Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On 04/08/2012 00:44, Mike Linksvayer wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 3:38 PM, ??? wiki-l...@phizz.demon.co.uk wrote: On 03/08/2012 16:24, Mike Linksvayer wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 5:14 AM, wiki-l...@phizz.demon.co.uk wrote: The proposal was floated by Jimmy Wales on the 10th of december, 1 day after a Creative Commons Board meeting, on which he sits alongside the mother-in-law of Sergy Brin (Google), and on which sit other representatives of other internet mega-corporations that derive profit from user uploaded contents much of which is pirated, or who make money from advertising on pirate sites. I don't know what other representatives you could be referring to. You have two board members that are closely associated with or paid by Google. One of which is a development manager for YouTube I see, you mean https://creativecommons.org/board#glenn who moved on to Twitter almost a year and a half ago. Someone will update that listing appropriately. When I'm on committees and such like we swap email addresses, and contact details, and what is astonishing those contact details don't all change simple because someone has moved on elsewhere. I note that also on the board you have listed three members from the Berkman Center, and Google provides 10% of all the Corporate Funding of that organisation. Direct corporate donations to Creative Commons are I believe dominated by large companies whose interests are similarly aligned with Google. The issue here isn't that there is some smoking gun of direct corruption where people are told to do the Emperor's bidding, but that the antecedence of a SOPA boycott on wikipedia came 1 day after a CC board meeting the members of whom are Google friendly. For legitimate content creators and filesharers in the US, SOPA held no worries, for the mega corporations of the internet that derive a large part of their income from infringing content, SOPA could be seen as a problem. Both wikipedia and Creative Commons sided with the Fat Cat's against the interests of the small content creators. In the case of Wikipedia the justification for doing so was tenuous in the extreme. http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
I am afraid that is not how it feels at all. It's more like organising a giant volunteer effort to provide a market stall handing out free sweets and cakes for anyone who wants some. The stall is very popular, and many people chip in, bringing in cakes they've baked and candy they've made. And some bring in stuff they've stolen from factories and supermarkets. Then someone suggests there should be a law against handing out stolen goods, like apple pies that still have Mr. Kipling's Exceedingly Good Apple Pies written on the wrapper. At that point, the popular market stall says, We couldn't possibly continue to hand out free sweets if you pass a law like that. We'd have to shut down, because some of our sweets are stolen. And just so you know what that would feel like, we're not opening the stall today. So now you assume that everyone who baked their own cakes and brought them in is against laws that forbid stealing. And you're leveraging the goodwill these people have created to enable theft. And you're misrepresenting what the law would mean to the operation of the market stall: because all that would be required is that if you see a Mr. Kipling label on a wrapper, you don't hand that over to a visitor. And later it transpires that your market stall has come to be funded by a very large organisation that stands to profit from lax laws against theft, to the tune of tens of billions of dollars ... One clincher for me was Tim Starling's e-mail the other day, about how the community were ... let's say misinformed, to put it politely, about what SOPA would have meant for Wikipedia: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html Man, I wish this organisation had an annual budget of $2 million rather than $20 million again, like it did five or six years ago. It had ethical problems then, what with Essjay and Carolyn and so forth, but there was at least a *plausible* semblance of innocence about the effort. That has well and truly been lost. On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 3:00 AM, FT2 ft2.w...@gmail.com wrote: There's a fallacy going on here - ie a term with two subtly different meanings. The community - who are the ones ultimately making the gift do so altruistically, in the sense of not seeking *compensation*, but that's not the same as not expecting *consideration*. We do expect consideration. Attribution (CC-by-SA/GFDL) is one form of consideration. The offer of this knowledge by editors has quite specific terms that we expect to be met in return by the world at large, which is the meaning of consideration. The offer of that knowledge, and its gifting, also doesn't imply * indifference*. This is more subtle, and arises because we aren't donating our time and effort into a void. We are donating as a result of, and often to benefit, things we believe in, such as helping others or free knowledge. There is an implied expectation (by some, perhaps not by others) that it will be treated with respect and used to further humanity. This kind of expectation isn't contractual, but it's there anyway. It's the same kind of expectation that says you would probably be upset , if you spend a week trying to find something as a special gift for me, and I respond by flushing it down the toilet and saying well you gave it to me so why are you upset what I do with my property? It might be legally true, perhaps technically true, but it's certainly not socially and perhaps not morally true. We donate time, effort and sometimes money, and we are not indifferent to whether those are supporting things we believe in. We donate for free knowledge and humanity, and do so because we care about free knowledge and humanity. Sometimes we say *Look, we care about these things enough that we put this effort in, you care enough to support and appreciate us putting this effort in, so please listen when we say that something is harming the ecosystem within which that effort is placed*. That is completely ethical and appropriate; no less than a wildlife volunteer who cares for dolphins pointing out things that harm dolphins or any other ecosystem that one might care for and try to support by nurturing it over time. Very few people throw sustained effort or money into a vacuum without any care whether it grows or dies. FT2 On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 2:28 AM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: For the record, I did not endorse the SOPA blackout, and I deeply resent my work in Wikipedia being leveraged to that political end. And I deeply resent Jimbo's statements to the BBC today*, about how We gave you Wikipedia and we didn't have to, and so you might want to listen to what we have to tell you. A gift is either made altruistically, without strings attached, or it isn't. To claim selfless, altruistic purpose and then demand consideration in return for what has been given is disgusting. * http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-19104494
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
