Talk:List of Wikipedia controversies

Misogyny at Wikipedia and WMF

• Murphy, Dan (2013). "In UK, rising chorus of outrage over online misogyny: Recent events in Britain draw more attention to endemic hostility towards women online". The Christian Science Monitor. Retrieved 1 August 2013. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help); Invalid |ref=harv (help); Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

The Exclusion of a Participant by WikiConference USA 2014

My apologies, I'm not sure what is appropriate for this page, since it's my first edit here. It seems like the incident involving the exclusion of Greg Kohs at WikiConference USA 2014 is noteworthy enough to include on this list, but it has been reverted. Could someone please tell me what criteria this incident doesn't meet for inclusion in this list? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wllm (talk • contribs) 03:27, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

• Wil: I'm going to drop you an email shortly. But to answer your direct query here: on a list of this nature, we generally don't include entries unless they have been referenced by multiple reliable sources. Your addition wasn't referenced by multiple reliable sources; I'd go as far as to state that it wasn't referenced by one reliable source, given that the PR piece you referenced is from an outlet that (a) isn't incredibly well-respected, even among the PR trade press, (b) the entry at O'Dwyers had to have misspellings including "Widipedia" and "Wikipendia" corrected multiple times before they fixed them as well as multiple other factual errors, (c) the article was editorial in nature, coming from a source fairly well known to not like us. Even though the list criteria aren't well-defined here, from the lede, "This list is a collection of the more notable instances" - preventing a banned WP critic who had posed an active disruption before the event from attending from attending clearly doesn't meet that standard, especially when it's only covered in O'Dwyer. Moreover, since the post essentially alleges wrongdoing using only the shakiest of sources on the part of conference organizers - even though they aren't explicitly named - I'd also suggest that including this content in the article represents a WP:BLP issue until it receives more substantial (and more accurate, one would hope) coverage from somewhere other than O'Dwyer. Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:40, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
• I think what happened is noteworthy, but it does have to wait for the news media out there to catch up to it. Publications like the Daily Dot and others usually have their ear closer to the ground on things to do with the Wikipedia and such, so we'll keep an eye out. Tarc (talk) 12:17, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
• The O'Dwyer article was inane, and I agree that more sources are required. Coretheapple (talk) 15:42, 6 June 2014 (UTC)
• New York (magazine) just mentioned it here, so we now have our RS. I will readd it. Cla68 (talk) 21:13, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

If we mentioned everything in this article that received a tangential one sentence mention in a RS about Wikipedia that was vaguely controversial, this would be an awfully long article. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:22, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm sleepy and retract my last edit summary (been a while since I've looked at the guideline,) but the point still stands. Come back when it's received more than a sentence in an RS. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:30, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Stop ordering us around. Wikipedia is supposed to be a collaborative effort. I found a RS so, it should not be removed unless a consensus is established here for its removal. WP doesn't belong to you. It belongs to all of us. Cla68 (talk) 21:57, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

And it smacks of self-censorship and cover up - Alison ^❤ 21:59, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Alison: you know that suggesting that removing an item in a list potentially this long that is currently only supported by one sentence in a RS represents censorship is hyperbole, which isn't something terribly useful here. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:03, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

A modified version of criteria #1 as found here is pretty clearly a roughly appropriate criteria for inclusion here and a single sentence found in a RS clearly doesn't meet that. Can you imagine how long this list would be if we included every WP related "controversy" every that received a SINGLE sentence in any RS? Please point me to any guideline or policy that suggests that absolute consensus needs to be established before content sourced to a single sentence in a RS is removed... especially when, currently, the balance of this talk page favors removal. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:01, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

The NYmag article (which only gives a couple of lines to the Kohs incident) gets its info about Kohs from O'Dwyer's. So citing that really isn't any different than citing O'Dwyer's piece a second time. Ian.thomson (talk) 22:30, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

For clarity: I was talking about the NYM piece only, I don't consider the O'Dwyer's piece an RS. Since NYM does meet the relevant RS guidelines, it's okay to use NYM as a source, even if they got it from O'Dwyer's - we grant them the assumption of good faith that they've factchecked, etc. But, since it's still a single bloody sentence in one RS, there's no way it's an incident worth including in this list, unless significant further coverage develops. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:46, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

The NYmag piece only gives it one sentence as an alleged event, so there's still a WP:DUE issue. Ian.thomson (talk) 22:49, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Ridiculous. That policy is about opposing points of view being represented in proportion to their representation in RS. It is completely beside the point here.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:55, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

... Stating that Ktr's edit summary violated BLP is more or less just looking for a reason to use BLP to smack him. I agree his argument doesn't speak directly to whether or not Kohs should be included, but it's hardly an egregious BLP violation. If we included every single Wikipedia-related thing on this list that received one sentence of coverage in one reliable source, the list would look positively ridiculous. Re: everything else, see my post below. Kevin Gorman (talk)

I am all for equal representation and whatnot here, but what concerns me is that we're reporting on something that goes with the event's Friendly space policy. There was a legitimate reason to remove Greg from the conference (people were not going to go if he was there), and there is nothing controversial about it if you go along those lines. He was not removed for his paid editing work, and would have been accepted if he wasn't banned for the above reason. Each organization has a right to implement a Friendly space policy and enforce it as they see fit. If you are banned for a legitimate concern, then that is not so much a scandal as the active attempt at including people who would not feel comfortable with that person around. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 22:25, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Everybody stop edit-warring. Gorman, you're an administrator, so you're supposed to know better. Furthermore, the incident is mentioned in a New York Magazine blog, so it's reliably sourced and is thus inclusable. The balance of the talk page doesn't "favor removal." Furthermore, your edit summaries seem to indicate that you think that items on a list need to be notable. They specifically do not need to be notable. They just need to be sourceable, to fall within the scope of the list, and to meet the selection criteria. This incident does all three. the NYMag mention is a source, the scope of the list includes this: " hostile interactions between Wikipedia editors and public figures," and we're discussing now whether it meets the selection criteria, which are essentially up to the editors on the page, not the MOS. Finally, this edit summary by Ktr101 is barely believable: "this is not a controversy. greg legitimately made people feel uncomfortable and there was a reason he was banned." First of all, it's a BLP violation. Second of all, whether or not "there was a reason he was banned" is irrelevant. The only thing that determines whether it is a controversy is that reliable sources identify it as controversial. The actor's rationale for the action is beyond immaterial. The NYMag source uses this incident as a primary concrete example of the claim that "Over the years there have been power struggles, schisms, defections, accusations of abuse, censorship, libel, and just plain-old bickering." See, the source identifies it as controversial? That's how we decide what goes in articles, not whether some people think they have a rational reason for the controversial things they do. Ktr101, you are violating BLP right and left. You should stop it. Not only that, but your arguments are completely beside the point, as explained above.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:30, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm aware there was an edit conflict, but just in case you don't see it, my comment was that the NYmag piece is merely repeating O'Dwyer's regarding Kohs. And if we are going to cite the NYmag, we should follow their wording, "allegedly," instead of taking the O'Dwyer's claims at face value. Ian.thomson (talk) 6:35 pm, Today (UTC−4)

Ian is correct that if we were to include this based on the NYM piece, we should include a disclaiming word such as NYM used one. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:47, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@Ian.thomson: The fact that the NYMag piece cites the PR piece is not the same as citing the PR piece. NYMag is a reliable source, so when it choses to cite an unreliable source we may rely on their judgment that the incident is controversial. That is the only question at stake here: Do reliable sources see it as controversial? Your last edit summary indicates that you too think that list entries need to be independently notable. They do not. You should revert yourself for shame as there is an ongoing discussion and you're removing sourced material.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:39, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

• I love the number of people who are trying to get Kohs included as a controversy on an article with a scope this large who are not bothering to make any policy-based comment on this talk page (or frequently, any comment at all.) Here's my argument: this is a list with a major scope that could include thousands of items, which would make it nearly useless - thus, we need to limit the scope of items included in this list. I would suggest that a modified version of the first criteria included here would be a good starting point - not necessarily requiring enough RS coverage to establish independent notability, but at a bare minimum requiring more than one RS - or at least substantial coverage in one good RS (and one line is not substantial.) And, on top of that, anything on this list should almost certainly be described as a controversy - otherwise, we're injecting our own opinion. Also.. that whole WP:RECENTISM thing.. yeah. I'd encourage anyone in favor of including Kohs as it currently stands to respond to this post with something other than "AHHH! CENSORSHIP!" Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:36, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@Ian.thomson: The fact that the NYMag piece cites the PR piece is not the same as citing the PR piece. NYMag is a reliable source, so when it choses to cite an unreliable source we may rely on their judgment that the incident is controversial. That is the only question at stake here: Do reliable sources see it as controversial? Your last edit summary indicates that you too think that list entries need to be independently notable. They do not. You should revert yourself for shame as there is an ongoing discussion and you're removing sourced material.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 6:39 pm, Today (UTC−4)

Wow, "for shame," really? Such judgmental language. And what about my other comment? That if we are going to leave it in there per just the NYmag piece, we should, as even NYmag does, treat it as a one sentence alleged incident? Unless we're also going to include a bit the effect that Sumana Harihareswara of the Wikimedia foundation noted that "For many people in the Wikipedia movement, free speech is, as John Scalzi put it, the ability to be a dick in every possible circumstance." Ian.thomson (talk) 22:48, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

I have no objection to the qualifier, by all means put it in as it's in the source. You still haven't explained why you think it's OK to remove sourced material that a number of editors think meets the inclusion criteria. And as for your piping of WP:CIVIL to "judgmental language," why don't you just knock it off and say what you mean, whatever that is? If you won't revert yourself for unqualified shame, consider reverting yourself because you're perpetuating an edit-war when there's ongoing discussion, something which many competent editors of Wikipedia would be ashamed of doing.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:53, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Ok, let me put it this way: treating an editor you disagree with about policy like a misbehaving child by telling them to revert themselves instead of being a grown up and doing it yourself) makes it look like you have some kind of m:Dick-ish superiority complex (which would be an indication you need to leave this alone for cooler heads). Also, it's WP:BRD, not "WP:Bold-Revert-Revert-Discuss." In other words, material is added, reverted (removed), discussed, and then added back in after the discussion. Ian.thomson (talk) 23:15, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Including sourced material that's on-topic is not a "bold" edit, so your invocation of the essay BRD is off-point. If anything, removing sourced on-topic material is being bold. That's why you ought to revert yourself, because your reversion of the edit supported edit-warriors who were ignoring the very essay you now invoke to support your removal of sourced material. Plus, your ridiculous piped easter eggs are uninterpretable. Why don't you say what you mean?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:35, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Adding content isn't a bold edit? What? Where is BRD does begin to make that sort of qualification? That sheer misinterpretation of both the letter and the spirit of BRD is nothing but Wikipedia:Wikilawyering, further evidence of you don't have the right attitude for this. Ian.thomson (talk) 00:45, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Ah hahahahaha.....00:53, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

How is that not m:Dick-ish? Ian.thomson (talk) 00:55, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I never said it wasn't. Do you have an argument to make beyond calling me names? I already agreed with your only substantive point, which is that the material should use the same qualifier as the source it comes from. Have you bothered to reply to a single argument I've made? By the way, did you notice this sentence from the metapedian non-policy you keep waving at me like a stick? The one that says "Telling someone "Don't be a dick" is generally a dick-move — especially if true. It upsets the other person and reduces the chance that they'll listen to what you say."?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 01:03, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

There have been plenty of points made, which you hypocritically either ignore, insult, or wikilawyer around. And all my posts have focused on behavior and attitude, per "Focus on behaviour, not on individuals. Say what you want and why you want it. Say why you think the other person's behaviour is counter-productive." I have assumed that you were acting in good faith, but with a inclustionist bent, while you refuse to acknowledge the possibility that those with the slightlest exclusionist tendencies could be anything but idiots who shouldn't be anywhere near the site. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:19, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Exactly. Your points focus on "behavior and attitude." Why don't you try focusing on content? Now, I conceded your point about the qualifier in the source. Why don't you try explaining why you reverted the sourced material? Do you even have a reason? Why don't you address my counterpoint to your puerile argument that citing a reliable source that cites an unreliable source is the same as citing the unreliable source?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 01:35, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I have made other statements, as have other editors, you've chosen to ignore or dismiss them. Don't twist my words. Your behavior does not contribute to a cooperative discussion, it is purely a distraction meant to establish a chilling effect on anything you disagree with. You want to play that way? Fine, see you at ANI. Ian.thomson (talk) 01:39, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Hi, Kevin, I have something other than "AHHH! CENSORSHIP!" I made the original edit, tho I haven't participated in the ensuing edit war. It sounds like we aren't going to come to a consensus on this matter without outside arbitration. Someone suggested that this matter would be a candidate for the WP:DR process. I'd like to call for that process to begin at this point, if that's something I can do. This would be my first experience going through this particular process, so I'd really appreciate any help or suggestions anyone has on bringing this to a just and reasonable conclusion as quickly as possible. I really don't like seeing interactions like these; every time a Wikipedian reverts an edit in an edit war, an angel dies. ;) Thanks! (Sorry, I moved this from the un-nested discussion and made some small edits for relevance in this thread.) ,Wil (talk) 02:12, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Wil, you're being too hasty. We don't need outside arbitration yet. It's killing flies with atom bombs. DR is bullshit and won't help anything. The problem here is that once a bunch of people got their version protected they've decided to withdraw from the conversation. Of course we can't make them talk, but we can build consensus. I propose that we start a new section and have an informal RfC. The next step after that would be a formal RfC, although that's a fairly last resort.— alf laylah wa laylah(talk) 04:06, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Damn. I was hoping this would be a good candidate for arbitration. I would like to see what that process is like. In any case, all in due time. ;) I haven't seen the RfC process, either; so I'm all for it. If that's the way to go, then let's do it to it. ,Wil (talk) 05:55, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Arbitration is like inviting the national guard in to occupy your city, impose martial law, and thereby quell disturbance. You go there for e.g. the LA riots in 1992 or Little Rock in 1956. Furthermore, despite the shameful displays of raw, unchecked administrative power made by some of the participants in this discussion, there really have been no serious conduct disputes. Arbcom deals with conduct only, not content.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 13:19, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict)@Kevin Gorman: You have no policy based reason for removal, *and* you're edit-warring, and you're ignoring substantive arguments. The NYMag source gives it as a prominent example of Wikipedia's "power struggles, schisms, defections, accusations of abuse, censorship, libel, and just plain-old bickering." How is that not saying it's controversial? Or are you, I hate to imagine, suggesting that sources must actually use the word "controversy" before an item can be included on this list?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:44, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, unless you're making a completely arbitrary difference between guideline and policy (which seems odd in this case,) I certainly do have justifiable reasons for removing the content - see my last post. This would be a ridiculously long list if we included every possible controversy that had received one sentence of coverage in a reliable source. See WP:LISTN//WP:LSC, as I've previously linked (not to mention the WP:RECENTISM issues involved in including a one sentence one week old piece...) Even from the inclusion criteria included at the beginning of this list - "This list is a collection of the more notable instances" - the material doesn't qualify for inclusion on the list, until/unless more significant coverage emerges. There are plenty of times when it's perfectly okay to remove reliably sourced information from an article as you should be well aware, and this is one of them. Kevin Gorman (talk) 22:59, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

