Wikipedia talk:News suppression

Please discuss. --Apoc2400 (talk) 17:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

very severe direct negative consequences for one or more individuals

This is far to weak. It should be much stronger if this is to go ahead. Something along the lines of "puts lives at risk". I'm loath to include national security concerns. I also feel that this should only be invoked if the traditional media are complicit with the blackout and reasons are presented to the foundation or some such authority. First 2 minutes thoughts. Verbal chat 17:44, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, we may need to be clear on that. Consider a politician potentially losing an election because the Wikipedia article mentions a scandal that is covered in the local newspaper. That is certainly not severe enough to suppress. Suggested wording? --Apoc2400 (talk) 17:59, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

There may be no adequate wording, if it is the idea that is flawed rather than the wording. One consequence of reporting facts is that someone may act upon those facts in a way the publishers don't desire or even anticipate. If we measure our words so that only "harmless" facts or those believed impossible to misuse appear, we're going to be missing a whole lot of facts. Agreed? Should information regarding, for example, the recent Iranian political crisis be censored by the same standard of "very severe direct negative consequence", or even "physical harm" to an individual? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.22.103.251 (talk) 18:11, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I changed the first point to "spreading it is likely to have very severe direct negative consequences for one or more individuals, on the level of life or death" (bolding added here). One of my reasons for proposing this is actually to avoid a general sentiment that consequences should always trump truthful information. That would be failing our integrity as an encyclopedia. --Apoc2400 (talk) 18:18, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

"It is withheld only for a limited time"

We should further define limited. Hipocrite (talk) 17:51, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

How can we define it, without setting a hard limit? A definite limit is when something goes from being news to modern history. --Apoc2400 (talk) 18:20, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Hard limits are good sometimes. Copyrights in the US are defined to last for "limited times". That was 20 years once, now it is 70. For a policy like this I would say approximately 6 months, after the latest news report on the subject, should be the hard limit, or immediately upon the first report by any major well-known source. --Mysidia (talk) 00:24, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

No, that's a terrible idea. I think the key consideration is that Wikipedia shouldn't be the one to break the black out. As long as WP:RS are self-censoring, so should Wikipedia. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 00:32, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Presumably we are only talking about journalism in jurisdictions where freedom of speech is safeguarded? I'd hate for this to be an excuse to "harmonise" news unfavourable to certain despotic regimes. Ohconfucius (talk) 14:41, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:OFFICE

I don't think a proposal for this is worthwhile, these should be handled by the WP:OFFICE rather than some sneaky administering by invoking a guideline-we-can't-name. –xeno^talk 17:54, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Or stewards (of which Jimbo is one)? The inter-wiki issue desperately needs to be dealt with. Why bother preventing dissemination on en.WP if it's on the Russian or Italian WP? Tony (talk) 18:28, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

or WP:BLP, which is often cited for not publishing information where there are privacy concerns. Ohconfucius (talk) 14:43, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Oppose/rejected

I am opposed to this, as policy. I feel that the adminstrators who covered up the reliably sourced information about the kidnapping were wrong. As such, I feel that this policy has not been widely reviewed by the community, nor has it been declared as an office requirement. As such, I move that it be rejected forthwith, and the next time we desire to cover up reliably sourced information we rely on existing policies (WP:OFFICE). Hipocrite (talk) 17:54, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I hope we can have the discussion now, so that next time the rules are clear. Do you think covering it up to protect Rohde was genuinely wrong, or only wrong because it was against the rules of Wikipedia? --Apoc2400 (talk) 18:11, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Both morally wrong and against the rules of Wikipedia. Hipocrite (talk) 18:46, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

The title alone is reminiscent of some late-communist era doublespeak. laughable. Pnd (talk) 19:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I prefer to be honest that this is a form a censorship, though motivated censorship, rather than pretending it is not. Anyway, the title can easily be changed. --Apoc2400 (talk) 19:17, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I somehow doubt on a place where WP:NOTCENSORED is one of the most linked to locations you will find a strong support for the undermining of everything the foundations of the encyclopedia were written upon. –– Lid^(Talk) 19:37, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Oppose. Hipocrite's arguments are excellent. The admins should not have done what they did, and condoning them by making it a policy is just plain wrong. Mcools (talk) 20:21, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Oppose, re Hipocrite. Additionally suggest that if people feel Jimbo's violated wikipedia's policy, that they action it through the rogue editor systems. Formally. Fifelfoo (talk) 01:45, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

CREEP and IAR/OFFICE

I think it's a case of WP:CREEP that is not necessary per WP:IAR and WP:OFFICE. Having this clarified in one way or the other would be adverse per the specificity and extraneous nature of the cases. Cenarium (talk) 17:57, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

IAR is about ignoring rules when they prevent you from improving the encyclopedia. The reason to suppress the news of David Rohde's kidnapping is not mainly to improve Wikipedia, but to protect Rohde. It wasn't an office action either. Saying that Jimbo et.al. were right while not setting limits open up to using the precedent where it is appropriate. There are many cases where writing about something could have severe real-life consequences, but we should not censor anyway. Think articles about explosives, drugs, infected nationalist conflicts, etc. --Apoc2400 (talk) 18:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

To follow up, I agree that Wikipedia has a big problem with instruction creep. I would prefer we use common sense more, and learn to ignore those that lack it. However, this is exactly the kind of situation where a codified ethical standard is good to have. People can disagree in good faith on the proper balance between telling the truth and consequences. Many newspapers and national news organizations have codified principles for just these situations. --Apoc2400 (talk) 18:34, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

This isn't OFFICE creep, this is BLP creep all over again taken to its extreme conclusion - that wikipedia must not do anything that can in any conceivable way possibly bring harm to any living person. You don't codify a policy that undermines the pillars of wikipedia because a case that is, correctly, being cited as bringing philosophical disrepute to wikipedia just to make the decision retroactively one in lines with wikipedia as it exists and should continue to exist. –– Lid^(Talk) 19:34, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

IAR is not only for content, in its usage, it's been used in the past for actions aimed to improve, or at least not deteriorate, the public image of Wikipedia for example. That case hasn't been handled at the office level indeed, but mostly OTRS, which is in between the community and the OFFICE level. It still implies that it's subject to different policies that those of the community, thus we may not need to make policy on how to act in such cases, and leave it for them.

Making policy on edge or rare cases, has not always good results, first because we don't have many case studies to base our policy on, and our policies are generally viewed as descriptive; there's also this idiom "A Bad Case Makes Worse Law" in relation to that. Moreover, a policy that is extremely dependent on the specificity of the case, as would be the case with this one, will in fact not be of great use to evaluate a case and find the proper response, and it would likely bring more contention, as it would reinforce the position of one party, and give less consideration to the specificity of the case at hand in favor to the general. This would be an open door to wikilawyering, as we call it, on the application to a wider range of cases this policy was not supposed to cover. And the aggravating factor is that this policy is to be applied in the most secretive way as possible, which doesn't go well with our general principles. So I think it should not be legislated, use IAR if you truly ought to, or defer it to the OFFICE/OTRS staff. Cenarium (talk) 01:37, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

As I already said on wiki-en, I consider the fact that IAR doesn't cover this to be a loophole in IAR. The same loophole exists for privacy and BLP issues. We really ought to fix IAR. Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:25, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

The problem with applying WP:IAR in this case is that it cuts both ways. Group A thinks that Wikipedia is "improved" by omitting details of e.g. the Rohde kidnapping, so they interpret IAR to mean they should remove the information. On the other hand, Group B thinks that Wikipedia is "improved" by including more information, even if it is of a controversial nature, so they interpret IAR to mean that they should push adding it, even if they encounter resistance. At the very least, a policy/guideline such as the one proposed functions as something we can point to when questions arise about what counts as "improved" with respect to media blackouts, much the same way as we can point to WP:CENSORED when someone goes "OMG! BOOBIES!". (You can apply similar arguments to say that WP:CENSORED is CREEP over IAR, as Wikipedia is "improved" by having (limited and appropriate) pictures/diagrams of penises/breasts/nudity - but again there are others who say that Wikipedia would be "improved" by removing penises/breasts/nudity from Wikipedia altogether.) WP:OFFICE does not apply (at least as written), because in OFFICE actions, "Grievances must be grounded in the law" - there's no law requiring media blackouts. -- 128.104.112.62 (talk) 00:02, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:IAR often cuts both ways, this case isn't exceptional in that regard. IAR doesn't say you can ignore Wikipedia:Etiquette, when you are encountering resistance. It refers to when a rule says something that prevents you from improving Wikipedia.

