Quoting "Daniel R. Tobias" dan@tobias.name:
And it's a good thing the real-life authorities (not the Wikipedia authorities) got involved, since they actually have the ability to stop real-life stalking (like by jailing the stalker), something that Wikipedia is completely powerless to do. Banning him from the site, while justified based on his actions, is pretty much useless for stopping his off-wiki activity.
I don't understand what point you are attempting to make. Are you attempting to argue that we should not have banned Amorrow?
Banning is one thing, and in the case of willfully persistent vandals and trolls, I have no problem with it. But we tend to tie ourselves up in knots trying to do more than that. After we ban someone, they may keep harassing us from external sites. They may try to "out" our editors. They may say some really truly not-nice things about us. And there's *nothing we can do about it*. But that drives us INSANE, because what they're doing is *WRONG*, and we desperately want to *MAKE* *THEM* *STOP*!!! So we try to ban links to their sites, and suppress any on-wiki discussion of anything about them or what they're saying, and block anyone who dares to try. It's not clear that any of that extra drama works. It might be the case that, after banning them, we should do our best to utterly ignore them. If they do something utterly unignorable, like stalking or harassing one of our editors in real life, we should turn the problem over to the real-world authorities, because unlike us and our website thingy, they *can* do something about it.
****** I'm a firm believer in the principle that ethical decisions where good people disagree belong to the individuals who live with the consequences. If another editor is harassed in real life, I respect that editor's confidentiality and choices. My responsibility as an editor and an administrator includes seeing to it that Wikipedia does not continue to be a platform for harassment in that situation. Hence, I follow up on banning the sockpuppets and closing whatever loopholes the harasser and his or her confederates attempt to exploit. Most of the time, quiet and efficient deflection is sufficient to end the problem.
-Durova
On 11/12/07, Durova nadezhda.durova@gmail.com wrote:
I'm a firm believer in the principle that ethical decisions where good people disagree belong to the individuals who live with the consequences.
It's sort of an abstract philosophical question, but for what it's worth, it seems to me that the people who have to live with the consequences are probably the very last people who should be making decisions.
So, to use a concrete example, if I have an off-wiki dispute with an individual or website-- they are strongly criticized, attacked, or (noncriminally) harassed me in some way-- I'm now probably the last person on the entire project who ought to be making decisions about that individual/website's articles. Nothing to do with my character, my judgment, or my faith-- I just am now personally involved, and should stay away from those articles-- if only to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.
And actually, this principle extends beyond personal disputes, but to any subject we're "too" passionate about. I know I have, in the back of my own mind, a set of articles I will never ever edit, because I'm just a little too close to them. I don't have an recognizable COI, but I care a little too much, and that work is best left to someone who doesn't care as much as I do. Passion is the enemy of precision.
I don't know that you're actually disagreeing with any of that, of course. It's just when you say "Let the person who has to live with the consequences make the tough calls", I say "No! Let absolutely anybody BUT the person who's gonna have to live with the consequences make tough calls-- the calls are tough enough as is, without being blinded by personal interests or emotions".
Stoically,
Alec
On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 17:55:19 -0800, Durova nadezhda.durova@gmail.com wrote:
I'm a firm believer in the principle that ethical decisions where good people disagree belong to the individuals who live with the consequences. If another editor is harassed in real life, I respect that editor's confidentiality and choices. My responsibility as an editor and an administrator includes seeing to it that Wikipedia does not continue to be a platform for harassment in that situation. Hence, I follow up on banning the sockpuppets and closing whatever loopholes the harasser and his or her confederates attempt to exploit. Most of the time, quiet and efficient deflection is sufficient to end the problem.
Yes. And sometimes, at present, this is then reverted with "how dare you suppress this! censorship!"
We could all do with a bit more AGF here. Some people give a very good impression of assuming that any removal of any link is motivated by a desire to censor legitimate criticism. Some admins think that this makes the people who stir up such drama *evil*. I don't think either of these views is productive. But neither do I think we should tolerate arguments based on points of non-existent principle (e.g. free speech) when an explanation has been made in pragmatic and specific terms (e.g. offsite harassment, banned users advocating content changes in offsite forums). Wikipedia is not a free speech zone and not anarchy either.
If anyone would like to propose a policy specifically allowing banned users to contribute to Wikipedia by posting their opinions in external venues, then we can see what the community thinks about that.
Guy (JzG)
On 11/13/07, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Yes. And sometimes, at present, this is then reverted with "how dare you suppress this! censorship!"
Well, as someone who has, on occasion, cried censorship, let me be clear here. I don't care about censoring any given <insert Enemy of the Project>. They aren't long censored anyway, as they easily take it off wiki.
