Wikipedia talk:Ignore all rules/Archive 1

message: The point is fulfillment, fun , a sense of contribution. Too many rules tend to choke this out.--Jondel 07:48, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Fun-Fulfillment

message: Shouldn't the title be changed to "Ignore rules when necessary". "Ignore all rules" could be used by people vandalizing Wikipedia. <FONT COLOR="#00AA00">тə</FONT><FONT COLOR="#00CC00">zє</FONT><FONT COLOR="#00FF00">ті</FONT> 18:52, Mar 25, 2005 (UTC)
:You've just made the mistake of reading the rule too literally. Part of the purpose of having such a guideline is to remind people not to be excessively literal in following the letter, rather than the spirit, of the rules. --Michael Snow 20:37, 25 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Title

message: After reading some of the discussion above, perhaps a more agreeable rule is this one:
:Enforce rules gently.
In other words, don't attack people who don't bold their article title or name an article with a verb. Just fix it for them and drop them a friendly reminder if warranted. I think this has much of the desired effect of this rule (you can edit without fear) without its strange connontations of encouraging rampant rulebreaking. Deco 05:40, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Or Give some kind of first warning(?) The second or third (or fourth )administrators are ussually ruthless or bold. I'm sure everybody follows rules more or less and will do something to prevent wikipedia from devolving to anarchy.--Jondel 05:59, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: Concur with Snowspinner. Note that the implication is "Ignore all rules... even this one." It's not promoting anarchy, it's promoting common sense: policies and guidelines are good and necessary, but too much legalistic enforcement of them is neither. Also, I am sure that anyone using this rule to justify blatant abuse would have to face the consequences they deserved from nearly every single person on the Support side, and as well they should. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 14:26, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Would a note about respect the spirit of the rules be useful here? Thryduulf 14:55, 30 Mar 2005 (UTC)

text: This is true — it's sort of aimed at a different audience, the idea being that it's not a rule you follow but a rule you take solace in others following. I also agree that it's more a guideline than a rule. I do disagree though with your implication that only sysops enforce rules — to the contrary they bear very little of this collective burden. Deco 03:29, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed rephrasing 

message: I took the liberty of rephrasing this to reflect some of the comments above, particularly from Mindspillage. As to the issue of how this should be classified, might I suggest Wikipedia:Ignore all categories? --Michael Snow 22:53, 5 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rewrite 

