UDWiki:Misconduct

Sysops are trusted with a considerable number of powers, many of which have the capacity to be abused. In many circumstances, it is possible for a sysop to cause considerable havoc. This document attempts to correct and provide accessible information regarding what is considered Misconduct, and what is done to combat it on this wiki.

What is Misconduct?

On this wiki we loosely define Misconduct as the abuse of powers given strictly to Sysop and the judgment inherent in the use of those powers.

The seeming vagueness of this description has lead to many disputes over exactly what is and isn't misconduct. For everyone's benefit we provide the following notes on some things that are commonly ruled as NOT misconduct:

• Editing under the MediaWiki namespace
• Unwanted edits made by a Sysop
• Performing maintenance actions on Protected pages.
• Protecting pages under Edit Wars without a protection request
• Deleting pages they recently created without a deletion request
• Reasonably unforeseen consequences resulting from a maintenance action.

As a general rule we expect users to look into a case before reporting it as misconduct. Increasingly often a case is simply a misunderstanding of misconduct that could have been easily resolved by looking into past cases or discussion with the Sysop in question.

Short Primer on What Is Misconduct

Rarely do clear cut cases of misconduct appear but when they do they should be reported post-haste. As of current some examples of clear cut cases would be:

• Violation of the UDWiki:Privacy policy through revealing personal information gained through privileged means.
• Escalating a user for personal reasons not relating to rules violations.
• Deleting pages for personal reasons not relating to rules violations.
• For more examples of what is considered Misconduct, look in the Misconduct Archive.

Common Punishments for Misconduct

There are no definite rules for what is and is not a punishment for misconduct but, over the years some consistent punishments have been considered standard.

For cases relating to incorrect banning of a user the Sysop in question is expected to serve a ban of the same length as the time period the user was banned for. These cases are rare but the Sysop has almost always been punished in this manner.

For cases relating to intentional abuse of powers, such as extended cases of deleting pages for personal reasons not involving rules violations, the punishment has generally been demotion. Although there have only been three such cases, and one was pre-misconduct, all three resulted in the demotion of the Sysop in question.

And lastly, for cases including calls for Sysop review it has been determined as beyond the ability of A/M to forcibly require. The reasons for this vary from Sysop Reviews not being a significant punishment for popular Sysops to Sysop Reviews being akin to passing the decision of their Sysop status to the hands of the two bureaucrats and the community as opposed to review of the whole Sysop team.

In the end it is the responsibility of the entire Sysop team to acknowledge each Misconduct case and determine a proper resolution in a timely and fair manner.