Talk:Criticism of Wikipedia

Note: This is the Talk page for the Wikipedia article on external criticisms of Wikipedia. Users interested in discussing their own problems with the project should go to the Village Pump where there are specific sections for dealing with various types of issue.

For critical takes on Wikipedia covered by Wikipedia itself, see Wikipedia:External peer review/Nature December 2005 (40 science articles) and Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2005-10-31/Guardian rates articles (7 articles of general interest).

Controversy with the Authors and Readers of Webcomics

A frequently cited criticism of Wikipedia and one that is sometimes blamed for the decline in traffic is the manner in which an admin determines that certain topics aren't significant enough to merit an article and deletes the article written about the topic. As a result of this policy, several articles about popular webcomics and blogs that recieve tens of thousands of viewers according to Alexa, many of which won critical praise had articles about them deleted by wikipedia. <references/http://www.webcomicker.com/?p=33> <references/http://comixtalk.com/terrence_markswikipedia_and_y> It was viewed as not acceptable my many webcomic authors and readers that articles about websites and webcomics that have tens of thousands of regular viewers are deemed as candidates for deletion as a result of an admin who is personally unfamiliar with the comic. Others found it counter intuitive that because of Wikipedia's deletion policy, users who come to wikipedia looking for information about a popular blog or webcomic or site were unable to find it. This seemed to go against what was traditionally considered one of Wikipedia's greatest assests, it's ability to provide information on topics that professional encyclopedias like Encyclopedia brittanica were too limited in scope to cover. Others view as a sign that Wikipedia has become too hierarchical, closed, and overrun with "admins" and "editors" and Wikipedia itself is becoming burdened by the bureacracy of of it's editing staff.

Elitism of Contributors

In the section entitled "criticism of contributors" the article absolutely needs to include the complaint that seems to be one of the most prominent criticisms leveled against wikipedia. That the contributors are elitist in determining that certain topics aren't significant enough to merit an article and deletes them. This is not acceptable when it's an article about a website that gets tens of thousands of regular viewers. Dozens of very popular webcomics and blogs that recieve tens of thousands of viewers according to the internet traffic tracking service, had articles about them deleted by wikipedia.

In short, any website, blog or webcomic that a decent number of people may come to wikipedia to learn about deserves to not have the article on that website, blog or webcomic deleted and thus have nothing turn up from their search.

Wikipedia is fantastic in that it lets you find straightforward information about any topic. Wikipedia's contributors shouldn't be deleting articles about blogs and webcomics that recieve a decent amount of traffic just because they personally don't know about them. This is the definition of elitism. And it also weakens wikipedia's ability to serve as a useful straightforward reference on virtually any topic.

The single greatest strength of wikipedia is that it contains so much more information than brittanica and every other encyclopedia could ever hope to contain. This is a strength that should be emphasized and encouraged, not actively undermined by elitist "contributors" who decide that just because they personally haven't heard of a blog or a webcomic, means that the thousands that do don't matter, and that the dozens of visitors who stumble onto the blog or webcomic anew and who turn to wikipedia for information about it deserve to have nothing come back on the search.

I can't mention how many times I come to wikipedia nowadays to learn about a new site with a lot of users and contributors only to have no article come back because an elitist editor decided that the article on that site/blog/webcomic wasn't important enough to be included. Pushy elitist editors deleting articles left and right, this is a problem that's worse than ever.

I regularly contributed to wikipedia since it's inception. But I've stopped contributing as a result of this and have actively encouraged others to do so as well. And that's going to continue until wikipedia changes it's policy on deleting articles left and right.

People who come to wikipedia looking for information about a popular blog or webcomic or site deserve to find it. That's the entire point of wikipedia, to provide information on things that brittanica was too limited in scope to cover. Wikoogle (talk) 22:26, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Have you got a source for this criticism, or is it more based on your own experience? -GTBacchus^(talk) 23:45, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

This is pretty much word-for-word the same criticism that you wrote in deletion policy, so I'll give you the same answer here that I gave you there.

The reason why there should not be an article for every blog and webcomic that has a few thousand visitors should be pretty obvious: Wikipedia does not exist to promote anyone's website, products or services. I've tagged a few articles about webcomics for deletion because they failed to assert their notability in any way. Actually, I usually tag garage bands that have never toured, signed with any record label, or had their music played on any radio station outside of their hometown. Then there are small businesses that have no significant national or international sales, and have received no media coverage. Then there are the biographies of a living person who has no notable accomplishments. I've tagged a number of articles about people who currently have a job, some kids and a dog. So? I've even seen articles about people in their teens and early 20s whose primary accomplishment in life so far has been graduating from high school or university! Whatever the case, the article is usually created by the owner/artist to promote themselves, since basically no one has ever heard of them. There are six billion living people, tens of millions of small businesses, millions of bands, and thousands of webcomics. If a webcomic becomes famous enough that its content starts to be quoted or imitated, fan sites appear, and merchandise starts to be sold in stores, such as Homestar Runner, then it deserves an article. If a webcomic is only read by you and other people who go to the author's university, its scope or appeal is too narrow to merit an article on Wikipedia. If we lower the requirements to allow a biography of any person who has ever had a family, or an article about every blog, comic, band and business that operates out of someone's basement, Wikipedia could easily have 100 million articles by 2009! That would really mess with search results, and make it difficult for readers to tell which businesses/bands/blogs/comics have national or international appeal, and which ones have an audience mostly composed of people who live in the artist's dorm.

Wikipedia policies sometimes need improvement, and everyone is welcome to participate in that discussion. As for claiming that articles about webcomics are being deleted by elitist Admins... don't you think it's a bit elitist of you to think that you can determine which webcomics are notable enough to deserve an article? If you're an expert on webcomics, please feel free to contribute content to the webcomic article. Maybe you could add a list of "popular" webcomics that might have appeal to fans of the genre, but aren't notable enough to deserve their own article yet. As for your perception that the articles are being removed at the whim of individual Admins, that's probably not true in most cases. With the exception of articles that are so obviously frivolous that they qualify for speedy deletion (patent nonsense, vandalism, etc), articles are proposed for deletion, usually by regular editors (since Administrators represent a tiny, um, elite fraction of all editors), and everyone in the world has at least 5 days to state an opinion. If, after 5 days, no one has made a strong case for why the article shouldn't be deleted, then an Administrator is free to delete the article because the people have spoken. What I'm saying is that articles are generally deleted at the will of the people, not the whim of a single Admin. If you feel that an Admin has acted inappropriately in deleting some article, please bring it to the Admin's attention, and if you're not satisfied with his or her response, then bring it to the community's attention. Maybe you're right and disciplinary action should be taken. But remember, an Admin isn't a vandal just because he deletes an an article that you think is notable! If they really are in the wrong, the rest of us are smart enough to come to that conclusion. There are more checks and balances on Wikipedia than there are in any government. Where else can absolutely anyone have a say in virtually any aspect of policy? There are some aspects of policy which I think could be more democratic but, for the most part, this is as good as it gets. DOSGuy (talk) 17:17, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I’m more inclined to think that the increasing toxicity of the community, coupled with power-drunk admins and people obsessed with the bureaucratic way of getting things done has finally gotten to the point where it drive more people away than come in.

There was a time when I logged over 1000 edits a month. Now I rarely bother to visit - not because there’s less work to do, but rather, because so much of what goes on there is unpleasant crap.

Ian

Fanatics and Special Interests

Why are we using the word "fanatics"? Calling people involved in criticms of Wikipedia, especially the Christian Post article and Conservapedia, fanatics, is pejorative, insulting, and amounts to little more to substituting childish namecalling for any response to the points made by these people. StaticElectric 07:00, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I also agree that fanatic is too strong a word and per Wikipedia policy is most likely a word to avoid. I renamed the section with the new title "Strong point of view editing," not sure if this is the best title for that section so feel free to change it to something more appropriate.¤~Persian Poet Gal ^(talk) 07:13, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

WIKIPEDIAJIHAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! kidding lol. this article seems like its criticizing itself just to let ya know. --Storkian aka iSoroush ^Talk 00:23, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Query about wikipedia data backup/recovery plans if wikipedia main server crashes

In Wikipedia Signpost interview dated 10 September 2007, WS asked question to wikipedia founder Jimbo Wales: 'As a follow up, does the Foundation have data backup/recovery plans in place should a disaster occur?'.

In reply to this question, Jimbo wales replied: 'Ask User:Brion VIBBER. I am not really qualified to answer detailed technology related questions'

According to Jimmy Wales, User talk:Brion VIBBER is competent to answer the question. But User talk:Brion VIBBER may not read this question on his talk page and can be contacted only by email. And emails are not reliable source according to wikipedia policy. Hence whether wikipedia foundation has data backup/recovery plans is unclear.

I just want to whether wikipedia has such plans in place. If yes, please answer it here with reliable source. If no, please allow me to post single line that, 'whether wikipedia has data backup/recovery plans in place if disaster occurs to wikipedia main server is unclear'.

I believe I am commenting on very important question by giving reference to interview with Jimbo Wales.

I politely request wikipedia editors/administrators not to push me too far. Otherwise unfortunate situation may arise and wikipedia will have to block three IP addresses. And that is like blocking one billion peoples and cellphone users in almost all countries on earth.

I politely request you to either answer my query or allow me to post single line.

I've tried to explain on your talk page that original research, unsourced personal opinion, and unsupported speculation can't be included in Wikipedia articles. I am restoring sourced, accurate information about what Jimbo said in his Signpost interview and about WP's periodic database dumps, which are made publically available to help insure against catastrophic data loss. Please stop inserting your speculations and opinions into the article with no support or sources. Thank you. Casey Abell 14:33, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Casey and I apologize for my frequent edits.

When I figure out this database dump, I will write article for average reader and Jimbo Wales.

But I have figured out that google, yahoo catch almost all wikipedia articles every week or so. Hence nothing to worry about data loss.

You may remove my addition to 'prediction of failure' section if you think it is unwarranted there. If I remove it, someone may consider it as 'vandalism'.

Thanks very much.

abhishka 15:30, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

quality of writing on Wikipedia

I am a bit surprised and disappointed to see that one of the most common (and in my opinion, important) criticisms of Wikipedia is not even mentioned on this discussion page, namely that the writing is often of extremely poor quality. I notice that "waffling prose and antiquarianism" (an oddly Victorian turn of phrase which might invite the criticism of . . . well, waffling prose and antiquarianism) is included, but that isn't really the point. One advantage that traditional encyclopaedias have over Wikipedia is the relatively uniform and generally conscientious application of certain minimal standards in grammar, spelling, and punctuation. While many Wikipedia articles are very well written and literate, an alarmingly high number are not. Am I alone in thinking this? Am I wrong? If I am, I won't mention it again and you can delete this comment as irrelevant. Just a small thought by way of constructive criticism. Mardiste 00:21, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't support deleting comments because they're irrelevant or wrong, and I think consensus is with me on this. We need to have sources in order to add more criticism to the article. It must be published somewhere, as in a magazine or newspaper, because Wikipedia doesn't provide unverifiable content. A.Z. 00:21, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I found an applicable quote from, guess who, Andrew Orlowski on the general problem of poor writing in Wikipedia. I added it to the "waffling prose and antiquarianism" section as a generalization of what Rosenzweig said about WP's history articles. By the way, I personally think the overall quality of WP writing is much better than Rosenzweig and Orlowski concede. Casey Abell 01:17, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I find it interesting that while the main articles are normally, but not always, well written, the Discussion forum contains very many contributions that show a lamentable lack of education on the part of the authors. This manifests itself, inter alia, in poor grammar, spelling and punctuation. I have also found that "uncomfortable" comments on my part have been deleted, sometimes with accusations of trolling, whilst semi-literate, racist and sectarian entries have been allowed to remain. I'm hoping to join Citizendium, which seems to be a more scholarly forum. Millbanks 09:31, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

I'll agree with about the quality of the forum entries. I've found myself mis-spelling words and omitting minor ones altogether. The main articles get refined and move towards perfection while the discussion sections are left alone almost completely so as to maintain an accurate history of the discussion, and to help know who said what? I'll grant you there are more scholarly places to be, but what works? Citizendium has an Alexa rank of 95,323 while WP is around 9th. I am still predicting that the two will merge some day. Nanabozho 19:25, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Ownership of Articles

In my opinion this is a key criticism of Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WP:OWN Antony272b2 04:17, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

External links

I would like to see some of the dated external links (those that are news articles posted on a particular day) to be folded into the main text as inline references. I think that this should be done even if it requires that new assertions be made in the text. The process is simple: read the external article, read this article and find a home for the link. Again: if the external article makes an interesting and relevant claim not in the Wikipedia article does not, then add a new sentence to the article and add the link as an inline citation and remove from the external links section. Maybe we should have a template that suggests such.--Mightyms 20:35, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

De Facto Leader

Why in the devil does it say that Jimmy Wales is the de facto leader of Wikipedia 3 times? I think most readers of this page probably could care less from knowing that he is so much cooler than us "mere mortals", that it has to be mentioned 3 times. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.161.208.225 (talk) 04:34, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

I screwed up.

Could someone please delete sub-page Criticism of Wikipedia/Criticism of the concept. I mis-read the guidelines. --Cat Lover 21:01, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Y Done - Nihiltres^(t.l) 23:12, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Has Wikipedia peaked?

Please take a look at the graph at the blog here. I think it is because of developing negative internal dynamics and the inability of the administrative staff to keep up with the growth of users. The project is far from complete. Should something like this be addressed in this article?--Filll 14:21, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

The slowdown in growth is definitely a possibility for the article. You can find a balancing viewpoint here. All sorts of caveats, though, especially because the slowdown finding is based on a (large) sample of articles rather than complete stats on all articles. And it's only a supposed slowdown in the rate of growth, not a stoppage of all growth or an actual shrinking. The encyclopedia is still expanding at a brisk pace – there has definitely been no peak in the total size of Wikipedia. Also, outside media haven't picked up the story much, so maybe we should wait a little to see if it develops into anything major. Casey Abell 16:52, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

I have realized that this comes from a very interesting page on Wikipedia. If you click on the image, you get directed to pages of User:Dragons flight with a lot of interesting discussion about this:[1] I hope it turns into an article especially if we can find someone outside who picks up on this so it is not OR.--Filll 19:14, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Interesting discussion on the talk page of the analysis. Several people are challenging the declining rate of growth argument, and there are some graphs which show that the rate of growth has actually increased recently. Again, all this looks like premature OR for the article right now. Casey Abell 12:58, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree that it is too early, particularly since it has really received minimal interest in secondary sources so far. But it is quite interesting. I am quite interested in the subject personally, so I will keep an eye out for any further mention outside of WP.-- Filll 13:08, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Humorous Critcism

Encyclopedia Dramatica is not an attack site. I see no harm in putting a link to the site there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.51.59.46 (talk • contribs)

There has been a broad consensus for quite some time that ED does not meet the requirements of WP:NOTE, nor of WP:EL. If you wish to argue for its inclusion, you would be best advised to do so in terms of those guidelines. -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:15, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Link to WR?

Some editors have been edit warring a link to Wikipedia Review into and out of the external links section here. I don't think that site is a source to which we should link, per WP:EL. Until consensus can be demonstrated that its value as a source is sufficient for us to use, I propose that the link not be used. Accordingly, I've removed it from the article, and I've created this section to facilitate discussion of the site's merit as a source. Opinions? -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:22, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

I'd say that site is extremely meritorious of inclusion here; it's the best-known of all the critical sites, is actually fairly well moderated, has interesting discussions, and besides, every damn administrator here who's worth his or her salt reads the site. Should definitely be mentioned in the article (as they say, whether you like the site or not). +ILike2BeAnonymous 08:35, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

I neither like nor dislike it; besides, my feelings about it are irrelevant. Apparently I'm not worth my salt, either. Thanks for the input, anyhow. -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:37, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Um... reinserting the link "per discussion" means that you think a consensus has been demonstrated. That takes more than one posting. I won't edit war with you, but... do you seriously believe that link has consensus support? :( -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:43, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes, ex post facto. +ILike2BeAnonymous 08:46, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry, I don't understand what you mean. Can you please unpack that answer a little bit? I don't know how something can have "ex post facto" consensus. -GTBacchus^(talk) 08:47, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

BADSITES strikes again. The top page of Wikipedia Review contains nothing offensive in any way, unless a critical attitude towards Wikipedia is considered offensive in itself. I often read the forum to view criticism of Wikipedia that is unavailable on the encyclopedia itself. A couple threads have been personally critical of me, but I can live with that. Among other notable items, Wikipedia Review help break the Essjay story. The BADSITES crowd censored linking to the site on Essjay controversy. Now they want to banish all mention of it here. This is typical of a scared, silly, censorious attitude. Instead of selectively removing links to threads on the site which may be unacceptable, the BADSITERS rise up in holy horror at the entire site – which makes Wikipedia look like a timid old maid from the 1840s.

