Misplaced Pages

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by VanishedUser 23asdsalkaka (talk | contribs) at 01:52, 1 November 2009 (→Another break, for fun: forgot to sign). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

The project page associated with this talk page is an official policy on Misplaced Pages. Policies have wide acceptance among editors and are considered a standard for all users to follow. Please review policy editing recommendations before making any substantive change to this page. Always remember to keep cool when editing, and don't panic.

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Missing bits

I had a good read and the following bits seem to be missing to me

1. Something in the nutshell or leader directing people to the five pillars if they just want to edit articles.
2. A principles section talking about the foundaton principles and the five pillars.
3. A little bit on Wikimedia Foundation, This being Misplaced Pages which is owned by the foundation but being self governing. The status of Office action policy.
4. The difference between policy and a policy page which may at any given time not reflect policy or consensus or even be vandalised.

Dmcq (talk) 17:15, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd certainly like to see a page with all these things in; but we ought perhaps also to be thinking about a change to the title of this page. It already incorporates policy on essays (which are not policies or guidelines); it seems natural (as Dmcq suggests) for it also to take in principles and Foundation issues that are felt to override policy; so in fact "policies and guidelines" will end up being just two aspects of the page content. Any ideas for a more comprehensive name? Misplaced Pages:Governance? Misplaced Pages:How the project is run? (Just two perhaps not very good suggestions of the top of my head.)--Kotniski (talk) 17:51, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

Not keen on a name change but how about this as text?

Principles

The Misplaced Pages policies are formed by collaborative consent. Editors should strive to ensure the policy pages faithfully express this consensus.

The Five pillars summarizes those policies editors must follow and is the clearest expression of the consensual principles under which editors work.

Editors should strive to ensure the policies conform to the aims and ideals expressed in the Founding principles and the Statement of principles

Governance

The Misplaced Pages project is operated by the not-for-profit Wikimedia Foundation.

The Misplaced Pages project is self governing but the Wikimedia Foundation reserve some rights, in particular to remove illegal or questionable content.

The Arbitration committee is a panel of editors with the power to impose binding solutions to disputes between editors.

- Dmcq (talk) 20:17, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I think the name and coverage are both alright. We cover essays here because they're sort of in the same category as guidelines, only... "lesser". They seem a logical inclusion, at any rate. But that doesn't mean we need to make the title "Policies, guidelines and essays" or change the title altogether to something more technically all-inclusive.

As for 5P, as Kim Bruning pointed out earlier, I'm not crazy about language indicating 5P is some sort of special policy that carries more weight than others, when really it's just meant to be a summary of them.

Your governance additions look like they might serve a good purpose, as fair warning that editors can expect intervention from time to time that might not seem congruous with the written policies. I'm not so crazy about the principles additions though. They seem instructive of how to write policies, and I don't really see that as the purpose of this page. It's more to let everyone know what policies are and how they're to be regarded. I could be mistaken. Equazcion (talk) 20:28, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to remove the didactic bit. Without that I get something like "The policy pages should describe that consensus". Not sure how to express that they aren't the precise words especially as the page might be vandalized. The next one is a bit easier, it could just say "The aims and ideals of the Misplaced Pages project are expressed in the Founding principles and the Statement of principles. I've described the 5P as summaries and principles rather than a policy, not sure what you were saying about them. It could be chopped down to "The Five pillars summarizes the consensual principles under which editors work." Dmcq (talk) 20:56, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

By the way I see this policy page as providing a context for people writing policies guidelines and essays and we should quickly direct people who just want to know policy so they can write articles somewhere else. Dmcq (talk) 21:04, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I *am* glad to hear that people think WP:5P is so important, I just wish we'd pushed a bit harder to have it replace everything else entirely ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:34, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I would like to point out that if you are going to mention how the Wikimedia Foundation reserves some rights then you really should point out Jimbo's "role", though that is in itself a touchy subject as many dont think he has a role or should have a role, though I believe his word still trumps anything put out by us "mere mortals" (as, in my personal opinion, it should). I dont know about the whole name change, I think it might be best to keep this article under topic of the current name "policies and guidelines" and not get off-topic about arb com and the Foundation. Principals, the five pillars, essays and other things like that are ok in my opinion as they are closely related to the topic (essays are often promoted to guidelines). Arbcom settles disputes, it does not create new policy nor are its individual decisions on specific disputes then carried over as a type of "common law" that now applies to every situation nor do their decisions become binding precedents for future disputes; theorectically arbcom can decide in favor of one side in a dispute and then turn around and rule in the opposite way in the very next identical dispute. Its less a "Supreme Court" and more as the title says- "arbitration". Ive edited here for over 2 years I think as a username, and more than one as an IP before that and I've never been touched by Arb Com nor has it affected my editing one bit, so its not something that is inherently needed to know as far as affecting policies and guidelines or editing. This should really be a description page of what policies and guidelines ARE, so that newbies and established users alike dont get it wrong about their role in editing; that is very important because we ALL share EQUAL responsibility in enforcing policies and guidelines, so we should all know their role. I dont see this page as giving any guidance on how to WRITE a policy, there is no "special RIGHT way" to do that. You discuss and you be bold. How is that different than anything else? Are you advocating the removal of our right to be bold on policy pages? I would IAR on that if it was ever codified into policy that I dont have the right to be bold.Camelbinky (talk) 22:53, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

I though Statement of Principles was about the right amount about Jimbo. That sounds to me like you want an essay describing policies, not a policy. Anyway if there isn't a policy that you normally should follow when writing policies and guidelines what would you have to be bold about when writing one? Dmcq (talk) 23:15, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

A policy about what a policy and guideline is supposed to do and how it is to be applied. Why cant that be a policy? Yes, it ends up being an essay in the generic sense but so are all our policies. The only difference is that it is not an essay in the Misplaced Pages definition. Alot of guidelines start as essays and the only difference is that enough people said "thats a good idea, we should listen to it more" and it gets promoted. I dont understand your last sentence, perhaps commas or punctuation might help, but plainer "common" language is probably what I need. But yes, I want this to be a POLICY that describes what policy IS and how it should be applied, when it should be ignored, and its role in Misplaced Pages. To make this a "how to edit policies and guidelines" policy would smell like instruction creep to me. We do not need instructions and policy on how to edit a policy. Editing a policy is done the same way as editing an article, but without the criteria of V, NPOV, etc. You need consensus on an article just as you need consensus on a policy no difference there. You can be bold on a policy just as you can be bold on an article, no difference there. If you are, in good faith, bold and an editor or the Community at large disagrees with you, you get your wording changed, you bring it to the talk page, but you do not get censured or warned or blocked or anything; because you were being bold in good faith. Our policies arent meant to be hard to be changed, they arent equivelant to the US Constitution as some around Misplaced Pages seem to think; and no I'm not a Maoist in favor of continual revolution as you asked in the Soapbox thread above, though I am a Marxist.Camelbinky (talk) 23:42, 21 October 2009 (UTC)

(undent) "The Misplaced Pages policies are formed by collaborative consent" is not entirely accurate: Some policies are imposed by the office and are thus not really formed by "collaborative consent". Additionally, such a sentence -- regardless of what you actually intend -- will be used as ammunition in the next effort to get WP:Consensus enshrined as the most important policy on Misplaced Pages. I think that most of this suggested text needs to be redrafted to lose the undue emphasis on consensus. This would also allow you to dramatically shorten the proposed statements:

The Five pillars is the simplest expression of the principles under which editors work. They summarize the aims and ideals expressed in the Founding principles and the Statement of principles.

The normally self-governing Misplaced Pages project is operated by the not-for-profit Wikimedia Foundation, which reserve some rights, including the right to remove illegal or inappropriate content.

What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:48, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

You seem to have removed mention of consensus entirely. This also seems to make a passing reference to self-governance, with the foundation's right to intervene being the objective. So where exactly would this go, would it be a replacement of something or merely an addition, and what exactly is its purpose? Equazcion (talk) 01:06, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I'd like to have a moratorium on this bs about the office "imposing" stuff on us. When is the last time you edited an article and the Office kept you from doing something or forced you to do something in a certain way? Can we use common sense and stick to what we are actually here to do, edit an encyclopedia. Policies and guidelines are for helping us edit an encyclopedia. What the office deals with is legal issues and their "meddling" with us is only to inform and keep us in step with laws which we have to obey regardless of the existence of an "Office", they telling us to do things is just to make sure we know what the stuff is. Can you find an instance of the Office giving a directive that we didnt already have to obey because it is the actual LAW? The mentioning of the Office is simply an end-around red herring to make it seem like consensus is not how we do things. You can bash consensus all you want, but THAT IS HOW WE DO THINGS. Consensus is how we decide to edit policy, it is how we decide to edit articles. Consensus, whether it is explicitly stated or not, DOES trump everything; even arb com is simply a form of consensus; and again I dont care about anything that has nothing to do with editing the encyclopedia, because we are an encyclopedia we are not a business we are not a bureaucracy and we do not exist to make laws and regulations and regulatory bodies and judiciary bodies; if it doesnt have to do with editing an encyclopedia then it doesnt need to be mentioned here on a page about policies and guidelines. All of our policies are decided by consensus, you cant just go throwing whatever you want in them if the majority of us dont agree, you'll get your wording changed or reverted and discussions will be started to find a common ground (like we are trying to do here). Can we agree to keep this policy relevant to what is relevant to Misplaced Pages's goal- to edit an encyclopedia?Camelbinky (talk) 01:26, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't think I've ever actually seen them impose exactly, just put things on "probation". Scientology-related articles was one thing. Assumedly the community was doing things they didn't like and revisions were deleted, but I didn't actually see that happening. There may have also been some passing concern at a debate regarding the Virgin Killer image, but with no actual imposition that I'm aware of.

All that said, I'm going to have to agree with Camelbinky here, even regarding some of his brave and borderline-hostile comments :) Consensus is how we do things. You guys seem to want more restrictive language, and I can guess as to why, but it's really not honest. Anyone making illegal edits or uploads will likely be dealt with by an admin, not a lawyer, and that's not what this page is about anyway. Read the nutshell. It's here to help, not scare, and not to provide legal coverage. Equazcion (talk) 01:44, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

There's also no point in mentioning the law in an external sense as if it meant anything much in an overall sense because the editors are from many different countries with many different laws. The community has to deal with the foundation and the foundation has to deal with the law in the US. Skipping direct to US law isn't quite right I think. Many different laws have to be considered in the content on Misplaced Pages. Dmcq (talk) 07:00, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I like the way WhatamIdoing has chopped things down to two paragraph. I'm believe the second paragraph says everything that needs be said here about governance and lets office action be included as a policy. The first paragraph seems problematic though. I am concerned that the element of consensus has been totally removed which is the basis for being able to write the policies and guidelines in the first place. Also I don't think the five pillars summarizes the aims and ideals of the Wikimedia Foundation or the Statement of Principles, there's important bits left out of the 5P which aren't of interest in everyday editing. Also it would be nice to express that it isn't the policy pages which are the policy but the consensus behind them. That allows for common sense instead of following the latest vandalism and some people do need to be told that. Dmcq (talk) 07:31, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I really don't think we should be referring people to the meta founding principles page or Jimbo's age-old statement of principles as if they had some meaning. The meta page is something anyone can scratch around on and doesn't seem to reflect anything except the views of a random few editors who happen to inhabit that page; Jimbo's statement no doubt made sense at the time but it has surely been superseded since then (though we should perhaps ask him).--Kotniski (talk) 07:51, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we can leave them out, they do control the project. The 5P are stuck before them. How about this to raise consensus up:

The Misplaced Pages policy and guidelines are intended to reflect the consensus on how to make decisions in the Misplaced Pages project. The Five pillars is the clearest expression of the principles under which editors work.

The aims and ideals of the Misplaced Pages project are expressed in the Founding principles and the Statement of principles.

The normally self governing Misplaced Pages project is operated by the not-for-profit Wikimedia Foundation, which reserve some rights, including the right to remove illegal or inappropriate content.

