Wikipedia talk:Administrators

Abuse of Power Admin Bald man Martin

I made a minor edit to the page for the film 'Purple Noon' tonight that consisted of cleaning up some mis-spellings, and fixing some errors in grammar. Within moments I received a "final warning" for "vandalism", which is very bizarre considering that I never have received such a warning before

When I went to the admin's page and pointed out that I did not do anything wrong, I received yet another "final warning" and odd comments from this person like "HOW DARE YOU??"

If this person is indeed an administrator, there are some serious problems. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.62.100.100 (talk) 09:29, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

• I'm pretty sure he isn't an admin. I've already reported him to Wikipedia:Administrator_intervention_against_vandalism for his behavior. Camw (talk) 09:30, 3 March 2009 (UTC)
  • The account has been blocked. Camw (talk) 10:04, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

He's already back as Tin Whistle Man http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Tin_Whistle_Man —Preceding unsigned comment added by Yakofujimato (talk • contribs) 10:15, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

• I've reported this account as well Camw (talk) 10:18, 3 March 2009 (UTC)

help

Resolved

I need help resolving disputes but can not find the appropriate way to do so in a quick manner. someone isn't resolving disputes properly and I feel vandalizing. I will watch this page, please assist if your in admin to mediate and/or report someone. Thanks! 2legit2quit2 (talk) 19:03, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

I have addressed this issue with 2legit2quit2. Rockpocket 19:45, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

p.s. Not resolved, that does not justify the actions. I have replied and would like further help. I will resolve this with someone else if needed, but you haven't taken enough time to research. I just left the message not too long ago, and a simple reply without understanding everything he did and removed and what it said and the context and the resources that were given, is not suffice. Please actually look into it yourself, not go by the breif revert comments. Thanks, I'll resolve the matter another time. It's too petty to argue in one day but the protocol for resolving by both of you have not been followed. I will take it up with someone at another time. Have a good day, and don't take it personal. Again, it was valid, I even edited and reduced the info. Read the entire talk section. Bye! 2legit2quit2 (talk) 19:56, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Minor edit needed

Unfortunately I am not yet autoconfirmed, or I would be doing this myself. The sentence "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, consider if you feel that are you an editor who has been an active and regular Wikipedia contributor for at least a few months, and who is familiar with Wikipedia, and respects Wikipedia policy, and who has gained the general trust of the community" should be "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, consider whether or not you feel that you are an editor who has been an active and regular Wikipedia contributor for at least a few months, and who is familiar with Wikipedia, [deleted "and"] respects Wikipedia policy, and who has gained the general trust of the community."WhisperingWisdom ^{T C} 08:26, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

The wording is very poor, and you're right to suggest a better one. The "who is" doesn't need to be repeated, and adding numbers inline (i) like this, and (ii) this, would make it easier to digest. But why not make it a more positive statement, rather than thematising uncertainty? "Candidates should have been active and regular Wikipedia contributors ...", pehaps? Tony (talk) 10:43, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Sounds fine to me. So, that would be, "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, candidates should have been active and regular Wikipedia contributors for at least a few months, and who is familiar with Wikipedia, respects Wikipedia policy, and who has gained the general trust of the community", yes? — RyanCross (talk) 10:49, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Or perhaps: "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, candidates should have been active and regular Wikipedia contributors for at least a few months, be familiar with Wikipedia, respect its pillars and policies, and have gained the general trust of the community."

I've added the pillars bit—obvious? Also, "be familiar with Wikipedia" seems vague ... um, either remove that item, or "with the procedures and practices of Wikipedia"? Perhaps you can think of better epithets. Gotta go out. Tony (talk) 11:04, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the "procedures and practices" bit sounds fine, but I agree, the "pillars" bit is a rather obvious. Along with "respects its policies", I added "and understands". And I also changed "a few" to "several". Runs more smooth when you read it.

So that would sum up to, "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, candidates should have been active and regular Wikipedia contributors for at least several months, be familiar with the procedures and practices of Wikipedia, respects and understands its policies, and have gained the general trust of the community." Sounds good? — RyanCross (talk) 11:13, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

Very good; can you make it "respect and understand"? These verbs come after "should ...". Tony (talk) 15:51, 12 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "These verbs come after 'should...'".

Anyway, I believe we're done now. Our final draft would be, "Before requesting or accepting a nomination, candidates should have been active and regular Wikipedia contributors for at least several months, be familiar with the procedures and practices of Wikipedia, respect and understand its policies, and have gained the general trust of the community."

Seems alright? Can we update WP:ADMIN with this new reworded version? — RyanCross (talk) 01:27, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

• Yes. "... should ... resect and understand ...", not "... should ... respects and understands ...". It fine now. Tony (talk) 02:05, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

• Done. Thank you for your help, Tony. WhisperingWisdom: Good idea posting your request here. We managed to find a better wording for that sentence since you brought it here for discussion. This is why discussions are always good before making any major edit to a policy page, or even articles. — RyanCross (talk) 03:18, 13 January 2009 (UTC)

WP:DEAL revisited

Requesting clarification on what NBD is supposed to mean. RfA in its current incarnation does not reflect the NBD policy as currently worded - the process of acquiring the title of admin is, as a practical matter, often rather complex nowadays and can require a significant time investment for interested editors. Has the community rejected the NBD policy, or does it just need to be reworded? And yes I looked at WP:PEREN before I posted this, ha. Townlake (talk) 05:16, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

For anyone interested, I mentioned my above question at the RfA talk page, and related conversation took off over there. I have zero preference for pushing the conversation to one WT:___ location or the other, but I do remain interested in seeing this aspect of policy clarified. Townlake (talk) 18:04, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Need for a good look at the "uninvolved" wording

