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Discussion

  • Yes they do, but they generally choose not to get involved with it. But that doesn't matter anyway because it just illustrates the problems Wikipedia has had with ED - I haven't linked it to claim we can't link because of the remedies of the case. Ryan Postlethwaite 21:56, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
Could someone provide a link to the RfC please?--Urban Rose 21:57, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
The RfC actually happens here - the bot will list it shortly. Ryan Postlethwaite 22:02, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
Its been listed since 21:57, 24 May 2008 UTC. (cf Urban Rose's last comment :) -- Fullstop (talk) 22:06, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dead link reasons #5 and 6 carry no weigh. Verifiability and reliable sources do not apply to external links, period. There's no contributory infringement liability from linking to the main page of a service that may happen to contain infringing material. If we're wrong that question will be settled by the Foundation's lawyer, not a discussion page - but we're not wrong. #1-4 are valid concerns, but they are not the case now so any use of a dead link based on them would be speculative and based on a situation that is not actually happening. #3 is misleading, though. The issue here is a live link to the main page in the article about ED, not a live link to attack pages, so the history people's abusive linking is not relevant. Wikidemo (talk) 23:48, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Okay, if the choice is a live link or a dead link, which do you prefer and why? This is not a vote, so don't let the question constrain you. Wikidemo (talk) 20:49, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

  • I prefer a dead link - There's two clear factions here; one side want a direct link, the other doesn't want a link at all. Having a dead link is a compromise between the two sides and hopefully at least everyone can feel like they've taken something out of the vast debate. Ryan Postlethwaite 20:54, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer a live link because there is no compelling reason to kill the link, it's all IDONTLIKEIT. (Дҭї) 20:57, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • A dead link on condition that it stays that way. It's a comprimise and people need to stop removing the link completely as Jossi did without any attempt to discuss or explain. If this is how things are going to be the article will soon be fully protected again I'm sure. EconomicsGuy (talk) 20:58, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer a live link for two reasons: (1) making the link dead doesn't have any effect on people's ability to find the site or Google's ability to index it, but rather serves only to annoy those of our readers who might want to follow the link from our site, and (2) it has the appearance of IDONTLIKEIT-based censorship. But I can live with a dead link if that's the consensus. —David Eppstein (talk) 21:00, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer a live link. If we're going to have a link, there's no reason to cripple it. All that does is make it less useful to the reader. Further, singling out this site to link differently than all of the other sites we link to on Wikipedia stinks of POV editing and NPOV just isn't something we should compromise on. -Chunky Rice (talk) 21:02, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Per the not linking to harassment policy, I prefer the deadlink. Also, as Ryan points out, it is s compromise between both sides of the issue that does not harm the encyclopedia content or nature of the article.MBisanz talk 21:06, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer a dead link. It's a compromise. It's not essential to be able to click on a link. (Paper encyclopaedias don't have links, but they still have information.) And there is some reason to discourage traffic to a site where dead children are referred to with offensive sexual jokes, even if we don't all agree that it's a strong reason. Ashton1983 (talk) 21:08, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
    • I went to the front page of the site and I saw no dead children. Are you sure that's representative of the site's material, or is that an outlier presented to cause moral outrage among Wikipedians? It's a wiki; anybody can edit it to add offensive material. One could even edit it to justify censorship on another website. (Дҭї) 21:12, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • If we're going to use a live link (which I'd say we shouldn't, but the way consensus goes with this article, you never know), should it at least carry a "may contain offensive content" warning of some sort? As pointed out above, the front page has featured some pretty nasty stuff in the past. Tony Fox (arf!) 21:31, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
