There is some discussion now about how the Code of Conduct Committee should be formed. See:
* https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
and
* https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra... .
Thanks,
Matt Flaschen
Some thoughts about https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Draft * I can't see community consensus (RFC) for this. * I see a lot (maybe 70%) staffer edits there. * It is complicated to understand the policy.
I have the feeling that only a few staffer building this. Please don't forget to involve the community!
How you like to enforce this policy on irc?
What is the committee? A WMF super arbcom?
Moor transparency would be great, and to write it in simple english so that non native speakers can get involved.
Best and with concerns, Steinsplitter
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 2015 00:27:22 -0400 From: mflaschen@wikimedia.org To: wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org Subject: [Wikitech-l] Code of conduct committee
There is some discussion now about how the Code of Conduct Committee should be formed. See:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
and
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra... .
Thanks,
Matt Flaschen
Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
Hi,
On Fri, Aug 21, 2015 at 11:49 AM, Steinsplitter Wiki < steinsplitter-wiki@live.com> wrote:
Some thoughts about https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Draft
- I can't see community consensus (RFC) for this.
"This page is currently a draft." It is not ready yet for a wide call for comments.
I'm not even sure that the RfC process is the right one for this. It is open for discussion. I just posted https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
- I see a lot (maybe 70%) staffer edits there.
I also would like to see more edits from volunteers and other affiliations. Please jump in! Most WMF employees drafting and discussing there are doing so out of their personal interest, with no WMF directive and most likely on their own time. I'm basically the only exception.
* It is complicated to understand the policy.
This new draft is based on an existing Contributor Covenant used already by several free software projects. See https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
We keep working on it, and you are welcome to join with ideas and edits.
I have the feeling that only a few staffer building this.
Please don't forget to involve the community!
See above. The base text has been forked from an external effort shared by many projects. The page is open to edits and comments from anybody. The initiative has been announced and discussed here and in other channels.
There is a proposal to offer an email alias to people willing to give feedback but preferring to do it privately. As you see, we are trying to get feedback from a wide variety of profiles. What else can we do to get more people involved?
How you like to enforce this policy on irc?
In the most effective way. :) What is your question, exactly? There is a lengthy discussion at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
What is the committee? A WMF super arbcom?
We are discussing the committee right now. It's not a simple question. It needs to be staffed by people willing to be in that role, it needs to have community trust, and it needs to be effective. Your ideas are welcome. See https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
Moor transparency would be great, and to write it in simple english so that non native speakers can get involved.
This exercise can be hardly more transparent. The fact that you can find so many open questions, some areas of dense language, and still not so many participants as we all would wish is due precisely to the fact that those interested are working openly in a pure wiki style since edit 1, and in fact since T87773.
As a non-native English speaker myself, I'm also interested in making the text simpler and clearer for everybody. This becomes easier as soon as paragraphs enter "testing" or "stable". Some areas are still in "unstable" and even "experimental". :)
Best and with concerns,
Please keep converting your concerns into more feedback. Thank you!
There is some discussion now about how the Code of Conduct Committee should be formed. See:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
and
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
On 21 August 2015 at 06:43, Quim Gil qgil@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi,
On Fri, Aug 21, 2015 at 11:49 AM, Steinsplitter Wiki < steinsplitter-wiki@live.com> wrote:
Some thoughts about https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Draft
- I can't see community consensus (RFC) for this.
"This page is currently a draft." It is not ready yet for a wide call for comments.
I'm not even sure that the RfC process is the right one for this. It is open for discussion. I just posted https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
- I see a lot (maybe 70%) staffer edits there.
I also would like to see more edits from volunteers and other affiliations. Please jump in! Most WMF employees drafting and discussing there are doing so out of their personal interest, with no WMF directive and most likely on their own time. I'm basically the only exception.
Speaking as a WMF employee who is involved in the discussion, this is my personal opinion - hence my choice of accounts to comment with. I suspect that WMF employees probably make up a big proportion of the technical community itself (something this proposal will hopefully help change!) and so large amounts of WMF participation is not surprising.
- It is complicated to understand the policy.
This new draft is based on an existing Contributor Covenant used already by several free software projects. See https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
We keep working on it, and you are welcome to join with ideas and edits.
I have the feeling that only a few staffer building this.
Please don't forget to involve the community!
See above. The base text has been forked from an external effort shared by many projects. The page is open to edits and comments from anybody. The initiative has been announced and discussed here and in other channels.
There is a proposal to offer an email alias to people willing to give feedback but preferring to do it privately. As you see, we are trying to get feedback from a wide variety of profiles. What else can we do to get more people involved?
How you like to enforce this policy on irc?
In the most effective way. :) What is your question, exactly? There is a lengthy discussion at https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
What is the committee? A WMF super arbcom?
We are discussing the committee right now. It's not a simple question. It needs to be staffed by people willing to be in that role, it needs to have community trust, and it needs to be effective. Your ideas are welcome. See https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
Moor transparency would be great, and to write it in simple english so that non native speakers can get involved.
This exercise can be hardly more transparent. The fact that you can find so many open questions, some areas of dense language, and still not so many participants as we all would wish is due precisely to the fact that those interested are working openly in a pure wiki style since edit 1, and in fact since T87773.
