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Archive 1Archive 2


What is this page about

Is this an essay or an attempt at policy? (→Netscott) 08:39, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it's just a definition. Policy is handled through Sock Puppet policies. SPA's by themselves do not violate policy but if they are used as a sock puppet in order to evade policy such as blocks or disrupting wikipedia, they are illegal. It's more of a red flag. SPA's are often tagged in voting since it appears they are created only to vote (a violation). SPA's usually don't have a long editing history.--Tbeatty 08:45, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Well I've tagged it as {{essay}} for now. (→Netscott) 08:51, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

notorious SPA's

There are SPA's with rather long edit histories out there, more than a year in some cases with edits only or mostly in a very limited range of often associated articles. I think it's justified to refer to them as being somewhat notorious SPA's. I also think that some policy regarding them could be of great merit to Wikipedia, because how good can an editor with such a narrow perspective be for Wikipedia or even his/her favourite article/s?

As a relative beginner (have been hanging around as an IP editor mainly correcting typos now and then) I'm not familiar with the policy process. Just wanted to post this as a suggestion, hear what people think about it, maybe the idea has already been there and rejected?

I imagine a simple system working with a predefined frame of values. For example, a user who registered at least one year (or six months, or 2 years) ago and has more than, say, 100 edits (or 500), 90 (or 85, 95) percent of which are in only one article or in a narrow range of thematically connected articles (like Milky Way and Andromeda Galaxy) could be tagged as a notorious SPA and consequently be prohibited from editing those special articles until their proportion on all of that users edits is down to 50 percent or instead for a certain period of time. 84.44.173.117 03:45, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Requiring them to edit other articles until they get down to a specific percentage is not workable or good, but single-purpose accounts often do warrant observation. —Centrx→talk • 02:29, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
For a start, it's pointless. because if someone doesn't want to comply, they can just stop using that account and start a new SPA account.
Secondly, i don't like the use of the word "notorious" here. Notorious implies bad. SPAs are just....a little suspicious. They're not bad in itself. If someone is say, obsessed with one topic, and keeps a daily eye on it - it's not nessasarily bad, unless they actually do something bad (like POV shoving). If someone just keeps a few articles they really like free of typos and vandalism by watching over it, i don't see any harm.
And i should mention, the "notorious SPA" account could belong to another wikipedia editor. There are legitimate reasons for using more than one account (WP:SOCK#Segregation_and_security) --`/aksha 01:18, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

If being an SPA isn't a violation in and of itself...

...and there's nothing to this otherwise, why is this here? It seems to be brought up more and more to discount opinions during discussions on project and talk pages, and the constant identification and condemnation of them with the {{spa}} scarlet letter seems to run afoul of more important, established things like WP:BITE and WP:AGF, not to mention it could very well be interpreted as a personal attack. What are we trying to accomplish with this, and is it really beneficial? --badlydrawnjeff talk 16:13, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