See this. Comments welcome here; for future situations, the policy wording should be cleaned up, I believe. Tony (talk) 11:12, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

Reading the whole WP:UNINVOLVED section, without taking bits out of context, it seems fine the way it is. The specific case you mention would fall into the "If a matter is blatantly, clearly obvious (genuinely vandalistic for example), then historically the community has endorsed any admin acting on it, even if involved, if any reasonable admin would have probably come to the same conclusion." part. Any reasonable admin would have blocked that account. I think people are blowing this way out of proportion. - Rjd0060 (talk) 15:21, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

We seem to be trying to legislate Clue. There is no form of wording that will make a determined POV-pusher or wikilawyer shut up, because there is nothing we can do to make that happen short of banning them, and even that often takes a year or more to finally get rid of them. I've only seen one thread recently on AN about this, and the result was so obvious that the complainant was rapidly sent away with a flea in their ear. Some admins will go to ANI or IRC for a block on an IP that is vandalising their talk page in retaliation for a block or other action, others will just handle it as part of the same block or action. As long as the vandalism is low-grade and blindingly obvious then there's really no need to have additional process or hurdles, and if anything the current wording could be shortened for clarity. In the end I think Mr Sanger had it right: "Show the door to trolls, vandals, and wiki-anarchists, who, if permitted, would waste your time and create a poisonous atmosphere here." Let's wind back m:CREEP and keep things simple. Guy (Help!) 11:13, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

1. Actually, if you wanted to "wind back instruction creep", you'd conduct a good cleansing of all of the redundancy, repetition and poor organisation on this policy page. I think I could probably present you with a draft that says the same things in two-thirds of the space, but is much clearer and easier to access than the current text (for admins and non-admins). I presume that you're not against the cleaning up of such an important text ...
2. Why would you want to "ban" a wikilawyering editor? That appears to be what you're suggesting. Wouldn't it be better to silence them by gaining a little rappart, engaging, and at worst ignoring? Banning should be used as a last resort, according to the policy.
3. In any case, this is policy, and the wording really does count, especially as admin actions can be surrounded by highly emotive situations. It is in all our interests for the wording to be as simple as possible, with the right level of detail (which is a problem in quite a few places). The page is not at all in a good state (it reminds me of the higgledy-piggledy ad-hoc build-on architecture of some older hospitals). Is there an inherent resistance to suggesting, discussing and implementing improvements? Tony (talk) 12:28, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

What about this? --Conti|✉ 12:54, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Conti, that is a timely improvement; thank you indeed, because it removes further (although not all) doubt about just where admins stand in relation to the quoted "sometimes" text above. I do believe that quoted text needs a little surgery. I'm concerned about the use of vague words such as "sometimes", and worse, "probably". While not wanting to be a legal-eagle, they are not normally the stuff of policy pages. Tony (talk) 13:28, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

Furthermore, give me a leg-up as to how a new admin would absorb this important part of the admin policy", particularly the green bit:

However, one important caveat is that an administrator who has interacted with a user or article in an administrative role (i.e., in order to address a dispute, problematic conduct, administrative assistance, outside advice/opinion, enforce a policy, and the like) or whose actions on an article are minor, obvious, and do not speak to bias, is usually not prevented from acting on the article, user, or dispute. This is because one of the roles of administrators is precisely to deal with such matters and if necessary, continue dealing with them. That said, an administrator may still wish to pass such a matter to another administrator as "best practice" in some cases (although not required to). Or, they may wish to be absolutely sure that no concerns will "stick", in certain exceptional cases<!--, a decision best left to their own judgement (COMMENTED OUT BUT LEFT IN CASE OTHERS THINK IT'S HELPFUL-->.

Come to think of it, how would an experienced admin work out this tortuous, twisting pathway of words? At least one ArbCom member thinks that "There is some ambiguity there - I think it needs to be spelt out why it is pragmatic to err on the side of caution WRT to COI - i.e. being called on it. This really needs to be more strongly worded.

I'm not being pointy here: I'm demonstrating that the wording is sometimes more smoke and mirrors. Can someone spell out what it does mean? Tony (talk) 12:48, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I agree that the section can and should be shortened. For example, reading through the entire "misuse of tools" section, there are at least three places where it says "if in doubt, ask for a second opinion". Unfortunately, I don't think I'm the best person to try this (based on my experiences at WP:UNDUE). SHEFFIELDSTEEL^TALK 18:59, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

I'd support a clean rewrite. Hiding T 11:26, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

I would support removal of the green-highlighted text above. As for a rewrite, that could work too, depending on what we come up with. --Elonka 18:35, 23 January 2009 (UTC)

On the basis of this feedback, I submit a draft replacement text. I played with it a few times, getting rid of informal fluff, redundancy, and unclear bits (150w down to 63w). I think it boils down to a single statement, really. Have I got it exactly right? I'm in no hurry to implement it, pending your careful scrutiny and comment.

However, this does not preclude an administrator:

• who has been involved with a user or article in a purely administrative role (such as by enforcing a policy, addressing a dispute or problematic conduct, or providing administrative assistance or advice), or
• whose actions on an article have been minor and not demonstrably biased,

from subsequent administrative action in relation to that user or article.

Tony (talk)

Update: I have made a proposal for a greater rationalisation and clarification of the wording of the section, here. Your feedback would be welcome. Tony (talk) 13:33, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Proposal

Based on this incident (specifically, the unprofessional block summary left by User:Jéské Couriano, now oversighted), I'd like to propose the following addition to this policy under the "Administrator conduct" section. Credit to Kelly Martin for the idea and wording:

Any admin who uses block or other log messages containing defamatory, insulting, profane, or other such impolite language may be summarily desysopped.

