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"Grace Period"

Greetings,

I hope this message finds you well. I wanted to draw your attention to an ongoing discussion on the User talk:Euphoria page regarding the Inactivity Policy. The conversation involves myself, @X:, @Justarandomamerican:, and @AlPaD:.

It appears that both "X" and "Justarandomamerican" hold the view that a "grace period" exists within the Test Wiki's process for removing permissions. However, it is important to note that no such provision is mentioned in the policy itself.

I have noticed numerous instances where "X" has repeatedly removed rights without following the established procedure, prompting my intervention to revert those actions.

I kindly request the community to provide their opinions on this matter, as I firmly believe that our actions should align with the guidelines outlined in the policy, rather than making assumptions based on its omissions.

Thank you for your attention and cooperation.

Best regards, Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 18:25, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Obviously, I  Support the ability for bureaucrats to use grace periods to remove rights for a number of reasons.

1. It notifies the user of their inactivity through email and allows them to regain their rights sooner, almost like a reminder if they forgot about the wiki.
2. It allows inactive users to quickly regain their rights if they come back. Bureaucrat can just assign them back permanently and admins can just request it be made indefinite.
3. If they don’t return to activity, it is a convenient way to remove rights, and the outcome is the same. The rights are removed on the same day.

X (talk) 18:37, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Whilst I  Support grace periods as a common sense measure, I do not understand what causes the absolute letter of policy, rather than the spirit, to be followed. The inactivity policy provides for removal of rights from inactive users. That is it. It does not explicitly disallow grace periods. Disallowing administration in the absence of policy by wheel warring is, more or less, making this wiki appear to be a bureaucracy when it is not. Justarandomamerican (talk) 18:48, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

You both need to follow the policy, same as anyone else. Nobody has has decided that a "grace period" is necessary, so why should you? Even so, before making decisions like that, a vote should be made here, on the community portal. I'll be expecting a response from @Dmehus: to confirm my reports. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 18:49, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Please explain to me how we are violating policy. You have said that we are, so explain it. What policy am I violating by setting grace periods? The policy states that a users rights will be removed after 3 months of no edits/logged actions, and that is what I am doing. X (talk) 19:04, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

@Justarandomamerican:, Expanding on your assertion regarding the absence of an explicit prohibition of grace periods, it is worth noting that there is also no explicit endorsement. Consequently, one must question the justification for unilaterally modifying the policy at will. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 18:52, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Does policy state that I can login? Does policy state that I can edit? Does policy state that I can breathe? No, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do it. X (talk) 19:04, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Again, this wiki is not a bureaucracy where rules providing for something must be made, and rules providing for something disallow all other handling of a situation, so administration in the absence of policy is allowed. We are not modifying rules, merely maintaining this wiki in the absence of them. The spirit of the Inactivity Policy does not disallow grace periods, in consequence. Justarandomamerican (talk) 18:57, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Again, you are modifying the rules by doing whatever you see fit. Clearly, we are at a crossroads and so, I'll leave this to Dmehus and/or @Drummingman: to decide. 18:59, 27 May 2023 (UTC) – Preceding unsigned comment added by Sav (talk • contribs)

What rules are being modified? Policy states to remove rights after 3 months of not actions or edits. We have not altered this in anyway. X (talk) 19:04, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

As I said above, I am not in favor of an "already lengthwise truncated user rights" where admin/crat rights are already truncated. I find that impolite and not inviting to test here. But giving a warning on the users' own talk page about 2 weeks in advance, "beware you are approaching the activity criteria", is sufficient as far as I am concerned. But what I find worse is wheel warfare with each other. I urge the users involved not to overrule each other and look for consensus. If you still can't come to a consensus, ask the stewards to get involved, and then do nothing until the steward has made a decision. Keep your head cool and let's keep it nice with each other. Greetings, Drummingman (talk) 19:16, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Hi, @Drummingman:. To put simply, that means no grace period, correct? We are okay to issue a friendly warning stating "You are approaching the activity criteria" yes? Regards. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 19:37, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

