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Now there's a banner I never thought I'd see my name under: The New York Times!
I wrote for the New York Times yesterday. Not making this up:
Where Are the Women in Wikipedia?: Trolls and Other Nuisances
Okay, so it's "just" their online opinion page, but I was still pretty stunned to be contacted by an actual NYT editor looking for a comment on the wikipedia numbers. I was expecting she'd take some little quote out of what I said, but instead she nicely edited down my piece and there I am, voicing my opinion right under Jane Margolis' statement! (She's the person who wrote "Unlocking the Clubhouse") So Darned Cool.
Where Are the Women in Wikipedia?: Trolls and Other Nuisances
Okay, so it's "just" their online opinion page, but I was still pretty stunned to be contacted by an actual NYT editor looking for a comment on the wikipedia numbers. I was expecting she'd take some little quote out of what I said, but instead she nicely edited down my piece and there I am, voicing my opinion right under Jane Margolis' statement! (She's the person who wrote "Unlocking the Clubhouse") So Darned Cool.
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If there's one thing I'd disagree with you about---and it really is a "nitpick"---it's your use of the word "trolling". As you know, I self-identify as one sometimes. The word used to mean something different and a lot narrower when I decided I was one: it was merely someone who deliberately created conflict on USENET, as I recall. And, IMO, that provided a useful function.
So I get that there are websites that do not want to be confined to discussing first principles over and over again. I have participated in these and agreed with the policy, up to a point. But in a lot of the internet, particularly blogs, they have accidentally and in some cases deliberately conflated the two ideas of trolling and harrassing behaviour. This has turned much of the blogosphere into what I call tall opinion silos, and I think this actually covers some of the pathologies of Wikipedia---which for similar reasons as the site to which you linked, I stopped contributing after a brief stint quite a long time ago.
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Now THAT is trolling :)
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One could more strictly term that example as derailment, but trolling seemed the best term to cover that sort of thing that might be individually harmless, but collectively adds up to something very close to harassment through repetition.
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So, I dislike false nuance, but this issue is one of those cases where it's a fine balance, I guess. We've discovered that public nature of the Internet has created a paradoxical conflict between inclusiveness and openness, rather than one contributing to the other. I know I'm saying this from a position of supreme and opprobrious privilege (in some dimensions at least), but I guess in cases of conflict I would tend---not universally---to support the latter rather than the former. I reserve some distaste for models of safety such as that practiced by, e.g., Shakesville, where certain discussions are off the table no matter what as a matter not only of community coherence but abstract principle...
The biggest problem for me---at least I think it is a problem---is that there are comparatively few spaces left on the Internet where people of diametrically opposing viewpoints argue respectfully or even disrespectfully at anything more than an introductory or juvenile level. Didn't used to be the case.
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or
EVERYONE is wrong on the Internet!
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