Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6] https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6] https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default)
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
- Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
- Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6] https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
Pine, as one of the admins who has worked to fend off this sustained attack, I can attest it is exactly that. Your point is a valid one, but it does not apply to this situation. Pete [[User:Peteforsyth]] On Jun 5, 2016 7:13 AM, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but
this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but
this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
Hi all,
As someone who deals with a lot of long-term abuse on the community side, I can give a bit of a comment here. Most of the abuse response comes from the community, not the WMF- they only get involved through their Trust & Safety team on the worst cases.
Our ability to deal with block evasion is limited at best. Anyone who wants to is able to by-pass a block through a mobile range or a proxy, and often times to deal with block evasion we end up blocking ranges which include a lot of collateral damage. The Inspire campaign doesn't seem to be directed at this, but there are ways that we could improve our abuse response - the primary one being an email requirement on account creation, and giving some users the ability to check accounts based on their email. This has been done on Wikia, and when combined with IP blocks has been very effective in reducing long-term abuse. But it is very unlikely to happen here.
It will never be possible to totally remove this sort of harassment, because these are cases where the system has initially worked, but the user is evading the system. As an open website, we only have a limited ability to protect against that, and that will always be the case. And unfortunately, this isn't an area that a code of conduct or any of those proposals would help with.
Adrian Raddatz
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 10:48 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default
)
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and
"harassment"
can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one
will
ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption
of
good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that
it
is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org
wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008,
but
this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several
months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a
victim
of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was
encouraged
to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should
just
get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence
of
harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated."
I
suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to
accept
that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment
by
Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign,
not
complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the
list
if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness...
! [4]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls
[5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33...
[7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.org
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Pine,
As many of our admins and functionaries are well aware, both the Wikimedia sites, and the internet architecture as a whole, favour anonymity and protection of privacy over the ability to track individuals. When a user is technically proficient in hiding themselves, platforms and even law enforcement can have little luck in determining who or where they are. Anonymity has great benefits, but also can allow great abuses.
There are of course "easy" solutions that would involve changes to our site accessibility - for instance, requiring secondary identification, such as social media accounts or verified emails. However, those are decisions that the community as a whole needs to discuss, and not something I or my department can change unilaterally. That said, improving Wikimedia's blocking tools and detection methods is an area where some progress can be made.
One of the benefits that this Inspire campaign can provide is open discussion and consideration of new approaches.
Pax, I am disheartened to see how some of the IdeaLabs are being used to belittle this problem, and am working over the weekend to keep at least the worst instances of abuse and hate-speech off of the pages :(
Best,
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 9:48 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but
this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
Thanks, Patrick. The community regularly expends considerable volunteer time and effort to protect the intrgrity of article content and to deal with block evasion. I think it would be helpful if further efforts could be made to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of tools and processes for addressing block evasion, including the use of Legal Department resources as appropriate. Block evasion is a problem that affects many aspects of Wikimedia, including article integrity and loss of volunteer time as already mentioned, as well as the harms to harassment victims, the stress on the volunteer admins and functionaries, and negative impact on community population and health.
Thanks for working on this. Is there anything more that you can do to assist with Pax's situation in particular?
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 11:11, "Patrick Earley" pearley@wikimedia.org wrote:
Pine,
As many of our admins and functionaries are well aware, both the Wikimedia sites, and the internet architecture as a whole, favour anonymity and protection of privacy over the ability to track individuals. When a user is technically proficient in hiding themselves, platforms and even law enforcement can have little luck in determining who or where they are. Anonymity has great benefits, but also can allow great abuses.
There are of course "easy" solutions that would involve changes to our site accessibility - for instance, requiring secondary identification, such as social media accounts or verified emails. However, those are decisions that the community as a whole needs to discuss, and not something I or my department can change unilaterally. That said, improving Wikimedia's blocking tools and detection methods is an area where some progress can be made.
One of the benefits that this Inspire campaign can provide is open discussion and consideration of new approaches.
Pax, I am disheartened to see how some of the IdeaLabs are being used to belittle this problem, and am working over the weekend to keep at least the worst instances of abuse and hate-speech off of the pages :(
Best,
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 9:48 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org
wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008,
but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
-- Patrick Earley Senior Community Advocate Wikimedia Foundation pearley@wikimedia.org (1) 415 975 1874
In general discussing specific cases on public mailings lists is not useful at helping the situation (Pax is, of course, feel free to do so if they feel it would be right). I think if people want to help then thinking about, and talking about, ways to do so is the best way to tackle the problem. Those discussions (and possible solutions) can take many forms and while the inspire campaign right now is a perfect (and tailor made) opportunity to do so it is in now way the only one.
Some thoughts to help people having difficulty coming up with what to do:
1. Do you think that the social or policy rules that currently exist are not enough? Then talk about that on the pages and what you think should be changed (and why) and how to roll that out. Do we need another policy or a global one? Do we need to rewrite an old one? Should it be a local/global community policy or a part of the ToU? Something else entirely from the board?
2. Do you think that the current rules are enough but are not being enforced properly and/or not ABLE to be enforced properly? Then let's talk about what could help. Is it other community members ignoring or misunderstanding the rules? Is it people being able to evade too easily? Is it that those who enforce the rules get harassed themselves and back off? Are they just so overwhelmed that they can't keep up? Something else?
