Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside interference and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the matter, they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers. Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge them on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy.
Since we start off with overkill, wouldn't it be easier to appoint admins based on resumes, personal interviews and obstacle course performance instead? And bureaucrats, having passed basic admin training, are selected for bureaucrat candidacy school and we take the top 10% of those?
Really, I think you're jumping at shadows. No one can point to even one admin account gained through some organized advocacy attempt, nor to any significant effects even as a result of this one "discovered" group. The point is there is no problem, and until there is... no solution is necessary - particularly not of the drastic sort. Most of the "organized" nationalism groups formed on-wiki and stay on-wiki, maybe you should fix that first.
Nathan
On Mon, May 5, 2008 at 11:50 PM, White Cat wikipedia.kawaii.neko@gmail.com wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside interference and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the matter, they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers. Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge them on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
I am? I am accused of having a secret agenda on a regular basis. Resumes can easily be forged. If the lobby is as organized as we fear it is. And sarcasm will not really charm anyone. Such an organization would have "legends" to their "agents".
I know about various 'nationalist groups' (thats really an oversimplification) that exists on wikipedia only to push their view and purge views they do not agree to. They exist because we go out of our ways not to address this issue simply to keep our hands clean. The problem will not solve itself.
- White Cat
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 6:59 AM, Nathan nawrich@gmail.com wrote:
Since we start off with overkill, wouldn't it be easier to appoint admins based on resumes, personal interviews and obstacle course performance instead? And bureaucrats, having passed basic admin training, are selected for bureaucrat candidacy school and we take the top 10% of those?
Really, I think you're jumping at shadows. No one can point to even one admin account gained through some organized advocacy attempt, nor to any significant effects even as a result of this one "discovered" group. The point is there is no problem, and until there is... no solution is necessary
- particularly not of the drastic sort. Most of the "organized"
nationalism groups formed on-wiki and stay on-wiki, maybe you should fix that first.
Nathan
On Mon, May 5, 2008 at 11:50 PM, White Cat < wikipedia.kawaii.neko@gmail.com> wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way
to
spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside
interference
and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the
matter,
they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers. Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge
them
on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
Since we start off with overkill, wouldn't it be easier to appoint admins based on resumes, personal interviews and obstacle course performance instead? And bureaucrats, having passed basic admin training, are selected for bureaucrat candidacy school and we take the top 10% of those?
Really, I think you're jumping at shadows. No one can point to even one admin account gained through some organized advocacy attempt, nor to any significant effects even as a result of this one "discovered" group. The point is there is no problem, and until there is... no solution is necessary
- particularly not of the drastic sort. Most of the "organized"
nationalism groups formed on-wiki and stay on-wiki, maybe you should fix that first.
Nathan
There are instances when the thumb has been on the scale, but that approach is not viable. It is far better to continue to develop as much sophistication as we can with respect to point of view and try to ensure opposing points of view are fairly expressed. To take the example of the CAMERA initiate, we need to ensure that the Palestinian and Arab point of view is fully and fairly expressed. That is far preferable to adopting a position of mistrust toward administrators.
Fred
That is an issue of content management, which we already do and we are already attempting to do better as time goes on. We've already got stacks of policies - some are in good shape, others could stand some significant improvement, but where we fall down is on enforcement. Creating a Foundation-wide policy condemning "attack groups" invites more of the sort of unending drama, accusations and amateur sleuthing that already clogs up our dispute resolution process from time to time. We should stick to what we're good at - creating and managing content. Investigating and punishing external efforts to influence content is really beyond what we can expect to do well, and if we do our current job well enough it won't be necessary.
Nathan
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 8:12 AM, Fred Bauder fredbaud@fairpoint.net wrote:
There are instances when the thumb has been on the scale, but that approach is not viable. It is far better to continue to develop as much sophistication as we can with respect to point of view and try to ensure opposing points of view are fairly expressed. To take the example of the CAMERA initiate, we need to ensure that the Palestinian and Arab point of view is fully and fairly expressed. That is far preferable to adopting a position of mistrust toward administrators.
Fred
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1
Though I understand your intentions and support them 100%, I don't think that your suggestion for the foundation to pass a ruling is the right thing to do. Ignoring the fact that you called it a "takeover" by lobbies (remember that almost all governments have these, and it is not considered a takeover by most people), this is what I see wrong with the proposal.
