Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 14:36, 27 April 2009

The project page associated with this talk page is an official policy on Misplaced Pages. Policies have wide acceptance among editors and are considered a standard for all users to follow. Please review policy editing recommendations before making any substantive change to this page. Always remember to keep cool when editing, and don't panic.

This page is for discussion of the policy; if you wish to complain about a user harassing you, your request won't be heard by many people here; you will have better luck at Misplaced Pages:Village pump (assistance). Thank you for your time.

Archives mid-2005 2005 - 2006

Is this policy

As part of an overall effort to simplify and streamline policy, I've boldly replaced the policy tag with a guideline tag. There are several reasons.

The policy tag was added less than a year ago without a clear consensus.

This page is disjointed and is more of an essay than a statement of policy. Much of the reason it is disjointed is that there isn't any real consistent policy on harassment. The AC cases that are identified in the page were the sort of cases that produce unclear precedent because there were so many problems being addressed at once. The most serious problems of harassment we have had are not mentioned here; they have involved sexual innuendo, threats of physical violence, and deliberate disclosure of personal information. That this sort of behavior is inappropriate at Misplaced Pages is so clear that no policy is necessary.

I note that several attempts to generate consenus for a "wikistalking" policy have failed to gain much support.

The Uninvited Co., Inc. 17:04, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I will re-read the page and related pages and come back either supporting or opposing this decision. Congradulations on being bold. HighInBC 20:08, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

After a very short re-read I have determined that it is indeed a disjointed series of ideas mostly covered in other areas. The section on wikistalking seems to be the only unique information here, but following people around can be either constructive or disruptive. In the case of constructive following(such as following a vandal or spammer) this is acceptable behavior, in other cases I beleive that other policies cover it. I support you decision to turn this page into a guideline. HighInBC 20:11, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

After re-reading the page, I also support your action. Thanks for doing this. JesseW, the juggling janitor 02:34, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikistalking?

When I looked at a user's contributions page, I saw several articles (about Italian models, if you want to know) that had a couple of minor formatting and capitalisation errors, so I went to those articles and fixed them. Would that be considered Wikistalking, though not harmful? --Gray Porpoise 19:17, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Nope, I consider such things to be more giving someone a hand rather than stalking. True wikistalking would be if you were to check their contributions on a daily basis and edited most of their changes. LinaMishima 15:19, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Query

I have had questions about the identity of a particular user and whether or not he is a person about whom a Misplaced Pages article is written. When I asked this question, he told me I had to remove it as it represented a form of harassment. I don't think that the policy states that it is a form of harassment to ask the question whether a particular user is actually the subject of an article, especially if that user is editting that article (and then there is question of violation of WP:AUTO). Please see the related discussion on my talkpage and give me some guidance. --ScienceApologist 19:48, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

• Read the note at the top of the page. This talk page is for discussing the policy; complaints about actual harassment go on e.g. the village pump. (Radiant) 15:51, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Harassment

A few people have been harassing me after I made a change to Treaty of Nöteborg. First some guy shows up claiming I'm some other user and posting things on my page. Then another guy shows up threatening me with blockage and stalking me half way across Misplaced Pages (undoing something that doesn't make any sense). I then took to see who this person and undid one of his edits (something that didn't make any sense to me). Then he comes back calling me names, claiming I should be blocked for stalking him (HE WAS THE ONE STALKING ME!). I left a message on this guys page telling him not to stalk me, but he removed the message saying "plonk".

Why am I being harassed and how come no one is doing something about it?

Atabata 12:01, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

• Read the note at the top of the page. This talk page is for discussing the policy; complaints about actual harassment go on e.g. the village pump. (Radiant) 15:51, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

And WP:STALK

Copied from WP:COI If this has already been covered, please direct me to the relevant conversation, but: doesn't this policy conflict a bit with user's right to privacy? In other words, it is it possible to suggest to someone that they are violating this policy without yourself violating the policy, in particluar "Posting another person's personal information (legal name, home or workplace address, telephone number, email address, or other contact information, regardless of whether or not the information is actually correct) is harassment, unless that editor voluntarily provides or links to such information himself or herself." IronDuke 20:50, 30 November 2006 (UTC)

• I don't understand what you're trying to say. It's quite possible to point out that someone is posting personal information without repeating that personal information. (Radiant) 09:27, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, wasn't clear. It's like this: let's say I edit the Bill Gates article and change the lead to read "Bill Gates is the smartest human who has ever lived." After looking at some of my other edits to Microsoft, etc., you get suspcious. So you come to my talk page and you say, "IronDuke, you aren't by any chance Bill Gates, are you?" Well, if it turns out I am, aren't you violating my privacy? And yet, am I not violating COI by editing the Bill Gates in a hagiographic manner? IronDuke 14:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

• If someone asks whether you're Bill Gates, they're not violating your privacy (they are likely incivil and incorrect, though). If he posts Bill Gates's home address and telephone number, that would be violating privacy. (Radiant) 15:12, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

But it says "legal name" above. Thus, if you post that I am Bill Gates, you are violating that part of WP:STALK, no? IronDuke 15:15, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

• If asked out of the blue, yes. If this could reasonably be implied from your on-wiki activities, then no. For instance, if John Doe is the founder of DoeCorp, and the article on DoeCorp is suffering WP:OWN issues from User:JDSomeone, it is not unreasonable to conclude that JDSomeone might be John Doe. In effect, the user has exposed himself. (Radiant) 15:21, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, he's exposed himself to being exposed, yes? If you, intrepid editor, are the only person who puts it together, it can stay secret of you keep it secret. But this gets back to my question... when may one essentially violate WP:STALK. I'm going to paste this conversation over there and see what people think. IronDuke 15:28, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

And WP:STALK, part 2

This is similar to the situation above. We have an articles on a company and its owner/CEO. Over time there have been several registered users and IPs who have identified themselves as the owner or officers of the company. Overall, they appear to be just one editor. One account was banned for legal threats but several of them posted threatening or intimidating language. The editor engaged in various edits which represented conflicts of interest, such as promoting the company in other articles, removing information from the articles of competitors, and trying to settle scores. In addition to violating WP:COI and WP:NLT, the editor has repeatedly violated other policies and guidelines, such as WP:POINT, WP:COPYVIO, etc.

A new account claims to have no relation to the company or its owner. However his editing patterns, spelling mistakes, interests, etc, clearly show it to be the same editor as before. Outside information, such as the content of a MySpace account, further supports the theory that the new editor is the owner of the company. Proving the connection to the owner serves to prove that the editor has a conflict of interest and that he is the same editor as previous usernames. So, to recap, is it legitimate to reveal a user's probable real name in interest of enforcing wikipedia rules? -Will Beback · † · 00:03, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

(Cross posted to Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard due to lack of response). -Will Beback · † · 07:34, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Harassment?

Since Misplaced Pages has pages on many real life people, places, and even businesses, what is it considered when people bring real life conflicts and start placing them onto Misplaced Pages? For example: an argument between two people, at least one of whom has a Misplaced Pages article about them, or also, a business that has an article and an employee/ex-employee that is angry at the business.

I have seen a specific instance of the latter where an employee from a company has gone onto the Misplaced Pages article of the company and posted various defamatory statements about real people that work at the company. Is this vandalism, harassment, or perhaps something else?

This brings to mind a second problem. What happens when sensitive information is posted onto a Misplaced Pages article? Due to the way the Wiki system works, any content that is posted is technically there forever. It may not be on the official page, but it will exist in the pages history indefinity as far as I know. What if, say, someone at KFC decided to post the complete KFC chicken seasoning recipe, or maybe every last piece of personal data they could find about the CEO? I suppose information of that nature would not be verifiable, but it should probably be removed somehow from the history. Sahuagin 01:21, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

• This talk page is for discussing our guidelines against harassment, not for reporting actual cases of harassment. I'd suggest you bring this up on the village pump, because you're more likely to get a response there. >Radiant< 13:01, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

I had a feeling you'd say that. I am not reporting a case of harassment, I'm asking questions regarding Misplaced Pages policy, specifically about vandalism and/or harassment. Sahuagin 15:41, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

• Okay okay, from your wording it was obvious you had a specific case in mind. Yes, it's inappropriate to bring real-life conflicts to Misplaced Pages, and Misplaced Pages is not a good place for whistleblowing about your ex-employer, because such statements tend to be unsourced (however, if you whistleblow to a newspaper and it becomes a media scandal, we'd certainly write about it). Sensitive information, well, that depends. If you mean "something that is true and verifiable but that the subject of the article doesn't like", well, tough luck. If a celeb goes to prison for embezzlement, our article will report that, regardless of whether the celeb likes that. If you mean "personal contact information", we delete it from the history. If you mean "a secret recipe", likewise. The admin deletion button allows us to do that. >Radiant< 10:15, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

User:Artaxiad violating WP:Stalk

I would like to report a case of harassment by User:Artaxiad. He has been following my edits, to identify myself with certain other physical identity without any proofs at hand. My creation and editing of this page of a poet who lived in early 20th century, served as a faulty ground for User:Artaxiad to claim my identity based on false name associations and some information he found on Internet about a certain individual in California. His first case of intimidation was here . User:Artaxiad further pursued harassment, trying to associate again User:Atabek with someone else and use an article on Internet as a basis for claiming that someone else as friend of another Misplaced Pages contributor User:AdilBaguirov right here . I will not add extra evidence on User:Artaxiad following my edits to pursue revert warring, all of this evidence is well summarized at , , . I am just wondering when negligence of disruptive behavior of this user is going to end. While being an experienced user, he walks away free with confirmed sockpuppets , gets involved in heavy revert warring, which is presented in ArbCom case , clear attempt to remove all of the images related to a certain country admitted here , accusing others of "lying" , and now clear case of harassment and stalking. How long this is going to go on? Atabek 11:55, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

Shortcut

The most common shortcut reference to this page seems to be WP:STALK. I see that a couple people (including myself) have tried adding it to the top of the page, but someone else keeps removing it saying it's unneeded. It's so commonly-used though, I think it's worth including. Anyone else have an opinion? --Elonka 20:25, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

I think it is good to have. I had seen people referring to "wikistalking" and was looking for mention of this on a policy page yesterday and had trouble finding this page because the shortcut was not there. Abridged 21:03, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

First, the point of the shortcut box is not to list every single incoming redirect; that's what Special:Whatlinkshere is for. The point of the shortcut box is to list a select few handy mnemonics for the page, generally related to the page name (e.g. HAR -> Harassment). Second, "stalking" is a needlessly nasty term and should arguably not be used for that reason (for the same reason that the term "COI" is preferred to "vanity"). Third, the term "stalking" is frequently used to mean "reading people's contrib logs". While it is not infrequently argued that reading people's contrib logs is a form of harassment, we should not be giving the impression that there is merit to this argument. So adding that redirect is (1) not necessary and (2) gives people the wrong impression. >Radiant< 09:35, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

"Stalking" vandals

The following text was deleted:

"Stalking" vandals: It should be needless to add that, once a consistent pattern of vandalism has been detected — particularly the furtive vandalism that in isolation might appear to be reasonable and accurate — it is important to vet the vandal user's previous contributions for further instances of editing designed to undermine Misplaced Pages's credibility. This is not considered "wikistalking".

