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:::ok, let's all just calm down here. <s>I am now seeing what this is really about, and it is in fact possible that Boson is violating [[WP:ORGNAME]] regardless of whether or not they really have any affiliation with the actual organization. And no, pointing that out is not in and of itself harassment. We block people for using organizational names all day long every single day so I would strongly suggest changing that username and being very careful about [[WP:NPOV]]. [[User:Beeblebrox|Beeblebrox]] ([[User talk:Beeblebrox|talk]]) 20:50, 12 October 2013 (UTC)</s> |
:::ok, let's all just calm down here. <s>I am now seeing what this is really about, and it is in fact possible that Boson is violating [[WP:ORGNAME]] regardless of whether or not they really have any affiliation with the actual organization. And no, pointing that out is not in and of itself harassment. We block people for using organizational names all day long every single day so I would strongly suggest changing that username and being very careful about [[WP:NPOV]]. [[User:Beeblebrox|Beeblebrox]] ([[User talk:Beeblebrox|talk]]) 20:50, 12 October 2013 (UTC)</s> |
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::::Actually no, I am now convinced I was not seeing what was "really" going on here and that there is no username violation. All the other stuff that is not struck out still stands though. [[User:Beeblebrox|Beeblebrox]] ([[User talk:Beeblebrox|talk]]) 20:04, 13 October 2013 (UTC) |
::::Actually no, I am now convinced I was not seeing what was "really" going on here and that there is no username violation. All the other stuff that is not struck out still stands though. [[User:Beeblebrox|Beeblebrox]] ([[User talk:Beeblebrox|talk]]) 20:04, 13 October 2013 (UTC) |
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== Reporting Paid Editing == |
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Paid editing, in particular undisclosed paid editing (that is, editing where the payment is secret) is a current and growing threat to the integrity of Wikipedia. It is sometimes thought that the policy against outing, which is very strictly enforced, makes the enforcement of the policy against paid editing nearly impossible. There needs to be a balance between the two policies. Outing is a threat to individual editors, and therefore to editor recruitment and retention, and therefore to Wikipedia. Paid editing is an institutional threat to Wikipedia. My proposal would be that, while reporting the employment or compensation status of editors on talk pages should remain outing, the policy should state that reporting paid editing to particular trusted personnel, such as OTRS, is not only permitted, but may be necessary. Comments? |
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[[User:Robert McClenon|Robert McClenon]] ([[User talk:Robert McClenon|talk]]) 01:25, 24 October 2013 (UTC) |
Revision as of 01:25, 24 October 2013
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Is it outing if the person has identified themselves elsewhere as being such-and-such Wikipedian...
...And their edits show a conflict of interest/vanity/advertising?
A certain user has attacked me personally and cited certain online sources to prove their points. When I checked the sources (links had been added to the Wikipedia article) to see if they were reliable, I found a link to the author's personal blog. Their handle on the blog-hosting site in question was the same as the Wikipedia user name of the user in question.
The editor in question had also claimed him/herself to be an author involved in the field under discussion.
Over half of this user's edits have consisted of posting links to the writings of the same source, and I am not sure how to react. The user has not made their real-world identity a secret, since the links he/she posted on Wikipedia clearly linked to sources that tied directly back to the user.
Should I bring this conflict of interest up on the relevant talk page, where the links to said Wikipedian's writings are still posted?elvenscout742 (talk) 05:07, 2 October 2012 (UTC)
- No don't do that it would breach our outing policy. wp:OUTING is quite clear on this If redacted or oversighted personally identifying material is important to the COI discussion, then it should be emailed privately to an administrator or arbitrator – but not repeated on Wikipedia: it will be sufficient to say that the editor in question has a COI and the information has been emailed to the appropriate administrative authority. I'm not convinced that this is something for admins rather than Arbs - I certainly don't want to take on such an incident. But I can see some of the reasons for this policy. Remember we don't normally accept blogs as reliable sources for precisely the same reason - it is very difficult to tell whether an off wiki blog page is really done by the person who claims to have done it or by a malicious impersonator. That's in addition to the issue that some people may be quite happy deleting attack pages on this site and ignoring the odd death threat provided their personal details are more than a click away from the vandals they deal with on this site. ϢereSpielChequers 10:47, 9 March 2013 (UTC)
- This answer confuses me, since the the info wasn't redacted or oversighted. But yes, there are lots of reasons not to consider a single blog source as reliable; you don't need to get into issues of the identity of the commentor. (Indeed, their identity usually doesn't matter to whether or not their comment is valid) – SJ + 05:13, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
Checking user pages?
