Wikipedia talk:Consensus/Archive 13

This is an archive of past discussions about Wikipedia:Consensus. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 10

Archive 11

Archive 12

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edit reversed as "disruptive"

[1] has the edit summary

it's wrong because it's disruptive, otherwise it's not wrong -- and it is useful to appeal to practicalities when giving advice

How say ye others? Cheers. Collect (talk) 18:15, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm really not too bothered - both versions are attempting to say the same (rather vague) thing. I'd rather spell this out in a new section.--Kotniski (talk) 06:48, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Ah, the section title implies to me that you may have misunderstood Ring's edit summary; I don't think he meant that your change was disruptive; I assume "it" was referring to the behaviour described in the sentence being edited.--Kotniski (talk) 07:28, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

I see -- well one well ought not to make edit summaries so readily misunderstood when reverting an entire edit, I would suggest. Collect (talk) 13:37, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

You could learn to bring your ideas here first or you could not learn that. --Ring Cinema (talk) 13:44, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Inasmuch as I proposed the exact language here first, I fear your admonition is remarkably ill-aimed. Collect (talk) 13:57, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

I was unaware of that proposal, so my apologies. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:29, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

See my more radical, directly above. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 17:39, 20 January 2012 (UTC)

I really do think consensus is better served by describing it consistently as an "arrival" at something without a section worded in a manner which implies the train can just as well leave the station as soon as it arrives. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 02:59, 21 January 2012 (UTC)

But the train can just as well leave the station as soon as it arrives, if not sooner. That is which we experience consistently as an "arrival". NewbyG ( talk) 13:47, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

If an edit is not an improvement, then it should be reverted. So simple??

The second sentence of the second paragraph of the subsection "Reaching consensus through editing" reads:

"If an edit is not an improvement, then it should be reverted"

This sentence is kinda poor. The gist of editing advice here should not be encourage reverting. What if the next person considered that the revert is not an improvement? To encourage reverting is not a good way to encourage Reaching consensus through editing.

If possible, “edit further” is preferred above “revert”. A good faith edit is an attempt to improve on some problem. If the edit fails to achieve, or creates a worse unintended consequence, or is just poor, then simply reverting ignores the fact that at least one editor thinks there is a problem needing improvement. Before reverting, editos should consider possible solutions that involve editing the edit.

"If an edit is not an improvement, then edit further to fix the previously perceived problem. If no further editing be discovered that improves on the previous version, then revert to that version." I think this is better, but is longer. What do others think? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 06:23, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Improvement should be favoured over reverting where possible. Also, there seems to be a little too much repitition in these sections, thus the project page is possibly too long, and not as clear and helpful as it might be. NewbyG ( talk) 10:10, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

It's nice to see you back here Newbyguesses, it seems a long time. Yes, there is a lot of repetition, or meandering, or bloat. I think Kotniski thinks similarly. I like your and collect's edits. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:35, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I think the edit after mine was an improvement. Not sure that the subsequent edit (partial revert) is an improvement though.

It seems too wordy, and the intermediate edit seems clearer and quite correct. I cannot agree that these tweaks constitute a substantial change to policy, nor see why any injunction would be contemplated. This is a wiki, and collaboration is the norm we aspire to, it's all we can do, isn't it? I may edit further to remove some repitition, (or maybe not), but I have no intention to substantially modify the policy page, and will continue to follow the discussion on this page, as I have been doing. NewbyG ( talk) 12:01, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Reiterating, I have no intention whatsoever to substantially modify the policy page. NewbyG ( talk) 06:00, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Nope, Noetica's change is both edit warring (second revert in less than eight hours) and opposed by multiple editors for being nonsense (although most of them have been kinder in their choice of words). An edit summary of "no consensus" is never helpful to the person whose edit is being reverted. It may be acceptable, and it is often efficient for the person doing the reverting, but it is never helpful, and providing helpful edit summaries is the sole subject of that sentence. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:00, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

For a revert of the type BRD or etc. For no edit summary would I be using no consensus. Might use see talk page or better yet 'link in the edit summary to the talk-page section'. But it is still a revert, whatever the edit summary comprises.

 So simple?? */If a talk page section already exists, then link to it in the edit summary

NewbyG ( talk) 12:02, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Not everyone knows how to link to sections in edit summaries, and linking to talk page sections only works if such sections exist, which they generally don't.

The real problem here is that Noetica (apparently) sincerely believes that an edit summary of "no consensus" magically communicates helpful information to editors when used on policy pages, while acknowledging that it's a completely vague and unhelpful edit summary on every single other page. "No consensus" could mean any number of things:

We talked about it last week, and everybody hated that idea.
I personally hate that idea, but I can't be bothered to explain why (take your pick: right now, to you, ever, etc.).
I'm so ignorant of Wikipedia's policies that I thought even the correction of spelling errors had to be discussed on talk pages.
I don't want you to change this sentence right now, because I'm selectively quoting it out of context to win a content dispute.
Your change makes this page contradict another policy page.
I have vague worries about this change, which might be okay, but I want time to think it through.
I agree with your change, but when I made a very similar proposal last year, people yelled at me.
Your change links to a page that confuses me.
Your grammar is bad, but I'm so lazy that I reverted the whole thing rather than fixing it.
You have such a strong reputation for screwing up policies that I figure anything you do should be blindly reverted.

And so forth: I could double the length of this list. An edit summary of "no consensus" does not help the reverted editor understand what the actual problem is, and therefore does not help the editor know whether the complaint is either legitimate or solvable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:07, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, yes not everyone knows how to link to talk sub-sections in an edit summary. However, in those cases you have listed, where there's been prior discussion, a reverting editor who wants to type 'no consensus' ought to be able to at least give the name of the section; after all they are claiming that they've read it and know what the consensus is in that talk-page discussion, or one from the Archives or FAQ would do as well, cheers NewbyG ( talk) 02:35, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Trim up to the disputed sentence

Currently, the project page is protected. The top 100 or so words (up to the disputed sentence) could be shortened as follows, for clarity, without any change in meaning:

Consensus refers to the primary way decisions are made on Wikipedia, and it is accepted as the best method to achieve our goals. This page describes how consensus is understood on Wikipedia, how to determine whether it has been achieved (and how to proceed if it has not), and certain exceptions to the principle that all decisions are made by consensus.

1 Achieving consensus

Editors usually reach consensus as a natural product of editing. After someone makes a change or addition to a page, others who read it can choose either to leave the page as it is or to change it. When editors do not reach agreement by editing, discussion on the associated talk pages continues the process toward consensus. Consensus on Wikipedia does not mean unanimity (which, although an ideal result, is not always achievable); nor is it the result of a vote. This means that decision-making involves an effort to incorporate all editors' proper concerns, while respecting Wikipedia's norms.

1.1 Reaching consensus through editing

Further information: Wikipedia:Editing policy, Wikipedia:Be bold, and Wikipedia:BOLD, revert, discuss cycle

Consensus is a normal and usually implicit and invisible process across Wikipedia. Any edit that is not disputed or reverted by another editor can be assumed to have consensus. Should that edit later be revised by another editor without dispute, it can be assumed that a new consensus has been reached. In this way the encyclopedia is gradually added to and improved over time. An edit which is not clearly an improvement may often be improved by rewording. If rewording does not salvage the edit, then it should be reverted.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Would that be clearer? NB -This is a proposal for serious discussion only, and not an edit-request, thanks. (smileyface) NewbyG ( talk) 08:36, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Or perhaps for the lede:

Consensus' is the primary and preferred manner in which decisions are made on Wikipedia, and is considered the best method to achieve our goals. "Consensus" on Wikipedia does not mean "unaninimity" (as that is not always achievable); nor is it a vote either. It means that the decision-making process includes an active effort to incorporate editors' legitimate concerns, while following our policies and guidelines.

The issues discussed here include:

What consensus is understood to mean on Wikipedia

How to determine when it has been achieved

How to proceed when consensus has not been achieved

When consensus is not valid for a decision (including specific exceptions stated by policy)

Collect (talk) 11:40, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, that seems better, just for starters. Fine with that, thanks. NewbyG ( talk) 12:44, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Generally, I think that we spend too much time trying to craft an ideal lede, but I kind of like Collect's idea of having a bulleted list of what this policy covers. The other, minor tweaks in the wording seem unimportant to me: make them, don't make them, it doesn't matter to me. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:11, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

The lede is fine already. Let's drop it. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:00, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

I can say you are consistent after looking at your edit history on WP:CONSENSUS - but your opinion thatit is "fine" is insufficient to shortcircuit the process of WP:CONSENSUS here. Cheers. Collect (talk) 14:30, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

My opinions are well-founded and -defended. You? Hmmm. Your history comes to mind, as well, of erroneously claiming that you weren't altering the policy when you were, so a dose of skepticism is warranted. I'm not sure you know what you're doing. The lede already says what it should say better than your draft. Let's try to improve the project. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:33, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

STOP... you are entitled to disagree, but don't make it personal. Blueboar (talk) 15:45, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the note. Sounds good. --Ring Cinema (talk) 18:20, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Whereas I see no significant difference between the existing and the proposed versions (maybe, Collect will explain us), I like the new version better. I have one comment though. In the Collect's version, there is no difference between guidelines and the policy. In actuality, we must observe our core content policy and we should stick with our guidelines. To emphasise this difference, I propose:

"..., while observing our policies and sticking with the guidelines."

--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:58, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

(od) Then properly following Wikipedia policies and guidelines should work - since policies state that they are policies, and guidelines state that they are guidelines, I do not think anyone would try to parse further, do you? The main change is seeking clarity for the confused reader - I regard clarity as a worthwhile goal. Collect (talk) 22:13, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

What is currently unclear? --Ring Cinema (talk) 23:46, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Apparently a significant number of other editors see the difference. I can not make you see the difference. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:40, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

So you can't explain what is unclear? To me, that means it's not unclear, which seems to be what everyone says. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:01, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

As a sidebar, when different drafts go up on the page here, sometimes it’s a case of Way too radical versus um, can’t see much difference.

We all agree ??? that our policies should remain in place, that they be stable, and agreeable, and the policy page should be easily understood!!!

Clarity of writing (for guidelines, policy pages) is an issue separate to the actual policy, it’s heft, it’s stability, it’s stamina, it’s consensus, and the enforcement, which is another issue.

We cannot expect equal, fair, immediate enforcement of policies simply by writing on a policy page that ‘’All behavioral policies will be strictly enforced’’.

But we do have to try to get the writing correct, the words on the project page (as few of them as possible). Consensus itself takes care of the longertivity of the actual policy, it's historical presence, as opposed to the words on the project page as such, if that makes some sense. NewbyG ( talk) 10:47, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

And the idea is to try to get the writing right, on this particular policy page, for the article-writers, and the newcomers. 11:19, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not about winning. Wikipedia is not about writing. NewbyG ( talk) 17:13, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

House cleaning

Since the page is currently protected, and there are no other on-going discussions, and no pressing reason whatsoever in any case to update the project page, perhaps it’s time for a little house-cleaning. Prior versions of pages are saved.

WP:CON is a behavioural policy, one of eleven pages currently linked there at FIVE .

Shortcuts

Editors should interact with each other in a respectful and civil manner.: Respect and be polite to your fellow Wikipedians, even when you disagree. Apply Wikipedia etiquette, and avoid personal attacks. Find consensus, avoid edit wars, and remember that there are 6,908,116 articles on the English Wikipedia to work on and discuss. Act in good faith, and never disrupt Wikipedia to illustrate a point. Be open and welcoming, and assume good faith on the part of others. When conflict arises, discuss details on the talk page, and follow dispute resolution.

Discussion/Five pillars

It’s not the idea to consciously synchronise policy pages, or the wording especially. However, the concision of the language on the one hand, and the placement and treatment of bluelinks on the other, make it worth looking at. NewbyG ( talk) 16:17, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Project page:status at 19 January

For instance, some text familiar from the January 19 version of WP:CON

Wikipedia:Consensus New revision 2008-05-18 23:00:35 Old revision 2008-01-19 00:59:06

Help:Edit conflict {{Policylist}}

Wikipedia works by building consensus.

Consensus is an inherent part of the wiki process. Consensus is typically reached as a natural product of the and inherent product of the wiki-editing process; generally someone makes ________________________________________ r leave the page as it is or change it. In essence silence implies consent if there is adequate exposure to the community. In the case of policy pages a higher standard of participation and consensus is expected.

When there are disagreements, they are resolved through polite reasoning, cooperation, and if necessary, negotiation on talk pages, in an attempt to develop and maintain a neutral point of view which consensus can agree upon. If we find that a particular consensus happens often, we write it down as a guideline, to save people the time having to discuss the same principles over and over. In the rare situations where consensus is hard to find, the dispute resolution processes provide several other ways agreed by the community, to involve independent editors and more experienced help in the discussion, and to address the problems which prevent a consensus from arising.

When consensus is referred to in Wikipedia discussion, it always means 'within the framework of established policy and practice'. Even a majority of a limited group of editors will almost never outweigh community ...

enter:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Sandbox

Project page:status at 2 February

The combined diff of the change to project page to 2 February 2012 is a tribute to the good faith efforts of many editors, and a vindication of the method of consensus

Discussion/To Do/Further action

Unintended US bias?

Here it says that the first name should be favoured when there's no consensus. As regards something like the Sega Genesis, since WP was started in the US... doesn't that make it more likely that certain articles will have been begun by a US editor? There seems to me therefore to be an (unintended) bias towards going with the US name, when all other alternatives have failed. Surely this is unfair? Mr Wales has said he wants to get rid of the male / white bias of WP editors, but there is a US one hidden right here. Malick78 (talk) 15:03, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

If you don't like that rule, then you need to go over to WP:Article titles (the actual policy that governs that) and convince them to change it. This page merely summarizes what the controlling policy on article titles says about consensus.

BTW, the fact that Wikipedia began in the US is not what makes US editors more common than (for example) UK editors. What matters is that there are five times as many Americans in the world as there are people in the UK, and therefore—even if all things were perfectly equal—we would naturally expect American editors to start five times as many articles as UK editors. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:22, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

I do accept the point being made, but the first creator principle is a very good default for when our policies fail. Sega Genesis is an unfortunate example, being the result of US editors imposing the US-only name of a global product known everywhere else by another name. But it's worth noting that (US-dominated) consensus was the driving force behind that (plain wrong) move; that Sega Genesis might have been created first was pure coincidence. —WFC— 04:04, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

This is not bias; it's a fact of history. If it were the other way (fewer U.S. editors) would there be some reason to think American editors suffered? No, it would just be one of those things. Some rules are conventional (e.g. green for go) and this is one of them. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:22, 6 February 2012 (UTC)

more Collect and B2C edits

I reverted Collect again for another big edit, calling specific attention to a couple of new concepts he introduced without discussion. Born2cycle put it back and chastised me, and then removed one of the new concepts I complained about. And I haven't even got past the first two paragraphs. Such a big change to a policy is too much to digest, as they're been told before. Dicklyon (talk) 05:25, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

It's not a big change. It easily fits on one page and took me a couple of minutes to review. "A big change" is a very lame excuse to revert, especially when it's not a big change. Please give specific objections.

Use of the word "formal" does not introduce a new concept, both informal and formal are used in similar contexts on the page already. However, in this context...

Discussions on other websites, web forums, IRC, by email, or otherwise off the project are generally discouraged, and are not taken into account when determining formal consensus "on-wiki." In some cases, such off-Wiki communication may generate suspicion and mistrust.

... it's superfluous at best, and a bit misleading at worst. Regardless of whether the consensus determination is an informal discussion on a talk page, or through a formal process of some sort, off-wiki discussion are not taken into account. I presume no one disputes this, and this is all this is saying, and all it said before (Collect's version - with the "formal" removed - is just crisper). This is the older wording:

Discussions on other websites, web forums, IRC, by email, or otherwise off the project are generally discouraged. They are not taken into account when determining consensus "on-wiki", and may generate suspicion and mistrust if they are discovered.

Obviously just a copyedit, and a readability improvement, with no change in intended meaning as far as I can tell. Same with the rest of the changes.

In your rude (because they're not explained substantively) reverting edit summaries you also mention the "disparate" wording as a "new concept". Well, let's look at that.

BEFORE:

Try not to attract too many editors into a discussion. Fruitful discussions usually contain less than ten active participants; more than that strains the limits of effective communication on an online forum of this sort. Where large-scale consensus is needed then it should be sought out, otherwise the input of one or two independent editors will give far better results.

AFTER:

Fruitful discussions usually do not generally contain too many participants. It is difficult to reach consensus with a large number of disparate views involved.

