Pine W wrote:
When I last spent some time looking at the proposal, I too felt that the contributions indicated that the policy had far too little community influence. *However*, if you'll entertain a hypothetical with me for a moment, let's suppose that the status quo continues and there is effectively no conduct policy for technical spaces -- in particular, Phabricator and MediaWiki, unless I am missing a conduct policy that already applies to them outside of the ToS. If there is no policy, is that better than the policy that Matthew has been drafting?
The "no conduct policy for technical spaces" argument was debunked here: https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016-November/085573.html
Pine W also wrote:
Well, WMF will have to deal with this policy too. (:
Sort of. The proposed text currently includes "If a WMF employee or contractor is accused of wrongdoing, or a WMF employee or contractor is reported as being subjected to wrongdoing, the Committee will forward the report to the employee's or contractor’s manager, and to WMF HR in writing." It remains very unclear whether this code of conduct policy can apply to Wikimedia Foundation employees, given comments from the Wikimedia Foundation's Legal and Human Resources departments.
While I have mixed feelings about TCoC and the process for its creation, I also don't want anarchy in Phabricator and MediaWiki, so it seems prudent to explore alternatives.
Anarchy? Huh?
Rogol Domedonfors wrote:
However, since the end of 2015 the drafting of the code has largely been in the hands of a small group of WMF staff, and they have taken it on themselves to change that consensus and stated that the code will come into effect as soon as the last section is agreed, which will be quite soon.
Do the WMF and the wider Community wish to adhere to the initial consensus, and put the draft code out to the comunity for adoption? Or will the WMF choose to enact it on their own authority irrespective of any community views on the subject?
If the code is to be voted on by the Community, what would be the appropriate venue for the vote, and where should the vote be publicised?
It's pretty bizarre that nobody has addressed this. Many people supported specific sections of the proposed document with an explicit understanding that there would be a final vote on the full document later. A few members of Wikimedia Foundation staff then tried to declare that a final vote was not necessary, violating previous statements and agreements. These same staff members have also been involved in closing discussions in which they were active participants or even the initiators of the discussion.
This is all noted at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_Conduct/Draft. I think these actions will delegitimize the entire document and any processes or procedures it attempts to implement.
Matthew Flaschen wrote:
English Wikipedia policy is clear (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sock_puppetry#Meatpuppetry): "In votes or vote-like discussions, new users may be disregarded or given significantly less weight, especially if there are many of them expressing the same opinion."
Other wikis have similar conventions and policies, and some other wikis even formalize this into required edit counts.
It's darkly amusing to see you citing the English Wikipedia. When I pointed out to you on mediawiki.org that "it would never be appropriate for the person who began a discussion to then also close that discussion," you replied that "English Wikipedia policies do not apply here."
MZMcBride