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A Perplexing Ethical Conundrum

 Thursday, August 14, 2008

Yesterday, I posted on MoultonLava an item involving Wikimedia Foundation Volunteer Coordinator, Cary Bass, who has long been Jimbo Wales' right-hand man.

Bass had briefly stepped in to deal with an issue brought to his attention by a troubled Wikipedia Admin who goes by the avatar name of FeloniousMonk. When the issue became too hot for Cary Bass to deal with, he bailed from the Brouhaha, whereupon it was taken up by the fabled and legendary Founder and Chairman Emeritus of the Wikimedia Foundation.

Late Tuesday night, and into the wee hours of Wednesday morning, I exchanged E-Mail with the Founder, who was seeking to placate FeloniousMonk by persuading me to remove from Wikiversity all links to learning resources currently residing on MoultonLava.

The ethical conundrum arose because in his initial ouverture to me, Jimbo Wales wrote: "Can we speak privately? I have a quick request for you."

Within 10 minutes, I wrote back: "You can call me or Skype me," and I included my phone number and SkypeID. Jimbo decided to stick with E-Mail.

He went on to ask me if I could do him a favor and not link to my "outing" blog from the Wikiversity Ethical Management Project, "as a courtesy to others."

He said the links to my blog were causing a lot of hurt, and he didn't see any particular reason for referencing the blog. And he asked me to "voluntarily remove those links" to my blog.

At the time the above message came in to my E-Mail, I was simultaneously in a Skype voice call with another Wikipedia admin whom I greatly admire and trust, as she has the highest standard of ethics of any Wikipedian I know.

I asked her how best to word my reply, and she kindly helped me craft tactful language.

With her help, I responded with this carefully crafted message:

I'd be happy to accommodate your needs as I understand that people have legitimate privacy concerns. If you would be kind enough to detail the specific items that you determine to be "outting" and explain the rationale behind each redaction, I'd be glad to review them and act accordingly.
Jimbo wrote back:
It isn't whether or not I consider it "outing" or you consider it "outing" — it's about you making a good-faith gesture to be generous and kind to people who are upset.

http://moultonlava.blogspot.com/ is the link in question.

It says, for example "I outed Filll" and links to a google search on what is, I suppose, his real name.

I am not asking you to remove that post from your blog, even though I think it would be kinder if you did. It's just rude and as far as I can tell, deliberately annoying. If that was your purpose, well, you succeeded already in annoying people, and it would be great if you could be generous and remove it.

But right now, all I am asking is that you remove the link from Wikiversity.

--Jimbo

Since Jimbo's supposition (that the cited blog post revealed Filll's real name) was an ungrounded assumption for which there is no reliable evidence, I wrote back:
As you no doubt appreciate, that song is a parody of an event that had occurred a few weeks earlier, when Filll requested a CheckUser to prove that he wasn't Bob Stevens. Here is a recent post, when someone unfamiliar with the story asked me about it...
No. And here's why...
As far as I know, no one's ever complained about that song parody because it doesn't actually out anyone. No one knows Filll's real name, and few, if any, believe his Yahoo screen name bears any discoverable relation to his real name or professional identity. I frankly don't know anyone who uses their real name as their Yahoo screen name. Besides, User:Filll on the English Wikipedia requested a CheckUser to conclusively prove that he was not User:Robert Stevens...

Checkuser request

Per your request, I used checkuser on you and user:Robert Stevens to determine whether or not you are sockpuppets, and I am reporting the result here, publicly. It is, in my opinion, virtually certain that you are two different people. Raul654 (talk) 20:20, 19 June 2008 (UTC)

In short, I have no idea of Filll's real name. On Wikipedia Review, I stated, "I hadn't concluded that the name on Filll's Yahoo E-Mail was his actual RL name. I had held out the possibility that it was just another realistic-sounding street name that further disguised the name by which he is known in academic or professional circles." And Lar (who is a Steward), concurred, commenting, "No it does not, necessarily, confirm that." So I don't know anything more than what Filll had already voluntarily disclosed on-wiki, which is bupkes as far as his real-life ID is concerned. If I were talking to Filll on Skype, and he had a heart attack in the middle of our conversation, I would have no idea how to direct any emergency medical response team to find him.
Moulton 02:03, 12 August 2008 (UTC)
While it's plausible that you might not have been familiar with the above story, I have no doubt that FeloniousMonk is fully aware of the fact that these song parodies (a genre for which I am not widely appreciated), is the basis for that little send-up of wiki-mania.
Then, in response to his asking me to remove the link just as a voluntary act of kindness, I added this to my message back to Jimbo:
Jimbo, I would be glad to engage in reciprocal acts of kindness. Would it be possible for those who have, for the past year, adopted an adversarial stance against me, Professor Picard, Professor Tour, and many others in academia to kindly remove from the pages of the English Language Wikipedia the false and defamatory content which has reposed in those pages for some two and a half years, with untold harm to innocent victims of those horrific BLPs.
He wrote back, "Kindness is its own reward, and need not be reciprocal," but nonetheless made this offer:
Can you give me links, and I will see if I can be helpful. I ask nothing of you in return but I hope that you will move forward in a spirit of helpfulness.
I answered his remark about kindness being its own reward with this observation:
Leadership means acting toward others the way you would have them act toward you.

