Wikipedia talk:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011/Archive 3

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data about new users

In the period since the trial has begun, we have had surveys that have demonstrated repeated and frequent complaints from new editors that even the present English Wikipedia is too difficult to figure out when getting started. see WT:Wiki Guides/What was your new user experience (note, link fixed by Chzz 08:28, 21 March 2011 (UTC)). this makes it even clearer than it was several months ago that -- since a priority is getting & keeping new users--this system is unacceptable as adding yet further complication. The proper course is to stop further work in development of this system, and end the trial, ending any attempt to continue it, to retain articles in it, or to work on modifying it. It would still remain necessary to analyze it, but if analysis of the trial shows that it was nonetheless helpful on article quality, then we can try to invent some other way to accomplish that goal. I did not previously feel so strongly negative about it, but this and similar surveys have convinced me. DGG ( talk ) 02:22, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't know what page you're trying to link there, but I get the idea and I share your concerns. We still shouldn't ignore our vandalism problem and I think there are compromises we should consider. For example, allow the edit filter and bots to flag high risk individual edits as requiring manual review. This might require delaying the visibility of all anonymous edits for a few seconds to let the bots run, but I've already been in that boat with my own edits the last several days in that many don't show up unless I reload and/or purge. I would prefer immediately visibility for the user making the edit only, but I know that is problematic. —UncleDouggie (talk) 02:34, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Note re. the above - I fixed the link, just now [1]. I hope that is OK; but note it here so the above makes sense in context (re the link not working).
DGG, absolutely right. One thing we easily forget - when discussing all this anti-vandam stuff - is the affect we're having on new users.
We get jaded; we know "how it works" - we forget what it looks like to new users. Wikipedia is really difficult - I no longer accept that your average-Joe can simply create an account and write an article that will live. It's possible, but very rare. cf. my rant in signpost
Frankly, we don't know the affect that PC has. We should - that's what a "trial" should have found out - by conducting surveys of new users, gathering real, specific evidence, comparing experiences on articles with and without PC (a control group), and so forth. The trial was a fiasco. Its continued use, now, is anathema to the wikipedian ethos (consensus, etc). Chzz  ►  08:28, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
DGG, doesn't the Pending changes make it easier for new users to contribute? They simply see an edit button, and, after editing, a notice that their edits will be reviewed (guessing- this may be incorrect, if so, tell me). Contrast that with an article that is under semi-protection, where the user must either create an account and go throught the autoconfirm process, or navigate to the discussion page (which I expect most casual readers aren't even aware of) and ask a registered user to make the edit. It seems that PC makes it easier for new users. I think that PC places an extra burden on experienced users, but not new users. Semiprotection seems harder to navigate for new users. Cliff (talk) 16:47, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Only a small fraction of articles are under semi-protection. Many have proposed wide-scale application of PC to all BLPs even all articles. —UncleDouggie (talk) 20:16, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Cliff, for semi, it isn't quite that bad - they click on submit an edit request - try that link, and you'll see what I mean. It's not great, it could be much better, but it isn't quite as perplexing as you think.  Chzz  ►  21:24, 21 March 2011 (UTC)
Yes, the idea was to make it possible for new users to edit articles which are now semi-protected. I believe we all think this a worthwhile goal, just as we all think protecting against vandalism a worthwhile goal. /But if this is done in a way that confuses them, it is not net progress. What I would hope is that after we improve the editing interface , after we adopt more effective ways of watching problematic articles and BLPs in general, after we adopt practices of explaining to new users their errors without antagonizing them, then we might possibly find a way to make a relatively understandable way of doing what protected edits set out to do. But it is clearer to say "you cannot yet edit this article" than to have a state when they will not know whether or not they have in fact edited the article, and where some articles behave when edited much differently than others. (What induced me to come here was a little experience trying as a new editor who had not signed in to edit the German Wikipedia--admittedly I have only a rather elementary knowledge of German, but this parallels the abilities of many who come to the English Wikipedia.) DGG ( talk ) 00:25, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
Clearer to say doesn't mean new users will find it less confusing/annoying or easier to work with Nil Einne (talk) 07:26, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

The idea of a 'protected page' is quite intuitive. "Sorry, you can't edit this, it is protected" - easy. Semi adds a slight twist to that, but even so, saying "Sorry, new users cannot edit this" is pretty clear. But pending changes is not. If the user edits the page, they see their change (plus the unreviewed notice) but, if they move away from the page, and then go back to it, their change is "gone" (if not reviewed"). Then, if they click "edit", the change is back in there. This issue has been discussed previously; please look in the archive of this page and the project page - I know, they're long and messy - we could do with summarizing the content.  Chzz  ►  08:06, 22 March 2011 (UTC)

The question of how quality measures like this impact retention of newbies is really important, I agree. See my reply to the thread just above this for some data... Steven Walling at work 23:10, 22 March 2011 (UTC)
Chzz your comment above should make things perfectly clear-- I wish I could have worded it as well. DGG ( talk ) 03:17, 23 March 2011 (UTC)

Planning for phase 4

I hope this isn't too early to think about the next phase. I quite like the ideas laid out by at Wikipedia talk:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011/Archive 2#Issues to be resolved but there are also some things worth considering on the first attempt at a phase 3.

I guess there are two things for us to discuss here.

  1. What are the issues that we would like to address in the next phase?
  2. How are we going to organise the discussion in the next phase?

Yaris678 (talk) 14:12, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

It's not too early at all. Based on the support for the short-term removal, we should probably assume for now that the proposal will be accepted. Therefore, I believe that the infamous Question 1 should be deferred to a question on long-term usage for the last phase, whatever number that ends up being. We should have concrete policies to propose by that point. To that end, let's first collect all the issues that we want to get resolved. We should draw on the original phase 3 questions 2 to 10, items of concern from phase 2, and my list posted above. Once we get a consolidated list that we're all happy with, the next step will be to decide how to resolve the issues. I think we can solve some of them right here by drawing from earlier discussions here, discussions from Jimbo's talk page, inputs from the WMF that Steven Walling is working on, and some new data analysis. We will then be left with a set of issues that require broad community input, including of course the article selection criteria. Whatever we can express as an up or down discussion might be best done right on the RfC page following the well-running phase 3 model. Other items might be best suited to a questionnaire. My activity level will be very sporadic for the next week, but I'll check in when I can. —UncleDouggie (talk) 15:49, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
Eh? Considering the number of editors opining in the past (several hundred IIRC), I would suggest that a minimum of 100 "supports" are needed (recalling that a larger number was "insufficient" from the view of those opposing PC in the past, this seems a minimal bar indeed.) WP:DEADLINE applies still. Collect (talk) 15:59, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
I think UncleDouggie was talking about a working assumption, while we think about the issues we want to address. To a certain extent it probably doesn't matter. If the current RfC doesn't pass we are still probably better off ignoring the short-term question and the issue of whether or not we want to use PC should still be punted into the long grass. I agree with the aproach outlined by UncleDouggie. Yaris678 (talk) 16:11, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
I really don't like the idea of a dogfight between finished proposals. That is the road of most drama. The questionnaire is the road of least drama, or at least is intended to be. I think we can all agree that after the sub-RFC on how it used right now is over we do need to return to addressing the future, as that has been the point all along. If we follow the plan for the questionnaire followed by examination of the results by a jury, we should then be able to present to the community a "rough" policy based on those results without having to have a fight about it. It can be posted as a "guideline" based on community input and refined and tweaked until it is a finished policy. That's of course assuming that participants in the questionnaire phase do not elect to reject it entirely. Doing this will take time and effort, but it should be a lot less contentious then having finished proposals for a policy duke it out. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:21, 24 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm hoping to have one finished policy that we put forward. If that involves a questionnaire, fine, but I don't think that's a given. If we don't get consensus, we take the comments and try again. I can't see people agreeing to turn over the final decision to a jury. —UncleDouggie (talk) 09:43, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
The only thing we would be seeking a final decision on would be "the big one." The actual policy would be drafted by the jury and presented as a guideline with the idea that it would have the bugs worked out of it over time as usual. No proposed policy is ever going to be permanently accepted as-is, policies get changed all the time. That is exactly why I am so strongly opposed to having people's proposals for finished policies be set up as opposing views to be voted on. That is likely to be an extremely contentious process. People will get mad, some may even quit, everyone will be sick to death of talking about it,(I'm sure we've all noticed that a lot of users already are) and after all that it will end up being changed later anyway. Not worth it. Better to put together something that we know in advance that it will be modified over time to suit the community's needs and desires. As the product of a consensus-based process there will be no ego issues involved, just a document designed to help us move forward at long last. The closing will of course be a lot of work but I believe it is doable. Beeblebrox (talk) 05:38, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
I agree that no policy or guideline is ever final. I'm a bit confused as to how you intend to arrive at the initial policy. Earlier you seemed to say this would be done by a jury, but in your comment here you seem to say it would be by consensus. I believe that the "big" question only makes sense within the context of some initial policy. Here is a highly hypothetical example: It is proposed to use PC on BLPs with under 1 edit/day, reviewers are required to reject changes for reasons x and y, they are required to approve problematic changes of type z, bots aren't permitted to perform reviews, and external tools are permitted to implement an approval action for reviewers only. Perhaps other classes of use for PC are also included in the initial proposal, or maybe they are submitted as a follow-on proposal. —UncleDouggie (talk) 08:55, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
The jury will interpret consensus to arrive at the guideline. Their first job will be to read all of the responses and find commonalities between them. Then they would use those commonalities to construct the guideline. There would be no further formal RFCs, polls, etc, the guideline would simply be presented to the community and PC would be expected to be used in a manner consistent with that guideline. This would be done with the understanding that through use of the tool we may find unanticipated problems with the guide that will need to be rectified. After a reasonable amount of time has passed, say 3-6 months, we can then have some further process aimed at promoting the now-improved guideline to a policy and formally incorporate it into the protection policy. If by some chance the answer to the big question turns out to be that we turn it off entirely then we are done right there. If the answer is to leave it in place and work with it then we do that after the guide has been published. Assuming that is the result of the current phase it would remain unused until the guide was out. To put it another way it will be a trial, but for the policy, not the tool itself. Although if we're keeping it we may be able to squeeze some improvements out of the Foundation tech team during that time as well... Beeblebrox (talk) 19:47, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Where are the results of the trial?

PC has been on for quite a long time, and I haven't seen any real statistics anywhere, not counting the few pages linked to from Wikipedia:Pending changes/Metrics. Surely there were some articles with PC being applied for random durations in large enough tests to get some real statistics, without being distorted by people turning on/off PC because it's helpful/unhelpful at the moment? How much the editing frequencies rose compared to semi-protection, how much it drops compared to unprotected, how often users whose first edits were to a PC article will make future edits in comparison to if their first edit was to a statistically identical article not under PC, etc? Could someone provide some links? --Yair rand (talk) 03:40, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

There is Wikipedia:Pending_changes/Metrics#Metrics - but I do not know how useful that is. The methodology of the trial is questionable; articles were (and still are) selected at the whim of admins, and there were no set goals, no control group, etc. It isn't really a trial; it would appear to be an attempt at bringing in the system without consensus. The only way we can assess the potential of PC is to try to agree to some further implementation - this time, working out some measures beforehand. You're quite welcome to examine the history of PC'd articles though, to gather the info yourself - Special:StablePages lists all those currently protected, and the logs show when PC was applied/removed - e.g. [2].  Chzz  ►  03:53, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
On that point we are in agreement. The trial was a shambles that was not done in a scientific manner, and nobody seems to have collected any meaningful results. This end of the process would probably have been a lot easier and less contentious if we had some more concrete data to use. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:24, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Feb 1 to date - looking at Alaska as representative (well, first) on the list: 16 IP edit sequences were rejected by reviewers, and 2 were accepted (pretty abysmal quality rate on the IP edits?), ClueBot only caught 8, and caught 1 registered editor for a bad edit. The article is open to IPs, and the bad edits were pretty much all by IPs, and a large majority were caught by Pending Changes. Then Britney Spears, first BLP on the list: No IP edits, and cluebot caught zero improper registered user edits. 9 edit sequences were rejected by reviewers (one initially accepted, then rejected by another reviewer). This shows a significant benefit is just over one month on a specific BLP. Then John Diefenbaker which should be representative of a rarely edited BLP. 4 rejected IP edits. Zero IP edits accepted. Zero IP edits caught by Bot. Even on a slow page, the use of Pending Changes is shown to prevent "interesting edits" from being made public, and more efficiently than the current bots can do it. And, amazingly enough, reaching statistical significance extremely quickly. Collect (talk) 11:26, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Numbers don't mean much. Examine the diffs, then judge. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 09:46, 26 March 2011 (UTC)
Note: This indicates that "semi-protection" by itself is decidedly not superior to Pending Changes, thus obviating that argument. I invite others to make similar comparisons on articles currently under PC. Collect (talk) 12:25, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
I tried pending changes a few weeks ago on Tiki Barber and it was a failure - it just created work to revert a lot of vandalism. Where pending changes is useful is the lightly edited / lightly watched BLP. That's where we have the toughest time keeping vandalism out, but s-protection is overkill. --B (talk) 13:44, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Um -- you turned on PC at 04:04 on 9 March, and turned it off at 22:59 on 9 March (under 19 hours total). I would suggest that this does not meet any standard for a try at PC. In fact, I found no notes of "accepted" at all in any edit summary, which means that PC may not even have been active for the 19 hours (or even at all). Collect (talk) 14:07, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
The "accepted" notes get removed when you turn off pending changes. The reason I turned it off after 19 hours is that it was being inundated with vandalism. --B (talk) 02:09, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Analysis

OK, so let's have a look at the first of those, more thoroughly;

PC enabled
20:31, 30 November 2010 [3]

Edits, from that point onwards;

Edits to Alaska under PC
User Date Diff Comment
21:29, 1 December 2010 86.145.67.137 [4] Plain Vandalism
Reverted by Cluebot [5]
17:00, 2 December 2010 204.39.176.72 [6] Plain vandalism
Reverted by confirmed user [7]
13:15, 3 December 2010 209.204.81.151 [8] Plain vandalism
Reverted by confirmed user [9]
20:53, 3 December 2010 216.67.81.116 [10] Subtle vandalism? Date change, no ref
Reverted by confirmed user [11]
---31 edits by registered users, all auto-accepted---
07:29, 5 December 2010 76.218.207.39 [12] Anon grammar fix (it's)
Accepted
---5 edits by registered users, all auto-accepted---
19:12, 5 December 2010 75.106.117.180 [13] Plain vandalism
Reverted by Cluebot [14]
---2 edits by registered user, auto-accepted---
21:38, 5 December 2010 99.242.122.15 [15] Unref'd change to a number
Reverted by registered user [16]

Net effect of PC (compared to semi): One anon added an apostrophe. They have made no other edits. And how much time was wasted in 'reviewing'? Hard to tell. We did stop "Hello Mum" etc. appearing for a few seconds on the article.

If someone wants to go on with this type of analysis, it might be useful.

 Chzz  ►  15:27, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I did the count from 1 Feb 2011 to date. The data are clear - and I think that the longer period (53 days) is far more utile here than a five day period. Collect (talk) 15:42, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
So can you produce some clear way of seeing the claims you made? Or, if not, is it worth my carrying on with the type of table above? Or is there a better way? I'd like to actually see what difference PC made. Chzz  ►  15:51, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Note also the current edit summary term "rejected" appears to date only to mid-December 2010, meaning that earlier PC rejections will all show as "revert" instead. 4 of the "reverts" were apparently due to PC being in place from 1 Dec to 5 Dec 2010 on Alaska. Collect (talk) 16:29, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Freddie Mercury has had PC for all of 2 days - in prior 2 days, more than a dozen iffy edits - 2 IP edits rejected now due to PC. Long time IP problem area - solved by PC. One more sample showing that PC works. Collect (talk) 16:47, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Maybe you know, there is a list at Wikipedia:Pending changes/Metrics/Anonymous edit quality where some edit analysis is made. This shows examples where PC 'doesn't work', such as Ann Coulter, and examples where PC 'works', such as The Mighty B!, Forrest J Ackerman , the latter being a good example of PC being helpful to test if protection is still needed (a RFC view mentioned this). Cenarium (talk) 17:11, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I think you have to compare the vandalism rate with no protection vs vandalism attempts under PC. Just examining the vandal edits submitted under PC ignores all the times where PC caused the vandal to not even bother to try. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 16:27, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

PC-level 2

In the event that PC is ultimately removed from all articles by consensus, I would support still allowing PC-2 together with semiprotection on the few articles where the only alternative is full protection. This would make Wikipedia more open, since autoconfirmed accounts would be able to edit, rather than everybody having to use {{editprotected}}. Reaper Eternal (talk) 12:56, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

I absolutely agree. For templates and things? Yes, for sure.
So yes; let's hope we can clear the air with the poll - and then, that is exactly the type of sensible proposed idea we can work out how to word, and hopefully get agreement upon.  Chzz  ►  13:13, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Not high-risk templates, as those can cause server issues. Addendum: It isn't possible to apply PC to templates as far as I can tell. Reaper Eternal (talk) 13:27, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Re. addendum: Hmm - so it would appear; I didn't know that. It's not even possible on the test wiki [17]. Odd; I don't know why that'd be the case. We need to ask about that.  Chzz  ►  14:41, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Apparently, it is impossible to apply PC to anything except articles. [18] Not that I can really see a use for applying it to talk pages or anything of that nature. Reaper Eternal (talk) 17:35, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
I emailed tech and asked about this. If it's not possible to apply it to anything except articles, I would assume that's an intentional design decision. If it's only templates, it may be either a bug or a security issue of some kind. A cursory search of bugzilla doesn't show anything related to PC and templates specifically, so I'll find out and get back to you. Steven Walling at work 19:26, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
It's definitely worthwhile finding out. I can think of various uses in other namespaces; I mean - within the last hour, I also did this, for example.  Chzz  ►  19:35, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
It's totally possible to apply it WP space [19] but it does not appear to function on any type of talk pages. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:43, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
I believe that Reaper Eternal was proposing some type of continued use of PC level 2 on current articles, and perhaps additional articles as well, prior to a consensus on the use of PC in general. If so, would someone please provide us a list of all articles currently under both PC level 2 and semi-protection so we know what we're talking about. My initial take is that a short period of full protection won't harm such articles and will be better for PC in the long-run. Such a use of PC begs for clear-cut policies that we just don't have today. —UncleDouggie (talk) 03:03, 26 March 2011 (UTC)

Comparing to semi-protection and robbing momentum

Discussion of long-term PC issue moved here from Wikipedia:Pending_changes/Request_for_Comment_February_2011#Comparing_to_semi-protection_and_robbing_momentum. —UncleDouggie (talk) 09:12, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

SirFozzie, you compare PC to semi protection, and say that since, in your opinion, it's "better" (in that it is less restrictive), we should keep on using it. However, this only applies if we never apply PC except from in case where we would also be happy to apply semi-protection. Do you agree that we should only ever use PC in these cases? If not then surely it is irrelevant to compare PC to semi-protection? See also: Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011/Archive 2#PC is not an alternative to semi-protection. Also, isn't the "momentum" PC has a headlong rush without actually stopping to see what's happening and properly consider the implications that continued use of PC has for the future of the project? Do you think this is a good way to implement a new feature? Personally I feel it's got a little bit too much "momentum", and stopping to catch a breath and think this through a little bit would be a good idea. - Kingpin13 (talk) 08:59, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

It's only a headlong rush if you compare it to fingernail growth! We've been discussing flagged revisions/ pending changes for, quite literally, YEARS now. My position now is only slightly modified from what it was at the start. I initially thought we should replace semiprotection with it, now I see it being useful as part of the spectrum of page protection. We're exchanging just three options for seven options. It should be added to articles just like all forms of protection, i.e. on a reactive rather than a proactive basis. —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 11:06, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
There's a more substantial difference here than you think, Elipongo, and it's that PC is utterly at the mercy of apathetic, malicious, or unknowledgeable reviewers, whose inaction or behavior will (not "can", will) eventually render PC as yet another form of semi-protection - complete with ignoring IP edits. As I have pointed out before, any measure relying on the benevolence, knowledge, and obedience of the general Wikipedia corps assumes the benevolence of Christ, omniscience, and complete and utter subservience to the five pillars - none of which any editor possesses all of, fullstop. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 21:07, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
That comes awfully close to WP:NPA friend. Do you have a problem with my reviewing history or that of any other reviewer? If so you should notify us of it, then if not satisfied bring it up at WP:ANI. Having said that, my own observation from the PC trenches is that while a few reviews are questionable, the vast majority are quite well done. Correct me if I'm wrong, but did I read above that you handed back your mop so as to avoid having PC? Regardless, I see that you don't have that Right. I might suggest you get the Right so you can get some direct experience in rather than have to speculate and speak in the subjunctive voice. —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 21:40, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
Indeed I did (and under a cloud, which at this point doesn't much matter because I don't like wielding nightsticks), specifically because, as User:David Levy already well knows (given how much I shouted at him) I want nothing to do with any Pending Changes implementation - to me, it directly contradicts a Foundation pillar. And I have seen PC be used. it failed miserably. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 21:46, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
So because of one month on one article, that article being one subject to intense real-world controversy, and that month just before the elections when the real-world debate was at its most heated; you have indicted the whole system? So what if it didn't work out there? To make a metaphor- when I'm riding my bicycle and the wind, terrain, or road quality changes; I shift gears to one appropriate to the current conditions. PC changes our protection "bike" from a 3-speed to a 7-speed, which means more options to be able to optimize to conditions. I was on a wikibreak at the time, so I don't know how bad the edit wars got on Park51 (though the sysop wheelwar is evident in the logs), but in general I would point out that PC allows for clamping down on an article just short of full protection (i.e. move=sysop, edit=autoconfirmed, accept=reviewer). Of course when sysops and reviewers are caught up in the war, there's no winning is there? As for your moral objection on WP:5P grounds, fair enough- but when are you starting your campaign to end the "temporary" blocking of anon article creation? Because I would be on-board with that one! Heck I can see future extension of PC to newly created articles by the non-autoconfirmed actually maybe helping us to finally win that argument! I say again, don't knock it till you try it. —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 22:44, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
The problem actually wasn't the edit war; rather it was the fact that it had to be forced off of PC because of systemic attacks from our best-known LTA - and he's generally the standard I measure most protection measures against, as he constantly attempts to find critical flaws in them (for which I begrudgingly thank him). As for the "temporary" blocking of anon article creation, I feel I should point out I registered after the Sigenthaler incident, so to me it's not "temporary"; it's just something that has been there from day one. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 23:36, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I see. It was that way when you got here, so it's ancient history and okay, maybe even a good thing! I'm sure antebellum Southern plantation owners felt the same about their peculiar institution. So if vandals and IPs worry you so much you should be advocating for universal semi-protection since you don’t trust your fellow editors to review the edits… as we've always done (that's what one's watchlist is for, no?). What I see in PC is a tool with the potential to make Wikipedia more truly an "Encyclopedia anyone can edit" than it has been in many years! You speak of "wielding nightsticks", yet I note that you retained your "rollbacker" right. Rollback is much more of a stick, with its abrupt nature and uneditable edit summary, than is PC with the glorified "undo" button that is its "reject" button. I really think you need to examine your motivations here, because they seem contradictory to me. In the meantime, please go to Special:AdvancedReviewLog and get some real-world, current data instead of relying on outlier examples and speculation. —Elipongo (Talk contribs) 03:50, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

I'm not going to comment on the mockery of my views; I'm just pointing out that anon article creation was disabled since before I registered and thus I don't know enough about the prior status to make a coherent argument one way or another.
And you're darn right I don't trust my fellow editors to review edits - Fuck, I don't even trust myself to review edits! What you see is PC thru rose-tinted glasses. I see more of the reality behind the veil: PC being used in content disputes willy-nilly as a means of enforcing a specific revision, edits backlogging due to editor ennui, the continuation of the "IPs/Newcomers are not welcome" vibe the site gives off enough of nowadays... the list goes on and on. The difference with rollback? A rollbacker is responsible only for what he does. Cops, whether you like it or not, are responsible for not only their edits, but for others' edits as well. And that leads to the violation of one of the Foundation issues (IP editing) because there will be far too few reviewers to handle far too many PC-protected articles - even if it's just BLPs. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 08:20, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
<sarcasm>Yeah, that intolerable "backlog" of unreviewed changes at Special:PendingChanges usually has what, three articles in it? There's no way our ~7,500 reviewers can keep up with three articles. On average, it takes the community one whole hour to review edits on these pages. Obviously, it's better to refuse to let IPs edit at all, than to make them wait a whole hour to see if their changes are acceptable. Zero editing by IPs is obviously the way to prevent IPs from feeling rejected!</sarcasm>
Nope, I'm not buying it. We could, in theory, exceed our capacity to review edits, but I think the Review Event Horizon is a very, very, very long way from here. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:27, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
I'll respond to the backlog comment with this: At present there's only ~1000 articles under PC. Even if we do it on BLPs only that number will skyrocket 518-fold, and that's just counting CAT:LP. Thus, whether there is a backlog at present cannot be indicative of whether or not there will be a real backlog problem when it's rolled out. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 02:10, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
It's true that there might be a problem with the backlog if PC were applied to a half a million articles (representing one-seventh of all articles on the English Wikipedia) or more. However, the solution there is to not overuse PC, rather than to reject it. You could sink a boat by overloading it, but that's not a good excuse for banning shipping, is it?
(Personally, I have no doubt that our existing 7,500 reviewers could keep up adequately with 50,000 articles... and I expect it to be a long time before we have that many pages under PC.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:40, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
The problem is a sizeable chunk (I don't want to say "most" as I'm not sure that is the case) of the people who support it want it to be, by default, applied to all BLPs (except for clear chokepoints like Barack Obama), WhatamIdoing, irrespective of any mitigating factors. Thus, I would say it's rather likely that, if PC ends up approved, there will be a backlog just from BLPs alone. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 05:15, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

Next phase

Assuming that PC will be removed from articles as the current state of discussion suggests, as commented above we need to consider the next phase. I suggest that we start the elaboration of a compromise proposal, either for a new trial, or an implementation of indefinite duration, maybe with mandatory reconsideration, with a fully fledged use policy. This can be done concurrently with a questionnaire with questions on specific policy issues. The proposed policy should be based on this RFC and other feedback such as the questionnaire if done. It should then be proposed to the community. If it doesn't gain consensus, we modify it in light of the new feedback and can propose a new one. As I've said already, I do not think it is possible to offer multiple proposals at a same time, because it's extremely difficult to discern consensus in such cases. I would also like that we do not rush, so as to avoid making the community tired of discussing PC. The basis for the policy already exists, at WP:PC, and the basis for a reviewing guideline exists at WP:RG, we can start from there. Cenarium (talk) 17:27, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

The questionnaire is intended to do all of that if it is allowed to proceed as designed. See my last edit [20] to this page for details on how it is intended to work. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:17, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
No, the policy needs to be drafted by the community then proposed for adoption, not by a jury, as it would give to a few people way too large a margin of appreciation. Cenarium (talk) 23:33, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
Yea, because having a free-for-all with a thousand different ideas being pitched has worked out so very well so far. If that is what we decide to do you can count me out because it's not going to work. By asking the community for input and then drafting a policy based on that the community is in essence drafting the policy, just in a more low-drama fashion. The jury would not be there just to make something up but to read all the replies and incorporate the commonalities in those replies into a cogent usage guide for PC. I don't know how we get "the community" to draft a proposal anyway. Look at the previous phases in the archives and you'll see what happens. We'll spend a week or two writing this proposal and the instant it has been posted users will start adding their counter-proposals and we'll end up with another giant mess with no consensus. That is not an acceptable result. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:40, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
The basis for the policy proposal is already there, previously we were talking with no clear goal and in difficult circumstances, it will completely change. Also, the trial itself came into being this way, and it worked to achieve consensus and implementation (for the flagged protection part, the devs never implemented the patrolled revisions part). Cenarium (talk) 20:25, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
Look at what is going on right now. We've got a perfectly clear yes or no proposal and many users who have commented don't even seem to have read it or understand exactly what it is they are supporting or opposing. Wikipedia is what it is, everyone wants to have their say even if it is grossly uninformed. Instead of getting endlessly bogged down arguing over every word of the proposed policy till we're all blue in the face, the jury would collect the data and let it speak for itself without all the hyperbole and other nonsense that has been an inevitable component of all major policy discussion of late. To think that will somehow change all of the sudden is .... well let's just say I find it overly optimistic. I wish it were that easy, I really do, but I very much doubt it. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:33, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
We didn't try yet. Further, I don't think that the idea of a jury making a policy based on their view of the discussions would gain a large acceptance in the community. Cenarium (talk) 20:56, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
They wouldn't be formulating the guide based on their own views but rather on commonalities from the responses to the questions. I realize the jury idea is unusual, but this is an unusual situation. It's extremely complicated and the more we discuss it the more complicated it gets. By having a wide range of replies reviewed and analyzed by a specific group we can cut out a lot of the bad noise we see at these discussions and just work on solving the problem in the simplest way most supported by whatever consensus is evident in those replies. The guide they would publish would not be intended to be a finished policy but rather a guide to help us move forward. Over the months of it's use unanticipated issues are bound to crop up and it can be modified as needed until it is ready to be formally integrated into the protection policy. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:54, 28 March 2011 (UTC)
We don't do things this way for a good reason. Frequently in discussions, a user will mention something that others hadn't considered and there is a sudden rush of support for the idea. This isn't possible with questionnaires and a jury. The range of opinions on PC is extremely diverse. The notion that a jury could find commonality, much less consensus support for that commonality, is fanciful. I think you underestimate the degree to which the ongoing trial has poisoned previous attempts. Also, the current proposal is the closest thing we've had to a structured discussion. —UncleDouggie (talk) 02:05, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
As a kind of compromise, I think we need to consider my essay competition idea described at #Ideas for what happens next. I think it has some of the advantages of the questionnaire idea, without some of the drawbacks that UncleDouggie is concerned about. Obviously some of the details need to be worked out... but I think we can work some of that out quite easily. Perhaps the next phase should be agreeing the rules of the essay competition. Yaris678 (talk) 08:16, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Beeblebrox, you seem to be advocating a jury, looking at the discussions, and writing a "guide" - what is that? A policy on how PC can be used? There is absolutely no way such a policy would be accepted without consensus. If the jury attempts to put forth a page saying "This is how we're using PC for now; we'll work out the details later" - then it'll be rightly lambasted. It simply will not work. Nobody can magnanimously decide how PC will be used - no matter how carefully they analyse the discussions. And if, instead, the jury comes out with a proposal - then it'll require discussion. And yes, the discussion would be long, and complicated - with counter-proposals. And rightly so.

