This is a great start, @jflory7! A few thoughts/questions:

• I know you say the examples are not exhaustive, but was leaving out Fedora Magazine deliberate or does it fall under the proposed policy?

• By "social media platforms" do you mean Fedora's social media platforms or those belonging to contributors individually?

• It's probably worth including Code of Conduct violations in the list of what's absolutely forbidden

• I'm a little leery of specifying consequences in this policy, since that really belongs in the CoC. On the other hand, I'm not sure we'll get a new CoC any time soon so maybe this is the best we can.

Now that I think about it some more, I don't think either of Community Blog or Magazine belong, because the intent seems to be for this to apply to unmoderated venues. Both the Community Blog and Magazine are moderated, official project channels.

@bcotton:
I know you say the examples are not exhaustive, but was leaving out Fedora Magazine deliberate or does it fall under the proposed policy?

Now that I think about it some more, I don't think either of Community Blog or Magazine belong, because the intent seems to be for this to apply to unmoderated venues. Both the Community Blog and Magazine are moderated, official project channels.

I deliberately excluded the Fedora Magazine. Admittedly, the Community Blog probably falls under the same exclusion. It just so happens that both publications are managed by Red Hat employees, but that was not always the case. That was why I included the Community Blog as an example initially.

@bcotton:
By "social media platforms" do you mean Fedora's social media platforms or those belonging to contributors individually?

Originally I was thinking of community social media accounts. But I also don't want to overlap too much on the Community sites and accounts policy.

I'm on the fence. What do you think?

@bcotton:
It's probably worth including Code of Conduct violations in the list of what's absolutely forbidden

Please give me the exact wording to use for this.

I'm pushing back a bit on this one. What is forbidden? Not being considerate or respectful? That is a very broad stroke. :wink: But I know changing language for the CoC is out of scope for this PR, but our existing Code of Conduct isn't clear on that, so I don't know how to be clear on that in this document either.

@bcotton:
I'm a little leery of specifying consequences in this policy, since that really belongs in the CoC. On the other hand, I'm not sure we'll get a new CoC any time soon so maybe this is the best we can.

I intentionally left it open-ended. Removal of content is not much different from what is already written on the Planet wiki page:

"Material which is deemed inappropriate may be removed from the Planet without prior notice, although the Fedora Project's contributors do attempt to resolve every such situation constructively and amicably."

Possible suspension of an account is new language, but it is also vague language. I did this in the spirit of "re-establishing activity is a conversation, not an algorithm" since this was a precedent set by the Mindshare Committee.

I deliberately excluded the Fedora Magazine. Admittedly, the Community Blog probably falls under the same exclusion. It just so happens that both publications are managed by Red Hat employees, but that was not always the case. That was why I included the Community Blog as an example initially.

I don't think Red Hat employment is the deciding factor here. Just that it's moderated an an official platform of the project. The WordPress instances are hosted by Red Hat's Open Source Program Office regardless of who the fearless leader is at any moment.

Originally I was thinking of community social media accounts. But I also don't want to overlap too much on the Community sites and accounts policy.
I'm on the fence. What do you think?

I think we want to make it clear what is in scope. I'm not entirely sure I know what I think the scope should be. I think it's okay to overlap the Community sites and accounts policy, since this is basically a reinforcement of that.

@bcotton:
It's probably worth including Code of Conduct violations in the list of what's absolutely forbidden

Please give me the exact wording to use for this.

I'd go with "Content that violates the Code of Conduct"

I'm pushing back a bit on this one. What is forbidden? Not being considerate or respectful? That is a very broad stroke. 😉 But I know changing language for the CoC is out of scope for this PR, but our existing Code of Conduct isn't clear on that, so I don't know how to be clear on that in this document either.

Yeah, our Code of Conduct is suboptimal. My suggestion above just pushes the dust under the rug. I some sense it doesn't improve things any (because of the weaknesses in the CoC you point out), but it does make it explicit that we expect contributions here to abide by the CoC. Specifically I'm interested in making it clear that harassment, etc is not acceptable.

