Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive248

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Noticeboard archives
Administrators' (archives, search)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130
131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140
141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160
161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170
171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180
181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190
191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200
201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210
211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220
221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230
231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240
241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250
251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260
261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270
271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280
281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290
291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300
301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310
311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320
321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330
331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340
341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350
351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360
361 362
Incidents (archives, search)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130
131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140
141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160
161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170
171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180
181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190
191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200
201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210
211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220
221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230
231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240
241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250
251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260
261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270
271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280
281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290
291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300
301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310
311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320
321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330
331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340
341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350
351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360
361 362 363 364 365 366 367 368 369 370
371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380
381 382 383 384 385 386 387 388 389 390
391 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400
401 402 403 404 405 406 407 408 409 410
411 412 413 414 415 416 417 418 419 420
421 422 423 424 425 426 427 428 429 430
431 432 433 434 435 436 437 438 439 440
441 442 443 444 445 446 447 448 449 450
451 452 453 454 455 456 457 458 459 460
461 462 463 464 465 466 467 468 469 470
471 472 473 474 475 476 477 478 479 480
481 482 483 484 485 486 487 488 489 490
491 492 493 494 495 496 497 498 499 500
501 502 503 504 505 506 507 508 509 510
511 512 513 514 515 516 517 518 519 520
521 522 523 524 525 526 527 528 529 530
531 532 533 534 535 536 537 538 539 540
541 542 543 544 545 546 547 548 549 550
551 552 553 554 555 556 557 558 559 560
561 562 563 564 565 566 567 568 569 570
571 572 573 574 575 576 577 578 579 580
581 582 583 584 585 586 587 588 589 590
591 592 593 594 595 596 597 598 599 600
601 602 603 604 605 606 607 608 609 610
611 612 613 614 615 616 617 618 619 620
621 622 623 624 625 626 627 628 629 630
631 632 633 634 635 636 637 638 639 640
641 642 643 644 645 646 647 648 649 650
651 652 653 654 655 656 657 658 659 660
661 662 663 664 665 666 667 668 669 670
671 672 673 674 675 676 677 678 679 680
681 682 683 684 685 686 687 688 689 690
691 692 693 694 695 696 697 698 699 700
701 702 703 704 705 706 707 708 709 710
711 712 713 714 715 716 717 718 719 720
721 722 723 724 725 726 727 728 729 730
731 732 733 734 735 736 737 738 739 740
741 742 743 744 745 746 747 748 749 750
751 752 753 754 755 756 757 758 759 760
761 762 763 764 765 766 767 768 769 770
771 772 773 774 775 776 777 778 779 780
781 782 783 784 785 786 787 788 789 790
791 792 793 794 795 796 797 798 799 800
801 802 803 804 805 806 807 808 809 810
811 812 813 814 815 816 817 818 819 820
821 822 823 824 825 826 827 828 829 830
831 832 833 834 835 836 837 838 839 840
841 842 843 844 845 846 847 848 849 850
851 852 853 854 855 856 857 858 859 860
861 862 863 864 865 866 867 868 869 870
871 872 873 874 875 876 877 878 879 880
881 882 883 884 885 886 887 888 889 890
891 892 893 894 895 896 897 898 899 900
901 902 903 904 905 906 907 908 909 910
911 912 913 914 915 916 917 918 919 920
921 922 923 924 925 926 927 928 929 930
931 932 933 934 935 936 937 938 939 940
941 942 943 944 945 946 947 948 949 950
951 952 953 954 955 956 957 958 959 960
961 962 963 964 965 966 967 968 969 970
971 972 973 974 975 976 977 978 979 980
981 982 983 984 985 986 987 988 989 990
991 992 993 994 995 996 997 998 999 1000
1001 1002 1003 1004 1005 1006 1007 1008 1009 1010
1011 1012 1013 1014 1015 1016 1017 1018 1019 1020
1021 1022 1023 1024 1025 1026 1027 1028 1029 1030
1031 1032 1033 1034 1035 1036 1037 1038 1039 1040
1041 1042 1043 1044 1045 1046 1047 1048 1049 1050
1051 1052 1053 1054 1055 1056 1057 1058 1059 1060
1061 1062 1063 1064 1065 1066 1067 1068 1069 1070
1071 1072 1073 1074 1075 1076 1077 1078 1079 1080
1081 1082 1083 1084 1085 1086 1087 1088 1089 1090
1091 1092 1093 1094 1095 1096 1097 1098 1099 1100
1101 1102 1103 1104 1105 1106 1107 1108 1109 1110
1111 1112 1113 1114 1115 1116 1117 1118 1119 1120
1121 1122 1123 1124 1125 1126 1127 1128 1129 1130
1131 1132 1133 1134 1135 1136 1137 1138 1139 1140
1141 1142 1143 1144 1145 1146 1147 1148 1149 1150
1151 1152 1153 1154 1155 1156
Edit-warring/3RR (archives, search)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130
131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140
141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160
161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170
171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180
181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190
191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200
201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210
211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220
221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230
231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240
241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250
251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260
261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270
271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280
281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290
291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300
301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310
311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320
321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330
331 332 333 334 335 336 337 338 339 340
341 342 343 344 345 346 347 348 349 350
351 352 353 354 355 356 357 358 359 360
361 362 363 364 365 366 367 368 369 370
371 372 373 374 375 376 377 378 379 380
381 382 383 384 385 386 387 388 389 390
391 392 393 394 395 396 397 398 399 400
401 402 403 404 405 406 407 408 409 410
411 412 413 414 415 416 417 418 419 420
421 422 423 424 425 426 427 428 429 430
431 432 433 434 435 436 437 438 439 440
441 442 443 444 445 446 447 448 449 450
451 452 453 454 455 456 457 458 459 460
461 462 463 464 465 466 467 468 469 470
471 472 473 474 475 476 477 478 479 480
481 482
Arbitration enforcement (archives)
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130
131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140
141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160
161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169 170
171 172 173 174 175 176 177 178 179 180
181 182 183 184 185 186 187 188 189 190
191 192 193 194 195 196 197 198 199 200
201 202 203 204 205 206 207 208 209 210
211 212 213 214 215 216 217 218 219 220
221 222 223 224 225 226 227 228 229 230
231 232 233 234 235 236 237 238 239 240
241 242 243 244 245 246 247 248 249 250
251 252 253 254 255 256 257 258 259 260
261 262 263 264 265 266 267 268 269 270
271 272 273 274 275 276 277 278 279 280
281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290
291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300
301 302 303 304 305 306 307 308 309 310
311 312 313 314 315 316 317 318 319 320
321 322 323 324 325 326 327 328 329 330
331 332
Other links

WP:UAA[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


WP:UAA is seriously backlogged, haven't seen it this bad in awhile. We'll have the full story... at 11! 20:26, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Any crats around to put this RfA out of its impending misery? (I'm filing this in duplicate pursuant to Wikipedia:BUREAUCRACY.) Drmies (talk) 14:22, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I've closed the MfD. Invalidating someone's candidacy, however misguided it is, by deleting it is not something we should be advocating. I will be leaving a message with JoshBlitz to let him know what's going on, but I don't have the time for that right now. --(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 14:34, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Thank you. It did seem to me that MfD was not the proper way to go. Drmies (talk) 14:54, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
(edit conflict) I agree. If we don't think someone should be running for admin, we don't address it by just deleting their nomination page - at least not without discussing it with the candidate first. A message on the user talk page seems like the way to go. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 14:56, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
(edit conflict) and I had to re-close it, after the nominator reverted Deskana's close. Syrthiss (talk) 14:57, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Ha, that's part of the editor's MO--they did that at AfC as well, 2 minutes after I declined their submission. Drmies (talk) 15:39, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
I was referring to Ritchie333 (talk · contribs · count) (the one who nominated it for mfd), not JoshBlitz (talk · contribs · count). Syrthiss (talk) 15:58, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Gotcha--the nominator of the MfD, not the nominator of the RfA. Drmies (talk) 17:28, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I left a message on Josh's talk page; I realize there are also some problems with AFC here, and there may be some issues that are going to require attention in the future, but some of what's happened here strikes me as unnecessarily mean. --Floquenbeam (talk) 17:50, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Indefinitely blocked IP addresses[edit]

A comment in a current ANI discussion about a blocked IP ("Zombie block") made me curious whether there were IPs which had been indef blocked so long ago that the reason for blocking was no longer a concern. I found this: Wikipedia:Database reports/Indefinitely blocked IPs. According to that listing, there are currently 300 indefinitely blocked IPs. 119 of them, almost half, were blocked in either 2006 or 2007. The most recent one appears to be a DSL IP indef blocked in February for making a single racist comment. Perhaps someone could go through this list and review some of these blocks? Delicious carbuncle (talk) 15:52, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I tend to monitor that list from time to time (many should remain blocked), though it's probably due for another review. I shall do so again over the next few days. FYI the database report list excludes a whole load of IP addresses. Much bigger problems exists at CAT:OP and this blocklist link. -- zzuuzz (talk) 16:04, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Also an idea to ask checkusers to review and clean up these lists periodically. I will drop them an email. Risker (talk) 16:48, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
I unblocked my two from that list.--v/r - TP 23:41, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • shrugs* I would generally support unblocking the ones blocked before, say, 2012, under the obvious provision that they can and will be blocked again if need be, and changing the others to a 365 days block (starting today). I've always held firm beliefs against indef'-blocking IPs and I still stand by that. I work at an ISP and I know that doing anything indefinite to an IP address is pretty much a bad idea. :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:37, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Of course, it doesn't apply to those indef'ed by request and to proven proxies and the like, but that goes without saying. Although I'm still saying it. :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:39, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

There is a relevant thread on the Village Pump suggesting a mass-unblocking of most old indefinite rangeblocks under controlled conditions. You are requested to participate in that discussion. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 08:51, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I will be reviewing some of these blocks using checkuser when I get the chance. --(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 10:50, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Heads-up on a possibly troublesome AfD[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I'd be grateful if admins could keep an eye on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of Wikipedia controversies, as I expect we will see banned users attempting to intervene in it. Prioryman (talk) 17:51, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

And as predicted, a likely banned user has intervened. [1]. Prioryman (talk) 18:23, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
H'mmm seems pretty much in favour of keep, atm... watching with impartial interest! Basket Feudalist 18:32, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Prioryman,
Is this the last attempt to canvass for your DRV after the snow closure of your AfD?
When will the canvassing, personal attacks, and vendetta end?
Kiefer.Wolfowitz 09:39, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Would you mind pointing out where the DRV is mentioned above, because I certainly don't see it. Prioryman (talk) 10:07, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
To be fair, the DRV came after this posting, so it's certainly not canvassing for the DRV. Anyways, this is no longer relevant so I'm closing it. -- King of ♠ 10:42, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Closure review of Simple English proposal at Village Pump[edit]

The discussion, and its closure is located at the Village Pump archive.

This proposal had already run once, and had a convincing majority, but due to a technical mistake, had to go through discussion again. All the relevant links are located at the top of the discussion. Relevant discussion about the closure may be found on the closing admin's talk page.

The second time this proposal was run, it met some opposition, but there were still a majority of supports. But it was closed as a no consensus based on a simple tally of all the votes. As mentioned in this continuation thread by Osiris, it failed to account for others who implied their support for the proposal without actually using the word. It also failed to count those users who participated in the original discussion, but not in the new one. Most importantly, this closure did not look into the inherent value of the various arguments; giving all of them equal importance, a view disputed by me and Osiris in the continuation thread.

Going by all these factors than a simple count of the votes, I believe that this discussion should have been closed in favour of the proposal, which is why I request another uninvolved admin to review this closure.

Cheers, TheOriginalSoni — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.227.239.137 (talk) 08:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I would say that the new discussion received far more attention and fewer procedural mistakes. Nathan's logic seems sound so I don't see a reason that his close would need to be re-accomplished. Nathan glossed over much of the discussion in the close rationale, but that doesn't necessarily mean he was oblivious to each of the points before Osiris made them. With the points Osiris brought up, some of those opinions would be discounted (such as just not liking SEWP) and others would be given such minor weight. Besides, many of the points Osiris brought up would be arguments not to implement this which gives more credibility to a no-consensus leaning close.--v/r - TP 13:58, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I have no problem with the actual decision: it could have gone either way. If you weigh up all the arguments properly there's probably about a 66/67% support rate, not an overwhelming consensus. My issue was with the method used to judge it; that is, tallying the !votes (perhaps hastily, given the miscount) and giving equal weight to each comment despite the irrelevancy of some. That's not a surmisation, it's what the closer said he did in his statement. The points I listed down the bottom were just a rehash of the arguments made as an example of the diversity of responses; many of them had counter-arguments that I didn't list. Osiris (talk) 15:55, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I am conducting a survey at the link above to accomplish two things. First, I hope to gather a list of some potential future candidates interested in cratship. Second, I hope to be able to use the results of the survey as solid evidence of how admins view the RfB process and what factors cause the very low amount of activity. Anyone is welcome to comment, but the input of admins is particularly desired. Regards, AutomaticStrikeout (TCSign AAPT) 14:58, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Incivility regarding User:Charlesdrakew and others[edit]

Statement by Rcsprinter123[edit]

I start this AN report, along with Adam mugliston, as the result of almost 2 years, 9 months and 29 days of torment suffered by myself, and pretty much 4 years, 7 months and 29 days by Adam. This is in regard to general unpleasantness and derogatory comments used semi-regularly by the same crew of editors over and over. Plenty of nearly-but-not-quite personal attacks, which do not reflect or fit into the perfect Wikipedia model of friendly, collaborative editing which users together write and improve an encyclopedia for the world to use. I feel degraded and inferior when those terms are used to describe me or somebody doing the same type of editing as me. The most prominent term is “bus spotter”. Bob Re-born has used this phrase to talk about, or even talk to, people involved with the public transport section of Wikipedia, a total of five times (many more actually, these are the only ones I care to link to), Stuart.Jamieson once and Charlesdrakew three times. Others have been seen to do this at times also. Peterkingiron and Alzarian16. Red stucco. JetBlast. MickMackNee.

While here, I’d commend Youngmangonewest for speaking out against that at this AfD debate where they made a point about unprofessional language used against those who join the bus side of things. Anoraks and flasks, Bob is claiming. He has no evidence we do any of that! He shouldn’t be allowed to talk about us as if we are not equals and are lower down, because of a passion for transport.

Demiurge1000 did tackle the problem at this AfD in July 2011, which presented an amount of evidence against Charles and Bob (known as Simple Bob at that time).

Basically, what is happening is that Charles is just trying to enforce the policies when it comes to articles, but he is going totally the wrong way about it. On top of being disrespectful to other editors’ views (for instance, if I try to contact him about an issue he will give a curt reply quoting some policy without answering all my questions), he has violated 3RR many a time and just wants to have the last word, while all the time believing that he is right, everybody else is wrong and as a result ranks lower than him. Treating editors like me as scum is not something I really want to have to put up with while going along with my daily business. Most of this will relate to pages to do with lists of bus routes, which is a whole other argument I need to bring up in time (they all got deleted), and while appearing to show no expertise in the area, whereas I do, I don’t think he should be charging about telling me what to do and reverting and delinking and everything else. I’d love to provide a few diffs, but unfortunately all the pages are deleted.

I have created this report to bring together and expose the poor judgement and terrible attitude used by those few who think they are higher than Adam and I. Additionally, I hope it will make the administrators think twice and perhaps sanction some of the editors I have mentioned, particularly Charles, who has been on our case, and one could say harrassing us, for a few years. Rcsprinter (chatter) @ 22:24, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

Statement by Adam mugliston[edit]

I agree with all of Rcsprinter’s points above. As well as them, I would like to add that Charles has exhibited many times what felt to me like wikihounding. Throughout my browsing of Wikipedia as a reader, I have encountered unsourced articles or sections, which no one seems to have minded. On some occasions, I added a sentence which was unsourced. Charles would then just ‘pop up’ and revert my work. As much as I understand that everything should be sourced, seeing the several unsourced articles, I decided that a sentence tagged on to a sourced paragraph would be fine. When confronted, Charles replied that he had the article on his watchlist, which personally I find a rather convienient coincidence, as I feel Charles has a personal grudge towards myself and possibly Rcsprinter and others and that he almost takes pleasure in ‘ruining’ our work. Due to this happening quite a few times, I feel that Charles has been watching me and therefore wikihounding. Another point I would like to make is that I noticed that Charles has removed references from some lists of bus routes. Unfortunately, I am not able to provide diffs for those, as the articles have now been deleted. Some time after Charles’ removal of references, the article would then be listed for AfD using the lack of references (or a sufficient amount of them) as one of the reasons for deletion of the article. The listing would be done either by Charles or one of his ‘friends’. I think claiming that primary sources are not good is absurd for this subject. Buses are perfectly notable and an important part of every community, however due to the widely available primary sources, not many organisations that would be classified as good as a secondary source write about them and those that do are often local newspaper or magazines that have no websites and are not easy to get hold of (i.e. they are not archived for the public to see). Therefore, I say that primary sources should be perfectly valid for transport articles and so Charles’ reasoning is not correct. That is why I consider that behaviour as wrong and planned to delete the article and so intentional ruining of my work, returning again to the personal grudge Charles seems to bare to myself and other users interested in buses.  Adam Mugliston  talk  22:25, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

Stuart Jamieson's Statement[edit]

Wow, I once use the term Bus Spotter (which according to our article is a valid collective grouping), to directed at any wikipedian but to refer to groups of individuals I deal with at my work (Who come to my work take down bus serial numbers and to photograph said buses) and I'm taken to the Administrators board for incivility about it? I'm unsurprised by a number of comments made here, as I've said before I do have expertise in this area and like Charles I believe our policies and guidelines as to what content should or should not be added is clear and this has been reiterated to Rcsprinter and to Adam yet they continued to create articles that had no independent secondary sourcing, add in links that failed our tests for Spam, added unsourced claims and content, etc and so on. It's now they're upset, because the finality of notifications and reversions has come and this information has been removed, so they seek retribution in reporting us to the Administrators (it should be noted that arbiter, Worm that Turned has previously adopted both these editors and kept a close eye on both mediating edits by them in the past). We did advise these editors that such content would be better on Wikia, but they ignored us with Adam's friend Wilbysuffolk taking the eventual lead in migrating these lists to Wikia which has much less strict policies and no requirement to write content that is encyclopaedic in scope, but Adam's defence in continuing to breach policy and guideline has been that their work would have a lower footfall on Wikia. It's no surprise that Charle's responses to these continual breaches of policy have become shorter as they continue to get repeated.

The irony is that most of the recent deletions have not been by the parties named above but by two other editors Adam's (real life) friend wilbysuffolk and Davey2010 both of who have a declared interest is buses as well but both realise that the edits and articles made are problematic and detrimental to the project and needed be removed, both like Charles, Bob and Myself were following and watching a great deal of bus related articles because we had found that discussion of the field was strongly likely to result in poorly sourced articles that were unlikely to be repairable. However barring any specific other complaints against me other than my use of that term in a disinterested way, I'll leave my statement here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Stuart.Jamieson (talkcontribs) 06:12, 15 April 2013‎


Charlesdrakew's statement[edit]

This complaint seems to be born of frustration at having most of the articles they work on deleted by strong consensus which included many non involved editors. A number of allegations have been made against me which conveniently cannot be backed up with evidence because of page deletions. I have in fact never intentionally violated 3RR although on the odd occasion I may have forgotten that I had reverted the previous day but within 24 hours. I have never deleted references that were from reliable sources. Rcsprinter and Adam have both consistently refused to accept Wikipedia's core policies on notability and verifiability and both have a strong page ownership problem. Rcsprinter actually emailed me while his last abortive Request for Adminship was open telling me to keep out of "his area". Much of Adam's statement above is his opinion on what Wikipedia should be as opposed to community consensus on what it should be. I think one incident he refers to is this edit on a page which was on my watchlist because I had edited that page before. It took a small edit war involving a number of editors to persuade him you cannot do that. I have never knowingly edited outside of Wikipedia policy and if some editors do not agree with those policies that is their problem.--Charles (talk) 09:33, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Discussion[edit]

  • Comment in response to Rcsprinter123's point. I am a little bit WP:INVOLVED with the recent deletion of the bus-titled redirects that appeared recently in WP:RFD. I noticed that the recent group of deletions was listed separately 10 times, so I grouped them all together and formed the proposal at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2013 April 4#List of bus routes in Cambridgeshire. Granted, I thought something was a bit odd at that time, given that all of these redirects seemed to be voted on in the same way by the same editors, but I never put the pieces together (mainly due to me not knowing anything about these previous AfDs.) However, here's my point: I have no desire to be WP:INVOLVED with this discussion... except to point this out:
There is currently another discussion regarding redirects that include "List of bus routes..." in their titles at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2013 April 14#Lists of bus routes in East Anglia. I might be so inclined as to ask someone to chime in on that RfD proposal ... and this point here ... since this discussion seems to be related to that new RfD proposal. Steel1943 (talk) 23:49, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

I could add quite a lot here, but very short of time so just one comment for now. I may have time to add some more evidence about sixteen hours from now. Anyway, if this is still going on then I'm very disappointed. I asked an administrator to have a quiet word with Charles after he used the phrase "autistic obsessives" in one of his regular diatribes about these people whose interests (or nature) he looks down on. (It was a particularly problematic comment because it also seemed to be part of a conversation where co-ordinated participation in AfDs was being planned, i.e. canvassing.) Charles' reply to a friendly word from an administrator about that, was "What are you, the Wiki thought police? ... Some of us just like to call a spade a spade." This was several months after the AfD linked by Rcsprinter above where several people had expressed concern about this sort of language and stereotyping being used. So clearly the editor has had opportunity to change his approach, and has chosen not to.

