[Foundation-l] Interesting legal action

Sat May 21 21:08:45 UTC 2011

On Sat, May 21, 2011 at 14:33, MZMcBride <z at mzmcbride.com> wrote:
> Sarah wrote:
>> I'm increasingly wondering whether we should be hosting any BLPs, because
>> these are often difficult decisions to make -- at which point there is
>> legitimate public interest in a person's private life -- and they can't be
>> reached thoughtfully in an open-editing environment.
>
> I think anyone who has been in the "BLP trenches" has had the same thought.
> The reality is that an encyclopedia without a "Barack Obama" article or a
> "Nelson Mandela" article really isn't a general reference encyclopedia, or
> at least isn't a very good one. The issue is making a reasonable distinction
> between those types of individuals and everyone else.
>
> MZMcBride
>
We could solve that by hosting only BLPs that have already had
encyclopedic or extensive treatment elsewhere, i.e. have already been
the subject of (a) an encyclopedia article; or (b) a book or book
chapter from a reliable publisher; or (c) a profile or in-depth piece
in a high-quality newspaper (one about the person, not about events
the person was involved in).

I know this has been suggested before, but it's coming time to
consider it seriously.

Sarah