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Arbcom slates?

Honestly, for these ArbCom elections, I kind of wish we had slates. I have trouble keeping track of who's who here. I just don't have a memory for names. Beyond that, how do I know if they're any good or not? I can't keep track of all these people's work and have limited interest in doing so. I have enough trouble keeping track of my own work.

Same deal in real life, which is why we have slates and parties in real life. I have little knowledge of down-ticket candidates, but I figure whoever my party puts up is OK, absent evidence of corruption, incompetence, or revisionism coming to my attention. There's nothing wrong with this -- I'm busy, let my party's selection committee (whom I trust) do the detailed vetting work.

There's a couple-few editors who I know and trust and if they said "I'm voting for X Y and Z" that would constitute a de facto slate and be good enough for me, maybe. One such editor is you, Jimbo. Beyond being the founder of the project (and the ArbCom), you obviously care about the project and probably know who all these people are. And I happen to generally agree with you about a lot of things, and so do a lot of other people I suppose. So how about it? If you create the Jimbo Slate -- all you'd need to do is say who you're voting for -- I'd likely get on board. Not mindlessly, but as a basis for approaching the election.

Or some candidates could run together. X, Y, and Z could announce that they're running as a slate and implore editors to vote for them all as a bloc (obviously editors could vote for none of them as a bloc or split their ticket, or course). No new policies or procedures would have to be put in place -- it's a wiki, candidates can run as a slate if they want to, right now. (I suppose the next step would be parties -- the Strong ArbCom Party, the Traditionalists, etc.)

Madison didn't want parties, but we have them. They're a natural development in electoral systems, and there's a lot to be said for them. Let's do it. Herostratus (talk) 04:27, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

I think something like this may emerge spontaneously, although it hasn't yet. One model is that candidates get together and form a bloc. Another is that some people with particular interests (BLP hardliners, let's say) decide to research the candidates and to vote as a bloc.

Given my unique position, and where I want to go with it in the long term, which is increasingly ceremonial over the years, I don't vote in elections nor am I likely to get involved in routine elections by endorsing candidates or anything like that.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 17:28, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Every year, there are a number of editors who put up "voting guides" that look a great deal like what you are discussing. They are either "in the loop", or close to it, and either know the candidates fairly well or do a non-trivial amount of research on them before the election. Even if you don't agree with their selection, they tend to summarize the candidates in an informative manner. — Coren  17:47, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

I really like the idea, not just for Jimbo, but for, say, Fastily and Courcelles, to name a few. — Kudu  21:21, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Coren, if you read the voting guides last year, and especially if you then went on to read the talk pages of some of the guide-writers as well as the talk pages of some of the people who posted on those talk pages, you would reach two conclusions, (1) I definitely had too much time on my hands one weekend afternoon when I most likely should have been doing something else, and (2) there was definitely some "bloc" behavior going on. This was also confirmed by some of the post-election comments. I'm sure it's all there in the archives somewhere, if you (Herostratus) want to try to figure out who the bloc(s) is/are, as I did last year (at least partially.) Or you can just wait for this year's election and see who's saying what about who. On the other hand, Herostratus, I am a little disappointed. When I read (on the RfC talk page) about your intention to ask Jimbo to endorse candidates, I was hoping to get here before he answered, so I could bet you $100 that Jimbo was going to courteously decline any "endorser" role in the elections. I was going to donate my winnings to the WMF. It looks like I was too late to win the bet though. Neutron (talk) 22:03, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Well, that's true. I suppose it doesn't matter. I think we all know which party Her Majesty, in her heart of hearts, prefers, and it doesn't help much usually. Herostratus (talk) 01:52, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Schools

Why does your encyclopedia want to have pages on schools that are just wrong like http://en.wikipedia.org/Kesgrave_Hall_School was ? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wlmmcf (talk • contribs) 21:09, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

If by "what," you mean "want," it has yet to be determined what "Jimbo's encyclopedia" "wants" in this case. You started an AfD on this article less than 24 hours ago. Right now the "vote" seems to be 2-2. Sometime in about 6 days, when more editors have weighed in and an administrator closes the AfD, then we will all know what Misplaced Pages "wants." (Which, if the article is kept, may not be what Jimbo "wants" based on his recent school-related comments, but time will tell on that as well.) Neutron (talk) 23:31, 19 September 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for the typo it was late and did not check it corrected now. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wlmmcf (talk • contribs) 08:10, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

