Talk:Submissions/History of the Murder of Meredith Kercher Article

Balance

This was arguably one of the most contentious pages on the English language Wikipedia in recent years, possibly the most contentious dispute since 2009 not to have gone before Arbcom. Are you proposing a balanced panel with a neutral chair, or are you proposing a panel from one side of the dispute? WereSpielChequers (talk) 20:54, 24 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hi WereSpielChequers (talk), thanks for the response. I just noticed it or I would have responded sooner. The proposal is what it is. The theme that Judge Heavey, Steve Moore, and I would bring is that the Wikipedia coverage has been deeply flawed and that this has terribly harmed living human beings. If somebody has real problems with a Wikipedia article, the proper response is to present reliable sources. We can't do this as editors because everybody who believed Knox and Sollecito were innocent was summarily blocked by European administrators who were convinced of their guilt. The next step is to present the WP:RS to the Wikipedia community in person. It's legitimate. (Note that repeated request for arbitration have been presented to the ARBCOM but their position is that blocked editors can't request arbitration.)

Remember that NPOV doesn't have to be half way between what two people are saying. It's what the most credible reliable sources say. I respectfully request that you take a look at this list of reliable sources. and these comments by Jimbo Wales. Not one of these RS is included in the article of today -- not one. This list included John E Douglas, one of America's leading experts on homicide investigations; Steve Moore, another retired FBI agent; Judge Heavey; US Sen Maria Cantwell;Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times columnist Timothy Egan; and Peter van Sant, a CBS correspondent who narrated four hour long documentaries about the case. All these people are breathing fire. Does that mean they're not neutral? No it doesn't. Perhaps what I propose is the "balanced panel" and what transpired at Wikipedia isn't.

I can't quite speak for the others, but I'm quite certain that while in London they would be more than willing to participate in other Wikimania panels that include any of the reasonably prominent pro-guilt editors, many of whom will probably be there. We would also consider requests from other editors on the topic to participate, although we might need more than the 45 minutes requested and we might try to turn it into two submissions. That's not unreasonable given the long distance traveled by the proposed participants. Note also that Jimmy Wales has been invited to participate as a panelist and he's as neutral as they come. He has deep knowledge about the dispute.

Heavey, Moore, and Douglas were brought in by US Sen. Maria Cantwell to brief the US Congress on the case. The panelists may be criticized as being part of a PR campaign. All panelists are paying their own way over there and will make clear to the audience that they aren't part of anyone else's PR Campaign, as falsely alleged in past versions of the Wikipedia article.

Again thanks for your interest in the subject PhanuelB (talk) 00:37, 1 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hi PhanuelB, I'm just going through all of these submissions as a volunteer, deleting the spam, fixing typos and asking questions like the one I posted here. I'm not especially interested in this particular subject and I'm going to respectfully decline your offer to go through those sources as going through them, the counterarguments and the debate on the article would take more time than I could allocate to that this month. I might well sign up to attend a debate in which there was a neutral chair, and speakers from at least two of the three positions, guilt, innocence and "unsure but broadly happy with the Wikipedia article", and yes I appreciate that 45 minutes would probably be too short for such a debate - I'd suggest you ask for at least 90. But I've no interest in attending a lecture critiquing Wikipedia and a group of Wikipedians unless the Wikipedians involved are getting a fair shot to defend their side. As for whether what you propose is the "balanced panel", even if ultimately your side were to win the debate you would only have a balanced panel if it contained more than one side of the debate and a neutral chair. I don't know how big the coverage of this has been outside of the US, Italy and the UK, if you consider that anyone from those countries is likely to have a slanted view of the saga then perhaps an Australian, Indian or Scandinavian should chair it. This is the sort of event where that would be easy to arrange. WereSpielChequers (talk) 10:24, 2 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

PhanuelB, I suggest you include someone from one of the "other" sides on your panel, such as one of the editors who opposed your group's editing agenda, or an administrator or arbcom member who took administrative action against someone in your group. Otherwise, it looks like you are using the presentation for advocacy, not as a presentation and discussion on WP issues such as reliable sourcing, NPOV, etc. Cla68 (talk) 00:27, 24 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your interest in the subject. Anyone who would like to participate in this panel is welcome to contact me. Please feel free to ask around or encourage others to take an interest. Alternatively they can provide their own presentation to challenge our theme.

The first thing to understand here is that those who believe that the Wikipedia article did not properly weight the interests of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito are not permitted to participate in this article. This is has been the iron clad de facto standard in place for a number of years now. There are close to a dozen indefinite blocks in place against only those with a single POV. Those blocked broke few if any rules and were targeted as part of a concerted effort to eliminate only those with a POV opposed by the European administrators who controlled the page. Jimmy Wales himself has made extraordinary statements fully verifying the bias and administrator misconduct that have defined the article's history. I'm the one who believes in free and open debate. The major players on the other side are not.

The proposed reliable sources (an American Judge and a retired FBI agent) here are prepared to travel half way around the globe at their own expense to challenge the use of Wikipedia as a platform for the demonization of living human beings. This page was defined by systematic exclusion of reliable sources (exact quote of Jimmy Wales). The presentation of reliable sources banned from the article is legitimate.

I believe that this will be the most important discussion of RS and NPOV at the London event. PhanuelB (talk) 13:42, 29 March 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Current content

But, how does this discussion improve current and future content of articles? Geraldshields11 (talk) 02:25, 15 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Geraldshields11. Thanks for the interest in the topic. I believe that identification of the most troubled articles and analysis of how they got that way is important for improving the project. Those who write history have deep responsibilities to get it right. As noted above I have identified this list of reliable sources. and these comments by Jimbo Wales. Not one of these RS is included in the article of today -- not one. Which article do you believe is the most troubled and how did it get that way? I may comment a little further in a bit. I have to run right now. PhanuelB (talk) 11:18, 16 April 2014 (UTC)[reply]