UDWiki:Administration/Policy Discussion/Vandal Banning page

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Reasons

In September 2007, the following administration notice was added to the Vandal Banning page.

Administration Notice
If you are not a System Operator, the user who made the vandal report, the user being reported, or in any way directly involved in the case, the administration strongly asks that you use the talk page for further discussion. Free-for-all commenting can lead to a less respectful environment.

This notice was added due several users using this administration page for silly conversations about users that were being reported for vandalism, or simply to mock alts of users who were banned. The Urban Dead Wiki is a community site to help Urban Dead users interact with each other. The opinions of all its users is welcome, specially in administration pages such as Policy Discussion and Deletion requests. Vandal Banning, on the other hand, is a place where the community should comment as little as possible.

Why ? Because by reporting someone as a vandal in the wiki, you are saying that he was acting illegally, in bad faith, towards the community. The report itself is already something that make a user feel bad, and its punishment might even make them feel less willing to contribute to the wiki.

Some users like to discuss a vandal report; they discuss whether it is vandalism or not, how they should be punished, or, in the worst case scenario, simply mock the reported user. Most of these comments don't add evidence of further vandalism or evidence that the user was simply mistaken and/or acting in good faith.

This is counterproductive. It is the job of the administration staff to decide if it is vandalism or not based on the evidence displayed in the report, or by analyzing the user contributions. If a normal user comments on a vandal report, it makes the administration staff looks bad if they punish the reported user when the normal user asked them not to, and makes the user look bad towards the reported user if he said it was vandalism but the administration staff said it wasn't. In both cases it only serves to worsen the relations between one user and another, or a user and the administration staff.

This is particularly important to have in mind: a simple case of vandalism can turn a normal user into a recurrent vandal troll, it all depends on how the user was treated in his vandal report. Reported users should be respected, even those who were permanently banned, and whose alts are being reported for banning.

If you are not a System Operator, the user who made the vandal report, the user being reported, or in any way directly involved in the case, the administration strongly asks that you use the talk page for further discussion.

This is what the guideline says. It should be kept only as a guideline, since, sometimes, the input of other users can be really helpful in a vandal report.

The Policy

  • Users are free to edit the Vandal Banning page, as long as they have something to add.
  • Users not involved in the case are strongly asked to use its talk page.
    • Users considered involved are: 1) The user being reported 2) the user who made the report 3) the administration staff 4) any user directly involved in the case
  • User who are found commenting on vandal reports in which they are not involved might be unofficially warned.
    • Users who were already unofficially warned twice who do not stop their behavior can be officially warned by the administration staff.


Keyword: strongly.
Users not involved in the case can comment on vandal reports, as long as they add something to the discussion such as evidence of further vandalism, evidence of innocence, or explaining to new users how they should use the vandal banning pages, in case they are using it wrong.


Keyword: might.
This policy is not meant to be followed all the time. It is only meant to be used against those who abuse the vandal banning page.

Voting Section

Voting Rules
Votes must be numbered, signed, and timestamped. They can take one of two forms:
  • # comments ~~~~
    or
  • # ~~~~

Votes that do not conform to the above will be struck by a sysop.

The only valid voting sections are For and Against. If you wish to abstain from voting, do not vote.

For

  1. For.Because it's already on there, illegally. This would validate it. If this is rejected, I will remove above notice from the vandal banning page with a clean conscience, knowing that the policy has been rejected by the wiki.  Nalikill  TALK  E!  W!  M!  USAI  20:32, 9 October 2007 (BST)
    You are not an administrator to remove that notice. Doing so will be vandalism. --People's Commissar Hagnat [cloned] [mod] 22:22, 9 October 2007 (BST)
    • note discussion moved to talkpage.-- Vista  +1  01:26, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  2. For Unless i am going mad this looks like a vote to keep the current notice and leave it as a guidline rather than a hard and fast rule? Now a bit pointless as someone has been banned for ignoring this guidance but it should be left there and anyone ignoring it taken to Arbitration rather than warned then banned! --Honestmistake 09:59, 11 October 2007 (BST)
  3. For Because it's a reasonable modification, and you nay-sayers are just being a bit mean....--Crabappleslegalteam 02:01, 15 October 2007 (BST)

