User talk:Isaacl

Scope of action

Do you have any further reading for the limit on the scope of the community's action you mentioned? –xeno^talk 02:00, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

Sorry, I did not keep track of the discussion I recall. (I didn't plan on ever having to refer to it.) In my memory, the community discussed if it could ban an administrator from using administrative tools. The consensus was that it would be equivalent to removing administrative privileges entirely, and so lay within the scope of the administrators policy pertaining to removing administrative privileges and the arbitration policy. From a practical perspective, I feel the sentiment was that the community shouldn't try to backdoor a desysopping procedure, but explicitly enact one. After all, if a sanctioned admin decided the procedure was invalid, a case request would end up in front of the arbitration committee anyway to resolve.

I won't discount the possibility I'm misremembering the arguments expressed. I suspect I would have remembered if a different conclusion was reached, but again, I could be wrong. isaacl (talk) 02:27, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

You may well be right, I was just curious to read it. –xeno^talk 03:07, 1 March 2021 (UTC)

I found these discussions that touched on banning an administrator from one particular administrative action. Voices were expressed on both sides; below is a highly selective list (just names that caught my eye). The latter two discussions were regarding specific events and so of course untangling the reasons for supporting/not supporting is more difficult.

• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive251 § Is the community free to restrict an admin's use of some but not all admin tools? — supporters included NewYorkBrad, Salvio Giuliano, and Risker (some by reference to links in other discussions), Dennis Brown (but see later discussion), VanIsaac, the editor currently known as Lepricavark. Against included NuclearWarfare, BeyondMyKen, Apteva. GiantSnowman and Kudpung felt if there was an issue warranting banning one action, then the validity of holding the entire toolset should be examined.
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive821 § Jclemens restriction — several supports; these are just a few opposes based on the general principle
  • Bbb23: Except in the case of an emergency, only ArbCom can desysop someone. A community restriction on the use of an administrator's tools is an end run around the rule.
  • Cas Liber: ... I can't imagine a restriction like this being compatible with holding adminship. The arbitration committee is the place for review of tool use, which is where this should go.
  • Black Kite: Wrong venue, and far too messy and vague. Needs to go to ArbCom...
• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive276 § Ban Ritchie333 from unblocking — again several supports; some dissents based on principle:
  • Beeblebrox: The other reason is that I am opposed to the very idea of banning an admin from using one particular tool while retaining all the others. Either we trust a user to be an admin, or we do not. If you can prove a pattern of tool misuse, take it to arbcom.
  • Dennis Brown: I would note that Arb has been given the authority to issue sanction for admin abuse, not the community, and it has always been reserved for them. No admin has ever had their tools limited by Arb, at least that I'm aware of. ie: If you want to remove some of his tools, you have to remove all of them, and Arb is where you file. We tried to pass admin sanction policies before (I wrote one of them, WP:RAS) but the community has soundly rejected the idea in the past. So my take is, even if it were to pass here, it has no authority because the community has already rejecting giving itself that authority in the past, many times. So, vote your hearts out, but it isn't enforceable until it goes to Arb.

← Thanks, these are good reading (you might also be interested in Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/RHaworth/Proposed decision#RHaworth prohibited from performing deletions, where Beeblebrox stays true to the 2015 remark above!). It shows that the issue is far from settled, and it doesn't look like it's been taken up by the community otherwise since admins became unable to unblock themselves. I'm still trying to recall admin blocks that happened even further prior to 2013; any where an administrator was blocked for "overall" reasons, not specific to a particular tool or form of use: an indefinitely blocked administrator is desysopped in all but name. Maybe it never happened? Absent that, Lourdes I think you're right in that: it's never been done per se. –xeno^talk 19:16, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

All of these deal with banning from a particular action and not the entire toolset. I think if the community ever attempted to ban use of all administrative privileges, the administrators policy would get modified at the same time, and the community would have to accept or reject both together, as policy is supposed to be descriptive of practice. isaacl (talk) 19:31, 2 March 2021 (UTC)