It was unimaginable to me, inserting this note, that this familiar point could be controversial, yet an editor suppressed this text— under the edit summary of making a "suggestion." Whether or not a few second-rate editors speciously accuse one another of "vandalism' in edit wars, this is not a sensible motivation for forbidding a guideline that concerns pursuing authentic vandals. On rare occasions I have been accused by vandals of "stalking" them. Surely this distinction needs to be made clear somewhere at Misplaced Pages, and this is the natural page. --Wetman 14:33, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

• It's a bit of a false dichotomy. Reading contrib logs isn't stalking period. What makes it stalking is acting upon those logs in a disruptive way. If, for instance, a long-standing editor makes a lot of tyops, it's perfectly reasonable to check their contrib logs for similar tyops and fixing them. >Radiant< 14:45, 4 April 2007 (UTC)

Posting addresses of sites which give personal details about editors is harassment

I have edited the section about posting editors' personal details, following discussion here and here. It needs to be very clear that posting addresses of websites that publish or speculate on editors' real names is forbidden per Misplaced Pages:Requests_for_arbitration/MONGO#Outing_sites_as_attack_sites (and per common sense). ElinorD (talk) 08:30, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Legal threats

Lately I've noticed something of an increase in legal threats. To make sure the implications of such threats are clear I changed the language "may be blocked" to the stronger "will typically be blocked" that appears in WP:NLT. It's a word-for-word copy from WP:NLT so I assume it's uncontroversial, but am mentioning it here in case anyone objects. Raymond Arritt 12:48, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

• One could make a good case for simply merging NLT into this page. >Radiant< 13:34, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

Personal security practices

Requesting comments on a proposal for a guideline on Misplaced Pages:Personal security practices that I've been working on, mainly out of the discussion on this thread at Wikipedia_talk:No_personal_attacks#Part_two. Any comments or concerns would be appreciated. Thanks,—ACADEMY LEADER 00:34, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Some more teeth needs to be put into this

In light of the very sad situation regarding User:H, there needs to be more teeth not only in this policy, but WP:NPA#Off-wiki personal attacks to ensure there isn't a next time for this outrage. It's simple common sense--we have every expectation to be safe editing here. Blueboy96 13:07, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Wikistalking - Following an editor to another article to continue disruption

The term "wiki-stalking" has been coined to describe following a contributor around the wiki, editing the same articles as the target, with the intent of causing annoyance or distress to another contributor.

This does not include checking up on an editor to fix errors or violations of Misplaced Pages policy, nor does it mean reading a user's contribution log; those logs are public for good reason. Using the edit history of users to correct related problems on multiple articles is part of the recommended practices both for Recent changes patrol (RCP) and WikiProject Spam. The important part is the disruption - disruption is considered harmful. Wikistalking is the act of following another user around in order to harass them.

An editor should not be constantly followed by a single editor "to fix errors or violations of Misplaced Pages policy". If someone is repetitively violating wikipedia policies, the person should be either blocked (to prevent further disruption), or the issue should be brought to community attention (if it isn't a clearcut case). If the person is really being disruptive, community would agree with it. Following an allegedly disruptive user for months is particularly unhelpful.

People stalking had been using "violations of Misplaced Pages policy" as a justification of causing distress by interpreting means to stalk from a policies/guidelines.

-- Cat 08:47, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I agree and given the issues being discussed at WP:ANI it seems this guideline might as well not exist. I don't see a need to sift through a users contribs in order to fix anything apart from vandalism. → AA — 14:37, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Wikistalking clarification

I think there needs to be more clarity in the definition of Wikistalking. People are being indef-banned based primarily on accusations of stalking, and it seems to me that there is significant gray area as to what it is and what it isn't. The current definition makes it clear that following another user's contribs "to fix errors or violations of WP policy" is okay, while doing it "with the intent of causing annoyance or distress to another contributor" is is stalking. But intent is hard to prove, especially when the actions involved are reverting edits and disputing on talk pages, rather than explicit PAs. Hypothetically, what if I come to the conclusion that another editor holds certain views that I believe erroneous, and I think it would be good for WP if I look for other places where that editor has advanced those views so that I can oppose them? Is this stalking? Does particular misbehavior need to be demonstrated, or is it always wrong to revert an edit or participate in a discussion that you found through someone's contribs page? I can see an argument for either side, and it seems to me that some people are confused as to just what is acceptable. Perhaps such situations need to be addressed specifically in the policy. --BlueMoonlet 06:14, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

I would say that if one follows a user contributions because one disagrees with the contents of his contributions then stalking is taking place. In other words, if the edits would have been judged "constructive" by general consensus (i.e. not vandalism, disruptive) then one should assume that the user is genuinely attempting to improve the encyclopedia and not hunt down his edits to revert/contest them.

I would expect a very good rule of thumb is if the actions done following a user's contribs would have triggered 3RR or been considered otherwise edit warring if they had occurred on the same article, they are almost certainly stalking. (Not that undoing a vandal would not fall under that criterion given that reverting vandals is never 3RR). — Coren  02:52, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

I disagree. If an editor has serious POV issues then looking at the editors recent contribs is reasonable and reverting problematic ones is not stalking. The truth is that stalking is very hard to define and is used generally when people already don't like an editor but can't pin anything concrete on the editor. For this reason, I'm generally very uninclined to claim someone is stalking unless there is very clear evidence. JoshuaZ 03:15, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

"People are being indef-banned based primarily on accusations of stalking" - can you provide some examples of this? How many people have been banned? Eiler7 00:14, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I'd rather keep the discussion here in the general case. You can follow my contribs — seriously, I don't mind :) — if you care to do so. My main question is whether stalking should be considered an offense in an of itself, in the absence of PAs or other incivility. And if so, what differentiates stalking from acceptable consultations of another user's contribs page. --BlueMoonlet 17:19, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Proposed change to WP:STALK

As I mentioned before, the WP:STALK policy is rather vague around the middle ground between researching a user's contribs to judge their RfA or to hunt down a vandal (obviously okay) and following them around to make personal attacks (obviously not okay). What I'm trying to address are accusations of this form (exaggerated somewhat to make the point): "This guy has opposed me on other topics, and he never edited on this new topic until I did. That's stalking and he should be banned!" The following is how I would write the policy if it were up to me, but what is really important to me is that the vague area be addressed in some form.

Current version:

Wikistalking refers to the act of following an editor to another article to continue disruption.

The term "wiki-stalking" has been coined to describe following a contributor around the wiki, editing the same articles as the target, with the intent of causing annoyance or distress to another contributor.

This does not include checking up on an editor to fix errors or violations of Misplaced Pages policy, nor does it mean reading a user's contribution log; those logs are public for good reason. Using the edit history of users to correct related problems on multiple articles is part of the recommended practices both for Recent changes patrol (RCP) and WikiProject Spam. The important part is the disruption - disruption is considered harmful. Wikistalking is the act of following another user around in order to harass them.

Proposed version:

Wikistalking refers to the act of following an editor to another article to continue disruption.

The term "wiki-stalking" has been coined to describe following a contributor around the wiki, editing the same articles as the target, with the intent of causing annoyance or distress to another contributor.

Reading another user's contribution log is not in itself harassment; those logs are public for good reason. In particular, proper use of a user's edit history includes (but is not limited to) fixing errors or violations of Misplaced Pages policy, or correcting related problems on multiple articles (in fact, such practices are recommended both for Recent changes patrol (RCP) and WikiProject Spam). The important part is the disruption — disruption is considered harmful. If "following another user around" is accompanied by tendentiousness, personal attacks, or other disruptive behavior, it may become a very serious matter.

Comments? --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 14:48, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

I think that's a better approach and you've hit it on the head with "Misplaced Pages:Tendentious editing" and "personal attacks". I would also suggest that unless it's vandalism patrol per WP:VANDAL, editors should be restricted to 1RR (or maybe even 0RR) as a way to measure WP:TE. → AA — 15:00, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

As no one has objected, I have made the change. --BlueMoonlet (t/c) 20:17, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

A curious question: Outing public personae

Would "outing people without their consent" be defined as harassment? Say Hillary Clinton comes on to Misplaced Pages and edits as User:HillaryClinton. She goes on all the consumer rights pages and makes edits that she feels are NPOV. She edits articles related to the Senate and health care, et. al. She adds quotes and links to her own websites and published work. She makes some edits to the Rudolph Giuliani articles. Then she decides she wants to be known as User:HRCL because people keep bringing up she is Hillary Clinton and she doesn't like that. She'd prefer to edit without that bugaboo hanging over her. Then Rudolph Giuliani catches on and mentions on his website that Hillary Clinton is editing his articles as User:HRCL. When we have public figures, who espouse their views publicly in all sorts of venues, come on to Misplaced Pages, is it "outing them"? Are there any considerations for COI and POV to not mention that User:HRCL is Hillary Clinton? The ultimate question is: is RudolphGiuliani.com "outing a person without their consent" as defined in the guidelines as they are being drawn? If a person operates publicly saying the same things they say on Misplaced Pages, is it "outing" them? This question needs to be taken into consideration, since our influence has increased to a point where influential people edit us. --David Shankbone 18:12, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Harassment#Posting_of_personal_information:

Posting another person's personal information (legal name, home or workplace address, telephone number, email address, or other contact information, regardless of whether or not the information is actually correct) is harassment, unless that editor voluntarily provides or links to such information himself or herself. This is because it places the other person at unjustified and uninvited risk of harm in "the real world" or other media. This applies whether or not the person whose personal information is being revealed is a Misplaced Pages editor. It also applies in the case of editors who have requested a change in username, but whose old signatures can still be found in archives. --User:THF

That was not the question. In fact, it highlights the question that you point out the reasoning is harm in "the real world" or other media because the question revolves around the person already exists in the media saying the same things. The policy was designed, seemingly, for people who are not public figures and may suffer repercussions for their edits. A police officer giving cited criticism of a city's mayor, for instance. But if it's Hillary Clinton criticizing Rudolph Giuliani? What real life harm comes if a known person is editing, and making edits that are the same statements they make in real life on television and in newspapers? What harm would befall them that they would require the protection of anonymity? Or, what harm would they be at risk for that the other public venues where they assert their knowledge and opinions wouldn't put them at risk? What makes Misplaced Pages different than CBS News in this regard? --David Shankbone 19:47, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Making Misplaced Pages Better

Cross posted from Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for arbitration/Durova and Jehochman/Workshop

The ultimate fate of Durova an myself are trivial questions. The larger concern is how will Misplaced Pages handle cyberstalking and harassment. We have one group of editors who use this site for trolling. Another group has formed to hunt the trolls. Unfortunately, this leads to vigilante style justice, with mistakes like the one that happened with Durova and !!. Troll hunting also creates a caustic, non-collegial environment.

