# 15:01, 5 March 2007 David Gerard (Talk | contribs | block) deleted "User talk:Essjay/RFC" (talk page of deleted RFC) # 15:00, 5 March 2007 David Gerard (Talk | contribs | block) deleted "User:Essjay/RFC" (uncertified RFC, not requested 'kept' by the subject; deleted per RFC policy and for the precise reasons contained in that policy)
I eagerly await an RFC and arbcomming over an in-process deletion ...
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
# 15:01, 5 March 2007 David Gerard (Talk | contribs | block) deleted "User talk:Essjay/RFC" (talk page of deleted RFC) # 15:00, 5 March 2007 David Gerard (Talk | contribs | block) deleted "User:Essjay/RFC" (uncertified RFC, not requested 'kept' by the subject; deleted per RFC policy and for the precise reasons contained in that policy)
I eagerly await an RFC and arbcomming over an in-process deletion ...
Hi. I requested on the talk page that rather than deleting it, it be moved back out to community noticeboard. Others, if I recall rightly, asked the same. Could you tell me more about your reasoning for deleting it instead?
Regardless, would you mind sending me a copy of it? As I mentioned before, I think in a couple of months when people have cooled down, it's worth coming back to see what we can learn of all this. However, the vigor with which people are deleting the record is going to make that harder than I'd like.
Thanks,
William
On 05/03/07, William Pietri william@scissor.com wrote:
Hi. I requested on the talk page that rather than deleting it, it be moved back out to community noticeboard. Others, if I recall rightly, asked the same. Could you tell me more about your reasoning for deleting it instead?
Just because people want it around is not a justification to keep an uncertified RFC around. Uncertified RFCs are exercises in reputation-trashing. That's *why* they get deleted.
Regardless, would you mind sending me a copy of it? As I mentioned before, I think in a couple of months when people have cooled down, it's worth coming back to see what we can learn of all this. However, the vigor with which people are deleting the record is going to make that harder than I'd like.
I have to say "too bad, that's not what RFCs are for."
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
On 05/03/07, William Pietri william@scissor.com wrote:
Hi. I requested on the talk page that rather than deleting it, it be moved back out to community noticeboard. Others, if I recall rightly, asked the same. Could you tell me more about your reasoning for deleting it instead?
Just because people want it around is not a justification to keep an uncertified RFC around. Uncertified RFCs are exercises in reputation-trashing. That's *why* they get deleted.
I think the case where some frothing loon uses an RFC to make somebody look bad unfairly is indeed an important one. I don't think that applies here.
The RFC brought together important evidence that people weren't aware of. Its most popular positions were calling for something milder than what eventually happened, And the view that it was a purely an exercise in reputation-trashing was, as demonstrated in the RFC, a minority one.
Further, given that it started life outside of the RFC space, you could just as well have moved it back out again to some talky-talk space and it would have met you procedural concern.
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
Regardless, would you mind sending me a copy of it? As I mentioned before, I think in a couple of months when people have cooled down, it's worth coming back to see what we can learn of all this. However, the vigor with which people are deleting the record is going to make that harder than I'd like.
I have to say "too bad, that's not what RFCs are for."
From all the chaos, it appears we did not have the perfectly appropriate structure to deal with this. I didn't realize you were a big fan of the narrow following of process, but since you appear to be, perhaps you could propose the process you think would make this go better next time?
Thanks,
William
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
This is becoming more and more epidemic in recent weeks. It's one of the major reasons why I'm seriously considering not contributing further.
-Jeff
On 05/03/07, Jeff Raymond jeff.raymond@internationalhouseofbacon.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
This is becoming more and more epidemic in recent weeks. It's one of the major reasons why I'm seriously considering not contributing further.
You're leaving because I dared use my l33t admin powers to delete in process an odious pretense at a dispute resolution page under the rules regarding the colour it assumed in its claim for legitimacy, *despite* a lynch mob feeling otherwise. How dare I!
It was a lynch mob page. It was only made an RFC to give it colour of legitimacy. Unfortunately, it failed even those rules and should have been killed yesterday. The wacky move of moving it to Essjay's userspace doesn't change that - uncertified RFCs are only kept in userspace at the subject's explicit request. If it's an RFC, it lives or dies like one.
Of course, that's nothing compared to people denied a hanging party, as you say.
