[WikiEN-l] Topic warriors

Fri Sep 16 10:08:41 UTC 2005

We all know about "POV warriors." I'm fortunate or wimpy enough not  
to have been involved in articles with serious long-standing POV  
wars, but my impression is that _for the most part_ these things seem  
to stay under reasonable control.

On the other hand, I think we are developing "topic warriors" who  
feel that a specific subject area deserves very detailed coverage,  
systematically watch VfD for any cases where articles on their pet  
topic are nominated for deletion, and oppose deletion of _any_  
article on their topic on principle, regardless of the quality of the  
article.

Unlike POV, a relatively small number of topic warriors CAN   
effectively achieve their goal. (And, of course, they are assisted by  
Wikipedians who do _not_ accept the premise that "Wikipedia is not an  
indiscriminate collection of information.")

NOTE NOTE NOTE ---> topic wars are FAR, FAR less damaging to  
Wikipedia and FAR less of a concern than POV wars.

Some Wikipedians undoubtedly feel that topic wars do not damage  
Wikipedia at all. My feeling is that they do,  because they  
deliberately _create_ systemic bias, and  create an area in which the  
average quality of the articles  is lower than the rest of Wikipedia.

They certainly damage the Wikipedia community by factionalizing it,  
creating an "us versus them" mentality, and, in some cases, publicly  
gloating over their "success."

--
Daniel P. B. Smith, dpbsmith at verizon.net
"Elinor Goulding Smith's Great Big Messy Book" is now back in print!
Sample chapter at http://world.std.com/~dpbsmith/messy.html
Buy it at http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1403314063/