Jan 11 2009
Wikipedia takes on Threshold RPG (part 1)
This is an abbreviated version of the story designed to get some discussion going. For the full story, with all the details, read my article here: Wikipedia’s War on Gaming History and Threshold RPG .
1) Wikipedia is full of people gunning for an administrator promotion. In the current climate, the easiest path is getting articles deleted and getting players banned. These acts somehow show you understand what is best for Wikipedia.
2) An editor and his admin buddy put Threshold in their sights, and rules and policies went by the way side. Innocent people got banned and their efforts to improve the article were systematically removed. Once everyone involved with the article was banned, they proposed the article be deleted (an AfD or Articles for Deletion recommendation).
3) People who participated on the KEEP side of the AfD were frequently banned for cooked up reasons and their arguments stricken. The AfD was possibly the longest in Wikipedia history. Most people voted KEEP. In order to delete, the rules state there must be a CONSENSUS TO DELETE. The closing admin deleted it anyway, for reasons that have nothing to do with the actual policy.
4) When possible, other retaliatory action was taken against KEEP voters. When the owner of Top Mud Sites showed up and argued for KEEP, links from other MUD articles to Top Mud Sites were deleted. He would re-add them, but they would get deleted again.
5) A Deletion Review happened. I have not checked the tally recently (I am banned again), but at my last check most votes and arguments were to overturn. I highly doubt that will happen. Once the wikipedian insiders are against you, you are done.
6) My first ban was for edit-warring. What was I doing? Researching citations and then adding back content that was removed because of a “lack of citations.” My second ban was for “sock puppeting.” The people who were supposedly my “sock puppets”? They included: my wife, who has a 4-5+ year old account with active edits in many varied topics, someone from Alabama, someone from California, and others. My third ban was for pointing out that people with confidence in their beliefs are not scared of arguments from the other side (and therefore, don’t delete them just because they have the power to do so).
Part 2: So, what is wrong with Wikipedia and how can it be fixed?
Part 3: What should fans and developers of MUDs/MMOs do now?
what happens to Threshold/other Muds does not only happen there. I am writing book reviews for a non-commercial site in Germany. We do not get paid for our reviews. But we were criticized as an advertisment driven company, because we pay the costs for hosting with ads. Even worse, we have some success and made more money than hosting cost us. How immoral…
Well, our links and that of many other fantasy/science-fiction review sites were all removed and some even blacklisted. Despite several top journalists working for these sites. One self-proclaimed mentor or whatever it is called got on a crusade versus all book review sites. Because they are all commercial and of low quality.
Nothing could be proved and was discussed to death, but as nobody involved had the time to match the effort that this zealous idiot put into deleting entries, we had to give up.
What can YOU do to prevent the deletion of Treshold an other MUDS? Well, some stupid jerk probably will say 1.) Richard Bartle is not really important in the big picture, 2.) MUDs are not that important either and 3.) Treshold is just another MUD. That this guy usually has next to no clue about the genre he is talking about and that his judgement is awful does not seem to count at Wikipedia.
You can only hope that some people have time to fight and do endless discussions for the cause of Threshold, as not the people who are “right” in an objective or subjective way, but those who can edit and quarrel forever.
You can try to appeal to an admin who shares your point of view, but who really knows the hierarchies and secret allies at Wikipedia. There were already some disturbing reports of Wikipedia admin games of power that involved mobbing and banning users.
I can only tell you, I lost a lot of illusions about Wikipedia and a free encyclopedia for everyone that day. Jimbo Wales is a follower of Ayn Rands philosophy of objectivism, which is highly criticized by academics and, even worse, often leads to VERY odd and frightening interpretations by several people. Terry Goodkinds late Sword of Truth novels were prime examples of this.
What can you do? Debate forever, till the other guys give up. Find an admin that shares your point of view, but how to find a mud lover… no idea.
I am afraid, you will lose. Zealots are more determined than normal and rational persons… I experienced it myself.
I am scared by Wikipedia and the awful power games behind the scenes.
I am glad that things are going well. Now you just need perseverance and someone watching the article, in case of a troll attack!