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
You're leaving because I dared use my l33t admin powers to delete in process an odious pretense at a dispute resolution page under the rules regarding the colour it assumed in its claim for legitimacy, *despite* a lynch mob feeling otherwise. How dare I!
Not you personally, but you're certainly not contributing positively to the culture.
And enough with the lynch mob nonsense. Seriously. Expecting a result when someone grossly overstates themselves and then uses it as leverage is not a lynch mob. I liked Essjay, too, but let's be serious.
-Jeff
David Gerard wrote:
You're leaving because I dared use my l33t admin powers to delete in process an odious pretense at a dispute resolution page under the rules regarding the colour it assumed in its claim for legitimacy, *despite* a lynch mob feeling otherwise. How dare I!
I understand you viewed it as a lynch mob, and that you were upset about that. I get it.
But you don't seem to have acknowledged that a) you didn't get much support in that view, and b) other people could have other reasonable interpretations. Have you considered either of those things?
Thanks,
William
On Mon, 05 Mar 2007 08:01:47 -0800, William Pietri william@scissor.com wrote:
I understand you viewed it as a lynch mob, and that you were upset about that. I get it. But you don't seem to have acknowledged that a) you didn't get much support in that view, and b) other people could have other reasonable interpretations. Have you considered either of those things?
Unsurprisingly I back David. That page has an inglorious history: started as a wildly out of process straw poll on whether to hang, disembowel or burn the witch, moved to an RfC, refactored into a form which was at least marginally compliant, but as David says never properly certified - and in any case now moot since Essjay has "left the building". One more piece of navel fluff under the Wikipedia microscope.
Guy (JzG)
On 05/03/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Unsurprisingly I back David. That page has an inglorious history: started as a wildly out of process straw poll on whether to hang, disembowel or burn the witch, moved to an RfC, refactored into a form which was at least marginally compliant, but as David says never properly certified - and in any case now moot since Essjay has "left the building". One more piece of navel fluff under the Wikipedia microscope.
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2007_March_5#User...
- d.
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 05/03/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Unsurprisingly I back David. That page has an inglorious history: started as a wildly out of process straw poll on whether to hang, disembowel or burn the witch, moved to an RfC, refactored into a form which was at least marginally compliant, but as David says never properly certified - and in any case now moot since Essjay has "left the building". One more piece of navel fluff under the Wikipedia microscope.
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2007_March_5#User...
There appear on first glance to be more "This deletion is going to make us look bad" and "Transparency is important" and "Most of what got deleted was substantial support for Essjay" than "David's a (insert bad word)".
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2007_March_5#User...
Can we please ditch the emotionally charged metaphors? Yes, saying "lynch mob" is quick and snappy, but it diminishes the efficacy of what you're saying (if you actually make an attempt to describe the behavior and emotions of the group you're talking about instead of just spouting a cliche, you've conveyed much more information) and devalues the term used. Lynch law is a brutal and calculating system of social control under which any member of a subordinated group who challenges the economic, social, or political status quo is punished with death. Taking the term and applying it to a situation in which, well, a bunch of people got angry at some guy for claiming to possess credentials he didn't possess, and then signed their names under statements asking him to resign his official positions on a website (or whatever)--that's silly, and it in no way illuminates the actual social psychology of what's going on here. Sure, it wasn't the specific example Godwin picked, but doing it still makes you look immature.
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 18:06:49 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve? What ongoing editing problem with Essjay is it trying to fix? What is the desired outcome? A community ban of a departed editor? An ArbCom case to desysop someone who's already desysopped? Or perhaps just to gaze deeper still into our Wikinavels?
Guy (JzG)
On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 18:06:49 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve? What ongoing editing problem with Essjay is it trying to fix? What is the desired outcome? A community ban of a departed editor? An ArbCom case to desysop someone who's already desysopped? Or perhaps just to gaze deeper still into our Wikinavels?
You can't reason people out of being upset and wanting to talk or vent about it.
The emotional halflife of a serious problem varies, but it typically on the order of many days to a week or so.
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 15:05:03 -0800, "George Herbert" george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
You can't reason people out of being upset and wanting to talk or vent about it.
But not on an RfC. RfCs are for fixing problems with editor behaviour. This editor has left the building, what problem can we fix?
Guy (JzG)
On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 15:05:03 -0800, "George Herbert" george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
You can't reason people out of being upset and wanting to talk or vent about it.
But not on an RfC. RfCs are for fixing problems with editor behaviour. This editor has left the building, what problem can we fix?
