UDWiki:Administration/Policy Discussion/Permaban Appeal Revisions

This policy proposal was prompted by the ongoing discussions at the 2013 De-Escalations page prompted by the permaban appeal initiated by User:SA on behalf of User:Izumi Orimoto. These proposed changes to the Permaban Appeal policy would not affect that case, but would affect all future Permaban Appeal cases.

The policy as it stands would have the bolded material added:

==Permaban Appeals== Users who have been permabanned on UDWiki may have their bans appealed here on the De-Escalations page. To do this, a user other than the permabanned user must submit a case under the permabanned user's name, preferably with usage of the {{vndl}} template and an explanation regarding why the user should be unbanned. The case will also be noted on the main page via {{Wiki News}}. During the appeal, the sysops may unban the primary account at the user's request, for the sole purpose of commenting on the case. This account will only be allowed to comment on the De-Escalations page and its associated talk page; any other edits will be considered vandalism and be a criterion for terminating the vote and escalating the ban. In certain circumstances, the user will be allowed to comment on other administration pages directly related to their appeal and its success. The user will have no other privileges, and cannot vote on their own appeal. Voting will commence for 2 weeks, and a majority of 2/3rds is needed. After the voting period is up, a sysop will review the vote and take appropriate action. If 2/3rds majority has been reached for rescinding the ban, the user will have their A/VD adjusted, and their permaban escalation will be struck, with an added link to the permaban vote. If the user was banned as per the "3 edit rule", they will have the permaban escalation struck but will be left with 2 warnings. A permabanned user must be permabanned for at least 6 months before they can have the ban appealed. If an appeal does not fit this rule, it may be immediately cycled by a sysop without warning. Appeals are considered a serious vote. Misuse of this privilege, eg. multiple submissions over a short time, may result in abusers being brought to vandal banning.

Please discuss this proposal on the talk 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. The biggest complaint I've been hearing is that we don't need to waste time with a policy. Well, the time has already been wasted, and this policy pretty much reiterates exactly what many of us would like to see. So, while I can understand not supporting the drafting of the policy in the first place, I can't understand not supporting it now that it's here. I've come around on agreeing that perma'd users should be allowed to advocate for themselves on their own appeals, and this simple addendum to existing policy will ensure that they can do so without being able to abuse that privilege in order to post elsewhere, engage in vandalism, or otherwise disrupt things. Besides which, if sysops need to act contrary to the letter of the law, we're empowered to do so, and our hands won't be tied any more than they were in this case if something extraordinary takes place. —Aichon— 16:32, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
2. If you're going to have policies in the first place, then those policies should be made as clear and as sensible as possible. Permabanned users should not be able to fuck about the wiki they've been banned from while their permaban is being appealed. One suggestion from a grammar asshole: "The user will have no other privileges, and cannot vote on his or her own appeal." --Paddy Dignam^{IS DEAD} 17:09, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
3. Provides much-needed clarity to the appeals process and removes the need for sysops to "loosely interpret/hand wave" policy to allow something they apparently want to see anyway. I would think that sysops would be interested in building and reinforcing trust between them and the community; the recent misconduct case, admin discussions, and policy discussion shows that the current status quo is confusing, awkward, and has likely eroded some of that trust. Yes, this will only affect a small-number of users but that is always going to be the case with a permaban appeal policy. I get that sysops trust the sysops to do the right thing, but I'd rather see something in writing rather then move toward some soulless, indoctrinated police-state.-MHSstaff 17:19, 2 March 2013 (UTC)

Against

1. We've already solved this once in a lifetime situation correctly. Any further cases can now be be handled by using the Izumi case as a precedent. Red-tape for no reason is bad. Now go do something productive with your time. --Thadeous Oakley Talk 16:03, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
2. Unnecessary red tape is unnecessary. In addition, if this policy had already been in place during the de-.escalation vote, it would have invalidated the community's decison to unban Izumi, as she would have been automatically escalated and put on ice for 6 more months. -- Spiderzed█ 16:38, 2 March 2013 (UTC)
3. I don't really think banned users should be unbanned during an appeal, especially if it means if they "step out of line" once, their appeal could be shut down, regardless of good/bad faith editing. This doesn't really address the issue of potential abuse either, other than to say that sysops "may" unban the user. I think the better call during the Izumi case would have been to ban the alt but continue the vote. ~ _{17:37, 2 March 2013 (UTC)}