I'm sorry but I find it pretty inappropriate that a chapter published such strong words about volunteers of a Wikimedia Project *"certain legal fetishism whose reason gets lost in processes and misses the outcome".*
I'm speaking on my behalf, however as a former board member of a Wikimedia Chapter I would never ever publish such a text, it's uncalled for and inappropriate to judge so strongly volunteers who dededicate their time for our common mission "Free educational knowledge" http://www.wikimedia.org/.
As a Wikimedia Commons volunteer I'm disappointed by the process followed by some chapters, i.e. which have chosen to bypass the community and send a letter directly to the board of trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation. However, I must say I would have prefered the chapters to talk with the principal stakeholders, i.e. all the communities. I know, said chapters are not forced to talk with the communities but It is rather ironical, when "ignoring the stakeholder" is a blame that I have heard a lot this month :p I believe the community as a whole is capable of complex discussion and decision as proven by the *Trademark policy consultation*, or the *reclaim community logo discussions*.
The thing that sadden the most is that I believe discussion on the URAA application is important movement wide (and also for the spread of free knowledge), however this discussion doesn't start on a good process and some letters were not mellow.
I know people might not share my point of view on how we should work together as a movement, however I wanted to state it. That being said, it doesn't change all the good work done by WMIL, WMES, WMAR, and I'll be happy to talk with anyone of you guys around a drink the next time we can meet to share our vision of the movement.
*Disclaimer:* I'm writting on my own capacity, my opinion as an administrator (and oversighter) on Commons is that I'm pretty neutral on the URAA matter, what I want and need is a community consensus to apply when I'm using the tools the Community gave me.
Sincerely, Pierre-Selim
2014-02-24 21:51 GMT+01:00 Galileo Vidoni galio2k@gmail.com:
Dear movement fellows,
Wikimedia Argentina would like to express its support for the letter by Wikimedia Israel regarding URAA-motivated massive content deletions in Wikimedia Commons. Yet, we would like to express our view not only to the Foundation BoT but also to all Wikimedia editors, and especially to those working in Wikimedia Commons.
Volunteers from Argentina have been among the most affected by the policy adopted by Wikimedia Commons administrators regarding images that could fall under URAA copyright provisions. Argentine copyright law provides that images enter the public domain "only" 25 years after their production and 20 after their first documented publication. This relatively generous criterion has enabled unaffiliated volunteers and we as Wikimedia Argentina to enrich Commons with hundreds of thousands of historical images that are absolutely free under Argentine law: images of the political and every day life of the country, of its culture, of its popular idols, of its joyful and dark days, of its customs and architecture.
However, over the last months certain Wikimedia Commons administrators have conducted massive deletions of these contents, in many cases involving entire categories. The burden of proof has been inverted: instead of having to justify the deletion of a certain file, things go that volunteers have to devout their time trying to justify the validity of their efforts. This has caused great damage, not only by way of our readers loosing access to free educational contents, but also de-motivating many editors and volunteers by making them feel that their efforts are ultimately vain and that our goal of free knowledge for everyone is being replaced by a certain legal fetishism whose reason gets lost in processes and misses the outcome.
We acknowledge that the Wikimedia Foundation BoT and its Legal team have repeatedly stated, as has been reinforced in recent communications, that images shouldn't be deleted unless we receive a takedown notice, and that it has not received a single URAA-motivated notice to date. Certain Wikimedia Commons administrators have dismissed the Foundation's statement as a mere opinion vis-à-vis the SCOTUS ruling. Yet, it is an opinion by the organization that is legally responsible for the contents being hosted in Wikimedia Commons.
We respectfully call the Wikimedia Commons community to reflect on the practical consequences of its current policy on URAA's implementation. Those files generating potential conflict could be even identified as such without the need for a pre-emptive deletion. And we would like the Commons community to reflect not only on the preventive loss of free contents we are generating, but also on the harmful disconnection between Wikimedia Commons and all of the other Wikimedia projects it serves as media repository, mostly Wikipedia.
Many years ago, the editors of the Spanish Wikipedia decided to close the possibility to directly host images, choosing instead to use Wikimedia Commons. If we miss the opportunity to find a workaround that saves hundreds of thousands of images from an unrequested deletion that hurts our very mission, Wikipedia editors could ultimately evaluate reversing that decision, reopening "project-hosted" uploads just to avoid the restrictive and exclusionary URAA interpretation that Wikimedia Commons has been sustaining against the Foundation's political and legal advice. That would be far from being an optimal outcome.
