The Foundation supports challenges to laws in Texas and Florida that jeopardize Wikipedia’s community-led governance model and the right to freedom of expression.
An amicus brief, also known as a “friend-of-the-court” brief, is a document filed by individuals or organizations who are not part of a lawsuit, but who have an interest in the outcome of the case and want to raise awareness about their concerns. The Wikimedia Foundation’s amicus brief calls upon the Supreme Court to strike down laws passed in 2021 by Texas and Florida state legislatures. Texas House Bill 20 and Florida Senate Bill 7072 prohibit website operators from banning users or removing speech and content based on the viewpoints and opinions of the users in question.
“These laws expose residents of Florida and Texas who edit Wikipedia to lawsuits by people who disagree with their work,” said Stephen LaPorte, General Counsel for the Wikimedia Foundation. “For over twenty years, a community of volunteers from around the world have designed, debated, and deployed a range of content moderation policies to ensure the information on Wikipedia is reliable and neutral. We urge the Supreme Court to rule in favor of NetChoice to protect Wikipedia’s unique model of community-led governance, as well as the free expression rights of the encyclopedia’s dedicated editors.”
“The quality of Wikipedia as an online encyclopedia depends entirely on the ability of volunteers to develop and enforce nuanced rules for well-sourced, encyclopedic content,” said Rebecca MacKinnon, Vice President of Global Advocacy at the Wikimedia Foundation. “Without the discretion to make editorial decisions in line with established policies around verifiability and neutrality, Wikipedia would be overwhelmed with opinions, conspiracies, and irrelevant information that would jeopardize the project’s reason for existing.”
Can Wikipedia simply not allow users from Texas or Florida? I.e. not operate in that jurisdiction?
Yes, but that kinda defeats the point of an open knowledge library for all. This is a problem that should be fixed with legislation and not artificial blocking. We shouldn’t punish the unfortunate for being stuck with the stupid.
What would happen, if they ignored the laws and did not geoblock Texas and Florida, just say they don’t operate there, but not restrict the users and still operate the way they operated until now?
Fines I would assume. Lawsuits even.
But, like when they would say in their EULA, that people from Texas and Florida are not allowed, then by using the service would be breaking of EULA and the wikipedia foundation could theoretically say that they’re not operating there and it’s the users fault. Like could someone still sue them then?
You can’t just put illegal discrimination in your EULA and expect it to be legally binding for the user. Also, you don’t even have to sign a EULA to use Wikipedia. It’s an open dictionary, not a proprietary app from a for-profit company.
Why can’t you restrict usage if you don’t comply with local laws? Why can companies like Facebook restrict usage of their new features like Threads in the EU then? Or some US news network restricting access from the EU?
They can’t. The EU is constantly fining them and suing them for not complying with EU law.
The EU law says that they can’t force cookies on EU residents. It doesn’t say that they can’t accomplish that by geoblocking.
As for Wikipedia, maybe they’re legally allowed to block all of Texas and Florida, maybe they’re not.
Regardless, such a move would be the opposite of the mission and function of Wikipedia: to be a free source for unbiased information available to everyone.
I feel like they should see the consequences of their actions. The politicians might learn that the public won’t put up with this shit, rather than have it forced upon them by a higher court so they can continue to play the victim card.
Not everyone in Florida and Texas voted for the fascists and not everyone who wanted to vote against them were able to.
Punishing those who are not complicit is injust, not to mention excellent campaign fodder for the fascists.
I understand your point. My intention isn’t so much to “punish” as to have them see the consequences of their policies. Which should drive a sane voting public against them once they really see first hand the consequences. If SCOTUS or someone hands down a ruling to counter them, then they just play the victim card, and their supporters are emboldened.
Again, not all sane Texans and Floridians are afforded the rights and opportunities needed to vote or otherwise get their voice heard.
If anything, geoblocking those states would only serve to deprive those not savvy enough to deploy a VPN and that’s a group that’s already more likely to be fooled by the demagogues and dishonest media outlets that would paint Wikipedia as the villains.
In other words, geoblocking the fascist-occupied territories would only serve to harden the support of the fascists while inconveniencing many and accomplishing nothing positive.
I agree 💯 that there needs to be consequences for the tyrannical actions of fascists, but geoblocking isn’t it.
Honestly… I get your point and I know people in Texas that don’t agree with Texas politics. However, the largest party in the county is the party of “I don’t vote.” If you actually manage to wake up 10%… 20%… 30%… of those people, plus all the Republican voters that didn’t want it, plus all the Democrats that didn’t want it and/or got lazy with their state votes… Well we might actually see major change in representation from Texas.
Which part of “not able to” don’t you get? Calling disenfranchised people asleep is victim blaming that doesn’t give them the right and ability to vote back.