[WikiEN-l] Fwd: The counterattack of the PR companies

[Ken Arromdee]

>> This directly conflicts with the Wikipedia FAQ/Article subjects (2012) page
>> that specifically
>> asks public relations professionals to remove vandalism, fix minor errors
>> in spelling,
>> grammar, usage or facts, provide references for existing content, and add
>> or update facts
>> with references such as number of employees or event details.
>But the real-life situation is that someone paid to edit has a boss and/or
>paymaster. Jimbo knows what he is doing here with sending out a soundbite,
>rather than citing the page. The boss can understand the soundbite, and is
>almost certainly not going to bother to understand the page.

Let me get this straight.  You are arguing "It is okay to for Jimbo to tell
the company something which contradicts policy because it's more likely
the company will understand the non-policy than the actual policy".

>Yes indeed. Jimbo neither makes policy nor enforces it, of course.

"Besides, it's their own fault for listening to Jimbo anyway.  They should
know enough about Wikipedia to understand that he doesn't make policy.  I
mean, he's just the public face of Wikipedia, why would anyone who needs to
know about Wikipedia policy listen to him?"

To any normal person, this is simply a case of Wikipedia contradicting
itself.  The fact that it's not because Jimbo doesn't make policy is a
piece of Wiki-arcana that the outsider really can't be expected to
understand.  The fact that we're deliberately trying to get the people to
listen to Jimbo and ignore the actual policy just makes it worse.