During the Late Great Userbox Wars, Jimmy Wales reminded us all about how it's a bad idea to use your userpage to forward a political ideology, that one's user page should be about oneself as a Wikipedian, and not for some other purpose.
Reminding us once again that the rules don't apply to him, Jimmy has subverted his user talk page from its proper purpose to use it as a political statement regarding the death of Wei Wenhua. (Jimmy has also protected his talk page so nobody can use it to leave him messages.) Now, I have no question that Wei's death is a horrific thing. But Jimmy has an obligation as the leader of the community to set an appropriate example. The message he's just sent is "it's perfectly ok for you to disable your talk page for a political protest".
I'm reasonably certain if anyone else had done this, they would have been subjected to various levels of sanction depending on how close to the center of the cabal they were. Jimmy, however, can do whatever he wants.
Hypocrisy in action.
Reminding us once again that the rules don't apply to him, Jimmy has subverted his user talk page from its proper purpose to use it as a political statement regarding the death of Wei Wenhua. (Jimmy has also protected his talk page so nobody can use it to leave him messages.) Now, I have no question that Wei's death is a horrific thing. But Jimmy has an obligation as the leader of the community to set an appropriate example. The message he's just sent is "it's perfectly ok for you to disable your talk page for a political protest".
I'm reasonably certain if anyone else had done this, they would have been subjected to various levels of sanction depending on how close to the center of the cabal they were. Jimmy, however, can do whatever he wants.
Hypocrisy in action.
There's some hypocrisy in how Jimbo said as part of his user page statement, "Freedom of speech is a fundamental human right", but he also likes to keep saying that "Wikipedia is not a free speech zone". Not for anyone else but him (and the clique), anyway.
ReplyDeleteBe funny if someone reversed Jimbo's protection as a violation of the Protection Policy (which it is).
ReplyDeleteCouldn't Jimbo have gotten about the same awareness by archiving his current Talk page, and then putting his memorial at the top of his still-active page?
ReplyDeleteAlways the out-of-process drama with Jimbo, isn't it?
What the fuck kind of protest is that?
ReplyDeleteWhile I often agree with you, Kelly, this time I think you have gone a bit too far. This silent protest to raise awareness of how freedom of expression on the Internet is being trampled is a poignant expression of what Wikipedia stands for. I urge others to follow Jimmy's example, and have done so myself on my own talk page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Danny
ReplyDeleteI agree with Gregory, shockingly enough.
ReplyDeleteJimmy's claim that 'I'll be traveling so it doesn't matter if this is protected.' is misleading. Jimmy responds only a tiny portion of the comments left on that page, mostly other people respond to it. The page is, by far, more of a general Wikipedia help page than any talk page.
Quite simply it was a half-assed action all around. It was the highest profile page Jimmy thought he could change without drama. While it seems his calculation was correct, it's still the wrong action: He's hypocritically abused his userspace, and he's failed to use this opportunity to explore how Wikipedia could publicaly support something without drama, and he's failed to give the significant death of Wei Wenhua the high level attention it deserves.
Shame shame.
(posted anonymously to avoid reprisal)
it's funny King Jimbo doesn't get upset when the US govt does something against journalists: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/12/24/04448/155/128/425989
ReplyDeleteIn that case it's the actual government prosecuting a journalist, in the China case it was government officials going against the law.
So Jimbo is on his way to Dubai? Is that to protest the blocking of Facebook there? (http://mashable.com/2007/10/01/facebook-uae/)
ReplyDeleteDanny: Like most other users, I can't follow Jimbo's example, because I'm not an admin.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous wrote:
ReplyDelete"it's funny King Jimbo doesn't get upset when the US govt does something against journalists: http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/12/24/04448/155/128/425989"
It's even more funny that you failed to mention that the supposedly persecuted "journalist"
was caught in an apartment with al-queda-in-Iraq leadership surrounded by a weapons cache that was to be used, presumedly, to kill more American soldiers and Iraqi civilians; he was not there on assignment. That is ok though, because the genius who wrote the article on Daily Kos (as if that hate-site is a reliable source of legitimate journalism)assures us that not all the of the insurgents engaged in the murder of their political and religious enemies are terrorists.
It is amazing anyone can draw some sort of moral equivalance between a "reporter" being prosecuted for uh, breaking the law, and a man who was murdered merely for filming a snippet of a protest.
If I were as stupid as you, I would wish to remain anonymous as well.