User talk:Jimbo Wales

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Commons: same ol' same ol' getting worse and worse

No comment necessary: [1].Volunteer Marek 20:16, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

(one comment is necessary: Ottava Rima's and Scott's supports are the only one that make sense).Volunteer Marek 20:16, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

...Really? That's all you can think of to complain about? You're scraping the barrel. -mattbuck (Talk) 21:15, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

I am sooooo gonna spam that thing onto the talk page of every user who pisses me off.Volunteer Marek 22:49, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Revenge editing? How purile. In regard to your initial post, does that mean you believe all users who support keeping the template (before Ottava commented - the ones after are sarcastic at best) are not arguing in good faith? It appears to me like a rather inconsequential DR, hardly anything to make a fuss over. -mattbuck (Talk) 22:56, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Obviously I was joking - though I do wonder what Jimbo would do if someone tried to give him that barns star. But the fact that you don't see a problem with this just illustrates how out of touch you and your buddies on commons are.Volunteer Marek 23:00, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Clearly we need a derivative work with a big cross through it. That would more adequately represent Jimbo's efforts. -mattbuck (Talk) 23:13, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Jimbo could only get this barnstar if he had been very active with uploading pictures on sexual matters. So, I don't see a problem in principle with this barnstar. I do see that this barnstar can be abused, e.g. if some editors where to give it to people who would object to it, but that's not a relevant issue right now. Count Iblis (talk) 23:35, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Is this really what we want our project to be known for? InconvenientCritic (talk) 23:28, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

We should not censor sexual content because of that, because then the project would be known for censoring sexual content, which is worse than being known for not censoring anything, not even sexual content. Count Iblis (talk) 23:39, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Personally I think that we should become known for "encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free, multilingual, educational content" [2], rather than for providing a dumping-ground for porn. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Where in the World are the authorities most concerned about protecting people from porn and how well is the educational system in these places? Count Iblis (talk) 00:04, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Is their children learning, you mean? Formerip (talk) 00:22, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The UK? And surprisingly good.--Gilderien Chat|List of good deeds 00:12, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The single incident in the UK was instigated by an NGO, there were no "authorities" involved. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 18:31, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

You're arguing a false dichotomy. The fact that there is porn on Commons (and the various Wikipedias) and the fact that people are going to whine, bitch and cry about it doesn't mean the foundation isn't also succeeding at that goal. Resolute 01:36, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

• Question: Is there a reason we haven't auctioned off that cesspool to Joe Francis or somebody yet? Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 00:09, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
• That barnstar gave me great mirth. In the spirit of NOTCENSORED, somebody should do a much more graphic version of that award for presentation en masse to the people who upload Truly Classic Images to Commons — and those who defend them at XfD. Two thumbs up! Carrite (talk) 01:43, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Call it the COMMONSISNOTCENSORED Barnstar... Ho ho! I love it... Carrite (talk) 01:47, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Better yet, emblazon the barnstar with Fae's Aussie wonderjock image. They'll be tripping over their feet in the haste to award it to each other. Tarc (talk) 13:01, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Streisand Effect anyone? No one had heard about that barnstar until 2 days ago.... -mattbuck (Talk) 07:47, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I'd say it was more analogous to shining a spotlight on a cockroach nest, but YMMV. Tarc (talk) 13:01, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Matt, I thought the Streisand Effect was more about actions drawing unwanted attention to something one wished to hide. In this case, I believe that several of the people involved would be quite happy to have more attention given to things like this on Commons. If it takes a news story to get the WMF motivated enough to clean up Commons, this one practically writes itself - the "Hot Sex Barnstar" created by a user with a conviction for distributing child pornography and who was banned by the WMF after Commons could not reach agreement to ban him? The tabloids would eat that up. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:43, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

First off, under WP:Child protection (though I don't approve of this aspect of the policy) you're not supposed to make such allegations and all this should be deleted! Also, that isn't right. WMF has a a process to ban editors quickly, so obviously they can outpace Commons once relevant data starts to come out in a Commons discussion. However, WMF does not and did not explain its actions, and such allegations remain unproven. Wnt (talk) 21:04, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not making allegations, I'm stating facts. All of this was openly discussed on Commons at the time because they had no similar policy. They still don't, incidentally. Anyone who wonders why such a policy is a good idea need only look at that discussion. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 23:17, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Lol, "unproven". There was reams and reams of evidence provided in that case at the time, you have to be either blind or in complete denial to reject it. The Commons admins declined to block him, that is why the WMF had to step in to protect the project from a sex offender, by globally locking his account, i.e. a de facto ban. Hell, Saibo to this day still maintains a bitchfest in his Commons userspace about his dearly-departed friend; User:Saibo/WMF. People like Wnt only seem to care about the Wikipedia's "child protection" policies when it comes to silencing their opponents. Tarc (talk) 23:32, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Nonsense. I've gone on the talk page for that policy something like three times already trying to get them to repeal that part of the policy, and every time I get nothing but Nein, nein, nein! ... even though nobody and I mean nobody enforces the policy they have written. I don't pretend to understand that, I just keep commenting on it in the hope somebody will do something someday. But the thing is, there's a difference between holding a one-time wide-ranging discussion in a special noindexed forum to decide whether a user, to a preponderance of the evidence, may be blocked based on child protection concerns - and going on widely read talk pages like this and, for any small reason, repeating claims that the person is definitely X. I was persuaded, to a preponderance of the evidence, in the Commons discussion - I never reached reasonable doubt, but I didn't think I needed to. I think other people were changing their opinions as the discussion proceeded, and more might have joined and continued to push the vote in the direction I'd gone. But the thing is, we're talking about a living person who someone can fairly easily figure out who it is we're speaking of, and according to stuff like BLP we don't make negative assertions about them confidently based on preponderance of evidence, or indeed, even on 'reasonable doubt' of an open talk or administrative forum. We'd need multiple secondary sources independent of the subject and all that. So while I favor having some leeway to discuss these things, we should avoid pretending that we really know for sure when there are so many ways for bullies online to deceive us. Wnt (talk) 00:55, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

