Wikipedia talk:Wikipedia Signpost/2013-10-30/News and notes

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Objectivity?

Considering that a siteban was proposed for Tony1 on the English Wikivoyage, that does call into question the objectivity of this story: voy:en:Wikivoyage:User ban nominations/Archive#User:Tony1 --Rs chen 7754 21:47, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tony1 and I don't always see eye to eye, but that block, and the discussion leading to it, is one of the most pathetic things I've ever seen on a WMF project. Wikivoyage blocked a user for criticizing the project, plain and simple. His word choice was just the excuse that the blocking admin used. Could he have been nicer? Sure. Would that have mattered? After seeing that discussion, I seriously doubt it. Really, really sad. Sven Manguard Wha? 22:56, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Rschen, since you're so keen to raise it, I am one of many—small fry—and it didn't matter to me personally; the worrying aspect was that it suggested the existence of a certain block-happy behaviour by a few admins (among others, you were named). Indeed, a Wikivoyager has pointed the Signpost to a number of recent instances of apparently gratuitous blocks. A weird one is this one just days ago, as intimidation against writing this. Given its falling numbers, the site can ill afford to turn away editors who lobby for change. You're welcome to continue this on my en.WP talk page; but the broader phenomenon is really for others, not me, to discuss. I just present the facts. Please note that I have authored or co-authored four substantial coverages of Wikivoyage over the past 15 months. Tony (talk) 23:50, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tony, just to make sure I don't misunderstand - in response to Rschen7754 claiming you have a COI due to being blocked, you are responding with the claim you don't have a COI because there exists another user on wikivoyage who has been blocked. Is that accurate? Bawolff (talk) 00:11, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well it's that, and also the use of quite provocative images that are used nowhere on Wikivoyage (knowing that most people won't read the captions)... just to prejudice the reader. I'm very disappointed. --Rs chen 7754 00:13, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Those images are especially yellow journalism-esque. They clearly imply that they come from Wikivoyage, or relate to it in any way, but are really just random salacious images from Commons. - AdamBMorgan (talk) 04:25, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A discussion of whether Wikivoyage's policies on illegal activities, drugs, etc need updating, and how to improve monitoring of edits for problems, would be welcome at voy:Wikivoyage talk:Illegal activities policy. However, I would ask that anyone who is concerned about this issue to please read the relevant section(s) of the articles that are being referenced, as some of the quotes used in the Signpost article seem to lack context - for example, the quote from the Amsterdam article is three sentences here, but those three sentences come from different places within a six paragraph section in voy:Amsterdam#Cannabis and other drugs, and those six paragraphs are strongly slanted towards addressing safety concerns for the large number of visitors who choose to experiment with available drugs there. -- Ryan • (talk) • 22:04, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) This article on WikiVoyage is a rotting load of holier-than-thou tripe. All the puritan attacks on Commons sexual content were not enough. I suppose there is still a need to go all tut-tut on the fact that -gasp!- people do pay for sex and like to smoke pot? What about instead dealing with it, and acknowledging that we're not all Boy Scouts? I don't do drugs nor I hang out with hookers, yet I do not feel the need to judge who does or to censor information that they may find useful. --cyclopia ^speak! 23:58, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"This user has been a thorn in our side almost from Day 1". Wow, WikiVoyage is becoming a trolling den more and more, as it's hate of Wikipedia and Wikipedians, as well as of any criticism, keeps on growing. In this case I don't support censorship, but it's a very interesting issue that Tony should be commended for bringing more light to. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:52, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I too want to express my appreciation to Tony for taking the time to write a detailed, interesting article about this WMF project. I also want to add that that the claim that a "conflict of interest" might exist in this situation is totally wrong - such a claim is based on a misunderstanding of what underlies COI: two or more different roles, such as parent and employer, or newspaper columnist and spouse. -- John Broughton (♫♫) 17:18, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To quote the article you link "A conflict of interest (COI) occurs when an individual ororganization is involved in multiple interests, one of which could possibly corrupt the motivation for an act in another." Tony's dispute/block on wikivoyage could quite possibly lead to anger, thus resulting in a potential corruption of his motivations for writing this article into revenge, or even just unconcious bias. (Furthermore the definition doesn't require this to have actually happened, only the potential for it to. I hold the view that this actually happened. Tony himself claims that he will be "... deeply committed to letting Wikimedians know what a corrupt and bullying power structure has developed [on wikivoyage]" [1]. Even if one doesn't hold the view that coruption of motivation happened, I still think there is extremely strong evidence that this could happen) This situation seems to fit the definition of CoI to me. Bawolff (talk) 19:09, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Bounty and Reward Boards

Its good that the mention of these two boards being up for deletion are on here. I personally called to have both closed. Though with this, there can be more discussion so progress can be made towards the final outcome. GamerPro64 21:14, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

signpost being used as a stick to beat other projects with

I'm kind of getting tired of all these attack the sister project stories on the signpost. Now please don't get me wrong, there are important issues involved, and its important to discuss them. However this type of one sided editorializing does not do this. Combined with the other lets beat on the sister projects with a stick articles that the signpost has published in the past (but never a negative article about wikipedia using this type of tone) seems mostly to foster an us vs them mentality then anything else. Bawolff (talk) 23:13, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

