User talk:WereSpielChequers/Archive 10

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This is where I archive threads that are mainly about Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion aka NEWT, a project that I started in October 2009, halted on the 23rd November 2009 and have sometimes had to explain since. I have also made some notes on this at:

Thanks for pointing me to your bot proposal

Hi, I really appreciate your pointer to your bot proposal. Only through this I found the great discussion at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/new users and your fascinating experiment. I have left my comment on the bot proposal page, and hopefully people would respond positively to it. Wondrousrecall (talk) 23:01, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Newbie treatment

Hi WereSpielChequers. I've been watching User:WereSpielChequers/Newbie treatment with interest - it's a very informative (and, yes, depressing) experiment. Perhaps it would be a good idea to mention the thing about arbcom wanting test accounts to be reported to them at the top of the page? I'd do it myself were it not in your userspace. Cheers, Olaf Davis (talk) 09:34, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, I've made that change, but please don't feel constrained by it being in my userspace, I'm hoping it will eventually be deemed worth moving to WP space anyway. I was hoping that the experiment would be frontloaded towards the depressing results and that after the 7 days we would be getting more reassuring results. My own test is still in there, as yet unpatrolled and I intend to unveil it when and if it survives those patrollers who patrol the back of the queue. It may not get there for a couple of weeks, but yes the results so far are not reassuring. ϢereSpielChequers 17:38, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Good idea. I'm thinking of adding my own experiment to the list, once I get the time and can think of a suitable subject. Olaf Davis (talk) 18:51, 19 October 2009 (UTC)

Newts and caterpillars

Sockcaterpillar

Would a caterpillar be an acceptable substitute? _Hamlet, Prince of Trollmark^{bugs and goblins} 15:58, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Your highness, my gratitude knows no bounds, thankyou for entrusting my little project with such a regal token of your royal personage. ϢereSpielChequers 17:51, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

RE: Newts

That's fine; I get the impression that "a newbie has made an article, lets fix the mistakes made" was not, unfortunately, the common reaction. I won't be attending Sunday (public law essay to do, bleugh) but I'll be down in December, it looks like. Ironholds (talk) 03:47, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually that probably is the most frequent reaction, but not as frequent as we'd like. I think we have met the 2 minute and 7 day challenges, but we have also established that the problem exists, it just isn't as stark as that journalist made out. Might see you in January as I'm away for the second Sunday in December. ϢereSpielChequers 15:20, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

If I may interject here, can I just say thank you for the interesting and thought-provoking work you have been doing with WP:NEWT, and the polite way in which you have been handling discussion around it. Bondegezou (talk) 15:06, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks very much, I guess I should have expected some of the controversy that this would provoke. We all make mistakes, and I think even the people who've been really annoyed to have their mistakes pointed out have almost all been pretty civil about things. BTW I notice you are also in London, can we tempt you to a wp:London meetup some time? I think the next I'm likely to be at will be in January. ϢereSpielChequers 14:13, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

I'd love to make a London meet-up some time, yes, although depends how busy work is! Bondegezou (talk) 17:18, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

Along the same lines of Wikipedia:Requests for comment/new users‎

When Netmouse signed up for the Wikipedia:Article Rescue Squadron/Members he mentioned this page: Strategic Task Force on increasing reader contributions Sometimes blowback can be a positive thing.Ikip (talk) 05:38, 13 November 2009 (UTC)

CSD project

You do know, once this experiment is stopped (which it already is, so I figured: "why oppose something that is already done?") then it will be very difficult to start it again without major controversy. Ikip (talk) 22:17, 16 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes I appreciate that, but we have more than enough data for this to be the equivalent of a focus group, and far more findings than I could have hoped for. Some of the early opponents of this scheme were easily one over - NVO went from an opponent to the creator of some of the best articles that wp:NEWT generated. I think if it had kept to stuff where practically no-one would support deletion then it would not have become contentious, but then its always the developments you least predict that throw you. My worst case scenario was being hoist with my own petard by deleting someone else's "newbie" article. Mind you that might still happen if I have a look at the articles created last Thursday! ϢereSpielChequers 14:21, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

I have to say, I am excited and thrilled at you and Casliber's efforts, and I trust your judgement fully. This is the first time I have had hope for Wikipedia in years and years. thank you. Ikip (talk) 15:29, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

Please see: User_talk:DGG#Scrapping. As DGG has on his user page:

"I do not attempt to convert my opponents--I aim at converting their audience."

