Wikipedia talk:Quickpolls

Proposed "no retaliation" rule

I agree that retaliation is a bad idea, but simply making that policy is an open invitation to the usual trolls to carry on with their favourite tactic of complaining about the victim before the victim finally feels obliged to complain about the troll. (We saw this exact sequence happen countless times on RFC and Complaints about Users. Habitual trolls are very good at this stuff.) Is there a way to avoid this problem that you can think of? Tannin

Uh, focus on accuracy of content rather than assigning euphemisms to donors?

How to deal with frivolous quickpolls?

We have a fairly blatant example of a frivolous quickpoll at the moment - 172 has started a quickpoll in apparent retaliation for VV's quickpoll started about an hour earlier. Frankly, I think this is an abuse of process. The question is, how do we deal with it? Should we have some sort of sanction for abusing the quickpolls process - say a temp ban of the user, or a more limited ban on the user starting new quickpolls (e.g. for one month or whatever)? -- ChrisO 10:27, 2 Apr 2004 (UTC)

We should require that any new Quickpoll be sponsored by an admin user, Chris. That would reduce the volume of silly and trivial stuff here enormously. Think about it:

From the point of view of an ordinary (non-admin) Wikipedian desiring to start a Quickpoll, Joe:User has only to persuade one out of the 200-odd admins. If Joe:User can't persuade even one (i.e., 0.5%) of the admins that there is a genuine matter of concern here, then the case does not deserve to be taken to a Quickpoll.
From the point of view of a relatively new user (i.e., someone who does not yet meet the length of membership/number of non-reverted edits qualification), this would be an improvement, as it would put them on a more even footing with the "elite" 3-month users. (Or 100 edits, or whatever the qualification is at the moment.)
From the point of view of an admin, this means that some careful thought is required. Let's say that Jill:User contacts me, requesting that I move a Quickpoll as regards your reverts on List of stupid lists. I have to ask myself if Jill's concern is genuine, or if it's mere trolling. I have to ask myself if this is a matter suitable for decision via Quickpoll, or if mediation might be more appropriate - or, indeed, other measures, such as page protection, or help with NPOV in the article concerned. I have to ask myself if the proposed Quickpoll has any chance of succeeding, or if it is most likely going to go nowhere. And, finally, I have to ask myself if moving this Quickpoll is going to make me look petty or stupid. In short, I'm not going to start the poll unless I can see that Jill's complaint really does have some merit.

You see what's happened here, Chris? All of a sudden, we are reintroducing the idea of personal responsibility. We are proposing that starting a Quickpoll actually require thought beforehand, not mere short-term anger.

You are an admin too, if I remember correctly. How many trivial and petty Quickpolls are you going to sponsor if the last one you signed your name to was roundly voted down? Or Martin? Or Hepastos? Or Angela? Or any of the other 200-odd admins? On the other hand, if the matter really is serious, then you (or me, or whichever one of us), if we take our responsibilities seriously, will stick our necks out and move the poll. Tannin 10:55, 2 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Perhaps we could have a Wikipedia:Requests for quickpolls page, along the lines of Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. The quickpolls page could be protected (so that only admins can add new ones) but the individual quickpolls could be includes, similar to those used on VfD, that all users could edit.

An alternative might be to restrict who can actually vote on quickpolls, perhaps just restricting the "franchise" to the 200-odd admins. That would eliminate at a stroke the sock puppets, ineligible voters etc. It could be accomplished simply by protecting the quickpolls page so that only admins can edit it. Again, there would need to be some kind of "requests for quickpolls" procedure where an admin can take a quickpoll request forward if it passes the "smell test".

Admittedly, these aren't particularly elegant solutions and I don't want to bog the whole process down in another layer of bureaucracy, but there does need to be some way of weeding out the hopeless and frivolous. The whole concept of quickpolling will be discredited very quickly otherwise. -- ChrisO 11:12, 2 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I agree, Chris, at least in the broad thrust of your remarks. I think that the notion of restricting quickpoll voting to admins only would produce rapid howls of outrage! For all that it would produce a technically neat and tidy, and very practical, way of proceeding, I think its chances of being implemented are close to zero.

But something has to be done, and done fairly promptly, as - just as you say - the whole concept of quickpolling will be discredited very quickly otherwise. Tannin 11:28, 2 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Bear in mind that it was a non-admin who made the valid quickpoll, and an admin who made the frivolous, childish retaliatory one. (Ditto for RfC.) 172's violation of guidelines and abuse of the system seem to be of precious little concern, however, if the 1-10 vote on his censure is any indication. -- V V 01:47, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Purpose of quickpolls

I apparently did not understand what the point of having quickpolls is. 172 clearly violated the guideline in question in addition to his generally belligerent behavior on that page, but votes (though few in number) were overwhelmingly opposed. So, what is the criterion? I understand of course that 172's ideology fits with the community (at least most of the voters), but is it really going to be the policy that a user's actions are tolerable as long as they have the "right" opinions? Or, should I assume that there is no three-revert rule at all? I held back on undoing 172's grossly inappropriate reverts because I believed that there was a rule and system for this. Apparently there is not. -- V V 01:47, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

In most cases the purpose of a quickpoll is to cause the subject to shape up, knowing that any further misbehavior will almost certainly result in a ban. Clearly, an improvement in a user's behavior is a better outcome than a ban. Mkweise 02:16, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I would have supported a temp-ban if you had given 172 a warning and a fair chance to improve his behavior, as required by quickpoll policy. Otherwise you open yourself up to charges of a "setup".—Eloquence 02:22, Apr 3, 2004 (UTC)

Notice location

Can some kind soul remind me where else I am supposed to post notice that I have blocked a signed-in user? I seem to remember that I am supposed to place a notice somewhere. (No, not the mailing list - I stopped reading & posting to that unreadable madhouse long ago.) But I think there is a page here somewhere I'm supposed to put a note on. Thanks -- Tannin 01:57, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Nowhere that I can think of. Do you want me to tell the mailing list for you? moink 01:59, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Thankyou. I'd appreciate it. I find the mailing list overly difficult to post to. (For complex reasons to do with using multiple ISPs.) Tannin

Done. moink 02:11, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)

I strongly oppose the idea of using this page to attack opponents in edits wars and pushing own POVs, like Wik is allowed to. Also, a strong Polish lobby, which also has an army of known and unknown sock puppets, may certainly be able to abuse this page in order to reach such a goal. There is clearly a need of more discussion of how this is supposed to work. Nico 02:26, 3 Apr 2004 (UTC)