Requests for comment/Global usurpation policy 2

The following request for comments is closed. Some progress has been made, with some intermediate conclusions, but the discussion has been at an effective standstill for quite a while now. Feel free to start a new proposal using this as origin for an up-to-date proposal. Effeietsanders (talk) 02:23, 13 April 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This RFC proposes to change the current rules about usurpation found in Global rename policy#Usurpation, to the proposed wording below. The first stage of this request for comment will be discussion on the proposed change, after which a period of voting to ratify the new policy will occur.

Usurpation requests

Under special circumstances, requests to usurp an existing username, i.e. to rename an unused account in order for an active user to use that username, can be made on SRUC and actioned by a steward or global renamer. To request a usurpation of a username, a user must a) be in good standing, b) have a valid reason for requesting usurpation of a different username, and c) be a well-established and reasonably active user. There are three categories of usurpation requests:

1) Usurpations of locked accounts with no meaningful contributions. In these cases, no notification of the original owner is required; a request can be made and completed immediately, because the target username cannot be used by the original owner. If the locked account has any content contributions which add worthwhile information to a project, then usurpation is not possible, regardless of when the edits were made.

For the following two cases, the original owner of the desired username must be contacted (either through email or on their apparent homewiki) and given no less than 1 month to respond, indicating whether or not they want to keep their username.

2) Usurpations of unlocked accounts with the consent of the original owner can occur, so long as the original owner understands that they do not need to give up their username if they do not want to.
3) Usurpations of unlocked accounts with no meaningful contributions, and without the consent of the original owner, can only happen if at least one month's notice has been given and the original owner has not responded. If the original owner responds that they desire to keep their username, then usurpation is not possible. If the account has been used within a recent period of time, usurpation is also not possible, even if the user does not reply within a month.

Local policies may make exceptions to this policy, in which case local project regulations apply where the requesting user and desired account name has edited on. These local policies may make usurpation more or less stringent, or remove the option entirely, and will apply to accounts with contributions on the single project with the additional criteria for usurpation. See below for a list of local usurpation guidelines.

Stage one: Discussion

Hello everyone. I think that this draft is ready for discussion now. Please note: This will not be the final version. I know quite a few people who think this is too restrictive, and quite a few more who think it is far too liberal. I've created a sub-heading below for just that discussion. Please comment, and if we can form some sort of consensus here then that would be ideal! Feel free to also modify the draft above, to correct any obvious errors or add in anything I missed. Thanks, Ajraddatz (talk) 20:59, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I don't even care about too restrictive or liberal anymore, I just want something passed and then I'll follow it. This language is fine. Keegan (talk) 21:09, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
You've summed up my thoughts on this, nearly verbatim, with your edit summary. Hopefully this'll be middle-of-the-road enough to get people on-board Ajraddatz (talk) 21:11, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Aside from my oppositions I stated below, I pretty much am fine with the policy.—cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 23:56, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I generally agree with this proposal. I may come back and comment further if I have any additional thoughts. ···日本穣^? · 投稿 · Talk to Nihonjoe 06:11, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for moving this forward. I stated my opposition in a section below, but would like some clarification on some aspects. Why is a global contribution count of 500, good standing, etc. proposed as a requirement for usurpation? We don't have account creation requirements either besides not having one's IP being blocked from account creation. Otherwise, point 1) seems to be fine as an (IMO unnecessary) compromise in case we insist on allowing usurpation. Point 2) I would oppose, it merely adds bureaucracy and confusion (e.g. a known user's account being taken over with consent or similar) without much gain, but I would accept this as a compromise. Point 3) I heavily disagree with as stated in my opposition below. --Vogone (talk) 12:11, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

The policy looks generally fine for me. Though, I would discuss the last sentence of point 3) (2-year rule) and I would clarify the meaning of the expression meaningful contributions; for this questions I start a new section below. Samat (talk) 09:02, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I think the overall policy is fine. I will read carefully to express a more specific opinion for some minor details.--Alexmar983 (talk) 10:50, 4 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Scope - too restrictive or too permissive?