• It's an old, old thing going on here, now and in similar thread usually started at Jimbo's page, like the one below. There are people offended by images of naked people doing something they reject personally and quickly putting it in the "porn" folder. Those people obviously never have seen some real porn in their live but despite that or better said, b/c of that lack of knowledge, they try to force their own limited judgement on everybody else in this world we're living instead of being happy that real porn didn't make its way into Wiki and related. No question about certain images about certain sexual practises that are unlawful in most countries and especially the US where Wiki's servers are located which are to be deleted on sight (like child pornography I.e.); But others should remain as free content. Those who are looking for porn most certainly won't search Wiki or Commons for it. There are plenty of sites out there to get real pornography for free. Welcome to the real world where you can get almost everything you always wanted to know about sex within a few clicks... w/o Wikipedia/Commons/etc. TMCk (talk) 01:21, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Oh you'll find that this isn't that people are anti-porn. What one wonders is why WP needs to host 1000s of amateur pics which serve no educational purpose at all. Why does WP need to illustrate every sexual act that happens to find its way onto urbandictionary? The result being that when you search for images changes are good that no matter how innocuous the search terms are you'll get porn. It is an issue of time, place, and appropriateness. If one searches for penguin images one might well get videos of naked nuns being fucked by dogs. John lilburne (talk) 01:44, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Commons is for educational purposes, not for disturbing, useless, and distracting images of penises. There are numerous more-appropriate venues for such images. I personally feel that the WMF needs to use an iron fist to resolve the idiotic problems there, until a community-based central governance solution can be found. Wer900 • talk 01:45, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

To both of you commenting above (John and Wer900): Commons is about hosting free images that might or might not be used in an article, but sex related categories are the only ones that people try to censor and cut down. The only reasonable conclusion for this is that more (or maybe just more verbal) people are offended by those. I actually wonder how those users get offended. I never saw any sexual image unless I willingly searched for an article that might have (for some disturbing) images. I somehow must assume that those complaining are looking on purpose to find images they'll be offended by, kinda like a peeping Tom who later complains about what he "had to look at". I remember a case where a guy went to a nude beach, taking pictures of nude people and then filed a lawsuit b/c of what he was exposed to. He was fined as a peeping Tom since even he knew about the nudity at the beach, he went there and took pictures, invading the privacy of those people at the beach. Get it?TMCk (talk) 02:14, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not trying to censor sexual images, but I don't agree that our donation to be spent on hosting media files which is remotely useful to any Wikimedia project (unless WMF green-lights a Wikiporn project). And these type of files is alarmingly and increasingly occupying our resources. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 02:46, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

TMCk, I have made a deliberate effort to look through the many images of nudity and explicit sexuality on Commons. This isn't because they offend me, or because I am trying to censor anything. It is because these images have the greatest potential to cause embarrassment to the subjects of the images. Many of those images were taken from image sharing sites and uploaded by hit-and-run contributors (which makes them copyright violations because of the false claim that they were created by the uploader). Some of those images are almost certainly "revenge porn". In any case, we do not have any mechanism for verifying that the subject consents to their upload and further use. The reason why some users focus on sexual images may have nothing to do with their attitude about sex or porn. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:22, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Let me put it like this: If, as far as images actually used on WP was concerned, copyright was abolished and each article could have a free pick of any image it wanted, Commons would NOT chose to be curate any of the current crop of penis images. It wouldn't chose to collect every 'free' one editors could find on the basis that someone else might want to use it. If someone really needs a penis photo they can source one for a couple of bucks, do there own search on flickr, or failing that take a trip to the toilet, or just hotlink to one as everyone else does. John lilburne (talk) 07:06, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm fed up

I will not denote anymore money to Wikimedia fundraising and tell the others follow suit because of how passively the issue of pornography in Commons being handled. Commons is being infected by a cancer called exhibitionism FOR YEARS. I see no point to increase more servers just to preserve those totally utterly useless media files. I will not pity its death by the hands of Commons admins, they're the same as US gun defenders. This disease is incurable already because no one had the vision to stop it earlier. This is not an appeal, because I expect nothing from you. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 01:54, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

If nothing can be done, then de-associate WMF (and Wikipedia) from the Commons. It's a mess. Dump them. Let them do whatever the hell they want but let them do it under their own name, not under WMF/Jimbo's name. As a long time contributor to this project I resent the fact that I even get associated with that place simply because en-Wikipedia and Commons have something in ... common. The same sentiment has been expressed in the past by other long time contributor's and en-Wikipedia members like User:Risker who said that she never goes on Commons because she always "feels dirty" even stepping over there. I think most responsible editors here feel the same way. It's a big ugly stain on the people who are working to create a serious free reference work.Volunteer Marek 03:40, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Same with me, I rarely venture over to commons and never ever ever go there at work (unlike Wikipedia and Wiktionary which is a staple at my job). Kumioko (talk) 03:42, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Commons looks more and more as a free porno site. The question is, if English Wikipedia is any better: [3] [4];[5];[6];[7];[8] and so on, and so on. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 04:05, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

IP, are you complaining that you went to an encyclopaedia, looked up sexual topics and found sexual images there? Oh my god, however could they be there! In articles about the subject! This is a disgrace!

