Wikipedia talk:Three revert rule enforcement

message: What should be done with an editor who mixes reverts with other significant (not minor, as above) edits? Jayjg 03:53, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Any comments?  I'm faced with exactly this situation. Jayjg 11:47, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: You need to go to RfC, Jayjg, don't you think? Your situation simply isn't covered by this policy. To be honest, I think this policy will be useless, because a truly determined troll/POV pusher will simply edit rather than revert and force the "good guys" to do the reverting.Dr Zen 12:10, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmm, RfC.  That's never been very effective in my experience. Jayjg 17:07, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: It's a means to enlist support, Jayjg. If you're not managing to get the support, perhaps you need to draw a conclusion from that.Dr Zen 22:52, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, when I tried one I was able to enlist plenty of support.  And the individual under RfC was able to enlist some support as well.  And then what?  Nothing. Other RfCs I've seen have been much the same. Jayjg 00:42, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, perhaps your view was not accepted by enough people to meet a consensus. What do you suggest should be done?Dr Zen 00:46, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: To begin with, consensus is when all people agree to support an action or position.  If 15 people support your position, and 5 do not, then there is no consensus, even though you have majority support.  Secondly, as VeryVerily correctly points out in his comment,RfC's generally accomplish nothing. Everybody blows off steam, and then nothing happens, and everyone who took part walks away frustrated.  Since there are no consequences, the parties concerned are free to continute their behaviour regardless of the outcome.  In contentious situations, particularly with partisans on both sides, RfCs appear to be a time-consuming formality whose only purpose is to allow the possibility of a future RfAR. Jayjg 18:42, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: RfC's generally accomplish nothing.  Everybody blows off steam, and then nothing happens, and everyone who took part walks away frustrated. VeryVerily 09:19, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Mixing reverts and significant edit

message: Let me reiterate some major points here which I think need to be answered:
* Sockpuppets.  Is reverting a sockpuppet an exception?  Are reverts by a sockpuppet blockworthy, and if so who judges?
* Near reverts.  Someone doesn't actually revert but makes other minor changes.  Or major changes.  Or a rewrite, based on their version. Or maybe they're offering a halfway compromise, which is interpreted as a near revert.
* Own user space.  I think one's own user pages should be an exception.  Often vandalized, often repeatedly, often anonymously.
* Talk pages.  Do they count?  A troll recently kept deleting my comments from a talk page.
* Admin judgement.  We didn't allow all admins to become bureaucrats for good reason, we don't and shouldn't wholly trust them.  Same goes for giving power to decide banworthiness of regular, signed-in users in unclear cases.
* IPs.  Especially dynamic ones.  You could go through a dozen without breaking a sweat.  Or a dozen AOL'ers are on at once.  Who's to say?
* Other issues:  Vandalism, stalking, ban enforcement, Wikipedia policy/newcomer pages, self-reverts as one revert or zero or negative one, corollary lack of clarity as to what is prohibited.
VeryVerily 02:16, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Major points 

message: It looks like this will probably pass, despite my opposing vote, but I have serious concerns about it. In the past, I always thought the three revert rule didn't apply to vandalism. In fact, I thought if I needed to revert a page 10 times in a day to protect it from vandalism, people would be glad that I did so. But now, reading about this enforcement, it seems like vandalism is not exempted, and I'm supposed to go to Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress and complain instead of simply reverting? Is that right? Because I'm sure not going to do that; that's absurd. I have a rollback button, why should I sit around waiting for someone else to revert a page when I can do it myself? The idea that I might be blocked for 24 hours by another sysop for reverting vandalism is so offensive to me that I think I might leave the project if it were to actually happen. Everyking 05:11, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: But can you accept that while someone who wipes a page and puts "George Bush is a tosser" in its place is clearly a vandal, there are others who make, let's say, provocative edits and are also labelled vandals? Should you have the unfettered right to revert them just because you're a sysop? Do you see how an admin who particularly wants a page a particular way could fend off three or four editors by claiming each was a vandal and reverting them three times each? What would prevent that if you are to be given an exemption? I think the policy is a trolls' charter, to be honest, for more or less exactly the reason you give but I think that if you allow "vandalism" to be reverted endlessly, all that will happen is that the battle will shift to one over who is and who is not a vandal.Dr Zen 05:59, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree entirely.  Perhaps a good addition would be to have some sort of "lower court" system for these types of issues.  We could set up a pool of interested and trusted users who would act as a mini-arb committee for issues which need quicker resolution.  Any disputed blocks based on the three revert rule could be immediately sent to a three-user panel of currently available users in the pool.  These decisions could be appealed to the arb committee, of course.  The only problem I see is how to randomly select three available users from the pool.  anthony 警告 16:00, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I can't see that ending in anything other than more bureaucracy.Dr Zen 04:59, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Not if we elect them. anthony 警告 07:02, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Concerns

message: If I need to revert a vandal, I'll block the page after the second revert.
If there are a bunch of vandals, then I have to go around rolling back like mad. I don't want to have to keep track of which page I have rolled back once, twice, or three times. 
The alternative is not to worry about vandals and let others do that. This is just shifting the problem around.
So I don't know what the solution is. To me, this seems like a band-aid. I suppose this would not happen if pages were blocked more often. Christopher Mahan 19:12, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: You shouldn't block a page after a second revert. Protecting pages is considered harmful and against the spirit of a wiki. It stops genuine editors from accessing the article and stops the article from developing and improving. jguk 19:34, 15 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: IMO a side effect if this proposal passes will be that blocks of users and page protections will become much more common. As an admin I am sometimes pateint, and will put notices and wanings a few times on the talk page of an anon ip#, giving them the benifit of a doubt that they are just a newbie playing around rather than a malicious vandal. If reverting their bad edits more than twice is removed from the tool chest of admins, expect them to be using the other tools they have more frequently. -- Infrogmation 18:19, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can't decide, so no. 

