Wikipedia talk:Deny recognition

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Deny recognition (talk page)

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This is not a proposal. Despite repeated discussion about making this essay a guideline, it is originally and fundamentally an essay explaining some users' opinions or actions. It needs neither implementation nor consensus as an essay.

Contents 1 Special:Contributions for MfD! 2 Guideline 3 Wrong 4 Disruption 5 Disagree with this proposal 6 An essay... 7 Results

[edit] Special:Contributions for MfD!

Per WP:DENY. Or at least that's what would happen if WP:DENY became policy. The Special:Contributions pages of vandals violate WP:DENY technically, and hence if WP:DENY became policy, then the page would be deleted. All the categories, userpages, talk pages, and long term abuse pages relating to vandals have been deleted (per something that isn't a policy that I don't like). While I must admit I was looking through the categories mostly for humorous usernames and silly edits, deleting the long term abuse pages is just outrageous. The long term abuse pages are a method of notifying the good users about the vandal! That's why I hate WP:DENY- you've got to know what vandalism is in order to revert it! SupaStarGirl 13:30, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

There was general community consensus to do so; for example, see the landmark decision Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Long term abuse/Willy on Wheels 2. Faulting an essay for expressing or formulating a popular rationale is illogical, since it is the community that interprets and enforces the suggestions given by the essay. Using the slippery slope to argue that deleting a vandal showcase will inevitably lead to the deletion of a core software feature is far-fetched. —{admin} Pathoschild 17:11, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but as an exercise in highlighting the absurdity of the policy and how it is unenforcable it can't be beat. See reductio ad absurdum. What it does show is that the proposed policy is not well thought through, and at worst may lead to abuse. - Ta bu shi da yu 11:46, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Guideline

I would support making this a guideline (I do not think it should be a policy.) Who's with me?! Grandmasterka 22:29, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't actually think the division between widely-accepted essay and guideline is a big deal (less so than between policy/guideline), but I would support tagging it as a guideline. --Sam Blanning^(talk) 23:46, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely not. Causes too many problems as is, and reduces community oversight. --badlydrawnjeff talk 23:48, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't like this idea. It's too vague in its current form, it's previous precise form was unacceptable and caused all sorts of problems, and you don't need a guideline to run MfD's. --tjstrf talk 23:54, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