- Dmcq (talk) 08:16, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I've substituted 'clearest' for 'simplest' which I had written there. Simplest would chop out everything except the first statement of each pillar I think. Clear can be a bit longer but not overly long. Dmcq (talk) 08:35, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Still this gives too much emphasis to the two pages I mentioned. I don't believe they control the project - they (or rather their original versions) may be of interest historically, but I think we mislead readers if we direct them there implying that they are fundamental to anything. I'll see if I can get any response out of Jimbo though.--Kotniski (talk) 09:41, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Or actually, I'll experiment by trying to edit the Jimbo principles page (remove the surely outdated info about the mailing list being the main forum for discussion) and see what happens. Really I think it just serves the same purpose as 5P, and if people weren't so fearful of change in this area, we would just combine the two pages (possibly taking ideas from the meta page as well) into one honest list of principles.--Kotniski (talk) 09:58, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I guess the mailing lists are important in the Foundation but they're definitely not basic to this project. For instance they give a way of reporting problems to them. Good luck, I'm not sure the documents can be logically combined even if at one point they stated exactly the same thing as they are the wishes of different parties. Dmcq (talk) 10:17, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, we'll see. If Jimbo himself reverts my edit, I might believe that this page represents his personal take. But looking at recent history it seems that it's a page edited by the community just like 5P is.--Kotniski (talk) 10:25, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Just be sure to preserve the original statement somewhere too, eh? (for historys sake, if nothing else :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 10:43, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Incidentally, if people fundamentally disagree with the founding principles, I can, do, and will -in the politestand nicest terms possible- point them to other projects on the internet -which I will take the trouble to look up-, where I suggest they can use their time (and ours) more productively. --Kim Bruning (talk) 10:52, 22 October 2009 (UTC) I'm not sure if it's possible to tell people to go forth and procreate more politely or nicely than that, but I m willing to take pointers!. ;-)

Re history: there's a link on the page to the original version of the page, which I suppose suffices. Re the founding principles: I don't think there's currently anything there anyone would disagree with (though since it's a freely editable page there's no guarantee that will always be the case), but it's hard to see what their use is when we already have 5P. The same applies to Jimbo's page. Why do we need three pages that are effectively forks of each other?--Kotniski (talk) 12:50, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand your point about the foundation principles being written on a freely editable page. Since all our policies are written on freely edited pages, what sort of limit do you see applying to the foundation principles that would not apply to any other page on a wiki, which, by definition is freely editable? Hiding T 13:32, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I didn't say anything about the foundation principles. I meant the page referred to as "founding principles", whatever that's supposed to mean (it certainly can't mean the principles WikiMedia was founded with, because that would be a constant and hence not editable).--Kotniski (talk) 15:58, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

By writing foundation principles as opposed to Foundation principles and given the context of the conversation I'd hoped I might have been a little better understood, but I apologise for the issue there. I'm still not clear why being written on a freely editable page prevents a version of that page being a constant? And they aren't the principles WikiMedia was founded with, since the projects predate the WikiMedia Foundation. Hiding T 10:17, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

They are statements by the interested parties and I see no reason to try merging them or get rid of any of them. Why not just accept them as in "What I tell you three times is true"? Dmcq (talk) 13:44, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

The interested parties are the same in each case - us. I think the fact you are quoting from a nonsense poem to justify the status quo sums it up pretty well;) --Kotniski (talk) 15:58, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

<<<outdent

I think I'll try being bold for now and sticking in that wording. I don't think we could remove them without a wider discussion on the Village pump because they have been in Template:Misplaced Pages principles for a few years now which is stuck on loads of pages. Dmcq (talk) 16:01, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

All right, we don't need to remove mention of them, but I think the description of them of being pages that serve to describe the principles is more accurate, rather than implying that they "are" the principles. --Kotniski (talk) 16:24, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I may be misreading you, but are you suggesting the founding principles are not actually the principles, but only describe the principles? And could you clarify what exactly the difference is. Hiding T 10:17, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

It's all a bit metaphysical I know, but the principles are somewhere in our collective mind, while the "founding principles" page (like the other two pages in question) is just an attempt by a few editors to articulate those principles (like our policy pages are an attempt to describe what we know collectively our policy to be).--Kotniski (talk) 10:27, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay, fair enough. Hiding T 11:02, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

That's how I see it too. Misplaced Pages was given a catecism and told to be good when it was set up but it is now supposed to make its own decisions. It's been given the keys of the car. With great power comes great responsibility. etc etc. How often does anyone make decisions strictly according to something that's written down? The policy changes with time, the 5P may go a little out of sync with the policy pages for a time, any of them may get vandalized. Dmcq (talk) 10:46, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

kitkat break

I'm still not entirely sure what the purpose of this new section is, despite the fact that I'm trying to edit it to sound more accurate grammatically and otherwise. Just stating that for the record. Equazcion (talk) 16:27, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

It's to tell people about things analogous to policies and guidelines but at a "higher level", I'd have thought. We should also mention that the Foundation has Policies (real ones I mean, not publicly editable) and give people a link to where they can find those.--Kotniski (talk) 16:32, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Sounds good to link to those. I still think clearly is better than concisely as it doesn't imply we should chop it down to something like the foundation principles from wikimedia. Dmcq (talk) 16:36, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I think concisely is more accurate. The five pillars are intended to be a succinct representation of the more important parts of policies. Conciseness, in other words. I would attribute clarity more to the expanded descriptions in the actual policies. Equazcion (talk) 16:40, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Hmm. I think I'll just try removing the 'most' instead then. Dmcq (talk) 16:42, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

That would be fine with me, good idea. Equazcion (talk) 16:43, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

The first and second sentences don't really state their connection to each other currently. Presumably there's supposed to be an implied connection between 5P and all the policy pages, and that should probably be stated more clearly. Since the nature of that connection is under debate, this may be difficult to come to an agreement on. Any suggestions? Equazcion (talk) 16:51, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I gave it a shot. Equazcion (talk) 17:07, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

Looks good to me. In fact the only bit of the page I'm still eying critically is the rather large leader. Dmcq (talk) 21:38, 22 October 2009 (UTC)

I trust you Dmcq to cut down the lead as long as the sentence- "Misplaced Pages does not have hard-and-fast rules, but editors are expected to abide by the principles laid down in policies and guidelines, except where there is a good reason not to." remains intact. Other than that I dont have much of an opinion of cutting the lead down.Camelbinky (talk) 18:24, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd rather it didn't be cut down, as we basically just got finished lengthily establishing consensus on all its individual points. I don't think it's too long at all. Do you mean it's too long as in uses too much extraneous language, or that it expresses too many points inappropriate to a lead section? Equazcion (talk) 18:31, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

There are standards on length of leads for articles, is there any similar standard used on policies or what should be in the lead of a policy? That might be a good place to start on deciding if there should be any change to the lead. I agree with Equazcion that it doesnt look too long, but at this point I would like to make Dmcq happy by doing this minor change if it means this gets over with quickly. ;-) I love the rewrite that has happened and all my original complaints have been addressed with it, it actually incorporates all I asked for.Camelbinky (talk) 18:48, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I too don't find the lead too long, though if it can be cut down without losing any of the key points, I'd be fine with that too. (If anything can go, it's the last paragraph that tells people the purpose of this page - there is a table of contents right below it, after all.)--Kotniski (talk) 19:30, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I removed that last paragraph of the intro, as it did indeed seem to be redundant with the table of contents. Equazcion (talk) 19:56, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

So, I assume if there are no exceptions from Dmcq regarding the length and/or content of the lead that we can declare this discussion resolved and the rewrite completed (as far as any policy can be "completed", meaning we're done for now until another user has an issue in the future we havent already discussed). If there are no exceptions then I suggest we consider the gavel has been banged and the judge has dismissed the jury with her thanks. I hope to see all of you around sometime and that we can all be on the same side of an issue (what an imposing team that would be in a debate).Camelbinky (talk) 21:23, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd prefer the leader just gave the scope of the policy instead of rephrasing bits of it. This policy itself warns about this type of problem. For instance in WP:N it gives no examples, it says "A topic is presumed to be notable enough to merit an article if it meets the general notability guidelines below", and also lists other policies which give conditions for notability in particular areas. I'd say something like

Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines are developed by the community to describe best practice, clarify principles, resolve conflicts, and otherwise further our goal of creating a free, reliable encyclopedia.

This policy describes how policy is derived and the basis for adherence. It also describes how the policy and guideline pages normally should be developed and maintained.

Rather short but I think it includes everything I think should be there and no more. It does reproduce the contents list a bit but I see no great harm in that. Dmcq (talk) 21:56, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

The harm is that that's all it does. Lead sections are supposed to be more than that. And didn't we already discuss this at length above? I don't think this needs rehashing. Equazcion (talk) 21:59, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

(after edit conflict) That just goes pretty much back to where we started, though, with an empty-worded leader that tells the reader nothing. What do you have against telling people things they might want to know? --Kotniski (talk) 22:03, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

(after two edit conflicts) I can not agree to anything that cuts out- "Misplaced Pages does not have hard-and-fast rules, but editors are expected to abide by the principles laid down in policies and guidelines, except where there is a good reason not to." By not including that sentence you are undermining the very reason why I and others began this discussion and it is an endrun around the entire endeavour at the last minute. I put my "vote" with Equazcion and Kotniski that the lead is fine the way it is. It is in fact already shorter than the lead in WP:N that you mention, and you accidently fail to mention just how indepth WP:N's lead is, with it mentioning specifically guidelines that fall under it as well. Most policies I have taken a quick look at have longer and more indepth leads than this one. And ditto Equazcion's and Kotniski's post right above.Camelbinky (talk) 22:04, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I'll reproduce the relevant section of this policy

maintain scope, avoid redundancy. Both purpose and scope must be clearly provided in the lead, and not merely as an aside. Content should be within the scope of its policy. Policies should not be redundant with other policies, or within themselves. Do not summarize, copy, or extract text. Avoid needless reminders.

I thinks that's pretty clear. The leader should concentrate on the scope. It shouldn't rephrase parts of the policy. What was there was stating policy in the lead. If you can rephrase the important parts of the policy in a nuthell that is the appropriate place but not the leader. Dmcq (talk) 22:09, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're quoting (and please let us know what that is), but I don't see anything there that says "It shouldn't rephrase parts of the policy". Equazcion (talk) 22:14, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

It really is getting harder to give you goodfaith on this issue. I dont see that as applying to leads, only to avoid redundancy on writing a policy, dont repeat yourself adnauseum when writing a policy. Check out other policy's leads. This is perfectly fine. If your problem is mentioning that they arent hard and fast rules etc, as I am trying very hard to give you good faith and not to think it is, then come out and say that is what you are objecting to. We are down to the final stretch where we can end this discussion, and as stated above by Kotniski this proposal of yours simply puts things back where we begin. To attempt that is not acting in good faith.Camelbinky (talk) 22:20, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Ah, you were quoting from this policy. Well not every caveat is going to be clearly listed. Intros are supposed to be summaries, so they will by definition be redundant in a sense. If you want to take the policy's wording that strictly, then fine, but I think we have consensus in this case to ignore it. Not that we need to. Consensus by practice seems to show that lead sections ought to summarize the content, as Camelbinky points out. Equazcion (talk) 22:21, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I would like to point out that, at least in my opinion, in the subsection quoted by Dmcq only the first sentence that explicitely states "lead" applies to leads in policies, the rest of the subsection applies to the core of the policy. "Content" meaning the core of the policy as opposed to the sentence before it which mentions "lead" and applies there. I know I'm wikilawyering here, but that is my interpretation of how it is written.Camelbinky (talk) 22:28, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

I really think it is wrong to go on so much about enforcement in the leader compared to all the other important stuff in the policy itself. It isn't even a decent nutshell. It obscures the bit about people following the principles of wikipedia. If you are determined to stick all that stuff about blocking in the leader then the policy should at least mention Category:Misplaced Pages enforcement policy. I thought the policy was supposed to be about the basis of support for the policies and guidelines and how they were written, not get into blocking policy or restate parts of IAR unnecessarily. If people know the five pillars you don't need most of that stuff in the leader. They should be sent there for all that stuff. They'll either really wat to get to 5P and so should be sent there or else they'll resd the body after finding out the scope. There's no need to repeat the scope and restate policy in the leader. Dmcq (talk) 22:44, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

We've been through this. Consensus is for the current intro. I don't have the energy to tell you why again, but it would just be a repetition of what's already been said anyway. You appear to disagree with the consensus, and it may need to be left as that. Equazcion (talk) 22:54, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Well I think what's there is against the spirit of wikipedia. The 5P do not go on about punishment. It is about encouragement to doing the right thing. All the business about enforcement is properly in separate policies I think and this policy could survive quite well without the adherence and enforcement sections. I'm happy about those being in as a general overall idea even though they duplicate the function of the proper policy pages. If you really feel you must have what I consider flaky and ill-though out text in the leader I guess I'll just console myself that it seems to be completely rewritten every couple of months. Dmcq (talk) 23:27, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Sounds like a plan. Equazcion (talk) 23:30, 24 October 2009 (UTC)

Well as Camelbinky says its not part of the policy proper and I don't think it says anything actually wrong, it just gets the weight wrong and seems against the policy itself in repetition. Dmcq (talk) 03:25, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Ok, sounds like we've got an agreement that everything is finalized as far as something on Misplaced Pages can be. If no further objections from either side of the courtroom, I'm officially banging the gavel now. Bailiff please clear the courtroom! As the bartender often says at closing time- "You dont have to go home, but you cant stay here". Let's go do some real editing before another rewrite of this policy is suggested in another couple months.Camelbinky (talk) 03:31, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

'nother break

I was hoping we'd come out in a different place. There's been a lot of discussion and editing, and when it's this hard to follow what's going on, I'm not sure it's time to bang the gavel. Just for instance:

• "Misplaced Pages does not have hard-and-fast rules ...": it does according to the fifth pillar, which has had a lot of editing with no significant changes (other than the departure from GFDL) all this year. The fifth pillar says that there are no hard-and-fast rules except for the five pillars (italics mine), and 5P covers a whole lot of ground.
• "... but editors are expected to abide by the principles laid down in policies and guidelines, except where there is a good reason not to.": by whom? How can that be? Policy and guidelines are a uniquely Wikipedian institution, and they're very useful, but guidelines pop up and wilt like weeds in a garden ... is it really true that any Wikipedian expects compliance simply because the guideline exists, that is, that they have no expectations the day before and expect compliance afterward? Does anyone have evidence of that? It's more accurate to say that there are certain understandings of the community, many of which are written down in policy and guidelines.
• "If by disregarding these principles an editor is found to be acting disruptively, he or she risks being blocked or otherwise restricted from editing." I appreciate the effort to tone it down, to put the emphasis on acting disruptively rather than disregarding "these principles" (which principles?) Still, there's a heavy-handedness here, and I don't think it's supported by actual practice at ANI, RFCU and Arbcom ... that is, I don't think that decisions there track and faithfully reflect whatever today's version is of the hundreds of policies and guidelines, as opposed to yesterday's or tomorrow's version.