+1 - Commons and Wikinews have been recent targets. --Rs chen 7754 23:15, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

+1 Legoktm (talk) 23:16, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

+1 Micru (talk) 12:15, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

+1 Avenue (talk) 21:37, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I am afraid I have to agree.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:57, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

+1 (generally speaking: less tabloidesque writing, and highlighting of just the conflicts, please. It does a dis-service to the neutral tone, and comprehensive coverage, that we're all so fond of.) –Quiddity (talk) 06:33, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

VW page views

Stating "Its page views have dropped 12% from the levels in January when the new site was launched" needs to be put into context. I would say it is a sign of just how well WV has done. In January WV was getting international media attention. After that its viewership fell and now is nearly back to the level it was when it was getting this attention. That this occured after only 6 months is amazing. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 23:48, 2 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There's also bugzilla:52688 which is probably throwing a wrench into it. Legoktm (talk) 00:06, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"Citation needed". How were those stats obtained? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:52, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ah sorry you mean this [2] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 06:07, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

And what is wrong with sex/drug tourism, exactly?

Everyone seems to be taking it as a given that something wrong is happening here. So long as nothing illegal (both de facto and de jure) is going on then more or less everyone benefits from sex and drugs tourism. Women are lifted out of poverty, relatively speaking*, and drugs are either provided by the government in a couple of countries, or are cannabis - and the two obvious places to go for cannabis are either Christiana in Cophenhagen or most of the Netherlands.

I actually find this cultural imperialism of red state us hypocritical puritanism much worse than any so-called exploitation.

*yeah, they may still have pretty unpleasant living conditions by western standards, but relatively speaking it's a pretty decent deal.

Egg Centri c 01:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

This really should have been an op-ed

This raised some interesting points, and it's not as bad as the Farmbrough piece in the Arbitration Report a while back, but The Signpost really needs to do a better job drawing the line between articles and opinion pieces. Furthermore, it was a breach of basic journalistic ethics for Tony to not disclose his personal involvement here. I understand that The Signpost has a lot of work to do with relatively little resources, but I expect better than this. — PinkAmpers &^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 01:48, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Fair point. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 02:53, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The ed17 is on vacation so there may be a delay before he sees this but I will leave a note on his talk page. As editor-in-chief this was his decision to make. I had no involvement in the writing or publishing of this piece, but FWIW I have some issues with how this piece is presented especially in N&N instead of op-ed as PinkAmpersand suggests. --Pine^✉ 07:00, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, and it frequently makes references to "The Signpost" when it probably means just Tony1 himself. --Rs chen 7754 07:10, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed. Tony himself said 'Incidentally, the Signpost publishes only balanced material in its "News and notes" and is keenly aware of COI issues (although this is not necessarily the case in its occasional opinion pages).' --Avenue (talk) 22:07, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I can agree with the general premise in this section. However, I think we can cut Tony1 a little slack here (especially considering his hectic work schedule) and not shoot the messenger. (I suspect that Tony1 originally wrote a more balanced piece about Admin abuse at Wikivoyage but pulled it at the last minute precisely because of a perceived COI - we're human after all and I think can be permitted the odd, non-malicious mistake.)

If his opinion piece causes a bit of a re-think about attitudes to gender issues, anonymous editors, censorship and sex tourism policy at Wikivoyage, then so much the better.

If the tabloid proclivities of the (non-Australian, of course) press batten on this Op-Ed and the WMF Wikivoyage projects get some free journalistic plugs or interest (and they should have cleaned up there act a wee bit by then), then so much the better too. --118.93.67.66 (talk) 23:16, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The search engine problem

As the unnamed editor indicated, Wikivoyage is not attacting enough readers and new editors because search engines virtually always rank its articles below Wikitravel's. And it's not just Google. Until that changes, WV will struggle. Can the wider WMF community not help with this? Nurg (talk) 03:12, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tony1 is following a long tradition of Australian journalism in trying (successfully) to sensationalise the ordinary and non-controversial.

However, he does raise, if only briefly and at the end, two important issues:

When is it appropriate to censor prima facie good faith contributions that are not libellous/legally controversial, gross personal attacks, obscene or hateful (either by excising "offending" contributions or by blocking editors) in WMF projects? And, even more importantly,
How can WMF get more bang for the bucks it has (nobly) expended on the Wikivoyage project by ensuring more eyeballs on their pages. The teutonic "Master of Puppets", Frank, has given Wikivoyage good advice as to how to achieve this, but most of the admins (Ikan Kekek, Nurg, Pashley, Peter Southwood and a few others nobly excepted) seem more interested in amateur sleuthing than taking up Frank's challenge. The bald fact remains that, as I write this, his test article still has the highest Google search ranking of any Wikivoyage article bar none. Just use a typical search phrase such as 'guide somerset tasmania' with the anonymised, non-personalised results from Google obtained by using the US site: https://startpage.com to check that for yourself, dear reader...