• No not a guideline, the part about deleting user pages is badly misguided. --JJay 00:32, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
• It's not a big deal, but a widely accepted essay (if actionable) is by definition a guideline. Per JJay's objection, I've clarified the part about 'deleting user pages' to indicate such deletion goes via discussion on WP:MFD since we don't have a WP:CSD criterion for that. (Radiant) 09:47, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm not convinced it's widely accepted. It's definitely heavily pushed by a very vocal group of editors, but there's no evidence of wide acceptance. --badlydrawnjeff talk 11:44, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
    • There is evidence that we have MFDeleted pages that had no purpose other than to glorify or otherwise give attention to vandals, and that these deletions were not controversial. (Radiant) 12:15, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
      • We also have evidence that the deletion of such pages that have that information have caused major problems. See the recent resurrection of Brian G. Crawford as an example. WP:DENY should not be a guideline because of situations like that - the pages must be handled on their own merits, and rogues who choose to simply speedy them outright without discussion are not helping the situation. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Which resurrection would that be? I find no record on Brian G. Crawford. At any rate, you are arguing that this should not be iron-clad without exceptions, and I agree - that's why it shouldn't be policy. The whole idea of all guidelines is that they're never iron-clad without exceptions (see also WP:POL). (Radiant) 14:00, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
          • Check on the issue w/Mr Spuky Toffee, who was later found to be a sock of BGC. User:JzG then made a post to AN/I to entertain the thought of unblocking him, which people endorsed until it was pointed out why he was blocked. This information used to be on his userpage before it was deleted under the auspices of WP:DENY. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
            • Where to I check this issue? There is no User:Mr Spuky Toffee. It would really help if you would cite actual links. (Radiant) 14:20, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
              • User: Mr Spunky Toffee. I don't really have the time or energy for specific diffs from weeks ago on the issue or I would provide them. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:30, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
                • I fail to see the problem you allude to. Toffee's user page clearly shows he's a sock of Brian, and Brian's page clearly shows he is banned by the foundation, and neither page shows any record of information deleted per WP:DENY. Are you suggesting that this page states we delete the reasons why people are blocked? Because that's not what the page says, and neither is that what happened in this case you mention. (Radiant) 14:46, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
                  • Then you're not reading the logs very well. The userpage of BGC was deleted as the userpage of an indefintely blocked user. This is right in line with WP:DENY, and exactly why we need to get rid of this quickly, so otherwise great editors don't make that sort of mistake again. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:51, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
                    • So? All the necessary information about BGC is still there and has not been deleted. The information deleted from the page consists of a bunch of userboxes and a list of AFDs he was involved in. In other words your claim that WP:DENY causes the deletion of useful information is false, QED. (Radiant) 15:15, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
                      • It isn't false, actually, plenty of info on the talk page was removed as well. You can keep saying that, but it doesn't make it more true. I'll also point you to Cyde's deletion logs, who's arguably the biggest proponent of this and often speedies this information in a blatant disregard for anyone else, and the various MfD discussions where otherwise useful information has been removed. --badlydrawnjeff talk 15:27, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
    • Toffee's talk page was never deleted; BGC's contains no information relevant to why he was blocked. Jeff, making allegations but refusing to substantiate them if asked for details is known as "handwaving" and is not a valid argument for anything. Until you have any actual evidence of your many unsubstantiated claims, I'm not going to bother discussing them with you any more. (Radiant) 15:58, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Your accusations of handwaving only seem to come when I have you cornered logically. I find that fascinating. If you believe what you believe, I obviously can't stop you, but I've provided plenty of evidence, it's your choice whether to accept it. --badlydrawnjeff talk 16:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
        • Badlydrawnjeff makes a good point. It is important to balance the needs of the community to remain aware of and keep track of ongoing problem individuals while also denying those problem users unwarranted notoreity gained from their disruptive behavior. One of the points that has been brought up is how glory seeking vandals have been inclined to let Wikipedia's tracking efforts function as a sort of automatic Google bombing for their vandal related terms. Optimally a system would allow for tracking while limiting the effects of such Google bombistic results. (→Netscott) 20:57, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
• The spirit of this WP:DENY is right. I don't see why this couldn't become a guideline. (→Netscott) 11:46, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Because the practice is wrong? --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:43, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
    • No because I've personally seen proof of vandal glory seeking. (→Netscott) 13:45, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
      • As have I. That doesn't mean that removing the information is the right move every time, which is what this implies. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:50, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
        • I don't see how this implies it, but it certainly isn't the intent of the page, so would you please edit it to remove that implication? (Radiant) 14:00, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
          • Not really, no, because the intent of the page as a whole is what's faulty. We'd be better off slapping a {{rejected}} on it to make sure it's not abused. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:10, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
            • I take it then that there really isn't an implication to remove the information every time, but that removal of such should be discussed on WP:MFD as the page says. (Radiant) 14:20, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
              • No, there is. Note how it has been handled. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:30, 8 December 2006 (UTC)
• Jeff has brought up some good points on why it shouldn't be a policy. I think it is widely accepted enough, and used often enough, that it can be a guideline. There have been many MfD discussions that put this essay into use, a lot of ANI threads about it that I can cite. Perhaps we can ask for wider input elsewhere? (Even on WP:ANI, where there are plenty of people who deal with this issue?) I certainly didn't expect this to turn into an angry argument between two editors, and I definitely wouldn't want to put a {{rejected}} tag on it. Grandmasterka 08:52, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
• Comment: The spirit of the initiative is good, the application is often bad. In the rush to deny vandals any form of recognition whatsoever, we often end up cutting off our noses to spite someone-else's face. I personally believe that the deny-initiative should be tempered with the maxim Don't deny where a trivial denial will cause a denial that you really wish you weren't responsible for because its waaaaaaay worse than a page with {{indefblockeduser}} on it. A good example of this is, don't delete a category full of sockpuppets of a given user if (as it will) it will cause you to find "{{declined}} It was more important to delete the sockpuppet category than it was to keep the information around for the benefit of checkuser." on RFCU. As long as users are stopping to think "How might this come back to bite me far worse than I ever expected?" I think we'll be fine. Essjay (Talk) 05:03, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

Comment: I still don't see this as a guideline in any way. The whole underlying premise is purely speculative or at best highly simplistic. I mean where is the proof for statements like: Vandalism is encouraged by offering such users exceptional notice or users imitate notorious or unique vandalism methods for amusement, to share in the infamy, or for the thrill of defying authority and/or the perception of destroying other users' work?

