Wikipedia talk:Protection policy/Archive 8

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Various proposals have been made recently at Wikipedia talk:BLP which would significantly extend the scope of protection. Basically the proposals involve semi-protecting all, or many, or some, articles which are biographies of living persons (BLPs), even if there has not yet been any controversial editing. Since the discussions over there are rather involved, I'll try and summarize what I see as the most pertinent arguments:

1. It is important for ethical and legal reasons to try to keep Wikipedia free of defamatory and certain other counter-policy material about living persons;
2. It is primarily BLPs which attract the addition of such material, usually by anonymous editors;
3. There are too many BLPs for the community to monitor effectively for such additions;
4. One solution (also proposed and being polled on on the BLP talk page) is to reduce the number of BLPs by causing more of them to be deleted, specifically by saying that AfD discussions on BLPs which end in no consensus should default to delete rather than keep;
5. Many people are concerned about the damage such a deletion policy would do (babies in the bathwater, further consensus-reaching prevented by disappearance of the article, etc.)
6. To try to solve the problem with less harm to the encyclopedia, it is proposed to allow semi-protection of large numbers of BLPs, which will keep the articles alive but significantly reduce the amount of vandalism (and, incidentally, the removal of inconvenient but well-sourced facts by article subjects themselves).

Comments welcome, preferably at the BLP talk page (under any of the many relevant sections).--Kotniski (talk) 16:02, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

Protecting the current version rewards revert warriors

Here's a typical revert sequence (A and B refer to two versions):

• A was the established version for quite a while
• Change #1: B without discussion
• Change #2: A without discussion
• admin admonishes both to use discussion instead of reverting
• Change #3: B with discussion
• Change #4: A with discussion

At some point, admin needs to intervene, since the revert war continues despite the discussion. (Versions A and B remain constant, nobody is willing to concede one iota to the other party.)

This policy currently says "When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators normally protect the current version, except where the current version contains content which clearly violates content policies, such as obvious vandalism or copyright violations." This means that, regardless at which point admin intervenes (after change #3 or 4), admin effectively cements the version of the editor who kept the edit war going. One might argue that it may be fairer after an even number of changes, but that is a weak argument. The policy sheepishly says it's only temporary, but there is nothing in the policy that backs up that claim. In fact, in most revert wars I've seen, once a page is protected, editors walk off to other areas for a time far longer than the 3 or so days for which it has been protected. This of course is a good thing, because we want them to cool off. But let's be honest: It also means that the version remains that way for a much longer time, thereby becoming the established version. This sends a clear message to edit warriors: Keep reverting as long as you can, or else your opponents will get their version established!

I will, once more, do my duty and protect the version as it is, but I'm very unhappy about it. I think, a good admin should strive to revert to a version that best fits certain clear criteria, such as the "reasons" I mention in a related discussion on WT:SLR#Clarification of what 1RR means to us. When I have the time, I might rewrite that so it can be applied to page protections. — Sebastian 18:05, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I think the intention is to keep the protecting admin from becoming involved in the dispute. If the admin is required to trawl through past revisions and decide which version they feel is the "best", they can't possibly be considered uninvolved: they've chosen one side of the argument over another. That's not what admins are for; we're just here to stop the edit war by whatever means necessary. I think you place too high a value on the "established version" - if a sensible editor looks in the edit history and sees a massive edit war prior to full protection, they're not going to place much weight on either version. When hell freezes over we get FlaggedRevisions, this will become even less of an issue, as neither version of the page will appear to idle viewers. All that aside, your scenario is overly simplistic: this simple case of persistent two-party reversion would just get both editors blocked for 3RR, no protection necessary. We (should, at least) only use page protection where the situation is a lot more complicated, with multiple editors and factions fighting over an issue (and usually with at least one or two cool-headed editors trying to keep things under control). Properly working out which revision is the 'correct' one in such cicumstances would be the work of ten, twenty, thirty minutes; which is time that an admin doesn't have to spend, particularly not if there's a nasty edit war going on. Overall, I think the hands-off, ultra-simple rule we have in place at the moment is the best solution to a problem with no easy answers. Happy‑melon 18:30, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your reply; you make a number of points that merit good replies. I'm in a rush now, so please forgive me for picking out only two, where you directly criticize my example.

"simplistic": I simplified the example a bit, but it is certainly not simplistic. I think your calling it "simplistic" stems from several wrong assumptions on your part. First: It seems you are assuming that each opinion is only added by one account. That is not necessarily the case. Often, you have tag teams. If both sides have a tag team, WP:3RR which refers to editors, not versions, practically allows 12 or more reverts per day. Your second wrong assumption seems to be that, once the "allowances" are used up, edit warring stops. But heated edit wars can last for many days.

"too high a value on the 'established version'": You would be surprised to learn how many people read or edit Wikipedia without ever looking at page histories! And I've seen enough cases where an experienced editor made some change to an article without checking the history, and then even some blatant vandalism can get frozen in articles for many months, because all experienced editors trust the first experienced editor. Of course, that doesn't always happen so fortunate for the vandal or edit warrior, but it sure happens often enough to be an incentive for them. That's what I mean by "Protecting the current version rewards revert warriors". — Sebastian 22:33, 6 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't think you've really proven your point. You seem to assume that somehow protection is also "good". Full protection is an all out bad thing. When we have to fully protect and lock down a page, there is no up side, it's bad. It can be edited, changes can't be made and it can alienate outside editors. That's not to say we shouldn't do it; it's often the only way to stop an edit war and hope that those involve will solve it themselves. Protection is not really a solution, it's a band aid, it's a temporary fix. I agree with Happy-melon above, the admin is to protect the current version, however wrong. Any other action would mean that they have to take a side, and then we get into favouratism and just general elitism. Then we'll have to open up Wikipedia:Protections for Discussion, which would be a bureaucratic nightmare that no one wants. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 17:07, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Of course, I agree that full protection is not the panacea to Wikipedia's editing problems. But how does that disprove my point? Conversely, your argument that "Any other action would mean that they have to take a side" got it completely backwards - what more extreme side can anyone take than completely siding with one extreme version?!! Sebastian (talk) 06:00, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Because protecting what's there is a rule which doesn't allow an admin to take a side: they have no control over which side ends up being "favoured". Insisting that we protect whatever's currently up is a simple way to ensure that admins can't take sides in a dispute. Happy‑melon 08:23, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, limiting an admin's choices can in some cases be helpful for the admin. I don't think that's necessarily always the case, but that's beside the point. For the sake of argument, let's assume you are right and we always need to rigidly limit the protecting admin's choice.

With that, we can address the topic of this discussion: "Protecting the current version rewards revert warriors". Nobody says that the rule to protect the current version is the only possible rule. With a little bit of imagination, we can think of many other equally rigid rules. For instance, we could rule that: "Admins always protect the version before the last revert". That rule would provide an incentive for not reverting. Can you see what I mean? Sebastian (talk) 10:55, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

I want to add my own comments to this debate, which I have come to following the recent edit war on [Virgin Killer], and the controversy over the cover image displayed. Briefly, an article on a minor news site accused wikipedia of hosting child porn, and this prompted a heated debate over the image. An edit war ensued, and the image flicked back and forth. It was protected, without the disputed image at the top. I was suprised to discover WP:PREFER - the admin had correctly followed this policy. In this case, people coming across the current news article, checking wikipedia, would discover that action had been taken - ie it would appear WP had relented to outside influence, rather than it's WP:NOTCENSORED line. Having read the erudite comments above, I do understand why the rule exists. However, I wonder if an alternative could be found, without overly complicating matters. Perhaps, in a clear case of a recent edit war, where a stable version has previously existed, then the prev version would be the one locked whilst the dispute is resolved? I don't know if such a policy could be stated clearly enough to avoid the admin becoming embroiled in the dispute, but I do think that the matter is worth consideration. --  Chzz  ►  20:12, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Almost always, the best approach is to protect in the The Wrong Version. Productive talk page discussion to decide consensus often can not happen if some of the editors feel that one side has an advantage over the other. Freezing the article in the wrong version is key to helping editors believe that the system is not biased against them and that talk page discussion consensus will be based on a fair interpretation of policy. So, yes, it keeps admins uninvolved, but also can help editors that are distrustful of each other more easily move on with the discussion. FloNight♥♥♥ 20:29, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