--118.93.67.66 (talk) 05:01, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

PS: Alice has e-mailed to say that the full text of this part of her quote was: "The readership is actually static with rolling hills and troughs. It's just that it should be 8-150 times greater and should be topping Wikitravel - that will never happen unless and until they adopt proper SEO - what Frank suggested is just the bare minimum of what is needed."

She also apologises for using me as her "meatpuppet" but respectfully points out that, after more than 6 years, she is still blocked from editing EN Wikipedia. :--118.93.67.66 (talk) 05:27, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

PPS: Alice has e-mailed me again to say that the full text of the relevant part of her separate e-mail to Tony1 (not that it makes much difference in my opinion to Tony1's "quote" to run the two e-mails into one) was:

"> Is the matter of spam taken seriously by en.WV?

Yes. it is but because Search Engine Optimisation is NOT taken seriously, (see the https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Wikivoyage_talk:Search_Expedition#Action_points_to_boost_our_readership thread for more detail) our readership numbers are only a small proportion of the original Wikitravel site and that means we are not so attractive a target of the spammers.

At Wikitravel the automated spam attacks have reached truly appalling dimensions."

--118.93.67.66 (talk) 05:43, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

There's no particular tradition of sensationalising in the Australian press—at least none that is distinguishable from the press in other countries. The article presents the facts, and if you think the context makes it sensational, perhaps Wikivoyage might reflect on how to react in a positive fashion. There's a desperate need to attract female editors and readers; reducing the turn-off factor for them would be a good start, and creating a more inclusive social environment at the site would help, too. But instead, the boys—yes, they are all boys—are gathered around the camp fire working out how to attack me ("a jerk", "a dick", "a crap article", and a call to arms: "attacks against the author are 100% valid"). Flicking an email to FOXnews would be a very bad idea ("If we publicize this, we both get more publicity and give the lie to the claim that we can't tolerate any criticism"). And may I say that the comment above that "Women are lifted out of poverty" through prostitution displays the very problematic thinking that has landed the site in this unsatisfactory state. There are misconceptions about women and a regrettable association between developing countries and opportunities for sexual exploitation that some people might see as linking sexism and racism (although I don't).
I didn't want to make suggestions, but my research on the site led me to think that centralising advice on prostitution and drugs rather than allowing it to scatter all over the place would be a way of controlling the message. And the message does need to be controlled by responsible hands in the English Wikivoyage community, given the sensitivities of those topics. Centralised advice is offered on other matters at the site.
Once you get over the initial anger and personalised attack stage, this and other possibilities of making the guidelines more functional might float to the surface. Thank you. Tony (talk) 05:38, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

These efforts have my complete support if we can show that they work for an already established article. The difficulty with the article above is that it was newly created on both sites around the same time. It is thus not a good representation of 99% of the content on WV.

I tried all these techniques at the same time on a single article and while that article became more popular briefly, it was only briefly and WT's article while worse is now once again ranked higher. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 06:14, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Tony, first of all, I think there are some folks at Wikivoyage who will be very surprised to be called men. But more to the point, it's interesting that you never edited or even, to the best of my recollection, commented on any content in violation of Wikivoyage's policy on sex tourism in all the time you were on Wikivoyage. If you had been half as interested in looking for such violations as you were on arguing about spelling policy, you could have actually done something constructive about it. Instead, you try to make a few out-of-context lines of text into something sensational after the fact. Ikan Kekek (talk) 07:04, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Vikivoyage

Excuse me Viki Voyage, your Freudian slip is showing. Nurg (talk) 03:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We do need more editors on Wikivoyage

And this is so immediately apparent here. Even though we are not @Wikivoyage, the same usual stuff crops up which has nothing to do with advancing Wikivoyage but a lot with fixed personal agendas and (hurt?) personalities. This is becoming boring like an old sitcom - very predictable, with the same characters and writers out of ideas. So, we have:

The same guy as usual trying to make themselves better by proposing to formalize a policy on something moderately unimportant, and later building a whole campaign of personal self-gratification around it.
The same guy as usual complaining to high heavens because he can't link to Wikipedia
Not-logged-in people who ostensibly aren't Frank but somehow are only interested in said Frank, Frank's edits, Frank's proposals, Frank's situation with other users and discussing Frank

This sitcom is not "Golden Girls" and it's not getting any Emmys, it's just sad and boring.

So, if you're reading this and have absolutely no idea what's going on, just head over to Wikivoyage and start contributing. Despite all the negativity above, by and large it's just fun, rewarding and very easy. Once there are more of us, the sitcom becomes just an old TV rerun channel nobody watches. For now, it's getting undue prominence and gives the project a bad image. PrinceGloria (talk) 05:27, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

More readers = more editors

wouldn't you think?

