User:Gordon Ecker/Policy

Users

Users are the core of the community, it is the users who should collectively make content and policy decisions, and the users who should collectively choose the sysops and bureaucrats and make the final decisions on removing sysops and bureaucrats. All registered users should be given equal weight for the purpose of determining concensus. It should be acceptable to give unregistered users less weight due to communication and identifiability issues.

Sysops

Sysops should be trusted members of the community, and should serve two purposes. First, they should deal with disruptive and malicious editors, malfunctioning bots and excessive, mistaken or otherwise inappropriate blocks, for which they should be entrusted with the block user right. Sysops should have reasonable discretion in issuing short-term blocks, and in removing blocks, however they should only unilaterally issue long-term blocks when it is very clearly warranted, such for patently offensive comments, libel or repeated vandalism. Second, they should be entrusted with the high-risk delete user right which is necessary to enforce some of the community's content decisions, as well as the deletedhistory and undelete user rights because they are necessary to reverse deletions. Additionally, sysops should be entrusted with the protect user right, which confers the ability to protect and unprotect pages, and to edit protected pages, the abilities conferred by this user right overlap the two roles. There is no reason to restrict sysops' use of the deletedhistory, undelete, rollback or patrol user rights, and it would be impossible to restrict the use of deletedhistory.

Bureaucrats

Bureaucrats are entrusted with an extremely high-risk user right: the userrights right, because of this, only the most trustworthy users should be bureaucrats. Because it is the community who chooses the sysops and bureaucrats, and it is the bureaucrats' duty to implement these decisions (as well as decisions to remove sysops or bureaucrats), only the most impartial, objective users should be bureaucrats. Becuase they are trusted and have the ability to add and remove user rights, bureaucrats are also the most appropriate people to entrust with the duty of temporarily suspending sysop status in the event of abuse (and the de jure duty of suspending bureaucrat status in the event of abuse, however only a server administrator could realistically stop a rogue bureaucrat), although suspension is indefinite, it is also temporary, it can be reversed by a bureaucrat at their discretion, and must be reversed if the suspension is successfully appealed through a request for adminship / reconfirmation, sysop (or bureaucrat) status should be reinstated, and the suspension should only become a permanent revocation if the request for adminship / reconfirmation fails or the suspended admin declines or fails to appeal. Because bots are not administrators, Bureaucrats should have reasonable discretion in approving and revoking bot status. If only bureaucrats can form arbitration committees and the number of bureaucrats is limited then the total number of bureaucrats should exceed the arbitration committee's quorum by at least two, and bureaucrats should be periodically elected to prevent inactive bureaucrats from slowing down arbitration, however if the number of bureaucrats is uncapped or the arbitration committee membership is not restricted to bureaucrats then inactive bureaucrats would not be a problem. I don't see any need for bureaucrat and sysop status to be mutually exclusive.

Arbitration

Because they should be trusted, impartial and objective, Bureaucrats are the most appropriate people to sit on the arbitration comittee, however sysops or hypothetical "arbitrators" would also be acceptable. The arbitration comittee should function vaguely like a court, resolving disputes between users, making rulings on alleged user misconduct and allowing blocks to be appealed. The arbitration comitte should have the sole authority to authorize the long-term blocks of registered users.

Policies and guidelines

Both policies and guidelines should exist to improve the wiki.

Policy should primarily regulate user conduct, although any issue overlapping both content and user conduct may be within the scope of policy. Policy should serve important functions. Only minor or accidental policy violations should not be considered serious misconduct. Although policy enforcement should be the explicit duty of admins, the task is not restricted to them. In addition to restrictions, policy can also include entitlements, such as explicit permission to remove vandalism.

Both content and user conduct should be within the scope of guidelines. Only the most egregious guideline violations should be considered serious misconduct.

Summary

• Users:
  • Make content, policy and guideline decisions.
  • Choose sysops and bureaucrats.
  • Make the final decisions on removing sysops and bureaucrats.
• Sysops:
  • Duties:
    • Enforce content decisions.
    • Keep malicious or otherwise disruptive users in check.
    • Possibly arbitration.
  • Discretionary user rights:
    • Block (long-term blocks of registered users should require ArbComm authorization; the block user right encompasses both blocking and unblocking)
    • Deletedhistory
    • Protect (as long as it isn't abused to override content decisions)
    • Rollback
    • Undelete
  • Non-discretionary / janitorial user rights:
    • Delete
• Bureaucrats
  • Duties
    • Appointing sysops and bureaucrats in accordance with community decisions.
    • Revoking sysop and bureaucrat status in accordance with community decisions.
    • Suspending sysop (and, in theory, bureaucrat) status if it is abused, however their decision is not final, and can be appealed to the community.
    • Possibly arbitration.
  • Discretionary user rights
    • Userrights (when used to suspend sysops and bureaucrats, reverse the suspension of sysops of bureaucrats, or to grant or remove bot status)
  • Non-discretionary / janitorial user rights:
    • Userrights (when used to appoint sysops and bureaucrats or revoke sysop / bureaucrat status)
  • Periodic elections are only necessary if arbitration comittee membership is restricted to bureaucrats and bureaucrats are limited in number
• Arbitration committee:
  • Made up of bureaucrats, sysops, special "arbitrator" sysops with no special user rights or a combination of the above.
  • Duties:
    • Resolving disputes.
    • Making rulings on alleged user minconduct.
    • Allowing blocks to be appealed.
    • Authorizing long-term blocks, when warrented.
• Policies and guidelines
  • Exist to improve the wiki.
  • Enforcement is a specific duty of admins, but is not limited to them.
  • Policies:
    • Primarily, but not exclusively, regulate user conduct.
    • Should serve important purposes.
    • Policy violations are serious misconduct unless they're accidental or minor.
    • Mostly restricitons, but can enclude entitlements (i.e. removing vandalism).
  • Guidelines:
    • Can govern user conduct, content or both.
    • Only severe guideline violations are serious misconduct.