message: The 3RR rule and this proposal might be imperfect. But maybe no perfect way is possible. Life is a series of trade-offs. In my view, several of the alternatives proposed are too complicated, although it's possible to have refinements about clear vandalism. And about accidentally going over the limit, what is the harm in 24 hours away from Wikipedia? Maurreen 18:43, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Nothing's perfect, but the proposal is good

message: Since the proposal gives sysops complete discretion on whether to apply a ban, and if so for how long (up to 24 hours), it's fair to ask what is meant by 'equally'. Suppose the 2 sides to a revert war are a vandal with form and the other a newbie, say, or a long-time sysop. Does 'equally' mean we consider each party in turn (together with their history and background) so that one party may get banned and the other not. Or does 'equally' mean - if the sysop thinks the vandal deserves to be banned for 24 hours, then the other party must (regardless of any other considerations) be banned for 24 hours too? jguk 22:18, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Vandals may be blocked for vandalism, and this proposal will not change that. If someone blocks a vandal who has reverted to a vandalized version four times, I don't think this rule will require anyone to block the veteran sysop who rolled back the vandalism five times: the vandal isn't being blocked for excessive reverting, but for clear and obvious vandalism—page blanking, say, or announcements that Josh is teh gat homofag. —No-One Jones (m) 22:26, 16 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, answer this: given that there is already the means to block these vandals without reference to the 3Rs rule, and that you do not expect it to apply to sysops, surely it's only intended, in your view, to be used by sysops against users they describe as vandals? We all know that there are two problems here: vandalism, in which a surfer, overexcited by the idea that they can do what they like to a page, does what they like to a page; and edit wars, in which editors who are keen on a particular POV -- which includes admins -- revert one another instead of discussing their edits. In the latter case, my view is that anyone who reverts three times in a day is a "vandal" but I doubt that that opinion will be shared by many admins.Dr Zen 01:50, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: I used a sysop as an example but it could apply equally to anyone reverting clear and obvious vandalism. If an admin blocks someone for edit warring but gives "vandalism" as the reason for the block, thus evading his responsibility to block the other edit warrior, I'll be the first (though not, I suspect, the last) to cry for desysopping. I think admins are responsible enough to know the difference between vandalism and POV editing, and if they don't, they shouldn't be admins. —No-One Jones (m) 03:43, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: It cannot "equally" apply to anyone reverting vandalism, Mirv, because not anyone can employ this rule to block users they do not like. The problem is that this rule simply isn't needed to block the first kind of vandal, because they can already be blocked, and the second kind is far too subjective a call. We are not disputing the rectitude of banning someone who reverts the friend of a gay (that should not happen) but that of banning someone who is involved in POV editing by claiming they are a vandal. I agree that something should be done to fix the latter problem but I doubt this is the right cure.Dr Zen 04:08, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: I have confidence in the ability of sysops to distinguish between genuine vandal-fighting and POV wars, and I have confidence in the ability of the arbcom to deal with sysop abuses if they should arise. The definition of "vandalism" makes it clear that POV editing is emphatically not vandalism, and it will therefore be clear if a sysop should block a POV warrior under a false pretense of "vandalism". As long as this is the case, I don't foresee sysops abuses being a problem.  —No-One Jones (m) 05:43, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: Well, I had to revert vandalism on John McCain five times just now. Pretty soon, I suppose, doing that will get me blocked for 24 hours. Let it get to three reverts and then throw up my hands and let it say "poo" for however long it takes for someone else to notice it, I suppose that's what I should do. Dealing with vandalism is exasperating enough as it is, but now I'm supposed to tolerate it? Everyking 04:42, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: There's a process for calling for support when vandalism is in progress. If you are not an admin, you can call for one to block the vandal. I'm sure you wouldn't have to wait too long if you put a request on the VIP page. That's not to say that I don't sympathise with you. I do. But there is a way prescribed.Dr Zen 05:10, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I am an admin, but I don't like to block people, especially IPs (although I did eventually do it in the above mentioned case), and besides, it's utterly absurd that I should have to go complaining on VIP when I can revert it myself. Everyking 05:19, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: What does 'equally' mean?

message: Please see my question on Wikipedia_talk:Three_revert_rule#Any_.27.27one.27.27_page.3F. I'd like to understand this particular before I vote. Vote Sam Spade for Arbiter! 14:25, 17 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Any ''one'' page? 

message: : (Remember, the three revert rule says don't revert any page more than three times within a period of 24 hours. This is understood not to include cases of clear vandalism.)
This states that vandals can revert as often as they like.  It has plenty of precedent in Wikipedia, but probably it would be better to write "This is understood not to include reverting of cases of clear vandalism." --Zero 07:19, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: All right, good to have that clarified. Everyking 07:25, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)

text: Uh, I'd just like to see the reaction to the first admin who interprets the rule that way.  (Yes, I blocked you but not TrollVandal because you see his edits were a clear case of vandalism.) VeryVerily 18:41, 27 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pedants of the world, unite!