Now, what's the objection to this? Collect's wording avoids the "how to" language (which we should avoid), without changing meaning or intent. It does remove the "less than ten" heuristic, which obviously was pulled out of someone's ass. And the previous wording is obviously talking about disparate views - if the views are not disparate, then there already is consensus! Actually, you can even argue disparate is superfluous here (but certainly not a new concept or a change in meaning), but I think it's a stylistic point, and it brings attention to the fact that a situation where consensus is developing involves discussion among people with disparate views. Why would you object to saying any of this?

Now, this was a significant amount of time and work to dig all this up and explain it, much more than it would for you to read and evaluate the entire change in question. To what end? Do you have an objection or not? What are these "new concepts" and what makes you think they're new? If you don't explain your objections substantively, then your revert is simply disruptive. If you wish, I can start a file on how often you do this... --Born2cycle (talk) 06:46, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

The change was from being about too many editors to a version that seems to limit how many different views can be discussed. Seems like a bad idea. And that's all just in the first two paragraphs. Why not reword without changing meaning? Dicklyon (talk) 07:19, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Collect's version also says, "too many participants", which, as far as I can tell, has the same meaning as "too many editors". The following sentence refers to "a large number of disparate views", but this is obviously referring to the views of the participants/editors from the previous sentence, and explains why having too many editors is problematic in these situations. How is this a change in meaning? I suppose 2 or 3 people could in theory have 10 different views each on the same topic, but in practice we know that's not the case, and that's not what this is talking about. This is a reword with a bit of clarification but without any change in meaning. I'm really trying to assume good faith, but I have to tell you that I really feel like you're jerking my chain, and this isn't even my edit. --Born2cycle (talk) 07:43, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Collect's assumption that his changes are not substantive or deserve no discussion are leading to trouble. Out of respect for the many who are not wasting their time here, the editors on this page generally realize that it is better to be conservative about changes. I don't see why he wouldn't bring his proposal to discussion first, especially since he was seriously mistaken the first time about what constituted a change in policy in the eyes of others. I suppose if good faith were going to be questioned, that might be one to bring up, B2C, but you haven't mentioned that. --Ring Cinema (talk) 09:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

My statements are true, and my edit summaries are accurate. Your ownership here is getting tiresome. I have seven times as many edits as you, though you appear to have a hold on reverts on this one page. Your contributions appear to be 20% on this page and on MoS/Film - I think if you engaged in other articles where you saw CONSENSUS at work, that would make things far easier. At this point, I count only you and Dick as being "many editors" here, whilst, I, Kotniski, Carol, B2C, SmokeyJoe, Brews, WAID, Jayjg, et al are now of no account? I rather think it is you who is fighting clear [[WP:CONSENSUS[[ at this point. I am sorry - this looks exactly like "tendentious editing" as defined here. Collect (talk) 13:29, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

You may believe your statlements to be true, but a policy page is too important to expect other editors to just trust that your rewrite is a good thing. It would be better to say what's wrong and how you want to fix it, rather than expect us to figure it out from an edit summary and a long complicated diff. And having your changes vetted and approved by B2C only makes matters worse, as he has a long history of rewriting policy to suit his needs. Dicklyon (talk) 15:39, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

As I noted - two editors saying "nay" do not negate a clear consensus, Dick. And asserting that one editor does not count because he has tried to make changes before is ludicrous - I can not find any Wikipedia policy saying "editors who try to edit do not count when determining consensus" at all. Perhaps you can show me that bit in some policy somewhere? Collect (talk) 15:47, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

@Dicklyon, discussing the editor not the edit is breaking the first rule of working to achieve consensus on content? Have a spot of warm tea. Generally speaking, I firmly believe Collect's contributions here have been cutting through some of the crap and flotsam created by (albeit well-meaning) attempts to quantify aspects which are simply better left to common sense and the context of each individual situation involving an impediment to achieving consensus. Casting aspersions on Collect's edits by crying WITCH! about an editor who agrees with Collect's changes is axe-grinding. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 16:19, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Good idea. But I'll have a Cappucino instead, and retire from the Censensus argument. Dicklyon (talk) 18:55, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Dicklyon, you wrote: a policy page is too important to expect other editors to just trust that your rewrite is a good thing. That's true, but why say that here? What has Collect said or done that cause you to believe Collect expects others to just trust that the rewrite is a good thing? Collect's change at issue here can be reviewed by any editor in two to three minutes. If something problematic is seen, it can be reverted and the problem explained.

What I see here is pure disruption: reverting without substantive objection/explanation, and then much more time and energy spent on making vague objections about process. This disruption appears to be based on the position that all non-trivial changes must be discussed first, and any non-trivial change not discussed first can and should be reverted without reading/evaluation/objection/explanation, and hours, days or even weeks can go by without the reverter offering anything substantive in objection to the change, rather than an honest and genuine reading and evaluation of the change, followed by a possible reversion and associated explanation if there is substantive objection. Reverting merely for lack of discussion or not establishing consensus first itself blatantly contradicts consensus as explained all over WP, including on this policy page at Wikipedia:Consensus#Reaching_consensus_through_editing,

If an edit is not an improvement, then it well should be reverted. Any such revert should have a clear edit summary stating why the particular edit is not considered to be an improvement to the article, or what policies or guidelines would require the edit be undone. Further discussion should then be undertaken on the article discussion page.

,

and at Wikipedia:RV#Explain_reverts:

It is particularly important to provide a valid and informative explanation when you perform a reversion. Try to disclose the link for the Wikipedia principle you believe justifies the reversion. Try to remain available for dialogue, especially in the hours and half-day or so after reverting.
A reversion is a complete rejection of the work of another editor and if the reversion is not adequately supported then the reverted editor may find it difficult to assume good faith. This is one of the most common causes of an edit war. A substantive explanation also promotes consensus by alerting the reverted editor to the problem with the original edit. The reverted editor may then be able to revise the edit to correct the perceived problem. The result will be an improved article, a more knowledgeable editor and greater harmony.

I'm a second set of eyes, and I see nothing significantly objectionable in the original edit. In my opinion "formal" is unneeded per the explanation above, but it's not a big deal whether it's in or not. The main thing is that the affected parts of the policy read much better after Collect's changes are applied.

Now, does anyone who has read this far - which should take more time and energy than reading and evaluating Collect's change - have any substantive objections to the change? --Born2cycle (talk) 17:06, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I think everyone here has broken that rule, Vecrumba. And along with Collect's other misstatements about his contributions, now we can add a claim of clear consensus where none is present. His effort to work in harmony with the usual practices in this space are not much in evidence. I started a discussion of the second person question in deference to his concerns and I think it was immediately clear that opinions differ on these matters. --Ring Cinema (talk) 17:09, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Who or what is Vecrumba and what rule are you talking about? Since you've stated no substantive objection to the change in question, I will presume you have none. Making statements about the behavior of others is highly inappropriate here regardless of who says them or how much others have done so (need I remind you that two wrongs do not make a right?). --Born2cycle (talk) 17:16, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

My objections are not difficult to understand, so which unappealing conclusion about your state of mind would you prefer we draw? I recognize that you have not been able to make a meaningful counterargument to my objection. Until that appears, my objection stands. --Ring Cinema (talk) 11:10, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

Vecrumba is Peters' actual username. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:19, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I have not been involved here before, nor am I interested in the back and forth in above. However, I take issue with Collect's edit that changed:

Try not to attract too many editors into a discussion. Fruitful discussions usually contain less than ten active participants; more than that strains the limits of effective communication on an online forum of this sort. Where large-scale consensus is needed then it should be sought out, otherwise the input of one or two independent editors will give far better results.

to:

Fruitful discussions usually do not generally contain too many participants. It is difficult to reach consensus with a large number of disparate views involved.

Whether or not the numbers were "pulled out of someone's ass" (as Born2cycle put it), they represent the consensus prior to Collect's edit and they provide useful guidance on arriving at consensus. Which is after all, a major purpose of this policy. Johnathlon (talk) 18:32, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Amazingly enough - ascribing words to an editor which they did not write is not a good way of either gaining consensus nor of gaining the respect of an editor whom you falsely ascribe the words to. Cheers, and consider redacting false statements. Collect (talk) 22:23, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Honest mistake. My bad. A simple, "I didn't say that" would have sufficed :). And it was tangential to my statement. Johnathlon (talk) 08:18, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

I doubt this represents prior consensus, it was just something that someone wrote once and it's taken until now for anyone to notice it and object to it. There are just too many variables affecting the optimum number of editors. I don't much like the revised version either, though - "usually do not generally contain too many" is almost meaningless; and it's not the number of disparate views we're concerned about (the more alternative ways of looking at the problem, the better, probably). --Kotniski (talk) 18:48, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Hey! "Pulled out of someone's ass" was how I put it, not Collect! (credit where credit is due!). I disagree that "usually contain less than ten" is useful guidance, but I have no issue with it being in there. I don't think it changes the meaning at all. But something so minor, like the removal of "formal", is something that can be done while reaching consensus through editing via actual edits and edit summaries, which I suggest is far more productive than Reaching consensus through discussion in a situation like this. --Born2cycle (talk) 18:53, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm happy to have the "less than ten" advice removed, because it depends. Five may be too many for a content dispute; ten may be too few for a site ban proposal.

I am unhappy that "too big a change" and "no written documentation of prior authorization" are being tossed about as excuses for reverting changes. It took me less than 60 seconds to review the changes to that section, and this policy in particular does not need to have an incredible level of stability. If you've got a problem with a specific bit of wording that was changed, then you should feel free to revert that specific bit, but it's really inappropriate to toss the baby out with the bathwater. For example: if you don't like "formal consensus", then remove the word "formal", but don't revert the grammatical changes (e.g., splitting a long sentence into two shorter sentences) at the same time. You are all experienced editors here: wholesale reversions because you don't like a fraction of the changes are for newbies and incompetents. WhatamIdoing (talk) 00:27, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

It wasn't a big change. It easily fits on one page and took NewbyG a couple of minutes to review, just now. That is bold editing, of the type quite often encountered on this project page, back in my day, <nostalgia> Under what circumstances is bold editing unsuitable for the projety page which describes Consensus? <running away, hiding> NewbyG ( talk) 20:42, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

even by those who had disagreed...

In "Consensus can change" we read "Decisions reached through consensus should be respected, even by those who had disagreed." This is perhaps somewhat off the mark if consensus is not majority rule. Those who disagree supposedly have their dissent heard, and everyone tries to accommodate those views. So if consensus is reached, there shouldn't, at that time, be disagreement. If someone else would like to tackle that one, okay. I am thinking on it and will edit there when I think of something that satisfies me. Are there other views? --Ring Cinema (talk) 22:52, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Nope - the point is that consensus != unanimity - and thus there will still be those who disagree. Simple and clear? Collect (talk) 23:43, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

No, I don't agree that's the way to state it. Unanimity is the ideal. Dissenting views are included. Simple enough? --Ring Cinema (talk) 00:30, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

IPOF, "dissenting views are included" is not always true of consensus. In fact, it is quite rarely true. Cheers. Collect (talk) 07:18, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

That's one of the parts that needs to be binned as gratuitious and of utterly no use to the community. This page should be shorter rather than longer.

Tony (talk)

08:44, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

Which part do you mean? (I agree with Collect about the original point though - unanimity is often not achieved, and there will therefore often be people who disagree with the decision reached - and if the decision was "no consensus" and whatever (in)action follows from that, then there will certainly be people who disagree - nonetheless those people are expected to abide by the decision - this is pretty much the whole point of this page, and ought to be given much greater prominence IMO, since if editing "against consensus" were not to be regarded as a Bad Thing, then the whole purpose of the consensus policy would be negated.)--Kotniski (talk) 12:38, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

I think you are making the point that we are, indeed, missing an introductory section "Achieving consensus." We launch right into policy about consensus and discuss the conflict resolution and the "output" portion without sufficient discussion of the "input", including how to write about things in a manner that good faith consensus can be achieved. We also need to honest about WP not being some encyclopedic utopia, and to separately deal with how to deal with good-faith disagreements and how to deal with disagreements (taken to be) in bad faith. Policy needs to be geared to actual circumstances; Collect is correct, there are, in fact, very active editors who espouse editorial views which are supported in no reputable account of topics in dispute and which will (ultimately) never be included in article consensus.

We also need to deal head-on with the sticky situations which result in entrenched editors running off fresh contributors via abuse or intimidation (or, as I call it, acronymonious behavior). Let's be realistic: every editor is going to wish to promote their editorial view, hopefully it is well-sourced where basic facts are also not in dispute; the downside is that WP policy OMITS factual accuracy as a gate for content inclusion, so WP:CONSENSUS needs to deal with that aspect as well. PЄTЄRS J V ►TALK 15:27, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

I see several bids for majority rule here. For those who feel that dissenters needn't be accommodated, perhaps they can spell out the difference between their idea of consensus and majority rule. We might be thinking of different cases, so perhaps we have a hard case / easy case problem here. Hard cases involve binaries, where there is literally no middle ground; easy cases involve the more common decisions that editors manage through discussion. I was thinking about the easy cases, and I am still quite sure that the ideal of consensus is unanimity. If we write this page in a way that makes it easy to ignore dissenters, consensus will be impoverished if not meaningless. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:56, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

On the other hand, if we write it in a way that makes it easy for dissenters to ignore the majority, then consensus again becomes meaningless (since our decisions would no longer result from the consensus process, but from a tactical edit-warring process). We need to cover both sides of the coin - it's not majority rule, but it's not the law of the jungle or the liberum veto either.--Kotniski (talk) 07:16, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

"Decisions reached through consensus should be respected by everyone who participated in its formation." I don't think this comes with the full force required. If a decision was reached through some reasonably full process (i.e. not just by one person claiming that his edit has stood for x weeks and is therefore "decided" by WP:SILENCE), then everyone needs to respect it, regardless of whether they participated. You can't just stay out of a discussion, watch the community come to a decision, and then say "I wasn't part of it so I'm not bound by it". That, as I think we can easily see, would be disruptive to the whole process.--Kotniski (talk) 07:21, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

You can, however, explain how the previous group of participants were mistaken. WP:SILENCE is trumped by speaking up. If something is wrong, you don't have to respect it. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:08, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, well, I don't mean "respect" as in "sit quietly and say nothing" (like we are supposed to respect people's religious beliefs); perhaps "abide by" would be a better choice of words. You can still try to persuade people that they've got it wrong (up to a point where continual harping on the same point becomes disruptive in itself), but it's disruptive to edit against the decision. (E.g. if consensus is to delete an article, then don't recreate an almost identical article - get a review of the decision first.) If people weren't expected to abide by consensus decisions, then this whole policy would be just empty words.--Kotniski (talk) 10:39, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

Trying to recap: I think the issue is not that folks who did not assent in the first place to the consensus must consent to it, but more that once the article is in "calm mode" that seeking to keep arguing the case is not productive to improving the article, that it is generally wiser to either move to another article, or find other issues which would improve the article at hand. Picking at sores does not generally help them heal. Cheers. Collect (talk) 13:13, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

We seem to be conflating two issues here: one is whether it's appropriate to raise again for discussion a matter that's already been settled (to which I would generally answer yes, with provisos - that's the "consensus can change" principle); the second is whether it is appropriate to edit so as to thwart the result of the settlement (to which I would generally answer no, with provisos).--Kotniski (talk) 16:48, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

IT looks as if those two issues are conflated here. NewbyG ( talk) 08:32, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

On the grounds that a shorter page is a better page, venturing an IMO here that the project page is fine, easy to read etc, etc from Section 2.2 down.

