Mailing List Archive

On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 5:46 AM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>
> I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag.

I appreciate this step, but the community has now firmly rejected your
continued status as "Founder flagged"-- you have not been asked to cut
back on your privileges, you are being ordered to relinquish your
founder flag.

I'm happy that you're beginning to question your earlier actions, but
your founder status is not for you to decide. Currently it's 3-to-1
against you continuing in this role. If that doesn't change, you
need to abide by it.

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On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 11:59 AM, Alec Conroy <alecmconroy@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 5:46 AM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>>
>> I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
>> things from the "Founder" flag.
>
> I appreciate this step, but the community has now firmly rejected your
> continued status as "Founder flagged"-- you have not been asked to cut
> back on your privileges, you are being ordered to relinquish your
> founder flag.
>
> I'm happy that you're beginning to question your earlier actions, but
> your founder status is not for you to decide.   Currently it's 3-to-1
> against you continuing in this role.   If that doesn't change, you
> need to abide by it.

I disagree. Those objections are not against the idea of a founder
flag, but against his rights, or rather the way he used these rights.
If those rights are significantly curtailed, we have a different
situation, and not everyone who was against the extensive rights will
be against the narrower ones as well. In fact, I would say that
letting Jimbo remain Founder, but remove several rights from that
position would be very fitting in the Wikimedia way of working: Not
voting, but searching consensus for a compromise.

--
André Engels, andreengels@gmail.com

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On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 7:46 PM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>
> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag.  I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages!  (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)

You have kept 'protect', which I am guessing overrides the
'autoconfirmed' that you removed.

You have also kept 'Edit membership to global groups' and 'Manage
global groups', which means you can change these permissions at any
time. When you have time, I think it is necessary to explain why you
need those, or to relinquish them.

--
John Vandenberg

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On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 11:46 AM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag.  I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages!  (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>
> I do not want to be a tyrant or dictator.  I do not want us to fight
> about that kind of thing, as it's really a distraction from our work.

Thank you Jimmy very much!

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On Sun, May 09, 2010 at 10:46:50AM +0100, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>
> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag. I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages! (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)

In the immortal words of Judge Judy; "Perfect, PERFECT!".

== Perfect ==

I was just about to post about the need to assure the commons community
that there would be no repeat performance. This is a risk-management
issue: why would a commons user take an initiative that might be
marginalized or rendered futile in the near future?

That kind of situation has a paralysing effect on a community.

The paralysing effect has now been largely negated.
Perfect.

== PERFECT! ==

Do you know how long I've been trying to encourage experienced/high profile
admins to hand in their flags?

Why? It's a Poka-yoke / idiot-proofing measure
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poka-yoke

As a precaution, one should not take (high profile) actions, without
confirming it with at least one other person in the relevant community.[1]

By not having the requisite permissions oneself, one is forced to talk
with someone who does, no matter how impatient, panicked, or tired one
is. Obviously this doesn't catch all edge-cases, but it certainly
reduces the number of ways in which things can go wrong.

In this case, Jimbo Wale's founder flag gave him _Uber_-Admin powers.
That's Got to Lead To Uber-Pain. And It Did.


So now that's fixed. I wouldn't be surprised if Jimmy's influence
in the community didn't actually *increase* due to this. [2]

PERFECT!

== Me three? ==

Jimmy Wales correctly identifies the fact that experienced
users who do hand in their flag should still be able to view
things, such as deleted pages, etc.

In fact, the reason that I haven't been able to convince fellow
admins to retire, is because they really didn't want to lose
their viewing abilities.

<drama>
Before, I was but a single voice, calling in the dark. But Now! Now that
the world's most high profile Wikipedian has *de-facto* finally
vindicated my position, after all these years...
</drama>

... it would be really nice to have a similar set of permissions
for "retired" admins and stewards. Please? <Puppy-dog-look>

sincerely,
Kim Bruning

[1]It is always wise to work in pairs anyway. Ask Ward Cunningham, or
any other Agile-type person you know!

[2] This wouldn't be immediate. First some wounds will need to heal,
of course. And people still need to vent their catharthic
venting for now.




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Hash: SHA1

On 37-01--10 03:59 PM, Jimmy Wales wrote:
> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag. I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages! (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>
> I do not want to be a tyrant or dictator. I do not want us to fight
> about that kind of thing, as it's really a distraction from our work.

Thank you, I think this is actually enormously helpful.

I think you'll find that whenever you want to have something done that
should actually be done there will be no problem convincing community
members to do it. By contrast, if you ask them to do something that
shouldn't be done, it may be more likely they won't do it. Of course,
your opinion carries much weight, so people are likely to acquiesce, but
all the same, I think this will make folks much more comfortable in
accepting your guidance.

