UDWiki:Open Discussion/Voting Guidelines

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At the moment, there's a policy being discussed here about making English the sole official language of the wiki administration. More specifically, it has been created as a result of some votes on A/D/S being made in languages that can't be understood by the majority of the Wiki (from memory, Japanese, Indonesian, Dutch, Italian and German.)

It's clear that a strict "English Only" rule is not wanted by the majority of the wiki community. However, it does seem that most people do agree that the bolded part of the vote should be easily understood by the Wiki community (or more correctly, whoever counts the votes.) Basically, I'm proposing a guideline change, which adds the following clause to voting guidelines on administration pages (A/D, A/D/S, A/PD,) to include the following:

The stance of a voter must be easily understood by the Wiki community. Ambiguous votes will be struck.

(Commentary is not covered, only the bolded part.)

I would much prefer this to be a guideline change, as opposed to a new policy. If the community seems to want this as a policy, as opposed to a guideline change, I'll ask for this page to be moved to A/PD. Of course, the wording is up for discussion.

Thoughts? Linkthewindow  Talk  09:08, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Just a note that the bracketed text (covering comments) will not be included in the final version. See below in regards to comments. Linkthewindow  Talk  13:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Discussion

I like it, and the idea sounds good. I think the word "stance" is ambiguous though, and the phrasing might be better if it read as, "The bolded part of the vote..." for that first part. Alternatively, we could just say something along the lines of, "The only acceptable votes are Yea, Nay, or easily understood variations thereof. All others will be struck." —Aichon— 09:50, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
Well, there's a For and an Against section for votes to be placed in, so how is there any ambiguity? There's no actual need for a bolded word of any kind. Whatever else people add (if anything) is irrelevant, all that counts in voting terms is their signature's placement in the relevant voting category.--Mallrat The Spanish Inquisition TSI The Kilt Store TKS Clubbed to Death CTD 10:27, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
We aren't just talking about policy discussion. There are no for and against sections on A/D or A/D/S. Linkthewindow  Talk  10:31, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I still don't see why there's any need for this, since the voting guidelines are pretty clear on most pages.
For example, there's this voting style:
It seems pretty clear to me.
Then there's this style:
Again, pretty clear.
Then there's A/D, A/SD, etc.
Okay, here I can see a change being needed to prevent people from arguing that their submission had a "short and to the point" deletion reason, just in Uruk-hai. Although I think it would take only one or two precedence setting vote-strips due to general f*%^tardery for it stop being an issue. If any page might need an English-only clause, it's these admin ones and only these ones. -Wulfenbach 11:05, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
It's to make it clear that votes must be understood by everyone, and to give people the power to strike them when people go ahead and do it anyway. Yeah, with a strict reading of the rules, it might be redundant, but a bit of redundancy to reduce ambiguity is only a good thing. Also, the A/D/S rules need a rewrite - under a strict reading of that rule, the vast majority of these votes are invalid. Linkthewindow  Talk  11:10, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
It's always a good idea to have precedence set in guidelines/policy, too (as with the porn deletions.) Linkthewindow  Talk  11:15, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I quite like your second one. While we are at this, would it be worth standardizing all Wiki voting (so it's in the A/PD standard,) instead of having three different systems for doing the same thing. I've never understood why we don't use a derivative of the A/PD voting for deletions and scheduled deletions, anyway (as A/PD is a superior system, imo.)
If we did that, we wouldn't have to worry about adding in a "languages" clause anyway (as you don't need a bolded word in an A/PD system.) Linkthewindow  Talk  11:10, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
Well, then we're potentially talking about two different things that need addressing: 1) A clear, English stance (yea/nay) and 2) a standardized voting system (for/against). A third, related topic, would be when required, a clear, English reason for purposes of admin acting on issues.
1) I would change your suggestion to "The stance (a bolded vote option) of a voter must be easily understood by the Wiki community. Only stances listed in the voting section of the page are valid. Commentary is not ever considered part of a stance. Ambiguous votes will be struck."
2) Whatever system we would go to should be balanced such that a user can agree, disagree or abstain (as a stance). As for whichever one, meh. We have several and they're for the most part purpose-built for the voting required.
3) The fundamental issue I see is whether or not to require English use when there is a demonstrable need for clarity and understanding. Reasons to delete, demands for action, etc perhaps need that requirement where necessary. Commentary should not be so required at this time until users so show that it can be abused to spam pages. At which point we won't need to require English, since there will be precedence for punishing people for being deliberately trollish.
This would change 1) to "A vote or a request must be easily understood by the Wiki community. A valid vote or request conforms to the requirements as listed in the appropriate section of the page. Commentary is always optional, and thus not required to be understandable or present. Ambiguous votes and requests will be struck. Repeated ambiguous entries by a user may be considered spam." -Wulfenbach 12:06, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I kinda need to hit the sack, but let me chime in quickly. As a guideline, part of the beauty of it is that it can be kept simple, since it just needs to get the point across and can be quickly amended to deal with issues that arise. Compare that to policies, where they basically act as laws, loopholes and all. Towards that, I think you're starting to complicate what is really a very simple matter. Something that's short, simple, and to the point works best in this context, and Link's approach really is a good one, I think. Phrasing it as he did ensures that English isn't forced on everyone, which is good (after all, I'm guessing most English speakers know what "nein" or "si" mean, so there's no sense in mandating that they can't be used), while also ensuring that the rules are clearer than they are now.
Also, I don't believe that an Abstain stance is necessary. By definition, a person who abstains from a vote does not vote. There's no need to make explicit the fact that they are abstaining, since the simple act of not voting is sufficient. :) —Aichon— 13:19, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I agree, there's no need for excess complication. There's precedent for VB-ing people who are "shitting up the admin pages," and I assume that repetitively posting a vote that gets struck would come under this. Linkthewindow  Talk  13:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I thought of that actually, but I believe it'd be rather awkward in places like A/SD or A/D. In the former case, you'd have to provide a section that will rarely get used. In the latter, you'll have to provide four sections. Both will bloat the page considerably and clutter things up unnecessarily, I think, though the system is certainly superior in terms of its clarity. I like the idea, personally, but I don't have to deal with it day-in and day-out, so I'd rather hear input from you or one of the sysops, since you'd actually have a better idea of how it would affect daily use. —Aichon— 13:23, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
I wasn't thinking of a separate section per vote type, rather a single "here are the voting rules" area, like in UDWiki:Administration/Deletions. Perhaps these areas need a bit in them saying "English, motherfuckers, do you speak it?!" -Wulfenbach 13:31, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
The "voting sections" thing was in response to Link. :P And yep, a little section wouldn't be a bad idea. —Aichon— 13:37, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
We were talking about splitting up the actual voting area into keep/delete/merge/move, not the guidelines at the top ;). Linkthewindow  Talk  13:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
True. I didn't see a point for it on A/SD (as it's only a single keep vote and it gets moved.) Good point on A/D, however. We could do this and streamline the vote types at the same time (ie: just keep/delete,) but IMO, that's not really a good idea. Linkthewindow  Talk  13:39, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Generic Header

