User talk:Jimbo Wales

Question about flagged revs

So, we're turning on flagged revs with a ~60% consensus? Don't you think this is a classic example of "no consensus"? I see no agreement, no discussion coming to a largely resolved opinion, and no realistic chance of anything changing in the short term. I'm really confused where the momentum you sense to turn this on for the English Wikipedia is coming from. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 04:01, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

It was actually a straw poll, so I guess consensus doesn't matter too much here. Chamal ^talk 04:08, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Normally, foundation (small-f) changes require consensus in the region of 70% before they're even considered. Jimbo: please reconsider. There is literally no consensus within the community to even try it out. And please don't make this into our Treaty of Lisbon, where it keeps coming up every time we say "Non." Sceptre ^(talk) 18:25, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

? Issues this big hardly ever come up, but, on a smaller scale, we got rid of spoiler warnings after (actually during) a straw poll which gave removal 58% support (after a previous poll gave the "wrong" answer). PaddyLeahy (talk) 19:10, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

FR needs to be tried. I personally doubt it will scale well, I think the same vandalism and disinformation problems will occur, only more sneaky (and locking in previous inaccuracy). But it's there, it needs to be tried and either accepted or rejected based on experience. Franamax (talk) 14:00, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Obviously, a large minority of the community feels differently. I don't know if this is the best place to argue your POV too.

Also, Jimbo, may I ask for another major foundational shift that occured with consensus of barely over half the community? Considering that this isn't some silly thing about rollback, but something that might make people quit the project (~20% of German regulars quit after FR was implement, if I remember correctly), don't you think it is more prudent to repoll in a few more months and see if a better community consensus can be found?in a year and see if community consensus is different. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 19:22, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Nuke, that's the wrong way to go about it. This is not gonna become another one of those ideas which keeps getting voted on until whoever started it gets the "right" answer. My mother taught me when I was a kid, "No means no." Once is enough. Thor Malmjursson (talk) 19:35, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Also, "X bad thing happened, if I remember correctly" doesn't really help me much to explore the issue. Do you have a reference?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 19:43, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Let me strike that part. The German IRC channel informed me that it was a lower percentage than that, though they don't have active figures. However, User:Dapete/Report_on_Flagged_Revisions,_December_14,_2008#Influence_on_edits_and_user_registrations, a translated version of a mailing list post, suggests that in the past year, registration has gone sharply down, by as much as 50%[1]. NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 20:07, 17 January 2009 (UTC)

Are there any before/after numbers to suggest this had anything to do with Flagged Revisions? Or was the decline before this was implemented? Remember, too, the Germans have decided to use Flagged Rev's *everywhere* *by default*, which is not even under consideration here.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

As an aside, I consider our BLP issue to be so important that I think it is actually unethical to not use a tool which holds great promise for helping with the problem, now that it has been successfully tested elsewhere. Anyone who would like to see this tool not go into practice needs to start by convincing people that either (a) it is ok for the BLP vandalism problem to continue or (b) there is a better way to solve it. Anything else, for me, is just a total non-starter.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:44, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Category:Living people currently has 333,547 articles. That's 12.34% of our articles (about one out of ten). Enabling FlaggedRevisions on such a large segment of the site will undoubtedly create backlogs that we will be unable to manage. I propose that we enable it for articles that have demonstrable issues, but we absolutely should not do anything site-wide or across a huge segment of our articles.

And having spoken to a number of people about this issue, a lot of them tell me that the places where they see the worst BLP violations are in articles that are not in Category:Living people. Enabling FlaggedRevisions on all BLPs is a poor solution to the problem that will do far more harm than good. --MZMcBride (talk) 02:01, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Nonsense. "Undoubtedly" we should remember that we're not prognosticators here. I don't think you can pretend to know what would happen, but I will make a wild prediction that the sky won't fall. German Wikipedia is flagging over 800,000 articles with a much smaller contributor base. This proposal deserves a trial, not FUD. Cool Hand Luke 07:20, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Excuse me? It may come as a surprise to you, but this isn't my first time on the merry-go-round. We currently have new page patrolling on this project. After 30 days, the data expires and the pages can no longer be patrolled. It has been backlogged literally since its inception. One admin has been working nearly daily to keep the data from falling off the end, and even then it requires a bot to keep up with the high volume. And this is just new pages (which are restricted to logged-in users).

If we were to implement FlaggedRevisions for all edits, it would create backlogs. This is a certainty, and I know this not because I'm a seer, but because that's how things work on this site. I've spoken with a number of different people about this. At one point I even tried to get FlaggedRevs implemented through sysadmin fiat. But I've come to realization that doing it site-wide simply will not work for this project. It's time that others caught up to this reality. --MZMcBride (talk) 07:32, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Addendum: One last thing. All of this talk about "fixing" BLPs. Guess what? Flagging the content doesn't do anything. In fact, it nearly does harm when content is flagged as "accurate" or "verified" when it actually isn't. You want to fix the BLP problem? Go to Wikipedia:Database reports/Biographies of living persons containing unsourced statements and start editing. That's the first 500 entries in a list that's over 17,000 entries long. Until people like you start helping out and fixing the actual problem rather than putting cute little flags on the content for somebody else to fix, nothing will change. --MZMcBride (talk) 07:39, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

You're excused. The "first time" was an absolutely pointless venture; there's no compelling reason to update revisions since it made no difference to the displayed content one way or another. Different story with flagged revisions on a minority of our articles; we have strong ethical and technological motivations to flag them because we care about the content on living people and the edits won't show up otherwise. We've got more users, and we're proposing to flag less articles than de.wp, which is 98.7% flagged up-to-date; it deserves a trial. Worst case scenario: you're right and we drop it. Cool Hand Luke 07:40, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

::::::I'm sorry if this offends you, Jimbo, but it seems to me that you are hell bent on getting this mutant offspring of a wiki extension implemented here even if its the last thing you do. When are you gonna start to listen to the users? I have spoken to Administrators who think you are making the biggest mistake of your life. Over 40% of those polled have laid some exceptionally strong arguments, but you seem intent on walking on those who have opposed this and going ahead with it anyhow. A clear cut use of The Parliament Act, if I may say so. Go ahead and implement it if you must, but I for one will accept it if you agree to take it out of use should it prove to be, in your own words, "a non starter". Thor Malmjursson (talk) 02:20, 18 January 2009 (UTC) Struck out - Utter nonsensical ravings and gobbledegook. Reworded below :) Thor Malmjursson (talk) 04:46, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

How could I be offended? It's as if you've accused me of being a Purple Martian. What you are saying about me has so little resemblance to the actual facts about me, that I can't be offended, but rather bewildered. Do you want to try again to take a more nuanced approach?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 03:51, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

(Outdented) - Sorry about that, Jimbo. I hate confusing people, but sometimes things in my brain don't reach the keyboard in the right order; a mild case of PEBCAK if you will. What I was trying to say is, it looks like you are going to force this through no matter what comes, and that you are not listening to your editors properly.

The reference to the Parliament act comes from a British law about something known as a "suspensory veto"; if a law goes before the House of Lords and gets rejected, the Prime Minister can invoke the Parliament Act, Part I, to force it through against their wishes. This is what your attempt to bring FlaggedRevs in looks like from my point of view.

The matter of FlaggedRevs has been discussed at length on the English IRC channel, where I have spoken to several administrators who think the implementation of it here is wholly wrong. It is, in the words of one I spoke to, whom I will not identify, "an abortion waiting to happen." I wouldn't go that far, but I disagree with it in principal.

I would however, accept Flagged Revisions if the condition was added that in the event of it being a failure or causing a lot more problems than it solved, you would agree to remove it from this Wikipedia.

