Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 71

Inappropriate RfO closures

All,

I bring to your attention the closures of Majorly's and Barras' RfOs by NonvocalScream.

These elections have, in my opinion, been closed inappropriately for three reasons. Firstly, the closure of RfXs should not be undertaken by anyone but an elected Bureaucrat - this is, after all, what we appointed them to do - regardless of whether it is vote counting or not. Secondly, NVS has a clear COI with the elections, being involved with them, and so should not have closed them. Finally, the votes should be left to run for the specified time period and not closed early - there is no "SNOW pass".

I request that until this is resolved neither Majorly nor Barras use their Oversight tools and instead continue to request actions from the Stewards.

Regards,

Goblin 11:00, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Nifky!

Let's not dramatize this too much; as outlined by Barras and others, there is a pressing need for this Wikipedia to get local oversighters. Both Barras and Majorly had no oppose votes, and both of them had the 25 support votes, as required by meta. In order to get a more robust system, our intent here should be to get a third oversighter, so that if one of the two current ones quits or becomes inactive, we are not in a hurry to re-elect a candidate. Can I therefore invite all those regulars who have not voted yet, to express their opinion on the remaining candidates? - Thanks. --Eptalon (talk) 11:28, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

To make another point that I have thought about, there were still about two weeks to run - in that time there could very easily have been a mass of Opposes made, which could have changed the outcome. All Oversighters should be elected at once, not in drips and drabs. Goblin 11:31, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman!

You do not have to be a crat to close anything except RFA. This is because only a crat can grant the sysop flag. Anyone else can close other discussions. Yes I participated in the vote, and there were no opposes. This means that opposition was unlikely and the discussion could close. There was no conflict of interest as it was just a vote count. But I will wait for other's to comment. I have however, no issue with the tools being used in the interim. NonvocalScream (talk) 12:14, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Two incorrect points: "there were still about two weeks to run" - no, RFO don't have an ending date, they only end once consensus, or otherwise is reached. "the closure of RfXs should not be undertaken by anyone but an elected Bureaucrat" - no, bureaucrats close RFAs and RFBs. Checkuser and oversight are a totally different set of tools. Additionally, if I see something that needs oversighting, I will be oversighting it myself. Enough of this dramamongering nonsense. Majorly talk 12:44, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

And assuming we go with adminship length of time, a week, it was closed about 14 hours earlier than that. But conditions for oversight were met. So why drag out for another two weeks? I never saw in the entire time one good reason for postponing these elections, and dragging them out for a ridiculous length of time. Majorly talk 12:48, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

We now have two oversighters, can we perhaps focus on getting a third one, for the reasons cited above, rather than talking this to death? --Eptalon (talk) 13:13, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I already supported everyone running, there isn't much I can do. Majorly talk 13:15, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

On a side note: per Wikipedia:Simple talk/Archive 70#Current consensus, only the best 3 candidates will be promoted (which means there is only 1 free spot now for the next candidate to reach 25 support votes). This also means that the remainder will have their RfOs closed as "unsuccessful" even if they have the required number of votes. Chenzw  Talk  14:42, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any consensus there, only mixed views. If more than one more gets 25 votes, then they shouldn't be prevented from being promoted. If they are, I will resign so at least one can take my place. Majorly talk 15:08, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

And only Eptalon and me commented there, so it is clearly not a consensus. Barras || talk 15:11, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

To Chenzw: I know the last consensus was to have no more than 3 oversighters. But is there a meta policy that prevents a wiki from having more than 3 oversighters? —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 14:59, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

No. Majorly talk 15:08, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't know/recall if the consensus was to elect exactly three, or at least two. If we agree on exactly three, it is probably a bad idea to give the spot to the next person who reaches 25 support. Rather we should look who the best candidate for the spot is. At the moment we have two, which is workable. Can we postpone the closing until either time's up, or there is visibly no more movemement in the process? - This also gives us time to agree on what we want. --Eptalon (talk) 15:13, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

If we're going to do any changing of rules/what we want etc then the two currently closed RfOs should be re-opened and the rights revoked - especially if we are going to be choosing the candidates... Like I said, these haven't been thought out enough, were rushed again and we're paying the consequences now. Goblin 15:16, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Nifky!

Can we nominate this incident as drama of the week, please? - We all agreed we need two oversighters. The two people currently holding the position were elected with no oppose votes. All the other candidates do have oppose votes. - Put yourself in the position of the closing steward/crat at the end of this month? - Which one of the candidates is probably best for the n positions? - Probably those who have the most support, while fulfilling the requirements? - The two we have now, have 25 and 26 support votes, and no oppose votes, respectively. The remaining four still running all have a number of oppose votes (and not 25 support votes yet), so they are necessarily the worse choices than what we have now. Since we seem to have a need for oversighters, why not go with what we have? - Is there any use in demoting the two now, to re-promote them in two weeks' time? --Eptalon (talk) 15:34, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Short answer: yes. Goblin 15:36, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman!

Eptalon, the patronising tone is not required. Have you forgotten that "there is no rush" here. We've managed forever without a local OS, there was no need to prematurely promote anyone. We are all very clearly aware that on this Wiki, things/editors tend to appear at the last minute - closing any RFx too early is questionable, particularly when it involves something as important as this. The Rambling Man (talk) 17:22, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I fully concur. hmwithτ 18:13, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Clarification: I agree that they should still be open. There's no need to be in such a hurry. This all happened so quickly. Someone a vacation or busy at the moment could have missed everything. They could have been left open for a longer period of time. hmwithτ 18:18, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

That does it. I will be resigning as soon as another is elected. I'm sick and tired of this bloody dramamongering about nothing. Majorly talk 18:32, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

At the end of the day, we don't need to freak out and push stuff through when there's no use for doing it. Why is everyone here in such a rush? The Rambling Man (talk) 18:36, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

