User talk:Awilley/Discretionary sanctions

No personal comments sanction

One of the things that triggers drama is an editor making personal observations about the supporters of one side. Most of the comments are directed against Trump supporters and include remarks about them being racist, anti-science, ignorant, etc. How can we stop off-the-cuff comments which contribute nothing to the discussion but yet allow legitimate comments when relevant (e.g., discussion about Trump's climate change policies and why/how they have support of voters)? --NeilN ^{talk to me} 02:30, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Should make it clear that applies to referring to a group of editors along with a single editor. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:35, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

[1] ~Awilley (talk) 14:46, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Courtesy in reporting sanction

Notification usually happens already. I would hesitate before setting this as a requirement for repeat offenders. Otherwise we'll get: violation - fix after a few hours, wait a couple days, violation - fix after a few hours, and so on. I also don't want to prevent admins from taking immediate action if they deem it necessary, regardless of the editor was notified or not. Finally, editors know they're breaking a restriction in some cases (e.g., accusing another editor of being a paid shill for Putin). This is not an inadvertent violation of the sometimes-tricky consensus-required restriction and really doesn't an explanation of why it's going to get an neditor sanctioned. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 02:45, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

@NeilN:, so the goal here is to try to change the culture of reporting. Right now there is a big emphasis on getting users from the opposing POV sanctioned. Topic bans and indef blocks are ideal because they completely remove the editor, but any sanction (short blocks, warnings, etc) will do because those can be brought up later when asking for the larger sanctions. Editors will sometimes report violations on the talk pages of admins they see as friendly to their cause, hoping to get a quick block instead of reporting it to a noticeboard that requires notifying the editor (thereby risking the chance that the editor remedy the problem before an admin can act). I recall a certain editor that we both know actually privately emailing an admin and successfully getting an opponent blocked for an incredibly minor and completely unintentional 1RR violation. Heck, I've had people email me asking for sanctions.

Anyway I want to change the emphasis from trying to get others sanctioned to trying to get others to correct their behavior before administrative intervention is needed. Often editor-to-editor talk page warnings just turn into fights because editors are rude to each other, using generic templates and being accusatory and demanding. (This is a good thing for you if your talk page warning is just the first step towards trying to get an editor sanctioned, because the editor is more likely to bite back instead of fixing the problem.) I want to fix that by giving people a simple form to follow: "Hi, I believe that you have violated [link to rule] with this edit [diff of edit violating the rule]." Editors who don't remedy their problems after that deserve the sanction, but someone subject to the "no personal comments" sanction who slipped up and said "I know Trump supporters hate science but here you have to follow reliable sources" has a chance to retract the first part of that sentence before an admin steps in with a ban. This, I think, is the path of least disruption, when editors police themselves. Things get messier when admins get involved, (and by extension, messier still when Arbcom gets involved). None of this though prevents an admin from getting involved at any point in the process and imposing whatever sanction they see fit for blatant violations.

For repeat violators, I would hope that the annoyance of having to repeatedly correct themselves would be sufficient motivation to stop screwing up. But if not I'd rather have a user who screws up and consistently corrects their mistakes than a user who stonewalls when challenged. In any case I would hope that the general reduction in background noise would make the real disruptive users stick out more.

Sorry for the essay. Does that somewhat address your concerns? ~Awilley (talk) 15:54, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Awilley I'm not sure if you got my response to your email, but if you didn't, then let me know and I'll say it here. I just wanted to point out that this one is something that could end up being incumbent upon the admins. In short, any admin about to sanction someone will need to check that the editor to be sanctioned had been given a chance to self-correct. I think it should be specified not only that a reporting editor must notify the editor they intend to report, but must prove that they did so when actually reporting. Of course, that still becomes incumbent upon the admins to not act without seeing that proof, but that's not so much of a burden.

