用戶:GUT412454/User:Antandrus對維基百科行為的觀察

對維基百科上行為的一些觀察，穿插了關於如何處理的建議。

1. 當有人大聲抱怨審查制度時，您可以確定他們沒有做好事。
2. 許多離開項目的人要麼責怪項目，要麼責怪項目的人離開，而沒有意識到一個人的熱情減退是正常的。它適用於我們曾經感到興奮的所有事情。這既不悲觀，也不悲慘：人們總是需要找到新的令人興奮的事情去做。生活中的一切都會改變和終結，這包括一個人對維基百科的參與。"He who kisses the joy as it flies / lives in eternity's sunrise."當你在這裏時享受它，在你離開後享受你所做的一切。
3. 麻煩的編者比破壞者浪費社區更多的時間。一個有時做出好的編輯，但無休止地爭吵，威脅，侮辱，抱怨，並最終被封禁的人，將花費其他用戶數百個小時的時間，而其他用戶本可以更好地利用這些時間來構建百科全書。這在一定程度上是由於人們對衝突的迷戀。高效地管理麻煩的編者是改進項目的最佳方法之一，但也是最困難的方法之一。
4. 那些對被發現錯誤而進行無休止的報復的人，應該儘快但儘可能溫和地從項目中移除。
5. 自2005年中後期以來，維基人，特別是新維基人，越來越關注設計漂亮的用戶頁、用戶空間小部件、花哨的簽名和其他類似的東西，而不是貢獻內容。這可能不是一個好趨勢，但不太可能改變。最好的內容貢獻者往往忽視這些事情，反之亦然。
6. 如果任何登錄用戶的第一次編輯是對用戶頁的故意破壞，或是對討論頁的惡意人身攻擊，則應立即永久封禁，不必多說。
7. 如果用戶的第一次和第二次編輯是創建他們的用戶頁和用戶討論頁，沒有內容，則其第三次編輯將是故意破壞、人身攻擊或其他形式的擾亂。當這些賬戶被封禁時，人們站出來為其辯護，這既不是同謀也不是惡意，而只是缺乏經驗。
8. 使用匿名IP或創建傀儡來破壞用戶頁或留下惡意的人身攻擊是一種特別卑鄙的懦弱形式。如果你和某人有問題，公開解決。
9. 單一主題的編者很少（如果有的話）對NPOV感興趣或有能力做到它。此外，如果您仔細觀察，您經常會發現利益衝突。
10. 觀點越極端、越不百科全書，吸引傀儡支持的可能性就越大。
11. 如果一個編輯真的是從中立的角度來寫作的，那麼從這個人的編輯中就不可能看出他們的觀點是什麼。這在政治文章中最為明顯，但適用於任何地方。
12. 維基百科是一部百科全書。維基人的主要工作是編寫它。其他一切都是次要的。
13. 由於維基人的主要工作是編寫百科全書，因此任何主要活動是干擾編寫的用戶都應該儘可能無痛地從項目中刪除。最好的辦法是說服他們在其他地方會更快樂，並祝他們一切順利；最壞的辦法是毆打他們並使他們生氣：但無論如何，都必須這樣做。
14. 列舉出所有類型的虛榮心是不可能的。(弗朗索瓦·德·拉羅什富科, No. 506)
15. 維基百科最大的敵人是那些虛榮心受到傷害的人。他們可能是中等知名度的人，他們試圖編輯一篇關於自己的文章，但未能控制它；或者他們可能是努力寫一篇關於他們關心的主題的文章，但被社區刪除的人；或者他們可能是試圖推動被社區拒絕的POV的人。通常他們會援引更高的道德原則來支持他們反對這個項目的運動，例如審查制度，言論自由，針對他們的陰謀或其他什麼，因為他們的虛榮心使他們無法認識到虛榮心本身就是他們不滿的根源。
16. 一些擾亂者和POV推動者最好在時間延遲的情況下進行戰鬥。讓他們進行編輯；然後在一兩個小時後，甚至第二天進行修改。擾亂者很容易感到無聊，如果你稍等片刻，他們就更有可能離開。（公然的破壞行為當然需要立即恢復。）這一策略對於風暴陣線或自由共和國類型的人特別有用，或者對於任何推動 POV 並專門尋找戰鬥的團體來說都是有用的。
17. 存在一個陰謀集團。這是一個核心編輯團體，他們相信百科全書必須保護自己免受混蛋和寫垃圾的人的侵害。
18. 一旦有人在他們的用戶頁上寫下咆哮來攻擊社區或社區的任何部分，他們的維基悲劇的第五幕就開始了。這將不可避免地以他們離開或被驅逐出項目而告終。
19. 管理員佈告板、RFC、RFArb、偶爾還有RFA，就像高速公路上壯觀的車禍展覽，當每個人都把頭扭過來看的時候，兩個方向的交通都會減慢。每當有新的失事事件發生時，對百科全書的貢獻就會減少。
20. 整個項目中衝突增加的一個不太引人注意的原因是，幾乎所有關於重要主題的文章都寫完了。沒有那麼多「激動人心」的工作要做，比如從頭開始創作一篇關於重要主題的文章，而衝突是最常見的替代興奮點。項目的早期階段已經結束，就像在戀愛關係中一樣，真正艱苦的工作是在最初的興奮消退之後。