We are sure that we as the broader community of Wikimedia volunteers can find a common ground that permits to adapt to all legal conditions and challenges while putting in the first place the fulfillment of our goal towards free knowledge.
Approved by the Board of Wikimedia Argentina on February 22, 2014 _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
2014-02-26 13:26 GMT+01:00 Pierre-Selim pierre-selim@huard.info:
As a Wikimedia Commons volunteer I'm disappointed by the process followed by some chapters, i.e. which have chosen to bypass the community and send a letter directly to the board of trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation. However, I must say I would have prefered the chapters to talk with the principal stakeholders, i.e. all the communities. I know, said chapters are not forced to talk with the communities but It is rather ironical, when "ignoring the stakeholder" is a blame that I have heard a lot this month :p
WM-IL and the other chapters have posted a text on meta, saying what they think. I don't know how this counts as "bypassing the community", isn't Meta the place where the community discuss? That said, it is not the first time I see strong opinions in a discussion within our community.
Also note, that these open letters do not imply any decision (as the board resolution, which you are referring to, did).
C
Maybe it's a cultural issue, does e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_letter have a geopolitically limited point of view? Open letters are a common tool of *discussion* with the public (= community in our case) in the corners of the world that I know best.
Nemo
On 26 February 2014 13:51, Federico Leva (Nemo) nemowiki@gmail.com wrote:
Maybe it's a cultural issue, does e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_letter have a geopolitically limited point of view? Open letters are a common tool of *discussion* with the public (= community in our case) in the corners of the world that I know best.
As a major unpaid Commons contributor, I find these emotive and political emails to lists and open letters elsewhere confusing and rather wasteful of the good faith volunteer effort behind them.
If anyone wants to create meaningful and lasting change to Commons, then please create a Request for Comment on Commons[1] rather than making a fuss and criticising Commons (volunteer) administrators in non-Commons discussion channels, which most Commons volunteers are unlikely to either notice or care much about.
For Chapters, I suggest you check who among your active volunteers are most active on Commons[2] and ask them to help engage or create discussion about policy and guideline changes. If you cannot find anyone close to your chapter that is active and engaged on Commons, perhaps you should change that situation before firing off official letters.
Links: 1. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:RFC 2. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Fae/Userlist
Fae
On 26 February 2014 16:46, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
If anyone wants to create meaningful and lasting change to Commons, then please create a Request for Comment on Commons[1] rather than making a fuss and criticising Commons (volunteer) administrators in non-Commons discussion channels, which most Commons volunteers are unlikely to either notice or care much about.
The trouble with your proposed course of action is that it seems the action *least* likely to resolve the problem.
Commons is at a stage where the problems with its approach can only be worked around.
- d.
On 26 February 2014 17:07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 26 February 2014 16:46, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
If anyone wants to create meaningful and lasting change to Commons, then please create a Request for Comment on Commons[1] rather than making a fuss and criticising Commons (volunteer) administrators in non-Commons discussion channels, which most Commons volunteers are unlikely to either notice or care much about.
The trouble with your proposed course of action is that it seems the action *least* likely to resolve the problem.
Commons is at a stage where the problems with its approach can only be worked around.
No David. It is just the least dramatic approach. As for the mantra "OMG Commons is broken", you wore out that record a long time ago.
Those using channels elsewhere to create noise and heat, can hardly be considered to be using their time to help us reach a community consensus if deliberately avoiding the community they are targeting.
Folks, dust off your Wikimedia Commons accounts, and log in. You can start by raising your issues at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:VP rather than by sending emails or writing in other places where Commons volunteers are never going to read your opinion.
Fae
Hi,
2014-02-26 22:56 GMT+05:30 Fæ faewik@gmail.com:
On 26 February 2014 17:07, David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 26 February 2014 16:46, Fæ faewik@gmail.com wrote:
If anyone wants to create meaningful and lasting change to Commons, then please create a Request for Comment on Commons[1] rather than making a fuss and criticising Commons (volunteer) administrators in non-Commons discussion channels, which most Commons volunteers are unlikely to either notice or care much about.
The trouble with your proposed course of action is that it seems the action *least* likely to resolve the problem.