As ever, don't search for "porn" and you're unlikely to find it. -mattbuck (Talk) 07:50, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Mattbuck, Encyclopedia Britannica has no article about scrotal inflation, and what a disgrace(!) it has no article about erotic electrostimulation either. Does it make it less of encyclopedia? 76.126.142.59 (talk) 13:47, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, it does make it less of an encyclopedia. Coverage of such topics in one aspect where WP is superior. --Cyclopia^talk 15:52, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That is a nicely absurd position to take. And one which I find so unconvincing as to US and international law that I suggest the WMF staff would find it ludicrous as well. Collect (talk) 08:03, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I find nothing illegal with his point of view? Please explain how pornography has now become illegal everywhere overnight? 99.39.113.250 (talk) 12:46, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Try looking up laws about child pornography etc. I suggest you will find it is generally regarded as "illegal." Really. Collect (talk) 15:55, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Given this line originated from the argument that one is unlikely to find porn without looking for it, I am at a loss to understand how this is anything but a red herring. Resolute 16:02, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Innocent searches are irrelevant to the original complaint here; indeed, the ongoing work to keep this material by hiding it from casual users emphasizes how much of it appears to be irrelevant to any encyclopedia and is just Flickr with even looser rules. It's hardly surprising that the majority of the world, whose standards are less prurient than ours, would object to having their money used to fund someone's stash of objectionable and unencyclopedic material. Mangoe (talk) 18:20, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Are there complaints from people who search for some subject unrelated to sex, who get wrongly directed to pages with explicit sexual images? Or is this simply about not wanting to have an encyclopedia that contains topics on sexual matters with explicit images in as much detail as any other subject? Count Iblis (talk) 12:55, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Don't get me wrong. I'm totally fine with "pornographic article" with proper image to assist it as long as the article is well sourced. I can't stand that Commons admins constantly insist images uploaded by exhibitionists to be "useful IMO". Those images are hardly useful in any Wikimedia project. I've suggested that sensitive image with no chance of being rationally used in other project's article should be deleted, but this suggestion has been taken lightly or challenged by Commons admins/defenders with "it's only useless in YOUR opinion" or something like that. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 13:33, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Commons acts as the central repository for Wikimedia projects, but its scope is not limited to Wikimedia. I'm not going to defend the need for dozens of penis pictures, but I don't find "it's not used on Wikipedia" to be an outstanding argument in general. Resolute 14:44, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I said "it's not used on any Wikimedia project". More importantly, when has Commons become the repository for projects outside of Wikimedia? I only find such argument solely justifies that dozens of unused penis pictures. I just don't understand, if someone wants to publicize their own penis or vulva, why it has to be Wikimedia Commons? There are dozens of more appropriate websites to host those images. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 15:13, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Wikimedia Commons is a media file repository making available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language. It acts as a common repository for the various projects of the Wikimedia Foundation, but you do not need to belong to one of those projects to use media hosted here. And if you are going to view everything as black and white absolutes, then this discussion really won't be worth continuing. Like I said, I won't defend the need for as many such images as we do have, but an argument for deletion of "unused at Wikimedia" isn't a qualifying delete rationale in my view. Resolute 15:26, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I read it differently from your interpretation. "You can use the files as you please" doesn't mean "you can upload the files as you please". Again, I don't want my donation spent to support those exhibitionists, that's my bottom line. -- Sameboat - 同舟 (talk) 15:36, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That's fine, I won't tell you how to spend your money. But in a project with 17 million images and millions of articles in 200 languages, the "exhibitionism problem" is really quite small in the grand scheme of things. Resolute 15:50, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

This points to the general dilemma. Any reflective person would probably agree that a free repository of educational images would have some images that they themselves find offensive, even substantially offensive, like some of these. So, how to deal with that. Probably the ones who view, keep, and maintain such images should be more sensitive to that, and the ones who find them offensive should be more tolerant. Both stances would be easier if there was more meeting in the middle. The WMF, however, appears to be the only one in a position to mediate. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:53, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Barf. Commons does not "make available public domain and freely-licensed educational media content (images, sound and video clips) to everyone, in their own language". It scrapes content from other sites. If Wikimedia Commons did not exist the images would still exist and would still be available elsewhere. There are 100s of websites that host poor quality amateur porn. For each image on wikimedia commons there are 1000s of others in the same category, of better quality(NSFW), and almost certainly with better descriptions. The sex content on this site is woefully inadequate, and most likely wrong, it tends to dwell on the bizarre, freakish, and sensationalist, at the expense of what most people do. Any one that says the sex content on WP is in any way educational is either lying or deluded. John lilburne (talk) 20:27, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, there have been many complaints that sexualized imagery pops up in unexpected places on the Commons, such as searches for "skittles" or "toothbrush". Tarc (talk) 13:41, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That's probably a matter of incorrect categorisation, should be quite simple to fix. Does Commons have an equivalent of our New Page Patrol that can fix such problems proactively. Is there a specific category for images of an "adult" or NSFW nature, which can be used as a filter by those who need it? Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 15:15, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Unfortunately no, it's due to the search engine. We do have a category "Nude or partially nude people with electric toothbrushes" so that nude images don't show in the main toothbrushes category, but the only way to stop such images showing when you search for toothbrushes would be to remove the string "toothbrush" from the file completely, which rather goes against the point of having such an image to begin with. -mattbuck (Talk) 16:46, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

