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It’s not even just controversial topics or politics: people try to control the pettiest things. I used to be active there, and it was a struggle to add “timelin

by ratww 5y ago

It’s not even just controversial topics or politics: people try to control the pettiest things. I used to be active there, and it was a struggle to add “timelines” of band members to some old rock acts even though it was already in place in most of the site, because a classic-rock fan disliked them. There is also one specific user who gets to pick who is metal and who isn’t, and reverts addition to lists for bands who aren’t “metal enough” for him like Rammstein or Nu-Metal. Even with sources and pushback from other moderators, it’s hard to compete with people with an agenda and a lot of time.

rsj_hn 5y ago
> Even with sources and pushback from other moderators, it’s hard to compete with people with an agenda and a lot of time. Exactly! This, writ large, is why a small disciplined group can take over a bureaucracy that allows open participation in decision making processes. You see this, for example, in everything from city council meetings to the state department. Which explains why bureaucracies always end up with some ideological litmus test of us vs them applied to screen out who is allowed to participate, whether because the bureaucracy doesn't want to be taken over by an ideological group, or whether it has already been taken over by an ideological group, the ends result is the same -- every bureaucracy develops an ideology that it defends. Taking this back to wikipedia, we see why no project like wikipedia can actually be "neutral". At best you can have a variety of ideological biases for different topics, with the most fanatical group's ideology dominating any given topic. /rant
bobthechef 5y ago
The article certainly betrays an ideological alignment that is routinely denied by those who moderate Wikipedia, but nonetheless is often fairly obvious. But my general attitude toward Wikipedia is not to take it too seriously. These moderators are also generally randos with no credibility anyway, and they know it, hence their style of moderation. Also, I would much rather have an encyclopedia with individual or a limited number of authors per article (like SEP does). If there is significant divergence on a subject, those divergences can be represented as alternate articles. What you don't want to do is pretend to have a "neutral" body of knowledge just because you have some article edited by an anonymous, unbounded committee and moderated by an asshole.

by ratww 5y ago

rsj_hn 5y ago

> Even with sources and pushback from other moderators, it’s hard to compete with people with an agenda and a lot of time. Exactly! This, writ large, is why a small disciplined group can take over a bureaucracy that allows open participation in decision making processes. You see this, for example, in everything from city council meetings to the state department. Which explains why bureaucracies always end up with some ideological litmus test of us vs them applied to screen out who is allowed to participate, whether because the bureaucracy doesn't want to be taken over by an ideological group, or whether it has already been taken over by an ideological group, the ends result is the same -- every bureaucracy develops an ideology that it defends. Taking this back to wikipedia, we see why no project like wikipedia can actually be "neutral". At best you can have a variety of ideological biases for different topics, with the most fanatical group's ideology dominating any given topic. /rant

bobthechef 5y ago

The article certainly betrays an ideological alignment that is routinely denied by those who moderate Wikipedia, but nonetheless is often fairly obvious. But my general attitude toward Wikipedia is not to take it too seriously. These moderators are also generally randos with no credibility anyway, and they know it, hence their style of moderation. Also, I would much rather have an encyclopedia with individual or a limited number of authors per article (like SEP does). If there is significant divergence on a subject, those divergences can be represented as alternate articles. What you don't want to do is pretend to have a "neutral" body of knowledge just because you have some article edited by an anonymous, unbounded committee and moderated by an asshole.