Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss existing and proposed policies and guidelines.
If you want to propose something new other than a policy or guideline, use the proposals section.

Please see this FAQ page for a list of frequent proposals and the responses to them.

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Nuvola flags

These nuvole flags are gaining increased usage on wiki, This is quite worring for me as they are more decorative than standard flags. At Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style_(flags)#Nuvola_flags,i am proposing to strongly limit the usage of these flags, please comment if your interested .

Required Reading

I propose that before an editor is able to open an account, he be required to read several guidelines first, most notably MOS (thoroughly) and What wikipedia is not. Just as in a licensing agreement, the prospective user should be required to check the "I have read/accept" box before his account will be activated. That way we will have better users, with still small barriers to entry. Halli B (talk) 02:17, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

How would you prove that such an editor read the required material? Simply checking a box doesn't prove that material was read. SMP0328. (talk) 02:22, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

We couldn't. But at least some of the editors WOULD read it. There are no drawbacks to this plan. Halli B (talk) 02:23, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

The drawback is that plenty of users would just choose not to contribute. Reading MOS thoroughly takes hours, no-one is likely to do that before opening an account... --Tango (talk) 02:25, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, the ones that do will be more likely to grow into productive editors. Those that can't invest the time in wikipedia don't deserve to be here anyway. Might as well weed out the malingerers and myspacers early on rather than later. Halli B (talk) 02:28, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

This proposal wouldn't "weed out" anyone. Most would check the box without doing the reading. This proposal would simply add a little piece of busy work to the account opening process. SMP0328. (talk) 02:41, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Would WP:POINT be on the list? Anomie⚔ 02:50, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

No, that is more advanced reading. Halli B (talk) 03:01, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't like this proposal. Yes, for the looks of it it seems like you are asking people to read it, but whom of you carefully studies the lengthy agreement when installing software before pressing "I agree". I never do (and may have signed away my fundamental human numerous times for all I know).
In my opinion this is just a nuisance for new editors, and a lot of useless bureaucracy for the project. Arnoutf (talk) 08:19, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I have no intention of ever reading the MoS thoroughly. DuncanHill (talk) 21:44, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Don't expect an average citizen to know all the laws professionally, especially when he/she has just been born. Same applies here to MOS. Wishful thinking. NVO (talk) 23:50, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Like DunanHill, I don't think I'll ever read the MoS thoroughly. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:53, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

This is directly contrary to the spirit of Wikipedia. We encourage people to be bold and ignorance of the rules (within reason of course) is a perfectly valid excuse for messing something up. Mr.Z-man 00:02, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

this idea is too bureacratic I like the open wikipedia we have now —Preceding unsigned comment added by Zaharous (talk • contribs) 17:32, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Editors who are very weak in English

Question: Is there a Wikipedia policy regarding literacy levels of English. It is extremely difficult to collaborate with editors who do not have a good grasp of English. This leads to misunderstanding of Wikipedia policy and methodology. This is very disruptive and impacts the development of articles.

If there is no guidance on this subject - maybe a new policy is required in this area.

Bobanni (talk) 14:01, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

I am no fan of creating too many rules, but I do recognise your problem and encounter it myself frequently. I have reverted un-intelligly written contributions in the past, just because the level of English was so low it made the article worse, regardless whether the ideas behind the edit were worthwhile Arnoutf (talk) 20:51, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

This only becomes a problem if the user is being disruptive. There's literally no way we can require everyone to have a given level of English ability. Plus, many editors with less than stellar English skills (including some native speakers of English) edit very usefully. Perhaps what we need is something along the lines of what they have on some other language versions, the "English Wikipedia for X Speakers" page, where people can post questions, read information and get assistance in their language. Exploding Boy (talk) 20:55, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

And what do you know, we already have it. It's called Wikipedia:Local Embassy. Exploding Boy (talk) 21:08, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Same. I've reverted people before because they've added unintelligible nonsense. This is, after all, the English wikipedia. If you can't speak the language, then you probably shouldn't be editing an encyclopedia in that language. Of course, there's probably a Wikipedia for whatever language they do speak fluently; ideally, they should be there, since those need a lot of work. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 21:24, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

This whole thread confuses the two issues of those foreigners who just don't have a good enough grasp of english (per Celanor) and those native english speakers who just are illiterate and poor writers. The first group we can just kick off completely as long as they are invited to contribute in their own native-language wikipedias..The second group, I'm not sure about yet. Maybe put them on "literacy probation" or something? Remedial training? Halli B (talk) 23:23, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

And I think that that last remark is, of course, nonsense. "Foreigners"? Good grief. This is the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit, not that anyone can edit provided they have a given level of fluency in English. As on other language Wikipedias, we welcome anyone here who wants to edit constructively, and we correct their writing if and when necessary.

And just as a side note, Halli B, you seem to be someone who is very familiar with Wikipedia but whose edits are almost exclusively to this page and to other talk pages, and some of your comments, like the one above, seem a little extreme, which leads me to suspect that you may be an established or banned user using a secondary account to have a little fun. Whatever the case, you are obviously familiar enough with Wikipedia to know that "literacy probation," "required reading" and some of your other suggestions are not how we do things around here. Exploding Boy (talk) 23:35, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

If you can't write in a language, then you shouldn't be editing an encyclopedia; I don't really see any way around that. Simple Wikipedia may be a better place for them in terms of writing style, but they still have to be at least somewhat literate; you simply can't get around that. If you can't write effectively, people aren't going to be able to understand the point that you're trying to get across; and if you can't do that, well, then what's the point? Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 23:32, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Its as simple as this: If you can't write standard english, then you're out. Go stumble-bumble somewhere else. Halli B (talk) 00:55, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Ha ha! What?! Who is this Halli B character? — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 01:08, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Well, its not like i get on German wikipedia (I have 1 year of college german) and even attempt to write articles on there in a good faith yet subliterate fashion. If i did, i would understand if i got kicked off. The english/american wiki should be no different. Just because it is vastly larger than any of the other language wikis should not make it more tolerant of broken gibberish. Halli B (talk) 01:24, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

The "broken gibberish" should be removed, but we shouldn't deny people the right to edit an article. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 09:20, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Agree. Note however, although sometimes removing broken gibberish is taken as a personal insult or even vandalism by the original editor; which shows some people have no sense of their own weakness of English (but no reason to block I agree). Arnoutf (talk) 09:28, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

No, You guys are being too harsh and close-minded. The issue of poor writing is a very serious issue affecting a lot of Wikipedians, myself included. What happened to "Assume good faith"? It would be insulting and discouraging to remove some statement written poorly without any explanation to the original author, as it implies that he committed vandalism, which is not the case. This kind of action just drives people off from Wikipedia, while the job of established editors should be to encourage new people to contribute. I agree with Exploding Boy about his proposal, but Wikipedia:Local Embassy seems too inactive. Maybe we should revive it a little bit. Eklipse (talk) 09:39, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I only remove such texts as it is truly gibberish, in general I try to improve it; but sometimes I just don't understand what the intended meaning is. Such texts, (often provided by anon IP's who may not respond to a query) are likely to be Good Faith contributions, but if they are resulting in a worse article immediate removal is necessary (I use an AGF summary something like Revert Assumed Good Faith edit, the english in the added line is too poor to be understood, please copyedit or ask help on talk before re-adding).

