Wikipedia:BLP examples for discussion: Difference between revisions

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This page provides '''examples''' of situations in which editors must apply our policy governing '''[[Wikipedia:biographies of living persons|biographies of living persons]]'''. It is intended both to spark on-wiki discussion, and also as a resource for discussion at meet-ups and the like.

A panel and audience-participation discussion of these examples will taketook place at [[Wikipedia:Meetup/NYC/Wiki-Conference|Wikiconference New York 2010]] on August 28 or 29, 2010. Other meet-ups are welcome to use them as well.

== Background ==

Over the course of the past severalfew years, conscientious Wikipedians have developed and made increased efforts to enforce our policy on [[WP:BLP|biographies of living persons]]. Without seeking to recapitulate the substantial amount that has been written on this subject, theThis policy attempts to addressis theespecially factimportant thatbecause as Wikipedia pages have become ever more readily accessibleprominent in Internet searches, what we write about living individuals may have real impact on their lives.

One main thrust of the BLP policy is that in order to avoid the misuse of Wikipedia to spread false or defamatory information about living persons, all negative or contentious assertions regarding a living person must be well-supported by citations to reliable sources. FewAlmost peopleall ofeditors goodnow faithagree questionon the appropriatenessneed offor this requirement, although its interpretation can lead to dispute in individual cases.

However, according to some interpretations, the BLP policy and the philosphyphilosophy behind it extends well beyond merely avoiding the inclusion of defamatory or unsourced negative material, as important as that of course is. Rather, itmany haseditors been repeatedly arguedurge that norms and appropriate behavior sometimes call for the exclusion ofexcluding information from Wikipedia even where the information is undisputedly true, and even if it might otherwise be considered notable under our usual notability guidelines.

ItEditors iswill inevitable that Wikipedia editors willinevitably continue to debate how we apply BLP norms in these types of situationsituations. Part of the background to this debate is the fact that Wikipedia's conduct and guidelines on these issues cannot be evaluated in the abstract, separate from the information propoundedfound on the rest of the Internet. The author of this page ([[User:Newyorkbrad|Newyorkbrad]]) has discussed some of these issues at greater length, both on-wiki (starting [[Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Doc glasgow#Outside view by Newyorkbrad|here]] and [[Wikipedia:Requests for comment/QZ Deletion dispute#Outside view by Newyorkbrad|here]]), in off-wiki writings such as [http://volokh.com/posts/1242270923.shtml this post] and [http://volokh.com/posts/1242179591.shtml this post] on [[The Volokh Conspiracy]], and in [http://www.archive.org/details/nywikiconf_newyorkbrad_26july2009 my speech at Wikiconference New York 2009].

This page provides some examples of the types of more nuanced BLP problems that arise. There are no clear-cut right and wrong answers to these scenarios. Often the right way to handle these situations is not clear, because the right way for the Internet and the Press and Society as a whole to handle these situations is not clear either. The hypotheticals are designed for discussion either on-wiki and also as an aide to discussion of the problem at meet-ups where there is a session scheduled on BLP issues.

Each of these examples has been inspired by one or more specific real-world examples, but the purpose of this page is to allow discussion in the abstract, without fear that in discussing the examples we are disseminating questionable information regarding the people involved in the issues, and without inviting lobbying by partisans in the underlying dispute that inspired the examples. Most BLP discussions on-wiki are either highly abstract and difficult to channel into practical decision-making, on the one hand, or highly focused on a pending dispute about a particular article, on the other. These examples are intended to be somewhere in between.

Comments on these examples are welcome on the talkpage.

All manner of comments on these examples are welcome on the talkpage. I'll weigh in with my own thoughts, if there are any that don't get expressed in the discussions, in a couple of weeks. I may also add more examples in days and weeks to come.

== Sample problems ==

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Soon after the group fired the manager, their next album included a song attacking him. The song claims unsubtly that the manager is a crook and suggests among other things that he deserves to be imprisoned or even to die. Litigation between the group and the manager, including a defamation claim based on the song, ends inconclusively. There is no dispute that the song was intended to refer specifically to him. Any number of fan and other sites report without contradiction that the song was written as an angry attack on the manager's honesty and ethics.

The group is well-known and is mentioned in dozens of articles on Wikipedia. The song and the album are hits and also easily satisfy our notability guidelines for pop music articles. The business manager is reasonably well- known in Hollywood but would never have risen to the level of being mentioned on Wikipedia were it not for this song.

What, if anything, should Wikipedia report about this matter?

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=== Example 5: The Silly Video and the Internet Meme ===

One day a kid wanting to have some fun throws on an outfit from a favorite science fiction movie and carries on in a silly way for a few minutes, mimicking one of the characters. Someone films him doing this and posts the video to a site like YoutubeYouTube. In the unpredictable way that happens sometimes, the video becomes a wildly popular "Internet meme," spreading "virally" from one person to another. Within weeks, the video has hundreds of thousands of hits, and the kid's real name is plastered everywhere online, certainly to the point that the video or the incident has arguably become "notable." Of course, the boy had given no thought to the possibility this would happen—perhaps he did not even know a camera was running—and the absurd publicity given to a random moment of silliness is damaging his life.

What, if anything, should Wikipedia report about this matter? Should an effort be made to avoid mentioning the boy's name, even if it is widely known elsewhere?