What would be good for this? Is it social pressure or support to enforce the rules already in play? A global arbcom type body? Better blocking tools? (do we have ideas on better how?) A "reporting" tool that reports to admins/the community in some fashion with the ability to escalate to the WMF (either harassment specific or made to deal with other reports as well such as vandalism or COI)?
These and others have all been brought up to me in conversations by community members so I know people are thinking about it. We want to get it down where everyone can think about it. On a personal basis I think it's likely it's a mix of different things + something we haven't thought about before but we can only do so much at once obviously.
If someone sees a proposal that you think would cause more harm then good I would strongly encourage them to consider making other proposals that they think WOULD help rather then targeting and attacking those who created other proposals (or even attacking the proposals themselves). Doing so has a tendency only to help people feel harassed and attacked and moves them to belittle and ignore your concerns. What we need is more ideas, not more shit slung over the fence.
In the end I do agree that any idea that harassment is "not real" or not a major problem right now is, at best, naive and could overall be very dangerous not only to our users but the projects as a whole. That does not, of course, mean we know the answer. In fact, we know we don't, it's what we're (all) trying to figure out.
James Alexander Manager, Trust & Safety Sent from my iPhone
On Jun 5, 2016, at 12:31 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Thanks, Patrick. The community regularly expends considerable volunteer time and effort to protect the intrgrity of article content and to deal with block evasion. I think it would be helpful if further efforts could be made to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of tools and processes for addressing block evasion, including the use of Legal Department resources as appropriate. Block evasion is a problem that affects many aspects of Wikimedia, including article integrity and loss of volunteer time as already mentioned, as well as the harms to harassment victims, the stress on the volunteer admins and functionaries, and negative impact on community population and health.
Thanks for working on this. Is there anything more that you can do to assist with Pax's situation in particular?
Pine
On Jun 5, 2016 11:11, "Patrick Earley" pearley@wikimedia.org wrote:
Pine,
As many of our admins and functionaries are well aware, both the Wikimedia sites, and the internet architecture as a whole, favour anonymity and protection of privacy over the ability to track individuals. When a user is technically proficient in hiding themselves, platforms and even law enforcement can have little luck in determining who or where they are. Anonymity has great benefits, but also can allow great abuses.
There are of course "easy" solutions that would involve changes to our site accessibility - for instance, requiring secondary identification, such as social media accounts or verified emails. However, those are decisions that the community as a whole needs to discuss, and not something I or my department can change unilaterally. That said, improving Wikimedia's blocking tools and detection methods is an area where some progress can be made.
One of the benefits that this Inspire campaign can provide is open discussion and consideration of new approaches.
Pax, I am disheartened to see how some of the IdeaLabs are being used to belittle this problem, and am working over the weekend to keep at least the worst instances of abuse and hate-speech off of the pages :(
Best,
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 9:48 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008,
but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.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
-- Patrick Earley Senior Community Advocate Wikimedia Foundation pearley@wikimedia.org (1) 415 975 1874
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
Hi James,
I more or less agree with your comments and suggestions. But one consideration is the damage that comes from ideas left unchallenged and the readers of the ideas feel dispirited or alienated that no one spoke up pointing out the problems/concerns.
That is the reason that take the time to comment on talk pages about ideas that I both like and don't like. Warm regards, Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 4:13 PM, James Alexander jalexander@wikimedia.org wrote:
In general discussing specific cases on public mailings lists is not useful at helping the situation (Pax is, of course, feel free to do so if they feel it would be right). I think if people want to help then thinking about, and talking about, ways to do so is the best way to tackle the problem. Those discussions (and possible solutions) can take many forms and while the inspire campaign right now is a perfect (and tailor made) opportunity to do so it is in now way the only one.
Some thoughts to help people having difficulty coming up with what to do:
- Do you think that the social or policy rules that currently exist are
not enough? Then talk about that on the pages and what you think should be changed (and why) and how to roll that out. Do we need another policy or a global one? Do we need to rewrite an old one? Should it be a local/global community policy or a part of the ToU? Something else entirely from the board?
- Do you think that the current rules are enough but are not being
enforced properly and/or not ABLE to be enforced properly? Then let's talk about what could help. Is it other community members ignoring or misunderstanding the rules? Is it people being able to evade too easily? Is it that those who enforce the rules get harassed themselves and back off? Are they just so overwhelmed that they can't keep up? Something else?
What would be good for this? Is it social pressure or support to enforce the rules already in play? A global arbcom type body? Better blocking tools? (do we have ideas on better how?) A "reporting" tool that reports to admins/the community in some fashion with the ability to escalate to the WMF (either harassment specific or made to deal with other reports as well such as vandalism or COI)?
These and others have all been brought up to me in conversations by community members so I know people are thinking about it. We want to get it down where everyone can think about it. On a personal basis I think it's likely it's a mix of different things + something we haven't thought about before but we can only do so much at once obviously.
