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The page says a normal use of a user page is to give information about “your wiki-related activities.” Is that intended to include non-Wikimedia wikis like Uncyclopedia, Conservapedia, and AboutUs.org? I suspect not, and if not, it should say what it means: “Wikimedia-related,” “Wikipedia-related,” or “English-Wikipedia-related.” —teb728 t c 10:25, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Agree. "Wiki" is a poor abbreviation. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:46, 21 December 2011 (UTC)
Agreed. I have changed this to "Wikimedia-related", as the others are too narrow. MER-C 13:06, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Simulating the MediaWiki interface (joke banners redux)

There is a consensus to ban misleading user talk notification banners. I will update Wikipedia:User pages, though my wording may need refining. SilkTork ✔Tea time 19:17, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

In practice, I think the "Simulating the MediaWiki interface" subsection is mainly aimed at joke "You have new messages" banners (the orange bar). To clarify that, I have made an addition to it. The community doesn't so far as I know "strongly disapprove" of such banners; most people don't like them much, but we're definitely divided on whether it's appropriate to remove them from other people's pages, per many earlier discussions on this page and elsewhere. (Here's one from 2008.) The guideline should reflect the lack of consensus on that matter better, and should definitely mention the joke banners specifically, since the technical term "simulating the MediaWiki interface" doesn't mean much to most people. The wording I have added (reinstated from an earlier version) is that the community "frowns on" such banners. Please note that the guideline specifies disapproval of "formatting codes that disrupt the Wikimedia interface, for example by preventing important links or controls from being easily seen or used, making text on the page hard to read or unreadable (other than by way of commenting out), or replacing the expected interface with a disruptive simulation". I agree with disapproving of all that, of course, but to call a simulated new messages banner linking to Practical joke disruptive would surely be a devaluation of the notion of disruption. A fake banner linking to malware or goatse would be disruptive, but perhaps that obvious point doesn't need to be in the guideline? (Please add it if you disagree.) And if you feel we need another of the hardy perennial joke banner discussions right now, go ahead, of course. Bishonen | talk 14:02, 30 November 2011 (UTC).

  • Agree that calling a joke banner plain "disruption" is to devalue the term, but it is a degree of disruption. It is a simulation of the interface intended to be a bold messaging mechanism, and to jokingly simulate it is to disrupt the concentration of the reader and to devalue the importance the of the new message notification. To my memory, any time a nomination at MfD appears relating to a simulation of the interface, inclduing joke banners, it results in either deletion, or the simulation being removed with the clear message that otherwise the page would be deleted and/or the user blocked. I think the guideline should be more strongly phrased than "frowning" on joke banners. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:16, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
Seconded. We need to make these a blockable offence. They do not contribute to discussion, have no encyclopedic value whatsoever and are just a straight-up pain in the rear end! Barts1a | Talk to me | Yell at me 01:33, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
  • I agree with SmokeyJoe that at MfD, the prevailing consensus is to disallow these joke banners. I have never seen a single MfD where a joke banner was allowed. The joke banners serve little purpose. They irritate others more than they amuse. I have reworded the guideline using SmokeJoe's phrasing, which is stronger than the current wording and which better reflects community consensus at MfD. Cunard (talk) 08:21, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
  • My revision was reverted by Bishonen who wrote that the wording was opinionated and that there was insufficient consensus. I have removed the wording about the orange joke banners because the weak wording does not accurately reflect community consensus at MfD to disallow them. That weak wording was cited at User talk:Bishonen by Heimstern (talk · contribs) and Hans Adler (talk · contribs) to demonstrate that such banners cannot be removed. Both users stated that they believed the banners should be "prohibited" and "illegal", but that there was insufficient community consensus.

    What are other editors' thoughts about how to word the guideline regarding the joke banners? Should an RfC be initiated? Cunard (talk) 14:23, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

  • I have a joke banner, and nobody is going to confuse it with a MediaWiki user notification message. Please be careful on any future wording. Reading this discussion sounds heavy-handed and authoritarian which is not the way we keep users around long term. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)
Be assured that somewhere, sometime, a Wikipedian is frowning on your joke banner. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:20, 21 December 2011 (UTC)
  • The original wording was to frown upon "joke 'You have new messages' notifications (the orange bar)". The wording of your joke banner does not deceive the user into believing s/he has a new message, so it would not violate the original wording of the guideline. I would be open to any suggestions about clarifying the wording to avoid misinterpretations. Cunard (talk) 14:44, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

Not sure why an outright ban can't be implemented and enforced here. User pages belong to a specific user insomuch as they somehow further the encyclopedia's aim or they're benign. If someone's user page is actively disrupting/annoying other users, I'm not sure why it has to be tolerated.

bugzilla:12681 is a software solution that I've long been in favor of. But this could be considered fundamentally a social problem, not a technical problem. --MZMcBride (talk) 15:12, 15 December 2011 (UTC)

I agree that these irritating pages should be outright banned. How should an RfC about the issue be framed? Cunard (talk) 17:59, 15 December 2011 (UTC)
  • I read "Joke "You have new messages" notifications (the orange bar) are frowned upon by the community." as true, whether accurate or understated, and think it should be put back. Disagreement about how to word a more accurate stronger statement is not a good reason to remove the sentence entirely. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:07, 19 December 2011 (UTC)
  • Weak wording unrepresentative of community consensus at MfD should not be restored. Because there is disagreement between Bishonen and me about the wording, I have reverted to the revision prior to the disputed wording. The current wording:

    The Wikipedia community strongly discourages simulating the MediaWiki interface, except on the rare occasion when it is necessary for testing purposes.

    is inclusive of Joke "You have new messages" notifications. It should suffice until there is consensus about how to word the discussion about Joke banners. I welcome suggestions about whether an RfC should be started and how it should framed. Cunard (talk) 01:29, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

RfC: Should "new messages" banner hoaxes be prohibited?

"New messages" banner hoaxes simulate the MediaWiki interface. Many direct readers to unexpected locations such as the practical joke article and non-Wikipedia websites.

Proposed: "New messages" banner hoaxes in the user and user talk namespaces are prohibited.

Note: This proposal covers only banners that in both wording and color closely resemble the one listed at Wikipedia:User pages#User talk notification. Joke banners that do not mislead editors into believing they have new messages are not included in this proposal.

