Should valued contributers be treated differently? Options

[mbz1]

I find this comment interesting:

If I was the boss of a company, I wouldn't fire my best employee for pissing off everyone else, especially if he or she actually gets shit done. Let's face it: Malleus is worth more to Wikipedia than five admins.

Why not let Malleus have immunity because of his usefulness? Is calling someone a cunt (even if regularly done over several years) that bad, considering this is the Internet?

If someone leaves Wikipedia "because" of Malleus, it's their choice.

Fetchcomms is mistaking: Malleus is worth more to Wikipedia than at least a hundred admins, probably more, but does it mean Malleus and other valued editors should be treated differently than not so valued, but good faith editors?

I have no answer to this question, but I would like to hear what others think about this matter. Thanks.

This post has been edited by mbz1: Sun 25th December 2011, 8:28pm

[Kelly Martin]

Content authors, cantankerous or not, do not add much value to Wikipedia. Sure, they need some content in order to maintain the appearance of an encyclopedia, but they've already got that. At this point, what matters most to them is how many people they can suck in, and cantankerous content editors don't help at all in that regard. Getting rid of them is a no-brainer.

[melloden]

Content authors, cantankerous or not, do not add much value to Wikipedia. Sure, they need some content in order to maintain the appearance of an encyclopedia, but they've already got that. At this point, what matters most to them is how many people they can suck in, and cantankerous content editors don't help at all in that regard. Getting rid of them is a no-brainer.

Content authors don't mean much to the WMF, but they do mean more to Wikipedia than how many new users there are. Wikipedia has a bazillion shitty articles - we point them out on WR all the time - and it should be more useful to improve them rather than suck in more people. Of course, they're trying (and sometimes failing) to do both at once with the university outreach programs.

[mbz1]

Content authors, cantankerous or not, do not add much value to Wikipedia. Sure, they need some content in order to maintain the appearance of an encyclopedia, but they've already got that. At this point, what matters most to them is how many people they can suck in, and cantankerous content editors don't help at all in that regard. Getting rid of them is a no-brainer.

Content authors don't mean much to the WMF, but they do mean more to Wikipedia than how many new users there are. Wikipedia has a bazillion shitty articles - we point them out on WR all the time - and it should be more useful to improve them rather than suck in more people. Of course, they're trying (and sometimes failing) to do both at once with the university outreach programs.

I might be mistaking, but I got a feeling that the most profound contributors are usually too bright to spend the time on improving "shitty articles" written by somebody else. I believe the most profound contributors spend most time writing new articles or improving their own old ones.

I believe Kelly made some valid points. Even, if valued contributors are good for wikipedia, admins who block them seldom care about wikipedia. They mostly care what is the best way to demonstrate their power without loosing their tools.

[Eppur si muove]

Content authors, cantankerous or not, do not add much value to Wikipedia. Sure, they need some content in order to maintain the appearance of an encyclopedia, but they've already got that. At this point, what matters most to them is how many people they can suck in, and cantankerous content editors don't help at all in that regard. Getting rid of them is a no-brainer.

Content authors don't mean much to the WMF, but they do mean more to Wikipedia than how many new users there are. Wikipedia has a bazillion shitty articles - we point them out on WR all the time - and it should be more useful to improve them rather than suck in more people. Of course, they're trying (and sometimes failing) to do both at once with the university outreach programs.

I might be mistaking, but I got a feeling that the most profound contributors are usually too bright to spend the time on improving "shitty articles" written by somebody else. I believe the most profound contributors spend most time writing new articles or improving their own old ones.

I believe Kelly made some valid points. Even, if valued contributors are good for wikipedia, admins who block them seldom care about wikipedia. They mostly care what is the best way to demonstrate their power without loosing their tools.

I find it easier myself to work alone on a relatively small subject and create a good article. A larger subject may either need the perspective of more than one person or at least will require working around other people who may be invested in the current version. Also what I can write about is influenced by what references I have at home and what I can get for free. For other subjects I would have to reach out to other people and this involves finding someone I am happy to work with.

In the case of Richard Wagner (T-H-L-K-D) I had the advantage of the article being written by some knowledgeable mature adults. I was also happy to acknowledge that Smerus (T-C-L-K-R-D) has a doctorate in a related subject. I therefore concentrated on proof-reading and on what was necessary to meet the GA criteria but was able to notice factual errors and could still do things such as rebalancing the lede. Whilst a lot of what I did was gnomish, I also took the role of a more conventional second author in being able to comment on the whole and adapt it.

Now, if I was to wade into a subject like the politics of Northern Ireland, I would find that it has so many watchers who have been brainwashed since birth into thinking one particular perspective is the one and only right one that it would be impossible to work productively. And many of them would resist change for political reasons how many reliable sources I produced. In the I/P area I have experienced and observed far too much nonsense of that sort. In articles on food items such baklava (T-H-L-K-D), hummus (T-H-L-K-D), falafel (T-H-L-K-D) various nationalists of different hues interfere so that any good article would be likely to degrade in the face of nonsense.

So many content developers have learnt to keep away from existing articles and work on their own stuff. But if Malleus were ever to change his views on further participation, then I would be happy to take up a long-standing offer he made askign for a collaborator to make ferret (T-H-L-K-D) a GA or better.