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 David Gerard's misguided tweets..., Is he really that free and loose on Twitter? |
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| the fieryangel |
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the Internet Review Corporation is watching you...
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| Cedric |
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General Gato
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QUOTE(the fieryangel @ Sat 28th November 2009, 5:56am)  Nothing much evidently. Andrew Landeryou apparently is a right-leaning political blogger from Australia. He has a BLP, which some IP editor vandalized on November 21 to state that Landeryou was "Premier of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics". The IP resolves to Australia. Another IP editor (resolving to the US) reverted the vandalism and prodded the entire article for deletion yesterday, some hours after Landeryou sent Gerard his "threat". Another Australian IP had showed up on November 9 and removed or toned down some of the more controversial material in the article, but I cannot tell if that has anything to do with the "sockpuppet investigation" that Gerard refers to or not. Gerard being Gerard, instead of laughing off Landeryou's agitated email, he has to go blogging about it. Sheesh! It appears to me that these two twits deserve one another. |
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| Somey |
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Can't actually moderate (or even post)
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QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sat 28th November 2009, 10:43am) Maybe Kelly or some old timer could tell us more about DG and CoS. It always seemed strange to me that an ex-CoSer (I assume that is what DG is, but not certain) would take on such an aberrant appearance/style and cult-like involvement in another project... I'm quite certain that Dave has never been a Scientologist. If I looked hard enough, I could probably find something linkable somewhere in which he explains his motivations - Dave wanted to be a rock journalist back during the Usenet days, and apparently participated in several band-related newsgroups... at some point he noticed that the CoS was basically trying to "take over" Usenet via large-scale spamming and disinformation campaigns (and you're right, KM could tell us more about this). To some extent they succeeded, and they (along with numerous other groups and spammers in general) actually made Usenet largely worthless for people who just wanted to chat about things that interested them. Essentially, he transferred his loyalties to Wikipedia fairly early on, and began to develop an almost hypervigilant mindset towards CoS activity on WP - I think the quote I saw went something like "I'll be damned if we're going to let them do to Wikipedia what they did to Usenet," or something to that effect. Anyway, as a result of all that he was labeled a "suppressive person" by the CoS, which is ironic, since he actually is sort of suppressive, generally speaking. |
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| GlassBeadGame |
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Dharma Bum
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QUOTE(Somey @ Sat 28th November 2009, 12:09pm) QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sat 28th November 2009, 10:43am) Maybe Kelly or some old timer could tell us more about DG and CoS. It always seemed strange to me that an ex-CoSer (I assume that is what DG is, but not certain) would take on such an aberrant appearance/style and cult-like involvement in another project... I'm quite certain that Dave has never been a Scientologist. If I looked hard enough, I could probably find something linkable somewhere in which he explains his motivations - Dave wanted to be a rock journalist back during the Usenet days, and apparently participated in several band-related newsgroups... at some point he noticed that the CoS was basically trying to "take over" Usenet via large-scale spamming and disinformation campaigns (and you're right, KM could tell us more about this). To some extent they succeeded, and they (along with numerous other groups and spammers in general) actually made Usenet largely worthless for people who just wanted to chat about things that interested them. Essentially, he transferred his loyalties to Wikipedia fairly early on, and began to develop an almost hypervigilant mindset towards CoS activity on WP - I think the quote I saw went something like "I'll be damned if we're going to let them do to Wikipedia what they did to Usenet," or something to that effect. Anyway, as a result of all that he was labeled a "suppressive person" by the CoS, which is ironic, since he actually is sort of suppressive, generally speaking. Ahhh. A dark Ziggy Stardust defending rock and roll against an evil cult. Makes some sense really. Was that one of subplots of Heavy Metal? |
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| Somey |
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Can't actually moderate (or even post)
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QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sat 28th November 2009, 11:15am) Ahhh. A dark Ziggy Stardust defending rock and roll against an evil cult. Makes some sense really. Was that one of subplots of Heavy Metal? You're probably thinking of the far more Gerardian Kiss Meets the Phantom of the Park (T-H-L-K-D)... Many aspects of Dave Gerard's WP history are actually ironic, even going beyond what he did in my own case. For example, one of the Aussie rock bands Dave was interested in back in the 90's was The Church (T-H-L-K-D), who you'll recall had a fairly big hit with a song called "Under the Milky Way." The Church were fronted by Steve Kilbey (T-H-L-K-D), and if you search the WR archives on the word "Kilbey" you'll find that the only two admitted fans of his around here are me and the now-inactive Piperdown. But Piperdown would never have joined WR if he hadn't been erroneously indef-blocked as an "overstock.com meatpuppet" by... you guessed it, Dave Gerard! I'm sure there are other examples, but that one always gives me a chuckle for some reason. |
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| TungstenCarbide |
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Allegedly shot down by stray Ukrainian missile
