[seqfan] Wiki deletion: vandalism by another name

Robert Munafo mrob27 at gmail.com
Fri Dec 4 21:50:23 CET 2009


If this bothers people now, it's really going to be a problem in the Wiki.

Stuff gets deleted from Wikipedia all the time because of
judgment-calls about "notability". Over time, communities (like that
which curates Wikipedia) evolve towards an increasingly conservative
and narrow focus (In Wikipedia's case, they are moving towards print
encyclopedias of the 20th century).

In Wikipedia, typical "notability" deletions involve TV episodes and
other fiction topics; in our domain the common victims will be:

  - "easy" sequences with no references, or other "trivial" sequences
(like A017631-A017640 or A021735-A021743)

  - "recreational maths" sequences -- everyone has different opinions
on what qualifies, but base 10 digit-related items will probably be
the first targets.

The built-in history archives of wiki servers do not help: deletions
and "redirect"s prevent access to lost content via the "history" tab.
So it amounts to vandalism to anyone who actually values the
information.

Alonso Del Arte wrote:
>
> I knew someone was going to ask the author before taking any drastic
> measures. None of the Associate Editors were chosen with a view to being
> trigger-happy with the Delete button.


Franklin T. Adams-Watters wrote:
> Subject: [seqfan] Re: delete or not delete?
>
> I have in fact received a reply from the author, who says "If the
> remark seems irrelevant or inappropriate under A006093, then I suggest
> that it be transferred and coupled as an extension to comment of
> sequence A002385 by David Wasserman".  I am going to do that.
>
Vladimir Orlovsky wrote:
>
> *It definitely should be deleted.*
> *Klaus Brockhaus*
>
> Q: why `delete`?
> why NOT contacting author, before doing this drastic mesure?
> definitely or maybe?!

-- 
  Robert Munafo  --  mrob.com




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