Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2023-06-19/In the media

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I've been digging into the Orsini/Gitz case since it was raised on a well-known criticism site. My feeling is that if something like this had happened on en.wiki, things would have been very different. It.wiki does not have an arbcom, does not have a method for someone to appeal against a block on their talk page, does not have WP:INVOLVED and has a culture where, it seems, ordinary editors are not allowed to comment on actions taken by admins.

The Orsini article was written by a group of editors, including admins, who did not like his politics. Nothing wrong with that. I don't like his politics. But what they did was create an attack article, as illustrated by Andreas above and by the article in Il Fatto Quotidiano. The involved admins then used their position to block other editors who tried to bring the article to a more NPOV position. Gitz was blocked by one admin for a week and then, with nothing happening in between, a second admin extended the block to indefinite. The first block looks dubious to me. The second ridiculous. It is this second block that seems to have been made by an admin with a conflict of interest as, according to the Il Fatto Quotidiano report, they work for an organisation which Orsini has frequently criticised.

I've more or less stopped editing here coming up to ten years ago, because I thought admins too easily got away with bullying editors who pointed out their mistakes. But it.wiki has that problem in spades. My instinct is that, if something like the Orsini case happened here, the mob with pitchforks and flaming torches would soon be gathered at WP:ANI before heading on to Arbcom.

Gitz has reassured me that they have not made the sort of threats that the Italian stewards claim. They merely emailed the blocking admin to ask them to undo their block in the light of their conflict of interest. Gitz said that they would then voluntarily withdraw from the project. Gitz says that they were approached to comment to Il Fatto Quotidiano but declined to speak to them. Gitz also says that the blocking admin had identified themselves on-wiki and that this information remained there until after the incident flared up and was only revdeled subsequently. Gitz says that they were not the person who spotted that someone with the same name as the admin worked for the organisation criticised by Orsini. Another party had emailed Gitz to point out that someone with this name worked there, and Gitz merely replied that the admin had edited an it.wiki article on that organisation. These COI edits have since been hidden too. So Gitz did not out the admin and raised legitimate issues by email.

We cannot change what happens on it.wiki. Different Wikimedia projects are independent. People banned by Arbcom or the community here have been able to operate as admins on other projects and have remained on the boards of local chapters. But what has happened in this case is that members of it.wiki have decided without good justification to globally block an editor in good standing here. So what are en.wiki people going to do to assert our right to choose who contributes here without interference from another project? --Dronkle (talk) 12:04, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Gitz has reassured you, how reassuring! An user who has plainly violated the universal code of conduct (m:Policy:Universal_Code_of_Conduct#3.1_–_Harassment) has written to you that he has done nothing wrong, and you have the kindness to believe to him and not to the users of it.wiki. Thank you very much for the assumption of good faith.

By the way, Gitz had been previously blocked also on es.wiki. But of course that must be a plot of cunning admins too... Friniate^talk 13:18, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

You say that they have plainly violated the UCOC. Where? What's your evidence for that?--Dronkle (talk) 13:41, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

As you can easily understand, since the case involves a breach of personal informations, I cannot discuss the matter in public. Friniate^talk 13:46, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

So you're saying thta because Gitz got mentioned in the article, then they must have spoken to the newspaper? That violated WP:AGF. Dronkle (talk) 13:51, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

No, I'm not saying that. Friniate^talk 13:56, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you both for providing additional context to those of not familiar with the case.

Friniate, since you alleged a "plain" UCoC violation, it's not unreasonable to ask what it consisted in. It seems you are saying that it was about the "Disclosure of personal data (Doxing)" clause in section 3.1 (fixed link: foundation:Policy:Universal_Code_of_Conduct#3.1_–_Harassment). It's clearly possible to provide more concrete information about what such a "breach of personal informations" consisted of without actually disclosing the personal information itself. E.g. (hypothetical example) one could state "user X posted the home address of user Y on-wiki" (without repeating said home address). This discussion is relevant to the wider Wikimedia community, considering the longtime concerns about the vague wording of that UCoC clause and possible over-interpretations.

Also worth being aware that just as this Signpost issue went to press, the article it:Alessandro Orsini (saggista) has been blanked (and its revision history removed from public view) by User:Team VRT, with reference to "a possible legal controversy". Regards, HaeB (talk) 14:02, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@HaeB You can ask directly a steward to tell you more about the issue, I don't think that I can say more, but they surely know what's the standard policy in these cases better than me. Friniate^talk 14:09, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Well, from your other comments here it sure sounded like you felt familiar with standard policies relevant to this issue. But you're right, let's ping User:Sakretsu - the blocking steward - directly in case they would like to address that question (I see they had already replied to some questions at m:User_talk:Sakretsu#Global_lock_of_Gitz6666). Regards, HaeB (talk) 14:27, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Gitz6666 was blocked on Spanish Wikipedia after a couple of dozen edits like this one, removing the 19th-century Flammarion engraving from the Spanish article on the Quran. Now I can't speak to the alleged harassment you assert has happened in the Italian Wikipedia (where admins blocked two users – are you sure you are punishing the correct one?), but in terms of article content, I confess I am as mystified as User:Gitz6666 what the Flammarion engraving (with a citation to wikiislam.net ... a wiki!) is doing in a Wikipedia article on the Quran. Andreas JN 466 14:16, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Gitz6666 had already been indefinitely blocked on it.wiki because of his disrupting behaviour. Then it had been decided to give him a last chance, with a de facto topic ban on "hot pages" about the russian invasion of Ukraine. Where did he choose to edit? On an extremely hot page, that, as it was noted here, has been overshadowed today because of legal intimidations against different users, a page that had already been at the centre of two big campaigns initiated by Orsini himself on the social media.

After an umpteenth "incident" with another user, Gitz was blocked indefinitely on it.wiki for the second time. He could have decided to continue to edit on en.wiki and on the other projects. But no, he decided to go after it.wiki administrators. That marks, IMHO, the word "end" for that user. Friniate^talk 14:28, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

As far as I'm concerned, nearly all the pictures he removed were just christian spam, that had no use in an article about the Quran. Grüße vom Sänger ♫ ^(talk) 14:32, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

There is a structural problem from a combination of:

A "Universal code of conduct" that is so broad and vague that nearly everybody sometimes violates a literal interpretation of it. And this flaw comes from development inside the WMF ivory tower.
Making something with such flaws a binding rule
Structure that a single individual can interpret it as they wish and unilaterally enact the harshest global penalties based on their interpretation.

Sincerely, North8000 (talk) 13:53, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

In this case we're not discussing of something that nearly everybody sometimes does, you can be sure about that. Friniate^talk 14:01, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Why must I think of this and this? (BTW: Why are the archives still on Meta, while the article was moved from the community to the ivory tower?) How to prove massive COI-editing without doxxing the COI-vandals? Grüße vom Sänger ♫ ^(talk) 14:28, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]