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Proposal Archive
The following proposal has been discussed and is now marked as resolved. The page has been protected and now serves as an archive. Do not edit this page.
Date Resolved: 21st June 2020
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Instructions
This is a page for creating and resolving concerns on the topic: "Removing article comments."
At the end of the page, there is a "Create New Concern" button, which you can use to voice your concerns or questions about the proposal. You can use the "Refresh This Discussion" button, which allows you to make sure that all changes have been saved.
After 7 days of discussion, the concerns stage will end. All points brought up during that phase will be taken into account and an administrator, assistant, or the proposal's creator can move the discussion to voting, modifying the original proposal with any changes discussed by the community.
You can also add your comments to existing concerns. On the other hand, if you have no concerns, then you just wait for the voting stage.
Have a happy discussion!
Proposal
Initially, this would just be a trial. If this proposal passes, there will be a one month 'trial period,' followed by a discussion to review them starting from Tuesday 28th July, where the community will be able to decide to restore the comments or keep the comments disabled.
If you have concerns about this, then please do leave a concern below. --The gamer 987654321
Concerns
Resolved concern: Existing comments
Preview • Modify • Comment< what happens to already existing article comments? -ChipFan111 >
All comments will remain visible at the bottom of the pages for articles that already have comments (although obviously you won't be able to reply to them or add any more). --The gamer 987654321 14:31, June 14, 2020 (UTC)
The gamer 987654321, that is NOT true. If you disable the article comments feature, they will disappear and no longer be visible at the bottom of pages. They're not deleted; they'll just be hard to find again. ~ SlyCooperFan1 [message · contributions] 14:49, June 14, 2020 (UTC)
SlyCooperFan1, that was not what I found when I temporarily disabled comments on a wiki I am an administrator of, although maybe I had not left it enough time, and I couldn't find any information about it when I looked it up. I will trust you, however, as you are a wiki manager, and presumably know what you're talking about. --The gamer 987654321 15:08, June 14, 2020 (UTC)
To be fair, I only know that through testing on a staff-access UCP test wiki. I'm not 100% positive that article comments disappear on legacy wikis when disabled, as I've never disabled them on a legacy wiki, but I can definitely say that they disappear on the UCP, so that's the assumption I'm working with since we're all moving to the UCP eventually anyway. ~ SlyCooperFan1 [message · contributions] 15:18, June 14, 2020 (UTC)
The comments will no longer appear at the bottom of the pages. As you can see on this page on a wiki with comments disabled, there is no mention of comments at the bottom, even though I did leave a comment on the page earlier. I imagine that the comments at the bottom of articles will go away after a few hours, as I presume they did there (possibly at 00:00 UTC). I can also confirm with certainty that users will still be able to write blog posts even if the comments get disabled, as shown by this blog which has comments on the same wiki. --The gamer 987654321
Resolved concern: Compromise
Preview • Modify • CommentHey there! Might it be useful to try disabling them for a short period to see if this helps? --Spongebob456 talk
I could see a compromise in disabling them for, say, two weeks, and then putting it to a proposal to re-enable them. In my opinion less than two weeks would not be long enough to assess the new situation properly, and any longer than that could be unnecessarily long if it turns out to be a bad idea. --The gamer 987654321 15:59, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Could try a month? I've seen other wikis do that with good effect, gives time to analyse data as well from edits, interactions etc. See if it negatively affects the wiki. --Spongebob456 talk
I would be fine with a month. I will update the proposal to reflect this. --The gamer 987654321
Cool, all good! Big fan of trying that I think. --Spongebob456 talk 17:23, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
< Can you please change it to a week? a month is too long -ChipFan111 >
Can you close them FOREVER? Almost every comment section on this wiki is FILLED with underage, obnoxious, annoying dopeys, so closing them down for a lifetime will be a miracle. Erik Nicholaz (W•C•L•E) 
Created concern: This'll just make things worse
Preview • Modify • CommentI don't see how having talk pages is better than having comments, as there are some problems with talk pages that comments don't have. Anyone can vandalise a talk page, but with comments you can't edit other people's comments. Additionally, just HOW will this prevent spam comments? You can still do spam comments on a talk page, and just because you have to click on an extra thing does not mean that less people will go and do spam comments. And of course, this will hide all the current comments which will stop all current discussions in the comment section, which can really be a problem. The talk page interface also isn't as good, and there are problems with it such as how you have to sign every time and how the newer discussions are on the bottom, rather than the top. MagicSponge123 (W•C•L•E) 16:03, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
First of all, the talk page can be autoconfirmed-protected in the case of vandalism, wherein any new users whose account is less than 4 days old can just go to an admin's wall and message them regarding a correction or update to the main page in question. Secondly, the implementation of talk pages in replacement of comments won't affect users from talking about the page subject in the forums or discussions (two areas on this wiki is enough; we don't need a third place for discussion whose only feature nowadays is mostly being spammed to death on with memes). Lastly, I see talk pages as a positive aspect because we would only use them to discuss improvements to the article rather than discussing the subject (which like I said can just be held in the forums or discussions), something that's often buried under all the spam jokes, irrelevant one-word comments and people unnecessarily quoting an episode rather than saying something remarkable about it. Many other popular wikis use talk pages instead of article comments effectively and with no problem: the Family Guy wiki does it, so do the South Park and Simpsons wikis. EmilyHReturns (M•C•B•E) 16:29, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Who would use talk pages then? Trust me, people aren't gonna use talk pages to talk about how to improve the article. Plus, even with auto-confirm stuff, after those four days the user CAN vandalise. MagicSponge123 (W•C•L•E) 17:04, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
How do you know they won't? If the admins put a strict disclaimer in the source mode that shows up to remind users that talk pages should only be used to discuss how to improve the article, then the user should and most likely will listen; if not then their edit will get undone.
