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Hallo Brianna,

NPOV is mainly a principle of Wikipedia, later also used by Wikibooks
and Wikinews. There is at least one project (Wikiversity) which
explicitely allow participants not to follow NPOV, but the Disclosure of
Point of Views in Wikiversity follow in principle the ideal of NPOV: It
tells the reader and participants that the content has a point of view
and thus gives the reader and participants to be aware of this and
accordingly to adjust their judgement in reading and writing the content.

The question here is about projects like Commons or Wikisource. Mainly
they collect free content and serve as a shared repository for other
projects so that these other projects can use these content. The content
themselves may have POV, that's for sure, and we don't make edits or
comments in these sources to make them NPOV. But we do category them.
And at least here we do make sort of comment in the source. Let me take
an example that actually happend on Commons. It makes a diffrence if we
categorize a caricature of an israeli bus in form of a coffin to the
very neutral Category:Bus or to more commentary category
Category:Political caricature or to the very strong commentary category
Category:Anti-israeli caricature. It makes very big difference how
Commons categorize such images. And I am in these cases more for the
implementation of a similar policy like Wikiversity's Disclosure of
Point of View: A source with a very strong bias of point of view should
be accordingly categorized. With that we do nothing else as to hold our
principle ideal of NPOV on projects like commons.

The example of the caricatures also show that although the majority of
our Commons community are indeed interested in free content and NPOV,
but there are seemingly also people who had discovered Commons as a
medium to broadcast their political agenda. And for me this is a very
strong abuse of our principles. IMHO the community should not close its
eyes and does so as if this is not real.

Commons is a very unique project, you see this alone on its URL, it is
not de or en or fr or ar.commons.org, but commons.wikimedia.org. I
recognize what you said about the two possible natures of Commons, but I
also think that Commons is both. It is a service project, but it is not
a zombie or a gollem without its own insights and ideals.

Ting

Brianna Laugher wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I think the Board's statement is quite commendable if unremarkable
> (which is I guess part of the reason for the silence - nothing new,
> which is as it should be!). Only one comment actually surprised me.
>
> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
>
>> The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some core
>> principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
>> these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
>> maintaining a neutral point of view.
>>
>
> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
> policy. Like Wikiquote, our "unit" of interest is something that
> typically has a strong authorial voice rather than being a synthesis
> of multiple contributions. (Unlike WQ, it does in some circumstances
> make sense to edit a file, unlike a quote -- but usually if the edit
> radically changes the meaning, it should become a separate, derived
> work.)
>
> We are also, like WQ, bound by the creations of others, especially in
> relation to past events. If there is some past conflict, where the
> (free) media is available only represents one side of the conflict,
> there is nothing we can do to "balance" that. So there is an external
> limit on how "neutral" we are able to be.
>
> I also find there is some tension between the views of 1) "Wikimedia
> Commons as a service project" and 2) "Wikimedia Commons as a project
> in its own right".
> According to 1), the files in Commons are "context-free", waiting to
> be used somewhere and given context. And context is a major part of
> NPOV. As a service project, it would not be up to us to decide
> questions of "proportional representation", because that would all
> depend on how they are used in the projects.
> According to 2), the Commons community would have a role to play in
> deciding appropriate proportional representation, and we would assume
> the Wikimedia Commons itself is a context of use for the files.
>
> This plays into the question of how much autonomy the Wikimedia
> Commons community has. If we have a curatorial role beyond being
> "license police" and enforcing our necessarily very broad project
> scope, then that must be negotiated between these two views. I
> definitely believe it is not Common's role to decide "for" projects,
> which free media they should use. So this is something of a constraint
> for (2).
>
> It *may* make sense to talk to NPOV for Wikimedia Commons, but I don't
> think it is necessarily obvious, or that it should be assumed everyone
> has a shared understanding of what that means.
>
> Of interest: <http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Project_scope/Neutral_point_of_view>
>
> cheers,
> Brianna
>
>