An interesting point, well made. But in deciding which is The Wrong Version, surely involves the administrator in the debate process, and the danger of the admin 'taking sides' re-emerges? --  Chzz  ►  22:36, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

The Wrong Version almost always is going to be the version that that an administrator sees when they go to protect to stop the edit war. Irrespective of which version it is, one side of a dispute will claim it is the wrong version. By explaining this, the admin can diffuse the complaints. Selectively choosing a version will undermine the effort. The administrator then is able to go ahead and mediate the dispute with "clean hands". FloNight♥♥♥ 23:13, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Srry I previously ,misunderstood what you meant by The Wrong Version - I see now you mean that it's likely, by chance, that the current will be that one. This is relying on chance probability, which doesn't strike me as an appropriate way to decide policy. I hope you can see that, it cases where media is involved, the image displayed during dispute is of great importance. --  Chzz  ►  23:22, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Just a few thoughts: freezing the wrong version seems actually to be a worse result than allowing the edit war to continue. Admins are appointed because they are trusted to make judgement calls sometimes, not just to blindly follow procedure. Seems to me that if an admin has time to look into a case in enough detail to establish that there is an ongoing edit war and protection is the appropriate solution, they can also be expected to reach a reasonable preliminary judgement as to which version is more accurate or in line with consensus. Of course, if protection or semi-protection would exclude one side from editing but not the other (e.g. in a dispute between an IP and a confirmed account), the admin is effectively taking one side over the other and presumably would be expected to check that that side appears to be in the right. But I think this right/duty should be extended to all cases. Of course admins won't always get it right, but their result ought to be far better than the 50% given by following a blind rule. (And of course it's not necessarily a choice between two extreme versions; the admin might be able to quickly devise a neutral version which differs from either side's.)--Kotniski (talk) 07:58, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

No, administrators are chosen because they are trusted to not make content decisions. An administrators role, in closing a Afd or any other consensus discussion, is to gauge the consensus of the other editors, not to inject their own opinion of what is best. If there is an edit war happening then usually there is not consensus. If the problem is that one editor is going against consensus, then that matter needs to be addressed as well by explaining the correct way to resolve disputes to that particular editor. Full protection is almost always temporary with the purpose of allowing the issues to be sorted out in a thoughtful manner. FloNight♥♥♥ 13:40, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

But protecting is still inescapably a content decision in effect (people won't stop using the encyclopedia while we resolve our disputes). Better then for that decision to be taken intelligently than blindly. It's the users and the accuracy of the encyclopedia that matter more than the sensitivities of a few editors.--Kotniski (talk) 13:57, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

No, protection is an emergency measure to maintain peace and tranquility on-wiki and prevent the edit history from being filled up with a potentially limitless stream of identical edits. It's a way to force editors to re-engage their brain, stop blindly clicking on the 'undo' button, and consider the possibility that the other side's argument might actually have merit. As long as the admin does not evaluate the relative merits of the two versions, protection is most definitely not a content decision.

I think when we finally get FlaggedRevisions, this rule should indeed be amended; perhaps to "admins usually revert the page to the last stable or quality version that existed prior to the dispute" or similar. That's exactly what flagged revisions are supposed to be for: checkpoints to fall back on when the editing gets contentious. As long as neither party to the edit war is a page-patroller, the edit war won't even be visible to 95% of an article's audience. But until then, there is no easy way to minimise the visibility of an edit war except by nipping it in the bud, for which full protection is a sledgehammer solution that does nonetheless work. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Happy‑melon 15:55, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

All right, if you say it works... But in my limited experience it simply makes one side the winner of the edit war, and everyone loses the motivation to discuss it further, leaving the protected version as the permanent one. That being the case, it's particularly important that the admin ascertain that it doesn't look to be the wrong version (as I'm sure they do in most cases, per common sense).--Kotniski (talk) 08:09, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

It does not work in most cases. As I wrote above, I've seen many cases in which the protected version remains stable for a long time after the protection expired. So, the idea that this is only "temporary" is unfortunately only wishful thinking. -- Sebastian (talk) 09:00, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. For example, current dispute over [virgin killer]. When protection expires, I will be reluctant to revert to the obviously stable and agreed version, because a) I don't want to provoke a further edit war, and b) I don't want to appear provocative. Even though I'd just be restoring the status quo. And editprotected doesn't work - admins won't edit when it's considered 'controversial'. This is definitely a problem with current policy. --  Chzz  ►  15:21, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

Ideally we would have a list of trusted experts to arbitrate edit wars in particular fields of knowledge. Given that that idea is probably not practical (though it might be worth looking at), we ought to encourage administrators to make common-sense decisions based on the evidence (much as they do in deletion discussions etc.; they don't just count the votes, they use their brains as well).--Kotniski (talk) 16:14, 11 May 2008 (UTC)

(deindenting) Protection isn't suppose to be perfect obviously. I admit that I'm not surprised with the Virgin Killer case. But I still haven't seen any better ideas on how to implement full protection. Choosing a particular version, saying it's "right", and protecting it would be a gross violation of position. I know the next suggestion would be to discuss which version is "right", but you can't do that because that's what the edit war it about. You can't just choose the version before the edit warring starting because it's probably also disputed. The only fair process is to protect the current version, as I said however wrong. Other suggestions become too bureaucratic or are just plain instruction creep. As to whether it "rewards" edit warriors, I don't think it does and if it did there's not much we can do about it (short of stopping protections, which would take an act of Jimbo). It is unfortunate that an arbitrary protected version becomes "stable". The template {{protected}} does say This protection is not an endorsement of the current version; it's too bad that it's not taken at face value. I don't think it was the intention of the protecting admins to do this though. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 20:36, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

It's inevitable that protection will have the effect of endorsing the protected version, regardless of anyone's intentions. But why would it be a "gross violation of position" to decide which version is right before protecting it? You make it sound like the quality of the encyclopedia we produce is less important than a sense of justice among warring editors. The admin has to look at the available evidence - the strength of the arguments advanced by the various parties, knowledge of WP policy, common sense - and make a reasoned judgement, as if they were closing an AfD or some other kind of discussion (except that here the judgement is in principle interim rather than final). Nothing unfair there, no particular danger of instruction creep, and not bureaucratic in any bad sense.--Kotniski (talk) 21:22, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

First, I agree largely with the above. There is just as much danger of an admin being accused of 'taking sides' by choosing the current version as there is if they make an 'informed decision', I think.

Second, lets remember that protection should be very much a last resort. On this note;

• Many 'extensive' edit wars seem to involve very few people. Surely it would be preferable for the admins to plonk some temp blocks on the editing of the specific page on those editors
• Furthermore, perhaps there could be an interim step prior to blocking, whereby a page is 'edit-war protected' (or somesuch) - where all edits, when 'save' is clicked, would result in a very clear notice appearing, explaining about edit wars, and asking the user to reconsider their edit. By clicking a confirmation, the editors would be taking a more active role in stating their personal inclination to involve themself in a dispute? A nice explanation of why they should reconsider whether their edit is constructive to the good of the project; links to relevent guidelines, etc. Not sure about the technical side of this idea (how would bots cope? perhaps admins exempt?), but I reckon it might avoid some protections - which would be a good thing, surely? (Unsigned by Chzz)

Those sound like good ideas - don't know if they would be supported by the software, but I guess they could be implemented fairly easily by the developers. However, on the main question of which version gets protected, there seems to be quite a lot of support for a change of policy, so I'll make a specific proposal (below) to enable discussion. (Unsigned by Kotniski)

You seem to be missing the point here. Admins are not judges. When we close an AFD one way it's because of policy, guidelines, and accepted practices. It's not an editorial decision; it's an administrative decision. Choosing any "right" version in an edit war is not an administrative decision. It's an editorial decision, and it's basically someone who has the word "admin" beside their name deciding what is "right" and what is "wrong". Not even the ArbCom gets into editorial/content decisions. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 15:49, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You're arguing in a circle here, by defining "administrative" and "editorial" to fit with current policy. No reason it has to be that way. Deleting or moving an article, or protecting it "blind", clearly affects content too. Reasoned protection would be no different - it would be based on the same policy, guidelines etc. as AfD decisions. Anyway, the idea has been roundly rejected, so no point discussing it again and again.--Kotniski (talk) 16:12, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Proposed change to policy

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

It is proposed to replace the sentence:

• "When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators normally protect the current version, except where the current version contains content which clearly violates content policies, such as obvious vandalism or copyright violations."

with the sentences:

• "When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators should make a preliminary judgement as to which version is most likely to gain long-term consensus, and protect the page in that version. That judgement should be based on the arguments advanced by editors in edit summaries and on the talk page, taking into account existing content policies, experience and common sense."