Against

  1. This isn't a policy it's just spam.--Karekmaps?! 12:04, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  2. We already have such measures in place. --The Grimch U! E! WAT! 12:11, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  3. Yap, this is just the status quo... --WanYao 12:24, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  4. Wrote the damn thing. It's just a bunch of guidelines. If people just follow their good ol' common sense this wouldn't be needed at all. --People's Commissar Hagnat [cloned] [mod] 13:15, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  5. Nope. --Cyberbob DORIS CGR U! 13:21, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  6. unneeded. The normal editing rules apply. Content should go on the main page and discussions should go on the talk page. The fact that in this case content means a vandal report and the judgment of a sysop doesn't change that. This policy describes the normal status quo.-- Vista  +1  14:03, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  7. I don't think this needs to be codified.--Jorm 17:52, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  8. No. Best reading on the wiki.--Sarah Silverman 20:08, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  9. -- dǝǝɥs oʇ ɯɐds: sʎɐʍ1ɐ! 22:24, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  10. The status quo is preferable to the proposed policy. --Dylan Mak Tyme 23:12, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  11. --Wooty 23:25, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  12. -- Sockem 23:27, 9 October 2007 (BST)
  13. This policy is unneeded- its already a part of the wiki. We don't need policies to restate policies already in place. --Karlsbad 00:39, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  14. Already common sense, sorry. --Pavluk A! E! 00:41, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  15. Spam, spam, spam. --Zod Rhombus 05:55, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  16. What everyone else said, but in a nice, respectable tone. ;) --ZombieSlay3rSig.pngT 14:19, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  17. Pedantic.--Jimmy Kimmel 15:18, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  18. This is pointless, doesnt this already happen... --Rorybob 18:05, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  19. Not needed. While the administration notice obviously helps, even if removed Sysops would still be entitled to do the same they did to you, Nalikill, because it's an implicit rule of the A/VB page. --Matthew Fahrenheit YRC☺T☺+1 18:12, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  20. Just say "NO" to wiki-lawyering. If there needs to be an "official policy" about every damn thing, maybe we should have an "official policy" against wiki-lawyering. And I also vote no because Nalikill called the current notice "illegal" which may be the stupidest thing I've ever read on this site. --Stephen Colbert DFA 22:09, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  21. No. Sorry about this, i can see work has been put into it and adding up the pros and cons, I can only seee this causing more problems than it would solve. Sometimes the lack of a rule is preferable to a rule that will just create problems.--SeventythreeTalk 22:17, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  22. --Ryiis 22:19, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  23. Vista removed my siggy.--  AHLGTG THE END IS NIGH! 23:08, 10 October 2007 (BST)
  24. Against. Policies in general are a bad idea; policies that are designed to be enforced sometimes are just a headache for sysops. --otherlleft W! 04:13, 11 October 2007 (BST)
  25. Nay! I would tell you why but where's the fun in that!--Supergodzilla2090
  26. Not even a policy. --User:Axe27/Sig 16:14, 12 October 2007 (BST)
  27. They deleted a profile before I could link it to my page it were purdy--User:ottotorrens 8:54, 16 October 2007 (BST)
  28. NOT - it's just spam.----Sexualharrison ה •QSG•TStarofdavid2.png Boobs.gif 14:55, 13 October 2007 (BST)
  29. No - This is just silly. There's allready plenty of rules/guidelines intended to keep people from being jackasses, and this one just has the potential to go too far. How about instead of tossing in a rule that (if in the real world) would be labled "authoritarian" you just keep the punishments and rules within the current system. :P So; no, no, no, no, niet, and negative. --Psiborg 13:53, 22 October 2007 (BST)
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