• You all know, that simple Wikipedia's status in the WMF is very bad. We are not really respected by lots of other. We have every week at least one ne drama. I'm really surprised, that we still have editers here on simple and that not all have left this project. We discuss and discuss and discuss. There is no more what we do. We should be ashamed to have so many drama on such a small project with only a handful editors. I fully understand that no one wants to edit this wiki. All what is done will be questioned (and yes, I know this post will be questioned as well). I fully understand that users like Exert and Juliancolton resigned their adminship. We all help voluntarily. Many of us spend a lot of time on the WMF projects. This wiki is a shame for the WMF, I'm ashamed to be here. I'm tired of reading discussions like this one. "User:xyz has done this, and because I have no better things to do I disagree. Now lets discuss this until we all die." This wiki is atm more a forum for dicussions and not an encyclopaedia. To be here and try to help voluntarily is getting more and more annoying. All users here act in good faith and no one respect this. The two closed requests had a very clear consensus. No opposes. 25 and 26 supports. Majorly is one of the most trusted users here on simple and this discussion brings him to say, that he want to resigned his oversightship when there is another oversighter. I'm very sad to see this. I think, or better I know and be sure, that in the next two weeks of the vote will nothing change. Two other candidates have atm 4 opooses. They don't have any chance to get the missing support votes, because on this wiki aren't that much users, for the reason mentioned above. We (Eptalon and me) tried to make a clear rule for the oversight elections. And what was the result??? No one, yes no one else said anything to an useful discussion. But here (when the things happend like it was), here discuss user and say the discussion between me and Eptalon is the current consensus. No, it's definitifly not. Eptalon nor I make consensus. It happened now this way. The closure was correctly done. We have NO rules for oversight elections locally, so no one should disagree. It is too late to discuss rules for the elections, now. We have no consensus, that only the best three will get the tools. If all other four will reach the needed 25 votes in the next two weeks, so all four will be elected. It's pretty late, now. @Majorly: I hope you will not resign your oversightship. You were correctly elected. I will not resigned oversight ship. If we go now and let remove the oversight tool, it would only damage the image of this image more (if this is possible). And in two weeks, we request perhabs the tools back. This is pretty useless. Other will say: "Simple wiki, the joke of the WMF". And btw, the elections don't need to be closed at the same time. E.g. the checkusers weren't elected all at the same time. Were is the problem when two have the tools earlier? There isn't a problem. And per one of the sections above, Simple should keep things local. The would help to keep things local. Thant's all from me now. Good evening all and I hope it is understandable, what I've just writen now.) Barras || talk 19:51, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
  • Yeah. But the main point remains - what's the rush? The Rambling Man (talk) 20:03, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
    • No. It was absolutly correct closed, otherwise the steward hadn't grat the flags. And all know that we need oversighters. Barras || talk 20:05, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
      • Long story said short: SEWP = WMF fail. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 20:08, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Firstly, as this is clearly aimed at me, you'll find that I write quite a lot of articles and do have better things to do than sit around discussing discussing discussing. You'll find that I participate in a lot less discussions than I used too. We're already a joke wiki because we don't discuss things such as the OS elections - ever thought that perhaps people were on holiday, and thus didn't have a chance to comment? I remember that was the main reason as cited for waiting... but no no no, because we are a playground for users to be able to what they want and get whatever rights they want we're just going to go and get Oversight straight away, as well as make silly proposals like the one below. What we need to make our image better is to get rid of troublesome users and toughen up on what exactly is acceptable. We need to stop using this page as a forum and start following some basic policies. We need to all focus on things that matter and stop complaining at every little thing that goes on. However, we need to accept that some things do need discussion and shouldn't be rushed - no matter how long it takes. Who really cares if it takes an extra 30 seconds to get something removed because we have to poke a Steward? That's what they are there do to btw. Yes, i'm guilty of some of this myself, but at least i'm not one of these users who I see doing minimal article work, yet have some of the highest positions. Note there are many more people I could have used. I would write more but I think I am about to throw up. Goblin 20:43, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Kennedy!

@Snake: For once, I agree with you.

@TRM: Precisely.

@barras: Yes, we need them, but not if it's of sub-standard quality. It was an incorrect close, end of.

@eptalon: Please, stop skirting around the issue. I think this has highlighted some pretty major points. Goblin 20:43, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Kennedy!

• Concur with Barras & Eptalon, I was hoping my incident was drama of the week, but I lost to BG7's complaint :(. Griffinofwales (talk) 20:46, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

• @Bluegoblin7: You seem to be talking a lot of smack on who to get rid of. FYI, I was here at this wiki far longer than you have. I also had some respect in this wiki before I left this project temporarily and the people who respected me also left soon after. The reason why I decided to leave for months was because I was fed up with all the drama, especially in this wikipedia. I hoped clearing my head would make things better, but it seems to have gotten worse. Face it, this wikipedia no longer has a point. Users play games over here and vandals get another chance to be obnoxious. Even if we tried to concentrate on writing articles there is still too many distractions, like how come my/your/his/her article is not simple english. Until another school year starts again for me, I'm just waste time here. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 20:58, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Damage control

• The discussion above has turned into needless drama(mongering). Damage has been done, and is done with every new post. The big question is not who did what, and if they did so correctly, but rather: What can we do to control/manage the damage done? - The race is running, changing the rules now is pointless. Therefore, what can we do to control the damage done. Please also be reminded that this is on-wiki; this is no place to let the frustrations out by dramamongering. We want to build an encyclopedia. An Oversighter, CheckUser, Bureaucrat or Admin does not directly help with reaching that goal. For lack of a better idea, I'll re-state what has resulted from countless discussions:
• We have not agreed otherwise, any candidate reaching 25 support votes, with at least 80% support will be made Oversighter.
• NonvocalScream acted correctly; whether he should have waited another two weeks is debatable. Undoing/redoing will make us look silly though.
• we do not need a weekly drama; we should be writing articles or improving them.

Open for flames. ;) --Eptalon (talk) 20:18, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

• A consensus has already emerged above. It is already there. You can see there is an agreement that we did the right thing. Even tho I dislike the archival templates on active discussion... I don't think I would complain if an uninvolved editor could nicely summarise the consensus in the above discussion, and place the templates. Please. I can't focus. Thanks, NonvocalScream (talk) 00:53, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

• Addressing the main points brought up by BG7: firstly, we had unanimous support, so the result was obvious. Secondly, we had unanimous support, so it didn't matter if NVS closed it as successful. Thirdly, there was unanimous support. Seeing that we didn't have a policy on oversight elections, we followed meta, which only stated vote requirements. In addition, the original intention was to allow editors on summer vacation to have a chance to vote. Looking at the number of us here, most have already voted. Those that did not vote were either informed on IRC or their user talk (and didn't vote, but still edited other pages). The points therefore do not stand. Please move along. Chenzw  Talk  01:55, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Deletion user rights

Resolved. Snake withdrew his original comments. The Rambling Man (talk) 18:38, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

I propose to add a new user rights that would enable non-admins to delete articles labeled {{QD}}, which is an administrative function granted to trusted users. Trusted users with the deletion rights would be allowed to delete vandalism or test articles from anon IPs. Essentially, the user right would be similiar to rollbackers. The tool would be used solely to fight vandalism. Admins should be allowed to grant and revoke the deleting rights. Abuse of the tool can be quickly solved by having an admin remove the abuser from his rights, and a possible block. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 18:07, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Completely unneeded - furthermore it's very easily abusable - you can't control what can be deleted. Goblin 18:08, 15 August 2009 (UTC) I ♥ Fr33kman!