No, WP is not censored and we don't use spoilers, so if the link goes in, it goes in on its own without our commentary on its content. MBisanz talk 21:39, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer a live link. Neutrality shouldn't be compromised for a moral panic. If there's a widespread practice of making links dead for "offensive" (to whom?) sites, can anybody give any other examples? *Dan T.* (talk) 21:38, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live Link of course. Assuming it hasn't been blacklisted as official policy, there's no reason not to have a live link except for IDONTLIKEIT. We would need a very good reason not to include a live one since every other article about a website has one. --Kevman459 (talk) 22:23, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link. I don't see the point of having the url but not linking it. There's no danger linking to the main page, nothing that could harm the user. In this context it's being used in an encyclopedic manner and it's not being used as an attack on anyone. If somebody did want to find some attacks on that site they'd have to search around a bit and probably know vaguely what they're looking for. Bill (talk|contribs) 00:59, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I support a dead link as a compromise between the two positions. It means that people can easily get to it, but won't click on it casually or by accident only to find themselves reading something very offensive. SlimVirgin talk|edits 04:09, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I think a dead link is a good idea here - It seems a sensible compromise to me. Further; I seem to recall that it's technically possible to alter the appearance of a page dependent upon the page last visited. Wouldn't it be epic lulz to display specific content to visitors coming from wikipedia? - and isn't that something we should probably try and avoid? I think so. Dead link = good idea in my book! cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 04:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
    • It could be done, yes, and there's not much we can do about it. (We could pass links through a mirror, but they could just as easily add the mirror to their "hate list".) I don't think it's likely, but if it does happen I'd support switching to a dead link then (not preemptively). — xDanielx T/C\R 04:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I prefer the live link option. I consider the "linking to harassment" argument tenuous since we're only linking to the home page. If in the John Doe article we link to an ED page that constitutes harassment toward John Doe, that's rather problematic since users will know who John Doe is and may have some existing or potential relationship with him; if we link to ED's homepage from the general ED page and the reader happens to glimpse a derogatory comment or two about Joe Bloggs, then promptly forgets the name and never encounters it again, that's not especially problematic. Linking to the ED home page is much like linking to Google.com, from which users can access all kinds of highly objectionable material with a couple clicks. — xDanielx T/C\R 04:32, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • A dead link is silly... it just makes readers do extra work for purely symbolic reasons. What's next, showing a picture of the link? Upside-down? The link is there... let's not hassle our readers just for kicks. --Rividian (talk) 12:42, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
    • Do it CAPTCHA style... in wavy, distorted text, with a link to an audio file of somebody reading it out loud for the sake of visually impaired users. No, seriously, this "straw poll" is unfortunately coming out very close to a 50-50 split, which doesn't look good for finding any sort of solid consensus. *Dan T.* (talk) 14:29, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I'd say a text link, even linking to the homepage of ED can easily make way for "featured articles" to be viewed, such was the case in "MONGO", which led to the initial Arbcom ruling.--Hu12 (talk) 16:51, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I feel very strongly about including the link, but less strongly about how we do so. If compromise is the order of the day, hopefully we can all live with that. Given my druthers, I'd make it a live link, since that's what we do at pretty much every comparable article across the site -- even in other cases where linked sites have offensive, objectionable, or arguably illegal material. I don't see much practical difference between the two options, here, only a symbolic one; similar to what Rividian said, we shouldn't hassle or hamstring our readers without good cause and should trust them to make their own decisions. – Luna Santin (talk) 19:14, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
I strongly agree with Luna above. -- lucasbfr talk 21:07, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Use a live link. We're not the internet police. I can think of a dozen other websites which have far more offensive material than this (ogrish.com springs immediately to mind) and we don't censor those links or make "text only" versions of them either. This does nothing than create an extra and unnecessary errand for the reader. coccyx bloccyx(toccyx) 20:10, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
  • live link. C'mon Slim, all the substantive details on your attack page have have been posted to RFArb by now anyway, so what's the point in fighting this now? The cat's out of the bag, no point in dragging this fight out. Just live with the parodies, like others, and move on. It's not like they are particularly nice to us furries, either, but I'm not going to loose much sleep over it. --Dragon695 (talk) 01:26, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live. NPOV above all else. Even the appearance of censorship is negative, and this would certainly give that impression. RyanGerbil10(Kick 'em in the Dishpan!) 03:42, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • No article should receive special treatment over all the others. Live link. Z00r (talk) 04:04, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Unforunately, a live link is the only option. Wikipedia is not censored for minors, visitors, or those who have hurt by the site's hurtful "articles". Our readers should be allowed easy access to the site to confirm that the claims made by the article about the site's abusive and trolling content are true. EJF (talk) 11:51, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Obviously a live link is the way to go. A dead one would be (a) pointless and (b) petty. Can we keep our personal grudges out of article space, please? Thanks. naerii - talk 12:41, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • WP:NPOV demands a live link. Personal moral judgements shouldn't affect our articles in any way. --AnotherSolipsist (talk) 21:15, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