Yanking all links to Wikipedia Review is disruptive, unnecessary, and unjustified by policy or ArbCom decisions. Now the article has been protected in its scared and silly form, where we can't even mention one of the leading criticism sites. More BADSITES insanity. Casey Abell 15:03, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

No. Not BADSITES. I'm questioning the appropriateness of this link in this article per WP:EL. ArbCom said that the inclusion of such links is a matter for sound editorial judgment, and that's the question I'm trying to raise. The article was being edit warred without any accompanying talk page discussion. This is where we should be discussing, not each others' motivations ("scared, silly, censorious attitude," which is ad hominem and unnecessary), but we should be discussing how this link does or does not meet the criteria laid out in WP:EL. Is there any way we can discuss that? -GTBacchus^(talk) 16:08, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

In particular, from our external links guideline:

Links normally to be avoided

2. Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources for explanations of the terms "factually inaccurate material" or "unverifiable research".

11. Links to social networking sites (such as MySpace), discussion forums/groups (such as Yahoo! Groups) or USENET.

12. Links to blogs and personal web pages, except those written by a recognized authority.

I question the suitability of the link to Wikipedia Review per these guidelines, not per some misguided "attack sites" policy. -GTBacchus^(talk) 16:42, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh come on, of course it's BADSITES. The users removing the link have been among the most prominent supporters of this nonsensical non-policy. As for the EL argument, Wikipedia Review has often been dead-on in its factual accuracy and citation of relevant diffs from Wikipedia. I mentioned the Essjay controversy, and a major contributor to the site was also a key player in the Siegenthaler incident. If a site that often offers accurate and important criticism of Wikipedia can't be linked in Criticism of Wikipedia, what can be linked? If a specific thread from Wikipedia Review is objectionable on EL grounds, then remove the link to that thread. But removal of every link to the entire site is exactly BADSITES, and it exactly resembles censorship and Victorian-old-maid silliness. Casey Abell 17:05, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

I've never supported that policy, and I'm the guy you're talking to now, and all I'm willing to talk about is WP:EL. That's what ArbCom charged the community with doing: exercising sound editorial judgment, per the consensus-based wiki model. I'm trying to determine whether there is a consensus that WR meets EL. That's all.

Now, you ask "if WR can't be linked, what can?" That's easy to answer; look at WP:EL. We can use sites that are reliable sources, offering notable views, and which publish responsible, verified information. Is WR one of those, in the case of this article? That's my question. I'm not "removing every link" to anything; check my contributions. If you think I have any interest in "Victorian-old-maid" silliness... heh, heh... you don't know who you're talking to. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:18, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

If you're concerned about EL, then apply it on a link-by-link basis, as any policy on references should be applied. If a link to WR or any other site violates EL criteria, remove the link. But blanket removal of every link to Wikipedia Review is silly, censorious and an exact example of BADSITES. The link to the top page of WR does not mislead anybody or violate any other criterion for referencing material relevant to this article. We already reference in this article many criticisms of Wikipedia that I think are unfair, misleading and downright dumb. (That asinine image from Encyclopedia Dramatica is the groaner of all time, for instance.) I haven't removed those links because I believe the reader should be given the right to decide on the validity of the criticisms. I only wish that other editors would stop removing links merely because they don't like the site where the link resides...which is the exact definition of BADSITES. Casey Abell 17:32, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Have I removed more than one link? Have I even removed that one more than once, ever?! You tell me to apply the policy on a link-by-link basis; that's precisely what I'm trying to do here, and you, instead of paying any attention, are accusing me of supporting a policy of which I'm one of the most vocal opponents. Now at what point will you be prepared to put the ad hominems aside and talk with me about this particular link in the context of EL? Why do I have to beg for this?

I have been extremely frustrated with the purges of which you speak, and that is precisely why I am trying to refocus the discussion on policy, one link at a time, patiently and with application of "sound editorial judgment", as ArbCom requested. Now... can we talk about the policy already, or would to make up some more bullshit about me first? -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:21, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I agree completely with GTBacchus in this respect. If the link is to be included, there needs to be a value judgment about the encyclopedic value of the link with respect to the article, from the perspective of a reader of an encyclopedia, not a player of inside-wikipedia baseball. What value does that link provide? We do not (currently) link to creationist claptrap sites when discussing the Piltdown Man. MOASPN 02:26, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

(after EC) Thanks very much for noticing what I was actually saying, MOASPN. What's really annoying about Casey Abell's reaction is that I'm attempting to model correct practices here. I removed the link one time, posted immediately on the talk page (which previous removers neglected to do), and I cited policy, without making any kind of remotely personality-based or ILIKEIT-style argument, and he jumps down my throat for some mass action of which I've never been a part. I'm sorry for venting; I'm finished now. I entreat all of us to try to refrain from jumping to conclusions about each others' motives. If I've made the same mistake without noticing, I guess that would be typical, and I'm sure someone will point it out to me. -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:31, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I think GTBacchus is getting some of the flak from people frustrated with the whole BADSITES business, which is not really fair since he's one of the more reasonable and thoughtful people out of the group that is generally against such links. I still disagree with much of his position, but if everybody in the debate was as fair and reasonable as him there wouldn't be nearly the level of heat and acrimony that there's been. Now, back to the real topic: while links to forums are discouraged as sources, that's not how the link in question is being used; it's explicitly there as a link to a prominent forum for discussing Wikipedia criticism. As such, I think it belongs here. *Dan T.* 02:30, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I guess when pro-BADSITES people think I'm anti-BADSITES and anti-BADSITES people think I'm pro-BADSITES, I must be doing something right, yeah? -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:33, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't mean to be a broken record, but "What value does that link provide?" Stating that "it's a very prominent forum" doesn't even take a step there - there are lots of very prominent things that linking to provides no value to our readers. Reading this specific forum as a non-player of inside wikipedia actually misinforms our readers - it is like linking to a creationist claptrap site on the article about the Piltdown Man. There are many good criticizers of Wikipedia - is the goal of linking to this rubbish to discredit real problems? If so, I suggest said strategy is backfiring, and leaving our readers stupider. MOASPN 02:41, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

• I strongly agree with GTBacchus here. WR does not pass muster with WP:EL, whether you consider it a GOODSITE, a BADSITE, or an UGLYSITE. ah-AH-ah-AH-aahhhh wah-WAH-wah... :) - Crockspot 16:48, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

I did not know about WR until I read these lines. Why were admins so concerned about linking to this web site? It seems very interesting to me. 128.227.27.99 (talk) 15:18, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Novus Ordo Seclorum

Four out of the five people who removed the link make comment that make me suspect the believe some policy REQUIRES the deletion-- they are clearly in error about this. But GTBacchus clearly states that's NOT his concern, that he considers the matter to be something to be decided by consensus, and that he's not acting out of a blanket purge mentality-- and I believe him on all counts.

Furthermore-- as much as I would love a nice test case to prove to everyone BADSITES is dead once and for all, I think I have to actually agree with GT on this. This article is about "Criticism of wikipedia", not "Critics of wikipedia". Looking over the article, it seems like we have no shortage of good secondary sources, so we should be able to satisfy WP:V without resorting to a primary source. WR, as a forum, isn't a very good EL, since it presents its content in threaded conversation instead of static prose. If it were a different article and WR merited mention in the text, I think NPOV would say we'd have to link to it. But honestly, given the current article, it looks just kinda tacked on at the end, just sort of hanging there. If it were notable enough to have its own article, or it there are enough news stories to support an article about the "critics of wikipedia", that might make an article, but I'm skeptical that subject is sufficiently notable to have enough reliable secondary sources.

But this is the beauty of living in a post-BADSITES world. We get to actually decide these things based on what's best for the encyclopedia. We get to talk about it, share our views, swap ideas, and form a consensus-- rather than having the answer dictated to us.

When the link was first removed from this page, I took it for a blind "vandalism-esque" deletion based on BADSITES-- I would have instantly reverted it, and fought to defend it. But now that we're being encouraged to actually form consensus again, we wind up having a discussion. And GTBacchus, invariably one of the most reasonable people in the room, has made an excellent point, eloquently explained it to me why this particular link isn't a very good one, and changed my mind anyway.

So for those that doubted-- let it be seen. The revolution was never about promoting our critics-- it was about improving our encyclopedia. :) --Alecmconroy 12:08, 21 October 2007 (UTC)

Okay, we'll leave out the link. I think it's silly that we can't link to the top page of a forum which has often provided valuable and accurate criticism of Wikipedia - criticism which was hardly "claptrap", to use one of the nouns tossed around. Some people might not like the role that WR played in the Essjay incident, the Siegenthaler incident, the media attention to plagiarism on Wikipedia, etc. But that doesn't mean we should censor all mentions of the site. I'm in the minority here, so I'll bow to BADSITES. But I'll put on record that I don't like the censorship. Casey Abell 12:26, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

{{fact}} MOASPN 12:32, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

The fact tag is kind of funny. I could provide the requested references to threads on WR that discussed Siegenthaler, Essjay and plagiarism on Wikipedia - but I'm not allowed to link to them! The BADSITES catch-22. Casey Abell 12:51, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

I could create a blog with discussions on Siegenthaler, Essjay and plagiarism on Wikipedia that state that the blog was the source that broke each of those. If there are reliable third-party sources commenting on this forum's activities, please present them. Forums, as self published sources, are not reliable. MOASPN 14:29, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Okay, try Essjay controversy for WR's role in the Essjay mess. But you probably wouldn't consider that reliable, either. I shouldn't even point out the reference, because it will probably now get scoured from the encyclopedia, as many other mentions of WR are disappearing. I couldn't disagree more that BADSITES is "behind us." Renamed in an Orwellian fashion as MALICIOUSSITES (principle 15.1 of the ArbCom decision) the policy is being used to get rid of links to WR throughout Wikipedia. See JzG's contribution page if you don't believe me. But as I said, I've surrendered on the issue. This will be my final comment on the matter. Casey Abell 15:21, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

{{Verify source}} - source does not state anything about Wikipedia Review. I've flagged it for review. MOASPN 16:48, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia 'review' is still quite clearly a bad source of information. Brandt's well connected to the LaRouche crackpots, and the ArbCom decision is still highly relevant to that can of worms. 123.255.55.62 10:27, 23 October 2007 (UTC)

Given the recent blind-insertion of the innapropriate external link, I question the initial comment. While it appears those in support of a BADSITES proposal were focused on encyclopedic value, at least some of those in opposition were certainly not. MOASPN 18:15, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

It does little good for the discussion to characterize people on either side as "blindly" doing things or as "not focused on encyclopedic value". *Dan T.* 19:13, 26 October 2007 (UTC)

I think EL covers this one in the main space, we don't need to invoke BADSITES as it doesn't pass muster as an EL or a reliable source. Thanks, SqueakBox 15:34, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks

Thanks, Casey Abell for finding so diligently these sources. After our flurry of edits over the last couple of days, the article is better sourced and more accurate. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 22:53, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the very kind note. Maybe I shouldn't say it, but this article has to be one of the easiest to source in the entire encyclopedia. Type Wikipedia NPOV or Wikipedia sources or Wikipedia just-about-anything into Google, and you get a flood of stuff. The Internet is loaded with criticism of this encyclopedia. Casey Abell 23:42, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Jossi is right that the sourcing is improved. Separately, I see that there seem to be several blogs in the "external links" section. WP:EL says:

• Except for a link to a page that is the subject of the article or an official page of the article subject—and not prohibited by restrictions on linking—one should avoid:
• Links to blogs and personal web pages, except those written by a recognized authority.

Are there recognized authorities on Wikipedia? I know some grad students have published studies on it, so I suppose they'd qualify. Anyone else? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 23:55, 27 October 2007 (UTC)

Since there's no response I'm guessing there's no defense of the inclusion of blogs in the external links. I'll be bold and remove them. If anyone wants to show how individual blogs are written by recognized authorities on Wikipedia then I'd be happy to see those restored. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 20:36, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia article deletions

Wikipedia article deletions are affecting our donations to the extent that it is notable news about Criticism of Wikipedia. If we created the article Wikipedia article deletions sourced with those news reports we could at least have a place that mentions and says something about stuff that does not otherwise warrant an article and redirects could be created pointing at that article. Might help with fundraising too. Anyway, I thought it was an interesting idea. Anyone care to give it a shot? WAS 4.250 17:49, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Proof that Wikipedia is being used for spying

See this. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Begantable (talk • contribs) 22:15, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Nifty graphic. All the info shown there can be gleaned from information available to any wikipedia user. Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} 02:35, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Okay, we can't even mention Encyclopedia Dramatica

I'm not going to revert any more on this. But I'll put on record my objection to attempts to eliminate even a mention of Encyclopedia Dramatica from this article. Like it or not, ED is now a very popular parody of Wikipedia, and efforts to hide this fact are, in my opinion, foolish and counterproductive. One thing's for sure, I never want to hear "Wikipedia is not censored" again.

And by the way, a backhand reference to ED remains in the article. Casey Abell (talk) 03:19, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

I added a mention of ED cited to its mention in a New York Times Magazine article. If they thought it was important, it certainly merits four words in one paragraph at the end of the article. 75.175.3.211 (talk) 06:04, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

Wow, I'm just appalled that there is not an article on ED on the wikipedia. That is just the most fascist f'd up behavior for what I thought promised to be an uncensored collection of human knowledge. How childish and what a waste. I'm really floored and have lost a lot of respect for something I thought was really great. Cyclopsface (talk) 04:53, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Um... if Encyclopedia Dramatica had received non-trivial converage in multiple independent sources, we'd have an article on them. It's not fascist; it's consistent with our policies. We don't keep articles on other websites that don't meet WP:WEB. Should ED be an exception just because... what? Are you arguing that Wikipedia should be an indiscriminate collection of information, with no regard paid to WP:V, WP:NOR or WP:RS? -GTBacchus^(talk) 06:57, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I'll assume good faith and take your response seriously: ED is more popular then the Uncyclopedia and is very very much more popular than the many webcomics (for example) and other smaller websites featured in Wikipedia. I understand that Alexa rank (for instance) is not the only measure of signifigance, but I think you would have a hard time convincing a reasonable and unbiased person that the hundreds of smaller websites, including the Uncyclopedia, warrant inclusion in Wikipedia while ED does not - especially as it is mentioned in this very article. I don't care about the Encylopedia Dramatica at all (its a silly place like YTMND and 4chan - both of which have articles by the way), but I do care about the integrity of the Wikipedia, which seems to have turned into to be a somewhat silly place itself.Cyclopsface (talk) 01:56, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Look at the bottom of the Uncyclopedia article. It has several instances of non-trivial coverage in independent sources. YTMND and 4chan are also both referenced to multiple independent sources. Are there such references for ED? If so, I haven't seen them, and I've paid pretty close attention to the debate for over a year now.

The simple fact is that ED doesn't satisfy WP:WEB. The fact that a lot of Wikipedians don't like ED may create the appearance that we deleted the article as a grudge, but we actually deleted it because the site is not notable, per our usual standards. The notability guidelines apply to all website articles, and I'm not defending any article that sits here in contravention of them. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:02, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Open Source Software Preferential Treatment

Maybe it is in the nature of the two systems but there appears to be a preference for open source software on Wikipedia. There are a lot of articles about open source software which should is questioned as far as its notability while commercial software is not found even though it is widely used in a particular profession. The commercial software is possibly deleted because it could be an advertisement. 98.195.185.125 (talk) 02:44, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

I love Wikipedia

I just stumpled across conservapedia and felt a little sick, they spout hatred, thank the lord (oh dont worry that`s not me being conserative) for intelligence here on wiki. Realist2 (talk) 20:39, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

By their fruits ye shall know them.--Filll (talk) 00:20, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Conservapedia is indeed frightening. What's their motto again? "All the information that we want you to read" ?Epthorn (talk) 12:29, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

original research?

"There are indications that academics' view of Wikipedia may have improved during the last few years. There has been an increase in the number of citations of Wikipedia in international scientific journals, though this may be at least partly the result of the greater prominence of the project."

I do not like the section that starts like this. "There are indications [...] may have improved"... this sounds very vague. I find two words in that sentence that are very vague and are leaning more to weasel words than referring to a source.

The section goes on presenting some statistics over some site ScienceDirect. Where is the source for this? This looks like original research.

This section just states some claims that might be correct, and doesn't ever refer to a source. It should be removed.

Besides that, I love Wikipedia and do not agree with most of what this article has to say... so don't you think I'm criticizing this section because I'm some Wikipedia-basher... PureRumble 00:06, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Fair use rationale for Image:Wiki-deathstar.png

Image:Wiki-deathstar.png is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.

BetacommandBot (talk) 05:40, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Since when is Encyclopedia Dramatica an "anti-wikipedia fansite"?

