The animated gif file of a man mastrubating is in a public domain, Do we need it in public domain? Options

[Peter Damian]

I'm surprised this is not a subject here already (and apologies if it is). On Jimmy's talk page http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...ublic_domain.3F .

Notable for the crass and stupid comments of various 'not censored' Wikipedians. Sample below.

I have opened the group [1] I have invited Sue Gardner to join it. Can you join it? I don't know what else can I do.I know that you are a charity. A charity in the UK must be for public benefit http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/Chari...it/default.aspx I don't know too much about the USA. I fail to see any public benefit in public masturbation. It hurts. Please do something about it!— Preceding unsigned comment added by Natbrown (talk • contribs) 19:26, 27 January 2012
Did your child see some naughty image you wish they hadn't? Just add Wikipedia to the list of blocked sites on your net filter and have a talk with your child.
Is it what you want people to do? 60% voted for this answer. Natkabrown (talk) 08:58, 28 January 2012 (UTC) Wikipedia is not censored. – ukexpat (talk) 19:37, 27 January 2012 (UTC)
When I masturbate in public, I don't really feel any different than when I do it in private; can you possibly tell us why when you masturbate in public, it hurts? Y u no be Russavia ლ(ಠ益ಠლ) 19:42, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

It irritates me when people call such stuff 'adult'. It's not, it's juvenile.

The collapsed box (IRC chat) has a good example of a sarcastic Wikipedian trying to humiliate the objector (who claims to be a woman).

[10:31]natbrown has joined #wikimedia-commons
[10:33] <natbrown> Hi, I found some very unpleasant photos http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mas...rfahrung%29.jpg
[10:33] <natbrown> There is a video attached as well
[10:33] <Funfood> What is your problem with these files?
[10:34] <natbrown> There is a whole category http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Male_masturbation
[10:34] <Funfood> there it belongs to, yes
[10:34] <natbrown> I am a woman. I find this very offencive. I don't want to see it.
[10:35] <Funfood> you don't need to open them, neither the files or the category
[10:35] <natbrown> Should this be in Wikipedia? Aren't there enough sites dedicated to these techniques?
[10:35] <Nickname1> you'll get over it
[10:36] <Funfood> commons is not wikipedia, but there are, of course a lot of discussions about those files
[10:36] <natbrown> I found them by searching for "roll over
[10:36] <Funfood> I for my part don't think that human body parts are disgusting somehow
[10:37] <Funfood> but your opinion may vary
[10:37] <natbrown> Very often I work with my granddaughter by my site. She is 8 now. Would you like your daughter or your mother to see those files?
[10:38] <Funfood> If they appear by accident on the screen, it is a good time to explain children something about the internet
[10:38] <Funfood> and my mother has surely seen a penis before

Actually I remember meeting Natka at the meetup in November last year. A grandmother, totally offended by the unencyclopedic nonsense she saw with her 8 year old granddaughter. The Facebook page is here http://www.facebook.com/pages/Stop-pornogr...307245972661745

[11:01] <Snowolf> natbrown: Wikipedia is not censored.
[...]
[12:01]<natbrown> I will copy and paste this conversation, so people know why I have opened the group.
[12:02] <natbrown> !admin@commons
[12:03] <Snowolf> You cannot copypaste this conversation without the permission of all involved

This post has been edited by Peter Damian: Mon 30th January 2012, 9:20pm

[carbuncle]

[11:01] <Snowolf> natbrown: Wikipedia is not censored.
[...]
[12:01]<natbrown> I will copy and paste this conversation, so people know why I have opened the group.
[12:02] <natbrown> !admin@commons
[12:03] <Snowolf> You cannot copypaste this conversation without the permission of all involved

Did you just copypaste the conversation that can not be copypasted? I suspect a lawsuit will be headed your way shortly....

[lilburne]

[11:01] <Snowolf> natbrown: Wikipedia is not censored.
[...]
[12:01]<natbrown> I will copy and paste this conversation, so people know why I have opened the group.
[12:02] <natbrown> !admin@commons
[12:03] <Snowolf> You cannot copypaste this conversation without the permission of all involved

Did you just copypaste the conversation that can not be copypasted? I suspect a lawsuit will be headed your way shortly....

May be Godwin will represent them.

[Rhindle]

Jimbo is having a meeting regarding the image filter and...

I will wait for the outcome of your meeting and if the outcome is not satisfactory, I feel it my duty to contact both http://www.irs.gov and http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/ about the matter. Natkabrown (talk) 21:14, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

[Mister Die]

That IRC chatlog excerpt is quite ridiculous. "You'll get over it." Real professional.

This post has been edited by Mister Die: Tue 31st January 2012, 10:27am

[mbz1]

Is WMF would have to make a choice, if Wikipedia is to host a free porno images, or it is a charitable organization?

[Web Fred]

Is WMF would have to make a choice, if Wikipedia is to host a free porno images, or it is a charitable organization?

Why can't it be both?

