Wikipedia talk:Three-revert rule/Archive 4

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WP:BLP and 3RR

My understanding of the relatively new policy WP:BLP (Biographies of Living Persons) -- in particular the banner that appears on applicable biographical pages -- is that 3RR does not apply when removing libellous or poorly sourced statements. Maybe I missed it, but I don't see this referenced in the 3RR policy page here. Just for the sake of completeness -- and to avoid "differences of interpretation", something about BLP being an exception to 3RR should be added ASAP. 23skidoo 01:35, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Admins guidelines for 3RR?

Where are the admin guidelines for 3RR? I noticed this bit on this guidline: "Some admins look at the quality of the edits in question; others do not." - seems a bit worrying. Sounds like an excuse for overworked admins not to take care over enforcing 3RR. Do some admins not attempt to mediate before enforcing a 3RR request? Carcharoth 09:19, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

most. Mediatetion is not an admin task.Geni 12:29, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

There is a lot to be said for a certain amount of randomness - it helps keep people straying just up to the boundary William M. Connolley 13:49, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Three basic flaws of the 3RR policy

These are:

• 3RR is enforced between individuals, not against competing sides. This encourages the use of meat puppets and factions, such as Muslims defending other Muslims. See e.g.
• A single revert will block all additions of the other author made since the version which the article is reverted to, even if they might be worthwile.
• Deleting is easy, writing valuable content is not. The prevailing 3RR policy equates both.

81.58.29.91 12:25, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Proposed policy changes

In the spirit of improving wikipedia and keeping in mind that our policies are evolving entities that we may adjust to make things work better here, I'd like to propose a few changes. The theme of these changes is clarity in 3RR and avoiding the ill-will that results from misunderstandings and inequitable policy administration. The changes are:

I 3RR template: a template for 3RR placed on user talk page, including length of block, all four revert diffs, warning diff, reporting editor, blocking admin, and link to ANI/3RR page. Diff showing application of this template placed in edit summary of block. Yes this will be more work, but the number of 3RR blocks is not huge, and 3RR should be applied fairly. Wiki policies are not created for the ease of blocking users.

II End to blocks for less than 4 reverts: The policy needs to be clear and understandable and err on the side of the editor, not the blocker. An admin may ignore 4 reverts, but he may not block for 2 reverts at will, especially under the catchall guise of "disruption".

III Corrolary: end to "3RR gaming" blocks. Admins currently block for less than 4 reverts claiming "gaming". Without a user declaring that he is gaming 3RR, this is an exercise in assuming guilt and often violates both WP:AGF and WP:CIVIL

IV Warnings: All 3RR blocks must be preceded by a warning on user talk page after 3 reverts. If the user commits a revert after the warning but within 24h, he/she may be blocked. No revert after the warning? No block.

V Vandalism exemption: If an editor claims his reverts are vandalism related and has a plausible explanation as to why that fits in the vandalism framework, dispute resolution must be pursued, rather than 3RR blocks. The current "obvious vandalism" exemption is too amorphous.

These all seem reasonable to me, making wiki a more understandable place with less opportunities to engage in factionalism or wonder if a block was legitimate or enacted with an untoward motivation. Thoughts?

Justforasecond 23:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Absolutely not to I. A simple explanation suffices and this will simply make more work for the blocking admins. Already admins are leary of helping out with backlog at the 3RRV page since verifying 3RRV takes so much time and effort. Also absolutely not to II - when necessary blocks for disruptive editing should occur. The classic example is a 24 hour block for 3RRV and a user comes back and immediately reverts again the same way. There is no reason that should be not blockable. Similarly, users who edit war reverting precisely three times in a 24 hour period every 24 hours repeatedly should be blockable. The response to II also applies to III although I agree that admins are on occasion more likely to apply a gaming block if they dislike the user in question or the user has been disruptive in some other way. IV is simply ridiculous. Among other things it would mean that a user who had been previously blocked repeatedly for 3RRV could simply revert quickly enough to avoid another warning and thus avoid the block. V is clearly related to your recent editing on the J4J article and while I agree that the block in question may have had issues that is precisely why we have an unblock template. On the whole these restrictions would simply be extra opportunities for wikilawyering and arguing over admin actions when we are trying to build an encyclopedia. JoshuaZ 00:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback:

Absolutely not to I. A simple explanation suffices and this will simply make more work for the blocking admins. Already admins are leary of helping out with backlog at the 3RRV page since verifying 3RRV takes so much time and effort

You seem to be missing the point -- the policies are not here to make it easier for admins to block, but to benefit wikipedia. Requiring reasonable documentation is fair and reasonable and will decrease the likelihood for abuse or false claims of abuse. Usually this will be just a simple cut and paste of diffs that are already available on ANI/3RR. I haven't seen a real shortage of admins, when reported for 3RR I've been blocked in short order, but, if more admins are needed, nominate someone! We've got thousands and thousands of editors who are doing great work. Justforasecond 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Also absolutely not to II - when necessary blocks for disruptive editing should occur. The classic example is a 24 hour block for 3RRV and a user comes back and immediately reverts again the same way. There is no reason that should be not blockable. Similarly, users who edit war reverting precisely three times in a 24 hour period every 24 hours repeatedly should be blockable

Ahhh, but wikipedia:disruption ("large-scale hindrance of Wikipedia's ability to function") does not include anything like this in its description, leading to confusion. Imagine the newbie who thinks he is removing POV. Gets blocked, and reads WP:3RR. Now he thinks he knows the rules, when he comes back he cleans up POV again and gets blocked again with zero warning. Quits in disgust and doesn't return. That could cost us a valuable contributor! Better would be to explicitly add this to a 3RR penalty -- e.g. a one-day block plus a one day revert probation. If we all agree, the six-reverts-in-48-hours plan can be written into policy here, rather than be some murkiness that users don't get. Six reverts, a warning, then a block. Simple 'nuff Justforasecond 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The response to II also applies to III although I agree that admins are on occasion more likely to apply a gaming block if they dislike the user in question or the user has been disruptive in some other way

I'll reiterate, assuming someone is "gaming" is assuming bad faith and is uncivil. Imagine you don't "game" but get blocked nontheless. What would your feeling about the block? Fair? Unfair? Capricious? Possibly playing favorites? Would your opinion of wiki be better or worse? Often these blocks don't end edit wars, they just cause a lot of bitterness. Keep in mind that most editors think they are improving articles. Justforasecond 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

IV is simply ridiculous. Among other things it would mean that a user who had been previously blocked repeatedly for 3RRV could simply revert quickly enough to avoid another warning and thus avoid the block.

To what harm? At the worst, the user ends up getting four reverts in instead of three. Not a big problem is it? Remember, the goal is to have understandable policies and prevent bad-feeling between valuable editors and valuable admins, not ensure that no one ever gets in an extra revert. Justforasecond 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

V is clearly related to your recent editing on the J4J article and while I agree that the block in question may have had issues that is precisely why we have an unblock template. On the whole these restrictions would simply be extra opportunities for wikilawyering and arguing over admin actions when we are trying to build an encyclopedia

Please don't personalize or denigrate this. These are serious attempts at fixing wikipedia problems. There is now an exemption for "obvious" vandalism, but there's no clear definition of what this means. What's obvious to me might be non-obvious to an admin. Clarity in the policies would prevent many misunderstandings and the negative feelings that result. Justforasecond 02:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

All of our efforts should be focused on making gaming 3RR harder, not easier. To tha end, these proposed changes are all unaceptable. Any user who engages in a revert war should expect to be blocked at any time, regardless of whether they have crossed the 3RR tripwire.. And I say that as someone who has been involved in them on occasion. Nandesuka 01:16, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I - the WP:AN/3RR has this already - this is needless bureaucracy.

II - reverting is not a right - the point is to stop edit wars.

III - this is pointless; users who are gaming 3RR never admit to it.

IV - equally pointless bureaucracy; someone who is an experienced editor, or who has been blocked or warned before, should know better.

V - Wikipedia:Vandalism is clearly defined, and most claims of reverting "vandalism" in edit wars are, in fact, content disputes.

These suggestions are all intended to have the exact opposite effect of the intent of 3RR. Jayjg ^(talk) 02:51, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

You may be missing the point -- for editors to feel they are treated fairly and that wiki is not cliquishly biased against them, they need a clear explanation of policies. Not a "sometimes four reverts will get you blocked, but other times one revert will get you blocked...sometimes if you are in the right that will help, but other times that won't matter...sometimes you'll get a warning, but other times not...". How would you feel if there were a sign that said "2 hour parking", but soemtimes you got a ticket after 20 minutes?

For your specific objections

I the WP:AN/3RR has this already - this is needless bureaucracy. -- to the contrary, there is no simple way to see why a user was blocked at some point (say 6 months) in the past. Why would readily available evidence be a bad thing?

II reverting is not a right - the point is to stop edit wars. -- actually the point is to build a good encyclopedia. Capriciously meting out penalties causes bad feelings all around. human societies learned this hundreds of years ago -- people don't like it if they don't know what the rules are. ergo the Magna Carta, the US Constitution, etc.

III this is pointless; users who are gaming 3RR never admit to it. -- You're missing the effect of accusing and juding an editor guilty of "gaming". The innocent are miffed and lose a little faith in the project. The benefit is minimal and causes admins more work. A better policy would lay out disallowed behavior, not interpretations of permissible behavior that might lead to blocks.

IV equally pointless bureaucracy; someone who is an experienced editor, or who has been blocked or warned before, should know better. -- A warning requires no extra bureacracy. Actually, it will lessen their load. Here's how: users reporting 3RR violations will place a 3RR warning template on the offending editors talk page after 3 reverts. If there's one more revert, they then report the offending user to ANI/3RR. Some of the time, the warned user will revert that 4th time, but a good portion of the time, the warned user will desist. In that case, a lot of "bureacracy" is saved. It also prevents the ill will that comes from a block.

V Wikipedia:Vandalism is clearly defined, and most claims of reverting "vandalism" in edit wars are, in fact, content disputes -- This is not about content disputes, but about real vandalism. If there's real vandalism 3RR should not apply. If there's prima facie evidence that the user belives he is removing vandalism dispute resolution comes into play. This sets a more reasonable standard than the current policy -- any random admin deciding what crosses the line between "obvious" and "non-obvious" vandalism. The second pillar of this is refining the definition of vandalism. It's not "clear" as you say. Right now, placing a photo of an elephant on a page titled "cat" is only vaguely covered by the policy. Justforasecond 03:40, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The 3RR policy is quite clear: The three-revert rule is not an entitlement, but an "electric fence"; the 3RR is intended to stop edit wars. It does not grant users an inalienable right to three reverts every 24 hours or endorse reverts as an editing technique. Persistent reversion remains strongly discouraged and is unlikely to constitute working properly with others. The fact that users may be blocked for excessive reverting does not necessarily mean that they will be blocked. Equally, reverting fewer than four times may result in a block depending on context. If people don't want to have bad feelings or ill will, they should stop edit-warring. And one can never cover every possible edit in any policy; that's just a way for wikilawyers to further game the system. It's quite obvious what Wikipedia:Vandalism is, and people who are warring over content often make that spurious claim. Giving out "get out of jail free" cards to anyone who claims to be reverting vandalism is unhelpful, as is making the 3RR process so onerous that no-one will bother doing it. People who have been blocked for 3RR often attempt to get the policy loosened up, so that they can continue to edit war. More experienced editors resist those attempts. Jayjg ^(talk) 03:55, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Jay, the point is not a "get out of jail free card" or "wikilawyering" -- it's to make clear policies that everyone can understand. When wiki first started it had little in the way of policy. But wikipedia is not an experiment in anarchy and policies sprouted up (each time with the possibility of more "wikilawyering") and I think we can see all see wiki has prospered under policies. Let me give you an example of a policy: a speed limit. Now in the beginning people could drive as fast as they wanted "as long as it was safe". But people crashed and killed other people -- accidents happen. So we made speed limits they made sure that people drove under 25 mph near schools, etc. Now we have less lawyering than before. People aren't going into court claiming that it is safe to drive 70 mph in front of kindergarneters, because the policy is clear. They drive the limit and kindergarteners don't get run over. They also don't go home and whine about how they got a ticket while they were driving safely but some cop had it in for him because of some family feud and how the government is ruining everything and they don't hatch plans to overthrow the government. That's how this policy will work: it will lay out very clear rules for behavior. People will follow these rules and won't end up grumbling about rouge admins and librel cabals because there won't be room for abuse or misinterpretation. We may eventually reach the point where the policy is clear enough it can be enforced through software. This will be somewhere down the road, but we can make the first steps with clarifying the policy and removing the grey areas that are the source of much contention. Justforasecond 04:22, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

If there's real vandalism 3RR should not apply. Right, already covered -- there's no need for the self-serving exception which renders the word "vandalism" utterly void of meaning.

Such as?

What, you don't remember what you suggested? Your utterly self-serving, utterly subjective, free-pass-for-the-delusional-and-self-righteous, "A Word Means What I Say It Means" exception, of course. Or should I break out the butcher paper and crayons and draw you a picture, just to be clear? --Calton | Talk 16:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually the point is to build a good encyclopedia Noooo, actually the point is stop edit wars -- unless you're claiming that edits wars are just the way to build a good encyclopedia (and in case you're confused, the answer to that is, "no").

I think most agree the point of wikipedia is to build an encyclopedia.

And water is wet, a lot of tea is consumed in China, and you don't wear white after Labor Day. All of these have as much to do with the actual issue at actual hand as your bit of piety, which is to say, very little. --Calton | Talk 16:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Please don't personalize or denigrate this. Nope, it's merely noting the obvious conflict of interest and transparently self-serving nature of the proposed changes. --Calton | Talk 03:57, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Funny, here's a comment you left utterly alone. --Calton | Talk 16:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I propose a policy change: that we don't accept policy change requests from people who've recently been blocked under that policy... because they always make proposals that have no hope at all of being accepted :-) William M. Connolley 08:11, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Seconded, and I'd like to propose an extension of your proposal; namely, that we don't accept policy changes to NOR from people who've recently been told they can't add their own opinions to articles; and that we don't accept changes to V from people who've recently had edits removed because they can't find a source. :-) SlimVirgin ^(talk) 08:16, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, those are hardly well thought-out responses to the proposals. Does this have anything to do with WP:NOR? Think of the time and negative feelings this would save all of us. I'm sure every admin has blocked someone who has remained bitter about it. William, there's at least one lengthy diatribe about you in the past week. In that case a newbie was blocked under the "2RR policy" (yes 2). He's now bitter and disenchanted with the possibilities of wikipedia. How is that a positive, encyclopedia-building thing? Easy to understand policies, equitably applied, would have completely avoided this. Justforasecond 15:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Well, those are hardly well thought-out responses to the proposals. Actually, they're as well-thought out as they need to be, penetrating the fog and bafflegab to highlight, as they do, the obviously self-serving nature of your so-called proposal.

