QUOTE(dogbiscuit @ Thu 5th January 2012, 1:09am)
QUOTE(mnemonic @ Thu 5th January 2012, 5:29am)
QUOTE(Cla68 @ Wed 4th January 2012, 9:11pm)
Anyway, since this thread is about Mr. Godwin, I'd like to ask him something...why did you get involved in the David Gerard/ArbCom flap? There seemed to be several problems with the way you handled it:
1. You said that you weren't acting in your official capacity, but you implied legal implications in your communications with ArbCom members.
2. WP editors get wronged, or think they are wronged, by WP's administration all the time. Why did you jump in on David Gerard's behalf, of all people?
3. The WMF is always saying that it will stay out of WP's administration, but your intervention seemed to violate that informal edict.
Also, were you surprised at the level of animosity that so many WP editors have towards David Gerard?
Welcome to WR, by the way!
In a nutshell: I didn't want David to sue Arbcom as a group or as individuals, and I believe David had a case that would survive whatever the UK equivalent of a summary-judgment motion is. Although Arbcom is not an agent of the Foundation, a successful legal attack on Arbcom could potentially lead to problems for the Foundation, so in my judgment it was best to move Arbcom and David to a better settlement and resolution of the dispute. (As I recall, David relinquished any claim to admin powers, and Arbcom retracted its public statement that David was violating privacy or other rules.)
At the same time, it was important that I make clear that I wasn't giving Arbcom orders, but strongly suggesting as someone who was *not* their supervisor or attorney that "talk to the hand" is not the optimal response to a credible legal challenge. The confusion lay in the fact that my .signature appended my title in one or more of my first messages -- when I realized that was happening, I changed my signature.
I imagine that people who aren't trained as lawyers find it hard to understand why a lawyer might seek to prevent a potentially problematic case from arising rather than focusing on how to win it (or to stay out of it), but a very great deal of my work at Wikimedia had to do with preventing cases from ever happening. If you didn't often hear about other potential cases, that is because I frequently was able to nip them earlier in the bud. (More rarely, as you may infer, it was appropriate to make potential cases public before they got off the ground, as I did with the German murderers and with the FBI.)
One of the things that we as outsiders haven't got a clear picture of is the perceptions that the WMF have of The Community. I would say that amongst the diverse membership here, one of the few things there is consensus on is that the Wikipedian community is the fundamental thing that is broken. There are many aspects of this: the basic standard of behaviour to one another, the setting up of the unknowing to be considered better than the knowing (and you must have been gnashing your teeth as a lawyer at times being told what the law was by some Internet nerd).
While publicly we can expect to see WMF being supportive of their baby, I think Sue has been speaking out in ways which shows that there is perhaps more understanding of this within the WMF than might be perceived from their actions. As Eric mentions, there are a few particularly toxic characters who set the tone, and we'd count David Gerard as one of them - a very able debater who applies his mind to supporting his own extreme agenda. The failure of WMF to take any real responsibility for the community it relies on is my biggest disappointment, which I view as being at the door of Jimbo and WMF have taken their cue from him rather than trying to bring Wikipedia back into the real world.
Is there anything you'd care to share on that?
I think it's clear to most people engaged with the Wikimedia projects, including staff, that improving diversity in the community is a good and necessary thing. I also agree that the (correct in my view) attitude that Argument From Authority is a fallacy is too often interpreted as an excuse to discount a contribution from a (self-identified but presumptively honest) expert. As for being told what the law is by Internet nerds, I have enjoyed the frequent declarations on WR that I'm incompetent, that I've gotten the law wrong, etc. I'd take such criticisms more seriously if they were coming from colleagues, which I suppose indicates that, speaking personally, I'm one of those people who does value expert opinion over amateur opinion.
Still, amateurs can contribute a lot. (Amateur astronomers, for example, have done great work over the years.) So, I don't discount something merely because it comes from an amateur. So, striking the right balances to ensure that there is enough content to make an encyclopedia relevant is a hard problem. (One meme I've been successful in promoting is that Wikipedia should be a fine place to start researching a subject, but it will generally be a bad place to *start and end* your research.) I do understand and sympathize with some people who are unhappy about this or that aspect of Wikipedia. I also think it's worth keeping in mind that most people who work for WMF really are idealistic and trying to help these projects succeed.
QUOTE(lilburne @ Thu 5th January 2012, 3:53am)
QUOTE(mnemonic @ Thu 5th January 2012, 5:29am)
as I did with the German murderers and with the FBI.)
And hence the BLPs on WP have become a cesspit of sleeze, an accumulation of any bit of reported gossip, true or otherwise, permanently attached to the record of anyone deemed notable by some bizarre standard, and not only the reported gossip about the subject, but also gossip about their friends and family too.
Truly an achievement to be proud of.
I'm not sure why you use the word "hence" here. BLPs predate my tenure at WMF. The work I did in shutting down the German murderers' lawsuits against WMF and the chapters didn't promote inaccuracy -- instead, that work ensured greater accuracy. As for the FBI, I don't see a connection between the FBI Seal complaint and BLPs.