[WikiEN-l] WP:COI violation

Sun Nov 12 05:13:45 UTC 2006

Ken Arromdee wrote:

>On Fri, 10 Nov 2006, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>  
>
>>Asking someone to "avoid" participating does not imply disallowing that 
>>participation.  It only warns them that this sometimes leads to 
>>conflicts.
>>    
>>
>Any ordinary person reading this in a straightforward way would take an
>instruction to "avoid" doing something as a statement that it is not
>allowed.  
>
That may be consistent with your view of the "ordinary person", but 
others may see it differently.  Avoidance is a restriction that one 
applies on one's own self.  It does not depend on the imposition of 
external authority.  It favours the exercise of judgement and the 
ability to know one's own limits.  An outright ban on an activity could 
easily be stated with less equivocation.,

>Telling users to avoid doing something and then saying that that doesn't
>prevent legitimate uses because it isn't a ban, is expecting everyone who
>reads the policies to be a Wikilawyer.  This is absurd.  Policies need to
>be comprehensible by ordinary people.
>
Quite the contrary.  Some "ordinary people" don't need to be led through 
by the hand like little children.

Ec