Also, I think this should apply to the whole topic area; not be used as a sanction against individual editors. It's not entirely clear if this is the intention or not (I notice it doesn't end with "sanction", but it's still included in a list of possible sanctions). That was a part of my email, so apologies if I'm repeating myself. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 01:52, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Thank you, that's a really good point. I'll add some language requiring the editor to link to the notification. I hadn't meant for this or any of the sanctions to be a blanket sanction for the whole topic area, just sanctions that could be applied liberally to the more battleground-y editors. It would probably be a good thing to apply to the whole area but I hesitate to add even more complicated rules to the ones we already have in place. ~Awilley (talk) 05:03, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

That's completely understandable. Rather than going through saying "this applies to the topic, this can be applied to an editor at an admins's discretion", it might be worth considering taking just a few of these, such as the "no bludgeoning", "auto-boomerang" and "courtesy in reporting" sanctions and simply applying those to the entire topic, then just enforcing them with the 1-week non-escalating bans. There are pros and cons to that sort of blanket approach, but two pro that strike me are that 1) it's completely fair as everyone is subject to it; and 2) it's little more than a more systemic approach to the existing policy. It would be difficult for an editor, topic banned under this system to successfully appeal at AE, even if the appeal considered only the existing policy and not the topic-level sanctions. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 13:30, 9 July 2018 (UTC)

For me, adding an extra layer of complexity to already complex sanctions outweighs the benefits. Normal editors shouldn't have to count the number of edits they're making per day to article talk pages as required by the Anti-filibuster sanction. That's just for users who consistently abuse their talk page privileges by trying to down out everyone else by repeating their own argument over and over. Similarly the "courtesy" sanction is meant for users who abuse administrative processes in trying to get sanctions to stick to their opponents, not normal editors who occasionally report genuinely disruptive users. ~Awilley (talk) 18:42, 30 July 2018 (UTC)

Enforcement: 1-week non-escalating topic ban

Interesting idea. I would probably go with ten days and change "default" to usual. Blocks should also be 1 week/10 days - no leniency for time already served. How do we make it clear that blatant violations will not get these special sanctions? For example, if a new editor comes in and immediately starts disrupting, they're going to get indefinitely topic banned. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:31, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

Does this solve the problem for blatant violations?

On the 7vs10 days, I am aiming for a sanction that is significant to be annoying to users, but reasonable enough that it won't create more drama than it's worth. I personally like the 7 day option because it's easiest for users to remember (10AM on Tuesday to 10AM on Tuesday). On the blocks, the purpose of the block is to enforce the topic ban for users who lack the self control to enforce it themselves. Someone who slips up on day 6 shouldn't have a worse punishment (6 day topic ban + 7 day block) than someone who violates the topic ban right out of the gate (0.5 day topic ban + 7 day block). The other thing on 7vs10 is that for many users these days the entry in the block log is a much bigger deal than the actual block duration. A 1-day block is almost as bad as a 7 day block, and there's basically no difference between 7 and 10 days except that the 10 days feels less fair. ~Awilley (talk) 15:08, 6 July 2018 (UTC)

I like the idea of converting a violated topic ban into a block of the same duration. It's got a certain poetry to it that will appeal to folks' sense of justice, plus it neatly removes a problematic editor from a growing dispute without the usual mess of repeated topic ban violations that it takes before someone is blocked these days. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 01:55, 7 July 2018 (UTC)

Limiting how quickly events can be documented here.

I think a topic-wide restriction on how quickly editors can add information about a political newsworthy event might help a lot. @Masem:, I know you feel much the same way, so I'm pinging as I mentioned at AE. I think it's something that might need a little discussion to work out precisely, however. I think waiting at least a week is a good idea, but I don't want to immediately punish anyone who jumps the gun. Just, maybe, include such too-soon additions in the list of edits exempt from 1RR or possibly even 3RR, so editors who overstep can simply be corrected. Of course, editors who edit war over this sort of stuff can be dealt with. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 14:53, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