Cla68 (talk) 23:47, 2 February 2009 (UTC)

Tally

• I'll certainly endorse that change, yes. It's decidedly unprofessional behaviour and only serves to provoke people, both new editors and trolls alike - Alison ^❤ 23:52, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
• Strong support. – iridescent 23:53, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support. Though we are all volunteers, I like to think that administrators inhabit our primary "customer care" division and must be held to higher standards of civility and professionalism than other users. So you've had a bad day fighting vandal, "trolls," and "POV pushers" and want to lash out? Turn off the computer, have a drink, or go vent to your friends on IRC. But don't be a dick; don't bite newbies, and even if you don't believe a "new" user is truly new, don't don't publicly engage abusive editors at their abusive level of discourse; it makes the project look more amateurish than many already suspect it is.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 00:27, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support. Yes, I know I have balls to come here and support what would, if retroactively applied, get me desysopped. However, even I've come to realize in recent months that I'm being pushed closer to a precipice I'd rather not go down, largely due to my own aggressive personality. -Jeremy ^{(v^_^v Dittobori)} 01:08, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
• Comment I'd like to note that as reasonable as this may sound, it will backfire. Since we can't precisely define "defamatory, insulting, profane, or other such impolite language" we're going to get drama. I wish things weren't that way but we have to be realistic. The next time administrator X crosses that line we'll get an ANI thread with every friend of X saying "oh come on, it's not that bad, desysoping would be punitive, desysoping would be a net negative, yadayadayada". Thought experiment: think about your favourite admin who's prone to outbursts (now, now, be honest: you know some) and admit that this rule will never be applied without this ending up on ArbCom's desk. Shoot me if this is a bad idea but we could take a three-strikes approach. There are a few things that are definite no-nos for admins: the above situations of course, protecting a page when you're involved in a content dispute, blocking an editor that you're currently in dispute with. One thing that these have in common is that they are unacceptable regardless of context. So instead of a full-blown ArbCom case, we can get ArbCom to quickly say it's unacceptable without further bickering. Three strikes? Out you go. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 01:29, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
  • PS: not sure that my first sentence is clear. It goes without saying that things such as the latest incident are utterly unacceptable. But one of the saddest traditions of the wiki is to accept the unacceptable from admins and that trend won't be reversed so easily. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 01:35, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

My "favourite" admin would be re-confirmed in a heartbeat (assuming she wanted to be) if she were to be desysopped for breaching this hypothetical rule. I think more frequent reconfirmations would be an effective deterring factor for the more hot-headed sysops; after all, if adminship is "no big deal", de-sysopping and re-sysopping should be no big deal either. If after an outburst, admin cannot get reconfirmed, he or she had probably lost the community's confidence to begin with. The system is already in place; no ArbCom necessary, no 3 strikes necessary. If a log summary is clearly, unambiguously over the line, admin gets the boot but will be welcomed back at some point, if the community wishes.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back (talk) 01:44, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

Echo TFMWNCB's comments...and add, how do you define what is insulting, defamatory, etc? Well, you know it when you see it. If anyone sees something they believe crosses the line, they should report it according to the instructions listed in this policy, and the decision-makers, usually the Arbitration Committee, will decide and take or not take action. No more or less drama than any other governance process we have in the project. Cla68 (talk) 01:49, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

I am not disputing that we know when we see it. I'm just saying that while we can put this sentence on the page, we have to realize that it will never be implemented because every admin has a cheerleading squad that will fight tooth and nails against desysoping. To see this, just flip through past ArbCom cases. So a three-strike approach or something like Tony's suggestion below is more realistic and is more likely to make a difference. It's a simple idea: we forgive mistakes but we don't tolerate repeated mistakes. TFMWNC, I'm not sure who your favourite admin is but history teaches us that re-confirmation RfAs never go well for admins who have used abusive language and I suspect that you're actually thinking about someone who isn't prone to outbursts. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 17:05, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

• Support This is not the way admins should act. Sysops on Wikipedia should be professional and polite in their actions. Sam ^Blab 19:31, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose:

1. The explicitly threatened measure is over the top, given that it's not framed in terms of initial and repeated behaviour, and behaviour adaptation—many of us become annoyed and press the "save page" prematurely on occasion, especially admins who have to deal with vandals and dunderheads.
2. It's redundant, since the policy already says as much. See here, a codified form of what is on the policy page overleaf (Gen. requirements plus Specific No. 2).
3. There may be an "uninvolved" issue here too ("They lost any chance for civility from me the day after 4chan got FP'd. -Jéské Couriano")—that is unacceptable, and there are much better ways for admins to handle difficult users.

