Here comes the big bad Terms of Use Options

[thekohser]

Look out, everyone. The WMF is actually trying to build a Terms of Use for the Wikimedia sites.

This news came from an announcement by Geoff Brigham, who you may remember was introduced to the wider world by the mainstream media.

Here's what we'll potentially have to refrain from while playing around on Wikipedia:

Activities That You Agree to Refrain From

Maintaining and providing for a vibrant Community of Users is very important to us. We exist because of the contributions of Users like yourself, and we happily welcome your participation. Certain activities, however, whether legal or illegal, may be harmful to other Users and violate our rules, and they may also subject you to liability. Therefore, for your own protection and for that of other Users, you may not engage in such activities on our sites.

Prohibited activities include:

Harassment, threats, stalking, spamming, or vandalism;
Using any information obtained from a Project website to harass, abuse, or harm another person;
Intentionally or knowingly posting false, inaccurate, misleading, defamatory, or libelous content;
Infringing the privacy rights of others under the laws of the United States or your own country or jurisdiction;
Infringing copyrights, trademarks, patents, or other proprietary rights;
Linking to material that violates any provision of this Agreement or any applicable law or regulation;
Attempting to impersonate another User or individual, misrepresenting your affiliation with any individual or entity, or using the Username of another User;
Posting child pornography or any other content that violates U.S. federal or state law concerning child pornography;
Soliciting personal information from anyone under the age of 18 or exploiting anyone under the age of 18 in a sexual, violent, or other manner, or violating any federal or state law otherwise intended to protect the health or well-being of minors;
Fraud, misrepresentation, trafficking in unlawful obscene material, or gambling;
Posting or distributing content that contains any viruses, malware, worms, Trojan horses, malicious code, or other harmful content;
Automated uses of the site that are abusive or disruptive of the Services and have not been approved by the Wikimedia Community;
Disrupting the Services by placing an undue burden on a Project website or the networks or servers connected with a Project website;
Disrupting the Services by inundating any of the Project websites with communications or other traffic that suggests no serious intent to use the Project website for its stated purpose;
Probing, scanning, or testing the vulnerability of any of our technical systems or networks without authorization;
Accessing, tampering with, or using any of our non-public areas in our computer systems, including shared areas that you have not been invited to;
Transmitting chain mail, junk mail, or spam to other Users; and
Using the Services in a manner that is inconsistent with any and all applicable laws and regulations.

Watch for how the Wikimedia "community" will invent new and twisted ways of defining the words "harass", "misleading", "testing", and "invited".

[Cedric]

Hmmmm. I wonder who this is meant to refer to?

[Forward!]

Hmmmm. I wonder who this is meant to refer to?

I think we all know who that refers to, and I'm pretty sure they're banned from here too.

[EricBarbour]

If they actually implement this, they'll have to start by banning about 30-40% of the administrators.

Conclusion: they won't implement this.

[The Joy]

If they actually implement this, they'll have to start by banning about 30-40% of the administrators.

Conclusion: they won't implement this.

Or it will be implemented with everyone ignoring it until they need to use it as a banhammer against their enemies.

Now Giano, Malleus, and other straight-talkers will have something new to fear.

[Ottava]

"Posting child pornography or any other content that violates U.S. federal or state law concerning child pornography;"


US Law (as well as German law, mind you) states that child pornography includes cartoon pornography if the individual looks like a child to a "reasonable" person. Just imagine how this will be twisted around.

It also says that unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia or genital region is also child pornography, which means underwear shots with the rest of the body cropped out (one was recently deleted on Commons) would clearly violate that. However, you can expect fights.


Edit - sorry, apparently the image wasn't deleted yet - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:...Boxer_brief.JPG There were many similar images with clear statements that they were taken of minors.

This post has been edited by Ottava: Fri 9th September 2011, 8:19pm

[SB_Johnny]

Look out, everyone. The WMF is actually trying to build a Terms of Use for the Wikimedia sites.

This news came from an announcement by Geoff Brigham, who you may remember was introduced to the wider world by the mainstream media.

Harassment, threats, stalking, spamming, or vandalism;

Watch for how the Wikimedia "community" will invent new and twisted ways of defining the words "harass", "misleading", "testing", and "invited".

Or "threats", or "stalking", or "spamming", or "vandalism"... that will be fun indeed.

Will the ubiquitous "user warning templates" qualify as threats?

"Posting child pornography or any other content that violates U.S. federal or state law concerning child pornography;"

Dude, get yer mind out of the gutter, will ya? Sheesh!

[Alison]

Hmmmm. I wonder who this is meant to refer to?

I think we all know who that refers to, and I'm pretty sure they're banned from here too.

They've won the triple-crown of being banned from WP, banned from here, and banned from ED (old and new)

It also says that unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia or genital region is also child pornography

You're the only one I know who's been repeatedly shown to have indulged in "unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia", as your many postings here have illustrated. Seriously, dude.

[Sololol]

Edit - sorry, apparently the image wasn't deleted yet - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:...Boxer_brief.JPG There were many similar images with clear statements that they were taken of minors.

So you just posted a link to child pornography on our fair website?! Say it ain't so, Ottava!

[Zoloft]

Edit - sorry, apparently the image wasn't deleted yet - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:...Boxer_brief.JPG There were many similar images with clear statements that they were taken of minors.

So you just posted a link to child pornography on our fair website?! Say it ain't so, Ottava!

You know what they say—anyone who thinks about that stuff all the time and has access to it is a... *falls over laughing*
No, I can't sink that low, sorry.