As far as I am aware, this is a community discussion, and a Steward's decision is not final, as this wiki's decision making mechanism is not autocracy. We should continue to discuss this matter. I disagree as to it being unfriendly: How is it unfriendly when they are immediately notified by email and have a chance to request the rights be made permanent? Justarandomamerican (talk) 19:44, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree. Stewards don’t hold seniority in discussions. This is a community discussion. I also agree with Justa that it isn’t unfriendly. X (talk) 19:46, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Regardless if you don't like the decision, Drummingman has given the answer and until Mac or Dmehus gives their input, we should follow what Drummingman stated. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 19:48, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Elected Stewards have no say in community discussion besides what all other members of the community have, and their decisions are merely temporary dispute resolution. We shall continue to discuss this. Justarandomamerican (talk) 19:51, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

What I would like to add here is that this is my own opinion, not a direct "steward decision" but a user who is also a steward. I have not talked to the other stewards about this yet. Moreover, I also think it is important to hear your opinions on this. So, this is not a final decision yet. Drummingman (talk) 19:54, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for correcting my assumption that you were acting under the color of your authority to resolve disputes. That was a wrong assumption. Thank you again, Justarandomamerican (talk) 19:57, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

You're welcome. @X:. I really hope you stay active. Your work has been good so far. Don't let this discourage you. Drummingman (talk) 20:14, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

I won’t. I just really hate conflict. I think that grace periods should just be optional. You can do them if you want, but you don’t have to use them either. This is a good compromise. X (talk) 20:24, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

@X: That sounds good. I don't like conflict, either :-). What is most important to me is to respect each other's authority and not start a wheel war over this. I look forward to your opinions, feel free to add anything? Drummingman (talk) 20:54, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

I agree. This isn’t really that important, and to wheel war about it was admittedly futile. I don’t think I have much more to add besides grace periods are an optional part of bureaucrat revoking rights. You can close this, if you wish. X (talk) 21:02, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

•  Oppose I believe that inactive users should be notified 1-2 weeks before their rights are removed but their rights should not be temporary, they should be removed completely after 3 months. AlPaD (talk) 06:49, 28 May 2023 (UTC)
•  Comment: I support Drummingman‘s opinion. Anyone can(≠must) give inactive user warning like ‘Your rights will be removed in 2 weeks unless’…, and it’s more kind.
• Regarding ‘Grace period’, I’m not inclined to support this. because
  • If you set an inactive user's rights to expire and then they or requested crats revert them, they'll end up with two user rights logs. I don't like unnecessarily increasing logs and complicating records, except in cases where it can't be helped, such as adding a test group or adding a Bot flag instead of a Flood flag. As per Drummingman's opinion, if you give advance notice and the user edits in the meantime, there is no need to remove the rights, so there is no need for logs.
  • If it is chosen to set the expiration date of the rights instead of the permission removal notice on the talk page, the user must extend the rights himself or ask bureaucrats to do so. Whether or not it is a big deal depends on the person, but the only thing that is required in order not to be removed by Inactive Policy is 'edits or logged actions'. If you use the method of setting a expiry on the rights, for example, a user who only edits one week after the expiry is set will have the rights removed one week later. Is this in line with the spirit of the 'Inactive Policy'? (It is a different story if the user who set the expiry is responsible for confirming that it will not happen.)--Q8j (talk) 09:43, 28 May 2023 (UTC)
• I am honestly fine with having a grace period - it seems perfectly reasonable. That being said I do see that there is "edit warring" (with user rights) related to this. This needs to stop. Things should have been discussed further here instead of continuing to edit war. MacFan4000 ^{(Talk Contribs)} 14:06, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

  I am inclined to agree with you: Further wheel warring should be sanctioned. Justarandomamerican (talk) 14:37, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

  I am happy to compromise and agree that an inactive user warning could be issued, but not a "grace period" as Justarandomamerican suggested; it just complicates the matter as Q8j stated. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 03:59, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  Expanding upon my previous statement, I would support the inclusion of a grace period. However, I suggest implementing a courtesy warning prior to initiating the grace period. This would allow users to be notified in advance. If no edits are made within 48 hours following the warning, the grace period may be implemented. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 05:59, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  I would be fine with that, but I think 24hrs would be more appropriate. X (talk) 10:38, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  24hrs is fine with me. Sav • ( Edits | Talk ) 21:00, 29 May 2023 (UTC)