If someone sees a proposal that you think would cause more harm then good I would strongly encourage them to consider making other proposals that they think WOULD help rather then targeting and attacking those who created other proposals (or even attacking the proposals themselves). Doing so has a tendency only to help people feel harassed and attacked and moves them to belittle and ignore your concerns. What we need is more ideas, not more shit slung over the fence.
In the end I do agree that any idea that harassment is "not real" or not a major problem right now is, at best, naive and could overall be very dangerous not only to our users but the projects as a whole. That does not, of course, mean we know the answer. In fact, we know we don't, it's what we're (all) trying to figure out.
James Alexander Manager, Trust & Safety Sent from my iPhone
On Jun 5, 2016, at 12:31 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Thanks, Patrick. The community regularly expends considerable volunteer time and effort to protect the intrgrity of article content and to deal with block evasion. I think it would be helpful if further efforts could
be
made to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of tools and processes for addressing block evasion, including the use of Legal Department resources as appropriate. Block evasion is a problem that affects many aspects of Wikimedia, including article integrity and loss of volunteer time as already mentioned, as well as the harms to harassment victims,
the
stress on the volunteer admins and functionaries, and negative impact on community population and health.
Thanks for working on this. Is there anything more that you can do to assist with Pax's situation in particular?
Pine
On Jun 5, 2016 11:11, "Patrick Earley" pearley@wikimedia.org wrote:
Pine,
As many of our admins and functionaries are well aware, both the
Wikimedia
sites, and the internet architecture as a whole, favour anonymity and protection of privacy over the ability to track individuals. When a
user
is technically proficient in hiding themselves, platforms and even law enforcement can have little luck in determining who or where they are. Anonymity has great benefits, but also can allow great abuses.
There are of course "easy" solutions that would involve changes to our site accessibility - for instance, requiring secondary identification,
such
as social media accounts or verified emails. However, those are
decisions
that the community as a whole needs to discuss, and not something I or
my
department can change unilaterally. That said, improving Wikimedia's blocking tools and detection methods is an area where some progress can
be
made.
One of the benefits that this Inspire campaign can provide is open discussion and consideration of new approaches.
Pax, I am disheartened to see how some of the IdeaLabs are being used to belittle this problem, and am working over the weekend to keep at least
the
worst instances of abuse and hate-speech off of the pages :(
Best,
On Sun, Jun 5, 2016 at 9:48 AM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early
can
comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with
persistent
block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <
list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org>
wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire
proposal:
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default
)
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race,
ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
- Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered
off-Wiki
- Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they
cause
unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment" can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement
doesn't
imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the
presumption
of good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of others is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough
that
it is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example, comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age, nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <
list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org
wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, > but > this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list > messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several > months.) > > I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's
attitude
> toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this
month's
> Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have > that can > help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a > victim of > several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name > calling, > threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was > encouraged to > see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the > Foundation, and submitted a proposal. > > Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the
most
> popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political > correctness" > and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should > just > get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended.
[4]
> (That > first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to
remove it
> from the current campaign.) > > It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat > harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of > marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people > saying > things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The
existence
> of > harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through > self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been
exaggerated."
> I > suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to > accept > that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online
harassment
> by > Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6] > > I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor"
people
> who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an
encyclopedia,
> without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate
speech my
> way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal
with
> this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire
campaign,
> not > complaining about censorship and " crybullying." > > I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire > Campaign > talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the > list > if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading. > > - Pax, aka Funcrunch > > > [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch > [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire > [3] > >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness...
> ! > [4] >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls
> [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. > [6] > >
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33...
> [7] > >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.org
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Obviously racial criticisms and so forth are awful like Pax said, but on the matter of "troublemakers who are banned" I say it's a greatly overblown issue chiefly emphasized by administrative participants who feel their authority is threatened. One should really look to the nature of the ban-evading edits. If they are productive edits, I quarrel with the actions of those that revert them because of the supposed villainous character of any bannee or their psychological need to "teach the bannee a lesson" or temperamental or intellectual inability to actually appraise the edits.
Take a look at Russavia. He did an immense amount of contributions. He's banned by WMF for, what, an escapade in which he got Australian novelty artist "Pricasso" who paints with his penis to do a portrait of Jimbo Wales, who quickly alleged "sexual harassment?" (That's one theory, but I'd argue that he's actually banned for, in his capacity as Wikimedia Commons administrator, attempting to investigate the real-life stalking of Dutch Wikipedia's MoiraMoira, which I say was a case that WMF wanted to quickly go away.) Russavia was an immensely productive participant, and he's been shabbily treated.
Consider that the makeup of (at least) English Wikipedia administrative structure is in fact a bullyocracy. There are so few controls on what are essentially "imperial administrators." There're an hundred more examples, but I think right now of "BWilkins" who actually told some poor editor to "rot in the hell that is is eternal block." And nobody even blinked at it. It and an array of his other horrific actions went to Arbcom, and they wouldn't even consent to hear it the first time. He ran amok for like two more years, before an genuinely Herculean effort by some editors, assisted by off-wiki criticicism, finally resulted in his desysoping. But what of all the good editors he'd done away with by that time. There's no repair system for that.