message: Very briefly: I tried to tell a story without introducing my own biases, so now others impute them to me, willy-nilly. I failed to draw what I thought were obvious conclusions. I am compelled to speak. 
1. The American system of arbitrating Right-of-Way disputes does not work especially well. 
: A deranged teen Jolt junkie could program, in a week, a box that would control every automobile on the road, and the rate of crashes and fatalities overall be less than today. It's a relatively simple problem of physics and motion control; the only hairy part is predicting the presence of uncontrolled objects in the roadway. (Note I said "predicting", not "detecting". If the object is already there, it's not so hard to spot. Objects not in the vehicle's path, which may cross it in near future, are much more difficult.) 
2. The Chinese system of arbitrating disputes worked very well for thousands of years, during which it was endlessly refined. 
: My mother, who traveled to China long before I, told and retold a shaggy dog story of her own, which spoke of an intercity bus barreling down a narrow dirt road between two rice paddies. She spotted another bus zooming toward an inevitable head-on collision; there was simply no shoulder at all, no room on the single dirt track for even two manure carts to pass one another. She squeezed her eyes shut and, being simultaneously an atheist and an Orthodox Jewess, prayed mightily to a god in whom she had no faith. Hearing no crash and feeling no jerk from this world into the next, she looked out the rear window to see the other bus rapidly disappearing in a cloud of dust. Chinese really do know how to avoid contention. 
3. The Chinese system now fails miserably only within the modern, speeded-up environment of the congested city street, full of mixed vehicles and pedestrians, some of which are highly maneuverable automobiles, trucks, buses, and motorbikes. Available reaction time is cut to about 10% of what is available when pedestrians throng along motorless streets; and consequences escalate as the square of velocity of collision -- roughly 10,000% as dangerous for collisions at 10 times the speed of a walking man, and that's neglecting the increased mass of the colliding vehicles. 
4. The relative success of the American system is not evident during the occasional pissing contests, which merely serve to underpin the concept of more or less absolute Right of Way. It is evident in the innumerable small conflicts which are passed over with hardly a thought, in which one party yields to the other, both parties secure in the knowledge that, given the relative situation, they are each confident of who has the Right of Way; the dominant party accelerates, the submissive party yields, and all is well. 
: The pissing contests are the price we pay to enforce the concept of Right of Way. They are true cases of honoring a standard in the breach. In the worst case, when a raging motorist tracks another down ten miles of freeway, draws a firearm, and gets on teevee, every single American who sees the evening nooz has the same thought: "One of those guys had the Right of Way, and the other guy stole it." Yes, all the viewers also have the same, rational, criticism: "I don't really care which guy was Right and they were both stoopid." But nobody watching thinks the shooting was about anything except who cut who off -- and to have that thought, one must implicitly accept the idea that one driver can cut another off, and that means to steal the Right of Way. The concept is upheld. 
5. Right of Way is a formal rule of the road, a written law of man; but it is also a law of physics: whatever is in a spot first has the Right of Way, since no two bodies can occupy the same volume. It is also a social custom, and most drivers have never even glanced at the book they got from the DMV since they cribbed their written test. "Who has the Right of Way in this or that situation" is a lesson learned again and again, over the course of years behind the wheel, taught by one driver to another, and the one-finger salute is not really an insult, but teacher's red pen. Some drivers also require the heavier black marker of the bill from the body shop to underline specific instances of customary Right of Way, and John Law gets his licks in, too -- but the vast control of drivers' day-to-day actions is the vigilance of other drivers: peer pressure. 
: That said, it still doesn't work very well. Drivers are essentially all Anonymous Cowards -- flashy as they may be, as distinctive as their cars may seem, they enter each new conflict as anonymous as an egg. Positive peer pressure only goes so far; it is the naked threat of being rammed that negatively pressures drivers to conform. 
6. The Wikipedian is like the Chinese driver, but with American blood. 
: He began, when WP was small and he knew everybody, and everybody knew him; by yielding gracefully, and indirectly, to others, with no thought for "who is Right". On receiving a minor insult, he just ignored it. Most times, even two parties with adverse intent simply went ahead as directly as possible, doing nothing obvious to avoid collision, but not provoking it, either. This worked very well. 
: Time went by, and the road became more congested. It is a feature of cyberspace, especially wikispace, that all users are almost everywhere almost all the time. There is no such thing as a quiet corner; every street is a main drag, with packs of moto-vandals roaring along, herds of nitro-fueled trolls shooting up passers-by, and stealthy orcs deliberately altering the signage and standing on busy corners (mis)directing traffic. Not only do some of these troublemakers deliberately flaunt the unwritten, unspoken convention to avoid trouble and escalation of trouble; there are also waves of immigrants who simply know nothing, too numerous to educate individually, or even to watch closely enough to identify and distinguish from the rest -- not to mention the tourists who stop to make a random edit or three. 
: Wikipedians are overwhelmingly white male American college dropout ex-computer pros, and we reacted in typical white male American college dropout ex-computer pro fashion -- by forgetting all the Cliff-Notes Asian philosophy (though continuing to shout it in most-un-Asian fashion); by running to the thumb-sucking security of resort to authority; by building castles of ever-more elaborate rules, regulations, procedures, tribunals, sanctions, rules, more rules, rules of order, points of procedure, policies, guidelines, more rules, jockeying for high ground, Orwellian sanitizing of history, doublethink (of course), groupthink, clerkthink, and naive pleas for  peace, love, and good vibes; by descending to the level of the trolls and orcs, eventually joining their ranks; and finally all join in a hundred choruses of "Four legs good; two legs better!" 
: It's a good thing we aren't all white male American college dropout ex-computer pros; I suspect the 3 or 4 female Mexican high-school grad preschool teachers here are holding the entire project together by the skin of their teeth and when they finally get tired and go home to their friends and families, Devil Gates will come with his team of Men in Black (but no ties), kill it, cook it, freeze it, and laugh all the way to the bank. After the implosion, a hard core remains to sue Gates for his violation of GFDL. Guess what? He has more lawyers than you do. 
7. The best outcome if we continue on this road is that real growth will slow; the membership will level off as the PO'd leave as fast as newbies come in; existing members will spend more and more time in factional conflict and endless refinement of procedural points and puffy debate (like this bit). There will be no new articles on Real topics, because (1) everyone is already busy attacking, defending, or congratulating each other on not fighting; (2) everyone is afraid to make edits that might invite a reprisal, but for the trolls begging for one; (3) everyone has exhausted his own personal stock of expertise anyway, and the hostile climate excludes serious new members -- although the door is still wide open to the Visigoths. 
Fortunately, there will still be some numerical growth to point at, as hundreds of magical-weapon-foo-in-this-fantasy-universe pages will be copied in from user mans, and sooner or later, Somebody will propose that all Talk pages be added to article mainspace. 
:If there are any doubters here, I propose a simple metric. We are all proud of the number of mainspace articles, but let us compare number of edits to articles with number of edits to all other namespaces -- none of which do the Reader any direct good. Graph this ratio over time. I don't have the tools to do this, especially not stretching back to the beginning of the project -- but I guarantee Somebody does. 
8. -- which is Chinese Good Luck -- All is not lost and the project is not doomed. I took one thing away from China, if nothing else: the amazing way in which they are able to stubbornly resist all change in an area, right up to the point where they change everything all at once. 
: We just need to dump all the rules, all the nasty little procedures, all the crutches for little minds, and return to a simple philosophy of common sense, basic intellectual honesty, and good faith efforts to accommodate one another and reach consensus, not simple majority, on matters which perplex us. 
: Of course, we also must return the size of the community to a point where once again, everybody knows everybody, and implicit reputation management serves well. And we must do that without imposing new, Draconian rules which exclude new members or chase existing ones away. 
: Finally, we must agree on a Wikipedia:Charter -- a simple document that anyone can grasp, with the absolute plainest statement of basic principles, and which is not subject to debate or revision under any conditions short of a Constitutional Convention.
: Impossible? Well, of course. But then, what isn't? — Xiongtalk 18:52, 2005 Apr 10 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Charter? that's not too difficult:
* We are creating a free, neutral encyclopedia (and not anything else). Every action in wikipedia is subject to this goal. 
* People who want to participate in this project should behave civilly and friendly (follow Wikipedia:Wikiquette and Wikipedia:No personal attacks)
of course, the devil is in the details ;-) --Elian 02:13, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  For some strange reason, I'm working on something close to what you're looking for here: Wikipedia:Simplified_Ruleset. Please come over and help out! Kim Bruning 12:47, 12 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Right of Way explained 

