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Policy

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Policies and guidelines and the Style guide contain or link to most of the current en.Wikinews policies and guidelines, however most policy is suggested, and based on the accepted practices of the day on Wikinews, often these might not yet be written down. This section of the Water cooler focuses on discussions regarding policy issues.

You may wish to check the archives to see if a subject has been raised previously.

Arbitration Committee proposal and discussion

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This has been relocated to Wikinews:Water cooler/policy/ArbCom discussion.

Requests for De-administratorship proposal and discussion

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This has been relocated to Wikinews:Water cooler/policy/RfDa discussion.

Policy proposal Re; Time limit for Administrators

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put forth by Paulrevere2005 19:00, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

This is an urgent issue that must be addressed now,imo, because an integral condition for exercising administrative authority here on wikinews is stipulated to be "You are trusted by the community"[1].

I have designed a very simple policy proposal. Our past attempts at dealing with this sensitive issue(e.g.ArbCom proposals) have been unsuccessful,imo, because of their complicatedness. I would simply ask, if possible, that this proposal be given an "up or down" vote (with associated comments of course). Any attempt to complicate OR DELAY IT (especially by existing administrators) could be seen as suspicious behavior, I think. Administrators who have the community's trust have nothing to fear with this proposal.

Proposal;

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1. As of Feb.1,2006, adminships will be for a 1 year term.
2. All existing non-Bureaucrat adminships will terminate Feb. 1st. 2006.
3.Nominations for renewal of existing adminships will begin on January 24th.

SUPPORT;

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OPPOSE;

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  • Oppose. This is an an all-or-nothing proposal that will do damage to Wikinews. All admins are to be de-adminned on the same day opening the wiki to utter chaos that the bureaucrats simply don't have the time to deal with. Nobody in their right mind would accept a nomination for adminship if this proposal was passed because they'd become the people who would, in whatever small numbers you can gather in that time, have to deal with a great deal more work to protect from vandalism and POV pushing. Brian McNeil / talk 19:16, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Brian, please allow me to explain. Since the renewel nominations begin Jan.24th. the renewed admins would all be on-board by Feb.1st. Think of it as renewal of a contract; the discussion occurrs before the expiration date of the existing contract. I hope you will reconsider and,perhaps, tone down your alarmist language above in light of this explanation. Conceivably, we could have exactly the same Admins on Feb. 2nd as we have today; if that is what the community wants. Administrators who have the community's trust have nothing to fear with this proposal. Paulrevere2005 20:02, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. I don't know what's up with this whole "Admin's are evil, let's throw them overboard!", but it's getting really old and really irritating. I don't mind if you have any actionable objections, but you are treating the administrators without the respect they deserve: the exact same as other contributors. Continuing the notions that they are evil people doesn't help the project any, and neither does continually putting things to vote. --MrMiscellanious (talk) (contribs) 00:36, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Based what has transpired recently I can see why this is happening quite easily (as for explaining it - not so easy) Bawolff ☺☻  07:24, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

COMMENTS;