I'm amazed at your "I told you so" comment [21] on the current proposal. Nobody has "forced aside" anything - it's simply that quite a few people don't think it is the best way forward.

There was a consensus for the current proposal - even you, Beeblebrox, seemed to accept there was "general agreement" for the "side RfC" (as you called it). Personally, I'd like to have seen a little bit more discussion before it actually became a live proposal - but, I don't think there were many objections to it.

Whereas...for this "questionnnaire" - I am still not seeing a "general agreement". I'm seeing lots of people saying "whoa there, are you sure this is a great idea?".

I'm concerned that Beeblebrox wrote, The idea behind that process is to gather input rather having a dogfight between positions, - hold on; isn't an RfC supposed to be about discussion? ...and to use that input to construct a rough guide - so you think PC would be used in accordance to some "rough guide", without policy?

If you go ahead with the questionnaire, I wish you the very best of luck - but it is against my advisement. And I reserve the right to leave a message, two or three months down the line - if it hasn't achieved anything - saying, "I told you so".  Chzz  ►  15:52, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I trust Beeblebrox's judgment and believe the debacle that this RfC has become proves his position. --JaGatalk 18:36, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Thank you JaGa. The I told you so was more about how difficult it is to steer one of these discussions. Look at how many users have misunderstood or ignored the clear proposal you made and have discussed other matters instead. That's why I think more open discussion periods and proposal dogfights won't work. RFC stands for requests for comment. Although user RFCs have a standardized format there are no hard and fast rules as to how those comments are gathered. My proposal is the road of least drama. It will be difficult and involved work and I'm sure that the result will be criticized no matter what it is, but that is going to be the case no matter how we proceed. The guide would be like any other usage guideline. A guide which admins are to base their decisions on, treated with common sense and the occasional exception. The publishing of that guide would be the end of this process, the tool would go back into use in a manner consistent with the guideline.
We cannot and should not expect that the result of this RFC will be a perfect, finished policy that pleases everyone. That's not going to happen. No policy is ever finished. For example exactly six years ago today this [22] was our username policy. It tells new users that the best username they can pick is their own name. That is the exact opposite of what we tell them today. No matter what we come up with as a result of this process, over time it will be changed. One day it might say the exact opposite of what it originally said. We shouldn't worry about getting consensus for every last word or trying to make it perfect from the get-go when we know it will be changed in the future anyway.
The questionnaire/jury idea solicits community input without the fighting. We've already had plenty of that. The input is used to form a guideline. Since the guideline is based on community input there is no need to vote on it or anything, we can just start using it and if there are unanticipated problems we can fix them as they occur. Why have all the drama of fifteen or twenty proposals duking it out over a month? Think about this as well: with the inevitable counter proposals muddying the water the chance of a "no consensus" result is quite high if you go that route. This is exactly what happened when we tried to come up with a de-adminship procedure. I knocked together an idea for a process with the intent that we would all work on it together and make it into something we could use. Guess what happened? Nobody did that. Everyone simply started their own proposal from scratch, even if it differed only in minor details from the one I had drafted. Soon there were seventeen proposed policies. I don't have to tell you that the result was that we have no policy on de-adminship and the entire process was an enormous waste of time and energy. The newborn Administrator project died as an infant as a result of it's first project being such a spectacular failure. You say you want out of the state of limbo, so do I. I daresay that is the one thing every last one of us has in common. If we go the "policy proposal" route we won't get there anytime soon. (sorry for the long post but this story needed to be told as background for why I am so opposed to that idea.) Beeblebrox (talk) 18:55, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
WP:TLDR version of the above: I would argue that my idea is actually more in keeping with the spirit of Wikipedia because it is based on the idea of a group of users collecting input and working together to form a solution as opposed to presenting various proposals and having users work against one another to find a "victor" proposal. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:33, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
I think we already know the current opinions of the most interested users from the previous discussions and polls and there is little additional information to be gained from a questionnaire. The users who haven't expressed much of a clear opinion so far probably won't have anything more interesting to provide in a questionnaire response either. However, I believe there is room for compromise through further discussion. We need to break things up into small chucks and discuss each separately. For example, I didn't fully understand Kww's SPI objection until I asked and we had a small discussion on the matter. That's a topic that I think needs more discussion still with a larger audience, which is highly unsuitable for a questionnaire. There are many such topics to work through. —UncleDouggie (talk) 04:00, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Do we need a next phase?

So, a question's been tickling the back of my mind. I think a comment above brought it to the fore, namely about how discussions have resulted in a hopeless, tangled, and inconclusive mess.

We've got a name for that kind of a result. It's called "no consensus". I don't think continually rephrasing and reformatting the question is going to come to a different outcome, nor do I think that asking the question over and over is really an appropriate way to do so. If we're not seeing a clear consensus to make a major structural change (and PC is a very significant change), that change does not have the requisite support to be made. Just like any other policy change proposal which does not achieve a consensus, the proposal fails.

We require clear, unambiguous consensus to make far less drastic policy changes than this one. If over several months of trying, this effort at a change proposal has not received a clear and unambiguous consensus, it is a failed proposal. Seraphimblade Talk to me 20:22, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Wrong, ppl who oppose PC, seem to edit this page, only (filibusting, seems an interest group). Ppl who fight vandalism want this tool. PC isn't a major structural change, thousand or so articles under PC isn't. Vandalism is a major structural change. The grouping here isn't representative. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 21:03, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
If the questionnaire is allowed to proceed it will address the over-arching issue of keeping PC in some form or rejecting it entirely. Obviously I can't guarantee any particular result but I believe it will be possible to answer the yes/no question. That is, or at least was before it was sidetracked, the primary purpose of this entire process. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:19, 27 March 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Chrs.urs-o. I have a job in real life, 6,000 pages on my watchlist, and I spend time researching topics and adding content. I want PC, but I don't have time to spend in here constantly arguing this subject. I also resent someone campaigning on my talk page to get me to change my mind. I've made my support for continuing PC clear, and I don't want to be badgered about it. -- Donald Albury 23:37, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Post by Yaris678 moved to #Ideas for what happens next. Yaris678 (talk) 00:28, 28 March 2011 (UTC)

(To Seraphimblade) Are you kidding ? There has not been a single proposal put forward since the end of the trial, not one. So how could the proposal "have failed" ? Cenarium (talk) 23:33, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Ideas for what happens next

I agree with some of what Seraphimblade is saying. We have an inconclusive mess and very little consensus.

However, I don't think we should drop the whole idea yet. A lot of people want to use Pending Changes in some form. I think if we tried to work out now some kind of policy towards PC we would reach no consensus, again. I think we should try something. I have two ideas of what that something could be.

  1. An essay competition. This is inspired by Beeblebrox's questionnaire idea. However, rather than answer some set questions on a user subpage, people would be encouraged to write a user essay on Pending Changes. They would be asked to analyse the situation and come up with suggestions. It could be judged by a panel, as per Beeblebrox's idea, or we could use a more open-source judging system, based on barnstars... or maybe some kind of hybrid. However it would work, the idea is that people can be more reflective than in a usual discussion... going back to their essay and tweaking it.... adding new links... generally taking full advantage of the wiki way. And... hopefully... by collecting together lots of well thought out ideas we may end up with a better idea of what to do.
  2. My other idea is inspired by this video of a TEDx talk by Tim Harford. It's 18 minutes long but I really recommend it... Anyway, one of the things that Harford talks about is the importance of local experimentation. Maybe we should, for the time-being, forget about getting consensus on whether and how to do Pending Changes on the whole of the English Wikipedia. Maybe we should ask a WikiProject to run a trial. I guess it would work like this:
    1. Ask for WikiProjects to put themselves forward. Any WikiProject wanting to do it would have to gain support from the members of the WikiProject in an RfC.
    2. If more than one WikiProject comes forward then the choice would be open to debate with the wider community.
    3. The WikiProject is then free to apply PC however they like to articles within their purview. They would be encouraged to work towards consensus - within their WikiProject - on the best way of using the feature and to document this in policies and/or guidelines.
    4. Once the approach to be taken has settled down, they would be encouraged to run a trial in a more quantitative way. i.e. More like a clinical trial.
    5. Once the trial is over, they would present the results to the community and we would decide how to proceed. We may, for example, decide to do another trial with a different WikiProject.

Yaris678 (talk) 21:37, 27 March 2011 (UTC)

Yaris, thanks for mentioning that TED talk - fascinating. I was particularly interested to hear about H. R. McMaster - it's a pity our article doesn't do him justice.

I agree regarding the need for "field testing" - however, disagree with the idea of selecting a project group.

PC can be used in so many different ways - and its effects are different, in differing circumstances. By limiting the remit to a specific proj, we'd only see one type of use (for wont of a better term).

I do think that some form of carefully controlled, specific trial, with measurable objectives - all defined and agreed before it starts - would be the way ahead. But I think that forming an appropriate proposal for such a trial is a very complex task - which is why I think we'd need a "bunch of people" (committee, jury, team...whatever you want to call it) to thoroughly analyse the mass of discussion re. PC, and attempt to formulate a specific, clear proposal which they believe could obtain consensus. This is again, in essence, what I suggested some weeks ago here.

I am convinced that, one way or another, that is the only way that progress can be made. I'm also convinced that it won't happen until the trial is finally closed down - because I don't think it will be possible to get any true consensus until that happens.

I'm convinced that that is what will happen - maybe soon, if consensus for the current proposal is clear. Maybe later, after more months of lengthy discussions.

I also believe that asking users to complete questionnaires will not help in any significant way. I'm concerned that it is being suggested without any clear idea about how it could possibly be evaluated. We've seen brief mentions of some jury-like process, but nothing in any detail. Collecting huge amounts of data without first working out what you'll do with it, does not seem likely to be productive, to me.

In addition, the questionnaire idea goes against the idea of permitting discussion and consensus. If a bunch of (tens or hundreds of) users produce their own view, their own notion - without being able to discuss it and look for common ground - I fear that will not help.  Chzz  ►  15:08, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

I too have fears about the efficacy of the questionnaire. Cliff (talk) 15:28, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

Chzz, I like this idea. I think that maybe it will be possible to come up with some kind of synthesis of all these ideas. But firstly, judging by the response, I am not sure my essay idea has been understood. Although it is inspired by the questionnaire idea is different. The sort of things I am hoping we will get are:

  • Proposals for further trials
  • Analyses of why we can't reach consensus
  • Suggestions for how to make PC less confusing

And we may get some more polemic ones, but that is OK, up to a point. At least an essay will allow people to explain why they are massively for or against, in a way that is clearer than your average talk-page rant.

We could have some kind of central page, perhaps where the essays are categorised. This could help people get an overview of the opinions on PC and form a good basis for a discussion about what we should actually do. I would also encourage people to help each other out with their essays, although the user concerned would have the final say over any contentious edits.

And people will of course go back and refine their ideas as they think about them or in response to comments. This will hopefully keep the ideas easy to understand and prevent the WP:TL;DR problem that you get with a long discussion. The WP:TL;DR problem prevents people from coming in half way though because they would have to read a mass of discussion... but if we have essays setting out neatly what the current thoughts are then it should help.

Secondly, I think the difficulty with getting any future trial up and running will be agreeing on the policies to be followed during the trial. I think my WikiProject-based trial idea gets round that by reducing the number of people that have to agree. Your idea is similar in that it would ask for about 12 people to look at the discussion and come up with a proposed trial with some new policies to go with it... but everyone would have their opinion on that proposal and it would be hard to get going. But if only the people in the WikiProject had to agree it would be a lot easier.

I can see your point about a WikiProject-based trial only looking at one type of article. But I think that it its strength. That makes it easier to reach a consensus. Obviously the consensus would only be temporary. We’d then have to look at other types of article. But it would be a start.

I'm not saying my ideas are right and your ideas are wrong. I am just trying to be clear about why I thought my ideas are good. That way, as I say, we might be able to come up with some kind of synthesis that takes the best from each.

Yaris678 (talk) 16:08, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

If people wish to write essays - sure, go for it. And if you think doing so will bring out useful ideas - sure, go ahead and encourage it, with central collection, etc. I think it sounds like a very long-term idea. I see it as "better" than a questionnaire, to some extent, because you're encouraging discussion and evolution. However, I do think it'd fall into the same problems - it'd create reams of more disparate opinions, and I'm not convinced they'd be any more reconcilable into a coherent policy that the community could accept, than the q would.
Regards project groups - OK, yes, you could get the group to agree but you'd also need to get the community to agree to the scheme. I think that'd be problematic; I foresee people saying "Whoa, wait, why that project? Why not mine?" And, how could we justify limiting it to one specific proj group - if others wanted it, they'd be quite right to insist they had the same opportunity.
Plus, the major opportunity for PC is BLP. So logically, you'd consider Wikipedia:WikiProject Biography...but that wouldn't help narrow things down. I mean...maybe they'd agree. But it'd need to be a limited number of articles...and, oh, I don't know.
Getting any sort of agreement - given the history - is going to be very challenging, I'm afraid. I don't know the best approach. I just wish we could remove the silly trial articles, while we work it out - it's been 9 months, and no matter how we attempt to work forwards, I could easily see another nine...and I'd much rather the current crazy limbo situation wasn't hanging over our heads. Still - there's no deadline! I'm sure, eventually, it'll be sorted out. Just, maybe not during the current decade :-s  Chzz  ►  16:45, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Further trials? Seriously? I for one will have nothing to do with that idea. Anyone who presents that idea as the solution to this issue is going to get endless grief over it for the rest of their time here on WP, which probably won't be very long once they become the most hated user in the entire project. If we want out of "limbo" more trials is not the way. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:06, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Yes, indeed. We know what the tool is capable of now and how it works and where to use it. The users that object to the trial not being ended look like being satisfied and then we should tweak up their position as regards acceptance for usage on the project with no more trials, many users have supported pending protection and the trial is over issue is over so to speak, the users that like the tool and support it need to step up and support its use as just another beneficial tool in the box of users that work in this area. Off2riorob (talk) 19:14, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
A Gedankenexperiment seems more reasonable than another live trial. This can take many forms. For example, give the draft policy to 20 users and have them each review the same set of 50 randomly selected changes chosen from the types of articles and users that would be eligible for PC under the policy. Check how well their reviews agree with each other and collect feedback on where they felt the policy provided inadequate guidance. —UncleDouggie (talk) 04:13, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
The only good thing a second trial might produce is, as stated by Beeblebrox, "once they become the most hated user in the entire project" I will no longer hold that infamous honor. My76Strat (talk) 17:20, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Further trials

Two thoughts:

  1. A further trial is a Bad Idea.
  2. But if you are absolutely determined to do that bad idea anyway, I believe that WPMED will take on the trial, and, if so, I will personally guarantee that the trial will, possibly for the first time in the English Wikipedia's history, be a properly designed prospective randomized controlled trial. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:34, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Lol, awesome :) Shame it can't be double-blind too. --Physics is all gnomes (talk) 20:00, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

My opinion is that a second trial is definitely going to be necessary before full adoption of pending changes is decided upon. The problem with the first trial is that nobody defined good trial criteria or metrics prior to starting it up; the result is that almost all arguments related to that trial are either anecdotal or emotional, with little actual data being discussed. –Grondemar 21:05, 29 March 2011 (UTC)

What we need is a trial of a policy, not the tool itself. We know what it does despite the flaws of the first trial. We know that it prevents vandal edits from going live. We know that if it is used in a limited scope that there will not be a massive backlog of unreviewed changes. If we come back to the community after all this with the response that we're just going back to the drawing board and there is still no guidance whatsoever on how it is to be used we're going to get wiki-lynched. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:17, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
Agree with above with the endorsement that a PC Policy essay competition be launched with a specific deadline for when the essays must be in by. Once the essays are in, a simple "Do you endorse this essay to become policy? <Yes/No/Abstain>" poll be conducted so as to determine which essays become policy for PC, which become guidelines, and which remain minority essays on PC. This gives everyone the opportunity to say their piece and the community to determine what the consensus is. Personally I intend to write many essays regarding this as I think it's a good idea Hasteur (talk) 21:44, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
A competition is a terrible idea. I am extremely disheartened that my low-drama proposal is being marginalized so that we can engage in a bloody spectacle instead. My proposal comes as close as can be to guaranteeing some sort of concrete result. Having a war between competing proposals has failed again and again in this type of wide-ranging policy debate. When we end up with fifteen proposals with no one having a clear consensus behind it what do we do then? Start over again? No thank you. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:57, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
I can't think of an instance in which an 'essay competition' ever produced a guideline, much less a policy, at least not within a time period of less than several years. The community's preference for certain essays does become apparent over time... but over very large periods of time. This is perhaps the slowest possible route to a functional policy. Furthermore, I fully expect a couple of anti-PC people to jump up and down and demand that no one ever use PC on any articles, ever, until an Official Policy has been Approved By The Community (which, naturally, they intend to prevent from ever happening). An essay competition is probably better for points on which community practice can harmlessly remain divided for years (e.g., Should Wikipedia have a single format for all bibliographic citations?). WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:57, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
Forget the buzzword "competition". The idea is a good one. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 05:06, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
"Your chance to be remembered in Wikipedia history"- as the person who resolved the PC issue? Heh. I'd give 'em a prize for managing that :-)  Chzz  ►  12:29, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
I think WhatamIdoing hit the nail on the head. Whether it is a competition or not, this would take a very long time. We heard loud and clear from the participants in phase 2 that a decision needs to be made sooner rather than later. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:47, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
The essay route will potentially take a long time. However, part of the problem with PC is that we have been rushing things. I agree that a lot of people want a final decision sooner rather than later. Sadly, if you look at the other results you will see this is just not possible. Look how many people think PC is confusing. Look at the very different ideas about how PC should be used. Yaris678 (talk) 17:00, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
I completely disagree with the claim that arguing about PC for three and a half years constitutes "rushing things". WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:09, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
It has been a case of "more haste, less speed." Because we have been rushing we have taken a long time. If we step back a bit and think things through more clearly we will resolve the issue in less time. Yaris678 (talk) 17:50, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

To clarify. My idea is not that people write essays that are intended to become policy. Some of the essays will argue for a certain policy, but they will do more than state that policy. They will look at the evidence and explain why that policy would work. Other essays will not be directly related to policy (as the word is understood on Wikipedia). You might get an essay saying "If we try to resolve our differences in this order it is more likely to reach consensus". You might get an essay that says "It all makes a lot more sense if you look at it like this".

I guess you could see this essay by me as an example of the sort of thing that you might get. It isn't about PC... but it lays out the background and analysis before making some very tentative suggestions. Doing it this way means that it is open for someone to come along and say "I agree with your analysis, but I think a better way of dealing with the issues identified is..."

I agree that the word "competition" is perhaps not the best one (it was the word that came to hand at the time). The idea is not necessarily that we will pick one or two winners and everyone else is a loser. The idea is that we all develop our ideas in a clear and well-argued way. I guess there is the possibility that someone will write an essay that goes down in history as the great solution to the PC issue. If that happens then the fame for the author will be a prize of sorts. But we don't have to bank on that happening... the essays may just be one step towards resolving the issues.

In terms of deadlines... potentially it could be a very long-term project. Perhaps it would be good to have some kind of initial deadline. Say... after 2 months we will look at what essays we have and look at where we want to go. Maybe we will implement the suggestions of some. Maybe we will decide that some need to be developed more or that the ideas of some can be brought together.

Yaris678 (talk) 16:54, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

The community spoke rather clearly about wanting a decision in the near future as this has already dragged on for several years. I don't think 2 months of stalling while we collect user essays is what they had in mind. I don't see any problem with doing this, such essays could prove to be helpful, but I don't see at as a viable way to bring this RFC to a close. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:36, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
See my comment of 17:00. Yaris678 (talk) 17:50, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Yaris, and I think it would be a perfectly 'acceptable' closure to the RfC if - for example, and assuming results - we were able to say, "-The trial has ended, and PC was removed from existing articles -Now THIS (some bunch of people evaluating, or some essay plan, or whatever we decide) will happen, and after THIS TIME (2 months? maybe) that will result in a fresh proposal, which will be put to the community for discussion and consensus." - it's clear, it's a result, it's progress. And if you're bothered about it taking a couple of months, I really don't understand that...because we've been in a serious mess for nine months. This type of closure would show significant progress had been made, and that specific future plans were in place.  Chzz  ►  20:36, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
Frankly Chzz, after the nature of your objections to the questionnaire I'm baffled that you could turn around and support this idea. A completely open series of essays? You expect us to be able to make policy based on that but insist that a directed discussion focused solely on the key points would generate to many results to be meaningful? The community has told us they want a decision. I thought that was what you wanted to since it was your complaints about the lack of consensus that spurred this whole affair into action. Now you would have us turn around and tell them we've removed pc from all articles and in a few months we hope to maybe have some user essays with ideas in them we can use to start drafting a policy? And you would have us characterize that as "significant progress"? We're still at square one, but Chzz got his way and pc is currently not being used is not progress. While I'm sure Yaris propsed all this in perfectly good faith, it will slow things to a degree that the community will not find acceptable. They will lose interest, so will most users who have participated here, and when your two months are up we'll be no closer to a resolution than we were when we started out a month and a half ago. We can't let that happen. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:07, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
I'm advocating exactly the same thing I have all along; and it will happen - maybe soon, maybe in a year or more. We'll finish the trial, we'll go off and think about things (in some way), we'll come up with a specific proposal with a clearly defined scope, that we think can get acceptance, and put it to the community. Anything else is just waffle.
Re. the 'some way' - I don't care. If questionnaire's help (I don't think they will), or essays (ditto), or just going off and reading stuff...w/e. Doesn't matter.
I find the comment, "Chzz got his way" to be an extreme assumption of bad faith. I think consensus got its way, and because you do not agree with it, you are blaming me.  Chzz  ►  06:01, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
No, you're quite wrong. I don't disagree about switching it off right now. As I must have told you ten or twelve times by now I don't care about that. The results of this phase have no bearing on the primary goal of this RFC, so at the moment not only pc but this entire process is "in limbo." I have put forward a concrete proposal aimed at resolving this. That is what the community has told us they want us to do, so that is what all of us should be focused on doing.My new proposal for a final phase is in line with what the consensus from the previous phases, the ones that actually dealt with the issues this RFC is supposed to be dealing with, told us to do. It is not just me but the wider community that has spoken loud and clear that they want this issue resolved. None of the alternate proposals made so far do that. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:28, 31 March 2011 (UTC)
The community has also spoken that they want it done right. There is general frustration that it has taken so long. The reason for that is that we didn't follow our time-tested procedures. Taking a straw-poll was doomed to failure no matter how many options were included. Not shutting down the trial was also a fiasco. We don't need desperate solutions right now; we need to try doing things the right way for a change. I see hope in the discussion from the current RFC phase and I think you will too once the trial is ended and that large block of complaints is gone. —UncleDouggie (talk) 21:55, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

I think the only way forward is the elaboration of a single proposal, based on the views expressed in the RFC. Contradictory debate should not occur between different proposals, but within the proposal itself, and resolved through compromise. When it's considered ready, we submit it to the larger community. Cenarium (talk) 12:47, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Reviewing experiment

I really like the idea expressed above.


I wouldn't describe it as a thought experiment, as UncleDouggie did. It is an actual experiment. I guess I might call it an off-line experiment in that we are not experimenting directly with Wikipedia.

Anyway, the point is that it would give us insight into what reviewers have to deal with in practice and where differences of opinion might have a practical effect. It should get to the bottom of "The duties of the reviewer are unclear", which I believe is the most fundamental issue facing Pending Changes.

Let's do it!