So no, I would not suggest to ban users for lack of control of English, but I do understand some of their edits being reverted (as Good Faith edits) as it is the responsibility of the editor to provide at least intelligable edits. Arnoutf (talk) 10:18, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

What's so difficult about fixing poor writing? If it's truly incomprehensible, then remove it by all means. But if it's just poorly written, ungrammatical, or atrociously spelled, then fix it. Japanese Wikipedia, for example, has a convention whereby people unsure of their Japanese skills are invited to summarize their edits with 校正お願いします (Please proofread/correct). Japanese Wikipedia has Chatsubo for Non-Japanese Speakers, a Meta guide to the Japanese Wikipedia in English, plus their own version of our Local Embassy. In my opinion, we should be encouraging cross-Wikipedia participation and involvement from as wide as possible a cross-section of people. That is, after all, why we have the "globalize" tag, isn't it? Exploding Boy (talk) 15:33, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

To be honest I don't think we disagree on the big picture, only on the details, I would only like that some non-native English speakers (I am one myself - and am editing a lot of Europe related articles where the proportian non-native Engish speakers tend to be very high) would take accept that their English is not perfect, and would just think a bit more thoroughly baefore editing mainspace; as copyediting other editors English language (and it is sometimes truly un-intelligable) is not the task of other editors per sse. Your Japanese suggestion would be an interesting way to invite, in a polite way, other editors to help, so I would applaud a similar guideline for English wiki. Arnoutf (talk) 17:03, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

I think the assumption has just been that people know English, so we haven't made a huge amount of effort to accommodate those whose English skills aren't at near-native levels, whereas other language Wikipedias seem to make the effort to provide assistance and instructions for people who are editing in their second (+) language. Possibly this makes sense historically, but it's probably time for us on English Wikipedia to start making a bit more effort. We could start by expanding the Local Embassy as a place where questions can be posted in any language, and perhaps by making a link to it it more prominent on the main page. "Embassies" with many users could develop sub-pages with specific instructions, and the "Please proofread" edit summary could be promoted for users unsure of their English writing skills. Exploding Boy (talk) 17:10, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

It's not that easy. I have seen my own (non-native) writing copyedited to the point where the essence of a paragraph is either distorted, or played down or completely disappears. All in good faith and without <substantiated> reason or logic. Volunteers who are not well aware of the topic or who haven't read the whole text prior to editing word by word - do more harm than good. NVO (talk) 21:51, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Poor writing is poor for a reason; if you can't make sense of what the writer was trying to get across, then you can't simply "fix it" like you would like to. If someone's lax in vocabulary, then sure, you can improve the verbiage so it is somewhat more in line with the text of what an encyclopedia should be like, but if you can't make heads or tails of the point that the writer was trying to get across, then another editor isn't going to be able to improve it any more than a reader will be able to understand it. Accepting all contributions may be a nice idea, but we're here to write an encyclopedia; that does not include giving grammar and vocabulary lessons. If you can't edit, then don't try.

Of course, this isn't the kind of thing that we can hard-code into a policy, or even a guideline, really. It's just a bit of common sense, and I think that we're better off keeping everything the way it is in that department. Nonsensical contributors generally don't last that long anyway. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 21:58, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

User NVO just admitted to a serious conflict of interest in this issue. I am with Celarnor, although I think we should simply indef block those incompetents in English. I doubt if anyone would really unblock. Halli B (talk) 22:52, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, well I think we can safely ignore anything Halli B suggests. As for Celarnor, isn't that more or less what I said above? Revert unintelligible nonsense and fix poor writing? (as we already do anyway...). I know of plenty of editors whose English skills aren't great who edit very usefully. Exploding Boy (talk) 00:21, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Meh. my experience is that some wikipedians (unfortunately) are a short-sighted and intolerant, and its usually the ones with the loudest voices. the solution to this problem, obviously, is for decently literate editors to take the time to suss out what less literate editors are talking about, and then revise edits to clarify what the less literate editor is after. that makes everyone happy, and shows the less literate editor (by example) how they can be more literate. but there's always going to be some editor who's first reaction is to snap the less literate editor's head off, and then spit it back out at them in a fit of pique, and that spoils any chance of a decent editing environment. the real problem isn't what do we do with less than literate editors; it's what do we do with the grumpy bears that jump on them. --Ludwigs2 00:41, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

The thing is, you can't necessarily make anything out of what they're trying to say. I certainly don't snap people's heads off. I just don't like the idea of coddling editors who add ambiguous, nonsensical things like "(Subject) is A-number-1 (some Kanji characters), doesn't afraid his criticism-ers and bravely heroically charges in front of 3 televions" or something when they're talking about a political television figure. It's simply too difficult to extrapolate a meaning in some cases--even this example could be changed into something meaningful, but the point is, they're out there, and I don't like the idea of keeping them around just for the sake of keeping them around.

Naturally, sanctions are far beyond a reasonable response to such things, but I don't think its appropriate to be berating users who revert such nonsense, especially when the subjects are BLPs. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 02:23, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Exploding Boy, please keep your comments civil. I do not wish to be victimized just for voicing my thoughts and opiniong. Halli B (talk) 01:02, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Let's see. So far you've advocated blocking anyone who doesn't edit enough articles; banning anything on user pages not directly related to articles; blocking anyone who has a guestbook; requiring new users to read and agree to all our guidelines before being allowed to edit; allowing blocked users to pay to be unblocked; and now blocking anyone who doesn't meet some standard of English writing ability. Are you telling me you're serious? Because the way I see your contribution history, out of 50 edits, fully half have been to this page, and most of the rest to essays and user talk pages. Combined with your obvious knowledge of how things around here work, that suggests very strongly that you are, as I mentioned above, an established or banned user using a sockpuppet account and trying to make a point about something. I'm sorry if you find my comment above incivil, but I simply do not see how your suggestion of automatically indefblocking people with poor writing skills is sensible, fair, or in the spirit of Wikipedia. Exploding Boy (talk) 01:25, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Not all editors who reside mostly in the project space are sockpuppets; that doesn't really make sense, as anyone can find out "how stuff works here" by reading essays, policy and guideline pages, and other meta venues. I don't do much article editing myself outside of vandalism reversion; most of my edits are involved in the political side of Wikipedia, trying to keep BLP in check and trying to keep power in the community; that doesn't mean that I'm a sock of an established user. It just means that I'm not involved in article editing very much. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 02:23, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Not every editor, no. But this editor? Very probably. Exploding Boy (talk) 02:52, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

See also generally, m:Poor language skills; Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/International Churches of Christ; Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Stefanomencarelli. Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:56, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Methinks Halli is Ouijaouija in disguise. Corvus cornix_talk 20:11, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Interesting possibility. Either way, s/he's now begun creating hoax articles in addition to the generally disruptive editing. Exploding Boy (talk) 20:14, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Style questions

I have a lot of questions about how we're going to proceed with style guidelines and copyediting between now and WP 1.0. Opinions welcome at Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Groan. - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 22:51, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Okay, work has begun at WT:WPMOS; please join us. Here's a snippet:

• How do we overcome the known downsides of working in a nonprofit environment? The fun stuff gets done, the boring stuff doesn't. Working on your own articles is fun, copyediting articles you don't have a connection to is boring. Promoting style guidelines you feel passionately about is fun; reviewing existing guidelines you don't care about to see if they've been superceded by later work is boring ... and also thankless, since every page will have at least a few champions. There's around 99% agreement with the statement that current style guidelines are not likely to be read and absorbed even by all the very active editors; there's an impression that they are too difficult and extensive and not sufficiently reflective of consensus. How much pruning do we have to do to get a much higher rate of "buy-in"? - Dan Dank55 (send/receive) 20:36, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia "probation" and "parole."