message: Just in case you didn't know, this exists.--Jondel 09:08, 15 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: www.anarchopedia.org

message: :Some questions have been raised about the origin of Wikipedia policies. The tale is interesting and instructive, and one of the main themes of this memoir. We began with no (or few) policies in particular and said that the community would determine--through a sort of vague consensus, based on its experience working together--what the policies would be. The very first entry on a "rules to consider" page was the "Ignore All Rules" rule (to wit: "If rules make you nervous and depressed, and not desirous of participating in the wiki, then ignore them entirely and go about your business"). This is a "rule" that, current Wikipedians might be surprised to learn, I personally proposed. The reason was that I thought we needed experience with how wikis should work, and even more importantly at that point we needed participants more than we needed rules. As the project grew and the requirements of its success became increasingly obvious, I became ambivalent about this particular "rule" and then rejected it altogether. As one participant later commented, "this rule is the essence of Wikipedia." That was certainly never my view; I always thought of the rule as being a temporary and humorous injunction to participants to add content rather than be distracted by (then) relatively inconsequential issues about how exactly articles should be formatted, etc. In a similar spirit, I proposed that contributors be bold in updating pages (the current version is much expanded, as it should be).
Larry Sanger http://features.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/04/18/164213&tid=95
nyenyec ☎ 20:24, 19 Apr 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Larry Sanger on the origins of this rule 

