Edit war
Encyclopedia
An edit war or revert war is a situation that sometimes arises on websites which are run on wiki
principles, such as Wikipedia
, where users repeatedly re-edit or undo or reverse the prior user's edits in an attempt to make their own preferred version of a page visible. With the ability for anyone to edit a page, and older versions of pages stored in the edit history, edit warring becomes possible as long as there is little or no control over the editing.
Wikipedia has a policy known as the three revert rule in which regardless of the issue or the importance of the page, any editor is allowed a maximum of three reverts a day to any given page. If an editor goes beyond the three reverts, s/he can be blocked from editing for a period of time.
If a particular page has been involved in an edit war, and many editors are involved, this results in the page being protected from editing by anyone other than administrators. Any changes that are proposed to the page must then be discussed and approved by an administrator. Even an administrator is not allowed to boldly make changes to such a page that do not reflect consensus.
For example, the Daily Telegraph reported in September 2009 that filmmaker Roman Polanski
's Wikipedia article had been temporarily blocked from public editing following an edit war by contributors over its content. Polanski was, at the time, facing charges from a sex scandal.
Wiki
A wiki is a website that allows the creation and editing of any number of interlinked web pages via a web browser using a simplified markup language or a WYSIWYG text editor. Wikis are typically powered by wiki software and are often used collaboratively by multiple users. Examples include...
principles, such as Wikipedia
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free, web-based, collaborative, multilingual encyclopedia project supported by the non-profit Wikimedia Foundation. Its 20 million articles have been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Almost all of its articles can be edited by anyone with access to the site,...
, where users repeatedly re-edit or undo or reverse the prior user's edits in an attempt to make their own preferred version of a page visible. With the ability for anyone to edit a page, and older versions of pages stored in the edit history, edit warring becomes possible as long as there is little or no control over the editing.
On Wikipedia
On Wikipedia, edit warring is very common but is controlled by means of page protection (restriction of editing to certain user groups) and blocking (disabling of editing) of the user(s) involved.Wikipedia has a policy known as the three revert rule in which regardless of the issue or the importance of the page, any editor is allowed a maximum of three reverts a day to any given page. If an editor goes beyond the three reverts, s/he can be blocked from editing for a period of time.
If a particular page has been involved in an edit war, and many editors are involved, this results in the page being protected from editing by anyone other than administrators. Any changes that are proposed to the page must then be discussed and approved by an administrator. Even an administrator is not allowed to boldly make changes to such a page that do not reflect consensus.
Notable edit warring
It is most common on Wikipedia for edit warring to occur on a popular topic.For example, the Daily Telegraph reported in September 2009 that filmmaker Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski
Roman Polanski is a French-Polish film director, producer, writer and actor. Having made films in Poland, Britain, France and the USA, he is considered one of the few "truly international filmmakers."...
's Wikipedia article had been temporarily blocked from public editing following an edit war by contributors over its content. Polanski was, at the time, facing charges from a sex scandal.