To me its not so much documenting key factuall, non-controvesial events that creates the problem, its the rush to include "talking head" coverage of those events (with no lack of shortage from RSes for these) without knowing the long-term impact of the event that creates the behavioral problems in editors. Editors should be very careful about getting into the reactions that happen to these events, to a point where reactions shouldn't be added until after some time has passed to assure that documenting the reactions are appropriate, or that there's some discussion on the talk page about inclusion. This is where it becomes rather hard to the mix of content and behavioral issues. --Masem (t) 15:07, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure there's already a policy-based distinction between "analysis" and claims of fact, so I can see how what you're saying could work. The problem with what you're saying is users trying to use talking heads to support claims of fact. And then there's the problem of determining who's a talking head and who's a journalist. Fox News especially seems to intentionally blur this line as much as possible. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:32, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

You'd think there would be one, but there isn't. A lot of this comes down to editors pointing to UNDUE and saying "all these people are talking about it, we must include it", which, in a 24/7 news cycle, no longer really is true or appropriate. Fixing UNDUE is a separate issue.

But I would think editors have enough common sense to be able to recognize uncontested statements of fact that have long-term relevance, and "assertions of facts" from talking heads trying to put their own spin on things, to know where to draw the line. I have a feeling that knowing where that line is is being blurred by personal feelings and opinions on matters, and that's where some type of behavioral aspects can be brought in. How, I don't immediately know. --Masem (t) 15:51, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

WP:OR touches upon the subject, but mostly to describe editor analysis. I thought there was something in WP:V, but I'm not finding it. That's a shame, but I think it leaves us at looking to discouraging all information about an event for a time, just to make sure we keep the BS out. I know that I -like many others- don't even bother to check WP for recent news stories, not just because I don't trust the coverage it will get here so soon, but because half the time, it doesn't even occur to me that WP will have information on it, yet. Anyone using WP for their news is doing themselves a serious disservice and should stop. NPR, BBC and AP are much better places to get the news, even if you want to ensure you're not getting "biased" news. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 16:22, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

Going back to an RFC I started related to NOT:NEWS, there is concern that if we apply too strong a limitation/delay for updating pages on controversial topics, we equivalently should delay updating on non-controversial events, which is not a desired goal, nor are these articles ever problematic in keeping up to date. There are nearly no problems on updates on breaking stories related to disasters or attacks, outside of massive "reaction" sections, (which is partially related to this), and for existing topics, new updates that have long term significance (based on editor judgement) such as new casting information for a movie in production are readily added without any problems. This unfortunately leads us to a situation where "I know it when I see it" as the best way to describe what the problem with recent updates actually is, very hard to make a definitive line on this. --Masem (t) 16:40, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

I would apply this only to AmPol, myself (hence why I'm mentioning it here, where it only takes admins' discretion to enact a sanction). Within that topic, I don't think there's much political news that's "non-controversial" in the sense we use that term in other topics. One thing we could do is list some exceptions, like:

• Results of a vote, either a public vote on an office or a House/Congressional vote on a bill.
• Brief statements about scheduled events. For example, what Trump talked about (but not specifically what he said) during the Helsinki meeting with Putin.

I'm pretty sure every other news event in politics these days is controversial. We could also do a blanket ban on "reaction" sections for any news event, but I'm pretty sure that would need to be enacted as a full policy. I think a good enough proposal would pass an RfC, tho. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 16:52, 19 July 2018 (UTC)

I'm honestly not crazy about the idea of putting a throttle on how quickly you can update articles to reflect recent news. I agree with the premise that it is problematic for editors to try to update articles with every "controversy of the day" that is being talked about on the cable news channels. (As a side note it's always interesting to see editors switch sides based on whether the recent news is a positive or a negative thing for their particular point of view, with one group arguing an event is clearly notable and the other group saying "let's wait and see.") That said, this proposal seems CREEPY to me, and I'm not convinced the positives outweigh the negatives. There are some events that are clearly notable enough to add immediately, and it is impossible for us to predict in advance what these events might be. That's why we need to rely on editorial judgement, and by extension, on editors who consistently exercise good editorial judgement (as opposed to those whose judgement is consistently compromised by their point of view). I think a better solution to the problem is to try to create an environment where those editors who put the encyclopedia above their personal points of view can have a stronger voice and don't get drowned out and dragged down by POV-pushers with too much time on their hands. That was one of the motivations behind the anti-filibuster sanction: to throttle those who consistently engage in long WP:IDHT arguments.