I modified the original draft to include usurpation of accounts with no meaningful contributions, but without the owners consent. Arguments for: this allows usernames to be used by people who are actually active. Arguments against: could be used for read-only accounts. I honestly don't care either way, I just want a working global policy for this issue. But I know both sides have some advocates, so discuss away! Ajraddatz (talk) 20:59, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

In my mind if someone has a handful of meaningful contributions, but from a decade or half-decade ago, they are not going to mind having their username being taken by someone active. So I would prefer to leave it to steward/global renamer discretion rather than disallowing any usurpations of usernames with "any" meaningful contributions. –xeno 22:33, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- Unfortunately this is not reality, that people are not going to mind. People mind very much. I've seen more than one occasion, on the English Wikipedia for certain but also at least once on the Dutch Wikipedia, where an account came out of the woodwork to make their first (and often) only edit to protest a usurpation request. Having lived through SUL finalization on the receiving end, I can further assure you that people generally do care about their account name, but are willing to be renamed provided a good reason. Someone else wanting your name who is more valuable than you because they contribute is not a good reason for most people at all, since there is no requirement to contribute when you sign up for your account. Unsurprisingly, people respond badly to this kind of thing. Keegan (talk) 23:11, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm inclined to agree with Xeno. If they stopped editing for over a year, and are notified a month, maybe two because they've edited, and they fail to respond, the usurpation should be granted.— cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 23:57, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  - I absolutely agree that arbitrary terms like "not active for X time and notified for Y period" are acceptable, and this sort of usurpation is fine (It's how I got the username Keegan, after all :) ). My point is that we should never assume that what we do regarding usernames won't be a big deal to anyone, because usernames are about as personal as you can get and changing them does upset people. Doesn't mean we can't do it, but we should acknowledge this. Keegan (talk) 01:05, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    - Indeed, which is why we increase the waiting period based on the fact the user has edited meaningful before. I would also be okay with a waiting period proportional to the amount of edits the target user has. Say 1 month plus 1 week for every 250 edits. So if the target user has a thousand edits, they are given 2 months to respond. If they are active during the waiting period, no response should be considerer a decline, and if they are in active, no response will be actioned on.—cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 12:56, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
- I am pretty much opposed to such an approach, taking away other people's usernames in most cases has absolutely no benefits but rather makes people unhappy. I myself have been a read-only account before I finally made my first contribution and I imagine I would not have done so if suddenly my user account seemingly "disappeared" (I didn't know editing without account was possible, I didn't have any email set). That being said, I find the desire to usurp selfish, do not encourage it and would prefer if our site did not allow it (except maybe for locked vandal-only accounts or similar). Also, I imagine nobody would miss this "feature" after some time since on other sites this generally is not a possibility either. The benefit of usurpation (unifying accounts) has gone since SUL finalisation, it's time to end this. --Vogone (talk) 11:39, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
  - I agree with Vogone. I think that we should first decide should we allow to usurp accounts at all (except locked vandal-only accounts and such) as I already commented at Requests for comment/Usurpation policy/RFC (btw why we do have so many RfC's about the same thing?). --Stryn (talk) 16:28, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
    - If you want to discuss "should we usurp at all?", then you could make a section below for just that. However, it is clearly just a vocal minority that wants to prevent any usurpation, and it is that same minority IMO that is requiring so many RfCs, due to continued opposition to clearly established community practices and any attempts to move forward with proposals like these. Sorry if that sounds a bit harsh; I think I've said something similar to Vogone privately already, but while I respect your opinions and appreciate your input, at some point we need to move forward rather than stalling every proposal that comes up. Ajraddatz (talk) 16:59, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
