User talk:Jimbo Wales

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Gender gap task force and RfA proposal

I have made a proposal that I would think would help close the gender gap in WP's administrative corps. I think this is necessary because, speaking from observation and personal experience, WP's RfA process has a lot of serious issues. Cla68 (talk) 06:18, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Now renamed Wikipedia_talk:Requests_for_adminship#Proposal_from_Cla68_regarding_women_candidates. Closed and premature. But actions to bring in more women or proposals for things to increase numbers that will be more widely accepted certainly are needed. Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie) 12:37, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

The proposal was not closed as "premature." It was rejected because the discussion found it to be offensive and infeasible. SPECIFICO talk 14:47, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

If you are going to comment on almost everything I write, at least get it right. I wrote "Closed and premature." How's this: "Someone closed it AND I and/or others found it premature to propose it when it wasn't even discussed on the talk page, modified or reject there." In short, it was not a Gender Gap task force proposal, as the original subject line suggested, and it was just one individual's proposal, just to be clear so we don't have to hear a 100 accusations it was. Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie) 19:16, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

It could never be a GGTF proposal. Everyone here is responsible for their own edits. The GGTF cannot propose anything and is as toothless as any other project in that respect. The best that the GGTF can do is discuss initiatives. - Sitush (talk) 23:42, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

• Although actions to address our gendergap - including our administrative gendergap - are sorely needed, especially when taken in the context of the rest of cla's actions this is such obvious trolling that someone should block Cla for a day or two for disruption/WP:POINT. I'd do it myself, but I'm sure people would bring up WP:INVOLVED. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:26, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
  • Kevin, to threaten someone for proposing an affirmative action-type remedy is an extremely ironic reflection of the actual hostility that women (and men) face in the real world when the patriarchy threatens them for trying to fix real-life gender-related issues. I appreciate that you said that, because now we have an example of the outright hostility towards women and women's issues that is entrenched in WP's administration. Cla68 (talk) 23:33, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

While I did not say that your proposal was trolling I did think it very loudly. I find it hard to believe it was meant to be serious. I can see Kevin's point of view, though I don't see anything actionable. Chillum Need help? Type {{ping|Chillum}} 04:19, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

• • • Kevin Gorman an example of outright hostility towards women and women's issues? Now I've heard it all. I wasn't sure before that Cla68 was trolling, but with that comment it's entirely clear. I won't block anybody for trolling on this page, though. If Jimbo doesn't want to encourage it, he can close the thread. Bishonen | talk 23:48, 10 September 2014 (UTC).
      • Many people aren't aware of their ingrained biases or prejudices until confronted with an actual affirmative action-type proposal that affects something important to them, in this case WP's administrative corps. It's a result of unrecognized, socialized privilege and entitlement. Affirmative action exists for a reason, and people's reactions to such proposals reveals quite a bit about them. If they say, "I disagree", that's one thing. But, when they say, "Burn the witch!", as Kevin is saying here, then that is something else altogether. Cla68 (talk) 23:59, 10 September 2014 (UTC)
        • I think those reactions have centered around your obvious insincerity, rather than the merits of the proposal itself. MastCell ^Talk 00:22, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
          • As Mast said, the issue at stake is your obvious mocking insincerity rather than the proposal itself. I'd never suggest blocking someone for the proposal itself. Describing my actions as an example of the outright hostility towards women that is entrenched in Wikipedia's administration is even more solid evidence that you are trolling if anyon doubted it before. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:40, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
            • Kevin, you could have said, "I don't agree that an affirmative action measure will work here". Instead, you indicated, "It's a ludicrous idea and I wish I could ban the jackass who proposed it." It's the level of hostility in your reaction that is revealing. Cla68 (talk) 00:47, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
              • Your argument is rather undercut by how much you exaggerated what I actually said. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:49, 11 September 2014 (UTC)
          • If you can tell the sincerity of an anonymous account holder on WP or anywhere else on the Internet, then you're a lot more perceptive than I am. You have to judge by a person's actions here since their tone and demeanor are usually invisible. I voted for the proposal and will be the first one to vote for it if it is again proposed. And, I was disappointed that you didn't vote in support of it. Cla68 (talk) 00:36, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

It would have worked. Editors running for Admin would all have self-identified themselves as female regardless of their real sex, so the gender gap would have vanished. Count Iblis (talk) 19:45, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

Now, now, we all learned from the Private Manning Case that "you are what you say you are, and that's that." Seriously, that's the majority view of the nature of gender at WP... Carrite (talk) 22:32, 10 September 2014 (UTC)

I think this was a good idea (after all, I remember proposing such "affirmative action" myself within the past few months) but 15% is a very steep preference. Maybe 5% would have had a chance, but you might have had to start at 2 or 3 percent. I think that "you are what you say you are" very much does apply here - if an admin is willing to walk the walk and deal with a certain risk of bizarre behavior that some women report here, that will make the admin a more experienced and aware candidate regardless of sex or gender.

