When editors start to complain noisily over and over and over that the pornographic pictures of the english wikipedia are spilling over their project, then there is a problem. And I think it is normal that I report it, because I think it is understandable that people are upset and ask that a solution is brought. Add that this is done by a bot and at high speed, and add that it is NOT easy to revert a redirect to another project, and you have the seed of a crisis boiling. When porn images were linked many times in the english project, due to vandalism, it resulted in some solution being proposed : no direct linking allowed (granted, there was also the issue of the copyright). When wrong images are uploaded at high speed by anonymous editor, the solution is to allow image upload only to log-in editors. These two solutions do not allow to entirely prevent vandalism, but they allow to slow down the speed of it. Now, we have several projects, such as the french, the dutch, the spanish ones, which are victims of vandalism spree by a bot, which redirect pages to the english pornography. It is a vandalism difficult to revert. It is time consuming. And it is very upsetting to editors. The question is "is it okay that several editors spent several hours running to remove pornographic images from other editors talk page or their main page ?"; Is it the best way to use people time ? what value do you give to people time when they spent 1 hour cleaning up the mess of a 5mn bot ? Dunno, but when editors leave me a spanish desperate message on my talk page, when I see calls on the french pump to go for deletion of the english image, I just think there IS a problem. I am not sure the solution of this problem is to make a general call on all pedias vandalised to go vote for the image deletion.

1) Brion is on the case already. There's a code change in CVS that will allow InterWiki redirects to show a "Redirected from" like regular redirects.

2) Angela pointed out to me that even if the image was deleted from the English Wikipedia, it could still be on any of the other wikis on the InterWiki map (e.g. all Wikicities), all of which can be used for InterWiki redirects. So you wouldn't just need a cross-Wikipedia

or linking policy, but pretty much one across all wikis. That is

not a workable solution. 3) The autofellatio image may be a case where many people agree that

inappropriate in any context, but many images which we clearly want,

as the photos GerardM uploaded of venereal diseases, would be clearly inappropriate on user talk pages. That doesn't mean such images

deleted.

We should simply consider this vandalism, and improve the tools we

deal with it. 1) helps a great deal already. Single login will also

as people will not suddenly be thrown into a wiki whose language they

not speak once they have set their language user preference. We may, however, want to consider disabling InterWiki redirects specifically

non-Wikimedia wikis whose policies are beyond our control. All best, Erik

No, but this is precisely what is happening right now. Which is why I raise up the issue.

If your interest is to censor encyclopedic content on any wikimedia wikipedia, then your goals are at odds with the goals of the foundation. Because you do not share the same goals, you should fork and produce your own project with censorship among it's goals. If you continue to endorse censorship you are harming the project. Please allow those who want to share knowledge freely the ability to do so on wikipedia by taking your censorship someplace else.

However, I just limited myself to vote for its deletion on the english wikipedia, and will absolutely accept very willingly any decision the community will find toward its future.

I am absolutely zero when it comes to technical topics, but I can hardly imagine that it be impossible for servers to exclude single computers - regardless of the User Name apllied.

David Gerard a écrit: Uh ? Giving one's opinion is worse than useless ??? Yes, but if the image is voted once for deletion, it should be automatically redeleted afterwards. This was the first time *I* voted. ... Well, if the current direction is to encourage editors to say nothing at all when they disagree with a situation, or to flow them under accusations and insults when they do nevertheless, I think Wikipedia is in big trouble. It is never a good think to threaten people who try to give their opinion, and today makes me really wonder what project I am in all fairness giving my time to.

I find it admirable that you are so utterly certain that you know what the goals of the foundation are better than members of the Board of Trustees of the Wikimedia Foundation, and are so unhesitatingly willing to accuse those Trustees of harming your project, and are so quick to request that Trustees leave your project. Admirable, and very wrong. But admirable. Well, sorta.