One could generalize the problems to include "...and community reaction".
I don't really personally care what form it takes (as I said, I'd personally like it to go away, too, it's unseemly), but realistically it's representing upset feelings and as such there should be someplace for it to happen.
What's ended up happening is, perhaps both typically and tragically, Wikipedia standard controversy reaction - it's up, it's down, it's back up, it's moved, it's moved again, it's speedy deleted then restored then deleted and up for DR and sideways with sugar on top and can I please have a little more, sir?
I begin to wonder just how badly we are our own worst enemies...
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 15:23:55 -0800, "George Herbert" george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
What's ended up happening is, perhaps both typically and tragically, Wikipedia standard controversy reaction - it's up, it's down, it's back up, it's moved, it's moved again, it's speedy deleted then restored then deleted and up for DR and sideways with sugar on top and can I please have a little more, sir?
All the more reason to go back to my proposal of many reiterations: no article on any event until at least a year after it has happened, to allow time to form a proper historical perspective.
Guy (JzG)
That is exceptionally sound advice for situations like the current one, but I don't think it works as applied in normal times. I don't think we could have no article on, for example, the most recent congressional or parliamentary election even if it's been less than a year since them. Deleting routine articles, or sentences within articles, on grounds of "too new, not a year yet" would certainly soon before more trouble than it was worth.
Which is unfortunate, because any bright-line rule that could have eliminated several of the travails of the past month would have been a Very Good Thing.
Newyorkbrad
On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 15:23:55 -0800, "George Herbert" george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
What's ended up happening is, perhaps both typically and tragically, Wikipedia standard controversy reaction - it's up, it's down, it's back up, it's moved, it's moved again, it's speedy deleted then restored then deleted and up for DR and sideways with sugar on top and can I please have a little more, sir?
All the more reason to go back to my proposal of many reiterations: no article on any event until at least a year after it has happened, to allow time to form a proper historical perspective.
Guy (JzG)
http://www.chapmancentral.co.uk http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:JzG
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On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 18:52:12 -0500, "Newyorkbrad (Wikipedia)" newyorkbrad@gmail.com wrote:
That is exceptionally sound advice for situations like the current one, but I don't think it works as applied in normal times. I don't think we could have no article on, for example, the most recent congressional or parliamentary election even if it's been less than a year since them. Deleting routine articles, or sentences within articles, on grounds of "too new, not a year yet" would certainly soon before more trouble than it was worth.
It might also be more worth than it is trouble :-) Just think: all those "controversy" sections padded with the latest crap form the scandal sheets, all of which can be purged of anything that fails the one year test. Since many of the alleged controversies are teapot tempests, the end result will be better.
Guy (JzG)
On 05/03/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 18:06:49 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
It's hit DRV, where the lynch mob are now asserting that anyone who doesn't agree with them is too biased to comment:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve? What ongoing editing problem with Essjay is it trying to fix? What is the desired outcome? A community ban of a departed editor? An ArbCom case to desysop someone who's already desysopped? Or perhaps just to gaze deeper still into our Wikinavels?
Why don't you ask them? I'm sure they'll be most informative on the subject.
- d.
On Mon, 5 Mar 2007 23:05:48 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Why don't you ask them? I'm sure they'll be most informative on the subject.
I did. I confidently expect to be attacked for it. Seems that there are not very many of us who want people to allow Essjay to depart with any dignity whatsoever.
Guy (JzG)
On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve?
Provideing backup for the assertion that claiming credentials that you don't have is a bad idea. Aditional it is never posible to tell what records are going to be needed in future.
geni wrote:
On 3/5/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve?
Provideing backup for the assertion that claiming credentials that you don't have is a bad idea. Aditional it is never posible to tell what records are going to be needed in future.
Not really. However long the RfC turns out to be it's not going to change the simple fact that EssJay is still only one person. The lack of evidence that others have done this only tells me that this is a one-off situation.
Ec
Not really. However long the RfC turns out to be it's not going to change the simple fact that EssJay is still only one person. The lack of evidence that others have done this only tells me that this is a one-off situation.
Essjay is one person out of maybe half a dozen with a similar level of responsibility. 1 out of 6 is quite a high rate...
"Thomas Dalton" thomas.dalton@gmail.com writes:
Not really. However long the RfC turns out to be it's not
going to
change the simple fact that EssJay is still only one person.
The lack
of evidence that others have done this only tells me that this
is a
one-off situation.
