Do we really want to be the Anonymous News Network?

I understand that a lot of us here, including me, are deeply interested and passionate in Internet culture, but do we really need to keep putting out interviews with disgruntled Scientology members constanly, as if we were releasing press releases for Project Chanology. I realize I will get a lot of heat for this, but I think I'm telling the truth

People here write about what they're interested in; Wikinews isn't a workplace, it's a volunteer effort. In addition to this there are very few people who actually write articles for Wikinews. The vast majority of the content is produced by less than 30 people, all of whom are very part time volunteers.

Because of these two facts our article creation tends to lean strongly toward whatever any given Wikinews reporter happens to be interested in that week. The reporter who has been writing these articles happens to have an interest in stories related to Scientology. That's fine. Their is nothing wrong with his or her articles. The problem comes from that fact that because there is so little content being produced by Wikinews (due to the small number of people actively involved at any given moment) we appear to be concentrating a lot of time on particular topics. This week, Scientology. A few months ago we were inundated (or so it appeared to casual observers) by stories about Chilean aftershocks.

Unfortunately this type of thing is going to happen in a community as small as ours. The only way to combat this issue is to create more stories, so that a single topic of interest doesn't comprise so great a percentage of our output.

Do I hear any volunteers vowing to help the effort? ;)

I don't see why this is any less important than articles about NASCAR, the movements of ordinary tropical storms, or an interview with an Ubuntu developer. If you think there's something else that should be written about for Wikinews... then put in the effort and write it!

I'm also not sure why this would be considered an "Internet culture" article. Most of the people I know who take an interest in Scientology's legal/criminal issues only know how to use a computer to check their email, and like to print everything out before they read it. They're lawyers and cops keeping an eye on news, not kids protesting in Guy Fawkes masks.

@Zobango (talk · contribs), I strongly agree with above comments, by Gopher65, and Fishy c.

Here are some other comments about recent articles on this subject:

• "Good journalism. Presents both sides of the story, backs up everything with references." - 216.195.213.51 (talk · contribs)
• "Great article...would love to see more on this topic." - 24.128.255.141 (talk · contribs)
• "Sadly, there's only been 3 Scientology articles this year." - Mikemoral (talk · contribs)
• "Very balanced article. Would like to see more about Scientology here, too. In fact, the thing I love about Wikinews is the references/sources, something that no other news site does.."
• "I thank the Wikinews staff and volunteers for posting this. It is important news regarding the fight against that dangerous, brainwashing cult." - 187.112.127.134 (talk · contribs)
• "Very nicely informative article." - 76.173.234.126 (talk · contribs)
• "Great article, thank you!" - Petter Bøckman (talk · contribs)
• "Very interesting article and interview. Well done." - Tristan Thomas (talk · contribs)

Thank you. Such comments are most appreciated. Especially after the efforts put into researching the subject matter, successfully conducting the interview and copyediting, and putting the entire article together. :)

I also think this is an excellent interview about a very important and largely hidden subject - the best way to prevent abuse of this kind is to publicise it widely. Excalibur (talk) 14:51, 22 November 2010 (UTC)

Thank you!