Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Article titles and capitalisation/Workshop

Main case page (Talk) — Evidence (Talk) — Workshop (Talk) — Proposed decision (Talk)

Case clerk: TBD Drafting arbitrator: TBD

The purpose of the workshop is for the parties to the case, other interested members of the community, and members of the Arbitration Committee to post proposed components of the final decisions for review and comment. Proposals may include proposed general principles, findings of fact, remedies, and enforcement provisions, which are the four types of proposals that can be included in the final decision. The workshop also includes a section (at the page-bottom) for analysis of the /Evidence, and for general discussion of the case.

Any user may edit this workshop page. Please sign all suggestions and comments. Arbitrators will place proposed items they believe should be part of the final decision on the /Proposed decision page, which only Arbitrators and clerks may edit, for voting, clarification as well as implementation purposes.

Motions and requests by the parties

Repair revert warring

1) That the language in WP:Consensus on "no consensus" edit summaries, referred to in #Noetica rewrites policy on consensus. be restored to its condition on January 4, 2012, until this case concludes or consensus forms to change it.

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Comment by parties:

• The new language is the following addition to a long-standing sentence: Unless a discussion regarding a claim of "no consensus" is undertaken on the discussion page, an edit summary of "no consensus" or "not discussed" is not helpful, Unless a discussion regarding a claim of "no consensus" is undertaken on the discussion page, an edit summary of "no consensus" or "not discussed" is not helpful, except possibly if the edit being reverted created a change in prescribed practice (as on policy and guideline pages), since such a change would need to have wide consensus to be valid.
• The sole discussion of this change is WT:Consensus#Noetica edit, begun after the edit. Two editors commented, besides myself and Noetica. Both disagree with the change. This is not "wide consensus".
• Therefore, the addition condemns the process by which it was added.
• Noetica has now restored his own language; Dicklyon also reverted to it after it was removed by another editor; it was then modified by uninvolved editors and Noetica reverted again to his own original wording.

Comment by others:

No tendentious editing

2) Noetica is barred from editing policy or guideline pages until the conclusion of this case.

Comment by Arbitrators:

Comment by parties:

In addition to the events above, in which Noetica edited WP:Consensus to justify his own actions, the main complaint here is Noetica's edits on WP:TITLE. Under this sanction, it could be unprotected.

As I shall show in evidence, Dicklyon has also been involved; but he has normally been involved following Noetica's lead. JCScaliger (talk) 22:38, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Postponement if necessary

3) If any of the parties to this case is blocked due to the complaint of another, the schedule of this case shall be postponed accordingly.

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This may not be necessary, but it removes an incentive to disruptive complaints. (Noetica did bring his dispute to ANI, and neglected to inform me of it, until reminded. I think it is this he calls

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Proposed temporary injunctions

Moratorium on consensus policy change

1) Participants in this case are enjoined from editing WP:CONSENSUS until it is concluded.

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Proposed to avoid muddying the waters further. Making a moving target out of the meta-policies which govern the modification of the MOS is disruptive. Mangoe (talk) 14:15, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposed final decision

Proposals by Greg L

Proposed principles

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Limit tendentiousness directly

1) Locking down guideline pages for a year (as some have proposed elsewhere on pages related to this action), is an exceedingly good way, in my humble opinion, to highlight that the very essence of Wikipedia and its Five Pillars have been severely undermined by behavior and that current interventional processes were incapable of handling the experienced editors involved. Clearly, the venue itself didn’t change in the last month; just the way the mix of actors behaved.

ArbCom in other cases has resorted to remedies such as topic bans and inter-editor interaction restrictions, but I urge ArbCom to consider something else. One of the key reasons—I believe—that WT:AT broke down is that walls of text and cybersquatting (just short of WP:OWN) by a handful of experienced combatants made it exceedingly difficult for “outsiders” to join in so they could moderate hot-heads and help to establish a consensus.

I propose that rather than throwing good, knowledgeable editors clean out of certain areas of Wikipedia or other remedies like interaction restrictions, ArbCom consider identifying which parties mostly contributed to a climate that drove others away from Wikipedia and from specific areas of Wikipedia such as WP:AT and WT:AT. Once those editors are so identified, I propose that they be muzzled to a 24-hour total of (something like) 600 words across all venues combined in which any of the other restricted parties is also present. Like this:

• Party A is on WT:AT advocating something.
• Party B sees this and weighs in with disagreement.

