I don't claim to be able to answer this question. But I think I speak for many when I say I'm grateful that the Signpost doesn't try to find "drama" or make itself into a gossip tabloid. And barring the occasional screw up, it usually lets people speak for themselves rather than publicly attacking them or dressing them down. Thebiguglyalien (talk) 04:53, 26 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
I think what we are talking about is potentially talking ill of editors. Very few editors would hate being held up as a good example and asking for permission to report on the good stuff will probably elicit a pleased yes. We probably have a Wikipedia equivalent of public figure by prominence of editing or being a current or former organizer of things. Editors with the Admin or Bureaucrat bit, of course, but also project leaders. And there is also an instant leap to being WikiAvatar through bad choices. Mostly, we should not call out all the little bans, but bans and blocks become important if they illustrate a particular way in which Wikipedia as a community needs to be on watch for a type of style of bad behavior and by their bad behavior they have forfeited a right to be forgotten. Having a review of what happened is a good thing for those of us uninvolved to better understand how Wikipedia works as a community. It also is important because not saying anything is worse. Not saying anything can be like a conspiracy of silence where members of the community leave or are shown the door and then we're pretending nothing happened. 🌿MtBotany (talk) 22:53, 30 December 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Coming to this discussion late (as seems to be my habit), this article touches on an important dilemma. On the one hand, the vast majority of people connected to Wikipedia are private individuals & don't deserve being dragged into the public attention due to a (often) part-time hobby. This is something that crops up whenever I think about writing a memoir about being a Wikipedian for mumble years: to talk about conflicts & discussions that shape how Wikipedia operates one must inevitably mention people; yet except for their contributions to Wikipedia these people don't merit notability & have a right to privacy; so it is difficult, if not impossible, to discuss disputes such as over editors like Ed Poor & provide some account of their contribution to Wikipedia, both positive & negative. Hence one is unable to talk about most Wikipedians, which forces historians & reporters to focus on individuals who had little to no direct effect on Wikipedia yet have public visibility, such as Jimmy Wales, Larry Sanger, & Maryana Iskander. So one either provides the necessary accuracy of Wikipedia & intrudes on the privacy of countless individuals, or one simply focuses on the (so to speak) celebrities & provides an imperfect account of this project.I don't know how to mediate the two. -- llywrch (talk) 09:35, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost and other news sources are the "first draft" of history, but a memoir comes rather later to events. If I am mentioned by name after I am dead I will not care. If I can figure out a way to direct my heirs/executor I'll put my name to my account. I do not right now because it seems to me that we are in a time where editors can be targeted by pressure groups and, unfortunately, the Wikipedia Foundation cannot be trusted to protect us as their interests do not align perfectly with those of individual editors. They are for protecting the project as a whole and for fundraising. But that is mostly about the intersection editing and private life. I also have to "own" what I do here on Wikipedia. If my editing is talked about, that is part of putting my work in front of a large audience like Wikipedia's. If we are discussing the work and the editor's behavior on Wikipedia, why not just refer to them by user name? Some do not see a handle as a name, but they're just as real as any other nom-de-plume. They have not yet acquired the noble patina from long usage, but as a way of identifying one editor they seem just as useful as names like Zane Grey or George Eliot. If humans are still discussing such things in English in 200 years I suspect that seeing a handle from this era will seem part of this time like one of the pseudonyms used in the American Constitutional debates does to the 1780s. 🌿MtBotany (talk) 21:49, 4 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]
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