[WikiEN-l] Re: Proposal on VFD: enforcement of nomination policy

Sun Mar 6 12:48:17 UTC 2005

On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 12:20:04 -0000, Charles Matthews
<charles.r.matthews at ntlworld.com> wrote:
> Pete/Pcb21 wrote
> 
> > [*] E.g. esoteric topics about individual characters in sub-plots of
> > Lord of the Rings are kept, whereas as articles about million dollar
> > turnover manufacturing busineses are deleted, reflecting the (painting
> > with a broad brush) slant towards the "nerdy student/lefty" make-up of
> > the Wikipedia population.
> 
> Wikipedia will reflect its editors' interests, no question.  I don't really
> accept that analysis, though.  A million-dollar turnover manufacturing
> business is still family-sized, actually.  What is more, a million dollars
> in one bank account looks much like a million dollars in another.  It is the
> price of a very ordinary house in London, for example.
> 

I don't think Pete was complaining about our slant towards editors'
interests, in fact, I'm sure we can all agree that Wikipedia only
exists because it allows people to write about what _they_ want, not
what others want them to. However, if every time you try and write
about something you are told that it is not notable or encyclopedic,
you would soon turn away, and another potentially great contributor
would be lost. I don't think that a million-dollar family business
deserves to be in Wikipedia more than a LOTR plot detail. However, I
don't think the converse either. In fact, I don't presume to the
qualified to judge the importance of any information, saving whether
it is neutrally written about, and verifiably true. Let me note, also,
that number ten downing street, is by many standards, a very ordinary
house in London. But that billions people know of it, while only a
thousands know of the [[Russian_Constitution_of_1906]] does not make
one any more suitable for inclusion than the other.