Re: [Wikimedia-l] WMF position on SESTA/ Sec 230?

[Jan Gerlach]

Hi David and Patrik

We're closely watching developments around SESTA. As we explain on the public
policy portal <https://policy.wikimedia.org/policy-landing/liability/>, we
strongly support intermediary liability protections, such as CDA 230, which
are of existential importance to community driven platforms like Wikipedia.
We rely on such rules to ensure we can continue to be a neutral host of
content that can stay away from editorial decisions. In other words, the
rules allow us to defer to community consensus on editorial decisions. The
SESTA bill is problematic because it is written too broadly, as the EFF
describes
<https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/stop-sesta-amendments-federal-criminal-sex-trafficking-law-sweep-too-broadly>,
and would open up states to write more laws that affect website hosts.

On the EFF's campaign page <https://stopsesta.org/>, Katherine Maher
briefly explains our views on CDA 230. We are in conversations with several
advocacy groups who are focusing on the SESTA bill and have submitted a
letter to the Senate in which we explain our concerns. We shared an update
<https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/publicpolicy/2017-September/001691.html>
about that with the public policy mailing list. We invite you to discuss
the issue with other Wikimedians on that list, if you'd like. Please join
the list <https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/publicpolicy> if
you'd like to receive further updates and join the conversation.

Best,

Jan


==



Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
149 New Montgomery Street, 6th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
jgerl...@wikimedia.org



On Fri, Sep 8, 2017 at 1:34 PM Patrik Zill  wrote:

> There is a Katherine Maher quote prominently featured on <
> https://stopsesta.org/#quotes>.
>
> I'd be interested in what exactly the problem is for the Foundation,
> though. The EFF leaves aside that question at least in the blog post that
> David referred to, which is instead focussed entirely on some exception to
> the exception that allegedly doesn't apply. What it doesn't talk about is
> why and when - in the cases at issue here - a hosting provider like the
> Wikimedia Foundation needs to rely on 47 U.S.C. § 230 in first place. It's
> not so obvious (at least not to someone legally trained outside the U.S.)
> that you would attract criminal liability for somehow being involved in
> "Sex trafficking of children or by force, fraud, or coercion" (18 U.S.C.
> § 1591(e)) or otherwise get into conflict with provisions relating to sex
> trafficking by hosting an open web encyclopedia that may be abused in some
> way (how?) by some random third party. Naturally, laws don't penalize all
> conduct remotely linkable to a criminal act - there's always some kind of
> threshold, implicit or explicit, and I'd be curious as to where/what for
> specifically the Wikimedia Foundation needs a section 230 defense in this
> area.
>
> I believe if you want to communicate your position effectively, you (that
> is, the Wikimedia Foundation) should produce one or two example scenarios
> and then contrast your liability analysis under the present legislative
> framework with that under the proposed new regime, so an interested
> observer can follow along the relevant provisions and get an idea of where
> exactly we'd reach the point where the proposed changes would cause the
> Foundation extra troubles. If you've already done that, all the better,
> and, like David, I would appreciate a pointer :).
>
> Patrik
>
> On 7 September 2017 at 21:13, David Gerard  wrote:
>
> > https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2017/09/stop-sesta-congress-do
> > esnt-understand-how-section-230-works
> >
> > What's our position/analysis on this?
> >
> >
> > - d.
> >
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[Wikimedia-l] Re: Seven Wikimedia chapters rejected as permanent observers to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO)

[Jan Gerlach]

Hi Andreas

China was in fact the only country to oppose the Wikimedia chapters'
request for observer status. Other countries for political or unknown
reasons may have aligned with China's position on process, but no country
besides China unilaterally or independently opposed the Wikimedia chapters'
request.

