Guild Wars Wiki talk:Activity

Feedback

• Bcrats/sysops - suggest no distinctions.
• Signs of life - only "edits or sysop activity on this wiki". Being an audience member on discord, responding after a month by email, or logging in to gw1 for your zaishen bounties to be an admin on the wiki isn't right.
• Standby - this is just pandering to inactives. Even at this stage of the wiki's life, it's highly unlikely that a user who even checks recent changes twice a year cannot occasionally find a typo, a vandal or something worth deleting or commenting on (same applies to bcrats).
• Known future inactivity - just resign. We can give you the rights later if you ever return by approving it via the skeleton-community with an RFA for transparency. If the worst comes to the worst and we end up with zero active admins and bcrats, there's always the ANet wiki rep to assign new user rights as required.

-Chieftain Alex 09:47, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

I would also say that this isn't a basic draft proposal of what was put forward by Infinite. Her proposal was that of not adding in an activity clause and instead just having admin's who are contactable easily and reliably, at a drop of the hat. This proposal seeks to put in a specified minimum number of edits and the like, which may be the proposal that you and alex want, but isn't what Infinite proposed and isn't what gained widespread approval by everyone chatting. A codified "you need to be active this much" may be something we want to discuss, but I also don't intend to write excuses to BC's, if my life gets buzy and im away for a 6 month placement in Africa. As I'm not a penitent schoolboy, im an adult... with a whole life to live.

Just have what infinite suggested; which is a list of sysops who are prepared to be contacted, who will agree to respond to direct messages ASAP. If any of the sysops show a pattern of none-responsiveness (say not responding to the requests for help within a timely manner (say 2-3 days), repeatedly in the same year, then make it a BC issue.

This is an excessive amount of extra red tape for monitoring activity on a wiki that has a skeleton crew at best and is far past the peak of its active days. I will edit here because I want to edit, not because im doing busy work to keep Alex happy.

Also Frankly Alex's feedback above is not representative of the initial consensus that infinite reached in her proposal and is more just a reflection of alex repeating his intital stance. This isnt how consensus works Alex.

(EDIT) Also Horrible, I'm aware my tone is a bit sharp at times, thats not my intent. I genuinely do appreciate the work you've put into this and respect what you're doing ehre. My comment isnt meant as an attack on what you're doing. Just suggesting an alternative thats more in keeping with what infinite suggested.

(Edit) Actually im a nob, i somehow missed the whole standby thing in your original proposal, which changes alot of my point's above (not the point referencing Alex's feedback, but alot of the other stuff). I'm an utter idiot. Apologies to you Horrible. -- Salome 19:06, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Feedback was asked for and given on multiple counts. Didn't see anyone else stepping forward. -Chieftain Alex 19:35, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

This policy proposal was made just over 24 hours ago. It's intent being to represent the common ground idea put forward by Infinite. Restating your original points, that you made at the start of the debate, when all these RFA's were first created, doesn't really reflect one searching for a common mutual ground to build upon. You can of course suggest anything you like, that abides with your personal senses... its still just not how consensus operates. As I believe we've somewhat moved on from the hardline viewpoint you seem to want the wiki to embrace. -- Salome 19:41, 21 June 2020 (UTC)

Well it's now been over two months, Salome. And no one other than Aiiane (including yourself) has bothered to give feedback. horrible | contribs 16:51, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

and? The fact everyone has migrated their discussion to tane's proposal, should probably be seen as "feedback". -- Salome 19:04, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

What makes you say that? I see nothing on either page implying that. You seem to be making a habit of using the absence of something as evidence of its opposite, which I don't really think is accurate in these cases. horrible | contribs 19:09, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Also, in case it isn't clear, this isn't an either-or scenario. We could always implement both, or neither. Having a policy regarding sysop expectations seems (from what I've seen) to be fairly popular - You're the only outspoken voice I've seen in direct opposition. horrible | contribs 19:12, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

If you feel that way, thats very much up to you. *shrugs* Anyway, have a nice day. -- Salome 19:17, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

(ec) "This is a counter-proposal to User:Horrible's Activity policy proposal ... It purposely does not include a direct activity requirement, as I personally do not believe one would be useful" <- my first post on the standby admin proposal talk page.

