Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 06:56, 4 July 2012

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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Block evasion=socking?

Isn't block evasion, by its definition, socking?Jasper Deng (talk) 01:55, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

No. An IP resetting his IP to avoid a block or a user logging into an alternate, unblocked account isn't socking, but it is block evasion. Reaper Eternal (talk) 02:27, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

But doesn't that constitute the use of multiple accounts to evade sanctions, which is part of socking?--Jasper Deng (talk) 03:27, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Discussion to change/add wording to the Block policy

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the debate may be found at the bottom of the discussion.

No consensus - While there seems to be a want for better text about this, this has been open for over 4 months, and there is still no consensus on what the final version of the text should be. So closing this now. No prejudice against immediately starting a new proposal with new/modified text. - jc37 00:22, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Inspired in part by a discussion at WP:AN, which was in part inspired by a comment Newyorkbrad made here. I am proposing the following change to the blocking policy:

"Most blocks are not controversial, but sometimes a block requires discussion in the general community to establish its appropriateness. In the case of community discussions regarding a block, the status quo is defined as "unblocked". For a practical purpose, that means that any block needs consensus to remain in place. Blocks that have community consensus may be enacted (if they have not been already) or retained (if the block preceded the discussion)."

The rationale behind this is simple: it removes the "first mover" advantage to blocking first and then starting a discussion. It shouldn't matter whether the discussion precedes the block or the block precedes the discussion, there needs to be a consensus that an editor needs to be blocked in order to be blocked. Blocking first and then seeking a discussion should not get a different result than starting the discussion before the block. We should be clear also that administrators who block someone and whose block is later undone by community consensus are not automatically at fault or wrong, but if the community is not behind a block, a person should not be blocked.

Feel free to discuss this below, make any suggested changes, etc. etc. In light of recent events, and in light of Newyorkbrads well thought out explanation of the conundrum, a change of this sort is really needed. Thoughts? Ideas? Support? Oppose? --Jayron32 01:50, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Support

1. As nominator --Jayron32 01:50, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
2. Unblocked is a reasonable default. The most important aspect is eliminating first/second mover nonsense; community action should not be the result of accidents of timing. Nobody Ent 02:33, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
3. Specifying any default for the "status quo" is more reasonable in my view than the almost chaotic outcome these "no consensus" discussions typically have. I would like to see additional mention of the length of the block, rather than just the binary yes/no outcome of "no consensus" discussions, but this proposal is a good first step. I have one lingering concern over this default, namely that editors with many wikifriends are officially unblockable now via "normal" blocks. (These may be good content contributors who are regularly rowdy, or they may be POV pushers with similar wikifriends.) I estimate that AE blocks, topic bans, RfC/Us, and Arbitration are going to be used more often if this proposal passes. This is not necessarily a bad development though. Perhaps it's a transition towards less cowboy wikijustice. Finally, I note that for quite some years now ArbCom has advanced the view that blocks are a remedy of last resort for long term contributors, even if there's staunch opposition to that view around these parts . (ArbCom has repeated that view in their latest PD here and here). ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 09:27, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
4. If there is no strong consensus in support of a block, it should not exist. --He to Hecuba (talk) 14:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
5. Especially for long term and indef. — Ched :  ?  15:33, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
6. In general I think we need some changes in this area. However I think #Montanabw is a much better wording and that there are some legitimate issues raised by the opposers with the current wording. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:52, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
7. It is my understanding that first moves are akin to WP:FAITACCOMPLI, hence a block is not status quo. This is consistent with all other WP's decision processes (absent ARBCOM or Office Actions which transcend the community's self-governance). Like any other process at WP, we err on the side of freedom of action. A prohibition at WP falls unless there is consensus to retain it - no consensus means there is no consensus to prohibit something - not just that there is no consensus to change something that once may have had consensus; the prohibition is gone because no consensus supports it any more. An attempted deletion at WP, failing to achieve consensus means the item stays. Hence, all policies, practices, guidelines, and consensuses that prohibit any activity or mandate (whether suggestive or more arm-twisting) compliance retain their force only so long as consensus can be shown to retain the same. For example, we went through a whole rigamarole over whether to link dates in articles - which got decided by ARBCOM. Had it been decided not from "above" but by consensus to prohibit such links; we can always test whether such consensus still exists, and in its absence, the prohibition is removed because the status quo ante a consensus which no longer exists was no prohibition. It's similar to how XFDs handled; it matters not whether the thing was or wasn't deleted; if there's no consensus to delete it, we retain it (as the lesser prohibition). Blocking is a (technology enforced) editing prohibition. And it, like any other may be reversed absent consensus to retain it. The status quo is not relevant in any material sense. We make rules against ourselves, but these remain only so long as we choose to retain them; self-perpetuating rules makes us a WP:BUREAUCRACY and invites WP:WIKILAWYERING. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 19:24, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

   There is a really important point here that I would like to draw out and reexpress: the relationship between freedom of action and a default state. We allow deletion of articles, because the default state is that they should not be deleted. Ironically, the very fact that articles should not, in general, be deleted, provides some freedom of action in deleting them, because such actions can be challenged and undone relatively easily. If we want admins to have a similar freedom of action to block editors (and I think we do), then we only truly provide that freedom if there is a default state of unblocked. The only question, in my mind, is how we return to the default state when there is no consensus. If, for short blocks, we just let them expire, then for longer ones, it seems to me that the most natural thing is to commute them into short blocks. Geometry guy 22:06, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

   I was once blocked for 10 seconds. Can anyone provide a rational explanation for what that was meant to achieve? Or why that admin is still an admin? Malleus Fatuorum 23:19, 24 February 2012 (UTC)

Oppose

1. 'No consensus' usually means 'no change' on Misplaced Pages, and we should stick to that principle with blocks. Additionally, I think this change is likely to encourage wheel warring: admin A blocks, admin B unblocks claiming 'no consensus for block', admin A reblocks claiming 'there is a consensus', etc. (I realise that can and does happen already, but any wording in policy which tells admins to overturn each other's actions will encourage it.) Finally, this is going to cause problems with requests for unblocks. Currently, when a long-term blocked user requests to be unblocked, their request is only granted if there is a rough consensus in support. Under this proposal, if there is no consensus as to whether they should be unblocked, presumably 'default to unblock' would apply. I think that's a bad route to go down: overturning a block should require consensus, not the lack of it. Robofish (talk) 13:15, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   As an afterthought, I would support this policy specifically for indefinite blocks, though. I don't think an indefinite block should be imposed where there isn't consensus for it. But for normal blocks, I think the best approach to a lack of consensus is simply to let the block expire. Robofish (talk) 13:19, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

2. I agree with Robofish. The proposal would enshrine the second-mover advantage, encourages wheel-warring and provides effective immunity to blocks for anyone with a certain number of friends who show up at ANI. This would make policy enforcement even more arbitrary, ochlocratic and dependent on social dynamics. Admins should normally defer to decisions made by colleagues, and overturning blocks should normally need community consensus. But I'm open to discussing rule-based, transparent methods to resolve disagreements about controversial blocks, e.g., referral to a panel of three or five uninvolved admins.  Sandstein  14:16, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   The "friends who show up" issue can be handled the same way that it is in AFD, by tagging such accounts with the {{spa}} tag and allowing the admin who closes the unblock discussion to make a "strength of argument" determination. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 23:35, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   Such a panel already exists. It's called ArbCom. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 20:58, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

3. I am persuaded by the opposes. I would feel better about the post-block consensus discussions if all commenters were impartial going in. But that seldom seems (or, too often does not seem) the case. They are either involved, or they seem previously partial for or against the User or Administrator. Crowd sourcing has its pitfalls. All blocks should be good blocks (especially for the less popular user). All administrators should exercise good judgment (or be removed). Process and policy should advance these as the defaults. The community should trust its admins to do the right thing, the first time. Of course, appeal should be allowed but not to a stacked deck, either for or against. Alanscottwalker (talk) 18:24, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
4. No. This would enshrine the concept of wheel-warring and encourage undoing of the status quo based on subjective interpretations of "consensus", which is often declared based on the first few interested parties to show up on ANI. A more useful offering would be that in cases of no consensus on indef blocks, the discussion is spun out into a full RfC on "should this user be blocked, and for what duration", formatted as an RFC/U, running the full length of 30 days and closed by two or three uninvolved admins at the end of that. Yes, it's bureaucratic and drags out, but at least it avoids the issue of "first person to call 'consensus!' or 'no consensus!' gets to do what they want" and allows for full community discussion and the avoidance of the blocked party's best friend or worst enemy being the one to decide whether there's a consensus to do anything. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 19:47, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   So shorter blocks would just time out, I'm inferring? Would the indef'd editor be unblocked to participate in the RFC/U while banned from editing elsewhere? Nobody Ent 20:18, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   Yes, I suppose they would. A full RFC wouldn't be useful for a 24-hour or weeklong block, at any rate, due to time constraints. If we wanted to, I would say my idea could be stripped down to bare bones of "block discussion threads must run for a minimum of 24 hours and must be closed by two or more admins in agreement over the result." The main issue, as I see it in these contentious block/unblock threads is hasty calling of consensus or lack thereof, often by an involved, or at least non-impartial, party. The right answer isn't to default to either block or unblock, it's to make sure the threads are run cleanly so that an individual consensus can be built in each case. At least, that's mho. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 01:08, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

   The idea to move to a RfC/U in such cases has already been rejected on WP:AN. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 21:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

   That's unfortunate, but it doesn't make this proposal any more acceptable an alternative in my mind. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 01:08, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

5. Oppose. Pretty much any block of an established editor is going to be controversial, and this kind of policy change would just add to more chaos. I'm also uncomfortable with the suggestion that there are that many bad blocks, that this kind of change would even be needed. The solutions, IMHO, are not to change policy to allow blocks to be easily reversed, but to get rid of admins who are making bad blocks. So if an admin blocks, and then there is a clear and substantial consensus that the block was bad, and this seems to be happening on a repeated basis, the community should consider removing that admin's bit. --Elonka 17:29, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

   In your analogy then this policy change will make no difference as if all admin blocks are good then they will have a consensus. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:52, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

   The policy change is not needed, and if it were implemented, it would make a difference because it would cause more "revolving door" blocks, more chaos on ANI, and more wasted time all around. --Elonka 21:49, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

6. Oppose. Consensus requires debate and discussion, and such can ebb and flow - not least as different participants turn up. If like AFD these discussions were normally left to run for 7 days then it would be more reasonable to default to unblock. But in a debate that can be ended at any moment it makes it too easy to unblock if it can be done the first time the argument ebbs to the point where one could argue there was not quite consensus to maintain the block. ϢereSpielChequers 23:13, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

   ? Montanabw's wording below addresses these concerns. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 23:21, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

   Addresses but doesn't resolve to my satisfaction. Keeping the debate going for seven days to see if you can get a bare majority sounds to me like a recipe for even more drama than we now have. ϢereSpielChequers 21:23, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

   I don't think so, people will probably start to care less after seven days, so I doubt there will be as much drama as an immediate unblock. We wait for seven days for move requests and AfD's and that seems to work pretty well. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 22:30, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

7. Oppose. We should have faith in initial blocking Admins. competence and decision making although more comprehensive rationale for blocks should be documented. Giving certain editors who have a posse of friends or a friendly Admin. in their pocket even more scope to evade blocks is no good thing. Leaky Caldron 12:40, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

   So, some admins are corrupt by being willing to unblock their friends, but the cabal of "initial blocking Admins" is pristine with no possible biases? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 14:07, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes and No respectively. Nevertheless, I do trust the vast majority of Admins. to block appropriately most of the time. A lot of the noise about inappropriate blocks to certain editors is just that, noise. I do not recognise the cabal to which you refer. Individual cases of indisputably incorrect behaviour should of course be dealt with. Leaky Caldron 15:18, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Mu

1. This proposal was initiated in response to this ANI discussion which was inspired by a conundrum raised by NYB. Far from addressing the problem, this discussion illustrates it. The "default to unblock" position is reasonable, as is the "no consensus means no change" position. Rather than arguing a point here, I encourage editors to engage with opposing views. For example, this proposal is evidently not intended to encourage wheel-warring, as nobody wants that. For another example, if indefinite blocks require special treatment, how about really long blocks? Please do not ask me alone, as I already made my proposal at WT:AN, and it still looks pretty good to me. However, please do read and reflect on the basis for views contrary to your own, and look for a better solution. And if, on reflection, you are open minded about dialog and possible solutions, the merits of diverse views, feel free to say "mu", as I do, rather than "support" or "oppose". Geometry guy 01:24, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
2. I'm not really getting the "Mu" meme but I support any protocol which eliminates first mover/second mover or the "quickest" (or second quickest?) admins' decision from having precedence over everyone else's. It's definitely reasonable to split blocks into short term and long term categories -- if consensus is sketchy there's not harm in having an editor clock out a short term block, but editor's should not be indeffed unless there's a clear consensus to do so. Nobody Ent 01:32, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

• question Is there any expected time frame for this RfC? Meaning, 7 days? 30 days? The reason I ask is that my time on wiki is spotty, and will be for the next couple weeks; but I do want to throw my 2-cents in. At first blush, I'm inclined to support for many reasons, but agree that the couple opposes do have valid points. I'd like time to review and research a bit before committing a definitive support. (or oppose). — Ched :  ?  18:05, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

• As long as it needs... --Jayron32 18:19, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

• As per previous similar proposals on AN, this one also has a snowball's chance in hell of passing. I suggest early closure, because it's already proving to be a waste of time. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 21:00, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

  Calm your liver. If it passes it passes, if it fails it fails, but its been open 20 hours and 8 people have commented. I wouldn't call 8 people "the community". Give it a few days. Seriously. If you don't like it, vote oppose and get it over with. But don't feel the need to prevent other people from discussing proposals you don't personally like. --Jayron32 21:25, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

  Thanks for your kind concern for my health. I've already !voted support in case you didn't notice. Based on the preliminary discussion, I just don't think this going to have the necessary support to make a policy change. The WP:V 1st sentence change was rejected even though the !vote was 2:1 in favor. Good luck. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 21:37, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

  I'd also say that in general avoiding immediate commentary one way or another is the wisest course of action - that avoids any possibility of losing face if one want's to change their mind. Giving people a chance to think about this properly is probably sensible. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:34, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

  I'd also mention that we are into the weekend now and I can easily imagine that many editors do less editing during that time due to items they may want to engage in in their real lives. And yep - WP:V is indeed a very tough audience. (also - thank you Jayron32 for a very well designed proposal.) — Ched :  ?  22:20, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

• Comment: I see a need, perhaps for three different things here. 1) A default status in general when, AFTER DISCUSSION, there is no consensus - i.e. if no consensus, then unblocked is the default. In principle, I like that and support the need for a default standard. BUT there is also 2) Blocks used on people actively and currently being quite disruptive -- vandals or real mean-spirited, attacking sorts. These need to not be subject to wheel-warring and unblocked too hastily, as sometimes the disruption starts right up again. It's good to give these sorts of things a few days to sort themselves out, give everyone time to weigh in, and be sure that the "consensus" reached is a real one and not simply a dogpile in one direction or another. BUT 3) Then we have the long term blocks, which usually are for users with a lot of experience but also a lot of baggage -- not the immediate vandal-type abusers who need (and deserve) fast, firm short blocks (which often reform those sorts quickly or they leave quickly). These longer term discussions are probably are the most in need of the default concept, that, summed up, may mean that if there are 10,000 supporters on one side and 10,001 opposes on the other that after two weeks of yammering around and around with no clear consensus in either direction, just everyone repeating themselves, the default is unblock. Thoughts? Montanabw 20:33, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
  • Seems very sensible. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:08, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

    I also see a lot of sense in these comments. Geometry guy 22:55, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

    Sounds good to me, but it's going to be tricky to word it as policy. How exactly would you describe the difference between situation 1 (where the user should be unblocked) and situation 2 (where they shouldn't)? Something like 'where there is no consensus on whether a block is appropriate, the user should be unblocked, except when they are likely to disrupt Misplaced Pages'? That seems a bit like begging the question, particularly if the question of whether they will disrupt Misplaced Pages is the very matter there was no consensus about... Robofish (talk) 16:50, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

I still feel like this is a solution in search of a problem. Further rules (even soft cultural ones) should arise when there is a need. Can we please list some blocks that were perceived as problematic? Not discussing the blocks themselvs, please, just listing them so that we can see if they are worth discussing. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 00:30, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

See WP:AN and WP:ANI. It's a rare day where there isn't a thread on one or both of those noticeboards asking for a review of a block; if there isn't one today, check the archives. You'll find thousands of such discussions. --Jayron32 01:23, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

More rules won't stop bad judgment. If a block needs to be discussed, don't do it. Blocking is a last resort, to be used only when other options won't work, and when it is obvious that the block is correct. Jehochman 01:39, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Respectfully, Jayron, that's a non-response. 1) The simple presence of threads asking for review of a block would not indicate that there was a problem with first-mover's advantage. 2) The burden of proof is typically on the person making the claim. If you say that this is an issue, it's best if you don't just wave your hands and say "look there!" Particularly if there are thousands than it's no burden for you to provide an example. 3)There's nothing I see on ANI or AN right now that falls under "first mover." - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 02:38, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

I can pull up one right now, Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Civility enforcement started over exactly this issue, and is exactly the kind of block that results in contentiousness. Indeed, many of these sorts of blocks end up at ArbCom eventually, which only shows that the community has not, as yet, devised a way to deal with them equitably. See also this case which was declined titled "Unblocks and enabling". Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Arbitration Enforcement sanction handling is yet another one. There are many such ArbCom cases and ANI threads where the community doesn't show the ability to be able to decide how to handle when a long-term, polarizing editor is blocked. The idea behind this is that, when there is no consensus to block, a person should not be blocked. Period. It would head-off a lot of problems which clearly exist. I understand that you oppose this idea, Aaron Brenneman, and I would feel fine with you voting oppose, but I find it troublesome that you seek to short-circuit the discussion by refusing to acknowledge an open problem. --Jayron32 04:12, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

To be fair it is possible that, like me, he is thinking about how he will comment before committing to !voting one way or another.

I have to say I do prefer Montanabw's wording as it addresses the actual issue without affecting anything wider. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:54, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

I think his wording is great as well. This discussion is intended to be a starting point, and not an end, and I certainly don't have any attachment to my wording or to the final result of the discussion per se, but it is important that we have the discussion as a community, given the obvious problem. I'm most concerned with resolution, not necessarily any particular resolution, excepting solving the problem in a way that works. --Jayron32 14:34, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Jayron, please consider how the tone of your response affects the way debate continues. That aside, if we only have two examples, do we really think that this is a problem worth discussion? Further, I am able to disagree with you that there's a problem (which I have not, please note, done) without it being somehow disruptive to the discussion. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 10:16, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

One of those examples led to over 100 people commenting on an Arbcom request - its clearly a problem. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:35, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Again, that's handwaving. How any of those "over 100" commenting raised the issue of first mover? What is the "it" that is clearly a problem? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 01:07, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

The case is here: Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Civility_enforcement Nobody Ent 01:39, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

• I also like Montanabw's views. I think she says things well. — Ched :  ?  04:05, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Hypotheticals

How would the examples given above have been different if the "no consensus on blocking means unblocked" guideline had been in place? For the civility case, are we talking about Hawkeye's block? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 10:19, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

No, Thumperward's. And here's the problem: a principle that "no consensus on blocking means unblocked" would have added further support to John's unblock, because there was certainly no consensus for the block. However, the very process of undoing another admin's action, while the issue remains a bone of contention, can itself be disruptive, as it turned out to be in this case. This is one reason I proposed shortening no consensus blocks, rather than simply undoing them. Geometry guy 11:03, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Another ongoing example is Misplaced Pages:ANI#On-wiki_harrassment.2C_POV_editing.2C_and_off-wiki_attacks. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 11:49, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Is it really better to have to argue about whether to block or unblock her, rather than having a definitive answer one way or another?

