Wikipedia talk:Proposed policy on userboxes/Archive One

message: *Archive 1
Although I do understand the importance and usefullness of having userboxes, we should keep in mind that Wikipedia is a developing encyclopedia, not a Myspace or a blog. Userboxes should definitely be used, but there should be limits/policies of what we can put in those userboxes.Osbus 20:05, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

message: In light of the fact that we were heading down a spiral to nowhere, I've reset the debate to look for a discussion to see if we even want a policy, rather than confusing policies about not wanting policies, and trying to keep track of an incredibly complicated vote/debate we had going. If I've been a dick in doing this, say so here, but also say why, and try to see if we can get a genuine discussion going rather than a straw poll. Thanks. Harro5 06:12, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. We need to have a knock-down drag-out brawl over whether to even have a policy first. — Phil Welch Katefan's ridiculous poll 07:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's what this is now set up for. Brawl away, to quote you. Harro5 08:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I think User:Lar's idea may be a good one.  I see much of the controversy here as stemming from differences in how people view user pages.  The question becomes, what is the fundamental purpose of a user page?  Some people appear to emphasize the personal, individual aspects -- free expression, free speech, all that good stuff -- as well as community-building.  Others (myself included) appear to focus on the ultimate goal of Wikipedia to be an encyclopedia, and consider anything not conducive to that goal as inappropriate.  I suspect reaching consensus on this point (if possible) will make much of the rest of this moot. --DragonHawk 03:39, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It should also be noted that some users consider the personal, individual aspects of a user page as part of the community-building process, which in turn serves the goal of creating an encyclopedia. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:04, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Note that "My suggestion, for what it's worth..." was written before the refactoring and restart that user:Harro5 so admirably carried out. I think we are doing better now than we were, but I note that people still are engaging in back and forth on the page. My understanding of how one does policy proposals is that the proposal is a draft, worked on, and that comments occur on the talk pages. So we still could do better at moving comments here, IMHO. That aside I think I want to amplify what User:DragonHawk and user:Josiah Rowe say. The GOAL here is to write an encyclopedia, just as the goal of an automobile factory is to make automobiles. Yet automobile factories have break rooms and candy machines and places where people hang out and talk, and even after hours clubs and activities and on and on and on. Those all have to be evaluated in the context of "do these activities enable the making of better automobiles"? If they do not, they should go. My assertion, and the assertion of many of us, is that much of the WP community (barnstars, april fools jokes, WP:BJAODN, wikimeetups, and many many other things) help editors be better editors and be more prolific editors. WP is not a free speech zone but userboxes, unless they are hateful, are part of commmunity. Yes, like pop bottles from the breakroom in a factory, they can be misused, but it is the misuse we should censure, not the tool.  Fundamentally, user boxes, even ones that show POV, are part of WP community and should be cherished. IMHO. ++Lar: t/c 04:22, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well said, Lar. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:27, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Well said indeed. I'll also add that on Wikipedia there's even more reason to have "break rooms" than at factories, as it's a lot easier and cheaper for us to have to them. Yeltensic42.618 ambition makes you look pretty ugly 15:20, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Fresh start

