Wikipedia Distributing Child Porn, Co-Founder Tells FBI - FOXNews Options

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Wikipedia Distributing Child Porn, Co-Founder Tells FBI
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The parent company of Wikipedia is knowingly distributing child pornography, the co-founder of the online encyclopedia says...

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[Jon Awbrey]

Jon Awbrey Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
April 28th, 2010 at 17:56

Barndoor, Horses.
Horses, Barndoor.

[Jon Awbrey]

Jon Awbrey Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
April 28th, 2010 at 17:56

Barndoor, Horses.
Horses, Barndoor.

I have to say I was a little shocked to discover this, but apparently they've come up with some kind of Electronic Series Of Tubes (ESOT) that prevents unwanted content from appearing on their, how U say, “Weblog” — maybe Wikipedia could get itself an ESOT, too?

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

[GlassBeadGame]

Jon Awbrey Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
April 28th, 2010 at 17:56

Barndoor, Horses.
Horses, Barndoor.

I have to say I was a little shocked to discover this, but apparently they've come up with some kind of Electronic Series Of Tubes (ESOT) that prevents unwanted content from appearing on their, how U say, “Weblog” — maybe Wikipedia could get itself an ESOT, too?

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

I suppose you could always try Erik's Blog to comment. The range of free expression their runs from We Wub You Erik all the way through We Wub You Erik Very Very Much I'm sure Mr. Information-Wants-to-Be-Free welcomes your views.

[Milton Roe]

Jon Awbrey Says: Your comment is awaiting moderation.
April 28th, 2010 at 17:56

Barndoor, Horses.
Horses, Barndoor.

I have to say I was a little shocked to discover this, but apparently they've come up with some kind of Electronic Series Of Tubes (ESOT) that prevents unwanted content from appearing on their, how U say, “Weblog” — maybe Wikipedia could get itself an ESOT, too?

Jon (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/tongue.gif)

Mr. Information-wants-to-be-free is probably wishing wewy wewy hard that certain information about his past opinions, now that he has a good day-job, would remain hidden in the net's nooks and crannies, never be found. Alas, this is not the way the net works.

Rectal exam time, Mr. Moeller. And I can't think of a more appropriate patient.

Here's a blog with all kinds of Moeller edits AND a link to his defense of non-violent child-porn:

http://mashable.com/2008/05/08/erik-moeller-pedophilia/

This cite was given by Sanger in his letter to the FBI and cc: to WMF. From which we find that Councillor Godwin actually does do something during the day. Godwin hinted darkly that Sanger saying that Moeller was "well-known for his defense of pedophilia" was perhaps actionable. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ohmy.gif) Erm, I suppose WP:NLT doesn't apply to Godwin, even when published in the WP:SIGNPOST. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ermm.gif) That would be asking too much. But here's Godwin's full response. Given that Moeller has explicitly defended child porn as being harmess, I'm not sure that it is actionable if somebody says that he's well known for defending pedophilia. He's more well-known all the time (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/biggrin.gif) . And the rest is splitting a mighty fine hair-- since who else but a pedophile would be interested in child porn?? (Not me, Mr. Godwin (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/sad.gif) )

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Wik...ger_allegations

Here's a Godwin quote which only Godwin could explain:

Returning to "community standards", Godwin stated: "There is no evidence in Sanger's message that the community has failed in its efforts to make sure that the content of Wikimedia Commons is legal, at least in the context of the law applicable to Wikimedia Foundation as a hosting provider".

The question of who the community is, in this situation, has not been defined. Godwin doesn't help. From here, it looks like Godwin is going to argue that it's anybody BUT whoever anybody else thinks the community is, is the community. The "community" is undefinable.

In any case, he says CDA 230 protects WMF as long as they don't originate the material. And he's probably right, although CDA 230 is going to groan and snap eventually, as we alll know.

As for Moeller, he's #2 man at WMF on their org chart. Aren't these public background-checks a bitch? Especially when they get to FOX news. Heck, don't you wish you could just block and ban FOX? Alas, WP doesn't control TV or Google. They simply help them in their destructiveness. Usually with no harm to themselves. But what goes around, does tend to come around.

I have a "if the glove don't fit you must acquit" slogan for WMF: "The interNET does not forGET." WP has an oversight memory hole. Don't let it influence your view of the rest of the world.