Agreed. If you're trusted enough to delete articles, run for adminship. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 18:09, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

(E/C)Sorry, but I oppose the idea. That's why we have admins. Most users here are already admins and there's usually at least one around at any time. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 18:10, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict x 50000) No need. The bar for adminship is not as high here as it is on en-wp. hmwithτ 18:11, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Proposal removed. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 18:34, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Comment - Rollbackers and admins can also abuse their rights as well. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 18:36, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Admins we trust not to abuse their rights. Also a user abusing rollback doesn't do as much damage as one abusing delete - if I was to abuse rollback all my changes could be reverted easily (I have a script that can do this) - however if I was to abuse delete (I know I can't delete but lets assume I can :) I could do a lot of damage; consider this:

• article a has 3000 revisions, article b has 1000 and article c has 1000
• delete article a and move article b to a
• delete b and move c to a
• restore article a

article a now has the history of both b and c AND it is over 5000 revisions, this means that the article cannot be delete (well, it can be delete by a steward or dev...) to clean up the history. That case would require developer intervention to fix. --Chris 01:43, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

And a great deal of time to correct the histmerge. NonvocalScream (talk) 01:56, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Anon editing

Link to previous discussion: here

I think that we've now reached the point where anonymous editing is not providing us with any benefits. In the past few hours for instance we have had to deal with a massive flurry of personal attacks and heavy amount of vandalism. I think that useful anon edits probably stand at less than 2% of all anon edits. I'd like to encourage the community to consider turning off the ability of anons to edit at all. Thanks! fr33kman ^talk 05:26, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

No, I can not support this at all. I can support the limiting of anons, but they must be permitted to edit. NonvocalScream (talk) 05:31, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I would support this if it was very common, over a couple of days, but since this has only happened once, I would not be supporting it yet. Sorry. иιƒкч? 05:33, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

It's happened loads and loads and loads of times. We get masses of anon vandalism every day. I personally don't think it's buying us anything. It'd still be the encyclopedia that anyone can edit; they can just get an account first. It's still anonymous, I don't know who most of the people on this project are in real life. fr33kman ^talk 05:36, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I feel very uncomfortable. Can we attempt autoconfirmed first? Best, NonvocalScream (talk) 05:41, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

This is a single round of this type of editing. If IPs couldn't create pages, we'd just have a slew of new accounts creating the pages instead. EVula // talk // ☯ // 05:59, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Whoa, because I'm crazy tired (long day), I totally missed what you were actually saying. No, IP editing will never be disabled; take it up with the Wikimedia Foundation, as it's a policy of theirs that utterly trumps any one project's consensus. (even if we all agreed to turn it off, it wouldn't happen) EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:02, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I think some projects already disallow IP editing. Majorly was mentioning them. fr33kman ^talk 06:13, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

News to me. I know some projects (like enwiki) have disabled anonymous page creation, but I wasn't aware of any project that turned off anonymous editing entirely. EVula // talk // ☯ // 06:18, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll check with Majorly, I think it's one of the smaller wikis. I'm pretty sure that it's okay by WMF policy. Anyone can still edit, they just need an account. fr33kman ^talk 06:29, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually it was Djsasso who said it happens on other wikis already. fr33kman ^talk 06:37, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Today is an example of why we should ban anonymous editing, though I don't know if we have the authority to do so. Mythdon (talk • changes) 06:14, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I just created my account less than 24 hours ago, but yet I had to deal with this harassment along with two administrators, and the victim within less than 24 hours of joining this Wikipedia. Wow. I didn't expect that my first 24 hours here would be this. Mythdon (talk • changes) 06:21, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

You joined on a bad day: LOL :) fr33kman ^talk 06:29, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I actually don't feel bad, to be honest, but yes, I did join on a "bad day". Mythdon (talk • changes) 06:31, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Banning IP editing is like saying anyone who is not an admin in this wiki is not welcome. Its true that the majority of vandalism comes from IPs, but almost everyone here who has an account and is a regular editor is also an admin, or former admin. If we made a requirement to have a user account just to edit here, we would be more of a failure in the eyes of WMF, meta, and ENWP. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 08:04, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

• Definitely agree with original proposal. There's no need for anyone to edit logged out, ever, and it was a mistake to begin with. It takes less than 30 seconds to create an account. I can only see benefits here, and the arguments "I'm just not comfortable" against are not compelling. If people are unhappy with this, I propose new page creation by IPs is removed. Majorly talk 09:23, 16 August 2009 (UTC)
•  (change conflict)  (change conflict) Agree entirely with Majorly. If IPs want to create pages, they go to something like Wikipedia:Requests for articles. I'd always preferred the enWP system. Anyway, we must agree, 99.99% of the pages created by IPs are deleted. They're either G2s or G1s or similar. On the other hand, disabling edits is a poor way to tackle vandalism. Regards, Pmlineditor  Talk 09:33, 16 August 2009 (UTC)
• Sorry, I can't support the complete disabling of anonymous editing. However, disabling page creation is a good idea to handle vandalism and actually encourages IPs to contribute content (to existing pages or by creating an account). To tackle the mass creation of pages by new (vandal) users, we could follow what the Chinese Wikipedia does and force the preview of an edit before saving for un-autoconfirmed users, achieved using JS. Chenzw  Talk  09:27, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

(E/C)It's the whole thing about Wikipedia: Anyone can edit it. Maybe some people don't want to create an account. It does happen. Look at RC on ENWP. You'll see that there are some constructive edits from IPs there. You could create an account and make a load of PAs; same thing. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 09:30, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

It's easier to keep track of things with accounts than it is with IPs. Also, with regards to "anyone can edit", that does not mean what you think it means. It means anyone as in the person, not by which method (anon or named user). Anyone can still edit the wiki, they just need to spend 20 seconds making an account first. IP editing is actually much less anonymous than editing with a user account. IP editors run the risk of having their actual PC compromised. fr33kman ^talk 17:04, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

No. If this is that much of a problem, disable anon page creation or enable the abusefilter. This is not the solution. (btw, Chenzw force preview won't work because users can just disable javascript) --Chris 09:36, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Agree with Chris, enabling the abusefilter is an excellent idea. 70.244.155.191 (talk) 09:40, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, I disagree. Not all anonymous editors are bad and not all registered users are good. I don't think it will do anything to protect vandalism, just like with IPs all you have to do is sign up for an account and after it's blocked, you use another proxy and start all over again. As said, Wikipedia is for anyone to edit. [: --<font=Comic Sans MS>S3CR3T ♥s you! 17:39, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

No way. I disagree, as I am an anon myseldf. I can't create an account because I would just get blocked in just about two days. 78.144.101.149 (talk) 18:31, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Why would you be blocked in two day? fr33kman ^talk 19:29, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Because I would be a sockpuppet. 89.240.183.132 (talk) 17:57, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Then you make my case perfectly don't you. You should not be editing here as an anon either if you are an already banned user. fr33kman ^talk 19:38, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

2% is an incredibly low number. I think that about 50% (or more) of IP edits are productive. Yes, there are problems created, but there are a lot of articles created by IPs, a lot of vandalism reverted by IPs, and a lot of expansion by IPs. Yes, it is as easy as creating an account, but some IPs do not want to (for whatever reason [usually it's because they're stubborn]). I had over 100 edits with my IP before I decided I like WP enough, and decided to create an account. Because our WP focuses on children (who are unlikely to create an account immediately), or ESL people (who might not want to create one), it should be kept open (even if it does mean protecting user pages, adding names to the blacklist, etc., the positive outweighs the negative). Griffinofwales (talk) 21:32, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

