[WikiEN-l] BLP, and admin role in overriding community review

[jkelly at fas.harvard.edu]

  Todd,

  While the below sounds like a reasonable concern, I suggest that you're
missing an important point.  If a Wikipedian encounters something being
published through the site that looks potentially libelous, they should remove
the content, and that content should stay removed, until all reasonable
concerns have been addressed, and anything that needs fixing has been fixed.

  There still seems to be this idea that potential libel, potential copyright
infringement, etc. should continue to be published onsite until it has been
voted off in strict accordance to bylaw something or other of the policy of the
week.

  Reversing the removal of this kind of material is just as bad as the original
use of the site to publish it.  We need to hold accountable any admin who uses
Wikipedia to publish potential libel. That's not giving every user "office
powers".  It's a statement that someone who thinks reversing BLP removals just
because there's no policy against it, or because the user didn't cite the
correct combination of letters when removing it, shouldn't continue to be an
administrator.

           Jkelly


Quoting Todd Allen <toddmallen at gmail.com>:

> So basically, Fred, what you're saying is, any admin can basically
> invoke powers equivalent to OFFICE at will, including that anyone who
> reverses them (even with consensus support!!...) will be automatically
> desysopped? I don't think that's a great idea, and I think it's a
> tremendous and unwarranted expansion of BLP's scope.
>
> I have no issue saying we should be exceptionally demanding of good
> sources in BLP's, and that any unsourced material should be taken out of
> them sooner rather than later. That's all very good. But there's a
> reason we restrict unilateral action with no opportunity for review to
> only Jimbo, the Foundation, and a very few which they may trust to
> extend that to. Extending that this far, to all admins in general (and
> even all users!) is a bad, bad idea. Yes, we should act quickly where
> BLP concerns are invoked, no, that shouldn't be reversed until the
> situation is cleared up. But it shouldn't be totally irreversible,
> period. If consensus says "This is not a BLP concern", and OFFICE
> declines to step in and say "Oh yes it is", then that's the decision.
>
>