While there are some technical issues with the unblock its fairly clear Arbcom is looking at them, and I'm not sure the unblock per-say is that problematic, especially given the person it affects seems to have been happy to give another chance. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:52, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Analogies with deletion

Has anyone considered the irony of having very detailed processes in place to delete articles (including discussions being open for 7 days), but to revoke an editors' access to[REDACTED] requires one blocking admin and "no-consensus" at ANI? We should propose to re-write the deletion policy so that the first admin to delete it gains first-mover advantage, and require undeletions to go through ANI/AN. 204.50.172.132 (talk) 22:30, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

I've thought about this, and I think we need to be more discriminating. It's true that AfDs last as long you say they do, but we also have WP:CSD. Even in the sanctions arena, we already have a distinction like that. Bans of all kinds (topic, interaction and even site ban) normally require community consensus (or ArbCom decision), except in WP:AE "free fire zones" (I mean WP:Discretionary sanctions). There is an obvious philosophical disagreement between those wanting the entire Misplaced Pages to be a free fire zone for admins, and those who think long-term content contributors should be shown more deference. ArbCom has inclined more towards the latter lately. I think a practical step towards mitigating this conflict would be to detail some types of "infractions" for which AE-type (first-mover advantage, "speedy") blocks can be imposed. And also detail other types that would require AfD-type consensus to be established first (disallowing first-mover advantage), making the decision making process for those similar to that for bans. For instance, WP:close paraphrasing would probably fit in the latter category. Thoughts? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 11:16, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

In general, ASCIIIn2BMe / MontanaBMW's ideas are good. The most difficult situation might be Montana's #2 which an editor under discussion is continuing with questionable behavior while the discussion is ongoing.

The Afd is false analogy -- articles are inanimate passive things; editors are people who actively change the encyclopedia. Nobody Ent 11:31, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

With regards arguing the false analogy fallacy, the expectation is not that two items are completely alike, but rather they share enough qualities that we can draw inferences from one item to another. For articles that do not assert notability there is speedy deletion, and for people who are immediately disrupting the encyclopedia - there are immediate blocks for disruption/vandalism accounts. For established articles where the notability is asserted, there is a discussion that occurs prior to action being taken. If a user is not actively disrupting the encyclopedia, there is no reason for a block until consensus can be reached. However, I don't think the solution is to block users when discussion can still occur, and rely on ANI to bring forward a consensus where it clearly isn't structured appropriately for it. 204.50.15.4 (talk) 21:28, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Arguably, articles are more valuable than editors to Misplaced Pages. Articles are our core content: getting rid of an article directly affects the Misplaced Pages product in a way that getting rid of an editor doesn't (not directly, anyway), which is why it usually requires consensus in a discussion over at least several days. To put it another way, articles are essential to Misplaced Pages; editors are disposable. (This may sound like a somewhat extreme philosophy, but when you think about it it's a fair description of how Misplaced Pages works.) Robofish (talk) 12:35, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, a recent essay, Misplaced Pages:Misplaced Pages does not need you, argues the same point. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 14:23, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Rebutted by an even more recent essay Zeroth law of Misplaced Pages. Short version: who writes the articles? Nobody Ent 15:04, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

I've addressed this issue in my !vote. WP has no rules but two: (1) those imposed by office actions (laws) and by ARBCOM and (2) those which the community's consensus puts upon ourselves. Leaving (1) to the side, since methinks nothing can change it, we're left with our own rules. The overriding rule is freedom of action (we default to unblock, keep articles, non-compliance with BS stuff) unless there is a consensus to do otherwise. And whatever rule is adopted (be it by block or deletion or some policy/guideline etc.) it remains binding only so long as the consensus to keep it remains. We know consensus can change. WP:CCC. This is not a WP:BUREAUCRACY where you need 2/3 to override a veto or some such mess. A rule than cannot demonstrate a current consensus is no rule at all; nothing is kept in place solely because someone got there first. Article titles are moved around (the first author's title - even if it had consensus at the time - may not be where it ends up); categories come and go (the first editor's organizational ideas - even if they had consensus at the time - may not be retained); many of the various policies and guidelines, etc., were established without much discussion or evidence of consensus (especially as they are freely editable and it's hard to be bound to a contract which is altered after you've signed); and finally, blocking. The blocking policy is just one among many of WP's policies - no more magical and mystical than any other. So, we should default to unblocked. But, from a practical point of view, most blocks are not very controversial; and I expect few will be overturned by a lack of consensus - especially, if the blocked party continues the behavior that got them blocked after unblocking - we should at least make the words match the reality. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 19:35, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Updated proposal

In order to address the valid concerns expressed regarding hasty decisions I propose the following modification:

"Most blocks are not controversial, but sometimes a block requires discussion in the general community to establish its appropriateness. For a practical purpose, that means that any block needs consensus to remain in place. Blocks that have community consensus may be enacted (if they have not been already) or retained (if the block preceded the discussion). If a block has been imposed, a time period of 24 hours must pass before unblocking due to no consensus. This does not preclude the block admin from unblocking nor an administrator unblocking in response to an unblock request."

With regards to the unblock the intent to to allow a legitimately blocked editor who posts a good unblock request -- "Yes I understand I screwed up, I won't do that anymore" to get unblocked. If this is reasonable, then I'd suggest the next step would be to strike through the original proposal, notify all previous participants and revote. Nobody Ent 17:43, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

• Comment. I think you need to specify that if a block is being discussed on a noticeboard, unblock requests must be put on hold pending the outcome of the discussion. If ANI is heatedly discussing a block of user:Foo, admin Bar should not swoop in and make a one-person decision as to whether to block or unblock Foo - a discussion is ongoing, and it's no single admin's place to supplant the outcome of community discussion with a unilateral opinion. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 18:02, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

One condition in the unblocking section is "a commitment to change is given." Are you suggesting modifying this, only allowing unblock with consent of blocking admin, or something else that I'm just not getting?

Would that imply a burden for an admin reviewing an unblock request to do a search on noticeboard(s) before applying an unblock? Nobody Ent 18:52, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

I think (and this is more or less just taking shape in my mind as we discuss it, so feel free to ask more questions if they occur to you) I'm suggesting that we draw a line in the unblocking policy between uncontentious blocks - which can easily be reviewed via template by a single admin, and unblocks granted if a commitment to change, etc is given - and contentious blocks - blocks that are the subject of ongoing discussion, blocks where the blocking admin opposes an unblock, etc, where a unilateral unblock, via template or via just happening upon it, should not be granted due to the possibility that it would be in defiance of community discussion. This should, ideally, call for no little or no more effort on the part of the unblock-reviewing admin than usual, because a user whose block is being discussed on AN or ANI would have an AN/ANI notice on their talk page - the reviewing admin, who can already reasonably be expected to survey the contents of the user's talk, would then see that and be aware that the block is being discussed. Similarly, if the blocking admin opposes unblock or wants the user to make further concessions before unblock, that will often be found on the blocked user's talk page. Yes, this isn't perfect, and it's not unexpected that an admin might miss that discussion is ongoing, but my expectation is that if an admin unblocks and then discovered that the community is reviewing whether an unblock is warranted, the unblocker would restore the block on the basis of "oops, potential for community consensus trumps my own thoughts on this issue; it's inappropriate to short-circuit that process".

In short, if the community is on the case, the community has dibs on deciding the block's fate; no admin ought to step in before that and single-handedly moot the community's discussion. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 19:05, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

That makes sense as far as my second point -- as I never personally block/unblock my understanding is somewhat abstract. I guess the expectation that given a reasonable "commitment to change" consensus would likely shift pretty quickly to unblock. I've struck the last phrase from the proposal. Nobody Ent 19:17, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

(indent) Same objection as before - How have we shown that this is enough of a problem to require more instruction creep, more layers of complexity, more opportunities for disruptive Gnomic-like discussions? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 05:11, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Have you paid attention to the recent civility case at Arbcom? -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:30, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes. And it's been pointed to several times in quite vague terms. I haven't looked in a few days, but it's closed now so if "first mover" was important, it'd be somewhere in the principles or findings of fact at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Civility enforcement/Proposed decision, right? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 08:53, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

In a declined arbcom case the committee told us explicitly the ball is in the community's court, suggesting as one alternative a "community led Rfc" Nobody Ent 10:29, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

The current policy results in Black swan events; while relatively rare, they consume significant wikiresources. It will be too late once the next event occurs, as comments are then interpreted as biased towards/against the editor and admins in question. It is best to strike while the iron is cold. Nobody Ent 12:23, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Only one committee member supported the "balls in court" thing, though, am I correct in that? (Two opposed two abstained.) And the second link you've provided is the civility case prior to rename, correct? Forgive me if I'm misunderstanding your answer to the question. I'll try to rephrase: In your edit to this page of 01:39, 22 February 2012, you explicitly pointed out the Civility_enforcement case as an example of why this change was required. Is that still your opinion? How do you reconcile that with the fact that (unless I'm missing something) nothing on first-mover's made it into the final product? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 15:49, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

If this policy or equivalent was in effect, John doesn't do the unblock which leads to Hawkeye7 not doing the reblock and it's possible the issue could have been resolved without an ArbCom case. Nobody Ent 02:41, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Relisting

"Most blocks are not controversial, but sometimes a block requires discussion in the general community to establish its appropriateness. For a practical purpose, that means that any block needs consensus to remain in place. Blocks that have community consensus may be enacted (if they have not been already) or retained (if the block preceded the discussion). If a block has been imposed, a time period of 24 hours must pass before unblocking due to no consensus. This does not preclude the block admin from unblocking."

Support

Hopefully allows us to move forward while addressing concerns previously raised. Nobody Ent 16:01, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Oppose

• I find this more palatable than it was in its initial form, but I still can't side with defaulting to unblocking due to the ease with which "no consensus" can be gamed by a few people overwhelming a thread with heated commentary, or friends-of-blockee piling in to protect them. I could support "if a block has been imposed, a time period of 24 hours must pass before unblocking due to no consensus. This does not preclude the block admin from unblocking" as a stand-alone change to the policy, but I can't support the rest of the content proposed here. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 16:20, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

• So, assuming we adopt this proposal, what's preventing an admin from blocking someone every 24hrs while this "no consensus" situation exists? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 22:18, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

That's covered by existing practices Nobody Ent 03:15, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

I was tempted to reply that it doesn't apply to admins. Seriously, if your fix for a policy flaw in a hotheaded area is a change that requires common sense in order to avoid abuse, then we're better off with no change at all. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 15:32, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

I definitely support the simplest change as suggested User:Fluffernutter. I think there is value in making the most conservative change first, and I think this change should resolve the worst of the current behaviour which is clearly extremely swift unblocking after a very short time. Even if the 24 hours isn't followed strictly 16 hours or so is still probably enough. I think this change should solve 80% of the problems which led to this being discussed, and further changes can be done later if necessary. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:40, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

• FYI, this contravenes current policy at WP:CONSENSUS: "When actions by administrators are contested and the discussion results in no consensus either for the action or for reverting the action, the action is normally reverted." I'm going to leave a note there. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:21, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

  Not really. WP:Consensus merely gives some simple examples of what other policies and guidelines say to do if there is no consensus. WP:Consensus does not establish what the correct response should be. If this policy changes, then WP:Consensus will be updated to match it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:47, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

• By the way, I've deactivated the RfC tag because the listing has expired. . Clar voter fatigue at this point, so this should be tabled as "no consensus for anything". ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:30, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

reverted edits

It's customary on policy pages to discuss changes on the associated talk page and gain consensus, per WP:BRD. Nobody Ent 02:38, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I noticed a lot of (and some large) changes to this policy today. I saw a couple comments on the talk page - but not directly related to these changes. Could somebody give me the cliff notes version of what's happening? Was there an RfC or something I missed? — Ched :  ?  02:41, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Looked to me like mostly copy editing (rearranging sections). Nobody Ent 02:55, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

While the changes may look large at first sight, each individual change is small. The way the diffs show may give the impression that some changes are large, but they are not. Just read the edit summaries to see what happened. I could have done the changes in fewer edits, but I did one error and I intentionally made a restructuration gradually to ease reviewing. Otherwise, it would have been preferable to do the work in fewer edits. --Chealer (talk) 03:47, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Unjustified rollback

User:Eraserhead1 and User:Nobody Ent both did a rollback losing several changes today in 479561842 and 479582181, both unjustified. The former was misguided and I reverted it, however I didn't revert the latter for now. The edit summary refers to here, but there is no justification here. I asked the editor to justify on his talk page. Unless a justification would come, it needs to be reverted too. --Chealer (talk) 03:55, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Chealer, my justification is that you seemed to make a very large change that was difficult to see what was going on. Please can you make your changes more slowly so we can use the diff tools effectively to see what's happening.

I took a diff of your changes and I couldn't see what had changed in a timely fashion.

You can't just edit war over policy, and all I'm asking is for you to make the changes more slowly - as I said in my edit summary. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:19, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I also think it was poor form that you only gave me three minutes in the middle of the night to respond to your talk page request. I should have been given at least 24 hours, if not 48. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:25, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

A quick perusal of the policy on the use of rollback does not show me that as one of the valid uses of the tool. Maybe I'm missing something at 5AM. I can understand undoing such an edit, but not rollback (oh, and I agree - attempting to discuss an issue means actual discussion, not a driveby-then-off-to-see-admins) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 10:09, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

"The above restrictions apply to standard rollback, using the generic edit summary. If a tool or manual method is used to add an appropriate explanatory edit summary (as described in the Additional tools section below), then rollback may be freely used as with any other method of reverting." Nobody Ent 10:59, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I think there is a misunderstanding. Slowing edition so that it can be checked is not a request. This was meant to explain how changes can be "checked plausibly". What you probably want is to check each change individually by using the "prev" links on . If you consider that as implausible, then ask for more detailed edit summaries of the specific changes you find hard to analyze. --Chealer (talk) 17:22, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Hi Eraserhead1, please see Slowing edition so that it can be checked. --Chealer (talk) 17:01, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

OK, I've taken a look. I agree with your structural changes. I'm not sure about your other changes. I want some time to think about it. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 17:44, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I've done the first set of structural changes. I'll go and do the rest in a couple of days unless there are any objections. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:16, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

(←) I do not believe "slow down so that I can check them" is a good reason for rollback. I endorse the series-of-small-changes approach taken here. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 04:28, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

• Reminder (per Aaron):

Rollback may be used:

• To revert obvious vandalism and other edits where the reason for reverting is absolutely clear
• To revert edits in your own user space
• To revert edits that you have made (for example, edits that you accidentally made)
• To revert edits by banned users who are not allowed to edit (but be prepared to explain this use of rollback when asked to)
• To revert widespread edits (by a misguided editor or malfunctioning bot) which are judged to be unhelpful to the encyclopedia, provided that an explanation is supplied in an appropriate location, such as at the relevant talk page...

I would urge anyone who is using the rollback feature to brush up on the Misplaced Pages:Rollback feature guideline. I'd hate to see anyone get in trouble or lose that ability over a simple misunderstanding. Peace — Ched :  ?  18:42, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

Meaning depends on context -- the preface to the above list clearly says "it has the disadvantage that only a generic edit summary is generated, with no explanation of the reason for the change. For this reason, it is considered inappropriate to use it in situations where an explanatory edit summary would normally be expected." Then, after list, the guideline notes: The above restrictions apply to standard rollback, using the generic edit summary. If a tool or manual method is used to add an appropriate explanatory edit summary (as described in the Additional tools section below), then rollback may be freely used as with any other method of reverting.

As the edits in question all had a reasonable edit summary, the rollback prohibition clearly is not applicable. Nobody Ent 22:31, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

I've seen you around enough to know you know what's going on Nobody - wasn't questioning anyone - just saw the "Rollback" post - thought I'd mention it so a newer user or something didn't get their butts in a bind. Carry on ... (In other words, Ched didn't take the time to research anything. :)) — Ched :  ?  23:03, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

I do not believe "slow down so that I can check them" is a good reason for reversion of any kind. Once the person is finished, I go back and you review their edits. There's no problem with the wrong version being on the page while I'm looking. What is proposed as acceptable (reverts any edits "you" have not yet approved) is not how it's meant to work. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 01:01, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

The top of this page clearly states: "Before editing this page, please make sure that your revision reflects consensus. When in doubt, discuss on the talk page." I don't mind Chealer being bold -- I'm frequently bold myself, but Eraserhead was entirely correct to revert the edits if there was any doubt as to consensus. Nobody Ent 02:17, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I'll continue to disagree, I'm afraid. If one says "I read and checked this, and I don't think it has consensus" that is clearly acceptable. But to say "I'm reverting because I don't have time to read and approve these edits" is not acceptable. I'm stepping away from the horse now. - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 02:36, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm staggered that anyone would think differently. Beggars belief really. Malleus Fatuorum 02:56, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

And as for the more general question about rollback, it's surely got to be the most useless bauble in the history of baubles. Nobody needs it, it's just an "I gave it and I can take it away" attempt at control. Malleus Fatuorum 02:59, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

That could be misinterpreted, but the context makes it pretty clear that this is talking about policy changes, not about simple restructuring or rewording: "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.". I clarified the template anyway. --Chealer (talk) 06:34, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

The problem is that we couldn't check your rewording as you made a whole bunch of changes all at the same time. In a few days - once everyone has got used to the new layout and we know there aren't any issues with that, you can start making your content changes. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 20:23, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Don't include me in your "we". If you (singular) don't know how or don't have time to step through a set of diffs, just step aside and let someone else do it. Did you really think you were the only one able to prevent the total collapse of the encyclopedia? Franamax (talk) 05:21, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

There is still the issue that it wouldn't necessarily be easy to revert the changes individually. Misplaced Pages's diff algorithm is quite poor. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:36, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

I do not understand what you just said at all. The point of making lots of small changes is that it makes it easier to revert out bits? - Aaron Brenneman (talk) 10:01, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Eraserhead, you used rollback inappropriately and your request that changes only be made the way you want them to be made is not reasonable. You made a mistake, numerous users have tried to explain it to you. So please, stop tap dancing around the obvious, own up to it and move on, Beeblebrox (talk) 01:44, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

I apologise for my later comments, it wasn't acceptable and was bringing up points that were unreasonable, it was possible to check the diffs - and something in the end I did. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:47, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Request for comment: Adoption of new unblock appeals tool

Hello, all; an RFC has been opened at Wikipedia_talk:Guide_to_appealing_blocks#Adoption_of_new_unblock_appeals_tool to seek input regarding the implementation of the Unblock Ticket Request System as a replacement for the unblock-en-llists.wikimedia.org mailing list. Comments from all users, especially those who have experience in reviewing blocks, would be greatly appreciated. Hersfold non-admin 21:15, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Are they punishments?

Are blocks punishments? --NoObsceneUsernames (talk) 23:31, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

They shouldn't be, but sometimes are. causa sui (talk) 02:11, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

Query

Under "Setting block options" the policy says: prevent account creation will prevent accounts from being created by the account. How can an account create another account? Does it mean will prevent accounts from being created on the blocked IP address? Victor Yus (talk) 07:35, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

Some people may be reluctant to provide too much information to this query per WP:BEANS; but I'll say this much. If you look at WP:SOCK you'll notice that we've had a need in the past to address issues where an editor is acting in an unacceptable manner, they were blocked, and they simply stated editing under a different name to carry on that same unacceptable behavior. The technical aspect of "prevent account creation" is simply a measure used to prevent this from happening. I'm not sure that fully answers your question, but I hope it explains the concept and the WP:BEANS non-answer. — Ched :  ?  13:23, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

So is my original interpretation (that it means will prevent accounts from being created on the blocked IP address) basically correct? In combination with the following sentence, which implies that the "blocked IP address" is the last IP used by the blocked account (if it's an account rather than an IP that's being blocked), provided "autoblock" is not unchecked? (I don't really need to know; I've just seen "account creation blocked" on certain block log entries, and have been trying to work out what it might mean - without doing the experiment of getting myself blocked to find out.)--Victor Yus (talk) 14:10, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

If I understand your question .. yes. Sorry for the delay - I hadn't checked back here. — Ched :  ?  17:36, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Actually, accounts can create other accounts via Special:UserLogin/signup. The "account creation block" prevents this. It is normally only disabled when the username is inappropriate (e.g. a spammy username) so that the user can create an account with a more appropriate username. The autoblock prevents other users from editing from the IP, and it also prevents further account creation from that IP. Hope this helps. Reaper Eternal (talk) 02:07, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, but is there any difference of consequence between "an account creating an account" and that user first logging out and then creating the new account? Victor Yus (talk) 06:48, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Unblocking bot accounts

The following discussion is an archived record of a request for comment. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion. A summary of the debate may be found at the bottom of the discussion.

