I don't know if many of you are aware, but last week we had a user in here (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target=... ix_F._Bruyns) who was on a personal crusade to make wikipedia 'family friendly' - IE, by censoring our articles. Needless to say, it didn't go over very well. Long story short, he ended up threatening to sue several contributors - http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk:Raul654&diff=385320..., http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk:Moriori&diff=385317...
I started digging through our policies, and found this dusty relic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_legal_threats
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
--Mark
--- Mark Pellegrini mapellegrini@comcast.net wrote:
... I started digging through our policies, and found this dusty relic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_legal_threats
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
Before any ban the user should be made aware of the policy first. Irismeister was was banned for 10 days in part due to legal threats (there was a 6 to 0 ruling forbidding him from using legal threats as a tactic to intimidate other users). So, IMO, this policy has been confirmed by the AC and should be considered to be enforceable.
But do try to work with people first - banning them outright will only confirm their paranoia and possibly make it more likely that they will mount a frivolous (or otherwise) lawsuit. And those could be expensive to defend against (or at least make it impossible for Jimbo to travel to countries where there are bench warrants for his failure to appear in court).
--Daniel Mayer (aka mav)
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On Tue, 15 Jun 2004 02:04:42 -0700 (PDT), Daniel Mayer maveric149@yahoo.com wrote:
. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-sight rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
Before any ban the user should be made aware of the policy first.
Yes, you should definitely drop links to this policy, and if they continue, only start out with a 24-hour ban. And direct them to the proper place to raise legal concerns, as well, which is... hmm, which is it? Is Foundation-L any good?
Mark Pellegrini wrote:
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
We already have enough excuses for banning people. We don't need another one. These threats are almost always hollow.
My response to legal threats is, "Go ahead and sue." When the person finds out what's involved in bringing forth a suit across international jurisdictions they quietly drop the whole thing.
This is another variation of, "Don't feed the trolls."
Ec
What I want to do is to create an agreement that all disputes will be handled through our arbitration procedure, thus precluding any legal action other than possible appeal of an arbitration decision. I don't think folks realize that we can legally do that.
Fred
From: Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2004 07:27:44 -0700 To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Legal threats as grounds for automatic termination
Mark Pellegrini wrote:
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
We already have enough excuses for banning people. We don't need another one. These threats are almost always hollow.
My response to legal threats is, "Go ahead and sue." When the person finds out what's involved in bringing forth a suit across international jurisdictions they quietly drop the whole thing.
This is another variation of, "Don't feed the trolls."
Ec
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
I don't think that it's a question of what the Foundation has the legal right to do. Most of these "threats" of legal action are just a matter of blowing off steam. Many of these "disputes" don't come near to being a part of arbitration procedure. Do you really want to make more work for yourself than you already have? :-)
Ec
Fred Bauder wrote:
What I want to do is to create an agreement that all disputes will be handled through our arbitration procedure, thus precluding any legal action other than possible appeal of an arbitration decision. I don't think folks realize that we can legally do that.
Fred
From: Ray Saintonge
Mark Pellegrini wrote:
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
We already have enough excuses for banning people. We don't need another one. These threats are almost always hollow.
My response to legal threats is, "Go ahead and sue." When the person finds out what's involved in bringing forth a suit across international jurisdictions they quietly drop the whole thing.
This is another variation of, "Don't feed the trolls."
I want to forstall filing of law suits, especially in federal courts (which can be quite arbitrary). A simple, essentially bogus, legal action in a federal court with associated appeal can easily cost the defendant $100,000 or more.
Fred
From: Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2004 12:07:58 -0700 To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Legal threats as grounds for automatic termination
I don't think that it's a question of what the Foundation has the legal right to do. Most of these "threats" of legal action are just a matter of blowing off steam. Many of these "disputes" don't come near to being a part of arbitration procedure. Do you really want to make more work for yourself than you already have? :-)
Ec
Fred Bauder wrote:
What I want to do is to create an agreement that all disputes will be handled through our arbitration procedure, thus precluding any legal action other than possible appeal of an arbitration decision. I don't think folks realize that we can legally do that.
Fred
Of course. But the plaintiff will have to lay down his money first. That, as they say, will separate the men from the boys. For a lawyer to take it on a contingency basis, he will need to see that the pockets are deep enough to make it worth his while.
Nobody here has come near to threatening me with a law suit. If they tried to pull that, my reaction would be, "I dare you." Ec
Fred Bauder wrote:
I want to forstall filing of law suits, especially in federal courts (which can be quite arbitrary). A simple, essentially bogus, legal action in a federal court with associated appeal can easily cost the defendant $100,000 or more.
Fred
From: Ray Saintonge
I don't think that it's a question of what the Foundation has the legal right to do. Most of these "threats" of legal action are just a matter of blowing off steam. Many of these "disputes" don't come near to being a part of arbitration procedure. Do you really want to make more work for yourself than you already have? :-)
Ec
Fred Bauder wrote:
What I want to do is to create an agreement that all disputes will be handled through our arbitration procedure, thus precluding any legal action other than possible appeal of an arbitration decision. I don't think folks realize that we can legally do that.
