[Wikipedia-l] Re: Fwd: Banned from editing except on en

[Henry H. Tan-Tenn]

Hi, Jimbo,

You are quite right that the inactive Wikipedias are not being cared 
for, except by some dedicated Wikipedian admins from the outside.  So if 
indeed someone has been a troublemaker (i.e. editing in bad faith) on 
those inactive WPs, he or she should be judged accordingly, and I think 
you and others have the trust of the larger community to make such a 
decision.  But again, I am not comfortable with the idea of a global ban 
(except en:).  I think each of the active WPs should consider the record 
in the context of actual edits performed in each edition.  That is, 
assume he or she is on a "white list" for all WPs, and only ban him/her 
_locally_ for violating specific community policies (which could well 
differ).  It could mean that a persistent editor would need to be banned 
by and from all WPs, one by one, but so be it.  (It maybe enough, IMO, 
that all the WPs be notified that so-and-so is believed to have edited 
in bad faith on one or more WP, and leave it at that.)

It was along this line that I proposed to remove Mark from a wide "black 
list" as regards zh-min-nan (to be confirmed or rejected by other 
editors there, of course).  In that sense I was "vouching" for Mark, and 
only in that sense (given my limited attempt to follow the discussion).

Anyway, I hope things work out for all.

~~~~


Jimmy (Jimbo) Wales ti 2004/11/15 EP 04:44 sia-kong:
> Henry H. Tan-Tenn wrote:
> 
>>>You are banned from editing at any wikipedia site other than en.
>>
>>Personally (and with all due respect to Jimbo), I'd prefer that 
>>judgement be left to individual Wikipedias to decide, per their usual 
>>policy of banning users.
> 
> 
> The problem is: he has been making annoying edits on wikipedias that
> do not have any current users.  He removed all the interlanguage links
> from one, and replaced the standard boilerplate text with his own
> message and email address.  When Angela fixed this, he reverted her.
> 
> This is just one example of an ongoing pattern of difficult behavior.
> 
> He is one of the main factors forcing us to pursue a policy locking or
> closing small wikis, which is of course ironic, since he is an
> activist for small language wikis.
> 
> He and I had a partly constructive dialogue about these issues earlier
> today in IRC, and I am hopeful that some compromise can be worked out.
> 
> I admire his energy and enthusiasm, and I find him to be very bright.
> But there have been several incidents that are just problematic to say
> the least (look up the unresolved issue of sockpuppets for example),
> and his hostility and personal attacks against people who are highly
> respected in the community don't help at all.
> 
> I took this action at a global level rather than at an individual
> project level, because that's where the problem has arisen.
> 
> If you want him to be able to edit at zh-min-nan, then that is enough
> for me.  He can do that.  If anyone wants to vouch for him anywhere
> else (in an active project), email me and it will be done.
> 
> --Jimbo