Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2019-06-30/Discussion report

Several hours before this was published, ArbCom sent out an open letter to the board. --Yair rand (talk) 16:41, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Good job, Bri. It must have been very challenging to write a column-length summary of this complex and voluminous crisis. It has been so polarizing that I was unsure whether an objective synopsis was possible but I think this was well-done for the limited amount of space that the Signpost allows. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 16:46, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Thanks, it was challenging, and I tried to limit my involvement in the discussions to remain objective. Even so, the issue left out many important late breaking discussions, not the least of which surrounds the WMF Executive Director's comments on Twitter and her first ENWP edit since 2016.

Readers should know that any column is not really just the creation of the author with the byline; there is much back-and-forth at the Signpost Newsroom and elsewhere, including offline guidance from the Editor in Chief for which I'm very grateful. I'm sure the next issue will have important followup. ☆ Bri (talk) 16:59, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• "A bureaucrat recall motion against WJBscribe was initiated on 26 June"? Why the passive voice? Who initiated it? Someone from the WMF? Another 'crat? A well-respected veteran editor? An SPA and/or troll? --Guy Macon (talk) 17:52, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  This appears to be the "bureaucrat recall motion", though I'm sure Bri can clarify, since they wrote that part. I agree it is a bit confusing to call it a "motion", since it gives it a bit more formality akin to Arbcom's motions (and one could assume it was Arbcom discussing the motion, as I initially did when I was reading it). I think adding a link to the archived discussion and a rewording from "motion" to "request" would be appropriate, especially since that was the actual discussion's section header. Retro (talk | contribs) 12:48, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

  (Pinging Guy Macon) Retro (talk | contribs) 12:50, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

  There was an overwhelming "Oppose recall" consensus (a consensus which would have been much larger had it not been closed after 8 hours) and the resignation that followed specifically says "and irrespective of the 'recall' discussion started above". I say we should remove this small part of the discussion report as being irrelevant. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:45, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

  @Guy Macon: Since a consensus which would have been much larger is entirely a hypothetical, and discussions like this can easily shift one way or the other, I don't think anything definitive can really be said there. I do agree that mentioning the crat recall discussion may be undue weight and suggest a causal line that is not as clear as the actual reality of the situation. Retro (talk | contribs) 15:25, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• The losses we have incurred in this incident are very serious. I do not want to say that they outweigh the cost of having taken no action, because that is far from clear, but it would certainly be a reasonable position to hold.

What, then, are the issues of concern?

Independence of the community

The Foundation was created, as much as anything, to be an entity to count beans, and protect the community from legal issues. It has grown into a behemoth, which has huge agendas of its own. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but the repeated failure to respect the community is a crying shame. Every time it happens we get promises to do better in future, which presumably works, until next time that it doesn't.

Hostile environment

There is no doubt that there have been many issues in the community which have been dealt with poorly. And certainly Fram is one of those - there are others that have not even appeared on the radar. Because of the timescales of some of these issues it is tempting to "let sleeping dogs lie" - certainly something I have tended to prefer. It's important though that we are prepared to put the work into resolving these difficult issues. One of my complaints in the past has been that we have preferred to ban one or the other party, and move on. This can contribute to the hostile environment rather than resolve it.

Way forward

1. Fairly clearly we should return to the Status quo.

2. The community and the Foundation need to negotiate a way forward for future issues. This could include, for example, Foundation input to community processes, in the form of evidence, or providing tools to analyse data, training or funding for clerical work to compile and analyse the mountains of evidence that come to ANI or ArbCom.

3. Last and least, but still importantly, make some progress with the case that triggered this.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 19:01, 30 June 2019 (UTC).

• I find reprehensible the use of the word "safety" by Raystorm and women like her. I have come to learn that many women continually reassess how emotionally-stable, socially-connected, and physically safe they feel. Sadly, some women wrap up their feelings about the former two into the all-inclusive language of the latter, which is a mistake. I don't use language that impugns others for the discomforts I and everyone else feel. I would recommend to all women that when they don't feel comfortable with the tone of a discussion, that they eschew claims that they don't feel safe, as if someone has put a gun to their heads. Describing your unhappiness with conversations and disagreements as feeling "not safe" serves to silence and punish the majority of us who are trying to reason out a solution, while also discrediting the word of all women about matters of safety. Chris Troutman (talk) 20:18, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  I find the comparison to GamerGate more worrying owing to the association of that issue with virulent sexism. The sex of Fram and whoever they interacted with had never been mentioned up to that point, and even now the consensus seems to be that sexism is not a factor here, being a red herring at best. Throwing out unsubstantiated and gratuitous claims of sexism only serves to help discredit people who're legitimately suffering due to it, whether on Wikipedia or anywhere else. #MeToo is good if the accusations are accurate. It's an albatross if it's used in a manner approaching reductio ad Nazium. —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 21:35, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  As far as that goes, I believe it reflects off-wiki stuff that targeted a single user as the sole alleged complainant (which we now know not to be true, as there were multiple complaints). So the link to examples of virulent sexism perhaps was less about what Fram did, but rather what others who support Fram did. And those folks are not helping their own position, let alone anything else. Montanabw^(talk) 22:01, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

