Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 02:45, 16 March 2008

Kicking off Talk Page

I think a short guideline or policy may help as a centralised location for discussion, and hopefully it might help stop the noticeboards having to cover exactly the same ground every few weeks... as such, I support it conceptually... and will have a little reword to tweak it slightly..... Privatemusings (talk) 02:44, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Policy name

It may be just a first impression, but I'm not totally into the current name - here are a couple of other ideas for consideration;

• Misplaced Pages:RealWorldThreats
• Misplaced Pages:RealWorldIncidents

I'll create a shortcut too, while we think about it.... Privatemusings (talk) 03:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Policy

While I think the policy is a great idea, apparently proper procedure right now is to report it to the WMF, who have special peoples that can get down to figuring out stuff like this. That's how we did it for the recent bomb threat to Plano High School on their page. Master of Puppets _{Call me MoP!☺} 03:36, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

While alerting WMF is a good step, since threats can come in at any time (2am alerting to an 8am attack) it should not prevent someone from making the call to the police. Plus in the Plano case I personally called the local police and informed them of the threat. Here for more info. Bstone (talk) 03:41, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

(ec)I agree, ordinary users should not be responsible for contacting authorities, it should be done through the foundation, or at the very least an admin. The system we have now sort of works, just reporting it to WP:ANI, surely theres no need to change that. I imagine having a Threats noticedboard would be a bit too beans, which is a shame--Jac16888 (talk) 03:45, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

While I am not an admin, I am a licensed EMT with years of experience as a public safety professional. I regularly work with law enforcement as part of my job and I regularly deal with people who are suicidal and homicidal. As such I felt very comfortable making the call to the police dept. Since I also have a lot of IT experience I felt comfortable with the IP info, diffs, etc. I believe that once a threat has been posted it should be reported to AN/I and someone, anyone, should take immediate responsibility in reporting it to the authorities. Thus, this policy would make it clear that while these might be hoaxes, we do not and will not tolerate them and will always err on the side of caution, better safe than sorry, etc. Bstone (talk) 03:52, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Bstone and disagree with jac16888, we should have a dedicated board were experienced and trusted admins or above (an obvious exception might be Bstone) would be able to respond to these events. 03:56, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Bstone i can see very well why you saw fit to contact whoever, you're clearly qualified to do so, but i imagine you or the few editors similarly qualified will not always be able to make the call, and the average user should not have to, i remember a case several months ago, i think it was a threat, maybe a suicide note its hard to remember, where an editor made the call to the police but then became very nervous about what they'd done and needed a lot of reassurance. As for an dedicated board Hypnosadist, that would be a terrible idea, since it would no doubt increase the number of threats recieved i.e. WP:BEANS--Jac16888 (talk) 04:02, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I think that AN/I is the most appropriate place to keep the discussion. I hope that this proposal becomes policy very quickly so that there does not need to be a discussion as to taking future threats seriously or not, but rather moving them forward into the reporting stage. Perhaps making some sort of incident report form which can be filled out afterwards just in order to have some papertrail other than AN/I just in case law enforcement wants to see a centralized discussion. Tho perhaps AN/I is sufficient. In any case, anyone who feels comfortable reporting threats of violence should, admin or not. I will say that when I talked to the police I gave my name, address, drivers license #, etc. It was a bit invasive but I was happy to do so if my participation might save a life. Many years ago I was a volunteer host on AOL and helped intervene when someone made a legit threat of suicide. I called his local police and gave the contact info to the AOL TOS folks who released his home address. A few weeks later I got a thank you note from him saying that the right help got to him, he got to the right hospital and thanked me for my assistance. In sum, whoever feels comfortable reporting should but the debate over Misplaced Pages taking threats seriously should be put to rest with this proposal and I hope I speak for us all when I say Misplaced Pages takes all threats of violence seriously. Bstone (talk) 04:25, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree 100% with all of the above statement--Jac16888 (talk) 04:32, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Misplaced Pages takes all threats of violence seriously and if people here think an/i is the way to deal with it then so be it. 07:02, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I, for one, surely do not join in the "take seriously" sentiment, but more significantly I'm not at all certain that the community broadly hold that view (one may see, at the very least, that various objections are raised at the AN/I thread that references this proposal) or that it might be understood as accurately reflecting codified practice. This is, of course, only a proposed policy, one for the adoption of which a consensus will be required, and while such a consensus may well emerge, it probably ought to be observed that the community don't regard this as such a plain, settled issue as do some here and that elevating TOV or some similarly-styled essay about real world harms is not a matter simply of our determining exactly what our prescribed practice ought to be but whether there ought to be any such prescription at all (to be sure, we would probably do well to have some policy or statement of general practice, since editors, in their capacities as individual citizens, will likely, and are free to , continue to report certain threats , but it is not, at least to me, clear that the community are interested in taking a position on the issue of whether all threats ought to be treated in a single fashion or whether anyone should feel encouraged or discouraged to report putative threats). Joe 23:19, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Would this work well as a part of WP:LEGAL? They seem to be related, as making a threat of harm is illegal in most places, and definitely in the United States, where the Foundation is located. ···日本穣 05:22, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps WP:LEGAL has some standing in this, but it doesn't directly address the issue of taking threats seriously. Bstone (talk) 05:28, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I know it doesn't right now, but I think that this would work well as an expanded WP:LEGAL, especially if we broadened it to be basically WP:THREAT (making that the main one), covering both, "I'll sue you!" and "I'll kill/maim/bomb/etc. you!". They are so closely related (IMO) that I think it would be good to have them be together in the same policy. They both deal with real world threats; just different types of real world threats. It just makes sense to have both together in the same policy. ···日本穣 06:22, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

