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Quick note

The project is slowly dying. Enjoy.Cptnono (talk) 05:17, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

The project isn't a living organism, therefore it can't die. GoodDay (talk) 14:55, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
A metaphor is a figure of speech that identifies something as being the same as some unrelated thing, for rhetorical effect, thus highlighting the similarities between the two. It is therefore considered more rhetorically powerful than a simile. While a simile compares two items, a metaphor directly equates them, and so does not apply any distancing words of comparison, such as "like" or "as." Metaphor is a type of analogy and is closely related to other rhetorical figures of speech that achieve their effects via association, comparison or resemblance including allegory, hyperbole, and simile. Bosstopher (talk) 17:02, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
  • ........in further news, WMF has already surpassed its aggressive fundraising target for the entire fiscal year (which ends in June 2015), core volunteer count remains stable, and we're now over the 4.7 million article mark... Dead, indeed. Carrite (talk) 17:14, 16 February 2015 (UTC)\
Maybe he is talking about The Project or The Project. -- Ed (Edgar181) 19:51, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
What use does the WMF have for money if they can't find a worthwhile way to use it? KonveyorBelt 16:15, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Moar VisualEditor. --DSA510 Pls No Level Up 23:25, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
I won't argue whether "the project" is or isn't dying. I'll just say that I spend a fair amount of time in the Wikipedia archives, going back to 2004-2005 and there have always been people declaring that the dream is dead. Maybe it's best to give up what you think Wikipedia should be and work with what it is and plan for what it could be. Liz Read! Talk! 20:39, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
That's convenient. Everybody loves a good zombie story. :) →StaniStani 22:39, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Discussion at Village Pump

Jimbo, your input and that of others would be welcome at this discussion about Wikipedia's potential implementation of HTTPS for all readers. Thank you, BethNaught (talk) 08:18, 17 February 2015 (UTC)

Proof that you can't please everyone

I would hate to be in the middle ot this mess. Mysoginism runs rampant in the UK. Nyth63 16:48, 16 February 2015 (UTC)

The unfortunate thing about the whole thing is that Harriet Harman is a serious person with real credentials and a solid track record on women's issues. A pink bus just feels to me like a stunt not worthy of someone of her stature.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:36, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
I laughed at most of the article. Some people happen to like the color pink. Some don't (for various reasons). Those that don't seem to make it their mission to bother everyone else with their opinion. And to have to apologize for having a male driver is hilarious too. Nyth63 21:39, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Feminism doesn't mean discrimination against men, so a male driver in the pool is only to be expected. The "woman to woman" part is more dubious ... unfortunately, it follows a long and international tradition. Every time an American politician "reaches out to Latinos" (which must be daily -- Latino x anything => Latino and so it's a constantly growing category on the census), he's doing the same thing. All the politicians see a couple of demographic facts about somebody on a form and start basing their whole strategy around racial/sexual statistics - ignoring that what people need are ideas that are valid no matter what the viewer's extraction. Wnt (talk) 14:07, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
If there had not been a controversial pink bus, people might know nothing of this campaign, but look at how much publicity has been generated. Sometimes 'mistakes' are not as much of an accident as they might seem. --nonsense ferret 20:32, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 18 February 2015

Your birthdate

Hi Jimbo, I noticed you posted on Talk:Jimmy Wales#Birthdate redux that your birthdate is not on the 8th as Britannica says. [1] Britannica also says that you "provided a scanned image of [your] passport showing [your] birth date to be Aug. 8, 1966." Is this true, and if so, are we to believe that your passport has your birthdate wrong? I hope that your response will settle this silly dispute once and for all. Everymorning talk 02:48, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

This revision is pretty good. What I'm guilty of is having a sense of humor. My birth certificate has an error, which has propagated across many but not all legal documents. (As a side note, my birth certificate actually spells my name wrong - as Jimmie.) My mother and father were there, though, and it was definitely not the date listed on my birth certificate. Their theory is that the doctor was tired and didn't note the time (11:21pm, if my memory serves) and got back to his office and filled out the paperwork at the end of his shift in the morning. My sense of humor has been, in the past, to play with people - if they say one date, I say "Oh, that isn't what my mother says". If they say the other day, I say, "Oh that isn't what my birth certificate says". --Jimbo Wales (talk) 05:14, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Except, right now, the article has the 7th on the first line in the lead, and the 8th in the first line under early life. Very funny indeed. Nyth63 15:00, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Are we really that concerned with his proper birth date that we can't share in the humor? Wow. Call someone Jewish and there's an uproar that you can't label people that it is possible BLP to label people as simply "he is Jewish" instead of the awkwardly worded "his mother and father are of Jewish descent" (even if there are quotes where the person has outright said "I am Jewish", such as one quote by Adam Levine). BUT good lord, say yes let's all have a field day having to narrow down someone's birthday because THAT'S not personal information or might be construed as a BLP violation if you get it slightly wrong. Camelbinky (talk) 15:49, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Maybe we should put the "7th" In quotes? Nyth63 16:58, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Or maybe we just average it out and call it 7.5. :-)--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:01, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
7.4865th (1401/2880) ? Nyth63 17:31, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Maybe we should have a birthdate template that changes date of birth according to Time Zone. It was the 8th somewhere. That way everyone can have an ambiguous birthdate. It's only fair. --DHeyward (talk) 18:24, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Jimbo, you could just be like the world's oldest reigning monarch and have two birthdays!--5 albert square (talk) 02:22, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Birth Certificates often have errors -- my wife's lists her mother as from South Carolina instead of Scotland. My uncle's had his older brother's name on it. Errors != fact. The anecdote from JW here is sufficient to note "birth certificate made out the next day" and be done with this. It is not quite the same as someone trying to claim they are five years younger than they are, fgs. JW can, of course, seek a correction of the certificate without a huge deal of trouble. Collect (talk) 18:53, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

I don't know - it seems like a huge deal of trouble to do anything at all about it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:31, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
It may take as long as an hour to do -- and lately it is considered pretty routine. Honest! Collect (talk) 21:32, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Heather Bresch

Hi Jimbo. About one month ago there was a discussion on your Talk page here about whether Heather Bresch was fairly represented on Wikipedia.

I wanted to notify you and your watchlisters that participated previously that I started a Request for Comment on the Talk page of the Heather Bresch article at: Talk:Heather_Bresch#Request_for_Comment. As previously disclosed, I have a financial connection with Bresch's employer. CorporateM (Talk) 02:08, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

Idea for improvement

Hello Mr. Wales. I must apologize, for I don't know if this message is as much for you as it is for all of your talk-page stalkers, but with as many people who patrol this page, I thought this would be as good a place as any. This idea is to both promote new users and user-retention, by making Wikipedia just a little easier to use.

One of the most difficult things I had to learn to deal with was all of the wiki mark-up. Although I now understand the necessity of it all, one of the most frustrating things about editing an article is weeding through all of the references on the edit page.

My idea is: When someone goes to an edit-page to make changes, perhaps the references could be arranged just like in the article, that is, as numbers from 1 to whatever. Beneath the main edit-section could be another section with the references spelled out separately from the text, so that people can still edit them from the same page. To simplify things, when a person wants to add a ref, they simply add it like normal. However, when they hit "preview," that ref could change to a number and drop down to a section (or window) beneath the text. It seems to me that, by moving the refs out of the way (to a different section), it would make easier for those trying to both edit the text and the refs. Of course, I'm no programmer (still pretty computer-illiterate) and I don't know how hard that would be to implement, nor what kind of other chaos it may cause. Therefore, I'll just propose the idea once and let you all take it from here. Zaereth (talk) 13:51, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Syntax highlighting is a possible solution.—Wavelength (talk) 19:30, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
  • Moving cites to {Reflist|refs} to reduce clutter: @Zaereth, you have noted one of the biggest problems in editing WP pages, and some years ago, we discussed moving most of the cites as named wp:reftags into "{Reflist|...refs=..}" to reduce all the confusing clutter of cites interleaved into the upper text of a page. A utility program to auto-generate named reftags & auto-move cites into {Reflist|refs=} would be one of the most valuable tools to have in Wikipedia or other MediaWiki sites. Some users have hand-sorted many pages to put all cites into the lower References section of each article. Years ago, the interleaved cite text was not as hideous, but now many pages, such as "Twitter" have more than 350 cites mixed into the upper text of the page. Although WP began as a "Micropaedia" with short articles, it has ballooned into a rambling mass of wp:Data hoarding with more than 50 screen-pages of text about thousands of major subjects. When moved into separate sections, it would be possible to concurrently edit the named cites in a 2nd window, while editing the upper text, then save both edits without an wp:edit_conflict (as long as one line remained unchanged between the edited sections). -Wikid77 (talk) 20:35, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
  • This implies making creation of WP footnotes similar to Word or Apple "Pages," for example — which is exactly how a WYSIWYG editing program should have been designed. Instead VE attempts to make sugar from shark turds, faking out a template for references. That was one huge, critical failing at the outset, in my opinion, not going the route of ref and /ref tags and then WYSIWYG editing of footnotes but instead pasting in field data and shoving everything in the template creation blender... Carrite (talk) 02:04, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
Thank you all for your responses I'm not sure I fully understand them all, nor if I'm using the correct terminology, but it seems like we're talking apples and apples here. To be honest, I only got my first computer at home about a year ago, but that was for the sole purpose of taking people on flight-sim rides. (Spent the last year configuring everything to run an eight-screen, surround view.) Therefore I'm hoping that others here or in the WMF may consider integrating something that could be easy and user-friendly.
This often becomes a bit of a hassle. For example, today, making a WP:ENGVAR edit, I was able to use "cntrl+F" to easily scan the article, but still had to be very careful not to alter variations in the references. If they were separated, such edits would be easier and more foolproof. It would make it far easier when editing for flow, grammar, and syntax, requiring less previews to see if it sounds good. But, like I said, beyond making the suggestion I have no idea how to take it the next step, Thank you all for the information and interest in the matter. Zaereth (talk) 02:04, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

What is "Providence Research" (and what is the Wikimedia Foundation doing collaborating with them)?

I have never heard of Providence Research before and it sounds like this is a legitimate concern which, per below, Philippe is passing along to the legal team. Good. We can re-open discussion here in the future if there's new information.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Greetings, User Jimbo Wales. I was cleaning up the Wikipedia article on George S. Patton and saw a curious looking reference for a book cited there authored "By Providence Research, Wikimedia Foundation, U.S. Senate, Office of the Federal Register". Seeking to make sure a real reference had not been vandalized I put that text string in Google and did a search: the first link was to an Amazon.com page (here) for a selection of Kindle books featuring "Providence Research", "Wikimedia Foundation", and others in various combinations as collaborative authors. Additional subjects included Isis, Terrorism in Benghazi, and ebola.

Curious as to "Providence Research's" bona fides I started searching for it at Wikipedia–and drew a complete blank. That's odd, I thought, not even notable enough for its own page? So I went back to Google and searched there, again drawing blanks (among numerous valid hits for entities containing "Providence Research" in their name in health care and elsewhere).

What can you tell me about this unusual collaboration on "buzzword" books between a Wikimedia entity and another I can find no information on? If not you, who can you refer me to that could shed some light? I'm an experienced Wikipedia editor, but I don't know my way around the larger "Wiki universe". Thank you in advance for your thoughtful reply. Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 23:04, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

@Wikiuser100: It looks like the book just uses content stripped from Wikipedia and other sources, and cites "Wikimedia Foundation" as an author as a result of that. This book, for example, has the description "This collection of data from a variety of important sources..." and lists the Foundation and a bunch of government agencies as authors - I highly doubt any of them actually did any collaborating with the editor/publisher (someone correct me if I'm wrong, please). ~SuperHamster Talk Contribs 23:30, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
Thank you for the quick chime-in, User SuperHamster. I hear what you're saying, but that seems pretty sketchy to me. If I wrote a book on something and used Wikipedia as a source where would I get off listing it as a "co-author" (any more than I would the New York Times drawing info from it)? As it stands, this anonymous "Providence Research" is branding itself with the Wikimedia Foundation's reputation and good will. That can't be jake with the foundation. Can it? Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 23:40, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
@Wikiuser100: It looks like they're trying to comply with the attribution requirements mandated by our CC-BY-SA 3.0 license. --NeilN talk to me 23:49, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

They'e not just doing that. That's my point. See my above examples. I don't get to call Wikipedia or the New York Times "co-authors" because I cite content from them in a work I create. As I indicated, this unknown quantity–"Providence Research"–is branding its work with the Wikimedia Foundation's halo.

I'm not just a contributor here, I'm a donor. I don't support that. How can we get to the bottom of this? Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 23:59, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

And what might even be worse, from an editing perspective, is that if this book's content comes from Wikipedia, we shouldn't be using that source for a reference for a Wikipedia article. We don't use WP for a reference for WP. It might be worth doing an external link search to see any other articles use this publisher as a reliable source. Liz Read! Talk! 00:08, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Good catch, User Liz, the circular reference.
So, what is the next step on a cease & desist on this false-flag branding by "Providence Research"? I realize they have right to cite Wikipedia as a reference, but not list it as a co-author on its publications...which indeed are on some exceptionally dicey subjects, including Isis, "terrorism", and ebola. Those are not topics that the Wikimedia Foundation/Wikipedia needs to be co-branded with by some outfit too sketchy to show up on a Google search and doesn't even merit - or create its own - Wikipedia page. Who can carry the ball to Wikimedia Foundation legal? Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 00:50, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

First, that's rather preposterous (since contributor identities are fundamentally pseudonymous, but that's all they've got); 2nd, that's citing authors, not the Wikimedia Foundation, which gives the appearance both of collaboration and endorsement of the finished work. This isn't insignificant. Yours, Wikiuser100 (talk) 02:10, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Regardless of the other ramifications, the Wikimedia Foundation is not the co-author of those works and the publisher should get a letter from WMF Legal explaining things. Perhaps Philippe or Maggie could pass this on. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 06:07, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Consider it passed on.  :-) Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 06:07, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Thanks. :o) --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 06:08, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Black macaque monkey reads its Wikipedia article and copies it?

Possibly, as suggested here. However, as suggested here in the "reliable" media, Wikipedia never said that the monkey owned the copyright on the image.--♦IanMacM♦ (talk to me) 16:15, 15 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm disappointed on the decision-making ability of those at Commons who decided this man, who owned the camera, developed the film, and yes- OWNED THE PICTURES, asked them to remove it and they refused on shaky ground. How many of you involved in the discussion are actually lawyers? I'm sincerely saddened by this and would now never post any photo to Flickr or Commons or anywhere on the internet without copyright protection. I hope this man does sue and win. Someone asks for a photo of theirs to be removed, why discuss, just remove it. What reasoning that the photo absolutely must be on Wikipedia?! I'm curious how Jimbo would have !voted in the discussion and his opinion.Camelbinky (talk) 16:41, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
In short, because cases like that, where someone asserts they own the copyright of a photo/scan where they do not are extremely common, and honouring bogus copyright claims would obliterate our supply of public domain materials. Historic art owned by museums/galleries and so on is a very common case for this sort of thing, but also people who own a physical photo with expired copyright - stock image companies and the like especially. While the case is a little unusual in the specifics, the general pattern is common. As the photo itself is notable, it's tough to argue we shouldn't have a copy - nevermind that it's very dodgy for a free project to honour invalid copyright claims. WilyD 17:29, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
Exactly. There are enough cases where copyright is abused, that it is entirely reasonable for us to be aggressive in defending the public domain in cases where copyright does not apply. It's unfortunate when someone like David Slater ends up at a disadvantage as a result, but consistently defending the limitations of copyright is not nearly as morally dubious as some might like to depict it. {{Nihiltres|talk|edits}} 19:44, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
Except that copyright does apply in this case under pretty much every legal definition, Wikipedia simply decided that they would ignore it. Ironic for a so-called "free" encyclopedia, isn't it? Not to mention arrogant. Like Camelbinky, I'd really like to think that he'd sue - but I'd quite understand if he didn't. Black Kite (talk) 19:50, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
The US Copyright Office decided it wasn't copyrighted, so we could go by that even if we didn't think the photographer was taking liberties with the notion of copyright. -mattbuck (Talk) 21:25, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
Keep whistling in the dark. The Commons decision was ill-considered, unethical, and immature — taken up a notch by the arrogant buffoonery that happened at Wikimania in London. Lawyers are doing their thing, I understand, and we shall see... Carrite (talk) 04:20, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
I'm particularly sickened by the way that an admin, infamous for his hard-line approach to NFC, so harsh on it that he worked hard to hide an obvious sock of a banned user who was equally hard on NFC material, chose this image to decorate his user page.
Not that the Lord of the Flies celebrations at Wikimania, where the children celebrated their victory over the grown-ups by dancing around their animal head totem, was much better. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:57, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
And so the response to the photo being public domain is that everyone unhappy that Wikipedia, Commons, and their communities take a fairly hard stance on copyright law comes here to sling insults? WilyD 12:10, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
It doesn't matter whether it's in copyright or not. Commons has the precautionary principle such that if the copyright is dubious, that media should be deleted from Commons unless it can be demonstrated that the content really is free. To quote Commons itself, "arguments that amount to "we can get away with it", [...] are against Commons' aims:" Commons has deleted thousands and thousands of images under issues like COM:URAA, where they're very clearly PD in their country of origin but there is a suspicion of a problem in another country. If it's not absolutely clear that an image is free, then it just shouldn't be on Commons. (It should be obvious that many Commons users, and the photographer(sic), hold that there's a copyright problem here.) Andy Dingley (talk) 22:14, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
It is absolutely clear that it is public domain. However I do agree that the Wikimania stuff was just crass, bullying almost. -mattbuck (Talk) 19:36, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
It is unequivocal that the original photo by the monkey is not copyrightable in the U.S.. Unfortunately, Commons is not in possession of that photo. They are in possession of Mr. Slater's modified version (cropped, photoshopped). --DHeyward (talk) 18:37, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
@Matt - for the sake of clarity, can you please link to an available copy of this claimed judgement? Andy Dingley (talk) 20:22, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
It's a statement made in a Compendium of US Copyright Office Practices released in October. It's not a ruling about htis case, just a general statement that works by animals are not copyrightable and one of the examples given was a "picture taken by a monkey." I don't know if Mr. Slater attempted to register the photo in the U.S. Copyright Office and this was example was related. --DHeyward (talk) 19:24, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
Thanks, although if anyone can link to it, it would probably be a useful thing to have easily available.
This is still a straw man argument though. Very few people are claiming that the monkey holds the copyright (and so the monkey's legal ability to do so is irrelevant). The larger group, with the stronger argument, are claiming that the photographer holds the copyright for their work in setting up the conditions for the camera to operate when handled. That's independent of a monkey's legal status and there is no statement by the US Copyright Office (AFAIK) that places any restriction upon it. Claiming "It is absolutely clear that it is public domain." is thus merely argumentum ad lapidem with nothing to back it up. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:42, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Are you sure it's not a straw monkey? Or maybe even the "melon that broke the monkey's back? Martinevans123 (talk) 12:12, 23 February 2015 (UTC) .... never mind about cameras, can't we fix up a few typewriters??
Its good to see that the Celebes crested macaque uses File:Macaca nigra self-portrait large.jpg which is at an angle and is the actual photo the monkey took, rather than the rotated and cropped version produced by the photographer. In my view any post production of the image counts as artistic work and has a much greater claim to copyright.--Salix alba (talk): 10:58, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
It's a cropped and photoshopped version of the original (original was 2912x4368, cropped to 2912x4030). It's not the raw, original photo created solely by the monkey. Who cropped and framed the monkey in the derivative work? --DHeyward (talk) 18:44, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
The editorial and ethical question of what commons should have done is an interesting one which could be pursued separately. There is a complex and interesting set of cases in which, although the law is firmly on our side, we may choose to remove something for a variety of reasons. I won't offer an opinion at the present time about this particular case.
What I will do is respond to Camelbinky's assertion that there is for some reason "shaky grounds" here from a legal perspective. There is no "shaky ground" here - this is an open and shut obvious case. I'm surprised that an experienced Wikipedian would not know that "owning the camera" and "developing the film" have zero bearing on copyright. I hope this case doesn't go to court, because I feel sorry for the photographer for making an outrageous and laughable legal claim and wouldn't like to see him waste his money on a frivolous court case.
That's the only part I'm responding to, because I do think the legal situation is not the right route to a proper resolution of this case. The image is absolutely in the public domain, and that's that. Whether there are human dignity and courtesy reasons that it should have been deleted upon request is a very very valid question.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:26, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Camera ownership and image development aren't really the grounds of the argument to be made. Rather, whether setting up gear and causing creation of an image is sufficient or whether one must physically click the shutter. That's a matter which is very, very unclear. Carrite (talk) 17:37, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
That's not unclear at all. According to Wikimedia's legal counsel (private email in a different matter): Who clicks the shutter is irrelevant. The person 'directing the shot of the image' is the copyright holder. The only remaining question is whether leaving a camera with a monkey can amount to 'directing'. --Pgallert (talk) 20:59, 17 February 2015 (UTC)
Since we're being armchair lawyers, I'll put forth my theory, which I admit may not hold water, but is fun to theorize anyways. This is all a good back and forth amongst us all. My theory is that if you set up the camera, leaving it with an animal with the intent that the animal will take pictures, it is your rights; and I admit I worded wrongly which Jimbo pointed out it doesnt matter if he owned the camera or developed the film, however I believe those two things SHOULD indeed be taken into consideration. Just as in criminal law you have mens rea, which is the fact that you have to have the intent to commit a criminal act for it to be a criminal act (for certain crimes) or else you are not guilty of the crime; so should it be considered that this man had the intent that the animal should take the photos FOR HIS USE. The animal didnt steal the camera take some photos and the man figured he'd never get the camera back, as sometimes happens to tourists in places like Cambodia with similar primates (monkeys? Do macaquese have tails or not?!). As Jimbo stated though, it's a moral issue, not necessarily a legal issue. In my opinion the people on Commons should have considered more than "the law is on our side we have to protect the bigger picture of copyright law and how we want it interpretted".
If the photographer had left a hand grenade instead of a camera, would they be considered as guilty of culpable monkeycide?
IMHO they would have been, and the two situations are analogous. Andy Dingley (talk) 11:07, 18 February 2015 (UTC)
Hmm; this is an area where I rarely see WMF and some people in Commons in same bench. They may right in legal grounds; but I don't think such celebration and humiliating a fellow photographer among us is justifiable in any point of views. Jee 12:50, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Look at this one, with the "personality rights" warning on it, because we wouldn't want to infringe the personal rights of a WMUK staffer with whole categories of content dedicated to them. Rip the copyright for a commercially valuable image from the photographer though, that's just fair game. Andy Dingley (talk) 13:10, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Personality rights is a standard template where people are identifiable. It's a warning to potential reusers that they should be aware there may be issues arising from using identifiable people in a way which suggests they, for instance, endorse your product or political view. It doesn't matter how many photos someone has of them, whether they be Joe from down the street or Brad Pitt, the issues remain the same. -mattbuck (Talk) 20:23, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
I agree the WMF aren't on 'shakey ground' here they are treading quicksand. All photographs taken by camera traps are copyrightable to the photographer that set them up, it matters not how the shutter was triggered. Trip wire, movement detection, or infrared sensor, why would animal pressing button be any different? What we have here is a 1000lb gorilla in the shape of a WMF Fagin, employing its Artful Dodgers on Commons to rob and steal. Its a shame the you Jimmy are taking the Bill Sykes character. John lilburne (talk) 23:03, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

So if I set up a motion acivated camera at my remote cabin, and get a picture of bear and a burgler, who owns the copyright to those pictures? Nyth63 15:45, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

According to Pgallert's description of the WMF email, you would have "directed the shot" in that instance, I think. But the main moral here is that somebody has to stand up for the commons. I understand that under our flawed economic system, photographers feel compelled to pursue their fiduciary interests to the letter of the law, whether they make sense or not. (Just ask the people who find out their wedding photos are copyrighted and it's a violation to post them to social media) What will be left to the commons if people say let's back off, "just to be nice", we'll let people take our inventory away and make it unavailable to the whole world? Wnt (talk) 19:32, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
User:Wnt, I have a tangentially related question- I'm in discussions with an artist to do a commission work for me, he's well known enough he's mentioned in at least 6 of our articles though lacks an article of himself. Since I paid to have it commissioned would the copyright go to me and I could give permission for it to be used in Wikipedia? If the answer is yes to that, could not the argument be made this man "paid" the monkey to do the work for him?Camelbinky (talk) 19:45, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
Well, the theory there is that there's some sort of handover of copyright going on. I'm not a copyright lawyer (nor any other flavor) and I doubt I will make any more sense out of work for hire than you can (especially since it's my stated position copyright doesn't make sense, and it's totally arbitrary and unpredictable who turns out to be the fabulously wealthy founder of a Google or YouTube and who turns out to be a criminal responsible for Napster or Aereo). All I know is you're free to make your best case, and unless the artist is sure he can't, he's likely to make his also. Wnt (talk) 21:03, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

It is perfectly obvious that this photo should have been deleted from Commons upon the request received, and it is my view that this should be done now as an Office action, if necessary.

