Forum:Establishing Requests for IRC op/chatmod rights

Hey,

I know this has been thrown around on IRC before and I am fully aware I've voiced numerous concerns about this idea but seeing as a lot of the time there are no ops in the channel that are active (I may look like I'm there 24/7 but I use a bouncer, not to mention I haven't been that active lately due to...other stuff...), I figured now would be the best time to formally put this forward and we may as well do it for chatmod while we're at it.

The title of this thread states my proposal of establishing two separate pages to request IRC chanop at chat moderator rights. I'd like to note from the offset that I was hesitant to bring this up based on my concerns from the past but I'm willing to give this a go based on the following grounds:
 * The vetting process is done just like an RfA - with a community vote on whether the candidate should get the flags or not. I remember the initial ideas being that it should be done more like how rollback is given out - my main issue with this is that IRC op flags are an integral part of what an administrator can do on IRC as well as the possibility of candidates easily being given the rights solely on personal ties without anyone else really getting a say; an RfA-style vote is the best way to go about this. I'm not saying that the causes of my concerns will come to light but I'm definitely not ruling it out either.
 * The IRC ops get a slightly watered down version of the flags in order to avoid undermining the purpose of administrators on IRC. I recommend giving them only +Aor (note that admins have +AOiortv) which will allow them to use /cs quiet and to use the required op commands while not allowing the users to receive autovoice/op or to set channel topics, so that we can designate who's an admin and who isn't as well as the fact that the topic can easily be changed abusively and therefore should be left to admins. Chatmods are unable to promote new chatmods (something that admins can do), so no issues there.
 * Some sort of control over how many new ops/chatmods we'll get. There's no need for everybody to have these rights and apparently newer users often dislike seeing 99% of the channel with operator status.

I do still have numerous concerns over how this will all go down in the long-term and while I am open to discussing any possible compromises to what I said above, I feel that what I've listed is vital towards this whole thing gaining any support from me at all. My concerns are more to do with IRC than anything as Chat is much easier to manage and I am therefore more open to the idea with Chat.

Note that this thread isn't about who should get any rights at all, this is discussing the idea. If we do decide to go down this road then we'll decide once the nominations/requests pages are set up.

So what does everyone think? 22:29, January 14, 2013 (UTC)

Discussion
I'm in support of this idea, but I have two points/ideas to add. Firstly, could both requests be handled on one page, instead of two? Second and more importantly, would we establish in the guidelines for nomination/request, some sort of rule regarding whether or not an Op/Mod needs to be an active user on TSW? Some of the people in the IRC Channel and Chat may not be major contributors but might frequent those places, so I'd like to see it opened up to people even if they aren't frequent TSW users. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 23:00, January 14, 2013 (UTC)
 * It can potentially be done on one page with say two different sections (one for Chat, other for IRC). Two pages seems easier but I'm open to what everyone else thinks. As far as guidelines/minimum requirements for eligibility are concerned...I'm not sure. I do remember a long time ago someone suggesting that we could give chat moderator status to rollbacks though only a few of the chat regulars are rollbacks and two of them, by my knowledge, are already chatmods. At this stage, all I can say as far as that subject goes is that we base it on how active one is in Chat/IRC (no point giving it to a lurker who never talks), how long they've been about and would they really benefit from the rights. That's all I have, aside from the obvious stuff, such as behaviour and whatnot (as there it's detrimental giving the rights to someone who is constantly getting banned, being told not to do something by a current op etc.). 23:10, January 14, 2013 (UTC)
 * What you're saying is pretty much in-line with what I was thinking for this. I've got nothing else to add. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 23:14, January 14, 2013 (UTC)