All this surely isn't going into any BLP of Moeller on WP any time soon (maybe right after they finish the Doran one-- what do you think?) (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/smile.gif)

[HRIP7]

Mr. Information-wants-to-be-free is probably wishing wewy wewy hard that certain information about his past opinions, now that he has a good day-job, would remain hidden in the net's nooks and crannies, never be found. Alas, this is not the way the net works.

Rectal exam time, Mr. Moeller. And I can't think of a more appropriate patient.

Here's a blog with all kinds of Moeller edits AND a link to his defense of non-violent child-porn:

http://mashable.com/2008/05/08/erik-moeller-pedophilia/

This cite was given by Sanger in his letter to the FBI and cc: to WMF. From which we find that Councillor Godwin actually does do something during the day. Godwin hinted darkly that Sanger saying that Moeller was "well-known for his defense of pedophilia" was perhaps actionable. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ohmy.gif) Erm, I suppose WP:NLT doesn't apply to Godwin, even when published in the WP:SIGNPOST. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ermm.gif) That would be asking too much. But here's Godwin's full response. Given that Moeller has explicitly defended child porn as being harmess, I'm not sure that it is actionable if somebody says that he's well known for defending pedophilia. He's more well-known all the time (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/biggrin.gif) . And the rest is splitting a mighty fine hair-- since who else but a pedophile would be interested in child porn?? (Not me, Mr. Godwin (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/sad.gif) )

Milton, in the interest of fairness, there really is a translation problem here. What Erik Möller said was that there is no evidence that viewing nonviolent (adult) porn harms youths. At no time did he say anything to the effect that nonviolent child porn was okay.

Furthermore, google at times translates "gewaltfrei" (which means "nonviolent") as "violent", e.g. "so far there is no empirical evidence to show a negative impact of violent porn" reads "bisher kein empirischer Beleg für eine Negativwirkung von gewaltfreien Pornos existiert" in the German original, meaning "so far there is no empirical evidence to show a negative impact of nonviolent porn".

That is not to say that everything he says in the article would be uncontroversial, but it's important to get right what he actually did say.

This post has been edited by HRIP7:

[thekohser]

Milton, in the interest of fairness, there really is a translation problem here. What Erik Möller said was that there is no evidence that viewing nonviolent (adult) porn harms youths. At no time did he say anything to the effect that nonviolent child porn was okay.

Furthermore, google at times translates "gewaltfrei" (which means "nonviolent") as "violent", e.g. "so far there is no empirical evidence to show a negative impact of violent porn" reads "bisher kein empirischer Beleg für eine Negativwirkung von gewaltfreien Pornos existiert" in the German original, meaning "so far there is no empirical evidence to show a negative impact of nonviolent porn".

That is not to say that everything he says in the article would be uncontroversial, but it's important to get right what he actually did say.

And, what are Erik Moeller's academic/scholarly credentials that makes him an expert in this area? Or, is he an amateur researcher delving into the fascinating subject of adult pornography's effects on children? I have some recollection that Moeller's professional experience is as a freelance journalist, software developer, and project manager. Such an interesting selection, then, for his free time!

I suppose an amateur may have missed these sources:

W. L. Marshall, "The Use of Sexually Explicit Stimuli by Rapists, Child Molesters, and Nonoffenders," The Journal of Sex Research 25, no.2 (May 1988): 267-88.
* ...early exposure (under fourteen years of age) to pornography is related to greater involvement in deviant sexual practice, particularly rape.

K.E. Davis and G.N. Braucht, Exposure to Pornography, Character and Sexual Deviance, Technical Reports of the Commission on Obscenity and Pornography (1970), 7.
* ...males who are exposed to a great deal of erotica before the age of 14 are more sexually active and engage in more varied sexual behaviors as adults than is true for males not so exposed.

Interview with Ann Burgess, professor of nursing, University of Pennsylvania, 15 January 1997. "Pornography - Victims and Perpetrators," Symposium on Media Violence & Pornography, Proceedings Resource Book and Research Guide, ed. D. Scott (1984).
* ...pornography short-circuits and/or distorts the normal personality development process and supplies misinformation about a child's sexuality, sense of self, and body that leaves the child confused, changed, and damaged.

