Wikipedia talk:Semi-protection policy
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billions of accounts will be made
People will sign up billions of accounts if they are a vandal to get around this we need to make sure that they can't do this. --Adam1213 Talk + 01:36, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Umm....what? Please read the discussion above: no IP can create more than 10 accounts per day, and the percentage number will be coded as a variable in case the number of accounts gets too high. There is an idea to limit the number of accounts created per hour, but I'm not sure where that's headed. Please read the issues before commenting like this. Further, how can or will vandals get around this, and what would you propose? In the future, try to make your comments a little more coherant. Thanks. -Mysekurity(have you seen this?) 03:31, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Somehow, I am reminded of Boothy443...:-(.Voice of AllT|@|ESP 03:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- 10 accounts a day seems so high...if the only reason we're allowing it is because of classes signing up behind a proxy at the same time, we should have a process where a teacher requests from any admin to allow their ip to create more than 3 accounts a week. --kizzle 04:01, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Throttling down from 70 accounts per IP per week to 3 and raising the limit only upon request from faculty wouldn't help students who want to create their own accounts independently of a class but are limited by the residence hall's caching proxy, or for that matter users behind any other web proxy such as that of AOL, or any ISP in an IP-address-restricted less-developed country. --Damian Yerrick 15:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I'm thinking we add an option to Special:Userlogin about creating more accounts if the user is from a University/school/legitimate group behind a single IP. (Maybe an e-mail/contact link that would get sent to any admin who signed up for the task?) I think that would probably be more useful, plus a 3 account creation limit, or maybe just two accounts. -Mysekurity(have you seen this?) 15:37, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Throttling down from 70 accounts per IP per week to 3 and raising the limit only upon request from faculty wouldn't help students who want to create their own accounts independently of a class but are limited by the residence hall's caching proxy, or for that matter users behind any other web proxy such as that of AOL, or any ISP in an IP-address-restricted less-developed country. --Damian Yerrick 15:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
It should be always many ways to vandalize if u want to , but at least this method could put some obstacles for that , and this method would apply in few sensitive pages which are under excessive monitoring and control . so this method is originally against the intended Vandalism made by untolerant ppl.--Unfinishedchaos 09:40, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Question
Now that we seem to have a pretty solid consensus on this, where do we go from here? Jimbo has been informed of this but maybe another shout out on his talk page now that we've come to a general consensus in terms of what the policy should say? I've been working on the project for a year now but I've never done policy. Any enlightening would be helpful. :) And yes I read the How To Create Policy thingy. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:15, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Actually, I will leave a note on Jimbo's page. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:16, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- I also left a note on the Village Pump page. Hopefully someone will tell us what to do next. :) 100 to 4 is a damn good consensus. Don't think anyone can argue with it. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 05:32, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Village Pump probably won't yield anything. Another call to Bugzilla should probably be the first step, as well as notifying developers in the IRC channel of the status. Also, any developers monitoring this page should leave feedback as to what the status of implementation is. --kizzle 09:16, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Bugzilla Link --kizzle 18:43, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- I also left a note on the Village Pump page. Hopefully someone will tell us what to do next. :) 100 to 4 is a damn good consensus. Don't think anyone can argue with it. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 05:32, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
100 list
Splash, I guess we can add this proposal to the Wikipedia:Times_that_100_Wikipedians_actually_agreed_and_voted_to_support_something list, now, huh. --kizzle 04:43, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Indeed, which is excellent news! I'm surprised to see such large numbers visiting. I'm also pleased to observe that discussion has continued even as the poll is working; a good balance between the evility of voting and the process of discussion. Note that Kim Bruning's comment (he'd never vote) sounds like an oppose to me, although it's a pity he didn't revisit the discussion. There are a number of experienced Wikipedian's whose names I'd like to see somewhere, but if they aren't here, they aren't. However, User:Datrio is one of the m:Stewards, so that's encouraging, especially since he indicates that he has changed his mind over the course of the process. -Splashtalk 14:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Sweet. --kizzle 18:08, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Woohoo!
Apparently, we have Jimbo's attention. Looks like he's going to talk to Brion about how hard it'd be for this to be implemented. Given all of this civil lawsuit nonsense, this is probably a very good time to hit him up on something like this. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 15:33, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Classes of Users
Being one of the newest X% of registered users is not simple or predictable.