LISTN is a red herring. It's a notability guideline and has nothing to do with what's included on a list. There is nothing in that guideline that has to do with whether or not an item should be included on a list. LSC is more on point. As it says, one question to be asked is "Is this person or thing a canonical example of some facet of X?" Now, the NYMag article singled out this incident as a concrete example of the bitter controversies Wikipedia generates. Thus, according to a reliable source, the answer to that question is "yes." Furthermore, obviously there are times when it's OK to remove sourced material from a list. This may or may not be one of them, and that's what we're discussing. However, there are never times when it's OK to edit-war over it, which you were doing. That's not OK, and as an administrator, you ought to know better. Now, as to your argument that this list would be ridiculously long if we included items like the one under discussion. That's a valid argument, but is it sound? I don't believe you. Give me a few examples of things that would be included on this list but are not currently included. I don't think there are enough to make the list ridiculously long. In fact, I think there are zero to few of them. Please, find three such items and I will concede the truth of your premise and therefore the soundness of your argument.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:35, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

The banning was a blatant act of gutless cowardice, no one but the most dyed-in-the-wool Wiki-Slurper can see that. But there are still standards to meet here for sourcing; an NY Mag entry that doesn't mention the subject by name, and even that only references the problematic O'Dwyer ref. Give it more time to see if other outlets pick it up. Tarc (talk) 01:28, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

That's a reasonable point of view, but reasonable people can disagree. The source doesn't mention Kohs by name, but it's hyperlinked in such a way that we can assume that not mentioning his name was a stylistic choice rather than a comment on his relevance. The fact that it only references the PR thing is not a problem. That's what reliable sources do; they take information from unreliable sources and, like a Wikipedian king Midas, make it golden with their touch. Let's put it in shan't we, Tarc?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 01:39, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

alf laylah wa laylah Sorry for the late reply in this, but the major issue that I have with this article is that it completely misrepresented what Alex and I said to her. Yes we talked candidly about the movement, but I never said that some editors have pizza stains on their shirts and rambled on for a few minutes after I messed up my conversation with a friend. She wrote that to reinforce her own preconceptions about us, as evidenced by her mentioning of braces (which I had for a surgery I received a year ago, and is totally irrelevant to me being twenty-three) and her stating that Alex had John Lennon glasses (he doesn't, just check any photo of him out there). To tie this back in to what Kevin has been saying above about Greg, she was on the mailing list when Greg commented on his banning and got the same e-mail that we did. At the same time, she is trying to make our movement look more scandalous than it is in that we supposedly are banning people on flimsy grounds. Granted, I am not going to edit war here, but I wanted to let people know that that article is not an accurate representation of what was said, as there was an incredible amount of editing that was put on those quotes. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 02:34, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

If Philip Roth doesn't get to contradict reliable sources based just on his say-so, I don't see why you should get to do so either. We go by what reliable sources say, and your recollections and your narrative are not reliable sources, now, are they? Get NYMag to issue a correction and your version can go in. Your speculations on the motivation of the author of the article aren't relevant either. By the way, "braces" in that context almost certainly means "suspenders." You didn't happen to be wearing suspenders, did you?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:51, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Regarding this - There is no American on either side of the Mississippi that would think that "braces" meant "suspenders". Since this was an American event(Wikiconference USA) and the source is an American source(NY Mag), written by an American, I highly doubt "braces in that context almost certainly means suspenders". In fact, that's far fetched. Also, looking at the photos from the event, braces may have meant leg braces. Which is most certainly a misleading innuendo the way it was worded. If that's the case. Dave Dial (talk) 03:56, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, do you have something to add to the discussion regarding the content, or are you just here to show off your remarkable lack of knowledge of the American language?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:15, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I think I did just add something. The source seems misleading, and it barely mentions the "banned" editor. It definitely doesn't seem worth a mention. Oh, and I think you mean your astonishing lack of knowledge of the American language. Suspenders -- Suspenders (American English, Canadian English) or braces (other English usage, chiefly British) are fabric or leather straps worn over the shoulders to hold up trousers. For anyone to make a declarative of "almost certainly means" with the explanation/excuse you gave, has no idea what they are declaring. Dave Dial (talk) 04:29, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

So what you have to add is OR and the use of Wikipedia as a reliable source? Thanks, but no thanks. Let's stick to WP:RS, if you don't mind. That means that NYMag is reliable and your interpretations or personal experiences are not. Also, let's look up the word "chiefly" and see if it means "always." Jesus Christ, can't anyone here discuss the actual content of the article with reference to policy? Do we have to search through 8 zillion photos on commons to see who has pizza stains on their shirts in order to decide if an article is a reliable source? That's really not how it's usually done.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 05:09, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

No, the piece is written like a gossip blog and only mentions "a banned editor" in passing. There is no way it should be inserted in this article with the OR in the edit that was removed. Thanks. Dave Dial (talk) 05:17, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

At last you will comment on content. You say the piece is "written like a gossip blog." I will charitably interpret that as an attempt to argue against the use of the source on the basis of WP:RS. Unfortunately, NYMag is not a "gossip blog" and there's nothing in WP:RS about the tone of sources. It's straightforward reporting from a reliable source. It's not an opinion piece, and your feelings about the prose style are irrelevant. So that's a fail. Now you say it "only mentions 'a banned editor' in passing." I will charitably interpret this as an attempt to argue against the inclusion of the material because it doesn't meet the inclusion criteria of the list. But there are no explicit inclusion criteria for this article, and this item falls well within normal inclusion criteria for lists, so your argument, while it may not fail, certainly needs some elaboration to convince. Furthermore, you seem to think it matters that the NYMag piece calls Kohs "a banned editor" rather than stating his name. This is a red herring. His name is in the hyperlink. It's a stylistic trope on the part of the author, obviously, rather than a comment on the importance of the episode. Next you say there was WP:OR removed. What was that? What was the WP:OR in the edit that was removed? Just a second ago you were arguing about the meaning of the word "braces" in the article based on your examination of a bunch of photographs, showing that you're perfectly willing to do OR if it supports your position. Now that you've finally condescended to discuss content, I hope you will take the time to make more cogent arguments in favor of your position. Please keep in mind that the material that was removed was perfectly well supported by a reliable source. No one doubts that the removed material was accurate. The only, *only*, sensible argument for removing it must be based on list inclusion criteria.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 10:15, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

A much simpler explanation for non-inclusion

While the above discussion is an interesting deconstruction of our policies, there is a much simpler explanation for why, at this point, the "June 2014" incident cannot be included:

1. The O'Dwyer piece is unreliable, as it is not a widely regarded outlet. It also contains a factual error that the "Paid Editing Moderated Discussion" session was the only one that "made it to the WP conference," when the preceding session on PR and paid editing was in fact the primary session about the issue.
2. The New York Magazine is factually incorrect. It says, "At this year’s conference, one former Wikipedian scheduled to give a talk critical of its processes was allegedly banned from attending." Greg Kohs was not "scheduled to give a talk" at the conference. The proposal had not been accepted. Therefore, the reporting is incorrect and an erroneous understanding of the situation is very likely to have caused the writer to put this incident forth as an example of the community problems, or as some contributors here feel -- a controversy. Reliable source or not, Wikipedia does have standards on factual accuracy. Given this line from NY Magazine contains both an error and a dependence on an unreliable source, it cannot be taken as a credible provable reference.

For now, there are no verifiable references that show this is a "controversy" of the same significance as the others shown in the article. -- Fuzheado | Talk 11:27, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

I love that the NYM source also specifies that we have 22k registered users :) Kevin Gorman (talk) 14:22, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Very clever, Fuzheado, but no one actually denies that the incident occurred, so the O'Dwyer piece alone is enough to establish the factuality of the statement. Nobody here thinks that Kohs was scheduled to give a talk, either. The fact that the NYMag piece cites the O'Dwyer piece adds credibility to the interest of the outside world in the incident. The fact that the NYMag has factual errors is not reason not to use it, since our purpose here is not to describe facts, which are known from the uncontested O'Dwyer piece, but to establish enough interest by RS in the incident to justify including it in the list. Your theories about why the author used it are, of course, fascinating, but they essentially constitute original research. Your statement that a source is less reliable because it cites unreliable sources is, as pointed out ad infinitum, nonsense. That's what historians and journalists do for a living. They use unreliable sources as material to manufacture reliable sources. Every secondary source cites unreliable sources.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:19, 7 June 2014 (UTC)

Sources have been provided and the arguments against inclusion appear to be weak. I think there's a valid basis for inclusion. Under ordinary circumstances, if a hated "enemy" was not the subject, I feel sure we would not be having this argument at all. Everyking (talk) 02:28, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

• To be clear @Everyking:: multiple reliable sources haven't been provided, only one has, and that source only discussed it in passing. Taken from the lede of this list "This list is a collection of the more notable instances." Do you think one offhanded sentence in a single RS represents one of the more notable instances of controversy involving Wikipedia? Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Inclusion criteria

I was curious about what the standards are for inclusion in the list, and one thing that is clear is that almost all of the current entries are directly related to Wikipedia content - mistakes, vandalism, misuse of content, plagiarism, COI editing of content, problems getting material deleted, etc. Of the material which isn't directly related to content or editing, one is a fork, some relates to WP policy through sock puppets and similar, and the rest are directly related to the WMF. This makes sense, as the WMF is directly responsible for the management of Wikipedia.

My difficulty based on that with the suggested inclusion of the conference issue is that it is neither directly related to WP editing, policy or content, nor to the WMF. The conference wasn't run by the WMF, so much as two regional Chapters, and any actions taken at that conference have nothing to do with WP as such. So I can't see how it would be regarded as a Wikipedia controversy based on current content - it might (although "controversy" seems like a strong word here) be seen as a WikiConference USA controversy, though. Is it reasonable to extend the scope to include independently run events related to Wikipedia, or should we keep the focus firmly on Wikipedia and the WMF? - Bilby (talk) 04:20, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Excellent point, except WMF is listed prominently as a main sponsor of the event and not only that but WMF servers host external links advertising the conference as, e.g., here: Wikipedia:WikiCon, so it's clearly strongly WMF associated. Furthermore, the Gibraltar stuff is about Wikimedia UK, a local chapter, and is featured prominently here. Thus there's ample precedent for including material related to regional chapters.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 05:01, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

They are a sponsor, but not an organiser. As a sponsor I don't see that they would have a direct say in regards to the organisation of the event, as the organisers were a separate body This simply doesn't look like a controversy about Wikipedia - at best it is a controversy about an event about Wikipedia. At some point we need to work out how far removed from Wikipedia-proper an issue has to be before it no longer qualifies here. At the moment, my reading is that it qualifies if it is directly related to content, editing, access or policies of Wikipedia, or actions by the WMF. Actions by affiliated bodies seem far enough removed to limit the controversy to be about them, unless they otherwise meets the criteria. - Bilby (talk) 06:05, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

First, what about Gibraltarpedia, then? We've been including material about the chapters since the beginning of this article. Second, it's not plausible to assert that if the WMF sponsors controversial events then the ensuing scandals are not WMF controversies. Organizations are routinely held to account for the organizations they sponsor. I'll think of specific examples if you'd like, but various campus stock divestment protests are roughly comparable. A university, supposed to stand for freedom, holds stock in e.g. South African companies during apartheid. This is universally seen as a controversy regarding the university.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 13:15, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Gibraltarpedia is a controversy for Wikipedia, as well as for Wikimedia UK, because it directly involved editing Wikipedia. A university which sponsors a questionable organisation is controversial because it sponsors the questionable organisation. Sorry, but your comparisons don't work, as neither holds here. Fundamentally, this isn't a controversy about Wikipedia - it is, at best, a controversy about a conference looking at Wikipedia. But even that is doubtful, as to show that something is a controversy that warrants being included in this article, surely our standards are higher than a single passing mention in one article, that doesn't even get the details correct? I'd expect that we'd at least need decent coverage to show that it is controversial, none of which appears to be forthcoming. Or is there more than that single mention to show that this is something other than naval gazing? - Bilby (talk) 13:28, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm sorry, maybe I wasn't clear. A university holds stock in companies that operate in repressive countries. The companies don't do anything repressive, but they do help the economy of the repressive country. Students at the university routinely see the investments as controversies regarding their universities even thought the university is not actively, but only passively and at a remove, giving economic support to repression. Also, you're equivocating on the WMF and Wikipedia (probably unintentionally) in your last comment. This is essentially a WMF controversy. WMF controversies have been covered on this list from the very beginning, and if you poke through the archived talk pages you'll see that this was discussed at length. You're free to reopen the discussion, of course, but please don't act like it's somehow obvious that this incident can be excluded on a technicality. I think your arguments about sourcing are wrong but cogent. Your argument about this incident being out of the scope of the list is wrong and not cogent. We're not just looking at aircraft carriers here, you know, this is serious business!— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 13:48, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

No, I think you are missing where I'm coming from. If the WMF sponsors an event where something bad happens, we might say that there is controversy over their choice to sponsor that event, especially if they had reason to expect that bad things would happen. However, it isn't that bad thing that is controversial for them, it is their choice to sponsor the organisation knowing that bad things might happen. There is nothing controversial about the WMF sponsoring a conference where the organisers chose to preclude a person from attending. There would be controversy for the WMF if the WMF, knowing that the conference was acting badly, continue to sponsor them, but that's not the issue here.

