I had this idea after seeing it done at Japanese Wikipedia and seeing how our current ban discussions at AN/ANI are rather disorderly and tend to resemble a mob more than an actual discussion. MBisanz talk 03:55, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
Points of interest
Things to discuss more
Not CSN |
Wasn't sure whether to add this above, comment there, or create a new section... Carcharoth ( talk) 12:39, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
It's not easy to accurately assess someone's past and it is always much simpler to use a throwaway, vague statement, or go with a gut feeling. Just as an example, it would be much easier to assess things if everyone participating here had to: (a) quote at least one diff in their own statement of behaviour they found unacceptable; (b) disclosed prior involvement with the user; and (c) in some cases wiki-ideological (for want of a better word) position (if they have an openly declared one). That would make it so much easier for uninvolved people (and indeed those participating) to dispassionately assess what is going on.
That's all I can think of for now. Might be too much. Is it better to keep the proposal simply at first, or incorporate all theabove in some way? Carcharoth ( talk) 12:39, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
I like this. See also Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Location of ban discussions. You might want to float this idea there or wait until it has developed more. I'll add some specific suggestions here. I should also look up the old discussions and see what they say. Maybe also contact User:Jehochman and User:Durova if you want more pre-floating ideas, as I've seen them take an interest in this sort of thing. Carcharoth ( talk) 11:53, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
I've added a draft section under "discussion close", based upon experience at other proccesses and ban discussions where it would have been helpful to set out the broad basis a decision is made upon. Crossref AFD where well known norms for closure help avoid disputes. FT2 ( Talk | email) 00:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Since I was one of those mentioned at your notice on AN, I thought you might like input from an editor who has been on death row. This proposal looks fair, reasonable and well balanced. From my personal experience I was under the impression that an RFC/U would be used before a ban, Its nice to know that this is taken into consideration. I think that bans should not be discussed at ANI, that board already has an extremely bad reputation and many administrators avoid it at all costs, This proposal appears to address that. I think that De-sysoping is a community power and thus can be used in-conjunction with the ban or as an alternative and probably be done on the same page as RfBan. I think that their should be a "consideration time" where by users can ask questions but cannot !vote for a set period, this will avoid sake of the moment or other slapdash votes and will help users make sound and well thought decisions, banning is something we should not do hastily. The Arbs should not intervene at all unless it falls into their jurisdiction (that being only an RFAR) as the community is quite capable. I hope this helps, Keep me posted «l| Ψrom3th3ăn ™|l» (talk) 02:19, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I like this. It is clear, fair, and structured in a way which should reduce the chances of over-hasty or hot-blooded action. I think it would reduce drama, and increase editor confidence in how we deal with some difficult and emotive situations. DuncanHill ( talk) 02:01, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
My only other suggestion is that admins who are community banned should be desysoped, and be required to go through RfA again to get the bit back (if they want it) if the ban is lifted. Ed Fitzgerald t / c 04:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good, except that we're running into a terminology conflict over the word "ban". To many users, "ban" means an article ban or topic ban, and they're not familiar with what a site ban is, so "requesting a ban" may not make sense unless more context is given. Personally, I try to be very clear about whether I'm referring to an "article ban", "topic ban" or "site ban". This current page seems to be covering the "site ban" aspect, but doesn't cover the ArbCom discretionary sanction bans at all. Perhaps we need an entirely different word to separate the concepts? -- El on ka 05:18, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Speaking very much from a personal perspective, I'd be happy to undertake the kind of role allocated in the draft for Crats, but would first want to see a strong indication of consensus from the community for Crat involvement in a more naturally Arbcommy area. The natural place for this would be in the section two below this one, headed by Ryan P's comment. -- Dweller ( talk) 09:50, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Isn't this just a reheating of the CSN? Stifle ( talk) 09:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Community sanction noticeboard | Requests for banning | Commentary |
---|---|---|
Stated it should not be used for "complex or ambiguous cases" and that if a "case is not a straightforward case" it belonged elsewhere | States that it is to be used after an RfC. It is targeted for complex or ambiguous cases where individuals could have differing good faith views on the best result. | Two totally different purposes |
Based on threaded discussion | Based on cased-subpages with individual comment sections | Threaded discussion is difficult to read for context because a single person may respond multiple times. Also, threaded discussion makes it difficult to separate out proposals. |
Requester presented evidence for sanction and proposed the sanction | Requester must not be the RfC certifier, may only refer by link to the RfC evidence | Splitting the evidence presentation and sanction proposal decreases the odds of a rush to judgement |
Evidence and sanction were presented and commented on together | Evidence and ban are explicitly split over different pages and time periods | We don't want to focus on the ban when we should be discussing the evidence |
