Giovanni di Stefano Options

[Robert Roberts]

I guess he stuck the lawyers on them - both Jimbo and Fred have been very active here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_di_Stefano



Wikipedia Whispers

" It's hard to keep up with the helter-skelter career of Giovanni di Stefano, the self-styled lawyer who claims to have represented Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic, Ian Brady and Kenneth Noye.

The past fortnight has seen him busier than ever: issuing statements on behalf of his chum "Dutchy" Holland, who is in Belmarsh awaiting trial on abduction and firearms charges; complaining about political interference in the Eurovision song contest; revealing that Saddam was a fan of Dundeed FC, where di Stefano was once a director; threatening legal action against Ashworth top-security hospital for refusing to let Ian Brady keep a book about the Moors Murders; and, er, releasing a CD by "Italian singer Just Carmen" which includes a cover-version of "Everyone's Gone to the Moon" by kind permission of di Stefano's mate Jonathan King, the convicted sex offender.

Until recently, anyone wanting a guide to his exotic career could find an extensive article in Wikipedia, which mentioned everything from his fraud conviction in 1986 (when a judge branded him "one of nature's swindlers, without scruples or conscience") through his failed attempts to buy footbal clubs and the recurring doubts about whether he's really a lawyer at all. ("As far as we're concerned," the Law Society said, "he has no legal qualifications whatsover.")

Di Stefano didn't like this one little bit. Two years ago he started editing out anything he found embarrassing, sometimes twice a day, to the point where the page was "locked" for several months to prevent further tampering. When asked to stop deleting the contents he threatened Wikipedia contributors with legal action.

On 24 April this year, without warning, Wikipedia founder and director Jimmy "Jimbo" Wales personally deleted the entire page. Soon afterwards a new, cleaned-up version of the di Stefano entry was created - minus all the awkward facts."

Copyright Private Eye 2007

[Unrepentant Vandal]

Di Stefano is a hilarious person, as anyone who lives here will attest.

Although he may not be a legitimate lawyer (or anything else), if I were accused of serious crimes I would get in touch with him. His reputation is unparalelled.

[tarantino]

I guess he stuck the lawyers on them - both Jimbo and Fred have been very active here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giovanni_di_Stefano

Their activity continues, and SqueakBox also hones his editorial skills on the bio.

di Stefano editing as Pnazionale was recently blocked for "vandalism" on the article, but it was quickly overturned by Freddie.

[Kato]

Holy cow! This has passed me by. I had no idea that di Stefano was actually arguing on the talk page himself! (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/ohmy.gif)

di Stefano is an outrageous character and one of the most engrossing figures to be found in the inside pages of press! And he's always there, he puts himself in the frame whenever he can. A kind of Real World Squeakbox on a grand scale.

Unsurprisingly, judging by the talk page Fred Bauder doesn't have a clue who he is.

[blissyu2]

This is a fine example of the absolute absurdity of the No Legal Threats rule.

Giovanni di Stefano is a lawyer. He went on to Wikipedia and with his very first edit he made an implied legal threat. He then proceeded to remove sourced information from the article about himself, a clear Conflict of Interest. He then made several legal threats to other people on Wikipedia. Ultimately, he was reverted, but then Fred Bauder, an ex-lawyer, agreed with him and backed him up with his admin tools. Finally Jimbo Wales had the last say and supported him.

We are told that if you want to make legal threats then you have to do it in the right way. Is this the right way to do it? He said his real name, e-mail address, street address, and phone number on Wikipedia, while writing legal threats on-wiki. Per their rules, he should have been banned indef. Additionally, he broke Conflict of Interest rules by editing an article about himself - indeed he didn't do anything other than edit the article about himself (aside from his first ever edit, to make a legal threat to someone's user talk page). He also broke the rule on 3RR.

Ultimately, I support Giovanni di Stefano in principle. I don't know the specifics of the case, but ultimately, yes, he sure does have a right to not have things that put him in a bad light on a public document about him. If people want to look for a smear then they can look elsewhere for smears. Responsible encyclopaedias don't have smears on people.

Personally, I think that the NLT rule should be thrown out the window as it doesn't apply in real life, and whilst people are often anonymous on there and all, in the end they are real people and in real life legal threats can be useful.

Conflict of Interest is relevant sometimes, but it is worded stupidly. Experts on topics are the people who should be writing articles, not "neutral" people who don't know a thing about it. And on an article about yourself, you are the world's foremost expert on it.

And yes this is an important article to write about. It demonstrates how stupid some of Wikipedia's rules are.