Let's get to the point: what you're selling? No one's buying it. --Calton | Talk 16:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Jfas is now down to advertising his proposal to other blocked users [1] (or is it just users blocked by me?). Lengthy diatribes are two a penny. Your newbie was blocked fo 4R, but sadly refuses to admit it. 3RR policy is easy to understand: The three-revert rule is not an entitlement, but an "electric fence"; the 3RR is intended to stop edit wars. It does not grant users an inalienable right to three reverts every 24 hours or endorse reverts as an editing technique. Persistent reversion remains strongly discouraged and is unlikely to constitute working properly with others. The fact that users may be blocked for excessive reverting does not necessarily mean that they will be blocked. Equally, reverting fewer than four times may result in a block depending on context. William M. Connolley 17:28, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

It is worth noting the following: I am the "newbie" that William M. Connolley is referring to. Other administrators have already commented that the rationale used by Connolley to block me under 3RR is invalid; as an empirical matter (check the article) I conducted only two reverts. It is true that blocking may occur with fewer than three reverts, but that was not the justification employed. Moreover, other users had violated the 'two revert' "rule" as I did, yet they were not blocked. That sort of selective blocking is inequitable and not in keeping with the intellectual and professional standards of Wikipedia. If administrators are unable to conduct themselves in an equitable and thoughtful manner--William M. Connolley has shown that they (at least some of them) cannot--then we need rules that are not up for capricious interpretation. That interpretation leads, and has led to, POV pushing. It suffices for the pushers to find an administrator sympathetic to their position to silence the NPOV folk who wish to prevent an article from becoming a font for POV propaganda.ParadoxTom 22:17, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

If diatribes from users upset about their 3RR block are two a penny, it seems that 3RR is causing a lot of bitterness int he community. Perhaps some simple changes would prevent this. Just now I took the time to look at a few 3RR cases. 1 of them was a vandal. Another was not a 3RR at all. Others always had at least two edit-warring parties, one of whom remained unblocked. Warnings were often absent. Admins were involved in the middle of wars and "gamed" 3RR to get others blocked. Justforasecond 18:03, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Well since I was asked to comment, I will but I'm not sure you'll like it! In my mind, IV and V are very clearly bad ideas: IV basically creates the opportunity for bad-faith editors to avoid blocks while continuously being disruptive and V opens the door to never-ending debates that are sterile. I think it's actually ok to have a rule that says "even if you think it's vandalism, don't revert indefinitely but seek consensus or outside opinions". As for the first 3 points, I'm not sure that I) is really a big gain for the editors and it certainly is a nasty overhead for admins and I don't have much to say about II and III since I have not followed closely any contested block on 3RV. Pascal.Tesson 20:24, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Extra comment: I think a lot of bitterness comes from the fact that too many users make a big deal of blocks. Sure I can't assume that it's fun (although I haven't had that pleasure) but blocks are generally quite short and yet people react as if they'd been shot in the head. Even in cases where the block is excessive it's rarely completely unrelated to a certain recklessness of editors. My best advice to someone who's been blocked unfairly would be to drop it, take a day or a week off from Wikipedia and come back, rested and fresh! Pascal.Tesson 20:34, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Diatribes from frustrated POV pushers are indeed two a penny. 3RR is unambiguous and can be diagnosed without difficulty and there is always an alternative: not edit warring. Guy 23:03, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

The diatribes are evidence that 3RR is harmful to the community, not that 3RR is "unambiguous". Simple changes could prevent a lot of the ill-will that results... Justforasecond 00:13, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree with you that making life easier for POV pushers and vandals will make them happier. I disagree with you that that is in any way, shape, or form good for the encyclopedia. Nandesuka 00:22, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

I also agree that for POV pushers, assorted axe-grinders, wikilawyers, process freaks, and vandals, making them happy is very low on my priority list. --Calton | Talk 01:48, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

First, Justforasecond's proposal sounds like a reasonable suggestion to me. Second, all I see here is a group of editors who won't even consider the actual proposal, but rather jump on Justforasecond on everything they can think of. That, in itself, is ad hominem. The proposal is an okay one, though, I have my grave doubts about the entire 3RR rule, altogether. Third, people disagreeing is one thing, making personal attacks is another. Here is a quote, made here, "Your utterly self-serving, utterly subjective, free-pass-for-the-delusional-and-self-righteous, "A Word Means What I Say It Means" exception, of course. Or should I break out the butcher paper and crayons and draw you a picture, just to be clear?" --Calton | Talk 16:27, 5 September 2006 (UTC) This was said and I can't find one negative response to that extra nasty attack. Why has no one addressed this? We have a real clear WP:NPA policy here. There are plenty of other attacks and mean accusations aimed at Justfor that were said here, too.

As far 3RR goes, I don't think it is a helpful policy. Not only because it only gets used on occasion, but because it gets used specifically sometimes to block other users when they get in the way of a group of editors (who are sometimes biased and sometimes wrong). It's often easy to gather support for an issue, have massive reverts and then block the one editor with a differing opinion on his 4 reverts. Just because a group of editors agrees on one thing does not make it so. Occasionally they are wrong. Anyhow, the rule itself is too easy to game. Whiskey Rebellion 04:18, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Making 3RR a "strict" rule goes totally against the letter and spirit of numerous principles of Wikipedia, including (but not limited to) WP:POINT, WP:DICK, WP:IAR.

The only obvious effect of such a move would be to turn a unmber (if not all) articles into battlegrounds where people from "opposite sides" would keep reverting one after the other, in complete disregard for the quality of the article, its improvement, and their own mental health ; in Wikipedia, people are supposed to all work together toward a better encyclopedia, not split in antagonist camps and revert each other's work.

And I am quite opposed to the idea in the first place. Rama 17:28, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

These comments don't entirely make sense. Opposed to which particular idea in "the first place"? You might note that WP:DICK is not a wikipedia policy (it's usually a personal attack). WP:IAR is already in conflict with WP:3RR. What's a user to do if he sees bad material? Follow IAR and revert a fourth time, or follow 3RR and leave it alone...and ya know, we could say that *any* policy violates IAR. As for WP:POINT I don't quite see how it applies, but I'd be happy to address your concerns if you spell them out. Justforasecond 05:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

That's terrible reasoning. "What's a user to do if he sees bad material?" You're suggesting edit warring is what a user to do? No, it's cool and collected discussion and pursuing dispute resolution. 3RR is not in conflict with IAR. IAR means you should follow common sense when it is in conflict with strict policy: fortunately, edit warring is never common sense. QED. Your definition of IAR appears to be that all policies must be violated at all times (in order for it to be in violation of them all). That idea is even worse than your definition of dispute resolution. Please drop this proposal; it is clearly without merit. Dmcdevit·t 07:06, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

The entire point of 3RR is to stop edit wars in their tracks. The reversions themselves are not the evil being addressed; edit warring is. Having broken 3RR is simply the most obvious, incontrovertible evidence of edit warring; it is sufficient, but it is not necessary -- one can edit war without breaking 3RR, and admins are exxpected to use their own judgement to determine what constitutes edit warring. Editors who have made a habit of edit warring do find themselves being observed more carefully and treated more strictly; the more experienced the editors are, the more strictly they should be treated, as edit warring is detrimental to everyone using or editing Wikipedia. If you find yourself making what you consider a reasonable change, and someone reverts it, take it to talk. Immediately. Edit comments are no substitute for talk page discussions -- and just because you don't get what you want on a talk page does not give license to edit war. Rather the opposite; once it is clear that consensus is against you, continuing to insert the non-consensus version crosses the line from editing to disruption. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 17:51, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes. This can be the case. The one doing the 4rth revert can be the problem. But it still remains true that others can easily game the system with the 3RR by gathering support and be themselves the true edit warriors. How carefully this is looked into can also be a problem. Another problem, as with other rules, can be revenge or an excuse to block. If there needs to be a 3RR then it needs to be consistent and not horsed around with in any way. Period. Either that or it needs to be gotten rid of altogether. I believe that much of the Wikipedia chaos (not all) could be avoided by having rules that are either stuck to -- or not having them at all. Whiskey Rebellion 20:06, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

The entire point of 3RR is to "stop edit wars in their tracks". The reversions themselves are not the evil being addressed; edit warring is. Having broken 3RR is simply the most obvious, incontrovertible evidence of edit warring; it is sufficient, but it is not necessary -- one can edit war without breaking 3RR, and admins are exxpected to use their own judgement to determine what constitutes edit warring. Editors who have made a habit of edit warring do find themselves being observed more carefully and treated more strictly; the more experienced the editors are, the more strictly they should be treated, as edit warring is detrimental to everyone using or editing Wikipedia. If you find yourself making what you consider a reasonable change, and someone reverts it, take it to talk. Immediately. Edit comments are no substitute for talk page discussions -- and just because you don't get what you want on a talk page does not give license to edit war. Rather the opposite; once it is clear that consensus is against you, continuing to insert the non-consensus version crosses the line from editing to disruption.

Jpgordon, thanks for your feedback. I guess I don't see how this is relevant the proposed changes, e.g. "edit comments are no substitute for talk page discussions" -- the proposals say nothing about edit comments. The proposals are things like requirements that evidence is included in the block log, that warnings be given, etc. (see beginning of thread) Justforasecond 05:15, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

• I wasn't responding to you, but to Whiskey's post, since he or she seems confused about the purpose of 3RR. I don't feel a need to respond in detail to your proposals, as they've been adequately replied to by others, in particular Calton, Jayjg, and Nandesuka. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 14:22, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

I second Whiskey Rebellion's statement posted 04:18, 6 September 2006[2]. Furthermore, there seems to be an unhealthy trend towards clique building and clique supports going on among the admins lately, that's why I support the suggestion to apply measures which will make it harder for admins to block editors arbitrary and which will make admin actions easily traceable. CoYep 14:25, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes. That's why I say, too, either have this rule consistently or throw it out altogether. Another thing that seems to happen commonly is admins coming in to a situation, not reviewing much at all, and then blocking on the spot. I've seen some blocking that is fair and square. I've also seen blocking, like with Justforasecond, that is just straight out punitive. Nasty attacks were made on Justfor here. Did the attackers get blocked? Not that I know of, at least. Whiskey Rebellion 18:13, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

The rule is consistent. Violate 3RR, get blocked for 24 hours. The rule is not exclusive; disruption is grounds for blocking, and can be widely interpreted. With over 1000 administrators, of all sizes, shapes, ages, colors, nationalities, opinions, and predilictions, if a block is inappropriate, it's pretty easy to get another administrator to correct the error or at least speak up for the blocked editor; if an editor has made himself sufficiently unpopular that he can't get one of the 1000 to speak up on his behalf, well, perhaps that editor should consider his own behaviour. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 18:31, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps. Like you said Wikipedia has all kinds of admins. It also has all kinds of editors. The wiki is a community made up of both. I've seen quite a few editors defend Justforasecond. He was viscously attacked here. I asked this question before but got no answer. Why were the attacks igonored? Whiskey Rebellion 21:34, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

History. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 00:00, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for your comment, Jpgordon, but it's not history that Justforasecond is on a 48 hour block right now for a personal attack that he never made. And still, something should have been done about it then. Whiskey Rebellion 01:52, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I think you're missing the big picture here, Whiskey Rebellion. Every day, thousands upon thousands of people edit tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of articles at Wikipedia. Sometimes there are conflicts, but by and large most editors just go on about their business. When an editor is constantly involved in conflict, and constantly engaged in revert warring, they are given less slack than other editors. In other words, when I see a revert war between someone whom I know is constantly engaged in revert wars versus someone who has a track history of being a quiet, effective editor, I might block both of them, depending on their behavior. But more likely, I'll probably just block the one that I've seen revert warring more often.

We have a word for that sort of decisionmaking. That word is "justice." Nandesuka 01:59, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

"When an editor is constantly involved in conflict, and constantly engaged in revert warring, they are given less slack than other editors." "We have a word for that sort of decisionmaking. That word is "justice." (User:Nandesuka)

I guess that was the reason why you blocked JFS for this edit [3] with an expiry time of 1 month for alleged "Continued vandalism of Kwanzaa", but when I made the very same edit [4] a couple of days later, I was neither blocked nor was my edit reverted. Furthermore, at the time of your block, JFS had 3 blocks, one for 3rr @ kwanzaa (see my comment above), one for alleged "disruption" because he was speaking up against an user [5] who not only has an enormous block log [6] but who is also on probation [7]for personal attacks, incivility, racist attacks, and a great number of 3rr violations. (Interestingly enough, Jpgordon not only defended this user vehemently, he also repeatedly threatened JFS because he requested arbitration against this very same user [8] [9]). That leaves one maybe or maybe not justified block for 3rr @dellums. One block is hardly a basis for your assertion that JFS was a user who was constantly involved in conflict. It's one thing to disagree with JFS's proposal, it's another thing to personal attack him or to allow personal attacks against him. Justice? I don't see justice, what I see is unfair clique mentality. But since this discussion page is not the right place to address or solve this issue, I think that JFS should request mediation or, if necessary, even arbitration.CoYep 13:15, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I absolutely encourage Justforasecond to follow Wikipedia's dispute resolution process if he feels he has been treated unfairly. Nandesuka 14:06, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

No offense, Nandesuka, but I don't see this as justice, either. The more I learn about this whole thing, the more injust it becomes. Whiskey Rebellion 19:01, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

I will allow another user the honor of explaining to WR the dynamic and intricate relationship between 'making one's bed' and 'lying in it.' drseudo (t) 01:28, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Good, since this is clear now it would be great if we could finally start to discuss the proposal. I cast a support vote for reasons already mentioned in my earlier post. CoYep 20:45, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

• What makes you think there is a "vote" happening? This whole section really should get WP:SNOWBALLed. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 01:28, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

If I would think that a vote is happening, I would have typed "support" in big bold letters at the beginning of my statement as it is custom on wikipedia. "cast a support vote" "I support the proposal" "I agree" ... pick the one you feel most comfortable with. So, now that this is settled as well, do you have any new comments concerning this proposal? CoYep 06:12, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Great, we're finally making progress. Everyone, I'd please ask that this not be personalized so we can stick to the proposals. Are there any further objections to proposal I? The only argument I've seen so far is "too much bureacracy". Justforasecond 17:16, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Of COURSE there is, and "too much bureaucracy" is a COMPLETELY valid point, since it's being objected to by the people who would actually being doing it, the admins who enforce the policy you're trying to water down for your own benefit. That being the case, your unilateral declarations of policy procedure are NOT going to be enacted, not matter how much you pretend you've got backing.

And given the transparently self-serving nature of your proposals, "personalizing" it is not only appropriate, it's mandatory. You might as well have entitled it "The Justforasecond Get-Out-of-Jail-Free Act of 2006".

There is no "vote", and there is no movement for change. Don't like it? Stay within the existing rules, then. --Calton | Talk 02:22, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Please be civil Calton. Policies are for the community to decide on and are meant to improve wikipedia. Simple recording diffs in the block log is not a significant burden on anyone. Justforasecond 03:23, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

That 'whoosh' you just heard was from the sound of rapidly-moving goalposts. The 'proposal' doesn't call for 'recording diffs in the block log'; it calls for '3RR template: a template for 3RR placed on user talk page, including length of block, all four revert diffs, warning diff, reporting editor, blocking admin, and link to ANI/3RR page.' (Implicit in 'all four revert diffs,' you'll note, is the theory that any editor who reverts fewer than four times is exempt from blocking under any circumstances. As WP:3RR makes clear, this is not the case.) See also WP:ABF nos. 11 and 15. drseudo (t) 04:43, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Is it preferable to have no record of why the user was blocked? Go to a block log and/or a users page, you often won't find any link to what the user actually did that precipitated the block. I, for one, believe that if someone is blocked the evidence should be readily accessible. Justforasecond 05:30, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Speaking as someone who has been the recipient of numberous bogus blocks (as well as a few legitimate ones) for alleged 3RR violations, I would absolutely endorse the requirement for a warning and an opportunity for the defendant to undo the offending edit before the block is put in place. I haven't done an exhaustive study of this, but in my case, the majority of my blocks were the result of petulant admins who misrepresented my edits as "reverts" as an apparent attempt to prevent/discourage future edits. In the few cases where my blocks were legitimate, I would gladly have undone the edit in question rather than be blocked. I would also encourage the adoption of a method of punishing admins (including stripping them of admin status) who show a pattern of abusive 3RR blocks. --SpinyNorman 16:47, 12 September 2006 (UTC)

Admins are admins because they have been deemed worthy to judge what counts as a revert, and what the 3RR essentially means. Insulting others by reinterpreting your edits as merely reverting vandalism (when all it is is just someone else's opinion) does not count. Just as a side note to people reading this, I am NOT engaged in any edit warring with SpinyNorman, but I am involved in an ArbCom case at present which will decide on what penalties to impose (if deemed warranted) on SpinyNorman based on his (recent) past behavior. Jsw663 23:06, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, so would evidence be a bad thing? In a civilized society, police officers, prosecutors, and judges, are "deemed worthy" to do their jobs but they must still record evidence. Most people think this is a good idea. Justforasecond 02:21, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

A judge hears evidence in a case but it does not mean all evidence will be regarded as evidence, and even if such evidence is found to be evidence, it is not all given equal weight, just as you have reliable and (relatively) unreliable witnesses' testimony. Surely most people know this as well. Jsw663 18:18, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

Another proposal to eliminate 3RR

I think we should consider scrapping the 3RR as an independent entity. It should be subsumed completely by a more general, stronger rule: Wikipedia:No Edit Wars. One piece of the No Edit Wars policy could be a tripwire past three reverts, as the current 3RR structure has it; but it would be much clearer that there is no entitlement to three reverts per day -- rather, three is the most you can get away with before being automatically given a day off, but if you're seen to be edit warring, you're going to get at least a few hours' timeout. As Wikipedia:Edit war points out, an edit war can be (and often is) more nebulous than revert revert revert revert; a broader policy, I think, will be helpful in avoiding the sort of misunderstandings represented in the previous section of this talk page. We don't need court-like proceedings, recordings of evidence, and so on, to stop edit wars in their tracks; it's pretty obvious when one is happening, and after the editor has been advised just once (not once for every occurrence, just once) they should be able to tell when they are doing it. Also, 3RR is specific about time periods; it doesn't deal with other real annoying forms of edit warring. A broader rule will empower the community to reduce edit warring further than 3RR already does.

If Wikimedia's permissions system was more refined, the best way to enforce No Edit Wars would be to implement per-page or per-namespace bans. Someone breaking No Edit Wars might draw a 24 hour ban from a specific article, but they could still continue discussing the challenged changes on the talk page (which, of course, is what we want them to be doing.) Then, if they just pick another battlefield, the ban might be broadened to the main namespace.

As with the existing 3RR, the intent of this is not punishment, it is to stop edit wars. Any single block under this policy can be reversed if the editor, in good faith, promises to stop edit warring; of course, a history of No Edit Wars bans or blocks would likely mitigate against the reversal of such a block.