• My feeling is that a warning is adequate initially, and that repeated behaviour such as this might incur stronger penalties, including desysopping down the line; admins who aren't flexible enough to adjust their behaviour are probably best let go. The problem may then lie in the cumbersome process for desysopping, and the consequent fact that it rarely occurs. Tony (talk) 02:04, 3 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support. Three strikes is two too many. One can always run for adminship again, but contributors should not be verbally abused by janitors. Cool Hand Luke 17:32, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Strong oppose: What a bunch of nonsense. Summarily desysopped for a potty mouth? It's a bit early for April 1-esque humor, isn't it? --MZMcBride (talk) 17:38, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support A motion and vote by ArbCom to remove the tools after ArbCom is notified would be the best approach. I don't think it will be a rush to judgment if done by ArbCom. Using this wording, an admin with a pattern of leaving inappropriate log comments will be desysop without the need for a full case. FloNight♥♥♥ 17:45, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Neutral Desysopping for abuse is something we need to make easier outside the normal "document this person gravely abuses the tools on a regular basis at an RFC, then come to RFAR and prove they are still doing it" method we currently employ. But of all the admin "crimes" out there, this one ranks a bit lower on my severity scale compared to things like blocking when involved, deletion against consensus, etc, and those are things I see on a weekly basis at AN/ANI. As I read this proposal, it basically says, "if you violate WP:CIV or WP:NPA in a log entry, you will be desysopped". Given the degree of difficult even arbcom has in applying WP:CIV to situations, I'm not sure this is the best policy to turn into auto-desysop. Making WP:INVOLVED or WP:SOCK an auto-desysop policy would be something I would be more agreeable to. MBisanz ^talk 18:07, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support per Alison. –Juliancolton ^{Tropical Cyclone} 18:12, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Weak Oppose I can be desysopped for insulting someone? If someone is insulted for being called a vandalism-only account, I can get my bit removed for that? What about if I say "go away"; that's impolite (I should obviously say "go away, please" :D). The amount of latitude here is ridiculous; block summaries like "get the fuck out of here, assface" are obviously bad, but the current outline is just waaaaaay too open for an immediate, on-the-spot desysopping. I'd be comfortable if it was something that could be used in conjunction with other evidence that leads to someone's demotion, but it all on its own? Yeesh. EVula // talk // ☯ // 18:23, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose as disproportionate. I like the idea, but summary desysopping is way way way over the top. Perhaps a three-strikes-in-three-months system or similar would be effective. — Werdna • talk 18:24, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support per Alison, but make it gradual. Two strikes. rootology (C)(T) 18:26, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Neutral I'm not certain that immediate desysopping is warranted for the first offence, but laissez-faire and careless block messages, edit summaries, revert messages and most behavior contrary to a convivial and enjoyable existence on the project for all parties should be actively discouraged in any capacity. Bastique ^demandez 18:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Strong oppose. Desysopping without trial should be reserved for the most extreme of cases, e.g. hacked accounts or admins gone rogue. I'm not condoning profane log summaries but context is everything. Admins, like all other people have emotions and when people get stressed they make bad choices. Desysopping an already angry/stressed admin will only serve to add insult to injury and create even more drama in an already tense situation. How about we spend our time working on a policy to get rid of admins with recurring issues rather than lynching good admins that make one mistake? BJ^Talk 18:59, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support, unless some other strict behavioral guidelines for administrators are established and enforced (not an actual suggestion that I'm making - just trying to make a point). This proposal is honestly a bit bureaucratic for my tastes (as would the "alternative" I made in the previous sentence) but on the other hand, there's no reason for anybody to act like this in edit summaries, let alone administrators who theoretically have a superior sense of judgment and should have better behavior in general. If all editors are expected to adhere to WP:NPA, then administrators should be expected to adhere to WP:NPA+1, if that makes any sense. - Rjd0060 (talk) 19:20, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. Not for one solitary incident. Maybe three in a short space of time, or similar. Per bjweeks, mainly.  GARDEN  21:03, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose - So far over the top, its not even in the mountain range anymore. We barely enforce the civility policy, but we want to start desysopping admins for "impolite" log summaries? Admins aren't robots, if acting like a human every once in a while is a desysoppable offense, I imagine this site is going to start bleeding admins fast. We want to have a collegial atmosphere, but that doesn't mean we should be handing out Draconian sanctions for minor offenses against the peace. I imagine any attempt to enforce this is almost certainly going to cause more problems/drama than the log message itself. Which also raises the question, who is going to enforce this? Are we going to have polls on AN as to whether or not a comment is "impolite?" Mr.Z-man 21:40, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support Admins should abide by the standards they are supposedly enforcing. Or, to put it more bluntly, I am sick and tired of the double standards and special pleading we get when admins behave unacceptably. DuncanHill (talk) 02:19, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose too lenient as is. Change the "may be summarily desysopped" to a "will be summarily desysopped". RMHED (talk) 02:31, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose If we are going to invent tripwires this isn't the one to invent. Admins shouldn't be doing that sort of thing at all, but the response is exactly what happened: admonish and move along. If it becomes a pattern then start an RfC/Recall. If it is some incipient problem, start an RFAR. Protonk (talk) 02:35, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support. If you're so frustrated that you can't just write "vandalism only account" in a block summary, then why the hell are you making the block? Giggy (talk) 03:02, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Strong oppose: Where do we draw the line? Can I call a long-term, abusive vandal who abuses multiple accounts a shithole for being just that? Is that abusive? What about a disruptive dick? I can see where some may be offended by the usage of some curse words, but administrators have and will be frustrated when certain editors test and retest our patience again and again. Wikipedia does not need to become a nanny state, to constantly hover over us and watch our sometimes crude and sometimes truthful language, and to dole out desysops for a matter that is overly minor. Don't like it? Take it to our usual processes if it is a long-term issue, such as RFC. seicer | talk | contribs 03:15, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support modified proposal, with removal of "defamatory". Tim Vickers (talk) 05:13, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose - I'd be very concerned that this would be used to justify desysopping an admin for something trivial, like deleting an article with the summary "worthless spam". No log summaries should be profane or defamatory, but a blanket ban on something that someone might consider insulting is only going to result in drama. --B (talk) 06:32, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose "Impolite" is a deeply subjective term. While I support the spirit of the proposal, a new rule which would "summarily" desysop someone based on such a mutable idea is extremely dangerous. We already have a community strong enough recognize and deal with admins who are rude and otherwise improper in carrying out administrative functions (as evidenced by the situation that prompted this proposal). We don't need yet another piece of bureaucracy to create drama and be argued over. Steven Walling (talk) 06:38, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose I agree with this in principle, but I don't agree with the concept of admins possibly being desysopped after a single transgression - I suspect this isn't what's being proposed here, so the wording should be clearer. WP:AN already functions as a star chamber in which admins who make a mistake get beaten around the head (sometimes rightfully) and there's no need to feed