Not when you are encountering resistance from the community, and your action isn't supported by consensus. --Mysidia (talk) 00:31, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The problem with IAR here isn't the "rule" part, it's the "improving Wikipedia" part. Doing something to save a life, or protect someone's privacy, doesn't improve the encyclopedia, so IAR may not be used for it. Ken Arromdee (talk) 01:40, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

While the witting may seem to restrict the policy in that way, in its usage, it's not. Many see it as "do the right thing, even if you must breach policy for that". It's been used in that way in the past, and it has led to loads of contradictions indeed, depending to which level you apply it, the article, Wikipedia, Wikipedia and its public reception, the Internet, a living person, Mankind, etc. Cenarium (talk) 01:48, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not making this problem up. "IAR is only for improving the encyclopedia. It may not be used to protect individuals. See, it says it right there, it's only for improving the encyclopedia" is probably the most commonly used loophole in IAR. It usually gets used whenever someone tries to invoke IAR for privacy or BLP considerations, but it also applies here.

You wouldn't think that IAR could have loopholes, but it does, because nobody seems willing to eliminate them. Ken Arromdee (talk) 15:49, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Isn't the easiest way to resolve Jimbo's acting in a way contrary to Wikipedia policy, to put his user account up on dispute? Fifelfoo (talk) 01:39, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

the ethical basis

• "if there is an other scandal like the Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse, then it could be argued that publishing it would lead to more resentment and terrorist attacks against Americans in Iraq. However, such news is of public interest, the danger is not to specific individuals and the consequences are not direct. Therefore it should not be excluded from Wikipedia if published in reliable sources."

suppose in a case like that the perpetrators had not yet been brought to justice, and publicity would cause them to receive long prison sentences. There would thus be harm done to them if we published and it was wider known. I think you would still say that we should, in which case you're saying that because you think the negative consequences to them would be justified, and probably also because it would prevent harm to future prisoners. In this case you;re making a political and ethical judgment about who should be protected from harm, not that we are protecting from harm.

In a case like the present one, though, suppose someone might say in a case like this, it would be desirable that the person be killed--either because the person thinks that this would arouse anger towards the enemy and lead to its quicker destruction, or because the person thinks that such reports are indeed secret agents acting on behalf of an imperialist power and those holding him have a just cause. Again, political judgments. I think and I'm sure essentially everyone reading this thinks that they would both be perverse political judgements, but that expresses only our own politics.

The example of D-Day was mentioned elsewhere with respect to this--that withholding information was justified. Now suppose one were in a position to disclose information about the planned fire-bombing of Dresden and one were in a position where one could safely disclose it and perhaps cause the raid to be cancelled. The answer depends on your judgment about the morality and political/military wisdom of that raid. I know what I feel about it, & I would have disclosed if safe to do so. (knowing what we know now). I would possibly have felt differently at the time--but that was because information about the true effect of such raids was not made available).

People cannot avoid making ethical judgments on the basis of their fundamental beliefs on when harm is justified if they judge these things on the basis of not doing harm.

The only morally consistent position that avoids such judgements is thus to always tell the full truth regardless, as long as one reliably knows it. Information is neutral, and its the ones who use it who do the harm. Otherwise admit that we are expressing the political preferences of ourselves and our society, not making an abstract statement about ethics.

(Incidentally, I would personally not have disclosed the information in the case at hand. It's an emotional response based on protecting those to whom I have the closer ties with.) DGG (talk) 18:01, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Interesting argument. I think that while ethics can rarely be completely defined in an objective way, it still exists and we do have ethical obligations. I don't think someone going to prison for their crimes is a severe negative consequence, but getting executed in Iran for being homosexual is. That requires us to separate fair justice systems from unfair, I know some Wikipedians dislike that. Still, the German Wikipedia follows German law as well as U.S., while I assume the Persian Wikipedia does not follow all Iranian laws. --Apoc2400 (talk) 20:59, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

If it had been up to me I would have declined to honor the NYT blackout request, unless they offered a more credible explanation. As I wrote here, the explanation for the blackout in the article Kidnapping of David Rohde basically boils down to "'experts' told us to do it this way." Desperately worried people, like Rodhe's family, and his colleagues, are not in a position to make a wise decision as to whether the advice of the 'experts' was credible.

We sometimes have {{afd}}s where the subject of a biographical article has requested, via OTRS, or (apparently) on the talk page, or in the {{afd}} itself, that they not be the subject of an article. My recollection is that when the subject is clearly a notable person, we politely tell the subject that they are notable, and we are going to decline their request. My recollection is that it is only when their notability is marginal that we take their request into account.

I think our own analysis of the credibility of the basis for a blackout request should take precedence over the analysis of families or colleagues. Geo Swan (talk) 21:04, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

You may wish to review User talk:Rjd0060. Hipocrite (talk) 21:06, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Pro-American

I'm going to get this in early, hopefully pre-empting any issues before they become too big a deal. At the moment, there are only two examples given of information being suppressed collaboratively by Wikipedians: those examples being David Rohde and Abu Ghraib. I know the intention isn't to alienate non-Americans who aren't especially pro-American, but there is the danger that, without examples from different parts of the world, folk might use this to fuel claims that Wikipedia is unfairly biased - "Wikipedia wouldn't have censored the information if it had been Iraqis torturing Americans in a prisoner of war camp" or some similar argument. I'm not trying to draw anyone into argument about whether there is any substance to such claims: I'm neither particularly pro- nor particularly anti-American and my intention is to prevent rather than initiate any polarisation on this issue. But I think the credibility of Wikipedia as an international, non-partisan entity would be well served by including some examples which didn't in any way include American nationals. Whether such examples actually exist, I have no idea: hopefully someone out there can come up with a few. Peace to you all ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 19:54, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Abu Ghraib is an example of information that should not be removed from Wikipedia to protect Americans. I will make this more clear. However, you are still right that some examples not related to Americans would be good. --Apoc2400 (talk) 20:00, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I would even more strongly challenge any insinuation that we provide News Supression services to anyone but privlidged (rich, powerful, famous or all 3) members of the North-Eastern hemisphere, and would ask that any evidence that we do so be provided before anyone attempts to codify it. Our News Supression services are available to editors of major newspapers and billionares, not American Soliders or unknown Tibetian Monks - please don't try to delude yourself on this point. Hipocrite (talk) 20:04, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry Apoc, I misunderstood the example of Abu Ghraib: your new edit makes everything a lot clearer. Hipocrite, I agree with you fully: as I say, I was trying to get in there early in order that any policy which eventually gets written is bullet-proof on the issue of who WP protects and why. I think we all agree on this ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 20:09, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Feel free to add a {resolved} tag to the top of this thread. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:31, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but I'm not sure it has been resolved yet. If a policy does actually end up getting written (and I appreciate it's still very much an "if" at this stage), the issue I'm broaching will need to be addressed when selecting examples to be cited. Maybe I've come in with my comments too prematurely, given that we're clearly still far from reaching consensus on whether a policy is even necessary ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 21:06, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Will invoking this policy or guideline draw attention to the suppressed information?