The most direct solution for this problem is to route significant cyberstalking and harassment problems to the Foundation Office where they can be investigated and dealt with by volunteers under strict supervision of competent legal staff.

The advantages of this solution include:

1. No longer can a group of trolls reinforce and protect each other by stacking consensus. Office operates on the legal definition of what is allowed and what isn't. There's no voting.
2. Office investigations are private and legally compliant (amateur sleuthing may not be).
3. If harassment arises to the level of being a legal problem, Office is better prepared to deal with the appropriate authorities.
4. Amateur sleuths can instead focus their efforts on editorial problems, like conflict of interest, pseudoscience, fringe theories and POV pushing. These are important problems where we need to apply more effort as encyclopedia editors.
5. The secret mailing lists can be reconstituted under strict Office control for accountability.
6. Harassment reports filed with Office will be completely separate from editing disputes handled by Arbcom. I have personally experienced the very uneasy feeling of filing a harassment report with Arbcom, only to have that report used against me in another incident. That should never happen to anyone, ever.

That's my proposal. Hopefully we can all learn something from this dispute and make Misplaced Pages a better place. Let's not use Durova as a scapegoat for a problem that is much larger than her own activities. - - Jehochman 04:40, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Rename WP:STALK

I propose renaming "Wikistalking" to "Wikitrailing". Stalking in real life is a very big deal and we ought not to cheapen actual instances of harassment and stalking by using a powerful term too loosely. Durova 01:54, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, Wikistalking is the equivalent of harassment in real life. — EliasAlucard (Discussion · contribs) 05:44, 30 January 2008 (UTC)

Is Revealing Conflict of Interest Harrassment?

There's been an interesting discussion over at Conflict of Interest about when (or whether) it's appropriate to reveal an editor's employment when it provides evidence of Conflict of Interest. The issue arose because of a perceived conflict between the Harrassment and Conflict of Interest guidelines. I'm of the opinion that posting employment information to demonstrate Conflict of Interest does not constitute what is meant by harrassment, and therefore a limited exception should be provided in this article.

I suggest adding the following to the section on posting of personal information:

The posting of lLimited information concerning an editor's employment may be done posted to demonstrate Conflict of Interest.

Please add your comments. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 15:14, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I just edited my own text. --SteveMcCluskey (talk) 15:24, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I would oppose this. First, people who have no genuine interest in protecting WP against COI will use this as an excuse to harass. Secondly, anyone who hasn't outed themselves and who's believed to be in COI can be dealt with by contacting the ArbCom by e-mail. I can't see that there would ever be a need to out someone on-wiki. SlimVirgin 15:30, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that there is no case for revealing personal information in this case. Releasing information only to 'demonstrate COI' doesn't place much of a limit on when it might be done. Since WHOIS was mentioned in the thread at WT:COI where this question originated, I'll ask whether WHOIS information could be taken notice of on-wiki. It's my belief that this question is not completely settled. E.g. an editor adds a link that some might perceive as advertising, and WHOIS can be invoked on that link. Or an IP editor makes some changes that seem promotional and WHOIS can be invoked on his IP. If WHOIS reveals an outside affiliation, can the affiliation be stated on-wiki? Once I asked an editor whose identity was completely obvious thanks to the whois information on his own site (that he had already linked to) if he wanted his identity protected, and he said yes, so I left it alone. EdJohnston (talk) 02:30, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

just to make things more complicated - someone who is attacking me off-wiki on their blog and making libelous claims, also charges conflict of interest for me who does not disguise my identity, even though their conflict of interest on the other side is equal or greater and far more hostile. This related to my complaining about their repeated nonsourced or WP:OR or highl POV edits, as opposed to mine which are WP:RS and WP:NPOV. (They also revealed personal info which they promised me by email they would not!)

More specifically on conflict of interest and outing, obviously if a person is charging conflict of interest whose own COI can fairly easily be proved if they were editor of the offending blog, that would be of interest at least to the mediators or arbitrators, wouldn't it?

Generally to this article, Village Pump link needs to repeat in more sections since section I jumped to didn't have it.

Carol Moore 23:44, 23 January 2008 (UTC)Carolmooredc {talk}

I think the consensus at the MFD in favor of on-wiki "outing" of people having a conflict of interest is clear. If there were a consensus that these situations should be dealt with by contacting ArbCom by e-mail as you suggest, the noticeboard would have been deleted. —Random832 21:48, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

COI

Random832 has added the following bolded sentence to this section, which significantly changes the guideline, so I've moved it here for discussion:

Posting another person's personal information (legal name, date of birth, social security number, home or workplace address, telephone number, email address, or other contact information, regardless of whether or not the information is actually correct) is harassment, unless that editor voluntarily provides or links to such information himself or herself. This is because it places the other person at unjustified and uninvited risk of harm in "the real world" or other media. This applies whether or not the person whose personal information is being revealed is a Misplaced Pages editor. It also applies in the case of editors who have requested a change in username, but whose old signatures can still be found in archives. This does not apply to mere identification of who is suspected of having a conflict of interest in the course of the normal operation of the conflict of interest noticeboard.

SlimVirgin 22:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

I can see how dropping messages on COI could be harassing, but if there is external evidence that reveals the connection it seems to me that it would be difficult to pursue the issue without making some sort of revelation of identity. There has to be some degree of telling the truth that isn't harassment. Mangoe (talk) 19:03, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at User:AlexNewArtBot/COISearchResult. (This is a bot output that is mentioned in an entry at the COI Noticeboard). The bot looks for resemblance between article names and user names. I'm assuming that the operations of this bot are acceptable, and do not constitute harrassment. EdJohnston (talk) 19:44, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't yet see enough motivation for Random's change to Misplaced Pages:Harassment. There is a de facto compromise in place now, and I don't see any crisis that calls for a change. At present people use common sense, and it's unclear how to codify common sense. EdJohnston (talk) 20:15, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for notifying me of this conversation.~ In any case, "normal operation" was intended to refer to common sense, and the language as a whole was intended to point out that this is not a bright line rule where others might misunderstand and think it is. —Random832 20:39, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

Anyway, the addition was in order to bring it more in line with the result of a (then-)recent MFD, so you can't really say there's not a consensus or discussion behind it. —Random832 20:44, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

I just tried to introduce a shortened version of the COI language and it was reverted by User:Jayjg. Judging by the conversation here, there wasn't any significant objection to adding that language, but, I'll bring it up again here anyway before I readd it. COI is not allowed in Misplaced Pages. In order to show COI, we sometimes have to post personal information about another editor. This isn't harassment, but the right thing to do to show COI. COI is very serious because it affects the credibility of the project. Cla68 (talk) 01:10, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:HARASS, WP:BLOCK, and WP:OVERSIGHT make no exceptions for COI. Invading the privacy of individuals and exposing them to harassment is equally important as COI, if not moreso, because it undermines the very working environment for our most important resource, our editors. If you want to change policy in this significant way, please ensure that you have significant consensus for doing so. Jayjg 01:33, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

They don't say anything about COI, because it's obvious that in order to prove COI, that sometimes you're going to have to give the editor's real name. Therefore, there's a discrepancy in the policies that needs to be corrected. Either delete the COI policy, or change the three that you mention to make it more clear, because right now it is implied, that outing to show COI is fine. Why would a "significant consensus" (whatever that means) be necessary to fix a discrepancy in the policies? Cla68 (talk) 02:04, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

That's a very convenient interpretation. However, COI isn't mentioned because it's not an exception. WP:COI is advice for editors on how they should edit, not advice for others on how to out people they suspect have a COI, and it certainly doesn't trump the WP:BLOCK and WP:OVERSIGHT policies. Jayjg 02:17, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

You're stonewalling, we're not talking about just the page WP:COI, we are talking about the COI noticeboard, whose normal operation routinely involves revealing at least names and/or employers. --Random832 (contribs) 17:31, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

This page is a guideline, the same as WP:COI. I haven't seen where either WP:Block or WP:Oversight prohibit actions other than the improper use of those tools. Ideally we would have a very clear and limited policy for discussing COIs, which would include things like 1. Promoting one's own business, 2. Promoting references to one's own work, 3. Editing one's own bio, 4. Adding negative material in pursuit of a personal dispute. I'm not sure if there are others, but any of these issues would also have to be currently ongoing to warrant discussion. Otherwise we could simply tell people to be careful, though this leaves the problem that nobody has any good idea what will happen from time to time. Or, the third option is to state very clearly that COI is never an issue, and that what matters is always only the edits themselves. I tend to like the third option as well, but it seems to make for bad PR, and basically people don't seem willing to follow it. Mackan79 (talk) 18:04, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

It is typical at Misplaced Pages to assert that policy is "what we do" or in some cases (BLP) "what we agree we should do" ("best practice"). What we do is to reveal real life identities when a COI violator is an outsider; but to protect real life identities when a COI violator is an insider. Deal privately with those who are our friends but deal publicly with strangers. There is some degree of sense to it. Also we are moving in the direction of offering to strangers the option of privately handling COI investigations. It is a well known conundrum of our governance. WAS 4.250 (talk) 06:26, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it is a conundrum. Since we apparently have a discrepancy here in our policies, or at the least, some very vaguely-worded guidelines, I think we probably should consider adding some clearer language to the COI guideline on the steps to take in identifying COI editors, and upgrading the COI guideline to a policy to give it more weight. Cla68 (talk) 06:54, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

It might help to make a distinction between personal information and biographical information. Personal information concerns financial accounts, home address, telephone number and such. Biographical information is the sort of information that identifies who you are and/or what your experience is that applies to an editor's motivation for editing an article.

Personal information should be protected as a matter of strongly enforced policy; however, biographical information should be generally available if the editor releases it in the first place. That places the burden of privacy on the editor to not reveal the information in the first place.

In the wiki I am using, editors are required to use their real name and provide a brief bio on their talk page that explains their qualifications to edit in the wiki. Of course, it is a specialty use of the shell (thank you Media Wiki), but it might be reasonable foe Misplaced Pages to make the suggestion that, if an editor is willing to release biographical information, it should be shown in the personal page and other editors should accept that as the limit of disclosure.

