Talk:Gamergate (harassment campaign)/Removal of comments from the talk page

PeterTheFourth, you're not supposed to perform more than one revert every 24 hours. Your removal of this link to a user comment in the history page is problematic - first because your deletion of Ryk72's post doesn't fall under any of the reasons at WP:TALKO to remove other people's comments, but mainly because it hurts the accountability of this talk page.

The limit of participation is already a controversial measure, as it goes against the spirit of "anyone can edit", so the least we can do is to keep track of how that unprecedented restriction is going on and how many comments (and of what kind) have been hidden because of it. By posting a link to each removed comment, those removals will be kept available forever at the archive - where it will be easy to find about their existence, which wouldn't happen if they were simply removed without trace and left hidden among the flood of all the uncategorized and unindexed edits to the history page. Diego (talk) 13:16, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

1. The 1RR restriction is for the article, not the talk page. This came up before regarding some reverts over the press box.
2. If you want to keep an index of removed comments please do it elsewhere. This isn't what this page is for.
3. We don't need editors trying to make a point about the editing restriction. If editors want the restriction removed WP:AN or WP:AE is a better place for that.
4. If an editor wants to take responsibility for another users edit they are free to do that. While not directly applicable, it would be within the spirit of WP:BANREVERT.

— Strongjam (talk) 13:25, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

I don't necessarily want the restriction removed, I want to keep track of how it is affecting the talk page, given the exceptionality of the measure being applied here. I've seen no reason stated of why we shouldn't keep here a reminder of what's going on and that perfectly non-disruptive comments are being removed from the conversation. Diego (talk) 14:10, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

You're free to keep track of how the new restrictions affect the talk page. You might do that in your user space, or in a project, or on your desktop. You might do that in your personal diary for that matter. You might try doing it at AE if you like. But this page has a specific purpose, and your personal investigation is not part of that purpose. MarkBernstein (talk) 14:22, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

You might do that in your user space I'd caution any editor doing that to be mindful of WP:POLEMIC, I think it could be done without running afoul, but it's something to keep in mind. — Strongjam (talk) 14:25, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

What is the purpose of removing the notifications of deleted comments? Do editors feel they are disruptive in some way? Gamaliel (talk) 14:47, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

@Gamaliel: My 2-cents. Depends on the comment that is removed. A good example would be the WAM study link. The discussion was worthwhile. However if the comment removed is just something we've seen a many times before (e.g. non-specific NPOV complaints,) then I'd rather just have it in the history. We don't need an empty section header with a comment removed box. Personally, I don't have any plans to remove notifications unless the diff itself is disruptive though. — Strongjam (talk) 15:01, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

As you know, we've had a vast amount of “meta-discussion” about this talk page recently, frequently veering into, or perhaps constantly residing in, WP:FORUM. This page seems inappropriate for that purpose, a point I recently raised at AE. The decision at AE was to move the meta-discussion to its own page, and the proper place for dissent or appeal is surely AE or elsewhere --not here. Similarly, the proper place to complain about, or catalog the effects of, recent restrictions on inexperienced editors and sock puppets is AE. Finally, the discussion itself apparently seeks to "clarify" just what discretionary sanctions are; again, we can't really do anything about that here except muddy the waters. (Whether water-muddying is the point or not, I cannot see any other outcome as likely or even possible.)

It seems to me that the ideal implementation of the restriction would behave as semi-protection does: an unconfirmed editor cannot change the page. If that cannot readily be accomplished by admins, the implementation ought to mimic that.

Please note as well the recent -- and possibly coordinated? -- attacks at Brianna Wu's talk page. Both that dialog and this one seem to be getting a lot of attention from certain GG sites. MarkBernstein (talk) 15:04, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

Please note that I have opened a discussion at AN here concerning the removal or modification of the 500 edit/30 day account age restrictions. Mifter (talk) 16:17, 25 May 2015 (UTC)

My specific motivation in removing the notification of that deleted comment was that leaving a notice that 'This person said this and you can read it here' is essentially the exact same as letting that person participate on the talk page proper, just with a slight barrier against lazy people clicking through to see what they said. PeterTheFourth (talk) 00:16, 26 May 2015 (UTC)

Hi PeterTheFourth, The description 'This person said this and you can read it here' is a mis-characterisation of the notification that was left on the Talk page (See this edit). The notification did not include any of the details of the removed comment, and included neither invitation nor request for other editors to continue the discussion. It was also of a format which had been used twice previously, without issue.

The page level restriction does not provide for editors to refactor or remove Talk page contributions made by editors with more than 30 days & 500 edits; and such removal is not supported by WP:TPG or WP:5P4.

While I consider that it is now too late to self revert the removal of the notification, I would appreciate if you would strike through the sections of your comment above which misrepresent its nature. - Ryk72 ^'c.s.n.s.' 13:42, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

Linking to a diff allows anybody who clicks through to see the material that was present at the time of the diff, as well as any that was removed by that diff. PeterTheFourth has made few or no other edits outside this topic. 13:47, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

The same is true of clicking on "View History"; however, there is not yet a suggestion that the page level restriction mandates revdeletion for edits made by editors with less than 30 days & 500 edits.

The description 'This person said this and you can read it here' misrepresents the notification which was left on the Talk page, in that it implies that the removed commentary was repeated in the notification, and in that it implies that an invitation was made to editors to view the removed commentary. I would appreciate if you would strike through it. - Ryk72 ^'c.s.n.s.' 14:41, 9 June 2015 (UTC)

"...is essentially the exact same as letting that person participate on the talk page proper" That would be true if other editors reacted to each deleted comment by following the link and directly replying to its content, which they should not be doing; none of that is a reason to remove the post without trace, nor to alter or revert the posts made by an editor with more than 500 edits merely because they link to history. Archiving the original post and leaving a note at its place should be enough to satisfy the ban's goal to avoid editors becoming engaged in discussion with the newcomer; no need to hide that it happened, nor forbid talking about the topics introduced this way if they're worthwhile.

If I posted a comment saying "some acquaintance told me X about GamerGate, I'm posting it here in their behalf", no one would think that this is something that must be removed, as the comment is made by an editor in good standing - (this is in the spirit of WP:BANREVERT- the editor reposting the content takes responsibility for it).

BTW - MarkBernstein above seems to misunderstand my concerns. I'm not planning to challenge nor even discuss the edit ban at AE. What I want is that the talk page itself keeps track of the subjects being proposed in it, so that any reader accesing the page is aware of the concerns raised - even if some posts are being removed because the people posting them is not considered kosher. A discussion at a different forum or an external complied list of links would do nothing to achieve that in-place archival. Diego (talk) 18:11, 1 June 2015 (UTC)