[Foundation-l] Racism in Commons

[Nathan Awrich]

Correct me if I'm wrong - the various Wikimedia projects have
different aims, but you can generally describe them as the
accumulation of information to community specific standards so that
this information can then be displayed to the public. Commons, on the
other hand, is a service provided not to the public generally but to
Wikimedia projects - therefore, the policies that apply to externally
useful articles/reports/books etc. need not necessarily apply to the
storage of media at Commons.

I think it would be a mistake for the Foundation board to declare, by
fiat, that all Wikimedia projects must adhere to a specific content
policy (aside from legal policies such as copyright protection etc).

~Nate

On Dec 5, 2007 12:24 PM, Yoni Weiden <yonidebest at gmail.com> wrote:
> I am happy to see that the images were removed from Ariel Sharon's page.
> Thats one setp. However, I still have a problem with categories like
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Caricatures_of_Ariel_Sharon
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Politics_of_the_Palestinian_territories
> and such. There images should be hosted by Wikimedia, except for one or two
> images - for educational reasons (like I said - the Hebrew Wikipedia has one
> cartoon example on the artist's page).
>
> Regarding double standard - I have no idea whats going on in other pages. I
> can imagine that this artist and others have infected other pages too, incl.
> Bush's page, and even Hitler's page. These pages should be *clean* from
> racist images that promote nothing Wikimedia stands for.
>
> I would like Wikimedia board members to set a resolution to force Commons to
> create some sort of NPOV policy and to force them to clean their site -
> Ariel Sharon's page, Bush's page and even Hitler's page. Futhermore, I think
> the foundation should publish a basic NPOV policy that will bind all
> projects.
>
> Hosting such pictures in the name of education is taking the word to a new
> and unwanted level.
>
> Thanks,
> Yoni
>
> 2007/12/5, Nathan Awrich <nawrich at gmail.com>:
>
>
> > I'm not a Commons member, but am an en:wiki member of the Israel and
> > Judaism projects (to illustrate where I'm coming from on this issue).
> > I think that NPOV should be not be applied to Commons. A media storage
> > space (even one with verification and other processes) shouldn't have
> > a neutral or any other point of view. Its simply storage. If the
> > cartoons are actually used anywhere, then they should adhere to the
> > POV-related and other policies applicable to where they are used.
> >
> > An issue unrelated to racism, NPOV, etc. is proper categorisation.
> > That is the purview of Commons, and the images probably belong in some
> > more specific category than images of Ariel Sharon.
> >
> > ~Nate
> >
> > On Dec 5, 2007 11:06 AM, Riana <wiki.riana at gmail.com> wrote:
> > > On 06/12/2007, Christiano Moreschi <moreschiwikiman at hotmail.co.uk>
> > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > [...]
> > > > There's a word for that we use at enwiki: POV-pushing.
> > >
> > >
> > > I wish every discussion along these lines didn't turn into a enWP v/s
> > > <insert smaller project here> pissing contest, but meh. Had a brief look
> > and
> > > [[commons:George W. Bush#Cartoons and Caricatures]] turned up. So which
> > > accusation do we prefer, Commons folks - non-NPOV, or double standards?
> > :)
> > >
> > > --
> > > Riana
> > >
> > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Riana
> > > http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Riana
> > >
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