I see here that sometimes troublesome editors are placed on "probation" and/or "parole," where they have restricted editing privileges and are monitored full-time by an admin or other established editor. In keeping with the spirit of the whole system, I propose that editors on probation or parole are made to change their user names to a number, just like a prisoner incarcerated in a correctional system. The users would only be referred to by their "wikipedia corrections number" for the duration of their probation. Changing the probationers' names to a number would re-inforce their lower status as editors without full privileges, just as in real life correctional systems. Furthermore, it would make keeping track of them easier. These troublesome users would reform faster if treated in such a manner.

Of course upon successful completion of their probationary terms, the user would have the right to resume using his old user name. Halli B (talk) 02:50, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Halli: please stop wasting everybody's time with nonsense. Something like this is never, ever going to happen on Wikipedia, as you well know. Exploding Boy (talk) 02:54, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

No, i dont know. I thought this was the place to bounce around new ideas. Please turn that frown upside down, man. Halli B (talk) 02:58, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

It is still a bad idea. Humiliation is not what we do. Robert A.West (Talk) 03:12, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

How would reinforcing "their lower status" help them to "reform faster"? I was under the impression that treating a person like shit doesn't help them become a better person. — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 03:18, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Is there a single sane thread on this page today? – iridescent 03:19, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what happened to VP/P. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 05:00, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

vandalists should be banished anarchal grimlins should have a good eye on them you dont want to alienate them from wikipedia, there is a thick line from paradigm wikipedia adder and wikipedia destroyer, you might alienate contributors from wikipedia the best way to handel these people Is non harshly, not as a number. --Zaharous (talk) 17:20, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Please tell me that the above was a joke.Robert A.West (Talk) 19:02, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Deletion of material from talk pages

I have noticed recently, a tendency for editors to delete material from talk pages and to cite WP:Talk as a reason. This concerns me. My reading of that page is that such actions were to be confined to BLP violations or manifest and extreme personal attacks. In Talk:Bristol Palin (article a semi-protected redirect on the theory that a bio article would violate undue weight), I have reverted some recent deletions by two different editors of comments not their own.

Am I misunderstanding our policy on talk pages? Is it OK to delete comments just because they are ranting, accuse Wikipedia of censorship or violate Godwin's Law? Robert A.West (Talk) 12:13, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

• I've been seeing a lot of it, and I'm a torn. For most (nearly all) talk pages, I think blanking comments is highly inappropriate. But some things, like the various Palin pages, I've been seeing people post things to the talk pages not to discuss the page, but to communicate to the masses about the topic. I think if we don't blank that stuff more and more of the talk pages for highly popular and controversial topics will be rants and raves not actual discussions about the articles. So I think we need to blank (or even delete) in some very rare cases. Otherwise the talk page just won't work... Hobit (talk) 12:55, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

• Per WP:TALK, a valid reason to remove comments includes "Deleting material not relevant to improving the article (per the above subsection #How to use article talk pages)." Mind you, I would tend to limit that only to new sections that have not received any comments, and never to secondary comments to a new section unless they were completely inappropriate (BLPs, personal attacks, etc.) --MASEM 13:18, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

I ma very hesitant to remove stuff, but have seen and supported removal of trolling remarks (of repeated trolls) before other editors responded to the bait. So far I have hardly seen removal reasons being abused or if they were texts were usually placed back very soon thereafter. Arnoutf (talk) 13:33, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

• • I am sure that the deletions were in good faith -- well, one may have been WP:POINT -- but I just think we need to be very careful about doing this. What bothered me was the deletion of comments that suggested that Wikipedia is engaging in right-wing censorship. (When I was working to delete Al Gore III, I was accused of being part of a left-wing censhorship conspiracy.) People can feel disenfranchised or angry without being trolls. Robert A.West (Talk) 15:08, 8 September 2008 (UTC)
  • The problem is that one person may think it's irrelevant, and another may disagree. On the Sarah Palin talk page one or more people kept adding comments about a letter written about her that has gotten lots of attention, and others kept removing it. It was clearly on topic and potentially relevant to improving the article (if you think the letter was relevant to the article which is a content issue). But my sense was that the letter material was added just to get it into wikipedia somewhere. That's not AGF, but that was my guess (and AGF is why I didn't blank the material). Hobit (talk) 15:47, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

It's entirely appropriate to remove off-topic discussion, per "How to use article talk pages" > Keep on topic: Talk pages are for discussing the article, not for general conversation about the article's subject (much less other subjects). Keep discussions on the topic of how to improve the associated article. Irrelevant discussions are subject to removal. Exploding Boy (talk) 15:16, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

• But, as pointed out by User:Hobit, irrelevancy is often in the eye of the beholder. It is deceptively easy to convince oneself that an argument with which one disagrees is simply irrelevant. A screed on the legitimacy of the 14th Amendment would be clearly irrelevant to the Bristol Palin page. A screed on how the absence of a full biography proves that Wikipedia is controlled by a censorious right-wing cabal would merely be dumb, not irrelevant. Robert A.West (Talk) 18:20, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

True, but sometimes it's clear. "This article is non-neutral because XYZ" is relevant. "You're all a bunch of faggots and this article is just part of the homosexual agenda because XYZ" might be relevant, although I wouldn't fault anyone for removing the incivility. "ZOMG Zac Efron is SO HOT" is obviously irrelevant and should be removed on sight. Exploding Boy (talk) 18:24, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

In the past I've deleted comments on Talk pages about actors with such comments as "ooh, he's so dreamy". Even if they're responded to, they're not there to improve the article. Talk pages are not chat rooms. Corvus cornix_talk 20:13, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Proposal: derestrict page creation by unregistered users in Wikipedia namespace

I have made a proposal on the technical board, but perhaps it should have been posted here. Anyway I'm just drawing attention to it. Please post there to avoid duplication. Thanks, MSGJ 19:53, 8 September 2008 (UTC)

Set edit:autoconfirmed for entire Template namespace

Given the recent spate of IP vandalism to templates which don't qualify for protection as "high-risk" yet still affect high-profile pages, I propose semi-protecting the entire template namespace. It has no real downside - the very few constructive IP edits to templates can be done via {{editprotected}} - and will stop most of this inane template vandalism.

Thoughts? Daniel (talk) 06:36, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Previous discussion, at which this idea was rejected. Algebraist 11:31, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps Algebraist means Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 31#Proposal: Semiprotect the entire Template: namespace? (archive 31, not 13) — Twas Now ( talk • contribs • e-mail ) 12:05, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, of course. Wrong copypaste. Algebraist 12:16, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

A different approach may be to test out flagged/sighted revisions on the template namespace. It would actually let more templates be unprotected and open to editing by anyone, since problematic edits could simply be knocked out by the reviewer. MBisanz ^talk 12:17, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I remain opposed to semi protecting the whole namespace as I stated in the previous discussion, however I would certainly support any reasonable way of bringing in flagged versions on templates. Davewild (talk) 17:29, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

We're currently averaging about 30-40 complaints per day on OTRS relating to vandalism to templates, in particular the one with the giant highlight text which covers the article title and the edit tab. I think the previous consensus needs to be reexamined. Daniel (talk) 13:25, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

The previous discussion seemed pretty short. I would support this idea, myself. Exploding Boy (talk) 14:22, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

And it would blow in your face. (Sorry, I couldn't resist. :-D)

Personally, I am against such blanket protections. I believe we have proven that we are capable of managing the current system, where vandalism-magnets are protected and the rest of the templates are left in peace. Or is there the impression that IP users do not edit templates in good faith? I have advocated the extension of the auto-confirmation period, but I am firmly against further erosion of free editing.