--
Ting

Ting's Blog: http://wingphilopp.blogspot.com/


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2009/4/22 Ting Chen <wing.philopp@gmx.de>:

> NPOV is mainly a principle of Wikipedia, later also used by Wikibooks
> and Wikinews. There is at least one project (Wikiversity) which
> explicitely allow participants not to follow NPOV, but the Disclosure of
> Point of Views in Wikiversity follow in principle the ideal of NPOV: It
> tells the reader and participants that the content has a point of view
> and thus gives the reader and participants to be aware of this and
> accordingly to adjust their judgement in reading and writing the content.


I think the point is to have whatever would be the locally relevant
version of neutrality. On Wikipedia it's NPOV. On Commons or
Wikisource, I expect it would be neutrality of subject matter. Etc.
The key point would be (something like) that Wikimedia projects are
not for pushing views.


- d.

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On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 3:32 PM, David Gerard <dgerard@gmail.com> wrote:
> I think the point is to have whatever would be the locally relevant
> version of neutrality. On Wikipedia it's NPOV. On Commons or
> Wikisource, I expect it would be neutrality of subject matter. Etc.
> The key point would be (something like) that Wikimedia projects are
> not for pushing views.

NPOV transformation to general neutrality will work in the most of the
cases. A clear example for such transformation is Wikinews. Even
called as "NPOV", Wikinews neutrality is a different kind of approach
because it is a journalistic one.

*But*, even neutrality is not always possible. Wikiversity is the case
because, for example, you are not able to teach/learn about
impressionist critics of art by applying any kind of neutrality. While
this is an extreme example, a lot of scientific fields are more or
less there.

And if you want to force any kind of neutrality there, you would get
the same kind of scientific production which existed in East European
countries during 50s and 60s: A (very good) book about ancient Greek
literature starts with 20-30 pages of Preface in which author explains
relations between ancient Greek literature and Marxism. But, there
were a lot of not so good books which had a lot of grotesque
connections between Marxism and its content not just inside of their
prefaces.

There should be a way how to protect projects' integrity, but it is
not insisting on NPOV or neutrality if it is not possible.

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2009/4/22 Milos Rancic <millosh@gmail.com>:

> NPOV transformation to general neutrality will work in the most of the
> cases. A clear example for such transformation is Wikinews. Even
> called as "NPOV", Wikinews neutrality is a different kind of approach
> because it is a journalistic one.


And even then, some of the most interesting original content is
interviews, which are all about the subjective POV of the interviewee.


> And if you want to force any kind of neutrality there, you would get
> the same kind of scientific production which existed in East European
> countries during 50s and 60s: A (very good) book about ancient Greek
> literature starts with 20-30 pages of Preface in which author explains
> relations between ancient Greek literature and Marxism. But, there
> were a lot of not so good books which had a lot of grotesque
> connections between Marxism and its content not just inside of their
> prefaces.


I'm not clear on the connection between neutrality and Marxism ...
could you explain the logical steps between the two clauses of your
first sentence?


- d.

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On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 5:20 PM, David Gerard <dgerard@gmail.com> wrote:
>> And if you want to force any kind of neutrality there, you would get
>> the same kind of scientific production which existed in East European
>> countries during 50s and 60s: A (very good) book about ancient Greek
>> literature starts with 20-30 pages of Preface in which author explains
>> relations between ancient Greek literature and Marxism. But, there
>> were a lot of not so good books which had a lot of grotesque
>> connections between Marxism and its content not just inside of their
>> prefaces.>
>
> I'm not clear on the connection between neutrality and Marxism ...
> could you explain the logical steps between the two clauses of your
> first sentence?

I wanted to say that if neutrality is forced in a field which is not
possible to present neutrally, you'll get bizarre explanations why
some course or book is neutral. (As young revolutionary authorities
demanded connection between any field of knowledge and Marxism.)