At the same time, it simply removes a large part of what folks have been
grappling with this weekend.

I think this is quite a positive change,

- -Mike
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On 9 May 2010 10:46, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>
> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag.  I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages!  (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>
> I do not want to be a tyrant or dictator.  I do not want us to fight
> about that kind of thing, as it's really a distraction from our work.

Thanks for this, it is a very good move. I think this will have the
desired effect of allowing us to move on from discussing you and
discuss the actual issue.

I notice you have kept "protect" and "undelete". Is that intentional?
If so, can you explain your thinking behind that decision?

As someone else has mentioned in this thread, you have kept the rights
necessary to change your own rights in the future. It would probably
be best to remove them too. I'm assuming you don't intend to give
yourself back rights should you want to use them (that would make this
a meaningless gesture, which I've never known you make before), so you
have no need to keep those rights.

I think you should also consider your admin rights on English
Wikipedia. I know they are historically a separate issue from your
founder rights, but since you have already voluntarily given up your
enwiki block rights, now might be the time to give up the rest too.
(You can use the founder flag for the various view rights, which I
think you are right to keep.)

Thank you again for doing this - despite the fact that I've just been
picking holes in it, I really do think that even with these issues it
is an excellent thing to have done. The important this is the good
attitude you've shown in doing this.

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I agree that this ends the need for any immediate action by the
community in this aspect of things.

David Goodman, Ph.D, M.L.S.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:DGG



On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 11:18 AM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9 May 2010 10:46, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>>
>> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
>> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
>> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
>> things from the "Founder" flag.  I even removed my ability to edit
>> semi-protected pages!  (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>>
>> I do not want to be a tyrant or dictator.  I do not want us to fight
>> about that kind of thing, as it's really a distraction from our work.
>
> Thanks for this, it is a very good move. I think this will have the
> desired effect of allowing us to move on from discussing you and
> discuss the actual issue.
>
> I notice you have kept "protect" and "undelete". Is that intentional?
> If so, can you explain your thinking behind that decision?
>
> As someone else has mentioned in this thread, you have kept the rights
> necessary to change your own rights in the future. It would probably
> be best to remove them too. I'm assuming you don't intend to give
> yourself back rights should you want to use them (that would make this
> a meaningless gesture, which I've never known you make before), so you
> have no need to keep those rights.
>
> I think you should also consider your admin rights on English
> Wikipedia. I know they are historically a separate issue from your
> founder rights, but since you have already voluntarily given up your
> enwiki block rights, now might be the time to give up the rest too.
> (You can use the founder flag for the various view rights, which I
> think you are right to keep.)
>
> Thank you again for doing this - despite the fact that I've just been
> picking holes in it, I really do think that even with these issues it
> is an excellent thing to have done. The important this is the good
> attitude you've shown in doing this.
>
> _______________________________________________
> foundation-l mailing list
> foundation-l@lists.wikimedia.org
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/foundation-l
>

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On May 9, 2010, at 7:28 AM, Kim Bruning wrote:

> On Sun, May 09, 2010 at 10:46:50AM +0100, Jimmy Wales wrote:
>>
>> In the interest of encouraging this discussion to be about real
>> philosophical/content issues, rather than be about me and how quickly I
>> acted, I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
>> things from the "Founder" flag. I even removed my ability to edit
>> semi-protected pages! (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>
> In the immortal words of Judge Judy; "Perfect, PERFECT!".
>
> == Perfect ==
>
> I was just about to post about the need to assure the commons community
> that there would be no repeat performance. This is a risk-management
> issue: why would a commons user take an initiative that might be
> marginalized or rendered futile in the near future?
>
> That kind of situation has a paralysing effect on a community.
>
> The paralysing effect has now been largely negated.
> Perfect.
>
> == PERFECT! ==
>
> Do you know how long I've been trying to encourage experienced/high profile
> admins to hand in their flags?
>
> Why? It's a Poka-yoke / idiot-proofing measure
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poka-yoke
>
> As a precaution, one should not take (high profile) actions, without
> confirming it with at least one other person in the relevant community.[1]
>
> By not having the requisite permissions oneself, one is forced to talk
> with someone who does, no matter how impatient, panicked, or tired one
> is. Obviously this doesn't catch all edge-cases, but it certainly
> reduces the number of ways in which things can go wrong.
>
> In this case, Jimbo Wale's founder flag gave him _Uber_-Admin powers.
> That's Got to Lead To Uber-Pain. And It Did.
>
>
> So now that's fixed. I wouldn't be surprised if Jimmy's influence
> in the community didn't actually *increase* due to this. [2]
>
> PERFECT!
>
> == Me three? ==
>
> Jimmy Wales correctly identifies the fact that experienced
> users who do hand in their flag should still be able to view
> things, such as deleted pages, etc.
>
> In fact, the reason that I haven't been able to convince fellow
> admins to retire, is because they really didn't want to lose
> their viewing abilities.
>
> <drama>
> Before, I was but a single voice, calling in the dark. But Now! Now that
> the world's most high profile Wikipedian has *de-facto* finally
> vindicated my position, after all these years...
> </drama>
>
> ... it would be really nice to have a similar set of permissions
> for "retired" admins and stewards. Please? <Puppy-dog-look>
>
> sincerely,
> Kim Bruning
>
> [1]It is always wise to work in pairs anyway. Ask Ward Cunningham, or
> any other Agile-type person you know!
>
> [2] This wouldn't be immediate. First some wounds will need to heal,
> of course. And people still need to vent their catharthic
> venting for now.
>



