Hi folks,
This is just a quick interim update on the BLP issue I raised here last week.
First, thanks to everyone who has contributed to the discussion thus far. We all know that foundation-l isn't necessarily reflective of general Wikimedia opinion, and that many experiences and skills are unrepresented here – but nonetheless, I have read every word, and have found it really, really useful. Thank you for helping.
Here's my quick rough summary of what we've discussed:
First, there seems to be a general view that BLPs are a problem that is worth addressing. I won't recap all the reasons for that, because it seems there is ---happpily--- already consensus.
Second, there is also a fear ---represented here probably most strongly by David Gerard, but I believe lots of other people think the same thing--- that if we tackle BLPs clumsily, we could make things worse not better, or at least might introduce new problems. For example, we might make the error of privileging kindness over neutrality, resulting in a general whitewashing of BLPs. Or we could accidentally encourage a massive wave of deletionism, resulting in much smaller and less useful Wikipedias.
There is also general concern about policy creep and instruction creep, which is important. We know that the sheer volume of Wikipedia policies is confusing and intimidating for new people who want to engage with us – so in general, given that we aspire to attract new contributors and generally make it easier for people to interact with us, it is probably better to generally aim to refine and streamline existing policies, rather than adding to their number.
With that as preamble, here are the areas that I think we've surfaced as needing further attention:
1) There is a big unresolved question around whether, if marginally-notable people ask to have their articles deleted, that request should be granted. My sense -both from the discussion here and other discussions elsewhere- is that many Wikipedians are very strongly protective of their general right to retain even very marginal BLPs. Presumably this is because notability is hard to define, and they are worried about stupid across-the-board interpretations that will result in massive deletionism. However, other people strongly feel that the current quantity of BLPs about less-notable people diminish the overall quality of the encyclopedia, reduce our credibility, and run the risk of hurting real people. There seems to be little consensus here. Roughly: some people seem to strongly feel the bar for notability should be set higher, and deletion requests generally granted: others seem to strongly feel the current state is preferable. I would welcome discussion about how to achieve better consensus on this issue.
2) There is broad general agreement that we should continue to create and implement mechanisms and tools designed to catch and correct vandalism and poor-quality edits, both before and after-the-fact. There is a lot of work being done in this area - for example, projects continue to request and receive implementations of Flagged Revs. I wonder if there is more we could/should be doing in this area.
3) Currently, we know that people with BLP problems have trouble getting in touch with us: the contact information is buried or confusing. I believe there is broad general agreement that we should make it easier for people to request help with BLPs, and to report problems in general. And I am glad that some work on that is beginning to happen (e.g., a “report a problem” tool, a “rate this article” tool, a BLP FAQ for article subjects). It's obvious we need to be cautious – we can't afford to open the floodgates to complaints if we will all then immediately drown in them. And we need to ensure the new tools are user-friendly - that they will actually help the people they're intended for. But in general, I believe there is agreement that we need to do a better job of enabling BLP article subjects to communicate with us.
And 4) I believe there is general support for the notion of training Wikipedians to handle BLP issues well. I personally strongly believe that handling BLPs requires a set of specific skills and abilities – for example, an excellent understanding of core Wikipedia policies; experience with policies such as notability that are particularly important in BLP issues; diplomacy, kindness and patience. I am very interested in exploring further how the Foundation could support such training, and how it could be scaled up so everyone could access it. (I've been kicking around notions such as face-to-face training camps; training at Wikimania and the all-chapters meetings; the provision of support materials to chapters; monthly “train the trainer” webcast sessions, etc.)
So .. that is my rough, quick recap of where I think we're at.
In terms of next steps – as I said, I'll be speaking about this issue with the board in early April. This is just an interim note: Please feel free to help me further my thinking on all this -particularly #1 and #4 above- over the next few weeks. And thank you for your help thus far.
Thanks, Sue
2009/3/8 Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org:
Second, there is also a fear ---represented here probably most strongly by David Gerard, but I believe lots of other people think the same thing--- that if we tackle BLPs clumsily, we could make things worse not better, or at least might introduce new problems. For example, we might make the error of privileging kindness over neutrality, resulting in a general whitewashing of BLPs. Or we could accidentally encourage a massive wave of deletionism, resulting in much smaller and less useful Wikipedias.
FWIW, I drafted the version of WP:BLP that first became policy on en:wp :-) Very strong on the basic content rules and putting the new considerations into that context. It's changed considerably in the details since then, of course, but the point still stands: if NPOV requires upsetting an article subject, NPOV wins.
- d.
