Ethics and freedom: in and around Wikipedia
The understanding of the processes taking place in Wikipedia among people who are not actively involved in the project is at a rather mythological level. I will try in a series of topics to highlight several issues that cause the most bewilderment among the public, and overgrown in connection with this large number of myths and legends. I will begin with a brief answer to the question asked in this blog quite recently: Will Russian Wikipedia moderate the Internet? . No, it will not. However, the question is incorrect. The fact that it is behind him, what is happening and discussed in Wikipedia - below.
Let's start with the basics. Wikipedia is an Internet project with a specific goal: the creation of an encyclopedic resource, striving for completeness, accuracy and neutrality of the presentation of information achieved through the joint work of many participants on the same content. This is different from many other communities and Internet projects: first of all, from various communication platforms (be it FIDO, IRC channels, web forums, LOR or Habr), which have no such goal. In this sense, Wikipedia is much closer to the Linux Kernel - however, with one major difference. Linux Kernel can only be managed by Linus Categories. In Wikipedia, any article can edit any person. At least, until the opposite decision is made. Our story is about how and when such decisions are made.
Keywords here: collaboration and collaboration. They sound great. So it seems: you wrote an article from two sentences, saved it, went to sleep, and woke up in the morning — and in its place is a beautiful, complete, well-structured and well-formed article, refined by other people. In practice, it often happens. But there is a downside. You worked on the article for a long time, spent a lot of time, wrote, published, contentedly went to bed, and wake up in the morning - and you see that some participant came to the article, redid and redid everything in his own way, deleted a bunch of your wonderful text, added a bunch his. And now you need to negotiate with this participant and seek a consensus on how the article should look like. (You cannot say “this is my article, don't dare touch it!” - Wikipedia is based on working together - in particular, it allows us to constantly improve articles and make them more neutral.) Under these conditions, it becomes extremely important a) to be confident that the opponent has made an amendment to the article, because he wants to do better, and not to, say, annoy you personally; b) to come to an agreement - to conduct a polite and correct discussion. Obviously, if the discussion begins with personal attacks in the style of "you are a fool" - then it will most likely continue with the words "he is a fool" - which obviously will not bring the participants closer to any result.
')
Therefore, in Wikipedia, there are quite strict rules concerning the interaction of participants with each other. You can not insult. You can not be rude. You can not get personal. A lot of things can not. By the standards of any forum, the space, of course, is small - but we didn’t come together just to chat and find out who is cooler - but to achieve some result, right?
Now let's imagine a situation: the participant rules “your” article, on which you have spent a lot of time and effort, so that you do not like it (but without allowing gross violations - say, not deleting all the content to it); and in parallel, let us say, in your personal blog (or on some more popular site), it pours you a selective swearing, and declares that, let's say, it will get you with its edits until you leave the project. And you know about it. (For example, stumbled upon a blog, or someone sent a link — it doesn't matter.) And you know for sure that this is it. (For example, his blog is linked to from Wikipedia’s personal page.) Can you then conduct a constructive and polite discussion with him and assume that he is acting for the good of the project, and not for the purpose of harming you? Hardly. Even if you can, it is not very long, because the lack of good intentions will be obvious to you. And if he not only insults, but also threatens - “once again, my editing will be done - you will miss the teeth”? Most likely, you will spit over time, and throw your article. And, having seen what the results of your work turn into, which you do not have the opportunity to defend, you are unlikely to write anything new. Obviously, this will not benefit the project - so it’s not to lose all constructive participants for long.
Is it true what to do? If you contact the administrators only on the basis of the fact that the participant rules "your" article, and you do not like it - they will not be able to do anything. Edit articles are not a violation. If these edits do not bring obvious harm, and only you do not like it - they will tell you - “agree with your opponent”. And that's all. No one will block anyone. Your “abuser” will continue to make edits. Of course, you can complain to the Abuse Team LiveJournal (if insults are to LiveJournal), the police and the Hague court - but the faith in the good intentions of your opponent will not return, and his actions will not be more constructive. And to continue the aggression on another site, for example, after the closure of a LiveJournal account, no one will interfere with it.
Actually, if we consider that the administrators of Wikipedia cannot take into account the actions of Wikipedia members outside Wikipedia, directly relating to Wikipedia, then the conscientious participant from the example above turns out to be completely defenseless. To prevent this, Wikipedia administrators are forced to take into account such factors. Because those who wish to exploit such helplessness have already been - and, of course, there will be more. Therefore, in some situations, we are forced, among other things, to impose blockages on the participant, relying (usually - among other things) on his actions outside Wikipedia - but clearly relating to Wikipedia, its participants and the processes occurring in it. Insults by themselves this may not stop, but at least remove their cause - the differences in the draft; and also removes the need for a bona fide participant to interact with the unscrupulous.
In fact, the situation described is only one of the possible scenarios in which administrative intervention is required based on “external” information. There are others - there is no possibility to discuss them in detail right now, and it is hardly possible to list all such scenarios.
A small result. No, Wikipedia is not going to moderate the entire Internet. This is not our function, and we do not have the resources for this. We have little interest in what expressions Wikipedia members communicate with their friends, whom they ban, whom they praise and whom they criticize. As long as it does not affect the work of Wikipedia. But systematic insults, personal attacks, threats, harassment of Wikipedia participants in connection with their work on Wikipedia, attempts to “survive” a participant from a project, or otherwise harm him, are unacceptable, regardless of what technical and informational means such actions are performed — be it e-mail, IRC, blogs, twitter — whatever. We cannot assume the good intentions of the participants who perform such actions, and in some situations are forced to limit their participation in the project technically.