As a non-native English speaker myself, I'm also interested in making the text simpler and clearer for everybody. This becomes easier as soon as paragraphs enter "testing" or "stable". Some areas are still in "unstable" and even "experimental". :)
Best and with concerns,
Please keep converting your concerns into more feedback. Thank you!
There is some discussion now about how the Code of Conduct Committee should be formed. See:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
and
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
-- Quim Gil Engineering Community Manager @ Wikimedia Foundation http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/User:Qgil _______________________________________________ Wikitech-l mailing list Wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikitech-l
On 21/08/15 14:39, Oliver Keyes wrote:
On 21 August 2015 at 06:43, Quim Gil qgil@wikimedia.org wrote:
Hi,
On Fri, Aug 21, 2015 at 11:49 AM, Steinsplitter Wiki < steinsplitter-wiki@live.com> wrote:
- I see a lot (maybe 70%) staffer edits there.
I also would like to see more edits from volunteers and other affiliations. Please jump in! Most WMF employees drafting and discussing there are doing so out of their personal interest, with no WMF directive and most likely on their own time. I'm basically the only exception.
Speaking as a WMF employee who is involved in the discussion, this is my personal opinion - hence my choice of accounts to comment with. I suspect that WMF employees probably make up a big proportion of the technical community itself (something this proposal will hopefully help change!) and so large amounts of WMF participation is not surprising.
If nothing else, WMF employees are likely the bulk of technical contributors with the spare time to actually talk meta about this stuff, since they're already spending their paid time making things. Imagine if you were doing all of this in your spare time, would you rather be using your limited time making things, or talking about some ephemeral proposed thing that may not ever even affect you even if it does become real? Having to make that choice could impact matters too.
-I
On 08/21/2015 06:43 AM, Quim Gil wrote:
I also would like to see more edits from volunteers and other affiliations. Please jump in! Most WMF employees drafting and discussing there are doing so out of their personal interest, with no WMF directive and most likely on their own time. I'm basically the only exception.
It's important to remember that we're building this CoC because it is relevant to both our community and our work.
I know that's why I'm participating, and I believe it's also why the volunteers are.
Matt Flaschen
On Thu, Aug 20, 2015 at 9:27 PM, Matthew Flaschen mflaschen@wikimedia.org wrote:
There is some discussion now about how the Code of Conduct Committee should be formed. See:
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra...
and
https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Talk:Code_of_conduct_for_technical_spaces/Dra... .
Glad to see steps forward!
But I strongly recommend we seek out people who have experience with organizing this sort of thing before we try cobbling together an enforcement committee on our own, just as we seek out people with domain expertise on technical issues that we wish to implement.
More generally:
I think it's pretty well-known within our community (that includes me, that includes you if you're reading this, that includes everyone who works on MediaWiki, MediaWiki extensions, JS gadgets and user scripts, templates and Lua modules for Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and other sites, etc) that we've seen lot of negative interactions between people: anger, put-downs, "not my department", "RTFM", passive-aggressive eye-rolling sarcasm, etc -- these are the sorts of things that poison a community and make it harder to attract and retain people who start out excited about helping.
I believe it's important that we explicitly acknowledge this and improve our community norms -- and especially our enforcement systems -- with it in mind. Among other things, this means that listing out specific offenses has only limited utility; toxic behavior can easily extend itself through "rules-lawyering", as I think we've all seen on Wikipedia.
-- brion
On Mon, Aug 24, 2015 at 9:01 AM, Brion Vibber bvibber@wikimedia.org wrote:
But I strongly recommend we seek out people who have experience with organizing this sort of thing before we try cobbling together an enforcement committee on our own, just as we seek out people with domain expertise on technical issues that we wish to implement.
Agree completely. Within the WMF, my sense is that Community Advocacy has the most domain expertise around community enforcement mechanisms, although the dynamics in the projects' communities of course don't map perfectly to those in our technical community, and I'd value their input.
More generally:
I think it's pretty well-known within our community (that includes me, that includes you if you're reading this, that includes everyone who works on MediaWiki, MediaWiki extensions, JS gadgets and user scripts, templates and Lua modules for Wikipedia, Wiktionary, and other sites, etc) that we've seen lot of negative interactions between people: anger, put-downs, "not my department", "RTFM", passive-aggressive eye-rolling sarcasm, etc -- these are the sorts of things that poison a community and make it harder to attract and retain people who start out excited about helping.
I believe it's important that we explicitly acknowledge this and improve our community norms -- and especially our enforcement systems -- with it in mind. Among other things, this means that listing out specific offenses has only limited utility; toxic behavior can easily extend itself through "rules-lawyering", as I think we've all seen on Wikipedia.
I agree that lists of specific behaviors aren't enough to produce a genuinely welcoming community, but it's still very important to have them in order to address the "oh, I didn't know that was inappropriate" argument (an unfortunately common one almost no matter what the offense). As they say, "common sense" isn't, especially in as broad a community as Wikimedia contributors.
-Frances
wikitech-l@lists.wikimedia.org