Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2010/Candidates/Iridescent/Questions

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Questions/comments from Ncmvocalist and responses from Iridescent

If it's not inconvenient for you, I'd like it if you could respond directly under each question/comment. Thank you in advance. Ncmvocalist (talk)

Done, although you do realise I'm not Giano? – iridescent 16:04, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry...if it's any comfort, I've embarassed myself by saying "responses from Giano" to several other candidates when I was pasting them. :S Ncmvocalist (talk) 18:14, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Administrators

Q1. In your opinion, are unblocks more harmful than blocks? Why? Ncmvocalist (talk) 15:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

No, quite the opposite. If someone is unblocked wrongly, the worst that happens is the original blocking admin gets annoyed and the unblocked user then goes on to cause a problem and promptly gets blocked again. If someone is blocked wrongly, we run the risk of losing a good faith contributor. With the number of active editors already in steep decline, that's a risk we shouldn't be taking. – iridescent 16:04, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Q 2-3 relate to the following scenario: A request for arbitration is submitted concerning an administrator who: (1) is territorial over their admin actions - refusing to permit their peers to modify their actions in any way, (2) has a history of threatening their peers with arbitration requests, and (3) appears to generally view their role on the project as a combination of cop, prosecutor, and jury (in favour of convictions via blocks) rather than the actual role that many Wikipedians expect of admins. The admin in question spends a lot of time in AE, praising and defending AC, as well as statements that you have made as an arbitrator. This request is filed at a time where AC is still the only body capable of desysopping an admin. Assume that a request for comment on user conduct has resulted in mixed responses, but the admin in question has refused to heed any requests to change his approach.

Q2. How would you deal with or respond to this situation? Ncmvocalist (talk) 15:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Assuming there was a general (not necessarily unanimous) consensus that the admin was using admin powers inappropriately, desysop if they continued to refuse to change their behaviour. Desysop/resysop ought to be used far more frequently; at the moment, despite all the "no big deal" talk, people tend to treat desysopping as the Wikipedia equivalent of branding. – iridescent 16:05, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Q3. {placeholder}

Questions from Skomorokh

1. You have been a vocal critic of the civility policy, or at least a certain strain of its application by adminstrators. Do you agree that a collaborative project needs some norms to encourage healthy interaction amongst participants and if so, what principles or standards would you suggest Wikipedia adopt in this regard?

   Absolutely, but I don't agree that the current system works. The spirit of WP:CIV is "create an environment in which positive contributors don't feel threatened or intimidated by each other". To my mind, too many people interpret it as "never use any word which might be offensive to anyone", or "always be polite even to people who are patently only trying to stir the pot". There's also an issue in that what is "uncivil" is culturally relative, but treated as an absolute by those who enforce it; language which would be considered friendly banter in Australia or England is considered grossly offensive swearing in the US; conversely, a phrase like Have a nice day is perfectly ordinary conversation in the US but considered patronising and offensive in much of the world. The whole focus on "civility" needs to be cut back to "was the person who wrote this genuinely trying to be offensive, and if so were they provoked". – iridescent 18:37, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

2. In what respects should the Arbitration Committee differ in their assessment and treatment of vested contributors as opposed to less experienced editors?

   I've never been convinced by the whole "vested contributor" thing. If someone's here and trying to help, they ought to be treated with the same courtesy one would give to someone who's been here three years. We should be far less keen to block regulars, but that's because we should be far less keen to block anyone who's not actively causing a serious problem. – iridescent 18:37, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

3. In non-emergency situations, what grounds of administrator misbehaviour should be sufficient for desysopping by the Committee without substantial prior dispute resolution?

   Depends what you call an "emergency situation". To my mind the only times blocks and desysoppings should be imposed without warning is when the editor continuing to edit/continuing to have admin tools presents an actual risk—an admin conducting a lot of out-of-process deletions, or suspected of leaking defamatory material from deleted contributions, springs to mind. – iridescent 18:37, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

4. As someone involved in selecting the election personnel last year, who is opposed to secret ballots and an interested observer in your movement from high-cabalist to quasi-retired critic and back again, I am curious as to what extent you were being serious in this comment, and the implications that might have in your decision to stand for election this year under similar circumstances. Thoughts?