Thoughts? --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:20, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

In an ideal world with administrators who are unquestionably fairminded I think this would make sense, but administrators are actually human beings. This would move things to an even less objective definition or disallowed behavior "it's pretty obvious when one is happening". Is a single revert a "war"? or is it more of an "edit skirmish"? Justforasecond 17:18, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Jpgordon, aren't administrators allowed to block people for reasons other than 3RR already? I don't see the extension necessary. However this does not mean scrapping 3RR as an identity - as with normal laws, some always overlap slightly. If anything, the criticism should be directed towards the enforcement of such a policy - but how can a 3RR policy be administered equally (which in some people's minds translates as 'fairly') when there are so many administrators, and so many different (but not completely dissimilar) situations? I don't think that just because something is not implemented perfectly one must add more laws (eg requiring more than one admin to approve something) or subtracting laws (making administrators more 'powerful' by giving them a wider range of situations where they can implement bans). I think the current system is working fairly well, and although I don't necessarily agree with Justforasecond, the general principle of wanting to improve something is not something to be frowned upon. Jsw663 18:26, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I have never liked 3RR blocking and voted against the original policy. Then, as now, my objections are that it leads to a rather larger amount of sockpuppetry than we would otherwise have to endure, that over time enforcement has become mechanical rather than applied with discernment, and that 3RR is prone to misunderstandings both as people try to game the system and editors involved in lengthy work in an article make inadvertent partial reverts. I believe that the main problem with 3RR today is a lack of discretion in enforcement, a process initiated by User:Geni, who though now no longer interested in 3RR matters, was the first to make a habit of blocking any users in violation of it regardless of the merits of the particular situation at hand. A return to the more editor-friendly process of warning people in most cases and using 3RR blocks only when it is abundantly clear that the editor is not making a good-faith effort to contribute constructively would go a long way towards mitigating the problems with 3RR. The Uninvited Co., Inc. 18:25, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

But that's already the policy, isn't it? An admin can look the other should he so choose. "when it is abundantly clear" is, to use wikilingo, POV. you say you're being constructive, i say its abundantly clear you aren't, who is right? Justforasecond 22:47, 16 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually, the more general rule of "No edit warring" already exists... somewhere deep down. The 3 revert rule is more of an electric fence. As with all hard rules, it has been gamed quite a lot :-P Kim Bruning 18:59, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

• It has already been established that admins can block for edit warring even if it's not a strict breach of the 3RR. This is useful e.g. to deal with wikilawyering people who revert exactly three times every day. This indeed might be a reason to remove the 3RR - some people seem to think that they have the right to three reverts; I haven't looked into whether that's actual misunderstanding or deliberate misinterpretation. >Radiant< 21:52, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
  • WP:AGF tells us that we should first lead editors who seem to misunderstand the policy to WP:3RR, which says about the intent of the policy, The three-revert rule is not an entitlement, but an "electric fence"; the 3RR is intended to stop edit wars. It does not grant users an inalienable right to three reverts every 24 hours or endorse reverts as an editing technique. Once warned, if they persist in their deliberate misinterpretation, they'll find themselves less welcome here. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 05:07, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Are cartels allowed?

I think the 3RR is a very good rule. However I was surprised to read that "the policy specifically does not apply to groups. Any reversions beyond this limit should be performed by somebody else, to serve the vital purpose of showing that the community at large is in agreement over which of two (or more) competing versions is acceptable."

Is this a good idea? It means that a group of editors can form a cartel and use the 3RR rule to effectively keep an individual editor from contributing to the article information the cartel doesn't approve of. In fact shouldn't there be a DDRR rule: "Don't delete relevant and referenced information without first discussing your reasoning in the talk page"? Not all reverts are made equal. Dianelos 08:14, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes it is a good idea, otherwise a single editor can hold community consensus to ransom. Agathoclea 08:50, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I understand that, but on the other hand a group of editors may agree to simply delete any editor's well referenced contribution that is not according to their own personal POV, and in this way exploit 3RR and reduce an article's neutrality. Facts belong to an encyclopedia. Editors should not simply delete a clearly relevant and well-referenced contribution before at least discussing their reasoning in the talk page. Again, I agree with 3RR but I think this rule would work better if some policy were in place that discourages editors from simply deleting well-referenced information.Dianelos 23:44, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

And they do, regularly. It's definitely a flaw. Often the single editor represents an unpopular point of view, and editors with numbers on their side play tag-team 3rr-evasion. And then they have the audacity to report other editors for 3rr. Two recent examples involving the same tag-team are available at United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East and Palestinian exodus, where additions with alternative viewpoints are simply reverted, using bad-faith invocations of Wikipedia policy as the thinnest pretext. It is system-gaming plain and simple, and it happens everywhere. 222.235.48.232 23:00, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

It's not system-gaming. In fact it's very important. I'm not saying you're doing this, but let's imagine that, say, someone is trying to rewrite World War II to indicate that there was no Holocaust. They repeatedly edit to a prefered version of theirs, and everyone else editing the page reverts them. No discussion is possible between the two groups: the lone user is wrong, and the others are right. On the other hand, imagine a situation where some barely notable company has 5 editors trying to keep their company's article POV to promote the company, and only one honest WP editor knows about it. When the honest editor tries to fix the POV they get reverted by the cartel repeatedly. The difference between the two situations is based on who's right... but that first situation is much more important, critical, and common. So, no prohibition on "cartels." In the second situation, the honest editor does have options: they can report the situation at WP:ANI or nominate the article for deletion, or simply put up a request in a wikiproject for backup. Mangojuice^talk 04:04, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah; there are many routes open to single individuals other than reverting if they feel they are facing a 'cartel' with negative aims. --Robdurbar 10:35, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

3RR interpretation

Correct interpretation of the 3RR has arisen as an issue in a Request for comment. Please see Wikipedia:Requests for comment/William M. Connolley 2. David | Talk 11:50, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Editor A's contribution to an article was accidentally garbled. Editor B removes it and specifically asks on the talk page that "If anyone knows what it is trying to say, and can edit it to make sense, please go ahead" Editor A puts the contribution back un-garbled. Seems obvious to me that this is not a revert, but what do other people think? NBeale 07:25, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Two questions

I've got two questions on the interpretation and enforcement of the 3RR rule. One is on this clause: "Editors who have been banned from editing particular pages, or banned or blocked from Wikipedia in general, and who continue to edit anyway, either directly or through a sock-puppet, may be reverted without the reverts counting towards the limit established by this policy." Does the sockpuppetry need to be proven (via checkuser or a confirmed allegation) for this clause to apply?

Yes, or at least made reasonably probable, unless you want to risk getting blocked. You also need to make clear that you're invoking the clause William M. Connolley 10:40, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

The second question is whether a 3RR violation has occurred if one user has reverted a page multiple times via multiple user accounts or IP addresses. I've been helping fight a persistent vandal who is currently blocked but is reverting a page repeatedly (six times today) via AOL IP's, making blocking him tricky. Thanks for your help. | Mr. Darcy talk 01:01, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

The policy says that the limit is per-person William M. Connolley 10:40, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Question

This page says you can't revert the same article more than 3 times in 24 hours, which gave me this question: If you are reverting vandalism and a persistent vandal keeps putting it back, does this rule still count? --AAA! 09:34, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

There is an exception for blatant vandalism. Too many people labnel content disputes as vandalism, so be cautious. Blatant vandalism tends to get hit by the RC patrollers anyway William M. Connolley 10:41, 14 October 2006 (UTC)

Does a first delete count as the first revert?

My question involves the method of counting used to determine violations of 3RR.

Background

To keep it simple (yet we're dealing with far reaching principles), let's assume we're talking about one long-present link in the External links of one article. (Two links were involved, but the following could just as well apply to the one less deleted.)

We have two users -- User:A (myself) and User:Z

There was discussion on the talk page, so this isn't about an editor acting without any attempt at collaboration or discussion. Only after no one debunked User:A's interpretations of three policies (they only used POV and emotional reasonings, but no reference to any policies), did User:A make a bold delete. User:A doesn't believe that personal POV and emotion trumps policy. If the policies are considered wrong by certain editors, then they should be revised. They should not be ignored or violated when they go against those editors' POV.

This is not about disallowing ordinary negative sites in the External links. Other sites with negative viewpoints are available and of course allowable, but this website is of the type that is expressly forbidden in WP:EL, and especially WP:BLP.

The personal website is a collection of email newsletters written and sent by one man - even spamming it. He has therefore been forced to change web hosts. The website had an article about itself here, but the website was so non-notable, bad, unsourced, vicious, libelous, and violated WP:RS so much, that the article was deleted after an AfD. The link was (unfortunately) left in External links and in articles, even though it should have been deleted from External links, and in some cases in articles. The libelous (major) content of the website is the subject of ongoing libel cases in court.

Now to my question....

• Does a first delete of that link count as the first "revert" for the person who first "deletes" it? Here's the situation:

User:A, after examination of policies (WP:EL, and especially WP:BLP - where 3RR doesn't apply), interprets them to mean that the particularly libelous link is forbidden by those policies and "deletes" it (not a "revert").

User:Z disagrees and reverts, thus initiating an edit war with this history:

• Z - 1st revert

A - 1st revert

• Z - 2nd revert

A - 2nd revert

• Z - 3rd revert

A - 3rd revert (and goes to bed)

Now Z calls in the troops to carry on the battle (which the pro-libel cartel willingly does!), reports A for 4RR, and both get blocked.

We have an interpretation problem here. Does "delete" mean the same as "revert" (when it's the first delete of long-standing material)? If so, where in the policies is this stated or implied? I'd like to understand this matter better. I did not and would not violate 3RR willfully, and was surprised to find that my first "delete" was apparently counted as my first "revert" (but a revert to what?).

Proposed solution

To eliminate confusion, I suggest that the relevant wording precisely state that a "revert" is of a previous "deletion" made very shortly before (and name a number of hours, possibly 24 hours), not a "deletion" of long-standing material (over 24 hours).

Example:

• A "revert" is defined as the reversion of a previous "deletion" made within the last 24 hours, and does not apply to "deletions" of material older than 24 hours.

If long-standing material is brought into the equation, we then create a problem with determining what is to be considered the "Previous version reverted to," which is the precise wording used when reporting violations of 3RR. Just how far back in the history would one be allowed to go in that case? Different editors would then choose their favorite "Previous version," some going back 3 hours and others going back 3 years. -- Fyslee 07:07, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Looking at it, in your case the "prev version" supplied was (a) malformed (so I doubt anyone checked it) and (b) wrong. OTOH a deletion is almost by definition a (partial) revert, though I see your point about longstanding. I think 24h, or any specific period, would be a bad idea though William M. Connolley 09:04, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

back when I was inforceing the 3RR i drew the line at 500 edits. If I can't get it on the same screen with the standard buttons I'm not going to care.Geni 10:06, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

Not such a bad rule of thumb. Just recently [10] made me waver... eventually I blocked on the grounds that the reverter was active then, and indeed making the "prev version" revert, which is another possible heuristic William M. Connolley 13:29, 15 October 2006 (UTC)

I am somewhat encouraged by your recognition of a possible interpretation problem. (So I'm not totally crazy! Whew!) But I'm still in doubt as to what to do in the future. It's still not clear to me. The words "delete" and "revert" are not synonymous. While a revert involves a delete, not all deletes are reverts. The first delete is not necessarily a revert, and it's actually nonsense to call it a first revert, if the controversy started afterwards. That's when further deletes are reverts. That distinction needs to be made. A reversion is an attempt to restore the original, "calm" (see below), version.

I would definitely not have violated the 3RR rule if I had been sure of how to do the counting. I rarely get in these situations anymore, but this time the counting tricked me and I ended up getting blocked for twelve hours. The other editor was also blocked, as he had made 4 clean and clear reverts (not mere deletes), but only three of them were of the same link. (The admin has apologized and then blanked his own page, including the links to his own archives. Weird! Is that allowed?)

I think the time factor is important. I understand how you might not like to pin it down to precisely 24 hours or such like, but something needs to be done. I liken it to disturbing water. If the water is calm, with no ripples (no edits for awhile as regards the future controversial point), then the first one who touches the (future) controversial point is creating ripples by making a deletion (which is not a revert). The next one who attempts to calm the ripples to the pre-rippled version is making a revert, and everything after that point from both sides are also reverts. It's the degree of existing calm (no controversies at the time) that determine if the first delete is merely a delete or if it is actually a revert. If there is an existing controversy, then talking about a "first revert" is nonsense. Someone has to start the controversy, and that is necessarily a delete, not a revert. Reverts are attempts to restore the original calm version (which isn't necessarily a good thing, since the existing version will often need improvement. We are encourage to be bold....;-) -- Fyslee 20:20, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

But I'm still in doubt as to what to do in the future. - be in no doubt. The official advice is: don't get close to 3RR and you will have no problems. WP:1RR is best. But if in doubt, leave it for a bit is a good idea. The idea that you will win by reverting your opponent into submission doesn't work, although I admit its tempting, and indeed have been tempeted myself in the past... William M. Connolley 20:38, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

I fully agree. Collaborative editing is best, with discussion on the talk page, etc.. That's also what I usually do. The issue here has to do with rules. Rules should not be ambiguous, especially when one can get punished for violating them. Whether there has or has not been a violation should not be open to interpretation. Rules that are wishy washy, ambiguous, or not enforced, are problematic. Even worse is when this can result in the punishment of innocents who have misunderstood the situation because of poorly defined rules. My situation has revealed a flaw, and quality control procedures dictate that the flaw needs to be fixed. This situation will get repeated over and over again if not fixed. -- Fyslee 21:00, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

3RR and popups

I have accidently violated the 3RR a couple of times because of Navigation popups. I use the revert tool but sometimes I make a mistake and realise that I shouldn't have reverted. Then I revert myself. This means that I have reverted twice. I would then want to go back to Recent changes but click the back button. This reverts a third time and I have violated the rule. I'm just pointing out that some people may use tools and accidentaly violate the rule. --lEoN2323 20:57, 16 October 2006 (UTC)

Self reverts don't count. --Lou Crazy 23:29, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Thanks about that, I was getting a bit worried.  :-D --lEoN2323 20:27, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Exceptions

I've been thinking more and more lately that it's a bad idea to explicitly have exceptions for reverting vandalism or removing libelous information. Of course, I think we should always remove vandalism or libelous information... but the existence of those exceptions causes a lot of trouble with certain users who like to think that because other editors aren't getting along with them, their good-faith edits are vandalism. And it seems like these exceptions are mainly theoretical -- how often does someone really need to revert vandalism more than 3 times in one day on the same page? The whole idea of those two exceptions seems to me like telling people not to stuff beans up their noses -- I think those exceptions actually encourage edit warring. Mangojuice^talk 04:48, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Also, if there is vandalism or libelous information repeatedly being added the correct solution is to get the user blocked or the page protected, not to revert endlessly. There is no reason to encourage it. —Centrx→talk • 23:27, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Agreed William M. Connolley 08:37, 19 October 2006 (UTC)

Proposed change to Exceptions

Based on the brief discussion above, I propose to change the sentence "In cases of simple vandalism that is clearly not a content dispute (e.g. graffiti, link spam), the three-revert rule does not apply." to "Administrators may choose to not count reverts towards the three-revert rule maximum if they feel they are reverts of simple vandalism (e.g. graffiti, link spam) that is clearly not related to a content dispute." And I propose to reword the libelous contributions section similarly. Basically, I wouldn't want to do away with the exception entirely: the best thing would be to word it so it's clear that it's the admin's judgement that counts, not the user making the reverts -- at least then when an admin chooses not to disregard, they can point to the rule and use it to back them up. Mangojuice^talk 04:41, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Re libel, or vandalism - should there be a bit to say "There is no need to go over 3R to remove libel... if it is libellous, list it at (pagename) so other editors can help" or somesuch William M. Connolley 07:34, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

This should not emphasize "counting" toward 3 reverts in 24 hours. Regardless of the numbers, if someone is edit warring they should be blocked; conversely, if the several "reverts" are productive partial reverts in collaborative editing, they should not be blocked even though it would technically violate the numbers. —Centrx→talk • 00:52, 21 October 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I've made the changes. In order to follow those comments, I changed the text at the top of the exceptions section to give the general idea that for a revert to not be subject to the 3RR rule, it has to be non-contentious. I rewrote with that in mind. In the case of the libel exception, I had to write to trim it back a fair bit: IMO it's going way too far to allow someone to freely violate the 3RR, just because they think they're doing the right thing by WP:BLP... and it's not the way this rule is used in practice. Mangojuice^talk 16:47, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

"General Notice" 3RR Template

Another editor and myself have been discussing the possibility of a "lower level" 3RR warning for newer editors, perhaps in the "General Notice" category. Would like to get input on this. If others think it's a good idea, and if so, what format the message should take. The last two revisions of the message we've been reworking are as follows:

Hi! Simply re-instating your changes when they have been reversed (as you are doing in <article>,) can lead you to be blocked from editing (see the three-revert rule). The best way is to put your suggested changes into the discussion section of the article and then wait for feedback. When a consensus emerges the article will be stronger.

or

Welcome, thanks for your contribution to Wikipedia. Please note that repeatedly reverting other people's edits (, as you have done in <article>,) can lead to you being blocked from editing (see the three-revert rule). Please discuss your changes in the discussion section of the article and gather feedback before proceeding. Thanks.