If you can look in the history and point out a version that you think was particularly wrong, that'd be helpful. One topic that people are interested in is how maintainable articles on schools are, and how badly wrong they are, and for how long. Some people (though not many) may have an inherent bias in one way or the other that schools should almost *all* have an article or that almost *no* schools should have one. But for most people, the question of where to draw the line is based on evidence of quality (or lack of quality) on average, and examples are helpful in shaping our understanding of that.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 12:59, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for taking the time to reply, the version was http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Kesgrave_Hall_School&oldid=450147754 Wlmmcf Wlmmcf (talk) 21:07, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Article creation advises to make Special:Mypage first

When creating a new article, I am finally seeing a message to suggest making the page a user-space version, first. The creation banner now suggests:

You can also start your new article at Special:Mypage/xxxxx. There, you can develop the article with less risk of deletion; ask other editors to help work on it; and move it into "article space" when it is ready.

I think that is great for new users who "hear" of articles being deleted, so the above message might sway more articles into becoming user-space drafts. Users are guided into making their own draft pages. Also, the workload must be frustrating for many admins to keep speedy-deleting the non-notable draft articles (hundreds per day?). It will be interesting to see if this affects the current enwiki count of new-articles-per-day, as ~930 per day. -Wikid77 (talk) 05:49, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Oh no. This makes it even more necessary to have pages moved from user space to mainspace in the "new pages" log. New page patrolling is useless without these. Please get some programming time off from the edit content filter and on to this long requested feature. Fram (talk) 06:32, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Self identified 13 year old joins WP:WikiProject_Pornography

Hi Jimbo. Long time reader - first time commenter. There is a discussion on WP:ANI about an editor who has self identified on his userpage that he is 13 years old and that he participates in WP:WikiProject_Pornography. Other editors have noticed that he hasn't actually made any contributions yet to the Porn wikiproject. However, there is concern that a 13 year old shouldn't be contributing to an area of Misplaced Pages that is dedicated to porn. Some have presented arguments that because the topic is educational and not sexually explicit that it should be allowed while others have said that although it is educational there is still some sexually explicit content or pictures. Some have said that we wouldn't have known the user is 13 and there are many 13 year olds reading the material so it shouldn't be a problem, while others have said that because we know he is 13 and we know he is interested and focused in the Porn Wikiproject that we are now knowingly contributing sexually explicit content to a minor in violation of US law. What are you takes on the issue? Is this somewhere the foundation should step in and give a legal opinion?--v/r - TP 16:04, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

This isn't just about WikiProject Porn. The true question here is if minors should be disallowed from editing porn-related articles on an educational website? (I think Dr. Blofeld misunderstands the point. Implementing a restriction at the WikiProject won't actually do anything.) Swarm 17:47, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Anything with Porn and 13 year old next to each other should send alarm bells to anybody. Even if his editing is harmless it could ignite into a nasty media report that wikipedia supports a 13 year old editing pornography articles, and do you realise how many parents would ban wikipedia from their kids if they read that in a newspaper? They would be missing out on learning from thousands of articles because of it which is contrary to our goals. Jimbo very likely would be purely against it for media/legal safety sake even if he thinks the editor's contributions are not involving explicit material as it is a risk we can't afford to take but I will be interested to see what he has to say. Obviously we don't know the age of most of our contributors but should somebody disclose they are 13 then in my view they should be prohibited from editing pornography articles or taking part in that wikiproject but are fully welcome to edit anything else. Perhaps this is time to impose an age minimum for that project as its rocky ground.♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:55, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Although Misplaced Pages is not censored I do agree that it is reasonable at the least to put a banner at the top of that project page with some sort of disclaimer that editors should be over X years old to edit. The tricky thing here is, depending on where they are that age differs. Some states are less than others and some countries don't care at all. --Kumioko (talk) 18:00, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Would an 18+ restriction to WikiProject Porn be enough, or would we have to accept it as a general rule covering all porn articles? Or should we handle it on a case by case basis for individual minors? Swarm 18:03, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I believe we should keep in mind that there are at least two separate issues here. The first is what our policies should be, and we have a right to set those policies. The second is whether we are doing anything "illegal", either by policy or the absence of policy, and that is a broader question as it involves not just editing articles about porn but opens up a legal can of worms on age limits and Misplaced Pages more generally.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:18, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