I hope this is a little clearer than my last ranty attempt to say what I was thinking. Thanks for understanding. Thor Malmjursson (talk) 04:46, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. On the other hand, in this particular case, Parliament seems to have passed it - by a wide margin. And yes, of course, a trial period is meant as just that: a trial period.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:43, 18 January 2009 (UTC) Addendum: I have thought through the Parliament Act analogy several times, and I still don't get what you're saying. There is no "House of Lords" which has rejected it, and I'm not forcing anything through against the wishes of the community. We have a straw poll which shows that there is support by a wide margin, and I'm suggesting that it is about time to go through with it. Saying that I'm not listening to users doesn't make sense to me either... I'm not sure how me going against years of discussion and a community poll would be "listening to users" more than what I'm doing.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:48, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

There is no "wide" margin. At the time of writing, there is exactly sixty percent support for a trial. If just one more person opposed it, you'd have a majority on which the US Senate couldn't invoke cloture, and that's on the low end of supermajorities. Sceptre ^(talk) 16:49, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

10% seems pretty wide to me. It's enough that the poll is unlikely to have got the wrong result through sampling errors. --Tango (talk) 18:39, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

We don't make decisions by majority opinion. Cheers, — Jake Wartenberg 18:54, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Try and find one significant proposal that passed with 60% support or less. No RfA has ever passed with that percentage, and you can count on one hand the number that came below 70%. The straw poll does not show consensus for turning on flagged revisions. Hut 8.5 19:15, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

The worst that can happen is we turn it back off. What is the big issue? Prodego ^talk 05:05, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

The big issue is that while we have majority support, we don't have consensus--and that's the way we have always made our decisions. I think that everyone involved should stop and evaluate not whether or not you think flagged revisions are good, but if you think going ahead despite lack of consensus will be good for the community. A lot of editors are becoming disenchanted with the project; we are losing them all the time. This is not going to help, and that is my main concern right now. It should be yours too, Jimbo. The issue of the extension itself pales in comparison. Regards, — Jake Wartenberg 16:40, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Jake makes a good point about losing good editors currently, but I think we will continue to lose editors if we don't turn on flagged revisions and don't make effort to deal with BLP problems. Using flagged revisions (and whatever other means we have for BLPs) is so essential. Here is an example [2] of how flagged revisions would have helped. I only noticed the IP edit inserting blatant BLP violations in that article, when I noticed another user reverting it six days later! I believe this edit ~1 week later [3] was made by the subject, and on this BLP talk page [4], you see that the subject of the article has previously complained to OTRS. I feel horrible that the IP edit remained for six days! It's an embarrassment to Wikipedia. Flagged revisions would certainly have helped, and is worth whatever effort we need to put into to patrol/approve the edits. The sooner flagged revisions is turned on, the better. If somehow, it doesn't work, then we can always turn it off later, but we must try it and I believe it will be helpful to have it. --Aude (talk) 16:53, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I am also of the opinion that a trial is better than no trial at all. We don't know until we see some data, we either discover that it's not right for Wikipedia, or we miss out on the biggest opportunity this place has ever had. The BLP situation has become so extensive, that I can completely understand why Jimbo feels it is crucial to investigate every possibility in dealing with it. Of course being unopposed to a trial does not equate to being unopposed to the actual full implementation flagged revisions. Looking at the opposition, a lot of people seemed to have missed that point. --.:Alex:. 22:26, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I have personally put much thought in to the pros and cons of flagged revisions as currently defined. One of my greatest concerns is the nebulosity around exactly what the trial will incur, and whether it is merely a trial that can be reverted or a fiat. This point in particular needs to be addressed affirmatively so that the community can at least move forward without doubt hanging in the air. While the straw poll is merely that, a "feeler" for the community's opinion, as it currently stands, there are many who oppose and consensus is not reached. A trial on a limited number of articles also cannot address the problems of scale, so I don't believe that it should be called a trial, since it would not be an effective measure of viability.

I am fully cognizant of the liability the project faces when dealing with BLP's that are less than factual, but my concern is that flagged revisions will ultimately do more harm to the project in the long term. Wikipedia's core principle is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit". It's on the Main Page, and has been virtually since it's inception. Flagged revisions are being used on the German Wikipedia, with mixed results, as stated by some of the administrators from that project. Flagged revisions would be effective if the care is taken to check for vandalism before sighting, but with a project the size of this Wikipedia, I have my serious doubts. A significant backlog seems almost inevitable, with one solution for German Wikipedia being the use of bots to sight articles, which obviously has potential defects as compared to an editor sighting the article. Other concerns are how it will impact the project to those who want to contribute, but will discover that Wikipedia is no longer the "instant gratification" that allows their hard work to appear immediately. There is also the question around who will be provided the necessary permissions to sight articles. I am not at all against the concept of some method to reduce liability, but liability will not miraculously vanish with flagged revisions. The sole solution to removing liability for inaccurate BLP's is by shutting down Wikipedia. I respectfully disagree with those that believe that flagged revisions is the "magic bullet" that would remove all liability.

The other concerns are more on a forward looking basis around how Wikipedia will present itself to potential and existing editors. With the implementation of flagged revisions, nobody other than those privileged with sighting flags will be able to edit the live version of an article. This in particular holds many dangers in the approachability of the project to an editor. I would certainly not wish to devote time and effort to the writing of content when there is no guarantee that my work will ultimately be shown. German Wikipedia has experienced a significant reduction in the number of edits to their project since the implementation of flagged revisions, and considering that this Wikipedia is also currently experiencing a decline in editing activity, I am concerned that this alone would ultimately be a fatal blow to the project.

To summarize, flagged revisions are an imperfect cure to a difficult problem. We already have existing tools in place that can mitigate the damage being caused that do not alienate the core group of editors that have made Wikipedia what it is. I must therefore respectfully urge that flagged revisions not be implemented in it's currently defined iteration, and that all concerns raised be weighed on their merits. Best regards. --Chasingsol^(talk) 08:21, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

"A very large majority, at least two-thirds" is needed according to Erik Möller [5]. DuncanHill (talk) 14:27, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Do images fall under WP:RS policy?

A discussion was started at Talk:2008–2009_Israel–Gaza_conflict#Is_source_of_dead_baby_photo_a_reliable_source.3F and User:Cerejota suggested asking you for arbitration. Arguments against treatment of images as per RS policy, as far as I can tell, are: 1) It is established practice 2) It would mean few pictures available as RS pictures are usually not free

My counter argument is actually based on WP:IMAGE#Pertinence_and_encyclopedic_nature - which suggests, at least to me, that RS policy is deciding policy if any question is raised concerning an image. Being encyclopedic does not mean an image must accompany an article. If RS for image can not be established, why agree to use non reliable images? As I stated at the original discussion, I personally don't consider past practices particularly binding, without some supporting logic or arguments. Regards --Stenwolf (talk) 11:38, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I'd just like to point out, not having really considered the issue in any depth this morning, that "It would mean few pictures available as RS pictures are usually not free" doesn't persuade me right off the bat. Many pictures do not require a reliable source for the simple reason that they are self-evidently what they purport to be. A zebra is a zebra. Where it gets tricky can perhaps be characterized as "images which purport to depict a unique historical event". In this particular case, where emotions clearly run very high on all sides, and the photo itself is clearly inflammatory and upsetting, I would suggest that a very high standard of care is necessary. I think that some consideration of human dignity is also important here, although not absolutely determining what should be done.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Obviously, things like the zebra are black and white... ;~) LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:56, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

There is currently a vote/discussion ongoing at Talk:2008–2009_Israel–Gaza_conflict#Should_the_picture_of_the_dead_baby_be_displayed_on_the_page.3F about whether circumstances favor the inclusion of this photo on the page.--Cdogsimmons (talk) 17:20, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

The image in question is from a Creative Commons commercial attribution licensed image from Al-Jazeera, in other words, a free image from a reliable source.