This is an important issue for COI. I stand behind my name and accept that I have a conflict of interest in some articles that should be disclosed to other editors. However, I know of at least one editor who has revealed his identity in one part of Misplaced Pages, but continues to use a fictitious screen name. When editing in article for which he arguably has a COI, I feel that most editors working on that article do not know his current educational pursuit. It becomes an enforcement issue for wiki policies. Tom Butler (talk) 02:12, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Private correspondence

Kendrick7 removed the section called Private correspondence. I believe it was informative, and suggest it be restored. Rejected proposals tell us something, and so does the Arbcom decision that was mentioned. If this paragraph isn't useful then Misplaced Pages:Perennial proposals isn't either. EdJohnston (talk) 01:33, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 05:19, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Seems very WP:COATRACKish to go on about something there's no community consensus on in a policy guideline per WP:BURO, doubly so as I don't see how this relates to "harassment" per se. We could, for example, have any number of sections about specific rulings on specific ArbCom cases, but since ArbCom doesn't create policy I wouldn't think it's worth the trouble. I guess I can try to clean this section up though. -- Kendrick7 00:27, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

BTW, what's the other ArbCom case that was mentioned? Anyone know? -- Kendrick7 00:36, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

The section was useful, and should be restored. I'd actually like to see more links to ArbCom cases on relevant policy pages, as they help to clarify where the community consensus is. --Elonka 02:58, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

I did a rewrite to a version which simply state the historical facts here. The ArbCom occasionally has cases before it where they just have to make things up as they go along. Here's an example, among many, where what they came up with on the spot was debated and rejected by the community per Misplaced Pages:Consensus. I'm still unclear how exactly this paragraph ties in with being a "type of harassment" or what good it does to point out here that there is no relevant policy. Per WP:CREEP, I'd prefer policies to be tight and to the point not ramble into history lessons about tangential issues. As we used to say in school: is this going to be on the test? -- Kendrick7 07:58, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. But hey, that's an interesting side-avenue ... where do we get to ramble on about the history lessons? Because of course those ARE very interesting when you're trying to find more detail on how consensus was formed. <scratches head> Any ideas? --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:28, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

Clearly a policy

This is clearly a policy, not a guideline: there are no situations where true harassment is warranted. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk)

Indeed, I am a little shocked to realize it was not a policy. People who break this policy get blocked and get blocked fast. It would be a disservice to imply that the prohibition against harassment is mearly guidance to be followed or dismissed. _(1 == 2) 18:52, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

See #Is this policy for earlier discussion on this topic. _(1 == 2) 18:59, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

That was in 2006. This page has matured considerably since then. I support upgrading it to a policy. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 21:59, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

So let it be written, so let it be done. (You guys figure out if it was the right thing to do. ;-) ) --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:29, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

What does this have to do with the article?

Thoughtcrime? I looked at the page and it says nothing about Wikiharassment. (a protologism I know)

Lunakeet 23:56, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikistalking

There are several problems with this section:

1. It does not explain legitimate uses of the contribution history, such as following up on vandalism, copyvio, etc, in one article by checking other edits made by that user. While clarifying this may not stop the inevitable drama of a serial copyviolator coming to light, it will at least let them be assured they are getting due process, instead of the now-seemingly-inevitable upset as they discover this policy and cry "Wikistalking! Why do the rules only apply to ME?!"
2. The name itself is problematic: when actual, real-life stalking migrates to or develops on Misplaced Pages, we need to be ready to deal with it. Mistaking it for a minor form of dispute escalation is not going to help us here.

As such, this section needs rewritten and renamed. I'd suggest that we either use soft redirects as per WP:VANITY to handle the renaming, or, as we'll be rewriting the policy anyway, set up a page at Misplaced Pages:Wikistalking labelled as a historic policy, and giving the reasons for the change in name, and link to the new policy. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 17:31, 4 August 2008 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Harass#Assistance_for_administrators_being_harassed

I suggest the recommendation concerning OTRS be removed - ie or to contact the Arbitration Committee or OTRS if needed.. It appears not to be true. --Matilda 01:45, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Nutshell

I think the nutshell should be slightly amended to account for the distinction of necessary, purpose- and useful contacts on the one hand from unuseful contacts on the other. A given message may annoy the addressee, but it may nevertheless be justified by its content.

Do not stop other editors from enjoying Misplaced Pages by making threats, nitpicking good-faith edits to different articles, repeated unuseful annoying and unwanted contacts, repeated personal attacks or posting personal information.

All input appreciated. user:Everyme 15:12, 12 August 2008 (UTC)

Outing and COI

In the section on outing, we need to explain how a users can talk about conflict of interest editing without violating this policy. For example, there may be circumstantial evidence that an editor is writing about themselves and linking to their own work for the purpose of promotion. How is a user supposed to deal with that potentially serious damage to Misplaced Pages without outing? Jehochman 13:20, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

That this is a problem suggests the relationship between WP:OUTING and WP:COI hasn't been thought through well. Obviously it's clear harassment to out an editor who's doing nothing wrong. But if they're doing something wrong already, it could cripple attempts to protect Misplaced Pages if we can't do anything that leads to deduction of identity (e.g. if an article is getting attention from anon IP editors, the whois necessary to show that they're socksmay reveal identity).

It does look as if intentions have drifted. WP:COI started out with the assumption that few, if any, people are capable of writing neutrally about themselves or their own companies, and that COI edits were therefore to be strongly discouraged. COI makes for a bad dynamic, because the suspicion of bias will always be present, especially if someone with a COI is pushy proactive in that connection. Gordonofcartoon (talk) 16:41, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

WP:OUTING vs. WP:COI & WP:NOR

While WP:OUTING addresses the serious issue of stalking, as currently written, it renders WP:COI and aspects of WP:NOR (specifically WP:COS) unenforceable. Any good-faith attempt to identify a user as having a COI (e.g., WP:COI/N#COI with Rjm7730) usually necessitates some degree of real-life identification. Typically, the user name is a give-away, but otherwise only an intentional or inadvertent admission by a registered or anonymous user is usable evidence – and the problems are mostly with editors who do not want to have their COI edits exposed as such or are unfamiliar with WP:COI in the first place. I feel that the community needs to discuss whether WP:Outing trumps WP:COI and WP:COS (which should then be degraded or eliminated ) or else needs to accommodate legitimate, good-faith enforcement of these policies and guidelines (thereby perhaps making WP:Outing more in line with WP:STALK, the problem which originated). While the issues have been raised here, there has been no resolution, and that lack of resolution is beginning to hamper the work of enforcing WP:COI. Askari Mark (Talk) 15:34, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

WP:COI is not intended to be "enforceable". It is advice to people who may be editing under a conflict-of-interest, and is not supposed to be a club used to justify edit reversion, article deletion, or outing. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 15:47, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. Conflict of interest is a Misplaced Pages guideline. For troublesome COI editing, you can reference neutral point of view as the relevant policy. Jehochman 15:57, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

WP:COI is a guideline intended to be read by users who may have a conflict of interest. We use WP:NPOV and WP:OR, among others, as the policies which back up the guideline. True, we can not invoke WP:COI to a user who does not reveal his connection to the topic, but that's not really an issue in my mind. WP:COI specifically states that a user with a conflict of interest is not automatically prevented from editing, it just offers them tips on how to make sure they stay within policy. Think of it like this: WP:COI is for the user who comes here thinking "I want to write about my company, but I want to stay within policy. How do I do that, in a nutshell?". In this regard, WP:COI is not at odds with WP:OUTING.

The user who comes here completely anonymously to project his opinions, original research, etc, is probably not interested in reading the guideline anyway. In those cases, we have the policies on NPOV and OR that we can invoke to ensure the articles stay within policy. This is true whether the editor has a COI or not. Arakunem 16:19, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

What WP:OUTING fails to acknowledge is that evidence of an individual's identity may already exist on the internet, and is therefore in the public domian, as such presenting information about an editor that is already acessible to all concerned cannot be considered outing. Semitransgenic (talk) 17:59, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

The Misplaced Pages community does not want people sleuthing details about editors lives and making speculative comments on Misplaced Pages. (What happens elsewhere we cannot control.) Who somebody is does not matter so much. We are concerned about the quality of their edits. Jehochman 18:34, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

It depends how you define "sleuthing". We're talking about what's effectively Open Source Intelligence, where the information is not in the least secret. I'm thinking of situations where, say, ] is editing Yrellag Gallery and Google shows the proprietor of Yrellag Gallery to be a Joe Blow. If the search required is at that level of triviality, as it often is because COI editors are so commonly both arrogant and stupid, it can heardly be considered as "outing". Gordonofcartoon (talk) 19:01, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I think we need a consult with the Foundation on that issue, because I am uneasy tiptoeing around the edges of WP:HARASS by making that link on Misplaced Pages. When is something blatantly obvious (and reliable) enough not to constitute outing? You can certainly do the sleuthing and then act on that info by saying, "Joe Blow, your editing seems to be very promotional. Are you associated with that gallery?" Jehochman 19:38, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. If the sleuthing stays within Misplaced Pages's pages then it's likely ok. By this I mean that if User:Yrellag Gallery edits the Yrellag Gallery page, then we know there's a COI. This happens a lot with autobiographies and such. As soon as you have to go to google to establish the connection then you're treading on dangerous ground. "You" (the hypothetical "you") may stop at "Ok, are you the proprietor of Yrellag Gallery?" but the next, more fanatical editor that comes along might do a phone book lookup and call Joe at home about his editing. Its best if that train never left the station. Remember, if Joe Blow is editing the article and inserting promotional material or original research, then we neutralize it, whether he's affiliated or not. Arakunem 20:31, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Well it all depends how seriously wikipedia wants to take the issue of WP:COI. When it can clearly be demonstrated that an editor has a COI, using public domain information, they should be restricted from editing an article, or at the very least they should be placed on some kind of admin watch list. What should be appreciated, is that COI editors waste peoples time, particulalry if they have a POV adgenda that they are intent on pushing, and this is something that is not good for wiki long term. Also, the declaration bypass is a poor safeguard because the editor can still behave in a problematic fashion. There seems to be little incentive to tackle this issue, and it is one that can potentially create a lot of hassle. WP:OUTING using public domain information should be seen as an acceptable method of bringing attention to an existing COI especially if admin are reluctant to deal with the issue in a satisfactory manner. Semitransgenic (talk) 20:40, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

(ec) I oppose any policy prohibiting people from editing pages where they have a COI. What should be, and is, prohibited is POV-pushing. If somebody finds a Misplaced Pages entry about themselves and sees inaccurate negative information in there, they should absolutely have the right to remove it. If they want to write a hagiography about themselves, they should be forbidden from doing so; but they already are forbidden from doing so, by WP:NPOV. Same goes for adding unverifiable information about themselves: it should be forbidden, and is, by WP:V. Also, to Arakunem, we need to be careful of assuming that people who declare themselves to be the subject of an article are telling the truth; that assumption can lead to a whole new type of BLP problem. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 22:10, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree completely, S.I. (if I may abreviate) :) At the end of the day, NPOV and V are the order of the day, so keeping editors, COI or otherwise, within those policies takes the burden off of having to validate an identity claim in the first place. Arakunem 23:11, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