All that said, the same consideration that can be obtained by a rule could be obtained by a little more awareness of RfA by Gender Gap participants with no formal difference in admission criteria. Wnt (talk) 02:51, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

While Cla68's proposal and way of announcing it may have had some problems, and he may have over-reacted to criticism aboe, I think it was a serious proposal. Unlike this new joke proposal and series of jokes GG Task Force has to suffer through now. Hold Wales & WMF accountable. Now Kevin can really let loose if he likes! Carolmooredc (Talkie-Talkie) 03:54, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

That Cla68 is concerned about misogyny I find surprising--from the comments he has made off wiki I would have guessed the opposite. Likewise with the individuals who were previously interested in editing pornography articles and who are now engaging with the Gender Gap project--I can't seem to follow why they are unarchiving threads that were previously archived by the women as off-topic or disruptive. Question for Cla68 about his proposal: can you give an example of a woman's RFA that was unsuccessful, but would have been successful under your proposal? It would help to have a real life example of what you think the problem is. —Neotarf (talk) 05:19, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

This comment is indicative of part of the problems on the GG project, and perhaps the reason you were added to the arbitration. You seem to think this project is run by and owned by "the women". It is for decreasing the GG, no? I'll be the first to agree that women's perspectives are absolutely vital in order to shrinking the gap, but trying to claim a fiefdom isn't going to accomplish much.Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 14:08, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

There is nothing in WP:Talk page guidelines that prohibits archiving or refactoring by users who are female. I see no evidence of a female conspiracy to "claim a fiefdom". Judging by the number of complaints about off-topic and disruptive threads, if anything, they were being too cautious and conservative about keeping controversial edits. But maybe TKOP, you can explain why you blanked this users comment? Also you might explain your edit summary here: "why don't you dine on the swine?" Are you soliciting me for something? —Neotarf (talk) 03:17, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

No, the issue is not archiving comments, the issue is that you seem to be under the erroneous impression that the GGTF is a women's group, for and run by women. It is not. Dine away.Two kinds of pork^Makin'_Bacon 21:35, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

I find this whole discussion very disturbing. This is not the place for it, and someone should have told Cla68 that instead of stoking this fire. However, the worst thing about it is the deeply-entrenched sexism that is evident from some of the above comments, not to mention the attempt to "out" Cla68 by referring to off-wiki events. The fact that a majority disagreed with the proposal does not make it insincere and certainly does not make it trolling. These are wild accusations from undisciplined contributors. Deb (talk) 10:44, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

No one is attempting to "out" Cla68, at least that I know of. He uses the same name elsewhere as he does here. —Neotarf (talk) 03:17, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Controversial current events

Articles about controversial current events seem to attract editors with a bias. I have the impression that Wikipedia's influence on public opinion for these subjects is negligible compared to the influence of the news media, so that the only thing a biased editor could accomplish is to influence readers that Wikipedia is biased. --Bob K31416 (talk) 02:47, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Controversial article attract biased editors on both sides as well as neutral editors. Hopefully all sides work together to form an article that is neutral and unbiased (+/-5%).~Technophant (talk) 13:21, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

How is Internet Slowdown Day different from SOPA?

Hi Jimbo. You earned a lot of respect, IMHO, when you brought up the WP:SOPA issue and galvanized the community to take a stand. I am curious why didn't you feel necessary to do the same thing with the Internet Slowdown Day action? Also, do you know why WMF has taken no interest in this (during SOPA they issued several press statements and such...). Thanks, --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 03:51, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

First, no one asked me about it so I was unaware that it was happening. I think this is the first time it has been mentioned on this page.

Second, the timing for something big from us has to be just right. I'm not sure this is the right time. With SOPA we were able (with others) to stop Congress from voting into law a really bad act. There was a specific task to accomplish and we did so. Asking people to send comments to the FCC is important but doesn't have quite the same feel in terms of a specific urgent mission with a possible "win". I think us doing things like this needs to be reserved for moments when we can be highly impactful otherwise we end up like the boy who cried wolf.