I haven't followed the status of this argument enough to say, but step back and ask yourself how much time you are spending arguing with editors who never, ever, ever will be convinced. If you find you are going in circles, it is time to move on, either around or over the naysayers, if not carry on. :)

Anyway, I would love your input on DGG's page. Ikip (talk) 22:52, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Your opinion on a NPP collaboration project

(Note: I originally wrote this for a wider audience of editors, but decided against it and thought I'd ask you.)

Special:NewPages is in almost irreparable chaos. Managing both the backlog of unpatrolled pages and new ones flooding in is proving to be too much work for too little users working on it. Fewer articles are being removed from the backlog every day than are added to it the same day. This really is ugly and pressing. We need more people helping with it.

People have been pointing fingers at WP:NEWT for the unforeseen effects it had on the NPP process. It wasn't their intention, but it heaped a lot of stress onto the already loaded new page patrollers. It's a stressful job. There are hundreds of articles that go through Special:Newpages every day, and every one has to be tagged or patrolled or referenced or deleted. In a space of ten minutes you might get fourteen articles. Not every new user can be guided and helped up appropriately. While a warm welcome for every newbie is an ideal, efficiency is a necessity.

Anyway, I'm rambling. Bottom line: WP:NEWT became a project that challenged the patrollers from the newbie side. I'm proposing a collaboration of editors that will work from the patrollers' side to deal with new articles and users as they think they should. What do you think ? A little insignificant ^{Giving thanks to all that is me} 18:24, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

Interesting, but I'm not sure I agree with your analysis. A third side to newpage patrol and the one that I'm most active on is Category:Candidates for speedy deletion which until recently would frequently be over 100 articles, its currently at 45 but has been much lower in the last week or two. New page patrol actually gets a couple of thousand articles a day, but Special:Newpages doesn't seem any busier than normal, and as for the back of the queue, well I know it was at 30 days on the 5th November, after the signpost article about NEWT it dropped to 25 days, and is still only 27 days. My conclusion from all that is that if anything NEWT at least for a while brought some extra eyes to new page patrol.

Yes new page patrol deals with a daunting flood of new articles, I think that the trick to working there without stressing yourself is to remember you are part of a team, do some bits of it that you enjoy doing and leave the bits that don't interest you to others. In particular remember that you don't have to make a decision about any article, there are some subjects that I neither know nor care about and I tend to simply ignore new articles aboout those subjects.

However I do like your idea about a collaboration of editors who work on newpage patrol, though I'm not sure I'd agree about "from the patrollers' side to deal with new articles and users as they think they should". One thing that NEWT has shown us is that there are some differences of opinion about NewPage patrol, though I would say the divide is inclusionist/deletionist rather than new page patroller v the non-patrollers. I think that NEWT has already sparked a lot of ideas for reform of the process - too many really for me to stay involved in all the discussions I've started and also do some other things that I want to do. So I'm holding back on some further suggestions until the consensus emerges on the ones already being discussed. I suspect that Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/SDPatrolBot II is currently the closest to going live, if it does I think it would make life a bit less bitey for newbies, and a little easier at newpage patrol. By contrast Wikipedia talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#Should unsourced become a speedy deletion criterion? got a clear consensus for no change - though sadly I think the "delete unsourced stuff" view which was occasionally expressed at WP:NEWT didn't participate at WT:Speedy.

