Talk:Bot policy/Archives/2013

Inactive global bots should lose their global bot status

I would like to propose that global bots who are inactive (or nearly inactive) for some time (for example: for six months) lose their global bot status (with the possibility to re-apply for global bot status, of course).

Just one example: User:EivindBot is a global bot (proof) but was last active in 2008 (proof). The more (inactive) global bots around, the higher is the possibility that one day the password of a global bot is cracked, with the possibility of vandalism, linkspam etc. that will probably not be noticed immediately – thus, I think it would be safer to remove the global bot flag from inactive accounts (or nearly inactive accounts that just have a handful of edits). --UV 20:27, 21 October 2010 (UTC)

• good idea Seb az86556 12:12, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
• Yes, please. -- Quentinv57 13:28, 23 October 2010 (UTC)
• Makes sense to me. In fact, policy for global bot access requires that the bot be active. --dferg ^{☎ talk} 14:11, 23 October 2010 (UTC)

Dferg, thank you for discovering that the current bot policy already allows removing the bot flag from inactive global bots: When a bot is not (any more) "active on several wikis", it does not meet the requirements for the global bot flag (any more) and thus the global bot flag can be removed.

Is there any hope for a (toolserver) query that tells us the number of edits (and their distribution over individual wikis, in order to be able to spot global bots who are only active on a small number of wikis) of the global bots over the last six or twelve months? Whom could we possibly contact about implementing/running such a query? --UV 20:29, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

Comment : this tool could be useful before implementing a query specific to global bots. -- Quentinv57 07:02, 26 October 2010 (UTC)

Thank you, I have now made 23 requests for removal of global bot status at Steward requests/Bot status. --UV 23:58, 30 January 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for working out that list. It is nice to see how many bot owners have been reminded to return their bots to activity - every one helping improve the projects. –SJ · talk | translate 13:23, 6 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree that it is helpful that more bot activity takes place, and I am happy that some bot owners have expressed their intention to resume interwiki bot activity. Still, the current system of interlanguage links is suboptimal (which was already recognized in 2005), so I would in fact prefer a system that eliminates the need for interwiki bots altogether (although I am not able to specify the details of how an optimal solution to the problem could look like). And another limiting factor to the usefulness of some interwiki bots: Interwiki bots that cover many languages are far more efficient than interwiki bots that just cover a relatively small number of languages. --UV 19:42, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

Some removals complete of what look like clear-cut cases. I'm waiting at least a week for any fallout before moving-on to less clear cases. --Daniel Mayer (mav) 19:22, 13 February 2011 (UTC)

More done. --Daniel Mayer (mav) 13:58, 19 February 2011 (UTC)

All done for now – of the 23 bots that I listed for removal of global bot status, 6 resumed activity or will probably resume activity, and 17 bot flags were removed. --UV 20:55, 4 March 2011 (UTC)

For the record: In October 2011, again 13 global bot flags were removed due to inactivity, see log. --UV (talk) 22:14, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

I have now made 16 more requests for removal of global bot status at Steward requests/Bot status. --UV (talk) 22:14, 1 January 2013 (UTC)

These requests were not done for now, see User talk:Millosh#inactive global bots. --UV (talk) 22:13, 9 January 2013 (UTC)

Minimum edit rate to count as bot

Would a program which updates an on-wiki list between once and 4 times per day need a bot flag (on Meta)? πr² (t • c) 20:32, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Hello. I guess it depends on the nature of this edit. But it shouldn't be a problem if it's left unflagged... -- Quentinv57 ^(talk) 15:04, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Chat about Bot Policy and Global Bots on various WP/WM projects

Hello. My name is Randall Livingstone, and I am a faculty member at Endicott College (Massachusetts, US). Over the last two years, I have been conducting research on bots and bot operators on WP/WM projects for my dissertation (which was published under CC last year...check it out here if you'd like). Some of you may already know me from that project...for others, hello!

I am continuing to learn about the bot community for a current project and am looking to chat with anyone involved with bots and bot policy on non-English WP versions or non-en.wikipedia projects (well, really anyone who wants to talk about bots...I'm looking for all perspectives). Specifically, I am looking to understand how bot policies and bot approvals vary between projects, and how Meta Bot Policy and the global bot flag is recognized/not recognized by different projects.

I am bound by my English-only language skills, however. I you are interested/willing to participate in English, we could set up an online chat, videochat, phone call, email conversation, or start an on-wiki conversation...whatever works for you. Although this is continuing research, I am ideally looking to chat with contributors sometime in the next few weeks. Please let me know via my en.wp Talk page or email me here if interested, and thank you in advance.

This research has been approved by the Institutional Review Boards at both the University of Oregon and Endicott College. (Feel free to request a copy of those protocols).

UOJComm (talk) 19:49, 19 February 2013 (UTC)

Policy on bot-generated content

On the Swedish Wikipedia, we are currently generating literally millions of articles based on data collected from freely available sources, Wikidata and others, such as databases of flowers, animals, books, etc. A few users have raised concerns regarding this practice, and it would be nice to get input from other languages and other projects. The quality of the articles is not the main concern here, the question is whether this is in line with the Wikipedia idea in general. 85.225.142.97 09:07, 7 November 2013 (UTC)