Hi all -
Although this thread has gone pretty far from perfectly as a whole, it has
comforted me to see a number of people contribute to the thread who haven't
been active on this list in quite a while. I'm going to send out a couple
separate emails apart from this - but would like to thank the contributors
who have popped in to this thread to post their thoughts who have been
inactive for some period of time. I can't guarantee I will be able to
consistently do so, but will make a stronger effort to keep up on
gendergap-l traffic going forward, and also to try to help ensure that any
obstacles that currently discourage women from participating in this list
are mitigated, moderated, or if push comes to shove, removed from this
individual community at least.
Best,
Kevin Gorman
On Tue, Jun 24, 2014 at 2:09 AM, Marie Earley <eiryel(a)hotmail.com> wrote:
Apologies for long post but, as another example of
external pressure often
being able to get to do more than internal, I'd like to relate the
following experience.
In October 2008 I joined
TriggerStreet.com (now Trigger Street Labs
<http://labs.triggerstreet.com/>). It is a website set up by Kevin Spacey
and his business partner Dana Brunetti, their film production company made *The
Social Network* and *Captain Phillips*.
The idea of the website is for members to read each others screenplays /
short stories, watch each other's short films and give feedback. You earn
credits for reviewing material and spend them on adding your own material
to the site, you can also add additional credits to 'push' your work nearer
to the top of the pile waiting to be reviewed.
The website also has discussion forums, I was shocked, not only by the
comments on display but also by the attitude of moderators. In one early
exchange the word 'fa**ots' was used to describe gay people, the thread was
locked but no action was taken against the perpetrator. I e-mailed the
moderator asking why, he wrote back to me saying, "As a gay man myself I am
sympathetic to your comments," (I hadn't known he was gay until he replied)
"but as a moderator, I have now locked the thread and it will now slide
down the boards."
Discussing the policy on how the site was run on the boards was a complete
NO-NO, there was just a general rule about 'not feeding trolls'. Another
thread I was involved with concerned a discussion about Julian Assange
there was lively discussion as to whether he was a hero or a villain, but
it was civil. Out of nowhere there was a comment, "Why can't we get back to
talking about porn and masturbation." Everyone ignored this, the
conversation went on, there were two further attempts by the same poster
asking the same thing, he then began his own thread entitled the "Porn and
masturbation thread." Not only was nothing done, in a (very, very naughty)
thread suggesting more ought to be done to prevent such behaviour, Dana
Brunetti in particular stated that he didn't want the site to become
"sanitized" and he didn't want it to turn into Orwell's *1984* - to an
approving chorus of "Dana's right" from other members.
Just like Wikipedia there is no way of blocking other users, and, again
like Wikipedia, the nature of what the website was set up to do may mean
that it is impractical. It was all compounded for me by the "screenplay of
the month" feature where the winner was displayed on the home page (since
replaced by "featured short film", "featured short story" and
"featured
screenplay"). I watched winners include Mr. "fa**ots" and, another month,
Mr. "porn and masturbation thread". The name of the screenplay of the month
winner and their avatar were also displayed, this prompted one winner to
change his avatar to two women in bikinis kissing. Cue a congratulatory
thread to the male writer in his early 20s plus a side helping of "nice
avatar btw." One bigot had his screenplay optioned by a studio - so much
for ignoring trolls.
The website also had an industry podcast each week usually featuring Dana
and Vice-President of Trigger Street, Carter Swan. One week they said that
there were going to be big changes including revamping the website, and
anyone who didn't like the new changes could "f*** off". One of the
changes
was to get rid of the plays section (and with it all the credits I had
gathered). One of the other changes was to have a lot more podcasts from a
purpose built studio. A fashion podcast, a music podcast, one for comic
enthusiasts and one featuring the porn star Kayden Kross, reviewing a
different film each week.
I complained (by e-mail - no dissent allowed on the forums remember), I
was ignored, so then I tried a different tactic. I wrote to various groups
dealing with domestic violence that were based in Southwark, London (home
of the Old Vic where Spacey is the Artistic Director), asking them to lobby
Kevin Spacey at the Old Vic. I also wrote to all the e-mail addresses
within the Old Vic that I could find. It worked the other podcasts
continued but the ones by Kayden Kross stopped.
The rules about using the website also changed, including the following
new statement:* "While using the Site or Services, you agree not to:
Transmit any content or information that is unlawful, harmful, threatening,
abusive, harassing, defamatory, libelous, vulgar, obscene, hateful,
fraudulent or otherwise objectionable content, or infringes on our or any
third party's intellectual property or other rights."*
I have no idea how much of that (if any) was because down to what I did. I
have also no idea how rigorously the new rules were / are enforced, they
got rid of me around the same time as Kross. My account, not deleted, just
suspended where it has remained since August 2011, no explanation given and
no indication as to if / when it will be reinstated - if they read this it
will probably
The film - *50 Shades of Grey* is set to be released on Valentine's Day
2015, it is being made by Trigger Street Productions.
Marie
------------------------------
From: LtPowers_Wiki(a)rochester.rr.com
To: gendergap(a)lists.wikimedia.org
Date: Mon, 23 Jun 2014 08:24:12 -0400
Subject: Re: [Gendergap] A cautionary tale
Wow. That's sobering. I'd like to think we don't have it that bad on
WMF sites, but maybe we do?
Then there's this:
"Technical solutions abound when websites and apps provide options that
take targeted users into consideration -- namely, giving us back our
ability to make boundaries. For instance, sites shouldn't let strangers
message strangers, and all sites and apps should allow users to block
others. When Quora tells people to pick interests or topics they want, it
should also tell them to pick interests or topics they don't want."
Unfortunately, I don't see any way that a wiki can work with the ability
to block "strangers" from messaging each other, or allowing individual
person-to-person blocks. Works great for message boards; doesn't work on a
wiki. Does it?
Powers &8^]
-----Original Message-----
*From:* Delphine Ménard [mailto:notafishz@gmail.com]
*Sent:* 22 June 2014 19:05
*To:* gendergap(a)lists.wikimedia.org
*Subject:* [Gendergap] A cautionary tale
Hello,
I found this:
http://www.zdnet.com/quoras-misogyny-problem-a-cautionary-tale-7000030762/
an interesting read.
Cheers,
Delphine
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