I guess the big sticking point regarding off-wiki sleuthing is that it is un-policeable, so there's no way to know if a user has gone too far with his sleuthing. If there were a wikipolicy saying that investigation using google is ok, for example, and a tenacious investigator ended up with a COI contrib's phone number, workplace, etc., and harassed them in person, it could be construed as sanctioned by the foundation. Arakunem 22:06, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

yes but the issue with COI, from what I have seen of it, ranging from possible COI, to full blown COI, is that the manner in which it is policed by admin depends entirely on the priority of the article and the level of exposure it receives. Also, getting a COI issue addressed in the first instance, and seeing something done about it, long term, requires time and effort, whereas if an editor could point directly to evidence that supports a claim it would cut all the red tape, save everyone time, and hopefully lead to real policing. But that's only COI, one can face an uphill struggle having POV pushing dealt with also; and never mind getting WPV addressed wiki-wide. It's fine saying this is not allowed that is not allowed but if such matters are dealt with in an inconsistent fashion, and varying results are achieved, nothing will improve, and people will continue taking the piss, knowing definitive action will never be taken. There is an attitude that if articles are not to the fore, are not controversial, and generally have fewer interested parties engaged in editing them, that they slip down the scale of importance when it comes to admin enforcement. Semitransgenic (talk) 23:02, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Depends on the admin, I guess. Recently an admin and I got pulled into in an issue (called in as a COI to the noticeboard, but was really just POV), over whether a song finished in last place, or second-to-last place in a contest, in a stub-class article. Certainly not an article in the forefront by any definition, but we spent a fair amount of time discussing NPOV and V issues with the involved parties. I suppose the bigger issue might be how and where to bring up COI and POV concerns. We have the notice boards, but the average anon editor working on one article may not know how to handle these disputes. And you are absolutely right that consistency in policy application and enforcement is critical. Arakunem 23:16, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Semitransgenic, ArbCom has made rulings specifically stating that outing another editor onsite is unacceptable unless the editor has disclosed his or her identity onsite voluntarily, no matter how well know this identity is elsewhere in the Web. Now that doesn't stop you from presenting the relevant evidence to administrators or to ArbCom if there's a need; it's a matter of compliance with the Foundation privacy policy. You can view this as a tradeoff. So yes, it's possible to exploit the privacy policy in order to circumvent the COI guideline, but people who do that assume a risk for themselves and their employers. Sometimes the press catches onto that stuff and when that happens it does not look good at all. Durova 23:38, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

And it looks even worse when admin are engaged in COI. The Jossi Fresco case for instance. That incident, in my opinion, undermined the credibility of this encyclopedia and that is the concern. But there are a number of editors guilty of conduct similar to Fresco's but they go unchecked for the most part. They are not only persistently engaged in vetting the contributions of others, they are clever in the way they edit, so as not to appear too problematic, and draw attention to their activities. Challenging such individuals and then demonstrating to others that a particular agenda is at play is not easy. Semitransgenic (talk) 23:41, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

That particular editor has disclosed his real name and his affiliation. I thought the primary question you raised had to do with undisclosed conflicts of interest? Durova 23:47, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

No, not entirely, as I mentioned earlier, the disclosure clause is a weak deterrent, the Fresco case is one example of this, but odder still, if the article is correct, with Fresco "there's a catch...you can’t expose him the Conflict of Interest Noticeboard. He created the Conflict of Interest Noticeboard." Maybe I'm being idealistic in thinking that there is a way to do things here that benefits the encyclopedia long term, and that those interested in supporting this ideal should be met with a greater good approach to policy enforcement. The form of extreme egalitarianism practiced here is simply counter productive when it's obvious certain individuals ultimately have their own interests at heart. Semitransgenic (talk) 00:13, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Our onsite mechanisms of dealing with conflict of interest are inherently weak deterrents. Suppose someone estimates a dollar value of $20,000 to maintaining a positive brand presence at Misplaced Pages. A 24 hour block makes no difference and it's fairly easy to invest a little manpower into circumventing whatever Misplaced Pages's volunteers try to do. So manipulating Misplaced Pages looks like an attractive option. What's to balance that? Well, the more steps to resist scrutiny the worse it looks when the press does get hold of it. And when the mainstream press takes an interest that generally costs a lot more in bad PR than anything they hoped to achieve. Durova 00:33, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

You are dwelling on a specific form of COI that relates to commercial interests, let's instead dwell on the Jossi issue, for instance: "So long as you divulge a conflict and you edit appropriately in light of that conflict, then it's OK to continue editing," says another senior administrator, who requested anonymity. "But Jossi made considerable revisions to that conflict of interest policy himself, including deleting a section about having a conflict of interest relating to your guru." Semitransgenic (talk) 00:37, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Also, "According to Misplaced Pages's 'user contribution' tool, Fresco's first 2400 edits - spread over more than a year from April 2004 to August 2005 - were almost entirely devoted to Prem Rawat- or cult-related articles. The edit histories of Momento and Rumiton look much the same." This leads nicely to the issue of tag-teaming, when are we going to see official policy on this form of abuse? Same for goes for polite POV pushers. Semitransgenic (talk) 00:41, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I dislike the idea of calling out a particular individual to this extent on a policy page, unless it's coupled with a link to the relevant arbitration case that followed. Your posts are likely to give passers-by an impression that this individual's conduct has not been scrutinized. It has, and he is currently a named party in a second arbitration case. If you have substantial information to bring to bear that the arbitration committee has not already considered, please raise the matter there. Nothing good can come of further steps down the present path: either he behaves appropriately, in which case this is unfair to him; or he behaves inappropriately, in which case the arbitrators ought to receive whatever you have to say directly. In general the site runs better when people handle such things in a direct way. Best wishes, Durova 01:01, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Now this is interesting, I didn't know all that, but you are presenting it like there is a legally binding non-disclosure agreement in place, yet this 4 page item on The Register is in the public domain. Misplaced Pages does not exist in isolation, there is no border, as such, where a different set of legal constraints apply, at least I don't recall agreeing to any terms and conditions that limit me from discussing a relevant news report on a discussion page. The Jossi incident has the potential to demonstrate why we need stronger COI enforcement and why the issue of tag-teaming needs to be given more serious attention, at the very least it should be policy, and not just an essay. Semitransgenic (talk) 01:11, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Well, as always, there is more to this, having read more to the background, I can now see why you express concern about that article, it appears it may have been a hit piece. It also seems the ArbCom cleared the editor of any wrong doing, have you a link to the second arbitration mentioned above? Semitransgenic (talk) 01:27, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Durova and Semitransgenic are both right. We're not here to discuss particular cases but the COI guideline is too weak prevent abuse. I suggest that the COI talk page would be the best place to diccuss improvements to that guideline, including incorporating some of the good ideas discussed relevant to "polite POV pushing" and tag teaming. As for this policy, no COI justifies harassment. If an editor can't handle his or her COI, then they should be referred to the ArbCom or at least ANI. Probations and banning for editing problems aren't harassment. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 01:31, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Well said, Will. Durova 01:34, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

No outing, period. Any concessions to the contrary will void the privacy rule. NVO (talk) 05:21, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I just looked at the Wikimedia privacy policy, and it doesn't mentions anything about outing. The only policy that concerns outings is this one. If the community wishes to change this standard it may do so. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 05:55, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Change to what, exactly? Mandatory upfront disclosures? Fingerprinting? Mind reading? The last one is no joke: the Foundation may require copies of IDs, letters from employers, tax returns, but how in the world can it establish/discourage COI in less formal matters? NVO (talk) 06:06, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

I'm not proposing any change. I was just noting the logic of saying that "we can't change this policy because that would violate this policy". Changing a policy doesn't violate a policy. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 06:43, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your responses, but so far I’ve seen little discussion about the conflict between the “current editions” of WP:OUTING and WP:COI. Please keep in mind that WP:COI was established before such serious stalking problems arose that the formulation of WP:OUTING was found necessary. The establishment of WP:OUTING (as it currently exists) quite essentially changes Misplaced Pages from an environment in which privacy of identity was not a “given”. If we are to maintain WP:OUTING in its present formulation, then something has to give with regard to WP:COI (and WP:COS) – or vice versa.

Since identifying someone as having a COI is tantamount to “outing” them, if WP:OUTING is to be maintained and enforced as it currently stands, without any nuance of qualification or exception, then there is no point in having COI/N at all – for the majority of COI problems are not with conflicted editors who have revealed their COI and are working as requested by the guideline; furthermore, the archives must be reviewed and any past outings oversighted. In fact, retaining COI/N for the sake of problems with “known unknowns” begs for problems with well-meaning editors who don’t re-read a policy or guideline every time they rely on it to see what has changed since they first read it months or weeks ago. Inadvertent outings are inevitable, so COI/N would require more watching by admins.

Gordonofcartoon raises a further important point not defined in WP:HARASS: Just what constitutes “outing” (an unfortunate choice of words given the term’s normative cultural meaning which is unrelated to what’s going on here). Ignoring the trivial cases, what happens when someone makes the obvious connection that User:FOO may have a COI with his peacocking in the article on Dr. Foo? Are logical deductions from an obvious user name relationship “outing”? If so, why? How is it any different than when a user name is the editor’s real-life name? Furthermore, how does one “legally” approach a user suspected of having a COI when the very suggestion essentially constitutes an outing? If WP:OUTING is to be a no-exceptions policy (as it is currently), then WP:COI and WP:OUTING both need to be revised with guidance on how to do what they encourage editors without accidentally crossing the line. Askari Mark (Talk) 21:15, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Posting of personal information, when scoured from wikipedia contributions

Someone reverted what I thought was a quite reasonable change to “Posting of personal information” (WP:OUTING)

The section currently says “Posting another person's personal information … is harassment, unless that editor voluntarily posts this information, or links to this information, on Misplaced Pages themselves”

The “unless” clause creates quite a loophole legitimising actions that should be considered blatant outing, on the basis that information posted was derived from editor posts. Editors who wish to be anonymous, even moderately so, should be allowed to participate under their chosen handles without having to worry that every edit will be scoured for information for a protected outing. Additionally, a user who once posted personal information, should be allowed to return to anonymity, and this policy should encourage all editors to protect the anonymity of all other users in cases such as these.

