Wikipedia:Canvassing

Canvassing on Wikipedia means sending messages to Wikipedians informing them about a community discussion, with the intention of influencing the outcome in a particular way. This is considered disruptive behaviour – firstly because it may compromise the normal consensus building process; and secondly because, if done to excess, it may annoy the recipients of the messages.

It is perfectly acceptable to publicize ongoing discussions among interested editors, provided that it is done to broaden participation in the discussion, rather than influence the outcome in a desired direction.

	Scale		Message		Audience		Transparency
Acceptable notification	Limited posting	AND	Neutral	AND	Nonpartisan	AND	Open
	↕		↕		↕		↕
Canvassing	Mass posting	OR	Biased	OR	Partisan	OR	Secret
Term	Excessive cross-posting ("spamming")		Campaigning		Votestacking		Stealth canvassing

Appropriate notification

Appropriate notification normally takes the form of:

• Neutrally worded messages on one or more of Wikipedia's noticeboards, if the subject of the dispute relates to the subject of the noticeboard(s)
• Similar neutral messages posted on the talk pages of one or more relevant WikiProjects, other talk pages directly related to the topic under discussion, the Village pump or other central locations
• If the discussion is regarding policies, guidelines or other matters that have a wide impact then consider Wikipedia:Centralized discussion
• Polite notices on the talk pages of users mentioned in the discussion (particularly if the discussion concerns complaints about user behaviour)
• If necessary, neutrally worded notices on the talk pages of individual users who have participated in previous discussions on the same or closely related topics, who are known for expertise in the field, or who have asked to be kept informed. The audience must not be selected on the basis of their opinions – for example, if notices are sent to editors who previously supported deleting an article, then similar notices should be sent to those who supported keeping it. Do not send notices to too many users, and do not send messages to users who have asked not to receive them.

Such notices should ideally be brief (the user can always find out more by clicking on the link to the discussion), polite, and clear as to what their purpose is. Do not use a bot to send messages to multiple pages.

The {{Please see}} template may help in notifying people in a quick, simple, and neutral manner. It is good practice to leave a note at the discussion itself about notifications which have been made, particularly if made to individual users.

Inappropriate notification

Inappropriate notification is generally considered to be disruptive. Canvassing normally involves the posting of messages, but note that it may also include other kinds of solicitation, such as a custom signature to automatically append some promotional message to every signed post.

The following behaviours, on the other hand, are regarded as characteristic of canvassing (and may be seen as disruptive):

• Posting a notification of discussion that presents the topic in a non-neutral manner
• Posting messages to groups of users selected on the basis of their known opinions – for example, sending notifications only to those who supported a particular viewpoint in a previous discussion, or who state on their user page (e.g. through a userbox or user category) that they hold a particular opinion ("votestacking")
• Contacting users off-wiki (by e-mail, for example) to persuade them to join in discussions (unless there is a specific reason not to use talk pages)
• Posting messages to an excessively large number of individual users, or to users who have asked not to receive such messages
• Posting messages to users or locations with no particular connection with the topic of discussion ("talk page spamming")
• Soliciting support other than by posting messages, such as custom signatures that automatically append some promotional message to every signed post

Below are some brief explanation of the most common types of inappropriate notification:

Excessive cross-posting

Important discussions sometimes happen at disparate locations in Wikipedia, so editors might be tempted to publicize this discussion by mass-posting to other Wikipedians' talk pages. Even if the goal is not to influence the outcome of the debate, indiscriminately sending announcements to uninvolved editors is considered "talk-page spamming" (or e-mail spamming) and therefore disruptive.

Campaigning

Campaigning is an attempt to sway the person reading the message, conveyed through the use of tone, wording, or intent. While this may be appropriate as part of a specific individual discussion, it is inappropriate to canvass with such messages.

Votestacking

Votestacking is an attempt to sway consensus by selectively notifying editors who have or are thought to have a predetermined point of view or opinion (which may be determined, among other ways, from a userpage notice, such as a userbox, or from user categorization), and thus encouraging them to participate in the discussion.

In the case of a re-consideration of a previous debate (such as a "no consensus" result on an AFD or CFD), it is similarly inappropriate to send an undue number of notifications to those who expressed a particular viewpoint on the previous debate. For example, it would be votestacking to selectively notify a disproportionate number of "Keep" voters or a disproportionate number of "Delete" voters.

Posting an appropriate notice on users' talk pages in order to inform editors on all "sides" of a debate (e.g., everyone who participated in a previous deletion debate on a given subject) may be appropriate under certain circumstances on a case-by-case basis.

Stealth canvassing

Because it is less transparent than on-wiki notifications, the use of email or other off-wiki communication to notify editors is discouraged unless there is a significant reason for not using talk page notifications. Depending on the specific circumstances, sending a notification to a group of editors by email may be looked at more negatively than sending the same message to the same group of people on their talk pages.

How to respond to inappropriate canvassing

The most effective response to quite recent, clearly disruptive canvassing is to politely request that the user(s) responsible for the canvassing stop posting notices. If they continue, they may be reported to the administrators' noticeboard, which may result in their being blocked from editing. Users with a prior history of disruptive canvassing, which they have previously been asked to discontinue, may be blocked immediately without further warning, if such an action is deemed to be necessary.

Other forms of inappropriate consensus-building

For other types of action which are inappropriate in the consensus-building process, see the Improper consensus-building section of the policy on Consensus. Apart from canvassing, these include forum shopping (raising an issue on successive discussion pages until you get the result you want), sock puppetry and meat puppetry (bringing real or fictional outside participants into the discussion to create a false impression of support for your viewpoint), and tendentious editing.

See also

• Articles for deletion, notifying interested people
• Wikipedia:Publicising discussions
• Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines
• Wikipedia:Sockpuppets section on meatpuppets
• Wikipedia:Griefing
• Wikipedia:Survey notification (inactive)
• Wikipedia:Cabals