Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss proposed policies and guidelines and changes to existing policies and guidelines.
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WP:BRD as essay

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

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As far as I can tell, there is pretty wide agreement that WP:BRD is a good thing, that things work a lot smoother when it's followed by all parties. Why, then, is it defined as only essay? When someone deviates from BRD in a contentious situation, and someone else calls him on it citing BRD, and he says, "Well, that's only an essay", what are the appropriate response and reaction to that? Do we have to go to talk just to establish consensus that BRD is to be followed? ‑‑Mandruss (talk) 15:51, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

WP:BRD is supposed to limit edit warring, but still encourage editors to be bold. As when you're bold, and it turns out to be good thing when it's discussed, it stays in the article. But if you're bold, reverted, and then you discuss it (WP:BRD), the real reason it was excluded begins to come to light and you attempt to convince the other editors that it would be beneficial to add to the article. Why it's not a policy or a guideline is because it has not passed a formal RfC to make it such. I'm not exactly sure of the process of adding a new rule or guideline, but I'm iffy on including it as a guideline or a policy. Just because of unforeseen circumstances and consequences which my mind seems to be missing atm. Tutelary (talk) 20:46, 6 October 2014 (UTC)

WP:BRD doesn't work very well for contentious content, while there is some ambiguity whether or not to discuss before reverting. If each contending party only comments on the talk page after reverting, well, what you get is a thinly veiled edit war (and WP:BRD has been used in defence of such practices). I'd deprecate WP:BRD rather than uplifting it to guideline. Also, there is a viable alternative, the flow chart pictured & explained in WP:CONSENSUS#Reaching consensus through editing. WP:BRD could be made a shortcut to that policy section.

Otherwise said, the current WP:BRD will not become more than a somewhat dubious essay, as long as its position w.r.t. consensus-seeking (or: its positive effect in the frame of Wikipedia:Dispute resolution) remains unclear. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:13, 7 October 2014 (UTC)

Also, please read WP:PGE, and remember that BRD itself tells people that they shouldn't use BRD all the time. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:40, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, WP:PGE is a good example of an environment that, in its desire to be flexible, seems designed to encourage counterproductive and self-defeating conflict. Aside from perhaps MOS matters, there isn't clear guidance on much of anything, the rules themselves are largely matters of opinion and interpretation. But I suspect I'm not the first person to have figured that out, so I'll leave it there. ‑‑Mandruss (talk) 11:26, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Here's why I believe BRD should become part of the edit warring policy.

1. It helps to stop edit warring.
2. It encourages discussion of controversial edits.
3. It leads to establishing consensus.
4. It establishes collaboration by stopping contentious solo editing.
5. It's nearly always the only known method for figuring out exactly who started an edit war, and the exact diff for when it happened. (The edit which starts an edit war is well before 3RR.)

While it's good to write "follow BRD" in an edit summary, because BRD doesn't have the weight of policy it's often better to also write "don't edit war", because that is the consequence of the first violation of BRD.

It's spelled BRD, without exception, and it's that second B in a BRB sequence which is the first shot fired in an edit war, and that second B should not have happened. I have seen many admins wisely use this sequence of events to pinpoint the most guilty party in an edit war. They don't even have to cite BRD, but can with certainty say "You started an edit war here (diff), and you failed to edit collaboratively. That's very disruptive." Determining "who started it" does matter.

Sure, there are exceptional situations where BRD isn't perfect (the same applies to all our PAG), but it usually works as intended, and that's important enough to give it policy status. That's why I'd like to see it become part of the edit warring policy. -- Brangifer (talk) 14:56, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

And here's a list of reasons why we shouldn't:

1. It discourages improvements to pages by favoring the status quo ante. The reverter's dislike of your changes is privileged over the good-faith contributions of the bold content creator. Change is bad.
2. It encourages WP:OWNership by giving the reverter an unfair advantage: you can make a bold edit (or even a timid one), but if I revert it, then all subsequent edits by you (even if unrelated) will be thrown in your face as proof that you're "not following BRD". This is very handy if I want to make sure that nobody else gets to edit "my" article.
3. It does not require the reverter to do anything except revert. As a bold editor, you can show up on the talk page, but there's nothing requiring the reverter to participate in discussions, to explain why I reverted you, or to be reasonable or collegial.
4. It encourages needless discussions on talk pages instead of collaborative editing and efficient use of edit summaries. Example: Someone added a line, an editor made a good partial reversion, I reverted it for reasons that seemed good to me at the time, and my edit was re-reverted by someone who knew better than I. By my count, that's BRRR, with zero talk-page discussion, and definitely a good, efficient outcome.
5. It leads to reverters claiming that bold editors are not allowed to make any other changes unless and until you can document "consensus" (defined as their personal agreement) on the talk page. This is very handy if I'm a POV pusher who thinks that the status quo ante is The Right Version™.
6. It prevents collaboration by encouraging the second editor to revert instead of to offer their own bold adaptation of your edit.
7. It's never necessary for figuring out who started an edit war, and often not useful. Look at the example above: I count it as BRRR, but you could also legitimately count that as BBRR, especially if you noticed the dates on those first two edits, which are more than two years apart.
8. It assumes that there are only two editors. In fact, BRD explicitly encourages bold editors to focus on the objections of a single person instead of trying to please an entire group. My example shows four.
9. Reverters don't read BRD. WP:Nobody reads the directions in general, but reverters, taken as a group, really don't seem to understand BRD. BRD is advice written for experienced editors who are trying to find a path forward when things are stuck. The steps are: make a bold edit, wait until someone objects, and then find out why that specific person objects before trying to edit again. Some reverters hear about BRD, never quite bother to read the page, and somehow conclude that BRD requires them to revert bold changes that haven't been discussed (even when they agree with the changes!).

I could go on, but I doubt that it's necessary. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:05, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Fine, if BRD is a bad thing, then an enormous part of the real-world community hasn't gotten the memo. If there is community consensus against BRD, then a big note needs to be added to the top of WP:BRD: This essay is contrary to community consensus. Please see X instead. Yes, you would think its mere-essay status would be enough, but it's clearly not. If community consensus does not exist, I can't think of anything more important than seeking one, as difficult as that may be. You can't allow alternate sets of laws to exist and expect a community to survive very long, let alone thrive. We must agree on the ground rules. ‑‑Mandruss (talk) 18:44, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

We do agree on the ground rules. The ground rules are in the policies WP:Editing policy and WP:Edit warring. BRD is merely one of many, often equally valuable, ways of complying with the actual policies. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:16, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I have to concur with Francis Schonken and WhatamIdoing on this. BRD is overrated, because it's too easily gameable to sugar-coat an editwar. It's been my experience that a large number of combative, PoV-pushing, WP:OWNish editors refuse to abide by it, when they're they one trying to make a controversial change, until essentially forced to by 4 or more editors shouting them down, while the same editwarrior will insist on BRD, and revertwar incessantly against changes they don't like, always declaring that not enough D has happened to satisfy them. BRD is too often a tool of, not against, strife.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  12:13, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