(now the 600-word per day limit kicks in}

• Party A takes offense and goes to Party B’s talk page to profess grief.
• Party B goes to Party A’s talk page.

All the above interactions, in total, count to the 600-word limit for the day.

The solution is simple for each party: If they avoid each other, they are unrestricted. If they want to mix it up, they had best learn to be succinct.

The beneficiaries will be the rest of the community. They will still benefit from the restricted party’s expertise and insight. When things are humming along smoothly and the parties aren’t mixing it up, there are no restrictions. If they want to mix it up, the disruption it causes is minimal. The word limit breaks the back of tendentiousness. If Party A and Party B actually learn to agree on something, they can *break the rule* of their limitation since they can merely elect to not report the foul. Greg L (talk) 18:23, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

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A simple, straightforward solution. Locking MOS and TITLE down would be even better; that way those who get their fun out of "giving their little Senate laws" would get bored and go away. But I still think that there are less drastic remedies. [Note to clerk; isn't this section really two remedies?]

The chief problem with the word limit is that rational discussion of any of the points here at issue requires examples, and probably discussion of examples. Those could well go on a subpage; but they would still count against the 600 words. JCScaliger (talk) 18:46, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Disagree this works, at least alone. It simply takes a protracted debate between the dissenting sides of a MOS debate into a long protracted debate. The larger issue of this case involves editors' attitudes in how the MOS is treated, and my experience in watching various MOS debates is that it is impossible to the change the minds of those that have a strong opinion of which way the MOS should go even if you add more voices against that position. Even for date delinking case, the difficulties of getting an advertised RFC was troubling enough. Locking down the MOS page (with allowable editrequests to be performed when there is a clear consensus for a change) seems reasonable, however. --MASEM (t) 19:21, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

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Proposals by User:JCScaliger

Proposed principles

Not legislation

1) Wikipedia is not governed by statute: rules are not the purpose of the community. Written rules do not themselves set accepted practice. Rather, they should document already existing community consensus regarding what should be accepted and what should be rejected. When instruction creep is found to have occurred, it should be removed.

While Wikipedia's written policies and guidelines should be taken seriously, they can be misused. Do not follow an overly strict interpretation of the letter of policy without consideration for the principles of policies.

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WP:NOTLAW JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Guidelines

2) The text of guidelines and policies should reflect consensus.

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WP:POL JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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"No consensus"

3) Unless a discussion regarding a claim of "no consensus" is undertaken on the discussion page, an edit summary of "no consensus" or "not discussed" is not helpful

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WP:Consensus. (Quoted in the long-established form)

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When to claim consensus

4) The text of guidelines should not present a minority or strongly disputed view as if it were consensus.

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Corollary of (2); also, we should attempt accuracy in labelling. Calling something consensus when it isn't only produces bad feeling. JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Goal

5) The goal in a consensus-building discussion is to reach a compromise which angers as few as possible.

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Quote from WP:Consensus JCScaliger (talk) 03:34, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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The effect of stone-walling

6) The mere retention of a text which angers more editors than actively defend it rarely constitutes consensus.

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From (4) and (5). JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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When there is no consensus

7) When there is no consensus on guidance because there are two roughly equal parties who disagree, it is generally undesirable that either side's position be presented as if it were consensus. When consensus is established or demonstrated, stating it as guidance becomes desirable. Both sides are encouraged to bend over backwards to accommodate the other position, if possible; the other side will see it as little enough.

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From (5) and (6). JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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When there is no consensus

7a) When there is no consensus on guidance because there are two unequal parties, it is strongly undesirable that the minority's position be presented as consensus. If the majority can agree to some acknowledgement or accommodation of the minority position, this is more likely to be a stable consensus than retaining the majority's position unaltered, but there are clear exceptions: This is not intended to encourage the inclusion of fringe views, and there are times when Wikipedia must decide to tolerate some practice or to discourage it.

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As (7). JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Both are often possible

The Manual of Style can, as one solution, agree to tolerate either of two styles, as it does with Anglo-American spelling or the serial comma. Consistency on such points within articles is generally desirable.

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A useful reminder. JCScaliger (talk) 03:04, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposed findings of fact

Reliable sources vary

1) The questions at issue in this case are ones on which reliable sources vary.

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For example, the Chicago Manual of Style, recommended by WP:MOS, prefers brussels sprouts (§8.60); the Oxford Guide to Style, equally recommended by WP:MOS, recommends Brussels sprouts (§4.1.11). The OGS continues with an observation that capitalization is becoming more common.