      - I am sorry, but the issue I see is rather that no arguments are being presented why we should allow this. I will not support usurpation policies just for the sake of having one. Thanks for understanding, --Vogone (talk) 18:16, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        "Because we can" is an argument to do so. Heck, I think that's the argument for most human decisions. Whether or not you agree with the argument is one thing, but you can't pretend it doesn't exist in order to advance your desired outcome. Keegan (talk) 19:53, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        I indeed do not think this is a convincing argument (rather a trivial one which can be used for either position), but neither this trivial argument has been presented by anyone until now by you. I think it's a bit unfair to claim I "pretend" anything to "advance" anything. --Vogone (talk) 20:19, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        My sincere apologies if my choice of language at the end offended you, I was attempting to reflect Ajraddatz's position and did so poorly. Keegan (talk) 02:44, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        
        If for no other reason than to give us happier and more productive volunteers, usurpation of abandoned usernames is a net benefit. –xeno 21:36, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        In the same way it might make people happy, it makes other people sad. Besides, it's the "because [I] can [request]" mentality which makes people want an usurp in the first place. --Vogone (talk) 22:30, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        If someone no longer logs onto the project, they have no opportunity to be sad. I once had the urge to set up shop on Twitch and start broadcasting my gameplay. I found that someone had taken my name (my original name, not the one I use most often here), the name I've used since 2002, and they had abandoned using it on that platform. They even said so on their profile. There is no way to usurp names on Twitch. And since my name is not available, I don't contribute - all because of some long-departed name squatter. Attracting and retaining contributors is paramount to keeping life in the project. –xeno 23:46, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        And the policy being proposed here solves a situation similar to yours in what way? It is being proposed to allow usurps after 500 global contributions only, a new contributor usually starts with an edit count of 0. --Vogone (talk) 14:37, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        I'd prefer that be relaxed and left to discretion. –xeno 21:23, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
      - Also, I believe it is fairly acceptable to question "established community practices" and change them, if they don't turn out useful or became outdated. --Vogone (talk) 18:25, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        Why does meta have the right to overrule a local community's will? –xeno 21:36, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
        It does not, neither did I imply it. --Vogone (talk) 22:30, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
In my opinion, as I expressed in previous discussions already, a name that is taken is taken. Usurpations should not be allowed; locked spambots etc. with 0 edits can be an exception (no. 1 in the proposal) to prevent too many "good" names to be wasted, but to be honest I don't see such a danger. Allowing usurpations with the consent of the user (no. 2 in the proposal) is of course a different thing, it is not even necessary to call that "usurpation", rather abdication. - That said, the conditions proposed at no. 3 in the proposal are not too bad; I could live with that being made policy (although I do not support it ofc). --MF-W 15:00, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
There is one case which does not seem to be acceptable, namely, usurpation of an established and previously active user by a much less active user. In case of this policy it would be perfectly legal to let a user with 501 edits to usurp a user with 50,000 edits who was unactive for two years for some reason (retired, busy in real life or just simply died). I think that we need additional criteria that a) requesting user should have more edits than target username, b) target username should have less than X edits (with X around 10,000, as beyond that we will most likely have a mess with broken links on talk pages, mentions of this user in discussions on-wiki or off-wiki etc.) — NickK (talk) 15:31, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
P.S. I would add one more point: any usurpation of an active user should be followed by updating links on discussion pages to prevent further mess (i.e. links pointing to the wrong userpage). As someone who usurped an active account previously it is rather frustrating to have to do it manually, thus having an automated script for this would be appreciated — NickK (talk) 15:38, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. The way the proposal is current written, no usurpation of accounts with "meaningful contributions" would be possible. This means that the scenario you described could be avoided :). You make a good point with your second comment; that should certainly be added into the documentation for global renamers performing these actions. Ajraddatz (talk) 17:30, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, I misread Usurpations of unlocked accounts with no meaningful contributions, I thought it was about accounts with meaningful contributions. In this case I think that the scope is too restrictive as it should be definitely possible to usurp a name of a user with just a few edits years ago — NickK (talk)

