Wikipedia talk:Governance reform/Archive 1

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Agreement

I agree. Maybe not in all the details, but Wikipedia would definitely benefit from a more enlightened governance model. The lack of meaningful leadership around here leads to a dissatisfying status quo. Governance by committee of whoever shows up at a random discussion page is very challenging at best and self-destructive at worst. Dragons flight (talk) 17:02, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I as well support a change. Policy development and review is not being handled well in our current system. FloNight♥♥♥ 17:10, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Agree as well. Some sort of policy creation and review board (government, whatever), sounds like a good idea, but selecting individuals for it and term lengths could be problematic. John Carter (talk) 17:19, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I have also thought about something like this. I think it's a necessary step, as the community grows larger. The m:Foundation issues include a principle that the wiki mechanism is used for content, but there is no reason that policies also must be written in that way. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:06, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

This is a very good idea. We need a body of editors to act as some sort of a legislative body. STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 12:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I've been thinking for a while that sooner or later we're going to need something like this - I think we're probably at the stage where we should start serious discussing it. --Tango (talk) 15:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I like this, although I think the group of people should be smaller. It needs to be a deliberative body in order to work, and 50 is too many. 15 would make more sense. There is a wide set of fundamental changes built into this proposal, though, that I would like to see outlined. The use of a majority rather than consensus method, elections to essentially establish a project authority, a switch to policies that cannot be edited by the community at large, the creation of a new tier of user and new set of user rights (maybe). What are the wider effects of these changes? How would the policy process interact with Jimbo and the Board? I'm assuming even this group would be forbidden from editing WP:NPOV? This body should absolutely be separate from the Arbitration Committee, which should remain as the body that interprets and enforces policy and handles decisions about private matters etc. Avruch ^T 16:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Avruch seems to postulating a "constitution" of unchangable policies, which is probably a good idea. I would personally object to having the number being too small though, because we will have to take into account that very few if any of use are competent to speak reasonably about every possible policy set forward. Having a large enough body to ensure that there are enough people knowledgable about the subject being discussed would probably be more important than having too small a number. I do imagine that there would eventually be informal, de facto "committees" on most of the major policy areas, made up of editors familiar with that particular aspect of wikipedia, and that might be the best way to go. John Carter (talk) 16:21, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

A constitution of unchangeable principles might be good, but the actual policies need to be editable (WP:NPOV has been edited nearly 100 times in the last month alone - and not all of those were reverted [1].) I like the idea of a committee system - I don't think you can get good representation with only 15 people, and there's also no room for people going inactive, with 50 it doesn't matter if a handful aren't around for a particular vote. --Tango (talk) 18:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Let's at least drop the number to 24 or 30 (note, divisible by three per proposed 3 tiered tranche system). 50 is just still way too many. Yes, we want to deal with absenteeism, but that can be done with 2 or 3 dozen. Also, there's nothing preventing this group from allowing others to help out. One need not be elected to a committee to voice an opinion. Talk pages abound. - jc37 19:18, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think having at least 50 is important, it will help to ensure that things can still continue even allowing for the almost inevitable inactivity by some. It will also enable a cross-section of the wikipedia community to be represented (different views/opinions etc.) and will help prevent those who disagree with decisions made from saying 'we (larger number) oppose/support this proposal so why is this (smaller number) forcing such a policy upon us'. Davewild (talk) 19:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Part of my concern is considering how labour intensive arbcom elections are. Incidentally, 10 a year (30) would make this group exactly double the members of arbcom. Can we presume that 4 or 5 times that amount will "run"? As I recall, the last Arbcomm elections had only maybe 8 or 9 which even made the numeric threshhold. Let's not get so big that we're just filling seats to fill seats. - jc37 19:23, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I understand and agree with your concerns. The only reason I would at this point want to keep the number fluid is because we still haven't figured out exactly what they'd all be doing in the first place. If members of ArbCom were to be permitted to join, that might make us want to change the existing totals. Addition of any other groups in any way might as well. And we haven't even discussed the number of specialized fields might be involved. We might, perhaps, find that if there were to be specialization (maybe direct election to a "Conduct" committee, or any other possible groups for example), it might actually increase the number of candidates by more clearly defining their primary role. After we define what it is they'll all be doing, we'll have a better idea how many of them there should be. John Carter (talk) 19:30, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

3 tranches with yearly elections would mean 3 year terms - that's far too long. It doesn't work for ArbCom (most people resign before completely their term), so even if it was a good idea to have people on the assembly that long we wouldn't actually be able to. 30 people with 10 elected every 6 months might work, although I would prefer slightly more (48, say). --Tango (talk) 21:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I strongly support this proposal (and wish I'd noticed it earlier). Wikipedia has three options:

1. Allowing its policy to continue to stagnate,
2. Having the Foundation step in to impose structure on the community,
3. Having the community come up with something like this.

Of these, the third is by far the most preferable. Of course, I imagine this will fail for the same reasons as it's needed, which leaves us a choice of the first two. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 12:48, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

I am a proponent of parliamentary procedure, and although it does not work for things like content disputes, this refined version appears to me to be exactly what is needed to stop the rapid deterioration in the policy-making process—especially when considering the on-going specialisation and sophistication of guidelines (one look at the Community Bulletin Board is a strong indication of this trend).

Regarding the specifics, now... I support using three tranches, so that continuity may be ensured, but three years are just too much. Elections every six or eight months are fine with me, resulting in eighteen- or twenty-four-month-terms respectively. As far as the number is concerned, I support a large body, with at least fifty members; not only would it be more representative of the quite sizeable electorate and less affected by absences, but it would ensure that the decisions would be more balanced. More different backgrounds and opinions can help shape a more acceptable solution overall. Perhaps certain criteria should be put in place to guarantee a more variegated membership. Waltham, The Duke of 20:22, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

Policy vs. guideline

Sounds interesting, but I think we should still retain the community's ability to affect guidelines.

(for brevity, I'll call my suggestion "Policy Review (PRV)".)

So have it so that all new community designed "policies" start out as guidelines, and this new policy review committee (or whatever we call it) only determines if these guidelines should become actual "policy". In addition, they should probably have the ability to review all current policies and see if any should be deprecated to guidelines, and whether guidelines should be deprecated to essays.

So it would be a case of someone nominating a guideline (or essay) for review. Run like a combination of a DRV and arbcomm. The elected committee (let's say for now that they're elected the same way as arbcom) would would discuss, with everyone else discussing on the talk page, with the PRV committee result found the same way as an arbcomm ruling.

Obviously the details in format or whatever are changeable, but this at least illustrates how it could work.

Essentially the committee would be:

• Reviewing a policy for demotion
• Reviewing a guideline for promotion or demotion
• Reviewing an essay for promotion

So no individual editor would be able to mark a page "policy", it would require either PRV, or some other group to do so (such as the wikimedia project).

But anyone could mark a page an essay, and anyone could mark a page a guideline, while knowing that doing so may have the page nominated for PRV.

What do you think? - jc37 17:58, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Sounds like a variation on the standard "bill nomination" model, which I think might work. There might be a question regarding a necessary new policy regarding a subject which doesn't even have guidelines yet, and various legal or otehr situations could result in the need for a quick creation of a new policy. We might also want to specify a specific number of days for comment on a proposed policy or policy removal before a vote would take place, but that should be relatively easy to arrive at. John Carter (talk) 18:03, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

I think this would be unnecessary makework on an already broken system. I'd prefer to do away with the misleading policy, guideline and essay templates, and basically rank project namespace pages by some other ranking system. (A ranking system with just 3 ranks is never going to be very fine grained).

The best proposal I've heard so far is to rank pages by number of pages linking to them (compare the old google pagerank algorithm).