Just to clarify - the current wording does not cover comments. Example:

  1. Yes - оно над девять тысяч Russian User 13:44, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I, the person counting the votes can easily tell that this user is for the proposal (ie: their stance.)

  1. да - оно над девять тысяч Russian User 13:44, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I have no idea what this person is saying, the vote should be struck.

Just thought I should clear this up before/if it ever becomes an issue. Linkthewindow  Talk  13:44, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

The proposed guideline is beginning to look a little bloated. Rather than get into an "arms race" with people who will find every sneaky way of subverting our wiki's common language, I'd say just set up the voting for important areas into clear sections of "for" and "against" and let people write whatever garbage they want in the area which indicates the intent of their vote.--GANG Giles Sednik CAPD 14:18, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
That wasn't to be included on the guideline - it's just an example to show that the guideline does not directly cover comments. Linkthewindow  Talk  14:31, 29 December 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for addressing my earlier misunderstanding, Link. I agree that the A/PD system should be adopted across the board: it avoids the need for further complications and people can yak away in whatever language they like just as long as their comment's in the right section (and if not, tough).--Mallrat The Spanish Inquisition TSI The Kilt Store TKS Clubbed to Death CTD 15:03, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I like the general idea here. Perhaps, though, it should read "The bolded vote, if one is required, should be readily understood by English speakers. Anything not readily understood will be struck". That way it's more of a common sense decision, rather than hard-and-fasdt rules which can be wrangled around. Nothing to be done! 14:54, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Stance is used instead of language to ensure that rule-breakers won't find any other ways to make their vote ambiguous. I can write a vote in Wingdings, it's technically still in English. And the point of a guideline is that it's not a hard and fast rule (unlike a policy, which is.) Linkthewindow  Talk  22:08, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

An opinionated summary of UDWiki pages

Actually, let's take a look at the appropriate pages:

-Wulfenbach 12:06, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Non-binding straw poll

Since no-one's commented here in days, I'm going to run a straw poll to see if there is sufficient consensus for the change, which is the following:

The following text will be added to the Guidelines section on A/D, A/SD and A/D/S. This change does not cover comments (see above for an explanation.) Note - there is no need for A/PD to be included in this as it already has clearly defined voting sections.

The stance of a voter must be easily understood by the Wiki community. Ambiguous votes will be struck.

Please note that this not a vote, or a policy vote (see Polling is not a substitute for discussion.) I am merely seeing if there is sufficient consensus for such a guideline change (as people only really positively affirm something if there is a vote involved.)

Comments are very welcome. Linkthewindow  Talk  14:58, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Aye, go for it. Nothing to be done! 15:04, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
Yep.-- Adward  15:25, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
I still think the wording should be tightened up, since "stance" isn't clear enough, but it's an improvement, so I'd be for it. —Aichon— 23:10, 2 January 2010 (UTC)
I agree with Aichon on this, that 'stance' is a little unclear unless you've thought about it. I think it needs to be changed to something that directly mentions Yea or Nay. - Wulfenbach 04:24, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
Yarp. "stance" seems fine to me for the wording. I can't think of a better word.--GANG Giles Sednik CAPD 04:44, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
Stance is fine. Cyberbob  Talk  04:46, 3 January 2010 (UTC)
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