Local policy exemptions

I'm opposed to local policy adding on to or superseding global policy. User accounts are global, renames are global, so in no way can a local policy be applicable to the rename process. It creates conflicts, and distorts the process. IMO, local policies can be superseded by global ones to an extent because global policies merge with the local policy for a local process. With renaming, it's just not possible, and I will continue to adamantly object to it.— cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 23:54, 24 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I completely agree with you on this point, and I've taken the liberty of making another section for this topic. IMO since account names are global, there should be one global standard. Ajraddatz (talk) 00:42, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Agree. Keegan (talk) 01:05, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Allowing local policy would create perverse incentives, where users of some languages claim privileges on the attribution of global usernames. All accounts are created equal ;-) whatever their language. Nemo 08:01, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Per above and my reply on the list, opposing local exceptions on this. —Marco Aurelio 11:51, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Not allowing local policy to override the global policy established here would be removing (usurping, if you will ;) the consensus of the local communities, and I don't think that's what the global regime was intended to do. If the account only exists on 'X' project, then the guidelines for usurpation established on that project should continue to apply. (In most cases, the local account is only global because it was forced to be so.) –xeno 12:16, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I see your point to an extent, but that can be easily gamed. Let's assume that existing practice is currently the global policy here on meta, that process can be easily gamed by creating an account on enwiki, make the required minimum edits there and then requesting usurpation on enwiki of the account they really wanted, but only exists on enwiki, and because the request is on enwiki, the waiting period is only 1 week, and usurpations of accounts that made edits are allowed as long as they are inactive. That alone conflicts with this assumed global policy. Local policy is built off of global policies for local process. A global policy is an agreed established way to do something on all wikis. But I just can't see a local policy supplementing a global policy documenting procedures for a global process, that affects all wikis simultaneously. A global rename from one local policy could create conflicts with others, and I just think it will be way too hard to sort out. However at the very least, "local" usurpations should not be restricted to the bureaucrats alone. We global renamers, especially if we reside on the local wiki are more than capable of assessing usurp requests on local wiki. :-) That's why we were subjected to 2 weeks of scrutiny. :p—cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 13:13, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Global policy can and does override local consensus; the proposed usurpation policy is not unique in this fact. This is why, for any such policy change, local communities need to be involved - while I have only spammed this on meta and the global renamers' list so far, I'll be sending out massmessages to the appropriate local venues at some point in the future as well. Ajraddatz (talk) 17:01, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I don't want this global policy to override dewiki, with their more restrictive approach, just as much as I don't want it to override enwiki with the more permissive. That someone once contributed one "meaningful edit" back in 2005 on enwiki should allow them to deprive an active volunteer of a name they desire strikes me as absurd, and I don't think that the enwiki community would stand for an overriding global policy to implement such a restriction by fiat. I could be wrong. We will see when this discussion is advertised. (I'm fine with extending the waiting period to a month, less fond of the 500 edits requirement, and if it's permitted by global policy, fine with global renamers helping process.) –xeno 21:43, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I know we've had this conversation before, but I want to make something very clear here: When it comes to global accounts, any actions should be governed by global policy. It's not a case of "overriding local consensus", first because local consensus has absolutely no impact on global actions (locks, hiding, oversight, etc), and second because we are all part of the wider Wikimedia movement. Projects are not islands, and global policies aren't made by members of some distinct "meta community" - they are approved by a global community from all of the projects. Right now, I don't want to involve everyone just yet, because there are clearly parts of the proposal that need to be nailed down before a final version is presented. But this policy will not be approved without the chance for broad input from the global community, and that consensus is what matters, not age-old practices formed by discussions among eleven people on a local project. All this to say: let's work on making a solution here, and if it is too unpalatable for individual projects then we can add the potential for local exceptions if absolutely needed. Ajraddatz (talk) 22:04, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
If a name only exists on enwiki, and the nominal global account only exists because it was forced into existence, I don't really see how any "global"' policy has any bearing on the matter. –xeno 23:51, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
There is still a global account associated with that name, and the action to rename it is taken from the CentralAuth extension out of Meta. I truly do not understand how you can think there is anything "local" happening with this new process. You talk about about making a nice environment for our users, yet here you want overlapping layers of bureaucracy for each project with a group of 11 users that can come together and decide on some local variant to the policy? Ajraddatz (talk) 17:27, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
The enwiki usurpation guidelines have been established for years. Not sure why you're getting held up on the number of users who started the ball rolling, but they're enshrined in almost a decade of practice now. If the enwiki community want to continue to usurp abandoned usernames according to those established procedures, even in the forced global regime, we should continue to be able to do so. The global rename process was supposed to replicate and allow the projects to continue to exercise control over usernames as they had for the history of the project. In any case, I don't want to get too hung up arguing back-and-forth on this point. Let's hammer out the fine details and see what others think. –xeno 22:05, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

For the record I would like to point out my statement about the global policy superseding local, doesn't mean I don't agree with enwiki practices. If it were up to me I would keep the one month waiting period, but allow usurpations of inactive accounts.—cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 23:40, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Local policy exemptions make no sense at all, as pointed out by Nemo. --MF-W 14:52, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
No, we should not have local exemptions. As usurpations are now global, we would rather take into account arguments of respective local communities when designing this policy — NickK (talk) 15:32, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is better if we have a global policy with consensus and a unified usage/interpretation of it. Therefore it is better if we don't have any local policy exemptions. Samat (talk) 09:26, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Should USURP be allowed?