It isn't, and just because some guy from New York Times called it that does not make it so. It's a website that catalogs and satirizes internet culture and drama, and Wikipedia is certainly targetted often in that regard, but there's so much more to the site. Shouldn't this line be rephrased? Perhaps it should just say... Satire also exists in the form of parody encyclopedias such as Uncyclopedia and Encyclopedia Dramatica. Thoughts? Caleb462 18:58, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree entirely. Actually the NYT calls it a "Wikipedia anti-fansite" which might or might not be subtly different from what we've got. I think calling it a satirical or parody wiki is probably a safe description that's true to the source and to reality. -GTBacchus^(talk) 19:18, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

When I added it, I chose that wording just to conform to the source as much as possible. Given the amount of ED-phobia around here I was trying to give the least possible grounds for a hater trying to remove it. --arkalochori ^|talk| 02:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Understood, but like GTBacchus said, I think the rephrasing is both true to the source and true to reality. I don't think anyone could make a solid argument for removing it. 67.33.214.249 18:51, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I have removed it. The article for the site was deleted [2], [3] and later salted. It's an attack site, and it does not deserve attention. Greswik (talk) 21:18, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

That is your opinion it does not deserve mention in this article. It is referenced per WP:RS and WP:V policies.  Mr.Guru  talk  21:25, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

According to what policy we can't mention ED in the article. This is a case of I don't like it.  Mr.Guru  talk  21:47, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Our not having an article on them has nothing to do with "I don't like it". I happen to like ED, and I'm against it having an article here, because there is no coverage in multiple independent sources on which to base such an article. It fails WP:WEB, pure and simple. Just as "I don't like it" is invalid, so is "you don't like it and that's why you're against it". None of this has anything to do with what anyone likes, nor with where anyone edits, nor with what anyone's motivations are. It has purely to do with the fact that our mission is to build a neutral, verifiable encyclopedia, based on reliable sources.

All of that said, it's false that "according to policy we can't mention ED in this article." The mention in this article was cited to the New York Times. It's not anything on which to base an entire article, but mentioning it in this article could make sense. The question would be whether we're doing original research by including what the NYT called a "Wikipedia anti-fansite" under "Humorous criticism". -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:27, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

When I tried disussing this on your talk-page, you just reverted it away- just like you have reverted anyone ever trying to talk to you, except for the welcome-message. When it comes to why I removed it: I certainly gave other reasons than " I don't like it". I gave the reason it has been deleted after a massive debate,( despite what seemed like massive sock-puppetry and COI-editing from it's followers), as a non-notable and as an attack-site. As long as that decision stands, I don't have to explain why is it a non-notable attack-site. And this is very far above "I don't like it". Greswik (talk) 14:00, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Now JzG has joined the edit war over this; first he reverted me with a completely false assertion that I was a member of ED, and then he reverted again with "Revert deliberate WP:POINT addition. Note that the site violates privacy by log harvesting etc." This is a total non-sequitir; how does this relate in any way to the fact that it's a parody encyclopedia that has been mentioned in a NY Times article on Wikipedia? I'm not going to revert any more (I try to stick to 2RR myself), but I find the reasoning behind reverting me to be totally bogus. *Dan T.* (talk) 01:44, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

If you ever has seen this ED, you may have noticed it seems to be used by people to piss on girls they have been with and who has left them- this was at least the impression I got. That kind of things. It is a disgusting attack-site. It is not a parody in any good sense, allthough a troll-mirror also is a parody in one meaning of the word.Greswik (talk) 14:11, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

This talk page is for discussion of improvements to the article Criticism of Wikipedia. If you'd like to talk about your feelings about unrelated websites, there's a whole Internet out there. Thanks for understanding. Wikipedia is not a soapbox. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:26, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually I thought some of the wiki related articles were rather funny. It seesm rather immature or insecure not to have an article on ED. Greglocock (talk) 01:09, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

It's neither immature nor insecure; it's policy-based. If they were the subject of non-trivial coverage in multiple independent sources, we would have an article on them. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:26, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

There are some males on the Internet who seem to think that taking out their dicks and whacking them on their keyboard proves that they are real men. I call it TMS...Testosterone Madness Syndrome. It is sad in a vestigal sense, but not really funny. --Cberlet (talk) 03:01, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

How does this comment contribute to the discussion? If you're just stepping in to be vulgar, please leave. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:26, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

It contributes to the discussion because aggressive bullies, shameless gossips, and crackpot conspiracy theorists are impeding the ability of 99% of Wikipedia editors, across the political spectrum, to edit entries. I have been able to edit articles with editors diametrically opposed to my political views. II have even edited pages along with neonazis, and we worked to creat a better entry. But it is an utter waste of time to deal with rumor-mongerers and self-impressed critics who spew nothing but venom. Feel free to find another website that values whining cranks and thugs. --Cberlet (talk) 03:40, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Excuse me? I'm not arguing for "valuing cranks and thugs". I'm arguing against making moral arguments over encyclopedic issues. It's irrelevant, it muddies the waters, and it undermines our credibility when we claim to be committed to neutrality above all. You can't show that name-calling is wrong by calling name-callers names; you do it by setting an example of refraining from name calling. Don't stoop to; rise above. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:59, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree that "it is an utter waste of time to deal with rumor-mongerers, etc". That's why I'm arguing against stirring up shit by making it look as if we're dealing with it somehow personally. That's a bad idea. -GTBacchus^(talk) 04:00, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Sure. So we take a dispasisonate view: does ED contain authoritative, respectable, well-reasoned critique? Answer: not hardly. It contains sophomoric trolling. If we had an article on sophomoric trolling it might be a source, but as a source for crioticism of Wikipedia it abjectly fails WP:RS, and that's how it should be judged. Guy (Help!) 11:47, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

The Register article about the November 18th block

While I am sure that this probably needs a paragraph or two, it seems that (a) you are cribbing almost directly from the Register article, using mostly direct quotes instead of actually writing a Wikipedia article and (b) at least one of the editors identified by user name is not actually identified by any name in the Register article, so including his user name is original research. This particular article is way too much of a battlefield for me to play around with, but I just want to point out that we *do* have some quality standards here, and it would be nice if the criticism article would uphold them. Risker 02:39, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I changed all the direct quotes that weren't comments from people. Cla68 is linked to from Charles Ainsworth in the article. --arkalochori ^|talk| 02:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I mean Giano II. He is not mentioned by name in the article at all, just as a "rogue editor." We all know it is Giano, but the source has not chosen to include that information. Risker 02:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, it did link to his page when it said that Wales' scolded the "rogue editor" in question. --arkalochori ^|talk| 03:22, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Ahh, good point, I had not specifically noted that, although I assume it was to quote Jimbo rather than "out" Giano. This may require some additional input from others. Risker 03:58, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

No I think you were right. The article specifically detailed Cla68, Kelly Martin, and Dan Tobias, while never referring to Giano by name. I assume there was a point to that decision. --arkalochori ^|talk| 04:08, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

This is primarily a bunch of gossip and rumors. It is just fodder for people who confuse criticism of Wikipedia with malicious bad will and disruption.--Cberlet 03:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Before restoring the text, can we discuss why rumor and gossip deserves so much detailed text? It is bogus.--Cberlet 03:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't see any rumour or gossip in it. It is remarkably factual, although not necessarily good publicity. Since it is from a reliable source, and the author is not historically a Wikipedia critic but rather a journalist of some repute, let's leave it alone where it is and talk about it. Risker 03:56, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

The text that was written was entirely POV from an anti-Jimbo anti-leadership POV. There was very little factual material in the text. I rewrote parts of the text to make it less hysterical and less POV. The article itself is a good example of bloated hype. Most Wikipedians never heard of the incident, and most who did probably thought it was a silly mistake and quickly dealt with. I think a discussion of cyberstalking, bullying, Testosterone Madness Syndrome, and aggressive anti-Wiki disruption is long overdue. But no matter what I think, the text was highly POV, negatiove, and breathless.--Cberlet 04:08, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Why are even discussing a tabloid here? I have removed the material. In any other article, such material would not survive 5 minutes. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:20, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Well then, Jossi, you better get to work...here are the first 1000 links to The Register[4]. Have a good evening, I am sure you can find others to help you. Risker 04:30, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I do not give a hoot if there are 10,000 links to The Register. A tabloid is not a reliable source as per WP:V#Sources, in particular when it relates to living people. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:35, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Hey, you're the admin here, Jossi. Since you've made that determination, it's up to you to fix the problem or find others to help you. If you aren't interested in cleaning up the other articles yourself, you could always just make a post at WP:AN, and I am sure everyone will help out, just as they would if there was a CSD backlog. Risker 04:40, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Hey, you are an editor, same as me. Adminship has nothing to do with it,. If something is broken. fix it. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 15:15, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, I think The Register is a pretty reliable source, if a bit over the top in this case, and so do hundreds of other editors who have used it, as there are 1835 wiki-links to it. You're the one who says it's a problem, Jossi, not me. Risker 15:20, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I did fix it, in this article. Feel free to fix it in other articles if warranted. A source may be OK to use in one context and not OK in another. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:09, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

*singing* You just don't wanna admit there's a cabal; you don't wanna admit there's a cabal. *puts down karaoke microphone* Seriously, I called it, over a year and a half ago. You're just sore that admins have actually been caught doing the things we've all suspected 'em of doing behind the curtain for a while now. (Yes, I did log in for the first time in months just to gloat. Yes, I don't know you personally, but unfortunately I have to assume that all admins are out to get me and people like me, who were once interested in edit quality instead of edit quantity.) - Corbin ^{Be excellent}_(TINC) 20:37, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

"We"? Who is "we"? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:39, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/12/04/0333252 , for starters. A handful of people from my LUG, and at least fifty or so from LUE. Not a lot of people, perhaps, but still, we once were editors, and we once were valued members of the community. - Corbin ^{Be excellent}_(TINC) 20:44, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

The Register piece is almost entirely fabrication and conspiracy theorising. The supposed facts on which it is based have been contradicted many times, but a very small numebr of editors prefer to believe evil conspiracies than simple incompetence, and appear to have decided to use the Register to spread the meme. It is a straw man, not a valid criticism of Wikipedia. It's completely unacceptable to take an on-wiki campaign, plant it in the press, and then come back and cite it as if it had some objective merit. It doesn't. Both the Register pieces are clearly polemical, the followup parrots Bagley's lunacy completely uncritically and taken together they demonstrate a strong agenda on the part of one journalist, rather than any credible critique of the project. We might as well dispense with the pretences and say that according to long term contributor UserChickenLittle a 75 minute block of one user by one admin represents the storngest evidence yet that the sky is definitely falling. Guy (Help!) 15:21, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

You're throwing out the original research thick and fast, can you find a source that verifies your statement? Sometimes A Great Notion (talk) 17:21, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

The supposed facts on which it is based have been contradicted many times, but a very small numebr of editors prefer to believe evil conspiracies than simple incompetence, and appear to have decided to use the Register to spread the meme...It's completely unacceptable to take an on-wiki campaign, plant it in the press, and then come back and cite it as if it had some objective merit.

Please assume good faith. — goethean ॐ 19:12, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

There has been a lengthy discussion of this on wikien-l. The facts are as stated in the Durova arbitration: Durova sent an email, mistook silence for assent, and blocked a user without giving any of the recipients of the mail a hint that this was what she intended. The list was not some sort of super secret ban cabal, it was a list constituted to discuss the stalking and harassment of editors, and was merely the formalisation of a lengthy email cc chain. The list did include arbitrators, Jimbo, admins and non-admins. every single person who was originally a recipient of Durova's emaiol has said the same thing. A tiny number of people in the wikien-l thread have persisted with the assumption of bad faith, and two or three of them decided to hand it to Cade, who wrote the piece on a basis of assume bad faith and extrapolate form there. Cade's subsequent decision to publish without apparent question the Judd Bagley view of the naked shorting dispute further underscores the fact that Cade is not a reliable source here. The source for this piece is polemical, not reliable, and the criticism is unfounded. If you genuinely believe Jimbo would take part in a group such as Cade describes then you need to find another project because you will never be able to trust this one again. Guy (Help!) 11:13, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Your opinion is noted, JzG. The problem is, however, that you're not an acceptable source (original research) and the Register is. Check the policies. Cla68 (talk) 13:48, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and for the record JzG, since you've declared that you're involved in the secret list and other aspects of this episode, it would be inappropriate for you to make any edits or revisions to the main page of this article concerning this subject, or to undertake any admin actions related to it such as blocking an IP or any other editor who had added material in relation to the same subject. You haven't done that, have you? That's a yes or no question. Cla68 (talk) 14:07, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I find that nicely ironic, since my information is that you are one of the primary sources for the Register piece. So let's do what Wikipedia does: look at secondary sources. Please cite the analysis of this case in reliable secondary sources - not primary sources (the Reg), but secondary sources. Not that the Reg is reliable in the context of Wikipedia anyway, it displays a clear agenda here. So: where are the sources that discuss the dispute, including both sides, not just repeating the claims stated to be false by every single known member of the mailing list and every single known recipient of the Durova email? Guy (Help!) 16:33, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

JzG, you didn't answer the question so I'm going to bold it to ensure that you see it. Did you use your admin tools in connection with material in this article related to the Durova controversy? Cla68 (talk) 05:56, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I have absolutely no idea. I do not know what you would consider "connected" - judging by the piece you planted in The Register your definition might well be different from mine. What I did not do was to block anybody based on anything Durova said, in any context. It's not in any way relevant, anyway; you are here arguing for inclusion of a piece that was largely down to your own interview, and that is inappropriate. In my view it was also wildly inappropriate to say what you did, since there are so many things in that article which assume that the only people telling the truth are the ones assuming bad faith; another one of those perfect leak-free conspiracies that are so very common in real life. Not. Guy (Help!) 11:25, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Hi! This is the last edit I ever make here. I'm sick of this crap. jericho4.0 (talk) 22:18, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the two Register articles belong here. They are unquestionably "criticism of Wikipedia", and they are notable, given that they were both Slashdotted, Digged, and heavily blogged. Mentioning and linking them does not mean that we're saying the articles are accurate or objective, only that they were notable criticism. *Dan T.* (talk) 16:54, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Additionally, JzG has a clear conflict of interest and should recuse himself from this article rather than edit warring. — goethean ॐ 16:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I think, given how much he clearly cares about this project, JzG really ought to consider recusing himself from a number of areas in it where he has proven unable to engage in serious discussion without resorting to emotional rhetoric, guilt by association, fallacious arguments, and other things that only serve to make critics and attackers more convinced of the rightness of their own positions. He is doing Wikipedia a grave disservice. *Dan T.* (talk) 17:01, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

My "conflict of interest" is restricted to knowing that the people who gave the register their information are wrong in what they assert about the mailing list. I know this because I, unlike them, was party to the list's creation and was an original recipient of the Durova email. Dan, on the other hand, is one of the sources for the "black helicopters" article and Cla68 is identified as the main source for both. In what way is knowing the truth a conflict, but being a major contributor to the article not?

