Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On 23/05/2011 03:56, geni wrote: On 23 May 2011 02:24, Brian J Mingusbrian.min...@colorado.edu wrote: When you Google for Santorum's last name this Wikipedia article is the second result. This means that people who are looking for legitimate information about him are not going to find it right away - instead we are going to feed them information about a biased smear campaign rather than the former Senators BLP. Google's search results are entirely their business. Yes, I agree with that comment. As Google are aware, people try to game their algorithm; and their business model requires them to take action on that. Not our problem at all. The business of neologisms on WP was actually put into How Wikipedia Works (Chapter 7, A Deletion Case Study). At that time the example to hand was of the buzzword type, and the question was apparently whether WP's duty was to keep people informed of new jargon, or to be more distanced and only include a new term when it was clearly well established. To be a bit more nuanced about this instance: if there is a dimension in that article of a BLP, certain things follow at least at the margin about use of sources. And NPOV clearly requires that a successful campaign to discredit someone is reported in those terms. Here there is a fine line between mockery and smear, and saying the latter by default omits the element of satire. In other words, there are people who take US domestic politics very seriously, and media stories very seriously (I think enWP tends to take the media as a whole too seriously, BTW, which is the media's estimation of itself) , and regard Google now as part of the media, and so come to the sort of conclusion that Brian does. OTOH we have our mission, and our policies, and should do our job. I'm prepared to take the flak if our pages contribute to information (i.e. report within NPOV) on a biased smear campaign (or satirical googlebombing, whatever you prefer); as long as our article is not biased, and is not campaigning. Bear in mind that the COI is supposed to limit the use of enWP for activism of certain kinds. We do have the policies to prevent misuse of our pages. Charles Charles ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
Words coined after the names of then-living people: *Orwellian *Chauvinist *Boycott *Bowdlerize and countless others. Wikipedia can't ignore significant cultural trends for the sake of censorship and super injunctions. Nor should it be used to promote those trends. So long as we stick to verifiably summarizing reliable sources using the neutral point of view, with due consideration for living people, we'll stay on the right path. -Will Beback ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On 23/05/2011 03:56, geni wrote: On 23 May 2011 02:24, Brian J Mingusbrian.min...@colorado.edu wrote: When you Google for Santorum's last name this Wikipedia article is the second result. This means that people who are looking for legitimate information about him are not going to find it right away - instead we are going to feed them information about a biased smear campaign rather than the former Senators BLP. Google's search results are entirely their business. Yes, I agree with that comment. As Google are aware, people try to game their algorithm; and their business model requires them to take action on that. Not our problem at all. The business of neologisms on WP was actually put into How Wikipedia Works (Chapter 7, A Deletion Case Study). At that time the example to hand was of the buzzword type, and the question was apparently whether WP's duty was to keep people informed of new jargon, or to be more distanced and only include a new term when it was clearly well established. To be a bit more nuanced about this instance: if there is a dimension in that article of a BLP, certain things follow at least at the margin about use of sources. And NPOV clearly requires that a successful campaign to discredit someone is reported in those terms. Here there is a fine line between mockery and smear, and saying the latter by default omits the element of satire. In other words, there are people who take US domestic politics very seriously, and media stories very seriously (I think enWP tends to take the media as a whole too seriously, BTW, which is the media's estimation of itself) , and regard Google now as part of the media, and so come to the sort of conclusion that Brian does. OTOH we have our mission, and our policies, and should do our job. I'm prepared to take the flak if our pages contribute to information (i.e. report within NPOV) on a biased smear campaign (or satirical googlebombing, whatever you prefer); as long as our article is not biased, and is not campaigning. Bear in mind that the COI is supposed to limit the use of enWP for activism of certain kinds. We do have the policies to prevent misuse of our pages. Charles Charles This seems to combine malice and political purpose. Really it is stuff that belonged on Encyclopedia Dramatica. Fred ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On 23/05/2011 13:35, Fred Bauder wrote: This seems to combine malice and political purpose. Really it is stuff that belonged on Encyclopedia Dramatica. I take it Fred means this article or this campaign: if the latter that's obvious enough. Given a mainstream piece of coverage such as http://swampland.time.com/2011/05/17/please-do-not-google-the-name-of-this-undervalued-republican-candidate/ from a few days ago, I wonder if the article is really out of step. Charles ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 5:54 AM, Charles Matthews charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com wrote: On 23/05/2011 13:35, Fred Bauder wrote: This seems to combine malice and political purpose. Really it is stuff that belonged on Encyclopedia Dramatica. I take it Fred means this article or this campaign: if the latter that's obvious enough. Given a mainstream piece of coverage such as http://swampland.time.com/2011/05/17/please-do-not-google-the-name-of-this-undervalued-republican-candidate/ from a few days ago, I wonder if the article is really out of step. Charles There is a big difference between This name-based neologism is offensive and derogatory and This name-based neologism is offensive and derogatory, but politicially and socially significant. It's neither our doing or fault that the neologism has become significant in some areas of society and has had a noticeable and noticed effect on Santorum's potential future political career. Failing to cover it would be an error of judgement on our part, and quite frankly if we removed it we'd probably stir up enough negative controversy related to censorship that his name would be dragged through the mud worse than it already has been. Santorum himself seems to have a decent level of understanding that the phenomena is out of his control and not something he should try to suppress, despite being personally offended. We don't exist to fix the real world - we exist to report on it accurately. Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid, a tornado that killed 89 plus people, a terrorist attack in Pakistan and several ongoing and incipient wars, these are other unfortunate things that make the neologism Santorum pale in comparison. -- -george william herbert george.herb...@gmail.com ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 4:47 PM, George Herbert george.herb...@gmail.com wrote: Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid snip Candidate? Last I looked, he was Managing Director of the IMF at the time the story broke (he is now former head). Anyway, I'm surprised that the situation with Twitter and a UK footballer hasn't been discussed more on Wikipedia, but maybe I'm missing the discussion and that is happening somewhere. Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 4:58 PM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: that the situation with Twitter and a UK footballer I was looking at the wrong article. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_British_super-injunction_controversy This one is more specific: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CTB_v_News_Group_Newspapers Carcharoth ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 4:47 PM, George Herbert george.herb...@gmail.com wrote: Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid snip Candidate? Last I looked, he was Managing Director of the IMF at the time the story broke (he is now former head). Anyway, I'm surprised that the situation with Twitter and a UK footballer hasn't been discussed more on Wikipedia, but maybe I'm missing the discussion and that is happening somewhere. Carcharoth It was discussed on the Foundation list in the thead, Interesting legal action. Seems to be pretty much over now, with massive violations, including us. However it is still in effect. Fred ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 11:47 AM, George Herbert george.herb...@gmail.comwrote: On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 5:54 AM, Charles Matthews charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com wrote: On 23/05/2011 13:35, Fred Bauder wrote: This seems to combine malice and political purpose. Really it is stuff that belonged on Encyclopedia Dramatica. I take it Fred means this article or this campaign: if the latter that's obvious enough. Given a mainstream piece of coverage such as http://swampland.time.com/2011/05/17/please-do-not-google-the-name-of-this-undervalued-republican-candidate/ from a few days ago, I wonder if the article is really out of step. Charles There is a big difference between This name-based neologism is offensive and derogatory and This name-based neologism is offensive and derogatory, but politicially and socially significant. It's neither our doing or fault that the neologism has become significant in some areas of society and has had a noticeable and noticed effect on Santorum's potential future political career. Failing to cover it would be an error of judgement on our part, and quite frankly if we removed it we'd probably stir up enough negative controversy related to censorship that his name would be dragged through the mud worse than it already has been. Santorum himself seems to have a decent level of understanding that the phenomena is out of his control and not something he should try to suppress, despite being personally offended. We don't exist to fix the real world - we exist to report on it accurately. Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid, a tornado that killed 89 plus people, a terrorist attack in Pakistan and several ongoing and incipient wars, these are other unfortunate things that make the neologism Santorum pale in comparison. Well said. It's a dirty word, it's politically motivated, but it fits all valid criteria for inclusion on Wikipedia. The only reason to delete it is personal political or cultural bias. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 8:58 AM, Carcharoth carcharot...@googlemail.com wrote: On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 4:47 PM, George Herbert george.herb...@gmail.com wrote: Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid snip Candidate? Last I looked, he was Managing Director of the IMF at the time the story broke (he is now former head). Braino on my part. Yes, he was the IMF Managing Director. -- -george william herbert george.herb...@gmail.com ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