And what encyclopedic purpose does a nude person brushing their teeth serve...or is something that need not be repeated here going on with these toothbrushes?--MONGO 17:29, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The file name should be enough for you: File:Woman masturbating with improvised vibrator.jpg. It was originally known as File:Masturbating with a toothbrush.jpg although User:Mike Peel renamed it after the search results became a topic of discussion elsewhere. All too frequently, the specific examples raised are dealt with like this but the general problem remains unaddressed. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:50, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Precisely as I expected.--MONGO 18:16, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

"Encyclopedic purpose" is irrelevant, Commons is separate from the hundreds of encyclopedias hosted by the WMF. Images on Commons can be used for any purpose. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 18:21, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, people bring this up from time to time, that the vast Commons repository is for the world to link to and make use of. I'm curious about the licensing though, how do the Commons staff and admins and such verify that the CC-BY-SA is being adhered to by non-WMF entities? Tarc (talk) 18:41, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

They wouldn't, any more than they spend time verifying that our encyclopedic content is being used in compliance with the license. It is up to the uploader (who owns the license) to enforce it, if they so choose. Resolute 18:50, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

So if an image of a topless woman is scraped off of, say, Flickr, that is where any responsibility ends? I then create a website that charges for access to pictures of topless women, with links back to Commons-hosted images. As long as the original Flickr uploader doesn't show up to complain, Commons is golden? Tarc (talk) 18:58, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

This is kind of off-topic but can't all pictures there be used commercially? That would leave attribution, which if the link is back to Commons gives the attribution. Alanscottwalker (talk) 19:16, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

You would want to talk to a lawyer about the legalities of it, but my understanding is that yes, Commons would be okay from that perspective. If the image is licensed CC-BY-SA and we are properly attributing the file and properly licensing any derivatives, then yes, WMF should be okay. When you license CC-BY-SA, you are explicitly allowing commercial reuse. If subsequent reusers are violating the terms, then that is an issue between that reuser and the copyright holder. I have several of my images reused elsewhere. Most that I have seen have credited me. Of those that haven't, I chose not to make a big deal out of it. But that was my choice, and ultimately my responsibility as the copyright holder. Resolute 19:19, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Is commons separately funded and run? If not, then it isn't separate. Also, our own article claims that "Given its primary function as a supporting project for the other Wikimedia web sites, the main content policy for files uploaded to Commons is that they must be potentially useful on any of the Wikimedia projects." That seems to me to be in conflict with the assertion that "encyclopedic purpose is irrelevant." Mangoe (talk) 19:02, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Encyclopedic purpose is irrelevant...then what's the purpose of Commons. This sort of thing is not what I've used it for. The image linked by DC above does not indicate the age of the person, nor is the image used on en.wiki.--MONGO 19:17, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Commons' purpose is educational content, not encyclopedic. The definition of "educational" can be as broad or narrow as anyone wishes to make it, however. Resolute 19:21, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

First, that's in conflict with the statement I've quoted, which I have to think has better authority behind it than your opinion; and second, I do not agree that "educational" is devoid of meaning. In particular, I'm quite happy to make the claim that the disputed images are not educational, and I would guess that a typical person would make the same assessment. Mangoe (talk) 19:39, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

It is only in conflict because the Wikipedia article is imprecise. I am quoting from Commons' own policies. Also, images of nudity and sexuality, as a broad category, are educational. In a very broad encyclopedia, such as Wikipedia, then a broader range of images likewise qualify (much in the same way that we have millions of articles you'll never find in a traditional encyclopedia). That the meaning can be argued in a broad sense does not render it "devoid of meaning". Resolute 19:56, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

"But it's educational" is the kind of lame excuse boarding school boys used to give to masters when their stash of girlie magazines was uncovered in room inspections. Images of nudity and sexuality are not intrinsically educational simply by showing those subjects, and indeed are as a rule not educational except in certain narrowly defined contexts. It seems to me that the properties which render an image "unencyclopedic" are precisely those which render it "not educational", even in a very broad sense. "Educational" is not a "get out of having to justify" card. Mangoe (talk) 20:19, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Well...once we head down the censorship path we never know where it will end. The main concern is whether we hosting images of underage subjects and the liability that comes from that.--MONGO 20:27, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

If that Project is going to rely on consensus-editorial-discretion to determine "educational," as it has been set up to do, it is likely it will get a broad definition, approaching, "able to convey information" and "not illegal." -- Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:33, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Personally, I disagree on the argument of being intrinsically educational. Also, Commons, by its nature, does not provide context. I think most would agree that placing an image of someone's breasts in the breast article can be expected to use that image in an educational context. By extension, any image of breasts can become similarly educational, and therefore fits Commons' scope. Likewise, as long as we have articles like exhibitionism, then exhibitionist images can easily fit within the scope of "it's educational". There aren't many image types that can't be made to fit this scope. The real issue, imnsho, is not the value of an individual image or of a single category of images, but the number. A hundred individual penis images can be argued as having educational merit. The single category of penis images can as well. But the question really should be "do we need 100 images?" I think framing the debate along these lines has been attempted before, but my (unsupported) recollection is that these debates usually end up polarized and trainwrecked. Resolute 20:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That's a signal that the community is incompetent— not necessarily because individual members are so, but because the decision-making process allows its exploitation by those to whom it is advantageous to prevent it from setting any standards. Mangoe (talk) 20:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

