While that tag may certainly need improvement or change, we do have many otherwise acceptable articles that are written in a tone entirely unacceptable for an encyclopedia, so unless you personally are willing to fix all of them in the next few days, we should have some way to mark and categorize them. JesseW, the juggling janitor 05:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I've suggested improvements to the tag, including a more pleasant "tone"and putting it on the talk page rather than the article. What "tone" is required for articles? There doesn't seem to be any policy requirement or guidance, so this is down to personal judgement. Experts or professional writers have a particular difficulty with patiently accepting criticism which in their opinion is unjustified, so this exemplifies the problem. Marking and categorizing could be done discreetly, tags are there to nag. ...dave souza, talk 16:05, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Vandalism could be reduced by 1- requiring editors to register a username and 2- require some proof of age. At present, an 8 year old can edit right alongside a Ph.D., do the same reverts, cut out any amount of text, etc. And to actually get a person banned is not a short path. Terryeo 15:45, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Lack of adherence to or understanding of scholarly values At present, anyone can edit and there is no qualifier that they must understand the subject at all. Thus, we get people editing the Scientology articles who have been declared suppressive and expelled from the Church. They are anti-Scientologists. An equivalent in the Catholic Church would be excommunicated members, editing the Catholic articles to prevent any mention of what the Catholic Church does in preference to articles filled with the few controversial issues the Catholic Church is known for. An additional discussion page which establishes the "broadly published" / "narrowly published" ratio for a given article could be helpful. I think of an additional, fixed page which defines an article's paramenters. The page could only be edited by a few (perhaps administrators) and would be available for every editor to view and work from. Established facts could be put on it. It would always present, although the article might present the facts in different contexts over time. For highly contentious articles, the article's ration of "this point of view = 30 % of the article" "that point of view = about 70% of the article" could be helpful because editors would have to work out how broadly published their own point of view was. A major issue in the Scientology series of articles. Terryeo 15:57, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