message: Anyone think that maybe clarifiying that ignoring rules is diffrent from breaking them to prove a point/be an ass is in order?--Tznkai 00:15, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The point of IAR is that you're supposed to use your brain. Spelling it out sort of moots that.  ;-) Kim Bruning 01:23, 11 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  IAR or BAR? 

message: I have seen much abuse of this recently. The worst has been admins justifying blocks with it. As common sense is a misnomer, I will explain. The whole point of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit, and that admins are just regular users with a few tools. Thus anything that restricts either one user's editing or anything that cannot be reverted by anyone should be done carefully and have its basis in real consensus policy. It's not enough for the block to be "common sense" to the admin making the block.
Also, IAR states that one can ignore all rules... including IAR. But it's kind of hard to ignore a rule, even IAR, when one has been blocked for it. --SPUI (talk) 17:33, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Definitely. However, seeing as this is a WP policy, I don't think you can just add clauses to it, such as this one. Anyway, this is a common sense rule, and you have to use common sense when applying it. Obviously it doesn't mean just blocking someone because you feel like ignoring rules and because you can. I'm reverting the change, not because I don't think it's a totally valid point, but because I think it ought to be mentioned here for a little while first. --Blackcap | talk 17:57, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: It doen't have the  tag. when and where did this get consensus to be a policy? I don't recognize it as one. DES (talk) 18:04, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm not exactly sure. I guess it's not policy as such, but my point was just that you can't make arbitrary changes to something that exists as some kind of guideline, policy, or whatever. --Blackcap | talk 18:40, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Problems with this

message: Should IAR be policy or policy-like (policy, guideline, proposed, rejected) or essay-like (Category:Wikipedia essays)? If it weren't for the link to Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines, I'd have added it to the essay category long ago. --cesarb 18:12, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think both "proposed" and "rejected" are inaccurate. I usually regard it as a guideline. I do believe the the spirit of it means that it doesn't matter what you call it... Mindspillage (spill yours?) 18:43, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

text: It should be in Category:Ignore all categories. --Michael Snow 20:51, 20 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Policy or essay? 

message: Thank you Phroziac for moving it back. Much better at IAR.
James F. (talk) 02:17, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Concur, for reasons detailed in various places above. :-) Mindspillage (spill yours?) 02:23, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Name: "Use common sense" back to IAR 

message: This is listed in WP:5P as one of the "five unchangeable pillars that define Wikipedia's character." Yet, there isn't a  tag on the page (although there was for a little bit until it was removed). I definitely understand why some would oppose this policy, but as it's listed there and apparently Jimbo supports it (as evidenced by his vote at the top of this page, and yes, I do know that it's old), I think it ought to be considered as such, or at least be given a new vote. If that's not done, then it should be removed from or otherwise annotated at WP:5P because it's pretty confusing having a policy, which isn't policy, listed on WP:5P and be supported by WP's benevolent dictator. 71.139.97.219 00:54, 27 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry. I keep getting kicked out of my account for some reason. --Blackcap | talk 01:02, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

text: Well, word from Jimbo is enough for me. I'm a-putting the policy tag up. --Blackcap | talk 04:46, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree it's policy. But, to my knowledge, it was not originally intended to be policy, and was just sort of an essay. It's not like saying it's not a policy will change anything though, IAR is just common sense. --Phroziac(talk) 05:42, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree completely, but it makes things clearer (in my mind) to have the tag up. I'm not trying to instigate some big change, just to make things obvious. It just seems kinda silly to have Jimbo support/create something, and not have it be recognized by the community. --Blackcap | talk 16:15, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: We're entitled to disagree with Jimbo, but I'd like to think that we'd only do so when we have a good reason.  Kelly Martin 16:49, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Of course we're entitled to disagree with him, on everything and forever, if we want to. But that doesn't change his status as the grand dictator of this project who has the right (and ability) to do absolutely anything he wants. --Blackcap | talk 16:53, 29 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Policy? 

