On Thu, Mar 2, 2017 at 12:26 PM, Stuart Prior <stuart.pr...@wikimedia.org.uk> wrote:
> As an example, anthropogenic climate change is a politically sensitive > issue, but how can a consensus-driven movement not take into account that > 97% of climate scientists acknowledge its existence > ? > [1] <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change> > Accepting a scientific consensus just isn’t a political position. It isn't, but I think it's still worth thinking about context and presentation. There are organizations whose job it is to directly communicate facts, both journalistic orgs like ProPublica and fact-checkers like Snopes/Politifact. In contrast, WMF's job is to enable many communities to collect and develop educational content. If the scientific consensus on climate change suddenly starts to shift, we expect our projects to reflect that, and we expect that the organization doesn't get involved in those community processes to promote a specific outcome. The more WMF directly communicates facts about the world (especially politicized ones), rather than communicating _about_ facts, the more people (editors and readers alike) may question whether the organization is appropriately conservative about its own role. I haven't done an extensive survey, but I suspect all the major Wikipedia languages largely agree in their presentation on climate change. If so, that is itself a notable fact, given the amount of politicization of the topic. Many readers/donors may be curious how such agreement comes about in the absence of top-down editorial control. Speaking about the remarkable process by which Wikipedia tackles contentious topics may be a less potentially divisive way for WMF to speak about what's happening in the real world. I do think stories like the refugee phrasebook and Andreas' arctic photography are amazing and worth telling. I'm curious whether folks like Risker, George, Pine, Chris, and others who've expressed concern about the report agree with that. If so, how would you tell those stories in the context of, e.g., an Annual Report? Erik _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