This can be done by a computer, and saves valuable human time. :-)

--Kim Bruning (talk) 08:03, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Interpret the policies

It just occurred to me that this would also be useful as a group "at the disposal of Arbcomm". So that if arbcomm is looking for an interpretation of a policy/guideline/essay, this group could present a "finding". This would allow arbcomm to focus more on arbitration and less on policy interpretation. To clarify, PRV would interpret policy, Arbcomm would interpret actions of an editor. And to do so, would rely on PRV to present an interpretation of policy, when wanted/needed. (Others can argue out whether arbcom is "bound" to the PRV's interpretation or not.) - jc37 18:12, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

Need identified but policy not written

One of the biggest problems that we have is that Wikipedia is lacking policy in some areas despite a need for them. Over the last several years, the Arbitration Committee has advised the Community of the need for several new policies or policy re-writes but the Community does not seem able to do it in a manner that gain consensus. FloNight♥♥♥ 18:13, 22 April 2008 (UTC)

So you would imagine this committee not only blessing existing or new guidelines, but also creating new policy de novo? I'm not opposed to this at all, just clarifying. I think that is probably a good idea, but when it is completely new, or via a arbcom request should the community have input, or only the indirect input of voting? - cohesion 15:09, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

My personal preference would be something like the existing set-up of ArbCom, where there is a page where initially everyone can make their comments regarding a proposed policy, including changes to phrasing, and where later the designated policy shapers can work out any further details regarding the exact phrasing. Allowing separate pages for both community input (particularly before the final consideration, but also during it) and one for the more formal revision/ratification process among the designated individuals, has seemed to work fairly well so far. John Carter (talk) 15:18, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

On a practical level, I'd certainly think that any policy-making body would receive community input in the form of direct comments in any case. New policy—whether proposed by a member of the committee or by another editor—would presumably go through the normal public proposal & feedback phases; the only real difference would be that the elected body would make the final decision on whether said proposal (or some version of it) would become policy or not. Kirill 15:18, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Maybe more changes

Right now, ArbCom functions basically as our judicial system. Generally, a government will have executive, legislative, judicial, and enforcement entities. We already have some corporate execs, and this proposal would function effectively as our legislative wing. Some could argue that all admins are in the enforcement wing, although I think, if we had enough interest, it might be a good idea to specifically name a number of editors as specific "enforcers", similar to many governments' police.
Additionally, we could probably stand for our "lawyers", or topical or conduct experts, as well. These wouldn't necessarily be appointed or elected positions, but rather like expert witnesses individuals called in by the ArbCom as informed, neutral parties knowledgable about a specific topic under discussion. These individuals might even be, if in any way specifically designated, the effective "content judges", although that might be going too far.
Lastly, I note that there is an extant proposal for ombudsmen at WP:OmbCom which might be relevant to this proposal as well.
We definitely do neep some sort of way of expediting the creation of policy. Maybe it might be possible to create !voting periods for certain proposals which haven't been rejected, so that there could some at least potentially binding policies in necessary areas. Would I be right in thinking that maybe the bureaucrats would be the ones to decide on the final results, possibly based on a required percentage of the !votes on a given subject? John Carter (talk) 18:14, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

That would be a first step, perhaps. I suspect that referendum-style voting is going to become impractical (if it hasn't already) because of drive-by voting. A fixed pool of votes (as in an elected body) allows a proposal to undergo modifications during the voting process until it can garner sufficient support to pass. With an open pool of votes, however, there's nothing to cause early voters to reconsider after modifications, and each modification conceptually invalidates all the earlier votes without any real provision for restoring them. Kirill 05:49, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

We need to consider the press aka the fourth power as well. Although we have the Signpost, its role still need to be thought of. User:Ral315 failed RfB (Executive branch) because of his involvement of Signpost (forth power). SYSS Mouse (talk) 17:24, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

The chicken or the egg

I have not thought about all details, but I agree with the general analysis: Basically, it seems that there is no controlled way at this time how policies are made, or changed. Ironically, one might say that not even the current policy has consensus; proposed as new policy, it would most probably end up being rejected.

But in the end, this proposal may suffer from a kind of chicken-and-egg problem: By the very analysis, and since it would constitute a major change, it would never have a chance to get consensus. Maybe it would have to be imposed by the foundation, or similar, to become effective.

Actually, has even the ArbCom system once been set up in consensus? --B. Wolterding (talk) 20:08, 23 April 2008 (UTC)

You mean an explicit expression of consensus? The closest thing would be the ratification vote from 2004; but that's not really applicable to the present environment of the project. Kirill 05:44, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with both the analysis and the proposed solution. (But note that any form of voting will have to seriously deal with issues of sockpuppets, more than we have up till now.) However, as Wolterding says, the chances of the community reaching consensus on such a far-reaching reform are slim. --Zvika (talk) 11:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not as pessimistic, I think many people are frustrated with the current state of decision making, and may support something like this, knowing that their views will still be represented. I could be wrong of course. :) - cohesion 15:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Correct, the Arbitrary Committee is not a legitimate authority. We are under no legitimate obligation to obey its dictates or "resolutions". Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 15:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you'll find little traction for that argument. You're right that nobody is obligated to obey arbcom's dictates, but nobody is obligated to participate in Wikipedia either. If someone is sanctioned by arbcom and doesn't like it, they are free to leave, or stay and try to reverse the sanction, or stay and live with the sanction. But the argument that the sanction doesn't apply at all isn't likely to go far. — Carl (CBM · talk) 15:57, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

policy consolidation

It seems to me that the most valuable thing that such a body could do is consolidate, not create, policy. Kill pages that are basically rewording of pre-existing policy, move single-author ranting to userspace, merge related policy clarifications, etc. I'm amazed that any new users can make heads or tails of our policy structure, 'cause I sure can't. - BanyanTree 10:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Strongly agree, simplifying and clarifying policy I think would be the best thing this group could do. There is a lot of cruft in our policies now that doesn't serve that much actual purpose, and is very confusing for new users. - cohesion 15:17, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Committee members

I propose that they be elected by the community and serve six-month terms (they are allowed to run for re-election twice). Good idea? STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 12:40, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Six month terms sounds good. I personally wouldn't necessarily want to place term limitations though. We might have a few very respected individuals who we might want to keep in office indefinitely, the "elder statemen", as it were. I hope not too many of them, but I don't think that'll be a problem. I imagine this type of post will have major burnout issues anyway, limiting the number who would even want to stay in office for very long. I really think we'd have more difficulties getting people to take on the post than possible problems of people not wanting to leave it. John Carter (talk) 14:16, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Agree, as long as there is good transparency (which I think should be an obvious goal and requirement of this plan) I think the Wikipedia community is well-informed enough to not require term limitations. If someone is doing something bad, I think the community will know. This is a good idea by the way. :) I like the idea of guidelines by the community, and policy by this group. - cohesion 15:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with 6 months (or maybe 18 months and 3 tranches, so 1/3 are elected every 6 months). Much shorter, and we waste time with constant elections, much longer and the body isn't really accountable to the community. I also see no need for term limits - if the community don't want someone to continue serving, they can just not vote for them. --Tango (talk) 15:46, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd actually prefer yearly terms (tranches, etc are fine by me), based on the same reasoning of tango above: "Much shorter, and we waste time with constant elections, much longer and the body isn't really accountable to the community."

Every six months is just too short a time for this. (And a yearly term has several precedents at Wikipedia, and Wikimedia.) - jc37 17:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

But so much can happen in a year, and the assembly could easily no longer represent community views by the end of the term. --Tango (talk) 17:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Which makes it a perfect time for an election : ) - jc37 18:31, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

No, it makes it too late for an election. The elections should be frequent enough that the assembly is always pretty close to representing the community. --Tango (talk) 18:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, I was actually disagreeing with the notion that at the end of a year they would be "out of touch", but was allowing that after that they potentially "could" be.

But seriously, just because you're a part of a committee, you lose touch with reading/experiencing policy? I highly doubt it. - jc37 18:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I didn't say they would be out of touch, I said they may no longer be representative of the community. People on the assembly are likely to be people with strong opinions that aren't likely to change as fast as the general community. They may well know what the community wants, but that doesn't mean they'll vote that way (generally, politicians vote according to their own opinions [or those of their party], not according to the views of their constituents). --Tango (talk) 19:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Let's compromise: 2 year terms, and a 2-tranche system, with elections yearly. Better? - jc37 19:28, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

How is that a compromise? It's more extreme than your last suggestion... I think 18 months terms in 3 tranches (so 6 monthly elections) is best. If you want a compromise, how about 18 month terms in 2 tranches, with 9 monthly elections? --Tango (talk) 19:49, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, actually we were (I thought) talking about two different things... Frequency of election, and length of terms. Yearly elections with 3 tranches = 3 years. Hence the "compromise". (And honestly, I do think 3 years is way too long.)

Here's the pron;em, as I see it. I would support year long terms. But I would want membership terms overlap. And that measn elections more often than a year, which I would oppose. (I think yearly elections is often enough.) So how would that be resolved? Well, a 2-year term, with 2 tranches, and yearly elections is one way. A 2 year term, with 4-tranches, and elections every 6 months is another.

I used 2-year terms because it's more easily scalable. Consider the above with single year terms: 2-tranche with elections every 6 months; 3-tranche, with elections every 4 months; 4 tranche, with elections every 3 months. Elections simply would happen way too often.

I don't like 18 month terms, sinply because it's confusing. Let's stick with terms with length in years.

So I think I'm the most strongly leaning towards 2 year terms. - jc37 21:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC).