While I fully agree with how Wikipedia handled this situation, I wonder how we're going to handle it in the future. Had the editors of that article taken the discussion to the talk page, the secret would have been out. It doesn't take a genius to click on the Talk page hyperlink. Now that the secret is out, there are discussions at the Village Pump, the Admin noticeboard, the Reliable Sources Noticeboard and possibly several other places I'm not aware of. The reason why we were able to handle this with David Rohde was that almost all communication was done privately. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:31, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I attempted to address this with the paragraph Administrators or other editors enforcing this may avoid directly explaining why or referring to this rule, if doing so would negate the purpose (see Streisand effect). In those cases it would be prudent to explain the reasoning later. Editors acting per this should probably not put "per Wikipedia:News suppression" in the edit summary. --Apoc2400 (talk) 20:53, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Here's a modest proposal, but with a point:

• No disciplinary action may be taken against any Wikipedian for attempting to enforce Wikipedia rules when an admin or other editor breaks them for the purposes of this policy, since an average Wikipedian will be unable to distinguish valid applications of this policy from abuse by administrators. Actions which may not be punished include but are not limited to edit warring, violation of Wikipedia:Assume good faith, and WP:DICK.

Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:22, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we need a rule for that. Naturally, someone who has acted in good faith should not be punished. --Apoc2400 (talk) 21:33, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I was thinking of the situation where someone gets mad at an admin for apparently abusing the rules. Now, it's true that you're not supposed to get mad at admins anyway, but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth if someone can be punished because an admin has, de facto, egged him on. In other words, if you break the rules, the responsibility for anyone else's reaction to that breakage should be yours, even if it was an overreaction. Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:43, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Something like this should be added to the article: "For example, editors should avoid including "per WP:News suppression" in edit summaries unless absolutely necessary". A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:40, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I added Putting "per WP:News suppression" in edit summary is probably a bad idea when trying to keep something secret. Is it clear now? --Apoc2400 (talk) 21:48, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, better. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:10, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I am going to agree that Ken is making an excellent point here. There have been several times, over the years, when I have noticed good, promising contributors, because they made contributions to the same controversial topics I contribute to, end up going rogue, and being driven away from the project, or been driven into rogue behavior that got them permanently blocked, because the first administrators who tried to enforce policy on them weren't fully complying with the wikipedia's civility policies themselves. Who can blame them for failing to understand the wikipedia's civility policies when the administrators they interact with set a bad example? The saddest thing is that while I sometimes agreed with those administrators that the newbie had lapsed from an important policy, there were other cases where I thought the administrator was wrong, or was over-stepping the authority entrusted with them.

Most contributors to this thread, have accepted, at face value, that complying with the NYTimes request would make a serious difference to Rohde's safety. (Personally, I don't accept that the information made public about the NYTimes request was sufficient to justify bending our policies.) And I think that most people would suggest that taking steps that might help preserve Rohde's safety were worth risking turning a promising new contributor into a rogue by treating him in a high-handed fashion for eight months -- that this would be worth turning a dozen, or a hundred, promising new contributors into rogue users who have to be permanently blocked.

As more articles have covered the wikipedia aspect of Rohde's news blackout some stuff has been published there, which I think should first have been published here, on the meta pages. Some of those news reports said that the insiders covertly working to effect the news blackout tried, and were unable, to contact the most persistent contributor trying to cover the kidnapping, off-wiki -- and were unable to do so, because they were contributing from anonymous IP accounts.

If you look at the edit summaries this contributor left they were clearly growing more and more upset at what I think everyone can agree looked at the time like an arrogant clique abusing the authority entrusted with them. It seems those who implemented the news blackout don't think they did anything wrong, so they don't think they owe the good faith contributors who tried to cover this event an apology. But would a simple acknowledgment that they understand how it must have been, to be at the receiving end of their uncandid and dismissive comments? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Geo Swan (talk • contribs)

Agree with the foregoing that this could be the collateral damage to the project if this proposal gains acceptance. We will have to accept that over a relatively long period (ie several months) that admins will be behaving strangely (sic) in diverse corners of WP, trying to suppress news which is freely available elsewhere because our own 'Official Secrets Act' has been invoked. This is another reason why we shouldn't go there, IMHO. Ohconfucius (talk) 01:26, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Feasible accomplishments & backfires

I appreciate the author's intention to improve the morality of our actions. Kudos. However,

1. I don't see how a codified standard would improve upon our current situation, which (to my understanding) is that we uphold our principles, and once in a blue moon find they lead to a blatantly wrong outcome, break them, and then take the flames. This restricts the breakage to dire emergencies and case-by-case evaluation - which seems to be the best-case scenario for a codified rule.
2. A rule for suppressing information would be self-defeating in public use, and granting the right of secret suppression to any specific class of editors would cause a revolt.
3. I worry that this could give weight to attempts to remove morally questionable information, no matter how tenuous the arguments involved are (e.g. "endangers our troops," "gives aid and comfort to our enemies"... there's always a connection.)
4. Where there are rules, they can be are lawyered, changed, argued about, expanded upon -- is it within our capability to make rules that would work better for choosing targets for news suppression than a select individual's or group's individual discretion? And/or rules that would work better than the clandestine actions of that individual or group? And/or rules that would limit news suppression, when the whole point of the activity is to break the usual rules for something more important?

The best option seems to be keeping matters such as the Rhode affair in the shady backrooms where they belong. Please pick this argument apart. For once I'm more interested in what's right than being right. --Kizor 20:55, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Re: point 2: we are already granting the right of secret suppression to any specific class of editors. The only question is whether we admit that we're granting that right. Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:08, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree that people did the right thing here, but I don't think it's obvious. Those who say that the possibility of real-life harm always trumps everything else are making it too easy. I think most newspaper editors would agree that a media blackout is not something you should do lightly. There are many articles these days discussing whether the media and Wikipedia did the right thing or not. In my opinion, the general principle here should be decided by the Wikimedia Foundation office or by community consensus, not an admin cabal. Obviously, starting a community discussion before acting on a real case is out of the question. That is why I want to have the discussion now that it is safe, and let people act based on it when necessary.

Re. 2) The right is not only granted to any group, and acting based on this would not require referring to it.

Re. 3) I think the risk of gradual expansion is bigger if the principles are not codified.

The New York Times people were lucky that they managed to get hold of Jimbo. Let's say they contacted OTRS or a random administrator instead. Would that person feel confident to break several Wikipedia rules, with only very weak IAR support? What if that person is strongly against censorship in any form? A codified community stance would empower the former to do what is right and remind the later to put their personal opinions aside. --Apoc2400 (talk) 21:28, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

As an OTRS respondent, I personally would have done the exact same thing, and I would have encouraged any other OTRS agent who asked me for their opinion to also do it. Daniel (talk) 03:21, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I am having quite a fundamental problem in that I can't imagine a situation to which this would apply — if an ordinary WP editor has public domain information from a reliable source, and was in a position to insert it in an article (with relevant citation) to the point of edit warring with someone seeking suppression, then what good would it do if we had this policy in place? Ohconfucius (talk) 15:17, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Deuce Martinez

Deuce Martinez is an example where news organizations were warned that publishing the name of a specific individual could endanger him. They published the name anyway. Of course, 1) he isn't a reporter, and 2) he was associated with an administration and policies who the New York Times doesn't like.

The proposed news suppression policy is unambiguous about what to do in this case: once the Times publishes it, it's free game for us.

But I don't think that's wise. Newspapers are, for obvious reasons, going to balance competing interests differently when the person who is put in danger is a newspaper reporter. If it isn't a reporter (and, as in this case, if the person put in danger is politically disfavored by the newspaper), the name is a lot more likely to get published. Half of the reason why I think this case smells is the "protect reporters, but the public has a right to know about everyone else" aspect.

