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Wikimanía 2015; Lightbreather ArbCom case

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By Go Phightins! and Gamaliel

Wikimanía draws to a close

Wikimanía 2015 drew to a close in Mexico City, Mexico. An "annual conference celebrating Wikipedia and its sister free knowledge projects", Wikimania features remarks from some leading players from the Wikimedia Foundation as well as the free knowledge movement. Overall, most attendees "were really quite impressed with how smoothly the conference went", according to Andrew Lih, who added that in terms of food and venue it was much like a corporate conference.

WMF executive director Lila Tretikov gave a presentation entitled United in Knowledge in which she encouraged Wikimedians to "be bold, break your own rules", much to the chagrin of some attendees, who view that as a misinterpretation of WP:BOLD and WP:BRD. Lih said that although the speech was somewhat unrefined, it is difficult to communicate effectively with newbies and veterans simultaneously. "I do think Lila needs a few more of these before she gets her message calibrated and seasoned", he said. "Part of it is English as her second language, and part of it is that we have a real demanding community."

Additional reaction to the keynote speeches is in this week's Wikimanía report from Peaceray, a conference attendee.

Perhaps the biggest downside, according to Lih, was the lack of video recording; only keynote speeches were recorded, leaving attendees to do their best with limited equipment – many of them expressing outrage on the special Wikimania mailing list and Twitter at what they felt was an unconscionable oversight. Speaking to the value of video recording, Lih wrote,

Even WMF staffer Asaf Bartov expressed agreement that the lack of video recording was problematic. The issue was even raised in June, but received no reply, something Hydriz called "rather disappointing." Other posts focused on the perceived value of video when weighed against the cost. On Twitter, one tweet bemoaned, "I thought the idea of video recording sessions was that you dont [sic] have to (go) yourself."

Ultimately, some sessions were recorded in audio only, and others with smartphone video capabilities, and posted to YouTube. At this point, it is unknown who is at fault for the lack of video, but Lih says that Ivan Martinez, the event's local coordinator, told him that "hiring the hotel or local team to do it professionally would have been very expensive", so the plan was for the WMF to handle it. Unconfirmed reports are that the staffer who was supposed to be in charge of that aspect of the conference is no longer employed by WMF. The Signpost emailed Ellie Young, the WMF's conference coordinator, multiple times seeking comment on this and other aspects of the conference. We received no response.

Wikimanía attendees

However, on the mailing list, WMF storyteller Victor Grigas reported that based on his conversations with "the team doing video recordings", only certain talks would be recorded because last year it was expensive to record everything, something he emphasized was not his decision. More interestingly, he said, "All the footage that the video team is shooting will be owned (copyright) by Wikimedia Mexico per their contract, so if there are particular clips you want later, contact WMMX." WMF was unable to clarify the remarks due to multiple staff vacations. The Signpost will run a follow-up story next week.

The conference was also not without technical glitches. According to several attendees in contact with the Signpost, Internet service was down for upwards of 20 minutes at one point. "[T]here seemed to be a major hiccup each day ... but otherwise I'd say it was pretty solid. Compared to other Wikimanias, I'd rate it very good. But all you need is one 20 minute stretch, at a critical time, to ruin your day", Lih said. Other attendees complained that the Internet was slow; a Phabricator ticket indicates at least one problem was rectified.

Other conference highlights included Jimmy Wales' speech, which focused on issues of Internet freedom and noted that of 234 governmental requests to remove content from Wikipedia, none were granted. Wales also gave away the bride at a wedding of two Israeli Wikipedians at the conference, Darya and Avner Kantor, whose love story was featured on the WMF blog earlier this year.

As Wikimania 2015 draws to a close, attention turns to the 2016 iteration of the conference, slated to be held in Esino Lario, Italy. Although there are serious questions as to whether infrastructure available in the small Lombardy town is conducive to a large conference such as Wikimania (see previous Signpost coverage), at the site presentation in Mexico City, Iolanda Pensa (Iopensa), the lead organizer for the conference, answered the question "Why Esino Lario?" simply by saying "Because we can."

Lightbreather Arbitration case

Even before it closed on July 17, the Arbitration case involving Lightbreather attracted widespread comment. Lightbreather herself posted a banner on her userpage on July 1 declaring "Retired due to sexual harassment", only returning two weeks later to make edits to the talk page of the proposed decision.

The language in one of the proposed principles attracted widespread comment. Regarding the inability of the community and the Committee to effectively address serious cases of harassment, the principle suggested that victims should consider "lowering their profile until the threat is past". This prompted objections on- and off-wiki. SlimVirgin wrote that the proposed decision supports the idea that "women who are being baited are expected to keep quiet or stop editing". A number of the Arbitrators agreed. One of them, Euryalus, wrote "I opposed the reference to people being advised to keep quiet and lower their profile of harassed, for precisely the reason you outline - it tells people to let the harassers win. What we should be telling people is to make a fuss about harassment through the right channels, and for those channels to work well enough that the harassment gets dealt with." The offending language was removed by Roger Davies on July 13 "in an endeavour to achieve consensus".

