User talk:Jimbo Wales

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Vision

I have a vision for Wikipedia to be devoid of typographical errors, and would appreciate it if you can actively take steps to work toward this goal. 104.207.136.27 (talk) 14:51, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

I've corrected your typographical error for you. Squinge (talk) 16:09, 23 January 2015 (UTC)

One small step for grammar nazis, one giant leap for mankind. --7157.118.25a (talk) 00:51, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

:-) Squinge (talk) 09:28, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

I've proposed many times that Eric and I get sizable pay checks for our work, but to no avail. Drmies (talk) 03:42, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Or should that be "cheque"? The biggest problem that I have come across is people arguing about which national version of spelling to use, which is covered at WP:PERENNIAL. Overall, the spelling on Wikipedia is pretty good, and better than some newspapers where the proof readurs seem to be working part time.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:18, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The same IP posted at the the village pump with a similar concern. I posted at their talk page encouraging them to fix it themself. Oiyarbepsy (talk) 16:52, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Mark Bernstein blog post

Hi Jimbo. I'm very concerned about the allegations raised in Mark Bernstein's blog post Infamous. If the allegations of who will and won't be banned, and why, are true (and based on my experience outside of Wikipedia of the GamerGate movement, it's very likely), then we need to stop the preliminary decision from being enforced in its proposed form. If the allegations are false (unlikely), then the community needs to address the claims made in the blog post. Just hyperlinking to the arbcom case won't work, as it's a tad tl;dr. Thanks, Andjam (talk) 00:50, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The entire situation is a poignant illustration of what happens when you lose any sense of proportion. Guy (Help!) 01:00, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

For using terms like slander, I don't see much in the way of evidence from Bernstein, so it looks like spin and exaggerated distortion to me. It appears those "five horsemen" were colluding themselves to silence those they disagreed with[1][2] so I question Bernstein's portrayal of them as poor persecuted feminists. --7157.118.25a (talk) 02:57, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

My guess is that both sides were colluding in the way Bernstein criticizes from what I'm seeing of this. To an extent I wonder if such collaboration even can be kept out of Wikipedia at all. It seems like trying to ban guns or alcohol, there will always be a black market. Frankly people are always going to want to work together on causes. Part of me wonders if the anti-canvassing restrictions just lead to cases of sneakiness like this where the ones who get away with it are those willing to lie about it while accusing others. It's frustrating to play by the rules and run up against gangs of people working against you as seen here. --7157.118.25a (talk) 03:23, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

• Bernstein's post is very one-sided. Then again, the current Gamergate WP page is one sided, the on-wiki debate has been one-sided, the mainstream media coverage has been one-sided, the result of the "battleground" fight has been one-sided — so this is nothing new. In his criticism of the proposed decision he is peddling horsefeathers... There need to be POV warriors removed on both sides of this food fight and Arbcom is (imperfectly) doing that. Carrite (talk) 03:33, 24 January 2015 (UTC) last edit: Carrite (talk) 03:41, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The real danger I see is not so much POV (since everyone has one, as long as one keeps it out of one's editing and just reports the facts) or even collaboration, but rather colluding to remove those one disagrees with. Then it becomes a free speech issue and results in dictatorships with biased results, where consensus can't be achieved because all those who disagree get eliminated. That's why I am so concerned about using objective standards to define what fringe views are, because I think that issue is one way discrimination occurs, resulting in removal of editors based on their viewpoints. --7157.118.25a (talk) 03:57, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Much better to give every fringey fringe equal air time. Or, alternatively, using subjective standards! Drmies (talk) 04:32, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Hey, 7157.118.25a, if you're User:Jzyehoshua then you're indef blocked for violating a community imposed topic ban and shouldn't be creating new accounts here. I guess you couldn't keep your own POV under control, huh? Where's Mabel? (talk) 04:35, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Ha, thanks. Drmies (talk) 04:42, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

My pleasure. You may want to block User:71.57.118.25 (or just keep an eye on Mike Huckabee for the next sock). Where's Mabel? (talk) 04:54, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Or, if you find Mabel, you can maybe ask her to log in to her regular admin-powered account, and she can take care of it! Anyway, I'm guessing the autoblock might take care of it--and if not, well, Jimbo has admin powers too. As for Mike Huckabee, I am court-ordered to stay away from him: I'm highly allergic to the man and his ideas. Post at RFPP if it gets out of hand. Thanks, Drmies (talk) 04:58, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