21. There are no fools more troublesome than those with wit.
22. 那些在維基生涯早期就宣佈要做管理員的人，可能不會成為管理員。管理員的身份最好是作為一個成熟的維基人承擔的責任，而不是作為一個新手渴望的獎盃。最好的管理員是那些被委任的人，而不是那些急切地等待着三個月的門檻或某個編輯數的人。管理員的身份不是一個獎盃，要小心那些想把它像一個閃亮的徽章一樣別在身上的人。
23. 人類作為一個整體表現出來的所有美德和惡習都可以在維基百科上找到。任何因為不能忍受社區的惡習、分裂和政治而逃離社區的人，將不得不在生活中的其他地方再次面對同樣的惡習、分裂和政治。
24. 對傳統百科全書主題文章的匿名編輯，尤其是在上課時間，比對流行文化主題的編輯更有可能是故意破壞。
25. Vandalism in the form of trolling and nasty personal attacks spikes on Friday and Saturday nights, local time. Look at the bright side: at least they're not driving drunk.
26. If a vandal insults you, it is a reliable indicator that you are doing something right.
27. One of the commonest kinds of vandalism is an assertion that something, someone, or somewhere is "gay". This is a reflection of the common, indeed unavoidable, sexual insecurity of male adolescents, who make up most of Wikipedia's vandals. It's as universal a part of maturing as acne; revert and ignore.
28. Any new article with exactly the same name as its creator can almost always be immediately deleted as CSD A7. "Userfying" – moving these pages to the new user's user page – is a slightly more compassionate approach, but it doesn't work as often as it should.
29. Good people leave the project all the time. Fortunately, good people join the project all the time as well. Bad people also come and go. The project survives in spite of all these arrivals and departures.
30. Many of our best contributors began with a few shabby edits. Be kind to newbies, even though it is a test of patience to see the same mistake hundreds of times over several years. Patience is one of the most underrated of the virtues, and in our present attention-deficit-disorder age it is one of the most rare.
31. People who loudly accuse the community of some vice are almost invariably guilty of, but blind to, some variant of that vice themselves.
32. If you've been blocked, consider first the possibility you did something wrong. Instead of complaining about abuse of power, censorship, or whatever, just behave in such a way that you don't get blocked. There are thousands of editors who have contributed enormously to Wikipedia without ever getting blocked. It's not that hard.
33. When someone's first edit is reverted, and they are sufficiently angered by this that they leave several paragraphs of invective on the reverter's talk page, it is highly unlikely that that person is suited to become a Wikipedia editor. Hard as it is, we need to leave our egos at the door, or as much of those egos as it is possible to unload. Not only can anyone edit, but anyone does edit, and reversions of good-faith edits are all part of a day's action here.
34. Whenever a group of people, particularly if they are administrators, gets together and agrees on something, there will inevitably be one or a handful of vocal detractors who oppose because they see something sinister in any group which is in agreement – especially if they perceive that group as having power over them. See WP:CABAL.
35. It's good to let your ego be punctured once in a while. Most of us, after several years and tens of thousands of edits, start to put a lot of our egos into our work here, more than we originally either intended or anticipated. While it's natural for this to happen, the unintended consequences include feelings of ownership over one's contributions and a quickness to react in poor faith, and even with arrogance. Someone reverted your edits with a sarcastic edit summary? Let it go. Someone called you a bad name somewhere? Don't retaliate. Let it go. While it hurts at first to let these things go, being able to do so is the true test of strength and maturity. You only gain in the long run. Retaliating not only brings you discredit, but it increases your anger, and corresponding risk of over-reaction, as the number of related provocations rises.
