[WikiEN-l] Quasi-vanity and quasi-advertising

Mon Oct 3 16:14:12 UTC 2005

On 03/10/05, dpbsmith at verizon.net <dpbsmith at verizon.net> wrote:

> I'd like to redefine "vanity" as meaning "an imbalanced mix of motives in
> which serving the needs of the contributor outweights serving the needs of
> the reader."

Redefine "reader" as "project", and there's the rub - that definition
holds for *everything*.

Adding a link to your site to a relevant article? That (usually) helps
the encyclopedia. Adding a link to your site to every page in seven
categories? That's spam; the benefits to you strongly outweigh those
to the encyclopedia.

Editing a political article because it has a garbled description of
the beliefs you subscribe to? Helps us, benefits the encyclopedia.
Rewriting a political article to support your personal beliefs? It's
done for your benefit not ours, so it's not good.

--
- Andrew Gray
  andrew.gray at dunelm.org.uk