And WMF "san-fran-bans" are one thing. If you people are talking about "community bans," that's a complete misnomer for the actions of the regulars at WP:AN/ANI. There's no charter for WP:AN/ANI, there's no rules-based process for its "vote him or her off the island" mob violence, it's completely illegitimate mainly from the sadistic tendencies of some of those regulars that, I dunno, also want to feel superior and important.
Anyhow, I'm just trying to illuminate a different perspective on the hundreds and hundreds of wrongly perma-blocked editors, and as well the thousands and thousands of perma-blocked IP editors in this nearly completely unaccountable administrative system that attracts some of the worse kind of psychologies imaginable.
Trillium Corsage
05.06.2016, 17:49, "Pine W" <email clipped>:
Hi Pax and Pete,
It sounds like part of the issue in this case may be that may we need more effective tools for dealing with troublemakers who are banned but continue to return and cause problems. I'm wondering if Patrick Early can comment on what efforts WMF is making in terms of dealing with persistent block evasion.
Pine On Jun 5, 2016 07:13, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <email clipped> wrote:
I am defining harassment primarily as personal attacks, not merely  disputes (even strongly-worded disagreement) over content.
Some examples of what I consider harassment:
- Vandalizing an editor's user or talk page (hence my Inspire proposal:  https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Protect_user_space_by_default  )
- Making derogatory comments about an editor's gender, sex, race, Â ethnicity, sexual orientation, religion, or (dis)ability
- Posting personal information about an editor that was gathered off-Wiki
- Evading bans with IP-hopping to do any of the above.
These actions not only cause "net harm to community health," they cause  unnecessary, avoidable harm to specific individuals, and discourage  marginalized people from participating in the project.
- Pax
On 6/5/16 5:09 AM, Pine W wrote:
Hi Pax,
I agree that blaming the victim is an unsatisfactory resolution.
On the other hand, defining what is meant by "incivility" and "harassment"  can be very tricky. Just because there is a strong disagreement doesn't  imply that people are being uncivil, and we cannot expect that no one will  ever lose his or her temper when provoked. Similarly, a pattern of  disagreement doesn't necessarily imply harassment, and the presumption of  good faith is rebuttable which means that questioning the motives of  others  is occasionally OK.
So, as Sumana once said, we have a tricky situation with regards to  balancing free speech with hospitality.
I think there are situations in which behavior is egregious enough that it  is a net harm to community health and cannot be excused. For example,  comments that demean someone on the basis of race, gender, age,  nationality, or religious or political beliefs, are generally out of  bounds.
I'd be interested in hearing your thoughts about how we should define  harassment, and how we should seek to reduce the frequency of it on  Wikimedia sites.
Thank you for speaking up.
Pine  On Jun 4, 2016 19:15, "Pax Ahimsa Gethen" <email clipped>  wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but
this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list  messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude  toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's  Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that  can  help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim  of  several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name  calling,  threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged  to  see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the  Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most  popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political  correctness"  and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just  get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4]  (That  first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it  from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat  harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of  marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people  saying  things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of  harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through  self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I  suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept  that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by  Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people  who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia,  without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my  way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with  this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not  complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire  Campaign  talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list  if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch  [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire  [3]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness...  !  [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls  [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case.  [6]
https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... Â [7]
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Â Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.org
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Agreed that uncivil administrators can be a part of a negative feedback loop of stress and cynicism, as can uncivil WMF staff and others in positions of authority. However, there are no perfect human beings and if we demanded that all administrators and WMF staff be perfect at all times then there would be no one left to guard the fort, so we must accept that we are all human beings who will occasionally mess up. People who mess up in particularly significant ways, or who mess up repeatedly, can be sacked; English Wikipedia's arbitration committee has not been shy about removing admin rights of admins who mess up. Fortunately, it seems to me that the vast majority of administrators are net assets to the community (perhaps I am biased because I am an admin, although on small wikis.) I do think that offering professionally designed training to administrators might be helpful in certain areas, such as training administrators on how to deal with harassment and conflict including how to de-escalate situations, and how to interact with victims as well as bullies. For training sessions, I think that videos and group discussions might be more memorable and reinforcing than written materials for individual study.
I agree with James that we likely need a mix of approaches, one of them being better ways of dealing with block evasion.
Pine
Thank you, Pax/Funcrunch, for bringing this topic to the broad wikimedia community. I'm sorry that you've had a bad experience contributing to Wikipedia. And I'm glad that you are staying around to add and improve content, and also to offer your ideas about how to address harassment.
I appreciate that the WMF staff is working on keeping the Inspire Campaign pages a safe and friendly place to contribute ideas. I hope that some people with admin, oversight, and checkuser privileges on meta are helping out, too, because it will be better if it is a shared job.
I too am disappointed that so many of the options getting broad support are suggesting that the target of harassment needs to be fixed or that they should leave or reduce their participation in the wikimedia movement in order to reduce disruption on wiki.
I know that there are many oversighter, checkusers, and stewards all across the movement who are working hard to fight disruption from trolls and harassers. But right now we are stuck without outdated tools and processes to combat harassment.