Rationale: see above discussion. Since the protected version is in practice likely to remain stable for some time, it is in the interests of the encyclopedia that it be the "right" version rather than just the version that happens to be on top when the admin performs the protection operation. Admins are trusted to make this sort of decision, analogous to the decisions that have to be made when closing AfD discussions and the like.--Kotniski (talk) 08:35, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Whilst I fully agree with the principle, I think the wording needs work - the para you are talking about is really aimed at editors rather than the admins (as I understand it) - so a bit simpler? And not 'Should'? I'd suggest, perhaps:

"When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators will protect the page in a version which, in their opinion, is in the best interests of Wikipedia."

Probably not right, but can we discuss the text a bit before we vote please?

--  Chzz  ►  08:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Shorter is generally better, but I'd prefer to spell this one out in a bit more detail, simply because this is going to be read by (often disgruntled) editors, and we don't want to give the impression that we are simply licensing admins to do whatever they please. But if people are happier with your version, I've no major problem with it.--Kotniski (talk) 08:54, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Have to disagree here, what is the "best" version of an article? And how can an administrator determine the best version, without compromising their neutrality, and without the other side shouting "biased!. Sorry, I just think there's too many potential issues to support this change. Steve Crossin (talk) (review) 08:54, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
  • In my longer version above it is explained explicitly how the administrator is to determine the best version. If it's a reasoned judgement, accusations of bias won't hold water. (Obviously this mustn't be done by an admin who is involved in the dispute.)--Kotniski (talk) 09:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
• Completley oppose. If it were easy to determine which of the versions was "right", there wouldn't be an edit war. This has few advantages, none that wouldn't be solved by FlaggedRevisions, and will result in massive wheel wars. Happy‑melon 09:22, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

No-one said being an admin was going to be easy;) But edit warriors by nature don't always respond to reason, so edit wars often continue in cases where a neutral, intelligent and experienced observer (which administrators are appointed to be) is perfectly capable of making a reasoned judgement in favour of one side (or possibly for some neutral version they come up with themselves). If and when flagged revisions comes live, we can review to see what needs to be changed then (depending on what policies are adopted on flagging). But for now we have to make policy in the situation we're in, without flagging. I trust admins not to engage in wheel-warring on a massive scale; can you provide any evidence that this would occur? And yes, this change would have "few" advantages, indeed only one as far as I can see, but a very important one - it would make for a better and more accurate encyclopedia. Some people seem to have lost sight of that goal.--Kotniski (talk) 09:59, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Absoloute opposition to this idea - administrators should not have any sort of editorial control over non-editors. And I say this as an editor myself. IF there i an edit war and there is on side clearly in a minority a short discussion followed by a unprotection request will rapidly solve the problem. Viridae^Talk 10:06, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Not sure I fully understand this, but you obviously inhabit a different world than I do if you're saying that edit wars are rapidly solved by short discussions (and remember that minorities are not always wrong).--Kotniski (talk) 10:17, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually you would be surprised how quickly some edit wars are resolved when protection is instated. If they aren't easily resolvable how are admins expected to know the facts better than those already versed on the subject?If it really is a cut and dried issue then an admin could just apply selective blindness until the correct version is instated - and noone would be any the wiser, meaning there are no appearances of bias, clouding the issue. (not a reccomended tactic by the way, but doable in extreme cases) Viridae^Talk 11:13, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Of course edit wars are "resolved" quickly on protection, because people see no further point talking about them, but if they're resolved to the wrong version then the outcome can hardly be considered satisfactory. The selective blindness tactic is what I presume many admins already do, but current policy gives no encouragement to do that, so an admin in a hurry will feel perfectly justified in protecting any old version which doesn't contain obvious faults such as vandalism and copyvio.--Kotniski (talk) 11:33, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You haven't dealt with many edit wars have you? Once protected, 9 times out of 10 in my experience participants will take it to the talk page if they believe there is a significant cvase for the edits they were tryying to make/undo. And policy does encourage selective blindness in protection occasionally - IAR was written for exactly this kind of situation - and IAR should be applied sparingly, not liberally. Really having one group of unskilled editors with final editorial control of an article in the event of an edit war to the detriment of other unskilled editors (ie comparing citizendium with WP here essentially - there are no expert editors on WP) will only ever create problems. Viridae^Talk 11:44, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Who said anything about final control? No-one's talking about changing who controls what and on what time-scale, we're just saying that the control which is necessary sometimes should be exercised intelligently and not randomly.--Kotniski (talk) 11:52, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Oppose - completely misses the point of the protection/3RR policies. MickMacNee (talk) 10:25, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Explain please. (To me it seems the current policy completely misses the point of building an encyclopedia).--Kotniski (talk) 10:42, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Oppose protection isn't supposed to be an editorial decision, and making it so will make it much more contentious. Right now, complaining about whether the right version is protected is generally out of bounds, and I don't want to change that.--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:33, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

So you don't much care whether Wikipedia displays accurate or inaccurate information, as long as admins are protected from editorial complaints?--Kotniski (talk) 10:42, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose, all it will do is extend the edit war by encouraging further fighting over what is the "correct" version. If it's that easy to tell, an {{editprotected}} will achieve immediate consensus. For WP:BLPs we should continue to apply Clue. Guy (Help!) 10:50, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

If by fighting you mean wheel warring, then I hope the admin community is above that. If you mean further arguing among editors, then that will and should continue anyway, regardless of this proposal. And immediate consensus is just wishful thinking considering the emotional state edit warriors tend to be in.--Kotniski (talk) 11:33, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Comment Consider this scenario: National news picks up on a controversial page on WP. People flock to the page and start an edit war. Admin locks the page with the controversial part removed. Overwhelming majority of genuinely interested editors are in favor of keeping the page as it was. People attracted to the page through the media scream and shout that 'it should be banned'. After a few days of protection, they go away. Page is unlocked. Consensus reached to keep controversial article. Job done.

The problem is, during the protection, many people have read the media stories, looked at the article, and seen that WP appears to have taken action to remove the controversial material. This contradicts WP:NOTCENSORED - OK, so we (people who read policies and participate in discussions) are aware of why it happened, and that it was temporary, etc. The fact remains, it appears to the rest of the world that WP has engaged in a knee-jerk censorship action. That, to me, is the problem with the current policy. For this reason, I think a) WP:PREFER should change, b) more effort should be made to avoid using protection whenever possible. If admins engage in a WP:WHEEL, we have a problem with our admins, not with our policies. Of course admins have to make decisions. We have to trust their judgement will be NPOV. If not, there are procedures in place. This matter is all about the image of WP to the outside world. This is a chance to improve the encyclopedia, and to please more editors than it annoys. --  Chzz  ►  11:04, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose per HappyMelon and JzG. Stifle (talk) 11:16, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I never really intended this to be an immediate vote situation with people shouting out Support and Oppose. But if you oppose "per" someone, and their arguments have been answered, it would be more helpful if you could provide counter-arguments (or rather counter-counter-arguments) to show why their points remain valid.--Kotniski (talk) 11:33, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• I understand the rationale behind this idea (and I know many admins that use their brain when protecting a page, as they should be expected). However, having this practice set in stone in the policy is not a good idea, imho. -- lucasbfr ^talk 11:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Because you think admins should retain the freedom not to use their brains if they don't feel like it? Or some other reason?--Kotniski (talk) 12:05, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes indeed =) More precisely, in controversial protections, we shouldn't give the right to an admin to protect the page in the states he likes best. We have already enough "omg wrong version rouge palestinian/israel/communism-friendly admin" drama on ANI as it is. Accusations of bias will hold water and fly in the controversial areas. I prefer the WP:IAR status quo (eg: only select a version when it is obvious). -- lucasbfr ^talk 13:09, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You should be supporting the proposal then. It's the current policy which enables administrators to protect the page they like best, by timing their protection accordingly. Or to simply not care. The proposal would force admins to explain their actions.--Kotniski (talk) 15:01, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose: While I understand the rationale behind the proposal, I don't see how any one administrator can determine what is a "right" or "best" version or not, unless it is clear vandalism, trolling or BLP vios. seicer | talk | contribs 12:12, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