@bcotton:
I'm a little leery of specifying consequences in this policy, since that really belongs in the CoC. On the other hand, I'm not sure we'll get a new CoC any time soon so maybe this is the best we can.

I intentionally left it open-ended. Removal of content is not much different from what is already written on the Planet wiki page:

"Material which is deemed inappropriate may be removed from the Planet without prior notice, although the Fedora Project's contributors do attempt to resolve every such situation constructively and amicably."

Possible suspension of an account is new language, but it is also vague language. I did this in the spirit of "re-establishing activity is a conversation, not an algorithm" since this was a precedent set by the Mindshare Committee.

Yeah, I like the intent, I'm just not sure I like the implementation. But that's more on Legal than you. :smile: I think s/will result/may be subject to/ is an okay middle ground?

So, would that cover personal twitter account, or just the ones using the Fedora trademark ?

I do ask that, because if we cover personal twitter account of contributor, then posting a meme would result in suspension, as I think that most memes are copyright violation, especially since fair use do not exist everywhere in the world.

The part about posting nudity would also be problematic if applied to contributor personal account, I do know a few people in the free software community who do have private instagram account (or private mastodon one) to post nudes or near nudity.

The part about "adult content" is also something that rub me off in the wrong way. There is place where discussing LGBTQ topic would be seen as "adult content", even if there is nothing sexual involved. It do happen on a regular basis, see the recent cloudflare debacle ( https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/04/01/cloudflare_familyfriendly_dns_service_flubs/ ).

And in fact, adult content is quite vague. I see why it cannot be precise, but if someone speak of how they are doing their own beer, that's obviously about alcohol, and could be understood as "adult content" based on drinking laws in the US. But in Germany, you can drink beer if you are 14 under some conditions (and 16 without those condition), so that would not be understood as "adult".

Or someone speaking about their love of manga (like Elfen Lied, Battle Royale, who are kinda violent and dark), or movies (Saw 3 is 18+ in France, Trainspotting is 18+ in Argentina, Kill Bill is 18+ in Japan, Reservoir Dogs is 18+ in Germany).

@bcotton:
I don't think Red Hat employment is the deciding factor here. Just that it's moderated an an official platform of the project.

I respectfully disagree. Infrastructure and services managed by Red Hat employees for the Fedora community play by a different set of rules than infrastructure and services managed by the community. I think this is reflected by the Community Platform Engineering team handing off multiple projects to the community, but not fully being able to do so (e.g. G.D.P.R. concerns with some data).

Red Hat employment is not a crime. I don't see it in a negative light. But internal policies and motivations at Red Hat do influence decision-making about allocation of specific categories of resources in Fedora (e.g. a person's time). Since Red Hat is Fedora's most significant sponsor, I feel like this is just being honest.

@bcotton:
I'd go with "Content that violates the Code of Conduct"

Yeah, I like the intent, I'm just not sure I like the implementation. But that's more on Legal than you. 😄 I think s/will result/may be subject to/ is an okay middle ground?

Edited in commit aa8109aa5537770da24bb1d6ca19be6373b306ee.

@misc:
So, would that cover personal twitter account, or just the ones using the Fedora trademark ?

Just the Fedora Trademark. In commit aa8109aa5537770da24bb1d6ca19be6373b306ee, I added more explicit language to connect this policy to use of the Fedora Trademark.

@misc:
I do ask that, because if we cover personal twitter account of contributor, then posting a meme would result in suspension, as I think that most memes are copyright violation, especially since fair use do not exist everywhere in the world.

You put your finger on a sore spot.

A short-term reply: Fedora should not consider the behavior or content shared on personal media and this policy proposal does not apply to personal social media (unless you are using the Fedora Trademark on it). This only applies to Community Publishing Platforms, which for now, basically means the Fedora Planet and some shared Fedora-branded social media accounts. Or a personal social media account that also uses the Fedora Trademark.

