User:VeryVerily/Conflicting Wikipedia philosophies

Here are my observations of different underlying philosophies of Wikipedia which may underlie conflicts. People with different views on these spectrums may be stuck in a conflict which is actually a meta-conflict.

Please feel free to add comments or content to the bottom of this page, but please do not apply edits before the section.

= User:VeryVerily's version =

Disclaimer: This is just me rambling.

The first of these continua employ standard Wiki terms. The others I just made up.

Extreme immediatism

 * The key is to make Wikipedia a useful and reliable Internet resource as of now.


 * Any edit which is problematic should be reverted on sight; there is no time to fix it while live.


 * New ideas for changes should be developed in a sandbox.

Moderate immediatism

 * Articles should be in as good condition as possible when they are live.


 * Dispute notices should be avoided unless there's no clear "right" version to post in interim.


 * Reverting poor writing and unbalanced coverage is appropriate. Cleaning it up would be too tricky and take too long.


 * Sandboxes are most geared towards proposed major edits.

Moderate eventualism

 * It is worth maintaining articles in good condition, but not to the extent it would stymie their organic growth through the Wiki process.


 * Edits should only be reverted if they are unsalvageable or at least hard to salvage.


 * Poor and biased writing should be addressed, but unless there is no content should not simply be erased.

Extreme eventualism

 * The process of free, continuous editing will in the long run make articles better and better.


 * Only vandalism should be reverted. Anyone who makes an edit has something to say which should be respected.


 * Poor and biased writing and misinformation will be corrected in due time. Relax.

Statusquoism
Deliberately not in continuum order to order concepts.

Moderate statusquoism

 * The state an article has been in for some length of time is the benchmark.


 * Edits which add controversial material should be reverted until justified in Talk.

Moderate anti-statusquoism

 * Edits should not be reverted unless they are truly just troublesome.


 * Poor writing is not a problem; later editors will fix it up.


 * If an edit is so controversial that it should be reverted, an explanation should be given on Talk so the author can respond.

Extreme anti-statusquoism

 * Edits should not be reverted unless they are basically vandalism.


 * Poor writing, biased coverage, and questionable information is no problem; in time, later editors will fix this up.


 * Similar to eventualism.

Extreme statusquoism

 * An article should not be altered in any potentially controversial way without prior justification.


 * The removal of controversial content, say pending fact-checking or discussion, should be reverted until justified in Talk and agreed upon.


 * The burden of proof is on anyone who wants to make a change. Unless they're reverting.

Communityism

 * Wikipedia should be made a welcoming place for newcomers who wish to participate.


 * Actions which might be seen as rude and disrespectful to others should be avoided, even if avoiding them temporarily negatively affects the content.


 * Personal attacks should not be tolerated.

Encyclopedism

 * The sole purpose of Wikipedia is to build an encyclopedia; social interaction is a byproduct of no importance.


 * Treating people respectfully and being nice to newbies is only desirable inasmuch as it encourages contribution.


 * Personal attacks are no big deal. Indeed, it is hard to say they're bad at all if it makes an editor who is wrong back off.

Authorism

 * Articles, or sections of article, often have a distinguished "main author" who is primarily the writer of the article.


 * The original author should be regarded as having more clout than others in how it should be organized and flow.


 * While major changes by non-authors should require justification, the original author should feel entitled to reorganize his own prose.


 * An article may require inquiry as to "original intent" from the author before changes are made.

Anti-authorism
(I'd like a punchier name for this. How about communalism?)


 * There is no author for articles. Although one person may seed an article, each one is a community effort.


 * Once an article text has been submitted, the submitter has no special privileges vis-a-vis future edits to that text.


 * There is no "original intent" other than what is in the text and perhaps notes on the discussion page.

Rehabilism vs. anti-rehabilism
Sketchy

Anti-rehabilism

 * Trolls and other problem users and should be banned and done with.


 * A former troll has a lot to prove if they want to ever be allowed to contribute again.


 * Don't feed the trolls.

Rehabilism

 * Every editor, even a vandal, is a potential contributor.


 * Every opportunity should be extended to a former troll for rehabilitation.


 * AssumeGoodFaith. Give the benefit of the doubt.


 * The cost of fighting a troll is higher than fixing whatever trouble the troll causes.

Edit warring
Wholly lacking titles here.

WikiPacifism

 * Edit wars considered harmful. They are also childish and pointless.


 * Edit wars poison the page history, flood recent changes, and disrupt other editors.


 * A responsible user should walk away from a persistent reverter. Let others handle it.

