[WikiEN-l] 3RR Unenforceable

Wed Dec 14 15:37:23 UTC 2005

On 12/13/05, Tony Sidaway <f.crdfa at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/13/05, Jtkiefer <jtkiefer at wordzen.net> wrote:
> > It's gotten to the point where 3RR has become unenforceable.  Any
> > administrator who tries to enforce 3RR regulations posted on AN/3RR are
> > subsequently villified, accused of bias, amd/or threatened with an RFC
> > if they continue doing their job. Due to this many editors stay away
> > from enforcing 3RR and I think something needs to be changed so that
> > admnistrators can actually enforce this rule without fear.
> >
> >
> The 3RR was one of those ideas that may have seemed good at the time
> (I supported the proposal).  In practice it seems to be used for two
> bad purposes:
>
> * to justify the notion that making up to three reverts per day is a
> normal mode of editing
> * to bait hotheads and get them into trouble
>

That is more a symptom of other problems, though (and I say this as
someone who doesn't support the 3RR as a rule but only a guideline).

There needs to be better mechanisms for dispute resolution: somewhere
people can turn to when they disagree over an article and using the
talk page is not resolving the problem; somewhere where there are
established precedents for dealing with certain types of situations
that come up over and over again; somewhere that the wise citizens of
Wikipedia occassionally hang out in and can diffuse the situations by
pointing to policies and precedents.  This would make both revert wars
and the 3RR unnecessary.

I see the proper place for this as the RfC page.  But the RfC page is
not utilized very well.  But then again, maybe I'm overoptimistic as
to how easy these things are to resolve.