Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Whatever the earliest editors did has long been superseded by liberal bias. (It was nearly impossible to insert even neutral information about Hillary Clinton into her article) It is important to stay in the US unless you wish to experience what lack of an enforced constitutional guarantee of free speech means in practice.
Fred Bauder
Hoi, I hope your argument holds true. I sincerely do but I have severe reservations that this will remain so.When you accept how the press is treated, citizens are next. There are already proposals of a police that has even wider authority to use brutal measures when there is a protest.
When the question is do I trust our community, our movement, I do. When the question is do I see the USA as a good example of the free world, no. Thanks, GerardM
On 27 January 2017 at 19:48, FRED BAUDER fredbaud@fairpoint.net wrote:
Whatever the earliest editors did has long been superseded by liberal bias. (It was nearly impossible to insert even neutral information about Hillary Clinton into her article) It is important to stay in the US unless you wish to experience what lack of an enforced constitutional guarantee of free speech means in practice.
Fred Bauder
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wik i/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
What a coincidence! "longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics" was the name of the band I saw last week at the local pub. They weren't very good though - I liked their earlier stuff.
On Fri, 27 Jan 2017 at 19:39, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding,
pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side
trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least
in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former
public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the
situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the
bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely,
Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ----
Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100
From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com
To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with
knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as
result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before
something can be published about this topic, the government needs to
approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship.
Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad,
out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in
the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who
is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did
not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand,
apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based
organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and
the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment,
disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure
Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this
still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom
of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where
the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I
do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would
actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world.
Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the
knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should
think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and
should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines
New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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LopeCosby used to be xx legit before their Soylent Green period. Not surprised their depressed fans would turn to petty counterfactualism.
//$
On Jan 27, 2017 2:08 PM, "Liam Wyatt" liamwyatt@gmail.com wrote:
What a coincidence! "longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics" was the name of the band I saw last week at the local pub. They weren't very good though - I liked their earlier stuff.
On Fri, 27 Jan 2017 at 19:39, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding,
pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side
trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least
in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former
public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the
situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the
bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely,
Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ----
Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100
From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com
To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with
knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as
result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that
before
something can be published about this topic, the government needs to
approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship.
Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad,
out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers
in
the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation,
who
is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did
not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand,
apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based
organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and
the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment,
disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure
Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this
still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech,
freedom
of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where
the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I
do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would
actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world.
Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the
knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should
think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right
and
should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
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New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org
Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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Fred,
Whatever the earliest editors did has long been superseded by liberal bias.
"Classically" liberal, as in libertarian trickle-down economics, have been strongly reinforced including recently. Have you seen the cadre of editors who protect their walled gardens of Mises Institute-sourced economics articles? Fair Tax is a good example, pure trickle-down advocacy with a dozen articles on it, so carefully curated that Fair Tax would come up first in "Suggested articles" before they realized it could be gamed like that and turned it off:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wiki-research-l/2016-November/005496.h...
It was nearly impossible to insert even neutral information about Hillary Clinton into her article
That is obviously hyperbole. Her article at the end of October has a six paragraph "Whitewater and other investigations" section mentioning no less than eleven scandals and linking to four summary style sub-articles. There are also separate "Email controversy" and "Clinton Foundation and speeches" sections, each with their own sub-articles.
Fred, remember when you proposed banning me for calling the medical credentials of a Department of Defense employee who claimed to be a doctor in to question after repeated deletions of my edits supported by MEDRS-quality sources that breathing uranium fumes is dangerous? I still feel that you treated me unfairly, and you may be interested to see that the controversy is still ongoing but slowly turning in favor of the MEDRS literature's position:
http://www.bandepleteduranium.org/en/latest-news
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 11:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Hello,
I'd like to talk beyond this particular instance or these particular protagonists.
I'd like to talk about culture. We've created a culture that is hard on people, somewhat punishing of them. We engage in a good deal of public shaming.
We need to find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse. If we fail, smart, good, healthy Wikimedians will go away and not add their knowledge to our projects.
It’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party:
- “It’s the dysfunctional board.” - “No, no. it’s the “toxic communities”. - “Of course not, its the obtuse staff”.
First, this is not healthy and it is not true. We have smart, brilliant, competent people throughout our movement. I’ve met brilliant, generative, empathic community members who have performed a deep service by adding their knowledge. I’ve met brilliant staff members that are advancing ideas that can have tremendously positive impacts on our projects. I’ve met brilliant board members who are thinking about the future in a very serious way.
Second, it does us no good to shift the blame around and work against each other. We have to find ways to support each other in solving problems because we have a lot of important problems to solve together.
