Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/RfC to physically restrict access to the Helper Script

Background

Reviewing submissions at Articles for Creation using the Helper Script is currently restricted to users who have:

a Wikipedia account at least 90 days old.
a minimum of 500 undeleted edits to articles.
thoroughly read and understood the reviewing instructions.
a good understanding of the policies mentioned in the reviewing instructions, including the various special notability categories.

Currently, any autoconfirmed users are able to add their names to the list whether they are qualified or not.

Issues

The page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/Participants where users can enter themselves on a list that authorises them to use the Helper Script is under no other restrictions than Semi Protection (registered, autoconfirmed accounts). Users can do this whether they meet the requirements or not. A simple glance at the List Page History will show that it needs constant monitoring, but also that very few AfC regulars are actually monitoring it. In the worst case scenario, users who have been removed from the list will continue to review and in one instance hack the script so that they can use it anyway in defiance of being asked to refrain from reviewing.

Other users have been known to enter themsleves in order to review their own submissions, and the main problem is that many users hover over their edit count to enter their names as soon as they reach the 500 edit/90 day threshold but without having any additional relevant experience.

Proposal

To reduce the need for constant monitoring of the page at Wikipedia:WikiProject Articles for creation/Participants and to help ensure a higher standard or reviewing it is proposed to:

Place the page under full protection (editing by adminstrators only)
Undo the redirect of the talk page so that the list once again has its own talk page.
Oblige editors to make an Edit Request on the talk page for their name to be added to the list.
In a similar manner to the way access to AWB is accorded, admins will review the requests and at their discretion, add the editor to the list of authorised Helper Script users or decline the request.
Encourage AfC admin regulars to keep that talk page on their watchlist and process the requests.

NOTE: This is an interim emergency solution to be implemented until a better solution can be found.
NOTE: This is practically a straw poll. Please DO NOT propose alternative solutions here. If you wish to suggest another method of control please start a separate RfC.

This RfC will run for 30 days or until a clear consensus emerges. It is recommended that this RfC be closed by an Admin - one who has no previous involvement in the AfC process. Editors who have participated in similar discussions will be notified of this RfC in accordance with canvassing guidelines.