Notifications

Support

  1. See my view below for an extended comment about this proposal. Cunard (talk) 05:08, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  2. Enough is enough. It's time to end this disruption once and for all! Barts1a / What did I actually do right? / What did I do wrong this time? 05:29, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  3. Imzadi 1979 → 05:55, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  4. That I don't laugh at trolling doesn't mean I don't have a sense of humor. Get rid of these. ♫ Melodia Chaconne ♫ (talk) 06:55, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  5. I have great respect for Malik Shabazz and agree with him on most matters. But this I see as a hoax rather than a joke. Cullen328 Let's discuss it 07:01, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  6. It's clear that these hoaxes bother some people, and it's simply not collegial to tolerate something that disrupts the experience of using Wikipedia for others.  Sandstein  07:50, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  7. It was funny the first time it was done, but the joke was used up after that. 67.119.12.141 (talk) 09:36, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  8. Not funny, just distracting. Nobody Ent 11:03, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  9. Simulating a official message means that people may ignore actual messages. Washuchan (talk) 12:16, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  10. No fake messages. ~~Ebe123~~ → report on my contribs. 12:47, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  11. Could be quite distracting to see fake messages. Not funny. Armbrust, B.Ed. Let's talkabout my edits? 12:51, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  12. Not finding deliberately irritating 'jokes' to be funny is not indicative of a lack of sense of humour. Kill these stupid things with fire. → ROUX ₪ 13:34, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  13. The worst one of these I've seen was directing people to Special:UserLogout, forcing them to log in again. Stuff like this is not original or funny, just annoying. Jafeluv (talk) 13:48, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  14. We don't tolerate jokes that are actually disruptive and this particular joke ceased to be funny a long time ago. Hut 8.5 14:02, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  15. Support; this was disallowed a long time ago in my home wiki. — AlexSm 15:43, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  16. Support – there aren't many of them in my experience, but those that I have come across have been annoying, and the whole matter would be even more irritating were these things more widespread. Ergo such banners are intrinsically annoying (and have not been bothering me too much only because there aren't many of them around, not because they are in of themselves funny/whatever), and should be banned. It Is Me Here t / c 15:58, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  17. Support – there is no reason to deliberately annoy other users. Cusop Dingle (talk) 17:49, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  18. Support prohibition of banners simulating the "You have new messages" one. Not funny, and confusing to new users. JohnCD (talk) 18:29, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  19. Support—there is a line between humor and just plain disruptive. Whenaxis about | talk 22:00, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  20. Support - If they are going to be "highly discouraged", you might as well go one step further and say they are not permitted. Nothing wrong with the odd joke here and there, but these are clearly disruptive and should be disallowed. CT Cooper · talk 00:31, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  21. Support The first of these fake notifications that I saw was amusing while also being a distracting irritation. That was a long time ago and it is time for them to be removed as they serve no purpose other than to confuse new users—when an old joke is copied many times, it loses its humor. Fooling around with the user interface is a very bad way for a new user to focus their attention, and permitting fake notifications sends the wrong message to such new users. We should be saying this is an encyclopedia where collaboration and respect are important. Johnuniq (talk) 01:27, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  22. Support - joking around is OK, but sometimes when I'm expecting someone to edit my own talk page, these false positives aren't needed. Jasper Deng (talk) 03:16, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  23. Support Wikipedia is supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a site to post disruptive, lame and utterly unfunny "jokes" such as this one. Edison (talk) 06:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  24. Support. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  25. Support. Nothing to do with building an encyclopedia; security risk; disturbing to a high number of people without any redeeming value. Shrigley (talk) 18:44, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  26. Support as security risk and unnecessary biting of newbies. Seems like the basics of it are already covered by not replicating the MediaWiki interface. It just needs to be enforced. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 20:13, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  27. Support I have a sense of humour, but confusing newbies isn't a good thing. As for seeing them too much because one is looking at user pages rather than articles? Yeah, that's called being an admin. Those people who spend time worrying about what goes on in non-article-space are there to ensure the article creators don't have to deal with socks, trolls and vandals so much. —Tom Morris (talk) 22:43, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  28. Support Look, I have a sense of humor just like everyone else here but in my book these fake messages are just annoying. Yes, some people find it funny but at the end of the day it's a detrimental distraction. The ultimate purpose of Wikipedia is not to allow autonomous user-pages, it's building a free encyclopedia. As I see it (see the arguments above) these "jokes" boil down to an irritable nuisance to committed editors. </magister's-rant> Magister Scientatalk 23:24, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  29. Support. Those things are downright annoying, and while after awhile one can learn to ignore them, I think around these parts people probably really do have better things to do than stop and mistrust any userpage where they seem to have new messages, because that's what it comes down to. Also makes a place that much less welcoming to new users, who will have a whole whack of other stuff to get used to even without that... -— Isarra (talk) 00:13, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
  30. Support. They are very annoying, as well as misleading. I get very annoyed when I am waiting for a response on my talk page and click the hoax banner, only to be disappointed. Suitable material for Encyclopedia Dramatica, but Wikipedia users should be more mature.--Yutsi Talk/ Contributions 15:40, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
  31. Support. While I appreciate the humor, I think there are more appropriate ways to express humor that do not lead to undue confusion. Furthermore, if the humor is at the expense of the poor newbie who falls for these fake messages- isn't that newbiebiting? Nightenbelle (talk) 18:03, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
  32. Support - I have a sense of humor (I swear!) and appreciate the April Fool jokes and whatnot, but when a joke actually upsets people it's no longer acceptable. -- Atama頭 23:23, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
  33. Mild support. I once had a similar banner, although it said "You have NO new messages". When I ran for admin, I was told to lose it. Hence, I thought such banners were already banned. I don't get apoplectic when I see one, but it also depends on what it redirects to. And, frankly, it was funny at first but by now it's nearly as old some of my jokes. :) ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 02:05, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
  34. Support per above. --Rschen7754 02:58, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
  35. Always hated 'em. Ling.Nut3 (talk) 12:53, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
  36. Support. I could almost defend these on "freedom of expression" grounds, but I see many of the opposers are claiming these are actually funny, which needs to be refuted in the strongest possible terms. These things are less funny than a drunken uncle demanding you pull his finger. They are less funny than the "infinite loop" knock-knock jokes that small children across time and space independently discover upon turning four. They are less funny than a washed-up comedian doing contract work at a company dinner, telling stale jokes about the CEO's golf score. They are less funny than Joan Rivers. They are less funny than Joe Piscopo. They are less funny than Joe Dirt. Carrot Top would not put such a thing at the top of his userpage, despite the orangeness. 28bytes (talk) 22:22, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
  37. Support this was mildly amusing the first time I saw it. Now it's just a waste of time, both mine and the creators. Eluchil404 (talk) 05:03, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
  38. Support. This is the first time that I have come across these "joke banners". I can see how some editors would be irritated and/or confused by it. (As a joke, it is weak, but that's not really relevant.) Axl ¤ [Talk] 15:43, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
  39. Support - Almost as unfunny as Joe Piscopo. (No need for hyperbole here.) Disruptive, annoying, good riddance. Anna Frodesiak (talk) 02:46, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  40. Support These banners violate WP:DICK. As an experienced editor I find them annoying, but I imagine that new editors are seriously confused by them. Nick-D (talk) 06:42, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  41. Weak support The only thing lamer than being upset about these is actually putting one on your page. So this !vote isn't struck, they are somewhat disruptive and upset a number of users. AniMate 12:40, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  42. Support. They're not constructive or useful. They have the potential to annoy. Not all attempts at humour succeed, and these banners don't. Colonel Tom 13:51, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  43. 'Support Though we have bigger problems than this, it's one of the things that we can most easily do something about. User space is primarily for communication, and for personal expression intended to build building the Wikipedia by encouraging cooperation. This feature is not nearly neutral in these respects, but actively hinders them both. DGG ( talk ) 17:35, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  44. Hear hear. Hurricanefan25 (talk · contribs) 18:43, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  45. Support per my view below. --Tothwolf (talk) 23:14, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  46. Support Way too much potential for abuse. Klilidiplomus 14:35, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
  47. Support: Humour on user pages and talk pages is OK within bounds as long as it doesn't get in the way of serious editors: these hoax message bars do get in the way of serious editors. PamD 00:16, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  48. Support: They get in the way of working on improving the encyclopedia. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 00:19, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  49. Support I usually remove these per WP:SMI, and it would be nice to have specific text prohibiting these fake new messages banners. They are confusing and do not benefit the encyclopedia in any way. Logan Talk Contributions 01:34, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  50. Support BigDwiki (talk) 05:42, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  51. Support I am surprised that this isn't already prohibited. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:33, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  52. Support—Neither do I see a good reason to oppose this proposal, nor do I see a good reason for anyone to have hoax new message banners (or any other hoaxes that simulate the interface). Ynhockey (Talk) 10:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  53. Long overdue. I don't mind humour, I'm occasionally prone to be humorous myself, but this isn't humour, it's social networking stupidity and tiresome the first time you encounter it. --Dweller (talk) 12:08, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  54. Support Any templates or messages which simulate the user interface should be banned and removed on sight. There is too much potential for abuse and it sends the wrong messages to readers and editors that this kind of fakery is allowed on WP. — MrDolomite • Talk 17:31, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  55. Support. Destroy them with fire. --Fang Aili talk 05:03, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
  56. Support. --  Badgernet  ₪  09:43, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
  57. Support - Yes, hoax banners are mildly irritating, but my bigger concern is that they will confuse new users. If the first time someone sees the new message bar turned out to be a hoax, new users will not realize the real meaning of the bar. This is especially true when the hoaxer warns or welcomes a lot of new users. Their pages are visited too frequently by new users to be leading them astray. --Andrew (User:90) (talk) 18:03, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
  58. Support - Forbid malware vectors. Selery (talk) 06:07, 10 February 2012 (UTC)
  59. Support. I don't see how these type of recreations of the interface do anything to improve the encyclopedia. Indeed, they have a small but significant chance of driving editors away. May I politely suggest that the people behind these redirect their creative efforts in more productive directions, such as improving the encyclopedia? –Grondemar 23:19, 10 February 2012 (UTC)
  60. Support. It is funny (but lamely) the first twenty times, after that it is just annoying. A small matter to be sure, but there is no point in doing something silly on your talkpage where the sole purpose to be irritating. Sjakkalle (Check!) 18:51, 11 February 2012 (UTC)
  61. Support. Funny or not they are misleading and confusing.--Amadscientist (talk) 06:42, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
  62. Support These fake messages are annoying and disruptive time-wasters.--Chaser (talk) 21:59, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
  63. Support per Dweller. Paul Erik (talk)(contribs) 04:59, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
  64. Support per Grondemar.Babakathy (talk) 12:48, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
  65. Support - not funny, and a distraction when people are trying to do actual improvement to the encyclopedia. LadyofShalott 21:48, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
  66. Support. Not funny, not useful. Drmies (talk) 04:29, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
  67. Support. Could certainly make people who click on them feel foolish for falling for a stupid practical joke. Someone ending up at Practical joke, which some of these banners link to, would discover that they've fallen prey to "a mischievous trick played on someone, typically causing the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort." MANdARAX • XAЯAbИAM 07:07, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
  68. Support. Annoying, misleading and disruptive. Bgwhite (talk) 07:56, 14 February 2012 (UTC)
  69. Support. I've come across this hoax a few times and has been annoying after the first time. And not to mention how confused newbies would feel when they come across this. Suraj T 05:05, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
  70. Support Banner hoaxes are a huge security issue. Thankfully, we don't yet have mammoth issues regarding these, or users inclined to make a point. This proposal should have been implemented like yesterday. Wifione Message 05:15, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
  71. Support Yes, it's kinda cool and funny, and kinda old and lame at the same time. But it's caused so much disruption over the years, and wastes people's time, might even confuse some. Editors with this type of practical joke should be kindly told to stop. Rich Farmbrough, 16:02, 16 February 2012 (UTC).

