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Political positions

How about goint finally all out and outright clarifying point 8 ("Polemical statements unrelated to Wikipedia") as outright forbidding explicit statements pro- or against- any real world political, religious or philosophical conflict?

I've yet to hear a single argument showing any usefulness to encyclopedia building, and those statements (whether specifically in a userbox-like format or not) are divisive and polarizing, helping to canvass and reinforce edit warring in controversial areas (the Troubles, I/P, Macedonia, etc.)

I'd be entirely in favor of removal on sight and swift blocks for disruptions for editors who persists in restoring them— there is no excuse for attempts to turn userpages into soapboxes or rhetoric platforms. — Coren (talk) 22:34, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

Discussion Forums?

Is it appropriate to have user subpages that are intended to be pseudo-discussion forums about both wikirelated and non-wiki related topics? (specifically looking at User:Negabandit86/Forums and possibly User:Negabandit86/Trivia. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 19:55, 8 November 2008 (UTC)

Proposed change

I am proposing the following changes under the "What may I not have on my user page?" subsection. (Changes in red)

The Wikipedia community is generally tolerant and offers fairly wide latitude in applying these guidelines to regular participants. Particularly, Community-building activities that are not strictly "on topic" may be allowed as well as a statement of personal achievements 1. , especially when initiated by committed Wikipedians with good edit histories. At their best, such activities help us to build the community, and this helps to build the encyclopedia. But at the same time, if user page activity becomes disruptive to the community or gets in the way of the task of building an encyclopedia, it must be modified to prevent disruption.

==Notes==
1. "statement of personal achievements" is anything a user has done that they consider notable to themselves as long as it is not blatant spam. The statement "I founded and eventually sold a business, a publishing company that used recycled paper." is allowable while the statement "I own a business, a publishing company, that sells books on a website, for low prices" is not.

discussion

This is based on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Johnbuckman which showed a consensus that, based on What may I not have on my user page?, a user page may consist solely of outside work. Notability of the user was discussed and was shown that having Wikipedia article on yourself or your business's is not a factor in allowing these types of user pages. Thanks. Soundvisions1 (talk) 14:14, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

Simulating the MediaWiki interface again

From User talk:Bishzilla:

[1] If you revert me I won't edit-war over this, but I think the guideline is clear. If you'll forgive my reverting you without touching base, we can discuss any disagreement.--chaser - t 02:15, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
Hi, Chaser. I guess it's not clear, then. The way it's formulated, "The Wikipedia community generally frowns upon simulating the MediaWiki interface, and it should be avoided except when necessary for testing purposes", is a compromise after a hot debate on the matter some time ago. Some people wanted the guideline to say that SMIs, such as joke message bars, are verboten, and anybody can remove them; the other faction was as strongly against such encroachment on the traditional Wikipedia "wide latitude to users to manage their user space as they see fit" (quoting the guideline text from a little higher up). The text which was finally agreed on does not say "feel free to remove them", it says the "community generally frowns upon" them. Not everybody frowns; and those who do, merely get to go ahead and frown. Not to use brute force. "Should be avoided" is not the same as "is not allowed"; it's simply some more frowning. When the matter was last made a big issue of, I argued against forcible removal, because I feel that users should not be overridden in the management of their userspace for such trivial reasons as "the joke isn't funny" (who gets to decide that, seriously?). By contrast: some users have removed content on NWA.Rep's userpage that they considered sexist or aggressively nationalist; those are non-trivial matters, and I have not restored any of it. But the New Message bar is trivial; it's really not necessary to humiliate the user further over such a thing. I'm restoring it. Bishonen | talk 10:37, 24 November 2008 (UTC).
I take your point about the compromise wording and trust you on the intents behind it. That the candidate has now withdrawn from the ArbCom election renders the issue moot for me. Cheers.--chaser - t 16:43, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't want to needle this too hard but interface spoofs are nettlesome because they're time-wasting hoaxes and as such they're little bits of vandalism which I don't mind saying, are more often than not meant to waylay the heed of volunteers. Put them up on joke day but otherwise they're disruptive. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:10, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

I thought this conflict has been gone through and through Dengero (talk) 12:30, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
Oh, it has, I only wanted to say what I thought about it. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:36, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
I agree it's only appropriate to be put up on joke day, but seriously I don't see what's the big deal about it. I was annoyed when I fell into the time wasting trick (As I'm sure we all did), but other than that we should leave him for now and worry about more important things (ie, personal attacks on his user page, the crazy amount of backlog needing attention in Afd). Dengero (talk) 14:39, 24 November 2008 (UTC)
Yes, the personal attacks are much more worrisome and there are many more helpful things to do here than talk about the (nettlesome) new messages spoof. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:47, 24 November 2008 (UTC)

User Talk cannot be redirect: codify it, or don't enforce it.

