NOTE: You will have heard by now that Recap is a Staff team whose primary responsibility is to log and report the ongoing events within the main Staffchat of the -EN branch of the SCP Wiki. The recaps all go through a process of review; first to AdCap, then to General Staff. Now you get them! Hopefully, we are performing our job adequately; we strive to make the recaps a balance of comprehensive and concise, without making them difficult to navigate. If you have an issue with any of the recaps put out this month, would like some more detail, have a question about the recap process, or have any feedback, don’t hesitate to comment below.
NOTE 2: A recap of the events surrounding this thread is forthcoming, however it remains a sensitive matter at the end of December. When a full statement is provided, a recap of the discussion in staffchat will be appended to this post.
Table of Contents
Topic: ROUNDERHOUSE Leave of Absence | 11/30/2021 - 12/01/2021
Recap: ROUNDERHOUSE announces that he is taking a leave of absence from staff "until christmas at the earliest." He is wished well. Athenodora realizes that it is now December, and asks if it's time to break out the holiday user nicknames. HarryBlank replies:
You mean dusting off our
old
saint
nicks
which is clearly hilarious. LadyKatie sprays him with water, but he announces that "The recap will take my side."
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Topic: Official TikTok | 2021/12/02
Summary: There's an official TikTok. Staff are old.
Recap: Yossipossi announces that the Internet Outreach Team "is now in the process of launching an Official TikTok account." stormbreath pogs out. Elunerazim recommends that several SCP TikTokkers be approached about plugging it; Yossi confirms that most of the suggested individuals are already on board, and he will consult the remainder. CityToast has been practicing his "TikTok lingo," explaining that he is now a "pogchamp." He then "fortnite dances." JacobConwell is nonplussed: "I can't believe I was "How do you do, fellow kids" by esteemed Wiki author and staff member MetropolitanCookedBread."
This conversation took place sporadically over ten hours.
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Topic: Disciplinary Process Exception Update | 2021/12/04
Recap: OptimisticLucio asks whether the DrEverettMann/Dexanote disciplinary process has any updates. aismallard notes that TheDeadlyMoose is busy but should be "able to finish drafting today and post tomorrow."
This conversation took place over three minutes.
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Topic: Tag Purview | 2021/12/04
Summary: Why are tags managed by two teams? Because it's easier.
Recap: Hexick ports a question from the Maintenance and Ancillary Staff Team (MAST) Discord: why is tag creation under the purview of the Tech Team, and not the Tagging Team? stormbreath responds: as "Tags are a thing of technical infrastructure on the site" and "we don’t have the manpower on Tech to do the daily and constant load of tagging," they are created by Tech but managed by a separate team. He further clarifies: "we only outsourced the workload and nothing else." DrBleep, as a MAST Captain, doesn't "want to have to deal with the approval of new tags and the whole tag rework." Both believe this arrangement is sensible and desirable. aismallard explains from a different angle: "Tech does a lot of technical policy. So reviewing what tags exist, adding or removing them, maintaining the CSS and content policies, investigating issues with Wikidot, etc. MAST does a lot of maintenance work. So deletions, applying tags to new articles, etc."
This conversation took place over two hours.
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Topic: Adult Splash Pages | 2021/12/06-2021/12/07
Summary: Staff discuss who is responsible for Adult Splash Pages and author notification.
Recap: Vivarium would like stormbreath to explain to a user in the SCP Declassified Discord's meta-scp-discussion channel why their SCP was given an adult splash page. stormbreath did not "make the call," and cannot speak to it. Vivarium did not make the call either, but is now fielding the question since he was the one to implement the page. stormbreath does not wish to be involved in this topic. Limeyy states that it "doesn’t look like anyone made one particular call"; they offer to explain the conversation in question to the user tomorrow. stormbreath will be "raising the issue of adult pages during the adcap meeting tonight," and therefore suggests waiting until after that. Vivarium agrees. stormbreath notes that this topic is "something that nobody covers on staff," hence the topic's complexity. DrBleep doesn't think this needs to go to Admin and Captain chat, and makes the following statement: "MAST handled implementation of adult pages when they were first rolled out, I think this would be shared responsibility of AHT and MAST and to screen and implement the splash onto pages that are determined to need it." gee0765 thinks implementation seems squarely within MAST's remit. stormbreath agrees. Limeyy notes that this is not how the process presently works. gee agrees: "true right now people say pages need the adult splash and nobody does it." stormbreath notes that closing the Censors Team without replacing it is to blame for this problem. Bleep notes that the issue "fell through the cracks." stormbreath notes that users are quite properly concerned that there is presently "nobody to appeal to and no notification of why pages implemented," "as well as the recurrent issue we've seen in here with nobody making the splash pages." DrBleep asks if Vivarium agrees to coordinate with the Anti-Harassment Team for this purpose. Vivarium agrees. Limeyy is uncertain: "This seems like a weird issue to hand to aht just because of the the manpower." Bleep clarifies: "We're coordinating, not handing it."
Vivarium is mainly concerned that "an established system for this with oversight" is established. Bleep agrees that we need "solid policy so we have a clearcut system to follow." Vivarium asks Limeyy to inform meta-scp-discussion that the issue is being handled. Limeyy again agrees to do so tomorrow. GremlinGroup notes that the discussion on this topic in meta is perpetual, so informing them today would be preferable. Vivarium does not believe his presence in meta would help, as he was not involved in the process beyond adding the splash and would have trouble looking up the relevant information. GremlinGroup notes that the concerned user is very concerned. GremlinGroup makes suggestions for the new process: "a log on 05, a message to the author (perhaps with a recommendation to include a more specific content warning at the top of the article?), and a masterlist of all adult tags and reasoning (for the sake of consistency and precedence-checking)." stormfallen asks whether Tagging has "the manpower for that?" Vivarium feels it's important since this "does have a noticeable impact on an authors article." gee notes that these splash pages are only applied infrequently. GremlinGroup agrees: "Adult tags are rare and sensitive enough that care shoudl be taken. Manpower should not be a reason fro not enacting care in such a sensitive / important topic." He also stresses the need for a clear and accessible appeals process
The following day, Jerden states that "including the information about why the article has the adult splash page on the actual adult splash page seems like the best solution. It would be much easier than keeping a separate log of all adult pages and the reasoning for it, and would make the splash page actually useful to readers trying to avoid specific topics, and it would encourage authors to get involved in the process to suggest content warnings for staff to put onto the splash page. It definitely should be up to staff but there's no reason authors can't help." This would differentiate each adult splash pag, detracting from the impression that all adult articles are painted with one brush. OptimisticLucio feels that this is more of a trigger warning than an adult content warning, which is not the purpose of the splash; the splashes are merely there to signify Not Safe For Work content for several reasons, including legal ones. Jerden still feels nonspecificity is a problem, and Alexander suggests that "splash pages should double as content warnings." Lucio does not take issue, but notes that this would represent a change of approach from the original purpose of the splashes. Jerden thinks it would be a solid item for proposing on 05command. Lucio suggests contacting Tech Team to work in implementation; Jerden examines the splash pages and determines that adding a content warning would be simple.
This conversation took place over two days.
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Topic: Random Artpage Button | 2021/12/06
Recap: LemonBee suggests adding "a random artpage button to the random section on the sidebar," "assuming it's possible to make a random page based on two separate tags." Jerden muses: "I assume it works like listpages, and you can get that to select things based on one of two tags (list the tags without a + sign)." It doesn't go any further than that.
This discussion took place over eleven minutes.
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Topic: Licensing Request for Article Removal | 2021/12/07
Summary: Staff discuss whether the Licensing Team needs the power to have copyright-infringing articles summarily deleted, and the manner in which they have requested this.
Recap: stormfallen links an 05command thread created by Licensing Operational Staffmember CityToast (with Captain permission) wherein the Licensing Team is asking that an article which likely violates copyright law be removed by admin fiat and notes that the author is upset they were not consulted, as is the SCP Declassified Discord. FabledTiefling is appalled that this thread was created "without apparent pertinent information and without contacting the author involved in any way," as this is a violation of transparency which harms "a known and active member of the community with no strong history of intentional malicious behavior." They are also dissatisfied with the practice of promising future updates instead of "posting all pertinent information at once," as they feel that if the information isn't ready yet, "any action at all is premature." They note that they are not aware of all the details, but that the optics are bad and courtesy was not extended where it should have been. Siddartha Alonne and Pedagon agree, with the former thinking a warning should have been issued first and the latter finding the 05 post's tone unnecessarily "harsh and accusatory" in a manner potentially provoking anxiety. Fabled considers this a serious failure of communication connected to a pattern of previous mistakes. gee0765 was expecting "a new policy thread" for future actions, not a specific target; Licensing Captain LilyFlower states (having already stated as much before) that "there is going to be one tonight." gee thinks that should have come first, as "you're posting a deletion request using a policy which doesn't exist yet." Pedagon agrees that this timeline will appear problematic, "like we are changing things as a result of this one article." OptimisticLucio believes that the article has been "a problem since posting, but it's been pushed back for one reason or another until today." CityToast is unsympathetic: "The user posted copyright infringement in an an article, and explicitly claimed the content was their own." He notes that Lucio is correct, the Licensing Team has been discussing this since it was posted. He also notes that he "requested to be allowed to DM the user and ask them to take it down on September 24th, and was told to wait." Nevertheless, he states that the article "needs to be taken down, whether the user is informed or not."
Fabled feels blame is being shifted, which isn't the point — the lack of communication is. Pedagon tells CityToast that the infringement is not the issue, but the way the issue has been handled. Lucio agrees, though he feels "it's less lack of communication and rather lack of work" [emphasis in original]. CityToast says that "communication was not mishandled. It has not been, in my experience, staff policy to ask a user to take their article down if it is a blatant violation of site policy. The article would be taken down tha the user informed afterward." Fabled notes CityToast's statement that he was told to wait, and that the user resultantly learned of the issue via the unofficial SCP Declassified Discord server. "There was a plan to have communication, and that communication never occurred. Ergo, communication was mishandled." CityToast remains unsympathetic: "So the user is upset that they broke site rules, and were not told they are breaking site rules before staff initiated action to resolve it?" He notes that no disciplinary action is being taken, so far as he knows. Fabled notes that the user is not upset "that they broke site rules," but for the reasons already explained. Pedagon feels the approach is flawed: "If it can wait long enough to request an admin fiat on O5 then why can’t the author be informed as well?" He was also under the impression, given the tone of the 05 post, that disciplinary action was on the table. Siddartha Alonne notes that he believes "the user thought it was alright since it was part of Project Crossover." gee feels the author likely saw similar articles and "didn't think they were breaking rules." CityToast acknowledges that Licensing should not have waited, and states that the issue is now a high priority.
Fabled clarifies the issue further: "This is not due to "user violated rules", this is a user upset they were never informed of the process. The same goes for the wider community. The wider community sees moderators and staff going back on a promise for improved communication between staff and community." gee agrees: "suddenly their project crossover is getting fiat deleted but the other ones are cool" "and nobody was told before right now." CityToast is unmoved: "I would love for the user to explicitly state that they believed their article full of copyrighted characters, which is titled "Copyright Infirngement" was not a violation of site policy." Fabled steps away from the discussion. OptimisticLucio adds that all Project Crossover articles are problematic, as mentioned in the 05command post. CityToast says this isn't about Project Crossover, and that the offending piece is "worse because it literally ackowledges it is it copyright infringement, while utilizing characters owned by a litigious multimillion dollar company." gee asks if changing the title would reduce the urgency. CityToast is extremely unimpressed with the question, and the overall discussion: "I cannot genuinely believe this is a matter of debate." Lucio suggests CityToast take a break. CityToast continues: "If a user posts spam, is it site policy to ask them to take the spam down first, or to remove it? If it is the former, then I am wrong here." Dexanote calls a fifteen-minute break, and notes that 1. AdCap is discussing the issue, 2. it will be handled with due care and time, and 3. everyone needs to calm down. When the break expires, Dexanote states that "One big problem with this conversation is that I'm fairly sure the current Licensing Captain isn't present."