I was recently accused of "hounding" by another user. This user has admitted to having a grudge against a certain Wikipedia naming convention, and has on their user page a list of pages they created. When I merely clicked on their signature, I noticed that the user had violated said naming convention numerous times. Of course, putting article content above editors' personal feelings, I went to move all of the articles, but when I did so the user reverted me when he could, and posted a very bizarre personal attack against me elsewhere. When I made a valid argument in response to the personal attack, the user suddenly played the WIKIHOUND card.
I am just wondering -- was I wrong for attempting to impose Wikipedia guidelines where I could see they had been violated? Does it qualify as "harassment" to check a user's edit history when they have admitted they have it out for said guidelines? (By the way, I didn't actually check his edit history, just his user page.) elvenscout742 (talk) 06:58, 23 December 2012 (UTC)
- This was my question as well. And it's discouraging to see that 7 months later, no one has responded to your question 69.125.134.86 (talk) 16:33, 28 July 2013 (UTC)
Is it "outing" if one's Wikipedian account and real-name connection is publicly known?
For example, User:RandomName does not have his personal information posted on Wikipedia, yet Googling his username clearly shows his name is John Doe. Under the "outing"/harassment policy, I could not mention his real name on Wikipedia. Is this not lacking in common sense? User:RandomName (reminder: this is an example. I'm not "outing" someone to prove a WP:POINT, people) has admitted who he really is to the world and the Streisand Effect along with the nature of the Web would make it impossible to regain anonymity. Why should anyone be punished then for pointing out that User:RandomName is John Doe? Ripberger (talk) 05:30, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- Yes. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 05:52, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- How so? John Doe has already stated publicly that he is User:RandomName. Why try to suppress that information on Wikipedia? Ripberger (talk) 08:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- Whatever the intent of the policy or whatever you think it should say, the policy is very clear on this. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:01, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- The policy seems to be poorly phrased. It might help to split the section on personal information into "No Muckraking" (Don't dig up identifying info about others that they don't want shared) and "Support Strong Pseudonymity" (Don't mention or link to off-wiki identifying info about others, even when it is commonly known or they have published it themselves elsewhere). The latter is more controversial. – SJ + 05:13, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- Whatever the intent of the policy or whatever you think it should say, the policy is very clear on this. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:01, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- How so? John Doe has already stated publicly that he is User:RandomName. Why try to suppress that information on Wikipedia? Ripberger (talk) 08:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- What matters to me is that the policy explicitly concerns privacy. If someone has not made the connection between their account name here and their real name a private matter, then I fail to see why we should act as if it is a private matter. The situation we have is that people who publicly tell people their real name and who they are on Wikipedia or otherwise make the connection obvious elsewhere, such as by using the same account name, are able to claim protection from outing here because they haven't publicly disclosed their real name on-wiki. It does not mean we should ignore someone who is excessively loose with personal information, but that we don't act like it is the greatest wikicrime ever to say an editor's real name when said editor doesn't even try to make it a big secret.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 05:57, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's what I'm thinking. John Doe yells in the city square that he also goes by User:RandomName, yet the police arrest anyone that points out the connection in the village bar. It makes no sense. Ripberger (talk) 08:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- I think you would need to raise a suggestion for a change at WP:VPR. However, the factual answer to the OP is yes. If User:X has "I am John Smith" on their user page, it is not a problem to mention that X is Smith (although the question should be asked as to why is someone mentioning that, and it should almost never occur on an article talk page). However, if Smith writes a blog and says "I am User:X", it would be a violation of OUTING to mention that on Wikipedia, or to mention that a Google search will reveal X's identity (the latter point is routinely violated, but any kind of outing is prohibited). More complex cases where Smith hints they are User:X are even clearer violations of OUTING. The essential point is, if someone mentions another editor's identity because they find it fascinating, they are misusing Wikipedia (we don't spend time speculating about other editors). And if the identity mention is specifically to bring trouble to the user, then the spirit of OUTING is clearly being violated. If necessary, trusted admins (or arbcom) can be emailed some information privately. Johnuniq (talk) 11:06, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- We have no way of verifying the John Doe really is User:RandomName -- see joe job. NE Ent 11:49, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- If user:RN says they are JD, we only know "user:RN says he is JD". If blogger JD says they are user:RN, we only know "JD says he is user:RN". Both scenarios are different from muckraking investigations. If the metric is "being crystal clear they don't mind the association" [to quote Jehochman below], I think a blog post saying "I am w:user:RN" is much more clear about this than simply having the blog "RN.blogspot.com" with a real name in the blogger profile. A rules-laywer might still suggest you should contact RN privately to make sure they don't mind having their announcement from their blog also posted on WP itself... but this sort of edge case has not come up in practice. – SJ + 05:13, 23 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's what I'm thinking. John Doe yells in the city square that he also goes by User:RandomName, yet the police arrest anyone that points out the connection in the village bar. It makes no sense. Ripberger (talk) 08:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- Yes, current policy states that unless he's identified himself as John Doe on Wikipedia, then it is outing for you to post information on Wikipedia linking user:RandomName to John Doe (cf "Posting another editor's personal information is harassment, unless that person voluntarily had posted his or her own information, or links to such information, on Wikipedia."), and any attempt to do so would result in the information being oversighted and you being cautioned against continuing to violate policy.