I don't think 18 month terms is confusing. 18 monthly elections would be, but no-one is suggesting that. I wouldn't object too strongly to 2 year terms in 4 tranches, though, if people really want an integer number of years. --Tango (talk) 21:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Term limits

Even if very liberal in usage would be essential. Say, 3 on, 2 off, 3 on, 2 off; or 3 on, 1 off cycles. The last thing we need is a stagnant pool of delegates, when we're trying to fix stagnant policy change now. No one "needs to" or should be on something like this or the AC forever or constantly. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 13:09, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

But such term limits aren't a restriction on delegates, they're a restriction on the voting community - why shouldn't the community be able to vote for whoever they want? --Tango (talk) 15:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

They can. My thinking is that if Tango serves in 2009 and 2010, he takes off 2011 to let a fresh set of eyes in, but can run again in 2012 and 2013, but has to sit out 2014. The idea being so that there is deliberate shift to some degree, so that we don't end up with 80% or something of the Delegates in there for 6+ years. But if there is no support for that notion of mine, it is what it is. I'd want the same sort of thing for Arbcom, as well. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 15:32, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

A complete reversal of the nature of "policy"

We don't need a body to write "policy", because properly understood, "policy" on Wikipedia merely describes what is already happening, and are most emphatically not binding rules. Actions do not follow "policy"; rather, "policy" follows actions. A failure to understand this simple concept is what's truly at the root of what's wrong with Wikipedia. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 15:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

That's how it was meant to be, yes, but it doesn't really work like that any more because there are too many people involved. Policy being descriptive only works if we can actually establish a true consensus, and that's rarely the case any more. --Tango (talk) 15:48, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Not at all. That's the point--people go ahead and do what's best in a given specific situation. Later on, someone comes along and describes what typically happens in certain situations and writes that up as a guide so people know what to probably expect, with the understanding that there's no guarantee because there are no obligations to obey it. You don't need a "consensus" to do that; you just need to pay attention to what's going on around you. What is being proposed here is a complete repudiation of the concept of a wiki, and I will not stand for this institutionalized hypocrisy. There's enough of it already as it is. Kurt Weber (Go Colts!) 15:50, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

We already have several policies that are often considered "normative"; the main objection I have to this is that the policies were not written with that intent. If there were a body that was charged with writing reasonable, normative policies, but all people were still free to edit individual pages subject to these, that would not "repudiate" the concept of a wiki. — Carl (CBM · talk) 16:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You do need a consensus, otherwise you have people doing different things, so what do you write up? You can only have a descriptive policy if everyone does things the same way - ie. you have a consensus. --Tango (talk) 16:06, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Please Draft as a viable guideline

There is no way that a proposal, nay mind a guideline could be without links to WP. Even the folks at the Boston Tea Party ditched clothing and created a new constitution. What you have is the most ill thought out proposal I have ever seen. I'll work with you but - you editors refine and condense before you invite other editors to the brigade. - BpEps - t@lk 15:49, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

It's always good to have some discussion before worrying about the details of the proposal. --Tango (talk) 16:07, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Come on, the proposal is drafted as some kind of Wikipedia declaration of Independence. You point out nothing specific in your reform, just a lot of words which would confuse. Drop it and let editor mark it for deletion if you will not re-write it for universal understandable English. BpEps - t@lk 16:23, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

There seems to be some confusion here... it's not my proposal... --Tango (talk) 16:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Before it can be drafted as a viable guideline, we would have to know what the guideline would actually say, wouldn't we? That is what the discussion which has taken place to date has tried to determine. It is a comparatively newly stated, if not entirely new, idea, and as such the specific phrasing which you seem to be requesting cannot be clearly and definitively made. After there has been discussion as to what is to be included in the policy or guideline to the extent that there is agreement, if such arises, then I have no doubt that there will be the specific phrasing you're requesting. It took three weeks between when the United States Declaration of Independence was proposed and the time it was finally presented as a draft, and the people working on it were able to work on it for a concerted period of time. I would expect it to take at least that long before this proposal gets to the finished state you are requesting. John Carter (talk) 16:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I've written a form in a common English while still holding your principles, I think it reads better for non native English speakers/Lawyers - User:Bpeps/Governace - Really It does have your principles at heart. -- BpEps - t@lk 17:30, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Support as a legislative body

I like the comparison that someone made above to the three branches of government. We already have a judicial branch in the ArbCom, and an executive branch in Jimbo and others. What we need now is a policy making branch. I disagree with some above who have said that this new body should have the function of interpreting policies. That is already ArbCom's job and should stay that way. This body should make policy, while listening to the opinions of the community, just as a real legislature does. I think that a body of 50, with elections every six months and no term limits, sounds great, for reasons already enumerated by others above. Finally, as an aside, being interested in China as I am, I strongly support calling this new body the Legislative Yuan. (That was only partially a joke)--Danaman5 (talk) 16:36, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Since you're comparing this (I presume) to the American governmental system, Here's the difference: The application of the interpretation.

In an arbcomm case, there are several sections, including "finding of fact". Anyone can edit and propose those. In other words, anyone can be a Wikipedia version of a "constitutional scholar".

It's not up to Arbcomm to interpret policy (though there have been a few direct specific exceptions to this recently), it's up to Arbcomm to determine if the findings of fact apply to the case at hand, and (being pro-active, and future minded) other potential similar cases in the future.

Or to simplify (as I mentioned above) PRV would interpret policy, Arbcomm would interpret actions of an editor, and apply the policy to those actions.

• PRV is about determining policy within the framework of Wikipedia's mission
• Arcomm is about determining an editor's actions within the framework of Wikipedia policy.

And they have said repeatedly that they don't make policy. (Though, as I mentioned, there have been a few exceptions recently. All of which would likely have been handled by the PRV if it had existed then.)

I don't to get too bogged down on this, as it's something minor, and would likely come out de-facto, eventually, anyway.

Anyway, I hope that clarifies. - jc37 17:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

ArbCom do interpret policy - that's what the "Principles" section is for. --Tango (talk) 19:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Which are listed by anyone, and discussable by anyone. (And noting that, atm, the PRV committee doesn't exist, so someone has to, in the meantime : ) - jc37 19:43, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Proposed principles are listed and discussed by anyone. The principles that appear in the final decision are decided entirely by ArbCom. --Tango (talk) 19:44, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Idea

Further information: User:Stormtracker94/Governance reform

Add ideas if you want here to here.

See also: User:Stormtracker94/Legislative list

- a lost of areas that would be represented.

This would act as a legislative branch in a new form of government, functions somewhat like the U.S. government:

Executive branch:

• Jimbo Wales (compare to president)
• Angela (compare to vice president)
• Board of Trustees (compare to cabinet)

Legislative branch:

• Legislative body 1 (compare to U.S. Senate, approx. 50 members)
• Legislative body 2 (compare to U.S. House, approx. 200 members)

Judicial branch:

• ArbCom (compare to Supreme Court)
• ANI (compare to lower courts)

The legislative branches would act like the U.S. legislative system, a policy must be passed my a ⅔ majority on both sides and approved by the president (Jimbo) to be passed. The first branch would be elected members of the community that apply, and would serve terms for six months. The second one would be users chosen to represent specific areas of the project, so opinions would be balanced (e.g., representative from WP:MILHIST, one from WP:KIND, one from WP:BASEBALL, etc.) STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 17:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

The link to the page doesn't seem to work. Also, while I don't dispute the idea that there should be representative voices from all across wikipedia, I would very much hesitate to proscribe any specific criteria (like being a member of a given WikiProject, for example.) My guess is that members of that project would support their fellow members in any event. But it clearly would help if the various nominees had all demonstrated some competence relevant to the post. John Carter (talk) 17:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think that there should be one member from each major project or area represented. This would erase any possibility of biased voting, etc. STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 17:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think a bicameral legislature would be a bit more than necessary at this point. Two hundred fifty legislative positions on the site would be a bit unwieldy, particularly when it comes to elections. Sχeptomaniac^{χαιρετε} 17:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think around a dozen, more or less, would be optimal. (Arbcomm is 15, I think). - jc37 17:53, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think you need more than that to get decent representation - I think 50 would work well. The benefit of a small body is in discussion and drafting, but hopefully most of that will be done by the community, this body would just vote at the end. --Tango (talk) 17:58, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Why would you have Angela as VP? That seems rather random... She's a former board member, but other than that she's never held an particular power individually, and certainly doesn't now. Also, I see no need or even reason for Jimbo to have a veto on all policy decisions. He doesn't now, why would you increase his level of power? I also see no need for a bicameral system... It seems you're just trying to replicate the US system of politics as closely as possible - just because the US does it that way doesn't mean it's the best way (especially not for us, seeing as we're not even a country...)! --Tango (talk) 17:58, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I'd drop the executive branch altogether. That the Foundation's business, not ours. It could put any peron or persons in any position it would desire, at it's discretion. We'll have enough to worry about just with the other two branches, anyway. John Carter (talk) 18:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I'd like us to avoid comparisons to a single form of government. Wikipedia is not a country, and has different (though, at times similar) needs for/from governance. I really think we need to stay open-minded in this and not get bogged down by comparisons to this government or that. Yes some things may be similar or comparable, but some thing are distinctly not. - jc37 18:35, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Jc37 that comparisons to other forms of government will not really assist us in this. I think the general idea being discussed here is a very good idea but lets produce a reform that it is geared for the needs of wikipedia and keep centred on forming a policy making body and not trying to fit the different areas of wikipedia into other government structures. Davewild (talk) 18:42, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I don't think, for example, that a bicameral legislature is necessary for Wikipedia. The reason that such legislatures have arisen in the real world is primarily due to issues surrounding the representation of certain constituencies and disparities in wealth and stature. Since we are a group of semi-anonymous internet users, and individual members of this legislative body wouldn't be assigned to represent particular constituencies, the need for a bicameral system disappears. I was not, by the way, intending to suggest such a close alignment between Wikipedia and the American system, or any other system, in my comment above. I agree that any system should be geared toward the needs of Wikipedia.--Danaman5 (talk) 20:14, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Sounds familiar...