There's a reason he's topic banned. Really he misses the entire point. In the encyclopedia that anyone can edit, there should never be "5 horseman." Lots of people making small neutral edits keeps ownership and POV problems in check and prevents the anthropomorphization of any viewpoint. The target was created by problematic editors. NBSB has thousands of edits on this sole topic. That's a problem. --DHeyward (talk) 05:33, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The reason that there are "5 horsemen" is that anonymous trolls on 8chan decided to target the editors who were preventing them from slandering living people on the encyclopedia. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 11:09, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Nonetheless Mark Bernstein is topic banned with very good reason. He accused User:Thargor Orlando of being part of a coordinated effort against him on 8chan, based on absolutely no evidence[3]. He implied that the thread was part of an attempt on his life (thereby implying based on 0 evidence that a wikipedia editor was part of a plot to murder him).[4] He has accused other editors of being pro-rape and women-beating.[5] He has accused User:Masem of being head of a complex 8chan cabal of GamerGaters, and of being a rape apologist based on an edit war he tried to solve.[6] He has shown complete disregard when advised that he may be causing more harm than good.[7][8] Mark Bernstein is the last person (excluding a few 100 or so pro-GG conspiracy theorists) any self-respecting journalist should have gone to for information about the GamerGate arbcom case. Bosstopher (talk) 16:46, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm not talking about Mark Bernstein in this case. "Operation 5 Horsemen" was explicitly devised by trolls on 8chan. You want a link to the pastebin they put together to say "These five editors oppose our POV, therefore we should destroy them"? NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 18:45, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

I'm aware of the fact that "Operation 5 Horseman" is an 8chan thing, hence why I started my comment with "nonetheless." The point I was trying to make was that even though what DHeyward is saying is incorrect, he's right that Mark Bernstein is topic banned with good reason, and is not someone (at least in this scenario) who journalists should be citing as a main source for information. Bosstopher (talk) 19:02, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

As I recall, DSA is the one who coined the "5 Horsemen of WikiBias" term and 8chan just ran with it. Most of the evidence in the findings of fact against the five appear to be mostly my evidence with some of Tutelary's evidence. Not sure where Tutelary's evidence came from, but the evidence I presented is basically all stuff I dug up myself and it seems the small bit of evidence I got from someone else (on my talk page) is not being used. Claims that 8chan is somehow controlling anything going on with this case are pretty meager. Only one piece of evidence I sent privately was from 8chan and that was more like a tip that I then investigated before e-mailing them. As of right now, it appears that evidence is not affecting the decision.--The Devil's Advocate _{tlk. cntrb.} 20:50, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Part of a bigger problem

The Arbitration Committee is probably the biggest factor to Wikipedia's disrepute, especially towards female and LGBT editors. I said so after Sexology, I said so after Manning naming dispute, I said so after GGTF, and I'm saying it again now after Gamergate. In all four cases, people who were trying to prevent specialised POV pushing from bigots were reprimanded severely and said bigots were given free reign in their topic areas. Far from being a neutral arbiter of disputes, ArbCom, no matter who is on it, seems intent on keeping and worsening the heterosexual cisgender white male systemic point of view. Sceptre ^(talk) 05:22, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Hi, Sceptre. You may be looking at all this very narrowly. The big picture is that the current proposed decision is even-handed and includes:

• no site-bans
• eleven t-bans
• endorses forty or so existing community sanctions and places them under ArbCom enforcement
• endorses about a hundred community warnings/notifications and brings them under ArbCom enforcement
• introduces discretionary sanctions for any gender-related dispute or controversy to fast-track problem editors
• reminds editors of the existing BLP provisions to tackle drive-by abuse
• tackles factionalism and blocs
• invites neutral editors to participate
• invites uninvolved administrators to participate
• invites review of problematic articles