Oppose

  1. Grow a sense of humor. — Malik Shabazz Talk/Stalk 05:18, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  2. Draconian nonsense. That a mode of expression is personally unfunny or distracting to some editors is in absolutely no way an acceptable threshold for its prohibition. To endorse this censorious frivolity would be to set an ill-judged precedent blind to the inevitable unintended consequences. Skomorokh 14:55, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
  3. I am philosophically opposed to excessive policing on user page content. That said, the joke is stale and annoying. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)
  4. Get lives, people. This is what we do on Wikipedia? Debate a line of trivial code in userspace? Write articles, for heaven's sake—stop beating a dead horse and nitpicking at irrelevant shite. /ƒETCHCOMMS/ 03:13, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  5. Obviously the support votes are too busy looking at User Pages than contributing anything meaningful. Lugnuts (talk) 09:50, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  6. Per Malik Shabazz. Stifle (talk) 17:22, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  7. It's damn irritating, but it's not particularly disruptive either (ie if your editing experience is significantly impacted by this, the problem is not the "joke"). And making more rules on Wikipedia is taking coal to Newcastle. Danger High voltage! 23:04, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
  8. What a waste of time debating something that really doesn't matter. -DJSasso (talk) 00:39, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
  9. Beyond prohibiting downright offensive content, content that's problematic for copyright reasons, and content that's subject to speedy deletion, we have no business telling someone what may not go on a userpage. Nyttend (talk) 23:23, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
  10. Can't say it better than Schmucky.--Kubigula (talk) 04:39, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
  11. What a waste of time! (This here and future enforcement if implemented).TMCk (talk) 15:53, 31 January 2012 (UTC)
  12. See my comments, below. — TransporterMan (TALK) 17:28, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
  13. Does it actually stop you from improving the encyclopaedia? Von Restorff (talk) 21:10, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
  14. Weakly, and with caveats, as described by TransporterMan. The fake new messages should have some difference compared to the regular "new messages" banner, but as long as there's some difference and they don't redirect to a different site, there's little harm. It may confuse newbies a little, but so does using WP:SHORTCUTS for WP:EVERYTHING WP:WE WP:SAY WP:ON WP:THISSITE. Steven Zhang Join the DR army! 05:00, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
  15. WP:Wikipedia is not censored. We don't need to be controlling userspace. A412 (Talk * C) 00:24, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
    You might want to re-read the text that you linked: it says "articles or images". And I guess you're unfamiliar with the following text as well: WP:User pages#What may I not have in my user pages?. — AlexSm 00:48, 5 February 2012 (UTC)
  16. Eh, I find them annoying (though I haven't seen one in more than a year) but it's way too much bureaucracy to make rules like this. Really. Hobit (talk) 03:13, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
  17. Serious over-regulation. Reaper Eternal (talk) 17:39, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  18. I don't deny they can be mildly annoying, but not so much or so common as to warrant an additional rule. Rlendog (talk) 18:11, 8 February 2012 (UTC)
  19. Oppose; they aren't very funny, but they are not in themselves all that disruptive either. (A fake "new messages" banner that redirects to an especially annoying place could be a different story.) Cardamon (talk) 09:27, 9 February 2012 (UTC)
  20. Oppose. Lord Roem (talk) 19:16, 12 February 2012 (UTC)
  21. Oppose. This joke was old long ago, but it doesn't usually cause any real problems other than annoyance. Sometimes it may cause problems, e.g. when linking to explicit content, but it doesn't arise frequently enough that it can't be handled thoughtfully on a case-by-case basis. Humor in general is an essential element of community-building and contributes to relationships that are later leveraged to contribute new content. I also fear a general rule against simulating the interface could unwittingly crush experiments with new interfaces or tools being conducted in user space. Dcoetzee 04:58, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
  22. Oppose - I don't care for these banners, but the last thing we need is another arbitrary restriction on what people can and cannot do with their personal space.   — C M B J   07:35, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
  23. Oppose - an editor's User page and talk are the one place on Wikipedia where silly stuff is allowed - some write hoax articles about themselves, some add conflicting user boxes, some add fake "new message" banners. If they think it's funny (and as long as it is only in their own user space) I see no big problem with it. --Six words (talk) 09:01, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Discussion

  • Some of the users do have such banners. User:Lugnuts and User:Fetchcomms/Miscellany have two of the banners that this proposal would prohibit. User:SchmuckyTheCat and User:Stifle have joke banners on their user talk and user page, respectively, that would not be prohibited by this proposal.

    Some of the opposers are philosophically opposed to imposing restrictions on the userspace though they dislike these banners ("stale and annoying" and "irritating"). Although I do not subscribe to that philosophy, I find these arguments to be the strongest to oppose this proposal. I have discussed User:Danger's Wikipedia:Avoid instruction creep comment below. Skomorokh's concern that this would "set an ill-judged precedent blind to the inevitable unintended consequences" is a slippery-slope argument. This proposal is narrowly defined; further changes to the user page guideline will require another discussion. User:Nyttend's comment that "we have no business telling someone what may not go on a userpage" except for "prohibiting downright offensive content, content that's problematic for copyright reasons, and content that's subject to speedy deletion" is a valid opinion. But it is one that does not correspond with Wikipedia:User pages#What may I not have in my user pages?. The guideline includes other prohibitions such as discouraging "writings, information, discussions, and activities not closely related to Wikipedia's goals". "New messages" banner hoaxes that serve only to irritate fall under that section.

    I find that the rest of the oppose votes only cast aspersions on those who support this proposal and are ad hominems that should be accorded their due weight by the closer. Cunard (talk) 00:06, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

One important factor behind the vibrancy of this project is that every volunteer to free to volunteer their time and aptitudes in whatever way they choose. Volunteers are not constrained by what others think are the leading priorities. To tell someone else that they are using their time poorly is so close to casting a critical judgement on their value that it really is best not done.
Here, Cunard is cleaning up loose ends, ambiguities in the rules, and is thus contributing to improving the project in terms of professional appearance and efficiency in function. Silly games, skylarking, pressing doorbells and running away to laugh, are not worth the time for the police to respond to. However, Cunard is not asking others to enforce the mature-behaviour-rules. He is clarifying an old, simple rule: Do not deceptively simulate the WikiMedia interface. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:32, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
One important factor behind the vibrancy of this project is a sense of humor and a spirit of fun. Blah blah blah insert condescending and irrelevant crap here blah blah blah. I am offended by your use of "WikiMedia", too. Another important factor behind the vibrancy of this project is the correct use of its name. /ƒETCHCOMMS/ 23:22, 1 February 2012 (UTC)
Got me on a point or two there. Normally, I'm a dedicated supporter of many things humourous. However, I expect some originality. The discovery of a new perspective on something old is fantastic. Your joke banner I find unfunny because the "new message" turns out to be the same old page I've previously be tricked into loading. As it is, it only serves to trick the newcomers. Now if your joke new message banner took me somewhere unexpected, or even interesting, I'd appreciate it.
By the way, I found the fourth joke original and very funny. In many ways the merge is well underway. However, I think the first shows many signs of damaging bloat, and that splitting would be beneficial for those trying to maintain as well as the external audience. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:34, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
I'm disappointed in myself for being unoriginal ... I could've sworn I'd done something witty but it was so long ago. Perhaps I'll change the color to something satirical. /ƒETCHCOMMS/ 02:35, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
comment don't waste my time (smileyface) NewbyG ( talk) 01:42, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

I've run the numbers and as of 5:34 UTC on 13 February 2012 there are 3 supports to every 1 oppose (63/21=3). Barts1a / What did I actually do right? / What did I do wrong this time? 05:38, 13 February 2012 (UTC)

Heh...

I just found this little gem... This is just one example of how these banners can be used abusively (In this case linking to Gay Nigger Association of America which can be seen by many as calling someone a gay nigger) Barts1a / What did I actually do right? / What did I do wrong this time? 02:40, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

View by Cunard

Wikipedia:User pages#Simulation and disruption of the MediaWiki interface currently states:

The Wikipedia community strongly discourages simulating the MediaWiki interface, except on the rare occasion when it is necessary for testing purposes.

CSS and other formatting codes that disrupt the Wikimedia interface, for example by preventing important links or controls from being easily seen or used, making text on the page hard to read or unreadable (other than by way of commenting out), or replacing the expected interface with a disruptive simulation, may be removed or remedied by any user. Inappropriate internal or external links that unexpectedly direct the reader to unreasonable locations or violate prohibitions on linking may also be removed or remedied by any user. Text, images, and non-disruptive formatting should be left as intact as possible. Users of such code should consider possible disruption to other skins and to diffs and old revisions.

Some Wikipedia user pages contain joke "You have new messages" banner hoaxes (the orange bar). An example of such a user page can be seen here. The guideline currently states that simulating the MediaWiki namespace is "strongly discouraged". Joke "You have new messages" banner hoaxes are covered under this wording. I propose that this wording be strengthened for "You have new messages" banner hoaxes. Rather than saying that the banner hoaxes should be "strongly discouraged" or "frowned upon", I propose adding a sentence that says they are "prohibited", "banned", or "disallowed".

In December 2011, Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:NWA.Rep was closed as "delete". The user page contained a fake "new messages" banner. The consensus was against allowing them; see my discussion with the closing admin at User talk:28bytes/Archive 16#Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:NWA.Rep. SmokeyJoe (talk · contribs) writes above:

To my memory, any time a nomination at MfD appears relating to a simulation of the interface, inclduing joke banners, it results in either deletion, or the simulation being removed with the clear message that otherwise the page would be deleted and/or the user blocked.

I agree with him that the prevailing consensus at MfD is to disallow these joke banners. I have not seen a recent MfD where a joke banner was allowed. This proposal is prompted by the above discussion and the edit war at User talk:NWA.Rep to remove the "new messages" banner.

The above proposal covers banners that closely resemble the one listed at Wikipedia:User pages#User talk notification. Joke banners such as the one at User talk:SchmuckyTheCat that do not mislead editors into believing they have new messages are not included in this proposal.

Such banners were extensively discussed in 2007: see Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive AF#Practical jokes in "new message" boxes, Wikipedia talk:User pages/UI spoofing, and Wikipedia talk:User pages/Archive 3#Crafting a guideline on "new message" joke banners. See also David Levy (talk · contribs)'s removal of a number of the banners.

I have read the above discussions about the banners and have listed arguments opposing them below. They have been edited for clarity, concision, and spelling. For context, the diff for each comment is appended at the end of each comment.