What we don't want censored is Wikipedia. That's the super-precious thing to cling to. That's the point of the project. That's why this is special and magical.
There have been encyclopedias before-- having an encyclopedia isn't that special-- especially not an encyclopedia you can only kinda trust. And we brag about being Free, but let's be fair-- every library in the developed world has many free [as in beer] encyclopedias-- so that's not really special. Some people might say the fact that you personally can edit Wikipedia is special, but to me, that's just a sidenote.
What's special about Wikipedia is that Wikipedia is not Censored.. It's breadth is so beyond anything that's ever existed. We have an article on anything and everything.
I can remember being a kid and reading "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" and wishing there really was a guide like that-- which hand entries on practically anything. I remember watching star trek and being jealous of their library computer which knew everything about everything. That's why Britannica doesn't have. THAT'S why we're different. That's why we're amazing. We are building the Hitchiker's Guide, we are building the Enterprise's library computer.
I didn't get to help build The Greay Pyramid. I wasn't an engineer on the Apollo Program. But I get to come home every day and work on a Wonder of the World-- Wikipedia. It takes your breath away, when you think about it. ---
Too often, when we hear "Don't censor that", I think people hear "Don't censor Brandt or Bagley or whomever". But that's missing the point. The point is: Don't Censor Wikipedia.
(and yes, yes, not all deletions are censorship, and half our value is in what we prune away, as opposed to the internet at large where there are no AFDs. But we must be ever vigilent against deleting or banning what we don't like because we don't like it.)
Alec
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 08:52:58 -0500, "Alec Conroy" alecmconroy@gmail.com wrote:
Yes. And sometimes, at present, this is then reverted with "how dare you suppress this! censorship!"
What we don't want censored is Wikipedia. That's the super-precious thing to cling to. That's the point of the project. That's why this is special and magical.
But nobody's doing that. Don't make the mistake of thinking that a link to a hate site is ion some way "content". The content is what we say about the subject, not the links at the end.
We could remove the hotlink from www.stormfront.org and it would have no effect at all on the neutrality of our description of that site.
Nor does removing the occasional statement in debate that "stormfront says this, it should be in the article!" materially affect the neutrality of any other subject. Stormfront is very obviously not a reliable source.
And let's be clear here, the sites we're talking about are *not reliable sources* for anything at all - not for critique of Wikipedia, and definitely not for content.
What's special about Wikipedia is that Wikipedia is not Censored.. It's breadth is so beyond anything that's ever existed. We have an article on anything and everything.
This principle has been widely misunderstood, in my view. People have used it to justify linking to harassment, egregious violations of WP:BLP, gratuitous images of sexually explicit material. What WP:NOT censored means is that we do not censor material in order to avoid offending specific real-world cultural mores. Wikipedia is not censored for the protection of minors, or to prevent children in the American deep south for learning that great-great-great-to the tenth-grandpa was more monkey than Moses. We include the Mohammed cartoons, the article on penis has a picture of a penis, and we don't shy form covering controversial content.
But we do self-censor. We do it all the time. WP:BLP is 100% self-censorship. So is WP:NOR. We don't include any old thing just because someone wants to, we include it only when it is of direct benefit to the core aims of producing a verifiable, neutral encyclopaedia.
And again, links *are not content*.
Guy (JzG)
On 13/11/2007, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 08:52:58 -0500, "Alec Conroy" alecmconroy@gmail.com wrote:
Yes. And sometimes, at present, this is then reverted with "how dare you suppress this! censorship!"
What we don't want censored is Wikipedia. That's the super-precious thing to cling to. That's the point of the project. That's why this is special and magical.
But nobody's doing that. Don't make the mistake of thinking that a link to a hate site is ion some way "content". The content is what we say about the subject, not the links at the end.
The naming (not even linking) of antisocialmedia.net was suppressed per WP:NPA - a community rule being applied to article space. Don't be obtuse.
- d.
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 20:51:29 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
The naming (not even linking) of antisocialmedia.net was suppressed per WP:NPA - a community rule being applied to article space. Don't be obtuse.
Well, now, I thought that editorial consensus pretty rapidly formed for mentioning but not linking. Is my memory at fault here?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Attack_sites...
The first mention of "suppression" in the evidence for hat case comes from Dan, stating that it was "suppressed" from ANI (where it should indeed not have been linked, as a vile and baseless attack and campaign of harassment against several people: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Attack_sites...
The Evidence page does not, at a quick re-scan, mention removal of any *mention* of the name form the Bagley article, and I would expect such a removal to last about as long as the good faith but misguided removal of the links to michaelmoore.com and donmurphy.net.
Guy (JzG)
On 13/11/2007, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 20:51:29 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
The naming (not even linking) of antisocialmedia.net was suppressed per WP:NPA - a community rule being applied to article space. Don't be obtuse.