As I think everyone here knows, consensus is not a vote. And further that policy/guidelines (with some exceptions) are to be based upon common practice, and not the other way round. So in closing this, I need to weigh both this discussion, as well as broader common practice/policy/guidelines.

With that in mind (as (re-)affirmed in the discussions below):

1. Common practice has been that bot owners have unblocked their blocked bot "if" it can be presumed that the block was simply due to a technical error, which is now presumably fixed.
2. A bot owner should not be unblocking their bot for any other reason.

The problem with the common practice for opposers to that common practice is it relies (in their opinion) too much on presumption.

Misplaced Pages:Blocking_policy#Other_important_information already states:

• "If there are any specific recommendations or circumstances that a reviewing administrator would need to know, or that may help to avoid administrator disputes upon review of a block, the blocking administrator should consider including this information in the block notice. For example: Suggested conditions for an unblock."

A bot owner thinking of unblocking their now-presumably-fixed bot would be "a reviewing administrator".

So this is already in policy. Someone blocking a malfunctioning bot should inform the bot owner when blocking that this was the reason for the block.

Therefore, that would seem to remove the majority of the opposing comments.

So with all that in mind, there seems to be most support for some version of: "Administrators should not unblock their own account(s), including bots, without permission from the blocking administrator."

(Essentially one of Hammersmith's proposals, but changing "must never" to "should not", per opposition comments.)

- jc37 00:58, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Policy regarding the unblocking of bots is unclear. RfC asks to clarify the policy, amending Misplaced Pages:Blocking policy and MediaWiki:Unblockiptext. --Hammersoft (talk) 19:27, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Since 2008 there has been a message on MediaWiki:Unblockiptext that admin bot owners should not unblock their own bots. The matter has come up during Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Rich Farmbrough/Proposed decision, and it turns out that some admin bot owners have ignored that message. It is felt that a mediawiki message does not have the force of a policy, though it is also pointed out that the message has been in place since 2008 unchallenged. As the message makes sense, and it would avoid potential conflict if the message were adhered to, it is suggested that "including bot accounts" is added to the "Unblocking will almost never be acceptable" statement as follows:

• "Unblocking will almost never be acceptable: ... to unblock one's own account including bot accounts"

Comments? SilkTork 20:00, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with the change, but sometimes the blocking admins says "I've blocked it because it's crazy, unblock whenever you fix it," which is a different circumstance. MBisanz 20:08, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

When my admin bot got blocked, I added a request for unblock. Otherwise it's a conflict of interest. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:00, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree, I'm just wondering how we can account for lazy blockers who trust that admin-operators won't re-start it until they've fixed the problem. MBisanz 23:06, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

"...except with the explicit consent of the blocking admin"? T. Canens (talk) 23:17, 9 May 2012 (UTC)

That's fine with me, I'm just trying to avoid situations like what Carl describes below. MBisanz 03:43, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Some change to that effect would be fine with me, as long as the WP:NOTBURO "...except with the explicit consent of the blocking admin" clause is included for use in uncontroversial cases. Anomie⚔ 01:33, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

I am an admin and I run several bots. One was blocked by MBisanz in Dec 2008 because the password could be discovered. He blocked the bot and emailed me, I fixed the problem and unblocked the bot. I don't think he expected anything else. On the other hand, if someone blocks a bot and the operator unblocks it without the permission of the blocking admin, that's a different story. I think that the permission of the blocking admin, which is usually clear from the block message, is the deciding factor. — Carl (CBM · talk) 01:37, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Admins should be allowed to unblock their own bots if the module(s) generating the problem edits have been repaired or disabled. Otherwise, we'll have pointless unblock requests sitting in the queue for hours before another admin finds it and removes it. The admin himself isn't blocked—otherwise admins could not unblock themselves if blocked by mistake! Reaper Eternal (talk) 02:12, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

For what little my opinion here is worth I also agree that the devil is in the details. Most of the time the bots are blocked for something simple that's easily fixed. Once that problem is fixed, with or without consent of the blocking admin, it seems reasonable to unblock it. Aside from that I personally think that the policy is fine doesn't need to be changed as a knee jerk reaction to a single incident scenario. Its been in place since 2008 and only now after 4 years has it come into question about 1 editor. I don't think that really qualifies as enough to need to clarify a message with clear intent. Kumioko (talk) 02:33, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Furthermore, speaking from a programmer's standpoint... sometimes the only way to know if the bot works is... to run the bot and stand ready with a kill switch if it screws things up. --Rschen7754 04:35, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

An outside opinion... We would all hope that admins are able to act rationally in such situations without a plethora of bureaucratic rules to negotiate their way through. I would change the MediaWiki message and leave the policy as it is. Victor Yus (talk) 06:51, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

If it is just a simple mistake that makes a bot task go wrong for some reason then I think the admin should be allowed to unblock and fix the problem as soon as possible. Why should we wait? If an admin directly abuses his/her bot(s) both the bot account and the admin account should be blocked. In most cases the admin would know if it was ok to unblock. But if the blocking admin think that we are somewhere in "the grey area" and it is not clear if the bot task was intented or a mistake then the blocking admin could leave a message telling "Please do not unblock the bot yourself untill the matter has been discussed". --MGA73 (talk) 07:06, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Agree. For me, there's a difference between stopping a bot that's obviously malfunctioning (editing logged out, inserting a typo), and blocking a bot that's doing something more contentious - maybe there's been a discussion about whether it should or shouldn't do X, and the discussion hasn't concluded or went the other way. In the first instance, as long as the owner is fixing it, allowing them to restart to carry out tests wouldn't be a problem. If they restart without fixing, and the bot gets stopped again, then that's into the problem area as well. In those latter cases, bot owner really needs to ensure that someone else unblocks - either blocking admin, another member of BAG, or with discussion somewhere. Continuing to run a faulty bot should be grounds for blocking the owner as well I think. Elen of the Roads (talk) 09:22, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

It should be self-evident that the restriction on unblocking oneself is also going to apply to an admin's bot accounts, non-admin sock accounts and anything similar. However, it will do no harm to spell this out. There have been more cases than "a single incident scenario" of admins controversially unblocking their own bots and not understanding this is a problem. The case of Yobot springs to mind, which was routinely unblocked when the owner disagreed with the block, and it took several ANI threads before that behaviour was stopped. I agree that an uncontroversial self-unblock after a bug fix is probably ok, but I would not be in favour of sanctioning this in policy. It should be entirely at the self-unblockers own risk to judge that the blocking admin will not object. Otherwise, what is the problem with waiting for an unblock request to be approved? The system is pretty slick and ubuearocratic and "sitting in the queue for hours" hardly seems like a major disaster to me. SpinningSpark 10:28, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Presume there's some more general principle applicable here, which might somewhere be spelt out in policy or guidelines, but anyway I would expect administrators to follow it more or less intuitively: if you have personal involvement in a matter, then you can take uncontroversial administrative actions in that matter, but should leave anything that might be controversial to someone else. (Where by uncontroversial we mean what would be uncontroversial if another admin did it.) That would be somewhat parallel to the advice given to editors who have an outside WP:Conflict of interest in some matter of encyclopedia content. If that uber-rule were generally understood and adhered to, then we wouldn't need micro-rules for every particular situation like this that may come up. And if someone shows a persistent inability to distinguish between controversial and uncontroversial actions, then it would probably be better for that person to be relieved of the burden of administratorship. Victor Yus (talk) 10:50, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

SpinningSpark, do you know if that was why the extra message was added to the editnotice? Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:04, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

It appears it was added by User:X! when he unblocked his own bot following this thread and this BRFA. Presumably he realized it was an omission given the action he was performing at the time. MBisanz 13:52, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

That is actually very funny. "I'll just do this then create a rule against it - don't want mere mortals doing it." - a statement that echoes down the history of Misplaced Pages and the human race. Rich Farmbrough, 17:33, 12 May 2012 (UTC).

• I would suggest the following alternative language: Unblocking will almost never be acceptable:...to unblock one's bot account when the block is the result of a dispute over whether the bot should be allowed to operate. With a footnote: In cases where the block was the result of an error that has been corrected, or where the block was clearly only an objection to a specific bot task and the task has been discontinued, the bot may be unblocked by its owner or any admin. An admin should be careful to err on the side of not self unblocking if there is a reasonable likelyhood that someone will object to the unblock. I think that would be consistent with generally accepted practice, while making it clear that when there is a dispute over the bots future operation, self-unblocking is not allowed. Monty₈₄₅ 19:48, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Sounds good to me. --Rschen7754 19:55, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Mmm, yes. But, I think the verbiage could be reduced or bullet pointed to demonstrate cases or something. Anyway, a straw poll on the resulting language might be useful too. --Hammersoft (talk) 20:57, 10 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Works for me. Anomie⚔ 00:42, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Looks good, though I agree it could be more terse. Also, likelihood*. — madman 01:11, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I can't disagree with the content, but must formally record an objection on grounds of instruction creep (though on Misplaced Pages that battle seems to have been lost rather disastrously a long time ago). Victor Yus (talk) 06:28, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • At first sight, that's a massive change with the potential for all sorts of unintended consequences. Do you really intend it to be that sweeping? It seemingly turns bot-owners into super-users to whom the usual rules don't apply. Is this what you meant?  Roger Davies 07:20, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Sounds okay to me, hopefully the admins don't find it too long to bother to read.  Hazard-SJ  ✈  04:13, 12 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I think this is good. It seems pretty straightforward to distinguish between cases where the operator fully agrees with and has addressed the reasons for the block and cases where the operator disagrees with and has not addressed the reasons for the block. The latter requires some discussion/etc, but with the former it should be fine for the operator to unblock and test. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 16:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

How about a nice simple "Unblocking your own account will almost never be acceptable.... Admin bot owners should not unblock their own bot unless they have the permission of the blocking admin (which may have been given at the time of the block) or another admin, or approval to restart the bot following a discussion at an appropriate noticeboard." Unless the bot is putting out a fire in the server room, it can wait the small amount of time it would take to attract the attention of another admin, or for the typical four lines of discussion at a board ("looks like Mauvebot is doing X, I've blocked it." "Mauveowner here - sorry bout that, faulty code at line 146." "Botexpert here - you need to add...." "Mauveowner here - added. Can I unblock to test" "Iluvbots here - go ahead") Elen of the Roads (talk) 10:25, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

In my new role as the resident hippy anarchist, I'd have to say that this is even worse (from the instruction creep point of view) than the previous proposal. Not only does it add extra words to read about something that ought to be obvious from general principles, but it actualy does instruct people to go through a pointless bureaucratic step in certain situations. It may be that it won't take much time, and I know it applies only to administrators who maybe enjoy this sort of thing, but it still seems to be a step against the brilliant Misplaced Pages ethos that you can go ahead and perform actions that are obviously right without having to ask permission or otherwise jump hoops. Victor Yus (talk) 11:17, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Following on the heels of Elen, noting that the server room isn't burning down if a bot isn't working, I have something very simple:

Administrators must never unblock their own account(s), including bots, without permission from the blocking administrator.

Tada. :) --Hammersoft (talk) 13:18, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

• I support that. There is no need to write reams on corner cases. If it is not abundantly uncontroversial then don't do it. SpinningSpark 13:41, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • But never does not even make allowance for "abundantly uncontroversial". That kind of rule will see people get jumped on for doing something perfectly harmless and actually beneficial, which as I say, is horribly contrary to Misplaced Pages ethos. Victor Yus (talk) 14:45, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
    • That is what WP:IAR is for: it means we don't have to have endless instruction creep with ever more detailed and complex rules. But ok, we could say "almost never" which would encompass other corner cases such as admininstrators going rogue and blocking every other admin. SpinningSpark 14:55, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Actually, admins largely don't have freedom to use the tools however they like, no matter how abundantly uncontroversial their action seems. Rather, the community by and large favours having tool use tightly constrained. Elen of the Roads (talk) 14:56, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

You may be right, but this is perhaps because such matters are only ever discussed in the context of someone having done something controversial, as a result of which rules are formulated which would have "forbidden" the controversial thing, without thought as to the side effects - the forbidding of otherwise uncontroversial things (which then become controversial just as a result of the rule). Anyway, very well, if there has to be more bureaucratic regulation and control on Misplaced Pages, let it be the admins who suffer - just as long as it doesn't lead to an increased culture of rule-making to oppress ordinary editors, who already have to contend with far too many instructions, often incomprehensible. Victor Yus (talk) 15:26, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Victor is correct (except that in this case it was uncontroversial-with-permission unblocks form years back that triggered the discussion) - we actually do want administrators to block vandals, edit protected pages, delete and recover stuff and change page protection. Otherwise we wouldn't have given them the ability. "However they like" is loaded language, certainly we want them to do good things and not do bad things, but getting all precious about admin actions builds the myth of "Admin is a big deal" - which is another thing that disheartens the community. Rich Farmbrough, 18:50, 11 May 2012 (UTC).

• Oppose "noting that the server room isn't burning down if a bot isn't working" - simply not true. Nowadays we rely on bots to clerk pages like WP:AIV and WP:DYK. When we had the SOPA blackout in January, we had to make sure that all the bots shut down gracefully so that they would be back when we returned the next day. --Rschen7754 18:59, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

• I seriously doubt an unblock request would last for a day. Failing that, a post by the owner to WP:AN I am sure would be quickly resolved. --Hammersoft (talk) 20:09, 11 May 2012 (UTC)
  • In my experience, AN/ANI posts by the blocking admin/bot operator do indeed resolve such issues almost immediately. — madman 03:08, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose - I am ok with Elen's language or similar language, but language that required invoking IAR to unblock in uncontrovertial situations is not appropriate. Rlendog (talk) 20:57, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

• I was perhaps unwise to mention IAR here, and I am sure that was not the intended meaning by Hammersoft who proposed the wording. I am fine with "without permission from the blocking admin" as an absolute rule. SpinningSpark 18:23, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Comment - Although I support changing the language of the policy to indicate that someon should not unblock their bot, it should be noted that the Arbcom already changed it by determining that it was innapropriate for Rich F to use his admin rights to unblock his bot and to use that as the primary resaon that Rich F's admin rights should be revoked. So really this discussion is rather mute since the decision has already been made. Kumioko (talk) 17:08, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• The arbitration committee has no power to change or create policy. Their decision on Rich Farnborough was based on their interpretation of existing policy. This in no way restricts the ability of the community to amend policy as they see fit. SpinningSpark 18:23, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose—If the bot owner has fixed everything the blocker complained about, there doesn't seem to be any reason not to unblock and test. ErikHaugen (talk | contribs) 16:23, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Discussion (following close)

That was some of the bizarrest logic I've ever seen. (To be more specific, it seems to assume that "should consider..." means "must and always will...".) Victor Yus (talk) 08:20, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages does not have hard rules. So while we strongly suggest things, we rarely "mandate".

That said, presumably a block of a malfunctioning bot is an indefinite one. And afaik, common practice is that when blocking any account indefinitely, an admin either makes it clear why indef, or notes the criteria for unblocking (or both).

However, I do note that this does not seem to be directly noted in the blocking policy (except somewhat in the section I noted in the close).

As it's fairly common practice, I presume it could be boldly noted in the policy. But I think I'll wait to add it til others have seen these comments, in case anyone has concerns or suggestions. - jc37 23:38, 25 June 2012 (UTC)

But even if it is common practice, we shouldn't phrase our instructions to potential unblockers on the unspoken assumption that it definitely will have been done. (Particularly when some people seem treat those latter instructions as the prescriptive type that people might be "punished" for breaching.) I would have thought that when blocking a bot, which can make many edits a minute, speed would be of the essence, so the blocking admin might well not want to spend time spelling out all the conditions - and in any case probably has better things to do than type out the obvious. Victor Yus (talk) 06:48, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

That seems only common sense. If I found a bot that needed to be stopped, I'd stop it, then look at conditions, etc. Dougweller (talk) 07:02, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps I was taking it for granted as "common sense" (as you note), but afaik, typically when blocking any account, the button is pushed, and then the reasons for it (and the criteria for unblocking) would be noted (if they weren't already made clear).

Blocking being preventative not punitive, etc etc.

Though of course, notes, warnings, and other such things often happen before "hitting the button".

Besides all this, this obviously does not preclude review of the block by another "reviewing admin". Even if the blocking admin neglects to leave such info following a block, there's nothing stopping the bot owner from placing an unblock template request (or emailing, etc.) This discussion was specifically focused on the situation where admin bot owners unblock their own bot, as well as the question of common practice of unblocking their own bot when they felt that whatever was causing it to "malfunction", was repaired.

I suppose the shortest way to describe the consensus gleaned from the discussion might be that there was clear consensus that an admin bot owner, may only unblock their own bot if: a.) it was malfunctioning and is now repaired, but b.) only if the blocking admin established that as unblocking criteria. There was fairly clear consensus that "presuming" this to be true was inappropriate.

There were a few that expressed the concern that a blocking admin may be (let's say) "neglectful" to provide this. But that simply did not have consensus to over-ride the concerns about "presumption".

Incidentally, I'm treating this thread as a "request for clarification of a close". And am responding in that light. - jc37 15:35, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure how you reach that conclusion. More people, if anything, seem to be of the view that one can make the commonsense presumption that if the reason for a block was a malfunction, then repair of the malfunction is a ground to remove the block without further bureaucratic time-wasting, and regardless of whether the blocking admin spent the time to spell out this (usually obvious) fact. Victor Yus (talk) 15:42, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Big problem. Please help.

Hello. This might not be the correct place to post this but I am lost. I have basic knowledge around Misplaced Pages's administrative pages and I find reaching someone to solve a problem is confusing, fruitless and time consuming. I have been a[REDACTED] user for years. I am a Syrian citizen and I live in Syria, and most of my contributions to Misplaced Pages are about minor articles regarding my country. Now, my government has been blocking wikimedia for years now and thus we can't view Misplaced Pages properly because all images and illustrations are messed up. That is why we all use anonymizers to bypass this problem. When we do this, we are always banned from editing as collateral damage. Right now, I am using my original IP address to write this and believe me it is not pleasant. I have contacted an admin whose blocks I often encounter and he/she seems to be busy these days. My appreciation for his/her concern stands true regardless. Please, I need this problem fixed. Check my IP address and confirm that I am connecting from Syria. Why can't an admin unblock a username? Too complicated? (not being sarcastic here as I am not knowledgeable in that matter).

Thank you and I apologize if I misplaced this post. I just really REALLY want a solution for this. REMcrazy (talk) 18:13, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

I have replied on your talk page. Egg Centric 21:33, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

I also will respond to the talkpage soon. -- DQ (ʞlɐʇ) 21:52, 15 May 2012 (UTC)

innocent prisoner's dilemma

In cases where significant doubts regarding the innocence or guilt of an editor exist in the community, forcing the editor to make admissions of guilt as a prerequisite to unblocking could punish innocent editors, or reward guilty ones in an innocent prisoner's dilemma.

I suggest this addition to policy, as I don't think wiki-justice is perfect.

