Guild Wars 2 Wiki talk:Policy/2007-2008 archive

Initial comments

I think to start off we need to set out the ground rules; E.G the rights of people, what people can and cant do, etc. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 21:37, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Admins, and RFA need to be sorted out. RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 21:40, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Ill work on that. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 21:41, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

More GuildWikians than GWWians Here? RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 21:42, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Marco advertised it on his userpage =P --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 21:43, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

A start

Well, shall we make a start and say that policy redirects should be in caps? RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 21:42, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah. I made the RFA. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 21:43, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

But not in the right namespace RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 21:43, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Discussion first

Shouldn't we discuss the policy outlines first, without actually creating the policy. We want to make sure this wiki does not have the problems ..other certain wikis might. so make sure discussion is before creation. Right? --brains12 • (talk) • 21:48, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

/agree. delete pl0x. - Y0_ich_halt 21:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Indeed... RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 21:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Creating policy suggestions. Not actual policies. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 21:51, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Before starting to hash out policy I'd like to see people say what their expectations are for policy here. I've seen a few say "I want policy set down right". So please start by saying, without anger and excessive history, what do you think are the weaknesses and strengths of GW and GWW policies? What do you consider to be at the heart of good policy and what do see as essential for this new wiki?

I'm not entirely sure whether there is a problem with policy. I think anything we've seen could be attributed to personalities and a rift between GW and GWW since the inception of GWW. I'd like to see a policy scheme which allows Joe User to be able to make edits without knowing the rules (and therefore avoid being excessively stomped on by rules). I think the GWW is more restrictive here but maybe not excessively so? Both wiki's have spent so long on policy discussion I can only *sigh* to think it is going to happen all over again. --Aspectacle 21:56, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I suggest we copy the same policy's as GWW here. Both wikis are pretty much run by the same community and it would be weird if something wound be allowed on GWW but allowed on GW2W ~ SCobra 22:10, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

No, we form our own policys to make it better, for expample GW1 articles are not a problem in GW1 wiki but are in 2 RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 22:11, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) That would be best for the time being, but we should start on making the policies from scratch to avoid the same problems over here. This should be a fresh start. --brains12 • (talk) • 22:12, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

What problems are you people talking about? ~ SCobra 22:17, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) The so called problems to our (and by our, I mean GWW) admin/sysop system, requesting for adminship system, etc --brains12 • (talk) • 22:18, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

But what is that problem?? you keep pointing to a problem but youre not mentioning it ~ SCobra 22:25, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, scobra. For the sysop problem, that they are just glorified janitors with no power, whereas Guildwiki have too much power (or the right amount). That they cannot ban using their own discretion being the main issue, and if they did, it's being power hungry. I'm not saying there's a problem with them myself, but the fact that some people think there are, shows that the policies aren't agreed by all, and thus no proper consensus. --brains12 • (talk) • 22:34, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Imho, the powers of an Admin are fine over at the Unoff Wiki. They are chosen, and thus trusted to being able to make reasonable decisions themselves (infact, I've been RFA'd there...). If they are power hungry, they shouldn't have passed the RFA, imho --- -- (s)talkpage 22:36, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Brains is absolutly right here. This policy shoul be either empty, or clearly marked as a proposal. Backsword 22:17, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

So, until we have our own, follow GWW policy, but they are replaced as relivent policy comes in GW2W? RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 22:21, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I guess so. But don't just copy and paste it all. Just provide a link to GWW on this page. --brains12 • (talk) • 22:22, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Thats a good idea, we follow that of GWW and then change the policy as needed, we have enough time to set it up. ~ SCobra 22:25, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

GWW Policies?

Shouldn't we simply adopt the old policies? they seem pretty balanced and fair over all. Any other thoughts? --User:Lou-Saydus 22:23, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

You may wanna read above :P --brains12 • (talk) • 22:24, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Not everyone would be happy with that; such things as fundamental structures have great inertia. If we adopt GWWs structure for now, probability is that it's forever. I'd also like to note that there is no great hurry; there's not much to make policy on. Backsword 22:32, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Agreed with Backsword. I`d like to highlight the point that he`s making, we don`t need all (most) policies right now. Even if we do need a few, we don`t need them as complicated and extensive on GWW or elsewhere. If we really need a signing policy, for instance, lets start with a very basic one, and build upon that as needed, instead of importing things wholesale. --Dirigible 22:38, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Basics-examples are: Make it clear it's you, img restriction, linking (always useful), no external links and stuff like that? --- -- (s)talkpage 22:42, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I'll agree with this. (My own edit in that regard notwithstanding. I was more concerned with copyright issues than making a full-blown proposal) --Valshia 22:46, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd say that the most basic requirements should be that the signature cannot be overly disruptive (we can get into the precise nature of how big images can be and things like that later), linking, and making sure that the sig makes clear who the user is. *Defiant Elements* +talk 22:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Reconfirmations?

Is there any plan to reconfirm the current Admins or otherwise deal with the question of who the Admins will be or are the GWW Admins simply be kept? *Defiant Elements* +talk 22:48, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Emily said GWW admins will stay admins here, and were waiting for them to confirm it. ~ SCobra 22:53, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

She did not say that. Her words were:

To start, we've automatically grandfathered all Sysops and Bureaucrats from the Guild Wars Wiki over to the Guild Wars 2 Wiki. We're assuming that you'll want to hold your own elections for this new wiki, and that there may be some varying opinions about whether having Sysop/Bureau status on one wiki should automatically grant it on the other. Since we don't want to set any policy, we'll leave this to the membership to decide, and will leave the timeframe of this decision completely in your hands.

So, it`s going to be up to us to decide. My best guess is everyone`s going to go through reconfirmation soon. --Dirigible 22:56, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok, thanks Dir. *Defiant Elements* +talk 22:56, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) Reconfirmations are the best option. Best to start everything with a clean slate, and leanr from what mistakes we've made on GWW. Calor — talk 22:57, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, no Wiki is perfect, and, as Dir has said, once policy is well established, it is nigh impossible to achieve the significant change in mentality necessary to change it (as I'm beginning to discover on GWW), so tabula rasa seems like a pretty good idea. *Defiant Elements* +talk 23:01, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, on the note of elections, RfA, and reconfiramtion, we need policies for those immediately, else we can't reconfirm or elect Sysops or bureaucrats. Calor — talk 23:11, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, we could have an interim Reconfirmation-specific policy just to deal with this instance and then create RfAs, Elections, etc., in the future. I'm not sure it's even a good idea to hold those reconfirmations just yet, might be a better idea to wait awhile until the Wiki is stable and the number of users has increased (while I'm not necessarily for or against the current Admin team, I don't think there's a huge amount of harm that would be done by letting them remain in place for a little while on this Wiki prior to reconfirmation). *Defiant Elements* +talk 23:13, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

On GWW, all grandfathered sysops went through a reconfirmation after about 4-6 months, when most policies were decided on. In my opinion, that worked very well. --Xeeron 23:50, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree, it was wise to have a group in place to deal with any problems near the beginning before elections/votes could take place. reconfirmations will surely happen in due course. --Lemming 00:36, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Proposals

I suggest we add proposals to "*thispage*/*username*_Proposal" for policy proposals. I could write up a small table that people can add their own proposals to on the actual article. Anyone else? --Lou-Saydus 23:01, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

I think it's best if we follow the current convention. Create the policy proposal/draft in the Guild Wars 2 Wiki namespace, put a draft/proposal tag on it. Once consensus is reached, change the tag to accepted or failed.--brains12 • (talk) • 23:24, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Considering we have no set-in-stone policy here, I just had this idea. Perhaps an "interim code of law" saying that all GWW's policies are in effect here until some date, say three weeks from now when every policy here we need to get rolling is created. Calor — talk 23:36, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Temporary policies

Temporary policies I am very weary off, since they tend to stay for longer than one might initially plan. In my mind, the 2 policies we can absolutely not do without are NPA and Adminship, so we have a basis to stop really bad behavior. Everything else, including the stance on signatures, article retention, etc is not critical. We can live without these policies for now, so there is no need to enforce GWW's. As a second save guard against introducing policies by stealth, I gave the temporary solution a hard end date.

That all being said, of course we do not have to reinvent the wheel. If a old policy is seen as working well, nothing stops us from adopting that policy here as well. However it should be discussed like any other policy proposal. --Xeeron 00:24, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Imo, we can do without NPA, especially given what happened over at GWW with it ("YOU SAID SOMETHING I DON'T LIKE SO I'M GONNA COMPLAIN ABOUT NPA"). I think we should let the admins deal with what I lovingly term "general asshattery" - that is, if someone's acting rude or offensive, let the admin let him know that his behavior is not appreciated and may earn him a ban if he keeps it up.