But you haven't addressed the second point. Why are you saying this is a controversy significant enough to mention here? What secondary sources are covering this event, making it clear that it is important and significant? As far as I am aware, the only coverage of this event outside of ourselves and Wikipediocracy is a passing mention in one publication, which isn't enough to raise this to the ranks of "controversy". Am I missing coverage? Because if this is a bigger issue, then it might be worth covering. Otherwise, we're too close, seeing a big issue in something that is of no significance to anyone other than ourselves. If this was any other article, that single mention would never be enough to warrant listing it as a controversy. What makes this article and this issue different? - Bilby (talk) 14:08, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

The WMF is going to stop sponsoring their NYC chapter over this? If not then they're continuing to sponsor the organization. I've addressed your second point at length all over the talk page. It's your best argument, and others have joined you in it. I don't think it's productive to reargue it here, because it just fragments the discussion further. If the material is left off the list because consensus is that there's insufficient coverage to warrant its inclusion, I will feel that Wikipedian processes have worked successfully even though I would prefer that the material be included. Anyway, there's not much to say about it. You (and others) think the sourcing is insufficient. I (and others) think the sourcing is sufficient. There's not much to say about that that hasn't been said many times already, right?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:20, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

You are mistaken. I am not saying that the sourcing is insufficient. I am saying that the coverage is insufficient - there is a reliable source saying that someone was excluded from the event, in spite of the errors it includes. What hasn't been shown is that there is sufficient coverage to show that this rises to the level of being a significant controversy. In any typical article, I'd argue that it should be excluded until we can show that there is significant coverage to warrant including it, rather than questioning whether or not it happened. We don't rely on notability to determine the inclusion of content, but we do rely on the extent of the coverage to evaluate due weight. - Bilby (talk) 15:08, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm not mistaken, although perhaps I was unclear. That's what I understood and understand your argument to be. I'm sorry that I didn't make that clear. As I said, that's the only reasonable argument I've seen yet for excluding the material, although, as I said, I disagree with its conclusion.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:25, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Informal RfC on the Gregory Kohs material

I propose that we have an informal RfC on whether material on the exclusion of Gregory Kohs from the 2014 WikiConference USA be included in this article. I'm purposely not proposing language because I think it'd be best to reach consensus on whether the material should be included before we negotiate exactly what information should be included. I'd prefer at this point not to have a formal RfC because it's fairly unwieldy, but, of course, if anyone wants to start one, they're free to do so. Please give your opinion in the appropriate section with reasoning. For clarity (just look what happened to the section above) perhaps we can consider confining threaded discussion to the so-designated section.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:13, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Support including some material on exclusion of Kohs at this point

1. Support As I said above, the NYMag source uses the "alleged" exclusion of Kohs as a paradigmatic example of cliquish shenanigans at WMF-sponsored events. That says to me that it's "a canonical example of some facet of X" as WP:LSC tells us is a reasonable criterion for including an item on a list.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:13, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
2. Support. Wow, is this not a textbook instance of the Streisand effect? More: the fuss around including this snippet of information underlines how this issue hits a nerve. There's a lot going on here. I would accept Kevin Gorman's points except that, even without the evidence that this talk page provides, this controversy seems to me more significant than many that are already included in the list, not least the strangely opaque entry on Ryan Kaldari that almost immediately precedes it. FWIW, I have no great love for Kohs, but think that banning him was a mistake, that refusing to provide reasons for the ban only compounds that mistake, and that those fighting against its inclusion here are further making that compounded mistake worse. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 05:24, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
3. Support. The fact that Wikipedians have edit-warred to censor mention of this incident in Wikipedia, forcing full-protection of this page, is proof enough that this was a controversial incident. Also, per Alf's reasoning. Cla68 (talk) 06:16, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
4. Support. (edit for full disclosure: I am the guy that originally added the item to the list, although I had no involvement in the ensuing edit war.) But what exactly am I supporting? What do y'all mean by "some material"? Is this the "informal" part of the informal RfC process? :D ,Wil (talk) 06:43, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
5. Support, seems appropriate for inclusion. Everyking (talk) 09:17, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
6. Support: echoing jbmurray's comments above. Fylbecatulous talk 11:36, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
7. Support - It was controversial and it was covered in a media source, ergo it reasonably meets criteria for inclusion. Carrite (talk) 05:10, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
8. Support – Kohs' notability was already established in 2006. Does anyone deny that this incident happened? If not, then "reliable source" arguments seem like undue disparagement of the source. As this list already goes into incredible detail, what's the big deal about adding one more? Just put in a short blub similar to if not identical to what's been reverted, and move on and get back to work. This has turned into a big distraction. Wbm1058 (talk) 13:23, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Neutral or ambivalent

1. Ambivalent/Wait - There are enough troutings deserved here to open a fish market and a few whalings to open one in Wakayama, Japan. An argument about braces FFS? Anyway, the sources aren't that great... the NYMag piece is full of editorialization of light on details of the actual controversy. But I do have concerns that this is being swept under the rug. This even happened just a few days ago I gather. Why not wait a few days and see if any better sources pick up the story once the workweek starts. If no one else touches it then don't include it. If more sources run it, then add it. EvergreenFir (talk) 18:27, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Oppose including any material on exclusion of Kohs at this point

1. Oppose per the fact that the source cited is not a reliable source and there is only one instance of this being mentioned, not multiple reliable sources. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 05:26, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
2. Oppose Not a Wikipedia controversy, but a WikiConference USA issue. Only a single passing mention in one reliable source - not enough to qualify this as a controversy anyway. - Bilby (talk) 06:24, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
3. oppose seriously we need to get some perspective. Almost daily there are articles somewhere in the media about some edit war on some Wikipedia article. For example, there are two articles about yesallwomen right now, and the fact that there is some edit warring. Who cares?? We don't add such issues here. Even if reliable sources exist, that doesn't raise this to a notable controversy, which is what this list is for (see last line of lede) And this incident, where a minor wiki personality was uninvited from a minor wiki conference, and was mentioned in literally one line in a broader article, is so minor in the scale of things to be laughable. Has it had any impact, in the way the women novelists fiasco did? Is the ACLU weighing in yet? Are famous writers tweeting about the injustice? Did it lead to broad scale changes at Wikipedia that reliable sources wrote about? A controversy - for the purposes of this list - is something that generates extended coverage over a significant period of time with multiple angles. It's not a controversy - for the purposes of this list - if the only people talking about it in detail are wikipedians and Wikipediocracy denizens; if that is all that is required, this list would grow enormously. This list should be reserved for things which non-wikipedians found out about, studied, and wrote about. This is a peccadillo, a small slight to a person who was banned from Wikipedia and was now banned from one of its chapter meetings. It's a non-event, even charitably. Alf is trying to make the point that this is some sort of 'first they came for the xxx' type of moment, and if we don't speak up now and trumpet this far and wide soon editors in good standing will be secretly excluded by a cabal of vicious insiders. Nothing could be further from the truth. Finally, the points made above about the number of inaccuracies in the nymag piece make it not a reliable source, in any case. The very line in question, the 'reliable sentence' if we can call it that, is WRONG, since apparently Kohs wasn't even scheduled to speak. So why would we even use such an article where the journalist was rather sloppy? We need to wait to see if this gets more coverage and covers the event in detail.-Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 21:49, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
4. Oppose...notability has not been established.--MONGO 14:07, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
5. Oppose. Sorry alf et al., but I also don't get "controversy" out of one article. Drmies (talk) 00:21, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
6. Oppose. Unfortunately I've been without internet for a couple days and unable to comment, but I don't see how in the hell a single sentence in a reliable source talking offhandedly about an alleged controversy is worthy of inclusion in a list of this scope (the last line of the lede of the article currently reading "This list is a collection of the more notable instances.") This isn't a more notable instance of a Wikipedia controversy, or it would've attracted more RS coverage. There's really little reason why this should even be an argument. I'd also point that this is not a well constructed RfC. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:03, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
7. No further time and effort should at present be spent on this feigned and manufactured controversy. It appears that this article and its talkpage are being used to emphasize a few editors' strong personal disagreement with the Wikiconference's decision to disinvite Mr. Kohs, which is not the proper purpose of mainspace. I also agree that the overly complex nature of the RfC is unhelpful. (COI note: As a board member of the New York Chapter, I am the person who communicated the decision to Mr. Kohs, and I have greater knowledge of the relevant background than most others who have edited this page.) Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:33, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
8. Oppose This article primarily concerns controversies concerning encyclopedic content and the governance of that content. A wikiconference can exclude whoever it wants and that is only a big deal to those who want to make it a big deal. Johnuniq (talk) 03:53, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Threaded discussion

Well obviously it's going to hard to sort all this out, since it's an article on the Wikipedia that is about the Wikipedia so almost by definition most every editor is going to have an emotional stake in the issue (whether they admit it or not, even to themselves), so rather than most of the involved editors thrashing out the various aspects of the situation in a collegial fashion, as we might get with (say) List of controversies involving the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, we're at best going to get editors who are pretending for tactical reasons to thrash out the various aspects of the situation in a collegial fashion while actually marshaling their arguments in defense of a position that they're not actually going to examine. More the courtroom than the editorial workroom I'd say.

Right? Yeah probably. This is why articles about the Wikipedia are hard and wasteful of time and energy. Probably we should outsource them to a neutral third party. We can't do that, so I'm not sure what the answer is.

One way is to look at how we treat similar entities or handle similar articles. Category:Lists of controversies only has one similar article, List of controversies involving the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. (This alone makes me wonder why this article exists, since we don't have List of controversies involving Google or List of controversies involving Exxon-Mobile and so forth, although most large companies have Criticism sections, but they're usually not all that long.) It's not clear to me what Wikipedia and the Mounties have in common that these two entities and only these two ought have special lists of their controversies. But whatever, maybe I'm missing something.

So, looking at some broadly similar type articles:

• List of controversies involving the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, since that's the one article that in title seem to parallel this one.
• Encyclopædia Britannica#Criticism of Encyclopædia Britannica, since that's also an encyclopedia.
• Criticism of Facebook, since that's also a popular website.
• Twitter#Issues and controversies, since that's also a popular website.
• Baidu, since that's also a popular website. There's no Criticism section exactly, but there are sections titled "Baidu workers arrested" and "Censorship".
• Yadda yadda. I picked the above at random and you could doubtless pick many more.

The question is, if this situation came up for these articles -- if there was a broadly similar situation involving the Mounted Police, for instance, such that some individual that had a Greg-Kohs-like relationship to the Mounties, and the Mounties had a conference and he wasn't invited (or Britannica, or Facebook, or whomever), and we had the refs we have here, and the incident had achieved the general level of notability that this one has, would we want to include it in those articles? I'm asking. Herostratus (talk) 07:40, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Just to comment, as I'm still catching up on all of this - for the comparison to work, the situation would be that a group managing the Canadian Mounties were one of the sponsors of a conference about Canadian Mounties run by a semi-independent group. At the conference a person was asked not to attend, and this was then mentioned in a single line in a questionably researched article. In which case, no, I would argue against including it in the Canadian Mounties article. :) If this was the result of a direct action of the WMF I'd feel differently, or if it was covered in some depth in multiple reliable sources I'd be more willing to include it, but at the moment it hasn't achieved the level of notability that would warrant a mention. - Bilby (talk) 08:21, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

• Comment. I think this is a situation where we should have a formal RfC. When we have such an article as «Wikipedia controversies» it’s important that the editing of the article is mainly handled by editors who are not involved in the underlying disputes, to avoid that this article becomes part of the disputes itself.