It is a description of what a single-purpose account is. It is not sufficient to be a violation in itself, but it is a contributing factor in deciding what to do about a user. If an account is here only to push a particular point of view on a strictly confined set of articles and it is otherwise being disruptive—whether it be a sockpuppet or some partisan, the response is different from that for a person who is making encyclopedic edits across a several areas or a broader range but who is still somewhat disruptive or uncivil. —Centrx→talk • 21:01, 2 October 2006 (UTC)
Regarding Badlydrawnjeff's comment about WP:BITE, there could be guidance this tag shouldn't be used unless editors have a minimum amount of edits. Regarding very new accounts commenting at AfD, for example, different tags could be used. Regarding the implied lack of civility, we could create a message to be placed on the SPA user talk page that is more encouraging and emphasises they haven't violated any policy. I'm not saying the essay is wrong, merely that it could possibly be improved. Addhoc 15:55, 3 October 2006 (UTC)
I have added a sentence pointing out that SPAs are not de-facto bad. Rich Farmbrough, 10:24 4 October 2006 (GMT).
I disagree that accounts which are made for single specific purposes actually fit into the neutral point of view model, on which the entirety of Wikipedia is based. If the users had nothing to hide they would come in as their regular users, or at least declare the reason from the small list of possibilities on WP:SOCK. I would still assume good faith, however unless they delcare their reason for existence as a "single purpose account", I would not see their contributions as being helpful in the long term. Ansell 10:02, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't agree, a single purpose account doesn't have to violate WP:NPOV. They could be someone who doesn't have much time and focuses on a subject of particular interest. In the long term, they could broaden their interests. Even in the short term they could be attempting to instigate a change that would help NPOV. Addhoc 10:13, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
(unindent) I am still only convinced that the small list of accepted reasons on the sockpuppet policy are allowable. If the user does come into a discussion with a view to improving the neutrality of the current consensus then they may need to do it without having other contributors prejudiced against them at the start, however, that is one of the accepted uses of sockpuppets, so I agree there.
I guess it is the wording as "single purpose" which gives me an eery, non-neutral point of view prejudice against the position of this page. Neutrality IMO must not be based on "single purposes". Ansell 10:36, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
I also disagree strongly with your reversion of my deletion of the sentence "There is, of course, nothing wrong with single use accounts as such." since there is something inherently wrong with them, and their use should be restricted to the small areas that you point out, not having their use as a common method of sockpuppetry. Ansell 10:50, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
Could we rephrase the current sentence to explain that being labelled a single purpose account does not imply the user has infringed policy, merely their views should be given less weight? Addhoc 13:37, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
I would be more comfortable saying that they should be "taken in context" rather than directly giving them less weight. If the Single Purpose Account engages in edit warring, then the context of that account is a not a good faith attempt to improve the page. However, if they are not edit warring, and still being abused/not treated right on a talk page, ie, given less than the usual weight, then the context is that they are not being accepted as a good faith account.
Not sure about the sentence really, other than what I said above about it being incorrect in the general case. Ansell 00:01, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Even if they aren't engaged in edit warring or WP:NPA or WP:CIVIL concerns, I think views of a SPA could still be given less weight compared to established editors for the purposes of straw polls etc. I agree "taken in context" sounds better than "given less weight".Addhoc 10:23, 11 October 2006 (UTC)
Of course, people with SPA's might actually be experts in the article in question, and editing it precisely because they are experts. So, being a SPA is in itself no indication that an editor has less gravitas than any other. The reverse might well be true, because generalists editing a vast number of articles are unlikely to have a deep knowledge of any particular one. I actually don't edit the articles in which I am a recognized expert at all, precisely because it's a bit maddening to do so. Derex 01:21, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Expertness is irrelevant. AfD's are a consensus of the community factored in with interpretation of policy/guidelines. That said, SPA's are people who have not contributed much to the ocmmunity and therefore there views related to consensus should be given less wait. That said, their citation of policy/guideline is no different from any other editor although their personal interpretation may be suspect. A similiar rule exists for sock puppets in that persons with 50 edits or less are given much less sock puppet leeway than established editors. The SPA tag is way to to point out potential disruptors/sock puppets/spammers/other malcontents to the closing admin. It is not a deletion of their views. --Tbeatty 01:37, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
That is completely incorrect. Expertness should have some consequence. If a bunch of Australians vote to delete a US president because they thought he was non-notable that would be a joke. An "expert" US opinion in this case should completely divert the discussion. AfD should be a place where the people with the expert knowledge discuss, not where a certain closed-wall subsection of wikipedia vote based on their version of an expert opinion. The closing admin can find the users by themselves, without the closed-wall (spa possibly) afd users labelling accounts who have an interest in wikipedia and a discussion, completely against assume good faith. We are not here to label and push new users away. Labelling people as sockpuppets by reflex will not improve the community at all. Where is that rule BTW? Ansell 01:47, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Interesting that you put it in a way that a single user should be given more weight than a bunch of others who don't have the same stake. It's the same argument for the SPA tag. They are not community members. Therefore their views should be weighed appropriately. Also, last time I checked, there is no personal idenifying information required to vote. There is no "expertness" known to the closing admin. In fact, prior history with Wikipedia is one of the few factors that can be weighed and I agree with you that it should. --Tbeatty 01:54, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
If User:John Quiggin says an economics article is crap, giving reasons, and User:Tbeatty says otherwise, then I would hope we would have the sense to listen to John. Else, Wikipedia is being truly ridiculous. As far as I know, his "single purpose" is to edit economics. But, that's because he's a professional economist and a damn good one. But, I don't even ask that we give someone like that excess weight, all I ask that there not an automatic assumption of less weight. (Disclaimer John may actually edit more broadly, I haven't checked.) Derex 06:11, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
AGF says otherwise. People are members of the community no matter if they have 2 or 10000 edits, and their views are treated exactly the same. The closing admin should take into account different points of view in the "discussion" as opposed to just being a robot and totally up the votes. I put the example down as an example of the absurdity that can happen when discussions are completely based on individual editors POV's without reference to reality. See the discussion on G11 for an example of the practical limits of the absurdity of thinking that expert opinions are not relevant. Ansell 02:02, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
It's a dismissal of their views based on an arbitrary opinion of the tagger, one that isn't necessarily likely to be correct. --badlydrawnjeff talk 01:49, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
There is no dismissal unless the closing admin believes they should be dismissed. If the AfD is being spammed because of a post at blogsite and a bunch of newbies start voting from their IP's, should that count as much as an established user? Answer: It depends. But the clsoing admin should know about it. Tbeatty 01:56, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
I don't think it's an arbitrary dismissal, as we do permit new people to weigh-in on Afds. I think it's just a way for Admins to be aware that these new people may or may not be a part of our community, and may just be here to weigh-in because they were guided here by an external website, as we saw in the Information Clearinghouse, Whatreallyhappened, and Encyclopedia Dramatica debates. All 3 of those debates included brand new editors, yet the results were different. My point is that the Closing Admin was able to weigh and evaluate the arguments, including those presented by SPAs. Morton devonshire 02:06, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
So, right - it's arbitrary, and lacks assumption of good faith. Again. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:43, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Why should it matter if they are "part of our community"? Closing admins are supposed to weight the quality of the arguments, not the number of votes. Is a quality argument from a newbie ipso facto of lesser quality? Shouldn't we focus on the edits, Morton, and not the editors? That's a saying I hear quite a bit around here; is there any substance to it? I wonder. Derex 08:33, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