message: IAR is for editing. It's not so much about the sort of "rules" that we call policy, but rather to the ones we call guidelines -- the Manual of Style and so forth. Nobody expects IAR to apply to rules against vandalism, personal attacks, or legal threats. We would never accept a defense of "I was following IAR when I vandalized those articles," or "I was Ignoring All Rules when I called that editor a worthless craphead and threatened to kill his dog and to sue him for negligent crapheadedness." Someone who did that would still get blocked, possibly banned.
Likewise, IAR doesn't justify disrupting procedures like AfD, RfA, or RfAr. We wouldn't accept "I was Ignoring All Rules when I blanked that deletion vote," or "I was following IAR when I replaced that nomination for adminship with 'This editor is a terrible person!'," or "I was Ignoring All Rules when I posted a bunch of completely erroneous information to that arbitration request."
IAR means that editors, particularly new ones, should not need to familiarize themselves with a lot of rules and stylistic requirements before they start editing. A good-faith editor should be able to be bold and jump right in to improve articles. If they write well but don't follow Wikipedia style conventions, they won't be punished -- instead, someone else will come along and clean up their prose.
However, in contrast, we do expect administrators to familiarize themselves with a lot of rules and requirements -- that's the Administrators' reading list. ("Sysops are expected to have an intimate understanding of Wikipedia policy.") We don't have a "be bold" guideline for administrative action; WP:BOLD is Be bold in updating pages. And because administrative actions have profound effects on other people that editing generally doesn't, we don't want administrators to leave messes that other admins have to clean up.
IAR is a promise that our policies will not become so complicated or non-obvious that a good-faith editor will get themselves in nasty trouble for not knowing them. It means that "Love, and do what thou wilt" shall be a safe rule for editing. It means that ignorance of the law (plus good faith) is a defense for editors. But it stops somewhere -- and administrative action is well past that point. --FOo 19:56, 19 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  What is IAR for then? 

message: Would something like this work?
This page is one of the  five pillars of Wikipedia. It has wide acceptance among editors and is considered a standard that all users should follow. Feel free to update the page as needed, but make sure that changes you make to this policy really do reflect consensus, before you make them.
Friday (talk) 17:31, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The problem is that the page does not have "wide acceptance", not unless you include a commeht that it is also widely disputed/objected to, if perhaps not as widely. The wording above implies that the page is supported by consensus, which the discussions here indicate is not the case. DES (talk) 17:45, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

