User talk:Jimbo Wales

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Should WMF employment and ArbCom membership intersect?

Jimmy: Information has arisen that User:Coren has become a paid employee of WMF, effective Feb. 25, 2013. To his credit, Coren did disclose this information HERE. I am curious whether WMF's legal eagles have issued an opinion as to whether this is an acceptable "co-mingling of responsibilities" or whether this presents a potential foothold for anyone who might in the future seek to demonstrate legal responsibility for the Foundation over content. Do you personally share my own view that Coren should resign one position or the other? Carrite (talk) 16:50, 26 February 2013 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 17:09, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

Considering the rest of us dont get paid for our contributions this might be in the affirmative. Pass a Method talk 16:58, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that my manager at the Foundation would be pretty annoyed if I billed him for my volunteer work – and well he should. I am being paid for very specific technical work on a specific part of the infrastructure, not for any of the work I do on the English Wikipedia. — Coren ^(talk) 02:00, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

It's my understanding that the legal eagles at WMF do not see any issue with Coren's retaining his role from a legal perspective. Fortunately for me, they've been okay with my remaining an admin and an editor in spite of my work, too, as long as I am careful to maintain separation of roles. I'll be happy to verify. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 17:39, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

First, a brief correction: Coren is not a paid employee of the Wikimedia Foundation, he has accepted a contract for a defined scope of work as a contractor, I believe. On the question above, however, Maggie is correct. Prior to Coren accepting employment, I asked the General Counsel this exact question. The opinion he expressed to me is that there is no conflict of interest from a legal perspective, and therefore that wouldn't legally bar his appointment or him continuing on the Arbcom. Of course, community issues of COI and editorial standards are different, and the community is certainly allowed to create and codify standards there, but there is nothing that legally prohibits this. Disclosure: like Maggie, I retained my adminship here when I was hired. Philippe Beaudette, Wikimedia Foundation (talk) 18:15, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

I suppose the fundamental question is whether being one of 15 elected ArbCom members is fundamentally different than being one of 1500 or so Administrators. I don't see a COI issue between WMF employment with the latter, I do with the former. Carrite (talk) 18:18, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

This is an interesting question, but it'd be worthwhile for someone who thinks there is an issue here to explain exactly what it might be. ArbCom's work and the work of the Foundation have very little overlap. ArbCom doesn't rule on Foundation issues (it has no authority to do so) and the Foundation doesn't interfere with ArbCom decisions (it has the authority to do so, but it doesn't as a general practice). I'm not sure what the problem would be.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 19:41, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

I don't see it as a big issue but it's probably not a good idea in principle. I know the analogy can only go so far, but it is a bit like mixing the Executive branch with the Judiciary. --regentspark (comment) 20:34, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

Risker says on the page linked that he would have had to recuse from 27% of Arbcom cases in the last year, as well as other matters. Coren's response: "...But, in the end, if it turns out that I would have to recuse on half of the issues that reach the Committee during my contract (which would surprise me no end), that leaves me available to contribute positively for the other half...." does not represent a good way forward. Johnbod (talk) 20:42, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

While that's not a good sign, the bigger problem is that people will wonder who's doing the talking. The WMF or the arb. And this is regardless of whether there is an overlap between their roles at all. Human nature being what it is, this is probably not a good idea at all. --regentspark (comment) 20:52, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

From what I've seen, "who's doing the talking" is a problem that's been solved by people having official accounts that are separate from their volunteer accounts, and making sure they talk from the right one at the right time. (About which quite a degree of care seems to be taken.) --Demiurge1000 (talk) 15:39, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Carrite, "information has arisen" is an interesting way of saying "Wikipediocracy has just noticed"; there was hardly any secret involved. As soon as I was offered the job I posted prominent notices on a half dozen high visibility noticeboards (including the Committee's, AN, and the Village Pump) inviting comments and discussion. (And, incidentally, I would have appreciated notice that you were discussing me here).