As we have no jurisdiction whatsoever over editorial content, and have absolutely no mandate to create new policy by fiat, I'm not clear what else we're supposed to do.  Roger Davies ^talk 06:21, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

The fact that the decision is "even-handed" is the problem, Roger. There are not two "equal sides" here, there is one side that has been responsible for vicious attacks on living people and endless attempts to depict living people in a false light, and another side that has worked tirelessly to prevent these falsehoods from appearing in the encyclopedia. Pretending that these are "equal" issues is the very crux of the issue that you continue to ignore. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 11:07, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

That is certainly the view of the partisans on both sides (though of course both portray theirs as the only valid view). Those not committed to one side or another are less convinced. The Manning case was a trainwreck with obvious enabling of homophobes and trolls, this one less so. Guy (Help!) 14:05, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

I don't think you've seen enough of what goes on in this topic area to make that comment, Guy, because the sources are pretty clear-cut. NorthBySouthBaranof (talk) 18:47, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

FWIW, even if we accept the Gamergate proposed decision as neutral (it's not), there's still the other three cases. Banning Carol Moore but not Eric Corbett is inexplicable for any other reason than institutional sexism. Same with banning Andrea James but not James Cantor; in the latter case, Andrea James was rather uncivil, but Cantor is the very model of a civil POV pusher (and a dangerous one at that). Sceptre ^(talk) 19:03, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Speaking of Arbcom, Sceptre, aren't you topic-banned from this topic that you are stirring up here now??? Carrite (talk) 05:48, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Sceptre are you aware of the details of these cases or have you just skimmed over them and concluded the issue without any analysis of detail? Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 06:25, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

I think I have seen altogether too much: my view is "a plague on all their houses", topic-ban anyone with more than ten edits to the article and get fresh eyes. But then, I freely admit to being deeply cynical about hysterical manufactroversies about video games, a subject which is slightly less important than which leaf will fall off my field maple next. Behaviour around Gamergate has been despicable, and the triviality of the root subject only makes this more shocking. Guy (Help!) 15:50, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

It seems to me, Roger, having read quite a lot of the debate around the case, that you are supposed to ignore fairly egregious misbehaviour, such as clear edit waring, battleground and assumptions of bad faith because, on the one hand, the cause is noble, and, on the other, the trolls made them do it. Neither should be an excuse and I, for one, am glad that the committee seems to see it that way. GoldenRing (talk) 22:29, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

• +1, GoldenRing. What the media seems to have gotten wrong, is that editors are not being sanctioned because of they are anti-GG, or whatever content they bring to the table. It's because of their conduct. It's shoddy fact-checking and reporting by the media, including trusting the opinion of an editor who has been topic banned from GamerGate exactly because of his conduct. starship.paint ~ ¡Olé! 01:33, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

hatting comment of user who is topic banned Avono (talk) 16:45, 24 January 2015 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
That the proposed decision of which I wrote is infamous, is an opinion widely shared. Yes, some of its most extreme measures might not pass and some additional, disposable accounts may be sanctioned to give the impression of balance. Whether or not widespread public indignation at its measures has played some role in that, I cannot say. But only hours ago, Arbcom was used to punish a prominent woman in computing through filing a specious case over whether allegations that she prostituted herself should be described as "false,"' following the NY Times, or as "unproven". Public deliberation proceeded for quite some time with sedate judgment by editors and arbitrators about characterizing this woman's sex life until, finally, someone realized that the page should be blanked. Wikipedia has been and continues to be used as a weapon against women in computing; I see little in either the proposed decision or the current revision that recognizes, much less remedies, this, and much that lends assistance to those who would like nothing better than the opportunity to intimidate women with the threat that their own sex lives might be the next topic for Arbcom publicly to scrutinize.(Posted under the terms of my own topic ban which permits participation in the Arbcom proceedings, and because my essays seem to be the subject here.) MarkBernstein (talk) 10:11, 24 January 2015 (UTC) As to your larger issue, I have nothing to add but as someone who watches Arbcom, on procedure, proposing a ban and having it be voted down soundly is a way to clear the user directly and openly. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:20, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