We face so many challenges, not least of which is a world that seems to think that closed societies and ignorance and divisions are better than open societies, coursing with knowledge and constructive unity. Of the many challenges we face together: being collectively diminishing of one another and divisive should not be one of them.
Sorry, I just can’t keep quiet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_DvGP6Y4jQ on this any more.
/a
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 10:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Anna, I am surprised at your pessimism
I see cases over and over again how we "find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse"
See how our Armenian friends is doing wonders turning their closest surrounding into being open in a very tough culture
remember how our Bangladesh friends managed to get their orglicense from authorities without paying bribes, just being true to our culture
read almost every week how we manage to get the GLAM sector into being more cooperative and positive to disseminating knowledge with inspiration from us
Please do not concentrate too much on enwp and US
Anders
Den 2017-01-27 kl. 20:50, skrev Anna Stillwell:
Hello,
I'd like to talk beyond this particular instance or these particular protagonists.
I'd like to talk about culture. We've created a culture that is hard on people, somewhat punishing of them. We engage in a good deal of public shaming.
We need to find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse. If we fail, smart, good, healthy Wikimedians will go away and not add their knowledge to our projects.
It’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party:
- “It’s the dysfunctional board.” - “No, no. it’s the “toxic communities”. - “Of course not, its the obtuse staff”.First, this is not healthy and it is not true. We have smart, brilliant, competent people throughout our movement. I’ve met brilliant, generative, empathic community members who have performed a deep service by adding their knowledge. I’ve met brilliant staff members that are advancing ideas that can have tremendously positive impacts on our projects. I’ve met brilliant board members who are thinking about the future in a very serious way.
Second, it does us no good to shift the blame around and work against each other. We have to find ways to support each other in solving problems because we have a lot of important problems to solve together.
We face so many challenges, not least of which is a world that seems to think that closed societies and ignorance and divisions are better than open societies, coursing with knowledge and constructive unity. Of the many challenges we face together: being collectively diminishing of one another and divisive should not be one of them.
Sorry, I just can’t keep quiet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_DvGP6Y4jQ on this any more.
/a
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 10:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Anna, you are talking about a decade old problems, which are not yet addressed.
There are two exceptions: (1) Board largely stopped making shame transfer statements; and (2) For the last couple of years, every interaction with the staff has given impression to me that I deal with competent professionals.
Although it wouldn't be that significant advancement for an average organization, having in mind the complexity of the Wikimedia movement, I have to say that I am in a way content. It was relaxing to me to realize that, for example, the latest visit do Ghana addressed everything basically needed.
However, those old problems are still here. Numerous tries to solve them properly have been mostly implicitly undermined. Sometimes because of lack of support, sometimes because of making more or less visible barriers. And it's not about community which blocks it, but about those in power.
It is extremely important to understand that position of power brings more responsibility. The position of power doesn't need to be "absolute" (i.e. Board members; yes, I know it's not absolute, that's why I used quotes); in many cases, it's very relative and it's sometimes hard to distinguish (who has more power on English Wikipedia: a WMF employee or an ArbCom member). However, in the most of the cases, it's very visible: an ordinary Wikipedia editor, not willing to be organized in a chapter or a user group, has power to vote few times per year and power to *edit*. While the first power is very relative, only real power which that editor has is to edit.
That leads to sticking with the only real power and alienation from all other segments of the Wikimedia movement. An average active editor of Wikimedia projects most likely have very negative opinion towards anyone else than the fellow editors.
Making equation between Board, staff and community is false because it's about very different levels of responsibility. Urging to the community to do something won't be treated serious as long as they have to abandon their rights (even it's about abandoning practically non-existent rights) as long as all of their power -- to elect the guardians of their community -- is mostly about broken promises. And the system has been made in the way that the promises will be always broken.
The story of WMF (both, Board and staff) reminds me a lot of the story of US Democratic Party and the centrist parties all over the Europe: forcing business as usual as long as it is possible, no matter if it's been done by ignoring the voices, searching for pseudoscientific conclusions based on techniques that work when you want to sell marketing services, but not so much when you want to address the concerns of the population you lead.
Fortunately, we are not in the position that "everything has been lost" and we could change it. But that would be possible just if there is political will inside of the WMF to do that.
Last year this time we've witnessed the revolution, the power of staff to replace ED. Around the end of the event, I was assured that the staff will be the stakeholder that would lead the change. If there were changes during the last year, they are invisible.
Long time ago -- at the beginning of this century -- we've invented large scale constructive participatory democracy. Instead of using it, instead of nurturing it, developing it, those in power neglected it at the best, and actively obstructed it at the worst.