[Mister Die]

Is WMF would have to make a choice, if Wikipedia is to host a free porno images, or it is a charitable organization?

Why can't it be both?

Because the average person would probably be appalled if they knew that their children's favorite encyclopedia had images of great value for articles of equally great value like "Snowballing (sexual practice)" (a gag-worthy image, and I can look at Goatse without flinching) and "Cum shot."

You don't think there's something off about an "encyclopedia" that simultaneously contains articles for Kwame Nkrumah, Mewto and Salirophilia?

This post has been edited by Mister Die: Tue 31st January 2012, 4:53pm

[Web Fred]

Is WMF would have to make a choice, if Wikipedia is to host a free porno images, or it is a charitable organization?

Why can't it be both?

Because the average person would probably be appalled if they knew that their children's favorite encyclopedia had images of great value for articles of equally great value like "Snowballing (sexual practice)" (a gag-worthy image, and I can look at Goatse without flinching) and "Cum shot."

You don't think there's something off about an "encyclopedia" that simultaneously contains articles for Kwame Nkrumah, Mewto and Salirophilia?

No I don't have a problem with it. An encyclopaedia is an information source for all things in our world and in our humanity. Non-normal sexual practises come under that banner as far as I'm concerned.

It's not Wikipedia's responsibility to be a net nanny. That's the parent's job.

[Mister Die]

I'm pretty sure actual encyclopedias of the past 230 years or so were a bit discerning when it came to content. For instance, there is much to learn about Paris. There is much to learn about the United States Declaration of Independence. There's also much to learn about ancient Rome, Greece, the Celts, Hebrews, Sir Thomas Moore, and, of course, sand and air, among hundreds of thousands of so many other subjects.

I don't think "encyclopedias" in which large articles on sexual slang and practices are able to seamlessly coexist with heads of state and world wars would be ones in which learned persons would put their names on. Much less is there a need for, you know, actually having an image most people would find fairly disgusting on said sex-related article. The description does not in any way need a visual aid.

Also Wikipedia passes itself off as an "encyclopedia." It doesn't pass itself off as "a website where people can put up whatever they want so long as the powers that be deem it notable." Students are actually encouraged to use Wikipedia as a "way of getting references." Not to mention that it's not much of a step from having an article on, say, the insertion of exotic things into the anus and having an article on pianos saying "YOU CAN ALSO USE PIANO KEYS FOR INSERTION INTO THE ANAL CANAL (cue link to exotic anus insertion article)!!!" since a good amount of persons on Wikipedia are willing to add mention of "non-normal sexual practises" to all sorts of otherwise benign articles, as this forum has demonstrated in regards to Crisco and what have you.

This post has been edited by Mister Die: Tue 31st January 2012, 5:11pm

[mbz1]

Is WMF would have to make a choice, if Wikipedia is to host a free porno images, or it is a charitable organization?

Why can't it be both?

Well, I simply read what the user who started the thread about masturbation at Jimbo's talk said:

I will wait for the outcome of your meeting and if the outcome is not satisfactory, I feel it my duty to contact both http://www.irs.gov and http://www.charity-commission.gov.uk/ about the matter.

And it does not look as Jimbo liked the discussion because his only response was archiving the thread http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=...oldid=474196855

This post has been edited by mbz1: Tue 31st January 2012, 5:56pm

[Abd]

No I don't have a problem with it. An encyclopaedia is an information source for all things in our world and in our humanity. Non-normal sexual practises come under that banner as far as I'm concerned.

mmm... "information source for all things in our world and in our humanity" isn't accurate. Took me some time to wrap my head around this. "The sum of all human knowledge" does not mean all knowledge, added together in one big mass. It means "summary." And that's classically encyclopedic. A general encyclopedia does *not* contain all detail about everything, there is selection for importance. Which is obviously somewhat subjective. The Wikipedia community or the WMF couldn't figure out how to discriminate on importance, objectively, so it punted. Inclusion became based on the availability of independently published sources meeting certain reliability standards. However, there is no reliable structure in place to apply the standards evenly, so what is considered adequate is about anyone's guess, at least on the edges. Lots of the most highly objectionable articles have weak sourcing, but attempts to delete them on that basis are perceived, by enough users, as being censorship. Horrors! That's why, even though notability doesn't expire, in theory, we still see AfDs succeed on, say, the 8th attempt. That proves about nothing about the individual article, but it does show that something is way, way off in the process, in the structure.

In a classical encyclopedia, notability does expire, where subjects become irrelevant to society.

Once again, the root problem is the lack of reliable decision-making process. Notability or other inclusion standards should be reasonably predictable; when it isn't, people waste lots of time, in both directions, in writing what is going to be deleted, and in attempting to delete what is going to be kept. The function of what has been called "instruction creep" has been missed. It's to make the world safe, it's called "rule of law," so people will know, reasonably well, in advance, how decisions will go. Otherwise its up to whatever jury and judge show up on a particular day. Unpredictable. Waste of time written into the structure, a natural consequence of it.

