Jimbo's beef with paid editing, Why does he have it? Options

[that one guy]

Sort of a tangential topic from the timidguy case, which seems to be an issue of paid editing and Jimbo's ever lasting hate of it. I know we had the Kohs issue in the past but what's his issue with paid editing?

[timbo]

The answer to the "Why not have paid editors?" question, of course, is that paid editors skew content. They pump up their clients and would quickly, it is not difficult to imagine, slag off on their competitors. I think this is a very logical, sensible reason to keep paid flacks out...

Can paid editors produce good content? Sure. Just like paid lobbyists can produce good legislation...


t

This post has been edited by timbo:

[thekohser]

They pump up their clients and would quickly, it is not difficult to imagine, slag off on their competitors. I think this is a very logical, sensible reason to keep paid flacks out...

Whew... good thing the unpaid religious, political, and ideological zealots who have taken over Wikipedia would never do that!

[Maunus]

Paid editing is against all of the principles that wikipedia should be based on. It circumvents the meaning of WP:CONSENSUS, WP:COI, WP:NOTABILITY off the bat.

It is a non-argument to compare with POV pushers and other agenda driven editors - because they are not a priori identifiable as such. It is like asking "should we allow tedentious editing?" the answer has to be no.

Other than that I find it ethically and morally questionable. And it shows what I see as a basic failure to understand what it is that could be good about wikipedia.

[Peter Damian]

It is a non-argument to compare with POV pushers and other agenda driven editors - because they are not a priori identifiable as such. It is like asking "should we allow tedentious editing?" the answer has to be no.

Other than that I find it ethically and morally questionable. And it shows what I see as a basic failure to understand what it is that could be good about wikipedia.

It is a non-argument to compare with POV pushers and other agenda driven editors - because they are not a priori identifiable as such.

So you are conflating the question of whether we know that X is doing something wrong, with whether X is doing something wrong? I.e. because we don't know whether X is acting unethically, we shall assume he or she is so acting? This is very Wikipedian. There should be a whole system of Wikipedian ethics that students study as a module.

It is like asking "should we allow tedentious editing?" the answer has to be no.

Same conflation. Tedentious editing = paid editing. Why?

Other than that I find it ethically and morally questionable.

Why? What if I am a well-off person who has been grossly slandered, but so busy that I need to pay Greg or someone to pay my name? You can't say that paid editing is inherently wrong, otherwise that example would be wrong.

And it shows what I see as a basic failure to understand what it is that could be good about wikipedia.

Exactly what is it that is good about Wikipedia? As Greg pointed out above, everyone who edits Wikipedia, unpaid, is acting for an agenda sometimes. They could be trying to normalise pedophilia, or advertising a garage band, or promoting some dubious political cause, or their own crank theory. Why is that any better than someone being paid to do this?