The problem with your suggestion is that we as a community can't make a distinction between lobby groups and just groups. Groups can be highly beneficial, which is why we have Wikiprojects, etc., that people sign up for and collaborate on. On the other hand, lobbying groups are considered bad, but only in the sense that they are POV pushers. I would even go as far as saying that lobbying groups might even be good, if used and constrained properly, and edited for NPOV.
But where do we draw the line? Editors with good intentions might be punished, while if you are trying to hide, it is quite easy if only one edit is controversial out of over one hundred.
The only thing that we can maintain is NPOV. We just have to remember not to yield to admins if they are pushing their POV, even if there are many admins on that side, and to resolve dispute cases when they arise. We can't ban groups, because we would be fighting forever over what constitutes a lobbying group versus a normal, beneficial group. We can't do anything about people forming groups, so we just have to play the game we've always played- NPOV.
- -Hairchrm
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside interference and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the matter, they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers. Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge them on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Which is good because it is likely most editors on Foundation mailing have no idea what the CAMERA incident is...
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside interference and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the matter, they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers.
Which type of ruling are you thinking of ?
Ant
Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge them on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy. _______________________________________________ WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Which is good because it is likely most editors on Foundation mailing have no idea what the CAMERA incident is...
Due to the very nature of wikis they are very open to outside interference and manipulation. Although there had been many discussions on the matter, they never generated the intended level of brainstorming.
I am sure someone can provide a brief history of past external manipulations so I will avoid listing them on this email.
You may be under the false impression that large wikis such as en.wikipedia is invulnerable to such attacks, but this would be a fatal mistake. English wikipedia is probably the most vulnerable language edition of wikipedia. If a lobby group were to secure some 10 admin accounts they can effectively overwhelm any process we have on English Wikipedia.
So lets discuss possible solutions and precautions.
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby takeovers.
Which type of ruling are you thinking of ?
Ant
Although it goes without saying along with NPOV, spelling it out has benefits and no harm. This way we can more easily and promptly purge them on wikis that did not have a serious conversation on this matter enough to come up with a policy.
We probably cannot completely prevent organized lobbies having some influence. Effective efforts would require a degree of discipline which would be far too rigorous for a volunteer organization. So we will have to accept some interference by supporters of Zionism, supporters of the Chinese government, and, indeed, any organized nationalist or social movement.
We can mitigate it somewhat by continuing to be conscious of point of view, but POV editors can be quite skilled at manipulating NPOV and making it seem that they are on the short end of the stick, when, in fact, they dominate.
Fred
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 9:37 AM, Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am
sure
English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and
the
purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
Which is good because it is likely most editors on Foundation mailing have no idea what the CAMERA incident is...
Yes, I know that. Which is the reason why I posted it on Foundation-l as well as Wiki-en-l
[...]
I recommend that foundation pass a ruling on the matter of lobby
takeovers.
Which type of ruling are you thinking of ?
Ant
I am not entirely certain. Some sort of a *carefully worded* statement that unwelcome systematic pov pushing. Really should go without saying...
This has happened many times before. Just to refresh your memory the Danish Mohammed cartoon controversy, Youtube/Facebook based campaign to remove all depictions of Mohamed from wikipedia, CAMERA incident are a few of the more notable cases.
While English wikipedia is somewhat prepared to deal with such issues, other wikis are quite ill prepared. It would immensely help if there was a global rule on this issue.
Stewards will not be able to step in unless this is a general rule I think. Or at least such a ruling would untie the hands of stewards and locals alike.
- White Cat
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
What is this all about, and what is the CAMERA incident?
Best, Jon
Jon wrote:
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
What is this all about, and what is the CAMERA incident?
Best, Jon -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.7 (MingW32) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org
iD8DBQFIIDIV6+ro8Pm1AtURAlYuAKCUWdnAEzhmBlOl0NLFVjeHH3iM8ACggbuw MNMKcDd7+YM7hyVmEHd/Z0o= =ZO0E -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
I asked on irc
Following links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-05-02/In_the_... https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_n...
ant
Florence Devouard wrote:
Jon wrote:
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
What is this all about, and what is the CAMERA incident?
I asked on irc
Following links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-05-02/In_the_... https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_n...
Strikes me as a routine incident of ravings from the lunatic fringe. We do ourselves just as much harm by attaching more importance to these people than they deserve.