Come to that, we can probably go without any policies but a list of sysops, as long as we can agree that our sysops are trustworthy enough to not run around causing wiki apocalypse. Armond 02:05, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Are you drunk? A wiki without policy's is like a truck without a steering wheel ~ SCobra 14:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I think we have enough time, to not need temporary policies.. poke | talk 19:53, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Believe it or not SCobra, a wiki can run without policies. What Armond described can actually work very well, but it's unlikely to be consensual.reanor 23:57, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

No it can't. Humans are social animals, and affected by others. Add to that the fact that they're not entirely random, and you get persistent patterns on enforcement, followed by the admin base. The technical structyre of a wiki, any wiki, also supports this. Armond isn't suggesting no policies either, he's suggesting the admins make the policies. Backsword 00:05, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Just to get it out there

/vote sysops with discretion this time.

Let the flaming begin. @.@ Armond 01:57, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Agree --brains12 • (talk) • 14:17, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

A good chance for a little change

Since it looks like we are starting from scratch here, maybe it may be a good chance for fixing a few issues from the previous wiki.
My main concern for now is the apparent lack of power that sysops and bureaucrats had. Even if they could, by the letter of the law "ban or sanction based on current policies", there were always arguments raised by users (usually the same people) that delayed the action that should have been taken within hours to days or even weeks. I think a good example was the talk page for the "F' this wiki" article, that had to stay up for a couple of days, until it was finally catalogued as G4, instead of just deleted right at the moment (and this just because a user didn't agree with the deletion when proposed... the same user that actually created the talk page (not the article, obviously)).
Enough rant for now... i would like two things actually
For policies

• A general idea of the policy proposal can be raised by any registered user (admins excluded). If no concensus is reached about the need of it in X days, the proposal is rejected (Bureaucrats decision may overwrite any concensus reached at this stage).
• A Sysop/bureaucrat (or a group of) will be selected to redact a new policy or adapt an existent one to meet the requerimentss of the proposal. No user can be included in the redaction group.
• The proposed policy (or change to a current policy) will be presented to users for comments. Users can not change the proposal by their own).
• Bureaucrats (only) will consider if any proposed change is adequate, and adapt the policy to any new requeriment.
• The policy goes live.
  
• The golden rule: The less policies, the better. "Editing" and "Play nice" are better than "NPA"+"Harrasing"+"GWW:USER"+"GWW:Images"+"GWW:guild"+"GWW:don't feed the trolls"+..."n".

For user issues

• Apply Anet's rule of "ban first, check if it's right later". I think it will cause a lot less trouble overall if you can put a stop to disruptive use of the wiki right when it's happening, instead of having to ask permisions to the vocal minority about if they feel a user is cool enough or not to stay. A temporal ban of a couple of hours (while a decision is taken) in order to make a user think that it may be a good idea to "stop now" could work better than letting him go on and on for a month, and then call Arbcomm for a 1 year ban.
• In the same line, and Arbcomm can be called for any sysop over a user's behavior (excluded problems between the user and the sysop). Decision should be taken without userbase consult, and within 24 hours.

For general management
(aka. the No Policy policy)

• If a No Policy policy is taken (now that i have read the previous comments, i kinda like the idea), Sysop's actions should be taken without consult to the userbase. In case of doubt they can ask for other admins feedback, or in case of conflict with other sysops or users, bureaucrat intervention should be asked for, but no more "popularity judgements" should be executed... ever. Asking for feedback to one user over another only brings the most vocal users to comment (or the "he roxorz/he fails" ones), and doesn't help for a neutral decision to be taken--Fighterdoken 02:39, 21 December 2007 (UTC).

Fighterdoken wins, imo. The only two things I have a problem with are the word "redact" (wtf does it mean?) and the fact that bureaucrats basically control policy changes. However, with active bureaucrats, that shouldn't be too much of a problem... I do like. Armond 03:26, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I, for one, will act according to my own discretion, in terms of sysop actions. It's served me and the wikis I've frequented well in the past. If consensus is against something I do, I'll revert, but I don't see that happening... my sysop actions are usually non-controversial. —Tanaric 04:48, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I've always seen GWW's admin system too inflexible, and admins almost seemed to be tools of the community. Giving admins discretion to make sure nothing blows up seems to be the way to go, as 99.9% of the time nothing will' blow up. Thus, I agree with Tanaric, and feel he's making the correct decision in how to go about his business on the brand-new GW2W. Calor — talk 06:03, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Calor, I appreciate your support. :) —Tanaric 06:08, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Just for the record, I strongly disagree with bureaucrats having a final say over policy, I strongly disagree with "ban first, check if it's right later". --Xeeron 12:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Calor, admins are supposed to be the tools of the community on GWW. That's the very idea. Backsword 13:18, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

A complicated formal system. It has some loopholes tho', so it wouldn't work. Eg. redacting can be done down to the letter, allowing the admins to bypass what is meant to limit their power. Backsword 13:21, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I totally oppose this proposal. This goes far beyond "sysops with discretion" to a dictatorship under Out Benevolent Bureaucrats. Giving them the sole and final power over policy changes will of course allow them to ignore the desires, or even clear consensus, of the userbase. That's a little too much power to trust anyone with. --Valshia 19:17, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I totally oppose your point. If bcrats did something that angered the entire populace, the community would leave! The wiki would die and that's the end of the game. No continues, no extra lives. —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 00:52, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

A lot, not all. Calor (t) 00:59, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

And you don't see "if the bcrats did something that angered the entire populace, the community would leave!" as a VERY good reason why we should make sure that the community can never get so angry as to leave? As a very good reason why it would be wise to implement some kind of safety valve, so the situation never reaches that critical pressure? --Dirigible 03:54, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Having power in the sysops would assure that problems don't spring up through speedy resolutions. Bcrats and sysops are elected from the community to monitor the community so of course the community trusts the judgment of these sysops that they themselves have elected. It's like the 1/10 of a regiment that were grenadiers: very elite, very strong, very respected. The creme de la creme if you will (in terms of intelligence). —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 04:01, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

But speedy resolutions can also cause problems. Wikidrama and alienation are inevitable, and minimizing them is a delicate balancing act. Giving admins the power to edit, twist and veto policy proposals would provide little or no benefit, and would cause a great deal of wikidrama, even if that power was never abused, or never used at all. -- Gordon Ecker 05:07, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Humble request

I think it would be prudent to not post everyone's view on everything on this page. It might be wise to consider spending some time putting down your thoughts on your user page, linking to it from this page's article page, and allowing users to comment on what they see. At such a time as we deem necessary, we take the best from each section, see if we can reconcile differences and vote on what we'd like in a policy. -elviondale (tahlk) 03:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm greatly sorry, but I'm about to head for bed and don't feel like copypasting everything I put up there onto my user page right now >.< Everything past this post, however, I'll do so. Armond 03:26, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

That's totally cool, its just that I see this page spinning wildly out of control in terms of length. And maybe other things, but I'll assume good faith. -elviondale (tahlk) 03:32, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the discussions on this page should pertain primarily to a) What policies need to be drafted, and b) General philosophy regarding changes to policy rather than changes to specific policies. This page should outline where we want to go, but not necessarily how to get there. *Defiant Elements* +talk 03:34, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Starting out

I've started Project:Starting out, which should be a place for non-prescriptive, non-confrontational general guidelines that everyone should read. Please assist and enhance. —Tanaric 04:46, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

That's a great idea, however two quick things- 1) There really isn't that much content to add yet and 2) the policy issue on GW1W is a huge concern and in general, people want to address this. -elviondale (tahlk) 04:50, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

That's fine, I'm certainly not telling people they can't discuss policy. I'm hoping that people defer policy discussion until a need arises. We tried the whole "policy before content" thing on GW1W and, as far as I can tell, it was a huge failure that bit everyone in the ass. The policies on the GuildWiki were much more organic and useful in the end, because they were more like "we all already do this, so here's an article explaining what we do in case you're new" instead of "we can't act without written instructions, so four of us got together and convinced everybody that this is the best way" —Tanaric 04:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I always feel like I end up returning to PvX as an example, but that's probably simply because it's the only Wiki that I can really claim to be involved in from the very beginning. Either way, in point of fact, the way we went about it on PvX was to institute what we all considered to be obvious policies (things like NPA) and then, as the site grew, everything followed from there. I think perhaps that starting with guidelines as opposed to policies is a much smarter strategy. A formal policy, no matter how vague, is still less malleable than a guideline and will be interpreted more strictly (although some policies are more open-ended than others). We (Admins on PvX) often joke about single all-encompassing policies with names that are inevitably equivalent to "PvXwiki:Don't be a dick." But, assuming that you trust your sysops to make rational decisions, that kind of guideline-oriented mentality covers most policy violations. Regardless, great job on the article (I'll get around to editing it a bit at some point). *Defiant Elements* +talk 05:02, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I worked to set up GW1W in a manner far different than we set up the GuildWiki so that I could learn strengths and weaknesses of both methods. I much prefer using sysops and common sense over stringent, explicit policy articles. Thanks for the compliments, if we can get more people on it, it'll end up being useful. Since all the comments are positive, I'm going to link to it from the main page. —Tanaric 05:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

From my experience as a Bureaucrat on PvX and from what I've seen of both GW and GWW I'd agree with that wholeheartedly. Policies should stem from the exercise of common sense, and the policies should reflect that. *Defiant Elements* +talk 05:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I've been asked about it by others in IM; but I never replied until now: while my engagement is the excuse that I've always listed for resigning my sysop status on GW1W, the actual root cause was my frustration with the politics that formed around the endless and lethargic policy discussions in GW1W - as well as the mandate to blindly following of the word of the policies while being required to ignore the intent or even common sense. (my resigning on GW was a spill-over from that, and the issues that came up from it taking the fun out of the game for me - I enjoyed the game much more without the wiki politics). --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 05:16, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I've distanced myself from policy discussions in general as well, for the same reason. Ideally we can prevent the same mentality from becoming dominant here. —Tanaric 05:19, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

What caused you guys to feel that users had a "mandate to blindly following of the word of the policies while being required to ignore the intent or even common sense"?