This reminds me somewhat of an analytical essay I wrote some time ago, User:Walton One/Constitution of Wikipedia. As regards the discussion above, I disagree that Jimbo and the Foundation trustees constitute the executive branch of Wikipedia -they're more like absentee landlords. Rather, the executive branch consists of the admins and bureaucrats. Broadly speaking, it's the community's job to make law (really a form of direct democracy except, paradoxically, without voting), the administrators' job to enforce law, and the ArbCom's job to interpret law (though they sometimes effectively make new rules, just as the US Supreme Court does from time to time).

Returning to the main topic, I do agree, though, that an elected legislature, with a fixed membership, would be a good idea for a community of this size. I disagree with Kurt Weber's remarks that policy should be merely descriptive and not prescriptive. The rule of law is inherently desirable; people should know what the rules are, what they can do and what they can't do, and should be protected from the arbitrary exercise of power. So I do support a formal "legislative" policy-making process for Wikipedia. Having said that, I doubt it will ever gain consensus due to the community's innate conservatism. Walton^One 18:22, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

That legislature should be fairly big consisting of various individuals instead of getting the same, perfect little admin group running the show. Since this probably won't happen, I'm against this idea. Monobi (talk) 20:31, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Government surely?

The United Kingdom sort of invented tiered judiciary rule and exported it after we burnt the White House down. Tiered judiciary works better because in the Uk system we have more judges and peers (Magistrates.

Appeal

• Jimbo
• Angela
• Godwin

The High Court

• Godwin (Chief Clerk)
• The Happy Arbcom Team

The Crown Court

• A Representative from Arbcom
• Wikipedia Bureaucrats

Magistrates

• A representative from Bureaucrats
• Two Admins picked by universal ballot/lottery

For any subject/individual/article to go up before the relevant courts (with process) it would be necessary to establish two further forces. (Leet) - 50 outstanding members of the Admin corp decided on by the ranks of the judiciary. (Police) - an admin who hasn't been reported to AN/I within the last 3 weeks. Police refer to Leet and set articles in motion. (Flagged Rollbackers do routine maintenance work and report to Admins who are not yet police. Editors just quake in fear. BpEps - t@lk 18:35, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Why is Angela appearing on all these lists? What does she have to do with anything? --Tango (talk) 18:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

This is true. I think Angela knows lots and lots to be co-opted onto our court of appeal while still being part of a separate organisation. The Trustees could still form part of (Privy Council/House of Lords and or European Parliament) as an further tier. BpEps - t@lk 18:56, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Rejected

Learn to use the consensus model correctly.

We've been discussing how consensus derails. This has nothing to do with how wikipedia scales, and everything to do with how people have misunderstood the consensus system in the first place.

I'll add more later, but I'm in a skype chat atm :-P

There's actually a previous similar page which was dropped Wikipedia:Wikirules_proposal, that was started by people who were also influentual at the time.

Finally, an attempt to remove consensus from the process probably doesn't have consensus.

--Kim Bruning (talk) 19:31, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

{ec) - I'm sorry, but I disagree. It's more acknowledging that others have "learned how to manipulate the consensus model, contrary to its intent". And by the way, if you read over consensus and consensus decision-making, you'll find that some oversight body has to make the final decision. It's the same reason some individual "someone" closes XfD discussions. So no, in my opinion, we're embracing the consensus model. - jc37 19:34, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Consensus maybe? We're using the wiki-model which roughly looks like consensus, and we're using it mostly to edit pages. For that it works. It also works well for policy, though in recent months some people have been blocking consensus inadvertently in some places. --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:52, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Which has apparently undergone quite a few changes in the past few days. That aside, Maybe, rather than talk around each other (as it seems we're doing), let's discuss consensus. I have a feeling we may agree. - jc37 20:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Those are mostly tidying up changes, but that's part of my point actually. ;-) This is a major policy which is not suffering any problems whatsoever with regards to maintenance. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC) contrary to what is claimed here :-P ... that and we should obviously eat our own dog food

Sorry, I can't help noting this irony - somebody comes along and marks the proposal rejected (while it is still being discussed), and tells us this is the way consensus works? --B. Wolterding (talk) 19:33, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Why? We can reject bad ideas and perennial proposals that failed before? --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:46, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Who's we? The proposal is a very early stage, but several editors have expressed support on the talk page. Now a single user comes along, does not contribute to the proposal, does not engage in debate, but his very first post to the talk page is "the proposal is rejected", referring to a 3-years old discussion. And he argues with consensus. Doesn't that strike you as ironic? --B. Wolterding (talk) 08:48, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

You can't unilaterally reject a proposal, even if it is a perennial one. Consensus changes - read this talk page and you'll see plenty of support for the idea. I've reverting your edit. --Tango (talk) 19:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

It's not unilateral if the proposal is perennial. Community has spoken on this many times. Can you imagine that folks might not really ready to embrace something that states that people want to undermine the consensus model? ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:46, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You're guessing what consensus is based your personal opinion, rather than actually reading this talk page. The evidence is right in front of you - read it! --Tango (talk) 19:51, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I did. I was hoping to spot something useful, but the talk page contains mostly previous perennial proposals and other failed concepts :-(. The proposers haven't helped out in documenting the current wiki-editing process, and it kind of shows. :-( --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:57, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

More extensively: The policies, guidelines, and essays till now have been descriptive of wikipedia best practices. That's why we have WP:IAR, for instance, you're allowed to do what you want, and then document what is being done. People here seem to want to institute a prescriptive system.

This is rejected by the current system for the following reasons:

• It is not actually descriptive of any particular process currently in use.
• It fails to describe any current best practice.
• It does not recognize current practice.
• It attempts to deprecate consensus.

--Kim Bruning (talk) 19:50, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well first this is a discussion about creating a proposal, not the proposal itself.

But that aside:

• So since a process doesn't exist, a new one can't be created?
• As I've noted, this is a discussion to create the proposal, not the proposal itself.
• Consensus
• No, I disagree. It's merely dealing with some specific needs in the determination of it.

Perhaps once the proposal is in a more "finished" state, we'll agree more. (Though that might be a sign of possible "consensus"...) - jc37 19:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Basically I've been here before several years ago. Now, once again, people are discussing basically to abolish the consensus system. I don't think much has changed though, and I don't think that abolishing consensus is possible on a wiki. There has to be at least one person here who is willing to fight really really hard to prevent that from happening. --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

As I mention above, I'm in support of the consensus system. Maybe we're talking about similar things, or maybe different things. Let's figure that out? - jc37 20:02, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Alright, where to start? --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:11, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, we should create a page for the proposal and what it would change. STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 20:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

:-P And we should totally actually read other people's work on this. I've never let a committee take over policy before, and I'm not really happy to let anyone do it now either. I get the feeling that this is mostly politics. Does that make sense? --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:49, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I've been around several years as well (with varying levels of activity), and a lot has changed in that time. The main difference is that there are far more people around now - consensus decision making doesn't work with a large group. Just take a look at RfA - it is now a vote for all intents are purposes because there are too many people involved for a true consensus to ever be formed. --Tango (talk) 20:03, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, this argument is perennial as well. It turns out that the wiki is very scalable. Only small numbers of people work on any page at any given time. --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

But we're not talking about content, we're talking about policy. Consensus works fine for the vast majority of content editing (admins can step in with protection and blocks in the few cases where it doesn't), but it doesn't work for policy making. We virtually never change policy significantly because we can never establish a consensus. I won't give examples because any particular example can be dismissed as not being broken, but do you really claim that our current policies are all near perfect? --Tango (talk) 20:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm, I update policy pages whenever necessary, and don't have many issues except in cases where people were blocking consensus (like in the recent NFCC situation). I gave it a BRD kick or two. How's that coming along now? People are at least talking, right? :-) --Kim Bruning (talk)

(Grin) So that's what this is. (rubs shin) - jc37 20:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry about the shin! ^^;; --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:50, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Jc37: Note that the current system is consensus through wiki-editing, but this page does not at this point even remotely describe it, or link to the relevant documentation. Of course people who wrote this page are frustrated if they can't get policies together.

I understand that they would very much like to force their views on others, and are frustrated because they cannot.

I've started many policies and systems. I'm indirectly responsible for WP:5P even, and I've successfully defended the foundation issues from deprecation or deletion. I don't have a problem with the current system; Why don't people want to learn to use it?