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What problem does this proposal solve/help slove? Admins are just normal users with a few extra buttons. Adminship is really no big deal. Almost any action an admin takes can be undone by a different admin or in some cases any other user. --Cspurrier 19:01, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
This seems like a strong way to approach a problem I don't believe I see. I don't think we've discussed this proposal enough before voting on it, and honestly it seems a bit of a reaction to your Rfda proposal not receiving the support you wanted. It's also a bit underhanded to specifically only post a link to this page on the talk pages of exactly the same list of people as those who supported the Rfda for MrM. -- IlyaHaykinson 19:22, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Ilya, I am a bit surprised, I just had a bite to eat and will now resume sending notices to the more active contributors; I am somewhat restricted in computer time because of health issues. Of course, anyone else is free to notify anyone they wish I imagine. Also, the Rfda showed me that the Rfda process is too adversarial and creates bitter personal comments and possibly polarizing effects (9 supporters were non-admins; 6 opposed were admins); the Rfda process will still exist for those rare instances where it is warrented. This new policy would, imo, do no harm at all and,perhaps, give us all a nice fresh start on Feb.1,2006, even if we have exactly the same admins that we have now. A vote of confidence and trust never hurt anyone,imo. I truly hope you will consider supporting this policy and there is no time limit on it so discussion can continue until the community feels it has been adequately discussed. But there is no reason to prohibit votes as they can always be changed(and often are) here on wikinews. Paulrevere2005 20:15, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
As much as I understand the reasons why this has came to a vote so fast. (Delay and complicate is a problem), meta:Polls are evil pretty much sums up my opinion. Although we have to do something, and I believe this is one possible route we could go down, I don't think we should vote yet. Bawolff ☺☻  22:54, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Now that I'm suspicious :) I changed all the proposal/comment/support/oppose things to headings, because I like headings. Hope you don't mind. by the way, the main problem I see is lack of Adequate dispute resolution. Bawolff ☺☻  23:19, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Note If you absolutly make me vote right now I would vote yes, as something needs to be done. owever I'd prefer some other way and I don't think all at once would be a good idea. (I predict 20 some votes all at once, and a masive vandal attack.) Bawolff ☺☻  01:44, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
CSpurrier, I think someone once even said that basically anyone who contributes sensibly for a short time -- ie is visibly not a vandal -- should be given admin privs - since the idea of a wiki is that all readers are editors and authors by default. But that hasn't happened here in reality, the politicisation of the few admin positions is overwhelming. This is the first sensible suggestion I have seen to resolve a current problem here, which is that the few admins there are are very chummy, and i think very clearly favour some types of contributions and disrespect users who make contributions that they do not like. View numbers are down, I don't think that is coincidence, the infighting is quite repulsive. A regular vote may be a good way to get people who normally keep to themselves to express an opinion, even as little as a yay or nay, regarding admins here. Personally, I would suggest quarterly re-elections. Simeon 00:40, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I would rather encourage folks to nominate others for adminship -- there were frequent nominations there for a while but they seem to have slacked off... --Chiacomo (talk) 00:43, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
  • There is alot of things to be adressed and discussed about the organisation, here on wikinews. Im really worried about the signs of elitism among the administrators. The demography of the voters in the final result of RfDA against Mrm [2] is alarming. Total polarization between users with and without administrators powers.
After some thinking about what to do I would have suggest a discussion before the votingprocess as a part of consensusbuilding but this suggested policy make a fair compromiss of what I might have suggested and a statusquo opinion.
But the best with this poll is that it bring up the issue to discussion, a very importent discussion for every comunity based on voluntarily efforts. As Wikinews may be called an informal meritocracy everyone with formal authority must be highly trusted by the community. Administrators should be janitors, not a junta, as Rcameronw formulated it.
I find the biggest problem with elected authorities is that they usually is hard to remowe if they show themself unsuitable for the given assignment or act in a way that electors lose their faith in them. Without a more finetuned way to solve this problem I support Paulrevere2005:s proposal. International 23:11, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
What is most interesting to me is that apparently, most of our contributors don't care... --Chiacomo (talk) 23:28, 19 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Question: If we must do something like this (and I don't necessarily oppose it), why not hold confirmation votes in classes, much like Meta does? Also, why don't we encourage simple voting (with nothing but a brief comment accompanying the vote) rather than the long rants we've recently observed -- this would prevent some of the vitriol, I think. Extended discussion can take place on the WN:A talk page. --Chiacomo (talk) 00:36, 20 December 2005 (UTC) update... see Meta:Meta:Administrators/confirm and Meta:Meta:Administrator --Chiacomo (talk) 01:52, 20 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
2. All existing non-Bureaucrat adminships will terminate Feb. 1st. 2006. I dont agree with this date. We would be better off just checking back at the date they where originally admin'ed and add one year :) I suppose if a admin is a older then a year by then, maybe that date. --Whywhywhy 14:45, 21 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Comment: I think it's safe to say the current actions being taken, if the whole administrator team is dismissed, Wikinews will not only fall to spambots, vandals, or malicious users - it will also fall to users who not only ignore the NPOV policy, but wish to destroy it completely. Getting rid of all administrators only means that Wikinews will fall to those who wish to exploit wiki to its fullest extent - manipulating it for their own personal forums, advertising on a non-profit website, the whole nine yards. One day makes a big difference. One day could plaster the whole site with advertisements from spambots. One day could allow all the members of the GNAA, WoW and other troublesome "organizations" who have proven their destruction of all Wikimedia projects and philosophies. Safe to say as well, if you do plan to go along with this, you are most certainly driving people away, those who wish to have an ad-free, spam-free, NPOV experience. By putting them up to 'vote' or questioning their ability to "run this site", as many of you claim, is not only disrespectful, it is utmost insulting. If the de-admin process hasn't worked yet, that means this site picks their administrators fairly. Furthermore, I don't know anyone who would volunteer to be an admin for only a year. Call this disruptive, call it whatever you want - but I honestly think that this continuous call for administrators to step down is really showing what some users are made of; whatever they feel is unfair, they round up a posse and start drafting ideas to get people out. If there was a campaign for users to only be users for one year, I don't think anyone would be supportive of that - and there's no reason why they should of administrators, either. --MrMiscellanious (talk) (contribs) 00:15, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