Yes, this is the type of detail concerned here. JCScaliger (talk) 19:26, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

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Usage

2) Reliable style guides base their recommendations on how people actually write English.

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Quotes follow. I bring this up because MOS continually bristles with demands, one now on the evidence page, that things be done MY way (usually phrased "the right way"), whether or not this "right way" is actually done by any but a small minority.

Search WT for "Mebibyte" for more than ArbCom wants. They're WT:MOSNUM, Archives B0 through B17. I must thank Greg L for mentioning this disaster. JCScaliger (talk) 19:26, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Whim

3) MOS is frequently written on the basis of some editor's personal prejudices.

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I don't think so, Tim. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 19:28, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

This very long post by SMcCandlish alleging that one commonly used style is restricted to "English or some other hidebound liberal artsy course[s]," which is certainly nonsense (for example, CMOS recommends the one in question). But the whole page (WT:MOS/Archive 93), and inceed all of MOS discussion on "logical quotation" are worth reading.JCScaliger (talk) 19:54, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

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Noetica rewrites policy on consensus.

2) Noetica has rewritten Wikipedia policy on consensus to suit his views.

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Buried in [this compound series of minor and trivial edits] is the introduction of a novel phrase, italicized below.

" Unless a discussion regarding a claim of "no consensus" is undertaken on the discussion page, an edit summary of "no consensus" or "not discussed" is not helpful, except possibly on pages that describe long-standing Wikipedia policy."

The series was done on January 5 and 6, 2012, while Noetica, Dicklyon, and Tony were engaged in such reversions.

Even this tentative phrasing is insufficient to justify the conduct which actually took place; but that it should have been introduced at all, by an involved editor, is what several of the sanctions here are intended to prevent. JCScaliger (talk) 03:15, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposed remedies

Note: All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated.

Lock 'em down

1) WP:TITLE and all of WP:MOS (all pages bearing the {{style-guideline}} will be fully protected for a year. At the end of the year, amendments to this Arbcom decision suggesting what to do then are welcome.

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This has now been suggested on the evidence page, and referred to above. I still don't think it is the best solution; but it is a solution. Those who get their fun out of being legislators will find a hobby where it is welcome. After that, we can resume under WP:NOTLAW.JCScaliger (talk) 22:22, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

What reason is there to assume that MOS, as it exists, is a net benefit to the encyclopedia? Certainly we have no evidence to that effect. As it is now conducted, it does not reflect consensus; it reflects the most determined revert warring. JCScaliger (talk) 22:22, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

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If we assume going in that having a manual of style is useful, then it stands to reason that we want to improve it, and per WP:NOTLAW it needs to keep changing to reflect changing consensus. This is a huge admission of failure—this should only be contemplated if we are convinced that we can not do anything to have productive debate at these policy and guideline talk pages. I don't think this proposal can be taken seriously. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 21:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

And if we don't think that having a MOS is useful, then we should of course get rid of it, not lock it up so we have a stale document that purports to mean something. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 22:47, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

It is MOS "as it now exists" that is the problem. It would be possible to have a Manual of Style which was as relatively calm as many of our Naming Conventions; we would need a different culture there first. But getting rid of MOS may be worth suggesting, as thinking outside the box. JCScaliger (talk) 03:46, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Beg pardon, I misunderstood, I somehow thought this was a suggestion to prohibit any edits whatosever, not merely full protection. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 17:23, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

General sanctions

2) Wikipedia:Article titles and all pages composing WP:MOS are under probation. A rule of WP:1RR shall be enforced on them. Since we have an interest in avoiding stalemate, this is intended to restrict exact reversions; novel wording is one road to compromise.

Since these are pages of wide interest, admins shall take care to inform editors of this rule before imposing sanctions. All participants in this case can be assumed to know about them.

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This is the problem at WP:TITLE; it is also the problem throughout MOS. The response to any change in the text is exact reversion. JCScaliger (talk) 19:07, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

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This feels reasonable to me; I dont't think there is ever any good reason to go back and forth like this on these pages—there should be orderly discussion first when there is this kind of disagreement. To me, this kind of edit warring was the main problem in all the activity that led to this case. I was contemplating suggesting 0RR. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 21:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

General sanctions, continued

2a) Wikipedia:Article titles and all pages composing WP:MOS are under probation. Exact reversions without prompt and substantive discussion on the talk page are prohibited; admins may waive this in cases of obvious vandalism, although noting the vandalism and the reversion on the talk page are encouraged.

