[WikiEN-l] Neo-nazis to attack wikipedia

Mon Feb 7 17:55:38 UTC 2005

Jake Waskett wrote,

On Monday 07 February 2005 00:25, AndyL wrote:
 > Perhaps we need some sort of intermediate form of ongoing protection for
 > certain pages. Perhaps some pages should only have registered editors able
 > to actively edit them with non-editors only able to make suggestions on
 > talk pages? Perhaps other pages should be protected on an ongoing basis and
 > only have admins able to edit them based on proposals on talk pages which
 > have achieved consensus or passed a certain standard?
 >
 > Andy
Superb idea. I'm not sure that Wiki has the facility to have "registered"
editors, but a nominated admin could be responsible for a page and apply
changes that have been voted upon.

This is a very dangerous idea.  I agree we need a strategy for dealing with 
massive organized assaults on Wikipedia, whatever the source.  I hope we 
can come up with something better than putting an administrator in charge 
of a site and taking votes.

This brings us back to an issue I and others have raised: we have 
mechanisms for resolving disputes over behavior; we do not have, but need, 
mechanisms for resolving disputes over content.  I think Jake is basically 
suggesting just such a mechanism.  But it is a mechanism I oppose -- I 
don't trust putting any admin. in charge of a page, and I don't think votes 
are a good way to resolve issues of conflict (especially when 43,000 storm 
troopers are threatening Wikipedia!  Let's not forget that Hitler  took 
advantage of votes as well).

So: I do agree that we need mechanisms to resolve conflict over content 
(even though I reject this particular mechanism).  I believe that such a 
mechanism, along with vigorous enforcement of NVOP, No Original Research, 
and Verifiability will be enough to protect ourselves against any 
small-scale assault.

But Jay's point is that none of these mechanisms will protect us against a 
43,000 person assault.  Fred might be right, that our worst-case scenario 
will not happen, but I tend to agree with Jay that we need to consider this 
and think of ways to deal with it.  But I do not think that the solution to 
this kind of problem will be anything like the mechanisms we currently rely on.

Steve

Steven L. Rubenstein
Associate Professor
Department of Sociology and Anthropology
Bentley Annex
Ohio University
Athens, Ohio 45701