SO only from 2.1 back up to the lede, which have creeped to look at. NewbyG ( talk) 23:01, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

First arbitrary break

I agree with all of the above. Kotniski's objection is very well taken, but I ignored that consideration on the theory that remaining silent for the purpose of objecting after a consensus is reached would constitute bad faith. And, in fact, it is perverse behavior, since one must eventually make one's case. On the other hand, my draft eliminates the idea that a single editor can arrive at a consensus or that an editor on holiday is out of luck. So, on balance, perhaps this is okay as is. Where Collect's summary is concerned, there is some ambiguity in his words, but I think it is probably not legitimate to claim that an article/edit is "settled" as a form of denying a new editor the chance to offer an improvement. Kotniski's second objection finds less favor with me: objections should be accommodated; that is the policy. Claiming a consensus despite continued good faith objection is not consensus-seeking. Therefore, it is not possible to make a change (ignoring the binaries) without obtaining some form of assent from dissenters. That assent might take the form of agreeing to put the matter to a binding straw poll, but since that is not consensus everyone is clear that only the participants can be so bound. Thanks. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:01, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

You now seem to be saying that nothing can be done until everyone agrees (or something like that). As we've long established, that doesn't work. Sometimes we say we have "consensus" even though we don't have universal acceptance. Not every objection can or should be accommodated. And those whose objections are not accommodated must live with it. Whether or not their objections were made during the decision-making process or are brought to the table sometime later. I'm not saying you can't raise objections after the fact, but then it should be talk first, action later. --Kotniski (talk) 16:43, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

I don't see a principled explanation of which objections do not have to be accommodated. In the absence of that -- which is really quite basic, Kotniski, for your post to make sense -- I have no problem saying that real consensus means everyone agrees. What else is it if not that? A super-majority is not a consensus. It does no good to say you want consensus only for people who agree with the smart people in the majority. True consensus is ideally unanimity where different views are ironed out through some form of compromise. Of course that is difficult, but that is how it goes here. When dissenters agree that the majority should be allowed their way, that is consensus, too. As I've mentioned in the past, if majoritarianism is unavoidable, its most palatable form is acceptance of a majority proposal by a majority of the minority. I mean, that's my opinion. --Ring Cinema (talk) 19:50, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

You still seem to have a different view of what "consensus" ought to mean than that that actually operates on Wikipedia. Super-majority situations are called consensus here. Sorry, but it wouldn't work otherwise. --Kotniski (talk) 19:59, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

No, that is not in the policy and it is, unfortunately, incoherent to say that we operate under consensus except when we use majority rule. (And, again, let me stipulate that I am not talking about binary choices.) I realize that it is difficult to explain which objections can be ignored or under what circumstances, but it must be done. My idea on the majority of the minority is a principled explanation of the circumstances that could allow it. There could be others. However, we got here with consensus, so the practice functions fairly well already. According to the policy, all legitimate concerns should be accommodated, and that includes dissenters. To say that we follow consensus when we actually employ some undefined version of supermajoritarianism is not honest. --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:54, 11 January 2012 (UTC)

It amounts to the same thing. In Ring's system, any viewpoint that isn't being accommodated is simply defined as "not legitimate" and then ignored. In Kotniski's system, the small minority's viewpoint might be legitimate, but it isn't being accommodated anyway because the super-majority doesn't choose to. The end result is the same thing: the small minority's viewpoint is not accommodated, and the super-majority claims to have a consensus not to accommodate it.

Ring, I think it's important for this page to address consensus in ways that apply to binary choices. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:12, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

No, it doesn't amount to the same thing. All legitimate viewpoints must be accommodated. The circumstance that allows them to be ignored should be stated or, as has been the case, left to the editors to work out. Not majority rule. Consensus. 2) I agree that we cover binary choices, but we label them and explain the difference. --Ring Cinema (talk) 03:27, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure what you're saying now. It's not the case that all legitimate viewpoints must be accommodated (as you seem to acknowledge yourself, in the next sentence, when you say that there are circumstances that allow them to be ignored). And I'm not sure there's a substantial difference between "binary" choices and other choices. With non-binary choices there's more potential for seeking a middle-ground solution, but we aren't obliged to adopt such a solution; and such possibilities may also exist in the case of apparently binary choices (e.g. in a deletion discussion, the result may be to merge the article into another), but again there is no obligation.--Kotniski (talk) 09:11, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Second arbitrary break

Ring, how do we know what is a "legitimate" viewpoint? As nearly as I can tell, a viewpoint is legitimate if the supermajority chooses to accommodate it, and it is not legitimate if the supermajority does not choose to accommodate it.

So I had a case a few years ago in which a guy wanted a particular idea about how posture affects human health to be "accommodated". Was his viewpoint "legitimate"? He certainly thought so (and gave several reasons why he thought so), but the supermajority did not think so (and gave several reasons why we thought so). We don't have a system for declaring someone to be an omniscient being who can rule on whether his position was Truly™ legitimate; all we really know is that, in the end, the supermajority did not choose to accommodate his viewpoint, and that we declared our refusal to accommodate his viewpoint to be "consensus". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:11, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I didn't introduce the term 'legitimate' for this context or decide that consensus is Wikipedia's decision procedure. It is simply the standard and the policy. We are, actually, obligated to try to incorporate dissenting views; that is the essence of consensus. A poorly-framed supermajoritianism is a slippery slope to majority rule if dissenters don't have to be accommodated. If we want to design a backstop to outliers and cranks, a supermajority rule is worse than recognizing the majority of the minority because the latter requires the majority to craft a proposal that meets with some dissenter acceptance. In this way, I implicitly define legitimate views as those held by a majority of the dissenters. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:44, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm with Kotniski. I think you're conflating how it should work ideally with out it works in reality. Take this discussion as an example and you're the only dissenter about this point. We'll hear you out, to a point, but if we don't convince you and you don't convince us, at some point we, the super-majority, will declare that the super-majority is the consensus and you'll be expected to respect that. --Born2cycle (talk) 22:08, 12 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for eloquently making my point. You are advocating majority rule. In consensus decision-making, my views should be accommodated. That is the policy. To the extent you want to ignore them is the extent to which you want to ignore the actual policy. And in fact, I happen to have the only proposal that offers a formal solution to the paradox of consensus. That you would think it is fine to ignore the only solution before us only shows a lack of understanding of how consensus works in practice. I'm not obstructing, I'm offering arguments that are not rebutted. Thanks again. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:52, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Although you say you're talking about how "consensus works in practice", you offer no evidence that this is how it works in practice on Wikipedia. This is how you think it should work. This is how you believe it can work. This is the only way it can legitimately be called "consensus", in your view. I get all that. What you are refusing to accept is that, "Consensus on Wikipedia does not mean unanimity" (that's what the policy says; it does not say that all views should be accommodated). And thank you for providing a great example of why it must be this way. --Born2cycle (talk) 02:03, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

You misstate the policy. To "incorporate all legitimate views" I take as longhand for "accommodate all views". So, my only evidence is the text of the page on consensus. And, as it happens, my proposal offers a formal method to realize the contradictory goals of accommodating all views but determining which are not legitimate while requiring the majority to offer something to the minority when unanimity is not possible. That is something supermajoritarianism doesn't do. --Ring Cinema (talk) 02:40, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

I misstate nothing; you do. It does say "Consensus on Wikipedia does not mean unanimity" (verbatim), and it does not say "incorporate all legitimate views". It says "involves an effort to incorporate all editors' legitimate concerns". Again, this is a good example. An effort is involved here to incorporate your concerns, but since they're contrary to what policy says and what is done in practice, their legitimacy, and therefore the need to incorporate them, is in question. --Born2cycle (talk) 04:03, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Ring, I still think you're misunderstanding something or else trying to pretend that some ideal is always achievable in practice; but you mention your "proposal" - what proposal would that be (I've kind of lost track)? If it's still the idea that people who didn't take part in the decision-making process don't have to abide by the decision, once properly made, then I think that's clearly wrong (it would go against the fundamental principle that what we call "consensus" is the way we make decisions, and not just a talking shop which leaves the actual decisions to the edit-warriors and the (pseudo)random admin page protectors). Though I think this issue deserves a separate section, to deal with the subtleties.--Kotniski (talk) 08:31, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Kotniski, I concur on your edit throwing out my try on the first sentence of "Consensus can change." It's a better paragraph without it and I was not completely comfortable with it myself. You will note that I didn't just jump in and change it. I asked for opinions and stated my intention to change it.

But to the substance: No, I am not misunderstanding consensus. I believe you don't appreciate how often unanimity is possible when it is insisted that people try to get it and how easy it would be for the page on consensus to lead people to ignore other views. When editors say to each other, "I don't agree with you but how about we do this?" there is a lot of ground covered. So I am accounting for theory and practice. We want to find unanimity where it is possible, we need here to recognize that the process of trying to find unanimity is the essence of consensus, and we can improve on the page the principles that allow ignoring anyone's views. My proposal is that we pay attention to the majority of the minority; their assent is meaningful. But of course there are problems with any approach so it requires careful consideration. At least it is a principle that requires the majority to offer something to the minority. --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:19, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

principled explanation of which objections do not have to be accommodated.

A principled explanation of which objections do not have to be accommodated is firstly, we ‘’try’’ to accommodate or incorporate or assimilate ‘’all’’ suggestions,

We do not accommodate and therefore apoligise with reasons, those suggestions which are simply too wierd, or retracted.

We do not accommodate and therefore give reason, those suggestions which are binary ie. Driving on left or right hand side on the road.

We do not accommodate and therefore apoligise with reasons, those suggestions which we have’n’t figured out how to implement yet.

That’s about it. NewbyG ( talk) 08:52, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

We are, actually, obligated to try to incorporate dissenting views; that is the essence of consensus.

Actually, Ring, that's my point: we are not "obligated to try to incorporate dissenting views". We are actually obligated to (politely) tell WP:Randy in Boise to take a hike. We are obligated to omit tiny-minority views altogether. We are obligated to omit any and all views that can't be supported by suitable reliable sources.

"All legitimate views" is not a longwinded way of saying "all views". We don't have to accommodate all dissenters. We don't even have to accommodate a "majority of dissenters". NPOV requires us to care about a "viewpoint's prevalence in reliable sources, not its prevalence among Wikipedia editors". That means that the prevlance of a viewpoint among dissenters is explicitly rejected as a factor that can be considered in determining the consensus for an article's content. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:02, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

Bravo! Never saw WP:Randy in Boise before. Excellent. I've added this to my favorite quotes section on my page, here: User:Born2cycle#Consensus. --Born2cycle (talk) 18:46, 13 January 2012 (UTC)

1. We are not obligated to make an effort to incorporate dissenting views as long as we don't follow the policy. Dissenting views are legitimate, so it's clear that there is a choice: follow the policy or incorporate dissenting views. That is how consensus works and what distinguishes it from majority rule. 2. Of course legitimate views are different from all views as soon as there is an omniscient editor (see WhatAmIDoing above). Since we don't have that, only consensus can determine the difference, and that gets us nowhere in the context of a decision about which views can be ignored. I'm sorry, it's not up to the majority to decide when a consensus is not needed, since that is majority rule. So for those reasons I've offered my proposal. It suggests a principled way of managing these difficulties. No one else has made such a proposal, but if there is a better one I would be interested in it. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:00, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Consensus here clearly does not seem to accept your assertions. Collect (talk) 14:10, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm just repeating the policy, so it's hard to know what you mean. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:20, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

You seem not to appreciate the meaning of "make an effort..." You can try to find a solution that satisfies everyone, but sometimes it proves impossible, and you have to be satisfied with one that satisfies "most" people (for a value of "most" that we don't define exactly). So the policy certainly doesn't say or mean that all dissenting views must end up being incorporated; and after discussion has run a resonable course, there is a kind of majority rule (otherwise we would end up with minority rule, with single dissenters able to block any change, which would be even worse).--Kotniski (talk) 14:44, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

We are not "obligated to try to incorporate dissenting views".

We are 'predisposed and inclined to 'try' to incorporate all suggestions'.

There 'are' no dissenting views, just suggestions, no disruption, or assent or dissent or factions. (To be continued when the koolaid wears off). NewbyG ( talk) 10:06, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, we are obligated to try to incorporate all legitimate views, including dissenters. If we don't do that, we're not seeking consensus.

The bit above about views that are "wierd" (a mashup of wired and weird?) is perhaps a conflation of dissenters with cranks and I am sure we all understand there is a difference. Clearly, it is a challenge to have one policy that offers some principled way to distinguish the two, but that is where the hard thinking has to be done. --Ring Cinema (talk) 16:05, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, we're perhaps then, on the point of coming together. Now, in an article, on the article page, we (try to) incorporate all legitimate views, that is all views that are accumulated in tertiary references, reliable, and with provisos. But we do not have any dissenters. Ok, on a talk page, on an article talk page, a proposal is made to paint the barn red, and there will be those for and against, and they will state their reasons. And in a binary case, there can only be paint it/dont paint it. But neither side are dissenters. It's not the RED team wins because they are morally superior, so no one gets to be classified as a dissenter. One more case, fringe beliefs, conspiracies-theories. Those are not dissenters, those cases are exiles, or more usually self-exiled, so have pity and do not insult the vandals, by calling them dissenters. More to follow. I think. NewbyG ( talk) 17:32, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Back here in reality, there most certainly is something called WP:Disruption, and it happens fairly frequently over content disputes. There shouldn't be any disruption, but when inexperienced or highly biased people find their goals for an article effectively thwarted, we see all sorts of disruptive behavior, from name-calling to frivolous ANI reports to edit warring to grandstanding on the talk pages about how millions of people are going to die because you're not letting them spam their new cure for HIV infection into Wikipedia.

Sometimes these people are simply cranks, and Ring would apparently declare their views to be illegitimate and thus wash his hands of any accommodation, but other times these are typical editors who just have another opinion. To give an example: I have a different opinion about the ideal scope for the article Pain. IMO it ought not be so narrowly focused on "physical" pain. But I'm apparently a minority of one: the sole editor to favor that approach, a dissenter from the otherwise unanimously supported decision to focus the article somewhat more narrowly. Dissent means only that I did not agree, not that I believe either side to be morally superior. I believe that the people who disagreed with me have significantly improved the article. I believe that they were seeking—and, importantly, that they found—consensus on that point. I believe that they have produced a good article (just not exactly the particular article that I would have written).

I believe, in fact, that further efforts to find a halfway compromise that "accommodated my legitimate views" would likely have produced a worse article than the one they did produce (and also a worse article than the one that would have been produced if they had wholeheartedly agreed with my view). Sometimes halfway is worse than either end. There is a consensus for this article's scope. It just happens that my view did not happen to match the consensus view in that particular instance. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:47, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

I would declare their views illegitimate? No, I am saying that we don't have a principled method or a process to distinguish cranks from dissenters. It would help to progress on that. --Ring Cinema (talk) 00:00, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes, progress on that is what we are after. And no, it is not possible for me with a straight face that I have never seen Disruption, unfortunately. Trying to make these distinctions, on the project page, in as few words as possible is what we are working towards, note this may need a new sub=header soon, thread is getting long, and we try to keep topics separated if we can, cheers NewbyG ( talk) 02:18, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Third arbitrary break

Just a quick correction: "Legitimate" is the wrong word to use... Wikipedia does not base inclusion on the legitimacy of a viewpoint... it bases inclusion on the significance of the viewpoint. We are required to include all significant viewpoints (even those we personally consider illegitimate), but may exclude viewpoints we deem (by consensus) to be insignificant. Blueboar (talk) 16:28, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Are you not possibly mixing the viewpoints of editors with the viewpoints found in sources? When we are talking about the viewpoints of editors on a particular question, I think "legitimate" is closer to what we mean than "significant" - if 100 people want Justin Bieber's article to say that he's the greatest singer of all time "because he is", that's likely to be significant, but someone assessing consensus would (hopefully) conclude that those people's views are illegitimate.--Kotniski (talk) 16:37, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Ah... now I understand what you are saying. Yes, I did misunderstand what you were talking about. Blueboar (talk) 16:52, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, Kotniski, but my understanding is not lacking. All views should be incorporated; that is consensus. I see that you increasingly endorse majority rule, and I mentioned a few days ago that your views are majoritarian in character. Now you've stated it. However, on Wikipedia, we don't operate by majority rule, we make our decisions based on consensus. Majoritarian views belong in a different forum. My sense is that you want to take examples of outliers and cranks and generalize that problem to anyone with a minority view. That's not consensus, and I think you have sort of admitted it above.