  • No! This is baised speculation, rethoric that is far from fair but fairly talking in it self. Who says all administrators will be dismissed, not administrated again? I think you deliberate missinterpretate Paulrevere2005s proposal. You are manipulatve in bring the focus away from the question of comunitys trust in the users given administrator priviledges to a ... insult to users and wikinews community. International 17:57, 22 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
There's your problem user Mrmiscellanious. You don't think of yourself as a user. You are a user first, admin second. You are not entitled to be admin, it's a privilege. The problem is that some admins act without consulting talk pages or community very much, and often bring the hammer down to get what they want. This is simply a proposal to add a check to that power. If you think this is a bad idea, come up with an alternative check. --MateoP 01:57, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
You're right, I don't see myself as a user - because simply when I try to be a user, I get listed for de-admin because admins can't simply be editors, now can they? "Adminship" should only be revoked when it is in violation of the blocking policy, and when there is absolutely no good faith to be assumed from it. If you are having a problem how an admin edits, put it up on WN:ALERT and ask for a short block. That's what editors deserve when they go on the fritz, and it should be no different for admins. We're here to take care of spam, and add categories to protected articles. Not a whole lot more than that. Almost everything I've seen the RfdA's consist of were how the admins edited Wikinews; it wasn't a violation of policy. If you don't like how someone edits the wiki, it's tough luck - it is a wiki. But if there is a consensus, then it should be brought before the community. But having this large "you shouldn't be afraid to vote yes for this" pressure on people is very immature to the users who are doing this; and saying you will call disruption on an opposition to a proposal is more harmful than anything I can think of. I am not afraid to vote no for this, and you shouldn't be telling people what to vote for here. If admin's need to have their sysop status removed, it better be for a large policy violation and not how they edit the wiki - that's unfairly punishing them. As users. --MrMiscellanious – Happy Hanukkah – 15:29, 30 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Comment The limiting of admin terms isn't likely to be profitable to the community. However, I can imagine recruiting more admins and placing all admins on a "rotation". But does rotation solve anything not solved by just increasing the number of admins and/or Ilya's eventual dispute resolution system? Admins are meant to be users with mops. Improving our dispute resolution system is the best solution. Nyarlathotep 19:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

changes in style guide

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a recent change [3] in the style guide has added the following statement which i think needs a broader scrutiny by the community.

As from time to time, sources may get information "wrong", or it is incorrect, it is recommended that you find multiple sources on an issue, and fact check against them before writing your article.

there are some problems with the statement

  • it doesn't belong in the style guide, belongs in the content guide, if at all.
  • "wrong" and "incorrect" are vague terms, who decides if claims by news sources are wrong? it has been insisted elsewhere (in article talk pages) that the criterion for correctness is an official statement from state bodies, which, in my opinion, is highly npov.
  • while i have no problems with trying to find multiple sources for statements in articles, there are many stories which are broken by one news source, and insisting on multiple sources can be an easy way to delay or prevent publication of such stories on wikinews.
  • "fact check"? what exactly does this involve? fact checking also flies in the face of wiki original research guidelines.