There is pretty much only one body on Wikipedia charged with doing the sort of off-wiki investigation that would discover information linking a user to their real name if they haven't already posted it on Wikipedia: Arbcom. And even Arbcom does it only in extreme circumstances and pretty much never reveals the results, because it's generally felt that it is better for the project to set a very clear line about how unacceptable it is to a) research someone's offwiki life [answer: pretty darn unacceptable] and b) publicly publish the results of such an investigation [answer: completely unacceptable]. The latter, especially, is generally only performed by someone hoping to to (at best) use the person's [ offwiki | onwiki ] identity to discredit their [ onwiki | offwiki ] one, or (at worst) "get back" at the person by harming their real life. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 14:32, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) As far as going right to a block: a caution would be used in a case of a new or inexperienced user, or where we otherwise had reason to believe they were not familiar with our policies, and where we have reason to believe that a simple caution will cause the behavior to stop. With a deeply experienced user (as Cla68 appears to be, going by his talk page and involvement in Arbcom/policy issues), or in a case where the behavior is ongoing/persistent/being performed in bad faith, a block can be the reasonable response given that it would appear the user already knows they're violating policy. As far as indef vs. temporary: a set-time block would be useless in a case of outing - the goal is to make sure the outing won't happen again, because harassment is such a significant policy violation that a "we'll just wait and see if they do it again" approach isn't acceptable. The trigger for the block to be lifted would be an acknowledgement that the harassment will stop, and that acknowledgement has to come from the blocked party and will come when they decide to give it, whether that's 5 minutes after the block is put in place or 5 years. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 16:13, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- (@Hex) I'd like to see an elimination of indef blocks, but I don't always get what I want. All blocks have a termination provision. In many cases, the termination provision is the passage of a defined period of time, or a satisfactory unblock request, other have only the latter. They are called indefinite, for that reason, but indefinite is not necessarily infinite.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 17:27, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- I don't think Cla68 was harassing anyone by linking to the blog post. The reasons he had for posting were more in the context of Sue Gardner being named in the blog post and he showed her the post to get her comment. He certainly wasn't harassing anyone by providing links to prove it wasn't outing.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 18:27, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- Cla68's gross misconduct here is more than ironic, given his vehemence in the TimidGuy appeal case that WillBeback be banned for identifying to Jimbo TimidGuy's employer, something TimidGuy had previously posted himself, but had removed. And at least one of Cla68's defenders' like him, clamored for a ban of WillBeback, and is in the identical boat of having previously posted their employer but having had it redacted, making the defense puzzling at best. No admin or arb should be willing to lift Cla68's ban unless they are prepared to do the same simultaneously with respect to WillBeback. Fladrif (talk) 18:04, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- This page is for discussing the policy, not specific cases. The editors' talk page, or, if you want a wider audience, the administrator's noticeboard are preferrable. NE Ent 18:25, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- I would say that intent certainly plays a role. If it is an accidental outing that is not meant to be harmful (such as being friends with someone IRL and accidentally saying their real name on-wiki), then there shouldn't be an issue. But considering that Cla's intent was to bring up malicious info on Russavia's past...yeah, can't blame the indefinite block there. SilverserenC 21:24, 1 March 2013 (UTC)
- That's right. Intent matters. There's hella rules here and I sure can't remember all their clauses, so I try to suss the gist or spirit of the rule. The spirit of this rule is to be very very cautious about doing anything that could cause hurt to a colleague in real life. At the end of the day, the Wikipedia is just a website, but life is serious. Amount of harm or potential harm matters too -- "no harm no foul" is a reasonable standard for applying many rules, I think. In the particular case being discussed, I see a bloody-minded intent to damage a real life. The amount of potential actual harm I can't assess but it seems likely to be non-zero. Herostratus (talk) 15:21, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
- There is a difference between Wikipedia and every other site on the internet. I participate in a few message boards and I have never been especially careful about hiding my real world name - I've linked to my own blog, arranged for meetups, etc. But on Wikipedia, you encounter angry people who threaten real-world harm. Also, any and every term used on Wikipedia zooms instantly to the top of Google results. So even if you know that I am user such and such on some other message board and if you scour my posts there, you can find me giving my real name, that doesn't mean I want my real name published on Wikipedia. --B (talk) 22:45, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
