David Gerard wrote: A spammer (who indicated in that post an intent to spam some more) feels insulted by getting told to knock it off? Terrible thing, terrible thing. Most websites block linkspammers on sight without notice or appeal. Warning linkspammers and vandals at all is nicer treatment then they'd get most anywhere.

On 7/9/07, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote: God, please don't. RfA is broken enough without having even more people opposing to make a point about something they want people to do more. How about you convince current admins on AIV not to demand 4 template warnings before a block, or nom some CSD warning templates for deletion?

On 7/9/07, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote: It depends on the situation. If someone has uploaded a copyvio despite multiple warning notices I will throw {{subst:nsd}} at them if only becuase it is more polite than what I would write. If however it looks like someone just forgot to list themselves as a sorce or whatever it will generaly avoid a template if only because the responce rate is higher (perhaps because it makes people think genisock2 is a real person or whatever). So templates do have their uses in some cases but are less use for regular communication. Untill I see more detials of this case it is hard to say which applies. -- geni

David Gerard-2 wrote: Oh, please. Would you listen to someone caught speeding who suggested that having a standard form was insulting, and that they should receive a hand-written letter detailing their idiocy in beautiful copper-plate? -- Phil -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Don%27t-template-the-newbies-either-tf4047514.html#a1… Sent from the English Wikipedia mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

David Gerard-2 wrote: On a slightly more serious note, there does seem to be more of an atmosphere recently of "tie the admins up with red tape". This business of "blocks shall be preventative rather than punitive", for example. Quite apart from the distinct echoes of Monty Python [1], who are you going to block in a preventative manner other than some clown who has been acting the goat, and how is that not punitive? There seems to be a gang of people willing to jump into a thread on WP:ANI cudgelling any admin who makes themself available, and I don't like it. HTH HANFD -- Phil [1] "…and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceed to three. Five is right out." -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Don%27t-template-the-newbies-either-tf4047514.html#a1… Sent from the English Wikipedia mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

On 09/07/07, George Herbert <george.herbert(a)gmail.com> wrote: What you're describing there is bureaucratic arse-covering, not human communication. That doesn't make it somehow not bureaucracy replacing communication. Because a template only communicates "you have been processed." There's clearly not a human behind it, or there's a human pretending to be a machine. - d.

Don't template anyone? Dear god, what are we coming too. Then again, I'm a bit biased on this, see [[WP:TTR]] - G1ggy On 7/10/07, geni <geniice(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Nonsense. For a start, seeing someone spam and concluding that the person is a spammer is not prejudging, it's just judging. You don't like threats? Should we not tell people that what they're doing will get them blocked and just block them without warning? Or perhaps you think blocking them is somehow unfair and we should just accept whatever people do? Templates are used for convenience. It is much quicker to type {{subst:test}} than a couple of lines explaining why we want them to stop. If you make vandal fighting harder you will reduce the number of vandal fighters which will increase the length of time it takes for vandalism to be found and fixed and increase the amount of vandalism that gets missed completely. Not being very friendly to spammers and vandals is a small price to pay to get vandalism fixed promptly.

P.S. Okay, he was cut-and-pasting. I've amended my remarks on his user page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Nsusa) On 7/9/07, The Cunctator <cunctator(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Thomas Dalton wrote: I don't think that's quite correct. Everybody acts foolishly now and then, but immediately judging them a fool is indeed prejudicial. I've been a rabid anti-spammer since before the web existed, so these days I have a pretty short fuse on the topic. But I still try hard to keep in mind that the first time somebody spams, they rarely know that it's bad. I have talked to a shockingly large number of well-meaning small business owners who believed the promotional flyer for the bulk mail package they bought. Until they have done it repeatedly or after warning, I don't think of them as spammers so much as people who have spammed. They were just trying to promote their business in a way that seemed reasonable given their lack of knowledge. I don't like threats. I do like explanations. I think the difference is Wikipedia's secret sauce: the assumption of good faith. It depends on how you count the costs. I think being actively unfriendly can get somebody's dander up. Some of those people will become more persistent, or more sneaky. Some will decide to get even. Many, because they still don't understand quite what the problem is, will tell people how horrible Wikipedia is. Or just take it out on their dogs. On the other hand, people who feel they have been fairly treated (that is, not as fools but as people who have unintentionally done something foolish) have less incentive to take revenge. Perhaps now that they've edited, they'll add something. Maybe they'll tell colleagues why they shouldn't try to market themselves via Wikipedia. And it could they'll even join us in tidying things up. William

