Wales on GamerGate

Wales's GamerGate comments receive criticism, praise

Jimmy Wales

Digital Spy and The Mary Sue reported on recent comments by Jimmy Wales regarding the GamerGate controversy in the video game world.

Digital Spy reports that "GamerGate is a movement claiming to be fighting for ethical coverage of video games [in the media], but that has been accused of supporting harassment of women within the industry." Editing the GamerGate article on Wikipedia has been a controversial and contentious exercise, culminating in a currently open Arbitration case involving numerous editors on both sides of the issue as well as a number of administrators, including this author. A source of discontent with Wikipedia has been r/KotakuInAction, a Reddit forum populated by those who identify with the GamerGate movement, including a number of editors active on the Wikipedia article. On December 18, a Reddit user posted a complaint he emailed to Wales and Wales' response. Wales verified that the emails were authentic.

In the email, the user told Wales he would refuse to donate to Wikipedia's fundraising efforts because of his displeasure with the current state of the Wikipedia article on GamerGate, a frequent complaint on KotakuInAction and other online GamerGate forums. The user also complained about the December 13 deletion of a page on the Wikia that is devoted to GamerGate. (Like Wikipedia, Wikia was co-founded by Wales.) That Wikia page listed a number of Wikipedia editors and administrators, including this author, as "hostile users".

The user wrote:

“

Here's the problem: Wikipedia's complete lack of any sort of attempt at neutrality regarding Gamergate is giving me serious ethical qualms about [donating to Wikipedia]. I don't want to financially support an organization that claims to be a neutral, impartial source of information on all things that then goes on to try to push an agenda and spin a narrative of an author's choosing. And then after the deletion of the Wikia page documenting editor abuse and corruption, I CERTAINLY don't feel comfortable giving money when the founder of the site publicly condones such actions.

”

Wales replied:

“

...Wikipedia is not for sale, not to any donors, so even if donations were dropping, that would not mean to me that we should compromise on our principles of quality and neutrality in response to a pressure group.

My point here is not to say that there is nothing wrong with the article - I actually think it needs a fair amount of work. But I want you and others to understand that threatening people is not helpful.

I've recently seen web pages in which people who are - and I don't know how else to put it - vicious assholes - are gathering data to attack the personal lives of volunteers. It is very difficult for me to buy into the notion that gamergate is "really about ethics in journalism" when every single experience I have personally had with it involved pro-gg people insulting, threatening, doxxing, etc.

”

Wales continued his responses to complaints about these issues on Twitter, replying to one GamerGate supporter and Wikipedia editor that the deleted Wikia page "was a long hitlist of editors. Much nastiness. Exactly the kind of viciousness that [GamerGate] is famous for."

While Wales was criticized by GamerGate supporters, The Mary Sue praised Wales' response, writing that he was "handling it admirably".

In brief

Viva la información: The Guardian discusses (December 23) how Cubans are circumventing the widespread lack of Internet access in their country. Those with reliable high-speed access sell and distribute information on hard drives for offline usage. Wikipedia in particular is usually downloaded in packets of 2–5 gigabytes that people keep on their phones for offline usage.

Charity begins on phones: CNBC discusses (December 20) the difficulties millennials have donating to charities using popular technological means such as Twitter or mobile devices and talks with one MIT student who found it easier to buy a vacuum on his phone than to donate to Wikipedia.

Amazon art identification: Mashable reports on a December 19 update to the Fire Phone's Firefly tool. Firefly now uses Wikipedia to identify over 2000 famous works of art.

Iranian Wikipedia conference: The Iran Book News Agency discusses a December 18 conference regarding Wikipedia at the Hosseiniyeh Ershad in Tehran, Iran.

"We'll meet again": Jimmy Wales was one of many celebrities to appear on the December 18 finale of The Colbert Report. Pictures are available at Talking Points Memo.

← Previous "In the media"

Next "In the media" →

In this issue

24 December 2014 (all comments)

From the editor

In the media

Discuss this story

These comments are automatically transcluded from this article's talk page. To follow comments, add the page to your watchlist. If your comment has not appeared here, you can try purging the cache.

Man the GamerGate article is just one big powder keg, isn't it? GamerPro64 04:00, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

"numerous editors on both sides of the issue as well as a number of administrators," "Wikipedia editors and administrators" -- and here I thought administrators were editors. NE Ent 12:01, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

I was trying to distinguish between editors involved in the content dispute and uninvolved administrators like myself trying to herd the cats. Gamaliel (talk) 15:39, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

What is the Mary Sue? Simply south ...... sitting on fans for just 8 years 15:16, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Simply south: The Mary Sue (formerly known as Geekosystem) is a site that talks about comics, movies, and other pop culture stuff. Supernerd11 _{Firemind ^_^ Pokedex} 01:00, 29 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

One of the biggest criticisms of Wikipedia that I hear is that a disproportionate amount of its coverage is video games and pop culture in general, while history and literature get thin coverage. -- Ssilvers (talk) 15:49, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

But the literature of video game journalism ethics is no doubt the pinnacle of human achievement.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 16:46, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

It's worse than that. The word "ethics" should never be used in relation to video games, since 99% have no conception of it. From the FPS article: "In the 21st century, the first-person shooter is the most commercially viable video game genre, as well as being the genre that has taken more market share of any other genre in the gaming industry." Ethics? Please, that word has no meaning in this context and anyone who uses it can't be taken seriously. That's why "gamergate" is a joke. Viriditas (talk) 03:30, 30 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

How can a phone hold that much data?— Vchimpanzee • talk • contributions • 20:38, 25 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
really, really easily. Ironholds (talk) 17:53, 26 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This is not very much data today(!). Flash_memory#Capacity, Flash_memory#Flash_scalability. 87.78.175.233 (talk) 16:15, 27 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

The "In Brief" report on Amazon's art identification misidentifies the device that has this capability. It is the Fire Phone, not the Kindle Fire tablet. The photo is also incorrect. Thanks, GabrielF (talk) 02:15, 28 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Facepalm Oh, crap. How many devices does Amazon have? Wow, I really dropped the ball there. Thank you for the correction. Gamaliel (talk) 21:30, 28 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

White, upper middle class people problems. Another manufactured controversy about nothing. Anyone involved in the absurdity known as "gamergate" should find something better to do with their time, like trying to make the world a better place. Viriditas (talk) 03:23, 30 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]
The initial "controversy"? Sure. The death threats and similar chilling creepiness is, however, a genuine problem. Ironholds (talk) 07:12, 30 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]