I've suggested above that we do the Wikipedia thing here, whihc is step back and look what the reliable secondary sources say. The Register piece is clearly not reliable, being clearly polemical and including only the far extreme of one side of the dispute. So what does the New York Times say? Guy (Help!) 17:12, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Someone with a conflict of interest will himself deny it, while the rest of the community repeatedly points it out to him. This "let's wait for the New York Times" attitude is almost exactly identical to what happened in the Essjay controversy. Lo and behold, it wasn't long before the New York Times was writing about it. I see above a user active since 2004 has quit the project thanks to one of Guy's comments. Really, when will those who enjoy some level of respected power on this project finally give Guy the lengthy time-out that he needs. Has Guy spent one minute checking (and, if necessary, deleting) any of the other 1,800+ links to The Register that Wikipedians have found useful to include in various articles? No, he is more interested in focusing on a reference to a "private, invitation-only, but not certainly not 'secret'" mailing list that he himself was a part of. No, there's no deranged conflict of interest there, folks. Move along. Get back to editing the encyclopedia while the controllers and manipulators decide the light in which the project shall be painted. -- ZD Netman (talk) 14:36, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Again, Cla68 was the named source for the first Register piece, Dan Tobias and Cla68 are quoted as sources in the second. Their conflict is obvious here, what's mine supposed to be? I don't see you criticising Dan and Cla68 for agitating for their own criticisms of Wikipedia to be included in the criticism of Wikipedia article, which is what they are doing. As it happens I also know for a fact that a very substantial part of Cla68's criticism, as quoted by The Register, is pure hokum. So I'm doubly sure that we should be waiting for reliable independent secondary sources. Ones that, you know, actually bothered to ask people on both sides of the story. Or even mention that there is another side, that would be a good start. Guy (Help!) 18:19, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

The best thing to do is clearly state that the register says it, then people can decide for themselves how much of it to believe. Some of their wording is a bit over the top, so it would be a good idea to quote it and again let people decide. - Peregrine Fisher (talk) 22:03, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Again, the issue is that Guy is pushing pure original research, none of what he has said has been published by a third party source. Also it was not just the Register that covered this, the Guardian, PC Pro, and SiliconRepublic all did as well. Additionally it is unacceptable to use a self-published blog in an article, and ridiculous to even suggest so. The reason they might not be "covering the other side" could be that it is a fringe view only held by a dozen people, i.e. the members of the list. 75.175.2.38 (talk) 22:52, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Er, no, I'm pshing WP:RS. The Register pieces make it plain that they are a restatement of one or two editors' view of a controversy; a brief look at the extended discussion on wikien-l shows that these two have chosen to completely ignore the fact that every editor known to be on the "secret list" has rejected their interpretation of it, and that list of editors includes Jimbo. To allow editors to plant a story in the gutter press and then drag it into Wikipedia as a "criticism of Wikipedia" sets an extraordinarily bad precedent. We should look at what reliable secondary sources say, especially those sources which review both sides of the argument, since any one-sided view for which no contrary source exists will necessarily violate WP:NPOV. It is quite normal to reject attempts to include partisan sources in Wikipedia articles, especially where those partisan sources are used to advance a controversial and disputed view but where the argument is sufficiently trivial in the global scheme of things there are no sources whatsoever even attempting to cover it dispassionately. You accuse me of original research, but the first Register piece is Cla68's view is nothing more than a restatement of what Cla68 thinks, and what Cla68 thinks is provably wrong in many respects, as recipients of the original email and members of the list have pointed out. It would be easy to cover this properly if there were any analytical sources covering the dispute, but so far none have been presented, only a polemical piece by a journalist displaying a clear agenda in a publication of no provable authority in these matters repeating as fact one side of the story without any attempt to cover or note the other side. I can't think of any other area od Wikipedia where any editor in good standing would even think about including such a source.

The idea that the list was not a secret banning cabal is hardly a "fringe view" since the list includes arbitrators, non admins and Jimbo. The list is precisely as has been stated many times: a result of a long email trail between people who have been harassed and stalked, formed to discuss ways of handling that problem in the face of - in particular - people like Dan Tobias reflexively reverting any removal of any link to harassment as "censorship". Dan does not believe that harassment is a problem, he has made this perfectly clear. That's one view. Another view, held by a number of people who've been phoned at home, stalked, had their personal details published, had people call their employers and so on, is that it is a problem. And there is a pressing need, as far as these people are concerned, to formulate a way of handling harassment that presents the victim with more than the current two options, which are to leave it or to have the anti-BADSITES activists make it massively high profile. Any properly reliable and analytical source will discuss both these views. The Register fails to allow that any view other than Cla68's exists. Guy (Help!) 11:59, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

wikipedia review

Since wikipdia review links here, I thought i should point out the following quote from http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2007/dec/06/wikipedia

The secret dossier was leaked, and turned out to be a deeply flawed quasi-profiling purportedly establishing the suspected contributor as, paraphrased, a sleeper agent for an enemy cell (that is, from Wikipedia Review) bent on disruption. Yet official actions were taken to stop the leak from being posted in Wikipedia discussion under the pretext of "policy and violating copyright" (tinyurl.com/ytj9qo). Of course, the material was immediately available on Wikipedia Review (tinyurl.com/2sjrmj) and another site, Wikitruth.info, thus giving those sites redeeming value, whatever their flaws.

This is just something I think we are wise to remember every time the subject of these 2, by some referred to as WP:BADSITES, pop up. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 21:10, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the irony is staggering. On the one hand they castigate us for failing to guard the privacy of people they like, and on the other they laugh at us for addressing privacy violations targeting people they hate. Guy (Help!) 15:32, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is broken.

I actually wanted to post this on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Gary_Weiss , but couldn't.

I adored the Wikipedia when it was first launched and I contributed to a number of articles, some extensively, and always anonymously. The Wikipedia then was a riot of contributors, each adding bits and pieces to the articles they were familiar with, with nary an admin or editor in sight. The Wikipedia was about articles and contributors. It was a fascinating source of information and the talk pages were often incredibly informative. You could have honest to god discussions there! You could build up an article with two or three anonymous contributors on the talk pages over days (or sometimes weeks). The Wikipedia WORKED.

The current Wikipedia is a very different beast--hierarchical, closed, and overrun with "admins" and "editors" who are more concerned with personal politics, the bureacracy of the beast, and minutae like "wikification" than contributing to articles. Nowadays the Wikipedia is all about the Wikipedia. Articles and contributors are caught in a vast bureaucratic clusterfuck. Articles in particular are "turf" to be fought over, to the great detriment of the people who actually contribute to them or use them. Edits are about notches in your belt, not adding content. Knowing an admin is more important than knowing your subject. Making an edit nowadays prompts threats and frequent reversions (or lockings) for no damned reason. It doesn't have to be controversial. You can correct the spelling of a species name and get chewed out for it. The talk pages, far from being about building consensus and putting togethr good articles, are bully pulpits for admins and connected editors. The NPOV and common courtesy have gone right out the window on talk pages, as shown by all the hyperbolic and downright paranoid rantings by admins here shows. "Hate site"? Please. I've seen hate sites, and Bagley/Byrn ain't it. "Jihad"? You must be joking.

Nowadays the Wikipedia community seems obsessed with the tangental side of the wiki: voting up admins, arguing about (usually pointless) policy, locking and unlocking articles, and pointless editing to enforce editorial unity ("This article has a trivia section--triva sections are discouraged because they're fun and interesting. Please consider rewriting the article to bury all these nifty facts under an avalanche of stilted faux academic prose in the main body of the article. Failing that, just delete the trivia, since traditional encyclopedias don't have trivia sections and we're bound to follow a fifteen-hundred year old dead tree paradigm, never mind that we're a twenty-first century hypertext website.") and stylistic monotony. The Wikipedia DOESN'T work. The Wikipedia is broken.

Justreg'dforthis (talk) 23:38, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

It is true. Wikipedia is broken. And the sooner the cyber-bullies, cyber-stalkers, agressive trolls, and gerneral jerks are banned, the sooner that people across the political spectrum who actually reached adulthood (no matter what their chronological age), the sooner we will fix it. Feel free to go elsewhers to engage in Internet posting. We are building a different culture here.--Cberlet (talk) 03:05, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Some of the worst bullies around here are the people who claim to be "building a different culture" by calling people "trolls" and threatening to ban them. *Dan T.* (talk) 03:23, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Democracy includes sanctions for bullies.--Cberlet (talk) 03:44, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Democracy? Have you dealt with bullies here? I mean, you're right in a way, but it can take, like, years. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Cberlet, I understand the appeal of what you say, but that idea contains dangers you may not be aware of. Who will watch the watchmen? Remember that the person deciding who is or isn't a "cyber-bully, cyber-stalker, aggressive troll, or general jerk" also is human, and has flaws, and a limited point of view. If we're building a different culture (which I support wholeheartedly) then it will begin with the cessation of name-calling, not with our getting down into the mud in our effort to show people that mud-slinging in wrong. Don't we become our own enemy in the moment that we pronounce moral judgement on another person? Surely the way to build the new culture is to set an excellent example, and let others hang themselves on inevitable policy violations. Furthermore, the less we indulge in irrelevant accusations of bad faith, the more credibility our policy-based arguments have, because we're clearly staying on-task, and refusing to get personal for any reason. -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

It can, yes. Querulousness is also notoriously difficult to deal with on Wikipedia. But that's not really relevant here; what we are dealing wiht at present is an uncritical repetition of the most extreme anti-Jimbo perspective on the Duroiva case, combined with a presentation of the most vehemently pro-Bagley interpeetation of the Weiss dispute. The self-evidently polemical tone means that neither piece can be taken as a reliable source here; what we would have to have is a reliable secondary source contextualising the thing. I've not yet seen one, perhaps because the Register pieces are so fatuous that nobody's deigned to comment. Guy (Help!) 16:40, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Making more "guilt by association" against critics does not contribute anything useful to a discussion of their ideas. *Dan T.* (talk) 16:42, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the ad-hominem. So you think The Register piece is reliable? Guy (Help!) 17:09, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Describing your argument as "guilt by association" is not technically an ad hominem, because it's a criticism of your argument, not of you. As for querulousness being notoriously difficult to deal with, I think it's easier than you think. There's ways to deal with it that make it more or less difficult. As for the "Register pieces", I'm afraid I don't know what you're referring to. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:53, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

<undent>When I see this sort of criticism, I am struck by how unrealistic it is. People expect there to be "one right answer" and "one truth" that agrees with their own personal opinion. If Wikipedia does not agree with their own personal bias, then they complain. Bitterly. Loud and long.

For example, if a contributor does not believe that men landed on the moon, this contributor will complain bitterly if the article about the moon landings on Wikipedia is written from the viewpoint that men actually landed on the moon. If articles debunking the moon landing deniers are linked in or mentioned, this will be viewed as evidence of a secret plot of the evil global media / Jews/ Americans/ Bilderbergs/ Council on Foreign Relations / Vatican/ Masons/ etc.

If Wikipedia is not written from the viewpoint of a given contributor, such as a moon landing denier, then all kinds of charges of bias and unfairness will be levelled. Of course, if Wikipedia acquiesces and allows the moon landing articles to be written only by moon landing deniers, then another group will charge that Wikipedia is biased etc.

The same is true on just about every issue. For example, the Miquelon and St. Pierre article discusses the origin of the name Miquelon. Several scholarly texts discuss the name "Miquelon" as being of Basque origin, which was mentioned in the article. There are also many other pieces of evidence that the early visitors to the island were Basques. This is standard knowledge that appears in many reference books and is taught in many schools. I was taught this in school growing up and required to memorize it.

However, there are people in Spain who are sensitive about Basque nationalism and Basque separatist movements. So an editor from Spain was highly incensed that our Wikipedia article should suggest that the name "Miquelon" was of Basque origin, but had no references to suggest that Miquelon is not a name of Basque origin, but instead is Spanish. This turned into a minor dust-up, and I am certain the Spanish editor went away positive that Wikipedia is biasd that they would take the word of textbooks and scholarly publications over his own personal say-so.

As another example, I have encountered several Polish editors at Frere Jacques who claim that it is well known that Frere Jacques is supposed to be a pilgrim on the Way of St. James who has not woken up his fellow travellers in time. They had no references for these claims. I looked and looked but could find none. The references they suggested were in foreign languages, and when translated, did not support their claims.

On the other hand, I had dozens of other references in scholarly journals and other sources for the identity of Frere Jacques which did not agree with their theory. However, the Polish editors were positive that it should be obvious to me and everyone else that their own personal theory, unsupported by a single reference, should be the correct one and should be the main or maybe even the only theory discussed in the Frere Jacques article. And when I did not give in, they went away furious and fuming about the "bias" in Wikipedia and the terrible unfairness.

After dealing with a few of these situations, and then reading the complaints of people about the bias and unreasonableness and errors in Wikipedia, I am struck by how silly this is. How many left wing extremists think Bill O'Reilly is unbiased? How many right wing extremists think that Bill Clinton or Jimmy Carter was a good president? Have any of these people complaining actually read the articles in World Book Encyclopedia or Encyclopedia Britannica? This sort of complaint is just pure nonsense.--Filll (talk) 18:08, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

This is a place to discuss the article about criticisms of Wikipedia, not a place for essays about what you think of the critics. *Dan T.* (talk) 19:29, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but not a place for you to advocate inclusion of articles where you state your own criticisms of Wikipedia and which repeeat it as fact. Guy (Help!) 07:51, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

I see. And your posts above would be a good example of this principle?--Filll (talk) 20:28, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not broken. It's just going through a natural course of all things that reach prominence. It started out with a vision and much of the content was written while still in obscurity. By the time it became a top 10 website most of the major content of the truly encyclopedic subjects had been written. Now it is really a matter of improving and maintaining the current articles which is more of a management function than a creative one which is not as much fun. There are still some kinks to work out and the more contentious subjects will take longer to develop so it would be best to give this project at least 10 years(from its inception) to fully develop and then come up with an evaluation of the success or failure of it. MrMurph101 (talk) 19:40, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Liberal bias section

This section has several problems. First of all, it is entitled "liberal bias" when there is no evidence presented to show that allegations of liberal bias is more common than claims of bias towards other ideologies such as libertarianism. Secondly, the sources are a bit poor, with much of the section taken up by results of a survey relying on self-identification. I'm not quite sure how to fix this section ATM, so i'm raising it here rather than diving striaght in. Lurker (said · done) 16:07, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

• This is a fair point, although the extreme conservatives are probably more outspoken in calling bias. My own view is that this is a natural consequence of our ties to the free software movement coupled with the fact that Wikipedia has a global reach, and the centre of US politics is to the right of that of most Western democracies. A self-selected survey is a poor source. Are there secondary sources to support this criticism? Conservapedia's list of alleged bias is hilarious, but of absolutely no provable worth. No articles on prominent conservatives? {{sofixit}}. Nobody cares. And it's hardly a surprise that the ID movement would consider Wikipedia biased - they think that the Anglican communion is a dangerously liberal organisatioon, and consider that any POV other than biblical inerrancy is in and of itself biased. Actually I've been told by some conservative evangelicals that to quote any version of the Bible other than the King James is tantamount to heresy. I don't see how that reflects on us rather than them, though. I wonder if there is a better source for this section than conservative Wikipedians, which appears to be all it has right now? Guy (Help!) 16:57, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree with this completely. I have met many fundamentalist Christians who think Catholics are satanic atheists or devil worshippers and should be jailed, deported or executed. And Jews...jews..., or homosexuals... well in those cases their sentiments are much much worse. As for other faiths, well, they are so seething with anger about them they can hardly even acknowledge they exist. And these people are positive that if Wikipedia does not support their personal views and agendas, it is has a horrible liberal bias. Anyone who says the holocaust is real is a terrible horrible liberal. Anyone who says the end of slavery was a good thing is an evil liberal. And on and on and on... So what does one do?--Filll (talk) 00:40, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

One avoids accusations of bias by citing everything to reliable sources. As for what we do in this article, we make note of criticisms that have received attention in sources. What else is there to do? -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:40, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

In this case, the thing to do is exactly that. The Conservapedia comments look like original research - some editor has noted that Conservapedia criticises Wikipedia. Where's the secondary source? It's a great test. Guy (Help!) 11:31, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

• "New York attorney Andrew Schlafly — son of the conservative anti-feminist and Eagle Forum founder Phyllis Schlafly — was an early Wikipedia enthusiast, but he says that long ago he began to notice a pronounced liberal bias among the site’s editors. So last fall Schlafly launched his own open-source reference site, Conservapedia. It mimics the self-correcting methods of the bigger site while achieving, in Schlafly’s view, “what Wikipedia says they are trying to do but actually don’t do.”" nytimes
• "Conservapedia, that propagandist endeavor designed to undermine Wikipedia's allegedly liberal bias?" [5]

WAS 4.250 (talk) 14:10, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

WAS, that has the makings of a much better paragraph than we currently have on it. Guy (Help!) 17:34, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

I do not understand what people are upset about. Conservapedia exists, as do hundreds of other wikis. If people do not like Wikipedia principles and the articles they lead to, then they will go to these other wikis. Let the market decide.--Filll (talk) 15:19, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Who's upset? -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:52, 9 December 2007 (UTC)

Eh, but there's the rub. I know I want Wikipedia to be the opposite of that wiki that shall not be named, but not on a partisan scale. The reason I detest that "c"pedia is because it is all about preaching to the choir and only allowing the views that it endorses. I don't believe this 'liberal bias' #@$% in the simplistic way critics use it, but I definitely don't want to let "the market decide" especially since we don't have to- as wikipedia is free, we can try to avoid that. Epthorn (talk) 12:33, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

It would be unproblematic to state that conservative evangelical Christians consider Wikipedia to have a liberal bias, and cite third-party discussion of Schlafly et. al. as a source, I think. It's clearly wrong to assert or imply that Wikipedia has a liberal bias, just because some particularly illiberal people say so. In many cases both sides accuse our content of being biased towards the other, which is a good sign :-) Guy (Help!) 16:34, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

I definitely don't want to let "the market decide" especially since we don't have to. I am afraid you are not understanding. And we have no choice but to let the market decide. If people prefer some other wiki written according to other principles, then it will become more popular. And we cannot stop it.--Filll (talk) 18:10, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

