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subsection</span> </button> <ul id="toc-How_do_you_fix_this?-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> <li id="toc-Leadership_with_authority" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Leadership_with_authority"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">2.1</span> <span>Leadership with authority</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Leadership_with_authority-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Consensus_system_change:_just_vote" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Consensus_system_change:_just_vote"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">2.2</span> <span>Consensus system change: just vote</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Consensus_system_change:_just_vote-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Perhaps_a_purge_is_looming;_perhaps_anarchy_is_looming" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Perhaps_a_purge_is_looming;_perhaps_anarchy_is_looming"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">2.3</span> <span>Perhaps a purge is looming; perhaps anarchy is looming</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Perhaps_a_purge_is_looming;_perhaps_anarchy_is_looming-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-Ultimately,_it's_not_about_control" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-2"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#Ultimately,_it's_not_about_control"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">2.4</span> <span>Ultimately, it's not about control</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-Ultimately,_it's_not_about_control-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> </ul> </li> <li id="toc-See_also" class="vector-toc-list-item vector-toc-level-1 vector-toc-list-item-expanded"> <a class="vector-toc-link" href="#See_also"> <div class="vector-toc-text"> <span class="vector-toc-numb">3</span> <span>See also</span> </div> </a> <ul id="toc-See_also-sublist" class="vector-toc-list"> </ul> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </nav> </div> </div> <div class="mw-content-container"> <main id="content" class="mw-body"> <header class="mw-body-header vector-page-titlebar"> <nav aria-label="Contents" class="vector-toc-landmark"> <div id="vector-page-titlebar-toc" class="vector-dropdown vector-page-titlebar-toc vector-button-flush-left" > <input type="checkbox" id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-vector-page-titlebar-toc" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox " aria-label="Toggle the table of contents" > <label id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-label" for="vector-page-titlebar-toc-checkbox" class="vector-dropdown-label cdx-button cdx-button--fake-button cdx-button--fake-button--enabled cdx-button--weight-quiet cdx-button--icon-only " aria-hidden="true" ><span class="vector-icon mw-ui-icon-listBullet mw-ui-icon-wikimedia-listBullet"></span> <span class="vector-dropdown-label-text">Toggle the table of contents</span> </label> <div class="vector-dropdown-content"> <div id="vector-page-titlebar-toc-unpinned-container" class="vector-unpinned-container"> </div> </div> </div> </nav> <h1 id="firstHeading" class="firstHeading mw-first-heading"><span class="mw-page-title-namespace">User</span><span class="mw-page-title-separator">:</span><span class="mw-page-title-main">GoneAwayNowAndRetired/Wikipedia is broken and failing</span></h1> <div id="p-lang-btn" class="vector-dropdown mw-portlet mw-portlet-lang" > <input type="checkbox" id="p-lang-btn-checkbox" role="button" aria-haspopup="true" data-event-name="ui.dropdown-p-lang-btn" class="vector-dropdown-checkbox mw-interlanguage-selector" aria-label="This article exist only in this language. 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<div id="contentSub"><div id="mw-content-subtitle"><div class="subpages">< <bdi dir="ltr"><a href="/wiki/User:GoneAwayNowAndRetired" class="mw-redirect" title="User:GoneAwayNowAndRetired">User:GoneAwayNowAndRetired</a></bdi></div><span class="mw-redirectedfrom">(Redirected from <a href="/w/index.php?title=User:Rootology&redirect=no" class="mw-redirect" title="User:Rootology">User:Rootology</a>)</span></div></div> <div id="mw-content-text" class="mw-body-content"><div class="mw-content-ltr mw-parser-output" lang="en" dir="ltr"><style data-mw-deduplicate="TemplateStyles:r1252059228">.mw-parser-output .module-shortcutboxplain{float:right;margin:0 0 0 1em;border:1px solid var(--border-color-base,#a2a9b1);background-color:var(--background-color-base,#fff);padding:0.3em 0.6em 0.2em 0.6em;text-align:center;font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .module-shortcutboxleft{float:left;margin:0 1em 0 0}.mw-parser-output .module-shortcutlist{display:inline-block;border-bottom:1px solid var(--border-color-base,#a2a9b1);margin-bottom:0.2em}.mw-parser-output .module-shortcutboxplain ul{font-weight:bold}.mw-parser-output .module-shortcutanchordiv{position:relative;top:-3em}.mw-parser-output li .module-shortcutanchordiv{float:right}.mw-parser-output .mbox-imageright .module-shortcutboxplain{padding:0.4em 1em 0.4em 1em;line-height:1.3;margin:0}</style><div class="module-shortcutanchordiv"><span id="WP:WPBROKEN"></span></div><div class="module-shortcutboxplain noprint" role="note"><div class="module-shortcutlist"><a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Shortcut" title="Wikipedia:Shortcut">Shortcut</a></div><style data-mw-deduplicate="TemplateStyles:r1126788409">.mw-parser-output .plainlist ol,.mw-parser-output .plainlist ul{line-height:inherit;list-style:none;margin:0;padding:0}.mw-parser-output .plainlist ol li,.mw-parser-output .plainlist ul li{margin-bottom:0}</style><div class="plainlist"><ul><li><span class="plainlinks"><a class="external text" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:WPBROKEN&redirect=no">WP:WPBROKEN</a></span></li></ul></div></div> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9c/Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg/220px-Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="154" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9c/Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg/330px-Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9c/Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg/440px-Titanic_wreck_bow.jpg 2x" data-file-width="1480" data-file-height="1036" /></a><figcaption>If Wikipedia were a ship, it would look like this.</figcaption></figure> <dl><dt>Wikipedia governance is functionally broken and <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_is_failing" title="Wikipedia:Wikipedia is failing">is failing</a>.</dt></dl> <p>How is Wikipedia failing at this? </p><p>The content is still getting created. Articles are still being written, but overall the number of active editors has been flat, and growing flatter as a trend, <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Why" title="Wikipedia:VisualEditor/Why">as seen here</a> and <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Editing_frequency" title="Wikipedia:Editing frequency">here</a>. However, there are a growing number of problems. </p> <meta property="mw:PageProp/toc" /> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="What_is_broken?"><span id="What_is_broken.3F"></span>What is broken?</h2></div> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Crowd_in_street.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7c/Crowd_in_street.jpg/220px-Crowd_in_street.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="308" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7c/Crowd_in_street.jpg/330px-Crowd_in_street.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/7/7c/Crowd_in_street.jpg/440px-Crowd_in_street.jpg 2x" data-file-width="460" data-file-height="645" /></a><figcaption>How Wikipedia pretends it functions: random milling about, and blocking the workflow of traffic.</figcaption></figure> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="No_leadership_with_authority">No leadership with authority</h3></div> <p>Wikipedia, by its model and design, is toothless and leaderless. <a href="/wiki/Jimmy_Wales" title="Jimmy Wales">Jimbo Wales</a>, Wikipedia’s co-founder, is not our leader on this English Wikipedia encyclopedia. He is a former figurehead, and has an honorary seat on the Wikimedia Board of Trustees, but has no actual authority on this project more than any other Administrator of a thousand do. His role largely is advisory, as a talking head to promote the idea of a Wiki-type project (including his for-profit Wikia.com corporation), and to solicit funding with our annual fund-raising program. Anyone who tells you otherwise, himself included, is simply incorrect. He has his power by the gratis of the community—the editors of Wikipedia—and nothing more. He is not the legal owner of anything in Wikipedia and has not been in some time; he has an extremely limited ‘box’ of authority, which is ill-defined, but can do nothing major. Perhaps years ago, he could, but not today. </p><p>The next closest thing we have to leadership is the <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Arbitration_Committee" title="Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee">Arbitration Committee</a>, as the only major elected body on this website. However, many users are adamant that this group live in a very small, very narrowly defined realm of reactive judging of ‘disputes’ between users, of a behavioral variety. Is one or more users misbehaving? Then it falls under the purview of the Arbitration Committee. Anything else? No – and many users are adamant about this. </p><p>Wikipedia pretends it is an <a href="/wiki/Ochlocracy" class="mw-redirect" title="Ochlocracy">ochlocracy</a>, or mob rule, but it is not. It's a slothful riot of selfish one-man mobs, or occasionally small cabals of like-minded sloths. Each moves their own way, and has the ability to completely block the flow of traffic, due to the fact that no one is in a position of rightful authority to tell them when to cross the proverbial street. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Consensus_is_a_joke">Consensus is a joke</h3></div> <p>The ideal of a ‘consensus’ of users determining a course of action on this website was previously the nominal way in which we decided things. It used to work—until the scope and scale of the site grew wildly with the number of its users, and when many users realized that by simply digging in their heels intractably, that they could take control of this deeply flawed system to gain whatever they wanted for political, social, personal, or other reasons. The other major problem with ‘consensus’ is that many, many users adamantly refuse in many cases to set a bar of what ‘is’ consensus. </p><p>A typical conversation may go like this: </p> <div style="margin-left: 1.6em;" class="poem"> <p>User 1: “How many people need to agree for us to have consensus?”<br /> User 2: “As many as it takes.”<br /> User 1: “How many is that?”