If we're fatigued with all the discussion over the last two month (and we should be), I have no objection to leaving the page like it is for a month, but I'll be coming back to this before long. - Dank (push to talk) 16:41, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Yep that covers most of my feeling about the leader and the status of the 5P. I think the rest of the policy page is okay though. I'll be happy to join in. I think the compliance is supposed to be a description of what happens rather than that people comply with the guidelines because they are written down. being written down conveys information about consensus. Or something like that, it's hard to pin down. Anyway arbitrators are happy to quote them. Dmcq (talk) 17:05, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

You miss understand the fifth pillar, you claim it says we do have firm rules. The fifth pillar specifically states that Misplaced Pages does not have firm rules, which is what we say here on the policy page. The five pillars are specifically not classified as policy, that is why they arent covered very much on this page which is about what policies and guidelines are and how they are used. This page isnt a description of our "rules" in general. Another attempt to impose on this policy page the concept that there are "laws", which we've already been over in this discussion and came to the consensus that policies are not laws per WP:NOTSTATUTE. If you want to bring this up again next month then fine, I'll be here and we can repeat this very same discussion all over again. I dont see the point so soon though. This seems like an attempt to simply wear this side down and hope that some of us dont feel like returning. What if it is that Equazcion, Kim Bruning, and Kotniski dont come back because they are tired of this, but they still have the same feelings and points. Are you going to roll over and bully me? It took me long enough fighting alone to get the conversation even going when other editors were trying to sweep this discussion under the rug with things like "this is how its been written for years, why change it?" (one of the worst arguments I heard claiming we shouldnt change a policy), and "policies are laws" (still dont know how that was an argument saying we cant change policy). I'm all for changing policies when it can be shown that policy is significantly lagging behind consensus (it will always lag behind consensus), but having the same discussion a month later? Seems like a tactic to me. We've been through everyone of the points listed, we've come to a consensus. I really tire of this.Camelbinky (talk) 19:23, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

AFAIK, I've never bullied or intended to bully you or anyone else. I don't mind having the discussion now; I'm saying that it's unrealistic that we'll be able to get everyone to read the very long discussions, keep up with the long edit history, and stay focused month after month. But I'm open to discussion any time. - Dank (push to talk) 20:46, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Also ... I think you misunderstand me ... the best I can tell, I'm on your side in this debate, I'm advocating that we change the introduction so that it doesn't give a false impression that policy is the same as law. Of course, that opens up the question of what policy is. - Dank (push to talk) 20:50, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

What you think is not necessarily consensus. Dmcq (talk) 20:14, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

The fifth pillar is actually a pretty funny paradox. One of the five pillars says there are no firm rules except for the five pillars, one of which is that there are no firm rules. Think about that long enough and you'll be sitting in the corner drooling and hitting yourself on the head with an imaginary box of baked ziti. 5P needs some repairs before we can even begin discussing this. Personally, I'd say 5P is a summary of other policies, and is not meant to set new rules not already existent elsewhere.

As for your problems with the compliance part: "there are certain understandings of the community, many of which are written down in policy and guidelines" -- That seems pretty accurate too. My only concern is that it doesn't state any need to comply at all, when in practice we really do pretty much expect everyone to comply. If they don't they get reverts and warnings. We don't expect them to know about every rule we have beforehand, but nevertheless, we expect compliance once they are informed that they've broken a rule, in the vast majority of situations.

As for practice not agreeing with policy 100%, well, that would be a general Misplaced Pages complaint. I think it would be pretty contentious to say something like "You might not be able to predict what we'll do to you", which seems to be what you're suggesting. Misplaced Pages may have its problems, according to certain opinions, but we do our best. We don't need to represent opinions on how well the place is run -- only on how it's meant to run, and what people can generally expect. Equazcion (talk) 20:15, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

I think of the 5P as not just a summary of the main policies but also expressing principles because of its wide coverage and being used that way for a while now. The paradox doesn't matter too much, I guess people ought to try removing such things from policy pages but I don't think it is expected that principles be totally logical. It is better to express ones desires as best one can rather than get bogged down in logic. Dmcq (talk) 20:37, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

5P is a product of the WMF and en.wikipedia at the same time; what makes it the latter is all the attention it's gotten, with no significant changes, over a long time. Wikipedians must be happy with it, and it's easy to see why; it says a lot of things that are fairly obvious.- Dank (push to talk) 22:11, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

←You have good points, guys; we don't do people any favors by saying that policy pages change every day so there's no point in paying attention. I'm not willing to make an argument for what guidelines are; I don't have the expertise, and they live in kind of a quantum world where they're right and wrong and applicable and inapplicable at the same time, depending on what day you read the page, what got changed recently, etc. As to what policy is if it isn't law, we can say at least 4 things about all the policy pages that belong to one of the main policy subcats (conduct, content, deletion and enforcement):

• Even when the pages aren't perfect, they're still more likely to be right than any other page on Misplaced Pages that claims to cover the same or overlapping material, because they've gotten so much more attention (although a few of the enforcement policies, such as Misplaced Pages:GlobalBlocking, don't get a lot of discussion because they're really more WMF policies; maybe we should have a subcat for that).
• Long-standing text in long-standing policies tends to be very persuasive at ANI, RFCU and Arbcom, so people who like to skate on thin ice should be particularly interested in policy pages.
• Policy pages tend to be an efficient way to get up-to-speed, because so many people have removed things that they didn't think were universally true, or particularly helpful even if true.
• Mostly: policy pages attempt to speak the unspoken rules of our culture at en.wp, the things that people in other places generally don't spell out for newbies, so that you don't have to pay attention to every conversation and learn by trial-and-error. - Dank (push to talk) 22:11, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I agree with Dank that we do agree on the ends, but I think we disagree on the means to that end. I do not, and can not, agree to the removal of the sentence stating that Misplaced Pages has no hard and fast rules etc etc. That is the very core of what I wanted in the first place and completely strips the whole meaning of everything worked on so hard over the last couple weeks (month?). I really dont care what people use the 5P for, I've never had any use for them, and except for today never read them, and couldnt have told you what they said, they have no bearing on everyday editing, which is the only thing I personally care about, and in fact editing the encyclopedia is the only thing Misplaced Pages is here as, this is not a bureaucracy nor an experiment in creating one or in creating "laws". The 5P are specifically not policies, they summarize our policies, basically the 5P page is a summary of all the things commone on policy pages. This page is a description of what policies and guidelines are, it tells newbies and established users alike what the purpose of policies are and how they are meant to be used. I know Dank is working in good faith on the same principles I hold dear, but I think some of his solutions will end up weakening the use of IAR and give editors like Dmcq more ammunition in diluting its ability. I have an agenda- I want IAR and common sense to be strong enough to withstand challenge by those who quote policy as the word of God. On Misplaced Pages there is but one god, his name is Jimbo, other than that I recognize nothing as binding except for the consensus of the community at the current moment (which is constantly changing and for the better). I dont want this policy page to be able in any way to be interpreted as policies must be obeyed to the letter, that policies are laws, that policies can be used by one individual to "overrule" or ignore the consensus of the community in a debate. I think Dank may agree with my motives and goals, perhaps we can find a compromise on our methods and means for that end.Camelbinky (talk) 22:21, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

In other words you know The Truth. The leader is the wrong place to put it. The body text is the right place. The leader doesn't attempt to state policy, it should try and give the scope and purpose of the policy - not the policy itself. The body overrides the leader. Dmcq (talk) 22:36, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Putting words in my mouth making it seem like I ever said I know "The Truth" is awfully close to a personal attack, please dont again. When I say "I think", "I want", "in my opinion" I mean just that, "I" as in ME; dont go reading into it thinking I'm speaking for anyone else when I write a post, I dont speak for the community, EVERYTHING I WRITE IN A POST IS MY OWN OPINION NO MATTER HOW YOU READ IT OR HOW I WORD IT, unless I am quoting a policy or someone else's statement and then I will put it in quotes and make it clear it is not me. I only accept what you write as your opinion, I never accept anything you write as the opinion of anyone but YOU. It is your opinion the body overrides the leader, I have never read anything that says that. Nothing in the body of this policy contradicts the leader. I dont care what your opinion on IAR is, just as I have an agenda to strengthen IAR, I believe you may have an agenda to weaken it. I have been honest with my agenda from day one, do you have anything you would like to share? If you think that IAR is wrong and you are doing this because you dont want anyone to use this policy to justify IAR then say so, there is nothing wrong with that. You have stated your opinion is that policies are laws, consensus has told you they are not. In my opinion you are continuing to do an endrun around consensus by removing the teeth from what was already agreed on.Camelbinky (talk) 22:53, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Please read this policy itself. "maintain scope, avoid redundancy. Both purpose and scope must be clearly provided in the lead, and not merely as an aside. Content should be within the scope of its policy. Policies should not be redundant with other policies, or within themselves. Do not summarize, copy, or extract text. Avoid needless reminders" And as you said yourself about this "I would like to point out that, at least in my opinion, in the subsection quoted by Dmcq only the first sentence that explicitely states "lead" applies to leads in policies, the rest of the subsection applies to the core of the policy. "Content" meaning the core of the policy as opposed to the sentence before it which mentions "lead" and applies there. I know I'm wikilawyering here, but that is my interpretation of how it is written.Camelbinky (talk) 22:28, 24 October 2009 (UTC)" Where you justified that repetition was allowed in the leader because it wasn't part of the core. Dmcq (talk) 23:15, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

←I'm not sure what change Dank is advocating now, but it doesn't seem the same as what Dmcq wants, which is to change the lead section into a nicely-worded table of contents. Dmcq, consensus is against what you want, as we've already established twice now, both times having ended with you stating some form of acceptance. At the end of the last section, you said "I'll just console myself that it seems to be completely rewritten every couple of months". When does the consoling yourself start? You seem like you're pretty intent on hammering on the same point no matter how many time it's been refuted. How is a talk page supposed to function if a lone proponent of something never gives up? I'd point to WP:JDI. The way to end a discussion with someone intent on getting their way is to simply stop responding to them. This means you, Camelbinky. A repetitive and useless comment is not worth a response; responding provides validation and fuel. Equazcion (talk) 23:21, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

Camelbinky seems to be saying he achieved something useful by trying to state a policy in the leader and he is very adamant he wants to defend that bit. I was merely pointing out to him that the proper place for a policy was in the body. This policy says the leader should give scope and purpose and you've tried to do some sort of summarizing as well but that is a summary of the policy, not the policy. What he should really be doing with these ideas about policy he has is try and get a consensus on changing the statements in the body of the policy page. What exactly is your problem with that? Dmcq (talk) 23:33, 25 October 2009 (UTC)

And sorry if he is a she. I should really try harder and fix my sentences to get round that problem. Dmcq (talk) 00:10, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

What are we discussing?

I'm lost now - just when I thought we'd got everything settled, a new round of arguing breaks out. I understand Dmcq is still trying to argue for the removal of any helpful information from the lead, which is becoming a bit tiresome, but really is a secondary matter (if this policy's later wording implies that leads of policy pages mustn't tell the reader anything more than the table of contents, then I think it's that later wording that needs changing). More importantly, is anyone proposing that the information we give be changed so as to be more accurate? Looking at it again, it's still not quite right - we probably shouldn't be saying "principles laid down in policies and guidelines". In fact the structure of the lead should probably be more like "Although Misplaced Pages does not operate on a systm of hard-and-fast rules, it nonetheless has principles (practices?) relating to behaviour/content... these principles derive from common practice or explicit consensus or Jimbo or WMF... editors attempt to document these principles... when consensus is reached that a page successfully and usefully documents such principles that page is marked as a policy or guideline... these pages are maintained and updated so as to explain the principles better and more accurately... therefore(?) editors are generally expected to abide by these pages except when there is a good reason not to." I'm not proposing any exact wording here, but isn't that the story we ought to be telling?--Kotniski (talk) 08:10, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I am not arguing for the removal of useful information from the leader. In fact I wasn't even proposing to do anything at this time even though I am unhappy with the leader. It was Dank who came along and said they didn't like the leader and might come along in a month to look again at it again and I said I supported their ideas.

What I said was that the leader should outline the purpose and scope of the policy and the nutshell was a good place to summarize the content.

I particularly disagree with the second paragraphs in the leader. I believe it gives undue weight to enforcement. Overall the leader says little else except thankfully the purpose of the policies which has survived in the first paragraph. It doesn't give the scope properly.

I hope that makes my position clear.