The communities on both English Wikipedia and Commons spend, in my personal view, far too much time debating the fine points of, and deleting useful content based upon, ever-more-abstruse, purely notional copyright claims where there is at most a vanishingly small chance that any copyright-owner would actually assert the claim. By contrast, we are far too indifferent to the wishes and rights of persons who own or at least arguably own intellectual property rights and are actually asserting them. This manner of proceeding cannot reasonably be justified. Newyorkbrad (talk) 19:42, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

I'll agree with you in the first part - some of the claims of architecture copyright on random street scenes there are beyond ridiculous. But not the other. Wnt (talk) 21:03, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Newyorkbrad nails it. The way Mr. Slater has been "rewarded" for the time and effort he spent producing those beautiful photos has been nothing short of reprehensible. Here and on Commons he's been mocked, insulted, and accused of "copyfraud" for asserting the right to profit from what would not exist had he not spent the time and effort to set it up. Even if you think copyright law entitles you to use the images he produced without his permission or consent, it doesn't entitle you to treat him with such mockery as I've seen here and on Commons. And I dare say that those who think it's OK to appropriate his work because they think his claims are "outrageous and laughable" may be in for a nasty surprise should this ever wind up in court. Delete the images and apologize to Mr. Slater for the abuse he's received. 28bytes (talk) 22:34, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Slater might have copyright on any post-production work, but an animal cannot own copyright, and per Slater's own initial comments, he was not intending for the monkey to take the pictures. He did not set up the conditions for those pictures any more than the manufacturer of his camera did. I won't insult Slater - though his attempt to shake down Public Knowledge over a patently obvious case of fair use was a dramatically poor idea - but Wikimedia is in the right here. Resolute 23:09, 19 February 2015 (UTC)
I can't comment on fair use claims, but WMF is not in possesion of the photo taken by the monkey, it is possession of the photoshopped file uploaded by Mr. Slater. The original work is not copyrightable but the whether this is a derivative work (metadata says it's from photoshop). Without the original, how can WMF say with authority there is no artistic improvement or change? This is not an armchair concern [2]. He's not obligated to provide the original to WMF and that is the only version that would be free from any claims. If WMF does not have the original shot snapped by the monkey (and the original is not what is uploaded), they are taking a big risk that hosted file is not a copyrightable derivative of the original. Metadata has the original at a different size(the commons version is cropped from the original). Is cropping the same as framing a shot? That email from the WMF lawyer about requirements to assert copyright requires "framing" might come back to bite them if WMF can't come up with the rest of the picture to remove that artistic bit of framing done after the monkey took the picture. --DHeyward (talk) 18:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Just a short while ago there were reports about ArbCom banning all feminists from wikipedia, they had quotes and everything. John lilburne (talk) 00:14, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
My thought isn't to mock Mr. Slater, simply not to delete the photo - and to me this seems to be true of the other people here who are saying not to delete a notable public domain photo. When governments declare that binary numbers are property, deleting photos becomes a business decision rather than a matter of politeness. And the business of all the volunteers on all the projects is providing public access to content. Wnt (talk) 00:36, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
User:Wnt is it truly our business to provide public access to all possible within the letter of the law content that we can grab? I would argue no. Otherwise we wouldn't have things like WP:RS and various arcane notability !rules about this being "automatically notable" (every single podunk town) and this not unless under certain conditions being met ("celebrities" who are famous for just being famous, and porn stars for instance have stricter rules than regular actors). I think there's certainly a moral aspect to this decision and the more I hear and research on what the response of the Community at places like the Wikimania convention it disheartens me greatly and I get disillusioned that, oh my L-rd these are the people we have entrusted with spreading and conserving for the World the sum of knowledge of Mankind?! Wearing monkey masks, mocking the man, being prideful, and gloating over a "win" over a man who simply wanted control over pictures. If he hadn't publicized the photos in the first place they wouldn't have become famous. He should get some credit for bringing them to the attention of the world. What if he had kept them to himself and had never posted them ANYWHERE out of fear of copyright problems? Isn't that the big fear we should be fearing? That Commons has set a precedent that all photographers will now fear- don't advertise or post or show to ANYONE any photos that could possibly not be confirmed as your copyright property. We have stifled the very growth of public property and knowledge and "cool things" that will come into this world. Way to go Commons. Congratulations.Camelbinky (talk) 18:27, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
You make it sound like we wrote the law ourselves. Either the photo is copyrighted, and we're blocked from using it by external powers, or it isn't, in which case nobody who has the money for legal advice is going to pay him anything. You are free to go lobby your congressman for stricter copyright - a lot of people have done so over the years - but I don't believe that's the right way. I think it is long past time we recognize that copyright violates basic freedom of expression; this was always true (indeed, the intent from the time of registration of the first English publishers) but it gains significant effect when the cost of copyright greatly exceeds the cost of replication. I believe that every taxpayer could be required to pay an amount proportional to their income tax liability to independent funding organizations of his or her choice that fund notable works of art; these could reward people who write, paint, draw, throw paint at canvasses, or hand cameras to monkeys according to their donors' wishes. In such a way we could fund artists - on average - considerably more than we do now (showing some middlemen and record company lawyers to the unemployment line, making fewer filthy rich celebrities but making creative endeavors a reliable occupation for a much larger number of people), charge most people less for royalties than we pay now (saving money on court costs and investor uncertainty), and abolish all limits on what you can read, copy, parody, and adapt. Until such time as we do so, the halls of copyright will be paved with injustices - singers who have to sign themselves into 30 years of indentured servitude to "make it" in the industry, artists who make decent works but fail to catch on and make nothing, people who get sued for all their profits over a half-second sound sample. Just add this to the list. Wnt (talk) 21:01, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
This discussion should be closed as Jimbo appears to have no intention of stepping in it (so to speak). Nyth63 04:23, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
But he did, and even considered this worth discussing... - Nabla (talk) 10:03, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
So, as I understand Wnt, for us to protect 'our' photos at Commons, we should take every photo that we can, never mind if it means stealing a bunch of them? Hey, the law is wrong anyways, right? There should not be any copyrights, so we'll just go ahead and follow our law! --- Is that us? We steal from the ones weaker than us?
From my point of view Wikipedia has a very poor history of disrespect for copyright. Long ago I uploaded a few photos and tagged them as not for commercial use. Eventually they were deleted, because it conflicted with WP's copyright, and that is just fine. What was not fine, was that, in a period I was absent, some user(s?) changed the copyright notice that I placed. How come some random user has the right to change that? They should not. I am not uploading anything, ever, as far as I can see.
Anyway, the main question, as I see it, is that we have users arguing and making decisions over complex legal matter. That is why I stay clear from the deletion forums for photos because I can not make a educated opinion whether a image is, or not, fair use, or if a copyright, or public domain, claim is coherent, let alone correct. We are not lawyers... how can we do that?
That said, as a layman, it feels like we stole that man's photo. Shame on us - Nabla (talk) 10:03, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
The only photos I recommend 'stealing' are those we can get away with 'stealing' under the law, because they're not actually copyrighted in the U.S. Commons' actual policy is considerably more restrictive than that, and I don't want it to get any worse. Wnt (talk) 13:49, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Even if he can't assert copyright on the original, I doubt the raw monkey shot was released straight away. It sounds like he put in a lot of effort after the fact. He has two bites: one is as the original copyright holder, which WMF disputes. The other is a derivative-works copyright holder. How much did his photoshop programming change the original that would make this a derivative work? Is retrieving a file from a camera, modifying and then putting it to paper a substantial change? Is photoshopping an image an artistic change in presentation? Personally, I don't see why WMF doesn't simply honor the takedown request. It's a picture of a monkey for crying out loud. --DHeyward (talk) 11:10, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
No its an existential issue, if the WMF and it's child pickpockets can't steal this there is so much more they can't steal either. Remember the other year when they went apeshit over removing a butterfly photo taken and uploaded by a confused twelve year old? In that case they got Fagin's mother (Geoff Brigham) to stand on the doorstep and yell at the kid. There are at least 8K of music articles where the guts of allmusic review has been snagged and the other parts of the article filtched from sites per MD's (WMF) instructions as moonriddengirl. John lilburne (talk) 11:47, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
yeah, yeah, sweat of the brow. The usual "The museum paid a lot of money to put in those high quality lights, so why don't you just accept that any photos you have of the ancient artwork in it ought to be their property, viewable only by those with the money to pay?" Or in this case, consider the maker of the camera -- doesn't the company deserve an eternal copyright reward for making a camera so robust and easy to use a monkey can work it, even before you consider the amount of internal programming needed to convert raw CCD readings into a linear and well-balanced set of color curves! It's a lot more creative work than the person who owned the camera did. Really, whenever an amateur volunteer clicks a button taking a picture of some landmark in a rare country where freedom of panorama is involved, isn't he like the monkey? Clearly the copyright on a photo you take with your camera ought to reside with the owner of the camera software who put in all that sweat of the brow and creative endeavor to make it work! Wnt (talk) 13:49, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Strawman fallacy. "Sweat of the brow" claims by themselves are not a derivative work without an artistic change. Even if the original monkey photo has no copyright, that photo has never been uploaded. Only the modified version from the photographer has been uploaded. If those changes are artistic, he can make a derivative copyright claim. A person drew a mustache on the Mona Lisa and it was enough of an artistic change to enable a derivative copyright claim. Commons is not in possession of the photo the monkey took, they are in possession of a derivative of that photo made and released by a person. --DHeyward (talk) 17:21, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
If someone blacked out the mustache, or redrew that little area with a best-guess interpretation, that would not be copyrighted. Likewise, if someone readjusts the color profile and recrops the image, clearly it should not be copyrighted. But additionally, there's the issue that the mustache, drawn by itself in its own little layer and shipped separately, would still be copyrighted. However, any simple color profile (a few numbers, basically, that define a mapping of one color to the other; you see these points on a "curves" view in GIMP or the like) would not be copyrightable. Likewise, cropping a photo is not by itself a creative work; again that is just four numbers (x1, x2, y1, y2). This seems an argument born of desperation. Wnt (talk) 21:18, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Bear in mind that Commons has long held, with WMF support, a policy of uploading photos of old paintings directly from museum websites, even though the museums object strenuously. Those photos are of course cropped by the museum/website staff, are color adjusted, have camera color profiles built in and so forth... but the goal is still a faithful reproduction of the original, and so it is not creative work protected by law. At least, so far ... there is nothing legal under copyright today that won't someday be banned when the right lobbyists pay the right amount of money, including Wikipedia itself. Wnt (talk) 21:22, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Bear in mind that someone I know photographs medieval artworks he does so with a macro lens. Photographing a couple of sq centimeters and essentially picking out the abstractness of the paint, colour, texture, and the effects of age. You would be hard pressed to claim that those were PD. Others photograph sections of an old master work, alter contrast, tonality, perspectives, adding colour shifts. There is no intention to create a faithful reproduction of the original. In any case Brightman v Corel probably needs revisiting. In that case Corel did with Brightman's transparencies, what Brightman had done with the originals. A set of behaviours that are far and above more ethical than the "Save As". John lilburne (talk) 22:41, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
And the upside is "What is the motivation for museums to provide high resolution of their works if they lose any license to the work?" The photographic artists that are capable of faithfully reproducing artwork will no longer exist and Commons and WMF will be left with no future source of photos. It's a very shortsighted and selfish policy that defeats the core principles. IMO, "fair use" reduced resolution photos for anything even remotely creative by someone that makes their living doing such things is what WMF should be striving for. The museum photos, especially, as the photographers are likely paid a fixed wage for time (which was a Stallman/FSF original principle.) --DHeyward (talk) 20:39, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
Probably cropping and mapping is not copyrightable, yes. Still, try mapping at random, or cropping at 4 random places. - Nabla (talk) 22:46, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
The difference in all those cases is the original source is out of copyright and available. WMF is claiming, without having seen the original, that their version is the same as the monkeys and the differences are not artistic. How can they make this determination? The monkey pushed a button and created a .raw file at maximum resolution. The monkey did not create the color balanced and cropped .jpg. There is no evidence that Mr. Slater was trying to accurately copy anything other than produce a work that he could sell. The photo event, as I understand it, consisted of him paying the zoo for exclusive access and he makes his living creating .jpg from raw images in sizes, contrasts and colors that suit a specific client (i.e. National Geographic most likely has color limitations for print). The .jpg only exists because Mr. Steven created a derivative work from the public domain but unpublished original. WMF cannot recreate the original from that derivative. WMF cannot create their own version from the original. WMF cannot state what the differences between the original and jpg. Instead, WMF took Mr. Stevens derivation and claims it is not artistically significantly different from the original without ever seeing the original. It is correct that only the differences between a derivative and original are copyrightable. WMF does not know what those differences are. They have a better fair use claim (which they should immediately attribute Mr. Stevens as the creator of that .jpg and make it conditional that his authorship be attached to all copies.) What's ridiculous is Commons will go on a copyright binge and delete asinine copyright claims (like National flags or political party flags from the BJP party in India) - but think nothing of the expense, effort, time and creativity to bring a picture like the monkey selfie to the public when they take a picture and declare it "free". Mr. Stevens did lose the administrative battle that he is the original creator with original copyright. If he takes that at its face and then challenges WMF that they directly took his derivative work without any effort to ascertain originality, I am not sure if he would be compelled to produce the original or if the original raw file is deleted and he simply claimed his customer specific and custom photoshop flows add artistic value that they pay for. The sad part is that this action by WMF hurts the future of professional photography. A bunch of for-profit publishers now reprint the "free" image that they previously paid for and WMF had fair use exemption. Why WMF/Commons would take money from artists and give it to businesses when WMF still had arguable fair use exemption is beyond me. It's like shooting themselves in the foot. How many for profit companies are using that image for free instead of paying royalties to the person that spent money to create a portfolio for a client? I sure hope he doesn't suddenly remember that a lot of those photos weren't "selfies" but actually controlled by the wireless shutter remote provided with the camera. --DHeyward (talk) 02:37, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
  • I personally find it odd that there are thoughts that the crop, at least of the version linked, was from Slater. Does nobody actually check the source images? And white balance adjustments, with the goal of realism, are hardly "creative". There are eighteen million ways to do that automatically. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 06:55, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
  • The uploaded file has metadata that the original raw file was at maximum size. I don't believe the raw file was released. Commons lifted a jpg from a paying customer at its full resolution. --DHeyward (talk) 08:37, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
  • Look above. People (oh, you!) say that the crop was the photographer's. Was it? No.
A public domain image that people want to be paid for permission to reuse is still a public domain image. I can ask for restitution all day long for a public domain image I've scanned or whatnot, but that doesn't change the fact that it is still PD. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:50, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

@DHeyward: You keep claiming that color balancing makes a public photo not public domain. But any PD photo of an old work of art is color balanced first by the museum, which puts up expensive lighting instead of some crappy fluorescent fixture, then by the camera, enacting its makers' proprietary protocols, then by the photographer, then perhaps even by the webmaster. And we still have this desire, as somebody put it, to "steal so much more" by taking these photos to illustrate our articles on these ancient artworks. Not only the desire, but apparently the legal right. And no matter how much some want to 'revisit' such a modest legal decision limiting the amount by which others can enforce their 'property' on our computers, certainly others of us have neither the need nor desire to do so. Copyright is a sinking institution and instead of trying to delay the inevitable, we need creative professionals to start promoting a new economic system that ensures that creators (not middlemen!) can make a decent salary without rationing or censoring anyone else. Wnt (talk) 14:39, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

