On 01/04/07, Marc Riddell <michaeldavid86(a)comcast.net> wrote: A clearer-than-it-would-be example: imagine there is a good-faith contributor who just causes unbelivable amounts of strife. They mean well, they make good-faith contributions, they haven't done anything *wrong* per se... but the community gets in vast lengthy wasteful fights with them over things, huge amounts of effort are wasted looking after them and cleaning up after them and trying to calm down the arguments and so on and so forth. Do you feel we should - a) ban or restrict that user and let people get on with their work; or b) some other remedy which essentially maintains the status quo? a) is probably more beneficial to the project, whilst b) is undeniably more fair to the user. Both are defensible solutions, but hopefully you can see the difference in the principles underlying each... [I don't follow arbcom; I don't know if there have been arb bans on the basis of They Just Waste Too Much Time. There have been community bans to that extent, however...] -- - Andrew Gray andrew.gray(a)dunelm.org.uk

Marc Riddell wrote: Nice idea, doesn't work in practice. Way back when, I tried to help problematic editors a number of times, and there were exactly two outcomes; the person understood what they were doing wrong after getting the one hint, or never understood, no matter how many times it was explained. We get a *lot* of borderlines, and one always hopes that just one more rephrasing will cause the light bulb to come on - but these folks have more serious problems than can be solved with talk page notes. You should try your hand at it, will be valuable for insight - pick a problem editor, such as one who's come up in an RfC, Arbcom case, etc, and assign yourself to help them. Stan

But isn't it too late by the time it has gone to RfC or arbcom? Sometimes RfC then arbcom? If an editor doesn't get it in RfC and is still a problem, particularly if they are still contributing exactly the same problems, and this Stan is familiar with, then the situation is already lost. But when someone mentioned problematic but well-intentioned editors, I thought of someone like our current "rewrite-the-taxonomy of the single-celled eukaryoteic groups according to me and C-S" guy, who has had to be downshifted a number of times on this exact same thing, his original protist taxonomies, but crops up with it again here and there. I did not consider someone who has been to RfC or arbcom and continues the same pattern. The former (protist dude) is someone worth working with, as he's one of only a handful of editors interested in the protists. The latter happens rather routinely on Wikipedia, people given a billion chances. But it happens because these editors do something else worthwhile to Wikipedia. So, even if the situation is already lost, even if good editors give up after having been burned a couple of times trying to work with the hopeless, maybe assigning someone to them is a great idea, not just a good idea, because all that time has been spent/wasted on arbcom or RfC because the editor was actually contributing. Maybe assigning someone to protist-dude would be a good idea also, as he's not just into protists, but I think into the non photosynthetic ones. I wouldn't know one amoeba from another if I were phagocytotically 'et by one. KP

on 4/6/07 7:19 AM, Ray Saintonge at saintonge(a)telus.net wrote: You are right. But denial is a powerful thing. Yes, their goal is to protect, defend and convince others of their beliefs. But what they first need to see is how their very behavior is alienating the people they are trying to convince. In any case, it is they who need to realize they are getting nowhere in the debate; care enough about the topic to want to know why - and reach out for help with it. In another setting: It is they who need to realize they are getting nowhere in the relationship; care enough about the relationship to want to know why - and reach out for help with it. Marc

Ron Ritzman wrote: I don't think that follows. To me, acting in good faith only means that you are well-intentioned. There are a lot of reasons why a person might not follow advice that you see as reasonable; a lack of good faith is only one of them. To come to a conclusion about somebody else's motivations, which is something you can never know for sure, is rarely something they will enjoy. You could well be wrong, and even when you aren't, you've created ground for an endlessly unwinnable argument. More importantly, people are creatures of context. If you treat them like they are good people who have made perfectly reasonable mistakes and just need a little help to fit in, they are much more likely to start acting that way. Act like somebody who's in a fight, and they will obligingly step up and fight you back. Get them mad enough and they'll do it forever. To me, that's the magic of AGF. Most of the time, most people really are acting in good faith. By treating them that way, we avoid letting miscommunication, misunderstanding, or their good-faith flubs wreck the relationship. And when people come to us with mischief in their hearts, treating them as if the meant well can bring out the side of them that does mean well. That's not to say that we shouldn't boot people that are hopelessly disruptive. We've got an encyclopedia to build. But we should do it with "a countenance more in sorrow than in anger," and without impugning their motives. Not just because it's the kind thing, but because also because it's the practical thing. William

Ron Ritzman wrote: To a point, yes. It depends just as much on how the "reasonable" person is presenting himself. As long as the "reasonable" is just reverting without engaging in any kind of meaningful coversation, or just protecting a POV perhaps neither party is acting in good faith. Ec