I know that if we put our minds to finding better solutions, we will! :-)
I look forward to reading more ideas! Warm regards, Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Sat, Jun 4, 2016 at 9:56 PM, Pax Ahimsa Gethen < list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org> wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6] https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.org
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Thank you, Sydney/FloNight. More outspoken editors with attitudes like yours would help make Wikipedia in general and the Inspire Campaign in specific a safer and more welcoming space for editors from diverse backgrounds.
- Pax
On 6/6/16 3:10 PM, Sydney Poore wrote:
Thank you, Pax/Funcrunch, for bringing this topic to the broad wikimedia community. I'm sorry that you've had a bad experience contributing to Wikipedia. And I'm glad that you are staying around to add and improve content, and also to offer your ideas about how to address harassment.
I appreciate that the WMF staff is working on keeping the Inspire Campaign pages a safe and friendly place to contribute ideas. I hope that some people with admin, oversight, and checkuser privileges on meta are helping out, too, because it will be better if it is a shared job.
I too am disappointed that so many of the options getting broad support are suggesting that the target of harassment needs to be fixed or that they should leave or reduce their participation in the wikimedia movement in order to reduce disruption on wiki.
I know that there are many oversighter, checkusers, and stewards all across the movement who are working hard to fight disruption from trolls and harassers. But right now we are stuck without outdated tools and processes to combat harassment.
I know that if we put our minds to finding better solutions, we will! :-)
I look forward to reading more ideas! Warm regards, Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Sat, Jun 4, 2016 at 9:56 PM, Pax Ahimsa Gethen < list-wikimedia@funcrunch.org> wrote:
Hi all, I'm Pax aka Funcrunch [1]. I've been a Wikipedian since 2008, but this is my first post to this mailing list. (I've been reading list messages on the archives page occasionally for the last several months.)
I'm writing because of a concern I have about the community's attitude toward harassment on Wikipedia. I got a Wikinotice about this month's Inspire Campaign, which specifically asks: "What ideas do you have that can help prevent and generally address cases of harassment?" [2] As a victim of several of the harassing behaviors mentioned as examples - " name calling, threats, discrimination, stalking, and impersonation" - I was encouraged to see that this problem was (hopefully) being taken seriously by the Foundation, and submitted a proposal.
Looking at the other proposals submitted, I soon noticed that the most popular "ideas" on the list included complaints of "political correctness" and suggesting we shouldn't be so sensitive [3], and that we should just get some sleep and exercise and reconsider why we're so offended. [4] (That first "idea" has since been recategorized by a WMF staffer to remove it from the current campaign.)
It really bothers me that a campaign specifically designed to combat harassment - which is a very serious and real problem for people of marginalized identities like myself [5]- is being co-opted by people saying things like " Harassment doesn't cause actual damage," " The existence of harassment is an opportunity to improve ourselves further through self-discipline," and " Harassment on Wikimedia has been exaggerated." I suggest that people who honestly believe this, but are willing to accept that they might be wrong, read a recent essay about online harassment by Anil Dash: "The Immortal Myths About Online Abuse." [6]
I'm not "looking to be offended," and I'm not trying to "censor" people who simply disagree with me. I'm trying to help build an encyclopedia, without being harassed by block-evading stalkers hurling hate speech my way. The existing tools and policies are *not* sufficient to deal with this. That's (what I thought was) the point of this Inspire campaign, not complaining about censorship and " crybullying."
I've posted a much shorter version of this concern on the Inspire Campaign talk page [7], so feel free to weigh in there instead of here on the list if that's more appropriate. Thank you for reading.
- Pax, aka Funcrunch
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Funcrunch [2] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Inspire [3] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Stop_%22Political_Correctness... ! [4] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Don%27t_feed_the_trolls [5] Queer, trans, and black, in my case. [6] https://medium.com/humane-tech/the-immortal-myths-about-online-abuse-a156e33... [7] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants_talk:IdeaLab/Inspire/Meta#Blaming_the...
-- Pax Ahimsa Gethen | pax@funcrunch.org | http://funcrunch.org
I have created https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to our experienced CheckUsers.
Pine
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to our experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding making the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required annual training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who have demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will be required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping their admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it. Big carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training develops a track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it helpful, and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6 or 12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the success of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to our experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work for all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be mandatory for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding making the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required annual training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who have demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will be required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping their admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it. Big carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training develops a track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it helpful, and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6 or 12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the success of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to our experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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
Hi Sydney,
I think that if individual communities create a consensus to mandate training, or if arbitration committees issue that mandate on particular wikis, that's completely fine and good. I'm hesitant to say that WMF should wield a stick to mandate this kind of training for administrators on all wikis until we know that the training is successful; otherwise WMF might push out a set of training with high cost and low effectiveness that would quickly be resented by the community and make any further development in this area nearly impossible.
I could see mandatory training happening further down the road, and it might be a very good thing, but there are important steps before we make that decision.
Pine
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 12:01 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work for all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be mandatory for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding making the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required annual training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who have demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will be required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping their admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it. Big carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training develops a track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it helpful, and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6 or 12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the success of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to our experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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
Hmmm. I find this recommendation concerning. There *might* be some validity on large projects with hundreds of administrators, but there are a lot of projects with only a few admins, and they were "selected" because they were willing to do the grunt work of deletions, protections, and blocks. Nobody was selecting them to handle large-scale harassment. Indeed, I cannot think of a single administrator even on a large project who was selected because of their ability or their interest in handling harassment incidents. There's pretty good evidence that it is not only not a criterion seriously considered by communities, but that absent the interest or willingness to carry out other tasks or demonstration of aptitude for other areas of administrator work, an admin candidate would not be selected by most communities, even large ones where harassment is a much more visible concern.