If there's an entire Commons category for images of people masturbating with electric toothbrushes then I think that probably tells you more about the place that a couple of megabytes of circular arguing on here. Black Kite (talk) 20:37, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

It is an entire category of one single image, created on the grounds of principle of least astonishment. -mattbuck (Talk) 21:22, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Cos obviously no other solution was available like the delete button. I don't suppose that just placing it under female masturbation was a possibility either. Its a wonder it wasn't catted as "Nude or partially nude people with electric toothbrushes in right hand, lying on a green mat, wearing a gold coloured watch on the left wrist, and with ceramic tiles in the background". John lilburne (talk) 21:38, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That it's a toothbrush is rather important to the image, so no it should not just be under female masturbation. As for deletion, iirc it survived several DRs on the grounds that improvised vibrators are a common thing. -mattbuck (Talk) 21:52, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

I need to point out here that the issue of separability is being ignored in this. If the community cannot come up with a standard of "educational" that has any teeth, I expect that individual donors can, and that it would not be "Flickr with no content standards whatsoever." I see no reason to hurt funding for other WMF projects simply because Commons is really nothing more than a media webhost. Mangoe (talk) 20:52, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

How are Wikimedia, as a secondary producer, and the editors uploading this material, as secondary or primary producers, in compliance with the Child Protection and Obscenity Enforcement Act, which is the law of the land? Who is keeping the detailed records of the performers to ensure that they are of legal age? Whether you like the law or not, it is the law, and it could be enforced at any time. Jehochman ^Talk 20:59, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The uploaders are in the frame, those taking part in the discussions are in the frame, those exercising judgement calls over the content are in the frame. The WMF is behind the sofa claiming "Not us Guv! its them over there, and here are the names IP addresses etc". John lilburne (talk) 21:09, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

That would be an interesting prosecution, as in who is prosecuted and who has to keep it. Someone mentioned above the Flickr "has standards." What are those? Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:08, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Yahoo T&C

You agree to not use the Services to: a. upload, post, email or otherwise transmit any Content that is unlawful, harmful, threatening, abusive, harassing, tortuous, defamatory, vulgar, obscene, libellous, invasive of another's privacy, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

and they uphold them whenever a breach comes to their notice. Screw with flickr and you are likely to lose every photo you uploaded there. Screw with yahoo and you'll lose your email accounts, really screw with yahoo and everything you ever posted on any yahoo site will be scrubbed. John lilburne (talk) 21:20, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

All-in all, that is kinda vague, as these things often seem to be. That second link you give for Flickr has this to say: "If people want to publish content that's not suitable for children (or would be generally offensive to most people) they may. Then, it becomes member choice to elect to see that sort of content, using SafeSearch (or not using it, in this case). Note that this doesn't mean illegal or prohibited content is OK - it's definitely not." That's not much standard. Alanscottwalker (talk) 21:29, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

They do blank out some material if you aren't logged in, so it isn't the case that all material uploaded is visible to everyone. Mangoe (talk) 02:37, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

They allow general adult content so long as it is appropriately tagged as such. If someone is incapable of doing that then they'll do it by marking the entire account adult. Non logged in users, those identified to yahoo as under 18, and Germans cannot see adult content. Others get to chose, so they can browse at work with safe switched on, and browse at home with it switched off. Otherwise yahoo has types of content that they will not allow examples are incest, shit play, racism, sexualisation of kids, voyeur content where the person photographed is unaware that they are being photopgraphed, upskirts and down blouse stuff. Basically if you want to be an arse to other people then go do it some place else, I think Commons has been mentioned as that place from time to time. John lilburne (talk) 07:11, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

OK. To construct a list of defined prohibited content, a site needs an editorial controller to make a list. Alanscottwalker (talk) 11:07, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Perhaps but Y! has no published public list as to what is or is not acceptable. For example, a documentary type photograph of kids smoking is OK, an account that has a lot of photos of kids smoking will be deleted. Y! does not countenance the glorification of kids smoking falls under the category 'harmful' above. BDSM images are OK but not when it involves blood. Using cucumbers as sex toys, or fisting images, are similarly not allowed. Accounts that appear to be offering services or hookups are another no go area. Again there is no published list, probably to avoid people prodding at the boundaries, this is just what has been observed by a number of people over a number of years. Yahoo has a Corporate or editorial policy over what it wants to be associated with. In many ways it is fairly liberal and flickr probably contains the largest collection of adult material outside of a dedicated porn portal, in others it is surprisingly conservative. WMF similarly needs to be clear as to what it wants to be associated with. Whether it wants to be a site that hosts jailbait or anyoneup type content. John lilburne (talk) 16:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Right. Which means it takes editorial control to define and enforce the policy. Alanscottwalker (talk) 16:22, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

