Community Guidelines

We are confident that you will together build a supportive and collaborative atmosphere during the AI Twitter Conference (AITC). The following bullet points set out explicitly what we hope you will consider to be appropriate community guidelines:

• Be respectful to others. Do not engage in homophobic, racist, transphobic, ageist, ableist, sexist, or otherwise exclusionary behavior.
• Use welcoming and inclusive language. Exclusionary comments or jokes, threats or violent language are not acceptable. Do not address others in an angry, intimidating, or demeaning manner. Be considerate of the ways the words you choose may impact others. Be patient and respectful of the fact that English is a second (or third or fourth!) language for some participants.
• Do not harass people. Harassment includes unwanted physical contact, sexual attention, or repeated social contact. Know that consent is explicit, conscious and continuous—not implied. If you are unsure whether your behaviour towards another person is welcome, ask them. If someone tells you to stop, do so.
• Respect the privacy and safety of others. Do not take photographs of others without their permission. Note that posting (or threatening to post) personally identifying information of others without their consent (“doxing”) is a form of harassment.
• Be considerate of others’ participation. Everyone should have an opportunity to be heard. In update sessions, please keep comments succinct so as to allow maximum engagement by all participants. Do not interrupt others on the basis of disagreement; hold such comments until they have finished speaking.
• Don’t be a bystander. If you see something inappropriate happening, speak up. If you don’t feel comfortable intervening but feel someone should, please feel free to ask a member of the Code of Conduct response team for support. As an overriding general rule, please be intentional in your actions and humble in your mistakes.

When does the Code of Conduct apply?

This Code of Conduct governs participation for all interactions related to the data study group week. It applies to all participants at all times, including during after-hours working and social events.

The internet is real life! This Code of Conduct applies in all digital spaces connected to the AI Twitter Conference (e.g., the slack workspace, other group chat channels, mailing lists and collaborative documents) as well as physical locations.

Participants who have violated this Code may be excluded from this and future twitter conferences, and may be asked not to attend after-hour events.

Violation reports may be shared with other members of the AITC business team so they are able to make informed decisions about the involvement of individuals who violate the Code of Conduct in future AITC events.

Giving feedback on the AITC Code of Conduct

This code of conduct is not intended as a static set of rules by which everyone must abide. Rather, you are invited to make suggestions for updates or clarifications by using the suggest function in the google doc.

How do I report an issue related to the Code of Conduct?

The Code of Conduct response team is:

Alexander Laurence - alexander.adamlaurence@gmail.com

Please speak to Alexander if you encounter an issue—whether related to a specific situation or to a more general aspect of the twitter conference. The members of the Code of Conduct response team can contacted in person or by email.

What happens when I report an issue?

All reports will be heard, read, reviewed and investigated by the Code of Conduct response team.

If you are unsure whether an incident is a violation of the Code of Conduct, or whether the space where it happened is covered by this Code of Conduct, we encourage you to still report it. We would much rather have a few extra reports where we decide to take no action, rather than miss a report we’re equipped to address. We do not look negatively on you if we find the incident is not a violation.

We also welcome general feedback or suggestions about how to make the Data Study Group a more inclusive event. To share your thoughts, please write to Alexander Laurence at alexander.adamlaurence@gmail.com.

The Code of Conduct Report and Response Process

All reports will be heard, read, reviewed and investigated by the Code of Conduct response team. The process we follow when an issue report is made is detailed below.

The Initial Response

The Code of Conduct response team member will read or listen carefully, compassionately, and respectfully to the issue. If the issue is reported by email, an initial response to confirm receipt will be provided without delay.

Individuals who have reported an issue may withdraw their report and participation at any time, for any reason.

The Issue Summary

If reporting an issue by email, please describe:

• The nature of the issue, complaint, or concern;
• A description of the incident(s) that occurred (please be as specific as possible);
• The individual(s) involved in and (if applicable) witness to the incident(s);
• Whether you believe the incident(s) is ongoing;
• The kind of resolution, information or support you’re seeking;
• Whether you believe any member(s) of the Code of Conduct response team might be in a conflict by responding to your issue.

If reporting an issue in person, the member of the Code of Conduct response team you speak to will seek your permission to write a brief issue summary that includes the information listed above. The person reporting the issue is welcome (but not obligated) to participate in this process.

The purpose of the issue summary is to provide a consistent framework for gathering information, to ensure that experiences are understood accurately and consistently by issue responders, and to minimize the burden on those making a report to retell their account. When new information arises, the issue summary can be updated accordingly. Drafting an issue summary is not required in order to access guidance, information, referrals or support.

Conflicts of Interest

If the issue, complaint or concern involves a member of the the Code of Conduct response team, that person will be removed from the issue response process and will not have access to documentation related to the issue.

Appropriate Responses

Based on the nature of the issue, the Code of Conduct response team will propose a course of action to the individual who made the report, and work with them to determine whether that proposal is an appropriate response before acting.

An appropriate response is one which:

• Seeks to ensure the safety, dignity and security of all AITC participants;
• Respects the autonomy, experience and judgment of those who decide to report an issue;
• Aims to provide a resolution that is meaningful and fair to all participants affected;
• Encourages accountability, responsibility, cooperation, honesty, personal growth and respect on the part of all participants affected;
• Is context-specific and aims to “make things right,” repairing specific harms to affected individuals; Works toward greater inclusiveness at AITC.

Here are some examples of responses that could be appropriate, depending on the context and nature of the issue:

• A mediated conversation or agreement between the impacted AITC participants;
• A request for a verbal or written apology, public or private, from a AITC participant;
• A public announcement clarifying participant responsibilities under the Code of Conduct;
• Nothing, if the issue reported is not a violation or outside of the scope of this Code of Conduct;
• AITC-wide policy changes to avoid repeating harmful incidents;
• An agreement that two or more individuals be kept separate for the duration of AITC;
• A written warning to a AITC participant and/or conditions on their future participation;
• The temporary or permanent removal of a AITC participant from the data study group, and from future events, with or without warning.
• The temporary or permanent removal of a AITC participant from the slack community workspace.
• Sharing the violation report with other members of the AITC business team so they are able to make informed decisions about the involvement of individuals who violate the Code of Conduct in future events.

Confidentiality

Information shared with the Code of Conduct response team with be treated in a confidential manner and will not be shared with anyone outside of the data study group organising committee.

In some cases, information will need to be shared for the purposes of implementing a response under this Code of Conduct. For example, if an individual reporting an issue is seeking an apology from another AITC participant, fairness requires that the other participant is made aware of the issue which has been reported and the identity of the individual making the report. However, information will never be shared with other AITC participants without an individual’s knowledge and consent.

Information cannot be kept confidential where the safety of other AITC participants is at risk, or where there is a legal obligation to report.

Attribution

This code is adapted (lightly) from the Citizen Lab Summer Institute 2017 Code of Conduct and used under a CC BY 2.5 CA license. We really appreciate the work that they put into creating such a well considered process.

Parts of this Code are based on the xvzf Code of Conduct, the Contributor Covenant, the Django Code of Conduct and Reporting Guide and we are also grateful for this guidance from Ada Initiative.

This Code of Conduct is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0 CA) license which means you are free to share and adapt the work so long as the attribution to Kirstie Whitaker and the Alan Turing Institute Data Study Group organising committee is retained, along with the attribution to Citizen Lab and the other resources.