There are methods and models how to do that. I have my own preferences, but I -- and the majority of editors, I am sure -- would be quite fine with anything which works. And, no, limiting editors to the decision of which image would be the first on the article about toilet paper orientation is not one of the viable models. No, limiting them to make decisions about the rules for deciding which image would be the first in any article is neither a viable model.
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 8:50 PM, Anna Stillwell astillwell@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hello,
I'd like to talk beyond this particular instance or these particular protagonists.
I'd like to talk about culture. We've created a culture that is hard on people, somewhat punishing of them. We engage in a good deal of public shaming.
We need to find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse. If we fail, smart, good, healthy Wikimedians will go away and not add their knowledge to our projects.
It’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party:
- “It’s the dysfunctional board.”
- “No, no. it’s the “toxic communities”.
- “Of course not, its the obtuse staff”.
First, this is not healthy and it is not true. We have smart, brilliant, competent people throughout our movement. I’ve met brilliant, generative, empathic community members who have performed a deep service by adding their knowledge. I’ve met brilliant staff members that are advancing ideas that can have tremendously positive impacts on our projects. I’ve met brilliant board members who are thinking about the future in a very serious way.
Second, it does us no good to shift the blame around and work against each other. We have to find ways to support each other in solving problems because we have a lot of important problems to solve together.
We face so many challenges, not least of which is a world that seems to think that closed societies and ignorance and divisions are better than open societies, coursing with knowledge and constructive unity. Of the many challenges we face together: being collectively diminishing of one another and divisive should not be one of them.
Sorry, I just can’t keep quiet https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_DvGP6Y4jQ on this any more.
/a
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 10:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that before something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers in the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation, who is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech, freedom of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right and should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
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-- "If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it." - Margaret Fuller
Anna Stillwell Director of Culture Wikimedia Foundation 415.806.1536 *www.wikimediafoundation.org http://www.wikimediafoundation.org* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
Anna
I propose to challenge your comments "t’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party"
There is a difference between fault, responsibility and accountability. Just saying we are all at fault is as meaningful or meaningless, and as useless, as saying that we are none of us at fault. The question is, who is responsible for doing what, to whom are they accountable for doing it, and how well or badly have they done what they are responsible for?
You say "We've created a culture that is hard on people". Which culture do you mean? Is it the working culture within the WMF? Or one, some or all of the hundreds of volunteer projects? How were those cultures created and why did they evolve as they did? Did anyone create them, if if "we" did, who are "we" in this context? Is it everyone equally? Do you think that a Director of Culture and Collaboration might have more responsibility and more impact than one of the hundred thousand or so active volunteer content contributors, or the billion or so users?
What do you propose that the Foundation and Community actually do to support each other?
"Rogol"
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 7:50 PM, Anna Stillwell astillwell@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hello,
I'd like to talk beyond this particular instance or these particular protagonists.
I'd like to talk about culture. We've created a culture that is hard on people, somewhat punishing of them. We engage in a good deal of public shaming.
We need to find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse. If we fail, smart, good, healthy Wikimedians will go away and not add their knowledge to our projects.
It’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party:
- “It’s the dysfunctional board.”
- “No, no. it’s the “toxic communities”.
- “Of course not, its the obtuse staff”.
First, this is not healthy and it is not true. We have smart, brilliant, competent people throughout our movement. I’ve met brilliant, generative, empathic community members who have performed a deep service by adding their knowledge. I’ve met brilliant staff members that are advancing ideas that can have tremendously positive impacts on our projects. I’ve met brilliant board members who are thinking about the future in a very serious way.
Second, it does us no good to shift the blame around and work against each other. We have to find ways to support each other in solving problems because we have a lot of important problems to solve together.
We face so many challenges, not least of which is a world that seems to think that closed societies and ignorance and divisions are better than open societies, coursing with knowledge and constructive unity. Of the many challenges we face together: being collectively diminishing of one another and divisive should not be one of them.
Sorry, I just can’t keep quiet https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=v_DvGP6Y4jQ on this any more.
/a
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 10:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that
before
something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data abroad, out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on servers
in
the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation,
who
is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I did not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia and the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make sure Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech,
freedom
of information, etc are important, I would think that the location where the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the largest, I do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the world. Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right
and
should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- "If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it." - Margaret Fuller
Anna Stillwell Director of Culture Wikimedia Foundation 415.806.1536 *www.wikimediafoundation.org http://www.wikimediafoundation.org* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
“Rogol”,
Now that you’ve told me on another thread that “Rogol” is a fictitious name, I feel that I’ve entered a world of international intrigue. Lord knows my Saturday could use the excitement.
