But apparently the rest of Wikipedia doesn't mind these American geeks
deleting them. And if you're going to claim that the rest of Wikipedia
are made up of American geeks, I must disagree. Do geeks make up a
substantial amount in our community? Yes. However, the ratio of geeks to
non-geeks has been going down in the past few years.
While it's based mostly on opinion, I think most people would agree that
our goal of building an encyclopedia is not drastically hurt by the
deletion of school articles. Hopefully, eventually we will be able to
have more school articles, but Wikipedia exists to serve our audience,
which does not appear to mind the lack of school articles much, if at
all. Currently, few people are really worried about school articles.
That may change in the future, but until it does, we must work with the
community, even if you think it's an unreasonable one.
John Lee
([[User:Johnleemk]])
Mark Richards wrote:
The problem boils down to one of POV. No, I don't
care
about a school in west nowhere, and I don't care about
a foreign handbag company. I care about Pokemon
characters, I don't care about Indian villages.
Slashdot jokes are in, high schools are out. Obscure
varients of Linux are in, obscure Hong Kong companies
are out.
The question is not 'are people within their "rights"'
to delete things that don't interest them, but does it
serve the creation of a neutral and wide scope
encyclopedia. We are removing content simply because
(mostly) American techies think it is unimportant.
That's what really bothers me.
Mark
--- John Lee <johnleemk(a)gawab.com> wrote:
>I believe in one of my more recent mails, I quoted
>[[What Wikipedia is
>not]] stating that it is not an exhaustive list by
>any means.
>
>In any case, Mark, while there is no consensus to
>delete schools, there
>is none to keep them either. Thus, I'd say those who
>are listing them
>are acting within their rights, because schools
>aren't covered by any
>policy; thus we decide them on a case-by-case basis.
>Democracy is always
>unfair to someone, but if there was a real
>miscarriage of justice, how
>come much of the community doesn't care we're
>deleting oh so important
>articles on Hong Kong handbag companies or high
>schools? (Of course,
>there's the issue of whether there was true
>consensus; in quite a few,
>there hasn't been any.)
>
>It so happens that most people on VFD are
>deletionists. Inclusionists
>argue this is unfair as important articles are
>unfairly deleted.
>However, this calls to mind a recent post to this
>list by, if I'm not
>mistaken, Dpbsmith: Most people ARE a "strong
>neutral" on these; they
>don't care whether these articles stay or go. I am
>of the same opinion.
>If they really felt the system is unfair, they'd
>either pack up and
>leave (those who have done this are so few, I doubt
>their existence) or
>complain. So far the only people complaining are
>those from the extreme
>inclusionist camp. Therefore, much of the community
>couldn't care less
>about the fate of school articles. Delete all
>articles with the word
>"green"? If they found out, they'd almost certainly
>be livid. Delete all
>school articles? Lots probably would care (I mean,
>would you delete an
>article on [[Eton]] or one of those posh prep
>schools?). Delete an
>article on, say, [[Allerton High School]]? Most
>wouldn't and don't care.
>
>The community is fine with the current practice,
>whether it's in line
>with policy or not. Remember, policy and VFD exist
>to serve the
>community. They are the means to an end. Not an end
>in themselves.
>
>John Lee
>([[User:Johnleemk]])
>
>
>