Essjay is one person out of maybe half a dozen with a similar
level of
responsibility. 1 out of 6 is quite a high rate...
Come on. That's a [[Hasty generalization]]. What if Essjay hadn't messed up? Then we'd have a 0% failure rate!
On Tue, 6 Mar 2007, Gwern Branwen wrote:
Essjay is one person out of maybe half a dozen with a similar
level of
responsibility. 1 out of 6 is quite a high rate...
Come on. That's a [[Hasty generalization]]. What if Essjay hadn't messed up? Then we'd have a 0% failure rate!
"If we didn't fail as much as we actually did, we'd have a much lower failure rate" isn't an interesting deduction.
I think the point is - the sample size is too small for any such statistics to be meaningful.
-Matt
On 3/7/07, Ken Arromdee arromdee@rahul.net wrote:
On Tue, 6 Mar 2007, Gwern Branwen wrote:
Essjay is one person out of maybe half a dozen with a similar
level of
responsibility. 1 out of 6 is quite a high rate...
Come on. That's a [[Hasty generalization]]. What if Essjay hadn't messed up? Then we'd have a 0% failure rate!
"If we didn't fail as much as we actually did, we'd have a much lower failure rate" isn't an interesting deduction.
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: http://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
half a dozen is a too low number. There is over 50 people with potential access to checkuser, oversight if you count all wikis. So it's 1 out of 50. Number increases many times more if you count bureaucrats and other positions above sysop
Recall that english wikipedia is not equivalent to wikipedia.
Thomas Dalton wrote:
Not really. However long the RfC turns out to be it's not going to change the simple fact that EssJay is still only one person. The lack of evidence that others have done this only tells me that this is a one-off situation.
Essjay is one person out of maybe half a dozen with a similar level of responsibility. 1 out of 6 is quite a high rate...
I wasn't aware that we had identified anothe 5 users who had falsified credentials, but even so your inference is somewhat strangely backwards. It means that if we had identified only one other the rate of 1 in 2 would be even worse! The more important and useful statistic is the number of thes people as a ratio of total editors.
Ec
I wasn't aware that we had identified anothe 5 users who had falsified credentials, but even so your inference is somewhat strangely backwards. It means that if we had identified only one other the rate of 1 in 2 would be even worse! The more important and useful statistic is the number of thes people as a ratio of total editors.
I didn't say there are another 5 editors with falsified credentials, I said there are another 5 editors with a similar level of responsibility to Essjay. There was only such a big outcry about this because of Essjay's position in the community, so any statistics should be about those people in similar positions, not the whole of the community.
On Tue, 6 Mar 2007 00:33:06 +0000, geni geniice@gmail.com wrote:
Interesting. What issue is the RfC going to solve?
Provideing backup for the assertion that claiming credentials that you don't have is a bad idea. Aditional it is never posible to tell what records are going to be needed in future.
That is a separate discussion not tied to the person of Essjay, although the example of Essjay would be valid and relevant in the context of that discussion. Start a guideline proposal, [[WP:NOFAKECREDENTIALS]] or some such.
Guy (JzG)
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
You're leaving because I dared use my l33t admin powers to delete in process an odious pretense at a dispute resolution page under the rules regarding the colour it assumed in its claim for legitimacy, *despite* a lynch mob feeling otherwise. How dare I!
You would not close and AFD you had been involved in. While I don't belive the issue has come up with RFC before it is not an unreasonable position that the same ruleset applies.
It was a lynch mob page.
Nyet. "lynch mob"s would generaly not be in favor of someone keeping their adminship.
It was only made an RFC to give it colour of legitimacy.
Nyet. It ended up at RFC because a few people thought that was where it should be rather than filling up most of [[WP:CN]].
Unfortunately, it failed even those rules and should have been killed yesterday. The wacky move of moving it to Essjay's userspace doesn't change that - uncertified RFCs are only kept in userspace at the subject's explicit request. If it's an RFC, it lives or dies like one.
It isn't an RFC though since it wasn't create as an RFC. The alturnative position gives people the option of people moveing stuff they don't like to an RFC subpage and then deleteing it after 2 days if no one notices the move.
Of course there is the third option of trying to define what is and is not an RFC through ways other than the process of it's creation but that brings up other issues.
Generaly if you wish to nomic your way out of a problem on wikipedia I would recomend copyright since it tends to have fewer side effects.
