[SharedKnowing] Wikimedia to adopt a stricter porn policy?

[David Goodman]

I left Citizendium in part because of Larry's insistence on a
"family-friendly" policy, which I considered incompatible with writing
a serious encyclopedia for contemporary adult users.  Porn is
portrayal of sexual activity intended to arouse sexual desire, and why
this should be though a bad thing escapes me entirely. Even if we were
for some reason to adopt the view of an earlier century and think this
an evil thing to do, I consider very few of the cited images to be
pornographic, but I can only judge on the basis of whether they tend
to excite me, though I accept it is impossible to tell what will be
sexually exciting to someone else. Indeed, there is nothing or almost
nothing that will not be sexually charged to somebody, and excite
their sexual desire.

There are some few of the images cited that I find of sexual  as
distinct from informative or artistic interest, and even were we to
have a policy against including images that were for some significant
portion of viewers pornographic, I do not see how most of the images
under discussion would fall in that group.  A very few of the images
under discussion at commons seemed to me questionable on other
grounds, such as the possible use of underage models, or as possibly
photographs of people who did not consent to this use of the images,
and those of course cannot be kept unless this can be ruled out.

We should include all aspects of contemporary culture  and human
behavior, including sexual activity, and present it as any other
subject, with words and images. Our only limit should be what the law
allows, and if there is a country more liberal in this respect than
the US, we should move commons to it.  The only excuse for Jimmy's
action is if he is in fact proceeding under legal advice,and if so,
the WMF attorney should take the responsibility for it--and explain
why he thinks it advisable to not try for the narrowest definition of
the class of illegal materials possible.


David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG



On Thu, May 6, 2010 at 9:04 PM, Larry Sanger <sanger at citizendium.org> wrote:
> This is shaping up to be big news, as in
> front-page-of-tech-sections-around-the-world news.  Maybe front-page news,
> full stop, because it involves Jimmy Wales admitting that Wikimedia Commons
> and probably Wikipedia itself has porn, just days after Jay Walsh
> essentially denied it to the AFP; and that’s pretty big news to a lot of
> people.
>
>
>
> After the recent coverage in FoxNews.com of my FBI report, I posted a reply
> to the resulting hullaballoo here:
>
>
>
> http://www.larrysanger.org/MoreAboutWikimedia.html
>
>
>
> After a few days, I found myself looking at the rather witty and very
> well-informed, if somewhat unbalanced, commentary on wikipediareview.com.
> Say what you will about those folks, but they really know what they’re
> talking about when it comes to the problems with Wikipedia.  They’re
> veritable experts.  Anyway, I opened an account and started posting, and
> among other things I posted this and this:
>
>
>
> http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=29374&view=findpost&p=234454
>
> http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=29374&view=findpost&p=234500
>
>
>
> Then just a few days later—today—Jimmy Wales started ordering the deletion
> of porn from Wikimedia Commons, and (I assume also) Wikipedia.  Look at:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Sexual_content
>
>
>
> and:
>
>
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Village_pump#Cleanup_policy
>
> (The rascals are out in force, bemoaning that their porn is being deleted.)
>
>
>
> and:
>
>
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Jimbo_Wales&oldid=38806204
>
>
>
> For discussion of these events, see:
> http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?showtopic=29458
>
>
>
> There isn’t just some unnecessary porn on Wikimedia servers.  There’s an
> amazing amount and variety, and Jimmy Wales now wants it reduced.  And the
> Wikipedians/Wikimedia Commons participants are pushing back hard!
>
>
>
> I did not realize until recently how many people did not know that Wikipedia
> & Wikimedia projects host terrific amounts of porn.  I asked a few people at
> a conference at which I spoke about Wikipedia today; they didn’t know…even
> many school district technical directors didn’t realize it.
>
> For your, um, edification, here are some links that were posted to Jimmy
> Wales’ user talk page
> (http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Jimbo_Wales).  Note, these are
> on Commons, not on Wikipedia itself, although Wikipedia itself has quite a
> bit of unadulterated, no-questions-about-it porn too:
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:BDSM
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:BDSM_humiliation
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Sexual_fetishism
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Spanking
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Zoophilia
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Pedophilia
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Sexual_penetrative_use_of_dildos
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Sexual_penetrative_use_of_objects
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Masturbating_with_dildos
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Female_masturbation
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Fisting
>
> http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Male_masturbation
>
> An intrepid WikipediaReview.com user found this very interesting edit, in
> which Jimmy Wales asserts his authority: http://is.gd/bXEUk
>
>
>
> He says this explosive thing:
>
>
>
> I believe that you misinterpreted what I said. I said that if the Wikimedia
> Foundation wants to declare that it is ok for Commons to be a porn host,
> they can do that, and I'll not be able to continue. That isn't going to
> happen, though, and in fact you should expect a strong statement from the
> Board and/or Sue in the next few days.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:35, 6 May 2010
> (UTC)
>
>
>
> Jimmy Wales has essentially issued an ultimatum: essentially, as I read him,
> he’s saying that either the porn goes, or he goes.  I have congratulated him
> on his good judgment on this (on Twitter).
>
>
>
> It will be interesting to learn why he has taken this stance (that Wikimedia
> Commons at least has a lot of unnecessary porn, and they should get rid of
> it), just days after Jay Walsh essentially denied that the Wikimedia
> projects support or host porn.  But I do have to congratulate Jimmy Wales on
> acquiring a backbone on this.
>
>
>
> --Larry
>
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