Despite this, the final decision, which included a site-ban for Lightbreather, was still controversial on-wiki and attracted comment offsite. Brianna Wu, a game developer who has been the victim of significant harassment herself, tweeted: "The whole case is shameful. She asked Wiki to take action against sexual harassers, they didn't. They ban her, no punishment for harassers." On User talk:Jimbo Wales, Robert McClenon placed the blame on the Wikimedia Foundation, not on the Arbitration Committee: "My opinion is that the WMF has not done enough. Off-wiki harassment of Wikipedia editors is an existential threat to the neutrality of Wikipedia...Off-wiki harassment is a threat both to the neutrality of Wikipedia and the editors of Wikipedia." CorporateM began an RFC asking whether or not Wikipedia should have "a sexual harassment policy or a part of the harassment policy focused on sexual harassment."

Coverage of the case itself will appear in next week's Arbitration Report.

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Layout issue
A screenshot showing text layout issues
Resident Mario has been upgrading our templates and we're all getting used to them. We'll try to fix it ASAP. Gamaliel (talk) 23:32, 23 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
 Rich Farmbrough: What is your platform and web browser. ResMar 00:27, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
For the next few days it's Windows (Microsoft version, not X-Windows) and Palemoon. I use the traditional skin (monobook?). All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 00:58, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
The issue is the width budget. The tools take 10%, the excessive left margin on Signpost takes another 10%. the Wikimania logo takes 30%. The first Lih quote takes 20%. The text of the article has a reasonable 30% left, but the extra column margins for the huge quote signs and layout reduce the actual text to 15% of the screen width. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 01:05, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
 Rich Farmbrough: There shouldn't be an issue with the width budget, because the last two items you mentioned—the Wikimania logo and the Lih quote—do not, or are not meant to, stack horizontally. Content is split between two columns that don't interact with one another until necessary, at which point the two columns simply merge into one another. Visually the issue to me appears to be that the quote is taking up a slice of the column it is in, instead of the full width of the column. Does the rest of the text in that column come through without problems? Is the quote indeed taking up less space than it was allotted, or is the entire text column that narrow?
Perhaps this is an issue with the browser itself? ResMar 03:49, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Signpost-layout-july-2105-1
It's substantially the same in Firefox. I have looked in I.E., Cometbird, Opera and Safari. They all have issues at various sizes of window, or various zoom factors. For images see my upload stream on Commons. Only on the modern Firefox browsers can I get this exact problem, it's not clear if it's a browser bug (I haven't looked at the HTML) or if it's due to the vertical proximity of the first pull-quote with the end of the image. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 14:50, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
 Rich Farmbrough: Ah, I think I see now what the issue is. Content in the right column is aligned via float, and if two items try to appear in the same space it appears that the browser wants to send one left instead of below. That results in a double stack of content, which messes up everything thereafter. The issue should be fixed now with the insertion of a {{clear}} between the two items to force them to stay apart. ResMar 15:25, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Did that fix the issue? If so I can add this into the templamentation to permafix it. ResMar 15:25, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Yes it's fixed. Funnily my first instinct was to stick a {{Clear}} in the page. But this way it's fixed for the future too. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:08, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
  • There has been bad characterisation of the Light Breather case, which is a shame. The committee can and does take into account off-wiki actions, however it's writ does not run outside en:wp. It is quite clear that Light Breather's ban was based on their behaviour, and was not out of the ordinary, even if there may have been other solutions which could have been implemented back at the GGTF case, and made this ban moot.
  • It's also clear that this case is another opportunity for those seeking off-wiki publicity to ride the "Wikipedians are evil" bandwagon - there are however "no wheels on this wagon".
  • As to off-wiki harassment, I haven't followed the drama, but if there is no clear connection between the accused editor and the off-wiki harasser, it would be very wrong to take peremptory action on-wiki. Instead we should be providing technical help and moral support, where we can. Dealing with the perpetrator is a matter for ISPs and if necessary law enforcement.
  • All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 00:08, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
  • Patricio Lorente most certainly does not "represent Wikimedia Argentina" on the Board of Trustees, any more than Alice Wiegand represents Wikimedia Deutschland, or María Sefidari represented Wikimedia España. Once on the board, even if selected by Wikimedia affiliates, their only duty is to act in the best interests of the Foundation and the movement. I thought it worth pointing out explicitly rather than directly editing the story, but I encourage the editors to explicitly correct this. Ijon (talk) 01:18, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Geez. This year for the ArbCom is something else, isn't it? So much controversy from the Committee than usual it seems. Then again, I've been paying extreme attention to them since the beginning of the year. But still. GamerPro64 02:07, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