This may or may not be the best forum for getting something done about this, but I'd like to see someone make a reasonable attempt at trying. A topic ban might be a way forward, since it always seems to be on these particular topics that these outbursts occur. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 03:41, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Just what "regular diatribes about these people" would that be Demiurge? Diffs please.--Charles (talk) 13:15, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Really? That's your counter argument? You pick only two words, of which has little to nothing to do with Demiurge's central point, to pick at? Wow. Talk about a Red herring.--v/r - TP 18:42, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Yes really. Where is the evidence? We have a link to an almost two year old AfD where intense discussion took place, where unfounded accusations were made against me, but where I made no personal attacks nor was I uncivil to anybody. I do not believe I have ever been uncivil to either of the complainants. Nothing else has been produced. So where is the evidence?--Charles (talk) 23:18, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Do you think this comment was appropriate? Or your response to an admin pointing it out to you? That is Demiurge's evidence. But you've ignored that and latched onto a couple of words with minor connection to his central point in an effort to divert attention away. Clearly, a red herring.--v/r - TP 03:23, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Perhaps my choice of words was inappropriate on that one occasion and I apologise for it. It will not happen again. It was not directed at any editor in particular and certainly not at those bringing this case. That does not however give Demiurge any reason to claim that this single mistake is part of a pattern when it is not. I normally remain calm and civil in the face of provocation.--Charles (talk) 08:48, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • It does seem like that was directed at particular editors, as that was related to the lists of bus routes, therefore you do quite strongly suggest that this is about the creators of the lists and so myself, Rcsprinter and Wilby and possibly others. That mistake was in a pattern as you have been uncivil and rude before several times. You may remain calm in the face of provocation, but you also provoke a lot.  Adam Mugliston  talk  21:30, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • "part of a pattern"? It seems apt to quote my comments from the AfD already linked above, seems like a pretty glaring pattern to me, this was over twenty months ago and it's clear the behaviour is still going on now; "More concerningly, this current nomination came exactly two minutes after Simple Bob intervened in an edit war on the article about colour schemes, where Charlesdrakew had already reached 3RR. Disagreements about colour schemes are not a good reason for frivolous AfD nominations as a form of retaliation. More concerningly still, the attempts to demean the article authors as "anoraks" (a derogatory term - look at a dictionary) or as "trainspotting" or "planespotting" is unseemly and not appropriate for a collaborative editing environment - trains and planes are not mentioned in the article at all, they have no relevance. Further, this comment could very well be seen as a personal attack, and at the very least its tone is entirely inappropriate. Responding to an expression of concern about it by demanding that expression of concern should be struck, followed by threats that "I may well take this to ANI", is an indication that Charlesdrakew at least has lost track of acceptable standards of behaviour. Replying to other editors with farmyard noises, as Charlesdrakew has also done more than once, is another hint that all may not be well. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:04, 26 July 2011 (UTC)" --Demiurge1000 (talk) 03:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I think this post shows the dangers of allowing a pair of editors who have canvassed and conspired off-wiki (more on that later) to bring a collective complaint against multiple editors. I hope you are not deliberately conflating what Bob has said in the past with what I have said and throwing it all on me but it does come across that way. It would help if you provided some diffs so we could see what was actually said and by whom. You talk about "frivolous AfD nominations" but all of those articles have subsequently been deleted so they can hardly have been frivolous. You have had to scrape a long way down the barrel to find a twenty month old conversation in which words were being put in my mouth by other editors pushing me to quite justifiably threaten a report on it. As for the one link you do provide a look further down this page will show how frustrating Adam mugliston's interminable circular arguments about being allowed to add original research can become. And then you claim that these widely spaced and pretty trivial incidents show some regular pattern.--Charles (talk) 09:06, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
  • [2] "Quack! Quack!" is one diff and clearly posted by you. More "quacking" is also clearly visible on that page. And once again, neither I nor Rcsprinter canvassed. I have already said, this was a joint decision to follow this route. Neither of us specifically said "I'm starting an AN against Charles and Stuart, come help me take them down" or anything similar. We both agreed we wanted to pursue the lack of civility by Charles in particular and Rcsprinter suggested this as a possibility, which we both agreed on together. Any one of us could easily provide a very large amount of events in which you have been rude and uncivil, just by looking through your talk page archive's. Come to canvassing, you've canvassed yourself Charles...  Adam Mugliston  talk  15:20, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
  • That wasn't my claim, the claim is that these two editors have independently decided to embark on these AfDs. Wilby and Davey don't know each other off-wiki as far as I've know and I haven't seen any evidence for puppetry, it's Adam and Wilby who do. If there's an issue with off-wiki contact again I'd be asking questions over how much is being said off wiki between RCsprinter and Adam. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 07:36, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Ah, I see. So now, you are accusing another group of editors of meatpuppetry as well, but with separate intentions from the other group of accused meatpuppets. Understood. Steel1943 (talk) 07:39, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Nope still not accusing anyone of meat puppetry. I said the latter group had Off Wiki contact that they've refused to clarify, I said the former group have no connection as far as I know. I have not said that either group is engaged in any puppetry and I'm not sure what your intent is in repeating such a strawman.Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 08:00, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Of course I've been involved in the discussions, that's why my name is listed at the top of this section with an accusation against me. The ones who should be dodging the boomerang are those who brought this complaint here against me. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 08:10, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • There is no question of meat puppetry here. A complete red herring. Adam.mugliston began by cooperating with Wilby on bus route articles but soon fell out and has been extremely rude and uncivil about Wilby on many occasions that I have noticed on-wiki. Davy is acting independently.--Charles (talk) 08:32, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Stuart: My off-wiki contact is private and nothing to do with Wikipedia. We all have the power to free speech and as much as that is limited here on wiki, it is not off it. With this, I am not saying that mine and RCSprinter's and mine and Wilby's contact related to Wikipedia, but my point is hat if we want it to be about Wikipedia, we are perfectly permitted to.
  • Charles: Would you like to show me where I've been "extremely rude"? I don't recall extreme rudeness towards him.  Adam Mugliston  talk  08:53, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • When off-wiki contact relates to editing Wikipedia it does concern Wikipedia. I note that there is nothing on your or Rcsprinter's talk pages about bringing this complaint. Your statement above was posted immediately after Rcsprinter had posted a complaint specifically including you. This proves an off-wiki conspiracy to "have a go" at a few editors who prevent you from turning Wikipedia into a bus route directory as you seek to do. I wonder if this case should be procedurally closed as stemming from off-wiki canvassing.--Charles (talk) 12:47, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Firstly, As you can see from the opening sentence of Rcsprinter's statement, this is a joint report between Rcsprinter and myself. We both agreed that this is a route we would like to follow to pursue Charles’ incivility and joined efforts to file this report. The times of posting are so close together, as we had planned to file this report yesterday and I was waiting for Rcsprinter to post his statement and after seeing his statement, I posted mine. Secondly, Who said about about ‘’turning’’ Wikipedia into a bus directory? I merely want to fill the large gap Wikipedia has in this subject, just because books don’t publish things about them. If we can have a list of train stations, which we do, we can have a list of bus ‘’routes’’. Buses are the primary form of transport in England and many places around the world and therefore if forms of transport used less than them can have articles, so can they.  Adam Mugliston  talk  15:34, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • A question for Charles: Where has Adam been "extremely rude and uncivil about Wilby"? Peter James (talk) 19:17, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • It's precisely what I wanted to know, yet as you can see above, I didn't get a reply...  Adam Mugliston  talk  19:35, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Too busy to dig around for it today but it can be found.--Charles (talk) 23:24, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • This is the only example I can locate at this time. Pretty uncivil to myself and denigrating Wilby. I have seen stronger comments re. Wilby but cannot locate them as yet.--Charles (talk) 21:12, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • The uncivilness was towards you and not Wilby and I simply mentioned that Wilby's lists weren't formatted as well as mine, although perhaps in a overly harsh tone due to your earlier uncivilness. It all comes back to you.  Adam Mugliston  talk  21:21, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment in reply to Charles’s statement, I would like to point out that this is not about the deletion of lists of bus routes, but about his and others’ incivility and frequent rudeness.  Adam Mugliston  talk  15:34, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I'd just like to say that Adam mugliston and Wilbysuffolk do know each other well in real life, so anybody trying to do a bit of speculation that's there for you. Lets get back to saying how badly Charles has been behaving. Rcsprinter (gossip) @ 21:49, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Comment to all of you[edit]

Have any of you people read either the large bold notice at the top of this page, or the extremely prominent bright red editnotice that pops up each time you try to edit this page? This is "a page for posting information and issues that affect administrators", not the place to come to settle your arguments, the headquarters of the Wikipedia Civility Police, or the place to make vague accusations of "off-wiki conspiracies" over an argument about bus routes for god's sake. Arbcom is that way. 94.196.134.192 (talk) 15:44, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

  • WP:Requests for comment/User conduct is one option, mentioned in the dispute resolution page, but discussion of a proposed topic or interaction ban (probably what "sanction" refers to) should "generally take place at the administrators' noticeboard or a subpage thereof", according to the banning policy. Peter James (talk) 16:06, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
I would not denigrate the editor who started this thread by using such impolite language as began this section ("you people"). A simple direction to the appropriate forum would have been sufficient. I applaud User:Rcsprinter123 and the others, all of whom seem to be frustrated in edits being done in their chosen specialty. We can't all be interested in English bus routes, but then not all of us are English or ride buses. A Beer summit is advised at the local pub. Yours, GeorgeLouis (talk) 16:22, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
It would help if the editors took the advice they've been given and wrote interesting articles on bus routes (we've regularly pointed them to well written articles about that very subject such as Buses in Bristol)but essentially all that is ever done on the subject (of routes) is to reformat primary sources such bus timetables and present the result as a table that is neither in scope nor notable and a link to the original timetable from a a parent article would be of more use to our readers.Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 17:10, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
Don't want to drop him in it, but Worm That Turned told me this was the best place to come. I didn't think it was serious enough for arbitration or dispute resolution or an RfC. Rcsprinter (talk) @ 16:35, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
Since when has expertise in a subject been a requirement for editing? It is more general editors like myself who are best placed to keep some sense of proportion as to what is of encyclopaedic interest and what is enthusiast cruft. Unlike rail articles which are well regulated UK bus related articles are in a shocking mess and if Stuart, Bob or myself were topic banned from editing them that could only get worse.--Charles (talk) 16:51, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
Why don't you make up a few scenarios to prove your point, because I'm skeptical of it at the moment. Rcsprinter (warn) @ 17:01, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
Expertise isn't a requirement, but is jolly useful and doesn't drive the people, who have more expertise, nuts. And should you or Stuart or Bob be banned, bus articles would improve and a more comprehensive coverage would flourish, contrary to the destruction that can be seen following your path.  Adam Mugliston  talk  17:07, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
Bet I have more expertise than you, but then we've been through that discussion before and it didn't change anything. As for more comprehensive coverage, as I say above we've been encouraging you to write articles with comprehensive coverage - whatever happened to the proseBuses in Colchester article you were going to write to replace List of bus routes in Colchester at its first AfD? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 17:40, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
As I have mentioned before, I couldn't find enough secondary sources to justify it. As much as I think a list of bus routes is perfectly fine in a list of bus routes, probably not quite in a prose article. Also, personally I'm not interested in history, so I take no pleasure in writing the article and for me that's the most important thing.  Adam Mugliston  talk  18:09, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
So where is this comprehensive coverage going to flourish from when Charles, Bob, and Myself are topic banned - if there are no secondary sources to write it from and you aren't interested in writing the comprehensive coverage? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 18:50, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
The comprehensive coverage relates to what I've previously said about their being a gap in Wikipedia's coverage. The comprehensiveness will come from the fact that we will finally be able to fill the gap for all major cities in the country.  Adam Mugliston  talk  19:25, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
The gap that you self identify as coming from the fact that secondary sources do not cover it so the only thing you can fill it with is primary sourced information and original research. It has been said to you many times over the past 4 or 5 years, but Wikipedia is an encyclopaedia. An encyclopaedia takes multiple secondary sources or tertiary sources and summarises them in a convenient format, so that the reader doesn't have to be an expert in the field to understand the secondaries or get overwhelmed by the raw data of the primary sources. What it does not is simply reformat and display the primary data (it's not a database) though it may contain carefully selected snippets of that primary data to support its synopsis of the secondaries. If people want the raw data it's reasonable for us to direct them to the location of it but there's no need for us to reprint it, reformatted or not. If you want to fill the gap, find the secondaries that do exist and use them - it's hard but it's worth the work when you create an article that manages to get to GA or FA and articles on Bus Routes have achieved that so it's your disinterest that's holding creating the gap and preventing our coverage being as comprehensive as it could be. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 21:54, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
It's funny, since what you described above is almost what I've been doing. As you said, people don't want to "get overwhelmed by the raw data of primary sources" and therefore I have summarised what is in the raw data into one simple table. As you can see, I have never added a timetable to an article. A list of bus routes, that is comprehensive, is very hard to find and requires knowledge of the subject to be found. Usually, you can get a list of route numbers (but not their destinations) or one route with destinations and a timetable, therefore a list of bus routes is a good compromise and nicely summarise the more detailed data available.  Adam Mugliston  talk  06:35, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
I'd also like to point one that I have never put original research into my work. As much as I have been accused of it several times, I have never put any in.  Adam Mugliston  talk  06:37, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
No what you're doing above is simply refactoring the raw timetable data it's not summarising that data, and you could do the same by pulling it out of a timetable database with an automated query. A Summary of it would be something like "Buses run by Stagecoach leave the Town Centre headed to Andover, Swansea, and Newport." which could go in a prose article. As for your second point you say above "On some occasions, I added a sentence which was unsourced. [...] As much as I understand that everything should be sourced, seeing the several unsourced articles, I decided that a sentence tagged on to a sourced paragraph would be fine." What do you think Original research is if it's not adding unsourced material to articles? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 08:22, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
A summary is not writing the whole thing. As I have already said, I have not written the timetable out but I have summarised several timetables into one list, by simply listing the routes. Original research would be if I went to say Brighton in this case and stood at a bus stop to see what type of bus came up. I found the information on a website, but I just did not link to it, as I didn't think it was worth it for a few words.  Adam Mugliston  talk  21:09, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Nope, feel free to check out the wiktionary definitions of wict:summarize "To review the key facts" and wict:refactor "To rewrite existing [Data/code/text] to improve it's readability without affecting it's meaning." The reality is an automated query to the UK NaPTAN or NPTDR databases could produce exactly these lists from the underlying timetable data. It wouldn't summarise which facts are actually key and review them to explain why they are key, and nor do you in your lists. On your second point, you're now defending your actions as not Original Research but either a copyright violation, or plagarism and you think this is better? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 06:40, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
The route is a key fact of a timetable. On the second point, you're now accusing me of things with no basis. Who ever said that I copied it word for word? I found information about other buses running and added a clause onto a sentence that this happened. Point out the copyvio here if you think there is one.  Adam Mugliston  talk  15:09, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
And in what way are those key facts reviewed, or in what way does it explain why this route is important - you continue to insist it is but have never shown any evidence for this position and current consensus is that they are not. On the second point you're running round in loops; there are three outcomes I've outlined 1. This is new information not found in any sources but you've seen by observation or extracted from raw data - this is Original Research, 2. This is information found in a source, copied word for word and not credited back to the original source - This is a Copyvio, 3. This is information found in a source, you've rewritten it into your own words but not credited the original source - This is Plagiarism. The lack of a source means that it's likely going to fall into at least one of these categories but without seeing the original diff I don't know which it is and I'm not going to specifically accuse you of a particular one (as you are claiming). There is an adage that when you're in a hole you should stop digging. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 16:13, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
I can't believe you're still bothering to argue about 6 words. 6 words. Really? Of all the original researched and unsourced things on here, you choose my 6 words. And to explain the situtation, the website I found listed the main type of bus and then others. I contracted that into a clause to mention other bus types operate. There's no OR (as I got it from a source, although didn't link to it), Copyvio (the website didn't give those exact words) or Plagiarism (the bus types were listed, it was a summary written completely differently to the website), therefore you have no argument, except I should've linked to it, which I know. Now let's quit arguing over 6 words and get back to the point of this AN.  Adam Mugliston  talk  16:39, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
If you know it was wrong and don't want to discuss it further, you might want to strikethrough the complaints about Charles reverting it in your statement above, otherwise it's perfectly reasonable to discuss the validity of your allegations. BTW representing someone else's research as your own no matter how much you've rewritten it is plagiarism. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 17:03, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
I never presented it as my own work. And my point is there is no need to argue about this further. I've proved your ideas wrong and the problem is sorted. In my statement, the point of it is not that Charles reverts my work, but that he turns up wherever I am. So drop it now, cause it's getting boring.  Adam Mugliston  talk  17:12, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Of course you did, if I check the article history and whose name is there, and who is licencing the work under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License I see your name but no reference to the person who wrote the original list so you've not proved any ideas wrong and it's not sorted - you just don't want to talk about it any more (which is surprising since you keep replying) because it's about the fact that Charles rightly corrected your error. Like Charles I have many bus related articles on my watchlist (many less now that they're getting deleted) not just related to you and RCSprinter (many you haven't even edited) so if I see a problematic edit I'm going to sort it nothing to do with stalking you. Your complaint about Charles, Bob, and I is boring you? You could have considered that before bringing it to the Admin noticeboard, but it's roughly how other editors feel when you keep insisting Wikipedia policy shouldn't apply to your actions or to the articles you write. Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 17:36, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Stop changing my words. This argument over, once again, 6 words, is boring me, not the entire AN. And rather than bugging me over such a small addition, why don't you address everything else that's not sourced properly?  Adam Mugliston  talk  17:40, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
You keep going on about "6 words" as if it has significance, the reason given for listing me in this AN is for using 2 words (which weren't directed at you or RCSprinter) are the additional 4 words more or less significant than that? If you're really that bored with it just stop discussing it and I won't have anything to reply to. You can also rest assured all articles on my watchlist are equally cleaned up if something unsourced or extremely poorly sourced is added . 20:09, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
The point of me "going on about 6 words" is that you could clean up articles with significantly more unsourced content, yet choose to bother about just a few words, which really does seem like it's because of me having added them. That's that and over with then.  Adam Mugliston  talk  20:14, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

And the point of me asking about this is because you have stated that writing on the subject of Bus routes will flourish if Charles, Bob, and I are topic banned. So feel free to instead of discussing your failure to comply with policy in creating/expanding bus articles -to demonstrate well written, policy compliant articles, on bus routes that have been adversely affected by our involvement? Stuart.Jamieson (talk) 20:34, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Davey2010[edit]

I see questions have been raised about me & Wilby - I don't know him nor anyone else off of Wikipedia nor are we related ... I'm just the lost sheep! Just thought i'd say... I may of read the above comment wrong but again Me & Adam don't know each other neither .... I like buses & all that but in the end I realized the lists were time consuming, out of date and well pointless, I didn't agree how the afd's were done but we all learn from our mistakes (me included!) →Davey2010→→Talk to me!→ 21:30, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Continued vandalism by User:DoubleVigie[edit]

About a week ago, I mentioned several users who were contray to a bunch of WP policies. The thread has now gone into archive: Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive792#please_block_User:.D0.9F.D0.B5.D1.82.D1.80_.D0.A3.D1.82.D1.91.D1.81_and_his_probable_sock_puppet_User:DoubleVigie (I think I mixed up the sock puppet and editor on the original post). User:DoubleVigie has continued to vandalize my talk page and talk pages of articles related to Benedict XVI on his own and with a using a new sock puppet / IP User:2a01:e34:edb4:cae0:94cd:d06d:1641:a6bb. Please block them both. Thanks. >> M.P.Schneider,LC (parlemusfeci) 09:44, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

User(s) blocked.. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:08, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


On this article, there is a great deal of contention, at least one block, and several warnings issued regarding adding the 3rd victim's name in the article. There is conflicting information regarding if BLP says we should, and there is at least some question as to the reliability of the information regarding the victim's name. There is a loose consensus to simply delay putting it in the article until we have better information, and some question about the family not wanting it in. While that isn't the primary consideration, the questionable verification concerns do reach into WP:BLP, and it would be helpful if some admin with solid BLP experience would visit and review. I'm not completely sure, but I think waiting until we have positive confirmation is the best way to go, but again, would prefer an outside view there. Thanks. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 20:06, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Change in policy regarding use of subpages?[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Has there been a change of policy regarding the use of subpages? If so, than you can ignore what is happening at Perth Agreement and Perth Agreement/Timetable. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Notwillywanka (talkcontribs) 20:21, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

It appears there is a brief discussion on the talk page about this, and it does not seem to be a contentious discussion. What was it you wanted from an admin in this situation? Beeblebrox (talk) 20:49, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
I think it should be made into a template. While it doesn't seem problematic in this specific situation, WP:SUB specifically indicates mainspace subpages aren't intended to be possible. :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:02, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
They're possible in the sense that we can create titles with subpage-style names (otherwise 9/11 would be impossible), but the software treats the slash as just another character for pages in mainspace. As a result, the software doesn't realise that Perth Agreement/Timetable is at all related to Perth Agreement, and someone could end up in the timetable by clicking Special:Random. Nyttend (talk) 00:28, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Move discussion - Bioncentrism[edit]

Can an uninvolved admin please weigh up the consensus for the contentious discussion here: Talk:Biocentrism_(theory_of_everything)#Requested_move (some of the move proposals require an admin as well). Bear in mind there was off-wiki canvassing evident in the discussion. IRWolfie- (talk) 09:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Resized file backlog[edit]

Hello, admins: There's currently a backlog of nearly 2,200 files at Category:Rescaled fairuse files more than 7 days old whose old revisions need to be deleted. Any help would be appreciated! —Theopolisme (talk) 12:22, 14 April 2013 (UTC)

Ah, the joys of having two different things that I'm avoiding doing... I just knocked it down from 2168 to 1968. I'll try to zap a few more after I actually do the stuff I'm avoiding. :) EVula // talk // // 01:07, 15 April 2013 (UTC)
I knocked off a handful, where the original was over 100K. What's the rationale for deleting an image if it is under 100K?--SPhilbrick(Talk) 18:10, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Never mind, answered my own question.--SPhilbrick(Talk) 20:17, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
The main problem is that the old revisions violate WP:NFCC#7. --Stefan2 (talk) 15:17, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

NFCR[edit]

WP:NFCR is backlogged again, can I get an admin to close 9 requests? these have all been open for at least 4 months, one that goes back 10 months. The sections are:

Thanks, Werieth (talk) 14:29, 15 April 2013 (UTC)

Anyone? Werieth (talk) 13:17, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
*echo** Images-related discussions are an area that a number of admins stay away from, you might have better luck by directly pinging regular closers? :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:30, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Come on guys, I would ask the regular closers except there are none. Werieth (talk) 18:30, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Try B (talk · contribs) or Diannaa (talk · contribs). They have closed a lot of discussions at WP:PUF and WP:FFD recently and might be able to help. --Stefan2 (talk) 23:37, 17 April 2013 (UTC)
Good grief ... we're reaching a year on some of these? (I'm looking now.) --B (talk) 21:23, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
One despairs, one really does. -- Dianna (talk) 23:50, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
The ones on the above list are all done. ---B (talk) 00:25, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Please create 🙈🙉🙊 with the text

#REDIRECT [[Three wise monkeys]] {{R from alternative spelling}}

Thanks. I can't because the title is blacklisted. — The Great Redirector 05:47, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

What kind of black magick is this? Killiondude (talk) 05:54, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
👍 Like Damn it, I wanted to create that... Chamal TC 06:13, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Well, much as I like it, I can't really see anyone typing it in as a search term -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:28, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Agree with Boing ... that's an implausible redirect (✉→BWilkins←✎) 09:27, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Those are the unicode symbols for each of the monkeys, and as the Unicode Spec V 6.00 says about them, "The core emoji sets used by Japanese cell phone carriers contain a large number of characters for emoticon images, and most of the characters in this block are from those sets". Because of this I thought it's quite possible that the emoji-loving Japanese would like to use them. Well, no big deal either way I guess. Chamal TC 12:43, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
For what it's worth, the Japanese Wikipedia doesn't even have that as a redirect[3]. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 13:03, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
The real question is, where should WP:🙈🙉🙊 redirect to? --Floquenbeam (talk) 13:53, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Nowhere on en.Wikipedia: --Anthonyhcole (talk · contribs · email) 13:56, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, you're probably right. Are there icons for "see evil everywhere", "hear evil everywhere", and "speak evil everywhere"? --Floquenbeam (talk) 13:59, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
What's that? Make it a redirect to WP:AGF, you say? Well alright then, if you insist. EVula // talk // // 04:23, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Well, beware. Some administrators like deleting redirects involving the monkeys. Killiondude (talk) 05:24, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Those characters don't even display properly in the browser on my Japanese smartphone. I think they're only supported in the messaging apps. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 17:52, 16 April 2013 (UTC)
It displays in iOS (Safari). Viriditas (talk) 04:14, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
iOS running FF here and it displays them. Killiondude (talk) 05:24, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I'm Firefox on a Windows 7 machine and it displays fine. And shouldn't WP:🙈🙉🙊 redirect to ANI? --B (talk) 22:44, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Yellow Infoboxes[edit]

Can someone point me to the discussion regarding changing all the infobox to have a light yellow background. I edit less than I have in the past, so I miss things. The last few times I've been on I've noticed that the infoboxes are yellow. I thought this was just a change to the specific infobox on the articles I was reading, but it appears that this has been a universal change to all infoboxes. Thx in advance. --Trödel 16:57, 18 April 2013 (UTC) (PS I tried searching the wikipedia, mediawiki, template and associated talk namespaces and can't find it)

I'm not seeing any yellow infoboxes - can you please give us a link to one specifically that is yellow? -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:01, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Interesting - its a very light shade of yellow. Oviedo, Adam Scott (golfer) for example. Also compare Template:Infobox Latter Day Saint biography#Examples with Brigham Young. (also checking my custom css pages - I'm using the Vector skin) --Trödel 17:09, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Nope, no yellow for me (I'm using Vector with no custom .css). The infobox background for me is exactly the same as the page background. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:24, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks - I'll look into my css. --Trödel 17:37, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I'm seeing the infoboxes linked with a very light grey background, assumed that was normal. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 20:51, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Closing RfCs[edit]

We seem to have a big problem with open RfCs. We have a significant backlog, and Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Requests for closure has been used for clearing the backlog. However, now the vast majority of pending requests have been archived, and it seems that no-one will ever do anything about the pending RfCs. Would someone be able to restore the pending close requests to the page? StAnselm (talk) 23:39, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

They are months old in some cases and don't need to be closed, so I've archived them. If you can see individual RfCs that really do need to be closed, those can be restored, but bear in mind that not all RfCs need formal closure. The problem with the page is that User:Cunard added several old RfCs to it at once, which created an apparent backlog. See the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Administrators' noticeboard/Requests for closure. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

Alan Liefting and long blocks[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I'm just going to leave these here, without comment – make up your own mind. Take a look at the first. It's my view that there's something wrong here and it's obvious from that first link. If it's not obvious, maybe I'm wrong, then there's discussion of it at the second link. Andy Dingley (talk) 15:01, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

The situation here is that Alan Liefting has an edit restriction due to long-term complaints about his category-related edits and numerous previous warnings [4]. The restriction is completely objective: "Alan Liefting may not make any category-related edits outside of mainspace until and unless this topic ban is lifted." Since the restriction was established, Alan Liefting has violated it on numerous occasions. As described at [5], he appealed the restriction twice, and the appeals were not successful. He specifically agreed to follow the restriction as part of one unblock [6], but then went back to violating it. The reason that the current block is for three months is that shorter block lengths have not been effective. The first blocks were much shorter, but Alan Liefting declined to change his editing despite the community's clear request in the form of an editing restriction. — Carl (CBM · talk) 16:10, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Blocks should be done as a preventative measure to prevent harm to the pedia, not to make a point or as punishment which seems to be the case. If Alan was doing something that as a harm, I would agree with a block, sanction or not. Since the edits Alan was doing were improvements and not contentious, there is no need for a block and certainly not one of this length. Additionally, I agree with Andy's assessment that the block log appears that CBM has taken an unhealthy interest in ensuring this user is blocked. Both issues of too long of blocks and edit stalking needs to be addressed IMO. Kumioko (talk) 16:29, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
The relevant question is only whether Alan has violated his edit restriction against making "any category-related edits outside of mainspace". In fact, he has, and the purpose of the block is to prevent him from continuing to do so. — Carl (CBM · talk) 17:25, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Just some general comments to address some of the criticism raised here, without offering a specific opinion on the merits of the most recent block. Edit restrictions and/or topic bans are imposed when a community discussion has determined based on repeated, past experience that an editor cannot be trusted to do a certain thing. If the editor nevertheless continues to do that thing, the only way to address it is after the fact with a block, and that block is not only to stop the edits but to act as a deterrent to prevent future harm to Wikipedia (i.e., more of the restricted edits), contra Kumioko's characterization of it as punishment. Such edit restrictions and consequent blocks are applied frequently enough that it doesn't seem at all helpful for Kumioko to complain of that method being applied here as if it is unique to this case.