Do you think there is a more important topic for discussion and action than the poor (and static) readership of Wikivoyage nearly one year after launch? Please be part of the solution rather than part of the personality fixation you so graphically describe (it should be obvious to anyone looking up my IP that I'm neither Frank nor Alice - although, as I've clearly stated above, I have been engaging in an e-mail conversation with the latter.) --118.93.67.66 (talk) 05:57, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes I agree that the readership is poor. It is currently, from what I gather, about a tenth of that of WT. It however is not static. With the launch of WV we saw a great deal of press and with it a large number of readers (WV was briefly ranked higher than WT on Alexa). After this readership fell more than 60%. From this low point however it has more than doubled in the last 6 months.[3]

Could we do better? Yes definitely. Along with distinguishing the site from WT we also need to make it a lot better than WT. The site less than a year old in English. Will some SEO help? Possibly. And if there is good evidence that it will I am sure that the community will develop bots and adopt it. The evidence however is currently tentative. We would love the help of more people who know about this sort of thing. We would also love more people who simply wish to write about travel. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) (if I write on your page reply on mine) 06:25, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

In response to some of the above comments

I am the Wikivoyage administrator who initiated the discussion on Tony's user block. I'm also responsible for the quote "This user has been a thorn in our side almost from Day 1", with which another editor above took issue. I stand by that quote, as well as my decision to nominate him for a user ban.

I'd like to address some of the comments that have been made here. Tony was not banned for censorious reasons. He was banned, if you'll pardon my bluntness, for being a dick. Civility is a fundamentally important part of user interactions on any wiki, and if Tony had expressed his concerns and suggestions regarding the direction Wikivoyage is taking in a civil manner, he would have had a much more receptive audience among his fellow Wikivoyagers. As other commenters have pointed out, these are frustrating times at Wikivoyage—and if anything, we heartily encourage helpful suggestions about how to make our site better, drive up traffic, and so forth. We do not, however, encourage disruptive and uncivil behavior. Many Wikivoyage administrators went out of their way to urge Tony to adopt a more civil tone in his discourse, but received hostile responses for their troubles. Blocking Tony was the only reasonable course of action we had. In point of fact, Wikivoyage policy states that user bans are a last-resort solution for dealing with problem editors, and we did not regard Tony's case as any different—especially given his fairly distinguished track record at Wikipedia and on other WMF projects. A thorough perusal of Tony's contributions at Wikivoyage will bear out everything said here.

It's worth mentioning that the writing of this article can reasonably be seen as the follow-through of a veiled threat Tony made to smear Wikivoyage in the Signpost upon his nomination for a user ban. Needless to say, we at Wikivoyage do not cotton to strong-arm tactics of that nature. And, also needless to say, all of the above-described baggage Tony has on Wikivoyage points to such a massive conflict-of-interest issue that it's frankly dubious what, if any, value this article may have. That's really a shame, because if Wikivoyage's policies on sex tourism or illegal activities are problematic, they ought to be rectified.

-- AndreCarrotflower (talk) 08:43, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would like to add that while the English Wikipedia frequently does not enforce civility at times, other Wikimedia sites including the English Wikivoyage, take a much harder line on civility. --Rs chen 7754 08:45, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You guys really are just angry: blame the messenger, sure. Now, could I have diffs of this supposed incivility, please—or is it like the other blocks, trumped up, excessive behaviour by admins? And could we have evidence that the pack-attack culture that you and Ryan Holliday and Rschen perpetrate at Wikivoyage might end, to be supplanted by a more mature environment for editors? But before you start, the strategy of personalising the issues and attacking me is to distract from the issues in the article. I don't think readers will be fooled by this. Tony (talk) 08:51, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

AndreCarrotflower: of course you are historically accurate in stating that Wikivoyage policy still states that user bans are a last-resort solution for dealing with problem editors. Why do you think this attitude has changed so much in the last year? Do you think it's some contagion that has been carried over from the extreme censorship practised by IBobi and other IBadmins in the times of strife before the fork or do you think it is like the siege mentality that led to recent US governments flouting the constitution and international law? Since I'm not aware of Tony1 ever causing problems for the Traveller - in article space - if you thought he was being a Dick (and many, perhaps the silent majority, didn't) why did we not regard Tony's case as any different to our historical tradition and simply ignore him?

Rschen7754: Will you continue to regard yourself as the sole arbiter as what is allowed to be discussed on the pages of the Pub?