    • Arbitration cases are like sausages. Once you know what goes into them you want as little to do with them as possible. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 16:09, 24 July 2015 (UTC).[reply]
  • About the value (and lack of) video recording at Wikimania 2015, there was a decision to forgo much video because of the expense of renting video equipment & retaining videographers, & the cost of preparing it for upload to Commons. However, I think that we have reached an age where good quality video can be obtained from smart phones. Witness the independent film Tangerine that was shot on iPhone 5s phones. I think that all that remains to work out tripods & audio (either a plug in microphone or a Bluetooth or wired feed from the mixing board if a sound system is used). I going to give a shout-out to Harej & Kirill Lokshin to connect me with someone who might be interested in working with this for the upcoming WikiConference USA 2015. Peaceray (talk) 16:49, 24 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Speaking of Tangerine, it could be useful viewing for people interested in working on the conflicts surrounding womens' issues here. We could show this film to prospective female editors so they realize we're serious about free speech, no "drama", and being an encyclopedia *anyone* can edit, just to let the female editors know what kind of atmosphere they're walking into, then do an A-B study to see if it improves our retention rate ... I laughed and laughed after watching it last night, told my date "it's just like Wikipedia!!" (Luckily, the film was being shown in a "safe space," just down the block from the FBI building. :) --Djembayz (talk) 12:56, 25 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • I didn't realise that Wikimanía wasn't being videoed in full. As someone who has neither the budget nor the mental health to travel to Wikimania events (indeed my mental health meant I couldn't make it last year, when it was my own city!). We should definitely do everything we can to ensure every single session is videoed in future; even if only on a smartphone. — OwenBlacker (Talk) 13:49, 25 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • On the topic of harassment in general:
    1. I did not follow this specific case, so I am speaking in general terms.
    2. Innocent people should not be harrassed. It's unjust, unfair, and should not be condoned.
    3. Some people (think of any recent public figure or someone in your office/church/neighborhood who has "fallen from grace" due in large part to their own behavior) are not entirely innocent - their past or present behavior practically begged for others to privately or publicly chastise them on or off-wiki. Sometimes this chasetisement goes over the top and crosses the line to become harrassment, but until it crosses that line, the "victim" should look inside himself rather than complain about being harrassed.
    4. I am one of those whose on- and off-Wiki behavior has earned me righteous chastisement as well as some over-the-top harrassment from both the Wikipedia community and outside of it.[1]
    davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 22:51, 25 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
  • Actually, davidwr, it isn't a question of whether you have done something wrong. Nobody should be harassed.
As per earlier remarks:
It is time to lay to rest the idea that people deserve to be harassed, because they are:
  • obnoxious in their interactions with others
  • committing infractions of our immense, complicated set of rules
  • not writing enough featured articles
  • not cool enough to be a part of the website
  • not technical enough to understand that it's just the Internet and insults don't count
  • editing from an IP address
  • a member of a group of people whose characteristics somebody doesn't like
  • [or some other excuse here].
It is time to implement a policy that everyone volunteering here deserves respect, with no exceptions, and everyone volunteering here, with no exceptions, will be required to actively show respect to others. --Djembayz (talk) 04:04, 27 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@Djembayz: Actually, the first item you list, "obnoxious in their interactions with others," when chronic, is something that a user should be reminded not to do, then if it persists, he should be given stern warnings and, if necessary, brought to the attention of administrators. The obnoxious user is likely to perceive some or all of these steps as harassment. Whether other editors' responses to his obnoxious behavior cross the line to harassment is up to the community to judge. For example: putting a single warning on an obnoxious user's talk page is clearly not harassment (in fact, to the extent that it educates the user, it is kinder and more respectful to the user than doing nothing), putting 5 warnings for 5 different instances of obnoxious behavior that occurred in a short period of time but before the first warning is placed is borderline but WP:AGF probably applies, putting 50 warnings for 50 different cases of recent obnoxious behavior that all happened before putting up the first warning is clearly crossing the line and is harassment. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 04:19, 27 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@Davidwr:Agreed, it is important to set out clear standards, so that reasonable and appropriate discipline does not become unreasonable chastisement, verbal abuse, or repetitious harassment. --Djembayz (talk) 04:30, 27 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]
@Djembayz: There's also the issue of confusion over vocabulary: In your most recent message above, you treat chastisement as a bad thing. The word can also be used as a near-synonym for reprimand or admonishment, which when used properly are not bad things. davidwr/(talk)/(contribs) 04:45, 27 July 2015 (UTC)[reply]


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