Wikiversity:Community Review/Wikimedia Ethics:Ethical Breaching Experiments/SB Johnny

Pages redeleted
I have redeleted the pages in question, reblocked Private Musings, and desysopped SB Johnny.

I am happy to reinstate SB Johnny upon his agreement not to do this again.

I am happy for us to have a discussion about process and policy for the future, but for today, I'm calling an absolute stop to this particular project. It is not appropriate for Wikiversity for the reasons hat others have outlined above. It is simply not within the scope of Wikiversity to host projects of this nature. I am interested in bringing in very good, high quality, innovative contributors and helping Wikiversity become something really amazing and special, and I am here to assist in that process by empowering those who wish to see the same. I expect and insist upon a professional environment we can be proud to show to serious newcomers - and this means drawing a firm line that frivolous trolling projects have to be deleted.

I agree, quite strongly in fact, with those who would argue that Jimbo coming in to lay down the law is not an appropriate and sustainable longterm governance model for Wikiversity. I have no interest in doing things that way. At the same time, it is clear that at least so far, appropriate policies have not been put into place, and one of the reasons is that the endless search for consensus (a good thing) fails when there is no clear guidance on the endpoint goals.--Jimbo Wales 17:17, 15 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I am still recused from related discussions, but I am leaving this note to acknowledge that I have cleaned up broken redirects, redlinks, and talk pages related to the matter in addition to notifying both parties to the above. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:58, 15 March 2010 (UTC)


 * I requested the removal of my sysop tools as a form of protest against your approach. What you have done is simply not right! Even if you reinstall SB in this very moment it is too late. Think, discuss, act. The order is important. --Gbaor 18:46, 15 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Jimmy, you're really not making your point very well here. I've always "held sacred" your long-ago statement that "being an admin should be no big deal", and I don't think it's a big deal to lose the status either. But, well, wow. --SB_Johnny talk 20:50, 15 March 2010 (UTC)

To Jimbo Wales. Right now, I'm working with other editors on changing the policies so that materials promoting or commemorating activities disruptive to other Wikimedia projects are explicitly prohibited. Re: "helping Wikiversity become something really amazing and special," I'd like to share my thoughts about what could be done.

First of all, I think there are tremendous misunderstandings about what Wikiversity is, and many unrealized opportunities to promote Wikiversity. When I went to the Wikipedia NYC meetup back in February, I realized that most of the other people there did not realize what Wikiversity was for, especially how it is based on a University/academic model but very flexible about what types of learning resources could be added. This was not because of a lack of interest--people were interested, but they just didn't know what it was. For example, I'm not sure the one-line description of Wikiversity on the main page of Wikipedia is specific enough to capture what it is. Perhaps "Free school, university and research materials" or some such phrase might draw more of the right people to the site. In addition, I think Wikiversity might benefit if more articles on Wikipedia linked to it. Attending the Meetup, I met Wikipedia people who are now thinking about using Wikiversity for their project but would not have considered it without my input. I would very, very much appreciate your feedback re: my thoughts. --AFriedman (talk) 20:50, 15 March 2010 (UTC)


 * AFreidman, I think that sounds delightful. I think your formulation is a very good start, although I don't think Wikimedia projects should necessarily be privileged.  I would feel the same way about a project started to discuss ways to destroy a messageboard community through sockpuppeting and trolling (as just one example of many that we could come up with in a short time).--Jimbo Wales 13:26, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

The question then becomes, where do we draw the line. The goals and values of the other Wikimedia Foundation projects are all very similar to Wikiversity's, and I strongly believe that the sister projects should promote, support and protect one another. However, not all websites share our core values, and not everything on the Internet is used for a good cause. In most instances I would agree with you about the message board example, but on the other hand, is it wrong to infiltrate and disrupt a terrorist website or a website used to coordinate the trafficking of child prostitutes? Would it be wrong for Wikiversity to commemorate or encourage people who do this? How do we decide where disruption is acceptable, and where it isn't? In order to expand the policies to encompass non-WMF projects, which is likely to be necessary if a similar project finds its way onto this site, IMO there needs to be more careful thought about how to formulate things. According to our policies, another one of our goals is to minimize censorship. --AFriedman (talk) 02:14, 17 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Preparing people for assault and war, that shouldn't be open to discussion. If you find terrorists and child molestors on the internet, tell Interpol or the FBI. They are out of your league at reacting and will be happy to hear from you. Don't patronise people like that. There are no havens for such people on these sites and there are no war factories either. Am I mistaken there? RTG 19:19, 17 March 2010 (UTC)

