On 31/01/2008, Bryan Derksen bryan.derksen@shaw.ca wrote:
Peter Ansell wrote:
I apologised, but as yet the entire incident has turned into a firestorm I have only ever heard about in american politics. Poor Aussie isn't used to being attacked. Still not taking back the essential comment about GFDL childrens pictures posted on the net.
Laura made a good observation over on the AN/I thread that purveyors of child pornography are unlikely to be concerned about whether the pictures they're using are properly licensed. The issue of whether the photos are under the GFDL seems like another irrelevant tangent.
If the pictures were never posted to a public place then there would be zero risk of them being vandalised by a paedophile. That was the real issue. Is a child not worth zero risk? From the sounds of the posts it seems like the complaint was about her and not the child. Wikipedia editors should understand the GFDL as a prerequisite though, including the revocation of any right to sue a person who modifies a photo in any way as long as they attribute its authors correctly.
Of course the complaint is about me and not my kids. I'm not worried about the well-being of my kids being jeopardized by a couple pictures. Not in the least. What I'm upset about is your shameful behavior and the fact that the moderators of this list ignored it. And I'm now pissed about your excuse, which is so obviously fake. If you were concerned with our kids, you would have done more than make an underhanded "aside" comment on a list you knew we didn't subscribe to.
I am passionate about keeping all possible avenues for exploiting children closed. It is illegal to post pictures of someone elses
child
on the net in Australia, and I naturally assumed that they saw the risks I guess, mostly because of the emphasis on bathrobes I think.
Wikimedia falls under a different jurisdiction, fortunately, or http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Children would be a lot more sparsely populated. And those photos are of their own kids so that law wouldn't apply here anyway.
Still, given the wikipedia review topic about the recent issue with commons having a "Category:Lolita" and the vandalism of scout photos, there is an issue. Its a shame that freedom of speech outweighs child safety in Florida, US.
That's totally ridiculous. To say people shouldn't be able to upload images of their kids. That's just ridiculous. I let my kids play outside too, and I take them to the store with me. There is, of course, always the risk of them being kidnapped, and so I risk that when I take them out. I could shelter them in the house all the time, reducing that risk to near zero, but I don't. Does that also make me an irresponsible parent?
I would appreciate even simple comments about how badly things could be taken, as I had not noticed the veracity of the statement until I was brought back to it again. The crux of the statement shouldn't be attacked though even if I expressed it in a bad way.
I'm not really sure what you're trying to say here.
It is a completely different culture in which people both get annoyed quickly and try to make scandals out of a few words, and in which parents are ultra-sensitive about their parenting styles. Thats the Australian part I was trying to get at. If someone here had thought to tell me that it could be offensive then I would have retracted the comment then and there. Now that I have thought about it I think the point of the comment, child safety considerations, is relevant still. If Florida doesn't give a stuff then I hope Wikipedia has a conscience to care outside of what is explicitly needed by law.
Peter
First of all, this is yet again inappropriate. You just categorized a nation of people as easily annoyed, scandalous and ultra-sensitive. Second of all, I'm American. Pedro is British. Who's the Australian? You? If so, you just categorized two nations of people.
Regardless, you stated you apologized. That's inaccurate. A [[non-apology apology]] does not equal an apology. Lara
On 31/01/2008, LaraLove laralove@bathrobecabal.org wrote:
What I'm upset about is your shameful behavior and the fact that the moderators of this list ignored it.
I didn't ignore it; I simply agreed with what he said. The thought that crossed my mind was that it was "pretty stupid" to be uploading images of one's children to a wildly popular public web site. I just chose not to voice my thoughts, because I didn't think it was entirely appropriate to criticise the parenting skills of someone I don't know. But evidently you are keen to make a big deal about it and draw attention to the slight on your character, so I guess it's alright for me to be honest.
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
In that light, I think it's wrong to call your posting of pictures of your children as "grossly inappropriate", but I still feel it is a bit reckless.
~Mark Ryan (one of the WikiEN-l moderators)
Mark Ryan wrote:
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
I don't know Lara and I haven't followed this thread, but I would speculate that her attitude might be similar to mine: I refuse to grant those nutcases that much power. Some tiny number of them exist, who have perpetrated some tiny number of (albeit high-profile) atrocities, and now suddenly nobody else on the entire planet can post pictures of their children to the net? No; I defy that lopsided capitulation.