Leadership could be dangerous, Jimmy. You go first. ;)

And then I said I would dig up the links he asked for in the morning, as it was getting close to 4AM, and I needed to get some sleep before dawn.

The next morning, I compiled this list and transmitted it to Jimbo:

I have moved forward in a spirit of helpfulness.

Meantime, here are some links to atrocious BLPs and other assorted travesties propounded by the WikiClique on Intelligent Design...

Rosalind Picard Biography, as I found it, exactly a year ago. It's still not fully cleaned up.

Affective Computing, which the IDCab trashed up in a childish act of revenge.

James Tour Biography, a similar battleground for accuracy, excellence, and ethics in online media.

David Berlinski Biography, an utter travesty if I ever saw one.

A Scientific Dissent From Darwinism, which I fear the IDCab will never bring into compliance with reasonable standards of objectivity and professionalism.

List of Signatories to the Scientific Dissent from Darwinism, which for two years contained libelous and defamatory claims about many scientists and academics whose names were emblazoned there.

Icons of Evolution, which can't even cite a bibliographic entry correctly without a protracted edit war on how best to write a hatchet job.

Moulton's User Page, which FeloniousMonk egregiously vandalized, necessitating an MfD by gobsmacked admins.

FeloniousMonk's scathing indictment of Moulton, which he and User:Filll cite in three administrative proceedings: RfAr/C68-FM-SV, RfAr#Moulton, and RfC/ID#Questions.

Filll's non-article space biographical sketch of me (referenced in WP:AN/Moulton)

IDCab's Spammish Inquisition of a year ago which Sam Korn (and others) found to be a sham.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg, Jimmy.
But as I closed out that thread in my mailbox and went back to look at other accumulating messages, I found this one, with a different subject line:
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2008 15:34:58 +0800
From: Jimmy Wales
Subject: Here is what "speak to you privately" does not mean.

It does not mean bcc'ing other people, Barry.

Come on now, I am being straight with you here. Don't be rude to me in return.

--Jimbo

So I wrote him back:
I don't understand what your issue is here, or why you are calling me "rude".
To which he replied:
You sent at least one other person on our correspondence. I know this because they sent a copy to me.
To which I responded:
Ah, that must have been my counsel, taking independent initiative.

With respect to the "privacy request" in your initial ouverture, I simply ignored that request as inappropriate and made you a counter-offer, inviting you to simply contact me at your convenience, by phone, Skype, chat, or e-mail. Surely a man of your stature and experience (as Emeritus Chair of WMF) would not expect anyone to enter into delicate (and potentially adversarial) discussions and negotiations without the benefit of counsel. Only a fool would do that, Jimbo. You have on the WMF payroll the most brilliant counsel in all of cyberspace, and I imagine you routinely avail yourself of that counsel. Surely you did not intend to deprive me of the right to comparably competent counsel from among those whom I consider to be comparably well-placed in the Wikisphere to wisely and intelligently reckon the subtleties of such delicate discussions and negotiations.

Would you prefer that my counsel negotiate directly with your counsel?

This morning, I found the following perplexing (and unsigned) missive:
I am not aware that Alison is your counsel. Stop being a jackass. This is not a legal negotiation, this is me asking you a favor.

Don't waste my time with bullshit or I will just personally block you at wikiversity and that will be that. At that point, I can assure you that your lawyer can talk to Mike Godwin if that's the way you want to play this.

Or, you can just knock off the bullshit.

And so we come to today's ethical conundrum.

The above message contains rude and abrasive language. But more importantly, it contains an anankastic conditional that is clearly a threat of dire consequences.

And that is where I am stuck, and seek guidance from ethicists who are more astute in these delicate (and sometimes adversarial) discussions and negotiations.

What is the ethical best practice for responding to Jimbo's last message?