[Foundation-l] Letter to the community on Controversial Content

[Thomas Dalton]

On 9 October 2011 17:19, Sue Gardner <sgardner at wikimedia.org> wrote:
> Nobody wants civil war.

I'm sure they don't actively want one, but it seems the board do
consider one an acceptable cost.

> Please read Ting's note carefully. The Board is asking me to work with
> the community to develop a solution that meets the original
> requirements as laid out in its resolution. It is asking me to do
> something. But it is not asking me to do the specific thing that has
> been discussed over the past several months, and which the Germans
> voted against.
>
> The Board is hoping there is a solution that will 1) enable readers to
> easily hide images they don't want to see, as laid out in the Board's
> resolution [1], while 2) being generally acceptable to editors. Maybe
> this will not be possible, but it's the goal. The Board definitely
> does not want a war with the community, and it does not want people to
> fork or leave the projects. The goal is a solution that's acceptable
> for everyone.

But what happens in the event that such a goal cannot be achieved?
Ting has made it very clear that they intend some kind of image filter
to be implemented on all projects, regardless of community wishes. I
hope the community will come around and accept some kind of filter,
but if they don't then the WMF needs to accept that it has failed, do
so gracefully, and not try to start a war that in cannot possibly win
and will cause a great deal of damage.

I think that if the WMF made it clear that they will not implement any
kind of image filter on a project if there is overwhelming opposition
to it, the relevant communities would be much more willing to engage
in constructive dialogue.