Since these are pages of wide interest, admins shall take care to inform editors of this rule before imposing sanctions. All participants in this case can be assumed to know about them.

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Noetica, again, reverted persistently, without ever discussing the text at all. This is also routine beehabiour on MOS and its subpages. (2a) is intended to be in force together with (2) immediately above, although they could be enacted separately. Either would help. JCScaliger (talk) 19:07, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Thia is when to enforce 0RR instead of 1RR; if there is another standard idea, I don't know it. JCScaliger (talk) 22:24, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Comment by others

I think with 1RR/0RR this is redundant, as a practical matter. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 21:02, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

When there is no consensus

3) When there are two or more roughly equal opinions on a matter of style, and there is no consensus which includes them, the Manual of Style and its subpages shall either state that there are several ways to do it, or be silent on the question until consensus language can be achieved.

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MOS does this quite often now; WP:ENGVAR is perhaps the most obvious example. Such language tends to be stable because everybody can tolerate it, not from revert-warring; and it does not generate pages on pages of talk page controversy. (This is the best wording I can come up with right off; I expect ArbCom to improve it.) JCScaliger (talk) 03:42, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposals by User:Mike Cline

Proposed principles

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Proposed remedies

Lock The Policy Page Down 365 days

1) In proposing this remedy, I first want to call attention to 3 of the five WMF strategic goals

• Grow participation
• Grow scope and quality of content
• Grow reach into the global south

Disputes like this sap volunteer energy in a great many ways, and does little if any to contribute toward achieving our communities’ strategic goals. WP:Title is a policy, but as a policy statement its evolved into part guideline, part how-to essay and part link farm to other conflicting and contradicting guidance. There is only one absolute, undisputable truth about WP article titles—they must be unique, the software demands it. Yet, we’ve managed through 1000s of edits to create a policy document that only one can guess is trying to explain how to create the perfect or best title for every article—all 3.9 million of them. Perfection is difficult, so we attempt to create wording on a case by case basis. Anytime a dispute arises around a title, we seem to need to tweak the policy wording just a bit to what end is unknown other than the quest for perfect titles and perfect policy. I am confident that a great many editors not only enjoy these disputes and enjoy tweaking policies and guidance on a whim but it's become their Raison d'être for participation in the project. Unfortunately when viewed holistically and in context of our strategic goals, such participation is counterproductive.

To say our titling policy is dysfunctional is an understatement and no amount of tweaking in the next 365 days is going to significantly alter that dysfunction, so I recommend, as I did on the evidence page, that the policy page be locked down for 1 year. During that year, interested editors, hopefully from a much wider audience than those who see policy pages as a playground, via RFCs or other methods develop a more concise and functional titling policy. I fully understand there are those who object to this, but I challenge anyone who does to provide substantive rationale as to why no title policy changes over the next 365 days will adversely impact WP and the communities’ ability to work toward the WMF strategic goals. I struggle with the notion that our titling policy is perfectly functional, yet to keep it that way we have to change the policy every few days. If it is dysfunctional today, no amount of incremental change will make it any more functional in the next 365 days. On the contrary, if it is functional as some claim, what is gained by incremental changes?

There are two very important reasons this policy should be locked down for 365 days. 1) to give editors who seriously want to improve this policy and make it reflect WP practice across ~3.9M articles growing to ~5M in the next few years some breathing room to do some real work and consensus building. And 2) It will remove the opportunity for contentiousness over a policy discussion and a policy page. Editors may still involve themselves in contentious debate, but hopefully it will be over big issues, not sound bite incremental policy wording.

This whole dispute started out over the contentiousness caused by trying to change a policy page with incremental, sound bite edits that favored one position over another. That type of behavior will not cease, and will not abate unless we agree to stop and look at this policy we call WP:Title and all its associated MOS and naming conventions holistically. We can’t do that as long as the policy page isn’t protected because energies must inevitably be diverted to defending any change perceived as against a local position. We are hostage to the current dysfunctional policy. There’s a rather famous line in hostage negotiations-Drop the gun and step away from the door. In our case, its Stop editing and step away from the policy.

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This suggestion is analogous to closing the school for the rest of the year because the teachers and administration haven’t yet figured out how to handle bullying. Greg L (talk) 00:19, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

While TITLE has been protected seven times since it was renamed, four of those protections involved Noetica and his friends, and one (by Nyttend, last May) involved Tony and Kwamikagami. Barring MOS regulars from the page would be more than enough; imposing restrictions so that the MOS style of stonewalling and reversion is impossible would be enough.