As to the point about 'laid down'. I much prefer the wording in the derivation section. And the other points are better covered in the adherence section. Dmcq (talk) 08:57, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

• Don't forget our goal also guides our policies and guidelines. A lot of our policies stem from the fact that we are writing an encyclopedia, and were formed long before the idea of having policies took hold. Like you I have kind of lost the plot a bit, so I agree it is useful to think about the story we are telling here. We're basically summarising the story of what policies are on Misplaced Pages, so we need to convey how they can and have come into being, how they work and what they do. I'm not quite understanding what the derivation section of the page is trying to do, to be honest. If it is attempting to show where policies and guidelines derive their "power" from, then I think there does need to be a mention of the fact that being an encyclopedia is quite important. The encyclopedia came first. The community came second to build it. Does that help any? Hiding T 09:31, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

This comes down rather to the nub of it. This policy is about policy and guidelines. It should not really be trying to set up general principles about the main body of the encyclopaedia because it isn't read enough by the main community whereas the 5P fulfills that role very well. The derivation section points to the main principles and if you follow the link to 5P you see that building an encyclopaedia is the first pillar. That is entirely as it should be I feel. Repeating principles or other policies is just not the right way for this policy to go I feel. It should concentrate on what it does best which is describe community standards for policy and guideline pages and the procedures for looking after them. Some indicators where the principles are derived from and the basis for adherence and enforcement sound okay too but I'd prefer all that referred to and deferred to the 5P and the appropriate policy pages. Baically the scope should be in the leader whereas at the moment only the purpose is. Dmcq (talk) 10:30, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't see the goal of this page as being to summarize the existing policies and guidelines... I see it as telling editors how best to write and edit policies and guidelines. Blueboar (talk) 13:23, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

I think the Blueboar has a useful and practical perspective on this page. I also think that it may be a minority view, based on how this page has changed during the last year. For example, if you're trying to provide practical advice instead of a philosophical treatise, you wouldn't normally bury most of the practical instructions in the footnotes. You probably also wouldn't care very much about the precise definitions of "policy" and "guideline" and so forth, since they have very little practical impact. Defining "Policy" as "an invisible pink unicorn that some editors like to argue about for entertainment" would probably not hurt the encyclopedia, whereas writing "If you think something should be a policy, then you're invited to unilaterally slap a {{Policy}} tag on it" clearly would. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:08, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Grin, that's probably right. No harm would come if this page were shorter. In fact, conciseness is one of the qualities I look for when trying to decide if a page reads like a policy page or not. - Dank (push to talk) 17:22, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Concision is not best measured by overall length. This page currently stands at half the size of WP:NPOV, but no reasonable person would suggest that it is therefore more policy-like than NPOV in any respect. (For myself, I think this page is a blend of policy, essay, and procedure.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:33, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Well I wonder how big this minority actually is. I guess it can be reduced to whether this policy is mainly supposed to describe overall policy like the 5P or whether it should mainly be concerned with describing how to look after the policy and guideline pages. Some question like that could be phrased on the village pump. If the scope of this policy could be thrashed out on the village pump that would solve a lot of problems here. Dmcq (talk) 17:38, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

5 Pillars is neither policy nor above policy, policies do not HAVE to follow the 5 pillars "by law"; the 5 pillars is simply a nice summary of what is in common across all policies already; the 5P flow FROM the existing policies, not the other way around. I think people are giving the 5P too much weight and thinking they are a Constitution and our policies are statutes. We've already had a consensus above regarding "polices are/arent laws". I'm not rehashing this argument over and over until it gets the way some want it to be. I will not agree to any removal of language or addition of language that violates agreements we made earlier regarding that policies are not laws and they are not to be treated as such. I have stated three times already the specific sentence in the lead that in my opinion can not be taken out. Just because Kim and Equazcion arent talking as much doesnt mean the opposition can just keep talking and make separate "consensus" because everyone got fed up with the same thing being brought up again. I ask politely that whatever changes are decided you do not break the consensus that was reached above regarding what are policies. They are not to be enforced by the letter and this page is not to portray them as such, we arent a bureaucracy or government in the business of ensuring our policies are strictly enforced. We are the opposite. Please stop trying to put in language that would make it seem otherwise.Camelbinky (talk) 22:37, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

Could you try and give a concise summary of what you believe the scope of this policy page is please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmcq (talk • contribs)

I don't see anything wrong with this page being both about "how to write policies" and "how to regard policies". We could start from there and think about a new structure, perhaps separate sections for each. The lead issues are separate, secondary, have been discussed to death, and may require rethinking but only once this more important issue is dealt with first. As for the derivation section, I added that because certain folks insisted on including mention of 5P and of the Foundation and their "reserved rights". I had trouble wedging those in without that section, and I understand if it doesn't look like it fits. Equazcion (talk) 22:50, 26 Oct 2009 (UTC)

To answer Dmcq's question- the scope of this policy is to state what policies and guidelines ARE. That is the scope. "Scope" means "the breadth of the topic" or in even simpler words- "what the topic covers", it is not a summary of the topic, nor is it a summary of the content of the topic. The topic is what the name of the page is. The name of the page is "Policies and guidelines", since a page's scope is only what the topic states, and all pages must stay within their scope, it is clear the scope of any page is what the name of the page is. In this case- policies and guidelines. It doesnt seem that hard to understand to me.Camelbinky (talk) 23:38, 26 October 2009 (UTC)

So you would exclude "how to write, get approval for, and maintain policies and guidelines" from the proper scope of this document? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:00, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I would like to mention that I have spent the good portion of my day at work today reading the talk page of the 5Pillars and I am more convinced than ever that they were never intended to override policy and that policy does not "flow from them" as some say, they werent written by Jimbo, nor handed down by the "office", the Wikimedia Foundation never imposed them on us, most of our policies are older than the page itself, which dates from 2005. It was also surreal to notice that Kim Bruning was among the first to comment on the talk page of the 5 Pillars way back in 2005! Her opinions have not changed, and it seems she was even involved in the same argument of "are policies laws or not" here on this talk page back in 2005 as well; consensus supported her back then as it did this time. I guess I shouldnt have been so surprised this same exact discussion has happened before, though I am comforted by the fact that, at least in 2005, the outcome was in favor of the position I hold now.Camelbinky (talk) 01:07, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

To answer What's question in a nutshell- no. When writing an article on a city we dont just describe the city, we also have a history section, and we describe what is going on in the city and developments that are planned. I see no reason we cant describe "how to write and get approval for policies" though I think "maintaining" is going to get a little tricky. We dont want to in anyway give the impression we are limiting a Wikipedian's right to be bold when editing a policy nor do we want to go in the other way and tell Wikipedian's "its ok not to discuss things in a talk page that may be controversial". Unless you are vandalizing being bold on a policy page is not going to get you banned or even warned despite what is implied by the current wording on this page last I read it. All I really care about is that this page makes it clear that policies are not hard and fast rules or laws and that it does not contain (in the lead or the core) any language that can in any way be interpreted as undermining IAR, saying there is no common sense, or stating that they are laws.Camelbinky (talk) 01:15, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your prompt reply: it clears up a source of confusion. You said above that "the scope of this policy is to state what policies and guidelines ARE. That is the scope".

Most people believe that "what you do with something" is, or, at least, 'can be', different from "what it is". (For example, you may have heard someone claim a distinction between a human being and a human doing.) Consequently, other people on this talk page have (apparently, and IMO reasonably) interpreted your statement that the scope is what P&G "ARE" as an exclusive statement that specifically rejects including on this page any information how you write them, how Misplaced Pages approves them, and how you maintain (=update) them. "Put a note on the Village Pump" does not tell anyone anything at all about what policies and guidelines "ARE", in any standard sense of this intransitive verb.

It sounds like your notion of the scope, despite your first effort at describing it, is the same as most of the other editors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:49, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Like I've said many times, I couldnt care less what is on this page as long as nothing can be construed in any fashion by any editor that there are hard and fast rules that are laws, or anything that weakens IAR or makes common sense unneeded because "policies are laws and enforced as such". As long as nothing is inserted that does that, you can edit the entire page to say "silly boy blue, badoop adoop, fly me to the moon" for all I care. Actually, anyone who can find a legitimate way to add that to ANY policy would get a barnstar from me and become my hero.Camelbinky (talk) 03:54, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

The nonsense text? It could be used as an example at WP:CSD G1. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:18, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

That was funny, and accurate. Wikihumour!Camelbinky (talk) 05:23, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

Policy on notability describes good practice on ensuring notability in articles. Policy on policies and guidelies is in my view mainly about describing good practice in the policies and guidelines pages. So I'm fairly firmly in the setting, up, writing, getting consensus camp. As part of that it has to explain the role of policies and guidelines, what their purpose is, how they derive their authority, and how they achieve their function. The principles on which they derive their authority and the consensus whereby they are decided are described on other pages. The methods whereby they are enforced are described in other policies. The main role is to support writing good policies and guidelines.

As to the 5P it is true they weren't here from the start. Jimbo's principles were and then there were the founding principles. But Misplaced Pages is now self governing. Decisions are by consensus. Ultimately Misplaced Pages is run by the WMF, but for normal running it has to decide for itself to do what's right. The 5P is by now the de facto statement of principles. It has been on the bottom of most of the policy pages under 'principles', no qualification, for a number of years, and people are happy with that. By now it is more than just a summary of policy. A cycle has been set up whereby policy should be in line with it also and if there is a conflict it becomes a wider issue than just that policy page.

What is written on this policy page is only relevant for good practice on other policy and guideline pages. It is not important enough to appear on the 5P. WP:IAR for instance does not depend for its existence or validity on this policy. Dmcq (talk) 08:44, 27 October 2009 (UTC)

• We don't have policy on notability. We have guidance. And that distinction is something this page should probably be making a little clearer. I'd also differ somewhat with the way policies evolved. Even the founding principles were written backwards, in that they cam after the event. A lot of what we now see as policies actually stem from Larry Sanger as much as they do Jimmy, and I don;t think we should duck that point. My digging through the history of Misplaced Pages indicates that the way the policies evolved is that the idea of the encyclopedia came first. Then "rules" were put in place by Larry, Jimmy and the community, in no particular order and with no particular authority. Larry left/was fired, but the community and Jimmy still created rule, and at a certain point the Board was created and Jimmy's power slowly passed to teh community and the Board, such that the community makes policies and guidance in most areas although the Board can mandate in certain areas where they have legal responsibility. Larry leaving is one turning point, the creation of the board is another, and 2005 is probably the last major one, because in 2005 the policies and guidelines tags were implemented and it was also when policies started being framed without the direct input of Jimmy or the mailing list. Hope that helps inform the debate in some way. Hiding T 09:42, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing out notability is a guideline rather than a policy and the bit of history. I'm not sure the status of WP:N will change what I do though, I only noticed a couple of days ago a page that called itself a guideline and people seemed to follow and quote but wasn't even in the guidelines category :) Dmcq (talk) 10:07, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

This issue is one of the reasons that I think trying to pin down precise definitions of the types of pages in the Misplaced Pages namespace is largely a waste of time. There are essays that have nearly the force of major policies in certain limited circumstances, and there are parts of bona fide policies that are "honored more in the breach than the observance", as the saying goes.

How to write, propose, and maintain such pages is useful information that this page can communicate to editors. Trying to tell editors which page will trump which other page in any given type of dispute is not helpful. For example: IAR is both a fundamental principle, and the rule most likely to 'lose' in any dispute.

Most of the changes in the last week or so have been to take the page away from the previously stated purpose ("This policy page specifies the community standards related to the composition, structure, organization, life cycle, and maintenance of policies & guidelines and related pages") towards warning editors that they have to follow the policies, and they might get blocked (but feel free to change them), and so forth. Consequently, I think that most of the major changes to this page have been unhelpful -- not "wrong" exactly, because they're fairly accurate statements, but more "pointless", because telling editors that they should adhere to policies doesn't tell you anything about writing, proposing, or maintaining them. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:28, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

That all depends on what you see the purpose of the page being. You see it as instructive of how to write and maintain such pages, while others see it as educative of how such pages are to be regarded. I don't see why we can't compromise and make it about both. Does anyone object to that? And if so, why? Equazcion (talk) 20:44, 28 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I agree with the compromise Equazcion has stated that it can be both, I believe What did politely ask what my stance on that was and I had hoped I put clearly that I am O.K. with it be instructive along with educative. I do disagree with What, however, if I have understood him correctly regarding his statement that this page NOW is about warning editors and it wasnt before. As the editor who started this whole thing I can tell you most definitely that the way the policy was written at the time of my very first posting on this page, it did include most of the words (and even harsher) regarding "you might be blocked" and warning them about being blocked. It was precisely BECAUSE the policy had such wording, and harshly written, about punishment and blocking that I brought up this proposal of a rewrite. I believe if What wants to focus on how to write and maintain a policy or guideline that is very good. Showing a good way of how policies are written and maintained is good, because it will cover common sense, consensus, talking, and of course it has to mention the Village Pump (proposals) and Village Pump (policy), and I guess some of the other village pumps are tangentially relevant; and it would need to mention that we do listen to new opinions and welcome them, that we are a work-in-progress, and that our policies do evolve and change as new consensus' are formed. I think we have shown through example on this page on how to successfully write, rewrite, and maintain a policy. It isnt all that different than an article, you be bold, you talk about controversial subjects, and you respect consensus as it evolves. Policies and guidelines arent static, written in stone, or unchangeable, nor should anyone be subject to being told "this is how its been written for over two years, no need to change it" as I was told. We should make it clear we are open to new ideas and suggestions, not all will be used, but all should be listened to and if they arent helpful then it should be politely shown why logically the policy shouldnt be changed, other than "this is how we've done it so far". That's my two cents.Camelbinky (talk) 23:33, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Camelbinky, I'd recommend that you compare the lead from a couple of weeks ago with the current one, which says "If by disregarding these principles an editor is found to be acting disruptively, he or she risks being blocked or otherwise restricted from editing." The only material changes I've seen have been to add a link to IAR, to spam the word consensus a bit, and to rearrange existing sentences, including promoting "you're going to get blocked" to the lead, out of its previous context, which mentioned common sense. If your goal was to remove any mention of risks to editors that violate Misplaced Pages's standards, then IMO you've failed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:01, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Consensus is important, What, and with all due respect, the prose you suggested made no mention of consensus at all, which is why consensus was against it. If "spamming" the word consensus means including mention of it, then I say let's spam away. Putting something in the lead isn't a promotion, it's an attempt to summarize, which is what the lead is for. Regardless, let's try not to just express our soreness about things that have already happened. If you're attempting to be constructive, What, IMO you've failed. Let's try focusing on this compromise instead. Equazcion (talk) 04:11, 29 Oct 2009 (UTC)

What, here is the diff that shows what the page said prior to our work and what it is today, please read it and point out to me how you think it did not say anything about being blocked and punishment? Because it did prior to our work, I know there's been many changes and its been awhile, you may have forgotten just how harsh it was. So, yes I have compared the CORE of the policy, and it is as I stated.Camelbinky (talk) 06:09, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

That diff shows to me that WhatamIdoing is totally correct in what he says. The adherence and enforcement sections are unchanged. You can switch on a better diff in your preferences under Editing gadgets called wikEdit which will make it even more obvious once you learn how it works. The changes have taken away the scope from the leader and left behind some spam about IAR and punishment which doesn't follow what's said in this policy anyway closely. The content about adherence and enforcement is unchanged and better written. Dmcq (talk) 10:12, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Camelbinky, I specifically said that the changes promoted the "you'll get blocked" sentence to the lead, which IMO this change makes punishment seem more important, not less, to the readers. SlimVirgin removed this statement a couple of hours after my comment. The correct comparison is this, since yours includes three changes made after my comment. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:59, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Compromise

If anyone has any thoughts as to how to move forward with combining educative and instructive information on this page, on how policies are to be regarded and written, respectively, do post your thoughts. Equazcion (talk) 06:17, 29 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Am I correct in saying Camelbinky, Equazcion, Hiding and Kotniski are quite happy to insert all this business about IAR and blocking in the leader, and if I wasn't around they would have been quite happy to remove the first paragraph in the leader about the purpose of the policies? And that they approve of removal of the paragraph

"This policy page specifies the community standards related to the composition, structure, organization, life cycle, and maintenance of policies & guidelines and related pages"?