It's explained in the original proposal how they would do that. It would be based on policy and the arguments presented by editors, just like when closing an AfD or RM debate. They might get it wrong sometimes, but better to be wrong 25% of the time, say, than the 50% you get if you throw the knife blindfold.--Kotniski (talk) 12:21, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose, though I think it's a good idea in principle, I don't think it's compatable with the current use of the protection tool. Protection is an administrative function that prevents damage to the project by halting repeated vandalism or edit-warring on a specific article. Frequently, protection is applied in the midst of this disruption, which is fine because the very nature of protection means that - once editing on the article stops - the problems that caused the edit war can be discussed and resolved without further enflaming the issue by continuing to edit (and revert) the article in question. Protection is not permanent in this context, and there is no deadline - so the need to have the "correct" or "optimal" version protected is minimal, and - as noted above - will probably serve only to enflame the editors involved in the edit war, perhaps making consensus or discussion impossible. UltraExactZZ ^Claims ~ Evidence 12:32, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

OK, I promise this is my last contribution to this debate for the next few hours at least, but: (1) the fact that there is "no deadline" seems to imply that the need to have the right version on top is important (potentially lots of users are going to read the page before the dispute gets resolved at some indeterminate future time); (2) why should a reasoned administrative decision inflame editors any more than an arbitrary one? If they genuinely care about building a good encyclopedia, they should appreciate the admin's extra effort.--Kotniski (talk) 12:46, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Some points. Many admins I see do not edit articles much, leaving them slightly outside the loop of the editing process. There have been many cases of administrators editing an article while it is protected, that editing often lead to desysop, or sanctions. The idea that someone can come in, read the article, and make a decision that a normal group of editors could not, is pious. As standard editors, with a set of tools to prevent mischief, they should have no higher say then the editors who are currently editing the article. I want to try to understand this fully, and examine this so I will present some situations. If an admin, with no interest in the article, appears to simply prevent further edit warring, they will not have the knowledge, nor expertise in the subject matter to determine some key issues, WP:SYN, which would require the admin to review the entire article, then all of the sources, to decide if such a violation is taking place. In cases of NPOV, with an admin who is not knowledgeable in the topic, they may save to a version that further aggravates the balance, or may not have a version to save to that actually justifies either side of the equation. Cases of BLP are already covered, cases of COPYVIO are already covered. Instances of WP:OR are covered under the same argument as WP:SYN. The admin would have read the entire article and all sources to get the full picture.

The next step is to examine an admin with an interest in the article. An interest meaning they have religious beliefs, political beliefs, or other, that coincide with one side of the debate. The admin with knowledge of topic, say a popular author of a controversial subject. One side of the debate states a SYN violation is taking place, the other side says it is not. They are edit warring over the content, the admin protects the page, then begins reading the content. If the issue is murky, or simply not too easy to discern, or the sources located offline, how does the admin go about deciding? His own judgment may be faulty, or influenced by personal belief. There are two issues now, Wikipedia has in place methods for seeking out 3rd parties for advice, numerous forums and noticeboards for discussing issues of SYN, OR, NPOV, etc. What would normally take place is a consensus would form in one of the prementioned forums. Instead the admin will be deciding what the consensus is, effectively voiding the very basis for discussions on Wikipedia, and possibly at a detriment.

While we would like to assume that an admin would not violate policy, there is a laundry list of incidents it has happened, and no reason to assume that greater abilities would not effectively allow it to radiate further. What is effectively the benefit? The article will appear more balanced to the passerby visitor, or less depending on where they stand on the issue. If a content dispute exists, or edit warring, two parties are battling, with two different beliefs on what is right. How can it be in the best interest of Wikipedia to support one side over the other, the side of the admin, instead of supporting the continued efforts to locate the middle ground by seeking consensus? In dire cases, such as BLP and COPYVIO, the admins are given the power to act to prevent growing issues and possibly legal problems that could stem from the content. I see no actual benefit to allowing an admin decide, over consensus, and other forums for finding that middle ground, what is right. Sorry for the long-winded comments, however I felt I should explore things as deeply as possible. --I Write Stuff (talk) 13:10, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

Just a quick reply since I'm putting this snowball on the flames: the admin would not have to research sources in depth, just assess the arguments already put forward, as in an AfD dispute. And the admin would not be given the chance to decide over consensus. The consensus-finding process would continue just as it does now. The only difference would be what is visible to encyclopedia users in the meantime. No-one seems to get this. Sigh :( Kotniski (talk) 15:12, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• This proposal is completely antithetical to the widely and consistently recognised principle that admins don't use the tools to determine the outcome of content disputes. Admins may also be editors, but one can only wear one hat at a time. --bainer (talk) 14:28, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

When an admin closes an AfD discussion, is he not determining the outcome of a content dispute? When an admin protects the current version because it happens to be current, is she (this time) not determining the outcome of a content dispute? --Kotniski (talk) 15:12, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

• Oppose; I see the potential for good behind this idea in conception, but I don't think that anyone can be all-knowing and really know which version is the "more likely right" version. We all have our own personal biases, and while the admin coming to protect the page might not be involved, asking them to then choose one version over the other (unless one version is obviously vandalism, which would get reverted anyway) makes them no longer an unbiased authority, and would only inflame those involved in the edit warring more. -- Natalya 14:52, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

I've explained already why I think a reasoned decision should inflame people less than an arbitrary one, and why the admin is not expected to be all-knowing (even if admins get it wrong 40% of the time, it would still be better than the current policy).

• I am completely opposed to this proposal. Firstly, and most importantly, it would tempt involved or biased editors who happen to have protection/unprotection bits into gaming the policy. Secondly, it would cause wheel wars whenever some other admin decided that the first protection was on a blatantly wrong version. Thirdly, it would tend to foster accusations of cabalism, since questionable protections would let people claim (whether rightly, merely understandably, or completely fatuously; it doesn't matter) that the page protector was acting abusively. Bear in mind, in circumstances where there's absolutely no question that one version is bogus (blatant vandalism, blanking, unsourced BLP content), the protection policy and actual practice allow and encourage reverting away from that version. The "wrong version" aspect of the policy only applies to circumstances where there is necessarily a question about which version is correct, and in those cases, picking a version to protect on is the wrong thing to do. — Gavia immer (talk) 14:55, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

You are just repeating arguments which I've already answered. No-one seems to reply to any of my points, which just confirms in my own deluded mind that I may be right. But since this proposal is obviously going nowhere at the moment, time to SNOW it.--Kotniski (talk) 15:12, 13 May 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.

Why just color

This is not what is in guidelines.. I see an increasing number of maps and charts with just the color differences... sometimes the colors are so close..please give some pattern on the locks to help the users who are not so good at differentiating based on colors.... Why cant you have different shaped colors or simply a no. on the lock to tell the level of protection..... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.175.105.145 (talk) 00:53, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I can't even tell the difference between locks, I always have to look up what kind of protection is in effect. We should really be using the banners more often, but people like the little locks too much. I guess we could have an S, P, M, O or something on them or something. I'd have no trouble with it.

We used to have only one lock (gold I believe), then someone thought we should have different colours and nobody objected at the time. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 04:48, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

I've always liked the different colours (I was the instigator of using the red padlock for permanent protection); but I can see how people could have difficulty telling them apart. I've added mouseover text to the small padlocks, so you can more easily see what protection is in place. Happy‑melon 10:36, 17 May 2008 (UTC)

Can someone list how to use padlocks here?

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Bradymonty (talk • contribs)

If you're asking who can protect pages, the answer is only administrators can protect pages. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 17:32, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Autoconfirmed Proposal/Poll

Well, what can I say. Someone resurrected my proposal from last year to overhaul autoconfirmed status. It has already gotten coverage from the Signpost, and is currently leaning towards 7 days/20 edits, a limit I see as reasonable. I hope that people who watch this page will take a moment to participate in the poll. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 16:19, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Can you please explain exactly what the proposal is? Thanks.  Chzz  ►  16:28, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The proposal is to change who is "autoconfirmed". Right now, after 4 days you're automatically autoconfirmed. In Jan 07, it was announced that we could now require a number of edits plus time for someone to become autoconfirmed. I made a proposal last fall to change it to requiring 4 days and 20 edits to become autoconfirmed, which didn't get enough discussion and was rejected by the devs. Now, it's been revived with multiple proposals. 7 days/20 edits has the highest support right now. If that succeeds, then a new user will not be autoconfirmed (be able to edit semiprotected pages, move pages, a few other things) until 7 days after registering and only after making 20 edits.