SPA mention

So this new type of labeling users turned some heads at the Stanford Review regarding their recent AfD discussion:

"The language used amongst Wikipedians is intimidating and bewildering to outsiders. Words like “walled garden” and “spamvertisement” are used to degrade articles. Inexperienced users are called “SPAs” or “single purpose accounts” as an attack on the credibility of anything they write on Wikipedia.
The Stanford Review and World Ahead Publishing recently gained an ally in their war against Wikipedian deleters. The user, Turkey2020, put forth some solid claims for the retention of the articles—and also went to the trouble of improving the articles with citations. Of course, then Turkey2020 was accused of being an “SPA” and accused of using “misleading” arguments."

Not only does this type of thing violate basic civility and good faith requirements, but it's also starting to make us look bad. Should we even have this at this point? --badlydrawnjeff talk 16:54, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

IMO, it also reflects the fact that, although we say it is not, AfD is most definitely a vote, the loudest side wins. I used to bother going to AfD's with citations, but the old "nn delete" always won the day. Ansell 23:44, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

I think I'm somewhat to blame for the sudden popularity of this term since I created the {{spa}} tag. I never intended this tag to spread beyond AFD, but it has and I know of one user who was banned for harassment after using it to persistently tag an established editor. I too would support any proposal to formalise the definition of "single purpose account" to reduce the reoccurrence of such incidents in future. --  Netsnipe  ►  00:47, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

So you're the evil doer! In all seriousness, I'm not sure if a strict definition is the answer, either. I mean, as an example, I can name a few users off the top of my head with thousands of edits who would fall under the same SPA definition that we toss folks with a dozen AfD messages. If I threw the tag on their talk page or contribs at a discussion, I'd likely be blocked for incivility or harassment. It's somehow okay when we do it to a newb, though. I'm not sure if defining or tagging or even calling mention to it (and I've done so in the past, full disclosure) is good, as it fails basic civility and interaction guidelines and policies, as well as perpetuating the myth that these non-DRV processes are a vote, when they're not. I'm wondering if it's not too late to contain the spread. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:15, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

From the DRV from October 20:

"'All contribs are single purpose accounts' What a horrible thing! You get someone to actually contribute to a site and maybe they'll enjoy it and continue to do it. Apparantly you have to contribute to an article you're not interested in before you can do one that does interest you. To me, this just seems to fly in the face of what wikipedia is supposed to be."

This isn't good. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:49, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

If the tag is only meant to be for deletions, then why don't we change it. So instead of "Possible single purpose account:X has made few or no other contributions outside this topic." change it to "This nomination for deletion was made by an account which is possibly a single purpose account"?

I don't see why we should stop using the term just because standford review doesn't like it. Shoule we start considering "spamvertisement" a BITE too? As long as we make it clear on the SPA page that a SPA is not a bad thing by default, it should be fine.