If that is a fairly accurate summary of the state then I think we are not done yet with discussing scope and purpose. How can there be an easy compromise between such disparate views? The scope needs to be worked out in a proper clean fashion so there is much less room for disagreement. I reject what has been inserted as irrelevant and undue emphasis of one section which isn't the point of the policy, and they reject the old paragraphs which I am defending as irrlevant or repeating a contents list. In particular they have removed the paragraph stating what as I see as the scope of the policy. Dmcq (talk) 10:37, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

In fact the edit SlimVirgin is what I would think of as a reasonable form. I'd like to keep Larry Sangers quote if only for nostalgia's sake. It says something about the difference between policies and guidelines which is in the title, and it says something useful about editing which is in line with the scope of this policy as far as I see it. So overall thumbs up. Dmcq (talk) 10:53, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

What does the Sanger quote say about the difference between policies and guidelines? (I didn't think they even had such a distinction in those days.) Oh sorry, you meant Slim's edit. OK, let's leave it, it's not worth arguing about any more. This sentence that tries to explain the difference between policies and guidelines doesn't really mean anything though - it would be better if we just admitted that there isn't really much difference between the two (and even better if we stopped distinguishing the two altogether).--Kotniski (talk) 11:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Sorry should have got my referents better. This is an encyclopaedia and what do you expect people doing such a thing to like doing excedpt to categorize things? People would be unhappy with one great bit heap. The various guidelines are in various subcategories as well. Dmcq (talk) 11:33, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, and that makes sense, because the subcategories are based on the topics of the pages, not on their perceived "status". But the artificial breakdown into policies and guidelines is largely just an inconvenience.--Kotniski (talk) 14:14, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't like Slim's edits because I don't agree with the "discussed in advance". I believe changes should be discussed, but I don;t think it matters if you make the change and then discuss, or discuss and then make the change. Hiding T 12:22, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Well, it talks about changes that "change accepted practice" (that wording could be improved), so in principle, that's right - you can make changes that better describe accepted practice without discussing them, but it's wrong to write that something is the accepted practice before it's been accepted.--Kotniski (talk) 14:14, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

There is a fairly strong consensus that significant edits (whether the intent is to change the accepted practice or just better describe accepted practice) should be (at least) proposed on the talk page first (with some rational given for the change). A short explanation and discussion of a prposed change can help eliminate knee-jerk reaction reverts (such as when editors revert simply because the edit changes "long standing language"... A brief discussion helps everyone think about whether the proposed language might actually be better than the "long standing language".) Blueboar (talk) 14:58, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

This policy uses the word ' substantive' when talking about changes. I just stuck in substantial or controversial in the leader a moment ago. Significant also sounds good, is there somewhere it is used that is like this? Dmcq (talk) 15:08, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

My support for including a (suitably qualified) "discuss first" statement is for purely practical reasons: editors that make changes without prior discussion are likely to have people get mad at them. Having people get mad at them reduces our editors' numbers and enthusiasm. IMO, telling editors about the "unwritten rules" (which affect different pages to different amounts), and thus retaining happy, active editors for Misplaced Pages, is properly considered an act of kindness that helps the encyclopedia, not mindless instruction creep.

Note that I don't always follow this advice myself, e.g. , but I do think it's kind to give editors a bit of 'fair warning'. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:12, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

OMG. We had a consensus and in one swoop you undo the entire consensus by simply pushing and pushing until others give up. The wording on enforcement is now just as harsh as it was when I started and warns editors that they can get "punished" for not adhering to the spirit even if they adhere to the letter. Where is the wording on the other flipside, of being ALLOWED to violate the letter if you dont adhere to the letter? You've stripped IAR and the ability to show that policies ARE NOT LAWS per consensus. I dont care if some of you think they are, THEY ARENT, AND WE HAD A CONSENSUS that they werent. I find this in bad-taste. I find it annoying and ironic that now people are talking about whether or not you can be bold or if you have to talk first when the entire leader was changed without talking and against consensus. We had a consensus on the leader the way it was. I am disgusted with how this just played out and I'm done arguing about this. I've found support everywhere I take this about policies being "laws" or the role of the 5P, so I dont care what this page says anymore because it is getting hijacked by those with minority opinions and this entire page will simply be ignored about what it says regarding the place of policy. Dmcq's agenda of making policies laws is not consistent with consensus or the practice of the Community. Also- Dmcq, I suggest you read What's statement at the end of the previous thread and re-read the diff I put in, I think you got it backwards about what What said and what the diff said, or your just having your own bias, I've noticed you jump on the bandwagon and state your "agreement" with anyone who comes with a legitimate criticism and think they are on your side when mostly they arent even close in coming to your view of how things work with policies. I have not seen one legitimate or even helpful point come from your posts. If you think what I wrote is harsh, reread the various posts you put on here and the 5P talk page regarding "Camelbinky wants to..." and "Camelbinky thinks..."; as you state "I'm simply writing my opinion on what you think", so if its OK for you to do that, what I'm typing is OK as well. I'm outta here, have fun making changes against Community practice.Camelbinky (talk) 17:05, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Camelbinky, you keep making this assertion... and you keep failing to provide a concrete example, despite repeated requests.

So here's a concrete example of getting blocked for violating the spirit, but not the rules: Editors get blocked every single day for WP:Edit warring, even if they don't technically violate the 3RR "specific rule". This is an example of what this page describes as "violating the spirit, but not technically the rule" -- and getting in trouble.

Now, can you show me a single instance of someone breaking a specific, detailed, written rule, while obviously and fully complying with the spirit of the same document, and actually getting in trouble for it? You will need to identify both the general page (e.g., WP:EW in my example), and the specific rule (e.g., WP:3RR). (Note that pages that don't have any (relevant) specific rules can't have this problem: you cannot break a specific rule that does not exist.)

And if you can't, will you please quit asserting that it happens? WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:18, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Excuse me? No, I dont have "quit asserting it". And I dont have to give an example, and I find yours not only very rare and not "every single day", the edit warring you speak of is usually in regards to the vandalism and not the edit warring the editor who gets blocked for. I dont need to have an example of adhering to the spirit while disobeying the letter BECAUSE IAR says you can. Other editors, in fact the vast majority, have the same view, so I dont care if you keep making this about "Camelbinky" when it isnt just me. I'm sick of seeing that. Is it somehow beneficial to your view to "pick on me" in this manner, for you and Dmcq to continually make it seem like I'm a lone gunman here and make me seem to be out of touch with consensus when well over 5 to 8 editors have supported me here at various times regarding policies are/arent laws and the role of 5P (here and at the Village Pump (policy) discussion). Do you really think you can change people's opinions by going after me? Fine, I'll leave; obviously you think if I do then you can get what you want, since in your opinion it is just me alone against you with crazy ideas. I guess Equazcion, Kim Bruning, and everyone else who told you and Dmcq earlier we had a consensus and supported this were figments of my imagination. Oh, and dont ever ever ever try this again of telling me what I must prove to you. You are not a moderator, a teacher, or a cop or any other authority figure who can tell others what they must do in order to talk. I find your entire attitude harrassing and in bad faith. Read the harrassment policies and guidelines regarding "any actions that make it uncomfortable for an editor to contribute" and various other language that makes "editing unpleasant". You have all along gotten very very very close in these respects with you and Dmcq's various (and WRONG assertions as to what I do and dont believe) and your above post requiring that I dont assert my opinion or that I must give you information that you want.Camelbinky (talk) 17:31, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

So you admit that the problem you want to ban already never happens. Writing a policy to prohibit a non-existent problem -- even an inconceivable problem, since none of us can imagine anybody ever punishing a sensible action -- is too WP:CREEPy for Misplaced Pages. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:04, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism

Do not revert edits as vandalism unless there's adequate reason to think they were made with the intention of damaging the page. You're in a content dispute at the moment, so the word vandalism should not appear at all when you revert each other. Equazcion (talk) 17:45, 29 Oct 2009 (UTC)#

I apologise for calling it vandalism as I've got to assume Camelbinky did it in good faith and really thinks the change will improve Misplaced Pages. May I point to the bit in this policy itself about changes where a 0RR or 1RR policy should be adhered to rather than edit warring on the policy page. Dmcq (talk) 18:02, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Appreciate the apology. Just to be clear, 1RR is per-person, so if I wanted to revert you I could still do that. I don't generally like to revert though. Reverting is like a slap in the face. It's better to make a well thought-out edit to someone else's version, then they edit your version, and so forth. In conjunction with discussion, there's more of a chance that way for you to end up with a compromise. Equazcion (talk) 18:11, 29 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Anyway I'm off to a dance which is as good as a coffee break any day. Silly of me to get annoyed by something like that. Dmcq (talk) 18:39, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

My edit

• Removed summary of difference between guidelines and policies -- "primarily advisory" vs "standards everyone should follow", this falls right back into the ambiguous trap, totally useless especially to new editors.
• SlimVirgin removed mention of blocking on the basis that blocking wasn't actually all that possible for most guidelines. I'd contend that it's just as possible for guidelines as it is for policies, as long as people are found to be acting disruptively as a result of the violation. People can certainly be deemed disruptive by continually editing without regard for notability or the manual of style, both guidelines.
• Generally SlimVirgin's edits didn't take our discussion into account, which I'll assume was because she wasn't aware of it. Just because one person comes along and reverts doesn't negate the discussion, especially when they haven't participated themselves in said discussion. Equazcion (talk) 15:48, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)
• Oh, and SlimVirgin removed "Misplaced Pages does not have hard and fast rules", which her edit summary didn't cover. I can only assume she's of the "that's a dangerous thing to say" camp, but of course since she didn't explain, who knows. Regardless, it's the truth, and people should know it. Equazcion (talk) 15:54, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Please Change Incorrect Web Site To Locate My WLOL-FM Classical Music DJ Experiences

Dear Folks--I, Jim Stokes, was a classical music DJ at WLOL-FM, Minneapolis MN, for several years before they changed format in 1972. It was perhaps my favorite radio job. I had wanted to be a classical music announcer since childhood. So God does fulfill wishes. :)

And Misplaced Pages was kind enough to offer a web site address to view my 9,000 word article "What Does A Classical Music DJ Do Between Selections?" The British musicweb site does not own my copyright. I HOLD THE COPYRIGHT. However it is a joy to have such a prestigious internet service host it. They did a great job of laying out the copy.

Unfortunately, the wrong web site is listed in Misplaced Pages. However I CAN give you the correct web site. So please change accordingly. There are three options for you. For myself and others, I very much prefer the simpler access, which is to simply type into a browser, "Jim Stokes, WLOL-FM Classical Music DJ." Or you can type in the full name of the story and my name. See below.

"What Does A Classical DJ Do Between Selections? by Jim Stokes"

The other way is to laboriously type in the specific British web site, which has my story. See below.

That address is "www.musicweb-international.com/Jim Stokes"

And many thanks to Wikiepedia. If I can ever help you in any way, let me know via my email. It's "october@visi.com". I have a long history of working in radio and TV and would be most happy to share those adventures.