Quick note from SB_Johnny
I'm still trying to figure out how to respond to all this, but two things I'm sure of: What we should be focusing on in this Community Review is on the two questions I was originally looking for clarification on: We're supposed to be a community of scholars here, so let's act like it. Look at the underlying principles and ignore the mundane dramas. One way or another, we're going to be OK, and we'll grow from this. Don't be afraid of "losing wikiversity"... we won't. --SB_Johnny talk 00:02, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) My undoing of User:Jimbo Wales actions were absolutely what I was supposed to do: yes, those pages were questionable, but the question was something for the community to decide. I un-deleted the pages so that we could discuss them and decide whether they were within our scope, and I unblocked the user who created them so that he could explain his intentions. I then opened this Community Review, because that's what we're supposed to do when we're unsure about policy.
 * 2) My custodian tools are no big deal. I really believe in that, and I've tried over the past few years to get other people to see it that way too. I was fully aware of the possibility that Jimbo would "desyssop me", my feelings are not at all hurt, and I don't really need the tools at the moment. This is no big deal.
 * 1) Is the (now deleted) project within our scope? Jimbo's deletion reason was "out of scope"... I reversed his action because I didn't think that was clear. I undid his block because there didn't seem to be any justification (or even a warning).
 * 2) Should Jimbo be free to use his tools outside of community policy and process? I don't see why he should.


 * I fully support the undoing of those actions and agree that these are issues that should be debated and decided by the full wikiversity community. We have long had a process in place for discussing deletion of project pages that some find questionable; to bypass that process is not a healthy way to build our learning community.  Moving forward...


 * it is up to the community to decide if there is confidence in SB_Johnny as custodian and crat. As tempted as I am to undo the desysop action, I feel that in the interest of keeping drama to a minimum we should carefully follow our established procedures.  If sbj gains the support of the community through the process of a Request for Custodianship I will respect the consensus will and reflag his account.


 * while I sympathize with the gesture made by Gbaor I feel that the request was made in haste and consider that this respected custodian still has the support of the community and will reflag his account, if he has second thoughts about the decision to resign. and I hope he does reconsider...


 * The deleted pages should be subject to a Requests for Uneletion to discuss the merits of those project pages and the final status of these pages should be decided by the full community.


 * a Community Review should be opened to discuss the indef block of User:Privatemusings


 * another Community Review should be opened to discuss the unilateral actions that were recently taken by User:Jimbo Wales. If any elected custodian had taken such actions without discussion or support of the community it would have resulted in the removal of tools.  I don't see that there is any mandate from wikiversity participants to support such actions.


 * --mikeu talk 15:36, 16 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Mikeu, I would like to request that - in the interest of keeping drama to a minimum - you not do any of this. In particular, do not reflag SB_Johnny without my approval, do not undelete these articles without my approval, and do not unblock Privatemusings without my approval.  I have the support of Sue Gardner to assist this community in a process of reform - and that process needs to proceed in an orderly and professional fashion, not as a civil war.  I am neither dictatorial nor unreasonable, so there is no need to get into a wheel war with me.--Jimbo Wales 17:06, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Dear mr Wales! I thought long what to write here... You are certainly not unreasonable, but what you have done is dictatorial for sure. I am really sorry to say that, because I respect you as a person very much. To do it in professional fashion, I feel that the community review of your should be made as a direct consequence of your actions. Since this is a situation involving both WV and WP editors from both sides should be notified. --Gbaor 17:33, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Note: I have to say that I don't like your approach of blocking users. The revert of the comment could be seen as getting rid of a personal attack (for me it was a borderline case as well) but the ban is simply too much. The user might be blocked on WP, might not be an angel, but here he has just as much right to speak as anybody else (given that it moves the discussion further and the wording of the comment is polite or at least not a direct or indirect attack). The core question of this user remains valid: "Does the Wikimedia Foundation have no interest in allowing the community to discover how the WMF might be persuaded to improve its position on matters of ethics?" Rather a short and maybe unclear question but since the user is blocked, no more explanation (for now).--Gbaor 09:59, 17 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Jimbo Wales, sorry if my statement was unclear. I have no intention of taking any unilateral action.  I am simply proposing that a discussion of these issues would be a productive exercise in clarifying the scope of wikiversity and gaining consensus on what appropriate action the community feels should be taken when a project page falls outside of the scope.  I do not see my role as one of making a judgement on these topics, but rather facilitating debate and then acting in a manner that is consistent with the will of the wikiversity community.  --mikeu talk 20:09, 16 March 2010 (UTC)