From: "Tony Sidaway" <minorityreport(a)bluebottle.com> Reply-To: minorityreport(a)bluebottle.com, wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org To: <wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org> Subject: Re: [Wikipedia-l] Autofellatio Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2005 15:28:52 +0100 (BST) Wouter Steenbeek said: Well most people decided it shouldn't be on Wikipedia, whether because they suspected it was a copyright violation, they thought it was too open to abuse, or they didn't think it was suitable for Wikipedia. Quadell has closed the discussion, deleted the image, and removed the link from the article. I'm happy with this outcome. The image was deleted by consensus.

This is not an "outcome", in the sense that it will not stop here. Other images will appear, and one can easily find images that are fine for articles but will upset a lot of people if they are put in place of their user page.

Well most people decided it shouldn't be on Wikipedia, whether because they suspected it was a copyright violation, they thought it was too open to abuse, or they didn't think it was suitable for Wikipedia. Quadell has closed the discussion, deleted the image, and removed the link from the article. I'm happy with this outcome. The image was deleted by consensus.

But don't imagine that those of us who think that, for example, it is blatantly obvious that the [[Imgae:Autofellatio_2.jpg]] image is wildly inappropriate for wikipedia are simply prudish censors. Such a view really fails to respect and understand the point that we are making. A respectful discussion of this difficult issue is hard to have if anyone who is in favor of deleting some images from wikipedia is to be shunned as a censor who ought to leave the project and fork.

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:42:36 -0800, Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales <jwales(a)wikia.com> wrote: I do not want to discuss whether the image is appropriate or not. That's an issue that I do not want to discuss here, although I guess it needs to be discussed. What I do want to state is that if there is one Wikipedia page in one language where it *is* appropriate, and 1.499.999 pages on the various Wikimedia Wikis where it is *not* appropriate, the one page that can use it should weigh more heavily than those other 1.499.999 where it is not. And in particular, an image should not be deleted from the *English* Wikipedia because it is inappropriate at the *French* one. Andre Engels

On Tue, 29 Mar 2005 04:42:36 -0800, Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales <jwales(a)wikia.com> wrote: Is that really the case? I'm surprised that you would disagree with the statement above, that if someone's intention is to censor encyclopedic content, based on such value judgements, that they are at odds with the project and should work on something else. I certainly see how you might state that I was mistaken in classifying the proposed measures as censorship, or that it was rude of me to insult someone of unquestionable value... This is quite heartening to hear reaffirmed. At the same time, what I see being proposed is the idea that it's acceptable for wikipedias in differing languages to have a differing set of standards, and this is the one, and perhaps only, point where I am reasonably confident that I am not misunderstanding Anthere. I don't see how these ideas can coexist. If our test of a material is it's value to educate and inform, is it not true that the same material which would educate and inform would also educate and inform people of another language? A policy that says that we will exclude content differently depending on the language of wikipedia, says that we are applying an additional test, a test of moral rightness. This thread is surrounded on all sides with bad information... Anthere's initial concern was primarily about vandalism... But vandalism is an issue that we can't even come close to solving by the proposed measures that I objected so strongly to (value based standards of content)... The autofellatio image is a bad example because most people would agree that it has some of the poorest inform to shock ratios of call the contested images on wikipedia. (I'd still argue it's of value, as one person said after seeing it... "wow.. thats possible? eww", but I haven't been involved in the voting for that image and don't intend to be) I jumped in the thread because I believe that the idea of differing standards inclusion standards in differing languages necessitates censorship and I decided that it was a worthwhile matter which was being ignored in the thread... because of the separately worthwhile discussion of applying technical means to address that specific form of vandalism. My apologies, both to the list and Anthere, on this matter... My attempt cut away issues I saw as extranious to the issue I wanted to discuss (vandalism, that specific image,etc) came off as offensive. (I may not care if you find a useful image on the 'pedia offensive, but I really would hope you don't find my discussions as offensive.) Grey paint begins with black and white. I did not mean to imply that we should shun the issues or the people bringing them, but rather strike up some vigorous discussion on this important matter... and through out some ideas that I think should be widely acceptable, such as "if making good/evil value judgements about content is someones goal then everyone would gain from them working on a fork, given the intentions of the project". Well, If I'm going to have to base my discussions on whom is proposing an idea rather than the merits of the idea, then I should probably give up now.... :) _______________________________________________ Wikipedia-l mailing list Wikipedia-l(a)Wikimedia.org http://mail.wikipedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikipedia-l