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QUOTE(Somey @ Sat 28th November 2009, 5:09pm) QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sat 28th November 2009, 10:43am) Maybe Kelly or some old timer could tell us more about DG and CoS. It always seemed strange to me that an ex-CoSer (I assume that is what DG is, but not certain) would take on such an aberrant appearance/style and cult-like involvement in another project... I'm quite certain that Dave has never been a Scientologist. If I looked hard enough, I could probably find something linkable somewhere in which he explains his motivations - Dave wanted to be a rock journalist back during the Usenet days, and apparently participated in several band-related newsgroups... at some point he noticed that the CoS was basically trying to "take over" Usenet via large-scale spamming and disinformation campaigns (and you're right, KM could tell us more about this). To some extent they succeeded, and they (along with numerous other groups and spammers in general) actually made Usenet largely worthless for people who just wanted to chat about things that interested them. Essentially, he transferred his loyalties to Wikipedia fairly early on, and began to develop an almost hypervigilant mindset towards CoS activity on WP - I think the quote I saw went something like "I'll be damned if we're going to let them do to Wikipedia what they did to Usenet," or something to that effect. Anyway, as a result of all that he was labeled a "suppressive person" by the CoS, which is ironic, since he actually is sort of suppressive, generally speaking. I seem to recall more of his personal history on his user page, but it seems to be deleted now, or i just missed it. He had a big long spiel about being run out of Australia, or something like that, after giving an obnoxious speech at an awards ceremony while a rock journalist. |
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| Kelly Martin |
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Bring back the guttersnipes!
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David Gerard was a second-wave anti-Scientologist, as i recall: he got involved when Helena Kobrin attempted to rmgroup alt.religion.scientology. At the time, he was living in Australia. My mental classification for him at the time was "gadfly critic": he rarely had much to say that was worth saying, and seem mainly to be involved for the fun of it rather than out of any real concern for Scientology's social impacts. I think his present dislike of Scientology is almost entirely founded in their "attack on the Internet" rather than any deeper concern for the need to defend against manipulative cults. He is also clearly a shock counterculturist (as his involvement in the operation of several well-known shock websites attests), and being anti-Scientology is viewed as "edgy" by some people, so that probably also added to the appeal.
One of the things I noticed when I was involved in the anti-Scientology movement was the tendency of anti-Scientologists to become cultish themselves. This isn't surprising since so many of them are ex-Scientologists, which means they've already demonstrated a susceptibility for cult behavior. Gerard, however, has no documented history of cult involvement, other than Wikipedia. I doubt he would become involved in a cult at the lower levels, but his clear predilection for being a behind-the-scenes manipulator makes him a prime candidate for high-level membership of a cult that he helped start.
Ironically it's David that put me on to Jo Freeman's essay about structurelessness, which is so clearly applicable to Wikipedia, yet David has on several occasions moved to block changes that would remediate these problems. David knows that Wikipedia has governance problems and clearly has some sense of how to cure them; but he also knows that the cure would deprive him of the emotional fix he gets from the current state of affairs. And there is no way he's going to put his personal predilection for drama ahead of Wikipedia's long-term interests, about which he has very little, if any, concern.
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| Jon Awbrey |
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Ï„á½° δΠμοι παθήματα μαθήματα γÎγονε
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QUOTE(Doc glasgow @ Sat 28th November 2009, 11:49am) QUOTE "@jeamland mr landeryou has some history on wikipedia. (i did the sockpuppet investigation.)"
Where goes the WMF privacy policy? Checkusers blogging and bragging about their investigations? I'm going to look at the history of this further. Oh good, the Big Bad Internet Highway Cop hiding behind the Internet Billboard pulls his nose out of his Internet Dough-Net long enough to go chase 1 out of a thousand speeders, and Justice Prevails in Wikiland. Jon (IMG: smilys0b23ax56/default/hrmph.gif) |
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| LessHorrid vanU |
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Devils Advocaat
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QUOTE(Doc glasgow @ Sat 28th November 2009, 4:49pm) QUOTE "@jeamland mr landeryou has some history on wikipedia. (i did the sockpuppet investigation.)" Where goes the WMF privacy policy? Checkusers blogging and bragging about their investigations? I'm going to look at the history of this further. Not that it will get you anywhere, in truth. DG is old school, which means there is enough kudos in the WMF to allow DG to get away with what would have you and me banned from Wikipedia. Mind you, it would be ironic if thee and me got into some sort trouble with ArbCom for dissing DG on an off-Wiki site. I would invite it, in truth. |
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| LessHorrid vanU |
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Devils Advocaat
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QUOTE(Kelly Martin @ Sat 28th November 2009, 7:16pm)
David Gerard was a second-wave anti-Scientologist, as i recall: he got involved when Helena Kobrin attempted to rmgroup alt.religion.scientology. At the time, he was living in Australia. My mental classification for him at the time was "gadfly critic": he rarely had much to say that was worth saying, and seem mainly to be involved for the fun of it rather than out of any real concern for Scientology's social impacts. I think his present dislike of Scientology is almost entirely founded in their "attack on the Internet" rather than any deeper concern for the need to defend against manipulative cults. He is also clearly a shock counterculturist (as his involvement in the operation of several well-known shock websites attests), and being anti-Scientology is viewed as "edgy" by some people, so that probably also added to the appeal.
