[HN Gopher] Wikimedia Russia has been dissolved
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Wikimedia Russia has been dissolved
Author : pera
Score : 107 points
Date : 2023-12-21 18:03 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (mastodon.xyz)
(TXT) w3m dump (mastodon.xyz)
| coding123 wrote:
| While I think freedom of speech is important, anything I
| contribute on Wikipedia is reverted. There's no free speech here
| either.
| klyrs wrote:
| What is free speech if people cannot disagree with you?
| m00x wrote:
| Wikipedia, while still extremely useful, has slowly become a
| hivemind that remove changes if they disagree with them, even
| if they're backed by good sources.
|
| Wikipedia is not a place for opinions and bias, but for
| facts.
|
| OP should share his edits so we can see ourselves, maybe
| they're just bad, but I've also had edits removed from bias,
| especially on controversial topics.
| danogentili wrote:
| Now this leaves me wondering, should I agree because I have had
| similar experiences when trying to improve some frankly
| unintelligible proofs in certain sections of CS wikipedia, or
| should I carefully disagree because of the suspicious second
| part of your comment? :=)
| j_maffe wrote:
| Care to share your edits for people to judge what you tried to
| contribute?
| segasaturn wrote:
| Are you making sure to include citations to proven reliable
| sources to back up your contributions? If so, then you can
| dispute any reverts on the article's Talk page. My experience
| with Wikipedia is that they are extraordinarily open and fair,
| and honestly they give more benefit of the doubt to editors
| than most of them deserve.
| keiferski wrote:
| Certainly the task of determining "the truth" is a difficult
| one, but Wikipedia's definition of _reliable sources_ is not
| very good and basically just means "mainstream, well-funded
| news organization."
| legitster wrote:
| _This_ is the better criticism of Wikipedia. But it 's
| really not a criticism of Wikipedia directly - it's more of
| a indictment on how media creates Zeitgeists and reality
| conforms to them.
| keiferski wrote:
| But it is a criticism of Wikipedia directly. There is no
| reason why they couldn't come up with a more thoughtful,
| complete validation method. Instead, they just default to
| a last-century model of trust.
| legitster wrote:
| It's hard to imagine that Wikipedia with a centralized
| authority to handle "validation" would be remotely the
| same Wikipedia.
| keiferski wrote:
| I already find it to be highly centralized and with a
| very obvious monoculture.
| duskwuff wrote:
| What other "validation method" do you have in mind?
| keiferski wrote:
| I don't have anything in mind, because I don't run a
| Wikipedia competitor. I haven't spent enough time
| thinking about it. But certainty _anything_ other than
| "just trust what the big media companies say" would be an
| improvement.
|
| In general I find Wikipedia articles to be written from a
| very specific viewpoint that highlights certain facts and
| hides others. Whether this is from Wikipedia writers
| themselves or is merely a reflection of their sources,
| I'm not sure. But if the goal is to provide the truth, I
| don't think they make a particularly good effort at
| incorporating alternative perspectives.
| m00x wrote:
| A lot of citations just use Fox News, Vox, CNN, etc. as fact.
|
| Wikipedia isn't very serious about scientific/objective
| truth.
| foverzar wrote:
| This and lots of highly opinionated literature.
|
| Not that there is anything wrong with opinions, but they
| should at least be referenced as such when there is a clear
| debate.
|
| Otherwise it just erodes trust - this actually seems to be
| an awfully common sentiment towards wikipedia, as it is
| evident even from neighboring comments.
| BobaFloutist wrote:
| Wikipedia's purpose is freedom of _information_ , not freedom
| of _speech_.
|
| The two are cousins at best.
| phkahler wrote:
| Wikipedia is has nothing to do with free speech. It's there to
| (in my words) document the world around us. To explain things
| factually, or as factually as we can. It's not about anyone's
| opinions or ideas.
| shikon7 wrote:
| Still, free speech is what allows such a project. And
| Wikipedia also explains philosophical opinions, political
| positions, NSFW concepts, etc., which is only possible to
| that extent due to free speech.
|
| So I would disagree both that Wikipedia has nothing to do
| with free speech, and that it's not about anybody's opinions
| or ideas.
| Clamchop wrote:
| There was a far more productive reading you could have
| taken.
|
| Free speech allows Wikipedia to publish unpopular or
| controversial speech, but that's not the same as having an
| editorial policy that contributors are allowed to express
| themselves on the platform, which would obviously be
| inappropriate.