Because when SPAs nominate things for deletion, other people often comment it in their text anyway. So it's not like not using the SPA tag means SPA who nominate articles for delete will not get called SPAs. Someone will comment about the fact that the nominator seems to be a newbie anyway. THis just makes it less messy, and more formal, and therefore (hopefully) less chance of offending anyone. --`/aksha 01:41, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Actually, this is more offensive as is. It's one thing to point out an account is new. It's another entirely to claim that the account exists for one purpose, and never in a positive context. It's a failure of assuming good faith, and it's typically derogatory. --badlydrawnjeff talk 02:01, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
I agree totally, the tag has no relevance to the discussions per AGF and NPA. If a contributor to the discussion suspects something then they can investigate themselves, otherwise, XfD discussions are about pages, not about nominators, or discussors. Closing admins should be wise enough to check the nominators history, as a closing action only IMO. Ansell 02:07, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
In the context of AfD, there are a whole bunch of AfDs started everyday by obvious single purpose accounts that create an AfD with a reason like "nn fan games" or "wikipedia not shopping guide." Their reasons are usually completely off the mark, and their account has done absolutely nothing but create that AfD. SPAs need to be redefined to apply only to these accounts, i.e., the original intention of the term. Someone who only likes to edit a few articles isn't really a single-purpose account. — Dark Shikari talk/contribs 02:35, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Why should it matter? Again, I can find a whole bunch of AfDs and CSDs by people with thousands of edits who only edit on AfDs and CSDs. Are they SPAs? Of course not. It's specifically meant to disregard the people being labeled as such. --badlydrawnjeff talk 03:04, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Can you really? And were the accounts created for that purpose? —Centrx→talk • 03:08, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, I can, and no, I can't, much like none of the folks who throw the SPA tag around willy nilly can. --badlydrawnjeff talk 03:11, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Invariably, someone outside Wikipedia always gets in a huff about the tagging of SPA in an AfD. It has happened before, and it will happen again many times before Wikipedia is through. This particular article is by someone who nearly had a stub-level article deleted for non-notability, tried to rally the faithful to save it, and had their votes discounted because they signed up expressly for the purpose of saving the article, and had them flagged as SPA. In such an event, the SPA guidelines and associated template are working as designed. While certainly there are occasions where editors have used the template to bite the newbies, these can be taken on a case by case basis as abuse by individual editors, rather than a flaw in the SPA guidelines themselves.--Rosicrucian 13:28, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

So it's designed to act as a scarlet letter, bite newbs, and insult people? --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:41, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
It's designed to cut down on meatpuppets and spamming of AfDs by outside sources. It's also designed as a sort of shorthand to make work quicker for closing admins on AfDs that have been spammed. Given the possible vanity status of the family of articles that were up for deletion, as well as the Op-Ed author's obvious stake in the matter, did it occur to you that he's fairly biased on this? As I said, abusive use of the SPA tag for harassment is a matter for the Administrators Noticeboard or the Dispute Resolution Process. It is not indicative of SPA itself being a faulty premise.--Rosicrucian 13:50, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Is there a non-abusive use? What was wrong with simply pointing out that a user was new the last few years prior to this? Why make claims about possible motives? --badlydrawnjeff talk 15:31, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Of course there's a non-abusive use. SPA guidelines are not, in and of themselves, abusive and you haven't really indicated why you seem to think they are in a non confrontational way. You have pointed out instances in which you believe they were used in an abusive manner, but I don't believe you've made clear how these examples are indicative of a flaw in the guidelines rather than an example of individual abusive editors. As for motives, I should think it goes without saying that the Editor in Chief of the Stanford Review cannot be considered an objective source regarding an AfD on the Stanford Review. He is an involved party. That should be self-evident.--Rosicrucian 16:32, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
I haven't? --badlydrawnjeff talk 18:19, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

I am persuaded by the quote bdjeff provided "... Apparently you have to contribute to an article you're not interested in before you can do one that does interest you. ..." This tag should not be used. Bottom line AFD should _not_ be a vote, and that should be more than lipservice. We routinely have votestacking solicitations and AFD noticeboards for those of a particular outlook. So, while I sympathize with Ansell's correct observation that "'nn' delete always won the day", the solution is to put a stop to numbers counting instead of putting a scarlet letter on people with a narrow range of interests here. Bottom line, admins have signed up for the daunting task of sorting arguments on merit, not number, and an spa tag gives no insight at all into the merit of an argument. Derex 01:14, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

So when a cogent argument is put forth for deletion and the input of the first edit IP weighs in with Delete per nom (because the nom is very convincing), that should be thrown out on the merit of the argument? That makes no sense. Rahter, it is important to know that this particular editor only saw interest in voting for this single AfD. It's common sense that if the first edits of a contributor are process edits they are most likely spam. Free Republic or democratic underground can generate hundreds of votes. The AfD is as much about community consensus as it is about policy and the SPA tag helps determine Wikpedia community consensus as opposed to external community consensus. --Tbeatty 07:07, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Strangely enough, my first edit was to a process related page.[1]. Back then noone said anything about first edits being on process pages. They just didn't care. I gave reasons for things and that was about all. Delete per nom is about the worst reason that people can give. At least point out what parts of the nomination were great. Nominations are rarely perfect, and if they are, you can state the set of points in a more concise manner indicating agreement. This may cut down on serial AfD editors who just go along doing exactly what you say, ie, get to nominations first and do not think they have to discuss, so they just put delete per nom down. Ansell 09:50, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Well, "delete per nom" or "keep per above" just helps build consensus - saying that a lot of people agree with the reasoning. It doesn't add to vote counting, it simply adds to a chorus of voices that there's agreement, sorta like the {{prod2}} tag. This is much worse. --badlydrawnjeff talk 13:17, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

