--- Florence Devouard <anthere(a)anthere.org> wrote:
We are more numerous, more protective to our
featured-content, less welcoming to our newbies (for
technical or social
reasons).
How many experts have been driven away by the agressivity
of some of our
members ? How many new editors just were discouraged by
the difficulty
of editing a table or a template ? How many newbies were
blocked because
they just did not understood quickly enough how to use a
talk page ?
Also, during the year, several cases of online or offline
harassment of
contributors were reported. Harassement which came as a
result of their
contributions to our projects.
on 10/21/07 10:25 AM, Matthew Britton at
matthew.britton(a)btinternet.com
wrote:
Absolutely.
Having tried editing anonymously for a few weeks myself, I
can assure you our treatment of newcomers - even those that
understand things from a technical perspective - leaves
much to be desired.
I'd also like to add another question to your list, if I
may. How many experienced editors with thousands of edits
and no user conduct issues have been forced to stop
contributing after they were found to be editing via
proxies and issued with a de facto ban by administrators
enforcing a policy for policy's sake? While the number may
be small, the loss from each is significant.
Florence & Gurch,
The can this opens is one which has needed opening for some time now. There
needs to be a complete, in-depth look at the entire Admin process: where it
started, where it is now, how they are chosen, who chooses them, who they
are accountable to, what it takes to get rid of them. This needs to include
an admin by admin survey of the persons currently wielding this power. As
daunting as this task may appear, it is crucial to the future of the
Project. For these are the persons with a great deal of power and control,
and not nearly enough oversight or accountability.
Marc Riddell