Well, now, I thought that editorial consensus pretty rapidly formed for mentioning but not linking. Is my memory at fault here?
Then people kept removing it, citing WP:NPA as applying to article space.
That is: encyclopedic content being decided for other than encyclopedic reasons.
That is: what Alec was talking about just now, that you responded to, that I then responded to.
- d.
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 23:37:58 +0000, "David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Well, now, I thought that editorial consensus pretty rapidly formed for mentioning but not linking. Is my memory at fault here?
Then people kept removing it, citing WP:NPA as applying to article space. That is: encyclopedic content being decided for other than encyclopedic reasons. That is: what Alec was talking about just now, that you responded to, that I then responded to.
So some people got it wrong, briefly. Not that it's in the evidence for the arbitration.
Who *is* (present tense) advocating not *mentioning* banned attackers where it would be material in article space?
Guy (JzG)
Guy wrote:
The Evidence page does not, at a quick re-scan, mention removal of any *mention* of the name form the Bagley article
Oh if only it were so. Sadly, the deletions were all too real. We really did come face to face with people saying "You can't even MENTION enemies of the project or their websites, even in articles".
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=prev&ol... adding back in removed section, removing NPA references -- stop using NPOV to justify your blatant policy violations
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=prev&ol... Anti naked short-selling campaign - removing website reference pending resolution of policy dispute re WP:NPA
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=prev&ol... that's how the policy reads; if you don't like it, change the policy
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=prev&ol... links or *references* are not permitted by NPA; this is a site with an attack on a Wiki admin splashed on its front page; NPOV has nothing to do with it
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=156282353&a... 1: ArbCom has not ruled on this 2: please explain how NPOV applies on talk page
As you say, damnatio memoriae was swiftly rejected-- but the next time somebody makes an orwell references, remember there was a time when some people really said "absolutely no *reference* to unpersons allowed in Wikipedia", and we went to arbcom over it.
Alec
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 18:39:52 -0500, "Alec Conroy" alecmconroy@gmail.com wrote:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Overstock.com&diff=156282353&a... 1: ArbCom has not ruled on this 2: please explain how NPOV applies on talk page
As you say, damnatio memoriae was swiftly rejected-- but the next time somebody makes an orwell references, remember there was a time when some people really said "absolutely no *reference* to unpersons allowed in Wikipedia", and we went to arbcom over it.
Actually, as that last link shows, it was an "anonymous website" - did we have a source for it being Bagley at the time? I thought he only admitted it later. And the content mentions that the site existed, so actually the encyclopaedia covered it. Not well, but it covered it.
Oh, and the "unperson" had a whole article to himself, which is not quite how I understand not *mentioning* the supposed unperson.
Plus it was over two months ago, and you appeared to be suggesting that this was still an issue now, which as far as I can tell it is not. Do you have a more recent example?
So much is down to detail and nuance, isn't it?
Guy (JzG)
On 14/11/2007, Guy Chapman aka JzG guy.chapman@spamcop.net wrote:
Actually, as that last link shows, it was an "anonymous website" - did we have a source for it being Bagley at the time? I thought he only admitted it later. And the content mentions that the site existed, so actually the encyclopaedia covered it. Not well, but it covered it.
It was named in reliable sources as his.
Oh, and the "unperson" had a whole article to himself, which is not quite how I understand not *mentioning* the supposed unperson.
Those removing all mention of it were also attempting to get it deleted, and coordinating their activity on a private mailing list.
Plus it was over two months ago, and you appeared to be suggesting that this was still an issue now, which as far as I can tell it is not. Do you have a more recent example?
Two months is recent enough. Stop trying to downplay or minimise this matter of very real concern *that you were in the thick of*.
- d.
JzG wrote:
So much is down to detail and nuance, isn't it?
Well, yes and no.
What we are fighting here is the perception -- rightly or wrongly held, but by nontrivial numbers of people -- that Wikipedia has a tendency to engage in suppressive and outright repressive ways towards some of its critics and towards some viewpoints that it doesn't like to hear.
The way to make that perception go away is not to twist and turn and find increasingly-tenuous ways of justifying the allegedly- repressive behavior as being something other than it appeared to be, or unfortunate but really necessary, or not so bad after all, or ancient history that nobody should need to worry about any more. The way to make that perception go away is to *stop doing the things that give rise to it*. And if we believe that the perception matters, we have to stop doing the things regardless of whether the perceptions are rightly held or not.
On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 19:28:23 -0500, Steve Summit scs@eskimo.com wrote:
What we are fighting here is the perception -- rightly or wrongly held, but by nontrivial numbers of people -- that Wikipedia has a tendency to engage in suppressive and outright repressive ways towards some of its critics and towards some viewpoints that it doesn't like to hear.