CityToast interrupts, as he has spoken with the author and thinks "we've found a great solution. So I'd love to kill the 05 thread and get moving onto that. Is that good with everybody?" GremlinGroup does not want the thread killed, but wants it updated to note the solution. Siddartha and gee agree. GremlinGroup notes that the solution is for the author to edit the offending material out of the article. Dexanote is pleased with this outcome. Pedagon feels this will not allay the fears of users who may now be concerned for their own works; he belatedly notes that unlike spam, this article was to be taken down months later. Dexanote agrees that work needs to be done: "we as a whole team need to consider how heavy topics come off to one another, and to those who read 05." He asks that a summary be prepared "for Licensing to review." Siddartha asks if Project Crossover articles will be reviewed for copyright infringement, as well as "articles that mention real-life brands." Dexanote feels the latter are likely safe, and that the issue is avoiding litigation. CityToast doesn't think brand references are necessarily safe either, and notes that guidelines and review are the way forward for assessing each case. He adds that a single person can do a lot of damage with copyright, as the Andrey Duksin case has shown. TheDeadlyMoose is "honestly confused as to why this is a concern at all." CityToast presents a flurry of intellectual property law terms to show the complexity of the issue. Staff discuss the desirability of avoiding litigation. PlaguePJP asks whether an article utilizing Muppets characters is "under threat of removal under these new guidelines." CityToast explains his extensive qualifications for dealing with these issues, and agrees to give Moose some resources for understanding them. CityToast is now absent from the conversation.
Siddartha passes on statements from meta that Archive of Our Own's (AO3) legal aid could help cover SCP; Yossipossi doesn't feel this is something to rely upon. Moose still feels the threat is overblown, and that fanfiction is in no danger; "I'm honestly kind of shocked that no one seems to be aware of this landscape?" PlaguePJP feels that the site's long period of not having been sued is indicative of safety; "It’s good to be proactive, but flat out removal of articles for referencing characters seems like a step too far." Moose feels that "this seems like a very odd form of sudden censorship based on individual paranoia and trauma, with absolutely no evidence that it's ever going to be a problem in any way." They don't think Plague's point is correct, however, since "the bigger you get the more you get sued." Moose muses: "It's not that the conversation is invalid. It's that it appears there isn't really a conversation so much as a decision based on no evidence and we're just talking about the specifics of execution." Lily clarifies that "AO3 has resources we don't. The wiki as a whole would be targeted, not just the article, and we need content to be able to be released fully under the license," and that Project Crossover's removal has been in the works for a long time. Riemann notes, several times, CityToast's absence. Users discuss AO3; in the absence of anybody knowing how it works, Siddartha proposes someone "get in contact" with them. Riemann reminds everyone that "There's an 05 going up tonight to hammer this sort of thing out!"
CityToast returns, and clarifies why fanfiction is not a parallel case to the wiki: "If the article in question had been posted to AO3, then I would not have worried about it at all. Here's the thing, though: content on our wiki isn't fanfiction. It's our wiki's content, that staff is curating and, ultimately, is responsible for. Even tales, which are essentially the fanfiction of SCP content, exist on our site. No, Disney has not sued us, or threatened to do so. But SCP has grown significantly, and continues to grow significantly. The approach to our content has to change, before we get a C&D." Moose wonders why the wiki isn't fanfiction, and why parody doesn't seem to have the protections they believe it has. CityToast explains that fan fiction "does not have a legal definition or protection. fan fiction is copyright infringement. it's just the kind of copyright infringement that most IP lawyers don't care about because it doesn't have a bank account attached to it." Nevertheless, as it's on our site, we may be implicitly responsible for it. He notes that "Parody is not 'protected'; parody is a defense against copyright claims, which is used for reasoning why the copyright infringement is acceptable. It doesn't make the content 'not infringement'. It just makes is 'acceptable infringement'," and that "The problem we face is that our site's license specifically prohibits certain uses which would, with any other license, fall under something that could be claimed as parody. Creative Commons, while very permissive, has very strict usage guidelines that many other licenses do not have explicitly stated. To put it another way, we might actually lose the ability to claim certain defenses like Fair Use or Parody, if it is shown that we were not even adhering to our own license." The measures CityToast is advocating will reduce the risk faced by the wiki.
Plague wants to know if there is "precedent for a corporation such as Disney or universal going after non-published, non-monetized works that reference their characters or media?" CityToast says there is; "Disney is an incredibly litigious group that has issues takedowns against mon-monetized works for a long time. This is the company that issued a cease and desist to a woman who had put spider-man on her deceased child's gravestone." On the AO3 topic, he adds that "AO3 gets away with a lot because it is a nonprofit, and they are able to claim submissions there could be considered fair use as a literary repository." Moose doesn't feel their questions have been properly addressed; they nevertheless add another topic for consideration: "a number of authors have pretty famously required people to use creative commons to allow fanfiction of their work." LadyKatie notes that "We need a prescident to handle copyrighted material." EstrellaYoshte points out that the AO3 comparison is flawed because "ao3 explicitly prohibits any kinds of monetization, which we do allow" [as CC BY-SA 3.0, the site license, allows commercial use].
stormfallen suggests moving the conversation to 05command. Lily says either she or CityToast can make the policy thread. CityToast would like to "outline some general concepts that really should be looked at." stormfallen is surprised that Licensing doesn't already have deletion powers under problematic circumstances; Lily and CityToast agree. Moose opposes this "without some kind of waiting period. Because I strongly oppose deleting context based simply on understandable personal paranoia." stormfallen suggests waiting for the thread. CityToast does not think this is paranoia; "This approach is based on expertise, research, and understanding of how some companies act. I was involved in creative commons stuff (with Wikimedia) before my book came out, and had these stances then as well." He further notes that "Realistically, IP law was made for one company's attorney to leverage against another company's attorney. It really just was not made for the era of personal content. IP law has not caught up with the ability for anyone to publish anything to the world." Moose thinks we should look into legal protection. They also do not necessarily want to limit the conversation to 05command, as "often decisions are made based on conversations like this, on impulse. In fact the author in question here is already been approached by staff. We absolutely cannot limit our discussions out of recap concerns alone. (Although I'm very happy to limit them if I don't feel that actually needs to be said right away lol. Which I have! 💜)"
Moose would prefer to take the chance, as they think our odds are good. CityToast again notes the greyness of intellectual property law. Staff discuss whether it's illegal to write about Walt Disney, then John D. Rockefeller, and if this turns into presidents I am putting my foot down you guys, not three months in a row. The conversation thankfully lingers on Disney's litigiousness and allergy to letting things enter the public domain. CityToast notes that "we need to build some guidelines that cover different types of licensing-related situations. trademarks vs copyrights vs personality rights vs performance rights." He then notes he has updated the 05command post. LadyKatie recommends ending the conversation to "save the poor recap staff," which is appreciated but rather too late. Moose wants a further update on 05command noting that "we have not actually objectively concluded as staff that this deletion request was valid." They further do not feel all rules have been followed correctly, and are concerned about "setting a precedent for rapid deletion." Cyvstvi is troubled by the 05 post and the process that resulted in it: "A brute force "fiat" should not be something that we just throw around so recklessly." Moose notes that "his is a power that belongs to staff. Licensing is supposed to ask first admins, then staff, if this is a serious enough concern to grant broad powers into a team to delete articles. All the powers that licensing has have been granted this way. And rightfully so, in my opinion." They note that this was likely an overstep, but "I've come to realize that a lot of power has been inappropriately taken from staff and I'm really loathe to see it happen again so casually. I think the right move is to make an argument on O5, as Toast plans, for why we should consider deleting or revising based on their request." Toast notes that the original 05 post was Licensing asking admins, as Moose suggests; Moose points out conversely that "This isn't a policy proposal, and there's no actual evidence given in a thread for anyone to decide on. It's just a flat statement of disaster impending. We can't really do that with this kind of proposal. In fact administrators are obligated to block it, although recently that's fallen out of favor because administrators don't like to interfere unless they've been pushed to do so by another team."
Moose feels that frequently "accountability structures have fallen apart because someone declared an emergency." CityToast notes that he has "been working on policy proposals for ages. They just haven't really…gone anywhere." Cyvstvi says that "You can't brute force policy into existence." CityToast responds: "Yes, but also no." Riemann feels the blow is softer when a thread proposing fiat use is made by individuals who do not possess the power themselves.
Staff briefly debate the minutiae of who was asking who to use fiat. Lily confirms that Licensing "was asking for admins to do it," as "licensing cannot and will not have fiat themselves." Bleep further clarifies: "There was discussion about extending deletion policy too articles that violate the licence, but that is a separate discussion and simply would expand the site rules to include summary deletion of articles that violate the licence." Moose feels fiat was out of line, as they cannot see this as an emergency. CityToast clarifies intentions: "I don't think there was any attempt to scare anyone into compliance. I am not an admin, so I don't have the power to fiat. I made a request to the people that do based on what I (and other licensing people) agreed was a problem and a form of obvious violation of policy." Staff briefly debate the minutiae of whether emergency or urgency was conveyed by the fiat request.
aismallard notes that "We need to draw up a proper policy changing Licensing's ability to handle copyright/etc violations, have it go through discussion, then voting (if needed), and then we will have an agreed upon procedure for how to handle issues like this going forward." Dexanote asks that greater care be taken going forward. CityToast acknowledges that all present acted in good faith. aismallard adds a cautionary note: "since wikidot deletions are irreversible, any fiat used in this way should absolutely have clear staff acclamation first. Given this was controversial from the getgo I would've opposed fiat solely on those grounds, because any fiat without staff approval is subject to reversal and, well you can't really reverse article deletion." Moose agrees: "Very very very very very much this. Administrator Fiat is supposed to be a temporary solution, almost always, and any kind of irreversible use of administrator fiat had damn well be backed by staff acclamation lol." Bleep sees work ahead: "This is something much better mediated by new policy to expand the coordinated powers of deletions/licensing to summary license violating content after x period of time, which would allow for takedowns of most Project crossover stuff which are the biggest offenders." Dexanote suggests that staff not able to see Admin/Captain chat start asking for summaries in case issues are being handled there. Cyvstvi is confused: "How can we ask for summaries without knowing what happened?"
pr0m37h3um, presumably knowing he doesn't have to recap while he's on break, attempts to reignite the conversation by stating: "the impression I get from it is "yeah we're gonna be removing or plastering over articles with existing characters" which, in my opinion, is bullshit." LadyKatie reminds everyone that there is an 05command thread. pr0m37h3um apologizes. I accept, not then but now. Moose steps away and thanks everyone for their work. aismallard workshops the 05command update:
There was extensive discussion about this request in staff chat. It was determined that staff acclamation did not exist for fiat to be executed. It was also general consensus that this should be executed as a regular policy discussion to better define how Licensing should handle copyright/other issues in articles. Administration leant its support to ensuring that policy process was sufficiently resourced and could go smoothly.
The update is made, SCPD survives, and the conversation devolves into "glad to be alive"-style casual chatter. GremlinGroup reminds everyone that "as a general note, by the time people start saying "i hope this goes in recap" it tends to be casual territory."
This conversation took approximately three and one-half hours.
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Topic: Team Change Announcements | 2021/12/07
Summary: Staff discuss the process for announcing when staff members join or leave staff teams.
Recap: GremlinGroup raises the topic of making announcements when staff join/leave teams. aismallard recommends "a thread to announce team changes like our JS announcement thread." GremlinGroup reads the minutes retrieves a recap quote from last month describing the issue. Everyone agrees that new JS should be announced. stormfallen states that "New JS are supposed to be announced, captains just tend to forget to so so." aismallard clarifies that this is about "announcing team changes." DrBleep feels that "this would be an 05 updating initiative most likely." stormfallen isn't so sure; "My interpretation is that keeping the thread updated is meant to be the responsibility of the captain or staffer, and 05Updating can use the thread as a reference if the team change isn't announced in here. The issue is that team changes are happening but not being announced anywhere, and 05Updating can only work off what we know. If the intent is that 05Updating also makes the announcements, then someone needs to tell us when changes happen." Bleep meant "more so proposing the change and then working with other teams to ensure that captains keep it up to date." stormfallen agrees with this. aismallard provides two options for this process:
Feed Option: Captains add team change updates to the thread whenever. Then O5 Updating, regularly scanning said thread, see the update and makes all the other relevant changes.
