Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)

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The policy section of the village pump is used to discuss proposed policies and guidelines and changes to existing policies and guidelines.
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Please see this FAQ page for a list of frequently rejected or ignored proposals.

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Is it simply Wild West?

I'm looking at serious ongoing behavioral issues, and don't know where to turn. WP:ANI doesn't seem to work. WP:NPOVN doesn't seem to work (although i would encourage everyone to watch that page and check it often to help others who are asking for help!) I have found admins who act abusively, instead of helping. I'm seeing bad editing practices all over the place. I'm seeing people unilaterally, archiving talk page sections that they don't like, re-reverting that when it's restored, refusing to acknowledge that it's a problem, insisting that there is consensus when there is not, hatting talk page sections that they don't like (to shut down the dialogue), people calling other editors names all the time, people using bad dialogue (like strawman/misrepresentation and rhetoric in place of substance) and the like. I'm seeing gang-like editing behaviors, where several editors seem to work together to maintain a page in a certain point of view. I'm seeing serious takeover of Wikipedia without a genuine regard to the policies. I'm seeing so much absurd stuff going on that it seems Wikipedia (at least in some topics) is broken. There is so much edit warring instead of discussion. There is unilateral action with complete impunity. There is very little actual enforcement of policies. There is WP:POV RAILROADing. I'm sorry i can't be more specific, but i have been observing these things in general for too long now, and the arbitrtion and enforcement structures simply do not work. It's broken. There is too much pushing and bullying. Where is the respect for each other and for "the sum of all human knowledge"? Rant over. Had to get that off my chest, and hope to hear your experiences, similar or different. SageRad (talk) 21:48, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

I agree with this wholeheartedly. To be added to Sage's list, I am also perceiving an increased tolerance of editors inappropriately editing others comments - to my mind this should be a clear line with swift and strong action taken if that line is crossed. Relatedly, I am also perceiving an increase in AN/I cases being closed by non-admins. Non-admins can not take action in such closures, therefore all these closures end with no action being taken when they perhaps should. Perhaps the policy of non-admins being allowed to close AN/I discussions needs to be reviewed. I feel this would help in avoiding the Wild West scenario.DrChrissy ^(talk) 22:12, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I noticed that too. I'm seeing a breakdown of Wikipedia. I think we've lost critical mass of editors with integrity and so the place has been taken over by pushy people with no scruples. Attempts at getting justice in terms of following policy seems to more often than not backfire into more bullying and pushing and ganging up and piling on. It's like Wikipedia has lost its immune system and at this point is even like it has an auto immune disease and attacks good people for doing the right thing. SageRad (talk) 16:20, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

@SageRad: See related Sanger item at WP:OTR.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  19:34, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

I think you need to be honest about your own role in degrading the editing environment, rather than blaming everyone and everything else. You didn't come here to help build a reputable online reference work; you came here because you were upset about an argument you'd had on someone's blog, and you wanted to use that person's Wikipedia biography to get back at him. Your actions demonstrated petty motivations, making your high-minded appeals to Wikipedia's foundational principles hypocritical, to say the least. You were then topic-banned by ArbCom for repeatedly casting aspersions against other editors and degrading the quality of articles and sourcing. You should probably be honest about that background, rather than leaving it for someone else to point out.

In the end, you're basically someone who joined a game, tried to cheat at it, got caught, and now you run around telling everyone how stupid the game is. The game may or may not be stupid, but your motivations are so transparently self-serving that they invalidate your criticisms. MastCell ^Talk 16:27, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Wow, there you have aspersions, a level of attempted outing, lack of assumption of good faith, and lack of focus on content, and more. I actually meant everything I said above with full genuineness. It's borne of experience. I had a nasty learning curve in Wikipedia because I found myself in the thick of toxic editors with toxic practices. It could have gone a lot smoother. I really meant what I said above, now that I fully grasp the wisdom of the policies and yet see them being wildly disregarded so often. Please rescind your aspersion. This is not a game. Too many editors view it as such and act like it is a game but it's not. This is serious work. SageRad (talk) 16:33, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

No, it's just a hobby. WIJAGH, as in FIJAGH. Unless someone has a vested interest in what the content says, in which case those of us for whom it's a hobby have to spend hours of our time protecting the project, which is why it sometimes pisses us off a mite. Guy (Help!) 16:53, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

SageRad you said yourself here that you had a dispute with that blogger (and that statement makes it clear that you were violating WP:BLPCOI) and that is what got you blocked. There is no outing here; not even close. Just more self-righteous and self-deluded grand-standing. Jytdog (talk) 17:09, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

The things you describe are largely the inevitable result of the need to slow the decline in editor population. We must strike a balance between good behavior and editor retention. I believe that the balance is currently wrong, and I've for some time had this comment on my user page: How much disruption must we tolerate in the name of peace and editor retention? Something's wrong here. Change the balance and you will, regrettably, lose some productive editors who are unable to behave better. In my opinion, after the word got around that things had improved at Wikipedia, those losses would be replenished more than one-for-one by editors who were better behaved and, eventually, equally as productive. That's the strategy we'd be following ... if only I were in charge around here! Mandruss For President? ―Mandruss ☎ 16:35, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I wish you were president. I believe there would be better retention of good editors if some of the worst offending editors received sanctions for their bad behaviors. Who wants to contribute their good work and energy when bullies will just come and kick down the ornate sand castles they build? SageRad (talk) 16:39, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

There are several talk page stalkers who lurk and attack when it suits their purposes, but rarely make content contributions. These individuals can be easily recognised. They should be identified as such and weeded out.DrChrissy ^(talk) 16:44, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

You're too hard on yourself. Some of your edits are fine. Guy (Help!) 16:54, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Look, we can have a constructive discussion here, or we can devolve this into yet another pointless pissing match. These are real issues and any participant's motivations are irrelevant. Debate the points made and refrain from making things personal, please. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:11, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

That said, readers of this thread might care to take a look at the comments being made on JzG's Talk page.DrChrissy ^(talk) 17:14, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

That said, - That said and ignored. Your comment simply pours fuel on the fire. Others' behavior does not justify yours. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:22, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• JzG's comment should be struck. They've been pouring fuel on the fire for so long on this site I was shocked to learn they are admin. --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 20:34, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Mandruss, I must respectively disagree with your statement that editor's motivations are irrelevant. This thread (not your comment) is becoming yet another case of WP:POV railroad where the motivations behind edits are the very focus of the Wild West problem. This is why I suggested people look at JzG's talk page.DrChrissy ^(talk) 17:33, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Well good luck with that approach, which has been used countless times and never works except as a defensive strategy at ANI. If you wish to achieve meaningful change you need to stay above the fray. Just ignore any attacks (even clearly block-worthy personal attacks) and debate the points. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:41, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Fair enough - point taken.DrChrissy ^(talk) 17:44, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I do want to add that I have seen more and more cases in topic areas involving controversial, ideological issues that groups of editors appear to work together, often unintentionally, to maintain a specific viewpoint or eliminate counterviewpoints and rational discussions of such issues. Such groups will often rely on UNDUE, POV, and FRINGE to shut down such discussions or dismiss any counter arguments, which is not what these policies are meant to be used for for controversial subjects, as we are to document such controversies, not participate in them. These groups will often have editors that may not have, as we define it, a conflict of interest, but do have a vested interest to support a specific view or to refute a different view, which our guidelines caution people when they handle such articles. The problem that often happens is that it is difficult to separate this poor behavior from what would would normally be completely acceptable behavior in being vigilant against for a topic area that was being flooded by IPs and SPA accounts to include vandalism, false info, and BLP; this same behavior is generally needed to empower such users to combat unencyclopedic information. (case in point is the recent arbcom decision on the Indian/Pakistan topic area, where they empowered the 500 edits/30 days rule to avoid these type of accounts). There's a line here but it is very very fuzzy, and we're seeing acceptable behavior needed to handle the latter type of cases slipping more and more into other topic areas that are not as easy to deal with. There's no easy solution, since determining when this is happening requires throughout investigation of talk pages or direct experience in the situation, but there needs to be a better means to remind such groups of editors that page ownership is not acceptable practice for WP and cooperation with all editors particularly experienced ones are needed. --MASEM (t) 17:43, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• Comment @SageRad: Sage, I'm wondering if between us we raised so many issues early in this thread that we have confused people. I think what we perhaps need to do is focus on just one of these. This is your thread and I am not attempting to hijack it, but I noticed you mentioned early on that you believe ANI is broken. I agree with you. Perhaps we should focus on this?DrChrissy ^(talk) 18:02, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I'd like to keep it on the whole gestalt... and not about any particular person, as was said above by Mandruss. I think this issue of general critical mass / tipping point of integrity, is interesting. SageRad (talk) 18:36, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

On the one hand, I agree with User:SageRad that WP:ANI is broken, and I agree with SageRad that there is too much tolerance of uncivil editors. I agree with User:DrChrissy that there is too much tolerance of editing other's talk page comments, which should result in a caution to new editors and a swift block to non-new editors. However, SageRad is very off the mark in saying that they had a rough learning curve because they came into the thick of toxic editors with toxic practices. They came into Wikipedia as a toxic editor. Whether the other editors were toxic is another question. User:MastCell is absolutely right that SageRad came in with a very biased agenda, and then characterized advice from non-admins that their incivility could lead to a block as "threats" and other advice as "punches to the face". SageRad is right that we are too tolerant of toxic editors, including of SageRad. I agree that WP:ANI is broken, but would welcome comments from reasonable editors. I agree that editing of other's comments on talk pages should not be tolerated. Robert McClenon (talk) 19:40, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Well if Robert McClenon himself feels the need to make this about individual editors rather than the issues, nothing more than an ANI thread in the wrong venue, I guess my pleas have been a waste of time. Enjoy the bickering and hat at will. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:46, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I did make comments about the issues. I agree tht WP:ANI is broken, and would welcome comments from reasonable editors like User:Mandruss on what to do about it. I did agree that altering of comments to mislead should not be tolerated. In the case that the latter is done by an admin, I would suggest arbitration and desysopping. Robert McClenon (talk) 21:17, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

@Robert McClenon: I don't feel I can say how to "fix ANI", exactly; I don't think I'm well versed in what people feel is broken about it; but I do have a couple of strong opinions about ANI.
First, that User X's bad behavior should not be allowed to excuse or mitigate User Y's bad behavior, and it routinely is at ANI. "Two wrongs don't make a right" may seem trite or naive to some, but it seems essential to me.
And secondly, ANI should be strictly about behavior complaints. It should not be allowed to become content dispute, and it routinely is. The minute it starts to be about content, an admin should step in and nip that in the bud as wrong venue. If anyone then persists, it should be handled as disruption. For this and other reasons, I think ANI would benefit from having at least one admin "on duty" as a moderator at all times, based on a previously agreed schedule. They could do other work at the same time, but should be tasked with monitoring ANI closely on their watchlist.
That's about all I have to say about ANI. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:08, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I think that the idea of having an admin serve as the moderator for WP:ANI is a very good idea. ANI is just a Wild West area. Your observation about two wrongs making a right is unfortunately often the case, and that if User X's bad behavior is argued as a defense against User Y's bad behavior, both should be sanctioned. (Whether by blocks, topic-bans, or what depends on the nature of the offense.) The moderating admin should be willing in cases of clear bad behavior to block and then close the thread so that it doesn't drag on. I will add that I don't think that filing parties at ANI intend to be bringing up content issues. In their excuse, they think that the failure of other editors to agree with them on content is a conduct issue (vandalism, POV-pushing, disruptive editing). That is a further reason for a moderator who will say, "Content dispute. Take to WP:DRN or use an WP:RFC. Closed here." Also, when two-way allegations of conduct drag on, a moderator should be able to formulate a proposal that can be !voted, such as topic-ban A, topic-ban B, topic-ban both. I agree as to moderation. Robert McClenon (talk) 22:52, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