I support continued use of the spa tag, or a similar way of tagging the obvious. On many AfD's of all subjects, someone tries to rally support on an external website, resulting in a major influx of anon "voters" who have no edit history, and are all pushing the same talking points, which often have no relevance to Wikipedia standards of deletion. It comes from all "sides". My first few edits at WP were to AfD's, and were tagged similarly, and deservedly so. It was a cold slap in the face to me that informed me that Wikipedia was not like a blog, or an online poll that could be "freeped". After a somewhat rough start six months ago, I have matured into a right good Wikipedian, with an edit history that anyone would be proud of. I am not against tightening up the language and use of such a tag. For example, to be used on accounts with less than X number of edits (25?), and stating something along the lines of "this user is an unestablished editor with less than X edits, and may be a single purpose account". Any abusive tagging of established editors should be removed by anyone on sight. - Crockspot 18:01, 22 October 2006 (UTC)

Er yeah. What Crock said. Otherwise we become much more vulnerable to external floods. Even with the current SPA marker and others we often have admins closing what might have been clear AfDs as "no consensus." There's no need to make it even easier for those outside Wikipedia to control our processes. JoshuaZ 20:16, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
If our processes don't involve head counting, a) what does it matter, and b) again, why does that preclude us from our basic civility and good faith guidelines? --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:26, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
Your premise is wrong. We all know our processes actually do involve headcounting, no matter what the party line is. That's why people votestack & noticeboard & spa. Of course, your premise should be right; that would be a welcome change. Derex 23:38, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
We say that we don't count heads but in fact this is also part of the strategy to avoid the flood of sockpuppets in AfDs. We cannot seriously hope to ever have a deletion process that lets an admin decide which side has the better argument because it's against the spirit of the project to give them that kind of power. So the current practice is in fact to do a bit of both: if one side is large enough and vocal enough with lesser arguments, then we conclude no consensus. That's perfectly fine but it's also important in that context to identify vote stacking and sockpuppetry and it's also important to acknowledge the fact that such abuse in AfD is routine. Sure the spa tag will unfairly target a newbie every now and then but it's also true that it is useful in helping admins with AfD closures, overall I think we can live with that. Someone argued that it should be left to the admins to check histories but then what difference is there between an SPA tag and a closure rationale that reads "discounted votes from likely sockpuppets"? Pascal.Tesson 23:58, 22 October 2006 (UTC)
I feel like I'm beating the dead horse here, but I have to ask - is helping admins with AfD closures worth violating at least two policy/guidelines? I'm not sure if we should live with that, it's just as against the spirit of the project, if not moreso. Meanwhile, what's the difference between the two examples? The latter doesn't directly single anyone out. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:17, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
What policies? WP:BITE, WP:CIVIL, and WP:AGF doesn't mean we can't comment on it being unusual for a new editor to make his first edits in AfD's, and that he (the new editor) may not have read the history of the article or be at all familiar with our policies and guidelines. — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 20:45, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
Why is it unusual? For instance, AfD stuff was one of my first 20 edits. The SPA tag doesn't really do that, in any case. It makes some blanket declaration taht this editor might only be here for one purpose. How do we know that? How can we even make any sort of declaration. Shouldn't we be assuming good faith about such users until we have information otherwise? Shouldn't we refrain from branding new editors like that? Is it really civil to call users an SPA, knowing full well the implication of such? --badlydrawnjeff talk 21:03, 23 October 2006 (UTC)
Actually, I don't think the tag is muched used unless the account has little or no edits. And by "little" I mean two, three, not twenty. Pascal.Tesson 05:39, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to tangent off Pascal's comment for a second. He support's the SPA tag because it promotes transparency. I see votestacking as probably a larger issue than this. If we have a SPA tag, shouldn't we by the same reasoning have a "notified by" template to apply (hopefully self-apply) to commentors who have been solicited to participate in a particular AFD? Logic and motivation seems pretty much the same. That's not to say that either new users or solicited users have anything other than quality input. But, for the same reasons you might want to know if an external blog is sending voters, you might want to know if an editor is soliciting other like-minded editors, since numerical counts do matter according to Pascal. Derex 03:45, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Meh, I wouldn't mind although some notification is tolerated even if it's discouraged. The problem (same goes for the spa tag) is that while these are meant to avoid screaming matches they sometimes can provoke them. But if someone abuses an spa tag or throws dubious claims of sockpuppetry it's ok to mention it on their talk page or to remove the spa tag if one feels it's abusive. Why shouldn't we trust wiki-editors to use these tools responsibly? And is there convincing evidence that they routinely don't? Pascal.Tesson 05:35, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
I'm beginning to lean that way, to full transparency on all aspects, including new user, spa, and personal notifications, and noticeboard notifications. Yes, there is convincing evidence (at least to me) that selective notifications have been an ongoing problem. I think that wouldn't really be an issue if this stuff were transparent. Basically, I agree that we simply do headcount to an extent, so the context of those counts should be clear. If someone notifies 10 friends of an AFD, and many drop by and say 'delete per X', then that should be known. Anyways, it's mildly off-topic, but I do have some proposed reforms in mind that I'd like to run by you in a few weeks, if you wouldn't mind taking a look. Derex 05:55, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
Of course one defining difference is that once the page is deleted as a result of a discussion like that. Only admins can see what was there and hence you cannot have that transparency the whole way through the process. Selective notifications IMO are mostly to those who care about the deletion, and hence we get to a point about whether it is okay to refer to "deletionism" or "inclusionism" at all... but thats possibly for another page.
Also, it was commented above that the closing admin somehow needs help from commentors on a debate otherwise they are possibly not just closing, they are interpreting. I do not see how that is against the current premises of what an admin is to do. One of the most important RfA aspects is whether a user is ready to be a judge on such issues. RfA is not simply about the tools, it never has been. It is about maturity and judgement. If the admin cannot figure out that "delete per nom" endlessly is non-productive and possibly no better than "keep" on its own, then they should not be closing debates. Ansell 07:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
One of the issues in AFD's is that spa can mean two different things. Sometimes it indicates an established editor who contributed to the nominated article, and maybe related articles on the subject. More frequently (and the template doesn't distinguish) it is used to indicate someone who registered a username five minutes before voting in the AFD and has edited nothing but that AFD. Fan-1967 16:10, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