Do you have any proof that ESL people will be less likely to create accounts than native speakers? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 23:49, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

No real proof, but it makes sense. English users feel more comfortable writing in their own language and more secure. Same with some ESL users. They feel secure in their language, and not so secure here or at enWP (where they probably went first). Griffinofwales (talk) 23:55, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

If that were true, it would render this project useless, no? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 23:56, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

They would feel insecure editing Wikipedia, not reading it (IMO, I compare them in a way to children, almost the same). Griffinofwales (talk) 23:59, 16 August 2009 (UTC)

I think people misunderstand "anyone can edit". Disabling anon editing will not prevent anyone from editing. They would just have to take the extremely minor effort to create an account to do so. Instead of a load of meaningless numbers, these contributors will have a recognisable name, and this silly "anyone can edit" business still works all the same. Majorly talk 00:35, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

If IP editing had not been enabled at enWP (different project, I know), I would not be here. I would have read articles, and that's it. IP editors are our future admins (true!). We should welcome them. There is an IP editor who has 22000 edits at commons and enWP combined! Not a vandal! Maybe we should invite him here. Griffinofwales (talk) 00:45, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

If IP editing had not been enabled at enWP and you wanted to edit, you'd have created an account very quickly. What if scenarios are impossible to substantiate. Personally, I started out as an IP editor. It doesn't mean I wouldn't be here. If the IP wants to come here, they can very quickly and easily create an account. It's not rocket science, and there's only positives in doing so. Majorly talk 00:47, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

No, I wouldn't have. I thought about creating an account, but there were many unknowns, and I wasn't sure what was going to be expected of me. I think a better solution is to isolate the regular good IPs who edit here, and invite them to create an account. There are some IPs who flat out don't want an account (I have no clue why), but they don't. I can provide an example if you want one (if I remember where I found it). Griffinofwales (talk) 00:52, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

If they can't be bothered to create an account, they aren't serious about being here. There are exceptions of course and it would be sad to lose them. But for every one good IP editor there are 1,000 bad ones. The benefits of blocking IP editing far outweigh the negatives on a project our size. -DJSasso (talk) 00:54, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

You can not logically infer that those who do not create an account are not serious. NonvocalScream (talk) 00:58, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Not in the current setup, but if you were forced to create an account, and creating one which takes seconds is too much work...well then yes you can logically infer that editing an article properly would also be too much work. -DJSasso (talk) 01:00, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Griffin, your argument goes completely because you're editing from an account right now. Majorly talk 01:04, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

• If I want to add references to porn, using my DVD porn collection, I might do it logged out. Should I have a second account for that? Just as a hypothetical. NonvocalScream (talk) 00:58, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

 (change conflict) Well, all of us have to die someday and who's going to replace us? The IPs. We have to encourage them, not the other way around. Cmt on last sentence: Actually, there are a lot of good IPs here. They usually do minor stuff, but we get a few good articles every day (about a week ago an IP created a bunch of new articles (not one liners) about Pakistan, and they were notable). @NVS: Yes, a second account, (User:Pornfreak?) Griffinofwales (talk) 01:00, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

The Pakistan editor is actually one of the reasons we want it. He creates really bad POV articles that we keep having to delete and he refuses to communicate with anyone about them. -DJSasso (talk) 01:02, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I expect very strongly more named editors will replace us actually. As I don't plan to die for another 80 years or so, it's not an issue at all. As for the Pakistan editor... well, what Djsasso said. Majorly talk 01:04, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

• And yes NVS. I would want a second account if you were too embarassed to do it with your main account. Using an IP is actually easier to trace back to you than a random username. -DJSasso (talk) 01:03, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

• I've seen a lot of good contributions - and a lot of good page creations coming from IP editors. If you think there is too much vandalism, a better option would be to enhance the antivandal bots (or get one of en.wiki's to work here as well) and enable the abuse filter. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 06:34, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
• I agree with Philosopher here. We should not be disallowing IPs from making new pages and we should never completely block IPs from editing in total. Both of these go against the purpose of the Wikipedia and if you guys are having trouble with the vandalism, like Philosopher said, get a better anti-vandal bot. Cheers, Razorflame 07:03, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Also, if this has been sparked by the amount of IP vandalism which has need oversighting, this is definitely not the solution. They will simply start creating accounts and then editing - this will in fact hinder our efforts to stop them because then only checkusers will be able to see their IP addresses. Also, I think vandals will regard this as a victory against Wikipedia and it may encourage them to continue. The only kind of vandals this will stop are driveby vandals (e.g. bored kids at school) - there is no evidence to support the theory that this will stop more persistent and long term vandals. --Chris 08:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I think Chris has made some good points here --Peterdownunder (talk) 12:12, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

If we disallow anon editing, they will create hundreds of usernames and surely many which needs to be hidden. And btw, there is atm still enough which needs to be oversighted. So far, I don't need more work *lazyis*. I think it is not helpful to disallow anons. Barras || talk 12:33, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Closing requests...

Hello all,

I think we need to seriously need to discuss who closes what kind of requests, after what time; this is in the context of assigning privileges/flags (Admin, Crat, CU, Oversighter). My take on this may be too simple, but I'll state it here anyway:

• (Crats) do not close requests where they voted, if it can be avoided. This is to prevent so-called Conflicts of interests
• Closing requests before time's up server little - most requests are not that pressing.

Please express your opinion, so we can find a way to get a guideline (based on consesus) on this matter. Note that I simply started the discussion; by the end, consensus on something is hopefully evident. --Eptalon (talk) 18:58, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Three proper closes... I don't think there is a problem with the process. NonvocalScream (talk) 19:00, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia talk:Non-admin closure for the beginning of this discussion the other day. -DJSasso (talk) 19:02, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I believe that only bureaucrats should be closing RfAs and RfBs. RfOS and RfCUs should be left to stewards to make the ultimate decision and then closed by a bureaucrat here. RfDs, GAVs and VGAVs could be closed by administrators. This is my opinion that non-administrators really don't have any real right to close any requests unless it is a clearcut WP:SNOW case. Cheers, Razorflame 19:02, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I think that closing a vote with the final supporting vote is just a crazy thing to do and expect people to not cry foul. We have plenty of 'crats around here, or are we now saying there's virtually no point in them? There's nothing to rush for, we can get on with things in regular time. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:06, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

This sums up my position. -DJSasso (talk) 19:11, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Frankly, I don't see why we have to come up with our own rules on this. EN wiki seems to have hammered this out pretty well, imo. So let's just copy their rules for it here and avoid the (needless) drama. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 04:46, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Getting things right

You know we keep trying and failing miserably. Recently, there was the thread about what should we do with stubs. We seem to have forgotten about that... Well, you all know we're going through hard times, the drama level is high but we all know that wikipedia is an encyclopedia built to make it better so people can benefit from it; and we aren't here to argue. This is why I want this to reach a conclusion.