bhar...@wikimedia.org wrote: This is inserting a conspiracy theory where one does not exist. The English Wikipedia community voted on the blackout and directed it into existence, not the Foundation. We merely facilitated. The proposal was floated by Jimmy Wales on the 10th of december, 1 day after a Creative Commons Board meeting, on which he sits alongside the mother-in-law of Sergy Brin (Google), and on which sit other representatives of other internet mega-corporations that derive profit from user uploaded contents much of which is pirated, or who make money from advertising on pirate sites. On the 14th of December Creative Commons was also calling for a blackout/action over SOPA. Whether you realize it or not you were manipulated by mega-corporations to stick it to the musicians, photographers, and authors, so that said corporations could better profit from the theft of their works. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Hi, Man, what a talent for story telling! But I don't think you story represents anything close to WP. First comparing copying digital content illegally with stealing cakes is a very bad analogy. That's what the industry wants us to believe, and you falled by the trick. Then I don't think people here are misinformed as you says. You may question that the blackout was the best strategy, but there was a public debate and vote about it. Finally, I don't think there is anything unethical about fighting against SOPA. Quite the contrary IMO. Yann 2012/8/3 Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com: I am afraid that is not how it feels at all. It's more like organising a giant volunteer effort to provide a market stall handing out free sweets and cakes for anyone who wants some. The stall is very popular, and many people chip in, bringing in cakes they've baked and candy they've made. And some bring in stuff they've stolen from factories and supermarkets. Then someone suggests there should be a law against handing out stolen goods, like apple pies that still have Mr. Kipling's Exceedingly Good Apple Pies written on the wrapper. At that point, the popular market stall says, We couldn't possibly continue to hand out free sweets if you pass a law like that. We'd have to shut down, because some of our sweets are stolen. And just so you know what that would feel like, we're not opening the stall today. So now you assume that everyone who baked their own cakes and brought them in is against laws that forbid stealing. And you're leveraging the goodwill these people have created to enable theft. And you're misrepresenting what the law would mean to the operation of the market stall: because all that would be required is that if you see a Mr. Kipling label on a wrapper, you don't hand that over to a visitor. And later it transpires that your market stall has come to be funded by a very large organisation that stands to profit from lax laws against theft, to the tune of tens of billions of dollars ... One clincher for me was Tim Starling's e-mail the other day, about how the community were ... let's say misinformed, to put it politely, about what SOPA would have meant for Wikipedia: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html Man, I wish this organisation had an annual budget of $2 million rather than $20 million again, like it did five or six years ago. It had ethical problems then, what with Essjay and Carolyn and so forth, but there was at least a *plausible* semblance of innocence about the effort. That has well and truly been lost. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
(warning, tl;dr!) ** *@Andreas - *I understand your sentiment, but in a reasoning way, I find I don't agree with that assessment. For what it's worth, I edit a lot on law - one of my GAs is a Supreme Court case, numerous others worked on, it's an area I like, and I tend to read full rulings like some read science fiction or fanbooks. It doesn't mean in any way I'm expert but I read draft legislation. So I'm not dependent on any WMF writer to assist on that. NPOV works well in articles with divided views, and suggests a good approach is to characterise the issue and the divisions. In that spirit, my attempt to fairly bridge the gap and explain where I see things diverging: 1. Some bring stolen goods to the party, we can agree. In this case that means that some people breach copyright in a severe way online, which can fairly be characterised as theft if one ignores technicalities such as the minority of countries that don't make it a crime. In the vast majority we can agree it's theft in all jurisdictions. So yes, theft takes place. We can agree it's significant, though in the context of global trade and dubious factsthere's a big dispute about the impact. 2. *(Evidence: The UK govt review of copyright theft online, Hargreaves or something, I may have edited it, certainly read it, said of the various studies into online piracy that most were figures based on unproven assumptions, or plucked from the air, or something of that kind, and that not one study could be found that was actually reliable in the sense of unbiased fair and methodically rigourous conclusions)*. 3. Theft in general web-wide was never the reason or issue for the protests by Wikimedians, or the WMF's involvement. It was not at any time a purported reason why *_Wikimedians_ *objected through *_this_ *site.There was never a plausible claim that Wikimedian protest was even slightly motivated by a wish to retain the ability of other sites to continue crime. 4. As regards Wikimedia itself and its community, as far as I can tell, both have very strong views that theft (ie copyvio) should not be allowed on this site. I see no evidence that parts of the regular/established/core/active community have an agenda to improve our project's use, or ability to use, copyvio material, see no evidence anyone here tries to turn a blind eye to it. We already have community policies that set standards far higher than the law requires. 5. Is it therefore fair to characterize the objections to SOPA/PIPA as we want to do illegal things, someone wants to stop us, and we don't want that? I can't see how that's sustainable. 6. I have the impression your complaint is that Wikimedians may have protested on grounds that were (a) not well founded in that in your view, the suggested risks were inaccurate, and (b) in protesting they chose to overlook harm elsewhere which these laws could have improved. 7. I think it's fair to characterize the objections of individual users en masse and how they felt as, We don't want to do illegal things, but illegal things may be done or claimed wrongly to be done, or actions threatened on the assertion of illegality. If this law passes, that could cause some things to be shut down for bad faith reasons or mistake without recompense, or legal concerns to have a chilling effect, and we don't want that? 8. They could be correct or incorrect to have that concern. I'm looking here at what individual Wikimedians like me, supporting the protest, may have believed and felt. In other words, were Wikimedian community protesters acting from a good faith belief there was a real concern, or in bad faith to gain by pretence a means to allow crime to occur? I think the former. 9. As supporting evidence I also note that the objections were not to the basic princviple of cutting off piracy. They were to matters that would allow harm without good cause. It targeted DNS issues where the markup committee had admitted they didn't know what technical issues would arise. It targeted shut down without fair hearing, and immunity for bad faith or mistake, no matter the harm done. Those could have been fixed. In the alternative OPEN bill, they generally were. One can judge the protests' intent by the points protested about. Whether or not that concern was well-founded, it was a good faith concern by individual members of the community expressing concerns. From your complaints and descriptions, it's *not* that the projects offer things without consideration as you suggested first. We do expect and require consideration, such as attribution and license compliance in return (see above). It's *not* that we give on the basis of No strings and later make demands - see above, giving does not imply indifference and doesn't exclude the right to say we see a problem here, please don't let that problem