There are many reasons for vandalism and this essay barely scratches the surface. It reminds me of those who argue that we could largely eliminate terrorism or rioting if media coverage was limited or non-existent, thereby conveniently ignoring the root causes. The best way to fight vandalism here is by consistently reverting. Failure to do so leads to John Seigenthaler Sr. Wikipedia biography controversy, arguably the best known case of vandalism at wikipedia, although the article calls it a "hoax". In that case, Denying recognition and infamy removes the primary motivations for vandalism and disruption is clearly false and would have been vastly preferred by the vandal, or should I say hoaxster, since the eventual recognition and infamy cost Mr. Chase his job and served as a severe warning for legions of wannabe vandals. There are many cases where the evidence of past vandalism should be retained, both the user pages and other examples. This should clearly be decided on a case-by-case basis. But erecting this into some kind of guideline with lofty aspirations to "mitigate vandalism" is at best premature, at worst a false panacea for a far deeper problem. --JJay 20:52, 13 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Essjay, while the spirit of the idea is good, the writing is too vague, and will lead to all sorts of unintended, and negative, consequences when used overzealously. Prodego ^talk 02:01, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

• So perhaps we could fix the wording? It is obvious that some decisions are being made on the principle that Recognition should be Denied. The counterargument "but DENY is only a proposal" has not been very convincing against that. It would be useful to have a guideline that indicates when we should and when we should not Deny things. >Radiant< 10:23, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

  When it comes to deleting nonsense userpages and talk pages that are nothing but vandal warnings, this should be used. When it comes to deleting pages that only contain subtle references to new users "actually doing it" (such as BJAODN pages or long term abuse pages), then this should not be used, and the pages should be kept. SupaStarGirl 16:27, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wrong

CVU pages and the like helped me coordinate and fight vandalism a whole lot when I cared about this stuff. Vandals outnumber us by hundreds to one, yet we beat them because we employ all available tools; rollback, recent changes apps, and so on, make us more effective and efficient and reverting vandalism than vandals can be at vandalizing. WP:CVU and the so-called 'vandal hall of fame' are part of the structure that enables anti-vandal "cops and robbers" to coordinate with each other and know what is going on in the Wiki.

The most important example of why it's needed to have specific information about vandal profiles is that particular vandals often repeatedly hit the same pages. That means that an informed vandal slayer, when he or she notices a pattern of vandalism, can know where else to look for vandalism to revert, causing it to be reverted much faster.

I appreciate the concerns raised in this article as well as WP:RBI, which is why I think the best middle ground is to "admin protect" the relevant articles so that only admins can view them. However, it seems that suggestion was dismissed without consideration by supporters of DENY with the rationalized non-argument that there is "no need to bother the busy devs". This made my work on Wikipedia frustrating and difficult enough that I pretty much quit.

It's disheartening to see people so concerned with making life harder for the people who do the boring and thankless job of reverting vandalism on Wikipedia. Vandal fighters catch enough grief from the vandals themselves; I've been threatened with violence and called all manner of names on my talk page, repeatedly. So to see the hard work done by myself and others to document effective vandal fighting techniques for other users summarily deleted by the community was frustrating to say the least, and was a major contributor to my effective quitting my administrative duties. Vandal fighting is hard enough for us to be required to do it in any way except the most effective way possible.

--Ryan Delaney ^talk 17:46, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I've never found a need to keep records of past vandalism... And the idea of this is not to encourage more vandalism. (See the MfDs on long term abuse pages and several threads on ANI on thi subject for evidence of a general support for this essay and some evidence of its effectiveness.) Certainly no-one here is trying to "make life harder" for you. Or me. Grandmasterka 23:04, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

I understand that it doesn't have anything to do with the way you fight vandalism, but what so many people seem unwilling to understand is that record keeping does in fact help a lot of people. I appreciate that no one is deliberately trying to make it harder for vandal fighters, but that is what I think makes this so pernicious. "The road to hell is paved with good intentions" means that people who believe they are doing the right thing will not be swayed from their most destructive projects. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 23:27, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

• Well, that's precisely what I would like on this page: an indication of what kind of information is actually helpful for vandalfighters and thus shouldn't be removed. >Radiant< 10:29, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

For one, the MO(s) of vandals with MOs more sneaky then just "Sockpuppets" or "adds foul language/partizan screeds/blanks pages/starts riots", see for example WP:LB which has the best list that I can call to mind. 68.39.174.238 05:05, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I concur with Ryan's analysis and would like to add a yet another observation. An experienced vandal buster who has an intuitive feeling of a behavioral pattern of a particular vandal spots his attempts on sight. But wikipedia is HUGE crowd, and quite often a well-meaning colleague starts questioning, and you have to waste lots of time. This often happens in the case of hoaxers who habitually create false pages. Having a history for a proof makes it easy to talk. `'mikka 21:12, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Disruption