I think that the pure-organic approach mentioned here would be okay as long as we (and Anet) are all upfront and accepting of us probably falling into what is essentially a benevolent dictatorship.

--Rezyk 06:04, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Rezyk, the prevailing culture of the GWW for the longest time (even now, though it's starting to slowly fade) was that a user could only act if a policy specifically allowed an action. Don't add content unless there's a style guide and unless you follow that guide. Uploaded an image with the wrong name? We deleted it. You have to measure your userpage with a ruler or else you'll be blocked. Don't write guidelines or articles in GWW namespace, as policy doesn't say you can.

On closer inspection one can see that often the actual policy articles weren't written in this restrictive manner, but it doesn't matter -- enough people thought they were and supported that perception vigorously enough to make the perceived policy the actual one.

—Tanaric 06:08, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Doesn't that illustrate one of the major advantages of bureaucratically maintaining policy pages? -- a perception that drifts away what was actually agreed upon, due to rhetoric and reinterpretation or whatever. The organic approach could then make that perceived policy/practice an actual one, while the bureaucratic gives users (especially newer ones who would have no reference otherwise) a decent chance to figure out what the system really is, argue against misinterpretations, see whether or not tradition is being interpreted on-the-fly as convenient, etc. --Rezyk 07:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

No, I don't think it does. It's irrelevant if the policy page disagrees with the consensus of what the policy is. People are supposed to follow consensus, not policy pages. You can't use the existence of a policy page that flouts consensus as a ward against that consensus. —Tanaric 07:13, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I can't see how to serious believe that consensus is that the policy is such that users can only act if policy specifically allows it. I already thought you were grossly exaggerating describing it as the prevailing culture. I think I must be misinterpreting you somewhere.

Back to the main subject: I would consider this stuff to be more central to the concepts of ignore all rules and avoid instruction creep, rather than go as far as avoid proactive policy. --Rezyk 09:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

(Reset indent) But there is no such consensus, Tanaric, and it's the consensus formalised in policy which is explicitly written in a all is allowed unless policy says so matter. While policy is relevant to what mentalities form, they're far from the only thing involed, and if the facts are actually on your side, easy to change without touching policy. Backsword 11:57, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Who cares if it's a dictatorship if it's a benevolent one? It works at PvX, GW, and WP... (Well, I can't really claim to know in detail about the latter. Also, I must repeat DE's excuse for constantly referring to PvX.) Armond 07:26, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Benevolent dictatorsip works with Linux. As long as we have the power to overthrow! RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 10:44, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

An all-wise Benevolent dictatorship is actually so nice. The "little" problem is there are not all-wise people and there are actually the same number of ways to be "benevolent" as there are people. Coran Ironclaw 08:22, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Jesus Christ!

Wow, this is a whole lot of convo I missed out on. Anyways, my suggestion is take all current policys from GWW and then later on, put reconfirmations on for Sysops here. — ク Eloc 貢 06:22, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Reading above, I'd say you've been democracied. Armond 07:27, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Democracied? — ク Eloc 貢 07:29, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

It means the democracy says you're wrong, and might blame you for it even. I'll point you to Project:Starting out for a starter read, and the section directly above this for another read. Armond 07:42, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Eloc fails...again.reanor 00:12, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Where's Eloc's fail userbox when you want it. And you don't fail. You just have to try harder. Calor (t) 18:08, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

First timer

I'm a fairly recent addition to active editing on GWW, but would like to get in on the ground floor here, so I will be monitoring this, and chime in when I think I have something to contribute, but as I'm still fairly uneducated on the whole policy development stuff any guidance would be appreciated.-- Wynthyst 08:48, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Just add your own views when you think it's neccessary RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 08:49, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok... for now I'll just work on prettifying my user page :P -- Wynthyst 09:23, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Cool! RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 10:43, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I disagree x100 with following everything gwwiki is like; I think this wiki should be more like guildwiki, aka not screwed up so people dont have to wait for a year or so before a vandal is banned. Anyway, I think we should start this site as a totally new one; aka, our own policies, no other admins (we choose our own admins) and that sort of things. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 11:00, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

What about a policy or somesuch, GW2W is not GWW or GW. It is a different wiki. RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 11:09, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Thats my point. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 11:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Structuring the discussion

As reference base, I think it would be useful to consider what the 'natural order' on a MediaWiki wiki is, due to the way the software is setup, in the absence of any policy on policies. Cosidering this may show the various points that needs setteling. I'm guessing the first one is of most interest to people, but I think the orther two is well worth considering.

1. Bureaucrat make all policy.
2. All policy is informal.
3. All policy is conveyed by action. (revealed)

Backsword 11:49, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

/disagree. Bureaucrats make all the policies? We havnt even decided if we're going to keep the old admins and bureaucrats yet. We probably wont, and anyway, all policy should be formal, the last one i have no idea what your talking about. Your notes have bad structural talking, and i dont fully understand what you're saying, but the buraecrats shouldn't decide everything- We're going to be making this wiki afresh, with good new admins. We're going to be deciding the new policies ourselves, so we dont have to wait weeks before we can ban somone for vandalising. Some buracrats would probably just use the same policies as what are on gwwiki, and that fails. The gwwiki policies fail, badly, and thats that. The bureaucrats arnt the owners or runners of this site, and most of them havnt even been on this site yet. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 12:05, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

"Bureaucrat" is a MediaWiki fuction that is set for some users; allowing them to add and remove users from usergroups. Backsword 12:09, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Exactly, but we want to be able to chose our ones, so that we dont have weak, easily manipulated people as our 'crats and sysops/admins, hence we want to be able to decide our own admins and 'crats. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 12:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Problem there is that in order for you to pick admins, you need a policy on picking admins that allows you to do so, and in order for you to make such a policy, you need a policy on policies allowing you to make said policy. So it will still come back to making that fundamental choice. Can't be dodged. Backsword 12:17, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Dont need a policy to nominate admins. Just create a RFA. And you dont need 'crats or admins to make a policy, just need a vote of concensus. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 12:18, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Nominations alone makes no admins. And you do need admins for policies to be real. Backsword 12:27, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Please learn proper grammar before replying to me, I have no idea what you just said.. "And you do admins for policies to be real"..? What the heck does that mean? And Nominations do make people admins, you just need somone to be voted 'crat, make 'em a crat, they then promote people who have good nominations. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 12:28, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

No need to get personal. And the last thing you mention you mention, that's policy. Which disproves your point. Backsword 12:32, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Ok what is up with the GWW1 bashing?

Reading this talk page I come upon many statements like "The policies on the GuildWiki were much more organic and useful in the end" and similar comparisons. Always without any evidence presented at all. Am I the only one remembering everything that went wrong on guildwiki? Am I the only one noticing that PvX wiki seems to be an all out brawl where the strongest survive, compared to GWW? Am I the only one thinking that GWWs policies work really well in giving the community a say, implementing consensus and ensuring fair rules? --Xeeron 12:58, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Can we please call it GWW, as I hate people calling the first thing x1 when it was Just called x It's Guild Wars, not Guild Wars 1 RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 13:22, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Everyone here is like "GWW is the source of all evil, admins are this and that". But i cant remember a thing that went wrong on GWW with the admins and policy's. Guildwiki on the other hand had a lot of trouble with polciy's and turned into a choas. GWW is much more newbie-friendly and organized, which is why i think we should take GWW as a base ~ SCobra 14:02, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

This is warw. GWW was a very insecure site, for instance it gave vandals a lot of leeway, eg only banning mega-vandals for an hour or so, then waiting a week to finally ban them again. Raptors was repeatedly banned, and each time it took a week + to get the ban on him. --Warwick

raptors got a one-year-ban fyi... and /agree with kurd/cobra. - Y0_ich_halt 14:16, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

NO. This site is soloing itself -.- We dont want another situation, and its not to be based on any other site. If its based on GWW, where the admins Policies fail badly, then Guildwikians will leave to create another wiki which will be www.gw2.gamewikis.org or somthing like that. Guildwiki has a lot less wrong with it then GWW does, but thats beside the point anyway. --Warwick

what problem do you have with gww? give me one exact example of a problem on gww that is not named raptors. he didn't get his ban for so long because every time he said he'll stop it now and he's a person who can make himself sound trustworthy. every other vandal was banned right away. - Y0_ich_halt 14:32, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

yes, we're gonna make our own policies and elect our own bcrats and admins, but in the end, our system won't have much difference from that of gww. i'm not for copying anything, either, but until we have those policies, letting the old admins from gww stay is ok imo. - Y0_ich_halt 14:33, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm not actually sure why I hate Gwwiki so much... It's been drilled into me by knowning MP47 for so long and listening to how much he hates them >.<.. I prefer Guildwiki, and as far as I saw, and i wasnt on that wiki for very long, I saw the Raptors/Ryudo incident, and that was disgraceful. Nothing was done for that, as from what I have heard, Raptors got his year-ban for somthing else. --Warwick

