User:Cenarium/Flagged revisions/Semi-automatic implementation

note that this is theory, no such version of the extension flaggedrevs exists AFAIK

Different technical ways to do that, proposed:


 * requires for flaggedrevs to be able to handle negative grades

i.e., additionally to flag levels 0,1,2,..., we have -1, -2, ... (behavior described below)

For example, [bad] (-2), [suspect] (-1), [unreviewed] (0), [sighted] (1), [good] (2).

For the purpose of an implementation on the English Wikipedia, we will only consider a flag with the following labeled grades:

[reported] (-2) - [deferred] (-1) - [unreviewed] (0) - [sighted] (+1) - [confirmed] (+2)

All reviewers can flag with -2, 0 and +1 any revision on any non-protected article, and possibly pages from other namespaces. Confirmed is restricted to 'moderators' (usergroup including sysops, contained in rollbackers) and can only be used on fully flagged-protected pages (see below). The -2 grade [reported] may be extended to other namespaces, it cannot be used on the latest version of an article. If you want to report an inappropriate latest revision, revert the edit (!: avoid to rollback if the username is offensive).

The flag 'protection' levels remain identical to the exception of the default:
 * none (default): the latest unreviewed, sighted or confirmed version is displayed
 * semi: the latest sighted or confirmed version is displayed
 * full: the latest confirmed version is displayed

Edits by autoconfirmed users to a semi flagged page are automatically sighted when possible (when the previous version is sighted). As an additional security, there is the option to deactivate this autoreview feature when justified (e.g. massive attacks by sockpuppet vandals). This does not affect the autoreview for reviewers.

The difference with the current version is that when, for example, the latest revision of an old reviewed page is deferred and the previous version is unreviewed, sighted or confirmed, then this previous version is default displayed, and the last rev is 'deferred' to the so-called 'draft' page.

Same for reported, except that we could also use this to report revisions that ought to be deleted straight away for inappropriate content, for example containing personal info. Those are reported to a sysop-restricted special page, then admins can decide at their discretion to not act, delete (revision deletion please !), or request oversight (see below).

Now the defer grade:

We (will) have the abuse filter that filters all edits, so we could ask this:
 * Wouldn't it be useful that the abuse filter defers edits that it has identified as suspect ?

The abuse filter can essentially warn or disallow, but no in-betweens, so it can act only on a very limited number of edits, since we don't want false-positives. Thus this is an opportunity to extend the scope of the abuse filter.

Existing special pages:
 * Special:Reviewedpages : all pages with positively reviewed latest revision (unrestricted)
 * Special:Oldreviewedpages : all pages with at least one positive review (reviewer-restricted)
 * Special:Unreviewedpages : all pages that have no positive review (reviewer-restricted)

Special pages to set up:
 * Special:Reportedpages: all pages with a reported revision (sysop-restricted)
 * Special:Deferredpages: all pages with a deferred latest revision (reviewer-restricted)
 * Special:Olddeferredpages: all pages with a deferred revision and with a non-deferred latest revision (reviewer-restricted)

The abuse filter will populate the latest two, and reviewers will populate the first one.

The use of report, defer and sight should be well defined and circumvented.

Revisions meeting WP:OVERSIGHT, such as revisions containing identifying personal information should be not be reported this way, see the policy for details. A revision should be reported only when the revision should be deleted, though the relevant policies are not utmost clear on what qualifies. This includes revisions with highly offensive edit summaries, copyvios with extreme prejudice to the copyright holder and extreme libel.
 * report

The abuse filter, when a new revision matches a 'defer-type' filter, would defer this revision. We may make it report certain revisions, but most of them would probably be disallowed by the abuse filter itself if they can be identified as matching such. See below for more details on the function of the abuse filter in this regard. As for reviewers, there is a very limited number of cases where defer should be used, and it could be abused. Thus this may be turned off for reviewers, and only available for the abuse filter, or possibly some bots.
 * defer

..is the default. Revisions can be brought back to unreviewed state by reviewers.
 * Unreviewed