And again, for those who did not have the opportunity to involve themselves in the previous discussion, the contract I have with the foundation is with Engineering and Product Development, which has no influence or authority on the English Wikipedia – let alone the Committee. While Jimmy is correct above that the Foundation does have some interplay with the projects, that would necessarily come from Legal and Community Advocacy, which is a different bunch of people. And even then, in order to prevent from even the appearance of impropriety, I recuse from any such interactions.

If you have specific concerns about possible interactions between my volunteer work and my paid role, I invite you to discuss them with me (or with the Committee); but to date the consensus is that, with some care to avoid the appearance of conflict, there is no impact on either. Vague gesturing at hypothetical shadows, however, is probably not quite as helpful. — Coren ^(talk) 01:56, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Nice of you to phrase it with overtones of conspiracy theory. I'm just curious about whether there is a potential of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act being undermined by your rather tone-deaf failure to separate commercial gain from volunteer service. The answer appears to be no. Good for you. Carrite (talk) 03:03, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• All arbitrators and all WMF employees (contractors) have some COI. They all are concerned about keeping their very nice positions much more than about being fair and honest. They all have much to lose, you see. Arbitrators have to balance of course. They have to keep friends in the upper circles, and they have to remain popular with the community. For example Jclemens made a very bad mistake, when he voted to ban Malleus, and he lost the election. On the other hand Courcelles has learned his lesson. Once he almost got desysoped for blocking Malleus. He's never repeated the same mistake again, and I am sure he never will. It was funny seeing him opposing Malleus's ban. Has he suddenly liked Malleus? Has he suddenly decided to play it fair? It is very doubtful. He opposed the ban not because he acted in Wikipedia's best interests, not because he acted in Malleus's best interests. He opposed the ban because he acted in his own best interests, and by a pure accident he did the right thing. Often though Wikipedia's best interests and arbitrators best interests are different. I think Coren has two COI now. I think he should resign as Chase did, when he got employed by WMUK. 71.198.250.115 (talk) 04:12, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
  • Is there anyone else you want to drag into this?--Amadscientist (talk) 04:27, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
• In my experience, when someone accepts a volunteer position like this one with a charitable organization, they are often hoping to work their way into a paid position, perhaps by doing such a good job in the volunteer position that they make a successful bid to get it funded with a salary the next business year. Coren, has any thought like this crossed your mind? Cla68 (talk) 05:22, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

  Oh come on man. More fodder for WR or well, whatever offsite dramaboard that has succeeded it?--MONGO 05:35, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

  • That's an ad hominem argument MONGO, meant to discredit my statement by casting doubt on my motivation for stating it. An ad hominem is a logical fallacy. As adults, we should try to debate the merits of each others' arguments without resorting to such tactics. Using such tactics reflects poorly on you, and on Wikipedia for allowing anyone to engage in such behavior. Wikipedians continue to do it, however, because there are no consequences for doing so. Since you edit anonymously, you don't worry about real life people coming to the conclusion that you debate in a dishonest manner. Cla68 (talk) 06:49, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

  I think Cla may be over-generalizing from his own expreience. Tom Harrison ^Talk 13:35, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

  I had that same thought. --Orlady (talk) 15:50, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

  • (@Cla68) I never had any pretension that what I do here on enwp is so brilliantly executed that I should be paid for it. Did my involvement here play a part in my getting the job? No doubt it did – the Foundation never made any secret of the fact that they consider involvement as a volunteer a "plus" when making hiring decisions. What I can tell you is that during the extended interview process, the people I have talked to seemed interested rather in my technical skills and experience.