More strawman. Mr. Slater artistically chose Macaque monkeys as subjects. He artistically chose an indonesian zoo as the backdrop for his photography. He rented the zoo for exclusive interaction for his photos. He artistically chose the full-frame CMOS camera, lens, f-stop, and shutter speed. He artistically chose the time of day. He created the environment for the photo. This is not someone taking pictures in their museum. These are new pictures of the monkies. I don't know how you start promoting or motivating creative professionals by claiming their entirely new creation is not theirs and stealing it. He wasn't getting paid for pictures of existing works of art, he was getting paid for never before seen photos enables by his creativity and diligence. He is the creator, not the middleman except on a lame technical interpretation that what he created was really a natural event (i.e. animal act). Sorry, but he's the type of profesional we should support and not take away his livelihood. WP has a decent fair use claim which would have surved the encyclopedia just as well. I believe it's obtuse to think that he is a middleman as opposed to the exact "creative professional" you allude to. Go after museum photos all you like as that's an entirely different act. Anyone can go to the museum and take a picture. Now go rent the indonsesian zoo to highlight the plight of an endangered animal and take pictures only to have them stolen by an organization that has no need to steal them. This is not the copyright abusers we should be trying to stop, this is a professional artist. --DHeyward (talk) 18:54, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
There might be a misunderstanding here. Slater's own webpage does not say anything about him renting a zoo. Which zoo do you believe he rented? It also makes clear that the monkeys chose the time of day, not Slater; "It was about midday on the second day and the monkeys, about 25 strong of all ages, halted for a rest". Arthur goes shopping (talk) 12:25, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
@DHeyward: I was not suggesting that this artist is a middleman, but copyright is in general an unfair system that rewards a lot of middlemen and not so many artists. I understand that the conventional "free culture" mindset one encounters is often incomplete - it includes a firm understanding that copyright violates privacy and freedom of speech, but doesn't have a plan for how to pay artists to keep producing content once it is gone, apart from tenuous donationware revenues. Above I proposed not only to end copyright but that it is possible to replace it with a market-like mechanism by which individual taxpayers can choose where to direct their revenues, but where an overall level of contribution to creative endeavors is ensured. This lacks the anarchistic purity one expects of a truly fair economic system, but only because the overall formulation of capitalism is in error; if one recognizes that human beings cannot make land or deposits of oil and minerals, and therefore any inherited claim laid to them is not justifiable, one understands that the Earth should be a common inheritance. Those who make fewer, but not zero demands on its resources should thereby be entitled to a royalty, a guaranteed minimum income (without restriction), payable by those who take more than their share via extraction taxes and property taxes, neutralizing the cruel excesses we see in the world today. (Though I call these taxes, these are simply property rights, as natural resources would be considered fundamentally the collective property of mankind) If this correction is applied, it is no longer necessary to compel donations since many would simply collect the payment to which they are entitled as part-owners of the natural resources and spend their lives freely indulging in creative endeavor. But for now, let's focus just on ensuring a predictable economic sector for creative works. Anyway, my point is: copyright doesn't reward everyone fairly; it didn't reward this man; that's not our problem; the fix is not a one-off acceptance (only by us and by no one who would actually have paid in the first place!) of copyright where the law didn't create it. Wnt (talk) 13:58, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
If it's so valuable to host Lord of the Rings, then why don't we just host it anyway? Invent a new interpretation of copyright such that Tolkien hitting keys on a typewriter was merely "enabling" the machine to write the novel for itself. Then as machines can't (yet) hold copyright, it's in the public domain and WP can land-grab it. What's so different from what Commons has done with the macaque?
Let's grab Jackson Pollock's works too. He didn't apply paint directly to canvas, he just threw paint in the air and so the design is a matter of gravity and air currents. QED, another one for the Commons booty. Andy Dingley (talk) 14:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
If one looks at US copyright law, the version of LotR published by ACE was, in fact, not copyright, and Wikipedia (had it been around) in 1965 would have to have made it available on the basis of some assertions made here. I would prefer that we stick to the simple proposition that a person who undertakes specific acts which are likely to result in a photo being taken, is the person who is responsible for the creation of the photo. Had Slater not set the camera, the probability of the animal taking that picture was zero. Collect (talk) 14:23, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
As you people well know, Wikipedia isn't free to make up its own copyright laws because, well, they're laws, and there are people who can take them to court if they deviate from the not particularly logical set of legal precedents out there. If the courts say Jason Pollock holds a copyright we don't host his paintings - I don't pretend that makes any intrinsic sense, because we're talking about copyright law here. But not content with that much, you want us to make up new copyright laws ... only for those cases where it means giving up even more of the public domain! What do you think we shouldn't give up 'just to be nice', anyway? Should we reduce all of the WMF's projects to one simple how-to guide explaining how poor mothers can sacrifice their babies to Moloch, because it is just intrinsically wrong for ordinary people to read things, know things, do things, or have any role in the world except in sacrifice to attest to the absolute power of the corporate oligopoly over every detail held in every human mind? Wnt (talk) 17:11, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
What were you reading into my post? Collect (talk) 17:15, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
When you (and the others) seem to suggest that there is nothing really wrong with us abandoning content from the public domain, where does it end? It ends with people being limited to whatever knowledge they can afford to buy, one item at a time. And when you deny a person knowledge, you deny him all power; you deny his humanity altogether. There's a reason why we should hold the line, and if we're going to hold the line anywhere, why not here? Wnt (talk) 17:33, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
It's a slippery slope, Collect...you start talking about an instance of copyright dispute and you end up with the collapse of civilization. Liz Read! Talk! 22:58, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
(edit conflict) That's classic six-degrees-of-Wnt. I only understood it as far as Collect wanting to sacrifice babies to Moloch, which, for the record, I oppose. MastCell Talk 23:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
[3] Sam Clemens:
I am aware that copyright must have a limit, because that is required by the Constitution of the United States, which sets aside the earlier Constitution, which we call the decalogue. The decalogue says you shall not take away from any man his profit. I don't like to be obliged to use the harsh term. What the decalogue really says is, "Thou shalt not steal," but I am trying to use more polite language.
The laws of England and America do take it away, do select but one class, the people who create the literature of the land. They always talk handsomely about the literature of the land, always what a fine, great, monumental thing a great literature is, and in the midst of their enthusiasm they turn around and do what they can to discourage it.
And so some on Wikipedia appear to feel about the worth of such property that is should be "free to all." Collect (talk) 23:12, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
When it seemed that the price of a book was substantial, and the ratio of the royalty to the author and the cost of the book was relatively fixed, the copyright system approximated the sort of directed funding from taxes that I have proposed above. After all, the cost of the copyright was but a small portion of the cost of the book, and only the wealthy could afford to have many books printed up for their own use anyway. Furthermore, these books were made available in that contemporaneous institution, the library, to many such as could read, and so the availability approximated the universal (but with notable restrictions) while the acquisition policies of the libraries served as a stand-in for the role of other funding organizations that are possible. Therefore, the flaws implicit in the institution were not visible at that time. Meanwhile, the notion of people directing where to send a pool of money in, say, a year-end tax form would be so far out of what the culture was willing to accept or capable of administering, that it was not a ready alternative. The one thing that hasn't changed, of course, is that we do need to find a way to reward the creators with "their" profit. Note though that in the system I suggested (as under copyright) what is theirs is determined by the preferences of a pool of consumers divided by the number of competitors, and so the degree of profit (as under copyright) is by no means predictable and certainly not a law of nature where someone can say that if he did not make X dollars from writing a book he was robbed, though I think mine is more predictable. Wnt (talk) 23:46, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

What are

Dear Jimbo, What are obvious role/shared accounts?--Amaris Monteon (talk) 18:48, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

Please be more specific, as I am unsure what you are asking.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:25, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
I think I understand the question. Please see if Wikipedia:Sock_puppetry#Role_accounts provides the information you need. Newyorkbrad (talk) 21:38, 22 February 2015 (UTC)
Yes, that may be all that is needed. I had assumed there was something more detailed to the question but perhaps not.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:41, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Disclosure issue

Jimmy, could you comment on a situation? If an organization hired a consultant with a proprietary area of practice (one that they sort of have a "name trademark" in doing -- like Google is practically associated with "contextual advertising", or like Apple is practically associated with "portable media player"), to do research that results in a report that finds that the organization is the world's best/biggest/fastest-growing entity in that area of practice, I understand that there's nothing wrong with that. But, what if the organization's employees also create and author a new Wikipedia article about the area of practice, using primarily the consultant's white paper as a reliable source, then promote the research results with a press release that links back to the Wikipedia article about what it is that they're supposedly best/biggest at -- and none of the organization's employees disclose any conflict of interest in their authorship of the Wikipedia article. Is that a violation of the Wikimedia Terms of Use clauses about disclosure? Do you feel that the organization has behaved ethically? Looking forward to your response. - WilmingMa (talk) 20:52, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Participatory grantmaking, mayhaps? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:55, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
This is certainly a convoluted restating of a discussion going on at Wikipediocracy about WMF's "Participatory Grantmaking" and allegations of a paid self-congratulatory propaganda offensive relating to that. Carrite (talk) 21:39, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
As usual, I find hypothetical questions like this to be unsatisfactory. Please give actual information so that people can evaluate it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:23, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
I'm sorry, Jimmy. I thought that if I put the scenario in hypothetical terms it would enable you to respond sort of generally about what constitute ethical practices for employees at large, rather than be put on the defensive to try to "cover" for your Foundation. There is a story you can find on Google that should summarize the "actual information" that you requested. - WilmingMa (talk) 15:34, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
That would not be my style. I prefer to speak plainly and directly, and that's much easier to do when we have clear facts. As I only now know what you are referring to, and know nothing about it, I'll have to look into it before I can comment sensibly. I can speak in the abstract, of course, that the ethical principles which I think apply to all organizations in terms of their editing of Wikipedia apply in the extreme to the Wikimedia Foundation itself. It would be impossible for the Foundation to take a leadership role on the issue if they did not adhere to the strongest possible standards themselves, including my "bright line" rule. I can say that before knowing what is even being alleged here, because that is at the level of principle.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
http://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=6068 --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:41, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Gregory Kohs's Examiner.com article is a lot easier to read than a forum thread, but since it can't actually be linked to from here I suppose a "soft redirect" will have to do. The WMF has an unfortunate habit of holding cozy relations with firms it contracts research to, but this is the first time I've seen WMF staffers actually create an article for a firm, and then link to the article from the WMF blog (google "citogenesis" and "wikiality"). --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 09:25, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Giving Jimbo a chance to respond, once he's had time to have a look into it. - 50.144.3.133 (talk) 13:48, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

I am evading a block but I am not a sock for which I was blocked Self Reported to ANI

This is already being discussed at WP:ANI, it doesn't need to be spammed here whilst that is continuing.
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

I got blocked for starting a SPI and accused of being a sock, Whose Sock????

Calling me a sock after I started a SPI was a convenient excuse to block me by User:Chillum. I am no sock and Chillum has never presented any evidence. I am fighting the abusive treatment of an IP which is all to familiar. Stating get an account is a cop out that does not address the abuse of socks and lack of AGF.

    1. 0 I started an SPI about an article I came across that was around since 2006 and deleted and salted after a few attempts by User:RGloucester and some new accounts like User:Jobrot which is a SPA that states they are "noob" but then first edits in December 2014 in a discussion to delete the article using very sophisticated alphabet soup. Clearly not a noob and the edit analyzer shows a remarkable number of edits with the above sock master even though the sock only has a few hundred edits of which most show up in the edit analyzer with RGlocester who avows to be a Marxist on their talk page. The subject cultural Marxism in an modern American use does not say nice things about Marxists or cultural Marxists. It was nominated for deletion and theatrically argued for deletion by RGlocester and then a new SPA shows up arguing for the same thing out of no where. I do acknowledge it may be a meat puppet recruited by the sock master but a meat puppet is to be treated the same as a sock per WP:SOCK. I was accused of pretending to be new by Chillum but he fabricated that and accused me of being a sock and then blocked block me based on his ridiculous claims. I previously argued against User Talk:John Foxe for COI and his previous use of a sock. That will demonstrate that I always use an IP to edit and not what Chillum falsely accused me of. And John Foxe edits on behalf of Bob Jones University a very politically conservative fundamentalist school. That demonstrates I go after both extremes of the political spectrum. Cultural Marxism in an American sense reflects a conservative use of the philosophy. It was a valid article with 9 years of existence that was salted for Marxist ideological reasons. It is the worst case of WP:PUSH I have ever seen and a complete failure by involved admins. One reasonably would question if they had COI or in my opinion acted foolishly. If you got the time look into the salted SPI about RGloucester and check out the case I made. It demonstrates meat puppetry at the best and a sock puppetry in the worst. The edit analyzer and Jobrots contributions are very clear. [4] It needs to see the light of day and not be immediately salted without examination. Again a foolish or malicious move by an admin. Thanks for your time 172.56.6.142 (talk) 10:16, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
This note has also been posted at WP:ANI where it is being addressed. Liz Read! Talk! 12:48, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

In Depth Highlights

    1. 1. A fight (not a discussion) to delete Cultural Marxism article initiated by User:RGloucester a self avowed Marxist. The article's modern American usage negatively portrays Marxists and big government control as a form of Cultural Marxism. The term has been around some time and is currently seeing a resurgence to describe big government or a nanny state. I found that out using google. The term is notable and its modern rendition is much different than the article it was merged into and the history shows many editors brought that up. The article is deleted and salted after a prolonged war but it was save and placed on several other web sites decrying abusive practices at Wikipedia. I found them when I googled the term. A new account User:Jobrot shows up claiming to be a Noob on their talk page and then edits their first day several times to delete the article wiki lawyering with sophisticated wiki alphabet soup language. I will later begin reviewing the closed AFD fight and I am shocked at the level of discourse concerning an article that is notable, well sourced, and that article that has been around for 9 years is deleted. There are claims in the AFD about socks and I begin looking into account histories and discover user Jobrot. I run the editor analyzer on all involved parties and only two accounts have a very high interaction. Here are the results: [5] User:RGloucester who started the AFD and the new account have almost all their edits in common and they both are strongly arguing for its deletion and subsequently on the related new drafts especially the new Draft:Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory which tries to use a great deal of negative ideological sources to paint the use of the term as a crazy fringe theory by right wing nut jobs.
    1. 2. User:Jobrot history shows an SPA account only working on Cultural Marxism drafts and the redirect Frankfurt School. User:RGloucester starts another AFD [6] to delete a new Draft:Cultural Marxism but is unsuccessful. Chillum States in the new AFD: I would support deletion then. Too soon. Chillum 19:55, 18 January 2015 (UTC) He is the same admin who has suspended my account for starting: 17:46, 22 February 2015 Chillum (talk | contribs) blocked 172.56.15.36 (talk) (account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 1 week (Obvious sock puppet is obvious. See deleted contribs. Logged out user. I am not logged out as I have never had an account. Chillum accuses me of being a sock for starting a SPI. Chillum never does a SPI on me just cast an aspersion to justify blocking me. That is an abuse of admin privileges and he assumes no good AGF. I am wondering about his motive as to whether he is paranoid of IP's, resents IP's or is acting maliciously because he disagrees with my edits to the original article. He also salted the original deleted article that I have now used (found when researching Cultural Marxism with google, check it out) as a starting point and improved.
    1. 3. I attempt to work on the article under a slightly different title Cultural Marxist and I am unaware of the draft at the time. I add much new material with many reliable sources here:[7] In the middle of working on the new article I am reverted by DD2K who states:where the Hell is the protection to this? here: [8] I am unaware he has done this while I am researching and adding to the article until I try to submit again which comes up as an edit conflict. I work around and improve article but I have lost much of my previous work and write this in the edit summary: (Improving references and adding a few, still working on article that is already much different and is undergoing much, discuss on talk page and please do misuse speedy delete to eliminate dissenting schools of thought) That is my only revert. DD2K puts a speedy delete tag while I go back to researching and working on the article. DD2K then does his second revert of everything on the article except his speedy delete tag and then requests page protection. DD2K has clearly been watching the page and reverts 2X to my 1X. I place a notice on DD2K's talk page for blanking the page. I check his contributions and see that he has requested page protection and I go there to argue against it stating: User:DD2K nominated the article for speedy deletion then immediately deleted it without any discussion. I was working on a substantially different article than the last known article. here:[9] I add more to the page protection here: [10] I argue that I am substantially improving the article. I lose and the page is protected and DD2K has only edited in the draft article since then, here is his contributions: [11]
    1. 4. I go edit some other articles but I decide to go back and start snooping around to see why all the bugaboo about the article, I find the draft and edit there instead here: [12] I am reverted again within 45 minutes by User:RGloucester. [13] Compare the two articles. It becomes clear there is some ownership issues going on here and the level of article improvement is irrelevant. I never reverted there. No edit war.
    1. 5. I go to the draft talk page to post my concerns about an article that has been ignored for 2 weeks until I show up. It is clear there are ownership and Push issues. I post this here:
  • Article has been vandalized back into a WP:PUSH political diatribe

"Amazing, no one has work on the article for 2 weeks and I spend hours adding sources from subject matter experts and RGloucester shows up and simple reverts to an agenda pushing political diatribe article that is designed to advance a left wing agenda. RG also fought long and hard to eliminate the real article because it did not fit their brand of cultural Marxism. The more neutral editors have all left because of the tendentious editing WP:TEND. More evidence that Wikipedia has become more extreme in promoting left wing ideologies and cannot be trusted as a source for anything political. The project relevance will continue to decrease if balance is not restored. Just compare the one RG reverted to and the one I did. RG eliminated info boxes, references, noted experts and replaced it with a political rant. I have no doubt that when they get the article to fit their politics (left wing cultural Marxism) they will be ok with putting it back up. It was there for years and after constant demands they got it deleted and salted as well. But a google of the title Cultural Marxism will bring up the preserved article and some very interesting commentary about what happened and where this project is headed. The current article is in no way encyclopedic and is now only an political diatribe to grind an axe. 172.56.7.197 (talk) 22:47, 21 February 2015 (UTC)

  • I also post in reply to Jobrots commentary: Jobrot-So it seems this is an American phenomena that Europe (the apparent origins of the movement) view with apt derision whilst the rest of the world is for the most part indifferent. --Jobrot (talk) 11:16, 14 February 2015 (UTC)
Me- It is not amazing that an American political philosophy that criticizes Europe's drowning in Cultural Marxism and Europe's downfall and current has been status that are only a shadows of what they once were does not want to talk about it. Europe's downfall is illustrated as what happens when countries are greatly influenced by the far left (Cultural Marxists} and what America will become as the yoke of political correctness (Cultural Marxism) suppresses the people. 172.56.7.197 (talk) 23:00, 21 February 2015 (UTC) Less than an hour later DD2K reappears and deletes both of my posts as I challenged his speedy delete and page protection on the page I originally began editing earlier. It appears as tit for tat?[14] (Reverted to revision 647604569 by Jobrot (talk): Rv -- ffs -- This is not a forum for political rants. We all know it is generally best to leave talk page comments alone. I reinstate my post and state this in the edit summary: Have you read the posts? It just does not fit your ideology so you delete comments about improving the article, recuse yourself if you cannot apply commonsense. So far everything I have tried to add has been deleted by some of those previously involved in an ongoing tendentious edit war. Yet later I will be accused of edit warring. Ironic
    1. 6. I am reverted again by a hit and run editor (they never came back to the talk page) so I give up for 10 hours (I got better things to do) and do not reinstate my talk page commentary. I return and remove this rant using the same basis as used against my post. [Cultural Marxism': a uniting theory for rightwingers who love to play the victim] Personally I believe the appeal of the Cultural Marxism theory is that things like, Feminism, Gay Rights and Civil Rights have become somewhat sacrosanct. In many spheres of life it's not really considered socially acceptable to criticize these movements (and doing so often garners emotionally visceral reactions and rhetorical vitriol). It would be much easier to explain this all away via a communist plot indoctrinating everyone, but unfortunately the reality of these movements is a lot more emotionally messy than that. --Jobrot (talk) 07:42, 20 January 2015 (UTC)

"If that is not a soap box statement then clearly my statements were valid as well. Jobrot restores himself Jobrot (talk | contribs)(Undid revision 648309581 by 172.56.15.36 (talk) it seems we have a vandal IP.) User:Jobrot edit history shows a SPA account only working on Cultural Marxism drafts and the redirect Frankfurt School. Jobrot poisons the well by calling me a vandal IP.

    1. 7. I began more looking into the history of those involved by running edit analyzer. Something seemed amiss and there were other statements to that affect in the AFD. Two names exhibited an amazingly similar editing pattern. That is the AFD initiator User:RGloucester and User:Jobrot a self described Noob who says they did not know what they are doing but on their first edit appears in a very contentious discussion about deleting an article and using some sophisticated wiki terminology. Cleary not a noob which Jobrot later admits in the ANI I started about myself and those involved in this fiasco. Jobrot and RGloucester both furiously argued to delete and salt the article. It looks very suspect and the analyzer supports that so I start an ANI where I lay it out in depth. No reasonable person would question whether I am detailed oriented or not based on my edits. I also notified many of those who seemed very involved in the AFD as they would have great interest in a meat puppet being used to eliminate an article including Chillum and another admin. Both parties suspected of being socks or at the least puppets are informed.
    1. 8. The SPI is quickly closed within 3:20 hours and deleted by User:Mike V here: [15] I am then blocked by Chillum here: [16] 17:46, 22 February 2015 Chillum (talk | contribs) blocked 172.56.15.36 (talk) (account creation blocked) with an expiry time of 1 week (Obvious sock puppet is obvious. See deleted contribs. Logged out user.) Chillum accuses me of being a logged out user of which I am not. Why did he do that? Chillum had closed the AFD and salted the article. Chillum would later state that I edit warred which I did not and the long response here makes it easy to see that is also a false accusation. I point out Chillum's action to everyone involved and start an ANI about me. This is when the real circus begins. Chillum repeats his lies and then bans me again for bringing all this up because I evaded his unjustified ban based on based faith and no evidence. I reasonably questioned Chillum's motives as they seem rather suspect. Whether he is attempting to cover up his original bad faith block or something greater I do not know. Things heat up after several exchanges and several more lies from Chillum stating I was edit warring and editing logged out. Nothing surprising there. Many others come in to the ANI. One admin lays out the issue pretty well but he is mostly ignored, I thank him for being fair and he in no way praised my actions but he had the balls to address Chillums short comings in all of this. Chillum and some others continue to attempt to block me from speaking up which is an exercise in futility. I will not be silent about being blocked for starting an SPI. That is what this all about.
    1. 9. Jobrot does something very decent the day after I start the SPI when he realizes the point I made and restores my talk commentary.' I believe that says something good about him to be fair, I am assuming good faith. Jobrot states: Jobrot (talk | contribs) (Undid revision 648261825 by Saddhiyama (talk) Reverting back even further in the interests of having an open discussion.) I just noticed this now as I left the talk after being reverted again. It was however the day after I started the SPI investigation. Up to that point everything I did was reverted in this contentious article discussion that is full of political push. I never exceed 3RR and mostly did only 1RR but somehow I became an edit warring sock. I used the talk page to address my concerns but was repeatedly reverted by those who had practiced tendentious edit warring here for a long time. My posts that were restored after I brought attention to my block at ANI have received quite a bit of discussion which was my intent.
    1. 10. Another commentator wrote this recently after my original post was restored by Jobrot here [17] Raquel Baranow (talk | contribs)(→‎Article has been vandalized back into a WP:PUSH political diatribe: agree with the IP) Raguel states: I totally agree with the IP. I've been following this since it was mentioned on Jimbo's Talk Page. (As you know, the original article was deleted through "consensus" and then restored by Jimbo.) I became aware of the right-wing use of the term from reading Anders Breivik's Manifesto and think it's an important concept. I also consider myself a Marxist because I believe in eliminating money but I'm not a cultural Marxist and disagree with the redirect to the Frankfort School, this should be a stand-alone article. I'm glad someone is volunteering their time to do something about this. Raquel Baranow (talk) 15:06, 23 February 2015 (UTC) She recognizes the differences in the use of the terms. This encyclopedia project was here to be reasonably inclusive and cover notable topics.
    1. 11. Why do the editors who wanted to delete the article fight so hard in editing it. That seems strange. Why spend time trying to improve something you argued had no relevance? I believe the intention was to delete an article because they did not like how it was written as it offended their ideological beliefs. That is my opinion and others have their idea as to why the article that stood for 9 years was deleted. One things for sure is that there was a great deal of POV going on both sides but that is no reason to delete an article and there was no consensus to be deleted so it should of stayed. The salting was also a very poor decision. Talk about trying to hide information. Thank God someone saved it and posted elsewhere. They are making a great deal of justified negative comments about Wikipedia over this AFD. This an extremely bad example by many involved including admins.
  • My intention is to inform here. Banning my IP is not a concern of mine at this point. It will hurt Wikipedia more than me if this type of ideological motivated deletion continues. Besides all that I need a break as all my free time has been dedicated to this over the last three days and even time I should of been taking care of other things. I am bold and determined as I spent much of my adult life as a Marine and not easily intimidated. I am tenacious as a bull dog when I feel passionate about something. Chillum brought the worst and the best in me by pulling that admin stunt of his. SEMPER FI Jimbo! 208.54.32.236 (talk) 06:10, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Request, though many will find controversial if you did, but hope you at least consider (Monkey redux)