That's the whole story.
This text is distributed under the terms of the license CC BY 3.0
The basics
Let's start with the basics. Wikipedia is an Internet project with a specific goal: the creation of an encyclopedic resource, striving for completeness, accuracy and neutrality of the presentation of information achieved through the joint work of many participants on the same content. This is different from many other communities and Internet projects: first of all, from various communication platforms (be it FIDO, IRC channels, web forums, LOR or Habr), which have no such goal. In this sense, Wikipedia is much closer to the Linux Kernel - however, with one major difference. Linux Kernel can only be managed by Linus Categories. In Wikipedia, any article can edit any person. At least, until the opposite decision is made. Our story is about how and when such decisions are made.
Keywords here: collaboration and collaboration. They sound great. So it seems: you wrote an article from two sentences, saved it, went to sleep, and woke up in the morning — and in its place is a beautiful, complete, well-structured and well-formed article, refined by other people. In practice, it often happens. But there is a downside. You worked on the article for a long time, spent a lot of time, wrote, published, contentedly went to bed, and wake up in the morning - and you see that some participant came to the article, redid and redid everything in his own way, deleted a bunch of your wonderful text, added a bunch his. And now you need to negotiate with this participant and seek a consensus on how the article should look like. (You cannot say “this is my article, don't dare touch it!” - Wikipedia is based on working together - in particular, it allows us to constantly improve articles and make them more neutral.) Under these conditions, it becomes extremely important a) to be confident that the opponent has made an amendment to the article, because he wants to do better, and not to, say, annoy you personally; b) to come to an agreement - to conduct a polite and correct discussion. Obviously, if the discussion begins with personal attacks in the style of "you are a fool" - then it will most likely continue with the words "he is a fool" - which obviously will not bring the participants closer to any result.
')
Therefore, in Wikipedia, there are quite strict rules concerning the interaction of participants with each other. You can not insult. You can not be rude. You can not get personal. A lot of things can not. By the standards of any forum, the space, of course, is small - but we didn’t come together just to chat and find out who is cooler - but to achieve some result, right?
Situation
Now let's imagine a situation: the participant rules “your” article, on which you have spent a lot of time and effort, so that you do not like it (but without allowing gross violations - say, not deleting all the content to it); and in parallel, let us say, in your personal blog (or on some more popular site), it pours you a selective swearing, and declares that, let's say, it will get you with its edits until you leave the project. And you know about it. (For example, stumbled upon a blog, or someone sent a link — it doesn't matter.) And you know for sure that this is it. (For example, his blog is linked to from Wikipedia’s personal page.) Can you then conduct a constructive and polite discussion with him and assume that he is acting for the good of the project, and not for the purpose of harming you? Hardly. Even if you can, it is not very long, because the lack of good intentions will be obvious to you. And if he not only insults, but also threatens - “once again, my editing will be done - you will miss the teeth”? Most likely, you will spit over time, and throw your article. And, having seen what the results of your work turn into, which you do not have the opportunity to defend, you are unlikely to write anything new. Obviously, this will not benefit the project - so it’s not to lose all constructive participants for long.
What to do?
Is it true what to do? If you contact the administrators only on the basis of the fact that the participant rules "your" article, and you do not like it - they will not be able to do anything. Edit articles are not a violation. If these edits do not bring obvious harm, and only you do not like it - they will tell you - “agree with your opponent”. And that's all. No one will block anyone. Your “abuser” will continue to make edits. Of course, you can complain to the Abuse Team LiveJournal (if insults are to LiveJournal), the police and the Hague court - but the faith in the good intentions of your opponent will not return, and his actions will not be more constructive. And to continue the aggression on another site, for example, after the closure of a LiveJournal account, no one will interfere with it.
Actually, if we consider that the administrators of Wikipedia cannot take into account the actions of Wikipedia members outside Wikipedia, directly relating to Wikipedia, then the conscientious participant from the example above turns out to be completely defenseless. To prevent this, Wikipedia administrators are forced to take into account such factors. Because those who wish to exploit such helplessness have already been - and, of course, there will be more. Therefore, in some situations, we are forced, among other things, to impose blockages on the participant, relying (usually - among other things) on his actions outside Wikipedia - but clearly relating to Wikipedia, its participants and the processes occurring in it. Insults by themselves this may not stop, but at least remove their cause - the differences in the draft; and also removes the need for a bona fide participant to interact with the unscrupulous.
In fact, the situation described is only one of the possible scenarios in which administrative intervention is required based on “external” information. There are others - there is no possibility to discuss them in detail right now, and it is hardly possible to list all such scenarios.
Total
A small result. No, Wikipedia is not going to moderate the entire Internet. This is not our function, and we do not have the resources for this. We have little interest in what expressions Wikipedia members communicate with their friends, whom they ban, whom they praise and whom they criticize. As long as it does not affect the work of Wikipedia. But systematic insults, personal attacks, threats, harassment of Wikipedia participants in connection with their work on Wikipedia, attempts to “survive” a participant from a project, or otherwise harm him, are unacceptable, regardless of what technical and informational means such actions are performed — be it e-mail, IRC, blogs, twitter — whatever. We cannot assume the good intentions of the participants who perform such actions, and in some situations are forced to limit their participation in the project technically.
That's the whole story.
This text is distributed under the terms of the license CC BY 3.0
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/84095/
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