    I was looking for a job, and there was a posting for a contractual position I was perfectly qualified for. I didn't go "Finally, my volunteer work 'paid off'!", just "Cool, I could work at something I love for a change." — Coren ^(talk) 13:37, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

    Of course that is the case, but the conspiracy theorists don't want to be fair. While there is no issue with some wanting a pledge from you to be mindful of COI issues, its the insinuation of assumed impropriety that is just pure tabloid dribble, suitable only for some slanderous trash rag.--MONGO 15:15, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• Besides everything else it is all but impossible to be an honest arbitrator and to be an honest employee. There's simply not enough time. Some time ago I happened to read an email sent by a former arbitrator, which was forwarded to me by an accident. They confirmed my words. They said that being an arbitrator is a full time job, and there's no time left for anything else. They said the amount of emails the arbitrators should read and respond is overwhelming, and then there's on wiki work to do. Also Risker writes: "I'm at work now, so am not in a position to use my fancy tools, so can someone checkuser this one please ..." So she cannot use her " fancy tools" because she is at work, but she reads and responds emails that have absolutely nothing to do with her work. Is she an honest employee? Of course she is not, and if a person is dishonest at his/her work, he/she makes a dishonest arbitrator. 71.198.250.115 (talk) 15:27, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• Excuse me, but what on earth are you gibbering on about? Yes, several arbs have day jobs that aren't to do with Wikipedia, and yes, they find enough hours in the day to carry out those day jobs and also carry out their arb "work". And yes, one might imagine they sometimes answer email from their workplaces during their lunch hour or during other designated break periods. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 15:36, 27 February 2013 (UTC) (writing this from, but not for, my employer)

• " during their lunch hour", yeah, sure. Give me a break, please. Besides I quoted a former arbitrator, and I have no reasons to mistrust that person.71.198.250.115 (talk) 17:29, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• What are you, someone who fell into a Roald Dahl novel and can't get out? Those of us gainfully employed in the modern world are not screwing the tops onto toothpaste tubes and required to do so many per minute across x number of hours we are sat in the factory. Grow up and get a real job. Or, as the Americans would say, "graduate college". --Demiurge1000 (talk) 21:26, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• The anon statement was not appropriate. Your statement is downright insulting. Please think before you hit save page. --Onorem♠Dil 21:35, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• I would do so if others would take the same care. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 21:44, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• (edit conflict)That's not at all what I thought you meant. I'm not surprised you don't get it though. --Onorem♠Dil 21:48, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• No worries, I respect your point of view anyway. By the way, just in case it helps you to think about such matters at all; if someone is elected to arbcom, and then happens to reply to an arbcom email while physically located on the premises of their employer, does that make the person "dishonest"? Just wondering what you think. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 21:51, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• Lets not get off topic here. Please come to my talk page and tell me what my point of view is. I don't think you have a clue based on your previous reply. I think you are simply trying to deescalate. No. I don't think occassional use of company time for personal matters is 'dishonest' exactly. It's not right, but it is something that many studies have shown happens very frequently. Most people waste 'some' time at work every day. --Onorem♠Dil 21:57, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• I might plead guilty to "trying to de-escalate", but in return you'll have to surrender the Falkland Islands and agree my right to re-coal dreadnought warships there. Deal? --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:17, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• Works for me as long as you don't try to treat me like a child again. (but again, this doesn't belong here now) --Onorem♠Dil 22:23, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

Well, a lot of people are salaried rather than on an hourly wage. If you're salaried, then there is very much less of a distinction between work time and non-work time, although this varies among salaried positions. In the United States at least, there is no limit to the workweek for salaried employees (there is for hourly employees: 40 hours (one can be required to work more, but by law must be paid a higher rater after 40 hours)). Salaried employees have no such limit and (again, depending on the particular job) often work irregular hours and at home (answering emails and so forth), and are sometimes on call at any reasonable time. Salaried employees are often more or less judged by their final product rather than their labor-time input -- e.g., if one produces one's "deliverables" on time and of acceptable quality, it doesn't much matter if one did a lot of the work at home and night and did other things during "work time".

So it's not really "dishonest" to remain plugged into the Wikipedia while "at work", for many. Many employers allow or even encourage salaried employees to engage in wide variety of activities throughout the day. Besides which the Wikipedia is a charity and many employers encourage their people to contribute to charitable undertakings.