It's not Wikipedia's responsibility to be a net nanny. That's the parent's job.

Sure. I'm a parent, so I don't allow my kids to read Wikipedia unsupervised. That's a shame. Where is education most important? For adults? We don't need an encyclopedia to learn about "unusual sexual practices." The net is quite adequate for that, or, probably better, a special encyclopedia with process that guarantees reliability, which the net itself doesn't do.

Wikipedia, I've often written, should fork itself. Heh! I mean it in a good way.

It would resolve a lot of truly needless and wasteful conflict. A core encyclopedia, highly reliable, and safe for kids as well, could *link* in certain ways to other specialized encyclopedias. It wouldn't have to host those images! But it might show where more can be learned about, say, "unusual sexual practices." My girls, 8 and 10, know what sex is, they know the basics, they have for years. They aren't terribly interested in gory details, which mostly gross them out. A shift will come as they mature.

The flat Wikipedia page structure wasn't designed to handle levels of education. A family of cooperating encyclopedias could easily be.

This post has been edited by Abd: Tue 31st January 2012, 6:27pm

[Web Fred]

No I don't have a problem with it. An encyclopaedia is an information source for all things in our world and in our humanity. Non-normal sexual practises come under that banner as far as I'm concerned.

mmm... "information source for all things in our world and in our humanity" isn't accurate. Took me some time to wrap my head around this. "The sum of all human knowledge" does not mean all knowledge, added together in one big mass. It means "summary." And that's classically encyclopedic. A general encyclopedia does *not* contain all detail about everything, there is selection for importance. Which is obviously somewhat subjective.

On this point I totally disagree. If "sum" was meant to mean "summary" then it would be "summary". It isn't. "Sum" is meant to be the mathematical term. And as for not meaning all then can I remind you: "The sum of all human knowledge".

And if one thing WP is not is a "classical" encyclopaedia.

As far as I am concerned is that if it exists and meets the criteria set down by WP then it goes in; whether it's a Gambian politician or the latest paraphilia.

[thekohser]

On this point I totally disagree. If "sum" was meant to mean "summary" then it would be "summary". It isn't. "Sum" is meant to be the mathematical term. And as for not meaning all then can I remind you: "The sum of all human knowledge".

And if one thing WP is not is a "classical" encyclopaedia.

As far as I am concerned is that if it exists and meets the criteria set down by WP then it goes in; whether it's a Gambian politician or the latest paraphilia.

Just as long as it's not Carolyn Doran, right?

[Abd]

No I don't have a problem with it. An encyclopaedia is an information source for all things in our world and in our humanity. Non-normal sexual practises come under that banner as far as I'm concerned.

mmm... "information source for all things in our world and in our humanity" isn't accurate. Took me some time to wrap my head around this. "The sum of all human knowledge" does not mean all knowledge, added together in one big mass. It means "summary." And that's classically encyclopedic. A general encyclopedia does *not* contain all detail about everything, there is selection for importance. Which is obviously somewhat subjective.

On this point I totally disagree. If "sum" was meant to mean "summary" then it would be "summary". It isn't. "Sum" is meant to be the mathematical term. And as for not meaning all then can I remind you: "The sum of all human knowledge".

You can think it means whatever you want, but it's obvious that the Wikipedia community has never interpreted it this way. That is, not all human knowledge is to be included (or eligible for inclusion, to be more accurate). Only "notable" knowledge, which, in practice, means that it has been "noted" in certain kinds of sources. Not in others, even though those other sources also represent human knowledge, even verifiable knowledge. Basically, Wikipedia *is* a summary, it's unavoidable. It would have to be far, far larger to be the true compendium, complete, the kind of sum that includes everything.

And if one thing WP is not is a "classical" encyclopaedia.

It used the word "encyclopedia," which then leads to certain expectations. There are two limitations on the size of an encyclopedia. One applied to print encyclopedias, limits on space. The other has to do with pedagogical limitations, and could be addressed by layering; in a word, hypertext. While Wikipedia has lots of cross-links, it did not develop serious layering, so that coverage depth could be varied by the user.

As far as I am concerned is that if it exists and meets the criteria set down by WP then it goes in; whether it's a Gambian politician or the latest paraphilia.

Ah, but that begs the question. What are "the criteria set down by WP?" Your standard is indeterminate.

One of the problems with what Wikipedia built is that what might be called intrinsic notability varies with the readership. There are factions on Wikipedia with central concerns. What one faction considers of high interest, another may consider fancruft. And the AfD results may depend on how many from each faction show up, or, if an administrator actually closes on arguments rather than numbers, on the preferences and opinions of the administrator.

Forking would resolve this, in fact, and it's been suggested that if the project were in layers, debate might be over what layer a fact belongs in, rather than black and white include/exclude. Error in such decision-making would be likely of far less impact!

This post has been edited by Abd: Tue 31st January 2012, 9:38pm