Birgitte SB wrote: > > > --- On Fri, 12/12/08, Florence Devouard <[email protected]> wrote: > >> From: Florence Devouard <[email protected]> >> Subject: [Foundation-l] and what if... >> To: [email protected] >> Date: Friday, December 12, 2008, 4:52 AM >> I can not help reflect further on the whole Virgin Killer >> story. >> >> Whilst I am very happy of the final outcome, and thank >> David Gerard and >> WMF for having handled that very well, I feel also a big >> disatisfied by >> the way we acknowledged what happen and discuss future >> steps. >> >> We all perfectly know that if this particular image was >> borderline, >> there are images or texts that are illegal in certain >> countries. I am >> not even speaking of China here, but good old westernish >> countries. >> In some countries, it may be sexually-oriented picts. In >> others, it may >> be violence. In others yet, some texts we host are >> forbidden. I am not >> going to cite any examples publicly ;-) >> >> Until now, we have blinded ourselves in claiming that >> * we do not really need to respect local countries law. We >> respect by >> default the law of the country where projects are hosted >> (USA) >> * if a country is not happy with some of the content, they >> can bring the >> affair in front of a local tribunal. Then it will have to >> go in front of >> an international tribunal. This will last 5 years at least. >> Good for us. >> * if a legal decision forbid us to show a certain article >> or a certain >> image, we'll implement a system to block showing the >> images or text in a >> certain country. >> >> And that was it ! >> >> Now, the fact is that we see that other mecanisms can work >> much better >> than the legal route. It is sufficient that a Foundation, >> privately >> funded by ISP, establish a black list, for the image/text >> to be not >> accessible. And on top of that, in a few hours, for most of >> the citizens >> of this country to be blocked from editing. >> >> Now, seriously, what is more important right now ? >> That citizens can not read one article ? >> Or that all the citizens of a country can not edit all >> articles any more ? >> >> I would argue that the content of Wikipedia can be copied >> and >> distributed by anyone, so preventing reading our site is >> not such a bid >> deal. >> However, editing can only be done on our site, so the >> impact of blocking >> in editing is quite dramatic. >> >> My point is not to bend on local laws at all. >> But I'd like to see people change their minds about the >> traditional >> route we used to think we could be blocked in >> "democratic" countries >> (legal route, with local then international tribunal). >> And I'd like to see people think about the "worst >> cases", and then work >> on how to decrease the impact (or prevent entirely) these >> worst cases. >> Scenario planning in short. >> >> If tomorrow, a really illegal-in-UK image is reported to >> the IWF, they >> will block it for real. And they will block again editing. >> Is that a >> concern ? Can it happen again ? What's the risk of it >> happening again ? >> If it does, what do we do ? Which discussions should we >> start to avoid >> the entire edit-blocking again ? >> >> And... beyond UK, what do we know about the >> censorship-systems the >> countries are setting into place ? I understood that >> Australia was >> setting up the same system than UK, but that France was >> rather thinking >> of other system. Should not we get to know and understand >> better what >> governments are planning ? Should we try to lobby them to >> adopt certains >> choices or not ? Should we help them adopt wise practices ? >> >> Or should we just wait to see what's next ? >> >> Ant > > > I am strongly against collaborating with Westernish governments to help make > their censorship more effective. I personally don't think we should help > anyone make their censorship more effective. But if we are to decide we > would rather have citizens under censorship able to participate with > censorship rather than not participate at all, we should not discriminate > with which governments we are willing to help. > > Personally I don't get censorship, nor the complacency Europeans generally > have about living under it. I don't get it but I can recognize that many > other people see it differently and may want to support censorship. But we > can't pick and choose which government's censorship we will support. This is > an international organization and nothing in mission expresses support for > western mores over others. Selectively helping some governments censor would > be a disastrous move for WMF to make. > > Birgitte SB
Hello I did not mean to suggest we should collaborate with whatever government. I meant that we could maybe learnt from what happenned and think about scenarios for different futures, and prepare ourselves for these different futures. Ant _______________________________________________ foundation-l mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
