Usuário:Teles/Mensagem para PB
Hi, Philippe!
How are you? Hope you are doing well.
I would like to have your guidance on how to deal with a legal situation involving Portuguese Wikipedia. An OTRS mail about it was forwarded to legal@wikimedia so you may be aware of it. Here is the ticket anyway [1]. There is a note on that ticket in English, with a summary of first actions taken by the volunteer.
My questions involve the way that OTRS volunteers, community of editors and staff can work together; what actions each one of them are allowed to perform on dealing with cases like this. The OTRS voluteer said he don't want to talk about it and if I have other questions I should bring it to legal staff.
On the request to the community [2], the OTRS volunteer informed the community that the article should be immediately deleted and that that was an office action. That didn't appear to be an office action and then I politely started my questions on the procedure he was asking us to do. I didn't undelete the article, though I think an input from a staff would be better than a request from a volunteer.
On Meta page "Legal and Community Advocacy", it says that community participates on this process, including OTRS, unless there is a need for an input from staff.
So, I ask:
1. Is OTRS able to request deletion with no community input? 2. Is the volunteer correct when he asks deletion then notify WMF? 3. What is the role of community in cases like this?
You don't have to answer exactly those questions; they were wrote so my concerns are exposed. Tell me what can I bring to community or if you want to keep some information in private or even if you can not tell me something.
Sorry for this long mail. I really need to understand how that works, as I don't want to do any harm here. Your help is much appreciated, Phillipe.
Thank you in advance.
[2] - https://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikip%C3%A9dia:Pedidos/Outros#Elimina.C3.A7.C3.A3o_UrgenteHi Teles - this note is to acknowledge receipt. I will probably be able to take a look at this still tonight but if not it may be tomorrow. If it's more urgent than that, let me know by return mail.
Good to hear from you.
pbHi Teles, I had a bit of time to take a look.
First, I'll say that OTRS agents have a hard job, and when legal@ is backed up (as it is now, since we're in the middle of a staff changeover), it's harder still, because the agents have to handle things on their own with little guidance. That said, I frankly have an issue with the use of WP:Office in this instance. I'll be addressing that through training with the OTRS admins. I've put direct answers to your questions below.
Thanks, pb
So, I ask:
1. Is OTRS able to request deletion with no community input?
OTRS volunteers are highly trusted and frequently have to do things outside of the norm. However, with that said, they are specifically told that OTRS is not a route around normal community procedure. I won't say that they would never do this, but it would be highly unusual. This is one of the rare cases where I could defend that action, however.
2. Is the volunteer correct when he asks deletion then notify WMF?
Given that he's attempting to keep the WMF in compliance with what he believes to be a valid court order (I have no opinion as to whether it is or not - that's the domain of the legal team), I think his actions are defensible, although I would prefer that it happen the other way round.
3. What is the role of community in cases like this?
The same as always: to create, edit, and curate content. The community should feel free to vigorously question, to debate, and to curate.
You don't have to answer exactly those questions; they were wrote so my concerns are exposed. Tell me what can I bring to community or if you want to keep some information in private or even if you can not tell me something.
For simplicity sake, everything within this email may be shared if you wish. I would prefer that it not be positioned as me being unhappy with the work of the OTRS agent: I'm not. I don't wish to undermine him. I do wish that this ticket had been handled differently, however, and I've asked the OTRS admins to take a look.
I can't tell you how much I appreciate OTRS agents and the hard work they do: I also appreciate the community for challenging, questioning, and holding us true to our values.
Sorry for this long mail. I really need to understand how that works, as I don't want to do any harm here. Your help is much appreciated, Phillipe.
Anytime, my friend.
I am very satisfied with your answer, Phillipe.
I am thinking on the best way to take this to community. I don't want to give the impression that I want to discredit the OTRS volunteer's work. In fact, I can see that he was correct in most of his actions and with the best intention. I was thinking on creating a link on a subpage pasting this conversation if that is ok with you. Maybe I shouldn't have started that conversation by mail, but publicly on wiki. However, I thought I should remain private to avoid any problem.
The best thing I think we could do is set some kind of guiding to both community and OTRS on what would be the best way to deal with cases like this. I know that there will be exceptions no matter how good this guide can be, but could work as a starter for these procedures. This knowledge is not so difficult to understand, but there is nothing written on Portuguese Wikipedia, so people don't know what to do.
You were very helpful, Phillipe. I am glad we got to talk.
Take care.