[WikiEN-l] Rambot the User_talk: Spambot

[Fennec Foxen]

Hello. I'd just like to draw attention to
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Ram-Man#Spambot
a discussion about whether Ram-Man should be permitted to use rambot
to send unsolicited bulk messages (soliciting participation in a
"dual-licensing drive") to thousands of user-talk pages. The bot is
currently blocked indefinitely, pending the resolution of this issue.

Ram-Man seems to believe that an implicit community consens exists and
approves of his use of the bot in this fashion. Currently, he claims
to have "over 70% support" of users who responded to the message,
although I believe this figure to be skewed by the "users who
responded" part. I therefore would appreciate it if otherwise
uninterested individuals provide Ram-Man with a more concrete measure
of the level of community support which exists regarding this message.

Others have expressed concerns regarding the precedent which this sets
for distribution of unsolicited user-talk messages, and suggest that a
more concrete policy be formed to deal with this form of userpage
spam.