Talk:Sympathetic point of view

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I don't think this page is written from a very sympathetic point of view towards Wikipedia. =b Fennec 15:55, 9 Mar 2004 (EST)

As with the overwhelmingly vast majority of things in life, this article is not about Wikipedia ;) -proteus 12:28, 31 Oct 2004 (EST)

> It is inappropriate to attempt to put a positive spin on slavery or > similar outrages, however, for even concepts have their limits.

Why not? Southerners were doing this sort of thing during the 19^th century. And besides, for concepts of these kind, people are bound to be provoked into writing long passionate critical articles against it. Enough so that the critical articles would outweigh the sympathetic article.

This isn't Wikipedia.

Right - this isn't WP. Here, you can write an article on the various contexts of slavery and we probably won't have a problem, as long as it's well-written, SPOV, and extends the wiki. -proteus 04:36, 30 Nov 2004 (EST)

It says if I create some biased article. It will be 'mercilessly edited' does this mean people will remove my material or does it mean that people will add their own?

Zain 07:12, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

Any article, other than a Wikinfo:Signed articles, may be edited by other users. We should perhaps remove the language 'mercilessly edited' , as it is just a hangover of Wikipedia language, but, yes, others who edit your article, in good faith, might remove your material or add their own. For example, suppose you write an article, The Palestinian view of Israel, and someone wished to improve it (while continuing to try in good faith to present the Palestinian point of view) they might do those things. If they edit the article so it reflects the Zionist point of view of Israel that would not be in good faith (they should create their own article for that), but so long as the article references actual Palestinian views, no problem. FJB 09:56, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

Regarding good faith and other suggestions

But 'good faith' has same inherent problem like 'NPOV'. Of course magnitude is smaller here. But same problem will do exist here. That which edits are 'good faith' and which are not.

Our structure supposes that, unlike Wikipedia, we will insist on a certain level of integrity. To take the example above, if someone titles an article, Zionist view of Israel, or edits it, they are expected to present or refine information which gives that viewpoint, not play games by inserting some other viewpoint. FJB 14:37, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

I'll like to purpose multi-signed articles. It can be of several types having one or many of following features.

1. Article can be made to exclude anonyms editors.

we already do this

2. Limit 'New Editors' by using date of register or date of first edit. (may be first non-reverted edit).

unnecessary

3. Avoid Sock Puppets editing using method2 with some minimum edits critaria.

already doing this, using GetWiki

4. Exclude particular user or group of users.

not advisable, except for known trolls/spammers, and regular bans

5. Only available to selected editors.

we have this with the protected pages: sysops only

6. Edits can only be published once approved by the original author.

this is for signed articles only: only sysops can edit

This can also help reduced/remove vandalism. Zain 12:33, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

Never thought of having more than one person do a signed article, but I don't see a problem if they agree to do that and all have verified their identity. FJB 14:37, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

Again, this is not Wikipedia, and the software is not MediaWiki. This is Wikinfo, running GetWiki, and we really have no affiliation with Wikipedia (except that FJB is an Arbitrator/Sysop over there). We have very, very little vandalism as a result. A bigger problem is with trolling. -proteus 14:14, 27 Dec 2004 (EST)

SPOV of autism article

Since my own interest is editing autism articles, I am curious as to how SPOV policy applies to the main autism article. There are two major points of view in autism: one is that autism is a developmental disability, which is held by the majority of parents and medical community. The other view is that autism is a way of being, which is a view held by most autistic people, and some (though a minority of) parents and professionals. This view is similar to the concept of Deaf culture, where Deaf persons view Deafness as a culture instead of a disability. When I read the description of SPOV I couldn't figure out which of these two points of view was to be presented in a positive light. Q0 16:55, 19 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Welcome, btw. I would think the view of autistic people should easily win out, however, not at the expense of science. I'm not sure if that helps you - I guess it immediately brings us into the debate of what is "normal" and what isn't, and who's defining it. Is there any particular bias you see in the article? -proteus 17:05, 19 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Thanks for the welcome. I guess my biggest concern with the autism article is the introductory paragraph which states autism is a disorder, without mention of the view autistic people have about autism. Q0 17:53, 19 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Yes, by all means, make it right, and any other related pages... -proteus 18:07, 19 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Yes, please, I and most other people have not thought deeply on the subject. Autism presents as a problem schools and parents have with certain kids. That is one perspective. They then take the kids to doctors and psycholgists who diagnose and treat these kids using the medical model. And the kids grow up and have an opinion about both themselves and the label that has been attached to them. I would say each of those three perspectives could make an article. FJB 18:24, 19 Apr 2005 (EDT)

Examples?