*Sparkhead 13:52, 28 October 2006 (UTC)

Either one of those looks good; not much different from Template:3rr, but a bit of a variation on it. Perhaps you could put it at Template:3rra? Mangojuice^talk 12:12, 30 October 2006 (UTC)

Confliction with WP:IAR

This policy states (and I've had several admins tell me this) that only reverting simple vandalism is safe from 3RR, not complex vandalism. Why? What's the point of that? Complex or simple, vandalism is vandalism, and removing it is improving Wikipedia, enforceing policy, and being a good person. Why should somone be blocked just because the blocking admin doesn't want to take the time to find out if it was vandalism or not? That's not fair at all, if you ask me. And another thing; doesn't WP:IAR protect people reverting any kind of vandalism from being blocked? I mean, after all, it is policy (according to Jimbo). Blocking people for reverting complex vandalism is like blocking somone for enforcing WP:OR, WP:NPOV, WP:V, WP:VANDALISM, and WP:IAR.--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 04:55, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

There's no such thing as "complex vandalism." The only kind of edits that are really vandalism are ones that could be described as simple vandalism. If the situation is complex, the term "vandalism" doesn't apply, since that refers to edits (from WP:VAN) "made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia." If the situation is complicated, referring to edits as vandalism are likely to be violations of WP:AGF.. and if not, it's abuse too complicated to be referred to as simply "vandalism". But more to the point, fixing vandalism is, frankly, much less important than not getting into edit wars. There are other solutions to repeated vandalism than reverting it repeatedly yourself: that's what WP:AIV is there for, and WP:RFP in extreme circumstances. Mangojuice^talk 05:36, 31 October 2006 (UTC)

Knowingly inserting masses of POV or OR into an article is a "deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia.", but you say it isn't vandalism? The point still stands, people shouldn't be blocked for removing obvious violations of Wikipedia policies per WP:IAR, yet WP:3RR states they should. IAR clearly states to ignore the rules if they keep you from maintaining the quality of Wikipedia (a.k.a revrting edits against policy).--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 00:58, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Usually people adding that think they are correct and improving Wikipedia by presenting the "truth". Regardless, the issue with regard to this policy is that with such changes it is not instantly clear which is the POV OR and which not; an exception to edit warring for these cases would be an exception for content disputes in general, effectively nullifying the policy. Overall, any sort of situations where someone would be engaging in repeated reverting instead warrants seeking a permanent solution such as protecting the article. —Centrx→talk • 02:35, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it would be too hard to find out who's adding the POV or OR. It just seems to me like, and I'm not trying to insult anyone here, you're saying people can be blocked for following WP:IAR because the blocking admin is too lazy to read through the edits/page history. And what about cases where the POV adding is completley obvious? This policy needs to be worded differently or changed alot.--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 03:17, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

No way. WP:IAR is "ignore all rules." If you feel that ignoring the 3RR would be good for Wikipedia, go ahead, but if an admin comes along and doesn't feel that ignoring your 3RR violation would be good for Wikipedia you'll be blocked for it, and you've only got yourself to blame: acting in good faith doesn't excuse all bad behavior. You are clearly looking for license to revert certain edits repeatedly, which is completely contrary to the spirit of this policy. Mangojuice^talk 04:06, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

If someone is pushing POV in an obvious way, they can be blocked for disruption. But someone revert warring with someone like that is also being disruptive, and can and should be blocked under the 3RR. Mangojuice^talk 04:07, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

1. WP:IAR is policy. If my revert warring was improving or maintaining Wikipedia (ex, removing POV or OR) and an admin just decided to block me because he doesn't liek IAR, he should be de-sysopped.
2. Why? For following WP:IAR, WP:NPOV, and keeping Wikipedia rid of nonsense? Wow, I never realised admins were so anti-Wiki...--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 04:11, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

I've explained to you how to deal with those who make problematic edits. Repeatedly reverting is an extremely bad solution to that kind of problem: it invariably leads to an escalation, further bad feelinds, and often to long-lasting edit wars and lots and lots of administrator involvement. In short, it's one of the most disruptive things you can do, and you absolutely SHOULD be blocked for that kind of thing. And your ideas about WP:IAR are just wrong: you might want to review WP:NOT, specifically, "Wikipedia is not Anarchy." Mangojuice^talk 04:23, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

So if IAR doesn't mean that you should ignore the rules if they restrict you from improving or maintainging the quaility of Wikipedia, what does it mean? And what the hell does Anarchy have to do with me not wanting good contributors that are following policy to be blocked? The Anarchy section of WP:NOT states that Wikipedia has rules to restrict your actions, which is true; but IAR states that said rules can be ignored without punishment if the ignorance helps Wikipedia. Blocking somone for reverting complex vandalism is like slapping a essay tag on IAR, and I'm pretty sure you'd get reverted if you did that.--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 04:32, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Simply, revert warring does not improve the encyclopedia. It clutters up the page history and it gets people angry and it interferes with normal editing, but it is not going to cause whatever preferred revision to be implemented even assuming that preferred revision is undoubtedly superior. —Centrx→talk • 04:37, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

WP:IAR, in its entirety, says "If the rules prevent you from improving or maintaining Wikipedia, ignore them." It says absolutely nothing about that your ignoring of rules should be accepted without question. You have to think big picture here, too. I agree, removing a POV edit would improve that Wikipedia article. But reverting it over 3 times in 24 hours will likely have little effect because in a revert war, your revert won't "stick," so it won't have much effect on the article. Worse, it further antagonizes the POV pusher: as a result of your revert, they will continue to act and feel like a Wikipedia outsider, which means ignoring our policies as much as possible. Discussion, or if that fails, using one of the other procedures in dispute resolution or reporting the situation at WP:ANI and getting administrators to intervene may actually solve the issue. So, in this case, there's a very bad case for ignoring the 3RR -- it only "helps Wikipedia" if you look at the situation with tunnel vision.

Let me try to explain what I think WP:IAR means, which is tricky. Basically, I see IAR as the equivalent of WP:BOLD with respect to policies and rules: it describes the way that Wikipedia policy is expected to develop. We are not here to build the perfect policies, so if the rules are wrong in a certain situation, IAR encourages you to simply ignore the rule and to things properly rather than trying to get the rule changed first (which would be much too cumbersome). If that situation turns out to be a blind spot in the rules, though, ultimately, it's expected that the policy will evolve so that people don't have to continue ignoring rules constantly. See WP:SIR for more. Mangojuice^talk 04:57, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

"It says absolutely nothing about that your ignoring of rules should be accepted without question."

All I meant when I said that was that IAR is policy, and following policy is basically the number one thing all Wikipedians are supossed to do.--KojiDude ^{(Contributions)} 05:06, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Sure... but I hope you see the irony in this. I mean, it's a "rule" that tells you to ignore rules. But seriously, WP:IAR cannot be entrenched to the kind of level where it supercedes other rules, or else we reall would have anarchy. Mangojuice^talk 16:40, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Deleting a section which more than one editor has contributed to

I have seen several examples recently where an editor has simply deleted a section (which expressed criticism of someone (s)he admired) rather than improving it or giving any indication of how it might be improved to meet his/her objections. It seems pretty clear that deleting a section counts as a revert. I think it is arguable that deleting a section which (a) two or more editors have contributed to and (b) has been a part of an article for more than 48 hours should be considered vandalism and that reverting such a deletion should not count as a revert. This would encourage people to make constructive contributions rather than to delete things they didn't like. What do people think? NBeale 22:12, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I think an unexplained deletion of a section is vandalism. I think a repeated unexplained deletion of a section should be met with a block. But I also think that repeatedly reverting that vandalism isn't the best answer. If you're having this kind of problem, report the user at WP:AIV. Mangojuice^talk 05:17, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Ok, but what about a more complex case. What about repeated explained (but bogus reason) deletion of a section? We have tag teams of editors that WP:OWN some articles and make sure it is thier POV that is presented. // Liftarn

If its more complex, then 3RR exemptions don't apply. It should go off towards WP:DR William M. Connolley 14:45, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Good point. If the other editor keeps igoring you I guess you could just escalate up the WP:DR ladder. // Liftarn

Serial reverters

I have come across cases recently where, for some Editors, (a) their "contributions" to a article consist principally of reverts; and (b) if you look at their "contributions" overall they are largely reverts across many articles. For example one editor made 17 reverts in his last 25 contributions. Obviously some pruning of articles is necessary, but this strikes me as the wrong balance. I wonder how/whether we can extend the 3RR to deal with this? NBeale 11:24, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

As the editor just contacted by NBeale regarding my "serial reverting", I would just like to point out that almost all of my reverts are vandalism related. I did revert one of NBeale's edits earlier today (over at Richard Dawkins), but noted why in my edit summary (inappropriate placing of material) and copied his material to the article's talk page (where I also commented on it). Anyway, just for the record ... --Plumbago 12:09, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I specifically don't want to personalise this. Obviously dealing with clear cases of vandalism don't count as reverts for this purpose. But suppose a hypotheical editor were to make large numbers of non-valdalism-related reverts and contribute little or nothing? NBeale 14:02, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh, please. A "hypothetical editor", just after you'd personalised it by pointing out and enumerating my reverts on my talk page? Suggesting that editors consume time speculating on such hypotheticals is not a good use of time. Yours or ours. --Plumbago 14:10, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

NBeale, what you don't say is that in certain articles we have a single editor being consistently reverted by no less than seven other editors. That single editor happens to be you. Consistent adding of non-encyclopedic material will result in consistent reversion. We do have guidelines for discussion questionable material on the talk page before adding to the project page. *Spark* 12:47, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I do a lot of reverting, as well, but it's always vandalism, or things that I can't tell if they are correct. Also, I never break the three-revert rule. If it gets to that point, I usually concede (unless it's vandalism, in which case I let the vandal break the rule first.) --Luigifan 12:14, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

A user who perpetually violates the 3RR can be blocked for longer and longer periods. But I see absolutely nothing wrong with a "serial reverter" -- that's what a LOT of editors do; they keep tabs on certain articles that are prone to questionable edits and revert those edits when there's nothing to discuss about them. Mangojuice^talk 12:52, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

The worst policy on Wikipedia, official.

The three revert rule is rubbish.

It needs to die, and fast, before it damages Wikipedia any more. I propose a much better system to deal with excessive reverting and/or edit wars:

1. Any editor finding an edit war or excessive reverting goes to a noticeboard and adds a link to the article(s) and editor(s) involved.
2. The enforcing admin leaves a notice on the talk page of an editor they think is excessively reverting or edit warring, telling them to stop editing the page and discuss.
3. If the editor goes to the talk page, then normal dispute resolution procedure is followed.
4. If the editor continues warring, they are blocked.

This gets round the fact that the "three revert rule" is entirely wrongly named (it's not a rule, it's not triggered either by three reverts or by more than three, it classes many things that are reverting as not included, and it includes many things that are not reverting). Fys. &#147;Ta fys aym&#148;. 12:56, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

So, you mean a policy such as Wikipedia:Disruptive editing. --Bobblehead 23:12, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

No such policy; that's a guideline. Make it policy and scrap the 3RR and I'll be ecstatic. Fys. &#147;Ta fys aym&#148;. 23:13, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Because there is such a big difference between guidelines and policies. :) DE does exactly what you suggest, just with less steps once the disruptive editor is submitted to AN/I. --Bobblehead 23:21, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Unfortunately there is a big difference between guidelines and policies. I think WP:AN/I would swiftly be overwhelmed if it had to absorb routine cases of disruptive editing, which is why I suggested a separate noticeboard (rather as WP:AN/3RR is now separate). Fys. &#147;Ta fys aym&#148;. 00:43, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Hey, this isn't a bad policy! The Wiklpedia 3RR is important on many reasons! Most important, it solve about 80% of edit-wars (two that won't agree on a piece of information). Other than that, constant vandalism of reverting to a page of a ridiculous time or to a vandalized version of the page can be also solved using this rule. Although I do agree some slack should apply to it (reverting obvious inaccurate information), this is not a bad rule. Don't hate! Anom8trw8 03:10, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Fys -- that's exactly why the 3RR is a good policy -- yes, edit wars are harmful, and tendentious editing, crankery, trolling, et cetera, are major problems... but it's very hard to judge them, because often both sides have points, both sides may have an agenda... and in the worst of those cases, we end up with an arbitration case. Things don't have to get that far in all cases, and the way that kind of thing can be avoided is if people are forced to discuss what they want rather than simply ignore each other. The 3RR puts one simple barrier in the way of editors blindly ignoring each other, and probably heads off a lot of nasty situations. I don't think anyone is arguing that edit warring generally shouldn't be viewed as disruptive, but things get fuzzy quickly. Mangojuice^talk 04:00, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

No, it isn't a "simple barrier". If that were the case, then people going over it would always get blocked, and those not going over it would not. Instead the punishment for not breaking the 3RR can be worse than that for breaking it. A block for a 3RR 'violation' or for a non-violation follows many hours after the edits which have brought it about. And the 3RR is being used to try to break all cases of edit warring, not just those involving excessive reverting: it wasn't designed for that, and it doesn't work. Get rid of it. Something much simpler would work much better. Fys. &#147;Ta fys aym&#148;. 11:01, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Fys, it is the best solution in an imperfect universe. Are you aware of how things looked before it was introduced? Do you think the inertia of wikiconsensus would have implemented anything like this as policy unless it was badly needed? There is no way to go back to pre-3RR times. If you have a suggestion of how to improve it, you are welcome to voice it, but if you think the 3RR is 'rubbish' I seriously doubt you have understood much about it, or the nature of edit wars. In obvious cases of disruption, we don't even need to invoke 3RR. Show me disruptive behaviour on any article I am not involved with, and I will block the offender without much ado (in borderline cases posting to AN/I for review). 3RR is a definition of behaviour well within 'disruptive' that can be identified algorithmically as it were. 'disruptive' behaviour (such as gaming-the-system) can be much more varied of course, but needs human common sense to be recognized and thus cannot be cast into a rigid if-then policy. You also seem to have misconceptions about what "Wikipedia isn't": being "just" or "equal-handed" in our blocks is no priority, per WP:NOT#Wikipedia_is_not_a_democracy (and -bureaucracy). The focus of blocks is to keep the editing process on track and palatable to hard-working, policy-abiding editors. If some disruptors occasionally get treated more rougly than other disroptors, that is of no consequence and doesn't need to be fixed at all. dab (ᛏ) 11:33, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Seconded. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 16:02, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

that said, if you have been blocked prematurely by some newbie admin (as seems to be the case), your course of action is not to rant against the 3RR itself, but about trigger-happy, power-crazed IRCite admins. I don't know if you have a case there, but even if you do, this has nothing to do with the 3RR as such. I am not watching AN/I 24/24, but if I do spot a complaint about an abusive block, and agree with it, I will be sure to unblock. But users wont to cry "wolf", who people, wasting ten minutes to investigate their case, find were being disruptive after all, will have a slimmer chance of getting their blocks reviewed. If your block was completely unjust or mistaken, I am sure it will be reverted by almost any admin. But again this has nothing to do with the 3RR, just with unjustified blocks that may (rarely) be meted out invoking it. dab (ᛏ) 16:00, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm interested, is there actually a rule which says imbalanced blocking is not a concern? I'd think it's one thing to say the main purpose is to protect WP, and I'd agree, but shouldn't an important part of that be treating people fairly? Perhaps our definitions of fairness differ, but I'd think if two people are doing the same thing under the same circumstances, we'd want to make at least some effort to treat them the same. Mackan79 19:24, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Copyright

Proposed addition below WP:LIVING: Copyright violations expose the Wikimedia Foundation to possible legal action and should be removed on sight. Guy (Help!) 16:11, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Approve. Mangojuice^talk 20:41, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Approve. This is really a no brainer--surely the possibility of legal liability trumps 3RR. I'm going to add it to the article, seeing no opposition here. · j e r s y k o talk · 15:31, 7 December 2006 (UTC)

3RR warning

Why doesn't the policy:

• mention the 3RR template (Template:3RR)
• and/or provide suggested wording for a warning
• or mention that many administrators won't block a user for a 3RR violation without a warning being posted on the user's talk page?

I understand that a warning is NOT mandatory, and some users even feel that it is counterproductive, but some users (like me) come to this page at least expecting to find a link to the template (and appreciating sample wording), and find - zip? -- John Broughton | Talk 01:29, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

add exception for reverting bots

I think an explicit exception should be added for cases where you're reverting bots adding interwiki links, as they frequently add inappropriate links over and over again. Theoretically, if you can chase down the corresponding articles in every single foreign language wiki and make everything consistent, you should be able to stop the bots, but in practice this is almost impossible. Arguably this case is already covered by the exception about "reverting without edit warring" (an edit war with a bot is pretty much a nonsense concept) but I think it should be made explicit.

(For the example that brought this up, see vitamin A.) --Trovatore 02:14, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Whoops, actually see retinol. The bots have been adding links to retinol from foreign-language articles titled "vitamin A" or cognates; I think these should go to vitamin A and not to retinol. --Trovatore 02:16, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

What about removing speedy tags?