Ec
This group, however fringy, is a very well organized professionally-run enterprise devoted to lobbying, with immense influence and a history of considerable success in influencing media, fairly and perhaps otherwise. We have not previously encountered any organization with its resources.
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 2:43 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
Florence Devouard wrote:
Jon wrote:
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
What is this all about, and what is the CAMERA incident?
I asked on irc
Following links
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2008-05-02/In_the_... https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_n...
Strikes me as a routine incident of ravings from the lunatic fringe. We do ourselves just as much harm by attaching more importance to these people than they deserve.
Ec
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On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 6:49 PM, David Goodman dgoodmanny@gmail.com wrote:
This group, however fringy, is a very well organized professionally-run enterprise devoted to lobbying, with immense influence and a history of considerable success in influencing media, fairly and perhaps otherwise. We have not previously encountered any organization with its resources.
The Church of Scientology.
Even more of a problem on-wiki, Lyndon LaRouche's supporters.
It is entirely clear from the evidence that there was not a vast whatever-wing conspiracy here - the number of people contributing in the email threads was quite limited, as are the number of en.wp accounts which were IDed as being associated by edit patterns.
It is possible to handle the (signifiant and real) policy implications of such attempts to unduly influence Wikipedia without inflating those who organized the attempts into superhuman individuals or monstrous malign organizations.
We do not know if the CAMERA organization, as an organization, did more than let one of their staff look into doing this and host the email list. Even if they had, they are in fact smaller and not as rich as and not as well organized as other groups that have sought to do similiar things on and off.
We're not really much at risk from small off-wiki organizational efforts. What CAMERA could have pulled together if this got going seriously would be in a risk zone, where it's not a handful of editors, but enough that the pattern of behavior may not be evident unless you live and breathe that set of articles (if then). But if you get too large, then the pattern is easily evident again.
As demonstrated by the ANI response, if detected, such groups can be identified and characterized and rather thoroughly stomped on in short order.
We're equally at risk from anyone who has a clue how to create well-separated sockpuppet brigades. And we have many of those about.
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 8:03 AM, George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 6:49 PM, David Goodman dgoodmanny@gmail.com wrote:
This group, however fringy, is a very well organized professionally-run enterprise devoted to lobbying, with immense influence and a history of considerable success in influencing media, fairly and perhaps otherwise. We have not previously encountered any organization with its resources.
The Church of Scientology.
Even more of a problem on-wiki, Lyndon LaRouche's supporters.
It is entirely clear from the evidence that there was not a vast whatever-wing conspiracy here - the number of people contributing in the email threads was quite limited, as are the number of en.wp accounts which were IDed as being associated by edit patterns.
It is possible to handle the (signifiant and real) policy implications of such attempts to unduly influence Wikipedia without inflating those who organized the attempts into superhuman individuals or monstrous malign organizations.
Everyone repeatedly confuses what could have happened with what did happen. There is no reason to suppose that the next time something like this happens the groups' ideological opponents will conveniently let us know.
I also have no idea how George can know with such confidence that "it is possible to handle" these situations. I haven't seen him on Eastern Europe or India-Pakistan stuff. I do know that that the Scientology people used a role account and multiple IPs registered to them. That is precisely the opposite of what a determined effort to subvert our processes of consensus would look like, so I don't know why it would even be brought up as a sign of our resilience..
We do not know if the CAMERA organization, as an organization, did more than let one of their staff look into doing this and host the email list. Even if they had, they are in fact smaller and not as rich as and not as well organized as other groups that have sought to do similiar things on and off.
We're not really much at risk from small off-wiki organizational efforts. What CAMERA could have pulled together if this got going seriously would be in a risk zone, where it's not a handful of editors, but enough that the pattern of behavior may not be evident unless you live and breathe that set of articles (if then). But if you get too large, then the pattern is easily evident again.
Again, I have no idea how you know this is true. You are clearly unaware that dozens of articles over the past six months have been turned into CAMERA quotefarms. How do we know that this is being done by a regular editor or a recruited one? I really wish that you would provide support for at least one of your assertions ,so I'd have something to chew on.
The difference between this and other groups is that they knew our processes and were prepared to subvert them in an atomistic way. If you can demonstrate that happening earlier, except by one or two individuals, I'd like to know.
As demonstrated by the ANI response, if detected, such groups can be identified and characterized and rather thoroughly stomped on in short order.
You're joking. In this case emails were available and not questioned. In Hkelkar2 emails were available and questioned. Nothing happened. In any such situation there will be people who will say "why the witch-hunt"? The claim that they can be easily identified is completely divorced from reality.