Agree with Yo_ich_halt. Where is this bad example everyone is pointing too. And stop acting like we need people from Guildwiki to get this site running. ~ SCobra 14:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

what the hell are you talking about? I am saying nothing about us needing people from guildwiki to keep this site running, learn to read.. EDIT= Bad example = Raptors/Ryudo incident. I was so disgusted about the lack of any action for ages that i left immediately after. --Warwick

then Guildwikians will leave to create another wiki which will be www.gw2.gamewikis.org or somthing like that... than came over as a treat to me, though you may not have wanted it to be ~ SCobra 14:45, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Meh, if you misinterpruted whatever. What I meant was that People like me and viper would probably leave, for the same reasons we didnt go to the offical wiki. Never said you needed us, just said that you'd have us leave. --Warwick

i told you to bring an example other than raptors. - Y0_ich_halt 14:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I got banned for a year or the Ryudo thing fyi. And if you want to start flaming about Guildwiki vs GWW, take it somewhere else because nobody here cares. --- Raptors / RAAAAAAAAAA!

Suggestion: don't bring up the "GWW vs. GuildWiki" debate here. Use examples from either site if you wish, but simply don't start setting the two against each other. Keep debates between examples specific to the examples. Don't bother with the "GWW is better than GuildWiki" or "GuildWiki is better than GWW", because that has literally nothing helpful to contribute here. If you're going to quote examples from either, be specific, because the overall atmosphere of a wiki is created from a large number of factors and having one similar aspect from one wiki to another is not going to copy the entire atmosphere. Bringing up unrelated disputes and arguments only serves to derail things here, which I doubt anyone wants, regardless of their thoughts about either other wiki. Stop bringing up vague arguments that "we don't want this to be GWW" or "we don't want this to be GuildWiki" and instead present on topic ones such as "we want to make sure vandals can't abuse the letter of policy" or "we want to make sure one person's arbitrary decisions can't totally subvert what the community wants". While learning from the past is all well and good, dwelling in it is not. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 14:49, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I'm not trying to. People seemed to keen to c+p everything from the offical wiki, which is somthing im against. Luckily, there are lots of people who do that, and I dont particularly like the offical wiki policies, and dont think of them as particularly effective. --Warwick

(Edit conflict) don't want anything to be c+pd either. and isntead of debating over nothing we should start actually making policies. - Y0_ich_halt 14:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Amen. Instead of debating over crap, lets make policies. I'll get right on it when i get home and can logg in. --Warwick

(Edit conflict) Then let warwick create his "own" gw2.wikia.org wiki... GWW has great features I miss in GWiki, like ingame integration, special renderings, ANet staff posts and so on... This seems to be an unneccesary discussion. Ah, just one point: The GWW accounts are linked with the GWW2 accounts, so guess what GWW2 will be... BigBluetalk 14:55, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

For gods sake, stop picking up on dead subjects you freaking nub, its dead and buried and over with. You are a freaking nub, and this is why i will never go to the offical wiki. 80.176.240.211 14:58, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

If you are meaning me, I wrote my comment long before Aiiane posted her answer. BigBluetalk 15:04, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Then why did you post it before reading what the other person had said? I always do that, because it might make whatever you posted irrellevent.. --Warwick

I think Aiiane wrote her comment in the middle of the discussion, not at the end of the current header. -- br12 • (talk) • 15:08, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but you should always read other peoples comments on talk pages before posting yours, even if you got edit conflicted- It might make whatever you said irrelevant, which was what happened now. All that he has caused now is annoyance from me, a spamming of this page, and minor spamming of RC. --Warwick

I made a mistake (my comment is marked as edit conflict) and for further discussion I refer to my talk page, thx. BigBluetalk 15:16, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Just a note to prevent misunderstandings: The edits done in this section signed with --Warwick where not done by the account User:Warwick (and please take your disagreement to the user talk page, or better, drop it entirely). --Xeeron 15:25, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, it was done by an ip pretending to be me. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 15:51, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

(reset indent)Very late reply to Xeeron's post that started this topic: I have not forgotten GW's flaws; but, because the GW model is not perfect does not automatically mean that the GWW model, which many also view as flawed, is the best solution. In my mind, learning from the past means learning from the successes, and the criticisms of both models. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 16:01, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Np, I never intended to port over the GWW system (in fact, I removed that part from the policy page). However several posts up above read like 'GWW is bad, use GW's/PvX's system', so I wanted to put straight that I do not feel that GWW's policies are in any way inferior to those of the other two. Each wiki has had its share of troubles, it just seems that people tend to forget those that are longer in the past (GW). We should really cherry pick the best approaches from all three wikis. --Xeeron 18:53, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Image policy

Just wanted to note, that the signature preferences are identical to GWW, and whenever they are changed they are changed both here and over there. Seeing as any user/sig images on the GWW are titled User Username Imagename.jpg, they would also have to be similar over here. That is unless there is a way to take off the link between the two wikis. -- br12 • (talk) • 15:02, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I h8 that policy RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 18:55, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

It could just apply to signature images though. That way, the signatures are not affected by the linking, and you won't have to apply the image naming to everything else. -- br12 • (talk) • 18:56, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I want new users to start contributing without a "you're breaking policy" welcome. That's a problem in GWW and it comes from the image naming policy.reanor 00:24, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Guidelines

Let me throw this in the air right now. Whenever we think about whether something should be a policy on here, please always spare a thought whether it could be a guideline instead. The important difference being that policies are something strict and specific, guidelines are more fuzzy and inconcrete. While being specific and strict is a desirable property in many uses, it is not in all. Especially everything that in other circumstances could be described as "ettiquette" is much better served with guidelines than with policies. We do need some policies for sure, but in many cases we would be better off chosing a guideline instead. --Xeeron 15:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

i just wrote a comment and noticed that i was repeating you with other words, so, in short: /agree - Y0_ich_halt 15:26, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Guidelines only makes sense under some systems. Since we have none yet, it's too early for them. Backsword 16:00, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I disagree with that. Guidelines are even more useful now that we dont have policies- When we have policies, they will be less useful, but now, they are very useful. --Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 16:02, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

yes, i'd also like to put in guidelines first and make them policies if we notice we need to. my thought is, let people more freedom at first, and if something happens take it away, but leave as much as possible. - Y0_ich_halt 16:08, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

that's also the main problem we had at gww... iirc. there were too many policies only to prevent stuff that might happen if you allow people to do stuff. - Y0_ich_halt 16:09, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree. GWW fell victim to an overly bureaucratic system where, for example, if one were to climb the reichstag dressed as spider-man, it would be an acceptable thing to do simply because there was no policy against it. If only the most trusted people were elected to be admins (so we'd have to avoid RFA frenzies like when the system was introduced on GWW), then we could allow them more discretion. I think the most imporant policy (as far as user disputes goes) we could have on either wiki is to simply not be a dick. Everything else would fall into place from there. --Santax (talk · contribs) 17:08, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

In my mind the biggest problem related to GWW's policies were not the admins, but the users (yes you read that correctly). The fact that many "ettiquette" related issues were formulated as policies instead of guidelines meant that some very active users went and checked the pixel lenght of signatures or user pages, which in turn was very off-putting for new users. Now enforcing policies strictly is good, but there should not have been a policy about user page length in pixels the first place. Better to have a system of guidelines. --Xeeron 19:00, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree. —Tanaric 00:26, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Me too. GWW:SIGN welcome FTL. Guidelines are the way to go here.reanor 00:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

You're allowed to agree with Xeer? I happen too agree here too. To some extent, I think we could have prevented this. I, for one, never got involved in those policies on the bais of 'how much can they matter?'. But if the first and second things a new user hears is variations on 'you're bad!', it's not going to make them enjoy the community. (And then they get Eloc). But that's really in the specific policy, not the system. Backsword 00:46, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

(Reset indent)

I think we should incorporate the following sections of Wikipedia's policies and guidelines policy into the draft.

Wikipedia has developed a body of policies and guidelines that have helped to further our goal of creating a free encyclopedia. The difference between policies and guidelines is that policies are regarded as mandatory, while guidelines are advisory.

While we strive to build consensus, Wikipedia Guild Wars 2 Wiki is not a democracy, and its governance can be inconsistent. There is disagreement between those who believe rules should be stated explicitly, and those who believe that written rules are inadequate to cover every variation of problematic editing or behavior. In either case, a user who acts against the spirit of our written policies may be reprimanded, even if technically no rule has been violated. Those who edit in good faith, are civil, seek consensus, and work towards the goal of creating a great encyclopedia should find a welcoming environment.

