Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Rockstone35/list of banned users

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 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the miscellaneous page below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result of the discussion was:  delete. In addition to being slightly more numerous, those arguing delete have referenced established guidelines and do not seem to be rebutted by the keep arguments with anything similar. RL0919 (talk) 19:56, 2 May 2019 (UTC)

User:Rockstone35/list of banned users


This was speedily deleted for being a recreation of material deleted per Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:List of banned users/Banned by the Arbitration Committee. This was contested at Deletion review/Log/2019 March 19, which referred the matter to this new MfD discussion. This is a procedural nomination, I am neutral.  Sandstein  14:56, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Keep I wasn't expecting that this would ever end up here, but I'm elated, naturally! I'm obviously for keep, since I'm the person who created it, and ideally I'd like to see the page live in as WP:LOBU in mainspace rather than userspace again. However, if we recreate the page, there should be no editorializing of the ban reasons - just the date of the ban, a link to the discussion/decision to ban, maybe the LTA page, and that should be it, since anything more just serves to antagonize users and isn't fair to them.  Rockstone   talk to me!   16:56, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I argued to overturn the WP:G4 deletion based on my strict constructionist view of WP:CSD. And, frankly, I'm also surprised we ended up here.  But, now that we're here, the real work begins.  It would be useful if you could explain how this material conforms to WP:USERPAGE and/or advances the project's goal of building an encyclopedia.  -- RoySmith (talk) 22:18, 9 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Nothing in the restored article violates WP:USERPAGE. The material is new content, not deleted content from the previous WP:LOBU. My proposed recreation of WP:LOBU would be useful for users attempting to determine whether or not particular behavior mimics that of a banned user, why a user was banned, and would serve as an "official" list of banned users.
 * Part of the issue is that the banned user category includes users who were never actually banned (they were blocked, and the admin used the wrong template), and in many, many cases, the ban reason is not linked (I've been slowly fixing that), meaning that users cannot know why the user was banned in the first place. I've also seen at least one case where the admin placed a block template when a ban template should have been placed instead. This resulted in User:Catcreekcitycouncil being community banned twice - once in 2012 and again in 2018. Yet, no one knew about it because there was only a block template. The only way anyone could have known would have been to search WP:AN, but that's a lot of effort and isn't easy to do.
 * Another issue is that the current category listing does not list user bans by year. Thus, if an admin or someone else needs to look up a particular user to determine whether or not he or she is socking, they simply can't do it effectively through the user category listing. However, with WP:LOBU back, the admin could simply go look up the more recent bans and read the discussions to determine why the user was banned, rather than going through all 18 years of bans. Also, if the admin does not remember the name of the user who was banned, he or she can more easily find it if its organized by date.
 * I'm not saying WP:LOBU should have a ban reason listed at all. I wouldn't necessarily mind it, but it did serve to just act as a pillory for banned users, and was too editorialized. In contrast though, simply having a centralized database of banned users more well organized than what we currently have would probably be a huge help.  Rockstone   talk to me!   22:48, 9 April 2019 (UTC)


 * Delete - We certainly don't need an incomplete list of banned users maintained after the original list was deleted. Huh?  Robert McClenon (talk) 00:29, 10 April 2019 (UTC)


 * There are possible valid uses for this:
 * (1) A study of how Wikipedia bans people, a study of the Banning policy, does it work, is it abuse, does practice differ from policy or theory?
 * (2) Assistance for all editors in recognizing and responding to ban-evading people. Does deletion of the records on banned users enable these banned to return return undetected more easily?  Is that a problem?
 * (3) A warning for banned users, "we are watching for you", and to others thinking of doing bad things, "we will name you, and post a internal but publicly accessible record of your crimes".


 * I think (1) is valid, but not for any editors to do willy nilly. Banning records includes information that is sensitive, whether to the person banned, or people they harassed.  If you can find information on banned user X having been banned for harassing user Y, it will include information making it easy to find X harassing Y on other website.
 * (2) is also valid, but it would have to managed by people who know what they are doing. A little bit of knowledge can be dangerous thing.
 * (3) is highly dubious, I think Wikipedia should not do this. That would be revenge.  It is contrary to WP:DENY.
 * For what validity there is for (1) and (2), I think any information or records should be under the absolute purview of people who know what they are doing. I think ArbCom is overkill, I think the answer is the regulars at Long-term abuse.  I think any publicly accessible information should be restricted to subpages of Long-term abuse where it should be considered under the control, including discretion to delete, by admin regulars of WP:LTA.  I think this information *should not* exist for sure in anyone's userspace, and should probably not be allowed to exist generally in project space.  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 00:16, 10 April 2019 (UTC)