Of course, that's nothing compared to people denied a hanging party, as you say.
Again will point out that that straw poll did not support de-adminship.
Anyway essjay left and people had for most part lost interest. Letting the page rot (maybe locking it down first) woud have worked as well.
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people feel they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation here where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to be attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we believe to be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be careful what we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his life. It's important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out what the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't necessary. As David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his rights to delete it.
Sarah
On 3/6/07, Slim Virgin slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers
to
enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who
had
less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people feel they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation here where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to be attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we believe to be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be careful what we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his life. It's important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out what the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't necessary. As David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his rights to delete it.
Sarah
All true. Nevertheless, I admit that I am concerned this does appear to be somewhat gaming the process - following the letter but not the spirit. Maybe David thinks he conforms with the spirit because the RfC was a lynch mob, but from what I could see at the time, only a few radical people were actually interested in anything like a lynching. It was a bandwagon (and an unwarranted one at that, IMO), to be sure, but not a lynch mob. Most people there seemed to like Essjay, and only a few people were doing the dramatic "I feel so betrayed/I can never trust him again/he should be deadminned" kind of thing. The pile-on was a natural consequence of interest in encouraging Essjay to step down for the benefit of WP.
Anyway, this is all academic now, IMO. It's time to move on, and it doesn't matter whether the RfC stayed or went. Let's get back to the normal business of the mailing list - making mountains out of molehills like this. Oh wai
:p
Johnleemk
On 3/5/07, Slim Virgin slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people feel they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation here where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to be attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we believe to be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be careful what we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his life. It's important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out what the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't necessary. As David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his rights to delete it.
Sarah
Let's ban the New York Times as well. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/05/technology/05wikipedia.html?ref=business
March 5, 2007 A Contributor to Wikipedia Has His Fictional Side By NOAM COHEN
In a blink, the wisdom of the crowd became the fury of the crowd. In the last few days, contributors to Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia, have turned against one of their own who was found to have created an elaborate false identity.
Under the name Essjay, the contributor edited thousands of Wikipedia articles and was once one of the few people with the authority to deal with vandalism and to arbitrate disputes between authors.
To the Wikipedia world, Essjay was a tenured professor of religion at a private university with expertise in canon law, according to his user profile. But in fact, Essjay is a 24-year-old named Ryan Jordan, who attended a number of colleges in Kentucky and lives outside Louisville.
Mr. Jordan contended that he resorted to a fictional persona to protect himself from bad actors who might be angered by his administrative role at Wikipedia. (He did not respond to an e-mail message, nor to messages conveyed by the Wikipedia office.)
The Essjay episode underlines some of the perils of collaborative efforts like Wikipedia that rely on many contributors acting in good faith, often anonymously and through self-designated user names. But it also shows how the transparency of the Wikipedia process — all editing of entries is marked and saved — allows readers to react to suspected fraud.
Mr. Jordan's deception came to public attention last Monday when The New Yorker published a rare editors' note saying that when it wrote about Essjay as part of a lengthy profile of Wikipedia, "neither we nor Wikipedia knew Essjay's real name," and that it took Essjay's credentials and life experience at face value.
In addition to his professional credentials and work on articles concerning Roman Catholicism, Essjay was described in the magazine's article, perhaps oddly for a religious scholar, as twice removing a sentence from the entry on the singer Justin Timberlake, which "Essjay knew to be false."
After the article appeared, a reader contacted The New Yorker about Essjay's real identity, which Mr. Jordan had disclosed with little fanfare when he recently accepted a job at Wikia, a for-profit company.
In an e-mail message on Friday, The New Yorker's deputy editor, Pamela Maffei McCarthy, said: "We were comfortable with the material we got from Essjay because of Wikipedia's confirmation of his work and their endorsement of him. In retrospect, we should have let our readers know that we had been unable to corroborate Essjay's identity beyond what he told us."
The New Yorker editors' note ended with a defiant comment from Jimmy Wales, a founder of Wikipedia and the dominant force behind the site's growth. "I regard it as a pseudonym and I don't really have a problem with it," he said of Mr. Jordan's alter ego.
On Thursday, Mr. Wales, who is traveling in Asia with intermittent Internet connections, stuck by that view. In a statement relayed through Wikipedia's public relations officer, he said that at that time, "Essjay apologized to me and to the community at large for any harm he may have caused, but he was acting in order to protect himself.
