@@ -309,23 +309,23 @@ The discussions surrounding this issue and its progress can be viewed in the fol
Hence, exploring historical patterns in detail remains one of the directions for future studies.
\subsection{Filter Usage/Activity}
%TODO decide how this fits into the overall narrative; write some kind of a fazit from this observations; also, decided whether this is the best representation or shouldn't they form a list rather
Following general patterns (syn!) of filter usage were observed:
Following general filter operation practices were observed:
There are filters that have been switched on for a while, then deactivated and never activated again.
Some of them had only been active very briefly before they were switched off and deleted.
There are a couple of different reasons for that:
The filter in question was only testing a pattern which was eventually merged in another filter (e.g.: ). 440 was merged in 345 (or was it a duplicate?)
The edit filter managers decided not to implement the filter, because edit filters were deemed an inappropriate tool to deal with the problem at hand (e.g. ...)308), 199 ('Unflagged Bots');
** switched off, bc filter was deemed inappropriate to deal with the issue at hand: 484 "Shutdown of ClueBot by non-admin user" (From the comments: " Just sysop-protect the page if you don't want non-admins messing with it. --Reaper 2012-09-06")
or decides to not implement the thing (that way); 290 (disabled, since relevant pages were protected);
or, because there were hardly any hits, so there wasn't really a problem at all ( 304, 67, 122, 401 ("Red hair" vandalism)). %result of editors implementing a filter "just to see if it catches anything"?
There are also cases in which filter managers implement a filter targeting the same phenomenon in parallel and without knowing of each other.
These duplicate cases (syn!) are also merged eventually, or alternatively all but one of them are switched off: 891 and 893
The edit filter managers decided not to implement the filter, because edit filters were deemed an inappropriate tool to deal with the issue at hand (e.g. filter 308 ``Malformed Mediation Cabal Requests'', 199 ``Unflagged Bots'', or 484 ``Shutdown of ClueBot by non-admin user'');
or decided to not implement the thing (that way): 290 ``172 Filter'' (catching edits about a Canadian politician coming from a certain IP range) was disabled, since relevant pages were protected;
or, because there were hardly any hits, so there wasn't really a problem at all (e.g. filter 304 ``Rayman vandalism'', 122 ``Changing Username malformed requests'', or 401 ``"Red hair" vandalism'').
This last group is possibly a result of edit filter managers implementing a filter ``just to see if it catches anything''.
It also occurs that filter managers implement a filter targeting the same phenomenon in parallel and without knowing of each other.
These duplicate cases are merged eventually, or alternatively all but one of them are switched off: filter 893 was switched off in favour of 891.
Sometimes, vandalism trends are only temporary and after a period of activity, the filters become stale.
This is also a reason for filters to be eventually powered off in order to save conditions from the condition limit.
Examples thereof are:302 (switched off on the grounds of insufficient activity),81 (bad charts)
211 ("Disable, appears to be inactive (log only filter). If you are using this filter, please let me know, and I'll reenable it -Prodego"); 20 ("A waste of processor time, deleted -Prodego"); 663?
There are also filters that were switched off because they weren't doing what they were supposed to and only generated a big amount of false positives: (false positives is a plausible option here): 394, 14 (disabled in couple of hours)
Examples thereof are: 81 ``Badcharts'', 20 ``Saying "The abuse filter will block this"'', 663 ``Techno genre warrior''.
There are also filters that were switched off because they weren't doing what they were supposed to and only generated a big amount of false positives: filter 14 ``Test to detect new pages by new users''.
And there are filters testing a pattern which was eventually merged in another filter (e.g. filter 440 ``intextual.com markup'' was merged in filter 345 ``Extraneous formatting from browser extension'').
\begin{comment}
%TODO This is a duplicate of a paragraph in 4.5.1. Does it fit better here?
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@@ -338,7 +338,7 @@ Then, there are filters switched on for a while, deactivated for a while and act
Sometimes because a pattern of vandalism is re-occuring, and sometimes–in order to fix technical issues with the filters: 61, 98 (was deactivated briefly since an editor found the "warn" action unfounded; re-enabled to tag), 148 ("20160213 - disabled - possible technical issue - see edit filter noticeboard - xaosflux")
Another group constitute enabled filters that have never been switched off since their introduction.
11 (verify), 79 (with brief periods of being disabled for couple of minutes/hours, probably in order to update the pattern), 164, 642 (if we ignore the 2min period it was disabled on 13.4.2018), 733 (2.11.2015-present), 29 (18.3.2009-present), 30 (18.3.2009-present), 33 (18.3.2009-present), 39 (18.3.2009-present), 50 (18.3.2009-present), 59 (19.3.2009-present), 80 (22.3.2009-present)
164, 642 (if we ignore the 2min period it was disabled on 13.4.2018), 733 (2.11.2015-present), 29 (18.3.2009-present), 30 (18.3.2009-present), 33 (18.3.2009-present), 39 (18.3.2009-present), 50 (18.3.2009-present), 59 (19.3.2009-present), 80 (22.3.2009-present)
There are also some filters that have always been enabled with the exception of brief periods of time when the filter was deactivated (and the activated again), probably in order to update the conditions: 79, 135 (there were couple of others in Shirik's list, go back and look);
There seems to be a tendency that all actions but logging (which cannot be switched off) are took out, when edit filter managers are updating the regex of the filter.
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@@ -363,11 +363,13 @@ Sometimes, when a wave of particularly persistent vandalism arises, a filter is
\subsection{Filter makers}
Here, a few characteristics of the edit filter managers group are discussed.
As mentioned in section~\ref{}, EN Wikipedia has 154 edit filter managers as of (date).
The group is as discussed (syn!) quite small.
(However, for comparison there are only 4 users in the edit filter managers group on the Catalan Wikipedia and the role does not exist at all on the German, Spanish and Russian ones which leads to the assumption that for these languages all administrators have the \emph{abusefilter\_modify} permission.) %TODO check!
As mentioned in section~\ref{section:who-can-edit}, EN Wikipedia has 154 edit filter managers as of May 10, 2019.
As pointed out, the group is quite small.
(However, for comparison there are only 4 users in the edit filter managers group on the Catalan Wikipedia
and the role does not exist at all on the German, Spanish and Russian ones where all administrators have the \emph{abusefilter\_modify} permission~\cite{Wikipedia:EditFilterDE}, \cite{Wikipedia:EditFilterES}, \cite{Wikipedia:EditFilterRU}.)
% TODO comment: so there is even bigger power concentration on Catalan Wikipedia, whereas in the other language versions it is effectively more users who have an access to the mechanism
The edit filter managers group is quite stable, with only 4 users who have become an edit filter manager since November 2016 (according to the discusssion archives of the edit filter noticeboard where the permission is requested)~\cite{}.
The edit filter managers group is quite stable, with only 4 users who have become an edit filter manager since November 2016 (according to the archives of the edit filter noticeboard where the permission is requested)~\cite{Wikipedia:EditFilterNoticeboard}.
Since the edit filter helper group has been created in September 2017, only 11 users have been granted the corresponding permissions and only one of them has been subsequently ``promoted'' to become an edit filter manager.
(Interestingly, currently (July 2019) there are 19 people in the edit filter helpers group, so apparently some of them have received the right although no records are there on the noticeboard??)