Anyone could close or the case would be archived due to age | Only certain very trusted users may close, and only on a certain time frame | We need skilled individuals capable of reading viewpoints and placing them in the larger context. Ban discussions need closure, the longer they hang around, the more drama and tension they create for all parties |
Time period was based on when a discussion looked like it had reached consensus | Time period is set in stone | Prevents bum-rushes and mob style discussions from forcing a ban through when no one is looking |
I'll add more as I think of things. MBisanz talk 12:42, 24 September 2008 (UTC) |
Sorry to be getting back to this rather slowly; that chart obviously represents a lot of hard work. As far as it goes I can't find much fault with it, but substantial differences are omitted because of the way this is framed. Sanctions need not be bans. Banning should be the last resort rather than the first. The philosophy CSN regulars worked under is that first we presumed no action was needed at all (you had to make a good case for it) and whenever feasible, the person who's under consideration for sanctions should be free to participate on an equal basis. That meant discussion without blocking them unless an urgent block was necessary, and if the did need to be blocked we'd implement a transclusion template so they could still participate in the sanctions discussion (the template would take a post they made to their talk page and repost it to a section of the discussion). If they abused the template it was easy to disable, and sometimes their feedback changed the course of the discussion.
When CSN started out (and when it worked best), the standard is that editors who are involved in a dispute with the individual under scrutiny would not be the ones to decide on sanctions. Involved editors could present evidence and reasoning, but they were expected to declare their involvement proactively and let neutral parties examine it.
CSN was also innovative in looking into lesser solutions than full sitebans. Traditionally, the community had implemented escalating blocks and then indefinite blocks. CSN was where some of the first community topic bans occurred. If mentorship and 1RR at a particular article talk would solve a problem, we would try that.
One of the most important things that CSN tried to implement was documentation and long range follow-up: if someone is topic banned or under 1RR, where would such a thing be recorded? The archives we were building were an easily searchable location because they weren't crowded with other unrelated material, and an unfulfilled goal I had in setting that up was to perform long range analysis after 1 year, 2 years, etc. What types of sanctions are successful? Once we had a large enough body of cases it should be possible to crunch the numbers, categorize the disucussions by type. So if several dozen cases show that Solution A solves a type of situation 75% of the time and solution B solves the same type of situation 30% of the time, then we should be switching over and using Solution A routinely. Durova Charge! 06:32, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
When we elect bureaucrats, we do so on a very specific purview. This move into dispute resolution is not what we elect bureaucrats for. There role at judging consensus at RfA is under fairly clear guidelines and there margin of discretion is relatively small. Judging consensus on ban discussions is something completely different, and I'm not sure that all the bureaucrats would be good at that (I acknowledge a lot would however). I just can't support this extension of the bureaucrats role - it's not what they're here for. If this was to go through and consensus about a ban isn't clear, then it should be left for arbcom to look at what the consensus of the community is. Ryan PostlethwaiteSee the mess I've created or let's have banter 10:21, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I know that this proposal is due to some controversial recent cases and I obviously won't be commenting on those but what happens when the case is obvious? I'm thinking of User:Nixer, User:Jacob Peters, User:Iamandrewrice etc. Nixer was banned in something like 12 hours [1] and rightly so. Does this proposal mean that we have to go through 10 days of debating at RfC before a ban can be implemented regardless of the offense? That seems like a bit too much process to me. Sorry MBisanz for being critical of this, I just want to be sure what is decided here. EconomicsGuy ( talk) 11:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I dislike this idea very much. We shouldn't be banning people very often at all, and certainly don't need a new process page to do it on. I disagree totally with the section that says such bans can only be appealed to Arbcom or Jimmy Wales. What, exactly, happened to the community deciding issues like this? And what is wrong with using the admin noticeboard(s)? -- how do you turn this on 13:04, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
You have made very constructive comments regarding 'banning' process. Your kind attention is requested (here). If needed incidents will be quoted where ethics are violated. Thanks. 75.55.49.63 ( talk) 08:12, 22 February 2009 (UTC)
I had this idea after seeing it done at Japanese Wikipedia and seeing how our current ban discussions at AN/ANI are rather disorderly and tend to resemble a mob more than an actual discussion. MBisanz talk 03:55, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
Points of interest
Things to discuss more
Not CSN |
Wasn't sure whether to add this above, comment there, or create a new section... Carcharoth ( talk) 12:39, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
It's not easy to accurately assess someone's past and it is always much simpler to use a throwaway, vague statement, or go with a gut feeling. Just as an example, it would be much easier to assess things if everyone participating here had to: (a) quote at least one diff in their own statement of behaviour they found unacceptable; (b) disclosed prior involvement with the user; and (c) in some cases wiki-ideological (for want of a better word) position (if they have an openly declared one). That would make it so much easier for uninvolved people (and indeed those participating) to dispassionately assess what is going on.