message: My suggestion, for what it's worth, is that we stop trying to write proposed wordings of rules and "voting" on them. Rather, I think an approach would be to try to get principles (based on core WP values and well accepted precedent) articulated and arrive at consensus (or realise that it can't be arrived at for a particular facet) for the various underlying fundamental questions around userboxes. In fact I thought that was what would be done first, but when Kelly presented a draft I thought, hey, maybe this is farther along and went straight to proposing mods. So if no one else does it by tomorrow, I'll try to make a subpage of the project page that has some principles that we can try to agree on, and ask people to edit them rather than "vote" on them. It's what I should have done in the first place and I apologise to the community for not having done it when I created the page by copying material from WP:VP that User:TantalumTelluride posted, material that I really thought was a good starting point for articulating principles. ++Lar: t/c 06:15, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, but let's not get ahead of ourselves. We need to have a knock-down drag-out brawl over whether to even have a policy first. — Phil Welch Katefan's ridiculous poll 07:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's what this is now set up for. Brawl away, to quote you. Harro5 08:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I think User:Lar's idea may be a good one.  I see much of the controversy here as stemming from differences in how people view user pages.  The question becomes, what is the fundamental purpose of a user page?  Some people appear to emphasize the personal, individual aspects -- free expression, free speech, all that good stuff -- as well as community-building.  Others (myself included) appear to focus on the ultimate goal of Wikipedia to be an encyclopedia, and consider anything not conducive to that goal as inappropriate.  I suspect reaching consensus on this point (if possible) will make much of the rest of this moot. --DragonHawk 03:39, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It should also be noted that some users consider the personal, individual aspects of a user page as part of the community-building process, which in turn serves the goal of creating an encyclopedia. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:04, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Note that "My suggestion, for what it's worth..." was written before the refactoring and restart that user:Harro5 so admirably carried out. I think we are doing better now than we were, but I note that people still are engaging in back and forth on the page. My understanding of how one does policy proposals is that the proposal is a draft, worked on, and that comments occur on the talk pages. So we still could do better at moving comments here, IMHO. That aside I think I want to amplify what User:DragonHawk and user:Josiah Rowe say. The GOAL here is to write an encyclopedia, just as the goal of an automobile factory is to make automobiles. Yet automobile factories have break rooms and candy machines and places where people hang out and talk, and even after hours clubs and activities and on and on and on. Those all have to be evaluated in the context of "do these activities enable the making of better automobiles"? If they do not, they should go. My assertion, and the assertion of many of us, is that much of the WP community (barnstars, april fools jokes, WP:BJAODN, wikimeetups, and many many other things) help editors be better editors and be more prolific editors. WP is not a free speech zone but userboxes, unless they are hateful, are part of commmunity. Yes, like pop bottles from the breakroom in a factory, they can be misused, but it is the misuse we should censure, not the tool.  Fundamentally, user boxes, even ones that show POV, are part of WP community and should be cherished. IMHO. ++Lar: t/c 04:22, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well said, Lar. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 04:27, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Well said indeed. I'll also add that on Wikipedia there's even more reason to have "break rooms" than at factories, as it's a lot easier and cheaper for us to have to them. Yeltensic42.618 ambition makes you look pretty ugly 15:20, 6 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Begin from fundamental principles

message: After Kelly´s action some time ago, now all religious userboxes have been speedy deleted. Without any warning or discussion. I think this is outrageous and all userboxes should be protected from now on against this kind of admin vandalism. Larix 09:58, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Both sides in the argument have agreed that there are some userboxes which have got to go. Protecting the lot makes no difference to deleting them; it's purely symbolic. However, symbolically, it does stop administrators deleting userboxes which do need to be deleted. Rob Church Talk 10:16, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: There is absolutely no concensus on how to deal with pov userboxes yet. So it is appalling to just massively delete these ones. I'm not talking about wikipedians who believe in santa here, but about humanists, muslims, jews and so on. Larix 10:18, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I find this very upsetting.  I fail to see what urgent threat is posed by these userboxes that could not wait two or three days until we hash out some sort of preliminary policy, and I am extremely offended that whoever deleted these userboxes didn't have the common courtesy to post a message somewhere explaining what he/she was doing and why.  After the RfC, there is no excuse for that kind of behavior and I don't see how it serves any purpose other than to irritate people.  (It's worked; I'm irritated.)  The point about userbox proliferation has been made, and the people here are working to remedy the problem.  Mass userbox deletion with no explanation given is absolutely uncalled for. - AdelaMae (talk - contribs) 10:25, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oh, and even if we had decided that these templates should be deleted, many of the proposals on the table suggest that users should be given the chance to place the code directly on their userpages; deleting the templates AND the pages at Wikipedia:Userboxes prevents this. - AdelaMae (talk - contribs) 10:29, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

text: I am not certain that 'both sides have agreed that there "are" some userboxes which have got to go'.  This seems to be a bold statement.  I think that under the current circumstances, boxes should not be restricted.  There is already the TfD process for removing templates, and it should work quite well for userbox templates.  It would be nice to avoid speedy deletion in user space.  --Dschor 13:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm fairly sure that general consensus supports any userbox being placed on a user's page, as it is free to be POV.  The issue comes from templatised userboxes, and their listing at WP:UBX.  I know what my POV regarding categorisation is - that is laid out in proposal #4, but achieving consensus here is going to be very difficult.  The final solution would be to ban templatising any userbox, and forcing users to create individual ones for each's page... but that wouldn't be very popular methinks!   Deano (Talk) 17:14, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Can't we just not put POV userboxes in categories? This would stop those attacks that happen. The userboxes would still be listed at Wikipedia:Userboxes/Beliefs so users could find them easily, but people wouldn't be able to target large amounts of say...Christians, so attacks would reduce or maybe even dissapear as POV bashers would only see a person's POV if they actually went on their userpage (which they wouldn't know to unless someone said that they has a particular belief, and the attakcer saw it) , instead of finding them on a category. -  «ßØÛ®ßÖÑ§3» Talk | Contrib's 16:21, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: *It's not just categories ... there's also the "What links here" page on templates, which would be just as useful for creating POV groups or POV attacks.  Userboxes would also have to be subst'd to get rid of this problem.  --Cyde Weys votetalk 21:42, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: (Note:I'm pro-userboxes). Substing out a userbox is not even a fix, and remving image to avoid what link's here isn't either, as you can always just run a search for the text of the user box, and get a hit list of all the users that way.  xaosflux Talk/CVU 03:32, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