Even further... Book in elementary algebra may be written well
according to the NPOV (but, not by following neutrality!) because NPOV
has clause which is related to the "common knowledge". But, if you try
to make a book with a specific approach to a number of micro and macro
dimensions in the Universe, by using NPOV or neutrality, you would get
a book which is not useful:

If A, B, C and D are some logical structures, statement "A x B = C" is
not a neutral statement. If there is some other approach which has
statement that "A x B = D", the author of the book will have to
mention and explain that as well. And this is a kind of a recursive
process.

We may rationally say that we won't demand from contributors to do
that. But, then, the approach is not according to NPOV or neutrality.

There are other important principles, too, like verifiability and NOR.
Both of them may be applied fully to Wikibooks if we say that we
really don't want OR in books. At Wikiversity, NOR may be applied for
sources. It is not reasonable to apply those principles for didactic
methods because didactics of teaching and learning on Internet is not
well developed. And it is not possible to implement those principles
for the process of teaching and learning: course in any applied
science must have OR during the process (and OR is not verifiable).

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On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Brianna Laugher <brianna.laugher@gmail.com
> wrote:

> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
> > The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some core
> > principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
> > these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
> > maintaining a neutral point of view.
>
> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
> policy.


Should commons allow images which are biased?

More concretely, in terms of photography, should photographs adhere to the
standards of ethics adopted by photojournalists?
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On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 12:46 PM, Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org> wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Brianna Laugher <
> brianna.laugher@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
>> > The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some core
>> > principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
>> > these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
>> > maintaining a neutral point of view.
>>
>> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
>> policy.
>
>
> Should commons allow images which are biased?
>
> More concretely, in terms of photography, should photographs adhere to the
> standards of ethics adopted by photojournalists?
>

Here's the NPPA Code of ethics:

1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work to
avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime or
tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an
overriding and justifiable need to see.
5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any
way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
information or participation.
8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek
to influence coverage.
9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.

1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 all deal with neutrality. Should they apply to
photos made for commons?
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2009/4/22 Milos Rancic <millosh@gmail.com>:
> On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 5:20 PM, David Gerard <dgerard@gmail.com> wrote:

>>> And if you want to force any kind of neutrality there, you would get
>>> the same kind of scientific production which existed in East European
>>> countries during 50s and 60s: A (very good) book about ancient Greek
>>> literature starts with 20-30 pages of Preface in which author explains
>>> relations between ancient Greek literature and Marxism. But, there
>>> were a lot of not so good books which had a lot of grotesque
>>> connections between Marxism and its content not just inside of their
>>> prefaces.>

>> I'm not clear on the connection between neutrality and Marxism ...
>> could you explain the logical steps between the two clauses of your
>> first sentence?

> I wanted to say that if neutrality is forced in a field which is not
> possible to present neutrally, you'll get bizarre explanations why
> some course or book is neutral. (As young revolutionary authorities
> demanded connection between any field of knowledge and Marxism.)


Yes, that makes sense :-)


> Even further... Book in elementary algebra may be written well
> according to the NPOV (but, not by following neutrality!) because NPOV
> has clause which is related to the "common knowledge". But, if you try
> to make a book with a specific approach to a number of micro and macro
> dimensions in the Universe, by using NPOV or neutrality, you would get
> a book which is not useful:


en:wp has experienced this - the arbcom finally had to say "no,
peer-reviewed journals are more reliable sources on global warming
than Rush Limbaugh radio transcripts or Michael Crichton novels, and
fifty faith-based science advocates don't get to vote the UK's top
climate scientist off the island. Don't be bloody stupid." In a few
more words than that.


- d.