While there is an obiouvs need for such a policy (as WP:THREAT ect... is not one) I think this one needs to be greatly improved uppon. It needs to clearly state what needs to be given to the authorities, and if there are any circumstances when it should be dealt with internally. I have personally contacted the police many times, and have sense created my own style of doing so, that is gather all the information need, the user in question and if they are an IP run that IP on something like GeoBytes to get its general location, get the diff of the threat, the date and time it happened, the url of the ANI thread, or where ever it was reported, along with the address, phone number, and the email of WMF, I then call authorities and they often request this information be sent by email. Every time they say they recommend that we contact them in these situations, and I generaly get a call back from them explaining how things are going. I have never once seen a situation where they where unhappy we reported it. I think that this policy should include guidelines as to what information to provide them with, and a timeline for doing so. Tiptoety 19:18, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Tiptoety, I agree with you that we must come up with a policy for exactly how to respond to threats of violence, but in the short term we must have a policy which clearly states that we do actually take all threats of violence seriously and report them to authorities. That way there will be no confusion as to the policy on how if to proceed but rather that we do. I believe this is the first step. Next step is drafting a response procedure. Bstone (talk) 19:45, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I actually think I would much rather see the specifics worked out before the policy is put into effect. This is a policy that needs to be very clear to all users, and needs to have some fundamentals down so that it does not create more confusion. Such things as: What constitutes a threat? Should the user/IP making the threat be blocked, if so for how long? Who should contact police, the user who notices the threat, someone who answers up on ANI? Should it only be a admin that reports the threat so that we dont have just some user representing wikipedia to the police? I personally do not think this is a policy that needs rushing, as most of the threat reports and ANI get handled pretty fast and the result is almost contact police. I guess I just do not want to put a policy into effect that is just going to be loosely built, where there are areas that could be interpreted, or areas not covered at all. All that will lead to is a longer ANI discussion about how to apply the policy to the incident at hand. Tiptoety 22:10, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I understand your view and it's valid, tho it seems to me that the first hurdle to overcome is determining on a policy level to take threats seriously or not. Once we have determined that we do take all threats serious, and not pass them off as jokes or hoaxes, then we can create a policy for responding. Truthfully I am a bit concerned that there has never been a policy like this made before, only an essay. It's time for us as a community to move forward, elevate this proposal to policy level (once we agree on how it's written, which I think it's written pretty ok), and then draft a response to threats policy. Bstone (talk) 02:34, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Per Privatemusings, "To minimise distraction and disruption, consider these words; Report. Revert. Ignore." Bstone (talk) 00:46, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea for us to have a policy in place for dealing with these situations. I agree that it should not be for us to decide what is serious and what is not. We should report threats and let the police do their jobs. AN/I seems like a reasonable place for reports to be made. Aleta 16:38, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

