[Advocacy Advisors] meeting with Google on 'right to be forgotten'

Fri May 30 11:40:19 UTC 2014

Hi all,

thanks to everyone for the interesting replies and the discussion so far. I
hope it doesn't stop here. It is a topic we'll should think about and I'd
be expecting at least some law suits around this.

Just to make sure everyone understands, I haven't been asked to consult
Google or to have Wikimedia on their advisory council or anythig like that.
I've just been invited to:
"discuss our approach in more detail, answer any questions or take any
views you may have" (direct quote)

I will make sure to report back here after the meeting.

Cheers,
Dimi

2014-05-30 13:21 GMT+02:00 Jens Best <jens.best at wikimedia.de>:

> Hi Dimi, Hi all,
>
> "Consulting" Google is something we shouldn't have any interests in.
> Having a talk could be interesting.
>
> The matter of social forgetting shouldn't be something which is decided by
> a council of "digital wise men & women" as Google is planning (I'm not at
> all happy to see Jimmy Wales in there) nor should it be decided by a
> government agency for official forgetting as the German government just
> announced to do (and what reminds me of some dystopian scifi story).
>
> The subject of deleting information out of commercial search engines is
> one problem (not basically ours), the ongoing campaign about making "the
> internet" forget about information (by cutting down the search results) can
> be a great problem for us.
>
> It is a cultural question which shouldn't be forced by any laws or court
> decision.
>
> There was a intense case about the right to oblivion and the right to have
> the information who murdered Walter Sedlmayr in Wikipedia[1][2]. Both in
> the German and the English Wikipedia this was a long dispute but in both,
> as of today, the names of the murders are noted and when you type in their
> names in Google Search the first results are the informations about them
> being convicted murderers who took their time in prison and now are free
> again.
>
> The question is, and taking the example of a murder makes this case so
> considerably, how we handle redemption and forgiveness as a society. The
> variety of social interaction makes a clear decision about what to forget
> and what to remember first look like a question which was in former times
> answered by religion. In todays open and free societies this question is
> based solely on the individual level - only very strong cultural barriers
> can "overwrite" this in very few cases and even there it is often cause for
> great dispute.
>
> Which leeds us to the only level on which the "right of oblivion" could be
> considered - the level of power over the people by scoring algorithms. We
> score each other on so many levels that this debate needs some reality
> check. Take the example of the murderers of Walter Sedlmayr. I bet many job
> applications of them went negative - officially not because they have been
> murderers and some fellow workman would feel uncomfortable having a
> murderer working next to him, no, surely officially there were many many
> other reasons why they didn't get a job, a creditline etc.
>
> So, scoring means power, knowing things about somebody leads to scoring
> possibilies. Intransparent scoring or scoring with highly disbalanced
> conditions are unjust and the need to level the play field is immanent.
> Search competence (even only knowing how to use Google cleverly) brings an
> advantage in personal scoring skills, this is a cultural and social
> challenge, not something you can regulate by law or with a bunch of
> selected wise men & women judging over your case.
>
> We, as the civil movement of Free Knowledge have to find or own answers
> beyond this cheap solutions which are now "negotiated" between business and
> governments. Therefore we should be careful to not let us be taken in by
> Google or any government.
>
> We should first of all develop our own thoughts on this. Where would an
> appropiate place for that? On Meta? Is there already some kind of draft
> paper about our thoughts as movements/European Chapters?
>
> best regards
>
> Jens Best
>
> [1]
> https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Sedlmayr#Aufkl.C3.A4rung_der_Todesumst.C3.A4nde_und_Folgen
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Sedlmayr#Murder
>
>
> 2014-05-30 11:10 GMT+02:00 Dimitar Parvanov Dimitrov <
> dimitar.parvanov.dimitrov at gmail.com>:
>
>> Hello everyone,
>>
>> I was contacted by Google's Brussels policy office team today and they
>> want to meet with me and talk about the recent ruling by the Court of
>> Justice of the European Union
>> <http://curia.europa.eu/juris/document/document.jsf?text=&docid=152065&pageIndex=0&doclang=en&mode=lst&dir=&occ=first&part=1&cid=276332>
>> that allows users to request information about them be taken off by search
>> engines.
>>
>> They want to discuss their approach in this matter in more detail and
>> answer any questions we might have.
>>
>> Dooes anyone on this list have a particular question they'd like me to
>> ask them?
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Dimi
>>
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>>
>>
>
>
> --
> --
> Jens Best
> Präsidium
> Wikimedia Deutschland e.V.
> web: http://www.wikimedia.de
> mail: jens.best <http://goog_17221883>@wikimedia.de
>
> Wikimedia Deutschland - Gesellschaft zur Förderung Freien Wissens e.V.
> Eingetragen im Vereinsregister des Amtsgerichts
> Berlin-Charlottenburg unter der Nummer 23855 B. Als gemeinnützig
> anerkannt durch das Finanzamt für Körperschaften I Berlin,
> Steuernummer 27/681/51985.
>
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