WP:IMAGE#Pertinence_and_encyclopedic_nature is clearly satisfied, unless you assume Al-Jazeera is not a RS or that pictures of casualties are not pertinent.

Just a clarification, because original poster framed it differently, giving the impression that the debate is around pertinence and sourcing, when the debate has been around "shock value" and if Al Jazeera is a RS.

The question then are: Is Al-Jazeera a reliable source? Are pictures of casualties of war pertinent? I would accept anything Jimbo says either way, but lets get it on. --Cerejota (talk) 20:52, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I would say that these questions are not really up to me to determine, but I can offer a few thoughts which I hope are helpful. (1) Al-Jazeera is generally a reliable source as far as I know, in the sense that we normally mean it. (2) Be careful about what Al-Jazeera is being a reliable source for - i.e. did a staff photographer take the picture such that they are standing behind what it is, or did they obtain it from an activist group claiming it to be such-and-such. I would trust Al-Jazeera (as far as I know) to report honestly in either case, and we should not go further than what they have actually claimed. (3) Pictures of causualties of war of course may be pertinent, but I would immediately think of at least two cautionary notes. First, the human dignity of the person (and their family and loved ones, in case you think it doesn't matter what happens to someone once they are dead) strikes me as a relevant consideration. Second, such images can often be used to promote a political agenda.

Since some people are pure pacifists, it may be impossible to come up with a universally agreeable example of what I want to talk about next, but let's suppose, as many do, that the Allied assault on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day in World War II, are something we would consider to be a highly unfortunate necessity. (Unfortunate, since it would have been better all around if the 20th century hadn't been so violent.) Well, it is not hard to imagine some horrific civilian casualties that day, with those casualties being used as propaganda by one side (or the other, depending on the exact details)... with very little educational value in an article on the battle itself.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:18, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I really hope you aren't comparing the recent Israeli invasion of Gaza with the Allied invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe. DuncanHill (talk) 01:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think that's what Jimbo meant; when I read those above comments, the images that came into my mind were the Allied forces films of Auschwitz during the liberation in 1945. Clearly a historical document of fact, yet also propaganda in the sense that they were used to say "this is what has been going on, but you didn't know it until now". It's a truism, if not a cliche, to say that the first casualty of war is the truth, and that is the nature of propaganda, both during and afterwards. Being idealistic is optimistic; we all know (or should) that conflict is inevitable, and that propaganda is, especially in a globally-connected community, a powerful tool. It's even more so today something else that has to be weighed carefully. Al-Jazeera, in my experience, don't have a particular axe to grind, to their credit. But, as with any news source, it must take its place amongst all others. With current events, we don't have the benefit of historical perspective, and even then we must remember as a general rule that history is always written by the winning side. Maybe in a hundred years time, documents will be unearthed that put any current event into a different perspective; until then, we must rely upon what is available to us. --Rodhullandemu 01:43, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I find the argument on human dignity convincing, in particular in the sense of civilians. I will ponder this.

The propaganda value, well, that is less convincing - precisely because of the same reason the human dignity argument is so convincing: who determines what is propaganda and what is reporting of fact? I think that part of illustrating an encyclopedia is to show that "casualties" are not dry numbers on an info box, but human beings who died sometimes in horrific circumstances: hiding this fact might probably be of more propagandistic value than showing it, in particular with all the stage management that goes on in modern warfare (there are more Public Relations -in all branches and commands- MOS soldiers in the US armed forces than there are Military Intelligence MoS). Human dignity also requires that we show what terrible effects war has - maybe not show the emaciated child in Buchenwald - but maybe show his dad: showing that people turn into barely living skeletons in concentration camps is not propaganda, it is objective reporting of fact.

I do like the formulation on RS being a specific, rather than a general value: op-eds in the New York Times are quite different than reporting in the same journal. I am also pleased that Al-Jazeera is generally a reliable source as far as I know, in the sense that we normally mean it. While it is certainly a source that identifies with an agenda, this is no different than, say, Fox News.--Cerejota (talk) 20:28, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Just a couple of points. The most egregious photograph is not from Al-Jazeera, but from the International Solidarity Movement, an activist organisation in solidarity with the Palestinians who are extremely controversial. The article in question has had several pictures of dead and burned children attributed to Israel, bodies at the morgue, orphanages bombed out (also from ISM), rocket fire hitting Gaza etc. Israel had one emotive picture, but it has been deleted. It seems some folks want to illustrate the greater suffering of one side with photographs. Is there anything to the argument that an overemphasis on photos of one side tend to make it appear that we are pushing a political agenda here? Perhaps we should avoid such emotive photographs until after the fog has cleared? Tundrabuggy (talk) 05:09, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

this admin needs someone to talk some sence into him

Jimbo, this admin has taken his power a little to far User:Sandstein User_talk:Sandstein#my_block_2 here. I have always been a very good wikipedian until a couple of days ago when I lost the plot over a failed RfA candidate (I had a few drinks at the time). I am trying to vanish but he is going against Wikimedias policys. (I have to change my IP after every edit I do)--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:25, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for contacting you about this but I need to show that I have tried everything possible to see my request is fulfilled.(to keep the lawyers happy)--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:29, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Was that a veiled legal threat? Why else would yo want to "keep the lawyers happy"? I recommend that you read the policy linked in the first sentence of my reply. Dendodge Talk^Contribs 13:34, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Oh hell, O.K. I was totally unfamiliar with that procedure, it's new information to me, my feeling was that I am on my own to sort this out myself. I guess I need to go through this procedure first then. I will see how that goes. It's hard to get the message across of how serious I really am.--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

After reading the dispute resolution page, by doing this I feel I am totally complying its procedure, So I don't see any other option here.--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:44, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I have also left a message here.--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:46, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

What annoys me the most is that I can not see what the big deal about my requestis. It is to protect my privacy. I have no interest of ever vandalizing Wikipedia in any way.--122.49.172.169 (talk)