My point is that BRD is both widely used and widely contested, resulting in a ton of counterproductive conflict. WhatamIdoing asserts that we agree on the ground rules, but it's obvious enough that we as a community do not. You can say all day that those who misapply BRD are simply wrong, but that does very little to address the conflict. There must be clear community consensus on this, and that consensus must be made clear to all editors. The amount of conflict is all the evidence I need that the ground rules are insufficiently clear and inadequately communicated. I think a majority of editors will attempt to follow the ground rules as they understand them. ‑‑Mandruss (talk) 12:25, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

It can't be policy; policy is something that should always apply. Even a guideline is probably too strong. Quite simply, BRD is very good advice, but there's far too many exceptions for it to be given enforceability. Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 12:42, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

Mandruss, I'm not quite sure what problem you're thinking of. I tell you that we have two widely supported policies that lay out the ground rules for editing. You say that we don't agree on the ground rules. Exactly which rules (or non-rules) are we disagreeing about? Do you think some editors disagree with the WP:Editing policy? Do you think some editors mistakenly believe that WP:BRD is a policy? Which ground rules are unclear and/or uncommunicated? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:42, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

• The first sentence at [WP:Edit warring#What edit warring is] states, "Wikipedia encourages editors to be bold, but while a potentially controversial change may be made to find out whether it is opposed, another editor may revert it. This is known as the bold, revert, discuss (BRD) cycle."  Unscintillating (talk) 01:14, 19 October 2014 (UTC)
  • That sentence needs to be fixed. The "D" in BRD is not silent. Bold-Revert is not the same thing as Bold-Revert-Discuss. (Also, it might not be BRD at all; it might instead be Bold-Revert-Revert-Revert-Revert-Block, or Bold-Revert-Give up, or Bold-Revert-Timid, or several other patterns.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:00, 21 October 2014 (UTC)
    • For the most part, WP:BRD is being misused by the edit warriors themselves - basically, tell the other person to WP:BRD while I revert this ten more times. It also contradicts some of our other policies, by favouring the status quo instead of favouring verifiable and reliably sourced information presented in a neutral manner. One could re-insert factually wrong info and cite WP:BRD. I'm also seeing that those who hide behind WP:BRD often never start the discussion as they have no intention to discuss anything, beyond jumping onto a page and claiming to WP:OWN it. Sometimes, I´m even seeing WP:BRR in a format where someone boldly adds info, the next editor reverts it and then (as the second 'r') removes a huge chunk of the existing article, either because they don't like the article's topic or they have an axe to grind. We already have policies on consensus. They accomplish nothing as every edit warrior assumes their version is "consensus" and the other editor's version is "vandalism", COI, "sockpuppetry", "disrupting Wikipedia to make a WP:POINT" and whatever else comes to mind. Add another policy to the mix and it becomes just another stick with which to browbeat editors during edit wars, while doing nothing to improve collaboration. It's a road paved with good intentions, but I fail to see what problem will actually be solved by making this a policy or guideline. K7L (talk) 18:24, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
      • I wouldn't worry, there's very little danger of that happening. I just look at rampant counterproductive conflict and instinctively want to eliminate it. Clearly, placing all the blame on the people involved—saying, "Well, there wouldn't be a problem if only x would stop doing y"—is not working and is never going to work; years of experience tell us that. My conclusion is that something needs to change in policy, in the system. There's nothing more important than that, but I see nothing being done aside from endless circular discussions that go nowhere. Like this one, for example. ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 18:39, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
• Support elevating WP:BRD to a higher level of authority. The fact is that it is already de facto policy, because a bold move made in good faith by one editor and reverted in good faith by another should never be reinstated without some discussion to iron out the dispute. If one editor makes a bold edit, another reverts, and the issue is then abandoned, this at least suggests that the editor abandoning the issue is either not paying attention to the consequences of their bold edits, or is not willing or able to defend the propriety of the bold edit. bd2412 T 23:41, 25 October 2014 (UTC)
  • If you really believe that "never", then I will conclude that you have not looked at the diffs I gave as an example in #4. (Also: I don't suppose that you've ever seen any good-faith BLP violations? "Never" means that you can't boldly correct a BLP violation, get it reverted by a POV pusher or a careless editor, and then re-remove the BLP violation, unless you have the time and ability to start a discussion. I suggest that you consider a word other than "never".) WhatamIdoing (talk) 21:40, 28 October 2014 (UTC)
    • Guidelines can be deviated from with good cause. Even policies can be deviated from with good cause. You could even explicitly state in BLP that it trumps BRD. There may be good arguments against guideline status for BRD, but the need for flexibility is not one of them. ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 21:51, 28 October 2014 (UTC)
• Promote the page. It deserves it. Brangifer has explained very well. --Tito☸Dutta 16:19, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

• Strong Keep it as an essay. I agree with WhatamIdoing. It is an essay and never useable as a policy. Compare WP:DRNC and its recent enlargement for some of the issues. BRD is a sort of bad policy, as it leads to disruptive editing behavior instead of using appropriate gradual steps. Serten (talk) 02:57, 31 October 2014 (UTC)

• Per my comments above, and some additional negative experience since then (WP:BRD is all but helping in the prevention of edit-warring): make Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle a #redirect to Wikipedia:Consensus#Reaching consensus through editing — maybe explain there this replaces the former WP:BRD. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:58, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

• Oppose elevating this essay to the level of policy. If there are policy changes that need to be made they should be made at actual policy pages. Per Francis Schonken, I would support making BRD a redirect to WP:CONSENSUS, and any pertinent bits from this essay might be added there, assuming there is consensus to do so. Rationalobserver (talk) 16:48, 9 November 2014 (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.

RFC/U

There is a Request for Arbitration currently open in which one of the issues is the closing of a Request for Comments on User Conduct that had not been properly certified within 48 hours. The question is being discussed at RFAR as to whether RFC/U is a broken process, but RFAR isn't really the proper forum for discussing whether RFC/U is a broken process. I think that RFC/U is a broken process, and has probably been broken for a very long time. I don't know the origin of RFC/U, but it may have originally been used to advise User:Jimbo Wales as to whether to use his reserved power to ban a user. In 2005 through 2007, when the banning of users was done by the ArbCom (rather than the noticeboards), sometimes the ArbCom looked at an RFC/U in deciding whether to ban a user, and sometimes they didn't. RFC/U is no longer a preliminary step to a community ban of a user at the noticeboards. The RFC/U asks what change is expected, and the certifiers are normally supposed to say that they want the editor to be more flexible or more collaborative; but the RFC/U process, which is adversarial, is not by its nature likely to succeed in making the user more collaborative. Does anyone else agree that RFC/U is not a useful process? Should it be retired from use, or is there a way to "fix" or reform it? RFC/U certainly bears little or no relationship to article content Request for Comments, which is an extremely useful process as a way of obtaining consensus. If RFC/U isn't broken, maybe it should be renamed so that it doesn't resemble a useful consensus process. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Comments? Robert McClenon (talk) 16:57, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Though I doubt it will happen, I would like to see ArbCom once again handle all bans, as the idea that just one admin may indeff someone without requiring discussion with anybody else is damaging to the project, and it reinforces the inequality between admins and non-admins. Rationalobserver (talk) 17:27, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Right, because when someone shows up and starts pasting "fuck fuck fuck fuck" rapid fire into 20 articles, admins shouldn't have the authority to act on that without seeking community discussion... --Jayron32 17:32, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Did you really think I was talking about obvious vandals? Rationalobserver (talk) 17:42, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