*Neutral. I don't believe that a dead link is the equivalent of censorship, but the only arguments I have heard in favor of a dead link are that the site is offensive or attacks Wikipedians, neither of which seem good arguments to me. I do actually have a different argument that could be used in favor of a dead link, however. The only time I think that a dead link should ever be used is if the link is to a site which could potentially cause harm a person's computer, (e.g. GNAA.com) and I've seen articles on ED with live links to sites which are browser exploits and contain viruses, so linking to ED could be seen as indirectly linking to sites which can damage a person's computer. But this seems a little bit overprotective at the same time, so I'm neutral on the issue.--Urban Rose 21:55, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Live link - Changing my vote. No good reasons have been given in favor of a dead link (the fact that the site attacks Wikipedians is not a good reason).--Urban Rose 21:17, 31 May 2008 (UTC)
There has been some talk of this. However, why give a warning for this site only, and not all the other sites that contain hate speech, pornographic material, shocking things, copyright violations, etc? The answer, I think, is that Wikipedia has rejected NSFW warnings, spoiler alerts and the like. That doesn't have to be the case but I think there's a strong consensus. Wikidemo (talk) 23:54, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
Our articles are written from a neutral point of view; it isn't our place to deem content objectionable, and the article already contains an explanation of the website's nature. —David Levy 23:58, 24 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link without warning, per my rebuttals above. dihydrogen monoxide (H2O) 01:54, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Undead Now we have the article, so live link or dead link won't change much, and a dead link would be incoherent. We have links to dozens of evil websites anyway, this one is just another one. I know, it's hard to make abstraction of the content, but this site should not be an exception, as it's against our principles. Also, it would have a strange effect on the reader, I think that it's preferable to treat this site like any other site in article space (and only there of course). Let's not give them the pleasure to be exceptional or that they can hinder our efforts towards encyclopedic values. It's ironical that the article has been resurrected following a DRV initiated by Grawp. Anyway, ED will be dead long before WP. Cenarium (talk) 02:46, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dead link, plus procedural objection to RFC: the site practices systemic harassment of Wikipedia volunteers that creates a chilling effect where open consensus is impossible. DurovaCharge! 04:17, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
    Your point seems to be that they're intimidating potential opponents of linking to them into silence by the implicit threat of their writing more nasty stuff about them? I see no obvious sign that anybody on that side of the issue has actually been intimidated; if anything, the anti-linking faction makes up for their slightly lesser numbers by being a lot more loud and vigorous in fighting for their side (I'm the rare exception who's loud and vigorous on the pro-linking side; there aren't many of me.) Are you claiming some large "silent majority" who would vote against linking to that site if they weren't too afraid of it? *Dan T.* (talk) 11:50, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
    Wikipedians are being featured on the front page of ED right now (currently its LaraLove). --Hu12 (talk) 17:42, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live Link already - Why are we still flogging this dead horse? There is no reason to treat this site any differently from any other. Attempting to do so makes us look petty, plays into their hands and suggests that we are incapable of reacting rationally when attacked - all much more damaging to our image than linking to their little playpen. Exxolon (talk) 06:32, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • If this were WODUPEDIA, there'd be a live link, but a plain-text URL is an acceptable compromise. WODUP 07:21, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dead Link per WP:PROBLEMLINKS --Kip Kip 17:08, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live Link - we have discussed this before, and I am sure that the consensus was to have a live link to ED [it was even whitelisted for this express purpose]. Having a dead link will not stop people going there, if people have enough skill to find Wikipedia and then this article, surely they can type 'Encyclopedia Dramatica' into Google, et al. Wikipedia is not censored, and there shouldn't be exceptions for sites that some people don't like: we don't [in all other cases] refrain from having a link because a minority thinks 'OMG!!! Dey have rude stuff on their site!! Call da FBI!'. Sorry for being a bit stupid, but then I suppose I view the circular discussion going on here as a bit stupid! RichardΩ612 Ɣ ɸ 17:51, May 25, 2008 (UTC)