There's another related issue unmentioned above. If we merely slap a tag or warning on such pages, there's every reason to suspect that a 13 year-old user won't want to so self-identify. BusterD (talk) 18:27, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Well I don't beleive we are doing anything "illegal" because even in the porn project there is very little explicit content. Lots of movie titles and Biographies but not much media. I do think that the public image could be a factor though and could be presented in a negative light by the media. I think if we start by adding a disclaimer to the project and to the Projects template that is posted on the articles thats a good start. We "could" also create a page disclaimer that could be presented at the top of some articles (like the ones in the porn project) so that it would notify anyone looking at the article that there is content that might be offensive or unsuitable. Maybe something like the Maintenance banner but maybe in a different color. Now I'm not talking censoring anything, just a message notifying the reader of their obligation to look away. --Kumioko (talk) 18:29, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Which brings up the thorny issue of enforcement.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:30, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I believe the essential issue is priority. Is it more important for us to protect 13 year-old eyes from editing and/or viewing content, or is it more important a user feels free to self-identify and/or act on self-interest? IMHO, a youngster might not consider the consequences of any self-identification. Another issue to be ranked would include public perception of how we address such priorities through policy and common practice, as described above. This isn't about this issue at all, but about our responsiveness. BusterD (talk) 18:39, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Buster, I agree with you and Kumioko that public perception is an issue, but even that will be difficult to resolve. At the same time, the legal issues are complex, and because it has been raised publicly here and at ANI, I think Wikimedia lawyers should at least be alerted to it.--Bbb23 (talk) 18:54, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

• On Wikipdia (or elsewhere) 13-year-olds should not be permitted to edit anything connected with porn. For their own good and the good of the project. Children are children and adults are adults, and while most 13/14-year-old boys disagree, especially about porn: adults are bigger, older and know what's best - so tough - little 13-year old will have to get his kicks playing outside in the fresh air. Giacomo Returned 18:47, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I can't disagree with your position, but none of the issues discussed above provide a method of addressing your proper concern... BusterD (talk) 18:50, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Well frankly I am more worried about WP's reputation than protecting the 13 year old eyes of an editor who clearly has access to the internet anyway. A controversial statement perhaps I admit. As I stated above I think leaving a warning banner will help for a start. Then if we know that an underage editor is contributing to areas that they ought not too then we should stop that as best we can. If we don't know then there's not too much we can do which also enforces the problem Buster mentions of driving the editor deeper underground. We could also require underage users to self identify as being under 18 and if they don't they could be blocked. With that said we have a lot of under 18 year old editors and I would hate to drive them away, some are in college and participating in the Unversities and other projects. --Kumioko (talk) 18:53, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

We have the option of community topic bans, so I am raising an RfC at WP:VPP to try to gauge community views on this. --Cerejota  19:19, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

"We could also require underage users to self identify as being under 18 and if they don't they could be blocked." This is impractical, or at least meaningless, since the only way to learn that an editor is under 18 is if they self identify as such. Therefore it would usually be impossible for administrators to discover that an editor had failed to self identify as under 18. In addition, since we generally advise minors not to disclose their age anyway, it's not clear why this would be a good idea. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 19:28, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I agree, but having it doesn't hurt either. It establishes that the community addresses this issue seriously. We already have nearly unenforceable policy, like WP:NOPAY, that exists as a principle. Even WP:NPOV is hard to "enforce" but its existence allows editors to at least direct discussion rather than "ramble on" on a topic. The enforceability of a principle is secondary, in my view, to the principle itself. --Cerejota  19:42, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

The word "minor", as a legal term, is defined differently in different jurisdictions and in different statutes. Thus, it is not safe to say that the magical age is 18.--Bbb23 (talk) 19:38, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Florida law applies to all Wikimedia hosted projects as per ToS - so this issue is moot.--Cerejota  19:44, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I'm astonished at the legal opinions expressed at Misplaced Pages. I wasn't aware that choice of law or forum clauses had any impact on criminal laws. And to the extent we're talking about civil suits, are you familiar with all the laws in Florida?--Bbb23 (talk) 19:56, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I am saying, that the question of what "adult age" is in wikipedia is moot and not subject to consensus because Office already said: adults in wikipedia are those under Florida law. I am stating a fact, not giving an opinion.--Cerejota  20:36, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

You said the issue I raised was moot because of the ToS. Whatever the ToS says is fact, although an interpretation of what it means would be opinion. Your conclusion that the issue is moot is an opinion. I never said anything about consensus, which, in my view, has nothing to do with the legal issues.--Bbb23 (talk) 20:43, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

You are correct, actually. My apologies. The only meta-policy that the Foundation has that addresses age is m:CheckUser policy, which says that "place of residence" is the criteria. THat does still makes the question moot, as "place of residence" makes the editor responsible for proving this. --Cerejota  21:02, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

I like the apology part (smile), but I honestly don't understand any of the rest. I don't understand what the CheckUser policy has to with what I originally said, and I'm not sure what question you now think is still moot. In any event, you don't have to respond to this if you don't wish to as I think it's become too much of a detour anyway.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:46, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