Also note from his talk page that he didn't give a shit about Wikipedia's policies:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Pnazionale

And it seems that rather than "familiarise yourself" with policies, you are better off to just ignore them completely, and focus on real life concerns.

[Kato]

This is a fine example of the absolute absurdity of the No Legal Threats rule.

Giovanni di Stefano is a lawyer....

Let me just stop you right there, Bliss.

[blissyu2]

This is a fine example of the absolute absurdity of the No Legal Threats rule.

Giovanni di Stefano is a lawyer....

Let me just stop you right there, Bliss.

Naturally, stop me and ignore every single thing that I say. Why don't you just leave this site?

I mean its one thing to argue your point, another to belittle and not even listen. This kind of disgusting behaviour has to stop.

[Castle Rock]

We are told that if you want to make legal threats then you have to do it in the right way. Is this the right way to do it? He said his real name, e-mail address, street address, and phone number on Wikipedia, while writing legal threats on-wiki. Per their rules, he should have been banned indef. Additionally, he broke Conflict of Interest rules by editing an article about himself - indeed he didn't do anything other than edit the article about himself (aside from his first ever edit, to make a legal threat to someone's user talk page). He also broke the rule on 3RR.

What is absurd about the No Legal Threats rule? They should be banned because they are toxic and stupid. They don't work from behind a screen name. Like when someone sent a DMCA to Encyclopedia Dramatica, but filled it out as the "Duke of Otterland" it didn't work.

Saying your real identity shows that you are serious and that its not just an attack. Most likely he also emailed and had phone conversations. Again showing he meant it. Not an anonymous person screaming LIBEL.

[blissyu2]

We are told that if you want to make legal threats then you have to do it in the right way. Is this the right way to do it? He said his real name, e-mail address, street address, and phone number on Wikipedia, while writing legal threats on-wiki. Per their rules, he should have been banned indef. Additionally, he broke Conflict of Interest rules by editing an article about himself - indeed he didn't do anything other than edit the article about himself (aside from his first ever edit, to make a legal threat to someone's user talk page). He also broke the rule on 3RR.

What is absurd about the No Legal Threats rule? They should be banned because they are toxic and stupid. They don't work from behind a screen name. Like when someone sent a DMCA to Encyclopedia Dramatica, but filled it out as the "Duke of Otterland" it didn't work.

Saying your real identity shows that you are serious and that its not just an attack. Most likely he also emailed and had phone conversations. Again showing he meant it. Not an anonymous person screaming LIBEL.

No Legal Threats has no meaning in real life. People use Legal Threats to avoid actual legal cases. Court costs are expensive and time consuming, and ridiculously complicated. Everyone wants to avoid an actual court case. Over the internet, Legal Threats are used regularly and very productively. There are a few places that laugh about them. You are right that ED does, as does rotten.com, and heartless-bitches.com, and a number of other smear sites.

The thing is that in this case, Giovanni di Stefano may not be an actual lawyer - that is actually in question. He probably e-mailed and phone conversations, but he might not have.

What is the difference between what Giovanni di Stefano did and what, say, Daniel Brandt did? Any difference? They both said their real name and identity, one was banned for legal threats, the other had his part changed.

If anything, the facts of the case means that Giovanni di Stefano shouldn't have been supported. But the principle is that he should have been.

I think that Jimbo has proven, and I will restate this, that the No Legal Threats proviso should be scrapped. People have a right to defend themselves from illegal activities.

[Kato]

The thing is that in this case, Giovanni di Stefano may not be an actual lawyer - that is actually in question.

Get it now? (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/huh.gif)

[blissyu2]

For those who like to make typos, there is also a Wikipedia article on Stefano di Giovanni

What is the point in this site even existing? Kato seems determined to destroy it, and me with it. While such stupid attacks continue, there is no point in this site. Either the attacks stop, or Kato leaves, or else that's it. They are not necessary, and destroy everything that this site has worked for 2 years to achieve.

[Kato]

For those who like to make typos, there is also a Wikipedia article on Stefano di Giovanni

What is the point in this site even existing? Kato seems determined to destroy it, and me with it. While such stupid attacks continue, there is no point in this site. Either the attacks stop, or Kato leaves, or else that's it. They are not necessary, and destroy everything that this site has worked for 2 years to achieve.

di Stefano is a very famous person in media circles in the U.K.

I'll always challenge people who are talking out of their digeridoos, no matter who they are. It's a calling of mine. I'm not usually rude about it but I'm not going to stop doing it. You'll have to deal with it. Or you leave. Sorry.