Which all adds up to a long way of saying that IMHO we can make newpage patrol a better place for newbies, admins and patrollers alike, but to do so we will need to make some changes. There are several proposals out there that would affect NPP in various ways if they were implemented, and all of them would benefit from input by New Page patrollers, especially strategy:Proposal:Speedy deletion - 24 hour pause for some articles which I fear lacks input because it is on the strategy wiki. ϢereSpielChequers 19:36, 19 November 2009 (UTC)

I also think we can reduce the size of the task at Newpages by nominating more users at Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/Autoreviewer. Though this could have the downside that if you patrol new pages believing you are looking at all the stuff coming in, the more good authors we have with autoreviewer status, the more jaundiced view one might have of our new articles! ϢereSpielChequers 11:40, 20 November 2009 (UTC)

WP:SOCK

Just so you don't miss it on the discussion page, from WP:SOCK, Contributing to the same page with multiple accounts: Editors may not use more than one account to contribute to the same page or discussion. Could you explain your justification for violating the policy here [1]?--Crossmr (talk) 14:26, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

Well I think the relevant part of the policy is "Contributing to the same page with multiple accounts: Editors may not use more than one account to contribute to the same page or discussion in a way to suggest that they are multiple people. Contributions to the same page with legitimate alternate accounts is not forbidden (e.g. editing the same page with your main and public computer account or editing a page using your main account that your bot account edited)." So the question is looking at User:Dahsun or the edit summary from this edit, do the edits by WereSpielChequers look like they were trying to hide a connection to Dahsun or WP:NEWT? ϢereSpielChequers 17:07, 21 November 2009 (UTC)

I think you'll find that part of the policy was just changed by someone who just did the same thing as you in the same project. That is not the wording at all. There is no exception built in there for legitimate accounts or an exception about not making it look like the accounts are two different people. The policy clearly states that the same editor shouldn't edit the same article with multiple accounts. While I agree that bot edits are autonomous and they may edit any article at any time without direct control of the person controlling it, you and several others engaged in deliberately editing the same articles with multiple accounts.--Crossmr (talk) 01:32, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

It's a question of the letter of the law vs the spirit of it. The intent of the sentence is to forbid the use of alternate accounts (declared or otherwise) to: create the impression of greater support for a proposal, to operate a "good-hand bad hand" or to avoid 3RR or edit warring tripwires. Otherwise, for example, if I created User:Euryalus2 as an alternate account for use on public computers (the most common form of legitimate sock) then I would be forbidden from using it on any page my main account had contributed to even though that contribution was entirely innocuous and the link between the names was immediately clear. I could not, for example, use User:Euryalus2 to revert vandalism at User:Euryalus. I doubt the sentence referred to is designed to forbid actions such as these. The link between User:Dahsun and User:WereSpielChequers is well known and declared on Dahsun's page. And the specific edits to Mago II of Carthage are not controversial. -- Euryalus (talk) 05:23, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

At the time of the edits the link was not well known or declared. I've got no problem with someone having a work account and a home account if they feel there is a legitimate reason to do so, naming them accordingly and using them on the same page. If You wanted to created Euryalushome and Euryaluswork and edit the same page and include links on your user pages, go nuts. But two different accounts with very different names and the only link being buried on a project page isn't in the same league as that.--Crossmr (talk) 07:50, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The link is also fairly prominently at User:Dahsun, and I don't believe that at the time WereSpielChequers edited the Mago II page, there was any attempt to mislead anyone about the relationship between the two accounts. I appreciate that was not the case when Dahsun edited the article in the first place, but the merits of that is a matter for WT:NEWT. I suppose the point I'm making is there was nothing wrong with WereSpielChequers editing the Mago page when he did, whatever the merits of the NEWT project and the Dahsun account. A semantic point maybe, but where the link between the two accounts is prominently declared on the relevant userpage and the edits are not otherwise controversial, I don't see it as violating the spirit of the paragraph in WP:SOCK. However, I acknowledge you have a different point of view. Euryalus (talk) 09:05, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

The link was not fairly prominent on the page when WSC edited the page. Here is his first edit to the page [2], Here is when he first put the link on the account [3]. Prior to that the only indication that he owned both accounts was buried on a project page. It was 20 hours after he edited the page with both accounts before he identified the account.--Crossmr (talk) 10:08, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Since you've continued editing WSC, is it safe for me to assume you have no further information/defense to offer to your editing the same article with two accounts before they were clearly identified as such?--Crossmr (talk) 10:12, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

Well as I explained above I think my actions were reasonable, though I realise you don't. However if anyone agrees with you that I behaved badly on Mago II of Carthage I would request that these three edits be taken into account. ϢereSpielChequers 11:34, 23 November 2009 (UTC)

A different kind of NEWT

Hello there,

I understand you have started the WP:NEWT initiative. I was pointed to it by an admin after I asked him where I should go to raise awareness about an apparent ambiguity in the guidelines for article semi-protection, which seems to be used lightly in some quarters, penalising the editing potential of unregistered users. You can find more details here and here.

