Wikipedia - problems and solutions
From Neutralpedia
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Wikipedia (WP) has noble ideals and an enormous amount of valuable information. Many insightful and committed community members contribute to it in a well established infrastructure. But Wikipedia is not a meritocracy and the positions of authority governing the sight have been assumed by the most frequent contributors and editors who negotiate its politics skillfully. These editors exert an enormous amount of power over editorial decisions. Because Wikipedia rewards editors who devote the most time to climbing its heirarchy and striking allegiances, it ends up being something like a Massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) and has taken on a Law of Jungle and Orwellian type atmosphere where cabalism and intolerance are widespread.
On the upside, as a community of mostly anonymous editors it has developed an enormous amount of content and coverage of a wide range of topics. This is adequate for general issues, however, there are critical gaps. Dissent on controversial issues can be easily suppressed and Wikipedia's Neutral Point of View policy is often suppressed. The "climate skeptics' consensus" is that articles at WP on climate science are untrustworthy, due to bias and censorship of material[[1]] [citations needed]. Until propagandists are addressed, WP will remain a starting-point for enquiries, and many will not achieve the respect or quality reliable reference.
Neutralpedia (NP) has been set up to complement Wikipedia by providing a home for documentation of important controversial issues. NP is able to fulfill tasks where Wikipedia falters such as in such areas where organizational secret mailing lists and other abuses have corrupted its content. The problems are particularly rampant in the topic areas of Climate Science, Anthropogenic Global Warming, and the Climategate scandal.
The WP ruling of "No Original Research" WP:NOR tends to discourage the use of sources that are not well established. This inhibits the use of independent scientific thinking, testing, and fact checking. This hits cutting-edge science, controversial issues, and "alternatives", to produce a systemic bias towards what is reported in a narrow range of mainstream media sources deemed acceptable. The Climategate controversy demonstrates the corruption of many "peer-reviewed" sources, and illustrates the need for alternative opinions, perspectives and research to be given their due. This is not to dismiss established sources or peer-reviewed journals, just to note that they are fallible and have failed over crucial issues in Climate Science. Part of NP's remit, therefore, will be to develop satisfactory ways of handling important Independent Research and scientific discussion in the wiki format. Complementing Wikipedia means that NP is not in competition with WP, and will not need to repeat what WP already does well.
Wikipedian ideals have been lost in Climate Science, as blog posts hereand here suggest. We don't want fanaticism here, but want fair hearing like we see at Climate Audit and Watts Up With That- where, unlike at RealClimate, all points of view can be heard, even those that disagree with the main direction here; and we still want the good points of Wikipedia. But we have to make this work. Building community at NP is essential for this.
In order to develop and to avoid losing a huge amount of deling with edit-warring, editors attempting to promote Antrhoprogenic Global Warming theories may be restricted. This situation is felt to be unavoidable pro tem and is deemed a reasonable compromise since their views are already represented on Wikipedia. AGW supporters can still, of course, comment on the Talk pages and post at WP, where skeptics resign or end up being driven out and feeling misrepresented.
NP Guidelines & Differences with WP
- We are a volunteer effort unaffiliated with any money-making scheme. Wikipedia, while relying on volunteers, uses its traffic to attract million-dollar investments.
- We encourage conciseness and clarity here, with emphasis on facts, like a true encyclopedia; instead of long articles like Wikipedia, we encourage short statements with pictorial evidence and iconic comments, and links to other pages to expand the subject where appropriate.
- We do not allow media opinions to be repeated here as though they are facts. Facts, data, metadata, and algorithms need to be made verifiable and transparent, and referred back to original research. Articles here can be held accountable to Scientific method and practice.
- We keep to the language appropriate for facts to be presented in a balanced way, with emphasis on science and with a minimum of opinion - but we allow open discussion thereof.
- We do not attempt to be neutral to all points of view. We attempt to be neutral to the facts, and to support points of view that are based on verifiable evidence. We attempt to provide information that complements Wikipedia, that when taken in conjunction with Wikipedia, is reasonably in balance.
- We allow original, properly labeled work, while Wikipedia does not. This promotes a more intellectual and scientifically aware atmosphere. On Wikipedia, observations based on personal experience and interviews are not allowed as they constitute "original research." Here, we do not restrict research for articles in that manner.
- We respect users' control over their own pages as much as possible.
- We do not require contributing editors to have to explain themselves constantly and justify every single edit to prove that it conforms to an exacting set of rules which are designed to suppress original thought, new ideas and penetrating insights.
- We do not wish to drive away experts by pretending that some random anonymous user who just signed up is as knowledgeable and authoritative as a scholar with decades of experience in teaching or research. Therefore we support the principles of protected pages (eg in the biography section) and quality control (eg in sections with data and metadata) where appropriate.
- We encourage intellectual pride; this can reflect in choosing appropriate editor names, with real names where possible. Many Wikipedia names send an inappropriate anti-intellectual message for an encyclopedia.
Friendly Note to Wikipedians in Exile
If you want to write up good climate science, but have found Wikipedia an impossible place to work, owing to its systemic bias against climate skeptics, please help us to develop Neutralpedia. In many areas, you probably have more skills than the team here has acquired, so far. Please sign in and visit the Community Portal page. Any problems or comments, please leave me a note on my Talk page here, rather than at Wikipedia. If you can work in harmony with Neutralpedia's goals, you will be very welcome. But we will quickly enforce bans on defiant AGW supporters, simply in order to enable this wiki to develop: AGW supporters already have Wikipedia. Lucy Skywalker (talk page)
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