Relatedly, you may have seen that the Wikimedia Foundation just obtained
accreditation at the UN's Economic and Social Affairs Council where a
similar situation was unblocked by a vote of the member countries:

https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/07/22/wikimedia-foundation-earns-accreditation-to-the-united-nations-economic-and-social-affairs-council-ecosoc/


Best,
Jan


==



Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Director
Wikimedia Foundation
1 Montgomery Street, Suite 1600
San Francisco, CA 94104
jgerl...@wikimedia.org


Andreas Kolbe  schrieb am Fr., 22. Juli 2022, 19:44:

> Dear all,
>
> A week ago, the WMF issued a press release, "Seven Wikimedia chapters
> rejected as permanent observers to the World Intellectual Property
> Organization (WIPO)":
>
>
> https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2022/07/15/seven-wikimedia-chapters-rejected-as-permanent-observers-to-wipo/
>
> This stated, in part, "China was the only country to oppose the Wikimedia
> chapters’ request for observer status, again, claiming that chapters were
> complicit in spreading disinformation and are subsidiaries of the Wikimedia
> Foundation. These statements are unfounded and misrepresent Wikipedia’s
> model which prioritizes accuracy, neutrality, as well as the fact that the
> chapters are completely autonomous."
>
> About a week ago, I had seen and retweeted a Twitter thread[1] by James
> Love[2], the Director of Knowledge Ecology International, listing a whole
> litany of countries that had supported China's position.
>
> I checked the webcast of the July 15 WIPO proceedings today,[3] and there
> were over a dozen countries – Russia, Belarus, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan,
> Tajikistan, Iran, Syria, Algeria, Zimbabwe, Nicaragua, Cuba, Bolivia,
> Venezuela, North Korea – that took the floor to support and endorse China's
> position – more, in fact, than took the floor to support the chapters'
> approval.
>
> Would it be possible to amend the press release accordingly?
>
> Best,
> Andreas
>
> [1] https://twitter.com/jamie_love/status/1550520525180518400
> [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Love_(NGO_director)
> [3] Available here: https://webcast.wipo.int/ (afternoon session of July
> 15, part 6. Admission of Observers)
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[Wikimedia-l] Update on EU Copyright Reform

[Jan Gerlach]

l for this to be effective. If you are an EU
citizen, please use the tool! If you feel so obliged, you can also support
by engaging in our #fixcopyright social media campaign and linking to the
page, or by sharing as statement by Wikimedia Foundation Board Chair María
Sefidari Huici statement[11] which also includes the link to our landing
page.

Questions? If you have any questions about this campaign, or would like to
get involved in the translation of our resources, please contact me
directly at jgerl...@wikimedia.org or subscribe to the public policy
mailing list to discuss.[12]

Best,

Jan



[1]
http://ec.europa.eu/transparency/regdoc/rep/1/2016/EN/1-2016-593-EN-F1-1.PDF

[2]
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2016/09/13/european-commission-copyright-leaks/

[3]
https://www.liberties.eu/en/news/delete-article-thirteen-open-letter/13194

[4]
https://edri.org/press-release-meps-ignore-expert-advice-and-vote-for-mass-internet-censorship/

[5]
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2018/07/05/european-parliament-votes-against-copyright-proposal/

[6]
https://blog.wikimedia.org/2018/06/25/time-is-running-out-to-defend-user-rights-online/

[7]
https://blog.wikimedia.de/2017/11/20/nofilter-bedrohen-geplante-upload-filter-die-wikipedia/

[8] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/European_Parliament_vote_in_2018

[9] https://fixcopyright.wikimedia.org/

[10] https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fix_copyright

[11]
https://wikimediafoundation.org/2018/09/04/internet-under-threat-european-copyright-reform/

[12] https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/publicpolicy


==



Jan Gerlach
Sr. Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
1 Montgomery Street, Suite 1600
San Francisco, CA 94104
jgerl...@wikimedia.org
@pd_w <https://twitter.com/pd_w>
@wikimediapolicy <https://twitter.com/wikimediapolicy>
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Authorities in Myanmar blocks all languages of Wikipedia, says internet freedom watchdog = Qiuwen

[Jan Gerlach]

Hello everyone

Thanks for alerting the list to this. Various teams at the Foundation have
been monitoring the situation in Myanmar and continue to do so. While we
are currently still gathering data to better understand what is actually
happening, our initial analysis indicates that the information about a
complete block of Wikipedia is not accurate. We are still seeing traffic to
our servers from various ISPs in the country.

We will send an update once we have enough information.