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 5:14 AM, wiki-l...@phizz.demon.co.uk wrote: bhar...@wikimedia.org wrote: This is inserting a conspiracy theory where one does not exist. The English Wikipedia community voted on the blackout and directed it into existence, not the Foundation. We merely facilitated. The proposal was floated by Jimmy Wales on the 10th of december, 1 day after a Creative Commons Board meeting, on which he sits alongside the mother-in-law of Sergy Brin (Google), and on which sit other representatives of other internet mega-corporations that derive profit from user uploaded contents much of which is pirated, or who make money from advertising on pirate sites. I don't know what other representatives you could be referring to. On the 14th of December Creative Commons was also calling for a blackout/action over SOPA. I wrote the December 14 post and an earlier one on the subject November 11, see http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/30836 and http://creativecommons.org/weblog/entry/30375 respectively and started the conversation inside CC about joining other blackouts in January. Nobody on the CC board prompted these things. They were notified and didn't give any pushback to CC staff AFAICT. Whether you realize it or not you were manipulated by mega-corporations to stick it to the musicians, photographers, and authors, so that said corporations could better profit from the theft of their works. It is true that I did not wear a tinfoil hat continuously throughout the period above. Mike ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Long as it's getting top-posted anyway... First, copying is not and cannot be theft. That's not to say it's always legally or ethically acceptable, mind you, but it's not theft. In legal terms, there was a court case over that particular matter, that ruled someone could not be charged on a transporting stolen goods charge for transporting pirated records. He was still convicted of criminal copyright infringement, of course, but it was ruled that pirate records are not stolen. Philosophically, if you still -have- what you claim I stole from you...that doesn't make much sense, does it? That aside, let's go back to your hypothetical food bank. What we're saying isn't Oh, we really DGAF if people (stole|infringed) stuff. Anyone who's worked on Wikipedia knows we absolutely do not tolerate copyright infringements and nuke them on sight, and on repeat offenses, we happily nuke the offenders right along with. So it's more equivalent to your food bank saying Look, when we realize the goods are stolen, we immediately return them as soon as possible, and if someone keeps bringing us stolen goods we don't allow them back. But sometimes people unwrap the apple pies and donate them to disguise what they're doing, in other cases, supermarkets happily donate some apple pies with the wrapping still on, and in yet other cases, someone's donating some apple pies they bought from the supermarket, with or without the wrapping. We do everything in our power to prevent the problem, but it would be absolutely cost prohibitive to do it 100% with the difference being that fine grained, and this law gives you the right to shut us down if we can't hit 100%. We think on balance what we do is good even if something bad occasionally slips through, so we can't support that law. And indeed, since this strikes at the core of what we do and could shut us down entirely, we must do everything in our power to fight the law, including energizing those who use our services to speak up against it. On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 5:42 AM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: I am afraid that is not how it feels at all. It's more like organising a giant volunteer effort to provide a market stall handing out free sweets and cakes for anyone who wants some. The stall is very popular, and many people chip in, bringing in cakes they've baked and candy they've made. And some bring in stuff they've stolen from factories and supermarkets. Then someone suggests there should be a law against handing out stolen goods, like apple pies that still have Mr. Kipling's Exceedingly Good Apple Pies written on the wrapper. At that point, the popular market stall says, We couldn't possibly continue to hand out free sweets if you pass a law like that. We'd have to shut down, because some of our sweets are stolen. And just so you know what that would feel like, we're not opening the stall today. So now you assume that everyone who baked their own cakes and brought them in is against laws that forbid stealing. And you're leveraging the goodwill these people have created to enable theft. And you're misrepresenting what the law would mean to the operation of the market stall: because all that would be required is that if you see a Mr. Kipling label on a wrapper, you don't hand that over to a visitor. And later it transpires that your market stall has come to be funded by a very large organisation that stands to profit from lax laws against theft, to the tune of tens of billions of dollars ... One clincher for me was Tim Starling's e-mail the other day, about how the community were ... let's say misinformed, to put it politely, about what SOPA would have meant for Wikipedia: http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html Man, I wish this organisation had an annual budget of $2 million rather than $20 million again, like it did five or six years ago. It had ethical problems then, what with Essjay and Carolyn and so forth, but there was at least a *plausible* semblance of innocence about the effort. That has well and truly been lost. On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 3:00 AM, FT2 ft2.w...@gmail.com wrote: There's a fallacy going on here - ie a term with two subtly different meanings. The community - who are the ones ultimately making the gift do so altruistically, in the sense of not seeking *compensation*, but that's not the same as not expecting *consideration*. We do expect consideration. Attribution (CC-by-SA/GFDL) is one form of consideration. The offer of this knowledge by editors has quite specific terms that we expect to be met in return by the world at large, which is the meaning of consideration. The offer of that knowledge, and its gifting, also doesn't imply * indifference*. This is more subtle, and arises because we aren't donating our time and effort into a void. We are donating as a result of, and often to benefit, things we believe in, such as helping others or free knowledge. There is an