Editors who in some way or other have involved themselves in the latest incident should note so in their «voting» and other comments; so that this can be taken into account. We should try to get uninvolved editors to comment in the RfC by posting notices on Wikiproject talk pages, like Wikiproject Education, Wikiproject Internet, Wikiproject USA etc. Iselilja (talk) 07:58, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I think I would probably qualify as one of those editors who has gotten involved ;), but I think this is a sound proposal for moving ahead. ,Wil (talk) 08:23, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to a formal RfC. Two reasons I chose to start with an informal RfC: First, it was late and I wanted to get discussion restarted sooner rather than later, but was too groggy to frame a properly neutral RfC question. Second, I think this discussion really must be had in stages. First we decide if the Kohs material should go in, second we negotiate what the material should be. If we did formal RfCs we're looking at 60 days worth of comment at a minimum. On the other hand, I have no objection to a formal RfC if you'd like to either modify this one or start a new one. Certainly, though, feel free to publicize at wikiprojects.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 13:23, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

@Ktr101:, could you explain how New York Magazine is not a reliable source per WP:RS?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 13:26, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

The citing of an unreliable source does not make it suddenly reliable. We had a Friendly space policy and that was invoked at the conference, which is not illegal for an organization to do, as it is their own private event. As MONGO said below, I don't have anything against you or Kohs, but I also don't find anything controversial in this whole event since it seems like people are just trying to manufacture a controversy out of something that was invoked to help make people feel more comfortable. Also, this should probably be turned into a formal RFC so that the community knows about it and can comment here, instead of just the select few that know that this page exists. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 15:46, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Kevin. We need to let the community decide whether this is controversial or not. And we need to provide them the information they need to make a fair decision. We can start with links to all of the sources which we currently know are available; there are only a few, so this shouldn't be an unwieldy list. Just like they don't know this page exists, they may not be aware of how WikiConference USA was organized or the long history of controversy in the Wikipedia project that Mr. Kohs has been involved in. And of course, we'll need to provide them a link to the page itself. Finally, we'll need to provide a link to this talk page.

Since we're all Wikipedians here, I don't think that any of us would deny that knowledge is power. Let's empower the whole community. ,Wil (talk) 16:09, 8 June 2014 (UTC) @MONGO:, could you explain what notability has to do with the inclusion of an item on a list? WP:LISTN explicitly says that it's OK to have lists where the individual entries are not notable as long as the topic of the list itself is notable.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:22, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Are you in the employ of Kohs, or acting as his meatpuppet? To be frank it surely looks like at least the latter is an accurate assessment.--MONGO 14:47, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Are you unable to conceive of the possibility that someone might disagree with you or question you without having ulterior motives or to respond to such disagreement without making off-the-wall unsupported accusations? To be frank it surely looks like at least the latter is an accurate assessment. Now, even though you don't deserve it, since you choose to accuse rather than discuss, I will explain why this issue is important to me. I and many other editors support Wikipedia through our hard work. We make it one of the top ten websites in the world. The WMF rides on that to collect money, which it uses not just to provide servers and software, but to form and encourage partnerships with respectable academic institutions (whatever GLAM stands for, those places). Once such activity is these conferences that they organize, held on university campuses, provided with scholarly speakers and financial support for attendees and so on. This is all good, but then they ban Kohs, who, by the way, I don't know personally, with whom I disagree on just about every position I've ever heard him express, and whose writing, both stylistically and with regard to content, bores me to tears, for some ridiculous made-up ex post facto reason which they won't explain. This kind of behavior is contrary to every established norm of respectable academia and takes all the hard work that you, I, and other serious editors here provide to the WMF as a groundwork for their efforts to become respectable, and squanders it just so some feral cliquish teenagers and their enablers can nail a handpainted "NO KOHS ALLOWED" sign to their treehouse. It's insulting and it's self-defeating on the part of the WMF. Do you see why it might matter to me regardless of my opinion of Kohs? Furthermore, once people start getting banned for secret reasons without due process and with no explanation required, it could happen to anyone. Even you or me, MONGO. I don't want to go to conferences where the organizers behave like this because it's scary. I don't want anyone to have to worry about whether it's going to happen to them. I don't expect anyone at the WMF to bend to my will on the basis of the work I put into editing, but I do expect to be able to express myself about issues that affect Wikipedia and the WMF on the basis of it. As should you. As should all of us. That's more of an explanation than you deserve given your scattershot accusations, but there you have it. None of that has anything to do with why I think the material at hand should be included in the article, naturally. It's merely a response to your silly questions about my motive. Now, as neither your accusations nor my response have to do with the content of this article, which is what we're meant to be discussing here, perhaps you could answer my original question: what does notability have to do with the inclusion or exclusion of a list item, especially since it's long-established practice and explicitly encouraged by guidelines to make lists of things which, although notable as a group, are not individually notable.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:18, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

P.s. I'm glad you felt free to start a separate section with a title more acceptable, but surely you're aware that "adding any material" and "adding some material" are logically equivalent, given that they describe identical sets of outcomes. One's against adding any material if and only if one's against adding some material. Nevertheless not my will but thine be done, oh MONGO.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:22, 8 June 2014 (UTC

I have no beef with you, Kohs or anyone else, but I simply don't see anything controversial about Kohs being banned from the site or his being disinvited from a wikimeetup to be either notable or controversial.--MONGO 15:33, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. I have none with you either. On the content issue, we disagree. This is normal.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:38, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Hi, MONGO. Please forgive my ignorance; I'm new at this. What has alf laylah wa laylah said that you believe indicates that he might employed by Greg Kohs or be his meatpuppet? It sounds like these are pretty serious allegations, but, if they can be proven, would be relevant well beyond the issue at hand. Where do you think the most appropriate place to pursue this matter would be? Please create it and provide a link, if possible. In the interests of settling this matter, however, I think it would be best to use this space for its intended purpose: deciding as a community whether Greg Kohs' being banned from WikiConference USA is or is not controversial. Thanks! ,Wil (talk) 15:52, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

A formal RFC might decide whether Kohs being disinvited from the party is notable. Kohs was disinvited from a wiki-party....cry me a river....as Hildegard Clinton might say....at this point what difference does it make???? Waaaahhhh.--MONGO 21:21, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Ah, good question, MONGO. It makes a difference to me because these Wikipedia conferences apparently happen quite frequently. Like a lot of people here, I don't agree with a lot of what Greg Kohs says or does. But, also like a lot of people here, I don't want to see anyone excluded from any conference if they don't provide a real threat to anyone. And even under those circumstances, I would expect some form of explanation. I, for one, don't want to see this happen again. I've already made it clear that I will not be attending any Wikipedia event that is not actually "open," as claimed in the WikiConference 2014 promotional literature. ,Wil (talk) 22:42, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

If it didn't make a difference, why are Wikipedians edit warring to keep this incident off of this page? In my experience, when an organization tries to cover something up, it means that they are admitting that they did something underhanded or hypocritical. Cla68 (talk) 23:46, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

I'm sure wikipedians and the admin cabal get up to all sorts of underhanded or hypocritical bullshit - every organization does, and every individual eventually does. I can point to blatant hypocrisy on the part of Jimbo Wales and on the part of his most strident critics. And yes, I think some wikipedians are trying to remove this instance because it relates to a bête noir and they'd rather not give him more oxygen or sunlight. But no matter what we suspect, that's not really relevant to the list itself, which is for notable controversies involving Wikipedia. This one simply is not notable enough, and if there were a great many more sources that discussed the banning, the impact of the banning, reactions from free speech groups, with the law school making public statements and distancing themselves from it all, etc, then you'd have something. For now you have a tempest in a teapot that for some reason some ppl are trying to turn into a cause célèbre.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:58, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Obi-Wan Kenobi. While I still don't agree with you, I wanted to take the time to thank you for the best summary of a side of the issue that I don't happen to support. If anything were to convince me to support the removal of this controversy from the list, it would be your comment. Please continue to help us in this discussion; you seem to have a very steady hand, and that's exactly what we need right now. ,Wil (talk) 00:54, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

(Moved to correct section) Isn't this essentially voting on whether we're going to keep arguing or not? Cause if we're disagreeing this strongly about whether the content should be on here in the first place, I can't see negotiating on what information should be included turning in to anything other than a 10ish-way split of the original argument that will all be just as lively. ,Wil (talk) 06:51, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

You might be surprised at how well the RfC process can work despite quite strong disagreements. See here for the most impressive example I know: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jerusalem. The level of disagreement here is trivial compared to the level surrounding that topic, and yet the process was successful beyond all reasonable expectation.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:41, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

@Obiwankenobi:, I am not trying to make a "first they came for" argument in favor of inclusion of the material, as I stated explicitly above. The comment to which you refer was in response to MONGO's assertion that he could see no reason for my stance other than me meatpuppeting for Greg Kohs. Without that accusation I wouldn't have found it necessary to explain why I think this issue is important in itself. The only arguments I've made for inclusion of the material are based on policy, guidelines, and the general type of item that has hitherto been included on this list without much fuss at all. That you disagree with me, not for the first time, is no reason to impugn my arguments by completely misconstruing them.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:09, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, your impassioned reply to Mongo suggests that the reason you are so stridently arguing for inclusion of this event, whereas hundreds of other peccadillos with even better sourcing are unnoticed by you and won't be edit-warred in here by you - is not simply policy ( which is, I insist, currently supported by the flimsiest of sources.) Can you imagine if every time a single reliable source mentioned a single 'controversial' thing in Wikipedia - in one sentence half of which was untrue!! - we added a line about it here? It would be endless! In the past 30 days there have likely been hundreds of reliable sources that discussed something of note, and even perhaps controversial, that happened in wiki-space, but we don't go around adding all of them - I think we really need sustained and detailed coverage from multiple sources - the list is for the really notable wiki controversies, not every single one. Even the source in question mentions a Wikipedia editor's clumsy interaction with a woman - should we add that as well? I think at issue is, regardless of generic policy, each list needs a clear inclusion criteria, so our first step should be to come to consensus on same. There's no rush, so let's take our time, but I think whatever criteria we come up with should be something that would limit inclusion of things like this one unless multiple sources discuss it in detail.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:43, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Oh, nonsense. I argue at the same level for everything, as you know very well. Look at TfD for May 25 and you'll see me expending the same amount of "stridency" (although I deny the applicability of the word) about some ridiculous navbox about fishes. Now you're repeating Gorman's argument about how endless the list would be if we stooped to letting this item on. It was ridiculous when he used it and it's ridiculous now. Find three examples if you're so bloody sure. Also, I didn't edit war over anything, so you should think about taking that back. I never do edit war, you know.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:18, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, you added in content that had been removed several other times by other editors. Per BRD, if new content is disputed, it is kept out until there is agreement to add it. Instead, you warred it back in. In that case, even if it was only one edit, you fired on shot in an edit war. It's not a big deal, I do it, we all do, but don't get all lily white on me. 3 example? Yesallwomen controversy, paper published saying wikipedia's medical articles aren't that great, some students using wikipedia to do their research (ah, the controversy!). In fact, looking at the list, I think the whole thing needs trimming. But, first, as I said before, we should come to consensus on inclusion criteria for what makes a "controversy", and what makes it notable enough to include here. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:54, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

• Oh, I may be invoooolved, since I believe the topic of discussion once said something bad about me on a certain website, so my !vote could be construed as sucking up to him. For the record, Kohs never bought me a beer and I don't believe he voted for me at my RfA. Nor did alf, I think, but please don't construe my !vote as a belated "fuck you" to an editor I respect very much. Drmies (talk) 01:39, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Drmies I am, as always, honored to have you disagree with me. Consider this statement an anachronistic absentee RfA support.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 06:05, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

• @Alf...Obiwankenobi is more tactful than I as to the insinuation that you might be in the employ or a meatpuppet here...I apologize for being...for being a MONGO. Point is you do seem highly concerned about much to do about nothing...this isn't worth anyone's bother really. Was the disinvitation of Kohs, which kept him from being able to pin the tail on the donkey, controversial enough for inclusion here? I can't see it.--MONGO 02:38, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

MONGO, think nothing of it. It's just one of those things we all say in the heat of the moment. I'm not being paid, and from what I hear, he doesn't pay enough to make it worth my while to edit on his behalf.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 05:44, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Note: just to be clear, obi wan doesn't think Alf is working for anyone but Alf - and by Alf, I mean the Alien Life Form - what is amazing is that Alf has never, as far as I can tell, edited the ALF_(TV_series) article, even though it is a more or less open secret that Alf is operating on instructions from Melmac, and this description of the character Alf is actually rather apt for our own Alf: "ALF has an enormous appetite; he is also troublesome, sarcastic, slovenly and cynical, and sometimes he puts himself at the risk of being discovered while perpetrating some of his often-unintentional pranks." But other than the obvious and nefarious extraterrestrial mind control connection, I don't think Alf is in the employ or shilling for anyone else.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:06, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Ah, that goddamned TV show. FWIW, you're the only person who seems to have made that connection in writing.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 05:44, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Arbitrary-ish break

Question - As far as I can tell, Kohs's notability still stems from MyWikiBiz. I don't think this would have received even marginal attention if it had been some unknown IP editor who had been disinvited. The talk Kohs submitted and the accepted panel he took issue with were furthermore on the subject of paid editing. There doesn't seem to be a new Wikipedia controversy going on--just Wikimedia taking action against an already controversial figure. So couldn't the conference events just be added as a single sentence at the end of the 2006 MyWikiBiz paragraph? E.g. "In June 2014 Kohs was denied admittance to a Wikimedia-sponsored conference for which he had submitted a proposal to again engage the community on the subject of paid editing.(refs)" ...Rough wording, of course. Hopefully this hasn't been proposed already -- there's a lot of text here :) --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  20:53, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Rhododendrites, that is an excellent suggestion! Seriously. Would you like to frame it as a formal proposal in a level two section, or, if not, do you have any objection to my doing so? I really think it's a good way to split the baby.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:20, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