We have to concentrate on getting articles to GA/VGA status or just writting articles that are good without having the little star or plus sign. These will be the things that'l most likely attract new editors. We have the List of articles all languages should have, so why not build those articles first?

There are different stages to building a GA. Writting the article, simplifying, reviewing the article, and fixing the points the reviewer found. What we need is to determine what each person is good at doing/wants to do. So I'm asking you what do you think you're good at doing or what do you want to do? Once we get things going it should work easily. We take every article in the List one by one, and we all do what we've selected. The people that write the article start, then come the simplifying team (in the mean time the writing team starts work on another article), then the reviewers come and review it, and the fixing teams is last. Once we've done one, things should work like a chain. It's no more complicated than that.

Please only choose the one thing you'd like to do.

Write/Expand the articles

• Razorflame 22:36, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
• —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 11:02, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Simplify the articles

• --<font=Comic Sans MS>S3CR3T ♥s you! 22:20, 17 August 2009 (UTC)
• hmwithτ 14:33, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Fix the issues found by the reviewers

• Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 10:35, 18 August 2009 (UTC)
• Pmlineditor  Talk 10:36, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Thanks you for your time. Remember we are here to build a wiki, and if you don't want to go and write articles that help others, well you obvisouly don't really care that much for it. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 22:14, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I must disagree. The goal is to build quality articles; GAs and VGAs have minuscule and cosmetic requirements that force you to spend hours of effort on a single article, when instead you could be improving multiple ones. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 22:18, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to help simplify the articles. :) --<font=Comic Sans MS>S3CR3T ♥s you! 22:20, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Then please do! :-) fr33kman ^talk 22:36, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Quality articles are those that a reader can browse and learn from in a reliable manner. They are not GA/VGA. Those can be quality, but perhaps are not always so. The important people for this project are the readers, not the editors. Yes, we do the work, but we do it for the reader. I've only got a single GA, but I think I've written lots of quality. A paper encyclopedia such as Britannica might have many small entries and many long and comprehensive ones, but the whole thing is still quality. We're trying to do the same with bits and bytes. fr33kman ^talk 22:36, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Well put, fr33kman. I will definitely help the Simple English Wikipedia help others by providing as many good non-GA or VGA articles as I can write. I will try to provide at least one a day, if not more than one. Cheers, Razorflame 22:38, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

@fr33kman:I agree, but doing this as a team is easier, more fun, better, and makes you Learn new things. By doing this together, we will reach a certain standard, and we can call the articles GA or VGA if we want to, but it's by no means necessary. We just want to reach a good standard. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 22:41, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

A team is only a group of individuals who work towards a common goal. We can all agree that the common goal is a quality encyclopedia, but not every member of the team does the same job. We all have strengths and weaknesses. Some are good at copyediting, others at simplifying, yet others at writing articles from scratch. Other people are good at importing from other Wikipedia's. What matters is the goal of enabling the reader with more limited English skills to be able to learn. We work for the reader, after all. Remember, if one team member is not working towards the goal, so what, you (the individual) can still do your job. fr33kman ^talk 22:48, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

But it still stays easier and more fun doing it together. If someone isn't working towards the goal, then why is he editing wiki? This is not MySpace. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 22:51, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

We are all volunteers, no one is paid. It is hard to make a volunteer do anything. If someone is not working towards the common goal, just do your best to do your part of it. That's all that can be done unless the other editor is actively harming the project. fr33kman ^talk 22:55, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

But if he isn't working towards the goal there are two possibilities. Either he's not doing anything, which is fine as he's a volounteer. Secondly (and most likely) he's not being helpful and is in some way(s) preventing the people that want to help from doing there best. Then those people should be blocked. But can we not keep arguing/talking about this and concentrate on this proposal or make another proposal. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 22:58, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Did you know ........

...that DYK is dying again? There are hooks that need dealing with and new hooks need to be nominated! Come on gang, let's not let this die again! :-) fr33kman ^talk 03:01, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

How many times do we have to save it from death before we just let it die out and leave it dead? Either way (talk) 03:16, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I think I agree with this. Our wiki is just not big enough to constantly be creating DYKs. -DJSasso (talk) 03:18, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Some people like it an it provides a focus for editors that actually edit mainspace to work on. It also encourages the use of citations. fr33kman ^talk 03:20, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I am not sure if those people that help the project much are even very active on this site anymore. Therefore, I find no reason to keep it active any longer unless we were to get a huge wave of new editors who would love to work on DYKs. Cheers, Razorflame 04:06, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Slow the output and cause the hooks to remain on the main page longer, as a temporary band aid. NonvocalScream (talk) 04:10, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Why not just put a few dozen of them into rotation, like we do with the selected article? –Juliancolton | ^Talk 05:17, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm sure what JC said was already proposed and I agree with it (but it was rejected last time). Let's just use the same hooks and put them into rotation. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 07:53, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree. It seems like the best option at this point. JC's proposal makes sense too. I would support either option. hmwithτ 14:32, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Maybe this project should be approached differently.

How about more focus being put on the Simple Wiktionary, trying to find easy ways to simplify phrasing complex terms, then applying that to English WP Articles that are forked here, instead of people just starting articles by scratch. Also, maybe it should be said that taking longer and more convoluted summaries to get across a concept then with the English Wiki is fine as long as it does so with Simple English.--Occono (talk) 18:22, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

QD tagging of attack pages

Could I kindly ask that editors who QD tag pages where the title of the page itself is an attack kindly avoid using Twinkle to do so? Using Twinkle leaves a record of the attack on the talk page of the attacker. Pages like this should really be avoided. I'll be talking to bot owners about the same thing. It's has taken me a lot of effort to undo these notifications and all of them have been to this latest IP proxy vandal. Thanks! fr33kman ^talk 19:09, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

There is an option on Twinkle that allows a page to be tagged without notifying the creator. SUL (talk) 19:42, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Ah, yes of course there is. I haven't been using it lately so had forgotten about it. However it's done, we need to avoid notifying vandals about these things: it only extends the vandalism onto a talk page, thus making the vandal happy and encouraging the page's recreation. fr33kman ^talk 19:49, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Looks like the attacking is going on again. Mythdon (talk • changes) 20:50, 19 August 2009 (UTC)

Perhabs, it would be the best not to add the notification template. I would suggest to add simply a warning (test1, test2,...) --Barras || talk 11:19, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Twinkle can also be customized (individually or project-wide) to not leave a message on the users talk page. Usually, for test edits and WP:N issues, it is beneficial for the user to know what has happened. EhJJ^TALK 22:01, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

For any edit that is rolled back/reverted, the person who made the bad edit should be notified. I agree with Fr33kman that the |articlename parameter should be left off of the notifications for articles where the title itself is an attack, but otherwise that parameter should be included so the user knows what he did wrong.. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 08:29, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

Question about math

Hi there folks!