Policies

Policies are considered mandatory. They have wide acceptance among editors and are considered a standard that all users should follow. Editors should be careful that any change they make to a policy page reflects consensus

Guidelines

Guidelines are advisory, not mandatory, and should be treated with common sense and the occasional exception. Amendments to a guideline should be discussed on its talk page, although it is generally acceptable to edit a guideline to improve it. Disputes over the wording of a guideline are resolved by considering and discussing objections and counter-proposals and coming to agreement, often using compromise language; such a dispute does not "suspend" the guideline or "turn it into" something other than a guideline. People are sometimes tempted to call a vote on a guideline, but this is a bad idea because it polarizes the issue.

How are policies enforced?

You are a Wikipedia Guild Wars 2 Wiki editor. Since Wikipedia Guild Wars 2 Wiki has no editor-in-chief or top-down article approval mechanism, active participants make copyedits and corrections to the format and content problems they see. So the participants are both writers and editors.

Individual users thus enforce most policies and guidelines by editing pages, and discussing matters with each other. Some policies, such as vandalism, are enforced by administrators by blocking users. In extreme cases the Arbitration Committee has the power to deal with highly disruptive situations, as part of the general dispute resolution procedure.

Some features of the software which could potentially be misused, such as deleting pages and locking pages from editing, are restricted to administrators, who are experienced and trusted members of the community. See the administrators' reading list for further information.

The only things I think absolutely need to be policies rather than guidelines are the root policy, the adminship policy (as well as the policies for promoting and demoting admins, if separate from the main adminship policy) and the copyright policy. I believe that arbitrary speedy deletions would cause more harm than good, and that the deletion process should be strictly regulated with clearly defined speedy deletion criteria and a reasonably long absolute minimum time window to contest non-speedy deletion, and that would require a policy. I would also like hard caps for non-ArbComm blocks and ip blocks, as well as an exhaustive list of acceptable reasons for blocking (including broad categories such as "trolling", "excessive technical disruption", "personal attacks" and "vandalism" to prevent loopholes from being exploited), which would likewise require a policy. I'm not saying that there shouldn't be other policies, I'm just saying that we should ask ourselves whether something should be a policy or a guideline. I believe the problem is that Guild Wars Wiki inherited the "guidelines are for formatting" mindset from GuildWiki. -- Gordon Ecker 02:28, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Agreed with that last sentence. I'd add the additional reason that the lack of revert policy meant policy was the only way to get something stable, without risking rever wars. I think this mentality thus have gone away significantly in the last few months, both due to the guildline policy and the revert policy. Backsword 12:04, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

i agree, too, and would like to point to my [[User:Y0 ich halt/policy|idea of GW2W structure]] - Y0_ich_halt 13:27, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Task list

Ok, this talk page is growning huge already (which is a good thing, but still adds a lot of text), let me put up a task lists of things that need to be done in my mind, in order of importance:

1. Decide whether we want to temporarily use GWW's admins

   Since we already have GWW's admins in place, this is partly moot, however we should decide what happens when admins change on GWW (e.g. after the bureaucrat election): Continue copying GWW's admin structure for now or stay with the one set up here by ANet till a GW2W admin policy is drawn up

2. Decide whether we want to temporarily use GWW's NPA

   Do we need that or can we do without it for the first month or so it might take to get a structure fleshed out here?

3. Decide on a policy about policies/guidelines

   Seeing how GW and GWW basically have the same structure, this might seem easy, however there have been some completely different ideas about a policy on policies around already.

4. Decide on actual policies/guidelines

No1 and 2 should not really take long to decide, they are basically yes/no decisions, but those should be discussed first really. No3 might or might not take a bit, depending on how controversial this turns out to be. No4, I have no doubt, will take a lot of time and talk page space till we get settled down. --Xeeron 19:21, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

1. yes
2. no
3. no
4. no

We don't need to define a structure -- one will naturally arise by itself. A statement of goals would be more helpful -- it's something that only PvX has ever had, and it's given them incredible focus and a basis for other decisions to be made.

—Tanaric 19:32, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

My answeres:

1. No (Change admins)
2. Yes (Use their NPA)
3. Yes (Do decide)
4. Yes (Do decide)

--Warwick (Talk) (Contr.) 19:35, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

If we are doing this in a "put your answers forth" sort of way -

1. Yes - Keep current admins. Do not add the newly elected bcrat to the admin list, nor de-admin the current bcrat. Decide on policies for the admin role, requests for adminship and such first, then reconfirm all current admins.
2. Yes - Use NPA for now
3. Decide a guideline on policies, not a policy on policies if that makes sense.
4. Create policies about the things that need a definate policy such as NPA, adminship; guidelines on formatting, userpage etiquette, signatures etc.

-- br12 • (talk) • 19:40, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Why does NPA need a policy? "Don't be disruptive or a sysop will block you" sums up the entirety of the policy, and yet is considerably more flexible and enforceable. Formatting certainly doesn't need a policy, and etiquette is the antithesis of policy by definition.

Only thing worth discussion is what you guys want sysops/bureaucrats/whatever else to be, as that forms the basis of all bureaucracy, in the end.

—Tanaric 19:43, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Since you mention it,

• Bureaucrat: When not acting as a bureaucrat (ie. not explicitly saying so and not exercising bureaucrat-only powers), treat as sysop. Otherwise, bureaucrat-only powers and authority should only be used in executing the (possibly reasonably inferred) consensus will or as necessary for arbitrating a dispute.
• Sysop: When not acting as a sysop (ie. not explicitly saying so and not exercising sysop-only powers), treat as user. Otherwise, sysop-only powers and authority should only be used in executing the (possibly reasonably inferred) consensus will.
• User: Ignore all rules and don't be a dick.

Bonus points if this looks familiar. --Rezyk 01:15, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) I didn't say for formatting to be a policy, but a guideline - something to simply to use as a reference when creating articles - do it, that's ok; don't do it, no problem. Sysops should have the power they need to make sure the wiki doesn't get disrupted. They should be able to block for a duration they see fit. As for bureaucrats, they should have the power to do the same as sysops, but refrain from carrying out blocks whenever possible and leave it to the sysops. Both should be able to protect and edit protected pages, and also delete/restore pages. Bcrats should also be in the position to promote/demote sysops as they see fit, in extreme circumstances as long as consensus doesn't disagree with them. -- br12 • (talk) • 19:59, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

There is great power in setting the frame of discourse, of course.

But for these, 1 is a non issue, as Anet have already decided for us, 2. is basically up to the bcrats until we get a policy on policies, so that's what's need doing before anything else. Backsword 20:04, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Quit ECing me already! :P

1. Yes/No (keep current/don't follow GWW elections/RFAs)
2. Yes
3. I favor a minimalist approach on policies.
4. Bureaucrat/sysop selection/policy are probably the only really pressing ones.

--Valshia 20:06, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

1 Yes

2 Yes

3 Yes

4 Yes

~ SCobra 21:36, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes, for a given term (2-3 months, likely). Bureaucrats will be an interesting topic with the ongoing elections, however.
2. No, it will likely be unnecessary because "Don't Be a Bully" is only needed for "bullies", and in this case the "bullies" are vandals. Considering this wiki is little-known, I doubt it will be the target for anons and vandals yet.
3. No, the less policies, the better. See the GWW for side-effects of an overdosage of policies (No Sarcasm)
4. Not yet. Soon. Calor — talk 22:18, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

As for the first point, I think keep the current sysops for temp ones until the official release then have a reconfirmation for all of them. But, keep an RFA policy in place to get some Sysops who will be dedicated from the start. — ク Eloc 貢 22:41, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Is that a tip of your hand for your plans her on GW2W, Eloc? And I agree that we need reconfirmations after the dust of construction settles, and also an RfA process for non-admin users wishing to become an admin. Calor — talk 22:53, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes, my diabolical plan. — ク Eloc 貢 22:56, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes, keep the current set of admins for now.
2. No. Imo, NPA is not really as useful as a Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Don't be a dick policy(except with a more diplomatic name), basically saying "Don't be obnoxious. Don't disrupt the wiki."
3. Ambivalent about this.
4. Keep policies minimal and general and based on the discretion of sysops, imo, instead of trying to deal with every specific thing that could ever happen that we don't want. --Edru viransu 00:36, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

(Reset indent) Tbh, I think this release was waaay premature. However-

1. Temporary, yes. Bcrats, I don't mind staying as such on both wikis, but sysops need to be one or the other.
2. NPA shouldn't be a carry over, however admins should not be afraid to put a stop to destructive/disruptive behavior. Unrelated comments should be kept to an absolute minimum (meaning 0)
3. Yes. Picture a large room of tons of people shouting out rules and this is what this is sounding like. As I said previously, we should utilize our userspace to develop our opinions and collectively discuss with 1 or 2 people at a time about merging said policies together. While having lots of policies is a bad idea, chaos and anarchy is just as bad if not worse
4. See previous -elviondale (tahlk) 00:42, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes
2. Yes (Raptors is not banned on this wiki last tme i checked) Killer Revan 03:08, 22 December 2007 (UTC)
3. Yes
4. Yes

Killer Revan 03:08, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

No I'm not banned, and I shouldn't be on the account that I've done nothing wrong. --- Raptors / RAAAAAAAAAA!