threat against wikipedian

If the threat is specific to a Wikimedian, and they are active at the time of the incident being discovered, it is general courtesy to ask them about the course of action. Bstone (talk) 04:52, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I think this would fall under WP:ATTACK. Tiptoety 22:11, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

redundancy checks....

hi folks - I popped a note on the village pump about this policy - partly to check to see if similar ideas had been touted previously - we need to check out the following and possibly merge or clarify purpose;

• Misplaced Pages:Responding to threats of harm
• Misplaced Pages:Fire

thanks, Privatemusings (talk) 05:35, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, PM, for checking on these. Those are currently only essays while I believe it is my (our?) intention to elevate this proposal to policy status. As far as a policy of how to respond, that needs to be worked out, but at least this proposal says that we view all threats to be absolutely serious and not jokes, hoaxes, etc. Bstone (talk) 05:46, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

My first impression is that the first link relates mainly to self-harm (a valid concern) - and that 'Fire' is a good fit in the essay space, but probably not as policy. I'm most comfortable with a wording which points out that if you think a threat is serious, then you should probably report it - not because that's wikipedia policy, but because it's the only sensible course of action. The key thing from my perspective is to make it clear that any individual action would be the responsibility of that individual (as in don't call the police and say 'wikipedia made me call you....' - that's just silly!). We should also, of course, emphasise that it's a perfectly sensible and normal thing to do to let an authority (though maybe not Tom Cruise) know that someone's making threats - even if wikipedia based..... that's as far as I've thought it through so far! - Privatemusings (talk) 05:52, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

possible refs

it's possible that some ref.s might be in order for the policy page - just to make very clear how firmly this proposed policy matches the advice issued by police forces and security agencies worldwide... please do add to this list if you find any advice from a suitable source; - Privatemusings (talk) 06:30, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

• The Met. Police in UK - "we continue to urge both the public and the business community to remain vigilant at all times and to report anything suspicious or unusual to police." - they also have a team expert in / setup to deal with hoaxes.
• NSW (State of Australia) advice - "it may be the missing piece that police need."
• Federal Australian Advice - "Every Detail Helps"

...I've only spent a couple of minutes grabbing these ones - and I feel certain there are more from agencies throughout the world - they may or may not be useful as ref.s / links - I'm not sure yet..... Privatemusings (talk) 22:07, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

Further guidelines related to Threats of Violence

I think this page is an excellent idea and I hope there will be an official policy on this soon. Actually, I discovered the threat related to Plano Senior High School and wasn't sure what to do. I posted messages on the Misplaced Pages Help-page, on the discussion page of WP:AIV and on the talk page of the user who actually reverted the threat. Once we have this page, an "odyssey" like this could be prevented, what could save valuable time if the threat is real.

Two further suggestions for the policy:

• Admins should be instructed not to block the user/IP that made the threat. Reason: If the threat is real, the IP/user may give further hints on the crime it intends with future edits. In this case, I believe further information on such a crime is more important than enforcing Misplaced Pages's general policy regarding Vandalism/blocking.

• Furthermore, immediately reverting the edit containing the threat should also be avoided. Reason: The threatening IP/user may feel that he/she is unobserved and may make further edits that reveal additional information. Also, the interest to keep Misplaced Pages Vandalism-free is less important than the objective to receive further information.