[Kelly Martin]

Linking to material that violates any provision of this Agreement or any applicable law or regulation

It's BADSITES all over again!

[Guido den Broeder]

Cool!

Even the first term alone will pretty much empty the user base.

[carbuncle]

We will not be liable to you or to any other party for any direct, indirect, incidental, special, consequential or exemplary damages, including but not limited to, damages for loss of profits, goodwill, use, data, or other intangible losses, regardless of whether we were advised of the possibility of such damage. In no event shall our liability under these rules exceed one-hundred dollars ($100.00) in aggregate. In the case that applicable law may not allow the limitation or exclusion of liability or incidental or consequential damages, the above limitation or exclusion may not apply to you, although our liability will be limited to the fullest extent permitted by applicable law.

We are not liable for any ill effects of WP. Of course, not being liable, our liability is limited to $100 or whatever pocket change we can gather up in the office. But we are not liable. Of course, if we were found to be liable, which we are not, and our own limitation on our liability were to be, well, not really something we can do, then we would only be liable to the extent of the law (which seems like it might be obvious, but you never know when some judge is going to have a minor stroke while on the bench and sentence everyone in the WMF to interplanetary exodus).

[Ottava]

Hmmmm. I wonder who this is meant to refer to?

I think we all know who that refers to, and I'm pretty sure they're banned from here too.

They've won the triple-crown of being banned from WP, banned from here, and banned from ED (old and new)

It also says that unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia or genital region is also child pornography

You're the only one I know who's been repeatedly shown to have indulged in "unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia", as your many postings here have illustrated. Seriously, dude.

Are people who run MADD drunk drivers? One can be obsessed with getting rid of a crime without being committers of the crime. I find your logic interesting.

Are women who create rape support groups or push for stricter rape laws as bad as rapists? Those who want to stop high murder rates as bad as murderers?



Sololol

So you just posted a link to child pornography on our fair website?! Say it ain't so, Ottava!

I posted a link to a deletion discussion that shows how people were willing to keep the image before.

This post has been edited by Ottava: Sat 10th September 2011, 2:40pm

[SL93]

If this is actually implemented, it will be just like the policies that are twisted around by individual editors especially in the case of admins. It is almost impossible to change an admin's behavior because discussion about their behavior normally points to the false belief that admins are messiahs or something.

[TheKartingWikipedian]

Plenty of "us" and "we" [Wikimedia Foundation] in that load of bullshit ToU - meaning, "not you". I thought Wikipedia was some sort of 'community project', meaning "all of us" or "everyone". There's too much "us and them" for my liking.

Opportunities for loads of new templates though: "Big Red Cross - You are in breach of OUR terms and conditions .... blah, blah, blah". Fuck off Wikipedia! You stink.

This post has been edited by TheKartingWikipedian: Sat 10th September 2011, 5:38pm

[melloden]

Plenty of "us" and "we" [Wikimedia Foundation] in that load of bullshit ToU - meaning, "not you". I thought Wikipedia was some sort of 'community project', meaning "all of us" or "everyone". There's too much "us and them" for my liking.

Opportunities for loads of new templates though: "Big Red Cross - You are in breach of OUR terms and conditions .... blah, blah, blah". Fuck off Wikipedia! You stink.

You thought that Wikipedia was a community project? It's not been clear that the WMF runs everything and can override the "community" when- and however it wants because it owns Wikipedia? There's a bunch of "us and them" because the WMF--not the editors--can shut Wikipedia down whenever it wants.

[EricBarbour]

There's a bunch of "us and them" because the WMF--not the editors--can shut Wikipedia down whenever it wants.

They should shut it down. But of course, they won't--because the WMF is now a moneymaking operation. Sue Gardner and Erik Moeller are quite fond of their fat salaries, and of their remarkable level of personal irresponsibility on the job. Not to mention all the asskissing they are unquestionably the recipients of.

It's like Comic-Con, or the furry convention scene. Too big to fail. If they shut it down, not only would thousands of basement-dwellers have nothing to do and go crazy. More important, Sue and Erik would have to go out and find real jobs. And they can't do that.

Would you hire Erik Moeller?

[Detective]

Edit - sorry, apparently the image wasn't deleted yet - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:...Boxer_brief.JPG There were many similar images with clear statements that they were taken of minors.

The intriguing thing is that this link has two deletion discussions. The first was closed as a keep. The second seems to be heading for a unanimous delete. Yet the first photo is just a redirect to the second! Can anyone explain the logic?

If the caption hadn't said it was a 14 year old, would anyone have known?

[Vigilant]

"Posting child pornography or any other content that violates U.S. federal or state law concerning child pornography;"


US Law (as well as German law, mind you) states that child pornography includes cartoon pornography if the individual looks like a child to a "reasonable" person. Just imagine how this will be twisted around.

It also says that unnecessary focus on a child's genitalia or genital region is also child pornography, which means underwear shots with the rest of the body cropped out (one was recently deleted on Commons) would clearly violate that. However, you can expect fights.


Edit - sorry, apparently the image wasn't deleted yet - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:...Boxer_brief.JPG There were many similar images with clear statements that they were taken of minors.

Let's take stock here:
* You are opinionated, shrill and and aggressive when presenting your position.
* You are an insufferable know it all who thinks everyone who disagrees with you is evil.
* You've had some sort of serious sexual abuse in your past
* You are obsessed with little boys' underwear

You're going to be a great Catholic priest Jeffrey.