Request Option: Captains tell O5 Updating they're making a change, and they make all the edits, including appending to the staff update thread.
She prefers the former "since it doesn't require O5 Updating staff be "on call" to immediately receive and make changes."
stormfallen "would hope captains both announce the change in here and in the thread, and then 05Updating can do the rest. But at the very least in the thread." aismallard notes that "it will need some system of marking which updates have been processed," as "since things can get lost in staffchat, the thread would be the source of truth for things the section needs to edit." stormfallen drafts the thread, then asks "Actually, do we want this to only be for OS+, or JS team changes as well? I figured the JS thread would remain for existing JS who attain/leave additional teams." aismallard feels "it should have all team roster changes" [emphasis in original] since "JS are OS in training, not some special diminutive rank" and "the JS thread can be for bringing people on." stormfallen wonders if this should "replace the JS thread entirely then?" aismallard feels the JS thread is "useful since it shows where all the new staff come from." Jerden asks if it would be acceptable for JS to post in the thread if their seniors forget to announce them. stormfallen left it vague "because I don't see reason in restricting who can post to this, so long as the post is authorized."
WhiteGuard has a preferred method of handling the thread:
1) Captains alert 05command Updating that a change is occuring. Either the Captains do some of the updating themselves or let 05updating take care of all of it.
2) 05Updating implements any remaining updates.
3) 05Updating notes the change on the thread.
In short, I think any system where the Captains are expected to note changes themselves will fail. The JS recruitment thread is a prime example of that. It's usefulness is sharply decreased due to the frequency of it being forgotten.
Likewise, I think it is time to do the same with the JS recruitment thread. We should approach that the same way and let 05updating handle it with this same procedure.
Additionally, O5updating already handles practically all updates and need to be alerted when these changes take place often in real time. Having the Captains only responsibility being to alert 05updating when a change takes place is already within our common workflow.
stormfallen asks if "it's worth remaking the JS appointments thread and archiving the current one?" WhiteGuard thinks an update is fine. Staff finish workshopping the thread, cutting a line which might unintentionally grant the power to refuse a new JS member's 05command application to parties who should not have it.
This conversation took place over three hours.
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Topic: Archiving Secure Facilities | 2021/12/07
Summary: Staff discuss the process for announcing when staff members join or leave staff teams.
Recap: Jerden asks: "what would be the process for archiving the current Secure Facilities Locations Page?" He is preparing a new one, and there is already an archived Secure Facilities page, but he believes the second one also merits archival. aismallard suggests an appropriate URL. Jerden discusses the potential necessity of re-parenting pages parented to the current version, and other technical details. aismallard asks whether the page will get "an approval on O5 before being posted on the mainsite"; Jerden thinks so, though he sees this "more akin to a rewrite than a policy proposal but once its done we'll definitely want to get feedback from staff and users before replacing the classic page." aismallard responds: "this is an official page, so yes it should get a discussion thread before replacement." She adds "as a procedural clarification: you always have to have a discussion thread (barring special circumstances/fiat), but you only need the voting thread if there wasn't a clear outcome from the discussion thread. if the discussion is just everyone approving, then you can carry the motion without voting." This prompts Athenodora to ask: "how do quorum and all that relate to threads-without-voting?" aismallard quotes the Site Charter as requiring "a consensus," and adds that "I think it's reasonable to only apply this in cases where the discussion thread got sufficient attention to be susbtitutable for quorum, even though it is usually not formally measured." Athenodora would definitely "prefer to see it being limited to case where we have good reason to be confident that it is substitutable for quorum, yeah." She then asks: "should we worry about codifying a way for that to be formally measured now?" If anyone is worried, they don't say so.
This conversation took place over less than two hours.
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Topic: Nightmarefest Winners on Frontpage | 2021/12/09
Recap: Zyn asks how long Nightmarefest has been over, and whether it's time that "we take down the banner announcing the winners?" GremlinGroup notes the winners were announced 25 days ago. Zyn plans to update the page to remove the banner.
This conversation took place very sporadically over eleven hours.
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Topic: AI Content Creation | 2021/12/09 - 2021/12/17
Summary: Staff discuss licensing issues around content created with artificial intelligence.
Recap: stormfallen ports a question from #site34, the IRC channel for the Tech Team. A user wants to know whether the AI-generated products of WOMBO are compatible with the license. LilyFlower says no, as "we don't allow other ai things." Jerden asks for clarification on this: "are we waiting until the legality of AI copyright/lack of copywriteability gets cleared up in the courts, or is it another reason?" Naepic agrees that this is the reason; "AI copyright law is still not quite set in stone." aismallard notes that "I don't think any of these products declare their outputs to be CC," and also that "AI outputs would be acceptable if all training data was verified as CC compliant, and output data was designated as CC," with stormfallen adding "And if the process itself was released under CC, I think." Jerden points out that this would exempt most editing software, a point stormfallen concedes. LordStonefish says: "So, theoretically, as Botnik-J was written using a program trained on a dataset of CC material and guided by a human hand, that’s fine. I’ve written using GPT-3 before, but all output data was used as a prompt and significantly fiddled with. I don’t believe fully AI generated content should be on the wiki, simply from a perspective of authorship […] I don’t really see these developers asking to prosecute, but it’s a good unofficial policy."
Jerden muses: "The AI is analogous to both the artist and the program they use, so while it's hazy I can't see there being an absolute requirement to use open source software." Stonefish asks: "Do we consider the actual software to be a toolset (like Photoshop), or a product (like a novel or a painting) That’s the call. If it’s a toolset, I think it’s fine. If it’s a product, we need to get cracking." Staff briefly talk theoretically about this; GremlinGroup interrupts to note that he already pointed out WOMBO's blanket protection on their AI products. Stonefish notes that "Attempting to determine the likelihood of AI content being suddenly licensed requires individual context and not a blanket policy. Simply put, what can we guess each individual developer will actually do?" They also wonder: "if an AI was trained on, say 85,000 copyrighted novels, fed an SCP related prompt, and spat out a totally original piece of writing that contained no individual phrase or word combination from those copyrighted novels, and the user released that text under CC, where exactly does the license violation come in?" GremlinGroup notes that "Brains do this," and Stonefish agrees: "Brains do exactly this. We can’t cite someone for having an idea based on a non CC work." Everyone agrees that everyone present is out of their depth, and as stormfallen says, "If we're unable to make an informed policy then I think erring on the side of caution is best." Stonefish asks who in the community would know more; stormfallen suggests CityToast.
Stonefish moves the conversation into staff-discussion from staff-questions, and announces: "Actually, checking with the World Intellectual Property Organization, in The US, Australia, Spain, Germany, and other jurisdictions, content created by a computer is not subject to any kind of copyright. The US Copyright Office has will only accept work from human beings, because of Feist Publications v Rural Telephone Service Company, Inc. 499 U.S. 340 (1991), where only “the fruits of intellectual labor that are founded in the creative powers of the mind” are protected under copyright. Australia has a similar case in Acohs Pty Ltd v Ucorp Pty Ltd. These nations hold that any work made by software can’t be copyrighted because a person didn’t make it. The CJEU take a similar but distinct stance in C-5/08 Infopaq International A/S v Danske Dagbaldes Forening which says that a work is original or not if it reflects the “author’s own intellectual creation.” These territories would likely allow the release of AI generated work under CC. […] As our community operates in a range of jurisdictions, I favor a blanket ban on all AI created artwork as the headache is too much and we cannot ever do a blanket global release under CC because it’s simply not compatible. The answer for us is no, no, and no. Never. We simply can’t." stormfallen is impressed: "Holy shit, you did some research." Naepic picks up the issue of jurisdiction:
the general rule of thumb is that we usually follow the most restrictive measure, within reason
like, there were some images that would be considered public domain if they were american, but are copyrighted per german law
so we followed the german ruling and removed those images from the site
that being said, we usually follow american public domain laws unless it explicitly conflicts with another country's laws
Stonefish concludes: "No one is allowed to directly post AI generated text or images to the wiki that were created solely by a computer program." stormfallen suggests that "we collate Licensing's decision and reasoning and make a post somewhere so that we have something to point at next some someone asks?" GremlinGroup seconds this. Everyone is pleased at the results of Stonefish's first day on Licensing.
stormfallen asks whether this would apply to text generation; the difficulty of determining whether a user used such an application makes it a grey area. Stonefish and stormfallen discuss the finer points of the summary, while stormfallen does research on what the Creative Commons has written on the topic. Stonefish muses: "Okay, so their argument is, as a human didn’t create it, it’s fully eligible to be CC? That changes things." They quote the resources stormfallen has provided to each other; stormfallen notes " just because CC says they think this doesn't make it law." Stonefish suggests: "Let’s split the difference. Text is inherently protected under Creative Commons, images need to be original because of jurisdictional issues." stormfallen cites further Creative Commons statements which Stonefish finds "Less helpful than I hoped." stormfallen makes a thread to discuss further.
stormfallen says: "gotta figure out how implementation will work. An 05 post and an FAQ in the Licensing Guide?" Naepic responds: "there's a brief excerpt in the image use policy that mentions ai generated images being banned without much reasoning so it'd go there."
Stonefish opines that "This should be fleshed out with the ruling from the Creative Common org itself, to differentiate text from images." CityToast offers his suggestions, after having done a great deal of research: "It is a grey area. Currently, Wikimedia considers AI-generated content to be public domain as it is not copyrightable. That said, if you load an AI system with copyrighted works and it produces something similar, the results may also be copyrighted. Allowing AI-generated imagery could open a legal loophole that could cause trouble in the future. But currently there's no caselaw or precedents for it. We could follow Wikimedia and call AI-generated content "public domain". But I would not be surprised if that leads to more confusion and/or fights." Lily is "inclined to just blanket ban for now," and aismallard agrees: "I'd rather not allow it, then later caselaw makes it not okay for us to host on site and we have to do a bunch of takedowns and replacements."
Stonefish suggests "we blanket ban all images. Text still has caveats (Botnik) that will fly under future advancement of current caselaw. We can make arguments for text, we could be on safe ground in the company of Wikimedia and the Creative Commons organization themselves, and it can be edited. The same effect can be made in words by a human if need be (AI generated text has no point or meaning, it is only used for flavor and tone). Images require time-intensive replacements and painful takedowns. It is not worth allowing them." The paucity of further resources on the matter is noted; CityToast suggests that "We could, if we did allow AI imagery, require the author to also submit a CC- compliant backup image." He promises to do some followup work.
aismallard invites TheDeadlyMoose to the thread, and they opine: "This will actually stay firmly under Licensing purview no matter what policy examination results in! Aka, this is a ruling that is long been License's to make in a situation like this, unless that power was taken away from Licensing while I wasn't looking. The AI cannot give permission to use works generated from it. Because it's a robot. Because legal risk can fall to licensing in cases where permission is impossible to obtain, it is therefore up to licensing to make this call. This works exactly the same as if a creator is impossible to contact (and it's not a 4chan/editthis SCP). Licensing gets to decide, under whatever grounds they feel necessary. The only way to counter this (without someone somewhere abusing power) would be a full staff vote that licensing couldn't get an admin to override. If that occurred, licensing would no longer have any obligation whatsoever to deal with that image at all, nor any creative works involving or using it. This has never happened, to my knowledge."
Work on this issue is ongoing.
This conversation took place over more than one week.