On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 5:12 PM, Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org wrote:
- There is a big unresolved question around whether, if
marginally-notable people ask to have their articles deleted, that request should be granted. My sense -both from the discussion here and other discussions elsewhere- is that many Wikipedians are very strongly protective of their general right to retain even very marginal BLPs. Presumably this is because notability is hard to define, and they are worried about stupid across-the-board interpretations that will result in massive deletionism. However, other people strongly feel that the current quantity of BLPs about less-notable people diminish the overall quality of the encyclopedia, reduce our credibility, and run the risk of hurting real people. There seems to be little consensus here. Roughly: some people seem to strongly feel the bar for notability should be set higher, and deletion requests generally granted: others seem to strongly feel the current state is preferable. I would welcome discussion about how to achieve better consensus on this issue.
I would quibble with this statement a little bit. There is a difference in my mind between raising the notability bar and granting weight to subject requests for deletion. There seems to be a growing agreement that marginally notable subjects make for bad biographies and greater risk; there is very little appetite for beginning deletion discussions or deleting articles upon subject request.
So these two issues need to be separated, because indeed they are quite separate. One asks whether the subject of an article (be it a person, corporation, or any other entity with living representatives) should be afforded some control over encyclopedia content, even as little as the ability to request a deletion nomination; most Wikipedians would be against this, I believe.
The other issue, of marginal notability and the risk it poses to Wikipedia, is much more relevant for this discussion.
Nathan
2009/3/8 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com:
On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 5:12 PM, Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org wrote:
- There is a big unresolved question around whether, if
marginally-notable people ask to have their articles deleted, that request should be granted. My sense -both from the discussion here and other discussions elsewhere- is that many Wikipedians are very strongly protective of their general right to retain even very marginal BLPs. Presumably this is because notability is hard to define, and they are worried about stupid across-the-board interpretations that will result in massive deletionism. However, other people strongly feel that the current quantity of BLPs about less-notable people diminish the overall quality of the encyclopedia, reduce our credibility, and run the risk of hurting real people. There seems to be little consensus here. Roughly: some people seem to strongly feel the bar for notability should be set higher, and deletion requests generally granted: others seem to strongly feel the current state is preferable. I would welcome discussion about how to achieve better consensus on this issue.
I would quibble with this statement a little bit. There is a difference in my mind between raising the notability bar and granting weight to subject requests for deletion. There seems to be a growing agreement that marginally notable subjects make for bad biographies and greater risk; there is very little appetite for beginning deletion discussions or deleting articles upon subject request.
So these two issues need to be separated, because indeed they are quite separate.
Totally agreed, yes - thanks Nathan. In future I will separate these two points.
One asks whether the subject of an article (be it a person,
corporation, or any other entity with living representatives) should be afforded some control over encyclopedia content, even as little as the ability to request a deletion nomination; most Wikipedians would be against this, I believe.
Hm. That's interesting.
As a basic principle, that makes sense to me - that article subjects shouldn't have control over the content of the encyclopedia. But -perhaps this is a little bit of hair-splitting- OTOH I don't think we should take deletion requests any _less_ seriously than complaints from disinterested observers. In other words - someone saying "the article about me is awful and shouldn't be in an encyclopedia" should be taken equally as seriously as someone saying "that article about X is awful and doesn't deserve to be in an encyclopedia." In both instances, the article needs be assessed on its own merits.
I say this because sometimes I think people may be tempted to refuse deletion requests _because_ they come from the article subject. If that indeed happens, I believe it's a mistake.
The other issue, of marginal notability and the risk it poses to Wikipedia, is much more relevant for this discussion.
Yes. I would love to see it discussed more here :-)
We should take it as seriously as we would any other statement from someone with Conflict of interest--seriously, but with great caution. It does not have the usual presumption of encyclopedic purpose.
On Mon, Mar 9, 2009 at 5:59 PM, Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org wrote:
2009/3/8 Nathan nawrich@gmail.com:
On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 5:12 PM, Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org wrote:
- There is a big unresolved question around whether, if
marginally-notable people ask to have their articles deleted, that request should be granted. My sense -both from the discussion here and other discussions elsewhere- is that many Wikipedians are very strongly protective of their general right to retain even very marginal BLPs. Presumably this is because notability is hard to define, and they are worried about stupid across-the-board interpretations that will result in massive deletionism. However, other people strongly feel that the current quantity of BLPs about less-notable people diminish the overall quality of the encyclopedia, reduce our credibility, and run the risk of hurting real people. There seems to be little consensus here. Roughly: some people seem to strongly feel the bar for notability should be set higher, and deletion requests generally granted: others seem to strongly feel the current state is preferable. I would welcome discussion about how to achieve better consensus on this issue.
I would quibble with this statement a little bit. There is a difference in my mind between raising the notability bar and granting weight to subject requests for deletion. There seems to be a growing agreement that marginally notable subjects make for bad biographies and greater risk; there is very little appetite for beginning deletion discussions or deleting articles upon subject request.
So these two issues need to be separated, because indeed they are quite separate.
Totally agreed, yes - thanks Nathan. In future I will separate these two points.