Support

Endorse Hasteur (talk) 14:07, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
A sensible move, as long as the reviewing admins remember to AGF. BethNaught (talk) 14:10, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
I assume this will only effect new users. Great idea anyways, but per above, admins should assume good faith and appreciate people volunteering to be a reviewer. George Edward C – Talk – Contributions 14:27, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Makes sense. --AmaryllisGardener ^talk 14:33, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
It makes sense, even though it may be introducing an element of hat collecting. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 14:49, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. Sledgehammer or not, this tack needs driving home. Fiddle Faddle 16:06, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. I think that it is reasonable to verify that the minimum requirements have been met. Cullen³²⁸ Let's discuss it 16:44, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, as an interim solution to a pressing problem. I would have liked to discuss first, but then I read teh instructions :-) IMO the hat collecting issue is nullified by the need to have help reviewing articles, and the extra admin power is negligeable - it's just access to a script. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:03, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse. No one seems to be disagreeing that the present system has problems. So let's try an alternative - one that's in place for other privileges, and seems to be working well for those. Obviously, the expectation is that admins will respond to requests within a day or so. If that turns out not to be true, then we can revisit this. [Also: for those who oppose this proposed solution, it would be really appreciated if, when you say things like "I think there are better ways to handle it that won't invlove admins", you actually spell out what one or more of these "better ways" actually is. Otherwise, some people are going to think that you're just making vacuous statements.] -- John Broughton (♫♫) 17:06, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Endorse - It's great people are signing up but not so good they either review there own article or simply sign up with under 400 edits!. –Davey2010^Talk 17:15, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
My first reaction to finding out about this was WP:CREEP, but I do realize that it does nobody any good to have AfCs reviewed by editors who lack the experience and judgment to do a good job, and I don't see any problem with, in effect, making this privilege about the same as Rollbacker or Pending Changes Reviewer in terms of how one can acquire it. --Tryptofish (talk) 17:34, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support -- The harm done to new users and to the encyclopedia by incorrect rejections is so great that something needs to be done to reduce it. Though the articles can always rewritten again, almost all users whose first articles never come back, and are lost to us forever. The very survival of WP is critically dependent of attracting and keeping new users. By my estimate, at least 1/5 of rejected articles are wrongly rejected, about 8,000 a year. And altogether too many copyvios and other major problems are being accepted. Yes, the AFC procedure needs a fundamental fix--this is a preliminary measure to make the problem manageable. As pointed out in the opposes, it won't absolutely prevent people from evading review--but they can evade afc just as well by writing directly in mainspace; we're not likely to find a solution to anything at WP that can't be evaded. It will I wouldn't call it an emergency--the right term to use is urgent, because while we are figuring out how to fix AfC, or to decide whether it even can be fixed, the problem is accumulating. Material that needs to be speeded is just being declined, and promotional editors are endlessly resubmitting material that they need to be told is hopeless. Articles are being declined for trivial reasons, rather than being sent to mainspace where the wikignomes will find and fix it. All this adds to the workload. We need more good reviewers, but the key word here is "good", DGG ( talk ) 18:09, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Obviously the oposers aren't reading what this is about. It's obviously not about giving more power to admins. The overall quality of reviewing is too low, Few people are taking any notice of what is happening on the user list page, and too many unqualified reviewers are slipping through. This needs an emergency solution especially when the AfC team keeps planning to run more backlog campaigns. This proposed measure will help them enormously. That the access to the tool should be gained on request for permission was already passed by consensus a long time ago (see the links above to the previous discussions). We have just failed to implement the 'request' part, and this will be it. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk)
Support this baby step towards fixing AfC in the right way (whatever that may be) — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(e • t • c)} 18:07, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support per DGG and others. A good solution that's sorely needed right now. APerson (talk!) 19:13, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I think that this is a good idea, but that the admins should WP:AGF as much as possible. We do need new reviewers. I agree with Tryptofish about how this should be roughly equivalent to Rollback and PC Reviewer. Origamite^ⓣⓒ 19:20, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support reluctantly, though I hope DGG or other admins here will hep out maintaining the list. At the AWB request page if I don't add in the people, they wait a long time. We should add in instructions so that people know how to put their their own writing into article space via the move button anyway. For AWB it is not an admin power trip, but just a simple edit job. The tougher situations are for marginal cases where someone gets to 500 edits, but has done nothing to show they could do the job. Perhaps they could but they haven't demonstrated it. Instead for those that like to say "no", they can make comments on people's requests so that admins only have to deal with the yes cases. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 20:36, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Strong support Consensus in past RFCs has already stated that we can't just let any random person confuse newbies by accepting articles only to have the articles unaccepted. All we need to do is implement it already. I have seen far too many new reviewers in the past few days that need to be directed to WP:CIR and WP:ICANTHEARYOU. — kikichugirl ^speak up! 22:07, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support, after considering both opinions. --L235 (talk) As a courtesy, please ping me when replying. 23:33, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Support Its been proven that unqualified editors can severely disrupt the reviewing process.... I don't know if creating a usergroup would work. Does AFC use special commands? or is it just text editing. As I said on the admin board "The biggest issue would probably be the damage someone can do in between the time of adding themselves to the white list - and being removed from the white list. So the white list is your issue. - Make the white list fully protected, users need to message an admin requesting that they be added." As far as cloning the script goes, I don't think there are that many people capable of doing it. It requires quite a bit of modification to make it run, therefor not a really a issue. I would recommend obfuscating parts the code the deal with the white list.