I propose a waiting period of 14 days and 50 edits before a new user is enabled for editing the frequently vandalized pages. An admin could examine those 50 edits and see if they were merely an evasion of the requirement (i.e. adding a comma in 50 random articles, for example)
The reason a number of days is important is because it's not variable on the actions of others (i.e. the number of other new registrations) and 50 edits is indicative of a desire to contribute to the Wikipeda and not a "hit and run" on a political target. patsw 15:39, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- The developers have indicated that, at present, there is no means for determining account-life in software (odd as that sounds), so we'd be asking for structural changes to the database. Counting edits is apparently too computationally draining. Also, correcting 50 commas is fine: we don't have a standard of editing, other than it be not-vandalism. I'd appreciate someone fixing 50 of my mis-commaed articles, for example! On the precise values you choose: 14 days is vastly too long. I would prefer something that equated to 2-4 days and no more. 50 edits is perhaps alrihgt, although whatever the barrier is, it should be nearly trivial to overcome by any new, good-faith contributor, imo. We want all the good-faith edits we can get our hands on. -Splashtalk 16:07, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yes, remember this is not to punish new users, but rather to stop "hit & run" vandals that plague certain pages. So it restricts anon & new accounts during the time needed by non-admins to fix the vandalism while still being able to contribute, and maybe a few hours more in case it's someone sitting at a workstation or school library. "New accounts" is needed to discourage "well if anon accounts can't edit, I'll just quickly create a new account & vandalise anyway". So really as long as the "new user" ban extends to accounts that are less than 1/2 a day old, it works. New accounts which vandalise already have a system for banning/dealing with repeat vandalisms. Right now I think the % suggested works out to 3-4 days, right? And the % can be tweaked if the minimum time gets too short later on. Jabrwock 16:18, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yes, apparently 3-4 days is about right. (Although a calculation based on growth of 10% per month at a constant rate per-day suggests rather shorter than that - less than a day). I suppose the devs are able to amend it if they need to, since it is currently the same restriction as on move, and I presume thinking-ahead has been done there for us. -Splashtalk 19:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yes, remember this is not to punish new users, but rather to stop "hit & run" vandals that plague certain pages. So it restricts anon & new accounts during the time needed by non-admins to fix the vandalism while still being able to contribute, and maybe a few hours more in case it's someone sitting at a workstation or school library. "New accounts" is needed to discourage "well if anon accounts can't edit, I'll just quickly create a new account & vandalise anyway". So really as long as the "new user" ban extends to accounts that are less than 1/2 a day old, it works. New accounts which vandalise already have a system for banning/dealing with repeat vandalisms. Right now I think the % suggested works out to 3-4 days, right? And the % can be tweaked if the minimum time gets too short later on. Jabrwock 16:18, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Splash, I can accept the difficulties involved in implementing my proposal making it impractical. If something like this is to be done, it should very, very difficult to game. I thought we did have a standard of editing reflected in policies of the Wikipedia. In terms of relative needs, I think the Wikipedia needs a good solution to the vandalism problem more than it needs all the good-faith edits Splash can get his/her hands on. If not as if improving the vandalism situation will trigger a boycott by the good editors.patsw 18:36, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- I would hope that allowing virtually all of our editors to edit a page except from those who are wanton vandals will be a good balance. We have blocking powers over those that game the system, and that's given added effectiveness with semi-protection since any sockpuppet a blockee may create won't be able to edit a semi'd page. -Splashtalk 19:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Patsw, the possibility of including an edit count check along with a time calculation is not off the table yet, we're just going to see if we can do without it first. If it becomes apparent that these pages still become heavily vandalized through legions of undead sleeper accounts, then we'll take this back to the developers, but initially, we don't want them to do more work then they need to do. --kizzle 21:38, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Poll closed
I've archived the poll, the discussions that went with it and the comments more than about a day old to Archive 3. By simple number counting, we have 103/4/2, but there is at least one comment that reads as an oppose and one that reads as a support; in both cases the not-voting appears deliberate. Discussion continues, naturally, and do note that Jimbo called by indirectly as mentioned above in #Woohoo!. -Splashtalk 19:20, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Having an official vote now seems way too bureaucratic, with 96% support... it's time to implement and tag this with {{policy}}. Sadly, I can't reach IRC to go to #wikimedia-tech to ask a dev to look into this in detail... Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 19:26, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Agreed. The proposal received 96.26% support and was spammed all over Wikipedia, so I believe it is fair to say there is a strong consensus behind implementing this feature without a recount. Hall Monitor 19:36, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Wow! that's the first time I've seen so many wikipedians actually agree on something. G-Man 19:40, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yes. I would, however, disagree with tagging this as policy without Jimbo actually blessing it. It's a change in the way we do things that would need his overt sanction. IMO, anyway. -Splashtalk 19:42, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- *Sigh* Well, it seems that I was in the (vast) minority here. I would still like, if this is technically implemented, to see a policy drafted or something added to the blocking policy saying that pages shouldn't be semi-protected permanently or for extended/long periods of time, and that this kind of protection should only be applied to articles facing serious and extraordinary levels of vandalism. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 19:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- That was part of the agreement, though. So, I don't know if it should just be made more explicit. Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 19:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Will this page become the policy page? I'm assuming that either Wikipedia:Protection policy will be modified or a new page will be created to document the policy. Flcelloguy (A note?) 19:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Umm, well this page is called Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy which seems like a reasonably decent name to me. We could merge it into the full protection document upon formal acceptance. However, for now, I think we should keep the discussion here. -Splashtalk 19:59, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Well, it seems we now count with Jimbo's Blessing. [1] Let's move ahead and tag this with {{policy}} Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 00:04, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Umm, well this page is called Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy which seems like a reasonably decent name to me. We could merge it into the full protection document upon formal acceptance. However, for now, I think we should keep the discussion here. -Splashtalk 19:59, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Will this page become the policy page? I'm assuming that either Wikipedia:Protection policy will be modified or a new page will be created to document the policy. Flcelloguy (A note?) 19:50, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- I really do think that the language on the front page is pretty clear about this. -Splashtalk 19:52, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- That was part of the agreement, though. So, I don't know if it should just be made more explicit. Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 19:49, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- *Sigh* Well, it seems that I was in the (vast) minority here. I would still like, if this is technically implemented, to see a policy drafted or something added to the blocking policy saying that pages shouldn't be semi-protected permanently or for extended/long periods of time, and that this kind of protection should only be applied to articles facing serious and extraordinary levels of vandalism. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 19:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Non english projects
I just discovered today that at least one non english pump has received a call for participation to discuss this policy. I am a bit wondering about this. Mysecurity, are you implying that a policy currently under work (well, apparently now closed) on the english wikipedia, will be applied to all projects ?
Anthere 22:02, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Not really, Anthere. It would be an extension to MediaWiki, which could then be applied to other wikis, after local discussion in each wiki. So, the proposal could affect other projects, but won't unless they want it. But we wanted to genererate as much discussion as possible (and still want to), so we wanted to adjust it to the need of other Wikimedia projects too by asking for external opinions. Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 22:06, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- After seeing the message, I doubt many understood that.... you might have mentionned a change in the software... By the way, I am curious. How much feedback did you get from other languages ? Anthere 22:20, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- Probably it should have been reworded to make that clearer, but no, it is not mandatory for other wikis to adopt... but we did get Datrio from Polish Wikipedia comment and think it is a good idea, as well as Unfinishedchaos from the Arabic Wikipedia comment on the issue. I'm active on the Spanish Wikipedia, so I tried to give a few interwiki thoughts as well. Titoxd(?!? - did you read this?) 22:38, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
- After seeing the message, I doubt many understood that.... you might have mentionned a change in the software... By the way, I am curious. How much feedback did you get from other languages ? Anthere 22:20, 16 December 2005 (UTC)
Following up on proposed policy
The recently discussed/voted on policy seems reasonable, but we should be thinking of how the vandals will get around it. The simple answer is that they will create numerous accounts and let them sit for however long is required to bypass semi-protection before launching attacks. That requires sufficient 'dedication' that it should deter most 'impulse vandals', but the zealots will immediately go for that loophole. Is there any way to prevent/discourage or at least identify that sort of activity? Also, what about the growing list of indefinitely blocked usernames which this policy will spur? Should we have a process for clearing these out so the names can be claimed by legitimate users in the future? Overall this 'semi-protection' idea seems better than the current alternatives, but we should anticipate issues which will arise from it. --CBD ☎ ✉ 00:13, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- These are questions that have been asked about issues other than SP. The username list thing is easy: the devs could clear out accounts with no edits if they wanted to, but there's no technical reason to do so. Any account with >1 edit can't be removed, for obvious reasons.