The appropriate place to collect information about yourself is on your userpage (or a user subpage). The first sentence of this section should reflect this. Posting personal information about another user should only be allowed if that user currently discloses the information in their userspace, where they control it. There’ll surely be ambiguous cases, but the posting of information collected from obscure locations, edit histories, third party userspace, etc, without good reason, should definitely be consider WP:OUTING, and should be discouraged as a matter of policy. The important issue here, as I see it, is WP:Editors matter, and the need for wikipedia contributors to feel safe within our community. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:41, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Is this by any chance related to your participation at Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/ScienceApologist‎, which is referring (quite often) to that section of the policy? It's generally not a good idea to refer to a policy in a discussion, and then go and change the policy to try and get it to backup the points that are being argued. --Elonka 00:50, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes. The MfD is what brought me here, where I found that the wording of the policy is at odds with its spirit, and sought to fix it. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:02, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

A completely thorough OUTING policy would shut down all COI enforcement, as was hinted in the section just above. The two priorities are 'in tension', and you can't preserve the maximum version of either one at the same time. I think we still want to enforce the COI rules, and I think we want to avoid discussing people's real life identities unnecessarily. (Judgment is required to find the balance). Someone who fears *any* disclosure of their personal information should avoid editing Misplaced Pages, and might be well advised to stay off the internet as well. (All those web sites out there are logging their IP address). I suggest that the current policies and guidelines should remain as they are. EdJohnston (talk) 01:27, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, Ed, but it seems to me that there is little regard for WP:COI issues here. I’m afraid that without some broader resolution, editors who bring up COI issues on COI/N in good-faith do so at their own risk of being “punished” for doing so. There is no guidance available for how to report such issues in a manner that doesn’t accidentally “out” someone (who, of course, has no desire to see their COI being pointed out in the light of day). Askari Mark (Talk) 23:56, 11 October 2008 (UTC)

This is an unsettled point that's worth discussing. Some of the site's most persistent and damaging long term vandals have been thwarted because of early self-disclosures. I don't think it's necessary to hamstring the conflict of interest noticeboard and other necessary site maintenance functions in order to supply a reasonable leeway for editors who AGF with ScienceApologist. Three principles can cover the situations:

1. Add voluntary or the notion of informed consent to the statement about self-disclosures. If an eleven-year-old posts their name and home address, of course we don't want to encourage reuse of that because a child isn't capable of making a fully informed decision. And it's reasonable to give adults some leeway for logout system bugs, within reason.
2. Add the concept of site standards compliance to the policy: editor who is here to help the project and acting in good faith shouldn't have to worry about an obscure early disclosure being exploited to bandy his or her identity on pages where it serves only as irritation, but long term abusive sockpuppeteers etc. don't get a free loophole to continue exploitation when their actions come under legitimate scrutiny. AGF is not a suicide pact.
3. Add the concept of necessity and/or discretion to the reuse of information under condition 2: when you know the person's real name, and you know they probably don't want it reused, but it's necessary to repeat it in order to prove a pattern of abuse, then use it only when necessary for that purpose. As much as possible, use the individual's username or other moniker (long term IP vandals are often assigned a nickname).

So to take an actual example, a certain editor had been indefinitely blocked and a later account was accused of being his sockpuppet. On his original account he had disclosed his own name early in his editing career. He was a writer in real life and had often edited Misplaced Pages to add citations to offsite material he had written. For COI, POV, and other problems he earned an indefinite block. Several months afterward a new account appeared, which often cited articles by the same author and claimed to be a fan of his. The original account had been dormant for too long to checkuser. Yet Wikipedians who checked the new account's edits noticed that the new account had attributed the original author by name at an Misplaced Pages article, and used a citation to a source article that lacked any byline. Only the the original editor or someone who knew him personally could have known that he was author of that source. Based upon that, the second account was linked to the original account and the editor got community banned. (I know who this fellow's name is, but as you can see I'm not using it because because it isn't absolutely necessary in this post). Later actions and checkusers confirmed that this conclusion had been correct. Durova 01:02, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Returning to this now that the MfD is closed

I understand the points made, but there is still plenty of room for improvement in the text of WP:OUTING. At the moment, the language is very harsh about a very narrowly defined meaning of outing. I believe that what Elonka did was wrong (debatably), that many would consider “outing” to be the applicable term, but that the action does not meet the more restrictive definition accepted by others, and the action was not at the level to warrant something like an “immediate block”.

The unstated but partially accepted definition of “outing” seems to be “the original publication of another’s personally identifying information”.

A softer definition would be “the repetition, or drawing attention to, another’s personally identifying information, whether that information was released by another party, accidentally by the subject, or previously but now with regret by the subject.

I think that WP:OUTING should state that the softer version of outing should be avoided. An exception can be made for good faith contributions to a WP:COI debate. However, when such cases are closed, the identifying information should be removed.

The intention is to support the anonymity of users who wish to be anonymous, including where a past disclosure was accidental or is later regretted. This intention should be supported by advice in this policy, not by threat of punishment over small infringements, and should not be taken to limit focused discussion with respect to WP:COI cases. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:38, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Information about people's real life identity, or at least their affiliations, is constantly leaking out due to their pattern of edits and how they behave in discussions. The suggestion that the 'identifying information can be removed' is unrealistic. The best we can do is not go out of our way to draw connections when they don't have to be drawn. In contexts where a person is charged with policy violations, we may necessarily have to draw connections. Whenever there is no hint of any abuse taking place we like to speak indirectly about a person even if sometimes we are skirting mention of the obvious. Street addresses and phone numbers can be oversighted but a person's entire edit history can hardly be oversighted. EdJohnston (talk) 04:34, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

By “removed”, I merely mean cut, or blank, so that search engines don’t index it. There also should be no obvious (to a non-wikipedian) instructions on how to find the information. I agree that there is little point in pretending that information can be removed absolutely, and indeed I am not suggesting trying to do that, and further, I think doing so (excessively deleting or oversighting important information) is a bad thing. The main point is that identifying information shouldn’t be repeatedly revealed, without good reason, if it is against the user’s wishes.

Ed, is it your position that there is nothing herre to improve? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:06, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

I think it needs to be part of our culture to not publicize information that might help identify somebody (who doesn't wish to be identified) unless it's in a context where it is necessary for protecting the encyclopedia. So it is perfectly in order for anyone to suggest to another editor that they have revealed too much about a third party and ask them to redact it. I've not yet seen any proposal for a rule change here that sounds convincing. EdJohnston (talk) 16:08, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

While it's good courtesy to refrain from repeating information about somebody that they don't wish to publicize and might consider to be harassing in nature (or to aid stalkers/harassers), unless there's a really good reason that overrides this, it's probably a bad idea to have a hard and fast policy that strictly prohibits all such mentions; the overextension of this concept has caused much mischief in the past. People have sometimes insisted on draconian efforts to shut the barn door after the horse has left, to suppress "personal information" that's already appeared on Slashdot or The Register. The "BADSITES wars" of last year were about some people declaring all links to certain critics' sites to be inherently wrong because those sites might just possibly "out" somebody. *Dan T.* (talk) 00:05, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

"hard and fast policy that strictly prohibits all such..." is an extreme that is obviously bad. It is preferable to have simple to understand policy that advises in softer terms. WP:OUTING, as written, is excessiveley stern about excessively restrictive situations. It is also too verbose. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:24, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikihounding

It's high time we phased out 'wikistalking' from site jargon: the word confuses minor onsite irritation with an actual real world felony. I've been bold; we got WP:VANITY out of our jargon and that was much less a problem than this. Durova 02:15, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• ... and now it will be confused with an aristocratic sport... NVO (talk) 03:25, 27 October 2008 (UTC)
  • That sort of confusion is much better than confusing it with a felony. Jehochman 03:32, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• • Heartily approve. annoyingly following someone around the wiki is a problem-- but it's insulting to all involved to liken it to actual felonious stalking. "Wikihounding" is as good a term as any I've yet heard-- and it's far better than "wikistalking". --Alecmconroy (talk) 05:58, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• • Agree. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 06:06, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• The new word seems fine to me, too. Cla68 (talk) 06:25, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• Concur. Although "stalking" is a common internet term, given the number of Misplaced Pages editors who have been physically or electronically stalked in the "real world", we need to differentiate between the annoying onsite behaviours and those that continue off-site, creating genuine potential for harm and/or safety concerns. Risker (talk) 15:01, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I've just used "wikistalking" in a proposed arbitration decision and no one seems to have minded.... Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I have commented on the talk page of the proposed decision. Risker (talk) 16:01, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you should not have. As a named editor, I was annoyed when somebody else casually accused me of "stalking" because I had been following their contributions (legitimately in my view, not legitimately in theirs). It is not nice when a Google return for a person's name returns an accusation that looks like a criminal activity. Jehochman 16:16, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I tracked the wording from the existing policy. As I've noted on the talkpage of the proposed decision, if the policy is changed by consensus, the decision will be deemed modified accordingly (either before or after it was issued).

In my view, as you know, Google should not be picking up any of the pages on which such allegations might be made, in any event. I thought this issue had been addressed by now. Newyorkbrad (talk) 16:23, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Regrettably, the situation is more complex, even with Google. We are not exactly sure where they stand and whether they might change their handling. There are also a number of mirrors and spam sites that copy Misplaced Pages pages. These copies can and do show up in Google. There are other search engines besides Google, including Yahoo, Microsoft Live, and Ask that constitute something like 30% of the search market in the United States. It is unclear whether these engines support noindex, and how completely they support it. Google's dominance is less in markets such as China and Russia which have strong local search engines (Baidu and Yandex respectively). Jehochman 16:30, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I was wondering at the outset how much to post onsite. It doesn't surprise me that someone came along to pooh-pooh the change; what does surprise is to see it coming from Newyorkbrad (who is usually adept at taking a hint and withholding judgment until the appropriate time). I've just sent him an e-mail and any other trusted Wikipedian is welcome to write me and find out what other reasons I have. Yeah, they're strong reasons. And yeah, they're the sort of thing best left offsite (hint: an FBI case I opened this year has something to do with it). Brad, consider yourself heartily trout slapped.Wikipedians who wonder where this move for a change is coming from are encouraged to contact me. Durova 18:13, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Wikihounding sounds much better! (Although it could be confused with fox hunting, which is illegal in the UK). I heartily support this change. DendodgeTalk 18:21, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I have no trouble with adding "wikihound" as an occasional synonym for "wikistalk", but I think it's going a bit far to aggressively attack editors who continue to use the wikistalking term. I also think that there's a subtlety that is missed between the two, as "stalk" is closer to "follow" which is what many wikistalkers do. "Hounding" on the other hand usually means a more aggressive kind of attack. If I say, "I have a stalker", then in on-wiki context it means that I have someone who is systematically tracking my contribs, and possibly popping up in various areas where I am working, to "hound" me. But I don't feel that it would make sense for me to say that I have a "hounder". --Elonka 19:34, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree it would go too far to aggressively attack; that's why no one is proposing such a thing. Look up WP:VANITY: you get a soft redirect with a note of explanation and a pointer to WP:COI. That's the right approach, and there's better reason to do that here. Elonka did not attempt to contact me and seek my reasons before she posted her opinion. Durova 20:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

If somebody is purely observing, we'd never know about it. They actually have to take some sort of observable action to be discovered. Additionally, that action has to have the effect of causing consternation. Hounding implies both following and some sort of annoyance (barking, slobbering, biting). I think it is more accurate than stalking, and as Durova points out, hounding does not conflate the issue with serious, real life, criminal terminology. Jehochman 20:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

There might be other synonyms that are better than "hound", but this is certainly better than "stalk". Support this change. Cirt (talk) 20:45, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• Would it not be more sensible to not use a potentially derogatory term at all? It's like DTTR; why not just describe one's actions rather than having to label them with something? Giggy (talk) 22:50, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Harassment of editors on-wiki, such as by following them around and tampering with their edits for the purpose of annoying them, can be a significant issue. Harassment of editors in real life, such as by threats of violence, defamatory statements to employers, unwelcome sexual approaches, and the like, is obviously a very grave and substantially more serious problem. Certainly nothing that I said above was meant to suggest or imply in any way that the seriousness of the former is on the same level as that of the latter, nor have I ever suggested or meant to suggest any such thing. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:06, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I for one had no doubts about your position on the matter. It seems like a good idea to use controlled vocabulary in an attempt to distinguish between the two cases. Jehochman 00:13, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you very much for that clarification, Brad. Unfortunately our current terminology lends itself to precisely that confusion, in situations where no need for clarification ought to exist. I have seen conscientious and well-meaning editors make that mistake more than once in more than one context. By shifting our terminology away from the zone where conflation does the most damage, I hope to spare other editors an additional layer of difficulty when dealing with gravely serious matters. Durova 01:54, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