So there is the problem of how to manage situations where consensus is hard to come by. It is possible to discuss which views are legitimate, but, as has been pointed out, there is no omniscient agent to settle that matter. That is why I have mentioned several times that legitimacy needs to be settled according to some principle, and, let me add, it is even better if there is a procedure or process that requires compliance with the principle. It is always possible to leave it to the editors, but, if we can do better and remain consonant with the principles of consensus, it would be a good thing. --Ring Cinema (talk) 17:18, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Ring, suppose I am of the view that President Obama is a reptilian alien from Mars. Suppose I feel strongly that this important and vital information should be included in the bio article on Obama (and half a dozen related articles). Are you saying that my view must be incorporated? Or would you agree that other editors can come to consensus that my view is utter nonsense, and exclude it? Blueboar (talk) 19:21, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

(Perhaps it would work to ask for a citation to support this crank viewpoint.) --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:17, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Or maybe a completely legitimate view will be excluded by your "consensus of the smart people"? I'm sure you realize that any power given to the majority that allows them to ignore the minority will be instantly abused. Your example isn't of a legitimate minority view so it seems simple. But to conflate minority views with outliers and cranks is an attempt to justify majority rule. The fact that there are sometimes cranks on Wikipedia is not a reason to abandon consensus-seeking. The larger problem is getting editors to reach for unanimity, and if we can we should make a path to it. My proposal at least motivates the majority to offer something to the minority to gain their support. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:34, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Just to be clear, I will agree that there should be something to handle cranks if you will agree that it should be different from the treatment for minority views. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:54, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

And there is something... it is a Wikipedia policy known as Wikipedia:Neutral point of view. The point is, we can exclude material based on consensus... however, that consensus should be based on Wikipedia's policies and guidelines, not our own personal opinions. Blueboar (talk) 00:11, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Hmm, not necessarily only on written policies and guidelines, but at least on a proper awareness of what Wikipedia is trying to be and what its principles are - on genuine arguments, in other words.--Kotniski (talk) 10:55, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Okay, so now two candidates are offered as reasons excluding views: views with a point and arguments that are not genuine. The latter gets us no further than "legitimate", right? "Genuine" is in the eye of the beholder in a completely congruent way. Both the minority and the cranks believe they have a genuine argument. I agree, of course, arguments that are not genuine (assuming we can cash that out) must be fake or bogus or ersatz, but it's no progress because we still lack the omniscience that WhatAmIDoing mentioned above. Next to the former: can we invoke a policy to exclude a viewpoint? Yes, we can, I agree. But, sadly, someone has to decide, and there will be disagreements about it. I have noticed that we lack an omniscient agent to decide for us. So, these two tries are both correct and both bound to fail in some cases. Now, I'm unclear if my respected fellow editors made their comments with the awareness that they were not offering a justification to abandon consensus when there is disagreement or if they were aware that these are merely excellent reasons that editors will use to persuade others to accept their own assessments. --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:17, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

I'm not entirely sure what you're saying now... But in the absence of an "omniscient agent", we have (supposedly neutral) admins to decide for us (in those cases where we are really unable to decide for ourselves whether consensus has been reached). And then we respect their decision (or challenge it, but we don't just reject it and edit against it - at least, we shouldn't, since that would thwart the whole process and render this policy useless).--Kotniski (talk) 20:22, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

You were offering 'genuine' as a criterion for 'legitimate', so I pointed out that it gets us nowhere, Kotniski. Not sure about this latest, since a consensus isn't about what an admin decides. Don't expect me to agree that admins can competently decide something important. I might not be able to stop laughing. --Ring Cinema (talk) 13:43, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Well, they don't always get it right. But who would you have decide? Or would you leave everything to the edit-warriors to fight things out?--Kotniski (talk) 14:04, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Who I would have decide are the editors, but I know you agree. I am thinking about how we can bring different views into alignment. An admin can't say what consensus is; that's a job for an expert. Light bulb. --Ring Cinema (talk) 16:29, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Aren't admins (or other "uninvolved editors in good standing") the closest thing we've got to experts, when it comes to matters of deciding Wikipedia "consensus"? (I sometimes disagree with their assessments, but I don't have any better suggestion as to who we can get to do it - of course it's preferable if the involved editors themselves do it, as I guess in most cases they do, but sometimes that turns out not to be possible and we need an outside judge).--Kotniski (talk) 17:02, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Sadly you are correct. It's like Zuckerberg deciding what is good privacy; at best, he doesn't know what he doesn't know. --Ring Cinema (talk) 21:38, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

It still seems to me that legitimate is not the right word to use on the project page. I think we are getting confused, also, maybe, between the process of deciding what goes on an article page, and the somewhat different decision process for what goes on a guideline page in wikipediaspace. And also, are we conflating consensus with inclusion? Inclusion is an issue for another page in wikipediaspace, isnt it, such as WP:V or WP:VNT cheers NewbyG ( talk) 17:49, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Ring, I think we might be having a semantic problem here. You define consensus as all editors' views about what's best for an article being accommodated. That's an acceptable dictionary definition as far as I'm concerned.

On the English Wikipedia, this is not what happens: The views of all editors are not always accommodated, and we don't actually feel much obligation to do so. On the English Wikipedia, what's done to an article is what most (not all) editors believe is best for the article—after discussion, with whatever level of compromise seems appropriate to those participating, and with the determination of which view counts as the "most" view being determined by some uninvolved editor if necessary—even if this means that there are people who completely disagree and whose views are not accommodated in the least.

We have traditionally called this process of listening to everyone and doing what most people want consensus, just like we call labeling Time cube as being pseudoscience is what we call neutral rather than judgmental, although the latter term is probably more accurate according to the dictionary.

Do you agree that (1) this is what actually happens and (2) that most editors call what actually happens consensus? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:49, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, I'm well aware of Wikipedia practices. The most prevalent among them is the alacrity with which editors take sides. I'm sure that no one thinks consensus means majority rule, that everywhere it means accommodating as many views as possible, and Wikipedia is no different. Clearly there are many methods used by editors to get things done when unanimity is not possible. Sometimes the minority backs down, sometimes they agree to abide by a straw poll, sometimes compromises are accepted. That's all great. Sure, there is a measurable gap between policy and practice; that is a good thing and makes it possible for superior solutions to bubble up. It would be disastrous to hint that majority rule is okay, because that would short circuit the give and take. Instead, we should use our best efforts to find ways to bring editors together. Today I made contact with an experienced expert in conflict resolution in my area and we are considering that there might be untapped resources and methods available in the literature. --Ring Cinema (talk) 00:36, 18 January 2012 (UTC)

So in your opinion, this kind of practice is actually done, and is actually called consensus, but you don't want WP:Consensus to admit these facts? WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:40, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

To add, we should use our best efforts to find ways to bring editors together. That seems to fit some where. he NewbyG ( talk) 23:18, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Legitimate

I think that we need to kill this "incorporate all legitimate concerns" idea. Here we have an editor asserting that the SOPA-related blackout was anti-consensus because it did not "incorporate all legitimate concerns". The fact is that we call that kind of decision consensual on Wikipedia, even if it completely ignores the legitimate concerns of a sizeable minority of the community. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:40, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

So what if someone wants to say that? Let's agree then that the first legitimate view we ignore will be yours. I expect your support. --Ring Cinema (talk) 06:49, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

We only say we "try to" incorporate all legitimate concerns. In some cases it turns out to be simply impossible to actually achieve that - almost every action has upsides and downsides, and there isn't necessarily a satisfactory compromise available. We can't have a blackout and not have a blackout (and even if there were a middle path, we wouldn't be obliged to choose it).--Kotniski (talk) 08:04, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

But we have already agreed that pure binaries are different, so again this is just a non sequitur. Please enunciate the principled conditions under which a legitimate viewpoint should be ignored in a way that is not majority rule. "It's too hard" is not a reason. We don't have a problem that we are trying to solve; we have a method that functions well in practice. (Are you okay if we ignore your legitimate viewpoint first? If so, proceed.) --Ring Cinema (talk) 13:47, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

The "method that functions well in practice" in effect includes a certain amount of majority rule, because if we waited for universal agreement we would sometimes wait forever. I don't have an exact algorithm for how these things are decided (sometimes different admins will reach different conclusions from the same set of facts). But no-one has a veto, even if his arguments are sound - there might be even sounder arguments (or at least, arguments that convince more editors) for doing the thing he opposes. I really can't think of any better alternative to the kind of qualified majority rule (following good faith discussion) that we effectively use at the moment - can you?--Kotniski (talk) 13:57, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

We don't use majority rule because that's not consensus. Perhaps it is true that you don't think that the majority should be required to accommodate minority views, but that is how it works. I'd like to advise you to become an expert in finding common ground instead of trying to avoid the requirements of consensus. (Again: you agree that we can ignore your legitimate arguments? If so, proceed.) --Ring Cinema (talk) 15:46, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

The majority should be required to make a reasonable attempt to accommodate minority views (give reasonable consideration to them), but they won't always succeed in doing so to the minority's satisfaction. Just like everyone else, I frquently find myself on the "losing" side of an argument, even though I still believe I'm right - in that case you just give way gracefully, you don't scream and shout and insist that your view "must" be accommodated.--Kotniski (talk) 15:55, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

(So you are okay if we ignore your legitimate views? I'm not clear on that.) There has to be cognizance here that a paradox lies at the heart of consensus. It is not unanimity and it is not majority rule. It is something else. You say that you don't scream and shout and insist, but I notice that you try to circumvent your collaborators when it's time to discuss and compromise. That leads me to believe that you don't really get the idea of consensus completely. The sentiment that the majority only owes the minority some "reasonable consideration" is simply majority rule rewritten. Presumably they already have, right? So that's not consensus. --Ring Cinema (talk) 18:09, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Yes, I'm OK if my legitimate views end up not being taken into account in the final decision, if there's no realistic way of doing so while also accommodating the legitimate views of a larger number. If you like, then yes, we have a kind of majority rule. I don't insist on calling it "consensus" - that's just other people's habit. But I don't see how it's realistic to expect to compel the majority to take account of a minority in some way. You can compel them to listen and engage for a while, but in the end, if you can't convince people, you have to accept it and move on. So do I, so does everyone (except the drama queens, who unfortunately are given far too much legitimacy around here - one of the reasons I'm taking a (hopefully long) break from Wikipedia pretty soon).--Kotniski (talk) 22:59, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

The SOPA discussion wasn't a pure binary. There were many different proposals. For example, when I wandered past the page at one point, there seemed to be significant support for a banner that explained the problems but could be clicked through to make all content available to the reader. A complete shutdown was only one of many options.

And, yes, I fully expect that my legitimate views will be ignored or rejected on occasion. In fact, I could easily point you at specific discussions in which that has happened. I am not always on the "winning" or "consensus" side of every dispute. When my "legitimate view" is rejected, I don't go whingeing about that the decisions are anti-consensus and therefore in violation of fundamental policies. Instead, I accept that there is a valid consensus not to incorporate my "legitimate view", because I have learned a bit about WP:How to lose. (Perhaps you have a different approach.) WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:57, 25 January 2012 (UTC)

Sure, you make a good point. Obviously legitimate views will not be included in all cases. There is some ground between unanimity and majority rule and this page should point people toward unanimity in the hopes they will find that ground. If the process requires editors to compromise, then we're golden. If the process tells the majority it's up to them, we will destroy consensus. --Ring Cinema (talk) 17:26, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

I am going to comment here to reiterate that our aim since the beginning of the project has been to grow an encyclopedia, an encyclopedia of articles.. So we ‘’try to incorporate’’ all suggestions. 'The primary means of excluding poor suggestions is that the proposer retracts the suggestion', once they realize it's a bad idea. That, believe it or not, gets rid of most poor suggestions, or some useful detail is incorporated in the final decision, so we begin by being in front, we get the good ideas, the good suggestions, for free.

Here now, is where edit warriors and ‘’fringe-believers’’ dig in. Those ideas have to be reviewed at length, by all available interested parties. This review takes place in the reasoning and intuitive mind and conscience of each reviewer, and is reflected in the edits they make. The review process takes place ON the article page, so do your best there, even if it is only adding a comma, or fixing a spelling. The article page is built up by many edits, and pages in Wikipediaspace are built up the same way, although there is more leeway to cut down on words. Articles are NOT meant as advice to the reader, and guideline pages ARE meant as advice to the reader.

So far, we have got rid of most bad ideas, but now we have to distinguish (on a guideline page), between ideas where there can only be a yes/no decision, (which means some suggestions are rejected) and those ideas that we have neither the skills or time to execute, (like flying cars or crush-proof clothes) and so some more ideas are rejected. What have I left out, not that this is meant to go on the project page, of course, but are there other pertinent cases I have left out of how come some ideas end up being rejected, and why, and how the process of rejection occurs? Obviously, in the process I am describing here, we have reached the point of migrating to the talk page, where the reasoned arguments and so forth come into play, cheers NewbyG ( talk) 17:20, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

A wiki-page for proposing, demonstrating and previewing edits to the policy wiki page.

Long ago, someone satirically suggested that we should set up a wiki page for discussing improvement to this policy. I think that it may actually be a good, realistic solution to the lack-of-stability-in-the-detail problem of this policy, which is caused by editors with the best convictions collectively, incessantly, editing the policy. The lack of stability is a problem because it means that editors not here every day loose confidence in the detail of the policy. It is also associated with a tendency to bloat.

This policy itself advocates discussion via editing. Personally, I am a strong believer in this advice. Discussion uncoupled to page edits becomes increasingly uncoupled. However, the theory doesn’t insist that the edits be directly to the policy. Indeed, often excerpts of this or other project pages are copied to the talk page for demonstrations of proposed edits.

I suggest Wikipedia:Consensus/proposed new version. Every so often, we seriously discuss editing Wikipedia:Consensus to reflect the subpage, and then copy-paste Wikipedia:Consensus onto the subpage for the next round. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 11:11, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

Fine idea, somewhere we can work on drafts, or archive them. I would suggest though, Wikipedia talk:Consensus/Workshop. Thanks NewbyG ( talk) 12:23, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

If you put it in the WT: namespace, then there will be no talk page for discussing changes as they happen, which some editors might like to do. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:27, 7 February 2012 (UTC)

That should be no problem, there can be talk pages for sub-pages I think, just trying to remember how it went with Wikipedia talk:Ignore all rules/Workshop (still in place) and Wikipedia:Civility/Workshop which became How to be civil, or something like that, my memory is not infallible, it was four years ago or thereabouts, both ways work, maybe I am wrong, either one way or the other would work for me cheers NewbyG ( talk) 18:10, 8 February 2012 (UTC)

Well the talk page for an/i goes to Wikipedia talk:AN which is the talk page for an. On the other hand, probably better here would be then Wikipedia:Consensus/Workshop. NewbyG ( talk) 09:43, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

So far, WP:CONSENSUS does pretty well for saying how to edit - making "different trules" for any single page is, IMHO, "instruction creep" of the first order. No need to change the sqa. Collect (talk) 13:32, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Non-WT:CON regulars have come by and said the amount of editing here doesn't work for them. Should they be ignored? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 13:52, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
- That exact argument could then be given for every single page on Wikipedia - so yes. Collect (talk) 16:31, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
  - Obviously this page is different, so this is a problem that we have to be cognizant of. Since good editors function better with stable policies, changes to this page should be done conservatively. It's destructive of the encyclopedia to make editors' work difficult, and frequent changes make it difficult. I suppose one can say that moving the walls of any room in your house is the same, but when you move the walls of the foundation some care is exercised. --Ring Cinema (talk) 16:38, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

I think that such would be technically available for ALL articles. A place for stable longer term work that isn't the fast-moving conveyor belt of the talk pages, and talk page rules which are to not edit other posts. (which workig on a draft would be) But the implicit requirement make such another requirement for major page changes is not a good idea. The major pages get a lot of talk about attempted changes, but very few substantive changes. North8000 (talk) 17:48, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Lots of talk and little positive action at some policy pages. That can be so true. But not to worry, Cheers, NewbyG ( talk) 14:37, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Looking for help on interpreting a "no consensus" result.

I have been involved in a recent discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ice Hockey about a question regarding whether or not to include a person on the List of ice hockey players who died during their playing career. The result of the discussion was that exactly as many people said that the person should be included on the list as said that he should not be included on the list, so the result of the discussion looks clearly like a "no consensus". The policy page here states, "In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations, a lack of consensus results in no change in the article." But now we are not in agreement about what "no change" means for the article.

