IRC

How to participate

For more information about IRC software you can install on your computer, go to the Wikipedia entry on IRC or the Meta page on Wikimedia IRC. If using dedicated software, connect to the channel irc:wikimedia-uk ^connect on the freenode network.

Guidelines

Scope

#wikimedia-uk is intended for discussion related to Wikimedia UK including the organization and related projects. There are specific channels for discussion about Wikipedia, Wikimedia Commons and other chapters, please see m:IRC/Channels for a list.

Use

The behavioural guidelines of http://freenode.net/channel_guidelines.shtml apply to the channel. Keep in mind that users may be under 16.

The Freenode policies apply to this channel. The following statement applies for off topic usage:

Off-Topic Use

Unlawful activities and their related support activities are considered off-topic, as are inappropriate advertising, heavy media file trading, gaming and proprietary game software modding, warez, hax0r activity, porn and various forms of antisocial behaviour, including (but not limited to) political, racial, ethnic, religious or gender-related invective. Off-topic activity may result in users being barred from the network.

In accordance with UK law freenode and the PDPC have no tolerance for any activity which could be construed as:

• incitement to racial hatred
• incitement to religious hatred

or any other behaviour meant to deliberately bring upon a person harassment, alarm or distress. We do NOT tolerate discrimination on the grounds of race, religion, gender, sexual preference or other lifestyle choices and run with a zero-tolerance policy for libel and defamation.

While we believe in the concept of freedom of thought and freedom of expression, freenode does not operate on the basis of absolute freedom of speech and we impose limitations eg. on "hate speech".

We expect all members of the community to treat other community members with respect and reserve the right to terminate anyone's access to our services should they be found to be in breach of policy.

User flags

Channel operators would most often be selected from interested users trusted as :wmuk Administrators, though this is not a prerequisite. Ask at the Water cooler if you are a frequent user interesting in helping with managing the channel.

Any frequent user can ask to have the voice flag set. This is only useful if the channel needs to be moderated (so only voiced users can speak), this has never happened.

Privacy

The channel will be logged during scheduled IRC office hours. Please do not publicly log the channel at other times; note that there is no way of ensuring the channel is not being publicly logged.

Cloaks are a means of identifying your IRC account with your Wikimedia identity and help protect your on-line privacy. See m:IRC/Cloaks for the process to ask for a cloak.

Please respect the privacy of others when using IRC. Always assume that the channel you are using might be publicly logged. Information such as contact details for meeting at events are best shared by direct email, though for convenience you may want to try using private messaging on IRC.