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Topic: Staff Inactivity Policy Update | 2021/12/09
Recap: GremlinGroup asks Vivarium for an update on their policy for dealing with staff inactivity. Vivarium notes that it has been delayed by both his and WhiteGuard's jobs, and apologizes for the delay. DrBleep notes that "policy slows to a crawl due to holiday season." GremlinGroup and Vivarium feel the policy will be useful; Vivarium notes that "Part of the reason I feel bad is because I know waiting for this policy has put discussions surrounding qurom and inactivity on the back burner." He promises further updates in the new year. GremlinGroup admits: "I'll be honest I'm sorta glad if only for the fact that we get to say that "the drafting of policy to tackle staff inactivity has become inactive due to unavoidable staff inactivity." Vivarium agrees: "Okay, that's fucking funny and I hope it's in the recap." Well, Merry Fucking Christmas Viv.
This conversation took place over less than one half-hour.
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Topic: Reimagining | 2021/12/10
Summary: Staff discuss whether the concept of "reimagining" justifies a hub, a tag, or a canon.
Recap: A user asks stormbreath whether a canon needs to have a canon hub to have a tag, and whether a hub for "reimagined" articles could be made by said user, who did not create the articles. EstrellaYoshte is "quite against this, having seen the hub," reasoning that it's "one thing to base an emergent canon around one or a small set of origin work, and another to try and link a bunch of other authors mostly-unrelated works into one." They cite earlier statements that "if someone made a canon based round 173, that doesnt mean 173 will get that canon tag qualifier" and consider this the same principle. Jerden asks: "I thought the idea was that they just want a tag for reimaginings of existing SCPs?" and thinks that's worth having a tag, though not a canon. Siddartha Alonne suggests a page similar to the ones for Explained and Archived SCPs. Athenodora asks: "we'll need to limit ourselves to cases where the author confirms that their article is a reimagining of something else, wouldn't we?" Jerden agrees that specific definitions will need to be agreed upon, and doesn't feel this is an immediately pressing issue. Estrella feels the use case of such a tag would be too "narrow," opining that "its fine if someone wants to create a hub for this (probably), but each efforts is independent of one another with no connective ties other than being an alternative take on another article." Jerden definitely feels a hub is a better fit for this concept than a tag and that this should not be a canon. Staff then do this:
Jerden: I'm actually going to need to make the hub hub, aren't I?
LordStonefish: You gotta make the hub hub, bub bub.
Jerden: But does the hub hub include the hub hub?
Vivarium: Jerden, if you do not follow through and create the hub hub hub then I'll have to rethink your promotion chances. /s
Dr. Bleep: what's all the hubbub?
until ManyMeats asks if anybody ever, you know, answered the user. Meats agrees that this doesn't sound like a canon, as "Canons are required to have open and ongoing stories" rather than this, which is ""Okay but what if this one detail was different…" stormbreath acknowledges that no response was made, and promises to make one.
This conversation took place sporadically over twelve hours.
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Topic: Staff Server Invites | 2021/12/15
Recap: stormfallen asks: "Would it be possible to put invites for the open staff servers in #rules-channel ? Or a new channel, whichever." aismallard suggests that "We could make a captain+ channel like staff-announcements but only for permanent items like invites yeah." stormfallen agrees. The #staff-resources channel is created, with the following statement of purpose by aismallard:
Staff Resources:
This channel is for listing resources corresponding to a specific team or staff at large, for instance permanent Discord invites or links to team sites (Wikidot or not).
Posts are limited one per team, if you need to add a resource, edit or remove the previous post. Only this initial post will be pinned. Contact an administrator to make changes.
On the 30th of December, an invite to the -INT Discord is posted in staffchat's announcements channel by aismallard. The link is declared open for sharing, so here it is!
This conversation took place over six minutes.
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Topic: -INT Ambassadors on 05command | 2021/12/18
Recap: ManyMeats notes that "there are several members of O5 who appear to be almost entirely based out of other branches" and wants to know why they are members. Meats states: "I am only removing EN staff who I am 100% sure have retired/quit/been removed, I will follow up on the not-en-staff people at a later date after I get info." ThePighead opines: "I think it was from the time before -INT as we know now was properly established. If I remember correctly, I think it was 2013-2014, there was Staff members of various Branches who were added to O5 to facilitate communication (as well as a first prototype of a -INT site)." WhiteGuard notes that these users are members of the -INT Ambassador Team; "We used to let (as far as I know we still can do so, but just don't anymore) ambassadors have the ability to post on O5."
This conversation took place over approximately two hours.
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Topic: Milk Tag Saves the Day | 2021/12/18
Recap: Alexander notes that they were "unable to remove the *crosslink* tag from a page for MAST's wikiwalk team recently," until "Vivarium fixed it by adding the *milk* tag, removing the *crosslink* tag and then removing the *milk* tag." LadyKatie expresses appropriate horror.
This conversation took place over four minutes.
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Topic: Banned User Edits | 2021/12/18, 2021/12/18-19
Summary: Staff discuss how the present policy on whether banned users can edit their articles came to pass.
Recap: Limeyy asks: "What’s the policy on edits for banned users nowadays?" stormfallen posts the relevant section of the Site Rules:
Users currently banned from the site may not submit new articles or other works to the site in any way.
Users banned for harassment concerns may not request content edits to their articles or submit any new content to the site in any way. Users banned for disciplinary matters may request content edits to existing work so long as proposed edits are not intentionally provocative, rule-breaking, or be so universal as to constitute a de facto new piece. Proposed edits will be considered on a case-by-case basis with no guarantees of acceptance.
Attempts to circumvent this policy will be seen as justification to deny any future edit requests.
All banned users may request deletion of their existing work or works, and staff will comply as soon as they are reasonably able to.
stormfallen notes the rules were changed in January of 2021. GremlinGroup asks: "Was there ever a discussion of why this rule was made so?" Naepic explains that there was a long discussion over a banned user who made extensive edits. GremlinGroup asks where this discussion took place, as "It seems a very arbitrary rule." Naepic believes it was in staffchat, but isn't sure if there was an 05command thread. "The reasoning was that we don't allow banned users to make new articles," and adds "However, edits were still technically allowed on the fact that they weren't disallowed." GremlinGroup finds the conversation, and says "Looks like the reasoning was designed specifically to retroactively allow for the Landis edit while blocking a specific AHT-banned user from making a similar edit." Naepic feels that "retroactively allow is a strong term," preferring to state that "we just rarely apply rules ex post facto." GremlinGroup responds: "Right, It was a loophole already allowed. It was written in a way that doesn't prevent a similar occurrence again." Naepic agrees. GremlinGroup muses further: "So this was a sitewide policy designed between two edge cases." stormbreath informs him that "This was discussed and passed on 05" and he promises to look, though he doubts "it'll change the cause of this rules creation." stormbreath provides additional context around the edit: "we realized that while there was no rules disallowing it, utterly nobody was thought well of that fact, and worked to close the gap so it wouldn't happen again," and adds that "the policy was written to explicitly prevent the circumstances that led to the creation of the policy."
Limeyy resumes the conversation on the 20th, asking who has jurisdication over the "case by case basis," as they want to implement "some minor edits that shouldn’t be an issue by a disc banned user." They ping Dexanote; Dexanote asks who the user is, clarifies "That rule was in response of certain banned users trying to still contribute via edits," and agrees that solidifying the rule in 2022 would be a good idea. Limeyy explains who the user is and the nature of the edits, but wants to focus on the rule itself so that if "next time if it’s a little more contentious we have precedent on process and who’s doing what." Dexanote says it's unclear whether the Disciplinary or Rewrite Teams have jurisdiction. Limeyy asks for an update the following day; Dexanote reiterates that it will be handled in the new year, and tells Limeyy to authorize the edits they are considering.
This conversation took place over three hours, then briefly on two additional days.
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Topic: -INT Translations on -EN | 2021/12/18
Summary: Staff discuss how translated works should be posted.
Recap: A user in IRC #site17 asks how translated articles from other branches can be posted to -EN. stormfallen ports the concern to the staff discord, noting he "can't find any obvious resources about how or where to post translations to -EN, which is kinda weird." LadyKatie states: "I really do not like it outside of 001s, but the current staff consensus is that it's allowed. Again, still very much do not like this." LemonBee12 asks why. LadyKatie responds: "It rightfully upsets other wikis to be treated like the minor leagues before they post to "main SCP." I also think it's kind of cheap. Just regurgitate something you've already done to collect more almighty updoots. It's essentially reposting." Alexander wonders: "how is it different from EN scps getting translated to other languages?" LadyKatie responds: "Because translations are not scratching the stickers off and calling it something else. They're still the same work, and are recognized as the same work. Whereas posting again under a different number's almost resetting and creating a duplicate." She clarifies: "reposting a translation from another wiki's mainlist to our mainlist is annoying for the above listed reasons (mainly that it feels like reposting with no changes imo). Translating and keeping it under the same name keeps them in the same group." The distinction is being made between translations, which are posted on the International Translation Wiki, and "reposts" as LadyKatie terms them, which are posted to the -EN mainlist. She plans to write a policy proposal for this in the future. LemonBee notes that "translations get more attention on EN"; "Which needs an entirely different solution," LadyKatie responds. LordStonefish suggests "linking INT from the mainlist" and LadyKatie agrees. stormfallen notes that "The INT link in the sidebar even goes" to the International Branches Hub instead of the translation archive. LadyKatie muses that "It'd really help if we can get them to adopt our tagging system." HarryBlank muses: "My favourite SCP is an -ES article translated and posted to the -EN mainlist." He doesn't think he would've seen it otherwise.
This conversation took place over three hours.
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Topic: Staffchat Casual Channels | 2021/12/20
Summary: A user is concerned about casual channels in staffchat, and staff discuss the urgency of the matter.
Recap: OptimisticLucio notes that a user in a non-staff Discord is commenting vaguely on the existence of casual channels in staffchat, "with ex-staff I might add," and asking for users to opine on this. Lucio isn't really sure what's being asked. Jacob Conwell believes the user is looking for confirmation that these channels exist, and that former staff are allowed in them. hungrypossum wonders if the community is asking for the casual channels to be removed. Staff discuss whether there have been complaints about these channels — Vivarium says there "have been some" [emphasis in original] — and whether it is advisable to remove them — Vivarium prefers that they stay, Lucio thinks there are too many, and UncertaintyCrossing thinks the problem is more that casual conversations happen in the work channels sometimes instead of the casual ones where they belong. Siddartha Alonne thinks this is not a priority issue. Lucio agrees, but also thinks it could be quickly resolved. ManyMeats states that "Casual channels were seen as just further places for staff to retreat to in order to blackbox conversation and create strata," but notes that "This has been largely addressed without deleting channels." Joreth comments on the presence of ex-staff: "most of these are just a way for the older staff to still be connected with old friends." hungrypossum feels that "Not having casual channels would be detrimental to staff activity and intra-staff relationships." stormfallen notes that lacking this outlet will "lead to more shitposting in work channels, and alienate staffers who don't or can't participate in massive Discords or IRC." gee0765 notes that some users have a problem with the existence of casual chats stratified by staff hierarchy. Lucio agrees with this criticism, and says it has been noted that the existence of casual channels allows staff to "not really talk or interact in SCP circles outside" of staffchat. ManyMeats does not believe enough recent unaddressed criticisms have been made to justify immediate action. Staff discuss whether the user is angry because staff are remaining in staffchat rather than utilizing other social media platforms available to them. They also have difficulty determining what the user's precise complaints are, noting a likely language barrier. gee notes that there have likely been fewer complaints lately because ROUNDERHOUSE and TheDeadlyMoose are working on "the current staffchat channel setup" (quote from ROUNDERHOUSE). As ROUNDERHOUSE is on break, the work is on hold.
This conversation took place over one half-hour.
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Topic: Recap Team Recruitment | 2021/12/20
Recap: A recap of the past week in Administrator-Captain chat mentions that pr0m37h3um and Vivarium have been working on Recap Team recruitment. GremlinGroup notes that this has been drafted and is soon-to-be-posted. About half an hour later, pr0m37h3um announces the thread in staff chat. Various congratulations are given by staff members; Conwell states that a prophecy has been fulfilled, Optimistic Lucio wishes the Recap Team good luck, and Hexick “Fortnite dances.”