_{disclaimer: I wrote the article.} Penyulap ☏ 10:02, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

There is no requirement that an editor be forced to do anything, so there is no need to add that suggestion to the policy. In particular, it is not a good idea to link to an article that introduces a range of concepts that are unrelated to the policy. A proposal along the above lines should be raised at WP:VPR with some examples showing that extending the policy is necessary (as opposed to covering a theoretical possibility). What would be desirable is that an editor seeking an unblock should provide an outline showing an understanding of the problem, and a plausible explanation of how future problems would be avoided. Johnuniq (talk) 10:32, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

If there is significant doubt, then that is cause for an agf unblock. But what are the circumstances in which significant doubt could arise? For a registered account, there can be no doubt that the account actually made the edits in question. It is open to the blocked editor to make a case that their edits were not, in fact, disruptive. This does not require any admission of guilt and will result in an unblock if the argument is accepted. If the blocked editor claims they did not make the edits because their little brother/friend/cat did it, then I am afraid the reaction would be to extend the block to indefinite as a compromised account. On the other hand, if it is the view of the reviewing admin that the editor is indeed being disruptive, as Johnuniq says, a believable assurance that it won't happen again is needed before unblocking. The only plausible circumstance the "I didn't do it" defence makes any sense at all is for IP editors either on a shared IP or WP:DUCK blocks of dynamic IP ranges. In the majority of cases this defence is merely trolling. Good faith editors caught in this kind of block using school or library computers should be strongly urged to open an account. The point Penyulap seems to be missing is that blocks are not meant to punish anyone but rather to protect the encyclopedia. While we do our very best to limit collateral damage to good faith editors, this is not a good enough reason for an unblock where we believe the damage would continue once unblocked - unless the collateral damage is extensive such as a too wide rangeblock. SpinningSpark 15:15, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

The point you're missing is that in reality blocks of registered users are very frequently intended as a punishment for some ill-defined "disruption" or other, a concept idiosyncratically defined by each individual administrator to suit the purpose; to believe otherwise displays an unbelievable degree of naivety. "Disruption" so far as Misplaced Pages is concerned quite simply means "an opinion I don't agree with". Malleus Fatuorum 15:33, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Malleus, you may possibly be right, but the problem you describe is not being addressed by this proposal and is not a solution for it. As I said, "significant doubt" should simply result in an unblock. Whether or not there is significant doubt is a matter of judgement. If the reviewing admin believes there is significant doubt it would be utterly perverse to demand an admission of guilt first. Do we have any examples of that happening? As far as I am concerned, unblocking will happen when the blocked editor credibly undertakes not to continue with the actions that got them blocked, regardless of whether or not they "admit" to those actions being "wrong". SpinningSpark 17:28, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

But that makes no sense if the blockee considers they've done nothing wrong, and is exactly what the prisoner's dilemma is addressing: "I agree to say whatever it is that you want me to say so that I can be unblocked". Malleus Fatuorum 18:04, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

I frequently see blocked editors argue that the block is unfair, even though they have been made aware of the policy the are breaching. What they are really arguing is that the policy is unfair. They may be right, and I don't require them to agree that it is fair, just that they will not continue to breach it until such time as they, or someone else, can get it changed. This is an entirely different issue to admins blocking for non-policy reasons. Making a policy aimed at admins who don't take any notice of policy does not strike me as a solution that is likely to work, nor is it the problem that is being addressed by the proposal. SpinningSpark 18:29, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

But you're failing to address a key issue here; how is "disruption" to be measured, and by whom? The blocking administrator, who in many cases is simply saying "I don't agree with this, and if you don't stop I'll block you"? Malleus Fatuorum 19:12, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Pretty much. Nobody Ent 21:36, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

Since when was policy an end in itself? causa sui (talk) 19:34, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

No, policy is not an end in itself, but administrators have no authority to make up policy themselves, most especially blocking policy. To answer Malleus' point, this policy page gives details of what is to be considered disruption. If you think that needs tightening, by all means make a suggestion, but your point seems to be that some admins are going to ignore it anyway so it would seem the problem you are bringing here, if it really exists, is not going to be solved on this policy page. SpinningSpark 10:16, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Should a blocked user be forced to take sides when a dispute has broken out over the original block, rather than examining the original block on it's own. Would removal of the block pending further bad behaviour by the banned editor be a better standard of proof than punishing integrity by creating the dilemma. Excluding requirements of admission in disputed cases and examining further behaviour on it's own would solve the problem, but appeals do not always succeed in a manner that is 'perfect'. Penyulap ☏ 22:25, 31 May 2012 (UTC)

As explained above, no one is forced to do anything. No, we should not remove blocks simply to see if the user repeats the problem. The reason we have many problematic users is that their first couple of blocks were removed too quickly, without due reason for the unblock. If a blocked editor does not provide a convincing request for an unblock (see outline by SpinningSpark above), they should go to another website until the block expires. Unblocks where the user has not expressed any understanding of the problem only encourage a belief that the user was fully correct all along, and that they should repeat their behavior. Johnuniq (talk) 07:10, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Force is exactly what the discussion is about, I'm wondering if you want to investigate the issue in detail this time. Penyulap ☏ 12:30, 1 Jun 2012 (UTC)

No, this is all about Rich Farmborough, who was banned from using AWB, used AWB and got caught out, and is now facing the consequences. That's the fact, everything else is a ridiculous smokescreen. The guy has even put his hands up and said he's done it, and apologised. Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:40, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Well it's hard to argue with that logic, except that Rich is not claiming to be innocent, or likely to, and then there is the appeals process, and Rich is cool with making apologies as am I. I don't think it applies to him so much as actual innocent editors in general who may be blocked by mistake. I don't want to address any single incident, if that were the case I would tailor my strategy to the case in hand rather than taking the sometimes longer route of adjusting policy, and then gaining retrospective application of it. I wish to clarify if we are comfortable working under the assumption that all blocks are correct and justified in all cases, and as a result, we should ask blocked editors appealing the block that they make admissions, which, if they are innocent, would amount to lies. Such a policy filters out honest people, keeping them out of[REDACTED] whilst rewarding the editors who are happy to lie to us, by welcoming them back to the project.

Also, although I can see the future, and maybe I just forgot that I foresaw Rich getting banned, in the future, at the time that I edited the policy page, I figure you may be mistaken where you are saying "No, this is all about Rich Farmborough".

Obviously, something brought the flaws in the policy to my attention, (there is no button to click that says 'fix this policy' omg, I have to make one for my talkpage, what a laugh !) The matter that alerted me is the block appeal here I made for someone who quite a few editors thought was innocent of any wrongdoing. In fact, I think a few suggested he was doing a good thing. That block appeal is no secret, I mention and link to the page and article which I was quite surprised did not exist on english wikipedia, so rather than write some essay I figure do something more useful by documenting the concept itself, and link to that. I mentioned that I was looking at the possible flaws of unblocking policy and guidelines, and I also linked to the article I wrote, you can find both links here.

You've been here on[REDACTED] longer than I have Elen, so do you think it is more useful if I illustrate the concept using an essay or an article ? Maybe as an article, people won't consider it properly, as they have an ingrained mindset that the concepts they should apply exist only in the[REDACTED] world, and not the real one. I see ‎SarekOfVulcan has nominated the article for deletion as soapboxing, I invite you to comment on that discussion as a critic. Penyulap ☏ 14:38, 1 Jun 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm, so this comes from your desire to support an editor who was blocked for throwing rude epithets at Japanese editors. Nice one. Elen of the Roads (talk) 15:33, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

I seem to have missed the bit where you provided a diff to where Histiographer was asked to admit guilt. SpinningSpark 16:20, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Spinningspark,... there is no diff given as this has only an incidental, if any at all, relation to that case. This is about the future effects of a possibly flawed policy.

Elen,...Not at all. That case has basically closed and it was thoroughly examined. It did however raise interesting questions, for example there were editors who suggest that the banned editor was guilty, as you seem to have noticed, and there were other editors who made comments such as this

• ..looks to me like someone ... attempting attempting to show empathy, ... the proper response isn't a block, but some wikilove.
• I highly agree, has the blocking admin been contacted?
• I very much disagree with you. This block is significantly out of proportion. ...a block is not warranted here, a warning is.
• Good advice, if accompanied by stronger language than necessary.
• A week would have been defensible, not three months
• ..looks...more like a user tired of edit wars who is giving out good advice to fellow Koreans.
• I would be inclined to view his remarks as basically meaning "Don't let the Japanese trolls get you down". The parenthetical remark literally means "Don't throw bait"

The user was banned in the end, however it does raise interesting questions, the obvious question is, what if, in future, someone was innocent ? naturally there is the superficial response 'nobody is innocent, everyone banned is guilty' idea, the logic of which is questionable. The more mature consideration is to accept the fact that mistakes do occur, or at the least, are possible. That being the case, would demanding an admission be in effect filtering out the hypothetical 'innocent editors' who cannot lie, whilst rewarding and welcoming those editors who are most willing to lie, and do it convincingly.

So, is it a good idea to have a policy which, hypothetically or not, filters out the good editors, and is more inclined to collect the people who are unwelcome in the community ? Penyulap ☏ 16:46, 1 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I don't know how many times we have to say this, but blocked editors are not required to admit guilt. Historiographer is not banned and will be able to edit again once the block expires. No one is maintaining that mistakes never get made, that is why there is an appeals process. Historiographer is able to use that process at any time. SpinningSpark 17:17, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages does not maintain a prison system. Nobody Ent 23:00, 1 June 2012 (UTC)

Exile.

Change your socks and climb back over the wall. Climb ? well, it's a walk, or a gentle stroll really. Why can't I get Chief Wiggum out of my head here ? I thought Indonesian prisons were lenient by comparison, but then again, if[REDACTED] ran a prison, HA! Still, it is the same concept, exile. Pointless to make it 'indef' too, should be like 5 years or something, so we can get back the ones who do mature. Penyulap ☏ 06:18, 3 Jun 2012 (UTC)

Link

This edit request has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Hello.

I am proposing the addition of a link to Block (Internet) in the lead paragraph on the bolded word. Thank you. 69.155.128.40 (talk) 05:21, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Y done Penyulap ☏ 06:48, 17 Jun 2012 (UTC)

RfC: third party request for unblock

Should this be added

"A third party may request the review of a block at the Administrators' noticeboard."

Penyulap ☏ 14:06, 27 Jun (UTC)

• I think there should be a procedure for review of blockings. Currently, there seems not to be a way to question an overly harsh block simply becuase the block editor is now gone. Maybe he wouldn't be gone if the block wasn't excessively harsh. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 14:18, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
• I think it warrants a mention as there are differing assumptions on the matter. Penyulap ☏ 14:20, 27 Jun 2012 (UTC)
• While I agree in principal that any user should be able to request review of any administrative action that they feel was wrong, I think we should be careful not to burden blocking admins with reviews just because we think they may have been a bit harsh. Review at AN/I or AN should primarily be for cases where the block was fundamentally defective, and the person should not have been blocked at all, or where the block duration was contrary to policy (such as an indef IP block on a first offense). In such clear cases, anyone should be able to request review if, after trying to discuss it with the blocking admin, the issue is unresolved. What we should not do is invite second guessing of admins over discretionary block lengths for conduct that was properly blockable. First, many times a blocked editor who requests an unblock and demonstrates that they understand what they did wrong and will make a good faith effort to avoid similar conduct will be unblocked without the need for an extended discussion. Second, where the blocked editor is not making the request, it can be hard to tell if they even understand why they were blocked. Finally, we want to respect the discretion of the blocking admin, and don't want a process that encourages those with an axe to grind to endlessly drag admins to the drama boards. Monty₈₄₅ 14:42, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

would it be better if the original blocking admin has nothing to do with the review of the block ? Penyulap ☏ 14:50, 27 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I would say the blocking admin almost *must* be a part of that process, or must have given an extremely clear rationale for the block, so that people know why it occured. -- Avanu (talk) 14:53, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• As Monty says, there are times a review is warranted. However, many times people use process to harass. Considering that anyone is able to request a block or adverse action against an editor, the converse should also be true. Admins should be able to figure out when something needs to be closed and when it is worth discussing, an easy rule of thumb would be simply when quite a few editors join the request by affirming that it worth discussion. We are, after all, supposed to operate on egalitarian consensus here. -- Avanu (talk) 14:53, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• It should be included, yes. Perhaps with a caveat that abusing the block review request process will result in a WP:BOOMERANG? - Jorgath (talk) 15:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

In way, leaving it open makes it less likely to be abused. If we don't forbid a third party person from making a request, then the assumption is that they can, and if we don't mention it either, people aren't as tempted to use it. There's probably an elegant way to make the point without making it too strongly. -- Avanu (talk) 15:10, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

The assumption is that the can for some people, and the assumption is that they can't for other people, leaving it up to assumption leads to confusion, and policy documents avoid that. Addressing the issue of abuse in some other way, rather than using murky conflicting assumptions of policy to do so, may be less work for everyone in the end. Simply establishing a consensus (on the block) in the usual way, directing new enquiries to the old consensus, and updating it if things change is a familiar path and process which people would have less difficulty with. Penyulap ☏ 15:42, 27 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I agree. Best to minimize confusion. I propose a modification of your original wording to this: "An editor in good standing may request that another editor be unblocked by starting a review of the block on the Administrator's Noticeboard. Editors are cautioned that making an excessive number of these requests against consensus may be considered disruption, and may lead to community sanctions against them. No request should be made in this fashion if the blocked editor has an ongoing unblock request on their own talk page, nor if the blocked editor has stated that they do not wish to be unblocked at the present time." - Jorgath (talk) 16:44, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• No; the blocked user should have indicated they want a block review - the only time a third party would make it is if the user has not been told how to request unblock, but does want to be unblocked. On the issue of block reviews (raised primarily by monty), I have seen several admins improve their approach significantly where although there was a consensus for a block, the consensus was that the duration be changed. If admins are not open to feedback or to occasionally having their actions subject to review or to being responsive to changes in circumstances, then they are not learning from experience. Admins are significantly protected under this policy, but it is not to the point of being immune from comment about the use of their discretion just because some do not consider it significantly problematic enough yet. The idea is to improve and resolve in the early stage rather than wait until it is too late or extreme (by which time the inevitable complaint will be "wish I had a better chance to improve before I developed this habit or got tot his point"). Ncmvocalist (talk) 16:03, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Actually, the message you get when you're blocked says how to appeal, whether or not the admin adds the template. MediaWiki:Blockedtext --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 16:57, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• If a block is bad, it should not matter if the blocked editor wants to be unblocked or not - if someone goes into jail for stealing stuff in a shop, but turns out to be innocent - it then does not matter whether the person wants to go back to that shop, however, the person should be taken out of jail - here the situation could be that someone is innocent and blocked, but we leave the person guilty because the person may not want to go back to editing (is it me, or could there be BLP issues here ...). If an editor, or a group of editors, think that a block was completely wrong, communication with the blocking admin and/or a community discussion on AN or AN/I (the latter with notification to the blocking admin) is the way forward. That does not mean that the blocking admin is a bad admin - it can just be that a block was applied mistakenly. --Dirk Beetstra 17:24, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

would it be fair to say that if the block appears to the blocked party to be impolite or spiteful, then the blocked editor is less likely to appeal, AND the block is less likely to be in harmony with community standards ? Penyulap ☏ 18:06, 27 Jun 2012 (UTC)

Does anyone think we should turn this into a full RFC? - Jorgath (talk) 18:42, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Should we add "If you want to edit an article, you may click the 'Edit' button" too? It seems like we have instructions for every possible scenario these days. causa sui (talk) 19:01, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Actually, this is in response to a recent debate in just such an WP:AN discussion over whether or not third parties could begin an unblock request/block review. - Jorgath (talk) 19:06, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  How can that even be a question? The fact that they asked the question starts it. Are we to the point where we are going to "procedural decline" a request to review a sysop action because the request was not 'filed' through the 'proper channels' and according to 'procedure'? Should I go speedy delete WP:BURO right now? --causa sui (talk) 19:16, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  *shrug* I have no idea how that idea came up, but it did. And if it's uncontentious to say this, then why not say it? - Jorgath (talk) 19:24, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Third parties may request a review of a block right after they occur (and often does happen), but they CANNOT request unblock on behalf of someone else, or a review down the road (✉→BWilkins←✎) 19:34, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

  Is that to avoid having a sock or meat puppet try to unblock the puppetmaster? - Jorgath (talk) 19:43, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• Yes, I do believe a full RFC is appropriate for this topic. Penyulap ☏ 19:52, 27 Jun 2012 (UTC)

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Should the above proposed change, "A third party may request the review of a block at the Administrators' noticeboard," or some variation of that change, be added to this policy per the above discussion? - Jorgath (talk) 19:56, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

• I would have thought we already do this under the pseudo-policy of "discuss/debate this at the various appropriate forums" like WP:AN, ANI, the user's talk, RP:RFU etc. It's almost like we are opening an RfC on the idea of being able to open an RfC on a user's block, which answers its own question.. Not that I begrudge such an RfC being opened.... S.G. _ping! 22:45, 27 June 2012 (UTC)
  • We do and we don't. Since the official policy doesn't say it one way or the other, some people say "you can do this, no doubt" and some people say "you can't do this at all." Furthermore, it'd be good to establish the "where" and "how" of doing this so that we have a consistent process, and we need to set it up to avoid abuse, especially sock abuse. Above, I proposed a specific variation:

An editor in good standing may request that another editor be unblocked by starting a review of the block on the Administrator's Noticeboard. Editors are cautioned that making an excessive number of these requests against consensus may be considered disruption, and may lead to community sanctions against them. No request should be made in this fashion if the blocked editor has an ongoing unblock request on their own talk page, nor if the blocked editor has stated that they do not wish to be unblocked at the present time.

"In good standing" is the critical phrase. I'd be willing to edit it further to block out non-autoconfirmed editors, and to especially exclude people who were also sanctioned in the same dispute as the blocked editor. - Jorgath (talk) 23:15, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

I see adding this phrase as an invitation to a bottomless pit. First, if a blocked editor wants to be unblocked, he can say so. If for some reason his Talk page rights are revoked, there are procedures for protesting that as well. If he doesn't want it badly enough to follow the procedures, that's his decision. So, what we would really be doing by adding this sentence is inviting everyone to evaluate administrative decisions just because someone thinks it was wrong. As if we don't already have enough procedural quagmires as it is, this would add yet another layer. Moreover, even without the sentence, editors can trot over to ANI or AN and complain about the harshness of some block or some ban or some something. But, with this change, we would send out explicit invitations to do so. Don't we have better things to do?--Bbb23 (talk) 23:47, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

That's a fair point for sure, it would lead to more requests if people knew they could actually make a request. However, this has less to do with the blocked editor. It has a lot more to do with the whole community, not standing around the 'corpse' of their long time buddy. (ok a corpse is dramatic, but haven't you ever seen a good editor lost ?) you may well know what to do, but other good editors do not.

A good editor often has some justifiable pride, or at least self respect, and if they believe they have been badly mistreated by a blocking admin, it might be more about the editor forced to bow down to someone he despises and less about the editor having respect for the wider community. When the block has clear support and backing by the community, demonstrated by many individual voices, rather than assumption alone, doesn't that make the block stronger ? If anyone can say 'that was a good block' then regular editors can show support for our admins, as it is now, it's not as strong.