A left-field alternative to public SPA tagging

Just another thought to throw out there....instead of public SPA tagging, what about the existences of a set of "clerks" on AfD to research the votes and assist the closing admin. To lessen the workload, the need for clerks could be limited to contested of even controversial (40-60%) AfD. Instead of using a public tag for SPA, the AFD clerks could use an in-code tag. Yes, I know that anyone can still see the tag but if you're "experienced" enough to know how to see them then you're probably not the newbie that we want to avoid biting. Of course, you don't even have to limit this to only the use of "clerks" since any editor can do it. Again, just a thought. Feel free to tear to shreds. :p Agne 19:06, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

I don't know about clerks, but I would heartily endorse "in code" tagging. There ought to be someway for a closing admin to turn it visible though (a dhtml switch), to avoid having to wade through the code. That avoids the whole "scarlett letter" issue while maintaining transparency. Hopefully, though, admins will take the time to have a look at edit history before making any judgement based on such a tag. Derex 20:18, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
I agree with the concept, as my main objection is about the tag not assuming good faith, and it being a possible attack on the editor. Agreed that editors who sign in five minutes before "voting" should be encouraged to view it as not a vote and make a decision based on the policies about articles. But conversely, their lack of experience does not mean public humiliation (tagging them as biased immediately) is necessary. Would it be possible to run a bot over discussions and tag the talk page with the edit counts and days since registered for each user discussing? It seems like something a bot and not a clerk would be more suited so and hence may be accepted more easily. Ansell 23:58, 24 October 2006 (UTC)
yes, it's bot-able — maybe an afternoon's work in Python. Derex 02:17, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
"Would it be possible to run a bot over discussions and tag the talk page with the edit counts and days since registered for each user discussing?" in that case, we won't have to bother tagging subtly. I'm assuming this would be something like a tag behind every single signiture with an edit count and age? In which case, everyone would be tagged. So it's really not a BITE or assuming bad faith. It can be public to help everyone understand AfD discussions better. And help enfource the "AfD is not a vote" idea.
On second thought, tagging with edit counts is a bad idea. Edit count shouldn't be a way of valueing editor's opinions. It'll become too contraversial. It'll encourage people trying to increase their edit counts. In all, i get the impression we shouldn't be putting so much spotlight on a user's edit count. I think age (as in how long registered, or ever better...how long since first edit) would be sufficient. --`/aksha 02:40, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
Age and over/under some edit count threshold ~100?. Possibly edits on the disputed article or article talk as well. Derex 03:00, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
I just don't think edit counting at all is good because there's so much people can say to argue about it. "I've only made a few edits, but they're significant edits, not just typo fixes" or "i use the preview button, so i end up making very few edits". Edit count on the disputed article seems like a good idea, but i worry it'll just fuel sockpuppet accusations on AfD pages. --`/aksha 03:35, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
Okay, so edit counts may be a not so good factor to include. What about a list of {{User}} or similar templates, which provide all the links needed to adjudicate the discussion. The list would be generated for all contributors to the main discussion page. Is that sufficiently neutral, while allowing one/two click access to any information about a user that is available. so one doesn't have to crawl through a complicated signature path to get the contributions of a user. Ansell 22:25, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Are we working toward a policy/guideline?

