Hi, y'all. I apologize that I could not figure out how to snip this message with a Gmail reply.
Scott: Do not forget "Email this user" (from user and talk pages) in our contact methods. Cheers! Wayne Calhoon [[User:Checkingfax]] 925-899-4051 Co-coordinator: Bay Area WikiSalon [1][2][3] [1] Meta planning page: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Bay_Area_WikiSalon [2] Forward facing public page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Bay_Area_WikiSalon [3] November event page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Bay_Area_WikiSalon_November_2016 On Fri, Nov 18, 2016 at 11:35 AM, C. Scott Ananian <canan...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > A few weeks ago our Executive Director gave a talk on "Privacy and > Harassment on the Internet" at MozFest 2016 in London. I encourage you to > read the transcript: > > https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Privacy_and_Harassment_on_the_Internet > > > Katherine argued that the Wikimedia project can take a lead role in > creating a culture of respect and inclusion online. I whole-heartedly > agree, and I hope you all do too. She concluded with: > > "We have a lot of work to do. I know that. We know that. As Molly’s story > > illustrates, we are not there yet." > > > I'd like to open a broader discussion on how we get "there": how to > build/maintain places where we can get work done and control abuse and > vandalism while still remaining wide open to the universe of differing > viewpoints present in our projects. We can't afford to create filter > bubbles, but we must be able to provide users safe(r) spaces to work. > > By habit I would propose that this be a technical discussion, on specific > tools or features that our platform is currently missing to facilitate > healthy discussions. But the "filter bubble" is a social problem, not a > technical one. Our project isn't just a collection of code; it's a > community, a set of norms and habits, and a reflection of the social > process of collaboration. A graph algorithm might be able to identify a > filter bubble and good UX can make countervailing opinions no more than a > click away, but it takes human will to seek out uncomfortable truth. > > So although my endgame is specific engineering tasks, we need to start with > a broader conversation about our work as social creatures. How do we work > in the projects, how do we communicate among ourselves, and how do we > balance openness and the pursuit of truth with the fight against abuse, > harassment, and bias. > > Let's discuss discussions! > > Here are some jumping off points; feel free to contribute your own: > > We currently use a mixture of Talk pages, Echo, mailing lists, IRC, > Phabricator, OTRS, Slack, Conpherence, and Google Doc on our projects, with > different logging, publication, privacy/identity, and other > characteristics. I tried to start cataloging them here: > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016- > November/085542.html > > > Because of this diversity, we lack a unified code of conduct or mechanism > to report/combat harassment and vandalism. > > Matt Flaschen replied in the above thread with an update on the Code of > Conduct for technical spaces: > > https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimedia-l/2016- > November/085542.html > > ...which should definitely help! The creation of a centralized reporting > mechanism, in particular, would be most welcome. > > I created a proposal for the Wikimedia Developer Summit in January > discussing "safe spaces" on our projects: > > https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T149665 > > Subscribe/comment/click "award token" to support its inclusion in the dev > summit or to start a conversation there. > > I have another, broader, proposal as well, on the "future of chat" on our > projects: > > https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T149661 > > Subscribe/comment/click "award token" there if that angle piques your > interest. > > It seems that "groups of users" arise repeatedly as an architectural > meta-concept, whether it's a group of collaborators you want to invite to > an editing session, a group of users you want to block or ban, a group of > users who belong to a particular wikiproject, or who watch a certain page. > We don't really have a first-class representation of that concept in our > code right now. In previous conversations I've heard that people "don't > want <their wiki project> to turn into another facebook" and so have pushed > back strongly on the idea of "friend lists" (one type of group of users) -- > but inverting the concept to allow WikiProjects to maintain a list of > "members of the wikiproject" is more palatable, more focused on the editing > task. From a computer science perspective "friend list" and "member of a > wikiproject" might seem identical--they are both lists of users--but from a > social perspective the connotations and focus are significantly different. > But who administers that list of users? > > Perhaps we can build a system which avoids grappling with user groups > entirely. It was suggested that we might use an ORES-like system to > automatically suggest collaborators on an editing project based on some > criteria (like editing history), rather than force you or the WikiProject > to maintain an explicit list. Perhaps you can implement block lists to > combat harassment based entirely on keywords, not users. Do we trust the > machine to be more fair and less abusive than us mere mortals? Additional > ideas welcome! (I don't have a dedicated phab task for this, but > https://phabricator.wikimedia.org/T149665 might be appropriate if you want > to contribute off-list.) > > > Hopefully this has been enough to prime the pump. > > Let's discuss discussions. > > Let's live up to the hope placed in us by the Washington Post: > > https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/10/25/ > somethings-terribly-wrong-with-the-internet-and- > wikipedia-might-be-able-to-fix-it/ > > > Let's retake the lead on building and renewing a healthy collaborative > community. We can't afford to be complacent or content with the status > quo. Let's come up with new ideas, build them, find the problems, and try > again. It starts with deciding that we can do better. > --scott > > -- > (http://cscott.net) > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/ > wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