One view is that because the person has been on the list for almost two years now (ever since he died) that "no change" means that he should be kept on the list. The other view is that the length of time he was on the list is immaterial and the change being discussed was the change that took place when he was added to the list, so "no change" means don't add him to the list. I am looking for input from people not party to that dispute to weigh in here on just what the correct implementation of a "no consensus" result would be in this case. Thanks. 99.192.69.56 (talk) 20:07, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

It is inaccurate that he has been on the list for two years. Each time this IP (or one of the other IPs he uses) has added it, someone has reverted him which is a clear sign that there has never been consensus to add him. This goes back to the original addition. -DJSasso (talk) 20:15, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Re:"The result of the discussion was that exactly as many people said that the person should be included on the list as said that he should not be included on the list" Technically, 4 voted against, 3 voted for. Not "exactly as many". Just saying.--Львівське (говорити) 20:25, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

I would actually say it was 4 said not to add and 2 said that it should be added. 1 said he wouldn't object but he also didn't say he would add it. Clearly that leans towards consensus to not add him. And being that the edit has been rejected by other editors over the two years that it keeps getting added that there would actually be more people in the "don't add" camp if they saw that discussion. -DJSasso (talk) 20:28, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

(ec) Actually, he has been on the list for almost two years. He was added On April 8, 2010 by someone else, two days after he died. He was removed once on May 19, 2010, but restored the next day by me. He was removed a second time on September 11, 2011 and restored the same day by me. The same editor who removed him in 2011 then removed him again earlier this month, leading to the present discussion. So he has been on the list for all but about one day of the last (almost) two years. 99.192.69.56 (talk) 20:30, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Irregardless his addition was objected to immediately. You shouldn't have reverted again. At that point it should have been discussed. So there has never been clear consensus to add him to the page going back to the original discussion. So the current discussion is just the discussion that was missed when you reverted originally to determine if there is consensus to add him. -DJSasso (talk) 20:34, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

The addition was not objected to for over a month. When it was, I reverted because I thought it was an error. At that time, there were only three editors that had offered any opinion on the issue. Two of us (me and the one who originally added him) thought he should be on the list. One thought not. And when reverted, that one did not pursue the question any further. So the reversion was not out of order. From that time he remained on the list for almost a year and a half without objection, so again, reverting a removal was not out of order. 99.192.69.56 (talk) 20:45, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

Most pages are not watched every second of every day. There is going to be time between when an edit happens and when it is detected. A month isn't that long, especially when its an article that has very few watchers (less than 30). On such a low edit page even a year isn't really all that long for an edit to go unnoticed. For example I saw the original revert that Krm500 made back then but I didn't notice you revert him or I would have reverted you back then. I had already thought he was off the list. -DJSasso (talk) 20:58, 20 February 2012 (UTC)

This is not really a forum for this. Our focus is the policy itself, not the editorial on specific pages. --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:33, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Gaming the ArbCom case

Noetica, Dicklyon, and JCSalinger (and possibly others) are involved in an ArbCom case about article titles. There are several proposed motions at here and here that would stop some or all of them (depending on the motion) from editing this page until the case is closed, and therefore from editing this page to make it appear to suit their side. (For example, a ban on editing this page would stop Noetica from insisting that "no consensus" is a helpful edit summary until the case was closed, but it would permit SmokeyJoe and Newby to continue with their improvement efforts.) If any of you have an opinion, then I believe you can comment in the "comments from others" sections. I'll be thinking about which, if any of the proposals I might support. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:23, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

It is right to draw attention on this talk page to a current Arbcom case, I am sure that is in no way canvassing. I have no intention of going there, nor wish to draw conclusions about editors there or elsewhere or from on this page for the time being.

But drawing other page disputes, content disputes in articles, or such to this talk page, or the project page doesn’t usually work out well. Or too much talk is wasted. Just look in the Archives archives, or read the top of the page. Oh, well. The 'sole urpose of this page is to discuss Wikipedia:Consensus. NewbyG ( talk) 05:49, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree. If none of the people in the ArbCom case had been editing this policy, supposedly to support their position in the ArbCom case, then the page wouldn't currently be protected over their edit warring, and we could be getting useful work done here. In effect, whether these people should be temporarily page-banned is a discussion about how—or whether it will even be possible at all—to improve this page. WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:13, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, the purpose of our policy pages is to aid the writing of articles. Not, in the first instance, to aid the writing of policy pages. NewbyG ( talk) 06:25, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Well, this talkpage has been missing a header for some time. I've added <!- talkheader|search=yes|WT:CON ->. And as has happened from time to time, judging by some unfortunate section headings above, soon to be archived, editors old and new deserve to be reminded from time to time of some of the guidelines, for courtesy. Cheers, NewbyG ( talk) 09:30, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, since you're obviously aware of the issues in the Arbcom case, which involved changing policy without establishing consensus, it seems odd that you would continue to war about a change here that would make it more OK for them to have done that. Can't you at least hold off until things settle out a bit? Dicklyon (talk) 18:36, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Right. It would be helpful for WhatamIdoing to acknowledge openly here what she obviously now knows: that this policy page has been manipulated by PMAnderson's sockpuppet JCScaliger as part of a long and disruptive campaign. This is well documented in the ArbCom case, as she is aware. WhatamIdoing compounds the mischief by editing like this, especially at this crucial time as the case draws to an end. The question raised in the case about ownership of this page is brought into sharp focus by her ironically non-consensual edit to restore a favoured provision (see also her editing at WP:POLICY), ironically bearing an inadequate edit summary. Noetica^Tea? 18:50, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

The Arbcom case has not yet reached the stage of proposed decision. So it will be weeks or months before that is finalized. I don't see anyone "owning" this page, though there is quite a degree of investment from a number of parties. The involvement of a sock-puppetting editor is particularly unfortunate. NewbyG ( talk) 05:56, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Two points:

I believe that the Arbs are smart enough to know how to find Noetica's version in the page history.
The only people who have voiced any support for Noetica's version—the version that asserts that an edit summary we condemn as uninformative magically becomes informative when the page in question has a {{policy}} template at the top—are the people in the ArbCom case. So this "nonconsensual" edit is the "non-consensus solely of people (1) who inserted the disputed text over multiple other editors' repeated objections and (2) who are apparently trying to preserve it for the sole purpose of winning an ArbCom dispute, which hardly counts as what the community is looking for when it advocates consensus for changes. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

RFC on helpful edit summaries

If you made a change to a policy page, and someone reverted your change with a vague edit summary like "no consensus", would that edit summary actually help you to understand what exactly the other editor believed was wrong with your change, or would you find that edit summary to be unhelpful compared to a substantive edit summary? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:52, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

History

In January, Noetica (talk · contribs) changed this policy to assert, among other things, that a vague, uninformative edit summary like "no consensus" or "undiscussed" somehow became helpful (NB: not "permitted" or "appropriate", but actually helpful) to the editor whose change was reverted if and only if the vague edit summary was delivered on a page that had been tagged as a {{policy}}.

The assertion that the helpfulness of these edit summaries depends on the type of page was unilaterally added by Noetica in January, and Noetica has been edit warring since then to keep the disputed text in the page, e.g., [2][3][4]. The stated reason for this edit warring is that Noetica's newly added sentence has been mentioned in an ArbCom case involving policy editing by a banned user, and so Noetica says his disputed sentence must remain in the policy until the ArbCom case closes (a position not supported by any policy or guideline), which may be months from now.

Noetica's original change was reverted as inappropriate within two hours and a discussion explaining the substantive objections was immediately begun on the talk page. So far, Noetica's change has been opposed uniformly by all editors on this page except Noetica and Dicklyon, neither of whom were active on this page until these changes were made and both of whom are involved in the ArbCom case and apparently hopeful that having this page call vague edit summaries "helpful" on policy pages will help their case there.

Generally, the opposition says that if an edit summary is unhelpfully vague in article space, then it's still unhelpfully vague no matter what the page is. The primary purpose of the paragraph in question is to encourage substantive objections like "Your change makes this policy conflict with this other policy" rather than "No consensus (and good luck guessing what the actual problem is)".

Points of agreement and disagreement

It is generally agreed that such vague edit summaries are unhelpful if used on article pages, templates, talk pages, image files, guidelines, essays, WikiProject pages, etc.
It is generally agreed that Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines#Substantive_changes has encouraged editors to provide actual reasons for reverting changes to policy pages for years now, e.g., with language like, "you should not remove any change solely on the grounds that there is no formal record indicating consensus for it: instead, you should give a substantive reason for challenging it, and open a discussion to identify the community's current views, if one hasn't already been started".
It is generally agreed that, despite this encouragement to be helpful and substantive, vague edit summaries are actually permissible.
The point of difference is only whether an edit summary that is condemned as unhelpful on every other page in the entire English Wikipedia somehow (magically?) become helpful, e.g., informative, when it appears in the history for a policy page.

The question

If you made a change to a policy page, and someone reverted your change with a vague edit summary like "no consensus", would that edit summary actually help you to understand what exactly the other editor believed was wrong with your change, or would you find that edit summary to be unhelpful compared to a substantive edit summary? In your opinion, should this policy include Noetica's claim that such a vague, non-substantive edit summary would be helpful to you on a policy, but unhelpful on all other types of pages? WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:52, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Objection to the framing of this RFC

This RFC fails to meet the requirements of protocol for RFCs, which include these recommendations (I underline for emphasis):

Include a brief, neutral statement of the issue below the template, and sign it with ~~~~ (name and date) or ~~~~~ (just the date).

If you feel as though you cannot describe the dispute neutrally, ask someone else to write a summary for you. You can also do your best, and invite others to improve your question or summary later.

Neither the RFC text itself nor the amplifying text that follows is neutral. Both distort the question at issue, and misrepresent the history by serious omissions of diffs and by other means. I request that it be withdrawn and re-presented neutrally.

I have experience in framing successful RFCs, and I will happy to assist. ☺♥

Alternative course of action (far preferable):

Since the status of this page, along with questions of ownership especially, is sub judice at ArbCom (see Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Article titles and capitalisation/Workshop), it is improper for an RFC such as this to proceed at the same time. I request that the RFC be withdrawn until that case is concluded (and perhaps longer, depending on possible rulings in the case). It would also make sense for edits to the wording in question (since the opening of case) to be reverted. It would not matter what gets "locked in" for the duration, because the section is now marked as disputed anyway, and gets no traction by being left in place for now. And it should have no authority as policy in the meantime.

♥

Noetica^Tea? 02:39, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

You have actually changed the policy (repeatedly) to say that an edit summary of "no consensus" is unhelpful except possibly on policy pages. IMO your claim that this edit summary is helpful on one page and unhelpful on all others is so plainly nonsensical that I can't even imagine a way to describe it that might make other editors sympathetic to your position (and I assume that's what you mean by "neutral"). There's a whole talk page here: feel free to explain to people how exactly the same words are helpful on policy pages and unhelpful on all other pages. If you've got a coherent argument for it, then I'm sure everyone will agree with you.

BTW, I doubt that anyone's going to buy your argument that ArbCom sets policy or owns this page, either. ArbCom has resolutely refused to do any such thing in the past, and has never told editors that they have to stop working on pages merely because a sentence from it has been quoted in an ArbCom case—especially a sentence added by a participant in the case and steadfastly opposed from the beginning by all of the non-participants who have commented on it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 04:23, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

WhatamIdoing, you continue flagrantly to misrepresent the history of events, and to misrepresent my stance and even what I have actually said. As long as you are unwillingly to work together and to remedy this, I will not take part in this RFC at all. I will perhaps watch to see if the RFC is set right; but I will make no further offer to assist the process unless that happens.

I may, on the other hand, come in and revert any refactoring, if my procedural objection is in any way made less prominent.

Participants, please read anything that is said here in this light: I will not reply or participate. I can be contacted at my talkpage as usual, or by email.

Circumstances in my life just now preclude any other approach, if editors at this page continue in such a mean-spirited, non-collegial, and proprietorial way.

Best wishes to all, as ever. ♥ ☺

Noetica^Tea? 05:46, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

It appears that this section, like previous exchanges between these two users, is tending to descend into a back-and-forth of recriminations, not "focused" on content. Yes, and it appears editors here , experiences editors, continue to need to be reminded of Wikipedia:Dispute resolution#Focus on content. The most important first step is to focus on content, and not on editors. Peace! NewbyG ( talk) 21:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Objection to the basis for this RFC

That whole bit about "helpful" came in with Collect's "copy edit" that i several times reverted as too big and complicated to review. What we're dealing with now is the fallout of a change to policy that was made without consensus, which included undiscussed provision masquerading as copy edits. We should talk about this notion, not just blame Noetica for trying to reduce the damage that was done by those saying they should have the right to change policy without consensus. Dicklyon (talk) 06:35, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

On further review, I see it was my fault. In trying to select portions of Collect's edit to make a sensible chunk, I accidentally copied this new "not helpful" idea from his "copy edit", in this edit. Perhaps I can try to repair...though it does seem clear that on a policy page consensus for change needs to be established before a change is made, and that when it's not, anyone should be able to revert pointing that out. Dicklyon (talk) 06:40, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

OK, I took out the most contentious bit, which was trying to say that an objection and edit summary of "no consensus" is never a good idea. On policy pages, it may in fact be the most logical expression of the exact problem with an edit, and directs the editor to go to the talk page and work out a consensus. But that may also be true on non-policy pages sometimes; this is not a good place to try to when it may or may not be "helpful" or otherwise appropriate. Dicklyon (talk) 06:51, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

And of course I realize that someone will probably revert me, saying "no consensus" or something effectively equivalent, in which case we can continue to work on it here, perhaps in a more appropriate new neutral RFC. Dicklyon (talk) 06:52, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

By the way, the provision in question descends from this edit by Triona, 5 Sept. 2011, that brought the essay into the policy (User:Triona retired later that month). There is no discussion of this edit, nor of the essay, on the talk page in the months before and after the edit, so I presume it snuck in unnoticed. In a policy page, that's the kind of potentially bad thing that can happen when one doesn't confirm consensus for a change, and it often comes back to bite later. Dicklyon (talk) 07:08, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

This explanation seems reasonable, and the edits also, we have sorted this out now, yes? So the discussion continues below, and the Rfc can run its course. We can however lose the unnecessary badge on the project page, soon, yes? NewbyG ( talk) 09:54, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to see the disputed/discussion tag removed. The dispute here is so fine, on an issue of editing etiquette, it is absurd to make it looed like "Reaching consensus through editing" is disputed. Or is it the further information that is disputed. This dispute is a really weird left-field dispute that I guess I can't understand because I haven't read some related arb case? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 10:55, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
I have no particular opinion on Collect's edit to that section. I only object to Noetica's efforts to to declare that the helpfulness of any given set of words depends on the template at the top of the page. Either an edit summary helps the editors understand the real problems with their changes, or it doesn't. It's silly to claim that the same couple of words have far more meaning on policy pages.
As for whether "on a policy page consensus for change needs to be established before a change is made," WP:POLICY says you're wrong—at least, if by "established before" you mean "discussed on the talk page in advance", and if by "change" you mean "substantive change" (so few of us want to discuss changes to, e.g., interwiki links in advance). I've made a number of bold edits even to contentious policy pages that clearly do have consensus, e.g., [5][6], because the changes have persisted, even though you won't find "documentation" of consensus being "established" on the talk page. The whole section here is about achieving consensus through bold edits, and the actual process is the same for policy pages as it is for articles.
To be clear, IMO most bold edits to policy pages should be reverted—but they should be reverted because they aren't actually improvements (writing good policy is harder than the average editor believes), not because consensus wasn't "established" in writing in advance. IMO a bold editor of a policy page is far less likely to be successful than a bold editor of an article, but both pages may be boldly changed, and when they've screwed up, both editors benefit from a useful explanation of how they screwed up, not merely a "you forgot to say Mother May I? first" response. WhatamIdoing (talk) 17:58, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Rules and practice are different standards. What is not a violation of policy may be a bad practice. A reasonable editor who doesn't want to be disruptive would likely think it's a good practice to discuss matters with other editors before making a substantive change on a policy page. This talk page occasionally gets a note from an editor frustrated with the absence of a consistent standard; clearly it serves our purposes here to maintain stable policies so the editors can work productively. --Ring Cinema (talk) 18:12, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

It would be good to at least keep the actual history in mind if there are things you object to. The concept of "except policy pages" originally came in here in 2009 in the essay Wikipedia:Don't revert due solely to "no consensus". When Collect's "not helpful" comment was added to the policy page (by me, due to insufficient care), it didn't include that limitation. So when Noetica put it in, with edit summary "Without endorsing this content, I simply quote an important qualification from the essay that is linked: "... except possibly on pages that describe long-standing Wikipedia policy"; highly relevant HERE! ", he wasn't saying he preferred exactly that wording, just that the "not helpful" should come with the previously negotiated qualification. Personally, I thought it was awkward, and indicated that the whole concept of "not helpful" was not helpful; that's a far cry from what WhatamIdoing's distortion, " Noetica's efforts to declare that the helpfulness of any given set of words depends on the template at the top of the page". I think we've settled on doing without the "not helpful" for now, so that's progress. I also unlinked the essay, which may or may not be a good idea. In general, I support the point that Ring Cinema makes: we need more stability in policies than we need in articles. Does anyone disagree? Dicklyon (talk) 02:52, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

"Stability for stability's sake" is not in any Wikipedia core principle - nor do I think it ought to be added. Collect (talk) 03:07, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

discussion

Editors should use useful edit summaries. For edits of substance, generic edit summaries are not so useful, as they fail to highlight the substance of the matter. This applies equally to the reversion of a good faith substantive edit. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 05:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Horses for courses. Generally, I am satisfied with the trimming and explanation with the latest edits and posts on this matter. Moving in the right direction. Let's keep focused on "useful" edit summaries, helpful was too strong, yes? NewbyG ( talk) 09:03, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I think this is a form of policy creep... "Helpfulness" and "usefulness" are not things we can or should discuss in policy. Sure, an extensive edit summary is more helpful and useful than a short one, but a short edit summary such as "no consensus" is more helpful and useful than no edit summary at all. And the fact is, there is no requirement that editors give any form of edit summary.