Are we? --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:06, 25 October 2006 (UTC)

Well, I think possibly. The most recent discussion centers around getting rid of this tag in favor of a bot summary for admins at closure. Derex 20:48, 25 October 2006 (UTC)
I've now invited Ryan Tracey from the Stanford Review and the users who were tagged as "SPAs" during the AFD discussion to provide their thoughts on the matter here. --  Netsnipe  ►  05:26, 27 October 2006 (UTC)

On that note, is there an appropriate tag to indicate that this isn't official policy/guideline? It recently said "though this has no basis in Wikipedia policy" which was edited out - I could put it back in, but wondered if there's an appropriate tag (like the "This page is an official policy on the English Wikipedia.") to use? Mdwh 22:57, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

new edit by JZG

"it is also not easy to link an account whihc has edits to only one subject with any edits made anonymously or under another account." this is an issue of sockpuppetry, not spa. if you think an account is a sock, then tag it that way. that's not the same as a spa. lot's of dedicated sockpuppeteers edit under both mains and socks that are not spa's. Derex 23:07, 4 November 2006 (UTC)

Tag

The tag has now been removed twice from the essay. Is there consensus among supporters of the essay for this? JBKramer 23:08, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I think it would be useful and relevant to have a link to the template some way or another, even if it's just a "See also". Also see Wikipedia:Sock_puppet#Templates - I don't see why the equivalent information should be removed from this page.
I realise that this tag is controversial, but I don't think it's productive to try to hide it. The result of the recent AfD for this article and the template was Keep. Mdwh 23:41, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
Agree. Since the tag has now undergone another, separate TfD and was kept, it should be mentioned in this essay. On a separate issue, we should probably put some warning language on the front page of Template:SPA that is similar to the cautionary language here. -- Satori Son 13:42, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

Merge

As discussed on WP:LAP, a new version has been written of the username policy, that essentially covers everything this page has to say (this page is admittedly kind of verbose). Hence it is suggested that this be merged and redirected there. >Radiant< 08:15, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

No to Merge with SPA Policy

I know that several of you are hell-bent on some kind of mass-merger campaign, both in the notability context, and it seems, here too. Well, it's not appreciated. Knock it off! The SPA designation is used all of the time in Afds, and is useful because you can cite to it and people immediately know what policy you are referring to without making them wade through the entire username policy. Please leave it just as it is. Thank you.  MortonDevonshire  Yo  · 21:55, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

This thing is muddled

It's not clear who the target audience of this is. When it get's down to the part that seems to be actually important, it collapses into weasel words and a lot of boilerplate about Wikipedia's Noble Principles.

If it's addressed to people who might be accused of having an SPA and wondering what the accusation is about, the problem is those people already know whether or not they are in this class, because they're likely to fall into one of three categories:

  • Newbies who picked the wrong place to start editing
  • Newbies who are single-purpose (e.g. joined to edit 9/11 articles)
  • Sockpuppets and similar fackery

The first two groups perhaps need to understand why they may be accused of being a sockpuppet, and they need to more generally understand that they aren't going to be able to barge into a heavily contested article and impose their position upon it. Other than that, and the instructions about use of the template, the rest of this has no purpose and needs to go away. We don't need to write an invitation for people to hurl accusations at each other, and telling people how to not look single issue is WP:BEANS.

This also seems to be trying to pretend to be a policy. Whatever we keep needs to be put in more advisory language. Mangoe 17:24, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

  • This was useful to me. One user was accusing another of being a "partisan editor whose single-purpose account exists solely to attack" the topic the first user was defending. This page helped to illustrate (a) that there's nothing inherently wrong with being an SPA and (b) that the user being accused of being an SPA was not one. (That user had edited a fair bit of Wikipedia, but had, in the past month, concentrated on one topic in particular, thus the accusation.) Calbaer 21:23, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

PalestineRemembered is an SPA

I'm editing under the above UserName. I probably have many things to contribute to the project, but I consider one of them to be far more important than all the others, and that's why I specialise in this single-minded fashion. This effort seriously endangers my private life, but someone needs to speak out and nobody can claim I'm acting in a deceitful or dishonest fashion. My contributions (which I'm confident are overwhelmingly factual and well-sourced) are not universally popular, but I'm only acting like most other editors, attempting to put the best information into articles.

As to why ...... let's not forget what people say: "Auschwitz teaches us that we cannot remain indifferent, that we cannot look the other way when atrocities take place, that we must always be ready to speak out against evil no matter where it takes place and no matter who the victims are." - Miles Lerman, Chairperson, United States Holocaust Memorial Council (1995) PalestineRemembered 22:44, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

So therefore you should exclude yourself from editing from those topics....⇒ SWATJester Denny Crane. 20:40, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
I rather prefer this transparency, if that's his goal. Obviously every one of his edits should be given the full attention of editors striving for NPOV. But there is no inherent policy violation in what he says. As the essay says: "Further, many people with expertise in a specific area quite reasonably make contributions within that area alone. [break] There is, of course, nothing inherently wrong with single-purpose accounts." nadav 08:46, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Discounting SPA-posted views - good or bad?