Sometimes it may take some time before I can respond. They keep me fairly busy here.
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 2:11 PM, Rogol Domedonfors domedonfors@gmail.com wrote:
Anna
I propose to challenge your comments "t’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I talk to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone other than themselves is the responsible party"
There is a difference between fault, responsibility and accountability.
This is a good point. I’m glad you’ve made it. It adds to this discussion and my own thinking. Certainly errors can be fixed through an articulation of accountabilities, if a lack of accountabilities are part of the underlying reason for the problem.
Just saying we are all at fault is as meaningful or meaningless, and as useless, as saying that we are none of us at fault.
I wouldn't go so far as to say the statement is meaningless when applied to our collective discourse.
Let’s apply “fault, responsibility, and accountability" to our collective discourse. When applied to this particular case—our collective discourse on email threads—then might the questions become, Who is at fault for our collective discourse on email threads? Who is responsible for our collective discourse on email threads? Who is accountable for our collective discourse on email threads?
In collective discourse... everyone is. We are all accountable for how we engage in civil discourse. But I've already expressed this as an absolute and I understand that you are trying to get me to look at the relatives, and wisely so.
The question is, who is responsible for doing what, to whom are they accountable for doing it, and how well or badly have they done what they are responsible for?
I want to understand this point. Are you talking about issues like who moderates the threads or who articulates the practices for email threads?
Also, I wonder, do you have your own answers to these questions? Have you thought about this subject yourself, Rogol? If so, I’d really like to hear your thoughts on fault, responsibility, accountability and collective discourse.
You say "We've created a culture that is hard on people". Which culture do you mean?
Thank you for requesting that I be more specific. Generalizations can be useful in problem solving, but only in certain phases. I am specifically referring to email threads, and in this particular instance wikimedia-l.
However, I have seen this kind of discourse in other places... talk pages (largely enwp where I edit), phabricator tickets, IRC.
Is it the working culture within the WMF? Or one, some or all of the hundreds of volunteer projects? How were those cultures created and why did they evolve as they did? Did anyone create them, if if "we" did, who are "we" in this context?
I think these are another series of very useful questions. Part of the reason it took me time to respond is because I’ve been contemplating your questions. They were not at the front of my mind all week, but they were on the “back burner” https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/backburner.
I’ve come to suspect that you have something to teach me in this regard. Would you be willing to offer me a history of what you’ve seen and heard and some origin stories (e.g., who created them, the relevant “we”).
Is it everyone equally?
You brought this up earlier in your email, at least that is how I read your initial statement about fault, accountabilities and responsibilities. I suspect that you have a different point of view and your view is likely more informed on movement history, structures, and dynamics. So I would like to understand your take. If you’re willing to offer it, I’d like to hear it.
Do you think that a Director of Culture and Collaboration might have more responsibility and more impact than one of the hundred thousand or so active volunteer content contributors, or the billion or so users?
I am very aware of the scope of my purview: I am the Director of Culture for the Wikimedia Foundation, and I’ve largely approached even that role through influence rather than command... “nudge and cajole”, not “command and control.” If I were to imagine myself the Director of Culture for the movement, I would also need to imagine myself arrogant, ill-informed, and grandiose, a vision of myself that I admittedly defend against.
But how do you see it, Rogol? Is there something that you would like from me in this regard? Is there some course of action that you are hoping to see from me? How shall I serve you?
What do you propose that the Foundation and Community actually do to support each other?
You are practical, yet another good quality.
On my end, I’m thinking about some kind of modular “community service” training for foundation staff. I’m not committing to anything right now, because I wouldn’t go it alone (other people with other high-priority agendas would need to be consulted and involved). I’m just thinking.
The reason I responded on this thread is because I thought that Salsman's post:
- was framed with a leading question https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leading_question. - was filled with a good deal of speculation https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/speculate (definition #2). - strikes me as mild affront to undue weight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources_and_undue_weight, though I do not believe that’s a norm of this list. Minority views on this list could be *very* important. I just don’t think this one is. Besides, the political persuasions of early editors cannot and *should not* be known. - seemed to be a circumspect form of argumentum ad hominem https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem, particularly when linked to a tweet discussing Rex Tillerson https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033’s favorite political philosopher (though I struggle to credit Objectivism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand) as a philosophy), as JW bears no relationship to Tillerson. - and I don't believe that the post was meant to solve any kind of problem. Sure, that’s a high bar to set, but it's on my mind.