Arguments for prohibiting the fake "new messages" banners
  • Faking the UI is intentionally creating confusion where something looks like clicking on it will give you one thing when it gives you another, or producing a page that looks like something it isn't (like creating a user page the looks like the page you get when there is no user page by that name). Decorative changes that don't impact how someone interacts with the UI wouldn't meet this criteria ...
    Adapted from Doug Bell talk's comment at 22:10, 12 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • We tolerate silly user page content up to the point at which it becomes harmful. Deliberately misleading people in this manner impedes their efforts to build an encyclopedia. These pranks are flagrantly harmful, and I would have attempted to outlaw them long ago if I'd realized that so many others agreed.
    Adapted from David Levy's comment at 16:57, 13 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • There is no positive, or even good-faith, reason to put fake UI on your page. Its only purpose is to harass other users. Given that it is also a potential security risk, we might as well say that it "may" be removed. It is true that there is great lenience about user pages, but it seems reasonable that the guideline can ask users not to engage in behavior that is broadly offensive to the community. This is underlined by the potential phishing risk of fake UI - it should not benecessary to doubt every UI link when editing a user's talk page.
    Adapted from CMummert · talk's comment at 01:48, 13 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • I'm still amazed by all the angst this proposal is creating in the name of freedom on user pages. We're not "creating thou-shall-nots all the way to the border of good behaviour"—we're talking about a very specific, practical and non-content-based prohibition on spoofing the UI. There's not lots of gray area here or some dangerous slippery slope. Even without the bot issue I would think this is a no-brainer; with the bot issue this should be a slam dunk.
    Adapted from Doug Bell talk's comment at 12:01, 13 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • I consider that this div class (usermessage) has been abused, and that its abuse should be curtailed by enforcement, not by a “please don’t” message on WP:UP. Most importantly, the community is able to be elastic about interpretation of WP:UP in murky cases. If consensus is against such orange user messages, which appears to be the case, then they shall be removed. There may also have to be an MFD for all of the user subpages of the general note “Sign here if you’ve been fooled, lol!”
    Adapted from GracenotesT's comment at 18:17, 13 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • Two cents here... when I was a newbie, I clicked on those joke "new messages" banners. Now that I've been around a while, I get the joke and don't click on them. Heck, I can go in my monobook.css and make my real "new messages" appear some other color or whatever. But, for the sake of newbies (per WP:BITE), these practical jokes should not be allowed.
    Adapted from Aude (talk)'s comment at 03:29, 14 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
  • I've got yet another con. When I'm on a slow computer (read: public one) and am just logging in for a few minutes (you know, just to make sure no one is calling for my head, maybe copyedit something, maybe make a follow-up comment on some talk page) these fake message bars can be really disruptive and time-consuming. They serve no positive purpose, yet they serve multiple negative ones. Luckily, I'm seeing consensus to remove them based on this thread, and will do so.
    Adapted from Picaroon's comment at 03:47, 14 February 2007 (UTC); see link to comment
Comments (edited) from current discussion
  • Agree that calling a joke banner plain "disruption" is to devalue the term, but it is a degree of disruption. It is a simulation of the interface intended to be a bold messaging mechanism, and to jokingly simulate it is to disrupt the concentration of the reader and to devalue the importance the of the new message notification. To my memory, any time a nomination at MfD appears relating to a simulation of the interface, inclduing joke banners, it results in either deletion, or the simulation being removed with the clear message that otherwise the page would be deleted and/or the user blocked. I think the guideline should be more strongly phrased than "frowning" on joke banners.
    Adapted from SmokeyJoe (talk)'s comment at 07:16, 1 December 2011; see link to comment
  • We need to make these a blockable offence. They do not contribute to discussion, have no encyclopedic value whatsoever and are just a straight-up pain in the rear end! Barts1a | Talk to me | Yell at me 01:33, 14 December 2011 (UTC)
    Adapted from Barts1a | Talk to me | Yell at me's comment at 01:33, 14 December 2011; see link to comment
  • Not sure why an outright ban can't be implemented and enforced here. User pages belong to a specific user insomuch as they somehow further the encyclopedia's aim or they're benign. If someone's user page is actively disrupting/annoying other users, I'm not sure why it has to be tolerated.

    bugzilla:12681 is a software solution that I've long been in favor of. But this could be considered fundamentally a social problem, not a technical problem.
    Adapted from MZMcBride (talk)'s comment at 15:12, 15 December 2011 (UTC); see link to comment

The following table is adapted from Gracenotes (talk · contribs)'s table. It has been expanded with arguments from the above quotes.

Table summarizing the arguments
Summary of the pros and cons of false new message boxes
Why to prohibit Why not to
  • Users often click on them without thinking, resulting in possibly downloading a virus or being directed to a malicious site. A user may also find him or herself in the security-threatening situation described by CMummert
  • Impedes users' efforts from building the encyclopedia
  • People find it annoying and disruptive
  • Disrupt the concentration of the reader
    • Confusing to editors.
    • Violates WP:BITE for new editors.
    • Disruptive and time-consuming to editors using slow computers
  • Many bots are coded in various languages to look for this div and possibly desist functioning until further instruction is given
  • An editor may be doing a systematic task (like reverting vandalism or tagging talk pages) when they are interrupted to consider a false talk page message
  • Devalue the importance of the new message notification system.
  • The Wikipedia community is tolerant, and shouldn't crush jokes just because they're irritating
  • The bot issue can be worked around, with some extensive recoding (?)
Users who endorse this view
  1. Cunard (talk) 05:08, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
    In reply to Σ: The comment about the "new messages" banner interfering with bots is motivated by this comment:

    I would also agree with disallowing this sort of practical joke. I think there was a situation in which one of the userbox migration bots kept stopping because it came across fake new-messages banners and thought they were real, so this is more important than just the annoyance value. (It's kind of ironic that users sporting such banners had their userboxes gradually degrade due to the bots not being able to replace them, but this interfered with other users too.) --ais523 15:22, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

    And this comment:

    I don't think that a fake new-messages bar is worth complicating bot programming for. I also don't think that there's a query.php uihasmsg check built in to the popular bot frameworks, so it would mean changes to existing bot code (which can be a bad idea; imagine if a new-messages banner was confusing an adminbot, it would have to go through a new RfA so that the uihasmsg check could be implemented!). By the way, Tra, you probably want to change the output format of that query.php check from the human-readable xmlfm, which has to be screen-scraped, into something more useful for bots. --ais523 11:54, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

    Complications, while not present in the bots listed by Σ below, may occur with other bots. As ais523 noted, recoding those bots to work around the div class "usermessage" problem will be a waste of precious time and resources. Cunard (talk) 22:33, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
    Those bots were old and dependent on query.php, which no longer works. It should be noted that like the current API, query.php also had the ability to check for new messages.
    Downloading the source of an article and searching for '<div class="usermessage"' would waste more resources in the long run than recoding the bot to download the text returned from a query (which should be trivial anyway - make the bot search the text of the API query instead of the article) and then downloading the article if there are no new messages. →Στc. 23:30, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
    Thank you for the explanation. I have stricken the mentions of bots from the table. Cunard (talk) 00:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)
    In reply to the Wikipedia:Avoid instruction creep argument: CMummert (talk · contribs)'s comment about WP:BEANS is applicable to WP:CREEP. Paraphrasing CMummert, WP:CREEP is always a Catch-22: If there is no written guideline, then it is much harder to argue in favor of removing things, but every guideline in oppositon of some behavior violates WP:CREEP. The community has, in the past, spent much time discussing the "new messages" hoax banner: Wikipedia talk:User pages/UI spoofing. There have been edit wars and conflicts since 2007 involving the hoaxes.

    These hoaxes are harmful: They (i) pose a security risk, (ii) confuse and give new users the impression that Wikipedia is not a serious encyclopedia, (iii) may cause people to disregard actual messages, (iv) wastes the time of users on slow computers, (v) impedes encyclopedia building by disrupting the reader's concentration, and (vi) is a detrimental distraction that annoys rather than amuses.

    In my view, prohibiting these net negative banners is not a violation of WP:CREEP but a codification of the community's willingness to, as Sandstein (talk · contribs) said above, no longer "tolerate something that disrupts the experience of using Wikipedia for others". Cunard (talk) 00:00, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

  2. Barts1a / What did I actually do right? / What did I do wrong this time? 00:41, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Comment by Σ

Searching for the div class "usermessage" is uncommon in most bot frameworks. It can be done through the API. If there are new messages: 

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<api>
  <query>
    <userinfo id="1234" name="Σ" messages="" />
  </query>
</api>

If new messages have been read, then the bold text is not in the query.

As far as I know, ST47's Perlwikipedia, Chris G's botclasses.php, and Cobi's wikibot.classes.php do not use the API to check for new messages at the same level Pywikipedia and Wiki.java do. But I am sure that none of them use the div class "usermessage" to check for new messages. →Στc. 07:45, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

View by Bulwersator

WP:BIKE Bulwersator (talk) 12:43, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Users who endorse this view
  1. Bulwersator (talk) 12:43, 28 January 2012 (UTC) - as proposer

View by TransporterMan

While I'm not pointing fingers at any of the proposers or supporters in this debate, I would note that if you look into the history of many lighthearted elements of WP such as the Department of Fun and, indeed, any which don't serve a strict nose-to-the grindstone purpose you'll find attempts, sometimes dedicated attempts, to get rid of them. Fortunately, such attempts ordinarily fail, as should this one. Sandstein's comment that, "It's clear that these hoaxes bother some people, and it's simply not collegial to tolerate something that disrupts the experience of using Wikipedia for others," can be seen, though I doubt that he means it to be, a call to arms in that direction. I have a fake banner at the top of my user page in the form of a warning that "This page contains text or images which may be disturbing to some. (Because everything is disturbing to someone.)" That is true and indeed, for reasons which I have explained at excruciating length elsewhere I find the term "wikilawyer" to be offensive and it disrupts the experience of using Wikipedia for me. Should we ban the use of that term, too? As much as I'd like it to be banned, even I am forced to say "probably not" because that term has a marginally useful purpose here just as the presence of humor also does. It cannot be questioned that we need to stick to our mission here, but neither do we need to allow this to be such a dry and humorless place that only masochists and those who would relish working in Ebenezer Scrooge's pre-Christmas workroom enjoy working here.