There is also no basis for putting forward that mandatory training for any administrator function would be useful on a global scale. How does one set up a mandatory training program for carrying out page protection, given that every large project has a different policy? What happens if an administrator doesn't "pass" a mandatory program? Are they desysopped, over the objections of their community?
I'll point out in passing that there is not even consideration of a formal global checkuser training program - again, the local policies vary widely, and the types of issues addressed by checkusers on different projects is very different.
Risker/Anne
On 7 June 2016 at 15:01, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work for all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be mandatory for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding
making
the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required
annual
training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who have demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will be required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping their admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it. Big carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training develops
a
track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it helpful, and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6
or
12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the success of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators
and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to
our
experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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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I fully agree with Risker. I feel this discussion is only (mainly) looking at enwp. Harassment probably exist on all versions but the seriously of the issue look very differently.
Being the most active user and sysop on a smaller version (svwp) I do not recognize the issues being discussed. On our version we do not need any arbcom, we are getting very good to resolve all issues without, on a page where all are welcome to participate (and block of more then a day is not allowed of an productive contributor by just one admin, it must have been discussed first and reached consensus first) . And haressements are not more frequent than that is is possible to handle them individually (which we do and have a low tolerance level)
And besides from us being few that makes this issue easier to tackle, my opinion is that the key for us is the yearly confirmation of admin rights. It is interesting to follow these over the years. First the reasons for non-support was if clear misuse, after a few years aggressive discussion style, but now it is being about the need to friendly and cooperative (but all OK to be tough on trolls, bad behaviour unserious editing)
perhaps instead of building up new rules etc, it could be worthwhile to study good working versions instead and learn from them?
Anders
Den 2016-06-07 kl. 21:18, skrev Risker:
Hmmm. I find this recommendation concerning. There *might* be some validity on large projects with hundreds of administrators, but there are a lot of projects with only a few admins, and they were "selected" because they were willing to do the grunt work of deletions, protections, and blocks. Nobody was selecting them to handle large-scale harassment. Indeed, I cannot think of a single administrator even on a large project who was selected because of their ability or their interest in handling harassment incidents. There's pretty good evidence that it is not only not a criterion seriously considered by communities, but that absent the interest or willingness to carry out other tasks or demonstration of aptitude for other areas of administrator work, an admin candidate would not be selected by most communities, even large ones where harassment is a much more visible concern.
There is also no basis for putting forward that mandatory training for any administrator function would be useful on a global scale. How does one set up a mandatory training program for carrying out page protection, given that every large project has a different policy? What happens if an administrator doesn't "pass" a mandatory program? Are they desysopped, over the objections of their community?
I'll point out in passing that there is not even consideration of a formal global checkuser training program - again, the local policies vary widely, and the types of issues addressed by checkusers on different projects is very different.
Risker/Anne
On 7 June 2016 at 15:01, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work for all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be mandatory for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding
making
the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required
annual
training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who have demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will be required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping their admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it. Big carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training develops
a
track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it helpful, and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6
or
12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the success of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators
and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to
our
experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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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Many volunteer organisations have mandatory training for volunteers, so that in itself is not a bad idea. But what about the cross-project differences that Risker brings up?
And more importantly, how could such training help when faced with the type of harassment that is referenced 99% of the time here - block or lock evasion after the system has already worked? Training would be a single sentence: "rinse and repeat the block/hide process until they decide to stop."
Adrian Raddatz
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 1:18 PM, Risker risker.wp@gmail.com wrote:
Hmmm. I find this recommendation concerning. There *might* be some validity on large projects with hundreds of administrators, but there are a lot of projects with only a few admins, and they were "selected" because they were willing to do the grunt work of deletions, protections, and blocks. Nobody was selecting them to handle large-scale harassment. Indeed, I cannot think of a single administrator even on a large project who was selected because of their ability or their interest in handling harassment incidents. There's pretty good evidence that it is not only not a criterion seriously considered by communities, but that absent the interest or willingness to carry out other tasks or demonstration of aptitude for other areas of administrator work, an admin candidate would not be selected by most communities, even large ones where harassment is a much more visible concern.
There is also no basis for putting forward that mandatory training for any administrator function would be useful on a global scale. How does one set up a mandatory training program for carrying out page protection, given that every large project has a different policy? What happens if an administrator doesn't "pass" a mandatory program? Are they desysopped, over the objections of their community?
I'll point out in passing that there is not even consideration of a formal global checkuser training program - again, the local policies vary widely, and the types of issues addressed by checkusers on different projects is very different.
Risker/Anne
On 7 June 2016 at 15:01, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work
for
all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be mandatory for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding
making
the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is until after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested and refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training is helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required
annual
training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who
have
demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training will
be
required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping
their
admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators will *want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it.