  I would characterise the off-wiki people as less "pro-Fram" and more "anti-everyone-who-currently-edits-Wikipedia-and-the-WMF". —A little blue Bori v^_^v ^Bori! 22:19, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• Nice work on the overview of the case, Bri. Kudos Montanabw^(talk) 20:40, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• On Pharoah of the Wizards’ initial post to BN, the article makes it sound like they were acting in some sort of official capacity or had some advanced knowledge but presumably they just had Fram’s user page on their watchlist, saw the block and then opened up a discussion. Pawnkingthree (talk) 23:55, 30 June 2019 (UTC)

• @Bri: - disappointed that the summary that I and others have contributed to at WP:FRAMSUM was not offered a link at the bottom. Early on, when I was the sole contributor, I had said that I was happy to share my work. starship.paint (talk) 02:36, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• If you look at the article history, you will find it in earlier incarnations. I and my editors were attempting to balance many competing imperatives. Sorry you were not pleased with the final product. ☆ Bri (talk) 02:44, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• @Bri: - I'm sure you can see that Seraphimblade's summary after 12 June 2019 ended up focusing on resignations (in proper written form), while other events ended up being covered in very brief form. starship.paint (talk) 03:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
• @Smallbones: - I see that you removed the link to the summary I contributed to [1] citing remove link to attempted outing page (no other links were removed, so it must be the summary). Where is the attempted outing? That would get me blocked, it happened once already. Please justify your comment, or publicly retract it. starship.paint (talk) 03:14, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• At the time I removed it from the article, the list had references to or links to outing of a board member and a very unfairly targeted editor. I think the outing of people in the early discussion of the Fram matter was totally shameful. Others may disagree or didn't see the links, but we never intentionally link to anything that contributes to outing. I'm not accusing you of outing, only that linking to your list would contribute to it. Smallbones_(smalltalk) 03:28, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

  @Smallbones: - acknowledged, so I'm guessing your edit summary instead meant "remove link to page that linked to attempted outing". If you agree, this matter will be settled. starship.paint (talk) 04:45, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• Fair enough Smallbones_(smalltalk) 05:46, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• Just to avoid any misunderstanding: when I said "my editors" it meant the ones editing the article I wrote. Not the possessive "my" or that anybody was reporting to me or anything like that. They weren't. ☆ Bri (talk) 03:46, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

  No misunderstanding from me. starship.paint (talk) 04:45, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• Well, heck! I'm gone for a month and I miss some real shenanigans. Thanks for the detailed article, interesting stuff. Lord Roem ~ (talk) 05:57, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
• Great job Signpost for summarizing this dispute. -Indy beetle (talk) 04:24, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
• Thanks a lot for the summary! -- Luk ^talk 09:40, 1 July 2019 (UTC)
• Nice summary.--Vulphere 15:43, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• Expanding on Rich Farmbrough's comment, for anyone doubting the side Wales is taking:

My own personal view is that drama never helps, but making it clear (through strikes/retirements) that something is unacceptable is a totally respectable and useful way to move the needle in an important way. (...) "Our best administrators are writing essays about why this is wrong, and many of them have indicated they will quit" makes a big dent. Also: "The good people protesting are not, for the most part, defending bad behavior. They are asking the WMF to consider how this action undermines our efforts to improve behavior" is helpful. – Jimbo Wales

(The bolding is mine). Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 19:45, 1 July 2019 (UTC)

• Thank you Signpost contributors for letting us know about this cluster****. WMF's "father knows best" attitude is really getting out of hand. Is it too much to ask that the community have input in the creation of a Super-ARBCOM body peopled by unelected non-Wikipedians? Come on WMF. Daß Wölf 02:32, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
• Updates: there are now statements, issued in the last few hours, from the WMF Board and from the Foundation. PamD 08:44, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

• Speaking as an editor ignorant of the internal workings of Wikipedia, this discussion is confusing and esoteric. What, specifically, did Fran do that was offensive? As Wikipedia edits are public information, why can't the offensive edits of Fran be identified? Or was his or her offense something else? Why can't the factors justifying the ban be presented in a concise and comprehensible manner? I see a lot of heat here, and little light. Is this mostly a bureaucratic power struggle? Smallchief (talk) 11:22, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

  @Smallchief: The community is clamoring precisely because it was given zero information as to what Fram did to get that year-ban. Some people (including admins) have been reading through Fram's Wikipedia contribs, and (as far as I know) nothing obvious was found that matches; however, the problem might also involve off-wiki conduct.