Well then the admins can just warn or block the user who's vandalizing the talk page. Simple as that. EmilyHReturns (M•C•B•E) 17:11, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Well, there's still the vandalism. Anyway, forums and discussions can't be used for all the non-spam comments, for example the ones which aren't intended to be replied to. MagicSponge123 (W•C•L•E) 17:15, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Talk pages aren't perfect, but given the current state of the comments, I would say they are a better alternative. Also, I would disagree with you saying that people would still vandalise talk pages. Many people who want to vandalise it would be unfamiliar with the interface of the talk page, if they can even find it. Any vandalism that does remain there could also easily be removed by any user, not just the administrators and discussion moderators. --The gamer 987654321 17:16, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Hi guys, it is certainly an interesting debate. I think one key advantage is moving conversations about the shows to Discussions does make them easier to moderate as you can basically click one button to delete a Discussions post. Comments take you to a whole new screen to delete them, then back to the main page, then back to the article to delete another comment. This might enable us to tackle spam comments more efficiently. --Spongebob456 talk 17:26, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
- you can do what i used to do: keep the comment section open in one tab, open the deletion page for a comment in a new tab, delete the comment, close that tab, and repeat. of course, i haven't been an administrator for a long time, so i have no idea whether that would still work. me18:43, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
- you can do what i used to do: keep the comment section open in one tab, open the deletion page for a comment in a new tab, delete the comment, close that tab, and repeat. of course, i haven't been an administrator for a long time, so i have no idea whether that would still work. m
Magic, what do you mean by "non-spam comments that aren't intended to be replied to"? Are you referring to when people say memorable quotes from an episode in the comments section? If so, then to be honest, even though I myself have made those types of comments in the past as well, now that I look back on them, those kinds of comments are disruptive as they don't provide any context or impact the comment section other than creating a quote chain, and most of these kinds of comments flood the activity and comments section. The only non-spam comments I can think of that you may be referring to are episode opinions/facts, both of which can easily be added to a discussion page or forum about the subject in question (e.g. "Pineapple RV discussion", "Mr. Krabs Character Discussion"). BTW, speaking of fact comments, I think the ones that do qualify as spam are those ones that were made by someone who commented all the "famous" episodes an APM track plays in on the track's page, which is really spammy and uncalled for IMO (who cares what well-known episodes a track plays in? It's subjective and uninteresting...) as they had been known to flood the recent activity and be used as an editcount booster. EmilyHReturns (M•C•B•E) 17:31, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Yeah, it would be easier to moderate, but there's still that thing about comments which aren't intended to be replied to. Talking about that, replying to Emily, creating forums/discussions posts about talking about pages has its own problem. If the posts aren't replied to, the posts will just get lost (Well the discussions ones, the forum ones appear on the Discussions about section, but we're moving to Discussions soon so this will be a problem) or will not get replied to in three months which would mean a new forums/discussions post would have to be made which is just a waste of... a lot of things. If we do this, one of two things will happen: The people who originally commented on articles would have to go to Forums/Discussions, but they'd not really want to go there, as they prefer comments. Or, The people who originally commented on articles would have to go to Forums/Discussions, causing more traffic over there. This can be a problem sometimes. Oh, and it could be something in between, but you get the point. MagicSponge123 (W•C•L•E) 18:03, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
I totally get where you're coming from Magic. I think part of the issue is, because it's been tough to keep up with comments, we've seen a lot of drama go behind the scenes and it's affected a lot of users (referencing a few recent blogs). Because Recent Changes gets flooded with a lot of comments, it's tough to keep track.
I get what you mean about users not coming back to comments after not liking Discussions. But I think that's why we're looking at a trial period to see if that would be the case. Per this blog, article comments are being reworked for the UCP and there's potential we could bring them back again with the redesign in place. :) --Spongebob456 talk 18:46, June 17, 2020 (UTC)
Created concern: < no >
Preview • Modify • Comment< We cant remove the article comments as this change is too big, and we can't have it because well, it's too big and I think this will make more consequences than gain, please don't do this -ChipFan111 >
While this is a big change, it is a big change with reasoning, and it will only be a trial at first. If it turns out to be a bad idea, the community will be able to vote to restore them after a month if this proposal passes. --The gamer 987654321 09:22, June 20, 2020 (UTC)