[Foundation-l] Arbitration committe and content

Sun Nov 21 01:14:43 UTC 2004

Jimbo Wales:

> At the same time, I think that the advantages would be minimal.  If
> the problem users are got out of the way, then good users can find the
> right answer for an article.  Almost never is the *content* the
> problem, the problem is *people* with poor social skills, poor editing
> skills, etc.  So if the ArbCom resolves the behavior issue, then the
> article content can be taken care of by other others acting in the
> normal wiki way.

I disagree. In many cases the *content* is the big problem, the poor
social skills etcetera just happen to surface because there is a
conflict. Perhaps not in the cases going to the arbitration committee,
but I think it is such in most of the cases that don't go to the
arbitration committee, but do not get resolved either except by one
party giving up hope and putting the page on their list of "pages that
I prefer not looking at above improving".

There must be some way to decide that certain POVs are simply so far
out that they are not going to be mentioned, or at least if they are
going to be mentioned then not on the main page. Theories about the
pyramids having been built by aliens do not belong on [[Egyptian
pyramid]] (not that I remember anyone putting it there, but...) and
telling both parties to stop yelling will not resolve that.

Wiki-editing _often_ gets us out of conflicts. But to think it
_always_ does so, other than by tiring one party to dead, is
hopelessly naive. Ten times more naive than thinking that Wikipedia
could actually work.

Andre Engels