[Wikinews-l] Date-specific vandalism

[Benjamin Massey]

Robin Shannon wrote:
>> At any rate, plenty of well-respected journalistic and news authorities
>> aren't above celebrating April Fool's Day. I don't see why we should
>> hold Wikinews to different standards.
>>     
>
> Because others hold wikimedia projects to higher standards than
> traditional media. If the NYT or britanica gets something wrong, then
> that just shows that no one's perfect. If we get something wrong it
> proves that this damned new-fangled wiki stuff shouldn't be trusted.
>
> paz,
> -rjs.
>   
And there is an epidemic of people writing "Wiki[blank] carried an April 
Fool's Day joke, ergo, Wiki[blank] is hopelessly unreliable"? While I 
don't pretend to have my finger on the pulse of the Internet, the 
scuttlebutt does not seem to head in that direction to my knowledge. 
While our errors are certainly overcriticised from time to time (and our 
inclusions more so!), our jokes are, to my knowledge, not.

Reversing the bad rap Wikinews and its ilk get is a good thing, but this 
seems to be barking up the wrong tree to me.