1. Yes - but I'd also support reconfirmation RfAs when we can.
2. No - this policy should be superseded by "Guild Wars 2 Wiki: Don't Be a Dick".
3. No - these will arise naturally as issues present themselves.
4. No - see #2.

Armond 04:57, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes, and I think that, after the release of Guild Wars 2, any remaining grandfathered sysops should be put up for reconfirmation.
2. No, I don't think it's necessary. We block vandals on Guild Wars Wiki without a vandalism policy or a blocking policy.
3. Yes, we need a foundation to build other policies on.
4. Yes, I think we should have concensus on a formal policy approval / disapproval process before we implement any policies.

-- Gordon Ecker 05:52, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Yes, for now at least, although as soon as is feasible, there should be a re-election. However, the fact of the matter is that until GW2W comes out, there should be nothing to actually regulate... so...
2. No, temporary policies are generally a poor idea, and, until an NPA policy naturally arises, Administrators should be empowered to handle NPA.
3. No (see Tanaric)
4. No (see Tanaric)

*Defiant Elements* +talk 05:56, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

1. Keep current admins, but don't follow GWW elections/RFAs. This is a new community, it deserves to choose its own admins, just like it deserves its own policies. New policies/community hierarchy/motivations, new admins to go with them. Someone who gets "janitor" Sysop status on GWW may not be fit for "judge, jury and executioner" Sysop status, as an unneglectable number of editors here are pushing for. Same with the bureaucrat position. Do our own elections/RFAs as soon as possible, in accordance to whatever power structure its decided to be used on this wiki.

2. No, not "GWW's NPA", at least not under that label. The content can be whatever, as long as this community agrees to it. And until we get our NPA, we might as well just start with "Don't be a dick" as a temporary guideline.

3. No, just let it be.

4. And again, no, no need. Necessary policies and guidelines can be formed over time, no need to rush it artificially. In fact, I think a more constructive approach would be to try solving any problems we stumble upon in a case-by-case basis and not hurrying to generalize them into codified policies. --Dirigible 06:22, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

admins from GWW?

If we're not going to follow GWW's admin policy, wouldn't it be stupid to prot over admins that we're only good at janitoring? — Skakid HoHoHo 00:34, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

They are not only good at janitoring. --Rezyk 00:37, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I was speaking hypothetically, of course. — Skakid HoHoHo 00:37, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, they play a mean air guitar too. Backsword 00:41, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I didn't bother to read anyof the above, so this might be repetitive ^^ — Skakid HoHoHo 00:42, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Once we have our own admins, were going to decide on our own. I'd like to see some of the GuildWiki admins also get a place if they would like to. RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 12:22, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

You guys are just too quick.

I have been trying to post here for the past half an hour, and absolutely nothing is getting in because there is just too much editing happening. I give up.-- Wynthyst 00:47, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Tip:Copypasta. Backsword 00:52, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Something to consider

User:Aiiane/Policy model (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 00:57, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Some thoughts from a relatively new community member

I would like to say that some of this seems way over the top. As it's already been determined by the owners of this site (Anet) that the Admins from GWW are being grandfathered in here to begin with, I think a discussion of adminship should be put on hold for the time being and some basics be determined. Things like, how are admins to be chosen on this wiki. Currently I don't think the community contributing here is large enough to have a real representation for any kind of nomination/election process.

As a relatively new editor of GWW (2 months or so) I may have some thoughts that would benefit considering. My very first experience on GWW was having something I spent an entire weekend compiling, as I was learning wiki code as I went, get tagged for deletion within 5 minutes of being posted because it didn't conform with policy. This was terribly upsetting and almost chased me away. However, I felt and still feel I can make a valuable contribution so I perservered. However, all anyone said to me for that first week was.... go see this policy page, or that policy page, which at the time were basically Greek to me. On the basis of that experience, I would like to see this wiki structured more with Guidelines than Policies, as Policies get entrenched very quickly and are much less likely to be open for flexibility and change. While I understand the need for basic rules, I also believe that all rules need to be flexible enough to be bent on occasion, especially if by allowing the bend, the issue can be resolved or corrected.

It is possible that as I am not a current admin, my ideas, input are not really appropriate here, but since this is ultimately a community site I have to at least try, as I hope to be a positive contributing member of the community.-- Wynthyst 01:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Well said.reanor 01:43, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

It hasen't even been decided if this is going to be "ultimately a community site" yet. A significant group disagrees. I should note that the policies that kept being problems for new users didn't have much with the system to do. Their creation was mostly a situation where only those who cared got involved in the policy for them, which was the same group who had specific tastes in how userpages and signatures should look. Backsword 12:34, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

How is this not going to be a community site? I thought that was the basis of all wiki's... they are built by the communities that use them. If it's NOT going to be a community site, then Anet needs to just pay the money to have a documentational website designed and populated with it's own approved content. -- Wynthyst 13:16, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. RT | Talk - A joyous wintersday to all 13:17, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

The fact that formatting is governed by guidelines and yet pages were still tagged for deletion boggles my mind. instead of taking the time to tag it, the user should have copied the formatting over. We need to lose the mindset from GWW of "if it isn't 'good', delete it". Instead, work to make it better. -elviondale (tahlk) 13:24, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

Define consensus

I would like to try and have a definition for "consensus" right from the start (and then maybe port it back to GWW). What is our definition of consensus? Would an article like that be a policy or a guideline? -- ab.er.rant 03:50, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I interpret concensus as more support of a position than opposition and indifference combined, and far more combined support, tolerance / indifference and weak opposition (i.e. "Y is better, but X is okay." or "X is pointless.") than strong opposition (i.e. "X will do more harm than good."). -- Gordon Ecker 04:19, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict)

Now here's a suggestion I'm quite fond of!

I'll respond to your last question first: whether it's a policy or guideline depends on what the definitions of guideline and policy are. :)

As far as consensus, I'm no good at defining it. I think perhaps defining how it is achieved is better. Looking at the Wikipedia's consensus policy reflects my own interpretation of consensus.

—Tanaric 04:30, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Formal defenition is no opposition. For practical reasons, one doesn't keep strictly to that, but rahter to a no outstanding, resolvable concerns line.

But this is only relevant if we are going to use a GWW like system. It's interesting to see how many assume we will, even people who at the same time suggests that we should have another sort of system. Backsword 11:54, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

"if we are going to use a GWW like system" consensus has nothing to do with GWW specifically. (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 13:20, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

"GWW like" != "GWW" Backsword 19:52, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Agreed with your equation, Backsword, but disagree more pleasantly. We're all here for the same reason. You've been awfully confrontational for no real benefit.

In any case, I don't understand your assertion that consensus only matters in a GWW-like system. I think this is what Aiiane meant as well. Even though the bureaucratic organization will likely be different here, consensus is still important for editing articles, the primary reason this place exists. We've always used consensus as the basis for our editorial guidelines, and I doubt that will change here.

—Tanaric 17:26, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

So should we adopt it directly as Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Consensus? Or should we rewrite it shorter. Also, we probably need to define what is policy and what is guideline and how consensus applies to both. -- ab.er.rant 05:10, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Gordon Ecker above. --Xeeron 15:28, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Ideal for core management system

I suggest that we take a step back and consider/discuss what our core management system will be based on.

• Direct democracy / representative democracy (through majoritarian voting)

A basic argument with this is that it is deeply, mechanically problematic for an open wiki. It also tends to polarize much stuff that is better off not polarized.

• Dictatorship

Presumably a benevolent dictator. Relatively quick and efficient decision-making whenever deemed warranted. Relieves much of the burden of responsible management from almost everyone else. Very appropriate for most privately-owned sites.

• Consensus decision-making

Can be slow/difficult to make changes.

• Some sort of meritocracy
• Freedom / anarchy
• Other

Take my comments/items above with a grain of salt; they are not intended as a balanced view. Some terms here also have potentially misleading connotations (like dictatorship with evil, anarchy with disorder).

Note that picking a system here does not mean that it has to be used thoroughly at every level, as any system could decide to use another system for a particular aspect. A consensus system could come to a consensus of having a specialized office filled through a democratic vote, or initial freedom for any action that can be easily reverted by anyone. A dictatorship could allow for its decisions and representative agents to be restricted on the condition that there is a consensus against.

In some sense, I would say that this is plainly a dictatorship at its initial root level, with ArenaNet being the benevolent dictator. But they obviously wish to devolve the power to us and be hands-off as much as possible; I am asking about what the core system should be immediately past that level. I also tend to think that this decision should be in some sort of root policy that is dictated to us by ArenaNet as part of responsibly handing over the reins, especially now that they have more familiarity with wikis. But we should discuss it.

