[Foundation-l] Policies expanding out of control

Sun Dec 5 15:07:58 UTC 2004

On Sun, 05 Dec 2004 06:16:54 -0700, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at ctelco.net> wrote:
> Here's a question for you then. Do you want the Arbitration Committee to use
> "common sense" or follow established policies. (fyi, the Committee is
> somewhat split on this point)
> 
> Fred

I think that 90% of all policies should apply to the main and Image:
namespaces (only 10% should apply to the other namespaces). The number
of policies should be pretty small (GFDL, NPOV, factual, be nice,
etc). The committee would go by the policy where one applies, but go
on common sense on most things.

> 
> > From: Dori <slowpoke at gmail.com>
> > Reply-To: Dori <slowpoke at gmail.com>, Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List
> > <foundation-l at wikimedia.org>
> > Date: Sat, 4 Dec 2004 21:36:32 -0600
> > To: foundation-l at wikimedia.org
> > Subject: [Foundation-l] Policies expanding out of control
> 
> 
> >
> > I am really concerned that the number and extent of policies on en
> > Wikipedia is getting seriously out of hand. It's true that some policy
> > needs are necessary, but I feel like it's getting to the point where
> > you must have memorized hundreds of pages, spanning hundreds of
> > kilobytes of text, just to be able to edit within the "rules". Unless
> > you're spending most of your waking moments on Wikipedia, and keeping
> > up with all the new rules and decisions, you're unlikely to keep up
> > with all this. This is especially hard on admins who are the targets
> > of disruptive users. I am not saying that there shouldn't be
> > accountability, but all these rules is making the whole editing
> > process a whole lot less fun than it used to be. I am already feeling
> > like I should stop being an admin, and if the policy explosion extends
> > much further into the normal editing, I'd probably stop editing
> > altogether. Common sense seems to be going out the window.
> >
> > It used to be that we had mostly guidelines, but at some point
> > guidelines seems to have moved into policy, and users are using these
> > to clobber each other left and right. I think this is a looming threat
> > to Wikipedia. The bureacracy level is increasing every day. I don't
> > think that the benefits of the increased bureacracy outweigh the added
> > complexity. Obviously Wikipedia is a lot bigger than it used to be,
> > but I think the medicine might turn into a new disease.
> >
> > --
> > [[en:User:Dori]]
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-- 
[[en:User:Dori]]