Again, I don't wish to personalise this, but are you aware that diffs can be provided that show some very un-civil comments by bureaucrats (present and former) of the English language Wikivoyage? Until their attitude has a sea-change, your comments immediately above have the whiff of a double standard. --118.93.67.66 (talk) 08:59, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Your post was archived (NOT deleted) because it was disruptive, and it was trying to start a flame war. Before I had archived the post, several admins indicated on that very thread that they did not want the discussion to continue. --Rs chen 7754 09:05, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

On the contrary, I have been very critical of the other Wikivoyage admins and policies throughout most of my time there. But I know better than to force a community into doing something, because we are a wiki that operates by consensus, and no one person owns it. --Rs chen 7754 09:08, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I accept that was your honestly held opinion and motivation, but there was no basis in policy for your action in prematurely archiving the discussion a few minutes after the last comment. Normal policy would be to wait until the topic had "gone cold" or to excise any part that was "grossly inappropriate". Have you learnt anything or, with the benefit of hindsight, do you think this could have been handled differently? --118.93.67.66 (talk) 09:11, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I have never been a fan of following policy for the sake of following policy, especially when doing so will result in Yet Another Discussion About W.Frank And Alice (TM) in which several admins resigned in protest. --Rs chen 7754 09:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, it seems that you are not the only graduate of the Internet Brands school of etiquette. Whatever happened to the egalitarian principles of many wikis that Admins are just there to perform mundane (but important) tasks of trust and not to bring in a nanny state of censorship and the Orwellian "correcting" of other editor's comments? --118.93.67.66 (talk) 23:04, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

No diffs are necessary; the very next sentence after your request demonstrates adequately the type of interaction for which you were repeatedly warned and subsequently blocked to cool off. The juxtaposition of the two sentences here, without any apparent recognition of the incongruity, goes well past ironic to simply mind-boggling. Powers ^T 22:10, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

To address two of the worst bullies on the English Wikivoyage: which bit of multiple name callings like that I'm a dick, I'm a jerk, are not covered by your civility policy? Or does it not apply to administrators on voy.en? Tony (talk) 03:47, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I think there are two broad norms of behaviour: the first (obviously deeply engrained in the current admin culture of Wikivoyage) is what might be characterised as the "Eton fag" system where the greater your seniority, the more latitude you are given in interpreting policy and following the rules; the second model (that used to be more common on Wikis) is that the more senior you are the better example you are supposed to set for newbies.

Obviously we're all fallible in the heat of the moment, but what does stand out currently at the English Wikivoyage is the disconnect of the reasonable and egalitarian tone of most policy pages that are still current as I write this (and that were largely inherited from the more enlightened time of Evan and Maj(noona)) and the actual bullying tactics seen recently where even words of formal welcome are interfered with and subject to snide allegations of Sockpuppetry --118.93.67.66 (talk) 06:43, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"Yes, they are all boys"? Oh no, they aren't!

Tony1 is presenting himself as someone very familiar with the foul conditions at WV which makes me wonder why he makes this strange (sexism?) claim. For the record, there are several female frequent contributors and admins at WV. Might be they are invisible to Tony1's eyes, because they try to concentrate on other parts of WV work, like adding content, filling empty articles, and making the site up-to-date and attractive to readers rather than escalating academic arguments about spelling.

I would like to avoid generalizing, so I speak for myself, but maybe it is also something to do with female pragmatic approach to work on wiki projects, that we are not so prone to getting involved in feeding the trolls? Danapit (talk) 13:01, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

a less generous view is that the gender gap is a hot button issue on wikipedia. By appealing to that perhaps Tony hoped to cause those on wikipedia who felt strongly about that issue to redirect their anger to wikivoyage. The photos in this article are clear appeals to emotion. It wouldn't surprise me if other arguments made were intended as such. Bawolff (talk) 13:38, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting theories you're both advancing. Tony (talk) 14:28, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I take it that by "interesting" you are suggesting both theories are false? In the article I read your argument as being, the editorial practises on wikivoyage relating to prostution are objectifying hence resulting in a low number of female editors at the project. (Please correct me if I misunderstood). Followed by a conjecture that there are only 2 or 3 female editors, possibly non active in an attempt to back up the first claim. Now the first claim (objectification being bad for gender ratios) seems at least reasonable at first glance, assuming such objectification is pursasive and this isn't just a couple of isolated examples taken out of context (which to be blunt I somewhat expect to be the case). The second claim is the one I have a problem with. It seems to just be numbers pulled out of a hat. How did you find this number? People don't usually disclose their gender publically. People often don't use gendered usernames and when they do its often for the wrong gender. On top of that wikimedia as a whole has gender balance issues. Any discussion of gender bias on a specific project (and thus implicitly comparing it to other wikis) should be done in terms of percents, and compared to percents on other projects to factor out the gender imbalance caused just by being a wiki. Thus I came to the conclusion that the talk of gender balance was more to invoke emotions stemming from a hot button issue, then a serious argument that whatever prostitution related content wikivoyage may have is actively lowering female participation below what it would otherwise be, since the supporting evidence seems to just be claimed without citation. If I have misunderstood your argument anywhere, or have a flaw in my reasoning, please let me know. Thanks. Bawolff (talk) 15:17, 3 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Reject censorship