--Rezyk 16:07, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

see [[User:Y0 ich halt/policy|this]] for my opinion. - Y0_ich_halt 16:12, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Make it like GWW, where it's mainly democracy. This place can't be a dictatorship as it's not owned by anyone really, but rather owned by ArenaNet. — ク Eloc 貢 19:40, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

We could have a series of temporary dictatorships, where each successive dictator is only chosen if there is a consensus supporting. But anyways, I am just asking for a more general basis ideal to start from, and not yet defining the structure and rules of specific offices. --Rezyk 22:42, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Some notes. If you are going to look at extrawiki powers as ANet then they're obviously not sovereign but bound by US law. Worth noting, but intrawiki is the real question. Also, consensus is a democratic system, more so than majoritarian systems. Perhaps most needed on your list is oligarchy, as most proposed systems go that way. Backsword 19:49, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah. I would push for being slightly more specific than "a democratic system" or "an oligarchy" though. --Rezyk 22:42, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I support a benevolent dictatorship as the most sensible option. —Tanaric 17:20, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't mind a benevolent dictatorship, that, or an oligarchical meritocracy. *Defiant Elements* +talk 17:42, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

To me, the main ones to strongly consider are a dictatorship and consensus decision-making. Some sort of oligarchy is not far-fetched either, but if going that route, I don't see much reason to not take advantage of the simplicity of a dictatorship instead.

Between the two, I advocate consensus decision-making because I believe it is relatively more conducive to healthier discussion and mass inclusiveness, but at a great expense of expediency. Another point to consider is whether to have users frustrated and discussion limited by the perception of difficulty in: moving consensus, or in changing the mind of the dictatorship. (Major flaws with both systems)

I'd also like to note that how much bureaucracy/policy to have (and how much it should develop organically) is not a straightforward correlation with this decision. We could start with a dictatorship with excessive policies, or a consensus approach that operates on just a minimalistic foundational policy where all actions should reflect consensus (sometimes indirectly). The need for policies should be driven by the need to improve communication, and this can vary in both systems.

--Rezyk 23:32, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd support the dictatorship but, imo, it would be near-impossible to get enough users to support it, since some would disagree on the person being "elected"/the choice of dictatorship over democracy or consensus or other ways to run a wiki/ect. Obviously, the next best method is consensus, but we'd need some solid policies and strong admins unless we want to repeat the rampid(sp?) trolling that occured in nearly every serious GWW discussion. —̵SEERINFLOOMES 22:43, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Agree. Having a dictatorship eliminates a lot of argument. But I have a feeling the wiki would have a problem agreeing on the dictator (WIkiBoss), or that the community, for lack of a better term, wouldn't have the balls to risk a dictatorship, because things could easily go awry if the dictator wasn't benevolent or got pissed off and went on a rampage. Calor (t) 22:46, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Having enough support for a dictator should, in turn, eliminate that possibility =P. —̵SEERINFLOOMES 22:50, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I support this -- Coran Ironclaw 22:54, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Having a quick look over the policy above-it seems pointless there's barley any noticeable difference between a sysop and an agent (sysops can edit a few more pages and protect/unprotect other that's about it) I'd much rather just have say 2 additional sysops instead of a whole different categorization of "adminship" so to speak.PheNaxKian(T/c) 22:58, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I think the lower rank ones are bound to policy (janitors) and the middle rank ones can use their judgement. But, this is not the place to discuss this policy. —̵SEERINFLOOMES 23:00, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, here I am mainly looking for discussion on which ideal to go by, and general ideas about how to work each one if needed...rather than say, a detailed structural implementation of a representative democracy. --Rezyk 23:08, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd Say a cross of Democracy and dictatorship (similar to what we have on PvX i guess (in a good sense)...), where as that everyone listens to each other and The people say who get's the power type thing but ultimately what the higher up says go, this allows for less deadlock situations (e.g. someones getting promoted and it's pretty split)PheNaxKian(T/c) 23:15, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

The ideal would, I think, be a benevolent dictatorship(or oligarchy) with very intelligent, generally unbiased bcrat(s) with good judgment and the best interests of the wiki at heart(Tanaric and DE and Auron are all people I'd probably support for the job) with absolute final say over who becomes sysop and bureaucrat. Possibly, the dictator/oligarchy could also have final say over policy, as well. Not sure whether I'd support that. --— Edru/QQ 23:30, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Too much power to individuals i'd say, but liek i said above, Bcrats would have finale say but they would only be needed where a decision couldn't be reached between the community or sysops.PheNaxKian(T/c) 23:33, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

(Edit conflict) An oligarchy would work most effectively imo - a dictatorship carries the worries of whether only one man can be trusted, or is able, to carry the weight of a big community that this wiki will soon enough contain. An oligarchy would share that burden, and also make sure that actions are not taken with the interests of just one man, but of a select few that have been chosen to work together, yet scrutinise their peers to make sure that only the best action is carried out in the interests of the wiki. Demotratic and consensual decisions are often very slow and take too long to reach an effective decision, with the problem of unneccessary drama and no action. -- Brains12 • Talk • 23:55, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

My vote is for theocracy. -elviondale (tahlk) 00:43, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Tanaric for wikigod, yes? --— Edru/QQ 01:32, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

See my ideas here. I feel some form of general consensus or democracy is the only way to go. If we allow all the power to consolidate among a few elite, we'll get a repeat of GuildWiki, full of abuses of power and general lack of productivity. Democracy may be slow, but it ultimately allows for a working community and productive wiki.--Mortazo 02:08, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

The good thing about a new GW wiki is (especially since it's the only GW2 wiki), it's a lot of the same users and now we have a better idea of who will abuse power, be mature, worthy of adminship, ect. —̵SEERINFLOOMES 02:16, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

And create socks to get around bans, no? -elviondale (tahlk) 02:27, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm not a sock, thanks. —̵SEERINFLOOMES 02:36, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

What is meant by "core management system"? Is this about adminship, the source of policy or both? -- Gordon Ecker 02:58, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Not sure how else to describe it...the system that makes management decisions, but excluding the top-level interface with ArenaNet (such as backend technical administration and the initial passing of power). Adminship and policy are part of it, but they are more like the fine details, while I am asking about a general ideal/model to follow. --Rezyk 12:33, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

What you should all be supporting is Draft 2 or Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Adminship/Draft 3 because of their efficiency combined with the fact with that they've been proven to work on wikis. I, personally, lean towards the second but either is excellent and a major step up from the clusterfuck that was, is, and seemingly will forever be GWW. Grinchy[슴Mc슴]Diddles 03:35, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

Clusterfuck? Great term. I'll have to use that one a lot. And GWW was draft 2, so I'm inclined to go against that. Draft 3 is ok, but I'm naturally inclined to support simplicity. That's far from it. And what wiki was Draft 3 proven on, unless I'm totally missing something? Calor (t) 03:41, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

The adminship policy of GWW wasn't really that bad. However, the mentality about adminship was. The policy on GWW gave sysops discretion. It was only the fear of the wrath of a few zealots that took it away from them. Draft 3 is pretty much Guildwiki/PvX's admin policies. The wording's different in some places, but the meaning is essentially the same. --— Edru/QQ 05:23, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Here are my initial thoughts on this (more detail on my personal concepts can be found at [[User:Barek/Policy thoughts]]).
My opinion is that a dictatorship could only be implemented if ArenaNet took an active hand in either being the dictator, or in selecting the dictator; without that, it would be difficult if not impossible for the community as a whole to support a single dictator - risking fracturing the community.
I believe that the ideal would be a democratic foundation; but realistically, any wiki governance by democracy or concesus is, in fact, an oligarchy of some size or another - depending upon how active the various community members become in the site governance. As a result, an elected oligarchy or one where the oligarchy's power is comprised of some determined subset of elected members would also be acceptable to me. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 04:04, 1 January 2008 (UTC)

admins and sysops and bureacrats oh my!

I don't wanna wait until its already all decided up so I thought it important that I get this out now: My userpage which is currently only discussing my thoughts on keeping administration from becoming overly bureaucratic, nebulous and having a system which spends more time worrying about users than about content. Remember that the wiki is about the game not about petty squabbles, accusations of power abuse, long discussions and month long voting processes.—♥Jedi♥Rogue♥ 20:15, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

I think policies and admin duties should be focused largely on user conduct because content generally doesn't need hard policies. Content issues can generally be resolved through discussions and formatting guidelines. Admin intervention is only necessary to deal with problem users who act against the concensus (vandalism, revert wars, trolling, personal attacks, technical disruption etc.), both by blocking specific problem users and by protecting pages, and to perform certain editing functions which are restricted because they are prone to abuse, such as deletion and undeletion. I think that admins should have reasonable discretion, but I don't think that adminship should confer any "senior editor" role, I believe that projects can generally fulfill any need for editorial oversight without any need to give certain users extra weight in content discussions. -- Gordon Ecker 00:49, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Rather than ranting more on this page, I, like JediRogue and a number of others have instead used my user space for the purpose of ranting, but, in an attempt to generate discussion (since the nice thing about ranting on this page is that at least people see it), I figured I'd at least add the link: User:Defiant Elements/Policy and Adminship. Cheers. *Defiant Elements* +talk 05:50, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I think that both types of adminship should combine discretionary and "janitorial" roles, rather than being purely discretionary or purely "janitorial". I believe that deletion, undeletion and promotion should be "janitorial", while "policing" and "security" actions such as blocking, demotion and page protection should be discretionary. I believe that deletion is a content decision, and that sysops should have no additional authority over content decisions, and, as such, should only speedily delete pages for which a categorical deletion decision, such as the speedy deletion criteria, has already been made. -- Gordon Ecker 06:26, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Here's my version: User:Dirigible/Admins. --Dirigible 14:45, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Here's mine: User:Tanaric/WikiBoss. —Tanaric 17:18, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Seeing as everyone else is, User:Brains12/Policy thoughts. -- br12 • (talk) • 19:23, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Same here, User:Gordon Ecker/Policy. -- Gordon Ecker 10:07, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

