[Wikipedia-l] Trusted status

[Daniel Mayer]

>then LDC wrote:
>>There's two issues there: as for upload privileges,
those in favor
>>of restricting them to logged in users make a good
case, so I'll make 
>>that happen soon.
>>
>>The second issue is should the Wikis share uploads. 
I'm of the 
>There is a third issue, which we saw in spades on the
Phase II 
>software: once someone is logged in, we will no
longer see that person's IP and 
>therefore will have no way to block that person--and
there will most 
>certainly be people who log in solely to upload files
that should not be 
>uploaded, and who will deserve to be blocked.
>
>This problem could be solved by reinstating the
UseModWiki feature of 
>revealing the IP of someone who is logged in simply
by hovering the 
>mouse over the username.  It worked quite well, even
on my dynamic IP--each 
>time I logged out and back in whatever I did on
Recent Changes would 
>reflect the IP I had assigned me when I did it.  I
would love to see the 
>feature returned.
>
>cheers,
>
>kq

Better idea; Reinstate a type of ‘trusted hand’ status
and name it something like ‘old hand’. Old hands would
be users that have been around for at least 30 days
and have made at least 30 edits (status would be
automatically granted by the software when those two
requirements are met – there could be more than a 30
edit requirement if that is deemed necessary). Then
have the software only allow old hands, sysops and
developers the ability to use the upload utility. This
would be grandfathered in for current users. 

I would further suggest that old hands would also have
the ability to edit protected pages and use the
administrative move feature (I don’t know if we should
restrict the possible ‘vote for’ feature to old hands
though). Then the only special privileges sysops would
have would be pure meta functions; blocking IPs,
manually setting user status, deleting pages and
protecting/unprotecting pages. 

Having a 30 day/30 edit requirement ensures that users
are exposed to wikipedia long enough to become
familiar with our naming conventions, policies and
guidelines. Whether they actually do pay attention is
up to them. If needed their status could be reset back
to just ‘user’ by a sysop. Alternatively, sysops
should be encouraged to upgrade the user status of any
user that ‘gets it’ early.

I see no reason why we should prevent long time users
from editing protected pages and moving pages and
their history. I also don’t see any need to /ever/
have to block the IP of a long-time logged-in user.
Why then would this information be displayed, even to
a select few? Furthermore, how is it going to be
possible to associate a user with an IP on the blocked
page? Even though I trust this won’t be abused, the
existence of the possibility of abuse could be
chilling to some. 

Allowing sysops the ability to block anyone, anytime
might be viewed by some as strengthening the perceived
quasi-cabal we have now into a real one. I have mixed
feelings on whether to allow the display of IPs of
non-‘old hand’ users though…This might still be a good
idea, but then to see the IP of an ‘old hand’ all a
sysop would have to do is reset the user status of the
‘old hand’ to just ‘user’. To prevent this type of
activity from going unnoticed logs should be made.

Besides, there are only about a dozen active sysops
and the protected pages need to have more maintainers
(It’s tiring to constantly to have to review and take
requests on what to put on or edit on protected pages
by well trusted long-time users – I would prefer to
just edit their edits in the wiki way). Having an ‘old
hand’ status would also help a great deal with the
upload issue – those that want to use wikipedia as
just a server are going to have to ; 1) create an
account, 2) log-in, 3) make 30 valid edits and 4) wait
30 days.   

--mav


__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Health - Feel better, live better
http://health.yahoo.com