A long-term reply: Technically this allows for a neo-Nazi to publish an affirmation of the Holocaust on their personal blog with no consequence to their participation in Fedora. I don't think this is what we want either. But I am also confident that we can agree something like the neo-Nazi example does not, and will not ever, belong on a Community Publishing Platform. I think this is something for the Code of Conduct to address, not the Community Publishing Platform policy.

The creative commons link does not seem to define content or work here. Also, it leads to a German page for me, so it would be good to link to a page in English to ensure "content" and "work" can be found there.

I would prefer an explicit list instead of some vague examples. As far as I understand, Twitter is not a "Community Publishing Platform" but https://twitter.com/fedora is, isn't it?

This sounds like a promise that does not seem like it will be kept. For this, someone would need to actively monitor Fedora planet posts and remove the content.

All other platforms are moderated already, aren't they? So why would violating content be published in the first place?

A short-term reply: Fedora should not consider the behavior or content shared on personal media and this policy proposal does not apply to personal social media (unless you are using the Fedora Trademark on it). This only applies to Community Publishing Platforms, which for now, basically means the Fedora Planet and some shared Fedora-branded social media accounts. Or a personal social media account that also uses the Fedora Trademark.

What does using the Fedora Trademark for a personal social media account mean?

For example for Twitter, does it mean that the Fedora logo is used as part of the artwork for the account or does it mean the trademark is used in a tweet, a re-tweet or a tweet that is liked?

What about Telegram groups around Fedora as listed in https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Telegram ?

This seems to be the only place we document any result of a Code of Conduct violation. By writing that they might loose their publishing access, it seems like this is the hardest action that might result from a CoC violation but there are other outcomes such as disabling the FAS account or taking legal action, IMHO.

I rebased the PR on latest master. Will try to pick this back up and address comments later in August.

Hi @till, I pushed four new commits that addressed your points. I split them out commit-by-commit to preserve my logic and process for thinking through the changes. See the commit messages for more details:

1. d38ea39 Maintain internal definition of Creative Works
2. b9417d4 Change examples of Community Publishing Platform to explicit list
3. 5e8a209 Do not set false expectations of active curation
4. a892825 Leave disciplinary action to Code of Conduct

Your feedback was excellent and I appreciate your eye for detail. I actually feel much better about this draft now. I am curious for you to take another look and share your thoughts.

@till:
What does using the Fedora Trademark for a personal social media account mean?

For example for Twitter, does it mean that the Fedora logo is used as part of the artwork for the account or does it mean the trademark is used in a tweet, a re-tweet or a tweet that is liked?

If you use the Fedora Trademark in your social media profile picture, and you also post anti-Semitic, racist, misogynist, homophobic, or any kind of discriminatory content, Fedora should protect its right to the Trademark, and thus the Fedora Council's right to work with a platform to remove the Fedora Trademark where the Fedora Council wishes.

So, the bottom line is, the Trademark Policy should protect Fedora's right to remove the Trademark where the owners of the Trademark wish. If you put the Fedora Trademark in your profile, avatar, or digital presence, and you behave in a way that reflects the values of the Fedora Project, no problem. If you use the Trademark and start to do things that are damaging to Fedora's Vision or Mission Statement, we might have a problem.

Rebased to latest master.

Hmm, why "Creative works"? This seems to conditionalize the policy on the "creative" part (and copyright laws). If I create an automatically generated blog (e.g. something that republishes the fedora-messaging stream with combined random quotes from another source), it will not be "creative work" since it'll be fully algorithmically generated. I think it would be more reasonable to use a more general phrase like "content (text, images, videos)".

I have a little discord-specific question. On a real time chat platform such as this, it wouldn't be of much benefit to go through a roundabout way outlined in the bottom of this PR and that is "follow the reporting guidelines in the Fedora Code of Conduct."