TLDR: The ability to quickly update articles with recent news is not the problem. The problem is editors who abuse that ability to push their point of view. ~Awilley (talk) 14:52, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

I agree with you about the root of the problem. If we got all the POV pushers out of politics, there'd be no need for this suggestion. It would do nothing but slow down the project. But right now, we've got POV pushers in politics, and just like with the anti-filibustering sanction, this is designed to create an inhospitable environment for them. Being forced to wait a few days isn't going to bother neutral editors, but it will drive POV pushers up the wall.

Side argument about quality of content, not as important as what I said above:
I'm not suggesting that some of these events may turn out not to be notable (we're really good at figuring that out already), but that the quality of the content in the days immediately following an event is way lower due to the lower quality of sources. Take a page like Unite the Right rally, and compare the section on Trump's comments from the day after and from two days after. It's a huge difference in quality, and not just due to the editing. Check out the dates on many of those sources. Now, compare that to the current version and look how much stronger it is, with sourced analysis that isn't characterized entirely by either left-wing hysteria or right-wing defensiveness, the way it was in the immediate aftermath. One part that worries me is how, once we get content in that clearly belongs (it's WP:DUE or WP:NOTABLE), the low-quality initial form that content takes must have a large influence on subsequent material. So material which non-neutrally skews left in the first could of days gets right-leaning counterpoints added to it, instead of being simply re-written to be more neutral. Obviously this isn't always the case, but it's certainly the case sometimes.

It's the same basic principle as all of the others: For example, the thicker skin sanction is actually a horrible idea in a typically well-behaved topic. Editors enforcing our policies on each other without resorting to the drama boards or complaining to admins is not a problem. It's the constant bickering that results when POV pushers are doing it. Also, for the record, I don't think being a POV pusher is a permanent condition. Editors can wise up. I know I've done some POV pushing in the past, which is part of the reason I stopped editing in politics. "Getting the POV pushers out" means getting some perennial POV pushers out of the topic, but also getting the inner POV-pusher out of a number of editors. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 15:54, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

This is where at least having some enforced time-delay or discussion requirement to include reaction and commentary to an otherwise factual event might help. We need to find some thing that helps to "condition" (for lack of a better word) these types of editors to not jump up and react to the latest explosion of news, but give pause and see if the event actually holds merit. --Masem (t) 20:11, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

@Masem, When you say "reaction and commentary" I am imagining stuff like the "Reactions" sections on newly-created mass shooting articles where we quote everybody and their dog offering thoughts and prayers and saying how despicable the shooting was. Also quoting congresspeople on the latest Trump-created scandal. Is that what you're trying to clamp down on? That kind of stuff annoys me as well, but are we allowed to police content like that?

@MPants, Lots of good points. I agree it would be better to try to take the POV-pusher out of editors than trying to take them out of the topic area. Being passionate about something is a good thing for editors as long as they can channel that passion into good editing instead of partisan fighting. I haven't had time to review the article sections you linked (currently out of town for a wedding) but I have a pretty good idea of what you're talking about. I often think about it in terms of a pendulum. If you start it out at one extreme it tends to swing to the other extreme and then back again until you have a fractured article stuffed with POV content from both sides. But if you start the pendulum in the middle the motivation to swing it is largely gone. ~Awilley (talk) 20:30, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

But if you start the pendulum in the middle the motivation to swing it is largely gone. That is exactly what I was getting at. In truth, I'm a little shocked at how well you seem to have understood what I was saying here (it's pretty par for the course for everyone to misinterpret everyone else here).

