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Wikimedia should block UK access. That will get the attention of media and popularity contest politicians might change their mind. Remember the "Repeal the Onl
by nickslaughter02 1y ago
Wikimedia should block UK access. That will get the attention of media and popularity contest politicians might change their mind.
Remember the "Repeal the Online Safety Act" petition? It has gotten over half a million signatures and the response from the government was a loud "no".
> The Government has no plans to repeal the Online Safety Act, and is working closely with Ofcom to implement the Act as quickly and effectively as possible to enable UK users to benefit from its protections.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/722903 https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/722903
- perihelions 1y agoThey did do that once, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477966 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3477966 ("Wikipedia blackout page (wikipedia.org)" (2012)) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_SOPA_and_PIPA#Wikimedia_community https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_SOPA_and_PIPA... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:SOPA_initiative
- GeekyBear 1y agoThat was part of a widespread protest against proposed bipartisan internet legislation in America. On that occassion, it was very effective at getting the American government to back down.
- alt227 1y agoSounds like a pretty much identical situation to this. Maybe it would cause the UK government to back down on this stupid law.
- thomastjeffery 1y agoYet this looks nothing like their reaction to SOPA and PIPA. They even explicitly state that Wikimedia is not against the legislation on the whole. > The Wikimedia Foundation shares the UK government’s commitment to promoting online environments where everyone can safely participate. The organization is not bringing a general challenge to the OSA as a whole, nor to the existence of the Category 1 duties themselves. Rather, the legal challenge focuses solely on the new Categorisation Regulations that risk imposing Category 1 duties (the OSA’s most stringent obligations) on Wikipedia. --- I personally find it rather frustrating that Wikimedia is suddenly so willing to bend over for fascists. Where did their conscience go?
- bbor 1y agoI share your general frustration, but as an unabashed Wikimedia glazer, I have some potential answers: 1. They lost this legal challenge, so perhaps their UK lawyers (barristers?) knew that much broader claim would be even less likely to work and advised them against it. Just because they didn't challenge the overall law in court doesn't mean they wouldn't challenge it in a political sense. 2. The Protests against SOPA and PIPA[1] were in response to overreach by capitalists, and as such drew support from many capitalists with opposing interests (e.g. Google, Craigslist, Flickr, Reddit, Tumblr, Twitter, Wordpress, etc.). Certainly Reddit et al have similar general concerns with having to implement ID systems as they did about policing content for IP violations, but the biggest impact will be on minors, which AFAIK are far from the most popular advertising demo. Certainly some adult users will be put off by the hassle and/or insult, but how many, and for how long? 3. Wikimedia is a US-based organization, and the two major organizers of the 2012 protests--Fight for the Future[2] and the Electronic Frontier Foundation[3]--are US-focused as well. The EFF does have a blog post about these UK laws, but AFAICT no history of bringing legal and/or protest action there. This dovetails nicely with the previous point, while we're at it: the US spends $300B on digital ads every year, whereas the UK only spends $40B[4]. The per-capita spends are closer ($870/p v. $567/p), but the fact remains: the US is the lifeblood of these companies in a way that the UK is not. 4. More fundamentally, I strongly suspect that "big business is trying to ruin the internet by hoarding their property" is an easier sell for the average voter than "big government is trying to ruin the internet by protecting children from adult content". We can call it fascism all we like, but at the end of the day, people do seem concerned about children accessing adult content. IMHO YouTube brainrot content farms are a much bigger threat to children than porn, but I'm not a parent. The final point is perhaps weakened by the ongoing AI debates, where there's suddenly a ton of support for the "we're protecting artists!" arguments employed in 2012. Still, I think the general shape of things is clear: Wikimedia stood in solidarity with many others in 2012, and now stands relatively alone. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_SOPA_and_PIPA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protests_against_SOPA_and_PIPA [2] https://www.fightforthefuture.org/ https://www.fightforthefuture.org/ [3] https://www.eff.org/pages/legal-cases https://www.eff.org/pages/legal-cases [4] https://www.salehoo.com/learn/digital-ad-spend-by-country https://www.salehoo.com/learn/digital-ad-spend-by-country
- rawbot 1y agoIn the age of AI chatbots having consumed all of Wikipedia, its relevance has waned. So I don't think they have the same pull as they did before.
- clutch89 1y agoIts relevance has absolutely not waned, more relevant than ever. Models need continuous retraining to keep up to date with new information right?
- ktallett 1y agoDespite having consumed all of Wikipedia, it still can't accurately answer many questions so I don't think it's relevance or value has waned. AI has not got anywhere near becoming an encyclopedia and it never will whilst it can't say I don't know something (which Wikipedia can do) and filter the fact from the fiction, which Wikipedia does uses volunteers.
- dylan604 1y agoDoesn't AI essentially use the concept of volunteers as well with RLHF?
- ktallett 1y agoGood point, it's similar to some extent. Although clearly the quality of the work that the people doing RLHF on the major LLMs is rather low in comparison with those volunteering at Wikipedia.