There is however a valid issue to be raised here. It's one thing to make a mild joke, but entirely another to do something seriously disruptive. A banner which takes you to the Practical joke article or to some similar inoffensive place is nothing more than a "gotcha" but it needs to end with the gotcha. A banner which takes you offsite at all, much less to one which is virus-ridden, or to something potentially offensive onsite such as a link to an image of an extended middle finger (to provide a relatively mild example) should not be condoned, not for a second. We don't need to prohibit all banners just to fix those problems when they arise, however; if the current tools are not sufficient to deal with those cases then focused tools should be adopted, but the Bozo should not be thrown out with the bathwater. Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) 18:31, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Users who endorse this view
  1. Hear hear. Steven Zhang Join the DR army! 04:52, 2 February 2012 (UTC)
  2. We should treat these on a case-by-case basis, as we have always done. Dcoetzee 00:47, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

View by Tothwolf

I'm going to give a little different take on these banners than what I've read above. While I previously had a dislike for these fake-message banners because I found them distracting, this is not the primary reason I don't like them. Until about a year ago I had a long-running problem with an individual who persecuted me in any way they could. This included following each and every edit I made, making personal attacks, gaming the system, and so on. These things almost always resulted in some sort of message being left on my talk page. It got to the point where seeing an orange banner would make me sick to my stomach because a large percentage of the time it meant this individual (or one of his "buddies") was in the process of trying to stir something up. Because of this, every time I now see that orange banner, I'm reminded of that stuff and it is a very unpleasant experience. --Tothwolf (talk) 23:12, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Users who endorse this view
Orange banner - Pavlovian reaction, I can sympathise with that. There were several months when the orange banner had that effect on me, for precisely the same reason. It is still not back to "Yay! I got a message!" Rich Farmbrough, 16:09, 16 February 2012 (UTC).

Comment by Rich Farmbrough

Disappointing to see so much attacking of those who !voted the other way, instead to cogent arguments. Rich Farmbrough, 16:06, 16 February 2012 (UTC).

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Deletion of user talk pages

I've been looking for an answer to this question, but can't seem to find one. According to this policy, user talk pages are generally not deleted, as they contain valuable history. But what about when a user talk page consists only of a redirect and absolutely no other history? (i.e., because the user has been renamed.) Is there any good reason why deletion shouldn't be possible in that situation? Robofish (talk) 22:47, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that the only reason to not delete talk pages is the concern that project-relevant discussion may be recorded only in that talk page. A counter point to that is that project-significant material should be moved/copied out of userspace.
Another concern might be that if a talk page is deleted, non-admins can't know that there wasn't anything of significance deleted. This concern can be attended to by explicitly noting in the deletion log summary the absence of significant content.
I think that it is reasonable to delete a talk page if WP:CSD#G7 applies. This could mean a reasonable assumption that you are acting on the user's behalf, and in the usual assumption that minor and bot edits do not stand in the way of G7. It sounds like you could delete this talk page per G7. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:06, 4 December 2011 (UTC)
If the page has never had any talk on it, then it isn't really a talk page so the rule doesn't apply. However, if they have been renamed there is generally some sort of pointer to the user's new name. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:42, 4 December 2011 (UTC)
@SmokeyJoe - No, also a warning history can be of interest in some cases, especially in the anti-spam area. Note that is not just the current version of a talkpage, it may also be the edit history of a talkpage.
Robofish, why would you want to delete the talkpage? Generally, there is hardly any reason to delete a user talkpage, they do not free up database space, and deleting may remove, even for not often occuring or obscure reasons, valuable information that is there (especially for those who do not have access to deleted records). Generally, archiving is the way to go (there is a bot doing that). I hope this explains. --Dirk Beetstra T C 09:38, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
The renamed editor may have been referred to (or had that page linked to from) elsewhere on Wikipedia discussion and project pages using their previous name. Except in privacy-related and legitimate other RTV cases, a redirecting link from the previous user pages will always be beneficial. Franamax (talk) 10:28, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
Hi Dirk. Yes, of course a warning history should be kept. Warnings in the history should mean that G7 doesn't apply. G7 should require that the only contributor in the full history is the user himself. Sometimes it happens that a new user fills up their user talk page with their own work, not appreciating the purpose of the user talk page, and such things can be readily deleted. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:37, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
I think one should just standard say 'don't delete user talkpages', except for some excessive things (only plain spam edits, attack pages etc.). All that does not fall under those categories should not be deleted, even if one does not see what possible use it may have - it is not in the way either. --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:37, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
I see you asking Fastily about his recent G7 page deletions and am interested. I'm not so much interested in what should be done with talk pages so much as checking that that the description of practive reflects actual practice. I see that trivial non-talk talk pages getspeedy deleted. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 14:27, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
Yes, I already undeleted one of them as unquestionably needed (it is part of an ongoing and active spam-case, not even of a case that is from 10 years ago or so - and even then), and there is at least one other which I find a very questionable delete. And then there is a handful of which I think the same. I have not fully looked at all yet (will do that soon). Do note, that these deletes are not 'non-controversial' deletes (as the edit summary of these ~30 pages says) - there has been a (albeit more extreme) situation where an admin got blocked over unilateral talkpage deletions.
There is an alternative process for this, and that is archiving, that leaves the traces that MAY be there and that MAY be of interest to someone (especially traces that need to be followed by editors who do not have an admin bit - and that is a process that is actually running). --Dirk Beetstra T C 16:06, 7 February 2012 (UTC)
Redirects are cheap. They should be kept. Note also a number of doppleganger accounts use redirects which is useful if you mistype a user name. Rich Farmbrough, 16:17, 16 February 2012 (UTC).

WP:UP#POLEMIC interpretation needed

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Key to whether a certain page in user space should be deleted is how WP:UP#POLEMIC is interpreted. I thought folks familiar with this guideline who watched this page might give us some insight on its applicability in this instance, here: Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/User_talk:Born2cycle/dicklyon. Thanks. --Born2cycle (talk) 22:43, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Next time, do what everyone else does and compile your evidence with an offline text editor, Google document, or somewhere else off wiki. Reduces drama, just as easy to access. Jclemens (talk) 02:30, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
That would have defeated the express purpose in this case. As he wrote in the above-linked MfD, he had previously done this very thing: he created a special subpage with the targeted editor’s name in the title and then went to the other editor and waved it in his nose to get him to stop opposing B2C. As B2C further wrote, it worked then so he thought he’d do it again! YEAH!!!!. (Not). Greg L (talk) 02:47, 7 January 2012 (UTC)
  • Since these issues are now being discussed at two MFDs, and the person posing the question has clearly gotten their answer (albeit the exact opposite of the one they wanted) I am closing this thread. No need to have three discussions going at once on the same topic. Beeblebrox (talk) 03:01, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RIP - digital cemetery?

Recently found out by accident that contributor User:Elisabeth Rieping died some time ago. Are there any standard procedures or guidelines for that? Richiez (talk) 22:24, 28 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes: Wikipedia:Deceased Wikipedians, Wikipedia:Deceased Wikipedians/Guidelines. Hut 8.5 22:26, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
Thanks - does not seem linked from Wikipedia:User_pages? Thats where I was searching intuitively. Richiez (talk) 22:53, 28 January 2012 (UTC)
I do think the guideline page ought to be better advertised, I wasn't even aware of it until someone took me to task for not following it. The only policy page which even mentions it is the protection policy. Not really sure it belongs on this page though. Hut 8.5 01:02, 29 January 2012 (UTC)
A small section somewhere close to Wikipedia:User pages#User pages and leaving Wikipedia would seem a natural choice. Also a mention under Wikipedia:User pages#Protection of user pages could be added. Richiez (talk) 13:21, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

Removing active block notices, part VII

On the subject of a previous thread ("Wording of removal-of-block-notices (again)"), I have altered the wording in an attempt to clarify what it seemed to be trying to say: don't remove active block notices. Although personally I think this is good advice, I'm not sure my changes (or the wording of that particular section even before my alterations) accurately reflect the results of the most recent discussions by the community.

If uncontested active block notices are to be excluded, then the first bulleted item in the list of things not to remove ("Sanctions that are currently in effect") is ambiguous, to say the least.

I'm not looking for yet another discussion about the merits and demerits of allowing users to remove current block notices, but I would welcome a discussion about the optimal wording of this section based on the discussions that have already taken place.

The most recent discussion that I am aware of can be found here, which also contains links to several of the other discussions on this matter. --Bongwarrior (talk) 08:04, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

The status quo was to allow users to remove block notices on their talk pages. The discussion you reference has no consensus, and in that case the status quo prevails. I will attempt to change the wording to reflect this. ~Amatulić (talk) 00:30, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Userpages should not be used to populate Special pages such as Special:DoubleRedirects

Multiple people are "testing" double redirects on en.wikipedia cluttering the log. En.wikipedia shouldn't be the place for bot tests and perhaps these should be migrated to test.wikipedia or some other wiki. Meta also has such a page mind you. -- A Certain White Cat chi? 17:35, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Templates or Other Means for Displaying Military Ribbons/Medals as Worn?

I know this page does not cover military ribbons, but are there any kind of templates (or other means) of displaying a military member's ribbons or medals as worn on their uniform? I have started here. There are only 2 problems: 1. How do I get the Operational Distinguishing Device to display on top (centered) of the Coast Guard ribbon? Someone uploaded a silver Roman numeral 0 to "fill in" as the "O.D.D.", and I added it as the device code for the template [[Image:{{{name}}}.svg|106px|alt=]]. However, nothing is shown on that ribbon. And 2. How is the 4th award of the Navy Sea Service Deployment Ribbon displayed? Is it 4 bronze stars or 1 silver star? The template shows it as 4 bronze stars, but I thought it is 1 silver star. Also, what kind of star(s) is/are it/they (award stars or service stars)? There is a difference. Thank you for your help. Allen (talk) 10:21, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

Edit request on 22 March 2012


SeyiB (talk) 15:29, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

 Done I changed nothing. mabdul 15:30, 22 March 2012 (UTC)

How do I find another user page?