This post has been edited by thekohser:

[Larry Sanger]

Thought you all might get a kick out of this:

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100428/...220.shtml#c1278

Re:
by Mike Masnick(profile)
My argument is that Wikipedia is an important project, and precedent-setting, and if the government takes a stand here, it will do significant good in the fight against the normalization of pedophilia

Larry, I'm curious. Do you HONESTLY believe that there is ANY movement whatsoever towards normalizing pedophilia? Of all the silly things you've said in this threat, that is, by far, the most ridiculous.

(reply to this comment)(link to this comment)

92.May 3rd, 2010 @ 2:29amListen to Larry
by tyciol(profile)
He`s got plans for this, as soon as we take down the paintings, we are going to get in the Delorean and go interrogate the guy who drew them in 1905 and make sure he didn`t base it on anything real.

(reply to this comment)(link to this comment)

93.May 3rd, 2010 @ 9:32amby Larry Sanger
@Mike Masnick: all right, I'll bite. Of course, if you're like certain people who insist on using "pedophilia" only to mean a psychological disorder in which there is sexual attraction exclusively to children, then no, of course there's no movement to normalize that disorder. Who wants to normalize a disorder? But if you use the word "pedophilia" the way that most people use it, to mean any actual sexual relations between full-fledged adults and children below the age of consent, then, yeah, there is such a movement. You mean you didn't know that? Yes, there are people who regard pedophilia as an action regardless of motives, and a terrible crime, and there is an anarchist-associated movement to make this all hunky-dory.

Yes, there is a nasty little movement devoted to normalizing at least some sexual relations between adults and children--relations that are now considered deeply criminal and deeply wrong by sane, civilized people. That there are people out there plugging for this is well documented on sites like http://wikisposure.com/ (BTW, search for "Tyciol" there, then look at the username of your most recent commenter) and you can read more on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_of_consent_reform and this copy of an old Wikipedia article that was apparently deleted: http://www.bookrags.com/wiki/Pro-pedophile_activism . These sorts of people see nothing at all wrong with, say, 12-year-olds (that's Levine's cut-off; and for others, younger people) being able to legally consent to sex with full-fledged adults. I do.

A little background for you: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htAUysRPvNs Fascinating, and scary.

You mean you really didn't know all this? Or were you baiting me to say it, so you could mock me when I said it? Well, go ahead. Dig yourself into your hole a little farther, Masnick. Mock away.

[SB_Johnny]

Thought you all might get a kick out of this:

<snipped, even though I got at least a small kick>

Welcome to WR, Larry. It's really good to see you here at last. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/wave.gif) (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/letsgetdrunk.gif)

Just curious though, since you cited my post elsewhere: are you in the "(a.) Wikipedia must die" group, or the "(c.) serious critique is necessary" group, or (a.+c.) both?

Also (and no offense, but): if Jimmy hadn't been such a dick to you over the years, would you have still taken this course of action? I'm just curious how much of this is a battle of egos vs. a conflict of ideals... or (again), both.

[Larry Sanger]

I have to admit that I was incredulous, at least initially, about your not being aware of those images on Commons. I'm not saying that I thought you'd seen them personally, though - just that we'd been discussing them here for some time, and these things have a tendency to get talked about. I hadn't realized the degree of disaffection you seem to have from there, though, so I think I owe you an apology for that. Sorry I doubted you!

No problemo. I knew about the bountiful hardcore porn and "Virgin Killer" (did a blog post on the latter in 2008), but I did not know about the drawn child porn. I hardly ever looked at Wikipedia Review until recently. So, I really just didn't know, and I really was surprised. The contents of Category:Pedophilia was, for me, a new low--and pretty much the last straw.

I have to tell you that I might have done nothing if the statute itself did not say that my only positive defense was to report the violations to law enforcement. This personalized the situation for me, and made me consider the situation not just as a violation of the law, or as a potentially embarrassing scandal; it made me think of it as a personal and morally serious matter, and one that I am better-placed to address than many people.

It may be that a multi-pronged approach will be required.