As for the fact that CBM has been the sole admin to block Alan for violating his topic ban, that doesn't necessarily mean CBM has been hounding him or acting inappropriately; I can think of at least one instance in which I've regularly monitored the contributions of someone under a topic ban and was apparently the only one doing so. The nature of an absolute ban or restriction on making a certain kind of edit is that it isn't permitted regardless of its merit, the whole point for the restriction being the community does not trust the editor to make that judgment for himself, and the only way to avoid whatever problems it was causing is to make the restriction absolute. This necessarily requires some monitoring, as those who have watchlisted affected articles but are unfamiliar with the editor's history are not going to notice anything amiss. That said, when I was monitoring that restricted user, I did not block him myself but instead in each instance posted a notice to ANI, and another admin then blocked them. So perhaps CBM should do the same thing in the future. Sometimes it's good to step back and let someone else act even if only to avoid your continued involvement raising the appearance of something personal even if done in good faith. postdlf (talk) 17:41, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Alan's restrictions were imposed by the community. He has appealed them a few times and those appeals have been denied by the community. No exemptions were provided for edits that break the letter of the topic ban but may be helpful anyway, the idea was and is that he is not to make such edits. Therefore the only questions we should be asking are:
  • Did Alan violate the letter of his community imposed topic ban?
  • Is CBM in violation of WP:INVOLVED?
If the answers arem, respectively, yes and no, there is no problem except Alan's apparent unwillingness or inability to abide by the terms the community has set for him to contribute here. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:59, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I think the "punishment" should fit the crime. The honest to god truth is I don't really care if an editor violates a topic ban as long as the edits being made aren't 1) contentious and 2) are correct. In this case the answer to those quetions are that the edits were not contentious (except the topic ban) and they were correct. I am familiar with the background of the topic ban and I think it had some merit when it was implemented. I also think that Alan has mostly abided by it and has not done the same types of contentious changes he was doing before. The over arching problem I have with these kinds of cases is the utter haphazard way we enforce them. Sometimes we look the other way and sometimes we enforce them, when we feel like it and the admin that takes it for action gets nearly unlimited authority to establish the length of block of their choice. I am not very popular here, I get that and frankly I don't really care anymore. But we cannot simply block every editor that is trying to make changes just because we feel like it. It doesn't really surprise me that the community didn't overturn the sanction. They rarely do. People are quick to vote to implement a sanction but its historically impossible to revoke one. Not that I think for a second it will be taken seriously. I don't really expect for folks to agree with me but that's how I feel. A few things I think should comem out of this discussion. Sanctions should have term limits. Blocks for them should have a limit. CBM is too involved in this case and needs to step aside and let another admin handle it, I think Alan was doing useful edits regardless of the sanction (IAR should probably apply here since several made it very clear to me a couple days ago that sanctions are not exempt from it) and I think I am completely wasting my time by commenting because no one really cares that good edits aren't getting done. We are no longer worried about creating an encyclopedia, we are more worried these days about ensuring that a sanction isn't violated and a policy isn't followed. END OF RANT!Kumioko (talk) 18:46, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
"The honest to god truth is I don't really care if an editor violates a topic ban as long as the edits being made aren't 1) contentious and 2) are correct." Then it's not a topic ban; it's not anything at all but the status quo before the restriction was imposed. postdlf (talk) 19:36, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Its not anything anyway. Its a meaningless determination really. We should all be here to build an encyclopedia. Not to sanction users so that they cannot contribute. A big problem with WP these days is too much time is spenting fighting about shit like this and arguing why some helpful contribution violated a sanction, ban or block rather than looking at the edit itself. If Alan was an admin this would have been swept under the rug long ago. Because he is an editor though its a national case. Admins on this site are allowed unlimited power to block and ban users and quite a few of them use their tools abusively. No one cares about them. But let a user edit an article that's only remotely associated to a topic ban (Russavia), create a category (Alan Leifting) or use excel to edit an article (Rich F) and they are blocks for months. I am becoming more and more convinced that Admins on this site are doing more to destroy it than the vandals they should be protecting it from. That includes CBM with his singluar attention to Alan's edits and a number of other vocal admins on this site. The sooner we disolve the Admin cabal the better! Kumioko (talk) 20:15, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Note: Alan should be given a means to respond. I suggest that material be included or copied from his talk page, as a restriction to only edit here might not be followed, due to the fact he has violated specific objective restrictions. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:27, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
    The last time he had an AN/only unblock, he did violate it once, but self-reverted. I'll leave it to others to decide whether he can be trusted with an ANI/only unblock. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:36, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
    I would prefer to see things copied here, if he wishes to respond more than he already has [7]. Moreover, per the outcome of a previous appeal [8], he is not permitted to appeal again until the end of this month. The issue here is simply that he declines to follow the edit restriction, it's not an especially complicated situation. — Carl (CBM · talk) 19:18, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • It is inappropriate to bring this matter up here, Andy. You've been here long enough to know that the way this board functions is to maximise the dignity and powers of administrators. It is not a place to seek fairness for a content builder. Still, this long punitive block, following the even longer punitive block of Rich F, establishes new precedents in the ease with which administrators can now put down even notable long term productive editors. --Epipelagic (talk) 19:51, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I agree completely with Epi. This is the Administrators board not the fairness to the user board. Decisions here are frequently not about doing the right thing but protecting the administrator with the vested interests. Kumioko (talk) 20:15, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I no longer have any idea if either of you are joking or serious. 8-( Maybe you're not being serious here, but there's no shortage of admins who would be. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:59, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Kumioko's complaint is based on two deeply mistaken ideas, which I think we should explicitly disown:
  • that an admin who blocks a user several times thereby becomes "involved" so that further interaction with that user indicates an "unhealthy interest",
  • that editing restrictions can be ignored if the result is "useful".
JohnCD (talk) 20:10, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
On the first topic though of CBM not being involved because he has blocked this user multiple times. Its also because he goes out of his way to follow the user around until he finds something to block him for. On the second issue, what I really think is that editing restrictions and topic bans should have a limit. Maybe a year or in some cases shorter just like a block. If you have a topic ban on not creating categories and you stay here long enough you are going to violate it. Accidentally or otherwise. Otherwise we are just setting the user up for failure later on. But it really doesn't matter what I think because I am here to help build an encyclopedia. The only reason I even get involved in these discussions is because I have grown to completely lack faith in many of the admins and feel like someone needs to stand up to them and their abuse. WP used to be a very fun place to edit and a lot of editors I work with were enjoyable to be around. Over the years this place has become more cutthroat and toxic and much less fun due in large part to bully admins that are allowed to do whatever they want, once they get the tools, with no fear that they will ever lose the tools. That needs to change. CBM is involved and he needs to let another administrator step in. Kumioko (talk) 20:23, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
It sounds to me like CBM is doing exactly what he is supposed to do. Just because you disagree that topic bans should exist does not entitle you to denounce CBM for acting in good faith according to the currently existing community consensus and established practices. If you think topic bans shouldn't exist, you need to establish community consensus for that opinion to have weight. Otherwise, you are frankly wasting your breathe. The idea that Wikipedia should just be 'fun' without any enforcement of rules seems like a recipe for disaster. Kaldari (talk) 20:49, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
When you refer to topic bans, Kaldari, I assume you are talking about the edit restrictions Alan and Rich F were placed under. These restrictions are just rules made up and imposed by admins. In the case of Alan, and particularly Rich F, these rules were "gotcha traps", set in such a way that over time the editors would stumble into them. That would be fine if there was a culture where admins also threw flexibility, common sense and a pinch of basic decency into the mix. We do get that approach at times, for example it can happen when Dennis Brown is involved. But admins of that calibre are not numerous on Wikipedia. Instead, many admins go for rigid rule-based approaches, such as we see here, which presupposes that the rules they made up themselves are sacrosanct. This approach has obvious attractions. Once the rules have been set, admins need do no further work. That can just wait for the targeted editor to err, and then remain in a state of suspended intelligence while they allow their knees to jerk with programmed responses. However restful this approach may be for the involved admins, it is a disaster at building trust with the editor community. --Epipelagic (talk) 21:41, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Any admin can observe Alan's edits and step in. Yet they haven't - Carl gets there first. Every time. I'm not going to poke that with a chi-squared test, but it looks to be statistically most unlikely that it's anything other than an "unhealthy interest".
We don't need this. Alan isn't a serious problem. He doesn't need to be stalked like this. In the spirit of collegial editing, even under a topic ban, he shouldn't be stalked like this. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:57, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Some admins unfortunately take blocking way too lightly. Gosh. Three months. Does the blocking admin realize just how long that is? ... ~ DanielTom (talk) 21:47, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
    • I do realize how long it is. The first block for violating the topic ban was much shorter: 72 hours. Alan Liefting had the opportunity since then to file several appeals, but they were not successful and the restriction has not been changed. A fair process has been followed. The reason this block is so long is simply that Alan has worked through all the shorter block lengths. At any point he could have begun to follow the restriction, and avoid another, longer block. — Carl (CBM · talk) 22:06, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Yes, Carl is obviously keeping an eye on Alan. The community (not admins, the community at large) has placed restrictions on alan. Carl is following the terms of those restrictions, which have no listed exceptions and call for escalating blocks each time Alan is found to be in violation. I agree that in most cases rigid adherence to rules is a bad thing, but Alan's severe WP:IDHT behavior does not make one at all confident that granting exceptions in cases where he clearly violated those terms, which he is perfectly aware of, would be wise. We are way, way beyond AGF here, Alan has been told what the community expects of him, and has, by his actions, sent a clear message that he does not respect the community's will and will violate the topic ban if he wants. Carl blocks him each time because Carl is apparently watching for violations. How are we to blame him for remaining vigilant in doing what the community has said it wants done in this situation? As I said before, the problem here is alan's refusal to abide by what is a very simple and easy to follow restriction. Block lenghts have been escalated each time, per the terms the community imposed. Frankly I would have gone for an indef block by now as it is clear alan has no intention of sticking to the terms of the ban. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:53, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Well I guess I really don't have what it takes to be an admin after all. I still believe in the good old days when blocks were only used to prevent harm to the pedia. Sanction or not, if there is no harm done then we aren't preventing anything and the block is punitive in nature. Bottom line! There is no doubt that Alan is creating some categories outside of mainspace but he certainly is not doing the same types of edits that were done prior to the sanction so IMO he is still upholding the spirit of it. I also still agree with Andy above that CBM is taking an unhealthy interest in Alan's edits. Admins on this site are block happy these days and there are no shortage of admins who are willing to jump in and enforce a sanction. Yet CBM is the first in every case for the last several "violations"? When he does few other edits at all. Its truly troubling but then again as I said above. Admins are above reproach on this site and everyone knows that once an admin makes a decision it must be the right one. There are always a few peers to jump in and back them up. Kumioko (talk) 23:59, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
And yet knowing all that you waste your time here. The logic of what administrators like CBM do is that prevention is ensured by escalating punishments. Surely nobody really believes the "blocks are preventative, not punitive" party line any longer? Malleus Fatuorum 00:06, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Sure Alan has WP:IDHT problems and at times can be high maintenance. So can be many admins. On balance Alan's overall input is decidedly positive, and it's now been lost to Wikipedia because admins will not, or lack the skills to develop more flexible and human ways of dealing with editor issues. I didn't come here to contribute under a harsh regime operating a rigid quasi-legal system which treats content builders as though they were criminals. It is staggering, the number of admins here who seem unable to distinguish long term committed and competent content builders from vandals. I continue to contribute because I think Wikipedia is a great project which shouldn't be allowed to crumble just because it is let down by a dysfunctional admin system. I still have faith that it is this admin system, which devalues and disempowers its content builders, that will eventually crumble and be replaced by something more positive.
As an example of the way admins make themselves special by sanctifying their rules, look at the statement above: "The community (not admins, the community at large) has placed restrictions on alan." This appeal to some imaginary "community at large" is used to place on a pedestal an arbitrary restriction made up by a tiny handful of admins. --Epipelagic (talk) 00:37, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Alan's edit restriction was unreasonably broad, in my opinion, but I accept that the community decided otherwise. Alan deliberately ignored the restriction, and I expected this block would come. Process has been followed, and Wikipedia is the worse for it.-gadfium 00:47, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
  • Since when did you become elevated to "the community-at-large", Beyond My Ken. --Epipelagic (talk) 05:01, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Guys, I've found a really odd article that might need some eyes. Have a look at Kayvan abbassi. It was created by an editor named Abbasi Keyvan (talk · contribs), then edited almost exclusively by Sledgepotk (talk · contribs), before being nominated for deletion via redlinked AFD tag by - wait for it - Kayvanabbassi (talk · contribs). All three accounts are exclusive to this article - Abbasi Keyvan and Kaybanabbasi have made their only edits adding content to this article, while the third account's only edits blanked much of that content (only to have it restored by IPs). I don't know if the subject would survive an actual AFD, and was inclined to delete it out of hand as an A7 speedy, but the original version seemed to claim notability. So, since I'm about to leave anyway, I figured I'd punt. My focus is what to do with the article, and as such (and due to time), I have not yet notified the editors named here; if someone wants to do that for me, I'd appreciate it. Thanks! UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 20:34, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

  • The AFD didn't create the new page, looks like either a copy/paste or borked twinkle edit. That is odd, particularly the one that keeps deleting, piecemeal. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 20:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Precisely. The AFD showed up on Snotbot's Bad AFD log as an article with no debate tagged for AFD. Normally, I'd complete it if there's a rationale or tell the editor who tagged it to formulate a rationale. But given the strange edit history here, I didn't know how to proceed - is one of them the subject? Or the other? What about the third guy? UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 12:51, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
As the "article" is now no more than a list of external links, I have tagged it for A1 deletion.--ukexpat (talk) 19:08, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Any admins able to help with WP:RM/TR real quick?[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Surprisingly, WP:RM/TR has a 2-day backlog ... which almost never happens. I managed to perform as many of the moves as I could as a non-admin that were truly technical moves, but I cannot perform the rest. Steel1943 (talk) 02:05, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Boston Marathon bombing suspect[edit]

Closing to prevent further attention to someone unrelated to the event. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 13:30, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

I just deleted the above linked article and protected it from recreation per WP:BLP. As I suspect this will draw attention, and I'm about to go to bed (3 AM here), any admin should feel free to reverse/adjust my actions as needed. This is related to the Boston Marathon bombings. AuburnPilot (talk) 07:42, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

At least as of now, what you've done seems like a good idea. No reason to publish negative info on someone we don't know all the facts about. -- King of ♠ 08:08, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
I understand that the case of Sunil Tripathi, and the strange transmogrification of his story from a missing Brown student to redacted per BLP. I don't know what the right course of action is for situations like this, but I would like to point out that redacted per BLP he was already notable as a minor national missing persons case. His odd disappearance was featured on many news programs, including Good Morning America. redacted per BLP but I think deleting the page simply because it didn't have enough sources in it, especially since so many reliable sources exist on him, is the wrong course of action. I would ask that you take whatever steps are needed to review this on Friday morning. AdRem (talk) 09:22, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Good deletion. There is no hard evidence of any connection to these events, only rumor and speculation that has now been challenged by verifiable reporting by an NBC News anchor. Law enforcement sources told Pete Williams that Tripathi is not a suspect at all - that the rumors and speculation are incorrect. Maybe his sources are wrong, but until we have hard facts, we should not speculate. polarscribe (talk) 09:36, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

AdRem (talk) 09:58, 19 April 2013 (UTC) redacted per BLP AdRem (talk) 09:58, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Absolutely not. There is a huge, huge, huge question that they are the two suspects. There is not a single reliable source to be found for the name of any suspect and, in fact, one major American news network (NBC) has gone on record and specifically refuted the claim that Trepathi is a suspect, citing information from "multiple" law enforcement sources who have stated that the suspects are foreigners who have been in the U.S. for no more than a year and received military training overseas, and that specifically the rumored names being tossed around are incorrect. You are right that information is rapidly changing, and at this point, it is changing to look like the amateur Internet detectives went and falsely accused yet another person of being a terrorist. polarscribe (talk) 10:06, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Per WP:NOTNEWS, WP isn't here to be made continuously up to date like a news ticker on CNN. The fact that so much information is coming out, much of it speculative, is an especially good reason to hold off the creation of any potention BLP violating articles. Blackmane (talk) 10:10, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
redacted per BLP — Preceding unsigned comment added by AdRem (talkcontribs) 10:22, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
The fact that names were mentioned on a police radio is not proof that they have been positively identified. I have been watching and listening to this all night and morning and there has never been verification of any names coming from any source other than this police radio. Lots of stuff goes out on police/fire radios that ends up being wrong. They are not "unmistakably the guys" and you are violating BLP by the very act of talking about them in this manner. polarscribe (talk) 10:32, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
I apologize for my impassioned language if it offended you--I'm absolutely exhausted, and, candidly, as a result, I've been less judicious in my word choice and framing than I otherwise would be. Separate Tripathi from the Boston bombing story completely, and Tripathi has still been a notable, national, if minor story for weeks. I think there's a very strong argument to be made that it would still have been notable as the national missing person story it started out as in the weeks prior. That's all I'm saying. I don't know when the article was created, but I would imagine it was before the Boston Bombing story crossed into it. If there was an article before the bombing suspect angle, I think it was questionable to delete it after that angle appeared just because that portion of the article may have been tenuous. I'm obviously not a big fan of sudden page deletions, because undoing those deletions, assuming such a thing is merited, involves SO much red tape, and in the meantime, people are deprived of the benefit of article that can change and grow.AdRem (talk) 11:00, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Best way to avoid that people feel the need to add this to the Boston article, is by adding something like the following: "The media has reported on possible names of the suspects, but have not been able to confirm these names as suspects". It's a bit of a disclaimer, but it will satisfy peoples need for 'up to date' information, while at the same time not totally ignoring our rules. —TheDJ (talkcontribs) 10:29, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

The Associated Press is now reporting that the suspects are from Russia, near Chechnya. This whole set of accusations has been nothing more than another bunch of amateur Internet detectives labeling an innocent person as a terrorist. I request that this section be archived, if not deleted entirely, per WP:BLP. The sooner this person's name is taken out of circulation regarding these attacks, the better. polarscribe (talk) 10:42, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

Heads up[edit]

The Texas explosion has a fledgling article already - West Fertilizer Plant explosion - and I expect this will be much like the Boston Marathon bombings article in terms of edit pace. I'm sure it will get lots of attention but extra admin eyes from the start would be useful. Cheers, Stalwart111 04:21, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Actually, looks like it is doing well without semi-protection, which is a good thing. I will try to peek in from time to time. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 20:45, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Looks like someone added PC1 protection to the page. Maybe I will warm up to it later, but I really don't care for PC1, especially on these busier pages. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 03:13, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

There are 2 request at that page for almost 2 weeks. I beleive an administrator should go and watch that page.--Pratyya (Hello!) 09:43, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

  • checkY Both done this morning. —Theopolisme (talk) 00:48, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

Backlog at the AWB Checkuser page[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


There is a pretty big backlog at the AutoWikiBrowser CheckPage. Would someone familiar with this process and has admin rights mind taking a look? Kumioko (talk) 18:57, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Improper use of speedy deletion, asking for article restoration and review of admin's use of deletion tools[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Deb (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) speedy deleted the article Beautiful Store under "G11: Unambiguous advertising or promotion". G11 states: "Pages that are exclusively promotional, and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic. Note: An article about a company or a product which describes its subject from a neutral point of view does not qualify for this criterion". The article has been userfied at User:Piotrus/Beautiful Store, and I think it is clear it does not fall under G11. I asked Deb for it to be restored, he refused, citing poor now poor grammar (discussion can be reviewed at User_talk:Piotrus#Deleted_AGAIN_how_should_we_do.3F and User_talk:Deb#Beautiful_Store_deletion. I do not dispute that the article suffers from poor (even very poor...) grammar, this, however, is not a criteria for speedy deletion (articles with poor grammar should simply be tagged wit {{Cleanup-english}}/{{Grammar}}). I told Deb he is welcome to prod or AfD it, if he still thinks the grammar is so bad as to warrant a deletion, but he still refuses to restore an article. I am therefore asking for 1) it to be restored due to improper use of speedy (with no prejudice for an AfD), and 2) for Deb actions to be reviewed. I am sure he acted in good faith, but I think he misunderstands when to use speedy (this is clearly not a G11, and grammar is not a speedy criteria), and needs to be cautioned (in a good faithed, friendly manner) to be more careful with the deletion tool. PS. Disclaimer: the user who created the article is a student in a course I am an instructor/ambassador for. PPS. Deb will be notified of this AN thread in a second. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:19, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Looking at the article I would have probably have deleted it too, it is very promtional, phrases like "Other than repairing the donated stuffs and reselling business, such as a beautiful Saturday, a beautiful apartment, sharing schools, shops moving companies or government agencies are campaigning to spread the culture of sharing and re-us" are blatant spam - The only way I could see it being a decent article is if it was started again from scratch - as the courses instructor it is your responsibility to ensure these students are aware of the standards we expect. If action is taken here it should be that you educate GaHee and his fellow students about how to properly add to Wikipedia--Jac16888 Talk 11:26, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Do you even know what spam stands for? If you think some sentences are overly promotional (and I disagree on describing the one above as such), they can be simply deleted, leaving the rest of the content in the article. And the article clearly has some usable content, explaining the readers what this NGO does. For the record, this Korean NGO is similar to Oxfam. Looking at Oxfam lead, I see the following unreferenced text "In all Oxfam’s actions, the ultimate goal is to enable people to exercise their rights and manage their own lives. Oxfam works directly with communities and seeks to influence the powerful, to ensure that poor people can improve their lives and livelihoods and have a say in decisions that affect them. Each organization (Affiliate) works together internationally to achieve a greater impact through collective efforts." This seems about as promotional and non-neutral as the stuff in the deleted article - are you going to delete Oxfam now? :) Of course, nobody is going to delete Oxfam. Perhaps it needs to be tagged with {{Advert}} (which, btw, does not redirect to WP:SPEEDY, and if anyone would try to speedy articles in Category:Articles with a promotional tone it would be a quick path to being stripped of admin powers...). In both articles perhaps a few sentences simply need to go (promotional speak...), but speedy deleting an article about a notable organization is way to much - for anything, but an abuse of admin tools by someone who doesn't want to be bothered with a proper procedure. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:35, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Otherstuff? The article is clearly and blatantly written from a promotional pov, if you educated its creator in how to edit Wikipedia then you did not do your job properly--Jac16888 Talk 11:43, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
I, too, would have deleted this. The tone is fundamentally promotional and this article needs to be re-written completely. Articles that describe the subject's "mission" in the opening paragraph are practically never worth keeping. Basalisk inspect damageberate 11:48, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Otherstuff is irrelevant here, as Oxfam page does not even carry promotional warning template, thus the cited example is for an acceptable content. Second, the primary problem is that G11 does not allow deletion of pages suffering from promotional tone; while I increasingly feel I am talking to the wall here, {{Advert}} and Category:Articles with a promotional tone are not candidates for speedy. G11 states, to quote it again, that it allows for deletion of pages that "that are exclusively promotional, and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to become encyclopedic." The BS article was not "exclusively promotional", thus while quite possibly a valid target for being tagged with {{Advert}}, it is not a valid target for speedy deletion. Let's also take a look at {{Template:Db-g11}}. It states that the target article in its "current form serves only to promote an entity, person or product". Well, this article was doing more then just promoting it, it was informing about it (for example the first lead sentence is quite clear and non-promotional "Beautiful Store(아름다운 가게) was launched in 2002 as an example to the Oxfam shop, is a not-for-profit organizations and social enterprises."). To quote further from G11 template: "Nor does this criterion apply where substantial encyclopedic content would remain after removing the promotional material; in this case please remove the promotional material yourself, or add the {{advert}} tag to alert others to do so.". And again, this article has many parts that are clearly non-promotional, and would remain a valid stub/start class article even after removing problematic sentences. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:52, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Also, since you're concerned about "proper procedure", the correct process for what you're trying to do would have been to take it to deletion review, and then if there are still concerns come here and ask for a review of the administrative actions taken. Basalisk inspect damageberate 11:50, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, will head to DRV. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 11:53, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Note:Text of the article in question can now be found at User:GaHee Park/sandbox.Deb (talk) 11:59, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • That should never have been in articlespace. That should have remained a WP:USERSPACEDRAFT until it was ready-to-go, which will take a lot of work. Bad judgement and horrible expectation-setting by anyone who encouraged (now discouraged) this new editor (✉→BWilkins←✎) 12:17, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • It's not a good idea for an admin to CSD borderline articles; CSD should be a two editor process -- an editor to apply a CSD tag and then a separate editor with sysop bit to evaluate and confirm / deny the CSD. Obviously vandalism / trolling articles should be deleted on sight, but this article is just really badly written as opposed to being obviously promotional. Difficult for me to assess as the references appear to be in Korean. NE Ent 12:43, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
The only thing wrong with that article is its grammar. Once it's been written to a pass-class level of English, it should be restored.--Launchballer 12:50, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Please note that the discussion about undeleting the article is at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2013 April 21. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 12:53, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

With a bit of searching I've found a few English links that might be of some use...

-- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 13:09, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Thanks, thorough notability is not an issue. You may want to add those sources to the student's talk page at User talk:GaHee Park, I am sure she'd appreciate any assistance. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 13:28, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Sure, I'll go and do that -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 13:30, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
Done -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 13:37, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Revocation of talk page access for User:Sir Gawain McGarson[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


This is a sockpuppet I blocked in August of 2012 at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Lucretius. Since then, it has gone through some unblock reviews and he has pretty much devoted his talk page to soapboxing, in particular against the system and myself. I've much left it alone for a long time, it is pretty normal to vent and be upset and I'm not a stickler for how someone uses their talk page, but this is a sockpuppet and their only use is to update and refine a series of soapboxing posts. The fact that this has been the only edits and it has gone on for an extended period of time indicates he has no intention of using the talk page for anything remotely acceptable under our user talk page policies. They should be requesting unblock via their master account anyway. Since I'm the central figure of this soapboxing, I bring it here to allow administrative review of my actions in revoking talk page access. It is doubtful that many people watch his talk page, as this sock had few edits outside of his talk page, and my actions were based on what I felt any reasonable admin would have done. If any admin feels that I have acted in a biased way, prematurely or should not have revoked access for any reason, I invite them to revert, and notify me afterwards. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 13:34, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

While I was reading your message, I opened a link to the userpage so that I could revoke talk page access as soon as I finished reading. If anyone complain about WP:INVOLVED, let me know and I'll re-revoke it, since I don't remember even hearing of this person before. Nyttend (talk) 13:58, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

WBB ban appeal[edit]

I know this has already been requested at ANRFC, but can someone completely uninvolved in past disputes with Will, the BASC, or any of the individual arbitrators assess the consensus and close the RFC for the Will Beback ban appeal. Thanks. On an unrelated and very sad note, Dreadstar, one of the administrators involved in the WBB case, has unfortunately left Wikipedia. Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 03:32, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

I took a look at it as I believe I am uninvolved, but I really don't know what it is. At least in my view, it's not an RfC or even an RfC/U. I've read what User:SlimVirgin wants ("a summary of the RfC's consensus on the various issues"), but if I hadn't read that and I were to "close" it, that wouldn't have been what I would have done. Considering the breadth of issues discussed on that page, summarizing all of them would be a significant task and I don't believe it would be productive or appropriate. The RfC (I'll call it that only because everyone else is calling it that) has a proposal. I would focus on that proposal if I were to close it.--Bbb23 (talk) 13:04, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi Bbb, if you're willing to close it, please go ahead as you see fit. SlimVirgin (talk) 16:33, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
This is also currently discussed at BASC. Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 16:46, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

GoodDay banned[edit]

The Arbitration Committee has resolved by motion that:

In remedy 2 of Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/GoodDay, GoodDay (talk · contribs) was warned that "in the event of additional violations of Wikipedia's conduct policies (especially of the nature recorded in this decision as findings of fact), substantial sanctions, up to a ban from the project, may be imposed without further warning by the Arbitration Committee". It is apparent from the submissions in this amendment request that GoodDay has engaged in further violations of Wikipedia's conduct policies. Accordingly, GoodDay is banned from the English Wikipedia for a period of no less than one year. After one year has elapsed, a request may be made for the ban to be lifted. Any such request must address all the circumstances which led to this ban being imposed and demonstrate an understanding of and intention to refrain from similar actions in the future.

For the Arbitration Committee, Callanecc (talkcontribslogs) 00:41, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Discuss this

Account creator permission usage[edit]

Hello everyone, I have started a discussion at WT:PERM regarding the use and assignment of the account creator flag. I thought I would let the people affected by this know. -- DQ on the road (ʞlɐʇ) 01:31, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

2013 and Boston Marathon bombing[edit]

Resolved

An uninvolved admin should check talk:2013 and see if consensus exists to list the Boston Marathon bombings on the year's article. Hot Stop (Talk) 21:07, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Hi everyone. There is a long backlog at CAT:EP awaiting edits to protected pages. Can someone take a look at it, since some items are even as old as two weeks? Thanks. — Peterwhy 09:15, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Request for Standard offer - MidnightBlueMan[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Unblock Request

I received UTRS Ticket #7429 from User:MidnightBlueMan who received a block for sockpuppetry and edit warring. The request was:

I've now been blocked for over 2 1/2 years. My block was for sockpuppetry, which I admit. Details: socks 1) Dragley, although technically a sock, the account was my first, and I didn't really like the name, so I set up FootballPhil and moved to it. I hardly used the Dragley account thereafter, and didn't intend to play it off against FootballPhil, but I think there are a couple of edits where I edited in the same general area. FootballPhil wasn't a name I liked so I set up MidnightBlueMan and abandoned FootballPhil (though I may have made a small number of edits thereafter).

I set up MBM as my "proper" account but eventually came across the Troubles (Ireland) issue and this, at the time, was my downfall.

Contrary to the sock report, the user Mister Flash is not a sock. However, he was a colleague of mine, who I shared a flat with at the time, and I recuited him to assist me with POV pushing. This went on for some time. "Mister Flash" has moved on and I now rarely hear from him (christmas card stuff). He may, or may not, still be interested in Wiki - I don't know.

Other socks were set up in shear frustration at being blocked. I made no bones about them being socks at the time and they were quickly blocked: SpongerJack CarbonNumbers BritishIslesPOVers

I understand the problem of socking and how it strikes at the heart of trust, a fundamental requirement - to be able to be trusted - of those participating in the Wiki user community. I won't sock again; It doesn't get anyone anywhere in the long run. For me it wasn't really socking, it was recruiting a colleague, which I know is just as bad, so again, this won't happen again.

I therefore ask, that after a considerable amount of time, I be given another chance.

The user wishes to invoke the WP:Standard offer. The user claims to have no socked in 2.5 years and has agreed to a checkuser. The user has preemptively agreed to a 6 month community topic ban from articles related to British Isles and a WP:1RR restriction if the community feels it's neccessary.

He has also suggested a sort of mentor:

If you agree to my request I would like to invite you, or your nominee, to monitor my work for six months or however long you deem appropriate.

User:DoRD performed a checkuser based on the IP Address in the UTRS system and has found no socks on that IP address. The SPI hasn't seen a sock since October 2010, and the old accounts are too stale to check for others.

Although the user has agreed to a topic ban or 1RR if the community deems it appropriate, I invite the community to start the discussion from the least restrictions and move up toward the most restrictive if a unblock is allowable.--v/r - TP 14:17, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

Sidenote: There were some privacy lapses in the SPI casepage from several years ago that should've never happened and violated the WMF privacy policy. It was cleaned up at the user's request and the offending revisions were oversighted, but the private data had no bearing on this request.--v/r - TP 14:51, 21 April 2013 (UTC)

MidnightBlueSun's responses[edit]

Thanks to TParis and all of you who have the confidence in me to agree my return. And thank you for also having the confidence not to impose mandatory restrictions. However, I think it is only right that I impose a self-restriction, so I give the undertaking that I will avoid all Troubles related articles for three months and also accept 1RR. I have a clear underststanding of what constitutes a Troubles article, but if anyone would care to monitor my edits over the next few months and if you think I've transgressed let me know and I'll immediately self-revert. I take 1RR to mean that I won'r revert anything, save for obvious errors and vandalism. Thanks again. MidnightBlue (Talk) 07:27, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Community Discussion[edit]

  • Support with topic ban for 3 to 6 months on Troubles articles, no other restriction, encourage to get a mentor. This seems to be a proper Standard Offer as he has admitted the mistakes, it has been long enough and we have some evidence he has lived up to the requirements for the SO. In the spirit of what we stand for, I think we should offer this second chance. I would support without the topic ban as well, but the Troubles area got him into trouble to begin with. In order to give him every opportunity to succeed in the transition, it is in his best interest to avoid that area temporarily. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 14:52, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support think a topic ban is wise but would be okay without having one if that's the consensus. Unless someone turns up recent socks or solid evidence that he's lying about something in this request I think he should get a second chance. Hobit (talk) 16:04, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support ~ two and a half years is close to an eternity here; if he's gone that long without reoffending, that's great. I would not support without a three month topic ban from The Troubles, just so's he can ease back in. And a mentor is certainly a good idea, but not essential. Cheers, LindsayHello 16:21, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support unblock: he seems to be "cured", and I certainly appreciate his honesty and candor. In my opinion, a topic ban is not necessary after such a long time. ~ DanielTom (talk) 16:45, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support This is why we have the standard offer. Once in a while it actually works.I don't see any need to formally topic ban them but they could always self-impose a topic ban if they are worried they will get into trouble in that area again. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:54, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support: Honest admission of wrongdoing, no passing the blame, and a credible sincere promise not to do it again. The topic ban gives him the opportunity to demonstrate his worth as a productive editor. I have to say, "Welcome back aboard!". Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 19:11, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support though I would strongly suggest that you avoid a contentious subject such as the troubles for a few months. Best to reintegrate yourself into the community in an uncontentious area. ϢereSpielChequers 21:05, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support with no restrictions or need for mentoring. I don't think we'll have any "troubles" from him. Chutznik (talk) 21:56, 21 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Someone removing my edits[edit]

Hello. On April 16, I've made very useful contribution to the page "Ghurid Dynasty" [9] (which is well sourced) and needed for the readers but someone is deleting it. What must I do to stop this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by BarryM9944 (talkcontribs) 14:54, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

You need to discuss it at Talk:Ghurid Dynasty and stop edit warring. - David Biddulph (talk) 15:08, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

UAA Backlog[edit]

Just FYI, there's a pretty hefty backlog at WP: UAA. If any admins have a little time on their hands, it looks like they could use an extra mop over there. Alles Klar, Herr Kommisar 02:55, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Informal User talk:Centre des Professions Financières unblock decline opinion needs more senior admin assessment[edit]

Hello all, fledgling admin Shirt58 here.
I have informally declined User talk:Centre des Professions Financières' unblock request. In my opinion, the unblock request to change username to another username is a request to change username to one that is still unacceptable.
I haven't edited the "unblock" message. I would ask that much more experienced admins step in and formally assess the unblock request. Pete aka --Shirt58 (talk) 09:35, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Actually, "Lucie CPF" would be acceptable, but drop the {{coiq}} on there to make sure they won't repeat the additional problems (✉→BWilkins←✎) 09:42, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Please remove my ban.[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I would like to protest a ban on Armenian and BLP articles I have been given.

The ban was given for using Twitter as a source for the nationality of UFC fighter Gegard Mousasi.

This is the ANI discussion. As I pointed out, Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources says of Twitter, "Never use self-published books, zines, websites, webforums, blogs and tweets as a source for material about a living person, unless written or published by the subject of the biographical material." This tweet comes from Gegard Mousasi himself.

However, Admin Gwickwire (he deleted his user page) said "twitter is never a reliable source" which directly contridicts what Wikipedia has established as reliable sources. I would like to point out Twitter is also used as a source for the ethnic backgrounds of other UFC fighters Scott Jorgensen and Chad Mendes.

Then User:Little green rosetta said that if the Twitter account is verified or acknowledged by reliable sources as the person's Twitter account, it is an acceptable source.

Here is where things got messy. At the time, I only knew one, apparently unreliable, source that acknowledged this as the account of Gegard Mousasi. However, I later found good sources, such as Yahoo! Sports and Bleacher Report, that confirm it is in fact the real Gegard Mousasi. And UFC President Dana White has talked to Mousasi on that account. He also puts unprofessional pictures of himself up that no website had first. However, at this time I no longer cared about my original edit and Glickwire said, "User now seems to be a bit remorseful, there wasn't any major WP:DDMP type problems, so.. WP:ROPE applies here imo, with the knowledge that next time, it will result in a significant ban/block." I assumed I wouldn't be getting in trouble and left the thread without showing my sources.

But I didn't realize a punishment was being decided behind my back and didn't get to appeal it. Had I known, I would have shown my sources.

As has already been established here, that while I haven't made personal attacks and have not used the undo button more than three times, User:BearMan998, who made this ANI, has said things like "Clearly you should know by now", "I believe this is what got you banned previously", "This is a pattern and it looks like you are repeating it despite multiple warnings and bans in the past" and "Based on your past behavior". These show he has very foul faith. Also, take a look at his contributions. He has spent most of his time on Wikipedia for the past month undoing my edits on the Gegard Mousasi and Karo Parisyan pages and trying to get me banned.

And as I told User:King of Hearts, this did not take place on an Armenian page because Mousasi is not a technical Armenian. Nor was the discussion about if he was Armenian. So, if I should be blocked from anything, it should be Iranian and/or MMA articles. But I do not think I should be blocked at all and that is why I'm here. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:26, 18 April 2013 (UTC)

I assume you're going to notify all involved, as didn't happen with me. My comments still stand, his twitter account is not verified, and therefore no matter how many people think it's the real him, we have no way of knowing. Plus, it's still a primary source, which you continued to use to try to source what it turns out was contentious material after being told not to. I'm still in support of this ban (and remind people that if I remember right, some people were actually quite close to recommending a full site ban). gwickwiretalkediting 22:38, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
If his boss thinks it's him, we can be pretty sure it is. Plus there are also reliable sources that have conducted interviews with Mousasi. Remember, Little green rosetta said "Is the twitter account in question "verified" by twitter or a RS?". Please elaborate on this: Plus, it's still a primary source, which you continued to use to try to source what it turns out was contentious material after being told not to.
Take note at the end that I said if the ban must remain, it sould be changed to Iranian and/or MMA articles. Mousasi and the edit conflict are not related to Armenia. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:47, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
"Nor was the discussion about if he was Armenian" By definition, a discussion about "Armenian" is related to Armenia. How do we know his boss thinks it's him? Has Twitter verified that? Not that I see. You continued to push the issue of using a primary source (regardless of whether or not it's him really) for what apparently was contentious facts after being told they were contentious. That's against WP:PRIMARY, which (not exact quote) says that primary sources must only be used for uncontroversial facts. Still haven't been notified, not sure about the others. gwickwiretalkediting 22:54, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
By definition, a discussion about "Armenian" is related to Armenia. Which this wasn't?
How do we know his boss thinks it's him? Because he talked to him. Also, so does Bleacher Report, which has interviewed him in person.
I'd also like to see where it says Twitter sources must be verified. Not on WP:TWITTER, for one. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 23:02, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I had a boss talk to someone who was sitting in the restroom stall, thinking it was me. It wasn't. The WP:RSN is where you take questions regarding the reliability of a source - if the Twitter is contested, you go there for external advice/opinion - you sure as hell don't charge forward like a bull in a china shop (✉→BWilkins←✎) 22:57, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Wikipedia:No original research: Wikipedia's content is determined by previously published information rather than by the personal beliefs or experiences of its editors. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 23:13, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
I'm confused on why you linked that policy, because it applies to 0% of what anyone has said so far. I'll also point out that you still have not notified all involved users as is required. Please do so before continuing. gwickwiretalkediting 23:16, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Wilkins is talking about his personal life. We can't have that shit here. And I've notified everyone, even though none of you notified me about my ban. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 23:26, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
You made the comment "his boss thinks it's him" - I was proving how wrong you could be by example - and it was an excellent example. Your response was ridiculous, and had no regard for the discussion as a whole (✉→BWilkins←✎) 23:31, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
TheShadowCrow, you don't have to answer back. Really, don't go down that road. Your ban should be lifted, in my opinion, so just keep being civil and polite, and everything will work out (hopefully). ~ DanielTom (talk) 23:48, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
You did not notify LGR or King of Hearts. Please do so now. Bwilkins was well within his rights to provide disproof for your "it must be true" thing. gwickwiretalkediting 23:39, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Done. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 23:58, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Just my 2 cents here - Regarding just the Twitter account, I think we can take it as a reliable enough source. The twitter page is verified by his official website (unless we are disputing that fact), his official facebook page (same here), and the mma website. Which makes it a reliable primary source, in my opinion. No comments on the rest of the issues. TheOriginalSoni (talk) 23:08, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Twitter should only be used as a source when it is absolutely confirmed that the person's account is the real/official one (e.g. like Justin Bieber's), but even then it is usually better to find secondary sources. Now, in this case, I also happen to think that Gegard Mousasi's account is the real thing, and therefore reliable, but even if it isn't, User:TheShadowCrow's edits were all made in good faith, so I support lifting the topic ban, although it would be best if he could try to avoid using primary sources as references for vital information from now on. Truly, DanielTom (talk) 23:29, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Just a quick question - How does one "absolutely confirm" if a person's account on Twitter is theirs? TheOriginalSoni (talk) 23:36, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
The only way to absolutely confirm is if Twitter verifies that. Twitter uses combinations of photo ID, and other small things to even meeting people in person in the past to verify their accounts. This will provide a blue checkmark next to their name on Twitter. Anything else is "maybe" "probably is" or unconfirmed nonetheless. gwickwiretalkediting 23:39, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
No, confirmation by a known official source is as good, probably better. The lack of verification from Twitter is often because Twitter hasn't asked, as according to their FAQ they don't accept requests. Peter James (talk) 18:50, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment - The issue that led to the topic ban(s) was that the user in question refused to listen when told to stop and discuss the reliability of Twitter, and then proceeded to continue to grasp at straws when told by multiple people it was not going to be reliable in this case, and continued adding it in. That's the issue, not the reliability of the source. gwickwiretalkediting 23:41, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
The topic ban was based on an ANI discussion - IIRC. Is there a link to that? (✉→BWilkins←✎) 23:55, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
If you had seen my appeal, you would have found such a link. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 23:58, 18 April 2013 (UTC)
Here. ~ DanielTom (talk) 00:01, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

In the initial discussion, I opined that TheShadowCrow was now quite sufficiently "on notice" and that a ban was not required at this juncture, and I suggest that my position still holds. The discussion is at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive791#Proposal:_topic_ban. Collect (talk) 00:02, 19 April 2013 (UTC)

