Many of you have probably noticed the considerable media coverage over the weekend about blocking of WP content in the UK, and much more alarming, the blocking of WP editing for most UK internet users.
The Wikimedia Foundation is concerned about this situation. We are in communication with the responsible self-regulatory authority in the UK, the IWF. To explain our position to the media and among our community of volunteers we will be distributing the following press statement later tonight.
Thanks,
--- Jay Walsh Head of Communications WikimediaFoundation.org +1 (415) 839 6885 x 609
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
---
Censorship in the United Kingdom disenfranchises tens of thousands of Wikipedia editors
Wikimedia Foundation opposes action by internet watchdog group to blacklist encyclopedia article
San Francisco CA, December 7, 2008: As of December 6, 2008, most Internet users in the United Kingdom no longer have full access to Wikipedia. Due to censorship by the UK self-regulatory agency the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), most UK residents can no longer edit the volunteer-written encyclopedia, nor can they access an article in it describing a 32-year-old album by German rock group the Scorpions. Wikipedia visitors in the UK have also reported performance issues accessing the site.
The IWF has confirmed to the Wikimedia Foundation that it has added Wikipedia to its blacklist, which also had the unintended consequence of rendering UK-based internet users unable to edit the encyclopedia, and possibly harming the site's performance inside the UK.
The IWF says its blacklist is used, on a voluntary basis, by 95% of UK-based residential Internet Service Providers. A statement on the IWF website says it added the Wikipedia article to the blacklist after the article was reported by a user, and an IWF assessment found it to be “potentially illegal.”
“We have no reason to believe the article, or the image contained in the article, has been held to be illegal in any jurisdiction anywhere in the world,” said the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel, Mike Godwin. “We believe it's worth noting that the image is currently visible on Amazon, where the album can be freely purchased by UK residents. It is available on thousands of websites that are accessible to the UK public.”
“The IWF didn't just block the image; it blocked access to the article itself, which discusses the image in a neutral, encyclopedic fashion,” said Sue Gardner, Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation. “The IWF says its goal is to protect UK citizens, but I can't see how this action helps to achieve that – and meanwhile, it deprives UK internet users of the ability to access information which should be freely available to everyone. I urge the IWF to remove Wikipedia from its blacklist.”
The Wikimedia Foundation is proud of the work done by its volunteer editors, who have created an encyclopedia which external studies repeatedly validate as equal or better in quality compared with conventional encyclopedias. Wikipedia's editors take care to ensure the quality of the content of the encyclopedia, and to safeguard the core community values of freedom, independence, and neutrality.
The Wikimedia Foundation will continue its discussions with IWF to resolve this matter.
Q/A can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_UK_Dec_2008QA
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh jwalsh@wikimedia.org:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
David Gerard wrote:
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
Interesting, which urls are they blocking?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer?bypass_censorship http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&iwf=please_dont_... http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256646302 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=IDW_censors_wikipedia&action=s...
Blocking each and every way to access one article on MediaWiki is a bit hard. Unless thay are actually reading the page content and so risk blocking any page containing the words 'Virgin Killer'.
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:02 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
Interesting, which urls are they blocking?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer?bypass_censorship
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&iwf=please_dont_... http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256646302
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=IDW_censors_wikipedia&action=s...
Blocking each and every way to access one article on MediaWiki is a bit hard. Unless thay are actually reading the page content and so risk blocking any page containing the words 'Virgin Killer'.
Any page containing the url of the image would make more sense.
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:20 PM, Anthony wikimail@inbox.org wrote:
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:02 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
Interesting, which urls are they blocking?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer?bypass_censorship
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&iwf=please_dont_... http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256646302
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=IDW_censors_wikipedia&action=s...
Blocking each and every way to access one article on MediaWiki is a bit hard. Unless thay are actually reading the page content and so risk blocking any page containing the words 'Virgin Killer'.
Any page containing the url of the image would make more sense.
Are they blocking
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&oldid=256621147 ?
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:22 PM, Anthony wikimail@inbox.org wrote:
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:20 PM, Anthony wikimail@inbox.org wrote:
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:02 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
Interesting, which urls are they blocking?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer?bypass_censorship
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&iwf=please_dont_... http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256646302
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=IDW_censors_wikipedia&action=s...
Blocking each and every way to access one article on MediaWiki is a bit hard. Unless thay are actually reading the page content and so risk blocking any page containing the words 'Virgin Killer'.
Any page containing the url of the image would make more sense.
Are they blocking
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&oldid=256621147 ?
I guess http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256621147 would be a better test.
Anthony wrote:
Any page containing the url of the image would make more sense.
Are they blocking
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&oldid=256621147 ?
I guess http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256621147 would be a
It was edited since I send my previous msg :P
The real test would be checking http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/33/Virgin_Killer.jpg
It's at a different ip and domain, so I wouldn't be too surprised to find that they're blocking the article (talking about the image issue) and not the image itself which they are supposedly trying to block.