- Yep. whether to have your real name known on Wikipedia is a choice every one of us is free to make, even banned users. In the specific case that led to this discussion there is an extremely simple way for the blocked user to come right back, they just have to indicate that they understand the outing policy and will abide by it in the future. They don't have to apologize, or say they agree with the policy, or tell Jimbo they see four lights when they know there are really only three, or swear a loyalty oath to ArbCom, just agree to follow this policy, which is here for the protection of any user who has not linked their WP account with their real world identity on-wiki. So, this is not about how hard it would be to put together who someone is,or the quality of the other edits made by the person who did the outing, or exactly how malicious they were being, it is about respecting their choice not to use their real name on Wikipedia, and that is all it is about. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:52, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
- The policy is correct and it does need to be observed. Putting aside issues of motivation or whatever, this was a deserved block. So yes... sigh... I agree with Beeblebrox, Seren, Herostratus and a few others here. The thing to do in these situation is to put yourself in the other person's shoes. Golden rule and all that. Even if this happens to someone you don't like, or even to someone who in some cosmic karma sense deserves it, it's still not right.Volunteer Marek 04:11, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
- The policy is correct. It's very easy for linking or threatening to link someone's identity to have a chilling effect on what articles people are willing to edit, or to discourage them from editing at all. Individual bits may be public, but the collection and correlation of them is more than their sum. It doesn't matter if they are assembled from public information, or even if they're partly or mostly inaccurate. Putting together a dossier on someone is threatening; it creeps people out; it discourages participation; and it makes Wikipedia look like the project of a bunch of internet psychos. Tom Harrison Talk 14:16, 3 March 2013 (UTC)
- Outing (or as someone has pointed out elsewhere, more accurately doxing) is a particularly noxious form of harassment: it's a way of saying "I know who you are and I know where you live/work", with the unspoken implication that the harasser will try to mess with your real-world life, job, relationships etc. Unfortunately that isn't always an idle threat; there are always people who are creepy and malicious enough to try to cause real-world harm in retaliation for supposed slights online, or just for malicious pleasure. Even if the harasser doesn't engage in offline harassment himself, he is advertising the information that a malicious or unhinged individual needs to go after someone. That's what makes it so dangerous. Prioryman (talk) 00:42, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- Correct. "You've already been doxed, or you've been lax about keeping details private, so I should be allowed to dox you some more" is a really bad defense. It's just plain rude to talk about an editor's personally identifiable information unless it is crystal clear that they don't mind the association. For instance, my name is on my userpage, which links to my social media profiles, so it shouldn't be considered doxing if somebody mentions the facts that I've revealed so overtly on Wikipedia. As with everything, clue (social skills) is required. Jehochman Talk 01:09, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
Outing is the wrong term
Suggest changing every instance of outing (read the article) to doxing, which is the technically accurate term. We are not speaking about the practice of publicizing people's sexual orientation. It is stupid to use terminology in an ambiguous way. Jehochman Talk 13:57, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
That's a useful improvement. For now we might say something like "doxing (also 'outing')" to make it clear this isn't really a change. Tom Harrison Talk 14:28, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- Nobody knows what "doxing" means. Despite our outing article, which incorrectly claims that the term is only used for sexual orientation, everyone knows what "outing" means. A simple Google news search finds plenty of examples of "outed" being used for things unrelated to sexual preference. Changing the word to an esoteric term that nobody knows is only going to create confusion - we want this rule to be as clear as possible. --B (talk) 14:41, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- I would support using both terms, doxing and outing, in the section for now. Long-term, I would prefer we use doxing rather than outing, as it's the usual term in Internet culture. Andreas JN466 17:46, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- The specific behavior that's banned is clearly delineated no matter what we call it. If we are going to use a label, let's use the correct one. Outing is about sexual orientation. Doxing is the practice of conducting research to gather personally identifiable information and then publishing it. We should be clear that both aspects are unwelcome: researching and publishing. I agree with Tom Harrison's suggestion to mention both terms for continuity. Jehochman Talk 15:22, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- Whatever the term may have originally meant, we all understand that outed/outing now can refer to revealing someone's identity. Everyone knows this. The term is completely