It seems you use very little to no math on the simple english science pages ... also where a little math would (in my opinion) help to clearify the explanations!!!

Shouldn't they also serve to make the math behind certain phenomena clear? By offering (where possible) less challenging versions of the equations in question?

Thanks for your consideration, Timo Bretten

PS: Why's there no little, blue "change" option right here in my post?!?

I see one. It's above and to the right of your comments. Griffinofwales (talk) 21:07, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Our articles are built by lots of people. If you think our articles could use more math equations, please add them. You probably didn't see the "change" button because you were looking at a diff or preview (they don't appear when you do that). EhJJ^TALK 22:03, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Hey thank you! so there is no advice to limit equations, is there?

Btw: I was plainly looking at the bottom right, not upper right ;-) God, I am really new to wiki ;-)

Timo_Bretten (talk)

This Wikipedia often has some trouble determining its scope. Wikipedia is supposed to be written using simple words and grammar, but not simple ideas. Some people think it is a Wikipedia for children, and while children may find this easier to read, it isn't meant "for" them. This is an encyclopedia for everyone and we should not exclude anything because it's too hard, we should explain it in simple words. So, to answer your question, my advice on limiting equations is don't. EhJJ^TALK 15:39, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

(<-) In science-related topics i have always found it useful to focus on applications, rather than throw loads of formulae at the reader. That way, i am quite sure a child is able to understand articles like Poisson distribution or exponential distribution, if they grasp the concepts behind it. It would also be possible to use formulas, which would probably frighten away the children. That way I left the formulas for later, they can of course be included in a more complete (bigger) article. The real difficulty of Simple English is to put the concepts into simple words, and explain them with those words. --Eptalon (talk) 16:13, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Abuse filter

Hello all!

I want to propose to enable the abuse filter. This was also mentioned above in the section "Anon editing". I think this could help us to fight better against vandalism and helps to find it. I would fully Support this. Comments are welcome. Regards Barras || talk 19:47, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

The filtering algorithms are very complex. NonvocalScream (talk) 19:58, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I think we could use/import them from enwiki and dewiki. But anyway, is that a big problem? Barras || talk 20:00, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

No, this is a good solution. I would rather import already tested algorithms, rather than figure this thing out by trial and error. The dEwiki ones may have to be translated. NonvocalScream (talk) 20:02, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I think the translation wouldn't be a big problem (someone needs to fix my grammar). I guess Eptalon would help as well with translation if needed. Barras || talk 20:06, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't like the abuse filter. Not enough people are good enough with regex for it to work properly. I have been caught by far too many false positives on other wikis that have it. -DJSasso (talk) 20:25, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

I agree with DJsasso, the abuse filter often considers some good-faith or constructive edits as vandalism. It might be helpful to control vandalism, but editors can get mangled up with the tool. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 22:58, 21 August 2009 (UTC)

A few questions to think about:

• Who will be able to assign the abusefilter userright? admins or 'crats?
• How will one apply for the right - are admins just allowed to add it to themselves or should there be a sort of minirfa style thing?
• Non-admins - should they be allowed access? If so how should they apply?
• Filters that can Block - should we start of with it disabled then enable it later or what?
• Viewing private filters - should we have a separate user right that just allows read only access to private filters? Should this right be bundled with the admin package? Can non admins apply for it? how?
• Should there be a criteria for a filter to be marked private - should a small amount of discussion be required first?

I'm pro abusefilter - however if we enable it we have to get it right or else we'll mess everything up. --Chris 03:45, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I hate the abuse filter. I would rather edit elsewhere on Wikipedias that don't have an abuse filter in place and active because I find that it sometimes causes false positives, such as what Djsasso said. Razorflame 08:00, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Currently, we have a bot that detects and reverts vandalism. I think the question to ask is not whether we want the abuse filter or not, but which of the two anti-vandalism options is better (i.e. which is more sensitive to pick up vandalism, but also more selective to avoid false positives?) Also, I know that GoblinBot4 doesn't typically revert more than once on the same article, but I don't know how to abuse filter functions. I think the question should ideally be: "given the choice between the Abuse Filter or GoblinBot4, which is better?" EhJJ^TALK 10:36, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm Back!

I have returned from my vacation, and look forward to helping out in both the article space and administrative actions. I've missed you guys, and look forward to getting back. Shappy ^talk 19:50, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Yay! Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 19:52, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Velkom back, Mr. Shappy! ^_^ --<font=Comic Sans MS>S3CR3T 19:53, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Welcome back! I removed your name from the DYK membership list (located here) because of the 7 day inactivity criteria. Feel free to add it again. Griffinofwales (talk) 19:54, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Welcome back, Shappy! Mythdon (talk • changes) 19:57, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

SHAPPY!!!!! Welcome back. Pmlineditor  Talk 08:46, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Great to see you back editing here on the Simple English Wikipedia again! I hope to see continuing edits from you now ;). Cheers, Razorflame 07:59, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Maintenance categories

These cats (and similar ones, not used for sorting articles by subject) should have __HIDDENCAT__ on them. I'm not really familiar with them, and this task is one that'd be better suited for AWB, which really doesn't like me, so some help's needed. :) Maxim_(talk) 15:53, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

What does this do? NonvocalScream (talk) 16:36, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Hides the category from view when you are looking at the article. But still lists the article in the category when you go to the category. -DJSasso (talk) 16:38, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Define me a target and I'll automate the process. Best, NonvocalScream (talk) 16:52, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Strategic Planning

The Wikimedia Foundation has begun a year long phase of strategic planning. During this time of planning, members of the community have the opportunity to propose ideas, ask questions, and help to chart the future of the Foundation. In order to create as centralized an area as possible for these discussions, the Strategy Wiki has been launched. This wiki will provide an overview of the strategic planning process and ways to get involved, including just a few questions that everyone can answer. All ideas are welcome, and everyone is invited to participate.

Please take a few moments to check out the strategy wiki. It is being translated into as many languages as possible now; feel free to leave your messages in your native language and we will have them translated (but, in case of any doubt, let us know what language it is, if not english!).

All proposals for the Wikimedia Foundation may be left in any language as well.

Please, take the time to join in this exciting process. The importance of your participation can not be overstated.

--Philippe

(please cross-post widely and forgive those who do)

Timestamp to archive: —MC8 (b · t) 23:31, Thursday August 27 2009 (UTC)

Proposal

There's a few ways we could go about getting rid of stubs. I understand that this is a perennial proposal, but something needs to be done.

The extreme way

• We think seriously about deleting every stub that is on Simple English Wikipedia.
• We concentrate our editing on the articles that every wiki should have. This list has been compiled already, covers a wide range of topics -- we have a wide range of editors. Picking this list caters for most. It is a relatively small list, of 1000. In essence, this proposal cuts Wikipedia down by fifty or so times.
• Quite simply, we reboot the entire wiki, as if we were a new wiki.