13:49, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Anyway I am done with this, I will just wait and see what happens in 30 days.--122.49.172.169 (talk) 13:58, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Actually on second thought I can not see why I should let this matter rest, Wikipedia is now feeling very much like a cult atmosphere. Like I said I have always been a very good editor, I've helped on the help desk, I have helped people resolve disputes plus much more constructive/positive things for the project. I have spent a lot my my free time on Wikipedia over the last year not forgetting that this is totally voluntary. I HAVE done a lot for your creation Jimbo I believe this reaches the poor people/country's of the world and that is who I think about when doing stuff on here. I am in noway a bad person in real life or on the web. my problems started a couple of days ago when Ecoleetage failed in another RfA(I really don't understand some peoples reasoning for oppose). Then I said something positive to Eco on his talk page, another user said something that contradicted my thoughts and I lost the plot and abused him in writing, my account was blocked and I asked to use my right to vanish of which it took a lot just to get my user space deleted (except my talk page). All I am trying to do now is get my talk page deleted because I believe when something vanishes it means it has completely disappeared that is all I am asking. I think the problem with Wikipedia Jimbo is that Wikipedia is slowly starting to target the wrong group/type of people for the administrators role. That is not the fault of the RfA system because anyone with an account can vote but more the expectations of admin gradually gets higher and higher so who is currently passing at RfA, well I'd like to say everyone from every walks of life but that is simply not true. When passing a job interview and starting a new job no matter of what your prior experience is you are still stepping into unfamiliar grounds, it takes some time to get good at your new job. Good employers can see good potential in people. The current RfA system relies totally on prior experience to pass, (hang on isn't that what I just said about getting a job?) well no, nobody ever gets a new job knowing everything about everything and that is what RfA has turned into. I have and do employ people, I have a check sheet with my criteria with must be met and I want to trust this person. The problem is everyone has different expectations about what level candidates should be at when becoming an admin, this is evident by lots of various criteria found on users user space. I think there needs to be a single universal check sheet to stop all the individual expectations and so the RfA process becomes more of a trust issue. Why am I so caught up with an admin issue on Wikipedia? Well we all know Wikipedia needs more admins, the role and view point(from others) of an admin is/has gone slightly into the role of a dictator. I know it's easy to say "well, if you just do the right thing you will never have to deal with an admin" I'd like to think that statement is 100% true but it is not. There are times when you need admin to think more logically and maturely rather than spew out a bunch oh policy's and essays. Admins talk on IRC and msn and from a single type of viewpoint or some fall into that pattern to conform(isn't that what policy's are meant to do?)of course not, especially on a project where there is no real human interaction, why a a lot of business's fail is because they get to big to quickly.(this is not a business!) that's right however Wikipedia is full proof it can not fail(yes it can) oh yeah it can and it's failing now by not reaching out to those who have the life/work experience required to deal with people from all walks of life.(why am I caught up with experience?), What the most important thing about interacting with people is that it is a two way thing, especially when you are a volunteer you go in expecting admins to be a bit lenient or a little more understanding towards people who are doing a good job but that's not the case and it quite frankly puts people off by that I mean the general editor. After helping out Wikipedia you will need an admin at some stage for one reason or another but often feel more confused than you did before. Going back to the IRC/mSN thing I don't view that as a issue at all. (I have to stop now I will continue later)--122.49.172.169 (talk) 15:41, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Theoneintraining (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log). seicer | talk | contribs 16:04, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

For those who can't be bothered to dig through diffs, this is User:Theoneintraining "always being a good Wikipedian" [6], [7], [8]. "Now I've reached my level of dealing with Wikimedia. I warn you one last time do it or your fucked.". – iridescent 16:09, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

For those not familiar with this situation, see this, which lead to User talk:Theoneintraining#"tan don't delete my thoughts we live in a democracy", and the sections below it as well. GlassCobra 16:12, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

The IP is now blocked for evading an indef block. See our guide to appealing a block for the correct way to get unblocked, if that is what you wish, IP. Jehochman ^Talk 16:23, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

Hello, Did you want something?Can you excercise my right to vanish and delete my talk page? if not I don't know what you want. all I want is for someone to acknowledge my right to vanish and delete my talk page for privacy concerns ten im done with Wikipedia forever. Until then I will just keep asking under various IP's.--122.49.141.101 (talk) 16:27, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't consider myself a Wikipedian anymore, so I don't care what I write now--122.49.141.101 (talk) 16:29, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

I am in noway trying to defend my actions I know I messed up, I want to vanish--122.49.141.101 (talk) 16:31, 18 January 2009 (UTC)

WP:RTV says that vanishing "...is not a right in the strict sense of the word; rather, it is a courtesy extended by the Wikipedia community to make it easy for users to exercise their right to leave." I doubt that someone with a track record such as yours, especially with the legal threat above, will have this right extended to them without good reason, which you do not appear to have. That, however, is not up to me to decide. — neuro^(talk) 20:13, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I have a perfectly good reason. I want to vanish for privacy concerns my employees and friends know of my (ex)Wikipedia activities. It may and probably will result in them having a different opinion of me after reading my talk page. If that happens I have no-one to blame except various admins on Wikipedia.--122.49.174.22 (talk) 07:30, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

and before you continue on about rights, You must understand the difference between a right and a law my friend. I want my privacy protected and the law allows me to.--122.49.174.22 (talk) 07:34, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

So...Neuro, I responded to you. Have you got anything else you would like to add?. Your are not understanding that these so called rights and policy's on Wikipedia do not mean anything in the real world. Now that you have chosen to get involved I would like to ask you to delete my talk page because I would like to vanish. I don't think you will respond because you simply don't know what to say.--122.49.174.22 (talk) 08:10, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

And why did you choose to get involved?.--122.49.174.22 (talk) 08:13, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Actually Neuro I've seen you on the help desk. You know that I meant and did well during my time on the Wiki. I like you, I have never had any problems with anyone here until I wanted to vanish. What is really happening? this whole situation has caused me stress in my life and I can not handle it on my own anymore. All I would like is my talk page to be deleted. Why did you choose to get involved with this?.--122.49.174.22 (talk) 08:35, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I've done a bit of thinking last night, I don't think my request is going going to get anywhere, So that is it for me I'm going, I am done. maybe someone will eventually delete my talk page, I just don't care anymore. I would like to wish everyone a happy and successful 2009 and I hope you get want you want out of life here and in the real world. This is my business motto "One Body, One Life, One Chance".--219.90.147.189 (talk) 20:28, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

fan wars

Hi. You'll have noted the dispute about the inclusion of large amounts of coverage on fictional subjects. This dispute has been going on for years and shows no sign of abating.

I'm here to point out a thread on Wikipedia talk:Notability (fiction). I started it at Wikipedia talk:Notability (fiction)#No 'trousers rolled' for me, thank you and I got a long reply a couple of days later at Wikipedia talk:Notability (fiction)#I'll bite from Pixelface. That whole page, w/41 archives, is huge and his reply is rather long; but I've read it three times now, and think you should, too.

I don't agree with him, but it amounts of a manifesto from the arch-inclusionist side. This dispute is going to have to be sorted somehow, and mebbe you're the guy to do it. Cheers, Jack Merridew 15:32, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I'd just like to echo that at some point, intervention may become necessary. There have been numerous efforts to sort out the content dispute from all angles. There are a couple of efforts at dispute resolution that are finally coming to a head, and may actually work. But there's a chance that they won't. And there's a good chance that these failures at compromise will polarize the community even more, and things will get worse. I hope you'll consider intervention. Not that you should hammer out what it is you want with an iron first (although if you did, it would end it once and for all). But the most helpful thing you could do is smack both arch-inclusionists and arch-deletionists. If you take the extreme position off the table, you empower people in the middle who are trying to promote compromise. If you say "at least 2 out of 10, and not more than 8 out of 10", it makes it easier to get somewhere in the middle. Randomran (talk) 16:57, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Transwiki to wikia, or some other wiki. Fancruft doesn't belong in an encyclopedia.--Cerejota (talk) 20:30, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Do not call things cruft. --A Nobody^{My talk} 22:43, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Fancruft. I see your essay and raise you one... Aren't you opposed to the use of essays as arguments in discussions anyway? Fram (talk) 07:34, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

And I raise you WP:ITSCRUFT. I am opposed to any and all use of "cruft" as it is an unacademic, non-serious nonsense non-word. It's a discussion killer for me. Once I see someone call something "cruft", then I know it's just an "I don't like" subjective opinion that is inconsistent with academic or encyclopedic discussion. Best, --A Nobody^{My talk} 20:17, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I will not use "fancruft", so let me rephrase:

Articles with in depth details of works of fiction or toy lines or collectible items that appeal only to a sub-set of a sub-set of a sub-set of the general population don't belong in Wikipedia. Such articles are often abandoned once created, suffer greatly from lack of attention, are frequent targets of vandalism, and in general do not contribute to advance the process of creating an encyclopedia - regardless of the notability and suitability for encyclopedic treatment of its core topics. However, there are other wikis that could benefit of such information, including those at Wikia (a wiki farm well know for hosting fan wikis), wikibooks, or perhaps some other wiki project could be started by proponents. Fanhood as a phenomenon is also a very subjective, very emotional subject, and creates an environment where people who lack judgement or commitment to the five pillars of wikipedia, become a drain on its resources, human and technological, without adding anything of benefit to the ultimate mission of writting an encyclopedia.--Cerejota (talk) 20:39, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

The importance of BLP's

I apologize for putting up a new section, but I had hoped to be able to converse with you normally. You mentioned above that "I consider our BLP issue to be so important that I think it is actually unethical to not use a tool which holds great promise for helping with the problem, now that it has been successfully tested elsewhere."