I formally request that you, as founder (or co-founder whatever people insist upon), perhaps could consider using your influence, wisdom, perhaps even direct powers that you may still voluntarily possess, to cause a change on the decision of the monkey photo we have discussed in the thread above. You seemed, perhaps, to be open to the idea that while legally the WMF has the right, that morally the decision may not have been and that more consideration should be taken. I am wondering if you are willing for a... debate? RfC? Or just Wikipedia's version of amicus briefs be given to you and perhaps you and the WMF could take a second look on moral and ethical instead of legal grounds on whether perhaps we should do, what in my humble opinion is the right thing to do. I'm sure a lot will argue here you have no grounds or power to do any such thing, but the decision at Commons and various comments, attitudes, and responses by some in the Community have truly dispirited me and this was all I could think to do, to feel like I'm at least trying to do the right thing, in my mind.Camelbinky (talk) 18:39, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Could you stop beating on the already dead WP:HORSE already? The legal opinion of WMF is in and seriously, this debate is getting just plain ridiculous. WMF is legally in the right and indeed might have their own horse in this race because protecting public domain images is one of their own interests. They're one of the only organizations I know that constantly put their money where their mouth is on subjects like this. Tutelary (talk) 18:42, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
What law school did you go to? And you want to talk about putting their money where their mouth is, has the WMF actually done that in this case? Given their budget and need to allocate wisely I doubt this is a huge priority to spend everything and anything.Camelbinky (talk) 20:07, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
This horse is far from dead. It is possible to be legally right and at the same time to be completely morally and ethically wrong. It appears to me that camera owner in this case has been greatly harmed by a legal "opinion". To me it looks like the WMF has no idea if the are embarrassing themselves or not by not even considering what is the "right" thing to do. Nyth63 18:59, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
Morally, we have the right to read whatever we want, write whatever we want, ignore all tyrants who dictate any limit on that for any reason, and await the SPA/RIAA S.W.A.T. teams with AK47s at the ready under the jihadist skull-and-crossbones banner of the Cathach of St. Columba. Wnt (talk) 21:09, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
In other words, Wnt, your position is that we should renounce any legal or ethical restrictions on our content at all. No BLP policy against libel or invading privacy; no honoring copyrights (if someone wants to post the full text of a book published last year, tough); no excluding child porn or photos taken by sneaking into a bathroom—no rules at all.
If that is really your view, you are merely a common troll, and your participation here is dangerous.
If that is not really your view, then your post is a useless piece of rhetorical exaggeration, and you should learn to think before typing.
In either case, you are not a serious participant in this conversation. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:18, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
I'm not the one who started with the "moral" arguments. I'm well aware that the legal standards are what matter because the legal action is the threat to WMF. If people want to argue law then let them argue law, but don't start with this "the law doesn't require us to delete this, so let's be moral, because not to be moral the way I want would be illegal!" That's not serious conversation, though it is an extremely common tactic around here of late, a time-wasting loop-the-loop that truly deserves dismissal. Morally, I admire everyone over the history of the Internet from Usenet on who have made it possible to simply transmit information and never mind what it is. All your censorship exceptions need to be dealt with other ways - by teaching people to look for reliable sources, by stopping employment discrimination against women who have revenge porn circulating, by making law enforcement actually find the people who are molesting children instead of jailing random nerds who were running file sharing software a picture passed over afterwards. That's what's moral. If you want to come argue law, then stay on that topic. Wnt (talk) 13:59, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
"The legal opinion of WMF is in "
Can you please link to that, for the sake of clarity.
Also, if that opinion is "A monkey cannot hold copyright" then that is still failing to address the question of whether the photographer can hold the copyright. Andy Dingley (talk) 16:34, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
Well the dilemma, here, seems quite deep. The WMF is of the opinion that legally the image may be hosted. The editors have apparently decided it will be hosted, to the apparent disgust of others but apparently those disgusted are unable to use regular process to get it removed. For the WMF to now take the editorial step of removing the image on non-legal grounds, it basically must use an out-of-process action. Whatever the justice of this particular matter - does the WMF becoming uber content editor make good sense? -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:31, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Yes. One possibility would be to conclude that while the legal opinion is there is no copyright issue, the situation is close enough to the line that it would be undesirable to test it. Another possibility would be to conclude that it is ethically undesirable to host content, at least absent a high degree of shown need, in the direct face of an entirely plausible request for deletion by the creator (or at least, someone intimately involved with the creation). And, importantly, the fact pattern here is sufficiently eccentric, as shown by the truly bizarre nature of some of the hypothetical comparisons that people have offered, that no broadranging precedent would be created. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:36, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Your first possibility, appears to be a legal position (don't test it) - of course they seem to have already decided against that but presumably they could reverse course; your second position appears to be in the nature of site editorial content policy (eg. "our content policy is need in the face of complaint") - the WMF making one off ipsa dixit editorial site content policy does seem like a far reaching precedent. Alanscottwalker (talk) 00:56, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
There have been occasional Office actions in the past; an admitted difference is that those have been obscure while this one would be widely publicized. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:03, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Right, but as I understand specific to Office Actions, there is a line to maintain: this, and no further - legal judgement but not editorial judgement. Alanscottwalker (talk) 01:11, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
To answer the specific question asked, I have no intentions to intervene here at all.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Then this discussion should be closed. Nyth63 04:21, 21 February 2015 (UTC)


Anent "copyright" and "being legally able to publish":

[18] gives an example of a deficient copyright under US law enabling the publishing of material without the proper owner's consent.

Being "legally able" to do something is not the proudest reasoning known to man. Collect (talk) 19:19, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

I have a hard time making sense of that article, but let's be clear: if there was no copyright renewal for Lord of the Rings then we absolutely should host a copy of it. We host copies of many things for which copyright renewals weren't filed already. You can say we shouldn't be proud of being 'legally able', but what thing in the world is nobler than freedom? What purpose is more fundamental to WMF than distributing the freely available content it can? You could say it's "morally" pirate to copy something that wasn't renewed, expired 75 years ago, or 100, or 1000, or was taken by a monkey, whatever, but what morality could there possibly be in extending the arbitrary bans of copyright whichever way you happen to think of? Wnt (talk) 14:08, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
No -- not "renewal" the copyright was never taken out in the US - so when Houghton Mifflin imported too many copies without registering in the US, it lost copyright under US law. Tolkien made substantive changes so Ballantine could issue a properly US copyrighted version -- which is now the version sold around the world. That time, the US public made known its belief that one ought not steal the work of others. Collect (talk) 14:33, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Well, if it's legal to post the original version now, we should post it. Is it? Wnt (talk) 17:14, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
We don't post complete texts on Wikipedia, so this discussion need not continue, thank goodness. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:13, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Wnt, you might try Wikisource. Liz Read! Talk! 23:00, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
For God's own sake, please tell me you didn't suggest that. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:36, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
Oh, I'd already thought of that, though I had to recheck their policy; I just got side-tracked by a beguiling article from the late 1700s over there (as he describes it, modified smallpox has quite some literary potential, I think...). But I still need more convincing that the original version is truly public domain in the U.S. at this moment in time. Wnt (talk) 23:57, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
As I feared, the Ace version of Lord of the Rings is part of the massive body of material taken (not stolen, of course!) from the public domain via the Uruguay Round Agreements Act of 1994. [19] Now, even more than two decades later my understanding is that URAA is still a legal 'gray area' with no one really understanding how it will play out, because after all that is just the blink of an eye on a legal timescale. Commons and the WMF are already in the midst of an argument over deletions of URAA images, as I recall. But I'm not feeling very hopeful at this point. With copyright extensions, treaties (if you think URAA was bad just wait for the secret schemes of the Trans-Pacific Partnership), cockamamie legal theories like for Happy Birthday, university libraries that have made all their resources proprietary, locked up behind passwords (even the card catalog), libraries subject to exorbitant subscription rates for being libraries, not allowed to simply collect journals from public donations and put them on the shelves ... today's U.S. seems as eager to destroy the public domain as people like Ben Franklin once were to build it up. And Wikipedia is, for now, a rare exception to that. Wnt (talk) 16:07, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

If instead of putting the picture out on the internet where anyone could pilfer them, he had put them in a book and sold the book, which of course any publisher would copyright the book, would Wikipedia/Commons/WMF have had the nerve to call them non-copyrighted because an animal took them? Would the WMF have been so cocky about lawsuits if it had been a major publishing company (or Amazon) with more resources had sent a letter from their lawyers? As I understand there is a lawsuit either pending or at least possible, and understand that Mr. Wales probably can't comment too much as he may affect the WMF's position; I'm just curious what everyone's thoughts are if those pictures had been published in a copyrighted book, and does the photographer still have the right to publish them in a book and have them covered under the book's copyright...? Can it work retroactively like that? I'm curious and want to hear opinions.Camelbinky (talk) 16:26, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

I think the obvious practical consideration is that a scan from a book would typically be much lower quality, providing less motivation. It shouldn't make any ideological difference - Wikipedians lift things that are copyright-ineligible from books all the time; there's even a special Commons template for it. Wnt (talk) 17:42, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Transfer of a Conversation with Admin Weldneck (very professional and rational)

It concerns the abusive atmosphere many IP's Receive Regularly if They Know to Much

ANI I started to have my actions and Admin Chillum's actions scrutinized

I started the ANI so others could look at the block I received for starting a SPI. Chillum blocked the IP I submitted the SPI with. I have a cellular IP and it changes frequently, that is how cell towers serve many customers. Chillum specifically said I logged out from an account and was a therefore a sock. What account did I log out from, what evidence was there? Did he start a SPI on me? No he just used a convenient excuse to block me. It was malicious at best. I believe he has a low level of respect for IP's and was not AGF. He has made up lies after that to defend his block. He says I edit warred. That is a lie. Show where I did that? The only thing I have done is turn off my device for 5 Minutes to get a new IP to respond to the ANI I started. Why did I start it? So his actions and my actions would be scrutinized. I could of walked away but I am tired of the abusive atmosphere here towards IP's. I will stand my ground on this one. I started the ANI and I will participate in it and see it out. The hell with the catch 22 when you have been maliciously abused by an admin. 172.56.38.47 (talk) 18:09, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Hey WeldNeck, I left a post at Jobrots page and I am no longer seeking a SPI. It has plenty of merit but if it is a sock or meat puppet I like Jobrots attitude better than the sock master. It could be a friend or even a sophisticated sock but it is no longer my intention to pursue it. My main concern is the abuse from Chillum and all the lies he has been telling to cover his tracks. He makes up stuff or misrepresents it by twisting the facts. His reason he posted on the account he blocked is that I was editing logged out and a therefore a sock. I have nothing to log into as I will not register due people like Chillum. Besides that it would be ok to log out to start a SPI if they thought they would face retaliation and considering User:RGloucester is involved that would be likely. It is your call about the SPI but it does not matter to me anymore. There are so many editors with sock accounts and friends battling for them what is a couple of more. 172.56.8.17 (talk) 19:27, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
If you feel the evidence is strong enough to warrant the SPI then go for it, I certainly think there's something to it. Just because everyone does it doesn't mean we should let people get away with it. WeldNeck (talk) 20:18, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
  • I think the abusive atmosphere here by some admins towards IP's does much more damage to the project and I have to pick my battles. I originally started the SPI which was deleted and then Chillum who was deeply involved in the article came along 5 hours after I started it and blocked my account here: [20] Chillum wrote: Per our sock puppet policy undisclosed alternative accounts are not to be used in discussions internal to the project. Logging out to file a complaint against another user qualifies as such. It is clear from your knowledge of events that take place well prior to your edit history that you have prior history here. It is also clear you are using more than one IP to edit war and act disruptively at Draft talk:Cultural Marxism. If you wish to appeal this block please log into your regular account to do so. Chillum 17:48, 22 February 2015 (UTC)

What account did I log out from? Having knowledge makes me guilty? Having cellular service that randomly changes IP's is now a crime? Discussing on a talk page about a bias and push in an article is now forbidden? Reinstating my deleted comments 1 time is an edit war? Making false allegations about someone who is an IP is accepted practice?

What is troubling is User:Chillums amount of lying to cover up after I self reported myself at ANI to get the matter scrutinized. The evidence speaks for itself but so do the reactions. It seems there is little accountability for admins abusing other editors especially the IP editor. There is probably a process to take this higher/further but very few know about it and are willing to go there. The catch 22 of being abused and then being blocked so you cannot make a report without being accused of evading a block is severely flawed as well. I have let enough admins know so at least their is more information about it.

Thank you WeldNeck for looking into the matter of the original SPI. The evidence is strong and I believed it deserved more attention. I would of been ok with the SPI going nowhere after the process which was very short and deleted, why? The clear abuse of someone who started a SPI has become a bigger issue for me. I did not even know about Chillum's block until I went back the next day to look at the SPI. My IP had already changed when I turned on my Cellular device. Chillum has tried to use my changing IP as evidence. That has no merit as cellular networks continually change IP's to allow more people to use the network than they have IP's allocated for. Take your cell phone for example (same type of network) and google "my IP" and then turn it of for awhile or go somewhere and google "my IP" again and it likely changed. The bigger the population of people the more likely it will change faster. I could of said oh well to Chillum's block and went on about my business and no one would of known or cared.

However there are people out there who use an IP that does not regularly change (unless they unplug their modem over night) who have been targeted by an abusive admin and I stood up for the community. It is possible Chillum thought I fell into that category and would be an easy target to abuse. Maybe he acted maliciously due to his involvement in the very controversial Cultural Marxism AFD. Maybe he has an dislike of IP editors or is paranoid about them. I do not know his reason and it does not matter so I fought against the abuse and false allegation. I forced the issue rather than just walking away which would of been easy. I knew I could fight him at ANI as blocking my IP is pretty much a waste of time unless admins are willing to go nuclear and range block millions of cellular users. That is unlikely to stop someone who has other access and knows how IP's are assigned. I pointed that out to Chillum on his talk page in a smart a$$ way to prevent such a meat head move on his part that would do a lot of collateral damage. I was successful in preventing that.

I have been very determined and sometimes a little to much of a smart a$$ towards Chillum as he has been towards me. Chillum's lying, false allegations and twisting to cover his a$$ did not bring out the best in me at all times. However as an Admin Chillum is the face of Wikipedia and he needs to exercise better judgment and that is my reason for not ignoring it. 172.56.32.8 (talk) 03:10, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Thanks Jimbo for letting this see the light of day here and for being accesable. Here is a link to the SPI I started that was deleted in three hours and then deleted so no one else could see it. [[21]] This investigation was started to investigate RGloucester and suspected sock or meat puppet Jobrot. 172.56.21.218 (talk) 05:04, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
How many times are you going to post the same thing on different talk pages? This was already discussed at ANI. Chillum 06:08, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
  • Quoting myself: Timbo's Rule No. 12. Most vandalism is caused by anonymous IP editors. The only reason IP editing is allowed at all is that it makes vandalism easier to spot. Rule 13. Since such a high percentage of anonymous IP editors are vandals, they are all treated like shit. Trying to make serious edits to Wikipedia as an IP editor is like blindly blundering through the countryside on the first day of hunting season dressed like a moose. — Solution? Register a damned account and use it every time. Carrite (talk) 17:03, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
There was some disruptive editing by this editor prior to the block. But the actual reason given for the block was not a good one - the editor has adequately explained by now that he did not log out of any account to make the SPI. The SPI itself was ill-conceived but apparently based on a sincere suspicion, so certainly not a blockable offence. All in all, User:Chillum does appear to have made a mistake about what had happened, but it was not an abusive block and IMO there was independent justification for a short block (probably, tbf, against more than one person).
I've suggested (at ANI) to the complaining editor that he create an account, and thus an easily recognizable identity for his edits, comments on talk pages, etc., and edit cooperatively in the future. He doesn't seem to be amenable to that solution, so I doubt that anything more can be done now, apart from everyone moving on without grudges. As the original block doesn't actually prevent him from editing, no harm is done. If the editor concerned will now simply edit without soapboxing and using battleground tactics, there is no need for any future problem. He does appear to have some relevant subject-matter knowledge, so he just needs to edit neutrally, incrementally, with civility, etc. Metamagician3000 (talk) 00:51, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

This has been discussed and resolved at WP:ANI. It was also hatted here prior. It is only here because this IP keeps putting it back. If you want to discuss this you are welcome on my talk page. Chillum 00:54, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Should Wikipedia have an article about a Wikipedia article?

Please have a look at this collection of links to sources. http://www.markbernstein.org/Feb15/Press.html When doing so, please notice that there is enough there to create a new Wikipedia article about a notable Wikipedia article. All you'd have to do is summarize these sources into an article about the referent Wikipedia's article about gamergate. In the future, if there is enough published in WP:RSes specifically about specific Wikipedia articles, more articles about much-written-about Wikipedia articles could also be created.

Thoughts? Chrisrus (talk) 04:41, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

It's been suggested that I should explain about the above link. If you would, please look at this collection of links by scrolling down just a tiny bit and clicking on the names of sources, here: http://www.markbernstein.org/Feb15/Press.html. The first one is "The Guardian". Each one links to another publisher's article about Wikipedia's gamergate article. That article in itself is apparently notable, and so we could base an article about it from those articles.
Thoughts? Chrisrus (talk) 06:28, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
Isn't it more about the controversy? Wikipedia has articles on several controversial events in its history.--Wehwalt (talk) 08:19, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
There's no particular reason to change the usual inclusion standards. There are at least two articles that're essentially about Wikipedia articles, Henryk Batuta hoax and Wikipedia Seigenthaler biography incident. WilyD 08:29, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
What if Wikipedia's article on the Gamergate Controversy is itself covered substantially in reliable sources, say by people complaining about self-reference in Wikipedia? Then we could have a Wikipedia's article on Wikipedia's article on the Gamergate Controversy and so on ad infinatum. In all seriousness, there should be an article provided substantial and credible sources exist. --Jakob (talk) 15:58, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
I recall a science fiction story about a digital encyclopedia that had indices, then an index to the index (index2) and so on for several iterations. And then they discovered an error ... one thing about Wikipedia, we've abolished the index (thank God, as they were usually unhelpful).--Wehwalt (talk) 17:28, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
I actually think an index (not to articles but for guidance of Wikipedia editors) would be very helpful. I've raised this point before but it did not get any traction. Coretheapple (talk) 17:39, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Editor's index to Wikipedia and Book:Wikipedia: The Missing Manual.
—Wavelength (talk) 18:05, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
One of the problems we already have is outlined at WP:NAVEL. I believe that it is well-established (and unfortunate) that anyone who has any sort of run-in with Wikipedia is likely to have a disproportionate section about it in their article. I think this is a bad thing. In terms of the current question, I would say that - yes, of course - it is possible that we could have a wikipedia article about a wikipedia article. But I'd want to scrutinize it very carefully. We do have articles about individual articles in other publications, although only very rarely. I know of one example, here: A Rape on Campus is about a Rolling Stone article that attracted a lot of attention when published, and then subsequently unravelled. UPDATE: I just checked it and WP:NAVEL isn't what I meant. I don't know where the discussion is about the problem of excessive attention being paid to news about ourselves.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:39, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
Question: is there anything more seminal about Wikipedia's article than a dozen other well-known articles that have come out about this teapot tempest? Certainly I think the video by Gurney Halleck would deserve a separate article first, by which I certainly don't mean that one is actually needed. If the article grows to the point where a split is needed, I'm sure there are better organization ideas than giving every source its own little article. Wnt (talk) 17:44, 25 February 2015 (UTC)
Another question: Why would people go to Wikipedia to look for an article about an article on Wikipedia? They can just go to the main article and look up the info from the main article, and if there is external info about the main article, these mentions can be added in a section in the main article. Epic Genius (talk) 20:10, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 25 February 2015

Disclosure issue

Jimmy, could you comment on a situation? If an organization hired a consultant with a proprietary area of practice (one that they sort of have a "name trademark" in doing -- like Google is practically associated with "contextual advertising", or like Apple is practically associated with "portable media player"), to do research that results in a report that finds that the organization is the world's best/biggest/fastest-growing entity in that area of practice, I understand that there's nothing wrong with that. But, what if the organization's employees also create and author a new Wikipedia article about the area of practice, using primarily the consultant's white paper as a reliable source, then promote the research results with a press release that links back to the Wikipedia article about what it is that they're supposedly best/biggest at -- and none of the organization's employees disclose any conflict of interest in their authorship of the Wikipedia article. Is that a violation of the Wikimedia Terms of Use clauses about disclosure? Do you feel that the organization has behaved ethically? Looking forward to your response. - WilmingMa (talk) 20:52, 20 February 2015 (UTC)

Participatory grantmaking, mayhaps? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:55, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
This is certainly a convoluted restating of a discussion going on at Wikipediocracy about WMF's "Participatory Grantmaking" and allegations of a paid self-congratulatory propaganda offensive relating to that. Carrite (talk) 21:39, 20 February 2015 (UTC)
As usual, I find hypothetical questions like this to be unsatisfactory. Please give actual information so that people can evaluate it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:23, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
I'm sorry, Jimmy. I thought that if I put the scenario in hypothetical terms it would enable you to respond sort of generally about what constitute ethical practices for employees at large, rather than be put on the defensive to try to "cover" for your Foundation. There is a story you can find on Google that should summarize the "actual information" that you requested. - WilmingMa (talk) 15:34, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
That would not be my style. I prefer to speak plainly and directly, and that's much easier to do when we have clear facts. As I only now know what you are referring to, and know nothing about it, I'll have to look into it before I can comment sensibly. I can speak in the abstract, of course, that the ethical principles which I think apply to all organizations in terms of their editing of Wikipedia apply in the extreme to the Wikimedia Foundation itself. It would be impossible for the Foundation to take a leadership role on the issue if they did not adhere to the strongest possible standards themselves, including my "bright line" rule. I can say that before knowing what is even being alleged here, because that is at the level of principle.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:28, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
http://wikipediocracy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=6068 --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:41, 21 February 2015 (UTC)
Gregory Kohs's Examiner.com article is a lot easier to read than a forum thread, but since it can't actually be linked to from here I suppose a "soft redirect" will have to do. The WMF has an unfortunate habit of holding cozy relations with firms it contracts research to, but this is the first time I've seen WMF staffers actually create an article for a firm, and then link to the article from the WMF blog (google "citogenesis" and "wikiality"). --SB_Johnny | talk✌ 09:25, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