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 6:07 PM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: My question, more directly, is: if the SOPA action from January 2012 were held in August 2012 (following the implementation of this new statement from the General Counsel's office), would it be considered a community initiative or not? The community's decision to blackout a project would not be within this guideline, but any additional WMF resources would require legal and financial review. There are strict laws in the U.S. that limit when a non-profit organization may engage in political and legislative activity, and it is the General Counsel and CFA's duty to ensure that the WMF complies with those laws. The community has procedures for determining consensus for action, and most of the time the community can implement that action without any additional resources from the WMF. -- Stephen LaPorte Legal Counsel Wikimedia Foundation ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On 3 August 2012 19:12, Michael Snow wikipe...@frontier.com wrote: I agree that the community retains the authority to reach its own decisions about future actions of this type. I think the policy should be understood primarily as something the foundation will adhere to in its operations, not something that regulates the community's autonomy. And, arguably: disabling Italian or Russian Wikipedia (which are very sizable and popular sites) did not require as much WMF coordination as disabling English Wikipedia, which remains around a third, IIRC, of our size, load and readership - that took much more serious technical consideration, and the Foundation is the relevant body. - d. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 6:00 PM, Todd Allen toddmal...@gmail.com wrote: We do everything in our power to prevent the problem, but it would be absolutely cost prohibitive to do it 100% with the difference being that fine grained, and this law gives you the right to shut us down if we can't hit 100%. We think on balance what we do is good even if something bad occasionally slips through, so we can't support that law. And indeed, since this strikes at the core of what we do and could shut us down entirely, we must do everything in our power to fight the law, including energizing those who use our services to speak up against it. That wasn't the situation though, was it? Just quoting Tim here: ---o0o--- http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html * Geoff Brigham opined otherwise, IIRC.* Yes, on the basis that Wikipedia arguably falls under the definition of an 'Internet search engine'. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/12/13/how-sopa-will-hurt-the-free-web-and-wikipedia/ The definition was: The term ‘Internet search engine’ means a service made available via the Internet that searches, crawls, categorizes, or indexes information or Web sites available elsewhere on the Internet and on the basis of a user query or selection that consists of terms, concepts, categories, questions, or other data returns to the user a means, such as a hyperlinked list of Uniform Resource Locators, of locating, viewing, or downloading such information or data available on the Internet relating to such query or selection. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr3261/text It's hard to see how Wikipedia could fall under this definition, but even if it did, what would be the consequences? A provider of an Internet search engine shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, but in any case within 5 days after being served with a copy of the order, or within such time as the court may order, designed to prevent the foreign infringing site that is subject to the order, or a portion of such site specified in the order, from being served as a direct hypertext link. Geoff argued that we would have to manually review millions of links in order to comply with such a court order. But the definition of an internet site that would be specified under such a court order is: [T]he collection of digital assets, including links, indexes, or pointers to digital assets, accessible through the Internet that are addressed relative to a common domain name or, if there is no domain name, a common Internet Protocol address. We already index external links by domain name or IP address for easy searching, and we have the ability to prevent further such links from being submitted, for the purposes of spam control. The compliance cost would be no worse than a typical [[WP:RSPAM]] report. Maybe SOPA was a serious threat to freedom of expression on the Internet, and worth fighting against, but it wasn't a threat to Wikipedia's existence. ---o0o--- So we were talking about Wikipedia – if indeed Wikipedia could legally be considered a search engine, which seems a stretch – being given five (5) days to convert any direct hyperlinks they were specifically advised of by court order into just alphanumeric, non-clickable links. No? So all the talk about If Wikipedia had had just one infringing link on it, they could have shut us down entirely looks like a bunch of scaremongering nonsense you bought. Now, who *does* operate a search engine, and would have incurred some extra costs here? ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
How come these concerns weren't brought up months ago when the reflection about the blackout was posted to meta? It seems that right now Andreas, you are the main opponent of something that already happened and no one can change. I'd just post your concerns to meta and stop this talking in circles and finger pointing. It's tiring, reads like some conspiracy theory and seems to be losing any traction of game changing that it could. I appreciate hearing your thoughts, as many of us do, I just think they are best preserved on wiki where the majority of participants in the blackout hangout (most aren't active on mailing lists) and can participate in this analysis with you. Sarah Sent from my iPhone On Aug 3, 2012, at 12:52 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 6:00 PM, Todd Allen toddmal...@gmail.com wrote: We do everything in our power to prevent the problem, but it would be absolutely cost prohibitive to do it 100% with the difference being that fine grained, and this law gives you the right to shut us down if we can't hit 100%. We think on balance what we do is good even if something bad occasionally slips through, so we can't support that law. And indeed, since this strikes at the core of what we do and could shut us down entirely, we must do everything in our power to fight the law, including energizing those who use our services to speak up against it. That wasn't the situation though, was it? Just quoting Tim here: ---o0o--- http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html * Geoff Brigham opined otherwise, IIRC.* Yes, on the basis that Wikipedia arguably falls under the definition of an 'Internet search engine'. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/12/13/how-sopa-will-hurt-the-free-web-and-wikipedia/ The definition was: The term ‘Internet search engine’ means a service made available via the Internet that searches, crawls, categorizes, or indexes information or Web sites available elsewhere on the Internet and on the basis of a user query or selection that consists of terms, concepts, categories, questions, or other data returns to the user a means, such as a hyperlinked list of Uniform Resource Locators, of locating, viewing, or downloading such information or data available on the Internet relating to such query or selection. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr3261/text It's hard to see how Wikipedia could fall under this definition, but even if it did, what would be the consequences? A provider of an Internet search engine shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, but in any case within 5 days after being served with a copy of the order, or within such time as the court may order, designed to prevent the foreign infringing site that is subject to the order, or a portion of such site specified in the order, from being served as a direct hypertext link. Geoff argued that we would have to manually review millions of links in order to comply with such a court order. But the definition of an internet site that would be specified under such a court order is: [T]he collection of digital assets, including links, indexes, or pointers to digital assets, accessible through the Internet that are addressed relative to a common domain name or, if there is no domain name, a common Internet Protocol address. We already index external links by domain name or IP address for easy searching, and we have the ability to prevent further such links from being submitted, for the purposes of spam control. The compliance cost would be no worse than a typical [[WP:RSPAM]] report. Maybe SOPA was a serious threat to freedom of expression on the Internet, and worth fighting against, but it wasn't a threat to Wikipedia's existence. ---o0o--- So we were talking about Wikipedia – if indeed Wikipedia could legally be considered a search engine, which seems a stretch – being given five (5) days to convert any direct hyperlinks they were specifically advised of by court order into just alphanumeric, non-clickable links. No? So all the talk about If Wikipedia had had just one infringing link on it, they could have shut us down entirely looks like a bunch of scaremongering nonsense you bought. Now, who *does* operate a search engine, and would have incurred some extra costs here? ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Sarah, Well, for one I was not aware that there was a reflection about the blackout posted on Meta. A link would be appreciated. Thanks. Secondly, four or five months ago I would not have been aware of various events on the timeline that preceded the blackout. Third, this is an ongoing situation, as the subject of this very thread is the proposed policy defining when and how further action like that could be taken. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Foundation_Policy_and_Political_Affiliations_Guideline Regards, On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 9:02 PM, Sarah Stierch sarah.stie...@gmail.comwrote: How come these concerns weren't brought up months ago when the reflection about the blackout was posted to meta? It seems that right now Andreas, you are the main opponent of something that already happened and no one can change. I'd just post your concerns to meta and stop this talking in circles and finger pointing. It's tiring, reads like some conspiracy theory and seems to be losing any traction of game changing that it could. I appreciate hearing your thoughts, as many of us do, I just think they are best preserved on wiki where the majority of participants in the blackout hangout (most aren't active on mailing lists) and can participate in this analysis with you. Sarah Sent from my iPhone On Aug 3, 2012, at 12:52 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 6:00 PM, Todd Allen toddmal...@gmail.com wrote: We do everything in our power to prevent the problem, but it would be absolutely cost prohibitive to do it 100% with the difference being that fine grained, and this law gives you the right to shut us down if we can't hit 100%. We think on balance what we do is good even if something bad occasionally slips through, so we can't support that law. And indeed, since this strikes at the core of what we do and could shut us down entirely, we must do everything in our power to fight the law, including energizing those who use our services to speak up against it. That wasn't the situation though, was it? Just quoting Tim here: ---o0o--- http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html * Geoff Brigham opined otherwise, IIRC.* Yes, on the basis that Wikipedia arguably falls under the definition of an 'Internet search engine'. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/12/13/how-sopa-will-hurt-the-free-web-and-wikipedia/ The definition was: The term ‘Internet search engine’ means a service made available via the Internet that searches, crawls, categorizes, or indexes information or Web sites available elsewhere on the Internet and on the basis of a user query or selection that consists of terms, concepts, categories, questions, or other data returns to the user a means, such as a hyperlinked list of Uniform Resource Locators, of locating, viewing, or downloading such information or data available on the Internet relating to such query or selection. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr3261/text It's hard to see how Wikipedia could fall under this definition, but even if it did, what would be the consequences? A provider of an Internet search engine shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, but in any case within 5 days after being served with a copy of the order, or within such time as the court may order, designed to prevent the foreign infringing site that is subject to the order, or a portion of such site specified in the order, from being served as a direct hypertext link. Geoff argued that we would have to manually review millions of links in order to comply with such a court order. But the definition of an internet site that would be specified under such a court order is: [T]he collection of digital assets, including links, indexes, or pointers to digital assets, accessible through the Internet that are addressed relative to a common domain name or, if there is no domain name, a common Internet Protocol address. We already index external links by domain name or IP address for easy searching, and we have the ability to prevent further such links from being submitted, for the purposes of spam control. The compliance cost would be no worse than a typical [[WP:RSPAM]] report. Maybe SOPA was a serious threat to freedom of expression on the Internet, and worth fighting against, but it wasn't a threat to Wikipedia's existence. ---o0o--- So we were talking about Wikipedia – if indeed Wikipedia could legally be considered a search engine, which seems a stretch – being given five (5) days to convert any direct hyperlinks they were specifically advised of by court order into just alphanumeric, non-clickable links. No? So all the talk about If Wikipedia had had just one infringing link on it, they could have shut us down entirely looks
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Hi - Actually, it looks like there are a few places where people can share their thoughts, etc. about SOPA/Blackoutness: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/English_Wikipedia_anti-SOPA_blackout and other things related but not: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Project-wide_protests https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Advocacy_agendas https://strategy.wikimedia.org/wiki/Task_force/Advocacy_Agenda (which it looks like you can get involved in!) I'm sure there are other things too. Risker said it best - let's stick on topic instead of going off on tangents. Perhaps even having a place to discuss WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guidelines is ideal. Oh wait, there is ;) http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Foundation_Policy_and_Political_Affiliations_Guideline As you just shared! Again, this is more inclusive and it can bring your concerns to a broader audience who might not be on this mailing list. Ciao! -Sarah On 8/3/12 1:17 PM, Andreas Kolbe wrote: Sarah, Well, for one I was not aware that there was a reflection about the blackout posted on Meta. A link would be appreciated. Thanks. Secondly, four or five months ago I would not have been aware of various events on the timeline that preceded the blackout. Third, this is an ongoing situation, as the subject of this very thread is the proposed policy defining when and how further action like that could be taken. http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Legal_and_Community_Advocacy/Foundation_Policy_and_Political_Affiliations_Guideline Regards, On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 9:02 PM, Sarah Stierch sarah.stie...