No one here is a mind reader. You said admins "indeff<ing> someone without requiring discussion...is damaging to the project" If you didn't mean that, you shouldn't say that. If you meant something else, you should have said something else. --Jayron32 02:56, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Blocks ≠ bans. KonveyorBelt 17:58, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

As User:Konveyor Belt says, there is a distinction between blocks and bans. User:Rationalobserver: Are you asking that WP:ANI should no longer be able to impose community bans? Bans are imposed either by the ArbCom or by the "community" at the noticeboards. A block, including an indefinite block, can be lifted by any uninvolved administrator. (An indefinite block that no other administrator is willing to lift is considered a de facto ban.) Robert McClenon (talk) 18:58, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

The above comments are not really about RFC/U but about blocking and banning. RFC/U was formerly a preliminary step to banning. I don't think it serves a useful purpose any more, but is just a way for combative editors to engage in combat. That is my opinion. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:58, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

My comments relate because if admins issued blocks and ArbCom issued bans there would be no need for RfC/Us, which as you say are next to useless and not much more than a venue whereby editors can argue procedure over substance. Rationalobserver (talk) 20:12, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

Administrators do issue blocks. ArbCom and the noticeboards issue bans. Are you saying that you want community bans from the noticeboards ended, and the banning power limited only to ArbCom? I still don't see a connection between RFC/U and how bans are issued. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:22, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

But an indef block is a de facto ban, and admins may currently indef users without any discussion with others. I think admins should only be able to issue blocks of up to 30 days, and anything longer should require an ArbCom ban process, which would essentially supplant the current RfC/U. Rationalobserver (talk) 22:22, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

No. An indefinite block is not a de facto ban. An indefinite block that no other admin will reverse is a de facto ban. Sometimes another admin will reverse the block. If you are saying that trolls and vandals should only remain blocked for 30 days and should then be sent to ArbCom, I disagree. It would create too much work for an ArbCom that is already too slow. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:52, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

I will don't see what the blocking and banning process has to do with RFC/U. Blocking by one admin, indef blocking by one admin, community bans at the noticeboards, and ArbCom bans very seldom rely on RFC/U. If you see a connection between RFC/U and the blocking and banning process, please explain what it is. I don't see the connection. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:52, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

You said that ArbCom used to use RfC/U during ban discussions, but since admins don't need it for blocking, ArbCom should do the banning without the need for an RfC/U, as it's a redundant step in a process. Rationalobserver (talk) 23:19, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

I still don't see the connection. The original purpose of the RFC/U was as part of a request to User:Jimbo Wales to ban a user. When Jimbo Wales created the ArbCom to handle bans, the RFC/U became optional. As you said, it is a redundant step in the process. I don't see what any changes to the blocking policy have to do with RFC/U. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:36, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

It has to do with RfC/U because ArbCom will sometimes reject cases on the basis that an RfC/U hasn't been completed (see Dangerous Panda). If RfC/U is really optional, it ought not function as a required step to bringing someone to ArbCom. If we eliminate RfC/U, ArbCom won't be able to reject cases based on a lack of an RfC/U. Rationalobserver (talk) 23:54, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

The ArbCom revoked the admin privileges of two admins early this year, without an RFC/U. The Dangerous Panda case isn't being declined because there isn't an RFC/U. If it is declined, it will be declined for other reasons. I agree that RFC/U should be eliminated as a step toward arbitration. I still don't see what any changes to the blocking or banning policy have to do with RFC/U. Robert McClenon (talk) 15:01, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

ArbCom dismissed the previous case against Dangerous Panda on the basis that an RfC/U had not yet been undertaken. Blocking and banning are related to RfC/U in that all are aspects of the same behavior management system. Rationalobserver (talk) 16:06, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

Other Opinions

Does anyone else have an opinion about RFC/U? Robert McClenon (talk) 23:36, 4 November 2014 (UTC)

• It doesn't work because it is both onerous to actually run one, and toothless in solving problems. That is, the requirements necessary to start, and the hoops to jump through, to file, certify, run, and close one scares people away, and at the end of all that, it doesn't actually stop genuine pains in the ass from continuing to be pains in the ass. We should have a formal process whereby the community has the authority to tell admins "this person needs to stop or GTFO", but RFCU doesn't work for that purpose because of the reasons I just outlined. It has largely been supplanted by discussions at AN or ANI, many of which go something like "If you want to do something, start an RFCU", which no one does because it doesn't solve the problem, and we end up with endless ANI cycles. --Jayron32 03:01, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

That is consistent with what I had said. Robert McClenon (talk) 14:50, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

FWIW, I started a RFC/U earlier this year: Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Scholarlyarticles. The editor did not participate but their disruption was cut way down. Now when they pop up, I just point to the RFC/U and they go away again. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 15:36, 5 November 2014 (UTC)

• I had on several occasions users with an obvious pattern of misconduct. If they edit for a long time, I used to take them to ANI. ANI generally proves to be inefficient. One was an obvious sock but the sockmaster edited so long ago that it could nbot be technically confirmed. It cost me a lot of efforts to get the sock blocked, and only because some users happened to know the sockmaster very well and saw the ANI. Another one was causing disruption by removing parts of the text he did not like as unsourced (sometimes the whole articles). I had to take him to ANI four times, and he was finally blocked after he started to require sources to figure captions and to the official documents. The third one, who is generally incivil, I gave up. I was told that the only means to deal with him is RFC/U (for which I have no time for now, and he seems to have retired from the topics we could cross). I know that RFC/U is very time-consuming and very inefficient - but if we retire it, what should we do with such editors? ANI and AN usually refuse to handle them. Arbcom will not be able to digest it if all these editors are sent there, and it is time-consuming as well.--Ymblanter (talk) 08:21, 6 November 2014 (UTC)

• RFC/U, just like AN/I, is a place where POV pushers write absolute bullshit about someone who has got in the way of their POV pushing, with no fear of negative consequences for the lies being written. Until BLP standards are applied to anything that's written about another editor on Wikipedia, both places are disaster areas for truth and justice, and the appearance of Wikipedia as a place for honest, informed, mature discussion. HiLo48 (talk) 22:23, 9 November 2014 (UTC)
• I think it's tragic irony that proceedings held to resolve conflicts are so effective at drawing more Wikipedians in to them. -wʃʃʍ- 09:16, 12 November 2014 (UTC)
• See also Wikipedia:Village_pump_(proposals)#Do_Away_with_RFC.2FU NE Ent 12:22, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Obstructive article names

I do not understand why English Wikipedia has articles with names like Þorfinnr "Karlsefni" Þórðarson. Could someone please explain how that coincides with our Manual of Style here and sensible guidlines such as thisand this and this? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 19:09, 8 November 2014 (UTC)