• Roger Davies more or less precisely correct details the actual content of the ArbCom decision above — but the so-called Reliable Sources all insist that ArbCom has made a retaliatory hit against feminist Wikipedians in its decision, in de facto lockstep with the Gamergaters. Now imagine (and this is easy to imagine) that somebody inserts this "fact" into the article and that you can't restore actual balance because five or so POV warriors are "tending" the article, that any newcomer to the article is banned off as a "single purpose" meatpuppet, that any long-term Wikipedian is voted down by the clique because "reliable sources" do not exist to demonstrate that what Roger says is true — or that if they do exist, they may not be used because they "violate BLP." There, my friends, you have in microcosm the essence of what has gone wrong with the Wikipedia Gamergate article. Carrite (talk) 14:53, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Addenda: By "no site bans," Roger means "no site bans against the clique of editors who have engaged in battleground behavior to maintain House POV in the Gamergate piece." They are most certainly site banning off The Devil's Advocate, who crossed swords with them. Arbcom aren't even to be bothered with topic banning one of the leading clique members... Arbcom has pretty much punted the football on actually making it possible to fix the one-sided Gamergate article, truth be told... Carrite (talk) 15:20, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

No I mean "No site bans". It currently looks as if TDA will be t-banned,  Roger Davies ^talk 15:29, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

[redacted per BLP]

Well isn't that terrible. Look, I agree with Guy. Start afresh with new editors in that article, people with a sense of proportion on the shockingly unimportant subject matter. Coretheapple (talk) 19:04, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Heather Bresch

Hi Jimbo. I was wondering if you had a minute to take a look at this BLP page. About two-thirds of the current article is focused on controversy. In comparison, in-depth profiles in Barrons and other local pubs[9][10] give her very different treatment. This diff has some links to my mostly unsuccessful solicitations for review of the article and/or my draft at BLPN, IRC and user Talk pages. I have my usual COI. There is some discussion on the Talk page that is ongoing, so I don't think I can quite claim to be taking advantage of your offer as a "last resort", but thought it may still qualify as the type of page and situation you may have an interest in. CorporateM (Talk) 07:51, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

MBA section? Um. I hate he-said-she-said rehashings of events like this. Is there a single neutral independent overview we can sum up in a short para? Guy (Help!) 14:07, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Ok. I rolled up my sleeves and did a quick study. My first impression, reading our current article, was to ask myself "Is she even notable at all, outside of this one incident?" I had never heard of Mylan. But, as it turns out, Mylan is a company with over 6 billion dollars in revenue and 22,000 employees. Clearly the CEO is notable.

So our current article utterly fails to be a quality biography.

In your view is there a problem of POV pushing here, or is it just that someone eagerly came in and wrote up a lot about the controversy without really considering how it made the article imbalanced. I.E. do you think there is a problem here that will be made more difficult, or is it just a matter of someone coming in and fixing the article up?--Jimbo Wales (talk) 14:12, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Or, Jimbo, someone might have a different sense of "balance"... Nomoskedasticity (talk) 15:04, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Who? Has anyone put forward any argument that the article with the huge section on the scandal and cursory other sections is balanced? It's one thing to randomly hypothesize that someone "might" have a different idea - but I haven't seen any actual arguments.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 10:09, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Like you, I felt there was reasonable-enough consensus that there was a significant undue issue, especially given that there is already a dedicated article for the controversy and the summary on her page was half the length of the full, dedicated article, rather than following Wikipedia:Summary Style. Of course, the only way to address this undue issue completely is to fill up the rest of the article with her early life, job titles and claims to notability (female Fortune 500 CEO and lobbyist that pushed through a few notable pieces of pharmaceutical legislation). My sense is that the total body of literature positions her view that she did earn a degree as a borderline fringe view, so I do not contest NPOV the way one might expect; material on this subject should be significantly critical of her claims and explain, but not legitimize, her perspective.