Feel free to answer these or not as you choose, no rush. I might add more later. Skomorokh 18:19, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

Questions from Lar

Note to readers

This is a copy of User:Lar/ACE2010/Questions. These questions were taken from last year and the year before and modified to fit changes in circumstance.

Notes to respondents

• In some cases I am asking about things that are outside ArbCom's remit to do anything about. I am interested in your thoughts even so.
• Note also that in many cases I ask a multi part question with a certain phrasing, and with a certain ordering/structure for a reason, and if you answer a 6 part question with a single generalized essay that doesn't actually cover all the points, I (and others) may not consider that you actually answered the question very well at all.
• It is also Not Helpful to answer "yes, yes, no, yes" (because you are expecting people to count on their fingers which answers go with which questions...) go ahead and intersperse your answers. We'll know it was you. No need to sign each part unless you want us to know which parts you answered when.
• For those of you that ran last year (or the year before, etc.), feel free to cut and paste a previous year's answers if you still feel the same way, but some of the questions have changed a bit or expanded so watch out for that.
• Where a question overlaps one of the standard questions I have tried to note that and explain what elaboration is desired.

The questions

1. Is the English Wikipedia's current BLP approach correct in all aspects? Why or why not? If not, what needs changing? In particular, how do you feel about the following suggestions:

   a) "Opt Out" - Marginally notable individuals can opt out, or opt in, at their request. If it's a tossup, the individual's wishes prevail, either way. George W. Bush clearly does not get to opt out, too notable. I (Lar) clearly do not get to opt in, not notable enough.

   b) "Default to Delete" - If a BLP AfD or DRv discussion ends up as "no consensus" the default is to delete. A clear consensus to KEEP is required, else the article is removed.

   c) "Liberal semi protection" - The notion that if a BLP is subject to persistent vandalism from anons it should get semi protection for a long time (see User:Lar/Liberal Semi ... we were handing out 3 months on the first occurance and 1 year for repeats)

   d) "WP:Flagged Protection" - a trial, which ended up being called WP:Pending changes instead. Please comment on the trial results as they specifically relate to the BLP problem. (there is another question about revisions generally) Would you do anything different in the actual implementation?

   e) "WP:Flagged Revisions" - the actual real deal, which would (presumably) be liberally applied.

2. Given that it is said that the English Wikipedia ArbCom does not set policy, only enforce the community's will, and that ArbCom does not decide content questions:

   a) Is question 1 a question of content or of policy?

   b) ArbCom in the past has taken some actions with respect to BLP that some viewed as mandating policy. Do you agree or disagree? Did they go far enough? Too far? Just right?

   c) If you answered question 1 to the effect that you did not agree in every respect with the BLP approach, how would you go about changing the approach? Take your answers to 2a and 2b into account.

   Note: this question has some overlap with #5 and #6 in the general set but goes farther. Feel free to reference your answers there as appropriate.

3. It has been said that the English Wikipedia has outgrown itself, that the consensus based approach doesn't scale this big. Do you agree or disagree, and why? If you agree, what should be done about it? Can the project be moved to a different model (other wikis, for example, use much more explicit voting mechanisms)? Should it be? Consider the controversy around some election provisions... we had an RfC on the topic early this year, but by the election we still didn't have closure on some open questions. Does the recent adoption of Secure Poll for some uses change your answer?

   Note: there may possibly be some overlap with #7 and #8 in the general set but it's really a different tack. Feel free to reference your answers there as appropriate.

4. Please discuss your personal views on Sighted/Flagged revisions/Pending Changes. What did you think of the trial? Should we ultimately implement some form of this? What form? Do you think the community has irretrievably failed to come to a decision about this? Why? What is the role, if any, of ArbCom in this matter? What is the reason or reasons for the delay in implementing?