This discussion took place sporadically over about half an hour.
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Topic: Traced Art | 2021/12/20
Summary: Staff discuss the procedure for reporting traced art.
Recap: Dr. Whitney asks about procedure for reporting "traced art." Naepic states his belief that "procedure is to first go through establishing that it was in fact traced, then going to the artist to have them make an author post/edit on what has been traced," and "if it's indeed verified that the art was traced, ideally we can have the artist make a post of their own volition after a PM without us having to make a call-out post." UncertainyCrossing asks whether individuals whose art has been traced are informed; Naepic does not believe this has been done before, and notes that "tracing art rules" are a recent innovation. UncertaintyCrossing asks: "so if there's no precedent, what do we want to set as one?" Specifically, "what do we do if someone plagiarized an on-site work? do we notify the author "hey someone copied your thing" or do we just deal with it and take it down before it gets there?" Naepic notes that the victim of plagiarism is usually the person who brings the issue to staff's attention.
This conversation took place over less than one half-hour.
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Topic: Recap’s AdCap Review | 2021/12/22
Recap: GremlinGroup announces that the November Recap has been put forward for AdCap Review.
This announcement was a single message.
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Topic: Recap Review Date | 2021/12/24
Recap: GremlinGroup announces that recap review will likely take place starting on Christmas Day, and he believes that the timer for reading and suggesting fixes should be extended "by a day or two," though he is loathe to delay the thing more than it already has been.
This announcement was a single message.
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Topic: LadyKatie's Wildlife Report Vol. 2 | 2021/12/24
Summary: LadyKatie continues to report her wildlife spottings, at the behest of a single Recap Team member.
Recap: LadyKatie reports: "I've been seeing foxes during my drives home from work for the last week." LordStonefish asks how many; LadyKatie reports that she's seen 4, and "They're fluffy too." She has also seen bobcats. Edna Granbo rightly responds: "This better go in the recap." LadyKatie screams "YOU HEAR THAT?" at HarryBlank, and he responds: "FOUR FLUFFY RED FOXES AYE AYE." He also acknowledges the bobcats. Katie and Stonefish trade cat pictures, and Katie shares a photograph of a squirrel on a tree. "The squirrel has a nut," she reports. Katie thinks this will be a nice recap Christmas present. GremlinGroup notes that "December has been the lightest month yet," and HarryBlank immediately twists his words to throw shade on most of the Recap team. Athenodora says "psst month isn't over yet so don't jinx it," and she probably thought that was a joke, but guess what? Read on.
This discussion took place sporadically over seven hours.
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Topic: November Recap Review | 2021/12/24 - 2021/12/29
Summary: Staff review the November Recap, and a leak to -INT representatives is discussed at length.
Recap: GremlinGroup makes a thread in #staff-discussion and shares the November Recap, encouraging staff to read and point out any concerns. Minor suggestions for correcting spelling/grammar are made; recap staff note that quotations will not be edited and their errors will not be pointed out.
Siddartha Alonne has a request from "some -INT staff" for certain phrasing in the -ES incident recap to be toned down and expanded for context. HarryBlank responds: "I am not personally opposed to footnoting some of this information as having been received after the fact, for clarification" but "It's not what was actually said in the conversation being recapped." Siddartha asks: "What part do you think wasn't exactly said in the conversation?" HarryBlank indicates that essentially the entire requested expansion was not present in the original, and posts the original for comparison. Siddartha relays this, and returns with the statement from his contacts that the existing phrasing is "incredibly noxious […] in any official medium," and furthermore that the statement in question mischaracterizes events. HarryBlank doesn't mind paraphrasing the terminology, as he feels no context will thereby be lost, but he wants it made clear that the "noxious" phrasing was not Recap's, but instead belongs to an -INT admin. Siddartha acknowledges this, as LadyKatie has taken responsibility for said phrasing. HarryBlank suggests an edited version, wherein the sensitive information is now described as a "list of grievances"; Siddartha suggests toning it down more, but HarryBlank believes the only way to do that would be to add a footnote with additional context as the original phrasing cannot be paraphrased further without recap essentially editing the past. Siddartha promises to return to consultation.
GremlinGroup is surprised that -INT staff saw the recap review, as "I don't believe this is part of the review process. You're not supposed to share the document outside of staff chat." Siddartha responds: "No. I thought INT staff should have had a saying wherever we mention the letter or not, asked LK and said I could, so I did and we discussed." [LK is LadyKatie.] GremlinGroup asks the Recap captain and vice-captain if they were consulted by LadyKatie over "sharing pre-release recap to INT." gee0765, the vice captain, says he was not consulted. Siddartha clarifies: "For the record I didn't show the whole document, just that one specific part regarding the letter." GremlinGroup responds: "Hopefully permission was sought from prom, then." [prom is pr0m37h3um, the Captain of Recap.] Siddartha explains that the rephrasing has been accepted by his -INT contacts; GremlinGroup suggests this will need to be delayed until it's clear the proper procedure has been followed. Siddartha responds: "I'm not sure that LK asked Prom for permission but I can assure you nothing INT staff was not aware of already has been shared." GremlinGroup counters: "Yes but the role of Non-EN staff in recap review hasn't been covered by our policy. If we went to relevant non-staff parties or entities during the review process, it would look very different." Siddartha explains: "I just thought to make them know so that we would avoid misunderstandings. I apologise if that was not necessary and/or if I broke any policy."
Joreth wants to make sure LadyKatie is aware of "their part in this" recap; GremlinGroup tells him that LadyKatie signed off during Admin/Captain review.
pr0m37h3um does not believe he was consulted. Pedagon finds this "super annoying and improper," as "This isn’t even like a grey zone. The process is like straight up in the team formation of the steps and this ain’t even close to one of them." LadyKatie arrives: "Can confirm, they saw that single paragraph. This was in part to mantain accuracy's sake from their end." Pedagon asks: "Were we trying to do that? I was under the impression recap is an EN team meant to recap the things said in EN rather than an investigative team fact checking things from outside? I don’t see why we would need INT’s opinions on the accuracy of things said here." LadyKatie clarifies that she has been trying to keep a difficult situation stable, and that careful review of the passage in question was required for this. She notes that Recap is only "begrudgingly accepted" and therefore cannot be seen misrepresenting -INT. ROUNDERHOUSE notes that pr0m37h3um should have been consulted before the recap was shared. LadyKatie acknowledges this. ROUNDERHOUSE compares it to earlier staffchat leaks, and Pedagon has more complicated complaints: "Recap being used this way makes it more like state news propaganda than what it actually is. I do not like recaps being used to make INT staff happy by giving them a chance to change how we communicate the thing EN staff actually said." LadyKatie and pr0m37h3um discuss the problematic portion of the recap; Pedagon attempts to reorient the conversation back to the breach of protocol, and the fact that the sensitive topic was not even broached, merely referred to. ROUNDERHOUSE underlines that LadyKatie did not have the "power" to present this information outside of -EN staffchat. Pedagon agrees: "None of this sounds like it needed INT opinions without proper steps taken." ROUNDERHOUSE feels the sensitivity of the issue is being used as "a justification" for breaching protocol, and he is looking for "an admission of error with the understanding that it won't happen again." LadyKatie states: "Oh yeah, no I'm not going to do this again without talking with prom."
GremlinGroup states the role of recap in this matter: "What's relevant here is the characterisation you gave to a piece of information most people in staffchat didn't have. Recap is not primarily focused in reporting solely facts. It reports what is said in staffchat and the information shared at the time, even if it was a mischaracterisation or incorrect." What matters is, instead, the information LadyKatie provided and the way she phrased it when telling staff. Pedagon agrees: "We are not propaganda to make INT or EN look good and we are not investigative journalists." GremlinGroup is glad to hear that LadyKatie "won't circumvent Recap's process again."
LadyKatie insists that this topic is "a grey area" as she has had to discuss sensitive matters with -INT in the past. GremlinGroup disagrees: "INT staff have no bearing on what is or is not said in staffchat unless they're already here." LadyKatie apologizes, noting that the issue is a confused one. GremlinGroup wants to see a separation between the question of LadyKatie's mention of the sensitive topic, and "the discussion of Katie's reasoning behind circumventing the Recap process." LadyKatie and GremlinGroup agree that Siddartha is not to blame; "All Sid did was go to the wrong person," GremlinGroup says. LadyKatie has "reached out to Prom to find a time where we can talk about this." Siddartha apologizes as well, noting they did not think it "would have been that big of a deal," having not distinguished between -EN and -INT staff. "I understood the error and it won't happen again."
Siddartha asks whether the rewording will stand. GremlinGroup states that HarryBlank has made the change, and that he trusts said user's judgement.
pr0m37h3um pings staff to take a look at the recap, as it will hopefully be posted on the 28th. Various staff note approval; Vivarium jokingly says that "The whole thing is bad. We need to start over." HarryBlank nominates all of staff except himself for this task. pr0m37h3um notes that he and LadyKatie are discussing the -INT recap in PMs; he later adds that it will be covered in the Recap Discord server. GremlinGroup and pr0m37h3um confirm that Recap was never going to release the list of grievances, but were merely questioning how to address it in the recap.
Recap Review Visits the Recap Discord!
HarryBlank wants to know how to refer to the sensitive information going forward. pr0m37h3um thinks its existence will need to be acknowledged. Katie would rather it didn't need to be referenced, but understands the need. She is in favour of calling it a list of grievances. pr0m37h3um agrees, as does HarryBlank. LadyKatie asks for "blunting" of these topics for the December recap, due to the changeable relationship between -EN and -INT at present. GremlinGroup questions this phrasing, and Katie clarifies that she would rather it were phrased undramatically. GremlinGroup wonders if she means the contents of the grievances list, which he points out Recap isn't going to cover anyway. He also notes that Katie had no concerns during the Admin/Captain review phase. pr0m37h3um presents his suggested phrasing for the contentious paragraph; GremlinGroup doesn't think changing the existing wording is necessary, but defers to others if he is "in the minority." LadyKatie reiterates that the list of grievances does not need to be seen, confusing GremlinGroup who does not see how this is germane. She restates her desire to not have the list mentioned at all; ROUNDERHOUSE notes that this has the appearance of an expungement request, and should be done officially. pr0m37h3um suggests including a statement that Recap does not have authority over the list and won't respond to requests to see it. Katie thinks people would ask -INT instead. GremlinGroup says: "I'll note that if this is a request for expungement, it has not gone through the proper process." He then quotes the present team charter, and notes that "Expungement requests are to be made during the AdCap Review phase" which LadyKatie did not do. pr0m37h3um responds: "we've all admitted that the current team charter is a mess." GremlinGroup does not believe this has been agreed upon. ROUNDERHOUSE still thinks this is outside Recap's area of concern: "recap's job is to accurately report what goes on in staffchat, this went on in staffchat." He again stresses that an expungement request should be made if necessary.
pr0m37h3um asks what Katie' request is, specifically. Her request is that it be described as a list of grievances. pr0m37h3um asks what GremlinGroup's suggested solution to the disagreement is. GremlinGroup thinks pr0m37h3um' recent suggestion is sound. He is also concerned about the prospect of "expunging a statement that was made in staffchat" when said statement "will have impacted staff's perception of the ongoing issue." HarryBlank thinks "list of grievances" is acceptable characterization, noting that Katie's exact words were only quoted as a means of efficient recapping in a difficult month and that paraphrasing might have been done under less of a strict timescale. GremlinGroup disagrees: if the wording in question would be incendiary in a recap, it undoubtedly had an effect on staffchat. pr0m37h3um presents a new version of the statement, which LadyKatie vetoes as it still sounds too interesting. GremlinGroup considers this outside Recap's remit. He also determines that he must be in the minority, and agrees to go along with the team despite his reservations. LadyKatie responds: "I respect your opinion. Truly, I do. I can see how you're wanting to stick with transparency and that consistency is admirable. And you don't have to change. I don't want you to. My feeling here is some things get disguised for a reason, and not wanting to inflame tensions is one of those reasons." GremlinGroup is still troubled by the transparency issues, and how LadyKatie's motivations seem to be a desire to obscure something which happened in staffchat. Katie states that her primary concern is to preserve diplomacy between branches in a dangerous situation.