One asks whether the subject of an article (be it a person,
corporation, or any other entity with living representatives) should be afforded some control over encyclopedia content, even as little as the ability to request a deletion nomination; most Wikipedians would be against this, I believe.
Hm. That's interesting.
As a basic principle, that makes sense to me - that article subjects shouldn't have control over the content of the encyclopedia. But -perhaps this is a little bit of hair-splitting- OTOH I don't think we should take deletion requests any _less_ seriously than complaints from disinterested observers. In other words - someone saying "the article about me is awful and shouldn't be in an encyclopedia" should be taken equally as seriously as someone saying "that article about X is awful and doesn't deserve to be in an encyclopedia." In both instances, the article needs be assessed on its own merits.
I say this because sometimes I think people may be tempted to refuse deletion requests _because_ they come from the article subject. If that indeed happens, I believe it's a mistake.
The other issue, of marginal notability and the risk it poses to Wikipedia, is much more relevant for this discussion.
Yes. I would love to see it discussed more here :-)
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Sue Gardner wrote:
And 4) I believe there is general support for the notion of training Wikipedians to handle BLP issues well. I personally strongly believe that handling BLPs requires a set of specific skills and abilities – for example, an excellent understanding of core Wikipedia policies; experience with policies such as notability that are particularly important in BLP issues; diplomacy, kindness and patience. I am very interested in exploring further how the Foundation could support such training, and how it could be scaled up so everyone could access it. (I've been kicking around notions such as face-to-face training camps; training at Wikimania and the all-chapters meetings; the provision of support materials to chapters; monthly “train the trainer” webcast sessions, etc.)
I think one of the things that we've never done well at all is to actually teach people how to go about creating an encyclopedia, a dictionary, a textbook, a newspaper, and so on. We've only set up a space where people learn by doing, with one result being that we've privileged those who are autodidacts. The oft-noted inadequacy of our help documentation is a manifestation of this issue. Addressing usability challenges, as we're now doing, is one avenue to dealing with it, but I think content problems like this are another side of that underlying weakness.
Neutral point of view is an excellent concept, and helps keep Wikipedia from going off the rails in many respects. But some of the other concepts that have crept into our policies, like "notability" or "coatracks", while possibly useful in fending off various abuses, are really poor placeholders substituting for the fact that most of us lack training in the kind of writing and editing we're trying to do. So we end up borrowing approaches to writing from essays and research papers, which many of us do know how to do, and we do editing in the copyediting sense, but there are levels of writing and editing we have yet to reach.
I think training is a good idea. I think many regular contributors would be happy to get some training if they saw how it could help them contribute more effectively. I believe there is some portion of our audience with a similar willingness to support the projects, but who would only feel prepared to contribute if they got the training beforehand, instead of getting involved first and trained afterward. It appears to me that the community has not found its way to developing the training needed (not surprising if many of us do not have it). Which brings me to the questions that we need to answer: What kind of training is needed, how can the Wikimedia Foundation help assemble it, and what is the most effective way to disseminate it?
--Michael Snow
On Sun, Mar 8, 2009 at 11:12 PM, Sue Gardner sgardner@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi folks,
This is just a quick interim update on the BLP issue I raised here last week.
First, there seems to be a general view that BLPs are a problem that is worth addressing. I won't recap all the reasons for that, because it seems there is ---happpily--- already consensus.
With consensus or not the problem is urgent most of all because people with *poor* biography consider the cancellation an insult and would proceed in a legal point of view (I don't understand with which type of motion) (in Italian Wikipedia it's already a daily problem).
Surely these people will not stop their activity after the acceptance of their biography and they are a potential source of legal problems connected with defamation or calumny.
With consensus or not I hope that WMF, as legal responsible of servers, would proceed at least to awaken the communities to accept more strict rules for biography of living people.
Ilario
Sue Gardner wrote:
So .. that is my rough, quick recap of where I think we're at.
In terms of next steps – as I said, I'll be speaking about this issue with the board in early April. This is just an interim note: Please feel free to help me further my thinking on all this -particularly #1 and #4 above- over the next few weeks. And thank you for your help thus far.
Thanks, Sue
Amen to this and thank you for the recap Sue. There were too many emails to follow, so I did not read it all. I am curious to know if there is a wiki page somewhere, summarizing the major points (and differences) between the different languages BLP policies (and actually, if there is or not a BLP policy...).
Did someone create that comparison page ?
Ant
On Mon, Mar 9, 2009 at 7:16 AM, Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
I am curious to know if there is a wiki page somewhere, summarizing the major points (and differences) between the different languages BLP policies (and actually, if there is or not a BLP policy...).
Did someone create that comparison page ?
Ant
Talk about a way to get involved in meta and win the eternal gratitude of the wikicommunity! I agree such a page would be super helpful. File this with my request to start a meta page summarizing the arguments on both sides of the licensing debate :)
-- phoebe
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