" editors can trot over to ANI or AN " well, it took me 12 months to find that out. Seeing great editors banned has a demoralising effect upon me, if the system presents itself as unjust, or at least unaccountable, it's not possible to have as much faith in it. If we could give everyone more of a say, we'd give everyone more faith in the system. Penyulap ☏ 01:07, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• I would like to propose an alternative version:

Third party requests for block review

Third parties may request a review of a block at WP:AN/I. Third parties considering such a request are advised that:

• as with any other dispute, before escalating to a noticeboard discussion should first be attempted with the other party to the dispute, in this case the blocking admin
• Admins are afforded a reasonable amount of discretion when it comes to their use of the tools, review is not meant to second guess that discretion and should be reserved for cases where the block was clearly against policy or is extremely unreasonable in length
• during the course of a block review, it is likely that the history of the requesting editor will be examined and they should be wary of WP:BOOMERANG
• Engaging in Sockpuppetry or Block Evasion to submit a request for review is unlikely to be positively received, and may result in additional blocks and/or block extensions. A blocked editor who requests such a review should make the request on their talk page, or in the case talk page access is revoked, through either the Unblock Ticket Request System or Arbcom ban appeals subcommittee, and should not submit it in the guise of a third party request

I think the above would make it clear enough that block reviews should only be requested in the case of really bad blocks and would discourage excessive block review requests. Monty₈₄₅ 00:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Heh, you have a lot more faith than I do in the ability of some to read past the first sentence. Looks like a multi-factorial test one might find in a legal decision - not that it isn't admirably written and sensible on its face - it's just a lot of words to wade through. I stick with my simple "no".--Bbb23 (talk) 00:51, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I like it with some small changes. Edit to the first sentence - "In certain cases, third parties may request..." Then replace the second sentence with "Third parties are advised that such requests must be made civilly and in good faith, or risk sanctions of their own." Other than that, there might be some minor copy-editing, though I don't have time right this second to fine-comb it. But I like it. - Jorgath (talk) 01:05, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

It does raise a valid point that blocked editors would exhaust their sock supply / internet cafe visits / friends in a venue where they are expected, rather than in article space. Penyulap ☏ 01:10, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I dunno, the two aren't mutually exclusive.--Bbb23 (talk) 01:22, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't understand, what I mean to say is, that it creates a sock laundry somewhere away from article space or wherever else they would go, so it is like you say, a price we pay, it does create an extra can of worms, but some fishermen like worms :) and so we get a stronger community by people being able to say 'and stay out !!!!!' or 'just you hang on a moment !!' bringing the admins and editors closer together, and addressing editor retention as well. Penyulap ☏ 01:37, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

The fundamental difficulty with permitting – in all but the most limited circumstances – involutary and unsolicited reviews of one's blocks at the instigation of a third party is that sometimes the third party is a jackass.

Suppose that I've been blocked. I figure that I'm too pissed off by the situation to deal with it at the moment, and decide to get a good night's sleep. Twelve hours later, I return to Misplaced Pages calm and refreshed, willing and able to marshal a coherent and rational argument. I discover that in my absence a third party has taken up my cause, and fought a bitter and acrimonious battle on AN/I while I slept. (The third party may have a previous history with the admin in question, or be a POV-pushing partisan in an area where I edit, or just generally like to stir shit up on noticeboards. They may be acting entirely in good faith, but just be incompetent or overly emotional.) My case gets lost in an inconclusive mess of mutual accusations of bad faith and bickering over tangential issues.

No matter what follows, any appeal I might make has been tainted by the original third-party request. The noticeboards will already be fatigued by my issue; I won't have the opportunity to present my defence to a fresh audience. Not only do I have to respond to questions about my own conduct, but I also have to distance myself from my overzealous supporter(s). What could have been a viable unblock request instead gets closed as 'no consensus'.

I think all experienced Misplaced Pages editors have been in situations where they've thought of another user "I think you're right, but it would be sooo much easier to agree with you if you knew when to shut up." The well-meaning but inept would be problem enough; throw in the third-party busybodies with their own independent axes to grind and you're asking for real trouble. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 02:11, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

This. Oh, so very This. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 02:30, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

oh god I know where you are coming from there, being, you know, myself. So half the time I'm like should I stick up for this poor editor here, at the risk of making it ten times worse ? like ani right now, I think someone talks too much and said so, bad move right there, me, telling someone else they talk too much ? open my talkpage archive and crash your browser, my archive killed miszabot, twice, so I don't think there will be support there.

Maybe a user can leave a note on their talkpage, that they intend to deal with it, or a limit to say 'only after a week' or a week after the last comment or some such. Penyulap ☏ 02:37, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Question. Are we discussing third party requests in which the third party has already approached the blocking admin? Did I miss that part of the discussion? No snark intended, I looked and could not see where this had been mentioned. Personally, I have no problems discussing blocks I've made. To a point, of course. Watching recent changes I could make a couple dozen blocks a week (or more on occasion). Being interrogated over even a fraction of those could be tiring, but I'm always willing. Tiderolls 02:41, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't think you'd need to address the block at all, to establish a consensus, it has to be reasonably put forward, and as you made the block, that's the same as say the original editor who put text in an article, it's a given that you support. The only difference might be the level of consensus required, but in clear cases that's easy. 99% of blocks are a no-brainer anyway. Penyulap ☏ 11:49, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Support Generally speaking, I don't see why not. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 03:43, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• Comment Would a reasonable compromise be to require more than one third-party editor in such a request? That would make it slightly harder to bring dilatory requests for unblock. Sort of like requiring a 'second'. -- Avanu (talk) 04:49, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

  What sort of mechanic would there be for finding a person to second the request without it rewarding canvasing? Monty₈₄₅ 05:39, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

  do you mean like using a/the block template on the blocked users page?

  Avanu, would it be like finding a regular consensus, or something new ? Penyulap ☏ 11:49, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• I don't think that this would be a good idea, per TenOfAllTrades above, and simply because if the blocked user does not want to contest the block themselves there is no reason to waste the time of others and produce drama about it.  Sandstein  05:43, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Comment Many old-timers will tell you that third parties have been requesting unblocks, block reviews—and different variations of those—at AN and AN/I for years. These often happen when a person is mentoring somebody that has been blocked. I think IAR may be sufficient in this case without adding additional wording. 64.40.54.121 (talk) 07:00, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

the price we have been paying in editor retention is too high for keeping this 'secret knowledge', took me more than a year to realise that there is no defined process for a third party unblock, I even made a graphic for my tp as part of the illogic of this secret knowledge. Penyulap ☏ 12:05, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Unnecessary: Any admin action can be reviewed in this manner. I don't see any reason to explicitly call blocks out.—Kww(talk) 10:46, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

  BWilkins says "they CANNOT request unblock on behalf of someone else, or a review down the road" I think there should be clarity on the issue. Penyulap ☏ 12:09, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• It's a wiki. Yes, there should be more clarity on the issue. I agree with Penyulaps point about editor retention and with IP 64.40.54.121 — except that additional wording probably is needed, to make it clear that anybody can initiate a review on ANI. It has been the case for years that we all have this right, but you see how it took Penyulap 12 months to find out he could even post on AN and ANI? IAR is indeed not enough; what do newbies know about IAR? For those who fear opening the floodgates to "inept" block reviews: Misplaced Pages doesn't operate on the hierarchic principle "I'm clueful; you're inept; s/he's a jackass". If you start a review and your argument is without merit, it'll either be snowed under or ignored, and you will hopefully have learned something; if it has merit, other people will post in the thread to agree or protest, and depending on consensus it'll either end with an unblock or not. Why should WP:BLOCK call for an extra layer of bureaucracy and rule creep, by (implicitly) saying that you need to ask first? Only admins can block and unblock, but it's certainly not the case that only admins can review stuff on ANI. Be bold: just review. That is the principle that should be inserted into the block policy, for information; because it's unjust that only the wp savvy and the habitués should be aware that ANI is there and that this is one of the ways you can use it.

Please don't let's hear any more about ineptness and jackasses. Jackasses are a problem in all[REDACTED] processes; we get lots of foolish article edits, and still we allow anybody to post them; people don't have to ask permission first, because it's the encyclopedia anybody can edit. We get many inept FAC nominations, and we still don't have any rule preventing people from posting them. For that matter, ANI itself is clogged up with posts asking admins to block the guy the poster is in conflict with because "he was rude to me by saying my edit was bad". Why should the particular matter of third-party block reviews be elitist and newbie-unfriendly, when we normally strive to keep all our processes free of such thinking, and we normally put up with the (considerable) inconveniences resulting from ignorance or stubbornness? It's still a wiki.

I'll try to formulate suitable informational wording in an hour or two, when I get home, unless somebody gets in there before me (as I'm rather hoping they will). Bishonen | talk 12:20, 28 June 2012 (UTC).

awesome. here is the link to my archive which would be hard to find otherwise, I'll find the userpage I posted the templates at as well, maybe it's of interest as an illustration or for study, of for humour :) Penyulap ☏ 13:57, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

here is the discussion, and the history of the user talkpage. Penyulap ☏ 14:00, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Seriously Blocks are only to be undone when they are found to be a) policy non-compliant, or b) the editor submits a WP:GAB-compliant unblock. Admins are trusted to be impartial, and there are often more "background" things that 3rd parties cannot be/are not aware of. Admins are also trusted to implement any blocks using the same logic. WP:IDONTLIKEIT is not a valid reason to request someone else's unblock, and wasting the communities time by reviewing blocks needlessly is indeed a waste. The only time a third party should go to ANI/AN to request a review is when a) they themselves understand the related policy, and b) its policy non-compliant. That is why it's usually an admin who opens up 3rd party reviews. Allowing a 3rd party to actually place an unblock template is an abuse, because it's clearly non GAB-compliant (✉→BWilkins←✎) 12:26, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• There's two situations we should be looking at. 1) The block was appropriate or 2) the block wasn't. If the block was appropriate, the only person who should be able to request an unblock is the blocked editor. In that, they can explain whether they understand the reasons for block and changes they intend to make, i.e. a WP:GAB compliant block request, as per Bwilkins above. If the block was not appropriate, a case can be made (at any time), currently at AN or ANI. This is a perfectly normal review of admin actions, as kww said above. I'm a little unsure as to where the confusion lies. Worm(talk) 12:36, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I think the confusion is because both Penyulap and Avanu have had wrists slapped regarding this? (✉→BWilkins←✎) 12:41, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I guess I should watch AN/ANI more! Worm(talk) 12:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Hey, BWilkins... when exactly was this wrist slapping that you are talking about? Strange that you should make a comment like that when I haven't even seen the evidence to support it. I don't even know anything about Penylap except via this request, and the third-party request that started all this wasn't even started by *either* of us, it was started by an editor named Arcandam, and I actually have no idea what their motivation was for requesting the unblock, except I assume it seemed like a bad block. I was unaware at that time that a block had even taken place. So, please enlighten us with this "wrist slapping" that we supposedly endured and why it supposedly happened, because as far as I can tell that never happened. -- Avanu (talk) 22:38, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I think there are several incidents that all lead to this actually. However I do not recall getting my wrist or anything else slapped, however, if anyone thinks I do need a slap on my bum, I'll be happy to bare it in their general direction to assist the process. Penyulap ☏ 03:53, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Nothing in my comments should be interpreted as allowing third-parties to actually use {{unblock}}. I just consider my blocks to be reviewable at standard forums.—Kww(talk) 13:35, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• I'm unsure where the confusion lies, too. Bwilkins. Was anything in your post meant to contradict anything in mine? Because I don't see that it does. As for {{unblock}}, I haven't addressed it; obviously, it's not allowed to be placed by third parties. I'm discussing review on AN/ANI, and I think there should be something about it in the policy. Wasting the community's time by reviewing blocks needlessly is a waste of time, yes; so is dealing with inappropriate article edits; so is fixing inept FAC nominations. Should we make those and a host of other stuff permission-only, too? (Rhetorical question.) We waste a lot of time here. It can't be helped, it's a wiki. Bishonen | talk 13:51, 28 June 2012 (UTC).
• I'd like to formulate alternative text, to encompass the opposition to the proposed changes. Bwilkins, Worm That Turned, you seem to understand the view best, would you help with some text that can be added, so that people can understand better the circumstances in which it is allowed. Something to combine the following for example

'The only time a third party should go to ANI/AN to request a review is when a) they themselves understand the related policy, and b) its policy non-compliant.' and 'the only person who should be able to request an unblock is the blocked editor'

• that would help clear things up if it can be added to the policy page. Penyulap ☏ 06:32, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• I think Kww puts it in an interesting way: "I just consider my blocks to be reviewable at standard forums." From my perspective, this proposal is to clearly and explicitly say that any admin's blocks are reviewable by the community at AN or AN/I. And block-evading, excessively time-wasting, or pointy block review requests should be treated like any other disruptions at those forums. - Jorgath (talk) 14:07, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

• I've now changed Avanu's proposed wording from

If an editor feels a block has been improperly issued, they can ask for that decision to be reviewed. See Appealing a block for instructions. Administrators are able to "unblock" a user when they feel the block is unwarranted or no longer appropriate.

to

If an editor feels a block has been improperly issued, they can can initiate a review of that block on WP:ANI. Administrators are able to "unblock" a user when they feel the block is unwarranted or no longer appropriate.

It probably does need some instructions added, and they may be thorny to formulate without too much instruction creep. Please feel free to tweak etc. But the link to Appealing a block really wasn't helpful. The instructions on that page are for the blocked user, and would surely mislead a third party into placing an unblock template on the blocked user's page. Bishonen | talk 14:19, 28 June 2012 (UTC).

I feel that at the moment, the phrase 'third party' is required somewhere in a proposal, to counter the overwhelming first party focus of the docs/policy/guidelines/templates. unless it's the title of the section, sorry, I wasn't clear on that. Penyulap ☏ 14:39, 28 Jun 2012 (UTC)

We could just take Bishonen's version and correct "an editor" to "a third-party editor." - Jorgath (talk) 14:41, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

How about a implied permission via a cautionary statement like: "Third-party editors should take care in filing an unblock request for another editor to ensure that the unblock is desired or warranted." -- Avanu (talk) 15:03, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Both Jorgath's and Avanu's suggestions sound fine to me. Bishonen | talk 15:17, 28 June 2012 (UTC).

• Comment. Seems like a lot of folks have dived into solution mode. Where is the clear definition of the problem that this solution is intended to solve along with practical examples of where it would be helpful. I'm not seeing it in this discussion, just a lot of ideas and someone diving in and amending a policy page. Leaky Caldron 14:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I think the general idea among supporters of this is that since we operate on consensus anyway, there should be no reason that another, perhaps more experienced editor, couldn't file an unblock request on behalf of someone. The decision would still be made by an impartial admin or by a group of editors under the rules of consensus. The worry is that people will be encouraged to file dilatory requests instead of just leaving it alone. -- Avanu (talk) 15:03, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Is this going to be implemented by a narrow consensus on this page or via an RFC as mentioned somewhere above? Leaky Caldron 15:15, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

This is a talkpage RfC, please see these instructions. Penyulap even advertised it on ANI. Though if this drags out, I guess it would be even better to move his announcement to AN. He omitted calling it "RfC" in the header, that's all. I've put that in. (Please nobody try telling me it's obligatory to use the template provided on the RfC page. It isn't.) Bishonen | talk 15:38, 28 June 2012 (UTC).

I had no idea it was the RFC and there is discussion above about whether it requires an RFC. This is a significant policy. Rather than relying on page lurking can I suggest that the community is informed via MediaWiki:Watchlist-details. The RFC on WP:V changes fell foul of precisely this failure to communicate to the wider community last year. Not everyone with a view hangs out at WP:ANI, WP:CENT etc. Leaky Caldron 15:52, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

Page lurking? As I mentioned, Penyulap advertised it on ANI. Here. That's how I found out about it, and I should have thought most of the others who have commented here, too. It looks like quite a few people noticed it. Anyway, Jorgath has now asked for it to be put on the watchlists. We'll have to see if it's considered important enough for that. Bishonen | talk 18:49, 28 June 2012 (UTC).

I looked at the nav template at AN and advertised on any board I thought is involved in blocking, however, given that this effects everyone (Newbies, experienced editors who have conflicting views, and editor retention) I agree that it should be suggested for the watchlist. Penyulap ☏ 03:32, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• I tend to think this is unnecessary. Currently, a third party can ask for review if they think the admin's actions were inappropriate, out of policy, mistaken or abuse. We see this from time to time as it is, and I support them for even the most borderline cases. This is how we develop consensus on what is block-worthy, and how long of a block is too long. On the other side, if it just a simple "I've learned my lesson, I won't do it again" unblock, then ANI isn't needed, as there is already a process in place and typically the same admin won't respond twice, and multiple requests for unblock (to a point) are generally tolerated. And yes, occassionally, I see 3rd parties asking for review for another editor and present a compelling case, enough so that it is considered there at AN or ANI. My fear is that this policy change would be easy to abuse by some who don't like admins in general, to where blocks are constantly being second guessed, become a source for unnecessary drama, while not actually accomplishing the goal of avoiding bad blocks. There is a fine line between being fully accountable, and having to explain every block action you do that an editor just disagrees with but is otherwise within policy, and this would allow that. Since we already have reviews of questionable blocks at ANI, I don't see the need to change the policy in this overly general way. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 19:24, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

I don't think anyone has suggested that the request requires a response, wouldn't it sit and go stale like anything else that has no merit, or provoke discussion like anything else does. The primary concerns in raising the issue is twofold, the prevailing confusion that it cannot be done / can be done, as mentioned many times here, and the fact that it can't be found. I searched high and low for it. Looking for a howto in the templates the policies the guidelines, zip. Nada. Nothing. There are some who know how the system works, old timers and experienced editors, and clearly I see in this discussion that they do not agree if it is even allowed. The policy may well be laid out in documents somewhere else however, it would be nice if we could all be clued in on this, so that we can all agree. I should think this page is a lovely place to put such guidance. Penyulap ☏ 02:41, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with 3rd party requests, per se, but I'm just afraid that the way this is proposed will result in more abuse than benefit. You and I agree that there are bad blocks happening, and I want to find a way to stop them from happening in the first place. I'm not against changing policy, polices are made to be changed and broken, but I just can't support this change. What I would love to see is a more discussion and diffs identifying the problems before we start proposing solutions. There are a number of problems with blocking, I've spoken out in a half dozen places recently about some of them. But the problem is more our culture than our wording. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:23, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• No. Instruction creep that creates the impression that the only way to get review of a block is on WP:AN. If I am blocked and want to call the attention of another administrator who is familiar with the particulars and history of the case, I will do that. Having it in the policy suggests that people will 'procedural decline' requests to review a block because they weren't 'filed through the proper channels'. If we aren't intending to restrict block reviews to WP:AN, then this adds nothing to the policy. causa sui (talk) 19:36, 28 June 2012 (UTC)
• Example follow up on my comment above There are a lot of good blocks and a lot of bad blocks and certainly the bad blocks need to be reviewed. My concern is that if we start defining if/when a third party can ask for an unblock, we limit ourselves to only those specific criteria. Here is an example from a year ago when I—as a third party—asked for a block review for somebody else.
  • 67.18.92.167 (talk · contribs) asked for an unblock here
  • This was a rangeblock, so I—as a third party—asked for a review at AN
  • The original blocking admin unblocked the range

If we specifically define if/when a third party can ask for a review, I might not have been able to get that user/range unblocked. That is my concern. 64.40.54.97 (talk) 22:15, 28 June 2012 (UTC)

That is a proper and valid concern, it is important not to narrow the path to asking for a 3PU, we should include that in the language used. Until now, there has been no path or guidance for editors looking for 3pu's, either how, or if they can be done. I'm uncertain how to resolve this single valid concern with the possibility mentioned above by one editor that the person making the 3rd party request might be a jackass :) so I'll leave it to someone else to incorporate, or wait until another editor mentions it as well. As it is, with a clear path now laid out, possibly it is less of a concern ?

For example, if every option was listed, then an editor may attempt all of them systematically. Penyulap ☏ 03:25, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Not now This proposal needs work. Something like this may be ok provided some pointy advice is included, particularly with regard to two issues: (1) Often a good editor who occasionally does bad things gets blocked, and fans of the editor rush around in support. That's great, but what really causes trouble for the editor in the future is if the fans manage to get someone to unblock, when all that needs to happen is that the editor sit out their 24 hours and learn that problems are best avoided. ANI archives are littered with sad cases where someone who would have been very useful to the encyclopedia has incorrectly concluded that they must be right because of their supporters and because their blocks are sometimes overturned—that does the editor no favor as they get the wrong message. (2) There must be some throttling mechanism to avoid admin burn out. The encyclopedia requires admins who will make difficult blocks, and that guarantees there will be a team of opponents to good admins. An easy way to poke such an admin would be for a tag team to create drama around anything less than a crystal-clear block. Johnuniq (talk) 07:22, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• As per pretty much always what TenOfAllTrades said. Recipe for disruption, maybe we should have a League of Advocates (bet no-one's thought of that before), etc. - but most closely I'm thinking what Ten said above. Franamax (talk) 07:38, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

  Wow! I hadn't noticed that post (search for "02:11, 28 June 2012" to see it), and you are right, it is profoundly correct. Johnuniq (talk) 08:21, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

Summary so far and proposal

(see main section above) Editors sometimes see someone else blocked and feel that the block was unjust. New editors especially who are looking for guidance on what to do cannot find it. Experienced editors, some who have been on[REDACTED] for many years, disagree whether or not a third party is allowed to request a review. There has not yet been any suggestion to add text to the policy page to prevent a third party request for a review. The following text, suggested by a few editors above, has been proposed. Penyulap ☏ 03:20, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

Section title Third party request for unblocking

"If a third-party editor feels a block has been improperly issued, they can can request a review of that block on AN or ANI. Administrators are able to "unblock" a user when they feel the block is unwarranted or no longer appropriate."