The more I think about your question, the more I think the most impactful thing could be a comprehensive, moral-philosophical expose of Wikipedia's history of governance snafus and scandals, from a respected journalist in a top-rank magazine, which is then read and discussed as much as, say, "Is Google Making Us Stupid?" It would not just be a list of scandals, which are all old news, but a successful summing-up, something that connects the dots and explains to the uninitiated (which is almost everybody who uses Wikipedia) exactly how the various problems illustrate the project's patterns of abuse.

See, it's true that most people know that Wikipedia isn't perfect and that it has various problems and scandals, but these are regarded as little quirks, or as basic Internet stupidity at worst. Not very many people regard Wikipedia as a sort of rogue state, which is basically what it is. But if they knew what I, and most of the people on this forum, knew, there would be an uproar in many quarters. Wikipedia has been safe from serious external criticism only due to the ignorance about it on the part of people like those school district filter managers I was talking to.

Wikipedia is like any brand, it has a reputation, and its reputation needs to be brought more in line with reality. When that happens, one can hope that the WMF and/or ordinary Wikipedians will look to revitalize the project by making some positive changes.

@dogbiscuit--I understand, and I'd love to talk about it, but I don't really want to give people like Anthony the satisfaction of preening over his response to whatever I say.

I happen to believe the solution is fairly simple, but it requires the WMF to accept that while they can hide behind S.230, they still have an ability, and a duty, to set up processes to deal with the various problems that exist within Wikipedia.

I can certainly say that I hope that will happen. But then, the WMF has to take responsibility for making and enforcing policy. But the WMF desperately wants to avoid this, I'm sure. It would cause a veritable revolution within the ranks of Wikipedia; all the inmates in the asylum would revolt over the notion that the WMF can make and enforce policy. That's centralization. That's the end of their much-cherished anarchist-mob rule. For their part the WMF would hate it too because it means that they would then be answerable both to rank-and-file Wikipedians, who would demand more transparency and more meaningful democracy in exchange for the loss of their own arbitrary and unanswerable authority, and to the general public and authorities.

But, realistically speaking, I doubt this will happen just as a result of official action. The WMF will insist only on "taking down" whatever the authorities instruct them to take down. This avoids all the necessity of setting Wikipedia up as a proper polity. If the FBI or any other entity suggests that they set up processes for self-monitoring and taking down, they will push back hard, and if forced, they will try to make the processes as lightweight as possible, and tell the contributors that the government has ordered them to do this; meanwhile, Wikipedia's true believers will howl censorship at the tops of their lungs, and probably practice all sorts of "civil disobedience." In other words, the opposite of transparency, meaningful democracy, and more responsible governance.

Welcome to WR, Larry. It's really good to see you here at last. (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/wave.gif) (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/letsgetdrunk.gif)

Just curious though, since you cited my post elsewhere: are you in the "(a.) Wikipedia must die" group, or the "(c.) serious critique is necessary" group, or (a.+c.) both?

Also (and no offense, but): if Jimmy hadn't been such a dick to you over the years, would you have still taken this course of action? I'm just curious how much of this is a battle of egos vs. a conflict of ideals... or (again), both.

Thanks for the welcome, and I would put myself in the © group. It would be a shame if Wikipedia were to die. For many years, and even after starting CZ, I said that Wikipedia is incredibly useful and largely a force for good. But with each new outrage from that den of creeps, my respect for it even as a reference resource has taken a heavy blow. It's getting harder and harder for me to separate my absolute loathing for the behavior of some of the people in authority from my support for all the good, useful work that rank-and-file Wikipedians have done over the years. All that said, I remain somewhat optimistic--no, make that hopeful--that Wikipedia can be reformed.

I really do think I would have the same reaction, and taken the same actions, regardless of how Jimmy Wales had treated me. If anything, his treatment of me has made this even harder for me, because now the feces-throwing howler monkeys of Wikipedia can accuse me of "payback." Anyone who knows me personally knows that I have a long history of speaking my mind to authority. I'm a classic nonconformist or individualist, not a 60s hippie type (we had plenty of those at Reed College where I went to school), but the type that is suspicious of "in" groups of all sorts. If I don't speak out when I can make a difference, I feel like I'm doing something wrong. It makes me feel cowardly.

[anthony]

@dogbiscuit--I understand, and I'd love to talk about it, but I don't really want to give people like Anthony the satisfaction of preening over his response to whatever I say.

If it'll help, I promise I won't respond.