View source for Talk:Noteworthy E-mails

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What, might I ask, is the purpose of this page?  We have all the relevant historical information in the Record archives, why must students be singled out in such a manner as this? --[[User:06jps|06jps]] 23:47, 15 March 2006 (EST)

Agreed. These pages just seem to open up old wounds and goes against the general light-hearted nature of the Willipedia. --[[User:08tdm|08tdm]] 00:02, 16 March 2006 (EST)

I agree wholeheartedly. - Lucy C-C (sorry I can't figure/remember the tilda thing)

I agree as well. --[[User:06mea|06mea]] 00:20, 16 March 2006 (EST)

Personally, I don't mind good historical research, but these events are a little too recent for comfort, and the research is cursory, at best. --[[User:06emm|Evan]] 00:24, 16 March 2006 (EST)

That one of my issues too, that the "research" or whatever "facts" are presented here will somehow be given undue weight and that one or two people putting their opinions (whether or not they have any actual experience with the situation) about an event is not helpful or informative. -- [[User:06lc|06lc]] 00:27, 16 March 2006 (EST)


1) If everything in Willipedia is supposed to be "light-hearted," then please change the About page. Once you do, I'll stop contributing non-light-hearted material.

2) The "purpose" of this page is to record the history of what actually happened. If you don't think that history belongs in Willipedia, then say so.

3) The purpose of this page is not "good historical research". It's purpose is to record the raw historical documents. (Feel free to edit away the context that I have provided. Or make the context better.)

4) If you don't want events that are "too recent," then change the goal of Willipedia. If you do, I'll stop contributing recent material.

5) I confess that the research is "cursory at best." But, have you heard? This is a Wiki. You can edit it! If you don't like my research, then make it better. If you wait I bit, I hope to add much more material in the weeks to come. 

6) I am not even sure how to respond to that last comment. What does it mean to put "facts" in quotes? Are you denying that these e-mail were sent? Are you claiming that I made them up? I am as interested in a fun po-mo discussion as the next philosophy major, but unless you have a more substantive comment, it is hard to know where to start. I do love the line about "whether or not they have any actual experience with the situation". What do you expect? Do you think Laylah Ali is going to write about this? Do you think that the Dean's Office is going to reveal the punishment, if any, given to Lucien and Pritchard? That isn't going to happen, obviously.
--[[User:Dkane|Dkane]] 10:58, 16 March 2006 (EST)

Keeping a record of these events is not inherently a bad idea.  However, the fact that they seem(ed) to be recorded on multiple wiki pages gives the impression that someone is just trying to get everyone all riled up over them again, rather than merely keeping track of them for historical purposes. --[[User:06mea|06mea]] 13:02, 16 March 2006 (EST)

To phrase Lucy's (06lc) comment another way (at least, how I read it): Presentation is everything.  It's one thing to present facts, another to present raw data, and quite something else to present particular facts and data in such a way that the reader's opinion is instantly colored by the opinion of the presenter.  Whether it was intentional or not, that's what happened.  Imagine if I created a "David Kane '88" page and included as its only content, "David Kane, class of '88, is the founder of EphBlog and was involved in a large controversy when EphBlog posted racist slurs."  Factually true...but phrasing matters a great deal and that's certainly not the entire story of that controversy, EphBlog, or David Kane '88.  Yet imagine what a casual browser of Willipedia would take from that...
--[[User:06jps|06jps]] 15:18, 16 March 2006 (EST)

I agree with Joe's interpretation of my statement, and I also want to say that my comments do not just apply to the category of noteworthy emails, I have also made comments on why I think other pages dealing with these controversies are not necessary or appropriate, so asking me if I "deny these emails were sent" is beside the point and not helpful. -- [[User:06lc|06lc]] 15:49, 16 March 2006 (EST)

First, this may be all water under the bridge since the board has decided to 1) Post public e-mails in a central archive with no commentary (e.g., [http://wso.williams.edu/wiki/images/3/3b/William_Lenhart_to_the_Williams_Community_-_1_November_2004.txt here]; 2) To not maintain private e-mails. Second, if you think that pages about things like Nigaleian or QBE are not "not necessary or appropriate" you should bring it up with the board. I believe that they have decided to include such pages in Willipedia. Third, if you think that I (or any other contributor to Willipedia) have "presented particular facts and data in such a way that the reader's opinion is instantly colored by the opinion of the presenter" in an unhelpful way, you need merely edit that presentation. You have the power. (I do not think that this is a fair characterization, by the way.)  --[[User:Dkane|Dkane]] 16:09, 16 March 2006 (EST)

'''Action taken by the [[Willipedia board]] on this article.'''  Last night, a member of the board cleared the initial content of this article as we sought a better way to archive historical content. As DKane wrote above, we are going to try this for now:
# Because historical documents are not for editing, like a wiki article needs to be, they are more like media and will be treated as media -- like the pictures etc. you can upload and link to in articles at [[Special:Upload]].
# Public emails are fine to upload as .txt files.  "Public" means that the author of the text sent his email to campus@wso, williams-students, or a similar target that a sender expects will make his words public.
# Emails to individuals and student organizations, "private" emails, will not be allowed in the Willipedia archives.
#Writers may still, and are encouraged to, synthesize quotes and excerpts from documents into their writing.  Footnoting such short portions with a link to the full document you've uploaded to the Media section is great, if you deem it fit.

We thank all above who joined the discussion on this page, and still welcome more here and on other talk pages, as you also go about making the changes you want to see.
--[[User:05jl|05jl]] 18:03, 16 March 2006 (EST)