Noone has answered this.140.198.45.43 (talk) 01:00, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

The search box in the left sidebar can be used. Entering "user:cush" without quotes goes to that user page. Clicking the Search button displays a page where you can click Advanced and choose to search only User pages. Ask questions like this at WP:HELPDESK. Johnuniq (talk) 01:22, 30 March 2012 (UTC)

Old IP talk pages essay

Some people watching this page may be interested in this (new) essay: Wikipedia:Old IP talk pages. This essay formed as the result of discussion at WT:CSD. --MZMcBride (talk) 18:09, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Advertising File Sharing Drug War

Doesn't the heading say it all? You can't thwart the law of supply and demand by making up rules: you can only drive it underground. Wikipedia has one choice: underground, or aboveground? As with drugs, if its aboveground, you gain the right to regulate it and study it... that is to see what's happening. Are there any good things about banning people from saying that they do paid editing? Knee-jerk reactions like "I oppose the commercialization of Wikipedia" are divorced from reality here. They are possible in that we can viably ban advertisements for products and most services, but in this particular case we can only choose to know what goes on or to not know.

I said if we don't ban it outright we can regulate it: somewhere above there is a suggestion to the effect that we could regulate it something like this:

Allowed:

  • This editor is available for paid editing
  • This is how I go about my paid editing

Not allowed:

  • Contact me at X
  • Price list

This is a bit more than User:Peteforsyth, but less than Cla68. Cla68 would have to tone it down, and Peteforsyth could reveal more information. This would benefit the WP community to know what Peteforsyth is up to, and yet would not really allow advertising. We need to moderate our drug warrior tendencies which tell us "Failing to slam Pandora's box shut now would be a great mistake." Be——Critical 01:26, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

I support the phrasing and the reasoning of Becritical's proposition. Factseducado (talk) 19:09, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
So we're now proposing to ban people whose intention is to improve the site from being contactable off-wiki? —WFC— 04:46, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
No, just not advertising it. Anyone with an email can be contacted off-wiki. It seems to me too close to the kind of advertising we don't want to have Wikipedia link to a site with unknown content. And I thought that even including an email address in the add itself might be too much. Be——Critical 15:26, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
We can't stop all sockpuppetry, either, but that doesn't mean we just throw up our hands. Instead, we keep an eye out for signs of it, and when we catch a puppeteer, we ban them from editing. COI editing should be treated the same. Paid editors (to include those editing on behalf of an employer or on behalf of one's own company or freelance operation) who have failed to disclose fully and are discovered should be immediately and permanently banned, no questions asked. Disclosed paid editors should be subject to strict restrictions, including that they may never, for any reason, edit an article they've been paid to consult on/look at, except to revert the most blatantly obvious of vandalism. That'll solve the problem right there—if you take a nickel, you can't edit the article anyway! Try to hide it, and you run the risk of explaining to a client exactly what happened. This proposal would encourage disclosure (very strongly in fact), set appropriate behavioral standards, and if not stop, at least throttle back the problem of editors accepting cash for edits. Seraphimblade Talk to me 21:34, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
Not so. It would change nothing except making paid editing harder to spot. In fact, it is impossible to catch paid editing. How do you think it would actually work to ban paid editing? Socks are different: they reveal themselves, and where they don't then there's no problem. Paid editors would be revealed only by POV edits. In that case, you can only see the POV, not the pay, and so you might as well forget about payment and focus on POV. Don't let idealism get in the way of your perception of reality. Be——Critical 23:40, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Would it be accurate to summarize the 'Not allowed' items as: direct calls to action to receive payment? -- Eclipsed (talk) (COI Declaration) 22:08, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

Support -I support the phrasing and the reasoning of Becritical's proposition. Factseducado (talk) 19:09, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

Comment and new proposal

There's no clear consensus for totally banning mention of paid editing from user pages, and let's remember that paid editing is not disallowed. The irony of this puffed up, emotive debate is that advertising on a user page is a bad way of letting potential clients know you exist. And Clas68's user-page notice contained two things we might like to remove from the equation by way of compromise: mention of pricing, which is tacky and not good commercial practice anyway; and mention of external contact details, given that anyone with an IQ above 10 can find the "Email this editor" button within a few seconds of looking.

By contrast, a category would be dynamite: "Wikipedians who perform paid editing" would be much more useful for potential clients, but such categories aren't going to happen any time soon—we're just not ready for them, and someone might feel inclined to propose a stopper on that elsewhere.

What I'm expecting we all want to avoid is long, in-your-face ads, so why not take the heat out of this overblown discourse by setting out tight controls. I'm hoping it's a compromise that most of us can live with. Taking as a starting point the text originally proposed for comment in this RfC, may I suggest the following, then? Proposed additions/replacements to the original proposal are italicised. It contains, in passing, a much-needed updating of the referent from (the English) Wikipedia to the whole Wikimedia movement. Bullets 1 and 3 are existing guidelines; bullet 2 is proposed as an addition. The "for profit" wording in bullet 2 has been simplified.

Promotional and advocacy material and links
  • The advertising or promotion of an individual, business, organization, group, or viewpoint unrelated to Wikipedia the Wikimedia movement (such as including commercial sites or referral links).
  • The advertising or promotion of a product, service, or any other for-profit, money-making venture product or service for profit, regardless of its relationship to Wikipedia the Wikimedia movement. An exception is that an editor who is available for paid editing on a Wikimedia project may make a brief and discreet mention of this fact on their user page; this should not include (i) contact details or external links for the purpose of soliciting clients, (ii) explicit mention of pricing, or (iii) explicit connections between the editor's paid editing and other personal information on the user's page.
  • Extensive self-promotional material, especially when not directly relevant to Wikipedia the Wikimedia movement.

Your comments on what I hope is a pragmatic compromise would be welcome. Please keep them low-key; I expect opposition, but everyone should respect the views of other participants. Tony (talk) 12:55, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

  • Support as proposer. Tony (talk) 13:11, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose, because in its current form this causes the same problems as the previous proposal in different language. We have not tackled paid editing, and given that this is essentially the only commercial venture that can be instigated by a user which is directly related to Wikipedia, this is the only thing we need to deal with. Therefore, I would suggest the following amendments to your wording: —WFC— 13:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
Promotional and advocacy material and links
  • The advertising or promotion of an individual, business, organization, group, or viewpoint unrelated to Wikipedia the Wikimedia movement (such as including commercial sites or referral links).
  • An editor who is available for paid editing on a Wikimedia project may make a brief mention of this fact on their user page; this must not include (i) explicit mention of pricing, or (ii) explicit connections between the editor's paid editing and other personal information on the user's page.
  • Extensive self-promotional material, especially when not directly relevant to Wikipedia the Wikimedia movement.

