Wikipedia talk:Edit warring/Archives/2017/August

Does removing longstanding material count as a revert?

Question about the 3RR rule (and by extension the 1RR rule). Our definition says, "An edit or a series of consecutive edits that undoes other editors' actions—whether in whole or in part—counts as a revert." Does that apply only to undoing RECENT actions by other editors? Or does removal of longstanding content also count as a revert? Here's why: I am one of several editors trying to do some trimming and cleanup on an overly wordy article - to eliminate duplication, trim unnecessary detail, etc. The material I am removing is not recent. The article is covered by Discretionary Sanctions. So I find I am limited in what I can do, because as soon as someone posts an intervening edit, I understand that means I can't do any more such trimming until 24 hours have passed. Is that a correct interpretation? Or does 1RR/3RR apply only to undoing RECENT work by other editors? I don't find any such exemption on our policy page here. --MelanieN (talk) 17:50, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

No rule is meant to prevent constructive editing. You're not reverting (IMO) unless you're specifically restoring material in the article to the way it was in a previous revision, with the intent to undo subsequent contributions. If you're really not sure, or you think there's a chance that someone might reasonably disagree with your action, then it wouldn't hurt to discuss the changes beforehand and develop consensus, or draft your changes in your user space. From what you described, but without knowing which article exactly, I think you're probably fine. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:04, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

... But to answer the question directly, there is no time limit on reverts. If you make an edit, then 12 years later I restore the revision prior to your edit, I have reverted you and am subject to 1RR if that's the restriction. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 21:06, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

@Ivanvector: I strongly disagree with your second paragraph. This interpretation would place an undue burden on editors. By definition, every piece of text was added by somebody at some point in the past. Your interpretation makes every subtractive edit a revert, thus grinding encyclopedic work to a halt. Surely that's not the spirit of the policy or of the restrictions, which are in place to prevent edit-warring now. Editing something added months or years ago (weeks for heavily-edited articles) can not be considered a revert. — JFG ^talk 13:28, 12 August 2017 (UTC)

I think you've misinterpreted that paragraph. I had meant to say that if it's clear that my intent 12 years later is to remove subsequent contributions in order to go back to a specific older version, I would count that as a revert. Which isn't inherently malicious, there are valid reasons to revert contributions even if they are very old. And honestly I don't know what I was thinking when I said I would be subject to 1RR for reverting 12 years later, 1RR has a 24-hour window. Certainly I have and I'm sure you have seen "slow" edit wars where two or more editors are clearly reverting each other (using rollback or undo or Twinkle) but there are days or weeks in between the reverts, with no constructive development happening in the meantime. That wouldn't break the bright-line 24-hour 3RR criterion, but it is an edit war by the letter of the policy. Of course you're right that just making a subtractive change to something that somebody else contributed is not automatically a revert, that's just how editing works. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 13:57, 12 August 2017 (UTC)