By the way, somehow it did not get successfully archived in full. The entire discussion is at [10]. -- King of ♠ 00:11, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment It was a 5-1 discussion, with significant policy-based conversation, and not just 1 person's decision. Normal people just don't care about MMA, and thus the conversation didn't attract more people. As the topic ban was properly discussed, the editor had been blocked for similar reasons before (which counts as a warning) is there any good reason why a mere 7 days later, there is a request for removal of the topic ban? I have seen nothing new in the argument, and we sure should not be entertaining such a mere week later (✉→BWilkins←✎) 00:16, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment I think TheShadowCrow is missing the point that his use of Twitter was not the main reason for the ban, but it was his continued violation of WP:BLP. In the discussion, Twitter was just one of many examples. As noted in the initial ANI discussion, TheShadowCrow also misrepresented a source violating WP:STICKTOSOURCE in relation to the Karo Parisyan article and made a misleading edit summary reinstating unsourced POV in the Gegard Mousasi article as well, ignoring the warnings that further BLP violations would result in sanctions. This is what TheShadowCrow should be addressing in this appeal, instead of focusing on the Twitter issue which is a very small part of the reason for the ban. BearMan998 (talk) 00:29, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
    • "ignoring the warnings that further BLP violations would result in sanctions"
This proves that Bearman thinks he is an Admin. He has acted like he is superior to me in the past and on my talk page. This needs to be addressed. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 00:36, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • TheShadowCrow continues to belabor one point, losing sight of the whole. They were blocked for BLP violations, in a discussion that revealed his ad-hominem approach demonstrated here again. I don't see any reason to lift the ban, since they don't give any indication of understanding why they were blocked. Since they don't do that, they can't indicate how they would conform to our guidelines going forward. Drmies (talk) 02:38, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • A quick point as my internet time will be very limited over the next few days - TSC was topic banned for more than just using Twiter - we also have disruptive editing, POINTy editing, repeated addition of unreferenced material, repeated addition of poorly referenced material, edit warring etc. GiantSnowman 08:50, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment - ShadowCrow, If unbanned, can you agree not to edit the article in question, and try to avoid twitter as a reference because of the issues involved? It should be obvious that no matter the policy or guidelines, the issue is a contentious one. If the user agrees to the stated term, then I would support a removal of the ban. Sephiroth storm (talk) 11:53, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
Right, but sadly that only addresses about 1/4 of the issues that led to your topic ban. Once you decide to follow the community nature that is Wikipedia, and address the other 3/4 of the issues, then I'd also be willing to entertain such a removal ... in a minimum of 3 months after it was implemented. However, since there's no sign whatsoever that you are choosing to address those behaviours - indeed, your poorly-chosen attack on Bearman above proves that you're simply treating this entire project as a battleground (✉→BWilkins←✎) 20:47, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
I attacked Bearman? He spends 80% of his time attacking me. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 21:18, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
80%???? Seems rather high, compared to his editing record. (Hint: when trying to prove that you're not attacking someone, using skewed numbers actually is an attack) (✉→BWilkins←✎) 23:04, 19 April 2013 (UTC)
TheShadowCrow, I once again suggest you ignore BWilkins' provocations. I still think that the topic ban we are discussing is not necessary nor is it reasonable, especially now that TSC has agreed to be more careful with his selection of sources. In any case, let's try to focus on the issue at hand, shall we? ~ DanielTom (talk) 00:17, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
DanielTom, I'll encourage you to pay a little closer attention, and stop referring to "provocations". ShadowCrow's topic ban was in part because of his incivility. He's not only refused to promise to stop his incivility, but it has been extremely apparent in this very thread. Promising to stop 25% of his behaviour is not sufficient - unless of course you choose to believe his rather cherrypicked story at the beginning of this thread. It's people who refuse to read that cause the most problems as they set expectations for editors that cannot be met. Pay a little more attention to the whole story, and not just the bullshit bubblegum you've been fed (✉→BWilkins←✎) 00:25, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
I did read the archived discussions relevant to this case before commenting here, so the remark you've just made suggesting that I need to "pay a little more attention", besides being extremely ironic (given that it was you who didn't even notice the link in TSC's original statement), really is uncivil and fails to assume good faith. ~ DanielTom (talk) 00:43, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
I know Daniel. But I couldn't let him fool anyone reading into thinking I attacked Bearman when I clearly didn't. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 01:45, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
Shadow, you stated above "This proves that Bearman thinks he is an Admin. He has acted like he is superior to me in the past and on my talk page. This needs to be addressed. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 00:36, 19 April 2013 (UTC)" - that's a personal attack. All editors have the same rights to provide the same warnings on this project. The fact that your "opponent" gave it to you does not mean you get to accuse them of "thinking he is an admin". Your WP:BATTLE mentality and tenuous grasp on even the most basic of Wikipedia policies is digging you deeper and deeper. I mean crikey, when User:Dennis Brown !votes "oppose", you know you're in real deep (✉→BWilkins←✎) 11:37, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
Bwilkins, I was warming to you, but your wild accusation of personal attack is totally bogus, and your argument to use Dennis Brown as some sort of angelic Admin standard is beyond comic. You're picking on this guy, and references to his incivility in this thread up to now -- I don't see it. ANI = cesspool of irresponsibility, pure and simple. Ihardlythinkso (talk) 02:05, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
No one has ever accused me of being angelic here. They sometimes mistakenly call me too lenient, but not angelic. I actually like TheShadowCrow, even if I think he needs to pull back for bit, have a tea, and catch his breath. Many people (including Bwilkins) likely know that I'm not a fan of interaction or topic bans except under the worst of circumstances, and I tend to tolerate heated discourse past the point that other admin might (sometimes to the frustration of those admin), for various reasons. I don't support a long term ban and I hope this is something that can be lifted in a month, but that is up to TSC. TheShadowCrow and I have been discussing this on my talk page, and I've offered to help him setup user space areas to edit, but my previous opinions stand. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 13:04, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose Lifting of Ban Per the above, TheShadowCrow has refused to address the reason for the ban (continued BLP Violations despite multiple warnings including POV edits with no sources and manipulating sources, edit warring to keep such edits, battleground mentality, pointy editing, ect.) and has not shown any inclination to change the behavior that led to the ban in the first place. BearMan998 (talk) 00:47, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment - Bearman and Snowman both have their own fictional accounts of why this ban was placed, but the fact remains the ANI discussion was based off the Twitter incident. So, because the Twitter source was the topic that placed the ban, it should also be the topic of removing it. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 02:33, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose simply because no valid rationale has been provided. TheShadowCrow has received an AE block for violating WP:ARBAA2, then I had to block him for sockpuppetry during that block at SPI [11]. Then, this exact same thing happened again, violating ARBAA2 and sockpuppeting to get around it, just a few months after the first time. This was before the topic ban. And these aren't his only blocks [12], demonstrating a long term pattern. Through all this, he has a facination with using Twitter as a source for many "facts", in spite of being told that this is often clearly against policy, and almost never a good idea to begin with. Its a shame, as I've found him to often be quite reasonable, but when he isn't, he isn't. As it is, he is on the edge of an indef block for the next infraction, so tempting fate by lifting the ban seems a bad idea. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 03:06, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
The Twitter incidents have been addressed, so, in my opinion, it is you, Dennis Brown, who haven't provided a valid rationale. To quote User:TheShadowCrow: I don't see the math behind me being banned for being banned in the past. He is right, too. ~ DanielTom (talk) 11:03, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
The math is simple: a topic ban is going to be based on the history of the editor, a history I've used diffs to demonstrate. We don't topic ban for single incidents, we topic ban for people who show an obvious pattern of disruptive behavior. The reason for the ban wasn't "Twitter", it was his behavior. Twitter use was just the problem du jure when the ban was put into place. He has yet to accept responsibility for his behavior, and instead he attempts to blame shift, thus reinforcing the case for the ban. The history of edit warring, BLP violations, improper sourcing, sockpuppetry and WP:IDHT isn't overcome with a simple pledge to stop use Twitter as a source. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 11:52, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
I didn't know that a topic ban was an effective way to deal with sock puppetry. Silly me. ~ DanielTom (talk) 12:08, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
Note: As DanielTom has now taken to disrupting this thread with hidden text that serves only to denigrate the poster immediately above, he has been requested to refrain from further posts in this thread, or else it could lead to a block. Please see his talkpage for details (✉→BWilkins←✎) 12:24, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. I just don't see any proper understanding of the ban reason - or even any attempts to listen to or understand what people are saying here. All I see is battling argument, interspersed with the occasional personal attack. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:50, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

I closed this thread at 12:32, 20 April 2013 (UTC) as (in my opinion) the way it was trending was more likely that more sanctions would end being applied rather than any reduced. I'm reverting that close as a courtesy (I think) to the original poster in response to a request on my talk page; my advice remains that the drop the appeal for now. NE Ent 01:25, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Oppose Editor doesn't get it. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:58, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Not only does this editor not get the point, but he is being totally disruptive from what I see. Lord Sjones23 (talk - contributions) 03:50, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment - Several of the opposition against me have based their opinion's off lies. DennisBrown claims I have a "facination with using Twitter" when I have never sourced it before. He also claimed I was "told that this is often clearly against policy" before I sourced it, yet that is untrue.
  • This discussion cannot be decided by "user doesn't get it", facts are needed. I want someone who can tell me why it's ok for a normal user to threaten me with sanctions, when I was warned Twitter isn't reliable, how I can be banned from Armenian articles even though I didn't edit any, etc. The fact is no one has. Until someone can provide an arguement against me, this I won't stop defending the fact this ban was wrongly given. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 17:38, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose lifting topic ban. Indeed, having read this whole thing, I'm not even convinced this user should continue to edit Wikipedia at all. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 17:52, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment - Most of the Opposes fail to provide a reason. This provides nothing to the discussion. Unless the users care to elaborate, these should not be given much attention. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 18:55, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
    • The closing admin is perfectly able to judge the quality of the comments without your assistance - and from what I can see, almost every oppose gives a valid reason, such as your seeming incapability of editing productively and collegially without causing disruption. Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:26, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
      • No, it's mostly "user doesn't get it" and "agree with above"'s. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:04, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
        • That's still more reason than the zero support votes provide.--Atlan (talk) 22:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
          • If we don't count votes that lack depth, the consensus is 3-2. And this isn't a vote, of course. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:47, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment TheShadowCrow wrote " how I can be banned from Armenian articles even though I didn't edit any." Well, to answer your question, as noted in the initial ANI discussion and noted again here, you edited the Karo Parisyan article who is of Armenian descent. In this edit, you misrepresented a source, violating WP:STICKTOSOURCE. I believe GiantSnowman noted several Armenian related articles where there were BLP violations as well as can be seen on your Talk page. Additionally, I would like to note that you already broke the topic ban on BLP articles with this edit, this edit, and this edit today. BearMan998 (talk) 22:55, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
This is about Gegard Mousasi. Whatever you and Snowy think I did on any other page is your opinion and not fact. For example, Snow claims I made POINTy editing in the past, something I never did. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 00:02, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment: Kudos, User:Dennis Brown. Seriously. At least you tried to provide actual arguments for opposing the ban lift; the same cannot be said of the others who've recently just voted "Oppose". Sorry to say, but the way User:TheShadowCrow is being treated really is shameful, to say the least. I still think that the topic ban imposed on him was unjustified and unfair (see above), but I also understand that this case is now essentially hopeless, much to my regret. But hey! At least some people here will be happy knowing that they've crippled the ability to edit of yet another user for no valid reason. ~ DanielTom (talk) 23:13, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
If this were real court, this guy would be the judge. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 00:05, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Having reviewed recent edits from TheShadowCrow, I have to oppose lifting the topic ban at this time. The easiest and best way to have a topic ban lifted is to comply with it for a time. Show that you are able to abide by consensus, even if you do not agree with it. Show that, if the ban is lifted, you intend to work with other editors and make sure your future edits are not disruptive. The easiest way to have a topic ban extended is by violating it, as with this edit and others yesterday, while this discussion was ongoing. It's not a bad edit, honestly, sourced and concise. But it's on a BLP, and could not be a more blatant violation of the topic ban. The fact that it came during this discussion tells me all I need to know about your willingness to work with other editors and abide consensus. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 12:19, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Quick point. If you agree that his edits to articles are fine, I think that you should have voted Support, not oppose. The whole point of this thread is not to enforce the previous (unfair) "consensus", but to question it. Oh well. ~ DanielTom (talk) 15:11, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I agree that that edit is not inherently flawed, except for the fact that the article is a BLP and TSC is prohibited by the topic ban from editing BLPs. But to support removing the topic ban on that basis would be for me to say "He was topic banned, and violated the topic ban, but it's OK because the edits are OK." And that's not how it works here. He's topic banned from BLPs - that means He cannot edit BLPs. Period. Full stop. He appealed the ban here, as was his right, and - while this discussion was ongoing - edited in violation of the topic ban. That says "I'm going to ignore consensus", and that's not a reasonable argument for lifting the topic ban - that's a reasonable argument for extending it or for blocking TSC for disruption. You might have concerns about the original consensus for the topic ban, but now - thanks to this appeal - you have more editors who have affirmed it. TSC does not get to decide whether the topic ban is enforced, nor do you. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 16:10, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Given the above, I would recommend that the Topic Ban be reset to expire three months from 22 April 2013, given yesterday's violation of the ban. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 16:12, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
It was an accident. I was trying to avoid Armenia and Armenia BLPs. I'm trying to get the consensus of the ban changed to Iranian and/or MMA articles. So I thought those articles were OK. It was a mistake. BLP covers a wide range of articles. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 16:33, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I did some checking based on those violations of the topic ban and I found an even more blatant example. After you were notified of the topic ban on April 14th and objected to King of Hearts here you made an edit to change the spelling of Khoren Oganesyan to Khoren Hovhannisyan on the Grigory Fedotov club page on April 15th as seen here. It turns out Khoren Oganesyan is an Armenian footballer whose article you attempted to move to Khoren Oganesian but failed to gain consensus as seen on the article talk page. After failing to gain consensus you tried to get the closing admin to change it anyway against consensus as seen here. However when that didn't work, you changed the player's name on another page anyway, going against consensus and violating your topic ban on broadly construed Armenian related topics. Now this does not look like an accident, it looks like an intentional move against consensus. In light of the multiple violations of the topic ban I would even suggest a longer ban based on this. BearMan998 (talk) 22:18, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Grigory Fedotov club is not BLP or Armenia related. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:43, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose - been reading through this noticeboard for a change, and I do remember the AN/I thread. It's very, very obvious to me that they are violating WP:IDHT, and both TSC and DanielTom have resorted to personal attacks, some subtle (and hidden, in DanielTom's case, at least once), some rather not so. I'd support a lengthy block for TSC for constant personal attacks (and, apparently, violating the topic ban a few times), and a shorter one for DanielTom for personal attacks - and for returning here to be disruptive, having been warned to stay away. Lukeno94 (tell Luke off here) 14:25, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
The only thing I've "disrupted" was a series of "Oppose" votes which were, in my opinion, both unfair and shameful. Yours, DanielTom (talk) 15:19, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Close Request - Reviving this clearly was a bad idea. Can someone close it per "Consensus is not going to support an unban"; what it was closed as before? --TheShadowCrow (talk) 14:56, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I wholeheartedly agree with UltraExactZZ's suggestion of extending the topic ban to three months past the last ban violation, though (as I said originally) I'd be extremely surprised if there aren't more issues down the road. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 22:24, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
He said it was an "accident". Why don't you WP:assume good faith? ~ DanielTom (talk) 22:29, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I'd be extremely surprised if there aren't more issues down the road
Apparently users who support the facist movement don't have to use good faith> --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:43, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
You just shot yourself in the foot, TSC. ~ DanielTom (talk) 22:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I've already been shot in the back. Just fuck it. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 22:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

List of countries by military expenditures[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Hi. We have some issues here. Table which provided conflicting data, and which was misleading (expressed on talk page) was removed due to lack of consensus. But another editor Antiochus is desperately trying to push the table without consensus. He is not addressing my concerns, instead he is just making the issue personal. I wish some admin would come and check this out. Thank you.(Just 1 minute after he was reported to admins' board, he made another revert here breaking 3R rule as well. --Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 12:54, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

I can see large amounts of what appears to be original research on your part, Hakan. Can you provide references detailing current military expenditure by Greece, for example, to prove your statement to be correct ? If you cannot, then removal of data based on original research is just as verboten as inclusion of data based on original research. There's also no consensus, you appear to be engaged in a one man crusade to remove the page of data that you personally disagree with. If you could please compile a list of reliable references showing the data to be out of date and providing new, accurate data, then the page can be altered, otherwise it is accurate and follows the references as best it can. I would also take this opportunity to caution you against providing inaccurate information here at WP:AN, and caution against edit warring.
I have locked the page for 24 hours, in that time, can you please find reliable sources to support your point of view, or cease editing the page completely until such times are you're able to compromise and agree with other editors concerning the direction of the page. Your unilateral edits are unhelpful at present. Nick (talk) 13:05, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment There is no consensus to remove the table..so continuous removal is treated as vandalism. TheStrikeΣagle 13:00, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
    • First of all, there is no consensus to have conflict and misleading data from 2011 and 2013.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:04, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
      • Strike Eagle, it was very fair (sarcasm) from you, that you don't say a word to the guy who was making the issue personal, AND breaking 3R rule just as he was reported, instead, writing comments to my page... — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hakan Erbaslar (talkcontribs) 13:07, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
        • Whoa whoa whoa, hang on a minute strike eagle. Read WP:NOTVAND. Vandalism is a deliberate attempt to deface the encyclopedia in bad faith. Any good faith edit, even against consensus, is not vandalism. Treating it like vandalism will not save you from an WP:EW block in the future so be careful. You might want to strike your comment and change your direction on calling things vandalism.--v/r - TP 13:21, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Nick, please check my concerns on A, B,C , D, and E. on talk page.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:09, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
I didn't find any blatant personal attacks from any other users in the page. Otherwise I would have warned them too. Instead of commenting on my actions, I very strongly suggest you look for the sources to support your edits. TheStrikeΣagle
  • As Strike Eagle has mentioned you have no consensus and the 3RR does not apply when reverting obvious vandalism - blanking half of an entire article constitutes obvious vandalism. Also the Admins should be aware that I and other editors have communicated the need for consensus at the articles talk page and I my self have warned the editor twice at his talk page to refrain from vandalising the article.Antiochus the Great (talk) 13:10, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Antiochus, You said it was in the archieve that it was a consensus to have conflicting tables from 2011 and 2013 ? Yet you failed to show us. Now you are claiming that removed of data without consensus is vandalism? --Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:14, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
How could I possibly know what you already know? Anyway, from what I gather from the archives of this discussion page there is already an existing consensus to have the two tables single sourced from SIPRI. So no, you would need to gain consensus to remove the second table. For now, I will keep my eye on this article. Additionally, could you please clarify what it is exactly you don't agree with regarding the second table? I ask this because presently, the second table is inline with fundamental Wikipedia policies. Antiochus the Great (talk) 15:59, 20 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Removing data without consensus is not "obvious vandalism". I'm still waiting you showed me the consensus in the "archieve pages", which you claimed. Where is it?
1) Claim of earlier consensus in the archieve, failure to point it out.
2) Breaking 3R rule.
3) Reverting the article EVEN AFTER being reported to admins' board.
4) For example, China has conflicting data. Big difference between numbers. No word about it. No debate about the topic. Because he knows the data is MISLEADING.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:17, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
This is correct, removing data with an edit summary explaining the reasons behind that removal does not constitute obvious vandalism. This is, as far as WP is concerned, a content dispute, pure and simple. What is needed is more references, especially up to date ones, which support either point of view in this dispute, and a compromise from both editors in question to allow accurate, up to date, correct data to be added to the article, and if necessary, out of date, incorrect or suspect data to be removed. None of that can be done without proper, reliable references, certainly not with original research. Most governments publicise their defence spending in their budgets, it should not be difficult for both editors involved to find correct, proper references and compile an accurate, up to date list. I would ask they do that instead of edit warring, warning each other and spending time here at WP:AN. Nick (talk) 13:25, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi Nick. There is already duplicate data for the top 15 countries. For example China's 2013 military expenditure is clear. However the falso information of 2011 is also written on the same article. So it's not about finding sources for the top 15.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
With the utmost respect to the Admin (Nick), your comment although positive and productive does show how far removed you are from the situation. Quote: "for both editors involved to find correct, proper references and compile an accurate, up to date list". I emphasise "correct, proper references". Can I clarify that SIPRI is both reliable and authoritative as well as being the #1 source on military expenditure. At present both tables are single sourced from SIPRI, as recommended by policy to single source tables for consistency, reliability and to avoid improper WP:SYNTH. The first table is sourced from the SIPRI yearbook for the top 15 military spenders and is updated every year using current exchange rates. The second table is sourced from the SIPRI database and is updated every year using fixed exchange rates. However, the second table is updated sometime after the SIPRI yearbook is released and thus why the table is presently "out of date". I have already communicated this to Hakan and urged him to be patient and await the SIPRI database update which will be available shortly. As Hakan has no legit policy issue it is my belief his edits are a deliberate attempt to destroy the integrity of the article while masking it as a "good faith edit".Antiochus the Great (talk) 13:43, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
That explanation needs to be added to the page in question. It also needs to be clearly communicated to the reader that whilst spending as a percentage of GDP is the same (i.e France in both lists is quoted at 2.3% because of exchange rates etc, the dollar figure can vary). Nick (talk) 14:04, 22 April 2013 (UTC)Ignore that, such a description is found at the very top of the page. It perhaps needs to be made clear at the top of each table how the calculations are made by SIPRI. Nick (talk) 14:12, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Following my previous post, I would like to inform the Admin that the article used to be sourced from various citations provided by national governments. This lead to a table of 100+ countries using different citations each with different calculation methods and the sum total being given in national currency and not US$. This lead to edit warring on a continual basis and inconsistent figures derived from fluctuating exchange rates (i.e editors using an online currency exchange site to convert national currency to US$). The consensus was to use a single authoritative source with consistent calculation methods as per Wikipedia policy. The result was SIPRI and the article has been as such since.Antiochus the Great (talk) 13:56, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Antiochus,
  • Stop making assumptions about me and my earlier edits. Please address the topic only.
  • Why does China have two difficult numbers from the same source on the same article?
  • The data is conflicting and misleading and there was no consensus in the archieve as you claimed.
  • When did I say I have a problem about SIPRI? Oh my God. do you read/speak english?

--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 14:48, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Could we stop with the personal attacks and unhelpful language, Hakan. I'd ask that you strike your fourth point and apologise to Antiochus the Great. Nick (talk) 14:53, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Problem Solved...[edit]

The issue with Table 2 being out of date can now be solved. The data needed to update table 2 (all countries data) is available now at http://www.sipri.org/research/armaments/milex/milex_database and this ties in with the data from http://books.sipri.org/product_info?c_product_id=458# used to complete table 1 (top 15 countries). That should fully resolve all the issues, if both parties can review this data, confirm that by updating Table 2, the issue is resolved, I will unprotect the page and allow you chaps to resume editing it. Nick (talk) 15:26, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

Thank you Nick, this is exactly what I and other editors have been waiting for, an updated SIPRI database. It appears the old SIPRI database is in the process of being overhauled and since the 15th of April the database is instead available for download in excel form -until the on-site database is up and running again post overhaul. Consider everything ok on my side and I hope Hakan will be satisfied with the updated SIPRI citation. In future Hakan, it would probably be best to place a tag on the article suggesting the table needs updating and/or raising the concern clearly on the articles talk page. Best not to delete half the article instead!Antiochus the Great (talk) 17:25, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
Thank you Nick, I trust you on this subject. However the other party is still trying to give lessons, with his last sentence ending with commands and (!) signs. (Not even admins act like this) Please tell him to drop this arrogant language, it's kind of boring when the other side in an hallucination as if he is an army commander and we are his soldiers at his service.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 20:10, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
This is quite funny really:
1. "Could we stop with the personal attacks and unhelpful language, Hakan."
2. "it's kind of boring when the other side in an hallucination as if he is an army commander and we are his soldiers at his service"
By the way, there really is nothing wrong with using exclamation marks and Antiochus the Great wasn't giving commands, he was making perfectly reasonable suggestions. Kookiethebird (talk) 23:00, 22 April 2013 (UTC)


I am not obliged to offer any apologies towards Hakan. I am however happy with the current situation and thank Nick for finding the updated SIPRI citation. I would also like to remind Hakan of what I wrote in my second comment at the articles talk page before this all started. Quote; "The SIPRI database is updated after they release their yearbook, so just be patient." From this quote of mine you can clearly see I had communicated to Hakan that we were awaiting the new and updated SIPRI citation so we could update the second table. However, Hakan ignored my comment and continued his rather aggressive approach to the situation.Antiochus the Great (talk) 00:37, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Kookiet, Are you an adminstrator? are you trying to speak on behalf of Antiochus? What are you trying to achieve on topic? Are you trying to provoke the situation? Why are you copy-pasting my comments? --Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
And you Antichos, what is your purpose in posting messages to my talk page that you don't follow an administrator's request to apologize? Why are you writing here a full aggressive unhelpful parapgraph about me ? Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:03, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Nick, I think the problem is not solved, because I get the feeling, Antiochus has any right to continue his aggressive language.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:14, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
What you've said here has nothing to do with what I put above! Firstly, I was highlighting how you had been told to "stop with the personal attacks and unhelpful language", before carrying on with the personal attacks and unhelpful language. Secondly, I was pointing out that there was nothing wrong with what Antiochus the Great had done. It is you that is in the wrong here! Kookiethebird (talk) 17:13, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Kookiet, I ask again. Are you an adminstrator? Are you trying to speak on behalf of Antiochus? What are you trying to achieve on topic? Are you trying to provoke the situation? Why are you copy-pasting my comments? --Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Firstly, you've removed your comment that I was replying to. For the record, this is it: ":It seems we have here two angry guys who want to make this issue personal and refuse to accept the offer from an administrator. I wonder what Nick will say to this. Nick, do you see in what kind of behaviour even after you demanded an apology from both sides_?" Secondly, in answer to your questions: (1) No. (2) No. (4) No. (3 and 5) I simply wanted to have my say, to try to get through to you that it is you that is behaving badly, no-one else. I have given an example of that by copying one of your comments after one of Nick's comments. You have been told to "stop with the personal attacks and unhelpful language" and then you just carried on with the personal attacks and unhelpful language. Do you understand? Kookiethebird (talk) 17:26, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Kookiet, I ask again. Are you an adminstrator? Are you trying to speak on behalf of Antiochus? What are you trying to achieve on topic? Are you trying to provoke a resolved issue? Why are you copy-pasting my comments? Stop being silly with "Do you understand?" type unhelpful questions.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
You've just repeated your questions! If you want answers to them, look above! And as for the "Do you understand?" question, it was perfectly reasonable given what had happened. So I ask you again, do you understand, yes or no? Kookiethebird (talk) 17:34, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Kookiet, since you are a 3rd person who arrived after the issue was solved, I am going to ask these questions: Are you an adminstrator? Are you trying to speak on behalf of Antiochus? What are you trying to achieve on topic? (topic is list of military spending). Are you trying to provoke a resolved issue? What kind of bullshit language is this "Do you understand?" Do you think you have any right to be aggressive here?--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Hakan, Kookiethebird answered your questions above. GB fan 17:42, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Also, one doesn't have to be an administrator to post here. Writ Keeper  17:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
yes he did.
  • He is no administrator.
  • He is achieving nothing except trolling around and provoking an already resolved topic.
  • He has nothing to say about the topic of military spending but just thinks he will sit there and say anything and expects everyone else will stand idle.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Why don't you tell us all what you're trying to achieve by asking the same questions that have been answered? And I think when talking about "bullshit language" it really is you being aggressive. I am not being aggressive, I am trying to engage in discussion with you. By the way, the fact that you can't bring yourself to answer the question "Do you understand?" suggests that you don't understand but can't bring yourself to admit it. Kookiethebird (talk) 17:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