I fully support this type of plan, but I'd have to say that the difference between +Aor and +AOiortv is so minimal that possible operators should just receive the regular rights the administrative ops are given. Ѧüя◎ґ (talk)
 * Initially, autovoice (or autoop as it gradually moved towards) was used to distingush between administrators and non-administrators; I'd rather it stayed that way. I'm very iffy with topics because it can easily be abused and it's only really used for wiki announcements and administrative maintanence, so I'd rather that stayed with administrators. Non-admin ops can still do everything they need to with +Aor without undermining the role of administrators and they don't need to voice users, set topics or have an automated status flag. 08:17, January 15, 2013 (UTC)

Minor comment - Just a heads-up, if we do decide to go ahead with this then we lose the ability to  should we need to send important stuff to all administrators at once (such as twitter logins/passwords, vandalism data etc.). I'm not sure how much of an impact losing that would be but I felt that it's worth noting. 22:36, January 15, 2013 (UTC)
 * Not sure how useful that was?  Something like half of the admins don't use the IRC channel as far as I can tell. Ben (talk) 05:22, January 17, 2013 (UTC)
 * 10 users out of all 15 administrators losing this is nonetheless a notable loss. 12:40, January 17, 2013 (UTC)

About Topics (for anyone unaware), and other considerations: Topic Lock is enabled in the channel, so anyone without the +t flag is unable to update the topic (ChanServ will revert the topic back to what it was before).

However, Lab is incorrect about a few things he mentioned. +o does grant the ability to voice anyone, but it's +f that grants the ability to have ChanServ auto-voice someone. Anyone with an @ prefix can simply type /mode +v SomeNickHere or /mode #channel +v SomeNickHere (depending on your IRC client) to grant temporary voice to someone. The only thing ChanServ flag +v allows someone to do is to use /cs voice #channel SomeNick. Ergo, if you grant +o, you may as well grant +v (or not). I had to point this out because I'm one of (I believe?) three or four individuals with extensive IRC experience (please note that I could very well be wrong about this). I believe this leads well into my next points.

The minute someone is granted Op, they are in my mind a member of the channel staff. As the #wikia-sims channel is run to support TSW, by extension they become a member of the TSW staff. Generally speaking, this means being granted powers that, if granted to the wrong person, can be abused. Therefore, anyone granted these powers must simply agree to certain things, such as not voicing users. This is technically a proposal to create another staff position (albeit one that would not be a prerequisite to any other position such as Admin).

There is one more thing I'd like to point out. On most IRC networks, if someone with the @ prefix before their nick asks you to stop doing something, then generally you know that you must stop it. If they do not possess that prefix, there may incorrectly believe they are free to continue with the bad behavior. Therefore, I recommend the following flags: +AOiorv  You will notice that I left +t out of it, which in combination with the Topic Lock, means such individuals may not change the topic. I did include the +i flag because all that allows someone to do is use ChanServ to invite themselves to the channel in the event the channel has channel mode +i (usually unneeded, but just in case, they can still let themselves in).

That and if ChanServ goes down, which it has and does from time to time, remember that anyone who doesn't have an @ at the time is powerless, creating the opless channel problem.

However, I do understand the concern of too many @'s, so perhaps there may be a way to balance this. Then again, I'm making my recommendation based on the assumption that only a small number of people will be granted this, if this entire thing moves forward.

One more thing. Note that many of us use the ZNC IRC bouncer software, which has the ability to log all activity in the channel, whether you are connected to the bouncer or not. Therefore, there is accountability if it comes to that.

I hope everyone finds my two cents to be useful.