@gmail.comwrote: How come these concerns weren't brought up months ago when the reflection about the blackout was posted to meta? It seems that right now Andreas, you are the main opponent of something that already happened and no one can change. I'd just post your concerns to meta and stop this talking in circles and finger pointing. It's tiring, reads like some conspiracy theory and seems to be losing any traction of game changing that it could. I appreciate hearing your thoughts, as many of us do, I just think they are best preserved on wiki where the majority of participants in the blackout hangout (most aren't active on mailing lists) and can participate in this analysis with you. Sarah Sent from my iPhone On Aug 3, 2012, at 12:52 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 6:00 PM, Todd Allen toddmal...@gmail.com wrote: We do everything in our power to prevent the problem, but it would be absolutely cost prohibitive to do it 100% with the difference being that fine grained, and this law gives you the right to shut us down if we can't hit 100%. We think on balance what we do is good even if something bad occasionally slips through, so we can't support that law. And indeed, since this strikes at the core of what we do and could shut us down entirely, we must do everything in our power to fight the law, including energizing those who use our services to speak up against it. That wasn't the situation though, was it? Just quoting Tim here: ---o0o--- http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2012-July/121092.html * Geoff Brigham opined otherwise, IIRC.* Yes, on the basis that Wikipedia arguably falls under the definition of an 'Internet search engine'. http://blog.wikimedia.org/2011/12/13/how-sopa-will-hurt-the-free-web-and-wikipedia/ The definition was: The term ‘Internet search engine’ means a service made available via the Internet that searches, crawls, categorizes, or indexes information or Web sites available elsewhere on the Internet and on the basis of a user query or selection that consists of terms, concepts, categories, questions, or other data returns to the user a means, such as a hyperlinked list of Uniform Resource Locators, of locating, viewing, or downloading such information or data available on the Internet relating to such query or selection. http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/112/hr3261/text It's hard to see how Wikipedia could fall under this definition, but even if it did, what would be the consequences? A provider of an Internet search engine shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, but in any case within 5 days after being served with a copy of the order, or within such time as the court may order, designed to prevent the foreign infringing site that is subject to the order, or a portion of such site specified in the order, from being served as a direct hypertext link. Geoff argued that we would have to manually review millions of links in order to comply with such a court order. But the definition of an internet site that would be specified under such a court order is: [T]he collection of digital assets, including links, indexes, or pointers to digital assets, accessible through the Internet that are addressed relative to a common
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Michael Snow writes: Perhaps worth adding, I think it's fair to say that these reviews did take place with respect to the use of Wikimedia Foundation resources in the context of the January SOPA protest. They didn't necessarily follow the form of the current policy, since it didn't exist yet, but Geoff was actively involved and I believe the staff was generally quite conscious of the limitations on what they should do in their official capacity. There's always room for honest disagreement about whether the protest was desirable or necessary, but just in terms of the process, I think things were entirely appropriately handled. I agree with Michael Snow's take on all this. I agree that the community retains the authority to reach its own decisions about future actions of this type. I think the policy should be understood primarily as something the foundation will adhere to in its operations, not something that regulates the community's autonomy. And I especially agree with this. One of the greatest strengths and protections in the Wikimedia movement, both for the community and the Foundation, is the community's autonomy. The community has the autonomy to make decisions that may include certain kinds of political action from time to time, and the Foundation is able to function within its legal constraints because community members are not (for the most part) agents or employees of the Foundation. I think Geoff and his team are doing an excellent job at further developing and strengthening appropriate legal protections for the Foundation while preserving the community's ability to act independently, including (what I hope will mostly be unnecessary) the ability to act and speak out politically. --Mike ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Stephen LaPorte wrote: On Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 6:07 PM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: My question, more directly, is: if the SOPA action from January 2012 were held in August 2012 (following the implementation of this new statement from the General Counsel's office), would it be considered a community initiative or not? The community's decision to blackout a project would not be within this guideline, but any additional WMF resources would require legal and financial review. There are strict laws in the U.S. that limit when a non-profit organization may engage in political and legislative activity, and it is the General Counsel and CFA's duty to ensure that the WMF complies with those laws. The community has procedures for determining consensus for action, and most of the time the community can implement that action without any additional resources from the WMF. Thank you for this reply. It was helpful. There's still a disconnect for me between what's being said on this mailing list and on the Meta-Wiki talk page and what's being written in this new statement. What I'm hearing being said is that this _internal_ policy is mostly a guide for legal reasons to avoid trouble for the Wikimedia Foundation, its employees, and its non-profit status under U.S. law. If so, wouldn't the policy mostly be a matter of ask the General Counsel's office whether involvement in a particular action would be legally problematic? This policy seems to extend far beyond what _can_ the Wikimedia Foundation legally involve itself in? and by requiring Board approval and community approval (sometimes), seems to be a policy about what _should_ the Wikimedia Foundation be involving itself in. Is this accurate? This is where I see the disconnect. If it's simply a matter of keeping Wikimedia out of trouble with the IRS, there are simple legal tests that have no relevance as to whether there's Board approval or community approval or the approval of the Head of Communications or anything of that nature, right? Why are there so many various levels and steps if it's not a determination about principles and about whether a particular cause meets Wikimedia's mission? This is what's confusing me. People on the talk page at Meta-Wiki have seemed to suggest that you would _want_ this type of policy to cover administrator actions as administrators are often unelected and hold lifetime appointments. It's completely possible that it's just me, but something still isn't adding up in my head when I consider this policy and what exactly it covers and does not cover. MZMcBride ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 3:38 PM, ??? wiki-l...@phizz.demon.co.uk wrote: On 03/08/2012 16:24, Mike Linksvayer wrote: On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 5:14 AM, wiki-l...