WoWWiki:Vandalism policy

WoWWiki:Policies
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See also: guidelines, administrators

This page is an official policy on WoWWiki. This policy has wide acceptance among editors and is considered a standard that all users should follow. Feel free to propose any changes to this policy, but please make sure that changes you make follow the official process and reflect consensus on the discussion page before you put them into practice. Any big changes need to be Adopted or Decreed to be enforced as policy. See WoWWiki:Policies for an overview of WoWWiki policies. See Category:Policies for a list of proposed and adopted policy articles. Shortcut: WW:VANDAL

WoWWiki definition of vandalism

This is the definition of vandalism for the purposes of this policy:

1. Removing valid content without explanation or an explanation that makes no sense.
2. Items listed in the Do not post policy.
3. Pretending to remove other vandalism content in order to prevent cleaning. This includes minor edits or minor removals while leaving a bulk of unwanted content ("spam"), but making a comment as if you removed the unwanted content.
4. Continuing a particular behavior or practice after being warned or 'asked not to' by moderators.
5. Any edit or change otherwise made in bad faith, is deceptive, or purposefully degrades the surrounding section, page, or wiki as a whole.

Cleaning vandalism

An act of vandalism can be removed or reverted with only a comment in the edit summary identifying the type of vandalism (usually spam, unexplained deletes, etc.). Disagreement with the edit should be posted in the related discussion page. Cleaners will be added to the honorary Cleaners category, unless they request to be removed.

BEFORE YOU START REVERTING VANDALISM: Please read "About reverting vandalism".

Record of vandals

Vandals should have their user name added to the known vandals list with a some note on the type or level of vandalism and optionally any cleaning information.

Blocking vandals

This section concerns content that is out-of-date. Reason: Block Time has not been updated for anons, but can be used as a guideline.

Warning templates
PageName is optional {{subst:uw-vandalism1|PageName}} ~~~~ (unintentional vandalism/test) {{subst:uw-vandalism2|PageName}} ~~~~ (suitable for nonsense) {{subst:uw-vandalism3|PageName}} ~~~~ (please stop) {{subst:uw-vandalism4|PageName}} ~~~~ (last warning) {{subst:uw-vandalism4im|PageName}} ~~~~ (only warning) {{subst:uw-block|Blocker's name|Block time}} ~~~~ (user blocked)

Blocking by an admin will occur after a certain number of acts of vandalism, the length of time will depend on the number of acts, and a note to that effect will be added to known vandals list:

• If the user is seen to be posting with non-malicious intent, they should get a warning from the admin before a block occurs.
• If the vandalizing user is obviously controlled by a bot, the block will be indefinite.

# of Acts Vandalism	Block Time
1 act	7 days (168 hours)
2 - 5 acts	1 - 3 months
6 - 10 acts	6 months
11 - 19 acts	1 year
20+ acts	∞ (permanent)

Note that the above list is a guide and the length will also depend on the style of the vandalism.

For reference you can look at the list of currently blocked users or the log of users who have been blocked.

Appealing a block

Appealing a block may be done in a few ways:

• On your talk page (if it is un-blocked)
• By e-mailing an administrator (or other direct method to contact the admin if it is available)
• On the IRC channel

See also

• WoWWiki:Vandalism
• WoWWiki:Known vandals
• WoWWiki:DNP policy