To return to the matter of language, "pest" is what I used to call my sister when she did this kind of thing, not sure if this is any more pleasing than "hound" although - Durova's crucial point aside - we are talking about something unpleasant. We may need to use a neologism ... I am sure if it is clearly defined, after a few months people will get the idea of what it means ... Slrubenstein | Talk 02:08, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

We have a popular essay Misplaced Pages:Trolling#Pestering. A hound is slightly different from a pest. A hound is Misplaced Pages:Griefing whereas a pest is trolling. Pestering is defined as asking lots of disingenuous questions. Jehochman 02:42, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Not sure I disagree with the premise here, but I'm a bit concerned about "hound" here - in my experience, it can be used as a slang term with sexual connotations. Shell 05:58, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Do you have any evidence of that usage being common, such as a dictionary definition? We know that "stalking" is widely used in a criminal/sexual legal sense. Almost every word has multiple uses and meanings, but I think "hound" is far less confusing than "stalker". Jehochman 07:42, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Sure. Random House lists as one of its definitions "a mean, despicable person". The American Heritage Dictionary lists "A contemptible person; a scoundrel." Princeton University offers up "someone who is morally reprehensible". Webster's also lists "A despicable person." -- so perhaps not the precise connotation that occurred to me (courtesy of my grandmother :) ) but I can see how someone might legitimately assume we meant they were "despicable" instead of just "relentless". Shell 17:00, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

That's exactly it, that "stalk" is a word that's used in many senses, so it doesn't make sense to get rid of it just because of one narrowly-focused definition. Sherlock Holmes had a deerstalker cap. A panther "stalks" its prey. Would you want to change nature documentaries to say that the panther "hounds" its prey? Which doesn't mean that we can't try to use the word "hound" as a synonym and see if it catches on, but I think it's a bad idea to try and punish people for using the "stalking" term when it's so much a part of the English language. --Elonka 16:55, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Why, Elonka, we are not trying to punish anyone. People can use whatever terminology they like, but when we are writing official policy, I think a very good point has been made that we should not conflate a relatively minor wiki annoyance with a real life felony. Shell, looking up the definition of "hounding", after "any of several breeds of dog" we see "pursue or chase relentlessly" followed by "someone who is morally reprehensible". The context of this policy makes clear we are not talking about dogs. I think the risk of conflating "morally reprehensible" with wikihounding is much lower than conflating wikistalking with felony stalking. While neither term is perfect, hounding probably would cause less confusion. Elonka's point that stalking has a plain English meaning has merit, but I think overall we should use a different word. Could you perhaps suggest a third alternative? Jehochman 17:21, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Jehochman, you and Durova have been cautioned in the past about working in concert, yet changed this Misplaced Pages policy page without prior consensus, trout-slapped an arbitrator who dared to disagree, and now I see that you're already at Misplaced Pages:Wikiquette alerts, chastising people for being unaware of the policy change. Especially as you yourself have been repeatedly warned both on-wiki and off-wiki by multiple admins for harassment (diffs available upon request), and you are now trying to build a case that you should be an arbitrator, it is extremely bad form for you to be pushing through this kind of policy change while pretending to be a neutral voice. Please stand down. --Elonka 18:17, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Er. For what its worth as the person who was talked to on Wikiqutte alerts, the note seemed polite. I thanked Jehochman, came over here. Took a look and it and it seemed reasonable enough. As the recipient I didn't feel like Jehochman was "chastizing" me. JoshuaZ (talk) 02:45, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

I think everybody has had their full of disputes between Elonka and Jonathan & Durova. I only hope yet another round does not develop here. AGK 18:53, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, AGK. I hadn't looked at this page today until now. Very disappointed by the level of discourse. Just dropping by to repeat my offer: any trusted editor who wants to know my real, substantive reasons for wanting to change this wording is welcome to e-mail me, because it wouldn't be appropriate to post details of that nature here. This is about a serious matter. Please, some things are more important than personal likes or dislikes. Durova 21:14, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

One of my kids made a funny suggestion that hadn't occurred to me; I was describing the kind of behavior that we want to name and he immediately pipes up with "Mom, that's a griefer". That suggestion would probably resonate well with the younger crowd, but might not mean anything to older folks who haven't played an mmorpg like Misplaced Pages ;) . Other things we came up with were pursuer or badger(er?) (they'd have a theme song then I guess). While I was chewing on this, I started wondering about "harass" as well; could just be my point of view, but I tend to think of that in the legal sense of the word even more often than I would "stalk". Anyways, just some thoughts and suggestions. Shell 04:34, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I support this change of wording. More respectful, more accurate in most cases I would hope, less likely to escalate disputes; if it's criminal stalking we can call the police. Sticky Parkin 01:01, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

I think the fact that it is more respectful makes it less appealing. Sometimes off-wiki stalking begins onwiki, and I think it's a good idea to let people know - very, very firmly -- that this behavior is not okay. Wikihounding doesn't do the job as well as wikistalking. IronDuke 02:04, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

It's so funny, that we don't stalk anymore! I'm of mixed feelings about this change. On the one hand, I've long opposed the tendency of people here to form opposing cliques and camps, and accuse those in the "enemy camp" of the vilest crimes, using all sorts of inflammatory language of which "stalking" is just one of the terms. On the other hand, I've never liked "PC" renaming of long-established terminology just because somebody, somewhere, might be offended by it. I recall that now-banned user Jon Awbrey once made a big fuss about how Wikilawyering absolutely had to be changed to "Wikicaviling" because the term was defamatory to lawyers... that was swiftly reversed and was the last straw that got him banned, as I recall. *Dan T.* (talk) 12:36, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Making this policy being able to swim...

...instead of being a lame duck. Before we begin, yes, I know, "zomg Sceptre's trying to start up drama". And yes, I know I got blocked for "harassment". Now we've got over that, I want to say: I've got serious problems about this policy. It was well-intentioned to begin with. But these days, it makes no distinction between Amorrow's behaviour (criminal harassment) and editing the same page as someone who doesn't like you (not harassment). Often people are blocked for the latter but not the former. So I propose that this policy be improved by:

• Offering a clearer definition of harassment much nearer to the criminal definition (remember, harassment is a criminal offence, and like the Wikistalking proposal, we should not interchange criminality with minor annoyance).
• Vastly reducing the amount of blocks made for harassment so that only clear harassment is actioned upon. If there is any reasonable doubt that harassment has occurred, no block can be made.
• Harassment blocks, unless it is blatantly obvious to any observer, must be affirmed; by either the arbitration committee or the community.
• If it's a minor case of harassment, minor block. If it's criminal harassment, indefinite block. Not the other way around.
• Off-wiki inter-Wikimedian harassment is actionable. Again, the AC or the community will need to affirm any action.

Thoughts? Sceptre 17:13, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm sure we all agree that real-world harassment, such as making threatening phone calls, is unacceptable and even criminal in some places. The question here is more about what forms of activities within the community are unacceptable. From the beginning, personal attacks and incivility have been prohibited, though the exact definitions of those haven't been fixed. Harassment is an omnibus term that involves several categories of activities: following editors across wiki pages, divulging personal information, making threats, etc. It appears that Sceptre is suggesting that either some of those categories are entirely minor, or that some forms of them are minor. This proposal would be better if there was more specificity. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 18:59, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

My main problem is that accusing someone of harassment is very risky business. It's very defamatory if it's untrue, and the person accused would have a hard time trying to clear his name. With the current policy, this messy word has been used to accuse people who are trying to make points of something not far from a criminal offense. As an experienced Wikipedian, Will, I'm sure you've heard of the slang term "SlimVirgin harassment". What I'm trying to do is reduce this landmine of bad faith by reducing any harassment blocks to cases where it's beyond a reasonable doubt. I'm sorry if my writing's disorganised, but it's a Sunday evening :) Sceptre 23:59, 14 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure whether "SlimVirgin harassment" refers to harassment of or by that user, so that doesn't help much. Could you give some examples of behavior that was labeled as harassment that shouldn't have been, in your opinion? ·:· Will Beback ·:· 01:03, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Okay, I'll explain the term in pieces. Being experienced, you know SlimVirgin has a tendency to complain a lot about people. Hell, the ArbCom reprimanded her for this in a recent case (I forget what it was, it's either C68-FM-SV or SV-Lar). The term specifically refers to her tendency to call some good-faith edits harassment.

As for specific examples... well, for one, I still don't believe the actions I got blocked for, while childish, don't really constitute actually harassment (and some people agree). Sceptre 01:31, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm not following. Are you saying that SlimVirgin's comments/actions were properly viewed as harassment or not? Are the postings about her on WR or elsewhere on the internet harassment, or not? Regarding your own behavior, I'm sure you're not asking us to change a guideline based on what you think was improper handling of your own case. So again, please provide some specific examples of the types of behavior that have been called harassment that you don't think properly qualify, and that don't involve you. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 02:14, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm saying that, several instances SV has asserted to have been harassment were not really harassment. And that request has blown away my second example of poor application of this policy. Sceptre 02:24, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Again, you're not providing any specific examples. Do I need to explain the concept of diffs? Or quotations? I haven't seen any concrete evidence that will help editors know what it is that you're proposing. Please don't answer tonight as this is going nowhere. Take the time to assemble your evidence of what is, and isn't, harassment, and what changes you think should be made to this guideline. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 02:44, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Will here, and that does not happen often. Please clarify, as it stands now your proposal is incomprehensible. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:47, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I think you need to give a few examples here, Sceptre. SlimVirgin 02:52, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Very recent example, then: User talk:QuackGuru's recent block. From how I read DigitalC's talk page, QG was trying to solve a dispute and DC (if not QG as well) were being obstructive. Good faith actions should never be considered "harassment". DigitalC complained on ANI that it was harassment and QG got blocked. Unfortunately, this behaviour of quantifying an opponent's actions as "harassment" is all too common in FRINGE/Central Europe/Eastern Europe/Israel-Palestine/Armenia-Azerbaijan/Any-AC-restricted-area. Sceptre 12:34, 16 December 2008 (UTC)

There's still a lack of diffs or details here. I see that QuackGuru was blocked by a well-respected editor, User:Shell Kinney. Without a more detailed description of the purported error, I'd presume it is correct. I disagree with your assertion that Good faith actions should never be considered "harassment". Many people who have engaged in harassment probably thought they were doing it for the good of the project. We can assume good faith but we can't prove it. Behavior is what matters. The problem of editors in a conflict making false accusations isn't limited to this policy. We don't change WP:NPOV just because editors falsely accused each other of violating it. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 09:16, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