What do you think? Best regards, --Abrech (talk) 20:52, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I think your reasoning is pretty good, abrech - but I'm not sure we need to spell it all out in the actual policy - you'll see that I've recommended below that there might be another 'framework' or set of guidelines which spell out what's best to do - but I think that the fundamental policy should stay quite simple - perhaps it's more finished than we think right now! - Privatemusings (talk) 02:42, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Objection to this policy

(copied from W:ANI by myself — Gavia immer (talk) 13:39, 12 March 2008 (UTC))

Having a response plan for things like this is not in itself bad, especially since Jimbo has said we should operate as if these threats are generally real. However, in fact, these threats are generally not real; most people making them just want attention, so they might make hoax threats, make real threats and back out of them, or make ambiguous threats and claim, loudly, that Misplaced Pages's reaction is bogus – or, they might make real threats. A pernicious minority will be joe jobs or attempts to injure a third party by forcing attention on them (Police or otherwise). We don't want to encourage any of these, least of all the genuine ones, but I don't see how we can have a prominent policy page like that without it attracting more such threats to the wiki. If anyone wants community policy on this, step one is to figure out how to have that policy without attracting badness. I'm afraid this page doesn't do it. I'm not trying to crap in Bstone's cornflakes, here; our typical reactions to this sort of thing are badly disorganized, even among people who mean well, and attempts to fix this are laudable. The WP:BEANS issue needs to be fixed first, though, or this policy makes more trouble than it can ever prevent. — Gavia immer (talk) 21:11, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

"these threats are generally not real" Generally being the operative way, the problem is you are betting with peoples health and safety and that is not acceptable as Jimbo said.

"If anyone wants community policy on this, step one is to figure out how to have that policy without attracting badness." Can't be done, but thats just tough it does not remove from us our duty of care as a 21c ethical not for profit organisation.

All police services say let them do the policing just tell them whats happened and thats what we should do. 13:52, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

It's always, always better to be safe than sorry. What might look like a hoax or joke might in fact turn out to be a credible attack. The Plano High School threat had a date, time and device/mechanism. That's very specific and very, very scary. Their police dept was very interested in this sort of threat and said we should report everything any anything despite how how of a joke we might consider it to be. If Jimbo said we should take it seriously, public safety professionals like police (and myself) say to take them serious and common sense says to err on the side of caution then I am thinking this proposal should be elevated to policy ASAP. Bstone (talk) 16:48, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

There's no particular reason for us to denigrate threats etc. received on Misplaced Pages, because the authorities, not generally understanding the Internet in particular or Misplaced Pages in general, are likely to do that anyway - but that's not our problem. Our problem is to see that pertinent information gets to people better equipped to evaluate it and act on it. It hardly matters if most of these threats are false alarms, if one out of ten thousand helps to prevent an incident, then the policy will be worthwhile. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 19:47, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. And at the same time people might stop making hoax threats once they hear the police visit you soon after it's made, but that's tangential. Bstone (talk) 20:08, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

AN/I

I removed the recommendation to contact AN/I for now..... I think there's a sensible discussion to be had, and framework to be developed for what pragmatic steps to take to best implement this policy - but I'm less sure that it's a good fit actually on the policy page - particularly given its likely something that will be quite susceptible to creep of various kinds... no biggie though - just my tuppence! - Privatemusings (talk) 02:34, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

PM and I discussed this together on IRC. We've agreed on AN/I for now. Bstone (talk) 03:54, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

and the dabbling continues! - I've reworked that bit to try and incorporate both 'real world' and wiki-based reporting... oh, and I've added the ref.s too - I'm getting a good sense of progress! - cheers, Privatemusings (talk) 04:07, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

copyedit

I've made a series of small copyediting edits to the text, with no intent to change the meaning of what was there, just to clarify and streamline the wording. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 17:18, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

The one thing I'm a bit ambivalent about is the use of "real world", which sounds just a bit light for a serious subject - btu I can't think of an appropriate replacement. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 17:23, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Support your changes, Ed. I think 'real world' is probably ok, but would welcome any alternative ideas, remembering that to be concise and clear is a huge plus, I reckon. Privatemusings (talk) 17:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Report, Revert, Ignore

A kinda obvious derivative of 'Bold Revert Discuss' (and WP:DENY, I guess) - I came up with this little mantra as an easy way of recommending a course of action to cause the least fuss. So that's its intention - and without prejudicing discussion of whether or not it should be mandatory, or whether or not the slightly stronger push in that direction we have now (which I totally support in terms of clarity), i wanted to just note that it was initially intended as a suggestion only.