So Robert, what should I/we do when an admin with many years experience has changed my edit to mislead. We are agreed AN/I is broken. I suspect that if I raised this at AN/I, the result would be that I will be blocked. What should I/we do to change this state of affairs?DrChrissy ^(talk) 19:50, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Well either you fix it when you find it or let others fix it. A one time occurrence is not something that should be brought to ANI, if the behavior continues it should be brought to ANI and dealt with. The proper response is NOT to revert the fix so it stays in the altered state until the person who made the change fixes it. -- GB fan 12:25, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Our [[WP:Talk page guidelines state "Never edit or move someone's comment to change its meaning, even on your own talk page (their emphasis). This sentence, or something very similar including "never", has been in the guidelines since at least 2010 so it is well established and non-contested. Why have such a strong statement if we are to then only say "oh well, once or twice won't hurt"?DrChrissy ^(talk) 16:51, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, it does say that. Our policies also say to never vandalize an article but we don't block someone for one act of vandalism. I never said "oh well, once or twice won't hurt". I said when you find that it has happened fix it or let someone else fix it and if the behavior continues to raise it at ANI. Very few things do we say one time is enough to bring someone to ANI, that is reserved mostly for repeat offenders. You revert and warn the editor to not do it again. Like I said before the correct thing to do is not revert a fix to what you don't want, like you did. -- GB fan 18:19, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

If I make a good point, it matters not if I'm making it to serve my own selfish, even illegitimate interest; it's still a good point; therefore my history is irrelevant, and to bring my history into it only serves to derail the debate. Discussions like this should go down as if all participants were here anonymously. (Note for the overly literal: I have used the first person merely as a device; I am not referring to myself.) ―Mandruss ☎ 20:22, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• I agree. There are way too many editors who would rather discuss an editor's individual history than expand on a good point. My personal belief for this is because those editor's who divert an idea into a new direction, fear change or the loss of power. And it's very effective because I can go back 3, 5 years ago, see editors discuss the exact same issues as now, but nothing's changed! --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 21:04, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• Indeed. Let's note that i've had some contentious relations with these folks who felt the need to come along and speak badly about and to me -- and not just about me but about their perspective about me -- and this is another illustration of exactly the point i'm trying to make here because these folks who are quite outspoken all over Wikipedia and act like heavies all over the place, in my opinion, problems at ANI and in the whole functioning of Wikipedia with integrity. I seriously want this to not be about specific people, but they did make it so, and tried to derail this dialogue, and so i must say they have a history with me and not a good one. Sure, they say i'm bad, bad, bad, i'm a bad boy... Fine... I disagree and it's basically gang warfare that you're seeing. There's a gang here. They've tried to make that point before and seem to have a chip on their shoulder for me -- but i say that i have integrity and edit according to policy, more than most i know.

This really does come down to reckoning, and it take a human sense with much observation and experience, to really get down to it. When it's person A saying there's a problem, and then persons B and C come along and say "No, A is the problem here!" but according to person A, persons B and C are part of the problem although person A didn't name specific people to begin with... it comes down to observations of edits and dialogue over the long-term. It's way too easy to play the discredit game, where multiple editors with a chip on their shoulder or an agenda come along and say something mean about editor A -- poisoning the well, introducing a prejudicial air to the dialogue, etc.... and that's not cool with me. Everyone has made some mistakes in their life, and we need to see who is willing to learn and to do better, and who is just constantly a problem and causing problems. And we must remember that opinions are from a point of view, as well.

And yes, i did enter Wikipedia in a toxic environment, and learned from some of the worst in terms of behavior, and learned to act like it's the Wild West -- you grow up in a gang environment and you learn you have to act tough. Only later did i see the wisdom of the policies and that we could work better if we cooperated and acted in a civil way. It can work. But it requires a critical mass to work. We need a critical mass of editors who speak up for integrity all the time. SageRad (talk) 21:12, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I should clarify that I'm not taking sides in any disputes involving anyone present. Partly because I know nothing about them, partly because I don't care about them, and partly because they are irrelevant here, as I said above. If I make a bad point, I can be defeated by a strong counter to that point, still without bringing my history into it. I hope I've (finally) said everything that I meant. ―Mandruss ☎ 21:17, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I appreciate that, Mandruss, very much. That is the way i would like it to be, as well. I intentionally did not name any specific people or topics or articles, so that we could have a general discussion about the gestalt of the functioning of Wikipedia, and not devolve into mudslinging. Having said my piece in self-defense, i am done with specifics and back to general observations. I know you have no history with me and i don't expect you to have an opinion of me. SageRad (talk) 21:20, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

Hopefully we can all be learning and evolving together, and not polarizing all the time against each other. Hopefully people who have had past issues can evolve to work better with each other. SageRad (talk) 21:37, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

SageRad, if Wikipedia is "broken" then it has always been broken. There never was a period of time where peace and harmony and civility reigned. You look at arbitration archives around 2005-2007 and you'll find major problems going on and unqualified editors becoming admins and going to town, blocking their "enemies". By perusing Wikipedia history you'll find that a lot of problems that used to exist are no longer the serious issues they were years ago. There have been improvements. I know that ANI is much better now than when I first became a regular editor in summer 2013 where editors would often come to discussions with pitchforks and torches. I think at some point I think you have to accept that you have Wikipedia was never some harmonious haven of writing articles, cooperation and exchange of open information, Wikipedia is flawed and has always been, just like any human being or any organization is flawed because it is made up of imperfect individuals. Expecting people, on the internet of all places, to be kinder and more thoughtful than they are in their off-line life is unrealistic.

I think you also have to accept that you are approaching this issue the wrong way. An individual, even a few organized individuals, can not change the culture of a group. People are who they are and no amount of posting on noticeboards will change that. Your best option is to focus on realistic, doable changes to policies that you think might lead to improvements, run an RfC and try to get a consensus to see if your argument has the support of the community (or at least those that choose to participate in an RfC). Yes, this takes time and effort but even Jimmy Wales can not wave a magic wand and make Wikipedia suddenly change overnight to the idyllic community that you hoped it would be. I'm not saying that this is good or bad, it's just the nature of how slowly organizations change, especially decentralized groups like the Wikipedia editing community. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:03, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

↑ That. As I understand your complaint, you're unhappy at the open nature of Wikipedia and want a centrally enforced "constitution", but changing the internal structure of a project with between 3000—100,000 participants (depending on how you measure it) isn't something that will just happen because you say you're unhappy; you need to propose an alternative, and then convince a majority that they'd be better off with the alternative. As Liz correctly says, it's worth bearing in mind that despite the shrillness of the critics, Wikipedia at present is probably the least dysfunctional it's ever been. ‑ Iridescent 22:09, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• The above two comments are seriously wrong. That's the classic just give up. Should the middle class and poor in the USA also give up and sign over what little income they have left to the 1%er's? --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 22:27, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• I think Iridescent's point is that complaining is easy, but changing things would take work and thoughtfulness. That is different from telling someone to "give up". Stellar analogy, though. MastCell ^Talk 01:34, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

• It would be much easier for me to agree with your point were it not for that big arrow! --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 03:49, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

• Unless your monitor is exceptionally wide and your default font exceptionally small, the big arrow should be pointing at Liz's last sentence (I'm not saying that this is good or bad, it's just the nature of how slowly organizations change, especially decentralized groups like the Wikipedia editing community.), a sentiment with which I concur wholeheartedly; fifteen years of inertia isn't going to shifted just by wishing it so, and if you want major changes you need not only to identify the nature of the changes you want made, but identify a means of getting them implemented and a means of persuading people that doing so will be worthwhile. Make the quote Philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point, however, is to change it if that suits you better. ‑ Iridescent 17:42, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

• Why, yes my monitor is indeed exceptionally wide, and my default font is exceptionally small (6 pt)!
  

Here are some identified changes I'd like to see implemented.

1. Stop admin elections. Instead editors are automatically admin based on length of time (which should be within one year or less) and number of edits. Take the power away from the fascist few. Give it back to the masses and it will not be the big deal that it is right now.

2. Make it easier to lose admin rights. Wikipedia doesn’t need tenured admin. Admin rights should be something an editor loses, not something an editor fights to win.

3. Create clear rules to follow, not excessive bloated essays that have other bloated essays that counter each other. Can’t be more than 10 or 12 rules. (Even AA only has 12 steps!)

4. Greet all new editors with the rules they need to follow.

5. Anyone using cuss words gets an automatic 48 hour ban their first use. Thereafter, that editor will receive an one month ban.

6. Create a bot so that whenever one’s editor name is mentioned, the editor is notified.

7. If a subject is true and can be verified by reliable sources, it stays. Stop with the esoteric value judgements which is based on one’s knowledge (or lack there of) of a subject.

8. Eliminate the COI witch hunts. All editors show up with personal biases & POV’s. Spend that wasted time on making a neutral article. Readers only care about facts.

9. Put warnings on all medical articles.

10. Add links at the top to the best ranked sites for all the science topics. Wikipedia owes this much to the public since Google is now defaulting to Wikipedia. (Which is worse than being bought and paid for, it’s called being used!)

11. Create friendlier warnings. Do they really need to look so hyperbole? Like someone’s about to be maimed? Especially since they’re really meant to bully rather than warn?

12. Everyone gets one account only! IP’s will need to create an account if they want to edit.

13. A mass reprieve for all banned editors. This would exclude those globally banned.

14. Change page patrol to page approved.

Thanks for asking! --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 16:31, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I'm sure you don't actually expect that 14-point wish list to pass as a package. Pick one that you feel is high is importance and stands a decent chance of passing, argue for that (a separate subsection would help), and leave the other 13 for other days. Otherwise the discussion is going 14 different ways, and nothing gets accomplished. ―Mandruss ☎ 17:21, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

• Sort of a package deal like congress? Why not! Wikipedia needs big changes. This site has been spinning its wheels for quite some time now while not addressing issues.
  

fyi - If editors don't believe there is something growing more amiss with Wikipedia, check out, "The Knight Foundation grant: a timeline and an email to the board." --MurderByDeletionism^"bang!" 19:23, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

@ Mandruss - a very friendly reminder - I think it is frowned upon to include a user's name in your edit summary.DrChrissy ^(talk) 18:17, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

• While there are some things that are part of the "unfixables" that Wikipedia will always have as long as we have the tagline "the encyclopedia anyone can edit", there are problems being raised here that have becoming more troubling in terms of "cliques" around controversial topics that are being used to quell proper discussion. Normally, in the past, things like dispute resolution or AN/I would be venues to at least engage in discussion when such problems occurred but as identified, I've been seeing more cases of these groups on controversial articles refusing to engage in dispute resolution, and if these groups include long-standing editors, AN is often hesitant to get involved. Mind you, the number of such cases is trifling small compared to the number of other disputes that happen every day and that are resolved as harmoniously as we can expect on WP, but it still exists and becoming more evident. And I think some of this is being influenced by the global situation in the world that align with the social conflicts that are happening across the globe and the change in media's role that work against our purpose as a neutral tertiary work (I've describe this in depth about a month ago here on VPP). --MASEM (t) 22:44, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

• Seems more like as the years go past, the attempts to deal with particular personality problems have yet to be resolved. For the ones who complain about never ending chaos here, you do realize that you can always WP:FORK the entire contents of the project and create your wiki-encylopedia with whatever rules and ideas you want, right? If your ideas create a better encyclopedia, I say go for it. Otherwise, is there an actual policy discussion or proposal here? It seems like it's just "oh this place is so terrible now." -- Ricky81682 (talk) 04:28, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

There is some substantive discussion occurring in this thread, contribute to it or not as you wish. If you want to play the wrong venue card (which is played with great selectivity, I've noticed), go ahead, but this discussion has a place somewhere on the site (and not consigned to user space). I'd be happy to relocate the entire thread. ―Mandruss ☎ 12:03, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

I think one of the general areas that is being discussed here is civility. I edit in several areas and it amazes me the difference in civility in some topic areas. I have been in the situation where after taking an incivility-bashing from groups of editors who have followed me, I have moved to editing another area and despite the subject being (potentially) contentious, the editors there have behaved with total respect and civility. So, although this is not about individual editors, it is about like-minded (incivil) editors who see what others get away with, repeat this, the precedent is then set and suddenly we all have to tolerate it.DrChrissy ^(talk) 12:52, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

I agree this is also what I've seen. Editors that behave as we'd expect in a friendly, cooperative manner in most other areas are a different type of person in a specific article or topic area, and this usually seems to be the result of having some type of interest in that specific topic. As as I've noted, when this is from established editors, it's hard to convince AN or others that something is out of place, often sweeping such confrontations as "a bad day" (which everyone has, no question, but makes it hard to have any action taken against such editors). --MASEM (t) 18:00, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Is there an opportunity to share these best practices in civility across communities and projects? Something along the lines of, "Hey, here's how we work and what our interoperation of civility have meant for our project." Followed by a simple checklist of what works? Maybe we can raise the tide for all boats without having to rely on Mom and Dad enforcing good behavior? Sorry for having more questions than answers. :) Ckoerner (talk) 22:41, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