Yaris678 (talk) 18:05, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Attribution

Toward the end of the interim poll, I came in late with this comment. Because it was late there never was feedback. Chzz and I had a private discussion which left us in disagreement. I still maintain this position. Furthermore, I went to consider a semi-protected edit request which had been done upon my arrival. I was however reminded of my earlier comment and the fact it has not been vetted. Review this new users comments and consider if in fact this is a valuable consideration. My76Strat (talk) 18:39, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

This is a good point, but the impact is very limited. Most PCs are made by IPs, for which attribution isn't an issue. It's only a problem for the first 10 edits and 4 days of a registered user's contributions. With the limited use of semi-protection, that's maybe one or two edits. However, most newly registered users have previously contributed as an IP without proper attribution, so I don't know that it's such a big deal. In cases like the one you linked, an admin took care of the problem and the personal touch was probably more valuable than attribution for one edit. Also, when I fulfill a protected edit request, I always link to the talk page section in my edit summary. —UncleDouggie (talk) 23:07, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

A book

Would someone familiar with making a wiki book consider consolidating all of the relevant conversations, from the beginning, into such a book? Then it would be possible to review the entire conversation if one was so inclined. My76Strat (talk) 18:58, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Don't know anything about wikibooks, but Template:Pending changes trial would be a place to start gathering all that. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:22, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

Realism: many editors get tired of this repeated 'opinioning'

Yes, I know, officially this is not a vote, but after casting you 'opinion' many many times about yet another aspect, I and I know many others are getting really tired of this prolonged discussion to achieve community consensus. For those done with the discussion, I have created a user page where you can cast you final opinion now and be done with it. The page is found here (removed page, the opposers will continue to misrepresent the will of theity till they win)]], and once the discussion of the final proposal gets to a final round of consensus forming, those opinions will be added to the tally at that time. There are only two opinions you can agree with: Implementation versus rejection. If you want a detailed say, don't use this option. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 22:02, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm getting damned tired of it myself. I am unable to get agreement on this page on even the simplest things, and the number of proposals for how to proceed keeps growing. I have pushed this process towards its conclusion as hard as I can but it seems there is a group of editors bound and determined to ignore the mandate we have been handed to resolve this matter sooner rather than later and to instead pursue odd, complicated, and extraordinarily long processes that have little to no chance of achieving an actionable result. I had also considered the idea of splintering off my own RFC in userspace since this process has been completely derailed and my attempts to get it moving again have been repeatedly blocked. The objective of this process from the very first edit was to get an up or down answer. If no plan aimed at resolving that question is going to be allowed to proceed here then this has been a complete waste of time. I say we just look to phase two. The answer is obvious. Whether it is on right now or not the broader community wants PC enabled. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:18, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
Well, most want it implemented, the question is to what degree. I would suggest a simple solution to that. For each crucial aspect (Who, which pages, etc) make a incremental series (A, B, C, D, ...) of proposals. Let everybody cast they 'opinion' under the version that supports their idea best. With that opinion, they agree with that version of the incremental proposal but will also agree with the lower ranked proposals. For example, if you vote for all BLP's, that vote also counts to 75% of BLP proposal, the 50% proposal, etc. Not implementing PC is not an option anymore as we have already voted about that and the large majority wants it implemented. Once that voting is done, determine where 60% is in favor and implement that as policy. This bullshit need to be over with and it need to be soon! -- Kim van der Linde at venus 22:36, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
See here start of idea-- Kim van der Linde at venus 23:02, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
Unfortunately, it is extremely difficult to asses consensus when multiple options are offered, and this has proved prone to protestation, as seen in the poll at the end of the trial. It may not allow us to reach a policy for its use too, remember the question of use is inseparable of the question of how to use it. Cenarium (talk) 23:33, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, usage has already been decided. Suggesting otherwise is trampling on all the previous onioning excersises in which clear majorities were of implementation. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 00:03, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

I can understand the sentiment. It's exactly two years since the original trial proposal has been approved. And debate has been occurring over and over since (and already long before). As I've noted above, now that the issue of the current status of the implementation is about to be resolved, which was the main reason for wanting to address the matter urgently, we'll be able to move forward on the elaboration of a proposal in a calmer and more 'consensual' manner. We won't have to make another big consultation of the community on this until the proposal is ready, which will provide a break. Cenarium (talk) 22:33, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Don't forget the other staw poll: Wikipedia:Pending_changes/Straw_poll with a much larger number..... -- Kim van der Linde at venus 22:38, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, but that one resulted in no consensus. Cenarium (talk) 23:33, 1 April 2011 (UTC)
That was not a no consensus. 400+ people for, 217 against, 44 ambigous, sounds like a 60-65% in favor, which is sufficient for such large discussion. Ask Jimbo in that case. -- Kim van der Linde at venus
No, Kim, I suggest you look at that poll again. Many of the "supports" were for a specific means of implementation only; i.e. conditional. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 00:11, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
No, the majority is in favor of implementation. The onoly question remaining is how. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 00:32, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
Call it whatever you like. That did not result in any implementation. I don't see how this can possibly relate to Jimbo, and I know the matter better than him in any case, I've participated in flaggedrevs discussions since before the poll you mention and it's my proposal that was approved for trial. Anyway, let's not rehash the past. Cenarium (talk) 00:14, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
I realize there was no implementation coming from that, but by allowing the opposers to continuously rehash the question of IF after several straw polls have already shown clear majorities for implementation, we let the process be high-jacked by a few vocal opponents. It is time we stand against that and move forward with determining the HOW we implement it. Three straw polls with clear majorities is enough. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 00:32, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
Where do you come up with these stories Kim? There is no proven consensus (or even majority support) for implementing PC in any form. In addition, it is not the opposition who continually try to rehash the question. In fact, the straw poll, straw poll on interim usage, and phases one and two on this page were all set up by supporters of PC, and they were actually accused of repeatedly asking the same questions over and over until they got the response they wanted. This phase 3 which is currently live is the first phase I've seen which I feel was really decided through consensus. We carefully discussed on this page what the wording of the question should be, the options for !voters and other aspect of the phase. The other phases and the straw polls all seemed to be set up on the whim of an individual, which would explain why there were so many problems with some of them, the worst being (imo certainly, and it also seemed to generate the most controversy among other users) the straw poll following the end of the trial, which you are now saying proves we should use PC. I feel like I've had to explain to a thousand users the problems with this, so I'll just point you towards this and this. You are failing to understand the problems with implementing PC, you say "the majority is in favor of implementation. The onoly [sic] question remaining is how." But, as Jeremy said, therein lies the difficulty. If you implement one option, then you get some of the so called supporters of PC, preferring that PC be turned off than that we use that option. If you switch around and use the option those supporters want, then again other so called supporters would rather having no PC. This was rather clearly demonstrated in the results of the straw poll you're saying we should use as a justification to implement PC. This straw poll gave voters four options: one of which was to close, three of which were to implement PC in a specific form. Then at the end of that, the three so called "keep" options were lumped into one category, and it was claimed that this showed a majority support. However, if you split the votes for each option down, no single option actually got a full majority support. This concept (that there can be an apparent majority support for PC in some form, but in actual fact, whatever form you use will not have a majority support) is something you need to grasp. You also state "[we're letting] the process be high-jacked by a few vocal opponents." But the truth of the matter is that the people who don't care about "process" here are by and large the supporters of PC, just look through the phase three page, what you'll find might astound you. One of the first things I discovered is that a certain Kim van der Linde (that's you) complains there that "nothing can be done without process fetishism." There you seem to be trying to bypass process yourself. As to who are really the "vocal" users here, I think that is made clear enough by who is shouting (e.g. bolding and uppercase by you), and setting up polls and whatnot at their whim (this includes you). Besides which, this is largely irrelevant and I wish users would stop bringing it up, users being "vocal" is not the issue here, everybody wants to have a say. One of the actual problems, I find, is the format they are given to have that say within. We have plenty of users expressing their opinions in these straw polls and discussions, but it's getting increasingly difficult to read the result of these (which is why it's so important to set up discussions in a fair and unbiased manner). This is again something I've already commented on, please read here. Finally, you also say "three straw polls with clear majorities is enough", and "for those done with the discussion, cast you final opinion here." Let me be totally clear, that straw polls with clear majorities (which we don't currently have anyway), which ever way that majority is going, is not enough to justify any sort of large-scale action in this area. Discussion is not over, and using straw polls as an alternative at this point is not acceptable. - Kingpin13 (talk) 03:44, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
You win. I will leave the vandalism and the rest of the negativity for other to clean up and I just go on with the things I am coming for, which is contributing to obscure articles that do not suffer from vandalism, POV-pushing and edit wars. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 03:57, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

Proposed motion

I realize the way forward is not clear yet. So I wish to propose a motion, to be handled in the same way as the current motion proposing removal of PC. I know some users may have fundamentally different ideas on how to proceed, but the way I suggest is how the trial itself went into being, while we were in a same confused situation at the time, so we now it can work. I think this addresses two absolutely essential issues: the need to have a proposed policy on the use of PC in any proposed implementation, and the fact that when multiple proposals or when multiple options are presented to the community in controversial matters, it is extremely difficult to determine consensus, and results are often heavily contested (as seen e.g. in the poll that followed the trial), while a binary question (do you approve or not ?) is simple and non-ambiguous.

It is as such:

Now that the issue of the current use of pending changes has been resolved, it is possible to move forward on addressing the question of future use of pending changes. The following framework is proposed:

  • The community will work on elaborating a proposal for an implementation of pending changes detailing the policy for its use. The proposal should be based on the views expressed in this request for comments, and differences of view resolved through compromise.
  • The proposal can be either for (i) a new trial of fixed duration (ii) an implementation of indefinite duration, possibly with a mandatory reconsideration after some time (iii) or any other implementation plan. It is only required that the proposal details the policy for the use of pending changes (including reviewing) because users condition their acceptance of an implementation of pending changes on how it would be used; should the proposal be adopted it will become a usual policy (like the protection policy) while in effect.
  • When considered sufficiently achieved, the proposal should be submitted to the larger community for evaluating if there is consensus for its adoption. There will only be two options: approving adoption of the proposal, or not; because determining consensus when several options exist is too difficult and subject to contestation.
  • Should the proposal fail to gain consensus for adoption, the community will consider modifying it to address the objections, and an amended proposal can be submitted again.

Please indicate support or oppose with brief reasoning in the comments section. Comments longer than 1000 characters, responses to the comments of others and general discussion of the topic should go in the discussion section.(Unneeded to make a formal proposal if we reach an agreement here.)

Cenarium (talk) 00:23, 2 April 2011 (UTC)

This is what we should be doing on this page right now anyway. I don't see any value in submitting the proposal to the community. What would the oppose position mean, just dismantle PC for good? Why is it that we need a new mandate to do this? We have an abundance of comments already to work with. Why in the world should we start another open discussion forum that would just be polarizing? —UncleDouggie (talk) 04:58, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
This is a proposed course of action for the future. If there's no opposition to this then we may go ahead without putting it to discussion on the RFC page, but I wouldn't want to "force" my way through. An oppose would mean that the user wants to proceed otherwise. There's no clear way forward yet, only various proposals that people have made but not one that distinguishes itself. We need to know clearly what the next steps will be, or we risk losing momentum. Cenarium (talk) 11:03, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
It's fine to discuss the details of how to move forward here. If we agree on the broad plan you have outlined, I don't see any need to go out for another RfC phase before proceeding because it's not at all controversial in how things are done around here normally. If we can't agree on a plan here, I surely wouldn't want to ask the whole community to solve it for us. That would be a disaster. A mediator would probably be better, but I really hope it doesn't come to that. —UncleDouggie (talk) 07:21, 3 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree to a large extent. Then I ask that users give their opinion here on this proposed way forward. Cenarium (talk) 00:08, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
Most of this proposal is sensible. I can see some people objecting to it on the basis that the new trial will be of indefinite duration. Even if that doesn't provoke wiki drama in itself, we still have the prospect of the trial being inconclusive and then PC just limping on indefinitely, neither expanding nor contracting and without much consensus about what to do next. I know the proposal says "possibly with a mandatory reconsideration after some time" but it need to say one or the other. I would change it to say "The proposal can be for a new trial of agreed duration". Yaris678 (talk) 12:48, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
I did not intend to suggest in the motion a specific form of implementation, I reworded the proposed motion to make the sense clearer. I deliberately wish to let all options open so that this proposed motion is not overly controversial or limiting. Cenarium (talk) 19:54, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
Perhaps I'm misunderstanding. Are you creating a proposal asking whether we should spend time redoing all of the policies rather than just going about redoing them with community input? It seems the cart has been put in front of the horse here. If I am mistaken, please let me know.
I also brought up the question regarding whether to rewrite all of the policies to Steven while referring to the Phase 2 analysis. His reply to me:

"I would wonder if the 'PC is confusing' meant the policy, the software itself. Probably both. Anyway, if it does get kept in the long run, then the policy about where and how much to use it might change drastically, so I wouldn't want you to expend a lot of energy reworking the policy only to have your work be meaningless. So I think the best thing to do for now would be to simplify the existing policies as much as humanly possible, while leaving them to fit the current set of use cases as the trial laid out. Make sense?"

I was referring to figuring out those types of policies ("where and how much to use it" for instance), but he may have a point that we need to simplify what we have, thereby creating a basic skeleton for the system. So, let's start with trying to simplify everything, then try to expand. Then we look for support or opposal. Thoughts? CycloneGU (talk) 23:49, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm asking that we elaborate a proposal for an implementation of pending changes, which details the policy under which PC would be used. This would be done based on the input gathered in the RFC, and whenever there are conflicts we would resolve them through compromise. Then we submit the proposal to the community. We need to take into consideration the feedback given in the RFC to get closer to the overall view of the community. Regarding simplifying, WP:PC should be the formal policy while Help:PC is the guide for users, and WP:RG the guideline for reviewers. It's difficult to simplify policies beyond a certain point when this concerns complex issues, but we should try as far as possible yes. I'm not certain though that there'll be that much in common between the current text of WP:PC and the proposal, since they are from a different perspective (the current text describes what was the trial 'policy', while what I propose is making a proposal for a new implementation). The proposal if approved would replace the text of WP:PC. We could make a draft at Wikipedia:Pending changes/Draft proposal. Also, WP:RG should be subordinate to WP:PC. Cenarium (talk) 00:03, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I am in favour of starting a draft proposal at the given location. We need to start putting something together, we've been languishing over this longer than a certain languishing banner has been at the top of Chzz's talk page. Granted, the latter has only been about two weeks. =) CycloneGU (talk) 00:19, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

So are we thinking that Wikipedia:Pending changes/Draft proposal should contain everything that will go into WP:PC, WP:RG and the PC-related bits of WP:PROTECT the protection policy? That would probably be easier to coordinate, during the drafting stage, than modifying those pages directly. To a certain extent that is just a detail. I think the motion is pretty-much ready to go now. I think the motion will provide clarity on what we are trying to do. We can always look again at the other options if:

  1. It gets rejected
  2. There is no consensus
  3. It is accepted but we are finding it difficult to get consensus on what the new procedures should be.

Yaris678 (talk) 09:25, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

It would be a train wreck to put this out as the next phase of the RfC. The second bullet has three options, which people will try to vote on. The last two lines discuss a future proposal, but everyone will read it as this proposal and mass confusion will ensue. Why is this controversial? Which of the ideas represented on this page would it not permit within it's framework? Certainly we would need to work through the issues list in my proposal somehow to draft the policy. I assume that since Beeblebrox‎ has left the building, there isn't much, if any, support for the questionnaire or "go for broke". What else is at issue? —UncleDouggie (talk) 10:35, 5 April 2011 (UTC)

Which is a pity, because I thought the questionnaire was a very good idea. WormTT · (talk) 10:42, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Perhaps we will reach a point where we have some some key unanswered questions that we could present to people with appropriate background information. Just throwing out questions now like "what articles should it be on?" wouldn't really be helpful. That's something that requires discussion so we can at least assemble the options, associated rationale, likely impact and alternatives. What are your thoughts on the proposed direction from Cenarium? —UncleDouggie (talk) 11:37, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
It's possible to run a questionnaire in parallel then get feedback out of it. Cenarium (talk) 14:35, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
It appears to be a proposal that we have a proposal... which sounds absurd. I'd suggest that it would be more sensible to just get on and make a proposed implementation, which can be discussed. Having said that, until there is a clear steer from the community as to what PC is going to be used for (eg BLP, vandalism) any proposal will be useless. Is it going to be used for BLPs? Is it going to be used in lieu of semi-protection on high vandalism articles? WormTT · (talk) 11:53, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
If we can reach an agreement here there's no need for a formal proposal. With regard to your specific points on the use of PC, I think the only way to handle this is through compromise, because we have opposing viewpoints of similar level of support (case at point in the RFC phase 2, 'PC should be used liberally' vs 'PC should be used used sparingly'), so it seems to me that the only way to find a resolution is finding a middle ground. Cenarium (talk) 14:35, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
UncleDouggie, I assume you mean this issues list. I think it is a good list. I guess the assumption behind this proposed motion is that the issues identified can all be dealt with as-and-when they come up in the process of attempting to draft some policies. I guess it could all end up being a big mess, as you suggest.
OK, here's a thought. Why don't we take another step back from this? Maybe the next step should be a communal effort to summarise the current situation. The nearest parallel would be this summary list which was drawn up at the end of the trial proper. However, in this instance we would attempt to summarise:
  1. The results of the RfC in all its stages
  2. The issues that we may have to deal with
  3. Ideas that have been put forward to help us work through some of those issues, including a decision now, trials, essays and questionnaires.
We would attempt to reach a consensus on the current situation and the ideas raised before we hone in on an answer. I guess you could think of it as the orientation part of the OODA loop.
Yaris678 (talk) 12:01, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm not sure that this would help us much in moving forward. We don't have to discuss all at the same time. We can first discuss if we want an implementation of fixed duration of indefinite duration, and if the latter with or without a mandatory reconsideration. Then we consider the proposed use of PC (there are multiple issues but they depend on each other so we can't expect to discuss them in isolation), then the role of reviewers, then all remaining issues. Each specific issue should be addressed as they come then the compromise entered in the proposal. Cenarium (talk) 14:35, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm not proposing that we discuss all the issues simultaneously... Just that we try to work out a list of what those issues are. That way, we can work through them in a logical order. (well... as logical as possible). Yaris678 (talk) 09:22, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
I've reverted Cenariums change to say there can only be two options, as I think almost certainly there have to be three, to expand it to cover a large number of articles, to leave it covering only a small number of articles, or killing it completely. All three options have pluses and minuses, and if you don't discuss all three at the same time then you have to have multiple polls.
We go through this exact process for Arbcom elections, and you "elect" the option which has the highest ratio of votes and implement that.
And the choice has to be what we do forever, having yet another trial is just going to continue this process further. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 17:20, 11 April 2011 (UTC)
First, this is my proposal, if you want to propose something else feel free but cease from editing my proposal. Second, read it more thoroughly. The question that is to be submitted to the community is: Do you approve this proposal or not ?. I don't know what you're talking about with small vs large number an article, the proposal would in itself detail the specific use of PC that it proposes. The manner that you propose of evaluating your multiple option poll is highly contestable, it doesn't guarantee in any way that there's consensus for the 'elected' option, at the end we'll still not know which use policy it's supposed to be. Anyway, this doesn't seem to relate to my proposed way forward, which is about approving or not a previously prepared compromise proposal. Cenarium (talk) 18:48, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

Here's a new version, I hope this is clearer:

Now that the issue of the current use of pending changes has been resolved, it is possible to move forward on addressing the key question of future use of pending changes. A compromise proposal will be elaborated then submitted to the community; the following framework will be respected:

  • The community will work on elaborating a proposal for an implementation of pending changes detailing the policy for its use. The proposal should be based on the views expressed in this request for comments, and differences of view resolved through compromise.
  • The first step in elaborating the proposal will be to decide the general implementation plan (should it be a trial of fixed duration or an implementation of indefinite duration, with or without a mandatory reconsideration after some time, or something else).
  • The second step will be to determine the proposed policy for the use of pending changes (including reviewing), this is necessary because users condition their acceptance of an implementation of pending changes on how it would be used; should the proposal be adopted it will become a usual policy (like the protection policy) while in effect.
  • When considered sufficiently achieved, the proposal should be submitted to the larger community for evaluating if there is consensus for its adoption. There will only be two options: approving adoption of the proposal, or not; because determining consensus when several options exist is too difficult and subject to contestation.
  • Should the proposal fail to gain consensus for adoption, the community will consider modifying it to address the objections, and an amended proposal can be submitted again.

Feel free to edit provided you don't substantially change the meaning. Cenarium (talk) 20:47, 11 April 2011 (UTC)

I think other than it fairly clearly needing to be of indefinite duration I think that sounds sensible. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:18, 14 April 2011 (UTC)

tl;dr all of this, only most. Even the revised proposal is confusing as hell. The people "voting " on the front side of this page were confused about what "support" and "oppose" meant in the context of that proposal. I can only barely grasp what you're saying here, cenarium. I agree with the editor who said "it seems that you're proposing that we have a proposal." It doesn't make sense. Why don't you just start the document that you're proposing that we propose in your sandbox, invite everyone here to edit and make policy suggestions until we think we've got something real to propose. Cliff (talk) 04:26, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Mediation notice

I have requested informal mediation to resolve the impasse here. Wikipedia:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2011-04-03/Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:47, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

I've crossed this out, the procedure is cancelled. CycloneGU (talk) 23:20, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

How to end the PC trial

So, who turns off the PC trial, and how is it done? --JaGatalk 16:06, 4 April 2011 (UTC)

We had broadly agreed (see above discussions) that should the proposal be enacted, admins will have discretion to transition articles under PC to either semi-protection or unprotection. A few admins indicated their willingness. Cenarium (talk) 18:06, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
OK. I'm willing to help, and there's 2:1 support for ending the trial. Let's do it. I'll get started this evening unless there's a valid reason not to. --JaGatalk 23:33, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
Brad and WJB indicated they would perform the close, we should wait for the close. Cenarium (talk) 23:37, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
I concur with waiting for the close. Until it happens it's still an open discussion and someone will gripe about how it's already being removed, etc. And while I can't see how they'd do this, they could still suggest consensus is not in favour of removing it. CycloneGU (talk) 23:42, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
Ah, OK. Waiting is fine with me, as long as someone is moving this forward. --JaGatalk 00:21, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
This is a joke, seriously. Remove it from all articles immediately, we'll never see it implemented again, and all the more freedom to those who want to whine about how it didn't work on the articles it was implemented on when it actually DID. "But, we were promised that it was just a trial that would eventually end." Consensus has spoken. End it forever. Great job we had while we had it. Wonkery. Doc talk 06:25, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
The comments above ignore the clear language of the RFC, which is "...remove pending changes protection from all articles, for now, with no prejudice against reinstating it in the future, in some form, based upon consensus and discussion. This proposal does not affect potential future use of Pending Changes..."Guy Macon (talk) 09:50, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
I think, primarily, the trial needs to be ended, and of course this seems to be the way it's going anyway. But let talk continue after its end as to how it should be implemented, and in what way it would run, because to be honest, if it is strong enough to hold on itself, the idea should be able to garner enough consensus to pass it and fully implement it. With this in mind, the new PC feature would have the same 'acceptance/rejection' system, as opposed to the user-edit-only function of SP. However, there would be cause to reject for: vandalism, patent nonsense, libel/threats, copyright violation, breach of BLP, illegal blanking - and then, most particularly - lack of citation for something that may be wrong, a clash against the referenced source, definitely incorrect information, etc. Kfodderst (talk) 07:48, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
New PC feature? Nothing was wrong with the one that's in place except that it was promised to end. There will be no new PC feature, no matter what is promised by those that want it removed simply because there was an end to it promised. Start from scratch? Really? It ain't happening, and we all know it. If it ain't broke to begin with, don't start all over and then go from there. Keep it in place where it's already working and then amend it. Too late, however.... Doc talk 08:08, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
Doc, you know I agree with the better part of what you're saying. After all, there have been several polls and discussions that all showed dramatic favour for PC and now it seems that we're putting all of that aside and dismantling PC. Well, we're not. I've read some of the support comments and it seems that people in there still support PC, but agree that removing it from all articles for now is the way to go. I am not one of those supporters; I think removing it where it's not working is a wise idea, but leave it where it works. Unfortunately, my feeling does not have the consensus. I'm thus going to have to accept the outcome that is generated and try to join finding a way forward from there. I also want to see PC implemented, but not in the same fashion that some want (a few people think it's wise for ALL articles - ha, that's funny). I don't see any harm with leaving it on the articles where it works; if anything, it helps us flesh out the policies on an actual article in the article space rather than in a non-realistic situation on a user talk page, which most people will not be editing unless leaving a message for somebody. Unfortunately, that is not the consensus. CycloneGU (talk) 14:59, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree; it provides a 'check' for many articles without having to go to the extremities of SP. Plus, it's worked well on many articles, and particularly, it brings any potential vandalism on often-vandalised pages up quickly, via the 'articles pending changes' page. Kfodderst (talk) 21:23, 5 April 2011 (UTC)
About some of the less temperate language: Removing PC from the remaining ~900 articles (out of more than 1600 that were under it during some part of the official two-month trial, and doubtless more than were added afterwards) is not "dismantling". "Dismantling" is when we (lose our minds and) tell the devs to remove the feature from the software, as if it had never existed. Putting articles currently well-served by PC back into semi-protection may be "stupid" or "draconian" or "undesirable" or any number of other things, but it's not really "dismantling PC". If we decide to remove a given article from PC today, we can equally decide to put it back under PC tomorrow. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:03, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
WhatamIdoing is exactly right. This is not dismantling the tool forever. It's removing it from articles and agreeing as a community to not add it to more until a more finalized decision is made. There's no action that might be taken based on this current polling that technically prevents the community from PC the instant you want to start doing so again. Steven Walling at work 06:28, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

What happened with that questionnaire thingie?

I stopped by to post my answers but it looks like it's flushed? Kind of difficult to figure out without reading the wall of text above. Is there a 1-line answer to whether it's finished/still pending/tossed? Thx. 75.57.242.120 (talk) 09:40, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

The questionnaire was indeed dropped for now, but more good things are coming. If you took the time to develop some answers, please feel free to post them here for everyone's consideration. Thanks. —UncleDouggie (talk) 13:55, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
cough WormTT · (talk) 13:59, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
The request is from an IP editor and they can't create separate pages to contain the response. —UncleDouggie (talk) 14:24, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Oh yeah... Sorry, thought you were asking for questionnaires that had been completed. WormTT · (talk) 14:46, 8 April 2011 (UTC)
Actually, IP's can create pages in the "Wikipedia talk" namespace. So, 75.57.242.120, you can make e.g. Wikipedia talk:Pending changes/Whatever you want to call it, if you like.  Chzz  ►  21:10, 8 April 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. My answers are at User talk:75.57.242.120/Pending changes questionnaire.* They were mostly written a few weeks ago when the questionnaire was first posted (I was waiting for it to go live) but I've just tweaked them a little. If someone wants to pagemove it to my user space from user talk, that will let other people comment on its talk page. 75.57.242.120 (talk) 02:50, 9 April 2011 (UTC)

*Moved to User:75.57.242.120/Pending changes questionnaire to allow discussion (offering no opinion, at this time - just helping out)  Chzz  ►  03:17, 9 April 2011 (UTC)
Are we supposed to have a discussion about that page on its relevant talk page? CycloneGU (talk) 20:42, 12 April 2011 (UTC)
You're welcome to comment on it either there or here. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 07:56, 14 April 2011 (UTC) (new address)

Wikipedia's proof that perpetual motions exist

Sorry. All I mean to say is that we should permit editors to individually ask that articles which have benefitted, in their opinion, from PC, should be allowed to request that PC be tagged for such articles. As they are willing to tend to the revisions, there should be no concerns that others will be given an unfair burden of reviewing articles at all. Collect (talk) 01:09, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

I for one am certainly going to be pushing for a final decision. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 06:13, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

When does this end? Can we close it yet?

It's 122 to 61. It's been at a 2 to 1 margin pretty much the entire time, and will in all likelihood continue to be at a 2 to 1 margin for however long it continues to run.

When does this poll end? When can we close it? Sven Manguard Wha? 03:49, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Sven, I agree. This has undeniably been a very exhausting process. Trust me, if I hear the word PC protection again my head will implode. However I think with much regret it is best to give it like 6-8 more days before this thing is closed. mauchoeagle 04:03, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
By this time next week this phase will have run for a month. I will bet you (a completely unverifiable) $20 donation to the WMF that at this time next week, the ratio of support to oppose will still be roughly 2 to 1. Is anyone willing to make that bet with me? Sven Manguard Wha? 05:03, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
I would take you up on your bet because there is a pretty fat chance of that happening but I don't bet.mauchoeagle 05:12, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
Guys, its a controversial topic, you have to give it the full time. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:46, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
It is also not a yes no answer, the wotsit is in the detail. Useful for moving forward is such as the number of users that have comment in support of pending moving forward but support the position that a clear end to the trial will help implement the tool on a permanent basis. Off2riorob (talk) 17:44, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
I suppose that is true, however it's been a day since the last time I checked, there were only three new votes, and it is still a perfect 2 to 1 split. I'm not sure what six more days can milk out of the community. Sven Manguard Wha? 08:11, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
And yet, six more days will not do any harm, either. Because these things are not decided by counting votes, it is possible that the 61 votes will prevail over the 122 votes. It is also possible that three days from now someone will post a comment that is so convincing that everyone changes their mind. Guy Macon (talk) 14:16, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
<blinks at conversation below> Soooooooo... how about that Boston Marathon, cool eh? You know what, I think Guy makes a good enough point about there being no harm in waiting six days. <points in random direction> I'm going to drop this and go walk over there. Yes? Good. See you all in six days. Sven Manguard Wha? 20:58, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Sven, thanks for the little bit of sanity. (However little ;) Cliff (talk) 04:41, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Pitchforks and Torches and Castles and the Undead

I split this chunk off from the above thread because they are starting to diverge in topic. For one thing, this little section has become an enraged nine headed venom spewing hydra, while the above was a cordial discussion on timing. Now I've got nothing against hydras, especially in the proper context (Dungeons and Dragons, video games, fantasy literature, tee shirts, etc.) but this is a little much. Let's remember that people posting posting here have strong opinions on the matter and deep protective streaks for Wikipedia. Sven Manguard Wha? 20:58, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes, also although there is a basic 2 to 1 poll to end the trial there is still a lot of support for the tools usage in some form so this is not the end of anything, the discussion will continue and when we arrive at a proposal for long term usage there will likely be another poll. Off2riorob (talk) 14:25, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
If this ends with a finding that the consensus is "end the trial" and PC is left in place on any pages, a crowd of villagers with pitchforks and torches will burn down the castle in order to kill the undead monster. Guy Macon (talk) 14:42, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Haha, I hope we get more than consensus is to end the trial from the closure, some pointers for the way forward would be beneficial. Off2riorob (talk) 14:51, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
That would be a very good thing, if we aren't lied to again like we were the last two times. Guy Macon (talk) 17:47, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Give it a rest, no one lied to you - nothing is fixed in steel in fact flexibility and the ability to let go of wiki process sometimes is a net gain, - have a read of this WP:IAR - Off2riorob (talk) 17:58, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
WP:IAR doesn't excuse conscious deceit. The extension of this trial beyond two months was a betrayal, not "ignoring rules to make a better encyclopedia".—Kww(talk) 18:04, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Where is this conscious deceit - who did it? Off2riorob (talk) 18:07, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Everyone that said (in summary) "There's no need to honor the original agreement to have a two-month trial, despite the fact there was only consensus to turn on PC for the temporary period. The decision to go back on one's word isn't something that is done by accident or mistake.—Kww(talk) 18:18, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
I was hoping you could point to something tangible , something specific, your reply seems just like a vague throw-over, its wrong to accuse anyone of lying about anything here. The position was polled and found support to extend and a new rollout was waited for - Its totally undue to label anyone that supports the ongoing use of the tool as liars. - Off2riorob (talk) 18:26, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
If the dozens and dozens of comments from folks who feel they were lied to - and the details they posted about exactly what was promised and when - aren't enough for you, I don't know if anything will be enough for you. Guy Macon (talk) 18:32, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
No one has lied. Such comments are closer to personal attacks than the truth. Have I lied? Am I a liar? Off2riorob (talk) 18:53, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Suppose you were running a limited term medical trial, would you stop the treatment after the agreed time if it proved successful? Would it be more ethical to keep your word or to break it? To what extent does this analogy apply? AJRG (talk) 18:33, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

The analogy doesn't apply well. In that case, each individual would be given an individual choice about his or her own treatment. The concept of "consensus" doesn't apply. If there had been a clear-cut consensus before the two months were up to extend the trial, that could have been something I could live with. The idea that there had to be a clear-cut consensus to stop the trial when it had already gone past time is the problem. Without consensus to change, we revert to status quo. The status quo at the time the two-month trial completed was that PC was not used.—Kww(talk) 18:41, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
How about the case of BLPs? Are they better protected with PC? AJRG (talk) 18:44, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Doesn't matter. There was no consensus to continue the trial. Arguing that there should have been consensus because of the effects on some class of article doesn't make consensus exist when it did not.—Kww(talk) 18:50, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Vandalism to BLPs potentially harms real people. If PC protects them even slightly better then we shouldn't turn it off for BLPs. Other articles may safely follow a different course. AJRG (talk) 18:55, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Harming Wikipedia hurts real people two. People who rely on Wikipedia Don't think any harm has occurred? Consider these comments:

>"Many editors consider the refusal to end the trial on the date promised as a breach of trust"
>"It's impossible to assume good faith when a past assurance continues not to be honored (i.e. begs the question: How can we trust you to honor the results of discussions if you're not honoring the results of a previous one?)"
>"The main reason the trial got in in the first place was due to users supporting with the understanding that it would be removed, and only because it would be removed, saying they wanted to try it out. If we don't keep the promise of turning features off after the trial, this factor will be lost for future trial proposals"
>"The poll that produced the original consensus to turn the feature on was for a trial with a specified end date. In the absence of any consensus to make the feature permanent or start another trial the feature should be removed from articles. Failing to do this has damaged the credibility of any future software trial proposals."
>"I disagree that this is just removal soley for the sake of making a point. This is making good on the original agreement that the trial would end, by the end of 2010 for the last agreement. Anything beyond that wasn't approved, it's that simple. In the absense of any community agreement to do anything else this is the default option and the one we must follow. The only way around that is to totally ignore the original agreement, which ... totally goes against the whole concept of consensus."
>"This is necessary to deal with negative feelings about being lied to. I must say I have trouble with those myself and feel a strong irrational urge to oppose to everything related to pending changes."
>"The only consensus was for a fixed-term trial, with a clear expectation that if no further consensus arose then we would revert to the status quo ante. We need to deliver on that promise, to retain credibility for future trials in other areas."
>"If "trial" comes to mean "turned on indefinitely", no-one else will get consensus to trial other new ideas in future."
>"I increasingly feel this debate has become about something much more important than pending changes. It's become about good faith. A sizable portion of the editor base clearly feels that without a clear consensus to continue the pending changes trial that the original commitment to end the pending changes trial after two months should have been upheld. ... Wikipedia is already hurting in recruiting and retaining editors, and cannot afford to reach a point where change and compromise has become impossible because of distrust."