Big
carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training
develops
a
track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways: administrators' feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it
helpful,
and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are done before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2) after 6
or
12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the
success
of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators
and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer to
our
experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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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Responding to a few different points:
(1) I don't envision this training as being sufficient to make anyone an expert in harassment or incivility response; the goal isn't to train all administrators to handle large-scale harassment. Rather, the goal is to train the administrators who take this course (further discussions below on how wide the recruiting for that will be) to a baseline level of familiarity with how to handle harassment and incivility if and when they encounter it. I think of it this way: in the physical world, only a few police officers will specialize in investigating harassment cases, but all police officers ideally should have a basic familiarity with how to address incivility and harassment situations. Anecdotally, I rarely hear people complain about learning more or getting reinforcement about "people skills", communication, leadership skills, and self-awareness. On Wikimedia sites, administrators are often in the potision of being "first responders" to difficult situations, and it seems to me that training for how to handle those situations would be good. Of course, some wikis may have developed their own training programs, and this training would be in addition rather than a replacement.
(2) Let me reiterate that while I support offering this training, I am not supportive of making this training mandatory until it has been widely tested. Even if there is a desire to make the training mandatory, I think it would be preferable that the decision be made by individual wiki communities who can adapt the training to their individual circumstances. I feel that a global mandate for administrators to take this training would be 2 years from now at the earliest, after administrators and communities who voluntarily adopt the training have had considerable time to test it, adapt it, and make suggestions about how to optimize it. With widespread feedback from multiple communities, we might eventually be able to offer a set of training modules that could be adaptable globally and that WMF could mandate with reasonable certainty that the benefits are worth the costs.
(3) The training is not a panacea. It won't stop block evasion. It won't make administrators be superhumans who are always right. It won't stop the problem that there are a few administrators who cause enough problems that they shouldn't be administrators. But I feel that overall, if done carefully and well, training administrators could move us in a good direction.
Pine
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 12:39 PM, Adrian Raddatz ajraddatz@gmail.com wrote:
Many volunteer organisations have mandatory training for volunteers, so that in itself is not a bad idea. But what about the cross-project differences that Risker brings up?
And more importantly, how could such training help when faced with the type of harassment that is referenced 99% of the time here - block or lock evasion after the system has already worked? Training would be a single sentence: "rinse and repeat the block/hide process until they decide to stop."
Adrian Raddatz
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 1:18 PM, Risker risker.wp@gmail.com wrote:
Hmmm. I find this recommendation concerning. There *might* be some validity on large projects with hundreds of administrators, but there
are a
lot of projects with only a few admins, and they were "selected" because they were willing to do the grunt work of deletions, protections, and blocks. Nobody was selecting them to handle large-scale harassment. Indeed, I cannot think of a single administrator even on a large project who was selected because of their ability or their interest in handling harassment incidents. There's pretty good evidence that it is not only
not
a criterion seriously considered by communities, but that absent the interest or willingness to carry out other tasks or demonstration of aptitude for other areas of administrator work, an admin candidate would not be selected by most communities, even large ones where harassment is
a
much more visible concern.
There is also no basis for putting forward that mandatory training for
any
administrator function would be useful on a global scale. How does one
set
up a mandatory training program for carrying out page protection, given that every large project has a different policy? What happens if an administrator doesn't "pass" a mandatory program? Are they desysopped,
over
the objections of their community?
I'll point out in passing that there is not even consideration of a
formal
global checkuser training program - again, the local policies vary
widely,
and the types of issues addressed by checkusers on different projects is very different.
Risker/Anne
On 7 June 2016 at 15:01, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can work
for
all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative or functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be
mandatory
for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding
making
the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is
until
after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested
and
refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the training
is
helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a required
annual
training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees or other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up, the ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators who
have
demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training
will
be
required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping
their
admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators
will
*want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try it.
Big
carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training
develops
a
track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways:
administrators'
feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it
helpful,
and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are
done
before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2)
after 6
or
12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the
success
of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore <sydney.poore@gmail.com
wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
I have created
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators
and would welcome feedback there.
On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would defer
to
our
experienced CheckUsers.
Pine _______________________________________________ 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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I think making available and funding conflict resolution training is a good idea (provided it's available online of course, it would not be reasonable to expect a worldwide group of people to physically attend it). Making it mandatory via a grant is a nonstarter, though, adminship standards are a community decision. It could be proposed as a requirement through the normal means, of course.
Todd
On Fri, Jun 10, 2016 at 1:29 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Responding to a few different points:
(1) I don't envision this training as being sufficient to make anyone an expert in harassment or incivility response; the goal isn't to train all administrators to handle large-scale harassment. Rather, the goal is to train the administrators who take this course (further discussions below on how wide the recruiting for that will be) to a baseline level of familiarity with how to handle harassment and incivility if and when they encounter it. I think of it this way: in the physical world, only a few police officers will specialize in investigating harassment cases, but all police officers ideally should have a basic familiarity with how to address incivility and harassment situations. Anecdotally, I rarely hear people complain about learning more or getting reinforcement about "people skills", communication, leadership skills, and self-awareness. On Wikimedia sites, administrators are often in the potision of being "first responders" to difficult situations, and it seems to me that training for how to handle those situations would be good. Of course, some wikis may have developed their own training programs, and this training would be in addition rather than a replacement.