Fred
I want to forstall filing of law suits, especially in federal courts (which can be quite arbitrary). A simple, essentially bogus, legal action in a federal court with associated appeal can easily cost the defendant $100,000 or more.
And banning them will prevent this how, exactly?
Banning is one suggested solution. I propose another solution which would require as a condition of editing (possibly even of using) Wikipedia that all disputes be submitted to our dispute resolution process, up to and including arbitration thus keeping us out of court, except for the possiblility of appeal of an arbitration for which purpose we should designate a convenient court, probably the district court where Jimbo lives in Florida.
Fred
From: Sean Barrett sean@epoptic.org Reply-To: English Wikipedia wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Date: Thu, 17 Jun 2004 07:14:06 -0700 To: wikien-l@Wikipedia.org Subject: Re: [WikiEN-l] Legal threats as grounds for automatic termination
I want to forstall filing of law suits, especially in federal courts (which can be quite arbitrary). A simple, essentially bogus, legal action in a federal court with associated appeal can easily cost the defendant $100,000 or more.
And banning them will prevent this how, exactly? _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
--- Fred Bauder fredbaud@ctelco.net wrote:
What I want to do is to create an agreement that all disputes will be handled through our arbitration procedure, thus precluding any legal action other than possible appeal of an arbitration decision. I don't think folks realize that we can legally do that.
That is already part of the submission standards that Alex drafted a while ago. We should look back into that and make it official (along with the terms of use he wrote up as well).
-- mav
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Well, I think one way to do this would be to have a policy that no discussion of lawsuits could take place on the wiki, that is to say that, once a user has declared their intention to take legal action surrounding Wikipedia or its users, the policy would be to block that user and anyone else who discussed it, because of the potential for incrimination / liability etc. Ban them, and direct them to raise the issue offline with the foundation's legal representative. Most companies and non-profits have a similar rule that their employees and volunteers are not empowered to discuss legal aspects. If they drop the case, or it is settled, then allow them back. Mark
--- Mark Pellegrini mapellegrini@comcast.net wrote:
I don't know if many of you are aware, but last week we had a user in here
(http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special:Contributions&target=...
ix_F._Bruyns) who was on a personal crusade to make wikipedia 'family friendly' - IE, by censoring our articles. Needless to say, it didn't go over very well. Long story short, he ended up threatening to sue several contributors -
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk:Raul654&diff=385320...,
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk:Moriori&diff=385317...
I started digging through our policies, and found this dusty relic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_legal_threats
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
--Mark
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
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I suppose it would just be too easy to note that threats of legal action are already listed in "No personal attacks," wouldn't it?
-Snowspinner
On Jun 15, 2004, at 10:41 AM, Mark Richards wrote:
Well, I think one way to do this would be to have a policy that no discussion of lawsuits could take place on the wiki, that is to say that, once a user has declared their intention to take legal action surrounding Wikipedia or its users, the policy would be to block that user and anyone else who discussed it, because of the potential for incrimination / liability etc. Ban them, and direct them to raise the issue offline with the foundation's legal representative. Most companies and non-profits have a similar rule that their employees and volunteers are not empowered to discuss legal aspects. If they drop the case, or it is settled, then allow them back. Mark
--- Mark Pellegrini mapellegrini@comcast.net wrote:
I don't know if many of you are aware, but last week we had a user in here
(http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Special: Contributions&target=Fel
ix_F._Bruyns) who was on a personal crusade to make wikipedia 'family friendly' - IE, by censoring our articles. Needless to say, it didn't go over very well. Long story short, he ended up threatening to sue several contributors -
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk: Raul654&diff=3853204&oldid=3852747,
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=User_talk: Moriori&diff=3853177&oldid=3852828
I started digging through our policies, and found this dusty relic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_legal_threats
At this point, it's only a proposal. Also, it doesn't actually *do* anything. I'd like to suggest adopting a terminate-on-site rule -- you make a legal threat, and you're automatically banned. I'd like to know what others here think.
--Mark
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
__________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - You care about security. So do we. http://promotions.yahoo.com/new_mail _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@Wikipedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
On Tue, 15 Jun 2004 12:27:17 -0500, Phil Sandifer sandifer@sbcglobal.net wrote:
I suppose it would just be too easy to note that threats of legal action are already listed in "No personal attacks," wouldn't it?
What of threats against the Wikimedia foundation?
Mark Richards wrote:
Well, I think one way to do this would be to have a policy that no discussion of lawsuits could take place on the wiki, that is to say that, once a user has declared their intention to take legal action surrounding Wikipedia or its users, the policy would be to block that user and anyone else who discussed it, because of the potential for incrimination / liability etc. Ban them, and direct them to raise the issue offline with the foundation's legal representative. Most companies and non-profits have a similar rule that their employees and volunteers are not empowered to discuss legal aspects. If they drop the case, or it is settled, then allow them back. Mark
If any of them were serious they would be advised by their own lawyers not to discuss the case.
Most of these people have not seriously declared their intention; they've only threatened it. Until a case has been filed there is no case to discuss or drop. I can't see why you are so intent on suppressing free speech.
Ec