The above quotes clearly show that harm has been done. This proposal is just a baby step toward mitigating that harm. You cannot unring the bell. We need a firm and clear published policy that promising to try something for a limited amount of time and then breaking that promise will never again be tolerated on Wikipedia, and a formal apology for doing it in this case. That is the bare minimum required to start to regain the editor's trust. Guy Macon (talk) 22:56, 18 April 2011 (UTC)

Harm's been more than done. I, for one, can never bring myself to trust anyone - and I mean anyone - supporting what essentially amounts to (pardon the invocation) Hitleresque fascism in the guise of IAR. If it has gotten such that the supporters of any wide-scale proposal are explicitly invoking IAR to maintain an already overextended trial, then WP:Consensus means nothing at all. (And before anyone shouts "But Jimbo saaaaiiiid...!!", bullshit. Jimbo explicitly noted he would bow to consensus, so that is not a valid argument. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 21:09, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
I feel just as betrayed by these consensus-flouting "trial" shenanigans as the next guy, but comparisons to Nazism are uncalled for. TotientDragooned (talk) 21:28, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Pages, numbers, discussion, and closure: a suggestion

In the week that the closing of this RfC has been delayed per the request of a couple of contributors, a grand total of six latecomers have arrived to indicate their support or opposition, yet the byte count of the project page has grown by 20 percent. I make no negative assumptions about the intentions of all who added to that growth, but I do question whether anything that has been added during that period offers any fresh insight to illuminate the question in a meaningful new way.

This phase is a rather straightforward up-or-down proposal to (depending on one's choice of wording) end the trial or end the use of PC until there is clear consensus whether—and, if so, how—it should be deployed. The support–oppose ratio has remained essentially unchanged over the course of phase three, at roughly 2–1 in support of the proposal. While major RfCs on hot-button issues aren't decided on the basis of numbers alone, the most significant points on which the question turns appear to be found, succinct and clear enough, along with the quantifiable element in the "support proposal" and "oppose proposal" sections.

Assuming the presumptive closer is still on board, we're probably only 1–3 days away from the end. There's already a ton of material for even the most patient reader to digest, and the discussion appears to be going around in circles, at best, and perhaps degenerating into something less than perfect civility in places. With the greatest respect to everyone, I'd like to suggest, fwiw, that further comments—unless they offer a genuinely novel perspective—might be more constructively placed here on the talk page. Rivertorch (talk) 01:41, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

We should move everything not related to the proposal over here. No sense having it get archived with the proposal discussion when it could be useful to developing the next phase. There is also no need to overtax the closers; we might need them again. —UncleDouggie (talk) 02:52, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
I agree with you but suggest caution. Cutting and pasting on such a large scale would probably be contentious unless there were near unanimity to do so, and I dread the appearance of another long thread. Rivertorch (talk) 04:38, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Happy Birthday Pending changes RfC!

On 15:45, 16 February 2011, this RfC was born. Yes, there were earlier larval stages, so one could argue that it is much older, but the February 2011 iteration was born one two months ago. Everybody is invited to put on their party hats and blow their noisemakers at exactly 15:45 today. No cake: as GLaDOS once said, "Cake and grief counseling will be available at the conclusion of the test." Guy Macon (talk) 15:02, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

We do what we must because we can. For the good of all of us. Except the ones who are dead. Give me pie instead.--Obsidi♠nSoul 16:58, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751058209749445923078164062862089986280348253421170
679821480865132823066470938446095505822317253594081284811174502841027019385211055596446229489549303
819644288109756659334461284756482337867831652712019091456485669234603486104543266482133936072602491
412737245870066063155881748815209209628292540917153643678925903600113305305488204665213841469519415
11609... AJRG (talk) 17:30, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
I believe GLaDOS would have answered 3.243F6A8885A308D313198A2E03707344A4093822299F31D008... --Guy Macon (talk) 23:25, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
nom∞--Obsidi♠n Soul 17:35, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
Two months. Not one. CycloneGU (talk) 20:36, 16 April 2011 (UTC)
Is it too soon to start planning the upcoming gala "One Year of Pending Changes Without Consensus" party? We could invite everyone who has experienced having consensus go against them, have workshops with names like "Pending Changes was allowed to continue without consensus: how you can achieve the same result with your proposals" an appearance by the a-promise-isn't-a-promise-unless-I-say-it-is dancers and an open bar for those editors who have been driven to drink by this. :) Guy Macon (talk) 09:37, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

Replacing semi-protection with pending changes level 1 protection

The problem with semi-protection is that only autoconfirmed user can edit.Though anonymous users have played a role in vandalism in most of the articles ,but we have to admit that some of the anonymous Users do actually contribute to Wikipedia by making constructive edits.So I think Pending changes level 1 will be viable alternative to semi-protection because in pending changes protection anyone can edit unlike semi-protection.Moreover if anonymous user or any other user create vandalism on the article,his edit can be unaccepted by reviewer. Suri 100 (talk) 02:05, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

I would oppose this if it were being made into an actual policy as while there have been many good-faith contributions by IP editers, a vast majority of them are made by people who have nothing better to do with there time than to vandalize Wikipedia. mauchoeagle 02:31, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
I'd also oppose. The manpower required would be prohibitive, and it would be an especially egregious assumption of bad faith towards IPs. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 05:12, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
I would support it partly, if reviewers actually gave a better indication of being capable of AGF and if it weren't applied so liberally (i.e. it remains an alternative, not a replacement). Back again to the scope question. PC, unlike Semiprot, seems to be applied preemptively at the moment. While it does still allow IP's to edit, applying it without evidence of the need is unnecessarily taking away the editing rights of a large subset of editors and placing it on the hands of a few.--Obsidi♠nSoul 05:16, 17 April 2011 (UTC)
Interesting point here. With some articles under semi-protection, there is no guarantee that an anonymous editor will have his or her question addressed on a talk page. With Pending Changes, they can make the edit themselves and we can correct it if it's vandalism or inaccurate. Which system sounds more user-friendly to you? We need better reviewer policies to make this more possible to become a reality. And no, some pages still need SP; namely ones that we tend to keep an eye on. CycloneGU (talk) 16:31, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

If you think majority of IP users vandalise wikipedia ,then why not semi-protect all pages? Suri 100 (talk) 06:45, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

You will be able to move some pages from semi-protection to pending changes level 1, but you won't be able to move all of them. --Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:32, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Why cant we move all semi-protected pages to pending changes level 1 protection? Suri 100 (talk) 12:15, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

I saw here/somewhere recently a list of articles currently under indefinite semi protection - has anyone got the list so as to allow investigation of the figures? Off2riorob (talk) 12:24, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Database_reports/Indefinitely_semi-protected_articles or [23]. The reason we don't is because many heavily vandalised pages would be unmanageable, due to the overwhelmingly unconstructive nature of the edits. Take Stupidity and Failureas examples where PC was tried. -- zzuuzz (talk) 12:34, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the links Zzuuzz. Around 3000, the first link appears incomplete. I agree with removal from those two articles, vandal magnets. Some vandal magnets after move to pending pending have imo experience received decreased vandal activity but wholesale transference is not an option that we could deal with or would benefit from imo. Although, if you moved them all from semi to pending and lets the dust settle naturally I would hazard an educated guess that more than half of those articles would remain stable and protected on pending. The question that you would have to ask yourself there is, do I support as open an editing environment as possible which still protects articles from vandalism and attack additions, and do you consider pending protection is a more open editing environment to unconfirmed contributors than semi protection.Off2riorob (talk) 12:59, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

article pending feedback

There are some occasions that pending is useful in ways that no other current protection possibility is, such as at this article. The addition of pending in Feb has allowed experienced users a degree of editorial control over it, this has resulted in the first decent version I have ever seen. Prior to pending being applied the content was largely an in out, in out. battleground between fans attempting to add promotional content and people that don't like him adding negative issues weakly cited. This resulted in the article being a total mess as some poor additions were spotted and removed and some were not. With the constant inability to protect and improve the article many users wanting to NPOV and improve the content simply walked away writing it off as a waste of time. The attraction of uninvolved experienced editors with pending permission to watch the article and the realization from the promotional supporters of the subject and the vandals that they were wasting their time has stabilized the extremely contentious BLP and yet there is still the option that an unconfirmed user with a beneficial addition can directly post it to the article and have it quite quickly accepted. Adding semi protection to a disrupted article does not attract any additional watchers at all whereas adding pending protection effectively adds and attracts a multitude of experienced watchers. Off2riorob (talk) 10:57, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

  • Q - are there any users that don't accept this statement? Off2riorob (talk) 09:59, 19 April 2011 (UTC)


I accept your statement partially.There are some IP editors who are experienced in making constructive edits to wikipedia.Suri 100(talk) 12:36, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

Yes absolutely, there are many of them, I support all efforts to assist and develop new users and unconfirmed accounts, those contributions I would accept on sight and expect to be accepted every time by all reviewers. Off2riorob (talk) 13:06, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

How is this discussion relevant to the question of whether the short-term trial should be stopped after having already dragged on 7 months after the agreed upon stop time? You seem to equate "PC is a good thing" with "the original commitment to have a trial doesn't need to be honored".—Kww(talk) 16:17, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

This discussion is in regards to the bigger picture, the possible best future usage and the ongoing assessment of the tool. For many commenters their only/main objection to the tool has been that they wanted to see a clear end point to the trial. Now that the trial is almost at the end point and those objections can be put to bed. so to speak, we can begin to discuss and progress as to how to move forward with what is well supported from the trial results having been seen in some ways as a beneficial tool. Off2riorob (talk) 17:20, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
We also need to distinguish between BLPs (where vandalism could result in Wikipedia being sued) and other articles. If PC on BLPs reduces the chance of Wikipedia being sued, then it would be unwise to turn it off. AJRG (talk) 18:22, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
Well, there has been almost a month of specific discussion in regards to this issue and if the outcome (closure is this Friday/Saturday) is to remove pending protection at this time then the articles will be not be simply unprotected but re-protected by a similar level of protection so we don't have to worry there. Off2riorob (talk) 18:28, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
If PC provides no better protection than what is already available, in what way was the trial a success? AJRG (talk) 19:33, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
That is where you have to consider the issues on a bit deeper level, we can replace all pending protection with indefinite or some time level of semi protection. Users need to ask themselves and consider the foundations aims and ambitions that the editing environment should be as open as possible. So I think I said earlier - do you support as open an editing environment as possible for unconfirmed new contributors and then, do you feel that pending protection is a more open editing environment for those unconfirmed users than semi protection. In my experience of working extensively with pending protection it is a more open editing enviroment than semi protection and it does benefit lesser watched BLP articles by attracting large numbers of experienced watchers and also has benefits as I have outlined above that no other protection tool allows, all resulting in a worthwhile addition to the protection toolbox. Off2riorob (talk) 20:13, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
  • -Take an article successfully under pending protection since June 2010, for the last nine months - George Osbourne - UK chancellor of the Exchequer. - remove pending protection and stand back - after some time you will semi protect and then again and actuality it will need indefinite semi protection - it was happy under pending protection, which is preferable? which is more open for an unconfirmed contributor, how many unconfirmed contributions were accepted compared to how many talkpage edit request templates were accepted on the talkpage. Which environment more encourages unconfirmed users to edit? All questions to consider moving forward. Off2riorob (talk) 20:26, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
  • I for one agree with the comments and examples raised by Off2riorob in this section. I would suggest instead of treating the numbers above as a vote, that comments such as this are considered in the overall consensus. CycloneGU (talk) 17:07, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

The analysis of the article on Zakir Naik is very interesting. Off2riorob is saying that PC is good because it helps us to filter out non-neutral additions to an article. That sounds great, but it isn't what PC was designed to do. You are only supposed to reject obvious vandalism and BLP violations. OK, so some of the non-neutral statements will be BLP violations, but do you see my point?

BTW, I am pretty neutral on whether PC is a good thing and I also think that the current reviewing guidelines are unhelpful, so this isn't an attack on PC. If anything, I want to discuss this sort of thing more, so we can reach some sort of consensus on what PC is for.

Yaris678 (talk) 18:26, 26 April 2011 (UTC)

How to review and who to give the permission to

This has been often a comment that its unclear 'how to review and connected to that who should be given the permission, so in an attempt to clarify... originally for the trial to get a decent amount of reviewers to get the issue off the ground the permission was given widely and you had to refuse it if you didn't want it and users have said they are confused as to how to review, but as I see it users are reviewing all the time with or without the permission...So users with the permission should review as they would usually do to any edit to their watched pages, as such it almost doesn't even require writing down. You have a look at it and if its uncited and likely false you revert it as you usually would. If its a vandal edit you revert it as you usually would, if its defamation or libel you revert it as you usually would, if it looks useful but uncited you can go look for a citation and add it also and accept it...you do not under any circumstances have to accept anything but vandalism or libel and then re-edit the addition...none of this needs writing down, if you don't know how to review a desired edit then you just should not have the permission. This should be the condition of being given the user right in the future, you should be able to explain to an administrator how you are going to review a contribution and your edit history should support that you are able to edit and assess a desired addition as you say you will if you are given the tool. As such the question is not that you should be asking, how to review? but the question should be asked of you, how do you review? -Off2riorob (talk) 17:01, 17 April 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, we should aim vandalism, defamation or libel, false (such as destroying numbers, decimal points, etc.), uncited edits. The evil edits that lower the quality of a paragraph. More needs the know-how of the main article editors. Use PC just as a complementation to recent changes patrol, on articles with low traffic and few watchers. People experienced reverting vandalism (rvv) get rollbacker, and should be able to get reviewer as well. I think this is very far away from bad censorship, I think this is just maintenance, keeping the quality shown live. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 09:26, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
I think that all editors with rollback rights and who request for reviewer permission should be given the permission. After all, they should have had demonstrated that they understand what is vandalism, what isn't, what should be rollbacked, what shouldn't, and etc. Bejinhan talks 09:34, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes I agree, a user that has already requested and been assessed for rollback rights would automatically qualify for reviewer right if they requested it or moving forward if the tool is accepted for some general usage then all rollbackers could be automatically given the right.Off2riorob (talk) 10:56, 18 April 2011 (UTC)
So, would it thus be more sensible to simply merge rollback and reviewer, instead of having some separate user right? That's worth discussion. Probably not right here and now, as the simple 'trial' issue does need resolving; and I suppose the specific requirement of 'reviewer' depends greatly on the defined duties of same - ie, what they're expected to be checking. This looks like one (of many) considerations we need to think about, in moving forwards.  Chzz  ►  03:15, 19 April 2011 (UTC)
Bundling it might help remove the objection some users have expressed that a new user group of elite editors is being created.Off2riorob (talk) 09:55, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

*How to review

This came up a lot during the earlier discussions and I see it as one of the core issues users have with the tool that they either didn't know how to review or they though only libel or vandalism should be reverted. Wikipedia:Reviewing#Reviewing process - do users think this is unclear and could be improved? Does it reflect how you review ?Off2riorob (talk) 20:23, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

I definitely think this needs looking at. There are technicalities about the precise process and there is also the big question of what sort of stuff are we supposed to reject. In terms of the big question, I can think of two possible approaches:
  1. Have a bit of a rethink about what PC is for. e.g. Are we also aiming to improve article neutrality, as happened with Zakir Naik (see #article pending feedback).
  2. Do an experiment where we get a number of people to review a number of changes. This would allow us to see what sort of things people in practice want to accept or reject (first suggested by UncleDouggie at #Ideas for what happens next).
Yaris678 (talk) 18:42, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
I think this no question, really, really... You need know-how to edit an article, so you can't do it as a reviewer. It is the same as with rollback rights, you have experience with vandalism and libel/defamation on BLP content. More is not possible, more is too complicated. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 19:31, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
So are you saying that the non-neutral content shouldn't have been rejected from Zakir Naik? Or just that if it is then that is a happy accident? Yaris678 (talk) 11:49, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
If you are sure of it, then you can do it as a normal editor, but normally you don't have the know-how to decide it wisely. I see it on the PC blacklog, if it's a good faith edit and the article isn't in the scope of your know-how, you have to quit. It's like reading a paragraph about Timbuctu in Chinese. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 14:26, 27 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes... maybe we (I?) have been thinking in too polar a way. We have been thinking "this is what PC is for" and that other uses are an abuse. Maybe we need at least three categories - "what you must do as a reviewer", "what you can do as a reviewer (if you have the knowledge and/or time to find out)" and "what you should not do as a reviewer".
Yaris678 (talk) 09:23, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
Agree, it seems a nice way to make a useful proposal, at last :) --Chris.urs-o (talk) 11:29, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
Cool. Seems like we are getting somewhere on this important issue. It would probably help to come up with a provisional list of what goes in each category. How about something like:
  1. Stuff reviewers should reject
    1. conflicts with the Biographies of Living People policy
    2. obvious vandalism or patent nonsense
    3. obvious copyright violations
    4. legal threats, personal attacks or libel.
  2. Stuff reviewers can reject if they have enough knowledge and/or time to look into it
    1. irredeemably non-neutral statements (e.g. mostly words to watch)
    2. stealth vandalism
    3. violation of the copyright of obscure sources.
  3. Stuff reviewers should not reject
    1. points of view they disagree with but do not violate the neutrality policy or that could be modified to come into line with that policy
    2. changes related to an on-going content disagreement.
That's just a starting suggestion. If anyone has a better idea, please go ahead.
Yaris678 (talk) 12:50, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
Theoretically seems ok, just commonsense I suppose, if rollback works, this should work to ;) --Chris.urs-o (talk) 13:50, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
That works for me. I think it preferable to admit that there's a gray area than to pretend that the right answer is always obvious. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:28, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
Exactly - it preferable to admit that there's a grey area. Just thought of something else that could go into the grey area - spam. Arguably it could go into the "must reject" area but I suppose its not always going to be obvious. Yaris678 (talk) 16:35, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

Reviewers?

Off2riorob's comments above about reviewing are interesting, but I'm wondering: What if we don't have a special group of reviewers, and instead let all autoconfirmed users be able to accept edits? (All autoconfirmed users are already able to unaccept, by simply reverting.) Sure, an autoconfirmed user may accept a bad edit, but the same user may make a bad edit, and it will be automatically accepted. (If an autoconfirmed user accepts e.g. obvious vandalism, I think s/he ought to be treated as if s/he had made the edit.) The point is to reduce the number of bad edits, and so far it has worked well on this article. Would this create more support for PC? I'd rather have this kind of PC, than no PC. Dugnad (talk) 10:16, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

I'm against PC of any kind, but if PC has to happen I prefer this solution over yet more usergroups.TotientDragooned (talk) 17:05, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
It's definitely an alternative to consider. It can have both good and bad consequences if someone innocently accepts an edit to an article they're visiting and doesn't realize that they accepted a bad edit; this happened to me even as a reviewer under PC. At the same time, I still like the idea of having a page where changes that have yet to be accepted are tracked and users are able to keep an eye on it, going through older changes so they don't become backlogged like other areas of the encyclopedia. This would put the following levels of protection:
  • unprotected - anyone can edit anything
  • pending changes as proposed in this section - IPs can also edit but must be accepted, registered user can edit freely and accept IP edits
  • semi-protection
  • full protection
I'd be in favour of trying this out. Right now with Pending Changes, an unaccepted IP edit followed by a registered user edit can mess up the accepting an edit system. CycloneGU (talk) 17:14, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
There is a button to review all changes at once ;). -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:02, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
Oppose because autoconfirmation doesn't imply any level of trust. Even with 10 edits and 4 days it is far too easy for a vandal to surmount the barrier. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V SM 19:14, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
How about putting the Reviewer userright behind a hidden 100 edit limit? All edits must be mainspace edits, too, meaning if vandals try to sneak edits in they can be found and quickly uprooted. Keep in mind I only am suggesting the all users idea when an established editor visits the page from the above proposal; any editor without the reviewer userright per the proposal would not be able to see the list of pages waiting for confirmation. CycloneGU (talk) 20:11, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
I don't think getting reviewer rights at the moment is that difficult to be honest. -- Eraserhead1<talk> 07:03, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
I'd go a step further and say that, by trial design, it was deliberately made far too easy to get. —Jeremyv^_^v Components:V S M08:58, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
I called for a higher level for reviewer (autoconfirmed don't necessarily know what they're doing at all) but giving it to all autoconfirmed isn't completely insane. 100 edits sounds better than 10 edits. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 06:44, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
It doesn't matter if they've ten or ten million. A large number of edits does not mean that the editor is automatically worthy of the reviewer bit. I can see it bundling with Rollback (even if it means I'd be obligated to cough it up), but as part of autoconfirmed or automatically granted after X amount of edits is a recipe for disaster. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 07:42, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
It seems to me that we could get a consensus for or that there is a degree of agreement that the reviewer right should be comparable to the level of understanding we currently require to receive rollback rights. We could not bundle them but all accounts requesting and receiving the rollback right could be offered the reviewer right at the same time. Some editors ( like myself ) would not want both. Off2riorob (talk) 20:12, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
I'm adding the point about reviewer rights to my proposal below. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 22:08, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
I still laugh at how the rollback userright came to me - Chzz suggested it after I did some reviewer work at Julia Gillard, and thus I had a visitor to my talk page within days of becoming a reviewer. The quote: "If I granted you rollback, would you promise not to blow up the wiki?" (As background, this was the page I referred to a few times in my comments as not suitable for Pending Changes for a while because she had just been nominated Prime Minister of Australia on the day I made that determination.) I promised only to blow up spammy parts of the Wiki. Even now, my use of rollback is extremely rare, I might have used it twice. So in a sense, rollback isn't something you'd use very often, it's just nice to be able to use it if you see a need for using it. Should it be bundled with reviewer? I wouldn't go that far. However, I agree there should be less of a quickness to hand it out to random users, something I think was done during the trial (an admin. sees a user making constructive edits and whammo, they're a reviewer; I think that was my experience). I'll discuss this more as the RfCs go on. CycloneGU (talk) 05:14, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
Bundling with Rollbacker sounds sensible. It's a highly similar activity, after all. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:31, 29 April 2011 (UTC)

A few suggestions

1. The vandalism should be understood as a pointer to future ones too. In the beginning an article should be considered to have admin level protection, and the level of protection should be decreased in exponential(my preference)/linear manner till lowermost level, and when vandalism increases the level of protection should be increased to twice its previous level, then again increased in same manner till highest point. This may not happen by just one or say a limited number of attempts at vandalism, depending upon load on personnel, so attempts that can increase protection level may be 5 in the beginning, 3 on another day, 2 on still another day and so on. When vandalism decreases, protection level can be reduced exponentially again after a certain period(depending upon load on personnel) and then still further exponentially it later in case there is no vandalism. In short, when a lot of vandalism is detected, increase protection level by twice, when it decreases then decrease the protection level exponentially.

2. At a basic level, one must come to peace with the understanding that there are two sides to any issue, and perhaps encouragingly or not, the man with references wins.

3. In case of contentious references, the issue should be resolved on discussion page first, (till then the section could be locked).

4. Vandalism should be treated lightly in case load on personnel is not much, and stringently otherwise.

Just my 2 cents.Thisthat2011 (talk) 13:15, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Oppose. It needs too much manpower (admin/sysop). We are able to fight defamation/libel on BLP content and number/decimal point vandalism on exact sciences, that's it I think ;) --Chris.urs-o (talk) 14:03, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
Oppose - Too complicated. CycloneGU (talk) 17:16, 20 April 2011 (UTC)
Oppose - I'm getting the distinct impression you're a newcomer, so I'll explain in detail why I'm opposing instead of spouting off my usual vitriol.
  1. Even with PC, protection schemes don't have numeric "levels". You have unprotected, payola, semi-protected, semi+payola, full-protection, and, last, forget editing this article altogether unless you have a death wish. Low amounts of vandalism on an article don't even justify having to do what amounts to putting up a "Bribe CRASH to Edit" scheme on an article, even if the article is semi-protected, unless the vandalism is blatant libel that requires immediate oversight or similar BLP violations.
  2. Requiring that all articles be fully-protected to start is more of an assumption of bad faith towards newcomers than payola is and restricts article creation to administrators.
  3. Standard operating procedure w/regard to protection and payola is that articles are to be unprotected when the need no longer exists, and protected only so long as there are concerns that the behavior that caused the protection in the first place still exists in the immediate term. (This is explicitly spelled out in the protection policy.)
  4. Bullet 2 is usually, but not always the case; see also Arbitration/Requests/Case/Scientology,/Gibraltar, /Race and Intelligence, /Climate change, /Macedonia... The list goes on and on, but the point is that having sources on your side does not necessarily make one right in an editorial conflict.
  5. Bullet 3 is best practice, but I feel obligated to point out that only the full article, and not a section thereof, can be protected or put behind a bribery slot.
  6. Bullet 4 is at best counter-intuitive.
Hope those help. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 09:25, 21 April 2011 (UTC)

A possible (hopefully substantial) proposal

I've been thinking about this for a few days now and I think a concrete proposal for what to do about Pending changes going forward needs to be made. I'm not 100% clear about who should have the right to review articles, but I think we'll need one before taking it to the community.