We don't exist to fix the real world - we exist to report on it accurately. Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid, a tornado that killed 89 plus people, a terrorist attack in Pakistan and several ongoing and incipient wars, these are other unfortunate things that make the neologism Santorum pale in comparison. -- -george william herbert I think you miss the point. Malice can make even publication of true information about a public figure actionable. Participation of a nonprofit corporation in political activity poses problems. I'm not sure what happened here but we need to look at it carefully and evaluate our level of participation in creation and dissemination of this word. Fred ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Fred Bauder fredb...@fairpoint.net wrote: We don't exist to fix the real world - we exist to report on it accurately. Many of the things we report on are unfortunate. An IMF candidate who alledgedly raped a hotel maid, a tornado that killed 89 plus people, a terrorist attack in Pakistan and several ongoing and incipient wars, these are other unfortunate things that make the neologism Santorum pale in comparison. -- -george william herbert I think you miss the point. Malice can make even publication of true information about a public figure actionable. Participation of a nonprofit corporation in political activity poses problems. I'm not sure what happened here but we need to look at it carefully and evaluate our level of participation in creation and dissemination of this word. The word was created in its neologistic sense, propogated, and became popular / infamous without Wikipedia's help. Google was a large part, and blogging, but we really weren't. I don't discount that Wikipedia is at times used promotionally, sometimes with negative BLP impacts, but in this case it was a real world phenomenon not something driven by WP editors. The article seems balanced to me, particularly presenting Santorum's objections in a responsible and reasonably positive light. -- -george william herbert george.herb...@gmail.com ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
I'm skeptical that we should have an article. The reason: Wikipedia is on the Internet. If Wikipedia has an article about something whose promoter specifically intends to spread it on the Internet, it is impossible to separate reporting from participation. It's a loophole in the definition of neutrality that doing things which help one side of a dispute doesn't break neutrality, simply because our intentions are neutral--even though our effects are not. This brings to mind GNAA. GNAA is a troll group who intentionally gave themselves an offensive name so that even mentioning them helped them troll. Wikipedia had a hard time getting rid of the article about them, because we can't say by using their name, we're helping their goals in deciding whether to have an article. It was finally deleted by stretching the notability rules instead. And in a related question, I'd ask: Should we have an article Richard Gere gerbil rumor? (As long as our article describes the rumor as debunked, of course--otherwise we would be directly violating BLP.) Some of the justifications for that and for this sound similar. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
I agree. Let's remove all content on Wikipedia about the Internet. On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 4:56 PM, Ken Arromdee arrom...@rahul.net wrote: I'm skeptical that we should have an article. The reason: Wikipedia is on the Internet. If Wikipedia has an article about something whose promoter specifically intends to spread it on the Internet, it is impossible to separate reporting from participation. It's a loophole in the definition of neutrality that doing things which help one side of a dispute doesn't break neutrality, simply because our intentions are neutral--even though our effects are not. This brings to mind GNAA. GNAA is a troll group who intentionally gave themselves an offensive name so that even mentioning them helped them troll. Wikipedia had a hard time getting rid of the article about them, because we can't say by using their name, we're helping their goals in deciding whether to have an article. It was finally deleted by stretching the notability rules instead. And in a related question, I'd ask: Should we have an article Richard Gere gerbil rumor? (As long as our article describes the rumor as debunked, of course--otherwise we would be directly violating BLP.) Some of the justifications for that and for this sound similar. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, 23 May 2011, geni wrote: When you Google for Santorum's last name this Wikipedia article is the second result. This means that people who are looking for legitimate information about him are not going to find it right away - instead we are going to feed them information about a biased smear campaign rather than the former Senators BLP. Google's search results are entirely their business. The fact that we need to be careful about BLPs because the BLPs rank high in Google is our business. This is not technically a BLP, and Santorum is known for more than one thing, but I'd think it'd at least fall under the *spirit* of Wikipedia editors must not act, intentionally or otherwise, in a way that amounts to participating in or prolonging the victimization. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, 23 May 2011, The Cunctator wrote: The reason: Wikipedia is on the Internet. If Wikipedia has an article about something whose promoter specifically intends to spread it on the Internet, it is impossible to separate reporting from participation. It's a loophole in the definition of neutrality that doing things which help one side of a dispute doesn't break neutrality, simply because our intentions are neutral--even though our effects are not. I agree. Let's remove all content on Wikipedia about the Internet. Is about the Internet and is mainly an Internet promotional campaign aren't the same thing. Someone might write a book and want it promoted on the Internet, but the fact that it's being promoted on the Internet is way down on the list of important facts about that book. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
I agree. Let's remove all content on Wikipedia about the Internet. My God! Larry Sanger was right! Fred ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