this by raising the prospect of admins being desysopped as a result of a lapse in judgement or an allegation from a disgruntled editor. Moreover, the current wording of the 'Administrator conduct' section makes it clear that admins are expected to maintain the highest standards, so there may not be much more to add. Nick-D (talk) 08:42, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose, over the top and very open to interpretation. Should be taken to ArbCom if a pattern of inappropriate behaviour occurs. Per Protonk. Stifle (talk) 09:20, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose, mostly due to the word "summarily". I also agree with the principle, however as worded it will be used to bludgeon opponents when they make minor or once-off missteps. If they are major missteps, they will likely end up under scrutiny at WP:AN, and escalate to WP:RFAR if the behaviour continues. John Vandenberg ^(chat) 09:51, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose – an incredibly over-the-top proposal. Someone who loses their temper once and goes off deserves to be immediately desysopped? Not only is it asking for more drama, one offense is hardly grounds for desysopping. A warning is nice. A second offense results in a stronger warning. A third warning merits serious consideration for the person's ability to act as an admin and thus is grounds for desysopping at that juncture for having a history of doing so and not getting the point. A history of incivility is necessary to question someone's fitness as an admin, not one isolated incident where an admin lost their temper at a troll. — sephiroth bcr ^(converse) 10:01, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose - Might as well make rules for: any admin who (repeatedly) restores a copyright violation might be blocked, or restores a blp violation, or.... All that is common sense and it depends on the circumstances what the result of such a bad action is. To make a rule specially for this is too wikilawyerish. Garion96 (talk) 11:20, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support after Tim's clarification. The community as a whole clearly feels that admins lack adequate accountability, and it really isn't asking much to display civility (remember that? core principle and all) in a log summary. I agree that there are cases in which mechanically desysopping would be a lousy result, but I trust the community to deal with those exceptions. And really, if you're too worked up over a matter to type out a reasonable summary, you probably shouldn't be the one making the block. Xymmax ^{So let it be written} _{So let it be done} 14:21, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose It's too easy to wikilawyer a rule such as this for maximum drama - admins get accused of defamation for such routine things as blocking a user for spamming, or adding a domain to the spam blacklist. Of course admins should be civil, particularly when acting in an official capacity - it's common sense & common courtesy. Existing civility policies cover this, there is no need for a 'zero-tolerance' clause. --Versageek 15:06, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. Not because I think admins should be allowed to use abusive language in block logs (they shouldn't) but because we already have mechanisms to deal with this and because the primary effect of adding this as a rule is going to be to allow a lot of people who were properly blocked to waste our attention whining that words like "waste our attention" and "whining" are uncivil and abusive. —David Eppstein (talk) 16:11, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose [based on an e-mail I sent] I hope all who know me and my work can agree that I do my best to remain as civil, cordial, and respectful as possible, even in the face of those who act otherwise. However, I would be very leery of any plan to summarily desysop an admin for a one-time, or even highly infrequent, civility breach. A warning and a slap with a large, cold, dead, gilled creature, yes—a desysop, no. Sysops are often berated, yelled at, improperly accused, and, in general, bear the brunt of user dissatisfaction with the project and the system. They also happen to be human, and can make mistakes and/or break down with frustration too. This is not OTRS which we are discussing; there I agree that only the most mature and patient people (those who can answer the e-mails with a smile, and wait until they are off-line before they rip loose a stream of frustrated invective that would make George Carlin blush) should handle the sensitive tickets. But sysops dealing with the regular run-of-the-mill vandalism protections and edit warring should not be faced by a one-strike-and-you-are-out policy. If there is a pattern of such abuse, then desysopping should be an option, but very infrequent mistakes should be viewed as what they are, mistakes, not character flaws. -- Avi (talk) 16:28, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• oppose Absolutely not. Sysops are under a lot of stress already. A situation where the use of profanity in a block logs is desysoppable is not good at all. We already have a shortage of admins. This seems part of a general trend to emphasize civility over substance and this is not good. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:35, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose I agree in principle that admins should not try to insult or offend people in block messages, but we certainly shouldn't be summarily desysopping people for a single alleged instance of it. If there is a long term pattern of such activity then ArbCom should take it into account. Note that "defamatory, insulting, profane, or other such impolite language" is very subjective and could be subject to all sorts of interpretations. Hut 8.5 18:29, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose I support conduct RFCs on Admins who are uncivil, either in block messages or warnings or discussions. I support Arbcom cases for severe or ongoing abuse / incivility problems. But as phrased this is just a hammer to use against admin interventions. Admins need to be civil as everyone else does, but admins being uncivil is not any significant part of the incivility problem on Wikipedia, and that which exists can be handled by peer pressure, RFCs, and Arbcom under existing policy. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:14, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Ambivalent Support in spirit, but a little too draconian ("'impoliteness' in the summary" invites liberal interpretations, and entices retaliators and lulzsters to play victim). "One strike, you're out" is appropriate for egregious behavior maybe, but otherwise too harsh, too hasty. But I'm shocked how digracefully some admins conduct themselves sometimes. Admins who act like louts and bruisers create more disruption and long term damage than vandals. It's an embarrassment to the project. Those who can't behave professionally with the tools should lose them. Professor marginalia (talk) 20:42, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support per Alison and The Fat Man Who Never Came Back, who both make very good points. Flopsy Mopsy and Cottonmouth (talk) 20:57, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Weak support "impolite" is far too gameable and I would suggest "abusive" as an alternative. I thought the phrase "Find yourself another hobby" to be extremely impolite, but since we are not going to deflag Jimbo I do not see why other functionaries should lose the bits for a moment of poor judgement - abusive covers anything that really does warrant the revoking of rights. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:49, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• Amend. Basically per the comments by EVula, Avi (Avraham) and especially David Eppstein. "Insulting" and "impolite" are much too vague, opening the door to incessant drama and wikilawyering. "Profane" is a somewhat clearer line not to cross though even the meaning of "profane" can be debated. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 00:53, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
• Oppose. This is too open to subjective interpretation (especially impolite and profane). In addition, I do not understand what summarily means. In the legal language it means that a decision is made without a formal hearing and without considering all evidence. If such interpretation is implied, I strongly object to it. Ruslik (talk) 07:19, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
• +O Though I sympathize with the intent, I feel this is an ad hoc solution to the real problem: desysopping currently requires an act of Congress with an okey-doke by the pope. What we need is not ad hoc solutions but a meeting of the minds on a sane process for desysopping—one which does include some fast-track options. Ling.Nut ^{(talk—WP:3IAR)} 10:21, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
• Support if amended to simply say "an incivil message, or one making a personal attack" to put the judgement of whether it has been violated firmly within existing policy, and making clear that this does not apply to the use of any standard messages from the dropdown box.

