[WikiEN-l] Re: Broken dispute resolution mechanisms (was Reithyisa problem)

[Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales]

Charles Matthews wrote:
> "Bryan Derksen" wrote
> 
> > Kicking off 0.1% of Wikipedia's users isn't going to significantly reduce
> > the pool of editors, and would reduce the stress for a significant portion
> > of the 99.9% who remain. I don't see what these 1-in-1000 antisocials are
> > contributing to Wikipedia that is worth it to endure the bad atmosphere
> > they generate for everyone else.
> 
> Well, I think that's the debate really.  If it was uncontroversial who they
> were, and that a surgical removal was possible without splitting the
> community, they would be banned quite quickly.

I think you're both right.  :-)

The "problem user" that concerns us all the most is not the troll or
vandal or obvious nutcase.  These are taken care of quite quickly with
a minimum of fuss.

The problem are the people who are *good* and *bad*, and there are
many many types of these, and really all of us has some tendencies in
this area.  (One of the best decisions I ever made around here was not
to edit much myself: I love NPOV in principle, but I'm not sure I
would be good at it on topics that I care a lot about!)

If we could unambiguously identify the 0.1% and remove them, yes, we'd
have a bit more peace.  But in the meantime, we can just cautiously
and slowly adjust our policies and procedures more or less tightly,
with an eye on kindness, love, justice, and principled action, and
seek for a helpful middle ground that we can all mostly support even
if we think it goes wrong sometimes.

I don't think anyone can seriously campaign for pure wiki anarchy, nor
for a regime of fast-banning by admins anytime there is a dispute of
any kind.  Neither would be consistent with our goals and values.

So, here we are, eternally talking about what to do.  This is not a
bad thing, it's just the human condition.

--Jimbo