Message for devs: Once the script is cloned, its fairly easy to change how it deals with the white list:

change if ( !userAllowed ) { to

if ( userAllowed ) {

If I was the dev, I would just make some confusing loops and change variable names to deter amateur programmers eg:Userallowed = CanToastBread

Lynctekrua (talk)

Oppose

Oppose - putting in a tack with a sledgehammer. — {{U|Technical 13}} ^{(e • t • c)} 14:54, 1 February 2015 (UTC) Moving to Support, I guess this is a baby step toward my preference. 18:07, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. Admins don't need more power. Sorry. --Biblioworm 15:47, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Agreed on Biblioworm, also some concerns about hatcollecting. — Revi 16:06, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Not convinced there's a big problem here. Participant list appears to be well monitored. We need all the help we can get here. We don't need any additional barriers to recruiting new participants. ~KvnG 16:26, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose While I entirely understand the issues behind this, I think there are better ways to handle it that won't invlove admins. EoRdE6^{(Come Talk to Me!)} 16:53, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose If this is a genuine emergency it should not need to wait 30 days for approval. Maybe "emergency" overstates it. It should not take 30 days to work up a proper solution. This looks like the sort of situation that would last indef. An emergency measure should be time limited.Commenting also that I'm not too keen on anonymous emergency proposals that give more power to Administrators. Leaky Caldron 17:51, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
+1, well said. Legoktm (talk) 19:45, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. This technically does nothing to prevent any autoconfirmed user from simply clicking the "move" button, or any registered user from copy-pasting their article which has been gathering moss and mould in WP:AFC for the last half-month directly into mainspace one second after they create an account. The script automates various reviewer tasks, such as leaving comments or removing AFC-related templates after the article has been accepted, but is not essential to any AFC task. In this respect, the proposal is useless; it also does nothing to abate the very real problem that AFC (last I looked) is a hopelessly-backlogged nightmare where the few viable or valuable articles are buried under weeks of the usual mess of personal and corporate autobiography, unsourced pieces, poorly-written text and rambling about various subjects which don't quite meet notability - all of which are pending review because of a lack of reviewers to wade through it. Place further restrictions on reviewers and there will be fewer reviewers, more backlog and a greater chance of losing valuable new contributors... all without solving the issues this proposal was intended to address. AFC *is* broken, but this fixes nothing. K7L (talk) 17:57, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I have to agree with K7L. This wouldn't actually prevent users from reviewing articles or approving their own. If they have enough determination to find the helper script, skirt the rules, and figure out how to use it, they will be determined enough to either manually review articles or simply create their in the mainspace. Ramaksoud2000 ^{(Talk to me)} 18:26, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I'm utterly confused as to how people are being physically restricted. Are we preventing them from looking at the source code? Legoktm (talk) 19:44, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per K7L. This won't improve things. wctaiwan (talk) 19:59, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I'm opposed in principle to making any WikiProject "permission only". Specifically, I oppose this proposal, per K7L (and indeed, most of the above). Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 20:01, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. There is overwhelming evidence that AfC is a detriment to the project by reason of being what it is (a form of pre-moderation), cannot be fixed by any means whatsoever (because no system of pre-moderation could avoid having the same fundamental problems), and should simply be shut down. It should simply not be possible to "reject" an article without going through the normal deletion processes (CSD, AfD and PROD). I don't believe this proposal will improve that situation, and giving admins a discretion to reject reviewers might actually make it worse, if they reject the wrong people. James500 (talk) 23:33, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion

Can we include a discussion section here for those who want more information before !voting? If so, please tell me how an autoconfirmed user will be prevented from moving a submission into article space by not having the script being suggested? Why wouldn't it be more effective to allow autoconfirmed users free access to the script, in good faith, while focusing on how best to technically restrict a user's participation when they have demonstrated a sufficient lack of competence? I am glad things are moving towards tightening up the AFC lose ends, though I am more interested in making sure we put forth our best effort – and that when we are done, we will have done it right. I am open to being shown that this RFC is our best approach, and I will gladly give my full support once I've been made a believer. I'm not quite there at this time however. Thank you.--John Cline (talk) 21:20, 1 February 2015 (UTC)[reply]