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Sounds like a lot of whining to me. The author's reaction to this made him lose all credibility with me. First off, you think you're an expert? Maybe you are,

Sounds like a lot of whining to me. The author's reaction to this made him lose all credibility with me. First off, you think you're an expert? Maybe you are, maybe not but even experts aren't always right and just because you think in your infinite expert wisdom that so and so should have a Wikipedia page, the majority of us obviously don't. Secondly, so sorry the appeals process was so inconvenient for you. So far Wikipedia is doing just fine and your rant doesn't seem to be hurting them much. With all the garbage that people attempt to post on Wikipedia, there's a good reason for all the walls. In the end this comes off like a know-it-all's childish hissy fit for not getting his way. The world doesn't have to accept your point of view. Your response to this whole thing probably played a large role in you not getting what you wanted. Next time try to up think about why some of these things are in place, know that you can't jump ahead of someone else in charge just because you think you're better qualified (it's first volunteer, first served on Wikipedia) and just approach the issue with a lot more tact and less childish kicking and screaming next time. Some people love to talk about ideals like freedom, democracy, fairness, and all that but as soon as it inconveniences them they take the position that somehow those rules are for everyone else and they're somehow special. This guy doesn't fall in with the ideals thing I was talking about but he somehow managed to convince himself that everyone should just see thing his way. How dare a free, worldwide, not for profit, website with a 99% democratic submission and editing process not bend to your will! The audacity! Welcome to Wikipedia on the WWW where majority rules (even if you think they're all stupid-heads). I hope Jimmy Wales sends you a personal apology. Now let's all go edit the Wikipedia pages for "Cry Baby", "Brat", and "Temper Tantrum" and cite the author as a living example.

eykanal 15y ago
What's with all the hate? The author has a lot of valid points. 1) If it's supposed to be the "encyclopedia that anyone can edit", then it should be easy to use. If the "anyone can edit" is marred by insane levels of bureaucracy, making it so that, technically anyone can edit, but realistically, only those who know how to game the system can edit, than the system as a whole is a partial failure. 2) Who are you to judge whether he's an expert? Given that he at least claims to work in the field, that makes him more of an expert than almost all of the wikipedia editors combined. They just know their own bureaucratic guidelines, he actually knows something about the article in discussion. In the interest of journalistic integrity, they should at least attempt to listen to his points. 3) His points about how difficult it is to contest something is completely spot-on. There's no good reason why all the "contest this" or "discuss that" pages are simply huge text pages, other than because no one gave them a proper UI. For new users, it's confusing as heck. Given the status wikipedia has nowadays, and how widely it's used, they simply can't expect every user to know or care about their arcane systems. The system needs a proper UI for these sorts of things, making it easy to (a) file a complaint, (b) find a previously filed complaint, (c) discuss the complaint, and (d) find the resolution. His story about wading through talk pages isn't unusual, and it's kind of shameful for wikipedia that they haven't made it easier to use since their inception.
- vacri 15y ago
  It is easy to use. It's just not mindless to use. It's easy to drive a car, but that doesn't mean there's no initial learning. Also, where you say 'game the system', you really mean 'follow the system'. I've made tons of correctional edits and vandal reversions on Wikipedia, and a small number of new info edits. Only one of them has ever caused a problem - that was a revert done by a bot that didn't recognise I was fixing vandalism (some previous errant edit had blown the page of a seagoing vessel out to the longest page on wikipedia by far, with ctrl+c ctrl+V). The bot that wouldn't let me revert also wouldn't let anyone comment on the talk page, and the feedback link for it was broken. But apart from that one experience, I've made probably somewhere between 100-200 successful edits. I don't even have an account, I edit anonymously.
  - Flibbler 15y ago
    Just because you find it easy doesn't mean others do, agreed there's an initial learning curve to everything in life but we (current Wikipedia contributors) could be doing a lot more to smooth that curve for less technically minded people who want to contribute. We could also be doing more to make the basics of the rules clearer.

eykanal 15y ago

What's with all the hate? The author has a lot of valid points. 1) If it's supposed to be the "encyclopedia that anyone can edit", then it should be easy to use. If the "anyone can edit" is marred by insane levels of bureaucracy, making it so that, technically anyone can edit, but realistically, only those who know how to game the system can edit, than the system as a whole is a partial failure. 2) Who are you to judge whether he's an expert? Given that he at least claims to work in the field, that makes him more of an expert than almost all of the wikipedia editors combined. They just know their own bureaucratic guidelines, he actually knows something about the article in discussion. In the interest of journalistic integrity, they should at least attempt to listen to his points. 3) His points about how difficult it is to contest something is completely spot-on. There's no good reason why all the "contest this" or "discuss that" pages are simply huge text pages, other than because no one gave them a proper UI. For new users, it's confusing as heck. Given the status wikipedia has nowadays, and how widely it's used, they simply can't expect every user to know or care about their arcane systems. The system needs a proper UI for these sorts of things, making it easy to (a) file a complaint, (b) find a previously filed complaint, (c) discuss the complaint, and (d) find the resolution. His story about wading through talk pages isn't unusual, and it's kind of shameful for wikipedia that they haven't made it easier to use since their inception.

vacri 15y ago
It is easy to use. It's just not mindless to use. It's easy to drive a car, but that doesn't mean there's no initial learning. Also, where you say 'game the system', you really mean 'follow the system'. I've made tons of correctional edits and vandal reversions on Wikipedia, and a small number of new info edits. Only one of them has ever caused a problem - that was a revert done by a bot that didn't recognise I was fixing vandalism (some previous errant edit had blown the page of a seagoing vessel out to the longest page on wikipedia by far, with ctrl+c ctrl+V). The bot that wouldn't let me revert also wouldn't let anyone comment on the talk page, and the feedback link for it was broken. But apart from that one experience, I've made probably somewhere between 100-200 successful edits. I don't even have an account, I edit anonymously.
- Flibbler 15y ago
  Just because you find it easy doesn't mean others do, agreed there's an initial learning curve to everything in life but we (current Wikipedia contributors) could be doing a lot more to smooth that curve for less technically minded people who want to contribute. We could also be doing more to make the basics of the rules clearer.