At least at my experience, these lines where civility is an issue don't align with WikiProjects, though individual Wikiprojects may have had to deal with internal problems on one-off bases, and the Signpost often features Wikiproject spotlights that ID these things. The situations I see generally fall outside the individual coverage of Wikiprojects. --MASEM (t) 23:53, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

It's easy to be civil and it's easy to not be a bully, if you're committed to doing so. It's easy to edit according to policy and to hold ourselves to high standards of integrity, if we want to. I also edit in areas that are extremely civil, and it's a wonderful experience. I want that same level of integrity and civility in other areas that are contentious, but there does not seem to be the critical mass of editors willing to stand up for civility and principles as there needs to be to change the general culture. There is instead impunity and gang behavior. Many good editors have been intimidated out of editing in such areas, and have stated so explicitly. When you do try to use ANI or NPOVN or other structure which are supposed to be the next-level way to address it, they typically result in no action or blowback action against the person making the appeal. Therefore, the system is broken in certain areas where there is contention. I think we can foster a critical mass of integrity, and the first step in doing so is to name the problem. The second step is to step up and address it. Stand up for what's right, even in small things. If an editor is repeatedly deleting other editors' comments on talk pages, isn't that a signal that they don't have the innate integrity needed to function well in discussions of possibly contentious topics? If another editor is consistently name-calling, acting bully-like, being emotionally abusive, etc... that's a signal that they are probably a source of problems. Other editors may react in the moment sometimes to those centrally problematic editors, and that's to be expected. They even know how to bait, how to get others to blow up and then use that as ammo against them. There is this stuff going on. This stuff is toxic, and drives away good editors who really do want to apply the policies like NPOV and RS to to correct goal of writing a good encyclopedia useful for the human species. SageRad (talk) 15:05, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I support your reasoning in principle. But, as I've said recently, one's opinions count for nothing if they prefer to remain silent, and intimidation tactics work. I strongly suspect that a large majority of editors would do anything to have a better working environment—anything except stick their head up so it can get chopped off. I don't think that's going to change, we can't repeal human nature, so there's no solution short of an outside entity (WMF?) stepping in, assuming control, and overriding the vocal and aggressive minority. I don't see that happening, so I'm pessimistic about such ambitious and idealistic goals. I feel we can make significant improvements in the culture with changes like what I suggested at 22:08, 9 February 2016 (and even those would be difficult to pass), but I don't see us achieving any more than that at this point. ―Mandruss ☎ 15:33, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

As somebody on the other side who has been described as a bully, not by anyone in this discussion, I would like to put the other side's point of view. Many discussions seem to go on and on and on over matters where the sources are pretty clear but those arguing against them think there is some great injustice to fix, and they simply will not stop. That is where we get pointers to various WP: like great wrongs and flogging dead horses from. Yes there is some bad behavior sometimes but it is often because of exasperation because these 'polite' editors continue to disrupt Wikipedia. In my opinion it is they who drive new editors away and make things unpleasant for people who just want to edit Wikipedia according to the policies and produce a good encyclopaedia with a neutral point of view that goes by the sources and their weight. More than just dealing quickly with people who have been uncivil to each other what I really would like is a way that editors who flog a dead horse just get toned down or excluded from topics quicker rather than the endless recursive stairs of the process for content disputes. Dmcq (talk) 16:07, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I don't see you as "on the other side" from me. I think we should have a far more aggressive block schedule. If one hasn't cleaned up their act after three blocks, what they and Wikipedia need is for them to receive an involuntary 5-year sabbatical to work on themselves. They are a net negative to the project, full stop. I think we'd be surprised at how many misbehavors would change their ways if they knew that their continued editing rights depended on it. ―Mandruss ☎ 16:11, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

I think you'd get less blocking as a result. If admins knew that the third block would result in a 5-year ban, there would be less minor blocking as I imagine every block will be subject to gigantic amount of scrutiny based on the "now the editor only has two chances to avoid a five year block, it must be for a very good reason." You're going to get more chaos not less. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 22:31, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

However, I have seen cliques that stand perhaps too much behind policy as to refuse to engage in any discussions that require nuanced considerations of policy, recognizing that some policies need to have more weight than others for certain topic areas. Most commonly that I've seen is the use of UNDUE and FRINGE to eliminate counter-discussion about a topic that is contentious. Policies are meant to be flexible; there are times where editors are encouraged to and should use UNDUE/FRINGE to remove minority/fringe counterpoints (particularly when it comes to BLP), but there are times where there is need to be more accommodating if we are to remain neutral on a contentious topic. But instead, sometimes these cliques stick to the policy like glue and refuse to consider their flexible nature in areas where they need to be flexible; whether this is just a mechanical application or intentional usage to uphold a specific POV, it can be very difficult to tell, but in either case, these groups need to work with editors that bring these questions forward in a cooperative manner. It creates elitism which is not helpful for the project as a whole. And again, this type of behavior is very much a long-term phenomena, and very difficult to identify as an outsider to the conversation, or even to guide outsiders to the most relevant points. --MASEM (t) 16:25, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

Yep FRINGE and WEIGHT do sometimes cause problems and especially when put together. Some editors go around removing the facts about fringe topics even when it destroys Wikipedia as an encyclopaedia on the basis of WEIGHT. All you get is an article saying it is pseudoscience and lots of people have shown it is rubbish with very little about what the topic is about in the first place. It is unfortunately very easy to be cliquish and the general rule that should be followed I think is that a notice should always be placed on an article talk page if the article content is being discussed elsewhere, not just inform an editor if they are explicitly named. Dmcq (talk) 23:43, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

No linkage of bad behavio(u)r

The parent discussion is useful, but too blue-sky to actually achieve change. I would like to take one of the things mentioned (by me) and frame it as a formal proposal.

PROPOSED: Confine each ANI complaint to addressing the behavior of one editor. If the opponents of that editor have behaved badly, handle that separately. Avoid linkage. Do not allow User X's bad behavior to mitigate User Y's bad behavior.

• Support as proposer. Many editors are far more likely to behave in a disruptive manner if they can reasonably expect to be forgiven after pointing to someone else's behavior. "I'm usually not like this, but I had no choice. They made me do it. Hey I'm only human." This is bullshit. No one makes me do anything, I'm an adult and I decide how I behave. Two wrongs don't make a right, and there is no "justified" bad behavior. Don't make excuses for your behavior, and don't legitimize excuses in Wikipedia process. It has created a culture of excuses and one of the best things we can do for the editing environment is to change that culture. ―Mandruss ☎ 13:39, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose Terrible terrible idea. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:48, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose So if two editors are both revert warring each other, we must have separate discussions created for each one? It's too chaotic and too restrictive. Besides, this won't stop people from using the behavior of others unless you want to spend all day policing people's rationales. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 22:28, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. It takes two to tango, and oftentimes more than that on Wikipedia. Calidum ¤ 22:32, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - If we were to adopt this, who ever complains to ANI first would effectively win any dispute... Even if their behavior was more serious. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Blueboar (talk • contribs) 22:51, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - per Ricky81682. I have to agree that separating the discussions between editors that act in bad faith would clog up an administrator's time. It should also be on the administrator to review the actions of all involved, not just of those being reported. Boomer Vial^Holla 10:19, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose I have read Mandruss's explanation below and I disagree with what they say. One person's behavior does in many circumstances mean another's should be excused to an extent. We are not robots, we are supposed to use commonsense. Dmcq (talk) 12:14, 14 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose on the principle of boomerangs. It also makes any ANI threads much easier to read through and discuss when both editors can be discussed in the same "parent" thread. Separating the threads would remove easily viewable context of the editor's behaviours. I do however agree that one user's behaviour should not excuse another's through a perverse false balance. Cheers, Doctor Crazy in Room 102 of The Mental Asylum 10:50, 16 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose - each user's behavior must be judged in context of how this user was treated, or thinks (s)he was treated, by the accusers and other users. A user's behavior can be migitated by the fact that this user was treated badly (yes, there are absolute red lines, but even crossing them may be punishable by a smaller punishment). To discuss a user's behavior without its context would clearly make this context harder to find. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 04:16, 22 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose Calidum nailed it. Very frequently, if not the outright majority of the time, the complaints by Editor A against Editor B are overblown and histrionic, and both editors (or groups thereof) need to settle down. Those of us who bother to try to moderate these disputes should not have our hands tied. We'd probably also have to get rid of WP:BOOMERANG, which we've long relied upon. It's also unworkable because ANI reports fairly often are about multiple editors. We shouldn't have to have five threads at once to deal with the behavior of an editing bloc.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:42, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Discussion: No linkage

Ricky81682: First, this is about ANI, not AN3. This is not an edit warring context. Also, it doesn't say we must have a separate discussion for User X, only that User X's behavior may not be used as a defense by User Y. As for your last sentence, I'm not sure what you mean. Are you referring to User Y "using the behavior of others" in their own rationalizing, or as a defense at ANI? If the latter, that may be true, they may try the defense regardless of this culture change, but that defense would be futile. ―Mandruss ☎ 22:50, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Um, actually it says quite clearly: "Confine each ANI complaint to addressing the behavior of one editor. If the opponents of that editor have behaved badly, handle that separately." So "It doesn't say we must have a separate discussion for User X, only that ..." does not appear to be an accurate statement. If you want to change the proposal then change it, but please don't try to gaslight us that we're all having reading comprehension problems.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:42, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Calidum: I don't know what that means, or why it would be an Oppose rationale here. Could you elaborate? ―Mandruss ☎ 22:50, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

I mean that in many instances (though not all) both parties have contributed to the dispute; this doesn't mean they're equally guilty or that the actions of one excuse the actions of another. I fail to see how breaking out each users' conduct into separate threads helps at all. Calidum ¤ 23:04, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. I thought my !vote answered those questions. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:05, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Blueboar: Not so. If the person who was reported first was not judged to have committed actionable bad behavior, no action would be taken. But their behavior would not be excused by someone else's behavior. Regardless of the outcome of the original complaint—or even before that complaint is resolved—a complaint may be filed against the person who filed it, and that outcome may be more serious than that of the first complaint. No change except the elimination of linkage. The need to keep the complaints physically separate is simply a matter of organization. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:14, 12 February 2016 (UTC)

Specific behaviour

1. Editing other's talk page comments.
2. Non-admins closing ANI threads.

Both of these are not new behaviour, rather behaviour that was tolerated far more in the "old days". If I make a distracting spelling error why should someone not correct it? If a thread needs closing why should it not be closed? The ossification of the community has made both of these actions ones which were looked askance upon, and then (unofficially) frowned upon, and then over which people were taken to task.

My advice is, be very careful editing others' comments, and annotate anything non-trivial (indeed consider notifying the editor instead) and be careful closing ANI sections.

The reason I suggest more caution over editing others' comments is that the action is less obvious. ANI closes can be, and often are, reversed: so while it is a good idea to close "correctly" a mistake should not be a major problem.

Wikipedia is (or was) a bit like the Wild West, and where reversible actions are concerned this has stood us in good stead. Almost all the problems stem from irreversible actions. And we tend to compound this by taking more irreversible actions as a remedy.

All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 13:50, 14 February 2016 (UTC).