I have two objections with regard to this. The first and more relevant is that I strongly, strongly disagree with BLP as an important issue (per se). If there is untruthful information on some living person's BLP, we are completely, completely free from violating the libel laws of the State of Florida and the United States so long as Wikipedia doesn't officially give it a stamp of our approval. Since the legal issue is non-existent, offense is our only reason that I can see to specifically protect BLP's (with FR, etc.). People may well get offended at their own personal pages. These people honestly don't matter much. The Seigenthaler incident, in the end, did nothing to damage Wikipedia directly and only slightly lessened its credibility among the vast majority of our readers. We spend way too much time pandering to the views of the few who are "privileged" enough to have merited WP articles and far too little time working on getting all of our articles done. I very firmly believe that all our articles should be treated equally. A typical Wikipedia reader is far more likely to be seriously upset by a false article on his country, religion, or culture than on some random famous person. Do we really believe that Seigenthaler is more worth protecting than France? Which one's a more likely target for vandals? Which one will offend more people?

The other point is a strong belief that I and many others share, which is that FR is at this point (at least) the wrong way of protecting BLP's. It goes against our fundamental principles and beliefs. I don't think I need to bring up the arguments since many, many people have already done so. And that leads me to wonder: there were a lot, a lot, a lot of well-thought out objections to the FR proposal. (And a lot of well-thought out supports, of course.) You say "I consider our BLP issue to be so important"... well, you yourself may. Does that mean our attempt (and ultimately failure--I'm sure you would agree we didn't find a consensus by any means) to find a consensus on the issue didn't matter, because you had already decided for us that it was a big enough issue? What if we had been split down the middle? Did you represent an opinion equal to that of 10% of all Wikipedia's editors? 20%? 60%? 5%? I'd like to know directly from you what perspective you have on the consensus or lack thereof that we reached, as well on the much more relevant issue of why you think BLP's are so important. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 22:44, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

• It's not about legally allowed, but ethically allowed. Nor is about what is offensive, but rather what damaging. When information on Wikipedia gets you detained at an airport in Montreal, that's a problem. When you don't like the way we tell the history of Montreal, then it's appropriate to say "tough". WilyD 22:55, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

After all the years we have been discussing BLP-related issues, I find this comment and others of a similar ilk to be profoundly dispiriting. Matt, you have missed the point so very gravely that I don't know where to begin, although referring you to my comments from two years ago at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Doc glasgow#Outside view by Newyorkbrad and Wikipedia:Requests for comment/QZ Deletion dispute#Outside view by Newyorkbrad, as well as the decisions in RfAr/Badlydrawnjeff and RfAr/Footnoted quotes might be one place to start. In the vast majority of cases, a Wikipedia article on an individual will be the very highest-ranking search engine result when a search is conducted on the name of that person. This affects the lives of the people we write about on a daily basis. To suggest that Wikipedia does not have profound obligations to do its best to keep these articles free of defamatory, gossipy, and privacy-invading material is to suggest that we are without obligation to consider the real-world impacts of our actions and the work we are doing. It would be intolerable for a project of our impact and influence to operate in such a manner; and it has long been a matter of imperative public importance that we should not do so.

Neither flagged revisions nor semiprotecting BLPs nor any other single step that could be taken will solve all the many interrelated problems that we class under the heading "BLP", ranging from the random-driveby-vandalism problem to the POV-pushing-attack-article problem to the invasion-of-privacy problem. As it happens, I gave a talk on this topic yesterday at the New York meet-up which ended somewhat inconclusively: neither I nor nor anyone else can "solve" the issue of how Wikipedia sometimes unfairly and negatively affects the lives of some of its article subjects—any more than we can solve the problem of how the Internet in general has this effect, for this is an Internet-wide problem and not just a Wikipedia one. Although additional concrete steps toward improvement need to be taken sooner rather than later, I have not made up my mind at all about what the best solution should be in terms of the details. But it, frankly, horrifies me that there are still dedicated Wikipedians who think that the best answer is that as a matter of principle we shouldn't give a damn. Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:03, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I unreservedly agree with Newyorkbrad in regards to his comments. The problem we face is an incredibly difficult one to solve, short of shutting down Wikipedia. As I discussed further above (and a permanent record can be found at User:Chasingsol/FlaggedRevs), there must be some action taken. One suggestion that was mentioned to me was segregating all BLP articles to a separate namespace where they could be subject to stricter oversight, rather than attempting to apply it piecemeal to existing articles. Others include semi-protection of BLP's, the use of flagged revisions, or disallowing BLP's at all. There is no "right" solution to this quandary, only ones that can mitigate some of the concerns. We must very carefully balance our moral duties to those we have articles about, but must also not alienate the very group of people who have made Wikipedia in to what it is. --Chasingsol^(talk) 23:50, 19 January 2009 (UTC)

I neither agree with Matt's position, nor NYBrad's. I think BLPs are an area where we should be especially vigilant in enforcing our normal editorial policies such as NPOV, NOR, and V, and correct problems arising with those sooner rather than later. We should be far more aggressive with unsourced information or non-neutral presentation in a BLP than we should be in hydrogen. That only makes sense. What does not make sense, however, is what Cerejota states. We have lost sight of the fact that we don't censor. If information is available from highly-reliable sources, we should not redact it simply because someone may dislike it. We should present it neutrally, factually, and without undue weight, but if it is significant enough to be in the article, we should not shrink from presenting it.

When BLP was first getting trotted out, I was every bit on the side of it. I remember reassuring people that we would never tolerate its use as a sledgehammer in content disputes when information was reliably sourced, that we would never censor information already available in reliable sources in the name of "privacy". I feel an idiot, because I've watched exactly those things happen. Those who feared such things were exactly right. We've got to rein this thing in. That doesn't mean we need to eliminate it, but we do need to limit its scope. We can't let powerful tools get out of control, and we're in severe danger of that here. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 04:20, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I don't think anyone is calling for removing or disallowing information from highly reliable sources because someone may dislike it as the ideal of enforcing BLP. "Dislike" doesn't enter into it - potential for harm may, and an editorial judgment on what facts need to be included can certainly be brought to bear in order to limit that potential. That is the the diffuse edge of BLP concern, however - more important by far are unsourced statements of controversial fact, and I'm sure you've seen many of those. Your comment inaccurately restates Brad's (and others') position on information about living people. The policy and tools to enforce it may be being misused or misunderstood, but that doesn't indict the policy itself or the concept of due care behind it. Avruch ^T 13:25, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree with Matt's second point here, and somewhat with his first. That Wikipedia is an encyclopedia anybody can edit has been a fundamental tenet of the Foundation since inception; schisms have been caused by our intransigence on this matter. When did we decide that the ends justify the means, and betray our core values? Certainly we should show extra vigilance towards articles such as BLPs, where vandalism can have profound negative real-world consequences, but it is my understanding that the average lifetime of vandalism on Wikipedia articles is on the order of seconds six minutes, and I imagine it is even shorter on important, watchlisted BLPs. The push for adopting an overbroad technical solution disproportionate to the problem bears the characteristics, in my opinion, of a moral panic, one which will severely stunt the growth of the project in the long run.