If you make a bold edit, and it is reverted with what you consider to be an "unhelpful" or "not useful" edit summary (or reverted with no edit summary at all)... the solution is simple: ask for an explanation or clarification on the talk page. That is what the talk page is for. Blueboar (talk) 13:47, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for making this point. The editors are better at figuring out what is helpful, I would say. --Ring Cinema (talk) 13:49, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

Reverts to the project page March 2012

Not convinced by this argument which accompanies a second attempt to restore this fruitless and un-neccesary "tag". Peace! NewbyG ( talk) 00:25, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

I also find it unconvincing. I can see no matter of substance at the level of policy that is in dispute. The dispute concerns a matter that is not integral to the policy, but is included only for completeness, for the likely audience of newcomers who are very likely to find pointer to Wikipedia:Concensus. I see instead a semantic dispute here that has spilled from elsewhere. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 01:06, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

Isn't the point here that an editor is trying to change this page to smuggle in a change he wants on another page? That's my understanding, although I haven't looked at it carefully. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:25, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

That would be irrelevant. Editors who edit this page, edit this page. Bringing other disputes from other pages to this page is NOT on. They can't do it and get away with it. Ignore them, and just edit this page, or if it doesn't need editing, leave it alone. Peace! NewbyG ( talk) 05:29, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

I also think the tag inappropriate, especially since it makes it appear that the entire section is disputed. {{Under discussion-inline}} might be acceptable (although the particular phrase being discussed has since been removed), but definitely not the whole-section tag.

Additionally, the hidden comment that editors "should not" edit the entire section until the ArbCom case is closed is simply a made-up rule. There is no policy or guideline that requires editors to stop working on a section merely because it was mentioned on an ArbCom page. That sentence should also be removed. WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:54, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

No consensus resulting in change

Ring, I don't understand why "A lack of consensus does not always result in no change being made to the page" seems misleading to you, even though you acknowledge that it is accurate. The ==No consensus== section gives multiple instances of when "no consensus" results in change, notably including:

Disputed external links are always removed (that's "a change made to the page", right?).
Contentious matter about BLPs is normally removed (that's also "a change made to the page").

So what exactly is misleading about saying that "A lack of consensus does not always result in no change being made to the page"? How does telling nothing more than the truth mislead editors? WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:22, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree. Without your edit, the reader reads on and sees that sometimes no consensus results in a change in some narrow circumstances. However, with your edit, they might not read on and think that no consensus might mean a change is good based on whatever context they think applies. In sum, I am considering tendentious readings of your sentence. In general, no consensus is not a justification for change and I don't think we should undermine that with material that can be lifted out of context. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:06, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

If there's no consensus, then whether a change should be made or not depends on the kind of change being discussed. "No consensus means no change" is a common misconception, and IMO this policy ought to de-bunk common misconceptions about consensus. No consensus often means no change, but it does not always mean no change. (That's why the word "always" appeared in that sentence.) Would you be satisfied with something like "A lack of consensus usually, but does not always, result in no change being made to the page"? WhatamIdoing (talk) 06:40, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

"A lack of consensus results in no change, with the exception of the cases mentioned below." Would that be acceptable to you? --Ring Cinema (talk) 19:16, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

If I believed that the list of "cases mentioned below" was actually an exhaustive list, then sure. But these are really just examples that happened to occur to us over the last couple of months, and for all I know, there's another half-dozen cases defined in other policies or guidelines that also follow this no-consensus-means-change result. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:48, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

A side discussion on "no consensus"

One of the more frustrating (and contentious) situations on Wikipedia is when there is "no consensus to keep things as they are", but also "no consensus for a specific suggested language designed to replace it" (ie situations where there is general agreement that there is a problem with the "current wording" and so something needs to change... but no one can agree on what to change it to.) Because there is "no consensus" on how to fix the problem (with each saying that someone else's attempt to fix it has "no consensus") the original problematic version often ends up being retained under the "no consensus means no change" rule, and can never be fixed. Some guidance is needed. Blueboar (talk) 16:57, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps the first step is to agree to strike the incorrect language. So it's a two step solution. 1, do we agree this passage should go? Then do it. 2, can we agree on a good replacement? "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent." --Ring Cinema (talk) 19:22, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

You presuppose the contended language is incorrect. Under your proposal, "no consensus" can then be simply invoked by any editor who wishes to delete (correct) content they personally object to. I would suggest incremental change as an alternative, but even there I have seen editors introduce POV content originally proposed and reverted (no consensus) bu doing it slowly over a number of weeks or months. In most cases I have found that "no consensus means no change" works to the benefit, not detriment, of an article where it's been stable for some time, which stability is disrupted by new contentiousness. I'm not sure there's a better solution, as you can't assume the content in dispute is either "correct" or "incorrect." VєсrumЬа ►TALK 03:33, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

That's not what I said at all. The premise is that there is agreement to make a change, not the situation you describe. ----Ring Cinema (talk) 16:54, 4 March 2012 (UTC)71.34.36.94

My question really concerns reaching a consensus on policy pages where there is general agreement that the current wording is flawed and needs to be replaced... but no agreement over what wording to replace it with. I have seen this happen several times in various policy page discussions, and it is very frustrating. Blueboar (talk) 17:08, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Ring, yes, but how often does that actually happen? Seems to me that usually if not always at least one side in a dispute would prefer the status quo over nothing. They might agree it could be improved (what couldn't be?), but that doesn't mean they would agree to striking the current language simply because everyone agrees it's imperfect. We could wipe clean every policy page on that basis. --Born2cycle (talk) 17:14, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

You changed the premise, so what I said has nothing to do with that. Blueboar's premise begins with agreement to make a change, not a disagreement about making a change. --Ring Cinema (talk) 18:50, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

Ring, it seems to me that the scenario you outline is something like this:

There's a general agreement that half the page should be improved, i.e., to replace half the page with something better.
There's no agreement about how to improve that half-page of content or which of several proposals is actually better than the old, disliked version.
So we'll just blank it and have nothing.

Is that what you're talking about? WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:52, 4 March 2012 (UTC)

No, I'll go even further. I think that if all they can agree on is the word 'The' then everything else should be cut and the only word in the article should be the word 'The'. Yeah, right. Reductios used to be a waste of time, but they're back, absurdum and all. I guess I missed the part where Blueboar said that half the article was in dispute. Since you're the only one who read it carefully, could you please run down that quote for us? --Ring Cinema (talk) 04:14, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Seemed like a fair application of the underlying principle to a hypothetical situation to me. Anyway, let's try this.

There's a general agreement that a particular statement should be improved, i.e., to replace the statement with something better.
There's no agreement about how to improve that statement, or which of several proposals is actually better than the old, disliked version.
So we'll just blank it (or literally ~~strike~~ it?) until and if we come up with something to replace it with which consensus supports.

Is that what you're talking about? --Born2cycle (talk) 07:02, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

When you say "general agreement", do you mean there is consensus? --Ring Cinema (talk) 14:18, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

I won't speak for Born2... but I was talking about a true consensus (i.e. all but unanimity). To lay out the scenario clearly:

There is a consensus that a particular section or statement of a policy/guideline is flawed should be improved... a consensus exists to replace the section of statement with something better.
There is also a consensus that the policy needs to cover the particular policy point in question (i.e. we can't simply "not mention it")
But there is no consensus about how to improve the section or statement... endless talk page discussions ensue... editor after editor makes suggestion after suggestion in an effort to find common ground, but every suggestion that is proposed raises objections by somebody. Stalemate ensues.

What I am asking is: how do we break the stalemate? Blueboar (talk) 15:31, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

So there is consensus that XYZ should be replaced, but there is not consensus on AYZ or BYZ to replace it. It is significant whether or not X is false. I assume there is agreement that all false statements should be cut, so you must be considering a case where X is not false, but simply out of bounds (inadequate or rhetorically inferior, e.g.). Is that right? --Ring Cinema (talk) 17:18, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

I too am interpreting and using "general agreement" and "consensus" (in the WP sense... not necessarily unanimity) interchangeably.

Yes, there is consensus that X is problematic in some significant way and the need to improve it is strong, but probably not outright false (because, as you say, in that case there would probably be no issue about removing it).

It seems to me that in such cases at least one side would strongly prefer to have X (flawed as it is) over nothing. What you seem to be proposing in such situation is to delete or strike the section or statement that everyone agrees is problematic never-the-less. I don't know. It seems to me that in such cases XYZ might actually be the compromise between AYZ and BYZ, as side A presumably prefers AYZ over XYZ, but XYZ over BYZ, and side B prefers BYZ over XYZ, but XYZ over AYZ. That is, while AYZ and BYZ are each a first choice for one side, they also the 3rd choice for one side, while XYZ is the 2nd choice for both. And if XYZ is preferred over nothing by at least one side if not both, then at best it's just as likely to be better than nothing than it is to be worse. --Born2cycle (talk) 19:42, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Looking forward, looking back

Changes to the project page since 20 May 2008. A lot of different words, a lot of words the same. A few more bytes. Does anyone here think they can remember if WP:Consensus was better or worse appreciated back then? 'Bout the same, I think. The project page is still doing its job, yes. NewbyG ( talk) 06:49, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Consensus determinations

I have boldly removed the sentence from the "Determining consensus" section which heretofore read:

If the editors involved in a discussion are not able to agree on where the consensus lies, the determination is made by any uninvolved editor in good standing.

Having recently dealt with it at this discussion at the Dispute Resolution Noticeboard, I had reason to consider its implications and effects. I believe it to be deficient, if not pernicious, in two primary ways:

1. In an atmosphere where the community has never been willing to allow binding content arbitration or other binding content decisions, this provision does so in this instance. Not only does it do so, it allows it by a single, albeit uninvolved, user's decision with no opportunity for wider community evaluation or input. For example, though users are allowed to evaluate consensus for the purpose of closing Articles for deletion nominations, it is only after the solicitation of wide community input through listing them at AfD and even then the closing user's decision is subject to review through Deletion review. Here there's none of that: a single user with no neutrality or experience qualifications can make a determination which, by all appearances, is binding on all parties and which is not subject to any kind of review by the community, making it also vulnerable to canvassing and gaming the system. While such deficiencies can, of course, be corrected, it will be at the price of erecting an entirely new set of procedures and, likely, venues, which brings me to my next point.

2. How was consensus determined before this provision was added to this policy? (History: The deleted provision was discussed here, added here, and modified here to remove the suggestion that an admin ought to ordinarily make consensus determinations.) The discussion at the time this language was added implied that there was no determination or that determination was circular, requiring in effect a consensus about consensus. That discussion failed to recognize that in fact the absence of any procedure to determine consensus enforces the very notion of consensus: the existence or absence of consensus is something that should be so obvious that anyone editing against consensus is so clearly engaged in disruptive or tendentious editing that they will almost certainly be sanctioned if they persist in it. If there is any substantial doubt that sanctions would result, then consensus does not exist. To say it differently, we do not need a process to make consensus determinations because we already have one: ANI.

Regards, TransporterMan (TALK) | DR goes to Wikimania! 20:38, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Actually, our process for determining consensus is at WP:CLOSE, not ANI. ANI is only about incidents that require admin support, which does not include all forms of consensus. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:59, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Making more of a philosophical than practical distinction: Since WP:CLOSE is not a policy or guideline, it is not binding on anyone and the closer's decisions should not be, at the end of the day, any more than merely one more opinion in the consensus melange. To the extent that it has any additional weight, it should only be because it is made by a neutral party. (Just as the opinions rendered in dispute resolution also have persuasive but non-authoritative weight for that reason.) A decision at ANI (or similar forum) on whether or not a user who persists in editing against an apparent consensus is engaged in disruptive editing and is subject to sanction, is where, ultimately, the consensus determination will be finally made (or at least as finally as anything ever gets around here). Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) | DR goes to Wikimania! 21:32, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

The dramaboards are among the worst places in the project to attempt to find "consensus". Nikkimaria (talk) 22:02, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

I find I agree with every word here from TransporterMan. “If the editors involved in a discussion are not able to agree on where the consensus lies, the determination is made by any uninvolved editor in good standing” is not how we work. This sentence describes a loosely empowered “drive-by random dictator”. It is a method that has merits, the closed thing described in mainspace seems to be Random ballot. While it serves very well as a tiebreaker, it is a dangerous method. In this situation, it invites sockpuppets, meatpuppets and team taggers. It excuses the drive-by random dictator from having to defend his position, or demonstrate awareness in depth of the issues, because his action is authorised by a line in policy. It could encourage a culture of drive-by, superficial, arbitrary content-decision enforcement.

Neither WP:ANI nor WP:CLOSE involve determinations of consensus. WP:ANI deals with specific, behind-mainspace issues, usually involving specific editors. WP:ANI does not directly intervene in questions of content. WP:CLOSE does describe judging consensus, but this is only in the easy special cases where it means declaring and articulating an already demonstrated consensus. Beyond that, we have “rough consensus”, which is a different thing. Although WP:Rough consensus is appropriately linked from here, WP:Rough consensus is not a special case of WP:Consensus. WP:Rough consensus is about, universally I believe, closing a discussion that needs to be closed with a binary decision. Examples include deletion discussions, rename discussions, block/unblock discussions, privilege assignment discussions (RfA, RfB, RBA). As WP:Consensus is policy with direct application to content, more care should be taken to not generalise non-content decision making into content decision making.

Instead, the determination of where consensus lies can only be made with time, retrospectively. If the past decision works, and is unchallenged or not successfully challeneged, or if everyone continues to support the past decision, then the past decision represents consensus. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 22:46, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, do say. Sortition (found right at the bottom of random ballot) is an even more interesting proposition, philosophically, given a suitable context, rarely occurs. For instance, every seven years, let the May Queen or Best actor reign as absolute King, for say six months only, something like that. Then back to boring old 50-50 split elections. And so on NewbyG ( talk) 23:56, 5 March 2012 (UTC)

Coming in late here, sorry. I was the one who brought this specific case to DRN (where I hoped that a clerk would determine consensus, but never mind). This was a situation in which there seemed to be no policy arguments, or indeed guideline, but was a subjective argument about whether an article should be in a specific category, in this case a category that prevented an article from being in a WMF pilot. The editor who originally placed the tag reverted anyone who removed it and it was my opinion that they were in a minority of one and that a number of editors disagreed. Transporterman, follwing the bit in the guideline he's now removed, maintained that the guideline required someone uninvolved to somehow appear and make a decision. Frankly, this seems pretty ridiculous. We need a way to stop one person from preventing action on an article when there are no policy or clear guideline provisions being breached. Dougweller (talk) 10:25, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

However, the weight of sheer numbers does not outweigh the strength of arguments (per WP:NOTAVOTE). After all, that's just asking for things like canvassing. Nikkimaria (talk) 12:43, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Sorting the See Also section

The see also section contains quite a lot; Wikipedia:Staying cool when the editing gets hot should be linked somewhere, then removed from see also. Any other editors care to discuss whether some items need sorting? NewbyG ( talk) 22:44, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

No, on second thought the list appears about right, with fourteen items and also three articles linked there. NewbyG ( talk) 18:05, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

The text appears to offer little guidance when there is no concensus

When there is no consensus the text:

In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations, a lack of consensus commonly results in no change being made to the article at this time. However, for contentious matter related to living people, a lack of consensus often results in the removal of contentious matter.