I'm rather wary of the suggestion that violatory pages be mass MfD as if this is misapplied, it could cause tremendous (perfectly innocent) disruption. Would it be worth suggesting that "if the page is particularly long established or used by the community" you ask (VP, AN, or someplace simliar) what peoples opinions are? I'm not suggesting VP/ANI become the new MfD, but that if someone suggests deleting something and the response comes back unanimously negative, a very disruptive scene could be avoided. 68.39.174.238 05:10, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I don't see how that would make a difference; you'd simply be proposing a deletion on an unrelated discussion page instead of using the normal deletion process. —{admin} Pathoschild 00:12, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Not if you don't say "Let's hold an MFD on ANI" (Bad pharaphrase), but something like "I suspect all [...] don't do any good and want to delete them all, does anyone here actually use them or find them useful?" and if you get a flood of "Yes usefull keep" its probably likely the MfD would go the same way, with a little more annoyance as a result of having that hideous green banner splashed on a ton of pages. 68.39.174.238 14:43, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Disagree with this proposal

You can't just put your head in the sand and say that vandalism doesn't happen. If this ridiculous proposal becomes policy, then we had better get rid of the counter-vandalism unit, all vandalism pages (like Wikipedia:Vandalism) and WP:AN/I, as they all recognise that vandalism occurs. I definitely oppose this policy, and particularly dislike the fact that it is already being bandied about as a policy when it is not one. - Ta bu shi da yu 10:17, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I kinda lost interest in it. I realized that after we deleted the Willy on Wheels and other vandal hall of fame pages that its main purpose had already been fulfilled. We don't need special pages to tell us that page-move vandals should be blocked pretty much on sight, but for less than the most obvious vandals it's useful to have a small amount of info on them. Grandmasterka 12:22, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the idea was to not recognize vandalism more than what was needed to deal with it at the time. Personally, I think the obvious solution is to organize anti-vandalism efforts off-wiki, for many reasons, and some already do this. I'd have to admit, most of my fears about "misuse" of this guideline have been unfounded. -- Ned Scott 14:10, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

• The fact is that we have deleted a lot of unhelpful stuff for the reasons of the principles espoused here. Sure, we mustn't delete anything that has a benefit to the encyclopedia - and perhaps some of the ovezelousness att he start has taught us that. I'd not argue that this should be policy/guideline, but that, in fact, (regardless of how you tag it) it IS policy/guideline. Sure, many people here, on this page, have concerns (some legitimate). Others have opposed it outright. Perhaps we can't generate a consensus here to tag this as policy. I don't actually care. However countless times MfD DRV etc. have in fact accepted the arguments and deleted stuff. So, that's very generally Wikipedia practice, and if it remains so we can maybe write up the policy at a future date when it is less contentious (or again, maybe not). But policy is as we do, not as we 'legislate'. Actually, no one wants a blanket policy here. No one is suggesting we speedy anything. There's always going to be borderline stuff that we'll want to debate. And vandal fighters will have some things they genuinely need to keep. So we'll need to take each item on a case-by-case basis. If we accept this as a 'policy' it wouldn't compel people to vote 'delete' in a debate - so if we reject it, it doesn't stop deletion consensus forming either. At some point maybe I'll write up an essay (unless someone beats me) recording the case (and the counter case, if you like), but for now it matters little what tag we put on this case. "Contentious, and perhaps (?) without consensus, in principle - often accepted and implemented in reality - lots of room for discussion at the edges". --Doc^g 23:16, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

  Until someone actually produces evidence that these pages result in more vandalism than they help revert, I'd prefer to leave that determination up to the people who actually use them. That it is often cited as policy does not make it so; this is an is-ought gap. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 23:36, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

  Ah, just what I love about Wikipedia. There is a cabal (I've met them), and there are so-called "policies and procedures" which are not followed, then there are policies and procedures that aren't actually written down but nevertheless, need to be followed. What a wonderful place this has turned out to be! As for transparency, well, heck, that's already shot and unless you are part of the inner sanctum (i.e. you are in the core group of people in the UK and the US), then you might as well not attempt to do anything on Wiki. Welcome to the world of "consensus" that isn't consensus, and the free encyclopedia that is anything but free. Sheesh. - Ta bu shi da yu 12:02, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, that's the point. There isn't any logical way of producing hard evidence, nor could there be. Although we do know that vandals were interacting with some of the pages that we've now deleted. I caught one vandal tagging his own socks, checkusers have caught others. I think we've reached the balance point, where we keep those things that the vandal fighters indicate they are actually using, and we've got rid of most of the rest. That balance takes the heat out of the argument. As to people citing this, that's less significant than the fact that we've reached dozens of deletion consensus on the strength of related arguments. We have a defacto consensus that is operating, which rather renders debating the wikilaw moot. (So, I'll discontinue....)--Doc^g 00:12, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