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:50 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote
The real test would be checking http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/3/33/Virgin_Killer.jpg
It's at a different ip and domain, so I wouldn't be too surprised to find that they're blocking the article (talking about the image issue) and not the image itself which they are supposedly trying to block.
This has been pointed out on the lists and the wiki. They are not blocking the image itself. They are not even intercepting the upload.wikimedia.org traffic.
As far as we are aware are blocking only two URL, the article and the image description pages. The matches appear to be exact matches, all of the above proposed evasions work. The image shows fine when placed in other articles.
Of course, we can't know what else is being done: Other pages could be blocked, perhaps logs of everything you view are being sold to the highest bidder? Can't know. We just know that ISPs are running servers which pretend to be Wikimedia's IP, which capture the traffic and produce fake error messages for at least two URLs. That may be all we'll ever know.
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 1:50 PM, Platonides Platonides@gmail.com wrote:
Anthony wrote:
Any page containing the url of the image would make more sense.
Are they blocking
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Virgin_Killer&oldid=256621147?
I guess http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=256621147 would be a
It was edited since I send my previous msg :P
My point was that the URL I gave doesn't have the image in it.
But apparently they aren't blocking those other URLs anyway. I misunderstood what you were saying in your message.
Platonides wrote:
David Gerard wrote:
2008/12/8 Jay A. Walsh:
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/12/07/how-the-great-firewa.html
How the Great Firewall of Britain works
- d.
Interesting, which urls are they blocking?
AFAWK, an exact match in page request for http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Killer, and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Virgin_Killer.jpg and nothing else. As been said, any variation to that is unblocked, including when the above image is part of any other articles.
KTC
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
Jay A. Walsh wrote:
Many of you have probably noticed the considerable media coverage over the weekend about blocking of WP content in the UK, and much more alarming, the blocking of WP editing for most UK internet users.
The Wikimedia Foundation is concerned about this situation. We are in communication with the responsible self-regulatory authority in the UK, the IWF. To explain our position to the media and among our community of volunteers we will be distributing the following press statement later tonight.
Thanks,
Jay Walsh Head of Communications WikimediaFoundation.org +1 (415) 839 6885 x 609
http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Press_releases/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_U...
Censorship in the United Kingdom disenfranchises tens of thousands of Wikipedia editors
Wikimedia Foundation opposes action by internet watchdog group to blacklist encyclopedia article
San Francisco CA, December 7, 2008: As of December 6, 2008, most Internet users in the United Kingdom no longer have full access to Wikipedia. Due to censorship by the UK self-regulatory agency the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), most UK residents can no longer edit the volunteer-written encyclopedia, nor can they access an article in it describing a 32-year-old album by German rock group the Scorpions. Wikipedia visitors in the UK have also reported performance issues accessing the site.
The IWF has confirmed to the Wikimedia Foundation that it has added Wikipedia to its blacklist, which also had the unintended consequence of rendering UK-based internet users unable to edit the encyclopedia, and possibly harming the site's performance inside the UK.
The IWF says its blacklist is used, on a voluntary basis, by 95% of UK-based residential Internet Service Providers. A statement on the IWF website says it added the Wikipedia article to the blacklist after the article was reported by a user, and an IWF assessment found it to be “potentially illegal.”
“We have no reason to believe the article, or the image contained in the article, has been held to be illegal in any jurisdiction anywhere in the world,” said the Wikimedia Foundation's General Counsel, Mike Godwin. “We believe it's worth noting that the image is currently visible on Amazon, where the album can be freely purchased by UK residents. It is available on thousands of websites that are accessible to the UK public.”
“The IWF didn't just block the image; it blocked access to the article itself, which discusses the image in a neutral, encyclopedic fashion,” said Sue Gardner, Executive Director of the Wikimedia Foundation. “The IWF says its goal is to protect UK citizens, but I can't see how this action helps to achieve that – and meanwhile, it deprives UK internet users of the ability to access information which should be freely available to everyone. I urge the IWF to remove Wikipedia from its blacklist.”
The Wikimedia Foundation is proud of the work done by its volunteer editors, who have created an encyclopedia which external studies repeatedly validate as equal or better in quality compared with conventional encyclopedias. Wikipedia's editors take care to ensure the quality of the content of the encyclopedia, and to safeguard the core community values of freedom, independence, and neutrality.
The Wikimedia Foundation will continue its discussions with IWF to resolve this matter.
Q/A can be found here: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Censorship_of_WP_in_the_UK_Dec_2008QA
foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
geni wrote:
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
A sudden thought... and what if the whole story had been entirely made up ? As in "Amazon staff member made the complain to the UK foundation in hope it would give a kick to the album sale ?"
Right, I am dreaming, but I like the "what ifs" :-)
I would be curious to know sales for that album in dec 08 compared to other months. My brother also was a big fan of scorpions (and I must confess it was the least bad of all heavy metal groups he was listening to), and I regret we dumped all these old albums. It feels like it could become a collector...