text: I can see two ways for this to go, then.  First, we need to figure out whether the pillar "Wikipedia does not have firm rules" is the subject of such controversy, or whether the particular wording here is the reason for the disagreement.  If it's the former, we could use wording like "Although this is defined as one of Wikipedia's five pillars, there has been some controversy surrounding its application..."  If it's the latter, we either fix the wording here or make a "No Firm rules" page, and put the policy template on.  My understanding of the pillars is that they're fundamental and not really intended to be subject to debate.  Of course, just because there's not supposed to be disagreement, this doesn't cause all editors to magically agree.  Friday (talk) 18:14, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Do you really think it's such a large percentage?  Or are there perhaps a smaller number who's actions are sufficiently controversial or disruptive as to make it seem like more?  Friday (talk) 18:22, 24 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Well in the "poll" above, i see 57 people indicating "support" and 23 indicating "oppose". When i first saw this page, my immediate action was to log an "oppose" and frankly i would be happiest if this page were to silently vanish forever -- i think it does harm to the project. I belive that there is a sizable percentage of regular editors here who share my views on this, to some extant. There is also a sizable number who feel quite the opposite. I don't know what the percentage is, and I don't belive that the poll above, with "votes" spread out over years, is a good indicator of current community feeling about this concept. But i don't have a better one. There are certianly a number of respected long-time editors who have expressed opposition to the concept here and elsewhere, and a number of others who have supported it. I don't think it can safely be described as having consensus support, or "wide support" unless the rather wide opposition is also mentioned. Perhaps a tag similar to the one on WP:RPA (which i also oppose) might be a good idea? DES (talk) 21:42, 24 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Wow.  That was clear, concise, and probably in line with Wikipedia consensus.  Have you considered adding that to the policy page? TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:12, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I support your points A and D, strongly oppose your point C, and I am dubious about yout point B. I don't honestly think your point C can be supported without effectively supporting what you call "the oversimplified veersion" of the IAR concept. The problem with B is that I have seen too many cases where experienced users were conviced that their judgement told them that what was best for the project was to ignore a rule that on its face seemed to be clearcut. So far IMO not one of those people was correct. On my experience, such use of judgement in fact does more harm than good -- far more. Not everyone agrees with this view, indeed it is probably a minority view. I am not at all sure it is rare enough that even your "more nuanced" version can be said to have "wide support". DES (talk) 17:16, 25 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Alternative to policy or guideline template 

message: I've tried to make the writing tighter — make it something people might actually read rather than have wash over them. Also added the dynamite analogy - David Gerard 20:15, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: This latest edit is great!  It seems clear to me, and I cannot possibly fathom how anyone could disapprove of it.  Since there are no objections, I think it should be given a  tag ASAP.  ;-) Friday (talk) 20:19, 28 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Tighten; dynamite

message: TenOfAllTrades, I'm not sure what you mean by, "WP:IAR shouldn't be cast as a dispute resolution tool."  Of course it shouldn't, and nobody has claimed that it should.  In fact, quite the opposite as stated in the When NOT to ignore all rules section.  Could you please clarify your concern?   --Zephram Stark 02:51, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: You have, in fact, claimed that all Wikipedia rules are for the purpose of dispute resolution. Jayjg (talk) 03:56, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Which is why you can ignore all rules when there isn't a dispute, right?  --Zephram Stark 03:59, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't understand your statement. The purpose of rules/policies in Wikipedia is to create a great encyclopedia - that it the whole purpose of this venture, and the rules around it. Jayjg (talk) 04:11, 30 October 2005 (UTC)

text: Also, the paragraph you inserted - In a perfect Wiki, everyone would place the importance of collective thought above personal bias, but we sometimes find ourselves in disputes where bigotry threatens the NPOV of the article. Natural human tendency prompts us to offset unyielding partiality by any tools at our disposal——disparaging remarks, counterbalance bigotry, and unintended use of administration power——but these tools only compound perceptions of intolerance. Wikipedia has created policies and guidelines to assist us in resolving partisan disputes. These policies are not weapons to destroy an obdurate editor. They are only a means of achieving consensus. To minimize vandalism and enable the collective power of easy mass editing, our aim in using rules must always be to get to the point where we can ignore all rules. We must always strive for a system that works without them - is a just a completely POV summary of what you claimed happened at the Terrorism page, and has nothing to do with "Ignore all rules".  Please recall that Wikipedia is not a soapbox. Jayjg (talk) 04:16, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I also support the removal of Zephram Stark's additions; they're drifting off into soapboxing and overspecific interpretation, which I don't believe suits the nature of this page. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 06:05, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Cast as a dispute resolution tool?