Essentially I see this as a power-grab by the wiki-nomic contingent, and I'm not amused at all! :-P --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:08, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

How is it power grabbing by anyone? The proposal is for elections, there's no reason to believe the people proposing the change are going to win those elections. --Tango (talk) 20:17, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

If the election happens, the consensus system dies, afaict at this point in time. Perhaps people can convince me otherwise? (but it seems fairly hard, it's the proposed committee that would undermine consensus, afaict) --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

This is not about the consensus system for determining article content. Article creation by consensus is a foundation issue and nobody is proposing to change that. There is no reason to expect that policy must be formed by consensus, as well; that is not a foundation issue. At some point, as the user base gets larger, we need to accept that not everyone will be able to participate in every policy discussion. The most sensible system in that case would be the one adopted by virtually every large group of humans: to choose a smaller group to discuss and make decisions on behalf of the larger group. — Carl (CBM · talk) 20:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the consensus system for making policy would no longer exist under this proposal, you're correct. The consensus system is already dead though - to mangle a metaphor, you're riding a dead horse. You mention you've made a few changes to policy, but how many of those were significant changes? --Tango (talk) 21:35, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

"Yes, the consensus system for making policy would no longer exist under this proposal, you're correct." - Please clarify that for me. - jc37 21:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

What do you want clarifying? The final decision on policy would be made by a vote of a fairly small assembly, as opposed to consensus. That's the essence of the proposal. --Tango (talk) 21:43, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Right. Do others agree with you on that? --Kim Bruning (talk) 21:53, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I do. We need a formal process of approval for new policies, which must inevitably involve a binding vote. This nebulous concept of "consensus" is fine for a small wiki, but is not sufficient for so large a community as this one. Walton^One 22:21, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't. At least not those words, the way I read them.

The use of the word "final" is absolutely a non-starter, for one thing.

I'm starting to wonder if I'm truly understanding the proposal. (And hoping that this proposal is still adaptable enough to still be workable from within the "wiki-way".) - jc37 22:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

The proposal is hard to understand, because the details haven't yet been gone into. However, I think that the essence of the proposal is, in effect, to create a body which would be able to act when the situation requires action to resolve existing problems. This is not to say that it would act in any circumstances beyond those. I don't think that anyone is envisioning a government like the US government, where various presidents enact whatever proposals they deem necessary. It is a streamlined, representative way to enable necessary actions to be made in circumstances as required. There are additional proposals as well, but those are pretty much secondary to the main proposal.

It has been said that "this is not the wiki way." Perhaps it has not been to date. But I also very seriously doubt that "the wiki way" is to have people wringing their hands about how there is no consensus to pull the fire alarm even though the building is clearly burning down. I do not doubt that any policies or guidelines enacted by this group, were it to exist, would be and should be altered. In fact, I imagine they would be changed rather frequently and substantially. However, "the wiki way", as it has evidently been to date, cannot be said to be such endless argument about whether something should be done, and then realizing that while the discussion has continued the problem has possibly gone too far to be easily countered.

I believe that this organization has come too far, due to the remarkable, valuable input of so many, for us to allow it to collapse because of the inabiility of editors to ever agree to anything. We cannot stand by and argue about whether getting water violates policy when the city we have all worked so hard to build burns down. Every voluntary organization goes through "growing pains", this one included. It seems to me that the opposition to this proposal is primarily from those who, for whatever reason, have decided to, metaphorically, reject such growth. They are as individuals free to do so. However, I do not believe that they have the power or authority to reject ideas which seem to be necessary for the continuing functioning of the project out of hand, simply because they seek to declare "consensus" problems on the second day of the idea's proposal. No one has yet gone into any details, and the details are extremely important. I think it would be best for all of us if we withheld any final judgements until such time as those proposals are concretely made. John Carter (talk) 00:03, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

So emergency de-policy or make-policy? No thanks. Policy is for general situations, not exceptional stand alone events. Exceptional stand alone events are exactly what IAR may be used for. Those times which policy doesn't cover the situation; correctly, exactly, or at all. - jc37 00:24, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Partially. More accurately, maybe finally getting around to creating a policy regarding an idea which has been discussed, possibly more than once, in the past, but where a formal policy was never developed because people thought "it'll never happen" or "it won't happen often enough for there to be a policy." And I can't see de-policying ever happening. Most policies have been created over time, and there is no reason to think that those policies would be made redundant. Maybe a better metaphor would be placing a ill-formed bandage over a wound to prevent further damage. It would certainly be true that the bandage would be replaced and treatment possibly change later. And I cannot imagine, as stated in the bottom section, that it would happen very often. My personal guess would be that, basically, when it becomes clear, either by statements of ArbCom, Jimbo, the legal office, or potentially other parties that guidelines or policies need to be created to prevent a problem from recurring, this group would be able to create such a basic policy. Once created, it would be subject to change, like all other policies, up to and including being marked historical if required. Maybe they'd be most similar to legislative aides, who basically write bills but don't enact or regulate them. Once it's written, and the proximate reason for its creation is at least addressed in some form, the community would be given a period of time to address any concerns they might have, probably a month or so?, and then if there is consensus a final, minimal, draft of the policy is created. John Carter (talk) 00:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

(de-dent) - So policy "clerks"? Sounds like a group of scriveners. "Here, we've decided that we should have a policy regarding X. Write it up for us." Would they have their own wiki for this, or could anyone join in on the fun? : )

(A bit of levity, it's been a long discussion : ) - jc37 00:48, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

It has been long, and God knows I haven't done anything to help that. But, yeah, basically just that, a group to write policies with community input when it becomes clear that such policies are required. I don't think there would be the need for a separate wiki, though. I don't think any of us would want anything like a presidential administration, which could change taxes or declare war, just write the minimal policy required for circumstances. Although if we ever do declare war, Citizendium had bloody well better watch out. ;) John Carter (talk) 00:55, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Then it looks like you aren't understanding the proposal either. It's starting to appear that what is being asked for is a parliament, of sorts, which will simply create policy (rather than create policy pages, as you're suggesting). That's not what I had envisioned, I must admit, when first joining in this discussion. (I'm seriously considering writing up my proposal, though. The more I think about it, the better it sounds.) - jc37 01:07, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

I think part of the parliamentary appearance is due to the fact that we would want to be able to ensure that all relevant viewpoints are included in the proposal, which would logically include people from as many different, potentially relevant fields, as possible. And, for what it's worth, believe it or not, the Congress of the US was set up initially to basically act in substantially the same way, only acting when it had become necessary, and otherwise basically engaging in endless debate but never actually doing anything. The problem right now is that we've got the last part, endless debate but never actually doing anything, down to an art, but haven't gotten the need to occasional act part down very well. And I don't myself see a difference here between policy and policy pages, just like I don't see a difference between law and passed legislative bills. Any policy by definition would be in policy pages. I think we're all too used to the busy, "hands-on" nature of modern legislatures to really grasp the idea of a "caretaker" government, but I think that the latter is what is really being proposed here. The problem is the reason for the proposal is the fact that we haven't to date done a particularly good job as "caretakers" in all cases, so that it looks like we're talking about an "activist" government, when all that Kirill and others seem to have initially proposed is a "adequately activist" government, i.e., one which has done more than we have done to date in certain required areas. And I personally wouldn't mind seeing as many proposals as possible. The more the better, in fact. John Carter (talk) 01:23, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I see the confusion now. (At least one of them.) I think you'll find rather strong opposition to the idea that "policy" = "policy page". The arguement is that "policy" exists whether there is a page about it or not. That's my whole point in my proposal. The PRV committee would determine whether or not the page in question measures up to actually represent policy. That's it. It doesn't create policy, but merely be a group which would review pages, and determine if they represent policy. If you want to create a proposal to have some volunteer scriveners group set up to help write up what is already determined to be policy, that's cool too. Sounds like a WikiProject to me, though... - jc37 01:51, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

We have a fundamental disagreement there, then. As I see it, the problem we're trying to fix isn't writing policy pages, it's writing policy. If there is a consensus then writing the page is easy. It's the cases where there isn't a consensus, so there is no policy at present, that we need a group that can step in and write the policy (based on their own judgement, guided by the community). If there is a consensus then this group would just need to tick the box and that's it - the policy pages could be written by the community as they are now. --Tango (talk) 15:24, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah, so people really would like to resurrect the proposal system that we thought was buried by now. *sigh* Back to square one, I guess. --Kim Bruning (talk) 08:06, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

In response to Jc37, I think we would have to know where this policy which isn't written down could be found if it isn't written down, and how it could be known to be policy. It seems to be declaring that there are one or more "unwritten policies" which have to be followed. Taking recourse to such unwritten policies can be problematic, because they are, almost by definition, impossible to revise, because no one is entirely sure what they are in the first place, and are certainly, at the least, among the ones which noobs would be least familiar with, having never seen them anywhere. Now, this isn't saying that each policy would necessarily be a separate page, but rather that they would all be mentioned in at least one policy page. But if there is anything which is really almost explicitly contrary to a transparent system of governance, it is taking recourse to "policies" which aren't necessarily specifically defined, aren't written down anywhere, and thus can't be revised, because their exact nature isn't clearly known. John Carter (talk) 15:14, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The proposals system was written down. The consensus system is also written down (it covers much of the project namespace ;-) ). the only problem might be that there's no real page that ties everything together for when you're maintaining policy pages. Then again, it's no different from other wiki-process, so why should there be a separate description?