@phizz.demon.co.uk wrote: The proposal was floated by Jimmy Wales on the 10th of december, 1 day after a Creative Commons Board meeting, on which he sits alongside the mother-in-law of Sergy Brin (Google), and on which sit other representatives of other internet mega-corporations that derive profit from user uploaded contents much of which is pirated, or who make money from advertising on pirate sites. I don't know what other representatives you could be referring to. You have two board members that are closely associated with or paid by Google. One of which is a development manager for YouTube I see, you mean https://creativecommons.org/board#glenn who moved on to Twitter almost a year and a half ago. Someone will update that listing appropriately. Mike ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 11:12 PM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: Why are there so many various levels and steps if it's not a determination about principles and about whether a particular cause meets Wikimedia's mission? This is what's confusing me. People on the talk page at Meta-Wiki have seemed to suggest that you would _want_ this type of policy to cover administrator actions as administrators are often unelected and hold lifetime appointments. It's completely possible that it's just me, but something still isn't adding up in my head when I consider this policy and what exactly it covers and does not cover. I'd suggest what you're struggling with may be the impression that someone very much *wants* Wikimedia or Wikipedia to lobby for political causes. I wouldn't even be surprised if the idea that Wikimedia should have a community advocacy department was suggested by some of Wikimedia's partners and sponsors. Basically, Wikipedia has enough traffic to be a top-ten website. So if Wikipedia says or does something, it's noticed by a heck of a lot of people. The job of the Advocacy Advisory Group seems to be to make sure that the community says the right thing. Several of the six decision types listed on the proposed policy page, e.g. Collaborative Advocacy (collaborating with another organization to take action on a particular policy or political question) and Limited Trademark Endorsement (permitting another organization to use the Wikimedia name and trademark to promote a policy or political cause), require neither board input nor wider community input, just consultation of the AAG. As I said on the proposed policy's talk page, that Advocacy Advisory Group is an odd thing. On the one hand, the proposed policy insists the AAG is a community organ, implying it is not under the Foundation's control. On the other hand, though, the proposed policy says the group is managed by the Legal and Community Advocacy Department, which is part of the Foundation. So what does that mean? And who is in this group? Its name is hyperlinked to yet another mailing list: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/advocacy_advisors ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
Andreas makes a really important point below. Now that I read it from his perspective, it seems like what we're dealing with here is a surreptitious attempt by the General Counsel to hijack the Wikimedia Foundation and its projects to serve their covert corporate masters. Obviously the Bilderberg Group, using Google as its tool, has subverted the movement for its own aim of global domination. On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 10:00 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: I'd suggest what you're struggling with may be the impression that someone very much *wants* Wikimedia or Wikipedia to lobby for political causes. I wouldn't even be surprised if the idea that Wikimedia should have a community advocacy department was suggested by some of Wikimedia's partners and sponsors. Basically, Wikipedia has enough traffic to be a top-ten website. So if Wikipedia says or does something, it's noticed by a heck of a lot of people. The job of the Advocacy Advisory Group seems to be to make sure that the community says the right thing. Several of the six decision types listed on the proposed policy page, e.g. Collaborative Advocacy (collaborating with another organization to take action on a particular policy or political question) and Limited Trademark Endorsement (permitting another organization to use the Wikimedia name and trademark to promote a policy or political cause), require neither board input nor wider community input, just consultation of the AAG. As I said on the proposed policy's talk page, that Advocacy Advisory Group is an odd thing. On the one hand, the proposed policy insists the AAG is a community organ, implying it is not under the Foundation's control. On the other hand, though, the proposed policy says the group is managed by the Legal and Community Advocacy Department, which is part of the Foundation. So what does that mean? And who is in this group? Its name is hyperlinked to yet another mailing list: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/advocacy_advisors ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On 3 August 2012 22:00, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: lots of stuff Andreas, I'm sorry, but you've been involved in Wikimedia projects for quite a while now. What in heaven's name would ever give you the idea that the WMF could possibly get itself organized enough to co-ordinate something like this with Google? Now, could you please get back to the subject, which is how the WMF should handle third party requests to participate in advocacy, and drop this whole Google/SOPA thing, or at least take it off this list? Risker/Anne ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 12:52 AM, Brandon Harris bhar...@wikimedia.orgwrote: This is inserting a conspiracy theory where one does not exist. The English Wikipedia community voted on the blackout and directed it into existence, not the Foundation. We merely facilitated. Yeah, and I remember how users were directed (by WMF staff, wasn't it?) to stop marking votes by single-purpose accounts and IPs, as is common in every other minor community discussion in the English Wikipedia. SPA and IP votes are routinely discounted in garden-variety AfDs. But they counted in the blackout vote. It's a fact, and quite unprecedented. Why? And the timeline of the Italian blackout in October, the half-a-million-dollar Google donation in November, the first Wikimedia endorsement of the Google position, also in November, and the subsequent SOPA blackout in January, are what they are. Politicians may protest, Oh, my lobbying for Mr Rich had nothing to do with the $500,000 they gave me at about the time I started lobbying for them. But people generally aren't stupid. For the record, I did not endorse the SOPA blackout, and I deeply resent my work in Wikipedia being leveraged to that political end. And I deeply resent Jimbo's statements to the BBC today*, about how We gave you Wikipedia and we didn't have to, and so you might want to listen to what we have to tell you. A gift is either made altruistically, without strings attached, or it isn't. To claim selfless, altruistic purpose and then demand consideration in return for what has been given is disgusting. * http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-19104494 On Aug 2, 2012, at 5:45 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 12:11 PM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: What type of action was the SOPA blackout in January? You mean, given the $500,000 Google donation Wikimedia received in November 2011, one month after the Italian Wikipedia's blackout, and two months before the English Wikipedia's SOPA blackout, and round about the time Wikimedia first made public statements denouncing SOPA? Good question. ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l --- Brandon Harris, Senior Designer, Wikimedia Foundation Support Free Knowledge: http://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Donate ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