The first few batches of quotes above are not disturbing in any way. Wikivoyage should accurately portray the conditions that tourists will meet. We should not forget that these are sovereign nations that have the power to crack down on prostitution effectively, or the right to legalize it entirely: we are not the judges either of their citizens or of the foreigners who visit their country. It is true that they should avoid a discriminatory tone against women as described later, because that tone does nothing to advance their educational purpose, but I hope those are merely rare random abuses found in crowdsourced content. Where legally necessary to avoid potential accusation of collusion in illegal activities, Wikivoyage may be forced to enact restrictive policy to preserve its mission, but we should recognize that that is "sacrificing a doctrine to save the church", not a slope we should want them to roll down to the bottom. Wnt (talk) 00:28, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Well said! --118.93.67.66 (talk) 10:27, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure I entirely agree. Taken to extremes this would allow some quite objectionable material. For example imagine if wikivoyage contained information on how to poach endangered species from national parks. I would consider that going too far. Thus I don't agree with no cencorship ever in principle even if Im not to worked up about drugs. Bawolff (talk) 11:58, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As I alluded above, I'll acknowledge (without really knowing, as I'm not a lawyer) that there might conceivably be legal risk if an editor specifically instructs people that they can call a particular number and ask for Jerry to help them hunt a rhino. However, if there really is a general phenomenon in a country that tourists are doing black market hunts, there's no use trying to conceal that, or even trying to conceal the general outlines of how they go about doing it, such as where they start. Certainly a serious poacher would have little trouble finding out the same information from Mr. Google; but by describing that we can give other people more of a feel for the character of the place before they get there. Wnt (talk) 15:16, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Editor's thoughts

Thanks to everyone for your comments. I have been unavailable to comment since this article was published as I was on vacation and in no mood to look at Wikipedia; I'm now just catching up with all this. I greenlighted a Wikivoyage story in September, because while I'm certain that information on finding prostitutes and/or drugs is helpful to some people, I'm equally certain that they don't appear in reputable travel guides—which is what Wikivoyage is striving to be. As such, this topic is one of public interest, and we enjoy fostering healthy debates (good example) when they appear. Wikivoyage's editors are, of course, free to choose their own path. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 03:32, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Suffice it to say that I am very disappointed in this response, and I think that it reflects badly on the entire English Wikipedia. A more "healthy debate" would have been at least giving the editors of Wikivoyage a chance to respond, rather than publishing a rather one-sided story like this. --Rs chen 7754 04:01, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Heavens, Rschen, you've all had ample time and space to respond here, but all I see are personal attacks against me, not substantive debate. What is stopping you?

I offered a few positive things to consider, somewhere above, but no one has taken them up; these included centralising the messages about prostitution and drugs so the message is coordinated, avoiding putting women off and normalising certain ways of thinking by young males about their travel activities (thinking that may not always lead to positive experiences for them or others). Many travel-guide outlets—newspapers in particular—don't touch sex or drugs and manage to be stimulating and insightful for readers (and if they do, they do not talk in terms of "girlie bars" and "pick ups"—that can be really offensive to women). I'm no prude and I'm happy to see the topics treated in WV, but I got the feeling on researching the site for this story that the policies and the treatment both need to evolve. A centralised advice page—even if it gave information about prostitution or drugs in each country/city—could contain health information, advice as to best and safe behaviour, and legal warnings. At the moment it's all over the place: the entries of dozens of casual/anon editors need to be audited.

I'm pleased to see that Holliday has chimed in above with substantive points; I hope this prompts others into debate, which is what the Signpost expects and hopes of its coverage. Debate cannot proceed on WV itself, since that is likely to lead to blocks by the alpha males; on a big wiki such gratuitous blocks—documented with casual arrogance that disregards the notion of justification—would result in action against the admin. Tony (talk)

Saying that you wrote a bad article is not a personal attack, Tony, no more than it's a personal attack to say that a mainspace article has POV issues. — PinkAmpers &^{(Je vous invite à me parler)} 15:39, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

But it's not a bad article: it's precisely the kind of coverage on a WMF project that is appropriate for journalism. The fact that these issues are not raised on the project itself are a symptom of the bully-boy mentality among powerful editors there; you see them ranting and attacking on this talk page, too, trying to discredit the messenger rather than grapple with the issues raised. That is a pity. The fact that this has prompted some soul-searching, at least among some Wikivoyagers, is a helpful sign. Let us hope that this boys' anger stage passes and the movement can reflect on how to build Wikivoyage into a better site with a more balanced tenor where sex and drug tourism are concerned. Tony (talk) 03:42, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