The idea was to get rid of long term vandals (Quebec was my example, but it seems the vandal who had like 90 socks finally retired) who would make sleeper accounts, wait 4 days, and launch a full scale attack on semiprotected pages which could only really be stopped by full protecting the page (which as I've pointed out above sucks). This would allow us to semiprotect some common vandal pages with a better effect and we wouldn't have to fully protect as much just due to vandalism. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 17:30, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Hrm, OK, just spotted this. I see it was a straw poll, and is now closed. Although it was presented as a straw poll, it appears that somewhere along the line an actual decision was made. Can somebody clarify?

I think the ballot was flawed in a pretty significant way: the number of edits increased in direct proportion to the number of days. I don't think 7 days is a particularly bad limit, but 20 edits seems like a pretty enormous number for a new editor. It is easy for more experienced editors to forget how timid many of our best editors are in their early days; I don't think that's something to discourage. It takes some time to build up confidence, or to find the areas in most need of help. Meanwhile, we will be unnecessarily discouraging good faith editors from helping out with semi-protected articles, image uploads, etc. -Pete (talk) 01:43, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

You should really discuss at that talk page, but in any case the poll is closed. I believe as of now (unless I've missed something) the autoconfirmed level stands at 4 days and 10 edits (because of a bad request on bugzilla). But full discussion is on Wikipedia talk:Autoconfirmed Proposal/Poll. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 02:48, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Vandalism following a Google "logo link"

I noticed this morning that Google had (again) changed their home-page logo. (For those few residents of Outer Mongolia using Wikipedia but not Google, Google often change their graphics to reflect a particular "notable event" associated with a particular day ; this graphic is linked to a standard Google page searching for articles on the subject of the graphic.) The top article on today's search page was, unsurprisingly, a Wikipadia article ; when I went to visit it, the vandalism banner had been raised on the page.
This begs the question of ... well, two questions, actually

• how often does this happen (viz, is today's incident of vandalism an isolated event or a common thing, as I suspect is likely)? and
• does anyone know what topics Google are likely to be using in up-coming days, so that pre-emptive vandalism protection could be enabled?
  

I would assume that Google have a fair "pipeline" during which their cartoonist cranks up the creative juices, inks up his graphics tablet and does whatever he does. So, there's a potential at least for Google to pass the appropriate information to Wikipedia as an organisation. Or, if there's a Wikipedia admin in Google's staff, to install and remove the vandalism flags in good time.
Looking through the Google logo page, I see a discussion of the considerable administrative background to the process, so including some sort of checking for the consequences of making such prominent links.
Aidan Karley (talk) 09:05, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, first things first, protection is not preemptive. Secondly, from what I see clicking on the google logo links to a google search, of which a Wikipedia article happens to be the first result (which isn't a surprise). They didn't link directly to Wikipedia. Thirdly, Google is an independent website that can do (and they do) anything they want. I don't think it would really make a difference if they told us, maybe more people would watch the page. If there's a lot of vandalism it'll get protected (which it has by the looks of it). Nothing else we can really do. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 20:11, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

Move protection for special articles

I would like to propose that we protect from move important articles like

a) Real important personalities. For example Max Planck, Friedrich Engels, etc.

b) Countries. For example Greece, etc.

c) Important cities. For example Rome, etc.

and as extra I think User pages can be available for moving only by the user itself and administrators.

Please tell me your opinion about that. -- Magioladitis (talk) 22:52, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

Number 1, (as always) protection of any kind isn't preemptive. Pages are move protected on a case by case basis based on recent move wars, we don't just do batch protections. You can always ask for protection at WP:RFPP too. Your second proposal (user pages) is interesting, but cannot be implemented at this time because of software limitations. I think I've heard the proposal before but I'm not sure. I know that user .js and .css pages are only editable and movable by the user and admins so the basis for the code is probably there, but currently pages can only be semiprotected or fully protected. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 03:42, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Since we know that some articles can be moved only in very special occasions, why don't establish that? Less work in revering/requesting protection/etc.-- Magioladitis (talk) 08:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Because that would be turning away from our most fundamental principle, which is that we're "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit". For a long time after wikipedia was first created, the tools now reserved for admins were given to all editors; adding the autoconfirmed level was a huge step to take. The biggest question is: how do we define an "important" article, or one that "can be moved only in very special occasions"? Countries, places, are both good examples, but so are all biographies, not just "important" ones. Where do you draw the line? For that matter, can you name me a page on-wiki which shouldn't be move-protected if pages which don't need to be moved should?? Carry this to its conclusion, and a significant fraction of wikipedia's articles deserve move-protection - even if that's only 5%, that's 100,000 pages. Any overhead administrators would save in not having to manage move protections would pale into insignificance besides the task of implementing that protection in the first place, and then in moving all the pages which genuinely need to be moved (which would be regular and common events). Happy‑melon 11:56, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I hope it's understandable that the moto "free encyclopedia that anyone can edit" is always within a frame. That's the reason we already have many page protected. I propose a small extension. Not a major one. -- Magioladitis (talk) 17:47, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

No, you're proposing an extention from the carefully-defined box we currently have, to a box with an outer boundary which is so fuzzy as to be utterly undefinable. How do you objectively define "important article" such that it does not constitute the majority of the encyclopedia? Please note, however, that I actually support your proposal of limiting pagemoves in the User: and User talk: namespaces to admins and the userspace's owner, provided we work out a few technical caveats first. Happy‑melon 19:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I get your point. Ok, my last shot: How about: "All countries and capitals of countries should be protected from page move"? -- Magioladitis (talk) 19:18, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

But why those and not articles on numbers or letters of the alphabet? :D You see the problem: where does one stop? It's impossible, so it's best just not to start down that road in the first place. Happy‑melon 19:30, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Ok. I see the difficulties. -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:13, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm back again. This time I would like to propose the move protection for all Wikipedia:Featured articles. These articles are really important and action for moves should be limited. -- Magioladitis (talk) 20:26, 28 May 2008 (UTC)

Oh god here we go again :D. This time, though, I'm on your side - I can't see any reason not to do this - the advantages you correctly note above still apply (more so because the FAs take a good proportion of our traffic - something like 8% IIRC), and it's a very clearly delimited group, so none of the problems from above. Happy‑melon 13:32, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Woo woo! :) -- Magioladitis (talk) 21:34, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

Your first proposition is an excellent one. As for the notion that WP is "the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit", this is of course true, but it's a notion that assumes that the anyone thinks like a sane, sober adult. Sane, sober adults have no need to rename these pages in a great hurry, other of course than after some lamer has renamed them stupidly (e.g. "on wheels"). But the lamer wouldn't have been able to rename them if we'd adopted this sensible suggestion of yours.

One drawback of your proposition is that cretinous page-renaming is conspicuous, and since WP is anyway sure to be the target of drunks, small children, psychopaths, etc., better that they should be provided with footballs such as these. But I'm not convinced. -- Hoary (talk) 05:38, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

This sounds like a sensible idea. Count me in favor. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 06:31, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

If we were making those assumptions. We assume good faith, not "assume sober adult". You can be drunk and edit Wikipedia (see: Wikiholioc quiz) as long as you don't do something stupid. You can also be underage and edit Wikipedia. You also don't have to be "sane". There is no litmus test for who can edit Wikipedia. That's why it says anyone. And that's why we don't assume that they are an adult, sober, or even sane. All policies come from this thinking, none make any assumptions. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 16:51, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

I have nothing against the editing of WP by the underage, drunk or insane. I merely demand that they edit as if they were adult, sober and sane.

What are the chances that an editor (possibly childish, drunk or even insane, but acting in good faith) would have a pressing need to make a constructive move elsewhere of, Max Planck, Greece, Rome, or indeed User:Royalguard11?

My own guess is that they're vanishingly low, and that any of them would be better first brought up, discussed and agreed to on an appropriate talk page.

There's a single exception I can think of, which is the pressing need to move an article about Max Planck back to "Max Planck" from "Max Fuck" or whatever had been given it shortly before by somebody with a mental age of nine.

What am I overlooking? Can you give a single example of an undiscussed and constructive renaming (other than to mop up after vandalism or other stupidity) of an article on a real important personality, country, important city, or (other) user?

