Anthere wrote:
Feedback from a french contributor, named coeur (cœur)
* he mentions the fact a user could be registered
under different name on 30 wikipedias, hence vote 30
times
-> my answer. This could happen. Some people do have
different names, and a tiny few could do it on purpose
and could cheat. However, the risk is limited, we
trust people per default not to abuse the system, and
likely it would be an artifact.
We could limit the risk by setting a minimum of
contribution, perhaps ?
* he mentions the fact different users could have same
name under different wikipedias, hence good votes
would be discarded
-> my answer. This will happen, we already know
several cases. Checking and discarding will not be
automatic but be human powered with control.
I suppose I am correct :-)
* he mentions he is *bound* to have different names on
en and fr, as his name need utf8 encoding.
-> my answer. I said we trusted him to be honest here.
And he should have stick to a good old name with no
weird caracters ;-)
You can't determine identity automatically. Two people may have the same
name on different wikis. Two people may share the same IP address or
even the same computer. Our defences against dishonesty are as follows:
* All votes are logged publicly. The name, number of days since first
edit, and number of edits are displayed to all. Who the person voted for
is not displayed.
* Election administrators can also see the IP address and user agent of
each voter.
* Election administrators can strike out votes by clicking the "strike" link
* Other secret methods may be implemented in order to catch people out
who think they know our defences
However it would also be useful if anyone caught cheating in the
election could be banned from Wikimedia web sites for an extended
period. It should be clear that this is not a game.
A demonstration of the voting system is at
http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Boardvote . There are two open
accounts:
* Voter -- a user who has been around for 90 days
* Election administrator -- a user who may strike votes and view IP
addresses
Both have no password.
-- Tim Starling