The entire m: Meta-Wikipedia is devoted to Talk about Wikipedia. Please don't do it here!
Only issue worth noting is who we don't want coming over here. It's now getting quite easy to identify who the ideologically motivated censors are:
This account correctly quotes the sysop-vandal w:User:Pakaran and the overt racist w:User:RickK as conspiring to attack and remove views from a contrary POV, that of Reds.
According to that account, "The comments by User:Pakaran are merely an example of a broader, overarching pattern; the abuse of users who hold unpopular beliefs is practically out in the open now and out of control." w:User:Jimbo_Wales calls this sysop vigilantiism, though he himself admits an anti-communist viewpoint probably due to being American and brainwashed by racists and fascists in primary school.
Sokolov's list of racists and fascists engaged in this behaviour include"Pakaran, RickK, Adam Carr, PMA, Very Verily, Tim Starling, and Robert Merkel". Of these w:User:Adam_Carr seems most egregious to Sokolov/172. Interesting how this list compares to those listed in the various AWR. It could not be a coincidence that on a list of ONLY SEVEN USERS, that THREE OF THEM would be also those engaged in ideological censorship earlier, against 142 and others - see 142.X.X.X/Tim_Starling for instance, where Starling basically admits his whole motivation for adding range blocks to mediawiki is ideological.
There's an interesting discussion on the Webby - People's Voice message boards about Wikipedia's nominations (under the "Community" and "Best practices" categories). It is partly referenced in a w:Wikipedia:Village pump thread (subject: Integrity of Wikipedia as an Encyclopedia).
If you want to view or contribute comments on the Webby Awards website, go there, log in and look under "community" and "best practices" for comments.
From w:Wikipedia_talk:Webby Awards
- "The day will come when I will put out the call for funds to distribute paper copies of Wikipedia to every child in every third world country in the world. This, too, is our mission...to achieve those goals will require us to become famous, to become a household name to every single person on the planet. Why? Because to distribute our work to everyone in the world is going to cost an enormous ton of money,...We're taking part in a revolution here, not playing around with a sideline hobby...I fully intend to get a copy of Wikipedia to every single person on the planet, and I'll do what it takes to get there" - Wales.
- This would be profitable for the paper and printing industry. What do you suggest then, printing and distributing Wikinfo? --Juxo 17:15, 27 Apr 2004 (EEST)
- Wales must be stopped, now, before he and his clique really do rule the encyclopedia world. He used to be just an incompetent hobbyist. Now he wants to be the Bill Gates of content.
- This would be extremely dangerous for the planet itself, given w:GDP and other far right wing entries, the unbalanced "community" that "protects" these to remain acceptable to far-right Americans. There's also deliberate censorship of even mildly green entries.
- The right answer is for an independent board, say from longnow or some bunch of NGOs, to take over and figure out what an ideal developing nation village actually cares about, and then make sure at least that is there in Simple English. Sabotaging this kind of thing is what makes good projects into enemy projects. The GFDL Corpus must be taken over by some more responsible group that cares about its users, not its own "community"/cliques.
- Feel free to do so, it's GFDL stupid
also from that page
Integrity of Wikipedia as an Encyclopedia
While I was voting for Wikipedia under the category of community, I ran accross a comment that suggested Wikipedia is not a community and that the encyclopedia was losing its integrity as a pedia because members were making some sort social hierarchy which resulted in the deletion and reverting of articles on the basis of who wrote it instead of the accuracy of the article. Should these accusations be true, then the goal of Wikipedia as an encyclopedia has be compromised. What I want to know is, are these supposed deletions and revertions on the basis of the writer of an article indeed occuring?
- This is true, it's ad hominem delete and sysop vandalism, which are absolutely counter to any "real encyclopedia" goals.
There's an instructive discussion re: Wikipedia and Bomis at w:Talk:Fallujah. Several users are demanding some sort of disclaimer that Bomis is somehow associated with the U.S. Marine Corps and therefore Wikipedia/Wikimedia cannot be neutral in editing such articles as Fallujah. Jimmy Wales has replied here
"Trolls and vandals [aren't] the problem -- its the control freaks who are the real problem." - Adam Rinkleff [1]
- Absolutely correct. In fact the trolls are the freedom fighters, and the vandals now seem to be serving a necessary purpose by keeping many sysops who are control freaks distracted, and hopefully burning them out eventually.
Also, some on the mailing list are actually advocating participating in googlebombing for partisan causes.
English Wikipedia User Plautus satire comments on Wikipedia:
- "I can speak from personal experience with Wales and wikipedia, they are not nearly as interested in accuracy as they are in getting a polished product to package and sell to the highest (Disney) bidder. Blocking of users is frequent and capricious. The admins there run in packs, any time one of them finds something they want drowned off the pages, they alert the other admins who all stand in line to revert it one after another until they goad people into getting nasty with them. Classic troll mafia techniques, that project is shit as far as I'm concerned."
- The correct move is to discredit Wikimedia with the governments and corporate bidders that have expressed interest or support, and to create other GFDL corpus access providers that are free of this Wikimedia corruption.
English Wikipedia User Secretlondon details how Jimbo Wales has sent an offensive email to her, telling her he was "sick of her anti-American prejudice", resulting in Secretlondon's decision to stop writing for Wikipedia.
- Probably she just did not share his Fox News point of view. ;-)