I think one of the problems of allowing editing of others' comments is that it blurs what could be clear line, helpful in preventing misunderstanding. I recently had a comment of mine heavily edited and it significantly changed the meaning. There were comments along the lines of "it is a single occurrence so it is not actionable". I disagree. We take action over a single edit when this breaches 1RR or 3RR. If we have a clear line that others' comments should not be edited, this can be avoided. Oh, by the way, the AN/I thread in which these changes were made was closed by a non-admin...I think this indicates why I also disagree with the second behaviour in your sub-heading.DrChrissy ^(talk) 15:33, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

Given I've seen people use comments out of context as well to infer an entirely different meaning, this strengths the need to avoid any edits on others comments, even if it is fixing a spelling error. The only times comment editing should be allowed is to fix page-breaking or discussion-confusing layout (adding the required colons or stars for intentingindenting or moving a misplaced comment, or closing an open italic/bold format or the like), to remove BLP or copyright-violating material, or otherwise strip clear vandalism out. If its a spelling mistake or a missing word, that should be let be though you're free to tag that editor to ask them if they want to fix it. It prevents the line from where one fixes a spelling, to adding a few extra words, to changing the entire meaning of the user's post, and that's just the easiest way to prevent that slippery slope. --MASEM (t) 15:41, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

@Masem: Do you want to fix your spelling of "intenting" to "indenting"? Seems to be closer to what you are saying. Cheers, Doctor Crazy in Room 102 of The Mental Asylum 02:12, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, thanks. --MASEM (t) 16:23, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

I occasionally fix indenting per WP:THREAD (many, many editors don't understand that simple indenting system or refuse to follow it because they disagree with it, in some cases resulting in misunderstanding of one's meaning). I've been known to remove massive bolding per WP:SHOUT, without being the local massive bolding sheriff. Inserting a blank line for readability, no problem. Correcting others' spelling is excessive, unnecessary, and potentially annoying to the writer, but forgiveable if not overdone. Anything else should be verboten, and I'd be likely to raise a bit of a stink if someone did it to me. ―Mandruss ☎ 19:27, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

What MASEM called "slippery slope" is the result of applying an old excuse: that the end justifies the means. As we have many times seen in the past, this miserable excuse hides, always and only, a battle for power. Is the community really willing to mingle with this? Wouldn't be better to find an higher bank where to conduct the struggle from? Carlotm (talk) 21:14, 14 February 2016 (UTC)

• Question I have just seen that a current thread on AN/I was opened by an editor and the same editor closed the thread as a "non-admin closure". Is this allowed?DrChrissy ^(talk) 18:41, 15 February 2016 (UTC)

What is the context DrChrissy? (Read; provide a link please) If they are withdrawing their request/notice/what-have-you, then I'm pretty sure that is allowable in most cases. Cheers, Doctor Crazy in Room 102 of The Mental Asylum 02:12, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

The closure is of AN/I "Edit-warring at Pakistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa" which is now in archive#914. To be clear, I'm not making any report of this editor (which is why I have not named them or pinged them), I just thought that actual self-closing of a report leaves the system open for gaming and abuse. By all means an editor should be able to withdraw and ask for closure, but should they really be able to close it themselves?DrChrissy ^(talk) 15:52, 16 February 2016 (UTC)

He pulled his own request as things had calmed down. There is nothing at all wrong with this. Also you basically named them and should have pinged SheriffIsInTown. Mrfrobinson (talk) 02:07, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

I had this request open for so many days and no admin intervened to resolve the matter. Once we were done fighting and I stepped back from my stated position. I thought there is nothing wrong in pulling out this request. I had seen non-admin closures before so I thought let's close it myself so nobody else can be bothered with the closure as well but if there is a policy saying that requestor cannot close their own request then do let me know and I will refrain from that in the future. Sheriff | ☎ 911 | 02:59, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

SheriffIsInTown I saw no issue with your action at all. I only pinged you because it was mentioned above by DrChrissy who said they weren't going to name names but linked to it (which is essentially the same thing). Mrfrobinson (talk) 12:16, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

@SheriffIsInTown: As I indicated above, it was the principle of the action (self-closure of a thread on AN/I) that I was raising as a genuine question, not the incidence in which you were involved. I only linked to your closure when requested. I apologise for any embarassment or inconvenience caused by my drawing attention to you. DrChrissy ^(talk) 14:19, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

Not a big deal, thank you :), i had my share of bogus blames since i joined Wikipedia, compared to those, this is nothing. Sheriff | ☎ 911 | 17:21, 18 February 2016 (UTC)

• Um, these two specific "bad behaviors" are trivial, rare, and easily dealt with (and sometimes even permissible, per WP:REFACTOR and WP:NPA when it comes to changing others' posts, and WP:NAC when it comes to WP:SNOWBALLs that result in no administrative action being needed). They certainly require no changes to process, procedures, or rules.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:46, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Who still writes articles around here?

I believe the sad reality is that many should just leave the project. Before things can get better first they have to get worse. The current editors seem not at all interested in changing their ways, things just are not bad enough. Or things are going just fine the way they are, it depends on your perspective.

I think the problems are many and obvious. There are countless ways to identify the problematic editors. For example: If you are reading this and your mind is fixated on pretending I've experienced- or physically are- the problem then you are one of them. As long as you maintain that bad faith assumption you and me can not write an encyclopedia together. -> This is not my problem. You are doing this every time you see someone raise an issue. Don't expect that on the man approach to ever fix anything.

It is like filling a bug report "that link overthere doesn't work", then getting a response like "you can still get to that page by doing A, B, C, D" Here the person who is suppose to fix the bug pretends it is the user who is having a problem. This while the person filling the bug was trying to help him.

As noted above, the Wikipedia system was bad from the beginning. There never was peace on Wikipedia nor was there sufficient effort to enforce the rules. There are these illusory pillars and edit guidelines but they are like having a law book without a police force or a court system.

It is perfectly acceptable for overly active long time editors to cite guidelines they've made up themselves. If their buddies, or shall we say, random other editors agree, then: that is what the guidelines "says" and it will be enforced the way it was imagined to work.

As an IP editor I get to see this again and again. The usual response is that I should make an account, which fails to appreciate the issue raised. It is as if I'm interested in treating the sympthom, as if it is acceptable for editors who know better to "accidentally" fabricate convenient guidelies.

But that is not all, much like any article the guidelines and pillars are written and guarded by teams of users who by understatement are really not interested at all in your participation or views. Endless debates and small tinkering will never accumulate to serious changes to any of these ideas. Those who would have agreed with your proposal left Wikipedia long ago or avoid the page like the plague. That is what WP Consensus refers to in this context.

If you can see- or think-that the small club (or shall we say cult?) controlling the guideline is wrong or insane you should really abandon the project. Do continue to edit some trivial mainspace mistakes 2 or 3 times per year or post 2 or 3 talk page comments, but limit participation to that.

Admins, the wikipedia law enforcement, can and do randomly shoot people on the street without consequences while being reluctant to enforce even the most obvious guidelines.

I've seen one editor, who I cant blame at all, with an edit history that should be described as a multi-year river of insults. I estimate he cost Wikipedia roughly 2000 users as people simply don't care for cynical and insulting feedback on their constructive legitimate effort. It was amazing to see administrators ban users on his request after they simply insulted him in return (which should be an entirely acceptable deed for a newbie repeatedly insulted by a long term user) The guy had so many insults in his name that we can hardly blame him for it. He clearly didn't know any better.

Meanwhile on a different page far far away editors are ganging up on a contributor who simply lost his cool for 1 minute.

It is hard to imagine admins not to be entirely and fully aware of these double standards.

But you wanted solutions, I find it hard to see where to begin but ok.

Lets enrich ANI by having involved parties provide links pointing at their X most recent mainspace contributions. Restoring deleted content doesn't count and minor contributions may be skipped if the editor desires it.

That way administrators don't have to read endless horror stories but they can adjust their bias to the wonderful contributions made by the user before banning her.

While the report might be valid and filling it might contribute to the project constructively: If the editor filling the report is not an active contributor his ideas about the way the article writing process should work are not based on experience. It was someone else who was trying to write an article and he chose to get in the way of that process. That choice might be legitimate, the goal of the project is certainly not to make antagonizing the writing of the encyclopedia as comfortable as possible.

The reality is that editors who are willing to do the research, make the citations and format the pages are perfectly capable of self-policing among their own. (not directly of course)

In the current paradigm vandal fighters are a precious type of users in contrast with article writers who are considered a disposable commodity. But face the music, the vandal fighter is never going to teach the new user how to write articles, all he can do is tell her how not to do it. again and again and again...

Personally it is the first thing I look for when a user is disagreeing with my contribution. I look at their edit history to see how many years ago their activity last involved article writing. If I'm impressed by their contributions I will make far greater effort tying to debate the disagreement, if there are any I respect their emotional outbursts and continue to calmly explain why I think it is valuable to the article and so on. If their contributions are laughable however, I will systemically avoid debating the art of article writing, not because I don't want to but because it is pointless. You can only have a serious discussion if participants share the same goal.

I believe administrators are very capable of making that call if they are conveniently provided with the stuff that makes valuable editors.

Ill consider against to be a vote against article writing per WP:Making Stuff Up. 84.106.11.117 (talk) 22:17, 20 February 2016 (UTC)

• Support as proposer.84.106.11.117 (talk) 22:17, 20 February 2016 (UTC)
• A bit overlong but I think what you are asking for is a reputation system which works to encourage constructive edits. It is hard to stop such things being gamed and encouraging cliques of people who back each other up. However I would support efforts to find such a system as it might help greater engagement by good editors. Dmcq (talk) 13:58, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Public Accounts

Last year, the Public Account Movement (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:The_Public_Account_Movement) caused a stir on Wikipedia, before being driven underground. But we did not cease to exist. We believe that Public Accounts, which anybody can log into and use, will succeed in making Wikipedia into a fairer place for all. What do you think? We want to talk about Public Accounts. --The Public Account Movement Is Back! (talk) 23:58, 11 February 2016 (UTC)

• @The Public Account Movement Is Back!:Some background, please? What is this? Why is it good? Oiyarbepsy (talk) 00:01, 12 February 2016 (UTC)
  • I see no advantage to public accounts on sites where anonymous editing is permitted. In fact, such accounts would probably end up being hijacked by individual vandals who change the password and start with full-scale disruption until the accounts will need to be blocked, anyway. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 18:27, 13 February 2016 (UTC)

The account has been zealously blocked, so we may never know. Perhaps more to the point we may fail to explain to this user why a public account on the existing software is a bad idea.

There are (or have been) proposals to improve the anonymity of IPs, which may answer their concern. All the best: Rich Farmbrough, 13:56, 14 February 2016 (UTC).

Bad idea. Accounts with high levels of permissions such as Administrators or CheckUsers and such would be taken over easily. Those hijacked accounts would cause some pretty mass destruction. FiendYT 03:32, 22 February 2016 (UTC)

• This is just silly, per all of the above, and per the WP:COMMONSENSE that anons can edit, so the entire IPv4 and IPv6 system is essentially a big public account. Next.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:49, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Promotional copyvio by copyright holder

I have a question, or two:

We delete copvio mateial, rightly so.

We delete promotional material, right so.

However, consider when the copyvio material is actually posted by the copyright holder as promotional material. Have they therefore signed over the material to "commons" usage, as per the text at the bottom of every edit screen, namely 'By clicking the "Save page" button, you agree to the Terms of Use and you irrevocably agree to release your contribution under the CC BY-SA 3.0 License and the GFDL with the understanding that a hyperlink or URL is sufficient for CC BY-SA 3.0 attribution' (my bold). Hence there is no longer a copy right violation since it was agreed to by the copyright holder? There then just remains the matter of making it encyclopedic rather than promotional. Eno Lirpa (talk) 13:16, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

This sounds fairly tricky. If this is indeed the case, the copyright holder basically waives any monetary claims to the uploaded material (as it is now open sourced under creative commons). This means that the uploaded materials would not only be usuable in Wikipedia, but anywhere, for any purpose, by anyone (as long as they conform to CC). This may be an unwanted and unknown consequence of the uploader (but tough luck there). However, to be able to allow this in Wikipedia we need to be 100% certain that the uploader is indeed the sole copyright holder (or at least has legal power to waive copyright on the material for ever). I am not sure Wikipedia has such control mechanisms in place; and we could get into a lot of problem if someone poses as sole copyright holder, uploads stuff, which then gets copied outside Wikipedia. Arnoutf (talk) 13:30, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Okay, but how do we know anyone has the right to cc the right to any material they post? Eno Lirpa (talk) 14:06, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

We probably don't, and therefore should not allow this (sorry for backtracking in the thread) Arnoutf (talk) 15:34, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

There is a huge difference between content where, as far as anyone knows, only exists on Wikipedia; and content which is known to be on a company website, where we have reason to think that the copyright may have been legally turned over to the company (and not the person who claims to be the author), and even if not - there may be multiple authors in the company. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 14:40, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

When an organization identifies something has promotional material that is not enough for us to use it. The material must be specifically licensed with acceptable free license. This is very rarely the case. While I’m sure it happens on occasion I can’t recall ever running across it. Of course as suggested above but worth emphasizing, even if the material is appropriately licensed, the very nature of it being promotional means it is likely to be worded in a way that is not acceptable for an encyclopedia. ::::However, if it is appropriately licensed we can reword it and not have to worry about close paraphrasing and as long as we comply with the requirements for attribution.--S Philbrick(Talk) 14:42, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Dilemma (BLP and CoI editing vs. reliable sources)

Today I was again confronted with issue that perhaps is very much of our time: social media representatives. I'm not sure what experiences other editors have had with BLP articles and these people, but this is an example that I came across today. The singer Barbara Hannigan has engaged some who manages her 'online affairs' according to this edit. In it, there is a reference to a separation, apparently requested by the artist. I did a quick search both in Dutch and English media outlets, but found no reference to it. Obviously this is a BLP issue and a private matter. I am tempted to blank the Personal Life section for this very reason. However, I am worried that it will cause a edit-war with the CoI editor User:VCM05 on whose page I already left a notice about conflict of interest issues. How have others dealt with this situation? Any advice is appreciated. Karst (talk) 16:22, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

My 2 cents. These edits fall under WP:Paid and possibly under WP:COI. In any case, if so requested a reliable source WP:V should be provided. In this specific case, however, such a source may be lacking.