So everything is right out there on the surface and in plain sight and probably quite familiar to you. Then again, you know how familiarity breeds contempt and all... people might simply be trying to look too deeply? --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:35, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

What I'm at least suggesting

The way I was seeing this discussion heading was towards a committee which would act as a whole in the same way an admin acts in closing a DRV discussion.

I was and am opposed to the bureaucratic creation of subcommittees and the like, since we have the entire Wikipedian community to support the committee (the exact same way the community supports/aids in arbcomm discussions).

This is not the creation of a parliament or congress!

This is why I am in support of a small committee (comparable to the number of regular closers at DRV or the membership of arbcomm).

And this committee should be allowed to exercise their judgement and discernment the way arbcom does, as opposed to how bureaucrats are straight-jacketed in closing RfAs.

And since this committee would be elected by the community, and that vetting process would presumably determine that they are likely well--founded in policy and process, I was also suggesting that this committee would be useful as a knowledge-base, a source that arbcomm could draw upon in reagrds to interpretation of policy.

Now if I'm mistaken in this, and this proposal is about the creation of a parliament or congress, then I'll likely step over and join KB in soundly rejecting such a proposal as contrary to the foundation's principles.

I hope this helps clarify. - jc37 20:16, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

What I'm suggesting is probably somewhere inbetween. I think the assembly should do more than just determine consensus (you say they would be allowed to exercise their own judgement, but I'm not sure to what extent you mean - I would have them working entirely with their own judgement), but they should certainly be guided by community discussion. If you try and have it so they determine consensus but with a little leeway in how they do that you'll just end up with the same thing as happened on RfA - people complain so much whenever the exact vote count isn't followed that crats have no choice by the just count votes. --Tango (talk) 20:21, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Exactly. No abitrary straight-jackets allowed. - jc37 20:24, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Committees should not exist if the resolutions they make are binding. The same people calling the shots leads to corruption. If we are going to have a body that makes binding decisions, I'd like to see one that has different people for each "case", or whatever it maybe. Something like a Jury system, even. Monobi (talk) 20:28, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec) - The resolutions may be "binding", but they also may be subject to change. Note that arbcomm is not held to precedent for these and other reasons. - jc37 20:37, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

A jury system would be good. STORMTRACKER 94 ^{Go Irish!} 20:35, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Wondering if you'd consider arbcomm to be a "jury of our peers". - jc37 20:41, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

If decisions aren't binding (but subject to change, of course), there's not really any point making them. A jury might work, but the logistics are far more complicated than for an elected body. As long as the elections are frequent enough (I say 6 months, perhaps with 3 tranches yielding 18 month terms), we should avoid the problem Monobi points out of the ruling body becoming corrupt. --Tango (talk) 20:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I wasn't suggesting that we have no groups with non-binding resolution, but instead we shouldn't have committees of the same people for 3 years who call the shots. Monobi (talk) 21:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:CCC used to be called "no binding decisions". [2] . The discussion page there is very interesting too. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:40, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll note that I was using "binding" to indicate the short term, current case focus of arbcom, not as a long-term, "permanent" remedy". (Clarifying for others, because I think KB understood already : ) - jc37 20:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, with your view, it might work...but you'd not have random people, or experts, but elected people, right? (random people and experts have both been known to be able to write complex things like encyclopedias. Elected people have been known to set PI=3. )

I'm also not sure that your position is actually what's intended here.

I'm actually quite happy about using consensus editing on policy. It's really good to be able to eat our own dog food to be able to update documentation about ourselves. If we can't eat our own dog food, then that's not really a show of confidence is it? :-P

I'm quite happy to teach others how to do consensus/wiki based editing, including on policy. I've written documentation on how that works out, and I even intend to do a talk about it at Wikipedia:Lectures. --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:28, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

(random people and experts have both been known to be able to write complex things like encyclopedias. Elected people have been known to set PI=3. )

Though it has an interesting flawed logic in how the comparison works, it's still an absolutely great comment : ) - jc37 03:09, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The italics comments are intended to be more whimsical. :-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 03:29, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

And actually, I'd like to presume that we'd be "electing" Wikipedia policy "experts". We're just using the elective to vett them. (And yes, I realise I'm turning a blind eye to more than a few of the problems with elections : ) - jc37 03:12, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Abolish ArbCom

ArbCom needs to go. It is a source of much "wiki-corruption" and does nothing more than create extra problems. Great example is with privatemusings, and users supposedly proxy editing for him (as well as others), while he (and others) was/were banned by ArbCom. This just lead to pointless edit warring over nothing important and sometimes caused good edits to be reverted. Also, ArbCom ignores all sense of community input. They might say "email arbcom for suggestions about who should be a checkuser" or whatever, but in the end, as revealed by the Arbcom mailing list leak about Majorly, they just do what they personally want. Finally, ArbCom is illegitimate. It wasn't created by the community, it was created by a person with no particular authority. If there is ONE thing that comes out of this, I'd like to see ArbCom removed. MedCom on the other hand, can stay, because it isn't binding nor forced. Monobi (talk) 20:23, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, Arbcom was ratified by the community in 2004. The checkuser thing is a red herring - checkusers have never been appointed by community discussion, and unless a consensus develops to do so, the arbitrators are acting properly in appointing checkusers using their own discretion. — Carl (CBM · talk) 20:32, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

It was not created by what the community wanted, but by what was dictated. Also, just because checkusers might not of previously been elected by the community doesn't mean we can't start now. The current system is failing. Monobi (talk) 20:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Nevertheless, it was approved by the community. If they didn't agree with it, nobody was forcing them to vote in favor of it. — Carl (CBM · talk) 20:53, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

30 votes supporting over 4 years ago is hardly what I call a community. Monobi (talk) 20:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You're free to try to find consensus to reverse the ratification, but the approval appears to be in order. Simply because Arbcom was approved before some editors began editing doesn't mean it is illegitimate. But my suspicion is that if there was a vote today Arbcom would again be approved. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, 4 years ago, 30 votes was a pretty decent turnout. --Tango (talk) 21:15, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

What would you replace ArbCom with? We need some way of dealing with behavioural issues when we can't establish a community consensus. --Tango (talk) 20:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Replace them with a system that has minimal interference with normal wiki activity (specific behavioral problems with specific users, not general behavior) and that system should be wanted by the community, with the community able to remove it at anytime. Monobi (talk) 20:47, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You've just described ArbCom... --Tango (talk) 21:00, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

There's some proposed systems out there that might be more scalable. --Kim Bruning (talk) 20:42, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think it works ok, for the most part. Though I have to agree, 3 years is a long time to stand a post here, especially from a single election.

(This parenthetical suggestion is merely a suggestion for arbcomm: 2 year terms might be a move in the right direction.) - jc37 20:52, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, 3 years is a long time - what percentage of Arbitrators have completed their elected terms? Not many, I think... --Tango (talk) 21:01, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think 8-month terms would be plenty long. Shorter terms are better for accountability as well as being important to get busy but wise people to commit. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

To answer my own question - it looks like 2 people have completed a 3 year elected term and at least 6 have resigned early (could be more - it's difficult to tell from the timeline who was elected to a 3 year term in the first place). So we're talking about at least an 78% drop out rate! --Tango (talk) 21:10, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

ArbCom needs fixed. It's broken. Changing the length of terms won't fix this entirely, although it is certainly a start. Monobi (talk) 22:09, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Can you provide more detail? --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:29, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

(e/c)If we shorten the term length, we also have to make the election process less horrible (though we should do that even if we don't change anything else). Mr.Z-man 02:32, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, at some point I said some choice words about the arbcom election procedure, and never ran again. ^^;; --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:39, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Eww, why would you want to run in the first place :P Mr.Z-man 02:40, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

It wasn't too bad at one point ... --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:52, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Thoreau once wrote, "Trade and commerce, if they were not made of India rubber, would never manage to bounce over the obstacles which legislators are continually putting in their way." Similarly, on Wikipedia, editors often bounce over the obstacles that the ArbCom and the community put in their way. The ArbCom attempts to impose restrictions, but users can easily evade bans, unless they repeat a distinctive edit pattern. For that reason, the ArbCom usually doesn't even bother trying to impose anything more stringent than topic bans; a broader restriction is difficult to enforce. One could try to give ArbCom rulings more teeth through more liberal use of CheckUser, but then people would just switch to Tor. Wikipedia's dirty little secret is that a large proportion of productive editors, and even sysops, are banned users who have decided to obey the rules of the community (except for WP:BAN), just as the open secret of the marketplace is that, in spite of the laws, large numbers of people are evading onerous taxes and regulations. Effective enforcement would make our governing bodies so problematic that we would finally have to do away with them, rather than just ignoring them. Tisane (talk) 00:39, 22 March 2010 (UTC)

Size of the community

I was curious a few days ago just how many active users there are. I used the recent changes logging information for a one-month period to generate a table showing how many logged-in users edited the site. (Note: because I was lazy, all IP editors are counted as a single userid in the table.)