• Support I like the idea, as long as we restrict it to editors in good standing to reduce the risk of disruptive socking. Let's tack something onto the end of the proposed wording saying something like "Requests for review posted at other locations will be moved to the administrators' noticeboards". It won't really matter to someone who doesn't read it, but we have enough bureaucracy these days that we should emphasise the importance of moving things around where they'll best be served instead of declining something purely procedurally. Nyttend (talk) 04:10, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Sounds reasonable to me. Worm(talk) 07:54, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose mainly for reasons of WP:CREEP. Processes exist to request a review of a block and if a block is really so bad a third party can intervene anyway and rattle appropriate cages at WP:AN. In a genuine case there would be ample numbers of willing supporters to ensure that justice is done, without invoking a bureaucracy and potential claims of the 3rd party being either a friend of the victim or opposed to the blocking Admin. for some pre-historic reason, and therefore "involved". Aside from one example above, there is no evidence of the extent of the alleged problem that requires this further layer of formality. Leaky Caldron 09:31, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

• I'm confused by your statement. It sounds as if you're saying "We don't need this, because in egregious cases someone can simply go to WP:AN". Isn't that precisely what the proposal would permit if enacted? As it says above, there was a recent case in which an attempt to rattle appropriate cages was declined on procedural grounds. As far as I can see it, this is an attempt to reduce bureaucracy, not to expand it. Nyttend (talk) 13:30, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

• The oppose below by Ultra puts this in a very persuasive, neat nutshell. Adding formality adds bureaucracy and to paraphrase Ultra, detracts from the ability of the blocked editor to make their own case. Leaky Caldron 13:41, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose, mostly. I believe a third party - any third party - should be able to go to the blocking admin and ask them to take another look. "I'm not sure you got this block quite right, and here are diffs showing why..." or some such would be perfectly acceptable. I've done that on blocks where I was uninvolved, both before and after becoming an admin. But putting in a formal request? No. We're not judging the eloquence or persuasiveness of a third party, we're supposed to be judging the likelihood of disruption from the blocked editor - and other people's edits offer no insight on that point. Could a third party help the blocked editor craft an unblock request? Sure! Could they advocate for that request? Sure. But they should not be originating it. Half of what I look at with an unblock request is how reasonably the blocked editor can discuss what happened and why - and you get none of that from someone else. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 12:31, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I disagree that other people are unable to offer any insight. I'd also ask, isn't the nuisance value of questioning 10 blocks a good price to pay so that people know if a rogue admin is being deliberately spiteful, acting outside community standards, and trying to upset the editor who is being blocked unfairly, so that editor will be so disgusted they will have no more to do with wikipedia, that editors do not feel entirely powerless to do anything other than be next in the firing line or injustice ? A rogue admin may well realize that the more he or she upsets the victim, the less likely the decision will ever be judged.

Editor retention starts here, where people can see this place has some semblance of natural justice, by being able to check if a block meets the community standards, rather than a personal vendetta. Penyulap ☏ 14:18, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

I would be more convinced if some evidence was produced, not just the anecdotal example of an unregistered user experiencing some temporary injustice. Leaky Caldron 14:30, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I'd tend to agree. If the issue is that one admin is repeatedly making questionable blocks, then the argument at ANI would focus on that admin. It isn't "This guy should be unblocked even though he did not ask to be and has not edited...", but rather "This admin blocked a bunch of editors who didn't do what he said they did..." or whatever. Nothing here would prevent that review of admin conduct, nor would anything here prevent an overturning of the bad blocks after the fact, if there's consensus at ANI to do so. I had assumed this proposal would deal with valid blocks. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 14:39, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I think without question we all recognize that there are times when any of us might question a block. Rather than officially declaring ourselves to be 'every man for himself', it seems only reasonable that that it is allowable for any person to raise the question, "Was this block done well?"

If we are part of a society here, and not a million independent islands, then we must allow for a community to weigh in. It seems that we've gone around and around with a long discussion, and yet this is a very simple and decent request. In courts of law, we don't demand that people make their case alone, unaided. We allow people a competent couselor, an advocate, who acts on their behalf. Saying we must always go it alone here on Misplaced Pages seems contrary to our policies of Consensus, Civility, and Assumption of Good Faith. Our decisions at Misplaced Pages are not our own, but are always open to review by others. It isn't just a 'good idea', it's our policy. Treating each other with respect and fairness isn't just a good idea, it is a pillar of our community. And finally, while on a practical level, there will be problem people, we are asked to assume the best, not dwell on the worst, again, by policy.

In short, whether it is approved here in this thread, other editors must always be able to say "I don't think that block was in line with what the community would have wanted." To say that no one can question, no one can help, and we are each left on our own is not a Misplaced Pages that we should want. -- Avanu (talk) 14:45, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I'm not aware of any policy that specifically prevents any of the support, help, assistance and advocacy that you have identified above. Leaky Caldron 14:55, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

We do have this policy right now, because anyone can simply claim it is policy, and do (see examples in the discussion above, and clear examples in the discussions I've linked to above). Without clarity on the matter, it is de-facto policy. There is de-facto policy for and against simply because it is not written down. (edit conflict) x 2

• "they CANNOT request unblock on behalf of someone else, or a review down the road"
• "Seems like other than the blocked editor posting the unblock template is confusing and disruptive...

the latter is a good example, even with widespread concern over the block, the matter still went stale, for reasons that are obscured from public view. Penyulap ☏ 15:30, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

No, anyone can advocate as you suggest. But, if consensus is that the block was proper and valid as applied to the blocked editor, then that's that. This proposal would add a step after that, where a third party advocate could propose unblocking - "Fine, so he edit warred, could he be unblocked if he agrees to 1RR" or some such. As proposed, an admin could respond "Sure, 1RR, he's unblocked." Under the current practice, the blocked editor himself would need to affirm that they would abide 1RR and are willing to resume editing under such restrictions (and otherwise to edit within policy). And that's the key difference - we need to know from the blocked editor what we're going to get. That has to be a key step. UltraExactZZ ~ Did 15:50, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

When the block is a bad block, that demand has the opposite effect and damages the community, it's called the innocent prisoners dilemma Penyulap ☏ 15:57, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• I'm in the middle of a concrete case relating to this issue. A PR person with a conflict of interest created Matthew Lutton. The (new) creator was snippily blocked by an administrator who is a hardline opponent of paid editing, who called it "spam." I appealed on behalf of the blocked editor and another administrator snippily suggested I reconsider my reading of Misplaced Pages's COI policy — which states that COI editors causing disruption may be blocked. This is not a case of disruption, the article has not been run to speedy or PROD or AFD and is thus, by definition, not "spam." This should be a matter for AN/I. Is it??? Not according to the block appeal rules... That's wrong. Carrite (talk) 15:34, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Question It looks as though this would mean that an Admin wouldn't need community agreement to unblock, they could just use their own judgement. Isn't this saying Admins can wheelwar? Dougweller (talk) 15:59, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Well explain the process to me like I'm an idiot, with articles, if someone makes a bad edit against consensus, do we leave it up to them to fix the problem ? what if they refuse ? at least with a clear path for an editor who feels someone was mistreated, to open a discussion, the community can come on board and back the admin, taking time to explain to the third party that the block wasn't tyrannical or retribution for a personal dislike. I've seen a block where the admin has made what I consider to be derogatory and racist remarks. If that is fine with everyone, if that is the community standard, then I'm happy to accept that, and the fact that we do not have any process by which we can query it, means it is a defacto policy that we cannot question it, and I'm happy to accept that also. Penyulap ☏ 17:50, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• • Reply That part is already there, actually. No, an admin can't wheel-war, because a wheel-war, in my understanding, is not when an admin action is reversed, but when a reversing admin action is in turn reversed. Furthermore, any such action is also subject to admin conduct review at WP:AN/I or elsewhere. - Jorgath (talk) 16:07, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose on three grounds: 1) Unnecessary instruction creep (and the fact that this proposal is already accepted practice - anyone can request a review of admin conduct through AN). 2) Blocked users don't need advocates and we don't need to enable more wikilawyering. 3) in line with my previous two notes it's worth remembering that[REDACTED] is not a bureaucracy, these kind of suggestions while well intentioned don't need to be formalized into policy--Cailil 16:34, 29 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. As Cailil has summed it up very concisely, I will just I agree fully with all three points. This would be unnecessarily codifying what already exists, opening the door for abuse. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 17:09, 29 June 2012 (UTC)

I see nothing in either of your comments that demonstrates an awareness, let alone addresses, editor retention. Penyulap ☏ 17:42, 29 Jun 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, my comments here were more based on the concern of the abuse of the system than editor retention. I've been vocal about editor retention in many other venues, I just don't think this addition will achieve the goals you have set, and I fear it is more likely to be used for abuse than good. I'm willing to be persuaded, and work on editor retention with you in general. I agree it is the biggest problems we face here in the mid term and long run. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:35, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

• Oppose. I opposed a long time ago in this thread, and I gave reasons. If anyone cares, now that I'm being "forced" to !vote, they can read them up higher.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:15, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose. There is no legitimate reason for third parties to insert themselves into a dispute that does not concern them, unless one of the involved parties asks for it.  Sandstein  06:09, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Oppose per TenOfAllTrades above this section and Sandstein. T. Canens (talk) 08:17, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Unnecessary and creepy. People can and do discuss blocks that they believe are problematic, often by contacting the blocking admin or another admin they know. Nothing in the policy forbids doing so. Encouraging third parties to initiate reviews at ANI invites the sort of counterproductive activity described by TenOfAllTrades. If a non-admin does bring up a mistaken block at ANI I wouldn't take them out and shoot them, but I would not advertise it as a venue of first resort for questioning a block. ~ Ningauble (talk) 16:15, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Alternate proposal

section title third party requests for unblocking
In the past, uninvolved editors have made appeals against blocks at the AN, ANI, and other noticeboards, as well as the talkpage of the blocked user, the talkpage of the blocking admin, arbcom, and elsewhere. If you are a new editor and have seen a block of a good editor, and think it was unfair and would like to know what you can do to question the block, it is debatable if that can be done at all, your guess is as good as anyone's.


A third party may request the review of a block at the Administrators' noticeboard.

Penyulap ☏ 03:09, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• Well, I guess where people can't so much as agree on what is policy, then the idea that blocks can be appealed and how to do so, would be the kind of thing to put into an essay. Back to square one pretty much, or just leave them guessing, thinking it leaves less work (while not realising that it is less work because they have left the project). whatever. Penyulap ☏ 04:36, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)
  • An essay seems a better way to eventually change policy, as it is easier to change, add, subtract and can be much more dynamic than a policy page, until it reaches a level of consensus that makes it a good example for changing policy. Again, I truly agree with your goals here Penyulap, even if we don't agree on the road that will take us there. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 13:29, 30 June 2012 (UTC)
• Then make a better proposal. Currently, the attempt to address the situation is met with statements like this..

Template use prohibition
Seems like other than the blocked editor posting the unblock template is confusing and disruptive... does this happen frequently enough to make discussion of a formal prohibition worthwhile? Nobody Ent 21:27, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

link

So make a simple route for a third party newbie editor to follow, rather than enforce the hopelessness and despair they feel when they see innocent editors destroyed. Where you want to extinguish hope by eliminating a clear path for editors to follow to avoid trouble and harm as quoted, it's an offense to civility, it's an offense to reason, it's pointless to point out that it is against the idea that anyone can edit when you lay bear traps in their path, force their path into 'disruptive' behavior when they are simply trying to be decent human beings. You are forcing them to be disruptive against their will. You are forcing them to abandon empathy for their fellow man, my integrity will not allow me to agree with your demands and I'd sooner be a maytr than do as the rest of you do and go along with this insanity, I will not abandon my humanity, I'd sooner die, or in this case welcome with open arms an indef ban. There is always thewik.net, wikialpha, or any number of Carpathias where people wind back the clock to the better days, and carefully avoid this idiocy. Penyulap ☏ 15:27, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

my original proposal was the minimalist approach, simply "A third party may request the review of a block at the Administrators' noticeboard." the smallest guide possible for newbies to find their way through the threats issued on their struggle for civility and justice. You've inflated it to the point that nobody is considering upon it's merits, they aren't considering it at all, they are erroneously projecting their fears of 'what could happen' into hysterical extremes, and then !voting on that. Commonsense ironically left the building soon after Bish stopped talking. Penyulap ☏ 15:27, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

With all due respect to "third party newbie editors", how would they be in a position to accurately know if a block was unfair? There is usually a fairly complex set of issues leading to a block, including the interpretation of content policy which can confound even the most experienced editor. How do you expect a new editor to make a determination of what is or is not unfair? Leaky Caldron 15:41, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

we can just assume they are idiots, is that a safe assumption ? I've amended the proposal. I knew I was smart when I got here, and although Pesky and others would argue with me, I'm getting the feeling that I must have become a complete moron in the last 12 months, because what seems so bloody obviously commonsense is apparently just the opposite, maybe I am from some other planet in a Cosmos far far away. Maybe too much reading Hitch hikers guide to the galaxy and other nonsense has made me think you're all being unreasonable. Penyulap ☏ 16:05, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

The problem is that the wikilawyers are also smart, and most of the people trying to take advantage of a clear, open door, would be socks. There might be some middle ground here, perhaps something along the lines of "third party requests for unblock should only be attempted when $x (simple, general criteria that isn't too specific), and carry a risk of boomerang to the requesting party if not in good faith" where it is seen as the exception, and not the rule, and authorizing as much as saying it is the exception and has consequences. They are already allowed, for all intent and purposes. I don't know, talking off the top of my head here, trying to find some common ground. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 18:21, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Then rather than call it the WP:AN call it the WP:AN/shooting fish in a barrel venue where SPI types will have the time of their life, the cost of having secret business and overt lack of justice is higher by far, others pointed this out. Giving socks a magnet they can't resist is better than showing every honest editor the door. This is the largest multi-editor ownership I've come across so far, the attempt to keep the whole process secret from other editors. shooting fish in a barrel is too obvious, so just call it AN/third party review, a subpage of AN, if at some stage it does become apparent that the end of the world is upon us.

There just is no need to figure out every possibility, most of which are going to be rare, before defining the most basic things. Is it possible ? We still haven't decided if it is allowed at all, let alone any wording. Penyulap ☏ 18:38, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

To answer your questions: 3rd party requests are allowed in unusual circumstances. Usual circumstances just use the usual methods. Many admins, including myself, are open to looking at unusual circumstances unblock requests at ANI (ie: unfair, out of process, admin involved, out of policy, etc.). This is already done, and myself and others have already said this a few times here. Many of us are very tolerant of the most borderline cases as well. Again, editor retention is something that many of us are concerned with, but it isn't the only thing we are concerned with. Whether I are right or wrong in how I perceive the effect of a policy change, if I think a policy change will cause more problems than it will solve, then I'm generally against it. I took your advice and tried to come up with another proposal but you don't seem to be taking it seriously. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 21:49, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Taking it seriously ? this is deeply ingraining the idea that a majority of people here fall into the worst categories, selfish (keeping the knowledge to themselves to confuse newbies) cliquish (wikipedia is not for everyone, only those who have the secret knowledge, which btw we can't even agree on) callously indifferent (oppose because I's an ignoramus who doesn't care to study the matter, I just want you to grab my attention with a brilliant twitter sized idea, you failed) living in fear (I try to stay in the middle of the mob and not think for myself, so whatever the vocal ones say, for example, this will end the world, is true, baaah diiito baaaah diiito). Yes, many people are making sensible suggestions, that's true, I'm not looking for people to agree with me here mind you, I actually don't care if this thing is allowed or not, I'm just asking is it allowed or not, and why is there nothing anywhere that says so. Telling me is not the issue, because you cannot tell people policy one at a time. Chinese whispers do not work. This is the crux of my drive, decide anything at all, I care not what it is, just decide amongst yourselves and have it written down somewhere.

Passing secret knowledge from one person to the next in Chinese whispers doesn't work on[REDACTED] because people do not want to know who they can trust and who they can't, they want it official. If a newbie knows only one thing, and that one thing is that you can't trust anyone here, then that newbie is a fucking genius.

The solution to giving newbies a clear path is not to tell me, it's to tell them, in the docs, that is what docs are for. Otherwise you get problems, people trying to impose their own bullshit ideas on other people in an abrasive way. I put up with this kind of thing as a newbie for ages, drove me up the wall on the ISS talkpage for 6 months. I see it time and time again. here is an editor politely asking for a link to docs to verify bullshit secret knowledge and guess what, there was no 'consensus' there was no 'decided a while back' there was just bullshit. Write it down somewhere and you don't have arguments breaking out, you don't get squabbles, this is elementary. Telling me what is allowed and what is not allowed is pointless, because I'm just asking for it to be written down, not what you would write down, but that you do write it down. Otherwise next week, 10 different editors are giving 10 different bullshit conflicting versions of the same mess. What is so hard about writing down something.

• Option one, third party requests are allowed
• Option two, third party requests are not allowed

Looks simple enough, why is this too much to ask ? (rhetorical question) Penyulap ☏ 22:37, 30 Jun 2012 (UTC)

• No, we will certainly not include this alternate proposal in policy. The proposer is clearly not taking what is being said on board, so if there is someone who would feel offended by it, I'd say it is the Community who he requested comment from. the proposer has been given suggestions about contributing positively towards achieving the goals he states. However, the proposer says above about rather being a martyr than respecting consensus, so unfortunately I think we are now in the territory of wasting time. Ncmvocalist (talk) 02:05, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

you don't have the slightest idea whatsoever about what I think, or what I said I'd be a martyr for. Seriously, it's there in black and white, if you still have no idea after reading it several times and want to suggest I'd rather be a martyr than accept consensus, then maybe you can ask Dennis to explain to you what I wrote there in black and white, or Bish, or Auntie Pesky who will simply TELL you what I think. Zomg, she CAN read my mind, whereas anyone can read what I actually said. But Don't tell her about this RfC, she will kick my a** because of my foul language maybe, but then again, there was all that IRC stuff I heard of, meh. Naa, but Penyulap not accepting consensus, that is so way far off the planet, you might as well tell me I'm a sock or something it's just as much a end of credibility as suggesting I don't accept consensus. Nope if you want to know what I said or what I think, just ask someone I mentioned, or the next random person who walks through the door. Penyulap ☏ 03:50, 1 Jul 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, but your conduct and comments have shown every indication of working against the very cause you are supposedly trying to help. This is what is known as being disruption. If it wasn't enough for you to (without any evidence) accuse others of forcing third party newbie editors "...to be disruptive against their will... to abandon empathy for their fellow man", you also advocated as follows: "my integrity will not allow me to agree with your demands and I'd sooner be a maytr than do as the rest of you do and go along with this insanity, I will not abandon my humanity, I'd sooner die, or in this case welcome with open arms an indef ban". Your responses are just a continuation of you misusing this talk page through advocacy and irrelevancy. Ncmvocalist (talk) 07:14, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

• Agree with Ncmvocalist - Penyulap, Dennis has made some thoughtful and generous comments on your talk page so if you are interested in editor retention I suggest you follow his advice. On the matter at hand your suggestion is well intentioned but not an appropriate addition to policy. Changing the wording wont help I'm afraid--Cailil 02:29, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Actually he made them on his talkpage, and whatsisname didn't read what I wrote, so if you agree them you'll be wrong along with him/her, but as to Dennis, who I don't agree with on the crux, I do trust and respect him, our disagreement has nought to do with my respect and trust of him, and yes, I agree he is generous to take the time to explain his views, which aren't helping, even if it is his intention, however it's too complex an issue to explain why that is however. Regardless, the outcome of the RfC is meaningless to me, and the whole 'respect consensus' thing whatever it was, was a real rib tickler. Someone else can mention why if you like. Penyulap ☏ 03:50, 1 Jul 2012 (UTC)

• Something along these lines is very much needed. This discussion seems proof of that. --Nouniquenames (talk) 07:50, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

How about we get back on track, rather than attacking other editors? It is beyond obvious that any editor can ask for the community to weigh in on any block (or any decision for that matter), the major sticking points here appear to center around process and abuse of process. So let's try to think about ways to be flexible and productive and see the other person's point of view, and stay positive. -- Avanu (talk) 12:48, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

If, as you say, it is beyond obvious, what it the point in modifying the policy and process? I think that this is a lame duck proposal and should be closed as no consensus for change. Leaky Caldron 13:34, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

If it is a 'lame duck', and it is clear to all editors that community review is a right, then why are people still debating it, Leaky? I think what we have is people debating how the process should go. I personally feel that it should be spelled out in a manner that is clear to people, although I don't think it has to be *too clear*, but simply clear enough so that administrators do not summarily reject review requests. -- Avanu (talk) 15:32, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Oh by the way, let me explain one of the best reasons for why two people other than the original blocking admin and their blockee could begin a review process. They aren't personally involved.

