Wikinews talk:Permission expiry policy

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Proposed change to the inactivity period

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In light of the proposed removal of bureaucrat privileges from three users today, I propose that we change the privilege expiry policy.

• The current policy is too restrictive in my honest opinion.
• At the very least, the inactive period should be 1 year, as shown in option 1.
• However, when the stewards carry out administrative activity reviews for many wikis, the maximum allowed period of inactivity without community review is 2 years.
• Given that this wiki is not as large as others, I suggest we go for option 2, where all of the requirements would be increased to two years.

Current policy

Privilege	Status	action to be taken
Bureaucrat	No edits past nine months	Request steward downgrade to admin[1]
Administrator	No edits past nine months	Downgraded to 'normal' user
Either of the above	No use of either priv in past 12 months	Downgraded, or privilege removed[1]
Reviewer	No reviewer actions past 12 months[2]	Reviewer privilege removed
Accredited	No edits past nine months	Accreditation revoked

Option 1

Privilege	Status	action to be taken
Bureaucrat	No edits past 12 months	Request steward downgrade to admin[1]
Administrator	No edits past 12 months	Downgraded to 'normal' user
Either of the above	No use of either priv in past 12 months	Downgraded, or privilege removed[1]
Reviewer	No reviewer actions past 12 months[2]	Reviewer privilege removed
Accredited	No edits past 12 months	Accreditation revoked

Option 2

Privilege	Status	action to be taken
Bureaucrat	No edits past 2 years	Request steward downgrade to admin[1]
Administrator	No edits past 2 years	Downgraded to 'normal' user
Either of the above	No use of either priv in past 2 years	Downgraded, or privilege removed[1]
Reviewer	No reviewer actions past 2 years[2]	Reviewer privilege removed
Accredited	No edits past 2 years	Accreditation revoked

1. Once a bureaucrat is downgraded to administrator, the clock starts for inactivity as an administrator.
2. A not-ready review via the Easy Peer Review tool is a reviewer action, although it does not appear in Special:Log/review.
3. Users in the CheckUser and Oversight user groups are currently excluded from this policy.

I have deliberately not included any vote sections yet, in order to allow discussion to take place first. --Cromium (talk) 03:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

• Comment Two thoughts.

• Given the nature of the policy, I suggest tweaking the wording of the rightmost column heading from "action to be taken" to "action allowed" (doesn't actually change the meaning, as the sentence at the top of the policy governs, but may be clearer).
• Although I have no concerns going to 2 years on most of these privs, I'm not so sure about reviewer, which is a highly technical skill requiring the user to be very currently in-touch with what they're doing.

I may propose, after pausing to be sure of my step, an option three. --Pi zero (talk) 04:01, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

An option 3 would be welcome. The phrase "action allowed" would suggest it can be decided that privileges do not need to be removed. The question then is how such a decision is reached. My first instinct is it could be done in a similar way to how the privilege was gained e.g. a discussion for perhaps seven days to gauge what regular contributors and the inactive user think? --Green Giant (talk) 18:54, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

For reviewers I'm not sure about differentiating the inactivity period for reviewers because part of the motive behind this proposal is to give maximum allowable leeway for inactive users. I understand the rust problem but I think that makes more sense if the inactive user has barely user the reviewer tool or not at all. It it’s an experienced reviewer, I suspect they would become proficient again quite quickly. --Green Giant (talk) 18:54, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

As an afterthought I’m going to suggest we add bots to the table. Operating such an account should be treated as a privilege and lack of use over a defined period should be grounds for removal. --Green Giant (talk) 18:54, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

• Brian and Skenmy have made no edits in over 2 years, and should be desysopped under both current policy and the new one. Brian_McNeil has made edits in the last 2 years, but not in the last 9 months, and is clearly inactive, and should be desysopped per the current policy (if a new policy is adopted and made retroactive, can be resysopped). --DannyS712 (talk) 19:47, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
• It would seem reasonable to use option three, to me, here; news writing is a big commitment, time wise, which requires having large uninterrupted time slots. Sometimes reasonably experienced contributors disappear because of family commitments, and it is more difficult for them to come back to Wikinews than another wiki. I would support two year expiry here, an increase from the current time frames. --Gryllida (talk) 11:02, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Votes

Option 1

Option 2

• Support for maximum flexibility. --Cromium (talk) 00:36, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

Keep the current limits

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• I’m going to change it to Option 2 until an objection is raised. [₂₄Cr][talk] 00:04, 1 September 2021 (UTC)

Proposed change to notification

{{flag}} This is a separate proposal to change the notification requirement. It does not currently require the notification even after removal has happened. Instead, in light of the above section, I propose we add a compulsory notification requirement.

Current wording

To avoid conflict, a note should be left on the talk page of any user who loses privileges under the policy. This should explain the privilege has been revoked due to lack of use; not as a reflection of, or comment on, the user's standing in the community. See: {{PeP applied}}; feel free to add a personalised encouragement for people to re-involve themselves when using this template.

Proposed wording

A note must be left on the talk page of any user who could lose privileges under the policy, at least one month before the request for removal of privileges. This should explain the privilege may be revoked due to lack of use; not as a reflection of, or comment on, the user's standing in the community. If the privileges are removed, the summary in the user rights log should state that the removal is purely procedural. See: {{PeP applied}} for after removal of privileges; feel free to add a personalised encouragement for people to re-involve themselves when using this template.

As above, I’ve not created a vote section yet to enable discussion. --Cromium (talk) 03:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Discussion

• Comment

• Not for reviewer. Expiry of the reviewer priv is about a user having gotten rusty on the project, not about individual sentiment.
• For crat, this might makes sense, yes.

I'm going to want to give this some more thought, before making a specific recommendation. --Pi zero (talk) 04:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

• I am not sure a notification like this would be helpful. If I was in such a situation and got a warning of privilege expiry one month beforehand, I would possibly make an edit or two (i.e. stay active for this one month) and then family/work/another commitment would possibly make me inactive again. How could this possibly be avoided? Notifying of privilege expiry after it occurred partially resolves the problem, as the contributor can contribute for some time, after losing the privilege, and re-apply only if their other commitments allow to continue their work in their privileged capacity.

This is just the first thought; I have not seen how this is done at other wikis. --Gryllida (talk) 11:09, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Votes

• Support --Cromium (talk) 00:38, 13 August 2021 (UTC)

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• Withdrawn for possible rethink. [₂₄Cr][talk] 00:13, 1 September 2021 (UTC)