I shall be proposing sanctions for both alternatives. Straightening out MOS, where multiple editors have been behaving the same way, probably is beyond the reach of individual sanctions. JCScaliger (talk) 03:30, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

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Does this mean to fully protect, as suggested above at Lock 'em down, or does it mean no edits whatsoever? I'm not sure what "lock the policy page down" means or if it means something different then it does in that other proposal. In any case, while I agree that a total rewrite is unlikely to happen now, I don't see why it would be any more likely if there was some kind of moratorium on changes to the current version. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 17:29, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposals by Masem

Proposed principles

A Manual of Style is for consistency

1) A Manuel of Style for any work is meant to provide a means of providing a consistent reading experience for the end user of that work. It is meant to define presentation elements such as layout and formatting without directly influencing the content of the work.

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To set up why we have a MOS... --MASEM (t) 17:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

en.wiki's Manual of Style is a guideline

2) Within the English Wikipedia, the Manual of Style has been determined to be a guideline, "sets of best practices that are supported by consensus", as defined at WP:PG. They are not hard rules as with policy, and are open for the occasional exception often under WP:IAR.

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To set up the fact that the MOS is not policy, but descriptive of what we like articles to look like... --MASEM (t) 17:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

en.wiki's Manual of Style aims to prevent edit-warring over trivial matters

3) The English Wikipedia MOS was set up to encourage consistency across the work to prevent edit-warring over formatting and presentation matters. Editors for an article are expected to defer to the consensus for style for that article, or the first-author preferences if appropriate, instead of forcing the MOS-appropriate style to a different one.

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To understand that we are not to edit-war over MOS issues within articles. Not that this necessarily always works, but... --MASEM (t) 17:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposed findings of fact

en.wiki's Manual of Style incorporates a mix of other MOSes

1) The English Wikipedia Manual of Style has been built from a number of pre-existing Manuals from numerous fields. The best practices from these have been combined to create a single, unique MOS that applies to articles on the English Wikipedia.

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To understand that our MOS is a mix of several MOSes, which leads to the next FOF... --MASEM (t) 17:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

en.wiki's Manual of Style allows for editor preferences

2) The English Wikipedia Manual of Style, due to its disparate formation from multiple other MOS, recognizes that one form doesn't not fit all articles, and thus for some aspects, allows for selection from two or more variants for some style decisions, such as using Harvard references or citation templates for inline citations, as long as internal article consistency is maintained. Some choices involve common-sense selection between the options, such as using British English over American English for an article about a British person. These selections are to be made by consensus of the editors of each page.

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The MOS specially allows editor choice to come into play, reflecting the nature of it being a guideline, meaning that hard enforcement of the MOS is strongly discouraged (see above Principles #2 and 3). --MASEM (t) 17:50, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposals by User:Jojalozzo

Proposed principles

Policy and guidelines require special protection

1) "Wikipedia has a higher standard of participation and consensus for changes to policies and guidelines than to other types of articles. This is because they reflect established consensus, and their stability and consistency are important to the community." - Wikipedia:Consensus#Level of consensus

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This is not a proposal but a reminder of existing principles. Jojalozzo 18:40, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

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Proposed findings of fact

Policy and guidelines have insufficient protection

1) Existing editorial meta-policy is insufficiently codified and too easy to game.

Here are some statements about changing policy and guidelines that I have been able to locate:

Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#Content changes:

"Policies and guidelines can be edited like any other Wikipedia page. It is not strictly necessary to discuss changes or to obtain written documentation of a consensus in advance. However, because policies and guidelines are sensitive and complex, users should take care over any edits, to be sure they are faithfully reflecting the community's view and to be sure that they are not accidentally introducing new sources of error or confusion.

Because Wikipedia practice exists in the community through consensus, editing a policy/guideline/essay page does not in itself imply an immediate change to accepted practice. It is, naturally, bad practice to write something other than accepted practice on a policy or guideline page. To update best practices, you may change the practice directly (you are permitted to deviate from practice for the purposes of such change) and/or set about building widespread consensus for your change or implementation through discussion. When such a change is accepted, you can then edit the page to reflect the new situation."

Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#Proposals:

"New proposals require discussion and a high level of consensus from the entire community for promotion to guideline or policy. Adding the {{policy}} template to a page without the required consensus does not mean that the page is policy, even if the page summarizes or copies policy. Most commonly, editors use a Request for comments (RfC) to determine consensus for a newly proposed policy or guideline, via the {{rfc|policy}} tag."