FTR: I also have no objection with this getting a minor mention on the Kohs/MyWikiBiz article. It pretty meets our normal standards for inclusion there in a way that it doesn't here. To avoid two "informal RfCs" (which misses most of the point of an rfc...) from occurring on the same page at the same time, it would be good to hold discussion on that page, with only a brief mention of it here. Since RfC's are not at all required to last thirty days and one of their main purposes is attracting uninvolved editors, can you explain what your motivation to start one here was other than ensuring that few uninvolved editors were present and you didn't have to worry about writing a neutral summary of the issue? Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:58, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

The suggestion is to include it in the MyWikiBiz paragraph in this article, Kevin. Try to keep up.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 01:22, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, when there's already an open ANI against you regarding your ability to play nice with other editors, you might want to try to play nice with other editors. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:07, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Kevin, when there are already serious doubts about your ability to keep the conversation focused on content, you might want to try to keep the conversation focused on content.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:22, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Essentially every comment I've made on this page that hasn't been questioning why you are abrogating fairly standard guidelines and policies for no apparent reason has been directly discussing content relevant issues, except for those relatively few posts pointing out that when you're already at ANI over civility issues you might want to try to be civil. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:25, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Don't forget your oblique threats against me. I make them out to be about 14% of your edits here.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:31, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

@Alf.laylah.wa.laylah: - Thanks. To keep things as simple as possible in what is turning out to be a somewhat messy affair maybe you should go forward with proposing it as you see fit. --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  02:18, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

OK, I will do that. Thanks again for a really excellent idea.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:22, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I made the original edit, and I think this is not a good idea at all. This controversy has little to do with Greg Kohs; it is about the fact that a person who no one has proven has presented a threat to anyone was banned from WikiConference USA. In fact, I think it would be better to leave Greg Kohs' name out of the original text and let it stand. Thanks! ,Wil (talk) 02:41, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• FWIW: it wasn't Wikimedia taking action against anyone, it was the organizers from WMNYC and WMDC, two of Wikimedia chapters. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:22, 9 June 2014 (UTC)
  • This is true. I think it makes a lot of sense to be as specific as possible about this. To be clear, it was the organizers representing Wikimedia New York City and Wikimedia Washington DC, two local chapters of the Wikimedia Foundation who banned someone from a conference that they themselves promoted as "open". Would you agree with this, Kevin? Thanks! ,Wil (talk) 02:46, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
    • In the interest of following Wikipedia's rules, we should stick as closely to what was stated in the NYM piece, including using the qualifier "allegedly." Until we have a RS talking about the conference being promoted as open or one detailing the friendly space policy, neither bit belongs in the article. Though I don't feel great about sticking entirely to what the source says, because the bit about Kohs being scheduled to give a talk is factually incorrect and contradicted by primary sources. Assuming we end up puttin it in the section that already exists about mywikibiz which is discussed in one of the way higher than reasonable number of sections below, I'd suggest something simple to avoid problems of trying to juxtapose primary and secondary sources - "Gregory Kohs was allegedly banned from attending WikiConference USA." As it is, the secondary source sadly isn't reat, and both doesn't mention chapters, and claims we only have 22,000 users among other errors. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:54, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
      • OK, so we should stick to what was stated in the NYM piece until we shouldn't because it is factually incorrect? ,Wil (talk) 05:51, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
        • @Wllm: - unfortunately, if we're following our content policies, that is in fact pretty much we what we should do, yeah. I have significant qualms about what I just suggested, but having seen what relaxing the letter of our content policies does in controversial areas, I believe that they're worth following pretty much to the letter in controversial areas (and I do so even when the result isn't something I like.) If the story picks up more steam in the future and more reliable sources are made available, then we'll be able to better improve the description, but until then, we're pretty much stuck with the secondary source we have. I am personally okay with omitting information we know 100% is wrong, but even that is an editorial judgment that not all would agree with. We're an encyclopedia based off of secondary sources, and sometimes that means that even though we do include information that we'd love to personally add to or correct, it's not usually in our best interests over all. Explaining why I believe that fully is out of the scope of this page, but if you think about really controversial areas, you can probably guess why, as a community, that's more or less the way we've decided we should operate. (For instance: think about how many arguments would occur at evolution or God if we let people speak from their own personal experiences rather than secondary sources.) I personally draw the line at including information tha't I know is 100% is factually incorrect, but not everyone does that - we had a big thing about "Verifiability, not truth" going around for quite some time. To bring it back to this article: if we let people speak about thing that were not found in reliable sources, the article would end up covering my perspective, KTR's perspective, the perspective of a bunch of other people who were there or observed from afar, and a lot of other stuff. It might end up being something useful in the end, but that's not what Wikipedia fundamentally is. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:24, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Arbitrary break 2

@Newyorkbrad:: Seriously? "No further time and effort should at present be spent on this feigned and manufactured controversy. It appears that this article and its talkpage are being used to emphasize a few editors' strong personal disagreement with the Wikiconference's decision to disinvite Mr. Kohs, which is not the proper purpose of mainspace." Is it not enough that you are able to state your opinion along with other editors, you have also to try to shut down the conversation? And you comment not on content but on contributors and their motives? First we have administrators edit-warring and now we have an arbitrator explicitly failing to assume good faith and accusing without evidence "a few editors" of violating talk page policy? Is making unsubtantiable accusations like that "the proper use of mainspace" in your opinion?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:56, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

If I believed I could shut down the conversation(s) on this page unilaterally, I would be delusional, and whatever may be my drawbacks as a Wikipedian, I am not that. I do think that valuable editor time is being misspent here, however, and it's my right to say so. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:26, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Fair enough. Tah!— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:28, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad:: In fact, you're the only person here who can shut down the conversation(s) on this page unilaterally. It's simple. Just tell us why Greg Kohs was not allowed to attend WikiConference USA 2014. Thanks! ,Wil (talk) 04:40, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

@Newyorkbrad:: I just changed my opinion on the usefulness of this discussion now that you've shown up, NYB. It is well worth my time to finally get an answer as to why Greg was not allowed at the conference. You're right. This is a "feigned and manufactured controversy." And that's because the controversy is that the Wikiconference USA 2014 organizers banned an attendee from an "open" conference without citing a reason, as they should have if they were organizing a truly "open" event. In fact, you can end it all right now, NYB. Just tell us, in as much detail as is appropriate, why Greg Kohs was not allowed to attend Wikiconference USA 2014. ,Wil (talk) 04:25, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

All right. We just strayed back in to that territory of asking people to not talk about something. I'm glad it was NYB, tho, because I have something to say to him. NYB, I think it is highly unethical of a conference organizer to assert that there are good reasons for banning an attendee that they are privately aware of and not disclose them. You are playing with a man's reputation, NYB, and frankly it's starting to look like you'd be perfectly willing to compromise his to save your own. You are condemning him without a trial, and that is precisely the issue at the heart of this controversy. There is only one circumstance I can think of under which that would be appropriate, and that's if this attendee presented a threat to other attendees. In that case, I think many people would agree that it is sufficient disclosure to simply state that he was not allowed because he presented a threat. So, it's about time we got down to brass tacks. Was Greg Kohs banned from WikiConference USA 2014 because he presented a threat to other attendees, including, not limited to, organizers, presenters, or sponsored attendees, either legally or physically? You have the floor. ,Wil (talk) 04:14, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

The above was posted in the "oppose" section. I have moved it to here because RfCs cannot be followed once people start making points everywhere. Re the question asked: I would say that line of questioning would be fine in a webforum, but it's way off-topic here. Also, it's a question that cannot be answered. More than that, there is no answer that would be to the satisfaction of the questioner. Johnuniq (talk) 07:16, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for moving this to the right section. Do you have personal insight on what would satisfy me? If so, please tell me what would be required to satisfy me beyond the answer to the question I've asked above. ,Wil (talk) 07:57, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

At Wikipedia it's better to move towards resolving an issue (which is always content in an article), so while I agree that my comment has a logic error, it would be more helpful to identify what would satisfy you because time spent investigating my error is time wasted. The issue is completely off-topic for Wikipedia but I'll add a little more. While "yes" or "no" might be described as possible answers to the question, my opinion is that neither of those would be satisfying. A "yes" would raise a lot of questions while also falling under "cannot be answered". A "no" would imply there was some tantalizing response just out of reach. Johnuniq (talk) 08:39, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Conflict of interest?

It strikes me that there's an argument to be made that editors who accepted money from the WMF or associated organizations to attend this conference have a conflict of interest when it comes to editing material about the conference. Is there support on this page for holding those editors, many of whom have self-identified above, to the usual COI editing guidelines and/or slapping some connected contributor templates at the top?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 22:09, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

attending the conference, no. But if such editors were directly part of the decision making process that led to this controversy then one might consider them involved and they should take no admin action accordingly, but should feel free to comment here.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 23:43, 8 June 2014 (UTC)

Not even if they took money to attend? Really? And I'm not asking about admin actions, but editing the article.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:19, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

no. If you get a free airline ticket does this mean you have a conflict of interest wrt that airline or even that flight? A conflict of interest requires that your interests conflict - I fail to see how someone who got a scholarship now has a conflict of interest with some event they attended - unless part of their scholarship to the conference was an agreement to only speak positively of the conference in social media and they risked having to repay the scholarship if they broke this agreement - anyway isn't this page the wrong place for this discussion - if there's an article about that conference it should go there.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:39, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

The idea that someone who got a scholarship here has a conflict of interest is a complete fallacy. Everyone who applied received a scholarship, as long as they applied. This means that there were Wikipedians and non-Wikipedians from all walks of life roaming the halls of the building that day. To suggest otherwise, assumes that there is no good faith to be had in this conference.

Alf, I have nothing against you as an editor, but it is tiring to see sections being made and attempts at discussion bordering a conspiracy being created. Seriously, this talk page is for the list of Wikipedia controversies. Since the Kohs issue has been brought up, a good 90% of all the existing material on this page has been turned into a discussion on whether it is essentially a conspiracy that Kohs was banned and if it should be added at all. Heck, we might as well create a page called "Times Wikipedians wanted to include something to the site and it was denied" just to place all of this on, as that would be better than having it here. Honestly, that article where it was mentioned was rife with errors, including parts where I am quoted. Yes, I bungled up a discussion with a friend, but she is on record as saying that the entire environment in which it occurred was not conducive to good journalism. In addition to this, New York Magazine is a reliable source, but that doesn't mean that we should be taking them at their word. If so, then there are 22,000 editors on this site, and that is a real number, because they are a reliable source. The Kohs controversy was linked in that section, but only to a website which I suspect reported on it because they were told about the issue. That is also the only site talking about this, and if you remove that, then there is nothing that New York Magazine could have linked, because no one has published anything else to that degree.

Furthermore, I know exactly why Kohs was banned, and most of the discussion here does not even touch on it. I have hinted at it above because I respect him as a person and will not disclose publicly why, but to suggest that the organizers of this conference are people who had it out to get him is not true, as there were plenty of reasons to ban him. I will let the organizers of the conference state here if they want to why that is the case, but I can attest as someone who went there and knows everyone who planned the event, there was nothing to hide because this was open to everyone. As the keynote speaker said, if you explicitly include everyone, then you are implicitly excluding others. Kevin Rutherford (talk) 02:01, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

There has been an excellent discussion of the implications of the keynote speaker's remarks on Wikipediocracy, for what it's worth. That's neither here nor there since her remarks were made after the decision by organizers to ban Mr. Kohs and were made in reference to lack of civility on wiki, not as an existential statement about a person registering and participating a conference advertised as being open to "skeptics." Ultimately, the Kohs ban was covered in a media source and would seem to qualify for inclusion in this list, it seems to me. Carrite (talk) 05:08, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Ktr101, the conversation is "90%" about Kohs because the article is locked because of an edit war over that very issue. What else would you suggest we talk about? I thought I'd try to cool things down by doing a little copy-editing=by-proxy since the prose quality of the article has degenerated severely while I was away from it. This led to my being roundly accused by all and sundry of trying to make a point and asked a number of times to stop. So I did. We're now meant to be discussing the Kohs thing while the article is locked, and if we try to discuss any other aspects of the page we get yelled at. The talk page is for discussing improvements to the article. Non-Kohs-based discussion is deprecated. Now you're deprecating Kohs-based discussion? What in the world should we talk about? What you and your conference buddies know in secret that affects your editing of the page but that no one who wasn't in your smoke-free-filled safe-spaces is allowed to hear about? Pray, do enlighten us.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 06:03, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

One thing I've noticed is the authoritarian and directive tone taken by several of the conference attendees who are participating in this discussion. What's up with the bossy and intolerant attitudes? Perhaps it's the same attitude that contributed to the decision to ban Kohs from the conference, contravening the conference's inclusion code. Wikipedia, however, is supposed to be a congenial, collaborative environment. It's ironic that the attendees at the conference appear, at least on this page, to be trying to undermine that ideal to such an extent. Cla68 (talk) 22:09, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Not only are they bossy, but they're extremely reticent about telling us how much money they got from the WMF to attend the conference. In my profession, that kind of COI, essentially a junket, must be declared openly. Kevin (any Kevin will do), care to tell us how much you were paid to attend the conference descriptions of which you were previously edit-warring over?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:34, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, I've already given detailed instructions on how to find the budget for the conference as a whole in at least one other forum you're commenting on. But, to make it a bit easier for you to find the entire budget - lmgtfy.com/?q=wikiconference+usa+grant - that said, I was not paid anything to attend the conference, and am not sure where you got that idea. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:14, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

