Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 07:02, 16 March 2007

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Reboot

I archived the old version to reboot the discussion.

This discussion is about how to best achieve credential verification along the lines of my proposal. No changes to current policy are contemplated, so there is no reason to act as if this is a proposal which can be accepted or rejected. Since current policy allows for this, then if you want to stop it, then you need to propose a policy which would essentially ban people for being responsible about saying who they are in Misplaced Pages.

Virtually all of the objections were completely off target and misunderstood the proposal completely.

The only questions being discussed here are how to make the process as good as possible.--Jimbo Wales 04:33, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the problem is that people assumed this would be mandatory, combined with the fact that this was the de facto center of discussion for all credential verification policies, even the truly mandatory ones. -Amarkov moo! 04:36, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree. What I am proposing is that people create and start to use a new set of userboxes, derived from the existing ones. All the existing PhD, MD, and JD userboxes (and perhaps some similar but we should probably start small) should have two versions: verified and unverified. People can choose which they want. Those who are in the camp that credentials are bogus and we can't trust anyone anyway should pick the unverified templates. Those who believe in the wiki way and trust that the community has the good sense to move forward productively in assessing claims should pick the verified ones. No policy changes are required, only action on the part of good people to improve the encyclopedia in a spirit of constructive honesty and transparency. Rather than come up with a priori reasons why it can't work (with that, we could have never gotten to where we are in the first place), we can just move forward and learn and solve problems as they arise.

So now I want us to discuss how to do this. What should the userbox say? What should the design of the verification page be?--Jimbo Wales 04:42, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

You mean something like this? Mak (talk) 05:16, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Jimbo, I am concerned by your above statement "Those who believe in the wiki way and trust that the community has the good sense to move forward productively in assessing claims should pick the verified ones." Are you implying that anyone who chooses to forgoe this idea of "voluntarily" verifying their credential is no longer "in the wiki way". Is that what you mean? If so, then it doesn't sound very "voluntary" to me. It sounds more like "now do this, or be ostracized". This seems like a Hobbesian choice. Johntex\ 05:22, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I think if someone follows in EssJay's steps and claims to have a PhD but refuses to give any further information or verification when asked, the community will tend to view that very unfavorably. And reasonably so, I think, in some cases. There can be good reasons and explanations and all that.--Jimbo Wales 06:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

What will you require, faxing of diplomas or snail mail on institutional letterheads to the wiki office? How do you envision verifying this? Userboxes for ID may be fine, but I am more concerned about the process, and the potential for loss of privacy. -- Avi 04:46, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

The process is entirely voluntary, and has nothing to do with the office. You might want to read up on PGP keysigning parties to give you some ideas about how this might work. I don't understand what you mean about loss of privacy, then. You can give whatever information you want to whomever you want, or not, and the community will comment accordingly.

I continue to remain unconvinced that there is any merit to having any such process. Credentials mean little or nothing on Misplaced Pages; the lesson we need to take from Essjay's misconduct is not that we need to verify credentials but that we need to be more assiduous in disregarding them. Given this, having a procedure for verification of credentials when credentials don't matter anyway seems somewhat BEANSy to me. Kelly Martin (talk) 04:51, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the great merit to the proposal is that wikipedia is steeped in openness and transparency. People who tell lies about themselves undermine that openness and transparency. People should be encouraged, around issues that matter, to be open and transparent. Explaining to others, when true, how you came by your expertise in a certain field, is a good and healthy thing. (I disagree strongly with those who think that credentials are only used to beat up other contributors... this is an insult to the many fine PhDs we have working around here who adhere very strongly to be best standards of scholarship.) And we now have a means by which the community can adhere.

Sounds like WP:IAC to me Kelly Martin. (→Netscott) 04:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I would like to add that this absolutely is a proposal that can be accepted or rejected. If the previous discussion here is any accurate representation of what the whole of contributors to this encyclopedia believe -- and if some of the scenarios suggested by objectors do come to pass -- there will be many people leaving this project and fewer joining.

We learned from the Siegenthaler business. The media's criticism then was right, and we stepped up our focus on verification to meet the challenge. If we respond to the Essjay business by creating a privileged class of users whose credentials are stamped with approval, we're dividing the community into tiers that don't benefit it.

Perhaps we have a different idea of what is "the wiki way." —ptk✰fgs 04:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Of course this proposal can be rejected. If you want, you can try to get support for a policy of banning people who volunteer to go through a verification process. I doubt if you will get very far with that. :) So in fact, the chance of this being rejected is very close to zero. Show me if I am wrong.