More worryingly, the community as a whole does not want this solution. Newyorkbrad, I respect both your opinion and that of your fellow arbitrators, but your citing of a variety of RfArb decisions above only strengthens the argument that these concerns and proposed solutions are being imposed from the top, without the support of broader community consensus. Mr. Wales, you are the founder of the project, and I do not question the propriety of you declaring unilaterally how your hardware is to be used. But I do question the wisdom. TotientDragooned (talk) 06:45, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism only lasts seconds? I don't think the findings of a a comprehensive vandalism study back-up that assertion GTD 13:10, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the link. TotientDragooned (talk) 13:24, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm more worried about the controversial unsourced statements appearing in "unimportant" BLPs that aren't widely watchlisted - just as damaging Fritzpoll (talk) 13:44, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

We fix them when we get to them. There is no deadline. Perhaps we need to make this point to our readers more obvious, say, a large banner on BLPs in the main page and a constant link in the "navigation" section of the toolbar. It ain't broke, so don't fix it.--Cerejota (talk) 13:54, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

And perhaps we need to care more about our readers and about the subjects of the articles, and less about the editors (in cases where that's the choice). Things like flagged revisions may drive editors away, but the same things may also in the longer run attract readers, who prefer to get good versions of articles to read, and not the current vandalised version. And as for getting vandalism on BLPs quick: yes, a lot gets reverted very fast by our RC patrollers. But the things they don't catch can stay along for a long time, sometimes years. A recent example of a week-old blatant vandalism in the lead of a BLP was this [9], only reverted one week later [10]. And while looking at that old diff again and doing a search, I just discovered this [11], which hasn't been reverted in the last four days (I will do so now). Things are definitely broken and need to be fixed. Fram (talk) 14:05, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm still concerned that Flagged Revisions are being bandied around as the "magic bullet" to solve all BLP issues. This will NOT solve the problems. We have a moral duty to ensure that information in BLP's is accurate and well sourced, but the implementation of Flagged Revisions is not going to make that magically happen. There is no guarantee that a sighting of a BLP will be done with care, or even without malice. With several hundred thousand BLP's, it is folly to believe that this will solve the issue. As can be ascertained from the uproar that is currently occurring, it seems certain to also alienate a very large group of valued editors. With all respect to Jimbo, the German Wikipedia is NOT the shining example of a good implementation of Flagged Revisions it is made out to be. If it worked as intended, with human sighting of articles, then why on Earth are bots being used to sight revisions? This is the wrong way of going about solving this difficult problem and is already fracturing a severely cracked community. --Chasingsol^(talk) 14:12, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

BLP and images

Wikipedia has a lot of work to do wrt to biographies of living people. Even the terminology we use unnecessarily limits the frame of argument. What we're dealing with isn't an issue restricted to biography articles, or pages within the umbrella of a biography (talk pages, noticeboards, etc.). The issue is understanding and respecting our ability to do harm to living people in a variety of ways, whether through direct articles, references in other articles, discussion on talkpages, noticeboards, dispute resolution, deletion discussions, etc.

Perhaps the limiting lexicon of this problem explains why its scope and seriousness hasn't penetrated its way to all dedicated members of the Wikimedia community. When we blithely allow pictures of random naked women on the English Wikipedia and Commons, refuse to require any sort verification of model age or right to publish, and defend to the death our right to hold on to sexually explicit images so that users can put them in personal galleries like "Hot" or "Appreciation of the female form"... It's clear that, as a community, we are not yet fully serious about securing living people against our potential for harm. I'd love to see Jimmy or Brad recognize this problem as serious and begin to argue as strongly for progress in image management as they have for article management. Avruch ^T 00:38, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree with you on all the details here, and so I might not be aware of the scope of the problem. I would say that a personal gallery of sexually explicit images with the title "Hot" (to pick one example that you gave) would be deleted immediately and the person who did it likely blocked. Am I wrong?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:25, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm also not fully familiar with the problem as you (Avruch) describe it, in part because I have not really dealt with image issues as a speciality during my time on Wikipedia (the closest I came to these issues was in the two Betacommand arbitration cases). In the wake of the Virgin Killer situation a month or so ago, I did suggest adopting some sort of policy about images of minors, and proposed one, which did not enjoy a groundswell of support. (In general, I am tired of seeing the overused slogan "Wikipedia is not censored", which is intended to mean that we do not consider ourselves required to limit certain types of comments in order to shield the readership, misunderstood to mean either that (1) we can't take considerations of appropriateness in a given context into account in formulating our own editorial judgment; and (2) even more distressing, that we can't choose to limit our content in order to protect the article subjects (or image subjects) from unwarranted invasions of privacy.) I'd be interested in hearing from others with greater experience of this issue, but perhaps a subthread should be created so as not to divert attention from the original topic. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:39, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Unquestionably. There are a number of such galleries. Admiring the female form. Hot. Nude women & "undressing". Fav Sexy. Girls. I haven't spent a lot of time looking for these, and I'm sure there are a few more. I'm not saying they're everywhere; I am saying that they aren't effectively monitored, and that there are hundreds of images without sufficient provenance - just check out this category. You'll find that most of these pictures are at Commons, and relatively few of them currently have a home on this project, but the core issue confronts all of Wikimedia and not just its most prominent project. Also, should be noted that any of these images can be displayed on en.wp at any time and from time to time they are. Avruch ^T 01:52, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

I might be wrong, but isn't the commons be, besides all the legalese, "realistically useful for an educational purpose". I doubt random collections of naked women fit the criteria of "realistically useful for an educational purpose", however, pictures that can be offensive to users for a variety of reasons do have a "realistically useful for an educational purpose". For example, Ejaculation has a frame by frame picture of a man ejaculating. That image is offensive to many (although I suspect it is titillating to others) but it is clearly serving an educational purpose. I agree with Newyorkbrad that WP:CENSOR is overused, but it is also disrespected as a matter of course, for religious, political, and even fan-cruft reasons. The founding spirit, if I am not mistaken, of WP:CENSOR is to ensure liberty of thought over personal values - and one of the biggest problems of WP:CREEP has been people lose track of the spirit and start to see this as a legal game. I feel that we should always keep that in mind when considering not accepting content. For me the Virgin Killer case was one where the WMF took the correct position, a principled one. It would certainly been easier to remove that one image in order to guarantee access in the UK, but our position was defended. The one thing, behind all controversies, drama, and everything else, that I have always liked about wikipedia is an uncompromising position on freedom of knowledge. I'll hate to see that be eroded, simply because consensus moves that way. Sometimes only a minority defends liberty, does that make liberty less worthy of defense? --Cerejota (talk) 03:51, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

If there are images with educational value, no one is asking for them to be deleted. You're misunderstanding what I'm asking for if you see it as a censorship issue - asking for age verification, verification of right to publish and monitoring for encyclopedic use is not the same as censoring content. It's protecting image subjects who are unlikely to be able to protect themselves. At least BLP subjects can look themselves up in Wikipedia, or Google their name, to discover what untoward things are being said about them; how should an image subject go about doing that? Search for "naked_woman_on_beach.jpg" and click through a thousand images, once or twice a year, to make sure she hasn't been uploaded yet? As you can see, we won't get too many OTRS complaints - but that doesn't mean we aren't harming people by publishing explicit images of them. Avruch ^T 13:25, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