Unique userids with a minimum recentchanges count
Bots excluded
March 20 2008 to April 19 2008
Edits → Namespace(s) ↓	1	10	50	100	500	1000	5000
All	234,899	33,411	10,230	6,274	1,666	705	37
Main	150,532	26,884	7,916	4,585	853	284	13
Main and talk	157,037	28,718	8,622	5,121	1,059	368	18
WP and WT	17,160	3,514	1,213	659	48	7	1

The impression I take is that there are far more than the fabled "500 editors" active here. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

<grin> ... Now... try a histogram of number of editors per page. O:-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 21:07, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You've made that point before - we're not talking about content, we're talking about policy. It doesn't matter if only 2 people ever edit Pokemon (number and article chosen at random), lots of people are interested in each major policy. --Tango (talk) 21:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Your wish, granted. The drop off is not as fast as might be expected. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:21, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Number of unique userids per page
Main namespace only
Minimum # of userids	1	5	10	15	20	30	40	50	100	250	350
Count of pages	1,030,627	54845	14586	6511	3642	1408	651	320	34	2	0
Minimum # of userids	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Count of pages	1,030,627	344,354	156,481	86,364	54,845	38,500	28,661	22,296	17,784	14,586

That is pretty steep - the drop off from 1 to 5 is 95%! It's not too step from then on, but it doesn't need to be. 95% of pages edited in that month were edited by only one person, that's a lot! Kim is completely right about the statistics, they just aren't relevant to this discussion. --Tango (talk) 21:31, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, a lot of people can be right about statistics simultaneously. Yes, many pages were edited by only one person. On the other hand, 55k were edited by 5 people and 14k by 10 people. I'm not worried much about the pages only edited by one person, since any system works fine when you're alone. It's the pages that have multiple editors that interest me. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:39, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You're right, but it's still not relevant to this discussion. --Tango (talk) 21:45, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I think we're in complete agreement here, if you're saying that those 33k users who each made 10 article edits all are affected by policy even if they edit different articles. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:51, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Almost - it's not "affected by" that's important but rather "interested in being involved in". In the same way that the number of readers of an article doesn't affect how easy it is to establish a consensus of those editing it, the number of people affected by a policy doesn't affect how easy it is to establish a consensus of those writing the policy. --Tango (talk) 21:55, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

The number of people affected by any change to a policy page is 0. The number of people interested in updating a policy page at any moment in time (not counting spurious meatball:ExpandScope escapades :-P) is actually quite low, from what I've observed myself by eyeball. --Kim Bruning (talk) 23:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC) (what do your own statistics show, CBM?).

Hang on! Who made 5000 edits to the WP and WT namespaces in one month? Whoever it is needs professional help!! --Tango (talk) 21:14, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Er, sorry about that. I didn't remove userid 0, which is shared by all IP editors, from the table. So if you really want to limit it to just logged-in users you have to subtract 1 from each cell. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:26, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

So based on dunbar, we hypothesized that if there were only <150 people per page, we didn't need (additional) governance at the time. We presented that at Wikimania Boston. That was several years ago. Apparently, that still holds. :-) Wikipedia still operates the same way it did several years ago. --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:01, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

You're not listening, are you? We're not talking about content, we're talking about policy. Content can and will still be determined by consensus. --Tango (talk) 22:04, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I was going to ask the same question - how does the number of editors per article relate to the process by which we create policy? — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:06, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

That's not my problem actually. You argued that wikipedia was becoming too large and that we needed to change the way we governed it. Now you've done the numbers, and based on what we know about communities, it seems that the wiki can practically run itself. (I sometimes have the idea that it continues to run despite the community these days ;-) )

I didn't make the initial claim, I just showed that your claim was demonstrably incorrect. :-) The wikipedia dynamics are still the same as ever.

Pushing my point further: nothing has changed. People claim that something must have changed every year, but every year, no change. :-P

Pushing yet further: Why do you want to change the way wikipedia functions in such a fundamental way, when there is absolutely no grounds to do so, and where it has been demonstrated by many years of success that the model actually works better than anything that has ever come before?

Well alright, if you came up with some radically new proposal we've never heard of before, and that looked scalable and promising, well I'd certainly give it the time of day. I love that kind of thing! :-) But that's not what you're doing here.

--Kim Bruning (talk) 22:14, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm having trouble following. Nobody is claiming that it's hard to work on an article with 2 other editors, or proposing to change the model for article writing. The claim is that the policy-creation process is broken. The numbers I ran above don't seem (to me) to reflect on the policy-creation process at all. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:20, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Is this the policy creation process where you try to tell other people what they're supposed to do? ;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:30, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Not I; I have been arguing for a long time that policies are descriptive, and not binding, and that in any case we don't even have to read them. However, I find it harder and harder to make that argument with a straight face, since it has become a minority viewpoint. Many editors already feel that our policies are normative documents, and opinion is shifting even further in that direction. As I am somewhat resigned to that mentality taking over, I would like to see a system that can handle normative policies in a sensible, reasonable, responsible way. (By the way, as a personal favor, could you use fewer smilies in responses to me?) — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:38, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

We just killed the previous normative policy crap 6-12 months ago. Then we finally manged to get rid of the non-negotiable clause recently (people were using it to non-negotiate their way out of NPOV :-P ) ... normative policies totally suck. Why would we ever want to adopt a known broken system when we have a clueful system in place? --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Don't ask me. I'm saying I think the change of viewpoint is already underway; ask the people who support it why they do. My view is that if I am going to be stuck under these normative policies I would rather see them developed in a reasonable way. Note that I didn't propose this change, I just support it. — Carl (CBM · talk) 23:24, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Eh? I don't want to be stuck under normative policies. You don't want to be stuck under normative policies. I think the logical conclusion is that both of us should be acting to stop normative policies. --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The idea that policy is descriptive of what people actually do is great - as long as everyone does the same thing, ie. as long as we have a consensus. The site is now too large for that to generally be the case (we'd have no need for ArbCom if everyone agreed on policy, would we?), so normative policies are the only option. --Tango (talk) 15:33, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll give an example to help you. Take a look at Wikipedia:Attribution/Poll - we had nearly 1000 people take part in that attempt to make policy. 1000 is bigger than 150... --Tango (talk) 22:08, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Let's all stay friendly here. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

<Slow... evil... grin...> I totally opposed that poll, you can look through the page histories and see me doing it. My argument there (IIRC) was that making a poll there would end up as no consensus and would kill the whole thing. The reason that would happen is because making a large poll pulls in more than 150 people, making it impossible to discuss anything anymore.

Sound familiar? I then proposed we try use the wiki-editing method instead, and take things slow and one step at a time. Sound familiar some more? ;-)

Some of the people there were too think-headed to listen, and thus they blithely went ahead and killed their own proposal.

So now you'd like to use that *against* my position? :-D --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:22, 24 April 2008 (UTC) [3], some comments why the poll won't provide useful information., I'm sure I made comments earlier too, but there's a lot of ATT archives I shan't go through now.

My viewpoint is that polls like that will become more and more inevitable as more and more people take an interest in policies. But I agree with you that the polls never accomplish anything. That's why I would like to see a system that does accomplish something. I'm not sure how you would manage to replace any established policy with another (regardless of merit) by just editing the policy page; there would always be a group of editors who would oppose the change. Indeed, this is now the S.O.P. on many policy pages I see. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:42, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Those polls are far far from inevitable. The community dynamics have not changed. Your own numbers show they have not changed. Why do you argue like they have changed? --Kim Bruning (talk) 22:59, 24 April 2008 (UTC) if the SOP on some particular page has become to block consensus. Try WP:BRD first, or better yet, remove those folks from wikipedia entirely. They're not here to help with the wiki, after all. If bullies prevent you from forming consensus, why would you want to choose the side of the bullies?

