WikiIndex talk:Blocking and banning policy: Difference between revisions

** Editors who are sufficiently annoyed will will say as much on your talk page, with a link to a WikiIndex edit that irked them. If the behavior continues, an account may get progressively longer blocks, typically starting with 3 days, to act as a wiki vacation from WikiIndex.

: ''I made it much shorter, hopefully clearer and it is much different than [[English Wikipedia|Wikipedia]] - [[SoftSecurity]] is my intent. ~~ [[MarkDilley]]''

: I think that all edits should be initially looked at as [[WikiIndex:TestEdit|TestEdits]] - never as [[spam]] - this is from my strong belief in [[WikiIndex:AssumeGoodFaith|AssumeGoodFaith]]. ~~ [[MarkDilley]]

: I think that when we phrase our work as '''warning''' people - we have started off on the not [[WikiIndex:AssumeGoodFaith|AssumeGoodFaith]] foot and so I suggest that instead we try to encourage people to be constructive. ~~ [[MarkDilley]]

 

After staring at the red link to this page for a while, I grew suspicious that we aren't being real consistent in when and for how long we put down blocks on spammers. A cursory scan of [[wp:Wikipedia:Blocking policy|Wikipedia's blocking policy]] suggests the notion that lengthy blocks on [[IP address]]es is a little extreme. For reference I pulled up the blocking policies on a few other wikis: [http://en.uncyclomedia.org/wiki/Uncyclopedia:Ban_Policy] [http://www.hrwiki.org/index.php/HRWiki:Blocking_Policy] &mdash;&nbsp;<span style="font-family: Kristen ITC, Arial;">[[User:Sean Fennel]][[User talk:Sean Fennel|@]]</span> 14:19, 18 January 2007 (PST)

::The key is to not be a target of vandals.  Then there are the spambots, which are obvious, I would hope.  Block them forever, or for years.  PC is right, a short block might go unnoticed by a real person editor, a warning makes more sense. Do you guys get a lot of vandalism here, or just random botting/trolling?  At [[Rationalwiki]] we really don't much vandalism, a few [[troll]]s, I guess, but mostly no one harasses a wiki that has lots of active editors/sysops (we [[sysop]] everyone, pretty much).  OK, maybe it's because we're a fairly cool site, trolls prefer to attack loser sites.  But it might really be because we are active enough that trolls/spammers see they'd be wasting their time. Hope I helped in some way. [[User:Huw Powell|Huw Powell]] 06:23, 12 July 2009 (EDT)

#Wiktionary users may not realize that they have been blocked if they don’t happen to try and edit again till the block has expired.  Then they get repeated entries in their block logs without even knowing that they have done anything unacceptable.

#When users who have done something unacceptable get a warning on their talk page they will certainly see it next time they log in and the warning is less punishing.

[[:Category:Wikia|Wikia]] prefers warnings before blocks for minor offenses. Here’s the [[Liberapedia]] [http://liberapedia.wikia.com/wiki/Category:Policy Category Policy] though in practise these rules are not consistently observed.  At Liberapedia liberals are treated gently while administrators assume that conservatives aren’t likely to want to contribute constructively and they tend to get treated as vandals. Here are the [[Atheism Wiki]] [http://atheism.wikia.com/wiki/Blocking_policies Blocking policies]  

I once needed to edit my talk page at Wikipedia, I edited from a different IP adress, not my usual one and an administrator thought someone else was impersonating me.  It was quite annoying but I'd have minded more if someone had really impersonated me and the admins had done nothing.  Anyway I edited my talk age and tried to explain and later wrote more from my usual IP adress.  I agree that blocked users should be able to edit their talk pages but if they write rubbish on their talk age then we protect the talk page or reset the block to prevent that. [[User:Proxima Centauri|Proxima Centauri]] 04:52, 11 July 2009 (EDT)

:* blanking many user and user talk pages;

:* It looks like one [[sysop]] is on a vendetta when a user's block log shows only one sysop name. Is there some way we can reduce the appearance of a vendetta, and show that more than one sysop actually does approve of the block? Perhaps tweak this policy to disallow one sysop making two consecutive blocks? Or only allow blocks by one sysop only after someone else (perhaps not a sysop) puts a warning message on the blockee's user talk page?