"I accepted his apology," he continued, "because he is now, and has always been, an excellent editor with an exemplary track record."
But the broad group of Wikipedia users was not so supportive. Mounting anger was expressed in public forums like the user pages of Mr. Wales and Essjay. Initially, a few people wrote to express support for Essjay, along the lines of WJBscribe, who left a message saying: "Just wanted to express my 100 percent support for everything you do around here. I think you were totally entitled to protect your identity. Don't let all the fuss get you down!"
By Saturday, the prevailing view was summarized in subject lines like Essjay Must Resign, and notes calling Mr. Jordan's actions "plain and simple fraud."
Some Wikipedia users argued that Essjay had compounded the deception by flaunting a fictional Ph.D. and professorship to influence the editing on the site.
"People have gone through his edits and found places where he was basically cashing in on his fake credentials to bolster his arguments," said Michael Snow, a Wikipedia administrator who is also the founder of The Wikipedia Signpost, the community newspaper for which he is covering the story. "Those will get looked at again."
In a discussion over the editing of the article with regard to the term "imprimatur," as used in Catholicism, Essjay defended his use of the book "Catholicism for Dummies," saying, "This is a text I often require for my students, and I would hang my own Ph.D. on it's credibility."
Over time, Wikipedia users said, Essjay did less editing and writing and spent more time ensuring that the encyclopedia was as free of vandalism and drawn-out editing fights as possible.
By Saturday, Mr. Wales changed his mind about the episode. He cleared off the "talk" section of his own Wikipedia user page — usually cluttered with personal requests, policy debates and compliments — so that "this statement gets adequate attention" and announced that he had "asked Essjay to resign his positions of trust within the community." He said "that my past support of Essjay in this matter was fully based on a lack of knowledge about what has been going on."
Complicating matters for Mr. Wales was that Essjay had been hired as a community manager by Wikia, which Mr. Wales helped to found in 2004. Mr. Jordan no longer works for Wikia, the company said.
Mr. Snow said the Essjay case "is about the community, the trust the community depends on in terms of being able to review the work we each do."
"Even though you don't necessarily know these people personally," he added, "you see the work enough times and get to know that work."
Mr. Jordan announced his resignation from Wikipedia on his Essjay user page on Saturday night. In a brief note below, he said simply, "It's time to make a clean break."
That page had been a model of industry, with tallies of the more than 20,000 articles he edited and statements of personal philosophy and Wikipedia policy. Where there had been the motto in Latin, "Tu ne cede malis sed contra audentior ito" ("Yield not to misfortunes, but advance all the more boldly against them," according to some translations), there is a stark rectangular black box with the word "retired" written in white capital letters.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company
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"Stephen Park" stephenpark15@gmail.com writes:
On 3/5/07, Slim Virgin slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your
administrative powers to
enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you
were very
actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let
somebody who had
less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people
feel
they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation
here
where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to
be
attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we
believe to
be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be
careful what
we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his
life. It's
important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out
what
the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't
necessary. As
David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his
rights to
delete it.
Sarah
Let's ban the New York Times as well.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/05/technology/05wikipedia.html?ref=business
March 5, 2007 A Contributor to Wikipedia Has His Fictional Side By NOAM COHEN
In a blink, the wisdom of the crowd became the fury of the
crowd. In
the last few days, contributors to Wikipedia, the popular online encyclopedia, have turned against one of their own who was found
to
have created an elaborate false identity.
Under the name Essjay, the contributor edited thousands of
Wikipedia
articles and was once one of the few people with the authority
to deal
with vandalism and to arbitrate disputes between authors.
To the Wikipedia world, Essjay was a tenured professor of
religion at
a private university with expertise in canon law, according to
his
user profile. But in fact, Essjay is a 24-year-old named Ryan
Jordan,
who attended a number of colleges in Kentucky and lives outside Louisville.
Mr. Jordan contended that he resorted to a fictional persona to protect himself from bad actors who might be angered by his administrative role at Wikipedia. (He did not respond to an
message, nor to messages conveyed by the Wikipedia office.)
The Essjay episode underlines some of the perils of
collaborative
efforts like Wikipedia that rely on many contributors acting in
good
faith, often anonymously and through self-designated user
names. But
it also shows how the transparency of the Wikipedia process
oeôòô all
editing of entries is marked and saved oeôòô allows
readers to react to
suspected fraud.
