[Textbook-l] Block against

Thu Jun 15 11:08:48 UTC 2006

Brianna Laugher wrote:

>BTW cf. http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Wikibooks:Staff_lounge#Banned_WP_editor_Primetime
>which seems to have been accepted without question. That's more the
>kind of thing I was talking about...(again this is more copyright
>related, not social behaviour, and lazyquasar made a good point that
>in some cases people can "start anew".) I mean yes each project has
>its own community but I don't think it's beneficial to treat them like
>strangers. In situations like this we can work together and save each
>other some hassle.
>
>Heh, imagine if WoW showed up at a new project and we had this
>attitude... "Give the man a chance! He might have reformed!" :)
>
>cheers
>Brianna
>  
>
Look, I'm not saying that actions on one Wikimedia project should be 
ignored, but it is only "evidence" to help build a case against a user. 
 You shouldn't have a knee jerk reaction and assume that bad actions are 
going to carry over from one project to the next.  It is cause to 
investigate, however, and I have reviewed the edits of Zephraim Stark on 
Wikibooks in the past myself.  And carried on conversations with him on 
talk pages and e-mails.

Things like open proxies and routinely abusive ip addresses (such as one 
IP address from an Indian internet bar that has caused a bunch of 
problems for Wikimedia projects) should be investigated and banned as 
appropriate.  And have been by local admins on Wikibooks.  That is my 
point as well, that Jimbo didn't need to perform this micromanagement 
activity.  A warning to watch out for this user would have been more 
than sufficient.  A note by admins from Wikipedia would have been more 
than sufficient, if they felt it was of sufficient merit to warn other 
Wikimedia sister projects.

This is one more case where I say trust the community to get it right, 
as extreme micromanagement by the WMF board is going to simply cause 
problems in the future.

-- 
Robert Scott Horning