<br /> User 2: “As many as it takes.” </p> </div> <p>This is a model of ineffectual anarchy. It feeds people’s egos that all opinions and positions are of equal value, when they simply are not, and never will be. All users who are willing to commit to a fixed username to build a legitimate history and contribute do have an equal standing to sound off and be heard fairly, with uniform application of policy and rules to each and every one of them—anything less is simply wrong—but the ideas which lie behind consensus of giving each user a “piece” of the solution is simply, fundamentally, and unequivocally stupid. People lose in the real world, and lose all the time. Someone is right, and someone is wrong. The current usage of a consensus system is a waste of time since it conveys to many the idea that any solution that doesn’t consider the needs of all users isn’t that great. </p><p>Bullshit, I say. People are wrong, at times, and should be told they are wrong, and if they dislike the so-called “consensus”, too bad. Move along, you lost. The problem, however, is that they can dig their heels in, and derail anything and everything. This is fueled by further nonsense like our mantras of </p> <ol><li>Ignore All Rules (all the rules on Wikipedia are fake, didn’t you know?)</li> <li>Voting Is Evil (CONSENSUS AND DISCUSSION are our Gods, regardless of their being deaf, dumb, and blind Gods)</li> <li>Consensus Can Change (in other words, even if you lost once, you can go back to the Well of Argumentation again… and again… and again… and again…)</li></ol> <p>The neat cumulative end result of all of this is that, if someone puts their mind to it, they can filibuster anything and everything they dislike forever and a day. This leaves Wikipedia, in any area of positive forward growth and governance, an ineffectual wasteland. Do these ideas I listed in points 1-3 work perfectly for the matters of creating content on the website? I think so. Do they work for anything else? Only a blind man could truly believe so. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Cumulative_effects">Cumulative effects</h3></div> <p>As mentioned, this is having an increasingly nasty overall effect on Wikipedia. Positive forward changes get all but impossible to happen. Even the creation of a simple Advisory Council, with literally no powers nor authority, is <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/Advisory_Council_on_Project_Development" title="Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Advisory Council on Project Development">met with massive scorn</a>, and is attempted to be torn down before it even begins work. The mood and disposition of the website’s users has grown increasingly nasty over the years—it was a much more gracious and welcoming place, when I began using it in 2005—and today, it’s a constant war over the smallest details. Our mistreatment of <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:BLP" class="mw-redirect" title="Wikipedia:BLP">WP:BLP</a> subjects, articles about living people, gets us constant negative press coverage. Morale of our users is at an all-time low. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="How_do_you_fix_this?"><span id="How_do_you_fix_this.3F"></span>How do you fix this?</h2></div> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/20/Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg/220px-Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg" decoding="async" width="220" height="147" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/20/Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg/330px-Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/20/Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg/440px-Bastille_2007-05-06_anti_Sarkozy_487633669_93d13b826b_o.jpg 2x" data-file-width="510" data-file-height="340" /></a><figcaption>Wikipedia leadership today: none, and random people throwing rocks for their own gain and to prevent the formation of leadership.</figcaption></figure> <figure class="mw-default-size" typeof="mw:File/Thumb"><a href="/wiki/File:Capitol-Senate.JPG" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/89/Capitol-Senate.JPG/220px-Capitol-Senate.JPG" decoding="async" width="220" height="158" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/89/Capitol-Senate.JPG/330px-Capitol-Senate.JPG 1.5x, //upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/8/89/Capitol-Senate.JPG/440px-Capitol-Senate.JPG 2x" data-file-width="2592" data-file-height="1860" /></a><figcaption>What we need more of; a touch of ?order.</figcaption></figure> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Leadership_with_authority">Leadership with authority</h3></div> <p>You need a binding leadership that is not self-appointed, like Jimmy Wales. You need a group or two raised up from the community of users that has what some might call “Binding Authority” to close the endless loop of noise that is the community itself. Any successful organization or corporation—any—has ultimate leadership that can close the door on any and all discussions. Our website, in its shortsightedness, is setup to not have any such thing. We don’t need ineffectual non-leadership. We need a solid leadership that can close doors to move forward. </p><p>I’d proposed something of the sort at <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Committees" title="Wikipedia:Wikipedia Committees">Wikipedia Committees</a>, to have final arbitration “groups” that is wholly elected and promoted 100% by the user base of this website, which could act as final decision makers not just on behavioral issues, like the present Arbitration Committee, but also on matters of content and policy/’legal’ disputes, as a triumvirate. Each would be mutually exclusive from each other’s realms, and with functionally equal power in their own way, and would allow for people to move past all the nonsense to concentrate on the only real reason we’re supposed to be here: to make an encyclopedia. The idea was likely so alien that people either ignored it, or shot it down. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Consensus_system_change:_just_vote">Consensus system change: just vote</h3></div> <p>As simple and as stupid as it sounds, once a situation gets intractable, this is the only real way forward. Once a debate or dispute reaches that point where everyone is just repeating the same talking points again, you need to put a communal foot down. How do you do this, however, when our flawed structure allows—and even encourages!—any fool to repeatedly go back to the well, again and again? Simple, binding votes. How simple? </p> <div style="margin-left: 1.6em;" class="poem"> <p>“How many people in favor of Bob’s view? How many in favor of John’s view?”<br /> “Bob, you’ve lost. We’re not revisiting this for so many months.” </p> </div> <p>Do you have any idea how much time and aggravation this would save? Of course, this will never happen, since it would immediately de-power a great many people that have “control” over various articles, article families, or aspects of the Wikipedia project. Which is, ultimately, the worst thing, is that there are sad people who can and do everything in their power to derail any effort to equalize aspects of the governance of this website. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Perhaps_a_purge_is_looming;_perhaps_anarchy_is_looming"><span id="Perhaps_a_purge_is_looming.3B_perhaps_anarchy_is_looming"></span>Perhaps a purge is looming; perhaps anarchy is looming</h3></div> <p>Perhaps, in the end, all the people presently ‘in power’, or misguidedly thinking that they are, will simply need to be removed if they remain or become an increased impediment to the success of Wikipedia. They can be, of course, to create a new model. </p><p>Perhaps what we need is the Wikipedia equivalent of a <a href="/wiki/Protestant_Reformation" class="mw-redirect" title="Protestant Reformation">Protestant Reformation</a>. Or, failing that, we can simply fire those who think they're in power today, and muscle through change that can put firm leadership in place. The alternative is to sit, and wait, for the site to spiral more out of control every year. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading3"><h3 id="Ultimately,_it's_not_about_control"><span id="Ultimately.2C_it.27s_not_about_control"></span>Ultimately, it's not about control</h3></div> <p>Its about the ability to simply close a door: </p> <figure class="mw-halign-center" typeof="mw:File"><a href="/wiki/File:Revolving_Door.jpg" class="mw-file-description"><img src="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/0a/Revolving_Door.jpg/350px-Revolving_Door.jpg" decoding="async" width="350" height="467" class="mw-file-element" srcset="//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0a/Revolving_Door.jpg 1.5x" data-file-width="480" data-file-height="640" /></a><figcaption></figcaption></figure> <p>Too much of this website is like this door; we need to empower groups in regards to both content and policy to some degree to close this door from swinging. If that is antithetical to how we <i>used</i> to do things, or how the founders of this website envisioned things, that's a shame. </p><p>They don't own Wikipedia, anymore. We do. </p> <div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="See_also">See also</h2></div> <ul><li><b><a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Committees" title="Wikipedia:Wikipedia Committees">Wikipedia Committees</a></b></li> <li><b><a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Governance_reform" title="Wikipedia:Governance reform">Governance reform</a></b></li> <li><b><a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Why_Wikipedia_is_not_so_great" title="Wikipedia:Why Wikipedia is not so great">Why Wikipedia is not so great</a></b></li></ul>    </div><noscript><img src="https://login.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:CentralAutoLogin/start?type=1x1" alt="" width="1" height="1" style="border: none; position: absolute;"></noscript> <div class="printfooter" data-nosnippet="">Retrieved from "<a dir="ltr" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:GoneAwayNowAndRetired/Wikipedia_is_broken_and_failing&oldid=1087430317">https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:GoneAwayNowAndRetired/Wikipedia_is_broken_and_failing&oldid=1087430317</a>"</div></div> <div id="catlinks" class="catlinks" data-mw="interface"><div id="mw-normal-catlinks" class="mw-normal-catlinks"><a href="/wiki/Help:Category" title="Help:Category">Category</a>: <ul><li><a href="/wiki/Category:User_essays" title="Category:User essays">User essays</a></li></ul></div></div> </div> </main> </div> <div class="mw-footer-container"> <footer id="footer" class="mw-footer" > <ul id="footer-info"> <li id="footer-info-lastmod"> This page was last edited on 12 May 2022, at 11:53<span class="anonymous-show"> (UTC)</span>.</li> <li id="footer-info-copyright">Text is available under the <a href="/wiki/Wikipedia:Text_of_the_Creative_Commons_Attribution-ShareAlike_4.0_International_License" title="Wikipedia:Text of the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License">Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License</a>; additional terms may apply. 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