Requests for Comment/Endorsement of Meta conventions

Initiator comment: The purpose of this Request for Comment aimed at Meta is to codify certain principles and conventions that have been applied here. The reason why this codification is necessary is because of the disputes that have taken place at different times and in different places about whether these rules are indeed 'convention' or not. To some (including myself) these rules seem logical and as some would say a no-brainer but clearly the necessity for this Request for Comment arises because some others do not think that these rules are obvious or logical and contest their very existence. In addition to these rules I wish to invite all users that are part of the Meta community to add any proposals for existing conventions (or not) that they think should become official codified Meta policies for clarity reasons. I would ask anyone who has any questions to either reply here or to contact me via my talk page. Please do also not hesitate to edit or change the wording proposed above if you think you are able to make it more clear and comprehensible. --DeeM28 (talk) 17:27, 4 May 2022 (UTC)

Proposal 1: Notices and warnings on talk pages

 * A user who is warned or otherwise told that they did something wrong by an administrator or Steward may not remove the thread from their own talk page. The thread may be archived (but not removed); however, archiving (using one of the prescribed methods) should generally not be done sooner than approximately 2-4 weeks following the conclusion of the sanction/restriction (in the case of time-limited restrictions, sanctions, or blocks of 6-12 months or less) or 2-4 weeks following the imposition of a sanction/restriction (in the case of long duration restrictions, sanctions, or blocks of 6-12 months or more, or indefinite blocks). After a significant period of time (i.e., at least 12 months since the conclusion of a warning, restriction, sanction, or block with zero recidivism), a user may, in their discretion, either (a) remove a thread, without archiving it (if it's not been archived), or (b) request an administrator remove it (if it's been archived), typically by reaching out to any administrator on the adminisrator's user talk page, opening a thread at Administrators' noticeboard, or adding admin help to a new thread on their own user talk page

Proposal 2.1: Editing other users' messages

 * Threads and replies created by other users should generally not be edited by non-administrators or other advanced permission holders (such as experienced patrollers and Stewards), without their prior consent, notwithstanding to make technical corrections (i.e., to fix or update transclusions, retarget wikilinks, fix lint errors, or to make other corrections of a technical nature in the discretion of, principally, Meta administrators), to add unsigned signatures, or to make minor formatting, stylistic, or grammatical corrections. If in doubt as to whether one should another user's message or thread (in other words, in so-called "edge case" situations), one should, ideally, ask the subject user or ask a Meta administrator, usually by opening a new thread at Administrators' noticeboard or adding admin help to a new thread on their own user talk page. This only affects the alteration of messages and does not affect the right to remove, revert or undo posts as currently exists; however, users should be mindful when reverting threads from other users, particularly when using semi-automated tools such as Twinkle to ensure they were not merely reverting a good-faith question when a response is more appropriate.

Proposal 3: Editing other users' user pages

 * Other users' userpages should not generally be edited by non-administrators without their prior consent, notwithstanding the usual exceptions that include, correcting misleading statements (i.e. an assertion that one has rights that they do not in fact possess), to remove content that violates the Code of Conduct or other global policies or Meta Wiki local policies, is otherwise generally considered to be offensive or inappropriate for a user page, is either blatant vandalism or patent nonsense/gibberish, is narrowly construed as blatant spam (note that promotional user pages which act as a user's curriculum vitae are not "spam" for this purpose; spam is unambiguous self-promotion of a commercial product or service, often involving SEO techniques), to make minor technical corrections (i.e., to fix or update a page or template transclusion following a page move or deletion, to retarget wikilinks (usually related to the format), to fix lint errors, or to otherwise correct a broken redirect or double redirect), or to otherwise make minor, non-substantive corrections. As with above, if in doubt as to whether one should another user's message or thread (in other words, in so-called "edge case" situations), one should, ideally, ask the subject user or ask a Meta administrator, usually by opening a new thread at Administrators' noticeboard or adding admin help to a new thread on their own user talk page.

Proposal 4: Edit warring

 * Edit warring is not permitted on Meta (including on one's own talkpage). The 3 revert rule as described on Wikipedia is not applicable on Meta, and the level of sanction for edit warring is to be determined by a Meta administrator depending on the circumstances.

[I don't think it's necessary to directly reference 3RR since it isn't a hard rule and just states that it 'often attract blocks of at least 24 hours', so it's not a hard rule or anything --Reception123]

[I'm okay with the reference to the 3 revert rule, but would suggest rephrasing this. I wouldn't say it's not specifically "not applicable on Meta," but rather may be used by some administrators for the purpose of assessing whether edit warring has occurred or the severity. --Dmehus]