If these forms are frequently used in English sources, then it actually makes sense - we use redirects tomake it easier to find the pages without using special characters (in this case, for example, we have THorfinnr "Karlsefni" THordarson and Thorfinnr "Karlsefni" Thordarson. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 12:21, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

Why would incomprehensible non-English lettering be frequently used in English sources? What sources? Seems to contradict WP:Common sense. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 17:52, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

English sources frequently use non-English lettering because they are being consistent with the sources that they have copied from, and, for those who are familiar with the original script, they are more precise. In the case of the Viking mentioned above, different scholars may use different rules for transliterating runes into the Latin alphabet, but a particular runic spelling is unambiguous. In any case, the runic spelling should be used either as the primary title or as a redirect, so that someone who knows the runes can find the Viking without having to worry about transliteration. This also applies to Cyrillic and Arabic names and to Asian scripts. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:34, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

By the way, is "TH" used as well as "Th" to represent a capital Thorn? I have never seen that representation of a capital Theta. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:34, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

In looking further at the article, I agree that it is an incorrect title. The title should be in "English", that is, in the Latin alphabet. Any runic form of his name should be a redirect. I suggest that you discuss what the primary title should be on the article talk page. Robert McClenon (talk) 18:39, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

I've taken the issue to the article talk page to ask whether the primary title can be the "English", that is, Latin alphabet, title, rather than the runic version of the name. (The runic spelling of his name was, for a little while, the correct "American" spelling, since he explored parts of what is now the Eastern United States.) Robert McClenon (talk) 20:00, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

Like all issues regarding diacritics and other non-English Latin letters, this has been discussed to death before, so at least let's avoid some of the most glaring red herrings here: of course this is not a "runic form", and of course it already is in the "Latin alphabet" (though not in the English alphabet). The most recent debate about this particular issue can be found at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (use English)#RfC: Use of characters from the Icelandic alphabet; it was closed as "no consensus" in July 2014. In theory, the status of Icelandic "þ" is no different from that of German "ß", which we routinely do tolerate in our articles titles (see Category:Streets in Germany, which pretty consistently has forms in "-straße".) The problem is that for Latin-script names from non-English languages, we normally take over the original orthography from that language (in the absence of a firmly established conventional anglicisation), and this routinely includes diacritics and extra letters that don't occur in English; but unfortunately there's a large cline between things that are relatively common and relatively well-known to English speakers (such as "é" or "ç" in French, "ñ" in Spanish or "ä" in German), to things that may be a lot less familiar (such as Icelandic "þ"), to languages where the sheer number of unfamiliar forms can make a native spelling look positively bizarre to English speakers (such as Vietnamese). We have never been able to form a consensus about a commonly acceptable, rationally justified cut-off point along this cline, between what we tolerate and what we avoid, or indeed about whether there should be such a cut-off point in the first place, with both the exreme positions (reduce all non-English spellings to the native English letter repertoire, or leave all non-English spellings faithful to the original) being upheld by some editors. This is a perennial area of strife, and no single rational solution in sight. Fut.Perf. ☼ 20:03, 9 November 2014 (UTC)

Fut.Perf. makes the salient point here that bears repeating: We frequently recognize and use diacritics or additional letters in names all the time; the implication that the English language never uses anything except the unadorned 26 letters we all learned in kindergarten and nothing else is demonstrably false. We can find examples all over the place, including Pierre Garçon who uses the cedilla on his own uniform [1]. We have Coös County, New Hampshire which uses a diaresis in its official website. Yes, sometimes historical convention favors an alternate English spelling for foreign words (for example Cologne for Köln) but in the absence of established convention, we should default to the predominant spelling, using whatever letters are used most commonly. For people with very few English sources, this means we will sometimes need to use letters that aren't in the English-26, but so be it. The problem is not that sometimes we do, and sometimes we don't, the problem is that we demand that we MUST follow one convention or another all the time. That's the harmful position, to unbudgingly demand that we must ALWAYS use ONLY the native spelling or must ALWAYS use ONLY the standard 26 English letters. Sometimes we need to use the native spelling, and sometimes we need to change it to English letters. Lest we become foolish hobgoblins with little minds, we should embrace the inconsistency, not fight against it... --Jayron32 02:37, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Well said, Jayron. When it comes to diacritics (and other "non-standard" symbols), the solution is quite simple... do what the majority of reliable English language sources that discuss the subject in some depth to (Per WP:COMMONNAME). Yes, that will mean that some names will be presented with a diacritic and other (similar) names won't. That's OK. Blueboar (talk) 14:29, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

This article is at the wrong title. You only need to know three facts to figure this out:

• Thorn (letter) says "The letter originated from the rune ᚦ in the Elder Fuþark and was called thorn in the Anglo-Saxon and thorn or thurs (a category of beings in Germanic Paganism) in the Scandinavian rune poems."
• The runic alphabet is not the Latin alphabet. (There are some languages that use both, but these are independent sources of letters, with nothing in either original alphabet deriving originally from the other.)
• The article titles policy says "Names not originally in a Latin alphabet, such as Greek, Chinese, or Russian names, must be transliterated" (emphasis in the original).

"Latin alphabet" easily encompasses all diacritics and several letters unfamiliar to English speakers (including ß, which is just a ligature of long s and z), but it does not encompass Thorn, or any other letter whose direct origin is the runic alphabet (or Greek, or many other systems), even if those Runic (or Greek, etc.) letters are being added to an otherwise Latin-based alphabet. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:32, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Icelandic orthography and List of Latin-script letters disagrees with you on that one. Whether it is the dutch IJ, the Icelandic thorn, the French cedilla, or the German eszett makes no difference. There are other languages that use additional letters beyond the 26 you learned in Kindergarten, and those letters do get used in English language sources. Insofar as they are used in English Language sources, we should use them in Wikipedia article titles as well. If they aren't used in English language sources then that's fine, and we don't have to use them here either, but to imply that we ignore characters used by English language sources if those characters also exist in other alphabets doesn't make any sense. Why does eszett get treated differently than thorn, merely because thorn just happens to exist in both runic and latin alphabets? --Jayron32 12:57, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Jayron, none of the claims about Thorn's alleged status as a Latin alphabet are sourced in those two pages. I find sources that say things like this:

• However, four sounds in Old English did not occur in Latin as written in the seventh century, so new letters had to be found to convey them: ...[th sounds] were both written using the single Runic letter P, or 'thorn'.[2]
• two runic letters borrowed from the futhorc: 1) thorn[3]
• Sounds in Old English for which the Roman alphabet had no letters were represented by letters drawn from various sources: the letter þ (capital Þ), known as 'thorn', was borrowed from the runic alphabet to denote the dental fricative phoneme /y/ (both the voiced and voiceless allophones)[4]

which suggest that those pages are at least incompletely describing the subject. What I don't find (perhaps you will have better luck?) is any source saying that if you take a letter out of another, established alphabet (whether that alphabet be Greek, runic, Japanese, or anything else) and stick it into an otherwise Latin alphabet (with no significant modification), that said letter suddenly quits being what it has always been, and starts being Latin instead. It appears, instead, that it's possible for Icelandic to be a Latin alphabet overall without this particular letter being Latin. WhatamIdoing (talk) 07:17, 14 November 2014 (UTC)