PS: Daniel, I'm not sure I know which template you are referring to. Is it transcluded in the mainspace or is it just a toy for editors to play with? Waltham, The Duke of 06:02, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

I can't begin to say how opposed I am to the idea of further eroding the abilities of editors who have not yet reached the heightened autoconfirmation, which I think is already too much; I can't really believe that there isn't another solution to this problem that doesn't involve cutting the tendons of our new and inexperienced users. If you have a list of templates that regularly receive vandalism, it should be posted so it can get watchlisted and examined by more people; software solutions like this are far too much, and will only further reduce the ability of non-autoconfirmed editors to contribute to the encyclopedia. At this rate, it's going to be impossible to reach autoconfirm. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 17:32, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

What is with this reluctance to put restrictions on IPs? It's very strange. It may have been desirable or workable in the early stages of Wikipedia, but now it just makes no sense. We already restrict IPs from starting new pages and performing certain other actions. IP vandalism is in general harder to deal with. And it's far more likely that IP-only editors are casual users anyway; why would such a user have any need to edit templates at all? In other words, there is obvious benefit to semi-protecting templates (since they appear on thousands of pages) and no apparent drawbacks to preventing IPs from editing them. Exploding Boy (talk) 15:03, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Because it doesn't make sense. People who edit without creating an account (or people who have just recently created an account) have to deal with a lot of problems. If you've had your account for a while, your heightened abilities are probably something that you take for granted. IP vandalism is very easy to deal with, actually; most of the anti-vandalism tools out there filter based on those who haven't reached autoconfirm status yet and those who have not yet elected to make an account. It is much more difficult for the users of Huggle and the like to catch small vandalism (i.e, changing birth dates, accent marks, etc, that don't show up as obvious when compared to the "This guy is awesome" vandalism that we typically get from IP editors) made by 'better' editors who have the autoconfirm bit. We used to be the encyclopedia that anyone can edit; now we're the encyclopedia that you can only do anything useful on once your account has been alive for about a week and you've made ten edits to the mainspace. Do you really want to make that any worse than it already is, especially when there are better software-based solutions (flagged revisions, abuse filter) that can be used that will achieve the same effect or better without discriminating against a particular caste of users? Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 17:32, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Personally? Yes. I'd rather everyone was required to register a user name before being allowed to edit. It might prevent some people from editing, but it would make vandalism much easier to deal with, because a name is much easier to track than a string of numbers, and it would probably prevent a lot of the casual vandalism we have to deal with all the time. Exploding Boy (talk)

I wish to make this clear: ever since the auto-confirmation threshold was raised, semi-protection has been more meaningful, and its misuse more damaging. The previous four-day delay period was just that—a delay. Now, auto-confirmation requires a minimum level of participation, creating a clearer distinction between unregistered users, new registered users, and auto-confirmed users. Therefore, semi-protection is not something that one simply has to wait out, but something only active (even only to this level) editors can overcome. I still believe that raising auto-confirmation requirements to ten edits was a good idea, but this must be followed by prudent and careful application of semi-protection, which must be treated every bit as seriously as normal protection. The proposal suggests anything but this. Pre-emptive protection must be avoided at all costs; the practice is that even if a big wave of vandalism to a page is imminent, no padlocks are placed until it arrives. This is how things should stay. Waltham, The Duke of 22:06, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

To be fair, I've preemptively protected several articles in my nearly two years as an admin. Sometimes it is needed.
For those that are curious, they were all Colbert-isms. One of them saw vandalism as I was protecting it (ie: it was clean when I loaded the page, but was vandalized between then and when I hit "save" on the protection page). EVula // talk // ☯ // 22:12, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

We already have one namespace which is protected (fully protected, in fact) because of the damage that could be caused by allowing open editing. It is extremely easy to vandalise large numbers of pages using template vandalism - a vandal can put their "work" on several thousand pages for several minutes. I find it very surprising that when something like this is proposed there is strong opposition to it but when the proposal is equivalent to semiprotecting the entire article namespace editors fall over themselves to agree. Hut 8.5 16:13, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

"Semi-protect the entire article namespace"? This is preposterous. I don't know about anyone else, but I certainly shouldn't "fall over myself to agree". Waltham, The Duke of 03:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

How is a string of characters easier to track than a string of numbers? Please, tell me; I could revolutionize memory addressing.

In any case, you should probably review the five pillars and your understanding of Wikipedia; the idea is (or was, at any rate), that someone could pick up their computer after going to their 300-level CS class and help improve the article on computational complexity theory. It doesn't work this way anymore if its semiprotected, which pages frequently are (you have to wait five days if you want to do that, and make 10 edits to some other page); I don't think its enough of a problem that we need to make that situation any worse. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:27, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I should have thought it was obvious that it's easier to remember the unique username User:Foo than User:123.xxx.xxx.xxx. When IP talk pages you've left messages on appear in your Watchlist, can you identify them without going to their talk page? I know I can't.

Second, I'm familiar with the 5 pillars and with Wikipedia, thanks. This proposal is about the ability to edit templates, not articles. What possible need is there for an anon user to directly edit a template (they could still edit the template talk page) and how would the inability to do so be detrimental? Wikipedia is much, much bigger than it was when it began, and it's run entirely by volunteers. Anything that lessens the amount of work that needs to be done by volunteers is a good thing. The benefits of preventing anons from making simple edits that can result in major vandalism across thousands of pages far outweigh the potential drawback that some anon IP user, frustrated by being unable to edit a template, might decide not to bother editing Wikipedia at all. Exploding Boy (talk) 16:49, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism takes a few seconds to revert. Responding to a request for edit takes minutes (and the IP user also has to take more time to write the request than make the edit themselves—or, worse, they might simply not bother). What is more work for the volunteers? Waltham, The Duke of 03:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Except it may take several minutes to find the affected template, then it may take several minutes after the revert for all the affected pages to re-render a new cached version, and several more minutes to respond to clueless readers on OTRS and the help desk. Mr.Z-man 03:48, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

That I did not know. But surely this is not always the case?