i think these issues need to be resolved before such changes are made to wikinews policies and guidelines. Doldrums 19:16, 27 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that it belongs more in the content guide. However I disagree with the rest of the points:
  • Wrong and incorrect are potentially very exact terms when dealing with facts. What is the atomic mass of an element? What is the orbital distance of Pluto around the Sun? Those are facts that are easy to get drastically wrong; some sources we've used have gotten these kinds of things wrong.
  • The phrasing says "recommended"; this is not the same as "insisting on multiple sources".
  • While Wikipedia has a "no original research" clause, on Wikinews we do allow it and highly encourage it via Wikinews Original Reporting.
I support this change to the guidelines, though I'd also support a move of the change to the content guide. -- IlyaHaykinson 23:09, 27 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
agree that multiple sources & fact-checking are desirable and that certain "desk reference" facts are easy to verify. but there are stories where
  • a single news organisation breaks the story, (others merely report what this source says)
  • the story is based on interviews with confidential sources,
  • story concerns covert operations,
...etc where multiple sources and corroboration is difficult or impossible to achieve. further, the desirability of corroboration and thorough fact-checks must be weighed against the need to publish stories within a reasonable time period following the news event.
to reflect this, suggest rewording to (change emphasized)
To help guard against possible mistakes by news sources, editors are encouraged to find multiple sources on an issue, and fact-check those sources.
a further statement can be added emphasizing the need to fact-check the "desk-reference" facts.
Doldrums 11:25, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, its not a good idea as written. Wikinews should not *require* original research. We must allow people to just NPOV a news article they find and publish it. We are already chassing off n00bs with requirments. I've rewitten it to capture the NPOV spirit without comming off like a rule. Nyarlathotep 18:14, 13 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Policy needed re;Amgine's "Dragnet" Blocks

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I agree with Ed; in fact I was updating the running list[4] at the top 'til I found most users were bottom fishing. But Ed, I don't think this is enough of a wiki to manage such a radical change (even if desired by most). Neutralizer 04:12, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

As an alternatived, one could try archiving faster somehow. Nyarlathotep 04:21, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

OTOH, we have plenty of discussions which arn't going anyplace.  :) Nyarlathotep 04:21, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Edbrown05, Your War on Scroll is pretty funny, but I don't think your going to win. Nyarlathotep 04:21, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Got sumthin to say, get up top. -Edbrown05 00:29, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

It's too USA... how do I stick my tongue out? -Edbrown05 00:23, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

But the MeteoP eurocentric argumentativness won't touch that ... -Edbrown05 00:22, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Like I really wanna see what this scroll said way down where...-Edbrown05 00:18, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

New "news" belongs on top. Where the world will see it... instead of scrolling down like ... don't make me go there... -Edbrown05 00:16, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Curiosity got the best of me, What are you talking about? Bawolff ☺☻  07:22, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Special:Log/block