Basically, we're letting the questions "how badly in danger is this person?" and "how much does the public need to know this?" be decided by someone (the Times) who has a conflict of interest. Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:06, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

Once the cat is out of the bag, what's the point in suppressing it? I think the key consideration is that Wikipedia shouldn't be the to break the black out. We should wait until it's being published by major news organizations. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:14, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

So Wikipedia is an instrument of the New York Times, but not Pravda, or the People's Daily, or the CPGB Party Paper, or a long running minority paper? "Major" news organisations? The reputability guide is superior to this culturally specific context of Major.Fifelfoo (talk) 01:23, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Not at all. The same policy would apply if a reporter from Pravada, People's Daily, etc. was in the same situation. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:39, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

More danger

We also need to think hard about whether suppressing information can lead to terrorists hurting people with the intention of getting us to suppress or alter information. What if someone says "I'm going to kill a hostage unless you change your articles to say that Israel is oppressing the Palestinians"? Ken Arromdee (talk) 21:15, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

the public interest is small

Is this even necessary? With Abu Graib, it was widely reported so WP:News suppression couldn't be invoked based on this qualification alone. Hypothetically speaking, if the President of the United States had been kidnapped by terrorists, it would be of great public interest. But if the news media intentionally suppressed this information, then so should Wikipedia. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 21:54, 30 June 2009 (UTC)

"Hypothetically speaking, if the President of the United States had been kidnapped by terrorists, it would be of great public interest. But if the news media intentionally suppressed this information, then so should Wikipedia."

!? when did wikipedia become a project to promote & advance the interests of the United States of America, or the U.S. gov't, by censorship!?

if that's what this project is about, then i'm in the wrong place; could somebody please link me to the WIKIPEDIA: INTERNATIONAL VERSION?

P

hypothetically speaking, if somebody does kidnap the POTUSA, & the news services suppress it (US or globally?), & wikipedia supresses it, i want to move to a different planet & possibly a different species.

DAMNED STRAIGHT I WOULD EXPECT IT TO BE REPORTED ON WIKIPEDIA! if it isn't, then wikipedia is a joke

Lx 121 (talk) 01:11, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

My suggestion has nothing to do with the interests of the United States. That was just an example, I could have just as easily picked the Prime Minister of France or Michael Jackson. Please don't read anything more into my suggestion than there is. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:16, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

'fair enough; my point was, the rationale is flawed, fundamentally; we are not in the business of suppressing information. our standard is (or should be) something like "truth, thoroughness, & reliable, verifiable references" (& we can fight over notability :P); butonce we get away from that, & start deciding what to include & what to censor, once we start allowing admins that power; we lose what wikipedia is supposed to be. & for the record, i don't really think it made a damned bit of difference in the rohde case; the terrorists knew who they had, he managed to escape. yes, if it had become a headline lead story, it would have generated more interest all around, but that always applies; should we not report a hijacking or hostage taking, until the victims are all free or all dead? censoring wikipedia, or even censoring large parts of the western press did not make a difference; that's more like spin to tell a good story (& justify the decision) than anything else; it's funny how the press is a lot more delicate in reporting incidents in which members of the press (friends & colleagues) are involved. you don't see the same kind of approach when nearly as much, when the kidnap victim is a non-member of the press; say an aide worker. that's human nature on the part of reporters & news people; as such, it is understandable, but it's still wrong; & it is very wrong for wikipedia to go along with it. the level of wrongness involved in jimmy whales & friends deciding to do this arbitrarily, & in secret, disregarding WP rules & procedure, disrespecting the entire wikipedia community; well that level of wrongness is just about black hole deep... there are fundamental problems here that need to be addressed; but a policy of "authorized secret censorship" is not the way to fix things. it won't make wikipedia "more respectable"; it will destroy what this project is supposed to be; drive away a good 1/2 of the wp community, & turn what's left of wikipedia into a joke. don't be too surprised if affects the next fundraising drive either; people don't give to support censorship; at least not the kind of people who contribute their $ to the wikimedia foundation. Lx 121 (talk) 01:40, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

• Agree with much of the above, but not the form (especially of what is below). Remembering WP:CENSOR and that WP is a tertiary source should just about sum the situation up. Ohconfucius (talk) 04:32, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

on the level of life or death

What if terrorists merely threaten to cut off someone's arm? How about something like "great physical harm such as life or death"?

OPPOSE or FORK

OPPOSE

this WP proposal is INSANE;

trying to retroactively ass-cover by rewriting wikipolicy like this is UNACCEPTABLE

if this goes thru:

IT IS TIME TO FORK WIKIPEDIA!

if this is where things are going, a fork will happen, sooner or later.

the Rohde case raises certain issues on balance of priorities,

but

1. personally, i'm inclined to think the role the media blackout played is being overstated.

the kidnappers knew exactly who they had:

the story was reported in a plurality of news sources; including services the kidnappers would have had both access to & interest in (such as afghan news).

i'm glad Rohde is not dead; i'm glad he escaped.

BUT

could anyone explain exactly what relationship there is between Rohde's successful escape & censoring wikipedia, in direct VIOLATION of basic WP?

FUNDAMENTAL QUESTION

IS WIKIPEDIA ABOUT TRUTH & FACTS (accurate facts, backed up with appropriate references, etc.)?

YES

or

NO

?

i'm not sure which bothers me more, that this was done at all, or that this was done by a "secret cabal" of jimmy whales & friends...

i'm too... not just angry, but blown away, by the ARROGANCE shown by the top-level wikip leadership in doing this; especially in treating the rest of the WIKIPEDIA COMMUNITY with such disrespect.

Wikipedia IS NOT James Whales' private garden, which he is free to play with as he likes; maybe once upon a time it was, when it started out, BUT IT AINT NOMORE!

Rohde was a judgement call, & WP's LEADERSHIP handled it BADLY

if there was a vote on leadership right now, i'd call for a clean sweep; to vote the whole senior level leadership of wikipedia out.

don't expect any donations from me, not anytime soon, & i think i might be "de-prioritizing" my wikipedia editing time

i'll post more, after i've had time to calm down & think, but really jimmy, this ain't good!

yes, i know that i am SHOUTING; sometimes, there are some things that are worth shouting about

i did not contribute all my time & efforts on wikipedia, to serve (or put up with) crap like this

anyone who wants to contact me, to discuss this issue further, feel free

Lx 121 (talk) 00:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

+1 the BDFL/admin cabal model must end, the actual governance structure of WP is incompatible with open publishing. the leadership must be voted, with as much polling as possible. Pnd (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 15:34, 7 July 2009 (UTC).

rename to "information suppression"

we should rename this policy; "information suppression" is more accurate; there are too many weasel words in the draft, but let's at least be honest in the title?

Lx 121 (talk) 00:30, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

WP:CENSORED

We have a rule on Wikipedia that Wikipedia is not censored, it's part of what Wikipedia is not.

If we adopt a policy like this one, WP is no longer being honest with its readers and editors. There may be reasons for suppressing information in an article.

But what about following through on What Wikipedia Is? An encyclopedia, that has a neutral point of view, that anyone may edit, which has a code of conduct, but no firm rules.

If suppressing the information violates any of those principals, then it shouldn't happen. That means suppressing the information should be based on a discussion, anyone can participate in (to support the principal anyone can edit). An editor should not be allowed to remove information and say that the reason for the removal is secret when asked.

I find it permissible that they remove the information and post a reason on the discussion page, but not that they remove the information and don't say why; removing someone else's edit, and not being willing to provide an explanation (even when asked) shows a lack of respect for the person who added it, and reverting the edition further without revealing a cause, shows it's not that anyone can edit.