There's a fallacy going on here - ie a term with two subtly different meanings. The community - who are the ones ultimately making the gift do so altruistically, in the sense of not seeking *compensation*, but that's not the same as not expecting *consideration*. We do expect consideration. Attribution (CC-by-SA/GFDL) is one form of consideration. The offer of this knowledge by editors has quite specific terms that we expect to be met in return by the world at large, which is the meaning of consideration. The offer of that knowledge, and its gifting, also doesn't imply * indifference*. This is more subtle, and arises because we aren't donating our time and effort into a void. We are donating as a result of, and often to benefit, things we believe in, such as helping others or free knowledge. There is an implied expectation (by some, perhaps not by others) that it will be treated with respect and used to further humanity. This kind of expectation isn't contractual, but it's there anyway. It's the same kind of expectation that says you would probably be upset , if you spend a week trying to find something as a special gift for me, and I respond by flushing it down the toilet and saying well you gave it to me so why are you upset what I do with my property? It might be legally true, perhaps technically true, but it's certainly not socially and perhaps not morally true. We donate time, effort and sometimes money, and we are not indifferent to whether those are supporting things we believe in. We donate for free knowledge and humanity, and do so because we care about free knowledge and humanity. Sometimes we say *Look, we care about these things enough that we put this effort in, you care enough to support and appreciate us putting this effort in, so please listen when we say that something is harming the ecosystem within which that effort is placed*. That is completely ethical and appropriate; no less than a wildlife volunteer who cares for dolphins pointing out things that harm dolphins or any other ecosystem that one might care for and try to support by nurturing it over time. Very few people throw sustained effort or money into a vacuum without any care whether it grows or dies. FT2 On Fri, Aug 3, 2012 at 2:28 AM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: For the record, I did not endorse the SOPA blackout, and I deeply resent my work in Wikipedia being leveraged to that political end. And I deeply resent Jimbo's statements to the BBC today*, about how We gave you Wikipedia and we didn't have to, and so you might want to listen to what we have to tell you. A gift is either made altruistically, without strings attached, or it isn't. To claim selfless, altruistic purpose and then demand consideration in return for what has been given is disgusting. * http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-19104494 ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On 2 August 2012 21:07, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: Brandon Harris wrote: On Aug 2, 2012, at 5:45 PM, Andreas Kolbe jayen...@gmail.com wrote: On Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 12:11 PM, MZMcBride z...@mzmcbride.com wrote: What type of action was the SOPA blackout in January? You mean, given the $500,000 Google donation Wikimedia received in November 2011, one month after the Italian Wikipedia's blackout, and two months before the English Wikipedia's SOPA blackout, and round about the time Wikimedia first made public statements denouncing SOPA? Good question. This is inserting a conspiracy theory where one does not exist. The English Wikipedia community voted on the blackout and directed it into existence, not the Foundation. We merely facilitated. To be clear, my question isn't about Google or donations or anything like that. My question, more directly, is: if the SOPA action from January 2012 were held in August 2012 (following the implementation of this new statement from the General Counsel's office), would it be considered a community initiative or not? Given that this statement was written as a response to the January 2012 SOPA blackout, it seems like a reasonable question. Philippe and others have indicated that such actions would _not_ fall under this new doctrine. Is this correct? My sense is that the statement is written as a response to the overtures that have been made to the WMF since the January 2012 SOPA blackout. Like many people outside of the WMF umbrella (and quite a few inside it, as well, based on comments we see regularly), it seems that many of these advocacy groups believe that WMF=Wikipedia. Those of us in the know understand that there's an awful lot more that is involved, and that there are widely divergent opinions on many issues between projects and within the broader community. It's easy to forget (in fact, most people have forgotten) that the English Wikipedia community had been discussing some form of action in relation to SOPA for almost two months before the blackout. The Italian Wikipedia blackout in late 2011 demonstrated some significant fault lines if a large project suddenly closes up shop; because of this, I think the WMF justifiably had an interest in ensuring that if the English Wikipedia community followed suit, it was done in a controlled way that would not cause short-term or long-term harm to the actual project. I'm not talking reputational harm, but damage to the hardware, software, and data that are integral to the project. The line between what constitutes a community initiative and what's considered a request from an outside group still isn't clear to me, especially when I consider the Wikimedia Foundation to view the entire Wikimedia editing community as an outside group some days. Ah, interesting point. My read of this was that the guideline would consider an initiative requested by a non-WMF community or organization to be an outside group, whereas an initiative from one or more WMF communities, or from the broader general WMF community, would not fall under these guidelines. The recent request for comment with respect to the Internet Defense League[1] would be an example of an initiate that would fall within this guideline, I think. I think your questions illustrate the need for improving some of the prose within the guideline so that these issues are clear to future readers, both inside and outside of our broader community. It's quite possible that my own interpretation is off the mark as well. Risker/Anne [1] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Internet_Defense_League ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF Policy and Political Affiliations Guideline
On Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 11:59 PM, Risker risker...@gmail.com wrote: The line between what constitutes a community initiative and what's considered a request from an outside group still isn't clear to me Ah, interesting point. My read of this was that the guideline would consider an initiative requested by a non-WMF community or organization to be an outside group, whereas an initiative from one or more WMF communities, or from the broader general WMF community, would not fall under these guidelines. The recent request for comment with respect to the Internet Defense League[1] would be an example of an initiate that would fall within this guideline, I think. That is my reading of it as well. Are there guidelines or discussions on it:wp or en:wp about how to handling future community initiatives? SJ ___ Wikimedia-l mailing list Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l