- dylan604 1y agoThere were no "good" volunteers qualifier used though. Obviously, some RLHF "volunteers" are better than others just like some used by Wiki are better than others. I wonder if there's edit battles between RLHF like we've seen on Wiki?
- layer8 1y ago
- dkiebd 1y agoI thought people here didn’t like when American companies tried to strongarm democratic governments abroad?
- bee_rider 1y ago1) There are multiple posters on this site, they sometimes have contradictory opinions. 2) Lots of people like it when a company does an obviously good thing, and dislike it when a company does an obviously bad thing. I guess you’ve made a happy discovery: it turns out the underlying principle was something about what the companies were trying to accomplish, rather than some reflexive “American companies are bad” silliness.
- Levitz 1y agoI'd like to add, it's fine and dandy to have the stance that huge corporations in general shouldn't throw their weight around to shape politics, that's still not the world we live in and that must be acknowledged. Even if I'd rather have Wikipedia stay put, it does matter to me if they push for something I support as opposed to something that I'm against.
- NoGravitas 1y ago> the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron"
- eszed 1y agoNot to dismiss bee_rider's sibling comment, like at all, but: Wikimedia's nature and purpose might be distinguished from your generic "American" tech "company".
- Nicook 1y agoone of the good ones right
- 1y ago
- entuno 1y agoThose petitions aren't really worth anything - governments have ignored ones with over six million signatures before. And they also ignored this one a few years back that had just under 700,000 signatures to "make verified ID a requirement for opening a social media account": https://petition.parliament.uk/archived/petitions/575833 https://petition.parliament.uk/archived/petitions/575833 Ironically, the primary reason they gave for rejecting it was: > However, restricting all users’ right to anonymity, by introducing compulsory user verification for social media, could disproportionately impact users who rely on anonymity to protect their identity. These users include young people exploring their gender or sexual identity, whistleblowers, journalists’ sources and victims of abuse. Introducing a new legal requirement, whereby only verified users can access social media, would force these users to disclose their identity and increase a risk of harm to their personal safety.
- phpnode 1y agoThe other point is that recent polls suggest the British public are overwhelmingly in support of this legislation [0], which is not reflected in most of the narrative we see online. Whether they support how it has been implemented is a different matter, but the desire to do something is clear. [0] https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/survey-results/daily/2025/07/31/91334/2 https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/survey-results/daily/202...
- __oh_es 1y agoOdd - they also believe it wont be effective https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/survey-results/daily/2025/07/31/91334/3 https://yougov.co.uk/topics/society/survey-results/daily/202...
- ta1243 1y agoYes it's quite possible for people to hold both those views.
- johnnyanmac 1y agoThe moment the Russia Ukraine war hit, the top 10 apps in Russia was half VPNs. As long as websites don't want to lock out any user without an account, and as long as vpns exist, it'll be hard to enforce any of this. At least for now, that's one line big tech won't let them cross easily.
- ndr 1y agoDoes WP do this anywhere else? I wonder what happens if they simply don't comply. Will the UK at any point ask ISPs to ban Wikipedia?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Perz1val 1y agoI think just getting blocked is no big deal, but they'll probably get fined as well, that is the problem
- HDThoreaun 1y agoProbably, my understanding is theyve already implemented IP blocking to other sites.
- parasense 1y agoAs ridiculous or absurd as this idea might seem, it's probably the most succinct and likely effective response to this kind of situation. The UK is betting the rest of the world doesn't reciprocate.
- HDThoreaun 1y agoNot ridiculous, the only way to stop injustice is to fight.
- willtemperley 1y agoYes. HTTP 451 "Unavailable For Legal Reasons" was made for this moment.
- NitpickLawyer 1y agoNo, they should block with a very visible message, tailored to the british public. I know what that status message means, you know it, but the general public doesn't. They need the black page with big letters they used before with sopa/pipa/etc.
- Mogzol 1y agoYou can return a 451 error with a descriptive page, same as how sites have custom 404 pages
- bravesoul2 1y agoWe need new 6xx codes. "Requests that are fine, need no redirection and have no errors but are blocked because of politics, overbearing laws or regime"
- willglynn 1y agoFor example, "An HTTP Status Code to Report Legal Obstacles": https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7725 https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7725
- marcosdumay 1y agoThat's what 451 means. It's "user error, you are trying to access the site from some dystopian society that prohibits it".
- bravesoul2 1y agoYeah but I want to know if I should submit, protest or revolt. I need more codes :)
- owisd 1y agoProblem with Wikipedia specifically going all-in on a UK block is, due to the licence, there's nothing to stop someone circumventing the block to make a OSA-compliant Britipedia mirror with minimal effort.
- saati 1y agoExcept the effort and money needed to be OSA compliant. As the whole enwiki is permissively licensed everyone is welcome to do it though.
- incompatible 1y agoFairly easy, just make it a read-only mirror.