5. Wikipedia was founded on the principle that anonymity, or at least pseudonymity, is OK. You do not need to disclose your real identity, if you do not wish to, to edit here. You are not forbidden from doing so if you wish.

   a) Do you support this principle? Why or why not?

   b) If you do not support it, is there a way to change it at this late date? How? Should it be (even if you do not support it, you may think it should not be changed)?

   c) With anonymity comes outing. Lately there has been some controversy about what is outing and what is not... if someone has previously disclosed their real identity and now wishes to change that decision, how far should the project go to honor that? Should oversight be used? Deletion? Editing away data? Nothing?

   d) If someone has their real identity disclosed elsewhere in a way that clearly correlates to their Wikipedia identity, is it outing to report or reveal that link? Why or why not?

   e) Do you openly acknowledge your real identity? Should all Arbitrators openly acknowledge their real identity? Why or why not? If you are currently pseudonymous, do you plan to disclose it if elected? (this is somewhat different than Thatcher's 1C from 2008 in that it's more extensive)

   f) Does the WMF make it clear enough that pseudonymity is a goal but not a guarantee? What should the WMF be doing, in your opinion, if anything, about loss of pseudonymity? What should ArbCom be doing, in your opinion, if anything, about loss of pseudonymity?

   g) If an editor clearly and deliberately outs someone who does not wish to be outed, what is the appropriate sanction, if any? Does the question differ if the outing occurs on wiki vs off-wiki? (this is somewhat similar but different from Thatcher's 1D from 2008)

   Note: this ties in with #3(d) in the general set but drills in a lot farther. Feel free to reference your answers there as appropriate but I expect just referencing it with no further elaboration won't be sufficient.

6. Stalking is a problem, both in real life and in the Wikipedia context.

   a) Should the WMF be highlighting (disclaiming) the possible hazards of editing a high visibility website such as Wikipedia? Should some other body do so?

   b) What responsibility, if any, does WMF have to try to prevent real life stalking? What aid, if any, should the WMF give to someone victimised. Balance your answer against the provisions of the privacy policy.

   c) If someone has previously been stalked in real life, what allowances or special provisions should be made, if any?

   d) What special provisions should be made, if any, to deal with stalkers who are using Wikipedia to harass victims? Consider the case where the stalkee is a real life person and the harassment is done by manipulating their article, as well as the case where the stalkee is an editor here.

   e) Where is the line between stalking or harassing an editor and reviewing the contributions of a problematic editor to see if there are other problems not yet revealed?

   f) Are there editors who overplay the stalking card? What's to be done about that?

   Note: this also ties in with #3(d) in the general set but drills in a lot farther. Feel free to reference your answers there as appropriate but I expect just referencing it with no further elaboration won't be sufficient.

7. A certain editor has been characterized as "remarkably unwelcome" here, and the "revert all edits" principle has been invoked, to remove all their edits when discovered. In the case of very unwelcome and problematic editors, do you support that? What about for more run of the mill problem editors? What about in the case of someone making a large number of good edits merely to test this principle? Do you think blanket unreverting removed edits is appropriate or would you suggest that each edit be replaced with a specific summary standing behind it, or some other variant?

8. What is the appropriate role of outside criticism:

   a) Should all discussion of Wikipedia remain ON Wikipedia, or is it acceptable that some occur off Wikipedia?

   b) Do you have a blog or other vehicle for making outside comments about Wikipedia? If so what is the link, or why do you choose not to disclose it? Why do you have (or not have) such an individual vehicle?

   c) Please state your opinion of Wikipedia Review and of the notion of participating there. Describe your ideal outside criticism site, (if any)?

   d) Do you think it appropriate or inappropriate for an editor to participate in an outside criticism site? For an admin? For an Arbitrator? Why or why not (in each case)?

   e) Do you have an account at an outside criticism site? If it is not obvious already, will you be disclosing it if elected? Conversely, is it acceptable to have an anonymous or pseudonymous account at such a site? Why or why not? Assuming an arbitrator has one, some folk may try to discover and "out" it. Is that something that should be sanctioned on wiki? (that is, is it actually a form of outing as addressed in question 5? )

   f) How has this (the view of outside criticism) changed in the last year? Has it changed for the better or for the worse?

9. Does the English Wikipedia have a problem with vested contributors? Why or why not? What is to be done about it (if there is a problem)?

10. Does the English Wikipedia have a problem with factionalism? Why or why not? What is to be done about it (if there is a problem)?

11. What is your favorite color? :) Why? :) :) If you answered this question last year, has your answer changed? :) :) :) If so, why? :) :): ): :)