- We regularly block large numbers of accounts indefinitely seconds after their creation as it is. The determined vandals have been doing this forever. I wouldn't think we will create (m)any more determined vandals with this protection since there is already enough motivation to create throwaway accounts as it is e.g. pagemove vandalism, vandalbots etc. We've handled them all before, and will handle them again (sometimes with dev help, but that's life).
- How to discourage it is worth thinking about, in the larger sense (it isn't a problem peculiar to SP, imo). I don't honestly think that implementing the double hurdle of including an edit count threshold will make much difference to determined vandals: they're determined after all! We couldn't make it a very high numerical threshold for obvious reasons and so your average vandalbot could deal with it easily. I don't have any suggestions off the top of my head; I'm just giving some context. -Splashtalk 00:24, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I think an edit count + time check will indeed make a significant change should our initial sp of only a time check fail. This will remove impulse vandalism, but its not to say that any kid can still write down on a piece of paper the 10 accounts they created today, and wait a few days and then use every single one. Utilizing both checks requires each fake account created to have 50 edits, which is a daunting task unless one uses a vandalbot, which will be in the minority. I think we do need to seriously consider the proposal of deleting fake accounts, as you're going to see account creation substantially increase, and there's going to be a lot of indefinetely banned accounts with 1-10 vandalism edits. There's no reason to keep them around. Is it truly technically impossible to remove these accounts? --kizzle 01:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- We'd be breaking the attribution requirement of the GFDL if we removed the accounts, unless we also removed their edits and any edits that derived those edits from the articles' histories in which they appear. -Splashtalk 01:35, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yikes, that seems like that's going to bite us in the ass years down the road. --kizzle 01:37, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I have wondered about that. The counter argument is that, if the edits are all vandalism that was immediately reverted, then there are no derivative revisions in the later history of the article that would be affected by e.g. a history deletion. We occasionally do remove edits from articles' histories when they are of this nature, althuogh some have questioned whether that is permissible or not. The vandals are authors too, after all, even if they are unwelcome ones. -Splashtalk 01:40, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Hmm, well I guess 20 years down the road if people are using User:JohnSmith30948230948203984, they can just change their sig. --kizzle 01:42, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- .....if we don't usernameblock them for being too similar to the one before! -Splashtalk 01:45, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yeah, User:JohnSmith30948230948203983 makes us all look bad. -User:JohnSmith30948230948203985
- .....if we don't usernameblock them for being too similar to the one before! -Splashtalk 01:45, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Hmm, well I guess 20 years down the road if people are using User:JohnSmith30948230948203984, they can just change their sig. --kizzle 01:42, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I have wondered about that. The counter argument is that, if the edits are all vandalism that was immediately reverted, then there are no derivative revisions in the later history of the article that would be affected by e.g. a history deletion. We occasionally do remove edits from articles' histories when they are of this nature, althuogh some have questioned whether that is permissible or not. The vandals are authors too, after all, even if they are unwelcome ones. -Splashtalk 01:40, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Would it be simple to rename the accounts User:JohnSmith22 becomes User:vandal200512171800... 82.12.106.84 18:10, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- In fact, yes, it would, as long as the vandal has fewer than 6800 edits. We can already change usernames so that might be a way of freeing up desirable names in future, as long as the vandal never became established or anything. -Splashtalk 18:14, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yikes, that seems like that's going to bite us in the ass years down the road. --kizzle 01:37, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- We'd be breaking the attribution requirement of the GFDL if we removed the accounts, unless we also removed their edits and any edits that derived those edits from the articles' histories in which they appear. -Splashtalk 01:35, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I think an edit count + time check will indeed make a significant change should our initial sp of only a time check fail. This will remove impulse vandalism, but its not to say that any kid can still write down on a piece of paper the 10 accounts they created today, and wait a few days and then use every single one. Utilizing both checks requires each fake account created to have 50 edits, which is a daunting task unless one uses a vandalbot, which will be in the minority. I think we do need to seriously consider the proposal of deleting fake accounts, as you're going to see account creation substantially increase, and there's going to be a lot of indefinetely banned accounts with 1-10 vandalism edits. There's no reason to keep them around. Is it truly technically impossible to remove these accounts? --kizzle 01:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
co-operation with Tim Starling's new feature
I saw on GWB that Tim is going to implement a "last good version" feature in January for pages like GWB... will this be used in addition to, instead of, as a primary solution to semi-protection? --kizzle 02:22, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Hrm. Is this getting confused with article validation that is supposed to be coming in Jan? That was a Brion Vibber project, I thought, so perhaps not. Difficult to say without reading something about the feature. It reeks of content review by admins, though. -Splashtalk 02:34, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Amen, brotha. I wonder if the Wikipedia community will actually have a say in this implementation. --kizzle 03:07, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Of course not. Users telling us what to do? Ridiculous idea. ;-) 86.133.53.111 17:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Amen, brotha. I wonder if the Wikipedia community will actually have a say in this implementation. --kizzle 03:07, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Now that we have approval