- imtringued 1y agoIt can't be read only because you need infrastructure and editors that review and approve every single change by hand. Even a single accidental violation could get the mirror shut down.
- spauldo 1y agoAnd Wikipedia continues on without having to worry about UK regulations. What's the downside for Wikipedia?
- owisd 1y agoAnyone suggesting a block doesn't actually want Wikipedia to pull out of the UK, it's a negotiating position to extort concessions.
- spauldo 1y agoIs it? If the law would prevent Wikipedia from operating in the UK without adding age verification, blocking the UK is just a method of compliance. Organizations like the EFF want to strike down laws like this, but Wikipedia exists to operate a freely editable encyclopedia. It's really down to whether Wikipedia feels that compliance would go against the organization's principles. If so, blocking the UK is a perfectly reasonable thing to do. If another organization steps in to mirror Wikipedia in a way that complies with UK law, there's no downside for Wikipedia - they maintain their principles and the UK continues to have at least some access to free information.
- AlecSchueler 1y ago> Wikimedia should block UK access. That will get the attention of media and popularity contest politicians might change their mind. Or they could respect the democratic decisions of the countries they do business in? I'm quite critical of the implementation of this legislation but the idea of an American company throwing their weight around trying to influence policy decisions in the UK gives me the ick. Fair enough if the regulations mean they just don't want to do business there but please don't block access to try and strong arm the elected government of another nation.
- dizlexic 1y agoOr they should not do business in them. To me this means block access. If you don't then they're supposed to block access to you anyway so who is strong arming who?
- AlecSchueler 1y agoAs I said in my first comment: if it makes doing business in the UK unpalatable then they are of course free to halt their operations. I was specifically responding to the suggestion above that they should do so as a bargaining move to force the government's hand.
- _zeso 1y agoThe Wikimedia Foundation isn't "doing business" in the UK, they're a nonprofit. Their mission statement is "to empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free license or in the public domain, and to disseminate it effectively and globally." Part of fulfilling that mission is opposing laws that restrict free knowledge and open access, so why should they not use their huge presence as a bargaining tool? Doing so directly aligns with their purpose.
- AlecSchueler 1y agoBecause there are legal avenues of protest awarded to them by the United Kingdom. They also definitely "do business" there even if they aren't in it for profit.
- anon-3988 1y agoThis after the gaffe with the postal services, we are going to see some innocent folks being branded. In general, I think we need a shift in society to say "yea, screw those kids". We don't put 20km/h limits everywhere because there's a non-zero chance that we might kill a kid. Its the cost of doing business. Having privacy MEANS that it is difficult to catch bad people. That is just the price. Just swallow it and live with it.
- DaSHacka 1y ago> "yea, screw those kids". Well, at the very least, the American government is already aiming for that
- Arch-TK 1y agoI wish all non-UK entities which may be affected by this law just dropped the UK. But unfortunately it seems they have too much money invested in not doing that. But I'm sure even if that happened, the public consensus would just be "good riddance". This is an absolutely bizarre country to live in.
- panzi 1y agoProblem is that all that most people want out of Wikipedia is ingested in LLMs and for unfathomable reasons people now go to those first already. So the general public might not even notice Wikipedia being inaccessible.
- andsoitis 1y ago> Wikimedia should block UK access. That will get the attention of media and popularity contest politicians might change their mind. It is a gamble. If people increasingly get their “encyclopedic” information via AI, then it might make almost no noise and then the govt will have even more leverage.
- panzi 1y agoI commented basically the same and also got down voted. Do people just down vote comments that make them sad?
- profmonocle 1y agoPossibly naive question, why should Wikimedia do anything at all? Do they have a legal presence in the UK? If not, why not just say "we aren't a UK based organization so we have no obligations under this law" Let the UK block Wikipedia.
- gundmc 1y agoIANAL, but I assume this could open Wikimedia leadership to charges of contempt and eventually lead to needing to avoid visiting the UK or other extraditing countries and potentially pave the way for asset seizures. You generally don't want to antagonize world power governments.
- Aeolun 1y agoThat doesn’t make any sense. It’s not wikimedia’s responsibility to ensure people from the UK don’t hit their servers by typing wikipedia.org into the browser bar.
- alphager 1y agoAccording to UK law, it is.
- djeastm 1y agoCan you cite said law for us?
- callahad 1y agoIt's the Online Safety Act. As the government says about the OSA: "Ofcom is the independent regulator for Online Safety. [...] Ofcom has strong enforcement powers" https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/online-safety-act https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/online-safety-act Okay, so what does Ofcom say? "It doesn’t matter where you or your business is based. The new rules will apply to you (or your business) if the service you provide has a significant number of users in the UK, or if the UK is a target market." https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-content/guide-for-services https://www.ofcom.org.uk/online-safety/illegal-and-harmful-c...
- EasyMark 1y agothey should indeed. The rest of the world should not have to suffer for draconian & fascist laws in the UK