LMGTFY, super old-school! So you didn't get a "scholarship" to attend, as the other Kevin did? I got the idea that you got paid to attend because the other Kevin said that he got paid to attend and that everyone who asked also got paid to attend and he seemed to be including you in that. If I'm wrong and you bought your own ticket and paid for your own hotel, I abjectly and (actually) seriously apologize for impugning your ethics.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

There's a difference between "My flight to the conference was paid for, as was my hostel" and "I was paid to attend the conference." If I was supposed to be paid to attend the conference, I should go bug someone about my check. FTR: I don't view attending a conference on a scholarship as a significant COI in this discussion - probably one about at the same level as the swarm of Koh's friends that have shown up here from Wikipediocracy. Btw, still curious why your formatting of this discussion has both involved so many separate sections and seemingly been structured to avoid bringing in editors not connected to the issue in any way. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:31, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Noted. Kevin Gorman, unlike the rest of the professional world, doesn't think that a free trip to NYC with lodging constitutes payment. Just for instance, see what the New York Times thinks about such issues.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:42, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, this is bordering on disruptive. WP:COI says "when advancing outside interests is more important to an editor than advancing the aims of Wikipedia, that editor stands in a conflict of interest." You haven't made clear how someone who received a scholarship is, post-facto, advancing their "outside" interests by editing a section of an article that is tangentially related to said conference. If Kevin's regular paycheck came from the conference organizers, and he was looking forward to next month's check, and he feared that if he wrote something bad about the conference they wouldn't send him the check, then, yes, one might consider that to be a COI. But that does not seem to be the case here.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:03, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

How is it disruptive, Obiwan? No one is forced to respond to me if they don't want to, and I'm certainly not badgering anyone who chooses to remain silent. In any case, I have made it well clear how accepting free travel and lodging and then writing about the organization who paid can be considered a conflict of interest by reasonable people. Many professional codes of ethics count junketing as reportable gifts. Journalists cannot accept free trips from subjects they're going to write about. University faculty members cannot accept gifts in furtherance of their research without prior approval of their deans or IRB committees and subject to strict limitation. Politicians have strict reporting requirements and limitations on the kinds of free travel they can accept, given that they may be making decisions that affect the gift-givers. A wide variety of professions agree that this kind of thing creates the appearance of a conflict of interest and therefore forbid it.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:05, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

You.. don't know what an IRB is, do you? Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

You don't know how many small schools organize their faculty research ethics oversight, do you? Not every school can afford to have as many committees as Cal, friend.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 19:42, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, enough with hassling Kevin G about this. I see no conflict of interest. For what it's worth, if you want full disclosure, I attended the conference myself, and my expenses were fully paid thanks to a combination of monies from the Wiki Education Foundation and a scholarship from the conference organizers. I don't regard this fact as influencing me in the slightest in the discussion here. Conference organizers may have a COI, but neither Kevin nor I were involved in the organization --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 05:50, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks for popping in JB. And just to be clear to everyone else: although I do know more background to this situation than most conference attendees, I was not one of the conference organizers. Also glad to hear you were partially funded by the WEF: hopefully that signals a step in the right direction for the USEP in a lot of ways. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:05, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

@Jbmurray:: Yeah, you're right that it's enough on the subject, and I'm dropping it now. In any case, the problem is not whether editors are influenced by gifts, but if there's the appearance of influence. It looks so bad for Wikipedia, whether editors are influenced by gifts or not. Most professional organizations understand this and make rules against it.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:05, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, you are comparing apples and oranges. For a conflict of interest to exist there must be some sort of explicit or potential quid pro quo - an understanding or possible expectation that your favorable treatment of X will lead to favorable treatment of Y, or alternately that an unfavorable review will decrease your chances of being offered a junket in the future. This you have not established. If we were to apply your standard, anyone who received a scholarship from a university would have a conflict wrt to that university, and any editor who received a tax break would be conflicted wrt to the US government, and any Wikipedia editor who got a scholarship to join a conference would be conflicted in editing any article about Wikipedia. It's a ridiculous extension of the ideas of conflict of interest. The scholarship has been paid for, and there was no implicit assumption anywhere that editors were asked to favorably edit about the conference after the fact - and in any case this is not an article about the conference, this is an article about controversies and who was uninvited from said conference. It's just too much of a stretch to be credible. The editors in question risk nothing by blasting the conference here and gain nothing by praising it, at least not in any way you've demonstrated.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 18:05, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

And. . . you guys just strayed in to something I think is always worth talking about. What does it matter if Alf is being disruptive, Obi-wan? And JB, how do you know that it is enough for the everyone else watching this thread? I don't want to imply that I've disagreed with Alf on everything s/he has said on this page, but I'll still evoke Evelyn Beatrice Hall/Voltaire here. "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." All of you have the right to ignore Alf. Everyone certainly should not feel obligated to respond to what s/he says. But I find it incredibly disturbing that some editors that I've had great discussions with elsewhere are suggesting s/he should stop saying something for any reason whatsoever. Is this what we want to be as a community? Has everyone forgotten what this discussion is about in the first place? Now I'm watching again, and I would like to hear what Alf has to say. If I am not interested in hearing more in that vein, I won't reply to his/her comment. But, please, don't ask him/her to be quiet, because then you're not just stepping on his/her privilege to say what s/he believes; you're forgetting about my- and others'- privilege to hear him/her out. ,Wil (talk) 02:22, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Wil, in order to have useful discussions, editors are often told to WP:DROPTHESTICK, and that they are violating Wikipedia:Talk_page_guidelines - specifically, "Stay on topic: Talk pages are for discussing the article, not for general conversation about the article's subject (much less other subjects)" The talk page is WP:NOTAFORUM. Now, some discussion of editor behavior is normal as well, even if formally you are supposed to focus on content, not contributor, but when someone is being disruptive on a talk page it's normal to tell them to knock it off. Alf is beating a dead horse w.r.t. conflict of interest, no-one has supported their pov, and their pov about conflict of interest is not supported by our WP:COI policy, and continuing to badger editors here about it is disruptive. Alf was previously critiqued by several editors for spamming the talk page with trivial edit notices - which is now water long under the bridge. Editors are often told to go to a different forum to pursue their means - for example, to take it to their personal talk page, or to take it to an appropriate noticeboard. see WP:LISTEN, specifically, "In some cases, editors have perpetuated disputes by sticking to an allegation or viewpoint long after the consensus of the community has decided that moving on to other topics would be more productive." as well as WP:POINT, "When one becomes frustrated with the way a policy or guideline is being applied, it may be tempting to try to discredit the rule or interpretation thereof by, in one's view, applying it consistently." - which Alf was accused of during the 6 trivial edit requests that arrived shortly after the page was protected. FWIW, my whole post here is actually off topic for this page, so feel free to sanction me for it, fwiw.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 02:38, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

I'll violate NOTFORUM as well by mentioning that the reason for that procedure is very to understand once it is realized that the purpose of this website is to develop an encyclopedia. Even with all the rules, there are many talk pages which resemble war zones where pro-X editors battle anti-X people. No progress would occur if talk pages were owned by whoever was the loudest or most persistent. No human rights are being disturbed because people are welcome to say whatever they want—they just have to do it somewhere else. Johnuniq (talk) 07:25, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Kevin Gorman, you ought to read the page history

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Note that MONGO, who opposes including the content, split the choices here, with an edit summary stating that he wanted a third choice. I did not split the choices, as you assumed. I pointed out subsequently that in this context "any" and "some" are logically equivalent, but he wanted to keep it that way. I would think you would respect that editor's choice of choices, but evidently not. I suppose he'll come around and say whether he thinks your heavy-handed edit is OK with him. It strikes me as an egregious violation of WP:TPO, as MONGO evidently felt that there was a significant difference, which you've now elided, and it might be that you have made an "edit or [a] move [of] someone's comment to change its meaning." Perhaps you should put it back how it was.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 00:17, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

If he wants to keep it that way, he's more than welcome to come comment here or restore it if he feels terribly strongly about it. Given that every current oppose vote is opposing keeping any content related to Kohs in the page at the present time, there's no purpose in arbitrarily splitting the no votes in to two different sections - it just makes the RfC harder to interpret. Looking at the page history, I suspect Mongo will agree with my move, since I retained his section heading, and not yours. "Any" and "some" are not equivalent in this context, and point to another issue with a heavily opinionated editor creating an "informal RfC" so that they didn't feel the need to write a clear, neutral request for comment. Kevin Gorman (talk) 00:53, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Logic 101, Kevin, although I seem to recall that at Cal the lower division courses are two digits. In any case, let P="Include some Kohs material." Then ~P="Do not include some Kohs material." This means the same thing as "do not include any Kohs material" in context. Since both sentences are the negation of P they're equivalent. In any case, you're evading the issue, which is that (a) you accused me of doing something that MONGO did and (b) since MONGO saw a distinction, your refactoring of the sections changed the meaning as MONGO expressly saw it. In either case, if you actually believe that the statements aren't equivalent, you must admit that your refactoring changed the meaning of someone's comments.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 01:27, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Yes, I believe my refactoring changed the meaning of someone's comments; I think they changed the way you originally (inappropriately) phrased the RfC positions. Your options may have looked clear and neutral to you; they clearly didn't look clear and neutral to Mongo, and I don't think they looked clear/neutral, either. When you need to parse what your statements mean in the way you just did in order to defend them, it's a good sign that your statements lack adequate clarity. If you object to the way I changed your original heading, I'm more than up for talking about reverting it, but if you do end up insisting on reverting it, I'm probably going to ask for this silly "informal RfC where I don't have to write a neutral summary of what's going on" thing to stop as well. RfC is not a 30 day bound process to begin with, goes as far as to describe itself as informal at WP:RFC, and the thing that you've launched here misses one of the biggest benefits of an actual RfC: recruiting a large body of uninvolved editors. I frankly have no good faith clue why you chose to not just launch a real RfC. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:05, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Your point being that because you didn't understand what I wrote it was written unclearly? That's an interesting argument.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:29, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf: when multiple people find your wording inadequate, you might want to step back for a moment and consider how you could avoid that problem in the future instead of insulting the people who find your wording inadequate. Kevin Gorman (talk) 02:37, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Kevin Gorman, when multiple people consider that you are editing in an extremely unconstructive manner you might want to step back for a moment and consider not providing a performative demonstration of the validity of their concerns.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:26, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I find it.. kind of amazing that you consistently respond to my comments that are either to the tune of "you might want to be civil while there's an open ANI section about your civility" or "RfC's should be clear, and if multiple people find them unclear, something isn't optimal," with uncivil comments. And for the record, that's nothing approaching a threat, it's just... confusion. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• I suppose I did think the some wording was weak as far as my stance....but not going to get in the middle of this trivial wording issue. If anyone thinks there is an ambiguity they might wish to inform the earlier voters(!) and let them know that the term some was dropped since they voiced their opinion.--MONGO 02:26, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

|}

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

A concrete suggestion

Rhododendrites suggests the following above, which I am pulling out here with their permission for separate comment:

As far as I can tell, Kohs's notability still stems from MyWikiBiz. I don't think this would have received even marginal attention if it had been some unknown IP editor who had been disinvited. The talk Kohs submitted and the accepted panel he took issue with were furthermore on the subject of paid editing. There doesn't seem to be a new Wikipedia controversy going on--just Wikimedia taking action against an already controversial figure. So couldn't the conference events just be added as a single sentence at the end of the 2006 MyWikiBiz paragraph? E.g. "In June 2014 Kohs was denied admittance to a Wikimedia-sponsored conference for which he had submitted a proposal to again engage the community on the subject of paid editing.(refs)"

Perhaps we can have a straw poll on the wisdom of this, as it may be a way out that many of us can live with. My feeling is that we should express our feelings on the general proposal and, if there's sufficient support, we can hash out the wording— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:27, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Support