The secrecy of the list (or the deliberate lack of definable criteria) seems to be a universal characteristic of censorship wherever it is applied, public or private. This is one reason why censorship is invariably the tool of villains; because the lack of definition means that there is no possible way that it can be defined to exclude purely self-serving, politically motivated attacks. It also means that there is no way that anyone posting can ever know that he will not get into trouble, which further reinforces the importance of his being personally agreeable to the censor. Nonetheless, censorship fails at every purpose, or else we would never have been able to make headway against it, because there is an innate spark of goodness in the human spirit that no censor can ever predict or encompass, which must eventually unravel every scheme. Wnt (talk) 17:31, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I let some people into my apartment and don't let others. I have no definable criteria for deciding who I will let in. It's entirely up to me, which means that if I want to refuse to let someone in for a self-serving, politically-motivated reason there's no way to prove that. Still, it's the only practical way to decide who gets to be in my apartment. Ken Arromdee (talk) 20:49, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, but who said Commons was your apartment and not my apartment? or the apartment of the people who actually do watch over its content and generally get rid of many troublesome things at substantial personal legal risk. Wnt (talk) 21:18, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Yahoo own the servers. Their rules. They decide what they are comfortable with hosting. They don't go looking for non-compliant content. But they react when it is brought to their attention. The result is that the "getting it on" crowd and the "ducks and bunnies" crowd can mostly intermingle without a huge fight breaking out across the site. Several years ago there were 100s of accounts where someone had followed some women as she walked through the mall photographing her arse. Or they'd hung out around the parking lot snatch photos of women bending over to stow their shopping/kids. You don't tend to see that so much. There are still fuckwads posting crude comments on photos of someone's teenage kid, they don't stay around so long. John lilburne (talk) 19:31, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Wnt, pens and paper are also "invariably the tool[s] of villains", so I simply do not see the logic. It's difficult, usually even impossible to draw absolute lines between acceptable and unacceptable human behavior, but so what? It has never stopped anyone from placing any given act on one side or the other. "Wikimedia is not censored" is not the same as "Wikimedia has no standards other than those the law thrusts upon us." I don't don't think that the latter is really adhered to anyway. There's only so far I have time to go wading through commons looking for stuff (especially with the risk of displaying something that someone else in the room is going to object to) but my impression is that the offensive material in question is being protected from review because it is offensive, whereas if it were more innocuous the fact of its lack of utility would be brought to bear. We delete tons of stuff off the English Wikipedia not because it's offensive but because it's useless, e.g. old user pics and various other random pictures which nobody is ever going to link to. I don't run across a lot of this stuff on commons so it's pretty clear that either people don't bother to upload it, or it's getting deleted quickly and without fuss. Mangoe (talk) 20:43, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

It seems to me that if someone wants to post nude images they don't have a hard job finding them. And it doesn't seem to matter what the subject is either. Frankly who is going to source erotica from Commons, even if they are into dicks, Commons is hardly the place one would go for choice. They should concentrate on curating quality images that are educational instead of curating dumb shit that perhaps a dozen sad gits are ever going to use. Then when kids look for photos of Prince Albert or Pearl Necklace then that is what they get even with safe search off. John lilburne (talk) 22:02, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I haven't read the voluminous threads on this subject, but let me ask a silly question. Why doesn't the Foundation step in and say, "no"? The Foundation needs to be the adult in the room and say, "no, we're not running a pornography website here". You're never going to convince people to change their moral values and if someone sees no problem with hosting pornography in plain view of children on something that's supposed to be an encyclopedia, no amount of rehashing this topic is going to make them see the light. The Foundation needs to be the adult in the room, require that useless explicit files be deleted, and require that the ones retained be completely excludable by some sort of filter. How hard would it be to add an extension to MediaWiki that if you search for a term that returns an image in category:xyz will omit those images and prompt you to either opt in or opt out at that point, and store a cookie with your choice? For those who absolutely have to have their wikiporn, this makes you click on one more button to get to it. I've never understood the logic that just because Wikipedia/Commons is not censored, everyone who uses it is now required to submit to seeing casual porn if they accidentally click on the wrong thing. I'm sure that the same people who want Wikipedia/Commons to be a porn site will then want to argue that there's no difference between an encyclopedic image of nudity (like the one found at human body) vs the closeups of pierced genitalia with semen, but I would think that the adults in the room could make the differentiation. It's time for an adult to step in and just fix the problem. --B (talk) 23:08, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

I wish you could understand why we find it annoying for you to declare yourself the adult and us the children, when you're the one who can't bear to look at routine images of the human body and we're the ones who don't have a problem with it, and haven't had a problem with it for a full decade now, with no sky fallen. Wnt (talk) 00:58, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Of course, this completely misses the point. We're not talking about routine images of the human body. Human body has routine images of the human body. We're talking about obscene images on an educational site. Why is it that a simple one-click opt-in/opt-out is a horrible infringement on your right to see Commons porn? --B (talk) 11:56, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

B, you maybe haven't met Wnt here before if you're surprised at his completely missing the point. He elevates it to an artform in discussions like this. You were correct when you said "if someone sees no problem with hosting pornography in plain view of children on something that's supposed to be an encyclopedia, no amount of rehashing this topic is going to make them see the light". So we're left with appeals to authority in the form of Jimbo (who agrees but says he can't act), and the WMF. I think the "adults" you are looking for are behind the sofa, avoiding the ringing of the phone and the doorbell on this one. Begoon ^talk 12:09, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Wnt,in his usual hamfisted way, is try to make the following point:

If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. Once begin upon this downward path, you never know where you are to stop. Many a man has dated his ruin from some murder or other that perhaps he thought little of at the time. http://www.fallacyfiles.org/slipslop.html

He's hoping for a sledge come Christmas. John lilburne (talk) 12:26, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Heh - nice illustration. He can have my sledge. I prefer a nice solid set of stairs. You can go whichever way you decide on those. I've even been known to turn around halfway down and go back for something I forgot. Begoon ^talk 13:31, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Wnt, I understand it perfectly: I have teenagers in the house, and they continually express their annoyance when I call them on the use of that particular rhetorical device. I don't feel in any way constrained by your personal failure to hold to any standard, but I also don't believe that the people who are uploading this stuff think that it's innocuous. I suspect that most if not all of them know that it isn't innocuous, and that at least part of the reason it is being uploaded is because it isn't innocuous. It's ironic that I find myself in this discussion while I've been reading a memoir/history of a faculty member from my high school, because it's the same battle all over again. I remember myself weaselling out of one particular disciplinary infraction on some legalistic grounds, when there was no question that I had committed the act and no issue that the fellow who caught me was in a position to object to it. No, B is precisely right in identifying the problem is that lack of any adult supervision. Mangoe (talk) 12:16, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

What you're calling "adulthood" is the acceptance of a specific set of cultural taboos that only certain people believe in. If for some people you know it is correlated with increasing age, that is only because your taboos are in conflict with the state of nature. If people were entirely free from such mad ideology, they would have the right to stroll through the gates of Eden, and (among other things) they would do so naked.

The cost of your proposal, however, would be high - despite claims above, there really isn't any difference between showing a penis to illustrate the anatomy and showing it exhibitionistically; it still looks the same. If we begin concealing articles about sexual topics from children, the inevitable cost will be unwanted pregnancies and lethal disease. Pornography infects no one. We cannot accept your agenda without agreeing to make a blood sacrifice. Wnt (talk) 16:56, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

You gotta hand it to B. We should have stopped with "if someone sees no problem with hosting pornography in plain view of children on something that's supposed to be an encyclopedia, no amount of rehashing this topic is going to make them see the light". I'd reply, Wnt, but experience tells me that when I hear that funny music and Rod Serling's voice, and things start turning black and white, it might not be worth continuing. A bientot. Begoon ^talk 17:10, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Wnt, even in what you are saying there is a difference, because one illustration is anatomical illustration, and the other is a bold strike against prudery. I to hold that the latter is an adolescent act. As soon as you said "articles", you lost your momentum, as you know very well that the articles are not the issue (though I find the enthusiasm for, um, atypical sexual practices telling in its way). No, it's the smut that was created as such and uploaded as such and which will never see inclusion in any article, not even in articles about smut, which is most supremely indefensible except through childish arguments about defying authority. Mangoe (talk) 18:38, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Gee, if only Wikimedia had a full-time lawyer employed to handle legal issues. It's too bad we have to rely on anonymous laypeople to interpret U.S. law for us. And on a related note, Wikimedia hosts detailed information on how to construct nuclear weapons and how to produce/obtain all manner of lethal poisons. What educational value does this have?! Wikipedia is out of control!!! --108.38.191.162 (talk) 21:41, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

A message for wikipediocracy users

This seemed the fastest way to reach you. In this topic you say you found a photo of me with a water balloon. As you might have noticed, the person pictured doesn't have the same name as me, and that's because it's not me. Also, by posting it to imgur without attribution or a link back to flickr you violated the terms of the CC-BY-SA-2.0 licence. Cease and desist. -mattbuck (Talk) 07:08, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

How can it be possible that a holder of advanced permissions on a wikimedia project can come to Jimmy's talk page and commit blatant violations of WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA? Why is this OK? Aren't we supposed to be better than this? InconvenientCritic (talk) 11:38, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

(EC) Ironic, as the fastest way to get action on many things on wikipedia is to post it on wikipediocracy. Per the terms of the CC-BY-SA licence, attribution needs to be provided where/when the image is published/disseminated etc to the public, and available on request. Due to the nature of online storage (and even corporate cloud-based storage) this is not always where the image is actually hosted/located. This is somewhat of a grey area regarding CC-BY-SA-2.0 which they have still not worked out. Online data storage is not, as per the terms of the CC-BY-SA licence, strictly 'publishing' or even disseminating as they define it until its actually linked to. The thread you linked makes the attribution perfectly clear. Also web forums are rarely responsible for the content of their contributors except under certain circumstances. Like the WMF, most of them off-load the legal implications to the contributor. So wikipediocracy is no more responsible for its members posts than the WMF is (legally) responsible for commons porn stash. Tell me, are you keeping up to date records of the age of the models in the adult pictures you upload to commons? As its your legal responsibility under US law to do so, even if you scrape them from flickr, not the WMF's or the original flickr uploader. But if you wanted to reach the individual you feel is violating the CC-BY-SA licence, you could have just, you know, messaged them since you clearly are watching the forum. Instead of doing the usual commons deflection tactic of by screaming 'bad people at wpo!' when under the spotlight. Its kind of a shame really, as Jimbo's views on commons fall neatly in line with most of the critics at wikipediocracy, if they could all be sat down for a nice meal they could probably work out their differences. Only in death does duty end (talk) 08:35, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Note that as explained at Commons:Help:Sexual content and in particular [9] the exceptional claims regarding 2257 enforcement are pure threat and chilling effect without a valid legal basis. WMF Counsel actually considered the question and gave advice that Commons does not need to maintain 2257 documentation. Wnt (talk) 17:55, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