Anyway, the level of the problem (both the possibility of vandalism and its visibility when it happens) is directly proportional to the transclusions of the template. In the previous discussion, it was proposed to set a number of transclusions above which a template would be semi-protected. (500 was suggested, to be specific.) If the number is reasonable, why not? Much better than ending up pre-emptively semi-protecting templates transcluded in ten articles. Waltham, The Duke of 16:53, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

It would be very easy to make an admin bot that would go around and semi-protect all templates not full protected with above 500 transclusions. I wouldn't know how to do it, but I know that it would be easier to code than a good many of our existing bots. There are two hurdles though. 1. You'd need to find an admin willing to run it on their primary account or get it through RFA. 2. The moral hazard of people making dummy transclusions to userpages to get from say 450 to 500 transclusion. MBisanz ^talk 17:00, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Special:Contributions doesn't have any problems with doing it; why you'd be examining that by hand is beyond me... Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 17:26, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Notability RfC

There is an ongoing request for comments regarding the notability of spin-out articles and the relationship between the main notability guideline and the subject specific notability guidelines at: Wikipedia talk:Notability/RFC:compromise. In order for the eventual results to be viable, a broad consensus will be required to move forward on any of the proposed compromises. As such, additional input from more editors would be greatly valued and appreciated. Thanks! Vassyana (talk) 17:32, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words has been marked as a guideline

Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) has recently been edited to mark it as a guideline. This is an automated notice of the change (more information). -- VeblenBot (talk) 18:51, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I would note in passing that it was remarked a guideline after a group of editors being bold downgraded it to an essay. See Wikipedia talk:Avoid weasel words#Demotion to essay and prior and following. If anyone has links to where the demotion was discussed here, I'd appreciate it. LaughingVulcan 00:17, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

{{Di-missing article links}}

Please see this. I was asked to post this somewhere, so here I am.--Rockfang (talk) 06:03, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Is there a problem with it? The only thing I see is it's uncategorized. It tends to be a rarely used template. Undead Warrior (talk) 13:53, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, there are a couple problems with it. I've noted them on the template's talkpage. Also, it is more highly used than one would think.--Rockfang (talk) 15:36, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Just a note about Range Blocks

Something that I have read about on blogs and the television is that if someone really wants to edit wikipedia there is nothing the administration can do to keep them out. For instance, your even the hard-blocking of IPs and IP ranges has no effect on crafy Brazilians and their cohorts. I look forward to editing Wikipedia much today and in the future. Thank you for your time. W.B. Wiki Brizhans (talk) 17:09, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

How so? Unless they have access to a number of open proxies that are unbeknownest to the ret of the world, I don't quite see how that really works. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 17:20, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Date formats after autoformatting

With the recent deprecation of date autoformatting, "raw" dates are becoming increasingly visible on Wikipedia. Strong views are being expressed, and even some edit-warring here and there. A poll has been initiated to gauge community support to help us develop wording in the Manual of Style that reflects a workable consensus. Four options have been put forward, summarised as:

1. Use whatever format matches the variety of English used in the article
2. For English-speaking countries, use the format used in the country, for non-English-speaking countries, use the format chosen by the first editor that added a date to the article
3. Use International format, except for U.S.-related articles
4. Use the format used in the country

The poll may be found here, as a table where editors may indicate level of support for each option above. --Pete (talk) 18:41, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

What is a "raw date"? Thanks, Halli B (talk) 21:52, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

I can enter a date as follows: "September 10, 2008" without using any special media wiki tools; that is considered a raw date. Alternatively, and up until recently, a feature of the mediawiki software allowed one to enter [[September 10]], [[2008]] which, for logged in editors that had set a date preference, would have autofortmatted the date to their liking; all others would see "September 10, 2008" (with both day and year linked. --21:56, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

In fact this software feature remains active, but the community has decided (at WP:MOSNUM) to phase out the links on which it relies. While autoformatting is felt by many to be at best useless, it is actually the associated links that are felt to be positively undesirable (se WP:OVERLINK).--Kotniski (talk) 08:07, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. But I see the wikipedia date/time stamps on our signatures uses the DD/MM/YY format preferred in the English-speaking world. Why not just use that style all the time? Halli B (talk) 22:07, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

That isn't the format preferred in the American-speaking world. Corvus cornix_talk 20:40, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Uh, i beg to differ. And since when is "American" a language? If it is, I'm moving to Chelsea. Halli B (talk) 21:55, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Please provide proof that 11/09/2008 is the preferred format in the US. Corvus cornix_talk 22:37, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

If your contention were true, today would be 11/9, not 9/11. Corvus cornix_talk 22:39, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Required Reading 2 -- MOS

I thought about the objections to my "required reading" proposal (supra) and have this addendum to my proposal. Before you laugh my original idea out of hand, please consider this rejoinder to your objections that there would be no way to know if the user had indeed read the manual of style even if he checked "I agree." I propose that a new user would be required to take (and of course pass) a small "test" of his MOS knowledge before his account be activated. The test would be ten to twenty questions drawn from the MOS with multiple choice answers. The correct answer would be the "best answer" out of the four options given and the prospective user would have to score a 80% (this is subject to debate of course) passing score on the MOS test before his account would be activated. I think a multiple choice objective test would be easier to grade than an essay test, although I agonized over this issue for a while before coming to my conclusion.

A sample question would be like:

Q. Which of the following article titles conforms to Manual of Style guidelines? (select the best answer):

A. JOSIAH A. HARPER (MOVIE)

B. Josiah a. Harper (film)

C. Josiah A. Harper (Film)

D. Josiah A. Harper (film)

Correct answer: D

And so on... Or we could divide the test into different sections, one dealing with MOS, and one dealing with WP:NOT, and whatever other guidelines and texts we wish a new user to be familiar with.

So that's how we know the user has indeed read the texts. Now that this objection has been answered I think its time to implement this policy. The next step is writing the questions -- and I am up to thirty-five different MOS questions and answers so far. Please help. Halli B (talk) 22:03, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Um, no. Unless you haven't bothered to read the responses to your proposal above, you must know that nobody supports this idea at all, and it is never going to happen.. And in case you have any doubt, let me caution you now that "disruptive editing" (per your unblock) also refers to disrupting the Village pump (policy) and other pages with nonsense like this. Perhaps you are the one who needs to do some reading, to learn a little more about Wikipedia. Or better yet, why not turn your attention to doing something useful like editing some articles. Exploding Boy (talk) 22:10, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. Please stop with these nonsense proposals so that real proposals dont get lost in the flow. Resolute 22:13, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

I have no use for the test, but if you put together a short (that is, terse) condensation of the MOS (on the lines above, "This is how an article title ...") that would be very handy for reference. A cheat sheet. (I wonder if anybody has actually found all the suggestions for the MOS, let alone read them.) Saintrain (talk) 16:20, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Umm.....................no. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:24, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Back to the drawing board, then. :-)

I must say, though, the fact that MoS is discussed a lot these days is, on its own, a good sign.

(Saintrain, either you follow the Manual or you do not; there can be no cheatsheet. What we can do is make it easier for people to find what they are looking for. We are working on it.) Waltham, The Duke of 02:55, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Ummm. I want a "terse condensation", you want to "make it easier for people to find what they are looking for". The difference is ??? Saintrain (talk) 06:29, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't really understand the distinction, either. I've only used the MOS as a reference work, I've never actually read it from one end to the other; however, I do think that a highly condensed version would be useful for someone looking to familiarize themselves with some of the basic concepts or looking for a starting point for their understanding of the MOS. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 06:35, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

It should be noted that the proposer has been indefblocked for sockpuppetry. I think we can safely assume that his or her proposals were more attempts at disruption than improvement. Exploding Boy (talk) 15:11, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Wiki brah? I wonder if that means Wiki brah was also Ouijaouija? Corvus cornix_talk 22:52, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

GFDL, 4A section

GFDL [1] states under 4A: "Use in the Title Page (and on the covers, if any) a title distinct from that of the Document, and from those of previous versions (which should, if there were any, be listed in the History section of the Document). You may use the same title as a previous version if the original publisher of that version gives permission."

All articles in MediaWiki based platforms have the same title in each version. Doesn't this conflict with the above section? or do the users of Wikipedia specificly give their permission in a local policy (Which, I might add, does not exist in the Hebrew Wikipedia; Should this be added to our policy?)?