message: Am I the only person who thinks that IAR should hold IAR, with the fewest words possible? We can always make a Philosophy behind IAR page to complement it.
Else we'll end up with a page *about* IAR, but no page that actually has the rule :-/
Kim Bruning 04:05, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I am in favor of keeping this page as the minimalistic version, for this reason. A thought: Wikipedia:Use common sense currently redirects to this page. I wonder if it couldn't be used instead to present the philosophical notes and interpretations that have been inserted on IAR, with a sentence of text on IAR itself directing the reader there... this as the provocative page name with the short statement, the other titled with the intent as commonly interpreted giving the common interpretations, as a companion page. Mindspillage (spill yours?) 06:19, 30 October 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: The current version is a mess, IMHO. The page should be reverted back to the one-paragraph version of little over a month ago. BlankVerse 06:29, 31 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: IAR = IAR 

message: I think the expanded version of the page goes quite a way towards nipping obvious objections to the original wording in the bud. I do believe IAR is important, albeit a difficult idea to express. It's neither a license to create mayhem nor a rally for anarchy — it's simply a way of saying that it's the spirit of the rules and good-natured contribution towards our mutual goal that matters, not bickering over the fine points and corner cases of some well-intended policy. Deco 02:17, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Good rewrite 

message: There's nothing a good editor hates worse than a bunch of rules, unless it's a promise that they have certain editing rights when, in fact, they don't.  Wikipedia claims to give editors a level playing field, so that the best edits will naturally win out over POV, grabs for power, and history rewriting, but it doesn't deliver on that promise.  I don't think the answer is to give new editors more rules.  I think the answer lies in being honest.  If the rules are so subjective that administrators can do anything they want, why have the pretense of rules at all?  Why not just say that the senior editors (read: administrators) control the content of Wikipedia?  That's the way it is, so why all the illusion of arbitration committees that merely side with fellow admins?  Why have a list of reasons for blocks when administrators don't have to cite any of those reasons? 
Wikipedia would get a few good editors if it admits that administrators control content.  I'm sure that at least one person in a hundred would be willing to pay their dues as a non-administrator until they can work their way up the ladder.  But our current method of promising new writers that a better-written, more neutral edit will become the article through consensus, when all they see is administrative bias determining the outcome, will surely scare off every new good editor we attract.  In a best case scenario, they will go away believing that Wikipedia is fundamentally flawed.  In a worst case scenario, they'll be so angry that they become petty vandals or worse, but what would it take to attract and keep great new editors?  If we put ourselves in their situation, imagining ourselves new to Wikipedia, what would we want?
I believe the number one thing a new editor would want is an objective definition for the IAR.  They would want to know that they can ignore all rules and concentrate on just helping to write a great article within an expressly defined arena.  If that arena were that a new editor merely had to work with other editors, considering their opinion as equal to their own, I don't think we would scare away a single great writer.  To a large extent, Wikipedia already makes this promise, but we also have to deliver on it if we want to stem the growing tide of vandalism, poor editing practices, and a general sense that Wikipedia doesn't belong to the editors—that unless we are administrators, we have no real stewardship of Wikipedia.  --Zephram Stark 02:35, 2 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: However, with a project this large, you really can't afford to just ignore all the rules. Such a concept assumes that a user is mature and reasonable enough to know when and how to impliment it, and, trust me, not all Wikipedians are on that level. You end up with editors blissfully ignoring established precedents, templates, layout schemes, and basically using Wikipedia like a message board or a free fansite server. In my humble opinion, we need more rules, or at least we need to do a better job of enforcing the ones we already have. Otherwise, I don't forsee Wikipedia developing into a reliable reference, but instead into a dense, inconsistent, and low-quality repository for any and everything. --FuriousFreddy 07:40, 6 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't know. It seems to me that part of the magic of "everybody can edit everything" is that someone who doesn't know the rules and has no desire to learn them can still deliver useful content that's reformatted and edited by others into a standard Wikipedia article. Just think of it as a two-step process: the unwashed masses spend lots of time writing detailed content, and then the veteran Wikipedians with a good grounding in the rules and standards spend relatively little effort to polish it. If a reader happens to stumble across an intermediate version of the article, well, it's better to have some poorly organized information on a topic than none at all. Deco 02:37, 7 November 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: As a Jeffersonian, I'm of the opinion that, given enough transparency, communication, and consensus enabling tools, the best content is created through peer proofing, not through administrative content control.  --Zephram Stark 14:17, 7 November 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Objectively Defining the IAR