The argument that any letter can't be considered part of the "Latin alphabet" if it was borrowed from some other script is rather nonsensical anyway – by this criterion even "Y" and "Z" would have to count as "non-Latin" (because they too were (re-)borrowed into the Latin alphabet long after its formation). What matters is not provenance, but function: anything that functions as a letter in a Latin-script orthography is, by definition, a letter of the Latin script, just as any word that is regularly used in English is, by definition, an English word, no matter where it historically comes from. Of course, that's not to say that we'd be obliged to adopt all of them here; as I said above, I'm quite opposed to dogmatism on either side here. Fut.Perf. ☼ 23:38, 12 November 2014 (UTC)

Time to stop blocking .onion links

I don't know where's the right place to unlock this, so I'm posting it here.

My question is: Why every edit containing onion link is refused by MediaWiki? Since such giants like Facebook#Privacy offer their services via Tor. I was unable to insert their official URL – https ://facebookcorewwwi.onion

There's no logical reason to block top-level domains! --Rezonansowy (talk | contribs) 15:09, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

The .onion psuedo top-level domain has been frequently used by black market sites like Silk Road to conceal their activities, and most sites that exist only in the .onion domain are not suitable for links from Wikipedia. In addition, there is also a general policy discouraging links that require browser add-ons / special software in order to work properly, as .onion links do. Given this, .onion links were added to the spam blacklist. Proposals to remove items from that list are generally handled at Mediawiki talk:Spam-blacklist. If there is good argument to exempt a specific link (e.g. Facebook's), one can alternatively propose exemptions to the blacklist at Mediawiki talk:Spam-whitelist. Dragons flight (talk) 15:43, 13 November 2014 (UTC)

@Dragons flight: They refused all requests for official service URL's of Facebook, WikiLeaks and DuckDuckGo. I don't understand why. --Rezonansowy (talk | contribs) 22:47, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

There is a good reason in the comment you are replying to—why provide a link that would confuse almost all readers? Why would adding a couple more links help the encyclopedia? If Facebook thinks the links are important they will feature them on the standard web page that we link to. Johnuniq (talk) 23:17, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

@Rezonansowy: If you can get consensus on the talk page for it, for each of them, I'm sure it would be accepted. Cenarium (talk) 03:45, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

Reference Desk guidelines

Guidelines as to the proper use of the Reference Desk pages clearly state that (1) questions should not be asked requiring opinion or debate, and (2) responders should avoid responding with opinion or debate. Relevant guideline sections are here and here.

A dispute has arisen around these guidelines, specifically whether they are important enough to supersede the whims of the majority present. I.e., under what circumstances is it acceptable to deviate from the guidelines?

The thread that brought up this up is here, but the question obviously applies to any thread on any RD page. I hatted the opinion part of the thread (about 95% of it) but the hat was removed and the opinion discussion continues. Any feelings on this? ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 10:57, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Hatting should really only take place if the conversation is going bad in some way, such as off topic, criticizing people, stupid behaviour. But if multiple people are joining in something that is not a problem, you should not delete or hat it, as it is clear that they want to cover that topic. You can be pretty sure that hatting will upset people. Just respond calmly to say that opinions should not be called for. A new consensus should override previously determined consensus. A WP:Guideline is a guideline and not a WP:Policy. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 11:29, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

This RD thread was hatted just the other day, citing the same guideline. It was not off topic, criticizing people, or stupid behaviour. Multiple people were joining in it; whether it was a "problem" was the crux of the question. And yet that hat remains. I understand that the subject hat upset people at least one person, and that's regrettable. But is that the sole criterion here? Is the most important thing to avoid upsetting people? I commented calmly, I was accused of "preaching" and told to take it to talk, and the opinion discussion continued. Only then did I add the hat.

My understanding of the word "guideline" is that it should be followed unless there is good reason to deviate, and I don't consider "because we feel like it" a good reason.

Let's contrast the subject thread to this one. It's a long one, and it's not finished yet. People are stating opinions, or, more accurately, guesses. But the question is one of fact; there is one objectively true answer, we simply have yet to find it. Not so in the subject thread.

This is not about rigid enforcement of rules, and I'm not one to go around looking for excuses to play Wikipedia cop. It is about the perceived importance of limiting RD pages to their designed and stated purpose—answering questions of fact. There are other venues designed for questions of opinion or debate. ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 12:02, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

The guideline is against giving personal opinions, not opinions in general, and it is not a total ban. What it says about answering is "Personal opinions in answers should be limited to what is absolutely necessary, and avoided entirely when it gets in the way of factual answers. In particular, when a question asks about a controversial topic, we should attempt to provide purely factual answers. This helps prevent the thread from becoming a debate". Pointing to an article about a subject or writings by outside sources on a subject is well with the guideline. If a question seems like a request for a personal opinion try first of all rephrasing it as a request for some source upon the subject unless it seems clearly aimed at just giving the OP's opinion or starting a debate on the reference desk.

For example if an OP asks 'Do you think people would be more spiritual if they had wings and could fly?" One could answer "I can't give an informed opinion on that but some people have written on that, for instance Olaf Stapledon's Last and First Men has a chapter on such beings with a discussion of their way of thinking being influenced by flight and there are many more at List of avian humanoids. Dmcq (talk) 14:13, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

• The example on SOPA you mention was a controversial discussion which was getting a bit personal at moments and may have generated significant drama. The intent of this guideline in this regard is to avoid drama. Here, it's just a polite disagreement on the cornelian dilemma of turning up late for formal dinner. No big deal. Cenarium (talk) 14:14, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Case in point. ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 12:30, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

A question rdging political designations in blp infoboxes (or, "Is Orson Scott Card a genuine Democrat?"...)

This query turns on the use of the political party field in the infobox at blp's for individuals notable as political commentators. If that person is independent, would it be misleading to give his political affiliation, eg, a libertarian-leading conservative who voted for Obama as nonetheless affiliated as a Republican or a Lieberman-supporting commentator who ended up supporting Bush, McCain and Romney but who nevertheless prides himself as a member of the Democratic party? See the RfC @ Talk:Orson_Scott_Card#RFC:_Should_we_include_his_political_party_in_the_infobox.3F.--Hodgdon's secret garden (talk) 18:31, 15 November 2014 (UTC)

Should the +reviewer bit be removed from inactive reviewers?