Yes I agree that this is what we are fighting. I happen to think that as a perception it is deeply flawed. We are extremely tolerant of criticism. What we should not tolerate is people with a grudge harassing those who defend our core principles.
Some of the people who see us as suppressive are on record as believing that the publishing and republishing of baseless conspiracy theories designed to harass Wikipedia users is no bog deal. I happen to think that is wrong.
The idea that Wikipedia is suppressive seems bizarre to me. The banned users who cause most of the drama have worked long and hard to ensure that they are not welcome, and being constantly reminded that they are *still* asserting that the problem is *everybody else* is simply tiresome.
The way to make that perception go away is not to twist and turn and find increasingly-tenuous ways of justifying the allegedly- repressive behavior as being something other than it appeared to be, or unfortunate but really necessary, or not so bad after all, or ancient history that nobody should need to worry about any more. The way to make that perception go away is to *stop doing the things that give rise to it*. And if we believe that the perception matters, we have to stop doing the things regardless of whether the perceptions are rightly held or not.
But it is necessary. It is necessary, in order to create a safe editing environment, that we do not allow people to harass our users, including by bringing external harassment to Wikipedia.
People differ on how best to achieve that, but I don't see any meaningful number of people who believe that linking off-wiki harassment is in any way desirable.
Guy (JzG)
On 11/13/07, Steve Summit scs@eskimo.com wrote:
What we are fighting here is the perception -- rightly or wrongly held, but by nontrivial numbers of people -- that Wikipedia has a tendency to engage in suppressive and outright repressive ways towards some of its critics and towards some viewpoints that it doesn't like to hear.
Right!
And for the record, I personally think Wikipedia does a pretty wonderful job of dealing with the situation, in the long term.
When I look over all the BADSITESesque disputes, for example, everyone one got worked out correctly in the end. When you look over all the pages where these disputes have come up-- Michael Moore, we link to Making Lights and Don Murphy and Prof Black and WP:BADSITES and WP:NPA and the Attack Sites Arbcom and everywhere-- it's always worked out in the end. The Wikipedia system DOES work, in the end.
And even if there is a group of people who would prefer to change Wikipedia into were something a little more community-oriented and a little less enyclopedic-- the fact is, it hasn't worked, and the encyclopeidia has always won out in the end. So while we defintely have brushes with bieng a tad suppressive in the short term, in the long term we get an A+.
And indeed, when I look around, there's only two "active" problems in which the situation hasn't resolved itself in a way that fights this perception of Wikipedia as suppressive.
Persistent Issue One: We still don't have an article on Encyclopedia Dramatica.
It's not that this is a "wrong" decision, but it will be better when we can have such an article. It's jsut that not having an entry on ED does make a look bad.
I live here, so I understand that deletion decisions are complex, and at Wikipedia, coverage is often idiosyncyratic, but is instead a combination of the available sources and interest. This often leads to some bizarre conclusions when you compare coverage across articles-- as Colbert commented-- "any site that's got a longer entry on 'Truthiness' than on Lutherans has its priorities straight".
So I won't actually criticize the deletion of the ED article, I'll just say generally-- Wikipedia will be a better place when we are able to write a NPOV, NOR, Verifiable article on Encyclopedia Dramatica. That should be true of absolutely any subject.
If we can't have such an article-- if ED just isn't notable enough for us to have any sources to work with-- then that's the way it is, and it can't be helped. But I hope that won't be the case as soon as possible, because it doesn't "look good" not to have an article on it, and people who doesn't understand Wikipedia are probably inclined to suspect we don't cover it out of malice.
Outsiders have never heard of WP:OTHERSTUFF, and when they see we have a lengthy featured article on Spoo, a fictional food product from a cancelled sci-fi tv show, but lack even a stub on ED, it will contribute to the perception that we deleted the ED article out of bias.
Persist Issue Two: Rampant incivility The second problem that we're still dealing with is this persistent bug of falsely accusing people of being in support of, in favor of, or in league with banned users. I've discussed it extensively here, and in two different essays, so I reiterate it here.
Other than that-- we're actually doing great in the long term. Everywhere else, things have worked out completely non-suppressively in the end.
Of course, we should still work to make sure these outbreaks of embarassing transitory supressivess are as infrequent as possible. Making Lights and Michael Moore, for example, really showed us as our worst, but of course, they were "ancient history" in wikipedia time, so hopefully we won't have to go down those roads again the future.
Alec
Sorry, but I absolutely do not accept that lack of an article on ED is any kind of a problem at all.
Not only is it a site of no obvious significance, anyone who wants to find out about it can do so at the only place that actually gives a shit, which is ED itself.
Guy (JzG)