Reuters: “Exclusive: Wikipedia Launches New Global Rules to Combat Site Abuses”

UPDATED POST (Feb. 3, 2021): Elevating Wikimedia: a Universal Code of Conduct for Free Knowledge by Katherine Maher, CEO, Wikimedia Foundation
Official announcement of Wikimedia’s First Universal Code of Conduct.

From Reuters:

The foundation that operates Wikipedia will launch its first global code of conduct on Tuesday, seeking to address criticism that it has failed to combat harassment and suffers from a lack of diversity.

“We need to be much more inclusive,” said María Sefidari, the chair of board of trustees for the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. “We are missing a lot of voices, we’re missing women, we’re missing marginalized group.

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The new code of conduct bans harassment on and off the site, barring behaviors like hate speech, the use of slurs, stereotypes or attacks based on personal characteristics, as well as threats of physical violence and ‘hounding,’ or following someone across different articles to critique their work.

It also bans deliberately introducing false or biased information into content. Wikipedia is a relatively trusted site compared to major social media platforms which have struggled to curb misinformation.

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