Meanwhile, would you care for some examples of unconstructive renaming? (For a long time there were a lot involving wheels; recently there have been a lot involving penises and ejaculation.) -- Hoary (talk) 22:52, 3 June 2008 (UTC)

No examples forthcoming? Would it be unfair to suggest that this is typical as a profile of a newly arrived mover of well-established articles? -- Hoary (talk) 01:13, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

As I said, articles will be protected on a case-by-case basis, there will be no batch protecting of any kind. Protection is not preemptive. If you'd like to change that you need a bigger venue (the pump or something). -Royalguard11(T·R!) 19:08, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

• I think this is an interesting idea. I would recommend that you take it up on the Village Pump or the mailing list to get a more broad consensus on it before we consider implementing it, though. --causa sui ^talk 04:11, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

• I think that we can safely invoke IAR here, it is indeed said that semi protection and creation protection should not be used preemptively. But it's not even clear in other cases, and moving is not editing. In view of the damage inflected by recent page-move vandalisms, it could be in the interest of Wikipedia to adopt this kind of counter measures. Some pages should never be moved, at least without discussion, so basically, I think that it should be left to the administrator's discretion to move-protect a page. I agree that we need a broader venue if we want to make important changes, or let people know somehow. Cenarium (talk) 16:56, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Irony

I don't have anything really to say that's important, but it is kinda ironic that the Protection policy page is protected. --Alien joe (talk) 14:56, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Actually, it's only semi-protected to prevent IP vandalism (long history there). Registered users are able to edit it. — Satori Son 15:06, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

OdinMS private server listed?

Seeing as it is not an official MapleStory server, shouldn't it be removed? --Drake-san (talk) 23:52, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Please take concerns to the talk page of the article in question, not here. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 16:35, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

User talk page

Why can't user talk page be protect when user pages can? Headbomb (ταλκ · κοντριβς) 21:12, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

They can, but they are only protected in extreme cases. Talk pages should stay unprotected so that users can receive messages from other users and so they can collaborate. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 01:55, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

There is a page that has been hacked

This is the only place I could think of placing this but the page to bleach(manga) has been hacked and locked. The page displays one giant figure and no text. How do I report this to wikipedia? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.190.135.220 (talk) 04:19, 25 June 2008 (UTC)

Removed obvious

I removed 'obvious' as follows:

When protecting a page because of a content dispute, administrators normally protect the current version, except where the current version contains content which clearly violates content policies, such as obvious vandalism, copyright violations, or defamation of living persons.

I hope no-one minds me doing this unilaterally, but the adjective in question confuses the sentence. Plus it is tautological with 'clearly' earlier in the sentence. I though it obviously needed removal :-) --Surturz (talk) 07:43, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. --Kotniski (talk) 08:09, 20 June 2008 (UTC)

Looks good to me. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 01:17, 21 June 2008 (UTC)

User pages

I wish to propose the reversal of a change effected earlier this year concerning the semi-protection of user pages. Specifically, I wish to contest the re-introduction of the requirement that user pages should only be protected when "subject to heavy vandalism". To give a summary of the timeline:

• 1 July 2004: The original policy concerning user pages required that they be "subject to repeated vandalism".
• 12 December 2006: Citing "common practice", the policy is updated to state that "Userpages are not encyclopedic articles and are exempt from many mainspace-specific policies (Ownership of articles and the three-revert rule, to take two examples). Userpages may be semi-protected regardless of whether there has been any previous vandalism to the page, and need not be unprotected unless the owner wishes it."
• 6 March 2007: Semi-protection policy merged with the protection policy; allows "User pages (but not user talk pages), when requested by the user."
• 28 March 2008: MZMcBride re-introduces the clause, "User pages, but not user talk pages, when requested by the user and when the pages are subject to heavy vandalism." She gives her rationale on a talk page discussion, to which no-one responds (neither favourably nor unfavourably).

Whilst I understand MZMcBride's arguments, I find that the present policy frustrates new constructive editors who take offence at having their user page defaced, and find themselves unable to do anything until it has been vandalised for some unwritten minimum number of times. This is even more applicable to RC patrollers, who would eventually inevitably be targeted. Finally, keep in mind that this is an "opt-in" decision... users who don't wish to have their user page semi-protected simply have to refrain from applying for it. Opinions? Gail (talk) 00:39, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

We did discuss this last March (has it really been over a year?), with no solution. Personally, I think people need to understand it's going to happen. If someone vandalized my userpage, I (or a RC patroller) reverts it, and life goes on. If you're RC patrolling, the likelihood of getting vandalized goes up because users just randomly lash out at whoever's wrecking their "fun". It's not like you can't do nothing. You revert it. Some RC patrollers use rollback, popups, twinkle, and the half-dozen others that have popped up. It's just a userpage, and I'm still opposed to just protecting "upon request" (and I don't do them). If there is vandalism (the threshold being a lot less than articles), the it'll be protected.

Look for Steel will have the opposite opinion of me. -Royalguard11(T·R!) 05:59, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the link, I wasn't aware of that discussion. I think Steel explained his point well, so I will try to avoid repeating any arguments that were already raised. However, I feel that refusing to grant semi-protection following a defacement, no matter how minor or isolated the incident was, is actually hurting Wikipedia because it is losing us constructive editors. Whilst I'm sure that most admins and established editors are capable of completely ignoring personal insults, this is not the case for everyone. Several academics, professionals, children, and any other digital immigrants are not accustomed to the culture shock of being insulted by random strangers; whilst it is true that such attacks may be easily reverted, the fact that we are doing nothing to prevent their re-occurrence is often interpreted as a sign of indifference and passiveness on our part. If nothing else, the "heavy" qualifier should definitely be removed from the clause. Gail (talk) 12:04, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely agree with Gail. --Kotniski (talk) 12:44, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Then they're not going to be on Wikipedia long. It's hard to avoid controversy here (I had someone call me a wiki-Nazi, wiki-stalk me for several months across WMF wiki's just because I enforced a couple policies). Wikipedia isn't a place where intellectuals come to politely exchange information or ask legitimate question. It's cutthroat. You're going to get your hands dirty, and it's not going to be pretty. If you think it's suppose to be all rosy and kind, then I sorry you're been mislead into that.

Yes, we should try to keep users around and not loose them. But I don't believe in sheltering them or treating them like they're children. If your user page gets vandalized, I'm not going to come running asking if you're okay, immediately indefinitely protect your userpage so it doesn't happen again, and track down the user and lecture them (they'll probably get a boilerplate warning).

I don't protect userpages just upon request, but that's not to say that other admins don't. Just ask at WP:RFPP, usually they get done. I just leave the requests alone. -Royalguard11(T) 16:34, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

That might currently be the case in practice, but surely it is supposed to be a civil and courteous environment, and we should take what steps we reasonably can to bring it a little closer to that goal. Protecting user pages on request (as long as they are not themselves being used for abusive purposes) seems eminently reasonable, and nothing like the mollycoddling implied in your remarks below.--Kotniski (talk) 17:25, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I certainly agree our guidelines should be aspirational as well as practical. — Satori Son 17:45, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I'm not raising this issue for myself (my user page is already semi-protected due to past vandalism), but on behalf of the newer users. I never asked anyone to go running after users asking if they're okay. Addressing a user's concern about getting his/her page vandalized again is nothing more than a courtesy to show our appreciation of their contribution. And yes, I'm aware that several admins do not follow the current policy (I've seen user pages of admins being indefinitely fully-protected), but that highlights even further the need to amend the policy to standardize the practice. Gail (talk) 17:10, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Royalguard is exactly right: Wikipedia is not a particularly friendly place, and those with thin skins will likely not last long.

However, Gail is right as well: There does not seem to have been a predominant consensus for this change. I, for one, believe the determination of whether to semi-protect a talk page should be left to administrative discretion on a case-by-case basis, and this newly(?) included language is overly restrictive and unnecessarily bureaucratic. — Satori Son 17:22, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

I've amended the language to remove the "heavy" requirement, in line with what seems to be the former consensus and current pratice. It still only says administrators "may" apply protection, so those like Royalguard should not feel under any obligation to consider such requests.--Kotniski (talk) 17:31, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, I think the amended version is fair and representative of the current practice. Gail (talk) 18:24, 26 June 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) Current language: "User pages, but not user talk pages, when requested by the user following vandalism." Sounds fine to me. Gail: Thanks for the heads-up. It was very considerate of you to inform me of this discussion and I really appreciate it. : - ) --MZMcBride (talk) 19:47, 27 June 2008 (UTC)

You're welcome. I'm happy that you agree with the amendment :) Gail (talk) 12:06, 28 June 2008 (UTC)

Proposal to semiprotect the Template: namespace

I've posted a proposal to semiprotect the Template: namespace at the Village pump. Please comment there. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 03:10, 21 July 2008 (UTC)

Mistake

Shouldn't there be a new line just after the first padlock? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.73.93.44 (talk) 15:26, 2 August 2008 (UTC)

Graphics on talk page, too.