Its not 100% and I'm sure it needs further tightening up, but I think its reasonably substantial

  • Pending Changes is an improvement over semi-protection in allowing IP editors and new users to contribute to the project - therefore it should be enabled indefinitely.
  • To make sure pending changes is applied appropriately, and that the number of pages added to it is kept to a reasonable pace so we can make sure that there are enough reviewers all requests for Pending Changes level 1 with a time of longer than a month should be made to RfPP.
  • All requests for pending changes level 2 should be made to RfPP unless they are in response to an ORTS ticket.
  • As with other forms of protection when pending changes is first applied to an article it should be applied for a timed duration and not indefinitely.
  • All pages that are currently semi-protected as being part of the pending changes trial should be checked through and those that seem sensible to do so should be re-added to pending changes.
  • A database report should be created with the same columns (plus the level of pending changes) as the database report for Indefinitely semi-protected articles, so we can check what is currently protected.
  • From above reviewer rights will be bundled with rollback rights.

Feel free to make any comments and changes below. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:13, 20 April 2011 (UTC)

Bullets 2 and 3 are more or less redundant as pretty much everyone knows that RfPP already handles any PC requests, regardless of how long the duration is. Bullet 4 is also redundant, as any intelligent admin knows well enough to apply it appropriately. —Jeremy v^_^vComponents:V S M 09:02, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
I would say the majority of protection is done not through RFPP, but by requests in other places (some through private channels) and by admins on their own initiative. Forcing all requests to go through RFPP won't really help anything, including RFPP. It won't make any difference to whether it's added appropriately, or have any effect on the number of pages being protected. Furthermore, as with all forms of protection, indefinite is sometimes an appropriate length for articles which aren't widely watched. You can check what's PC protected at Special:StablePages. -- zzuuzz(talk) 10:21, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
Re: "therefore it should be enabled indefinitely", please address the issue of the harm that this will cause Wikipedia (documented several times already in this discussion, with no serious rebuttal claiming that there has been no harm). Guy Macon (talk) 09:42, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
GuyMacon, We know you don't like Pending protection ,so thanks, repeating it over and over is breaking up attempts to discuss and improve the guidelines for future usage. Shall I open an individual section for you to put you comments in ? Also - cut it out with the harm has been done to the wiki, harm has been done to the wiki exaggerated drama.Off2riorob (talk) 09:55, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
O2RR, that's not really very helpful. Indeed many people know your opinion, and Eraserhead's, but Guy isn't rudely telling you to run off to your own section and stop trying to disrupt Wikipedia just because he disagrees with you. Also, it is indeed the opinion of many (including myself) that it's incorrect to say "semi-protection is worse than PC so we should use it" - it's apples and oranges. That is also a very naive approach to take. -Kingpin13 (talk) 10:03, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
GuyMacons contributions to this discussion are in my opinipn becoming disruptive to it. As for you claims about my position, my position is not singular it is multi faceted. Off2riorob (talk) 10:07, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
He asked a relevant question, which is apparently unanswered. That is not disruption. Either ignore him, or actually try and answer his rather simple question (or point him to where it was previously addressed) - Kingpin13(talk) 10:12, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
Honest questions are not disruption. As I said, nobody has attempted to make a case that no harm has occurred. Some folks have expressed good-faith opinions that the good outweighs the bad, but have not claimed that no harm has been done. The series of quotes I posted earlier clearly shows that harm has already been done. I think it fair to ask you to address this harm when you make a proposal to continue pending changes indefinitely against a clear consensus is that it should have been stopped in December.
BTW, "GuyMacon, We know you don't like Pending protection" is a completely false statement. My position is weak support of pending changes. I have strong opposition to being promised that the trial would end and supporting the limited-time trial based on that promise, only to find out later that I was lied to. I am far from being alone in having this opinion. Guy Macon (talk) 11:55, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
There was also a clear consensus back in October that more users wanted PC to continue then in some fashion. The only reason we're here today is because no single proposal had the consensus support by itself compared to having no PC at all. This is the first discussion, from prior reading, started with input from those who oppose PC entirely (some only because of the trial bit, some entirely), and the "oppose" camp, if I may refer to it as that, had complained about every single poll and discussion that was set up by someone in support of PC. It's kind of an irony that you claim this is a clear consensus when some are only voting to support the proposal because they're tired of waiting for something to happen. CycloneGU (talk) 15:10, 21 April 2011 (UTC)
@zzuuzz, Jeremy I think given the controversy forcing all requests through RfPP seems like a good idea, and RfPP does usually do a good job of picking the durations pages should be protected for well, maybe when pages are protected elsewhere the standard is equally high, I'm not sure. The point about indefinite durations definitely seems worth making as in the trial almost all pages put onto pending changes have been done indefinitely.
Certainly for pending changes level 2 I think making all (non ORTS) requests go through RfPP seems useful as the vast majority should be in response to ORTS requests or for the very small number of articles that need something more than semi-protection and it increases transparency. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:10, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
It appears that there is no way to make pending changes protection automatically expire as there is with other types of protection. The PC log doesn't even list "(indefinite)". We could of course setup a list somewhere ordered by expiration date for admins to manually remove PC protection. —UncleDouggie (talk) 09:29, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
That isn't true actually ;). -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 09:31, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
Indeed, it's as flexible as other types of protection. Special:StablePages also shows the expiries and has a filtering checkbox for indefinite protections. You can even mix up the expiries[24] - this is a very useful feature. -- zzuuzz (talk) 09:35, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
Frankly I'm not seeing the controversy, and certainly not enough to justify the extra bureaucracy. I've seen very few requests at RFPP for PC protection to be removed. As one of the most active admins when it comes to protection, I reckon less than 1% of my actions are a result of RFPP. Yet you'd require me to list at RFPP anything I'm about to protect so I can carry on and protect it? Some of them also involve sensitive information or requests that don't need publicity or debate - OTRS is not the only channel for private information and has no greater authority to implement protection than other admins. I'd also point out that the indefinite PC protections that have been used were in almost all cases a direct replacement for indefinite semi-protection. There have been many examples of time-limited PC protection, where admins have exercised their good judgment given the relevant facts. -- zzuuzz (talk) 09:55, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
There is certainly controversy as the matter is still being discussed, but for the record I don't want to be too strict on this proposal, I'm certainly happy to remove the point about putting level 1 pending changes requests through RfPP and I am definitely interested in hearing what other people think about that - I think on reflection requiring pending changes level 1 requests to go through RfPP seems like a mistake.
For level 2 pending changes I think there is much more merit in making those requests go through RfPP. Pending Changes level 2 seems good for pages like Britney Spears and other pages where pending changes level 1 and semi-protection have been shown not to work, but there aren't many pages in that category so its hardly going to be a significant burden on RfPP, which applying the rule to pending changes level 1 would do. Additionally using pending changes level 2 also increases the "class system" in Wikipedia which isn't a good thing because it creates an elite class of editors whose edits don't get checked on those articles, whereas all other users edits do get checked on those articles.
With regards to indefinite protections out of the approximately 1000 pages on pending changes there are only about 60 with a timed duration. With semi-protections the ratio looks to be closer to 50%, I think a reminder that timed durations should be the norm for pending changes as well is useful - especially for the people who aren't particularly positive about it. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 10:28, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
Reminders are good, but I don't think you can read too much into those statistics. The initial articles in the trial were mostly indefinitely semi-protected, so they were indefinitely PC protected. Then the trial stopped, ones with expiring protection came and went, and subsequent articles (in the IAR phase) were of the type that would be indefinitely semi-protected anyway. I'm inclined to agree with the sentiment about PC2, though I'm not sure RFPP is always the best place to handle it. I've used PC2 just the once, on an article involving some tricky defamation issues. It should be used very rarely, but I think perhaps a review and appeal method is better than a debate beforehand. -- zzuuzz (talk) 10:46, 22 April 2011 (UTC)
Good point. I think the review idea sounds interesting. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 10:57, 22 April 2011 (UTC)

Any further comments? -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 08:13, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

I am still waiting for someone to answer the following question instead of just telling me I am wrong to ask it:
"Re: "therefore it should be enabled indefinitely", please address the issue of the harm that this will cause Wikipedia (documented elsewhere in this discussion, with no serious rebuttal claiming that there has been no harm).
Please note that I am talking about the harm that continuing the "trial" without consensus that has caused, not PC itself. I like PC and would vote to support it. Guy Macon (talk) 10:02, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
This proposal wouldn't be a trial, it would be enabling Pending Changes on a non-trial basis. The past is the past, there is nothing that can be done about the current position of the pending changes trial. I haven't followed these discussions enough to know what damage the trial per say has caused, but hopefully this proposal can end that. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 10:06, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
Ah. I understand. If the proposal is to (after consensus is reached) turn on PC and leave it on, I support the idea 100%. PC is a good idea. If the proposal is to do anything that does not involve removing PC on all articles, then the issue of the harm that this will cause Wikipedia should be addressed. Guy Macon (talk) 11:41, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
Presuming the current proposal passes then this proposal does currently say that articles which are indefinitely semi-protected with the reason that the pending changes trial has ended will return to pending changes, but any pages where protection is removed won't be returned to pending changes, I am happy to change that if people feel that isn't a good idea. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 12:09, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
Good point. If this proposal fails, then be definition we aren't continuing the trial without consensus, and thus I would withdraw my objrections.
When you say "this proposal does currently say that articles which are indefinitely semi-protected with the reason that the pending changes trial has ended will return to pending changes" does that conflict with "remove pending changes protection from all articles, for now, with no prejudice against reinstating it in the future" (quoted from the RFC)? Guy Macon (talk) 22:21, 23 April 2011 (UTC)
Currently there are a bunch of pages that are indefinitely semi-protected with the rationale that the trial is over. If this RFC passes there will be a bunch more. These should be returned to pending changes, and that's what I'm proposing with my proposal. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:46, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

Any further comments on how Pending Changes level 2 should be used? -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 22:12, 24 April 2011 (UTC)

current multi - part RFC closure

- I have boldly closed the current RFC - what to do with Pending protection in the short term. The section is awaiting administrative closure at their convenience. User:Newyorkbrad and User:WJBscribe have offered to assess the discussion. Off2riorob (talk) 09:43, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Um, didn't you voice an opinion in it? I'm reverting the closure. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 07:31, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
Nevermind. However, it is normally considered bad form to close an RfC you've participated in, O2RR. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 07:33, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
He hasn't made a judgment of the consensus. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:44, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
  • update - for anyone not watching NYBrad's talkpage, he has commented that he is traveling until late tomorrow and will assess the discussion as a priority on his return. diff - Off2riorob (talk) 22:30, 24 April 2011 (UTC)
I had not checked his talk page, thanks for the update. I was going to leave one more edit in there yesterday (near the bottom I said I'd take a closer look at something), then came back to find it closed. *LOL*
What I am interested in right now is the next phase of the RfC. Whether PC stays in place for now or not, do we agree the next step is figuring out what the rules and guidelines should be? I figure there are two ways to handle it; if it gets removed from everything as a result of this page, then we can edit right within the guideline pages and put an under construction tag in them; if PC actually stays out in place, we'll have no choice but to discuss on alternate pages or the associated talk pages to make decisions. Either way, I am thinking that is a good next step regardless; fix the groundwork where problems exist and agree on how it should be run that both groups - the supporters and opposers - are happy. Thoughts? CycloneGU (talk) 05:00, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, basically as I see it, we now know the main issues people had with the tool from the previous discussions here and we need to slowly slowly work on resolving those issues one by one until we have a proposal and definition of possible usage that we feel has addressed those issues and has a reasonably possibility of polling a community consensus. If the tool is removed completely from the thousand articles we will also over the next month or even two have the additional opportunity to compare and comment on what happened to the articles after they were removed from pending protection, such as if transfered to indefinite semi protection was there an increase in unconfirmed accepted edits and was the article subjected to more or less vandalism as so on. Off2riorob (talk) 10:54, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

Just as a friendly observation, so please do not misunderstand this as a comment directed at anyone in particular, it seems to me that this page has slowed to being a conversation amongst a relatively small number of users, so perhaps it would be best to wait for the administrative summary before making plans that rest upon interpretations of the results that may not be generally agreed upon. --Tryptofish (talk) 22:02, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

  • Please allow interested users to continue discussion - There is no reason not to continue discussion at this time, in fact attempting to keep the momentum ongoing is preferable to closing the discussion down for a couple of weeks. Off2riorob (talk) 22:38, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
  • I agree, it's better to keep discussion going than just coming to a cold stop. We can't go ahead with anything until the decision is made on the page, but we can discuss what might be a good next step pending each result and go from there. As it stands, the only two possible results I can see are either "Endorse" or "No consensus". An "Oppose" seems less likely, but seems similar to no consensus in what would happen. CycloneGU (talk) 23:11, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
    One of my issues about removal of the tool was that discussion will disappear once the tool is removed from all articles so the comments here are currently nothing more than thoughts for the way forward and I accept that user input here may well drop off, users that oppose the tool will have no reason to input towards a consensus for usage. But imo we have a duty of care, especially to living subjects and if this tool can protect some BLP articles from having libel and defamation published to the WWW through the en wikipedia we should press on and seek the position where consensus support is available for usage. Off2riorob (talk) 23:20, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
    Absolutely; I don't currently have time for Wikipedia, but I'm glad to see that some people are working on this PC project. Dugnad (talk) 13:28, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
Sheesh. Tryptofish didn't propose anything, so what's up with this minipseudovote thingie? And yeah, don't expect everyone to still have the 'momentum' after everything that's happened. If users are not exactly excitedly planning on what to do next with optimistic glee, you only really have those who kept barring consensus to blame. Yes, the input will probably sharply drop off for users who will not be using it firsthand (at least in the formulating stages), but I think the actual proposals will just be as *cough* lively. Already it's quite obvious that users (even among reviewers) have very different plans on what PC should be for, plus everyone will still be affected by it of course even if they won't exactly be using it. So yeah... should be interesting.--Obsidi♠nSoul 14:48, 26 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes indeed. Although users that support the protection tool do have some differing personal views as to what/where they would like to see the tool used, the objective moving forward is not to discuss that but to evaluate the previous discussions and find the point at where community acceptance for the tools usage exists and then to present that offer to the community for polling. Off2riorob (talk) 13:26, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

remaining issues

What are the remaining issues? -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 11:06, 25 April 2011 (UTC)

I would say one of them is, where is community consensus support to use the protection is still not resolved. On what type of articles and how many articles and for how long are we going to add the protection for, how long seems to be getting some support for - not indefinitely by default and where - as I have seen on BLP articles seems well supported - but numbers is still clearly an issue ... users mentioned they are worried about large expansion of the tool in regard to creep, as in from my observation of previous discussions - many users that support the tool do so on a limited level - they clearly do not want to support it and then see it all over the project like a rash.. and time limits for reviewing and workloads etc... setting clear limits for the tools future usage would help to resolve some users comments in this regard. Off2riorob (talk) 12:28, 25 April 2011 (UTC)
Yeah, we should aim a healthy "articles under PC"/ "number of reviewers" proportion. I suggest a time limit of less than c. 6 hours (average) for vandalism and defamation/ libel on BLP content and c. 36 hours for uncertain good faith edits what need a specific know-how. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 11:39, 28 April 2011 (UTC)
It's not just the number of articles: the activity matters. One busy article might burden the system more than a bunch of obscure articles that get one IP edit a year. If we could get automated reports about activity during the last 30-60-90-180 days (particularly, the number of edits requiring review, and the proportion that were rejected), then we might be able to manage this better by moving the high-traffic/high-vandalism articles to regular semi-protection, and leaving the low-traffic/low-vandalism articles in PC. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:43, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
That should already been happening. I request protection when pending changes isn't working. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:50, 29 April 2011 (UTC)
Yes, this occurred automatically and was the natural result of editor experience. No one wanted a protection applied that was not beneficial/detrimental so it was removed as a matter of course where it created problems. Off2riorob (talk) 11:55, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
It seems to be happening on an ad-hoc/if-I-notice-and-complain basis. IMO we should be more systematic about it, and thus I wish for automated reports. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:56, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
One of the very clear gained experienced for the tool from the trial, and I think this is well known amongst admins and users experienced with the tool- is that the tool caused trouble on high vandalism activity pages and was replaced by semi protection or full protection rapidly when that occurred. I think that at the moment there are around one thousand articles with the protection and such a level of usage is such that it is almost unnoticeable to some users watchlists and that the page with edits waiting to be reviewed is almost always empty. So the level of usage we currently have could be described as completely unobtrusive. As regards the number of edits requiring review, and the proportion that were rejected we could choose an article each and collect data from perhaps ten random articles - high traffic ones would return more accept reject data - personally I have the feeling this data would be valueless and that there is nothing to compare it to , perhaps to the same article under semi protection, how many unconfirmed editors made successful edit requests during the comparable time period and how much libel and defamation was kept from publication through wikipedia and its mirrors to the WWW by pending protection in comparison to no protection. I would be willing to assist in data collection from one or two of the articles under trial from the start to date if required. Off2riorob (talk) 08:46, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Figuring out what to close

As some of you know, I've been asked to opine on and close this phase of the RfC, and I've been reviewing it for that purpose. I find that I'm not quite clear on what is timely to close at this time. Is the only question currently to be closed out, the narrow one of whether to continue the "trial," or something broader? I don't want to stir up a huge fuss or drama by closing the discussion either more broadly or more narrowly than people are expecting.

I'd appreciate any input on this question within 24 hours so I can wrap up the appropriate aspect(s) of the discussion. Thanks. Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:33, 1 May 2011 (UTC)

I thought it was the narrow one as to whether we continue the trial. I think discussion on how to move forward is still ongoing. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 20:52, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes, the only question was "Should Pending changes be removed from all articles, yes or no?". Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 20:55, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
The proposal actually was a little more complicated than Seb claims - It is proposed to remove pending changes protection from all articles, for now, with no prejudice against reinstating it in the future, in some form, based upon consensus and discussion. - and was especially related to the issue that the trial is over and was not specifically in relation to support or opposition to the actual protection tool. Personally I would like to see a closure that was helpful to point us in a consensus direction for possible progress moving forward. If there is more detail in the consensus than remove from all articles that would be beneficial. For example if amongst the poll comments a consensus of users have also commented that they do not want the tool at all then that would be of additional benefit in the closure. Additionally to the basic question of, is there consensus that the trial is over or not, is the assertion also supported that pending protection requires removing from the articles it is currently protecting. Off2riorob (talk) 21:06, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
It's the narrow definition, as Off2riorob says. Simply the trial, nothing more. i.e. this is not a vote on whether we should remove PC forever from enwiki.--Obsidi♠nSoul 23:29, 1 May 2011 (UTC)
  • I pretty much agree with the above. It is proposed to remove pending changes protection from all articles, for now, with no prejudice against reinstating it in the future, in some form, based upon consensus and discussion. The sole question is if we should remove it for now. I agree that if any way forward past that issue is divined from the comments it could be shared by the closer. Hobit (talk) 00:07, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
(edit conflicts) It might be more accurate to call it closing the third phase of the RfC, not closing the RfC entirely. The relevant text is in the first paragraph here. The two bulleted points below that may or may not inform a decision that incorporates suggestions for next steps, I suppose. Rivertorch (talk) 00:17, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Assuming that the RFC passes, I expect two specific results.

1: I expect every page that currently has PC to becomes a page that does not have PC.

2: I expect the statement "This proposal does not affect potential future use of Pending Changes; it is only to end the trial." to be taken seriously. No "something broader." No "how to move forward." No additional issues "divined from the comments." Once again a firm promise was made" "This proposal ... is only to end the trial." I expect that promise to be kept. Only means only. Guy Macon (talk) 03:33, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Assuming that the decision is to stop using PC for now (language that is much clearer than "end the trial", since a trial suggests that someone is looking at results, which was true for the two-month trial but does not appear to be true now), then I think an explicit statement that any admin is authorized to remove any article from PC, and to return it to semi-protection if appropriate (nearly all were previously on long-term semi-protection) would be helpful.
It would probably also be appropriate to supply a statement that explains when "for now" is over, i.e., that regardless of what the consensus is for a given article at RFPP, nobody is permitted to place an article under PC until <fill in the blank> happens—or that so long as all of the "trial" articles are removed, then admins are permitted to use their best judgment in choosing PC rather than semi-protection starting tomorrow, or whatever. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:54, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
Good point "end the trial" is unclear. Fortunately, it is preceded by "It is proposed to remove pending changes protection from all articles". which is much clearer. Guy Macon (talk) 07:29, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't think it would be appropriate to add pages to Pending Changes if the motion passes until there is a further agreement. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 07:30, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
I haven't read all of the comments and therefore don't know what the commenters believe is appropriate. Fortunately for me, Newyorkbrad is stuck with figuring it out. I provided options because I don't want anyone to think that I'm trying to tell him what the "right" answer is. I just want him to tell us the answer, so that we don't have to have a new PC-or-not-PC fight every single time someone thinks that PC would be the best choice for a particular article between now and whenever things are well and properly settled. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:31, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
Is the a consensus in the poll and comments that the trial is over and if there is then is there a clear consensus support in the poll and comments that pending protection is required be removed from all articles? Is there a general support for the tools usage in the comments? Off2riorob (talk) 08:28, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

Brad, it's good to see you here (indeed good to see any resolution in sight)! I think you can see from the talk here that the task before you is to determine consensus as to whether or not PC should be removed for now from pages where it is now. It would be very helpful to define clearly what the "rules" are, with respect to not adding PC to any more pages at this time and with respect to substituting semi-protection for the removed PC. It is agreed by all "sides" that this RfC does not speak to the potential future use of PC, and it would be helpful to repeat that explicitly (it comes from the requirement by the developers that the underlying infrastructure for PC not be removed and then reinstated). Some other editors are, additionally, looking for signals as to the level of community support for eventually using PC in some form; what you do or do not say about that should be a function of what you do or do not see in the consensus. --Tryptofish (talk) 20:46, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree entirely with Tryptofish's analysis of Brad's role. Yaris678 (talk) 16:40, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

Discussion beyond "Figuring out what to close"

For me, I believe that there is, and will continue to be if the RFC remains open or will be reopened, a 2 to 1 supermajority, if not a consensus outright, in support of ending the Pending Changes trial. That is to say, probably remove all articles currently under PC protection and replace with the appropriate level of standard admin protection using the Protection policy, which is a return to the status quo, or the status the wiki had before the introduction of PC. I’ll also note that most of the supports and opposes are based on principles, however, i.e. "a promise is a promise" and "PC is still valuable as a form of protection for current articles". I think, as soon as this RFC is closed, with NewYorkBrad’s administrator closing statements/comments/input/whatever, we can move on to a newer "phase", which would possibly address the second most-important issue of PC with a significant amount of consensus already garnered for it: PC on BLP articles. We can start a newer RFC out of this old one with questions like "Should PC be used on: 1) all BLPs? 2) some BLPs? 3) no BLPs?". :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 22:09, 2 May 2011 (UTC)

I think the best place to start is for Pending Changes to be suggested as another protection option, along with semi-protection as I've suggested above as that is most likely to get support. Expanding to all BLP's or whatever can be done later if a consensus can be found to do so. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 22:26, 2 May 2011 (UTC)
I keep hearing about these "promises" and it has been sounding like a broken record for a while. I'd appreciate seeing some diffs showing exactly what was promised, who made the promises, and who the promises were made to. My interpretation of past events is different from Guy Macon's, but it's possible that I missed something somewhere. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 08:57, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Where to apply pending protection

This is another issue that users seem to want clarification. Do users have some feedback as to places and reasons that the tool should or should not be applied/restricted to certain sectors of the project? Off2riorob (talk) 08:50, 3 May 2011 (UTC)

  • My opinion from experience of the tool is that I see no reason to specifically restrict the tools usage from any sector or only to a single sector (such as BLP) as I have seen the tool work beneficially in articles about living subjects and expired subjects just the same. I think in specialist subjects where almost every review requires a high level of knowledge about the subject the tool created some problems such as the acceptance of false data by drive by reviewers that was later reverted by the specialists that edit the articles, and articles such as where there is a tendency to add regular updates of uncited data, like footballers and game show etc that if protection is required that semi protection is preferable but I didn't see the wiki wheels dropping of in any specific sector and the edit summary of change protection to semi protection as pending is not working here was applied as and when administrators felt the need or when users active at the page returned to WP:RFPP and requested transfer or removal of protection. So my preference would be not to restrict usage only via experience and by actual numbers in general such as a hat on the proposed maximum number of articles that could be put under the protection without returning to the community to request expansion of usage. As a suggestion that I feel there could be a community consensus for ongoing usage of the protection tool I would suggest 2000 articles could find support, at one thousand we have no editing issues at all as regards reviewer numbers or time delays so allowing for some natural expansion of general usage to double the figure at current usage would seem to be pretty uncontroversial and an acceptable cap for the foreseeable future. Off2riorob (talk) 09:23, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
  • I would add a new usage: to new articles created by IPs or by those with under 50 edits under a registered name. With any luck this might reduce the problem of instant deletions of such articles, allowing Wikipedia to retain more new editors, while preventing clearly improper articles from being visible to the outside world ab initio. Any such article which matures sufficiently would then have PC removed. Collect (talk) 11:04, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
Indeed, I proposed such there on 5 April. I would note that some who oppose PC in general supported this idea. Collect (talk) 20:09, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
  • @Collect: Not feasible, unless reviewers are willing to fix problems in new articles as well. The initial version may not actually be the best one. So reverting to it when declining a revision may not help much. This also clashes with the other proposal to limit new page creation to registered users, the results of which can invalidate the proposed scope.
My 5 cents: it should not be used to stop pages which are being edit-warred upon (as reviewers are not assured to be neutral and may favor one side over the other whether deliberately or not), in those instances semi or full should be used.
It should not be used preemptively in a majority of cases, i.e. it should not be used on articles which already have a significant amount of watchers. Perhaps only in high traffic high visibility articles (like, say, a current events subject), and only if there is evidence of significant undos interspersed with productive edits (again, only if the undos are of actual vandalism, not cases of edit-warring). The drawback is that it will be potentially very labor-intensive for reviewers trying to keep track of the changes.
On the other hand, low-traffic sensitive articles (read: BLP) with very little active watchers or none at all might also benefit from this. This has the benefit of being relatively easier on the reviewers as well as keeping quality control on the more obscure corners of Wikipedia.
It's probably a choice of one or the other. Either way, care should be taken not to overreach and bite off more than people can chew. Because enthusiasm will flag, and reviewers may find themselves undermanned or overtaxed. enwiki is probably far busier than other language wikis and making the scope too wide or too generalized can eventually lead to backlogs, something that imo should be avoided as much as possible. Revisions should be reviewed as fast as possible to avoid discouraging new contributors when their productive edits don't show up.
And lastly, it should not be seen as censorship or guarding, it should be seen as guidance. AGF must be a top priority (i.e. fix what can be fixed, only reject the unsalvageable edits or blatant vandalism/misinformation).--Obsidi♠nSoul 11:47, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
Some good points, most of which I could give support to. Off2riorob (talk) 14:10, 3 May 2011 (UTC)
Semi is far more discouraging than PC, and editprotected requests are far more likely to get ignored. Processing latency isn't that big a deal most of the time. The idea is to just make it easier on reviewers by letting them click "accept" instead of having to transfer a proposed edit manually, which usually makes them want to rewrite it in the process. 69.111.194.167 (talk) 11:28, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

Discussion about possibly using pending protection on newly release films articles

There is a discussion about this here. More feedback is needed. Thanks. —Mike Allen 00:39, 4 May 2011 (UTC)