I guess there may be cases where to revert and ignore might not be best, but then that bit could always be ignored, I guess..... thoughts most welcome.... Privatemusings (talk) 17:30, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

You're right that in clarifying, I also turned a suggestion into something stronger. I've rstored "consider". Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 17:32, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Implications for privacy policy and checkusers?

While these are often made either by a non-logged-in user or in an article that implies enough about the location to at least find a jurisdiction; what should be done in cases where this is not the case? —Random832 17:57, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the priority is to report - in the case of logged in users, it's probably wise to include the foundation office details, and maybe OTRS, in the report. I'm not sure we need to spell that out though, the danger of 'creep' is fairly large here, I would think. My feeling is that any 'investigation' is best led by someone with some experience and expertise (eg. a professional like a police officer) - and I have a presumption that that could be facilitated largely 'off-wiki', though p'raps 'on-wiki' if absolutely necessary.... Privatemusings (talk) 18:07, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Since I believe the Foundation gets involved when police authorities seek information about users, should the policy say something about notifying them as well? Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 18:14, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Hi, Random. This policy proposal is simply here to codify that on this project all threats of violence are taken seriously-- and reported internally to AN/I. As for responding, that will be in a follow up proposal once this policy is approved. I have given thought to the senario of a logged in user making a threat of violence- homicide or suidcide. In that case it would be reported to AN/I and check users would get immediately involved to uncover the person's IP address. Either the checkusers themselves would make the calls to the police/EMS or turn over the info to a trusted admin or editor who has been "approved" to respond to these sorts of issues. I envision a short list of people who are entrusted by the community to respond to these issues. Thoughts? Bstone (talk) 18:16, 13 March 2008 (UTC)

Defining Admin response

Reporting the problem to WP:AN/I is a good first step, but last year I was part of a group that was involved in this type of situation (bomb threat from a school IP) and much panic ensued among admins about the appropriate course of action. It would have been helpful to have a specific procedure to follow - for instance:

1. one admin should be delegated the task of contacting the school administration as well as local police.
2. provide local responders with relevant information: nature of threat, time and place, user ids, etc.
3. ensure all information is preserved in place

Ronnotel (talk) 03:59, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Ronnotel, what you wrote is very similar to what I have in mind for the external reporting proposal. Perhaps you'd like to be part of the group which drafts it? Bstone (talk) 04:03, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

happy to help. Should we start WP:TOV/External reporting or does it already exist somewhere? Ronnotel (talk) 04:05, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Oh, yes. Let us. Want to start it? Bstone (talk) 04:25, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Title of this essay

Threats of Violence - why the scare caps? ~ Riana ⁂ 05:21, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

It's actually a proposed policy, not an essay. Why the capital v? Why not? Bstone (talk) 05:31, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

that's a bit of a pet peeve of mine, actually - being Very Susceptible to Unnecessary Cap.s myself, it grates whenever I (finally) see it - I'll move it over to the less scary small 'v' ! Privatemusings (talk) 05:35, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

ah..... that's much calmer! - I can't stand them when I spot them! - thanks, Riana..... Privatemusings (talk) 05:38, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Going too far, I'm afraid

I generally support the theory of behaviour behind this draft. However, I strongly believe that it should not be elevated to policy; even as a guideline, its language is too strong.

We cannot create a moral imperative for people to report perceived threats of violence or self-harm. Encourage, probably. But the use of strong language ("should", etc) creates an ethical obligation that goes far beyond any legislated requirement for most countries of the world. If editors "should" do something, then people are in the position of having to defend why they did not do something; that's completely in reverse of everything else we do here, where the only obligation is to be responsible for acts we have actually carried out.