IMO it's an highly misleading and unbalanced article, and quite inappropriate for the Signpost's New & Notes section. It should prompt some soul-searching, yes, but primarily among the producers of the Signpost. So far I do not see much sign of this. --Avenue (talk) 06:35, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ed, you're doing a 'No real Scotsman' here. If I understand your point correctly, you are saying that other travel guides don't have information on finding prostitues and/or drugs, and therefore wikivoyage won't be a reputable travel guide if it has. I don't think that's a valid argument. It's a tricky issue, and good arguments can be made in favour and against inclusion of this information, but this isn't one of them. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 07:21, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Ed, the topic of this report is ok. We can have healthy and civil debates about important issues while keeping the tone of N&N carefully neutral. This piece's tone is aggressive and I think will do more harm than good. --Pine^✉ 08:05, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Which bit is "aggressive", please? Tony (talk) 03:32, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think this is actually accurate. I've read detailed accounts in Lonely Planet and Rough Guide of Amsterdam's peculiar toleration of drugs and prostitution for instance, something that in that case is arguably of general interest as "local color". Just picking up a Rough Guide to India, it has a section on drugs that briefly describes what drugs are common in India and what law enforcement is like, and that's pretty standard with these sorts of guidebooks, in my experience. Information about prostitution isn't unheard of either, at least in places where it is legal. (I remember reading in some "reputable guidebook" a detailed description of how to negotiate with a prostitute in Amsterdam's Red Light District--probably written in the 1990s I don't know if they would do so today). Wikivoyage is not that far out of line. 117.199.179.154 (talk) 12:18, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. If you go hunting for travel guides in a brick and mortar bookstore in the U.S. you may not even find anything but Lonely Planet, and they certainly do not censor such information: [4] I do not approve of the exploitation of women, especially not their abuse under so many regimes where they are punished for their nominally illegal prostitution in order to subjugate them to pimps who hold power with the government, but a travel guide should describe this world, not some fairyland of the imagination where the mountains are made out of caramel. Wnt (talk) 15:21, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

So the story was "greenlighted [...] in September". Did you notify the Wikivoyage community about the planned story at that point, or did you decide to launch a sneak attack instead? I don't believe the latter was your intent, but nonetheless, that's effectively the decision you faced. --Avenue (talk) 03:28, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

It's not a sneak attack any more than almost every News and notes story in the past year has been. We are not in the habit of broadcasting the themes we're working on. That would not be in the public interest. Tony (talk) 03:32, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Why not? Are you afraid there will be some attempt at a cover-up? That seems completely pointless on a public wiki like Wikivoyage. If the community is notified and the problems get addressed appropriately before publication, surely that would be the best possible outcome for the Wikimedia movement.

This "habit" of keeping future themes secret is counterproductive at best, and should be overturned immediately. What themes does the editorial team have lined up for future editions, and has it failed to notify any of the relevant editing communities? --Avenue (talk) 06:28, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Hello Avenue, thanks for your posts. Unfortunately, you've far oversimplified the problems here if you think that many of the problems we've reported on could be fixed with a few backchannel conversations. Take my critical takes on the English Wikipedia's adminship process]], for example, or Tony's excellent reporting on the decision to decline Wikimedia Hong Kong's grant ambitions. Furthermore, we're not a public relations agency looking to sanitize potential problems—we're a news outlet, and investigative reporting is not something best done in the public eye. When I greenlighted this story, I saw it as a way to kindle a healthy debate within the Wikimedia community; I think it still has the chance to do so, should people be interested in discussing it. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 06:58, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

As for some of the other comments here, I'd like to extend an invitation to all editors to use my talk page, my email, or the Signpost's suggestions page to point us towards positive stories that are coming out of the Wikimedia sister projects. As I said on my talk page earlier today, we're well aware that the bulk of the stories coming from the movement are positive ones. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 07:00, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Alternative proposal

Rather than censoring information, Wikivoyage should address issues of this kind by adding more information. For example, in the case of prostitution, editors should ensure that the article describes:

Rate of HIV infection of the prostitutes (definitely relevant travel information, not to mention a sure-fire way to dampen the tourist's ardor outside of a few enlightened jurisdictions)

Legal penalties for tourists who are caught (both actual and theoretical, with an emphasis on the former)

The relative risk of robbery or violence for "johns" in the region, and, if available, the probability that the prostitute is not actually a willing participant

The articles also should, of course, be properly sympathetic to all persons, including the sex workers, and avoid any snarky, dismissive language meant to denigrate them. Wnt (talk) 15:31, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Inaccuracies and mischaracterizations in the en.voy piece

Editorial guidance I'm surprised and disappointed in how negative and inaccurate the Wikivoyage story is. E.g. the claim that there aren't active Wikitravel admins (e.g. me--I perform maintenance there multiple times a day) or the fact that the spam articles that Tony1 mentioned are almost immediately deleted. There is a serious spam issue at Wikitravel but it's being addressed with heavy moderation (not the best possible solution but it's something). This could have been fixed easily by having someone verify his claims. I blame the lack of editorial guidance on this site more than the author. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:15, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Kudos to you, Koavf, for recently starting an heroic task in IBobiland's fief at Wikitravel and for really getting stuck in. However, I think you'd be the first to admit that Wikitravel is a pale shadow of the community it once was (before most of the active community left and you were nominated as an admin by one of the very few "old timers" left).

