This thing has really gotten out of hand.
Wikipedia has grown so large that it is no longer possible to rely on so-called soft security.
A small community like Ward's Wiki (which is chiefly about software development) or MeatBall (which is about creating online communities) which has a HIGH RATIO of readers to writers, can rely on soft security. Every change is read by dozens of Recent Changes junkies.
The days when a single admin (like Maveric in his heyday) could be "on duty" for several hours at a time and single-handedly hold back the tide of vandalism -- well these days are forever gone, my friends.
Sorry, but we are the victims of our own success. And it takes the full attention of a dozen admins to counter one determined troublemaker.
The arbitration committee was created, not for vandals and troublemakers, but for long-running personality conflicts or style/content disputes. But when there's a troll loose in the dungeon, we need to the authority to act quickly and quarantine the problem.
I did not plan to be the one to force the issue; I had hoped to avoid even the slightest hint of "unilateral action", but todays' crisis seemed to call for what we might call "citizen's arrest". Responding to repeated calls for help, I blocked a user and all his known puppet accounts. This action requires immediate review by the Arbitration Committee.
If the committee wants to unblock him before making a decision, that's fine. That's what Fred and all them are supposed to do: figure out how to handle a case where everyone else has given up. If they want to keep the block in place while they investigate and make up their minds, that's fine too.
Ed Poor
I did not plan to be the one to force the issue; I had hoped to avoid even the slightest hint of "unilateral action", but todays' crisis seemed to call for what we might call "citizen's arrest". Responding to repeated calls for help, I blocked a user and all his known puppet accounts. This action requires immediate review by the Arbitration Committee.
If the committee wants to unblock him before making a decision, that's fine. That's what Fred and all them are supposed to do: figure out how to handle a case where everyone else has given up. If they want to keep the block in place while they investigate and make up their minds, that's fine too.
I vote to ratify/endorse/support/agree-with Ed's bans. Bird and its sock puppets have explicitly announced its intentions of doing harm to Wikipedia. It needs to be restrained while its allegations are evaluated.
On 3/9/04 2:28 PM, "Poor, Edmund W" Edmund.W.Poor@abc.com wrote:
This thing has really gotten out of hand.
Wikipedia has grown so large that it is no longer possible to rely on so-called soft security.
A small community like Ward's Wiki (which is chiefly about software development) or MeatBall (which is about creating online communities) which has a HIGH RATIO of readers to writers, can rely on soft security. Every change is read by dozens of Recent Changes junkies.
The days when a single admin (like Maveric in his heyday) could be "on duty" for several hours at a time and single-handedly hold back the tide of vandalism -- well these days are forever gone, my friends.
Sorry, but we are the victims of our own success. And it takes the full attention of a dozen admins to counter one determined troublemaker.
Time to don the jackboots, my friends. When will we learn that violence begets violence?
The Cunctator wrote:
On 3/9/04 2:28 PM, "Poor, Edmund W" Edmund.W.Poor@abc.com wrote:
This thing has really gotten out of hand.
Wikipedia has grown so large that it is no longer possible to rely on so-called soft security.
A small community like Ward's Wiki (which is chiefly about software development) or MeatBall (which is about creating online communities) which has a HIGH RATIO of readers to writers, can rely on soft security. Every change is read by dozens of Recent Changes junkies.
The days when a single admin (like Maveric in his heyday) could be "on duty" for several hours at a time and single-handedly hold back the tide of vandalism -- well these days are forever gone, my friends.
Sorry, but we are the victims of our own success. And it takes the full attention of a dozen admins to counter one determined troublemaker.
Time to don the jackboots, my friends. When will we learn that violence begets violence?
And your idea is? Ed is right, there are an amazing number of vandals out there, and they seem to have not the slightest hesitation in doing violence to us 24 hours a day.
Stan
On 3/9/04 6:25 PM, "Stan Shebs" shebs@apple.com wrote:
And your idea is? Ed is right, there are an amazing number of vandals out there, and they seem to have not the slightest hesitation in doing violence to us 24 hours a day.
It doesn't amaze me. The insistence on figuring out ever-more complex and punitive strategies to deter juvenile behavior leads inevitably to a ramping up of that behavior. The whole "vandal" label is, as I've said before, not helpful.
More important, I should think, would be to ensure that standards and mechanisms are put in place so that it's as easy for people to improve entries as it is for people to worsen them.
I'm going to continue to be a believer in atomization as a way of maintaining quality.
For example, I would consider it a much higher development priority to set up permalinks than it would be to develop baroque ban/stall mechanisms.
I would consider it a much higher development priority for the discussion mechanisms to be better integrated into Wikipedia (a web-based bulletin board which uses wiki-formatting within individual posts).
There will always be an amazing amount of stupidity and misinformation on Wikipedia. But it will also be better than the world at large.
The Cunctator wrote:
On 3/9/04 6:25 PM, "Stan Shebs" shebs@apple.com wrote:
And your idea is? Ed is right, there are an amazing number of vandals out there, and they seem to have not the slightest hesitation in doing violence to us 24 hours a day.
It doesn't amaze me. The insistence on figuring out ever-more complex and punitive strategies to deter juvenile behavior leads inevitably to a ramping up of that behavior. The whole "vandal" label is, as I've said before, not helpful.
There are people who have no idea that Wikipedia even *has* "complex and punitive strategies" for anything - they see that they can click on a button to edit and another to save, and they'll do it just because they can. I just don't see how these people are somehow being magically encouraged by things they don't even know about. And why would they care how they're being labelled? I'm fixing the vandalism hours or days after the perpetrators are gone.
Stan
Poor, Edmund W wrote:
The arbitration committee was created, not for vandals and troublemakers, but for long-running personality conflicts or style/content disputes. But when there's a troll loose in the dungeon, we need to the authority to act quickly and quarantine the problem.
You have that, and have had it for some time. This certainly qualified as an emergency.
I did not plan to be the one to force the issue; I had hoped to avoid even the slightest hint of "unilateral action", but todays' crisis seemed to call for what we might call "citizen's arrest". Responding to repeated calls for help, I blocked a user and all his known puppet accounts. This action requires immediate review by the Arbitration Committee.
Well, unless someone has a beef, I see no reason for it to come to that.
This is exactly why we gave sysops the technical ability to block logged-in users. We're cautious about using it, and it's sometimes controversial, but in this particular case, I see no reason for it to be so. You acted out of good faith, and additionally it was obviously to me the right thing to do.
There's no problem here, and no need for a policy change, because policy already fully supports what you did.
--Jimbo