Hi,
I wrote you a message a month ago about Wikikids/Vikidia:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikikids. I recently had a discussion on
IRC about this proposal.
Someone pointed out firstly a 2006 UK act that regulate internet
moderators on children website, and require a vetting process for them.
That's the UK Safeguarding Vulnerable Groups Act 2006:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safeguarding_Vulnerable_Groups_Act_2006
It defines "regulated activities" among which: "moderating a public
electronic interactive communication service which is likely to be used
wholly or mainly by children;" then "a person moderates a public
electronic interactive communication service if, for the purpose of
protecting children, he has any function relating to—(a)monitoring the
content of matter which forms any part of the service,(b)removing matter
from, or preventing the addition of matter to, the service,
or(c)controlling access to, or use of, the service."
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/47/schedule/4/paragraph/2/2006-11-…
I'm afraid that's what the sysop do on Vikidia. This wiki is hosted in
France for a content in french, but I wonder if it would prevent to run
a similar wiki in english, be it hosted in the US or elsewhere.
What do you think about it ?
I was also told that they were a kind of unexpressed policy on the
English Wikipedia that would be "Don't tell us you're a minor". As it
would be likely extended to another Wikimedia project, it would make
very tricky to make Wikimedians accept a Wikikids project, that aims to
enable children and teenagers (though not only them) to write and to be
involved in building the encyclopedia.
I have to recognize that Simple English Wikipedia actually seems to me
to follow this pattern, with a kind of similar principle that would be
"don't say that it fits/it's for children"...
The rest of the reasoning was about the "cultural climate surrounding
kids in America", especially concerns about pedophiles.
I responded that they were also legal standing for children empowerment
which meet the project (especially referring to the 1989 Convention on
the Rights of the Child:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikikids/Relation_to_the_Rights_of_the_Child
)
I had quite an idea about these issues before, both knowing some
specificities in the UK and the US, and because theses concerned have
raised and evolved in similar period in France, certainly with some
differences. But now I wonder if these concerned are too weighty to be
oversteped. Then if a wikikids were unlikely to be launched in English,
has the adoption of the project and opening in other languages
(German...) any chance to be accepted and uphold by the Wikimedia
community ?
--
Mathias Damour
49 rue Carnot
74000 Annecy
04 57 09 10 56
06 27 13 65 51
mathias.damour(a)laposte.net