I have to disgree. Tricks, such as pro-WP employees at google, and socks at CP, can help ensure that WP stays on top for reasons other than market. Now, if google is displaced, that is another story. Ra2007 (talk) 18:37, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Amazing. So you claim that the high ranking of many WP articles in Google searches is due to the employees of google biasing the results of the searches? And you claim you personally know the secret techniques Google uses to rank its search results? Wow. And you are bearing some sort of grudge over a Certainty Principle article that was AfDed 18 months ago? A quick search with google does not show much notable about the CP. When you make these sorts of claims, there is a tendency to relegate you into the category of assorted cranks. I cannot take any of this kind of nonsense seriously; and maybe you do not either, and you are just joking. Sorry.--Filll (talk) 19:25, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Systems employees responsible for specifying ranking algorithms certainly are involved; whether or not they realize it is a fair question, I suppose. I think some of them do. Certainly, WP games google with portals and the like. Ra2007 (talk) 19:42, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Claims about google are irrelevant unless you have a reliable source that reports these claims. 69.37.94.152 (talk) 20:28, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia and google

To respond to 69.37.94.152 above, here are some possible sources:"PageRank seems to favor Wikipedia pages, often putting them high or at the top of searches for several encyclopedic topics.", Would it surprise or dismay anyone if Google actually explicitly tweaked its algorithm to favor Wikipedia as a source of information? (By Greg L), As a result of Markov theory, it can be shown that the PageRank of a page is the probability of being at that page after lots of clicks. This happens to equal t − 1 where t is the expectation of the number of clicks (or random jumps) required to get from the page back to itself. The main disadvantage is that it favors older pages, because a new page, even a very good one, will not have many links unless it is part of an existing site (a site being a densely connected set of pages, such as Wikipedia). Ra2007 (talk) 20:35, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

In any event, intentional or coincidence, wikilinking, portals, etc., favor wikipedia. I'll keep looking for sources to this simple observation. Ra2007 (talk) 20:37, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

other links:

• "While everyone has noticed Wikipedia dominating Google’s search results, this is a little outrageous. After grabbing 600 random pages from Wikipedia (using their special:random link), I conducted searches in Google for each of the titles of the Wikipedia entries. Out of the 600, 580 were in the top 10."
• "Most material written today was in some way based on Google and Wikipedia - and if those did not reflect reality, a distortion was possible, the researchers said, recalling biased contributions frequently placed on Wikipedia."
• "Furthermore there is some indication of cooperation between Google and Wikipedia. Sample statistics showed that randomly selected Wiki entries consistently ranked higher on Google than on other search engines, the Graz team said." December 5, 2007 (TheAge.com.au)

Signing....Ra2007 (talk) 20:44, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Lovely bit of conspiracy theory, but fails occam's razor. Wikipedia gets so many millions of hits per day and has so many inbound links that any ranking algorithm is going to put Wikipedia right near the top. Guy (Help!) 11:43, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Conspiracy or coincidence, failing occam's razor doesn't preclude the use of these sources, does it? Ra2007 (talk) 22:46, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

Protected

Due to excessive edit warring this page has been protected for 5 days. Someone should reinstate semi-protection when the full protection expires. Please discuss as opposed to slow revert warring. Stifle (talk) 16:46, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

It seems I protected this page at exactly the same time. I think it better to keep this page locked until agreement is reached - I suggest everyone comes to a compromise here and then requests unprotection at WP:RFPP. If you are having difficulty reaching agreement you may find Wikipedia's dispute resolution mechanism of help. WjBscribe 16:48, 8 December 2007 (UTC)

Please stop editing the protected article

Can an admin please reverse this? It's not NPOV, it's a content dispute. I don't care about sides, but I thought this wasn't allowed? Lawrence Cohen 07:52, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

Request for edit - minor wording change

For what it's worth, I think it was a good edit. The Register articles does indeed allege material, as the neutrality and accuracy of their reporting is in question. Saying that the article discusses the use of a private mailing list for the purpose they describe is begging the question. Since JzG's edit has been reverted (to the original protected version of this article) is there any opposition to putting up an {editprotected} request to make a consensus change to the more neutral wording (discussed → alleged)? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:48, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd support the change, I just was thinking it would be best to do it by the book since so many people are fighting over this mess. Lawrence Cohen 17:51, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

And remove the link, per WP:RS and WP:EL, we should not link to biased and polemical sources which state falsehood and uninformed opinon as fact and represent only one side of a story, especially where it's a single editor taking an on-wikipedia dispute to an external source in order to try to gain an advantage in that dispute; there is no independent coverage cited, and we can't put the other side of the story - most importantly, the true nature and constitutions of the list about which Cla68 so egregiously lied, becaise there is no source for that at all. A dispute which has absolutely no reliable sources whatsoever (which this one does not, at this stage) does not belong in a Wikipedia article. Oh, incidentally, two wrongs don't make a right. Viridae's pointed reversion of actually a pretty uncontroversial edit is almost as despicable as undeleting an article created by a banned user at that banned users request, the request being posted in an attack thread on Wikipedia Review. No doubt Viridae's WR friends will be duly proud. I would tell you what I really think of Cla68's piece of shit Register story, but I'd probably get blocked for it. Guy (Help!) 23:19, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

That's the pot calling the kettle "biased and polemical". You're engaging in original research and violating NPOV in your dismissal of the article based on your personal beliefs, and bringing in irrelevant prior disputes. Incidentally, I support the change to "alleged" (which is similar to a change I made myself before the protection, but you reverted), but not the complete removal. *Dan T.* (talk) 00:39, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

No, it's an accurate description of the source. Of course you agree with the source because you are one of the sources for the Register pieces yourself, but that does not mean it is wrong to call it biased and inaccurate, which it is. It's utterly useless as a source because it presents a highly selective view of only one side of the dispute, based on the assumption that every single known member of the list is lying about it and the only people telling the truth are the ones who were not recipients of the original email. If I was trying to insert a source that put only my side then your comment might have some merit, but I'm not, so it doesn't. What I'm actually asking for is a source which is analytical and reliable, rather than simply stating as fact one or two editors' version of events, especially since I know for a fact that said version is wrong in several important respects, as was pointed out by every single member of the list that posted to the long thread on wikien-l, including Jimbo Wales. I fail to see how that is an acceptable source. Guy (Help!) 07:52, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I reverted both of your edits because they were edits made to a protected page without first gaining consensus on the talk page. Gain consensus for them, then instate them or use {{edit protected}}. Do NOT use your admin tools to continue to edit when other can't. Other than that I have no opinion on the matter, having not looked closely enough at the page/wording. If you have a problem with my other actions, my talk page is quite easy to find, as is dispute resolution. However before you start to attack me, think about this: I do not edit on anyones behalf, and will only make an edit/perform an action if i personally think it is the right thing to do. That someone at WR would like my edits, does not make them any less valid. Viridae^Talk 02:02, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

No, you reverted them because you dislike me - and the feeling is mutual right now. I've read your comments on WR, remember. Don't worry, though, I won't be dragging your sorry ass to ArbCom yet, although do please tell the WR people that hiding the thread where Kohs asked you to undelete his article and you acceded has not helped because Jimbo and some arbs have already seen it. Guy (Help!) 07:52, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

No I reverted because you shouldnt be editing a protected article. Simple. I would have done it had anyone else performed that edit. Hiding threads? I did no hiding, I post to WR in full knowledge that you and other read it. Paul August recently said "We should judge an article on its content not on the motives of the creator. Paul August ☎ 03:47, 10 December 2007 (UTC)". I my opinion, you (or anyone else) going through and deleting a perfectly well written article because it is by a banned user is petty and pointless. The readers (who this encyclopedia is for) do not give a hoot who it is written by, so that is why I undeleted, not at any request from Kohs, but because I thought it would improve the encyclopedia. Fault that logic, I dare you. Thats why I cited IAR. Viridae^Talk 06:27, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Er, it was a well-written puff piece for a client of a banned user written by a banned user using a sockpuppet account while banned, WP:CSD#G5. And you undeleted it by request of the banned user in a thread attacking a Wikipedia administrator on Wikipedia Review. If it were any more recent I think your sysop bit would be history. Also please show me the clause in the page proteciton policy which allows for reverting protected edits if you disagree with them; the edit from "reported" to "alleged" was in response to a request which I thought was valid in context and whihc semes ot have some support here - after all, the Register did not so much report the event as allow Cla68 a platform to restate some things which, actually, he'd been told were false, but preferred to continue believing the worst instead of assuming good faith of notorious POV-pushing trolls like User:Jimbo Wales. Guy (Help!) 23:12, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Religious and Similar Bias?

I don't think this kind of bias is discussed anywhere on this page, but it's something that's troubling me.

I recently added an NPOV tag to the "Archaeology and the Book of Mormon" page. The problem here is that a well-educated group of people who care a lot about having a page reflect the beliefs of their religion are able to cite a great deal of apologetics in favor of their point of view while burying research that might contradict their beliefs. I'm sure these are honest and sincere folks who believe what they are saying, but even though I'm no archaeologist (heck, I'm not even sure how to spell it) I'm equally sure that mainstream archeology finds a lot of what they are defending laughable (e.g. Native Americans descending from Jewish tribes, horses, wheat, sheep, and iron in Pre-Columbian America). I also suspect that it will be a lot harder to get mainstream archaeologists (who could cite reputable sources to contradict the weak and erroneous text cited) to spend their time keeping an eye on the page than it will be to get church members to dig up all kinds of backup for their holy book. Every piece of evidence that contradicts scripture ,therefore, gets disputed by a lot of references to (often church-funded) research that casts doubt on the archaeological evidence.

I have no axe to grind against the LDS church. In fact I have a feeling that this is not exclusive to Mormon religious beliefs. Perhaps someone else could point out similar problems elsewhere (articles on male circumcision overwhelmed by pro-circumcision evidence posted by Jewish people? Articles on contraception being overwhelmed by information posted by Catholic and fundamentalist believers? I haven't looked at either of those articles). Probably there others I haven't even though about.

The problem here seems to be that of a fairly large minority with fervently-held beliefs being able to "outpost" a smaller group of experts who can cite the justification for the viewpoint best supported by the evidence. In particular this is likely to happen when one viewpoint is held by scientists, for whom all knowledge is tentative and subject to contradicting evidence and the other viewpoint is held by religious believers, who feel they are starting from the truth and must discover evidence that supports it and find fault with evidence that contradicts it. It will be particularly bad if the religious group has the numbers, time, and resources to counter every argument from evidence.

This problem may not be exclusive to religious believers I'll even bet there are biases like this in articles about sectarian branches of Marxism -- please don't make me read them, though.

If I'm right, how should Wikipedia handle this? The Neutral Point of View page suggests that "partisan screeds" can eventually be "...cleaned up by people who concerned themselves with representing all views clearly and impartially" but I doubt this can happen in the circumstances I've described

If I was the Emperor of Wikipedia I would suggest a variation on the NPOV tag that says something like "The neutrality of this article is compromised by an imbalance of evidence supporting religious beliefs that contradict widely-accepted or scientific evidence"

Sorry to be so wordy. Comments from more experienced Wikipedians?

• I think this has probably been brought up somewhere before. I'm pretty sure I've seen this criticism elsewhere...although, maybe it won't hurt to make a specific section on "Ideological biases" or something like that? Shnakepup (talk) 16:25, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

It's a tricky one; LDS people are notoriously zealous in ensuring their view is reflected. Have you tried an article RfC or peer review? Guy (Help!) 16:31, 10 December 2007 (UTC)

More source material

• Metz, Cade Wikipedia black helicopters circle Utah's Traverse Mountain The Reigster

Hope this helps. Ra2007 (talk) 21:15, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Huh, we don't come off looking so good in that one, do we? So, has this got a place in this article? -GTBacchus^(talk) 22:23, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that should matter. Whether or not it is verifiable via a reliable source is more important, don't you think? Ra2007 (talk) 22:42, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Of course. I wasn't trying to suggest that it matters whether or not Wikipedia looks good in the article. What matters is whether the source is reliable. -GTBacchus^(talk) 14:25, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Worthless source, though. It is completely unreliable, repeats Bagley's lunatic ravings as fact, and the only things that come anywhere close to sane are actually two editors stating their side of a bilateral dispute without benefit of any balancing facts from the other side. Guy (Help!) 23:09, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

What's your reliable source for Bagley's claims being "lunatic ravings"? In fact that's a potentially libelous suggestion about a living person and should probably be expunged, even from a talk page, per BLP - at least per the way BLP is applied when it comes to any criticism of Gary Weiss or others who seem to enjoy highest-level protection. Bramlet Abercrombie (talk) 14:46, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

There are plenty of sources for Bagley's claims being specious, including Gary Weiss' columns in various publications, the Motley Fool and others - and (more importantly) none supporting his claims, particularly in respect to his claim of Weiss being one or more Wikipedia editors. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, and Bagley has yet to provide any evidence at all, extraordinary or otherwise. Guy (Help!) 22:15, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

Has The Register deemed unreliable? Ra2007 (talk) 22:20, 14 December 2007 (UTC)

For this subject, yes. No fact-checking, clear agenda, polemical tone, it's essentially a blog or personal opinion piece. Guy (Help!) 11:38, 16 December 2007 (UTC)

This is so awesome. Guy, you're absolutely right, the article in the Register is crap. The quote from the Encyclopedia Britannica is also totally biased and self-serving, and should be removed. It fails to AGF, and that invalidates it right there, really. This page could use to be a lot smaller. Don't you think? 207.112.75.38 (talk) 04:18, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

We should remove everything, and just have a blank page! All criticism of Wikipedia is, by definition, polemical, with a clear agenda, and just plain wrong, since we all know that Wikipedia is and has always been perfect in every way! *Dan T.* (talk) 04:31, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

So, lots of hyperbole in the hopes of obscuring the fact that The Register is clearly polemical, not a reliable source, sources its data from two named editors both of whom - amazingly! - are active here in agitating for its inclusion, and in sundry other ways makes a great case for excluding itself. Does a web-based tech tabloid compare in reliability for asessment of an encyclopaedia with the world's most famous encyclopaedia? Well, funnily enough, not it doesn't, and it would be absurd to even suggest it did. Guy (Help!) 14:35, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

The Register's Doran story has so far completely checked out. Not mentioning the Register in this article is censorship, pure and simple, which is counter to the principles on which this project are founded on. Why don't we take a straw poll, announced on the AN, ANI, Village Pump, and other community pages, on whether the Register articles should be mentioned here? Cla68 (talk) 23:50, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

That's a bit over-dramatic. Why not just use the Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard? That's what it's there for. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 00:11, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think that's an excellent idea. Cla68 (talk) 00:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Confirmation of Register's Bagley article in another source

Another source, the Daily Herald, has confirmed much of the information that was reported in the Register's article on Overstock.com and Bagley [6]. This is a regular newspaper and meets the reliable sources guidelines, plus they did their own research. I believe the information reported in both sources can now be included in this article. Cla68 (talk) 06:27, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Something like this might be considered more of a controversy than a criticism. I have no rooting interest in this but always believe that any perspectives that can be conformed within policy should be included and personal feelings should be left at the door. Personal feelings have led to much inconsistency of content inclusion and it leaves a lot of holes throughout the encyclopedia or, possibly even worse, bad content stays in that is very hard to remove due to the interests of those who take care of a given article. Unfortunately, this controlling of content makes wikipedia more like The Establishment in deciding what content is allowed instead of a truly independent gathering of information that does not filter information that some may find displeasing. MrMurph101 (talk) 18:35, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

• I think you mean repetition, not confirmation, and I don't think much of it - a grammatical error in the first sentence, for example. I note you're still promoting a story sourced to you, Cla68, that's very bad form. Guy (Help!) 18:50, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm not mentioned in the Herald story, and I wouldn't be the one to write about it in the mainspace. Also, it is confirmation, because they checked it out for themselves, not just repeated the Register story. So, if anyone is ready to write about it, please go to the admin who locked this article and ask for it to be unlocked so that you can add the material. Cla68 (talk) 00:45, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

• Well, I'm not so very sure they checked it out that carefully, since they appeared to miss minor but significant points like overstock's consistent failure to show a profit as possible alternative explanations for their poor share performance. Why is it that constant loss-making is never the explanation? Why do Bagley and Byrne blame everybody but themselves? It's a funny old world. Guy (Help!) 01:03, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

• Maybe because the point of the article was Wikipedia's apparently overzealous blocking, not the cause of Overstock's poor share performance? You seem to have an "IDONTLIKEIT" approach to deciding which articles are reliable sources, depending on whether they happen to include the facts and arguments you think are relevant, rather than the ones the reporters themselves did. *Dan T.* (talk) 01:59, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