4im is a big problem here, because the criteria for it is certainly lowering. You see people dishing out 4im for even very minor things these days, which isn't nice for the receiver. So, to start off another topic, what are other people's criteria for dishing out a 4im? ~Giggy On 7/10/07, Todd Allen <toddmallen(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Phil Boswell wrote: No, I wouldn't. However,on the rare occasions when I have been pulled over for something or other, I've only taken it seriously when the cop and I came to the shared understanding that what I was doing was actually bad, rather than just violating some arbitrary bureaucratic norm. When I was, long ago, a new driver, a couple of officers made a big difference by taking a few extra minutes to help me understand why they were pulling me over, and why it mattered. After that I took safe driving much more seriously. On the other hand, three or four years ago I was pulled over and ticketed while going at traffic speed. The cop, with a little chagrin, explained that there was some sort of state-wide safe driving campaign, and so they were trying to bring down the average speed of the freeway. That had no effect on me other than to erode my respect for the law a little, and the road is still just as fast as it ever was. It's not always possible to have that first kind of interaction -- some are not inclined to listen, and we don't always have the time. But where we can, I think we should. It will save us trouble in the long run. William

David Gerard-2 wrote: On the other hand, using templates does take the personal sting out of it: "you broke the rules, here's your ticket, nothing personal, just doing my job". Making up the text from scratch gives it the edge which can lead to personal grudges. Some people are better at communicating than others: are we to stop people who are very good at catching vandalism because their prose style isn't quite up to the mark for warning the abuser in a sufficiently stylish manner? -- Phil -- View this message in context: http://www.nabble.com/Don%27t-template-the-newbies-either-tf4047514.html#a1… Sent from the English Wikipedia mailing list archive at Nabble.com.

On 12/07/07, David Gerard <dgerard(a)gmail.com> wrote: [[Wikipedia:Template_messages/User_talk_namespace#Multi_level_templates]] "Level 4im - Assumes bad faith; strong cease and desist, first and only warning"

G'day G1ggy, <reads [[WP:TTR]] /> Good grief, man, did that hurt? It certainly looks like something you should only admit to having written after accepting what I believe is referred to in the patois of the streets as "a severe beat-down". Boilerplate warning templates are a necessary evil. They are necessary for two reasons: 1) Not everyone wants to expend the energy required to constantly rewrite the same message to new users they don't yet care about. 2) Many --- *many* --- CVUers, RC patrollers, etc. are utterly lacking in the social graces. Indeed, some even have trouble forming coherent sentences without reference to 'net zp34k or the word "fuck", and thus boilerplate templates could be seen as infinitely better than the alternative. This is one reason why the rise of the Anti-Vandal Admin should be viewed with alarm. I try to explain what I mean in plain English[0] whenever possible. Generally, I get better results than with templates (occasionally, my results are no better than they would have been; they are never worse, because I do not belong in category '2' above). I often find that there is no template that properly expresses what I need to say; the CVU approach is to use the templates anyway[2], mine is to sit down and damn well *say* it. There are times when I will use the templates. This is when the template is good enough, and I don't really care enough about the user in question to bother using my own words; or when the template really does say best exactly what I intend (rare, but has occurred). In what way is this approach illegitimate, or even inferior to "template 'em until they glow"? [0] For a certain value of "plain". I am, after all, Aussie[1]. [1] Well, I pretend to be. Really I'm an old granny in a council flat in Essex ... [2] And to say that saying something in one's own words is somehow illegitimate. There was a case last year --- April? --- of an RfA candidate being opposed because he didn't always use {{test-n}} templates to warn people, but sometimes spoke to them on a human-to-human level. I can only imagine that things have gotten stupider since, in accordance with the Second Coming Law of Thermodynamics. -- Mark Gallagher "'Yes, sir,' said Jeeves in a low, cold voice, as if he had been bitten in the leg by a personal friend." - P G Wodehouse, /Carry On, Jeeves/