[blissyu2]

Of course, and I will leave. And will this forum be better because some new guy who comes out of nowhere and takes it over and bashes established users is here, while the number 1 poster goes?

I hope you love your power trips, Kato.

[Somey]

...will this forum be better because some new guy who comes out of nowhere and takes it over and bashes established users is here, while the number 1 poster goes?

No... but at the same time, can anyone give me a reason for not deleting the sniping portions of this particular thread? (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/unsure.gif)

Blissy probably meant to write something like "claims to be" or "thinks of himself as" anyway, and might have edited himself within a few minutes... Who knows? Let's just not get carried away here.

[blissyu2]

Okay let's say this another way:

Wikipedia: No Legal Threats is meant to force people to use off-wiki means to deal with actual legal action. On-wiki legal threats are meant to get you banned.

Wikipedia: Ownership is meant to prohibit people from owning articles, especially if they have a personal interest in the topic.

Wikipedia: Conflict of Interest is supposed to mean that someone like Giovanni di Stefano is only allowed to edit to the talk page, not directly.

Wikipedia: 3RR is supposed to prevent Giovanni di Stefano from deleting the same text 20 times.

Wikipedia: NPOV is supposed to mean that Giovanni di Stefano is meant to be represented in both a positive and negative light.

Wikipedia: Reliable sources and Wikipedia: Verifiability is supposed to mean that when there are reliable sources saying that he's not a lawyer then its okay to have it listed in his article.

But...

Wikipedia: Biographies of Living persons says that we should err on the side of caution.

By pretty much all of Wikipedia's rules, Giovanni di Stefano should have been banned for what he did, indef banned, and his article should be presented in the way that it was. Wikipedia's rules do not suggest a single valid reason to remove the links that say that he might not be an actual lawyer and may be guilty of fraud. Indeed, none have been argued.

Giovanni di Stefano did not make legal threats off-wiki, he made them on-wiki. He made several of them. Other than deleting text, pretty much all he did was to make legal threats. If he happened to make some off-wiki legal threats as well, that's all fine and good, but he certainly made some on-wiki.

Daniel Brandt, in comparison, did pretty much the exact same thing, and was banned indef, and continues to be banned, yet Giovanni di Stefano got a pat on the back that its fine.

Now, if the reason why Giovanni di Stefano was able to validate it was because he is a lawyer, hence the legal threats are reasonable, then perhaps we can say hey that's okay all that we have to do is to be a lawyer, and we can get away with anything.

But the fact that the very thing in dispute is whether he is actually a lawyer makes this even more important.

I did a year of law school, so why can't I go in there and make legal threats to people? I've worked in a law office. I have pretty darn good legal knowledge. I make legal threats all the time in the real world. Why can't I go in to Wikipedia and say some legal threats?

The thing is that this case makes a mockery of all of Wikipedia's rules. And yet at the same time, I think that Jimbo and Fred did the right thing.

Respectable encyclopaedias don't have smear articles on people. They do if they are convicted major criminals (even then they don't if they are convicted in foreign countries and their government opposes the conviction) and they do if they are suggested by their government to be enemies of the state. Is Giovanni di Stefano an enemy of the state? Even if the convictions are true, its not exactly a major crime that he is alleged to have committed. He's not a murderer or terrorist or something.

How does it benefit Wikipedia to have that information in there?

And can Wikipedia afford the legal costs if they continue to have information like that about living people?

...will this forum be better because some new guy who comes out of nowhere and takes it over and bashes established users is here, while the number 1 poster goes?

No... but at the same time, can anyone give me a reason for not deleting the sniping portions of this particular thread? (IMG:smilys0b23ax56/default/unsure.gif)

Blissy probably meant to write something like "claims to be" or "thinks of himself as" anyway, and might have edited himself within a few minutes... Who knows? Let's just not get carried away here.

I fully support deleting the diversion started by Kato.

[Moulton]

I am dismayed and chagrined at the escalating frequency and intensity of the antagonistic rivalry, the ominous ultimatums, and the artless reliance on shreklisch varieties of narcissistic wounding.

Brush up your Shakespeare, youse guise!

Insults must be clever, amusing, and memorable. Try something along these lines...

You are nothing but a demagogue, a mendacious manipulator, a swaggering soldier of fortune, a nefarious eater of broken organ meats expelled by rival sites, and a creator of vexagonistic lunatic scapegoat psychodrama. Your arrival here represents a wave of spiritual decay and horror the likes of which Hell has never before seen.