  As an aside, why does a desysopping have to be the only punishment? In real life things like this get you suspended, not fired, on the first offense. Can we provide for suspensions of adminship (otherwise we'll have some long and dramatic RFARs over this as people get torn over "Sure X screwed up, but he's a good admin and I/we don't want to lose him")? Daniel Case (talk) 16:30, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

• Support as if being an admin is no big deal, then nor should desysopping and there's no need to block with a personal attack. Sincerely, --A Nobody^{My talk} 23:42, 10 February 2009 (UTC)
• Strong oppose - Having such a boilerplate rule with such a vague rationale will only cause problems. Deal with things on a case by case basis. — neuro^(talk) 08:06, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Comments

• Where can I place a warm fuzzy positive comment in favour of something akin to either 3 strikes or Tony's clarification above? Casliber (talk · contribs) 13:42, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

  I guess this would be the place. But perhaps this could be proposed more formally if a few people are interested in drafting this carefully. btw, a draft should be in place before this is proposed at the village pump or wherever. I'd be happy to help but it only makes sense if we involve arbitrators. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 17:05, 3 February 2009 (UTC)

  I used the words may be instead of will be in order to allow for some discretionary leeway for management. Cla68 (talk) 01:13, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

• Who decides? -- Avi (talk) 15:25, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Avi raises an important question. Let's take a step back, whoa. A three-strikes proposal, or at any rate a partly or fully codified process for applying a "gradualist" approach to encourage behavioural change could work, but would need to be set up very carefully. The stewards system seems to be unsuitable, with its language politics, distance from eng.WP and lack of suitable skill-base for this in most cases. ArbCom could appoint one of its own with delegated responsibility, to issue a warning, then a stern warning, then to launch a streamlined, quick process at ArbCom that might result in an ultimatum and further disciplinary action upon a further breach, or immediate disciplinary action (temporary loss of admin tools and status?), and full desysopping if called to ArbCom again after yet another breach (that's four breaches) ... well, it might be possible. AdminReview is being set up in project space as a community-driven process to process complaints by users about admin breaches of the ADMIN policies, but it will rely on the good-will of all parties as currently conceived. Elections will be held in late March for the Coordinators who will run it. I don't know how this would map onto any proposal for gradualist disciplinary approach by ArbCom. It could sit nicely alongside an ArbCom-appointed officer who issues warnings and takes matters to ArbCom, with referrals possibly. Have a look at how AdminReview is set up; quite tightly run and structured, with a few matters still to be worked out. Tony (talk) 16:15, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Has the potenial to create issues with deleting articles with more ah problematical titles.Geni 17:38, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

• Assuming this passes, will non-admins be under the same restrictions? A single 'naughty' word and they'll be indefinitely blocked, perhaps? --MZMcBride (talk) 17:51, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

The former administrator will still be an unblocked editor, so no, that seems illogical. Flopsy Mopsy and Cottonmouth (talk) 19:47, 6 February 2009 (UTC)

• As a trigger for automatic desysopping, this seems to me to be unworkable. The definition of defamatory is far too loose, for example - someone who makes many edits adding links to a website and is blocked using the standard block summary of WP:SPAM from the dropdowns in the block tool, could plausibly argue that it is a defamatory summary (and yes that has happened, and yes we assumed good faith and unblocked and removed the site fomr the blacklist, and yes he resumed spamming, and yes checkuser did show the account to be provably connected to the site owner). There is absolutely nothing wrong with making it plain that this is not acceptable, and that the degree of tolerance will be remarkably low, but it is not something that can be mechanistically applied like WP:3RR. It's somewhat ironic that this is being suggested now that the technical ability exists to delete some of these summaries. Guy (Help!) 18:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
  • We must be able to come up with some kind of wording for a definition of "unambiguously defamatory", though. I don't think anyone's talking about the grey areas, such as User:Godvia's taking offense at me for blocking with a reason of "persistent vandalism" when he actually was blocked for trolling and persistent personal attacks (yes, he really did complain); we're talking about situations like the one that prompted this discussion, a block on an IP whose only edits were to add Escape from Alcatraz to List of films based on actual events and to tweak the formatting, with a summary of "go circlejerk with your wethers". Remember, a lot of these IPs are using shared terminals or rotating IPs, and there's a good chance the next person to use the terminal will also see the block message. (I'd love to have seen the face of the teacher at the school when the next student to use the terminal saw the "blocked reason" screen in this case, mind.) – iridescent 19:58, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