We seem to be having some question as to whether usurpation should be allowed in the first place. So I'm creating this thread. Please answer yes or no followed with a comment if you choose. — The preceding unsigned comment was added by Cyberpower678 (talk)

Yes. Xeno couldn't have expressed it better above IMO.—cyberpower ^Chat_Hello! 23:47, 25 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. I don't think we should keep usernames forever for people who have never contributed or just made a few edits and abandoned their account many years ago. Defender (talk) 01:57, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, provided proper notification of the affected account. Keegan (talk) 02:48, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, per above, Jmvkrecords ⚜ (Intra talk) 05:28, 26 March 2016 (UTC).[reply]
Redundant thread, but I answer no as per my own comments above. --Vogone (talk) 14:19, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
This section should be removed. It is already discussed above. --MF-W 14:53, 26 March 2016 (UTC) Addendum: The question also is very unclear. What should "USURP" with nonsensical uppercase letters be? Does it comprise the proposed policy's case 1? Case 2 (which one can't even disallow)? Case 3? --MF-W 00:35, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it should under certain conditions — NickK (talk) 15:31, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. Ajraddatz (talk) 17:29, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, usurping abandoned usernames desired by other users will provide us happier and more productive volunteers. –xeno 22:08, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. We should prefer active users against inactive (or user who contributes over users who never or not really). It is better if we have usernames in usage like John than John1258. For the user who uses it and for others, too. Samat (talk) 09:30, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Sometimes possibly, but not always, even if the user is inactive, it's not a good reason to usurp. --Stryn (talk) 11:13, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, with a clear notification sent to the owner of the target account, for preventing later complaints. As said before, people do care about their usernames, so I think that usurps should be handled carefully and only in clearcut cases. Abandoned accounts with no edits or significant log entries are surely eligible to be usurped. RadiX ∞ 20:55, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

500 edit requirement

I don't even remember why I made this number up, and I have no objections to it being changed. I think that usurpation should generally be restricted to established users, but maybe 100 edits would be a better threshold? Or none at all? Ajraddatz (talk) 17:32, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

No. --MF-W 18:38, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Rather than setting an arbitrary edit count, we should grant usurpations to "reasonably well-established users" with discretion allowing for exceptions. –xeno 22:07, 26 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I like this idea. This gives the renamer enough discretionary range to make a judgement call, and potentially allow existing local project guidelines to continue to be enforced within the global regime. Ajraddatz (talk) 21:00, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I think we should let usurpation for users who has already remarkable contribution and clear activity (at least I used this criteria in the past). For the first term I think 500 edits can be a good number (even if I wouldn't use it very strictly). There is nothing in the policy about the the activity requirement. I am not sure if we need to define in the policy with numbers but I would mention it in the text. Samat (talk) 09:38, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

2-year rule

If somebody registered a username and do basically nothing after: how long should we wait until the usurpation process can start or take place? I feel 2 years a too long period here. If somebody register a name and use it for nothing for about half a year, it is quite rare that later will use it, and there is no reason to do not let the name for users who are active. What do you think: is the 2 years waiting period good or could be shorter? Samat (talk) 09:21, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I agree there is no real reason to leave/let such names to (more) active users, but do not understand the conclusion you draw based on this. --Vogone (talk) 10:28, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I missed a not from my sentence. Hopefully it is clearer now. Samat (talk) 11:14, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This is a tricky case, because there are many who think that usurps shouldn't be allowed at all (see the above section), and any sooner than two years leaves you within a reasonable range of return. That said, it's an arbitrary number, and I'd be OK with it being slightly reduced or changed to something more general to allow for discretion when handling a request (as with the 500 edits section above). Ajraddatz (talk) 21:04, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

What about a general statement like "long-time inactive"? ;) -- Samat (talk) 21:41, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I am fine with Samat's alternate proposal. It's neither too much arbitrary nor discretionary. RadiX ∞ 22:16, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Howe is "long-term inactive" not completely arbitrary to the discretion of the renamer? --MF-W 00:15, 28 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've changed it to "If the account has been used within a recent period of time". Does this sound good, or might it be too ambiguous? Ajraddatz (talk) 00:47, 4 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Too ambiguous in my opinion, everybody will just follow their own opinion based on this and we would be back to status quo (pre-policy). --Vogone (talk) 20:27, 3 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Meaningful contribution