Best regards,
Jan


==



Jan Gerlach
Lead Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
1 Montgomery Street, Suite 1600
San Francisco, CA 94104
jgerl...@wikimedia.org
@pd_w <https://twitter.com/pd_w>
@wikimediapolicy <https://twitter.com/wikimediapolicy>



On Fri, Feb 19, 2021 at 5:00 PM Alexander N Krassotkin 
wrote:

> On Russian Wikinews:
>
> Устроившая переворот в Мьянме хунта заблокировала Википедию
> https://ru.wikinews.org/?curid=8842919
>
> We also await official comment from the Wikimedia Foundation.
>
> sasha.
>
> On Fri, Feb 19, 2021 at 11:09 PM 《求闻》编译组／Qiuwen WMCug
>  wrote:
> >
> > BEIJING, Feb. 20 (Qiuwen) - NetBlocks, the internet freedom advocacy
> group,
> > says Wikipedia was blocked in Myanmar by the authorities.
> >
> > NetBlocks confirms "all language editions of Wikipedia" were down in
> Myanmar
> > starting Thursday morning local time. In a tweet [1], Netblocks said,
> this is
> > "part of a widening post-coup internet censorship regime imposed by the
> > military junta."
> >
> > Netblocks provided additional information in a picture attached to the
> tweet,
> > suggests that they have tested the connectivity of Wikipedia in English
> and
> > French, Wikidata, and wikimedia.org, with none of them accessible. This
> may
> > intimate that it is highly that the Burmese authorities not only blocked
> "all
> > language editions of Wikipedia," but all Wikimedia projects, as a whole.
> The
> > picture also suggests that Wikipedia remains inaccessible across four
> different
> > internet service providers in Myanmar.
> >
> > It is likely that the Burmese authorities are blocking Wikimedia projects
> > using the same tactic seen in China and some other countries, which is by
> > blocking the main IP address Wikipedia and its sister projects uses. All
> > Wikimedia projects share the same IP address, which makes it an easy
> target by
> > censors to implement a block.
> >
> > Qiuwen noticed that starting from February 19th, there was a noticeable
> > increase of edits made from IP addresses that were likely to be used for
> VPNs
> > on Burmese Wikipedia, signaling locals may have to use VPNs to get onto
> > Wikipedia already. On Friday evening local time, an administrator posted
> a
> > message on the Village Pump of Burmese Wikipedia, explaining the use of
> "IP
> > block exemption," a special MediaWiki flag, similar to rollback and
> patrol,
> > allowing users with the flag to edit from VPNs. A similar banner was
> also set
> > up, visible on every page of Burmese Wikipedia. The "IP block exemption"
> flag
> > is widely issued to users of Chinese Wikipedia, and previously, users of
> > Turkish Wikipedia, who needed VPNs to access.
> >
> > Internet blackouts are increasingly common in Myanmar and across the
> world.
> > The military shut down the internet before they attempted the coup on
> February
> > \1st, and the military authority has blocked or temporarily blocked
> Facebook
> > and other social media platforms starting February 3rd. Usages of VPNs
> > reportedly skyrocketed for locals eager to access blocked websites.
> NetBlocks
> > says the authorities have been implementing an "internet curfew," as the
> > internet shut down during the nights.
> >
> > This also means Myanmar has joined an increasingly bigger club of
> countries
> > that had blocked Wikipedia. Its recent members include Iran, which
> blocked
> > Wikipedia for around 24 hours in March 2020, and Venezuela in January
> 2019.
> > In countries such as Iran, Internet blackouts also interfered with the
> > Wikimedia movement, such as Iran's week-long blackout in November 2019
> had
> > delayed the Wikipedia Asian Month edit-a-thon. China, the "permanent
> member"
> > of the club, blocked Wikipedia since 2015. It is not clear whether or
> not the
> > block on Wikimedia projects will be lifted in the future, similar to
> what the
> > Iranian and Turkish authorities had done.
> >
> > The Wikimedia Foundation has yet to comme

[Wikimedia-l] Today at 1pm PDT: a talk about "From the Galaxy Zoo to Citizen Science Cyborgs"

[Jan Gerlach]

Dear all

I would like to invite you to watch a talk by Kevin Schawinski, an
astrophysicist from ETH Zurich and co-founder of citizen science platform
Galaxy Zoo, on April 14 at 1pm PDT (20mins from now).