Giving Jimbo a chance to respond, once he's had time to have a look into it. - 50.144.3.133 (talk) 13:48, 23 February 2015 (UTC)

Jimmy, do you think you will have anything to say about the provenance of the Participatory grantmaking article? Did Wikimedia Foundation employees act in accordance with Wikimedia terms of use regarding disclosure, and do you think the article holds up to Wikipedia's best practices for notability, sourcing, and NPOV? If you're not going to respond, please say so, such that this section need not keep getting rescued from your page's cleaner bots. - WilmingMa (talk) 13:25, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm in Bangladesh for the 10th birthday of Bangla Wikipedia. It will be when I get back when I will have time to review.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 06:06, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
Jimmy, given your travel itinerary, the fact that User:Carrite successfully got the non-compliant article deleted from Wikipedia, and the fact that this has been adequately covered in a journalistic sense by citizen reporters at both Examiner and the Wikipedia Signpost, I respectfully withdraw my request for your comment. Of course, feel free to respond if you'd like, but if this thread gets archived and we don't hear from you about the participatory grantmaking / Lafayette incident, I won't be losing any sleep. Be well, and happy editing! - WilmingMa (talk) 13:40, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
Just in case anyone missed it, here is the Signpost article about this issue. I still plan to comment but I haven't even read the Signpost yet - just saw that it exists!--Jimbo Wales (talk) 16:31, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
  • People are all humans. Just because Wikipedia hires a consultant, doesn't mean that consultant is an expert on English Wikipedia policies and practices. If they, or somebody else, does something wrong, we should simply correct them. That's it. There's no reason to start a holy war over a simple error. People around here should focus on peace making rather than trying to intensify every possible dispute. I see that the article in question has already been deleted. It looks like the matter has been resolved. Jehochman Talk 17:04, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
Ad hominem much? Carrite (talk) 19:02, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

Image of Journalist Censored in Wikipedia

Shamin Zakaria is a noted journalist ,Photographer and this can be verified here. This image commons:Commons:Deletion requests/File:SHAMIM-ARVIND.jpg was taken in Guwahati Airport along with Arvind Kejriwal and IAC volunteers of Assam with the I am Akhil T shirt Akhil Gogoi was a senior leader there. The image is a selfie of a noted journalist uploaded by the subject himself into Wikipedia commons in 2012 however when the image added to an article it became an issue and the Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/India Against Corruption sock-meatfarm wanted it deleted as per including this.Ankur J Das is his friend and he watermarked and developed the image. Sabajit Roy 's person contacted Shamin Zakaria on this but Shamin refused to oblige but sadly it was deleted based on banned editors request almost all those who voted where open proxies. This image has never been published anywhere nor has Ankur J Das made no any claim of copyright and is a third party here .Note Ankur J das is a professional Photographer he would surely published this photo the fact he did not and gave to Shamin.In India photo developers do watermark images and watermark does not mean Copyright ownership for a selfie.Is there a policy that anyone who has watermarked a image has to give hios consent through ORTS for an image to be uploaded in wikipedia ? Note IAC have hijacked Citizendium.What do want from Shamin to undelete this image.122.167.249.106 (talk) 09:01, 26 February 2015 (UTC)

Humans are animals. Wikipedia's policy is that animals can't have claim to copyright protection. Therefore- copyright claims are moot. Use any photo anytime for anything. Logic. Boom.Camelbinky (talk) 14:46, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
For the benefit of the similarly confused, this comment is more malingering about this thread above, and not actually germane to the IP's concern. HiDrNick! 15:20, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
There's a comment by User:Lupo at the Commons deletion discussion that explains what is needed. It says...
"Just follow the instructions I gave above and make Ankur J Das send a formal release via OTRS, from a verifiable e-mail address. If it's as you claim, it's also fine if he sends in a release saying "no, I didn't take that photo and I do not own the copyright; the photographer and copyright owner is Shamim Zakaria", and then Shamim Zakaria also sends in a formal release via OTRS confirming that (also from a verifiable e-mail address). Although both would have to explain how this image was taken, given that the subject who claims to own the copyright is in the picture. What's so difficult to understand about this? Either we get a valid traceable release via OTRS, or everybody can make unsubstantiated claims here on this page all day long and we'll still delete the image in the end".
An image does not need to be published anywhere to be copyrighted, and nobody needs to explicitly assert copyright. All creative works are considered copyrighted by default, and what Commons requires is a valid assertion that that copyright has been released in accordance with CC-BY-SA terms or freer. If what is claimed is genuinely the case, then it should be easy enough to get Ankur J Das and Shamim Zakaria to formally confirm it. Commons cannot really accept claims by anyone other than the person who claims the copyright and the person who has watermarked it. Squinge (talk) 16:01, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
There is a quote in WP:Why_Wikipedia_cannot_claim_the_earth_is_not_flat#6._Gaming that is brought to mind when situations arise that "If what is claimed is genuinely the case, then it should be easy enough":

"If the facts are against you, argue the law. If the law is against you, argue the facts. If the law and the facts are against you, pound the table and yell like hell."

— old lawyers' nostrum, The People, Yes (1936), Carl Sandburg





In this case, substitute "policy" for "law". JoeSperrazza (talk) 17:31, 26 February 2015 (UTC)
This actually is related to the monkey issue. Supposing for a moment that person A asks person B to "press the button", with person A being in the shot, when is the copyright held by A and when by B? My guess would be that if person A tells person B to stand "right here", and person B at his direction presses the button at that exact spot, then A might hold the copyright by that "directed the path of the shot" criterion that was brought up in the monkey discussion - just as if he had set a timer. (But then, how much can B monkey with the shot before it's his?) There's probably some actual legal precedent about it, and Wikipedia and/or Commons should set up a page of explanation in preparation for future cases. Wnt (talk) 02:41, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
ROFL Nyth63 04:44, 27 February 2015 (UTC)
On my talk page I was referred to c:Commons_talk:Transfer_of_copyright, which describes another way; but I think that many "this is me standing next to the sequoia" style vacation snaps are taken without formal (even oral) mention of copyright, so it might still be worth considering. Wnt (talk) 13:20, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

While there are several things wrong with the current Wikipedia culture, I wonder if removing the community appointed admins for paid ones might help. The problem is this, (with a few exceptions) police officers are not subject to the whim of a community, they merely enforce the laws on the book. But here at Wikipedia, admin actions are subject to community consensus, which is often erratic and contradictory, and sometimes unduly influenced by "popularity contests". I.e., what constitutes disruption is largely a factor of who you are and who you know. If we removed all community appointed admins and let the Wikimedia Foundation hire them I think we could get back to a more consistent editing environment for all. Let the community decide policy and guidelines, but leave the enforcement of them up to people not burdened by peer pressure and popularity contests. Maybe this is cost prohibitive, as I really don't know how many paid admins would be needed to cover the workload. And please forgive me if this is a perennial debate, but I don't see that it's been discussed anywhere. Rationalobserver (talk) 17:53, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

  • Seriously: it might be a better idea to set up a paid department at wherever Wikipedia's head office is, with trained staff to give pastoral support to admins and editors having problems, or where other editors can pass on any concerns about admins who they suspect are having personal problems. Due to unavoidable human nature, some areas of Wikipedia can be fraught and noisy places - the current expectation that the editorship has some psychic knowledge that a particular Admin (who appears tough) is actually fragile is a flawed concept. Giano (talk) 18:05, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
The Village Pump would be the place to seek answers to these questions. I do believe a proposal was brought there a few months ago, seeking to have the cummunity's ability to elect administrators revoked. The result was to keep the status quo. GoodDay (talk) 18:15, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
With all due respect, the Village Pump is subject to the same type of popularity contest mentality, and any idea brought there that challenges the status quo would likely get rejected out of hand. Rationalobserver (talk) 18:22, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Rationalobserver, I'm not evaluating the strength of your suggestion just reminding you that you need to consider your proposal for the English Wikipedia and multiply it times, I'm guessing, a factor of 200. While the English Wikipedia is the most visited and edited WMF website, it doesn't exist in isolation and the prospect of paying administrators on one language Wikipedia but not others would be a big source of disruption throughout the network of WMF sites that all rely on the work of volunteers. Liz Read! Talk! 18:16, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
That's a good point, but do the other Wikipedia's have an issue with admins and community consensus? Maybe we only need them here. Sorta like a pilot program. Rationalobserver (talk) 18:19, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
I don't know, do we? Is there a fundamental problem that you have evidence and proof for? And what's wrong with community consensus? That's what the entire site is based off. Whether to keep a page, delete a page, merge pages, redirect them, delete categories. Even in ArbCom there's semblance of consensus, if they have a consensus that an admin is not adhering to certain standards and is breaking those standards, they have the power via a consensus of arbitration members to desysop that admin. It's a backbone for the entire site. Relating that to this, the bar for something to -not- be done for consensus is very few and they are for good reason. WP:OFFICE for legal issues. So why would we need to subvert community consensus, that is assuming there is one--just to have admins do stuff that the community doesn't agree with? It sounds like a recipe for disaster. I'm very concerned that the community doesn't agree with it, why should it be done? Tutelary (talk) 18:24, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
(BK)Yes, they have. just ask any of the bigger ones;) I'm against this, as it gives far too much power to the mere supporting agency WMF and takes it away from the real sovereigns here, that#s the communities. The wikiverse exists only because of the communities, they deliver next to everything: the content, the donations (that flow because of the content), lot's of tools and programming, most of the organizing.... The WMF lives from the communities, it just acts sometimes as if it's not this way (see my sig). --♫ Sänger - Talk - superputsch must go 18:26, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Yes. If we had paid admins what are the odds we'd have Visual Editor as a default? --NeilN talk to me 18:29, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Rationalobserver, I don't contribute to Wikipedias in other language but, from an organizational sense, the smaller the admin corps are, the more influential each admin potentially is and I am under the impression that other Wikipedias have far fewer admins (per editor) than the English Wikipedia. So the admins there can more strongly influence the culture, especially because they don't often come to this user talk page to discuss problems that exist.
One problem regarding administration on the English Wikipedia is that the numbers of active admins have dwindled to 500-600 (from, I think, around 1500+) and since admins often focus their work on specific areas of the encyclopedia, like city policemen, they often have a "beat" or patrol. Some work at addressing problems with SPIs, copyright, dispute resolution, AfDs, RPPs, UAAs, FACs or any number of other areas. If you find yourself bringing issues to AN/I or AE often, you are most likely to run into the same group of admins who regularly check those noticeboards. And, for good or ill, editors and admins on Wikipedia have long memories and it's important not to burn your bridges because any time you bring a case, your own behavior, past and present, can be under scrutiny.
Right now, as at almost every other time Wikipedia has existed, the procedure of electing admins is being discussed and it has continually been critiqued and evaluated. There seems to be a general consensus that problems exist but none of the remedies that have been suggested over the past years have won approval. Having a greater number of admins might relieve some of the stress that current admins work under as there would be more individuals sharing the workload. But because of past problems, new candidates for RfAs are under much tougher scrutiny than ten years ago when there were usually a couple RfAs running each week (instead of one or two a month). Liz Read! Talk! 18:58, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
  • A rather fundamental point is being overlooked. Who is going to pay these admins and with what? It's better to look after the admins we have and make sure they are fully trained and well focused. Giano (talk) 18:54, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
(edit conflict) I will have to say Giano is right here...what we need is a training process for the admins we have and new ones....level of abilities if you will. -- Moxy (talk) 19:01, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Beyond likely being financially impossible, I fail to see what this proposal would reasonably do. Its not like being paid eliminates things like bad judgement calls, human error, bias, or anything else that people feel are wrong with current admin. If anything, it'd make things worse, as it would add an extra "paid corruption" dimension to people's complaints. (You know, the "Wikipedia is so slanted in this political/religious/social viewpoint, no wonder that admin supports it - they pay him to push that view!" kind of junk.) Sergecross73 msg me 18:57, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Doesn't WMF have around 50 gazillion dollars in savings or something, which they're not spending on anything? Bosstopher (talk) 19:00, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Actually a quarterly report was just issued. WMF surpassed their fundraising goal but, for some reason, the amount of money dispensed in grants has decreased. I don't know what kind of savings the WMF has but I think you could find out more information on http://meta.wikimedia.org in the official documents. Liz Read! Talk! 19:23, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
As a pilot program, it doesn't take a huge investment. Start with some training at SF for a pilot group of admins, that enables these admins to get to know their way around the organization as well as the policies. Make sure the group members all understand the existing admin policies. Then put them on admin duties three shifts of eight hours / day, two people per shift-- a primary person and a backup. Six people, maybe eight to ensure full coverage on weekends. This way you know there will always be at least one trained administrator available. (Could also be set up with four shifts per day of six hours). After a few months of working as administrators and sharing experiences, the pilot group gets together, possibly with a person who is a professional specializing in online community development, and writes a training guide for administrators.
Also, have the group look at the question of whether the technical and conduct aspects of the admin role should be divided into two different positions, and if so, what tasks, tools, and permissions are needed.
This isn't all that difficult. However, participants do need to be paid in order to ensure that the project is carried out by qualified individuals who are in a position to make this a full time commitment. --Djembayz (talk) 20:02, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
For those interested in training administrators, a grant proposal is already available. If people reading this are interested in participating, there is a call for volunteers, developers, advisors, community organizers, designers, and researchers. -- Djembayz (talk) 20:22, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
  • I've seen this suggested more than once lately, but it still makes no sense. We have plenty of qualified people who would be willing to do admin work for free; the problem is a selection process that anyone (including outside focus groups) can blackball. So ... why pay for what we can have free? Why not focus on the barrier itself, i.e. the acceptance process? You could, for example, pay 100 random Wikipedians a $20 gift certificate to impartially evaluate each admin candidate and vote on them, and obviously that would still be cheaper than one paid admin's salary. (Honestly, I suspect it is so ingrained in society that the rich are better than the poor and deserve continual tribute from the poor until the poor are entirely used up and somehow Removed from Play, that people simply apply this model to anything that seems related to social status, even when the comparison is faulty) Wnt (talk) 00:25, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
With regards to selection of administrators, the current system is voting, with no particular qualifying process. We are understandably getting mixed results. Identifying the necessary skills and policy familiarity for administrators, and putting together a required training program would ensure that the people the community votes on are properly prepared to do the job. Having the existing administrators complete a standardized training periodically, even as a refresher, would help ensure that all are on the same page. If you have an interest in volunteering to organize a group to put together an administrator training program, by all means do so! But if it hasn't happened in 11 years, most likely some sort of resources need to be put into this project to make it a success. --Djembayz (talk) 01:30, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
  • I see. So, what if one paid admin refuses to work on closing acrimonious deletion discussions and if they are all paid the same, a strike ensues over unfair wages per tasks? Or take on tasks like blocking a "vested" contributor? Maybe a few Dirty Harry/Rambo types might be willing to do the dirtiest deeds for more cash!--MONGO 01:36, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
    • If we were to have paid/professional administrators, we could setup a queue of tasks and you would be assigned tasks in a way that you could not cherry pick the easiest/non-controversial ones. If you are working, say, the AFD queue today, then you would be assigned the next oldest AFD to process, you would process it, and then you would get another one to do. --B (talk) 01:46, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
      • How about maybe a bonus incentive program! What's a possible bonus to block Jimbo?! (Just kidding Jimbo!)--MONGO 01:53, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
        • Well, that would be the whole point of the queue system. Someone who seeks out the high-profile drama-causing blocks would not necessarily get them any more. You're not leaving those issues to whoever is reading the ANI thread and decides that they're ready to pull the trigger. (Note that I'm not actually in favor of a professional admin corps as a practical matter - I'm just suggesting a system where it could be workable.) --B (talk) 03:22, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

I think Wikipedia as an organization has a general problem with decision-making. This is a natural drawback in making decisions via "consensus", which is whimsical, easily gamed and varies greatly depending on who shows up. It also encourages battleground mentalities, since a final decision is never made, so competing editors are allowed to argue endlessly. Consensus on Wikipedia is actually much less vulnerable to a "popularity contest" I think than corporate environments though, where many employees flourish based primarily on their likeability. It would be great to find a way for Wikipedia to make faster, more consistent, more clear-cut decisions on everything ranging from content to administrative actions, but doing so can only occur at a loss to the principles of a community model. CorporateM (Talk) 04:12, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

I wonder if Section 230 applies to an administrator handling behavioral, rather than content disputes; I am familiar with it, but not enough to have an opinion.
Personally, rather than paid administrators, I'd love to see consensus mixed with other decision-making models in a checks-and-balances type philosophy, rather than a "consensus>all" mentality, but any such proposition just won't be popular. CorporateM (Talk) 05:28, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

A suggestion for attracting and keeping female editors

Hey Jimbo, have you seen the Wikipedia article on cleavage? The one that the disambiguation page Cleavage decribes as "partial exposure of the separation between a woman's breasts"? No, not Decolletage, that's a different article about the same thing. The one I'm writing about here is Cleavage (breasts). People have been arguing lately about the number of images on that article. Right now there are 19 images to illustrate this very simple concept, but that number changes daily.


How do you think female readers will react when they see the sections called "pathology" and "treatment"? Let's ignore the fact that part of it is a word for word copy from the sources. The article has gone from talking about the social aspects of cleavage (and let's ignore the fact that this is already covered in decolletage) to talking about "cleavage wrinkles" as a condition that needs treatment. It is misplaced, and worse, medicalizes a common and completely normal effect of aging on women. And I won't even mention the absolutely awful Intermammary cleft, which is a totally unecessary content fork (with special added nonsense). Or the ridiculous Cleavage enhancement article which seems to be a how-to guide for transvestite fetishists.


If you want to attract and keep female editors, start cleaning up these awful messes that result from letting pervy creeps turn anatomical articles into their personal image galleries. Get rid of the plastic surgery linkfarms. Take hard line with editors who want to push their own odd views of what women should do with their breasts. In other words, make all of these kind of articles seem like they belong in an encyclopedia instead of a Tumblr site. Perhaps if women see themselves reflected by Wikipedia they might start editing as well as reading. If they see Wikipedia articles like Cleavage (breasts) is now, they will wisely stay far far away. Some people are made of plastic (talk) 23:54, 27 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm still waiting for somebody to tell me that camel toe is just an April Fool's joke gone terribly wrong. Carrite (talk) 00:09, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I'd be happy to delete or stubbify such articles, but it probably wouldn't end well if anyone started to do so without general consensus about them. I'd certainly support having some debate about their appropriateness or what is appropriate content for them. Metamagician3000 (talk) 06:37, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Metamagcian3000, the problem here is that editors are looking for "general consensus" instead of showing editorial oversight. Right now, there's a discussion about a table in the article Cleavage (breasts) featuring images of other types of partial breast exposure including "bottom cleavage". Sorry to pick on that article again, but it serves to make my point. I'm sure you can find editors to argue endlessly that this table of pictures should remain in the article, which is part of the problem. What new female editor wants to subject herself to that? There was a recent discussion about the inclusion of an autotuned audio file in Bhutanese passport that some people considered racist. I'm sure someone will suggest that "general consensus" worked in this instance, but really it was the imposition of indefinite article protection. If Wikipedia wants women to participate as editors, then Wikipedia needs to rein in the editors who insist on acting like little boys. Some people are made of plastic (talk) 14:32, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

I'm sure you can find editors to argue endlessly that this table of pictures should remain in the article, which is part of the problem. People shouldn't be able to argue policy or appropriateness of images if someone removes them. Got'cha. They should just be entirely removed, no images at all--after all, Wikipedia is censored I'm sure. I'm sure someone will suggest that "general consensus" worked in this instance, but really it was the imposition of indefinite article protection. You saw a content dispute on Wikipedia, you lost in terms of consensus and all of a sudden, instead of being considered the 'consensus' of editors, it's 'indefinite article protection'. How many articles or content disputes have gone in your favor that you reverse this standard on, I wonder? Also notice that you're linking to a talk page discussion rather than a full blown edit war. That's what talk pages are for--getting consensus on things. The fact that you don't want that to happen is telling. What do you think should happen when an editor reverts another editor's contributions? Just keep reverting? It can't work. Also, I really much ponder your original account, and whether you are the IP posting the same ranty-type vague speals below. Oh and to add, tell me your solution to this problem. Because if you can find something more efficient than talk pages, I'd love to hear it and I'm sure they would too. Tutelary (talk) 14:50, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Thank you, Tutelary, for providing an example of the kind of testosterone-fueled attack that would greet any female editor wading into that mess of an article. If you wre a woman, how do you think you would feel when faced with such attacks? Some people are made of plastic (talk) 21:13, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
The kicker is that I am a woman. Tutelary (talk) 23:01, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I don't think the original state of the articles has much to be said for it, but the suggestions above seem to have the wrong focus. The reason why the article might have struck someone as offensive or voyeuristic is simply that it was badly written. For example, a table of "top cleavage, side cleavage, and bottom cleavage" is not merely pretty, but actually encyclopedic. Adding a fourth category of "downblouse", determined not by how the woman dresses but on how she is photographed, not so much. Deleting the table, though, was not the right answer. Nor should mention of "downblouse" photography be entirely omitted, since it is a social factor that is affecting current female fashion, in that women end up thinking about what they're going to end up being presented as on social media. Wnt (talk) 15:18, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
  • I'd ordinarily agree with you, Tutelary, but this article is a complete mess, much of it WP:OR and when I last looked at it, it contained an extensive table of different types of bras which was totally misplaced. There is no reason why more than one image is necessary to illustrate what cleavage is. For comparison purposes, do we have 19 photos on Scrotum? No. Liz Read! Talk! 19:33, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Well, we probably would if men paraded down the fashion runways in pants designed to show off certain parts of them. :) Wnt (talk) 20:39, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Wnt, you clearly have not kept up with the latest developments in fashion. --Plastic-Al1ty (talk) 15:02, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
LOL, clearly I don't know enough about fashion! If you find some free-licensed photos we can certainly get to work on improving our articles. :) Wnt (talk) 19:07, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Gee, do you know how hard it is to blag your way into the photographer's pit at a major fashion designer's show? There's something unwholesome and crypto-fascist about professional photographers. They don't seem to like sharing their space with well-meaning wiki volunteers. Surely you agree? So... you and I will have to improvise by re-enacting those shlongtastic fashion shoots. Do you think that Jimmy himself could help? He's something of a male model, after all? How cool would it be to get him to hang out with his (Alexander) Wang out? Do you think we could get a grant for a camera? My current point-and-shoot model is kinda meh. Even better, could you maybe talk to Jimmy and convince him that shooting a series of selfies would be in the best interest of free knowledge? (I love knowledge. Especially when it’s free. Squee!)
Alternatively, I heard that there are some talented artists on the Commons project. Do you know Dee Coetzee? A friend of mine who knows more about wiki told me that xe's something of a legend and xe's got luscious MLP hair (Do you like MLP? It's the best, right? Rainbow Dash FTW!). Anyhow, thank you for your kind welcome and for your offer of working with me. I'm thrilled to be here. Together we can make this happen! Plastic-Al1ty (talk) 05:00, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