I think it's an error in the script of protection to put a graphic lock on a talk page, when that talk page is not locked. BrewJay (talk) 02:02, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Request

Hillary Rodham Clinton's Wikipedia page has her middle name in the title. This article should be titled "Barack Hussein Obama." Thank you.

Please make requests about a certain article on that article's talk page. -Royalguard11(T) 16:02, 9 August 2008 (UTC)

Lock a section rather than a whole page

I know this has probably been proposed before, but I didn't see it in the archive. My experience witnessing edit-warring has been that it is generally over one paragraph or even one sentence. It strikes me as overkill that the entire page may be protected when the problems are generally confined to one section. Could there be a feature allowing protection of one section within a page and leaving the rest of the page unprotected? This would be just as effective at stopping the edit-war without disrupting the other editors as severely. Plasticup ^T/C 14:43, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

No offense, but - no, it wouldn't. The edit warriors would just copy the disputed information to some other part of the page and edit war over it there. There isn't any way to stop that happening, so the protection would only inconvenience cooperative editors, and edit warriors are never cooperative editors, by definition.— Gavia immer (talk) 14:59, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. It isn't technically possible to restrict editing on particular parts of an article in any way which would prevent people from just starting afresh outwith the locked section. One could even just stick some comment tags around said locked section to remove it from the page. Chris Cunningham (not at work) - talk 15:12, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Both of those would require the editor to actively pursue a bad-faith tactic to circumvent an administrator's action. Not all edit-war-warriors are willing to do that, as it amounts to admitting culpability. There are ways around blocks and bans as well, but for the most part editors take the hint and yield to the authority. Obviously it wouldn't stop the most aggressive edit-wars, but I think it would be a good middle ground for your average good-faith disputes. Plasticup ^T/C 16:51, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Gavia immer and thumperwald, I don't think it would work. Besides that, I don't think it's technically possible. Each article basically has it's own entry in a table, so you can easily restrict who can edit a certain entry by changing a column "protection" to "true" (I'm oversimplifying), but I don't think you can restrict a certain portion of the article unless each section was split into it's own entry (which would require a huge re-writing of Mediawiki). Someone with better knowledge of exactly how Mediawiki works could probably explain it better. -Royalguard11(T) 16:18, 28 August 2008 (UTC)

Unprotect automatically after 1 year?

Can we add something to the policy saying that it is appropriate to unprotect mainspace pages (with the exception of stuff like the Main Page) automatically after 1 year, without the need for discussion? There could even be bot-enabled unprotection of such pages. I notice there are a lot of pages that may have had edit wars, etc. at one time, but now are probably needlessly cluttering the list of permanently-protected pages. In general, I think it's a bad practice to permanently protect low-visibility pages; it would be better to temporarily protect and renew as needed. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 16:08, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I don't see why we need to lock it at one year; if an edit war has been dead for any amount of time, it should be unprotected. Automatically expiring protections can be dangerous; if something is semi-protected to prevent anon vandalism but fully-protected against move vandalism, both will be reset. EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:11, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I think there is a mentality on the part of some, when it is pointed out that protection is not needed because an edit war has been dead for awhile, to say "See how well it works!" I.e., they think that it is better to leave it that way so it doesn't flare up again. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 16:13, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

To be fair, there are times where that is true; obviously, an article that has a lengthy history of repeated, constant edit warring should not be unprotected for that very reason (for example, see Elephant's protection log. That's one of the reasons that this shouldn't be an amendment to the policy; sometimes, leaving it protected is the correct course of action. EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:26, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

It's a tricky balancing act because we may well be missing good edits from anons with useful information about elephants. Given the potential for negative consequences either way, and given that vandalism is easily corrected, the safest course of action seems to be periodic renewal of protection. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 18:07, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

With the Elephant example, while we may be missing out on valuable edits (however doubtful), it obviously isn't worth the risk; as you can see, the protection is almost immediately restored as soon as it's unprotected. I'm still not seeing anything with how we handle long-term protections as an issue that needs to be addressed. EVula // talk // ☯ // 18:11, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps we could add some verbiage about it being generally okay to unprotect long-protected pages, but there are many cases where pages must not be unprotected (e.g. some OTRS-protected pages), or where there is little reason to (obvious vandalism); and many cases where pages should be "automatically" unprotected long before 1 year. —Centrx→talk • 16:56, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, even with obvious vandalism, I still think it's better to unprotect eventually. Who knows, maybe Britney Spears will come out with a new album called Trevor is a fag that sells a million copies but an editor will be unable to create an article on it without seeking unprotection because the page name was abused three years ago. There are probably less extreme examples but you get the gist. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 17:59, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Centrx. Pages should be unprotected after a period of time, especially semiprotected ones. There's currently a long backlog at Special:Protectedpages. The oldest semi-protected pages are over a year old now, and there is no reason for that to happen. Even George Bush gets unprotected periodically, and that time next year Bush probably won't need s-p. But of course the last time I tried doing something about it some concerned editor yelled a bunch on AN how I didn't notify user when I was unprotecting. Maybe I'll be bold and try again some time soon (this time setting an expiry date for protection a week away to give "proper notice"). -Royalguard11(T) 18:34, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

I think that actions on Wikipedia are sometimes drama- and crisis-driven in that people will often respond to the squeaky wheel and then choose to lock a certain decision in place in order to bring an early end to all the hubbub surrounding some controversy, and keep it from flaring up again. Unfortunately, it often compromises the integrity of our ideals, i.e. that this is the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Of course, one could argue, anyone can still edit it as long as they hang around for awhile, or choose an unprotected page to edit. Well, sure. At the extreme, we could fully protect everything but a single page, and have the semi-protection on that one require that your account be seven years old, and this would still theoretically be the encyclopedia that anyone can edit. We're far from that extreme, but the point is that when possible, we should keep pages open to editing because that's part of where our strength relative to Britannica, etc. comes from. Their strategy is to keep things locked up to keep the bad stuff from getting in. Our strategy is, for the most part, to let everything in and fix any problems after the fact. Empirically, we know that this works better in most cases.

Why is the burden on you to provide notice when you're unprotecting? Don't they have a watchlist that lets them see when changes are made (e.g. an edit made following the unprotection)? If any notice at all is to be required, I would think it should be the person wanting to protect a page, since they're the ones inconveniencing anyone who had planned on making an edit. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 19:16, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Here was the whole saga. Recommendations included that I should contact protecting admins before unprotecting (of which there is no point because many of them don't care that their protections last forever, and many others don't care if you change their protections), and getting consensus from editors when unprotecting (which has never been required because it's overly bureaucratic and is really irrelevant).

I know this is wiki-blasphemy, but ordinary editors don't have experience with protection to understand (heck, some admins don't understand it). They treat protection as a knee jerk reaction, just look at RFPP. Half the requests are denied. There is a reason that the policy is written so admins can interpret and decide without the need for discussion. People think their article is so important that it should remain in pristine condition forever, so they want it protected (not realizing they have no ground for protection). I guess that's the flip side of the policy: by trying to leave it open to interpretation by admins users can't understand what it means unless they watch. They don't.