He seems to think that you were directly suggesting Ant fork, which is definitely not the case. (as far as I can tell, you are saying that she is at odds with foundation philosophy and that if she really wants to have a Wikipedia where it doesn't follow philosophy, she can make a fork; rather than a suggestion that she really should)

I think it's perfectly well acceptable. There is not one possible 'ultimate' content of Wikipedia, and one language will make other choices than others. If one language uses image A and another uses image B, should we start having a project-wide vote on which one is better, and then, if B is chosen, force the first language to change their article?

The test of material is not its value to educate and inform, the test is whether it improves the given article and Wikipedia. And it seems to be generally accepted that there are places where Wikipedias differ. On the Danish Wikipedia there are stubs that would not be accepted as such on the German Wikipedia (I think). Should one of them change their policy because such stubs do/don't educate and inform? I don't think so.

A policy that says that we will exclude the same on all languages, says that we don't trust the Wikipedias to make their own choices.

I disagree that you say it 'necessitates censorship'. To me, forcing the same inclusion standards to all languages is censorship. Unless perhaps we take the most lenient standards possible. But do you really want to *force* Wikipedias to include certain images?

I totally agree with Andre here. I think it's important for us to take a middle path here. (Big surprise coming from me, huh?) We can't be complete cultural relativists and say "anything goes in any wikipedia as long as the participants agree" -- this would be the end of neutrality. At the same time, we must not be complete cultural *imperialists* and assume that exactly identical decisions have to be made everywhere, particularly on sensitive matters that have a strong cultural component.

Andre wrote: I think that's very well said.

Again, really, this is just extremely over the top. Tell you what, if you go out and find someone in the wikipedia community who says "I have the right to complete exclude the other side because I have a commandment from god to rid the world of such ideas" then by all means drag them in here to the mailing list so we can make fun of them. It'll be great fun.

In the meantime, let's try to address the arguments of people who are actually engaged in this discussion. I think that virtually everyone comes down along a spectrum in the broad middle which says: (a) there are universal standards and (b) there are local cultural considerations as well, so that (c) we expect some things to be more or less universal, but we can also have some local flavor.

I don't see how this is a good policy. By happy accident of languages, we have no US-specific Wikipedia, in which Americans get to decide how their Wikipedia is going to look---they have to share their English Wikipedia with the opinions of all other English speakers on the planet who choose to participate.

If your interest is to censor encyclopedic content on any wikimedia wikipedia, then your goals are at odds with the goals of the foundation. Because you do not share the same goals, you should fork and produce your own project with censorship among it's goals. If you continue to endorse censorship you are harming the project. Please allow those who want to share knowledge freely the ability to do so on wikipedia by taking your censorship someplace else. The claim that pages are somehow 'dirtied' by a mere image speaks strongly about your lack of neutral perspective.

And ? I do not think anyone can claim to be truely neutral on this picture :-) And I think we have the right to have opinions. All those who voted had an opinion.

No. And this was *precisely* what was happening. And this was one of the reasons why I brought attention to the list about it. And this was precisely why helping to decrease the amount of vandalism on one pedia resulting in the decision taken by another pedia could help. There is a saying : good fences make good neighbours.

perhaps not a tragedy, but yes, it occurred. It occurred because people were tired to fight this type vandalism.

Not sure about that. I think the primary reason was to prevent vandalism...

Neutrality is not even about being non-reactive about a topic.