*The users Kookiethebird and Antiochus are buddies and both from the Great Britain (GB), Kookiethebird came here to defend Antiochus and rally the lobby behind him. (he came after the issue was solved) It's funny we have some cheerleaders here.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:48, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

:I will not talk anymore on this subject since it's useless to debate when someone is not listening to adminstrator (Nick) and only interested in insults by bringing buddies and friends to this board.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

An Open Letter To Nick[edit]

Nick, I think you should interfere in this situation. Please tell me why Antiochus refuses to respond to my apology and why he is allowed to continue his aggressive language.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:22, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

I cannot force anybody to apologise or magically make everybody get on with each other. Both editors obviously have similar interests and should be working together to improve the project, instead of spending much of their time here getting upset with each other. A dispute occurred, some unfortunate things have been said, it's now time for everybody to move on and do something more productive. Ideally, that will start with everybody apologising and starting afresh, but I'm powerless to force everybody to be best friends forever. Nick (talk) 17:29, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Nick, you are an administrator and you are telling both sides to apologize. One side apologizes, the other side refuses to do so, and continues with aggressive language. Do you think there should be no consequences?--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:31, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Nick has not demanded an apology from anyone, he has only suggested an apology. I have not resorted to personal attacks (other editors also mention I have not personally attacked you Hakan) therefore I am not obliged to offer an apology, so I didn't. Furthermore I was not offended by any remarks made by you Hakan, but other editors have the right (and duty) to inform you personal attacks are against policy even if it didn't offend the person to whom it was directed. I really don't want to waste anymore of my time, your time, Nicks time and other editors time continuing this drawn out and pointless discussion. Fundamentally we are both happy with the updated SIPRI citation provided by Nick and i am now just waiting for the page protection to expire or be lifted and make the agreed upon changes. This will be my last comment regarding the issue.Antiochus the Great (talk) 17:48, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

:Antiochus, unfortunately you turned down an administrator's offer, (Nick's offer on your talk page) instead you called your buddies to further increase tensions. I will not respond anymore to such type of discussion. and I will not respond to people like you, who just call friends and buddies to an already resolved issue and do not even listen an offer from an administrator.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 17:54, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

RevisionDelete request[edit]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to request this, but here, Rmmcgrath apparently asked a question while logged out, revealing their IP address. Could an admin please redact that information? Thanks, FrigidNinja 22:22, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

 Done To avoid calling attention to such requests, you can also approach admins who list themselves at Category:Wikipedia administrators willing to handle RevisionDelete requests. Probably not a big deal here, but useful to keep in mind. Thanks! --j⚛e deckertalk 22:25, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Actually in this situation, this material is covered under the oversight policy and should be suppressed. In the future, you can follow the procedure here to contact an oversighter and they can help address your request. Best, Mike VTalk 01:05, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

J. Leon Altemose is blatant COPYVIO. Need assistance.[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


J. Leon Altemose is 95% verbatim from "Downey, Sally and Jane M. Von Bergen. 16 April 2008, Philadelphia Inquirer, "J. Leon Altemose, controversial contractor, dies at 68" which can be found online at www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2002543/posts.

I do not know know to apply CSD-G12 to this situation, and believe this is a candidate because being entirely content that is another entity's protected intellectual property.

The article is no longer on the Philadelphia Inquirer's website (that I can see), but this article's content still belongs to the Inquirer and has not been put into public domain. The text of the article can be found on the free republic forums as linked above and in other locations online (which are likely COPYVIO also).

I noticed that the Altemose article was heavily reliant on this one source from the Inquirer...in fact, cited it 18 times. I gave User:SummerPhD, the article's creator, a week to revise and address these issues, but she has been belligerently defiant when this and other shortcomings of the article that were brought to light. I advised that other sources be introduced. She acted belligerent to the suggestion. I finally was able to locate the source article today, and noticed that the Wikipedia article is little more than a plagiarised reiteration of that source.

Thank you for your assistance.--ColonelHenry (talk) 18:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)

  • And, quite frankly, User:SummerPhD is an asshole. Relentlessly abusive, unreasonable, acting like a petty dictator with rule enforcement, obstructive, etc. She's badgered people because they've disagreed with her AfD nominations. She tag-bombs articles seemingly immediately after their creation while it is apparent the creator is at that very moment working on them. Users like this drive people away from Wikipedia. I'm only concerned about the copyvio on this article despite how much this user irks me--but perhaps someone might wants to look into this user's pattern of behavior.--ColonelHenry (talk) 18:39, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Converted to a copyvio tag. This is, in my opinion, way too close to the source to remain unblanked and I almost G12'd it. Listed it as a copyvio to get a second opinion and to give people the chance to use the information (but not the text) in a new article per the instructions on the tag. Dpmuk (talk) 18:57, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Wow, that's basically the poster child for close paraphrasing. Way too close; I'd say stubify it by reverting to one of the earliest reversions, either this one or this one (sans under construction template, of course). Writ Keeper  19:16, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Copyvio cleaned. ColonelHenry, why did you tag the Philadelphia Inquirer citations as unreliable? It's a major US newspaper, and such publications we assume to be reliable unless we have evidence otherwise. Nyttend (talk) 19:29, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
ColonelHenry, following a brief dispute at another article sought out several articles I created and tagged them with numerous irrelevant tags to "be a dick"[13] (his words, not mine). (I didn't look back to examine his copyvio tag because of the on-going BS this was part of. Can't say I recall my original work on the article. In the context of labeling the Philadelphia Inquirer unreliable, it seemed like more of the same.) - SummerPhD (talk) 23:06, 22 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Sorry Dennis--I hate to revert a close. But I am a bit surprised to see someone referring to an editor on AN as an "asshole" and no one bats an eye lid. I don't know what all happened between these two, but Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Denyse Tontz (3rd nomination) may have something to do with it, and in those exchanges Summer is not an asshole. ColonelHenry, in my opinion, has crosses the civility line with this and other comments ("woeful Pharisees" at the AfD, besides "stop abusing contributors", claims of harassment, etc. This particular copyvio/paraphrase having been dealt with, I think ColonelHenry's uncivil remarks need to be addressed. If you, some of you, agree that none of these comments warrant even a response, then you can reclose this thread. Drmies (talk) 03:00, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
    • No problem, I knew closing it would be iffy, and anyone (even Ent) is welcome to revert any close if they disagree. I didn't want to drag this out with drama, and figured ColonelHenry already knew he had crossed the line from heated discussion into personal attacks. Maybe he will be wise enough to address the issue here so we can be done with it. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 12:39, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
      • Edit conflict with Dennis. I already blocked ColonelHenry for 24 hours before I saw the comment above. Garion96 (talk) 12:43, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment. There is a history of incivility in ColonelHenry's edits. Here[14] and here[15] he was warned for incivility to editors and threatened with a block. Here[16] there was a complaint that he had called an editor a "half-brain". Here[17] he accused me of "blatant dishonesty" and being "morally despicable" (show collapsed section). Also here[18] he added that I had "lied" and "trolled". Spoken on an administrators notice board, no less. I was surprised that the administrators there took no action. ColonelHenry's 24 hour block is merited. I hope it will give him pause to behave better in future. Xxanthippe (talk) 04:42, 24 April 2013 (UTC).
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Vandalism by IP[edit]

Edit 1

Edit 2 --Kazemita1 (talk) 02:16, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Oddly enough, the IP undid his or her own edits... Anyways, I left a note for the IP informing him or her that such edits are not constructive. Also for routine cases of vandalism, it would be best to post a request at the Admin's noticeboard for vandalism instead of here. This noticeboard tends to be highly frequented and in order to prevent overcrowding of posts, separate noticeboards have been established to handle such common situations. Thank you for the report, though! Mike VTalk 02:51, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Mikemikev again[edit]

Obvious sock as explained in the SPI/CU report above. Making too many problematic edits. Incidentally he is doing exactly the same elsewhere.[19] [20] Mathsci (talk) 07:15, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Further disruptive edits confirm this is Mikemikev (click on his contributions). Please block this account. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 07:21, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Collapse Mikemikev trolling on a noticeboard. Mathsci (talk) 07:36, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
This anti-semitic racist is also editing on metapedia. Aren't there laws against hate? UltimateBoss (talk) 07:27, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Why can't everybody just STOP THE HATE??? UltimateBoss (talk) 07:28, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Blocked by Future Perfect at Sunrise — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:29, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

CfD backlog[edit]

There is a serious backlog at WP:CfD. There are hundreds of overdue discussions, some of which should have closed a month ago pbp 14:22, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

SNOWBALL/IAR delete please - URGENT[edit]

Would an admin please act on this ASAP. There is no need for this to be discussed further.--ukexpat (talk) 16:52, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

 Done --Jayron32 16:54, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Excellent, thanks.--ukexpat (talk) 16:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

A user have creatid the article at another name see Daniel Niazi to see how many times it have been deleted on english wiki. --80.161.143.239 (talk) 19:34, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Article deleted and salted, sock blocked. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:00, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

My Giant Friend[edit]

Can an admin please tell me if the previously deleted versions of My Giant Friend were in any way identical to the current revision? Ten Pound Hammer(What did I screw up now?) 07:05, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I restored the history for you. -- King of ♠ 07:07, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

note[edit]

hi there. are you guys still here? I just left about 5 or 6 notes at 5 or 6 different places, and didn't get any reply. also, no one has revised those pages since my note.

would appreciate any feedback. or just a note. :-) thanks. feel free to read and review my contribs history for more information and details. thanks very much. --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 20:50, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

It might help if you gave more context. Do you mean here at this page, or one of the comments you've made at arbitrators' talk pages, or somewhere else? Nyttend (talk) 20:52, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
thanks so much for your note. was writing this note as you posted your reply. well, sure happy to clarify.
well, here is is my note to Arbcomm. it provides a link to the suggestion I made at a specific arbcomm page, which is here. my whole suggestions relates to proceedings at this page, and my input there. appreciate any feedback. thanks!!! --Steve, Sm8900 (talk) 20:55, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
I've been left scratching my head on this one. Sm8900 posted a suggestion at the ARBPI talk page regarding how Arbcom discusses RFC's (?!) in which they recommend that a moderator (someone above Arbcom??) defines the options to be discussed and fixes the agenda of the RFC to only those options. They then posted to half a dozen other editors, including a number of Arbs and Jimbo, wondering why there has been no response to their suggestion. If I've got that correct, I think Sm8900 has missed the point that having a large number of people raise comments on an RFC is pretty much what an RFC is meant for and that having a moderator define the options to be discussed is not an RFC so much as a Request for Votes. Blackmane (talk) 13:31, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Pending release of Echo (notifications)[edit]

Hey all :). Tomorrow, if things go according to plan (or next Tuesday if they don't!) we'll be launching Notifications, or Echo, which does what it says on the tin - offers a notifications system for Wikimedia projects. You can read more about what's in the release and what we've got planned on the project page. Once things are launched, we'll be gathering feedback on any bugs, annoyances or features people would like to see - if you'd like to get involved in that (and I sincerely hope you all will!) the best venue is the talkpage.

Thanks! Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 21:43, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Not using them unless I get them in the upper-right hand corner of my field of vision.Jeremy v^_^v Bori! 10:39, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Thankfully, that's where they'll be! :P. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 14:55, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Note that the deployment has indeed been pushed back to Tuesday. Sorry, all :/. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 14:55, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

An arbitration case regarding sexology has now closed and the final decision is viewable at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:

  1. Standard discretionary sanctions are authorized for all articles dealing with transgender issues and paraphilia classification (e.g., hebephilia).
  2. User:Jokestress and User:James Cantor are banned from interacting with each other, commenting on and/or commenting about each other including their professional lives, works and on-wiki activities. This applies to all namespaces, but excludes dispute resolution that explicitly relates to both parties.
  3. User:Jokestress is indefinitely banned from the topic of human sexuality, including biographical articles.

For the Arbitration Committee, Ks0stm (TCGE) 12:53, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Discuss this

Odd image revert problem[edit]

So I reverted to an earlier version of File:Loews Corp.svg, but the image in the file history is displaying the old version. So I tried reverting to the good version again, which caused the same problem, except the first revert now displays the right image in the file history. I've tried purging, forced refreshing, etc. No dice. Is this something that needs to be fixed? If not, could/should an admin delete the unnecessary extra versions I caused? —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 16:01, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Answered at Wikipedia:File namespace noticeboard. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 19:52, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

User:Samaksasanian[edit]

Hello, I asked User:Samaksasanian for reasons of his edits but he didn't respond. These edits are kind of Vandalism. Thanks.--Mervzi (talk) 22:25, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

I've left them a notice about communicaing in English for starters. Seems like they may be being coy since they have responded in English to others. Google translate choked on their comments so I don't know what they said, but the what language is this site thinks it is Slovenian or Croatian. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:03, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
And now they have replied to that with a response that makes me strongly suspect they are using machine translation. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:11, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Yes, you are right. I think he can't speak English and he uses machine translation. For example see the last article that he crated: Hamadan Province Turks. It is Unclear and dubious. He is Using machine translation (like Google translate) in articles for translating them for example from Persian and Turkish to English without any correction. Some of his edits are Vandalism.--Mervzi (talk) 01:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Names ending with "yan" or "ian" like this are very often Armenian; see the names in Category:Soviet Armenians, for example. Nyttend (talk) 03:33, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
After looking at his talk page, I'm confident that he's using some language from the Caucasus, since his focus is on things from that region. But which one? The notes on his talk page made me guess Azeri, but (unlike his signature) none of his writing has any of the common ə characters, and the language structure doesn't look like any Turkic language; compare his writing to Azeri, e.g. az:Azərbaycan dili. Perhaps this is what Armenian or Georgian looks like in Latin script? I know nothing of the Armenian alphabet or of the Georgian alphabet, so I can't easily transliterate it to find out. Nyttend (talk) 03:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
This editor is Iranian and is active on the Farsi Wikipedia. However that jibber-jabber is clearly either trolling or evasive, since the editor responds in perfectly good English in previous sections of the talk page. Looie496 (talk) 04:00, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Twinkle down?[edit]

I was just patrolling Special: Newpages when I noticed that the TW button wasn't showing up on the drop-down menu next to View History. Has anybody else has been having the same problem? So far i've had to tag and notify manually (a bit of a nuisance, but nothing a true Wikipedian can't handle). Alles Klar, Herr Kommisar 23:48, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

It's not down, but I do sometimes have the same issue, sometimes it just does not load. Reloading the page usually helps. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:06, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
It must be my connection. The servers have been slow for me, but the UTC clock seems to be working again, so i'm guessing TW will be working for me again shortly. Time to switch over to content-building. Alles Klar, Herr Kommisar 01:41, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Backlog[edit]

Hello, there's a backlog at WP:UAA. It would be appreciated if any administrator with nothing to do could help out and work through it. Thanks, FrigidNinja 11:21, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Sigh. this has been happening a lot lately, we could use some new regular admins as well as some simple clerking i.e. moving stuff to the holding pen and removing declined reports. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:06, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Ok, I will have a look, but please cut me some slack until I learn the ropes there. Lectonar (talk) 12:01, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Please grant User:Njbetz the instructor userright[edit]

Per their request and current granting conventions. Cheers, —Theopolisme (talk) 11:12, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

 Done. Salvio Let's talk about it! 11:16, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Why don't we move this granting to WP:RFP with clear guidelines? (✉→BWilkins←✎) 11:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
WP:PERM, you mean? ;) —Theopolisme (talk) 21:26, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
That would make too much sense. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 12:30, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Removing tag for out of date table and reverting sourced imf.org info[edit]

Hi. User Ujongbakuto is removing the out of date template for an out of date table on article of GDP capita PPP. And he reverted my sourced imf.org info more than 4 times. My edits were all sourced, he deleted the sources and introduced numbers from his own mind I need your help. Thank you.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 13:55, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Dear admins, I hope you all realize that it's Hakan Erbaslar who's in the wrong. I had already stopped removing the out-of-date template some edits ago, and I did not introduce numbers from my own mind. - Ujongbakuto (talk) 14:01, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Both of you are rapidly heading for blocks. It should be a simple task to click the link and read off the numbers to see if they match the numbers in the article. And yet here we are. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 14:13, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Very sorry, I won't do it again. I did "click the link and read off the numbers to see if they match the numbers in the article", which is why I dared to revert those edits. I thought 3RR did not apply to reverting vandalism. - Ujongbakuto (talk) 14:24, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
It doesn't apply to vandalism, as such. But when everyone is reverting so rapidly and arguing in the edit summaries, it's impossible to sort malicious vandalism from good faith I-misread-that reversions from content disputes from edit-warring-for-the-lulz. My point was simply that all reverting from you two should cease while we discuss who did what and why. This appears, on its face, to be a content dispute - so 3RR does apply, you've been warned, and all is well, so long as you don't revert any further. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 14:43, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Okay, thanks. :-) - Ujongbakuto (talk) 14:49, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
On the merits, Hakan the source I'm seeing from Ujongbakuto seems to be the International Monetary Fund. Given that the table is intended to display the GDP estimates from the IMF, I'm confused as to what the error was? What problem is there with the data that Ujongbakuto was inserting into the table? UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 14:22, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Ultra ok he's right. close this ticket.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 15:05, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Best practices in advertising an RfA ("don't"?)[edit]

Is there any policy or guide other than WP:CANVASS which discusses that? That one doesn't mention RFA in particular and just offers some general guidance, which is unfortunately open to contradictory interpretation. Is it acceptable to mention one's RfA (in a neutral fashion) at any page at all, or is it preferable to not mention it anywhere? My reading of the spamming and vote-stacking definitions at CANVASS suggests that any and all notification can be deemed to be inappropriate, as they either fall under notifying users who are not interested (spamming) or those who are (vote-stacking). Am I correct in that analysis?

The following second question is based on the assumption that any and all advertising of an RfA are discouraged. Let's say B has an RfA open. If editor A informs others in some fashion of editor B's RfA (let's say, through posting on a WikiProject talk page something along the lines "Hey, A is in RfA"), and the consensus is that RfA's should not be advertised, should editor B be expected to request that editor A reverts his notification? What if editor A refuses or delays? For example, how can B try to prevent his known and well-meaning friend A from ruining his RfA due to accusations that he is advertising his RfA? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 04:13, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

??? You run for adminship at Wikipedia:Requests_for_adminship/Piotrus_2 and that is not listed at WP:RfA ??? And you get votes there from people involved with WP:EEML, the arbcom same case that cost your the mop ??? And now you ask that meta-question here and elsewhere ask your supporters to come up with some plausible explaination [21] [22] of how there is no canvassing going on ? When the EEML case was about improper co-ordination ? Lots of questions here. Let's start with why your ongoing RfA is not listed, and why you phrased your question in a way that only makes sense if one checks your latest contribs? Skäpperöd (talk) 05:29, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Unexplained hostility aside, the answer is basically that you shouldn't do it except in a neutral manner on your userpage. The best idea is not to do it except with something like {{RfA-notice}} on the top of your userpage. Nyttend (talk) 06:05, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
@Nyttend, re-reading my questions above, their style reveals the confusion I felt that morning about what was going on more than it should have. The background is WP:EEML#Piotrus. I really did not mean to offend anyone and I apologize to @anyone who took that as hostile, it was not meant that way. I see that the process is now fixed so there is no undisclosed re-adminship going on and the issue of canvassing for "editor B" has also been clarified, so my concerns have been alleviated. Regards, Skäpperöd (talk) 09:42, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Yes, I remember the EEML incident from when it was new; I'm just amazed that you continue to attack Piotrus for it as if it were a recent situation. Nyttend (talk) 18:21, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
How incredibly dull. If you want to say "Vote for me!" on your own user page, go ahead and do it. People should vote on your merits as a candidate and nothing else. — Scott talk 09:18, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Re: "unexplained hostility". Thanks for spotting that; explanation is simply: some people cherish memories of conflicts past, sadly. Thanks for the tip about the {{RfA-notice}}. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 06:30, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
And good hearing you discuss my person again, Skäpperöd, always the sparkling fountain of good faith, aren't we? The RfA was not listed because it was still an unfinished draft that some people found uninvited and started commenting, despite a clear inline (and standard) request not to do so before the nom is live. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 06:48, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment. I went ahead and listed the Rfa on WP:RFA, and started the deadline timer per the instructions. Steel1943 (talk) 06:11, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Well, it was still an RfA draft, waiting for a conomination or two, that suddenly some people discovered and started commenting on, despite the edit-mode comment "Please do not submit comments before the RfA starts." (the existence of that comment seems to suggest that it is ok to have a draft of an RfA in the Wikipedia space for few hours/days...?). Since I consider it impolite, I did not revert the first comment that was added (it was also an oppose, and reverting it could be seen an unethical, plus if you consider who made that comment...). Well, so I guess this nom will go live without the conominations I was discussing; oh well, no biggie. Anyway, I presume I can let the editors with whom I was discussing the conomination know that the RfA is now live, and that such a notification would not be considered inappropriate canvassing? --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 06:30, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • It was a bad idea, not to mention impolite, to transclude the RfA. Though to nominate it for deletion would probably have been worse. The correct course of action would have been to just ignore the page, as it was not doing any harm. Or if one really felt the uncontrollable urge to intervene, he could have simply userfied it... Salvio Let's talk about it! 10:00, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Eh, not really. I'm not too worried about if it was the wrong thing to do or not (or even "impolite'" for that matter) as I was thanked on my talk page by the nominee for my actions. Like I stated above, I was essentially doing cleanup due to the RfA process violation (votes and comments were on the RfA prior to it being posted, which violated Wikipedia:Guide to requests for adminship#Before nomination). It's not fair to other editors, and the current process, that there were already votes on the RfA prior to it being posted on RfA. Also, the "seven day timer" hadn't stared either, and there were already 5 votes on the RfA, which is not fair to other nominees who have their RfAs performed properly without their first vote happening until the "start of the 7-day timer;" it sets a negative prescidence. Also, the nominee had already posted responses to the votes prior to the "timer" starting, making it look intentional that the nominee was possibly trying to circumvent the RfA process; the nominee could have blanked the votes instead, and asked the voters to not vote until the RfA had properly started, but that did not happen. Steel1943 (talk) 14:58, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
The right thing to do would have been to simply revert the rfa to the pre-voting state until piotrus wanted the thing transcluded. The only process violations here were by the people who were so eager to oppose his nomination they didn't bother to check that the rfa was live. If piotrus is fine will how this was handled, after the fact, then all is well. But what should have been done, what I should have done when i noticed this ANI thread and ignored it, was to nuke the comments and the votes and remind everyone to be more patient. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:54, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
That would've been the best possible solution, since the nom entered running without the expected conomination(s), other tweaks, and potentially x days/weeks/months too soon. Still, it's a useful experience, and all admins involved acted in good faith, so no problem here. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here 10:56, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Piotrus, honestly, if you were not wanting the RfA to go live yet, I recommend you, or anyone else for that matter, starts drafting the RfA in a userfied namespace, rather than as a subpage of Wikipedia:Requests for adminship. That way, you (or any other RfA nominees) don't unintentionally get into a situation where someone (such as myself) has even a chance of believing that the best course of action would be to transclude the RfA. In addition, I would also recommend that if the RfA were to become a subpage of Wikipedia:Requests for adminship before wanting the RfA to start that it be userfied, and possibly have the new redirect deleted, the latter step being a personal preference (since votes can always be deleted.) Steel1943 (talk) 23:38, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I agree with Someguy1221. This is why nom's are sometimes not the first ones to !vote support, because even they can't vote until it is transcluded and live. Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Nominate recommends that no votes be cast prior, but I think there is a consensus that nuking any premature !votes is perfectly fine, and preferred. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 12:53, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Dennis Brown, the idea of nuking all of the votes that you suggested, after thinking about it, makes more sense than the actions I took. Not only will I keep that in mind next time, but on the same coin, I propose that the suggestion you just made be included in Wikipedia:Guide to requests for adminship#Before nomination to better define a proper "good faith edit" to a non-transcluded WP:RFA. Steel1943 (talk) 23:25, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Really was Someguy's, I just agreed with him :) Most people used to know that, we just have fewer RfAs as of late so the issue doesn't come up very often. If you think it should be clarified on that info page, just pop a note on the talk page with your idea and wait a week. You can point to the discussion here as well. I'm guessing you wouldn't get a lot of resistance. For the record, if I removed four !votes from an untranscluded RfA, I would place polite notes on those editor's pages informing them. They would probably notice regardless, but its always a good idea to explain to someone before they have to ask you why you did something. Prevents drama. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 02:14, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Potential ownership issue at Wikipedia:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts[edit]

