[WikiEN-l] Re: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia

Wed Mar 9 04:34:49 UTC 2005

----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Snow" <wikipedia at earthlink.net>
To: wikien-l at Wikipedia.org
Subject: [WikiEN-l] Re: Wikipedia is an encyclopedia
Date: Tue, 08 Mar 2005 18:50:31 -0800

> 
> JAY JG wrote:
> 
> >> From: "Charles Matthews" <charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com>
> >>
> >> Jimbo wrote
> >>
> >> > I do not endorse the view, a view held as far as I know only by a very
> >> > tiny minority, that Wikipedia is anti-elitist or anti-expert in any
> >> > way.  If anything, we are *extremely* elitist but anti-credentialist.
> >> > That is, we seek thoughtful intelligent people willing to do the very
> >> > hard work of getting it right, and we don't accept anything less than
> >> > that.  PhDs are valuable evidence of that, and attracting and
> >> > retraining academic specialists is a valid goal.
> >>
> >> I think Jimbo perhaps meant 'retaining', though in my case 'retraining'
> >> rings a bell, also.
> >
> > "Restraining" might also apply. :-O
> 
> Though if they've been properly retrained, meaning they abide by 
> the spirit of Wikipedia's policies, no further restraint should be 
> necessary.
> 
An amusing comment (though I see no smiley) but I think it goes to the core of the problem. The strength of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit it, and supposedly the forces of right will outlast the forces of wrong (as it were).

As with censorship, when we "restrain" some users, the question is who is to be restrained, who proposes the restraining, who decides on the restraining, and who enforces the restraining.

Do not tell me these rules are applied equally. I don't edit certain articles anymore because I'll research an edit, back it up with sources, and bring the information down to an NPOV minimum. But how many like me realize that hours of work will be relentlessly reversed by the majority bias on the subject? That's the weakness of Wikipedia.

Of course, one will say "that's Cecropia's OPINION that his writing in NPOV." Well yes, and we are too close to our opinions to always catch our own biases. However, most anyone who has ever written more than a church fund-raising recipe for money knows when they are presenting something in a neutral fashion, in an advocacy fashion, in an aggresive fashion, or are writing a puff piece.

--Cecropia
-- 
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