Ben (talk) 05:20, January 17, 2013 (UTC)
 * Regarding the idea that IRC channel staff = Wiki staff... I don't think that's necessarily true. We can have people who administrate TSW who never go onto the IRC, never register a nick there, and never exercise op powers there, just as I believe we can have ops on the IRC channel that aren't administrators on the wiki, or that don't even edit the wiki. I agree that the IRC channel exists as a supplement to the wiki, but I don't believe that automatically makes the staff of one part of the staff on the other. I think the IRC ops could fill a sort of 'moderator' volunteer role, rather than existing strictly as a member of the staff. If we go with the moderator idea, then it only makes sense that their flags and abilities would be limited. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 05:48, January 17, 2013 (UTC)
 * I've always thought that there is no such thing as too many ops, assuming they are all competent and know what they are doing. I think its a good idea as a lot of the time the admins are afk or not watching the channel and could always use an extra pair of eyes. As for flags I'm thinking +AiorvV, which would differentiate the channel ops from the admins, and hopefully people won't get them mixed up with admins. As for how to do it... I don't see the need for a requests page, they can just ask an op, or preferably an op could ask them. Maybe something like an invite-only kinda deal where the current IRC admins pick people they think could use the rights on a case by case basis?
 * With all due respect Ben, I know you're not the most experienced person out there when it comes to wikis however what LiR said about IRC ops =! Wiki staff more or less applies to any website that does anything like this, so your argument is, in some places, flawed. I also don't believe that +i is required (as we never need to make the channel invite-only anyway), nor is +v (voice is only needed if the channel is +m and that's rare anyway). I also don't see the need to give the new ops a +O or a +V flag as it's really unneccesary as well as the possibility of causing confusion of some sorts. I also don't see the need of a non-admin to have a @ status next to their nick 24/7 - if they're told to stop doing by something by anybody then they'd act if they had common sense. We've also had issues in the past where users have thought that they deserved voice for unknown reasons (more likely for bragging rights) and those who don't pay much attention to the wiki will probably think it's a sign of favouritism and I don't want to go down that path again. tl;dr? Use the +Aor flags on the new ops as I proposed.


 * As for how we do this, WH's idea could work however I still feel that promoting a user to an op/chatmod requires wider community consensus and therefore a requests page is the only real way of going about it. 12:40, January 17, 2013 (UTC)

To try and center us back on the whole discussion.... I'm assuming, based on the commentary here, that the Wiki Chat Moderator rights discussion is acceptable to most, correct? If everyone is fine with Chat Mods being selected, let me know and I can set that page up - we can set up a page or modify that page for IRC Ops if we ultimately decide to follow through with them.

As for the IRC Ops matter... I agree with Georgie's proposed flags, except I'd like to also have them receive +v; while moderated chat is rare, it has happened before. Additionally, I think this and other flags could be given to these ops with the clear expectation (on the request page) that they be only used when necessary and not abused. As for the requests page itself... I think it should be a formal rather than an informal process, but I don't necessarily think each candidate needs to be subjected to the same scrutiny as if they were applying for an administrator position. --  LostInRiverview talk ~ blog 17:34, January 17, 2013 (UTC)
 * I do still feel that it should be a community vote similar to an RfA just to make it easier for one to give their input although how to make things friendlier...I don't know but as a visual aid to try and help us get somewhere, I'll draft up an RfIRCOp (for the lack of a better term) page I've created User:Lost Labyrinth/RfIRCOp draft as a draft.


 * As an attempt to reach a compromise on the flags, +Aovri sounds reasonable enough and the non-admin ops shouldn't need any more than that.


 * Finally, as it's fairly easy to manage and nobody seems to be against it, I'm cool with starting the RfCM (Requests for Chat Moderator) page whenever. 18:27, January 17, 2013 (UTC)

Moving ahead
Okay seeing as nobody has voiced any opposition whatsoever to either the IRC chanop or chatmod ideas, I've gone ahead and created The Sims Wiki:Requests for IRC Channel operator and The Sims Wiki:Requests for Chat moderator. I'm not going to archive this off just yet in case there are some other things we want to cover. I shall note that as nobody has opposed my compromise proposal for the flags, any new ops shall get +Aoriv.

I'd like to note that I've removed the "Users can nominate other users" part from these pages as these rights aren't as major as ones such as admin or bureaucrat, though if there is consensus to allow users to nominate others then that can be added back in. Both these pages are based on our RfA system for the sake of formality. If anyone has any questions or comments then please add them to this section. 17:10, January 19, 2013 (UTC)

Conclusion
Closed - We're done here, per above. 13:23, February 3, 2013 (UTC)