Wikipedia:Consensus#Level of Consensus:

"Wikipedia has a higher standard of participation and consensus for changes to policies and guidelines than to other types of articles. This is because they reflect established consensus, and their stability and consistency are important to the community. As a result, editors often propose substantive changes on the talk page first to permit discussion before implementing the change. Changes may be made without prior discussion, but they are subject to a high level of scrutiny. The community is more likely to accept edits to policy if they are made slowly and conservatively, with active efforts to seek out input and agreement from others."

Template:MoS-guideline

"This guideline is a part of the English Wikipedia's Manual of Style. Use common sense in applying it; it will have occasional exceptions. Please ensure that any edits to this page reflect consensus."

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"This page is the subject of a current discussion on the talk page.
Please feel free to join in. This doesn't mean that you may not be bold in editing this page, but it can't hurt to check the discussion first."

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"Attention: You are editing a page that documents an English Wikipedia policy or guideline. While you may be bold in making minor changes to this page, consider discussing any substantive changes first on the page's talk page."

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None of the policy and guidelines statements says that greater care must be taken when editing policy and guidelines. The language has the same loopholes, suggestions, and IAR latitude that we find valuable for regular articles. I think IAR and BRD are not workable policies for substantive changes to policy and guidelines. A protective editorial process needs to be made binding and stated clearly. Current policy statements differ from article editing policy statements only in the degree of caution suggested. Because they fully embrace IAR and BRD they are operationally identical to article editorial policy. Jojalozzo 17:56, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

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You might have included WP:GUIDES: "Editors should attempt to follow guidelines, though they are best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply." (emphasis added) To me, that contradicts the above: "you may change the practice directly (you are permitted to deviate from practice for the purposes of such change)", because anyone disregarding a guideline (without bothering to demonstrate an exceptional circumstance in a specific article) is likely to argue that his edit is the best practice that everyone should follow. So does the Manual of Style mean anything, or is it just one of hundreds of grammar guides? If it's the latter, I'll find something more useful to do. Art LaPella (talk) 01:02, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposed remedies

Overview

My proposals are structural rather than personal. I think in general that participants in the subject disputes have been acting in good faith within guidelines and policies that do not provide sufficient support and structure for working at the policy/guideline level of the project.

For this arbcom to accept and implement my proposals would be both overreach and self-contradictory. However, I will propose them and perhaps arbitrators would consider a short term, experimental implementation for WP:Title and MOSCAPS while the wider community considers these ideas for general long term application.

Limit bold edits of policy and MOS to refinements of status quo

1) Changes that clarify and refine existing policy and guidelines, shall continue to be governed by existing policy (e.g. Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines, Wikipedia:Consensus#Level of Consensus).

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Bold edits offer an efficient proposal mechanism that allows changes to be viewed and developed in their full context. BRD serves us well with articles and as long as policy and guidelines are not being substantially redirected, we should encourage BRD on policy pages with caveats that extra sensitivity is required with policy/guideline edits. I think the existing policy and templates do this well. Jojalozzo 17:56, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

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Require and support wide-audience RfCs for substantive changes to policy and guidelines

2) Do not propose substantive changes that take policy and guidelines in new directions via bold edits but instead introduce them through a formal, wide-audience RfC process (see "{{rfc polisubst}}). If an edit is made to a policy or guidelines page and you consider it to be a substantive change, revert the edit with the edit summary, [[WP:RfC polisubst#0-RR]], and start an RfC on the talk page with template {{rfc polisubst}}.

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This editorial meta-policy would improve our chances for maintaining policy/guidelines stability and consistency and reduce the likelihood of disputes overflowing onto policy pages. This will require at least rewording Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines, Wikipedia:Consensus#Level of Consensus (possibly other policy/guidelines pages) and the hatnotes for policy and guidelines pages as well as implementation of new templates for the 0RR BRD and RfC processes. I realize that I don't have sufficient knowledge or experience to implement or fully formulate my proposal and leave final wording and implementation to those who are better qualified. Jojalozzo 17:56, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Please don't; this will, in practice, become yet another device to entrench non-consensus language. JCScaliger (talk) 02:33, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Comment by others:

Support If nothing else comes out of this, a bias towards stability would at least contain the tendency toward combat to the discussion rather than afflict it on great swathes of articles, as appears to be the custom now. Mangoe (talk) 20:04, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Proposed enforcement

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Analysis of evidence

Place here items of evidence (with diffs) and detailed analysis

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General discussion

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