First step to 'attracting and keeping female editors' is not repelling them. That one is a pretty obvious strategy that could be worked on straight away, with zero need for initiatives, projects and funding, if the community will was there. Given that the will doesn't seem to be there then the question should be: 'How do we deal with those elements of the community who repel women?' That's where the conversation seems to stop or go or in ever unchanging circles. AnonNep (talk) 20:57, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

Good point, is the community will there? A recent open-source perspective in a O'Reilley talk about women in tech has helpful info for those who do not work in the tech industry for understanding some of the emerging terminology and tools. Also, a recent reflection about speaking up for women in tech. As the poster above points out, attracting and retaining women would happen naturally, without any speeches, jargon, funding or initiatives, if community members overall were actually interested in being hospitable towards women. One can only hope that eventually the conversation won't just "stop or go or in ever unchanging circles" the way it does now. --Djembayz (talk) 22:12, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
It is not a good point at all. In fact, some might argue that it is a completely ridiculous one. Why should female contributors some way get special treatment? Any problems that exist do so for all contributors and, yes, it is probably true that many newbies are repelled but I have yet to see any statistically viable evidence that the repulsion of potential/short-term women contributors comes from within. In almost all cases, we have no idea of the gender of these people and thus the repulsion is gender inspecific. This politicising needs to stop: it appears to have begun with Sue Gardner but it has run it course, as indeed has she. Sue did a huge amount of damage to Wikipedia in her attempts to impose her own viewpoint. She meant well but she screwed up big time, which has become particularly evident in this gender politics palaver and in the mess that was already present in Indic articles but which was made much worse by her Utopianism. That she appears to have been friendly with Ironholds didn't help her but she was well doo-lally even before that, assuming that the WMF charter (or whatever it is called) was not to promote social engineering. - Sitush (talk) 00:18, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
So you disagree with every survey and study in the life of Wikipedia that there is a gender imbalance? For you, the gender imbalance simply does not exist? Before. Now. Ever? (NB. Whether the gender imbalance exists, and the possible reasons why, are separate to if it exists at all.) AnonNep (talk) 00:29, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
No, but that is a nice attempt at deflection. - Sitush (talk) 00:34, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Not deflection, I'm trying to work out what your problem is. If it isn't that there are statistically far fewer female editors at Wikipedia compared to men, that anyone is asking the question or that anyone is trying to answer it? Succinctly, without deflection, where is your specific grievance? AnonNep (talk) 00:48, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
For starters, the question asked did not concern imbalance but rather how to recruit and retain female contributors, even though after the recent high-profile bollocks most people choose not to identify their gender. Gender is irrelevant. That this has been twisted into a discussion that concerns an alleged massively disproportionate gender balance that somehow can be fixed by social engineering is a different issue. As so often happens, the thread has been hijacked and, as also is common, it was initiated by an obvious attention-seeking sock account, albeit we'll likely never know of whom they were a sock (CU block, I believe). Smoke and mirrors are yet again at the fore. Let's just get on with fixing the crap, which exists in at least four million extant articles and in many more potential articles. That is the seriously shaming issue, not chromosomes.

As I said below, BoboMeowCat is an example of someone who seems generally to be able to find a middle way through this recent campaigning; Montanabw is another example of an avowed feminist who can see the wood for the trees. Others, whom it would be best I do not name, are outright politicisers and should have no place here. Gardner is/was a social activist and that is pretty distant from the primary purpose of WMF, unless I am completely misunderstanding that purpose. If people here spent as much time agonising why it is that the gender gap at Facebook etc is alleged to be swung in the opposite direction, and why that might impact on the end result of Wikipedia, then I might be more persuaded that the real concern is the imparting of knowledge rather than US-centric self-feeding "feminist studies" academic cohort. - Sitush (talk) 01:58, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

I've no issue with the 'gender shouldn't matter' position. If that's what some editors believe then that's their right. What I find perplexing is why it seems to be such an issue for some that others hold a different view, express that view and want to organise around it. If groups want to work on attracting/retaining female editors, like the Inspire Campaign, or focus on these issues, why the (often quite strident) opposition? Why not just leave them to it? AnonNep (talk) 22:38, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I do not see it so much of an issue of wanting "special treatment", but rather, it seems to me that female editors are disproportionately hounded and disproportionately the target of personal attacks, although these problems seem unfortunately rampant on WP, and are certainly not limited to female editors. Also WT:GGTF seems to be, for lack of a better word, trolled much more than other wikiprojects. I wish the community would do more to address these issues. --BoboMeowCat (talk) 00:38, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
(multi ec) BoboMewoCAt, I have often thought you to be the voice of reason in so far as spats at GGTF are concerned. We do not always agree but I do appreciate your sense, which is often calming. I see loads of hounding going on all over this place and those incidences are not necessarily even remotely confined to women. It is a wider issue, so don't make it a gendered issue which (semantic points aside) turns it into something that is basically binary. "Them against us" will likely never achieve a decent heat/light ratio. As for GGTF, well, it is at heart a small group whose talk page is frequented by perhaps slightly more than a dozen seemingly fairly, erm, keen feminists whose attempts to recruit other women contributors (even those who claim to be feminist) appears to have failed big time. The gap exists, although I doubt its extent, but the regulars there are making matters worse, creating entrenchments where few or none previously existed. In a vague sort of way, GoodDay has a point in the subsection below: who gives a damn about the gender of a good-faith contributor? I certainly do not and I have collaborated very well with people whose gender I do not know and with people who have claimed to be female. - Sitush (talk) 01:06, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Thanks Sitush. I think my main issue here is I'm trying to understand the rationale of others who seem to follow around female editors (or GGTF members). Specifically editors who may be seen by some as less than reasonable at times. I ’m certainly not referring specifically to only Sitush when I inquire about this, this is a general question. I can understand concerns about potential POV edits in article space, but I do not understand the sort of talk page chatter, ongoing talk page comments regarding certain editors, and the apparent following around of certain editors. I completely agree that female editors are not the only targets of this sort of thing, but as far as I can see, women editors seem to be disproportionately affected, which seems to make it reasonable to discuss the issue in relation to gender.--BoboMeowCat (talk) 17:50, 4 March 2015 (UTC)


The obtuseness of portions of this thread leaves me uncharacteristically without words. There are several people here who should clearly never be part of discussing any gender-related issues ever again. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:42, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Gender schmender

IMHO Jimbo, the project would be better off disregarding the female/male labels & view all editors as gender-neutral. GoodDay (talk) 15:49, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Maybe we could invent a new gender referring specifically to a wiki editor and corresponding pronouns. Nyth63 18:03, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
We could combine the words wiki and the nueter pronoun it and make the word wikit or even better, a wit. Nyth63 22:05, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
My point is, it's best to carrying on as though we're all gender-neutral. GoodDay (talk) 00:37, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I completely agree - Wikipedia needs to be a welcoming place for all people regardless of race, gender, country, religion, sexual orientation, income, age, etc. There is no way that Wikipedia is going to look like a perfectly stratified sample of the world because it just isn't of equal interest to all people. A disproportionately high number of Wikipedians are programmers, computer science majors, etc, and a disproportionately high number of programmers, computer science majors, etc, are men. But regardless of what the gender makeup is, all editors need to be treated with respect and welcomed. --B (talk) 01:03, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

English language: spelling reform

The English Spelling Society hopes to bring spelling reform to the English language.

—Wavelength (talk) 04:06, 3 March 2015 (UTC) and 04:13, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Idiots. They failed with "thru" and "frend" in the past century, and they'll fail again. Tradition is our absolute knowledge. RGloucester — ☎ 04:31, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Maybe "thru" got a tiny bit of traction, but let's face it, "frend" is nothing more than an ugly typo. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 04:59, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Spelling changes over time. I had a teacher who went berserk if "onto" was spelled as one word, but many modern dictionaries will allow this.[22] Meanwhile, spellings like "connexion" are considered old-fashioned.--♦IanMacM♦ (talk to me) 06:30, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Changes over time through natural evolution are fine. Top-down mechanical changes are not, especially when personally ordered by obscene political movements. Nothing is ever "old-fashioned", however. If something was good enough for my predecessors, it must be good enough for me. We're all the same, after all. RGloucester — ☎ 06:42, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
If you spoke as your predecessors do, going back into the mists of time, few of your contemporaries would have any idea what you are trying to say or why you are trying to say it...oh wait, perhaps that explains much :) DeCausa (talk) 07:58, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
OK, ya'll.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:37, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
It's y'all. --DHeyward (talk) 11:47, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Totes, dude, deffo. Martinevans123 (talk) 15:44, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Read your own link. It says ya'll is less common but still used as is yall. Nyth63 19:25, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
The spelling is fine, we are just pronouncing the words wrong. The article English-language spelling reform is more relevant to this discussion. Nyth63 14:20, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
I saw this with the debate here in Wikipedia as to whether thru was the proper spelling for our article on drive through and actually I think it should be considered a proper spelling. I heard Wikipedians with the erroneous assertion that thru was simply used because it was shorter both on a drive thru sign and on traffic control signs. And yet if you ask any state DOT if they use thru because it is shorter they will respond with a resounding no and give you a list of words and phrases that are much longer on traffic control devices than the popular "no thru traffic". The real reason? Because it is easier for people to read than a word that is spelled nothing like how it is pronounced, which is important when our schools have semi-illiterates getting diplomas and driver's licences. Now, do we really want to be like the DOT and lower ourselves to the least common denominator? Probably not. But Wikipedia, as a constantly evolving institution should face reality and with words like drive thru, use the wp:COMMONNAME. Shit, for example read George Washington's correspondences and you'll see he doesn't even write one of his dentist's names the same way constantly, let alone more common words; so this idea that historical importance on how to spell a word is not important because until the mid-1800s there really wasn't set in stone rules about spelling that were fully accepted throughout the country even though Webster's and other's previous dictionaries had been out for some time. Camelbinky (talk) 15:48, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
And Canada, as usual, is happy using both spellings. Resolute 19:42, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
The spelling and other writing conventions of to-day are not always those of to-morrow. Newyorkbrad (talk) 22:33, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Shorter words are not new tho.→StaniStani 01:06, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

"will be to publicise existing evidence for the costs of traditional spelling, while encouraging more research in areas such as the levels of functional adult illiteracy" - Far more practically accomplished by banning twitting than attempting English spelling changes. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:39, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Twittering, surely? Martinevans123 (talk) 18:45, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I prefer breathing to tweeting. Tweeting is for the birds, and I am a mammal. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 06:29, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Exactly! Nyth63 12:19, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

Question

In your opinion should one be blocked from editing if they take legal action against the WMF and/or individual editor(s) without making a legal threat on Wikipedia? 84.51.184.208 (talk) 14:36, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

I'm of course not speaking for JImbo here, but I'd guess the first thing he'd say is that this question is much too hypothetical, any answer would depend on the details.
IMHO, you should stay away from this question as far as possible, no matter which side you're on. It's not a question of drawing a bright line and saying "that other guy has to stay on the other side of that line", or "I can go right up to point x". The real answer is something like "if I see a legal question coming up from any direction and I'd be tempted to take legal action, or feel the need to protect myself legally - I want to stay as far away as possible. Life on-Wiki is just not worth getting into that." That said I can see people being forced into legal action in certain cases, and at that point follow your lawyer's advice, not mine or Jimbo's!
About the only parallel in real life I can think of would be that of an NHL player who is worried about his health because of fights. Anybody going into the NHL knows, or should have known, that pro hockey games can be rough-and-tumble. They will get into some fights. If they are thinking about suing another player, their team or the league, they will be getting themselves in a world of trouble. Don't do it.
But what if the opposing player pulls out a bowie knife and nobody does anything about it? I'd personally get out of there, quit the league, etc. and consider suing only later, if ever.
About the only Wiki case I can think of that I have ever been tempted to make a legal or regulatory complaint involves something that I considered kiddie-porn. Who to report that to, for both the benefit of Wikipedia and the kids involved? I think I did report it to the right person, did not make any legal or regulatory complaint, and was fairly taken aback at the response. Sorry, no details possible! But several months later there was something of an explosion, probably not related to anything I did.
A person coming into Wikipedia does not leave his/her legal rights at the door. Discussing general legal issues is not a problem - we need to know what the law is. But legal action is unlikely to have any good effects. Just stay away from that if at all possible. Perhaps a regulatory complaint might sometimes be more acceptable, but still, think at least twice. And please don't try to use this advice in any way against the other guy.
Still thinking about all the above - and not sure about any of it. Probably best to just say "this is too hypothetical, give us some details." But perhaps I've outlined some issues. Smallbones(smalltalk) 15:47, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Yes. The point is not that people shouldn't take legal action against WMF, the community or editors, but they can't do it and use community processes at the same time. Having them on both sides of any legal action is a recipe for disaster. WilyD 22:31, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
What if someone decided to get an injunction against the Willy on Wheels for his past vandalism but never made any mention of their action on wiki, should they still be blocked? Ill point out the block template says "you've been blocked for making legal threats or taking legal action" 84.51.184.208 (talk) 15:50, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
This "hypothetical" question sounds it abstracts from a real situation. What is the actual case or threat you are talking about? 50.0.205.75 (talk) 21:31, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

If you want to increase editor retention...

If you want to increase editor retention, I think a productive step toward doing that would be to encourage admins to apply policies equally to new users and long term users. Currently, there seems to be hesitation for administrators to enforce polices or block established users when they violate our polices. I suspect the reasons are related to longterm comradery (perhaps they’ve even shared a beer at some point) or else fear of retaliation from well connected users. --BoboMeowCat (talk) 16:34, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

It could be a simple cost/benefit calculation, BoboMeowCat...if I block Editor X for Infringement Z, would the benefit to the project outweigh the cost? If Editor X has been active for years and contributed a lot to Wikipedia, is preventing them from editing (because blocking is not a punishment, right?) preventing disruption or preventing constructive work on Wikipedia? With an unknown, new editor, it's unclear what their future holds on WP...if you look at the stats, the majority of new editors make 10 edits or less or edit very irregularly. If they are being disruptive, it's clearly of more benefit to the project to stop their disruption rather than bet on the chance that they will straighten out, change their ways and become a productive editor. But blocks usually escalate in length so most new editors who are not obvious vandals or spammers are given second chances.
I'm not saying this is how admins make these decisions or if this is how they should make these decisions...it's just one way that admins, confronted with regular complaints of disruption and incivility might approach these decisions. I think the most important factor is that admins are not a homogeneous bunch and you will find a variety of approaches to the admin tasks at hand. This might seem to some like inconsistency but I think it is actually a benefit to the project as those with different attitudes balance each other out and appeals to blocks are typically evaluated by an uninvolved admin.Liz Read! Talk! 18:09, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
Liz, I agree that blocks should not be punitive, but they should serve to deter recurrent violation of our rules and polices. Recurrent violations of our rules and polices (by editors who are apparently exempted from them) disrupts the encyclopedia. Personally, I think if a long term contributor will only continue editing, if the rules are not uniformly applied to them, then the project is better off without them, even if they are good writers. There are likely plenty of good writers out there, but I suspect many of them are put off by the current battleground environment. --BoboMeowCat (talk) 21:10, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
As I've argued in the past on another IP - if anything, established editors should be held to a higher standard - because they are assumed to know better. The idea that certain people are "irreplaceable" and need to be retained is not only laughable, it's contradictory to the very notion of an "encyclopedia that anyone can edit". It's fine to say "competence is required", but if there's genuinely this core of editors (the way there sometimes appears to be) who believe "competence" (as defined by them) is really so rare, then Wikipedia is only paying lip service to its core defining attribute.
For what it's worth, since it has recently been fashionable to bemoan the gender imbalance among established editors - I am 110% sure that the gender balance among IP contributors is much closer to 50-50. Perhaps established editors should consider the possibility that the problem keeping women from registering isn't some systemic bias in article content or in explicitly stated policy, or even a systemic bias in how policy is applied, but a systemic bias in their conduct. Why would any reasonable woman voluntarily sign up for this mess, especially when one of the first pieces of advice they'll receive is to hide their identity to avoid harassment? Why should they feel welcome when the best attempts by supposedly "feminist" editors to welcome them are clearly patronizing (e.g. suggesting that their poor sensibilities are too fragile to deal with an encyclopedia that hosts an article on "Fucking Machines" and deems it to be of high quality)? 76.64.13.4 (talk) 07:30, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
As for the idea that "blocks shouldn't be punitive" - absolutely farcical, at least if there is any intent to imply that everyone's on board with that idea. I have recently been shown new editors get indeffed for simple 3RR violations. Not only is the application of policy on Wikipedia hilariously inconsistent, there are multiple pieces of policy that explicitly advocate for inconsistent application (WP:IAR, WP:OTHERSTUFF, WP:POINT...). 76.64.13.4 (talk) 07:34, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

The 'pedia would be better off if all editors would see each other as gender neutral, IMHO. GoodDay (talk) 14:04, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Would the use of "he"/"she" to refer to fellow editors be forbidden? Martinevans123 (talk) 14:11, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Getting into the habit of avoiding those terms would be helpful. GoodDay (talk) 14:16, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
Hmm. Not as if they're ever used in real life, are they. Jimbo needs to lose that hipster beard too. Martinevans123 (talk) 14:27, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
User:GoodDay, we speak English, perhaps you would like to explain how we go about not using gender specific nouns? Plus, if everyone simply understood that as a Germanic language that English words that refer to more than one gender or to non-gender specific groups/individual are by default using the male version. That's simply history and linguistics. I'm sorry it offends some people as being insulting to women, but it isn't intended that way nor is it actually offensive unless you take it that way.
It can be done. One simply does it. GoodDay (talk) 16:38, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
User:Liz are you saying with your "cost benefit analysis" that you seriously think it is O.K. for someone to be rude, condescending, biting, and a male chauvinist, and anti-semite (those editors know who I am talking about), and yet if they go around correcting grammar or fighting vandals, it's all good! for them to drive off other established or new editors. Ones that may in time become even better, but because we don't know we cant give them a chance? The problem is consistency. We don't (in the USA) decide "X person contributes a lot to society so we should give them a pass because if they are in jail/prison and their reputation is hurt, they will not be donating money to libraries and charities, but Y should get a worse punishment because they are 18 and we don't know yet how they will contribute if at all and we shouldn't take that chance". That's the real world equivalent of what you are saying is how some admins may be making decisions. It is wrong in the real world, it is wrong here. Now, I have heard of countries (Denmark?) that have a graduated form of fines for things like traffic tickets, the wealthy pay more than the poor for the same infraction. That I'd love to see in a Wikipedia version- Admins get more punishment because they have more resources to begin with, they can "afford" to pay more. And plus, as some one above mentioned- they should know better. Being an admin should be about showing the world our best face, if you want the "power" that comes with being an admin, then you can be courteous. I can't be courteous so I've never asked to be an admin. Other's should have that same consideration.Camelbinky (talk) 16:22, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
You're badly misinformed about how the justice system operates in the US. A convicted defendant's apparent value to society is often, if not always, taken into account when imposing sentences. This practice is not always a force for good—for example, it leads to substantial disparities in sentencing based on conscious or subconscious racial and societal prejudices, and leads to occasional one-off outrages like the case of the university professor who was initially thought to be too valuable to society to be jailed for sexual assault... but this practice is real, and a fundamental part of the US justice system (and, to my knowledge, part of many other Western justice systems). So your argument isn't off to a great start, even notwithstanding your egregious misrepresentation of Liz's point. MastCell Talk 18:18, 2 March 2015 (UTC)
User:MastCell you're badly misinformed between the difference of what happens in the justice system and what is legally and constitutionally allowed. Your examples are not only against the very letter of state laws but also unconstitutional on an equal protection clause case. I'm sorry you don't know the difference between judges who make egregious errors and what the US laws and constitution require. You are making wrong assumptions of what the sentencing phase of a trail consists of and what the purpose of its usefulness; it is about assessing the guilty's likelihood of reform and best way to serve society by punishing the offender correctly in the most efficient manner, it is not about assessing their role int he community and whether punishing them would hurt the community.Camelbinky (talk) 15:36, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
Camelbinky I guess you missed the part where I state
  • I'm not saying this is how admins make these decisions or if this is how they should make these decisions...it's just one way that admins, confronted with regular complaints of disruption and incivility might approach these decisions.
I was offering a rationale that might go through an admin's mind (not all admins but an admin) when they are considering whether to institute a block, the length of a block or some other action. I don't think it is okay for any editor to flout policies regarding conduct and civility and expect special treatment. I was making an observation of why editors might be treated differently, not suggesting what should be done in the specific situations you describe. Liz Read! Talk! 18:43, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

I think some of the responses regarding value and cost/benefit might be misinterpreting what I’m suggesting. I’m not suggesting longterm contributors should be indeffed or banned when they break a policy such as WP:NPA or WP:3RR, rather just blocked for a day or two. I think the benefit of doing so outweighs the costs by discouraging repeat violations, which are disruptive.--BoboMeowCat (talk) 14:11, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

given that even short blocks of certain individuals lead to mega shitstorms on the various drama boards, I do not put much countenance in your cost/benefit disruption analysis at least in the short and medium term. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 18:21, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

Humorous?

