CrowsNest wrote:The chuckleheads of Wikipediocracy baffle me, they really do. It is easy to show the theoretical basis of the defamation, and indeed to show real world harmful impact. It is even easier to show it all stems from the unreasonable and unfair actions of the WMF, regardless of what they might now wish to say in court to justify their actions.
Yeah. What I see at this point is that overconfidence led them to not be careful. First of all, I expected them to challenge the jurisdiction of the Massachusetts court. They didn't even try, and by not trying with their first responsive pleading, they accepted the jurisdiction which will accept the jurisdiction of Massachusetts law as to libel. The WMF attorney "informed" me that the law was open and shut, a true statement cannot be libel and therefore I should go soak my head. Except he was polite, of course. These are real attorneys, and we both knew Christopher Lomax, a Jones Day attorney who was very helpful to me in Rossi v. Darden in Florida (a real cold fusion lawsuit!)
I suggested that the whole thing might be easily settled if the WMF would re-examine the claims behind the ban. His response to that was "What if they come up with the same conclusion?" I'm pretty sure he took that back to the WMF for their review, and they decided to stand on the technicality that they don't need no effing excuse to do whatever they please. They can. If it is not defamatory!
And in Massachusetts, libel law specifically allows claims for defamation through true statements, if malice is found. That's actually the old common law rule, only different in the U.S. because of the constitutional protection of free speech. Further, the troll EtherMan on Reddit, thoroughly contemptuous, nevertheless acknowledged that the "truth" of a statement includes what it might imply. And a WMF global ban implies, to many, a Really Bad Person.
So the legal issue here is not the ban -- I agree that they have, must have, the legal right to decide on a ban, and to implement it without notice, but the *publication* of the ban, which is not necessary. They use the clunky global lock tool because it is *slightly* easier, but it creates logs and records easily access by the public. Instead, they could ban in a different way, in an emergency, by changing the user's password, which anyone with database access can do. This would accomplish exactly the same as a global lock except for two things: no log, and the user's incoming email would not be disabled. Which was the most intrusive effect of the global ban process. It actually was not accomplished by the lock tool, so they must be manipulating the database anyway.
To challenge the WMF for a Bad Ban is much more difficult. However, as my case shows (see the draft Amended Complaint), the existing process, with no appeal, is ripe for abuse, a disaster waiting to happen. And it happened.
The WMF's legal position is they want to ban people for any reason they like, including no reason at all, not give anyone that reason, and then pretend there can be no harmful consequences from there being a public list of who is banned and the possible reasons it could have occurred, all highly damaging if true.
What attorney advised them to create that list, that Wall of Shame?
I'll be disappointed, to be sure, if all they do is to stop publishing banned users and scrub the logs. Rather, what I'd hope for is that they establish an appeal process, that is actually neutral. It could protect the privacy of complainants. It might actually protect complainants better than the existing system. After all, I know the identity of five of the probable six complainants, and the ban simply intensified my effort to uncover the truth of what had happened (impersonation socking to defame and private manipulation of wiki process). I had not actually outed anyone, but in the process of the research, I did out the Smith brothers. (the alleged doxxing of Joshua P. Schroeder is more complex, but that was far from what the WMF declares is cause for ban, and if there was harm to JPS -- highly questionable -- it would be because the Smiths archived the outing and noised it about, when it had been obscure and removable, and I did remove it from my blog and convinced admins on that web site to take it down. And then JPS claimed I harassed him!
Abd's case is clear, the WMF's unreasonablenss, their sheer lack of duty of care for him as a publicly identifiable person they entered into a legal contract with, as well as the people they claim these bans protect, has meant his life has become a living hell of endless harassment from anonymous trolls aided and abetted by impersonators, all posting stuff he has absolutely no legal recourse against if it is the Court's position that the WMF are not obliged to help him in any way to prevent people making allegations and suggestions that can be made to appear at least plausible by combining elements of their established ban policy, their public record of this ban, and the publicly accessible breadcrumbs of prior dispute resolution efforts that are scattered all around their site. That they now seek to dismiss this by falling back on an idea he could have been banned for no reason at all, and the damage is non-existent, not only reinforces their lack of care, it bolsters the case they are cowardly shitbirds of the highest order.
More or less, even if a bit colorful.
As to "living hell," the road to the Garden passes through the Fire. My training is to have peace of mind and power regardless of conditions. Nevertheless, people in my life have been harmed, and it has occupied many, many hours, getting to the bottom of this. Several thousand, probably.
They should have settled. There is no way they come out of this without either a hugely damaging public revelation of their true nature, or being forced to change the way they operate in ways they probably already know is just going to give them even more headaches because of who they are and what they do.
I really thought they might settle. The lawsuit as filed was a device to get their effing attention. They ignored an email, they ignored a certified letter to the registered agent, so, what would any lawyer tell you to expect if you do that with someone who believes they have been harmed by you? They relied, I suspect, on the idea that the people they ban could not possibly afford to sue them, or would, if filing pro se, do it incompetently, as has happened. However, they would be required to respond to a filing, even if incompetent, or face a default judgment.
I'm blazing a trail here. I can predict with high confidence that they will change their policies, because those policies leave them wide open to action. At least in Massachusetts, and probably in Florida, and Noonan v. Staples raised a lot of concern that exceptions to the veracity defense may exist.
I think this one is obvious: If I secretly decide to ban user X, while assuring the public that I only ban users when it is absolutely necessary, because they are very dangerous. I ban user X and publish the fact. The fact is true.
But what it implies is false and defamatory, and malicious. So I'm still liable.
To determine if it is malicious not, if reasonably alleged, requires a trial. That was what was found and ruled in Noonan v. Staples. It is possible that exceptions will be found elsewhere, it could be argued. To find out actually costs only $400 and a little time. Stonewalling, their policy, creates motivation. When one considers how much work many put into editing the wikis, $400 is peanuts.
(And a kind soul has already sent me half of that amount, and I have not yet created a GoFundMe.)
The WOdiots have no idea what real action in the real world looks like. They sit around stewing in their own self-satisfied opinions, complaining about Wikipedia and everyone else. It only takes a handful of people to transform society, actually. Used to be my saying:
Lift a finger, change the world. But most people won't lift a finger.Why not? Mostly despair, belief that "they won't let us," "I tried and failed when I was young, it can't work" and other stories. Blaming Bad People instead of something missing in structure, that could be supplied. We have a culture that avoids personal responsibility. And wikis, as structured, mostly, created an irresponsible community, by not only using anonymous editing, but *anonymous administration.* In theory, the WMf could have been the adult supervision, but never set up structure for it, only this weird star chamber ban process.
A draft, still incomplete, of my Amended Complaint is here:
http://coldfusioncommunity.net/w/index.php/User:Abd/Lomax_v._WikiMedia_Foundation/Draft_Amended_ComplaintI am doing something new here, crowdsourcing legal counsel. So far, I have learned a great deal from being criticized by idiots -- and from comments by the knowledgeable. I will be consulting an attorney before I file the Amended Complaint, and if the attorney advises me to STFU, I'lll consider it. I'm responsible for the choices I make, no matter who advised me.