NYB on The Volokh Conspiracy, Some First Thoughts on Wikipedia Options

[Jon Awbrey]

On His Blindness

They also serve who only stand and, oh, wait …

[CharlotteWebb]

That's all the more reason to level the field by adopting a "noindex" policy for all User pages. It might even take the wind out of some of those pesky teenage editors if they were unable to get a hormone kick from their Google juice.

Indeed. There was a thread on the village pump about this. Someone was wanting to know why the hell their user-page ranked higher on google than WP's article about the bird species they named their account after. I'm guessing it has something to do with the quantity of links pointing to each page?

Noindex of user-pages would make self-promotion (and certain types of cyber-stalking) slightly more difficult. And I do mean slightly.

Still, I'd support this change unless there is some meaningful down-side. Help me out here as I'm not seeing one.

[Moulton]

The Culture of Coercion and Bullying

NYB, when are you going to put your name on your user page? Cool_Hand_Luke should do it too.

I actually had planned to do it this week, as I mentioned in this thread last week. I might well have done it when I returned to editing last summer, but I didn't particularly appreciate the feeling of being coerced into it.

Yes, some of the ruling clique of admins like to bind and gag people they don't like, in addition to banning them.

There, in a nutshell, is the core problem with WikiCulture.

Coercion, bullying, binding, and gagging is simply not a sustainable practice for a functional project in education.

But it's a sustainable practice for a simulated war game.

[Lar]

I actually had planned to do it this week, as I mentioned in this thread last week. I might well have done it when I returned to editing last summer, but I didn't particularly appreciate the feeling of being coerced into it.

Maybe the move would be easier if the User pages has a "noindex" just like the User_talk pages do. I think there is more work to be done on the "noindex" front. It's true that your user page would most likely be in the top ten results in a search for your real name, because your real name is unusual and Google is infatuated with everything from Wikipedia.

That's all the more reason to level the field by adopting a "noindex" policy for all User pages. It might even take the wind out of some of those pesky teenage editors if they were unable to get a hormone kick from their Google juice.

Strikes me that the default for all namespaces ought to be noindex, and then evaluate namespace by namespace whether to be non default, (so article would be indexed) and then evaluate page by page (where necessary) whether to be non default from the non default (so that the article called "Daniel Brandt is a big weenie" is noindex even though articles generally are...)

I could swear there was a proposal to actually do that at some point.

But specifically, I think user ought to be noindex just like user talk.

[Cedric]

Strikes me that the default for all namespaces ought to be noindex, and then evaluate namespace by namespace whether to be non default, (so article would be indexed) and then evaluate page by page (where necessary) whether to be non default from the non default (so that the article called "Daniel Brandt is a big weenie" is noindex even though articles generally are...)

I could swear there was a proposal to actually do that at some point.

But specifically, I think user ought to be noindex just like user talk.

Yet another vapor policy. Just like flagged revisions.

[Daniel Brandt]

I thought NYB would realize that his choice is to either put his real name on his user page, or see his real name on hivemind along with his law firm's name. But he continues to equivocate and obfuscate. Therefore, he's back on hivemind.

When he puts his real name on his user page it will come off of hivemind. That's in his interest, because then his law firm's name won't show up in Google by virtue of his association of Wikipedia.

Same for Cool_Hand_Luke — put your real name on your user page and you can come off of hivemind. I believe in equal treatment for all of Jimbo's arbcom lackeys.

Neither NYB nor his law firm will rank as well they could on Google until I initiate further Google-manipulation techniques, which won't happen unless I get pissed off more than I am at the moment. If anyone has a problem with this, please send your complaints to Google!

[gomi]

Strikes me that the default for all namespaces ought to be noindex, .... I could swear there was a proposal to actually do that at some point.

If it is supposed to be an encyclopedia, what possible argument is there for indexing anything other than article pages? Even then, it would seem that #REDIRECT pages and most fancruft pages should be NOINDEX. Of course, that presumes Wikipedia's real intention is to be an encyclopedia. As we know, nothing could be further from the truth. The Wikipidiots desperately want their drama and ego-centric masturbation to be google-able.

[CharlotteWebb]

When he puts his real name on his user page it will come off of hivemind. That's in his interest, because then his law firm's name won't show up in Google by virtue of his association of Wikipedia.

If your goal is to hold him personally "accountable" why is the name of his employer relevant?

[the_undertow]

When he puts his real name on his user page it will come off of hivemind. That's in his interest, because then his law firm's name won't show up in Google by virtue of his association of Wikipedia.

If your goal is to hold him personally "accountable" why is the name of his employer relevant?

