try to obtain it through the
> Freedom of Information Act."  It's especially odd to continue to do
> this once the subject has asked you to stop.
>
> I can understand that it would feel creepy to be exposed to this year
> after year, if you're not used to it, especially when there's no
> editor-in-chief or publisher you can appeal to. Some people won't
> mind, and some will hate it. It's unkind of us to point to one of
> those emotional reactions and say "that's an irrational response, so
> we're going to ignore you."
>
> Sarah


This is a legitimate concern, but not unique to Wikipedia.  I have
seen people have similar reactions to ongoing local gossip column or
industry coverage (DJ, Radio personality, local politicians, etc) in
local newspapers.

There's an organization and editor to complain to in those cases, but
ultimately unless the coverage is libelous it's really hard to get it
to stop, and making an effort often intensifies the (non-libelous)
total coverage of the subject.

The local activist papers seem to do an event like this to someone
about once an issue.  And keep following up on a few people on a
regular basis, who to me often just don't rise to the level of ongoing
coverage or notability, but the papers have their own viewpoint and
agenda...

We have entrance criteria for notability and quality criteria for
content and neutrality.  If our problem here in this area is
proportional to and hopefully less than that of the other low-end
media problems that people face, I think we're doing ok.  We can't
solve this societal problem.  Privacy's not an absolute right.  There
is no perfect balance point here.


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