• Nothing to do with "IDONTLIKEIT" and everything to do with reliable sourcing. Your agitation for content for which you were a primary source indicates a significant objectivity issue, I suggest you leave this subject alone. "According to User:Cla68 and user:Dtobias, blah blah blah" is not really the kind of thing we're looking for as an independent source, especially when (once again) the other side is not covered. If this is a genuinely significant issue then (a) we would not be talking about such a very tiny number of reports, we'd have something unambiguously usable, and (b) we'd have some kind of independent overview articles which discussed the whole thing rather than simply reporting one side of the story. Whether or not blocking that proxy IP (and yes it was a proxy) was a valid act, has nothing whatsoever to do with the ban of Bagley and his attempted abuse of Wikipedia to promote an agenda, a point which seems to eb entirely lost on the tiny number of press sources covering the incident. So few sources, in fact, that one is drawn to speculate on whether these are journalists who have been actively looking for a stick with which to beat us, and this may e why they have so readily and uncritically accepted one side of the story. We may, however, have enough material for a list of people banned from Wikipedia but who lack sufficient self-criticism to understand why. Or maybe list of companies who have never made a profit and would rather blame the markets, the CIA and Wikipedia than themselves. Both lists would have at least one entry... Guy (Help!) 16:13, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Well said. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:53, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Jossi, expect to be quoted, along with Guy. Cla68 (talk) 17:05, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Please clarify, is that a threat to take this off-wiki again? Guy (Help!) 21:10, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

No, quoted by me in other project forums. Cla68 (talk) 01:22, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• What an unconvincing argument. Or rather, series of arguments, because the goalposts keep shifting. As long as it was just Bagley and Byrne, there were no sources. Once the Register got involved, there was a source but it wasn't reliable (although the Register is treated as reliable for opinion and commentary on plenty of other issues...) Now a "real" newspaper, with a circulation of 150,000, gets involved, and there's a reliable source but it's not really reliable because, well... actually I don't know why. Because an editor "indicates a significant objectivity issue." Because there aren't enough reports? Because the reports aren't, in your opinion, hostile enough to the overstock spammers?
• This is a page about criticism of Wikipedia. Nutty or not, well-founded or not, the overstock.com criticism has been documented on a very popular Internet tabloid and a mid-circulation Chicago newspaper. Verifiability, not truth, remember? Launching sweeping and vaguely paranoid attacks on the sources ("one is drawn to speculate on whether these are journalists who have been actively looking for a stick with which to beat us") doesn't make them unreliable. <eleland/talkedits> 17:06, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

• One can note that the Associated Press has now run an article (on the separate "Wikimedia foundation hires a felon" issue) that has been published in the New York Times among many other places; that article quotes The Register and Charles Ainsworth as sources. In fact, the Register article that broke the story was by Cade Metz, the same reporter who's an "unreliable source" here. So I guess AP and the NY Times and dozens of other papers are now unreliable sources too by association? *Dan T.* (talk) 17:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

It pays to actually read the articles, which makes it clear that fact-checking was done by the NYT and AP. And this does not change the fact that the bulk of the other article in the regtister was gossip planted by anti-Wikipedia trolls. I really object, Dtobias, to you constant facilitation of anti-Wikipedia trolling. What is the point? It has nothing to do with free speech, censorship, or writing an encyclopedia. It is a huge waste of time. I really wish you would reconsider your actions. They are tendentious and disruptive, even though I have no doubt you think you are being useful. Please think about this.--Cberlet (talk) 20:43, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Funny, those sentiments are exactly what I think about your side, which I think is being highly destructive to the cause of a free encyclopedia through your obsessive pursuit of a "war on trolls" similar to Bush's "war on terror". *Dan T.* (talk) 20:50, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

There is, however, one cricual difference: George W. Bush has declared "war on terror". None of us, as far as I can tell, has ever used any phrase even close to "war on trolls". If there was a war on trolls, you would have been banned long ago. There is no such war, your use of the phrase is just another of your straw men. Guy (Help!) 21:09, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Look, I disagree with Dan about a lot, but there's no point arguing semantics here. You're ignoring his actual point in favor of attacking the words he used to make it. Surely you can be a better active listener than that? It doesn't matter a whit whether someone calls it a "war on trolls". If people are acting in a manner congruent to such misguided enterprises as the "war on terror", then that's the concern that Dan is raising, which we may wish to address.

As for the item in question here, I would suggest that we bring more eyes to the situation. It's very clear that you, Guy, don't consider the sources being offered to be reliable, while Dan does. Let's open a content RFC and see what the community thinks. Surely that would be more productive than going another 12 rounds over who suspects whom of bad faith? -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:30, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm with Chip on this. The fact that we don't welcome trolls with open arms does not mean there is some kind of war on trolls. Or, if you want to believe there is a war, do you honestly believe we should not be blocking the sockpuppets of user:JB196, user:WordBomb, user:MyWikiBiz, user:Jon Awbrey and the other trolls against whom this supposedly problematic war is being waged? I think you've correctly identified the existence of a war, but not the side that's declared it. Nobody would be happier than me if these banned abusers decided to call it a day and leave Wikipedia alone. I'd go so far as to move Jon Awbrey's socks to another place - a fictitious "Peirce vandal" page or something - if it would help, and I offered to do that but he told me to get lost. So yes, there is a small group of people who have declared war, but they are not Wikipedia editors, and I don't think it helps us much to ignore the fact that the agenda here is being set by people whose mission is to undermine Wikipedia, including at least two who have active threats of legal action aimed at losing 501(c) status. In both cases this action is purely retaliatory, for being prevented from behaviour which was identified by pretty much everybody who saw it as abusing the project. Guy (Help!) 11:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Do I honestly believe that we should not block sockpuppets of the people you mention? Hell no, Guy, and if you imagine that I could believe that, then you've never understood a thing I've said. On this very page, you've put some of the most ridiculous words in my mouth, and I find it hard to believe that you even read my comments. You accuse me of saying there are "two options" which are both absurd, when I've never made such a claim. I suggest a different, more effective strategy for dealing with trolls (I note that your strategy doesn't work so well), and you accuse me of supporting trolls. Meanwhile, you're one of the biggest troll-feeders around here. I'd be happy to discuss strategy with you, either publicly or privately, but it would help if you'd stop making up bullshit about my position.

As for the issue at hand - Open a content RFC already. The solution is not to keep arguing about who's a troll; the solution is to bring more eyes to the question of reliability of sources. When a consensus of established Wikipedians exercising sound editorial judgment says, "the source is unreliable, no matter who supports it", then we win. When you say, "the source is unreliable, and Dan has an agenda," then you've just fed the trolls, and set us up for 12 more rounds of back-and-forth, he-said-she-said, unproductive crap. Make a choice.

Winning a content dispute is easy, but you don't do it by calling the other party names, or by talking about the other party's motivations. You do it by bringing more eyes to the situation, and staying on task. If you so much as mention the other party's motivations, then you enter a world of shit, and trolls dance in delight. How can you not know this, Guy? -GTBacchus^(talk) 04:43, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

<-------Institutions of any sort have an obligation to defend themselves from attempts to damage or destroy them. Wikipedia is no exception. Only fools welcome attacks that undermine the basic premise of an institution. Anarcho-libertarianism is a fascinating concept, but there is a difference between "anybody has a right to do anything" and a democratic institution. Most anarchists and libertarians understand this. "Peace at any price" did not fare well. There is an obvious and overt campaign to damage or destroy Wikipedia. We can pretend this is not true, or we can deal with it cautiously and carefully. Facilitation of these attacks hurts Wikipedia. I am an active listener. I hear Anti-Wiki trolls laughing at our gullibility. Facilitating them harms Wikipedia.--Cberlet (talk) 23:55, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

• Ugh, jeez, doesn't that sound a little over-the-top? I seriously doubt that there's "an obvious and overt campaign to damage or destroy Wikipedia". C'mon, both sides here have some valid points, but let's try not to take a left into paranoid-conspiracy land. The way you portray it, there might as well be some shadowy organization meeting in smoke-filled rooms, cackling maniacally at their plans to destroy Wikipedia and rule the world! And I disagree with your last statement. "Acknowledging" is not the same as "Facilitating", and it does not harm Wikipedia. There's not much that can harm wikipedia at all. It's not some small, fragile thing. It's a huge-ass online encyclopedia. Criticism of it has nothing to do with the everyday editing that goes on here. Shnakepup (talk) 15:28, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
• He seems to be defending the very same "war on trolls" that JzG denies exists. Anyway, I think leading Wikipedians / Wikimedians are doing a fine job of undermining Wikipedia/Wikimedia all by themselves, and one hopes that these fine institutions are indeed strong enough to withstand it. *Dan T.* (talk) 20:24, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Just a quick question, Guy: What would make this source verifiable? I mean, I see all your arguments that this story is biased and one-sided and all...does it have to be fair and balanced before it's okay to source? Is it possible for any source to be verifiable/useful/notable/etc if it's critical of Wikipedia? Shnakepup (talk) 15:28, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• Coverage of the dispute - both sides of it - in a credible source such as the New York Times. Guy (Help!) 15:29, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
  • I guess that would depend on what is credible...but thanks for answering. Don't want no trouble round these hear parts. Just been following the debate (if that's what it can be called) and wanted to toss in my two cents. Merry Christmas, btw. Shnakepup (talk) 15:49, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
  • That's strange, because I just read an article in both the Washington Post and in Forbes that covered "both sides" of Carolyn Doran (she was described as "personable, stylish and funny", as well as a felon), but it appears that an article Carolyn Doran is not being allowed creation. I guess the Washington Post and Forbes have quite a ways to go, to get to the JzG / New York Times threshold of credibility. I have this vision of goal posts moving all over a football field. I may have to scale back my watching of the NFL. --Lord on Canary (talk) 19:14, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• Not especially relevant to this discussion, since the topic at issue is Cla68 and Dan Tobias' pieces in The Register. If Carolyn Doran has an article, commentary on that belongs there. Guy (Help!) 19:47, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• It's not "my" or Cla68's pieces... they're by Cade Metz. Cla and I are merely among the sources quoted in those articles. *Dan T.* (talk) 20:21, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• Riiiight, and that's why he names the two of you as his main sources. Oh, and Judd Bagley, too. Great company you're keeping there, I hope you have a long spoon. Guy (Help!) 21:05, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Wikipedia surrendering users' info without a fight

I wonder what your opinion is about the following story:

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2007/12/video_prof03.html

Apparently, Wikipedia has surrendered without argument the info about some registered Wikipedia user(s) in response to a subpoena from the Video Professor. Other websites being sued have successfuly fought back on the free speech and the first amendments grounds, and even Comcast is demonstrating some backbone on the privacy protection grounds. But apparently not Wikipedia. Should this info perhaps be added (maybe even as a separate section) to the WP Criticism page? Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 15:01, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

• See, this is one of the things I find perplexing. We have a privacy policy, and the privacy policy says we should not reveal private information unless required to. Above, we have a lot of noise and fury generated because a long-standing user released private information and Jimbo stopped him, here we have a case where we *were* required to release the information so had no choice, and are being criticised for not holding out (at substantial cost). I have been watching the Video Professor (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) article for a long time, and it has been the target of a lot of POV editing, much of it no doubt well intentioned, but resulting in numerous complaints. The advice to editors has been much the same all along: find good, credible, independent sources for your criticisms and we will include them. No blogs, no forums. Please, anybody who is interested in this dispute, help Wikipedia to improve the article by suggesting verifiable, neutrally stated, authoritative critique of the company. Because as far as I can tell the major source of complaint thus far has been people who did not understand the continuity sales model - a lesson many of us learn at one time in our lives. Does anyone here know how reliable consumeraffairs.com is as a source? Guy (Help!) 15:24, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, but what do you mean "were required to release the information" and "had no choice"? It was a subpoena from a private party, not a court order, so there was plenty of choice. The other websites in question contested the subpoenas in the VP lawsuit and were successfull. If you read the consumeraffairs article carefully, you will see that the subpoenas against RipoffReport.com and Infomercialscams.com have been dropped because the companies in question fought back. Why didn't Wikipedia do the same? To say that there was a substantial cost involved is not a sufficient excuse. What happens if other companies start going after WP posters who posted negative informatition about them (say perfectly correct and verifyiable)? Will WP also play possum in face of such subpoenas? Won't this substantially affect the objectivity of the information provided by Wikipedia? I should think that other WP users will think twice or trice before adding any negative information on big companies, even if it is perfectly balanced according to the WP standards, fully sourced and verifyable. Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 15:46, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

If you are not happy with consumeraffairs.com as a source, here is a more direct source at the website of Public Citizen, a nonprofit public advocacy group that was involved in the lawsuit on behalf of the websites and the individuals being sued: http://www.citizen.org/litigation/forms/cases/CaseDetails.cfm?cID=432 The page has pdf files of some of the court filings for the case, including a Dec 12, 2007 motion by Video Professor to withdraw the subpoenas against RipoffReport.com and Infomercialscams.com: http://www.citizen.org/documents/videoprofwithdrawal.pdf This motion also talks about the Wikipedia case and Wikipedia's actions. Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 16:06, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

A subpoena as part of a court proceeding would have been passed to our general counsel, Mike Godwin. I don't imagine he'd have handed anything over unless he thought it was necessary. I have no opinion on consumeraffairs.com as a source, which is why I asked if anyone else here does. My experience of the VP article is that most of the criticisms were not "perfectly correct and verifiable", the sourcing of such criticisms has generally been very poor. I don't think the world at large is much interested. Guy (Help!) 16:11, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, that's an interesting line of argument: "trust us becuase we are the good guys and therefore we will do the right thing". Kind of reminds me of the arguments of the Bush administration in favor of secrecy and against congressional and judicial oversight. I did not claim that all the criticisms in the VP article history were "perfectly correct and verifyable". Certainly there was enough poor sourcing there, especially given the fact that the subject of the article is not that prominent. And it is probably true that, as you say, the world at large is much interested in the VP story at the moment. However, I was talking about the larger implications of the Wikipedia's actions in this case for future articles on other subjects. In my opinion, there will definitely be a chilling affect, especially if the news about the VP lawsuit story gets around. As a matter of policy, I, as a WP user, would like to see stronger protections of privacy and identities of WP users. Also, we should not just be talking about the validity of a particular Wikipedia criticism (which is what most of the discussion has been about thus far), but about suitability of mentioning this in the main Criticism of Wikipedia page. Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 16:37, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

This is sort of silly, because you really have no reasonable expectation of privacy when editing Wikipedia. Someone with sufficient computer skills can figure out who you are, unless you have taken special precautions. And Wikipedia does not have the resources to fight a lot of legal battles, obviously. It has no way to produce income, at least yet. So you are not really anonymous. There is no encryption or use of TOR sites automatically or other proxies. You really are editing Wikipedia naked. If you think that getting a login name protects you from more than just the simplest kind of inquiries, you are pretty naive, as far as I am concerned. So if you want to engage in libel or posting plans for nuclear weapons or other illegal activity, then you should think twice.--Filll (talk) 18:02, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

That said, having read the first article, I think this definitely should be included in the Video Professor article.--Filll (talk) 18:16, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I think it will take some time for Wikipedia to decide on what its policies and positions should be on these issues. I think that this sort of thing might very well eventually have a big chilling effect on certain kinds of editing on Wikipedia.--Filll (talk) 18:26, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Jimbo says "The story is not well reported. It is false to say that we did not put up a fight. And we were successful in pushing the company to seek identifying data not from us but from the cable broadband provider, which is protected under the Cable Act from complying with a mere subpoena."[7] WAS 4.250 (talk) 20:42, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Not so fast. Here is a copy of my response to Wales' post at his talk page. Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 00:13, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Curious. I have read the VP court motion where the Wikipedia issue is being discussed: http://www.citizen.org/documents/videoprofwithdrawal.pdf Here is what it says: "1. VPI issued subpoenas in early September 2007 to infomercialscams.com, ripoffreport.com, and Wikipedia for identifying information regarding the persons having posted anonymous defamatory remarks about VPI on these Web sites. 2. VPI is withdrawing its subpoenas to infomercialscams.com and ripoffreport.com. 3. Wikipedia failed to respond to its subpoena served out of the Middle District of Florida. In this case, VPI moved the Florida. Court on September 26, 2007 for an order requiring Wikipedia to show cause why it should not be held in contempt . A hearing on the show cause was scheduled for December 20, 2007. 4. On November 29, 2007, Wikipedia produced the subpoenaed information and, thereafter, the show cause hearing was vacated. 5. The information produced by Wikipedia consisted of IP addresses requiring additional subpoenas to be issued to the Internet service providers (ISP) of the owners of these IP addresses to provide the names and physical addresses of the these owners." It does say "Wikipedia produced the subpoenaed information", and there is no mention of any opposing action by Wikipedia. As I understand, in most cases Wikipedia does not have the actual names of the registered WP users, but only their IP addresses. That is what you had and that is what you surrendered. Moreover, the above document makes clear that Wikipedia surrendered the IP addresses of multiple users and not just a single poster. Frankly, I find this action astonishing! If this news spreads around, what kind of an effect do you think it will have on future posters who contemplate including some negative material, even if it is properly sources, about some big company, organization or country? And what about those companies/organizations themselves? How long would it take them to figure out that they can prevent posting of negative information about themselves in Wikipedia by itimidating its users? I would have expected more of a backbone from the supposed beacon of free dissemination of knowledge and information. The other websites in the lawsuit did not have the protection of the Cable Act either, but they chose to fight back and succeeded. Also, the post at Public Citizen, http://www.citizen.org/documents/videoprofsamplenotice.pdf, indicates that informercialscams.com actually notified its users whose identifying information was being sought by the VP subpoena. I don't suppose you did the same, did you? Regards, Nsk92 (talk) 21:00, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