1. Brandt does things arbitrarily.
2. He feels morally compelled to inform Brad's clients that their attorney may be spending billable hours editing Wikipedia.

I really can't believe we are back at this again.

[Milton Roe]

Strikes me that the default for all namespaces ought to be noindex, .... I could swear there was a proposal to actually do that at some point.

Yuh, it came from ME, among others (actually I suggested only BLPs be automatically noindexed, but it really should be all BLPs, userspace, and maybe even article TALK space). The rest of the encyclopedia articles deserve to be google-findable.

http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=&sh...ndpost&p=157102

Let's see you find anyone who suggested it sooner.

Milt

(Born to have my ideas ignored, then percolate up through people's unconscienceness' eventally)

[CharlotteWebb]

2. He feels morally compelled to inform Brad's clients that their attorney may be spending billable hours editing Wikipedia.

Okay, but... would this concern not also apply to anyone who holds a job? How is Brad special in this regard?

And above all, isn't it somebody else's problem?

[dtobias]

1. Brandt does things arbitrarily.
2. He feels morally compelled to inform Brad's clients that their attorney may be spending billable hours editing Wikipedia.

A more succinct way of putting it is "Brandt is a dick."

[GlassBeadGame]

1. Brandt does things arbitrarily.
2. He feels morally compelled to inform Brad's clients that their attorney may be spending billable hours editing Wikipedia.

A more succinct way of putting it is "Brandt is a dick."

I don't like Brandt's constantly changing and contingent standards for Hivemind. It would be better if as an a person of authority on WP NYB was simply listed in the same manner as anyone else. But holding Brandt to any standard or measure based on a WP essay is pretty lame.


(Not directed at Dan) Any claims that NYB bills clients for on wiki time is baseless and not supported by any evidence whatsoever. I don't believe that Brandt has ever asserted this.

[dtobias]

But holding Brandt to any standard or measure based on a WP essay is pretty lame.

Well, obviously I'm not following that essay entirely, since it also says that you shouldn't use it to try to label another person in violation of the No Personal Attacks policy.

[zvook]

(Not directed at Dan) Any claims that NYB bills clients for on wiki time is baseless and not supported by any evidence whatsoever. I don't believe that Brandt has ever asserted this.

I haven't seen him do so either. But people do goof off on company time, which is to me morally acceptable and one of the decent arguments for pseudonymity, assuming said pseudonym isn't fucking up on BLPs (and without prejudice to the argument that to contribute is to fuck up). Not everyone can be self-employed, comfy academics, retirees or otherwise freed from the encumbrances of The Man.

Speaking of which, to go back for a moment to the politics of the blog, I would call it right-wing, since it hosts the kind of libertarians who value the freedom of money to travel but not people, the freedom of corporations but not (the "un-ownability" of) the environment, the freedom to invade other countries, and ergo the freedom to vote for the last president twice, as main man Eugene did. They always seem a funny kind of libertarians to me. And the commentators reflect the readership, present company excluded of course. Eugene is often reasonable enough, though this thrilling foray into speculative fiction for nationalreviewonline was not his finest hour.

[CharlotteWebb]

(Not directed at Dan) Any claims that NYB bills clients for on wiki time is baseless and not supported by any evidence whatsoever. I don't believe that Brandt has ever asserted this.

Indeed I think this accusation came primarily from Colscott.

This is suitable for framing:

Not everyone can be self-employed, comfy academics, retirees or otherwise freed from the encumbrances of The Man.

That's The Man mind you, not to be confused with This Man or That Man.

[Random832]

Same for Cool_Hand_Luke — put your real name on your user page and you can come off of hivemind. I believe in equal treatment for all of Jimbo's arbcom lackeys.

except when you don't.

This post has been edited by Random832: Sun 24th May 2009, 7:13pm

[zvook]

That's The Man mind you, not to be confused with ... That Man.

Dunno about that!

[Somey]

Let's see you find anyone who suggested it sooner.

I was suggesting that they do something like that back in 2006 - this post, for example.

Not to take credit or anything...

[Milton Roe]

Let's see you find anyone who suggested it sooner.

I was suggesting that they do something like that back in 2006 - this post, for example.

Not to take credit or anything...

Meanwhile, the very least they could do would be to alter their robots.txt file to prevent unwanted biographies from being indexed by Google, but they can't even be bothered to do that, can they? Nooooo.

Ohhhhh, very good! Did you know the actual HTML(?) tag for that, at the time? AFAIK, we didn't discover NOINDEX until some time later. And were astounded at how easy this was, and yet WP still refuses to alter their software to allow it (yes, you can't add {{NOINDEX}} to a mainspace page and have it do anything, even if you want to).