Finally, I'm much more concerned personally about the anti-neutrality that is playing out in a major major way with locked down apps ecosystems. If you are looking for damage to the Internet in terms of not being a level playing field because a small number of players has a chokehold on which new organizations get access to customers - look no further than the iTunes store and Google Play store.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 06:33, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Probably somewhat difficult for Wikimedia Foundation to overtly defend Net Neutrality when it is engaging in non-neutral deals with global mobile telecom providers, via the Wikipedia Zero program. - 2001:558:1400:10:38EC:EC00:9AE4:9FBA (talk) 12:54, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

User:MutterErde

Hi, User:Jimbo Wales, why did you block Mutter Erde? Lotje (talk) 11:28, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Strange to bring up something from 2005, but of course you can just look up the reason at the block log: "persistent copyvios after repeated warnings". Deli nk (talk) 13:05, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Indeed, strange to ask about a block from nearly 9 years ago. (Amazing to think how long it has been!) What made you wonder?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 13:26, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

The edits on the different wikipedia do not seem to "fit". Thank you for your time. Lotje (talk) 14:51, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Shouldn't the old blocks be let to expire after a time limit? Otherwise we'll end up with an enormous number of indefinite blocks by the year 2100... Count Iblis (talk) 17:38, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Possibly but what's the harm?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 18:36, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

We probably won't be around by 2100. Besides, it's not like they're doing any harm. BethNaught (talk) 18:43, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Throughout Wikipedia, "harm" seems to have become the watchword, and it seems "harm" can only be done by having content, not by not having it. So there's no harm in deleting articles 'just to be safe', based on some guess about what might happen if people read them, even when the rest of the world doesn't see it that way; nor in getting rid of the editors (like MeropeRiddle in the thread deleted above) for expecting, naively, that Wikipedia policy is publicly readable someplace; nor is there harm, as you say, in keeping a database of editors to be blocked for all time, so that the threat of some outing deters them from ever trying to start afresh. But if the people here really believe all that, why don't you just walk down to the server room and empty a couple of clips into them? You could probably avoid hundreds, even thousands of embarrassing incidents, even save a few lives somewhere, though we may not know where, by preventing the wrong people from learning the wrong thing. Sure, some readers lose some knowledge that might have slaked their idle curiosity, but who cares? That's as valueless as the hundreds of thousands of edits so many of the most active editors put in before being banned for some trumped-up issue. Why do so many here act like they really believe that contributions are the problem, information is the problem, and discarding editors and censoring out the facts is the universal answer? Wnt (talk) 20:31, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

Nice rant, but not sure how it applies in this context. We are talking about a user banned for "persistent copyvios after repeated warnings".--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:35, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

You don't think we can let someone like that have a fresh start after nine years? True, in many ways it might be better for the person to start a fresh account and never mention the old one, but the way WP works, as long as the old one remains blocked there's a risk that the person admits he used to post under that account or can be traced from some postings on the web, etc. -- and end up with a fresh batch of trouble. We would do better to sweep all this stuff aside. I think past contributors, whether perfect or not, are still a good pool of prospects for future involvement. Wnt (talk) 15:18, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

@ User:Wnt, you are right, information is the problem... too often. Though, I am convinced wiki wizzards and fairies are keeping a vigilant eye and help wherever they can.

@ User:Jimbo Wales, would you consider unblocking User:Mutter Erde. He, might be willing to make a fresh start. Thank you for considering it. Ye'all have a great day today. Lotje (talk) 06:53, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

So really what your are asking for the ban on User:MutterErde to be lifted. The relevant policy page is WP:UNBAN although it is a little unclear how bans imposed by Jimbo can be lifted. I would start by the user making a case for why the ban should be lifted on their talk page: User talk:MutterErde. The appeal should address the two main reasons the ban was imposed WP:COPYVIO and WP:SOCK. Note ban and blocks are different things, bans which MutterErde has are more serious. See the reason for the ban at WP:BANLIST.--Salix alba (talk): 08:00, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Just read the text in the Jimbo Wales section of WP:BANLIST. "They may appeal their ban by emailing him or the Arbitration Committee."--Salix alba (talk): 08:06, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

In this case, I'm happy to say that the fact that I am the one who banned him 9 years ago should play no special role today. If he seeks to be unbanned, he can follow whatever procedure the community thinks appropriate.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:35, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