From where i'm sitting, this proposal is an example of WP:CREEP in action, and has a real danger of doing more harm than good if it becomes policy or guideline.

I propose that the least harm would be done by revising Wikipedia is not censored for the protection of minors, to say that content may be censored, for the protection of the interests of a living person mentioned in the article. Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons is probably the most suitable policy to be updated.

Instead of only saying that unsourced or poorly sourced should be removed immediately, it could instead say that unsourced, poorly sourced, or injurious material.

With a very minor tweak, that policy would require removal of any information that could result in immediate injury or death to a living person, overridable by a consensus of the editors.

The reason for the content removal could then be listed as WP:BLP in the edit summary, and is not inflammatory as WP:News Suppression would be.

And a reminder: Wikipedia:If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Isn't this case fairly exceptional? --Mysidia (talk) 00:48, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

no personal offense intended @ the previous post, but:

1. "injurious material" = weasel words, @ their worst; that could be used to allow anything to be censored

2. the whole arguement is to create loopholes, so that senior level wiki-admins can hide what they are really doing!? & hide it with wikilawyering to boot!

"a very minor tweak", that destroys the whole concept of freedom of information, & freedom on wikipedia

not a good idea

Lx 121 (talk) 00:58, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The word "injurious" has a specific meaning. It refers to causing physical harm or injury, slander, libel, or invidious (discriminatory/prejudicial harm). Not just anything meets that standard. (2) A new policy does not excuse past actions, and a good policy does not seek to create loopholes. (3) Unbridled indiscriminatory spreading of info is not what Wikipedia is about, WP:BLP even in its current form, is a testament to that. Sometimes Wikipedia really is a more useful encyclopedia, with higher levels of respect, when it follows basic standards of decency that reputable publications follow, and certain information is suppressed. --Mysidia (talk) 01:10, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I find it disingenuous to claim that this is indiscriminate information when the crux of the matter was that indiscriminate information is meant to cover non-notable information creep when this case hinges on thatn everything about this case should have as per the policy itself at the time should have had the opposite actonsdone rather than what occurred. As well the argument this does not excuse past actions does not flow as that my be an argument put forth about the policy but as the exact policy is to make the wrong actions in the past right by making them supported by policy the same effect is there, hypocrisy if this policy were ever to be enacted which it will not be. –– Lid^(Talk) 01:20, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

"Unbridled indiscriminatory spreading of info is not what Wikipedia is about, WP:BLP even in its current form, is a testament to that. Sometimes Wikipedia really is a more useful encyclopedia, with higher levels of respect, when it follows basic standards of decency that reputable publications follow, and certain information is suppressed."!? the absurdity of this statement is self evident (the WP standard is truth & accuracy, backed up by reliable references; oj simpson almost certainly did kill his ex-wife & goldman, fact; he was also found not guilty in the criminal trial, fact; he also wrote a book about it, fact; you want we should suppress this?). "injurious": "It refers to causing physical harm or injury, slander, libel, or invidious (discriminatory/prejudicial harm)." not quite the O.E.D. definition, not even the wiktionary one; what about "emotional injury"? even without that, it's still plenty broad enough as a loophole; we could use it to suppress information about a trial, criminal evidence, information that might put U.S. soldiers "at risk", u name it! ^__^ & who gets to decide? & why should it only be U.S. interests that get protected? what about everybody else's "interests"? ...how far down this road do you want to go? Lx 121 (talk) 01:23, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I think that if we suppress news, we should admit it. Saying that Wikipedia isn't censored isn't accurate, if occasionally it is. Having a policy that actually says we are not censored is, as you say, simply lying to our readers. Ken Arromdee (talk) 15:58, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

In Favor

Wikipedia is most of all about doing the right thing. It is difficult to write rules about doing the right thing but we often know what the right thing to do is. We can be paranoid and say adopting such a rule will lead to the all sorts of bad things or we can accept that we are intelligent with a goal of doing the right thing and can balance out the bad. Saving a life with little or no cost to anyone else is definitely the right thing to do. Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 01:37, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

But we don't need a policy telling us to do that, we just do it. Cenarium (talk) 01:42, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Should it be at least casually mentioned somewhere? Daniel.Cardenas (talk) 03:52, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

no, wikipedia is about education & providing free information to everybody; also about allowing everybody to contribute (& have their work judged on its merits)

here's the big problem with "doing the right thing": what is "the right thing"? & "right" by whose definition? hitler thought he was "doing the right thing", most people (like to) believe that they are good & right & (at least try) to "do the right thing". the concept of "the right thing" is FAR too slippery to be allowed to justify actions like the secret censorship of wikipedia. Lx 121 (talk) 01:53, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Abu Graihb is not a helpful example and other observations

There was never a question about Wikipedia not covering Abu Graihb, or any number of other noteworthy news events, for whatever reason, because the news broke massively more or less all at once (as I recall) from basically all reliable news organizations. Therefore, as an example, it seems quite misguided.

Another observation is that it is unclear to me exactly what behaviors this policy is intended to permit that aren't already permitted now. It is a deeply murky question as to whether the ordinary parameters of BLP and RS and NPOV and all the rest would ever need, as a practical matter, to be silently (how silently?) broken, and unclear how a rule would help maintain silence even in cases where it might be necessary.

The only thing I can think of is that this could be a rule designed to allow admins (or me? or WP:OFFICE?) to break policy (quietly?) and then be excused after the fact. I don't see why we need such a rule, but perhaps a hypothetical case could be put forward to illustrate it?

In this particular case, the only thing that was needed for us to pull this off was a set of rights that we already have per policy and as human beings. I'm not required by Wikipedia policy or as a human being behaving ethically to reveal knowledge that I have if I don't choose to do so. Admins are explicitly allowed to make judgments about WP:RS, WP:BLP, and other people are allowed to challenge those things. In this case, no one really did. The anon, thankfully, didn't really know the right way to go about making a stink on an admin noticeboard. The kinds of trolls who monitor my every move to look for nefarious motives didn't know or notice.

If they had, then it might seem to some that a tougher decision might have to be made: should Jimbo (in consultation with the office, the arbcom, however you might imagine it) do something that does in fact violate Wikipedia policy? I don't think that's a valid question because I can't think of any circumstances where doing so would actually even be successful. I can imagine that a great many good users, baffled by some strange behavior, would start to raise a stink, and this would blow the whole operation anyway.

I'm not requesting any special powers, and I don't quite see that any are needed.

There is one think I would add, and that is that I could be supportive of a guideline that strongly suggests to experienced users that there may well be many kinds of cases where delicacy is required, and that causing a big fuss about something on-wiki before taking the time to make discreet inquiries by email, isn't generally going to be a good idea. If during any of this, any user I know and trust had emailed me, I would have explained the whole thing. If during any of this, any user who I don't know and trust had emailed me, I would have been more circumspect and simply said that I would prefer if they wait a few months and come back to the issue. It's going to be very good if people understand that I'm not going to do anything to violate policy, but that there can be many times when many people (not just me) might strongly prefer not to engage in an on-wiki dialogue. Someone's life might be at stake, an investigation might be at stake, or there might just be a delicate BLP issue where a little patience to sooth the subject will be better than continuing to engage in a huge fight on-wiki. And so on, I guess everyone understands that there are a million possible kinds of things that might happen.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:47, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

hi james; in general i'd say i like what you do, but every once in a while you piss me off severely, & this is one of those times. you should be apologizing to the wikipedia community for your actions, even if you feel that they were justified. you disrespected us, & the rules of wikipedia, & excuses abt "lack of references" are something in between glib & flat out lies. it bothers me even more that you are justifying these actions, & seeking use this as possible precendent for future censorship actions, also taken in secret. saying that comparisons with abu grahib "are not helpful" is not the same thing as saying they are invalid. you're a good man, & i am deeply grateful to you for creating this wonderful project, but at some point you need to let wikipedia grow up; WP:is NOT your personal playground, not when it is built on the contributions, in work & in money, of MILLIONS of people around the world. i'm sorry, but you owe us more respect than that! one of the keys to building respect for wikipedia is creating a set of operating rules that we all live by, & not just to the letter, but also the intent of the law; it's in banana republics where the rules get swept aside, with "justifications" (try not to take the whole SABDFL thing so seriously, ok? it's meant as humour, not a literal statement of fact :P) i'm going to go away now, & work on something else; i have a bunch of artists w cool pics waiting to be uploaded & processed on wmc; whenever i spend more time on talkpages, than in actual work, it's time to take a break go & do something else Lx 121 (talk) 02:09, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

The New York Times people were lucky that they managed to get hold of you. Let's say they contacted OTRS or a random administrator instead. Would that person feel confident to break several Wikipedia rules, with only very weak IAR support? What if that person is strongly against censorship in any form? A codified community stance would empower the former to do what is right and remind the later to put their personal opinions aside.