Thanks, Yonidebest Ω Talk‏ 08:01, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I am not a lawyer; that being said, it is my understanding that our specific GFDL excludes those issues: Wikipedia:Copyrights says that "Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover Texts." By specifying that there are to be no Invariant Sections or Front or Back-Cover Texts, I imagine we escape the problem. I'd have to ask someone more qualified, however, to be sure. {{Nihiltres|talk|log}} 12:52, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

The term 'title page' is defined thusly in the GFDL: ... For works in formats which do not have any title page as such, "Title Page" means the text near the most prominent appearance of the work's title, preceding the beginning of the body of the text. We seem to be in violation here. Algebraist 12:58, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, the real answer is that we basically ignore parts of the GFDL we don't like. More than a few of the GFDL's formal requirements don't reflect the actual practice on Wikipedia. To date, no one has really tried to enforce those provisions. Dragons flight (talk) 13:01, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

The answer is of course to write a new license designed for Wikipedia and use that (perhaps dual licensed with the GFDL or something). I'm not sure how we could work this with revisions prior to the changeover, though. The most direct method would be to get the Free Software Foundation to approve our Wikipedia license as a version of the GFDL (since everything's currently licensed as GFDL 1.2 or later). Algebraist 13:07, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

If you really wanted to...but there's really no reason to do that, since we already say "... with no Front-Cover Texts, and with no Back-Cover texts" ... Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:23, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

As defined in the license, the "Title Page" is a different concept from the "Cover Texts". Dragons flight (talk) 16:39, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

It could be argued that the HTML of the page up to and including the title thereof constitutes our title page. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 06:33, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

There's no unique name there, either. Algebraist 09:58, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Some of you seem to be a bit confused about what's going on here. Firstly, the GFDL doesn't require a distinct title page; the text most prominently near the title of the work (re: the index page) is fine for that purpose per 1.8, as long as the title page is distinct from the documents therein. Second, we don't want or need cover-texts, since we...don't have covers. Nothing new is required. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 18:57, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Image sourcing

I have recently ran into a problem regarding a source for images. In my opinion, an Http:// source must be present on non-free media, including album covers, to provide valid proof that it is indeed a copy of the album art and not some kid's photoshop experiment. Image:Thescore.jpg is the image that started it. A lot of images claim that the source is the record label, but this one does not. On my talk page, the uploader lists her rationale for not including a valid source but I don't think that it's a good enough reason. (I'm half tempted to take it to IfD) So my question is this: If you upload an album cover, is it required to add that the image can be obtained from the label and/or provide the http:// source? Basically, if an image is uploaded and has no http:// source or no label present, I don't think it has a valid source. (unless it was scanned by the uploader) Undead Warrior (talk) 13:49, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

So... I think you just negated your argument with that last sentence. A source is required, yes. Sometimes that source is a web link, sometimes it's "scanned by the user". What's the issue? I'm kinda confused... EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:42, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

The issue is that some users are claiming a source is just saying it's the cover of the album. The image I just listed above states that it's the album cover for (insert name here). The uploader is claiming that it is sourced being like that. I disagree. Undead Warrior (talk) 17:01, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

That an image is the cover of an album is no more difficult to verify than the claim that a bit of information came from a certain book. Anyone can independently look at the album or the book if you doubt it. So I think simply identifying the album should be sufficient. If you disagree, it's a very simple matter to get a link to an online entry for that album at Amazon, Allmusic, etc. (or in this case, the band's official online discography linked to from the band's WP article) which would illustrate the cover and confirm that the image is what it purports to be. I don't know why you'd need to argue with the uploader about whether you could add that URL as a source; was he deleting it? Postdlf (talk) 17:24, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

She kept deleting the no source tag and would never add a proper source. Sources are required. I tag many images that don't have the source and notify the uploader. It is the uploaders duty to make sure all their non-free media is properly sourced. Undead Warrior (talk) 17:41, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Saying that it is the album's cover art is a proper source. Dragons flight (talk) 17:52, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

To be more explicit, the question of whether it came from some website, or was scanned by the uploader, or something else, is nearly always irrelevant to the question of who owns the copyright. In this case, all that really is relevant is that it is a copy of the album's cover art. Dragons flight (talk) 17:54, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes. But even if one needs another source, apart from the album itself, to verify that it is in fact the cover of that album, it took me all of 15 seconds to find the URL I linked to above. How long was spent posting and reposting the no source tag? Please don't get so hung up on browbeating an uploader into fixing something anyone could easily fix. Uploaders don't own images, and have no more privileged knowledge regarding non-free mass media images than anyone else. We're all volunteers here. If an image is useful to an article, then it's everyone's duty as WP contributors to ensure that it was properly uploaded and is appropriately used. Postdlf (talk) 17:58, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

I never said that I think they own the picture. I just stated that if you upload a picture, especially a non-free picture, you are required to post a source. Saying that the cover of the album is the source for the album art is not enough. How did you find the album? What source. Do you own it and scan the picture? Or did you find it from a website. Undead Warrior (talk) 15:42, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The point of sourcing and image tagging in general is to provide protection and respect for copyrights. The details you are focusing on are irrelevant to that process because they don't affect the copyright ownership. It doesn't matter who scanned an album's cover art. The source is the album. Beyond that we don't need to care. Dragons flight (talk) 15:55, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The bad editor

Ok so you come across a bad edit and do a revert which elicits a counter revert and then leads to the talk page. There, through discussion, you quicky come to understand that what you have on your hands is the proverbial, dreaded bad editor. (We all know him. He's not difficult to recognize.) Not a vandal (that would be too easy) but someone who doesn't have policy knowledge, doesn't care to learn it, yet is entirely sincere in their viewpoint. One might say a crusader even. He is passionate, has good writing skills, but... he simply, consistently makes bad edits. He removes good content, questions unquestionable material, assumes bad faith in discussion and, in general, seems to have dedicated himself to a program of steady deterioration of article quality.

Wikipedia policy says: Do not bite the newbies and assume good faith, good policies both in the majority of cases. But unless you are willing to spend a considerable amount of your time not, as you'd like, in article space, but in seemingly endless talk page discussion and arbitration, you (I) more often than not just give up and move on. Admirable? No. Practical? Very much so.

Inner Voice: "I just don't have the time man. I came here to write and edit articles."

Alter-ego: "This is a community project. Understand what that means?"

Inner Voice: "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but why should we have to waste so much time in drumming out of the project someone we know from the git-go is simply a bad editor. I'm telling you I just don't have the energy. Let someone else do it. I've got more important things to do."

Alter-ego: "Selfish b@$!@rd. You really shouldn't be editing in a public encyclopedia. Go back to writing your damn book."

I think we've all probably had the harrowing experience of coming across a bad edit, doing a history check of the editor responsible, and to our horror see that this guy has been doing this, not just in this article but all over the damn encyclopedia! He is involving many, many editors in the process described above. Not maliciously, mind you, in good faith, but just laying a path of destruction wherever he goes.

Perhaps sometimes it would be better to just recognize these people up front and to expeditiously get rid of them. Not everybody is cut out to edit an encyclopedia. We are not all Diderots.