This email is twice as good when you read it in Judge Judy's voice.

-Dan
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On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 5:46 AM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:

> I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
> things from the "Founder" flag. I even removed my ability to edit
> semi-protected pages! (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>

The community recognizes that you have given up certain permissions under
controversial circumstances and reminds you that you that those permissions
may not be reinstated without a proper request for permissions on meta.
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On 9 May 2010, at 17:57, Anthony wrote:

> On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 5:46 AM, Jimmy Wales <jwales@wikia-inc.com> wrote:
>
>> I've just now removed virtually all permissions to actually do
>> things from the "Founder" flag. I even removed my ability to edit
>> semi-protected pages! (I've kept permissions related to 'viewing' things.)
>>
>
> The community recognizes that you have given up certain permissions under
> controversial circumstances and reminds you that you that those permissions
> may not be reinstated without a proper request for permissions on meta.

Daft question: the community here being ... you? Or is there a wiki !vote page saying this?

Mike Peel
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The founder’s flag give to a single man a huge power. I can’t trust on
almost anybody to hold that power. But In less than two days Jimbo has
resigned of this power. By doing this he has proven that he is one of the
sparse people we can trust.

Wikimedia movement is a complex system. Capacity to take decisions is
distributed among a lot of stakeholders. Up to now it has worked pretty
well.

Along all this discussions I think several weaknesses of Wikimedia movement
arisen: This power on single man hands, the foundation need for money, the
power concentration in the hands of the board, the feeling that the members
of the project can’t do anything, the possibility of forking and creating a
project ruled by the chapters… And I could add more, by example: the flags
system is organized in a pyramidal way.

I think that removing a single piece of this system instead of solving any
problem can unbalance the whole. More if this piece has proved extraordinary
good results in the past and extraordinary positive attitude in the present.


Please give Jimbo those flags back. And start altogether a process of
rethinking the whole Wikimedia governance. Improve the system as a whole;
find the mechanisms allowing that it is not needed that anybody holds this
power.
I have opened this page on meta:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Requests_for_comment/Give_funders_flag_back





> On 5/9/10 4:18 PM, Thomas Dalton wrote:
> > I notice you have kept "protect" and "undelete". Is that intentional?
> > If so, can you explain your thinking behind that decision?
>
> I just removed undelete, manage global groups, and edit membership to
> global groups. I did that before I saw your note, so I missed
> "protect". It's not important one way or the other.
>
> My purpose here is for us to stop chattering about this aspect of things
> - which I don't care about. People seem to want to fight me on it,
> perhaps expecting me to dig in my heels. Everyone loves a good fight,
> even me, but this is not a fight that we need to have.
>
> --Jimbo
>
>
>
>
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On Sun, May 9, 2010 at 10:37 PM, Joan Goma <jrgoma@gmail.com> wrote:
> The founder’s flag give to a single man a huge power. I can’t trust on
> almost anybody to hold that power.

Every steward holds that power. If I remember well, I think that
stewards had a couple of more permissions than founder.

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Mike.lifeguard writes:
> I think you'll find that whenever you want to have something done that
> should actually be done there will be no problem convincing
> community members to do it... I think this will make folks
> much more comfortable in accepting your guidance.

Just so. Thank you, Jimbo.


Kim writes:

> PERFECT!
>
> == Me three? ==
>
> In fact, the reason that I haven't been able to convince fellow
> admins to retire, is because they really didn't want to lose
> their viewing abilities.
>
> ... it would be really nice to have a similar set of permissions
> for "retired" admins and stewards.  Please? <Puppy-dog-look>

This is a great idea. We should do it.

SJ


Dan writes:
>>This email is twice as good when you read it in Judge Judy's voice.

(Even better, in Kim's grinning impersonation of Judge Judy's voice.)

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