Are we going to modify the existing protection policy page to incorporate this or do we need to rename that page full protection policy? Seems like a minor thing, but it's not actually. I think we should rename the other page full protection and have this exist as 2 pages, since they are 2 different policies to a large degree. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 02:57, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I would agree with the seperateness, with obvious links between the two. Perhaps in time, they will naturally become One. I would, though avoid impinging upon other, already functional policies, until this one actually switches on. We have no reason, at present, to suppose it will be any time soon. (I am willing to be proved wrong, and to consume my second hat of the day.) -Splashtalk 03:02, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yeah we need to wait until it goes live before actually making any changes. But I wanted to get this debate going because it is important. If it's 2 pages, we need to change PP so it clearly states that it is just for full protection and that there's another page for SP. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 03:14, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Are users going to be able to request semi-protection or will this be applied at the whim of an admin? --kizzle 03:39, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- "Administrators will thus apply semi-protection in the same manner as current protection against vandalism is applied — either on their own initiative or following an alert on an article's talk page, WP:RFPP, WP:AN/I or some other relevant page". -Splashtalk 03:45, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Sweet, although I have a feeling there's going to be a lot of semi-protection requests. --kizzle 03:46, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- So? :-D We can handle it. We currently have about 5-6 new requests a day on RfP. We have 4-5 admins patrolling it. Another 20-30 a day could be handled and I doubt we'll get to those levels. We might get a flood to begin with (and honestly, I think GWB and Daniel Brandt might be SP without specific requests as tests for the policy), but it'll be something we can handle I think. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:01, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Ok, ok, just commenting, wasn't trying to argue! :) --kizzle 04:58, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I know. :) As I said, I'm proud of the discussions we had as a group. I wish all discussions on Wikipedia were that intelligent and civil. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 05:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Ya too bad we all don't live near each other so we can't celebrate and get drunk at a bar and sing karaoke. --kizzle 05:11, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I know. :) As I said, I'm proud of the discussions we had as a group. I wish all discussions on Wikipedia were that intelligent and civil. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 05:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Ok, ok, just commenting, wasn't trying to argue! :) --kizzle 04:58, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- So? :-D We can handle it. We currently have about 5-6 new requests a day on RfP. We have 4-5 admins patrolling it. Another 20-30 a day could be handled and I doubt we'll get to those levels. We might get a flood to begin with (and honestly, I think GWB and Daniel Brandt might be SP without specific requests as tests for the policy), but it'll be something we can handle I think. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:01, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Sweet, although I have a feeling there's going to be a lot of semi-protection requests. --kizzle 03:46, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- "Administrators will thus apply semi-protection in the same manner as current protection against vandalism is applied — either on their own initiative or following an alert on an article's talk page, WP:RFPP, WP:AN/I or some other relevant page". -Splashtalk 03:45, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Are users going to be able to request semi-protection or will this be applied at the whim of an admin? --kizzle 03:39, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yeah we need to wait until it goes live before actually making any changes. But I wanted to get this debate going because it is important. If it's 2 pages, we need to change PP so it clearly states that it is just for full protection and that there's another page for SP. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 03:14, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Great idea
Fantastic idea... I wonder if they can implement this in the MediaWiki software? - Ta bu shi da yu 04:00, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Glad you like it! In Archive 3 (see link up top), Aevar and Brion have both commented without saying it can't be done. They have pointed out that certain things would mean more work or server load than others, and the version on the front page, and subjected to the poll, deliberately avoids asking for those things. -Splashtalk 04:10, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yep. And Jimbo gave pretty damn fast approval. :) He must think it'd be doable or else he wouldn't have. This debate hasn't even been going on for a month yet and Jimbo said yes. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- This makes me wonder if it's a good time to bring up another MediaWiki idea I had - locking sections rather than entire pages. This would probably be well beyond the scope of what's being discussed, though. --Starkruzr 11:41, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Yep. And Jimbo gave pretty damn fast approval. :) He must think it'd be doable or else he wouldn't have. This debate hasn't even been going on for a month yet and Jimbo said yes. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Btw
I added a note to the top stating that this has yet to be implemented. Hopefully that'll stave off early requests. Edit it if you feel like it could be worded better. --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 04:08, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I also changed the tense on some of the words and spelled out the acronyms since this is official policy now. :) Needs to be readable for John Q. Wiki. :) --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 05:23, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
WebDSign
There is a way to implement such protection in a non-intrusive way: WebDSign application to Wikipedia.