The controversy does seem to be mostly focused on the actions of university staff. The internal investigation the college conducted found no wrongdoing on Bresch's behalf for merely inquiring as to her degree status, but said the college staff reacted to public pressure and the desire to protect an important alumni by manipulating records. Therefore, I am concerned that the dedicated article is named after her, whereas the primary focus is that of the college staff. However, since the subject of the article is her alleged degree, I have no better titles to propose as this is probably the title that makes the most sense for readers, even if it is unfair to a BLP. CorporateM (Talk) 17:15, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

Considering the school itself is more "involved" in the controversy than the recipient, apparently, maybe West Virginia University M.B.A. controversy might work better? John Carter (talk) 17:22, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

@John Carter It might be worthwhile to start an article-naming discussion. I think naming the article after Heather is actually more specific/better, but it is a fairly trivial benefit to Wikipedia and a substantial opportunity for harm to a BLP. Probably consensus would just vary based on who shows up that day and how they feel about BLP issues. CorporateM (Talk) 19:58, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

• Just in case anyone has missed it: CorporateM is working on behalf of Mylan, and Bresch is Mylan's CEO: [11]. Nomoskedasticity (talk) 17:37, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

  So? Why the hostility? He disclosed did he not? The company and the CEO have a right to request a review of the situation to make sure the article isn't unfairly negative. Jehochman ^Talk 19:38, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

In my experience, when an editor has a strong point-of-view and is unhappy about someone influencing an article to deviate from their viewpoint, they almost always focus on the editor, rather than the content. Passive observers may see Nomoskedasticity's comments as the kind of COI abuse that the PR industry is often complaining about, but the same hostility would be targeted against any editor that attempted to correct the page. Probably the same accusations of COI manipulation would occur even if the editor did not actually have one and it is even oten PR pros themselves that engage in similar bullying and allegations of corrupted motives, etc.. CorporateM (Talk) 20:17, 24 January 2015 (UTC)

I didn't take Nomoskedasticity's remark here as hostile. It is a fact that people should be aware of. CorporateM is acting here as a paid advocate for the subject of the biography. He's followed not only the letter of Wikimedia Foundation policy, but also the best practice of the bright line rule. I'll go a step further in praise as well. It would be entirely possible to follow both my bright line rule and the letter of policy and still be an annoying nitwit by wikilawyering endless on hopeless points. He isn't even doing that. So while we should all cut him some slack, it's also ok to make sure that all participants in the dialogue are aware of his status. If we are to have a credible sustained campaign against people doing things the wrong way, we have to laud and support people who do things the right way.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 10:13, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

CorporateM is good people. COIs are always openly declared, and where consensus is against, it is accepted with good grace. Guy (Help!) 15:16, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

I re-read Nomo's comments on the Talk page. Jimbo is correct actually. It was the speculation that minor copyediting items were some kind of intentional manipulation that made me feel mistreated, but this kind of thing is actually very common. I shouldn't have been so hasty to call his comments abusive. I think most of the discussions ongoing right now about article-naming/merging are areas where experienced editors may reasonably disagree and I will therefore abstain per my usual. I appreciate so many editors initiating thoughtful discussions and Jimbo proving once more that his Talk page is an effective board to draw attention to them. At some point (and there is absolutely WP:NORUSH, I hope we can take a look at the draft and get it GAN-ready like I do with most pages I have a COI with. CorporateM (Talk) 17:13, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

• I certainly agree that the Bresch article was ridiculously POV at the time that CorporateM raised the issue here. Better now. I'm not really bothered by the COI because look, this is a BLP, and anyone, including Bresch herself, would be within their rights to come here if BLPN didn't do anything, which was the case here. We do have bright-line rules but we also have policies of decency we have to follow on biographies, and it's ridiculous for this person's bio to be dominated by that controversy. However, it does have to be mentioned. I don't know about a separate article, either. That seems a bit weird. Coretheapple (talk) 17:36, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Heather Bresch M.B.A. controversy

Seriously? Heather Bresch M.B.A. controversy? Who the hell thinks that's a good idea? This is a minor semi-public figure, and we have an entire article on a teapot tempest relating to her, just because people can't cover it in the main article without bloating it out. Which leaves the indelible impression that the main article exists only as a WP:COATRACK. Guy (Help!) 15:14, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

That would be retired editor HoboJones, who created the piece in 2008, as you are aware from the template you put on his talk page. Carrite (talk) 15:28, 25 January 2015 (UTC)

Absolutely insane to have a separate article. Coretheapple (talk) 17:39, 25 January 2015 (UTC)