Gregory Maxwell wrote:
On 11/12/06, Tim Starling tstarling@wikimedia.org wrote: [snip]
There is a need for judgement, regardless of the software in use. Trolls will go on trolling regardless of what anti-spoofing restrictions we have in place. Our aim should be to minimise their impact, and heuristic systems with a high false positive rate do quite the opposite.
This note brings to mind an interesting homework assignment for the list...
Can we think of a good way to impliment "interactive intervention" in mediawiki which neither adds weird backend requirements (works with the nonpersistantness of php) or odd client requirements (no java or the like).
The idea is that we have hundreds of people in IRC.. many people RC patrolling. There are *many* sorts of activities which software can mark as suspect but which require judgement. Is there a reasonable way for us to get that judgement in real-time?
But that's easy...
* User tries to create an account * Software responds, "The username you chose is very similar to the username of an existing user. In order to ensure that you are not trying to impersonate someone else, an administrator will have to approve your username manually. Approval is usually processed within <average timeframe>. How do you wish to proceed?" [ Request approval ] [ Try a different username ] * User clicks "Request approval". Software responds, "Your request for approval has been sent off to the administrators. You will receive an e-mail as soon as approval has been granted or rejected." * Either an e-mail is sent to a mailing list, or a wiki page is updated, or (my preferred way) a special dedicated feature in MediaWiki is invoked, which alerts volunteers to the awaiting approval. * An administrator accepts or rejects the request. If it is accepted, the normal welcome e-mail with the confirmation link is sent to the user. Otherwise, an e-mail informs the user of the rejection.
Timwi