The source for her marriage is actually very flimsy, as it is just a few word clause in a newspaper report that is not at all about her personal life. Therefore in this specific case removal of the personal life section (basically one line) would solve the whole issue.

The way forward in this specific case may be to point the representative to above guidelines, and invite them to make a case on talk for consideration by other editors. Arnoutf (talk) 18:06, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks. I will remove the section for the time being and point to the Talk page. Karst (talk) 18:44, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

Motion to allow linking to large periods in prehistory and antiquity

Because it's really inconvenient to have to manually look up terms like 8th millennium BC or 5th century in articles about ancient and natural history.--Prisencolin (talk) 04:38, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

It isn't clear what exactly you want to do here. Can you please be more specific? עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 19:52, 23 February 2016 (UTC)

I'd like to add a line in MOS:LINKING that explicitly allows linking to large periods of time (maybe >100 yrs)--Prisencolin (talk) 01:32, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

I'm assuming you want to amend Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Linking#Linking_month-and-day_or_year, I don't think that is to controversial - but suggest you post at Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Linking, with the specific change you want to incorporate, then give it a reasonable time for comments before applying the update. — xaosflux ^Talk 02:41, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

• Too vague for appraisal. I concur with Xaosflux that this should be raised as a more concrete proposal in MoS talk. While it could be taken to WT:MOSLINK, or perhaps WT:MOSNUM which covers dates, you'll get more input at WT:MOS itself, and most non-trivial changes to MoS pages are discussed there, since the main guideline supersedes its detail pages, and they have to be kept in synch with it.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:34, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Excessive description of a book harmful to author?

I recently looked at the article for a well-known book, Michelle Alexander's The New Jim Crow. The "Overview" and the "Summary of chapters" sections together constitute an over 10,000-word description of what's in the book. Isn't this way excessive, in terms of what WP articles normally do for synopses of books, films, etc? Moreover, isn't description at this size and level harmful to the author? If it's written well, it may hurt book sales, because people now think they know everything that's in the book. Or if it's not written well, it's going to hurt the image of the book, because it gets details wrong or it isn't written as well or misses some important themes. Yet I couldn't quite find a policy that said that what this article is doing is wrong. Is there one? Wasted Time R (talk) 00:46, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

While one might argue WP:NOT#PLOT doesn't apply to non-fiction, the nature of it still does : we should not overly reiterate what is described in the book. Highlighting major themes and points is fair, but a 10,000 word summary is overkill. --MASEM (t) 00:59, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Given the lack of direct guidance for non-fiction summaries, the best we perhaps have is MOS:PLOT, which cautions that summaries of works should not overwhelm the rest of the article, or WP:UNDUE in general which discourages unbalanced articles of any type. I agree the length of the summary is excessive. --Jayron32 01:00, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Also, per guidance at Wikipedia:Plot-only description of fictional works notes several legal cases where works with excessively detailed summaries of the parent material constituted copyright violations of the original works. --Jayron32 01:04, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Just as a procedural note, its interesting to see that nearly every section of that summary in the book is from a different registered editor that effectively didn't edit much beyond that, over a very narrow time span (of a few days). I don't think it's socking (there's no signs the individual editors were blocked) but perhaps something else is going on? Class assignment? I would almost consider blanking that section just in case. --MASEM (t) 01:17, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

I'd imagine a class assignment would use the same IP, or at least ones that geolocate to the same area, and the timing would be shorter rather than over months. But you're right; it does look somewhat suspicious. Ajraddatz (Talk) 02:06, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Well, it could be an online class. ansh666 02:57, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Could be, though the time scale still seems a bit long. Oh well, I think that shortening the section per the reasons listed above makes sense. Ajraddatz (Talk) 03:11, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

One of the page headers at Talk:The New Jim Crow says that it was indeed part of a course assignment in Spring 2015. It would feel bad to rip out students' work, but it really shouldn't have been put there like this in the first place. Wasted Time R (talk) 03:13, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

This was my class's project. As the first Wiki project I engaged in, I didn't manage it very well. Frankly, I'm surprised the summaries are still up. So, don't feel bad. In fact, other work that students have contributed since has been taken down. I use these as examples about what stays on Wikipedia and what doesn't. So, it's helpful.76.14.51.82 (talk) 15:08, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Hosting class projects isn't part of this project's goals; if they want to use our site for their project, they have to live up to our rules, not visa versa. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 10:24, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Well yes but that would actually require rules to adhere to. MOS (and MOS:PLOT) are best practice guidelines, the other relevant guides are essays and MOS:PLOT doesnt apply to non-fiction works anyway. WP:UNDUE is not relevant either, excessive description is not a neutrality issue unless its skewing the neutrality of the article towards one point of view or another. An excessive summary of the subject of the work the article is about is almost never going to hit that. The appropriate place would be somewhere in the MOS for summaries for writing about non-fiction works. Which at the moment does not exist that I can see. WP:Manual_of_Style/Writing_about_non-fiction probably needs creating. Only in death does duty end (talk) 13:32, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Well, it probably violates WP:Primary or wherever we say do not base articles too much on primary sources (which is somewhere in our major policies or WP:RS) and the spirit of WP:Close paraphrasing. Alanscottwalker (talk)

FYI I deleted the section per the comments above. If anyone thinks we need more policy, please propose. Alanscottwalker (talk) 15:29, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

• Cite WP:NOT#INDISCRIMINATE, WP:NOT#SOAPBOX, WP:NOT#BLOG, and WP:NOT#TEXTBOOK for now, and fix WP:NOT#PLOT and MOS:FICTION to explain that, while the issues addressed mostly arise for excessive detail-geekery over fictional works, they also apply to obsessive dwelling on minutiae with regard to non-fiction, too, per WP:COMMONSENSE and WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY / WP:GAMING / WP:WIKILAWYER. And yes, excessive summarization may be a copyright problem (not a lawyer, but I worked as policy analyst with intellectual property attorneys for a decade, so I am quite certain of this).  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:29, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Unexplained abbreviations in articles?

I have noticed today this edit on my watchlist. I reverted it since I did not know what WL means (I also though the edit breaks markup, which it does not). My edit was reverted, with the comment that WL means "World leading". Whereas I am fine when my good faith edits are reverted for cause, I asked the user to add the definition of "WL" to the article. They refused to do it, saying that everybody knows what is this anyway. Now, the question is how should I read MOS: do we need the definition (or at least an active link), or the user is correct, and we should basically not care about the accidental readers who do not know what this is.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:36, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Unless specified in the "Exceptions" section below, an acronym should be written out in full the first time it is used on a page, followed by the abbreviation in parentheses, e.g. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Common exceptions to this rule are post-nominal initials because writing them out in full would cause clutter. Another exception is when something is most commonly known by its acronym (i.e., it's article here is at the acronym title), in which case the expansion can come in the parenthetical or be omitted, except in the lead of its own article: according to the CIA (U.S. Central Intelligence Agency).

To save space in small spaces (defined above), acronyms do not need to be written out in full. When not written out in full on the first use on a page, an acronym should be linked. An unambiguous acronym can be linked as-is, but an ambiguous acronym should be linked to its expansion. Upon later re-use in a long article, the template can be used to provide a mouse-over tooltip giving the meaning of the acronym again without having to redundantly link it or spell it out again in the main text: CIA, giving: CIA

Seems to be the relevant passages from WP:MOSABBR. --Izno (talk) 17:53, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

There is a list of related acronyms, including WL, at Athletics abbreviations#Records. At least some of them in that table could be linked there on first appearance. Or, and perhaps more reader-friendly, you could use footnotes, which could in turn contain links to that article section. ―Mandruss ☎ 18:14, 24 February 2016 (UTC)

Links or explanations for sure. Assume ignorance. EvergreenFir (talk) Please {{re}} 02:53, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

I was the one who reverted it back and wrote it to begin with. It's an Athletics Page, so I assume that people reading it will understand what WL stands for in this case. Either way, there is already "World Leading" above it due to a box with the World Record, Olympic Record and World Leading times, at the time of the event. I even wrote about the Original World Leading time had been abolished due to Doping, underneath. So I don't find it necessary to again write that WL stands for World Leading. Basetornado (talk) 10:15, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Abbreviations like WL should not be used at all as they are a specialised jargon. This problem of specialised abbreviations crops up all over Wikipedia, and it need to be stamped out as much as possible. We don't need to save space, and their use makes the articles harder to understand. The target audience is not thw same as the likely writers, so we have to make efforts to change the writers' style they prefer to use. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 12:16, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Okay, but I still think there is no need to say what it is, because of the aforementioned uses of the words. Basetornado (talk) 12:50, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

All the abbreviations in that article should be explained. I can't see what on earth is the point of putting in abbreviations like PB WL DQ SB and whatever other ones that are there without any explanation whatsoever. Lots of people would be interested in the 50 kilometers walk records but they will just be mystified by that article. This is supposed to be an encyclopaedia not a puzzle box. Dmcq (talk) 13:46, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

We should also remember that we are writing for a general audience, not a specialized one. While "WL" may be crystal clear to anyone interested in athletics, its not a common abbreviation outside it, and definitely must be defined at least once. --MASEM (t) 15:07, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

The original World Leading (WL) Time was abolished after Sergey Kirdyapkin was found guilty of Doping Violations. There you go. Basetornado (talk) 16:50, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks to all of you for the opinions. I will try to make sure PB and SB are referenced in all articles as well.--Ymblanter (talk) 16:52, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

I'm even a frequent sports editor, and have never seen "WL" outside of highly jargonistic context, and even then it was explained before it was used, e.g. a key/legend in a table. It's weird, confusing and inappropriate to just shove it into an article here. I wouldn't even use it with {{abbr}} markup without having already spelled it out earlier in an article.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  10:24, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

I think there might be an opportunity for a sports abbreviations template where one listed the abbreviations and it spits out a bit of boilerplate giving explanations for the various abbreviations. Dmcq (talk) 17:24, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

There is Template:AthAbbr, discussed here. Pinging SFB, just in case he wants to know, what's happening here. --Edgars2007 (talk/contribs) 17:42, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the ping Edgars. Quite a lot of work has gone into the template to reduce confusion around athletics abbreviations. Within results listings it makes most sense to use abbreviations, given space considerations and typical presentation in other media. All the abbreviations have real-world basis, although many such as A or WL are nonsense to most (conservatively I'd say all but WR and PB are nonsense to most). Among editors in the athletics project, the best result we've come to is to link to the athletics abbreviations page and describe those abbreviation and meanings in full. The template also provides a hover-over decode for abbreviations, which also works for screen readers. Sports stats can be so niche at times that a little confusion is inevitable and it's mostly unavoidable – for example, "AR" or "area record" has a very specific meaning in athletics that needs to be conveyed, but concepts like "the best legal-conditions mark set within a given event by an athlete within one of the six continental areas defined by the IAAF, such as the North America, Central America and Caribbean region governed by NACAC, but not athletes from within that region who are subjects of non-IAAF member states, or non-sovereign dependencies of states in one of the other IAAF-defined areas" aren't ever going to be easily expressed within a table, or even each article, without severely affecting focus and readability. SFB 18:44, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:26, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Somewhat related discussion

Currently there's a discussion going on here whether or not the acronym BWV should be linked on first occurence in an article. Maybe the acronym can be explained in a {{efn}}? Maybe a link in the infobox (which in the wikicode "precedes" the text in the lead section) is sufficient? --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:14, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Background and history: The article is about a Bach cantata, one of many, with their article titles construed of original title in German + BWV number, BWV being short for Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis. So far, both the original title and BWV 7 (in this example) were bolded, the former as the title, the latter as both the cantata number (we do bold symphony numbers) and as a main redirect. Some people would speak about the work as BWV 7, - it's almost a synonym. It seams particularly important to me to make the connection between the title and the BWV number by similar presentation as they are separated by (sometimes longish) translation(s). For those unfamiliar with the acronym BWV, a footnote {{efn}} explained what BWV means, which imho fulfills the spirit of the Mos to explain an acronym. The link - as required by the MoS - is prominently in the infobox, which to me is "the first occurrence" anyway. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:50, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Re. "Some people would speak about the work as BWV 7" – can you back up that claim? As far as I'm aware no reliable source would refer to the composition as BWV 7 without also mentioning its name. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:01, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