Sure, I've moaned about block-happy, censoring, "I-don't-like-it-and-my-Da-is-bigger-than-your's" admins abusing Wikiquette and policy at Wikivoyage, but that all pales into insignificance compared to the heavy manners of the IBadmins at Wikitravel! --118.93.67.66 (talk) 02:23, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Just wanted to add that the blatantly incorrect statement that all Wikivoyage versions save for English and German are "only marginally active" does not add the credibility to the article.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:22, 4 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Yup, I know from personal knowledge that Texugo does great work at the Portuguese version and the French version is also making great progress. I neither read nor write Russian, but I assume that you would also want to tell us that the Russian version is going great guns too. Is Peter B Fitzgerald from Georgetown still active there on that language version? --118.93.67.66 (talk) 02:23, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Koav, "There are virtually no active admins on WikiTravel." You might do us the courtesy of using the actual wording. An examination of the admin list revealed that almost all accounts were inactive. One or two appeared to have performed some maintenance work. I see that one of the sex-tourism excerpts mentioned here in the story has just been removed from Wikitravel. That's more than one could say for Wikivoyage. Ryan Holliday, whose bank account and business we all paid hundreds of thousands of dollars of legal fees to protect last year, has stated above that he's just fine with the price list of prostitutes in Tijuana quoted at the top of the story. Nice. BTW, there's a spam article there now for you to delete. Tony (talk) 03:23, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

While I think it would be better to keep this discussion focused on the article rather than on individuals, since my full name has now been used three times in comments, thus ensuring that this page will come up in search results for anyone researching me or my company, I would like to clarify that no one in these comments, including myself, has said that they are "just fine" with "price lists" of prostitutes being included in Wikivoyage articles - in fact, that is something that voy:Wikivoyage:Sex tourism policy#Prostitution explicitly states should not be included in articles. I have previously made only one comment in this discussion [5], and the purpose of that comment was to invite further discussion at Wikivoyage on how to better monitor the site for problem edits and how to improve the site's policies related to drugs and sex tourism. With respect to the WT lawsuit, I don't see how that is relevant to a discussion of Wikivoyage's policies on drugs and sex tourism, but should anyone want to discuss that issue then ping me on my talk page and I would be happy for any opportunity to again express my deep gratitude to the amazing people at WMF for their assistance. -- Ryan • (talk) • 04:17, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, I don't see any reason why giving general prices for a region should be excluded. For example, our Wikipedia article Prostitution in Nevada says "If the customer chooses a woman, the price negotiations take place in the woman's room, which are often overheard by management. The house normally gets half of the negotiated amount. If the customer arrives by cab, the driver will receive some 30% of whatever the customer spends; this is subtracted from the woman's earnings. Typical prices start at US$200 for 15 minutes." Given that it's appropriate here, why shouldn't it be there? Wnt (talk) 04:35, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Holliday, you say: "I would like to clarify that no one in these comments, including myself, has said that they are "just fine" with "price lists" of prostitutes being included in Wikivoyage articles - in fact, that is something that voy:Wikivoyage:Sex tourism policy#Prostitution explicitly states should not be included in articles". Then why did you write this earlier on this page: "The first few batches of quotes above are not disturbing in any way."

You say: "With respect to the WT lawsuit, I don't see how that is relevant to a discussion of Wikivoyage's policies on drugs and sex tourism, but should anyone want to discuss that issue then ping me on my talk page and I would be happy for any opportunity to again express my deep gratitude to the amazing people at WMF for their assistance". The relevance is that you've turned out to be a block-happy bully on Wikivoyage, turning off editors and perpetrating a nasty environment. Why did we support you? Tony (talk) 06:00, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Unless you're accusing me of sock-puppetry, it is clear that I made no such comment. As to your second statement, while I disagree with it I don't see how it is relevant to Wikivoyage's policies on drugs and sex tourism, but would be happy to discuss it elsewhere so that we aren't hijacking a discussion to debate an unrelated topic. -- Ryan • (talk) • 06:12, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The diff is there. Wnt ... that's you, isn't it? Tony (talk) 06:14, 5 November 2013 (UTC) No, I misread the n for an r—apologies, it's not you. But what a pity that I mistook the constructive post above "Alternative proposal" as coming from you. Tony (talk) 06:31, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]

We rightly supported Ryan and Dr Heilman because they were victimised and persecuted by Internet Brands and to clarify that forks are a legitimate (final?) response to the wilful and egregious breaking of both implicit and explicit agreements with their editor community. Yes, it is a pity that some folks don't learn from the lessons of history (pacé Sabras and Palestinians?) but I still think it was the right thing for the WMF to have done and I do hope that the "old boy's club" mentality of some of the current EnWV admin corps mellows and becomes more welcoming of new editors and less accusatory so that those dollars turn out to be well spent. Yes, Ryan is one of those most resistant to change, but he's a thoughtful guy and should prove capable of learning some lessons so that admin discussions may take place more publicly and on-Wiki(voyage) in future... --118.93.67.66 (talk) 07:02, 5 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]