There are currently 8011 reviewers, most of which have not made any reviews or edits to pages under pending changes protection in the last month or so. I'd like to suggest that reviewers who have not made any reviews for a month can have their reviewer bit removed by any sysop. There are a number of reasons for this, including the fact the flag is a common victim of hat collecting; Introducing a timeout, like we have for sysop, should hopefully reduce this. Also, this should better indicate who is actually responding to the requests, and if level 2 is ever rolled out, it shows who is actively using the user right, so who the people to approach are.
--Mdann52talk to me! 16:35, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
Happy editing, L235-Talk Ping when replying 16:40, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

TL;DR: proposal changed to 6 months of inactivity needed, and I'd like people to reconsider oppose opinions. Wall of text: I'd like to change the proposal a bit. I'd like the proposal to be removal if there are no reviews in 6 months. Also, re. no hatshopping seen: then you've never seen WP:PERM/PCR when it's busy- people request it, use it for a couple of days, then never use it again. It's not useful at all for reviewers that don't actually review anything. Also, I'm quite frustrated by what I feel is bandwagoning- people see an almost-empty support section and a quite lengthy oppose section, and have a bias towards opposing and unintentionally don't consider the merits of the proposal. It irks me that if Mdann and I had put down supports "as co-author" the proposal would be in a different direction right now. That was a bit harsh, sorry, but it gets the point across. --L235-Talk Ping when replying 05:09, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Discussion

When reviewer first became available, it was handed out without request to around 5000 users (mostly by Courcelles [5]), this is where most of the "never reviewed reviewers" came from. –xeno^talk 17:37, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

That's correct. Why should we keep these reviewers that aren't interested? --L235-Talk Ping when replying 17:59, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @Xeno: I'm not so sure. I've reviewed the logs for a number of accounts with reviewer permission (both recently granted and who have had it for a while), and most of these have never used it (or rarely have used it). User rights should only be granted if they are going to be used, not just so people have something in case it is useful one day. --Mdann52talk to me! 18:02, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Just more of an observation than anything. If the proposal carries, admins should probably stop handing it out without request. –xeno^talk 18:06, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

@Biblioworm: I agree on many points. Reviewer doesn't give you any possibility for abuse, that's true. One consideration here is hatshopping. This proposal would a) reduce the number of hatshoppers with the reviewer permission, and b) increase the rate of reviews as the hatshoppers that are interested in keeping the flag review pending changes. --L235-Talk Ping when replying 17:59, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

• I would be willing to support the removal of the flag for inactivity, however, 1 month is way too short of a time period. — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(e • t • c)} 21:26, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
  • I'm afraid six months is still too short. Let me make it clear what I would support. I would support removal of the bit from editors who were put in the group more than three months ago without requesting it and have never used it and or users who haven't used it in over a year. The main reason I would support it is to make {{NUMBERINGROUP:Reviewer}} more accurate as to the number of actual reviewers. — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(e • t • c)} 17:09, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
• Reviewers rights are granted liberally to trusted users regardless of whether they may use it or not because we didn't want this to be a closed system, and also because of PC2, for which there's no general consensus but which is used on occasion. There's no hatshopper issue, most of those users didn't even request it. Cenarium (talk) 22:01, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Support

1. Per the nom. I'd recommend a more liberal timespan like six months. Chris Troutman (talk) 00:46, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
2. Sorta I support removal after 1 year of complete inactivity; it is very easy to request back if someone who has left the project returns in the future. — xaosflux ^Talk 05:19, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
3. Sorta. I would say that if someone has been inactive edit-wise for over a year or more then it would probably be a good idea to remove permissions. Why? Because notability guidelines change and we can't automatically guarantee that the absentee reviewer would be aware of how much rules have changed- especially if they were from some of the "wild and wooly" times of Wikipedia. Even if the guidelines haven't had some sort of dramatic change, being gone for a year or more could have a negative impact on how well they remember those notability guidelines or some of the other pertinent guidelines of Wikipedia (BLP, etc). It's not like it's requesting adminship, so it's not that hard to get back and this way we'd ensure that they refreshed themselves on the basic guidelines of Wikipedia. Now if they are active but haven't used their reviewer status, then that's sorta debatable. I suppose that what we could do is just ask them after a few years if they want to continue using it- and more importantly, ask them why they haven't used it. I think that one of the biggest issues here is to try to find out why people aren't using their reviewer permissions and what we can do to improve the chances of them using it. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:27, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

   I think one of the reasons is that there just aren't that many opportunities to use it. I don't head over to Special:PendingChanges that much at all (just review now and again when they appear on my watchlist), but right now there's only four articles in the list. At least there's no backlog! Putting more pages under pending changes seems to be a good idea, we can obviously cope with it. Dylanfromthenorth (talk) 05:13, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

   Right now, pending changes is only approved for use in fairly limited circumstances - vandalism/disruption from anon/new users that is frequent enough to be considered "persistent", but not so frequent that semi-protection would be a better option. Mr.Z-man 14:05, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

4. Sort of weakly support, exactly like Xaosflux says. All advanced flags should presumably follow the same rules as the admin bit: If you are 100% inactive (not just inactive on pages requiring that particular flag) for at least one year, then you should probably (I guess) lose the reviewer flag. I don't think that this is hugely important, however. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:13, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
5. Support. Use it or (after 6 months of not) loose it. Tiptoethrutheminefield (talk) 15:30, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Oppose

1. Oppose. The admin bit is only removed after a year of inactivity because it can be very dangerous if it falls into the wrong hands. Sure, the reviewer permission gives you the ability to approve edits and edit PC protected pages without being reviewed, but it is not a dangerous tool. Besides, suppose a reviewer goes on an extended vacation or is busy doing other things on WP. Doing this would just make things unnecessarily complicated. --Biblioworm 17:27, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
2. Oppose - (IMO) No real need to remove, unless "extra drama" is needed. Mlpearc (open channel) 17:33, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
3. Oppose. Accepting reviewer permission does not imply the editor will start watching pages that are not already on his/her watchlist. If there are few or no pages on the reviewer's watchlist with pending changes activated, naturally the reviewer will not have much occasion to use the permission. Jc3s5h (talk) 18:30, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
4. Oppose per Jc3s5h. This seems to be a solution in search of a problem. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 18:57, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
5. Oppose The OP states "There are a number of reasons for this,..." (justifications for the proposal). They have provided a single, IMO rather weak reason. If there are further reasons the OP might like to share them in detail. Otherwise it has no merit. Leaky Caldron 19:13, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
6. Oppose. Even the most active of editors sometimes go inactive for months, either for RL commitments or wikibreaks. Forcing them to reapply when they return adds an extra layer of bureaucracy and creates unnecessary work for the admin corps. Altamel (talk) 20:09, 16 November 2014 (UTC)
7. Oppose. Why would we want to remove it? To make it harder for volunteers to do volunteer work? I can't fathom why this would be a good idea. Kaldari (talk) 00:46, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
8. Oppose. Not everybody edits in every single month, let alone does reviews, and implementing this will greatly reduce the number of reviewers to pass pending changes requests, thereby causing more backlogs. Reviewer permission does not imply that the user will be reviewing pages 24/7. Finally, one can't go rogue with the reviewer permission like they can with admin permission; a wrong review can quickly be undone by any autoconfirmed user, while if a block is mistakenly placed, another admin has to come along and unblock. Epicgenius (talk) 00:48, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