When I wrote "speak" I meant speak, - it's colloquially abbreviated like that. - Kindly look at some arbitrary page in the book of books about Bach's cantatas (by Dürr, translated by Jones): I see many mentionings of numbers without title. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 19:44, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

That book, like any other reliable source I know, gives the full name of every cantata it refers to by BWV number. Re. "speak", see WP:V. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:41, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

"refers to by BWV number", we agree, thanks for the better wording. It supports that this number should appear bold. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 10:12, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

As I said above (now applying emphasis): "As far as I'm aware no reliable source would refer to the composition as BWV 7 without also mentioning its name." – AFAIK, in the context of a source BWV numbers are not used stand-alone, i.e. the source will always contain the name of the work. --Francis Schonken (talk) 10:28, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

• @Francis Schonken:What concerns me after looking at the talk page discussion is that an editor with limited input changed a guideline and then uses that adjusted guideline as support for an editing position that includes edit warring. Could this be explained.(Littleolive oil (talk) 13:41, 26 February 2016 (UTC))
  • What do you understand by "limited input"? --Francis Schonken (talk) 13:46, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Perhaps you could explain the situation to clarify for those commenting here, and or link to the guideline discussion and change made.(Littleolive oil (talk) 13:50, 26 February 2016 (UTC))

• • • • For clarity, I didn't change/write a "guideline" (an exaggeration I ignored thus far), I updated a WikiProject "/Guidelines" subpage (a page clearly marked as having "essay" status), as a result of a discussion at the related WikiProject page (for the "/Guidelines" vs "guideline" ambiguity, I commonly refer to it as "guidance", unless it it is a guideline with guideline status). I also announced the update of the essay at the WikiProject talk page. Anyhow, both the diff of the essay update and the archived discussion related to that update are linked from Talk:Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7#BWV, in the sixth and seventh post to that discussion respectively. --Francis Schonken (talk) 14:17, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

An essay is just a formalized version of an opinion and holds no weight, so it should not be used as ammunition in a discussion. Further you did change the essay and then suggested Gerda abide by that change and that essay. I don't see any reason why she or any editor would consider the essay any more than what it is - an opinion - nor should it hold weight in this discussion. However, Rexx's comments below do hold weight and I would agree with him and Gerda that bolding BMV 7 is the appropriate way to title the article. (Littleolive oil (talk) 17:56, 26 February 2016 (UTC))

• • • • • • Wikipedia:WikiProject Classical music/Guidelines are the WikiProject Classical music guidelines, and can be used as such. --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:41, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

In this particular case, it's simply whether the article Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7 should have an opening sentence:

1. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ...;

   or

2. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ...

Both MOS:BOLD and MOS:BOLDTITLE indicate that the article title is to be rendered in boldface. In addition, BWV 7 is a redirect to the article (i.e. a reasonable search term), and readers expect their search term to appear in boldface as is explained in MOS:TEXT #Other uses. All three sections of MOS support version number 1 above - i.e. BWV 7 in boldface. --RexxS (talk) 17:42, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

According to the applicable guidance the abbreviation of the catalogue should not be separated from the catalogue number by a linebreak, so why did you remove the {{nowrap}} here? --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:41, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Citing from the guidelines you refer to:

• MOS:BOLD: "....This is done for the majority of articles, but there are exceptions." (emphasis added)
• MOS:BOLDTITLE: "In general, if the article's title is absent from the first sentence, do not apply the bold style to related text that does appear: The Beatles rise to prominence in the United States on February 7, 1964, was a significant development in the history of the band's commercial success. (The Beatles in the United States)..." (which is one of the exceptions)

In sum MOS:BOLD and MOS:BOLDTITLE rather recommend not to bold in this case.

Re. MOS:TEXT #Other uses: applying the "principle of least astonishment" (as mentioned there) rather indicates to not be wishy-washy about "When not written out in full on the first use on a page, an acronym should be linked." (which is in WP:ACRO, which doesn't indicate exceptions to the rule). --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:34, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Any exceptions to MOS:BOLD need to be for good reason. You have no good reason to remove the bolding on BWV 7, which is both part of the article title and a redirect. Therefore it should be bold.

The articles title's is clearly not absent from the first sentence. It is indeed the subject of the first sentence and not at all analogous to The Beatles in the United States. If you would prefer the opening sentence to read "Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7, (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan) is a .." then propose it on the talk page. The exception is for when it would be unnatural to re-write the opening sentence in order to re-create the title. That is no the case here. You read the words of the guidance mechanically, but have no understanding of what the guidance means.

MOS:BOLD and MOS:BOLDTITLE absolutely recommend to bold in this case. I cannot believe that the guidance could possibly be so misinterpreted here.

Forget acronymns. They are not relevant because BWV 7 is not an acronym - it's the catalogue number of, and a searchable redirect to, the article Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7. If you desperately want to explain the acronym BWV (note that's a different link), then link it at its next (non-bold) occurrence as the guidance suggests, or use a footnote to explain it. Either way, you don't need to break the guidance on bolding article titles and redirects. --RexxS (talk) 18:54, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

As for the removal of the no-wrap: the BWV 7 is placed so close to the start of the first line that there isn't a supported screen resolution low enough for a line break to realistically happen there. It doesn't hurt to put no-wrap in as "good practice", but it isn't needed in any likely scenario in this case. --RexxS (talk) 19:16, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Some sort of tunnel vision I suppose: on my smartphone it is near the end of the second line. So, please just follow applicable guidance in this matter, some of its underlying reasons seem to elude you. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:29, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

And WP:MOSBOLDSYN. --Izno (talk) 17:46, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

MOSBOLDSYN only applies for common abbreviations. Can you demonstrate that BWV 7 is a common abbreviation for Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7? --Francis Schonken (talk) 07:41, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

I did not contest that it was relevant to this exact case, only that it was relevant. --Izno (talk) 13:47, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

• per Ymb (the OP), RexxS, LO, others and the need for this page: Wikipedia:ALPHABETSOUP — Ched :  ?  18:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
• WP:BOOMRANG seems appropriate. A person needs clean hands to come and claim that changes they made should be observed by everyone. This is quite disingenuous. Montanabw^(talk) 03:43, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Please, "Comment on content, not on the contributor". --Francis Schonken (talk) 08:40, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
    • When the contributor is disruptive with IDIDNTHEARTHAT arguments, it is best to point that out. You have been tendentiously pursuing your own personal preferences and you need to stop. --RexxS (talk) 18:54, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Readability

For clarity, we're not discussing the difference between

1. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ...;

   and

2. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ...

   but the difference between

3. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ... ([1]);

   and

4. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ... ([2])

   or other possibilities (see below):

5. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ... ([3])

   and:

6. Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam (Christ our Lord came to the Jordan), BWV 7, is a ...

Notes

References

→ My point being the general readability of the opening phrase of an article. I don't think the sequence (in #3) "Bolded title/parenthesis/footnote for parenthesis/Bolded catalogue indicator/other type of footnote for the catalogue indicator" (and all that before starting to say anything about the subject of the article) is very inviting to continue reading. I'd gladly reduce the clutter at the start of such articles. --Francis Schonken (talk) 11:01, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

My point is that if we agree that BWV 7 should by bold, for various reasons mentioned above (such as the MoS if we don't make an exception - but why should we? ... and because Bach's cantatas are often referred to by their number, ... and to distinguish at a glance from the article with a similar title), your last version is not possible, so the question is reduced to: bold or not. What you call clutter is the little hint to a footnote which has been established to help readers who still don't know what BWV means. I can take it, but could also live without it. The link that you request is prominently in the infobox. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 11:56, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

ps: which adds possibility "5.", bolding yes, but no footnote, as it is in the article right now. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 12:03, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Added #5 & #6 to the alternatives above.

#6 is possible as the translation is referenced further down in the article, and content referenced in the body of the article doesn't need a footnote in the lede. So, that would be my preference.

I think it is best, indeed, to see this as a whole and not try to reduce it to bold/nobold of the BWV number. Other arguments have already been replied to, on this page, or at Talk:Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7 – would try to avoid becoming repetitive about arguments already given and repeated multiple times, but look at the new angle for its possible merits in the discussion. --Francis Schonken (talk) 12:20, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Just responding to the new translation aspect:

1. I understand that in the lead, you have to cite every quotation, which I think a translation is
2. It may even be a copyright issue
3. Further down in the article, sometimes even in the lead, it may be a different translation. There are always several, with different strenghts.
4. I feel I have to clarify that the translation is not by some Wikipedia editor, but by a source, and by which source.

I don't believe the inline citation for the translation is clutter. Readers who want things clutter-free can turn to the infobox. --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:04, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

For clarity, we're discussing the difference between the first two. The rest is consequential muddying of the waters. Once the principles of bolding the title, and bolding searchable redirects are established, then the ways of explaining BWV become clearer. A bare link to BWV is not the best option here, because (1) it's much less obvious in that juxtaposition (as you can see in 4 and 6); and (2) it's quite easy to briefly explain it within this article (e.g. a footnote), rather than requiring the reader to navigate away from the article to read the definition. --RexxS (talk) 19:26, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Quite unclear: are you discussing #1 and #2, or #1, #2, #3, #4, #5 and #6? Also: this is WP:VPP, which means that all policies, guidelines and essays can be discussed, in particular WP:ACRO which this section is about. Are you doubting the validity of WP:ACRO? --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:18, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Re. title translation in the lead: I think the issues mentioned by Gerda can all be addressed (some may even not be an issue at all), but as I don't want to be sidetracked by this aspect I'll leave it for what it is for now. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:18, 28 February 2016 (UTC) Update: see Talk:Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam, BWV 7#English meaning of title for more on this aspect. --Francis Schonken (talk) 18:49, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• Prefer Option #4. In asmuch that it wouldn't be clear that this option isn't contradicted by MOS:BOLD nor by MOS:BOLDTITLE (for me this is clear but for some other editors this apparently isn't clear), this could maybe be made a bit more explicit in the applicable guidance. --Francis Schonken (talk) 09:18, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

For instance (as an example formatted for a possible inclusion in MOS:BOLDTITLE):

---

When the incoming redirect contains an acronym:

The Europlug (CEE 7/16) is a ... (Europlug, with CEE 7/16 as an incoming redirect)

The Europlug (CEE 7/16) is a ... (Europlug, with CEE 7/16 as an incoming redirect)

---

--Francis Schonken (talk) 10:07, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

RfC: How to word first paragraph of WP:PERTINENCE at MOS:IMAGES?

Opinions are needed on the following matter: Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Images#RfC: Which version to go with?. A WP:Permalink for it is here. Flyer22 Reborn (talk) 19:34, 25 February 2016 (UTC)

RfC: Amending MOS:JR on comma usage

Following an RfC in April 2015, the text of MOS:JR was amended to allow both the use and omission of commas around the suffix "Jr" in names. In other words, as long as an article is internally consistent, one is allowed to write either Martin Luther King, Jr, or Martin Luther King Jr. In recent discussions of the matter, it has come to light that the form with the commas, whilst traditional, has lost ground to the form without them. If one reads a survey of style guides done by SMcCandlish, it becomes apparent that eliminating the comma not only has advantages in terms of readability, but it also is nearly universally recommended across the various varieties of English. Eliminating the comma improves prose readability, fulfilling MOS:COMMA's recommendation to reduce comma usage, where it is possible. In addition, it eliminates the necessity of the matching comma, which is often omitted in error or otherwise misused.

Based on these findings, should MOS:JR be amended to prefer the use of the suffix "Jr" without commas?

