Barriers to Quality at Wikipedia (and potentially other Wiki projects)

I finally grasp in its full width what Bhneihouse means by "brand". It's similar to my own emphasise on "factors of quality" and having neutrality and balance included in that list. In fact, what I did was similar to defining a brand then.

Is banning true believers akin to censorship? No, it is not. Why would we only block/ban users for vandalism, while that is the most easy way of destroying quality to recognize? Edits that kill neutrality and/or balance are by far worse, because they are so difficult to recognize. We should be prepared to be at least as punitive in such cases. That said, I'm always in favour of second chances, and third, as long as the user shows to have gained insight in why his behaviour was wrong.

PS: the arbcom I served did explicitly never judge in matters of content. They would never block or ban a user for vandalism or other edits that destroyed quality. I just found out the English arbcom has a much wider mandate.

@Woodwalker

You made me a very happy woman.

I agree that non neutral/non balanced edits are worse than vandalism because they are insidious and sometimes hard to recognize. Perhaps it is the difference between outright racism and subtle racism. In a way the second is worse -- perhaps because it actually takes more effort to do it or perhaps because it is more difficult to recognise, I do not know. But what I do know is that anything that is inconsistent with Wikipedia's brand and resultant purpose/mission/goals does not belong on Wikipedia.

If quality content is part of Wikipedia's brand then behaviors that affect the quality of the content are not permissable.

Thank you for taking the time to read what I post and working with the information. Your effort makes it worth the time it takes to post it.