Sorry. Just a bad case of schpilkus and I needed to heave. (red face) And here I am standing with it all over my shoes. ~ Alcmaeonid (talk) 16:02, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Something like dispruptive or tendentious editing? Remember, AGF and BITE are only guidelines, not suicide pacts. Once someone has been here a while and has been informed of the way we do things, they shouldn't be treated as a newbie. And if someone repeatedly fails to assume good faith of others, that's a perfectly valid reason to stop assuming good faith of them, nor does AGF mean they can't be sanctioned for doing something wrong. In general I agree with you though, we put up with far too much crap from users who just straddle the line between decent editor and blatant disruption. Mr.Z-man 16:19, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

And far too often we find we've wasted hours of our precious time stretching our credulity assuming good faith on the part of users who are clearly never going to be able to contribute usefully and who, more often than not, turn out to be trolls anyway. Exploding Boy (talk) 16:33, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Don't forget the ones that just don't get it. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:49, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

You needed something? More seriously, are these folks educate-able? Because if not, it's certainly better for our mission (encyclopedia) to get rid of them. Assuming good faith assumes that they can be pointed in the right direction by pointing them towards the relevant policy-pages, no? ~user:orngjce223 how am I typing? 04:44, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

The template: Overuse, Inappropriate Use and Drive by Tagging

I see the [citation needed] template used in every manner of situation even ones that are highly inappropriate where the statements made are entirely uncontroversial and purely factual or descriptive in nature. These tend to be along the lines of: "The allies won the second world war[citation needed]" and are just annoyances to the editors of wikipedia who actually do the useful work of adding new material.

The presence of a fact template suggests that there is something wrong with a statement or that it is doubtful or controversial.

I think that fact templates should only be added when the factuality of a statement is seriously in doubt or of controversial nature. In order to deal with incidences of drive by tagging I think there should be a reqiurement of anyone who makes a [citation needed] tag must write in the talk section exactly what they think is wrong with a statement.

There is also the issue of things which may not be documented, though they might be generally held as being true. If I wrote that "Alice Springs in Australia is not inhabited by four legged martians[citation needed]" I doubt I'd be able to find a source anywhere on earth that will specifically agree with that fact. In a more practical sense, if in a mathematical context one were to write 2 + 2 = 4[citation needed], there is no mathematical proof for the truth of such a statement (a point made by Roger Penrose) but the statement is almost universally held as true and certainly not controversial or doubtful in any way. Some statements are really difficult or impossible to find references for, not because they are wrong or 'original research' but because of their nature. Although there are statements where references can be found (sometimes only in print) wiki editors are not paid and many useful contributors don't want to waste their own time looking up references and writing them in when the statements themselves are completely sound.

I don't understand the motivations of people who add fact tags in inappropriate places (although I sometimes question their intelligence or character in my own mind) but anyone who adds a fact tag should be required to make a note on the discussion page of the article saying why they thought it was necessary to have the tag in the first place. I think it's important to use common sense when tagging the fact tag because it can do more harm than good in some cases. The potential harm includes: discouraging editors, wasting editor's time and fostering unfounded doubts in the minds of readers. Sometimes the [citation needed] tag seems to be the wikipedia analog of vexatious litigation.

I hope that the policies can be changed to retain the advantages of this tag without all the downsides which I have just outlined. --I (talk) 16:14, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree. In the sciences there are some essential points for which it's extremely difficult to find refs, because they're uncontroversial and scientists don't write articles about them. For example it took me two hours to find a decent explanation of protostome and deuterostome. I think the minimum standard should be that people who apply [citation needed] tags should be required to provide an adequate explanation on the article's Talk page, and [citation needed] tags without convincing explanations should be treated as vandalism. -- Philcha (talk) 16:24, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

(e/c)This is almost a perrenial proposal. If someone puts a {{fact}} tag on an obviously true statement, that's just being a dick (though you might want to use WP:DE if you bring it up with them). There's no reason to make editors who are truly concerned with the factual accuracy of articles do tons of extra work summarizing their thoughts simply because of some morons tagging everything that doesn't have a ref immediately adjacent to it. Mr.Z-man 16:28, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

I can't pass up the opportunity to point out this tagging again. – iridescent 16:36, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

How does one tell the difference between a dick and "editors who are truly concerned with the factual accuracy of articles"? And what should be done about dicks? My proposal about requiring an adequate explanation on the article's Talk page may be a workable criterion. Can anyone propose alternatives? -- Philcha (talk) 16:44, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

If common sense is sufficient (i.e, the above example where someone put a fact tag on "Normally, there are five fingers on a human hand"), then it might as well be vandalism; just revert it and go about your business; however, fact tagging is very important, and doesn't really require an explanation when it is properly used; I can't support the idea of forcing editors to go through more work just to point out that something is uncited. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 16:48, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

(e/c)No, all it will do is discourage people who are actually trying to help, while people just trying to inflate their edit count will just say they tagged a bunch of stuff because they didn't think it was true. Say I find an article which is entirely unsourced. I have a few options, I can: leave it as is, tag it with a generic {{unref}}, or tag individual statements that seem dubious with {{fact}}. Which is the most helpful, and which is the most unlikely if I'm required to explain why I think something is wrong? Also remember, not everything that's obvious to you is obvious to everyone else. "The Allies won WWII" - that would be obvious, but protostome? I haven't taken a biology class in about 5 years, I have no idea what that is. Because of that, I wouldn't go around tagging individual statements with {{fact}}, but dismissing concerns about accuracy by saying "its obvious" isn't much better than the people going around tagging things that really are obvious. Mr.Z-man 16:58, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

In order to answer your point about dismissing concerns about accuracy - the case that drove me to make my post in the first place was some person putting a cite tag on part of a synopsis I posted on a short documentary. The whole doc is only a few minutes long and freely available on the net and all I did was outline the content in a neutral descriptive manner. At some stage I feel the need to question people who can't be bothered to just check things out themselves should at least explain why they are tagging cite - it may seem like a easy fire and forget solution when you think something's fishy but seeing cite tags on their work can be exasperating to editors who are trying to add good information. It's the wiki equilvilent of being visited by the tax authority and having to dig up and sort through mountains of receipts. --I (talk) 17:49, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The term "drive by tagging" is quite appropriate. I sometimes dispair at the times it is used, mostly by IP editors. I am not sure that the "common knowledge" argument is helpful, but if there are ways to remove [citation] tags without being flamed for it, please suggest ideas! By way of showing what happens when editors are determined to cite sources for everything, see Glenrothes by-election, 2008, where the usually blank results box is now full of sources for all to wonder at. doktorb _words^deeds 17:57, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The way I see it if they had to say why they needed a citation for something then the "common knowledge" argument wouldn't even have to be made - bad cite tags are ones that cannot be justified in discussion. This is not to say that there may not be other types of bad cite tags, but ones that challenge common knowledge (or common sense) would have no leg to stand on if they had to be posted in discussion pages. --I (talk) 18:31, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Argh. There is nothing wrong with "drive-by tagging". If something is unsourced and needs a source, then tagging it is an improvement to the encyclopedia. Frivolous tagging is already covered by our rules for disruption. No work is needed here. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 18:42, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Echo this. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 18:51, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Ditto. Corvus cornix_talk 22:56, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

RfA Review - Recommendation Phase

As you are aware, a detailed review of the Requests for Adminship Process has been ongoing for some time. In June, 209 editors provided their impressions and thoughts on the current state of the process; these responses were reviewed and analyzed. The results, including a statistical analysis of responses, are now available for review at Wikipedia:RfA Review/Reflect. Based on the results of this analysis, we have prepared a new set of questions for editor input.