text:  2/3 of my attempted edits in the last 5 hours have failed due to server load.  I do not know how much that is due to failure of the userboxes we love to comply with WP:AIM, how much is normal for this time of day (I usually editing late nite), or other purposes.  Meanwhile the community disruption continues with more players taking over what User:Kelly Martin had quit doing pending resolution of the RFC. User:AlMac|(talk) 20:19, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Protect all existing userboxes as long as this discussion continues 

message: Little pretty boxes are not the issue. Use of wikipedia for nonencyclopedic purposes is a key issue in the use of pretty boxes. Deal with the real issues and the derived cases take care of themselves. To what extent social behavior on Wikipedia enhances encyclopedia building is highly subjective and no one should contemptuously or arrogantly or high-handedly act as if their assessment is unquestionable. Voting can not make unencyclopedic behavior acceptable, but what does and what does not help build the encyclopedia is no one person's right to decide. I think the real issues are in that mess of words somewhere and policies on pretty boxes are beside the point. WAS 4.250 13:18, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: WAS 4.250 cuts to the crux of the matter. I think in that:
#Use of images that are being used outside of FU Wiki policy should be speedily deleted (eg templates)
#Userboxes are a fad. I saw what others were doing and started adding my own before I saw how silly some had gotten IMHO...but that's just it: my opinion. What does it really matter if someone writes "I am a christain" on their userpage or puts/references a pretty box with a symbol of a cross on it. 
#Meaningless issue for us to continue wasting time on and too time consuming to police. Let people build userpages as they see fit as long as it does not violate the userpage policy, which is???? --Censorwolf 20:54, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

text: Thanks for thr reference, I couldn't find it before I made the post --Censorwolf 17:58, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Use of wikipedia for nonencyclopedic purposes

message: Here is some information I think would make it easier for us to resolve this issue:
#We need to quantify the effect that userbox templates have on Wikipedia, in terms of sever load or whatever.  This will give us an idea of the urgency of this task and how widespread the change needs to be.  I have seen a couple of people make comments vaguely linking userbox proliferation and Wikipedia's fund drive, but correlation does not imply causation.  Let's get some hard facts on how userboxes affect Wikipedia.
#We need to come up with specific instances where userbox templates have been used for various purposes, good or bad, so that we can evaluate the non-technical issues that have been brought up.  If userboxes and their corresponding categories are being used for vote-stuffing, provide examples. - AdelaMae (talk - contribs) 20:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Some hard facts would be helpful 

message: As Wikipedians, we must always try to make compromises in a fashion that addresses as many people's concerns as possible. As can be seen above, many people have concerns that they feel are best addressed by regulating userboxes in certain ways. Similarly, others have concerns with the idea of regulating userboxes. It is the intent of those working on this proposal to address as many of these concerns as satisfactorily as possible, so we may be advised not to limit ourselves to either "drawing up a set of regulations" or "not doing anything at all". There may be a third way to resolve this.
*I had this suggestion on the proposals page, but it got lost in the crowd: "Could there possibly be a place like Wikipedia:WikiProject Stub sorting/Proposals where people propose new userboxes and they are created or not based on that vote? Then, we could create a speedy delete criteria for any new userbox created that hasn't gone through this voting process. At least that would regulate it more than the current scheme (Wikipedia talk:Userboxes/Ideas) which basically sees people say, 'Can someone make this?', and it's done. This keeps the deletionists happy by slowing down the influx of new userboxes, and also allows userboxes on all topics to be created." Harro5 10:36, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: A third way

message: I agree with User:Lar that policies can still be relevant even if they don't necessarily apply.  Remember also that policies can be changed.  So, references to existing policy should not be considered a finding of law, but rather, a pointer to existing concensus which help guide us here.  So, to that end, I <S>will add</S> added some sub-topics for individual policy/guideline pages.  --DragonHawk 07:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Policies relevant to the userbox debate 

message: User page guidelines
*  Commentary on what should and should not be on a user page.  Ultimately, it appears inconclusive for this discussion.  Opinion pieces not related to Wikipedia are discouraged, but community-building is encouraged. --DragonHawk 07:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  User page guidelines 