36. When you are angry, it is extraordinarily difficult to differentiate between a good-faith edit and the other kind. Postpone that decision until you are no longer angry. The consequences of reverting a good-faith edit with a vandalism-reversion tool or "rvv" edit summary are unpredictable, and unlikely to win you friends or trust. As a general rule, do not edit when you are angry. Wait until the feeling has passed, and you are yourself again.
37. When someone screams about "admin abuse", it's most likely true – they're probably abusing admins again. If there's a block involved, expect to see a battalion of sockpuppets in short order, making even more shrill cries of admin wrongdoing.
38. Try to be as tolerant as you possibly can regarding edits by established contributors. Should you need to revert one, leave as polite an explanation as possible, with room for compromise: and if they're simply wrong, don't rub their nose in it. The loss of long-established contributors due to avoidable conflict is one of the greatest threats the project faces. People who have been here a year or more, and made thousands of contributions to the project, are its greatest asset, and this cannot be overstated.
39. While it feels bad to be attacked by one of the persistent, nasty, obsessive trolls, it is helpful to remember that some of these people are profoundly miserable. They are really suffering; life is hell for them: often they are neither in control of their impulses, nor completely sane. A little compassion can help, although one's initial impulse is to strike back. Don't. It's a sign of strength not to retaliate, and a peaceful response may actually do some good.
40. "Retired" editors sometimes leave the project forever, especially if they have left out of weariness, or because it is no longer new, fun, and rewarding for them. If, however, they have left in anger, they may not leave permanently: expect to see them return for "revenge" against those they perceive to have done them wrong: and the actions they perform on their return are among the most vile in the project, and the least productive towards its ends. You can find this kind of behavior in greatest abundance at RFA, RFB, RFC, RFArb, and the noticeboards. Sometimes these disgruntled editors return as sockpuppets, but the braver come back under their own names: but as in all vendettas, they do more harm to themselves than their victims, for they only cover themselves in debasement and slime. No human behavior is more despicable than inflicting suffering just to feel good about it, but unfortunately this is a common motivation indeed.
41. As in the dry season arsonists start fires, so when there is a contentious event on Wikipedia, certain editors will attempt to escalate conflicts, and so enjoy their destructive course. You may recognize the same names appearing again and again in such circumstances. As I have said above, it has become harder to work on articles in the last few years, and it is much easier, and much more pleasurable, for some people to feel the rush and the pride in one's witty put-down of an opponent, than to write or cite or cleanup or reference an article that no one will immediately read. Conflict is as addictive as cocaine, and unfortunately Wikipedia's civility policies only limit incivility among those who respect them in the first place, and who have the personal strength not to need to retaliate. Anonymity is to cowardice what Viagra is to impotence.
42. A high proportion of Wikipedians have issues with authority. That's why many people are attracted to Wikipedia in the first place. Keep this in mind if you become an administrator, for you may have just become, unwittingly, what these people most resent; and no matter how good a job you do, they'll find your one mistake and beat you up with it. It's best just to accept this demographic for the reality it is. They are often our most capable content contributors, and as long as Wikipedia remains open to all, this situation will remain.
43. A related point is that Wikipedia is often accused of having a "liberal bias". The only bias it has arises from the self-selection of its members: people are here because they are the ones who want to contribute to an open-content project. You're going to get a lot of "libertarian left" here by the project's very nature.
44. When you are attacked by a troll, remember that their choice of insult says more about them than about you, and it's an opportunity for compassion. They just told you what hurts them, and obliquely what probably has, in the past. Harper Lee put it well in en:To Kill a Mockingbird: "...it's never an insult to be called what somebody thinks is a bad name. It just shows you how poor that person is, it doesn't hurt you..." My only quibble is this: while it might indeed hurt, it does no harm.
45. "Envy is more implacable than hatred." An often overlooked motivation for persistent harassment is that the troll wants something you have: recognition, passion, education, skill, knowledge – something. It's usually disguised by some claim of wrongdoing on your part, but the disguise often contains subtle hints that the troll wants acknowledgement as an equal. The more persistent the trolling, the higher the level of insecurity that the troll is unwittingly showing.
46. A useful two-question test, to apply to dodgy accounts that seem to be stirring up trouble: 1) Is this person helping to build the encyclopedia? 2) If not, is this person actively interfering with those of us who are? If the answers are "no" and "yes", respectively, block immediately and move on.