If someone had noticed what you were doing, wouldn't they be less likely to raise a stink if they knew what you did was both the right thing and supported by policy?

I think removing the text claiming the source is unreliable was the right thing to do, because it was most likely to work. Normally I think it's not ok to claim a source is unreliable, when it probably isn't, to remove something you know is true and relevant. This was a special case.--Apoc2400 (talk) 10:29, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

My beef is not the censorship issue - I'm happy that the censorship had happened in this case (as I'm ex press agency too a few years ago) - but that Wikipedia and its editors are presented as some kind of out-of-control amoral herd without rules. The NYT was lucky in that the IP editor trying to add the story was as much a newbie as the NYT editor trying to delete the story. I mean 4 news sources and no one other than some newbie on an IP in Florida actually noticed ? This is kind of fringe to bother changing existing WP policies of WP:BLP, WP:OTRS and WP:OFFICE. Oh and someone should mention WP:COI and WP:NPOV to the NYT reporters before they pre-emptively puff up all their other content here. The reporting of this to date is a storm in a teacup that has failed to highlight that WP has more transparent content control than the general press. Jimbo Wales doesn't need to make excuses in what he did because in the end he needn't have done anything. The system that is in place would have stopped the IP editor because no one else noticed to try and break the system. If they did then the admin editor that posted a revert with the WP:OTRS number (which they did later!) means that any experienced editor would back off as it usually means legal issues and any inexperienced editor would lose a edit-war within a few minutes and would be blocked. This is the reality of WP today and it works well. Ttiotsw (talk) 12:47, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

ok, i can understand the feelings a former journalist might have here; it affects you more personally. i don't really think that wiping the english wikip article made a damned bit of difference; the issue was to not have the kidnapping blow up into a long-running lead/headline story in the mainstream press, we're kidding ourselves if we think that altering/censoring/doctoring a biographical article about an nty reporter on here had anything to do with what was going on with the people in afghanistan. but, we can agree to disagree on that point. we also don't really need to get into whether the press reacts differently when the life at stake is a fellow journalist. (&, for the record, my understanding is that over the 7-odd months or so that this story was being suppressed, there was more than one editor trying to get the truth up on the D.S.R. page) my problem here is that, of the two people above me in this topic (after jimmy), #1.is in favour of censorship, wants to codify the practice, & is glad that jimmy & friends found a nice, handy excuse that they could get away with (sort of). #2. isn't as keen on censorship, but is glad it happened in this case (fair enough), & while accurately describing the rule structures on wikip (& that we do in fact have rules & procedures on wikip, & can be trusted to cross the street by our own selves!), the comment also points out how kafkhaesquely complex those rules can be, & how admins can basically use WP:otrs shut down the debate on a topic anyway, anytime; no muss, no fuss, no bother. what ever happened to the whole freedom & openess thing!? i'm going to go & edit stuff now, until i feel better; back later, very much so Lx 121 (talk) 14:59, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

What disturbs me was not the removal of the information, but the way it was done: it was done by making false claims about Wikipedia:Reliable_sources. Abusing a policy by people with power is bad. Abusing this policy--a policy that when violated by normal Wikipedia editors is one of the most common sources of sanctions--is even worse. It violates the trust we have that editors will apply policies fairly.

You could have done a WP:OFFICE action. I don't know much about OTRS tickets, but some editors have indicated you could have done one of those. You could have said that the information was removed for privacy reasons and pointed to BLP. You could have rewritten IAR to allow for it and then invoked IAR. As it is, how can I ever trust an admin's word when he says that something isn't a reliable source?

There's also the issue I pointed out above: letting newspapers decide that the danger is big enough and the public interest is small enough--when the person being endangered is a newspaper reporter--is a conflict of interest. I doubt that we would have been so accommodating if it had been someone else. Ken Arromdee (talk) 15:43, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I didn't follow the case, but am extremely disturbed by the above revelations. It seems that there has been a massive deception surrounding this incident which I find totally unacceptable. It would only be a very mild exaggeration if I said I don't care if someone's life was at sake, because what took place appears to have been a case of misdirected ethics which caused the project's founding principles to be compromised. With those actions, we are sliding down the slippery slope of political censorship, and the corruption which goes with it. (Disclosure: I live on the edge of the most manipulative, paranoid censoring authoritarian state on the planet, so please take my comments in light of that) Ohconfucius (talk) 04:54, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

• I'd like to clarify my statement above, to say that I believe that censorship ostensibly to save some lives makes us hostages to blackmail. Whilst apparently noble and humanitarian, such action to suppress information could put move lives in jeopardy than the ones actually saved. We, Wikipedia editors (collectively and independently) propagate the free flow of information, and are poor judges of what would constitute the greater good of the greater number - that's why we have WP:NPOV and WP:OR. What's more, even if news was suppressed, there is no guarantee that lives would be saved as a consequence. Ohconfucius (talk) 07:41, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

This proposal lacks support for good reasons.

This proposal lacks support for good reasons. Everything good this proposal wishes to accomplish is already policy. BLP clearly states that harm is a factor to take into consideration. Our reliable source requirement means that if only one or two sources say something and other sources that could be expected to also report it do not report it, then those one or two sources can be considered suspect with regard to that specific claim. No source is always right. Whether a source is reliable or not is always dependent on the claim it is trying to make. Every source has biases and interests and areas of expertise. It is a shame that some people only think of sources as always reliable or never reliable. The world does not work like that. WAS 4.250 (talk) 05:12, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

In the NYT journalist case the sources and story was reliable and actually 4 quite major news agencies, PAN, Al Jazeera, Xinhua and Adnkronos, seem to have reported the incident. The *only* reason it didn't stick on Wikipedia was due to a rookie editor on Wikipedia trying to post a tertiary source from a typepad blog instead of using the secondary sources of the agencies. There is no question of the actually reliability of the secondary sources only the tertiary source selection. One admin at least got it right when they used the Wikipedia:OTRS in their edit. Reading the proposal in full I disagree with what it says. It is advocating that the crowd of Wikipedia editors ignore facts they find in reliable sources because of criteria in which we have no formal education or oversight and in which it goes against the whole principle of crowd-sourcing,

• How do you evaluate if "spreading it is likely to have very severe direct negative consequences for one or more individuals, on the level of life or death" ? Wikipedia editors DO NOT manufacture the news but simply copy what others have already said. The "others" are the other reliable news sources. Let *them* evaluate the consequences.

• How do we evaluate when "it has not been widely published in reliable sources" ? Given that in the NYT journo case all the major news agencies in that region *did* report it then what is "widely published" actually mean ? With the NYT journalist that would mean "widely published in Western newspapers that the NYT editors are able to pressure to spike the story". Gee that makes sense. I think we have "reliable sources" covered.