Whatever it is, it isn't capitulation. Its a recognition of reality (or a perception of it, since there is disagreement on the actual danger). If its raining outside, you wear a raincoat or take an umbrella. If its snowing, you put on boots. If you're a cop, you wear a uniform. If pictures on the 'net is dangerous, you don't post them.
I don't know that I would agree that posting pics on the 'net is harmless. Admins can sometimes be targets, and I don't post any photos of myself to the 'net on general principle. But other people have different ideas and shouldn't have their character impugned as a result - neither Lara nor Ansell. He made a poorly considered comment, has apologized for the offense caused but continues to believe that the general point of view is correct.
This should be dropped in the interests of not continuing a pointless argument.
Nathan
On Jan 31, 2008 11:35 AM, Steve Summit scs@eskimo.com wrote:
Mark Ryan wrote:
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
I don't know Lara and I haven't followed this thread, but I would speculate that her attitude might be similar to mine: I refuse to grant those nutcases that much power. Some tiny number of them exist, who have perpetrated some tiny number of (albeit high-profile) atrocities, and now suddenly nobody else on the entire planet can post pictures of their children to the net? No; I defy that lopsided capitulation.
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Nathan wrote:
Whatever it is, it isn't capitulation. Its a recognition of reality (or a perception of it, since there is disagreement on the actual danger). If its raining outside, you wear a raincoat or take an umbrella. If its snowing, you put on boots. If you're a cop, you wear a uniform. If pictures on the 'net is dangerous, you don't post them.
This is indeed increasingly tangential, so I won't enter an extended debate nor try to provoke one, but in my book, it *is* capitulation. (But it's all about how you come down on those "if"s, and picking your battles, and stuff.)
Steve Summit wrote:
Mark Ryan wrote:
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
I don't know Lara and I haven't followed this thread, but I would speculate that her attitude might be similar to mine: I refuse to grant those nutcases that much power. Some tiny number of them exist, who have perpetrated some tiny number of (albeit high-profile) atrocities, and now suddenly nobody else on the entire planet can post pictures of their children to the net? No; I defy that lopsided capitulation.
I absolutely agree. Much of this is a matter of trying to find a middle way between the nutcases and paranoiacs. There is no evidence to show that the proportion of nutcases is any higher than it ever has been. They just have more tools (as do we), and the media relishes giving them more importance than they deserve. There's something dreadfully wrong when we cannot perform normal acts for the sole speculative reason that we might be face-to-face with a nutcase. Being overly protective of children is damaging too when it prevents them from gaining normal life experience.
Ec
On 01/02/2008, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
Steve Summit wrote:
Mark Ryan wrote:
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
I don't know Lara and I haven't followed this thread, but I would speculate that her attitude might be similar to mine: I refuse to grant those nutcases that much power. Some tiny number of them exist, who have perpetrated some tiny number of (albeit high-profile) atrocities, and now suddenly nobody else on the entire planet can post pictures of their children to the net? No; I defy that lopsided capitulation.
I absolutely agree. Much of this is a matter of trying to find a middle way between the nutcases and paranoiacs. There is no evidence to show that the proportion of nutcases is any higher than it ever has been. They just have more tools (as do we), and the media relishes giving them more importance than they deserve. There's something dreadfully wrong when we cannot perform normal acts for the sole speculative reason that we might be face-to-face with a nutcase. Being overly protective of children is damaging too when it prevents them from gaining normal life experience.
In a case where it is letting a child go to the park on their own or letting them walk home from school on their own I would disagree that you are in anyway giving them life experience as a fair rational payoff for the risks. I see photos on the internet as having the same bad qualities without any of the supposed good to the child when they find out people did things to a photo of them when they were little, and their parents explicitly encouraged them to do it by licensing the photo a certain way.
Peter
Peter Ansell wrote:
On 01/02/2008, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
Much of this is a matter of trying to find a middle way between the nutcases and paranoiacs. There is no evidence to show that the proportion of nutcases is any higher than it ever has been. They just have more tools (as do we), and the media relishes giving them more importance than they deserve. There's something dreadfully wrong when we cannot perform normal acts for the sole speculative reason that we might be face-to-face with a nutcase. Being overly protective of children is damaging too when it prevents them from gaining normal life experience.
In a case where it is letting a child go to the park on their own or letting them walk home from school on their own I would disagree that you are in anyway giving them life experience as a fair rational payoff for the risks.