We're equally at risk from anyone who has a clue how to create well-separated sockpuppet brigades. And we have many of those about.
Not equally at risk in terms of subversion of articles, I'm afraid. Individuals tend to have more modest aims.
RR
Unlike the Scientologistas, this group does not represent a small fringe group of people whose extremely unusual ideas can be very readily spotted. They represent one side of a major political question of international significance, and their views are not fringe. There are many sources on each side of the question of strong ideological bias, and which can be reasonably challenged. Therefore they can effectively weight the balance on many articles in favor of their side of the politics. This sort of use is much more serious than the activities of a less mainstream group, or the propagandists for a small company. And it's not a few articles.
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 3:08 AM, Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com wrote:
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 8:03 AM, George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 6:49 PM, David Goodman dgoodmanny@gmail.com wrote:
This group, however fringy, is a very well organized professionally-run enterprise devoted to lobbying, with immense influence and a history of considerable success in influencing media, fairly and perhaps otherwise. We have not previously encountered any organization with its resources.
The Church of Scientology.
Even more of a problem on-wiki, Lyndon LaRouche's supporters.
It is entirely clear from the evidence that there was not a vast whatever-wing conspiracy here - the number of people contributing in the email threads was quite limited, as are the number of en.wp accounts which were IDed as being associated by edit patterns.
It is possible to handle the (signifiant and real) policy implications of such attempts to unduly influence Wikipedia without inflating those who organized the attempts into superhuman individuals or monstrous malign organizations.
Everyone repeatedly confuses what could have happened with what did happen. There is no reason to suppose that the next time something like this happens the groups' ideological opponents will conveniently let us know.
I also have no idea how George can know with such confidence that "it is possible to handle" these situations. I haven't seen him on Eastern Europe or India-Pakistan stuff. I do know that that the Scientology people used a role account and multiple IPs registered to them. That is precisely the opposite of what a determined effort to subvert our processes of consensus would look like, so I don't know why it would even be brought up as a sign of our resilience..
We do not know if the CAMERA organization, as an organization, did more than let one of their staff look into doing this and host the email list. Even if they had, they are in fact smaller and not as rich as and not as well organized as other groups that have sought to do similiar things on and off.
We're not really much at risk from small off-wiki organizational efforts. What CAMERA could have pulled together if this got going seriously would be in a risk zone, where it's not a handful of editors, but enough that the pattern of behavior may not be evident unless you live and breathe that set of articles (if then). But if you get too large, then the pattern is easily evident again.
Again, I have no idea how you know this is true. You are clearly unaware that dozens of articles over the past six months have been turned into CAMERA quotefarms. How do we know that this is being done by a regular editor or a recruited one? I really wish that you would provide support for at least one of your assertions ,so I'd have something to chew on.
The difference between this and other groups is that they knew our processes and were prepared to subvert them in an atomistic way. If you can demonstrate that happening earlier, except by one or two individuals, I'd like to know.
As demonstrated by the ANI response, if detected, such groups can be identified and characterized and rather thoroughly stomped on in short order.
You're joking. In this case emails were available and not questioned. In Hkelkar2 emails were available and questioned. Nothing happened. In any such situation there will be people who will say "why the witch-hunt"? The claim that they can be easily identified is completely divorced from reality.
We're equally at risk from anyone who has a clue how to create well-separated sockpuppet brigades. And we have many of those about.
Not equally at risk in terms of subversion of articles, I'm afraid. Individuals tend to have more modest aims.
RR
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
At 03:08 AM 5/7/2008, Relata Refero wrote:
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 8:03 AM, George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
We're equally at risk from anyone who has a clue how to create well-separated sockpuppet brigades. And we have many of those about.
Not equally at risk in terms of subversion of articles, I'm afraid. Individuals tend to have more modest aims.
RR is correct. We have sock farms, and possibly some deeply-entrenched sock farms; with sufficient precaution, they may be very difficult to detect, and, if detected, to prove sufficiently for present systems to respond to them.
However, there is no way that an individual can match what a group of individuals, coordinated, could do. Even a very small group, with sufficient motivation and intelligence, could basically take over Wikipedia, unless there are matching organizational structures in place to prevent it. Larger groups might be able to do it with less organization, and some think that this has already happened: all it takes is for a substantial group of editors to share some agenda and be willing to steadily promote it, and that agenda will quite likely prevail.