I think it would be important to discuss the meaning of this expression. Even if we don't define exactly in the policy (and let it for the renamers discretion) would be valuable to collect thoughts about it (for similar usage). I think it is clear that we are talking about only non-deleted, valuable (non-vandalizm) edits. It is not clear if we are talking only about the main (article) namespace or not. My opinion is, if somebody edits only his/her user page or discussion page, or has a limited number edits on the project namespace etc., shouldn't be a reason to disallow usurpation. Similarly if somebody made only limited number of minor edits (some typo corrections, dots, whitespaces edits etc.) in articles still not a reason to refuse usurpation. What do you think: should we define this? How? Samat (talk) 09:21, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

My understanding has usually been that "meaningful contribution" by default excludes deleted edits as well as trolling or vandalism. If memory serves, any copyright-creating edit (addition of text, creation of page, etc.) is potentially an issue during a forced rename; there is a question pending to WMF Legal about this.Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 09:43, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

In my understanding adding/removing some dots, whitespaces, minor changes don't create copyright and these contributors won't be authors according to the laws. Samat (talk) 10:09, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

They would be, however, given that the usurpation also changes the name associated with the edits for consistency, I don't think there is a legal issue with usurpations. Either way, best to wait for WMF legal to make a ruling one way or the other on it. Ajraddatz (talk) 21:05, 27 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

There is zero issue, we're wasting people's time asking these things. Breaking attribution would be either misattributing it, or removing attribution all together, and we do neither. This is a silly question.

As for the meaningful contribution, the standard has been, as mentioned, anything that's not malicious as generally defined by policy. We don't decide what is meaningful (whitespace is important to some people) in any other way, it is not our place to judge merits of contributions. Keegan (talk) 17:11, 28 March 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Status?

Okay so, let's get this moving again. It seems there's consensus that usurpation should be allowed and that no local policy exemptions should be granted. Can we focus now on the other aspects? —Marco Aurelio 11:39, 12 September 2016 (UTC)[reply]

@MarcoAurelio: It's hard to get anything done at RfC when things like this are lost in a sea of complaints regarding sysop actions elsewhere and other niche topics. It might be worth just closing this, and implementing something based on whatever consensus can be derived here. – Ajraddatz (talk) 02:00, 16 January 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@MarcoAurelio, Ajraddatz, RadiX, Vogone, and Samat: Did anything ever come of this? For some time now, I've been keen to usurp the global login for User:Snow (now I wish I had just taken the en.wiki name from my original registration). I inquired at m:SRUC last year about usurping the global account, but was told that it was not feasible because, even though this user only made a small handful of edits, and none since 2006 (global contributions), they had logged in once in 2015. This, I was told, was reason enough that the renamers did not feel comfortable granting the request until this policy was fleshed out and implemented. I take it (from the comments here and my inability to find a usurp policy page anywhere on meta) that the process is still stalled and the consensus still unsolidified? Snow Rise (talk) 12:13, 23 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Snow Rise: Account usurpations do occur in practice, however in your case Special:CentralAuth/Snow will not be able to be usurped unless the target account consents as it has a 62 edit count which is a barrier for regular usurpation. I cannot tell when this user last logged in because I do not have access to the user touched data, because it is private. Regards, —MarcoAurelio (talk) 09:44, 24 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you much for the response, MarcoAurelio. I was hoping that the small number of minor contributions might qualify to meet the criteria of "no meaningful contributions", at least in light of the 11 year lapse. But I gather from your comments and the discussion above that there is no consensus as to the definition of that phrase as yet, and that some of those who do have strong feelings on the matter want to err on the side of caution and interpret the phrase in a very broad fashion (the reasoning for which is understandable, even though I do wish the policy was less restrictive in this regard). Unfortunately, consent seems unlikely in this case: I posted to the user's meta talkpage a while back about the matter and never heard back; I'm doubtful they have logged in since, given what is known about the account activity.

Anyway, thanks again for your time. :) If there's ever a shift in consensus on this issue that favours allowing usurpations of long-inactive accounts, perhaps you'll chance to remember me, and let me know! Snow Rise (talk) 11:02, 24 July 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@MarcoAurelio: I suggest to summarize the outcome, close this RfC as inactive, and if there are any recommendations you'd see come from this, open a new RfC with a specific time window. Effeietsanders (talk) 03:54, 29 January 2018 (UTC)[reply]