[WikiEN-l] Defamatory Biographies - another problem looming for Wikipedia?

Sun Dec 18 20:42:52 UTC 2005

We have a real problem with unsourced defamatory biographies.

This morning, while working on the Help desk, I responded to a letter from
Lucianne Goldberg, who wrote seeking a deletion or correction to what she
considered to be two highly offensive paragraphs in her biography. I looked
at the article and saw that there were severe problems with some of the
material in it.

I have edited the article and sourced it as well as replying to her
attaching a copy of the article as rewritten by me. I am awaiting her advice
as to the specific information that was of concern to her. Once I have the
specifics, I will advise further on the matter.

However, the matter that I believe likely to be of most concern was in the
original version of the article and has survived for nearly two months with
multiple edits. There were no sources provided for the allegation. Frankly,
this problem has the potential to be another big problem with Wikipedia.

We need to pay particular attention to the biographies of contemporary
biographies especially of controversial figures. In particular, we need to
ensure that our articles are scrupulous in citing sources. We need to give
instructions to recent changes patrollers to be on the lookout for
biographies making negative claims without proper sourcing.

Regards

Keith Old

Keith Old