[Foundation-l] CheckUser (thoughts)

[Fred Bauder]

The biggest problem with the English arbitrators is that due to the  
press of arbitration business they have little time to do justice to  
checkuser requests from other users. Access is vital to carrying out  
arbitration duties in some cases, however.  One side effect is that  
some arbitrators have been drawn away from arbitration duties,  
perhaps for the good of the project as a whole, but drawn away  
nevertheless.

I think the technical expertise problem is exaggerated, so long as  
the investigator relies on investigations of editing patterns also.

Fred

On Apr 22, 2006, at 7:03 AM, James D. Forrester wrote:

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> Anthere wrote:
>
> [Snip "CheckUser is a bit of a mess"]
>
>
>> I plead guilty for part of this.
>>
>
> I don't think that it's fair to blame anyone in particular for a
> possibly non-optimal situation; certainly, what with your sterling  
> work
> getting an agreeable, if not perfect, policy in place, we would have
> been in a much worse position without you. :-)
>
>
>> I also think the arbcom of last summer
>> has a responsability in this, since it was asking for the arbcom  
>> to have
>> access, regardless of technical ability of its members.
>>
>
> I disagree with this; we said that we had one or two members who were
> (far) more than sufficiently expert to be able to carry out the
> analysis, and that it would be more sensible to have them carry it out
> directly, rather than via the developers in the scant few moments they
> weren't busy doing their fantastic work running the sites.
>
>
>> And for what is
>> worth, I think Jimbo also has a responsability in this, since he  
>> himself
>> decided all english arbcom members would have access.
>>
>
> Except, err, we don't all have access; we chose who on our project has
> both a sufficient (very great) level of trust, and also sufficient
> technical expertise (or the willingness and aptitude to improve their
> skills in this area a little). For example, I have elected not to have
> access to the tool (though more for reasons of time).
>
>
>> Then, there was a third mistake I think (it is not an accusation,  
>> just
>> an analysis). It was to make a tool dividing projects and languages.
>> Originally, we had a common set of volunteers to help us all. And  
>> this
>> was good. I am pretty sure some people did not know Brion intimately
>> enough to *trust* him, but they were told he was fine by people they
>> trusted, and they went to ask him with no fear. And Jimbo had no fear
>> either.
>>
>> Now, people have checkuser status only on one project/one  
>> language. Just
>> as if Brion had help ip checking on the french wiktionary, whilst Tim
>> was dedicated to the english wikipedia and Taw to the polish  
>> wikibooks.
>> It makes NO sense whatsoever. The *only* unigue advantage of the  
>> current
>> system is to understand the language of the project the checkuser  
>> make
>> the job.
>>
>
> I agree, this is indeed a problem.
>
> [Snip]
>
>
>> What that suggest me is this
>>
>> We should not have checkusers with the tool access on a one  
>> project/one
>> language, but a POOL of COMMON checkusers. Those should all have good
>> technical abilities. Those would have access everywhere. They  
>> would be
>> listed on meta with their language ability. The biggest projects  
>> would
>> be used to always ask to their favorites. The small languages will  
>> try
>> to find the one with a basic knowledge of their language if they  
>> wish.
>>
>> But all in all, checkusers should be a common good, just as our
>> developers right now are (and, hell, just as your board members are).
>>
>
> I think that this solution has some merit, but there exists the tricky
> problem of language - if one does not read Russian, then no matter how
> accurate and wide one's technical knowledge is, there is no point  
> being
> asked to carry out CheckUser checks on people. It isn't merely about
> technical proficiency, but about judgement of editing patterns, of
> style, and of content. This is something that is definitely
> language-specific.
>
> Yours sincerely,
> - --
> James D. Forrester
> Wikimedia : [[W:en:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]
> E-Mail    : james at jdforrester.org
> IM (MSN)  : jamesdforrester at hotmail.com
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