The not-as-extreme way

• We still concentrate fire on WP:HAVE.
• We (this is the important bit) change our deletion focus from "Is this notable?" to "Is this useful?". We change WP:QD#A4 from The page does not show notability. to The page is not useful to Wikipedia in its current state. A stub of something notable is next to useless. Conversely, a featured article of something no-one has ever heard of is also next to useless.
• This page is a stub.
  Please expand this article with more information or it will be deleted.
  18:10, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
  We create a template (right) that is added to all new stubs. We become ruthless. We delete all articles about anything that does not have the "parent" article created to a reasonable standard (DWDM-FM being created before National Broadcasting Network, for example).
• We change the colour of redlinks to grey. This will help switch focus from creating articles to editing them, in a subtle way. We could even do away with redlinks all together, using something along the lines of Template:Autolink.
• We develop a quicker delete-finger: if it is created, it can be deleted. If it is deleted, it can be created. We dismiss all arguments that 'it is a building block for expansion' -- we delete anything that is not useful. It can be recreated later. We are a work in progress: let us work on a smaller amount of pages.
• Wikipedia is a wiki for a reason. It is for collaboration. If we are all working on different articles, we are not collaborating. Shrink the article base, increase the need for working together.
• It may be said that Wikipedia is not paper, but put it into perspective: You buy a book. Would you prefer it with reams and reams of pages, with a small scribble at the top of each, or as a more slender book, with close-set type covering every page?
• We encourage merging. Stubs that people, for some reason, do not wish to delete, should be merged with other pages. Shipping Forecast, for example, could easily be merged into Forecasting, or possibly Meteorology.
• This plan can't easily be forced onto people: if they want to edit something, they'll edit it, regardless of whether it is on a list or not. We can only strongly discourage it -- so tweaking welcome messages may be on the cards.
• A gameplan: we get everything on WP:HAVE off the stub list. We get the 250-odd "core" articles (right) to at least GA.

• We, as per usual, recruit more editors. We can only do so much. It was suggested way back that we could have a prominent link to the ENWP article, and that they should have one back. We need to look into this. Prehaps we could look into off-wiki promotion (facebook, twitter? Need to liase with WMF on that, most probably).

Thoughts?

—MC8 (b · t) 18:10, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Let's create a mission and a vision for this project (just like corporations), and focus the project to meet them. Deleting most of the stubs is a huge task, and I'm not sure that we have consensus for it (at least 80%, it's a big change). From what I have heard, we cannot agree to whom this project is marketed to, and that is a big part of this argument. The question is (IMO): 1. Can these stubs be expanded? and 2. Do our readers want to know about these topics? If the answer is yes to both questions they should be kept. Griffinofwales (talk) 18:29, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Did you read his entire post or just the first subsection? →javért ^stargaze 18:32, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Vision, Mission. —MC8 (b · t) 18:38, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Not WMF's mission and vision. That's because they contradict with what this project does. Griffinofwales (talk) 19:01, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

If they do that, this project shouldn't be hosted by Wikimedia. —MC8 (b · t) 19:02, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

The mission and vision are better handled by the reader's home language wikipedia, not here. Griffinofwales (talk) 19:05, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

We are doing the WMF's mission & vision, but at a much slower rate. This allows us to do things that on en would never be allowed. As long as we "get there in the end", i.e. at infinity, all is well.

Not really, because the mission and the vision are already being accomplished by the home language wikipedia. Griffinofwales (talk) 19:16, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Again, we follow the WMF's vision loosely. Our aim is, that in the next 20, 50, 100 years, every article will eventually be an FA, about everything. We are following the WMF's mission, but loosely. We are still a Wikipedia. We are still run by the Wikimedia foundation. —MC8 (b · t) 09:38, Thursday August 13 2009 (UTC)

I agree with:

• A gameplan: we get everything on WP:HAVE off the stub list. We get the 250-odd "core" articles (right) to at least GA.
• We create a template
• We, as per usual, recruit more editors.
• We encourage merging.

To me the last point is a very good idea, and can solve a lot of the stub problems. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 19:07, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Do you agree with the notable/useful thing? It seems to me like we have to agree on that, and then everything else will fall into place. —MC8 (b · t) 19:11, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Why not just copy-and-paste article from enWP? That would solve most of our stub issues, alone. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 19:39, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I hope you are kidding. -DJSasso (talk) 19:40, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Because this is "Simple English" Wikipedia, not "English Wikipedia Part 2". →javért ^stargaze 19:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

<-----What about making a template that says that the person who creates a stub has a week to get it expanded into a non-stub before it gets deleted? That way, people are forced to write on only a single article and expand it into non-stub territory or face it getting deleted. Good idea? Razorflame 19:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

See point 6. —MC8 (b · t) 19:43, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Noted. Razorflame 19:46, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I don't see any reason how stubs hinder the very existence of simple wiki. If you thought why this wiki has a lot of stubs, that's because we're small compared to other projects. That's why some people at meta wanted to shut us down. Also I'm not kiding about copying-and-pasting. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 19:50, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Because we are small, prehaps we should think of quality over quantity. —MC8 (b · t) 09:38, Thursday August 13 2009 (UTC)

(<--) There are multiple problems here I'm afraid. Firstly, stubs are always going to be created and in many cases they are helpful even if they are single lines (they do tend to give the reader an indication of what a linked item is about, even if only very little). Secondly, to allow for the quick deletion of stubs based on an altered QD criterion is placing a lot of power into the hands of a single individual: what one person may think fits the QD reason another may complain about. Thirdly, you can't really go about telling people how they can and can not contribute here. Many editors here don't have much experience in researching topics, finding reliable sources for citations, and properly formatting articles to start class or beyond. What do we do to enforce a no stubs policy? Block people, this will not help us in the long run. Personally I've no problem with stubs as long as they are not about non-notable or barely notable subjects. My best idea is to do what I proposed along time ago, work on WP:HAVE and expand the subject area articles on the main page to GA/VGA standard. I'd be very much against the mass deletion of, or limiting the creation of stubs per se. Comments? fr33kman ^talk 20:36, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I have to agree with fr33kman here. I don't support the deletion of stubs because they are stubs. Stubs are the starting point of good articles. They need to be developed. What I will entertain is the deletion of non notable stubs, and that is an entirely different discussion. I don't agree with the mass deletion of restrictions of stubs. Best, NonvocalScream (talk) 20:40, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, the key is to get people expanding stubs, not deleting them. fr33kman ^talk 20:42, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

But we should redefine "notable" to cover less things. At the moment, the ratio of stub-creation versus quality-article-creation is the wrong way around. —MC8 (b · t) 09:38, Thursday August 13 2009 (UTC)

Edit conflict...