|
| Wikipedia documents opinions and ideologies but that's not
| the same as supporting the expression of the opinions and
| ideologies of its contributors. (See above.)
| foverzar wrote:
| > There was a far more productive reading you could have
| taken.
|
| As an individual, sure. But it's still a massively "go
| to" source of facts for billions of people.
|
| > Free speech allows Wikipedia to publish unpopular or
| controversial speech
|
| Do you really feel like Wikipedia has unpopular opinions?
| My impression is kinda opposite.
|
| > Wikipedia documents opinions and ideologies
|
| It would have been awesome if it was actually plural.
| Clamchop wrote:
| I'm _not_ claiming that Wikipedia has or doesn't have
| unpopular opinions. I'm making a distinction between the
| legal framework in which Wikipedia exists (they _can_
| publish unpopular or controversial speech) and what
| Wikipedia does (they intend not to express their own
| opinions at all; whether you believe they succeed is
| immaterial).
|
| OP was conflating the two, but Wikipedia has no
| obligation or principle to be a platform for free speech.
| It's completely irrelevant.
| neilk wrote:
| While there are many legitimate questions about Wikipedia's
| openness to new edits and editors, this is such a wild topic
| derail that I find it a little suspicious. Are you arguing that
| this _isn't_ a great loss for freedom of speech?
| foverzar wrote:
| > this is such a wild topic derail
|
| How is this a topic derail? What's the topic then exactly?
| matrix87 wrote:
| I don't think it makes sense to equate English speaking
| Wikipedia (I'm assuming that's what you're referring to) with a
| different language Wikipedia. Different cultures, most likely
| fewer people sitting around spending every free moment starting
| drama on wikipedia
| foverzar wrote:
| Wikipedia is a very popular "no brainer" source of
| information, which inherently politically becomes a focal
| point of conflict of opinions.
|
| So, actually, lots of drama.
| rsynnott wrote:
| Wait, are you suggesting that people shouldn't be allowed
| revert Wikipedia contributions? That would, er, swiftly leave
| it rather pointless.
| intunderflow wrote:
| Russian Wikipedia will continue without the Wikimedia chapter,
| for clarity. It's not going offline.
| Yizahi wrote:
| Of course they will. They are busy rewriting history under
| Kremlin directives.
| foverzar wrote:
| Who are "they"? It's still the same website on the same
| wikipedia domain, owned and hosted by the same global
| Wikimedia Foundation, with the same editors, roles and
| permissions.
|
| P.S. Kinda funny how the narrative of "THEY are rewriting
| history" is now present in both opposing blocks. These are
| truly the end times of objectivity and pluralism.
| duskwuff wrote:
| I think you're misreading the situation rather dramatically
| here.
|
| Wikimedia Russia was an outreach organization; their role was
| primarily to run local conferences and fundraise. Its closure
| has no impact on the operations and policies of the Russian
| Wikipedia and other localized projects -- which are, in any
| event, focused on the _language_ , not the country. (By way
| of analogy, notice that the Chinese Wikipedia is still
| operational, despite the site having been blocked in mainland
| China nearly since its inception.)
| ks2048 wrote:
| This sounds bad, but from this post alone it is not clear what
| this means exactly. E.g. it seems clear that ru.wikipedia.org
| continues as usual.
| terminous wrote:
| Bad headline. What is dissolved is the non profit organization
| that exists in Russia to host events for Russian Wikipedians and
| other tasks. ru.wikipedia.org != Wikipedia Russia.
| brokensegue wrote:
| The headline is right. "Wikimedia Russia" dissolved not
| "Russian Wikipedia"
| happytiger wrote:
| I cannot stop chuckling at your comment.
|
| Reminds me so hard if the Monty Python sketch:
|
| https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=WboggjN_G-4
| foverzar wrote:
| Curious context: about half a year ago Wikimedia RU previous
| director had left his post to fork Russian wikipedia and develop
| an independent "Free Encyclopedia".
|
| https://www.rbc.ru/society/24/05/2023/646e58029a794724e1b894...
| Ekaros wrote:
| Good start, now do the rest and wikipedia will be better off.
| up2isomorphism wrote:
| Ironically Wikipedia is practicing the worst form of censorship
| itself.
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(page generated 2023-12-21 23:02 UTC)