Instead, we have a way that allows our members to get in touch with the moderation team privately through PMing a bot which in turn sends a notification to all the moderators and further facilitates communication between the team and the member.

So I'm wondering whether this should be somehow documented either within the CoC or within this PR. Personally I'd like a sentence added to the CoC that reaching out to moderators of the platform in question should precede the report via pagure.io/CoC (unless the issue is with those moderators (?))

Where I'm coming from - creating a CoC ticket because someone posted or said something inappropriate on a real time (end-user oriented) chat platform, for it to be handled weeks later, isn't helpful. Such channels require response within hours in the worst case scenario - ideally minutes.

I feel like "CoC reporting" is for much larger issues than this, (especially contributor focused issues) and that this should be reflected in these documents. Somewhere...

@zbyszek wrote…
If I create an automatically generated blog (e.g. something that republishes the fedora-messaging stream with combined random quotes from another source), it will not be "creative work" since it'll be fully algorithmically generated.

Personally I disagree, I would consider this a creative work because it required a human's creativity to make the algorithm. Our algorithms are biased to their makers. Take a look at Facebook these days. :grinning:

But I appreciate your feedback. While I disagree personally, I'll see what others think during the two-week review period before proposing changes.

@rhea wrote…
So I'm wondering whether this should be somehow documented either within the CoC or within this PR. Personally I'd like a sentence added to the CoC that reaching out to moderators of the platform in question should precede the report via pagure.io/CoC (unless the issue is with those moderators (?))

This is a great question. I am with you on this too. Your Discord experience mirrors my experience with Telegram. I would even hypothesize ~75% of Fedora Community conflicts can be amicably resolved at a more "local" level without going down the CoC route.

I don't have a great answer. I want to say it is a Code of Conduct question, but I do deliberately mention Discord and Telegram communities in the policy. It is probably easier to add a note like this in this policy than it is to propose changes to the Code of Conduct.

I will try to revisit and propose a new edit this week. I am traveling starting tomorrow so I have limited bandwidth, but it is on my list. :grin:

But opening a CoC ticket is also used for more than reacting, as that's also for long term tracking.

If X do a CoC violation on platform A, B and C, who are handled by different mods, it can go under the radar if they are not talking together (especially if there is secret on decision, etc, etc). That's a issue recently highlighted on https://blog.mozilla.org/community/2020/09/10/weaving-safety-into-the-fabric-of-open-source/ , see "Centralized Data Tracking".

So the formulation should also be clear that while people should speak to moderators for a faster answer, I feel it should also be summarized in a ticket, for tracking purpose.

For tracking of moderation we have the tools necessary for the platforms in question. The problem with making this information "cross-platform" is that we would have to track our members to actually be able to figure out what's their account on which network and you can probably guess what kind of implications that would have, to not mention the need for a technical solution better than pagure tickets. (A database with unique user identifier, all of their connected network accounts, their infractions and moderation actions taken against them. All that with integration with whatever network we want this to run on. Think Valkyrja project with Telegram, Matrix, IRC, and "forum" modules.)

See commit c1edc24:

Amend reporting guidelines for Platform moderators

This commit amends the reporting guidelines at the end of the proposal.
The edit is based on feedback from @rhea in Pull Request #67. It
encourages reporters to work first with Platform moderators as a first
response. It deliberately adds language to allow a Platform moderator to
defer an issue to the Fedora Code of Conduct process at their
discretion.

This is a work-around to NOT collect Personally-Identifiable Information
about day-to-day issues often resolved quickly by an informed Platform
moderator who may have additional context that is not obvious. This
work-around hopefully encourages Platform moderators to work with the
Fedora Council at their own discretion of whether a local issue needs
escalation. Because making a formal report in the CoC is an
escalation, from a psychological point-of-view.

However, it also leaves a pathway for a reporter who is unsatisfied with
the handling of an issue by a Platform moderator to escalate.

@rhea I am curious on your thoughts on the edit from a Discord admin point-of-view.

Sounds good, thank you!

Approved in ticket