HarryBlank announces that the original choice of quotation in Recap missed a valuable line of context, i.e. the fact that -INT representatives voluntarily withheld the list of grievances to remove its aggressive qualities. He feels this information should help mitigate the problem. GremlinGroup is focused on accurately reporting what actually happened: "I hope it's clear why preserving a statement about INT, made by one of the most important INT contacts, is important to me." Katie understands, and is looking for "a halfway point" with Recap. "I do respect you sticking to your convictions," she says. HarryBlank presents a more accurate version of the original recap lines, which LadyKatie finds acceptable. She thanks Recap for their patience in this matter. HarryBlank emphasizes that Recap doesn't "want to mischaracterize anyone, particularly by omission of context." LadyKatie has further concerns, but they will be addressed in the recap review for December. GremlinGroup notes that this will be recapped, despite not taking place in staffchat, as it is part of the non-AdCap portion of recap review. LadyKatie asks whether Recap has received a request of this sort before; GremlinGroup says they have not, but "it's early days." He notes that his position has been consistent; LadyKatie appreciates that. GremlinGroup asks if this conversation is over; LadyKatie responds: "Unless we wanna talk about what presidents we'd like to ban." GremlinGroup blurts out "GOD," then clarifies in a mock footnote that "During recap review, GremlinGroup clarified that his outburst was due to frustration at the topic, not a suggestion to ban God." pr0m37h3um thinks that possibility is "still something to consider." HarryBlank has introduced the new wording to the in-progress document, which closes out the conversation in the Recap Team Discord server.
Back in the staffchat recap thread, LadyKatie notes that "a good conclusion was found. Round of applause for teamwork, everybody." GremlinGroup thereby issues a "last call for edits!" Athenodora wants to look, but will have to wait a day. Dora and various others workshop corrections on the following day — Pseudo-Xenophon comes up, because he's practically part of the Recap team by now — and suggestions for clarification or amendment are handled by GremlinGroup. The review period ends, and the recap is posted… only three weeks late!
This discussion took place over six days.
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Topic: ARC Removal Proposal | 2021/12/25
Summary: Brief summary of the events and discussion.
Recap: After the general review of November’s Recap is published, Optimistic Lucio reads it and spots the discussion about removing ARCs. He asks whether anyone would mind if he posted a discussion about removing ARCs to 05command. He cites his intent to prevent people “backlogging chat”, as well as preventing too much work for Recap Team.
Jerden asks whether Lucio’s intent would be to remove the link to the Archived SCPs link from the SCP Series pages, as was discussed last month. Lucio says his idea would remove the link, as well as removing any ARC-specific rules, such as deletion protection. He notes that he’d rather discuss the idea on 05, and only asked in Staffchat to ensure nothing “imperative” would break. HarryBlank seems excited to hear about this proposal, stating “DO YOUR WORST.”
Half an hour later, Lucio posts the discussion, notifies Harry and Jerden, and gee0765 replies “YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO go off king hopefully this goes better than the other times.” Lucio clarifies that his post is only a discussion, not a proposal.
An hour later, DrBleep asks whether the discussion could have waited “till after Christmas.” Vivarium agrees, saying the timing was “a weird call.” Bleep says that “none of the interested parties are here, nobody is going to participate in this discussion cause everyone is traveling, or celebrating the holidays.” She states the discussion could have waited. Vivarium agrees, noting that the discussion “isn’t bad or anything.” GremlinGroup notes that the discussion has no deadline, is not urgent, and that he sees no issue with posting the thread. Vivarium says it’s not a problem, but he is “critiquing the choice in timing.” Bleep agrees.
Vivarium says he’s in favour of “redefining” archived articles, but that the timing of the discussion is important. He’s waiting until mid-January to begin a discussion around Adult pages. After GremlinGroup agrees that the timing isn’t a problem and gee reiterates the lack of a timer on the thread, Vivarium states the two are missing his point. hungrypossum notes that “Fresh threads are inherently more visible than week-old threads,” and agrees with Vivarium and DrBleep. Alexander Roberts reiterates Vivarium’s statement about the timing being “weird”, not wrong. Vivarium approves. gee0765 argues that nothing is posted “because christmas season” making the thread more visible.
DrBleep states that she is aware of “multiple proposals” that are waiting for the holiday season to end, and their posting will lead to the thread’s burial without attention. She states that having no proposals during holidays, then a “big burst of proposals” is common for the Wiki Staff.
Vivarium states his feeling that the others are getting defensive over valid criticism. He reminds them that a part of being on the staff team is receiving criticism from other staff members. DrBleep agrees. He states no one has done anything “wrong” and that he’s just critiquing the other staff members.
Vivarium excuses himself to go enjoy coffee, and his Art Exchange gift. gee asks what type of coffee he’s drinking. It’s “regular ass coffee”. gee recommends that Vivarium “make it festive by putting a whole raw turkey in it.” Vivarium has no turkey, only ham. Bleep recommends adding peppermint. The conversation continues fading in to incomprehensible casualness in this fashion for some time, and eventually moves to #staff-casual-js when the participants remember Recap Team.
It’s Christmas Day. Merry Christmas!
Discussion Thread: http://05command.wikidot.com/forum/t-14405115/
Mainsite Mirror: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-14405121/
This discussion took three hours.
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Topic: Instant Karma's Gonna Miss You | 2021/12/28
Recap: aismallard notes that Wikidot is no longer updating karma, and the levels will therefore never again change. GremlinGroup responds: "NO." He laments being stuck at two bars, which "might be the worst level." Vivarium and Siddartha Alonne lament having come so close to Guru status in vain. Vivarium notes that "this will fuck with recruitment. I can no longer make assumptions about their contribution amount." stormfallen feels this is an opportune moment to revive the "discussion a while back about hiding karma on the site." GremlinGroup and Vivarium agree; Vivarium thinks the fact that the bar no longer "equates to activity level pretty much ruins the argument against this." He also clarifies that recruitment was not based on karma, but that it was a useful initial metric. He imagines a future where all active contributors have no karma, and then we return with our full bars as conquering heroes. "big western "sheriff enters the saloon" vibes," hungrypossum agrees. stormbreath shows off his full karma bar, proclaiming "GURU GANG FOREVER." Staff kvetch about their lost internet points for a while. This recapper has had guru for ages, so ha ha.
This discussion took place sporadically over more than three hours.
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Topic: Licensing and Copyrighted Work | 2021/12/28
Summary: LordStonefish provides a brief update on Licensing's evolving stance on copyrighted characters in wiki works.
Recap: LordStonefish belatedly responds to pr0m37h3um asking for an update on how Licensing will handle works containing copyrighted characters: "We're taking care of policy regarding this in the New Year. We're planning a thorough search of articles "containing" existing copyrighted work to determine if it either 1) falls under the boundaries of criticism/commentary, 2) Is fanfiction but can be rewritten to remove the offending content, or 3) must be deleted off the wiki." They note that they quotated "containing" because "there's some literary distinctions regarding what is arguable as criticism. Licensing Team User X may think SCP-5346 may be acceptable as a literary commentary on Tom Hanks' image and the film Forrest Gump in a way that will not trigger a lawsuit, and Licensing Team User Y may think any mention of Forrest Gump, the character, is enough to trigger a lawsuit from either Paramount Pictures or the estate of Winston Groom." pr0m37h3um asks: "Where does parody fall into that?" Stonefish responds: "Depends on who you're speaking to. I personally feel there's a lot of parody on the wiki that is not likely to trigger a lawsuit, but there's senior team members who would feel most comfortable if any and all outside references are deleted." They note that "We need to come to a unified decision on what is acceptable or not." pr0m37h3um is content to wait for said decision. Stonefish feels that edge cases will be given sufficient discussion before anything is done. A specific article using copyrighted characters, of which pr0m37h3um is a co-author, is brought up; Stonefish regrets that while they enjoy said articles, they don't think the material was sufficiently subverted for the articles to qualify as parody. pr0m37h3um disagrees, and Stonefish invites discussion on the matter "When we begin deliberation."
This discussion took place over twenty minutes.
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Topic: Offsite Links | 2021/12/28
Recap: EstrellaYoshte poses a hypothetical: "are authors allowed to link their onlyfans." Pedagon doesn't think so; Limeyy notes that "authors can and have linked nsfw sites/accounts either directly or secondhand on their author pages before" but not an OnlyFans. Estrella asks for clarification: "without any content warnings or whatever?" Limeyy would need to check, but is not in favour of this thing which they state nevertheless "currently happens." HarryBlank thinks it probably shouldn't be currently happening, and Limeyy agrees. Athenodora asks: "onlyfans would fall under our Donations policy, or something else?" Limeyy isn't sure but thinks whether it's allowed at all is the main issue. Staff, being a collection of magpies, are distracted by a discussion about PlaguePJP's fictional currency "PlagueCoins" and lose all track of what they were talking about.
This discussion took place primarily over a one-hour period, with meaningless junk at the end.
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Topic: Minors on Site and Staff | 2021/12/28
Summary: Vivarium, OptimisticLucio and Limeyy discuss the question of what protections for minors are being added to, rather than removed from, policy.
Recap: OptimisticLucio states that "we need to make it clearer how reporting to AHT works," and make the process easier. Same with the disciplinary process. Limeyy provides a sandbox with a list of "every issue that each team and the 05 and forum posts have raised with" the Age Unraising Proposal, complete with responses to each issue. Vivarium notes that "Having new policy to replace what you are removing will make this more favorable." Limeyy notes that they also have a list of the Anti-Harassment Team's issues with the proposal which they will not be sharing. Vivarium has to leave, to Lucio's distress. Limeyy wants it made clear that "This is something we’ve discussed extensively outside of staffchat btw we’re not just adlibbing this," and Lucio agrees: "we kinda spoke it to death privately." Lucio agrees to wait for Vivarium to come back, "otherwise we'll just walk in circles again." Vivarium agrees: "I will recomend this. We have a lot of policies we are working on right now. Let's put this on hold and get through the other ones first." Lucio feels that putting something on hold in a staff context is no different from dropping it entirely, and encourages the involved parties to continue discussing it in private so that when the conversation resumes there's something new to talk about. Vivarium states: "It's better to focus on one thing at a time and do it well, then try and do it all at once and then take forever to make the policy happen." He points to several other pressing issues.
DrBleep, pinged some time ago, shares this context on not having minors on staff: "We agreed it was a rather silly measure with the rolling age up policy." She asks to be pinged about it later, as she's presently unavailable. Other issues occur instead, and this does not happen.
This discussion took less than one hour.
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Topic: Minors On Staff | 2021/12/28
Summary: Staff discuss the role of minors on staff, and how to prevent them from encountering adult content.
Recap: Limeyy asks: "When was it decided that minors are not allowed on staff?" Siddartha Alonne was not aware that this was a rule; Limeyy states that the rule is unspoken. gee0765 says "it's actually explicitly spoken iirc just not publicly," and he links to a statement in staffchat. Limeyy is wondering whether this rule "has policy precedent or not," as they were once "researching a similar rule where minors existing on staff weren’t allowed to be promoted beyond their current rank" and discovered that said rule "was basically bogus and by one person who was mostly disagreed with at the time." Limeyy notes that gee's link only covers the promotions angle, and pings DrBleep to discuss the question. hungrypossum and Siddartha would also like to know the origin. Limeyy opines: "Given that it’s a rule that isn’t followed by at least 4 captains I know and isn’t enshrined anywhere it feels like a stupid rule to have." Vivarium says this is "incorrect," as "I don't concern myself with checking ages when I recruit JS but promos are a different story."