• To be clear, here, that is an extreme form of dickishness that should unquestionably earn a slap with the trusty Wikitrout, but is it on a par with the things that actually do get people desysopped, such as leaking defamatory deleted revisions, wheel-warring and so on? Not I would suggest, at the single event level. And as a reason for an automatic trip to the head teacher's office it is fine and good. But you know what they say about hard cases making bad law. Where's the evidence that this is a persistent or long-standing problem requiring of a change in policy? Guy (Help!) 20:38, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• In the last couple months I saw 3 admins block people they were in disputes with, over the dispute they were having, be taken to ANI and yelled at, the person was unblocked, and nothing happened to them. I also saw an admin delete a page to stop someone he was in a dispute with from editing it. When we talk of "summarily" desysopping people, I think of bright line rules (ie. 99% of the time it is applied it will be crystal clear). The situations I mention above are of the sort I would like to see made into summary desysopping. For these other situations about log etiquette, etc, why not have a full RFAR to examine the facts and circumstances and see if that occurrence was grave enough on its own to warrant desysopping (log activities can vary from outing someone, posting a BLP vio, tame incivility, and extreme personal attacks). MBisanz ^talk 20:59, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
• Guy makes the important point here. A bad case of dickishness has never led to desysoping. Should it? I think that the overwhelming consensus would be no, at least not automatically. It would also be a very significant departure from current practice. Cla68 says "that's why we should say may result in desysoping but this is precisely why this extra sentence would have no concrete effect. The ideas being thrown around by Tony and myself (including Tony's User:Tony1/AdminReview) are in response to this. We probably don't want summary desysoping for dickishness or obviously inappropriate blocks but we do want a mechanism to ensure as soon as possible that such incidents remain isolated. Arbitration cases are only initiated after a looooooooong pattern of incidents and we need some sort of intermediate solution and no, RfCs don't help. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 23:06, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

The only way you can for certain that something is "defamatory" is after the court case. This seems to mean in practice "potentially defamatory", and that would include to my mind calling somebody a "vandal" or a "spammer". I'd suggest Any admin who uses block or other log messages containing grossly insulting language may be summarily desysopped. That would make it clearer that this is restricted to the obvious cases, and sidestep the complicated issue of what exactly do you mean by defamation. Tim Vickers (talk) 02:38, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

• I'm again seeing people other than User:MGodwin making legal claims about edits made on wikipedia. This upsets me. None of us here are empowered to make any sort of legal recommendation to the project (e.g. what kind of a block summary is "defamatory", at what point would a "defamatory" block summary be brought to the attention of the foundation, who would bear the legal exposure for that defamation). Very few of us are qualified to be making those statements in general at all. If we are having some collegial discussion on the editing policy ramifications of some or another action, great. But please do not throw around words like "defamatory" and "court case" unless you are qualified to do so. And no, reading the wikipedia page on Defamation doesn't qualify any of us. Thanks. Protonk (talk) 03:03, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree, having a policy that would require us to get legal advice every time it was applied seems pretty impractical. Tim Vickers (talk) 03:12, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Tim's suggested wording and if consensus supports this addition I'll plan on using Tim's words. Cla68 (talk) 03:35, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Vaguely worded "zero tolerance" policies are a recipe for disaster, I think. Given the two options provided, I'd prefer Tim's slightly more specific wording. – Luna Santin (talk) 08:22, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Tim, I think it goes further than that: it is by now clear that the community finds the use of summaries and logs to be especially sensitive, and any grossly inappropriate material in any log entry is a significant issue. All such entries, from user creation logs which out people and harass them to edit summaries with shock sites in them, cause disproportionate effort to fix and are therefore not acceptable. Guy (Help!) 21:11, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

• I wholeheartedly agree that admins should strive to be professional, especially in log messages, but I have my doubts as to whether taking a shotgun approach to this is the best idea. Seems better to address specific incidents as they arise, using discretion to tailor solutions to circumstances. – Luna Santin (talk) 08:19, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
• This seems rather arbitrary and reactionary. We should be attempting to better enforce the civility policy as a whole, not just for a subset of users (treating admins either stricter or less strict than everyone else only encourages the view of admins as a special social/political group, which should also be avoided) in a small subset of instances (leaving an insulting log message is worth an insta-desysop but the same comment on a talk page or an edit summary gets a wrist slap?). Mr.Z-man 19:53, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Thought experiment

4 February 2009 AbusiveAdmin (Talk | contribs) blocked MeanEvilVandal (Talk) (account creation blocked, autoblock disabled) with an expiry time of indefinite‎ (user is being a dick)

Would this warrant a possible immediate de-sysopping? I think not. --MZMcBride (talk) 21:04, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

No, but it would warrant a "stop being, an uncivil, admin, y'all." —harej ;] 21:13, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I dunno, a pattern of calling people "dicks" is probably a cause for concern. Three or four blocks like that from a user who isn't getting the message might be worth a desysopping. — Werdna • talk 21:13, 4 February 2009 (UTC)ß

WP:DICK is an essay, not a policy, so I don't think it's professional to call someone that in a log summary. Remember, though, the proposed policy additions says may be not will be so that if this instance was reported to ArbCom or whomever they could use discretion in deciding whether it was a desyoppable offense or not. If I were the one making the decision, I would probably tell that admin not to use that type of language in the log entry and let it go at that if it were a first offense. Cla68 (talk) 02:32, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

• Careful, now. Professionalism tends to be hard to come by at some pay grades, and we're well below minimum wage :-) Guy (Help!) 21:12, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

When an indef block is put on an editor for acting like a dick that's dandy, but desysopping somebody for acting like a dick with their tools isn't? Professor marginalia (talk) 22:55, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Advertising the discussion