Not considered harmful

 * Edit wars are part of the editorial process.


 * The damage from a war now and then is minimal and greatly overstated.


 * Repeatedly reverting a damaging edit is wholly appropriate.

Adminship
''Who should become an admin. To be completed.''

= Contributed material =

Material appearing after this section should not be construed as being endorsed by VeryVerily.

Communityism

 * Wikipedia should be made a welcoming place for newcomers who wish to participate.
 * Actions which might be seen as rude and disrespectful to others should be avoided, even if avoiding them temporarily negatively affects the content.
 * Personal attacks should not be tolerated.
 * All articles should reflect the consensus point of view of the community.
 * No, I don't think this fits the communityism philosophy which is accepting and open to other view points rather than imposing the consensus will on minorities. Community is finding a way to live together, not about homgeneity.--Silverback 07:14, 20 Oct 2004 (UTC) -- hmmm, sometimes logins don't stick and I have to put in username by hand.
 * Fair enough. It's hard for us to figure out what the actual viewpoints of all these factions are; we are probably best to back off and let communityists themselves define their views. Most of these distinctions are just straw men right now.

Encyclopedism

 * The sole purpose of Wikipedia is to build an encyclopedia; social interaction is a byproduct which should not compromise this goal.
 * Treating people respectfully and being nice to newbies is desirable inasmuch as it encourages contributions and diversity of opinions, and avoids groupthink.
 * Personal attacks are no big deal. Indeed, it is hard to say they're bad at all if it makes an editor who is wrong back off.
 * There is no such thing as a "Wikipedia community". A community is a group of people sharing bodily risk, and social club concerns or annoyances are very petty compared to real-world political problems.

Sysopism vs. Rehabilism vs. Politicism
Sketchy

Sysopism

 * Trolls and other problem users and should be banned and done with.


 * A former troll has a lot to prove if they want to ever be allowed to contribute again.


 * Don't feed the trolls.

Rehabilism

 * Every editor, even vandals, is a potential contributor.


 * Every opportunity should be extended for a former troll to rehabilitate themselves.


 * AssumeGoodFaith. Give the benefit of the doubt.


 * The cost of fighting a troll is higher than fixing whatever trouble they cause.

Politicism

 * "Troll" and "problem user" are factionally defined terms at best. One person's valuable editor is another one's POV-pusher.


 * As Wikipedia becomes more and more influential, we can expect constantly renewing political disputes: this simply can't be avoided. Excluding contributors for political reasons would undermine Wikipedia's claim to neutrality.


 * Engage users in conflict by using the political virtues, and assess behaviour by these standards. Try to find "troll bridges" where opposing factions can work together. Be troll-friendly.

Edit warring
Wholly lacking titles here.

WikiPacifism

 * Edit wars considered harmful. They are also childish and pointless.
 * Edit wars poison the page history, flood recent changes, and disrupt other editors.
 * A responsible user should walk away from a persistent reverter. Let others handle it.

Not considered harmful

 * Wikipedia is a battlefield of ideas; edit wars are part of the editorial process.
 * The damage from a war now and then is minimal and greatly overstated.
 * Repeatedly reverting a damaging edit is wholly appropriate.

Neutrality

 * This section was added by Charles Stewart and The Cunctator.

Basic skill

 * Cultivating the habit of always writing from a NPOV in all wikipedia editing is a skill that is not difficult to acquire.
 * NPOV editing does not ever substantially conflict with other editing goals, and should never be compromised.
 * Provided all the relevant facts are available, it is not difficult to tell if writing is POV.

Elusive virtue

 * Composing NPOV text on contentious texts can be deeply difficult, requiring introspection and testing one's honesty with oneself.
 * Writing from a NPOV stance can conflict fundamentally with comprehensiveness, conciseness and freshness of writing, and, though of great value, sometimes it is best sacrificed to promote other editing good.
 * Facts can only be grasped from a POV; everyone has blindspots with respect to their own prejudices.

Unattainable absolute

 * A neutral point of view requires omniscience and omnipresence. No-one has that.
 * The comprehensive whole of all Wikipedia can be said to approach a neutral point of view as it becomes more comprehensive and includes more factual information. A single entry can only be said to have a neutral point of view assuming the limitations of the subject (which is not a neutral act).
 * "NPOV" as used on Wikipedia does not mean "neutral point of view". It's shorthand for a particular style of writing which avoids authoritative statements and is highly contextual, particularly temporally. "NPOV" writing often ages poorly.

Factionalism
To be completed.

Antifactionalism
To be completed.