Limeyy states that considering age in promotions "is actively policy we’ve abandoned." Vivarium states that he and Bleep "have been following that rule" because "staff are expected to handle and witness content that may be considered too adult for minors," which was the reasoning for its implementation. Limeyy does not believe this is the reasoning, and links what they believe to be the rule's first mention; Vivarium responds: "Do you honestly think that is the only place it was discussed? This is prior to our re organization so claiming a reason is incorrect is a big assumption." Limeyy states that their sense of the timeline came from a conversation with admins. They also state their annoyance at not having access to the entire conversation. Limeyy states that this is how policy presently works: "Minors are not supposed to be brought into staff and were previously not allowed to be promoted, but this was rescinded following new promotions policy and a discussion in adcap… recaps." Vivarium asks if this was done on 05command as a proposal. Limeyy says it was not. Vivarium says it isn't policy, then; Limeyy counters that the rule against hiring/promoting minors is also not policy under that criteria. Vivarium doesn't see a problem: "if it's not policy, then this is at the discretion of the Captains and who the believe should be promoted." He adds: "This is literally the exact same situation as the adult tag situation. We were handling prior without an actual policy to verify it so now I have to write the policy."
Having established that "there is no policy denying minors from joining staff," Limeyy asks their followup question: can they invite a minor onto the Site Criticism Team? hungrypossum states that his "current understanding is that as long as you're old enough to be a site member, you're old enough to be JS." Vivarium believes that the appointment in question "will be fine," though he wants to know the "activity expectations" for the "ton of JS" Site Crit is seeking, as he is concerned about JS inactivity across the board. Limeyy intends to keep on top of their activity, but is more interested right now in the policy question.
It is clear that the existing conversations on staff age have resulted in a variety of contrasting interpretations. Vivarium suggests that "we should honestly throw any assumptions out the window and only focus on what us actual voted on policy." "Which is nothing," Limeyy agrees, "So you need to be of site age for staff and of site age for promos." Vivarium states that it should remain "up to the discretion of Captains whether they want to keep it 18+ or not." Limeyy thinks this is strange outside of the Anti-Harassment Team; Vivarium doesn't: "MAST is about to have a team dedicated to talking about sex writing so its not too weird," and "I've already thought about the fact that minors could view the discussion, so I may need to lock it from view." Limeyy thinks this is a simple concern: don't invite minors to "the sex talk team," and lock the discussion. Vivarium doesn't want to lock the discussion, as "Transparency is important." Limeyy responds: "You already have to. There are minors in MAST." Vivarium considers this "kinda a valid reason for considering 18+" Limeyy states: "Lock out only minors if you’d like but this is a problem you’ll have to face if you recruit and promote new minors or not," and also "if we have underage staffers in MAST anyway we need systems in place to prevent members from seeing this channel for example.
hungrypossum notes that "Discord channels can be made 18+," though they're in favour of "keeping the rest of MAST open to underage users." Limeyy states that "it’s kind of difficult to justify 18 on disc even given that there are minors (minor?) in disc-cord." They agree that Anti-Harassment Team matters must obviously be 18+. Siddartha doesn't see why adult page discussions should be "locked away" when they've been held in staffchat in the past. Vivarium proposes: "Instead of trying to figure out how to make this non existent policy work, we just leave it as it is? Unless you want to make a policy surrounding this which will only add a ton of work to your plate and clog up the already ridiculously large backlog of policies." Limeyy agrees: "we just don’t do policy for this. You gotta be 16 for staff and 16 for promos." They add that "There are already minors in every non aht staff space" and "There’s no point restricting more of them." Vivarium counters: "Think about this fact, we are already exposing minors to adult content by reporting said adult content in staff discussions." hungrypossum counter-counters: "This argument has the pitfall of minors being exposed to said materials before we add splash pages/revert vandalism attempts." Vivarium acknowledges this, and feels that it's the point really: "No matter what we do, staff members will be exposed to adult content. If we care about preventing minors from seeing that content, there isn't a lot of options"… besides raising the age limit for staff, unfortunately. He sums it up: "Either we give up transparency and segregate channels even more or we go 18+" Limeyy disagrees: "Doing so without booting existing minor staff is hypocritical and makes it a pointless gesture. Booting existing minor staff is a stupid idea." Vivarium asks why it's "stupid," while taking issue with the phrasing. Limeyy explains: "Because they do a ton of very useful work for us and we’d be losing a fair chunk of active staff," and kicking them would be poor repayment for their work. Vivarium isn't sure this is a fair balance with the possibility of exposing minors to adult content. Siddartha suggests waiting for the age increase to continue.
OptimisticLucio opines that "Minors should be fine with anything that’s not… well, specifically explicit. Honestly i am at a loss at what they shouldn’t be allowed to see other than Disc/AHT related topics." Vivarium claims that he's "seen staff member call for people to read adult content to make sure it isn't crossing a line." Lucio suggests specifying that the content is adult in nature, or spoiler tagging the conversation, "Or, if really needed, make an “adult only” staff channel for explicit content and questions." Athenodora suggests determining which channels will contain potentially adult content, and determining which channels they can see thereby. Dora asks about what to do when people ask for crit on adult drafts; Limeyy states that nothing is done, as "We have content on site produced by minors that is behind the adult tag redirect."
Lucio apologizes to "the poor sod recapping this in a month or two," who is frankly used to this by now anyway, but thanks. "Respect the troops," Limeyy agrees.
Vivarium notes that "We don't have any policy what so ever that protects minors on staff from viewing adult content," which he considers "the crux of the issue." Lucio mentions the age raising, which Vivarium does not consider policy as he believes there was no 05command vote. Lucio informs him that there was, and links a thread… which turns out to not have been a vote, but to have contained a clause enabling the policy if no dissent is aired in the discussion. Vivarium is given pause: "So wait, that means the only policy that is protecting minors for adult content is literally the policy I am rewriting because it wasn't official." Lucio agrees: "Yes. And even the “protecting” is questionable." Vivarum carries this further: "We aren't protecting minors. Hell we are actively trying to get rid of the age requirement which is the only other policy protecting minors." Lucio acknowledges this, and wants "more policies to protect minors" rather than attempts to ignore their existence. Limeyy doesn't feel like Vivarium is characterizing the Age Unraising Proposal fairly. Vivarium asks: "Is it just going to remove it or add policy to improve it?" Limeyy replies: "The latter." Vivarium asks what the improvements are; Limeyy says they're "Still in the works. I am working with teams individually to find the team’s issues with existing policy and age unraising and how it can be solved." Vivarium and Lucio agree to shift the conversation to the question of what protections are being added, rather than removed. This becomes its own, much briefer recap.
This discussion took place over less than three hours.
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Topic: Still Not Funny | 2021/12/29
Summary: Yossi tries to do a funny again and HarryBlank isn't having it.
Recap: Yossipossi arrives bearing a new question from whoever was responsible for the Presidents fiasco in the November recap:
every president since the establishment of the geneva conventions has violated the geneva conventions. is this sufficient reason to ban them from the wiki, assuming that they are capable of being banned? if so, is it because the geneva conventions apply to the scp wiki, or for some other reason?
"so whats everyone's opinions on banning presidents for crimes against humanity," Yossi asks. HarryBlank expresses contempt. hungrypossum "literally just woke up man." HarryBlank proposes an alternative topic of conversation: "What's everyone's opinion on banning Yossi for crimes against Recap." HarryBlank is in favour. Yossi protests: "dont shoot the messenger." Harry doesn't see why not, "If they bring bad messages." Modulum proposes a further topical reorientation: "hi brief question. would cannibalism be against AHT policy." Yossi doesn't think so. Harry begins drafting this recap, with the tentative but accurate title "Fuck You, Recap," and shares this fact with staffchat. Yossi feels Harry's pain is justifiable punishment for membership in what Yossi fails to realize is the best staff team. ROUNDERHOUSE is philosophical: "i wonder if this joke will become funny the fifteenth time we do it." Yossi doesn't think it will, prompting a response of "better try a sixteenth, just for good measure," from ROUNDERHOUSE. Limeyy decides to humour the question for some reason, and responds: "If our anonymous friend read the first recap they’d see that I brought this up during the conversation." They suggest the questioner "read the recaps through a couple dozen times and get back to us." pr0m37h3um threatens Yossi with a barrage of emotes, but doesn't have Nitro, so can't unleash it. Yossi states, apropos of nothing but in tune with the general tenor: "Among Us." EstrellaYoshte states: "under US laws, the act of cannibalism is legally permissible." HarryBlank is getting fed up: "This whole conversation is cannibalism. Autocannibalism."
ROUNDERHOUSE claims to be "loathe to entertain this," but he's lying, because he immediately adds "it's illegal in idaho." He also cites local statutes banning it more generally. Yossi has passed Limeyy's answer along, and has received the following response: "while it is true that the first recap does mention war crimes, at no point is it determined that the geneva conventions do or do not apply to the scp wiki, which was part of my question." Yossi asks the room: "the scp wiki isnt a country, so the Geneva Convention just wouldn't apply right?" Harry responds: "I think this discussion is proof that there is nothing protecting us from inhumane treatment, yes." Yossi offers to recap the conversation, but Harry has already prepared the least-flattering version possible and is much pleased with it. Yossi has a new message from their source: "i would also like to say that you have my permission to give staff members my discord to yell at me directly if you ever get tired of taking shit for this." Yossi adds: "If this is still going by tomorrow I'm dropping the name lol." Harry responds: "If this is still going by tomorrow I'm dropping from the team." hungrypossum thinks this would be an act of self-care. Limeyy charitably characterizes this endless chain of horrors as "forcing recap to recap the same couple jokes over and over."
Yossi decides to attempt a volta by noting Recap's exhaustive attention to detail, which Yossi did not originally envision at the start of the project. Yossi doesn't think it's sustainable; Harry does, "if there's a team effort." ROUNDERHOUSE opines: "i think the natural evolution is that the little stuff is going to get broad-stroked while the extended, intense conversations get beat-for-beats which is… more sustainable." HarryBlank claims that the appearance that Recap is covering every conversation in extreme detail is inaccurate; the recaps are long, but they are summaries of much, much longer conversations. He also claims that the conversations being recapped are much more long-winded and circuitous than what is presented. pr0m37h3um states: "I agree that we're more beat-for-beat than initially expected but as long as people do their part, I think we can keep it up." None of this is funny, so the dead horse whinnies its last.
This discussion took place over less than one hour.
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Topic: -INT Incident Recap Response | 2021/12/29
Summary: Staff discuss responses to an -INT user's complaints about the recent -INT incident.
Recap: Vivarium posts a link to a mainsite forum thread created by an -INT user, who is reacting negatively to the -INT incident described in the November Recap. Vivarium thinks it should have been a comment on the recap itself, and suggests that it be left to the Recap Team to respond; OptimisticLucio points out that while the recap triggered the statement, the statement itself is "a general comment for -EN staff." Vivarium clarifies that "if people go onto that thread and enflame the situation, it won't be good, so whoever responds needs to be civil about it." stormfallen agrees: "it'd be literally proving his point." Vivarium is worried that a non-staffmember might respond first, further aggravating the situation; Lucio adds that a staff response would need to be carefully considered in order to avoid producing the same effect. Alexander asks "should an appropriate staff member keep an eye on the thread" in case things get out of hand. Vivarium doesn't think so, but he does think the complaint deserves a proper response rather than dismissal or ignoring.
GremlinGroup questions whether it should have been a comment on the recap, and whether there are rules suggesting this; Vivarium clarifies that "the comment is directly a reaction to the Recaps, so it should at least be in staff policy discussions or something. Having it in general invites the wrong kind of attention." He is worried about pile-on from the community. GremlinGroup doesn't feel a response from Recap would be appropriate, as "Recap isn't here to defend anyone." He also doesn't think he, as the member of Recap who was pinged, would have the ability to prevent brigading on the thread. Alexander asks: "which team is responsible for making sure people follow the rules on the forums?" Vivarium explains: "It's a collective staff responsibility."