So, I couldn't find anything about this, so I thought I'd ask: If a user constantly removes speedy deletion tag from an article he or she has created (which is against policy, I believe), does reverting these removals count toward the 3RR? Until recently, the drmspeedy2 template implied that removing speedys was considered vandalism, in which case it would necessarily be acceptable to revert more than three times. But this doesn't seem to be shown anymore. Heimstern Läufer 06:00, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

There is not much point to reverting in this case. An editor who does this is not likely to get blocked, but the more efficient solution is to contact an administrator directly or report on the administrator's noticeboard (or perhaps even convincing the person removing the tag to stop). Continually reverting is just a waste of time. —Centrx→talk • 06:31, 27 November 2006 (UTC)

Could someone give me a quick bit of advice?

I have just realised that my reverts on Tomorrow Never Dies could well constitute a violation of this rule. Could someone take a look and see? My removals are all to remove original research, speculation and opinion.-Localzuk^(talk) 20:17, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Yes, its 4R, and not agains blatant vandalism. Thanks for pointing this out, I shall block you now, hahhahaaa... but more seriously: you might want to self-revert William M. Connolley 21:02, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think I need to self revert - I will just not do any more reverting, and I will post a request for people to not post such material on the talk page (a block wouldn't be necessary, simply because I have realised my mistake and they aren't punitive but preventative).

This rule is more complex than it looks. It might also be slightly restrictive in its effects - ie. removing blatant policy violating material from an article is not detrimental to the article - regardless of whether it is a revert or not. It kind of puts a straight jacket on editors, preventing them from maintaining quality levels on the site. Articles such as this one and other TV show episodes suffer from serious WP:OR and unreferenced edit problems but this stops people from being able to fix them.-Localzuk^(talk) 21:21, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

While the 3RR rule may result in some lowering of quality - for example, you're going to have to be less zealous in guarding that article - it's absolutely critical to limiting edit wars, as the policy states. (There isn't a snowball's chance in hell of changing this rule - say, by increasing the number of reverts allowed - precisely because it is so important.) Also, you're incorrect about the punitive versus preventive distinction - a 3RR block is automatically considered preventive, as in "don't do this again". That you recognize what you've done and state that you don't plan to do it again is irrelevant. (On the other hand, since your most recent revert is about 24 hours ago and you're not in a fight with anyone over the article, it seems unlike that you'll be reported, and - as the policy says - old violations are ignored, so you're certainly safe if no one reports you within the next 24 hours or so.) John Broughton | Talk 19:39, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

John, you are incorrect about the punitive vs preventative block. Using the idea that a block is 'don't do this again' is wrong. A block is supposed to stop the edit war and give the user time to cool down and reflect upon their actions - with the intention of making them realise that revert warring is wrong and damaging to the site. The second line of WP:BLOCK states Blocks are used to prevent damage or disruption to Wikipedia. They should not be used as a punitive measure. - Stating that 3RR blocks are automatically considered as preventitive is nonsense really. If I were blocked now for an action that happened 24 hours ago and I have stopped and posted comments to say so, it would be a very poor decision and be completely punitive and not preventitive (what would it be preventing?).

Also, the idea of changing the rule wouldn't simply be to change the number of reverts - it would have to be much more fundamental than that, in my opinion. However, I am not about to propose such as change as I am not in the right frame of mind at the moment.-Localzuk^(talk) 19:59, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

The idea is that a block would discourage the user from doing it in the future. If a user clearly recognizes the error in good-faith, there would be no need for the block, but many of the violators of 3RR are chronic edit warriors. —Centrx→talk • 21:31, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

That still gives rise to the idea that the block is punitive, blocking them to discourage them from disruptive editing is a punishment (much like taking a child's TV away for watching something they shouldn't have). Blocking them to tell them not to do it again is not the point of blocks. This is outlined very clearly in our blocking policy as I stated above. The only reason I see that blocks should be imposed is in cases to prevent ongoing disruption and to give the user time to reflect on their actions.

Just so people don't misunderstand me though - I do support this rule! It prevents an awful lot of messing around and disruption on the site. However, I think everyone should be able to understand that my concern is that it may also be causing problems with good edits too.-Localzuk^(talk) 22:55, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Punishment is retribution for past acts. Punishment would be blocking for 3RR regardless of whether it is clear that the person will not do it again, having been warned. Deterrence is evaluating future likelihood, and that is preventive. —Centrx→talk • 23:27, 2 December 2006 (UTC)

Ah, ok. So that means that John's comment that I could be blocked is incorrect then. Ok. My comments about improving the policy still stand though. I will have a think about how this might be achievable (I understand how complex and difficult creating a foolproof rule can be - just look at the government in the UK, even they can't create laws which work completely as intended).-Localzuk^(talk) 01:16, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

HELP PLEASE, first encounter with 3R rule, school vandals amok

Please advise how to avoid escalating this but still solve it. The page Randolph High School (New Jersey) has a humourous, but completely spurious, non-encyclopaedic, joke section of current students. I removed it, added comment as to why, and explained further on the discussion page. Someone had put a lot of effort into it, so I tried to be kind, but it is just a joke, not an article. I also added template warnings to the relevant user pages, and a request for protection for the page as a whole.

Now User:Joefuf has replaced the text twice. I've added to comment to their talk page asking them to either stop, or explain their thinking. We are on the edge of an edit war, and also about to go into violation of the 3R rule.

I think I've been patient and tried to be nice about this. Now I'm just pissed off. Any suggestions please? thanks in advance. raining girl 14:45, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

Don't worry about 3RR, it doesn't apply to obvious vandalism. I've reverted and made it clear that this is a path they don't want to go down. yandman 14:54, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that this is a case where we have to try and "solve" things. Unfortunately, I think they know very well what they're doing. yandman 14:55, 6 December 2006 (UTC)

edit warring ... not against the rules?

Okay, I know edit warring is bad, and I know that edit warring gets people blocked. But unless I'm just having a bad seeing day, I can't actually find a policy which explicitly states that edit warring in and of itself, independent of 3RR violations, is against the rules. The best I can find is this:

Equally, reverting fewer than four times may result in a block depending on context.

on this page. WP:TE is a guideline and WP:EDIT WAR is an essay. So what is the official status of edit warring? - Che Nuevara 21:14, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

• It's disruptive. Do we need to legislate Clue? WP:DE is the disruptive editing guideline, though, WP:TE is an essay. Guy (Help!) 23:22, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Right, that's what I meant. - Che Nuevara 05:48, 20 December 2006 (UTC)

Lead

Any reverts beyond this should be performed by other users? WP:BEANS, anyone? The intent is: stop edit warring. Period. Tag-teaming is not within the spirit of that, surely? Guy (Help!) 21:30, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Agree whole-heartedly. - Che Nuevara 21:51, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, WP:BEANS totally applies there. Let's not encourage reverters to seek meatpuppets. Mangojuice^talk 23:37, 19 December 2006 (UTC)

3RR Considered Harmful

While we all agree that edit warring is a Bad Thing, it appears that making a strict numerical definition for it does not actually help in stopping edit wars, and has several undesirable side effects. In particular, despite the wording on this page, people tend to think that three reverts is an entitlement, or that they should simply ask one of their friends for the fourth. People often game the system by claiming a block before the third revert-per-day is out of order, and even some admins agree with that view and undo the block or censure the blocker. The more basic problem is that the 3RR is not constructive in that it tends to point admins towards blocking people, rather than protecting the page and starting up a discussion. Finally, people spend quite some time in filing the overly-complex reports on WP:AN3 (which tend to be filed by the other party in the revert war) and expect swift and semi-punitive responses to the reports. It may be time to deprecate the 3RR in favor of a more general and less legalistic rule about edit warring. Comments please? >Radiant< 14:39, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Disagree. Revert warring does more damage to the encyclopedia than almost anything else - with the obvious exception of wheel warring - and blocks for 3RR could and should be directly enforceable. If anything a stricter wording is needed to make it clear that activities like meatpuppeting on 3RR are also unacceptable and should be IMO block-worthy offenses. Moreschi ^Deletion! 14:54, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. I tend to believe that the 3RR system is most effective and keeps edit wars a lot less troublesome. :: Colin Keigher (Talk) 19:30, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I also feel that 3RR performs its function well. If we adopt a non-legalistic approach to edit warring, there will be endless complaints and bad blood that Mr. Connolley or some other blocking admin chose to block a friend of his opponents for two reverts and decided to skip a friend of his with four reverts. The current system pivots on equality and functions well enough for me. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 15:03, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• I've outlined some of my thoughts at User:Mackensen/Thought experiment, but that was meant to deal with content arbitration, not the three-revert rule. Whether deliberately or by accident, the 3RR establishes a legal limit for revert-warring. While we all "know" that the argument that any user is "entitled" to three reverts a day is very much against the spirit of the rule, that remains the inevitable result of establishing an actual barrier after which you can be blocked. Any user can reasonably argue that the 3RR means that any block before the third or fourth revert is illegitimate, and they may well be right. There's also substantial disagreement over whether the fourth revert means you should be blocked, or whether you need to be warned after the third, or whether complex reverts are reverts at all or attempts at compromise. These questions are ultimately impossible to resolve, and this is, in my view, an unfruitful topic in the first place.
• The three-revert rule does not favour "good" content over "bad" content save in cases of outright vandalism. I've covered this point in the linked passage above so I'll just recap briefly. m:Wrong Version aside, the 3RR can get an editor blocked for justifiably reverting POV-pushing or otherwise disruptive edits. Given the current stigma associated with a dirty block log, this can significantly harm a good user whose only crime was trying to better the encyclopaedia and who doubtlessly thought their actions were entirely appropriate. If there's an edit war breaking out the solution isn't to block the users responsible, that simply puts the problem in abeyance. If the article is suffering from disruption then protect the article and make them work it out on the talk page. Such discussions usually reveal who has a leg to stand on.
• Finally, from a historical standpoint, the 3RR was meant to stop really obnoxious edit-warring. I think that it's clear from all the 3RR blocks handed out that it hasn't done that, and a cottage industry devoted to 3RR enforcement has sprung up instead, with all the associated problems that I've outlined above. I'd rather see content arbitration, or stronger community enforcement, perhaps via the Administrators' Noticeboard, a mechanism which did not exist when the 3RR underwent its change in status.
• In brief, that's my problem with the 3RR. I'll be trying to come up with something more coherent at a later date. Mackensen (talk) 15:10, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I am thrilled by the idea of content arbitration. If it only could be practicable, it would put an end to the reign of POV-pushers in Wikipedia. Currently, you need extraordinary amounts of energy and time no neutralize each of them and many good people just go away. The winner is usually the one who has more perseverence in pushing his point of view. Talk:Jogaila is a monument to ineffectiveness of discussions between the same sets of editors: their disputes may drag for years without any result. Eventually the parties start to accuse each other of incivility or personal attacks and take it to ArbCom, which ironically does not do content analysis. Even now, the only receipt to settle a content dispute is to ask other respected people to look into the matter. Why not make it official? --Ghirla ^-трёп- 15:25, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Ghirla - in order for our revert rules to work, there needs to be some specific number of reverts that trigger it, and three seems to be the right number. If we give people discretion or flexibility, we'll get lengthier revert wars plus accusations of unfairness against every admin who enforces the rules. Gavia immer (u|t|c) 15:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• The present state of 3RR is not good, no. However, Ghirla has a good point there. There will be accusation of conspiracies and punitive blocking. I simply don't see how this is going to help our cause while being so subjective. We need to define 3RR in clear terms and leave less for admin-discretion. If you can come up with some other structure that relies on stated terms, we would find that more helpful. Thanks. — Nearly Headless Nick 15:28, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• I agree that the 3RR causes strife -- the real problem is edit warring. The problem is, edit warring is never a black-and-white situation. If we didn't have the 3RR, how would we define edit warring? And what kind of edit warring is problematic behavior, versus proper behavior that comes up when editors legitimately disagree? To me, the only kind of behavior we can clearly define as problematic is faulty engagement in the conflict -- refusing to attempt to communicate about the issue. (Even failure to compromise isn't always bad behavior -- in some situations it may be wrong to because policy unambiguously supports one side.) The 3RR sets up rules of engagement that are designed to prevent the worst kind of situation - a high-speed revert war where both sides don't care about the others' points. It's black-and-white, and forces the parties to try to communicate after a certain point. We could maybe clarify the point about "gaming the system" -- the 3RR is there to force the disagreeing parties to communicate over the issue, and this is what is really important, and refusing to communicate is unacceptable whether or not the 3RR is violated. The real disaster would be if we abandoned the 3RR and tried to get involved directly in content disputes: what's so great about the 3RR is that it simply solves countless debates without outside help, just by making the parties communicate. Mangojuice^talk 15:37, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• I guess the most on-point answer comes straight from the policy page itself: three reverts is not an entitlement, but an "electric fence". By the time someone trips the 3RR limit, there's obviously a serious conflict going on that needs to be forcibly cooled. It is possible for parties in conflict to seek outside input before getting to the point of 3RR (one POV-pusher is powerless in the face of two or three reasonable voices); it is also possible for admins to step in (the admittedly messy waters) where 3RR has not yet been breached but where bad behaviour is taking place. The 3RR is a worst-case scenario; it's the circuit breaker that trips when everything else has failed. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:55, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Alas, the converse is also true: one reasonable voice is powerless in the face of two or three POV-pushers. Two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner, that sort of thing. – SAJordan ^talk_contribs 19:27, 22 Dec 2006 (UTC).

• I stated my own idea about this above. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:01, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
• After scanning through the comments above, I thought I'd toss in an analogy which was used in an earlier discussion up the page. 3RR is like a speed limit in many ways - it is a hard numerical limit on an activity as a recommendation to help avoid accidents under 'safe editing conditions' (speed limits are designed against 'optimal driving conditions' to ensure safety). As we all know, speed limits are selectively enforced, gamed, used by enforcers for non-safety ends, and used as excuses. What I'm getting at is that enforcement of 3RR is prone to exactly the same human behavioral traits that lead to our frustration as drivers over selective enforcement of speed limits; that does not make 3RR or speed limits bad rules to follow and I support continued use of 3RR in this fashion - as a speed limit - understanding that there are conditions under which it is appropriate to break 3RR - if your wife is having her baby in the back seat, speeding to the hospital might be an understandable albeit risky offense; better to wait for the police escort. --User:Ceyockey (talk to me) 16:12, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• 3RR, in its current form, serves a useful role as a barbed wire fence. It exists, it provides a barrier against trespass, and you're already in trouble even if you just rub up against it. It should remain as is, a trigger for action instead of an entitlement. Your concerns are well stated, Radiant, but I feel 3RR should remain and effort should be invested by every editor and admin to advocate the spirit of 3RR proactively so that the letter of 3RR need never be executed. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 17:49, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• You've got to draw the line somewhere, and 3 is a reasonable number for reversions for each individual; anything beyond that it and the rv'ing becomes disruptive, not constructive. FeloniousMonk 18:08, 22 December 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, 2 is perhaps reasonable, 3 is benefit of the doubt, and 4 is "stop it, now." --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 18:16, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• I agree with Ghirla, if we replace objective with subjective rule situation could soon get pretty ugly. -- Vision Thing -- 19:42, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

If 4RR was intended to stop obnoxious edit warring, it really hasn't succeeded. I guess it stops 50+ edits a day edit warring, but the war just drags out for a lot longer. OffTopic.com is going at a rate of about 2-3 reverts for the past three days now. Hbdragon88 20:26, 22 December 2006 (UTC)

• Nothing can really be perfect, but I can see a real benefit of the 3RR electric fence just by looking at the state of the German wikipedia. enwiki is rather peaceful in comparison and as a whole blocks appear a lot fairer here. This might be a subjective view due to the articles I am watching there and the admins I had interaction with or who are reacting on the articles I watch. Basically I feel on enwiki I can have a content disagreement with an admin and don't have to worry about being blocked for it. Nevertheless 3RR is not a free ticket for editwarring or other disruption, but these get often ignored until 3RR is triggered, as not many feel the need to make that judgement earlier when the persistant cases get caught in the fence eventually anyway. Agathoclea 00:35, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

The 3RR rule needs no exceptions for anyone who thinks more reverts are appropriate. If something is serious enough that a person would have just cause to see that a fourth reversion happen in the same day, that person can ask for help. Instead of reverting for a fourth time, the contributor can ask for outside input. Someone else can revert if the situation warrants it. If the contributor who wants a 4th revert has no idea how to get help, then that contributor doesn't know enough about Wikipedia to make such a call anyway. Doczilla 09:13, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

• To say that the 3RR rule isn't working because violations continue, is comparable to saying that speed limits don't work because cops continue to give out speeding tickets. We have no way of knowing what would happen if the 3RR rule were dropped, but I'm pretty confident that there would be more edit wars, not fewer, if nothing else (like mandatory content arbitration) were available. John Broughton | Talk 16:53, 23 December 2006 (UTC)