47. "And slime had they for mortar." Every place on earth has nationalists; they are the dupes of demagogues, the tools of conquerors, and a great pestilence upon Wikipedia. Write a thousand good words on an important but neglected figure, and a nationalist will show up to argue over the spelling of his name; his birthplace, ancestry, ethnicity, or category; all in a tone of moral outrage. Look at the "bright" side: they keep our friends in the war industry employed. When some day earth is hidden in its final radioactive dust-shroud, their ghosts will declare: it's not so bad, they got what they deserved. Let the sane among you ignore them, and be good citizens of all of mankind, rather than just an angry splinter of it.
48. People who put lists of editors they don't like on their user pages won't be around for long. See #18, as this is closely related.
49. The highest compliment a troll can pay to you is to create an attack page about you elsewhere on the internet. It's as close to an admission of surrender as you will get, in addition to showing that you are doing something very right indeed. As in on-wiki trolling, the insults they choose tell you more about them than about you. Consider such pages to be monuments to your good work, but otherwise ignore them.
50. Wikipedia is no more a place for people with control issues than mining is a career for claustrophobes. That such people are as common here as they are is a poignant reminder of the all-too-human tendency of the chronically disaffected to seek out environments that make them angry and miserable.
51. Beware lest you begin to enjoy too much the blocking of vandals, the crushing of trolls, and the banning of troublemakers; spend too much time ridding the project of monsters, you risk taking on the characteristics of those you drive off. Too much troll-fighting can be destructive for one's attention span, sensitivity, and taste. It should be no surprise that the most experienced at troll-fighting often have the shortest tempers. The best way to counter this tendency is to do other things regularly, such as having a life outside Wikipedia.
52. Trolls, banned editors, and mental defectives will try to annoy you, if you are an active contributor. Do good work anyway. Avenge yourself on your enemies by not becoming like them.
53. As sarcasm is the protest of the weak, so attack sites are the whining of the incompetent, who failed to succeed at editing Wikipedia. They are unimportant. Continue creating useful and beautiful things, and spread good will in the world; if others are consumed by hate and vindictiveness, you may feel compassion for them, and be grateful you are not so afflicted.
54. Nothing is harder to put up with than the annoyance of good example. If you want to be liked, screw up once in a while, and apologize.
55. We all think it's a good idea to stand up to bullies. Not only is it harder to do than you sometimes think, other than under the influence of testosterone or your anger-enhancer of choice, but in doing so you risk becoming a bully yourself. I quote from the Dalai Lama: "...when encountering injustice, take a strong stand – but with no ill intent."
56. As Freud observed, we are most courageous when we feel most loved. Conversely, the lonely are often the most craven, and their anger is the most vindictive. Wikipedia is filled with the lonely.
57. "The cut worm forgives the plow." Trolls and banned editors may harass you repeatedly, attempting to provoke a reaction. Let it go; they'll get over it. The plow already has.
58. Beware of users so in love with their own virtue, that they are incapable of recognizing when it has become vice; and so in love with their own eloquence, that they cannot see when it has become hypocrisy. The former are those who never admit to any wrong, but yet demand apologies from others for the lapses of judgement to which all human beings are prone; and the latter are the blindest and most intractable of POV-pushers. Skill with words correlates neither with virtue nor wisdom.
59. When an editor ceases to contribute to articles, but instead writes only in the Wikipedia space, on talk pages, and arbitration cases, and when more than half of that editor's contributions are in conflicts, either beginning or prolonging them, then that editor is very close to departure. As with stars on the en:main sequence, some departures are shrinkings into dwarf states, with ever-diminishing contributions, giving little light, and with a long decay; and other departures are violent supernova explosions, spewing waste matter and hot gas in all directions.
60. It is easier to get a sincere "thank you" for reverting "you're a faggot" from someone's userpage, than it is for writing a researched, thorough, and referenced encyclopedia article on an encyclopedic topic. The best way to continue as a writing Wikipedian for many years is to be, as the Buddha recommends, "indifferent to both praise and blame." Indifference to praise is a hard task for mere humans, but millions of potential anonymous readers demand it of you, for if you require praise you will burn out with one of the fates indicated in No. 59. And remember this: you are allowed to take your work seriously here, and think highly of your own efforts; but be advised, don't talk about it.