My point was, and I didn't make it explicit, that galleries named "Hot" in the commons could be discussed for deletion, in other words, we have mechanisms to deal with them, and people then decide, by consensus, if they have educational value. The problem I see with proposals that take away that responsibility away from the community, is that we are delegating our responsibilities as editors either to bureaucrats or to machines. There is already a significant erosion in editor commitment to the spirit of the wikipedian five pillars, we do not need to add another nail to the coffin: the deletion process for the most part still work. Really what people need to do is stop trying to fix what is not broken, and actually use the tools at their disposal - there shouldn't be any shortcuts to discussion and consensus seeking - we stop doing that, like with flagging, this place will become stale and disrispected: everyones roots for wikipedia to work, but the jury still undecided, believe it or not. On the matter of BLPs, we already have stronger policies (WP:BLP) and for the most part they work. If we need stronger policies, then we modify WP:BLP. In a more philosophical point, all of these discussions are based on fear, fear of vandals, fears of pov pushing, fears of children exposed to unsuitable material. I am sorry, but I am not a coward, and I refuse to act on fear. I am a wikipedian, and I am bold. --Cerejota (talk) 13:50, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Perhaps its my fault for not being clear, and for not disclaiming specific concerns or goals first, but I'm not commenting out of fear or proposing a specific bureaucratic process. I'm not interested at this point in the exposure of children to explicit images, or of vandalism or POV pushing, as it relates to images. POV pushing is a problem with BLPs, but I think assuming that fear is behind what others have expressed as a concern is belittling and misses the point.

What I would like to see come from this discussion (in this newly created subthread) is Jimmy and Brad and others taking the problem of image management seriously, and I would like to see them incorporate it as a part of their campaign to raise awareness and provoke thought and progress in the area of BLP. Specifically, sexually explicit images should be more rigourously evaluated for encyclopedic usability and we should look into how we might do better at verifying uploader right to publish and model age. Avruch ^T 14:51, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

You were clear. We simply disagree: I am not assuming it is fear, the straight up language used is a language of fear: "protection" is only needed when one fears something and feels the need to protect oneself from it. If one doesn't fear something, there is no need to protect oneself. And while you are not proposing any concrete changes, what you propose will require those changes - we already have a process for dealing with inappropiate content, and a process for dealing with vandalism, and a process for dealing with POV pushing. If you suggest any change to that process you are, well, proposing that they be changed. Its pretty clear.

I am not so sure that there is anything wrong in how we handle image content, today. If people do not use the deletion process in the Commons and other wikipedias, is not the process's fault, it is the inaction of people's fault. If people vandalize, they get reverted. If people POV push, they get pushed back. Yes, dumbass is the number one language in an environment of massive collaboration, but from the collection of idiocies emerges a pretty amazing encyclopedic collection of knowledge.

I do not want Jimmy and Brad to go down a road that I know their instincts won't take them (erm, Jimmy is, well, lets say, aquainted with - soft - porn if his BLP is to be trusted), simply because people feel we have a "responsibility to protect the children". We don't have that responsibility, nor should we have it. We are not collective parents to the collective children. We are not the Borg. Of course, those offended can ultimately get the fork out of here. But the day we censor crap by bureaucratic order, rather than community consensus, its the day many of us will indeed getting the fork out of here.--Cerejota (talk) 21:08, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Pardon me, I don't mean to be rude, but it seems that Jimbo does seem to attract a lot of public conversation on his talk page, so I thought it might be ok for me to comment. Regarding the explicit photos: I've always considered Wikipedia an educational tool. If it makes sense to display a picture to further the education of a topic, then in line with the not censured mindset, it seems that it would be acceptable. If showing a picture is only an attempt to "shock" someone, then it really isn't what the community wants. I say this in line with a conversation (RFC) on the urination topic going on (but it seemed somewhat relevant). I'd personally hate to see wikipedia turn into a porn site, using education as a front for the graphics. I'm guessing that most folks agree with me, but I just thought I'd like to comment. Thank you for your time. Ched (talk) 15:04, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

• I tend to agree with Avruch, but the problem is that every time this topic comes up, there is little definition about how to determine sexually explicit material that is education versus superfluous. I probably have about four photos that could be deleted as they lack encyclopedic value, and I wish I hadn't uploaded them. Unfortunately, the motivations of people who make proposals for this often do have an agenda that would affect relevant and educational material that people just don't like because they are personally creeped out or offended by the human condition (which runs counter to our educational goals). Clearly my most controversial photos are the ones taken on the set of a big budget pornographic film shoot where the actors and film crew signed releases on file with Lucas Entertainment. The arguments against these images are because they are explicit, but also because they are gay. So would the photograph at the top of Pornographic film fall in line with one of the ones that should be deleted? No genitals are shown, and the focus is not on the actors, but on the totality of the set. Most people who oppose it seem to not like it simply because it's a gay film. Images such as these are often swept up in the anti-WP:CENSOR initiatives, even though everything Avruch described above does not apply to them. This is what I see as the main problem with prior attempts to limit explicitness. So, where is the happy medium? That's the light in which I'd personally appreciate hearing Jimmy and Brad's opinions. Nobody is really making those determinations. And I'm happy to supply a list of my own images that I think should be deleted, simply because they will probably never have much use on any project (IMO). All that said, people also make the mistake to think Wikimedia Commons is here to serve only Wikimedia projects, which pisses off the Commoners; in fact, the prior sentence just did that. So what is Commons? --David Shankbone 16:13, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

The Commons is not only for wikipedia, but as I quoted above, it is for educational material. It is explicit and clear in that goal. It isn't flickr or youtube or redtube or imagefap. That said, I share your concerns, but still trust the right desicion to be made - there are enough of us who can take offensive content and defend it over our offense because we see its encyclopedic value. --Cerejota (talk) 21:08, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

This image on Commons is particularly choice, with the added bonus that the extended description makes sure to mention she was with her children at the time. Avruch ^T 02:28, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

A deletion discussion was opened, and I argued for deletion.--Cerejota (talk) 19:50, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I could've told you it wouldn't be deleted. It's a cultural issue, really - no wider use of existing processes and policies will cause a significant change unless it is preceded by a concerted effort at changing perceptions and priorities in the Commons (and en.wp image) culture. Avruch ^T 22:28, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Unblock request

Jimmy -- Are you aware that your Wiki-bullies are undermining your original intent? There is no free speech on Wikipedia. I have been blocked for no good reason, and so have my colleagues. -- RSW, Ph.D. 71.242.195.155 (talk) 09:17, 5 January 2009 (UTC) You can contact me at wenocur@wharton.upenn.edu, if you care. I do not care if my IP address appears; the bullies get it anyway. Also, I am pres of NCV Corp. 71.242.195.155 (talk) 05:36, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

This is an inappropriate venue for requesting unblock. Have you placed an unblock request on your user talk page? Use the template {{unblock|Reason}} replacing "reason" with the reason for the request. If we don't know your username, we cannot do a thing from here. Also, you may be interested to learn that while Wikipedia is not censored, nor is it a free web host and you cannot simply post anything you want here. Your blog is for that. KillerChihuahua^?!? 11:44, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

The IP is obviously not blocked. Without information what account we are talking about the discussion just does not make sense. Wikipedia has more than 2000 admins, sometimes they make honest mistakes, very rarely they somebody abuses their power and deliberately makes wrong blocks, still accordng to my experience in 95% of such complains the administrators are right with their decisions Alex Bakharev (talk) 13:11, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Pedantic correction: at the time of writing, we have 1,619 admins on Wikipedia. This number can be obtained by the magic word "{{NUMBEROFADMINS}}". Graham87 13:23, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Double pedantic correction, I have refactored your post to use the magic word, as that is why it exists.--Cerejota (talk) 13:56, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Triple pedantic correction: I substed it, hence I said "at the time of writing", not "at the time you are reading this or whenever the servers decide to update the number, so I've undone your refactoring. Now I've probably screwed up the indentation, so a quadruple pedantic correction might be required. :-) Graham87 16:38, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I think he's evading a user account block with his IP; which is why I suggest letting us know his username. KillerChihuahua^?!? 14:43, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

As for free speech, yes you're right, there is no right to free speech on Wikipedia. – ukexpat (talk) 14:25, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

"Free like beer, not like speech." Gwen Gale (talk) 14:06, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

From the archives: enforcing NPOV

This was archived before it had been answered:

How is NPOV enforced?