However, for some people this is a fairly foreign concept. They work on an hourly basis and perhaps everyone they know does too. It's a sort of a class thing, and Onorem was right to point out that there's no need for Demiurge1000 get shirty about it. Demiurge1000, guess what: working for an hourly wage is a "real job", and not all of us can "graduate college" (its expensive for one thing), and "screwing the tops onto toothpaste tubes" is honest work and not to be denigrated by the entitled, in my opinion. Your lack of respect of the world of hourly-wage work does not make you better than 71.198.250.115 with his lack of respect for the world of salaried work. It makes you equally clueless, and a little more humility and kindness all around might be in order, I think. Herostratus (talk) 01:16, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Well said. The level of condescension and ignorance in those remarks is appalling. Beeblebrox (talk) 03:27, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Agree with Herostratus, and to the original question (posed to Jimbo, not me) I don't personally think there is any conflict between Coren's roles.  7  07:08, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

In the Roald Dahl story to which I was referring, financial difficulties are caused by the task of "screwing the tops onto toothpaste tubes" being taken over by machines. This was written in the early 1960s (most likely referring to events decades earlier), and I had no idea that half a century later there were still people employed in such roles, nor that they might be reading Jimbo's talk page in order to be offended by my comments. Unlike the IP, however, I was not accusing them (or anyone else) of being dishonest due to the nature of their employment. My thanks to Herostratus for enlightening me about employment practices and the affordability of a college education in the modern world. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 11:33, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

"Arbitrators are neither Wikimedia Foundation employees or agents" -- Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee. 67.41.203.4 (talk) 07:27, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

I think it's always been clear that means that the arbitrator role is not a WMF employee/agent role; not that a person holding the arbitrator role disqualifies them from also having WMF employee/agent role separately. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 11:33, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

That declaration implies a separation which no longer exists. There should be a more explicit phrasing detailing the new reality, in my opinion. What has "always been clear" was that ArbCom was the elected, highest expression of the volunteer community, and the Foundation was the Foundation, the professional organization behind The Project, which was something altogether different.... "While members of ArbCom may be paid employees of the Wikimedia Foundation, their activities as a part of ArbCom are an expression of their private, uncompensated participation as ordinary Wikipedia editors," or some such. (I really can't believe that the WMF legal beagles think this is a super great idea 230-wise, but I guess that's why they make the big bucks and I just sit around muttering under my breath and shaking my head...) Carrite (talk) 03:57, 1 March 2013 (UTC) Last edit: Carrite (talk) 04:03, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Under your breath? Not so much.

But I don't see why the page in question shouldn't be updated to make it clearer what it does and doesn't imply. Now, where would be the place to discuss making changes to that page? :) --Demiurge1000 (talk) 07:46, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

• Being on the ArbCom is good. Being a WMF contractor/term employee is also good. But you can't do both without (consciously or unconsciously) being biased. Sorry but one of them has to be dropped in order for the other to continue. It's a basic Conflict of Interest. 134.241.58.251 (talk) 16:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Qorvis and Wikipedia manipulation

Hello Jimbo,

I found myself interested in a man named Alexander Mirtchev after reading an article about the enablers of the dictatorship of Kazakhstan in the United States. I did some research and found that Mr. Mirtchev has been investigated for money laundering (in an article by the Wall Street Journal[1] ) and has been identified as the dictator's "point man" in Washington DC. I cited the Wall Street Journal (twice), Der Spiegel, Forbes, and The Human Rights Foundation as my sources. But this is only the beginning of the story.

My edits were almost immediately removed by a brand new user. We went back and forth debating the content of the article, but after a while, I lost interest—I do have a job after all and I can't spend all day arguing on Wikipedia. When I came back to check on the page a couple months later, I noticed that the page looked like a blatant advertisement. I also noticed some similarities between the half-dozen single-purpose accounts created to edit his page. 