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--- On Wed, 4/22/09, Ting Chen <wing.philopp@gmx.de> wrote:

> From: Ting Chen <wing.philopp@gmx.de>
> Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] NPOV as common value? (was Re: Board statement regarding biographies of living people)
> To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" <foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org>
> Date: Wednesday, April 22, 2009, 6:11 AM
> Hallo Brianna,
>
> NPOV is mainly a principle of Wikipedia, later also used by
> Wikibooks
> and Wikinews. There is at least one project (Wikiversity)
> which
> explicitely allow participants not to follow NPOV, but the
> Disclosure of
> Point of Views in Wikiversity follow in principle the ideal
> of NPOV: It
> tells the reader and participants that the content has a
> point of view
> and thus gives the reader and participants to be aware of
> this and
> accordingly to adjust their judgement in reading and
> writing the content.
>
> The question here is about projects like Commons or
> Wikisource. Mainly
> they collect free content and serve as a shared repository
> for other
> projects so that these other projects can use these
> content. The content
> themselves may have POV, that's for sure, and we don't make
> edits or
> comments in these sources to make them NPOV. But we do
> category them.
> And at least here we do make sort of comment in the source.
> Let me take
> an example that actually happend on Commons. It makes a
> diffrence if we
> categorize a caricature of an israeli bus in form of a
> coffin to the
> very neutral Category:Bus or to more commentary category
> Category:Political caricature or to the very strong
> commentary category
> Category:Anti-israeli caricature. It makes very big
> difference how
> Commons categorize such images. And I am in these cases
> more for the
> implementation of a similar policy like Wikiversity's
> Disclosure of
> Point of View: A source with a very strong bias of point of
> view should
> be accordingly categorized. With that we do nothing else as
> to hold our
> principle ideal of NPOV on projects like commons.

I don't think of NPOV as being a common value, but rather I think NPOV as being Wikipedia's answer to the common value of avoiding editorial bias. Wikipedia has much more fine-grained editorial input than Wikisource or Commons. Wikisource and Commons must avoid editorial bias in the presentation of the works we host, rather than within the works themselves. Wikisource for example does not allow excerpts of published works (as opposed to published excerpts). While we host biased material, we aim to avoid biased presentations of material. So far it seems to have been successful, even where there have been initial accusations of bias or inaccuracy to be worked out.

I think the people who are saying NPOV is a common value, are just using this acronym as shorthand. If you really examine how NPOV is defined; it simply doesn't hold up for other projects. The real value behind this issue if the "sum of all human knowledge". Bias in the form that excludes other information or interpretations is taboo, yet bias itself is not excluded.

Birgitte SB





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Hoi,
There is a difference between the way photo journalists work and the way
most of the illustrations come to Commons. The NPPA code of ethics are
clearly written for active press journalists. They get paid for what they
do. Also the NPPA is a USA national entity and consequently their rules do
not take into account the people that provide us with illustrations and the
fact that they are from all over the globe.

Another important difference is that the intent of our illustrations is to
illustrate encyclopaedic and other educational works. This means that a
slight exageration in an illustration may actually serves our purposes well.
Many of the subjects that are covered are historical and consequently we
have to make use of the materials available to us. There are best practices
about historic and other material and they are not universally shared.

* Having access to the original material and providing information where
this material can be found
* Preferably including the meta data as available from the library, archive
or musuem
* When material is altered, the alterations have to be documented to enable
people to assess the illustration
* High reolution material is always preferable to low resolution images
* Non compressed material is always preferable to compresssed material for
original material
* Compressing material can always be done before material is actually served
from our Wikis
Thanks,
GerardM