This is the latest in a series of WikiProject-associated controversies - others being whether you can put a WikiProject LGBT tag on the talk page of an article about a BLP who isn't widely known as such, and the disclaimer I added during the seal controversy (which, though moved, persists to this day, and yes, I know that it violates WP:NODISCLAIMERS) that WikiProject FBI is "open to all editors and is not approved, endorsed, nor authorized by the FBI in any way". I think that the recurrent problem we have here is that people confuse WikiProjects, which are about improving articles in some way related to various topics, as somehow representing or advocating these viewpoints. It may be time to think up a good line to add to the general disclaimer. IANAL, but I propose something like: "Misplaced Pages users may voluntarily band together to form WikiProjects to improve our coverage of some topics. The association of a user or an article with a WikiProject does not indicate any link with or opinion regarding the topic of the WikiProject, nor any endorsement or authorization by or association with any outside organization. WikiProject tags and user participation are merely internal notes to facilitate the upgrading of our encyclopedic coverage." Wnt (talk) 21:27, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Break

Obvious solution

Ban pornography and pornography related entries from Misplaced Pages. Case closed. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 03:06, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Obvious problem

Define pornography. AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Obvious answer

...

I don't actually know that banning pornography is the ideal solution, but I think one of the main roadblocks that we have as a community when faced with problems like this is our lack of willingness to consider more totalistic solutions to problems. Why not consider leaving really messy topic areas that are subject to all kinds of legal restrictions and social morays to the rest of the internet? Honestly, as an encyclopedia, we really don't have to explain every piece of porn lingo, nor do we have to include a bio on every two bit porn actor. Conversely do we have to get rid of them? Maybe not, but let's consider the possibility of doing so, and thereby not dealing with this can of worms, and the inevitable future cans of worms that covering pornography topics will give to us.Griswaldo (talk) 03:24, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

When you say "ban pornography", the censor alarms go off. But I don't see a problem with defining pornography as a thing that Misplaced Pages is not! Lots of problems would solve, it's not immoral to define what we are not, and it is an educational ruse to impart any social value for its inclusion. My76Strat (talk) 04:16, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I agree, and this policy would also allow us to get rid of other controversial and messy things; we can delete all the images of Mohammed, oh and finally put an end to the endless fighting over the Israeli–Palestinian conflict related articles by just deleting the entire topic area. Either Misplaced Pages is uncensored, (to the extent permitted by law) or it isn't. Monty₈₄₅ 04:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

It is naive to think that we do not already limit our content in several ways. Misplaced Pages is not absolutely "not censored," even if you add the caveat about not being censored within the limits of the law. And by "the law" do you mean "the laws applicable at the location of the servers" or some other laws, since, as you know laws vary between different localities, and different nations. But back to the point. We limit content all the time. For instance we have zero tolerance for content that is under copyright that we do not have permission to reproduce. We also do not allow certain types of material in our biographies of living people and as My76Strat points out, there is a whole slew of things we don't allow per WP:NOT. So it is naive to say that "censorship" is a black and white proposition. Whenever we choose to limit what type of content we have at Misplaced Pages I would hope we do so with practical rather than ideological aims in mind. Pornography is not as clear cut, either socially or legally, as something like copyright, yet it is still a much thornier social and legal issue in the English speaking world (this is en-wiki after all) than the I-P conflict or depictions of Mohammad. For one, the encyclopedia needs to keep its reputation in mind and a 13 year old WikiProject Pornography member is a possible minefield in that sense. I guarantee you that if such an issue were blown up in the media, and the community's response was WP:NOTCENSORED we'd be doing greater damage to our reputation than we ever have in the past. But the issue is bigger than simply reputation, I just use that as one example of a practical concern, as opposed to a naively ideological one. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 11:27, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Actually, if we were to raise the bar of notability for porn-related topics, and perhaps include a "must be notable for other things as well" guideline, we would be significantly reducing the porn content to something that 13-year-olds may already have read about elsewhere, and which would be largely "innocent". As in: it won't be titillating for those 13-year-olds who may be here for the sordid info that adults will otherwise feel entitled to share with the world as "encyclopedic" content.

Not to mention that it would cut down most of the remaining chaff.