I launched a sockpuppet investigation on the 31st of January[2]. The results came back positive, and the CheckUsers were able to identify several other accounts that edit on the same IP address. After reviewing the contributions of some of the usernames identified, it became clear that these were all sockpuppets of the PR company Qorvis.

In case you are unfamiliar, this is from Qorvis's Wikipedia page:

"In early February 2011, three of Qorvis's partners left the firm disgruntled by compensation; however, they later attributed it to the company's controversial work with foreign governments. A former employee, Don Goldberg, who represented Saudi Arabia and Halliburton while at the firm, was reported as saying, 'I just have trouble working with despotic dictators killing their own people.'"

Some of the usernames involved:

• RachelleLin edits exclusively Alexander Mirtchev, a man accused by the Wall Street Journal of laundering money for the dictator of Kazakhstan[3] and a man who directs the sovereign wealth fund of Kazakhstan — also, a known client of Qorvis[4]
• RichardBr2 is just a weak attempt at sockpuppetry working for the Mirtchev page. 
• Msgolightly212 is another editor that adds puffery to Mirtchev's page and removes anything negative, no matter how well sourced.
• Harriett888 edits exclusively Qorvis's page, removes all negative information, and hid the negative information he/she couldn't remove under the Bahrain section at the very end of the page.
• Sacoca edits exclusively Tom Squitieri, an employee of Qorvis.

I understand you are familiar with the ethical blindness of PR firms like Bell Pottinger[5]—a company to which Qorvis subcontracts some of its dirtiest work[6] including covering up the actions of Bahrain and Yemen. This is not the first time Qorvis has been caught editing Wikipedia[7] 

I am a huge fan of the Wikipedia project and I would hate to see it corrupted by lobbyists and PR firms, hoping to erase the evils done by dictatorships. If there is anything I can do to help, please let me know. KazakhBT (talk) 22:40, 26 February 2013 (UTC)

• As a steadfast opponent of all paid editing here, who knows nothing about the particulars of the above matter, all I can say is that if it is true, we need to have a long-overdue Wiki-wide discussion about eliminating all traces of paid editing, if Wikipedia is to maintain any semblance of NPOV, or just change the slogan to "The Free Encyclopedia that those with money and power can slant as they see fit." Jusdafax 04:38, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

By this reasoning, if Mirtchev himself had put such material in his own article, using a sockpuppet, you would be arguing that having BLP subjects editing their own articles should be absolutely prohibited. There's a big leap from "is often harmful, see, look at this case of it doing harm" and "should be absolutely prohibited". If Mirtchev had done this himself, we would refuse to take that leap; we should not do so here either. Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:43, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

To avoid a useless conversation, I'm hatting one remark that appears to be in factual error. You can click to see my response. If I'm mistaken, we should discuss the issue in a separate thread so as to not divert attention from the Qorvis issue--Jimbo Wales (talk) 14:39, 27 February 2013 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Isn't Qorvis connected to WikiBilim, headed by Jimbo's choice for Wikipedian of the Year in 2011? I would be interested in Jimbo's take on Kazakhstan's editing of Wikipedia, not just in English, as he apparently has some kind of personal connection with the issue. Cla68 (talk) 05:17, 27 February 2013 (UTC) According to google there is no link between Qorvis and Wikibilim. If you have other information, please present it in a separate thread, as I'd like to keep this thread focussed on Qorvis.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 14:39, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

• Noting that there has been a sockpuppet investigation into this matter with a number of accounts blocked. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 17:12, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

This response from Qorvis is relevant here - I'm travelling home today and I don't have time to look at this right now. If we could write up a solid NPOV summary of what Qorvis did, that would likely be very useful in terms of responding to them.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:18, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Question about Qorvis and Kazakhstan