An example... Dig Dug started out a stub and proved potential. See the edit history. Also, new contributers may only be able to contribute stubs, don't discourage them by deleting right away. Instead evaluate them for notability and encourage development. I don't want to lose content here. Best, NonvocalScream (talk) 20:42, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

 (change conflict)  (at fr33kman's first comment) - At the first, stubs will always be created. But we can set up something like ENWP's prod template. Uncyclopedia's ICU template works well. I understand the second point, I din't think of that. Third point, no, we can't. But we can actively encourage, or actively discourage people from doing things. "You may be interested in editing xxx, have you had a go?", for example. —MC8 (b · t) 20:45, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Guys, I know I've officially left, but I'd like to weigh in on this one having worked on this wiki for 2/3 years. I agree with every point of this, this entire wiki needs rebooting, but there is a wider problem here. We're all hobbyist editors here looking to do what we enjoy - to make this work, people need to do what they hate. The main problem is that simplifying English is not at all an easy process, and no-one has actually looked at developing our method. Our current approach is using old help material from when this wiki was just built, which was no doubt intended to be expanded upon as we did further research into simplifying language. Right now, we're using a lot of guesswork to find simpler language rather than paying attention to the audience and the language structures that need to be used to meet their needs. From what I've seen, feel free to correct me, I do not believe there is one single simplification standard that we can use to meet our audience's needs. We've come to the conclusion that we are serving multiple audiences (mainly ESL, but also translators, children, and native English speakers with learning difficulties). For example, I've seen plenty of people (while I was working here) correcting language that sounds patronising to a native English speaker, but from what I can see, it's often removing simple sentence structure that aids ESL learners. Also, those that need simple English text will be at varying ability levels - we will need to publish at varying levels of complexity for each audience. My advice would be to speak to some experts, do some research into how to actually simplify language, and build several new standards from there, publishing our core articles in different versions according to multiple standards. Hopefully this can be partially automated, just requiring an editor with knowledge of the rules to quickly read over computer corrections - unfortunately computers aren't particularly good at manipulating natural language. Archer7 - talk 21:02, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

I've always found that what works for me is to copy and paste an enwiki article and then go through it line by line to change words and phrases into simpler English. On average it takes me about 1-2 hours per decent sized article, but in the end we are left with as good an article as enwiki had and in simpler English. My biggest bug-bear here (as well as enwiki) is the lack of citations. An encyclopedia can't allow that. It makes the project unreliable. fr33kman ^talk 21:12, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

The problem isn't the "going through it", it's that we're not actually simplifying to any properly-defined standard, and also that we'd need to publish according to multiple standards to be any use. Simplifying English is a very hard thing to do. I do also agree on the lack of citations though. Archer7 - talk 21:19, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

<-Agree with Fr33kman. We should get some great article writers from enWP to come here for a week and improve the core articles. I don't think they would object. As TRM pointed out at WP:AN, we (the community) do not spend enough time in the article space. Perhaps 80% of community edits are not in article space. Griffinofwales (talk) 22:20, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

ENWP is different to simple, and many people at en think of simple as a fork, and treat it as such. —MC8 (b · t) 22:22, Wednesday August 12 2009 (UTC)

Not just enWP, meta also thinks the same. Some people back at meta headquarters want to close all simple english projects. Also several wikipedia proposals in other simple languages at been quickly struck down. —§ Snake311 _{(I'm Not Okay!)} 02:27, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

There's a legitimate reason for that. —MC8 (b · t) 09:29, Thursday August 13 2009 (UTC)

Bringing the discussion back to Griffin's ENWP proposal, it wouldn't solve the "simplification" problem. ENWP editors do not know how to simplify well, and they certainly would not follow the defined standard Archer7 is pushing for. —MC8 (b · t) 09:38, Thursday August 13 2009 (UTC)

I simply do not understand the problem with stubs - sure they are frustrating, but a simple stub is better than nothing. There is far too much emphasis on deleting - let us simply expand. I think some editors find writing too hard so they want to delete things instead. Let see a stub instead as a "seed" - an article that has been started and needs to grow. Join the stub eradication team if you are serious about improving quality. But enough, I'm going back to writing in the mainspace! Peterdownunder (talk) 09:41, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Juliancolton

Though I trust JC, and he has been a good admin here, I do not find it fair he gets his admin rights back. He requested that they be removed a few days ago, and they are given back without any kind of consensus on wiki (the reason for giving them back was per irc). I'm not asking for this to be changed, personnally I dont' care. But could we next time be told about these kind of things onwiki. Thanks, Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 07:57, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

No local policy, no reason why he should ask on wiki. He was and is an admin in good standing. No reason not to give him the tools back. Barras || talk 11:35, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Well he resigned them, it doesn't mean he should get them back... Just seems jammy to me, maybe we should have a policy which either allows this kind of things or disallows it. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 11:39, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Again: No policy, no reason why not. It isn't disallowed or allowed. This means the decission is up to the crats. Barras || talk 11:50, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I understand that, as I said I don't care. But I think we need a policy. I will make a proposal soon. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 11:58, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

"I do not find it fair he gets his admin rights back." Sounds to me in an other way. And if your goal is an other than the removal of he right, so you should change the section header. Barras || talk 12:00, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I do not find it fair he gets his admin rights back. in other words, not fair to other people. And no, I don't want to change the hearder, I don't want desysoping as I stated above, I'm not asking for this to be changed, personnally I dont' care. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 12:03, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually there is technically a guideline for this per our "lack of policy/guideline follow en" and en resysops any admin that removes their right when its not under a cloud. Not to mention many conversations on this wiki supports that way of thinking. Just look at any of the desysop requests. -DJSasso (talk) 12:45, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

It is always common practice that if an administrator resigns without controversy surrounding them, that they will get the rights back by request (as long as there were no major changes in that user's behavior during the period without the tools). Consensus is not needed, the user just needs to ask a 'crat to restore the tools. (ec'd with Djsasso who said the same thing basically). Either way (talk) 12:47, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I've alerted Juliancolton of this thread since it is about him sorta, kinda, in a way. Either way (talk) 12:51, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Anyway, doesn't matter, would just have been better to request it on wiki and not on irc. Would have made more sense. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 12:52, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Would you have been okay if JC had emailed a 'crat to request the rights back? Either way (talk) 12:55, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Yes, because people generally keep emails. You don't generally keep irc logs. Yotcmdr ^{=talk to the commander=} 12:58, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually, a lot of people do. And this is a lot of fuss about nothing. Please don't do this again, Yot. Majorly talk 13:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

But email is off-wiki and doesn't allow for consensus...it just allows for discussion between two people. So, I'm not understanding your point here. You're just "hatin'" on IRC so far as I can tell. Either way (talk) 13:19, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually its a case of we made him go through another RFA when he wanted his back because he left while his adminship was under a cloud. -DJSasso (talk) 13:27, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Let's all go review an article at PGA. –Juliancolton | ^Talk 16:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, this is dramah if I've ever seen any. I think it can easily be solved if we simply don't fulfil unnecessary requests. You should have avoided this in the first place. -- Mentifisto 17:04, 26 August 2009 (UTC)