[Foundation-l] Conflict resolution on meta Wikimedia

[Richard Holton]

On Wed, 23 Feb 2005 17:36:19 +0100, Gerard Meijssen
<gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> Hoi,
> The article [[meta:End-user content suppression]] was recently renamed
> to [[meta:End-user image suppression]]. It is an article that descibes
> how we should tag our content eh images so that people can choose to
> have content presented to them or not. The proposers of this idea assume
> that mechanism for censorship will only be triggered by individuals and,
> that it is to prevent them from coming across content they may find
> disturbing. They fail to answer several questions:

The purpose of the page is to discuss the implementation (though I
would suggest yet another name change to make this clear)., It is
unrealistic to expect at this stage that all questions would be
answered.

However, I can give you my personal answers to these questions:

> * Who is going to add these tags
The tags would be normal [[category:xxx]] tags. Such tags are already
being added, and would continue to be added by those who are
interested in adding them. Certainly not everyone would be required to
participate, but I would expect that those who are opposed to
censorship would not actively remove these tags -- since that would in
fact be a form of censorship.

> * What is the basis for tagging content. What to be done when someone
> comes along who wants even more tagging or the tagging of different
> categories.
The basis for tagging would be whatever basis people want to tag them.
As I see it, useful tags for images would include tags based on
content: clowns, temples, butterflies, sexual positions, etc.

Nothing needs to be done when someone wants to add even more tagging
of different categories. If a category in inherently POV (excellent
bands, disgusting people, offensive image) those categories would fall
under the same axe as any other POV.

> * How do you prevent organisations or countries from censoring our
> content using our own mechanism
How do we prevent this from happening now? We cannot directly control
the actions of any government or organization. Mechanism for blocking
specific sites/pages are common. I don't really see the issue here.

> * How do you ensure that the integrity of our NPOV content is maintained
> if people will not see the whole of our content
The intent of this system is not to make viewing of any content
impossible. Only to require some additional intentional action to view
it. People can currently engage in POV disputes without having read
the content, but their input is not particularly relevant.

> * What argument do you have against tagging content if you state that
> this is only about images
I'm not certain I understand the question. Is the concern that this
same mechanism could be used to filter certain articles? This would
require software specifically written to allow that, but I don't
particularly see any issue is allowing someone to so restrict his or
her own choices. Google allows you to have "safe search" on or off.
What's the issue?

> In the article that is now called [[meta:End-user image suppression]] I
> have added a tag to say that the subject is controversial and, the
> reasons why it is controversial. This is not appreciated and resulted in
> a slash and burn reaction. Apparantly you are not allowed to say that
> "when it walks like a duck an it talks like a duck, it must be a duck".
> I am afraid that censorship is alive and well.
> 
Indeed! Why don't you start another article on Meta discussing the
merits of free speech / censorship? What is preventing you?
Censorship? Freedom of speech does not allow someone to say whatever
they want whenever they want.

> The proposers of this policy say that it is only technical. I beg to
> differ. Censure is what I do not want for our content.
> 

I'm not aware that this has reached the level of a proposed policy.

As I've attempted to describe above, no content would be censored. 
You either have a misunderstood the nature of what is being discussed,
or you have a very different understanding of censorship than I have..

-Rich Holton
en.wikipedia:User:Rholton