story
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8596682
And that this in turn is what drives editors away. So it very much supports my point.
IAR can be and indeed is invoked all the time, making Wikipedia a bad example of how strict rule adherence stifles a community. It was quite a simple point that needn't warrant downvotes, italics and so many HN searches.
Try using WP:IAR anywhere on WP today and you'll quickly see how far WP has moved from founding priciples.
EDIT: I mean, just look at usernames. You're supposed to be able without a login, but sometimes that causes problems. So you go to create a username. The software has a list of words that you can not use (very. Few people think allowing a username like "JewKiller666" is a good idea). But then there's a username policy. This has been reviewed to make it more friendly to new users. But the application of those rules is still pretty hostile.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Username
That's the policy. See the changes to the "misleading" names section. That section had to be expanded because editors using their real name in a different script (eg, Japanese users) were being told their unicode name was misleading. Or a user with a eg psuedo-random string of characters was told that their name was confusing, even thoigh there wasn't any other name or namespace to confuse "kejdhdkaksaas983" with.
The "dealing with inappropriate usernames" section required a lot of work to prevent the admin-wannabe users from making many reports.
Once you've picked a name that gets past the software's filters but which an editor -or bot- thinks is bad you face:
1) templates. {{subst:uw-username}}
2) a RFC http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:RFC/N
3) an administrator notice board http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Usernames_for_adminis...
Notice that bot reports which the not admits may be low quality get sent to UAA, not the lower levels of discussion.
4) a holding pen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Usernames_for_adminis...
This convoluted conflicting mass of policy is hostile to new users, especially in the way it gets applied by editors. Just try using "WP:IAR" during this process.
These arguments (different arguments among different people) spread over diffferent pages and different spaces. They happened on article talk pages; in meta space (village pump, the WP manual of style); in admin spaces (ANI); even with some ARBCOM case.
There's easily 500,000 words about hyphen, minus, en-dash and em-dash on wikipedia.
Go and make some useful edits and see how that works out for you. Rules are strictly enforced above all else.
Everything I try to do is immediately reverted and sixteen rules are cited. Extremely frustrating, and it happens to many others in the community I'm in (Driving around the world) to the point I setup our own wiki so we don't have to deal with the BS bureaucracy of Wikipedia.
