User blog:RRabbit42/Category spamming is often lying

This is a blog I wrote for another wiki that doesn't have a lot of people looking out for it.

Over the past few months, I have been gathering information for a set of articles I want to write about something that can really help wikis. One of the points in the articles will be that most people don't realize that every time someone makes an edit, we expect it to be true. There are people who deliberately cause vandalism and other problems, but for everyone else, the expectation is the edits will be true. It's one of those things that's in the back of our minds that we don't think too much about.

I've dealt with category spamming as a kind of nuisance. For those who don't know what it is, that's when someone spends most of their time only adding categories. In many cases, the only thing they do is slap categories on pages and they never write anything worthwhile on them. They have the attitude of "I can just click on the 'Add category' button to put 'Arrogant antagonists' on the page so I don't have to write anything that shows how they are arrogant." This has led to many instances where there are more categories than sentences.

Some of this comes from the fact that the person is familiar with the story. They've read the book, seen the movie or watched the TV show. They might know that a character is arrogant or wrathful or whatever. But there's nothing on the page to prove it to people who aren't familiar with the story.

But then there are the categories that are definitely wrong. Examples:
 * A character is said to be a murderer when they were intending to kill someone but never actually did.
 * They're "failure-intolerant" but they never demonstrate the harsh punishments (usually death) that someone who truly is intolerant of failure would hand out.
 * A dog is a "sadist" when it is actually a disease like rabies that is the source of their actions and it's out of the dog's control.
 * Someone is "presumed deceased" simply because they don't appear in the story any more.

"Presumed deceased" in the real world

Let's take that last one into the real world. You see a woman get into her car as you go into a store. You probably won't see her ever again. Does that mean that the moment she's out of your sight, she likely died?

No. She is simply no longer a part of your story (going to a store). I see dozens or hundreds of people every day when I'm driving or doing my job. I don't think, "well, they're all dead simply because I don't see them any more". That's not realistic.

When category spamming becomes lying

After seeing too many times where people are category spamming, what I've come to realize is that it's a form of lying. It may not be intentional but it's still lying.

I could put the following categories on my profile page:
 * Songwriters for Celine Dion
 * Doctors with a PhD and DSocSc
 * Astronauts
 * White House interns

If I don't offer any proof that those are correct, am I just making things up or am I lying?

If this was the only place I said those things, then that might be okay because I could be doing it just for fun or bragging. People do that occasionally. Your profile page is considered yours to play around with.

But if I were to put categories like this on a page for a character when they're wrong, it becomes lying. There needs to be proof that those categories fit.

Here's an example that actually happened. In the story Cujo, a dog gets bitten by a bat and contracts rabies. As a result, it becomes aggressive and kills some people. Categories that were placed on the page included:
 * Xenophobes
 * Betrayed Villains
 * Seeker of Vengeance
 * Arrogant Villains
 * Sadists

All of them were wrong because the dog's actions were the result of a disease, not because of decisions it made of its own accord. It did not begin fearing and hating foreigners and strange customs. It was not betrayed by anyone. It did not attempt to correct an injustice. It did not display an attitude of superiority over others. It did not take pleasure in deliberately hurting someone. And it did not do the ten other things the person said the dog did when they slapped categories on the page.

No proof was on the page that the categories were correct. It took just a few minutes of reading the summary on Wikipedia to show they were wrong.

If that were the only time this person had put wrong categories on a page, it might not be a problem because it's easily fixed. An occasional instance of false information in the categories is no big deal. In this case, this person has been doing it for over a year, which shows that it's moved beyond false information into deliberate lying, which is another form of vandalism.

Going back to the real world, if you met someone that made statements about what they did and you later learned that they had lied to make themselves appear more important, you might pass it off as them being a braggart. But if you learned that they continued to do this over and over for many months or years, would you still be willing to excuse their behavior, especially when it was so easy to prove that they're lying?

For companies, when lying occurs on a resume or job application and it's discovered, the result is usually the person is fired. On a wiki, the "firing" occurs in the form of a block to prevent them from editing. When repeated blocks have to be set, especially after attempting to talk with that person to show them what to do and what not to do, then it becomes clear that deliberate vandalism is taking place.

How to provide proof that it's true

So what can people do to show that the categories they're adding are true?

The first way is to not use the "Add category" button. If you use that, the only thing that's entered into the edit history is "Adding categories". The better way is to edit the entire page and add the categories at the bottom by hand. That way, you can fill out the "Edit summary" line to give a reason why you're making a change.

Second, only add categories that can be supported by what's on the page. If all the page says is "Inigo Montoya is a former antagonist in The Princess Bride", then there's no proof that he's a "swordsman" or "skilled" or "vengeance-seeker" or "Spaniard" or "henchman". Anyone that's seen the movie or read the book knows it's true. But for those who haven't, if all they see are categories, they don't have any proof that the categories aren't a lie.

Third, ask yourself if the categories are really important. If you're adding trivial categories like "green-skinned aliens", ask yourself, "Is anyone really going to be interested to know all of the aliens that have green skin?" If you're adding a category just to add a category, don't. That only adds clutter to the page.

But the best way to show that a category is true is not to use them if you don't have to. Write sentences on the page to show what would be in a category. For Inigo, you might write something like this:
 * Inigo Montoya is very skilled with a sword, having studied the techniques of many masters. He is right-handed, but is able to fight with one in either hand. He accomapanied Vizzini and Fezzik after all three had been hired by Prince Humperdinck to kidnap Princess Buttercup as a means to start a war with a neighboring country. After being defeated in a duel with the Man in Black, he became a drunkard upon realizing he was not making any progress in avenging his father's death. Later, he was recruited to help the Man in Black rescue the Princess.


 * During that rescue, he finally met Count Rugen, the man who had killed Inigo's father, as identified by the six fingers on Rugen's right hand. After killing Rugen, Inigo pondered what his new purpose in life should be now that his vow had been fulfilled. He receives a suggestion to become the next Dread Pirate Roberts from the Man in Black, who is giving up that title to be with his true love, Buttercup.

There are at least ten categories that do not need to be added because all of them are covered by those paragraphs. If it happens later, it's a little better since now there's information to back up those categories.

It's the "Show, don't tell" mantra. "Telling" is slapping categories on a page. "Showing" in sentences provides proof that the categories are true.

That's what we need on pages: proof that things like categories are true. If all someone does is keep clicking on the "Add category" button, they're not helping. They're adding clutter. And when that clutter can repeatedly be shown to be wrong, their edits move beyond false information into lying and vandalism.