People who are personally involved in a dispute don't behave as dispassionately and as objectively as those who are outside of it. Why do you think we allow people to have attorneys represent them and why is there the old chestnut "a man who is his own lawyer has a fool for a client"? I would say it is because if you have nothing personally on the line, you can look at the situation with open eyes and a logical approach. There seems to be agreement above (by most) that anyone can ask for a review of any block, and I've seen many discussions at AN/I where people will defend other editors against a block. The question really seems to come down to a fear of people abusing something if they know it is permitted.

So here's a couple more questions. We allow people to request an unblock, and even tell them they can ask for an unblock as much as they like, unless it becomes disruptive. Who decides when it is disruptive? After all, if an editor is only able to edit their own Talk page, the only way it becomes disruptive is if I allow myself to become disrupted by it. But we do allow editors this discretion. Obviously if we can make the subjective determination in the case of one editor, we can make the same subjective determination in the case of other editors coming to the blockee's aid. I don't see how this is impossible, what I think is really the case, is administrators being worried about a lot more block reviews by making a tiny change to the wording on this page.

As always, taking up the tools is optional, not required. You can simply ignore the request. You can simply deny the request. I think I fully understand why people are hesitant to spell this out, but I don't see how the arguments are all that convincing. You could spell out in policy that the third-party must courteously discuss the block with the blocking admin, or if another block review or unblock request is pending, another one can't be started, etc. In other words, there are perfectly reasonable ways to limit the supposed disruptive potential, and I'm curious why people are simply scared to try this. We already do it, so it is a de facto process on Misplaced Pages, Penulap simply is asking for clarification so that we are consistent about this. Consistency leads to editor retention indirectly, because people know the rules and have a sense of fairness, even when a block might be unfair. So, let's have some reasonable suggestions to address this, so that we have consistency, and put the issue to bed. -- Avanu (talk) 15:52, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Umm, no, Pennyulap is trying to not abandon their humanity, haven't you been reading? But to address your comments Avanu, first of all, if you wish to put forward a proposal for formal advocacy on behalf of other editors, don't try to slide it in one chip at a time, put it forward as a proper proposal in a proper venue. Or perhaps do just a little research to find out what happened to the previous project that did exactly that, search around for the League of Advocates or whatever it was. It was a bad idea then and it's a bad idea now. Just please don't pretend that you've come up with some brand new great idea. And if you want a reasonable suggestion, so that we have consistency, how about if you just follow where the blue of WP:ADMINABUSE leads you. Right there is all the advice needed, in one convenient spot. Any admin action can be reviewed, at any time, by anyone, first directly with the admin, and then at an appropriate noticeboard. That is already noted in policy - which is what you want, right? Franamax (talk) 06:16, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

If its already noted in policy, then why are we debating? Sounds like we've all got what we need. I don't care for 'League of Advocates', sounds a bit Saturday Morning Cartooney to me, unless there is a secret Cabal of Doom lurking in a nearby swamp. Only thing I want is that we do our best to be fair and be thoughtful, beyond that, we're only human. -- Avanu (talk) 22:18, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Well it is certainly not what I want, winking in the dark, secret knowledge, hiding everything, if it exists it has to be on the bloody page. If it's not here, for all practical purposes it does not exists. Look at this discussion, nobody knows. This is completely fucked up right here. But while we are all here anyway, with nothing better to do, pray tell where is said policy hidden away ? I can't help but think there are a few people here would like to see said policy, because we can't find shit about the topic, and there are a lot of us here. Penyulap ☏ 21:56, 2 Jul 2012 (UTC)

I have to agree with Penyulap that the "convenient spot" for information helpful to somebody concerned about what they consider a bad block is this page: WP:BLOCK. It's the obvious place to look. There's nothing obvious about WP:ADMINABUSE, that Franamax recommends; that's a "spot" that's easily accessible only to the cognoscenti — the admins, the oldtimers, the regulars. That's what this discussion comes down to, isn't it: do we, or do we not, want to keep the information exclusive to these groups, fearing other, newer users are too likely to be "disruptive" with it? I think we should be trying to avoid and deconstruct wiki hierarchies, not encourage and cement them. (Note, I nevertheless honour Franamax's good intentions, and certainly don't intend to imply that s/he is out to cement hierarchies.) Bishonen | talk 22:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC).

Another alternate proposal

Join Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Editor Retention, which I just started. I think that editor retention is a big problem we face, and rather than hash it out on policy pages in a somewhat random fashion, we should be serious enough about the concerns to create a place to discuss ideas. The Project is NOT mine, only the idea was, so I would welcome and encourage boldness in developing the project. Penyulap has nailed the problem, retention, but it goes beyond just blocking policy, which is why a more centralized place is needed to discuss, so we can take a more holistic approach to solutions. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 15:19, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Use of talk page while blocked

It seems that we haven't spelled out guidelines on talk page use while blocked. Calvin999 (talk · contribs) has been posting instructions for others to edit on his behalf while he is blocked on his talk page. This flies against the spirit of the blocking policy but I don't believe this has spelled out. One of his buddies has pointed that out, challenging what I believe was proper administrative action by Bwilkins (talk · contribs) in revoking talk page access after blocking and after posting editing instructions. WP:MEAT comes close. I believe this should be added to this policy. Toddst1 (talk) 20:01, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I say that's a good idea, but I believe that is already covered in WP: MEAT. Robby The Penguin (talk) (contribs) 20:07, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I can see why we don't want editors to edit by proxy if they are blocked from editing, but to say "you can only use the talk page for unblock requests", as I've seen a dozen times, is flatly mistaken. Stop them from editing, yes, that is the purpose of the block, to prevent modification to mainspace. If they abuse the talk page to make personal attacks or edit by proxy, warn then block, makes sense. But to limit it to unblock requests only is clearly not within the spirit or letter of any policy. Even indef blocked users are still considered a part of the community, per policy, and putting too many restrictions on the talk page would be inconsistent with that policy. This only alienates editors and feeds into more problems and the loss of otherwise good editors. Many of the best editors have a block or two on the logs, after all. As for WP:MEAT, that is for offwiki communications and wouldn't seem to apply. If we simply view this as bypassing the block by editing by proxy, warn, then block talk page access if forced, it seems pretty simple. But adding "editing by proxy" in the policy somewhere for clarity is worth considering. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 20:49, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Arbcom has allowed arbcom blocked editors to participate in good faith discussions on their talk page, see Nobody Ent 21:10, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Thank you! I knew we didn't put onerous restrictions on this, just common sense. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 21:46, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, I mean communicating isn't the problem, the specific concern was about advocating proxy editing. Toddst1 (talk) 22:55, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

The user did not suggest an edit, they pointed out a problem. Nobody Ent 23:01, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

That is true, although the intent was obvious. That isn't a fine line, and not defined at all. Now that I think about it, proxy editing isn't banned per se, although common sense would seem to say it would be. I have seen instances where it would be proxy editing and it was tolerated, however. In this case, that isn't why Bwilkins took away his talk page access, however. At least the timing says it was his next edit, which I don't completely understand. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:08, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

I consider that common sense is not enough in this kind of actions. As Dennis says, a user gets blocked to protect mainspace, but their user talk page access should be only revoked if such user abuses of it. How could that happen? If the user commits personal attacks, etc. However, we should spell that in the guideline, so when such actions are needed, they could be properly expressed with a rationale, instead of common sense. —Hahc21 23:36, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

And to be clear, I left a msg on Bwilkins talk page, and I have no doubt he acted in good faith based on my previous experience with him, I just don't fully get why the talk page block was needed. I suspect the lack of clarity here is part of the reason. The reason for most talk page blocks are much more obvious than this. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 02:04, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

• Guys, please look at the blocklog - Toddst1 didn't detail Calvin999's block history above, and the context is actually important. On June 22 2012 Toddst1 blocked Calvin999 for violating WP:OWN. He unblocked on Calvin's agreement to abide by 1RR, Calvin broke this and simultaneously displayed the same WP:OWN issues on June 23rd. In this context Calvin999's coordination of edits is further WP:OWN behaviour and in this instance a removal of talk page access is thoroughly appropriate (if it was me I'd have doubled the block length too FWIW).
  WP:PROXYING is irrelevant as that has to do with banned users, WP:MEAT is a grey area unless the behaviour persists. And in the normal run of the mill editors are not prevented from using their talk page for discussions of content or anything else (as long as they are constructive) however where such comments demonstrate the same behaviour that got them blocked (ie incivility, ownership, outing, legal threats etc etc) then revoking talk page access is appropriate and necessary. We don't need to change policy to reflect that as WP:BLOCK already states that "editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only in the case of continued abuse of the talk page" - Calvin999's retention of a "ownership attitude" after being blocked for it constitutes both recidivism and, with his attempt to coordinate edits from his talk page, talk space abuse--Cailil 14:10, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Extrememly well put, Cailil. Toddst1 (talk) 15:51, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I concur and have struck out my previous comment. I was misled by Bwilkins statement " the ONLY reason you have access to this page is to request unblock." which demonstrates a lack of understanding of current practice and common sense. Nobody Ent 19:03, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

that is most of the problem summed up right there, everyone is being misled. Newbies look at that, and so much else and think WTF is this ? Penyulap ☏ 20:27, 2 Jul 2012 (UTC)

Erm, Nyttend appears to have come to a different conclusion than the direction this discussion is going and has restored talk page access. I've left him/her a note on his/her talk page. Toddst1 (talk) 20:25, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Nyttend was acting in good faith here, and I still think that unblocking was proper considering Bwilkins wasn't around. I have left a message previously on this talk page as well. Keep in mind, Calvin wasn't talk page blocked for making the edit request. That was almost two days before the talk page access was restricted. It was blocked just a couple of minutes after Calvin said "I have to say I don't think it's fair to condone me for trying to help remove WP:OR. Also, it was reverted half an hour after you responded to me BWilikins, and over an hour after I first presented it here, so who's to say that someone didn't see this? Regardless, it's been reverted now." so I have to assume that this statement was the reason for the talk page blocking unless someone can explain how it wasn't. It was literally 4 minutes after this post. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 16:06, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Proxy editing

We can agree or disagree with Bwilkins' good faith action with Calvin (please continue in the above thread) but I'd really like to get some clarity as to if proxy-editing requests to articles in general (or Xfd discussions etc) by a blocked user are OK. My admin spider-sense says it is not within the spirit of the blocking policy. If so, I think we should note that somewhere - likely on this policy page. Toddst1 (talk) 23:30, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

The spirit of a block is to prevent disruption. If a talk page edit is not disrupting Misplaced Pages, it should be fine. Saying "someone please look at this, I think it's OR" should not be a problem. No editor is required to take action; no one is required to read a blocked user's talk page (excepting unblock templates). If I (or any other editor) changes the article then the changing editor is responsible. Nobody Ent 23:50, 1 July 2012 (UTC)

No—that's poking people. Johnuniq (talk) 01:18, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

The more I think about it, the more confusing it gets. Proxy editing, ie: directing the actions of someone, is one thing, but the more I think about it, saying things like this, just pointing out a problem, may not really be proxy editing. This does need a bigger discussion. Hadn't thought about it much until now, and looks like many of us haven't as well, but it needs addressing so we can all act in a similar fashion, for the sake of fairness. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 01:59, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Poking is when I jab my finger in your chest. If I jab my finger into my chest, that's just making a gesture. Nobody Ent 02:25, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

The more I look at the Sockpuppet/Meatpuppet policy, which was invoked above, the less I think it applies to edits that improve the encyclopedia. I think the problem is that some folks are seeing this as Calvin999/Aaron circumventing his block. But he didn't have a loyal slave to do his bidding, he just said asked for people to fix a problem. Additionally, let's imagine he asked a specific editor instead to look at the problem. "Hey Joe, go fix this WP:OR." Even at that point, it would be Editor Joe who deserves scrutiny. Did he act independently or not? Was it such a no-brainer that anyone would have acted the same? Stretching rules so they apply to these extreme cases seems to go against the intent of the rule, which is to protect against BAD edits, not prevent good edits. Suppose I had an army of sock editors, against whom we could find no bad or problematic edits of any kind? Would we commend that person for their wonderful contributions or be so bureaucratic that we would kick them for having done nothing truly wrong? We're supposed to ultimately be an encyclopedia with no firm rules and no bureaucracy, yet sometimes we seek such precise rules and definitions, and other times we want it all loosely defined so we can stretch the definition like this example. How about we just look for what the best outcome is, and focus on that? Be as consistent as possible, but hey, as the old saying goes, "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth." Let's encourage positive contributions, and handle the rest with fairness and dignity. -- Avanu (talk) 02:57, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

But when we block someone from editing, aren't we telling them to step away from the keyboard? That's really the whole point of a block, for the editor to do something different for a while (to the extent that every block is a cool-down block). Ultimately I think it will come down to admin discretion though, and a judgement call on the likely outcome of the blocked editor's requests. If they are making a one-off spotting of vandalism somewhere, fair enough. If they are trying to edit right through their block and show that they have a sufficiently numerous cabal that they can effectively ignore a block because what they want done will be done anyway, then the preventive power of a simple block is nullified (there is no reason for them to change their behaviour) and TPA revocation is a reasonable escalation. It should be reasonable though. If I'm working with someone on GA candidate and get blocked in a totally different area, putting a list of sources for onto my talk page should be OK. Conversely, and IMO contrary to NE above, asking for review of OR problems in an article is a little too involved in the wiki-guts, and I shouldn't be doing that while blocked. And what if I post 6,000 lines of javascript? Franamax (talk) 06:48, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

What are blocks for? A block isn't a ritual; it's an action taken to mitigate some known risk of damage to articles, or some other kind of disruption.

• If somebody gets blocked for serious civility problems and continues to snipe from their talkpage then fine, shut that down too; but if they start having more civil discussions on their talkpage then it may be evidence that the earlier problem is going away. If somebody gets blocked for chronic pov-pushing and then use their talkpage to encourage allies or give them pointers, then shut down the talkpage too; but if they direct their passion into suggesting a neutral and properly-sourced edit on that topic, then the encyclopædia benefits.
• If we prevent any kind of talkpage editing other than unblock requests, the meaning of "indefinite" takes one step closer to "forever", because there is less scope for a blocked editor to to give the community broader confidence that they'll behave better in future.
• I think that proxy editing isn't inherently bad. If it's a bad edit (ie. repeating what the editor was blocked for), that's bad. But if it's a good edit, then it's not bad - reflexively stopping those edits too is a bit like reflexively reverting all edits by a banned user, even ones which the reverter acknowledges as positive - hence reinstating typos or vandalism or whatever.

Judicial metaphors aren't totally helpful, but I think that being allowed to edit your talkpage but nowhere else is like being in an open prison: There's more chance for prisoners to interact with others in a normal way which may ease reintegration into society; but for the subset of prisoners who jump over the low fence and burgle nearby homes, or shank somebody in the canteen, well, those ones can be sent back to some high-security solitary-confinement cell and the ability to use their talkpage is taken away. bobrayner (talk) 11:24, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Nobody Ent, nobody is required to do anything.

I agree with Avanu because this is a matter of giving people a guide to what will keep them out of trouble, what they can do, rather than guessing.

If you tell a toddler what they cannot do, and give them an endless list of dont's you always go wrong because they have only their own ideas to guide them. you need a list of DO's for them to follow, and they then stay on course and enjoy life as they grow. The focus on you can't do anything because some sock did that, so were not even going to tell you what you can do is killing the possibility that anyone can use[REDACTED] with what Avanu describes perfectly as "fairness and dignity" I know BWilkins is not nearly as bad as he seems to the untrained eye, but if he keeps going about the right thing the wrong way, it just means 1 sock blocked takes 10 good editors with it, and the sock recycles to take another 10 good editors with it. In the end, he'll have simply nobody but socks left to play with.

Bobrayner uses the phrase 'Judicial metaphors' which may not be perfect, that is true, but they are a fantastic shortcut to understanding, because they are something people already have an idea about. Calling a talkpage a prison cell, saying people can talk to a lawyer there, or say what they like if they don't get out of hand, and if they do, the warden will get the hose and so forth, and if someone wants to visit them and wants to deliver messages, it's ok so long as the letters are perfectly ok, well it's NOT perfect, but it's a fast shortcut to understanding. If some of this was written down in simple guides, then for example wilkins could say WP:PassingMessagesOverTheWall and that page says your trying to be manipulative, while for andy it's like talking to a lawyer, these ideas aren't perfect, but hey, they would put the fire out in a hurry, rather than people just saying "hey that right there is the epitome of hypocrisy" so with no guides, to what is right, or what is the norms, things get screwed up. Penyulap ☏ 15:58, 2 Jul 2012 (UTC)

While I was blocked for edit warring last December, I requested that an edit that had been in process when I was blocked be completed, because it didn't relate directly to the substance of the edit war, and after I uploaded some of my en images to Commons, I requested that someone add the NowCommons template for me. Edits such as this don't strike me as problematic, obviously. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 21:07, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

What is a block?

I think it is helpful if remember what a block really is, instead of what we think it is. From WP:BLOCK:

• Blocking is the method by which administrators technically prevent users from editing Misplaced Pages. Blocks may be applied to user accounts, to IP addresses, and to ranges of IP addresses, for either a definite or an indefinite time. A blocked user can continue to access Misplaced Pages, but is unable to edit any page, except (in most cases) their own user talk page.

• Blocks are used to prevent damage or disruption to Misplaced Pages, not to punish users.

Blocks are not prison sentences or punishments, they are last ditch efforts to prevent disruption to the encyclopedia, most importantly, main space, the part we all use. We have to remember that blocked users are NOT banned, they are just as much a part of the community as I am now. A block is solely defined as a necessary restriction placed on editing all pages outside their "home" space, temporarily, for the purpose of preventing disruption. That is all. The policy makes it clear that no other restriction is on them. So when do we take away talk page access?