1. For reasons already explained ad nauseam.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:27, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
2. Seems like a good compromise to me. 28bytes (talk) 02:54, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
3. [as indirect nom] --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  03:41, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
4. Not enough coverage to justify it as an entirely separate controversy, but this solution seems very reasonable since it involves the same clearly notable individual and probably the same issue.CurtisNaito (talk) 06:59, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Oppose, The problem with this as it stands is it goes beyond what the NYM piece says. "Gregory Kohs was allegedly banned from attending WikiConference USA in June 2014." would be a fine sentence to add on to the end of that paragraph, but that's as far as we can go based on the only secondary source to have written about this so far. Since the article from that point contradicts primary sources, I feel we should leave it there. If there was a bunch of secondary RS coverage of the issue, I'd be more okay with getting in to more detail, juxtaposing primary sources in with the secondaries, etc, but given that it's gotten one line of coverage in one RS, I feel that expanding it much beyond what we can say from the single RS present would be undue weight (I have still feel that including it at all is undue weight.) Tangentially here is no reasonably reliable primary source that says that Kohs was in fact banned - he was, but I prefer sticking closely to what sources say. It's one of the weird situations we run in to when writing about Wikipedia - our content policies mean we can't say things we know are true - but I prefer to stick to our content policies. Before anyone accuses me of only holding that opinion because I'm not terribly fond of Kohs, it may be worth reviewing my previous editing of other articles related to Wikipedia. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
2. Oppose, (Disclaimer: I made the original edit) While we could add this note to the previous controversy, this proposal doesn't model the controversy I added to the list at all. I think this proposal conflates a few issues. First, the controversy isn't about Greg's proposal being denied. No one promoted the event as open for everyone to propose at, and I'm sure everyone can agree that wasn't what this conference was about. If we believe that Greg's presentation being declined is a controversy, we need to discuss it separately and add it as a separate item to the list. This is about his being banned from the conference, which did promise to be open to all who want to participate. Second, the controversy isn't actually about Greg at all. It is about banning someone who didn't pose a threat to anyone from a conference that was billed as open. Now, if it is an issue that Greg in particular was banned from this conference, I suggest we create yet another item for the list addressing that. It's starting to sound like people believe the organizers' positions towards this particular participant were wrong on several fronts. Could we please stick to the controversy that I originally tried to add to this list in this thread, however? Or do we need still another informal RfC to decide that? ;) ,Wil — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wllm (talk • contribs) 03:02, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
3. oppose One sentence does not a controversy make. in any way, shape, or form. We need to do a serious trimming of this page, lest it becomes a repository of trivial edit wars and "ZOMG that editor was banninated??" Alf, why not just wait to see if WPOs efforts to generate more coverage around this are successful; if they're not, well, that's how the cookie crumbles. I don't think the outside world cares, and that's what matters here.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:09, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
   • Great! Something we can finally get some resolution on. Can we see the relative number of page views for this page versus the average number of page views for every page on en.Wiki? Thanks! ,Wil (talk) 05:46, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

   • @Wllm: - doing a comparison against every other page on ENWP wouldn't be easy, but you can see here that this page only gets about 2k page views a month. That's not very many, even with the recent spike. In comparison, a prominent academic in feminist philosophy might receive 400, and an article about a species of magic mushroom indigenous to the pacific northwest might receive 3k views a month out of season. Those are just random articles I've worked on through the years; we have articles that receive hundreds of thousands (or millions) of views a month. Best, Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:12, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

4. oppose per User:wllm. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 05:51, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
5. Oppose. A manufactured "controversy" that 1) Has nothing whatsoever to do with Wikipedia and 2) is sourced to a newsletter that has about as much credibility as a blog. The first O'Dwyer article inanely conflated Kohs as a member of the "media" and not his actual role as a self-styled critic who actually works in a corporate job in Pennsylvania someplace. The so-called "second source" is a regurgitation of the first source, with added inside-baseball references to this discussion. Coretheapple (talk) 14:44, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Threaded discussion

I believe this RfC is completely off-topic with regards to the original edit, which I made. ,Wil (talk) 03:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

@Kevin Gorman: Note that the straw poll is explicitly about whether we should include the material in some form in the MyWikiBiz paragraph. If we can mostly agree that that's a reasonable place for it, we can, as I said, hash out the wording later. With this crew, it's evidently best to take baby steps so everybody can keep track of what's going on. And before you threaten me yet again, let me say that I include myself in those editors included in "this crew."— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:29, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I think my comment will be pretty clear in intent to any outside editor interpreting it, and don't intend to move it to support currently. And Alf: I've not threatened you once. I've just pointed out that you've continued to violate/ignore policies at the same time that there's an active ANI section about your behavior Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:20, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Kevin Gorman: - The difference between my version and your version seems to come down to "Wikimedia-sponsored conference" and "for which he had submitted a proposal to again engage the community on the subject of paid editing." ...But neither of these are controversial statements that would need to be included in a secondary source. They just provide basic factual context that are visible publicly on the conference website. To me it's just better writing. If I cited a source at the Microsoft article which said "Microsoft is a corporation" and then wrote "Microsoft is a Washington-based corporation," drawing its uncontroversial location from its website, would that, too, be problematic? --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  03:41, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Unless I'm misremembering, I'm pretty sure the language in the straw poll has changed between the time I made my last comment and how it is now. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:20, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Read the page history, Kevin. Nothing's changed except that I readded 28bytes's comment which was deleted inadvertently in an edit conflict with you.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:26, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I had assumed he put it back himself. Going to go delete it, per my conversation with him on his talk page. Will take a look at the page history after. Given how many unnecessary sections this has and the fact that I'm getting a bit tired, it's perfectly possible I wrote something while looking at the wrong block of text. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:33, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Threaded meta-discussion

This section is for discussing the discussion in the section above. Feel free to iterate as many times as needed.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 02:27, 10 June 2014 (UTC) Everyone, I don't have time to keep coming back here to "vote" on one informal RfC after another. I'm trying to build a better encyclopedia. My goal for this month was to hit the "very active contributors" threshold by doing 100 edits on the encyclopedia itself. Now, I'm just trying to keep up with these silly off-topic debates on this talk page. Could we please just settle this? Formal RfC, ArbCom, whatev's. I don't care. I just want to spend more of my time building a better encyclopedia than dealing with silly wikipolitics. I'll be perfectly frank here: I have better things to do both on-wiki and IRL. Should I now create an informal RfC to see if everyone agrees with me? Thanks. ,Wil (talk) 03:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Your actions and your descriptions of your actions disagree. Which should we believe?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 03:45, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

My actions, of course. ,Wil (talk) 04:02, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Wil, sorry to say, but welcome to wikipedia. This is a run of the mill discussion, actually rather boring. Please stop mentioning arbcom, it has nothing to do with this - arbcom is for behavioral issues, not editorial disputes. If you want to do an RFC, you have to get people to agree on a neutral framing, and then add the RFC tag, and then (usually) wait for comments for 30 days, so an RFC is not the easy answer, and I REALLY don't want to do an RFC here, I hate to ask the community to weigh in on silly topics like this. It may be worth an RFC on "What is the inclusion criteria for this list", but people aren't engaging on that meta-topic sufficiently yet. These things can go on for pages, about a single semicolon. yes, it's true. If you're ready to throw in the towel, perhaps stick to content for a while and stay away from pages like this, as this is just a teaser compared to how these things can go for really controversial stuff, like what is jerusalem the capital of, or what is the name of the new star trek movie, or is yogurt actually spelled yoghurt? Wikipedians excel at tendentious argumentation, and Sayres law is force here "In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake" - while I love to argue I'm still a padawan compared to some here.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:09, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

See, that's exactly what I'm saying. Let's get this decided. I'm not throwing in the towel. I believe this controversy is controversial enough to include here. I just don't want anyone to waste my time- or anyone else's- coming to a final conclusion. In either case, I'm not going anywhere. ,Wil (talk) 05:29, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I lied. I up and left. It's pretty easy to find more productive things to do with my time. Best of luck with this pile of garbage I set fire to, everyone. :P ,Wil (talk) 19:41, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Sage advice, oh Jedi. Wil, for a very instructive lesson, read (and weep) about pizza cheese jihadists. It's what we do here. Compared to us, St. Thomas Aquinas wrote in sweeping generalities. And why not, for jots and tittles are the very essence of the law, are they not? (I mean, there's that stuff about loving your neighbor as yourself that Hillel and Jesus were so hung up on, but that was probably just because semicolons hadn't been invented yet...)— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 04:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, I followed you through the Pizza Cheese link, which was hilarious, but you totally went over my head after that. But I think I know enough to ask this: is tradition a good excuse for doing things in a somewhat time-consuming, completely off-putting way? Seriously, is Wikipedia so stuck in its ways that it can't adapt to changes happening all around and within it? Alf, you're a smart guy/gal/whatever; you undoubtedly know what happens to organizations that ask for change to stop for them. Change never stops for anyone, and they just get more irrelevant as time inexorably wears on. "Tradition" just isn't going to satisfy me as a reason to waste a ton of time talking about off-topic stuff. We can do better; and how bout we try in this very discussion. ,Wil (talk) 05:39, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

For an additional bit of background Wil, this isn't a typical Wikipedia discussion. Stuff like this tends to only happen surrounding topics that are totally explosive like race and intelligence, topics that have powerful outside interest groups pushing their agendas, or surrounding topics that gain a lot of attention from Wikipediocracy people and a certain subset of Wikipedians. So, despite the painfulness this has been: be reassured that it's at least atypical. Kevin Gorman (talk) 06:00, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

what do you suggest specifically Wil to break the logjam? Both proposals are sitting squarely at no consensus for now.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 13:28, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Inclusion criteria, redux

It seems much of the controversy (ha!) here stems from differing understandings of the inclusion criteria for this list - is it *all* things that happen in the wikipedia universe, broadly defined, that are have a hint of controversy - or is there a limit?

Thus, I think a good step would be to work on a consensus inclusion criteria for this list more generally. For now, we have these lines, roughly: "The media has covered a number of controversial events related to Wikipedia and its parent organization, the Wikimedia Foundation (WMF)... Controversies within and concerning Wikipedia and the WMF have been the subject of several scholarly papers. This list is a collection of the more notable instances."

At issue is, what makes an incident notable?

A wise man once said: "All incidents are notable, but some incidents more notable than others."

Normally, notability in wikipedia means something that passes GNG, or something that we would otherwise have an article about, or about which an article could be written. The canonical example is Wikipedia Seigenthaler biography incident, which has dozens of sources behind it.

Now, I personally think that a blue-link shouldn't be a requirement for inclusion here, as there will be incidents - or events in the parlance of the notability guideline - which pass GNG, but which don't necessarily have a WP:LASTING impact, and thus are more considered run-of-the mill news stories that happen to involve wikipedia. That said, I think we should go slightly beyond the bare minimum of GNG.

Thus, I propose that the inclusion criteria for list items here be changed to the following. If you have proposed minor edits, make them below, if you have a different criteria, please create a new section.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:37, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

inclusion criteria draft

This page is for incidents which fulfill the following criteria:

1. Either Wikipedia itself (content or editors), or the Wikimedia Foundation, is a central actor in the controversy

Thus, controversial activities of Wikipedia people unrelated to Wikipedia should not be placed here.

1. The controversy in covered in multiple reliable sources, independent of the participants, and the sourcing passes WP:GNG.
2. The sources cover the controversy in detail, and not only in passing
3. The sources make clear, through the language used to describe the event, that this was actually a controversy of some sort, and not simply, for example, a research study or a discovery of an error in Wikipedia. For example, a study about Wikipedia that demonstrated that Wikipedia articles are of poor quality or that 90% of editors are male is not a controversy. A controversy in this case would arise if such a study came out, and then several prominent academics responded to contest the findings of the study, and other articles were written about the controversy around the findings of said study, or if there was a public debate about what to DO about the findings of the study. Otherwise, such studies of Wikipedia quality can go to Reliability_of_Wikipedia for example, and notable hoaxes can go to Wikipedia:List of hoaxes on Wikipedia, and notable criticisms of Wikipedia should be placed in Criticism_of_Wikipedia.

Discussion

Note: Wikipedia's description of controversy is "Controversy is a state of prolonged public dispute or debate, usually concerning a matter of conflicting opinion or point of view." - which is what we should apply here.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:37, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• Thanks for drafting these, Obi. I support them, and believe that they reflect reasonably well the previously used de facto inclusion criteria as already somewhat presented in the article - "This list is a collection of the more notable instances." etc. Kevin Gorman (talk) 04:48, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
• As an example of the sort of stuff I'd want excluded is things like this: [1]. This was solved within hours, and there was no "controversy" - at least as far as I can tell. We need to carefully avoid the horrible navel-gazing nature of this list and really focus on things which are serious controversies, not news-filling, wikipedia-entry-incorrect-o-the-day type stuff.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:51, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

I think that's something that should absolutely fairly be excluded, unless it got a massive amount of coverage, because fake wikipedia death stories are a dime a dozen. I'd also note, interestingly, that that incident got at least one entire RS dedicated to it, as opposed to what we're discussing above.... Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:11, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

That incident got several sources for it, but again, where was the controversy? I didn't see it. It was just "someone found an error in wikipedia, and someone else corrected it, and the guy happened to be well known". There was nothing "controversial" about it.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:13, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Point taken, and agreed with. There's definitely a big difference between something like Jim Davis or any of the thousands of other stories like his, and something like John Seigenthaler.Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:56, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• Yes, Obi-wan. I second Kevin's support, and believe that this controversy meets all of those criteria. ,Wil (talk) 05:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• Hi @Wllm: - it actually fails more than one of them currently... but the thing is, it might pass all of them a couple weeks from now, which is why it's a bit silly to be having a conversation this long now. One of the requirements Obi posited was that any controversy must be covered in multiple reliable sources; another was that it had to be covered in more than passing. Currently this has only been covered in one thing we'd really consider a reliable source - NYMag - and it was covered in passing in that (as it only received a sentence.) Kevin Gorman (talk) 05:56, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• You know what this is starting to reminding me of? Remember that braindead card game “War” that we used to play as kids? Remember how if you put down cards of equal value you have a “war,” where you’d lay down 3 cards and compare the 4th pair? And remember how if the cards were of equal value, you’d have a sub-“war”? And sometimes this went on for a few different “wars” until someone finally won? Well, this is just as braindead. ,Wil (talk) 08:07, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
• This proposal is something completely different from what was initially added. I should know: I added it! Are we really going to go all the way down this path, potentially adding a note to some only superficially related item, only to have this whole thing start from scratch because we didn't actually address the issue we started with in the first place? For reals?!? ,Wil (talk) 08:07, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

consensus is a strange bird. I've learned that, even if it's not explicitly written, consensus is sometimes compromise. This means that side A doesn't get all they want and side B doesn't get all they want either. Ppl can be opinionated so sometimes very creative out of the box solutions need to be developed, which the above seems to attempt at doing. If someone were to close the discussion on the first entry you proposed the finding would likely be 'no consensus', which means by default we don't include the material. Kevin said this isn't typical, but it is, for anything where there is strong disagreement, as noted before, this is actually rather minor compared to debates we can have here. You ask if there's not a better way - ok fine - what do you suggest? But don't do it here, maybe at village pump policy or something. The way things work has evolved over 10 years. The essential problem is that ultimately there is no final arbiter of content, no supreme editorial board we can call upon. So instead we have to argue it out.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 10:52, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