It seems that this essay/proposal/whatever has been brought to my attention a bit late in its existence, but alas I'll lend my 2 cents: provided I am reading this properly, it seems that this would advise against enumeration of all of a vandal's edits (1 warning per each vandal edit). Provided this is indeed feasible to accomplish, I favor doing this as it provides an indication of exactly how prolific a vandal is; rather than perusing their history which (may) include seemingly normal edits -- perhaps legitimately useful or perhaps a series of minor edits intended to clutter their history of vandalism. This essay appears to be concerned that enumeration of vandal warnings will only encourage them, but on the other hand I believe it would assist with enforcement and ultimately blocking the offenders. I'm a bit tired at the moment, so hopefully this statement was at least half-coherent... just let me know if anyone would like further elaboration. Sláinte! --Bossi (talk ;; contribs) 03:28, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

That is only accurate to a certain degree. Although some warnings are not useful and can be deleted (such as on user pages of indefinitely blocked non-sockpuppet users), most warnings are genuinely useful in countering vandalism and are kept. The essay addresses this common objection: "Some material is still going to be valuable in dealing with vandalism, so this isn't about pretending vandalism doesn't exist. Information on vandalism should be critically appraised for its genuine value, and if that value outweighs any detriment from the publicity of that vandal/vandalism." —{admin} Pathoschild 05:24:50, 22 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] An essay...

... if this is an essay, why does it direct editors to do stuff?

Userpages for indefinitely blocked users (except sockpuppets and banned users) that have no practical purpose can be put on WP:MFD or WP:PRODed after a short while

Surely this is not what an essay is here for? - Ta bu shi da yu 00:35, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Lots of essays commend cources of action (see Wikipedia:No climbing the Reichstag dressed as Spider-Man). Anyway, saying 'can be done' isn't directing that anyone has to do it. If you disagree with the essay, then you probably won't do it.--Doc^g 01:00, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Sadly, the whole point of this debate is that this isn't a "if you don't agree with x then don't do it." This is not a dispute over a victimless crime; deleting these pages wholesale (as was being done when this was first a proposed policy, and some useful pages remain deleted still) causes real damage to the cause of vandal fighters and consequently to the project. It's not a situation where we can just stand by and do nothing. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 01:13, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps. But surely the solution is to say "definitely don't delete anything which has a utility". All but the most obvious deletions should go to MfD - and there we can try to ascertain what is useful. I for one will vote to keep anything if someone can make an actual case why it is useful. If something has been deleted that is really hampering us in dealing with vandals do tell, we should get it undeleted quickly. --Doc^g 01:35, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

I have nothing new to add to what I've already said to you about the usefulness about these pages, so I'm pessimistic about the utility of explaining it again. --Ryan Delaney ^talk 18:00, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, well I think the whole thing is just a matter of us all using common sense. There's really not a lot more to it.--Doc^g 18:03, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

A lot of people oppose this concept. Perhaps this is not necessarily a clear case of "common sense"? Many people (myself included) find it counter to common sense? - Ta bu shi da yu 10:05, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

• This page could probably be improved by adding examples of when it is and is not appropriate to delete vandal-related pages. >Radiant< 16:47, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

As the comprehensiveness of a vandal's MO within a single, stereotypical edit of theirs increases, the potential usefulness of pages on them decreases? 68.39.174.238 20:00, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

• Sounds reasonable. You are welcome to edit this page, of course. >Radiant< 12:55, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

Sigh. That's not what it was tagged as when I first saw it. - Ta bu shi da yu 23:42, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Proof this is a de facto plociy disguised as an essay.--71.170.41.7 05:41, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

All that shows is that a very early draft was tagged as a proposed 'policy, guideline, or process' eleven months ago. If you read the second box, you'll note that it was also tagged as "Project DenyRecognition" which sought to "gain wide approval for the deletion of unneeded categories and user pages which serve to recognize and/or glorify negative contributors". This was eventually changed into an essay instead. That's hardly proof that it is a 'de factor policy'. —{admin} Pathoschild 07:08:49, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Results

Surprisingly, Google results on Wikipedia for the previously most notable vandal have dropped 95% from 23,900 to just 1,150 (based on numbers archived in a revision dated 27 March 2006). That's not a perfect indication of glorification, of course, but I'd say we're off to a good start. I've personally noticed a dramatic decrease in page move vandalism based on that meme, but I may only be seeing what I want to see; some confirmation would be nice. :) —{admin} Pathoschild 18:14:28, 01 April 2007 (UTC)