Offers little guidance as it only states what is commonly done. To decide whether to remove the additions after a non-consensus determination itself requires consensus. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:30, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Is this one of those situations where there is debate (ie no consensus) as to whether a consensus exists? Blueboar (talk) 16:07, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Not quite, I'm thinking of the situation where text is removed following some concerns. If there is no consensus, let's say for arguments sake as determined by an admin close, then should the text be re-inserted or should it stay out? To do one or the other appears to need consensus or firm policy to say what should be done. There appears to be only general guidelines for this situation for what is done most often. Perhaps the language used should be toughened to say that in in all normal situations x should be done. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:40, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

I support, first choice, leaving the provision as it is now, i.e. without "commonly" in the first sentence and with no second sentence, but if there is a strong feeling that something about BLP is needed, how about, second choice, "In discussions of textual additions or editorial alterations a lack of consensus results in no change being made to the article, except in the case of contentious matter related to living people in which case [[WP:BLP|other rules]] may apply." That way we don't have to get into the issue about unsourced being one case (in which consensus is irrelevant) and no consensus for sourced being another. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) | DR goes to Wikimania! 19:09, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

I don't think we can make firm rules on this. A lot depends on the specific situation, and the specific question that is being asked when attempting to determine consensus... was the question focused more on removal, or focused more on inclusion? (ie were editors asked if there was a "consensus to remove", or were they instead asked if there was a "consensus to include". It's subtle, but these are not quite the same question. How you ask a question often influences the answers you get... and thus the action you should take based on those answers.) Another factor is whether the challenged material has been in the article for a long time, or was just recently added. Blueboar (talk) 19:28, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, but in which case is the lack of consensus a reason to make a change? I think those cases are the exceptions, not the rule. --Ring Cinema (talk) 00:41, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

It's more complicated than that. Even deciding which version is "the change" and which version is "no change" can be impossible. I think we can state, as a general observation of fact, that (in the easy cases) no consensus means no change for most types of article content, and no inclusion for BLP-regulated article content. But that's about it: a general description of the facts, and an acknowledgement that it's not always done this way. WhatamIdoing (talk) 01:39, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

To continue from my last comment (and perhaps answer Ring's question)... my take is that if the material has been in the article for a long time, then "a no-consensus" determination should essentially be read as a "no-consensus to remove", and we should default to the long standing version - with the material. However, if the material has just recently been added, then a "no-consensus" should be read as being a "no-consensus to add". Again, we should default to the long standing version - in this case the version without the material. In other words, for a non-BLP a "no-consensus" over whether to keep/remove material defaults to the older version (which may or may not include the material). The exception to this is a BLP, where we take a more cautious stance... if there is no-consensus as to whether material is appropriate or not... take it out. Blueboar (talk) 22:55, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Assuming, of course, that there is any such "long-standing version", which there might not be, and that said "long-standing version" isn't impossibly flawed, e.g., a copyvio.

Ring, the simplest case for "the lack of consensus is a reason to make a change" is possible spam: all disputed external links get removed unless and until there is a positive consensus to include them. So in the case of a true no-consensus discussion about an external link, we always make a change by removing the disputed link. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:04, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

The default

The default in "no consensus" is the path of least prohibitions; after all, we are free to edit (subject to ArbCom rulings and Office Actions, we set our own rules - including WP:IAR). So it should be made clear that lack of consensus means that: for admin actions, the community in not deciding to approve it, decides as a community to take it back from the admin and undo what he/she has done (block, delete, lock, whatever) - so that freedom of action is enhanced. In deletions, we default to keep - because that too enhances freedom of the community. In rules, absent consensus to retain the rule, it goes - because that too enhances freedom of the community. We don't give precedent or who gets there first any real weight when a question of whether there is consensus to retain it is made. The only real exception seems to be English variety usage (where first variety seems to be default absent a strong reason to favor another variety, which no doubt garnered consensus to forestall endless edit wars that add nothing to the encyclopedia). I see little support for keeping any rule absent a current consensus to keep it; hence, rules and policies don't need consensus to be changed: they need to show current consensus to maintain their current form and where consensus is not shown, the rule is relaxed or removed to the extent that there is no consensus to maintain it. The wording should reflect that. Something like "Rules of prohibition (including deletion, blocking, and locking) must be established by consensus; they are only effective so long as there is current consensus to maintain them as written or employed. To the extent that there is a lack of consensus to maintain the rule or maintain the rule in certain situations, the rule to that extent is not valid and the prohibition should be removed (or the certain situation documented as an exception to the rule) to prevent the enforcement of a rule lacking consensus." Carlossuarez46 (talk) 19:20, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

In the spirit of the above post, and that we document in Wikipedia policies what best practice can be discerned at present : that is policy pages reflect the best consensus we can discern and the page does not determine policy, until it is followed, it is a guide.

Ah, no change to the current words there then, and my second preference to the above preliminary draft. We do not appear to have a formed consensus here at the moment for instance on this ticklish matter, perhaps further discussion will unearth a pearl. NewbyG ( talk) 19:49, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

If I understand you correctly, you assume that consensus will always favor freedom for others, Carlossuarez. That is probably not going to stand up to scrutiny unless consensus is identified with unanimity. Many prohibitions preserve freedom and other positive values. Some rules guarantee freedom. Some freedoms are rightly circumscribed in the service of our mission or norms. So, I wouldn't necessarily accept that any proscription requires continuous consensus. An established rule should be preserved until there is a consensus to remove it. --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:02, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Which prohibitions, absent consensus, guarantee freedom here? Carlossuarez46 (talk) 22:30, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Carlos, I'm not sure whether you are proposing a change here or are asserting that this is the way that it is already done. The idea that "In rules, absent consensus to retain the rule, it goes" would seem to fly in the face of the longstanding statement at Wikipedia:Consensus#Level_of_consensus that, "Wikipedia has a higher standard of participation and consensus for changes to policies and guidelines than to other types of articles. This is because they reflect established consensus, and their stability and consistency are important to the community." The position you've quoted means that anyone can challenge any policy or guideline and if no consensus forms to keep it, then it goes, notwithstanding issues of whether the challenge was merely overlooked or that people thought it too silly or too unlikely to be supported to comment on it, among other reasons that consensus to retain it might not come together. To allow that is contrary to the notion that stability and consistency are important. Best regards, TransporterMan (TALK) | DR goes to Wikimania! 22:49, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Carlos' bold-faced text above strikes me as a statement of how he wishes it worked, not a statement of the way that it is already done. It isn't done this way: the English Wikipedia does not favor freedom for volunteers. It favors the status quo. Removing an existing prohibition requires every bit as much consensus as establishing a new one. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:06, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

For Policy and guideline changes... there are really three outcomes in any discussion over change: 1) Solid consensus supporting a proposed change, 2) Solid consensus opposed to a proposed change, and 3) "No consensus". My take is that a "No consensus" means that the long standing version no longer enjoys a solid consensus. It should be seen as an indication that a change is needed... but not the specific change that was proposed. So policy editors must continue to work towards a version that does gain a positive consensus. The "long standing" version is "default" retained pending the emergence of a new version with a clear consensus (but the long standing version should also be tagged with "under discussion", so editors arriving at the page know that concerns exist and are being discussed.)

That said... all this implies that an actual discussion took place. One person disagreeing with a policy or guideline is not enough to say there is "no consensus". Blueboar (talk) 23:35, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

It's interesting to note that many policies and guidelines originated and were adopted without any consensus - and moreover, nearly all of them have not had each and every provision discussed and consensus secured. Requiring a new and different consensus to overturn a prior one is WP:BUREAUCRACY and would purely be a demonstration that policies and guidelines are to be retained solely because they once had consensus. We don't do that generally at WP. For example: A consensus forms to delete an article at WP:AFD. It reappears, in exact form, is nominated for deletion and this time no consensus is reached. Guess what - we don't revert to the prior consensus (deletion); we keep the article! Another example, if an article was once considered a featured article, but upon discussion the current version cannot achieve a consensus that the article remains FA - it loses its FA status, rather than relying upon prior consensus to retain it. Why do we do this? I submit, this is because, without consensus any rule we impose upon ourselves loses its validity. Our guidelines are not a law book that accumulates useless rules that have no pertinence or applicability.

The reason why consensus cannot be achieved may be because none of the choices the community considered at the time was strong enough - and as Blueboar says, something may need changing, but not necessarily to what was on offer at the moment. A cautionary note should be placed in the policy or guideline to reflect that community's lack of consensus on what to do and alert those so inclined from relying on the policy or guideline to restrict other editors' freedom/block them/or delete things based upon it - until such time as consensus emerges on what to change it to. And I wholeheartedly agree with Blueboar that consensus is not imposed by one nor precluded by non unanimous support. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 01:22, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

What you are describing, Carlos, is the simple fact that consensus can change. This fact means that something could well have enjoyed a strong community consensus at one point in the past... and yet may no longer enjoy a strong consensus today. Blueboar (talk) 01:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

That consensus is not unanimity has been stated in the first paragraph for a long time. I think we are all aware of that from reading the policy page. I don't exactly agree that this project has elements that lack consensus. I am pretty sure that is false. Neither do I agree that policies and guidelines are retained solely because they once had consensus; to the contrary, that is exactly what the policies reflect: the products of past consensus. Virtually every page on Wikipedia enjoys either a consensus or isn't edited. (FA status is not lost because of lack of consensus; rather "Featured articles can only be demoted through a consensus derived through discussion at the Featured article review page." (See here.) So a new consensus changes the status.) For good reasons, changes to Wikipedia pages require consensus of the editors. Any time there is not a consensus, there is always the possibility of forming a consensus later. --Ring Cinema (talk) 02:22, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Policies and guidelines were originated

many policies and guidelines originated and were adopted without any consensus

This is false. If there was no consensus to adopt these pages, then the pages would not have remained tagged as policies and guidelines. What you probably mean is something like "many policies and guidelines originated and were adopted without any long discussions on their talk pages, in which dozens of editors !voted on specific questions like 'Shall we tag this page as a policy?', so that there would be written documentation of the community's views (at that time) available to editors in the future."

You don't need written documentation of the existence of a consensus to have an actual consensus. If you do something sensible, and (nearly) everyone agrees with you (as proven by the fact that they saw what you did and never objected or reverted it), then there is actually a valid consensus for your actions. It's the community's agreement, not the discussion, that makes the consensus exist.

Let me give you a concrete and currently contentious example: Last year, someone tried to claim that there had never been consensus to include the phrase "verifiability, not truth" at WP:V, because he couldn't find written proof of a discussion about it in WT:V's archives before the phrase was added. There certainly was a consensus to include that phrase: it was added and remained there for years, on a page currently watched by more than 1,400 editors. Merely existing in such circumstances is proof that there was a valid consensus for that particular phrase (back then: the consensus may well have changed since then). Discussion is not necessary for consensus; agreement is. If you've got agreement, no matter how that agreement is expressed (including silently), then you have consensus. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:20, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

You don't always need written documentation of consensus - but long standing material that has been out there in a certain way does not necessarily mean that consensus ever gelled in that direction. No doubt the various pages at issue in the Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Abortion_article_titles are watched by lots of wikipedians but alas, no one would be having a RFC requested by ARBCOM if there were consensus on the naming of those articles. I also dispute that a page currently watched by 1,400 editors has any real bearing on whether there was consensus back then when it wasn't watched by 1,400 editors. In any event, the issue is what to do when there is no consensus "now" - regardless of whether there had been in the past - and the trend at WP is to remove impediments that no longer enjoy consensus. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:30, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

I simply do not agree that the trend at WP is to remove impediments that no longer enjoy consensus. It would be just as true to say that the trend is to remove freedoms that no longer enjoy consensus. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:04, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, both cases can certainly be asserted and argued. NewbyG ( talk) 22:27, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm not seeing that; give some examples where freedoms are curtailed even when there is no consensus to curtail them (absent as I have said ARBCOM & Office Actions, which are not community self-regulation). Carlossuarez46 (talk) 17:31, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

How could there be such examples when decisions of all kinds are made by consensus? Similarly, removing prohibitions requires consensus, not simply the absence of a consensus to retain them (whatever that might mean in practice, which practice itself would be problematic to define). --Ring Cinema (talk) 00:55, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

The community sets its own rules. The rules remain solely while the community has consensus to retain them; not until there is a consensus to remove them. This is clear by all manners in which we do things here. No prohibition without consensus is valid. Freedoms need no consensus; it's the encyclopedia that anyone can edit; we don't need consensus to permit someone to edit. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:02, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Everything needs consensus. To give an example of a freedom being removed for lack of consensus, editors once had the freedom not to source BLPs. We no longer do—because there was no longer a consensus that this freedom is desirable. WhatamIdoing (talk) 03:50, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

All changes are made by consensus, including changes to rules and policies instituted by consensus. There's not a special category of "freedom" that operates differently or requires some kind of perpetual consensus to maintain. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:07, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

We are talking about two different things here... 1) determining whether proposed language has gained consensus, and thus should be added, or 2) determining whether preexisting language has lost consensus, and thus should be removed. Carlos seems to be talking about the latter. Blueboar (talk) 18:28, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, which is what the guidance we need to document in "no consensus" situations, which is what this whole chat is about. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 21:49, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
- The only confusion may be that case 2 is not a situation where any action is in order. First a proposal would have to be made to remove the passages and then the usual consensus policy operates. If there's not a consensus to remove, no change and the passages remain; if the proposal has a consensus, then it's removed. That is not the situation described by Carlossuarez, who seems to posit a category of "freedom" that is subject to a different form. Not only is there not such an exception, I have no idea how that category would be defined if we wanted to make it policy. --Ring Cinema (talk) 05:07, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Actually, that's bureaucracy not WP. Nothing is written in stone until something of a sand blast of consensus rewrites it. Rather it is written and remains so only so long as consensus remains to keep it. There is no status quo which needs to change to change the wording of policies. Let's say we have a policy that says "Never use the word 'ain't". Let's even say a consensus adopted it. Let's say that an editor or editors claims that the policy no longer has consensus and wants to use 'ain't'. The policy is discussed to see if there is consensus: if there is NO CONSENSUS; the prohibitive policy is removed - those who want to "change it" needn't muster a consensus to change it, but merely show that the policy no longer enjoys consensus support. Consensus can change also means that consensus may dissolve. Only a bureaucracy enshrines and perpetuates rules solely because they currently exist and WP:NOT#BUREAUCRACY. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 18:40, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Sure, but the converse is also true: Let's say we have a policy that says "You have the freedom to use the word 'ain't" whenever you want". Let's even say a consensus adopted it. Let's say that an editor or editors claims that the policy no longer has consensus and wants to remove ain't from all articles. The policy is discussed to see if there is consensus: if there is NO CONSENSUS, then the freedom-loving policy is removed.

It's exactly the same standard for both "freedoms" and "prohibitions". WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:02, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Not so. All is permitted save that which isn't. A positive statement that you have freedom to do X that loses its consensus IS NOT a decision that the freedom is gone; because freedom is the default. After all, I see no consensus that User:WhatamIdoing may edit? Can I now block you since there is no consensus - hardly. LOL. Rules that constrain us are of our own creation, and end absent consensus to continue them; those which free us are no more than restating the obvious, which remains until we decide to constrain ourselves by consensus - whether still written or not. Carlossuarez46 (talk) 20:25, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry but you're mistaken. If 'ain't' is forbidden by consensus, permitting 'ain't' only happens by a new consensus. Prohibitions and freedoms (whatever that means, and I'm sure you couldn't explain the distinction) are treated the same. Changes from the status quo require consensus. --Ring Cinema (talk) 20:49, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Yes, that's right, because ain't or ain't ain't is a fairly trivial change, but it doesn't appear to be what user:Carlossuarez46 is getting at. Where we do strike a bit of trouble though is the situation described here, where an issue is discussed, a decision made, and then sometime later, a week, a month, a day, a certain number of editors begin to come to the conclusion that the decision may no longer enjoy consensus, and the issue must be discussed again. I will suggest that how often we can take the time to discuss again, and how many editors it takes to show that discussion is necessary, is not related to whether the decision signifies a "freedom"or a "prohibition", but rather the important factor to calculate is how difficult will it be if we have to change the decision? If it is easy to change tack, then we can debate often (if we want to); however, if the decision will be very difficult to reverse, then we have a "status quo" that has a lot going for it. NewbyG ( talk) 22:04, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

With respect, you are not defending Carlossuarez's position or making the same point. Sure, there may be cases where editors reconsider things. I've been in that situation and realized that I had to find like-minded editors and form a new consensus. That is not the same as saying, Hey, the consensus from February doesn't exist any more because here we are in March and we have an issue of freedom and therefore what we agreed to no longer applies. It doesn't work that way. That's just an editor whose word isn't good. And, of course, there is no special category of freedom that is an exception to some of the policies of consensus. --Ring Cinema (talk) 03:10, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

I thought Newbyguesses' "yes" meant that he agreed with you (Ring).