Staff member PlaguePJP has left a one-word reply, which hungrypossum considers "unbecoming of staff." stormfallen pings Plague to explain; Plague considers the essay a bad faith defence of an indefensible moral stance, and responded dismissively because he felt that was appropriate. hungrypossum feels Plague has mischaracterized the thread; Plague points out that his characterization comes from a direct quote of said thread. Vivarium feels this is beside the point: "doesn't matter what the post says. We are staff and as such we need to handle these situations in a way that doesn't make it look like we don't care. You want the entire INT community to think we are a bunch of American pricks who wave their weight around? If you don't then we need to have some class about this." He adds that the user is likely not a native English speaker. pr0m37h3um isn't sure we need to be focusing on "a one word reply" right now. Vivarium states that Plague's dismissive response is problematic because he is staff; Leveritas agrees: "It also doesn't look well if it seems like we're immediately jumping into defense mode, one-word replies make it seem like we're not actually interested in breaking down/responding do individual points, look at something disagreeable, and make it look like we're dismissing the entire argument because of that."
Vivarium adds: "Since the post is directly talking to us, how we react defines who we are. If we handle it with maturity and class, we look good. If we shit on it guess what, we look like shit." Plague feels his concerns with the post are "common sense" and do not require explanation. Vivarium asks that he not engage further; "We will find someone else who can handle proving a point in a respectful and elegant way that's more then one word." Plague agrees. Alexander asks what the long-term stakes of the issue are, and whether handling it promptly will "mitigate the severity." Vivarium notes that "The ES incident is ongoing" and will be affected by this. OptimisticLucio has posted on the thread, and asks for a temperature check. gee0765 thinks it's fine, as does Vivarium who says: "Just remain civil and deconstruct the argument." Alexander asks if he can do anything to help; Vivarium thanks him for the offer but says there's no need. Lucio suggests that Alexander could "Respond with something honest and constructive to show that -EN members honestly listen and want to talk, maybe?" as "constructive comments to balance out the inevitable non-constructivity could help." Vivarium agrees with this, pointing out that the SCP community is a community of writers, and should therefore be able to handle a civil and constructive tone. Plague says he will "fix" his post, and Vivarium appreciates this: "Just keep a cool head. That will always be a benefit."
Leveritas notes that the original poster has "a lot of claims about staff behaviour without providing examples and/or proof. I feel it would be a suggestion to ask for them, as they can be examined for legitimacy." GremlinGroup asks that this not be done in the thread, but via PM, to avoid the sense of accusation and assure the user they will be taken seriously. He feels that "A public post will turn it into a screenshot-flinging" contest. Staff briefly discuss whether addressing the user's complaint that this issue is America-centric would be useful; Leveritas believes it would be, providing the example that "n the Netherlands gay acceptance has been such a non-controversy that we don't really do anything for pride month, there doesn't really need to be?" Lucio feels that "claims like “pride flag only matters to Americans” feel a bit exaggerated" and GremlinGroup thinks ignoring complaints because of how things work in the Netherlands would be "Netherlands-centric." Leveritas clarifies that he agrees with these points, and was merely providing his example for context.
Lucio feels the America-centrism is "a core part of the argument" but hungrypossum doesn't "see it as a pillar of their post." Leveritas asks again whether he can ask for examples to be provided, as "I think by and large, this is just a misunderstanding of intentions and some cultural blind spots that are misinterpreted." Alexander reminds him of the PM discussion. stormfallen suggests a member of the Disciplinary Team might send the PM. possum says he will "abstain from having opinions since I'm not LGBT+ either"; Leveritas suggests that possum's opinion on a misunderstanding is no less valid for this, and while possum agrees, he explains that he lacks the proper context and will defer to others.
Leveritas characterizes the problem as "people seeing hidden intentions or beliefs where there aren't necessarily ones," which he thinks can be deconstructed by addressing evidence. He adds: "it's also important to not come off as defensive, dismissive or giving benefit of the doubt to our own, but not to other branches, since that's what we're also being accused of, validly or no." He and hungrypossum agree that the argument needs to be considered good faith and engaged with on that basis. gee feels this conversation is circuitous. Alexander attempts to summarize one of -EN's issues: "some members of the EN wiki value this community as an escape from intolerance irl and so they respond vehemently to (perceived or actual) intolerance from other branches"; "not that this excuses problematic/inappropriate behavior on their part, but this is part of why there is such a strong reaction to this issue." Lucio feels that aside from the America-centrism, "most of the post is kind of right. We do kind of have a tendency to assume the -EN worldview applies to other branches." [emphasis in original] LadyKatie shows up and asks "Hi, what's the backscroll?" Lucio replies with a miracle of parsimony: "Ex-DE mod made a post about -ES." He thinks it's going fine so far. Leveritas suggests having a Disc member promise that the matter is being looked into; gee doesn't see why, since "nobody is getting banned." Lucio suggests a blanket statement that staff are looking into it. LadyKatie promises to handle it.
gee suggests that Lucio should be on the Ambassador Team; LadyKatie is too busy to train a new ambassador at present. Lucio isn't sure Katie should be the one handling this, as the user has made it clear that they only trust Katie amongst -EN staff and having her resolve the issue wouldn't alter that awkward state of affairs. He suggests Katie instead coach someone else to respond. Lucio suggests that Leveritas make the post. Katie agrees to work with Leveritas: "I have all the context on this because I've been the involved rep for years. And this is a discussion we'll have to have as staff at a point, because many of these concerns are completely valid and part of the problems we face with INT today." Leveritas workshops the post with Katie.
EstrellaYoshte workshops a post of their own with Katie and Lucio.
A brief tangent about -DE concerns specifically runs through this conversation, which Katie suggests is part of "a larger issue where we have a bunch of politically half aware people coming in and saying ridiculous things about political issues in other countries they don't really know much about." How -DE handles depictions of Nazis, and how they feel about the depictions on -EN, is briefly discussed.
LadyKatie feels this situation was inevitable: "This will never be something we can fully fix (some people will always just be, and others will look back on their moments like this and cringe), but it is something that we as staff largely haven't cared about."
This discussion took place over two hours.
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Topic: Sticky Situation | 2021/12/30
Summary: stormbreath deals with the overabundance of stickied threads in the Announcements forum by splitting things up.
Recap: stormbreath points out that the Announcements forum on the mainsite is an absolute swamp of stickies. He proposes: "we should probably create a new forum category for Page Announcements, and have the page announcement threads in there, with nothing else." The new page/update/deletions stickies can't be un-stickied. LadyKatie is in favour. stormbreath further proposes "solution: we make a new category, only containing these threads, so we can clear out the obscene number of stickies there and only have actual, important announcements in stickied in that category. by having the other category only have the post announcement threads, they will effectively always be stickied." Vivarium "actually planned on asking for a pure recruitment category once we had more recruitment threads." stormbreath notes that while this is good, it doesn't solve the entire issue; "the need to have those six threads perpetually stickied causes incredible bloat and prevents any other usage of sticky in the Announcement forum from being effective." Vivarium is supportive of any fix. HarryBlank agrees. stormbreath notes that there is support in staffchat and plans to "whip up an 05 post later today," omnibused with "a Recruitment thread forum category."
stormbreath thinks there will be two new categories — "Post Announcements" and "Recruitment." He breaks it down further: "split the "Site Announcements and Proposals" group into two - most likely, a "Staff Processes, for 04, Recap, Town Halls, Recruitment" and one keeping the current name for Announcements, Post Announcements, Proposals & Policies and Introductions." He implements his changes, making new categories and moving the relevant posts over. He notes future tasks: "We may want to move some of the old threads out of announcements as well, and move threads out of the archives into Page Announcements, but both of those are a workload I'm not going to deal with at the moment," then makes announcements on 05command and the mainsite.
This discussion took place sporadically over less than two hours.
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Topic: International Tech Group | 2021/12/30
Summary: LadyKatie proposes an inter-branch Tech group, which is swiftly put into place following general support from Staff.
Recap: LadyKatie begins a discussion in Staffchat surrounding a proposal she was planning. Originally, Katie intended to bring the proposal to 05command first, as a discussion. However, due to various recent failures on the wikidot platform, she says she is bringing it to the Discord to get it done faster.
LadyKatie puts forward her idea, as proposed to aismallard, to have the -EN branch bring their Tech Team staff members into -INT spaces for non-diplomatic tech roles. She states the “idea behind it was to create a brain trust between tech teams to share knowlege and information, have a larger group to help solve problems, and overall act as almost extensions of everyone's tech teams.” She clarifies that this would not unite all Tech teams, but extend the abilities of individual Tech staffers. She leaves the organisation of the “brain trust” to those who will be more in the know. She notes that aismallard and stormbreath, as well as “INT” are in favour of the proposal.
Vivarium notes his approval with the policy, and asks who would be brought over to the “brain trust” from -EN. Pighead considers the proposal a “win-win for everyone” and asks the same question as Vivarium. gee0765 is also in favour; they aren’t sure how it’d work, but trust that Tech will “figure something out.” Katie shares this belief; she states that aismallard and stormbreath will be figuring this out. LadyKatie goes on to say that the “exact operations of it would fall more on INT side.” She states that the team will change as it grows and develops; she’s inexperienced in Tech matters and thus unwilling to “throw down a charter, an exact structure.” She states that the “brain trust” is not "an extra team, it's an add on involving two teams.”
stormbreath states Tech haven’t decided who would be sent to the “brain trust,” partially due to a shortage of Tech staff. LadyKatie states that she'll "write up something official for 05," as she was intending, as it'll "have the specifics written up for future refrence."
This discussion takes around half an hour.
Twenty minutes later, LadyKatie announces that the group has been established. GremlinGroup is confused by this, thinking it was going to go to 05 first. He and LadyKatie quickly patch this up; the proposal was put in staffchat in lieu of 05, and was largely being announced / discussed for visibility. As an issue pertaining to solely one team (albeit across many branches) no vote was required to bring the Tech Trust into existence.
This exchange occurs over 2 minutes.
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Topic: “None” Tech Placeholder | 2021/12/31
Summary: aismallard proposes a new placeholder page to avoid dealing with a common css error. No issues are raised and the placeholder is made. Staff reminisce on another notable Wikidot bug and its impact on site culture.
Recap: aismallard appears in Staffchat to propose the creation of a Tech Placeholder page at http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/none. She explains that, in certain cases on the Wiki, using “none” in lieu of linking a URL in formatting can lead to the link pointing to “http://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/none”. While this is benign when no content is hosted on the page, if a user were to publish an article to this page, it could lead to “negative consequences”. She has brought the topic to staffchat to ask whether any members of staff had comments or concerns about the proposed placeholder.
Alexander says they think it would be unlikely someone would post to this url; Naepic disagrees, arguing that the “novelty factor” would make it likely. Vivarium backs this up: he “would write that tale.” gee0765 would too, and she’s “mad [she] didn’t”. GremlinGroup thinks it’d be a “cool article” and laments the loss of “the best pattern screamer format screw.”
In a slight redirection of topic, Naepic wonders whether SCP-5257’s permanent broken-ness as a Poisoned Slot (explained here) has drawn the ire of any authors on-site. Naepic opines that, should the slot be fixed come wikijump, it should be left empty. aismallard either wants a contest to be held for the slot, or for Naepic’s suggestion to go ahead. DrBleep would be in favour of the contest; she currently holds the attribution for the placeholder for SCP-5257. GremlinGroup agrees with aismallard, and also suggests making the page a redirect to SCP-7525-EX, which mocks the bug. Bleep is in favour of this redirect.
About ten minutes later, aismallard officially proposes creating the page. Twenty minutes pass without opposition, and she creates the page.
This topic lasts exactly an hour.
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Mainsite Mirror Thread: https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/forum/t-14437452/december-2021-recap
And that’s it from us! Happy New Year!