I sincerely hope the administrative team will insist upon proof of sockpuppeting here at wikinews as Amgine may be trying to punish someone here for something that happened at wiktionary where he is also accusing people of sockpuppeting. Please don't forget Amgine often is wrong with his sockpuppet allegations;As we've seen before with the Vonbergm and EdBrown accusations,[5][6]. Also, I hope something can be done to stop these types of dragnet blocks as many innocent wikinewsies are likely being blocked for no reason at all. Neutralizer 20:40, 27 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I have unblocked those address (the ones that hadn't been unblocked already) as Amgine didn't provide anty proof of sockpuppetting. Bawolff ☺☻  20:49, 27 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I suggest we establish a policy prohibiting such blanket blocks. Sympatico is part of the Bell network and is a HUGE ISP in Montreal and Toronto. I would guess over a million innocent people were banned by this latest episode; and the perpetrator of this disruption should,perhaps, be reprimanded in some way,I think. At least that's my opinion. Neutralizer 05:22, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. Why won't he step forth and speak for himself?--MateoP 05:24, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Amgine is on an extended cross-country road-trip, but he should be returning soon, I think. I'm checking on the relationship between blocked IPs and registered users. I'll report back in a few. --Chiacomo (talk) 05:31, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
As a test, I blocked the entire class C (.0/24) that my IP address is in -- when blocked, I could not edit, even though I was logged in. I don't know if this is a feature or a problem, but it appears that when a range is blocked, all users attempting to edit from that range whether registered and logged in or not are unable to edit. I would point out that entire ranges of addresses MUST somtimes blocked. I think, perhaps, this is a misunderstanding on Amgine's part in thinking that registered users could still edit even when the range is blocked -- there has been some discussion of enabling such a feature in MediaWiki I think. --Chiacomo (talk) 05:38, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks,Chiacomo for the technical update. I guess what that means is that many,many innocent registered users were affected. So, I suppose that exposes 2 situations to deal with from a policy perspective; One being whether our admins should be applying such dragnet blocks without really hard and specific evidence and the other being the technical aspect. Do you think you could make use of your friendship with Amgine to persuade him to calm down with the sockpuppet allegations ?[7][8]. It's starting to look a bit phobiaish,imo. Or at the very least, have some acceptable proof of sockpuppetry here on wikinews before applying blocks. His last message on his talk page raises a new concern which is that he is now talking about and bringing to Wikinews his own personal conflicts on his many other wiki/journal type projects...and that, in my opinion, is the very last thing we need to be wasting time on here at wikinews; we've had enough conflict of our own and I, for one, now want to just go back to writing articles 100% of my time so unless he keeps finding evermore creative ways of blocking me; I will be of no more trouble to him at all (e.g.I have given up entirely on rfdas etc.) Lets all just have some wikipeace; but maybe we do have to address the dragnet blocking as a policy issue because of the effect on so many innocent users (registered or not).Neutralizer 15:23, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
As a note, I yesterday blocked an entire range of IPs from Spain which have been the source of much Wikispam. It is my HOPE that a legitimate user will complain to us and their ISP so we can get some response from their abuse department -- as I've had not luck in contacting them. I think it's too late to be concerned about bleed-over from other projects as Amgine's most recent RfDA here at Wikinews and his RfA on Wiktionary show. He's extremely active on many of the least active projects (reverting spam and vandalism) and has worked tirelessly to establish new Wikinews projects in other languages -- he should be commended for his dedication. All this activity, of course, will produce some conflict from time to time and we've seen that spillover here to en.Wikinews. I really would like to see Neutralizer and Amgine "bury the hatchet" (and not in each other). Let's all take a breath and understand that he did have reasons for his actions as it could appear that there has been some sock-puppetry (I love that word) afoot. I have satisified myself, however, that at the very worst, we've seen some meat-puppetry rathan socks (and meat-puppets are part of the Wiki-way, sort of). --Chiacomo (talk) 15:38, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I wholeheartedly agree and embrace your assessment,Chiacomo, here are 3 links [9][10][11] which hopefully indicate I have begun to implement suggestions that I concentrate on articles and reject conflicts. Neutralizer 15:55, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Also this peace pipe;[12] Neutralizer 23:11, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Disagree. There is never an excuse to block an entire range and therefore block potentially thousands of innocents. --MateoP 23:38, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Clarification; I don't agree with the range blocking- that is indefencable imo, I do agree with the suggestion that Amgine and I kiss and make up. Neutralizer 14:43, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I wish Chiacomo would quit making sense... all the time that happens... -Edbrown05 23:24, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

lol, indeed :) --Deprifry|+T+ 23:29, 28 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

There came MateoP, (out of order), because Haiti is out of whack. I actually think all new posts should be on the top of the discussion, because maybe I think new "news" comes first.

But I am sure that ideas are a "ever-mind". And as to the objection, valid. Nothing is known until the unknown is pushed. -Edbrown05 00:03, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]

I never could understand, upon my first brush with Wikinnews, why a discussion post would come at the bottom of the page. That's where the whales do their business. -Edbrown05 00:12, 29 December 2005 (UTC)[reply]
New issues go to bottom because thats where the post a new section feature of mediawiki puts 'em. Bawolff ☺☻  07:24, 1 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Adminship

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There is no set-in-stone policy for how many votes are necessary for adminship. Currently it is done by vote, where the bureaucrats get to make the final choice. The bureaucrat gets to decide whether or not they believe consensus has been reached.