That's all I can think of for now. Might be too much. Is it better to keep the proposal simply at first, or incorporate all theabove in some way? Carcharoth ( talk) 12:39, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
I like this. See also Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard#Location of ban discussions. You might want to float this idea there or wait until it has developed more. I'll add some specific suggestions here. I should also look up the old discussions and see what they say. Maybe also contact User:Jehochman and User:Durova if you want more pre-floating ideas, as I've seen them take an interest in this sort of thing. Carcharoth ( talk) 11:53, 21 September 2008 (UTC)
I've added a draft section under "discussion close", based upon experience at other proccesses and ban discussions where it would have been helpful to set out the broad basis a decision is made upon. Crossref AFD where well known norms for closure help avoid disputes. FT2 ( Talk | email) 00:54, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Since I was one of those mentioned at your notice on AN, I thought you might like input from an editor who has been on death row. This proposal looks fair, reasonable and well balanced. From my personal experience I was under the impression that an RFC/U would be used before a ban, Its nice to know that this is taken into consideration. I think that bans should not be discussed at ANI, that board already has an extremely bad reputation and many administrators avoid it at all costs, This proposal appears to address that. I think that De-sysoping is a community power and thus can be used in-conjunction with the ban or as an alternative and probably be done on the same page as RfBan. I think that their should be a "consideration time" where by users can ask questions but cannot !vote for a set period, this will avoid sake of the moment or other slapdash votes and will help users make sound and well thought decisions, banning is something we should not do hastily. The Arbs should not intervene at all unless it falls into their jurisdiction (that being only an RFAR) as the community is quite capable. I hope this helps, Keep me posted «l| Ψrom3th3ăn ™|l» (talk) 02:19, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I like this. It is clear, fair, and structured in a way which should reduce the chances of over-hasty or hot-blooded action. I think it would reduce drama, and increase editor confidence in how we deal with some difficult and emotive situations. DuncanHill ( talk) 02:01, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
My only other suggestion is that admins who are community banned should be desysoped, and be required to go through RfA again to get the bit back (if they want it) if the ban is lifted. Ed Fitzgerald t / c 04:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Sounds good, except that we're running into a terminology conflict over the word "ban". To many users, "ban" means an article ban or topic ban, and they're not familiar with what a site ban is, so "requesting a ban" may not make sense unless more context is given. Personally, I try to be very clear about whether I'm referring to an "article ban", "topic ban" or "site ban". This current page seems to be covering the "site ban" aspect, but doesn't cover the ArbCom discretionary sanction bans at all. Perhaps we need an entirely different word to separate the concepts? -- El on ka 05:18, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Speaking very much from a personal perspective, I'd be happy to undertake the kind of role allocated in the draft for Crats, but would first want to see a strong indication of consensus from the community for Crat involvement in a more naturally Arbcommy area. The natural place for this would be in the section two below this one, headed by Ryan P's comment. -- Dweller ( talk) 09:50, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Isn't this just a reheating of the CSN? Stifle ( talk) 09:57, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
Community sanction noticeboard | Requests for banning | Commentary |
---|---|---|
Stated it should not be used for "complex or ambiguous cases" and that if a "case is not a straightforward case" it belonged elsewhere | States that it is to be used after an RfC. It is targeted for complex or ambiguous cases where individuals could have differing good faith views on the best result. | Two totally different purposes |
Based on threaded discussion | Based on cased-subpages with individual comment sections | Threaded discussion is difficult to read for context because a single person may respond multiple times. Also, threaded discussion makes it difficult to separate out proposals. |
Requester presented evidence for sanction and proposed the sanction | Requester must not be the RfC certifier, may only refer by link to the RfC evidence | Splitting the evidence presentation and sanction proposal decreases the odds of a rush to judgement |
Evidence and sanction were presented and commented on together | Evidence and ban are explicitly split over different pages and time periods | We don't want to focus on the ban when we should be discussing the evidence |