While writing this, I actually came up with an idea. User:VoABot used to notify admins when they protected something without a reason. Someone could write a bot that notifies admins after say 1 month if they protected an article without an expiry date. It would at least force admins to remember that they did do a protection. They could be reminded to either unprotect the article or set a reasonable expiry date. -Royalguard11(T) 16:42, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

WP:ANI is one of the least conducive places on Wikipedia to try to carry on any sort of meaningful discussion. I think preventing permanent protections from being simply forgotten could be a step in the right direction, so we might as well go ahead and write a bot. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 16:47, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Why don't we just use common sense. If the protecting admin wanted it to expire in a year they could have put that. We can deal with them one by one. Chillum 16:59, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The problem is, they're creating a situation that hinders growth and improvement of the encyclopedia, in a way that's a pain in the butt to fix because an ordinary user can't fix it on their own initiative; they have to get an admin involved. We may never know how many users wanted to create a cockblock article but were unable to do so because it was indefinitely protected; and did not want to go to the trouble of seeking unprotection. I cringe at the thought of the many useful contributions that were forgone. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 17:10, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

It is questionable whether even the cockblock article now created is appropriate for an encyclopedia, rather than being a non-notable sub-topic of a particular subject, much like every character in a film does not warrant an independent article. —Centrx→talk • 18:33, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

The repeated re-creation of an article by unrelated authors tends to speak in favor of that subject's inclusion. Is there any reason to cockblock people from consummating their passionate desire to create a new article on a subject that appeals to them just because previous attempts by others have crashed and burned? Fact of the matter is, it routinely happens that one seemingly spammy article after another will be deleted about, say, a company or band, and then finally someone writes a well-sourced, well-written one that survives. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 18:44, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Outright vandalism pages are repeatedly re-created by unrelated authors. Simply, cockblock is a bad example of what valuable articles might be blocked by long protection: the entire purpose of deleted protection is to block the creation of some articles, and cockblock may very well be exactly the kind of article that is the target of that purpose. —Centrx→talk • 06:50, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

And for all we know, a bestselling XBox 360 game will be developed that has the player try to hold off enemy fire with defense shields made out chickens, and it will be marketed as Cockblock yet some hapless user will be unable to add it because it's protected. Not only that, but if consensus changes, or the topic of seduction-related cockblocks should become more prominent in the public eye, then it will likewise not be possible to add it. There's not really any reason to permanently block page recreation, ever. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 07:21, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Ok, so I've made a boilerplate at User:Royalguard11/sandbox that I'm going to start giving to admins en mass. It's a notification, not spam, and it fulfills one of the requests that people made (that I notify admins), and hopefully they'll get the picture and start doing it. -Royalguard11(T) 19:09, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Anyone can request a page be unprotected at WP:RFPP. Chillum 19:50, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

I would like to request 1000 pages. Kind of impractical, isn't it? -Royalguard11(T) 20:18, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Go for it. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 20:25, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

Bot Idea

So I went off and notified about 30 admins about this, and the response has been pretty positive so far. Many pages I asked about were unprotected by the admins, some told me I don't have to ask, and some haven't changed. I think this limited trial has shown that a bot notifying admins about old protections (without expiry dates) is a good idea. It would be able to go much faster than me too. I'm making a request at WP:BOTREQ#Old_Protection_Notification (it'll be there soon) to see if someone can do this. -Royalguard11(T) 21:20, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

User:Betacommand has offered to code a bot to do the job. Here's hoping this will help. -Royalguard11(T) 02:23, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Haha, yeah, sic Betacommandbot on the protectionists. Aldrich Hanssen (talk) 05:49, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Looks like this is also going belly up. "The community" isn't comfortable with Beta running bots, and I haven't been able to get anyone else to volunteer to code one. -Royalguard11(T) 04:06, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

List of protected pages

I saw the bot request and thought that a clone of nl:User:Erwin/Beveiligde pagina's, which is a list of all protected pages and their protection summary, might be useful. However, the results for this Wikipedia are simply too long to put in a single page, or a couple of pages for that matter, and I had to split them up. A small part is now listed at User:Erwin85/Protected pages/Main/Sysop/Permanently/1. Those are articles that are permantly protected and only sysops can edit and/or move the page. The full, intended output can be found at tools:~erwin85/dbq/protectedpages.en.txt (4.7 MB; about 25,500 pages in all namespaces). If you're interested I can make a bot split the output to multiple pages and update them at fixed intervals like the Dutch page. --Erwin85 (talk) 10:29, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

That's. A. Lot. Of. Pages. A nice list would be all [edit=autoconfirmed] with no expiry date. Doesn't matter what the move permissions are. Actually, another nice list would be all protections still in effect that were done by User:Can't sleep, clown will eat me, who was desysoped, but has hundreds of protections still in effect with no expiry dates. -Royalguard11(T) 18:01, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

Sarah Palin

This page was fully protected because of persistent BLP violations. I believe it should not be subject to the same editing norms as if it had been protected because of edit warring. Specifically, I think that non-consensus editprotect templates should be honored (put into effect) as long as they are not obvious violations of policies or consensus AND they are converging asymptotically on some consensus (that is, they are not effectively revert wars). This article on a rapidly-evolving, high-traffic subject, and administrators are already (understandably) going in and making good-faith fixes; editors should have the same power to cause good-faith fixes to go into place. Homunq (talk) 01:47, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

A rapidly-evolving, fully-protected article is an oxymoron. There has been some discussion about changing to semiprotection on Saturday, to permit more rapid development. — Carl (CBM · talk) 01:58, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Iraq Central Bank

I was reading this article until, i found that the article has no mention of the iraq central banks establishment in 2004, this bank was largly; if not entirly, created by U.S forces. Since this article has a riduculos amount of protection, i kindly ask that peple allowed to edit this article actually edit in the iraq banks establishment. Thank you in advance. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dalek666 (talk • contribs) 15:38, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

If you are talking about Central Bank of Iraq, it is unprotected right now, and has never been protected. -Royalguard11(T) 18:08, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

Semi Protecting talk pages of articles

Suppose there is an article whose talk page is suffering continual low-level disruption from an anonymous IP editor who uses a variety of ISPs so that range-blocking is not an option (according to WP:SSP). The disruption is on the talk page of an already contentious article where the general area has had mediation and at least one arbitration report (which is how the advice from WP:SSP originated) The disruption takes the form of messages that do not conform to WP:TALK guidelines, being examples of soapboxing, irrelevant comments to the aim of improving the article, and derogatory comments about a whole group of editors interested in the subject on the basis of their country of origin. My question is, under these circumstances, does WP:PROTECTION absolutely rule out the possibility of semi-protecting not the article page, but its talk page? I can't seem to find any definitive statement about this, but I have had one rather stern warning from a newish editor to "not even think about it" when I raised the possibility, though said it probably wouldn't be a good idea, on an editor's talk page. Thanks.  DDStretch  (talk) 17:36, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

There is nothing which absolutely prohibits it at all times, but the disruption has to be extremely significant, the genuine contributions almost non-existent, the protection short term, and a place for new editors to discuss the topic should be created. If you're talking about the content disputes on the UK 'country' talk pages, not a chance. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 18:54, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I thought it would be permitted, but as I said, it was not a good idea on the specific talk page. The problem then is having sufficient people around to spot and remove content-free comments from an anonymous editor who merely posts abuse about the United Kingdom on a variety of talk pages of articles associated with it, and which therefore definitely falls foul of WP:TALK. Once again, thanks.  DDStretch  (talk) 18:58, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Re protection policy abuse to keep content out by starting edit to provoke an article protection

Resolved

 – Article is no longer protected. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 18:55, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Wasilla Assembly of God is the church attended by Sarah Palin and at which she gave a widely covered speech about a sermon at the church. The church, its pastor, and a frequent church guest pastor have been the subject of international news coverage since 1999, including for controversial sermons given at Wasilla Assembly of God in 2005 and 2008.

There was initially a dispute as to whether this article should be deleted. The article was kept. One or two editors then attempted to keep sourced information out of the article by constant deletions, vaguely citing “BLP” and “Coatrack” without specificity, and ignoring requests for specificity. They were successful, in that they created enough edit wars that they kept the information out by getting the article blocked.

There have now been three consensus suggestions for three sections for two weeks or so. All talk page suggestions made in them have been addressed.

The content of speeches and sermons given at this church has been the subject of almost a million web pages and thousands of news stories. Yet the information that is the subject of the international coverage, sourced with respected journalists and actual photos and video footage of the sermons is not in the article.

This article should be restored, with the three consensus sections as worded and sourced in the talk page, here[1], here[2], and here[3]. There are two editors who will object to any information about the speeches or sermons, but they have not made comment on the consensus suggestions for two weeks, and all concerns they voiced previously were addressed. If the three consensus sections are not added, a small number of editors who can engage in edit wars to keep information out by provoking an article protection by edit warring. Tautologist (talk) 19:02, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

In the future, if you believe there is consensus for a change to a protected page, you can use the {{editprotected}} template to call the attention of administrators to the proposed changes. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 18:55, 30 October 2008 (UTC)