Dear Mr. Wales: Please see Friends of gays should not be allowed to edit articles. It is marked as humor, but I really don't understand the title - Poe's law and all that. The article has been kept from deletion, but the title is patently offensive and unnecessary. The discussion page is headlined "This page contains material intended to be humorous. It should not be taken seriously or literally. In case you didn't see the nice little italicized note at the bottom of the page, and are coming here to rant about us all being homophobes, this page is intended to be humourous - it is satire, so laugh, dammit!" Do we really need this? I'm sure all of us have Gay friends, so therefore none of us should edit. With intent to have a kinder, gentler and more inclusive Wiki, I am, sincerely yours, Ellin Beltz (talk) 22:34, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

"I'm sure all of us have Gay friends, so therefore none of us should edit." - You took literally the complete opposite of the message being presented in that essay. And yes, it is definitely satire. The point of that piece is to both note that the angst over vandalism is overblown and to mock the "anonymous users should not be allowed to edit". And yes, a not insignificant percentage of vandalism on Wikimedia comes from people calling their friends gay. Because, lets face it, teenage boys are generally dumb. (Source: I used to be one). The piece is one giant reductio ad absurdum that argues against unnecessarily limiting certain groups (specifically: anons) from being able to edit. Resolute 23:00, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

The title is the problem, not the essay honey. You didn't read Poe's law page, or you would understand that yes - readers of that title will literally take your message to heart whether you think it is humorous or not. I'm not suggesting the essay be removed but only that the title be changed to something which encourages editor retention, not discourages it. Alternate titles have previously been suggested on the discussion page. I'm seeing all kinds of "why can't we keep women" arguments above; I'm asking for "why can't we stop being so insulting to everyone - not just women or gays"? Ellin Beltz (talk) 16:15, 4 March 2015 (UTC)

I think the only people that page is insulting are homophobes. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 23:18, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Anyone who takes the title of the "article" as literal, probably doesn't have the capacity to be a productive contributor .-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 19:18, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
And anyone who can't see the offensiveness of the article title is the problem, not the fact of taking it literal or not, doesnt have the capacity to be a productive contributor to this discussion. Seriously though- if it can be considered offensive remove it. It doesn't harm Wikipedia to remove it. It can though cause some to leave. No one is going to leave Wikipedia because we change it FROM an offensive name. But we might lose some if we do. Why, oh why, are Wikipedians so intent to leave things just because we can. When did we become such idiots?Camelbinky (talk) 20:57, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I must admit I agree with @TheRedPenOfDoom: here. I don't find the article title offensive - it's referring to a section of the article and it's satire.--5 albert square (talk) 21:49, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Note that someone has since moved the page to "Vandals should not edit articles", which seems a bit...obvious. No corresponding changes were made to the page text. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:54, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

Oh jeez, I saw that page years ago, it didn't seem offensive, except possibly by indirectly disparaging homophobes as as Red Pen says. It posited an AGF interpretation of a bunch of edits that less welcoming Wikipedians might treat as vandalism appealing to benighted homophobic attitudes, and saw them instead as over-effusive affectionate tributes to the contributors' gay friends. Pagemoving it seems almost homophobic in its own right. 50.0.205.75 (talk) 01:56, 5 March 2015 (UTC)

The Signpost: 04 March 2015

Some bubble tea for you!

Sir , I am amazed that , you have a WP account CosmicEmperor (talk) 06:31, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Think Progress

The ‘Five Horsemen’ Of Wikipedia Paid The Price For Getting Between Trolls And Their Victims MarkBernstein (talk) 17:17, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

@MarkBernstein: I'm not going to remove this because, I'm 99.9999% this isnt the case. But are you sure if the editor mentioned in this article is ok with his real name being disclosed on Wikipedia? Have you checked with him? I can't imagine he would be against it being known given that he disclosed it to the press, but you can never tell. Bosstopher (talk) 17:36, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Several Wikipedia editors (including myself) were interviewed for, and are quoted in, the article. I assume that, if any of them wished for their names or Wikipedia identities to be withheld, they would have requested this and the publication would have complied with their requests. MarkBernstein (talk) 18:00, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Fair enough, just wanted to make 100% sure as technically this violates outing policy. Pretty intersting article tho.Bosstopher (talk) 18:06, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Heather Bresch

Not sure if you had any ongoing interest in the article, but thought I would let you and your watchlisters (many of whom previously participated) know that it's at ANI now. CorporateM (Talk) 17:31, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

I do have an ongoing interest and I apologize for not having been involved. I've just been very busy with the day job(s). :-)--Jimbo Wales (talk) 21:15, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

Musical preferences of Jimbo Wales we will know soon

Hello Jimbo! What are your musical preferences? Article about you does not contain such information. Thank you! - 37.144.116.208 (talk) 22:42, 6 March 2015 (UTC).

Well, it's too encyclopedic to actually be in his article, but off the record I'd still like to know. KonveyorBelt 22:50, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

An atmosphere of distrust, spite, malice, incompetence and ideological censorship damaging the reputation of Wikipedia

The toxic atmosphere new editors and unregistered editors must navigate when making good faith edits has been very damaging to the reputation of the project. It has also been very difficult for even experienced editors who in good faith try to improve or add to certain articles that a regular editor demonstrates ownership, often for ideological reasons. They often tendentiously edit the article and immediately revert any edit they deem contrary to their cause. If the new or unregistered editor attempts to reinstate their edit they jump all over the new editor with threatening language about being blocked and often use uncivil behavior to bait the new editor so they can run off to ANI to make misleading claims. When they get to ANI the new and unregistered users face a high level of mistrust (no AGF there) and an awaiting lynch mob who just can't wait to pile on with abusive comments. The unfamiliar editor will face accusations by the article owner that are likely to be presented deceptively.

Juvenile concepts regarding perceived freedom of expression rights (not a repository of porn or sexually provocative images)

There are other issues that keep many from participating in the project. It is especially troubling when it concerns sexually provocative or degrading images unnecessarily kept on user pages despite pretty clear user page guidelines. The usual juvenile sounding crowd shows up decrying Wikipedia is not censored which is possibly an ideal of sorts but far from a realistic statement. There would be no Wikipedia if there was not some standards which in effect become a form of censorship. This same crowd has also been known to hound editors who strive to improve the encyclopedias reputation by asking for enforcement of existing guidelines. Many of those editors have been especially insulting to female editors which is very detrimental to encouraging more women to participate in the project. Many editors have strived to make the encyclopedia more user friendly and safer for children. I would not encourage the use of Wikipedia in K-12 schools at this time due to the foul language, unnecessary depictions of violence against women, sexually provocative images and general low regard civility among experienced editors and many admins. There is nothing gained for an encyclopedia to show actual images of women in bondage as it reflects violence against women. A simple drawing would be much more appropriate. There is a desire by some to have a free for all as they regard editing here as right. That is faulty thinking as it a privilege to edit here that can be rescinded at any time. If the pictures are still kept, I would offer a rating system that warns a viewer when an article contains graphics that are sexually provocative, depicting violence, nudity, etc.

Juvenile concepts regarding freedom to say anything "rights" on Wikipedia (NOT a forum)

There are many editors who enjoy demonstrating that "have a right to say whatever they want." They often use extremely offensive language for shock value and to get under a targeted editors skin. That reckless behavior out in public could result in a ticket for disorderly conduct and possibly a 72 hour psychological hold. It is amazing how tolerated it is in ANI and other community discussion. The juvenile behavior is lacking in any decorum and does little for maintaining some sense of order. It also makes for a toxic atmosphere that contributes to even more outlandish behavior. There is a group of self-identified juvenile acting males who seem to run together in their attacks on other editors. To be fair there have been many insults and biting comments from the feminist side as well but the juvenile behavior of some male editors is much more prevalent. Both sides have been going at it using derogatory remarks. The unnecessary use of derogatory language has produced a toxic culture war between the camps which is a reflection of modern western culture. The level of bullying and harassment that has been tolerated is hard to fathom for people who work in academics or other professional careers. It clearly allows the toxic atmosphere that has become so prevalent to continue and even grow. There needs to be drastic changes to change this atmosphere which brings out the worst in people.

Enforcement of civility severely lacking and removal of incompetent administrators

The elimination of the war culture is not possible but the enforcement of civility is through better training of admins and elimination of those admins who have not shown an ability to deal effectively with people. There are incompetent admins who create issues by not using sound judgment when enforcing the guidelines and thus misapply them. There are also admins who have taken a political position and cannot separate their admin duties from their own ideology. They are especially harmful to genuine open discourse and they add to the existing warring culture that is over taking Wikipedia. There are also admins who appear to have some personal issues or chemical dependencies who often are abusive to other editors. It would benefit the project to make it easier for WMF to issue a suspension pending review and recall of admins who have not effectively executed the obligations they assumed when they accepted the position.

Those pesky edit count stackers and (trolling rollbackers- trollbackers)

There are also many people with a great deal of knowledge who want to participate in the project but do not have the time to deal with the revert trolls who stack up edit counts by going around reverting with little knowledge of the material. They look at the editor and make sure it is not someone who could stand up to them and without exercising a great deal of thought they revert. The usual victims of the trollbackers are new editors and anyone who dares edit with an IP. The unregistered contributor is voraciously targeted as sock or someone editing logged out with no evidence but a paranoid culture against anyone who does not choose to join the club. They are usually given little in the way of assume good faith and to be damned to hades if they know anything about the project. The paranoid schizophrenic attitude towards new accounts and unregistered editors borders on a cult like atmosphere.

Ideologues pushing their propaganda through tendentious editing and task forces

Then there are the many ideologues who own an article and see Wikipedia as a means to push their propaganda to further their viewpoint of how they believe things should be. They often remove well documented additions that contradict their viewpoint and add their own viewpoint often laced with sources from blogs and politically oriented websites that clearly lack reliability. They often coordinate attacks by establishing a task force of like minded ideologues where they interact regularly and gain important allies in their quest to turn Wikipedia into a source that reflects their viewpoint in the best light.

Closing

The toxic editing atmosphere has been covered much in the past at Jimbo's page and some attempts have been made to improve the atmosphere but it still remains very dysfunctional. It is time harsher measures were put in place to deal with incompetent admins who are ineffective in executing the duties they agreed to when applying and accepting the position. The poisonous editing environment at Wikipedia has increasingly become the subject of articles in the media. The reputation of Wikipedia is being severely damaged by the lack of disciplined administrators. It has also caused many good administrators to leave the project due to the constant infighting and lack of civility especially at ANI. It is time some drastic measures be taken to improve the reputation of Wikipedia and encourage greater participation.

Commentary

I am sure there will be some offended as their behavior has been highlighted and is being greatly discouraged by the article. Please leave your comments below. Be sure to practice civility and address the argument and refrain from personal attacks because that demonstrates your argument lacks merit. Mr. Wales your thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks, Very Respectfully 208.54.38.224 (talk) 03:54, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Please discuss ways Wikipedia can be improved. Leave the blame game and snark at ANI, it is my intention to find constructive ways to improve the project and ideas on how that can be accomplished. 208.54.38.224 (talk) 13:27, 28 February 2015 (UTC)

Comments

Also see below: "#Solutions to problems". -Wikid77 (talk) 23:40, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Please sign into your account. Tutelary (talk) 04:11, 2arize 8 February 2015 (UTC)

That's a great idea. Any reasonably intelligent high school junior can cherry pick the negatives and summarize the criticisms without any obligation to provide diffs or stand on an established record of trying to solve problems while building the encyclopedia. Maximum transparency. Then, we will talk. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 04:48, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Hello Tutelary and thank you for your interest in improving Wikipedia. Also, thank you for taking the time to write all that you deserve a reply.
I agree people shouldn't use their user pages to store tons of major serious hardcore porn. That seems wrong. But it's hard to say for sure without an example because it would depend on the exact context and details of the particular case because one person's pornography is another person's art and lots of people have pictures on their USER pages and we don't want to go around policing everyones pictures that would be a drag. It's possible you're just getting all worked up about something that is really no big deal, I can't tell without looking at the context. Certainly, however, we don't want people using their Wikipedia pages as a place to store porn.
Similarly it's hard to understand what exactly you're talking in terms of mainspace and talk page edits without examples and details.
I'm sorry you had such a negative experience on Wikipedia and I promise to try to help you if I can but I'm just me. But I can't tell what you're talking about because we need specifics. Chrisrus (talk) 05:01, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
@Chrisrus: Tutelary didn't make the original post. --NeilN talk to me 05:05, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I am starting to think that a lot of these long winded anonymous posts are from the same person. If you want to hide your identity then expect to have little influence here, full stop. Chillum 05:02, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Given the talk about "porn" on user pages it's hard not to believe that this isn't the same IP that just went off on ANI last week about the same subject and got blocked for editing while logged out. Capeo (talk) 00:03, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Your post demonstrates an abundance of history here but where is that history? Everyone else here has their contributions visible to other users. Chillum 05:09, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I agree for the most part with the anon. If he or she wishes to remain anonymous, I think we can deal with the points that s/he lays out. The obvious one that jumps out at me is that admins don't seem to feel the need to enforce the rules anymore - just pick and choose which rules to enforce and who to enforce them against. Of course, editing as an IP and having an account technically makes him/her a sock, so .... Smallbones(smalltalk) 05:16, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
The only thing that's obvious is side A will cry that admins are not enforcing the rules against side B and side B will cry that admins are not enforcing the rules against side A. --NeilN talk to me 05:22, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
I have never once had administrators rule in my favor, even when I'm following all the rules, and other users are harassing me relentlessly, breaking all kinds of policies. For example: [23]
Note that @Jimbo Wales: actually personally warned one of these users for personal attacks a month ago, threatening a block. Well, Dave Dial is still harassing away, with no action having been taken against him. I'm beginning to think the administrators here are all corrupt. TBSchemer (talk) 11:55, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
  • PER WP:SOCK/Editing While Logged Out:
There is no policy against editing while logged out. This happens for many reasons, including not noticing that the login session had expired, changing computers, going to a Wikipedia page directly from a link, and forgetting passwords. Editors who are not logged in must not actively try to deceive other editors, such as by directly saying that they do not have an account or by using the session for the inappropriate uses of alternate accounts listed earlier in this policy. To protect their privacy, editors who are editing while logged out are never required to disclose their usernames on-wiki. Please refrain from casting aspersions and demands unrelated to the argument. Thanks for the few comments that actually addressed the article. 208.54.38.224 (talk) 05:35, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Without specifics it is difficult to respond to your concerns. Perhaps if you provided diffs that showed this mistreatment it would help a lot. As it stands you are an anonymous person making vague complaints. Chillum 05:42, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Please reread title and it is clear it is about an atmosphere not a specific complaint as those are addressed at ANI and this is not ANI. Your repeated requests are being ignored so there is no point in requesting them. Please stay on topic and if you have some constructive comments related to the atmosphere here please do so. Thanks. 208.54.38.224 (talk) 06:21, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
The complaints partly echo the issues described in the Technology Review article most of you have probably seen,[24] partly pursue themes we've heard endlessly from the Gamergate and related conflicts, and generally touch on issues well known to regulars. And the saying is "comment on the edits not the editor". So I don't think the calls for diffs and identification are impressive. The problems are deep and complicated and meta: might be a better place to discuss them. I'll abstain from adding my own theories here, except general advice for newbies: if you 1) stay away from contentious topics at first (regulars get reverted in them too); 2) concentrate on adding new info to articles rather than getting into conflicts about removing stuff; and 3) avoid editorializing and include solid citations for everything you add, you probably won't get reverted. Unfortunately it takes some experience to know how to do these things. I don't think this is an improvement over the "old" Wikipedia. 50.0.205.75 (talk) 06:36, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
"Distrust, Spite, Malice" - Is this a good example? BTW, the original poster should look at WP:SCRUTINY. --NeilN talk to me 13:48, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
  • While I have no doubt that the scenario you portray in your opening section has happened numerous times, I seriously disbelieve that it is as ubiquitous or universal experience as you are implying. My own personal experience as a noob was actually quite the opposite. Nyth63 14:01, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
  • Unfortunately, we still do allow editing by unregistered IP accounts, as Wichita208... points out. It would be nice — and a real boon to the editing climate here — if we could do something about that as part of any substantial reform project. Carrite ((talk)) 17:56, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
..........that said, this looks like more of the same in terms of carping about the community standard for civility enforcement and complaint about blind reversion of IP editors — albeit without a single, solitary diff to illustrate the case. All of which is presented behind the cloak of an alternate account... Carrite (talk) 18:10, 28 February 2015 (UTC)
Not too sure about the gender wars stuff, but pretty much everything else this user has pointed out I can corroborate with firsthand experience over the years. The constant assumptions of bad faith on the part of admins, the extreme heavy handedness towards new users, the article ownership and users who seem to spend the majority of their time doing nothing but reverting, and involved admins who don't know how to recuse themselves from their duties when they involve subjects they're personally vested in--these are all attributes that are driving away potential contributors. As for sexually explicit imagery and the idea of Wikipedia for Kids, I don't agree with the censorship approach, but I do think a small warning about non-worksafe imagery might be helpful for both children and adults. More importantly though, random talk pages often have people swearing like sailors with no repercussions for acting incivil.
I think perhaps the biggest issue when it comes to admin misconduct is just how difficult it is to get any single admin desysopped. There just aren't powerful enough consequences for abuse.174.45.178.216 talk) 20:37, 28 February 2015 (UTC)


  • I shuttered with recognition at each of 208.54.38.224 (talk)'s points. They have happened to me or I have seen them happen to others, and not always just to women. I love working in concert with others, brainstorming and forging something of value. There's a great sense of accomplishment when a good piece of work is done. However, I abhor confrontation and ad hominem attacks. The pillars and policies are always ignored by the nasty, leaving the non-aggressive with nowhere to go. Maybe my intestinal fortitude level is too low to try to participate in such a rough and tumble arena as Wikipedia. Thank you for your time, Wordreader (talk) 00:11, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
  • Thank you for the few that came and added constructively and I do thank those who helped illustrate the point I am making by posting personal attacks and extreme distrust of IP's. It is unfortunate they failed to address the argument and how to actually improve Wikipedia. One editor suggested to ban IP's but without much reason other than they can hide behind a cloak. Some are upset when they cannot easily target someone with unwarranted attacks. That type of character assassination is what makes Wikipedia such an unwelcome place for many. It is that distrustful, assume no faith attitude that has poisoned the editing environment. The lack of decorum, rampant distrust and character assassination continue to erode the community standards. There are great guidelines covering behavior here at Wikipedia but they remain only platitudes because of the toxic vile flowing from so many regular editors who would have long ago sent packing in any professional environment.
In regards to Wordreader it is not about intestinal fortitude but about reasonable expectations. It is reasonable to expect the environment here would reflect a more professional and ordered editing atmosphere. It may be you have more sense and better things in life to do than to engage in unproductive go no where arguments. Some regular editors enjoy ripping other editors which is a sign of personal insecurity. Some enjoy cyber attacking others to boost their imaginary self importance. I am often reminded of the country song about the guy who is a real hero on the internet in his own mind. They have become very skilled in the art of cyber insults from spending many hours daily engaging in it and a new contributor is likely to be turned off from further editing. The question I ask is how do they help the community foster a conducive and welcoming environment for those who have come to add their expertise but whose own busy lives do not allow the time to address petty editors looking for another cyber smack down. It as if the inmates are running the asylum. 208.54.38.202 (talk) 11:44, 1 March 2015 (UTC)
  • Dear IP user, while I see truth in some of your points, I think it is important to realize that change on Wikipedias usually happens incrementally. Proposals are brought to the Village Pump, RfC are started, articles are continually undergoing revision. Because of its history, organization and culture, Wikipedia is not a place where drastic, website-wide, changes normally occur. You are proposing changing a culture which has grown and evolved over 14 years and that won't happen over the course of a few discussions. In fact, I don't even know how a group could accomplish your goal of changing a culture without shutting down completely and restarting from scratch which isn't going to happen.
  • For me, the most important factor is, Is Wikipedia culture getting "better" or getting "worse"? Most of my judgment comes from reading over old arbitration committee cases but it definitely seems to me that, compared to 10 years ago and considering its exponential growth, Wikipedia has a better, more equitable culture than it did. Policies have been created that addressed long-standing issues and that can serve to alleviate problems like conflicts of interest and maintaining neutral POV. Wikipedia is no doubt more bureaucratic than in its earliest days but rules and guidelines also help prevent abuses like you describe, even when they are not applied 100% of the time, 100% equally.
  • No culture is ideal or perfect and you clearly offer some suggestions where there is room for improvement. I think you should create a proposal that you think could bring about the changes you would like to see and post it at the Village Pump where you might find support and assistance. Liz Read! Talk! 18:41, 1 March 2015 (UTC)