Thanks xeno, would be good if you write this also on the desysop proposal page for other readers' benefit. Thanks, Lourdes 03:45, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Lourdes: I still want to research "admins being blocked as admins" (from earlier than these) and see if any of those led to users being compelled to shed the tools, as that is the form I am thinking about (not a case of trying to restrict specific tools in the set). After that I can update the thread with the precedent (or lack, if I’ve misremembered this ever happening). –xeno^talk 13:00, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Lourdes and isaacl, thanks for your patience; now I remember: the last major set of cases where admins attempted to enforce purported disruptive administrative behaviour via the blocking policy occurred between 2006 and 2009 and concerned the use of unapproved scripts (admin bots) on their administrator accounts. See especially running unauthorized robots, Archive478, running an adminbot, Massive redirect deletions, Rogue admin bot for background reading. This all caused a lot of disagreement, so eventually WP:ADMINBOTs had to come out of the shadows instead of being a semi-open secret. Also brings to mind the curious case of the admin who stopped communicating one day, yet kept on reverting and blocking (sometimes inappropriately). Although they were removed by arbcom motion, the community could have also ended the non-communicative spree via blocking. (I always wondered if they would have unblocked themselves for fear of falling asleep) –xeno^talk 03:13, 4 March 2021 (UTC)

For the record, I don't think No admin has ever had their tools limited by Arb is true. See here re David Gerard's use of admin tools. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 11:26, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

Another counter-example was given below Dennis's statement; I chose not to edit that portion out of his comments as it's tangential to the issue of the community issuing a ban on a specific type of administrative action (which in turn is a step away from a ban on all admin actions, which is the original topic of this thread). isaacl (talk) 15:45, 3 March 2021 (UTC)

• Somewhat related, an essay by Wugapodes (to be refined) presents a fairly cogent argument against the notion of a non-arbcom led CDA process (which I suppose also applies to non-arbcom led "bespoke restricting" of admins (for example, restricting article creation). –xeno^talk 02:32, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
  • I think "argument against" might be too strong. Maybe it's the linguist in me, but I think redundancy in a system is a good thing: different processes have different failure modes, so the strengths of one can make up for the weaknesses of the other. A non-arbcom process is viable, but it requires innovation---I can't think of a decentralized dispute resolution system developed for use at our scale. We know something is off with our current processes but the different parts are so intertwined that localized solutions might be undermined by other parts of the system (c.f. dynamical systems theory). If we can develop a thorough understanding of why our system so often converges on negative outcomes, then we can identify the places where can most effectively nudge the system towards positive outcomes. — UwU wug's this? 07:02, 1 April 2021 (UTC)

    I've previously stated I feel conduct issues are more efficiently handled through a hierarchy, as is done in real-world organizations, including volunteer ones and other online communities. I appreciate why this is anathema to various editors, and it definitely has disadvantages. But it's hard to avoid stalemates without some form of delegation to deal with issues, rather than always trying to manage problems through large group discussions. isaacl (talk) 05:12, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Talk page threading - colons and asterisks

Hi, I've seen some of your posts elsewhere asking about the formatting of talk page discussions. The primary guidance is at MOS:LISTGAP and its supplement MOS:INDENTGAP (although these are MOS pages, they apply in all namespaces), but a fuller explanation is at WP:COLAS. Some people are unaware of the problems that incorrect formatting can cause; others are aware but are unsure why or how to fix it; and some wilfully disregard the advice. --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 19:12, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps you are thinking about another editor? I've written my own essay, User:Isaacl/On wikitext list markup, on this matter, and have posted advice to others on their talk pages. isaacl (talk) 19:34, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

No, I'm thinking of this post and the preceding portions of the same thread, and another thread further up the same page, in which I was named (not by yourself). --Redrose64 🌹 (talk) 22:05, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

OK, but I didn't ask about the formatting of talk page discussions. And I've said the same things as you did, during the current arbitration case and in the thread you linked to: many editors, even long-time ones, aren't aware of the problem, and some others just ignore it. isaacl (talk) 22:15, 22 March 2021 (UTC)

It amazes me that arbitrators themselves, after voting to desysop one of the most accessibility-driven admins we had, are still violating MOS:LISTGAP in discussions. The lack of decency is astounding - but thanks for at least trying to maintain them. I don't personally use screen reader or any other form of assistive technology, but it's not just that which causes problems when lists are incoherent. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez (User/say hi!) 20:19, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Unnecessary changes in list styles also can cause issues for those who are using the visual diff tool (enabled via a beta feature). For example, compare [1] with [2]. But it's pretty hard to get people to not do what they want to do, particularly when it's what they've always done or if it's a tragedy of the commons situation. isaacl (talk) 05:24, 3 April 2021 (UTC)