The difference between harassment and NPOV is that the former is a criminal offence. Yes, people act like prats for the good of the encyclopedia, but they don't harass for the good of the encyclopedia. Harassment, in itself, is an action of bad faith. And we assume good faith barring significant evidence otherwise, not assume bad faith and try to prove otherwise. Sceptre 13:02, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

The logical conclusion of your view is that if I publish your personal information you should assume good faith and not regard it as harassment. That if I post a dozen notes on your talk page demanding an answer to an editing question you should assume good faith and not regard it as harassment. And that if I follow you from article to article undoing all of your edits that it's probably a good faith action. I don't see that as a wise change to this policy. We should assume good faith, but we should also respond to harmful actions. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 17:38, 17 December 2008 (UTC)

Adding IP address to WP:OUTING

Has there been any discussion about adding one's IP address to the list of personal information prohibited by WP:OUTING. In many cases, an IP address could help geo-locate a user, narrow a user down to a particular school or business, and, when compared to other edits, could indeed be identifiable information. EU regulators have gone so far as to state outright that an IP should be treated personal information. I suggest we consider adding it to WP:OUTING. (My asking this was prompted by this ANI thread, but I'm not looking for any specific or immediate remedy in that case). --ZimZalaBim 14:51, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

While I think that not announcing a (usually) logged-in editor's IP address is in general a good rule of thumb, we should take care to note that there are situations where it is appropriate. (Where abusive sockpuppetry is taking place, for example.) An editor who logs out to engage in abusive conduct (or, in the alternative, who usually edits logged out but creates a bad-hand account for abuse) obviously shouldn't be sheltered by the provisions of this policy. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:47, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

If I read the linked source correctly, one commissioner said that IP addresses should be viewed as private information, not that it is viewed that way. On Misplaced Pages there are only two ways that the IPs of editors can be known: because a checkuser request or because a user failed to log in. Checkuser information is covered by its own special privacy rules, and that doesn't appear to be a problem. Editors who edit while logged out are advertising their IP address. As TenOfAllTrades writes above, this type of information is used in dealing with abusive editors and even harassment. Any new language should acknowledge that information divulged by users is no longer private, and that includes IPs. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 17:09, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm of two minds here. Obviously information that a user has voluntarily posted here is no longer secret, but I'm not sure that it should always be treated as no longer private. Consider a hypothetical situation:

• Joe Blow signs up for a Misplaced Pages account. Being a naive innocent, he posts his name on his userpage and boasts that he is studying physics at Prestigious University.
• A few months later, Joe Blow realizes that there are cranks, wackos, and stalkers on the Internet. He removes the identifying information from his userpage.
• A few months after that, Joe Blow is editing our article on meerkats. Jane Smith disagrees with his edits, arguing over details of meerkat mating rituals. A heated dispute involving many editors ensues on the talk page. At one point, Jane says, "Well, Joe, I don't think your professors at Prestigious University would see things the same way, do you?"

In this (imaginary) situation, I'd say that despite Joe originally revealing the information himself, Jane would still be waaaay across the line of our policy. On the flip side, if Joe were adding lots of references to his supervisor's (or his own) academic papers to Misplaced Pages articles, or deleting legitimate criticism of the Prestigious University's physics department from PU's article, a reference to his status which identified his apparent conflict of interest could be appropriate.

Now, linking IP addresses to usernames is slightly different in at least some ways. An IP address is usually less specific than other identifiers; in many cases the most an IP can confirm would be that someone was editing from the UK, or the eastern United States. (Some IP addresses reveal do more, however: particular school boards or even individual schools, universities, specific employers, identifiable government offices.) On the other hand, it is also much easier to leak one's IP address. While it's very difficult to accidentally post your contact information on your userpage, it's quite straightforward to inadvertently edit while logged out — nearly-indelibly posting your IP in the article history.

Posting another editor's (putative) IP address is something that should only be done where there is a clear and specific need to respond to abuse. It shouldn't be done just for the hell of it, and it should never be used in an attempt to chill discussion, to gain leverage in a dispute, or to encourage harassment. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:51, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

I also think the way an IP address is discovered/surmised/guessed matters. For example, I'm concerned that one editor to coerce another to visit an off-project website under the editor's control (perhaps linking to a site during an active discussion, attempting to align IP hits to that site with corresponding project activity), allowing a potentially accurate correlation between a user and an IP address. --ZimZalaBim 18:04, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, that is another way of obtaining an editor's IP address, and would count as a form of subterfuge. In that instance, the information is still private and posting by an editor would almost certainly be outing. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 18:22, 23 December 2008 (UTC)

Posting of personal information

This is an important section, and I suggest adding to it one's job, although I'm not sure of the best wording. It currently says "workplace address", but in my view that is not enough. If a Misplaced Pages editor is outed as, for the sake of argument, Google's Chief Engineer for World Domination, then it doesn't really matter if the name, ID number, car license plate, email address, etc. is given. Arguably, not even a specific job title but a general job role is also identifying information. If an editor is outed as a nurse, it doesn't matter so much, but if she is outed as a pediatric nurse at hospital XYZ, then it becomes quasi-personally identifying. Thoughts? BrainyBabe (talk) 16:25, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

outing question

So I used to have my name on my user page, and that was fine by me. Then another editor decided to use my name in edit comments, as a way of deriding me. I would like to prevent this in the future, and to that end, have de-published the mention of my name on my user page. I am not overly concerned with trying to keep my wikipedia activities unconnected to my real-life identity, but I would like to not have my name be a part of other editor's commentary. so WP:OUTING performs a useful function in that regard, even for people like me who are not overly concerned about secrecy of their wikipedia/real-name connection. So my question is, is my removal of my name from my own user page sufficient to achieve the result I want, which is simply for it to become once again prohibited for other users to make use of my real-world name in their comments. Tb (talk) 10:53, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

You are currently harassing me and other editors. It is called WP:Hounding and you need to stop. This is not "deriding." You are violating Misplaced Pages's rules, and ordinary manners. Please stop following me around Misplaced Pages and reverting all my edits. This is an encyclopedia and as such it is open to constructive editors and not to people who wish to disrupt us (such as by

So, if this is true (which it is not), you have the right to out me? Tb (talk) 10:59, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

You already outed yourself. And you continue to use your own initials, which don't exactly conceal anything. You outed yourself. You cannot unring a bell.

However, you can stop WP:Hounding me all over Misplaced Pages. You CAN stop deleting Misplaced Pages articles (which you list, showing that you plan to delete them again: ). Ad.minster (talk) 11:13, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

I believe that the policy says that once I depublish my name from my user page, you are prohibited from mentioning it in user comments. I regret that your disrespect for me is to the level that you think you can score debating points by mangling my name when you know I would prefer you not use it at all. Tb (talk) 11:22, 3 April 2009 (UTC)

Internet research to prove alleged POVs

Actually, I think this is an important point that doesn't seem to be covered in article. I use my real name and used to have link to my page but people would search around and find some opinion of mine and use it out of context (or claim I was "self-promoting"), so I took off my link. Now editors just google me, find some opinion, (usually take it out of context) and use it against me as proof of whatever. I've been calling this WP:Harassment but when looked at this article page now didn't see it as clearly described as outing as I thought it was. So I think both User:TB and I have issues here that need to be addressed. Thanks CarolMooreDC (talk) 14:25, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

That is a gray area. Without getting into any specific case, I would say that if the outside Misplaced Pages content is publicly available then it is not in itself a violation of privacy to bring that information here, particularly if that information is self published. That being said should this information be used to harass, identify someone who has not been identified on wiki, or to misrepresent then it would be very inappropriate. I am sure there are many other ways one could violate policy doing this, but I don't think it is an automatic no-no. I would love to hear the opinions of others on this subject. Chillum 14:30, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

You express the issue very clearly and guidance on that in the article would be great! CarolMooreDC (talk) 15:13, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

It may be time to re-examine Misplaced Pages's anonymity policy, in light of the rise of Facebook. Until Facebook, most bulletin board systems and social networks used anonymous handles. Facebook does not; it's based on real names and identities. Facebook is now the #1 social network (it passed Myspace in 2008). I think there's been a social change; the sheer amount of dreck and spam associated with unlimited anonymity has worn everyone down. The Facebook paradigm, that you really do have to identify yourself, seems to be on the way up. Misplaced Pages might want to get with the program. I'd argue, as a start, that privileged users (admins, oversight, etc.) should no longer be anonymous. --John Nagle (talk) 06:27, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Having just been reamed twice by an abusive admin for a minor oversight, I agree! CarolMooreDC (talk) 13:13, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Consequences

As this is a templated reason for blocking, I copied part of the "consequences" section of the NPA page here, editing appropriately. I thought this was on this page already, but perhaps someone edited it out. Editors who are pointed to this page should be made aware of the potential consequences of their actions. KillerChihuahua 21:49, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:HA#NOT

What are peoples' thoughts for this policy including something about what is not harassment? This is, with no exaggeration, the most abused policy on Misplaced Pages. It started out with good intentions: to protect victims of genuine harassment. But it's being used by most editors to mean "someone disagrees with me!" Which belittles and cheapens the horror of genuine harassment. The exact reason why we renamed wikistalking to wikihounding. Sceptre 23:21, 14 April 2009 (UTC)

I like what I see so far. The biggest wording issue I have is "a great amount of distress" which I feel is a bit too subjective. Basically everytime somebody abuses this policy they can just claim that it has caused them a great amount of distress, even if the claim is BS. I realise there can't be a matematical formula for what constitutes harrassment, but it should be a bit less subjective than it is currently. ThemFromSpace 20:52, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

This addition seems like basic sense to me. Chillum 20:54, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

I was bold and fixed it. Anyone can claim a warning is "valid" while still making it for ulterior purposes. An arguably valid warning isn't enough if it was presented in a way to be harassing. Warnings should be worded civilly and try to resolve conflict instead of egging it on. Also, saying it's not harassment unless it causes a great amount of distress is really just bizarre. So someone harassing someone else but not being good enough at it to cause full on emotional anguish is A-OK? No, the intent to harass (or lacking intent originally but continuing just the same when it's pointed out that the target objects) is the problem. Whether the harassment works or not isn't the issue. DreamGuy (talk) 21:00, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

Posting of personal information

I would like to point out that User:ChrisO, a wikipedia administrator, recently attempted to change the wording of this policy . He is currently involved in an arbitration case for issues of misconduct and abuse of administrative rights . People have indicated that some of his edits might constitute or be bordering WP:OUTING , so editing the very policy he is accused of violating could be seen as gaming the system: "Editing a policy to support your own argument in an active discussion may be seen as gaming the system, especially if you do not disclose your involvement in the argument when making the edits." . It goes without saying that I oppose his change. --Radjenef (talk) 14:36, 27 April 2009 (UTC)