[JoseClutch]

This is a fine example of the absolute absurdity of the No Legal Threats rule.

Giovanni di Stefano is a lawyer. He went on to Wikipedia and with his very first edit he made an implied legal threat. He then proceeded to remove sourced information from the article about himself, a clear Conflict of Interest. He then made several legal threats to other people on Wikipedia. Ultimately, he was reverted, but then Fred Bauder, an ex-lawyer, agreed with him and backed him up with his admin tools. Finally Jimbo Wales had the last say and supported him.

We are told that if you want to make legal threats then you have to do it in the right way. Is this the right way to do it? He said his real name, e-mail address, street address, and phone number on Wikipedia, while writing legal threats on-wiki. Per their rules, he should have been banned indef. Additionally, he broke Conflict of Interest rules by editing an article about himself - indeed he didn't do anything other than edit the article about himself (aside from his first ever edit, to make a legal threat to someone's user talk page). He also broke the rule on 3RR.

Ultimately, I support Giovanni di Stefano in principle. I don't know the specifics of the case, but ultimately, yes, he sure does have a right to not have things that put him in a bad light on a public document about him. If people want to look for a smear then they can look elsewhere for smears. Responsible encyclopaedias don't have smears on people.

Personally, I think that the NLT rule should be thrown out the window as it doesn't apply in real life, and whilst people are often anonymous on there and all, in the end they are real people and in real life legal threats can be useful.

Conflict of Interest is relevant sometimes, but it is worded stupidly. Experts on topics are the people who should be writing articles, not "neutral" people who don't know a thing about it. And on an article about yourself, you are the world's foremost expert on it.

And yes this is an important article to write about. It demonstrates how stupid some of Wikipedia's rules are.

Also note from his talk page that he didn't give a shit about Wikipedia's policies:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Pnazionale

And it seems that rather than "familiarise yourself" with policies, you are better off to just ignore them completely, and focus on real life concerns.

If you read the no legal threats policy, it makes an enormous amount of sense. Are you really suggesting that Wikipedia should let a 17 year old kid from Bangladesh handle a response to a lawsuit from a South African directed at an editor from Montenegro and a non-profit organisation in the United States? What are the odds that this will go well? Additionally, do you really want to continue to poison the atmosphere through these interactions?

I think most sensible people would suggest the answer to the questions is "no". If someone wants to deal with Wikipedia through the courts, the foundation wants them to call up Mike Godwin or Cary Brown or whomever is on the other end of OTRS right now, and not create an enormously sticky or growing problem by interacting with the mob of Wikipedia.

In practice, I'm not sure it's always necessarily enforced the way its supposed to be. But the *policy* is entirely sensible.

[tarantino]

Jimbo's butting heads with Fred now on this.

The omission tag is inappropriate. We have omitted nothing which we have a reliable source for. What we have omitted is material which implies facts but are not sufficient sources for them. Fred Bauder (talk) 04:27, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I think it completely impossible for our article not to include these facts, which so many fine publications have seen fit to print in their own profiles of him.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 05:53, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Jimbo's response, which included a list of reliable sources, was soon deleted by someone from Italy with the edit summary DELETIONS FOR DEFAMATORY SUGGESTIONS.

This could be entertaining.

[Moulton]

Facts, factoids, and counterfactuals are occasionally difficult to sort out, especially without resorting to the tools of scientific, academic, and forensic research.

[GlassBeadGame]

Facts, factoids, and counterfactuals are occasionally difficult to sort out, especially without resorting to the tools of scientific, academic, and forensic research.

Let's forget their silly rules for a minute. What would a sane publication do? First the problem is not the sources. The sources are fine. (score one for Wales.) Producing a layer of quotes to distance yourself from the contents of the quotes is inappropriate and waters down the content. If you use NYT as a source you say "X happened" and cite NYT you do not say "according to NYT x happened." (one for Bauder).

The problem is some heightened standard of proof is being used for issues relating to liability, not the usual content governing consideration. If your concern is legal the sensible thing to do is have your legal counsel review the court file and determine the status of the various matters. This is of course OR. But you are not having counsel make the determination for content reasons. S/he is making the determination for matters of ascertaining exposure to liability. Once this task has been performed you either make the claims or not, using normal sourcing if you decide to make the the claims and dropping any reference to the claim at all if you decide not.

The problem is the usual WP arrogance that displaces all need for expert knowledge with the wisdom of a bunch hackish amateurs. They are incapable of determining on which levels this might be appropriate and when it is not.