[WikiEN-l] Neo-nazis to attack wikipedia

Mon Feb 7 16:41:39 UTC 2005

Jake Waskett (jake at waskett.org) [050208 03:28]:

> Create and use a template for controversial articles, that says, in effect: 
> "This is a highly controversial article. Before making any changes, please 
> familiarise yourself with the discussion page, and add a comment describing 
> your change and the justification for it." We should also link to WP:NPOV.

Such a template exists, but it's presently only applied to talk pages.

(The idea is that such messages to Wikipedia editors are only ever to be
applied to an article as a temporary thing in the hope of facilitating
their removal - e.g. {{protected}}, {{npov}}, even {{stub}}. Ones intended
to be permanent fixtures seem not to be favoured at all by most editors.)

> If it doesn't work, we can create a "3 unjustified edits rule", similar to the 
> 3RR, and enforced in the same way. This need only be applied to articles with 
> the controversial header.
> This should help to some extent, as forcing descriptions and justifications 
> will slow editors down and may also create a deterrent for edits that authors 
> *know* are NPOV or are unwilling to discuss the matter. This may help get rid 
> of the more rabid POV editors.

I don't think it'll do a damned thing to slow down POV pushers, but I do
think the Summary field being compulsory would be good. It actually took me
a couple of days to realise what it was for (commenting in a version
control system).

- d.