Survey

• Support – Based on the evidence provided by SMcCandlish, I see no reason to allow for the comma. Consistency is desirable, in this case. Having to work around the commas makes it harder to write readable prose. RGloucester — ☎ 23:34, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support per proposer, and kudos to SMcCandlish for the solid work. ―Mandruss ☎ 23:42, 25 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support SMcCandlish's research on updated and current usage puts this baby to bed. Nice work SM. In the case of Martin Luther King, Jr., however, the name is so ingrained in history and his own personal use that in this one case it should stay. Randy Kryn 00:16, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support but consider it a deprecation / grandfathering approach. New articles and those now heading into GA/FA/PR review should be encouraged to used the comma-less version, but I would grandfather GA and FA articles that use the comma, allowing for consensus to change over. (eg a DATERET type situation). This would seem to enable the MLK Jr. case to be kept as is. --MASEM (t) 00:21, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Feature pages and MLK material do stand out as reasonable exceptions. Well said. user:Randy Kryn 00:33, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

• Support as we should attempt to matchcurrent practice. Also the use of commas in this stiuation causes confusion in lists with commas, such as references. When it comes to FA status, none should lose it over this, but on the next review, articles should be ammended to the current preferred practice. There would be no need to have a grandfather clause. We need to have one clear recommendation, and the allowed alternatives to prevent useless edit battles. Perhaps we can allow conversion to the preferred "no comma" form, and discourage the reinsertion of commas, but keep an article consistent. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 01:56, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. The use of Martin Luther King, Jr., here is interesting because he is one such subject where the comma is universally used. I see no reason to change from the current guideline because of cases like King where the comma is used more often than not. Per our article titling policy, we use commonly recognizable names such as those with the comma. This wouldn't be an issue but for a pair of MoS zealots who have fought to add commas in places where they should not be. The prior RFC was well-attended and should not simply be discarded because a couple users don't like commas. Calidum ¤ 05:14, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
  • Not a correct claim re: MLK, as I demonstrate below. There is no recognizability issue with or without commas; you're misunderstanding what "recognizable" means. It is not even slightly plausible that someone will think "Martin Luther King Jr." is a different person (or not a person at all) compared to "Martin Luther King, Jr." I won't comment on the civility of labeling other editors "zealots", other than to make a cross-reference to WP:ARBATC#All parties reminded. Finally, WP:Consensus can change, and it often does when evidence is presented instead of just opinions. Whether lots of people gave an opinion last time has no bearing on the evidence presented this time.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

So you're going after the Martin Luther King, Jr. commas again, saying there's no case for them? The case seems overwhelming. There is a memorial on the National Mall in the states which uses the comma in its official name. There is a National holiday in the United States which uses the comma. These commas are set in stone, literally. Dr. King's tomb carries the comma. This is not a case of preference over style, it is an actual situation where a man's name is set in stone. For Wikipedia to change the titles of the pages on the National Mall monument, on a national holiday, and on the other instances of agreed-upon honor and focus for this internationally recognized icon give pause to what 'exceptions to the guideline' means. Randy Kryn 12:49, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

No one is "going after" MLK, and he is tangential to this discussion. Only consensus on that talk page can determine whether that article should use the comma or not, and the last time it was brought up the comma was retained. Right now, we're talking about the MoS, and whether it should express a preference, as it usually does. RGloucester — ☎ 13:53, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

See the many mentions already posted in this discussion using MLK as an example of removing the commas, with arguments already being brought forward. So, yes, it does seem that the comma in King's name is being focused on by editors, including myself, with one in particular already strongly advocating removing that comma. I support the proposed language, with exceptions, and the King comma is such an exception that it should actually become part of the guideline language. Randy Kryn 15:28, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Um, Randy, the MLK-related evidence was produced in direct response to your own raising of MLK as a supposed smoking gun against this proposal. You're getting cause and effect backwards.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:43, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

I have no recollection of ever having previously commented on this matter with regard to MLK. My recent assumption (mostly because you and a few others keep asserting it without evidence – examples of the usage you like are not evidence of its dominance in current writing) was that MLK would be an exception; however, as I demonstrated below, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that its should be. But, yes, your umbrage about a particular case is definitely tangential.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:41, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

• Support. The no-commas pattern should be what MoS recommends without hesitation. We should allow exceptions for WP:BLPs (per MOS:IDENTITY, WP:SPNC, and WP:ABOUTSELF) who have affirmatively stated that they use the comma, provided that we also advise that the second comma (or terminal punctuation) must appear if the first comma is used. I do not support the notion of permitting the commas where a subject dead for 2 generations or whatever is believed to have preferred it back then, since English usage continues to evolve after people die, and 40+ years ago the commas were common. If the comma-laden style is continued here for some non-BLP case, as someone proposed for MLK, above, it should be only on a basis that a strong majority of reliable current sources, across multiple genres and registers of writing, continue do it that way. And this is not the case with MLK, sorry (see #Discussion section for proof).

  As for BLPs, simple examples of them using commas are insufficient, since we don't know if they're doing it out of preference, or because someone told them it's "correct", or someone actually edited it after they wrote it (very few celebs directly and personally maintain their own official websites and such). It's entirely reasonable for our house style, like any other professional-grade publication's house style, to go with its default rule, absent unusual circumstances that genuinely warrant an exception. Being consistent on this would be, well, consistent with our approach to similar matters, e.g. J. K. Rowling despite the house style of her publishers being "J.K. Rowling"; and so on. GA/FA articles are not magically exempt from changes, especially minor conformance tweaks most readers will never notice. The idea that GAs would be exempt that but FACs would not is self-contradictory, since the typical FAC candidate is already a GA. Any sort of "all style matters at my FA should be up to me" territoriality is not useful in a collaborative editing environment. And the analogy to WP:DATERET is faulty; it has nothing to do with GA/FA status, and is about cases where MoS has no preference (in this case, there would be a MoS preference), and defaulting to what was used in first major revision if consensus cannot be reached, which has nothing to do with obeying the demands of much later revisers. It's just completely unrelated to FA protectionism, on multiple levels.
  PS: Maintenance note: We should probably move the Jr/Sr/III stuff and MOS:POSTNOM to be juxtaposed, since many readers are going to think of them as the same thing, and also put these right next to the initials section, which wasn't even in the same MOS page for some reason (see merge proposal here.
   — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

• Support – for the reasons given by others, for me especially because it would be good to not have to get into fights about whether and why a comma is required after the "Jr". Unless someone can provide a substantive response to what SMcCandlish had to say about the use of MLK Jr, it also seems like the opposition to the proposal is a bit reflexive. AgnosticAphid talk 19:30, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support It is either no commas, or comma always both before and after, the latter being gramatically technically the more correct but not by popular convention. Also note for consistency it should be the same as IV after name etc. no commas at all as it is now. Technically Junior Joe Citizen == Joe Citizen, Junior, and The Fourth King Freddy == King Freddy, The Fourth, == King Freddy IV . . . Aoziwe (talk) 13:10, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support – I have used the comma all my life but now see the light and the freedom not using it allows. Cheers! {{u|Checkingfax}} {Talk} 13:48, 27 February 2016 (UTC)
• Oppose. Don't force more rule creep on us. Allow the editors of a page to use common sense instead of preferring one valid use over another. Nyttend (talk) 16:33, 28 February 2016 (UTC)
  • "Valid" according to what? Virtually all RS on present day English indicate the usage is obsolete, in both American and non-American publishing. What some plaques and street signs put up 30 years go say isn't really relevant, but seems to be the principle basis for the argument that certain cases should be exceptions. It's just weak. We're already contemplating than any BLP who insists on a particular usage would get it (we'd also honor that for someone like Jennifer 8. Lee who uses a digit for a middle name, or someone who insisted on being referred to as "II" rather than "Jr[.]"),  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:46, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
• Support and thanks to SMcCandlish for their research. I don't see how changing this is avoiding "common sense"; if style guides and standards worldwide indeed prefer one use over another, we should go where they're going. Ironholds (talk) 04:32, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
• Support—per SMcCandlish and RGloucester. Tony (talk) 01:51, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Discussion

We must remember that the WP:MOS is a guideline, that there are always exceptions. As I proposed it above, the MoS would express a preference for the comma-less version. It would not be a blanket proscription or prescription. RGloucester — ☎ 00:40, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Just to be clear, I do think I'm advising as a guideline with this with common sense exceptions. The reason I call out as a grandfathering aspect for existing quality articles because we don't want editors edit warring MOS issues (which happens, welcome to Wikipedia) on quality pages citing MOS as "policy". If we include language that grandfathers in existing quality articles, then there's no basis for edit warring at all. And along as the language to be added say "comma-less 'Jr' is preferred", that further enforces the guideline, exceptions-allowed nature. (To that end, I do wonder if we need a "MOSRET" guidance that applies across all of the MOS akin to DATERET, in that when the MOS presents optional approaches, that edit warring over the different options is not appropriate at all.). --MASEM (t) 01:35, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Edit warring is never acceptable, though. That's why we have WP:3RR. Regardless, the MoS states clearly in the lead "Where more than one style is acceptable, editors should not change an article from one of those styles to another without a good reason. Edit warring over optional styles is unacceptable. If discussion cannot determine which style to use in an article, defer to the style used by the first major contributor. If a style or similar debate becomes intractable, see if a rewrite can make the issue moot". This has always been part of the MoS. Editors behaving in such a manner are not acting in line with the MoS, they are just acting poorly. What I meant above was that what you say here is implied by the MoS and its status as a guideline. RGloucester — ☎ 01:42, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

Um, Masem, a "MOSRET" to freeze style that consensus has determined isn't what we want, and keep it in articles we think are good would a) irrationally defeat the purpose of MoS, which is to consistently present our content; b) thwart the very consensus by defying it; and c) make the good articles worse, by including style we've concluded is substandard in them, on purpose. So, 3× unworkable.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

SMcC, perhaps you are missing that the lead section of the MoS includes the equivalent of a "MOSRET", as I cited above. Of course, this only applies in cases of optional styles, and is subject to consensus, just like DATERET, RETAIN, &c. RGloucester — ☎ 13:51, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

No, I'm not missing any such thing. I'm directly opposing this particular attempt to create another *RETAIN or *VAR as poorly thought out in three distinct ways.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:51, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

• The problem with stating a "preference" is that it quickly morphs into "the rules"... And people start trying to enforce the preference as if it were "a rule". Better to bluntly say "both styles are acceptable. If you wish to change the style, state a reason on the talk page, discuss the issue with other editors, and respect consensus. Edit warring over commas is considered disruptive. Blueboar (talk) 02:17, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
  • I have to wonder if major newspapers, etc., experience so much resistance to their manuals of style. I seriously doubt it. Is it the fact that we're not getting paid that frees us from having to be consistent on style? If so, I fail to see the connection. We're supposedly aiming for professional-quality work, paid or not, and professionalism is generally taken to include consistency.
    As far as I can tell, this whole MOS-conflict thing boils down to people with poor attention to detail being offended when people with good attention to detail "correct" "their" work (as contrasted to each of us simply contributing what we can to the project based on our personal skills).
    Damn, I've gone all meta again. ―Mandruss ☎ 03:51, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
    • Of course other style guides don't see this much resistance. The collaborative editing nature of WP means that many participants automatically think that their style notions are 100% as good as anyone else's, even when theirs is based on opinion, but someone else's is based on a shipload of research. What Blueboar seems to be missing is that this isn't a proposal to state in different wording that both styles are mutually acceptable (we already have that statement, based on inadequate research around a year ago); rather, the proposal is to recognize that a detailed survey of nearly every major style guide in existence concludes in a real-world consensus strongly against the comma usage, and that MoS should go along this with this, having no internal reason to prefer the commas, and several reasons to avoid them. (The only potentially notable style guide I didn't have on hand for this was Penguin Handbook, and Dicklyon has that, so we can ask him to add a cite to what it says.)  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
      • many participants automatically think that their style notions are 100% as good as anyone else's - I'll have to take your word for that. It's been my impression that many simply feel that style consistency isn't important enough to be concerned about, which is something entirely different. It's anti-professionalism, a relative of anti-intellectualism, similar to a recent U.S. president's deliberate mispronunciation of the word "nuclear". ―Mandruss ☎ 23:53, 26 February 2016 (UTC)
        • Not to mention "Soddom Hussain". Yes, that anti-intellectual element is very thick in the mix, too. It just tends to be less problematic than the "what I was taught in Hoboken in 1983 is the only correct way to write and I will campaign to the death until MoS says what I want or it is destroyed" stuff. The "I don't care" people really, well, don't care and eventually drop it. The GREATWRONGS ones don't. The main result of the WP:DGAF attitude is people just write as they will and gnomes, bots, and AWB clean it up later. This is generally how it goes with all of our guidelines, which the truly average editor never reads any of.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  00:57, 2 March 2016 (UTC)
• It is not the case that "Martin Luther King, Jr., ... is one such subject where the comma is universally used"; not even close. A Google News search on "Martin Luther King, Jr" reports back a mixed bag of results, that is actually dominated by comma-free usage, even in American sources [4]. I'm often suspicious of news searches, but in this case, the journalism style guides and the more formal ones are in agreement, and this is reflected in a Google Books search [5]. The books search reports more comma usage than the news search does, since it includes older works, of course. But if you take time to look at them, you can see that the comma-free cases are predominantly newer works. In the first 10 pages of books results [I don't have all night for this!], all comma-free cases are 2004 or newer, except two dating to 1999, while the comma-bearing cases often date to the 1960s to early 2000s, though a few were as recent as 2015. No one is making a case that the comma usage is extinct yet, but it is very clearly no longer the majority usage, even in American publishing. A general Google search of the Web (i.e. including unreliable sources) also shows strongly mixed usage, as a point of "ground truth" on what people are doing in English more broadly [6], just in case someone wants to make the "those are just ivory-tower sources, and everyone really still uses the commas" argument. Nope, they don't. In short, there is no case to continue using the commas with MLK, certainly not on the incorrect basis that "the comma is universally used".