—WFC— 13:54, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

  • Comment I'm not sure if you saw the debate here at Jimbo's page, but I figured a simple way to avoid contention over things like "brief and discreet mention" would just be to make a standard templated userbox and then you can easily say "that's OK" or "that's wrong". Each person's definition of brief and discreet might be a certain number of characters or paragraphs or font size or whatever else, but standardizing it would help avoid that. By the way, the wording of "Wikimedia Movement" seems a bit strange to me. It seems highly open to interpretation and I'm not sure anyone has a clear idea what that 'movement' is. Although it is a bit inelegant, I would suggest that such a policy actually mention the projects that it wants to cover, for example: Wikipedia, Wiktionary, Wikiquote, Wikibooks, Wikisource, Wikimedia Commons, Wikispecies, Wikinews, Wikiversity, Wikimedia Incubator, Meta-Wiki.
All that said, this policy just doesn't explain WHY it says this. I'd personally prefer a short preamble paragraph be added, simply explaining the logic behind the policy. I realize some people are simply opposed to non-altruistic editing, which seems a bit extreme, Jimbo seems specifically opposed to "paid advocacy" which isn't the same as "paid editing" (which implies he's ok with people getting paid, as long as it is ETHICAL editing. The real reason I can see that we prohibit advertising on Wikipedia is because of the old adage "give them an inch and they'll take a mile". Without a absolutely clear guideline, you'll see pages covered in advertising as each editor tried to compete with the rest.
I have no particular love for the policy as written or as proposed here. We give people a user page to kind of have as 'their' space. If they said "I'm a 8-year editor of Wikipedia. My background is in publishing having previously worked for Random House as a copyeditor for 15 years, and have participated in 7 conferences as a paid speaker on new media and social media.... etc etc more about their experiences in life and how they have a dog named Betty..." This seems like perfectly acceptable biography stuff for a User Page, but some people might say it is promotional. I just think we end up being jerks a little bit if we don't have absolutely clear and objective guidelines on how people use User Pages, like a limit on the number of characters or images, etc. The other alternative would simply be to say "User Page content is allowed or disallowed per administrator determination of acceptable content" but I think that would lead to a LOT more conflict and problems. -- Avanu (talk) 13:56, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
I think both of these posts are worthy of consideration. BTW, I don't necessarily see altruism and pay as mutually exclusive. Artists and researchers on fellowships are essentially paid, but often produce their life's work as they would have in relative poverty. There can be more than one driving force behind an individual's productivity. Tony (talk) 14:05, 3 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Provisional oppose In principle this seems like an idea with a genuinely good intention, but I have a question. Sorry for coming to the discussion late (and I admit to only scanning the above comments so far) but what about userboxes? E.g. UBX/Windows 8 could be viewed as promoting a commercial product. Non-commercial products (e.g. {{User Bugzilla}}) would be viewed differently, AIUI. -- Trevj (talk) 08:11, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
  • oppose This endorses paid editing as a normatively accepted thing. That's not good. JoshuaZ (talk) 20:45, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
Even Jimbo doesn't oppose paid editing. He is opposed to paid advocacy and unethical edits. I doubt it is a problem if an employee of a company makes an edit to Wikipedia that reflects ALL of our core principles, using reliable sourcing, neutral tone, etc. It should be something as normal as someone doing it for free. I don't necessarily agree with the proposal above, but I'm not going to ignore a realistic and reasonable approach to improving Wikipedia and its content. -- Avanu (talk) 21:05, 4 May 2012 (UTC)
    • My comment may have been phrased a bit badly, in that I'd distinguish between being a paid editor (e.g. paid to edit Wikipedia) and an employee who happens to edit Wikipedia articles related to their employer. The first is the issue in question by this userpage suggestion. As a regular matter, you are correct that employees making such changes are ok if they follow guidelines. However, what this sort of thing does is enshrining people being paid to edit as freelancers- that drastically increases the danger and as a normative problem makes the likelyhood of neutrality issues become even more severe. Endorsing that in policy is a bad idea. JoshuaZ (talk) 02:58, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose Indicating price in advertisements is good commercial practice -- generally if a business doesn't advertise price it's because it's too high and/or they want you to contact them so you can get the hard sell. I'm against restrictions on user pages for any purpose other than to prevent disruption to Wikipedia. Nobody Ent 11:46, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
    • Disclosure on a user page about an editor being available for paid editing would not be primarily an advertisment of their services to potential clients, rather a statement to other wikipedia editors etc that they are (or wish to be a paid editor) so that, if necessary, the appropriate level of scrutiny is applied the their edits to ensure that the encyclopedia is not damaged.Nigel Ish (talk) 16:46, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Question. I have a link on my user page to my employer, a proprietary college, which shows my photograph. Would I have to remove that? Bearian (talk) 16:34, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Comment/Neutral I'm ambivalent. I don't have any problem with the particular phrasing in theory. I'm simply concerned that any minor benefit Wikipedia enjoys from tighter enforcement in marginal cases might be far smaller than the energy that might be drained by discussions and enforcement along any grey area. --joe deckertalk to me 16:52, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose largely per JoshuaZ. Though to be honest I can accept some forms of paid editing. A couple of years back a charity paid to have a bunch of medical articles translated into various south Asian languages, and our GLAM program includes encouraging curators and so forth to edit. Its the Public relations departments that I don't trust, I'd like to see a ban on them - and then we can talk about who can handle COIs. ϢereSpielChequers 21:17, 5 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Strongly SupportI support either Tony's version or WaitingForConnection's version. I support Tony's version more. Factseducado (talk) 19:05, 7 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose: Poorly thought-out. The underlying ideas appear to be "advertising is okay here as long as profit isn't being made", "profit is automatically and always evil", and "paid editing is automatically and always evil". All three of these are wrong. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 08:27, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose, this proposal doesn't address my concerns at all about what could happen if this took effect. My reasoning is at the bottom of the seventh section break. (In short: I'm afraid this could be a barrier to people advertising their beliefs or support for something on WP) dci | TALK 20:58, 13 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Oppose If it ain't broke. Collect (talk) 12:47, 14 May 2012 (UTC)

May sanctions that are actively in effect be removed from a user talk page

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
Consensus is that notices concerning active sanctions may not be removed from user talk pages.  Sandstein  17:50, 8 June 2012 (UTC)

There is a re-occurring question as to whether notices regarding active sanctions in effect against a user may be removed from that user's talk page. The current revision of the policy indicates that a number of sanction related notices may be removed, including: active block notices, and community imposed editing restrictions (non-arbcom). Is this consistent with the views of the community? 17:16, 26 April 2012 (UTC)

Comments

  • Active sanctions, including block notices and community imposed editing restrictions should not be removed. It is important that editors interacting with the user have access to such information, and particularly in the case of editing restrictions, it is unlikely an editor will think to search talk page history for removed notices. I support going back to the version

    Sanctions that are currently in effect, including relevant information about a currently active block or ban, declined unblock requests regarding a currently active block, ArbCom-imposed edit restrictions, and confirmed sockpuppetry related notices

    as I think it reflects the most widely understood interpretation of policy. Monty845 17:16, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
  • No. I understand the reasons for permitting the removal of warnings, but they're substantially different: unlike them, block notices and editing restrictions are of such importance that other users who interact with the "owner" of the talk page should be aware of them; this is esspecially true if sanctions must be applied, as the existence of previous sanctions might properly influence current and future visitors. Nyttend (talk) 18:17, 26 April 2012 (UTC) Does this make sense? I'm sleepy. If it's gibberish, notify me on my talk page and I'll fix it.
  • As with Nyttend, I'm certainly in favour, in principle, of a policy that any community-imposed restrictions on a specific user should be documented in such a way that they can be easily found from the relevant userpage. (Blocks, less so; they're system-logged and usually fairly visible through things like popups.) That said, two questions:
a) Does "relevant" apply simply to the notices informing the user of those sanctions - "This is to inform you that you have been banned from editing articles on XYZ"? - or does it apply to any related/subsequent discussion about those blocks? If the latter, I can see some potential for abuse - there are plenty of cases where people post inflammatory/insulting comments regarding a dispute, and if we have a firm rule that "related" material should not be removed, it's hard for the affected user to respond appropriately (ie, by archiving/removing them)
b) How does this apply to archiving? If "removed" includes archiving to a subpage, which it probably is intended to, then there'll have to be some plan for how the various archive bots will handle these discussions. Shimgray | talk | 18:24, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
Responding to b) first, that is a somewhat separate question that impacts both the current version, the old version I suggest going back to, and any other version that requires the notice. As for a) I think related only applies to sock puppetry notices, whereas for the other categories of notice the question is about the notice itself. Monty845 20:10, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
  • I used to be vehemently in favor of forcing users to maintain block notices on their talk pages, but given the level of pointless acrimony that it causes, I have changed my mind on this. If a user deletes their block notice, who cares? It is in the page history, and can be found easily. If a user has an active ban, log it on the ban log. They tiny little bit of convenience we get from having such notices visible is more than overcome by the general inconvenience of having to monitor this and deal with the inevitable backlash and silly debates that go back and forth every time this happened. If we just eliminated this restriction altogether, it would end all of the dramah. Just let it go. Blocked and banned editors are best left impotently ignored anyways: fighting with them only feeds the fire. Let them delete their block notice. Then, when you don't restore it, there's nothing left for them to do. Problem solved. --Jayron32 20:08, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
  • This again already? Allow removal - If you edit their page, you'll see that they're blocked. If you look at their recent contributions, you'll see that they are blocked. If you look at the page history, you'll likely notice that they had been blocked. I've never understood the argument that people who are actively trying to work with an editor need to have these block notices in place or they won't be able to figure it out. Requiring them leads to pointlessly stupid edit wars between upset blocked users and people who apparently have nothing better to do with their time. --Onorem♠Dil 20:30, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
    The guideline was changed [1] recently, removing the provision that a number of editors have been using to justify restoring active block notices. The last major discussion as I far as I can find occurred more then a year ago and resulted in a non-consensus close. Furthermore, as currently written, the guideline does not prohibit the removal of community imposed sanction notifications, which I think is clearly wrong. Monty845 20:55, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
    • That long ago? Hmm...could've sworn it was more recent. I guess it just seems that way because I think it's such an unbelievably stupid thing for people to war over. --Onorem♠Dil 21:03, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
      Actually I was mistaken, it ended last August, so less then a year, but not that recent. Also it was rather inconclusive. Monty845 21:06, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
      • I do agree that notices about editing restrictions should not be removed. That's not necessarily information that would be simple to find. --Onorem♠Dil 21:08, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
        • WP:BANLIST. You're welcome. --Jayron32 22:11, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
          • While a useful link, I don't think it's quite the same. Maybe I worded it poorly. It's not hard to find. It's hard to know when you'd need to find it. If you don't know that you should be looking for restrictions, you'd have to continuously go back and scan for the names of people you're working with. If you don't know that someone is blocked, a massive box pops up at the top of the page if you edit their talk or look at their contributions. --Onorem♠Dil 22:20, 26 April 2012 (UTC)
  • No, users shouldn't be able to remove active sanctions. I understand that most or all of those sanctions are logged but I see no reason why editors should be forced to search through multiple logs when it's easier to just retain the relevant Talk message(s) or template(s). While I am sympathetic for editors under sanction(s), the need for other editors to easily and quickly know that an editor is under sanctions outweighs the embarrassment and shame of the sanctioned editor. I would certainly be amenable to a banner shell that minimized the visual impact of sanction messages/templates. And I would likely change my position if (a) all sanctions were logged in a central location or (b) a tool created that could search all of the relevant logs and easily display sanctions for a particular editor. ElKevbo (talk) 06:34, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
  • No Hey look! It's the perenial "Let's be nice to editors who haven't conformed with the rules/policies/guidelines of wikipedia by allowing them to hide their misbehavior while it's still an active problem" proposal. The active sanctions are supposed to be on user's talk pages. Any expired (or reversed ones) are fair game for removal. Hasteur (talk) 20:42, 27 April 2012 (UTC)
  • No. Do we want to start talking about moving this into policy? Ironholds (talk) 06:56, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Irrelevant question - An admin shouldn't depend on the content of a user page as an ironclad fact of that user's status. The idea that you're going to get anywhere by being more overbearing with a user who is already unhappy with things is just setting up a WP:BATTLEGROUND situation. In addition, if an admin only relies on the text of a user page for guidance, there's no guarantee it wasn't modified to say whatever the user (or another editor) might want it to say. In other words, it is best to use other means to determine the TRUE situation and to do anything less is simply not due diligence on the part of an administrator. -- Avanu (talk) 07:04, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
  • Comment: It's not about admins, it's about everyone else. As an example, I semi-recently supported a proposal by a user that turned out to be someone blocked for various abuses, related directly to the proposal, which was an ulterior-motive move with potential fallout not immediately apparent from its wording. Had the user's talk page clearly indicated that the user had been blocked shortly after making the proposal, for badness relating to the same topic, I obviously would not have supported the proposal. I ended up looking foolish and more importantly lent support to a misleading proposal and to the user's "mission", which now that I understand it exists and what underlies it, I don't agree with. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 20:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
  • No Per Hasteur. And we need to be more, not less, restrictive with disruptive editors. WP:5THWHEEL should not be marked as a humor essay. >;-) There are a lot of troublemakers on the system who either contribute very little of value, or contribute lots of a value but lots2 of non-value, such that they're still doing more harm to the project than good. Mollycoddling these dwids, like allowing them to hide their sanctions and restrictions and fool other editors into thinking they're here to write an encyclopedia, is not a good plan. — SMcCandlish   Talk⇒ ɖ∘¿¤þ   Contrib. 20:06, 2 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Current wording in policy is fine -- It has longstanding consensus and support, and the arguments to change it are both unconvincing and violate WP:AGF. I personally agree that we should take stronger actions against genuinely disruptive people, but insisting that the notices that can currently be removed should not be able to be removed is not an action to prevent disruption, it is an action to further escalate WP:BATTLEGROUND behavior. If someone has read a low level block warning or notice by a single admin and has decided that they understand or that the person who put it there was more interested in disruption that truly trying to solve any perceived problems, they ought to be able to remove it. Many of the people above are assuming that all of these cases are always of people who aren't here to write an encyclopedia or are troublemakers, etc. Assume good faith and let the people who are good editors but made a mistake, got drawn into a fight of some sort, or etc. have the chance to prove themselves instead of trying to shame them off the project. A number of our best editors have had bogus warnings and blocks added to their user pages over the years that deserved to be erased. Restoring them is not a good faith effort to resolve conflict, it is just causing unnecessary stress. The policy states that the serious ones have to remain, which is more than fair, but that others can be removed. That's what the Wikipedia community supports as a whole and a handful of people here can't change that. DreamGuy (talk) 16:28, 6 May 2012 (UTC)
Please re-read the discussion. We're focusing only on active sanctions, not warnings or expired/old sanctions. ElKevbo (talk) 17:07, 6 May 2012 (UTC)
  • Users should be able to remove anything from their user page. Sanctions either are or should be logged elsewhere, and forcing them to wear a badge of shame does not benefit encyclopedia. Nobody Ent 17:49, 20 May 2012 (UTC)
  • No. Removal (or defacing) of currently active sanction notices should definitely not be permitted. It is important for the community to be able to find such things right away (without needing to resort to forensic examination of the talk page history). On a related point, what about automatic archiving? Ideally, there should be a way to tell the archive bots to leave sanction notices alone (if this is not already the case). — Richwales 16:38, 23 May 2012 (UTC)
  • No As per RIch above, removal/defacing of current sanction notices should not be allowed - clarity and openness is important. Dougweller (talk) 09:04, 25 May 2012 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