--- On Mon, 23/5/11, Charles Matthews charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com wrote: From: Charles Matthews charles.r.matth...@ntlworld.com On 23 May 2011 02:24, Brian J Mingusbrian.min...@colorado.edu wrote: When you Google for Santorum's last name this Wikipedia article is the second result. This means that people who are looking for legitimate information about him are not going to find it right away - instead we are going to feed them information about a biased smear campaign rather than the former Senators BLP. Google's search results are entirely their business. Yes, I agree with that comment. As Google are aware, people try to game their algorithm; and their business model requires them to take action on that. Not our problem at all. The business of neologisms on WP was actually put into How Wikipedia Works (Chapter 7, A Deletion Case Study). At that time the example to hand was of the buzzword type, and the question was apparently whether WP's duty was to keep people informed of new jargon, or to be more distanced and only include a new term when it was clearly well established. To be a bit more nuanced about this instance: if there is a dimension in that article of a BLP, certain things follow at least at the margin about use of sources. And NPOV clearly requires that a successful campaign to discredit someone is reported in those terms. Here there is a fine line between mockery and smear, and saying the latter by default omits the element of satire. In other words, there are people who take US domestic politics very seriously, and media stories very seriously (I think enWP tends to take the media as a whole too seriously, BTW, which is the media's estimation of itself) , and regard Google now as part of the media, and so come to the sort of conclusion that Brian does. OTOH we have our mission, and our policies, and should do our job. I'm prepared to take the flak if our pages contribute to information (i.e. report within NPOV) on a biased smear campaign (or satirical googlebombing, whatever you prefer); as long as our article is not biased, and is not campaigning. Bear in mind that the COI is supposed to limit the use of enWP for activism of certain kinds. We do have the policies to prevent misuse of our pages. Charles We discussed this a couple of days ago at our meet-up. I agree with some of the other comments made here that this blurs and crosses the line between reporting and participation. I have no sympathy for Santorum or his views. But based on past experience, I also have little confidence that the main author's motivation in expanding the article is anything other than political. They've created puff pieces on politicians before (as well as hatchet jobs), in the service of outside political agendas. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Dickson (later deleted as a puff piece of a non-notable politician, but only after the election, in which he was said to have done surprisingly well) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jose_Peralta Andreas ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Re: [WikiEN-l] Wikipedia article on [[Santorum (neologism)]]
On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 21:56, Ken Arromdee arrom...@rahul.net wrote: The reason: Wikipedia is on the Internet. If Wikipedia has an article about something whose promoter specifically intends to spread it on the Internet, it is impossible to separate reporting from participation. It's a loophole in the definition of neutrality that doing things which help one side of a dispute doesn't break neutrality, simply because our intentions are neutral--even though our effects are not. (Warning: POV ahead.) Using that logic, we should probably shut down every page on WP about politics, religion, alternative medicine and anything even vaguely controversial. There are factions within those movements or groups who stand to benefit from people knowing less rather than more about them. The Church of Scientology would probably object on the same lines as you have that the mere existence of the article Xenu can never be neutral because they would rather there not be an article at all. Our effect is to make Scientology seem more ridiculous to outsiders. Similarly, there are probably Pentecostalist movements who would rather people not read the sections of the article on Glossolalia about how linguists and neuroscientists have studied people speaking in tongues and found that they aren't actually speaking a language with any actual semantic structure but rather a meaningless but phonologically structured human utterance, believed by the speaker to be a real language but bearing no systematic resemblance to any natural language, living or dead. By including this material, we are in effect biased against movements who would rather people knew less about the scientific underpinnings (or rather lack thereof) of an impressive-looking religious practice. A great many people when asked their views on homeopathy think it is basically a form of herbal medicine. There are undoubtedly homeopaths who financially benefit from this confusion and are quite happy that people associate their extremely dubious pseudoscience with herbal medicine, which is basically a ragtag bag of stuff that does and does not work (the stuff that does work often becomes known simply as 'medicine'). In general, there are a lot of fields where people use and benefit from other people's ignorance. Neutrality isn't an excuse for ensuring inconvenient material doesn't turn up on Google search results because it might be biased. A reductio ad absurdum: imagine there is a voter who intends to vote purely based on some very arbitrary property of a political candidate like, say, the colour of their suit. Most informed people would say that this is a poor use of one's vote and one is not living up to one's moral duties to make an informed and meaningful decision about policy with one's vote. In order to enforce this kind of outcomes-based neutrality, should we remove all photographs of candidates on Wikipedia in the run up to elections in order to encourage people to vote based on policy rather than appearance. And what if there is a candidate who is specifically trying to benefit from being aesthetically pleasing? Should we make his picture bigger to ensure the race is fair? Determining neutrality on the basis of outcome could have such perverse consequences for article policy that it really seems like a tough row to hoe. -- Tom Morris http://tommorris.org/ Please don't print this e-mail out unless you want a hard copy of it. If you do, go ahead. I won't stop you. Nor will I waste your ink/toner with 300+ lines of completely pointless and legally unenforceable cargo cult blather about corporate confidentiality. ___ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