Cordially,

Jim Stokes —Preceding unsigned comment added by 209.98.172.3 (talk) 15:27, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

• I believe I've fixed it. For reference, I think we're talking about WLOL_(AM), the History section, where the external link text reads "in this commentary". The address that works is http://www.musicweb-international.com/classrev/2001/aug01/Stokes1.htm. Thanks for the correction, Jim. Let us know if you still see any problem. Equazcion (talk) 16:24, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

• The link was also in WLOL (defunct), which is actually what you were probably referring to. It's in the external links section, which I've also just fixed. Equazcion (talk) 16:35, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Blocking being paraded in leader

Well it seems Eqazcion has stuck blocking back into the leader again. What exactly is it about sticking blocking in that makes it look like we are more permissive? I wonder whetgher the previous entry ehere is because somebody has seen that we go around blocking people if they do anything wrong. Go ahead you're free to do as you like, make my day, ha ha bang. Can't you see that it violates be nice to newcomers and a whole lot else? Besides as many people have pointed out it just is not what this policy is about. This policy is about poliucies not wikipedia content pages. Helping people improve the content pages is the ultimate aim of the policies and guidelines but this conflates levels badly. Dmcq (talk) 16:06, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Why are we talking about Equazcion in the third person? Why not answer the comment above where he explicitly stated his reason for re-inserting it? It's things like this, I think, that have certain individuals thinking you to be abrasive, Dmcq. If you feel something's wrong, perhaps you'd like to suggest an improvement. I myself was considering inserting something about blocks only resulting from ignored warnings, but that seemed to be getting too specific for a leader. It seems like enough to just say that if someone is found to be acting disruptively they will be blocked, as I think that implies people won't be blocked on mere first sight of a violation. Equazcion (talk) 16:12, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I think it's good to mention blocking early on, because that's what a lot of people seem to associate policies and guidelines with, and we ought to make it clear. The point is that the word "disruptively" is key - you won't get blocked for innocently violating the letter of some policy or guideline you don't know about, so you don't need to worry about knowing all the rules before doing anything. (But then we don't want to go too far the other way and imply that you can just ignore policies with no fear of consequences.) So the wording can doubtless be improved, but we shouldn't just walk away from addressing this issue or try to bury it further down the page.--Kotniski (talk) 17:17, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I consider the edit to be against the spirit of the five pillars and ignore all rules, neither of which talk about blocking. If a person is going to eb disruptive they are not bgoing to stop just because that is written in a policy whereas good editors will be turned off. I will be reverting the change in line with that I believe it is harmful and as Equazcion has explained about reverting.. Dmcq (talk) 17:45, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

There are no emergencies, Dmcq, that should warrant your going against the consensus arrived at in this discussion in favor of "your concern" -- and an edit made by someone who drove by and didn't even participate here. Equazcion (talk) 17:53, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Ther is no consensus here for including that. Some people are for it, others are against. It should stay at the form before all this started until th dispute is resolved. And please look at WP:IAR. If any policy was going to stick in 'disruptively' and 'blocking' that would. It doesn't and for very good reason. There is no point to that paragraph. It is harmful. It is against consensus. The subject is incidental to this policy. Please desist. Dmcq (talk) 17:59, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

There's no more chance or reason for my "desisting" than there is of you doing the same, Dmcq. You're ignoring everything that's gone on on this page in favor of the status quo. Consensus can change, and has. If you'd like to continue discussion, that's fine, but you'll have to do just that. If there is a dispute as you claim, then there are no grounds for you to be protecting the right version. Equazcion (talk) 18:06, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Also, if you only dispute the blocking part, it would be best to just remove that part. As I said above, it's better to make a constructive edit that gets everyone closer to a compromise than to do straight reverts, as you keep doing. Equazcion (talk) 18:10, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I am happy with the text without the disruptive and blocking part. As to the rest how about practicing what you preach instead of repeatedly sticking in stuff for which there is no consensus? Dmcq (talk) 18:19, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

...in one individual's minority opinion? Yes, we still stick that stuff in on occasion. Feel free to actually answer my and Ktniski's arguments, though, on whether or not blocking and disruption should be mentioned in the lead, instead of continuing with the non-constructive repetition of how there's no consensus. Let's start building some. Equazcion (talk) 18:24, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Dank complained about it, SlimVirgin removed it, I removed it and now WhatamIdoing is complaining about it. Please do not again say you have consensus. I did address Kotniski's point. At least that was a sensible reason even if I don't think it overrides he opposition side. Somehow I seemed to have missed the place where you or Camelbinky have addressed any of my points and I have difficulty making sense of your reasons, perhaps you could provide diffs indicating them or copy and paste the main points so I am in no doubt? Dmcq (talk) 00:47, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

No need for any diffs etc, WhatamIdoing seems to be able to get through where I just seem to have received abuse. I don't know what it is about how I phrase things that has got some people here in a froth and defending the practical opposite of what they say they want. Dmcq (talk) 08:27, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Consensus

I take it we all agree that the blocking policy has consensus? And that consensus would include the fact that the blocking policy states "Blocks are used to prevent damage or disruption to Misplaced Pages". So I can't understand why it isn't a description of either policies or consensus to state something like "to further the goal of creating a reliable encyclopedia, editors may be technically prevented from editing in order to prevent damage or disruption." Hiding T 18:30, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

OK but somehow it has to relate to the subject of this page, if we're going to include it here. The main point I think it's important to make in the lead is that users don't need to read all the policies and guidelines before they do anything - you'll get blocked for being disruptive but NOT for innocently breaching some rule. (In fact I recall there used to be a sentence something like that in the lead - I never understood what it was doing there, but that was probably its intended purpose, except like most things written by a committee it ended up not saying anything clearly.)--Kotniski (talk) 18:38, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I like the previous version best: "If by disregarding these principles an editor is found to be acting disruptively, he or she risks being blocked or otherwise restricted from editing." If most of us have no problem with that, we can just restore it. Another option would be to mention blocking in relation to policy, but then to explicitly state that editors don't need to worry about innocent infractions. Equazcion (talk) 18:43, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I think Kotniski has a point though, I'll tweak accordingly. Hiding T 20:11, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

Kotniski was saying that the statement didn't connect the purpose of policy pages to the act of blocking. If you say blocking is to prevent damage and disruption without mentioning policy, the statement doesn't appear to belong. That's what I was trying to fix, by inserting mention of policy violation in relation to damage. Equazcion (talk) 20:18, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

There is no consensus for this change. Please read why this all flared up agaiun. Other edits came in complaining. Dmcq (talk) 18:49, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

The section on enforcement is the appropriate one for all this. Stuff that has the force of policy goes into the body of a policy. Dmcq (talk) 18:52, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I'll raise this problem again on the policy page. Dmcq (talk) 18:53, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

If you're going to raise the same concerns elsewhere, kindly limit your comments to neutrally-worded advertisements of this discussion in neutral locations, and direct people here via a link, rather than seeking a new venue to air your issues. Equazcion (talk) 19:01, 30 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I am perfectly aware of that policy. I wish the originator of this idea had conformed to it, he/she intimated that I was involved in forum shopping and trying to recruit people favourable to my point of view whilst putting messages on user pages of those that might support it him/herself. Did any of those contacted in that way complain about it I wonder? As to consensus it is not just me, another editor removed that wording starting up the current dispute. Dmcq (talk) 20:55, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

The current wording with knowingly and removing the blocking as such but referring to it improved matters somewhat. Unfortunately knowingly is not an observable. The blocking policy states things properly. However taking the 'knowingly' out makes the sentence revert practically completely to the old blocking statement in sound. This is a good illustration what is wrong with trying to paraphrase parts of one policy in another. I'll hold off raising the matter to see if the business can be improved to something reasonable. Dmcq (talk) 21:15, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I addressed that "concern" of yours the first time you slandered me with it Dmcq. I contacted Kim Brunning after she had already posted here! I would like to give you good faith that you perhaps had not read that post where I explained that, but given your actions here ever since I cant and will chalk it up to another attempt of attacking me instead of writing anything that supports your "ideas". BTW- I'm a he, but I do thank you for being sensitive about whether I am a male or female; I myself am not always as careful as I should be regarding that, since I grew up speaking Hebrew where the male term is generally used as the gender-neutral default (I believe Spanish does the same for mixed gender groups are termed male). As for the "other editor" that other editor failed to comment here in the discussion, still fails to do so, and may not have read our discussion, and if he/she had it was not the in best good faith to edit without speaking up and as Equazcion pointed out- against the consensus we had. He did a great job in addressing that issue in an earlier post. Perhaps you would like to reread it since you are still bringing up that editor.Camelbinky (talk) 21:24, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

If you wish to complain to an admministrator about what I said please go ahead. I was as happy not naming names. And other editors, not singular. And if it is relevant at all my first language was a chinese dialect and it is much more convenient about not having to specify gender. Dmcq (talk) 21:51, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I think it's odd that the editors who have carefully positioned themselves as being against any punitive intimations on this page are the ones that insist that the possibility of being blocked be (over)emphasized in the lead.

Camelbinky (and others), if you really want to reduce the likelihood of something thinking that this page is all about punishing editors, then why are you insisting on putting punishment in the lead? Why aren't you suggesting that all mention of punishment be entirely removed from this page? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:13, 30 October 2009 (UTC)

I cant speak for others, but I am not against there being a mention of what happens if you blatantly and purposefully go against Community consensus; whether it is "breaking" a policy, guideline, the spirit thereof either, or just going against consensus that has resolved an issue. Rarely have I ever seen anyone being blocked for violating a policy, even someone violating things mentioned here as examples such as the 3RR rule. When someone is blocked it is for NUMEROUS violations and for showing no regard of "I'm sorry" or any showing of remose or that they wouldnt do it again; no one gets blocked for violating their first policy. I myself actually did violate the 3RR in an edit war without even realizing it and I was relatively new, hadnt even heard of that rule; I did not get blocked, I got warned, not blocked; my reverts were to protect the article, so while I violated the letter of 3RR I did so in good faith and to keep out things that the consensus on the talk page had decided was harmful (but not vandalism, it was simply against what the 10-3 consensus on the talk page). So, to get to the point- this policy page as written at the time of my first post mentioned that you could get blocked for not obeying the spirit even if you dont violate the letter. I thought, that without mentioning you can (and I know you dont think you can, but I think you can and my posts are my opinions I can write what I want) violate the letter and it can be ok, per IAR. Since we are going to have in this policy the following- what policies and guidelines are, how to write them, how to propose them, how to maintain them (I dont quite understand that one though, since we dont "maintain" policies we encourage them to evolve and get rewritten, status quo is contrary to a wiki and Misplaced Pages's core values), we can also have room on how to enforce them, since at least last I checked it said (correctly) that every one has the responsibility of enforcing our policies. Since everyone has the responsibility of enforcing our policies then everyone should be aware of how to do so, and properly, and the consequences that can be done; IAR is important to know regarding how to or not to enforce policies as situations arise. Punishment is important, but harsh scary language is not needed; we are not proactive in deterring vandalism through scary language or actions (I myself have successfully been a party to stopping various proposals at the Village Pump (policy) and (proposal) that would have instituted draconian policies that would have curtailed IP's and newbies in order to "fight vandalism"). Which brings me to my next question- if "your group" is so interested in turning this page into a "how-to" on writing etc policies why no mention of the most important place that policies and guidelines are created, the Village Pump? Kinda why they were invented, it's their very purpose to exist; in my opinion they have supperseded any other route to policyship (a consensus on a guideline talk page that the guideline should be a policy is ridiculous because it's not the community at large, and would tend to be stacked by those already encouraging of what is written in the guideline).Camelbinky (talk) 01:31, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Village Pump (proposals) is both a remarkably unimportant source of policy proposals, and is mentioned twice on the page already. Proposals almost never originate at VPP; they originate elsewhere and are taken to VPP.

I believe you said that English isn't your native language? "To maintain" is is not just "to keep exactly like it is." If that were the goal, we could handle it with a quick WP:Requests for page protection. Instead, the relevant definition is "to keep in a defined state of repair, efficiency, or validity; to preserve from failure or decline". Preventing invalidity, failure, and decline of policy pages means regularly updating the page to accurately reflect the now-current advice. Maintenance = Changing. Encouraging maintenance of policy and guidelines pages = encouraging editing of policy and guidelines pages. It is not possible to keep policy and guidelines pages reasonably close to the actual consensus without changing them on occasion (that is, whenever the consensus has truly changed). WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:07, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I also want to say, as the person that originally wrote nearly everything on this page about procedures for new proposals and substantial changes to existing policies, that it's kind of odd that I am being accused of never wanting anyone to change policy and guidelines pages (while minimizing complaints from other editors). If it were true that I opposed changes to these pages, I wouldn't have wasted a week here last year in telling people just how to go about it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:09, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Whatami doing, further up you said the possibility of being blocked is being overemphasized in the lead. Could you propose wording for mention of blocking in the lead that would not be an overemphasis, or even an emphasis at all? Equazcion (talk) 02:44, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I would like to take time to thank you, What, for the definition of "to maintain", that was very helpful and I do appreciate the time you took to help me understand what you were talking about. While Hebrew was the first language I spoke, I havent used it conversationally since I was 7, I consider English to be my "native" language since that is what I use exclusively for conversation and thinking in my head (except for most dreams, I still dream in Hebrew most of the time). I do disagree with your opinion of the Village Pump, I see alot of interesting ideas pop up there all the time and very few are any that started on a policy page; it may very well be that those that interest me to even read just happen to be those that originate there and those that dont interest me are ones from policy pages brought over in which case what I look at would be biased and not a full sample. I still say that since the writing is important so is the enforcing, or the mentioning of when to or not to enforce. It seems this wanting to not mention enforcing at all is an end roun around any mention of IAR. It should and needs to be mentioned that policies are not hard and fast rules, as it currently states.Camelbinky (talk) 02:49, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Equazcion, I wouldn't mention blocking at all in the lead. IMO, any mention at all is overemphasis.