Essentially, open direct participatory democracies like Wikipedia (it *is* a rough democracy) have always been vulnerable to takeover by groups with a strong agenda; normal people don't want to stay up all night at tedious meetings, and normal people don't want to argue forever on Wikipedia pages. I've been doing some study of editing patterns, and there are some editors who are definitely not normal. Editing 18 hours a day for months and years isn't normal. Is this one person? Perhaps. Probably. But Wikipedia considers these editors to be the mainstay of the project, and they become administrators -- and more -- handily, as long as they stay away, at first, from certain kinds of offense of others.
Please don't misunderstand me. This is not a criticism of those heavily-involved editors. But it must be pointed out that heavy involvement can be a sign, sometimes, of some personal agenda. As I mentioned, small direct democracies, such as labor unions at certain periods in history, were vulnerable to takeover by radicals. The rank-and-file had families plus jobs. Some of the radicals only had the job so they could participate in the politics. That was their real goal. And they'd stay up all night if that is what it took to come to a point when enough others had gone home so that they were in the majority.
There is an answer to this problem. But it looks to me like practically nobody is willing to consider it. It does not involve any destruction or change of core Wikipedia values; indeed, it would simply realize them more perfectly. Instead, what I see is a substantial number of influential editors who seem quite ready to move to a different model, an elected hierarchy. That's been done before, just about everywhere. Look around you. You can see the result. Does it work?
(Yes. To a degree. But it also creates oligarchies and relative inflexibility.)
2008/5/7 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 8:03 AM, George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com wrote:
The Church of Scientology. Even more of a problem on-wiki, Lyndon LaRouche's supporters.
Everyone repeatedly confuses what could have happened with what did happen. There is no reason to suppose that the next time something like this happens the groups' ideological opponents will conveniently let us know.
The Church of Scientology. LaRouche fans.
- d.
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 5:34 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2008/5/7 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 8:03 AM, George Herbert <george.herbert@gmail.com
wrote:
The Church of Scientology. Even more of a problem on-wiki, Lyndon LaRouche's supporters.
Everyone repeatedly confuses what could have happened with what did
happen.
There is no reason to suppose that the next time something like this
happens
the groups' ideological opponents will conveniently let us know.
The Church of Scientology. LaRouche fans.
DG, read the rest of the thread.
RR
2008/5/8 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
DG, read the rest of the thread.
I did. I really don't see any reason to be running in circles in a panic over this.
- d.
Nobody is running in circles in panic, because no major disruption took place - it has been pointed out that on this occasion we were fortunate. We need not have been.
We have the opportunity to learn from this. The attitude that "we have weathered this storm before" is not helpful because, as has been pointed out repeatedly in the thread that you must have - er - skimmed, this approach has been qualitatively different from COFS, and their aims were broader than those of the average sockmaster.
As for LaRouche, ArbCom passed a ruling regulating mention of LaRouche-inspired material in non-LaRouche articles. That is obviously inapplicable here as well.
RR
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 5:42 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2008/5/8 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
DG, read the rest of the thread.
I did. I really don't see any reason to be running in circles in a panic over this.
- d.
WikiEN-l mailing list WikiEN-l@lists.wikimedia.org To unsubscribe from this mailing list, visit: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikien-l
David Gerard wrote:
2008/5/8 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
DG, read the rest of the thread.
I did. I really don't see any reason to be running in circles in a panic over this.
Indeed, but there are people in whom the spirit of Senator Joe McCarthy still lives strong.
Ec
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/5/8 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
DG, read the rest of the thread.
I did. I really don't see any reason to be running in circles in a panic over this.
Indeed, but there are people in whom the spirit of Senator Joe McCarthy still lives strong.
Ec
These would presumably be the same people saying "no witch-hunt is necessary" and "this incident is over"? In which case, I have an article on Joe McCarthy I suggest you read before you take his name in vain again....
RR
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 11:11 AM, Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com wrote:
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 10:01 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/5/8 Relata Refero refero.relata@gmail.com:
DG, read the rest of the thread.
I did. I really don't see any reason to be running in circles in a panic over this.
Indeed, but there are people in whom the spirit of Senator Joe McCarthy still lives strong.
These would presumably be the same people saying "no witch-hunt is necessary" and "this incident is over"? In which case, I have an article on Joe McCarthy I suggest you read before you take his name in vain again....