One of the things I noticed when I was involved in the anti-Scientology movement was the tendency of anti-Scientologists to become cultish themselves. This isn't surprising since so many of them are ex-Scientologists, which means they've already demonstrated a susceptibility for cult behavior. Gerard, however, has no documented history of cult involvement, other than Wikipedia. I doubt he would become involved in a cult at the lower levels, but his clear predilection for being a behind-the-scenes manipulator makes him a prime candidate for high-level membership of a cult that he helped start.
Ironically it's David that put me on to Jo Freeman's essay about structurelessness, which is so clearly applicable to Wikipedia, yet David has on several occasions moved to block changes that would remediate these problems. David knows that Wikipedia has governance problems and clearly has some sense of how to cure them; but he also knows that the cure would deprive him of the emotional fix he gets from the current state of affairs. And there is no way he's going to put his personal predilection for drama ahead of Wikipedia's long-term interests, about which he has very little, if any, concern.
DG not into cults? Well, I would certainly suggest with those "goff" piccies that people are careless enough to keep posting, that he was most likely into Southern Death Cult, The Cult, and even perhaps Cult Hero. Although, of course, being a wannabe music critic he may not even have been aware of these groups... |
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| Somey |
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QUOTE(MZMcBride @ Sat 28th November 2009, 5:59pm) QUOTE(Kelly Martin @ Sat 28th November 2009, 2:16pm) He is also clearly a shock counterculturist (as his involvement in the operation of several well-known shock websites attests), and being anti-Scientology is viewed as "edgy" by some people, so that probably also added to the appeal. lemonparty.org is his, right? What are the others? It was discussed in this thread, but the three mentioned at that time were thewillpower.org, yourmom.org and k-k-k.com. All are NSFW, of course... I vaguely recall that the latter is an attempt to embarrass the Ku Klux Klan by hosting interracial gay porn as if it were their idea of a good time, which I suppose makes it an admirable endeavor in a way. The others, ehhh, maybe not so much. (IMG: smilys0b23ax56/default/hmmm.gif) |
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| cyofee |
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QUOTE(Nerd @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:46pm) ArbCom have revoked his checkuser and oversight privs. Owned. Something tells me they've been waiting to do this for a long time. This post has been edited by cyofee: |
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| Cedric |
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General Gato
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QUOTE(cyofee @ Sun 29th November 2009, 7:25am) QUOTE(Nerd @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:46pm) ArbCom have revoked his checkuser and oversight privs. Owned. Something tells me they've been waiting to do this for a long time. Too much skulldancing, I reckon. (IMG: smilys0b23ax56/default/wink.gif) |
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| the fieryangel |
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the Internet Review Corporation is watching you...
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QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sun 29th November 2009, 2:55pm) QUOTE(cyofee @ Sun 29th November 2009, 8:25am) QUOTE(Nerd @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:46pm) ArbCom have revoked his checkuser and oversight privs. Owned. Something tells me they've been waiting to do this for a long time. Do I remember incorrectly or didn't the privacy policy made this the domain of "the ombudsperson," who seemed to have no other responsibilities other than enforce this policy for the board? The current policy seems to make no reference to this actor. I think letting Arbcom handle this instead of a person directly answerable to the board of trustees is a step in the wrong direction. Yes, but something clearly needed to be done. The fact that something has been done is a clear message to those who have access to private data: if you abuse it, you're going to suffer the consequences. I say that the Arbcom did the right thing here. |
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| GlassBeadGame |
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Dharma Bum
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QUOTE(the fieryangel @ Sun 29th November 2009, 9:02am) QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sun 29th November 2009, 2:55pm) QUOTE(cyofee @ Sun 29th November 2009, 8:25am) QUOTE(Nerd @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:46pm) ArbCom have revoked his checkuser and oversight privs. Owned. Something tells me they've been waiting to do this for a long time. Do I remember incorrectly or didn't the privacy policy made this the domain of "the ombudsperson," who seemed to have no other responsibilities other than enforce this policy for the board? The current policy seems to make no reference to this actor. I think letting Arbcom handle this instead of a person directly answerable to the board of trustees is a step in the wrong direction. Yes, but something clearly needed to be done. The fact that something has been done is a clear message to those who have access to private data: if you abuse it, you're going to suffer the consequences. I say that the Arbcom did the right thing here. Yes the right thing as far as it goes even if done by the wrong people. This whole task (Checkuser) ought to conducted by agents answerable to the B/T. Loss of employment should be the least of consequences with some prospect for further liability. There seemed to the beginning of recognizing this with: 1) a board level policy, and; 2) a special person(s) selected by the board to carry it out. Even then the actual task was handed out willy-nilly to "community members." But giving the job to ArbCom seems to me to be a retreat from even this passing nod to responsibility. |
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| the fieryangel |
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the Internet Review Corporation is watching you...