Anyone could close or the case would be archived due to age | Only certain very trusted users may close, and only on a certain time frame | We need skilled individuals capable of reading viewpoints and placing them in the larger context. Ban discussions need closure, the longer they hang around, the more drama and tension they create for all parties |
Time period was based on when a discussion looked like it had reached consensus | Time period is set in stone | Prevents bum-rushes and mob style discussions from forcing a ban through when no one is looking |
I'll add more as I think of things. MBisanz talk 12:42, 24 September 2008 (UTC) |
Sorry to be getting back to this rather slowly; that chart obviously represents a lot of hard work. As far as it goes I can't find much fault with it, but substantial differences are omitted because of the way this is framed. Sanctions need not be bans. Banning should be the last resort rather than the first. The philosophy CSN regulars worked under is that first we presumed no action was needed at all (you had to make a good case for it) and whenever feasible, the person who's under consideration for sanctions should be free to participate on an equal basis. That meant discussion without blocking them unless an urgent block was necessary, and if the did need to be blocked we'd implement a transclusion template so they could still participate in the sanctions discussion (the template would take a post they made to their talk page and repost it to a section of the discussion). If they abused the template it was easy to disable, and sometimes their feedback changed the course of the discussion.
When CSN started out (and when it worked best), the standard is that editors who are involved in a dispute with the individual under scrutiny would not be the ones to decide on sanctions. Involved editors could present evidence and reasoning, but they were expected to declare their involvement proactively and let neutral parties examine it.
CSN was also innovative in looking into lesser solutions than full sitebans. Traditionally, the community had implemented escalating blocks and then indefinite blocks. CSN was where some of the first community topic bans occurred. If mentorship and 1RR at a particular article talk would solve a problem, we would try that.
One of the most important things that CSN tried to implement was documentation and long range follow-up: if someone is topic banned or under 1RR, where would such a thing be recorded? The archives we were building were an easily searchable location because they weren't crowded with other unrelated material, and an unfulfilled goal I had in setting that up was to perform long range analysis after 1 year, 2 years, etc. What types of sanctions are successful? Once we had a large enough body of cases it should be possible to crunch the numbers, categorize the disucussions by type. So if several dozen cases show that Solution A solves a type of situation 75% of the time and solution B solves the same type of situation 30% of the time, then we should be switching over and using Solution A routinely. Durova Charge! 06:32, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
When we elect bureaucrats, we do so on a very specific purview. This move into dispute resolution is not what we elect bureaucrats for. There role at judging consensus at RfA is under fairly clear guidelines and there margin of discretion is relatively small. Judging consensus on ban discussions is something completely different, and I'm not sure that all the bureaucrats would be good at that (I acknowledge a lot would however). I just can't support this extension of the bureaucrats role - it's not what they're here for. If this was to go through and consensus about a ban isn't clear, then it should be left for arbcom to look at what the consensus of the community is. Ryan PostlethwaiteSee the mess I've created or let's have banter 10:21, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I know that this proposal is due to some controversial recent cases and I obviously won't be commenting on those but what happens when the case is obvious? I'm thinking of User:Nixer, User:Jacob Peters, User:Iamandrewrice etc. Nixer was banned in something like 12 hours [1] and rightly so. Does this proposal mean that we have to go through 10 days of debating at RfC before a ban can be implemented regardless of the offense? That seems like a bit too much process to me. Sorry MBisanz for being critical of this, I just want to be sure what is decided here. EconomicsGuy ( talk) 11:45, 22 September 2008 (UTC)
I dislike this idea very much. We shouldn't be banning people very often at all, and certainly don't need a new process page to do it on. I disagree totally with the section that says such bans can only be appealed to Arbcom or Jimmy Wales. What, exactly, happened to the community deciding issues like this? And what is wrong with using the admin noticeboard(s)? -- how do you turn this on 13:04, 28 September 2008 (UTC)
You have made very constructive comments regarding 'banning' process. Your kind attention is requested (here). If needed incidents will be quoted where ethics are violated. Thanks. 75.55.49.63 ( talk) 08:12, 22 February 2009 (UTC)