It's true that the two proposals need not be mutually exclusive, if consensus goes that way. Just saying I am already explicitly on the record as not in favor of this one (in my personal capacity as an individual editor, of course). - Tanetris (talk) 19:24, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Fair enough, I must have forgotten that. What about this policy proposal do you dislike, why is it not useful? It it something you think could be fixed, or are you just flat-out opposed to any sort of sysop activity requirement / expectation? I'm genuinely curious, because I feel that it would be inherently useful, even if it ends up being extremely lax. horrible | contribs 19:33, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Not Tanetris, but it's not useful because it doesn't actually do anything of value. It seems like a tautology, but it's taking a problem that doesn't exist (we've got no limit on the number of sysop slots available, and inactive sysops don't harm the wiki in any way) and inventing loops that people need to jump through to solve those problems that don't exist. I've previously proposed the idea of cleaning up the non-system-generated list of sysops just so anyone that's looking for help won't ping someone who's been away for 5 years or whatever (and at this point, even that concern is probably unwarranted; anyone still active on this wiki would know who to contact), but actually removing their sysop flag doesn't do any good.

Something that's been said to you repeatedly (that you've repeatedly ignored): sysops aren't power-users. They don't get additional weight when discussing policy proposals or RfAs or anything. Other users that have been around for a long time tend to know them and respect their opinions, but just seeing a sysop flag on someone doesn't automatically make me care what they have to say. Their history of level-headed and well-researched posts matters more than their sysop/bcrat position. We've had some huge fucking idiots as sysops and bcrats over the years, on this wiki and the others. Title don't mean shit.

If your issue is with individual sysops, and you feel they aren't qualified for the position for specific reasons you can state and find evidence for (like your case against Salome), that's fine. That's precisely what the RfA reconfirmation process is there to do. But trying to wipe the slate clean by purging most of the sysops to get rid of a few you personally disagree with seems... questionable at best. Wikis have always been a volunteer activity, and we've always had an expectation of delay built in so nobody felt like they had to be on all the time or they'd get ignored. In the decade+ this wiki has been around, we've only had 1 sysop come out of retirement and start handing out bans like candy based on an outdated notion of policy - and his behavior was quickly chastised and he promptly left the wiki (and later came back to apologize). That's all it takes. Putting in "missing the point" policy proposals to force activity is counter to the spirit of this wiki, and indeed all wikis. I'm not familiar with another one that requires activity every so often or you lose your sysop, especially not for a wiki this small. -Auron 20:17, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Overall good points, minus two things - (1) I've ignored "sysops aren't power-users" because (IMO) it's not exactly true - while in theory their opinions don't get any additional weight, I feel that in practice, they do. (2) I hadn't really interacted with Salome all that much before this started, so I'm not sure how you could come to the conclusion that this was specifically to remove targeted sysops. horrible | contribs 20:40, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

Sysops don't really have power over how other people feel about them. Since before I became a sysop, they tried to design a system that de-glorified sysops as much as possible. Originally it was to the extreme that they couldn't take any action on their own discretion, it all had to be spelled out plainly in policy somewhere, but that led to trolls constantly wiki-lawyering and riding the line (me included). So eventually they got ban reasons added like sysop discretion, wiki disruption, etc - but for policy or game content discussions, they have no more weight than other users. The only thing we can do is continue to remind people of that - when every single sysop is saying the same thing, they're not lying. Don't glorify sysops and they won't be glorified.

Honestly, I wasn't sure what the underlying goal of your proposal was from the beginning. It never seemed to solve problems that actually existed and hampered the wiki, so I assumed (potentially in violation of AGF? :P) there was some ulterior motive. You've had a history of vehement disagreements with a number of sysops and bcrats, so it felt like you just wanted to wipe the slate clean, and using activity as a gatekeeper was just a way to force it through. Only once it became clear that it wouldn't work on every sysop on the list did you start digging into personal details like individual history, usage of mod tools, etc. I might be totally off, but that seems like the most logical reason to fight so hard for a proposal like this. If you want to get rid of a corrupt group of dinosaur sysops and none of them edit anymore, what better way than to propose an activity requirement? -Auron 21:43, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

If this was at all related to my disagreements with sysops, then I'd be a real fucking idiot because none of the sysops I have disagreements with are on the list. There's no ulterior motive, despite what everyone seems to think - you can go back in the discord logs to see the initial discussion between myself, alex, and a few others about the topic, if you like. horrible | contribs 00:36, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Can you shed light on your first point? I personally initiated and set up a complete remodel of GW2W's base structuring back in the day in the presence of nothing but grandfathered GWW admins there and at no point have I felt additional pressure from them swaying the discussion somewhere they saw fit (against "regular" users' consensus), while the janitorial actions following the proposal and execution of which were taken care of in a timely manner. I also don't ascribe to the idea that sysops or even bureaucrats carry more weight within the community, because I'm pretty sure users like Falconeye and the sock account of Konig would have been banned from the off if the community hadn't attempt to reason with either of them beforehand. I do feel there is no reason to keep blatantly disconnected admins flagged as such. Though if certain admins are always going to remain on standby for this wiki regardless of their direct interactions with it, I don't see any reason to dismiss them on that exact basis. The only problem would be running out of all admins, standby or otherwise, as a result of a demand for visible activity. - Infinite - talk 21:47, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

