[WikiEN-l] Defamatory Biographies - another problem looming forWikipedia?

Thu Dec 22 05:27:00 UTC 2005

On Wed, 21 Dec 2005, David Gerard wrote:

> Angela wrote:
>
> > It's possible to add a stub category without adding a stub template.
> > Perhaps this would be a suitable compromise between those who need the
> > categories to be there and those who don't want multiple "this is a
> > stub..." notices on one article? Compare
> > <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ambrosius_Stub&oldid=27617688>
> > with <http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ambrosius_Stub&oldid=27615177>,
> > for example.
>
>
> Who on Earth can remember the one trillion stub types? Not me.
> WikiProject Stub Sorting are the ones who know them.
>
> For those revolted by multiple stubs (and I agree that they have all
> Geoff's listed points against them), the talk page could be workable -
> they wouldn't be blots on the article warranting {{toomanyboxes}} and
> they'd still be findable in the relevant stub category. WSS would need
> collective persuasion that this was a good idea, else they would likely
> assume it was an error and fix it.
>
You had me until that last sentence. I'm gonna continue with my "delete
all but one stub template per article" ways until one of the folks from
the Stub Sorting group decides to have a talk with me.

And before anyone thinks I'm in the process of irreparably destroying
Wikipedia with my lawlessness (okay, as much destruction as removing stub
templates can cause), let me state that on average I modify about one
article a week for this reason. Some days, when I'm on a rip, I might
strip stubs from as many as two or three articles. So it's not as if I'm
attempting to imitate some grand scheme like Wik did, monitoring the
changes on thousands of pages & reverting each one where he did not approve
of the edit.

And I admit that I agree for the most part with that WikiProject's goals:
one fat collection of articles under {{stub}} was just not workable. It's
just that some times I have to wonder if all of the energy sorting these
stubs wouldn't be better applied to making them into full-length articles,
especially after Angela's example with [[Ambrosius Stub]] -- although
now that I've had a moment to think about it, I suspect someone was
having too much fun adding {{stub}}'s to Mr Stub's article.

However, I often encounter some real head-scratchers, such as [[Ibn Yasin]],
whose article is marked with a {{philosopher-stub}} & an {{Islam-stub}}:
just how many philosophy wonks are going to make a substantial change to
an article about a West-African Islamic mullah? (At the moment, the most
serious problem with this article is neither philosophical nor religious,
but the least obvious: the date of his death. This article says it
was 1059, another article 1056, & a book I borrowed from the local
library says it was 1057. If I had more confidence in the book, I'd be
bold & change them all to conform with it.)

What I see is the problem here is that eager new editors, who are looking
for something easy to do, start adding every stub template or category
label that fits the article they can think of. I know I've been overly
enthusiastic in the past with some of my edits, so unless the WSS people
insist that I stop my stub pruning or be hauled before the ArbCom, I'm
assuming that most of these multiple stubs are the work of newbie editors
who will outgrow this habit in a month or two.

Geoff

P.S. Had I known my email would have generated so many follow-ups, I would
have changed the subject line. But I doubt I could have improved on Mark
Gallagher's "stubification to the max!"