I don't see any advertising for this proposal. Perhaps I'm simply missing it? But a radical proposed change in the admin policy surely needs to be advertised on the admin noticeboard, Template:CENT, the proposals noticeboard, etc., no? --MZMcBride (talk) 17:43, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

Watchlist-details? We all love a change there.  GARDEN  21:15, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I see no need to advertise what is still a vague brainstorm. Given the size of the community, it's now much more productive to have a small but hopefully fairly representative group of people work out a concrete proposal and submit that to a larger audience. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 23:10, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I dropped a mention of it at WP:AN. Cla68 (talk) 02:34, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

I would have thought admins would already have watchlisted the page that says what they can do and how they should do it, but I'm not an admin so what do I know.... -kotra (talk) 02:46, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Nope, not on my watchlist. Policies are like rabbits - take your eyes off them for a while and a whole new litter appears. Tim Vickers (talk) 02:57, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Not quite sure what you mean, this page has been around since at least 2001 (incidentally, that's a pretty amusing diff), but my comment was intended in a snarky, half-joking way, so I won't press it. -kotra (talk) 03:05, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

There was a time when this page wasn't policy and was simply an explanation page of the role of admins. (For a long time, actually.) At some point it was forced into policy-dom. :-/ --MZMcBride (talk) 16:34, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Would it help?

To modify the proposal from "...may be summarily desysopped." to something like "...may have their admin privileges suspended, or summarily removed." I think this addresses two concerns - the concern that it requires automatic desysoping by stewards, because it introduces a choice which would naturally fall to arbcom, and the concern that it'd be a 1 strike rule, or 3 strike rule, or any sort of "formula," again by passing a choice over to arbcom. At the same time, it doesn't soften the consequences: inappropriate behavior would still result in a loss of admin rights, either temporarily or permanently. --InkSplotch (talk) 15:18, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

No. That's not the problem. The problem is that the list of offenses is too vague. If I delete an article with the summary "worthless spam", I should not be desysopped. The rule needs to instead be limited to cover outing, harassment, and libel. But anyone using the log for outing, harassment, and libel is probably going to be desysopped by arbcom anyway, so the rule doesn't really solve an actual problem. --B (talk) 19:06, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

• What's wrong with simply saying that is is absolutely unacceptable, and leave it to the ArbCom to decide how to handle it? Guy (Help!) 21:13, 5 February 2009 (UTC)
  • What is absolutely unacceptable? The current proposal says "defamatory, insulting, profane, or other such impolite language". "Worthless spam" is potentially three of the four (defamatory if it doesn't meet the legal definition of spam, insulting if the intention was not to spam, certainly impolite). The rule needs to specify what is unacceptable. --B (talk) 21:41, 5 February 2009 (UTC)

Closing discussion

It appears that there isn't consensus to add the line to the policy. The comments ranged from full support to absolute oppose with several suggestions in between for modifying the proposed wording or changing the current system.

Although my proposal didn't pass, I was nevertheless happy, and hopefully not the only one, to see some attention brought to this issue along with some thoughtful discussion. I would propose two informal action items for everyone to take from this discussion: (1) that the members of the admin corps always remember that they "officially" represent the project in the eyes of most, if not all of the casual, new, or potential editors out there and thus need to always act with the appropriate decorum, no matter how emotionally invoved one may be in the issue at hand, and (2) that if we observe an admin violate our standards of conduct, that we make sure to provide them some quick feedback on what they've done wrong, or, if it's a repeated violation, that we report it to the ArbCom for corrective action, at their discretion. Thanks again. Cla68 (talk) 06:57, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

User page

Hallo! Someone redirect my user page to my user talk. Could you help me to fix it. Martim33 (talk) 13:12, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Done, --Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 14:50, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Very Very complex history merge! (Possible?)

List of Pixar awards and nominations was split to List of Pixar awards and nominations (feature films) and List of Pixar awards and nominations (short films). The original list is still intact but holds only some awads categories. First request: merging the histories to each list. Further more, List of WALL-E awards and nominations was split from List of Pixar awards and nominations (feature films). Second request: merging the history from List of Pixar awards and nominations (feature films) and User:Diaa abdelmoneim/WALL-E to List of WALL-E awards and nominations. Big mess.

Is this even possible? --Diaa abdelmoneim (talk) 15:02, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Minor improvements in wording and structure

I made a few changes to the wording in the first two sections, but backed them out until consensus can be established. The biggest change is the removal of the "area in between is gray" case, which I found redundant and inconsistent. It is redundant because the action for that case is covered by the "difficult to ascertain" phrase, and its boundaries are specified by the previous two cases. It is inconsistent because "gray" does not describe an outcome between "pass" and "fail". The rest of the changes involve deleting unnecessary words, combining single sentence paragraphs, and fixing minot grammar errors. Wronkiew (talk) 06:24, 19 March 2009 (UTC)

Looks like a good change to me. No problem with the gray area removal. I'm concerned about the minot grammar errors though ;) Camw (talk) 00:39, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Curses! QWERTY strikes again! Wronkiew (talk) 01:28, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Changes restored. Wronkiew (talk) 16:04, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism by User:Breeet

Could you please bar User:Breeet from further action, as all his lately edits are pure vandalsim (see User_talk:Breeet). Thank you, --DrJunge (talk) 15:07, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Semi-Protection for Derek Draper biography.

Can an Admin please put Semi-Protection on David Draper

thankyou. Kbdguy (talk) 03:28, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Semi-Protection for Derek Draper biography.

Can an Admin please put Semi-Protection on Derek Draper

thankyou. Kbdguy (talk) 03:29, 30 March 2009 (UTC)