Discussion reports and miscellaneous articulations

The following is a brief overview of the current discussions on the English Wikipedia.

Extend use of authority control

Authority controls are unique identifiers to differentiate objects. Only about 4,000 biography articles on the English Wikipedia use these controls, while the German Wikipedia has about 220,000 such articles, and Commons an unknown number.

New user group: moderator

"Moderators" would face the standard RFX process but would receive fewer tools. Moderators would not receive tools that "deal with the assessing of editor behaviour", like block or protect. The number of user rights has been reduced from an administrator's 54 to 17, just a few more than autoconfirmed users. As the originator of the proposal, Jc37 states, "The goal here is to not add to admin's work, but to give the moderator ... [the] ability to assess consensus [and] handle content-related issues without needing to run to an admin, because the moderator, in these situations, will be as trusted as an admin to perform them."

3rd party unblock requests

Comments have been requested regarding allowing a third party to request an unblock. An editor can see a block they believe is unjust and request a review of the block. Experienced editors who can interpret policy can help new editors who may have a harder time understanding the vast policies of Wikipedia.

Can it be verifiable and not the truth?

A look into the rewording of the content of the verifiability policy. Five versions of the lede are under discussion, along with 12 questions regarding the content. The last request for comment on this topic ended without a consensus.

Updating level-one user warnings

A study looking at how users reacted to warnings was conducted to improve the warnings so they do not bite the newcomers, while still deterring vandalism. Comments are requested on whether the new warnings are adequate or still need improving.

Internet Defense League and the Wikimedia Foundation

The Internet Defense League has approached the Wikimedia Foundation to join their ranks. The Wikimedia Foundation is requesting your input as to whether or not they join the league. The Internet Defense League is a group of websites that will join in any future protests against anti-piracy legislation (see related Signpost coverage).

Global ban policy

Since the update of the terms of service in May, a process for a global ban policy is yet to be decided. The policy is for problematic editors who have been blocked from multiple communities.

In this issue

2 July 2012 (all comments)

Analysis

Op-ed

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In the news

Discussion report

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I've been solicited twice already to write stuff into wiki to promote. One was OK (Consumer Reports) prob clean motive. The other NOT clean drug rep, and how did they get my email address??

Scary too that stuff has vanished from my talk. Gone as though it never happened. I wanted to recontact as requested the Wiki Foundation guy posted special survey about my experiences re strange edits suggesting follow the money conflicts. Nobody in wiki like administrators should have the power to make text vanish. Nobody should have the power to warn or block re edit war unless under strict rules (3x for ex).

I almost quit already once when an editor undid HOURS of my work researching then writing clean re cancer green tea health benefits claiming that a very (simplistic) FDA statement was better than pubmed research so much so he claims / enforces complete deletion! But then come back because one of my best friends DIED from "prostate cancer". Actually bad doctoring. I look for solutions.

I recommend a global ban on conflict of interest evidenced by edits specifically that are biased. Bias is easy to show in scientific topics. See how Yobol, adjkasi, and jmh649 sent me to irrelevant wiki pages to support their claims. Look how they immediately appeared and undid my edits giving irrelevant advise and links. My edits were well intentioned. Look how they tried to scare me off from entering new facts (Cochrane) demanding that I prove cochrane is peer reviewed!! Look how they diluted the final texts several ways, though they monitor maintain the original shown was worse by their own edits, or reverted back, or burried key words and sentences.

PS be nice if this page had spellcheck. I type fast as I speak, and read a page in a slow glance, but fixn spelling takes more time than orig text.32cllou (talk) 17:25, 3 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, nothing has been deleted from your talk page; its deletion log is empty. Perhaps edits have been removed, but they are all still there in your edit history. As for how people got a hold of you via e-mail, they probably used Special:EmailUser/32cllou, since you have email enabled on your account (in Special:Preferences). Finally, some browsers, such as Google Chrome, include spell-check in the browser itself. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 15:17, 7 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for checking. Maybe the Foundation guy contacted me some other way, though I don't know how. I changed my email pref, and will install Chrome.32cllou (talk) 01:28, 8 July 2012 (UTC) PS you senior editors really should have ways to ban editors that obviously degrade wiki. I offered code identification, but could provide examples of obvious mal intent. For example, take a look at this editors' harmful changes http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Breast_cancer_screening&diff=500890210&oldid=499986965 32cllou (talk) 09:38, 8 July 2012 (UTC)[reply]