• • Jimbo, Alexander Mirtchev is the "independent" director and a member of the Board of Directors of Kazakhstan’s $30 billion National Welfare Fund Samruk-Kazyna. Samruk Kazyna sponsored WikiBilim's expansion of the Kazakh Wikipedia, with funding of $340,000 spent in part on paid editing (71 contracts signed), digitization of documents, and conversion of the licensing rights of the "official" state-authored Kazakh encyclopedia, so that it could be copied (largely verbatim) into the Kazakh Wikipedia. Samruk Kazyna awarded 100 laptop computers to editors for transcribing articles within a given time frame and written to "a satisfactory level". Mirtchev is a client of Qorvis, who have been caught editing the Wikipedia article about him. Now, instead of hiding the assertion, why don't you address it? Cla68 (talk) 23:44, 27 February 2013 (UTC)

(As I said above, I welcome this discussion, so I object to your false accusation of 'hiding the assertion'. I asked you to bring me information in a different thread so as to avoid hijacking the other thread, which is much more important.) This is a different topic and deserves a different thread. Let me see if I understand what you are saying. Alexander Mirtchev is a member of the board of directors of the sovereign wealth fund of Kazakhstan, an organization with $78 billion in assets (not the $30 billion you mention) which amounts to 56% of the GDP of Kazakhstan. He is a client (in a personal capacity?) of Qorvis, who are accused (probably rightly) of inappropriate editing of Wikipedia. And that same sovereign wealth fund gave a grant to Wikibilim. And on the basis of this you are saying that Qorvis is liked to Wikibilim? I think that's a stretch. It's like arguing that the Wikimedia Foundation is linked to a PR company hired by an independent director of Microsoft (for example) if Microsoft has donated money to Wikimedia. We can expect that large grantmaking organizations will have members of their boards of directors with many connections to all sorts of things.

At the same time, let me be clear about several things. 1. It is wildly inappropriate what Qorvis appears to have done here and I strongly support acknowledging what appears to me to be an emerging community consensus that this is a problem that needs to be dealt with more firmly. 2. My own view is that we should clearly and passionately ban paid editing in the article space, and we should improve community processes to improve the ability PR people to participate appropriately through open self-identification and editing of talk pages. 3. Wikibilim should continue to make it clear that grants from any organization must come with no content restrictions. 4. The real issue with National Welfare Fund Samruk-Kazyna is not what PR firm for one of their board members have done, but their close ties to an autocratic regime which has engaged in repeated and systematic human rights abuses. It's not wise to focus on the side issues. It's extremely problematic that Wikibilim has received funding from them, despite the fact that as far as anyone has been able to show, their money has com without restrictions, and again, not because of unrelated issues having to do with one of their directors.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:41, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

It does not look like Cla68 will be able to continue this discussion any time soon. 71.198.250.115 (talk) 16:27, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

Cla68 is a seasoned editor and he knows the rules about that sort of thing.--MONGO 17:09, 28 February 2013 (UTC)

You're right, Cla68 is a seasoned editor and he knows the rules. That's why it is very strange that such experienced editor violated these rules, or did he? 71.198.250.115 (talk) 00:31, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

In this case, MONGO the editor who was supposedly "outed" has plainly linked his off-wiki identity to his on-wiki identity on Wikimedia mailing lists, used off-line accounts under his real name to ask for permission to use pictures on something in his userspace explicitly linking his off-wiki personal accounts to his Wikipedia account, and has stated on-wiki that he owns a perfume business, a business which he has also used as a source on Wikipedia articles (twice that I have seen). The policy is designed to protect an individual's privacy from serious intrusion, not to force everyone else to keep that editor's secrets when even said editor can't keep them secret.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 01:55, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Had you done what Cla68 did, I would be supportive of an indefinite ban...that applies to anyone who outs editors--MONGO 14:57, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Verifiability vs. Truth

You once said "I'm glad that we're finally rid of the "verifiability, not truth" nonsense - but it's going to take a while before people really fully grasp what that means." (Jimbo Wales, 11:36, 25 September 2012). Were you referring to a policy change that had been made? When/where/how did we get rid of it, or did that effort fail? We need a clear statement of policy. Chrisrus (talk) 03:41, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