clear. Nobody knows what "doxing" means. And even if you click on the doxing link, it takes you to the personally identifiable information article, which does not help you understand what "doxing" is. And besides, "doxing" isn't the only thing that is prohibited. "Doxing", according to this definition or this definition is to conduct cyber-sleuthing to determine a person's identity. But that's not all that is prohibited. If I personally identify myself in email, for example, and you were to post that information here, there's no "doxing" involved, but it is still a prohibited "outing". If you change the term to "doxing", then you are opening the door to wiki-lawyering to get around the intent of the policy. --B (talk) 15:44, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- The specific behavior that's banned is clearly delineated no matter what we call it. If we are going to use a label, let's use the correct one. Outing is about sexual orientation. Doxing is the practice of conducting research to gather personally identifiable information and then publishing it. We should be clear that both aspects are unwelcome: researching and publishing. I agree with Tom Harrison's suggestion to mention both terms for continuity. Jehochman Talk 15:22, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- As B notes, the definition of 'outing' as it is widely used today – whatever its historical origins or usage – is far broader than our article suggests. A quick search of Google News for "was outed" pulls one or two columns that deal with sexual orientation, and a much wider assortment of individuals being 'outed' as investors in a business project, undercover cops, a British actor playing an American, or a dabbler in performance enhancing drugs. Speaking for my own fairly-technically-literate self, I understood immediately what was meant by 'outing' in this context; in contrast, despite being a regular reader of Bruce Schneier's blog I still had to go and Google 'doxing'. Switching to a still-obscure term of art probably isn't going to help us enforce this policy. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:02, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
Neither term is ideal, but at least "outing" is understood in this context. If "doxing" was a better reflection of what is prohibited here I would support it, but this change is not an improvement. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:14, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- What's going on at the article outing? Has that article been tilted very far away from NPOV? Jehochman Talk 16:49, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- Outing has long been understood to mean disclosing or revealing hidden information. The close connection to "outing" closeted LGBT persons is quite recent. The word is still used, even here, in other contexts (see Fair Game: My Life as a Spy, My Betrayal by the White House as just one example). In fact, the lede of Outing used to say "In the late 20th century, outing became a common term for taking someone involuntarily "out of the closet"—that is, publicising that someone is gay, transgender, or intersex. The term can also be used more broadly to mean publicly disclosing other personal characteristics, such as political affiliation or religion, that someone wishes to keep private". (That was the whole lede, by the way.) Is the current article NPOV? Probably not, but it should not exclude the other meaning. Outing (disambiguation) currently says "Outing is act of disclosing a person's sexual orientation without their consent" before saying it "may also mean" other things. That is NPOV. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:09, 4 March 2013 (UTC)
- Being technically accurate is less important than communicating clearly. I'm sure I am, not the only one who never heard of "doxing" before a few days ago yet has been familiar witht he term "outing" in both a WP and real-world context for years. Outing is an easily understood term referring to the disclosure of personal information. It's sort of like a genericized trademark situation, it may have only meant outing homosexuals in the past, but it is now used to refer to any such situation, from "I've been outed as a closet fan of Dr. Who" all the way up to "I've been outed as supposed social conservative who in real life hangs out with male prostitutes smoking meth". Beeblebrox (talk) 19:16, 7 March 2013 (UTC)
- According to a usually reliable dictionary [doxing] is indeed a word and is internet slang. It is a new word to me, and I'd assumed it was an American English term for Outing though some of the editors who were unfamiliar with it are Americans so it could be an obscure alternate word for Outing in one or more English dialects or subcultures. I'd be OK with leaving it as a redirect, but see no benefit to moving wp:Outing to WP:Doxing. ϢereSpielChequers 11:02, 9 March 2013 (UTC)
- I support the change; the world is bigger than wikipedia, and although there are examples of non sexual orientation outing, the primary use of the word is in the sexual content. We often use English words on wikipedia to have wiki specific meanings check user, administrator (no, they can't reset your password or process your pay check), duck (no, don't feed them bread in the pond), sock (they don't keep your feet warm) or make up on own 3rr,?? or: who's this ani person and why shoud I tell them about my problems? If we decide to use doxing to mean violating the Wikipedia policy on personal information then that's what it will mean. NE Ent 13:41, 9 March 2013 (UTC)
OTRS, ArbCom and sexual harassment
Please excuse my poor English. If someone can correct my mistakes in the following post, feel free to do so !