2009/4/22 Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org>

> On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 12:46 PM, Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org> wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Brianna Laugher <
> > brianna.laugher@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
> >> > The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some core
> >> > principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
> >> > these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
> >> > maintaining a neutral point of view.
> >>
> >> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
> >> policy.
> >
> >
> > Should commons allow images which are biased?
> >
> > More concretely, in terms of photography, should photographs adhere to
> the
> > standards of ethics adopted by photojournalists?
> >
>
> Here's the NPPA Code of ethics:
>
> 1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
> 2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
> 3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
> subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work
> to
> avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
> 4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
> consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime
> or
> tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an
> overriding and justifiable need to see.
> 5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
> alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
> 6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
> content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in
> any
> way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
> 7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
> information or participation.
> 8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek
> to influence coverage.
> 9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.
>
> 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 all deal with neutrality. Should they apply to
> photos made for commons?
> _______________________________________________
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> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
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>
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I would love to see these adopted for Commons photographers. The issue
will become knowing when these principles are being violated. For
example, if you're going to alter audio to serve your own POV, you're
not going to make it obvious you've done so. Detection is one problem,
but even if you've detected that the audio was edited, there's no
telling what the audio should have been, and whether the editing was
deceptive. So, as a practical matter, I don't see that this is easily
resolved. As a matter of principle, I think these represent an ideal we
should strive for as a community.

-Mike

On Wed, 2009-04-22 at 12:57 -0400, Anthony wrote:

> On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 12:46 PM, Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org> wrote:
>
> > On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Brianna Laugher <
> > brianna.laugher@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
> >> > The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some core
> >> > principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
> >> > these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
> >> > maintaining a neutral point of view.
> >>
> >> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
> >> policy.
> >
> >
> > Should commons allow images which are biased?
> >
> > More concretely, in terms of photography, should photographs adhere to the
> > standards of ethics adopted by photojournalists?
> >
>
> Here's the NPPA Code of ethics:
>
> 1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
> 2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
> 3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
> subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work to
> avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
> 4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
> consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime or
> tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an
> overriding and justifiable need to see.
> 5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
> alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
> 6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
> content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any
> way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
> 7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
> information or participation.
> 8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek
> to influence coverage.
> 9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.
>
> 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 all deal with neutrality. Should they apply to
> photos made for commons?
>
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David Gerard wrote:
> 2009/4/22 Milos Rancic
>> And if you want to force any kind of neutrality there, you would get
>> the same kind of scientific production which existed in East European
>> countries during 50s and 60s: A (very good) book about ancient Greek
>> literature starts with 20-30 pages of Preface in which author explains
>> relations between ancient Greek literature and Marxism. But, there
>> were a lot of not so good books which had a lot of grotesque
>> connections between Marxism and its content not just inside of their
>> prefaces.
>>
> I'm not clear on the connection between neutrality and Marxism ...
> could you explain the logical steps between the two clauses of your
> first sentence?
>
>
Even if Marx's results are highly debatable, there can be little doubt
that all his long hours in the British Museum library were spent in good
faith trying to give economics a scientific point of view. Forced
neutrality is rarely neutral, and the "scientific production" of some of
these East European writers has more to do with sycophancy than
science. That kind of writing is not unique to a Marxist context.

Ec

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I'm not sure what the answer is, and I agree with you that it's not easily
resolved, but it seems to me that some sort of neutrality policy ought to
apply to Commons.

In my opinion the universal form of the NPOV policy is simple - be honest.

On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 2:00 PM, Mike.lifeguard
<mikelifeguard@fastmail.fm>wrote:

> I would love to see these adopted for Commons photographers. The issue
> will become knowing when these principles are being violated. For
> example, if you're going to alter audio to serve your own POV, you're
> not going to make it obvious you've done so. Detection is one problem,
> but even if you've detected that the audio was edited, there's no
> telling what the audio should have been, and whether the editing was
> deceptive. So, as a practical matter, I don't see that this is easily
> resolved. As a matter of principle, I think these represent an ideal we
> should strive for as a community.
>
> -Mike
>
> On Wed, 2009-04-22 at 12:57 -0400, Anthony wrote:
>
> > On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 12:46 PM, Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org> wrote:
> >
> > > On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 11:21 PM, Brianna Laugher <
> > > brianna.laugher@gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > >> 2009/4/21 Michael Snow <wikipedia@verizon.net>:
> > >> > The Wikimedia Foundation takes this opportunity to reiterate some
> core
> > >> > principles related to our shared vision, mission, and values. One of
> > >> > these values which is common to all our projects is a commitment to
> > >> > maintaining a neutral point of view.
> > >>
> > >> I find it a bit strange to talk of Wikimedia Commons as having a NPOV
> > >> policy.
> > >
> > >
> > > Should commons allow images which are biased?
> > >
> > > More concretely, in terms of photography, should photographs adhere to
> the
> > > standards of ethics adopted by photojournalists?
> > >
> >
> > Here's the NPPA Code of ethics:
> >
> > 1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
> > 2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
> > 3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
> > subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and
> work to
> > avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
> > 4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
> > consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of
> crime or
> > tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has
> an
> > overriding and justifiable need to see.
> > 5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
> > alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
> > 6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
> > content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in
> any
> > way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
> > 7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
> > information or participation.
> > 8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might
> seek
> > to influence coverage.
> > 9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.
> >
> > 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 all deal with neutrality. Should they apply to
> > photos made for commons?
> >
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On Wed, Apr 22, 2009 at 6:57 PM, Anthony <wikimail@inbox.org> wrote:

> Here's the NPPA Code of ethics:
>
>   1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
>   2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.
>   3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
>   subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work to
>   avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
>   4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
>   consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime or
>   tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an
>   overriding and justifiable need to see.
>   5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
>   alter, or seek to alter or influence events.
>   6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
>   content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any
>   way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
>   7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
>   information or participation.
>   8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek
>   to influence coverage.
>   9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.
>
> 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, and 8 all deal with neutrality.  Should they apply to
> photos made for commons?

I think most of these do not really apply for Commons. They are mostly
based on the situation of journalists making pictures about some
specific event. On Commons, even if you are at a specific event, many
of the pictures may say little or nothing about the event, but still
be useful pictures because of what they DO depict. Our 'subject' can
easily shift this way or that, making rules 1 and 3 mostly vacuous.
Going through the list:

> 1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.

Since for many pictures the subject is what happens to be represented
on the photograph, this is mostly vacuous. As an example, a journalist
going to a protest march of 1000 people among which 10 are typical
punks, would be breaking this rule if he made half the photographs he
made of the protesters of those 10. A Commons photographer would just
have to call them photographs of punks rather than photographs of that
typical protest, and all would be fine.

> 2. Resist being manipulated by staged photo opportunities.

Staged photo opportunities are little good for journalism, but they
are good for getting portrait-like photographs. Journalists are not
very interested in those, we are.

> 3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
> subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work to
> avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.

The first half to me seems hard when we get to the level of single
photographs, which is on Commons how the work usually goes. The second
part could well be a good rule, though at the same time when going to
single photographs it is too restrictive - should every picture of a
drinking Irishman be forbidden? I don't think so.

> 4. Treat all subjects with respect and dignity. Give special
> consideration to vulnerable subjects and compassion to victims of crime or
> tragedy. Intrude on private moments of grief only when the public has an
> overriding and justifiable need to see.

A good rule, but not related to neutrality. And one that Commons
photographers are much less in a position to break than real
journalists anyway.

> 5. While photographing subjects do not intentionally contribute to,
> alter, or seek to alter or influence events.

Again a rule that is good for photo journalism, but not for general
photography. If I want a picture of a dog swimming, I throw a stick in
the water when my brother's dog is near. But even in citizen
journalism, this is not a good rule like it is in professional
journalism - getting the 'inside view' is interesting. I would not
want the rule "Do not contribute photographs you made during events in
which you were involved yourself" - which is more or less the same
rule.

> 6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
> content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in any
> way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.

Now, this one I can agree with. Any editing beyond the trivial should
be made clear to the viewers.

> 7. Do not pay sources or subjects or reward them materially for
> information or participation.

I don't think any Commons photographers would do so, being volunteers
themselves, but where they do, they might well have good reason.