(2) Let me reiterate that while I support offering this training, I am not supportive of making this training mandatory until it has been widely tested. Even if there is a desire to make the training mandatory, I think it would be preferable that the decision be made by individual wiki communities who can adapt the training to their individual circumstances. I feel that a global mandate for administrators to take this training would be 2 years from now at the earliest, after administrators and communities who voluntarily adopt the training have had considerable time to test it, adapt it, and make suggestions about how to optimize it. With widespread feedback from multiple communities, we might eventually be able to offer a set of training modules that could be adaptable globally and that WMF could mandate with reasonable certainty that the benefits are worth the costs.
(3) The training is not a panacea. It won't stop block evasion. It won't make administrators be superhumans who are always right. It won't stop the problem that there are a few administrators who cause enough problems that they shouldn't be administrators. But I feel that overall, if done carefully and well, training administrators could move us in a good direction.
Pine
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 12:39 PM, Adrian Raddatz ajraddatz@gmail.com wrote:
Many volunteer organisations have mandatory training for volunteers, so that in itself is not a bad idea. But what about the cross-project differences that Risker brings up?
And more importantly, how could such training help when faced with the
type
of harassment that is referenced 99% of the time here - block or lock evasion after the system has already worked? Training would be a single sentence: "rinse and repeat the block/hide process until they decide to stop."
Adrian Raddatz
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 1:18 PM, Risker risker.wp@gmail.com wrote:
Hmmm. I find this recommendation concerning. There *might* be some validity on large projects with hundreds of administrators, but there
are a
lot of projects with only a few admins, and they were "selected"
because
they were willing to do the grunt work of deletions, protections, and blocks. Nobody was selecting them to handle large-scale harassment. Indeed, I cannot think of a single administrator even on a large
project
who was selected because of their ability or their interest in handling harassment incidents. There's pretty good evidence that it is not only
not
a criterion seriously considered by communities, but that absent the interest or willingness to carry out other tasks or demonstration of aptitude for other areas of administrator work, an admin candidate
would
not be selected by most communities, even large ones where harassment
is
a
much more visible concern.
There is also no basis for putting forward that mandatory training for
any
administrator function would be useful on a global scale. How does one
set
up a mandatory training program for carrying out page protection, given that every large project has a different policy? What happens if an administrator doesn't "pass" a mandatory program? Are they desysopped,
over
the objections of their community?
I'll point out in passing that there is not even consideration of a
formal
global checkuser training program - again, the local policies vary
widely,
and the types of issues addressed by checkusers on different projects
is
very different.
Risker/Anne
On 7 June 2016 at 15:01, Sydney Poore sydney.poore@gmail.com wrote:
My suggestion is to come up with a general type training that can
work
for
all administrators and functionaries since all have the freedom and permission to do all types of work on WMF projects. And that training should be mandatory.
Then people who are focusing on a particular type of administrative
or
functionaries work can take more advanced courses that could be
mandatory
for doing some types of work.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Tue, Jun 7, 2016 at 2:10 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com wrote:
Hi Sydney,
Thanks for that link. I think that for now I would suggest avoiding
making
the training mandatory because we won't know how successful it is
until
after we've used it for awhile. After the training has been tested
and
refined based on feedback, and if the consensus is that the
training
is
helpful, then at that point we could consider making this a
required
annual
training.
I could foresee is that, on wikis that have arbitration committees
or
other systematic ways of dealing with administrators who mess up,
the
ArbComs and/or the community could say that those administrators
who
have
demonstrated weakness in areas that are addressed by the training
will
be
required to take or re-take the training as a condition of keeping
their
admin permissions.
My hope is that the training will be of such good quality, and so interesting and useful to administrators, that many administrators
will
*want* to take the training or at least be curious enough to try
it.
Big
carrot, small stick. We can escalate from there if the training
develops
a
track record of success.
I would think of success as being measured in two ways:
administrators'
feedback about the training shows a consensus that they found it
helpful,
and communities report higher levels of satisfaction with their administrators as shown in the difference between surveys that are
done
before on multiple wikis (1) before the training starts and (2)
after 6
or
12 months of the training being rolled out.
Comments welcome, including suggestions about how to measure the
success
of the training.
Pine
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 7:58 PM, Sydney Poore <
sydney.poore@gmail.com
wrote:
Rosie Stephenson-Goodknight suggested Annual Training during the Harassment Consultation, 2015.
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment_consultation_2015/Ideas/Annual_tr...
If you've not seen it, it is worth your time to read the talk page discussion.
Sydney
Sydney Poore User:FloNight Wiki Project Med Foundation WikiWomen's User Group Facebook https://www.facebook.com/sydney.e.poore
On Mon, Jun 6, 2016 at 9:17 PM, Pine W wiki.pine@gmail.com
wrote:
> I have created > >
https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:IdeaLab/Training_for_administrators
> and would welcome feedback there. > > On the subject of block evasion, I have some ideas but would
defer
to
our
> experienced CheckUsers. > > Pine > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe:
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