But speed limits *don't* work. I never drove as safely as I did on the german autobahn, simply because I could keep my eyes on the road, and only had to worry about other traffic. :-) Like speed limits in real life, you're only really fighting the symptom (badly designed roads/lack of good faith (Assume Good Faith)), rather than the actual problem :-). Granted, if that's all you can do, it's better than nothing, but still. Kim Bruning 00:56, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Radiant has a point in reports. They are extremely complex. I think I have filled one or two only in my active year here. The report should be easier to fulfill. But I am not waiting for the third revert to block. I usually wait for a fourth or fifth, just to be sure the user received the warnings (in fact, I think I have yet to block someone due 3RR). Articles like Natalie Merchant, Holly Marie Combs, MechAssault: Phantom War, List of best-selling computer and video games and many others are subject to edit wars very often, and if I hadn't reported them, it is because the reports were too hard to fill. As a final comment, the rule could be 5RR or 10RR, but the larger the number, the more damaging for the article. -- ReyBrujo 01:41, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I agree with most(?) people that gave their opinion - the 3RR is helpful, and useful - and it keeps people from warring. Those that feel the need to revert a 4th time are those that don't have the personability to discuss changes on the talk page first - or the support to win a short revert war of very few reverts. Without the 3RR, wars could go on between two people until an admin protects the page - but with the 3RR, large wars can only happen if users organize against eachother - something that doesn't usually happen, and if it does, it stops quickly and discussion starts. Fresheneesz 09:37, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• The problem with subjective standards is that they are invariably applied unequally. There is 'wiggle room' even in the current 3RR system such that I've seen exactly parallel situations evaluated differently. I'm not a fan of blocks in general except for incorrigible cases. That can certainly be the case with edit warring and 3RR is a reasonably fair way to detect and act to stop that, but it commonly gets used instead of trying to resolve the dispute. If it were to be changed I'd suggest that we make the issue 'edit warring in general' and apply a 'laundry list' of blockable examples; more than three reverts in 24 hours, ten reverts of the same text regardless of time between them, any revert without discussion after being warned to stop edit warring by an uninvolved admin, et cetera. If the problem is that people 'game the system' then I would suggest updating the system to make such 'gaming' strategies every bit as blockable. There should be no question that making exactly three reverts two days in a row is every bit as blockable as making four in one day. --CBD 13:11, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I think what would help is (1) encouraging page protection rather than blocking, for it often takes two to edit war and it's frequently an involved party filing a report against his opponents; and (2) making WP:AN3 less bureaucratic. >Radiant< 13:45, 26 December 2006 (UTC)
    • Page protection sometimes makes it more difficult to work out compromise wording (discussing such rather than just editing in turn to get something all can accept), but in most edit wars there isn't even an attempt at such compromise and I agree that protection would often be more effective than blocking... though with the inevitable problems of the 'side' it was protected on thinking they have little reason to compromise and the other 'side' objecting to the 'wrong version'. I've often wished it were possible for a protecting admin to first edit the page to a version they would expect neither side to agree with. :] As to less bureaucracy... always a good thing. Though right now I think the most bureaucratic part of it is the 'paperwork' required in lining up the diffs... and removing that would mean more work for admins evaluating the situation. That said, I'd rather like to see an 'edit war at XYZ page' format for reports and let the admin(s) determine which users have/have not been edit warring. More work for the admins, but also more fair and thorough than 'Party A' stopping at three reverts so they can run off and report 'Party B' for four... reporting 'pages which are disrupted' rather than 'users who are disrupting' would make it a less hostile process and might encourage other alternatives like protection. Would also lend itself more to dealing with the long term 'three reverts per day by each participant' type edit wars. --CBD 14:57, 26 December 2006 (UTC)

Seeking clarification

Generally speaking, does it violate the 3RR to make four reverts on the same page in the space of 25 hours? My understanding is that this is not a 3RR violation, but I'd appreciate it if others could offer their views on the matter. CJCurrie 06:35, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

The edits CJCurrie was referring to were four reverts in 24 hours and 49 minutes. In my view, that's blockable if the admin chooses to block for it — especially when the reverter then reports someone else for a 3RR violation on the same page. CJCurrie says it isn't blockable, that the 24-hour limit is fixed. For another example of the kind of system-gaming I'm referring to, see this. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 06:44, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to lay all of my cards on the table here:

• The situation with GoldDragon is something that has been going on for several months, and not simply on the page you've cited. He's been admonished for actual 3RR violations several times, and has also been cited for other instances of unprofessional behaviour (on one occasion, he claimed that I had "vandalized" a page by introducing an NPOV template). I've taken numerous steps to resolve these situations, including multiple requests for informal mediation, but it never seems to work for very long: he simply has no interest in avoiding edit wars, and it's difficult for me to "debate" him without getting dragged down to his level. Others have had the same problem with this user in the past. The sad thing is, I've tried to avoid getting caught up in edit wars with this user, but it never seems to matter. I'm open to suggestions as to how to resolve this situation, because I'm frankly at a loss. (Having said all of that, I've recently taken steps to resolve this particular edit war.) CJCurrie 06:59, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

You could have requested formal mediation, or asked other editors for an opinion, but instead you continue with revert, revert, revert, which is most of what I see you do. You even left an edit summary on that page saying something like "Aren't you getting bored with this?" suggesting that you did, indeed, know how ridiculous it was, because that surely applied to you too. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 07:18, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

I did ask other editors for an opinion. Almost without exception, they decided against GoldDragon. It didn't help. CJCurrie 07:19, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• The primary situation at hand refers to a content dispute at Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid. Here's the chain of events:

1. On 21 December, User:GHcool added the following edit: [11] Among other things, this edit is factually inaccurate: Carter did not compare modern Palestine to the Rwandan genocide, and Dershowitz did not even claim that he did. I reverted the edit here. GHcool then restored the information here, and I removed it again here (at 07:53, 22 December 2006). This situation was repeated again here and here. Up to this point, this was simply a dispute between two contributors. There was no suggestion of a 3RR violation. While some might argue that I was too quick to revert, I considered the information to have been scurrilous (and a propable violation of BLP), and I'm quite comfortable with the reversions that I made.
2. SlimVirgin then entered the debate, and restored the disputed text. [12] At this stage, I decided to post a "disputed notice" [13] (This was not a revert.) I did this to avoid an edit war, given that more than one person had taken the view that the disputed information was justified.
3. SlimVirgin responded by removing the "disputed" template, which I thought was something we were not supposed to do. In the process, she directed an ad hominem attack against me. [14]
4. I responded by restoring the template, here (01:00). I make no apologies for this decision, as I do not believe that Slim's decision to remove the template was consistent with Wikipedia policy.
5. Another contributor later moved the disputed passage to the talk page [15]. I then decided to self-revert my template notice, here. My rationale for this was fairly simple: there was no point having it on the page if the disputed information was no longer there. CJCurrie 07:18, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
6. SlimVirgin then restored the disputed information without restoring the disputed template. [16] In retrospect, this strikes me as somehow dubious.
7. Despite having made three reversions earlier in the day, ([17], [18], [19]), SlimVirgin then made a series of new edits between 06:45 and 8:37. This struck me as a possible 3RR violation in itself, although I did not raise the point at the time.
8. Given that I had self-reverted my edit from 01:00, I believed that the only reverts which "counted" toward a possible 3RR violation were those from 07:53 and 00:45. To avoid any ambiguity, however, I decided to refrain from touching the article again until past 07:53 on the following day. Readers may note that my subsequent changes (at 8:42) were not a blanket reversion, but an attempt to create a provisional compromise while the matter was under discussion on the talk page.
9. SlimVirgin then accused me of violating the 3RR ([20]). I indicated that I did not do this, as the last two edits she highlighted were consecutive. She then accused me of system-gaming ([21]). I indicated that I did not do this. At first, I argued the narrow techical point that I had followed the rules to the letter. Later, I indicated that I was not guilty of gaming the system at all. ([22])
10. I also drew attention to the fact that User:Lance6968 was actually in violation of the 3RR, and asked SlimVirgin if she would care to make any statement on the matter. In fact, I did this twice. ([23], [24]). SlimVirgin did not take any steps against Lance6968. In fact, she did not even criticize Lance's actions.
11. Since it was obvious to me that no one else would report Lance, I decided to do so. ([25]. In the process, I made a statement about a possible double standard on the page. SlimVirgin responded by criticizing me, and an argument ensued. SlimVirgin did not refer to Lance's actions in the course of this discussion. I issued an apology here for my role in letting the 3RR page discussion get out of hand. CJCurrie 07:43, 24 December 2006 (UTC)
12. Lance then made a statement on the 3RR page discussion ([26]). He cut up my comments in the process, such that his statement was situated just above my apology. This made it appear as though I was apologizing to Lance, which was not the case, and I moved my comments to their proper location [27].
13. SlimVirgin then returned the text sequence to the incorrect order, and suggested that I was in the wrong to have corrected it. ([28]) I then restored the proper sequence a second time [29]. CJCurrie 07:48, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Well, no, that's not the chain of events but regardless, for you to say you're "comfortable" with your behavior says more about you than I could, so I'll leave it there. In answer to your first question (and you're an admin, so you should know this), if you report someone for 3RR, and you yourself have made four complex, partial reverts just 49 minutes over the "limit" on the same page, you risk being blocked too if the admin is so inclined. The policy makes that clear in, as I recall, the first paragraph, so I don't know why you're requesting clarification. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 07:15, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

No, the policy does not say this. Incidentally, readers might be interested to know that my final edit in this chain was not a blanket revert, but an attempt to create a provisional compromise wording. CJCurrie 07:22, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

To summarize:

• The situation with GoldDragon is indeed ridiculous, and I apologize for getting caught up in it. I'm still not certain how to resolve it. (Am I forbidden to revert his edits, even if they clearly go against a clear page consensus? Such a cure seems worse than the disease.) One way or the other, however, this is peripheral to the main discussion.
• The situation on PPNA is quite different. I suspect that certain contributors on this page may have an interest in portraying a legitimate content dispute as a "disruption", and in trumping up charges of 3RR violations to create an "edit chill" on the page. Perhaps I'm overly cynical, but the evidence so far is leading me in this direction.
• I do not believe that I violated either the letter or the spirit of the 3RR. I deliberately waited several hours before contributing to the page again at 08:42, for the specific purpose of preventing any ambiguity as to whether or not I was permitted to touch the page.
• I do not appreciate that I was criticized for a 3RR non-violation, while Lance6968 was not criticized for an actual 3RR violation. I also do not appreciate being criticized for bringing forward a complaint against Lance6968, when his edits were clearly in violation of the 3RR.
• Readers could be forgiven for thinking this entire matter is a content dispute dressed up as something else. CJCurrie 07:59, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

To reiterate my question

As a matter of general policy, is it forbidden to make 4 edits in the space of 25 hours? CJCurrie 07:58, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

And to reiterate the answer, as the policy says: "Users may be blocked for edit warring or disruption even if they do not revert more than three times per day." Reporting a user for 3RR after you've engaged in deliberately confusing complex, partial reverts with only 49 minutes to "spare" on the same page is the kind of situation in which an admin might choose to enforce that part of the policy. I hope that answers your question. SlimVirgin ^(talk) 08:05, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

My edits were not disruption, and since my 08:42 contributions were meant to be a productive compromise, I can't really see them as "edit warring" either. (Also, while undoubtedly complex, my edits were not "deliberately confusing"). Btw, do you question my assertion that Lance6968 is actually in violation of the 3RR? CJCurrie 08:09, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

On another matter, would you consider it "disruptive" for an editor to remove a "disputed" template when the person who posted the template is still making his comments on the talk page? CJCurrie 08:12, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Uninvolved layperson here. This policy clearly states in several places three reverts only in a span of 24 hours. Hard and fast numbers. The spirit however is 'do not edit war'. In this specific case, I reviewed the page history, and found that CJCurrie was cognitive of a potential edit war and used alternate means to diffuse the situation, including using the talk page and accepting the edit with a dispute-template qualifier. Other editors, including SlimVirgin, pushed it, though, after these tactics by re-inserting the disputed interview interpretation and accusing others of misconduct. ·maclean 08:53, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Without passing judgment on this specific instance as I haven't looked at the article, nor do I care to, I believe the opening paragraph of this article answers your question, CJCurrie.

The policy states that an editor must not perform more than three reversions, in whole or in part, on a single Wikipedia page within a 24 hour period. This does not imply that reverting three times or fewer is acceptable. Users may be blocked for edit warring or disruption even if they do not revert more than three times per day. (emphasis mine)

If you must consider the rule as equivalent to speed limits, think of it as the police consider speed limits. The limit is dependent on conditions, if conditions are poor, then the limit is lower, but in good conditions the limit represents the upper bounds. So in the case of 3RR, if an edit war is in progress than three reverts can be enough to block a person. This means whether or not your 4 reverts within 25 hours is enough to get you blocked is up to the reviewing admin. If they believe an edit war is in progress, then you can be blocked for 3 or less reverts in a 24 hour period. --Bobblehead 09:59, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

• People who intentionally make three reverts every day tend to be blocked for gaming the system; see also WP:POINT. >Radiant< 10:47, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

A straight answer - no. However, if I were handling a 3RR report where one party skirted the 3RR time limit by less than an hour while reporting the other, I would block both people. If you like, think of it as you taking one for the team -- in my experience it tends to be VERY unhelpful blocking only one side in a revert war -- the blocked party then mainly focusses on how unfair the block was, as opposed to actually learning that the behavior is unacceptable. The 3RR really doesn't work when it takes sides. Because of the language Bobblehead quoted, it would be unfair not to block both parties. Mangojuice^talk 16:18, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your response. It was my understanding that the rules concerning "excessive reverts that do not technically break the 3RR" were hardly ever enforced, but perhaps I was mistaken. I still don't believe I acted inappropriately here, I'll take extra precautions to avoid edit wars in the future all the same. CJCurrie 01:54, 25 December 2006 (UTC)

Talk page reverts add in?

I think that reverts to an articles talk page count separately to reverting the main article. Ie, you can have 3R to both in 24h and not be up for a block (if we're sticking strictly to the numbers). It doesn't come up often, mind you. Does anyone disagree? William M. Connolley 18:09, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

• Well, yeah, but why is someone reverting article talk page entries? If they're doing it to someone else's comments, they should be warned and then blocked if they persist; if they are doing it to their own, then I think that's pretty much OK. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 18:16, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
  • I think it was a GA tag William M. Connolley 10:36, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
    • Wow, fights over a "Good article" tag?! I'd have to guess that reverts wars on talk pages are exceedingly rare, since, as noted, it's a violation of talk page rules to edit or delete comments by someone else except in unusual circumstances (vandalism, posting personally revealing information, etc.) I suppose that there could be a revert war when one editor tries to remove his/her comment(s) and another edit reverts them back onto the page (or vice versa, when there is a dispute over whether the posted comment is one of the rare exceptions to the rule about not deleting another editor's comments), but generally editors care a lot more about articles than talk pages. In any case, I agree that talk page reverts and article reverts should be counted separately. John Broughton | Talk 16:02, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
      • Where exactly is it referenced that "it is a violation of talk page rules to edit or delete comments" by other users? - WeniWidiWiki 19:27, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Two revert-rule

Please see http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Wikipedia:Two-revert_rule --HIZKIAH (User &#149; Talk) 13:43, 31 December 2006 (UTC)

This proposal was rejected. --HIZKIAH (User &#149; Talk) 11:46, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Clarification edit to 3RR wording

It seems that WP:3RR is not as clear as it needs to be about when vandalism may be reverted without 3RR being an issue.

As stated at present, the exception covers only cases which are "simple, obvious" such as graffiti, link spam, etc.

However according to a recent unblock by Mackensen "3rr doesn't apply in cases of vandalism", so the current exception seems to give an impression that's quite narrow compared to the actual line drawn and can mistakenly lead to 3RR blocks for vandalism reversion.

The reversion was a quote which was being IP-vandalized to read the opposite of its actual (and linked) source wording. It was a checkable, blatent, vandalistic edit of a cited fact, rather than a genuine editorial dispute, and any editor could confirm this. The same might also apply if someone changed a numeric fact that's cited to a different (false) value that differs from the source quoted. Although reverting simple factual vandalism of this kind is not subject to 3RR, the policy doesn't make it clear they count as "simple obvious vandalism" right now.

In light of this slight confusion, I'm thinking of carefully adjusting the wording of 3RR to try and make this clearer:

• OLD:
  "reverts that ... are reverts of simple, obvious vandalism (e.g. graffiti, link spam) are not considered to be contentious."

• SUGGESTED:
  "reverts that ... are reverts of simple and obvious vandalism (e.g. graffiti, link spam, and in some cases repeated introduction of blatently false factual statements) are not considered to be contentious."

