Objections To Tolerate Off Topic

Wiki has a significant problem as of around the last few years (should I say starting from 2001?) with creating significantly valuable content. This problem is acknowledged by most people I personally know from this wiki. Honestly speaking, Ward, I am still wondering whether you pay the bills for this site because of the fond memories or because you genuinely believe it can still be saved.
Removed from the above: "And among others it was implicitly acknowledged by WardCunningham himself, even to the point that he created the page CrazyThingsThatMightSaveWiki." Actually, he didn't. -- EarleMartin

What suggests that this is due to any increase in OffTopic pages? In my recollection, there has been a drop in quality of OnTopic more than an increase in OffTopic. It's not obvious that reducing OffTopic would increase OnTopic.

Wiki can be valuable only if everybody cares genuinely about all wiki topics that he feels competent on. In the absence of this care, I genuinely believe that wiki's content quality will suffer greatly.

I agree.

Well, one can say, we can live with some good pages and some crap pages. Not really, and not likely. First of all, it'll create a distinctly bad impression on visitors to witness very bad pages close to high quality pages. And visitors will be puzzled whether a page is so because it represents only one point of view and nobody bothered to do anything about it, or because a page really was the synthesis of a genuine community effort to apprehend.

I also agree that poor quality pages should be deleted asap. What does that have to do with OffTopic?

It has to do with that the preponderance of crappy pages is amongst the OffTopic and SensitiveOffTopic category. Also, deleting them will generate the fury of the authors who will refuse to recognize their own crap or apply FixYourWiki. Go figure.

Given the previous considerations, I strongly believe that superficial pages deface wiki, significantly detracting both from its current value and from its potential. I do not think therefore that leaving a superficial page alone just for the sake of not stirring up controversy is a viable solution.

Likewise I agree concerning superficial pages. But better than delete them, challenge them - force their proponents to either support and extend them by contenting against them using ThereforeBut or StructuredContention. This will either generate the quality you seek, or provide you with an opportunity to provide that quality yourself.

As if folks should spend a lot of time and energy picking up after the garbage created by others. Those who create garbage always have the perfectly reasonable solution to MoveItElsewhere.

I do have very little tolerance of superficial and negligent pages, and more so about SensitiveOffTopic pages. If somebody will try to come up with a page, for example, saying that Christianity is harmful to humanity (I'm not making it up, folks did that on this wiki), I can't tolerate the thought of just leaving it alone. There'll be only two options: either I leave from this wiki (and wiki has historically suffered from this phenomenon - see WikiMindWipe or WikiMindWipeDiscussion) removing both my signatures, and likely deleting significant parts of my contributions, or I have to get involved in that SensitiveOffTopic to debunk whatever I legitimately perceive as idiocies and have them wiped out from this wiki on the grounds of them being bunk/illegitimate content. Of course, this will detract from the energy that I'm willing to spend on OnTopic pages, but giving both my deep personal beliefs and according to the assumption #2, just leaving SensitiveOffTopic bunk alone is not a tenable position for me.

Again, StructuredContention permitted many antagonistic viewpoints to coexist peacefully on TheReformSociety. If it worked there, it can work here.

Wiki currently does not have somebody who is both competent and willing to sacrifice his time, to take a topic on his/her own and single-handedly create ReallyValuableContent. We have lots of people that are competent, we have lots of people that have time to contribute, we have lots of people that would sacrifice their time. I do not believe we have any particular one that has them all. Or if we had, I'm not seeing the results for whatever reasons.

Speaking as someone who used to, but no longer qualifies as a "wiki star" - at least insofar as other people set up a tribute page for me against my will - the reason I left is the reason most leave: profound antagonism from a small number of diehard ZeroSumGamers. There is no ViableSolution to this on WardsWiki except anonymity. But what this has to do with TolerateOffTopic is a mystery to me.

Wiki suffers from a tacitly assumed duplicity. Are we a publication medium strongly dedicated to the creation of ReallyValuablePages, or are we just a chit-chat social club where we meet with interesting peers and we throw out 2c on the subject? I don't believe either options should be discounted. I don't believe that pursuing both is unrealistic either. But I strongly believe that the confusion between the two is currently a significant factor that ruins many potentially valuable pages.

Not certain but interested in this idea. However, again, I fail to see its relevance to OffTopic.

Establish Objectives in creating valuable pages

Relevant to the topic of this page is a "ViableSolution?" to the proliferation of OffTopic pages is to not participate in the creation of useless unrelated content, but to instead be involved in:

Reading the valuable content that already exists
Participating within the PositiveDialogueCommunity in topics which have to do with the perceived Mission of this wiki, and in such participation you will RaiseTheWikiPagePotential and the value of individual pages to the community.
Spend some of your time in the work of cleaning up little things, such as spelling, grammar, on pages where you happen to notice such things.
Making this place a place where NewUsers can easily perceive a viable, energetic and collaborative community whose intent is to construct a ValuableSpace on this Internet.
The creation of linkages to the existing OnTopic pages with the establishment of new, relevant, technically correct, pages.
Spending more time in the cooperative correction of the ideas presented here by utilizing your own expertise and the expertise of others competent in the ideas present. In doing so, it is space-saving and economical to refer to external documents by adding hyperlinks to recognized expert sources.

-- DonaldNoyes

Compromise: Let off-topic stuff float around for a while and maybe wait until activity stops for a month or so before deleting. The closer the topic is to computers, the longer it is allowed to last. If it is about your favorite candy, for example, it should be removed very shortly after activity dies down.

Could we shorten the name of this page to ObjectionsToTolerance? -- PhlIp