Camelbinky, I have no objection to mentioning IAR/"normally"/"should"/whatever other qualifiers are appropriate. Personally, I don't think that "you should normally follow these rules" is so important that it merits mentioning in the lead. I think that the existing {{policy}} tag is sufficient on that point. If other people feel strongly that it's necessary to emphasize the rule-following aspect, then I'll go along with that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:16, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I will be going with the consensus that policies arent hard and fast rules and I believe that it should and needs to be mentioned. It seems ridiculous to have this page not mention anything at all about how to enforce or not to enforce policies. Are you suggesting that we mention how to write them, maintain them, promote them, but no mentioning at all that they have to (or dont have to) be "obeyed"? It seems, to me, that you dont want language on how to enforce them. IF we agree to that, then I would say no language can be in there that even closely resembles what was there originally about "you can be blocked by violating the spirit even if you are within the letter of the policy" or anything else about how policies are to be enforced, nothing about "you must generally follow", nothing at all about having to listen to policies at all. That's a big if on whether or not I'll lend my support, and of course I cant talk for Equazcion; but if I support no enforcement language, I want it clear that there is to be NO language that suggests or hints or can be interpreted that policies are to be enforced, and no language that they are laws. If you want to remove some enforcement language, then I want it strictly enforced that there is no language about enforcement on this page.Camelbinky (talk) 03:42, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Please review the three critical words I've underlined (twice) above, and try again. I don't object to a well-written WP:POLICY#Enforcement section. Note that the "enforcement section" and the WP:LEAD are not the same thing. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:03, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I'd differ a little in detail from that description of a lead as applied to policies and guidelines. We can use a nutshell for a summary of the main points so we don't need much of that in the lead section, it can concentrate more on the purpose and scope. Overall the same information would be there but spread between the two. Dmcq (talk) 08:37, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Looking at the enforcement section I definitely think it could be improved. It was with the adherence section before which has the caveats. The blocking word looks fine to me in that section. Dmcq (talk) 09:12, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

What's the point of omitting all mention of blocking from the lead?

← In a practical sense, having blocking in the lead is useful, in a page that's supposed to describe policies. When you tell someone who's new to a community that there are rules, the first question on their minds is "so what happens if i break them?" Consequences are part of the definition of pages called policies, in any community or system, because otherwise there are no grounds for using the word "policy". I'm not sure what the agenda is in keeping this out of the lead; the mere concern of it getting "too long" seems rather unlikely. It's pretty short at the moment compared to some other policies.

What are the most important points about policies? They're not hard and fast rules, but you could still get blocked for violating them excessively. This is an honest and concise definition, and again I honestly don't see what anyone hopes to gain by omitting some part of that from the lead. Equazcion (talk) 10:59, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I tend to agree with Equazcion here. I haven't analysed all the foregoing discussion in detail, but I've no idea why this minor matter should have flared up into personal antagonism. Perhaps we can just leave the lead as it is for now, while tempers abate? (I would still like to add a sentence telling new editors explicitly that they don't need to worry about reading all the policies and guidelines.)--Kotniski (talk) 11:24, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

The reasons I have given are:

1. This policy is mainly about describing how to set up and maintain useful policies and guidelines. Blocking is just one policy amongst many.
2. People who are going to disrupt the place aren't going to take much of it in the leader and people who aren't going to disrupt don't need to be told it up front. I see it as offputting and unnecessary for new editors.
3. WP:IAR and WP:5P don't go on about blocking and if any place would have it up front to warn people it would be those
4. Blocking is mentioned in this policy only as additional information about policies. It defers to the blocking policy by referring to it.
5. There's other information about policies and guidelines which would be far more useful in the leader. The difference between a policy and a guideline for instance is directly relevant to this policy. Some people think the distinction is irrelevant but if so they should discuss that first and get consensus about changing the body first.
6. Newbies coming here would be much better being directed at a good page about the five pillars or a page about starting editing. Extra irrelevant clutter makes it hard to put in useful stuff.
7. This policy itself says the leader should give the aims and scope and that there should be no unnecessary repetition or paraphrasing of policy. Instead of trying to fix that if broken IAR was invoked to insert about blocking in the leader.
8. The paragraph in my view misstates the WP:blocking policy by its emphasis on removing editors rather than reforming them to improve the encycloipaedia.
9. We should WP:Avoid instruction creep

and you've had a number of other people complaining about it, they probably have additional reasons of their own. There is no consensus for inserting this in the leader. If it is minor in your view then you stuck it in - you remove it. I am very happy about a general statement like you say - a direct to the five pillars for that would do that well I think and tell them a lot more besides. Dmcq (talk) 11:52, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

What clutter? It's a sentence. I'm still not seeing the point in leaving it out. You seem so adamant about it, so I'm trying to get at the reason. If this page is about policy, don't you think we should be providing some rationale up-front about why the pages are being called policies? Because again, consequences are a fundamental part of that. Without consequence there's really no policy. You've mentioned some technical things here that could serve as backup for your position, but I don't understand the position itself. You seem to want to this page to come off a certain way, or perhaps avoid coming off a certain way, and I'd like some clarity on that. It would help us get somewhere in this discussion. Equazcion (talk) 12:00, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

You haven't dealt with any of the points above. Four editors have specifically opposed that paragraph about blocking being in the leader. There is no consensus for this change. Why are you so adamant about including it? Why not try including something about blocking on the ignore all rules page instead? That would be a much more relevant place. I'd oppose it there too but not so vehemently. Here in a place which newbie editors might get to almost immediately I believe it is against the spirit of wikipedia and harmful of the goal of creating a free, reliable encyclopedia. Dmcq (talk) 12:14, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

"Here in a place which newbie editors might get to almost immediately I believe it is against the spirit of wikipedia and harmful of the goal of creating a free, reliable encyclopedia." --- Could you elaborate on the specifics of that? I think that it's that general motivation we should move to discussing. We've each got our supporters and we've each got a technical case, which in themselves could be argued til the end of time. What exactly about mentioning blocking is harmful to creating a free, reliable encyclopedia? Equazcion (talk) 12:31, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

You have no technical case. You have no consensus for including it. Blocking is not in the remit of this policy. General discussion about the spirit should be in a general forum like Village pump. The various points for removing it have not been dealt with. This policy should be fixed to remove content without consensus before going on to discussions like that. I shall therefore remove the sentence about blocking again. Dmcq (talk) 12:43, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not suggesting discussing it just for the hell of it. You already touched on it here, but you haven't given specifics, regarding how the statement would impugn on Misplaced Pages's general spirit. That is pretty relevant to this discussion. I don't see how removing the statement just so someone else can put it back in, and repeating this sequence of events every day just because 1RR technically allows it, helps anyone. Equazcion (talk) 12:49, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

There is no equality between including or excluding content that is disputed in a policy. Only content with a consensus in favour should be included. Old content that is disputed should be kept while discussing to get a consensus but a 1RR business keeping inserting that could be counted as disruptive. Do you wish to go to mediation or to arbitration? Dmcq (talk) 12:56, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

There is a guideline which says what I'm saying better than me Misplaced Pages:Please do not bite the newcomers. Dmcq (talk) 13:15, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

You're in a dispute, fella. There's no defense for which version is correct at the moment unless there's consensus for one over the other. If there's no consensus, there's no currently correct version. The older version isn't the default. Blocking is unfortunate but it happens. "Not biting" doesn't mean "pretending unpleasent things don't exist." And if you feel the need to bring in mediation or arbitration, by all means go for it. Equazcion (talk) 13:46, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I can't agree either with the argument just given that because something appears in an infobox then all mention of it should be removed from the lead. Infoboxes don't explain anything - readers need logically connected facts. I don't understand why people are so anxious to hide certain ideas on this page. Aren't we at Misplaced Pages to tell people things?--Kotniski (talk) 13:59, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Because this entire debate (and mentioning it in the lede) is extranious to the point of this page, which is to explain what Policies and guidelines are, how to write them, and the process by which they get approved. Yes, Infoboxes don't explain... but they do link to where things are explained. Blueboar (talk) 14:06, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

All right, so they don't make it clear to anyone why they might want to click on any of the links, particularly in the context of what they're reading on the page. The scope of this page doesn't have to be strictly limited to the things you mention - remember that different readers come here for different purposes (many presumably through clicking on the "policy" link they see at the top of other policy pages, wondering just how worried they ought to be about these things called policies that they've just discovered Misplaced Pages has). Really this page ought to be written with newcomers upmost in our minds - I suppose it doesn't even have to be a policy page itself.--Kotniski (talk) 14:14, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Edit conflict with Kotniski, but agreeing with what shes just said -- The point, as far as IAR at least, isn't just to provide a link, but to explain something fundamental about policy, especially to newbies. The fact that policies aren't hard-and-fast rules is a rather important caveat on Misplaced Pages, I think, since the word "policy" has certain opposing connotations otherwise. Equazcion (talk) 14:16, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

"Policies have wide acceptance among editors". Things shouldn't be put into policies that don't have consensus. You don't have consensus for sticking blocking into the leader. Dmcq (talk) 14:20, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I think you misunderstand - it's the practices described in policies that have wide acceptance, not the presentational details of policy pages, which is all we're discussing here. (Consensus is still to be sought on those matters as well, of course.)--Kotniski (talk) 14:26, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

During a dispute, people often try to find ways to defend keeping their version alive while the dispute is ongoing. Consensus isn't just needed for adding things but for removing them too. That's why pages are protected during a dispute where people are continually reverting each other -- the current version doesn't matter until the dispute is resolved. Perhaps page protection would be appropriate for this page now. Equazcion (talk) 14:40, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Equazcion asked me to take part here, though it's not clear why, as the discussion has been going in circles for months. Four points that I care about: (1) that this page describe was does happen, not what editors wish would happen; (2) that the writing be decent and tight; (3) that it make clear there is a difference between policies and guidelines, a distinction a couple of editors a few months ago tried to erase, and (4) that it say nothing to encourage policies being destabilized by BOLD editing. SlimVirgin 14:41, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

As for the blocking issue, I don't think it should be in the lead, because editors are only blocked for violations of certain behavioral policies, and BLP. Blocks for violations of other policies are rare, and I don't think people are ever blocked for violating a guideline. SlimVirgin 14:43, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Latest edit: editors aren't expected to stick to guidelines the way they're expected to stick to policies, and the "needn't worry" thing is inappropriate on a policy page. We need to keep the writing tight and professional, and not internally inconsistent. SlimVirgin 14:47, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

We need to tell people clearly what they might want to know. Did you read the arguments above before coming along and just restoring your own preferred version? This really isn't the sort of behaviour we ought to be exemplifying on policy pages. --Kotniski (talk) 14:53, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for answering my request, SlimVirgin. The reason the policy/guideline distinction was removed was because it seemed awfully abstract, and although it may document a technical distinction, it wouldn't be helpful to anyone who didn't already understand the distinction previously. I'm personally not against stating a distinction, I'm just not sure any would be possible with the brevity required for a lead section. Equazcion (talk) 14:55, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Not abstract at all. Very simple. You're meant to stick to policies. Guidelines are offered for advice. SlimVirgin 14:58, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

If someone creates a non-notable article, it'll probably get deleted, and if someone edits in opposition of the MOS they'll be reverted. Do those things repeatedly after being informed, and you could even get blocked. It's the same with policies. I'm not saying there is no distinction, but it's a complex distinction that I don't think is easy to describe in a single sentence. Equazcion (talk) 15:00, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

If you create an article that seems to violate the notability guideline, it may or may not be kept at AfD. If you edit in opposition to the MoS, you shoudn't be reverted, and your article could end up as an FA, which does not insist on MoS compliance in all things. And no one would ever block you for either. If I'm wrong about the latter, please provide an example, because in four years of being an admin, I've never seen it. SlimVirgin 15:10, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay, if we assume people only get blocked due to policy and not guidelines, then would be okay with mentioning that as the distinction between the two (in gentler words of course)? Equazcion (talk) 15:14, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Last time I looked, WP:BLOCK said that you could get blocked for breaching policies or guidelines (there was qualification, of course, but it was definitely both). That certainly isn't the distinction between the two, anyway. (When was anyone last blocked for naming an article in contravention of our naming conventions policy?)--Kotniski (talk) 15:25, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Probably never, if they only did it once. If they kept doing it despite warnings, that's still be a disruption, no? I wouldn't know how to begin researching for past instances of that, but things like that seem to fall under the general category of "blocked for disruption". A lot of little things done repeatedly despite warnings can end that way. Equazcion (talk) 15:54, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

So, what they're actually getting blocked for is the disruption, not for the policy breach. If they went round removing categories from pages (a breach of the WP:CAT guideline) and carried on despite warnings they'd be treated the exact same way.--Kotniski (talk) 18:05, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I think you'll find it's a bit more complicated than that. WP:TE is "just" an essay. WP:DE is "just" a guideline. They are fairly often cited as justifications for blocks -- and DE blocks are widely accepted. Conversely, I doubt that anyone has ever been blocked for violating this page, even though it's a "policy". So I don't think that we want to say that policy violations produce blocks, but guidelines probably won't: it's just not that simple. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:06, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Edits that imply a change

Not clear what this means: "edits that would imply a change to accepted practice ..." How does an edit imply a change, as opposed to make it, describe, or document it? SlimVirgin 14:49, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I don't think "imply" was chosen deliberately over other words. Your suggested alternatives would probably be just as acceptable to whoever inserted that statement (I think it was Kotniski). Equazcion (talk) 14:52, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Yes; I just didn't like the implication that edits to policy pages actually cause changes in accepted practice. --Kotniski (talk) 14:54, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Changes that imply the consensus has changed? Dmcq (talk) 14:56, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

(ec) The edit, if it stuck, would change the policy, as people read it and adhered to it. The distinction you want to make is a valid one, but it will confuse the reader to insert an unclear word in the lead. Better to say "edits that would change accepted practice (where "if accepted" is understood). SlimVirgin 14:57, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

That sounds fine to me. Nothing different was meant to be implied by "imply" :) Equazcion (talk) 15:02, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Kotniski is reverting the edits I make, so I'm going to stop for a bit. My aim with the lead is simply twofold: (1) to make clear there is a difference between policies and guidelines, which no one should be removing because it's a fact, and (2) to remove any extraneous or confusing wording so that the writing is tight and clear. SlimVirgin 15:08, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm also going to stop for a bit, though my position is that these two aims are prima facie incompatible, since the idea that there's a fundamental difference between policies and guidelines is (in my opinion) itself extraneous and confusing - see the next thread.--Kotniski (talk) 15:21, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

More reverts

Kotniski, you're removing long-standing words that are elsewhere in the policy. "Policies describe standards that all users should normally follow, while guidelines are advisory."