I have tried to tread the line carefully, because any wording that allows >3RR for "false content" will be abused to the n-th degree and back again. But at the same time this needs clarifying and I think it strikes a good balance in allowing appropriate but not inappropriate reversions of this kind. Would others be okay with this 3RR sentence change, or one like it? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 17:30, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

I think, honestly, we should just give the gist of the kind of vandalism that it is okay to break the 3RR in order to revert. Let's not give people ideas on how to game the system. I think the use of the phrase "may be blocked" implies that Admins will generally use their discretion. Mangojuice^talk 18:36, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Agree, a good viewpoint. Can you draft such a gist? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 21:33, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

A few ideas: We could lose the parenthetical completely, or we could expand it to say "e.g. graffiti, link spam, or similar abuse". The wording that's there now isn't too bad, really. Mangojuice^talk 22:00, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

Graffiti and link spam are both forms of "rubbish vandalism". The kind of thing I'm thinking of is where someone changes a statement thats cited, to an untrue statement. For example the statement "He sold 1000 copies of his album [CITELINK]" to "300,000 copies", or "She lives in New York [CITELINK]" to "lives in Antigua". Blatent fact changing where its clear its vandalistic and its clear it's not a genuine editorial dispute. reversion of such vandalism isn't counted for 3RR but the policy doesn't make that clear. I'm not sure that "or similar abuse" helps. Thoughts? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 05:44, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

Changing things to be blatantly false like that is vandalism. The important thing to do is not change the 3RR wording but to make it very clear in edit comment and talk page that this is what you are doing. All too often people claim 3RR excemptions post-block which they should have claimed when they made the edits William M. Connolley 13:25, 6 January 2007 (UTC)

The problem is that neither 3RR policy nor WP:VANDAL makes clear that such edits are clear obvious vandalism. So there is no clear view expressed in policy that reverting them is reverting "simple, obvious" vandalism under 3RR. It's not really the edit summary in question; the edit summary wasn't that unclear in the present case. Its that neither WP:VANDAL or WP:3RR make clear that this kind of edit counts as "vandalism" as opposed to other forms of inappropriate editing, and hence it isn't clear it's outside 3RR. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 23:42, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I think something is "obvious vandalism" if it's obvious that it can be described as "vandalism." That's vague.. but then, what's obvious to one person might not be obvious to someone else. And, Wikipedia is not an exercise in rule-building. :) Mangojuice^talk 23:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I think this might solve it, without building rules or giving beans:

"In general, reverts that, in the judgement of the reviewing administrator, are reverts of simple, obvious vandalism (e.g. graffiti, link spam) and erroneous quotes are not considered to be contentious."

The only change is "and erroneous quotes". I don't think that "erroneous quotes" suggests WP:BEANS, so much as just suggesting "you're allowed to fix misquotation errors". But at the same time it adds the needed clarification and leeway to fix facts that differ from their sources vandalistically without 3RR stepping in. Are you okay with that addition? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 03:56, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I think WP:BEANS applies, because it gives yet another excuse to edit warriors that their edits didn't violate the 3RR. And, frankly, I don't think the need to fix misquotations is anywhere near as urgent as the need to remove link spam or graffiti, so it probably should not be an exception to the 3RR (in other words, get other editors involved). As a reminder, even removing vandalism shouldn't be done over and over without seeking other intervention. If the adding of those "erroneous quotes" should not be described as "obvious, simple vandalism," then reverting it should not be a 3RR exception. Mangojuice^talk 14:25, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Side note: fixing bad quotes isn't subjective - or shouldn't be - but it is overly specific and I rather dislike it for that reason William M. Connolley 15:09, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I would believe that the "vandalism" exception also includes obvious user tests. When newbie adds "Hello, can I really edit here?" to the bottom of a page, our WP:VAND tells us it is not vandalism, yet I have never heard of anybody being blocked because they reverted four different newbies who tried four different tests on the same article. Sjakkalle (Check!) 15:18, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

I've tried to redraft that paragraph in light of the various comments above. See below: #Update to vandalism section. Particularly, I have taken account of the comments by user:Mangojuice on WP:BEANS and the comments of User:Sjakkalle on new user edits. The rest comprises a more helpful explanation of how block/protect and vandalism interact, and clarity as to the process (for example that a block may not be granted for some cases, or may not be granted immediately, so editors know what to do in the meantime).

Comments in that section below? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 21:43, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

3RR in relation to other policies

Does the 3RR rule trump other policies/guidelines?

I'm currently working on a page where one user is massively POV pushing (some of which was aimed at discrediting the work of a living person and was thus verging on breaking wikibio rules), and another is adding substantial amounts of WP:OR. Both are very persistent.

A third user reverted or trimmed their edits several times based on normal wiki procedures for WP:OR/WP:V/WP:NPOV and misc bio, and is now being threatened with the 3RR.

Who would you say was on the most solid ground in this case?

perfectblue 09:36, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

The problem (if you like) is that 3RR is fairly definite; but deciding if something is OR or POV is rather harder to determine. The remedy for people breaking 3RR is to report them at WP:AN3; the remedy for POV pushing is recruiting more editors on your side, or an RFC. To be specific, please don't break 3R to remove OR William M. Connolley 10:32, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

It's always better not to break 3R --HIZKIAH (User &#149; Talk) 11:44, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

There are clear exceptions to 3RR - vandalism and negative unsourced info about living persons (WP:BLP) being the primary two. These are exceptions because, among other things, they are easy to judge. POV pushing and original research are, to a much larger extent, are in the eyes of the beholder. In fact, admins don't ask editors to provide a basis for their potentially excess edits, which is why it's a good idea to cite vandalism and WP:BLP in reverts. John Broughton | Talk 21:26, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

I think the main "other thing", with regard to living persons, is that the Wikimedia Foundation doesn't want to get sued. That's also presumably why copyvio is also listed as an exception -- you seem to have omitted to mention that one. --Trovatore 21:39, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Unless there is a blatent obvious vandalism, 3RR trumps several other editing policies. The reason is pretty clear when you look at it. An edit is (in simple terms) either very obviously bad, or not immediately obviously bad. If it's very obviously bad (spam, graffiti, etc) then its down to anyone to fix. But if its something one needs specialist knowledge to check, or contains opinion or the view of some source or some side in a debate, then 3RR kicks in, and the purpose is to prevent people edit warring over facts that both sides 'know' are right/wrong. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 23:45, 7 January 2007 (UTC)

Anons and obvious sockpuppets

It is among Wikipedia's core principles that anyone can edit. However, it is not a core principle that anyone can edit war. In practice, it is widely understood that anon IPs and obvious sockpuppets are used to prosecute edit wars by known editors seeking - usually successfully - to evade 3RR. The frequent success of this enterprise is its primary attractions. This can be judicially neutralized by exempting reverts of anon and obvious sockpuppet reverts from 3RR. To err on the conservative side, new anon edits would not be exempt, only reverts. Anons (and named accounts) which only revert are in nearly all cases sockpuppets of active (or banned) users. It is appropriate that policy acknowledge this reality. When established editors revert the reverts of anons and probable sockpuppets, they do a service to the encylopedia.Proabivouac 09:33, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Update to vandalism section

Based upon discussion above, covering WP:BEANS and other points made, I've redrafted the first short paragraph of the "exception: simple vandalism" section. I took account of user:Mangojuice (avoiding specificity and WP:BEANS) and User:Sjakkalle (new user edits), reconciled WP:3RR to WP:REVERT, and clarified some problems which have sometimes led to uncertainty for well-meaning editors:

OLD [with newline added for clarity]: In general, reverts that, in the judgement of the reviewing administrator, are reverts of simple, obvious vandalism (e.g. graffiti, link spam, et cetera) are not considered to be contentious. Still, repeated reversion against vandalism should be avoided. Blocking is the preferred solution to repeat vandalism originating from a single user or IP, and page protection is the preferred solution to repeat vandalism from multiple sources.

NEW: In general, reverts that, in the judgement of the reviewing administrator, are reverts of simple and obvious vandalism (including graffiti, link spam, et cetera), new user test edits, or disruptive sockpuppets of vandalistic users, are not usually considered to be contentious. Other vandalism reverts than these may still fall under 3RR. Repeated reverts, even of simple vandalism, cause disruption, disputes, and unhelpful entries within the page history. For these reasons, when a pattern of ongoing, regular, or repeated vandalism is established, it should be dealt with in the long term preferrably by switching to blocking of vandalistic editors, or page protection for articles being attacked, with cessation of reversion once this is granted. (Note: Page protection will usually only be appropriate for current and established vandalism, since it also disrupts the actions of genuine editors.)

continuation (unchanged): Non-administrators, who cannot block users or protect pages, may make requests for blocking of vandals at Administrator intervention against vandalism, and requests for protection at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. Repeated reversion of an article to deal with vandalism should be considered a last resort. Note that reverts in edit wars in which one side describes the other side's edits as vandalism are generally not only contentious reverts, but are also assumptions of bad faith. Blocking can be expected in such cases.

I believe this is a good edit. Its effect and differences are to tackle the main 4 issues in this section and clarify the first sentence, as follows:

1. Examples changed from "e.g" to "including" so it doesn't imply exclusion of other simple obvious vandalism but at the same time doesn't provide any WP:BEANS.
2. New user edits and disruptive socks of blocked users added, the former because they aren't "vandalism" but are noted as a sensible exception by User:Sjakkalle above [30], the latter as noted in Wikipedia:Revert as being a confirmed exception to 3RR.
3. Clarify the opposing aspect, that edits which are not clearly to do with simple, obvious vandalism, may still fall under 3RR. (To pre-empt playing the game.) This makes clear that this section provides only a limited exception, for other cases 3RR still applies.
4. Rework explanation, making clearer why blocking or protection is preferable longer term, and why in some cases these might not be granted despite a degree of active vandalism. (Explanatory sentence only)
5. Clarifying a "gap" that sometimes causes problems: Reversion of simple vandalism is not a breach of 3RR, but ongoing vandalism should be met by seeking blocking or page protection. However the reviewing administrator may decide not to grant the block or PP or may take some time to read the request. So it's worth making clear that block or PP should be requested once a pattern is established, but until it's granted then reversion of simple obvious vandalism is permitted. This is so that there is clarity as to the process and so that editors know what's what in the gap period, if simple vandalism is continuing when a block/PP hasn't (yet) been granted.

Those are the changes posted. The overall aim has been to address the issues discussed previously above, such as how vandalism and 3RR interact, without giving any WP:BEANS. I think it's a good edit to the policy. Comments? FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 21:43, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

I object to the substantive part of this change. "New user tests" are never going to be a 3RR problem, and fall under graffiti anyway. "Disruptive sockpuppets of vandalistic users," however, just encourages serial reverters to describe the editors they are reverting as sockpuppets or vandals, in order to try to exempt themselves from the 3RR. And even in legitimate cases, if the edits aren't "simple and obvious vandalism" but are merely done by "disruptive sockpuppets," I don't think there should be an exception. Before you continue on this, could you please explain why you think the policy needs clarifying so badly? Mangojuice^talk 22:37, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for responding. The problem was twofold: WP:REVERT states that sockpuppet reverting are not 3RR issues. But the 3RR rule itself, which people will look at for guidance on what's allowed and what's going to lead to a 24 hr block, and which has to be consistent, doesn't say that. It leaves it omitted by implication. Bringing two inconsistent policies into line is a good thing; leaving one saying it's okay and the other silent and hence by implication indicating it isn't, is not.

I take your point on new user edits. I wouldn't have thought of it myself - as you say, it's not exactly a very significant problem. However since 3RR applies to any reversion on a given page in a 24 hr period, different new user edits could push an editor's revert count over 3 (as was suggested). At least one person highlighted it, and WP:VANDAL doesn't count this as vandalism, so I figured it's worth saying, on the basis "at least one person wanted it, it makes sense, and it doesn't do any harm".

The last point you make is a sensible one - should edits that arent "simple and obvious vandalism" but are done by "disruptive socks of blocked users", be revertable outside 3RR? Whatever the final answer is, right now we have one source on reversions saying it is, and another silent on the matter. Again, it seems the best position is to bring them into consistency, and then if it's considered a problem or undesirable, discuss that as a separate question and keep or remove it in both. But first things first, having it stated as a rule in one document and silent in the other can never be a good thing, so I'm guided by the positive mention in WP:REVERT that "fighting sockpuppets" is outside 3RR, a definite, positive statement, and merely ensured 3RR itself reflects that as it stands. If it was a wrong statement there, then we change both of these and remove it, but again consistently.

As for why... 3RR is one of the most common misconduct (as opposed to content) issues in edit disputes and vandalism. Editors who are not administrators routinely try to revert these, and if they are consciencious, they try to stay within 3RR while doing so. So we need to make clear to them exactly where the lines are, and as it stood, the lines weren't quite clear on a few aspects. Without great change, it seemed right to ask others about what kind of issues came up in looking at that section (WP:BEANS was the main one) and then to try and address the gaps, taking others thoughts into account. But for sure, the gaps are better filled. It will benefit the editors who look to this policy, and want to be sure what they are doing is okay, or who are in a situation where they need to know if a given revert while waiting for a response to protection/block request is going to get them blocked themselves. The wording was unnecessarily unhelpful in that sort of area, because things described as outside 3RR in WP:REVERT weren't mentioned as such in 3RR, and it wasn't made clear what is or isn't okay while waiting for a block/protect decision. These clarifications will help editors facing simple obvious vandalism in future. I got caught this way myself for 4 x vandalism reversion (shortly afterwards being unblocked, deemed no 3RR contravention had occurred), and I'm careful. So certainly it was unclear and probable that others will have had this situation too. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 23:11, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually, it seems like the Help:Reverting page was simply out of date. Keep in mind that Help:Reverting is not an official policy page, whereas this one is, so between the two, this one is the source I'd consider more authoratative. When it comes to the edits of sockpuppets of banned users, though, the section "Reverting edits from banned or blocked users" contains the exception you were looking for. I'm sorry that you got mistakenly blocked... that sucks for you, but remember that admins are human, too, and can make mistakes. I think the policy should be written to make it clear that there are really only two basic exceptions to the 3-revert rule: (1) non-controversial edits that don't contribute to edit warring and (2) edits required by Wikipedia policy (such as removing of copyvio or libel, or reverting a banned user's edits). If that was all that was written, the intent of the policy would be clear, but the specifics would be very unclear. This vagueness would leave ordinary users unguided, as you say, which I think would discourage them from breaking the 3RR even in cases where it might be reasonable: in other words, they will seek an alternate solution because they fear a block. That's a good thing when it applies to situations like vandalism reverts or removal of potential libel, because reverting isn't the best solution (but it would be a bad thing if someone thought they couldn't self-revert or something). However, one bad thing about having a vague policy is that the 3RR is meant to be an objective rule, so that admins can enforce limits on edit warring without giving an opening to accusations of bias.

What we really want is a policy in which (1) there is enough vagueness that users are discouraged from repeatedly reverting, wikilawyering, and attempting to circumvent the 3RR, but (2) there is enough clarity that the rule is objective, so that its application will not inflame edit wars further. Or, put another way, once the policy is clear enough on the exceptions that it can be considered objective, we shouldn't keep clarifying things, or we'll just encourage people to revert more, which is quite against the point of the policy. If there's any way in which the "vandalism exception" would not be clearly understood by an average user, it's that people are likely to jump to conclusions that the opposing side in a conflict is vandalizing, and we speicifically address that misunderstanding. In my mind the "graffiti, link spam, et cetera" bit is meant to clarify the level of "simple" or "obvious" we expect -- the point is not to list all types of simple and obvious vandalism. Does it look like it's trying to be a list? If so, how can we rectify that? Mangojuice^talk 16:30, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Nice work and I concur with your rationale and thoughts, Mangojuice. I've made one minor accuracy correction to the wording on protection (see below) and one minor wording change where the revision looks stricter than it should be; beyond that it looks good.

I also note you've fixed WP:REVERT so it's now consistent and points to WP:3RR for exceptions instead of maintaining a separate list, which is a good idea too. It solves my other concern, inconsistency.

The one correction I did make was to slightly alter "Page protection will usually only be appropriate for vandalism from many unrelated users simultaneously" to the more accurate "... for vandalism from several different sources simultaneously". The rationale being that PP (especially semiprotection) is often and regularly granted for pages being hit by a single person on a dynamic IP. The term "sources" covering either IPs, individuals, or user accounts, seems more generic and less likely to suggest WP:BEANS, and it's probably "several" not "many" from the evidence of most protection decisions.