It seems to me that the concrete suggestion on the table is fair to all, in that everyone equally doesn't want it to happen. ,Wil (talk) 11:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Hard cases make bad law, Obiwan. I don't think it's possible to discuss inclusion criteria at this moment in time without everyone on both sides of the ongoing content dispute reading their positions on that into their positions on your proposal. I'm thinking it'd be better to wait to discuss general inclusion criteria until after we decide what to do in this concrete case, so that our general inclusion criteria are not infected by angling for advantages. I'm not suggesting that that's your intention, and I know you typically want to move concrete content disputes to ever more abstract problems which you want to settle before dealing with the issues on the table (not a criticism, just something I've noticed about your editing style). However, I don't see a desperate need for a general formulation of inclusion criteria. The article has developed fairly nicely without them for over a year, so what's the harm in waiting. Also, I don't see that this is a good time to formulate them, desperately needed or not. So, while I appreciate your effort and I see much good in your proposal, I won't be participating in this particular aspect of the discussion.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:50, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf, your consistent refusal to discuss inclusion criteria would be amusing if it wasn't so freaking tendentious. Obi was the first person to explicitly formulate a set of criteria, but I've brought up the scope of the list at least three or four times before in posts you didn't bother to answer. It's absolutely appropriate to discuss general inclusion criteria now. You decide if something belongs on a list and then decide what the list is going to be about. You decide what the list is going to be about and then decide if something belongs on it. As I previously mentioned, the list already partially establishes its scope in the lede - "This list is a collection of the more notable instances." I agree wholeheartedly with Obi that further discussion of scope would be a good thing, and that we shouldn't just go off of the previous framing used in the lede, but suggesting that we shouldn't discuss inclusion criteria now is pretty much saying "I'm not here to figure out how to create a worthwhile encyclopedic list, just here to see what extra drama I can stir up." Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:20, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Kevin, your consistent refusal to discuss actual content would be amusing if it weren't (sorry, I have some affection for the subjunctive mood) so freaking tendentious. I didn't refuse to discuss inclusion criteria, I merely said that I didn't think this was a good time to have the discussion. The fact that you (a) can't or won't read, understand, and/or respond to comments about content and (b) can't seem to stop yourself from accusing me of all kinds of random bad things just makes it even more clear to me that this is not a good time to have this discussion. At this point, like your suggestions that I be blocked for using the talk page, your false accusations about my intent in naming straw poll sections, your attributing edits to me that were made by others, your successful attempt to impose full protection on this page when you yourself instigated the edit-war which made the page protectable, and your oblique insinuations about my motives, your insistence that this is a good time to try to design inclusion criteria rather than discussing the particular content that's contested is pretty much saying "I can't get my way by building consensus, so I'm going to try to rewrite the rules until I win by a TKO."— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 19:36, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Alf: please stop misrepresenting what other people have said, and please stop disrupting the page in general. I probably won't have time to compile a reasonable ANI report with diffs until tonight when I land, but if your behavior hasn't changed, intend to do so then. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:50, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Forget about it

I'll admit that I have been absolutely amazed and confused at some of the things people have said and done in this debate. I got me to wondering: What am I missing? I looked through everything that has been said thus far, and about halfway through the first unbearably silly thread it occurred to me: Of course! the big picture! I don't care about getting this controversy on this list enough to waste any more of my time on it, let alone everyone else's. So let's just walk away from it. It wasn't there before I added it, and it won't be there after we all get back to doing something worthwhile. There are definitely debates worth having. This just isn't one of them. ,Wil (talk) 12:43, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

"We didn't start the fire,It was always burning, Since the world's been turning. We didn't start the fire,No we didn't light it, But we tried to fight it." One of the things you'll learn here is that consensus is often unpredictable, and seemingly simple changes can engender months of discussion. Also, while the initial creator 'withdrawing' their support for material has meaning, it doesn't hold much more weight than everyone else once others have weighed in. Once you start something, Wikipedia finishes it, either to your liking or not but it's out of your control...-Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 13:34, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Finish it without me then. I'm moving on to more important stuff. ,Wil (talk) 16:44, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Its an epiphany! Hallelujah!--MONGO 15:53, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

A new source

Although Kevin Gorman has suggested that I be blocked should I create any new sections on this talk page, I believe I will risk the wrath of the cabal for this important purpose. Here is a new source. Now, many of you think that O'Dwyer's is not an RS, but look! The NYT itself treats it as a reliable source. Can we do less? I will be proposing concrete language later today based on the fact that we now have multiple sources.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 18:38, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

• Alf, stop lying. Thanks. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:23, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
  • [2]— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 19:38, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
    • Read what I said in the diff you posted again. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:44, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
      • Still don't want to talk about content, do you?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 19:45, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
        • I'm quite happy to talk about how to make tihs an appropriate, high quality, encyclopedic list - you're the person a couple sections up who is for some reason refusing to discuss the scope of this list. However, until you correct your previous false (I'll extend AGF and take back the "deliberately false" bit for a moment at least) statement, you are correct that I will probably be asking you to stop making false and provocative statements about what I've said in this section, rather than talking much about content. Also, what Tarc said. Kevin Gorman (talk) 19:54, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
• It looks like a circle-jerk of O'Dwyer citing NY Mag's citing of O'Dwyer, tbh, so I really don't see how this advances the cause much. We need more than a sloppy PR insider blog and a casual not-even-a-name-drop mention in a magazine. Tarc (talk) 19:47, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
• Between the insistence that a rs citing a blog makes the blog an rs, the edit requests, and this logical fallacy, this is getting very tedious. We are at the point of it being disruptive. Dave Dial (talk) 20:08, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Not to mention, the new "source" in question is actually about this dispute, here on this page, NOT about any actual controversy around Koh's banning. It has become meta. Where is the law school? Where are the free speech activists? Where is the WMF's statement on the issue? Nowhere to be seen. The source in question doesn't spend any time on that, and addresses in no way why the banning itself was controversial. All we have is a report on what editors are doing on this particular page and whether THEY think it's controversial enough. This is all becoming very meta. I'm sure wikipediocracy is laughing their asses off. Now, if the NY times picks this up, and says "Huge edit war breaks out over whether to include content on this list", and then another RS follows up, we might actually get this discussion added as a controversy, but not the banning itself. What a waste of time.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 20:21, 10 June 2014 (UTC)

Obiwankenobi, I know you're sick of the whole thing, and please don't feel like you must respond, but I'd guess that your speculation about what's going to end up on the list are spot on. It doesn't seem at all unlikely that the edit-war here and ensuing discussion will end up getting an entry on the list.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:44, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

DD2K, first of all, "tedious" and "tendentious" are different things. If you're going to accuse me of tendentious editing, you should do so explicitly. If I'm merely boring you, go somewhere else. Also, if you have a problem with my edit requests, why don't you say what it is in some more appropriate venue, like ANI? My edit requests were perfectly proper. Now, on to your content-related points. First of all, it's accepted sourcing practice in Wikipedia and even in the scholarly world that a secondary source citing a fact to an unreliable source makes the information (not the source) reliable. Read WP:RS about how we use reliable secondary sources to evaluate the claims in unreliable primary sources if you don't believe me. Finally, you characterize O'Dwyer's as a blog, although it is not. You also don't note that even blogs can be reliable sources, and you fail to provide any reason why this isn't that kind of blog (even though it's not one). Now, why don't you drop your insinuations about my editing being tedious/tendentious and explain clearly how O'Dwyer's is not a reliable source. Protip: Read the NYT article I linked to above, which shows that the NYT considers it a reliable source.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:31, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

• Statistical measurements of meta ray radiation are showing upward trends according to a survey of past analyses. --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  20:30, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
  • As an aside, Kevin Gorman and Alf.laylah.wa.laylah, you're two of the most productive contributors to this discussion, but is there any of this parallel arguing (which ultimately doesn't push the subject at hand forward) that could be forked to usertalk or some other venue? I don't mean to stick my nose in, but the atmosphere and addition to an already formidable wall of text may, I would venture, discourage participation. --— Rhododendrites ^talk |  20:32, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
    • Rhodo: sadly, I agree with you that much of the dialogue between me and Alf discourages outside participation. Unfortunately, until Alf backs off, I'm not sure how much of it can be forked elsewhere (unless I want to start another ANI thread requesting action against Alf, which I'm still hoping not to have to do.) Alf had at one point started 26 of the 32 sections on the page at the time (I'm too lazy to recount now,) has started multiple sections (including this one) by either personally attacking participants in the discussion or by lying about stuff they've said, and has started multiple hilariously misguided faux RfCs. I think that Obi's section a couple up has the potential to resolve both this point and further points in this future, and would encourage as many people as willing to participate there. Kevin Gorman (talk) 21:47, 10 June 2014 (UTC)
• People who have to fill space with opinion pieces are excited by anything. However, the lead of the article shows that the topic is Wikipedia, as in the encyclopedic content and the governance of that content. Come back in three months and see how much of a "controversy" exists about the exclusion of a particular person from a wikiconference. Johnuniq (talk) 03:45, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
• All the defensive comments here really aren't helping very much. O'Dwyer is used as a source quite extensively in Wikipedia. It appears to be considered a RS by WP's administration, since they haven't done anything to try to remove it or have not attempted to blacklist the url. Cla68 (talk) 07:13, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
• There are three separate issues at play here. First, is the new O'Dwyer's article a reliable source for anything? Second, if so, does it tend to lend weight to this controversy regarding inclusion on the list? Third, if it is an RS, for what factual information is it an RS? I think a number of comments above conflate these issues. I was merely asking about the first so that we can move on to discussing the others.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 14:44, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

I'd say no, not really a reliable source for anything. It's a self-published blog for all intents and purposes. If this newsletter is used elsewhere in Wikipedia, then that simply proves that there's bad stuff in Wikipedia. Surprise surprise. Coretheapple (talk) 14:49, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

The references to Kevin Gorman puzzled me, so I went back and noticed that Gorman was pretty strong in criticizing the reliability of the first O'Dwyer article, pointing out some embarrassing errors. O'Dwyer took umbrage at that, and hence the article, replete with a photo of Gorman. Pure retribution, no news value at all, and just diminishes further the reliability of the O'Dwyer newsletter as a Wikipedia source. Coretheapple (talk) 14:54, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Note that J. R. O'Dwyer Company publishes a number of print magazines. Note that these magazines are taken very seriously by sources universally agreed to be reliable. Not only the NYT article I linked to above but e.g. Mondo Times. Articles from O'Dwyer's magazines are cited in scholarly journals, see this google scholar search. Articles from his magazines are cited in scholarly books, e.g. [3], [4] (which also cites his news blog, interestingly), [5], [6], and so on. It's pretty clear that his print journals are considered reliable by a wide variety of themselves-reliable sources. How then does this source not satisfy WP:NEWSBLOG? It seems to be the platonic ideal of one. This is only in response to your unsupported claim that O'Dwyer's blog is "not really a reliable source for anything." Is it possible that you could back up that opinion with reference to some actual policies or guidelines, preferably explaining how it's not a reliable NEWSBLOG in the process?— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:16, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

I can only "back that up" by observing that the article that they wrote on this was rife with errors, and that they followed up (or more precisely "he" followed up) with a hit piece on Gorman. "Platonic ideal" my fanny. Coretheapple (talk) 15:29, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

So your argument is basically that your personal knowledge of the subject of a single article from a source not only trumps the WP guideline on RS but that your personal opinion of the accuracy of a single article discredits all material from the source, even in the face of solid evidence that the source meets the WP guideline on RS? And this position is so obvious to you that you don't feel any need to discuss my actual substantive argument that O'Dwyer's satisfies WP:NEWSBLOG? I'm not arguing with you at this point, I just want to be sure I understand your position.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 15:42, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

My "position" is that I am believing what I see with my two eyes. Coretheapple (talk) 15:47, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

So basically your OR trumps both guideline and policy, then? Thanks for clarifying.— alf laylah wa laylah (talk) 16:08, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

Whatever. I'm just suggesting that we read a source before using it. This is simply O'Dwyer's blog. It's possible that he runs an empire of publications but what he has written on this subject is pure crap, filled with inaccuracies, obviously not even rudimentary fact-checking. Should we check on the reliability of his publications, are they as bad as what he produces on his blog? Good rhetorical question, Core! Maybe we should. But as I said, our own two eyes tell us that this is not a reliable source. There is nothing in WP:V that requires editors to be deaf, dumb and blind and to act like automatons. Coretheapple (talk) 16:11, 11 June 2014 (UTC)

But admittedly I haven't responded directly to your point. Does WP:NEWSBLOG apply? No it does not. This is not a blog in a news organization. It is the personal blog of some guy who runs a PR newsletter. As we can see from what he has written on this manufactured controversy, he writes utter rubbish, no fact-checking, no accuracy. So no, not applicable. Coretheapple (talk) 16:15, 11 June 2014 (UTC)