message: No personal attacks
* A personal attack is a attach on a particular person.  By extension, it could be argued that user boxes should not be used to attack a particular person or group of persons. --DragonHawk 07:25, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  No personal attacks 

message: Copyright policy
*In the debates that I was involved in regarding userboxes, mainly the Democrat and Republicans, editors who were pro-userboxes states that the Fair Use of images extended into user pages. However, the same people often say that NPOV does not apply to user pages; so where is it that certain policies inexplicably end? Fair Use is not just a guideline; the images are copyrighted, and copyright owners can sue. It's in place for a reason. Eightball 03:36, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Copyright policy 

message: Wikipedia:Avoid using meta-templates
According to WP:AUM and WP:AMT (are these two redirects to the same place? [Yes. <SMALL>--DragonHawk</SMALL>]) certain design features, of templates inside templates, contribute mightily to server load, making it difficult for us to edit anything on Wiki.  There's also reference to abuse of Categories, which I interpret as applying to WP articles as well as to userboxes.
In my POV opinion, like copyright violation avoidance, server protection policy should be an exception to consensus building.
Now for people like me, who are newbies at image manipulation code, and who get our stuff by copying what someone else got to work, then tweaking one piece at a time until it works, what we need is a HOW TO on getting stuff that does not violate WP:AUM and a version of that page for Dummies unfamiliar with the programming lagnuage involved.
User:AlMac|(talk) 17:35, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Meta Template policy 

message: NPOV policy
*WP:NPOV - many userboxes offend against WP:NPOV - NPOV is a concern for articles, not User pages.
** I will continue to argue strongly that userboxes should be allowed to show POV, but I nevertheless feel that NPOV is a policy that is relevant. it's relevant in that it doesn't apply as strongly (or at all) in userspace and should be mentioned in the list of relevant policies. (while you could argue that every policy that doesn't apply in user space could be mentioned, the POV/NPOVness of boxes seems to be a critical thing that this debate turns on. I think CIVIL bears mentioning here too for the same reason, and it is in fact mentioned just above that bullet. ++Lar: t/c 00:33, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV policy 

message: What Wikipedia is and is not
==== ... an indiscriminate collection of information ====
* Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information.  Taken to an extreme, perhaps the whole user box system should be scrapped.  Maybe they're really just not appropriate for Wikipedia.  (I don't really think this myself, but it's a point worth considering.) --DragonHawk 07:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wikipedia is not ... 

message: * Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information.  Taken to an extreme, perhaps the whole user box system should be scrapped.  Maybe they're really just not appropriate for Wikipedia.  (I don't really think this myself, but it's a point worth considering.) --DragonHawk 07:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  ... an indiscriminate collection of information 

message: * Wikipedia is not a soapbox.  I think this one is very apropos.  Sure, it is mainly focused on articles, but the key point is that The Wikipedia project, as a whole, is not a soapbox.  Using user boxes to push one's personal agenda seems very much against a core principle here. --DragonHawk 07:06, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  ... a soapbox 

message: Wikipedia is not an anarchy
* Choice bits here: "Wikipedia is not a forum for unregulated free speech" and "Wikipedia ... restricts both freedom and openness where they interfere with the purpose of creating an encyclopedia."  This is more indirect evidence that the "POV is allowed on user pages" rule perhaps only goes so far.  If these user boxes really are interfering with encyclopedic activities, this suggests they do not belong. --DragonHawk 21:33, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  ... an anarchy 

message: Policies and guidelines
* Respect other contributors.  This is one of the four "key policies" listed, but has no single page of it's own (it actually has several).  This policy is extremely relevant to this discussion, I think.  I think it's clear that anything, user page or otherwise, which fails to respect other Wikipedians is Not Good.  --DragonHawk 07:14, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Key policies 

message: With respect to categories that user boxes are in, can we agree that 
* this is a good thing when the user box describes a skill that is in demand, to help Wiki encyclopaedia development, like being able to translate between 2 languages.
* this is a bad thing when it identifies an interest sub-group that could be used to subvert consensus, or help support general vandalization, and cliques of either ordinary editors or administrators.
* there is a grey area in between where people say they interested in editing certain topics, or have certain qualifications that can help with verification.
There is an issue of enforcement.  As newbies learn how to put things in categories, and use the Special Pages to find stuff that needs better linking, this policy will be violated.  People like me who have been members for 6 months, still have lots of Wiki stuff to learn, so in some areas we newbies, in other areas we not.
User:AlMac|(talk) 17:10, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: No, we cannot agree to the above.  Categories do not make POV edits.  Wikipedians make POV edits, and when they do so, such edits are reverted to maintain NPOV.  Userboxes are part of user space, and involved in user categorization.  There is no compelling reason to remove the category associated with a userbox.  Ever.  --Dschor 22:19, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Categories of User Boxes 