As a new Wikinfo-User I'm still trying to understand SPOV. Are there any examples of articles with multiple point of views? -plauz 16:00, 21 Jun 2006 (EDT)

Welcome. More examples of multiple views on a topic "forked" onto more than one article are at: Forum:Suggested Page Sets. -proteus 02:49, 22 Jun 2006 (EDT)

Not many (It turned out I was too busy to do very many), but look at Islam and Islam:Critical views. FJB 00:31, 22 Jun 2006 (EDT)

I have written Sliders: a viewpoint favoring the first two seasons, which is an alternate view of Sliders. The Sliders article is essentially what was copied from Wikipedia, but my interpretation of SPOV is that the main Sliders article would be written from a viewpoint that all seasons are good and not to favor one over the other. There is also David Peckinpah (which has a supportive view of Peckinpah) and David Peckinpah: a critical viewpoint. However, these articles are short. Q0 01:24, 23 Jun 2006 (EDT)

Confused

I was browsing, stumbled on the Plagiarism article. Did not like it... But I cannot even try to fix it until I understand how SPOV is supposed to work. Plagiarism is a word that basically is a tool created by people who think it is a Bad Thing. So should be the main article be from the point of view that it is Bad, which is really quite embedded in the word itself, or should the main article be generally sympathetic to the act of plagiarism, and the mainstream view be in a separate article? And, are there always two articles at the most here on one subject, or can you refer us to good examples where more than two viewpoints are represented by more than two separate articles? (This is my first edit, so I don't know what I am supposed to put at the end, for a signature.) kethd 11:24, 26 Jan 2007 (EST)

In the case of concepts like plagiarism, the sympathetic point of view is that the concept makes sense and has a point. So the content would discuss it as the bad practice of using the work of others without attribution. An alternative article might attempt to show that using the work of others as a good thing. To sign, use four ~~~~. FJB 15:30, 26 Jan 2007 (EST)

Thank you for the explanation. I think that problem concepts like Plagiarism need extra clarification in the various articles; the base article should be headed something like "from the POV that plagiarism is bad/wrong" and the other version headed "from the POV that plagiarism is useful/normal/good". Maybe I'll try to make that happen someday... And it would be good if someone could update the edit-page frame to prompt folk to use the four-tilde signoff. kethd 08:55, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

Wheeler

Reading about Wheeler's struggles with "Classical definition of Republic", I don't see how "Sympathetic" is a very useful concept. Clearly, there is Wheeler's POV, and other POV. The sensible approach would be to call one article the "Wheeler's view of" version, and then have other POV articles. But the SPOV framework would seem to require using the official title "Wheeler's view of the classical definition of Republic" in order to apply SPOV-based dichotomy. (Note: I have not studied, and have no opinions about the definition of Republic. I am only interested in how we should structure information here.) The two intertwined subjects before us are: How to get the various POVs represented as clearly and usefully as possible? and, How to name/organize/access those various POVs? kethd 08:58, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

Wheeler's articles should probably be signed articles, as while he cites sources, they are essentially original research. Thus they do not strictly follow our scheme. If you wish to write articles expressing the "other point of view", link to your article at the top of his articles. FJB 12:59, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

SPOV:cv

It seems sad that there is no cv article for SPOV. But is the whole title construction free/arbitrary? Can there by "SPOV: A critical view" _and_ "SPOV: Another critical view" _and_ "SPOV: A critical view of A critical view"? (I don't wish to suggest that in general there should be; only that it is easy to imagine cases where such forking is really the only satisfactory way to avoid unresolvable edit wars.) Also, could the software be taught to expand :cv to ": A critical view"? kethd 09:00, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

The title of alternative articles varies according to their content. Consider Jesus: alternative articles might include, The Jewish perspective on Jesus, The Muslim perspective on Jesus, Historical investigations of Jesus, Jesus according to [name your gospel or Christian sect]. "Critical view" is a conventional title, but does not belong in the software, as it would be inappropriate in many contexts. FJB 13:08, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

Which leads to thoughts/questions about Article Naming. But I don't want to be off-topic; could someone direct me to the right place to learn/discuss that for this wiki? kethd 12:50, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

You found it. The premium here is on being creative and adding information which is both significant and useful. Titles should reflect that content. To return to anal sex, "Dangers of anal sex" might be an appropriate title for such an article, rather than "Criticism of anal sex". FJB 13:08, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

OK, I feel like I am starting to understand... The naming of articles here is rather "free form" -- it is our responsibility to try to figure out the best titles. And so I assume also that there is nothing built-in to the search feature or article display to group the POVs on a single matter. It is up to us the make sure that the group is prominently cross-linked, and we will evolve our traditions over time about the best ways to do that. So "SPOV" is really mostly shorthand for the general concept that each article will generally present a unified perspective, and substantially different perspectives will generally have a separate article. So far, so good. What I am still puzzled by, and will probably just have to learn over time, is that this seem to incorporate an odd bias against presenting viewpoint dialog together in one place. Certainly there are times when such a unified presentation doesn't work, and separation is good. But it is even more common to quite well be able to combine pros and cons, on-the-one-hand, on-the-other-hand, comfortably. Am I laboring under a mis-apprehension that that is not appropriate here? And to take a slightly different aspect, I quite suspect (without any experience/history) that many "critical" pages here will, if the haven't already, naturally accumulate a hodge-podge of perspectives, sometimes violently at odds, having little in common other than their opposition to the base article.