Commons is at a stage where the problems with its approach can only be worked around.
No David. It is just the least dramatic approach. As for the mantra "OMG Commons is broken", you wore out that record a long time ago.
Those using channels elsewhere to create noise and heat, can hardly be considered to be using their time to help us reach a community consensus if deliberately avoiding the community they are targeting.
Folks, dust off your Wikimedia Commons accounts, and log in. You can start by raising your issues at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:VP rather than by sending emails or writing in other places where Commons volunteers are never going to read your opinion.
On this, I agree (at least partially) with David. If only some Commons admins were not pursuing a political campaign to delete URAA-affected files under false pretences, everything would be much better.
I am not saying (yet) that Commons cannot be fixed, but there is certainly wrong there.
I am thankful to the board who, in its last statement, has taken a position allowing the community to find a solution to these files. However some admins continue to ignore that, and to oppose any kind of proposition. This needs to change. If these admins didn't take that position, no chapter would have felt the need to send such letters.
Regards,
Yann
On 26 February 2014 17:55, Yann Forget yannfo@gmail.com wrote: ...
On this, I agree (at least partially) with David. If only some Commons admins were not pursuing a political campaign to delete URAA-affected files under false pretences, everything would be much better.
If you have the evidence that individual troublesome Commons admins are disrupting Commons against the aims of the project, then desysop them.
As you know Yann, Commons has a simple governance process compared to most other Wikimedia projects, as described at https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Administrators/De-adminship. After the required /on-project/ discussion, the number of desysop votes needed would be fewer than the number of active members of most Chapters as it only needs a 50% majority to take effect.
Fae
2014-02-26 23:39 GMT+05:30 Fæ faewik@gmail.com:
On 26 February 2014 17:55, Yann Forget yannfo@gmail.com wrote: ...
On this, I agree (at least partially) with David. If only some Commons admins were not pursuing a political campaign to delete URAA-affected
files
under false pretences, everything would be much better.
If you have the evidence that individual troublesome Commons admins are disrupting Commons against the aims of the project, then desysop them.
Hopefully, we will not go that far. The debate is still going on.
Yann
I really expect to not being, what in Brazil we call as "jogar lenha na fogueira" ("throw fuel on the fire" in a literal translation) but...
The question here is something that the Board of Trustees known since 2007 [1], when it raised firstly by Wikisource volunteers: what to do with works still protected in USA but PD-old on country of origin?
They finally remembered to research for legal advice for better alternates than making forks only recently, getting an answer more than one year ago [2].
So instead of communities fighting against communities we must demand that the Wikimedia Foundation really research on ways to proper support free knowledge in all countries, acting more quickly, instead of ignoring such subjects as they are shamefully doing until now.
Or it will end as some suggested to me back in 2007: every national groups making local forks and stopping to contribute in a global platform.
[[:m:User:555]]
[1] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?diff=639122&oldid=619743
[2] - https://meta.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=5216837
On Wed, Feb 26, 2014 at 3:29 PM, Yann Forget yannfo@gmail.com wrote:
2014-02-26 23:39 GMT+05:30 Fæ faewik@gmail.com:
On 26 February 2014 17:55, Yann Forget yannfo@gmail.com wrote: ...
On this, I agree (at least partially) with David. If only some Commons admins were not pursuing a political campaign to delete URAA-affected
files
under false pretences, everything would be much better.
If you have the evidence that individual troublesome Commons admins are disrupting Commons against the aims of the project, then desysop them.
Hopefully, we will not go that far. The debate is still going on.
Yann _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Fæ, 26/02/2014 17:46:
For Chapters, I suggest you check who among your active volunteers are most active on Commons[2] and ask them to help engage or create discussion about policy and guideline changes. If you cannot find anyone close to your chapter that is active and engaged on Commons, perhaps you should change that situation before firing off official letters.
As for WMIT, we're considering to write one letter too and of course we'll give maximum priority to the opinion and advice of our members who are active on Commons and Wikisource. I've not reviewed the exact wording of each letter to ensure they don't attack/offend Commons: they certainly should not, the hard-working and backlog-overwhelmed Commons users are jewels; but I think on-wiki essays, including open letters, are an entirely legitimate method for any person or group to freely express their opinion on any Wikimedia topic. Especially on Meta-Wiki, freedom of opinion and expression from all wikimedians is highly valued.
Nemo
wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org