  I also agree with you. AlPaD (talk) 05:00, 5 June 2023 (UTC)

  I also now agree to allow a non-mandatory grace period. And also to wait at least 24 hours before it takes effect. Drummingman (talk) 11:05, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

CU Request

Hello, may a steward, perhaps Drummingman, check and see if my recent range block on 38.153.169.128/25 would affect legitimate users? Thank you! Justarandomamerican (talk) 23:33, 27 May 2023 (UTC)

What I can see is that the IP-range is an open proxy/VPN. That falls under no open proxy policy, so can just be blocked. Drummingman (talk) 12:34, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

Thank you! Justarandomamerican (talk) 12:38, 28 May 2023 (UTC)

Preferably, it open proxies [rfc:2119 should] be soft-blocked, so no existing users are affected. :) Dmehus (talk) 05:49, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

I would soft-block if this were a open proxy with no history of abuse, but given that the range is used for spam, I hard-blocked it. Justarandomamerican (talk) 23:51, 7 June 2023 (UTC)

Extension of stewardship flag

Dear, community, talking to the other 2 stewards, I wondered if the steward group could get permission to permanently bundle the user flags suppression and checkuser into the stewards flag? Then we could also see and check each other's actions faster, which is also a core policy on Wikimedia for those flags, 2. In short, this means that checkusser and suppression would thus be linked by default to the steward group. Which is partly already so, but now we have to temporarily assign the right to ourselves each time. Which I actually don't find very convenient, which is why I'm asking the community if you are comfortable with that? I would like to hear your opinions? Greetings, Drummingman (talk) 22:06, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

Conditional  Support. Although, this does lose the community some knowledge of when checks are performed. If this change is made, stewards must frequently review the checkuser logs for accountability. If the stewards promise to do so, I support. X (talk) 22:26, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

Of course: that is also one of the reasons why I request this extension of the flag. Drummingman (talk) 18:50, 16 June 2023 (UTC)

•  Oppose. CU and OS are a group of very sensitive rights, which means that high transparency is required. It is perfectly fine to briefly assign either of the rights with a small specific reason for assigning, so that the community can see what the tools are used for. This change erases this transparency, which is not good. — Summer ^talk 12:37, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
•  Support otherwise stewards can't see what the other stewards are doing when they self assign suppression/checkuser to themselves, which is a bit dodgy. Also, someone could make up a reason and nobody would really notice. Zippybonzo (talk) 13:03, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
• Partially  Support I think it would be better to add the permissions to the "stewards" group but I think the CU and OS groups should not be removed, because I believe it will be possible to promote users in CU and OS after vote like fortestwiki.myht.org. AlPaD (talk) 05:11, 5 June 2023 (UTC)
• Neutral, leaning  Oppose as written While I can appreciate it might be a bit cumbersome to add a checkuser or oversight hat, I also appreciate the value in the public transparency this provides. As well, X makes a supportive case for adding checkuser-log to the Steward group, which I could likely support, but I do think there is value in retaining the CU and OS groups as AlPaD describes above. For now, I would recommend no action at this point, on this proposal, but we could consider a subsequent proposal in the near- to medium-term future (i.e., 30-90 days after closing) to add the checkuser-log user right to the steward group. Dmehus (talk) 19:39, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

  Yeah. I think add checkuser log to the steward group and keep the current groups existing separate. That’s how it’s done on most wikis, I think. X (talk) 20:14, 17 June 2023 (UTC)

Account rename

@MacFan4000:, could you rename my account to "Summer"? Thanks! Summer ^talk 12:39, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

 Done MacFan4000 ^{(Talk Contribs)} 17:45, 4 June 2023 (UTC)

Alternate proposal: Merging CheckUser and oversight to steward

Hello community! I’d like to propose an alternative to the proposal above about merging the rights. Here’s what I’d propose:

• Stewards are granted the suppression-log, view suppressed, and CheckUser-log rights for accountability;
• The CheckUser and Suppressor groups remain existent and aren’t removed;

This would allow for accountability amongst stewards and still allow non/stewards to be granted those rights if absolutely necessary. X (talk) 15:46, 26 June 2023 (UTC)