Historical background

The office actions policy was originally launched on en.wp by Jimmy Wales, back in February 2006, and shortly afterwards on meta, in order to solidify long standing practices and processes followed by the Foundation, that were not officially recorded elsewhere in the projects at that time. Its original scope focused on page protections and BLP article content changes, in response to increasingly rising number of escalated calls for action, placed directly to the Foundation’s staff, by affected individuals. Danny Wool was the first designated Foundation staff member mandated to accept, review and act on such requests, after Jimmy Wales.

The office actions policy has undergone several iterations since, on both sites, and has been expanded to include a variety of office actions that have been taken over the years as common practice, broadening its original scope. At the same time, strict internal processes have been developed by the Foundation in order to complement as well as standardise office actions and staff use of advanced rights.

Office actions were originally intended to be temporary actions, alleviating pressures caused by controversial situations and calling community attention to them in the hopes of resolution. However, certain office actions have since evolved to be permanent and non-appealable due to the nature of the issues they deal with, while others have become defunct (Superprotect).

Local project versions

Commons

Wikipedia

Wikibooks

See also