• "Prevent this user from editing their own talk page while blocked", if checked, will prevent the blocked user from editing their own talk page, including requesting unblock. This option is not checked by default, and typically should not be checked; editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only in the case of continued abuse of the talk page. Emphasis in original

If the editor is highly disruptive or in a way that would warrant a strong warning or a block, then obviously it would be acceptable to block access to their talk page for the duration of their block. There must be abuse, which seems to mean continued (multiple or more of the same) actions that would be unacceptable under unblocked circumstances. However, if the act they are doing while blocked, direct or by proxy, is not something you would otherwise issue a warning for, then policy seems to clearly say it is acceptable because no where in the policy is any limitation on use of talk page given. This wasn't obvious to me at first, but the more I read it, the clearer it becomes. Perhaps all of us admins have been a little quick to recommend taking away talk page access, myself included. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 19:44, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

How can anyone be "disruptive" on their talk page, a page that nobody is obliged to read? Malleus Fatuorum 20:40, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

You've got a good point and unless they are doing something that would get them blocked anyways (i.e. making personal attacks etc) behaviour on the talk page probably shouldn't be considered disruptive and shouldn't result in talk page access restrictions. Making repeated unblock requests, or using other templates that cause the talk page to appear somewhere else on Misplaced Pages (i.e. {{help-me}} or edit requests) could also be considered disruptive. Ryan Vesey Review me! 20:45, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

"Disruption" is a word that gets tossed around an awful lot here, but more and more I'm becoming convinced that its meaning here on Misplaced Pages bears no relation to its meaning in any decent dictionary. Except this one. Malleus Fatuorum 20:53, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I suppose "disturbance or problems which interrupt an event, activity, or process:" OED would be appropriate. If an editors behaviour causes another editor to stop what they are doing and address it, the behaviour is disruptive. If a blocked editor makes repeated unblock requests, reviewing administrators are forced to address those requests, making it disruptive. My personal attacks message is a bit more round-about, and I suppose it wouldn't be necessary to call it disruption by the OED definition; however, it still is a reason for talk page access to be removed. Ryan Vesey Review me! 21:10, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

With all due respect (see the dictionary I linked to above), that's a rather naive interpretation of disruption. For instance, if I edit a page and that "causes" the main editor to stop whatever they were doing to look at the changes I've made, is that disruption? If there's a real problem with repeated unblock requests, then address that problem by changing the way that unblock requests are handled. Malleus Fatuorum 21:20, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Good point, I suppose under my definition, general things like requesting rollback or making edit requests could be considered "disruptive". I don't think that a change is really needed in the way that unblock requests are handled though. The blocking policy states that "There is no limit to the number of unblock requests that a user may issue. However, disruptive use of the unblock template may prompt an administrator to remove the blocked user's ability to edit their talk page" That instance of disruption is clearly referring to the definition I linked to. Care to clarify how you believe unblock requests should be handled? Are you referencing to the prisoners dilemma referred to above? Ryan Vesey Review me! 21:33, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

The prisoner's dilemma is of course one issue, but I was thinking more fundamentally. Why not centralise unblock requests rather than have them on a user's (perhaps unwatched) talk page? For instance, DYK nominations require the automated creation of a template; if unblock requests were handled similarly then it would be relatively easy to choke their number. Malleus Fatuorum 22:34, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I use the word only because it is the word we use here. My threshold for what is "disruptive" is very different on a user page than it is an article page, which should come as no surprise. This is why I prefer to use the criteria of "if you wouldn't have been warned or blocked for it before you were blocked, then we tolerate it". If the editor is making genuine personal attacks, legal threats or other highly disruptive edits, that is one thing. If they are upset and saying they think the block is unfair or "is bullshit", then no, I'm not inclined to take away talk access. The last talk page access I took away was because the editor was making personal attacks against another editor, which is something I won't tolerate. I had made the block. If she was calling me an "asshat", it wouldn't really bothered me, I expect them to vent a bit. That is the threshold as I see it. And I think that unblock requests ARE centralized, as a category, although it isn't one I watch so the name slips my mind. But they are centralized and anyone can watch them. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 22:53, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Here it is Malleus, Category:Requests for unblock. I checked, it is world viewable. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:00, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Interesting. You obviously never check that page, and I very much doubt that other admins do either, so I suspect that the only reviewers of unblock requests are those admins who already had the talk page on their watch lists. Which doesn't seem like a particularly healthy situation to me. I note as well that when I just looked there were only 12 pages in that category, so this canard of causing disruption by raising multiple unblock requests seems to be just that: bollocks. Malleus Fatuorum 23:07, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I've just added it as a link on my user page. I think I first saw it on Drmies page. Keep in mind, I'm still new to the bit, there are more things I don't know than I do, and more pages I don't watch than do. But I suspect I will try to peek in from time to time. I have gone there and reviewed maybe 2 or 3 unblocks before, and unblocked at least one. Oh, from my experience at SPI (where there is a lot of blocking going on), having to block talk pages is very, very rare indeed. I've probably done it a few times out of my 186 blocks to date, but I can't claim to be typical, nor are SPI blocks. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 23:17, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Evidence suggestions there at least several admins who monitor the unblock requests -- the first interaction they have on a given user talk page is either accept or declining unblock reviews. Nobody Ent 23:28, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

It's interesting that many admins don't use it. It is listed in the dashboard. Ryan Vesey Review me! 23:34, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

I would think that several in fact do. There aren't that many backlogged there, so someone is watching it. I'm not sure how many or who, however. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 00:09, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

What a curious sub-sub-thread this is. How else did you all think unblock requests get addressed? Some sort of adminly magic, which accompanies our preternaturally good health, facial symmetry and charm? To be fair though, there is also an email address to request unblock. But mostly, requesting unblock via the template puts you in a category that people can watch. How else did you guys think it worked? Franamax (talk) 09:45, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

It's also on IRC, #wikipedia-en-unblock (I think), regularly updated by bot. Not that I ever go on IRC any more! Worm(talk) 09:49, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I didn't and don't think that unblock requests do work, so your question is meaningless as far as I'm concerned Franamax. Malleus Fatuorum 13:14, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

FWIW, unblock requests are one of the things that shows up at Template:Admin dashboard. Before becoming an arbitrator, I used to use that as an overview of work to be done on a regular basis, even though I did not routinely handle unblock requests. Jclemens (talk) 23:05, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Arbitrary Break2

Just write up a guideline draft that suggests the usual help me sort of thing, here is a fine example of how to edit while you are restricted, it looks great, and is not going to attract puppetry related comments.

(example copied from User talk:AndyTheGrump)

This help request has been answered. If you need more help, you can ask another question on your talk page, contact the responding user(s) directly on their user talk page, or consider visiting the Teahouse.

Could someone please post the response below in the appropriate place (Misplaced Pages:Administrators%27_noticeboard#Block_review:_Sceptre_and_AndyTheGrump):

• Oppose, this attempt to involuntarily 'request an unblock on my behalf'. I have not requested an unblock, have accepted that my behaviour merited a block, and intended to accept the block without appeal. To use an involuntary unblock as 'fairness' to justify unblocking someone else seems to me to be highly questionable - and more so when the block has little time left to run, and this is supposed to 'balance' an unblock for a continuing refusal on Sceptre's part to conform to WP:BLP policy, and to cease using Misplaced Pages as a platform for a campaign to 'regender' Bradley Manning against Manning's own express wishes. Sceptre's continuing IDHT behaviour should be looked at on its own merits. AndyTheGrump talk 11:36, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

 Done ✉→Bwilkins←✎ 11:44, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. AndyTheGrump talk 11:51, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

Looks to me like Arcandam didn't want you left out. You've definitely been a great sport about your block, and I'm looking forward to you being able to get back to your normal grumpy routine. -- Avanu talk 14:40, 27 June 2012 (UTC)

you could ask what guideline they followed, or just use it as an example to draft a guide, or as a basis for policy. Penyulap ☏ 02:53, 2 Jul 2012 (UTC)

This is precisely what should be done. We should always accept good-faith requested edits made this way, unless there's some problem with the edit (e.g. can't understand the request, not appropriate for the page in question, etc.) that would cause us to reject the edit if it were made to the page itself by the same editor while unblocked. Think of it as an {{editprotected}} request. In other words, if you wouldn't complain if I made an edit myself, don't object to my using my talk page to aks you to make the same edit while I'm blocked. Blocks are preventative, not punitive, so we should welcome good-faith contributions by blocked people who are following the blocking policy. Nyttend (talk) 19:40, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Could you comment above please in the section talking about TPA? Toddst1 (talk) 20:25, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Fundamental misunderstanding of the purpose of blocks

I see a lot of people saying "blocks are preventive not punitive", which is all well and good, without carefully considering just what it is that blocks are seeking to prevent. Distressingly, I see a lot of editors above who are interpreting a block as some sort of minimal speed bump: a trivial inconvenience that a blocked editor is just waiting out, or something that the blocked editor should be able to 'edit around' as much as possible, as long as they aren't directly repeating the actions they took immediately preceding the block. Unfortunately, I think that sort of narrow view misses the point and purpose of a block.

Check out the last 500 blocks placed by Misplaced Pages admins. You'll notice that the vast, vast majority are long-term or permanent blocks of spam usernames, open proxies and TOR nodes, vandalism-only accounts, and sockpuppets of already-banned editors; only a tiny, tiny minority are of 'regular' editors. In contrast, Misplaced Pages has something like ten thousand registered editors who are 'active' (making at least one edit per day) and most of them are never blocked. You'll be lucky to find more than a couple of these 'normal', generally-productive editors blocked in any given day. A block isn't a trivial thing; it isn't a normal thing; it isn't a usual thing. Blocks shouldn't – and generally don't – come down because of minor errors; they arise when an editor engages in behavior that a reasonable person would understand could be damaging to the project and/or the community. A block is placed when an editor's conduct departs far enough from Misplaced Pages's norms that the editor should not continue to edit until the problematic conduct has been addressed. A block isn't 'preventive' in the sense that it aims to prevent a blocked editor from engaging in personal attacks, or legal threats, or BLP violations, or edit warring only for the duration of the block. The purpose of the block is prevent the misconduct long after the block has expired – ideally, forever – by prompting the blocked editor to (re)consider their actions and approach to editing.

Permitting and encouraging blocked editors to edit by proxy, whether in article or project space, badly misses the point of a block. It discourages the sort of reflection that a block might otherwise prompt, and it encourages the community and the blocked editor to incorrectly perceive a block as a minor occurrence or trivial nuisance. With relatively narrow, common-sense exceptions (for example, where the discussion directly addresses the block itself) an editor who is blocked should not be trying to engage in other project work or requesting and encouraging edits by proxy. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 21:16, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

You're living in fantasy land. Malleus Fatuorum 22:29, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Per WP:BLOCKBANDIFF blocked editors are still part of the community. As noted above, ArbCom is letting a blocked editor use his talk page while ArbCom blocked, and many editors (including some with admin privilege) have interacted with WebHamster (currently indef blocked) . This policy page specifically says talk page access should be revoked for abuse, not use. To claim that attempting to positively interacting with a blocked editor is counterproductive does not miss the point -- treating blocking as a metaphoric solitary confinement does. Nobody Ent 23:47, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

If someone's "editing by proxy", that means someone else is doing the edits, right? Specifically, someone else who isn't blocked, and is therefore (for now at least) trusted to make such edits? I don't see a problem - it's that person's responsibility to decide whether to make those edits or not; the encyclopedia benefits if they are good edits, and they can be reverted (and the "proxy" blocked if necessary) if they are bad edits, just as in the case of any other edits that "proxy" might have decided to make. Victor Yus (talk) 06:05, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

• This is an omnibus reply to all the related threads above: I don't believe any codification or new rules are needed here. Many of our policies are deliberately left somwehat vague to allow for discretion and common sense to be used when interpreting them. If you see an admin who consistently does not display either of those qualities, take it up with them, not the blocking policy. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:02, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Apparently common sense is lacking, much like a Vogon's knack for poetry. We've had a zillion paragraphs of debate here on two points that apparently are already supported by policy.

1. A third party can ask for a review of any block.
2. A user can use their Talk page while blocked for things other than requesting an unblock.

So why the long debate? If a group of assumed-to-be-rational people can't agree on something they already agree on, how can we expect consistency from a specific admin? -- Avanu (talk) 18:17, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Minor user page clarification

I went back and reviewed the circumstances regarding the addition of the section that covers user page blocks.

It appears it was added at 14:17, 28 September 2008 by Zzuuzz in response to a new 'bit' granted to admins at that time. It appears that the wording was chosen by copying the text from the block e-mail section above it.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Misplaced Pages:Blocking_policy&diff=prev&oldid=241536168

While I believe it is fairly easy to tell if when "abuse of the 'email this user' feature" is occuring, the concept of "continued abuse of the (user) talk page" does not appear to be as easy to discern. Some admins seem to feel that a user can reasonable request help or ask for editing assistance or even rant at the admin who blocked them. Other administrators do not agree with this.

I've made a small change, in an effort to more clearly base the conditions for a User page block within a policy argument. How exactly does someone 'abuse a talk page' versus 'how was a specific policy violated?'

• http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Misplaced Pages:Blocking_policy&diff=500560079&oldid=500191147

This may require additional thought and ideas to be perfect, but simply saying "you abused your Talk page" isn't clear or pointing at a specific policy. -- Avanu (talk) 22:18, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Seeing as Bbb23 has already reverted this, the Block policy is a policy, but the idea of "user talk page abuse" is not on this page. Where is that even remotely defined with some clarity? I would say the best place is probably the User page guidelines page. -- Avanu (talk) 22:30, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I reverted your change because (1) it should be discussed first (I don't think it's all that minor) and (2) I disagree with it. You changed it to "editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only in the case of gross continuing violations of the user page guideline". Not only are you tying it to a guideline (not a policy), but you are adding the word "gross". Both of those changes ups the bar for an admin who wants to revoke Talk page access, and I think an admin should have more discretion than that. I don't see why policy language has to be tied to some other policy, or in this instance guideline, and I also don't see why the fact that admins may act differently in different contexts is a basis for changing the language. Admins aren't robots and should have the ability to exercise judgment. Admins are also not fungible, so may not always exercise identical judgments, which, in my view, is often a good thing.--Bbb23 (talk) 22:37, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I can clarify the background somewhat. I was not alone at the time being concerned about unwarranted use of the new feature, and the edit is likely to have directly followed one or more WP:AN threads. However my main concern was just to update the policy with some sensible defaults. At first some scripts had the wrong default setting, but it seems some admins also thought it was a good idea to lock up every talk page by default. There was much disagreement. I think things have improved since those days, but there are still some fuzzy areas, and possibly some excess use by some admins. There are also a lot of long term abuse cases where things might not be what they seem. The word 'abuse' is intentional, as a recognised general description of what disruptive users get up to to enjoy this feature. But I'm fine with a change of wording. It is not my natural instinct to think that every abuse of the talk page is a guideline violation, but I'm happy to be persuaded otherwise. -- zzuuzz 22:40, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

(ec)@Bbb23: I agree with you that admins need to have discretion and be able to use their judgement. But I also think it needs to be more clear to the average editor where the line is. I've seen admins who say the exact opposite thing regarding the same facts over the course of the last few days with these debates over whether one user or another was properly blocked. If the admins cannot even agree, given the same set of facts, how can editors be expected to know? I think a clear tie to a specific guideline or policy will make it more clear when a user talk page block should and should not be enacted. We're not talking about overall block policy here, only a *very* specific subset, and the sentence already says that the block on talk page access "typically should not be checked". I think a solid basis in policy will make these arguments over 'good' or 'bad' a little less based on whether it feels like the thing to do and more based on whether an editor is acting in line with guidelines or policy. -- Avanu (talk) 22:44, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Presumably all the recent excitement is due to some desire to improve the encyclopedia. In that case, all the excitement is misplaced because attempts (such as Avanu's reverted edit) to enable a blocked user to carry on as normal by misusing the talk page used by the community to communicate with them is not helpful, particularly when blocked. If there is a problem, that problem needs to firmly established before making arbitrary edits to policy. In almost all cases, a blocked user needs to learn that problems are best avoided—that does not happen when a team of enthusiasts enables them to feel they are the righteous slayer of admins. Johnuniq (talk) 22:54, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

A lot of these block debates get bogged down in emotional baggage. I'm working slowly toward trying to remove some of that. "Misuse" of the talk page isn't a well-defined thing. Neither is "abuse". Dennis Brown said he feels it is generally ok to let an editor rant about a block, other admins don't agree. Sarek, for one, said it might be ok to let a person ask for a page to be improved while blocked, other admins didn't agree. We have these wide gaps in what administrators think is 'misuse' or 'abuse', and that kind of fuzzy vision isn't helpful when one day an editor gets blocked for something the other guy didn't. I realize that perfect symmetry isn't possible, but for many editors this unequal enforcement feels arbitrary and personal. So you end up having long debates with forensic diff analysis to sort out who was actually right or wrong or other. Not helpful. -- Avanu (talk) 23:03, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Even if I agreed with your goal (predictablity), I don't see how adding the word "gross" and tying the abuse to WP:TPG will achieve it. Nor will it reduce the claimed post-block drama. In addition, I agree with zzuuzz - the Talk page guidelines aren't a good thing to rely on in this context.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:10, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm curious to hear what else we can predictably rely on. Pillars make sense as a guide for this (like WP:Civility), but we have some admins who think its ok to let a user cool off by just venting, and the Block policy explicitly says cool-down blocks are not a good idea. So what is a clear example of "user talk page abuse"? -- Avanu (talk) 23:34, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

1. A user gets blocked for personal attacks and post-block engages in personal attacks.
2. A user gets blocked for BLP violations and post-block commits BLP violations.
3. A user gets blocked for legal threats and post-block makes legal threats.

--Bbb23 (talk) 23:41, 3 July 2012 (UTC)

Then how about a change to something like what you just said.

From: editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only in the case of continued abuse of the talk page."

To: editing of the user's talk page should be disabled only when the behavior that caused the block continues on the talk page.

-- Avanu (talk) 01:38, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, I think the wording is ok and that the real problem is so many admins thinking that you can only use the talk page for unblock requests. I also don't want to have to put that in the policy, as more words muddy up the place. Perhaps what is needed is an RFC to clarify that yes, an editor can use the talk page freely while blocked as long as they aren't violating more policies and guidelines. Then the wording can be left alone, and we have a consensus to demonstrate what we see might see as obvious. I had not given it that much thought before, and perhaps other admins haven't either. I prefer fixing the problem using the least amount of "force" (change) required, myself. To me, the policy already says this by its silence on restrictions, and intentional vagueness on "abuse", that allows an admin to use discression. I don't think it is their judgement that is faulty as much as their understanding here. Dennis Brown - 2¢ © 03:08, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Nooo, the policy is that if you are blocked from editing, you are blocked from editing. Your own talk page, the place that the community grants you at its discretion to be a convenient place to communicate with you the individual editor, is left open for you to discuss your block and ways that you might become unblocked. And that is all: anything else is just people being nice and hoping you will get the message about why you were blocked. I strongly disagree that an editor can "use the talk page freely" when they are blocked. Yes they should be given leeway, allowed a certain amount of venting, not made to feel permanently ostracized - but that is at the discretion and kind heart of the community and its representatives, not because some policy spells out some "user right" - which I hope we all still agree none of us has at all, y'know, privately owned website and so forth? Franamax (talk) 05:46, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

I have rarely seen such ill-considered bollocks even here on Misplaced Pages, which is of course jam-packed full of ill-considered bollocks. There is no "community" and no "granting" of anything, unless you believe that every anonymous IP in the world is "granted" the right to edit Misplaced Pages. Malleus Fatuorum 06:29, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

Personally, I think it's vital that editors should retain talk page access unless they do something soooooo bad that it would have got any editor (no matter how "respected" or "senior") an instant emergency indef block. An editor's talk page is a place where they can get into productive conversation with people who weren't involved in their block, with people who might be able to help them find a way forward which is acceptable both to them and to the 'pedia community, and just to let them know that not everybody hates them and is out to get them. Removing an editor's access to their own talk page for anything other than really outrageous behaviour is solely punitive, let's not kid ourselves on that one. Yes, some (most?) just-blocked editors can rant a bit on their talk. That's species-normal for humans, the ranting bit, especially if there was any heavy-handedness or gleeful "I'll show you!" vengefulness about their block. Communication is the key to getting anywhere at all. Decent, constructive, interactive communication. Removing someone's ability to communicate altogether, except for to grovel, is pathetically inadequate, lacking in the most basic insight into normal reactions, showing a complete ignorance of gentle (and effective) mediation / interpretation / go-between functions. It's punitive. It's nasty, it's spiteful, it's vindictive, and it's behaviour unworthy of an admin. Pesky (talk) 06:56, 4 July 2012 (UTC)

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