[WikiEN-l] Moderation on this mailing list

[Rich Holton]

Ron Ritzman wrote:
> On 2/21/07, Parker Peters <parkerpeters1002 at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>> It's not the obvious vandalism that's a problem, it's the number of people,
>> growing every day, who see an article, try to fix it, and get whacked by an
>> over-eager, over-egoed, over-caffeine-dosed admin who's lost the ability to
>> distinguish from a real vandal and someone trying to [[Be Bold]] and fix a
>> problem.
> 
> I can see two possible patterns a newbie editor can get into when
> trying to "fix" a "defended" article.
> 
> 1. bold/revert/talk/shrug/go play elsewhere
> 
> 2. bold/revert/bold/revert/bold/revert/go WTF on talk
> page/bold/revert/bold/revert/
> bold/revert/more dickery on talk
> page/block/sockpuppets/block/lather/rinse/repeat
> 
> As far as you know, have any of these innocent newbie editors drew the
> wrath of a "rogue admin" following pattern 1?
> 

Ron,

Perhaps I'm misconstruing your point. Is your question rhetorical, or 
actually seeking information? Are you suggesting that, if a "newbie 
editor" were to simply walk away, there would be no problem?

IF that is what you're suggesting, then I seriously disagree with you. 
Sure, perhaps there would not be the more visible problem of revert 
wars, "dickery", sockpuppets, etc. But the less visible, but more 
insidious problem of an admin preventing valid work an a page would 
remain. A "bold edit" (as opposed to vandalism) should not simply be 
reverted. Yes, I may be guilty of doing this, but then I should be 
gently warned, and progressively less gently warned if I continue, until 
either more drastic action is required against me, or I mend my ways.

Of course, none of that is exclusive to admins. That's just standard, 
respectful behavior. But if the newbie has heard that one must be 
careful about admins, or one can get blocked, the "shrug and walk away" 
behavior is more likely, especially for the kind of newbie editors who 
would likely become productive editors. The boldness of the newbie 
editor is diminished (if not squashed entirely), and at least in some 
cases, the newbie may give up on the project entirely.

Meanwhile, the admin who reverted the newbie doesn't draw the attention 
of anyone else. You can't really call the admin "abusive", at least not 
intentionally. But from the point of view of the newbie, it could very 
easily seem like "there was this admin, who could ban me from the 
project, who refused to allow me to make changes to this page. I guess 
Wikipedia isn't as open to people editing as I thought they were. And 
those admins sure are a pain in the ass."

No complaints to anyone. Just a bad taste in a newbie's mouth. 
Successful businesses quickly learn that the real bad news isn't that 
your customers are complaining to you--the real bad news is when your 
customers aren't complaining to you but are disappointed, and are 
complaining to others.

-Rich