I write here because I have some problems with the translation of this page in French. When I translated the part about "Dealing with harassment", someone on the French Wikipedia has deleted the part concerning private contacts of the ArbCom members and/or the OTRS team members ([1]), saying that the ArbCom or OTRS members have nothing to do with this ([2]). An admin ask questions about that on my user page too ([3]).
I think I understand why this page talk about the possibility of a private contact with persons trusted by the community and/or the Foundation in harassment cases. If we only think about some cases involving female editors, here or elsewhere on the Internet (see the second paragraph of meta:Gender gap to know more about this), we can easily understand why some cases must be treated in private.
So, I would like to suggest :
- to add more details in the "Dealing with harassment" section about what to do in cases where people don't want to show publicly their case. There's no clear mention about harassment cases on the meta:OTRS page,
- to create a new section about sexual harassment. I don't know if this problem occur frequently on the Wikimedia projects, but I know that people who have this problem must know that there's zero tolerance about that on the WMF projects,
- to make clear the role of the ArbCom and OTRS in harassment cases. Do it depends only about the language version of Wikipedia (in French, I don't know what they think about that) or there's a "meta" approach here ?
Sincerely, Simon Villeneuve (talk) 14:28, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Hi Simon, the Arbcom on the English language wikipedia has no role on the French language wikipedia. I suggest you look at fr:Wikipédia:Comité_d'arbitrage instead. Someone there may also know if the French language community uses the OTRS system, and if so which queue. ϢereSpielChequers 17:28, 21 March 2013 (UTC)
- Hi WereSpielChequers,
I understand, but my suggestions here aren't concerning the French Wikipedia. They are concerning this particular English page. I think it must be more precise concerning my 3 points. --Simon Villeneuve (talk) 00:20, 22 March 2013 (UTC)- fr:Wikipédia:Harcèlement is not a translation of this page. fr:Wikipédia:Harcèlement is an infrastructure page describing how the French-language wikipedia handles harassment. Due to history and use of shared infrastructure there similarities. English-language wikipedia does not (and should not) impose particular policies or implementations on the French-language wikipedia. The WMF may be forced to impose policies or implementations on the French-language wikipedia for legal reasons (due to being based in the USA), but WMF is not the English-language wikipedia. You may wish to read http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment and http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Harassement,_intimidation_and_WP%27s_rules_infringements_and_abuse_by_French_WP%27s_administrator_JPS68_and_others Stuartyeates (talk) 00:43, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Thank you for the links. I have read them carefully and I asked a question on meta:Talk:Harassment_policies#A meta approach.
I knew before this post that, for now, each project have their way to treat harassment. I just want you to know that fr:Wikipédia:Harcèlement is a translation of this page (I've done it myself). It's not a rule for now on the French Wikipedia, but it's a beginning.
I try to help us, the French community, by showing you some unclear points in your page. I think we'll do better on our project if you specify the points I raised above on this page. --Simon Villeneuve (talk) 11:58, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Thank you for the links. I have read them carefully and I asked a question on meta:Talk:Harassment_policies#A meta approach.
- fr:Wikipédia:Harcèlement is not a translation of this page. fr:Wikipédia:Harcèlement is an infrastructure page describing how the French-language wikipedia handles harassment. Due to history and use of shared infrastructure there similarities. English-language wikipedia does not (and should not) impose particular policies or implementations on the French-language wikipedia. The WMF may be forced to impose policies or implementations on the French-language wikipedia for legal reasons (due to being based in the USA), but WMF is not the English-language wikipedia. You may wish to read http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Harassment and http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Harassement,_intimidation_and_WP%27s_rules_infringements_and_abuse_by_French_WP%27s_administrator_JPS68_and_others Stuartyeates (talk) 00:43, 22 March 2013 (UTC)
- Hi WereSpielChequers,
"or links to such information"
I checked in the archives but couldn't find a discussion about this topic already which is surprising because I've seen it take place elsewhere.