/sigh, ok fine User:Elviondale/Policy -elviondale (tahlk) 13:59, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

lol [[User:Y0 ich halt/policy]] - Y0_ich_halt 21:51, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

I missed this thread earlier - here's mine: [[User:Barek/Policy thoughts]]. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 21:17, 12 January 2008 (UTC)

/Eloc — ク Eloc 貢 04:26, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Epic win at userspaces there. Armond 04:40, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

the temporary policy suggestion

I haven't seen much discussion of it since it was put up, so I thought I should try to begin some discussion. NPA is a pointless policy. It would be better included as a portion of a simple "Don't be a dick" policy. Besides, if a personal attack is worthy of punishment, the sysops shouldn't need a policy to tell them they can block people for it. Let's not implement a temp admin policy, either. It would probably end up permanent. Besides, with so few policies, we really can't survive with the policy-chained sysops of GWW's Admin policy. --Edru/QQ 06:15, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

Maybe. Most of the admins got stressed out by the mentality of "Do what we say or else" over there, I believe. They're probably perfectly fine, non-restricted admins at the moment. And NPA, trolling, vandalism, etc. is being condensed into one simple policy. Calor (t) 16:52, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

I've removed it, since there doesn't seem to be any consensus in favor of it, and it's totally unworkable. --Edru/QQ 23:48, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Tanaric's WikiBoss Theory

Does that really belong in the "Proposed Policy" section? It's really more about why Tanaric personally should be the final arbiter of... everything than something that would be cited as policy. More generally, it strikes me as a theory that, if adopted by consensus, would lead to policies that would empower the sole bureaucrat (Tanaric), but it's not really a policy per se. *Defiant Elements* +talk 20:30, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Well, it's just semantics, right? Tanaric is not proposing a policy, but rahter that we use the default system and make him the sole bcrat. Everything else follows naturally from there. So he's saying that we should not seek a foundatiuon policy and change userrights. That's a proposal on policy, but not a proposal for a policy.

But does it matter? Why not just leave it up to Tanaric if he want's to be listed or not? Backsword 21:50, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

I've removed it -- it was never intended as a serious policy proposal. I'm willing to act in that capacity if the community wished it, but I won't create that position by a silly article in my user namespace. :) —Tanaric 08:42, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Splitted Discussion

I think discussion is very disorganized. I made two subpages, please go there to properly discuss. Coran Ironclaw 18:06, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

These things should not be split, as they interact to form the foundational works of the administrative system. Having them in the same place makes getting the overall picture easier. Backsword 22:36, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

Don't you realize that the current discussion is by far more splitted than what I am trying to create? We have policy discussions here, and 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, [[User:Y0 ich halt/policy|9]], [[User:Eloc Jcg/Policy|10]], [[User:Barek/Policy thoughts|11]], 12, 13, 14 .... I find it extremely hard to get "an overall picture" this way. By creating a topic subpage I expect (I hope) people to concentrate there their ideas and discussions on that topic. Coran Ironclaw 18:56, 28 December 2007 (UTC)

It won't work out as fast or as well as you would hope, that's how the policy discussions got stated on GWW too :D everyone just kinda talked wherever they liked, but sooner or later, things will settle down into appropriate places once more structure gets put in. -- ab.er.rant 04:54, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

I thought that was how it was on gww at first. But I think that can be done better, specially when everyone is whining about the resulted policies on gww. I really feel the necessity to have an organized central place of discussion, failing in that may result (I just add the word may to be polite) in apathy of many users on the matter because of the very difficult task of lurking in all that places to have a global view of the discussion. Such apathy diminish the discussion and many options are not fairly considered or are just no longer discussed because their supporter stops posting. I know I don't have a previous experience on the matter, and therefore things might not result as I hope, but still I don't see anyone trying to do what I think is necessary so I will do my best on the try. Coran Ironclaw 08:15, 29 December 2007 (UTC)

Checkuser

Y/N? —̵SEERINFLOOMES 22:44, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I'd think there would have to be some sort of Checkuser function, to detect socks or whatever....though i suppose it seems pretty irrelevant as it doesn't make MUCH of a difference if anyone has multiple accounts unless they're for Vandalism, but in that case an IP ban would be issued IMO. However i think it should be implemented so it can be used in situations where the majority rules (a vote on say if someone should be an admin or w/e)PheNaxKian(T/c) 22:49, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Yes. There's really no reason to have socks, unless you have some sort of technical error or misnaming or something. And if you don't want people finding out your IP, frankly, you shouldn't be on the Internet. Calor (t) 23:01, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

I totally agree but like i said above, it should be there for things where it will actually matters-e.g. RFA forms or whatever, so that someone doesn't create a load of socks to just change the outcome of a vote or w/e. PheNaxKian(T/c) 23:03, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

There is no downside tbh. Yes. Lord of all tyria 23:04, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

(ec)Well if the wiki continues in the positive direction it's headed towards, sock voting on RfAs shouldn't matter =P —̵SEERINFLOOMES 23:05, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

Two things; one, CheckUser wouldn't be used unless an account is violating policy and needs to be checked up on, or unless an account gives pretty obvious proof that its owner has more than one account and is using them maliciously. We can't be CheckUser happy - there's no point to be so.

Secondly, socks spamming RfAs does not matter in the least (on a real wiki). Bureaucrats are supposed to look at the arguments presented on an RfA page, not the number of votes - pure votes are bad because the abundance of stupid people (I mean, c'mon; think of how stupid the average person is, then realize that half the people are dumber than that). Theoretically, if a single person supported a candidate on his RfA page and had an outstanding argument but 50 people opposed with just their signature, the opposing side should mostly get ignored. -Auron 13:54, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I see no reason not to install it. Reasons for its use may or may not come up, but if they do, it's one less hassle to worry about. If they don't, we don't use it. Simple - no one does anything without a reason, and so without a reason, it won't be used. This isn't PvX where we need to check for sock accounts for voting and the voting actually matters; this is GW2W, where we're much more worried about Stabber-like incidents, rare as they are. Armond 09:14, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

In Auron's case, what if those socks aren't dumb? What if they come up with two or three more valid arguments? And,unless it dramatically slows the wiki, it can't hurt to have the option to use it if an ugly situation arises. Calor (t) 16:05, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Archive?

I know it's only been a couple weeks since this was made, and some of the older content may still be relevant, but scrolling is no fun. -- Mafaraxas 16:30, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

TOC is there for a reason. :P Lord Belar 16:32, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I had the TOC disabled in my preferences. Anyway, 111+KB page is no fun. -- Mafaraxas 16:54, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

No need to scroll, just hit the end key. — ク Eloc 貢 04:57, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, but what if you don't want to go to the end? Also, yeah, 112 kb is way too long. Those poor 56k people will probably end up with exploded modems --Gimmethegepgun 06:27, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

That or having to wait 2 secs. Longpages are a problem for browsers, not transfer sysytems. They're still small relative to other traffic. Backsword 10:17, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

User:Backsword/Culture Poll

Somewhat related. Would appreciate input. Backsword 12:24, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

RFA and NPA

I am a very new user, and I have just read all of the above and want to help out, but I don't understand what NPA or RFA means. Can somebody please explain what they represent? Hopefully, my question will end some confusion for some new users such as myself. Apologies if this comment is out of place. Thanks. Sinny 07:45, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

RFA = requests for adminship, NPA = no personal attacks. -- Gordon Ecker 07:49, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

In short, (although not as short as Gordon!) an RFA is the process we use to elect admins, trusted users who have access to deletion, protection, banning tools etc. NPA just means that while discussion is good, be careful to make sure your arguments are on topic, and not getting getting personal. --Xasxas256 08:03, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

To help you understand a bit more about those policies, see the Guild Wars Wiki versions - gw1:Guild Wars Wiki:No personal attacks and gw1:Guild Wars Wiki:Adminship/Request for adminship. -- Brains12 • Talk • 10:56, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the links, keep 'em coming! -- Sinny 12:57, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Policies and projects

Could we keep all policies (once they are accepted/rejected/finalised in some way) as a subpage of "Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Policy/", and "Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Guideline/" for guidelines? On GWW, all policies and guidelines are kept in the Guild Wars Wiki namespace, and most things in that namespace are considered policy. Projects are kept as a subpage of Guild Wars Wiki:Projects. Which doesn't make sense. Linking [[Project:Projects/Name]]?

I would rather it was the other way around, so anything in the immediate Guild Wars 2 Wiki/Project namespace are all projects, and all policies and guidelines are subpages. That may also make it clearer by reading a link to know what is policy, guideline and project. -- Plingggggg \ Talk 22:32, 29 February 2008 (UTC)