I think [[vanity page]]s are acceptable if the user makes useful contributions as well, it's a way of paying the user for doing work.  Doing nothing except edit a vanity page is unacceptable to me. [[User:Proxima Centauri|Proxima Centauri]] 20:39, 20 August 2009 (EDT)

: I hope you can see that some person might think it is hypocritical of me to both (a) put information about myself on my user page, but (b) block a user and immediately delete all of that user's edits when that person has made no edits, good or bad, other than putting information about himself on his own user page.

: I don't know of any wiki where sysops immediately delete user pages without warning. People who follow the [[Wiki: AreYouThere]] protocol first post a warning, then wait at least a year(!), then delete that user page. Wikipedia never deletes such pages: "A user's contributions that consist solely of a lone edit to their user page, ..., should not normally be deleted" -- [[Wikipedia: user page]]

: Most wiki generally *encourage* newcomers to make a user page as one of their first edits.

How do we check if a spammer is a [http://computer.howstuffworks.com/zombie-computer.htm zombie computer]? is there any way we can alert the owner? [[User:Proxima Centauri|Proxima Centauri]] 01:44, 12 July 2009 (EDT)

:You could suggest they use [http://security.symantec.com/sscv6/home.asp?langid=ie&venid=sym&plfid=22&pkj=RTZYBMRSJRFSKLUKUMX&auth_status=0 Symantec Security Check] if they think they are infected (if that link doesn't work try [http://www.google.com/search?q=symantec+security+check&start=0&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=mozilla&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:unofficial this link]). [[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 03:22, 29 August 2009 (EDT)

::Perhaps you are aware of how to prevent this, "In 2005, a group from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation gave a demonstration where they cracked a WEP-protected network in 3 minutes using publicly available tools."[http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/content/view/24251/100/]? (<s>It doesn't mention</s>[I didn't notice anything about] the password strength but appears as if it doesn't matter.) [[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 05:24, 29 August 2009 (EDT)(Updated [[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 07:05, 6 September 2009 (EDT))

:::Sorry, typo; I meant WPA. You ''really'' don't have a vandal problem here. You have only a few edits from non-logged in users a day, so it is very unlikely that there is a hacker conspiracy hell bent on destroying your site. [[User:Phantom Hoover|Phantom Hoover]] 07:38, 29 August 2009 (EDT)

:As for the time being, I would suggest you go with [https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons Wikipedia's guidelines on biographical information] and also include their standard of notability as explained in that link. For example, most wiki administrators would not meet [[English Wikipedia]]'s notability guideline therefore you would delete information about them. When editors complain or violate it, someone might direct them [[WikiIndex:Policies and Guidelines#Biographical info]] and maybe they will present their case and we could establish some general guidelines that would work better for WikiIndex being that it generally has a more specialized notability criteria. [[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 03:04, 29 August 2009 (EDT)

:Secondly, perhaps some standard could be established regarding [[wiki]]s being excluded if they do not meet basic legal requirements for privacy, or whatever standards may be agreed upon by a significant majority of editors. If there gets to be [[edit war]]ring over the policy pages so this "consensus" is not possible, the owners would have to decide, I suppose. [[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 03:04, 29 August 2009 (EDT)

''"People may be blocked [...] to protect WikiIndex and its editors from harm."'' That sysop may have believed that they were protecting WikiIndex (or themselves) from "harm". There is no definition of "harm" here. Using terms like "harm" and "nonviolence", seems odd/vague, when most of this stuff is like content disagreements. Maybe there were some issues with "harassment". IMHO one of the primary reasons for policy is to clarify these sorts of things so that when there is a situation or emergency, you are prepared and united.  --[[User:Lumenos|Lumenos]] 18:15, 24 June 2010 (EDT)

:::I received a question with regards to why I am blocking spammers infinitely. I do not see a reason why if someone posts a [[spam]] link 100 times on a page that they should be allowed to return to do so again. I'll note that Mateo was banned for a year, and then came back and immediately did the exact thing. Therefore he gets a ban for that. As well, I have noticed on my own Wiki that if I short banned a spammer, they came back again and again to spam. If I perma-banned them, they would return over and over again to see the long term ban. That tells me that they are automated scripts, not people and so it shouldn't matter to them. I do not see why, personally, why we should have to deal with the same user/spammer/robot over and over again before removing them. Obvious spammers or posters of gibberish on a page do not deserve a second chance to do it again. We all have better things to do than clean up their mess and if it takes up all of our time then we do not have the energy to put into Wikiindex to make it better. Long comment, sorry, but I wanted to be clear on my reasoning. [[User:TeraS|TeraS]] 10:17, 25 September 2011 (PDT)