> 8. Do not accept gifts, favors, or compensation from those who might seek
> to influence coverage.

Not applicable.

> 9. Do not intentionally sabotage the efforts of other journalists.

Of course not, but has nothing to do with neutrality.

--
André Engels, andreengels@gmail.com

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On Fri, Apr 24, 2009 at 5:39 AM, Andre Engels <andreengels@gmail.com> wrote:

> > 1. Be accurate and comprehensive in the representation of subjects.
>
> Since for many pictures the subject is what happens to be represented
> on the photograph, this is mostly vacuous. As an example, a journalist
> going to a protest march of 1000 people among which 10 are typical
> punks, would be breaking this rule if he made half the photographs he
> made of the protesters of those 10. A Commons photographer would just
> have to call them photographs of punks rather than photographs of that
> typical protest, and all would be fine.
>
> > 3. Be complete and provide context when photographing or recording
> > subjects. Avoid stereotyping individuals and groups. Recognize and work
> to
> > avoid presenting one's own biases in the work.
>
> The first half to me seems hard when we get to the level of single
> photographs, which is on Commons how the work usually goes. The second
> part could well be a good rule, though at the same time when going to
> single photographs it is too restrictive - should every picture of a
> drinking Irishman be forbidden? I don't think so.


I think any image can be neutral given the right context, but that context
matters. Images in commons don't exist by themselves - they would be fairly
useless if they did. (I guess a biased image could be made useful by adding
context to them afterward, but then, so can a biased encyclopedia article.
So maybe the difference is one of immediatism vs. eventualism, but the end
goal is the same.)

I think the points described above are all good ones for anyone taking
photographs. The key in the first two sentences is the word "subjects". I
think you're reading too much into the rules if you think that it excludes
someone from taking a picture of something other than the event itself when
attending an event. I don't think such a rule is even meant to apply to
professional photojournalists.

Is commons meant to be a dump of anything and everything, or are the images
in it meant to depict something? If the latter, then they can depict
something accurately or inaccurately, and that's where neutrality comes in.
Yes, it's an amateur site, so expectations are low. If you're just randomly
pointing at a subject and shooting, then it's only your subconscious biases
that you have to worry about, but if you're intentionally making images with
the intent of depicting something, then there's a lot of room to introduce
biases when doing so.

I would not
> want the rule "Do not contribute photographs you made during events in
> which you were involved yourself" - which is more or less the same
> rule.


I would want want a rule of "Do not contribute photographs you made during
events in which you were involved yourself without disclosing that fact"
though.

> 6. Editing should maintain the integrity of the photographic images'
> > content and context. Do not manipulate images or add or alter sound in
> any
> > way that can mislead viewers or misrepresent subjects.
>
> Now, this one I can agree with. Any editing beyond the trivial should
> be made clear to the viewers.


I find it incongruous that you would agree with this one with the caveat
that a proper description excuses it, after going point by point on the
others assuming that the rule excluded photos regardless of description.

If you want a picture to describe "punk", why not make a few edits here and
there to make your image closer to the concept (assuming you have permission
of the individual(s) in the picture, anyway)? If you want a picture of a
dog swimming, why not airbrush out that stick that you used to coax the dog
into swimming? Why is it okay to manipulate the scene before you take the
picture, but not afterward?

---

But now we've moved from journalism, at least in the classic sense, to art.
Does a neutrality policy make sense in art? Considering the ability of art
to cast or dispel stereotypes, I think it can. On the other hand, does a
"no original research" policy apply to art? I don't think it can. Art *is*
original research.

Fortunately, there seems to be no reason to abandon original research in
Commons, as it is banned in Wikipedia. Commons is a less collaborative
site. It's more like Knol than it is like Wikipedia. And as far as I'm
concerned that's a good thing.

But I think a neutrality policy does make sense. Maybe I'm confusing
"neutrality policy" with "honesty policy" though, because I think the
summation of a proper neutrality policy is simply "be honest".
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