Wikipedia talk:Privacy

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[edit] w00t

Well done. Matt Yeager ♫ (Talk?) 22:47, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Alternative proposal

quoted from Wikipedia talk:Protecting children's privacy

I like the alternative proposal a lot. It gets the point across without resorting to moral panic and without demeaning minors by insisting they are all helpless and naive. Ironically, senior citizens are more often victimized by breaches of their privacy than children. Why should we only be worried about children? Kaldari 06:37, 5 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree. Crum375 15:17, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
It doesn't need to be any more than an essay, does it? It's much better than "We're going to tell you what you may or may not do, and if you don't listen, we're going to block you, but it's for your safety!", of course. -Amarkov blahedits 15:19, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
Yes, as I noted a long time ago elsewhere here, all we need is a general cautionary note to users about safe surfing and WP use habits. It should apply to all users - a computer-phobic grandma could be even more gullible (and vulnerable) than a smarty-pants 13 year old. Crum375 23:12, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
Of course it doesn't need to be anything, but actually it might help to make it a guideline in this case. I see little reason why not to - all it needs is to be actionable and consensual. It is obviouisly actionable since it tells people what not to do; it appears consensual to me because I haven't seen anyone disagreeing with that. Of course, some people state it is insufficient and that more and more stringent rules are needed. Maybe they are, but this can at least be a starting point. (Radiant) 11:37, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
end quote
Well, in terms of stringency, I think the urge more editors have (I know I do) is for individuals who do this to acknowledge the dangers. Maybe this is too weird, but could there be an aspect of this where, if challenged by another editor about the personal info posting, the editor who did it would have to somehow assert that they understood they dangers? I'm thinking by doing something a bit tricky -- substing a template asserting that onto their userpage or something, thereby demonstrating a)they know some people consider it foolish b)they are at least marginally computer-literate and therefore somewhat more likely to really understand the dangers? I mean, obligating people to jump through a few small technical hoops in order to post personal info on their userpage is a little mean, but it sort of addresses the problem. This is not a fully fleshed out idea however, so its possible I missed something. Dina 14:30, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Some issues

This seems well intentioned, but I think it has some issues that ought to be addressed:

  • The part about obscene phone calls and police reports is certainly WP:BEANS.
  • The part about being "advised" doesn't say who is doing the advising.
  • The final paragraph is more stern than actual arbitration committee decisions. Speculating on the true identity of sockpuppets may be thought of as posting personal information, but has it "usually led to permanent blocks"? Some links to block logs would be appropriate here.

CMummert 13:27, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

  • I'll think about this. In the meantime, you are of course welcome to edit the page to improve it. (Radiant) 13:40, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removal of personal information

Does a policy exist about other editor's removing personal information that is posted? I generally remove email addies and phone numbers from speedy candidates while tagging them, and I certainly remove them from articles, because they simply don't belong there. I have been tempted from time to time to remove overly personal info from the userpages of people who seem "naive", but have restrained myself to suggesting on their talk pages that they do it themselves. It's common practice to remove contact info from posts on the various help and reference desks. However, informed individuals do sometimes make the choice to make some of their information public and they should be allowed to do that. Perhaps the policy (or some kind of boilerplate talk page warning to go along with it) could include whatever data is available about how many people read wikipedia, something like this:

  • You have recently posted personal contact information about yourself on Wikipedia. I wanted to inform you that while this is not against policy the best estimate is that XX,000 people consult Wikipedia daily and every page has the potential to be viewed by XX# of strangers. This is more visitors than the average public bathroom has in a year. Please don't post information here that you would not write on a bathroom wall. If you wish this information to be expunged, consult WP:PRIVACY. Cheers. Dina 14:18, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
it could have a cute little graphic of a bathroom wall with "for a good time call..." scrawled on it (I am getting ahead of myself I know) Dina 14:23, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Guideline?

Why? It's perfectly fine as an essay, and having it be a guideline only encourages people who to remove all personal information posted, and tell people they aren't allowed to put it in, "per WP:PRIVACY". -Amarkov blahedits 23:21, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] This is too strong

Although it is your own responsibility, you are advised not to list personal details such as contact information on your user space, or to discuss them over the various contact channels, including IRC.

I don't think we should advise people not to share personal information. I think that is too strong of a position to take. —Doug Bell talk 00:42, 11 December 2006 (UTC)

I'd prefer it stronger, actually. We shouldn't make it an absolute "you may not", but unless you have a good reason to, you really should not post personal information. -Amarkov blahedits 02:17, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Note that a stronger version of this page is proposed as either policy or guideline at WP:CHILD. (Radiant) 14:45, 11 December 2006 (UTC)
I know, and that one is too strong. I'm going to complain about warring proposals now.
DISCUSS IT ON ONE PAGE! -Amarkov blahedits 02:45, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I tend to agree, and it would be preferable to merge the two, but I'm at a loss as to how to do that without upsetting involved people. (Radiant) 09:30, 15 December 2006 (UTC)
    • WP:CHILD should just go, this guideline here compliments WP:HA and how to avoid harassment. However IMHO the question "why should I not release personal info" isn't answered on the page yet. --Cat out 13:06, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] New merge tags

I see that merge tags have been placed on WP:YOUTH, WP:CHILD and WP:PRIV, but there is no indication in the tags of the direction that the merges would run or what information, if any, would be deleted from any of the pages, or on whether the resulting page(s) would end up being tagged as guideline, essay, policy, etc. Additionally, the "discuss" links all point back to the talk page for that page, which would potentially result in a discussion of the proposed merge (or merges) in three different places. Can we have a discussion in one location? (For now I am putting this comment on all three pages, but if a single page is designated for discussion and the links in the tags are changed, I wouldn't mind this comment being removed from the other pages.) And can we have some details of what exactly is being proposed? Once we have that settled, I will have some comments and possibly counter-proposals. I do think that, at the very least, some material should be added to WP:PRIV that is currently on one or both of the other two pages. 6SJ7 19:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Yipes, whatever. Anyway, I support this guideline, with some minor revisions that others have suggested. YechielMan 08:21, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Not a guideline

I dispute that this has project-wide consensus. If proponents feel that it does, they should advertise it (again) at the village pump and RFC/Policy. The fact that it was tagged historical for two weeks means nobody was expecting to have to comment on it.

Since I removed the guideline tag, i should give some specific objections. Here goes:

  • There is virtually no content; the entire page here could be a single paragraph in WP:USER. Avoid instruction creep and policy creep.
  • There is no need to tell adult editors what is good for them.

There are also minor problems with the organization and phrasing that I will not go into. CMummert · talk 12:19, 8 March 2007 (UTC)

I have requested comments on the status of this page at Wikipedia:Village pump (policy). CMummert · talk 01:56, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

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