From: Robert Horning robert_horning@netzero.net

As I feared would be the case, this new foundation policy has become a call to arms by deletionists to institute a massive removal of all fair use content on all Wikimedia projects. I don't know if this was the intent, but on at least en.wikibooks, the most active bureaucrat there has demanded that all fair use content be eliminated from Wikibooks. And has used this policy to strength his own counter claim that we should never have allowed fair use onto that project in the first place.

As the most active of the three bureaucrats on that project, I can only assume Robert is talking about me. This is a gross miscategorization of my words and actions, and should not be used to cause alarm among foundation members.

After reading the resolution, I suggested in a local forum that we needed to finalize our EDP policy proposal (which is an "unofficial" de facto standard at the moment), we needed to increase our monitoring and tagging of fair use images, and we needed to educate administrators about the use and misuse of fair use media. I specifically called for people not to delete any fair use media until our EDP policy was finalized, and so far no images have been deleted because of this.

... unless you have already "approved" an EDP (whatever that means.... and the process of approval is certainly vague here)

It's not vague at all, en.wikibooks has a method for approving new policy, and we are employing that method now to our own EDP. Again, no cause for alarm here.

Because of the earlier discussion about fair use that was started by Kat (before this policy was written), this same bureaucrat on Wikibooks also deleted and rewrote the fair use policy to simply say that fair use was banned, presuming authority on the part of the WMF.

A mistake on my part, which I personally reverted when I learned of my errors. I had been under the impression that Kat's essay carried more weight then it actually did, and that the forthcoming WMF resolution would be significantly more restrictive about fair use then our previous policy on the matter was. I was right, and there are significant restrictions on it.

But because this is a smallish project with only a handful of users who set policy, it makes it easier for some users to wildly mis-interpret what has been said.

And it is also easy for people like this to wildly misinterpret the actions of their fellow wikimedians. It's easier to raise alarm if you lie and say that our project is going to hell in a hand basket. It's harder to raise that alarm when you admit that our project is functioning normally, and is making a community effort to meet the expectations of the WMF resolution.

In the future, if you are going to lie about me, do it in private so I dont need to call you out about it in public. It's just rude.

--Andrew Whitworth (b:User:Whiteknight)

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