It seems to me that "or links to such information" in WP:OUTING is rather vague. More specifically, "links" can describe different things and depending on which definition you use, the scope of this policy changes drastically. For instance, is "links" means "hyperlinks", the policy is being violated regularly by COI investigations. If "links" means something like "evidence" or "information", the current methods being used to discern if there is a COI is not a violation of WP:OUTING.
Personally, I feel that if you, for instance, use your real name as your username and edit the article about the company you're the head of PR of, making the connection is not outing (as long as one assumes that it may be an impersonation). If anything, it's a person not understanding COI and/or how easy it is to make the connection. IP searches would fall under the same definition although I don't agree with a Checkuser linking accounts back to a company's IP address unless there's some extreme COI editing going on, especially if those editors haven't caused any COI or puppetry issues. Those opinions seem to be widely had.
Bottom line, I feel that our policy should more precisely reflect what we're doing. Does anyone else feel the need to clarify "unless that person had voluntarily posted his or her own information, or links to such information, on Wikipedia." to something more like "unless that person had voluntarily posted his or her own information, or any type of link to such information, on Wikipedia."? OlYeller21Talktome 21:08, 29 July 2013 (UTC)
- Since this has garnered zero discussion, I'll go ahead and make an official proposal.
- I propose that we change
- "unless that person had voluntarily posted his or her own information, or links to such information, on Wikipedia."
- to
- "unless that person had voluntarily posted his or her own information, or any type of link to such information, on Wikipedia."
- I feel that this policy needs to more directly reflect the way we operate as opposed to housing a vague statement that can be interpreted in very different ways. OlYeller21Talktome 21:39, 11 August 2013 (UTC)
Affiliation
Does stating another editor's alleged membership of an organization or political party count as outing if they have not revealed that information on Wikipedia? Should the person involved confirm or deny such statements? --Boson (talk) 19:54, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
- Any personal information that a user has not made public on Wikipedia is subject to the privacy policy and any edit that adds such information without the user's permission is outing. And nobody is ever required to answer any query of any kind about their personal life if they don't want to. (if you have see actual outing somewhere, please either email me the details or contact the suppression team as detailed at WP:RFO so that it can be dealt with quickly and above all quietly) Beeblebrox (talk) 20:00, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
- What if the editor openly boasted about his membership of that organisation and his related editing of Wikipedia articles, including revealing his Wikipedia user id, in a related public web forum, and is clearly using Wikipedia as a vehicle for pushing the message of that organisation? R.stickler (talk) 20:12, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
- ok, let's all just calm down here.
I am now seeing what this is really about, and it is in fact possible that Boson is violating WP:ORGNAME regardless of whether or not they really have any affiliation with the actual organization. And no, pointing that out is not in and of itself harassment. We block people for using organizational names all day long every single day so I would strongly suggest changing that username and being very careful about WP:NPOV. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:50, 12 October 2013 (UTC)- Actually no, I am now convinced I was not seeing what was "really" going on here and that there is no username violation. All the other stuff that is not struck out still stands though. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:04, 13 October 2013 (UTC)
- ok, let's all just calm down here.
- What if the editor openly boasted about his membership of that organisation and his related editing of Wikipedia articles, including revealing his Wikipedia user id, in a related public web forum, and is clearly using Wikipedia as a vehicle for pushing the message of that organisation? R.stickler (talk) 20:12, 12 October 2013 (UTC)
Reporting Paid Editing
Paid editing, in particular undisclosed paid editing (that is, editing where the payment is secret) is a current and growing threat to the integrity of Wikipedia. It is sometimes thought that the policy against outing, which is very strictly enforced, makes the enforcement of the policy against paid editing nearly impossible. There needs to be a balance between the two policies. Outing is a threat to individual editors, and therefore to editor recruitment and retention, and therefore to Wikipedia. Paid editing is an institutional threat to Wikipedia. My proposal would be that, while reporting the employment or compensation status of editors on talk pages should remain outing, the policy should state that reporting paid editing to particular trusted personnel, such as OTRS, is not only permitted, but may be necessary. Comments? Robert McClenon (talk) 01:25, 24 October 2013 (UTC)