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 12:41 PM, Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
geni wrote:
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
A sudden thought... and what if the whole story had been entirely made up ? As in "Amazon staff member made the complain to the UK foundation in hope it would give a kick to the album sale ?"
Right, I am dreaming, but I like the "what ifs" :-)
Mhm....that would be a risky move for whomever profits from increased sales of the album...although coverage is surprisingly pro-Wikipedia at the moment, (allegations of) child pornography do not make for very good PR in general.
I think the consensus on this list (or wikimediauk-l?) was that the album cover is rather tasteless and objectionable, albeit not illegal. I would guess that the public does not view the image much more favorably than the participants of this list, so the band will now forever have this "nude child on cover"-story attached to it. As said, not really good PR in the long term although surely profits might go up at the moment. Though, incidentally, is it not more likely that people would only go to the shops (physical or virtual ones) to see the cover without actually buying the album itself? I'm not sure whether many people think that just because the album has a controversial cover, they should buy it (as opposed to "having a look at it in-store")
Michael
2008/12/8 Michael Bimmler mbimmler@gmail.com:
On Mon, Dec 8, 2008 at 12:41 PM, Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com wrote:
geni wrote:
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
A sudden thought... and what if the whole story had been entirely made up ? As in "Amazon staff member made the complain to the UK foundation in hope it would give a kick to the album sale ?"
Right, I am dreaming, but I like the "what ifs" :-)
Mhm....that would be a risky move for whomever profits from increased sales of the album...although coverage is surprisingly pro-Wikipedia at the moment, (allegations of) child pornography do not make for very good PR in general.
I think the consensus on this list (or wikimediauk-l?) was that the album cover is rather tasteless and objectionable, albeit not illegal. I would guess that the public does not view the image much more favorably than the participants of this list, so the band will now forever have this "nude child on cover"-story attached to it. As said, not really good PR in the long term although surely profits might go up at the moment. Though, incidentally, is it not more likely that people would only go to the shops (physical or virtual ones) to see the cover without actually buying the album itself? I'm not sure whether many people think that just because the album has a controversial cover, they should buy it (as opposed to "having a look at it in-store")
Yes.. I rather expect that the claim to block this page was sent to IWF by someone who requested to delete this picture on Wikipedia and was unhappy with the deletion request result.
2008/12/8 Michael Bimmler mbimmler@gmail.com:
Mhm....that would be a risky move for whomever profits from increased sales of the album...although coverage is surprisingly pro-Wikipedia at the moment, (allegations of) child pornography do not make for very good PR in general.
Yes.. I rather expect that the claim to block this page was sent to IWF by someone who requested to delete this picture on Wikipedia and was unhappy with the negative deletion request result.
Thanks to the Foundation for its standing against this censorship. I hope and expect that this position will be upheld.
Regards Sir48 (Thyge) ---who resents a record with a cover like that has ever been released.
-----Oprindelig meddelelse----- Fra: foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org [mailto:foundation-l-bounces@lists.wikimedia.org]Pa vegne af Florence Devouard Sendt: 8. december 2008 12:42 Til: foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Emne: Re: [Foundation-l] WP edit/access blocking in the UK - statementfrom the WMF
geni wrote:
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
A sudden thought... and what if the whole story had been entirely made up ? As in "Amazon staff member made the complain to the UK foundation in hope it would give a kick to the album sale ?"
Right, I am dreaming, but I like the "what ifs" :-)
I would be curious to know sales for that album in dec 08 compared to other months. My brother also was a big fan of scorpions (and I must confess it was the least bad of all heavy metal groups he was listening to), and I regret we dumped all these old albums. It feels like it could become a collector...
_______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l Internal Virus Database is out of date. Checked by AVG. Version: 8.0.100 / Virus Database: 270.9.11/1817 - Release Date: 11/28/2008 8:17 AM
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
geni wrote:
2008/12/8 Florence Devouard Anthere9@yahoo.com:
A link
http://stats.grok.se/en/200812/Virgin_Killer
Ant
More up to date:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Popular_articles
If the current rate continued we would be looking at close on half a million views of that article today.
A sudden thought... and what if the whole story had been entirely made up ? As in "Amazon staff member made the complain to the UK foundation in hope it would give a kick to the album sale ?"
Right, I am dreaming, but I like the "what ifs" :-)
I would be curious to know sales for that album in dec 08 compared to other months. My brother also was a big fan of scorpions (and I must confess it was the least bad of all heavy metal groups he was listening to), and I regret we dumped all these old albums. It feels like it could become a collector...
No single item will have a significant effect on Amazon sales and the Scorpions appear to have long since dissowned the cover.
There is also the factor that it is unlikely that anyone could be sure that we would be able to figure out that the IWF was invovled.
wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org