RE:copyright. You are in error. The use of this image on imgur is clearly a copyvio, as a staticflickr link does provide neither credit nor license information, both required per CC-BY. In my country, courts have decided that even merely hosting an image on your server (without showing it on your web surface) constitutes copyright infringement. --Túrelio (talk) 09:24, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

(EC) Unfortunately its not the same in every country regarding hosting. Hence 'grey area'. The laws around linking are even more murky. Last time I looked the UK had about 3 conflicting court cases all with different decisions that could have gone either way. (Incidentally this caused my company to ban all CC licensed content because absolutely no one, either at the location where they were getting the pictures, or the hosts, was abiding by all the provisions of the licence.) - This discussion can go to my talkpage though if you want to continue it, I would be interested in the law you quoted regarding hosting material. Would rather not digress here too much. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:38, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

You already know that they are hypocrites. They will criticize Wikipedia for copyright issues, but then ignore the fact that they are violating copyright left and right by their own actions. But do you really expect any better from them? It's because of their hypocrisy that their opinions are largely irrelevant. Silverseren^C 08:20, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

You do realize that WP doesn't properly license the CC content it hosts. John lilburne (talk) 10:27, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

SS, having looked through that thread and poked around a bit further, I see (a) one person storing an image off-site, and (b) another thread in which how they should host their own image. Besides, copyright and hosting pornography are quite distinct issues. Mangoe (talk) 11:36, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Anyone that cares knows how to get from a flickr jpg url back to the photopage anyway. But the DMCA is mattbuck's best friend. John lilburne (talk) 11:42, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Mattbuck and crew only care about copyright and personality rights when it suits them. When it does not, they fight tooth and claw to retain any image for any reason, such as Mardi Gras topless photos scraped from Flickr. The hypocrisy is astounding. Tarc (talk) 12:25, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Really? You're still astounded by it? I used to be - but it's getting too old to astound me any more. It still annoys me, but I suspect that's most of the problem, and most of the reason for doing it - because they can, and because it annoys. We need to remove the "because they can" part, imo. B hits the nail on the head in the other discussion when he points out lack of "adult" supervision as the main problem. That's the missing part of the mechanism, and that's what the infrastructure doesn't provide. I think that's largely why these discussions always end up on this page too - in a hope that Jimbo can help that framework to happen, even if he can't do it himself. Begoon ^talk 13:17, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Mattbuck is absolutely right. I do not understand why these trolls from wikipediocracy decided to use a non-free image of a different person, if Mattbuck has released this image of himself with a free license? This real image of Mattbuck (look at his face) clearly illustrates why Muttbuck left this message to the talk page of Beta_M who together with Mattbuck keeps busy voting to keep every low resolution porn image71.198.248.45 (talk) 15:32, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

To clear things up, the reason I posted here was that it seemed the easiest way to connect to wikipaedocrats in the limited time I had available this morning. I didn't make any sort of personality rights case, I simply stated that the person they were claiming was me was in fact not me. As for copyright... I'm a commons admin, so yes, I care about copyright. I don't see how anything I said counts as a personal attack, or even being incivil. -mattbuck (Talk) 16:01, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Ohhhh, I called them trolls, right. Yes, I did that. My mistake, someone changed the title on me. -mattbuck (Talk) 16:06, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Mattbuck, leaving alone everything else, but if you truly believe that Jimbo's talk page is "the easiest way to connect to wikipaedocrats", you're not competent enough to edit Wikipedia. 76.126.142.59 (talk) 16:35, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

It seems a reasonable assumption, given they practically live on this page. Resolute 18:51, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

WP fixed for https/IPv6 pageview stats

This is just an FYI to relay the news that future stats.grok.se pageview counts are hopefully fixed now, and will, today, be re-including views via https-protocol links or any views by IPv6-format IP addresses. As promised, on 10 May 2013, by Diederik (User:Drdee) of the Analytics Team @WMF, the logged page requests were studied, and several software changes were made, to restore the pageview entries and fix related problems on 14 May, within just 4 days. I thanked him for the quick fix, as expecting a 2-week delay for some software-update cycle. Plus, note how two major populations of readers had been omitted from counts, not just https-protocol viewers (of the bogus Google-https links), but also anyone reading pages over an IPv6 address had missing pageviews.
Recent pageview tests confirmed other "missing" pageviews were not due to https-protocol omissions, because the totals were still hundreds too low after https-views had been discounted. With the recent fix to GWTW, renamed temporarily as "Gone with the Wind (1939 film)", the pageviews reported by stats.grok.se totalled only 3,600-3,800/day, as compared to former levels over 4,500/day for the GWTW film. The mystery remained about hundreds of missing readers, because we did not realize IPv6 pageviews had also been omitted. However, tonight, at 01:00 UTC, the 15 May pageview counts should return near March-2013 levels for many of the 300+ major articles which still have Google-https links, plus the thousands of other pages/images wikilinked from those articles. Meanwhile, the Google-https links remain firm (but counted) in search-results, while some Mobile-site pages "en.m.wikipedia.org/*" are still listed separately in Google, confusing many people, plus who has time to think about all these mega-problems even if they were simple, rather than intertwined complexities. More later. -Wikid77 (talk) 15:50, 15 May 2013 (UTC)