I was wondering if you can suggest any actions, other than asking clarifications here (which I am planning to do) and, for this particular situation with chemical elements, asking each protecting admin to reconsider their decision.

Thank you. 114.148.187.244 (talk) 08:46, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Hi, yes I started NEWT, but I'm not sure I've got enough experience to get involved in arguments about use of the protection and semi protection facilities. NEWT is a study into the way that articles by new editors are treated; predominately in terms of newpage patrol, speedy deletion and Welcoming, I had put an awful lot of time into all three of those processes, deleted thousands of articles, patrolled many more and welcomed quite a few newbies and therefore considered myself fairly knowledgeable about them before I started NEWT. But when it comes to Protection I have so far only protected 20 pages and unprotected none, and most of my protections have been utterly uncontentious salting of various deleted attack pages such as the sort that add "is gay" to the victim's name. So I consider myself underqualified to get into a general discussion about use of the Protection feature.

However I do have experience about the broader issue of editing by IPs, and how they are treated. Before I became an admin I spent a lot of time at recent changes, and to avoid competing with the hugglers I specialised in checking edits by editors with redlinked talkpages. The vast majority were not vandalism, and a couple of times since I've defended IP editing and revisited recent changes to confirm that such things haven't changed. I suspect that the "most IP edits are vandalism" meme is a byproduct either of Huggle's focus on edits by recently warned editors or the result of an editor watchlisting a vandal magnet like Beaver, not an informed view based on general experience with IP editors. I think that a project on IP editing and the treatment of IP editors would be well worth doing, though I suspect that if I participated it might unsettle some of our more deletionist colleagues. ϢereSpielChequers 14:17, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks!

		What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar
		I think that the idea behind WP:NEWT is a good one and we should run more experiments testing treatment of newbies in other areas - these kinds of tests help us figure out how to become better editors and how to develop a better working environment for everyone. Thank you for working on this! Awadewit (talk) 16:56, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Awadewit, I've really moved on to the results phase, should have something interesting on that soon. ϢereSpielChequers 20:35, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

WP:NEWT as historical

stifle marked Wikipedia:Newbie treatment at Criteria for speedy deletion with the template historical[4]

The template:

"Either the page is no longer relevant, or consensus on its purpose has become unclear."

...is this apt? Ikip 18:58, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I think it would be highly controversial to resume the data collection phase of wp:NEWT, and the problem we had on that page in the fortnight after we stopped collecting data meant it was impossible to discuss the results without every thread being hijacked into a discussion of the data collection. Remember I paused it because continuing it against that level of opposition would have become disruptive. I think that further debate in that area risks being disruptive to the pedia. I still regard New page patrol as a problem area where too many newbies are bitten, and too many patrollers don't discover that their work is contentious until they run at RFA. However now is probably not the right time to address those problems, and I am probably the last person to be seen to be promoting such an initiative as my involvement might provoke some to presume a Newt2. Of the many suggestions that came out of NEWT, I think that welcoming more Newbies and appointing more Autoreviewers are probably the least contentious. Which is why that is where I have recently been putting a lot of my wiki time. I also enjoy concentrating on the best articles I come across at New page patrol and looking at what else their authors have done. ϢereSpielChequers 19:57, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

thank you. Ikip 20:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Well said, WSC. —Ed (talk • majestic titan) 08:09, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Nomination for deletion of Template:NEWT notice

Template:NEWT notice has been nominated for deletion. You are invited to comment on the discussion at the template's entry on the Templates for discussion page. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 07:26, 30 September 2017 (UTC)