I'll give this some more thought, but in its current format, I would object to this being promoted as either policy or guideline. Risker (talk) 13:51, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Howdy, Risker. Let me try to address your concerns. I fully appreciate and understand them. The idea of this proposed policy is not to require people to report threats of violence to the police but rather to establish that threats are taken 100% seriously. Instead of passing off threats as a bad hoax or joke the basis of this police is to codify wikipedia position that we accept them at face value. We then ask people to drop a note of the threats to WP:AN/I. As far as external reporting to police, there is a separate policy being drafted for that. Hopefully this will allay the fears you may have and allow you to support the proposed policy. Sincerely, Bstone (talk) 16:25, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

A completely separate policy about external reporting? For what possible reason? Avruch 19:34, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, I see that earlier today, someone came and marked it as a proposed guideline, and you have changed it back to a proposed policy. I have a problem with that. You see, in my mind, policies are things that are actionable. If someone adds POV information, it is removed; if they keep doing it, they can be blocked. If someone makes a clear personal attack, it can be removed and they can be blocked. If a reference is added to a non-reliable source, it can be removed, and potentially even added to the blacklist, and editors who repeatedly add non-reliable references may be blocked and will certainly be told to stop adding those references. But if someone fails to report having seen a threat of violence or self-harm, it is completely inappropriate to take any action against them. Therefore, this should not be a policy. It's time to rethink the premises on which this proposal is based. Risker (talk) 18:22, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree that making this a policy is going too far - if someone sees a threat of some kind and doesn't report it to AN/I, what happens? Will they be warned, and then blocked if it happens again? Originally this proposal said that editors should report incidents to the appropriate authorities, didn't it? Now its just report it to AN/I. Somewhat regularly (although less in the past week) threats of this nature are reported and still ignored, and this policy doesn't offer direction on that. This just seems like overkill to address a problem that doesn't exist - is there some information suggesting that Misplaced Pages ignoring threats has led to violence or other harm in the past? Avruch 19:33, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Again, to be utterly clear, this point of this proposed policy is not to require anyone to do anything. It is simply to codify that Misplaced Pages position on threats of violence is to take them seriously and not pass them off as hoaxes or jokes. Since we are not in the position of being able to judge appropriately if someone is joking when they say they will blow up a high school, this policy states that we take the threat as being serious. There actually has been a bit of debate on this and PM and I wrote this in order to help avoid a situation in the future where we might pass off as a joke an early warning for what might actually be the real thing. Bstone (talk) 19:48, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok - if its a position statement, and not prescriptive, then why is it a policy? Do we have "here is our position, now do what you want" policies on other topics? Maybe what you are looking for is an essay, but I gather that doesn't convey your intent to demonstrate the opinion of the community as a whole? Avruch 20:38, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

rewrite

I just rewrote the proposed policy to be very specific. It now says nothing about reporting a threat but rather says only that all threats are taken seriously. Please discuss. Bstone (talk) 20:20, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Now it reads like a fork of WP:SUICIDE (see the "All threats are taken seriously" section, I think its called). Upgrading that to a policy would achieve what you appear to be trying to do here, but I think the reason it is an essay is that it is not prescriptive and there is no mechanism for dealing with those who disagree. Avruch 20:45, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

Too hard-line. I recently threatened to drop an anvil on someone's head in a humorous context -- under this policy, people would be required to take it seriously. --Carnildo (talk) 22:28, 14 March 2008 (UTC)

I would say that your anvil comment didn't actually constitute a threat, carnildo, and wouldn't worry about it... To be really clear, from my perspective this policy is intended to encourage people to respond to comments like the pipe bomb threat just by letting the police know, rather than by talking about it on wiki noticeboards - that's where I see the usefulness.... Privatemusings (talk) 02:18, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion

I did nominate this essay/policy proposal for deletion. My rationale is located at the page Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Threats of violence. Thanks, NonvocalScream (talk) 01:06, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I think a deletion discussion is actually probably quite a good way of getting some eyes over here, and as such support it! - will check it out and comment presently..... Privatemusings (talk) 02:19, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I do admire your attitude toward these things. :) I have a version in mind, if I can figure out how to write it, I'll do it (edit TOV) , and note here. Regardless of how I contribute to this, I do believe it is best not existing. Regards, NonvocalScream (talk) 02:39, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