None of that strikes me as constructive discourse and sets a low bar for the kinds of discussions we could have here. If we could start by not doing that, I think that would be a good first step.
Thank you for taking your precious time to engage with me in conversation. I know time is limited for us all, and that you've spent some of yours to help advance our projects is quite meaningful to me.
/a
"Rogol"
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 7:50 PM, Anna Stillwell astillwell@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hello,
I'd like to talk beyond this particular instance or these particular protagonists.
I'd like to talk about culture. We've created a culture that is hard on people, somewhat punishing of them. We engage in a good deal of public shaming.
We need to find a way to turn our culture toward more generative and constructive forms of public discourse. If we fail, smart, good, healthy Wikimedians will go away and not add their knowledge to our projects.
It’s not even about whose at fault anymore, because we all are. When I
talk
to people across the movement, they're all pretty clear that someone
other
than themselves is the responsible party:
- “It’s the dysfunctional board.”
- “No, no. it’s the “toxic communities”.
- “Of course not, its the obtuse staff”.
First, this is not healthy and it is not true. We have smart, brilliant, competent people throughout our movement. I’ve met brilliant, generative, empathic community members who have performed a deep service by adding their knowledge. I’ve met brilliant staff members that are advancing
ideas
that can have tremendously positive impacts on our projects. I’ve met brilliant board members who are thinking about the future in a very
serious
way.
Second, it does us no good to shift the blame around and work against
each
other. We have to find ways to support each other in solving problems because we have a lot of important problems to solve together.
We face so many challenges, not least of which is a world that seems to think that closed societies and ignorance and divisions are better than open societies, coursing with knowledge and constructive unity. Of the
many
challenges we face together: being collectively diminishing of one
another
and divisive should not be one of them.
Sorry, I just can’t keep quiet https://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=v_DvGP6Y4jQ on this any more.
/a
On Fri, Jan 27, 2017 at 10:39 AM, James Salsman jsalsman@gmail.com wrote:
Does anyone doubt that the English Wikipedia's longstanding, pervasive, counter-factual, systemic bias towards supply side trickle-down austerity libertarian objectivist economics due at least in part to early influence of editors attracted to Jimmy Wales' former public positions isn't at least partially responsible for the situation Romaine describes below?
Would it be better to move the Foundation out of the U.S., fix the bias, or both?
https://twitter.com/JaneMayerNYer/status/808003564291244033
Sincerely, Jim Salsman
---- forwarded message ---- Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2017 04:33:53 +0100 From: Romaine Wiki romaine.wiki@gmail.com To: Wikimedia wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikimedia-l] Concerns in general
Today I was reading in the (international) news about websites with knowledge on the topic of climate change disappear from the internet as result of the Trump administration. The second thing I read is that
before
something can be published about this topic, the government needs to approve this.
Do you realise what the right word for this is? censorship. Even if it is only partially.
Luckily there are many scientists working on getting all the data
abroad,
out of the US to ensure the research data is saved, including on
servers
in
the Netherlands where Trump (hopefully) has no reach.
In the past week I was reading about the Internet Archive organisation,
who
is making a back up in Canada because of the Trump administration. I
did
not understood this, you may call me naive, but now I do understand, apparently they have some visionary people at the Internet Archive.
I miss a good answer to this situation from the Wikimedia Foundation.
Trump is now promoting harassment and disrespect, already for some
time,
What signal is given to the rest of the world if an America based organisation is spreading the thought of a harassment free Wikipedia
and
the free word, while the president of the US is promoting harassment, disrespect and censorship on a massive scale.
This is just the first week of this president!
I am 100% sure everyone in the Wikimedia movement is willing to make
sure
Wikimedia faces no damage whatsoever, including in WMF, but to me this still starts to get concerning.
If we as Wikimedia movement think that free knowledge, free speech,
freedom
of information, etc are important, I would think that the location
where
the organisation is based is that country where liberty is the
largest, I
do not know where this is but it is definitely not the US.
To my impression WMF is stuck in the US, so I do not believe they would actually move when the danger grows.
But I think it is possible to make sure risks are spread over the
world.
Certainly as we are an international movement that intends to cover the knowledge of the whole humanoid civilisation.
To come to a conclusion, I think WMF and the Wikimedia movement should think about a back-up plan if it actually goes wrong.
If you do not agree with me: that is perfectly fine, that's your right
and
should be protected.
Thank you.
Romaine
Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
-- "If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it." - Margaret Fuller
Anna Stillwell Director of Culture Wikimedia Foundation 415.806.1536 *www.wikimediafoundation.org http://www.wikimediafoundation.org* _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, mailto:wikimedia-l-request@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe
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