Mr. Jordan's deception came to public attention last Monday when
The
New Yorker published a rare editors' note saying that when it
wrote
about Essjay as part of a lengthy profile of Wikipedia, "neither
we
nor Wikipedia knew Essjay's real name," and that it took
Essjay's
credentials and life experience at face value.
In addition to his professional credentials and work on articles concerning Roman Catholicism, Essjay was described in the
magazine's
article, perhaps oddly for a religious scholar, as twice
removing a
sentence from the entry on the singer Justin Timberlake, which
"Essjay
knew to be false."
After the article appeared, a reader contacted The New Yorker
about
Essjay's real identity, which Mr. Jordan had disclosed with
little
fanfare when he recently accepted a job at Wikia, a for-profit company.
A pity they didn't bother to name Daniel Brandt as that reader. You know it was him, I know it was him, but not naming him means we can't mention it in his article as yet another interesting/notable thing Brandt has done, even though we know perfectly well who that "reader" is.
General thoughts: this actually isn't too hostile to Wikipedia, especially given that The New Yorker said "neither we nor Wikipedia", specifically exculpating Wikipedia in general. We come off looking perhaps overly trusting or naive, but what questionable actions there seem to fall under the Essjay and Wikia rubrics.
There's no point to this RFC. Jimbo is handling the Essjay situation himself. It's already been discussed and an RFC will have no useful effects apart from destroying what dignity he's got left. We should just let it die. If we allow endless discussions about this our critics are gonna have us for lunch.
Mgm
On 3/5/07, MacGyverMagic/Mgm macgyvermagic@gmail.com wrote:
There's no point to this RFC. Jimbo is handling the Essjay situation himself. It's already been discussed and an RFC will have no useful effects apart from destroying what dignity he's got left. We should just let it die. If we allow endless discussions about this our critics are gonna have us for lunch.
Mgm
Yeh kinda reminiscent of 'ol Reagan falling asleep at cabinet meetings while underlings did the dirty work.
On 3/5/07, Slim Virgin slimvirgin@gmail.com wrote:
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people feel they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation here where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to be attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we believe to be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be careful what we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his life. It's important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out what the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't necessary. As David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his rights to delete it.
I would like to spin this back. I don't particularly like the carping on Essjay, and I'm not going to participate in it, but there is clearly a lot of community upset over both the affair, and whether we like it or not, it's going to come out.
Having a specific RFC page lets that happen in a single centralized space, which is probably better for the project - people can "me too" instead of venting the same thing over and over again in different places, and also if there's a fair degree of support for Essjay then those who are upset can see that, which is important. If they feel that they're being persecuted by an internal elite who delete RFC pages and the like they may get an inaccurate feeling that Essjay's supporters are only a small narrow insiders group.
I wouldn't recreate anything myself (as I said, I will not get into this, it's odious to me), but I think that until it dies off on its own, it needs its space somewhere. Let it burn itself out rather than fester.
Hi, Sarah. Thanks for writing. I especially appreciate the temperate tone.
Slim Virgin wrote:
On 3/5/07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
William Pietri wrote:
This especially concerns me as you used your administrative powers to enforce your minority view in a disagreement in which you were very actively involved. Wouldn't it have been better to let somebody who had less involvement decide the outcome?
William, I understand that feelings are running high and people feel they need an outlet. Still, we have a very serious situation here where the subject has left Wikipedia and yet is continuing to be attacked. Bear in mind that he's being discussed by what we believe to be his real name, so BLP kicks in here, and we have to be careful what we say, and respectful of his right to get on with his life. It's important to discuss the political fall-out so we can work out what the lessons are, but comments about the person aren't necessary. As David said, it was an uncertified RfC, and he was within his rights to delete it.
I feel deeply for Essjay in this. As with Sheldon Rampton, I know how painful it is to learn that bluffing your way through a problem doesn't work in the long run. And my education in this was a tiny fraction of what Essjay brought upon himself. If I knew him personally I'd be out right now dragging him for long walks in the park. As I've said repeatedly in various contexts, I hope he'll come back first as an editor and eventually as an admin. Once he has actually learned this lesson, I'll be first in line to support his RFA.
I also think that mere attacks are unnecessary and harmful. I've asked a number of people to settle down, tried to build consensus in the RFC, and redacted various needlessly harsh bits of language. Had I seen anybody both frothing and unwilling to calm down, I would happily have asked AN/I to give them a time out. Fortunately, I didn't have to do that.