This could vary from anywhere between 51% to 80% depending on the bureaucrat and the person up for adminship. This policy is unfair to all parties. It is unfair for the person up for adminship who might get unlucky and run into a bureaucrat who is more strict on their definition of consensus. It is unfair to the bureaucrat who is forced to make tough judgment calls on whether the community trusts a person or not. And lastly it's unfair on the community whom the decision is taken out of their hands.

This is not a poll - This is a discussion on what should be done so that he community gets to decide what its will is.

  • Acknowledges that consensus as defined on Meta can not apply to adminship, as compromise is not possible. It is possible for users to "agree to disagree" or "respectfully give in" but this isn't the same as a compromising form of consensus. It works in article talk pages; it doesn't here.

Include comments and suggest in the area below the line.

  • I believe that some numerical value is the only possible way to reach community consensus without giving bureaucrats the ability to decide for themselves. With that being the case, I'd chose a numerical value. I would say that 80% is a good number, but could work around that number through compromise here. --MateoP 01:43, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • maybe, a numerical value, will do, but lets not set in in stone. anywere around 70%-80% in an RfA should be fine. But as long as its not less than 70%.
    • Just for clarification, I'm having trouble understanding what you mean. And so other users will understand better... Are you saying that anything about 70% is fine? Or that anything within the range of 70%-80% then goes to the hand of the bureaucrat? That would mean that anything below 70% is automatically no-consensus and anything above 80% is automatically consensus and only that within those two numbers is able to be decided by bureaucrats. Is this a correct assessment of what you mean? I don't want to misinterpret your words, before we carry on. --MateoP 02:48, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
      • For the removed of doubt: anything within the range of 70%-80% it then is up to a bureaucrat; to decide on it; keep going, or wind the RfA up. If it is over 80% consensus has been reached and a bureaucrat is to be made into an admin.
        And if it is below 70% it becomes automatically no-consensus, however at the bureaucrats; decision; the RfA and be continued, until consensus has been reached, either, support, or oppose. Hope that clears it up. Brian New Zealand 03:38, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thats sounds fair to me. Bawolff ☺☻  03:41, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I don't like this idea. It just seems to make vagueness an official policy. Anyone between 70-80 percent gets decided by bureaucrats, and anyone below 70% (how low?) can have their RFA continued at the arbitrary decision of the bureaucrat? That seems to give them even more power than they currently have. It allows then to continue RFAs which are below even a simple majority, something which they would currently not do without looking like fools.

This seems to take the decision away from the community too much. It also is unfair to potential admins. There needs to be a hard and fast rule that prevents people from being able to complain about biases. I don't think bureaucrats should have any say in this, aside from the say that they have as regular users. --MateoP 05:06, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]


How about this instead, as a compromise for what user Brian New Zealand suggested. Anything over 80% is automatic consensus. Anything below 70% is automatic no-consensus. Anything between 75-80 percent is up to bureaucrats to decide if there is consensus. Anything from 70-75 percent is up to bureaucrats to decide whether or not the RFA should continue. I think that is a fair compromise. --MateoP 18:04, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I would disagree with this change to policy, it is a solution in search of a problem. Bureaucrats are elected to help decide if consensus exists. We have several bureaucrats to help if there is any doubt consensus exists. If a person is denied adminship by one bureaucrat due to a believed lack of consensus they may ask either of the other two bureaucrats. If there is a somewhat weak consensus I would suggest admining the person anyways unless there is a lot of opposition (imo anyone with less then ~65% support should never be admined) or the oppose votes are based on a lack of trust(imo a vote for adminship should be based upon trust nothing else). Andminship is not a big deal, there is nothing an admin can do that can not be quickly undone. --Cspurrier 18:48, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
Currently the system is set up so that it is very easy for a person to become an admin and very difficult for a person to lose adminship. That's a recipe for disaster.
Currently admins have a great deal of power because there is low oversight of their actions and policy is worded very vaguely which allows them to do mostly as they wish. Until this is changed either through an increase in users and/or through more restrictions in policy, it should be difficult to become an admin and easy to lose it. This is simply a matter of checks and balances. I believe my above proposal is a good compromise for which myself, user Brian New Zealand and user Bawolff have been discussing.--MateoP 18:57, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I think that is a fair compromise, of what I proposed before. However should there be a change to policy? That is the question that needs to be asked? Are their cases where; a bureaucrat has made an admin without community support (i.e. less than 74 or 75 %) ?
As it stands, should/if there is an change in policy, the one proposed , is what it should be.
As was said before Adminship is no big deal. But still we don’t want the wrong person/people, to become admin.