I believe both that continued vigilance of all outside issue groups and POV pushers is necessary (a majority will come back), and that this incident has been grossly overblown here on the list.
In perspective with other issue groups over the same time period, CAMERA was in fact low impact. It was a new and unfamiliar one to the circles of on-wiki abuse fighters. But novelty does not excuse hyperbolic reactions.
In a sense this was all a great pity, as CAMERA and Electronic Intifada could both learned some deep lessons from openly coming to the Wikipedia articles and having to deal with NPOV and consensus building with each other. Instead we got this blowup. It would have been very interesting if they'd taken the opposite track and engaged openly.
2008/5/8 George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com:
In a sense this was all a great pity, as CAMERA and Electronic Intifada could both learned some deep lessons from openly coming to the Wikipedia articles and having to deal with NPOV and consensus building with each other. Instead we got this blowup. It would have been very interesting if they'd taken the opposite track and engaged openly.
Indeed. And have blackened their own names.
One thing that surprised me about WikiScanner's media moment was not that the public were finally getting to know stuff the regular editors had been aware of for years - it was the vehemence of the media and general public reaction to perceived conflicts of interest, and that that vehemence was directed, not at Wikipedia, but at the organisations in question. So we're flawed, but people basically like us ;-)
And that the public perception of how close counted as "conflict of interest" was actually way stricter that what Wikipedia's rules allow, let alone what PR companies and lobbyists try to rules-lawyer with us.
So: organised POV pushing groups don't have to just fool Wikipedia, they have to fool everyone on the net, consistently and reliably.
- d.
I am not sure that is true. They just have to fool everyone speaking the certain language. In en.wikipedia's case thats all English speakers. - White Cat
On Thu, May 8, 2008 at 9:56 PM, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
2008/5/8 George Herbert george.herbert@gmail.com:
In a sense this was all a great pity, as CAMERA and Electronic Intifada could both learned some deep lessons from openly coming to the Wikipedia articles and having to deal with NPOV and consensus building with each other. Instead we got this blowup. It would have been very interesting if they'd taken the opposite track and engaged openly.
Indeed. And have blackened their own names.
One thing that surprised me about WikiScanner's media moment was not that the public were finally getting to know stuff the regular editors had been aware of for years - it was the vehemence of the media and general public reaction to perceived conflicts of interest, and that that vehemence was directed, not at Wikipedia, but at the organisations in question. So we're flawed, but people basically like us ;-)
And that the public perception of how close counted as "conflict of interest" was actually way stricter that what Wikipedia's rules allow, let alone what PR companies and lobbyists try to rules-lawyer with us.
So: organised POV pushing groups don't have to just fool Wikipedia, they have to fool everyone on the net, consistently and reliably.
- d.
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Jon wrote:
White Cat wrote:
Although it is a well known issue, this issue has finally made its way to spotlight with the ongoing CAMERA incident on English wikipedia... I am sure English wikipedia's arbcom will come up with a reasonable conclusion and the purpose of this email is not related to the CAMERA arbcom case directly.
What is this all about, and what is the CAMERA incident?
That's a valid question. Reference to the CAMERA incident has come up a number of times recently as though it were "well known". These incidents come up quite often, but most of us are not involved with them, and have better things to do with our time than to wade through other people's tedious flame wars. I suppose that a capsule summary would be helpful to those of us who aren't involved. If it turns out to be just another case of same-old same-old we can yawn and go back to our normal activities.
Ec
Summary I wrote to Foundation-l:
The bulk of the discussion associated with this thread is actually on WikiEn-l. CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America, www.camera.org) is a pro-Israel lobby group that had some e-mails by members posted to www.electronicintifada.org that showed some of them attempting to organize a campaign on English Wikipedia to influence Israel-related articles. When it was posted to a noticeboard on the English Wikipedia a group of editors and admins worked to connect e-mail addresses to editors and as a result a number of people were banned, indefinitely restricted, etc. There is a current arbitration case at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/CAMERA_lobby... .
Nathan
On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 2:27 PM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
That's a valid question. Reference to the CAMERA incident has come up a number of times recently as though it were "well known". These incidents come up quite often, but most of us are not involved with them, and have better things to do with our time than to wade through other people's tedious flame wars. I suppose that a capsule summary would be helpful to those of us who aren't involved. If it turns out to be just another case of same-old same-old we can yawn and go back to our normal activities.
Ec
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