• How do we evaluate when the "public interest is small" ?. Wikipedia is filled with stubs and articles of minor people in which "public interest is small". This is the whole point of crowd-sourcing. Its a way of collecting snippets that are uneconomic for others to publish.

• How do we know it is being "withheld only for a limited time." ?. What is limited ? 24 hours, a week or in the NYT case, months. More importantly how do you inform a "crowd" to withhold the news ! It just cannot be done. How does a crowd even know when "mainstream news sources are actively suppressing a news report" ?, why should a crowd even care ? Heck if we simply wanted to consume mainstream news then we wouldn't be here at all.

The proposal is incompatible to the crowd-sourced nature of Wikipedia. The only way you are going to effect any censorship/embargo is from high up via WP:OVER or WP:OTRS. This is egalitarian and anyone can get stuff suppressed, not just a NYT editor with a quickdial to some Wikipedia admin. Wikipedia management have been wrong in that they have not highlighted very clearly the correct processes that WP already has. Hopefully WP will produce a press release that details the *correct* process. Ttiotsw (talk) 09:35, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

rohde kidnapping

i'm curious; how does one define the rohde kidnapping as being "of minor public interest"?

the line: "Only a few, rather obscure news sources reported on the kidnapping." also sounds a little weaselly to me...

Lx 121 (talk) 09:53, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Al Jazeera English language service reported it. It is unquestionably a major news source. Geo Swan (talk) 18:23, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Do you have the URL for the Al Jazeera English language article? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:52, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Questions

I wrote the proposal, but there are some questions I think would help the discussion.

1. Do traditional news sources have written policies for this kind of situations?

1. Would this be better as a part of an existing policy? There is BLP, but I worry it is getting stuffed with too many things.

I think most agree with me that Wikipedia did the right thing in the Rohde case, but this page seems to have attracted those that disagree. Am I mistaken? --Apoc2400 (talk) 10:36, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether WP did the right thing: I'm still mulling that one over. An example springs to mind, I'm not sure whether it's apocryphal or not (and I can't find an on-line reference to it) where Martin Luther King admonished a photo journalist who stopped taking pictures at a rally in order to try and stop cops from beating a black man: King's objection to this intervention was that the photographer's role was to record the incident and disseminate it to the world, and in the bigger scheme of things, this was more important than rescuing a person.

To me, the issue of Jimbo's actions with regard to Rohde boils down to this question: "which is more important to preserve, the integrity of WP or the safety of a person?" I'm not trying to present that as a loaded question: it's a massive judgement call with a helluva lot to be weighed up, I wouldn't presume to judge Jimbo on it and I hope dearly that I'm never put in a situation like that. But that, to me, is the essence of the decision with which Jimbo was faced ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 11:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

i'm pretty sure that wikipedia did not do the right thing here; even if we went along with the media blackout, there were better ways of handling it. considering that the kidnapping was reported in the arab/muslim world's news services, i don't think it made much of a difference whether it turned up in DR's wikip-bio article or not. as per the questions Apoc2400 raised: 1.wikipedia is NOT a "traditional news source"; we are an encyclopedia. our "written policies" are rather different than those of say foxnews, or even the NTY 2.the second question presupposes that the idea of information suppression is a policy that should be accepted & adopted, i disagree with your basic premise on that. (more below; the indent thing is just too much of a bother)

there is another aspect to this case that bothers me, & hasn't really been addressed: jimbo & a few "trusted" users did this whole thing ARBITRARILY, without consulting the wikipedia community

this could & SHOULD have been discussed.

if we decided to go along with keeping the kidnap story quiet; ALL WE NEEDED TO DO WAS TO KEEP THE DAVID ROHDES PAGE TIDY!

the "taliban" (or whoever the kidnappers were) aren't following the petty internal squabbles on wikipedia.

the issue was: NOT TO STIR UP A WHOLE LOT OF ATTENTION IN THE MAINSTREAM PRESS

we did NOT need to have this ultra-secret censorship (but we can't tell you why, or even acknowledge that we're doing it) CRAP

jimmy & co didn't take this to the community for discussion, they just went gung-ho, & to hell with WP.

the bottom line:

they didn't respect the basic principles on which wikipedia is built

they didn't respect the TRUST on which wikipedia is built

they didn't trust the community to make the right decisions, OR even feel that the community had the right to make those decisions

jimmy & co didn't respect US

for all the grand talk & all the grand ideals of wikipedia/wikimedia, when it came right down to it, they threw it all out the window, & acted like this was a private playground, where they could just make up the rules, or remake them, as they pleased (WP:bar does NOT cover this!).

even if they felt it was justified, they knew they were in violation of very basic WP, were disregarding the community, & especially were mistreating those editors who were trying to tell the truth the whole time

this should NOT be considered a "success", on which to be congratulated.

whatever coverage it gets in the outside world, within the wikipedia community, jimmy whales, & the "trusted admins" who did this owe the community an apology for their actions,

the wikipedians who acted in good faith & tried to report on the rohdes story were treated SHAMEFULLY, & their good faith efforts were ABUSED

i didn't hear jimmy say one damn word about that; until he does, wikipedia is not ok here

Lx 121 (talk) 13:28, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Look, we all know your opinion, and I haven't even had time to read all you wrote yet. Could you hold back on long comments a little? --Apoc2400 (talk) 13:44, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Okay, people (and not just LX 121) feel angry, betrayed, indignant and disrespected. This whole issue is a major challenge to the relationship between individuals and Wikipedia. This page currently seems to be trying to serve two functions: as a place to express their pissed-off-ness about what has happened, and as a place to make suggestions for how a similar situation might be avoided in the future - and those two functions don't necessarily work well together on the same page. I'm not sure what the answer is: people have the right to express their feelings about the far-from-ideal way this whole thing was handled, and I certainly wouldn't want to deny anybody that. I'm sorry if that sounds patronising - that's not my intention, but it's difficult to express myself clearly through the cold medium of text on a page.

Anyway, I feel that we're unlikely to get far with deciding what to do to prevent any future repeats of Jimbo et al's actions until the dust has settled a bit, so maybe we all need to take a deep breath and remember that we don't need to get this whole issue sorted out immediately. ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 14:26, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

I doubt anything concrete will come out of this, as neither side wants it in writing. It is still good that we discuss the principles. I think it has broader implications on Wikipedia. --Apoc2400 (talk) 15:19, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

you're right, it does; the broader implications are something like: wikipedia is NOT censored? YES or NO & wikipedia is an opensource, free as in liberty, project? YES or NO Lx 121 (talk) 23:10, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

..."the tip of the iceberg"?

i was following up on a note i had left on user:Apoc2400 's talkpage (the user who drafted this wp:proposal), & found this rather odd entry there:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Apoc2400#WP:News_suppression

full text as of now (indented the header, to keep from making a separate section): ____

== WP:News suppression ==

Dear Apoc

Your initiative, I believe, brings to a head just the tip of the iceberg for what should be WP's next great expansion. I'd like to talk it through at this preliminary stage. Got clients for 10 hours, though. :-( Tony (talk) 04:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

____

end text

to say i find this conversation mildly disconcerting, would be a bit on an understatement....

Lx 121 (talk) 13:51, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

List Suppressed Articles

My instinct is to suggest, that if news suppression is going to be instituted. The way to do it openly would be to lock down the page entirely, no edits not even unrelated ones, and to have a list of articles that are currently being suppressed.

Of course this brings to light a problem, if pages that are suppressed are listed somewhere, that might inhibit the attempt to suppress the news. Even knowing the topic may be sufficient to identify what is being kept out.