Explain

Hi, can you further explain this edit? I'm not offended by it, I'm just genuinely curious as to what it means. I can't comprehend how a standard indentation could be more confusing than a bulleted indentation for screen readers. What is the actual difference in practice? In my mind, I use the standard indentation to avoid confusion. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 06:41, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Sure—I just ask for your forbearance if I cover things you know already, since I'm not sure what you're familiar with. The standard guidance is at Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Accessibility § Lists and Help:Talk pages § Indentation; RexxS has written an essay, Wikipedia:Colons and asterisks that discusses the issue along with examples of the underlying HTML, and I have written my own essay, User:Isaacl/On wikitext list markup. I'll discuss this guidance in the context of your edit, [3].

To start, note there is, to my eyes, no perceptible visual difference in the appearance of your comment between your edit and my immediately subsequent edit, [4]. However, there is a change in the following comment, which has two bullets displayed in your edit. I'll discuss this further in a moment.

The key aspect to know is that *, :, and # aren't represented in the underlying HTML as an indent level. They are used to introduce the start of a list (when appended to an existing prefix) and a list item. The * represents a bulleted list item, # represents a numbered list item, and : represents what I'll call an unbulleted list item (see either of the essays I referred to for more details on what it actually is).

The comment before yours started with **, so (going from right to left) it nested a second-level bulleted list item within first-level bulleted list item. Your comment started with :::, so it created a third-level unbulleted list item nested within two other levels of unbulleted lists. This has the effect of ending two levels of bulleted lists, and starting three unbulleted lists, nested within each other. Screen readers announce the start and end of lists, so five announcements are made, compared with just one if you had used a prefix of **:. But since the comment following yours starts with **, another five announcements are made to close the three unbulleted lists and open two bulleted lists, compared with just one announcement to close one unbulleted list. Thus an extra eight announcements are made. This is also why the comment after yours had two bullets, since with your change it started two levels of bulleted lists. isaacl (talk) 15:31, 4 April 2021 (UTC)

Wow, that all makes sense but I honestly had no idea. I deeply regret to learn that I've been regularly using bad indentation practices this whole time. I never even thought about this sort of nuance to indentation. Thank you for the explanation and all the resources you've provided. I get it now, and I will certainly follow the guidelines going forward. Good on you for correcting this sort of thing. ~Swarm~ ^{sting} 00:54, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Yeah, if you think of the characters as indents or tab stops, as I suspect many do, it's not obvious why it makes a difference what character is used. It's more evident when you know they define nested lists. It's not a great fit for threaded conversation, but the markup and visual output resemble the old-school visual indenting used on Usenet and text emails. Thanks for your consideration! isaacl (talk) 01:07, 5 April 2021 (UTC)

Editor of the Week

		Editor of the Week
		Your ongoing efforts to improve the encyclopedia have not gone unnoticed: You have been selected as Editor of the Week in recognition of your community awareness. Thank you for the great contributions! (courtesy of the Wikipedia Editor Retention Project)

User:Barkeep49 submitted the following nomination for Editor of the Week:

I nominate isaacl to be Editor of the Week for his incredibly deep thinking about the community and community processes. I don't know of an editor who has thought more about our systems, contradictions and all, than isaacl. His writing on consensus has really shaped how I view the way we work. However, he doesn't just think about how things are, he thinks about how things can be made better. I think more admins and others mediating disputes should be using his User:Isaacl/Community/Content dispute resolution toolbox. When he shows up to a discussion I know that what's written is going to come from a place of great study and be something I need to consider carefully and fully. He is a valued member of Project Editor Retention and always brings level headed, helpful and fair thoughts in conversations in which he participates. His comments are consistently helpful in dispute resolution.

You can copy the following text to your user page to display a user box proclaiming your selection as Editor of the Week:

{{User:UBX/EoTWBox}}

Thanks again for your efforts! ―Buster7 ☎ 14:19, 24 April 2021 (UTC)