I've already put this on the other page, but perhaps it is more relevant here. Yaris678 (talk) 13:47, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
If we go on to do a new trial, I think that basing it on films is a good idea. Each film could be randomly assigned to PC or not PC before the big marketing push starts. We could collect data such as number of edits that are undone and whether or not semi-protection is used. We could even do a "blind tasting" after the marketing hype has died down and protections have been removed - We could ask people to rate the quality of film articles, without knowing whether or not they were PC protected. Yaris678 (talk) 09:57, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes its interesting to consider the usage for a requesting project. I am more from the position that as such, continued trials are not needed, there is a point already at which there is consensus for the tools acceptance, it just needs clarifying where that point is. I was wondering as to the figures the project is estimating, if it is not too large a figure - perhaps a hundred or so the project could be allocated a portion of the capped usage (I think 2000 has little opposition) and as such could then go off and test the usage in their project and keep the sector under pending or not as they experienced its usage over a few weeks or so but that would not affect the tools general acceptance. Off2riorob (talk) 13:58, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
I think the idea of a new trial sounds like a terrible idea. Lets settle the matter once and for all. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:40, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes - the trial is over. Currently we have one thousand article protected with pending protection - I don't consider this usage to be part of any trial at all - current usage is because the protection is working and because it is beneficial and:::: generally accepted by the community and working right now. - See here - only yesterday the founder of the project used the protection tool to protect Steve Biko from continued vandalism and yet allow a more continued open edit environment than comparable options - a net gain for new users. Off2riorob (talk) 19:55, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
Block Jimbo! Block Jimbo! (joke, joke) --Tryptofish (talk) 20:08, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
Re: "...generally accepted by the community..."; [Citation Needed]. Guy Macon (talk) 02:13, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
I was a bit nervous of mentioning it, but in the end I think its important to express that although there are users that object procedurally to the tools continued use - there is a clearly a bigger picture - the reason the tool is still in operation is because there is consensus support for it and the same goes for the reason this RFC is not being closed because although there is in this RFC a weight of numbers asserting the importance of the end of the trial - there is no real community support to remove the protection tool from one thousand articles where it is working well and accepted, and no uninvolved experienced user wants to assert the tool should be removed when it is a clear net positive and is working well and protecting one thousand articles.Off2riorob (talk) 21:11, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
So pending protection can no longer be applied to new pages? There must be another trail to gather consensus for its use? I haven't followed the trails, but I don't see the big issue here. The pending protection would only be applied to a few articles (like I'm sure the upcoming film Thor would be a candidate, as will the release of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides and Kung Fu Panda 2). They would be protected for a few weeks, and then unprotected, it's not like we want to add pending protection to another thousand articles. One editor's reason for objection is to wait until the vandalism starts. The point is, we know it's going to start, we already know how time consuming it is to dissect anonymous edits and fish out the bad and leave the good, so why wait until the damage is already being done. I'm glad someone mentioned pending protection on the other page, because at least then IPs and new users would be able to edit. —Mike Allen 23:46, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
Pending is still available to request at WP:RFPP and your request imo makes a very good case for usage in a limited way as you described. In the next day or two we will look at helping requesting this for your project. Off2riorob (talk) 23:57, 4 May 2011 (UTC)
There is no consensus whatsover for expanding usage of this further. This is getting absolutely ridiculous. The promised trial is over. Any further use of PC is without any hint of consensus.—Kww(talk) 00:24, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes - The trial has been over for months. - and ? Off2riorob (talk) 00:28, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
Pending changes should not have been applied to any articles for the last 7 months. I'm really surprised that anyone can condone simply persisting on using a tool when there has never been a consensus for its continued use. To have continued to apply it showed complete disregard for the plain definition of "two-months". To continue using it now when there is 2:1 polling saying that it must stop makes it clear that there are people that have no intention of ever stopping.—Kww(talk) 00:38, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Oh boy. I didn't mean to start this.. —Mike Allen 01:16, 5 May 2011 (UTC)

Its fine, please try to ignore such emotional outbursts, as I said - if we can assist the film project in this request we will, and look to open it up for discussion over the next couple of days. Off2riorob (talk) 01:46, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
Please stop accusing me of having an emotional outburst. It is quite possible to be calm and still recognize that there are people that continue to support applying PC despite there being no consensus to do so. I'm not certain why you think any discussion of that is a result of anger. It's simply factual: the trial was over 7 months ago. It was extended invalidly, and, when people got upset about that, an extension until December 2010 was administered by fiat. December 2010 is long past, and still, people apply the protection despite there being no consent to have it as a protection mechanism for any articles. I can, and have, stated that calmly. I'll state it one more time: whether pending changes is good or bad is irrelevant — there is no consensus for its continued use.—Kww(talk) 02:02, 5 May 2011 (UTC)
An update: Thor (film) has been granted pending protection for two weeks. —Mike Allen 03:54, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Just for the record, I also have no anger over anything having to do with PC. What I have is worry. I worry about the way Wikipedia's principles of consensus were not followed. I worry that ignoring consensus will become an accepted practice. I worry about the harm that this has already done to Wikipedia. Guy Macon (talk) 07:02, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Oh boy. Do we have to go through another RfC to remove it again from that film?--Obsidi♠nSoul 07:12, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
If we can not use the tools, why are they still in place? Administrators (obviously) have the option to use it. —Mike Allen 07:24, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
The consensus was to remove PC from all articles, but not remove PC from the wiki entirely. We need to have consensus on how to use the tools before using it, that's all, it's not like we cannot use forever and ever and ever again. :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 07:28, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
I see. However, Jimbo Whales (and administrators) continuing using the tool could confuse others. —Mike Allen
I think TeleComNasSprVen is jumping the gun slightly. The consensus he describes is one possible outcome of the third stage of Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011. However, that stage is currently being analysed by administrators to see if they can determine a consensus. If the consensus is to remove PC from all articles for now then I'm sure the admins will do that, including removing it from Thor.
Yaris678 (talk) 09:18, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Admittedly, yes, we don't know exactly what the consensus is on the use of pending changes, which is why the notice at the top of the page says "pending (no pun intended) administrative close by Newyorkbrad to determine consensus". It might also be because the administrators have not yet heard about the RfC or its outcome; it's been months since this was started. :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 09:21, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
He he. I like the pun.  :-)
I guess we just have to wait for the admins to come to a considered decision.
Yaris678 (talk) 12:29, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Kww has made it a top priority to remove PP from articles. —Mike Allen 18:21, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Well, we are going to close this later today so its not a big issue now and we can then at least look forward without all this dispute. Please keep on the watchlist and input your requests in any upcoming discussions - regards. Off2riorob (talk) 18:36, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Closing status

I'll be closing this out tonight (New York time). Sorry for the delay; it's been quite a week for me (real-world and otherwise). Newyorkbrad (talk) 14:21, 6 May 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the hard work. Hopefully it's not been too stressful. :) Steven Walling at work 18:13, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Stressful - he hasn't done anything yet - its been stressful for users who support and oppose and discussing and working with this for months - and both sides wanting only to improve the project - perhaps a party later or some quiet reflection and consideration for the way to progress will be in order, - whatever - it will be good to clear the air with this closure - regards to all. Off2riorob (talk) 18:24, 6 May 2011 (UTC)
Did you not read his opening post, Off2riorob? Stop conflating Wikipedia with real life. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 00:40, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
As your post seems hard to assess - although its clear you don't want to party - let me take this opportunity to thank you for your contributions to article space - although they are minimal allegedly a single edit is better than nothing. Welcome and happy day to you - Off2riorob (talk) 00:44, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
And what's the reason for the ad-hominem attacks, O2RR? You're acting incredibly childish, which genuinely perplexes me to no end. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 02:04, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Off2riorob, you know better than that, please be civil. Guy Macon (talk) 03:43, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm doing my final view and composing the close in my head at this very moment. Please stay tuned to this channel (or come back tomorrow, for those who can stand the suspense).
Incidentally, the bickering above is really fairly pointless. If this page were on pending changes and I were patrolling, I would have rejected the last several edits. :P Newyorkbrad (talk) 02:23, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Closure

A few preliminaries. First, I'd like to thank the editors who came to my talkpage and asked me to close this discussion, for their confidence. Second, I'd like to apologize for the fact that it's taken me a few more days to finish reviewing the input than I had hoped. Third, I've tried not to write this closing using too much Bradspeak, but if I've failed, forgive me. Fourth, I'd like to ask that if I've posted this closing in the wrong place—e.g., if it should be in a nicely formatted box at the top of the project page or something like that—then could someone please copy it and put it there. (I don't think anyone wants me to delay this closure any longer while I figure that out.)

I'll begin by emphasizing the exact scope of this discussion. The proposal reads: The Pending Changes trial ended many months ago, but around 1000 articles are still using PC protection. It is proposed to remove pending changes protection from all articles, for now, with no prejudice against reinstating it in the future, in some form, based upon consensus and discussion. Thus, that's the only proposal I'm addressing here. The future of pending changes (or flagged revisions or anything else) on English Wikipedia is not being resolved today. And I'm not presenting my own views on PC/FR, partly because that would be off-topic and partly because I have mixed feelings about them.

I find that both supporters and opposers made many valid points throughout the discussion. The vast majority of the comments were reasonable and entitled to full respect in assessing the consensus. Unlike what we have unfortunately seen in many other contentious discussions on-wiki, I did not find many problems with frivolous views, SPAs, socking, or anything else that would warrant discounting any significant number of comments or !votes. (There was certainly some excessive rhetoric from a few commenters, and I hope that future PC/FR discussions can have less of that, but I saw nothing that significantly derailed the discussion.)

As closer, my task is to ascertain consensus, as this vague term is defined on Wikipedia. Clearly we do not have a consensus in the optimal sense of the discussion's converging on a result endorsed by more-or-less everyone. The policy page on consensus tells us that in such a case, "sometimes voluntary agreement of all interested editors proves impossible to achieve, and a majority decision must be taken. More than a simple numerical majority is generally required for major changes."

Here, the number of commenters supporting the proposal is 127, and the number opposing is 65. That's a bit over 66% in support of ending the pending-changes trial now, without prejudice to community decision-making about a further trial or implementation of PC in the future. A voting result of 66% is not as high as we require for some decision-making (for example, most of the time it wouldn't be sufficient to pass an RfA, although ironically it would have been enough in the last election to get elected an arbitrator)—but it's a two-to-one margin and can't be disregarded either. For purposes of governance decisions on the English Wikipedia, two-to-one is almost a landslide. The basic outcome of the RfC is clear and it is that the current pending-changes trial should come to an end.

The closure comes with two caveats, however. (I am sure that no one expected a closure by me to end without at least two caveats.) The first of these is that we can't just turn off the PC trial by flipping a switch ten minutes from now. Although some of the articles that are currently part of the PC trial were chosen basically at random or as controls, others were put on PC because of serious and persistent vandalism, especially BLP-related vandalism, or of even more serious BLP-related problems. Editors will need time to review the list of articles currently on PC to ensure that as needed, they are semiprotected, placed on more watchlists, etc. Accordingly, the PC trial will end, with the possible exception noted below, 14 days from today.

The second caveat is that there may remain a few articles for which removing PC status would really be grossly irresponsible—an example might be if the trial list includes a handful of extremely sensitive BLPs that have been the subject of persistent vandalism or harassment by sleeper socks (so that semi'ing would be insufficient). This does not reopen, for this discussion, suggestions that "all BLPs should be on PC" or even "all high-risk BLPs should be on PC"—those are respectable viewpoints, and might be outcomes of a future consensus, but for better or worse, they clearly are not what the community has decided now. Still, I can imagine there being some extreme situations where it could be considered outrageous to remove PC with nothing to replace it, and where semiprotecting would be insufficient (and full-protecting would be unreasonable). Relatively few of either the supporters' or the opposers' comments addressed this possibility.

Therefore, I think there is a need for further input on this question: Given that there is a numerical consensus to discontinue the current pending-changes trial, should any exceptions be made for articles with a history of extreme problems that cannot be solved by other means? The most useful responses to this question, I might add, will contain specifics rather than generalities. Given that this RfC has been open for too long already, I ask that editors try to post comments on this new question within 7 days from today. I will post an update to this close afterwards. At that time I will also try to post some suggestions for the next phase of discussions about the future of this entire endeavor.

The proposal itself indicates that adopting it would not affect PC test pages, test pages created in userspace by user request, or the like. Such pages should continue to exist, so that editors who are curious what PC is or who are asked to comment about its adoption in the future, can experiment and know what is being talked about. This exception to "turning off pending changes" is included in the close.

I hope that these comments and conclusions are helpful to the community, and I am sure I don't have to ask that editors should feel free to comment on them. Newyorkbrad (talk) 04:21, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

General Comments

Very sensible and cogent. Thank you. Can the further input you're asking for go on another page? (If so, a sub-page or what? Certainly not a new RfC.) This page has become vast and unwieldy. Rivertorch (talk) 04:43, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the detailed close - I suggest we just archive the whole page content apart from Newyorkbrad's closing statement - then a proposal for a community poll for accepted usage can be presented and tweaked. Off2riorob (talk) 07:38, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Good idea, archive the talk page except for this thread. Tijfo098 (talk) 08:20, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Done. (Hope I didn't screw it up.)Rivertorch (talk) 17:53, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Since there is not yet another place for comments, I leave mine here. I agree with the closure and thank you for taking the time to make it. With respect to the second caveat, I suggest that the 14 days until implementation should be enough time for interested administrators to put the (hopefully few) potentially problematic articles on full protection temporarily, together with a talk page message stating that anybody who believes that protection is no longer required can discuss it with the protecting admin or if necessary at WP:RUP.  Sandstein  10:16, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

As for the caveat ... that constitutes extending the trial, albeit in a far more limited form. There isn't a consensus that there are any articles that need PC. I do not want to see the trial stretched out while we have another interminable discussion about which articles are special in some manner. We are already extremely late getting this thing put to bed, and further delays aren't necessary. Put all the test articles on semi-protection, and, if there are problem children, that's what full protection is for.—Kww(talk) 11:35, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

If you object to that part of the close you should really discuss that with the closer. Off2riorob (talk) 12:37, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
  • Request for clarification - A very considered and well-written close. I have just one request for clarification from Brad. The pages where semi-protection would be insufficient... Am I right in thinking that PCP level 1 would also be insufficient? Such pages should be under PCP level 2. I can't think of any type of vandalism that would be stopped by level 1 but not by semiprotection. Or am I missing something? Yaris678 (talk) 14:11, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
    • This can be addressed in the week of additional comments, or in a future phase of PC/FR discussion, if desired. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:28, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
  • As far as it goes with the trial ending two weeks from today, I would have no objection to interested administrators starting work immediately (no hurry no worry) on removing the pending protection and replacing as a minimum a comparable protection - so that taking our time the protection will be mostly or all gone by the two week date Brad mentioned. If someone is easily able to collect and post somewhere, a userspace perhaps - a list of all the articles under pending protection at the time of Brads closure, this will be helpful for collecting data. Off2riorob (talk) 14:28, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
    That list exists: Special:StablePages Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 03:32, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
    Just to mention, there are only 85 pages under level 2 pending changes (plus 3 test pages). Monty845 18:49, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
    Hi, could you please post a link to that, thanks. Off2riorob (talk) 18:53, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
    Articles with level 2 pending changes. Monty845 19:02, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
  • Some people complain about "Bradspeak", but really, there's nothing wrong with explaining yourself carefully and in detail, even if (gasp!) it takes a few more characters. Your close is very clear and thoughtful, and certainly makes clear the reason why you were the right choice to decide on such a sensitive issue. That being said, would it be possible for you to give a few particular examples of these articles which you consider to be so severe a problem that removing PC (even in favor of full protection?) would be "irresponsible"? You said that you'd like comments to address specific examples, I think that'd be easier if we had an idea of which articles you meant so that we could evaluate them. Seraphimblade Talk to me 15:37, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
My thought is that we have 1000 articles that are currently being protected completely by Pending protection, some of them have been added for the trial and some of them have been added for specific problems - the point is that through this procedural wiki process removal - be careful for this reason to leave an article less protected than it was and as such allow it to be attacked and libeled. So Brad is saying have a good look - leave a note on the talkpage don't just go mad for leather and remove what is currently working well without protecting the article in at least an equal manner. - For example - if pages that were protected from libel and defamation being published to the www and mirror sites and that article is removed from pending and libel or defamation is allowed to be published after the new level of protection that would be detrimental. Off2riorob (talk) 15:44, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
(To Seraphimblade) I have no specific articles in mind, and I'm not saying that the set of currently-PC'd articles that fall into the category I described is a non-empty set. That's precisely the question I'm asking for a little more input on, because no one seems to have really focused on it with any specificity. One example I can think of would be a BLP article where the subject is subject to persistent harassment and sneaky vandalism by sleeper socks, but there could be others. (And at this point, unless there are any more urgent clarification requests, I'm going to go quiet on this page for the next six days while the additional input comes in.) If Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:31, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
  • PC lvl 1 is a lesser protection than SP and PC lvl 2 is a lesser protection than FP, so there is no risk of under-protection. If an article requires SP, it should be put on SP, if an article requires FP, it should be put on FP, and if an article requires neither, it should be unprotected. How to implement this had already been discussed, we had agreed to give admins some time to make a proper transition, 14 days looks like enough time. Thanks for closing, Cenarium (talk) 16:10, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
    • That is rather incorrect. I have had to re-add pending changes to articles that definitely need something better than semi protection (sleeper socks) but something that I cannot full protect forever. NW (Talk) 15:25, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
      • It doesn't matter if you have good reasons why a particular article need PC rather than full or semi protection. The consensus was to remove PC from all articles. The only question that remains is whether we leave individual articles unprotected or whether we apply full or semi protection. I am looking forward to seeing the details of PC worked out, consensus achieved to restart it, and it becoming a new tool in our anti-vandalism toolbox, but right now we need to focus on getting PC removed from all articles and replaced with whatever level of protection makes sense. Guy Macon (talk) 17:21, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
        • Please reread the 7th paragraph of Brad's closure. NW (Talk) 22:08, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
          • I've read it several times, and it still looks to me like Brad adding his opinion, rather than actually stating anything that consensus was reached for. I'm open to persuasion, though: can you explain why you feel that these particular articles had to have more than semi-protection, when Pending changes is actually less than semi-protection? What drove you the the conclusion that these articles were incompatible with the existing protection mechanisms?—Kww(talk) 22:45, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
          • His 7th paragraph was a led-in to the question he asked in his 8th paragraph. I gave my answer in the section titled "Comments by Guy Macon" and in the discussion that followed the consensus was clear. The consensus was and is that all means all. Guy Macon (talk) 02:25, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
            • There has been a history of autoconfirmed accounts adding inappropriate information, which negates the usefulness of semi-protection. However, not all edits were bad, so full protection was inappropriate. Level 2 PC is a nice intermediate ground between the two that maintains open editing but still allows for pre-publishing review. NW (Talk) 23:24, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
              • Hey, why don't we have a trial of pending changes and see if there's a consensus to use it that way? Oh hell, we already did, didn't we? And the result was that there is no consensus to continue use of PC, and we are supposed to be removing it from articles, not adding it back. If you click the "project page" tab above, you can see the discussion.—Kww(talk) 23:44, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
              • NW, Please stop posting arguments as to why PC is better than full or semi protection. That decision has already been made, and thus all such arguments are moot. Let it go. See Wikipedia:Drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass for details. Guy Macon (talk) 02:25, 16 May 2011 (UTC)
  • First of all, a big thank-you to Brad. (And I am heartily in favor of applying PC to WP:Bradspeak, which I regard as the best thing that I have found out about in the course of this trial!) I agree with Yaris' point about there being, in practice, relatively few cases of pages that seriously need protection that requires PC, and that cannot be provided by semi-protection. I think that there needs to be a clearly articulated set of criteria, up front, for such cases, if we are going to allow them at all. Otherwise, I think that there is a danger of ongoing disagreement about letting PC remain on such pages. I also agree with Rob's idea of being flexible in the time course. A good thing about that is that it allows pages to remain as they are now until someone actually takes a look at them, and determines case-by-case what is best—while also not slowing the process down unreasonably. It just seems to me that the (not unanimous) consensus is that there probably need to be a lot of pages that will move from PC to semi, as opposed to staying with PC or moving from PC to nothing. For those that do stay, for now, with PC, there need to be good objective reasons for doing so. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:24, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
  • Simple comment: Thank you. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 03:27, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Comments from Chzz

  • Prelim: Thanks for sorting it out; greatly appreciated.
  • Happy for removal to take a couple of weeks; I expected that. I suggest we firstly notify all admins who applied PC, asking them to remove it (citing this closure), then a week later, shout up on AN for the remainder to be changed. Will you, NYB, do that, or do you want me to, or others?
  • I think it should be clear if this RfC is closed or not, and the conclusion added to the actual project page, not just here - at least, summarizing the result and your evaluation, at the top of that page. I suggest, probably, marking it archived, and that any further debates should occur on a fresh RfC.
  • I suggest putting a clear, unequivocal statement on WP:PROT explaining that PC should not be used - I think that'd be best coming from NYB, if you don't mind. I'm still concerned people will use PC, citing IAR or whatever. That's unfortunate, but if it is crystal clear on the policy page, that might help. For an example of that (making no criticism of the specific case, purely example and reason for anticipating these issues), see User_talk:EVula/Jan-Mar_2011#R._L._Stine_PC.
  • Re. keeping it on a few specific articles - if absolutely totally necessary, OK. I really do not think it is necessary; we have semi and full available. For the situation you describe, full prot is perfectly appropriate. However, OK - as long as PC will not be added to any more pages and these will be exceptions and few - then, yes, I suppose so. It still leaves it messy as hell, because e.g. how do people apply for 'reviewer' permission, and indeed how can we have meaningful discussion about the requirements for reviewer, when lots of users already have it. But, we can sort-of-manage, I suppose. I rather hoped we could remove 'Reviewer' from everyone, which would clear the decks for that discussion - because, if we do not do that at this time, I foresee all kinds of crazy argument with users demanding we shouldn't take away their user right. We could still remove it from everyone, accepting that then, only admins could deal with the exceptions you mentioned. Which, effectively, is full-prot; but...well, yeah.

I would prefer a clean break here, and exceptions will muddy the water.

  • Re. testing of PC - we have a test wiki for that very purpose; it doesn't need to be active for testing on enwiki.

 Chzz  ►  16:12, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

  • There is no consensus to remove reviewer status from users. I would like to keep this talkpage for the ongoing discussion - as for the RFC - close it archive it, it needs moving somewhere so we can add the next one. Off2riorob (talk) 16:18, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
    • You can keep your reviewer status, as long as there no articles for you to review what difference does it make?! Tijfo098 (talk) 02:52, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
    • That's right. People should keep the reviewer-flag. If there are individual problems, complain. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 03:30, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Notification

Once all the articles are removed from PC, perhaps a notice can be placed at Special:PendingChanges so that reviewers understand why the activity there has ceased and so they don't waste their time repeatedly checking for non-existent articles to review. Maybe also a watchlist notice for reviewers using tools such as User:Joshua Scott/Scripts/pendingchanges.js and others not frequenting the Special:PendingChanges page. If there will still be some articles left under PC, it might be problematic since if Special:PendingChanges is usually empty, reviewers will fall out of the habit of checking. Mojoworker (talk) 16:20, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

All the more reason to avoid making any exceptions, and use semi and full protection instead. TotientDragooned (talk) 18:58, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Comments by Guy Macon

Re: "Given that there is a numerical consensus to discontinue the current pending-changes trial, should any exceptions be made for articles with a history of extreme problems that cannot be solved by other means?"

This assumes something that has not been established as a fact. I contend that articles with a history of extreme problems that cannot be solved by other means do not exist. Wikipedia worked just fine before this trial, and it will work just fine after PC is removed from all pages, as was clearly specified in the RfC. When the PC trial was first proposed, nobody said it was an emergency measure that is desperately needed to handle problems that cannot be solved by other means. It was presented as a trial of another form of protection that may have some advantages over existing forms.

Saying "should any exceptions be made for articles..." is really asking whether PC should, once again, be left on some articles in direct violation of consensus. There was ample opportunity to change the RfC so that it was a proposal to remove PC from most articles with some exceptions. That's not what the RfC proposed. I would really like to know exactly what part of "remove pending changes protection from all articles" is so hard to understand. It seems quite clear to me.

What will it take to get Wikipedia to finally follow consensus? Do we need to put up yet another RfC saying "It is proposed to remove pending changes protection from all articles. This time we really really mean it. All means all, no exceptions. Don't even think about retaining pending changes protection on a single article if this proposal passes. Seriously. Don't go there." Is that what it is going to take? Guy Macon (talk) 20:06, 7 May 2011 (UTC)

Well I can think of one example of a problem that could only really be solved by pending changes. A while ago a vandal kept replacing Evolution with a quotation from Genesis. Semi-protection and checkusers did nothing because he could make edits to get past the autoconfirmed threshold and used open proxies. His vandalism was so frequent that the only solution was to full protect the article and ask that all edits by non-admins be suggested on the talk page, which clearly impeded article improvement. Pending changes would have solved the problem, had it been available. Now that particular vandal has largely given up but there may be some similar examples of other articles I'm not aware of - probably a handful at most - where the feature really is needed, and even though I voted to end the trial I don't have a problem with pending changes being used in truly exceptional circumstances such as this one. Hut 8.5 20:24, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Why not make an edit filter to specifically trip on such edits? The filter can be set up specifically to negate autocon-busting. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 21:51, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't think it existed at the time and if it did he would probably have got around it. Hut 8.5 21:54, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
The two statements "the only solution was to full protect the article" and "a problem that could only really be solved by pending changes" are contradictory. Clearly full protection solved the problem, and thus it was not a problem that cannot be solved by other means other than pending changes. I do not believe that any such problem exists. Besides, even if such a problem did exist, that does not justify violating consensus. We have a procedure for dealing with such an emergency: WP:OA.
Yes, pending changes has some advantages over full protection. As I have said many times, I support pending protection if consensus is followed. The fact that we are being asked whether it is OK to violate consensus - again - tells me that at least some of the admins still don't get it. The question at the top of this section should never have been asked. The result of the RfC answered it already: "remove pending changes protection from all articles" Guy Macon (talk) 23:15, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
The more I think about it, the more I think Guy is correct. Exceptions, such as the one described by Hut, seem likely to be extremely few in number. And I would worry about unproductive arguments over proposals that a given page be one of those exceptions. --Tryptofish (talk) 21:18, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I agree with Guy Macon. Any problem that can be solved by pending changes can also be solved with semiprotection or full protection. It is therefore not necessary to retain pending changes on any articles. This includes Hut 8.5's example, where PC would be helpful because it does not require protected edit requests, but it is not strictly necessary to prevent disruption. PC should therefore be removed from all articles, as per the RfC outcome, and normal protection can then be applied as may be needed to deal with any problems that may arise.  Sandstein  21:59, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
A vandal as dedicated and devious as the evolution denier might well pass the reviewer threshold, making even PC level 2 ineffective. Then the article would need full protection anyway (assuming he's not cunning enough to sneak through RfA...) Certes (talk) 23:31, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Pending protection by its very nature attracts multiple experienced reviewers to articles some of them often previously without any or with almost no watchers - As such the sneaky vandal would very very soon be exposed and thrown to the loins. Pending protection is an additional benefit - it is not comparable or equal to semi protection and full protection is for extreme situations only and for as limited a time as possible. The edit filter is useful but only for some vandal additions semi protection is also useful and pending protection is also useful in other ways - its removal will weaken our defenses and lessen the options we have to protect our articles. Off2riorob (talk) 23:35, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
That assumes the reviewer is both knowledgeable and unbiased in the area, and in any case the situation discussed here isn't about sneaky vandalism; it's about obvious and persistent vandalism that an edit filter can catch. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 23:45, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes, we clearly have knowledgeable reviewers - There was not one single complaint of a biased reviewer during the trial. Off2riorob (talk) 23:51, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
Is it because the reviewers were unbiased or the IPs didn't care? —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 01:43, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
If you have evidence of bias amongst reviewers I would be willing to investigate but without such evidence I assume good faith that the sometimes randomness of a reviewer - especially when there are a few more pending requests in the list on the special page - limits any possibility of reviewer bias. (perhaps a note about be careful to avoid bias could be inserted into the reviewer guidelines or instructions how to review) Also unconfirmed IP accounts can and do complain when their quality contributions are removed through presumed bias just as any other type of editor would. Off2riorob (talk) 09:15, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm open to the idea that there *might* be an exception I'd support, but the evolution case does not rise to that level, full protection is going to hurt badly on that article, but not destroy the encyclopedia. --joe deckertalk to me 23:43, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
It's time to drop the stick and back slowly away from the horse carcass. The RfC is closed and the consensus is to remove pending changes protection from all articles. There is no point in arguing that we should not remove pending changes protection from all articles. That has already been decided. Guy Macon (talk) 23:50, 7 May 2011 (UTC)
I would tend to agree. The question here is now "How do we best handle the removal?" I agree with NYBrad's assessment that a simple precipitous removal from all articles currently so protected is probably not the best idea, but the clear idea here is to cease use entirely for now. That is "for now" only, and the RfC was very clear it is not intended to prejudice against deciding on a more permanent policy of when and how we should use it, but any arguments for it belong at the discussion of whether such a policy should be made and if so what form it should take. The question of where we're going right now has already been answered, now we just need to decide how best to get there. Seraphimblade Talk to me 01:16, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
Personally, I'm just going through a few articles at a time and applying my best judgment as to an appropriate protection status based on the article history and current PC state. If I screw up a few of them, other admins can fix it and other editors can use RFPP. I don't think there's a need to hammer out some long set of guidelines. Making protection decisions is one of the things admins were entrusted with at RFA time.—Kww(talk) 02:44, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Comments by Rivertorch

Chzz and Guy have said it well. I agree that consensus is clear for removal of PC and that exceptions would muddy the water. I'd add two points:

  1. It's possible that a meaningful distinction could be drawn between PC applied as part of the trial and PC applied for the specific reason of protecting a threatened article. I have waded through quite a bit of archived discussion but haven't found anything to clarify that point. My suggestion would be that for the affected non-trial articles, the admin who applied PC or the editor who requested it should be queried if the reason for applying PC cannot be readily determined from each page's history. Then, on a case-by-case basis, a determination could be made whether to apply semi or full protection or unprotect or leave PC temporarily in place. I'd be unhappy with the last of those options, but I can conceive of an instance in which it might be a reasonable, at least pending further discussion or community review of some sort. This process could not be completed before the witching hour, but my second suggestion (below) might serve as a useful stopgap measure:
  2. A concerted effort should be made to get the current crop of PC articles—particularly the non-trial ones—onto more editors' watchlists. If half of the people who contributed to just the third phase of this RfC would watch a quarter of the affected articles, any potential disruption could be minimized. I have no idea how to go about doing this, I admit. An informal, direct appeal to select editors? <shrugs> Rivertorch (talk) 05:21, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Please reconcile "Then, on a case-by-case basis, a determination could be made whether to...leave PC temporarily in place" with the clear language of the RfC, which was "remove pending changes protection from all articles." It really sounds like you think that it is OK to ignore consensus.
All means all. It is an entirely distinct concept from "some" or "most", neither of which is contained in the statement "Remove pending changes protection from ALL articles." If pending changes protection is removed from all articles, the number of articles with pending protection will be zero. None, Zilch. Nada. Null set. This specifically excludes deciding to leave pending changes on articles on a case-by-case basis. If I may paraphrase, nuke that sucker. All. Not some. Not many. Not most. Definitely not almost all or all but one. Every single one gets pending protection turned off. No exceptions.
Pending changes protection is demised. It has passed on. PC is no more. It has ceased to be. Pending changes protection has expired and gone to meet its maker. It is a a stiff. Bereft of life. It rests in peace. Its metabolic processes are now history. It is off the twig. If someone hadn't nailed it to the perch it would be pushing up the daisies. Pending changes protection has kicked the bucket, shuffled off this mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible. This is an ex-trial. PC strictly prohibited. No Zombies Allowed. Guy Macon (talk) 08:06, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Oh, for heaven's sake. I don't know whether to laugh or to cry. I am on record as opposing PC since before it was PC and I think I've been very clear that I support its removal from all articles now. My caveat was intended:
  • to acknowledge the reality that PC has been applied in two different ways—en masse as part of a poorly managed "trial" and on a case-by-case basis to certain other articles as "needed"—and that it is a reasonable (if not necessarily ideal) approach to consider those two ways separately, and
  • to suggest that the removal of PC from "all articles" (the RfC's wording, my emphasis) could happen in two stages, rather than all at once, without the sky falling.
I don't believe that our objectives here are at odds. I simply am trying not to be rigid or impatient, and I'm considering the long-term implications. If PC's deactivation is handled abruptly and without adequate preparation, it quite conceivably could result in a debacle that would practically guarantee that PC comes back in a hurry and is here to stay. Rivertorch (talk) 19:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Comments from CycloneGU

I in general appreciate and agree with what seems a thoughtful close on this contentious issue. While I personally do want to see PC implemented in the future and didn't see the harm in having pages where it is useful keep using it, I do in general agree with the principle to no longer add it to pages simply because the trial has ended. However, the "Exceptional examples" section below has brought up new thoughts. I do agree that admins. should not add it to pages through the requests for protection page, but I think if a quick consensus can be achieved at AN/I that a temporary occasional exception,ssuch as the election, be granted. Now, I do not think that the very few pages under this exception will require 5,000 reviewers, and this could actually cause other problems because many of them won't keep an active eye on the updates pages (I know I hadn't lately because initially I thought the trial had ended, and thus stopped using it), but having PC available at an agreement through AN/I for extreme occasional cases where it is warranted is still an option, and then it is immediately removed a few days later or when the possibly contentious period is an an end. It might have been rather useful during reports of Osama bin Laden's death, for instance...but after my experience at the Australian Prime Minister's page the day she was elected, maybe not, and maybe for this election being referred to it may be equally less useful. (Besides, I had an exceptional number of edit conflicts on bin Laden's page myself.) The idea still is that if agreement comes at AN/I, exceptions may be made for very brief periods (not meant to exceed 7 days in most instances). For right now, it's not a tool that admins. at the requests for protection are allowed to simply apply at a whim. Thoughts? CycloneGU (talk) 17:44, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Exceptional examples

  • Someone asked at the Village Pump the other day about PC for an article on an election two days from then. Abusing Wikipedia for last-minute electioneering is not uncommon. A very short run on PC would be far more effective in that situation than semi-protection, and far more reasonable than full protection. (Perhaps someone else will have other ideas about types of articles that might warrant an exception.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:27, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
That really isn't the example being sought. I don't think anyone doubts that there are examples of articles where PC, even in its current form, is more appropriate for some articles. The example being sought is of an article where all other forms work so poorly in comparison to PC that it would be irresponsible of an admin to change protection formats, despite there being no consensus for PC to be used at all.—Kww(talk) 02:37, 8 May 2011 (UTC)
And what is the WP:POLICY which allows established editors to censor less established ones? My impression is that editors who spend a lot of time here are just as likely to get short term "politics craze" around election time just like anyone else. Do you want this guy to approve edits just because he spends a lot of time here?! Tijfo098 (talk) 02:46, 8 May 2011 (UTC)

Role of reviewers

An interesting example is being discussed on Wales' talk page; as the point re. PC is tangential to that thread, I wanted to bring discussion here;

A user added info to a BLP about an affair the person had [25].

It was removed, and reinserted, a few times.

An editor in good standing (Trident13 (talk · contribs)) added it back, with a reference to a UK mainstream newspaper [26].

Much later, it transpired that the allegation was untrue, and it was reported in other newspapers that it was, in fact, a "smear campaign" [27].

I don't consider PC would have helped there, and I don't see that Trident13 did anything 'wrong'. Wikipedia, as a tertiary information providor, gives references to facts in 'reliable sources'. The newspaper in question is a tabloid, with a somewhat grubby reputation, but it's still an RS, surely. Sometimes, RS are wrong - but, is it really the duty of Wikipedia to investigate and check everything in newspapers?

Jimbo Wales said, That edit is more than enough to cause the instant removal of the reviewer flag [28].

If that is the case, then 'Reviewer' is something very different from what we've been discussing - and, it'd be a much higher standard required.  Chzz  ►  13:49, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

As Jimmy said there, User;Tridents additions recently would clearly require the removal of his reviewer right and if I was an administrator I would remove his reviewer right myself immediately. However as we are in the process of removing all the articles from Pending protection it doesn't seem to require immediate action. I have added him to my watchlist and will follow his edits in the future for violations and will report him as and when required and the report is fresh. The user Trident has come under my radar previously in regard to low standards of application of the BLP policy. If an admin watching this wants to read the thread on Jimmys talkpage and remove Tridents reviewer right for BLP violating edits I strongly support that now also. Off2riorob (talk) 14:02, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia is voluntary work, we are free to colaborate. Priority is to protect Wikipedia from vandalism and its BLP content from defamation/libel. We aren't in enough numbers to review better than a rollbacker quality level. We are able only to do a lil bit maintenance on the database. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 14:09, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
Jimbo needs to hire himself some psychics to work as reviewers if he expects reviewers to predict future retractions from newspapers. Tijfo098 (talk) 16:53, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
Even if that titillating trivia was true it had no value in the biography of a living person - it was plenty to report the subject divorced/separated in 2009 - the details belong in a celebrity mag or on a blog but not here. The intimate personal details of a subjects private life can sometimes be found in something allegedly referred to here as a reliable source but those reports still have no place here. Off2riorob (talk) 19:23, 9 May 2011 (UTC)
True or not, the reviewer should at least have added "According to..." or "It was reported by..." Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:20, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes, just to ensure, this user added this content in the end of 2009 - the article in question has never been under pending protection. The user was given reviewer status at the back end of last year. So the whole issue is a bit hypothetical, the point raised was that Jimmy said if a user made such an addition it would be grounds to remove them of their reviewer status. Jimmy has very high standards for externals and BLP content, likely because he knows what is detrimental to the growth of the project. Jimmy is a supporter of Pending protection and yesterday referred to it as a win win situation. To quote him, "By using Pending Changes, we can allow more people to edit, more freely, with less stress, while simultaneously dramatically reducing the incidence of BLP issues. It's win-win." Off2riorob (talk) 01:39, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
I agree. It's the same as rollback. Rollback is after the vandalism goes live, PC is before the vandalism goes live, we should not aim more. The problem is the workload, a backlog of more than 24/72 hours (blatant vandalism/ stealth vandalism, stealth vandalism requires research time and even more experience) isn't ok and if an article isn't being actively reviewed, if its backlog gets higher than a dozen pending edits, that woudn't be ok too. --Chris.urs-o (talk) 08:18, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes, backlog is an issue and if accepted a slow natural increase in usage would likely allow us to see where that point was. We had one thousand articles protected without almost any backlog at all and I suggested there might be an available community consensus for acceptance for general use of the tool if we added a cap limit to usage of two thousand articles which from the trial results I would say we could easily handle. Off2riorob (talk) 08:40, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
This is not entirely hypothetical anymore - I just saw a case in Pippa Middleton where someone did lose reviewer right (with some voluntary betting involved) over a perfectly reasonable story published in the Sun-Times which simply didn't fit Wikipedia's stringent policy requirements for a slavishly obsequious tone. Mark my words, no joke - if we don't stop this stupidity with trying to act "nice" with censored BLPs, the time will come when Encyclopedia Dramatica is viewed as a more reputable research source. I know that seems like a joke now... but don't laugh too soon. People come here looking for the loot, not excuses. Wnt (talk) 20:36, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
This User:Wnt appears to have recently (today) had his reviewer rights removed so he appears to be another...there was one yesterday also for similar reasons - there appears to be a rise in agreement that users portraying poor judgment by additions to or vocalizations about their opinions of acceptable additions to BLP articles are and should have the reviewer right removed, as is the case with this user. Off2riorob (talk) 21:35, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Vocalizing your opinions about what is acceptable to add to a BLP should never be a reason to revoke any userright unless you're displaying a clear COI. I will agree that adding BLP violations should be a reason to lose any userright, but merely expressing an opinion about what is and is not a BLP violation is part of what consensus-building is all about. —Jeremy v^_^v Components:V S M 23:48, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Well - yes, I agree with you more or less - but if you assert it is ok to add this and that to the articles of living people, whether you add it or not and consensus is strongly against your interpretation of policy, you are reviewer history. Consensus building is not about extreme positions. Off2riorob (talk) 00:15, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
To be clear, I used the word should, in italics - under current policy, I recognize there would be substantial disagreement involving whether Middleton is now a person notable for one or two events or a public figure. I never asked for reviewer rights, which were given as part of a test; I never used them except to see how the process worked; but I never asked for them to be removed either. Now it would appear that my participation in the experiment has been instructive after all. In fact, the general purpose of Pending Changes has never been codified, nor the expected behavior of reviewers - in previous RfCs there was no clear consensus on what reviewers should pass. I should say that while at first it sounded like it might be an anti-vandalism alternative, I am growing skeptical that Pending Changes could ever do anything but harm to Wikipedia. Above all: I never agreed to any restrictions on giving my opinions as a condition of having reviewer rights, nor would I consent to them, nor are such restrictions codified in any policy. Wnt (talk) 03:05, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
If we are to make any permanent implementation of pending changes, I would strongly disagree that simply advocating a position which fails to gain consensus is grounds for removal of the reviewer right. If the reviewer actually misuses the privilege, by approving edits against consensus, that's another story. That's true even if many people strongly disagree. If I advocated that anyone who uses the word "red" should be blocked for a week, I don't imagine that position would gain consensus, and it would be thought very odd—but it would not warrant desysopping unless I actually began making such bad blocks. Only actual misuse of a privilege warrants its removal. Seraphimblade Talk to me 07:32, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
I too was given reviewer rights without asking for them. I presume that this was because I had previously requested and been granted rollbacker rights. While I like the idea of being a reviewer and plan on doing some experiments in userspace when pending changes comes back, the idea of being a reviewer including some sort of restriction I never agreed to can't be right. I simply do not believe that such a thing is true. Somehow someone in the above thread must have misunderstood. Guy Macon (talk) 07:51, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
Well, from conversations at what is now User:Scott MacDonald/Removal of reviewer rights from User:Wnt, it doesn't sound like they're budging from their position. Despite the range of views expressed in this RFC, they seem to regard it as set in stone that reviewers must remove every case of "inappropriate" material about a living person, even if it is sourced to a famous Chicago newspaper that won 8 Pulitzers, based on their nebulous notions of what is trivial and relevant. They see it as non-negotiable that even a single slip-up (if that's what it is) on the part of a reviewer is enough to lose them the right. And they regard it as non-negotiable that even arguing in favor of such a reviewer, or a looser BLP policy, is sufficient to take away reviewer rights.
Now consider that these same admins allow to pass, for example, today's featuring of a news article, with photo, about a recent rape charge for Dominique Strauss-Kahn, which at early stage in time can only be supported by a single woman's statement. I think that the difference is simply that the French don't get the same kind of special treatment as the English - whether it's because the media are less favorable to them, or that it's a "Socialist Party", or because they don't have as insane a set of libel laws I don't know for sure. Though I don't have evidence, my gut feeling is that this Pending Changes is intended for the 2012 U.S. presidential election, and that we will discover that the two parties aren't treated equally there either.
As a consequence of such an extreme view, coming from what I see as core supporters of the Pending Changes mechanism, I no longer can regard it as even a potentially legitimate tool with a place in vandal fighting or other article maintenance. It seems to be intended from the beginning for the primary purpose of censorship of validly sourced information - a way to ensure that facts that some people think are "out of place for an encyclopedia" never show up even in the edit history.
At this point I am fully persuaded that Pending Changes must be opposed in any form, under any circumstances. Wnt (talk) 18:55, 15 May 2011 (UTC)
It grieves me to say that I agree with much of what you say here. I tend to assume good faith about everyone, absent clear evidence that I shouldn't, but there seems to be a sizable contingent of Wikipedians who don't reciprocate. When it comes to BLP issues, they are all too ready to assume bad faith about their fellow editors. This has created a toxic environment in several areas of the project. I was mildly involved in the periphery of one particularly ugly manifestation of this—l'affaire de Johnny Weir (I don't feel up to searching for diffs or even the relevant pages)—and am aware of others, although I've stayed far, far away from them.

Those instances, along with some of the recent comments on Jimbo's talk page, suggest to me is that when it comes to biographical content basic logic and reason, not to mention such niceties as consensus-based editing in a collaborative environment, are casually dismissed as irrelevant and replaced by fear-based emotional reactions leading to summary threats of blocking. That sort of "my way or the highway" attitude creates a chilling effect, making it literally impossible for to discuss policy nuances except in the most general terms. If this trend is carried to its logical conclusion, I predict an exodus of long-term editors; some will leave the project entirely, while others will simply choose not to edit any articles containing BLP elements.

Psychologically and sociologically, it's all quite interesting—some of the panicked cries of "libel" and "crisis" suggest something along the lines of group hysteria—but it's also deeply damaging to the project. Aside from threatening the continuance of the largely congenial editing environment that has marked Wikipedia's history thus far, it also may signal the end of any reasonable expectation that neutrality and comprehensiveness are attainable objectives in a large segment of our articles.

I have tried to remain open to the idea that something along the line of Pending Changes might be useful if applied sparingly under very stringent conditions, but I have to say that I am not optimistic about it. In fact, I'm worried there may be a move to apply it liberally to talk pages, effectively stifling any meaningful discussion except among those (dwindling few?) deemed worthy of the reviewer right. Rivertorch (talk) 19:59, 15 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree that there is something funny going on with PC, first the missed deadlines for removal, then blocking an admin for following consensus, then the various claims that consensus is a false god, consensus can be overridden by invoking the magic BLP word etc., and finally the apparent acceptance of using admin tools against an opponent in a conflict over removing PC. All very strange. I don't agree that the answer is to never have PC. I think the answer is to do PC the right way and to put safeguards in place against the kinds of abuse you describe. Guy Macon (talk) 09:54, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Notices

Could somebody place an appropriate box announcing the result of the RfC at the top of the following pages?

Wikipedia talk:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011 (AKA This page)

Wikipedia:Pending changes

Wikipedia talk:Pending changes

Help:Pending changes

Help talk:Pending changes

Wikipedia:Flagged protection and patrolled revisions

Wikipedia talk:Flagged protection and patrolled revisions

Wikipedia:Reviewing

Wikipedia talk:Reviewing

Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Reviewer

Wikipedia talk:Requests for permissions/Reviewer

...and possibly...

Wikipedia:Flagged revisions/Sighted versions

Wikipedia talk:Flagged revisions/Sighted versions

The notice should mention that PC can start up again. Guy Macon (talk) 16:40, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand Guy Macon's last point, but I do think that this closure could use more publicity, including my request for a bit more input on a narrow issue, as well as my intention to make some suggestions for the next phase of broad community discussion. Thank you. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:36, 10 May 2011 (UTC)
Sorry for being unclear, Let me try again. The notice should, of course give the result of the RfC and a link to same, but IMO it should also contain somme sort of wording that makes it clear that Pending Changes is not dead forever, just not applied to articles right now. Guy Macon (talk) 02:27, 10 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm not entirely clear about the result given, nor how to present it. Is there any consensus to use any form of pending changes on any pages at all?

If there isn't, then why do we have to pussy-foot around this?

If there is - or, if there is a suggestion to use it - then a new proposal would be in order.

Otherwise, we're still in limbo - with PC in use, on certain articles, in certain cases, with certain persons able to review, with absolutely no agreement to do so.  Chzz  ►  02:31, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Chzz, everyone else, these articles won't unprotect themselves. That's why the trial never ended. Do us a favour and start working through them, head over to the admins' talk pages, and to WP:RFPP. I've already done about 10% of them, but I'm going to stop there. There's still several hundred that need to be tackled. Thanks. -- zzuuzz (talk) 08:02, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Yes, indeed. Please move towards removal and closure of this phase. As Zzuuzz says we could use more admins that have been involved here to assist in removal. Although I don't support removal, I do support the consensus and the closure. I will go request some of the ones I have been watching are removed at WP:RFPP - Off2riorob (talk) 08:44, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

Suggested wording for a notice box to be placed on the pages listed above: Retracted; Off2riorob has a better wording (see below).

Guy Macon (talk) 15:45, 11 May 2011 (UTC)

  • I support that wording. --Tryptofish (talk) 16:27, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
    • I don't see that we are simply counting numbers is needed in the notice. Off2riorob (talk) 17:54, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
    • This is also surplus to requirements - Editors should start work immediately on removing the pending protection from all articles. In many cases, the removing editor will want to replace pending changes protection with semi-protection or full protection. This affects article space only; pending changes test pages created in userspace should continue to exist, so that editors can experiment. The deadline for having pending changes protection removed from all articles is Friday, 20 May 2011 - .....Editors should start work immediately on removing the pending protection from all articles.....really - immediately... - there is no need for this either - the articles are easily on schedule for removal - there is no desperate deadline . Off2riorob (talk) 17:57, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
There is a deadline. The admin who closed the RfC said "Accordingly, the PC trial will end ... 14 days from today." We had an "officially it ended some time ago but the articles still have PC" status before this RfC. The explicit purpose of the RfC was to set a deadline. I oppose the above shortened version on the grounds that there is a deadline and editors should be notified of it, and on the grounds that more administrators who are familiar with the articles working on PC removal will increase the odds of PC being replaced with the appropriate level of protection. I have no problem with removing the vote totals. Guy Macon (talk) 19:07, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
I added a end date as per your concerns. IMO there is no issue at all with requiring admins the be notified to start work immediately as the removals seem to be well known and in action already - I could remove them all myself with a week to spare. Off2riorob (talk) 20:00, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
I support Off2riorob's wording. It is better than my suggestion. Guy Macon (talk) 20:58, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
Cool, simple as possible to convey the message is a good target. No worries, all involved admins here are requested to assist if able in the removal - best. Off2riorob (talk) 21:41, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
  • As I mentioned above, the notice should also be placed at Special:PendingChanges, and there should also be a link to the next phase of the discussion. Is that WP: Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011/Review Recommend phase the original Beeblebrox proposal? Mojoworker (talk) 18:17, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
    • Hi, Mojoworker, yes a link there Special:PendingChanges - As for Beeblebrox's next stage, I am open to that if there is support for it, I also feel that the community is tired of opining on this and that there is already a point where there is a consensus support for the tool to be accepted and that through previous discussions here and through some more discussion here about the fine points that there isn't need for the feedback that the questionnaire could provide. IMO we are close to the wording to return to the community a proposal including restrictions and directed parameters for usage that would return consensus for general usage. The end point of the trial is 20 May 2011 and imo I don't see why two weeks after that point , the 3rd of June we shouldn't be in the position of having a RCF for accepted usage with restrictions and improved guidelines for usage ready for offering to the community. Off2riorob (talk) 18:29, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
      • OK. It looks like in a couple of days, Brad is going to outline his thoughts on how to move forward. But, I think that the notice really should have a link to the next phase of the discussion, wherever/whenever that happens to be. Mojoworker (talk) 20:10, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
        • Yes, I agree with you there, but where that link should direct to is another question...as I understand it, we are discussing and formatting the next RFC here. Off2riorob (talk) 21:49, 11 May 2011 (UTC)
          • I just Added the announcement to the pages listed above. Articles with edits awaiting review was not editable, so an admin will have to add the announcement to that one. Guy Macon (talk) 09:53, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
            • Just a heads up; one of the notices was edited (Diff). I see no problem with it, but it changes the wording we discussed and which the closing administrator did not object to. Guy Macon (talk) 16:40, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
              • I kind of liked/prefer the tweaked wording, it seemed to just a touch more reflect the actual suggested position we/pending pritection are in - if we change one they should all be tweaked. Off2riorob (talk) 17:35, 12 May 2011 (UTC)
                • Hey guys, only just noticed this thread... but if you are happy with my change then I am cool with that. I guess we should consider doing something similar for the other pages. I should point out that I also made this change to Wikipedia:Pending changes/Request for Comment February 2011. It is similar to the other one, but goes into slightly more detail because it is on the page specific to the RfC. Yaris678 (talk) 08:53, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
                  • Well, this one has been changed again by User:Ancient apparition. Off2riorob (talk) 09:25, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
                    • I only did a slight rewording to remove redundancies. The original meaning is still conveyed and has not been altered by me. Also we should consider making this into its own template for use on ALL other PC related pages. —James (Talk • Contribs) • 7:40pm • 09:40, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
                      • I agree with the second redundancy, but have reverted the first. While "short-term use" could mean "use in the short term" is could also mean "use for short-term purposes" which is not what we want to say. Nice work though - I like removing redundancy. Yaris678 (talk) 10:58, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

- hi, can we please keep them all the same, so we should alter them all. Off2riorob (talk) 11:08, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

Okey doke. I'm working on a template to use that deals with self-links intelligently... Yaris678 (talk) 15:12, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
Cool, thanks - Off2riorob (talk) 15:39, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
I have used the template on this page and the main PC page. If people are happy with it, we can role it out to the rest. Yaris678 (talk) 15:46, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
P.S. A big thanks to User:PrimeHunter, who created Template:No selflink. Yaris678 (talk) 15:46, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
Roll out to all pages sounds good. Guy Macon (talk) 17:31, 13 May 2011 (UTC)
Done.
That said... I reckon the template doesn't need to be on any of the flagged revisions/flagged protection pages - they are all about the old discussions that lead to PC... do they need an update on the latest news? If they do, perhaps it should be phrased differently of something.
Yaris678 (talk) 17:34, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

We still do not have a notice on Special:PendingChanges. How do we make that happen? Guy Macon (talk) 17:31, 13 May 2011 (UTC)

That's an interface message, you'll have to find the relevant "MediaWiki talk:" page for the message and slap on an {{editprotected}} request. —James (Talk • Contribs) • 2:06pm • 04:06, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
MediaWiki:Pendingchanges-list. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 14:04, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
I left an edit request on the talkpage there - and the template has now been added to the interface page. -  Done - Off2riorob (talk) 14:11, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
  • How about a notice at MediaWiki:Protect-text? This is what every admin sees when they are about to protect a page. —GFOLEY FOUR— 15:14, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
    I am not sure about that - I think one has been applied so that if you attempt to add pending protection the message is there so perhaps thats plenty? Off2riorob (talk) 15:20, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
    There is a red notice that tells people not to protect pages, but it still refers to the old straw poll. See here. —GFOLEY FOUR— 15:24, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
    Ah, yes, that one needs updating - could you do it please. Off2riorob (talk) 15:28, 14 May 2011 (UTC)
     Updated —GFOLEY FOUR— 15:57, 14 May 2011 (UTC)

In the MediaWiki%3AProtect-text history I see the notice was added, but when I look at The current version of the page I do not see the notice. (tested on Firefox and Opera, logged in and logged out).

Also, why does the protection infobox contain the phrase "...for the page $1" (Wikimarkup '''''<nowiki>$1</nowiki>''''')? It has been that way since the page was created in 2007. Are the nowiki tags an error?

Regarding the $1, there is an answer at MediaWiki talk:Protect-text. Could it be that the #ifexist:$1 is suppressing the notice? Guy Macon (talk) 14:46, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Still no notice at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:Protect-text - The notice is there if you loojk at the source, but it is not displayed. Guy Macon (talk) 19:00, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Guy, we should ask an administrator to sort this out. Off2riorob (talk) 20:06, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Progress Report (obsolete)

This is a count of how many articles are still using Pending Changes.

(Please use Wikipedia:WikiProject Time, not local time.)

The goal is to reach zero by Friday, 20 May 2011

Articles with level 1 pending changes

Articles with level 2 pending changes

Test Pages (no need to change these)

Count as of 03:00 on Monday 16 May 2011: Level 1 = 348 . Level 2 = 54 --Guy Macon (talk) 03:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 01:45 on Wednesday 18 May 2011: Level 1 = 275 . Level 2 = 49 --Guy Macon (talk) 01:52, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 06:56 on Saturday 21 May 2011: Level 1 = 226 . Level 2 = 33 --Guy Macon Guy Macon (talk) 07:06, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 17:45 on Saturday 21 May 2011: Level 1 = 143 . Level 2 = 34 --Guy Macon Guy Macon (talk) 17:50, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Moving count to end of talk page. It was an error on my part making an editorial comment rather than simply reporting progress. Sorry about that. Guy Macon (talk) 08:01, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

(Comments deleted because multiple editors do not think the statement was justified) Guy Macon (talk) 07:06, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

No... it's just that it's going to take some time to unprotect the pages, just have a little patience, rather than jumping to conclusions and making unfounded accusations - Kingpin13 (talk) 07:10, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Unfounded? A two-month trial the ending date ignored. A new "drop-dead" date -- completely ignored. This latest closure's two week deadline -- ignored. And now we are being told to wait another seven days without asking us whether there any consensus to do so, and with zero assurance that this new deadline won't be ignored like all the previous ones. That's pretty much the definition of "founded" - prediction of future behavior founded on past behavior. I stand by my statement. We have been lied to once again. Please note that I am far from being alone in this opinion. Guy Macon (talk)
And how many requests have you personally made to either WP:RFPP or to admins' talk pages to help speed up this massive task? Don't just sit here and wait and bitch, try doing something constructive about it. Thanks. -- zzuuzz (talk) 08:38, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Agree with zzuuzz. While I'm busy removing some with the bit of free time I do have, I don't see you bringing anything to RFPP to get it unprotected, Guy. Wizardman Operation Big Bear 16:39, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
So complaining here is sitting here, waiting and bitching, but compaining on RFPP is doing something constructive about it. It would have been nice if somebody had mentioned that. Guy Macon (talk) 17:42, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

The problem with implementing this is that it requires admins to do work, and work requires time; I'm pretty sure most admins would rather spend their time doing something else, like editing articles, or doing IRL stuff that needs to be done. It'll be done, but be patient. Hint: going "OMGWTFBBQ WHY ISN'T THIS DONE!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!??!" doesn't motivate admins to do this massive task. --Rschen7754 02:47, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Quick count of PC prot articles

http://toolserver.org/~chzz/pc.php

That is, select count(*) from flaggedpages join page where page_id = fp_page_id and page_namespace = 0 ;

...which is, articles only, how many have PC, now

Hope that helps.  Chzz  ►  00:52, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Additional comments from the closer

First off, my sincere apologies for not having gotten these comments posted a few days ago as I had hoped. For various reasons that will not be of general interest, I have had limited wiki-time this week.

Closure follow-up regarding the near term

I have carefully reviewed the input on this page since my closing two weeks ago. My initial reaction is that I am concerned by the limited amount of input that has been received. It appears that the closing and my request for follow-up attention by administrators and for follow-up input on a specific, narrow question has, due to no fault of anyone in particular, received far too little attention using our internal publicity mechanisms. This situation should be corrected.