   Still oppose with six months. I'd like to see at least a year of total inactivity (not reviewing inactivity; I mean, zero edits in a year) to remove this right. Epicgenius (talk) 16:49, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

9. Oppose. I've no idea what we'd gain by removing it from people. If there was a finite number we were able to give out, then maybe, but there isn't a finite number of reviewer permissions. I can well imagine that editors/reviewers like to focus on one type of edit for a good while, then another type etc etc, and those phases could last for any amount of time. I know I do; sometimes I'll be focussing on referencing articles, sometimes on NPP, sometime in AfD, or whatever. Dylanfromthenorth (talk) 01:08, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
10. Oppose What others have said above is very true. Additionally, compared to recent changes and new pages, the amount of work needed for PC reviewing is magnitudes lower, and reviewers sometimes may not have any pending change to review. And 1 month is way too short, IMO. Zhaofeng Li [talk... contribs...] 04:36, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

    Thanks for changing the proposal. 6 months is indeed better. But anyway, L235, you really should consider our reason given for the opposes before blaming bandwagon. Zhaofeng Li [talk... contribs...] 10:12, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

11. Oppose This is a solution in search of a problem. If wikipedia had a problem with mass vandalism caused by sleeper PC-approved users, then sure, but there's no utility to be gained by putting an expiry on the tool as a rule. Deadbeef 07:20, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
12. Oppose Sometimes a whole month goes by without anything to review. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:14, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
13. Oppose - Hat collecting is an "issue", but I wouldn't say it rises to the level of a "problem" that warrants the creation of a new process and more work for admins. Also note that the inactivity requirement for sysop doesn't require actually using the tools, just making an edit every 12 months. If we're going to do this (and I don't think we should), using a stricter standard than for sysop doesn't make any sense. Mr.Z-man 15:45, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
14. Oppose per Mr.Z-man. Ncmvocalist (talk) 15:53, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
15. Oppose - Not everyone edits in a month and if everyone needs to take breaks and whatnot It's going to be a pain in the arse!, All in all IMHO this'll create more crap instead of less. –Davey2010 • (talk) 16:42, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
16. OpposeLittle use in removing this bit from people even after long inactivity. Admin bits can be abused or accounts can get compromised and can really damage the wiki. A reviewer bit getting compromised? I'd be more concerned about vandals finding out about the backlinks feature of Twinkle, tbh rather than this. Oppose. Tutelary (talk) 23:14, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
17. I hope the fact that I'm a long-term reviewer doesn't weigh heavily against me here, considering the fact that I haven't done very many reviews (and none in at least a year). I just don't see the point of revoking access to this user right. It's not really the type of tool that's easily abused; you click a button and approve an edit. It also allows you to contribute to PC-protected pages without having to have your every contribution scrutinized beforehand. "Hat collecting" is a ridiculous reason to strip people of advanced permissions; if you are unable to prove that they can't be trusted with them, then why bother complaining? To offset accusations of "bandwagoning", I didn't even read past the first paragraph before I knew that I'd be against this proposal. My opinion here would remain the same if I were the last man on Earth Wikipedia holding it. Kurtis ^(talk) 17:21, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
18. OpposeThis is just more trouble than its worth. Unlike with admins, there is no real benefit to removing reviewer rights from everyone who is inactive. Doing so will just waste our admins' time and prevent them from doing more important work. Additionally, what about infrequent reviewers or users who go on long hiatuses? I imagine many people with the reviewer right fall into these category, and it seems silly to remove rights from people who are positively, if infrequently, contributing. Spirit of Eagle (talk) 03:44, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
19. Oppose- there does not appear to be a problem in need of solving here. So what if inactive users have the reviewer bit? Reyk _YO! 07:36, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
20. Oppose - Pointless bureaucracy, trying to solve a problem that is nonexistent is always a bad idea anyway. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 17:33, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
21. Oppose As has been noted by many others, no case has been presented that makes it clear that these users having an unused low-level userright causes harm. Should we remove autoconfirmed status from anyone who has not edited a semi-protected page in six months? Should we remove rollback from users who don't use it? Of course not, because it doesn't accomplish anything. Neither would this. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:57, 18 November 2014 (UTC)
22. Oppose - a solution looking for a problem. --Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 07:33, 19 November 2014 (UTC)
23. Oppose - There are only about a dozen pages at Special:PendingChanges awaiting review, and you are going to disparage some six thousand reviewers as "hat collectors" because there aren't enough pages to go around for all of them to review? Maybe the problem is that the process for configuring pending changes settings doesn't configure enough pages? There's about one page on my watchlist that's so configured, and half the time I can just revert it, which doesn't require the hat, which is why I haven't bothered to ask for it. Wbm1058 (talk) 16:38, 19 November 2014 (UTC)
24. Oppose - pointless work, and no real advantage. HÆDO_reply 03:33, 21 November 2014 (UTC)
25. Oppose I fail to recognize the problem which this proposal would solve. I think the asserted problem is lack of uniformity in the process of maintaining user rights, but this is not recognized problem and I see no argument in this proposal which describes it as troublesome in this case. Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:10, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Other comments

• If most of the reviewers don't want to review... that says something about how the community views the entire review process. Is (perhaps) the idea a well intended, but failed experiment? Blueboar (talk) 19:20, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Your first sentence appears to be a non-sequitur. Review is in my experience used for what is on your watch list, and several articles may have multiple reviewers watching but its not a race. Alanscottwalker (talk) 20:17, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

It's more like reviewers don't have much to review, which is a good thing. The backlog is well under control, so on that count this experiment, as you say, is a success. Cenarium (talk) 21:41, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

I'd like to see pending changes used more often but the community only seems willing to apply PC1 (or PC2) for editor behavior issues rather than preventative content protection. Chris Troutman (talk) 00:54, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

• Not in my case; my recent requests for protection have been for PC, for articles that aren't really getting semi-protection levels of vandalism, but where the vandalism isn't being caught very quickly, and it is happening at least once every couple of days, on fairly high traffic pages. Both were granted, as well. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 19:52, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

• I'd like to see more pending changes applied to articles as well, especially the extremely popular articles that are vandalized, spam edited, or similarly unhelpfully edited at least once a month. (By this I mean that it's not spam, personal attacks, or vandalism, but people writing in obviously non-usable content along the lines of what you'd read on a fan page or rumor site. You know, the stuff that is almost always inevitably reverted when it's caught.) I know that when I was just getting started with editing I would get very, very frustrated with pages like this and get even more frustrated when the pages would get semi'd but not really protected because the problem editors knew how to get around semi protections. I still get frustrated with those, I must admit. Tokyogirl79 (｡◕‿◕｡) 04:32, 17 November 2014 (UTC)
  • There are probably at least hundreds of thousands of pages where non-usable content is added at least once a month. It would be too contentious (just adopting pending changes is one of the most contentious decision en.wikipedia ever made). It would also risk bogging down the entire system because reviewers would no longer have clear cut criteria, resulting in huge backlogs. This looks more like flagged revs than pending changes, and consensus has always been strongly against flagged revs. I think the only potential extensions are targeted proposals like Wikipedia:Pending changes blocks. Cenarium (talk) 05:39, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

• As one of the people who helped push the decision on whether to use PC over the finish line after it had been stuck in limbo for several years I have to say it was always the consensus in every discussion I can recall that the reviewer right should be easy to get. In practice (at WP:PERM) it seems it is generally just slightly harder to get than rollback. The reason is that it has as little potential for causing real harm as rollback does. If someone is mis-using this tool, by all means, yank it back, but there is no need to take it away from users just because they aren't using it. If hat collectors think this very low-level tool gives them some sort of prestige that is their problem, there's no need to do anything about it. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:03, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

Require users to sign in

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

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I would like to make a suggestion to require all users to sign in when editing Wikipedia. I have many good reasons.