Then again, I think 13-year-olds can get similar kicks from the articles not (yet) tagged for WP:PORN, but which describe in detail, and depict, all sort of sexual pastimes. Focusing on WP:PORN's added risk for minors may be hypocritical, as long as some articles tell us how to properly enjoy a good lick on the scrotum. Dahn (talk) 12:08, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

RfC

Misplaced Pages:Village_pump_(policy)#RfC:_Should_underage_editors_be_topic_banned_from_articles_in_the_WikiProject_Pornography_topic_area.3F--Cerejota  19:36, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

further thinking on vandalism, revision review etc

I was thinking this morning, when I did this , that perhaps a flagged revision system could exist in an optional form, just like semi-protect and protect exist today. This particular article has been under severe BLP attack, with a lot of attention given to it by BLP patrollers because of this, but this is not always the case, and this particular BLP vio existed for 9.5 hours. So for example, what if a flagged revision system existed that could be turned on by sysops using the same or similar criteria as what is used to semi or proc articles, including the ability to request approval in the talk page? Also, this system could be used as part of the current talk page "edit requested" process for semi and proc articles, allowing the request to be inputed for approval (it would still have to be explained in talk) rather than the awkward and less directly attributed process of copy and paste we have now. I have no idea if this has been discussed before. Just a thought.--Cerejota  18:45, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

BLP-vio? It looks like WP:WELLKNOWN applies. blocking young editors from imaginary theories of harm and preventing them from learning about what the police have presented as a real and relevant danger. In the same day. Wnt (talk) 01:07, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Wnt, I'm going to have to ask you to stop posting to my talk page if you can't be more thoughtful in your analysis. "A deletionist deletes, period, no matter what" sounds to me like you just aren't listening to what people are saying. That's an insulting, divisive, and frankly unnecessary and unwelcome comment. It is the sort of comment that one makes when one has nothing to say.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 01:40, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I can cut out the sentence that bothers you, but doesn't this combination of "ethical" priorities bother you? Wnt (talk) 02:20, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I don't agree with your analysis at all. It's as if you didn't even look at the revert he's talking about. Someone linked, in an entry which merely mentions the man, about whom we do not have a biography, to an attack page, and listed it as "Ed Kramer biography". And you reacted to this as if Cerejota has done something wrong, and blathered on about irrelevancies. So, no, I don't think he has his ethical priorities wrong at all. I think you are just being mean and insulting in how you have falsely characterized what he said and did. Go away. Take a break and think about it.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 02:25, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Isn't what your suggesting how flagged protection (Misplaced Pages:Pending changes) was operating during the trial (except I believe it was kept to a limited number of articles)? Even after the trial, articles which had been protected remained for a while. But the original consensus only being for a 2 month trial and the inability to get a consensus for either continuing or a new trial, or implementing the feature permanently meant it was eventually agreed not to use it any more for the time being. Sure there were proposals to use it for all BLPs etc but these never got off the ground. I personally am a supporter of PC but unless the foundation is willing to do something from the top and all the evidence suggests they're not, I don't think there's much point poking that bear for at least a year from the closure of the previous RFC. Nil Einne (talk) 13:22, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Return of communism

Mr Wales, administrator misconduct has now reached such proportions that they revdelete all criticism. Misplaced Pages is now becoming like Ceausescu's Romania, where even typewriters were banned (or if they weren't you needed a government licence to own one). There is a discussion at meta:User talk:Tobias Conradi where the administrators seem to wield less power. 82.35.193.46 (talk) 09:35, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Uh you're linking to a page/case that is 4-5 years old Nil Einne (talk) 13:24, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

The criticism is false and ludicrous. But anon if you have a specific example of rev deletion of anything simply for being criticism, you may tell me about it here, under my protective umbrella.--Jimbo Wales (talk) 15:13, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

20 million all-language articles by Halloween

UPDATE: Including all other-language Wikipedias, the count of 20 million articles will apparently be reached by Halloween 2011, current count: 64,236,677 articles (all-languages). It seems you were right about the accelerating rate of growth in other languages: instead of mid-November, the latest figures project a count of 20 million articles, combining all languages, by the end of October. To speed-read all those articles, non-stop, at 1 article per minute, 24/7 and 365.25 days per year, would require 38 years, assuming 1-minute fluency in all the 282(?) Misplaced Pages languages. Separately, English WP growth is on track to reach 4 million articles in June 2012 (+930 per day).

How many printed volumes?  Using the size-data which concluded the average article size as 562 words (in January 2010), the count of printed volumes (all languages) would be 8,175:

• {{#expr: 20000000*562 / (1375000) + .5 round 0}} = 8175

That equates to 355 sets of 23-volume encyclopedias, or 40.9 bookracks (each, 10 shelves of 20 volumes). I would hate to be the mailman delivering that encyclopedia to the house! -Wikid77 (talk) 11:08, 21 September 2011 (UTC)