I made some edits at Wikipedia:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts that were reverted simply on the grounds I did not discuss them beforehand. This actually contravened the spirit of editing on Wikipedia i.e. only to revert edits if you disagree with their nature, not simply to insist that an editor must obtain permission first. I have since raised the matter in a discussion and an RFC at Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts which is ongoing. However, yesterday, the guidelines were edited so that the pertinent part of the guideline (Please don't remove articles which have some reasonable chance of staying here upon completion. Be bold, though, and if something was added which seems obviously not able to stand as one of the 10,000, remove it, with discussion if necessary, assuming good faith always) was changed (Everyone is welcome to edit the list, adding or deleting those articles they believe are "vital," but given that the Level 4 list currently exceeds its stated limit by over 300 topics, participating editors may request that you discuss your changes on the project talk page); see ([23]). The change in language now suggests that an editor may insist that a discussion has to take place, for no reason other than effectively to obtain permission. Since this is not a content dispute, but a practice affecting how editors should be allowed to edit Wikipedia I would like to request input from an admin at the RFC, and I would also like to request that the editing instructions are maintained in their pre-RFC form until the RFC comes to a conclusion. Betty Logan (talk) 07:09, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

So someone reverted you because you didnt discuss it first? Why does this seem familiar? Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:02, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
A few editors disagree about an approach, and there has been very little disruption: of the four editors involved I reverted twice and each of the others once and then it moved to the talk page, so there really is no need to turn this into point scoring. Let's focus on resolving the difference of opinion that does exist at the RFC. Betty Logan (talk) 11:25, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Although let me summarise from that RFC - you as a member of the film project would like the vital articles project to include/disallow films on its list of film vital articles in accordance with your (film projects) ideas of what is vital. Thats not really going to fly without significant discussion first. For all the reasons Dirtlawyer said. BRD applies almost everywhere and in almost every editing circumstance. The stated reason for discussion first is the size and scope of the vital articles. Allowing group additions/removals would make it unmanagable as individual films have individual circumstances that need to be discussed. Only in death does duty end (talk) 09:24, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Since the RFC essentially boils down to how the lists should be edited, I think proposals to alter the guideline should be put forward at the RFC in the context of a wider community discussion. Betty Logan (talk) 11:36, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
(EC) Bureaucratic process wonkery to be frank. Since any local guideline on editing wouldnt supersede wiki-wide editing behaviour. MOS issues to an extent can vary wildly from project to project. But BRD is generally considered the best way to actually edit. Since both the current (and previous incarnation) of the projects guidelines allow for the BRD method of editing, I am even less sure of what you are trying to accomplish. The wider community already thinks that you dont need to discuss before making edits if you feel they are not contentious. If someone has an issue and reverts them, the wider community consensus is that you should discuss it on the talk page. The local opinion of the VA project is that given the scope and nature of the list, non-discussed edits are not generally not helpful. This doesnt prevent you making BOLD edits, it just means you will be reverted and asked to discuss and explain your reasoning on the talkpage. Your options at that point are a)discuss it per the wider community consensus of BRD. b)Edit war. Only in death does duty end (talk) 12:16, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
There has been virtually no edit-warring: the only edit that would actually fit the definition would be my second revert (which was a revert of a revert), which I only made to get responses at the discussion I had started. And even if there had been constant reverting, the fact is there has been no edit to the article for two weeks. Project editing guidelines are always open to wider community scrutiny, and that is the purpose of an RFC. Since I have refrained from editing the lists I honestly do not think it is unreasonable that the guideline that is under debate is not re-written midway through the RFC. That is all I am asking, and hopefully I can spring a few more opinions to bring it to a conclusion, which would be to everyone's benefit. Betty Logan (talk) 12:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
By "spring a few more opinions," I hope you do not mean to suggest you are engaging in canvassing, Betty. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 13:08, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

I had hoped to avoid further escalation of these issues, but Betty Logan seems determined to create controversy in order to get her way. Frankly, she has made so many inaccurate statements, it's difficult to know where to start. I am going to try to focus on the core issues at hand. First, her reliance on the ambiguous (and out of date) introductory language of WikiProject Vital Articles/Expanded's project page is misplaced; it is not a "guideline," nor does it state what her interpretation says it does.

According to WP:GUIDELINE, "Wikipedia policies and guidelines are developed by the community to describe best practice, clarify principles, resolve conflicts, and otherwise further our goal of creating a free, reliable encyclopedia." Individual WikiProjects do not make guidelines, and WikiProjects certainly do not make editing rules that trump Wikipedia-wide guidelines. WP:BOLD is a Wikipedia-wide guideline, and so is WP:DISCUSSION. As anyone who has been editing Wikipedia for more than a brief time learns, every editor may make bold changes, and any editor may revert those changes; the best practice is then to engage in a substantive talk page discussion regarding those changes. This is described as the "bold change, revert, discussion cycle." (see WP:BRD) The ambiguous introductory language of the Vital Article WikiProject project page, even assuming Betty's interpretation of it is correct for the sake of argument, does not trump Wikipedia-wide policy.

Second, Betty drafted the RFC in question, apparently with no assistance. In her words, the RFC asks for resolution of the following question: "Should Film project editors be permitted to remove "non-core" film articles from the "vital articles" list?" The RFC statement is clear: it involves granting a privilege to film project editors to unilaterally remove individual film topics from the Vital Articles sublist of films, based on the film project's own list, on their say-so and no one else's. While the introductory language from the Vital Articles project page is mentioned in the RFC, the RFC does not ask for an interpretation of the following ambiguous language from the project page cited by her:

"Please don't remove articles which have some reasonable chance of staying here upon completion. Be bold, though, and if something was added which seems obviously not able to stand as one of the 10,000, remove it, with discussion if necessary, assuming good faith always."

The foregoing statement was poorly written and is clear as mud in its meaning, especially when viewed in light of the normal understanding of the BRD cycle. It was added several years ago when the Vital Articles project was still compiling its original expanded list of 10,000 topics, and clearly needs to be updated and revised to reflect the current status of the project. Yes, the existing introduction does suggest that editors may make bold changes to the Vital Articles lists, but it also says with "discussion if necessary" in an apparent reference to the normal understanding of the BRD cycle. Nowhere does the project page introduction suggest that bold changes are not subject to reversion and subsequent discussion. Betty's repeated reference to the ambiguous language above is misplaced. It is not a "guideline," nor does it unambiguously support her position. In fact, her interpretation of the language above is rather odd, especially given the explicit reference "with discussion, if necessary." Accepting the normal interpretation of the BRD cycle, one might suggest that discussion is necessary if your changes have been reverted. The introductory statement cited by Betty also says, "Please don't remove articles which have some reasonable chance of staying here upon completion." Betty has selectively chosen to ignore that sentence despite quoting it.

Having addressed Betty's statements directly, for the benefit of other editors, I would also note that Betty has been repeatedly invited to join the Vital Articles talk page discussions regarding individual film topics. She has steadfastly refused to engage in these individual topic discussions, and has characterized previous reverts of her edits as "solely bureaucratic reverts" and has dismissed repeated requests to participate in talk page discussions as "bureaucratic procedures." There is no monolithic conspiracy to oppose her proposed changes, and there exists considerable diversity of opinion on the Vital Articles project talk page. Several of Betty's proposed changes probably could have been agreed by consensus by now if she had simply chosen to participate in the normal discussion process. From my perspective, this is an unnecessary controversy, as one editor attempts to circumvent the normal BRD cycle by forum-shopping with an RFC and now an AN complaint; the best forum for resolving Betty's requested changes is and always has been the Vital Articles project talk page, where over 60 individual topics are currently under discussion, including over a dozen topics related to individual films, actors, and filmmakers. She only has to choose to participate. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 13:08, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

We have very different takes on this, but it is not about "getting my way" it is about my "interpretation" which is at odds with yours. The guideline as it was written is central to the discussion at the RFC, so all I am asking is that it isn't altered until the RFC is concluded. Also, again can we keep good faith here; I have not canvassed at all, unless you count filing an RFC as canvassing. The only other place I have raised the issue is here, and by "spring a few opinions" I think it is clear that I all I mean is that I hope this discussion may provoke some further input at the RFC. Betty Logan (talk) 14:17, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Let's be perfectly clear on three key points, Betty. For your benefit and that of other editors, I will summarize my comments above. First, the five-year-old introductory language on the Vital Articles WikiProject project page is not a "guideline" per WP:GUIDELINE. Second, even if it were a project guideline in the sense you suggest, it would not trump the "bold, revert, discuss cycle" which is Wikipedia-wide policy per WP:CONSENSUS. Third, that introductory language from the VA project page does not state what you say it does: it expressly states changes can be made "with discussion, if necessary"; I would suggest when your changes are reverted, discussion is necessary. I will not comment further to allow other disinterested editors to examine the situation and comment accordingly. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 15:35, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I gotta agree with DL1 on this. If there are any ownership issues, it's Betty who's exhibiting them. It's blatantly clear that Betty has edit-warred, believing erroneously that WP:BRD doesn't apply when it does. Not only was her proposal troubling in that it asked that a section of, it was so poorly written as to be incomprehensible to non-film project members. When Carl, DL1 and I asked for clarity, we were informed by Betty and SchroCat that asking for clarity was "overly bureaucratic". When DL1 and I pointed her to the correct channels, we were again accused of bureaucracy, or simply ignored outright. pbp 15:49, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
You cannot have ownership issues on an article that one has only edited eight times. Even though Dirtlawyer and I have diametrically opposing views he has acted in good faith towards me all through our disagreement, whereas you are trying to score cheap points at an inquiry that does not involve you by presenting your opinion as impartial when it is not, and now making bad faith accusations. I reverted twice, which doesn't even breach 3RR never mind come close to "edit-warring", and the discussion I started was ignored. I would really appreciate it if it you refrain from character assassination and focus on the issue: if your interpretation is correct then your argument should be strong enough. Betty Logan (talk) 16:07, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
What's character assassination and trying to score cheap points is you starting this thread in the first place. It's been blatantly clear for hours that this discussion is not going to result in any changes to the VA/E practice, or any sanctions of DL1 or myself, yet you persist in wasting the community's time with this pointless thread. Also, edit-warring doesn't have to be 3RR, and the way you reverted is pretty clearly edit-warring pbp 16:15, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
@PBP, I urge you to lower the rhetoric level; raising your voice is not going to help, regardless of the merits of your position.
@Betty, you suggest that "the discussion [you] started was ignored"; actually, you left a talk page note complaining of "bureaucratic reversions" (not a substantive discussion of your changes) at 9:18 p.m., east coast U.S. time (1:18 a.m., UTC), on a Saturday night (see diff). Having received no response in the next three hours, you started an RFC to force your changes at 12:12 a.m., east coast U.S. time (4:12 a.m., UTC), Sunday morning (see diff). I must say, given the time of day and days of the week, you certainly did not wait long for your discussion to be ignored. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 16:39, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I apologize to you personally if you feel I did not give you an adequate opportunity on the talk page, but all an RFC does is highlight the dicussion to bring in a few extra opinions. I feel this situation has somewhat escalated unnecessarily mainly because Purplebackpack89 has launched an attack on me in a completely separate issue to this, and I very much doubt he has taken the time to adequately explore the issue at the heart of that dispute, and even if he had he is not impartial. When a member of your party makes moves to undermine me in a completely separate dispute I don't really see much opportunity for resolving this just among ourselves. Betty Logan (talk) 17:55, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
This is the last comment I'm going to make to your baseless and inaccurate accusations. I would like to note the following:
"Launched an attack". Not an attack. If you consider my comments to be an attack, the premise of this thread is an attack against me and DL1.
"A completely separate issue to this". Nope. This concerns your behavior at WP:VA/E, just as the topic of the thread does
"I very much doubt he has taken the time to adequately explore the issue at the heart of that dispute". I read your proposal enough to know that it needs more adequate explanation before I have any chance of supporting it, but what does that have to do with an accusation of ownership anyway? I am not required to participate in all discussions at WP:VA/E
"And even if he had he is not impartial". So? Neither are you. Impartiality is not a prerequisite for participation in AN or ANI discussion
"A member of your party". That essentially amounts to an accusation of meatpuppetry. DL and I operate in completely separate spheres, with WP:VA/E being one of only a handful of intersects. DL did not request my imput in this thread, I did so solely of my own accord
In short, it's time to close this discussion without any action against me, DL1, Carlwev, the VA project, or WP:VA/E pbp 18:29, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I don't want action against you. I'm sorry if you feel that was my intent. I would just like an admin's explicit interpretation of the editing instructions if possible at the RFC, particularly if a project can prescribe the manner in which the list must be edited. Betty Logan (talk) 18:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I haven't read the RFC in question, but I don't see any reason why a project should be given control of any aspect of said list. Certainly one may bring members of such project into the discussion, but VA/E is ultimately separate from any Wikiproject and any consensus formed within its discussions are not required to fit into the whims of any project. If you want a list that the Arts project "owns" and maintains, then I would suggest creating your own project-specific list, such as at Wikipedia:WikiProject Canada/Vital Canadian articles. Resolute 18:50, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Admins are not referees. RNealK (talk) 02:44, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

ITN/C closures[edit]

There are a couple Wikipedia:In the news/Candidates that are marked as ready, but admins who are usually active in the project took part in the discussions so they can't be posted. Can an admin either post those, or leave a note as to why you don't think consensus has been reached? Ryan Vesey 23:44, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

BeneBot*[edit]

Can someone enlighten me as to why this "bot" is showing all over my Watchlist, and yet I see no contribs and no log entries anywhere? :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:28, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

See WP:WIKIDATA. The bot runs on wikidata.org, and its changes to Wikidata pages are shown on your watchlist for those connected pages on the English Wikipedia. You can click "Hide Wikidata" in watchlist settings to disable them, IIRC. —Theopolisme (talk) 21:31, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Hmph, assumed as much. I'm using some off-wiki Chrome Gadget to receive Watchlist notifications, so I don't think it's possible to use the on-wiki filters to avoid seeing those. Thanks for the quick explanation! :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:33, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Happy to. What is this "off-wiki Chrome Gadget" you speak of? —Theopolisme (talk) 21:37, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Wikipedia Watchlist, which you can thank User:Odie5533 for. I use it extensively and exclusively. :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:44, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
  • For the record, we've had a possibly related problem with this bot, when it initially did not run with the &bot=1 parameter set, which should've been corrected by its operator by now.--Jasper Deng (talk) 22:00, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I would, in case, strongly recommend putting something on the ENWP userpage; at least a redirection to the WikiData one? :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:05, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
I've notified the bot operator.--Jasper Deng (talk) 00:25, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Hi, I've created the bot's user page here. Is the problem still serious? Regards, -- Bene* (talk) 08:07, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Removing the "Secure your account" information from the login screen[edit]

Hi. I've started a discussion at MediaWiki talk:Loginend#Future of this message about whether we want to continue including the "Secure your account" information on the login screen. Please discuss at the link provided. --MZMcBride (talk) 21:44, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

Request to close a merger discussion[edit]

Merge proposal of "Kurdish separatism in Iran" into "Iranian Kurdistan" requires the attention of an uninvolved administrator to close the discussion. Thank you.Greyshark09 (talk) 07:20, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Quick request for help on WP:RFD[edit]

Could someone please close and/or relist the remaining two discussion on Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2013 April 11 and Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2013 April 14. Consensus looks pretty clear on both, and I would close them myself, but I am involved in both of the discussions. Steel1943 (talk) 23:04, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

 Done. JohnCD (talk) 11:34, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Can someone please userfy Once Upon Our Yesterdays?[edit]

Over one week ago, I asked the closing administrator of Once Upon Our Yesterdays to userfy the article. Can someone please userfy Once Upon Our Yesterdays? --Jax 0677 (talk) 03:53, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

User: Mr. Stradivarius is doing it now, I think. :) ·Salvidrim!·  06:38, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Yep, done. It can now be found at User:Jax 0677/Once Upon Our Yesterdays. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 06:45, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Reply - Thank you Mr. Stradivarius! --Jax 0677 (talk) 10:46, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
That's what WP:REFUND is for :-) (✉→BWilkins←✎) 11:29, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Betty Logan owns articles[edit]

Betty Logan seems to think she owns articles. Whenever anyone else edits List of vegans or List of vegetarians she just changes it back and claims that the other person has to discuss it with her before editing. She uses her own personal criteria to decide what does or doesn't belong in articles. For instance, Tobey Maguire is a vegan. Betty, however, doesn't think he should get to be called one so she won't let him be listed. "If someone eats dairy products it is irrlevant what they refer to themselves as! They are not vegan." and here she says "it doesn't matter what he self-identifies as! If someone eats dairy products they are not vegan." And here she threatens to block me for disagreeing with her. She has threatened me with blocking before and told me I shouldn't edit here if I can't do it her way. How is this right? Helpsome (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 15:34, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Purely on a practical level, if someone does consume dairy products, then they are not vegan. I'd say that on the face of it, she is not "owning" anything, but correcting your erroneous edit. As to the "threats" of blocking, I read that she has pointed out that the end result of edit warring, (which you were being warned about) is a possible block. I think you should have a quick slow and thorough read of WP:BRD, which advises you to discuss matters on the talk page, rather than keep reverting back to your own preferred version. - SchroCat (talk) 15:42, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Except it isn't true. There are four references given and in at least one he expressly states he doesn't eat dairy or eggs. Betty has just decided for herself that he isn't vegan. Helpsome (talk) 15:40, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • The individual should a) have an article, b) explicitly identify as a vegan, and c) be known as a vegan (i.e. not consume dairy or eggs). If someone self-identifies as a vegan but eats dairy, then they misunderstand what "vegan" means. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 15:50, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I think you need to read the sources more carefully. In one of them he says "I don't eat eggs, or nearly any dairy". Note the word nearly. He's not a vegan. He's nearly one, but not quite. The other refs refer to him being a vegetarian only. - SchroCat (talk) 15:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Are you kidding me? Because I am relatively new and she is a "Senior Editor" everyone lines up to say that I need to read rules but she can keep reverting back to HER preferred version? Where is she discussing things on talk pages? Or do those rules only apply to me? Helpsome (talk) 15:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
No, I'm not kidding, and no it's not because you're new and she isn't. Read WP:BRD. You made a Bold edit which Betty Reverted. You need to then Discuss on the talk page. It's you who wants to make the changes, so you have to be the one that opens up a discussion thread and work it out there. - SchroCat (talk) 15:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
WP:TRUTH is not listed as one of the exceptions to edit-warring. The process is be bold ... if it's reverted, do not re-add, but discuss until new consensus is obtained. Nobody is saying the rules don't apply to a senior editor, because they do. You simply need to read the rules and also act accordingly (✉→BWilkins←✎) 15:50, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
While I'd agree entirely that the place to discuss this is the article talk page, I think that Helpsome may have a point. It appears that Betty Logan is applying WP:OR to 'determine' who is or isn't a vegan. WP:TRUTH works both ways here, and it shouldn't be up to contributors to decide who is or isn't a member of a less-than-unambiguous category. AndyTheGrump (talk) 16:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I'm not entirely sure that's the case, Andy. It looks like where there is evidence that someone is a vegan (they have stated that and confirmed that they eat NO dairy products etc, they go on the list. Those who claim to be vegan but have said they still eat some form of non-vegan product don't go on the list, but onto the vegetarian one, as far as I can see. I'm not sure there is any WP:OR going on. Where do you see this OR going on? - SchroCat (talk) 16:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
'Evidence'? That is the problem. If contributors look at 'evidence', and reach 'conclusions', it is WP:OR. The fundamental problem is that a 'list of vegans' is always going to be questionable from a WP policy perspective - we are assigning individuals into an ambiguous category (there are differing definitions of veganism) on the basis of our own judgement. Given that this is an issue of ethics and/or individual choice, and that it is rarely something that individuals are notable for, I can see no particular reason why we should be making such judgements at all. AndyTheGrump (talk) 17:09, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Tobey Maguire is a well-known vegan. We should try to avoid imposing our own standards of purity, unless the subject has strayed so far that no reasonable person would continue to use the word "vegan" for him. I remember editors arguing that Bill Clinton wasn't a vegan because he admitted to eating one mouthful of turkey at Thanksgiving. Maguire admits to eating honey and the occasional piece of milk chocolate. [24] It's true that there are vegans and non-vegans who would exclude him for that, but in general someone who avoids meat, eggs and dairy and calls himself a vegan is regarded as a dietary vegan by Wikipedia, especially when lots of secondary sources call him a vegan too. SlimVirgin (talk) 17:16, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