Personal attacks in an archived user sub page

I would like to get some clarifications regarding WP:UP#NOT items #9 & 10. It seems fairly clear to me that those guidleines mean that attack pages are inappropriate in user space (including subpages). However, at a [2] recent discussion] on AN/I, several administrators have taken the position that if the attack is in an archived page, there's nothing wrong with it, since it is unlikely to be seen. Should we update WP:UP#NOT #9 & #10 accordingly, to reflect this? NoCal100 (talk)

Your ANI link will rot as soon as the thread it refers to is archived from the fast-moving ANI board, and then people here will only have access to your self-serving description of the discussion. I've changed it to a permanent link, I hope you don't mind. For how to create a permanent link, see Simple diff and link guide. And no, please let's not keep adding instruction creep to this page. All the cases that a wikilawyer can dream up can never be covered in the text of policies and guidelines. Instead, we apply common sense to individual cases that aren't specifically mentioned in "the rules". Bishonen | talk 01:38, 1 December 2008 (UTC).
Thank you for fixing the link. I already know that in your opinion WP:UP#NOT does not apply to archived sub-pages, that's why I posted here, to get a broader community perspective. Once we clarify whether or not the guideline applies to sub-pages, we can discuss if that needs to be made explicit in the the text of the guideline. I really don't see how a simple 'Note:This guideline applies/does not apply to subpages' is instruction creep, but reasonable people can disagree on this. NoCal100 (talk) 01:45, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
I've not followed the link, nor do I know what it's regarding, but right off the bat, I'd say no: no attack pages anywhere, for any reason. I don't see why that would be controversial. IronDuke 01:51, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
You might try following it, then. There can certainly be at least two opinions as to whether the page in question is an attack page. There often can, where the userspace is concerned, which is one of the reasons it's a poor idea to add text that encourages people to go looking for user subpages they don't like. It tends to raise the battleground stakes. Bishonen | talk 02:23, 1 December 2008 (UTC).
I think it's irrelevant to NoCal's question... he may be wrong about the page in question, but right in principle. Nevertheless, I shall take a look... IronDuke 02:54, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Okay, I read it. First off, Bish, I feel you owe me some as yet to be announced favor for that appalling bit of doggerel you made me read. Forget about ATTACK, what of WP:SCANSION? What about my precious eyes? Right... that said, three things occur: 1) Yes, it is an attack. Not the most brutal attack ever on WP, but still an attack. 2) It violates SOAP and NOT... please no political screeds -- anywhere. 3) What earthly good does it do? If the concerns are serious, raise them in a serious manner, at the appropriate page. IronDuke 03:08, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

IronDuke is spot on. There might be some difference of opinion as to whether the page in question is an attack page - but that is not the subject of this discussion, nor the crux of the objection you raised on the ANI page - which was that attack pages are ok if they are in archived sub-pages. If you'd like to argue that the specific page in question is not an attack page, please do so on the ANI discussion page. This discussion is about the applicability of WP:UP#NOT, in general, to archived user sub-pages. NoCal100 (talk) 02:59, 1 December 2008 (UTC)

Oh, come on, I'm not going to repeat myself on this page as well; I'm done. I can't tell if you're ignoring the main points of my posts above, or if you simply missed them. I'll leave it to your conscience. Bishonen | talk 04:29, 1 December 2008 (UTC).
Sorry, who was that directed to? (Wasn't sure if you saw my second post above.) IronDuke 04:56, 1 December 2008 (UTC)
Per thread formatting, it was a response to the post immediately above it (=not to you). Yes, I saw it. Bishonen | talk 07:19, 1 December 2008 (UTC).
Ignoring your main points? what would those be? I've responded to your point about "instruction creep". I'm now waiting for wider community input. NoCal100 (talk) 15:17, 1 December 2008 (UTC)