Nasty side-effect
There seems to be a nasty side-effect to this change. Consider the pages that a new user is most likely to visit and edit. It will commonly be one of the most popular articles, which are probably also the most vandalised articles. In a way, this change prevents a new user from making an edit to a page as they see necessary.
I would have thought that just disabling anonymous edits on semi-protected pages would have been a good place to start, before denying new users edits on popular pages. - James Foster 11:38, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- We've discussed and debated all of that. Here is a quick rehash. And btw, popular doesn't always equal most vandalized. And we're talking 20-30 articles at most. Anyway, you can read the rest for yourself. :) --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 12:27, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- There does remain the possibility of letting X = 0. The implicit supposition at present is, so far as I understand it, that it would actually be the sam X as currently restricts access to the "move" button. -Splashtalk 16:59, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
New topics immune to Semi-protection
I like the idea in general, and while Semi-protection is designed for oft-vandalised pages, I would like to recommend that it not be possible for anyone to semi-protect a new article for ndays after its creation.. even if it's being vandalised. This allows the maximum number of people to participate in the article's 'birth', even if it's a painful birth. My primary reason for this recommendation is that it ensures the Wikipedia is able to be immediately up-to-date with breaking news from people who've never edited before.--RickMeasham 12:22, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I just don't see the need for that. For one thing, articles are rarely protected now that are only a few days old. Secondly, as we've stated before, we're trying to start with as few restrictions as possible. I don't see admins semi-protecting pages that are 2-3 days old. They don't fully protect new articles, so I'm not sure why they would semi-protect new articles when it's clearly for prolonged vandalism. Admins are pretty self-policing. Trust me. I've been yelled at enough to know. :) --Woohookitty(cat scratches) 12:30, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- heh .. thanks for assuaging my concerns :) --RickMeasham 12:39, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Indeed. One might reasonably suppose that brand new pages would usually be free-ish from vandalism at first anyway. THey might well face an edit-war over any number of things, but as the front page says, semi-protection would definitely not be appropriate then. -Splashtalk 16:41, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- heh .. thanks for assuaging my concerns :) --RickMeasham 12:39, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Good work
And here I was thinking that Wikipedia would be able to avoid the classic decay and decline of other internet communities, the steady erosion of the basic principles that made the community and project work in the first place. Ah, innocence. Doesn't anyone remember that VotingIsEvil? The Cunctator 13:53, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- If properly implemented, I think the gains in quality and professional tone will attract more than enough new editors to make up for the ones turned off by the policy. If improperly implemented, then you're right, Wikipedia will end up turning in on itself like other internet communities. We'll just have to see to it that it's properly implemented, eh? Or I suppose we can give up, declare the whole thing a loss, and go home. We all have to make that choice individually. Stephen Aquila 15:37, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- This is, at very worst, a minor 'erosion' of principles. It will be applied no more widely, I hope, than full-protection is at present. So there will be no greater number of pages protected than there already are, and for no longer. The community will see to that. It is, at best, a de-erosion of principles since, rather than having 0.11% of editors able to edit a page, and forbidden by long-standing convention from doing so, something like 96-98% of contributors will be able to edit the page. There is no suggestion that we apply this to random pages just 'because'. Do read carefully the wording on the front page that refers to pages facing serious vandalism. Voting is evil. Yes, we know. The immense amount of discussion that went with it (you did read the whole of the archive, yes?) and the allaying of most fears that it resulted in is a good thing. The straw poll is just an optional extra to clarify the process. -Splashtalk 16:41, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Should Wikipedia:Semi-protection policy be semi-protected?