Wikiversity's review process for research is community-led, taking the following steps: I believe that the Wikimedia Ethics/Ethical Breaching Experiments page should be reviewed and discussed by the Wikiversity community so that community members can decide if the page was actually outside of the scope of Wikiversity research projects. From the deleted page: "ethical breaching  experiment: An experiment which causes no harm in its execution". The purpose of the deleted research project was to explore how ethical breaching experiments "might be designed and executed to best inform policy and practice on WMF projects". It is not clear to me how this research into ethical breaching experiments fails to fall within the scope of Wikiversity research. --JWSchmidt 16:04, 16 March 2010 (UTC)
 * 1) People add research to Wikiversity - they are encouraged to flag it appropriately as "research".
 * 2) If not done already, research is flagged with a template placed at the top of the page.
 * 3) If anyone reviewing (i.e. simply reading) the page finds something within the research to be questionable on methodological, ethical, epistemological grounds, they can add an appropriate template - or modify the existing one.
 * 4) The page(s) in question can be flagged for deletion - or a request for comments can be made

Just a note: I'm following the discussion here, but I'm relatively sure I would be banned if I expressed anything close to what I'm thinking. I'm looking into somewhere off-site to hold discussions, so feel free to email me about progress on that. --SB_Johnny talk 16:20, 18 March 2010 (UTC)

Recommend SBJ be reinstated
I agree with Collect, above. "SBJ clearly was of the opinion that where a process exists, it ought well be followed. I thus doubt the wisdom of punishing SBJ for doing what was clearly the process in existence at the time on WV." It seems clear that Jimbo desysopped SBJ for following process - hardly an offense. I recommend he be reinstated. KillerChihuahua 18:46, 19 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Following what process? We don't have a process for dealing with instances where Jimbo uses his Founder rights to delete content and block users. There is no process which says when that happens, despite Jimbo requesting "please do not unblock without consulting with me", we should ignore that request and unblock the user and restore the content that was deleted.
 * Of course the counter argument to that might be that Jimbo didn't follow the usual deletion process in the first place but two wrongs don't make a right as the saying goes. It is obvious from what has gone on that Jimbo didn't block PM and delete this content and then disappear. He has responded to messages on his talk page and commented here.
 * There should have been no rush to reverse Jimbo's action, and as I suggested shortly before SBJ went ahead and reversed Jimbo's actions, doing so might not be a good idea. Despite SBJ saying "Unless I'm missing something or there are strong objections, I intend to undo both", he didn't seem to wait for others to share their thoughts at WV:RCA before acting. Unsurprisingly that didn't turn out to be a good idea. Whilst I appreciate that SBJ's intention here would be to enable the deletion (or not) of this content to be discussed by the community, I'm afraid his attempts to do this were poorly thought out and inevitably resulted in more drama.
 * I don't think it would be appropriate to reinstate his rights at the current time since there is a risk his actions could further escalate this issue rather than help to resolve it, particularly inn light of recent comments that Jimbo "must accept the community's decision" regarding Wikimedia Ethics:Ethical Breaching Experiments. It still seems that SBJ doesn't "get it". The "community" can have their say on things but they can't overrule the WMF board on what is and what isn't appropriate. His apparent failure to recognise that the community of any WMF project can never have completely free rein over what goes on is concerning.
 * I've seen some describe the WMF projects as a dictatorship, presumably with Jimbo in charge. I think a better analogy would be that of a constitutional monarchy like that of the United Kingdom. The Queen (Jimbo/WMF board) is ultimately in charge but the citizens (community) elect officials (custodians/admins) to make decisions and look after day to day affairs. The Queen could dismiss the government if she wanted, just as Jimbo/the WMF can get involved in affairs if they consider to do so in the interests of the WMF. The community is only the group of users active on a project at a moment in time. The unfortunate reality is that those individuals might not be able to agree on something which could ultimately be in the interests of the project or the wider WMF. It is in those situations where direct intervention by Jimbo/the WMF might be considered and presumably what was felt to be the case here. Adambro 19:28, 19 March 2010 (UTC)


 * Last time I look, the WMF has long tried hard to maintain the stance that they are, technically, only a host and are not responsible for the contents. The board of trustees for sure has the right to do what they see fit to whatever they see.  However, jimbo wales' simply do not have god-king status on Wikiversity.  It is neither written in ink, nor ever discussed seriously, nor a custom.  Mind you, Adam, Wales launched the wikiversity in august 2006, but the true Founders of Wikiversity are our fellow Wikiversiters, like Sebmol, Cormaggio, Wisewoman and JWSchmidt.   Wales' one principal contribution is to agree to kick (English) Wikiversity out of (English) Wikibooks, making it necessary to form a new independent project.   In fact, I had wished Wales to come by, to contribute in the building of contents, perhaps something like The idea of Wikipedia, or The problems we faced in building Wikipedia.    Hillgentleman | //\\ |Talk 22:53, 19 March 2010 (UTC)