Despite this problem, it appears that administrators have been giving attention to articles that have been part of the pending changes (PC) trial, including deciding whether to use semiprotection in lieu of PC. However, there are still a couple of hundred articles under PC so this job obviously has not yet been fully completed. In light of the lack of publicity and the need for administrators to give careful attention to this task, I think it is best that we allow PC status on any articles within the PC trial that have not yet been carefully reviewed by an administrator, to remain in place for 7 additional days. In other words, the "deadline" for termination of the PC trial (except as otherwise specified), which had been today, is extended for 7 days. I acknowledge that in light of the 2-to-1 result of the RfC, even this limited extension may be near the limit of what can be considered consistent with consensus. Therefore, except as described below, I do not anticipate any further extensions.

In my closing, I specifically asked for comments on the following specific question: Given that there is a numerical consensus to discontinue the current pending-changes trial, should any exceptions be made for articles with a history of extreme problems that cannot be solved by other means? I thank the editors who have commented on this issue, although as noted I regret that there weren't more comments.

I understand the input I have received to the effect that it is desirable to draw a clear line separating the completed PC trial from any future implementation of PC, flagged revisions, or any similar system. Terminating the PC trial as to the vast majority of the articles that were under PC is consistent with the consensus. I remain seriously concerned, however, that for a small number of biographies of living persons, turning off PC without a reasonable substitute would be an irresponsible thing for the project to do.

Specifically, I refer to the subset of BLP articles in which there has been a serious problem of persistent vandalism, defamation, harassment of the article subject, or the like. Contrary to the views of some of our critics, I do not believe the number of such articles is a major fraction of our overall number of BLPs. But it is not a trivial problem either, by a long shot, and there have been instances of serious BLP problems even within the past couple of weeks.

I do not believe that the majority consensus in this RfC would necessarily oppose allowing PC to remain, for the interim period until we make a final decision here, on this limited subset of BLP articles. For some of them, there seems to be no good alternative to leaving PC intact: semiprotecting does not protect against defamation of article subjects by determined enemies or harassers who register sleeper socks and take the trouble to get autoconfirmed; and full protection would be an overreaction (and if instituted faute de mieux in the absence of PC, would be a far more drastic limitation on the ability to edit than PC is; I do not understand any argument that full-protection of an article is a better state for it to be in than pending-changes).

Therefore, my current inclination is to allow a limited exception to the termination of the PC trial, for the interim period (defined as the period in which the longer-term status of PC/FR is under discussion, up to 90 days), in which an administrator would be permitted to apply PC status to an article provided that:

  • The article is substantially the biography of a living person; and
  • The article has been subject to severe or persistent vandalism, defamation, or harassment of the article subject; and
  • The administrator placing the article under pending changes promises to watchlist the article and to urge other users to do so, so that proposed edits will be processed within a reasonable period of time.

If this exception is allowed during the interim period (which I've defined as lasting no more than about 90 days), like the termination of the PC trial in all other respects, it will be entirely without prejudice to the ultimate fate of PC/FR as decided in the future. It also would be meant to apply to a reasonably limited number of articles; it is not meant to be an exception that would swallow the rule.

Comments on this proposal will be appreciated, within the next 7 days. With the possible exception outlined above, the PC trial should be considered in its final stages of winding down, with a deadline of 7 days from today.

Suggestions for the longer term

I also indicated in my closing that I would provide some suggestions for discussion of the next phase of PC/FR.

I think that some prior discussions and attempts to gauge consensus have foundered because the community was trying to discuss too many issues at the same time, and because the continuum of options was not broken out well enough to gauge support for each.

Basically, I think there are three separate—although of course related—discussions to be had.

(1) The discussion of whether we want to have PC/FR at all. I think that any RfC or poll needs to be broken down within the following continuum of options:

  • No PC/FR at all.
  • PC/FR only for a very narrow subset of articles (e.g., exceptionally problematic BLPs).
  • PC/FR only for a specific but not especially narrow subset of articles (e.g., all BLPs, or all articles with high vandalism rates, etc.).
  • PC/FR on a majority of articles (perhaps with a subset of non-PC articles designed to introduce the wiki experience to newcomers).
  • PC/FR on all articles.

I think an RfC page presenting these options, perhaps with some tweaking of the wording or categories, could help bring us closer to knowing what consensus is, or indeed whether there is any hope of consensus being achieved at all. (I am not addressing here the "meta" question of what we should do if community opinion remains widely scattered among these options and we don't have any decision at all; suffice unto the day....) My suggestion is that an RfC among these options be set up to begin about 10 days from now, be widely publicized, and remain open for 45 days to obtain as broad in put as possible. We could then follow with a phase that would yield a specific final outcome within the selected option.

(2) The technical discussion. Features of PC/FR, how it should work, issues concerning the interface, and the like. I'm not an expert on these issues, so will defer in suggesting how this RfC page might best be set up in favor of those who are. I think this phase of an RfC could proceed in parallel with (1) and on more-or-less the same timetable.

(3) The personnel and operational issues. E.g., how we should select reviewers, what the criteria should be for accepting or rejecting edits, etc. This phase of the discussion, I think, would need to follow (1) and (2).

Comments on how the next phase of PC/FR input should proceed, including on my suggested methodology for RfCs as set forth just above, are also invited, within the next 7 days.

tl;dr version

  • For the most part, the pending changes trial is over, and we'll proceed to a discussion of whether the community wants to have pending changes enabled long-term.
  • Because there hasn't been enough publicity about this fact and there are still some articles left that administrators need to go through, the deadline for assessing articles under PC (and substituting semiprotection or whatever where warranted) is extended for 7 days. This is a final extension.
  • We might want to allow a limited exception to terminating the trial for some high-risk BLPs. I need more comments on this, within the next 7 days.
  • I've outlined a possible format for the next phase of the RfC, which will deal with the longer-term future of pending changes or flagged revisions. I request comments on this also within 7 days, so that we can get the RfC open within a few days after that.

I hope these comments and suggestions are helpful. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:21, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

I have no idea why you need more comments on the concept of limited exceptions. There's no need for such comments. There is a consensus to stop this trial. There is no consensus to continue it. There is no consensus to allow exceptions. You may think that it's a good idea. Hell, I may think it's a good idea. But, there is no consensus to do so. The primary thing that is becoming obvious is that we can never permit a limited time trial again, as trial supporters simply will not allow it to stop. The damage done by this constant clamor for exceptions and further discussion is incalculable: the trial was over 10 months ago. Let the damn thing die already.—Kww(talk) 04:24, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Further comments

I believe a large reason that not many people have commented thus far is because everyone is entirely burnt out. There has been continuous discussion on this matter for a full year, not counting the myriad of discussions we had before that. Might I suggest that any long-term discussion be postponed for more than 90 days (maybe more like 6-12 months)? NW (Talk) 00:34, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

I agree, this has gone on for too long.
Brad, on the issue of BLPs, PC is problematic when used instead of semi-protection. That was one of the issues with the trial. Semi-protection was removed from BLPs, including high-profile ones, and replaced with PC, which did nothing to stop the vandalism being seen by thousands of logged-in users; and in several cases editors just couldn't cope with the volume of reverting (or didn't want to have to cope with it). Personally, I would prefer we stick to your first closure, where there's a winding-down period during which PC is removed. Then, if people want to start a discussion later about using it only on BLPs—preferably in addition to semi-protection—perhaps we could do that after the six month (or so) break NW suggests. SlimVirgin TALK|CONTRIBS 00:49, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

I'm so utterly frustrated; this is a travesty, a total failure to adhere to core principles regarding consensus.

I do not accept this closure.

This is now beyond ludicrous.

Another seven days? On and on this goes, with no consensus for using PC. A two-month trial; the ending ignored. "Drop-dead date" - ignored. THIS closure, a 2 week deadline (Fri 20th) - ignored. Clear consensus to end the farce - apparently, ignored.

What on Earth gives you, NYBrad, the authority to override consensus, to judge that the community wants to allow exceptions?

If you (NY Brad) think that PC should be used on certain articles, you must propose it and get agreement - just like anyone else should.

I am very concerned that the events here have done massive damage to all our faith in consensus, in due process through community discussion. I hope the damage is not irreparable, but I will find it extremely difficult to believe in the process of consensus any more.

The proposal you assessed clearly, unequivocally, found in favour of ending the trial. There was no talk of exclusions. I'm annoyed.  Chzz  ►  02:08, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Bravo! My76Strat talk 02:39, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Newyorkbrad, if you are not willing to follow consensus, please recuse yourself and let someone who is willing to follow consensus take over the closure. Guy Macon (talk) 07:14, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I'm not happy either with the new suggestions for how to handle exceptions (see below), but I also don't think hyperbolic rhetoric is necessary. In particular, we gave Newyorkbrad a nearly impossible task, and anger directed at him is not well-placed. I don't know what's going on behind the scenes, but it's no secret that several very senior administrators, fellow arbitrators, and the Foundation strongly oppose removing PC. He's doing his best to find a solution to a complicated, political, and emotionally-charged situation that is palatable to most and stands some chance of being implemented and respected without extensive added disruption. TotientDragooned (talk) 07:52, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Fair enough. I was wrong to imply that this is Newyorkbrad's doing when his hands may be tied. If Jimbo wants PC he should simply decide to have PC. He has the authority to do so without consensus. What is happening now is like what certain kings used to do - trying someone over and over and keeping the jury locked up until they they returned the desired verdict. Guy Macon (talk) 08:34, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Let's put away the pitchforks, folks, and the conspiracy theories (without evidence, that is—if off-wiki pressure is being applied, someone with knowledge of it really should blow the whistle). I firmly believe, NYB, that you are acting with the best interests of the project at heart, but I think your decision here is faulty. It amounts to setting aside consensus in favor of expediency, and that—intentions notwithstanding—is unlikely to do the project any good. Consensus (or at least the striving to attain it) is at the very heart of everything that's meaningful about Wikipedia: its content, policies, procedures, and the possibilities it holds for remaining viable as an online community of people with certain objectives in common. If we cannot trust that consensus will be respected, what are we left with?

I'm not sure why you think the response to your closure was disappointing. Those who could still be bothered to pay attention and wished to respond did respond. My impression, based on the PC-removal activity I kept stumbling across all week, was simply that many more people were aware of the closure than cared to comment. In my comments I mused about how to determine the appropriate protection level for the non-trial articles, and I expressed the view that dealing with those articles separately (i.e., later) might not be unreasonable. I still think so—although I'd add the caveats that "later" must be very soon and that we must have consensus for it. At the moment, consensus appears to be running strongly against any such thing.

In any event, pushing the deadline back another week across the board (not just for the non-trial articles) seems like pointless procrastination. It contradicts the very clear timeframe you outlined for the trial articles in your first closure, and it appears to do so without any fresh justification. I think that's disappointing. Rivertorch (talk) 09:12, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

  • Even though I favored the removal of PC for now, full stop, I disagree with those who were angered by Brad's suggestions, and I find Brad's examination of concensus to have been very fair. It was a tough job, and I say thank you.
  • Yes, it's true that most of the community is just burned out by now, and really does not want to comment further.
  • I'm not at all convinced that there are BLPs that really need PC in preference to semi, but I also am not bothered by Brad's idea of how administrators should handle it. The proposed process allows for thoughtful examination, and the world will not end if some BLPs retain PC for a while. Perhaps a reasonable compromise would be to include, explicitly, a provision that editors can contest, on the talk page of the article in question, a decision to retain PC, and those disagreements will be resolved on a case-by-case basis.
  • I have a significant concern about the next stage of polling about the technical aspects. For many users who have commented (including me) there are some questions about the technical aspects that we would like (and maybe even need!) to have resolved before we would be able to give an informed opinion in the "first" RfC, proposed for within 10 days. Maybe there should be a "technical issues" discussion first, instead.

--Tryptofish (talk) 14:32, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
The endless, impotent whingeing about "there's no consensus—there's no consensus—there's no consensus" is irritating. Folks, let me point out that the truest definition of "consensus" on Wikipedia is what we do. And if every single one of our admins has, through inaction, actually refused to remove PC from a given article, then the fact is that we don't have a consensus to remove PC from that article. This is not news. This is the system we use everywhere. Want an article to be deleted? If zero individual admins are willing to delete it, then in practice, then consensus is that the article should be kept. Want a user unblocked? If zero individual admins are willing to unblock the account then in practice, then consensus is that the user is de facto banned. Want an article under semi-protection? If zero individual admins are willing to protect it, then in practice, then consensus is that the article's current settings are what we're going to have. We have some 750 active admins at any given point in time. If you can't find one admin out of those hundreds who is willing to change the settings, then you effectively have 750 !votes in favor of keeping PC on whichever articles are still under PC—and that's a true, impregnable consensus on the English Wikipedia. (As a practical matter: if you believe the consensus is to remove PC from these last few articles, then I suggest that you spend your time figuring out which of your friends are admins and asking them personally to take responsibility for the changes. The finger-pointing and whingeing on this page will never get the job done.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:47, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

My response to additional comments

Newyorkbrad, I don't find your suggestion about exceptions acceptable, as I don't believe it is at all supported by consensus on the proposal page. Could you please provide some diffs illustrating that of the people supporting the proposal, a very significant fraction were only supporting conditional on PC remaining for certain BLPs? I'm sure you understand how divisive and draining a new month-long "remove PC from all articles and this time we mean all" RFC would be.

I understand that the situation regarding PC has become very complicated, with no easy answers moving forward. On the one hand we have a powerful tool for protecting BLPs, which many editors believe is significantly more useful than semi- and full protection and will only become more so as remaining points of contention, such as ease of use and process for selecting reviewers, are ironed out. On the other hand, due to what I can only describe as breathtaking myopia, PC was introduced and kept in place in a way many perceive as running roughshod over the wishes of the larger community; from reading the comments on the main RFC page you can see that a bitter taste has been left in the mouths of many editors, who now irrationally oppose PC out of principle. That the well has been thus poisoned is extremely regrettable, and could have been avoided if only the introduction of PC had been handled with more finesse and less haste.

Let's not repeat that mistake today. A completely neutral interpretation of the "landslide" consensus that emerged at this RFC is exactly what we need in order to start clean, to discuss the future role of PC on Wikipedia without the emotional baggage that has accrued during the trial. Putting PC on certain BLPs may very well be the best solution at our disposal for those pages... but let's come to that conclusion as a community, through consensus, rather than by administrator fiat, in defiance of consensus. A few dozen fully-protected BLPs will not kill Wikipedia. On the other hand, the perception that we can no longer make decisions collaboratively, that overwhelming consensus is no longer binding on administrators who dislike the outcome... the harm there is incalculable. Wikipedia cannot succeed once its contributors refuse to work cooperatively. TotientDragooned (talk) 03:09, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

The first closure was a good summary of our comments about whether to stop the trial. Later additions are good-faith proposals, but not a summary of comments and therefore not a closure. It's clear what to do: stop the trial, analyse its results, then debate the main issue of whether to use PC and, if so, how. Certes (talk) 03:40, 21 May 2011 (UTC)


Proposed restatement of issues as near as I can figure:

Issues:

  1. Should Pending Changes be totally abandoned as a project?
  2. Should developers be asked to provide improvements as determined by experience using PC, seeing where it works best, and where it has problems?
Assuming #1 does not show a positive consensus to abandon PC, then there are two routes to follow:
  1. Should Pending changes be restricted to BLPs which have had specific problems in the past?
  2. Should Pending changes be allowed for any BLP where it is requested by a reviewer? (positing that a page which is not on any reviewer's watchlist is not likely to be so chosen, and any such page can only be requested by a person who has it on watchlist)
  3. Should pending changes be allowed for any article where it is requested by a reviewer? (I am making a strange statement that "requiring" pending changes on any specific group of pages is less than likely to gain consensus at this point in time)
Noting that the issue would now become (assuming #1 above does not get a positive consensus) which subgroup of Wikipedia articles would be allowed to have PC. Note that I do not see where an admin is required for a request - as only an admin can fulfill the request.
Would these cover all likely actual outcomes? And is it a valid logical statement of the issues at hand? Cheers. Collect (talk) 11:38, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I don't think it should be abandoned or limited to BLP's I think that's pointless. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 11:47, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
The last numbered issue addresses your position entirely. As to "abandonment" - that is precisely one issue which must be addressed specifically as NYB noted. Collect (talk) 14:24, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
I would vote in favor of PC if such an RfC was posted. It is only the failure to follow consensus that I object to. PC itself is, in my opinion, a very good idea. Guy Macon (talk) 17:55, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Would you do the honours of posting an RfC on these lines? Preferably with an understanding that this is, at this point, not a place for rehashing the well-documented discussions heretofore held? I turst it is as neutrally prhrased as possible. Thanks. Collect (talk) 12:28, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
I would strongly support PC-1 on BLPs, as that is where the most serious issues with libel occur. PC-2 should only be used with semiprotection on a few specific targets of autoconfirmed vandals. Reaper Eternal (talk) 12:50, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
From a purely tactical point of view, as a supporter of pending changes being brought back I would advise waiting the six weeks or so that NewYorkBrad has proposed. I believe that jumping directly into it now without a cooling of period would hurt the chances of such a RfC passing. In the meantime, we can discuss possible rules for the new PC on our talk pages, and we can even ask to have test subpages in our userspace PC protected and run experiments on them. Guy Macon (talk) 16:21, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
I was looking for that six week comment from Brad, have you got a diff? - I may be mistaken but we are going to continue discussion and formatting of the accept or reject poll and guidelines here on this page, albeit renamed to update the situation, Wikipedia talk:Pending changes/proposal for accepted usage am I wrong about that? Off2riorob (talk) 16:28, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Admin blocked for removing PC

We have the unfortunate situation now of an admin, Kww, being blocked by Scott MacDonald for removing PC from BLPs. There is a discussion on AN/I. SlimVirgin TALK|CONTRIBS 17:49, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Well, if that doesn't discourage admins from following consensus, I don't know what will. Guy Macon (talk) 18:23, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Don't worry, Guy, I don't discourage easily. I do find it incredible how hard it is to get the concept of "over" through to some people, though.—Kww(talk) 18:30, 21 May 2011 (UTC)
Good! The discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents appears to be sane but User talk:Scott MacDonald is full of editors claiming that there is no requirement to follow consensus if they personally disagree with it. Sigh. Guy Macon (talk) 07:56, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
That's true, in a limited sense. If you personally do not believe that Wikipedia is improved by taking a given admin action, then you should not take that action. You should not, however, prevent others from doing so, if the community generally approves of the action being done. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:49, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
Good point. Guy Macon (talk) 16:09, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

And to think I thought Off2riorob and myself were staunch supporters of PC, and now we have documented an admin. blatantly refusing to allow its removal - this takes the cake. Articles like the ones he mentioned are exactly why I vouched to keep PC on limited articles thus lowering its scope since the trial is ended. However, I still agree that it's more important to follow consensus. I slightly disagree with it, but I can't fight it. CycloneGU (talk) 04:10, 24 May 2011 (UTC)

Progress Report

Pending protection is now removed from all articles as per the consensus - Off2riorob (talk) 15:54, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

This is a count of how many articles are still using Pending Changes. (Please use Wikipedia:WikiProject Time, not local time.)

The goal was to reach zero by Friday, 20 May 2011

Articles with level 1 pending changes

Articles with level 2 pending changes

Test Pages (no need to change these)

Count as of 03:00 on Monday 16 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 348 , Level 2 = 54 --Guy Macon (talk) 03:00, 16 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 01:45 on Wednesday 18 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 275 , Level 2 = 49 . --Guy Macon (talk) 01:52, 18 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 06:56 on Saturday 21 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 226 , Level 2 = 33 . --Guy Macon Guy Macon (talk) 07:06, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 17:45 on Saturday 21 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 143 , Level 2 = 34 . --Guy Macon Guy Macon (talk) 17:50, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 08:03 on Sunday 22 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 128 , Level 2 = 32 . --Guy Macon (talk) 08:08, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 18:08 on Sunday 22 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 125 , Level 2 = 30 . --Guy Macon (talk) 18:13, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 05:30 on Monday 23 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 99 , Level 2 = 9 . --Guy Macon (talk) 05:36, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

I have removed pending changes from all remaining mainspace pages. Dabomb87 (talk) 15:22, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
Good work Dabomb - Thank you. Off2riorob (talk) 15:49, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Count as of 15:45 on Monday 23 May 2011 (UTC): Level 1 = 0 , Level 2 = 0 . --Guy Macon (talk) 15:49, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Injunction regarding pending changes and biographies of living persons

By a vote of 9-0, a majority of the Arbitration has voted to pass a preliminary injunction. Arbitration policy states that "injunctions are binding decisions that shall be in effect until a case closes". In the event that there is insufficient agreement among the Committee to open the case, clarification should be requested from the Arbitration Committee on how to proceed.

The injunction was proposed and passed after User:Scott MacDonald brought a case to the Committee regarding the implementation of the shutdown of pending changes. At the time of the passage of this injunction, the case request is currently pending before the Committee. The injunction is the following:

Any administrator who removes pending changes protection from any article flagged as a biography of a living person shall replace level 1 pending changes with semi-protection of an equivalent duration and replace level 2 pending changes with full protection of an equivalent duration. This measure shall be effective immediately, and administrators who have recently removed pending changes from biographies of living persons articles are expected to assure that these protection levels are applied to articles from which pending changes protection has been removed.

For the Arbitration Committee,
NW (Talk) 15:54, 22 May 2011 (UTC)

Discuss this

As noted by a few arbs, this does not prevent admins from subsequently, even the same admin immediately after, consider in their own appreciation which level of protection is needed, with all due regards to the specifics of the article and in accordance with WP:PP. The reason arbcom doesn't mention this yet acknowledges it unofficially is because they want to appear tough on BLP issues. Cenarium (talk) 00:19, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Comments from Newyorkbrad

Having reviewed the input since Friday night carefully (I've been travelling with limited wiki access over the weekend), please note the following:

1. Excessive rhetoric is unhelpful in any discussion on Wikipedia. Some of the comments posted since Friday evening were excessively strident and unwarranted.

2. Any implication that either my original closing or my additions to it on Friday were affected by lobbying by Jimbo Wales, the Foundation, or other arbitrators, is completely unfounded. There has been no such lobbying of any kind. In addition, my closure here has nothing to do with my arbitration responsibilities, and I've recused myself as an arbitrator in the related arbitration case (including on the vote on the injunction).

3. Given that the task of carefully evaluating the articles that were still under PC as of Friday had obviously not been completed, I see nothing controversial in my extending the deadline by a week. The alternative would have been simply to remove the PC on all the remaining articles by pressing a button, without considering whether anything was necessary to replace it, which would have been irresponsible.

4. It appears that administrators are now in the final phase of reviewing the remaining articles under PC and evaluating whether no protection, semiprotection, or (hopefully in rare cases) full protection is appropriate for each. I trust that this can be completed by this coming Friday so that we don't face the gnashing of teeth that would accompany extending the deadline again. The ArbCom injunction (which as noted I did not vote on or for) may also help draw some attention to the need to wrap this up.

5. I am keenly aware that in the two weeks of input on the original closure, no one came to this page suggesting a specific BLP on which continued protection might have been warranted. To a large extent, this may reflect consensus that the current version of PC is not a good solution to BLP issues, but I was concerned that to a certain extent it might also reflect that the RfC closure and my request for additional input was underpublicized. I am also concerned that the latter situation still has not been addressed (although I do not anticipate using this as a basis for extending the deadline another time).

6. On the other hand, at least one of our administrators with an enormous amount of experience in dealing with sensitive BLP issues opined on his talkpage that there indeed are serially vandalized BLP articles on which PC should continue to be used, and where neither semiprotection nor full protection would do as well (see, User talk:Scott MacDonald#Dustin Diamond). To my dismay, this admin opined that my closure discussion was too long to read, and he declined to come to this page to present his opinion, which therefore was not responded to by others who have strongly opposing views. I did not, however, think it made sense simply to ignore it.

7. "BLP" is not a catchphrase that, by intoning it, automatically supersedes all our policies, norms, and community decision-making. On the other hand, the group of issues that we collectively categorize as "BLP" go beyond the internal dynamics and politics of our project, because the contents of these articles can have profound impacts on the articles subjects. In my comments on Friday night, I did not purport to impose a new "PC for BLPs" policy by fiat; I asked whether there might be consensus for a narrow exception to the existing consensus to end the PC trial that my original closure had recognized. At the moment, it certainly appears that the answer will probably be no, but I make absolutely no apology for asking the question.

8. On the merits of the issue, I gather the reason there is strong opposition to even a limited BLP exception to ending the trial (other than repeated chants of "the trial is over! the trial is over!") is fear that it would be overutilized. I agree that it would not be in order, under any form of exception, to routinely substitute PC for semiprotection. On the other hand, there still seem to be people who think that it would be better for a handful of articles to be full-protected than for them to be on a PC status. If that is consensus, so be it, but it still strikes me as odd and I would still welcome someone's explaining it.

9. Regarding where the discussion goes from here, I'd still welcome thoughts on whether my outline for the next wave of RfCs is helpful or not, or what might do better. I also note NuclearWarfare's suggestion that we take a break before the next round of discussion; but others seem to be saying the opposite, so we need some more views on this.

I hope this is helpful. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:43, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

  • I agree completely with NW. We need a break with PC for some time, the community has become really tired of it. Let's just apply the arbcom injunction blindly, then see which protection level is needed for articles with all due regard to the article specifics and in accordance with WP:PP, and be done with it. Of course if it were not for the unconsidered actions of some who were overzealous at wanting PC immediately, we would have by now a consensual permanent PC implementation. Cenarium (talk) 01:09, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
Second that. A break will give everyone time to calm down and think about what is the best way to proceed. I would also suggest that when this comes up again a better title be chosen than "Request for Comment February 2011" and that the location of the new discussion be publicized with a notice on all of the previous pages that have dealt with this topic.Guy Macon (talk) 05:48, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
  • - There is no requirement for a break of any kind. In fact I see a six month break request as simply turning this unconditional to future use end of trial into a never for ever situation. IMO we should get this over with - lay out what there is possible consensus for and poll it in the near future - to take a break for months would simply make all the discussion and consideration of the last months stale and wasted. The trial has been ended as requested and we have discussed and considered for months, we now know exactly how the tool works and where it is beneficial and what we expect of reviewers and who to give the reviewers status to and the level of usage that there may well be a consensus for and as such we should offer that to the community in the near future. Off2riorob (talk) 08:47, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
As I've suggested before, the deadline has been set; pending changes should be removed from all articles; and this abomination should end. It is only after that can we ask for an RfC on BLPs, as appropriate. BLP may override consensus, but since we have the old protection system, consensus comes first before pending changes. :| TelCoNaSpVe :| 08:55, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
I agree with TelCo; This "short break" is a transparent attempt to keep PC in place without consensus. This needs to be settled here and now. These constant reboots of the RFC and breaks are a transparent attempt to wear out, confuse, and outlast all opposition to PC. No more reboots. No more breaks. Forget about it. Run this RFC, and if there is no clear consensus to implement, junk PC. I'm sorry if you people don't like it, but that's the honest way of handling this. ☻☻☻Sithman VIII !!☻☻☻ 09:08, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
Sithman, TelCoNaSpVe, I'm pretty sure that Newyorkbrad is talking about a break after removal of PC and before seeking consensus to reinstate it, not about keeping PC on any articles during the break. Off2riorob, if we jump right back into discussion without a cooling off period, there is a good chance that the timing will cause the proposal to fail. Guy Macon (talk) 09:36, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
I though there was some crossed purposes commenting there. As for the break - Perhaps, I am looking at around one month discussion to tweak and present the proposal which is not so straight away as to have a chilling effect, at least I don't think so. At the most, a six week break during which the proposal will be refined and discussed and after that break/discussion/proposal tweak a final accept or reject proposal can be presented for RFC. I am also hopeful that the accept or reject RFC on usage will gain only comments as to the value or lack of value of the tool through users experience and/or usage of the tool and not users thoughts and opinions as to the trial. As in - RFC - please comment on the tool and not the trial. Off2riorob (talk) 09:43, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
As I read NYB's dicta, I saw no such requirement that we wait any set period of time - ndeed he noted that some might like a short break. If we do not resolve this shortly, we will enter an exceedingly quiet time historically for Wikipedia (from late June through August, many folks disappear) and so I would suggest that since an RfC runs for a full month, that it be commenced quite shortly. If we wait until late June, the RfC will be a bit of a flop by any standards of seeking participation. Let's get it started - it will not be over until nearly the end of June in any case. Again, I ask that you do the honours. "If 'twere done when 'tis done, 'tis well, It were done quickly." Cheers. Collect (talk) 16:34, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
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