Wikipedia Sucks!

As part of their campaign against the idea Wikipedia should not sully itself with covering businesses and products because OMFG SPAM!?!!!1, for the first time ever, Wikipedia created a two-tier standard of how to measure worthiness. It's criteria are ridiculously restrictive, while at the same a time being classically subjective (Wikipedians don't like policies that lack the wiggle room to allow them to cover their favourite subjects).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Notability_(organizations_and_companies)

As the only victims were evil spammers, nobody really gave a shit. The Wikipedia loving media certain didn't notice, not that I saw anyway.

As was entirely predictable, moves are already being made to adopt these more restrictive ideas of what is worthy of note, to all articles. They are failing at this time, while getting a surprising level of support given the implications. Be in no doubt, if you have ever wasted your time writing Wikipedia articles on stuff that isn't seriously widely known, but you otherwise had assumed was covered in sufficient depth/detail to warrant recognition by Wikipedia as noteworthy, you are eventually going to be in for a shock, as much of your work is consigned to the dustbin of history. It could take years, but this is definitely where the most committed Wikipedians want to be headed (Wikipedia is a cult, so zealotryy is rewarded).

Why you are shocked, is of course a mystery to seasoned observers of Wikipedia. Firstly, Wikipedia has always been clear - you don't matter. You will see them say this proudly, quite often. You're a work unit, a drone, an absolute fucking mug (as if working for free didn't tip you off). Spent time and effort (sometime seven cold hard cash) to write a brilliant Wikipedia article? Sorry not sorry is the usual reply, as it is hacked to bits or flushed entirely. The minute you posted it, it became their exclusive property. Check the small print, or just wait a while, they say this often too.

Although this change would be grand in scale compared to anything previously attempted as far exchanging the basic nature of Wikipedia, it has always been a feature of Wikipedia to keep its contributors guessing as to what is and is not considered worthy of including. This has often been lazily described as a fight between inclusionists and deletionists, but it's always been way more complex than that. Often it doesn't even matter what the content is, only who is defending it. The Wikipedians love to fight, and the subjectivity of this endevour gives them plenty of opportunity to do so.

Outside of looking at what has previously survived deletion (and even that is by no means a reliable guide), there has certainly never been any way for editors to be able to, in advance, judge if their effort in writing an article, will be in vain. The Wikipedians are quite adamant that looking around for examples of what is allowed can be used to guide you is no defence, even though they have specific guidance that says yes, you should, but only if the articles themselves look like they pass the bar. Which just lands you in the same dilema.

Bizarrely, the Wikipedians consider the act of putting your own work up for deletion, just as a kind of stress test of it, to see if you are right in assuming it is considered an acceptable topic, worth spending the time to write and maintain, is considered disruptive. You're meant to be perfectly OK with never really being sure. And that is the case even when the ground of policy isn't shifting beneath you.

My advice? Stop editting. Don't silently hope this change will never come to pass. And whatever you do, don't try and resist, lest you like being seen as a friend of the spammers. You know how that goes. They had a two tier community well before they had a two tier inclusion policy.

Certainly don't assume your work will survive elsewhere. A key part of being a Wikipedian, is doing all your can to ensure alternatives to Wikipedia are kept out of public view. When they say 'send it to Wikia', they have a smirk on their face, no doubt about it. Some are happy to openly declare that what is not for Wikipedia, is for Facebook. Not for nothing are they FREAKING THE FUCK OUT over the prospect of Everipedia being a success.

Wow yes, good points.

I had completely forgotten about this, when this was first proposed, I was still editing!

I actually wrote this, later in the RfC:
(Prince of Thieves is one of my more successful puppets, with a pretty solid 2,885 edits.)

I would like to know how this applies to governmental organisations. Currently this would appear to apply to any group, and I sincerely doubt that even the national ministries of numerous countries would pass these guidelines. I don't doubt that this works well for companies and non-profit organisations, but I have concerns about it being applied to groups that are legally part of a government, and feel these should be exempted. Prince of Thieves (talk) 14:57, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

Prince of Thieves, I took it to mean that every municipal volunteer commission isn't notable. Nor is every department of a larger national agency. Anything that you noted would pretty clearly pass these guidelines, even on a local level, IMO. TonyBallioni (talk) 15:44, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

TonyBallioni I am not so sure, the vast majority of information about legally recognised government organisations is primary, often written by some other part of the government. Other sources rarely go in depth, and would be discounted as not substantial, or discounted as based on press releases. Given the nature of these organisations I would personally prefer it if these bodies only had to pass WP:GNG. Most truly irrelevant local municipal organisations won't pass WP:GNG even on current guidelines, but I am not convinced we need to make it harder. For example an article I created, Landsréttur, is a new (national level) governmental organisation, it opened last month. I have included sources which are perfectly acceptable for passing WP:GNG. But I don't think it would pass these new guidelines. Prince of Thieves (talk) 15:58, 2 March 2018 (UTC)

Prince of Thieves, under the old rules, any Icelandic government agency that got a couple of sentences in both Fréttablaðið and Morgunblaðið, and a long-ish article in just one of the two, would have been considered notable. I don't know whether that's still true (I'd have to re-read the changes – WP:Policy writing is hard, and the devil's in the details), but I think it's safe to say that the proposers intend for that to still be true, no matter what they may or may not have actually written at this stage. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:20, 6 March 2018 (UTC)

I think the priority is to be concerned with private profit-making companies, and then non-profits. Government organizations are a distant third. In particular, they're not as susceptibleto freelance paid editing rings. DGG ( talk ) 01:58, 7 March 2018 (UTC)

Of course Landsréttur is gone now, it's only the National Court of Appeal of Iceland, totally not a useful addition to Wikipedia.

Also bit the dust, was WP:NCRYPTO (now enacted policy). WP:TRUMPTWEET, which probably isn't policy (yet). Also Wikipedia:Notability of governmental organisations, which would have dealt with the problems outlined in my comments on the RfC.

Indeed the only policy page I made that survived was WP:159. Really I can't see why I bothered...

Classic Wikipedian logic. This thing we called the guideline for organisations and companies, isn't meant to apply to government organisations. It doesn't say that, you fools can find out in your own sweet time.

He basically admits the sole purpose in writing the policy, was to deal with paid editing. As if it isn't obvious. Do they not think huge companies benefit from paid editing the most? Do they not think medium sized companies are ecstatic they no longer have to pay Wikipedians to smear smaller rivals?

This is how Wikipedia works. Readers and non die-hard editors really aren't considered at all in their policy machinations. Any casual editor who stays after they realise it, really needs to question their life choices, because the world doesn't need any more people whose aim in life is to become a die-hard Wikipedian, or read the garbage they call an encyclopedia.

Oh well, at least you still have PORNBIO. No need to pay for those.