Most imported articles are NPOV. We usually don't change them unless there is a good reason to. If you wish to write one, feel free. FJB 22:04, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

To pick at another thread of Article Naming. Over at WP, they try to give the simple name to the thing most likely to be meant. Which sounds much better than it turns out. Naturally, you get arguments between people who disagree over which of various meanings is most "likely". And there is often little real evidence to go by. But they seem to have a tradition against resolving this by having the simple name just be a disambiguation page, and have all the article titles be qualified. But the craziest case I have yet stumbled on happened recently with the new Apple iPhone. Apple stole the name, and there was an ongoing trademark fight. So, of course there were people arguing that they were not entitled to the term, in any sense. And of course, others arguing that the new Apple iPhone would be what almost anyone looking up the term would want to know about. But I did not hear anyone say, Hey, aren't we supposed to be working on an encyclopedia, and isn't it kind of weird to be changing the names of articles every few weeks in response to news events -- shouldn't we at least be trying to choose titles that might stay relatively unchanged for years? *** And so, my suggestion here, if this policy matter has not already been settled, would be, at least in cases where it is hard to choose which meaning deserves to be the main meaning, just qualify all the titles and have the unqualified term go to a disambiguation page. Which presumably would be structured, in cases where there are a multitude of meanings, with the most popular/likely meanings at the top, along with the historical/root meanings, and all the other meanings organized in the most sensible fashion we can come up with. kethd 17:54, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

Sounds sensible. However, the plan is to crosslink all articles in a set at the head of each article. FJB 22:04, 28 Jan 2007 (EST)

I've seen some special fancy header bars here that do that, but I don't understand how/when to build them.-kethd 15:23, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

Major revision to SPOV

Analysis:

I have tried to apply what I learned on this Talk page, to the main article. I have tried to steer the reader away from the shoals of mis-apprehension I think are natural first reactions to the SPOV concept: Does this mean just one, Pro-perspective? Does this mean exactly two, pro-con articles for each subject?
I mostly added to the top of the article. What is left is somewhat redundant. Others may wish to edit down. But I prefer too-much to too-little, and this is a core matter for WI; it would be hard to say too much about it.
I see that elsewhere here the term "Article Sets" is used; it should probably get incorporated here. But that leads into the whole subject of Categories. I don't understand the issue. There need to be good resources on the wiki about the subject, and links from here. It is hard to believe that the plan would be that as an Article Set expands, it must always be hand-edited in at each of the articles. My fantasy would be, that every article would have a heading that puts it in context: parents, peers, and children from a subject-outline perspective, with a clear "you are here" on that concept map. Although there are articles that do not neatly fall into place in an outline, I suspect most do, and it seems like ultimately support for such a structure should be embedded in the wiki software.

Respectfully, if you don't understand an issue/topic, I suggest learning more before editing our policy and other major topic pages. -proteus 19:33, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

The example article names deserve more consideration, as prototypes. Do we really not want to try for them all to start with "Jesus"? Are we really content to have them start with "The"? How do we want to capitalize articles? And Jesus brings us back to the article-title dillemma: who gets the simple name? Is the base article "Christian view of Jesus", or just "Jesus"? One could well argue that Jesus was certainly not a Christian, so if it is to be written from his point of view... What a can of worms! But the bottom line for our structure here is, what happens when a reader types Jesus into the search box and clicks Go. They either get an article, featuring some POV, or a disambiguation page of some sort. Or, we could come up with a new method, and channel them to a random one of the Article Set?
If the "1000" quip is too flowery or cute, or needs linking, change it.

Probaby too cute. -proteus 19:33, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

I made one major change to the later portion of text. It previously said: 'Just be prepared for others to "mercilessly edit" your work', which made little sense to me, an oddly confusing threat seemingly out of keeping with SPOV. I've added instead: "In fact, those with other viewpoints are honor-bound here not to censor, limit, or damage the perspective; to only edit it to improve its representation of that point of view. People with other viewpoints are restricted here to only adding their perpectives, either within one article if that works out, or in separate articles, if necessary. And, in turn, the first article can be modified, or additional articles added, in further reply and clarification." If that does not sound like a good concept, or well stated, let's discuss it. Or change it.-kethd 16:51, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

Except you should be prepared for others to edit your work. I don't particularly like your edits to various articles, but I don't own the articles - but by that same token, neither do you ;) Be prepared for me to edit them. I'm glad you seem so interested in Wikinfo, but personally, I'd like to see a few more "dues paid" before allowing you to revamp all of our key pages. We have sysops who have been here from the start and are not so bold ;) -proteus 19:33, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

I'm sure I can edit it and improve it somewhat, but that means good work. FJB 18:12, 30 Jan 2007 (EST)

Talk:Sympathetic point of view

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Contents

Regarding good faith and other suggestions

SPOV of autism article

Examples?

Confused

Wheeler

SPOV:cv

Major revision to SPOV

See also: Multi-POV

Views

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