In his talk “From the Galaxy Zoo to Citizen Science Cyborgs", Kevin will
talk about astronomic research, in which volunteers can participate and
contribute to identify galaxies, and new developments in citizen science.
These phenomena are very much aligned with Wikimedia values and showcase
the power of collaboration for knowledge. Kevin is an amazing scientist
with a deep understanding of collaborative systems as well as a great
interest in online participation. After his talk, he will answer questions
- mostly about citizen science but maybe also about supermassive black
holes. :)

Here are the remote options:

YouTube stream: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vX5-kI2XvWE
Jacob Rogers will be relaying questions from IRC in #wikimedia-office

Sorry about the late notice. The recording will be publicly available.

Jan

==


Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
149 New Montgomery Street, 6th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
jgerl...@wikimedia.org
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[Wikimedia-l] Reminder: Legal IRC Office Hour starts in about three hours.

[Jan Gerlach]

TLDR:

What: IRC chat with members of Wikimedia Foundation legal

Topic: Freedom of panorama

When: Tuesday, April 19 at 11:00 AM Pacific Daylight Time / 18:00 UTC

Reminder: We can’t do legal advice.

Hi all,

We'd like to remind you of the return of Legal Team IRC office hours,
starting today, April 19 at 11:00 AM PDT / 18:00 UTC! We’re planning to
host these once every 3 months or so going forward.

IRC office hours provide an opportunity for members of the Wikimedia
communities to chat directly with members of the Wikimedia Foundation legal
team on topics of interest including public policy, legal issues facing the
Wikimedia movement, and what you can do to get involved. Please keep in
mind that under California law we can’t give out legal advice, so rather
than giving out legal advice, we will talk about the Wikimedia Foundation’s
stance on issues.

For this format, we’ll begin at 11:00 by doing a brief introduction and
then start taking questions from everyone that’s present. We’ll aim to have
a few people on at the same time to be able to respond faster and to
discuss different aspects of the issues.

For our first office hour, we’re planning to discuss the freedom of
panorama (FoP). With the recent decision in Sweden
,
holding that Wikimedia Sweden's website/database was in violation of
Swedish copyright law for making available on the internet photographs of
artwork permanently situated in public areas, FoP has become more pressing
than ever. We believe that the ability for members of the public to
photograph public monuments and landscapes is a fundamental part of free
expression. We plan to raise this issue to the European Commission this
summer, and need your help to let them know that it’s important. This first
one of a series of IRC office hours will be a great opportunity to exchange
thoughts about it.

If you have questions that you would like to discuss during the office hour,
you can add them on Meta Wiki here
.
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Wikimedia Argentina e-learning campus available!

[Jan Gerlach]

Felicitaciones, Anna and team of WMAR!

Beautiful site and a cool project!



==


Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
149 New Montgomery Street, 6th Floor
San Francisco, CA 94105
jgerl...@wikimedia.org

On Thu, Apr 28, 2016 at 2:22 PM, Anna Torres  wrote:

> Dear all,
>
> Hope you are all doing well!
>
> It is a pleasure to let you all know that the WMAR's e-learning campus
> <http://campus.wikimedia.org.ar/> is now available and ready to be use.
>
> As a pilot we will be doing our online course for all the spanish speaking
> countries, focused on teachers.
>
> Once finished we will be reporting the results!
>
> Hugs!
>
> --
> Anna Torres Adell
> Directora Ejecutiva
> *A.C. Wikimedia Argentina*
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Re: [Wikimedia-l] Annual report Wikimedia Argentina

[Jan Gerlach]

Muchisimas gracias, Anna! Muy inspirador el informe!

Abrazos para ti y el resto del equipo,
Jan

On Wed, Jan 4, 2017 at 4:14 PM, Anna Torres  wrote:

> Dear all,
>
> On behalf of Wikimedia Argentina we hope the new year find you all well!
>
> Moreover and like every year, we have launched our annual activities
> report. Even though it is in Spanish, we hope you can enjoy it!
>
> Please find the report here  >.
>
> Hugs!
>
> --
> Anna Torres Adell
> Directora Ejecutiva
> *A.C. Wikimedia Argentina*
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