61. When Wikipedians spend too much time on the noticeboards, in Arbcom cases, and on talk pages of contentious articles, they have a high probability of concluding that Wikipedia is dysfunctional, incompetent, and doomed to fail. Once a Wikipedian has reached this realization, expect that person's user page to boast an essay announcing the imminent failure of the project. The best cure for this condition is to leave those places, and instead read a few articles on genuinely encyclopedic topics, noticing just how good they actually are. Similarly, if you were to look at a table at a subatomic level, you would see that it consists mainly of empty space, with innumerable minuscule particles whizzing about angrily, each having an arbitrary and undefinable position; indeed, if you look at them too closely, they will change just to spite you: but back away, the whole becomes visibly a table again. We're a pretty good encyclopedia, and you will notice it once you back away from the conflict zones.
62. There will be world peace, and the lion will lie down with the lamb, before banned users realize that they have only themselves to blame for being banned. All campaigns referencing "corrupt admins" and "cabals" arise from this same inexhaustible source of folly: I can't possibly be wrong – all of them must be.
63. That bad editors seem to be as large and troublesome a group as they are is a form of en:selection bias, and the more time you spend on noticeboards, the worse it seems. It's rather like the bad drivers you encounter on the roadways: when you reach your destination, you may remember the two or three bad drivers you encountered, but not the hundreds of good ones who escaped your attention by doing everything right. Thus there may be 99 good editors for every bad one, but you'd never notice, for their names do not appear in drama threads, and their angry messages never contaminate your talk page.
64. Playing the victim makes you smaller. This is something that returning banned users, on making their shrill accusations of cabals and conspiracies and personal vendettas, do not realize: it does not make them rise in importance – it shrinks them, diminishes them, makes them even more insignificant and ridiculous on each iteration. It's reminiscent of Richard Matheson's Incredible Shrinking Man, that great existential film into which so much can be read. Instead of helping build the largest encyclopedia in the history of the human race, those trolls finish their Wiki lives battling imagined spiders, with toothpicks.
65. The only one-hundred-percent certain way to get rid of a troll is to close the browser tab. Takes a mouse click. Hard to do though, isn't it?
66. Any edit that improves the encyclopedia is a good edit. Before clicking "save page", always run this through your final mental checker: does what I just did in that edit box improve the encyclopedia?
67. People still write new articles for the encyclopedia, but with all the sound and fury at the noticeboards, you have to go out of your way to notice. Even more important, you have to care.
68. It's easier to burn down a dilapidated building than to fix it. The bigger the ego, the more pyromaniacal the impulse.
69. When you realize that editing an article on a current world conflict stresses you out more than the actual conflict does, it is time to take a break. Having your edits bombed to oblivion with an rvv is not as bad as losing your entire family to a paramilitary raid, and sometimes it is important to think about it.
70. It is impossible to love again anything you have truly ceased to love. Editors who return after retirement, or after a wearied or bitter departure, may edit again, but never with the same passion they once brought to the project. Each successive return will be with diminished dedication and shorter duration.
71. The very existence of Wikipedia is a massive proof that there are more people in the world wanting to build than to tear down. Were that not true, vandals would have overwhelmed and destroyed us years ago.
72. "Truth" is a big word. Editors who make abrupt claims about either having, knowing, or insisting on "truth", and editors who include the word in their usernames, are probably doing something that does not belong in an encyclopedia; and the more stridently they argue, the more suspicious you are right to be.
73. A common insult hurled at dedicated Wikipedia editors is that they "have no life". If you write extensively in an out-of-the-way area, you may well become the most widely read writer in the world on your topic. There are worse ways of "having no life", such as abusing the few actually useful people on the internet, but those who deliver such insults are invariably tone-deaf to irony.
74. The more one hates, the less one cares about what is true. This is as true in politics as with obsessed sockpuppeteers, and it's the secret sauce in conspiracy theories: look carefully at any, and you’ll find hatred at its core.
75. We have a noticeboard for everything imaginable, except competence.
76. If you become good at troll-fighting, and identifying banned users: if you come to specialize in just a few of them, or even just one: you may discover that your presence alone serves to attract them, and the best thing for the project is to step back and let someone else take over. You don't need to be Ahab, and it's not a White Whale anyway; it's a horsefly. "It is not your fate to be a fly-swat."
77. Beware that moment when you think yourself wise, for you may have just become a fool.

I'm as prone to vanity as anyone, if not more so, and posting these observations is not an attempt to imply that I am above these behaviors myself.

See also

• en:Wikipedia:Things that should not be surprising