I also added the sole word "contentious" so that the new sentence "Other vandalism reverts may fall under 3RR" clearly references other contentious reverts as intended, and doesn't imply that clearly noncontentious reverts might be 3RR (which is about how it works, if it's 'not contentious', then its usually okay). This clarifies that the important distinction for 3RR vandalism reversion is whether it's contentious or obvious, not whether it's merely in some list or not. Otherwise, no change, your edit looks fine. FT2 ^{(Talk | email)} 18:24, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

3rr rule in relation to reverting 3rr breakers

There was somthing about this in the article, but I didn't understand what exactly the rule was in this instance. If a user breaks the three revert rule by reverting one article, oh, let's say seven times and the 3rr noticeboard is backlogged and he just keeps doing it, and the other two of us have both restored it three times each, is it a violation to restore it a fourth time if the guy just keeps reverting for no good reason? Thanatosimii 21:22, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

You can only revert them once they have been blocked for violating 3RR. Prior to that it may be considered part of the ongoing edit war. --Bobblehead 21:31, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Ah. Dankechen. Thanatosimii 21:34, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

Even then you may wish to be careful about it. There isn't anything preventing someone else from submitting a 3RR against you and from an admin determining you're part of an edit war and blocking you for that. Ideally once someone violates 3RR it is best to leave their last revert, report them, and then once the person is blocked have someone that hasn't reverted that day revert their last edit. Unless it's a copyright violation, vandalism, or violation of WP:BLP, there really isn't any harm in leaving the disputed content on the article for a few hours. --Bobblehead 21:40, 16 January 2007 (UTC)

My recent revision

I recently rewrote this page, and trimmed away much of the fat, because I felt it was getting excessively bloated. You can see my revision here: [31]. But it was reverted, so here I am with my reasons for making the change.

The most obvious reason to me was that the rule was becoming unclear. I also tried to put the meat of the rule up front, in the lead, rather than having it strewn across several sections (in the current version, the lead and the sections "detail" and "intent of the policy"). I've just seen that there is some good material from older versions of this page which I have overlooked in this regard, and I'll try to work those into a new draft.

The other clear reason was that the rule was drowning in a sea of tiny, trivial changes which dilute the essential purpose of the rule (to stop people from edit warring) and introduce all sorts of oddities that the wikilawyers can have a field day with. For example, in the current version there is a paragraph on how "reverting for maintenance" is an exception to the rule. We don't need a general exception to cover a single situation, namely cleaning up the Sandbox.

Other examples of bloat are the instructions on what to do if blocked under 3RR (duplicates block messages) and the statement that persistent offenders may be subject to an ArbCom case. This sort of duplication causes inconsistencies which can only serve to confuse people; this page should be only about the 3RR.

You'll note that most of the simplification came from the exceptions section. I think that each of these needs plenty of discussion because I am sure that there are plenty of people out there who don't agree on all or even most of those supposed exceptions. The one on blocked users, for example, is incredibly unclear, and the one on a user's own userspace is another example of this. --bainer (talk) 00:56, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I support the change. It was a vast improvement. The one thing the new version needed was to preserve the "I've broken the 3RR, what do I do" section. I think the spirit of the rule has become unclear thanks to all the words, and I don't see the change as actually changing the policy in any way. Mangojuice^talk 01:22, 20 January 2007 (UTC)

I've done another draft, it's available here, with just a couple of small changes to the version available in the history. --bainer (talk) 05:44, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I support this--the page has indeed gotten too long, and is redundant. Your version is a clear improvement. Chick Bowen 06:21, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

I endorse your draft for two reasons. First of all, as mentioned above, it's shorter and easier to read. Second, it trims away a good amount of unneeded prose - brevity in policies makes comprehension, and therefore editing, easier.
The only part I disagree with (this may well have been in the old version too) is the part of the second to last line of the lead that says "or asking for administrative assistance." This implies that you can go running to the AN for help in an edit war, or, at least, I bet someone will eventually interpret it that way (in fact, some content-dispute related sections make me think people do believe that already.) Could you clarify what sort of assistance they should be asking for that can't be had at WP:RFPP? Picaroon 22:28, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

The reference to assistance is duplicated from the exceptions section, in a sentence which says that if you are unsure whether something is simple vandalism/copyvio etc, you should ask for assistance rather than reverting. But as you've pointed out, in the lead and out of that context it doesn't make sense, so I've removed that. --bainer (talk) 06:46, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Now that we have several people agreeing with the change, I've reinstated it, edited slightly. I kept the "I've violated 3RR. What do I do?" section, and de-emphasized the blue-outlined version of the rule. Mangojuice^talk 15:00, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

As far as I can see its OK. Minor nitpick: people sometimes interpret reverting-banned-users exemption to mean they can revert the last revert of someone blocked for 3RR. I don't think you can, and it doesn't come up often. Is it worth including? William M. Connolley 16:45, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

The previous wording said banned or blocked. The exception for reverting banned users at least has some consensus behind it, but there are so many situations in which a user can be blocked (is it ok to break 3RR to revert someone who has been blocked for unrelated personal attacks, for example?), and so much confusion (as evident on this talk page) that there could not be consensus. Personally I think it's preposterous that anyone can claim they are allowed to breach 3RR to revert someone blocked for breaching 3RR. If the other party had not been blocked when the revert was made, then both of the parties would have been blocked.

The short answer is that it's far too confusing to talk about blocked users so I confined it to banned users only, for which there would seem to be consensus. --bainer (talk) 00:55, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Why did you remove following formulations:

"This policy does apply to repeatedly moving, deleting, undeleting, or recreating a page."

"Administrators blocked under this provision must not unblock themselves."?

To me they don't seem as self-evident, specially the second. -- Vision Thing -- 17:57, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

As to the second point, well, Admins are never supposed to unblock themselves if they're directly blocked, which is covered at WP:BLOCK#Unblocking. Mangojuice^talk 19:27, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

The first point has been reworked, see the "What is a revert?" section. The second point is obvious and applies any time an admin is blocked; it's utterly unnecessary to clutter this page with it, and it's also a bad idea to choose a wording that can imply that an admin can unblock themselves for other reasons, just not when they've been blocked for 3RR. --bainer (talk) 00:55, 23 January 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifications. -- Vision Thing -- 20:06, 24 January 2007 (UTC)

Does the 3RR apply here?

I'm reverting removals of an entry from Wikipedia:Templates for deletion/Log/2007 January 25. Common sense tells me that the 3RR will not apply even if I make four reverts, but I'd hate to be blocked based on an uncommon view of common sense. Is this correct? --NE2 01:46, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Don't make 4R. If you're obviously right, someone else will William M. Connolley 09:42, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

That is, another editor will, in all probability, help you out if you are indeed right. Be very clear what you're doing in your edit summary - that helps others figure out that you're doing the right thing (or not, if not). Also, if it's any consolation, if you're fighting just one editor, and he/she removes stuff for a fourth time, that's a 24 hour block (assuming a warning, of course). -- John Broughton | ^(♫♫) 03:12, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Soft protection

Could we have a 3 revert rule exception for "soft protection", where you use reverts to simulate protection of part of a page, without having to protect the whole page? --Kim Bruning 07:21, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I think that would be too confusing. Why not just protect the page in such a circumstance? Mangojuice^talk 10:35, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Because sometimes doing that on high-traffic pages is more disruptive than the edit war was to start with. :-) --Kim Bruning 12:57, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

I think this is an interesting concept and worth discussing. However, I really think the proper place to discuss this would be Wikipedia talk:Protection policy. You're proposing a new kind of page protection here. If adopted, the 3RR would have to be modified, but it seems like a very bad idea to modify the 3RR if this kind of protection isn't generally an approved concept. Mangojuice^talk 15:22, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Not so new. IIRC it was one of the original uses people thought of for why to have reversion. --Kim Bruning 18:40, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Can you give me an example of a page that has had this kind of partial protection imposed on it? Or for which it has been discussed? To me, technologically, it makes much more sense to simply protect the whole page -- a user encountering that kind of protection will give up: there's nothing they can do. But a "simulated" protection would seem to be just another person reverting them, and they may give up because of the persistence, but they may continue to try to change the article, since they're still able to edit it. Mangojuice^talk 19:31, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Policy clarification

I would like policy clarification on the appropriateness of 3RR being applied to userpages, and if it is applicable, under what circumstances. - WeniWidiWiki 05:50, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Generally speaking, a user should not be punished for violating the 3RR in their own user space... but there are exceptions. For instance, if a user violated the 3RR in continuing to use a fair-use image on their user page, I would block. Basically, a user's own user space is pretty much their space, but that doesn't mean they can do just anything with it. Mangojuice^talk 10:38, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

My concern, is that there is a new trend in censoring people's userpage polemics, rants, userboxes, etc under WP:IAR and which violates WP:POINT in my opinion. In my case there was no effort at dispute resolution prior to full on edit-warring over rather innocuous content on a userpage. I am interested in clarification of policy on this issue, because I think that in these instances 3RR is being used for malicious ends. - WeniWidiWiki 16:22, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I would be most unlikely, as administrator, to block someone for making a fourth revert in his own userspace, and would, in fact, be more tempted to block the people who were reverting him. Why, oh why do people have to start replacing messages that a user has seen and doesn't want to keep on his userpage? Why do people have to annoy and harass a mildly troublesome user who isn't vandalizing or disrupting anything? If someone is readding fair use content or egregious personal attacks to his user space, I'll block for copyright violation or for disruption, but not for 3RR. That said, I wouldn't like to see "one's own user space" added to the list of official exceptions. I get a bit concerned when I see people reverting their own userpages and claiming that 3RR "doesn't apply". I would say simply that it "is generally not enforced" in cases of one's own userspace. Musical Linguist 17:47, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

It used to be listed as an exception, but it was somewhat hedged with terms like "generally speaking" and so on. Mangojuice^talk 16:53, 5 February 2007 (UTC)

Do you recall where the discussion took place and where consensus was reached to remove this exception? I am specifically concerned about users removing polemics, essays, rants, etc. about wikipedia policy from other user's namespace because they find it personally offensive, even though it is not targeting one specifically and is abstract. This happened to me recently when a user removed a rant I had against wikipedia policy on IP editors on my userpage and then another user submitted material for deletion under the same premise here. - WeniWidiWiki 19:34, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

It was removed in the recent large change that streamlined and simplified the policy page. This exception specifically was not discussed. Mangojuice^talk 20:33, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

I fear sometimes that arbitrarity and vaguity in policy is used as a crude bludgeon to bully other users, when the intent of the policies are not explicit or contradict other policies. I personally think that the only exceptions to 3RR which would apply in one's own namespace would fall under WP:IAR anyway. Thanks. - WeniWidiWiki 21:37, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Possible contradiction between this policy page and a warning template

I've been looking at some templates to warn users about vandalism, etc., and I came across {{Uw-3rr}}. It says, "Under normal circumstances a user is entitled to three reverts per 24 hour period on a specific page." However, the policy page says, "The rule does not convey an entitlement to revert three times each day, nor does it endorse reverting as an editing technique; rather, the rule is an "electric fence". Editors who engage in edit warring may still be blocked from editing even if they haven't made more than three edits in any given 24 hour period."

My instinct tells me I'd be safer to be guided by the policy page than by the warning template, especially since I looked at the histories and found that the policy page has existed since August 2004, and the template since 2 February this year! Could someone give some clarification, please? And if the template is misleading, could it be altered? Thanks. ElinorD 17:47, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

The template has now been modified by Kim Bruning. ElinorD 21:06, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

It should probably be deleted even, but perhaps we can keep it around for a while to discover who we should block? O:-) --Kim Bruning 21:30, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Proposal: 3 Reverts of CONTENT, not 3 Reverts by user

The intent of the 3RR is to stop edit warring. However, I've noticed that the 3RR rule is often gamed in a way that just creates more edit warring. This way is, what I call, the "Revert Round Robin." Basically, two or more users "revert where the other left off", so to speak; no-one goes above 2 reverts, but that particular viewpoint is successfully edit-warred into the article. The 3RR is, at the moment, not equipped to handle this.

My proposal is to include in the 3RR rule a section about content. Users cannot revert the same content 3 times a day as well as 3 reversions a day. So even if Person A has Person B revert after Person A's two reverts are over, that would still be unacceptable.

As a result, this would impel the two disputing parties to actually talk it over instead of one side using their superior numbers to keep content in the article (or keep it out) without discussion. This would truly fulfill the goal of stopping edit warring.

Obviously, this would not apply to obvious vandalism, BLP violations, and so forth (same things that 3RR does not apply to).

What do people think about this? .V. _[Talk|Email] 22:43, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good in principle. In practice I think stopping crackpots is already too big a pain. Of course sometimes you have two crackpots, but it's less likely. --Trovatore 22:48, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I figured a criticism of this idea would be that we need "tag-team edit warring" to sometimes stop a crackpot. Even the 3RR rule says if it needs that much reverting, the community must want it gone... but that's not true. Even if one other person joins in, that doesn't mean the community wants it. I guess that's where I'm coming from on this issue.

The benefit is that there would be far, far less (perhaps no) edit warring. The downside would be that we'd have to talk it out on talk pages. I guess individuals would have to weigh the good versus the bad for themselves, although it seems to me that edit wars are never good, even if they're trying to keep a "crackpot" (so to speak) out of an article. The problem I see is that for many editors, "crackpot" translates into "someone's viewpoint that I don't agree with"... and that's the very heart of edit warring. .V. _[Talk|Email] 23:02, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Of course this would be after the other resorts are exhausted, like WP:RFC, et cetera. Usually editors who are savvy enough to invoke dispute resolution are not the type who edit war. Usually. The main sources of edit warring in 3RR context is with WP:NEWBIES who are not aware that the rule exists, and therefore would not have the need to "tag-team." However, I do agree with the basic principle that tag-teaming shouldn't be allowed in the place of dispute resolution. V-Man737 01:52, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't mean to imply that the tag-teaming is intentional, but I've seen likeminded experienced users keep things out of an article by having one person revert twice and another person take up the reverting so that they don't get 3RR'ed. If you want to check it out, look at the history of any seriously controversial article. For bonus points, check out the history of an article that's listed under RfC, or, better yet, under mediation/arbitration. You'll see what I mean. .V. _[Talk|Email] 02:51, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

As I say, all that sounds good in theory. But the crackpots you have always with you, and they just keep coming. The only thing that keeps their numbers down a little is that they get in edit wars and get banned. As un-PC as it may be to say it, I think that's a fine outcome, and I think we ought to think long and hard about anything that makes it happen less often. --Trovatore 02:08, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

I oppose this for the same reasons as I gave at #Are cartels allowed?. A situation like you're describing is clearly WP:TE and WP:POINT#Gaming the system. I don't think the 3RR has to handle that situation precisely. Mangojuice^talk 16:13, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Every few weeks some POV-pusher, frustrated that he can't get his policy or consensus violating stuff into an article, comes here and tries to get this change made to policy. As is regularly pointed out, making this change would mean that one editor could effectively hold an article hostage against any number of opposing editors. No, editors are individuals, not amorphous masses, and what you call "tag-teaming" is usually actually a consensus of several editors. Jayjg ^(talk) 18:22, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Wow, way to assume good faith... .V. _[Talk|Email] 20:03, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

You forget, I've seen your edits, and your talk page comments, and your rather singular interest in "Jewish history", so to speak, or at least in presenting a certain view of one extremely narrow piece of it. Jayjg ^(talk) 03:27, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Maybe you're just seeing what you want to see? I've done Spoken Wikipedia articles, written various articles about Law, Japanese History, Medicine, etc as well as contributed to a wide range of topics (not to mention my work with disambiguations, copy edits, and vandalism fighting.) My interest in "Jewish History" makes up a total of 17% of my total contributions according to my edit counter (not counting copy edits/spelling errors/reverted vandalism on those pages, the number is significantly lower). That doesn't seem like a "singular interest" to me. On the other hand, I've noticed you only edit articles related to Judaism. But I'm not going to pass any judgment on your edits because I do not assume bad faith. .V. _[Talk|Email] 06:35, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

You've "noticed" I "edit articles related to Judaism"? Hardly, unless you have a unique definition of Judaism. I've edited almost 9,000 different articles on Wikipedia; you, on the other hand, have made a total of 333 edits to articles. I'd say my span of interests is somewhat wider than yours. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

I think the real concern here, which may be legitimate, is that such a system simply gives too much power to a minority. The current system, it seems, tries to reduce edit warring while still being at least kind of democratic. Of course, we say it's not democratic, but largely it is, and has to be. That said, I think a proposal of this kind might need some way to assure that small minorities wouldn't be able to disrupt everything.

So what would happen, if we implemented the policy? We'd suddenly have an immense increase in dispute resolution. Could we handle that? would there be any way to resolve it? That seems to me the question. Mackan79 15:50, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

If we implemented this individuals would hold articles hostage forever, and there would never be consensus; that's what would happen. Jayjg ^(talk) 19:31, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

What happens when your report is ignored?

I think there needs to be a section on what editors should do when a reported 3RR violation is not acted on by administrators. My idea is that the "reporter" should get a get out of jail card if reversion continues on the disputed page. Thoughts? Catchpole 22:19, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

This isn't a game. Sometimes there is good reason why a 3RR report isn't acted on. - WeniWidiWiki 22:29, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

Well in that case some communication would be appreciated. Catchpole 22:33, 19 February 2007 (UTC)

In most cases, a 3RR report that doesn't lead to a block will still get attention. If a report gets old, you can always mention it at WP:ANI to try to get someone's attention. However, you should not violate the 3RR yourself; that's the whole point of the 3RR. Just let the other person have their way for the time being. Heck, even if they get blocked, you shouldn't break the 3RR by reverting them back, it's just that no one would be likely to report you, since the other party is blocked. Others violating the 3RR should not be an excuse for you to do so under any circumstances. Mangojuice^talk 14:35, 20 February 2007 (UTC)