  • Comment a dead link's incongruousness will produce way more traffic going to Encyclopedia Dramatica - I'm unsure why we'd want to promote traffic there by using a dead link. WilyD 18:14, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link, as a link to http://www.kkk.bz/ is appropriate in the article on the KKK and http://www.combat18.org/ appropriate in the article on Combat 18, so this much less offensive and unpleasant website should not be given special treatment just because it targets people we know personally. Tim Vickers (talk) 19:25, 25 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dead link due to harassment and abuse. Everyking (talk) 08:28, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
  • I think there is a point to which some editors are forgetting that Wikipedia is for others. We are not making this encyclopedia for ourselves, we are making it (if I may wax poetic) for humanity. And humanity, generally, will not care about the petty Wikidramas between us and ED. I believe we should use a Live link simply because the other 90% of people who use Wikipedia are just normal people who don't edit, don't know who any users are, and just don't give a crap about it. They'll follow the link, maybe they'll chuckle at some of the articles, and that's that. We few thousand registered editors are not the be-all and end-all of the userbase, and we should respect those people who come here for information. Not letting the link ride live is tantamount to the Pentagon blacking out swaths of a document and claiming said document is "unclassified." We are not a governmental body. We absolutely do not ever get to say this one thing is wrong because it offends some editors. We provide information, uncensored. No Sharpie markers swooping down on a bill of lading to remove the building number as an act of petty, childish defiance at mud slung. Howa0082 (talk) 13:27, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link. Articles about still existant websites should have live links to the sites in question. That's common sense. In my view, it's the minimal requirement; We don't have to link to offensive/dangerous content, but I don't think there's any practical reason not to treat every site fairly and at least link to the main page. In general, I don't think we need any other kinds of warnings besides of the content that is already in the articles themselves. We have to, in a way, assume that the user makes an implicit decision when they follow an external link: "After reading this article, now full aware of what sort of site this is, I have chosen out of my own free will to follow this link." Or, "Having not read the article, I have chosen out of my free will to follow this link, expecting not much worse than any other website out there, and if it turns out to be worse, I accept it's my own fault for not reading the article and making a more informed decision." That covers just about everything. --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 17:24, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Dead Link forever...we're not here to help them promote their attacks...it creates a chilling effect and those that aren't being attacked by articles on that website have no right to insist we link to that shithole.--MONGO 17:33, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
    And how exactly does a dead link keep them from promoting themselves? --Badger Drink (talk) 23:33, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
    You'll have to be, you know, convincing. Trotting out an inapplicable legal term certainly doesn't cut it. Frankly, the "chilling effect" is more evident looking at the AfD this just went through, where people openly admitted to using proxies to vote from fear of WP retribution for daring to support this article. Whether we link to ED or not, they are STILL THERE. You can stick your fingers in your ears and chant nonsense all you like, but this won't change. Howa0082 (talk) 11:58, 27 May 2008 (UTC)
    I hope you know that this drama that you've helped create has brought many people to Encyclopedia Dramatica, including myself. Not knowing of their existence, it was only brought to my attention when I heard about this whole charade. If the article was created, linked properly, and treated as other articles are, I would not have heard about this site. You're only promoting them further, I hope you realize that. Bigjake (talk) 05:18, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link. Claiming that a text link is somehow "better" is the same misguided rationale that leads certain people to believe that "f*ck" is somehow better than "fuck". It's a petty power trip, nothing more, nothing less. The WP:CENSOR argument has already been trotted out time and time again, but how about No Climbing the Reichstag Dressed as Spider-Man, which is what this petty demanding that this site be treated differently than any other site Wikipedia covers amounts to? Any given website has a possibility of being defaced and replaced with a redirect to nimp.org - so by the "argument" presented, any and every link should be changed to text. --Badger Drink (talk) 23:33, 26 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link. For God's sake, this is the most ridiculous discussion I've seen on Wikipedia in a while. Because a few people don't agree with the content on the website (as I don't) does not give ANYONE the right to proclaim its validity on an open encyclopedia. Is this a true, open project or is it being run by a few cliquish groups who refuse to establish a proper article (which include links, as any article would if links were available,) simply based on the fact that something 'bad' was written about them or their fellow wikipedians? Seriously, disgusting and those who behave in this way should be ashamed that you're dragging what is once a good project straight through the mud, only to satisfy your selfish desires. Bigjake (talk) 05:14, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
  • Live link, no special treatment. Kusma (talk) 21:00, 28 May 2008 (UTC)
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