  There are plausible reasons for the WMF to keep the community in the dark. For instance, there has been some speculation that the ban was due to harassment, in which case giving the community a full account of what happened would expose the victim to more harassment from Fram supporters. On the other hand, some (including Fram) say the ban dropped because of Fram's criticism of the WMF, which could be true even if there was an underlying pretext.

  Pick what story you prefer between Fram getting their just punishment at the hands of a brave WMF honor-bound to silence, a political dissenter being wiki-eliminated by the secret police, or something in-between. My uneducated guess is that Fram did something bad-ish, the WMF decided to half-ban them either because it was not so bad or the evidence was shaky, and when the uproar occured the WMF decided to stonewall. (The problem is that if the WMF appears publicly to cede ground when the community is shouting at them, it encourages the community to shout louder next time, no matter how justified the shouting is in either case.)

  (Also, it's Fram, not Fran) Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 14:01, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

  • Thanks. Perhaps Fram should request that the Wikipedia Foundation publish the charges against him or her. Get it out in the open. Request full disclosure if you believe yourself innocent. Smallchief (talk) 14:08, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks User:Tigraan, a great and clarifying overview. Re User:Smallchief Fram should request that the Wikipedia Foundation publish the charges: that may be not the treshold. As Tigraan described: There are plausible reasons for the WMF to keep the community in the dark. The reasonable reason I can think of is: WMF Office explainig anything more would expose persons (those being harassed, possibly off-wiki). Not User:Fram themselves. For this same reason: WMF Office might have gagged Fram (i.e., silence Fram with threat of legal action or such) to prevent Fram publicising issues. It might be that WMF Office wants to prevent an off-wiki hounding. (todo: insert here the Maher post invoking Gamergate).

OTOH, last month dozens of enwiki admins have resigned as admin because, like: "If WMF Office does not trust enwiki admins & arbcom process, then what community we are?". -DePiep (talk) 16:52, 5 July 2019 (UTC)

Editorial Question about “Administrator Megalibrarygirl, cites her US Army experience and says it is.”

Hi Editor, or @Megalibrarygirl:,

Could you kindly share the link to where this statement comes from? I'd like to add a "citation needed" but not sure if it's appropriate to a Signpost. I am interested in understanding the reasoning of the statement and under what circumstance some of these governance approaches will fail

Thank you!

Xinbenlv (talk) 17:27, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm not able to spend the time to create a diff just now, but if you look for the word "army" in WP:Community response to the Wikimedia Foundation's ban of Fram/Archive 7, you will find it. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:10, 3 July 2019 (UTC)

Xinbenlv did you find the source that Bri pointed out? If you want to know where I was coming from, is that I was thinking of how our regulations for the unit came from up top. However, while we couldn't remove any of the up top regs, we could still add to them. So individual units had their own specific regulations, and therefore their own individual culture so to speak. Megalibrarygirl (talk) 16:15, 5 July 2019 (UTC)

This is an interesting aspect of military culture, that is, unit identity is persistent across time even though individual members are guaranteed to rotate through on a fairly short time interval – including leadership. How does identity and mission orientation relate to tradition and other intangible aspects of culture in addition to formulated policies and regulations? WPedians not familiar with this culture may be shocked to know that there is a great deal of small-unit latitude in interpreting orders, and demonstrating initiative is highly valued in the best units. Rigid uniformity across a force, though a popular stereotype, isn't really a thing. I think it's great that our perspectives on organization, leadership, and reward systems demonstrate our diverse backgrounds. MLG has offered hers, which I thank her for. ☆ Bri (talk) 18:01, 5 July 2019 (UTC)

@Megalibrarygirl:， I was able to find it, with help from @Bri:. Thank you! I think @Megalibrarygirl:'s comment makes quite good sense: an overall code of conduct plus local code of conduct. In conflict, follow the overall, just like how national-level laws vs local level laws etc. Xinbenlv (talk) 17:21, 11 July 2019 (UTC)