• It prevents IP addresses from vandalizing articles. I have seen many cases of vandalism by IP addresses.
• It protects those who use IP's by preventing hacking.
• Signing up is free and open to all the public so maybe it would be better i they created an account anyways.

Mistaspock (talk) 23:28, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

@Mistaspock: The top of this page contains a message that states: "Please see this FAQ page for a list of frequent proposals and the responses to them." On this FAQ page, one of the frequent proposals is Wikipedia:Perennial proposals#Prohibit anonymous users from editing. Thanks! GoingBatty (talk) 23:41, 16 November 2014 (UTC)

Personally I'd like to see the whole IP editing done away with, Don't get me wrong there's some IPs that actually help here but IMHO more often than not these days it's just IPs vandalizing everything. –Davey2010 • (talk) 16:51, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

I read a statistic once. It was a few years back and I can't remember where, so take this with a pinch of salt, but I think it was that 80% of all vandalism comes from unregistered editors (IPs) but actually 80% of edits by IPs were constructive. Make of that what you will. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 16:57, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

You can read it in the links that Batty provided above! The data is old (2007), and newer data would be nice, but I doubt it would reveal anything different. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 17:04, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Hmm. Perhaps some of us could take samples of the vandalism that we revert and see how much comes from IPs. --Biblioworm 21:07, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

Any study of IP editing really needs to consider both good and bad edits. It is true that IP editors contribute a majority of the vandalism, but they also seem to contribute several good edits for every bad one. The belief that the good outweighs the bad is a large part of the argument for not blocking all IP editing. Dragons flight (talk) 22:21, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

There is more to it than that. There is the issue that if you don't allow editing for non logged-in users, you may miss out on potential new editors that make their first edits without an account (I personally never contribute to wikis that require me to have an account). Other than that there is the basic idea of what a wiki is - and not needing an account is part of that basic idea. You can edit this page. Yes you. Right now. No need to sign up or all that nonsense, click edit, and fix what is wrong. That is what underpins the entirety of what a wiki is. Martijn Hoekstra (talk) 23:09, 17 November 2014 (UTC)

• At the end of the day, there's little difference between IPs and brand-new accounts. Some are great, and are very constructive; others are here to do nothing other than vandalize and/or troll. Axing IP editing won't make much difference other than to dramatically decrease the amount of editing that actually goes on. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 21:54, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

There are editors here who have earned my respect and others who have not, and I think that's important. It's part of the accountability that goes with having a username. IPs are virtually free from that kind of accountability because IP addresses are virtually impossible to remember. Of course there are reasons to allow IPs, but the downside is greater. ‑‑Mandruss ☎ 22:08, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

While I would personally support doing away with IP editing, I will note, as was noted above, that this is a perennial proposal. Unregistered editing has been around so long that any change to eliminate it is not going to come from the English Wikipedia community but would only come from the WMF, and don't hold your breath expecting them to change it quickly. I would suggest that someone close this thread as having been discussed ad infinitum. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:40, 18 November 2014 (UTC)

An other reason not to get rid of IP editing: Some disruptive users who keep coming back don't bother creating an account; we can see them when they go back to the same IP address/range. If we forced them to create an account in order to edit, they would start with sockpuppetry, which mwould make identification more difficult. Additionally, if established users happen to use the same IP address, the checkuser necesary to check these vandals out would violate the privacy of these innocent established users. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 13:52, 20 November 2014 (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.

Demotion of Wikipedia:Etiquette

I have proposed demoting Wikipedia:Etiquette from a guideline to an essay. Please join the discussion at the talk page. G. C. Hood (talk) 15:58, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

Increasing length of time for AfD discussions

I'm still relatively new here, so I'm not sure it's really my place to be making such a suggestion, but I've noticed that articles for deletion discussions are frequently relisted multiple times due to lack of consensus, in many cases because there are no !votes either way. I'd like to propose increasing the length of an AfD discussion, either to 15 or 30 days with a single relist allowed - this allows a longer base period for discussion and hopefully will prevent the multiple admin reviews and relists due to lack of consensus. If after one 15 or 30 days relist, a consensus is still not reached, the AfD should be closed as no-consensus. Peterborough Street (talk) 20:42, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I don't think it's particularly helpful to close as no consensus too readily. Further, the longer the list, the less people will look at the bottom of it. Clearing out as much as possible and relisting the rest at the top maximises the chances that there will be a resolution. Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 21:45, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

My idea with making AfD 30 days would be to reduce the number of articles being sent for deletion. If the nom knows they'll have to defend why an article should be deleted for that length of time, it might encourage editors to try make more improvements to the article first. Peterborough Street (talk) 12:29, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

• The problem with that would be that some AfD discussions are so done by the time 7 days is up.There's not really an issue with relisting discussions a couple of times, although I think in the past there have been discussions about having a maximum number of relistings (before closing as no consensus). Dylanfromthenorth (talk) 22:19, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I was actually thinking about that last night, perhaps include a clause that says if after 7 days there is an overwhelming consensus to delete or keep, then a Sysop could choose to action the article.Peterborough Street (talk) 12:29, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

Why not have the lists separated into weeks? This will help prevent articles (and images) getting deleted during vacation times when most editors are otherwise engaged on other things. There are many deletionists that seem to live on WP 24/7/356. Is it possible to get any graph showing the annual periods of deletions and those that eventually get reinstated?--Aspro (talk) 23:50, 20 November 2014 (UTC)

I agree with Adam. The benefit to relisting is that it puts the ones that need more discussion back at the top of the list. It might also be useful to make a list like User:Cyberbot I/Current AfDs more prominent, where people can see at a glance which AFDs need more comments. Mr.Z-man 15:21, 21 November 2014 (UTC)

The problem of significant content and trustworthy source

Hello all.

We had a problem, me and one Turkish user on this article. I was saying that this is Wikipedia, we can not put everything which some! people write on their newspapers. He was saying that I am supporter of Turkish goverment that's why I wanted to delete this section. At least the page protected beacuse violating 3RR.

I want to ask you very easy question. If some newspaper would call Barack Obama is terrorist with over 100+ references by newspaper. Will we add that information to Barack Obama page? I have a problem on Wikipedia's objectivity.

Does Wikipedia support dissident people out of United States in the world? Is it a project of supporting opposing? One guy procted this page without saying anything as you can see here MEOGLOBAL (talk) 16:14, 21 November 2014 (UTC)