;-) The policy page just got slashdotted 4 ½ hours ago. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 15:56, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- No, since Semiprotection is not a proposal to pre-emptively protect pages that might face vandalism. :) It's a well-written policy, you see! -Splashtalk 16:41, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Although it was a lighthearted joke when I first wrote that, it looks like we're starting to see some of the residual effects of the slashdotting now, in the form of vandalism. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 17:01, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Now {{vprotected}}. Flcelloguy (A note?) 17:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Although it was a lighthearted joke when I first wrote that, it looks like we're starting to see some of the residual effects of the slashdotting now, in the form of vandalism. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 17:01, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Smooth move to whoever protected it
You protected the wrong version. Notice the nice "HA HA" @ the bottom! 68.39.174.238 17:02, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Now reverted. Cut it out, or you will be blocked. Flcelloguy (A note?) 17:05, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I don't think it was him. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 17:12, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- It wasn't. 68.39.174.238 is the infamous "RVC" anti-vandal. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 17:13, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Support from Jimbo
How is that one sentence relevant? I get the feeling this is used to round up votes from those who admire him, a sort of appeal to authority or respect. Anyway, I do not think a statement like that should be put in bold fonts on a project page, it's just silly. --Friðrik Bragi Dýrfjörð 17:16, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- It was Jimbo who wrote it there, and if Jimbo says green is red, then green is red. →AzaToth 17:19, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I think he's talking about the note at the very bottom of the page, "Jimbo has also expressed his support.", which Splash added [2], not the press disclaimer at the top. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 17:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Ah, ok, that should be removed yes →AzaToth 17:22, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I think he's talking about the note at the very bottom of the page, "Jimbo has also expressed his support.", which Splash added [2], not the press disclaimer at the top. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 17:21, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- Well said, that man. Jimbo might call the shots at the upper level, but he is not a God. Statement such as, "if Jimbo says X is Y, then X is Y" are completely ridiculous. If Jimbo told you to jump off a bridge, would you do it?
- As to whether or not Jimbo's support for something should be allowed to influence whether or not people support it as well; well, if they do, that's their lookout. At the end of the day, are you a dog, a sheep, or one of the pigs? 86.133.53.111 17:26, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I just feel like it goes against the NPOV policy, even though it isn't an article. If a person has an opinion and supports it with valid and good argument, should that opinion be on the project page in bold fonts? If I had used this as an argument in support of this policy, those who argued against it would have said that such an argument is invalid, the fact that Jimbo supports something or not doesn't make it right or wrong. I don't have anything against Jimbo, I just don't like to think of him as something more (or less) than an equal even though he might be thought of as a first among equals. --Friðrik Bragi Dýrfjörð 17:41, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- As to whether or not Jimbo's support for something should be allowed to influence whether or not people support it as well; well, if they do, that's their lookout. At the end of the day, are you a dog, a sheep, or one of the pigs? 86.133.53.111 17:26, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Jimbo expressed his support only after the close of the straw poll and the {policy} tag was added only after Jimbo had expressed his support. It was not used for recruitment purposes, and is there merely as a justification for the {policy} status of the page. And anyway, if Jimbo says we do something, we do it. -Splashtalk 17:54, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
- I wasn't accusing you (or anyone) of rigging the votes, but using this as a justification is silly. The votes justify the policy (and are sufficient), Jimbos comments are completely irrelevant as a justification in this example. If Angela had noted somewhere she didn't like the policy, should that be in bold fonts on the policy page? --Friðrik Bragi Dýrfjörð 18:31, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
Voting is evil
JOHN SEIGENTHALER WAS THE REICHSTAG FIRE
WIKIPEDIANS HAVE VOTED FOR THEIR OWN ENSLAVEMENT
FASCIST DILDOS ARE SEIZING DICTATORIAL CONTROL
FREE THE ANONYMOUS EDITORS
Splash (talk · contribs) attempted to remove this free speech message
- Oh, get over it. It was an edit conflict that was unresolved. Yes, I can't stand free speech. Hates it, we do. Hates it. -Splashtalk 17:59, 17 December 2005 (UTC)