Unlike the last round of questions, this questionnaire is drawn specifically from the responses we received from editors, and is intended to generate recommendations for addressing the most common concerns about the RfA process. All editors are invited to participate by following the instructions at Wikipedia:RfA Review/Recommend. Editors who did not participate in the first questionnaire are welcome to participate in this phase - and all editors should feel free to answer as many or as few of the questions as you wish. Any input is valuable. Responses will be reviewed, and the most common responses will form the basis for possible changes to the RfA process itself.

On behalf of the editors who have helped with the project so far, thank you for your participation. UltraExactZZ ^Claims ~ Evidence 18:20, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Redirecting user to mainspace

I'm currently I'm in a small dispute with Everyme over his redirecting his User:Everyme/user page into User. I removed it without notifying him; today he reverted back, citing that the cross-name redirect strictly applies from the mainspace to the user. I based my action on Angry Aspie's user page, in which the user tried redirecting to Asperger syndrome but was redirected. That train of thought follows that it makes people confused and access contributions if they're being led to another page. I maintain that the rule is designed to prevent the mixing of the two namespaces, regardless of whether main to user or user to main. Is my action in the spirit of the rule? hbdragon88 (talk) 19:01, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

My counter-argument is that the redirect is harmless because I am not redirecting my main userpage into article space, but a specific subpage. Wherever someone clicks on my username or a link to my main userpage, they will be redirected to my talk page, not out of my userspace. user:Everyme 19:06, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Everyme's action seems harmless. I would allow it, unless there is a policy or guideline to the contrary. SMP0328. (talk) 19:10, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

There isn't, otherwise I wouldn't have done it, or alternatively would have removed the redirect myself if presented with such a rule. Admittedly, the fact that Hbdragon edited in my userspace without letting me know pisses me a bit off. The fact that he didn't say sorry after I told him it would have been polite doesn't really improve that. As a result, I'm quite determined to keep the redirect in place. Had he simply contacted me about it and shared his concerns with me, I would probably still argue that it's harmless, but might have considered changing it just to alleviate any concerns. But not like that. I've been active on Wikipedia for two years now, too long to let some admin act as if he knew more about policies and their spirit than me. I won't be treated like some stupid child. user:Everyme 19:16, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Lolz, tone it down, man. I'm a user. I didn't use my administrator tools to delete or protect or revert to my preferred version, so don't try to make this as a great BIG ADMIN vs. LOWLY USER debate, because it isn't. This is like any other disupte: make the edit, revert, discuss. If the communtiy decides I'm wrong about it, then I'm wrong. I'm not going to hold a grudge against you. "Spirit" isn't meant to mock you, it's my interpretation, which isn't a fact, but one view, which can be wrong. hbdragon88 (talk) 19:38, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't edit in another user's userspace on a hunch, and certainly not without informing them. Like it or not, that's a typical admin "prerogative". You wouldn't have done that before you became an admin, now would you? Maybe you just don't notice how being an admin affects your judgment and behaviour towards others. user:Everyme 19:45, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

You think it's an admin preogative? I don't think so. I can't provide any concrete examples before of doing this before. I have removed fair use images, categories, etc. from user subpages before. i'm racking my mind for actual examples, because this kind of thing rarely happens. But I considered this to be a very routine thing, like typos or corrections (since I beileved at the time that it was R2-like) and would have done it. I didn't think I was affecting actual content. Look at my logs, I haven't used the tool in over a month. I'm not very enamored with the sysop tools, to be honest. hbdragon88 (talk) 19:52, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Or else, it may be just be a matter of basic politeness, a distinct possibility. Whatever you think applies more. user:Everyme 19:55, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Why don't you just have your signature link to user instead? Or can you not do that? If that's the case, then I don't see a problem with it. Celarnor ^{Talk to me} 19:12, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

I used to link directly to the article from my sig, but then thought that people may find a link convenient to "return" to my userspace if they so wish. So I created that subpage and redirected it. user:Everyme 19:15, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Technically speaking...more research over at WP:SIG...it's required that a signature links to at least the user or user talk page, which Everyme does. Further, the guideline prohibits "disruptive links," like an autograph page. The only reason why I even did this to begin with was because I was pretty confused on why I got hit to User when clicking the apparent user page. That can be constructed as some disruption, though in practical reality I knew exactly how to get to the right page since I've been here for so long. hbdragon88 (talk) 19:19, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

"constructed"? Do you mean construed ? Also, I replaced the direct link to user with that link precisely so as to provide users with a link back to my userspace. Also, it's a weird reaction to your own confusion to just edit in my userspace instead of letting me know. user:Everyme 19:23, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Explain that, to me, again...you expect people to click on the redir, then click the top link to bring them to User:Everyme? Is that it? And...you don't even have a userpage either, that page just redirect to your user talk. So click user in signature > base redirect > User:Everyme > User talk:Everyme. A three-step process to get to the same page. Also, you think it's weird? I see a problem, I believed I was "fixing" it. hbdragon88 (talk) 19:30, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Fixing it by turning the redirect into a link to an empty subpage? I could have done better than that had you informed me of your concerns. Also, the Asperger situation you cited was truly problematic mainly because any raw link to the userpage (i.e. in article history etcpp) would be redirected out of that userspace. The alternative would be to link directly to user again, like I used to do. user:Everyme 19:36, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Trolls

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Hello, does anyone think there are any pages on Wikipedia that would exist were it not for the threat of trolls vandalising them? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.86.164.115 (talk) 20:19, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

No, I don't think so. Algebraist 20:21, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Adjustment to image tags

Based on this comment from Mike Godwin, the WMF's legal counsel, foundation-l, I'd like to open a discussion on our definition of free-images. Currently we define images with non-commercial {{Non-free with NC}} and non-derivative {{Non-free with ND}} as non-free images that should be deleted {{Db-i3}}. Given that Mike indicates that Wikiquote can consider non-commercial vs. commercial use in deciding what text it may use, that suggests to me that we may be able to accept a non-commercial image license as "free" and possibly even a non-derivative license, since what is expected of a charity is different than what is expected of a non-charitable enduser. MBisanz ^talk 01:56, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

It has always been the case that Wikipedia could freely use images with non-commercial and non-derivative licenses. The decision to count these as non-free was based on Wikipedia's goal of being free-content, which was taken to include freely copyable and modifiable for any purpose. The decision was not made to comply with copyright law. Algebraist 09:03, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Content in the User page

Hi everyone. I wanted to know if Wikipedia has any policy regarding to the removal of hate links and comments from user pages? --Kaaveh (talk) 04:22, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Would WP:USER be of any significance? ~user:orngjce223 how am I typing? 05:17, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Could you give the exact situation? Such things have to be carefully decided case-by-case. Many different considerations come into play there, among them WP:NPA and WP:HARASS. Everyme 06:37, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes, of course. In the Persian Wikipedia, a user who has a long history] of anti Jews/Israel/Zionism edits. has put an external link to a hate website, and to encourage other users to visit the hate webpage, he describes the link as (یک نمونه دیگر از وحشی گری اشغالگران صهیونیست) [2] which means "An example of savagery of zionist occupiers". I removed the hate link + the comment and some other user reverted my edit in just a few seconds. So I wanted to see if there is a genral policy with regard to this type of misusing the user page. Many thanks --Kaaveh (talk) 09:08, 13 September 2008 (UTC)