So in my mind, this means that you can't possibly have a news suppression policy that open and is consistent with the standards in Wikipedia. Running the policy openly would defeat the goals of the suppressors and frustrate the suppressed. IMO, the only effective WP:News Suppression policy is: "Don't" 128.97.68.15 (talk) 17:29, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Having the policy openly doesn't mean you have to use it openly. --Apoc2400 (talk) 19:00, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Yes, that's called a police state; everbody knows you have secret police, but not what they are up to... Lx 121 (talk) 22:59, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Evaluating whether suppression requests are reasonable?

Related, back in January I spent a couple of hours on an article on Jeffrey H. Norwitz.

It was deleted a few weeks later. The subject of the article initiated an OTRS ticket, requesting the article's deletion. The administrator who performed the deletion for him acknowledged to me that Norwitz didn't think the article was inaccurate, or biased. He just didn't want to be covered.

The administrator told me that he thought when the administrator dealing with an OTRS ticket thought the biography was of someone of marginal notability, they were authorized to deal with the ticket through deletion, without consulting anyone else, or informing the good-faith article creator.

One problem I have with this deletion is that while I understand that WP:CSD authorizes administrators to delete articles they think match a CSD criteria "marginal notability" is not a CSD criteria. So this particular administrator's interpretation of his OTRS authority introduces a loophole -- when someone sends an OTRS ticket requesting deletion, the administrator gets to delete based on their personal opinion on notability -- not a CSD criteria.

The other problem I have is that I think good faith uploaders and creators should always get a good-faith heads-up when an article is deleted. When someone places a CSD tag policy recommends they leave that good-faith heads-up. But when an administrator deletes an article based on their sole judgment that it lapsed from CSD, many administrators never leave that good-faith heads-up. That good-faith heads-up is important, because it is wasteful and impolite to allow good faith contributors to innocently go and repeat mistakes that have already been noticed. And it is important because administrators are only human, and will occasionally make mistakes. If they don't tell the good faith creator, the administrator who is only human strips themselves of the feedback they need if they are applying CSD in error.

With regard to Norwitz -- his was not the most notable article I ever started. But if I didn't think he was remarkable enough I would not have spent a couple of hours starting it.

I think this incident is one of the reasons the private decision to suppress news of the David Rodhe kidnapping disturbed me. I have no problem accommodating reasonable requests. But I think we have to rely on our judgment in assessing whether the requests are truly reasonable.

In Norwitz's case, he is a Professor at a service academy, who has published papers on counter-terrorism, and given lectures to the general public. I question whether his request was a reasonable one. Geo Swan (talk) 18:58, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

this is a lovely example of another problem with the whole secret-censorship approach. it grows; if you allow admins this power, it will be used, those uses will not be subject to proper, open review, & cumulatively, abuses will occur. the "rights-to-secretly-censor-wikipedia", will also be gradually expanded, again, with no open review. that's simply how it works, when you start down this path. Lx 121 (talk) 23:03, 1 July 2009 (UTC)

Well that does seem like admins helping someone manage their public profile. Though sometimes people are initially not very notable (i.e. less notable than obscure Pokemon) but then increase in notability. With Norwitz it appears that he spoke at the UN this year and actually it was on the 5th Febuary at the U.N. High-Level Symposium on Water Security so *after* January and he was also awarded the Superior Civilian Service Medal (which we don't have much information on but it is 3rd in rank just behind the Meritorious Civilian Service Award. That means that he was really very much a public figure known to many to get a UN invite but certainly now he is notable though more due to events in 2009 and so after the date on your article. Admins in this case seemed to have helped *manage* his public profile. Go figure. Ttiotsw (talk) 06:26, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

How much support is there for this guideline?

How much support is there for this guideline? There doesn't seem to be much. If so, should it be deleted? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:29, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

technical point: it's a draft proposal for a guidline/policy; & no it doesn't seem to have much support (thankfully), but given the level of discussion & interest, i think deletion is the wrong move. the wp community really needs to have an open discussion of all the issues the rohdes thing raises, someplace where we can deal with it properly; this talk should probably be added there. Lx 121 (talk) 02:54, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I think the conversation is itself intriguing and educational. This page/talkpage should be kept regardless, but whether it is marked "guideline" or "rejected" is for the conversation to decide. The conversation would be made even more useful, if it had more links to the threads at the mailing list(s), and to the external web sources that are having the same/related discussion(s). -- Quiddity (talk) 04:30, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

re: "NUTSHELL"; truth in advertising

the nutshell grossly misrepresents the facts being cited.

the rohdes case (which is being cited as the main "pro" arguement in the proposal) was not "of minor public interest

nor was it only reported in "minor, unreliable sources"; outside of english-language news reporting the story recieved a fair amount of coverage, certainly more than enough to cite as reliable, multiple references: italian news, xinhua, al jazeera, & in credible afghan news services.

it is intellectually dishonest to allow these assertions to go unchallenged

i've had the tags i added, challenging it, removed without proper discussion; not good WP either, but WP seems to be out the window a lot these days...

if the rohdes case really is "of minor public interest"; then it's non-notable, & should be prod'ed for erasure/deletion again.

dones anybody here wanna try it?

P

Lx 121 (talk) 02:49, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Hold on...the nutshell is supposed to be a summary of the article. If you want these changes, you have to change the article first. Right now, the nutshell is correct but only in the sense that it summarizes the article. If the article itself is wrong, you have to change that first. Once the article has changed, then you can change the nutshell. In any case, there doesn't seem to be much support for this article. Maybe we should stop editing the article until we figure out if there's support. If there's little support for this, there's no point in editing the article. Let's take a brake for a while and see if anyone actually wants this. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:58, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Rejected

Would anyone mind if I tag this with {{Failed}}? There seems to be little actual support. Discussion can still continue here of course, but I expect it will get quiet soon as other issues come into the spotlight. --Apoc2400 (talk) 21:36, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Support

I support the proposed policy as written, despite its subjective nature, primarily because I believe Wikipedia can afford to take the long-term view and remain out-of-date or incomplete for a limited period. In fact, this happens all the time naturally, when people simply haven't yet gotten around to updating articles. I don't know enough about the facts of the motivating case to argue whether or not it would have complied, but issues like this have arisen more than once and it's useful if nothing else to have a guideline describing the basis of past practice.

As a side note, I don't think it's particularly important to hide the reason why the information is being suppressed. After all, the content itself remains in the edit history. The point is to limit exposure, not to hide the information entirely. That is, we're hiding it from people who would never have found out otherwise, not from people trying to discover the information. I'd argue that it's essential to be able to have open communication and debate about any such suppression decisions. Dcoetzee 00:27, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

"this happens all the time naturally, when people simply haven't yet gotten around to updating articles" I think it's quite one thing for articles which are incomplete or out of date due to our haphazard and volunteer nature, but it's quite another to suggest it's OK to deliberately exclude information, for reasons which are unrelated to the encyclopaedic worth of the information in the relevant article, which is already in the public domain. Past practice must not be confused with best practice, as what was done in the Rohde case is arguably is not that. Ohconfucius (talk) 08:32, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I support it too. Common sense really. We can't have a strong BLP policy and be publishing information in those BLPs that we know might directly kill the subjects. :) SlimVirgin ^{talk|contribs} 00:55, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

I also support this, but not after some more discussion on how it should be written. The title should be something along the lines of emergency censorship rather than "news suppression". I'd also like: "This policy can only be invoked in cases where there is a clear and present danger to the physical well-being of a human being and there is no concern of suppression being used to harm the public interest.". I also think that there should be a mandatory review for any editor, administrator, or steward invoking this policy, with the burden on proof on the person using this policy to prove that they have not harmed the public interest. The punishments if community consensus is against what was done should be very severe. Irbisgreif (talk) 23:19, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

More censorship

Readers of this page may be interested in Stephen Farrell (journalist), which seems to be another instance. For further details, see the wikien-l thread or Talk:Stephen Farrell (journalist). --Gwern (contribs) 13:54 14 September 2009 (GMT)