Surely discounting views posted with accounts that are only used to post on a narrow range of subjects will inevitably cause a bias away from expert contributions towards the very kinds of casual shallow general-knowledge snippets Wikipedia is often derided for these days? 81.179.55.142 16:16, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Not at all. The only scopes in which single purpose accounts are relevant are in official discussion and vote-related areas which rely heavily upon the input of relatively experienced users of wikipedia, such as requests for adminship and articles for deletion. In articles for deletion, for example, valid reasons supporting or opposing deletion actually do require a working knowledge and familiarity with various policies and guidelines— even though elsewhere on the encyclopedia, this knowledge is not needed at all (in fact, we never require intricate knowledge of policies and guidelines from editors in order to allow them to edit).
Additionally, various articles nominated for deletion are especially prone to external canvassing, whereby a particular editor will create, for example, a page for his non-notable company, and when it is nominated for deletion, he will try to get his friends and family to create accounts on wikipedia in an attempt to sway the consensus away from deletion. As a result, several templates have been created for similar scenarios (e.g., {{!vote}}, {{Not a ballot}}, {{Rally}}) in order to discourage SPA postings. The SPA template ({{Spa}}) was created in cases where it can be difficult for both admins and experienced editors to sift through pages with large numbers of SPA postings (Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Urapopstar, for example) without having to check the contributions lists of every single contributor to the page.
It is not intended for regular article talk page discussions, and its use there would likely be seen as not assuming good faith or as biting the newbies.
Essentially, the {{SPA}} tag is simply a shorthand for tagging a contribution for a potential combination of conflict of interest and meatpuppetry (and in some cases sockpuppetry), without actually actually assuming any of them, on pages that are prone to vote-stacking.
--slakr\ talk / 07:08, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

View of an SPA

As an editor who is sometimes accused of being an SPA, I'm concerned about the turn that this page is taking (compare this version).

  • The statement that "there is nothing inherently wrong" with an SPA has been dropped completely, and instead of cautioning against treating SPAs differently this page now almost suggests doing so. (Linking "gentle scrutiny" to WP:BITE almost encourages biting, i.e., it suggest that "scrutiny" may be misunderstood as biting.)
  • The current version distinguishes between people who are here to contribute what they know on a specific topic from "committed" Wikipedians. What this forgets is that Wikipedia's distinct strength lies in encouraging content contribution precisely by people who, at least at the outset, have a narrow interest in (and limited commitment to) Wikipedia. Let people who know something contribute whatever they see fit; and then let editors with a more general interest in WP "wikify" the articles.
  • Overall, the page now warns against being an SPA, not against mistreating them.

Fortunately, this is not yet policy, but it is, sadly, a description of a widely accepted norm in practice.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 07:50, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

I have reverted to a more SPA-friendly version. The above comments were directed as this version.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 10:01, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Good heavens, we've got the most blatant single-purpose account I've seen yet (over a year of nothing but 9/11 "alternative view" advocacy, no less) trying to alter this page to make it all appear OK. The reality is that roughly 19 out of 20 SPA are disruptive editors here only to advance their point of view with as much advocacy as they can get away with. This page should reflect that. "Mistreating a SPA" is really quite hard to do and not something we need worry unduly about. Moreschi If you've written a quality article... 12:28, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
Do you mean "nothing we might do to an SPA could count as mistreatment"? You can probably see why an SPA like me would get worried? A more precise characterization of my "single purpose" life here would be "over a year of largely collapse-of-the-WTC-related editing". But you seem to have made up your mind. In any case, before I got here, the page said "there is nothing inherently wrong with an SPA". It was changed over a very short period, without discussion, to make it more hostile to the presence of SPAs. I changed it back after airing my concerns and letting them sit on the talk page for awhile.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 12:36, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I can see why you would get worried, yes. That does not concern me in the slightest. My concern is to make sure that pages like this reflect reality - that usually SPAs are not useful things to have around (widely agreed upon) - and patently disruptive SPAs should really be indefblocked right off the bat (but that really just is my personal opinion). Moreschi If you've written a quality article... 12:44, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
The article needs to advise how SPA's may be perceived, and inform the reasons that exist why their edits may not always receive the same weight in some cases. That said the page could do with a bit of an update, and I've done a bit of that. FT2 (Talk | email) 13:01, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
I think many of your updates are great. I don't think it will be accepted as a guideline unless it makes it clear that, while SPA's "may be perceived" with suspicion, they are not allowed to be perceived that way. My life here would be a lot easier if "SPA" didn't carry a "not usually useful things" that "would be difficult to mistreat" connotation.--Thomas Basboll (talk) 14:13, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
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