[Wikipedia-l] Autofellatio

[Andre Engels]

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 19:11:55 -0500, Gregory Maxwell <gmaxwell at gmail.com> wrote:
> At the same time, what I see being proposed is the idea that it's
> acceptable for wikipedias in differing languages to have a differing
> set of standards, and this is the one, and perhaps only, point where I
> am reasonably confident that I am not misunderstanding Anthere.  I
> don't see how these ideas can coexist.

I think it's perfectly well acceptable. There is not one possible
'ultimate' content of Wikipedia, and one language will make other
choices than others. If one language uses image A and another uses
image B, should we start having a project-wide vote on which one is
better, and then, if B is chosen, force the first language to change
their article?

> If our test of a material is it's value to educate and inform, is it
> not true that the same material which would educate and inform would
> also educate and inform people of another language?

The test of material is not its value to educate and inform, the test
is whether it improves the given article and Wikipedia. And it seems
to be generally accepted that there are places where Wikipedias
differ. On the Danish Wikipedia there are stubs that would not be
accepted as such on the German Wikipedia (I think). Should one of them
change their policy because such stubs do/don't educate and inform? I
don't think so.

> A policy that says that we will exclude content differently depending
> on the language of wikipedia, says that we are applying an additional
> test, a test of moral rightness.

A policy that says that we will exclude the same on all languages,
says that we don't trust the Wikipedias to make their own choices.

> I jumped in the thread because I believe that the idea of differing
> standards inclusion standards in differing languages necessitates
> censorship and I decided that it was a worthwhile matter which was
> being ignored in the thread... because of the separately worthwhile
> discussion of applying technical means to address that specific form
> of vandalism.

I disagree that you say it 'necessitates censorship'. To me, forcing
the same inclusion standards to all languages is censorship. Unless
perhaps we take the most lenient standards possible. But do you really
want to *force* Wikipedias to include certain images?

Andre Engels