This is not a discussion forum, but a discussion page designed to improve this article. if you have issues with the actions by the Wikimedia Foundation, you can write to them. You are wasting your time here. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:34, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• I think the arguments above are about whether or not to include "privacy concerns" in the main article (Criticism of Wikipedia). Specifically, whether or not Wikipedia's actions in the subpoena should genuinely worry people/editors about their edits, and if so, whether or not it should be placed in the main article as a genuine criticism.Shnakepup (talk) 04:44, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

If these issues were reported in secondary, published sources, we can describe what these sources say about the subject. If not, we would be violating WP:NOR. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:41, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Correction

Could someone correct the name Encyclopedia Dramatica to Encyclopædia Dramatica. Proper spelling is with the æ. Thanks Maxdamage (talk) 09:57, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• Better idea: remove it. It's not a "parody encyclopaedia", and it has no value or merit as a source or as a namecheck in this article. Guy (Help!) 15:48, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Wasn't ED mentioned in the NYTimes article about User:Gracenotes? Cla68 (talk) 19:30, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
• Well, the main page of ED spells it "Encyclopedia". People and institutions (and websites) get to decide how their names are spelled. Leave it alone. Risker (talk) 19:47, 24 December 2007 (UTC)
  • The question is not how their main page spells it; the question is how did our source - The New York Times - spell it. Guy - claiming that "it's not a parody encyclopedia" doesn't do much for your credibility, because that's precisely what it is. -GTBacchus^(talk) 23:20, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

• Uncyclopedia is a parody encyclopaedia, and funny. ED is just a bunch of juvenile nonsense, not a parody of anything. Parody in my book implies something more than just calling yourself "encyclopedia blah". Parody is an art form, toilet humour is an art form too, but a different one. Guy (Help!) 21:04, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

• Guy, there's no need to present your subjective opinion as fact. I don't find Uncyclopedia remotely funny, but I still acknowledge that it is a parody, even though it's pure dreck to me. Encyclopedia Dramatica is also a parody, for people who prefer their humor in a different vein. I find parts of it (not generally the parts about Wikipedians) to be hilariously funny, and very effective as parody. I'm aware of parts of it that are quite different from "juvenile nonsense", and that are indisputably parodies of very specific targets (including your Uncyclopedia). You don't find ED to be effective as parody, and you find Uncyclopedia funny. Tastes differ.

  More to the point, our subjective opinions about whether or not certain websites are funny are utterly irrelevant. They constitute original research, and have no place here. Wikipedia is for reflecting what sources say, not what we think. -GTBacchus^(talk) 22:08, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

• By the way, Guy, your declaring them to be "juvenile nonsense" here brings them more attention than if you were to refrain from commenting about your personal thoughts on the site. If you wish to discourage traffic there, stop vilifying them aloud. That makes people curious. If you wish to remove mention of it from the article, make source-based arguments that won't be mistaken for IDONTLIKEIT, which is precisely how you come across now. Every time you mention that you think it's a bad site, your argument gets weaker, and ED gets stronger.

  The argument not to call them a "parody" goes like this: "The NYT calls ED a 'snarky Wikipedia anti-fansite', not a parody encyclopedia." That is a source-based argument, and makes no reference to our personal tastes. -GTBacchus^(talk) 22:21, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

Give this man a medal. Viridae^Talk 10:28, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

GTBacchus: I don't actually care much about ED as a site, my opinion of them is largely based on removing mass spamming a long time ago before they were blacklisted, it's a problem that no longer needs fixing obviously. I don't think anybody in their right mind would take a word ED says seriously, but I did see the article they put up on Phaedirel, and it was grossly offensive - and not in the way smutty humour is offensive to the Mary Whitehouse brigade, I mean offensive as in nobody in the 21st century has any excuse for publicly describing another human in such a base and callous way. They also published (inaccurately) my work telephone number. That does rather argue for use of the ten foot pole in respect of that site. And please, don't give me the "oxygen of publicity" argument. I am not prepared to accept that the only alternatives are to allow puerile nonsense to stand or somehow to be part of giving it higher prominence. I'm fully aware that WR fans will use any opposition to any attack site as a hook on which to hang their Holy Crusade to allow them to be considered legitimate criticism, but I'm afraid I don't buy that; ED is worthless in every sense of the word. It's worthless as a source of criticism, and as a parody it is actually only a parody of Uncyclopedia, reversing Uncyclopedia's policy and setting out instead to be "stupid and just not funny". But here, all that matters is that they are not actually a parody encyclopaedia, they are a very amateurish and juvenile site with a small amount of anti-Wikipedia nonsense and a large amount of advertising. Guy (Help!) 11:37, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Your ignorance of ED's purpose and content is not anything on which to base our decisions. Your opinion that ED "sets out" to be "stupid and just not funny" (dead wrong - they aim for funny, and in the eyes of many, they achieve it), and your opinion that it is "worthless in every sense of the word", are irrelevant, and those opinions are certainly not obvious, nor shared by all reasonable readers. Personally, I don't care whether or not we mention ED in this article - they got one mention in an NYT article, which we can take or leave. I've never added them to this article, and if you delete the mention, I won't reinsert it. I will, however, never accept IDONTLIKEIT as an argument. If you wish to argue that ED is not a parody encyclopedia, then do so by using sources (hint: no source has ever referred to them as a "parody encyclopedia").

Every time you make a non-source-based argument, you weaken Wikipedia; please stop. As for the "oxygen of publicity argument", I don't claim that the only alternatives are to let it stand or else publicize it. I claim that the correct approach is to stick to source-based arguments, never to talk about "offensiveness", and thus avoid both kinds of publicity - positive and negative.

It is vitally important that we learn the proper way to deal with trolls - by being too boring for them to have any fun at our expense. You're not being boring in this thread. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:46, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

How exactly is referring to them as a parody encyclopedia "taking them seriously"? And I believe ED actually predates Uncyclopedia in existence (at least, it has an earlier creation date in the domain WHOIS records, though one can't be sure if either site may have pre-existed under different URLs). *Dan T.* (talk) 14:21, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

By placing them on a par with Uncyclopedia, which is a parody encyclopedia, with parodies of Wikipedia's rules and content policies, and wcich is hilariously funny as a result. Looking above, there was consensus for not including ED, so it;s not clear to me why it was ever in there. The occasional namecheck is not sufficient notability for most websites, especially ones that include egregious privacy violations and are laden with ads. Guy (Help!) 15:33, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Guy, what makes you so sure that ED hasn't got parodies of Wikipedia's rules and content policies? They certainly do have parodies of many elements of Wikipedia practice and culture, which I'll happily point out to you if you contact me by email (I won't link to them here). Once again, your opinion that Uncyclopedia is funny is just that - an opinion - and therefore irrelevant. As far as I'm concerned it's not funny at all, and my opinion is also irrelevant. Get it?

I don't see a consensus for not naming an example of humorous criticism that was cited by the New York Times; please point it out. I fully agree that the occasional namecheck is not sufficient notability, and that's why we haven't got an article on them. (I helped argue to get that article deleted and keep it that way - remember?) A trivial namecheck in NYT, however, can buy a similarly trivial namecheck here, depending on our sound editorial judgment. That means: not based on how much we like or dislike the site. Make encyclopedic arguments, not emotional ones.

Next, I don't know what you think you know about privacy violations, but ED has got strictly enforced policies about not publishing people's real names, etc., unless that information is already publicly available. They delete private info from page histories. No version in the history of your article there contains any telephone number, accurate or otherwise (I just checked). Maybe it's on some other page; I don't know. Please feel free to email me any relevant links. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:46, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Your opinions regarding the hilariousness, tastelessness, number of ads, and other things about various websites are not relevant criteria to their inclusion or exclusion. *Dan T.* (talk) 16:03, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

My apologies, I'll just call up a tabloid journalist and then they'll be in a reliable source and should be included. That's how it works, isn't it? Guy (Help!) 21:18, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, WP:NOR does say that "If an editor has published the results of his or her research in a reliable publication, the editor may cite that source while writing in the third person". *Dan T.* (talk) 18:01, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

• Fuckit, we just got trolled. Look at the contribs for Maxdamage (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Guy (Help!) 15:38, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

  It would have failed as a troll if you hadn't so passionately risen to the occasion. The only response necessary (which I gave above) was, "no, NYT spells it without the extra 'e'. Thanks anyway." In choosing to editorialize, you fed trolls. Congratulations. Don't give them that kind of reaction, and you can't be trolled. -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:46, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• What, by commenting in passing that it seems to have no merit? Thanks a bunch. You know, I'm getting just a little bit tired of this idea that the only two alternatives are to leave crap be or have it escalated by people like Dan. Why is there no third option? Guy (Help!) 21:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Guy, I've never claimed, and do not believe that those are the only two options. I've consistently supported a third option, which is to remove crap in a professional, de-escalatory manner. Comments in passing as to your personal opinion of the website are destructive, because they feed the idea that we make decisions here based on personal opinions. I suggest that you remove crap for source-based reasons, and leave your personal feelings out of it.

Our job, as experienced Wikipedians, is to set an example of what kind of arguments should be made here. I request that you keep this in mind, and stick to encyclopedic arguments.

Again: I have never claimed that there are "two alternatives", as you present. I continue to claim that calling anything "garbage" or "worthless" or anything to that effect is a bad idea, because it encourages IDONTLIKEIT-style arguments from others. -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:41, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Would you explain what you mean by "escalated by people like Dan"? Cla68 (talk) 21:22, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

It's a meme he's trying to push lately, in which everything wrong with the culture here is the fault of people like me, never people like himself; his opinions on what is "crap" are perfectly objective and obviously true, and anybody questioning them is merely trolling to stir up drama. *Dan T.* (talk) 23:16, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Dan, this isn't helpful either. If you wish to show that you're acting in good faith, then go race Guy to open the content RFC, and bring more eyes to the situation. Comments like this one don't do you much credit, you know. Don't sling mud back; rise above it. -GTBacchus^(talk) 04:48, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Lack of due process

{{editprotected}}

Another criticism of wikipedia is the lack of due process. When a user is accused of being a sock pocket because he happens at one point to have an ip that a vandal had. The user has almost no ability to fight this. The Isiah (talk) 08:41, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

• Source? Also, which websites do have "due process", and where does it imply that Wikipedia has or should have such? As far as I'm aware, your enforceable rights on Wikipedia are limited to the right to leave and the right to fork. Guy (Help!) 12:10, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Need I remind you that this article is about criticisms of Wikipedia... there is no necessity or relevance to proving or disproving that a particular criticism is actually correct or valid or reasonable, so it is a waste of space to debate such things on this talk page. *Dan T.* (talk) 14:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
    • Well, yes, we know that you think criticism sourced to individual Wikipedians is fair game for inclusion here, but I think that is a minority view. Hence the request for a source. As has been pointed out elsewhere recently, a "criticism of" article is not a free pass for WP:NPOV, WP:V and WP:NOR violations. Guy (Help!) 15:31, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
      • Guy is correct that we're not interested in listing any criticism that any random Wikipedian may have, and he's right to insist on a source. Dan is correct that it is irrelevant whether a given criticism is valid or reasonable. Guy, it would probably help keep the discussion focused if you omitted your opinion on whether a criticism is valid or reasonable. The question is: "Source?". Everything after that is distraction. Who cares whether other websites have due process? This page is not for responding to criticisms, sourced or otherwise. This page is for discussing improvements to the article. Let's all stay focused. -GTBacchus^(talk) 16:58, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

This one does look like patent nonsense to me so before going any further with it I suggest Isiah or others bring some reliable sources to back up his or her claim, then we can discuss it but why we should have an editprotected template without even offering sources is beyond me but also opposed by me. Thanks, SqueakBox 15:36, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok number 1 I really didn't expect this much rage to be generated. Its just a problem I have noticed and I just wondered if it should be put into the article. number 2 I have seen similar debates online for example:

• http://ask.metafilter.com/17456/Wikipedia-Yes-or-No debate on due process
• http://www.stoweboyd.com/message/2006/03/tom_evslin_on_w.html
• http://asia.cnet.com/blogs/rehashplus/post.htm?id=63001517

number 3 Just because wiki doesnt apply that you have a right to due process doesnt mean that there shouldnt be one. As for as I can tell this article is about what is "perceived" as wrong by some people not what is actually "right" or "justified". Please no flames. The Isiah (talk) 11:01, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I think it's important to keep the discussion focused. This talk page is not for discussing whether or not Wikipedia should have something like "due process". This page is for discussing which criticisms of Wikipedia can be sourced, and which ones are notable, with no reference to which criticisms are valid or invalid. Thank you for providing those links - now what do people think of those sources? -GTBacchus^(talk) 17:03, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the issue has broader implications for the article's structure. Currently it is divided into "Criticism of the concept" and "Criticism of the contributors". There really isn't a good place to put "Criticism of the process" which would be about criticism of the various policies and guidelines of wikipedia and wikimedia and how those policies are created and executed. It would include misunderstandings (people think it is strictly rule based as they do not get IAR - we are results based), disagreements (people think "free" means something other than copy-left plus no-cost) and negative consequences of the specific processes rather than from the concept or contributors (people claim our current policies produce a worse encyclopedia and more social harm than their idea of what our policies should be). WAS 4.250 (talk) 21:40, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Before talking about how to structure "criticism of the process" into the article, are we sure that such criticisms can be verified as actual criticisms coming from reliable sources? There's a difference between notable criticisms of Wikipedia and common misunderstandings of Wikipedia's rules, as observed by Wikipedians. -GTBacchus^(talk) 23:19, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

The "verification" of criticism is as trivial as the verification of the existence of a blog. A quote from WR or wikipedia talk pages verifies the existence of the criticism. The issue is level of notability. So let's use precise terminology so we don't argue in circles to no good end. Criticism of how we treat BLPs resulted in the creation of that policy, so that is certainly notable. More examples can certainly be given. Further, just cuz we fixed something, does not mean it should not be in the article. This is an encyclopedia article and not a to-do list. WAS 4.250 (talk) 23:28, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry if I was imprecise. Of course it would have to be notable criticism to make the article, which is why I said "verifiable in reliable sources", but you're right, the correct word is "notable". I'll repeat the question, with better words - have we got evidence of notable criticisms of process, e.g., misunderstanding IAR or misunderstanding "free"? -GTBacchus^(talk) 23:40, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

There is plenty of notable criticism about our conflict of interest policy; and our notability policy; and there was that recent semi-notable piece that reflected on the tension between COI and anonymity policy. There is a lot out there. For example I looked to find one clear cut example of policy criticism and I found "To some critics, protection policies make a mockery of the "anyone can edit" notion.[8] WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:25, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

(Outdentng) Ok, cool. So, would three broad categories (Criticism of concept, criticism of process, and criticism of contributors) cover all of the notable criticisms that we know about? Are there other categories of criticism that we haven't yet listed? -GTBacchus^(talk) 00:08, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

yeah that seems like it would do it nicely. The Isiah (talk) 02:33, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok, so why is the article protected? -GTBacchus^(talk) 22:08, 30 December 2007 (UTC)

Unsourced OR?

{{editprotected}} The statement:

If obscure articles tend to be of a lesser quality (not simply in their scope, but also in their factuality, rigor, encyclopedic style, etc.,) then as more minor articles emerge, the average quality of the encyclopedia's articles lessens (especially measured by article-count, unweighted by hits). Moreover, the collective resources of the encyclopedia may be diluted into maintaining less notable articles faster than they are increased by encompassing wider interests.

seems to be unsourced OR and should be removed. Dhaluza (talk) 04:22, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree. It is the Deletionist's Tautology. "Minor article" = "obscure article of a lesser quality" therefor fewer minor articles equals greater average quality; therefor Wikipedia should consist solely of non-minor articles and would be perfect if all non-perfect articles were deleted; and since there are no perfect articles, the perfect wikipedia is the nonexistent wikipedia. WAS 4.250 (talk) 06:28, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Who cares whether or not it's a valid criticism? All we're interested in is whether it's a sourced criticism. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:15, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

The criteria is not is it sourced. The criteria is is it capable of being sourced to a reliable published source. Not being sourced is one piece of evidence. Being invalid is a second piece of evidence. Together they make it valid to delete. We should not delete things we believe can eventually be adequately sourced just because they are currently unsourced. Hence the value of evaluating validity. WAS 4.250 (talk) 02:10, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I guess. I could see how invalid criticisms could yet be sourced, if they're talked about enough to be notable. As for whether it can be sourced, any material that has been challenged as to verifiability may be removed until a source is provided. Otherwise we would keep anything that someone claims they think they can source. -GTBacchus^(talk) 12:06, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, but we don't remove things that likely belong in an article, just because we can remove anything that is not sourced. For example,we don't gut the many articles that were written before this was a requirement on the English Wikipedia (and it's not even enforced on the German Wikipedia, for example). But something that is an obviously controversial POV statement like this should be removed. Dhaluza (talk) 17:14, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Precisely - any material that has been challenged. Why would we challenge something that can likely be sourced? If it can likely be sourced, then someone will come up with one and replace it. As long as we're all acting in good faith, which we are, it works out fine.