  But, if it had turned out that sources did overwhelmingly use the commas with MLK, WP would, too. MoS already regularly makes "the style is unusual but the whole world goes along with it" exceptions for such cases; cf. iPod, Deadmau5, DaimlerChrysler, CC Sabathia, etc. So, WP:DONTPANIC.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  08:59, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

  The wall of texts seem to being built again (ten feet higher this time?) to try to convince editors that Dr. King's name is not his name, although it is recognized on the National Mall, on the calendar which honors his birthday with a holiday, on his tomb, and on all of his books. This one exception does not seem unreasonable, and probably should be actually mentioned in our style guide. Randy Kryn 13:00, 26 2016 (UTC)

  Your response to a well-researched and thoughtful comment is "too long, didn't read"? Why bother? AgnosticAphid talk 19:26, 26 February 2016 (UTC)

  Of course I read it, and please reread my response. Dr. King should be a common sense exception, as a National Day, a National Monument, and King's own preference (there's a comma on the man's books, and on his tombstone, which is a pilgrimage site for people from around the world) all contain the standard and historically accurate spelling of his name. Randy Kryn 00:59, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

  Already addressed that. Those are all random, isolated usage examples, decades old, that do nothing to disprove that current, reliable sources on English deprecate the comma style almost without exception, and that modern RS for MLK in particular are also dropping the commas. "Dr. King should be a common sense exception" is not common sense, it's special pleading without sufficient evidence to back it up, and since I already showed that the evidence is against it, it also constitutes WP:IDHT a.k.a. "proof by assertion". I'm going to pre-decline to engage in any further circular debate with you. Either produce a new argument or stop rehashing already-deflated ones, please.

  PS: I checked, and the main source of "Martin Luther King, Jr., Day" with commas appears to be WP's own article on the topic [7]. Book sources are mixed, with newer sources dropping the commas (and many that do not have ungrammatically forgetten the second one, indicating low-quality editing) [8]. Same results for news sources [9]. It is conclusively disproven that "Martin Luther King, Jr.", with comma, is the preferred usage, much less near-universal. It's simply a decreasingly surviving old usage not favored by modern sources, and which frequently leads to punctuation errors, which is the entire point of this RfC to begin with. But go ahead and call my evidence "test-walling" again.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  01:19, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

  You say that "Those are all random, isolated usage examples, decades old,". The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial was dedicated in 2011. Randy Kryn 10:18, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

  Your smoking gun is one random isolated example that's not quite so old? They're all still just cherry-picked instances of the usage you like, not reliable sources on how to use English, nor even aggregate search results through publications. I recognize that you feel strongly about this one, from a traditionalism standpoint. As I said above, my original assumption was that this was a case where conventional usage was overwhelmingly in favor of the commas, but the facts don't lie. I'm not cherry picking anything. I've been through an enormous source pile on this (which I began with the expectation that there must be some nearly 50/50 split on comma usage for "Jr", generally, given the "fan base" that usage has on WP). I find that almost every RS says "no commas". Then I've given you raw feeds, of "Martin Luther King, Jr" searches, with the comma just in case. The results – books, news, and Web (to the extent we care about the last of those) – show the comma being abandoned, and that comma-less usage now dominates even for MLK, the more so the newer the sources are. And this is no sudden, recent change; here's Google News results from all of 2003, again with very few commas [10],. I don't know what else to tell you. I was surprised, but I believe what the evidence tells me when there's this much of it. I certainly can cherry pick prominent examples for you – [11], [12], etc. – but it wouldn't add anything to my data; it's all already in the first page of general Google hits. The comma usage is generally found in establishments like the King Institute that are not recent, in unreliable Web sources, in Wikipedia itself which is spreading not reflecting the comma usage, in newspapers even more recalcitrantly traditionalist than the New York Times, and in older works like Enc. Britannica.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ≼  13:39, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Overwriting original files with derived versions on Commons

The idle servant, 1655, painting by Nicholaes Maes. Original photograph taken by the National Gallery (UK) on the left, digital enhanced version giving false colouring on the right.

I welcome more feedback from Wikipedians about the damage done to Wikipedia articles when images are overwritten on Commons. This became a major issue for BLP portraits being overwritten with pornography a couple of years ago, as it was a route for vandalism that was virtually invisible on Wikipedia. In this case, a user has been systematically overwriting photographs of historic paintings with false-colour enhanced versions, in some cases radically changing the appearance of the Wikipedia articles these are used in, so that the image being displayed looks entirely different to what you would see of the painting in a gallery or museum, and radically different from the way the institutions represent these paintings in their own catalogues. Some of the files overwritten in the last few weeks have been used in long established Wikipedia articles for several years. When the files change on Commons, Wikipedia editors are not alerted by their watchlists as the article on Wikipedia that uses the image literally has no new edit.

The Commons discussion is at Commons:Administrator's noticeboard and a table of photographs overwritten this year is included.

There is a related policy on Commons (c:Commons:Overwriting existing files) but I do not believe there is anything similar on Wikipedia and as far as I am aware, nobody has suggested that Wikipedia watchlists should be adapted to alert users to these types of cross-project transcluded overwrites. Thanks --Fæ (talk) 12:57, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

• phabricator:T91192 is a Phab project to have edits to transcluded files display on local watchlists. It might ameliorate this issue if done.Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 13:16, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

  Given the task a thumbs up. I suggest other do as well, and consider commenting at Commons. The Commons guidelines which steer users to avoid any controversial overwrites need to be made clearer for files in active cross-wiki use. --Fæ (talk) 13:38, 27 February 2016 (UTC)

Interesting problem. But your example photo pair is a complete mis-representation of what happened, as you can see by looking at the history of the left one. And I would argue that the recent overwrite by the poor dark version from the NPG made matters worse. For 10 years there was a better brighter version in use on en.wp – not the one you show, and not modified from the NPG image – and we should go back to that one. Dicklyon (talk) 16:12, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Global rollbackers and suppressredirect right

The global rollbacker right currently includes the ability to suppress redirects on page moves. See m:Special:GlobalGroupPermissions/global-rollbacker to see every right in that group. On enwiki, this right is only held by bots, admins, and 'crats. This difference was recently seen in action with this this move. Courtesy ping for Hazard-SJ who performed the move.

I am proposing an addition to the global rights policy regarding this discrepancy. Global rollbackers should not suppress redirects on enwiki as that right is not granted to the local rollback group. It is less of a problem in this instance, since the userspace page could have just been tagged U1 anyways, but in the future I feel like this should be said somewhere. --Majora (talk) 04:00, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

I would think that if you target a right assigned to a global group that isn't also assigned within the related local group, you may as well target them all, such as markbotedits, which allows the use of rollback without having the reverted edits showing up in recent changes. Regardless, however, the current policy says that "[g]lobal rollbackers can use their rights by default...", and I think that any global rollbacker (or any member of any other global group) should use some level of common sense when it comes to using any rights which they have been assigned when they aren't specifically disallowed by policy (as is the case here). I understand that the right was not assigned from local consensus, but then again, neither are the other global groups. Of course, local consensus can overrule the use of such global rights, but I certainly think that in such trivial cases such as your example (that move was indirectly brought up in the BRFA before being done), moves within own userspace, or even moving recently self-created pages accidentally created with an incorrect name, it should be fine to allow the use of such global rights. On the contrary, pages created by others having no consensus (or otherwise obvious reason) to be moved without leaving a redirect behind should probably not have their redirects suppressed by a global rollbacker in most, if not all cases, as that would be a bit more controversial. Just my opinion,  Hazard SJ  04:33, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Putting in a recommendation that leaving redirects so that people accessing the old page can find the new one is a good idea seems fine for me. An outright ban means that wholly unnecessary redirects - the one in question here seems like it would be - will need manual deletion, so I think no.Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 10:47, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• The right is quite powerful and could be abused (deletion through the back door, basically), so if it is to remain with the user group, guidelines for its use should be created (e.g. only to be used in cases of obvious vandalism, etc.). –xeno^talk 11:24, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

  100% agree, enwiki should stipulate that globalrollbackers only use this for obvious vandalism. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:51, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• I assume that the primary purpose of the global rollbackers is to fight cross-wiki vandalism. If they find a global vandal who does page move vandalism, they should be able to clean up without needing to find their way through our policies and templates. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 12:43, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• The meta-policy about this appears to be pretty light, we may want to suggest edits at meta:Talk:Global rollback. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:40, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• Side note, I think the warnings from MediaWiki:Movepagetext are not being displayed in all situations, this page may need tweaking. — xaosflux ^Talk 14:53, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

  Possible bug(?) appears that the 'default' message is displaying instead of the localized version? — xaosflux ^Talk 14:58, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

  I will follow up on that with some admins that have been involved on that mediawiki talk. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:13, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

• As Vogone said on meta, users with global rollback are expected to follow local policies for non-countervandalism use of any of the rights in their user group. You could specify that the rights are to be used for counter-vandalism only at WP:GRP if you really wanted. Ajraddatz (Talk) 00:00, 29 February 2016 (UTC)

Gendered categories

What is the policy on gendered categories? Say we have categories for "Actors from Ruritania", "Male actors from Ruritania", and "Female actors from Ruritania". Would Matilda von Hentzau appear in both "Actors from Ruritania" and "Female actors from Ruritania"? DuncanHill (talk) 15:34, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Current guidance is at WP:EGRS. First, you'd need to establish there would be any need for gendered categories "Male actors from Ruritania" and "Female actors from Ruritania"; then you'd need to make sure whether or not the parent "Actors from Ruritania" category would be diffusing or not (WP:FINAL RUNG would exclude it in many cases). See also WP:GENDERID which may be relevant for the example you're mentioning. --Francis Schonken (talk) 15:53, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Actually, I would reverse that... first I would ask about the parent cat: Is being an "Actor from Ruritania" (regardless of gender) really a defining characteristic (or is it a form of over-categorization)? Certainly being an "actor" is defining... and perhaps being "from Ruritania" is defining (I am less positive about that)... but, I have to question whether the intersection of being an actor and being "from Ruritania" is really defining. The two characteristics do not really have much to do with each other.

That said... Assuming the answer to this preliminary question is "yes, the parent cat is defining"... I would take a common sense approach to the question of creating genderized sub-sub-categorization... I would ask: Are there enough articles in each sub-sub-category that sub-sub-categorization by gender makes sense? If there are very few articles in the broader "Actors from Ruritania" sub-cat, then it makes makes no sense to divide the parent sub-category up into gender based sub-sub-cats. If "Actors from Ruritania" is a very large cat, it may make sense to do so (I say may... because we also need to examine how many articles would end up in each of the resulting gender based sub-sub-categories. If one of the resulting gender-based sub-sub-cats is tiny, it is kind of silly to create a separate gender based sub-sub-cat for them). Blueboar (talk) 16:18, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Sorry about focussing my answer on the "gendered" aspect (which seemed the gist of the (hypothetical?) question), Blueboar is of course correct that the "from Ruritania" aspect may lead easily to categories rejected for overcategorization too. Yes and indeed there are still a host of other guidelines and policies that are to be reconed with (and which neither Blueboar nor I mentioned thus far) before the actor would be categorized in any of the categories mentioned thus far: WP:BLPCAT, WP:COP, WP:MOSBIO, etc. --Francis Schonken (talk) 16:31, 28 February 2016 (UTC)

Only in the subcategory. See for example Category:American actors, or most sport categories. Prevalence 05:20, 1 March 2016 (UTC)

Category:Stale userspace drafts

Why do people care about Category:Stale userspace drafts? Shouldn't drafts be left alone? What happened to so fix it? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 107.72.96.74 (talk) 09:05, 2 March 2016 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Standard offer - proposal to make guideline

I've started an RFC on whether or not WP:SO should be made into an actual guideline, considering it is already a de facto one. Please feel free to join in on the discussion at the proposal's talk page. — Coffee // have a cup // beans // 13:04, 2 March 2016 (UTC)