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> We are sorry for the harm we've caused by our unethical experimentation involving members of the Linux community. In accordance with community standards and a
by justinjlynn 6y ago
> We are sorry for the harm we've caused by our unethical experimentation involving members of the Linux community. In accordance with community standards and a desire to avoid benefiting from our ethical failure, we have requested the immediate retraction of the papers and other published work resulting from this unethical experimentation. We are also working together with our institutional leadership to address the systemic and individual failings which permitted this unethical research to take place. As a result of this, we will publicly prepare a report regarding the actions taken and potential systemic changes which will ensure these actions do not reoccur and further harm is not caused. Out of an abundance of caution and because experience has shown our judgement, as is, to be questionable, no further research similar in nature to the research in question will be undertaken by this institution or these researchers until proper community consultation has taken place regarding the report and proposed changes to systemic review are implemented. Once again, we take full responsibility for any harm we have caused and we will work to ensure that such harm never occurs again. We hope that, at some point, we may regain your trust and confidence and, if you'll permit us, to work alongside you.
[signed personally, by every involved researcher, professor, IRB member, and all of the relevant university leadership including the board]
Something like that would do nicely, in my opinion. Then they'd have to absolutely follow through on it. Ideally, they'd also ask involved members of the community so harmed, among other experts, to independently review and watch the process to ensure no further harm is being done, progress is made, and public accountability is kept.
- rajup 6y agoThat makes sense, thanks!
- tkgally 5y agoGood suggestion, especially getting the IRB involved. The board failed to recognize that the target of the research was not inanimate software but human beings.
- justinjlynn 5y agoThank you and my point precisely. This was both an individual and systemic failure and must be treated and rectified as such with all due seriousness.
- denton-scratch 5y agoI'd consider that a pretty good apology, if that were the one they had made. I'd like to see it expressed by the university ethics board, not just by the researchers. I wouldn't trust those researchers again, not for anything. Free software depends heavily on trust. It's astonishing that it works so well; but if you break trust, it's very hard to repair the fractures. The legal arrangements around free software are fairly fluid, because there hasn't been much case-law, because there's not much money sloshing around for Free Software developers to pay lawyers. Banning pull-requests from that college is much cheaper than sueing. I hope the whole uni stays banned until the ethics board issues their own apology. Then let it go, I say. People make mistakes. We shouldn't blame everyone for the mistakes of a few. But we have to protect the Linux kernel; billions of people depend on it's correctness.