The point is that we focus on whether something can be sourced, not on whether or not it's an intelligent criticism. It's validity as a criticism of Wikipedia has little bearing on whether or not it can be sourced. "Is sourced" versus "can be sourced" is an uninteresting distinction, because there's no deadline. -GTBacchus^(talk) 00:39, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Done. --- RockMFR 06:37, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Let's get this article unprotected

It's been protected for weeks now, and we really ought to resolve the issue and move on. The protection seems to be over the article "Secret mailing list rocks Wikipedia" in The Register. Some say it's a reliable source and that it should be included; others say it isn't a reliable source, and should be removed. So what are we going to do? I think the solution is to file a content RfC and get more community input, so I'll just set one up now. -GTBacchus^(talk) 18:47, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree. The idea of Criticism of Wikipedia being protected, while a number of Wikipedia admins themselves have apparently continued editing the page doesn't seem fair. Zenwhat (talk) 08:38, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

RFC: Is The Register a reliable source for this article?

I've read what I think may be the whole discussion, the sources in question, a lot of background material, and... I wish it were clearer. My conclusion, however, is that yes, the Register article, while not exactly radiating journalistic credibility, is a sufficiently reliable source that it can and should be used for this article; moreover, I believe it should also be used as a source for any articles that cover the underlying substance of the criticism (as opposed to this one, which is about the criticism itself).

It bothers me not a whit that citing the Register article will make some editors unhappy, as it will in effect give some additional credence to the criticisms of some people who are apparently, um, not terribly well liked, shall we say. If we can't even permit linking to this article it on a page dedicated to detailing criticisms of Wikipedia, apparently we're just not going to let it go anywhere. That doesn't work for me, so I'd be inclined to err toward inclusion on this page, but in this case I don't think the lean is necessary The source is credible. atakdoug (talk) 20:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

• I do not see The Register to be a reliable source for anything. It is fun reading (sometimes) but it is closer than not to a printed tabloid.... I mean Google kicks Wikipedia in the googlies: Move over, Jimbo - we're in the content biz now lol! ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 05:20, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

The controversy surrounding the two Register articles was widely reported and while I've heard a lot of badmouthing of the Register afterwards, I've heard no attempt to directly refute their allegations. The two key allegations are that Jimbo Wales improperly used his role as "benevolent dictator" to manipulate an article's content and suppress his opponents, and that many long-time admins use a secret mailing list to coordinate talk-page debates. The second allegation has a lesser allegation about improper use of the ban hammer to suppress viewpoints that members on this secret mailing list don't agree with.

Wikipedia's open nature is central to its purpose as a project. Just this morning, Jimbo is quoted in Ars Technica saying that he sees Wikia Search as "a political statement about transparency and openness." So accusations of hypocrisy are highly notable. I don't know that I'm persuaded by the Register article, but I'm stunned that there isn't even a mention of it.

The easiest answer would have been if the story was reported elsewhere-- unfortunately like many technical subjects this didn't make the mainstream media (at least I haven't found anything). I'd say that the Register fulfills the reliable source criteria. It has editorial oversight, a fact-checking policy, is not an extremist publication, and is widely cited by other reliable sources. The Noticeboard debate was pretty spirited [9], but the latest there was this: the Register is a Reliable Source and can be cited except in the case of baseless accusations about Wikipedia that we know are untrue.

I think that if we're going to post criticisms at all, that this issue should at least get a mention. NPOV is hard because most Wikipedia contributors have the same point of view on these allegations. It makes it extra hard to keep your editorial objectivity.

Wellspring (talk) 15:40, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

No, the Reg is not a reliable source for this article. We should not even be asking this: it says, in effect, that Cla68 criticizes Wikipedia due to his (incorrect, but that's an aside) interpretation of an incident. Why would that be significant? Guy (Help!) 14:46, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

"Should not even be asking this"? What does that mean? Isn't asking whether or not putative sources are reliable precisely what we should be doing, most of the time? -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:30, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

• Outside party says: Yes, of course, absolutely. With the caveat that factual information from the Register alone is not really reliable, but the opinions about Wikipedia and the claims about facts are entirely appropriate. An article about criticism of Wikipedia that doesn't discuss some of the highest-profile criticisms, apparently because a vocal minority of editors is personally affronted by them, is a bad idea. <eleland/talkedits> 21:38, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Any such "highest-profile criticisms" that is published in a reliable source, can be added to this article. The Register, is not such a source. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 21:48, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

It would be interesting to know if anyone ever said The Register wasn't a reliable source before the late great unpleasantness.--G-Dett (talk) 23:08, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

This [10] shows that the Register is currently cited 1,962 times in Wikipedia. I may be wrong, but I've only noticed Guy and Jossi object to the Register being cited here and in related articles like the Gary Weiss bio. By the way, the Register article doesn't only quote me, it also contains allegations that an entire suburb in Utah was blocked by David Gerard, who falsely claimed that the neighborhood ISP was an open proxy. These allegations were independently confirmed by a Utah newspaper as discussed earlier on this page. Cla68 (talk) 00:16, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

It looks like I have my answer. The Register has been described as an unreliable source before all this hoopla, by "Cave Bovum" aka WordBomb aka Judd Bagley, who removed a Register cite from Patrick M. Byrne, saying ["I'm sorry, The Register is not a reliable source." He was immediately reverted by none other than Mantanmoreland, who first restored the Register material without comment[11], and then another time with the admonition to "stop the POV pushing."[12] Mantanmoreland is an influential editor; perhaps he could be persuaded to weigh in again on the Register's behalf?--G-Dett (talk) 23:35, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

It all seems to depend entirely on whose ox is being gored in any particular instance. People are quite willing to switch sides depending on which happens to suit their agenda at the present time. *Dan T.* (talk) 01:26, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm really trying to grasp why people are fighting so hard to suppress this. True or false, the reports have been made, the source conforms to the guidelines particularly for an article of this nature, and the criticism is highly notable. The Register as an unreliable source is brand-new as I've heard, but either way their story belongs in an article of this nature. I understand that to core wikipedians, this feels like an injustice, but it's turning into a real test of our objectivity, openness and transparency.

Is there a compromise which would make people more comfortable with including this? For example, can we find valid citations which counter the Register and Daily Herald stories? Wellspring (talk) 04:32, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

Jossi, reliability of a source depends on what you're sourcing it for. As far as I know, the only sites which are really truly categorically banned are extremist fringe sources, and self-published sources which are not by recognized experts. Obviously the Reg is not an extremist source, and I haven't seen any real reason why Orlowski would be considered fringe (we are talking Orlowski, right?) Yes, it's a classic tabloid, sensationalist news-u-tainment with no clear separation between fact and opinion. That's why it's not a reliable source for straight factual claims^*, like "Wikipedia admins blocked an entire neighbourhood in Utah." But it's entirely reliable for the purpose of opinion and commentary on Wikipedia, which is kind of, you know, the subject of this article. <eleland/talkedits> 00:30, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

*except maybe stuff like processor specs

<outdent>One question. Has wikipedia officially responded to this criticism as in a press release? Guy notes the article in question is incorrect so why not do this? We could then cite this article and cite the press release rebutting the argument made. This could be considered OR to source the press release but this release could get reported somewhere and that could be cited. If criticisms like this are reported, they should be acknowledged and if they are erroneous wikipedia should address them and we can see all sides of the story instead of trying to sweep everything under the rug. MrMurph101 (talk) 04:56, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

As far as I know, no there's no official response. I suggested something similar above, where we present both sides of the story. So far no response from Guy on it. With the article protected, there isn't much users can do; it's in the hands of the admins now. Wellspring (talk) 05:54, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

• Yes, The Register is a WP:reliable source. Because it meets all the criteria for a WP:reliable source. Dlabtot (talk) 19:54, 15 January 2008 (UTC)

• So... shall we try unprotection? It appears that we've generated a bit more dialogue, and some Wikipedians are saying that the Register is a reliable source, and there hasn't been any response from those who think otherwise. How about we unprotect the page, and see what happens? Any objections? If there aren't any in a few hours, I'll lift the protection. -GTBacchus^(talk) 22:01, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

• One reason there is no comment from me is that there is 0% chance of persuading Dan and Charles that the Reg's reprinting of their peerless wisdom is anything other than the most perceptive and pertinent criticism Wikipedia has ever seen. It remains a tabloid source, and it remains a source saying, in effect, that a Wikipedian has criticised Wikipedia. As a source it sucks, as a story it lacks accuracy and even a basic attempt at neutral portrayal, the coverage of the strory is negligible (hence the Reg being an issue; if a better source had covered it we would not be here), and that story will always be a steaming pile of ordure, on which Judd Bagley piled more ordure to further serve his "forget the -3.68 five year average EPS, Wikipedia is to blame for Overstock's share price tanking" crap. It was, is and always will be abject nonsense inserted to pursue an agenda, and no amount of debate will persuade those pursuing The Truth™, in the Authorised Version By Cla68, that it is of anything other than paramount importance. The importance of this criticism in the world context is between zero and fuck all, and that, too, will never change. So the debate was and is sterile. And incidentally I know that much of what Cla68 says via the Reg is false because I was on the mailing list form the outset and I told him it was false and he was rebuffed from the mailing list which is why, I think, he took it to the Reg in order to weasel it in here. Cnyical, shameful, and in the end of no actual lasting relevance or significance. The mailing list still exists. Guy (Help!) 23:25, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Guy, what on Earth makes you think you would have to convince Dan and Charles of anything? Since when do they make the decisions around here? The people you have to convince are the community, and Dan and Charles are a negligibly small part of that. It's an RfC, where people are invited from far and wide to talk about the reliability of this source, and you're staying out of the discussion.... because you despair of convincing Dan of something? That makes no sense. Dan doesn't own the article. You say the importance of this criticism is "zero and fuck all," and you very well may be right, but you're not doing much to convince the community of that. Why? Are you trying to undermine your own argument, by making your case look as biased as possible? Are you thinking strategically here, or are you reacting? -GTBacchus^(talk) 03:02, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

This isn't about me or Dan, this is about the Register. Remember, most of the Register's reporting on the Durova, Bagley, and Doran incidents has been confirmed in other sources. Also, the Register is noted for its reporting and commentary on a wide range of technology issues. That's one reason that it is cited almost 2,000 times in Wikipedia already and is a valid source for criticism of Wikipedia. That's probably why the consensus here is to accept the Register as a valid source for this article. Cla68 (talk) 23:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

If you're looking for personal battles, take it to the Cage match section of WikBack. Here, you're supposed to comment on the content, not the contributor, and to give better reasons for rejecting a source than WP:IDONTLIKEIT. *Dan T.* (talk) 04:45, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• No. The Register may be a reliable source on certain computer issues, but on anything related to Wikipedia it is hopelessly biased and functions as little more than a blog. I would suggest also that Cla68 recuse himself from discussion of the Reg, as he was quoted extensively in both articles and is hopelessly conflicted. It is, at best, bad taste for a person quoted in an article to lobby for inclusion of the article in Wikipedia--Onlyjusthisonetime (talk) 15:00, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

I have not made a determination on The Register since I'm just starting to read this WFC. I am concerned with the above comment however. It is cherry picking. And might I remind everyone, we are all biased? As I'm certain most of the wikipedians are pro-wiki biased. NYCDA (talk) 22:12, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

• Yes. The Regiester's report is biased against Wikipedia. We can list pro Wiki articles as counter but should not exclude them because of bias. Many newspaper are biased. Be they conservative/liberal left/right etc. Having a point of view does not make them invalid. NYCDA (talk) 17:35, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Bias is not the sole issue, though it certainly is a factor because the bias is so blatant and egregious. The issue is reliability and accuracy, and that is where the Register is problematic on issues relating to Wikipedia. That was exemplified by the recent coverage. --Onlyjusthisonetime (talk) 22:23, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

But this is the Criticism of Wikipedia page; sources used here are merely sources to the fact that certain criticisms exist, not that they are necessarily true, valid, or held by unbiased observers (a critic is biased pretty much by definition). The notability of the Register articles is attested to by their appearances in Slashdot, Digg, and various blogs immediately after publication. *Dan T.* (talk) 23:38, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

When I said that the Register was "may be a reliable source on certain computer issues" I was being overly generous. Here [13] is what passes for journalism at the Register. This is a blog that calls itself a publication. Slashdot and Digg "reccies" from fans don't add to its reliability as a source. Neither is its "notability" an issue. Many blogs, including the Register, are notable, but that does not make them reliable as sources. The National Enquirer is notable enough for an article in Wikipedia.--Onlyjusthisonetime (talk) 05:55, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

Carolyn Doran and "hive mind"

Can someone think of a good addition to the "hive mind" section that uses Wikipedia's response to the Carolyn Doran article? Most of the stuff I add to articles seems to get reverted, so I'm not even going to try. --Fandyllic (talk) 11:06 AM PST 6 Jan 2008

Something seems lacking, unless I'm missing it

Is there really no entry on this page about the delete-happy nature of many editors, and the criticism which the notability system often receives? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.230.72.86 (talk • contribs)

• I will delete the article if that will help? Guy (Help!) 14:44, 8 January 2008 (UTC)
• Speedy delete - non-notable vanispamicruftvertisement. Userfy to non-notable blog and nuke from orbit. -GTBacchus^(talk) 07:18, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Article

Well, I can't say I've seen an article criticizing itself ;) Must be why its protected. SudoKing (talk) 01:13, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Invention

We should possibly have a section about Wikipedians inventing terms and concepts, or splicing them and nuancing them to make as many useless articles as possible. This happens especially in the Humanities and Social Sciences. This irks me, 'cause they get reproduced in places like Answers.com. Examples: Commonwealth realm, federal monarchy, federal republic, List of Canadian monarchs, etc. Topics that are not found in the finest paper encyclopedias! And almighty edit wars erupt over these articles! Btw, it's so refreshing to find a Wikipedia page that is so self-critical and so not up itself!--Gazzster (talk) 06:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Do you know of any documentation of this particular criticism. If so, then there might be a place for it in the article, otherwise it would be original research. -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:48, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Administrators link

In the third paragraph in the section Criticism of Wikipedia#Exposure to vandals, there is a link to Wikipedia:Administrators. According to WP:WAWI, we should make this an external link IF at all, but I don't think we should even have the link. Thoughts? -- Renesis (talk) 02:40, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia bureaucracy

What we have here is a deliberate attempt to create a wikipedia bureaucracy.
(example: all these unbelievable rules, (endless pages of them),
that no one knows who's making them)
Of course wikipedia is not a free cyclopedia as it claims.
It has owners.
And I don't thing that these things are happening under the owner's nose.

Therefore I think that the blame is on them.


(and please Mr Ass Hole Administrator,
don't delete these comments,
or my account, I beg of you ;)
It won't make you less of an Ass Hole.
Thank you!)
—Preceding unsigned comment added by Nikos papadopoulos (talk • contribs) 19:59, January 17, 2008

1. Calling people "Ass hole" doesn't help solve problems, however personally satisfying it may be.
2. It's false that "no one knows who's making the rules." It's actually quite well-documented.
3. The rules don't make Wikipedia into a bureaucracy, per WP:IAR. Wikipedia is not a system of formal rules, and from what I've seen, those who treat it as such come to grief. -GTBacchus^(talk) 21:08, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Defensiveness in second sub-section

{{editprotected}}

In the second sub-section after the summary titled "Usefulness as a reference", the first sentence sounds a bit defensive. A) It starts off with the implied tone that it's usefulness is under question, but preempts this questioning with an admission. I propose that, "Wikipedia acknowledges that it should not be used as a primary source for serious research," should be edited to read: "Many call into question the usefulness of Wikipedia as a reference, in fact Wikipedia acknowledges that it should not be used as a primary source of serious research." Or something along those lines, with proper links and citations, of course. (E.g. Citations of such criticisms and a pointer to the page on Wikipedia which makes the acknowledgment.) —Memotype::T 23:23, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

This sort of change needs to be made after the current dispute is solved and the protection lifted. Editprotected requests should be limited to immediate requests for uncontentious changes, such as adding interwiki links. — Carl (CBM · talk) 05:31, 18 January 2008 (UTC)