Also even through I am fairly new, to wikinews, I am yet to see, an admin (new or old) abuse his/her power, and anyway if you think and admin has done wrong (yet to see) most of the day, the wikinews IRC channel has admins and regular users, on it. So you could go and talk about what happened, if there was wrong. I can not speak for them, but I am fairly sure, one of them will fix it.

Even so, I do think that it would be in good idea to have an set-in-stone policy. But let any numbers be moveable, i.e. if someone had 74.5% support let that through.

Well that’s all I can think of tonight. Brian New Zealand 10:13, 3 January 2006 (UTC) PS If I can be convinced otherwise, I will be more than happy to change my opinion [reply]

Well according to Meta, bureacrats are only supposed to have the technical power to grant adminship. That means they are the button pushers. But they don't decide whether or not the button is pushed, understand? Giving them this huge range of decide making (anywhere from 50-80) takes away power from the community, which is who deserves it. It makes a hierarchical structure that is anti-wiki.

Movable numbers creates a Sorites Paradox. If you're going to grant 74.5 now, who not 74.0? That wouldn't be fair. Then why not 73.5 and then 73.0? See the point? Set-in-stone numbers is the only way that no one can complain. --MateoP 15:53, 3 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Blocking policy page

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The following line is not only vague, but gives admins unlimited power to block whoever they can claim are "trouble-makers" or are "not contributing to our goals". This allows for blocking abuse.

Are trouble-makers who are not contributing to our goals.

I think this is an easy remove, but let's discuss it first. --MateoP 19:41, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

That sounds like a good idea, but I'm more or less neutraal either way. Bawolff ☺☻  08:31, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I think that through precedence, there has been enough examples for administrators to realize (quite easily) what is and what isn't disruptive. I don't see how this is blocking abuse - Wikinews does have goals, and some users are here to do almost everything in their power to make it work for them, and not for the goals. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 04:20, 11 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
can u list/point to those "goals". i must say i have little faith in the ability of administrators who don't know the difference between style and content, to "realise" (by divine insight?) what is a contribution and what is disruption. wiki policies are are meant to be formulated by consensus and implemented by rules, not by the favour and wrath of a bunch of courtiers. i have still less faith in "precedence" which has, for instance, established that admin abuse such as wrongful blocking attracts no penalty whatsoever.
i stand against any attempts to word wiki polices vaguely and give admins the discretion to rule on them and then use that ruling to penalise other editors. Doldrums 09:04, 11 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
If you honestly cannot find a "goal" in Wikinews, I'd honestly have to ask you the question of "why are you here?". To quote the about page:
Quote
We strive at all times to meet the policy of using neutral point of view, ensuring our reporting is as fair as possible. Furthermore, everything we write is cited, to maintain the highest standards of reliability.
Those are the goals. Not only do the changes in the style guide reflect this goal, but so does this statement. So, as to your "admin abuse" attack, I will state that everything you have tried to bring up as an attack is well documented in site policy and guideline. So, please, stop trying to stir a crowd. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 21:11, 11 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

the "goals" u point to are part of core wikinews policy. the blocking policy already provides for blocking users who

Excessively and consistently break site policy. Admins should only do this as a last resort - efforts to educate must be made first, followed by warnings.

so please explain the need for an additional "troublemakers" rule, one that doesn't carry the safeguards against admin abuse that the above rule does, to address the same violations.

