Yes I agree with this. It would be nice if you could alert the user when a
statement is being changed to a previous value. Sometimes people "correct"
stuff that needs to be reverted again and again. Some of this is even done
semi-automatically by bots (!). So it would at least be nice if bot owners
could see these problems, which they can't now.

On Fri, Jun 10, 2016 at 8:46 AM, Sandra Fauconnier <
[email protected]> wrote:

>
> > On 09 Jun 2016, at 15:25, Julie McMurry <[email protected]> wrote:
> >
> > How big a problem is fact vandalism? It may be less likely to be
> detected/fixed in languages for which there are fewer editors. Only if a
> big problem, I'd suggest that specific text (not whole articles) be
> protected, but not locked. Eg implementing a requirement for confirmation
> by multiple editors before it is published. A lock would be too likely to
> thwart legitimate edits and could be abused by moderators.
> >
> > Some ostensibly hard facts do in fact change over time. Even the
> measurement of the mass of the electron took years to perfect.
>
> Correct. But then, also, for the history of science it is valuable to know
> how that measurement has evolved over the years.
> So you could have something like
> - mass of the electron has <some imperfect value> / statement with
> reliable reference and ‘deprecated status' / valid from a certain date till
> a later date / <- statement protected
> - mass of the electron has <some imperfect value> / statement with
> reliable reference and ‘deprecated status' / valid from that later date
> till an even later date / <- statement protected
> - etc
> - (current situation) mass of the electron has <today’s accepted value> /
> statement with reliable reference and ‘preferred status' / valid from a
> certain date / <- statement protected as soon as it has its reliable
> reference
> - New research? Add a new statement, give it ‘preferred’ status, give the
> previous one ‘deprecated’ value.
> Awesome stuff for science historians.
>
> I have seen many frustrating cases of merges and changes to ‘good’
> statements too; not all are due to vandalism, some can also be attributed
> to lack of experience or to agendas, for instance. And having a hard time
> to keep track of it via my watchlist. I’m very much in favour of a system
> where we have semi-protection of statements with reliable references,
> approved by a certain number of trustworthy editors, and editable only by
> trustworthy editors. (I know this is a very tricky thing to organise…..)
>
> I have a hunch that this would also make Wikidata much more attractive for
> external parties. In informal discussions with GLAMs, for instance, this
> issue comes up all the time: how can we really trust that the data on
> Wikidata is good? Why should we link our own databases to Wikidata and
> re-use its data if anyone can add nonsense there? Is there a way to
> indicate that certain stuff on Wikidata is reliable?
>
> Best, Sandra
>
>
>
>
>
>
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