Carlos's assertion that "freedom is the default" is simply wrong. I doubt that any amount of talk here (or anywhere else, for that matter) will convince him that his view is not correct, though, so perhaps we should just stop talking about it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 11:43, 16 March 2012 (UTC)

I have been involved in editing policy pages for a long time now, and have discovered that consensus on policy does indeed change over time... a policy statement that used to have consensus might not have consensus anymore. However, such shifts in consensus happen slowly, and there is often a certain amount of time during which the community will be fairly evenly split as to its opinion on the policy statement in question. It is during this period that very heated debates take place, with both sides claiming that their view of the issue reflects consensus, and the other side's view does not reflect consensus. In fact, neither view reflects consensus, because at this point there simply IS no consensus. However, it is important to remember that "No consensus" does not mean the same thing as "Consensus against".

The problem is that consensus is a sliding scale... not a clear cut "yes/no" duality. At one end of that scale is a zone marked "''Consensus for X". At the other end is a zone marked "Consensus against X"... but there is a large grey zone between the two.... a zone marked "NO consensus about X". It is when a policy statement is in that middle zone that the contention arises. Blueboar (talk) 22:33, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Chaning the default action for "no consensus" blocks

The current wording here is "When actions by administrators are contested and the discussion results in no consensus either for the action or for reverting the action, the action is normally reverted." A proposal at Wikipedia talk:Blocking policy#Relisting seeks to change that (again). ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:22, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

New guideline proposal

Wikipedia:Avoiding talk-page disruption proposes a new guideline related to this one. Its adoption is presently under discussion using an RfC located here. Please comment. Brews ohare (talk) 16:07, 21 March 2012 (UTC)

Invitation to comment

Matters related to this article are discussed in the essay WP:Avoiding talk-page disruption and an RfC has been posted requesting comments here. Please provide your advice. Brews ohare (talk) 16:11, 1 April 2012 (UTC)

A request for assistance with a consensus matter

This is a content dispute, not discussion about the Consensus policy. Please discuss content on the article's talk page or one of the dispute resolution noticeboards.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 16:11, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I come here with a request:

Within a content dispute at Template:Music of Canada is nested another dispute over:

1) Whether or not the content currently in question ever had consensus to be there prior to the commencement of the present dispute.

The content was first added in June 2010. Approximately six months later (December 2010), it was challenged by being deleted, a move that was itself almost immediately countered, both by revert and at the talk page, by five editors (including myself), and had no supporters other than the editor who made the deletion. That editor backed off until making the same deletion again in July 2011 (which was again immediately reverted) and it stayed thusly until the same challenging editor made the same deletion in February 2012, sparking the current ongoing dispute.

Did the reverts and disputation of the deletion in December 2010 establish a consensus for inclusion of the material? And does the fact the material existed in the template for 19 months (except for the two aforementioned, quickly reverted deletions) give the material additional consensus through silence?

2) If, prior to the most recent challenge and resulting dispute, the material had consensus for inclusion, is it the status quo and should it stay in the template until a new consensus is established and that consensus is to delete it?

If some with experience with the rules surrounding consensus could provide answers to the above questions, it would help to significantly lessen the complexity of the overall content dispute at Template talk:Music of Canada. Comments are welcome there. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 20:55, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

Please don't fall for the false dilemma presented above. You have more choices than two and there is more evidence to explore than is presented above.

Six months, in terms of the template was two edits later, with the next edit nearly four months later. That removal was part of a clean-up of the template by a long-time editor of that article. M then restored it immediately as he is on Wikipedia promoting Monarchist and British POV onto Canadian articles on a daily basis. It was removed two hours after being restored. At this point it's the start of a content dispute and edit war with a third long-time editor referencing bold and revert. No discussion ensued but the editor who removed the entry returned and started another edit war over the item. Please view the background.

I contend at this point that an irregular contributor took issue with the addition immediately and was pushed out by regular editors. I became involved in February of this year when a third edit war ensued and the two editors were found in collusion on the editor's talk page over the subject.

For the record, I too am Canadian and am pro-monarchy, but am not a monarchist.

In short, MIESIANIACAL is claiming that silence is consensus, and the silence was created by two editors who appear to collude on the matter, or at least work together in some sort of cabal. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 21:24, 11 April 2012 (UTC)

I have little to disagree with what WG has said. → ROUX ₪ 08:03, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

This is not the right place for this discussion. On this talk page, we discuss the formation of the guidelines, not their implementation. --Ring Cinema (talk) 01:27, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

I didn't intend for the discussion to take place here; I've amended my opening message in order to (hopefully) clarify. There is no false dilemma here; the content dispute is truly getting bogged down with this seemingly endless debate over whether or not the disputed content ever had prior consensus to be there. --Ħ MIESIANIACAL 13:58, 12 April 2012 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Can an editor claim that "there is no consensus" when all legitimate concerns have been addressed?

Sometimes, I encounter a situation when one or several users continue to oppose some proposal even after their legitimate concern have been addressed. Below is a fictitious example of such a discussion between users A and B:

A: I propose to add the following sentence to the article:

"The rain in Spain stays only in the plains"

B: The proposed text is insatisfactory. It ignores the fact that rains happens in mountain regions of Spain also.

A: Yes, I think you are right. Let's replace "only" with "mostly".

B: I still think the proposed text is not an improvement.

A: What concretely is wrong with it?

(after few days)

A: Guys, does anyone have any objections agains addition of the proposed text to the article?

B: As I already said, there is no consensus to add it.

In my opinion, in a situation when all legitimate concerns have been addressed and the user B is not able to provide any fresh and clearly articulate arguments, we can speak about achievement of consensus (despite the fact that some users still don't like new text). Am I right?--Paul Siebert (talk) 17:46, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Your example is fatuous. I commend editors here to view the discussions st the actual article to weigh whether you have "consensus" for your proposed major change on an article which has a specific restriction that no edits may be made without prior consensus which you did not mention <g>. And that, IMHO, you have absolutely zero claim to a consensus when the majority of editors do not accept your claim. Talk:Mass_killings_under_Communist_regimes#Well... is the section at issue - where a majority of the editors opining oppose Paul's major proposed edit.

Note the clear notice at the top of the page: No editor may make edits to the article unless such edits are either minor edits as described at WP:Minor edit and marked as minor, reverts of obvious vandalism or an obvious WP:BLP violation, or have consensus as described below, and the edit summary contains a link to the talk page discussion establishing that consensus.

Note also Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement/Archive101#Collect where Paul was specifically told that So I would block Collect for a week for the two reverts listed at the top of the report, and block Paul Siebert for a month for filing a complaint where he was just as guilty as the other party by one admin, so Paul, by giving a an innocuous hypothet is forumshopping here. Cheers. Collect (talk) 18:21, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Yea, I agree with Collect here. You can't just declare consensus... that's rather exactly the opposite of what consensus means, actually. Consensus isn't about vote counting, after all.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 18:32, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Sorry, I am not sure I understand you. You say: "you cannot declare consensus", however, what about declaring that there is no consensus? Can anyone declare "there is no consensus for this change", without providing any reasonable explanation (or citing already addressed arguments)? The page says that "decision-making involves an effort to incorporate all editors' legitimate concerns", however, how do you propose to deal with a situation when all legitimate concerns have been addressed, by some users still disagree? Does it mean that the right of veto exists in Wikipedia?--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:36, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Your "proposed edit" is a 633% increase in the length of a section (3 lines to 22 lines, IIRC) of the article. Yes - it means you need a genuine "consensus" to add it to an article where you have been warned that adding without consensus will lead to a block. Cheers. Collect (talk) 19:00, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

This your post is more appropriate to the Talk:Mass killings under Communist regimes. Here we discuss much more general question. According to my understanding, when all my arguments have been addressed and refuted, I have no other choice than to accept the opponent's viewpoint. It is quite reasonable to expect the same behaviour from all parties.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:27, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Adding 19 lines to an article where one has been told not to edit without a vclear consensus appears to be the issue here. "Addressing all issues" elides the fact that several editors say that the added material does not belong in the article. This is not just a paper issue, Paul - it goes to the heart of CONSENSUS - and where the CONSENSUS is not to include material, that is still a valid consensus. Clear? Collect (talk) 19:30, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Paul, it's clearly obvious (to me, as an outside observer) that not all arguments have been addressed, let alone refuted, on either "side". To both of you: Quit talking about blocks and bans, and start actually talking to each other rather than trying to run one another off, and this should reach a conclusion that is satisfactory to everyone. That is consensus.
— V = IR (Talk • Contribs) 20:07, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Ohm's Law, if you talk about the MKuCR article, that is a wrong page for discussing it. My question is much more general, and the MKuCR article is just one (simply, the most recent) example. The purpose of this thread is to discuss the issue in general. Concretely, we need to choose between two options:

"If some user (or a group of users) continue to disagree with some thesis, we cannot speak about consensus, even if no fresh arguments are provided by those who disagrees", or
If all reasonable concerns raised by some user (or by a group) have been properly addressed, and the disagreeing party has no fresh arguments to present, a consensus is deemed achieved".

I prefer the option #2, because consensus is not a right of veto.--Paul Siebert (talk) 20:48, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

"Option 2" is contrary to Wikipedia policy, and is hence not an option. OL - my posts at the article talk page are civil and forthright. Adding 19 lines to an article which do not improve the article requires clear consensus for the edit, per the clear notice placed by Sandstein. Cheers. Collect (talk) 20:58, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Why, in your opinion, it is "contrary" to policy, which explicitly prohibits votes and speaks about addressing legitimate concerns (which implies that not all concerns are legitimate)?--Paul Siebert (talk) 21:01, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

Only if you say length, relevance, argumentation, propriety in section, relevance, etc. are not legitimate concerns, as had been made abundantly clear by just about all the other editors. Meanwile, the RfC is started - cheers. Collect (talk) 21:30, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

This your response seems to belong to a different talk page. Do you have anything to say regarding the subject of the current discussion?--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:09, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

You made an inapt claim which needed to be properly answered. Cheers. Collect (talk) 00:11, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

What claim?--Paul Siebert (talk) 00:16, 16 April 2012 (UTC)

Can an editor claim that "there is no consensus" when all legitimate concerns have been addressed?

Of course he can. He can also claim that the Moon is made of green cheese, that the Sun rises in the North, and any number of other things. It's not helpful, but he is capable of doing it, and Wikipedia generally handles this level of dispute poorly. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:49, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Big news

"The WMF has legal control over, and liability for, Wikipedia. " Where did this come from? Rich Farmbrough, 16:59, 4 May 2012 (UTC).

(disclaimer: I have no legal expertise whatsoever) I assume what is meant is that while users are responsible for their own contributions, WMF is obliged to take reasonable steps to ensure that we do not systemically act unlawfully, i.e. that policies, guidelines or other consensus decisions do not (unwittingly) direct users to do something unlawful. —WFC— 17:27, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

I rather think it is almost tautological - The WMF pays the bills - and so is the obvious entity which would get sued. The guy who pays the bills (i.e. has all the money) is the obvious candidate, no? Collect (talk) 17:32, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Here's the diff. Rich, do you believe that all or part of the statement is false, or are you wondering why this sentence is present on this page? WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:54, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

Pretty much that, they're on the line for user generated content maintenance. Standard case stuff here in the US, they are required to comply with DMCA notices and the like as the provider. That being said there's certainly got to be a better way to word that revision, maybe in the manner of citing the WMF's legal liability as the maintainer body of the site instead of in a manner that seems to say that all WMF member's edits are inviolable since my understanding has been that that's rarely the case. The current abstract seems counter to the idea of wikipedia, when in reality what it's trying to represent isn't in so stark a contrast. --Karek^words?! 19:53, 4 May 2012 (UTC)

WMF own the servers (that's largely why WMF was created). This gives them a certain measure of de facto control and responsibility, and legal control and responsibility.

They comply with DMCA notices.
Office actions are respected by the community
Some configuration goes through folk who are paid staff (and this is muddy - many of them have two hats anyway)

WMF do not control the content, it is substantially CCbySA or free. Content here includes a lot of technical stuff, like almost all the software, the templating system, the category system, etc.

WMF do not control the community (by and large - see image filter).

So what makes Wikipedia? The servers, the content, the community? Rich Farmbrough, 11:06, 5 May 2012 (UTC).

Legally - the guy who has the assets is the guy who gets sued. WMF is the owner of the physical assets. Collect (talk) 11:29, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Overriding consensus

FYI, there's an RFC proposal for overriding consensus, Wikipedia:The need for coordination.

Consensus may be a powerful tool in small to moderately large decisions, like most content disputes on individual article talk pages or the working of individual WikiProjects. It is also extremely beneficial in large cases, creating the necessary scrutiny and community attention necessary to ensure the validity of such important decisions. However, for the majority of decisions which affect a large part of the encyclopedia, the process of consensus is a needless waste of time which neither introduces much community scrutiny nor proves more efficient than a top-down process. Many legitimate ideas on the village pumps have debates that drag on for days, ultimately moved to archives where they will be lost in the mists of time forever. The encyclopedia does not change due to the unwieldiness of the consensus process when applied to these decisions.

See the talk page WT:The need for coordination for the discussion. 70.24.251.208 (talk) 05:28, 12 June 2012 (UTC)

Software

Under CONEXCEPT, it would not be unreasonable of us to point out that the WMF can and do change their software and server setups whenever they want, as well as that MediaWiki developers (a community that includes a few WMF staffers and a couple hundred volunteers) can and do change how the software works without consulting the en.wp editors. It might also be a reasonable place to point out that requests for such changes are handled through Bugzilla. What do you think? WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:21, 26 June 2012 (UTC)

Reducing bloat

It seems to me (and perhaps I'm alone in this opinion) that this policy has become very bloated. It's hard for me to read through it and digest its key points, and I've been here for 6 years. I can't imagine a new editor finding this policy, as written, particularly useful or comprehensible.

I'm wondering if we can streamline it. Reducing the verbiage will actually make the policy much clearer and easier to understand and interpret. In general terms, good writing usually starts with a clear set of ideas that one wants to communicate. The writing here is all over the place, and doesn't prioritize or clearly communicate its key points. One way to start tackling this might be to identify the key take-home points that we want to communicate, perhaps in bulleted form. We could then revise the policy to clearly and concisely convey them. Does anyone else see substantial room for improvement here, or is it just me? MastCell ^Talk 18:29, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

Agree. I think the only way to do this is for someone to create a subpage with a rewrite proposal. That gets reviewed/edited until there is consensus support, then it replaces the current version. Lot of work! --Born2cycle (talk) 19:09, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

terminology where "consensus" wrongfully excludes some editors

What do you call the situation when consensus is not permitted to develop because one view (unsourced) is permitted by some editors but a contrary view (sourced) is not by means of driving adherents of the latter away from a talk page? I want to address the issue (not right away but perhaps in a few months, after additional preparation) and I want to call it by its accepted name. Has this ever been labeled in the past? For example, is it nonconsensus? unreliable consensus? violative consensus? blocked consensus? something else? Nick Levinson (talk) 16:28, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

It would depend on how the "driving adherents of the latter away" is happening. Are they just getting frustrated? Are they numerically outnumbered? Are they being attacked? Are they being technically prevented from discussing (by blocking or page protection, for example)? Depending on the circumstances, "limited consensus" probably applies, but I'd need to know a bit more about the situation to know whether a more specific term should be used. Nikkimaria (talk) 17:25, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

I missed the reply and just saw it now. Thank you.

It's premature to get specific about a case, but most of the possibilities you list apply. As I think a term should be stated in the Consensus page so a general term is agreed upon, I was thinking of proposing one. As my concern is with actions that violate policy or guideline, either individually or collectively, and not merely, for example, the lack of anyone weighing in on an article, a term that is clearer than limited consensus is needed, especially one conveying a lack of consensus due to wrongfulness preventing consensus. In case this has been addressed before, and it probably has been although I didn't find instances, I prefer to use an already established term, one from Wikipedia precedents.

Nick Levinson (talk) 17:27, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

I propose the expression "disrupted consensus". I had the idea of proposing the expression "sabotaged consensus", but I became aware that the "d" might be dropped in some people's loose pronunciation, and therefore in spelling. (See User:Wavelength/About English/D-dropping.) Consequently, I searched for the verb "sabotage" in a printed thesaurus, and I found several options, of which I selected the verb "disrupt". I propose the expression "disrupted consensus".

—Wavelength (talk) 18:01, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

I like it. Any additional comments? I'll wait a week before I formally propose an edit. (Also, I clarified the title of this topic/section.) Nick Levinson (talk) 18:23, 4 August 2012 (UTC)

This discussion is closed and discussion is encouraged at the Talk topic/section Proposing to Clarify That Wrongfully Disrupting Consensus is Policy Violation. Nick Levinson (talk) 14:37, 13 August 2012 (UTC)