[aside to mrm, if you want to discuss ur edits to the style guide, i believe there's a thread elsewhere on this page.] Doldrums 08:33, 12 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

You're not making any sense in this discussion. You ask what the goals are, then you say they are just policy. I quite frankly am not understanding this. The goal of Wikinews is to provide NPOV news that is factually correct that anyone can edit. Those are the goals; that's what they always have been, that's what they'll always be. --MrMiscellanious (talk) – 21:28, 12 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

mrm, what exactly don't u understand? u claim that a rule is needed to block users who "make trouble" and "don't contribute to goals". when asked what it means to "make trouble" and "not contribute to goals", u say it means not upholding npov and not citing sources. there are already plenty of ways to address violations of these "goals", from pointing out policies to newbies, tagging & reversion of articles to blocking users who persistently & excessively violate these policies. when all these rules already exist, i want to know why another vaguely worded rule is needed to do exactly what all those other rules do.
finally, i must ask you to stick to discussing the topic at hand. water cooler/policy is not the place to talk about what u "honestly want to ask me" and whether u think i "make any sense". Doldrums 08:12, 13 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Country names in articles

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Should country names be included in articles when they are about:

  • Politicians
  • Cities

Discussion

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  • If anyone says they don't know it, that's a pretty good indication it isn't known worldwide. If everyone says they do know where it is, that a good indication that it is known worldwide. StuRat 01:03, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • No place is known by everyone, so that's no good. you're always going to find someone who's unaware of a place. according to surveys, most people from the U.S. can't point out the U.S. on a map. --MateoP 01:13, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • You're exagerating. I'm sure their are some people in any country which can't locate their own nation on a map. However, anyone who reads a newspaper, online or not, is unlikely to be that ignorant. That is why the opinions of the readers of an article should be used as the standard for whether the place is known well enough to omit it's country name. If any say it isn't, then the name of the country should be added. StuRat 01:28, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
At this point in the discussion, I would like the participants to consider taking a break for tea, and cool off for a short while. - Amgine | talk en.WN 01:34, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • Country names should only be included if the article is of clear international interest. Rapes in some city in Mexico and occurances in the Australian parliament are not, and therefore the titles should not be cluttered up with unnecessary words. - Borofkin 01:12, 4 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]
  • I would agree with this policy if and when we divide articles up by region and only put articles of worldwide interest on the main page. But, for now, since everybody has to look at the title, it should be meaningful to everyone. You can actually make an article local only, by adding [[Category: Local only]]. I don't think your article on the murder suspects in Mexico should be considered local only, though, since I have heard the story on US news (which identified the country in the title, of course). 01:24, 4 January 2006 (UTC) -- posted by User:StuRat
I'm not sure its feasible to say whether an article has international interest or not, partly due to our questionable understanding of the impact of "globalization", but also due to general human curiosity. I think the distinction between "local news" vs. "global news" is merely a matter of presentation, i.e. choice of intended of audience. And I feel you should judge a given audiences knowledge base by existing news targeted at that audience, an fairly objective criteria.
But we've stumbled upon one serious wiki-problem here. Who is to say what target audience is "better"? I currently generally feel that international audience is always preferable. But such a view is based mostly upon the small size of wikinews. And such a view naturally becomes less and less valid as wikinews grows. And some valued contributors currently disagree with this view.
So I suggest two things:
  1. Everyone should respect the rights of a [[Category:Local only]] article to assume local knowledge, i.e. its best to ask on the talk page before retitling or rewriting a [[Category:Local only]] article for an international audience.
  2. Authors who get offended by the "internationalization" of their articles or titles should istead view such modifications as: others attempting to push my article on a more international audience, not necessarily for the benifit of the article, which may get tied up in details, but at least for the benifit of wikinews. I'm not saying you should agree with them, just recognize that their aims were noble.
Ideally, such debates should take the form: A writes an article assuming local knowedge & tags it [[Category:Local only]]; B asks if we can change the title & remove the [[Category:Local only]]; if A refuses, then B begs by saying how its such a nice article; etc.  :) B may choose to develop an international version in a subpage, as proof that the internationalized version won't suck. Nyarlathotep 18:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

To answer MateoP's original question: Why not try to use google searches on proper nouns in the title? People will generally be confused if google is confused. People will also be confused if your title contains no proper nouns.

For example, the first two hits on a search for Jersey identify the British island, while only the third mistakenly identifies New Jersey. So a title about Jersey, UK, might reasonable say just Jersey, while a title about New Jersey, USA should say New Jersey. However, a [[Category:Local only]] title about New Jersey, USA could say just Jersey.

OTOH, I feel Australians should be permitted to say "Oz", even though google doesn't place Australian very high in the results (note: no preceding results refer to real places). Mehh. Nyarlathotep 18:10, 7 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

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