...[W]ho enforces the core policies of NPOV? ArbComm says that they can't deal with such content issues, so it's left to the community. The community deals with NPOV dispute through dispute resolution, but it does not work all the time: what can be done then? How can significant minorities get the place they deserve per NPOV if the majority wants to silent them? What makes you think that the majority is benevolent with minorities, when there are strong evidence that they aren't? We have been through all sorts of dispute resolution mechanism, and I've always readily participated in them, and with civility. The DOE report is the most notable secondary review of Cold Fusion, as shown by his prominent place in our article: how come it is still horribly misrepresented?

The real-world History is full of examples of the sorry fate of unprotected minorities: why would it be different on Wikipedia? What's the point of "NPOV is non-negotiable" if NPOV is not enforced? Pcarbonn (talk) 09:26, 1 January 2009 (UTC)

I've had trouble with there being no way to get NPOV enforced, too. Would you please say something which would make the admins and editors on WP:FTN think about insuring that minority views are represented in proportion to their magnitude, without any "mainstream" obliteration of opposing views? The difficulty is in crafting that kind of thing to eliminate the quackery from homeopathy and acupuncture, and the superstition from pseudosciences like extra-sensory perception, without eliminating the plurality from cold fusion and similar less medical and more reputable scientific controversies. I apologize if this is a difficult sort of request to fulfill, but I honestly think it would be the kind of thing you could do with a few sentences saying that you do intend to set policy in your capacity as interpreting constitutional policy issues. NPOV is one very important pillar. GetLinkPrimitiveParams (talk) 20:41, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Unfortunately, perhaps, I think that right now we are in general achieving an appropriate balance. I think we're already extremely generous on cold fusion to an area that, to be frank about my personal opinion, is equally as reputable as homeopathy and acupuncture, and only maginally better than extra-sensory perception. But I am not an expert in any of those areas. What I would recommend here is that Pcarbonn recruit independent Wikipedians of known high quality to look at the specific statements in question from 2004 report to see if they should be included. NPOV does not imply that we should treat quackery as if it is the same thing as established science.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 20:57, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

The problem here, I think, is that there is confusion between "Deemed unlikely to be correct because it's a minority viewpoint" and "it's a minority viewpoint because it's unlikely to be correct". The fact that most, if not all, minority viewpoints have marginal coverage isn't because there is a conspiracy to suppress them but because they have, in general, either been demonstrated to be almost certainly wrong or are vanishingly unlikely to be correct because they contradict well-supported knowledge.

Neutral coverage of those topics will necessarily tend to portray them as marginal because they are marginal in their relevant field— no matter how passionate their supporters may be. Sometimes, a cigar is just a cigar, and a conjecture is rejected by the "mainstream" simply because it is wrong, not just because it goes counter the current assumptions. We can (and, indeed, should) cover the existence of those conjectures; but it would be very much not neutral to elevate them above the status they genuinely have. — Coren ^(talk) 22:48, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Jimmy's bio in wiki

Sorry, but can someone go to sort out the edits on Jimmys bio page, dates of birth have been changed

thanks Chaosdruid (talk) 21:35, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

Um, I believe that August 7th is his correct birth date instead of August 8th. Sources say so, and so does pretty much every revision of his userpage that I managed to look at. Nevermind, apparently they were changed from August 7th to August 8th by somebody. Later it was brought up on the talk page, and it's since been changed back. So...  Done UntilItSleeps PublicPC 16:25, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Obama's presidency

Dear Jimbo,

It strikes me that this new, tech-savvy government might be willing to release a lot of things to Wikipedia if we simply ask, e.g. videos and such.

Is there any chance you could liase with them to arrange for files and such to be sent our way, for instance, Obama's weekly internet videos? Obviously, we'd need to set appropriate boundaries, but I think there's a lot of stuff that it'd be wonderful to access. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:28, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Thank you,

Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 12:11, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I think {{PD-USGov}} and {{PD-USGov-POTUS}} would cover nearly anything Obama could possibly release. MBisanz ^talk 13:52, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

True, but it might be nice to get those files without having to rip them off YouTube. And btw, Obama did CC-3.0 most stuff anyway, so it's not a problem even in cases where those PD tags don't apply... SoWhy 14:00, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Query for anyone who might be reading this page: Why isn't the transition team images not in the PD? NuclearWarfare _(Talk) 22:54, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I've been talking to some people in the transition team, and they're all very savvy to these kinds of things. As soon as a CTO is named, I will try to get a meeting or phone call with him or her, and will mention this.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 16:19, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Fantastic! Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 16:38, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Popularity of Wikipedia

Hi Jimmy - I saw you called Wikipedia the "4th most popular website in the world". I've always consulted Alexa for global rankings, and the highest I've ever seen us is 7th (but usually 8th). Which site do you use for global rankings? Curious aside: we aren't ranked in Alexa's top 100 English language websites. --David Shankbone 15:31, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm guessing he's excluding search engines; strike them off the list and we're either 4th or 5th depending on the day. – iridescent 15:46, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Not sure where it started, but I've seen news reports refer to Wikipedia as 4th as well. Avruch ^T 16:20, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Alexa's numbers are very dodgy. I am basing that from ComScore. Our board member Stu got them to donate access to it for us, and he's been posting some reports on meta: Stu's comScore reports.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 16:21, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Muchas gracias - great news! I can see Alexa being unreliable, since on the Top 100 English sites "MetroFlog - Fotoblog personalizable, con la posibilidad de subir una foto diaria con guestbook" is ranked #46 and we are nowhere to be found. Thanks for the link. --David Shankbone 16:41, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I think it's ranking sites by domain, and wikipedia.org isn't an English domain due to all the other language Wikipedias. Hut 8.5 18:26, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Why I am asking Flagged Revisions to be turned on now

This nonsense would have been 100% prevented by Flagged Revisions. It could also have been prevented by protection or semi-protection, but this is a prime example of why we don't want to protect or semi-protect articles - this was a breaking news story and we want people to be able to participate (so protection is out) and even to participate in good faith for the first time ever (so semi-protection is out).

We have a tool available now that is (a) consistent with higher quality (b) will allow us to allow more people to edit it a wider range of circumstances and (c) will prevent certain times of BLP harm.

• We now have a community poll indicating approximately a 60/40 support for the future. This is a very wide margin, with 20% separation between the pro's and con's.

• The proposed configuration is significantly conservative as compared to that of the German Wikipedia, which has been successful with all articles flagged. They do, however, have an approval delay of 3 weeks at times, a figure which I regard as unacceptable. Our version should show very minimal delays (less than 1 week, hopefully a lot less) because we will only be using it on a subset of articles, the boundaries of which can be adjusted over time to manage the backlog.

• The proposal is for a time-limited test.

To the Wikimedia Foundation: per the poll of the English Wikipedia community and upon my personal recommendation, please turn on the flagged revisions feature as approved in the poll.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 23:00, 21 January 2009 (UTC)