message: In an edit summary just now on the project page (attached to this edit that changed what was lined out around NPOV as an objection, Eightball said "Many say that Fair Use extends to userpages, but NPOV does not; this is contradicting. Either they both do, or neither do."  
* My response: In my view these are different things. Fair use is legalistic. ALL publications, websites, etc, at least those in the US, have to abide by Fair use, or may get sued. It applies to ALL content, and specifically, it applies at WP in articlespace, templatespace, categoryspace, userspace, you-name-itspace. (and yes I possibly run afoul of Raul's rule about who knows copy law and who doesn't). NPOV is a policy of Wikipedia. It applies where it is chosen to apply. It's an unshakable policy, with respect to articles. Jimbo has said it is not negotiable. However he did NOT say it applies to userspace, and common convention here, as this newb sees it, is that it is OK for users to say they have a point of view. That's getting to the crux of the problem. Is it or isn't it OK? I think it is, I think policy and precedent here say it is too... see WP:UP. (as an aside, it may be under this interpretation that templatespace can't have POV, so all boxes that did assert POV would have to live in userspace and not templatespace)++Lar: t/c 04:48, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Comment by [[User:Eightball]] 

message: I tried a bit of a refactor here: Policies relevant to the userbox debate to try to capture that some people might think these policies are relevant, because there was a lot of back and forth and maybe this is inclusionary enough to be good? ++Lar: t/c 05:18, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bit of a refactor 

message: ( Moved MSK's "counterargument" to talk page  ++Lar: t/c 07:20, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah, done now - hope that's better --Mistress Selina Kyle (Α⇔Ω ¦ ⇒✉) 07:35, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  refactor 

message: One thing user boxes let us do is build communities.  Communuity building yields two major kinds of benefits.  One is that people interested in the same things, or sharing knowledge on the same subjects, can collaborate better as a community.  Experts on, say, geology, can coordinate their efforts, distribute the load, and check each other's work.  Such a community can even be a resource to outsiders -- to continue my example, if someone else needs to check a geological fact, they can go to the geology community.  Most or all of the WikiProjects are fall into this category.  The other benefit from community building is less tangible.  By making Wikipedia a place people feel like they belong, where they want to come to, we increase the overall quality and quantity of contribution.  These are all Good Things, and reasons why User Boxes can be Good Things.
However, as a counter point to all that, it should be noted that putting people into groups does not always build community; indeed, it can do the opposite.  Grouping people can divide people.  Any time you create a group that is "in", everyone else becomes "out".  This is an ancient human behavioral pattern.  Being a member of a group that others are not a member of can be powerful and addictive in all the wrong ways.
So, I think one key thing to look at here is: Does the group created by a user box bring people together, or push them apart?
Given that criteria, I realize now that perhaps some of the user boxes on my own user page are, perhaps, not as nice as they should be.  Rather then saying "I contribute with Foo", perhaps it would be better if I just said "I know a lot about Foo".
--DragonHawk 07:42, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Community 

message: (in response to Ronline... but started a subsection to make editing easier) 
If people are vote stacking I don't think the counter argument is to encourage opposing groups both to stack, as Ronline seems to be advocating (sorry if I mis read but that's my take). WP:NPOV doesn't mean ( POV vs. Opposing POV ) duke it out to see who can win, it means NPOV. NEUTRAL, not paired opposing.... That said I think there is an analogy with gun control here, those advocating userbox prohibition may not like this analogy, sorry. I oppose gun control for the reason that I don't think it works, and because it's going after the tool, not the tool user. Userboxes don't cause vote stacking. Users do. Getting rid of userboxes won't stop votestacking. It may make it marginally harder but it won't stop it. If we want to totally stop vote stacking without going after the people doing it, we have to ban every tool that can be used to do it. No email links, no categories, no searchable text on user pages, no posting what your IM handle is on your user page, etc etc. I think the right thing to do is to maybe make it a little harder to stack (mild: disallow automatic categorisation, stronger: require subst for all boxes so that even what links here can't find usages), not to ban expression of POV on user pages. If user boxes are banned completely I am going to still list my affiliations and beliefs on my page, by hand I guess, until and unless WP:UP says it's against policy to do so. ++Lar: t/c 23:07, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Vote stacking as an argument