My rollback to prior version

No biggie, but I felt this version more clearly elucidates its purpose and usefulness - so that's why I popped it back! thoughts? - Privatemusings (talk) 02:19, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Case of internet death threats in the UK

This case from the BBC shows the UK police are interested in this sort of thing! 07:26, 15 March 2008 (UTC) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/shropshire/7297184.stm

simplified version

I've rewritten a simplified version, that might be easier to find consensus on, if consensus can be found. Thoughts? NonvocalScream (talk) 15:48, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

hmmmm - well, I see your point, and p'raps the reasons I think 'my' version was more useful go to the heart of the differences in our approaches.. I think the previous version was clear, and spelled out some useful information pretty quickly (I was particularly pleased with the idea of having a few ref.s for example!) - and I don't think you actually said you disagreed with any of it - if I'm right, you just feel it's redundant? Having seen discussions on this topic go round the houses a few times, I'd say that the policy as it stood before was probably the strongest net gain - whaddy'all reckon? Privatemusings (talk) 23:35, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

I just rewrote it to be back to the intention of what PM and I originally brainstormed. This proposal was originally created to simply codify the position that Misplaced Pages takes all threats serious and then, in Misplaced Pages:TOV/External_reporting laying out the reporting procedure. Bstone (talk) 00:36, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think I've commented here yet. I object to this proposal. You ought not compel editors to report. We are all volunteers here on this project. It should not even be recommended what an editor should do. An editor reports because that editor feels the need to report, not because our project dictates it. NonvocalScream (talk) 01:23, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Objections and note lack of community support

• I agree with NonvocalScream and register the same objection - I don't think this proposal is getting wide enough attention, given the scope it attempts. I also think you should attempt to get some basic agreement on this policy itself before you try to bridge it to a second policy (which would itself be invalidated by the rejection of this proposal). So far I've seen a couple or three editors who agree with the need and the language of this proposed policy, and that doesn't at all represent consensus. The first time this policy is ignored and one of you attempt to hold the person doing the ignoring to some sort of remedy, I think the house of cards here will blow down.

• These questions haven't been answered:

1. What actual problem is this policy supposed to address, i.e. has not following this policy created an issue in the past?

2. What is the remedy implicit in this policy? Other policies are enforced by administrator action, do you propose to do that here?

3. What limits are there? Can you apply a block to someone in Australia who ignores a threat to a school in Texas, for instance?

4. What are you trying to achieve with this policy that is not achieved with WP:SUICIDE?

Even with answers to these questions, I'm not sure I can support this policy - and I don't think the general community will, either. The more strict it attempts to be (reporting requirements beyond AN/I, for instance) the more likely that it will immediately fail through lack of support. Avruch 01:36, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

• Might be interested in this section of WP:AN today, where Doc glasgow asks someone not to ever report suicide threats to AN because it encourages trolls. Avruch 01:43, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

• I did make at note at VP:Proposals and the administrators noticeboard. I think these groups need included. I'm tempted to broadcast a neutral link to the mailing list and to #wikipedia-en, because I want the community to comment on this. If I do post to IRC and the mailing list, I'll make a note here. But I think the best thing here is to get more eyes on this. If it is workable, it will be worked. I'm not confident if it is, but I am only one editor. There are a great deal of editors out there, all with good ideas. NonvocalScream (talk) 02:17, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Regarding the threat/trolling that Doc was asking people not to mention, it is in regards to ongoing fake suicide threats.

To the rest of your points:

• 1. The proposal is meant to codify Misplaced Pages's official position that threats are to be taken serious and not passed off as jokes. As such it will avoid the unthinkable situation of a real early warning being passed off as a hoax or joke.
• 2. This proposal is simply meant to codify a position. Perhaps it should be combined with TOV/External Reporting, but that depends on community support.
• 3. There is no mandate of someone picking up a phone and calling the police. Rather it is voluntary. However, once a report has been made to AN/I it would be ill advised for the community to ignore a specific threat and simply pass it off as a cheap hoax.
• 4. WP:SUICIDE is an essay. I am attempting to achieve a guideline or policy.

Bstone (talk) 02:44, 16 March 2008 (UTC)