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QUOTE(No one of consequence @ Sun 29th November 2009, 3:20pm) QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:55pm)
Do I remember incorrectly or didn't the privacy policy made this the domain of "the ombudsperson," who seemed to have no other responsibilities other than enforce this policy for the board? The current policy seems to make no reference to this actor. I think letting Arbcom handle this instead of a person directly answerable to the board of trustees is a step in the wrong direction.
It's cloudy. The Ombudsman Commission does not consider itself empowered to deal with situations that are unseemly but that do not actually disclose private information (such as when Jayjg disclosed that CharlotteWebb used tor). The Foundation Ombudsman Commission was indeed created to respond to complaints of privacy policy violations, but there is some doubt about what it's role should be on wikis that have strong Arbitration Committees that dispense (and theoretically review) checkuser and oversight permissions. It's also not clear in this case that the statement "You were socking on Wikipedia 3 years ago" actually violates the privacy policy, since it does not discuss IPs or other protected information and the policy itself is fairly vague. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understood that the privacy violations happened offwiki (on Twitter), although I haven't read DG's Twitter page. Did anybody else get this impression? If this is the case, this also leads to some interesting precedent for WP editors being responsible for their offwiki activities, as they relate to WP itself (at least)... |
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| the fieryangel |
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the Internet Review Corporation is watching you...
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QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sun 29th November 2009, 3:25pm) QUOTE(the fieryangel @ Sun 29th November 2009, 9:02am) QUOTE(GlassBeadGame @ Sun 29th November 2009, 2:55pm) QUOTE(cyofee @ Sun 29th November 2009, 8:25am) QUOTE(Nerd @ Sun 29th November 2009, 1:46pm) ArbCom have revoked his checkuser and oversight privs. Owned. Something tells me they've been waiting to do this for a long time. Do I remember incorrectly or didn't the privacy policy made this the domain of "the ombudsperson," who seemed to have no other responsibilities other than enforce this policy for the board? The current policy seems to make no reference to this actor. I think letting Arbcom handle this instead of a person directly answerable to the board of trustees is a step in the wrong direction. Yes, but something clearly needed to be done. The fact that something has been done is a clear message to those who have access to private data: if you abuse it, you're going to suffer the consequences. I say that the Arbcom did the right thing here. Yes the right thing as far as it goes even if done by the wrong people. This whole task (Checkuser) ought to conducted by agents answerable to the B/T. Loss of employment should be the least of consequences with some prospect for further liability. There seemed to the beginning of recognizing this with: 1) a board level policy, and; 2) a special person(s) selected by the board to carry it out. Even then the actual task was handed out willy-nilly to "community members." But giving the job to ArbCom seems to me to be a retreat from even this passing nod to responsibility. Clearly, you are right about the privacy policy being enforced by an independent entity who answers to the Board/foundation directly. However, since they can ever seem to get around to organizing this (and it will probably take legal action to motivate them to do so....), at least ARBCOM is willing to fill the power vacuum. If this becomes established precedent, it is indeed a step in the wrong direction...especially since the Arbcom members might have some sort of liability in the case of lawsuits brought by people whose privacy was violated. I don't think that this is quite fair for unpaid volunteers, especially since WMF hasn't actually made any clear statements about what happens when said volunteers are sued... ...but I suppose if people are willing to accept this responsibility, then that becomes their business. I certainly wouldn't. |
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| trenton |
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Wow. Good for them. They got rid of the biggest jackass around. First Jayjg, and now Gerard. Also, has anyone noticed he doesn't pop up quite as often as an official spokesman? He seems to have been demoted somewhat after he and Forrester ran Wikimedia UK into the ground (IMG: smilys0b23ax56/default/biggrin.gif) |
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