Nicely constructed, but still fallacious : ) - jc37 23:12, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

Where did I put the fallacy? Let me correct it. --Kim Bruning (talk) 02:16, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The last sentence did you in. Presumptive, prescriptive, and all that. - jc37 03:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Urk. <ponder> --Kim Bruning (talk) 03:15, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

My understanding was that, prior to the poll of doom, WP:ATT was built and instituted based on the consensus of the editors present at the time. The problem was that more than 1000 editors became interested in the policy and therefore most of them felt left out of the discussion. The accusations flying about of trying to "sneak in" a new policy are exactly why trying to craft major new policies by consensus flat out don't work; WP:ATT had already lost any chance at wiki-wide consensus before the poll even began. Nifboy (talk) 06:05, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Such worries are easily soothed. You are just polite to everyone that comes along and cheerfully point out that consensus can change, and please pull up a chair and join the fun! People can try really hard, but they can't feel left out for long like that. :-)

In the case of ATT, a couple of people who had worked on the policy actually decided they wanted that poll. Oops.;-) --Kim Bruning (talk) 07:52, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

The problem with ATT is that Jimbo decided to kill it. I never figured out why, but that was that; it was never going to be possible to recover once he yanked it for "discussion". — Carl (CBM · talk) 12:17, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Organizational behavior 101: People are more likely to accept a decision if they've had a hand in the process. Because discussion can only involve so many people, only so many people can readily accept something like ATT, which was in the works for, what, four months? Nifboy (talk) 14:43, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Wikipedia governance 101: They don't have to follow the decision., and they can join the process at any time. --Kim Bruning (talk) 19:37, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

So what happens 3-5 five years from now when we may add a 0 to the end of the number of editors? Sorry, Kim--we agree often, but discussion for the sake of discussion is a waste of time. Discussion as a means to an end is meritous. Deciding things by voting/polling is not a bad thing. We voted to ratify Arbcom (probably should be re-ratified every x years, to be frank), we voted on WP:3RR, we voted on the main page, we vote for Arbcom (it's a vote--Jimmy's authority is because we let him have it only, now that he has no ownership legal authority in Wikipedia and he would be bounced if he screwed the community and ignored our votes), we vote for admins, we vote for beurocrats, we vote for stewards, and we certainly vote for the WMF board in a pure election. I looked at that ATT poll; the problem there was every busybody apparently just had to have their say in the structure of the vote. The "Delegate Panel", my vote for the name of this proposed body, could also be used to build these major votes fairly. What works today is certainly not going to work tomorrow. Let's be forward-looking. Lawrence Cohen § t/e 14:00, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

All the votes you mention are outside the wiki-structure. The 3RR vote is one of those exceptions that confirm the rule (and there was already consensus for WP:EW before then, which is probably why 3RR vote worked at all.)

3-5 years from now if we add another 0 to the number of editors (rate of growth is slowing), the wiki will still have the same structure as before. Wikis scale very very well, (see the statistics thread on this page). This scalability is part of why the English wikipedia (as one of the largest collaborative projects in the world) is so successful.

The structure you propose scales rather poorly, because it introduces certain bottlenecks that were not present before.

If you really want to be able to accommodate an order of magnitude more editors, you will have to radically do away with committees, central pages, and votes. This is what I have been working on, slowly, st ep by step by st ep by st e p by s t e p, over the years.

--Kim Bruning (talk) 19:54, 26 April 2008 (UTC) list not exhaustive, also not in chronological order.

Same old same old? Yes. And for a reason.

I apologize for the length of this, but ... unfortunately, I don't have time to cut it down.

A few months back, WP:PRX was proposed as an experiment, to set up a system whereby a user could name a proxy by creating a proxy file in their own user space; a proxy table could then be created by transcluding the proxy files. The proposal actually did not set up any specific applications, but the full name of it was Wikipedia:Delegable proxy. The idea, basically, is that if some users name a proxy, and those proxies name proxies, etc., that one can estimate how many users a particular proxy represents, ultimately, by following the proxy table recursively. "Represents" is very rough, no proposal was made (nor did I support) any idea that the proxies were formal representatives; rather, they were simply users trusted by other users to be likely to make a decent decision when the user does not personally participate, and then that information can be used in various ways.

However, this method has, outside, been proposed by some for governmental applications. An interesting and very old proposal was made by Lewis Carroll in the 1880s, what is now called Asset Voting, which would see its best application for proportional representation, Dodgson (Carroll) was proposing it for that. If a candidate is not elected (i.e., does not get a defined quota of votes), the candidate may, by negotiation or otherwise, recast the votes; also a candidate who is holding more votes than necessary for a seat may recast any excess votes. What has been noticed is that the initial "candidates" become public electors, who deliberatively form an assembly. The process has no losers, per se, votes aren't wasted (except for the "dregs," which could be very small, and even with those there is a way to make the assembly *totally* democratic, i.e., fully representative.)

Anyway, WP:PRX was immediately tagged Rejected, apparently based on a false idea that it was (1) about voting, and (2) that it would create a bureaucracy, like AMA and Esperanze. Both of these were false. PRX was just a proposal that we experiment with what happens if editors name proxies, function to be determined *later*. That is, we can suggest functions, some are pretty obvious, but ....

PRX could create an assembly representing all those who decided to participate. The problem of scale is well-known in democracy, Wikipedia is not the first organization to face it! What has often been missed, however, is that the *essential* problem of scale is one of noise; try to find consensus in large groups, and the number of people participating either grows to the point where there is too much noise, or the number of people participating does *not* grow and a small group runs the organization. Which sometimes works. The problem is that sometimes it doesn't work, and, indeed, there can come to be a conflict of interest between the individuals who come to be in positions of influence and power and the general "membership." It is very natural, and it is not due to greed or power hunger. But it also creates a gap, with the general membership feeling more and more like "they" -- the in-group -- run the show....

So, classically, large organizations that started as peer democracies (Wikipedia was *roughly* that -- democracy does not mean "voting"), devolve into oligarchies or what can amount to a kind of oligarchy, a "representative democracy." But representative democracies, if they are organized through fixed elections for terms, can themselves develop quite a gap between the "people" and the "government." There is a way around this: the problem with direct democracy wasn't voting, per se, but deliberation. If too many people try to deliberate, the noise becomes too much. Voting, likewise, places too much of a burden on those whose interest and available time is insufficient to be informed on the issues. I wish I had a nickle for every AfD vote I've seen that was apparently based on a 30-second review of the nomination. If that. And most people just stay away.... With delegable proxy, anyone might still be able to participate, but "votes" can be weighted according to some kind of trust level expressed through the proxy system. And that does not mean that decisions would be made by "voting," decisions could be made just as they are now, by trusted individuals based on the advice that the community provides and their own investigation.

What do we have here, with this page? Just proposed, two days ago, and lots of opinions being expressed. Already an attempt to place a Rejected tag. How long does it take to actually consider a proposal? I can say this: if the number of participants is unlimited, it can take forever. It doesn't take forever, to be sure, to "Reject" a proposal, all it takes is enough people willing to make a snap judgment and vocally express it. WP:PRX wasn't just "Rejected," a group of editors tried to eradicate it, thoroughly. The person who proposed it -- a bit impulsive, to be sure -- was blocked, and, underneath all the immediate causes was a sense that he wanted to change things. Disruptive, that intention is. So ... I suggest that if we want to form an Assembly, we can. There is nothing stopping us. But if we try to do it on-wiki, we will see a repeat of the contention and endless and tendentious debate that has happened again and again. Delegable proxy can form an assembly, ad-hoc, without elections. The assembly can function in different sizes as needed; it's a characteristic of delegable proxy that a small group can represent a large one, and "small" can be very small, if needed, and "large" can grow without limit, at least the present human population isn't too large. TANSTAAFL: make the assembly too small, it becomes less representative because relatively more compromise must be made, make it too large, it becomes cumbersome.

However, basic rule: assemblies make their own rules. The U.S. Constitution, for example, does not specify the rules for the House of Representatives for the Senate; those bodies make their own rules. If we simply start naming proxies, and start a mechanism for those who wish to participate -- i.e., *work on it, not merely oppose it* -- we can create an assembly, in short order, that would represent the participants, empowered as much as they care to empower it. None of this takes anything away from those who don't participate. This Assembly, initially, would merely advise. Whom would it advise? Whoever wants to listen! It would advise its own participants with regard to cooperation in connection with the project, and it would advise others who might be interested in what a broad (or even narrow) peer organization of editors concluded. As consensus.

Such an assembly, at least initially, would have no power to bind anyone, it would not, if it follows my advice, make decisions except trivially about its own process. Rather, it would report consensus, after deliberation, and it could deliberate in small groups.

Is Wikipedia ready for this? Definitely not several months ago, and I'd be surprised to find that it is now. But I'd love to be wrong! In any case, interested? Email me off-wiki. The fact is that two people communicating and cooperating, seeking consensus, can do more than one, and three more than two. --Abd (talk) 23:27, 24 April 2008 (UTC)

be aware, this user is trying to form a circle of meatpuppets to force in his proxy editing (or the "sockmasters charter") - someone he contacted off wiki confirmed this to me. --87.115.8.27 (talk) 14:00, 26 April 2008 (UTC)

oh and he has an active meatpuppet in Sarsaparilla (blocked but still editing under various accounts) - the general pattern is that one of the two proposes some policy change and the other turns up to support it - be watchful for new accounts turning up here to !vote and support this. --87.115.8.27 (talk) 14:08, 26 April 2008 (UTC)