[WikiEN-l] Quasi-vanity and quasi-advertising

Tue Oct 4 02:47:07 UTC 2005

On 10/3/05, dpbsmith at verizon.net <dpbsmith at verizon.net> wrote:
>
> One of the characteristics of being a fan is that one has a sort of
> illusory
> personal connection to the object of one's admiration. Let's suppose,
> hypothetically, that I were a fan of Arlo Guthrie. I would feel almost as
> if
> Arlo Guthrie were a close friend.
>
> Now, suppose I were to insert an fawning article on his latest album,
> "Live
> in Sydney," pointing out the neutral and objectively true encyclopedic
> fact
> that it's terrific and everyone should buy one or two copies.
> Hypothetically.
> For only twenty-seven hypothetical U. S. dollars.
>
> I don't get a cut of the profits, and I'm not hired by Rising Son Records
> to
> promote this album, so I can say truthfully that it is not advertising.
>
> But, it sort of is. Because even though I don't get _money_ out of the
> deal,
> I do get the warm fuzzy feeling that I'm helping my close friend Arlo.
> (Even
> though he's not really my friend). And that I'm validating my fandom by
> increasing the number of fans.
>
> So, it's deliberate _promotion._
>
> It's not vanity, because Arlo Guthrie didn't write the article himself.
>
> But, it sort of is, because a close friend of Arlo wrote the article. Or,
> someone who has the illusion of being a close friend of Arlo wrote the
> article.
>
> Of course, wanting to "help" or promote the topic area on which one is
> writing is probably the commonest motivation for writing articles for
> Wikipedia, and up to a point it's legitimate.
>
> I'd like to redefine "vanity" as meaning "an imbalanced mix of motives in
> which serving the needs of the contributor outweights serving the needs of
> the reader."

Who cares about whether or not it's vanity? It's POV, and as such it should
be fixed.