This page has changed. This page is policy. In my view, this is not a change of policy so much as a change of wording to eliminate a completely false interpretation of policy that was often misleading people. Wikipedia should never publish things that are not true. If we have good reason to think that otherwise reliable sources are or were mistaken, we need to thoughtfully take that into account. I suspect it will be a few years (and a few bans of ideologues) before this really sinks in.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 05:34, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Taking that into consideration, my father is verifiably Bryan Joyce; however, this is untrue. This stems from an uncorrected newspaper article. Now, I don't have a Wikipedia article, but I can imagine this same situation can and does occur to people who do. Could you help these people out by helping institute a system to correct these errors? Right now, it seems that OTRS members will remove incorrect information, but won't replace it. I don't have the perfect system in mind, but the one I've floated in my mind is a system similar to OTRS where subjects of articles can send a Creative commons licensed email that is viewable by anyone and can source basic facts. I would presume the information that can be fixed by this would be more restrictive than WP:SELFPUB, but would follow the essential idea. We'd need some system to authenticate the person sending the email, and that would probably still be private. In any case, it would be great to see this, some derivative of this, or something totally different with a similar goal instituted. Ryan Vesey 05:46, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

If you are feeling particularly robust, go and check out the situation at Will.i.am.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 11:06, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

That really isn't the meaning of verifiability, sorry. The article was mistaken, therefore the information is not verifiable. If verified it would have been discovered to be false. Just being in a source does not mean the information IS verified, just that it has been written. I believe we have a good system in place right now...our contributers and editors. As Mr. Wales says "Wikipedia should never publish things that are not true. If we have good reason to think that otherwise reliable sources are or were mistaken, we need to thoughtfully take that into account." I repeat this, as this is very important. We have to listen to each other and go deeper then just what a single source states. That means actual research and a real discussion where involved editors let go of the information they may hold strongly just because it was in print, and take time to understand exactly what is being said and how it is verified. We know what to do when to sources contradict each other: "When reliable sources disagree, present what the various sources say, give each side its due weight, and maintain a neutral point of view"--Amadscientist (talk) 08:16, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. F.Y.I. Chrisrus (talk) 06:12, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

@Amadscientist, speaking as someone with battle scars from the center of that fracas, I agree with you in spirit but we need to recognize that we're not fully there. A patently erroneous statement is not verifiable in the real world, but it can be wp:verifiable. When we got rid of VNT what we did was get rid of a chant which was being used to exclude accuracy from conversations on whether or not to leave something out. Just recently we went a baby step farther which was to point out (which again was not a change) to say that just because something is wp:verifiable does not mean that it must be included. I think that we will be fully there (and make a huge difference) when we say that "WP:Verifiability is a requirement for inclusion, not a force for inclusion". The other next steps for further evolution will probably be:

• Recognize that sources have varying degrees of strength, and add two metrics ("expertise and objectivity with respect to the item which cited it") to the existing wp:rs criteria (which is to have traditional media structure). These other two metrics are already used (from common sense, not policy) at the RS Noticeboard, but are not in policies / guidelines, and so are generally still askew. This change would make is to that the strength of a reference can be discussed, vs. somebody being able to cite policy to exclude questions of "expertise and objectivity with respect to the item which cited it" from conversations.
• Recognize that there is a difference between an area where the answer is a matter of objective accuracy, and areas where the answer is a matter of opinion, or "lens" that it is viewed through. This will legitimize discussions on the former.

North8000 (talk) 11:26, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

• I have had this issue with two birth years for BLP articles. One is not the truth. One article had two sources each for each year. Of the six emails I sent only the two sources that had the correct year emailed back to verify they were correct. The other article was brought up at help desk by the subject of the article. We removed the single wrong year and replaced it with two different years that were sourced. I think that discussion is still going on. I walked away from both articles.--Canoe1967 (talk) 16:09, 1 March 2013 (UTC)

Your Awesome

For being the most awesome person

Teh Flying Corgi 15:29, 1 March 2013 (UTC)