As far as I can tell, you did not even read my proposal when you wrote "privileged class of users". So, you know, if you don't want to claim credentials, then don't. But don't get in the way of others who want to do so. That is what "the wiki way" means... let others do good work in peace.--Jimbo Wales 06:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Jimbo, may I ask how you would respond to my first three questions-headings here? In a nutshell:

1. Even after Essjay is it truly necessary or more "damage control" where long-term negative effects may outweigh short-term goodwill gains?
2. How will real-life private information be safeguarded; especially if the user has no control over to whom to reveal the information?
3. ad verecundiam - or, will people with degrees be able to brush off those without by the mere virtue of them having said credentials?

-- Avi 04:58, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I am happy to respond to these three points, although all three of them are really beside the point.

1. I see no long-term negative effects to honesty, openness, and transparency.
2. The user has absolute control over what to reveal. Absolute control. Did you even read the proposal?
3. Ask yourself how well brushing people off by claiming credentials has ever worked in Misplaced Pages. Anyone who does that is quite properly laughed at, and I see absolutely no reason for that to change.--Jimbo Wales 06:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think the proposal is okay in its current form (including my edits to it). I would have taken a different approach, but I can live with this - as long as my edits end up sticking to address the concerns I've been raising. I would have concentrated on due diligence re the identities of spokespersons and people in authority - but at least some of that will happen, too. It looks like checkusers will be vetted in future, and I'm sure spokespersons will be more carefully vetted as well (in practice). That doesn't go quite as far as I'd have liked, but you can't get everything you want. Metamagician3000 05:09, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

There seems to be massive confusion about various points. Checkusers have already for a long time been required to disclose their real identity to the foundation. That is a totally and completely separate issue, having to do with the foundation and legal matters, and is of no relevance to this discussion. Having said that, of course I agree with you that checkusers and spokespersons need to be carefully vetted. I like your edits, as far as I have seen, and I still encourage modification to the proposal to make it broadly appealing.--Jimbo Wales 06:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Er, so what Jimbo seems to be saying is that this is really a proposed essay about what people might like to do? Mak (talk) 05:44, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I would be a bit stronger than that. I think we need to experiment with it, test it out, see how it is working, and then elevate it to a guideline of encouragement and best practice. I have not seen anyone actually defending the idea that we should do the opposite: encourage people to both list credentials *and* refuse to verify them. So I think in due course people will begin to see that not listing your credentials is perfectly fine. And listing them is perfectly fine, if you are willing to give evidence for them (as I think most people will be). But the middle ground is fishy.--Jimbo Wales 06:57, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Why must this be proposed at all?

It says, in effect, "blah blah blah create a userbox with a subpage where people can try to verify credentials blah". Why does that need to be policy to work? I could go set that up on my userpage right now if I felt like it, and there would be absolutely no grounds to remove it. Just go ahead and do this, without any need to give any impression that our policies are concerned with editor's credentials. -Amarkov moo! 05:25, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

"No changes to current policy are contemplated" .... "So now I want us to discuss how to do this. What should the userbox say? What should the design of the verification page be?" Jimbo, above. In short, it's not policy and he is doing this, but asking for advice on how best to do it. Derex 05:48, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes it also says (emphasis mine):

This is a proposal to come from the community, and not be imposed by the WikiMedia Foundation. Please assume in your edits that this is a proposal which should be designed to achieve broad community support. If you just hate the idea completely and totally, then please argue that on the talk page, but please do let people try to achieve something useful and balanced here in the meantime.

That certainly sounds like a policy proposal to me. Johntex\ 05:54, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Then, feel free to edit that section to clarify that it's not. Jimbo is entirely correct that no policy change is necessary to implement this, and he's quite explicit above that it is not currently intended as one. Derex 06:25, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

A quick question

I realize I am quite late in this conversation, but I have been reading for the past while and cannot seem to figure out if this is intended to be implemented in the manner described in the Wiki of Trust. Due to the reality of stalking, I would be far more comfortable with this process if it were implemented in this manner in order to protect privacy. --Kukini 05:29, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes that is exactly what I have in mind. I don't think we need explicit central authority, and I am not eager to get the office involved at all, as the office is quite busy with business stuff and this is really a community editing matter. There are many Wikipedians of sufficient stature and trust that a confirmation of credentials by them would carry great weight. I think we can be totally open ended and see how it evolves, and tweak it later if we need to do so.--Jimbo Wales 07:01, 16 March 2007 (UTC)