 * User:SmokeyJoe -- The issue is that LTA doesn't have every banned user, just the most egregiously annoying ones. Rockstone   talk to me!   01:48, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * True, and so the issue continues: Should we retain publicly accessible records on banned users who are not a continuing annoyance? --SmokeyJoe (talk) 03:42, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, they should be public so that they don't come back a year or two later and do the same thing again. Otherwise that's not really a ban. But whether it should be so centralized (rather than just be a category as it is now), that's another question. I actually really like the idea of having the list of banned users be a subpage within WP:LTA. This way it's not as visible as being directly on Wikipedia namespace. Maybe there should be a policy to overturn bans after 10 years of no activity though. Eventually the person just grows out of it (usually -- there's plenty of people who don't grow up)  Rockstone   talk to me!   04:26, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Delete Pages at Wikipedia are either for encyclopedic content or for material that supports the encyclopedia. Maintaining a list of bad people is not helpful. Satisfying people's curiosity is not helpful. Shaming people is not helpful. It would be helpful if banned users permanently left the project (or, in rare cases, mounted a successful appeal). However, many banned users believe they were right and everyone else was wrong. Many such users react badly when someone puts BANNED on their user page (1 + 2) and they create socks to get what retribution they can. Experience shows that leaving them alone often results in them leaving us alone. At any, a BANNED tag or a list of BANNED users does nothing to help the encyclopedia. Johnuniq (talk) 05:02, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * How else are we supposed to know who is banned if we don't have some way to track it? Not saying that the list of banned users is the answer, but there does have to be a way to know who was banned, and why they were banned. Rockstone   talk to me!   16:44, 10 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Why? If you need to communicate with an editor, you post at their talk page. If you do that on a banned user's talk you will see a prominent message: "This user is currently blocked. The latest block log entry is provided below for reference:...". How would it help the encyclopedia for you to know the details of why the user was blocked and banned? Johnuniq (talk) 05:41, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Well, for one, there's a difference between a user who is blocked and a user who is banned. A plain blocked user should just fall under Deny_recognition and the only thing that should be marked there is the block template. A blocked user is not a banned one, all blocking is is a technical measure which prevents a user from making edits to Wikipedia. A banned user, in contrast, is not allowed to contribute to the project and is formally prohibited from doing so under any circumstances. When a user is banned, all edits made by the banned user are subject to be reverted, and the user is not welcome in the community anymore. Basically, blocking applies to the username/IP, a ban applies to the person. A ban is much more serious than a block, and we do need to know who is banned in order to enforce the ban and recognize when banned users might be sockpuppeting. Hence, the existence of some type of list of banned users (or at least a category describing banned users). Aside from the fact that the block log often doesn't tell us that a user was banned even if they were, the block log will rarely give a reason for the ban in the first place, which is useful when attempting to recognize sockpuppeting. Also, if the user later wants to edit again, or appeals their ban, knowing why the user was banned and having an easy reference comes in handy. One other thing -- I've noticed that the blocking admin has occasionally marked a user as banned when they weren't. That's one of the reasons to make sure that the ban discussion is available, to make sure that the user was banned and not just blocked in the first place! Rockstone   talk to me!   06:10, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * If the blocking admin did not think that adding a "you have been banned" box was worthwhile there is no reason for others to second guess the situation. Looking for edits by banned users (how are you going to do that?) so you can revert them per banned-means-banned would not be productive. Reverting socks of banned users is done by people familiar with the habits of the banned user. Johnuniq (talk) 07:49, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * When admins put the wrong template, there is certainly reason to second-guess them. Like I said, I've also seen ban templates on users who weren't banned, and at least one case of a user who was banned twice six years apart, because the ban template was never added to the user page. These types of things are why we keep track of banned users, and why they are banned. It also holds the admins accountable. Rockstone   talk to me!   08:31, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * You need to post a link showing where an admin misused a template or it didn't happen. At any rate, mistakes happen and maintaining an unmaintainable list of everyone banned would not help. Johnuniq (talk) 09:29, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Huh? Check my contributions. I've removed several ban boxes that were inappropriately placed. Also, look above -- User:Catcreekcitycouncil was community banned twice - once in 2012 and again in 2018 all because the userbox was missing. Regardless, the policy is to add ban templates and a link to the decision to a banned user's user page, and that's not under discussion here. We are instead discussing whether LOBU should be brought back. Unless I misunderstand you? Rockstone   talk to me!   13:02, 11 April 2019 (UTC)
 * A quick example where an admin put the wrong template was this one: User:Diabalo17 was marked as being banned, but he was merely blocked for vandalism. Rockstone   talk to me!   02:25, 12 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Delete due to serious problems with keeping live, negative information about other users without very good reason. If User:Rockstone35 is seriously interested in doing productive work in this area, I advise him to seek to collaborate with others at WP:Long-term abuse, first, and to not do these sorts of things in other places.  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 02:53, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * SmokeyJoe -- I really don't think the information is a problem, considering it is all publicly accessible information. Rockstone   talk to me!   05:19, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think that is a decision for the regulars at WP:LTA. Why don't you join them?  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 07:48, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think I will! Where should I start? The information is not a problem, but at worst, perhaps the centralization of it is. (though I still think it isn't) SmokeyJoe Thanks! Rockstone   talk to me!   21:24, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Good, but note clearly, I am not an LTA person, I know little of their culture, you should ask them. --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:22, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Keep. When we delete content like this from the wiki, it doesn't go away.  What happens is people learn it gets deleted here so they keep it off-wiki.  And the practical effect of that is to drive discussions about Wikipedia's processes and decisions offsite -- which is an unintended but rather harmful outcome.  The way to avoid it is to set the principle that information that comes from Wikipedia, and is about Wikipedians, can be kept on-wiki.— S Marshall  T/C 22:24, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * So keeping a list has no benefit other than it somehow prevents others doing it off-site? An on-wiki list will always omit juicy details and won't have editorial comment on the merits of the participants. Therefore, people liking gossip will always use an off-wiki site so they can comment freely. Regardless of all that, a user page is definitely unsuitable. Johnuniq (talk) 22:57, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I still haven't decided if I want to express an opinion about this, but I do have a question. Why is a list of banned users any different from Former administrators/reason/for cause?  -- RoySmith (talk) 23:16, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * That is a good question. I think there are big differences, one group are silly people who made mistakes and have been asked to leave, and the other is a group of community leadership who misused or abused their trust, and as a community we need to learn from past mistakes.  Its a good question though.  Hiding this information will cause the information to appear off-site, where its presentation may be done with less care or sensitivity.  --SmokeyJoe (talk) 23:28, 15 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I didn't even know this existed, thank you! I think the biggest difference is that someone who is an admin is in a position of trust, someone who is just a random banned user, isn't. But, I think that difference shouldn't preclude a list of banned users. Rockstone   talk to me!   03:28, 16 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the page's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.