As another IP editor, I wholeheartedly endorse the message here. I have no account here, never had and at this rate never will, and 208.54.38.224 does a good job of explaining many of the reasons why. It's ridiculous the extent to which IP editors are denigrated on Wikipedia, in spite of WP:HUMAN. We get treated with suspicion when we know too much, and can't get anyone to listen at all if we don't. Go to the wrong forum to air your grievances, and you get called disruptive; correct the error and you're forum-shopping; get it right the first time and it's "please sign in to your account" which may very well not exist. And when you put in effort to detail a case of how you've been repeatedly personally attacked by an editor, you can rest assured that within half an hour an administrator will be along to summarily dismiss your complaint, argue that somehow you're the harasser, and make further personal attacks, snark at you further if you complain about it, and allege "battlefield attitude" on the basis of being upset about personal attacks and a failure to assume good faith. Absolutely unbelievable. 76.64.13.4 (talk) 07:14, 2 March 2015 (UTC)

Re that last comment, I've had too many experiences of that kind to bother listing all of them, where assume good faith is chucked out the window, been slammed for NPA for simply criticizing someone's edits and stated motives, while being subjected to ANIs based on false and/or distorted claims, and also accused of "battlefield behaviour" when trying to combat ongoing POV on what is clearly an ideological agenda; it's so common in Wikipedia now it makes it not worth the bother to consider taking things to an AfD or RM or other procedure even when in need of doing; I'm so often the target to those who won't even read what I have to say but proceed to make false/conflated claims about me (often here on this page, also) that my patience is wearing thin....yet still am trying to fix the damage to various topics and titles and content caused by those who abuse guidelines from what they claim they say (when often they actually don't). Policy is abused too with "Verifiability" claimed to mean more than it does, and claimed to be more important than NPOV, which is is not. I completely sympathize with the energy the original poster here to lay out his case, and note the usual comments about it being too long to read; if you can't think, then don't read; and you shouldn't be writing an encyclopedia, much less trying to control it....Skookum1 (talk) 08:01, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Solutions to problems

Also see above: "#Comments". -Wikid77 (talk) 23:40, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

As noted above, a massive rework of WP, as a "Wikipedia 2" might seem to be the fastest solution to the numerous problems of wp:ANI-dogpiles and dysfunctional admins not enforcing the rules fairly, but the danger would be likewise troublesome people warping the new rules with similar "creative interpretation" of policies. Recall when people complained about cyberbullying in WP, the replies included the self-righteous "sympathetic" remarks that no one has the right to tell bullies what they can or cannot do and hurt their sensitive feelings[!]. Hence, the best solutions would include a diverse set of actions, including the typical wp:SOFIXIT, where more people need to become admins and take control of the situations where the current leadership seems off-balance. -Wikid77 (talk) 23:40, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

Do you mean Citizendium? 50.0.205.75 (talk) 00:30, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Well, I suppose the Citizendium could be considered a form of "Wikipedia 2" (WP2), but I was thinking about a twin WMF project which allowed anonymous editors, with IP addresses, but with new rules such as trust-levels for long-term users, trusted IP users (such as restricted laboratory computers), judgment by randomized juries of users, or sanctions as demerits tacked to improper actions by any users, new or admin. On the WP2, a user blocked in WP might continue to edit, with a more-fair access to pages, based on a broader (or random-jury) judgment about the user's prior actions. Users could choose to leave WP access, in favor of WP2 access to pages, if they liked abiding by the new WP2 rules better. The implementation could be done by separate usernames for WP2 versus WP, at first, where the user agreed to follow the rules which each username granted. -Wikid77 (talk) 00:20, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
2005 Wikipedia (what Swartz was writing about) has very little relationship to the heavily footnoted 2015 Wikipedia. Requiring a basic sign-in of everyone isn't going to deter anyone from serious contribution. Carrite (talk) 17:10, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Better idea, make EVERY edit an anonymous edit with no IP or username. That way information is purely information and the kind of frequent gerrymandering and circles of friendship would be broken. It is fairly obvious that some people are owning large sections of the encyclopedia and are damaging its reputation and credibility. Remove the egos, solve the problem permanently. 81.132.193.65 (talk) 01:03, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
Some forms of subtle vandalism are removed by reverting most/all edits made by a particular username or IP address, where rarely-read pages would otherwise be left hacked if no user-id stamp were logged for each edit. Also, the tracking of user-ids helps to reveal long-term patterns of usage, such as several different IP addresses all editing similar topics, as strong evidence that one person is responsible for adding much content as if being multiple IP users. -Wikid77 (talk) 20:03, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
Therefore you prejudice information based despite their being no qualification for competence beyond reputation amongst a circus of equally unprofessional individuals. With no accreditation, ethics or control body to enforce 'truth' and how WP:RS is split, the system will perpetually be prone to malign outcomes. It sounds like you have systemic corruption here. 81.132.193.65 (talk) 01:45, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
Here's how I'd use IPs: require registration to edit and then make sure that every registered user has their IP addresses logged every time they sign in. And then make it absolutely open season on sock-puppetry. You sock? You're gone — bye bye! Carrite (talk) 05:04, 8 March 2015 (UTC)

Sharyl Attkisson sums up the problem at Wikipedia in recent TedX

Hi there Jimbo and all, I thought you might be interested in this little clip.

Sharyl Attkisson calls out WP specifically (@ 4:00). While I think her investigation into Wikipedia could have been much deeper, as her examples weren't the best, she does speak to the crux of the problem here as I see it. It is, at the very least, the best explanation of what drove me away from WP (that, and the revenge editing - a result of my attempts to bring this very activity to light).

I know we've had discussions about WP being used by special interests, and from what I experienced, months and years of talk page activity has done nothing to curtail the problem. I left because I do not see the problem reversing. It's actually getting worse. Editors whom I respect, who are still here, have simply found the small corners of WP that aren't battle grounds, and have stayed there. petrarchan47tc 23:08, 3 March 2015 (UTC)

It's totally aggravating, I just finished editing on this Acharya S's Talk page for an article, which only Administrators can edit. Raquel Baranow (talk) 23:22, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
see User_talk:Jimbo_Wales/Archive_182#Journalist_Sharyl_Attkisson_criticizes_Wikipedia -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 23:26, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
If WP continues to deny that there is a problem here, obviously it will never change. Outside of this bubble, people are well aware that some categories of WP are little more than thinly-veiled ads, and from what I am hearing, distrust the entire site. I saw some crazy activity in the GMO and pharmaceutical articles, but had never heard of astroturfing until this video. It summarized for me why my experience here was so maddening. There is purportedly a great concern about why female editors are in short supply, so take this as a single case study, if nothing more. This female x-editor left because Wikipedia is overrun with the activity described in the video as astroturfing, FWIW. petrarchan47tc 23:54, 3 March 2015 (UTC)
"don't believe everything you read on the web". Not very shocking. -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 04:02, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Sharyl mentions you here TRPoD. --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 16:34, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I have made the pages of wikipediocracy - I can now die with my bucket list complete! -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 23:10, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Petrarchan, I think we're on the same page that what went on with BP's public-relations department writing copy for our articles on their oil spill was a disgrace. And I think you're absolutely wise to treat anything you read on Wikipedia with a default attitude of skepticism. I'd only suggest that you apply the same default level of skepticism to pretty much anything that Sharyl Attkisson says. In terms of actual harm caused by propagating misinformation and ignorance, the anti-vaccine movement (of which Attkisson is either a charter member or fellow traveler, depending on your viewpoint) has a huge leg up on Wikipedia at the moment. MastCell Talk 17:18, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Hi, MC. I am not referring to 'my' skepticism. I do not read WP anymore. I am speaking of people I have run into since leaving WP, ie, "outside of this bubble". I left with the intention (since I was unable to change things here) of warning others about this site given what I have witnessed. In these 9 months or so, I haven't had to school even one solitary individual - everyone I have run into IRL or online already knows. (Even today I watched a video where someone referred to WP and added the caveat "I don't recommend WP, but..." and then quoted some meaningless stat.) It doesn't matter what Sharryl is about, it in no way changes that fact that WP is a victim of massive spin-doctoring by special interests. And it has simply ruined Wikipedia as a trusted source, regardless of what Google, or the echo chamber here, declares. To shoot the messenger with ad hominems, and to see RPoDoom pipe in when they clearly have a history with Sharryl, is quite disheartening. The capacity for self-evaluation here appears close to nil. If three people tell you that you have a tail, it is best to turn around and have a look. petrarchan47tc 20:20, 5 March 2015 (UTC)
Given the content in the section below about Google depending upon Wikipedia as a source of "truth", is it time for Wikipedia to start a public education campaign to reframe how the public views the stuff we provide ? -- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 17:56, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
I liked this comment: "There is an entire industry built around it in Washington".... perhaps start there.... —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 23:01, 4 March 2015 (UTC)
Thanks for sharing the TedX video and the pointer to the previous discussion of it here. I don't understand why we are not taking what she said more seriously. I noticed a number of responses in both discussions include a heavy use of ad hominems attacking the presenter (Sharyl Attkisson) rather than the material presented. In the first round she was called a "conspiracy theorist", "charlatan", "crank" and suggestions she is "stupid". TedX presenters like her, were called "flaky". Many people identified her as "anti-vaccine", but in fact, that is not true, as is made clear on her talk page:
Other than the conjecture of biased and/or conflicted editors, there is no evidence that Attkisson has any anti-vaccine views at all. The term "anti-vaccine" is an agreed-upon propagandist phrase which the vaccine industry and its surrogates apply to anyone who examines vaccine safety, in an attempt to halt independent investigation of vaccine safety scientific questions. It's as inflammatory and misleading of a label as calling someone who is "pro-choice" -- "pro-murder." Merely reporting on vaccine safety issues -- even if the pharmaceutical industry and its surrogates don't like it-- is no more "anti-vaccine" than reporting on Firestone tire safety issues is "anti-tire," or reporting on Congressional corruption is "anti-Congress," or reporting on a dangerous drug is "anti-medicine," or reporting on a charity scandal is "anti-charity." In fact, one could easily make the argument that reporting which results in discussions regarding make vaccines safer is in fact pro vaccine, not anti vaccine. source
I reviewed the article that was used by a seconary source to prove she is "anti-vaccine": here It looks to me like balanced reporting (NPOV). One of the users most engaged to force the "anti-vaccine" label on her page was the first to dismiss what she said with ad hominem attacks.
These ad hominems are particularly interesting because, this is exactly what she points to as the warning signs one is being sold a bill of goods:
  • use of inflammatory language such as: "crank", "quack", "nutty", "paranoid", "pseudo" and "conspiracy" to marginalize any critic, so they are not worth listening to.
  • Astroturfers say they will "debunk myths", which are not myths at all.
  • attacking the people, personalities and organization surrounding the "myth" rather than the facts of what the person or organization says.
  • all skepticism is focused on those exposing wrong-doing (the whistleblowers) rather than the wrong-doers. Instead of questioning authority, they question those who question authority.
If criticism of industry is white-washed with company PR materials, as happened with BP, shouldn't we be concerned? Here we are seeing yet more complaints of this same problem from another outside reporter. I too have seen this same problem with all the GMO articles, where labels like WP:Fringe, "activist", "agenda", etc. are used to keep the views of GMO critics from getting NPOV treatment in the articles--even the controversy aricle. If this is allowed to continue unchecked, the credibility of Wikipedia--for presenting materials in an NPOV manner without undue influence from industry PR--is going to plumet.
I do have a question for Mastcell in particular. You were one of the users who were most understanding of this serious problem with the BP issue. You said:
The real question is whether those rules [COI] make sense if we aspire to be a serious, respectable reference work. Do you think it's OK for a company's PR staff to play a substantial role in drafting our coverage of that company? A role which is entirely undisclosed to the casual reader? If so, then we're setting ourselves outside the boundaries that have normally defined credible, reputable reference works. MastCell Talk 23:18, 27 March 2013 (UTC) source
If a reference work routinely allows a company's PR staff to play a substantial and undisclosed (to the casual reader) role in developing coverage of that company, I'd be very hesitant to extend credibility to that reference work. That approach violates every basic precept governing how serious, reputable reference works handle conflicts of interest. I understand your point about OTRS, but I also think there's a practical difference between a small company which finds itself vilified on Wikipedia, versus BP which has a public-relations budget of $5 million per week ([18]). In the latter case, I don't think we can reasonably rely on a handful of pseudonymous volunteers to vet the material produced by a massive, dedicated, well-funded professional PR operation. And while I don't think the mainstream press or the world at large cares a whit about various internal Wikipedia machinations and politics, I do think that it will look very bad for this project if/when the mainstream press (as opposed to, as you rightly point out, a handful of people with axes to grind) gets ahold of this. If we seriously expect to defend our practices by saying that we relied on a handful of pseudonymous volunteers to vet material provided by BP's public-relations department, and that we didn't disclose BP's role in drafting the content to the casual reader, then I think we're going to take a pretty big, and well-deserved, hit in terms of credibility. MastCell Talk 16:44, 28 March 2013 (UTC) source
Now Atkinson is saying the same thing about Big Pharma that Violet Blue said about the oil companies--PR people determining content either up front or surrepiticiously . I don't understand why you are not just as concerned about these COI problems that are happening with pharmaceuticals, and are now an equally big problem with GMO articles which lack of NPOV.
I hope we can all take seriously the continuing and expaning problem of industry PR and work together to address the problem before we lose even more honest unpaid editors and the public starts to lose confidence in Wikipedia for failing to keep this COI behavior in check.David Tornheim (talk) 00:58, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
So after canvassing Petrarchan, Viriditas, and others to try to whip up support to add POV content to the articles about GMOs (and this thread appears to have stemmed directly from that) you are now continuing your campaigning in classic ax-grindy form on Jimbo's Talk page and following Petrarchan in using this page to accuse me and others of COI in the GMO articles. And hanging your hat on an anti-vaxer. OK then. Jytdog (talk) 03:20, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
something else... you have argued that we must give more voice to folks like Jeffery Smith... And you had some questions for MastCell above... Well here are MastCell's edits to the Jeffrey Smith article. Now MastCell may well have changed views on what reliable sources have to say about Smith since then.... but you are just making a mess of things, acting this way. It is sad to see. Please put away your activist hat and your strong views on GMOs when you login, and become a Wikipedian when you are here. Read what the reliable sources say and deal with them, as you finally did on "substantial equivalence". Please. Jytdog (talk) 03:40, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Anyone can see that what he did was not canvassing. You have to allow less experienced editors to reach out for help in some way. Instead you have allowed him only to speak with you, or the gang at GMO talk pages. Anyone can see that what David has proposed is far from POV, or meant to cause trouble. You make big drama so that the actual content of articles is a long forgotten topic. But you aren't being perfectly truthful in representing the scene. You might have mentioned that David's request to hear more from Smith is on the "GMO Controversy" page, ffs. You have a record online of supporting Monsanto in comments sections before beginning here, and have been called out by a handful as a "Monsanto shill". You have a clear history of supporting GMO's, which is POV. You should not be editing those articles, let alone totally controlling them. It's the opposite of how WP is supposed to operate. I'm not sure how this is allowed to continue, except that you may be good at driving people off. :) petrarchan47tc 05:43, 6 March 2015 (UTC)
Not responding to this, except to say a) what David did was unambiguously canvassing and it is good that he stopped; b) I have no idea what you are talking about with my having "a record online of supporting Monsanto in comments sections before beginning here"; c) that sounds a lot like "opposition research" in violation of the OUTING policy (and to reaching false conclusions in any case); and d) your suspicions about me, and your personal attacks on me, have gotten you no where after all this time, but unhappy and burnt out. I still feel bad for you - it sucks to carry poison like that around. But that is your choice. I won't be responding here further. Jytdog (talk) 14:00, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

I always worry about anyone who cites autism and vaccines as "a medicine and a harmful side effect". It is quite correct that big business and other vested interests, especially in America, perform amazing gyrations to influence public and legislative (and even judicial) opinion. As well as big pharma an big oil, the media companies, and our tech "friends" Google, Microsoft, Apple, and content companies such as Disney, Sony et al. with their immense spending power have an serious hold on opinion. The increase in copyright term, the assault on the FCC, and even the battles between MRAA and Google, bear witness to that. However there is little new in this TeDX talk, and Attkisson gets Wikipedia pretty much wrong:

  • "sometimes in a matter of seconds you will find your edit is reversed" <nods sagely> - well precisely. Probably because, like the very people Atikisson is castigating, it is a medical article, footnoted to a peer-reviewed study. But not, as WP:MEDRS would prefer, a review. This is no better than the typical bottom of blog comment "I put something on Wikipedia and those callous bastards deleted it." "What was it?" "A page about my band." well, yes....
  • Misstates the Roth affair. An anonymous IP edited the Human Stain article stating "I have removed the reference to Anatole Broyard, at Philip Roth's insistence. I am his biographer." Attkisson states that it was Roth. The IP (who also has, and had at the time, a registered account) made two anonymous attempts to remove the suggestion, with no talk page messages, no discussion (other than edit summaries). Attkisson describes this as "However hard he tried .. they kept reverting the edits back to the false information" She then goes on to say "when Roth finally reached a person at Wikipedia which was no easy task" - well again it wasn't Roth but Bailey, and it's pretty easy to contact "a person at Wikipedia" (which in this case was a nameless admin). There's a link to "Community portal" on every page, there's a talk page for every article, and for every admin, there's noticeboard, and email-user, and of course OTRS. What is more Roth doesn't ever say it was difficult, all he says he says is "through an official interlocutor, I recently petitioned Wikipedia..." - that's it. Yet Attkisson extracts the "no easy task" from that - perhaps she is just embellishing or perhaps she didn't research the subject...
  • "A few weeks later there was a huge scandal when Wikipedia officials were caught offering a a PR service that skewed and edit[sic] information on behalf of paid[sic] and publicity seeking clients in utter opposition to Wikipeida's supposed policies." Unless I missed a scandal, it was well over a year later, it was one official, it was never established that information was skewed, and unless it was, it was not in opposition to our policies. Note the embellishment "supposed".
  • Then the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association rears its head. I won't go into the faults with the study, Doc James and others have already done that far better than I could, and the response in the journal in question pretty much decimates the study. It is strange that now we are on Attkisson's home (astro)turf, medicine, she still only presents what she wants us to hear. Obviously she has learned the art of spin. It might, perhaps, amuse those that heard her talk that the author of this "study" says in an interview "speak with your physician" - according to Attkissson, a sure sign of a Big Pharma shill.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 04:35, 6 March 2015 (UTC).

Unnecessary long user warnings and help pages

I had originally written this for my subpage User:SD0001/Thoughts. I just had the idea to post it here, so that the issue can get some attention.

One of the fundamental problems of Wikipedia due to which new users are left uncomfortable is the tradition of user warnings and help pages that are a bit too long. The CSD nomination notice produced by Twinkle that is posted on the author's talk page is so long and laced with links that I'd gamble to say that 90% of new users don't understand a word of it. The one produced by the Page Curation tool is only a bit more concise. In order to understand the notice, a new user has to read it, follow the link to see what that word means, then reread the sentence and check whether it makes sense... Isn't this process too cumbersome? In my view, CSD nomination notices should contain basic information about why the article may possibly not meet Wikipedia's criteria for inclusion, tips on what is to be done; properly and briefly explained within the notice itself, so that the user does not click on all those links to understand the message.

Of course, this is just an example; CSD notices are not the only things that are needlessly lenghty. Messages issued by the DPL bot, even if there is just one disambiguation link to be repaired, are no less than 65-70 words long. Actually, what prompted me to write about this is the way the Page Curation tool sends feedback from new page patrollers to an article creator. The feedback that is written is disguised within a string of automatically generated text. When I used it for the first time, I wrote in the following message: Please provide additional references for verifying the contents of the article. But when I visited the talk page, I was surprised to see that the message that had been posted there was much longer. It began with, Hi, I'm SD0001. USER, thanks for creating ... ! I've just tagged the page, using our page curation tools, as having some issues to fix ... I wish to point out here that the one line of useful advice was mingled with four sentences of pointless crap. The user-written comment is not bolded, italicised, or otherwise emphasised in any manner to seperate it from the automatically generated text. I don't see any need to keep saying thank you over and over again, except perhaps at the end of the message. New users are hardly going to feel warm or welcome by such Thank you messages as they would know fully well that these are computer-generated. On the other hand, one line of pointed, constructive advice would leave them inspired and welcomed. Links should be provided only so that a user can use it to know more about the subject, and not to know the subject itself.

Talking of emphasis, the only thing that ever appears in bold in the multitude of user warnings we have is perhaps the phrase "blocked from editing". This reminds me of User:Essjay (yes, the same guy who was the subject of the Essjay controversy). Particularly here (his request for bureaucratship), Essjay makes long and detailed explanations, but what is remarkable is his way of highlighting important points by bolding it, and in one instance, by increasing the font size and italicising. All this enables the reader to quickly take in the gist of what is being said. Regrettably, the use of such emphasis in user warnings, project namespace information pages and help pages is done sparingly. Also, a large number of project namespace pages fail to make the subject clear in the initial sentences, even as there is too much of information creep. Oh yes, WP:LEAD applies only to articles.

In today's fast moving world, it is important that new editors understand the mechanisms that make Wikipedia, and blend in to the community, with minimum time and energy expenditure. Only when this is assured can any attempt at editor retention succeed. SD0001 (talk) 12:40, 6 March 2015 (UTC)

No comments yet in 22 hours? That means I shouldn't have posted this here. Well, I'm sorry. SD0001 (talk) 10:55, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
It probably means it's too long :-). Looie496 (talk) 15:29, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
I thought that was ironic also. My own view is that this site would be better off if we used fewer mass-generated templates and more personal notes — particularly in the case of good faith bad account names and so forth, which are easily fixable matters. Carrite (talk) 16:31, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
But then, the trouble is that people simply won't take the trouble to write personal notes, leading to an even worse situation! SD0001 (talk) 19:44, 7 March 2015 (UTC)
"People" is a generalization. I write far more personal notes on user talk pages than I place templates. How long does it take to write a helpful, personalized sentence or two? Cullen328 Let's discuss it 05:38, 8 March 2015 (UTC)
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