About the harm this does, consider the situation on the long run. After a time T, the fraction of editors blocked in a time period spanning t will scale as t/T (this will start to be valid some time after the number of editors has stopped to grow exponentially). So, we'll have a huge list of blocked editors, but that list will be dominated by people who were blocked a long time ago. We keep an eye on new editors to see if they are socks of the blocked editors, so most of that effort is going to be wasted on checking for irrelevant or non-existent threats with the risk of false positives (who cares if an editor blocked at the age of 15 has returned at the age of 30?) The editors who should remain blocked are the editors who were blocked recently (in the last few years or so). It thus makes sense to unblock all editors after, say, 5 years unless there is evidence of recent misbehavior by socks. Count Iblis (talk) 15:50, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

• IMO after 5 years, unless the community has decided that they cannot come back under any means, a banned or blocked editor should be able to make a clean start account, and if someone finds out it will not be held against them. KonveyorBelt 19:09, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

BBC news request

Unverified request
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Dear Jimmy, I am looking for feedback from Wikipedia editors about the “MediaViewer scandal”. I would be very grateful if you could publicise this message internally throughout Wikipedia so we can get responses from a broad range of editors. From the advice I have been given so far, it seems it would be beneficial to engage in particular editors involved with the MediaViewer “RFC” and “Wikipediocracy”. Yours sincerely, Jane Investigative researcher BBC News http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ Dear Wikipedia editors, BBC News is interested in investigating a story about the “MediaViewer scandal”. We believe that the breakdown between the Wikimedia Foundation and the editors upon which it relies is a fascinating story that is almost unknown to our readers. We would like to invite editors to provide their accounts of this breakdown. Firstly, we would like accounts of what has happened. Secondly, we want to know how this has affected editors. Our readers are mostly very familiar with Wikipedia, but do not have the opportunity to see what happens “behind the scenes”. You should submit your stories on the general submissions page here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10725415 Any personal information can be made anonymous if requested. It is critically important that the line “Wikipedia MediaViewer scandal” is inserted as the first line in the “Comments” box. BBC News receives thousands of comments from readers every day and in order to receive your comments we will filter by this first line. If the line is not included, then your comments might not reach us. We welcome comments from all kinds of Wikipedia editors and encourage as many of you as possible to share your stories. We are also interested in looking at other internal Wikipedia topics for further articles. Ideas that have been suggested so far have included the following: - Harassment of women editors on Wikipedia - Contacting banned editors’ employers - Political correctness and “JZG abuse of process” at Sarah Brown’s (Gordon Brown’s wife) article - Administrators engaging in paid editing for commercial purposes We welcome comments from editors about all of these topics and any other internal Wikipedia topics that our readers might find interesting. We thank all of you for your time and look forward to hearing about your experiences. Yours, Jane Investigative researcher BBC News http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.131.212.16 (talk) 13:43, 11 September 2014 (UTC) That's decently clever social engineering. Get a bunch of Wikipedia editors to specifically discuss "Wikipediocracy", all with the same subject line, in the hope of spamming your site and story into the BBC News. (I assume there is no investigative reporter named "Jane ___?___" who posts under an IP address) What's funny though is that in the age of "web 2.0", where upclicks are everything, never mind why, there really is no difference between spam and legitimate news. Wnt (talk) 14:12, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

A barnstar for you!

	The Real Life Barnstar
	Thank you for completing the interview with me Jimbo. I really appreciate how you took time out of your day to talk with me! Mirror Freak 15:28, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Yahoo and your opinion on NSA requests

I was just curious given the newly released documents regarding Yahoo's lawsuit against the US Federal govt's NSA "requests" for user information what your opinion would be, and what possible courses of action are open to you personally, should the Wikimedia Foundation ever receive such a "request" and subsequent threat of a $25,000 daily fine if the WMF declines the request. Secondly I'm curious if you've ever been asked, or if you have asked, to present testimony to any Congressional committee hearings on such topics of internet privacy and such government requests.Camelbinky (talk) 18:28, 12 September 2014 (UTC)

Wikipedia editor being railroaded by Wikipediocracy

Mr Wales, Tutelary was doxxed by members of Wikipediocracy. They also claim that she is not really a transwoman, which is obvious transphobia. Now there is a proposal on ANI to topic ban her from BLPs or even site ban her. Just because she moderates some subreddits about women on Reddit does not mean that she is an MRA. Remember, Wikipediocracy are the same people who claimed that a KKK member shouldn't be editing articles about Jews. That's not how Wikipedia works - anyone can edit anything. I bet Tutelary knows more about feminists than most of the people who edit in that topic area. Please put a stop to this harrassment by Wikipediocracy supporters. Anyone voting to ban Tutelary should be banned for supporting doxxing. Doxelary (talk) 21:26, 12 September 2014 (UTC)