If an editor says they don't want someone posting on their talk page, can they be banned for being "oversensitive" etc?

An administrator has informed me that the WP:NOBAN guideline is wishywashy and that getting people to stay off your talkpage is not an enforceable act. That not accepting criticism, being oversensitive, etc. would get you blocked. [2] I believe if someone asks you not to post on their talk page, for any possible reason, than you should not be able to post there unless perhaps for official Wikipedia alerts(a page you created is nominated for deletion, you are in violation of the 3RR rule, etc). Can we strengthen the wording in the guideline page to make that absolutely clear? Does everyone agree posting on someone's talk page when someone asked you not to, no matter what the reason, is harassment? Dream Focus 09:36, 22 May 2012 (UTC)

  • If someone asks you to not post on their talkpage, then you should try pretty hard to honor that request. However, you may have good reason post something. They may be doing something that interacts with your editing and the message doesn't belong on any other talk page. Maybe there could be other weird reasons. If there is such a good reason, you should post minimally, to the point. If such a minimal post continues to cause offense, and you think you really need to post a message, ask someone else to do it for you. You could ask me. I may well tell you that you don't need to post such a message. You should not be posting a Wikipedia alert. A Wikipedia alert is not somethign that needs to come personally for you. If such postings continue, it is not "harassment", but it is something else.
  • If someone is posting on your talk page, and you have asked them not to, do not, under any circumstances, respond. Don't even blank the message. Don't respond on your talk page, or their talkpage, or on any other page to the unwelcomed post on your talk page. If it continues, say several times, then ask someone uninvolved to intervene. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 09:49, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
(edit conflict)No. A "user's" talk page is not the user's talk page. It a page own by the Wikimedia Foundation provided to allow a place for messages to a user to be placed. If an editor asks an editor not to post own their talk page, they shouldn't out of courtesy but if circumstances make a post appropriate then it can be made. Nobody Ent 09:53, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
What circumstances are appropriate? If the user feels someone is being too harsh in their criticism of them, or just doesn't want to be bothered by them, should the person have the right to post on their page anyway? Dream Focus 09:57, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
I'd be the admin who told Dream Focus that - and I used the phrase "end with a block" to imply that it would send you down that road. Now, looking at NOBAN - highlighting the "wishywashy" bits...
In general, it is usual to avoid substantially editing another's user and user talk pages other than where it is likely edits are expected and/or will be helpful. If unsure, ask. If a user asks you not to edit their user pages, it is probably sensible to respect their requests (although a user cannot avoid administrator attention or appropriate project notices and communications by merely demanding their talk page is not posted to). (highlighting mine)
My point is, the guideline says almost nothing besides "if someone asks you to stay off their talk page, it'd be courteous to do so". I've seen the request being classified as "avoiding scrutiny" in the past. There's a few questions that I think need answering here
  1. Under what circumstances should a person be able to as someone to leave their talk page?
    Should they be able to request any editor leaves for any reason?
    What about automated comments?
  2. Does it come under "harassment" if an editor carries on posting? Even if to an outsider the posts seem reasonable and helpful?
  3. Should administrators be subject to the same restrictions?
  4. Can an editor blanket request that a group of editors who are unconnected except by a !vote on ANI stay of his/her talk page?[3]
I know I have opinions on such matters, some of which are at odds with the community's, but I think my post above accurately sums up the current situation. WormTT · (talk) 12:00, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
The editor can tell anyone posting on their talk page if they don't want them there. She already telling one person and removing that person's bothersome post. And it doesn't matter if some see it as helpful to pester someone to the point of frustration, it bothers the person, and they should have the right to be able to keep it off their talk page. And why would this affect automated comments such as bot notices? Totally different situation. Dream Focus 12:19, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
I was thinking more about Twinkle notices, if someone is new page patrolling or tagging categories for deletion. It's regarding another situation I've come across in the past few weeks - sorry for confusing matters. The other problem is that if you have multiple names and actually try and record them anywhere, it becomes a "shitlist", something else editors seem to get into lots of problems over. I've been having a look into where this came from, and it looks like it was part of FT2's overhaul, with no discussion on the point, so I think you did the right thing bringing this up here. Might even be worth a request for comments as I've seen 3 different situations in as many weeks where editors have asked other editors to stay off pages and the request has been ignored. WormTT · (talk) 12:34, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
No list was posted. Just a message to the person in the edit summary. You can also ask them in a message on your page or theirs. You aren't allowed to have enemy list on Wikipedia of course, I remembering cases of that coming up before. If you know of any examples of people ignoring request to stop posting on someone's talk page, please link to them. Dream Focus 12:52, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
There is currently an edit war on Scottywong, where a user is trying to comment after being asked not to post. I'll have to dig up the other other one. The enemy list is hypothetical, but was referring to multiple people at the same time. WormTT · (talk) 12:57, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
The other example - an editor who was complaining about twinkle notifications. WormTT · (talk) 13:00, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
  • I don't want to know the circumstances behind the current case, but in some cases I have seen it was pretty obvious which editor needed to be told to stop (and blocked on a repeat). That happens both ways: Editor A tells B to stay away, but B finds a good reason to post anyway. Sometimes B is clearly poking A and B's message is not critical for the future of Wikipedia; furthermore, B manages to find a reason to post on A's talk once a week (or even once a day). In those cases, B needs to stop. In other situations, B is providing correct information to inform A of some ongoing problem re A's editing, and B is not being pointy or repetitive, and is not taking every opportunity to post, and A's editing does need attention. For that scenario, A cannot enforce their preference that B stay away. Such matters cannot be codified in rules, and we need to rely on judgment: do whatever is best for the encyclopedia. Johnuniq (talk) 12:24, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
    I would think its best for the encyclopedia to not drive editors away, by ganging up on them, and telling them if they don't like it they should leave. Dream Focus 12:31, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
    If you'd like to discuss the actual case and the reasons behind that note, my talk page is open. WormTT · (talk) 12:34, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
    No need to bother with that. Just kindly stop threatening her with blocking all the time. She has the right to tell people not to post on her talk page, without worrying about the fear of being blocked for that simply because you claim It will be seen as "refusing help", "not accepting criticism", "over sensitivity" and "lack of good faith"" [4] Dream Focus 12:43, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
    As her mentor, I have warned her that I believe her behaviour over the past week violates wikipedia policies, and that carrying on doing that would lead to a block. She responded very reasonably in my opinion - taking the comment as it was meant. In any case, that's not relevant here. As I said, if you would like to discuss my methods, then my talk page is open. If you believe I have acted inappropriately and want to take it further, believing that discussing the matter with me won't help, I'm sure you know where venues such as ANI, or DRN are. WormTT · (talk) 12:52, 22 May 2012 (UTC)
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