"X is more advisory than Y" is just confusing writing. SlimVirgin 15:01, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Anything that says "policy is X while guidelines are Y" is confusing. They are virtually the same thing; if there's a difference between them, then it's one of degree, not of kind. They both describe standards all users should normally follow; they are both advisory.--Kotniski (talk) 15:06, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

You are just saying they're the same thing but they are not. Editors are expected to follow the policies with no realistic exceptions. They are not invariably expected to follow the guidelines; there are lots of occasions where guidelines are ignored. That is just a fact. SlimVirgin 15:12, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Oh, I don't think so, up to a point perhaps, but there's no particular boundary. All sorts of stuff finds its way onto policy pages, while some quite fundamental things are on guideline pages. Everyone's expected to follow all of them except when there's a good reason not to; it's probably statistically true that there's a good reason not to more often in the case of guidelines, but nothing more than that.--Kotniski (talk) 15:18, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

If the practice is that there is little difference then the discussion should be about the body of the policy - not changing the lead without changing what's accepted in the body first. The lead should not describe new consensus before it is accepted in the body - there's no good reason for that. Dmcq (talk) 15:22, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

But it doesn't have to be in the lead at all - since there are people doing everything in their power to remove all useful information from the lead, surely the dubious and unhelpful information should go as well?--Kotniski (talk) 15:29, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

What you wrote there seems quite reasonable to me and implies the boundary isn't quite so hard. Dmcq (talk) 15:37, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

That has been in the policy for a long time, and there is no consensus to remove it. SlimVirgin 15:41, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm for removing it. The practical difference between policies and guidelines is too confusing to sum up in the lead. As far as newbies are concerned, they basically need to regard both the same way -- adhere in general, ignore when there's good reason. As far as generally summing up how to regard policies and guidelines to a newbie, I don't see a need to state any difference. It might not be technically correct to refer to them the same way, but it's most useful and easy for inexperienced users that way. And I don't care if there was consensus or how long it's been here, frankly. Change happens and I'd like to discuss that possibility. Equazcion (talk) 17:43, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Are we talking about changes to the lead specifically? If so, then SlimVirgin may want to review the lead from earlier in October, e.g., : The broad distinction wasn't mentioned there at all.

As for a broad distinction existing, and being documented elsewhere on this page (and on other pages), then yes: it's been there for a long time, and it does have community support. For example, the distinction is fairly often invoked in disputes involving multiple pages, e.g., the policy WP:BLP trumps the guideline WP:EL. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:16, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Scope

I'm pretty happy with what's in the lead at the moment except I don't think it describes the scope of this policy. Having different ideas about the scope has been a major part of the difficulty I believe. The following paragraph described the scope as far as I was concerned but was removed as just repeating the contents list - which by my reckoning means it must be pretty close to being a scope statement.

"This policy page specifies the community standards related to the composition, structure, organization, life cycle, and maintenance of policies & guidelines and related pages."

Has anyone a better idea for a scope statement or do people really think the lead is better of leaving the scope out? Dmcq (talk) 15:53, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I think it is better off without it (though I don't mind it being there as long as that isn't used as an excuse for taking other things out because the lead is then too long).--Kotniski (talk) 18:00, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I think that the above sentence is an accurate summary of the practical information provided on this page, and thus should be retained. Perceived verbosity does not form any part of my arguments against inclusion of relatively unimportant information in the lead, so Kotniski can be reassured that the existence of this sentence will, so far as I am concerned, have no bearing on any other sentence's merits. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:19, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Instruct users?

I'm not too keen on the 'instruct users' bit in the leader instead of describe. Mirriam-Webster says of instruct:

1. to give knowledge to : teach, train
2. to provide with authoritative information or advice (the judge instructed the jury)
3. to give an order or command to : direct

whereas describe is:

1. to represent or give an account of in words (describe a picture)
2. to represent by a figure, model, or picture : delineate
3. obsolete  : distribute
4. to trace or traverse the outline of (describe a circle)
5. archaic  : observe, perceive

instruct has definite nannyish connotations to me which I think is out of place here. Does it strike others the same or is it just me? Dmcq (talk) 17:39, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Pick a word other than "describe" then, though, because "describe" applies to both guidelines and policies. They both describe stuff; the point is to distinguish what one does from what the other does. I don't think there are any words that would make this technically accurate in one sentence, but "instruct" is as close as I could get. Policies do instruct people on how to behave, interact, and edit, so I don't have a particular problem if it sounds somewhat restrictive. Policy is somewhat restrictive. Equazcion (talk) 17:46, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Again, I don't think there's any qualitative difference between policies and guidelines that requires the use of different verbs. Since they both describe, I'd let that verb do for both. (Or use a different verb, like "inform", but mainly for stylistic variation.)--Kotniski (talk) 18:02, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Fundamentally, I think that the distinction between the (four: policy, guideline, essay, and procedure/help/how-to) categories of pages is really too complex to be glossed in the lead (especially in a sentence that only mentions two of them). I'd solve the word-choice problem by removing the sentence and thus eliminating any possibility of confusing readers. At best, the inclusion of this information in the lead provides nothing that isn't repeated -- and more accurately expressed -- elsewhere. It is therefore unnecessary at best, and misleading at worst. We don't need it: let's remove it from the lead (and do the thing properly in the body). WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:26, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Agreed on removing the distinction. I'd keep a short explanation of what policies/guidelines are though, as a group. Like "While not employing hard-and-fast rules, Misplaced Pages's policies and guidelines describe its principles and best-known practices." Something like that. Equazcion (talk) 18:32, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

Seems fine to me Dmcq (talk) 18:45, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you Equazcion for defending the one sentence I've been fighting for. I dont know why I got so much flak from the other side for defending that sentence in the lead but it "seems fine" to others when you defend it...like I said before there is personal animosity for some reason against me. the hard and fast rules part used to be linked, and I thought it had been to IAR, so I restored that link, but then I noticed that in your statement above you linked it to NOTSTATUTE. I believe your link to notstatute is more correct, I'll wait for your response before changing it from IAR to not statute.Camelbinky (talk) 20:18, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

When restoring the sentence about "hard-and-fast-rules", I linked to NOTSTATUTE instead of IAR in the hopes that it would be a good compromise, since some people seemed to take issue with having IAR in the lead section. In one of my later edits I accidentally removed the link, still not sure how I managed to do that, but anyway -- I don't mind IAR being there myself, but NOTSTATUTE might be less likely to get the whole sentence removed by someone. Equazcion (talk) 22:09, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

If you mean me what it links to is not something I'm particularly interested in. Dmcq (talk) 22:23, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I find it funny that they in the past have stated their opposition to linking to IAR in the lead(the number one most important policy, one that Jimbo himself has defended and restored after someone messed with it and HIS edit summary included "IAR has always been") but yet NOTSTATUTE is one section of a page that EXPLAINS a policy. Equazcion, I think this entire this is all about some people cant accept that Misplaced Pages has no strict structure and are philosophically opposed to "disorder" "chaos" or "anarchy" that they believe would happen if it was made clear that policies dont have to be obeyed as laws. I am quite convinced that Misplaced Pages is the closest thing to a true communist ideology; ie- it has no government, no laws, people are expected to "police" themselves and each other equally, there is no hierachy or class structure, and "to each according to their needs, from each according to their ability" we give admin "powers" and other "tools" to those that need them for what they like to do and those with abilities of better management of technical aspects whom have shown they have the right abilities for such responsibility (and I know some think the opposite but admins arent our police, judges, superiors, or in any way, shape, or form better or "higher" than a regular editor, we arent Compendium which has seperate classes). Editors with a more conservative world-view often bring that "law and order" belief into Misplaced Pages with a built-in disgust for a liberal view that IAR gives and try to impose structure on us, they also have a built-in disregard for recognizing the "penumbra" of our policies and want to stick to the letter of the "rules". We all cant help this of course, I bring in my own political biases into Misplaced Pages as everyone else does. However I do encourage the conservatives out there to realize that Misplaced Pages is in fact biased structurally towards a liberal interpretation of its own "rules", that's inherent to a wiki, especially one heavily contributed to by Americans (and yes, those who identify with the Democratic Party are the majority in the US, have been for a long time the only reason they lose presidential elections is that Republicans are more loyal to their party and turn are more likely to turn out on election day.) That's my diatribe on politics and Misplaced Pages.Camelbinky (talk) 22:29, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Could you please stop sticking all this noise into the page. Dmcq (talk) 22:49, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

One man's noise is another man's good point. I'm not sure if you actually read through Camelbinky's long posts, but you should. They're often pretty insightful. Equazcion (talk) 23:00, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I fail to see any connection between American presidential elections and this policy. Less Koans please. make it simple for this poor benighted person who can't work his way through all the allusions to the nugget of insight contained within. Dmcq (talk) 23:15, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

That made no sense. At least my posts make sense and are grammatically correct.Camelbinky (talk) 23:47, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Another break, for fun

Welcome to the 25th break in this conversation. I propose, since neither side can come to agreement, and arguing with small-minded people is getting annoying, that we do the following. WhatamIdoing, as the person on the other side that I have the most respect for since he has actually had ideas and opinions goes and takes whoever agrees with him and writes in a sandbox their version of what this policy should look like. Equazcion and Kotniski and if she's still watching Kim, and anyone else who agrees with this side, writes in another sandbox our version of what this policy should look like. After both sides are done, we come back and see just what is different and what needs to be changed to have one compromise version.Camelbinky (talk) 23:47, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I actually thought we had come to something of a compromise. The only thing I'm still unhappy about is no mention of adherence in the lead section. Does anyone have any other pressing issue with the page as stands now? Equazcion (talk) 23:56, 31 Oct 2009 (UTC)

I have no problems with the page as it is. The 'Life cycle' section looks like it could do with some tidying but nothing substantial. By the way WhatamIdoing says on her user page "This user is a female contributor". Equazicon stuck adherence into the last paragraph of the leader but I can live with that. If I read this right is Camelbinky trying to push blocking into the leader again despite clear opposition by SlimVirgin, me, WhatamIdoing and Dank? This business has gone on for quite long enough and it is clear there is no consensus here for such an inclusion. If you wish to raise it in a wider forum like Village pump (policy) then go ahead but just going on and on here is a time waster. Dmcq (talk) 00:47, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I should've said that I'd like mention of adherence other than the mere word being present in the last line. You could be hearing right: Camelbinky may want to include consequence, despite there being people who disagree with including it. There's no consensus for either version, so we may be at an impass, and further input may need to be sought. Equazcion (talk) 00:56, 1 Nov 2009 (UTC)

A bit of reality, thanks. And impasse does not mean you can stick it in and do 1RRs every day like you wrote about doing before. A policy should not include bits that have no consensus. Dmcq (talk) 01:13, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

I haven't stuck it in, and I haven't done any reverts. I'm responding to Camelbinky's drafting proposal. A bit of AGF, thanks. Reality can be elusive when you're busy hitting the undo button. As I said, it's easy to come up with reasons why the other guy shouldn't be reverting while you have every reason to. When I wrote about it, I was talking about everyone. It takes two sides to revert war. That's why we have page protection, and it's why we don't care which revision is on the page in the meantime. Until the dispute is settled, there's no correct version. Include, exclude, it's all the same. There is no default. Equazcion (talk) 01:29, 1 Nov 2009 (UTC)

OH MY GOD! Dmcq, really you need to stop! You said, and I quote- "If I read this right is Camelbinky trying to push blocking into the leader again" where do you get even the slightest hint from my post starting this latest break that I want to try pushing blocking back in the leader? I never said anything about blocking, or the lead. Another instance of you putting words in my mouth. Every single one of your posts have seriously been ill-informed and completely off-base about what is going on. Do you read other people's posts, because you have shown many times that you dont read mine. All I ever see from your posts are the same things and the occasional dittoing of another persons posts during which you show that you dont even understand what the person just said. I think you are over-your-head in this discussion and it really doesnt matter what you say anymore.Camelbinky (talk) 01:52, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Policy in footnotes

The last three footnotes look like they should be part of the main policy document. They say things like 'should' and give procedures to follow. I'll have a look at promoting them to the main text if nobody has objections. Dmcq (talk) 18:55, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Okay I've promoted those bits. I think there is a bit of fat in them just waiting to be trimmed. On the other hand it doesn't say about putting them in the right category at the end and updating lists. Dmcq (talk) 20:03, 31 October 2009 (UTC)