However, I still think David's decision was wrong.
First, the RFC was closed. If there were attacks, no new ones were happening. Open or not, there were ways to remove or archive actual attacks without removing the very large amount of substantive comment on many sides of the issue.
Second, BLP rightly doesn't apply to talk pages. BLP is to prevent our hopefully neutral, factual articles from being distorted with opinion and lies. The RFC was obviously opinion, and signed opinion at that. Nobody would have accidentally taken it as NPOV fact.
Third, suppressing discussion here is not going to suppress it everywhere. A quick look at the blog reactions show a hundred times more venom and contempt than were expressed on the RFC page. And what David has buried also includes a fair bit of neutral analysis and outright support for Essjay, as well a much more moderate and reasoned criticism.
Fourth, although I agree that Ryan Jordan has a right to get on with his life, that doesn't mean that Wikipedia the institution must or even should stop discussing the Essjay incident, any more than the New York Times should have stopped internal discussion, external publication, or message board comments around the Jayson Blair incident at the time he resigned.
Which leads me to my fifth and last point: our transparency. Negative things about Essjay are disappearing at a much faster rate than positive things. I think this is a natural consequence of people with heft being upset at seeing a friend go through the wringer, or seeing a project they love get a black eye. But if we are only transparent and open when we find it pleasant and easy, then it's not a principle, it's a convenience.
William
On 3/5/07, William Pietri william@scissor.com wrote:
[snip] ... Second, BLP rightly doesn't apply to talk pages. BLP is to prevent our hopefully neutral, factual articles from being distorted with opinion and lies.
Just a quick FYI, William. BLP applies throughout the website.
Sarah
Slim Virgin wrote:
On 3/5/07, William Pietri william@scissor.com wrote:
[snip] ... Second, BLP rightly doesn't apply to talk pages. BLP is to prevent our hopefully neutral, factual articles from being distorted with opinion and lies.
Just a quick FYI, William. BLP applies throughout the website.
Could be problematic if this were true in practice, since my user page utterly fails to meet BLP's standards and I expect the vast majority of other user pages are the same - I don't think I've ever seen a user page with a references section. I've also made assertions about myself on article talk pages from time to time that I never bother to cite.
Since IMO policy should make at least some effort to match actual practice, and since an effort to remove uncited claims from peoples' user pages would be quixotic at best, how about adding a note to the BLP page exempting the user namespace? That'd eliminate a major inconsistency in one fell swoop.
On 3/6/07, Bryan Derksen bryan.derksen@shaw.ca wrote:
Slim Virgin wrote: Just a quick FYI, William. BLP applies throughout the website.
Could be problematic if this were true in practice, since my user page utterly fails to meet BLP's standards and I expect the vast majority of other user pages are the same - I don't think I've ever seen a user page with a references section. I've also made assertions about myself on article talk pages from time to time that I never bother to cite.
Bryan, I'm sure you don't have defamatory material about living people on your user page. You're allowed to say bad stuff about yourself, just not about anyone else. :-)
Sarah
Slim Virgin wrote:
On 3/6/07, Bryan Derksen bryan.derksen@shaw.ca wrote:
Slim Virgin wrote: Just a quick FYI, William. BLP applies throughout the website.
Could be problematic if this were true in practice, since my user page utterly fails to meet BLP's standards and I expect the vast majority of other user pages are the same - I don't think I've ever seen a user page with a references section. I've also made assertions about myself on article talk pages from time to time that I never bother to cite.
Bryan, I'm sure you don't have defamatory material about living people on your user page. You're allowed to say bad stuff about yourself, just not about anyone else. :-)
Last I checked I was still alive, though I don't have a reliable source on hand to back that up so it's just OR. :)
Seriously, though, BLP actually doesn't limit itself to defamatory material. It reads: "Unsourced or poorly sourced contentious material — whether negative, positive, or just highly questionable — about living persons should be removed immediately, and without discussion from Wikipedia articles, talk pages, user pages, and project space." That covers pretty much everything I've put up on my userpage, and the contents of most other userpages I've seen as well. It gets even worse when we consider the user pages with "this user is a vandal" warnings and such - that's clearly defamatory stuff that other people have put there.
I don't think it's a good idea to have a policy that's this drastically at odds with the actual practice even if everyone's unofficially agreed that it doesn't _really_ mean what it says it means. Our policy pages should at least be honest, it's hard enough to make sense of some of them as it is.