By the way, enjoy the wedding! We'll get into it more when you get back. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 21:15, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

What you call reactions is what I believe too. I wouldn't call managing reactions as "policing", but keeping the weight of NOT#NEWS and IINFO in mind. When you compare similar controversies of yesteryear like the Watergate scandal or Clarence Thomas Supreme Court nomination (the later I remember very well "dominating" news, but that's when news was 3 times at day at most) to the news articles of today, we have far too much detail, because we have a near infinite amount of press sourcing that could be used thanks to 24/7 reporting and the Internet. It's why we're an encyclopedia, not meant to be a newspaper and should try to keep these relatively lightweight until they become something more significant. And then you add in the POV aspects MPants describes, and that's where this all can spiral out of control. --Masem (t) 21:22, 20 July 2018 (UTC)

As a unfortunately convenient live example, the issues over Sarah Jeong make for a good case for why we should be careful with "live updates". --Masem (t) 16:11, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

The sanctions Awilley describes here are aimed at moderating editor behavior. The restriction proposed in this section is aimed at moderating article content and I'm not going to play any part in that. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 16:22, 4 August 2018 (UTC)

I can definitely see the fundamental difference between the two, but we have lots of restrictions with the express purpose of moderating article content. So yeah, it's a fundamental difference, but not a good/bad one. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 02:14, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

@MjolnirPants: Hmmm. The only content-related restrictions I've ever placed were to enforce to outcomes of RFCs. How do you define a content-related restriction? If you're thinking about something like 500/30 I don't consider that a content-related restriction as an extended confirmed editor can add the content to the article that is suggested by a non-extended confirmed editor on the talk page. --NeilN ^{talk to me} 03:20, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

No, I'm actually thinking a bit more generally than that. I'm saying that WP:NPOV, WP:DUE and WP:RS and particularly WP:BLP all pretty strictly moderate moderate content. And this one seems less restrictive to me, as it doesn't ever prohibit certain content (the way BLP does, for example), it just says we must wait before adding it, to see what (if anything) newer sources, which are further removed from the content, have to say about it. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 03:24, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

To me, from what Mpants had said, if we know there's something controversial that has just broken in the news to a topic, and there's clear editing behavior problems over adding that content (and this includes both pushing to add, and pushing to remove), that's where a restriction of limiting any edits related to the controversy to 1RR for something like a month from the onset of the controversial aspect, so that no editor is trying to force a certain point, and thus discourage the behavioral problems. Ideally, if the behavior is so bad, then maybe blocking anyone from adding about it until that month is up or until a clear consensus is demonstrated in the talk page. --Masem (t) 03:29, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

All those policies and guidelines are a result of broad community consensus (with a push from the WMF). There's no community consensus on how to exactly implement WP:NOTNEWS point #2 and I won't be using discretionary sanctions to mandate an interpretation (other admins can take their chances, of course). Like it or not, some articles chronicle current ongoing events (e.g., Special Counsel investigation (2017–present)) and the weight of each incident related to the event is often disputed. We already have WP:1RR and consensus-required active for all content in that article. What, specifically, are you asking to be added? --NeilN ^{talk to me} 04:18, 5 August 2018 (UTC)

I just stumbled in

I can't remember how this came onto my watchlist but there are some interesting ideas here. EEng 01:28, 31 July 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, I'd be interested in any specific feedback you might have. Currently working on finding unintentional ramifications or loopholes. ~Awilley (talk) 17:02, 31 July 2018 (UTC)

I admit: I was the one who pulled EEng in here. I keep secrets the way dead people keep cats: they eat me up inside until they finally break free. ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 18:43, 31 July 2018 (UTC)

Darn. I guess I'm not interesting enough to have someone as famous as EEng stalking my edits. ~Awilley (talk) 19:06, 31 July 2018 (UTC)

If I believed for one second I was famous for my editing I'd run screaming from this site and never come back. lol ᛗᛁᛟᛚᚾᛁᚱPants Tell me all about it. 21:24, 31 July 2018 (UTC)