I grew up at a time when it was normal for kids to walk to school, and I can't recall a single situation where any child came to harm thereby. In hindsight I know that these things happened, but let's not blow them out of proportion. Even now, speaking as a member of the executive of a district parents' association for a district with about 23,000 students, reported actual incidents are fairly rare. There may be only a couple suspicious behaviour warnings per year. The risk of pedophilia is much greater in trusting relationships than with complete strangers.
Driving kids to school creates additional risks. I've seen parents let their kids out of the car from the driver side into traffic. The likelihood of serious consequences is much greater from that act than from stray pedophiles. Having children walk to school has additional benefits in combatting childhood obesity. The dangers from that are rarely immediate, but they do have a cumulative effect.
I see photos on the internet as having the same bad qualities without any of the supposed good to the child when they find out people did things to a photo of them when they were little, and their parents explicitly encouraged them to do it by licensing the photo a certain way.
Sure a real picture of a child being abused may show the child with an expression of pain on his or her face. So I can understand the situation where someone might photo-shop a happy face into that picture. Normal people provide an infinite choice of happy faces that could be used for that purpose; they mostly don't post pictures of their child in pain. Licensing does not matter; there is more in the pornographer's behaviour to go after than some vague pretext of copyright violation. One does not seriously combat the problem of pedophilia by putting heavy limits on normal behaviour.
Ec
On Jan 31, 2008 10:27 AM, Mark Ryan ultrablue@gmail.com wrote:
On 31/01/2008, LaraLove laralove@bathrobecabal.org wrote:
What I'm upset about is your shameful behavior and the fact that the moderators of this list ignored it.
I didn't ignore it; I simply agreed with what he said. The thought that crossed my mind was that it was "pretty stupid" to be uploading images of one's children to a wildly popular public web site. I just chose not to voice my thoughts, because I didn't think it was entirely appropriate to criticise the parenting skills of someone I don't know. But evidently you are keen to make a big deal about it and draw attention to the slight on your character, so I guess it's alright for me to be honest.
With the high profile cases where administrators have been stalked in real life as a result of personally identifiable information they post on the wiki, I feel it's mad for people to post their real names, let alone photos of themselves, names of loved ones or photos of loved ones. Sure, if you stay out of trouble on the wiki the chances of such a thing happening is pretty slight, but there's plenty of nutcases out there to go around.
In that light, I think it's wrong to call your posting of pictures of your children as "grossly inappropriate", but I still feel it is a bit reckless.
~Mark Ryan (one of the WikiEN-l moderators)
The moderators are not a collective group, by the way; as a moderator, I ignored that aside because we tend to be rather lenient about comments on the mailing list (we're not Wikipedia; we have no real policies on assuming bad faith or personal attacks, and banned users are free to spew their tripe here, provided it's not outrageous enough to qualify them for moderation) unless they form a continuing pattern of disruptive behaviour. I disagree with the notion that we should give in to nutcases this much, but I saw no reason to jump on a probably poorly-worded aside without a history of disruptive or abusive behaviour.
Johnleemk
On 1/31/08, Mark Ryan ultrablue@gmail.com wrote:
I didn't think it was entirely appropriate to criticise the parenting skills of someone I don't know.
Yes, good call, Mark. To anybody else still searching for the most polite and civil way to say "Lara is a bad mother..." you might try attending a few PTA meetings, or watching your local 6:00 news, or visiting your own neighbors; you'll probably see a lot of crazy shit. There are some rather feral pockets of humanity out there, which we usually take for granted the ability to ignore.
On a practical note, the fact that photos of (mostly anonymous) kids can be and are uploaded onto the internet under a free license makes it a bit easier to illustrate an article about [[children]] (though interestingly none of the photos currently used are "children of western society". Hmm...).
Yes, anyone's photo being on the internet is a potential liability to that person. It could be argued that a child whose photo is on the internet is at less long-term risk than an adult, all other factors being equal. Two to five years down the line, which person's appearance is more likely to be recognizable from the photo?
But supposedly the real issue here is about domain hacks or something, which are pretty limited. As far as I know it's not possible to cover up the "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" site logo or remove "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" from the <title> element of the page, or do anything else that would make it non-obvious to the reader that a page is being served to the browser by "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia", without further hacks in javascript (modifications which the reader would have to make on their own side, unless Lara & Co. are rouge enough to edit the site-wide common.js to serve their purpose, which I doubt -- oops WP:BEANS maybe)
Overall this debate is much ado about about relatively little, though I've probably donated to more than the customary two cents to it, possibly making matters worse (a risk I'm usually willing to take). Keep the change, save up for your next cheeseburger.
Peace out.
—C.W.