What benefit is there in discussing my feelings on sysops? Not only is this not the correct place to discuss it, it's pretty clear I don't have the ability to make a convincing argument. horrible | contribs 00:36, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

For what it’s worth, because I haven’t bothered to leave feedback yet, I also dislike this proposal because as Auron said it does not appear to solve anything while requiring a lot more maintenance (something we generally would want to avoid with this wiki at the state that it is in, see e.g. the guild namespace) for a questionable outcome. As we have learned within the past few weeks, the perceived issue is often not a limited sysop activity but rather the uncertainty of who can be relied on in what way on a day-to-day basis. The standby admins policy covers this thought in a more relaxed way without adding additional burden on the community and the affected parties. poke | talk 23:49, 31 August 2020 (UTC)

relaxed? if by "relaxed" you mean "impotent" and "not a compromise" then sure, it's relaxed. All it does is codify the requirement that a sysop has to have a heartbeat to retain their role - there's no expectation of sysops whatsoever, and that's exactly what led us to having 18 sysops and 1 bcrat still on the roster who all left years ago with no intention of returning. Having any requirement at all, no matter how lax, would have prevented that a long time ago. I'm not opposed to a standby status; I heartily seconded the proposal. My issue is with sysops who flat out leave with no intention of coming back. Having to RFA every single one of them is a time consuming process, solely for the sake of being time-consuming. Had we simply removed the sysops who failed to reply to their RFAs (as Aiiane suggested) we would currently be in the same state, albeit with less soapboxing. Tanetris's proposal is not a compromise, nor does it solve anything. This hardline opposition to any sort of "maintenance" is ludicrous - the core actions of a sysop all revolve around maintenance, be it banning vandals or deleting pages. horrible | contribs 00:36, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

“the requirement that a sysop has to have a heartbeat to retain their role” – Except that it requires that heartbeat to be visible instead of assuming that they are simply around when needed.

“Having to RFA every single one of them is a time consuming process” – And yet, I still don’t understand why you felt such a strong desire to do that in the first place. As has been reiterated multiple times now, since the wiki’s existence, inactive administrators simply haven’t been an issue. poke | talk 06:27, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

Sure, except for the aforementioned time where one was an issue. But if that's how you feel, maybe we should just go ahead and reinstate everyone who's already had their RFAs completed. I'm sure they'll all be wonderful productive members of the wiki. horrible | contribs 12:39, 1 September 2020 (UTC)

But that is completely unrelated to them being inactive before. The same thing could happen anytime with e.g. Tanetris or even you. The only thing that protects against this is a caring community that checks what happens.

You're assuming bad faith if you believe that every admin who has proved before that they care about the wiki has a realistic chance of coming back to misuse their powers. poke | talk 07:21, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

Being realistic isn't assuming bad faith (and from what I can tell, GWW:AGF doesn't cover speculating on future sysop actions anyway). The fact that it has happened means that it is realistic, even if you assume it to be unlikely. Reducing the chance of it happening is good. horrible | contribs 12:26, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

This proposal seems to introduce a relatively significant amount of maintenance (e.g. needing to proactively reaching out to individuals on regular intervals, statements about inactivity that potentially get debated by the community, tracking of numbers of administrative actions that have happened over sliding time windows), yet the policy does not talk about the justification for that maintenance. What benefit is the wiki acquiring from introducing this overhead? Why is it worth it? (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 00:19, 22 June 2020 (UTC)

This would add maintenance, but I don't feel it would be significant. Ideally sysops and bureaucrats should be active here / in communication enough to prevent any such checks in the first place (otherwise, they can always put themselves on standby). I also don't see the need to have anyone actively checking community involvement, to me this is just a formalization of a quicker way to resolve future situations similar to clean-up I initiated a month ago.

I feel that the "community interaction" section of the policy serves as more of a fallback measure. In in the event that an administrator does disappear, the removal can be handled without the need for a RFA. As a fair number of the RFAs I initiated show - there will undoubtedly be times where a sysop steps away and has no intention of returning. horrible | contribs 00:44, 22 June 2020 (UTC)