If you want more proof of ownership, here is Betty Logan blindly reverting an edit where I added another reference just because I added it. How is an interview with Oprah Winfrey clarifying that Thich Nhat Hanh is a vegan not a good reference? Helpsome (talk) 17:38, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Helpsome, I think you ought to soft pedal on the accusations a little. You've changed the nationality of someone from Vietnamese to Vietnamese/French, based on the fact that they live in France. Surely you can see why that's been reverted? If in doubt, the edit summary kinda makes it clear... and I'm fairly speechless that you've gone ahead and reverted her, despite what people have been saying to you here. Have you read WP:BRD yet? If not, I strongly suggest that you do so without fail. Once you've read it, read it again and make you you understand about going to the talk page, rather than reverting. In terms of the number of sources: if one is sufficient, then that is all it needs. - SchroCat (talk) 18:16, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
That isn't what happened. I added a reference which clarified that Thich Nhan Hanh is a vegan in his own words in an interview with Oprah Winfrey. The existing reference is a blog. I also added that Nhat Hanh lives in France not Vietnam as he was exiled from Vietnam over forty years ago. Betty removed the addition of France AND the reference without even looking at it. I added the reference back but didn't alter the place of residence and now you are claiming that I reverted her which didn't happen at all. I think maybe you should stop blindly defending Betty and actually look at the actions here. Helpsome (talk) 18:22, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
In fact, YOU reverted me and claimed "As per the ANI thread. Multiple sources are not needed, if one will suffice" but where in this thread did you state that multiple references aren't needed? Why didn't you remove multiple references from the other twenty some entires with multiple references? You accused me of one thing here and another in your edit summary. Helpsome (talk) 18:25, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Did you ask Betty Logan on the talk page why she reverted your edit? No. You didn't, and you should have done instead of reverting.
  • " where in this thread did you state that multiple references aren't needed?" right here
  • "I also added that Nhat Hanh lives in France": it's a list of nationalities, not places of residence (although to be fair, the column heading looks to be misleading here)
It all boils down to the fact that instead of reverting you need to go to the discussion page. Rather than reverting you should have said on the discussion page, "Betty, why did you revert xxx?" Let them explain their rationale or the policy, or the MOS and you can have a discussion rather than an edit war. - SchroCat (talk) 18:35, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
You edited your own comment after you reverted me and put that in your summary. Proof. And why is it ME that has to take things to the talk pages while you and Betty get to be bold? I'm sure the fact that SchroCat gives Betty "new WikiLove message" and keeps an eye on her talk page has nothing at all to do with taking her side and reverting my edits to protect her. I'm not part of your little good guys club so Betty can do whatever she wants and control articles and I will just leave. You win. You chased away another editor who was just trying to help around here. Good job. Helpsome (talk) 18:40, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Helpsome, I am slightly at a loss here. You have been advised by a number of people (in other words, more than just me) to read BRD and if your bold edit is reverted then you go to the talk page. You. You need to start the discussion to get it going if you want to change the article. The other person has to join in with it, it's that simple. I am sorry that you are thinking of walking off, but you really do need to get to grips with the fact that discussion is the way to build a consensus, not by endless reversions. If you had asked Betty why she reverted you, she would have explained, and you may have learnt something, if you had tried. But you obviously think you know much better than anyone else and that everyone is against you. No-one has "won" here and it looks like no-one has leant anything either. - SchroCat (talk) 18:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I can't see why Helpsome's addition of Oprah Winfrey as a source was reverted, when the existing source is just a blog. [25] Is it not better to have both, or to let the Oprah interview replace the blog? SlimVirgin (talk) 18:47, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I would suspect that it may be because the Oprah interview refers to him as a vegetarian, not a vegan, so it's not terribly clear (although he says "Yes. Vegetarian. Complete. We do not use animal products anymore." and "No egg, no milk, no cheese."). The letter he wrote says vegan. I'm sure it would be a very good question to ask on the article's talk page, which is what should have happened some time ago. - SchroCat (talk) 18:54, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
(ec) Okay, that's a fair point. Some people use "strict vegetarian" instead of vegan, so that's probably what he meant by "Vegetarian. Complete." Personally, I'd just add that as a second source. SlimVirgin (talk) 18:55, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
You "would suspect"? So you have no idea why it was removed but you went ahead and removed it a second time without having any idea why. And you claim I am being paranoid about you guys ganging up on me. When Betty removed the addition of France to Nhat Hanh's entry she turned around and changed the intro to the article to defend it. Where was the talk page discussion there? Oh right only I have to run my edits past everyone else. Not Betty. She's special. She has SchroCat to defend her edits even when he doesn't understand them. Helpsome (talk) 19:07, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I'm English: we have a different way of talking that sometimes understates things. Perhaps I should just have said "It is because...", but that pre-supposes I am able to read the minds of other editors. Maybe I'll get round this by asking the person involved why they did it... what a cunning plan that is! Helpsome, the problem is that you have not asked the question on the article talk page, and it is you who want and need to know the answer. Go ahead, ask it: it will be answered and you may gain some understanding as to why it happened. If you do not ask, then you are not going to find out why except by double guessing others, getting paranoid and winding yourself up into a temper. Seek and ye shall find. - SchroCat (talk) 19:17, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I don't think the problem is me not talking. What makes you so sure I would have "learnt" something? Where is Betty? She was notified of this and yet where is she? You are here which is strange since the last instance of you coming to this page was December 19th of last year. I guess you just woke up this morning, stretched, yawned, scratched yourself and then decided to pop on over to a page you had not visited in four months and just happened to defend your good friend Betty. But I am just paranoid. You aren't in any way blindly defending Betty. You didn't discover this thread by keeping an eye on your friends talk page. I'm sure it is all just a big coincidence. Helpsome (talk) 19:29, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Helpsome, I am sorry you feel this way, but if you ask the question on the article talk page it will be answered. I can't do any more than to advise you to do that. If you won't ask, then you won't learn what the reason behind it was. What have you got to lose? - SchroCat (talk) 19:33, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I don't need to ask Betty's permission to edit her pet article. Even though you like to pretend you are just being a friendly policy wonk, I have read BRD. It says "BRD is not a policy". It also says "BRD is not a valid excuse for reverting good-faith efforts to improve a page simply because you don't like the changes." It also says "BRD is not for reverting changes by different editors repeatedly over an extended period to protect your preferred version or ideas". My edits were in good faith and you and Betty blindly revert them to protect her preferred version. So I'm pretty sure you and Betty tag-team reverting me are in violation of BRD not me. Helpsome (talk) 19:39, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Right, but WP:CONSENSUS is one of the 5 pillars, and WP:BRD merely makes consensus easier to understand - yet, lo and behold, you're having issues. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 20:09, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
That's fine: ignore everything you've been advised by others and just do what you want. If you won't listen to the good advice of "discuss, don't war", then you will probably find yourself on the end of a 3RR warning before long. As for "you and Betty blindly revert them to protect her preferred version": you have not bothered to ask the question to find out, have you? I'm wondering why you won't ask the very simple question. - SchroCat (talk) 19:44, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I just quoted the non-policy to you and outlined how you are in violation of it and that means I am ignoring everything I have been advised to do and just doing whatever I want? Why won't you clarify whether or not you are solely here due to your friendship with Betty? Helpsome (talk) 19:54, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I have not violated anything. If you will not open a new discussion on the talk page, or join in the ongoing discussion there, then there is little more help that can be offered. Advice has been given. If you wish to ignore it and carry on your own path, that is your concern. - SchroCat (talk) 20:00, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
In the kindest way I can say this: bull. You have blindly reverted to Betty's favored version while admitting you didn't even know why she reverted me in the first place. Then you backpedaled and tried to make it look like the reason was that there were too many references as if there is a policy on only having one reference per statement. You even claimed in the edit summary that you were going along with the thread here but that required you to come back here and edit your statement to make your edit summary true. You were the first person to show up to respond to this compaint and you did it literally two minutes after I posted. You must really watch her talk page like a hawk. Helpsome (talk) 20:04, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Helpsome, I'm going to withdraw from this because it's just going nowhere and you are becoming less logical and more paranoid with each posting. You have little grasp of good faith, are making jumps of logic that are, quite frankly, ridiculous and you have not done the one thing that may give you an answer, which is to ask the question on the article talk page. I have no doubt you'll come back with some other twisted interpretation of other people's motives, but I am afraid you are barking up the wrong tree in attacking me. For the last time, I'll advise you go to the article talk page, which is the right place to discuss your question. - SchroCat (talk) 20:12, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Uninvolved observation: There's a dicussion on at least one of the talk pages that Betty is participating in. I may have missed it, but I haven't see you (Helpsome) participate, yet. Jauerbackdude?/dude. 19:46, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
The masses are generally hysterical. It's a good thing the judicial system isn't a function of the masses, else we'd have anarchy and chaos. Helpsome is correct and Betty is OWNing the article. 134.241.58.251 (talk) 19:48, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
She started that discussion after I filed this complaint and since she seems to be arguing with everyone over there so what would be the point? Helpsome (talk) 19:49, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
WP:DRN is the place for content disputes. Nobody is going to get blocked if they actually followed WP:BRD properly. (✉→BWilkins←✎) 20:11, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I don't want anyone to be blocked I just want Betty to release the hold she has on articles and allow others to edit without her just reverting it. Getting consensus is impossible. Look at the talk page right now. Betty just replies to everyone and tells them they are wrong. How would it ever be possible to create consensus with someone who owns an article and doesn't allow others to edit? Helpsome (talk) 20:14, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment I have to say as an uninvolved user I was quite surprised at how quickly Betty Logan jumped to lash out at me when I made comment that was merely answering her RfC question and wasn't even taking a stance on whether or not Tobey Maguire, in particular, should be included. I don't have a dog in this hunt but that kind of response to outside comment does not help promote constructive and civil dialogue. AgneCheese/Wine 20:24, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Comment As an uninvolved user, may I ask something? Why you have so few comments on talk page, Helpsome? And why is Betty Logan not writing anything here? Just curious. --Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 21:20, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Simply because I don't see what there is for me to discuss. Helpsome has edited the page on four occasions prior to this dispute and I did not interfere with those edits in any way. In fact if you go through my edits, apart from some restructuring which was agreed upon in an RFC, they are nearly all reverts (exclusively unsourced additions, additions sourced to facebook, blogs etc, unexplained removal of validly sourced entries). I have probably reverted more times on the vegan and vegetarian list than all other Wikipedia articles put together, but that's more of a symptom of the topic area. I edit a lot of snooker and film articles too, and I have never run into the level of poor editing I encounter on these two vegetarian lists. Ultimately what this comes down to is that I disagreed with the interpretation of the sources Helpsome provided and reverted him twice, and he ran off to report me for "ownership issues". It's rather telling that he came here first rather than the talk page. Crucially he hasn't supplied a list of edits showing my "ownership" issues, and I can't really refute an allegation. Betty Logan (talk) 22:14, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Saying you haven't reverted any of my edits until now is just a lie. You did on List of vegetarians a few months back and even threatened to block me back then. You just admitted that most of you work on these two articles is reverting other people. You want a list of edits showing "ownership" ok. Here is you unilaterally deciding that WTF with Marc Maron isn't a valid reference. Here is you deciding that an interview with the subject isn't a valid reference. Here is you deciding that About.com isn't a valid reference. Here is you having an edit war about using dead references. Here is you actually reverting someone who changed Paris Hilton's entry to say "socialite" instead of your prefered "appeared in a sex tape". But sure you don't show any signs of ownership at all. Helpsome (talk) 01:09, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Erm, about.com isn't reliable in 9 times out of ten. The Blum video may have been a copyvio (and should rightfully have been removed unless shown otherwise). I'd question a source titled WTF too. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 01:12, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Also, Youtube isn't reliable either as per WP:NOYT, and WP:DEADREF makes it perfectly clear we don't delete citations just because they have died, since a search through archives may locate replacements. As for Paris Hilton, well, what does she do exactly? "Socialising" is a polite way of putting it... Maybe one or two of those may turn out to be reliable, but they are all incredibly weak sources at the end of the day. I made a judgment call. If someone challenges me over a source I take it to RS/N. Ownership is essentially not permitting anyone to make edits, which is not true. Betty Logan (talk) 03:28, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I don't see any evidence of ownership. I do see edit warring by both editors. Betty has not violated WP:3RR on either article, but Helpsome has. Other than the edit warring, which belongs, if anywhere at WP:ANEW, I don't see any administrative action required. (I also don't see any "lashing out" by Betty. In my experience, she can be a strong and blunt editor, but she's not uncivil.)--Bbb23 (talk) 22:48, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
I was sharper than what I should have been with Agne, but I was cheesed off by then so he got the brunt of it, and for that I apologize. There was very little edit-warring in reality. I reverted twice with comprehensive edit summaries and then started the RFC, which is par for the course for me when it becomes clear the situation cannot be resolved through edit summary reasoning. The third revert, and the one that precipitated Helpsome violating 3RR was due to an unrelated misunderstanding: the article used to be a "List of vegans by nationality", but has been restructured over the last few months, and we lost the nationality distinction when we ordered it alphabetically. Since this wasn't clear to him I decided it would be unfair to get someone blocked based on what was a genuine misunderstanding, and I added the clarification that the countries are explicitly related to nationality. Betty Logan (talk) 23:08, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Solution Idea[edit]

As an uninvolved user, I have a solution offer. You can create an extra table of list for people who claim to be vegan but not strictly hold to it. Just an idea to be helpful to both sides.--Hakan Erbaslar (talk) 21:27, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

Agree, perhaps under the List of vegans#Disputed table?Antiochus the Great (talk) 21:44, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
Disputed by whom, though? We can't have contributors engaging in WP:OR to dispute whether someone is vegan. I'm not sure that a cited source saying that "X claims to be vegan but isn't" is particularly beneficial either. Anyway, this belongs on the talk page, not here. AndyTheGrump (talk) 23:30, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
It is disputed by Tobey Maguire, who once declared that he is "not technically vegan". Would you advocate adding him to a list of gays without explicit acknowledgment from the subject himself? Betty Logan (talk) 00:22, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
WP:BLPVEG?--Bbb23 (talk) 00:46, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Personally, I don't advocate adding anyone to a 'list of gays', full stop. Fortunately, we at least have the decency to insist on self-identification regarding sexual orientation, rather than engaging in WP:OR to decide who goes on a list, which is what you seemed to be advocating in the RFC you started earlier [26]. AndyTheGrump (talk) 01:01, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
There has been no evidence of WP:OR in the actual list article content, which is what the policy forbids. There is no prohibition for editors using their collective and independent thoughts and analysis on the talk pages to determine what is presented in the article and how it is presented and whether or not the source's claims are actually valid. WP:RS / WP:SPS / WP:V. You could find a reliable source published where I said I am the President of Pendoomistan, but that doesnt automatically validate an insistence that my name must be included on the List of Presidents of Pendoomistan.-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 16:05, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

This is the dumbest argument[edit]

Seriously, just topic ban both of them from anything vegan related and call it a day. Jtrainor (talk) 01:24, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I assume that means neither of us can edit vegan articles. I'll take it if it means she won't get to control those articles anymore. No complaints from me. Ban us both. Helpsome (talk) 01:38, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Topic ban is a Good Idea. Or a voluntary four-week vacation by each party. I have done this voluntarily myself, and I felt much better on a psychological basis when I finally went back to editing. How about taking a breather, all interested people? GeorgeLouis (talk) 04:55, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Well, why should I be topic banned when no actual evidence of ownership has been brought forward? Which edits of mine do you think display a systematic ownership of the article, as opposed to just being a valid interpretation of sourcing policy? I urge Bbb23 to reclose this unless an uninvolved admin is actually prepared to go through my edits and put together a case for me to answer to, because there really is nothing for me to defend myself from so far. I hope I'm not on the end of red-link prejudice here. The fact that Helpsome above has highlighted my reverts of additions sourced to About.com and Youtube, and that he thinks it is ok to removed dead references without attempting to replace them through archives should send out warning signs that he does not have a firm grasp on Wikipedia's sourcing policy. Betty Logan (talk) 05:25, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
I really think I need to step in here. I might be no admin but I think just because a source violates some copyrights and says "WTF" doesn't mean it can't be qualified as a reliable source. A video is always a clear proof no matter what. I'm not saying whether Toby Maguire is a vegan or not. Second of all Betty Logan you can't say that somebody needs to discuss with you before editing a page. Helpsome is correctly saying that it seems like you think you own the article. If there is an edit or edit war both of you have have equally participated in it. Instead of saying that someone should read the rules before editing you need to concentrate on the discussion. If they have committed some mistake then should e just politely informed. Your behaviour has also been disputive with other editors too and I think you need to improve your own first before telling others to improve theirs. 07:25, 24 April 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by KahnJohn27 (talkcontribs)
It is not really your place to comment on another editor's conduct when you were recently warned about threatening behavior and harrassment of an editor at the Film project by an admin. I filed an RFC to get an independent opinion, which is what you should have done on the film articles when you kept reverting User:BattleshipMan and User:Darkwarriorblake (a dispute which I only ever participated in at discussion level after they brought the issue to the Film project). Also, we would all love to hear about these ownership issues you encountered from me when I never actively reverted an edit of yours. Betty Logan (talk) 08:05, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Kahn, if you seriously think linking to a copyright violation is within our policies and guidelines then you need to read again (here too). — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:23, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Why Jtrainor feels the need to edit Wikipedia once every four months to make unhelpful comments is much more concerning than the current topic. Viriditas (talk) 08:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
I love you too, Viriditas. Perhaps you should find a better hobby than tracking how often I post. Jtrainor (talk) 03:22, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Funny how your account seems to just show up every four months or so to make strange comments on the noticeboards and does nothing else. Viriditas (talk) 03:46, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
What's it to you? It's a free wiki. Jtrainor (talk) 01:05, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support pbp 14:20, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Request that this support is struck – This is a "revenge" vote since I have have started an RFC to resolve an issue related to this editor's actions at Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts, so it is not impartial. Betty Logan (talk) 06:40, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Betty's edits on List of vegans[edit]

This is one of the articles I have been accused of ownership of. I am going to list all the diffs of every single one my edits from the last six months, and before any editor calls for me to be topic banned I would like them to sign their signatures next to the edits where they feel I displayed "ownership" as opposed to a valid interpretation of policy and guidelines. Once we have identified the edits where I have a case to answer, we will examine the edit more closely to determine whether it was an issue of ownership or whether it was in the spirit of collegiate, policy observing editing. This is a complete list, so there are some uneventful edits where I simply put names in the correct order etc, but I feel they are important to include to give a full picture of my activity. It's also worth noting I made 26 in total, out of a total of 135 edits: Betty Logan (talk) 06:01, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

  1. [27]
  2. [28]
  3. [29]
  4. [30]
  5. [31]
  6. [32]
  7. [33]
  8. [34] StAnselm (talk)
  9. [35]
  10. [36]
  11. [37]
  12. [38]
  13. [39]
  14. [40]
  15. [41]
  16. [42]
  17. [43]
  18. [44]
  19. [45]
  20. [46]
  21. [47] StAnselm (talk)
  22. [48]
  23. [49]
  24. [50]
  25. [51]
  26. [52]
  • Comment: I clicked on a random edit, and it was very close to ownership, and certainly below par. You reverted another editor without giving a reason. The editor had removed a dubious entry (based on a translation from another language, and I'm immediately wondering whether the correct translation is "vegan" or "vegetarian"). Why didn't you provide a reason? Why didn't you start a discussion on the talk page? Sertab Erener isn't listed as a vegan on her wikipedia article - why did you restore her to the list? Reading the discussion, I thought that topic banning you sounded over the top, but now I'm warming to the idea. StAnselm (talk) 08:31, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
    • Yeah, that doesn't look good. The ref used there is below par too; gazetehayat is not used anywhere else on Wikipedia. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:38, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • In that regard, but leaving the question of it being a reliable source apart: I had a look at the Turkish article that it was taken from, and she spoke about "vegetarian and vegan" as a lifestyle to follow, not necessarily for herself, but that her intentions go in that direction.....Only if you took a look at the title would you get the idea that she was (already) vegan herself. Lectonar (talk) 08:52, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
(source 8) I do always try to check translated sources when they are added. Google translator describes veganism as a "higher order of vegetarianism" and mentions other aspects of vegansism in that article, so the source seems to do what it says on the tin. I did once challenge the use of foreign language sources since I couldn't assess them properly, and was chastised by an admin (way back in 2010) that if I didn't have a credible reason for doubting their authenticity other than the fact it was a foreign language source, then I did not have a basis for removing them. The editor provided no alternative proof for negating the claim, nor did they say the source did not back up the claim. If the editor had disputed the edit then it would have progressed to the talk page as they usually do in these cases. Out of interest, if someone had come along and added that entry and I had removed it in that edit, would you have been sanctioning a ban then? The bottom line is that we had a source that I couldn't say for sure didn't back up what it claimed, so I had two options: leave it off or add it back on, and I generally just restore sourced content if the source itself isn't questioned. For the record I would more than happily remove the foreign language sources if that is what everyone would prefer. Betty Logan (talk) 09:08, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
The most obvious response is, why didn't you say this in your edit summaries? Why didn't you post a note like this on the talk page? StAnselm (talk) 09:13, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
It is a fault I do admit that I probably don't use the edit summaries enough. I spend a lot of time creating/editing templates and stat articles where there just isn't much conflict anyway, so I never really have cause to use them. Sometimes I try hard with them for a while and then it just tapers off, and you can probably see this from the edit history of the article, where I use edit summaries for a while and then I don't. Betty Logan (talk) 09:44, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Coupled with (Source 21) I can see it doesn't look great, but even though it's the same edit it is 5 months apart; I doubt I was aware of it at the time. Betty Logan (talk) 09:56, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Well, I am satisfied with that acknowledgement, and I think Betty Logan will learn from this experience. I would oppose a topic ban, as a needless loss to the community. StAnselm (talk) 11:39, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, it does mean a lot, although in reality I would have just diverted my efforts in the event of a topic ban. Betty Logan (talk) 12:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Unsolicited advice ahead: lack of edit summaries contributes to an image of page ownership. For example, there are some folks in the area of military history that I feel exhibit borderline ownership behavior, and recently one of those editors reverted an IP's contribution without any explanation. I felt it crossed a line and I called them out for it on their talk page, and their response explained the (legitimate) reversion... but if they had just done so in the edit summary, then some micro-drama would have been avoided. That's what edit summaries are there for. There are nearly 100 watchers of List of vegans; the next time you edit the list you can imagine that some of those watchers might want to know what's going on. Regards, Orange Suede Sofa (talk) 23:27, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Based on my clicks Betty needs to use edit summaries a bit more, but those I've looked at seem viable. Revert unexplained removals, revert additions with poor sources, etc. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 08:38, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with either of those edits. In a perfect world betty would investigate the source and provide a brief summary of her findings on a talk page or an edit summary, but I'm not going to fault her for that when the other editor's edit summary was no more informative than "not true". Anyway, the rest of this whole thread is just silly. What the OP needs to do is just go back down the road of dispute resolution, rather than trying to have an editor banned from a page because she consistently disagrees with him. Someguy1221 (talk) 09:16, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

Please know that it is not your place to say what user has what kind of behavior the other user has when you have induldged in the same Betty Logan. Apart from that sorry I misread the policy of WP:LINKVIO. I'm sorry about that. But that does not change the fact that you have a real serious combative behavior. This can be seen from your statement "Apart from that if you really think that I really threatened MarnetteD then you should first have a hard proof. Apart from that I request Helpsome not to worry since her unfair block warning to you has already been noticed by many users. This is actual bullying. As I've said that I was only acting upon what I see. It was actually a violation of WP:CONSENSUS but as his behavior was in good faith I thought that I'm making a mistake reporting about him because his intention were always good. We can clearly see how disputive the behavior of Betty Logan is and anyway it is you being discussed here not me. Apart from that I'm not going to comment here further because I already have said whatever there is to say. I think rather than saying that he did this and he did that you should focus on improving your behaviour. KahnJohn27 (talk) 11:49, 24 April 2013 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.253.184.57 (talk)
an observation: wikipedia has a big problem: edit conflicts. I see an edit conflict nearly in every article. the rules are too open for interpretation. wikipedia should not be edited by everyone. people should just upload info and source and comments, it must be up to admins to add it or not. (same like google translate). so many edit conflicts and endless debates are just stress for everyone and waste of energy and time.--85.103.120.170 (talk) 12:25, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Wikipedia is like a religion: you start off with a cult, move on to enlightenment and the spreading of knowledge, and then ultimately you will end up with the fanatics. Betty Logan (talk) 12:58, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment: You should see BL's edits to Wikipedia:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts and Wikipedia talk:Vital articles/Expanded/Arts. She edit-warred, claiming that the disclaimer allowing free editing of the page (which was being changed at that time) overrode WP:BRD. Then she didn't really delineate her proposal, when I asked "please just say delete articles X, Y, Z; add articles A, B, C" she called it overly bureaucratic pbp 14:17, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Purplebackpack89 is actually misrepresenting the situation. I have been the proactive editor in that discussion trying to resole the issue on the talk page. Here is the edit history of that page. I tried to remove some non core film articles on that page in full accordance with the update procedures at Wikipedia:Vital_articles/Expanded which state Be bold, though, and if something was added which seems obviously not able to stand as one of the 10,000, remove it, with discussion if necessary, assuming good faith always. Three of the editors reverted me a couple of times telling me to simply "discuss" it without providing any reasons for why they opposed the removal of the films. I found this rather strange, insisting on discussion for the sake of it, which was in direct contravention of the guidelines. I started a discussion on the talk page but the three editors ignored it, so I started an RFC about removing the films I though should be removed at Wikipedia_talk:Vital_articles/Expanded/Arts#Discussion. It should be pointed out that the RFC is going in my direction too, although they are on there saying they don't acknowledge the RFC. But as you can see I had never edited the page before, reverted a couple of times, but when it became clear there was a problem I took it to the discussion page. To be honest I don't see what this has to do with the vegetarian articles: I tried to edit the page, when it was clear the edits were a problem I took it to the talk page, and when it was ignored I started an RFC. I don't think this issue is relevant to the vegan one, but I wouldn't mind if some of you added to the RFC because it is dragging on a bit. Betty Logan (talk) 23:00, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Betty Logan's reverting at List of vegans has been a problem for over two years, and I know one new editor, User:Andomedium, stopped editing Wikipedia because of it. I'll offer just one diff to show the problem. Andomedium's first edit to the page was to add a name out of alphabetical order, which Betty Logan moved with the edit summary: "They don't teach the alphabet in schools anymore??" Andomedium ended up putting a lot of work into trying to fix the article, including making the ref formats consistent, all of which Betty Logan reverted. There's a similar attitude at List of vegetarians; this shows Betty Logan removing a name with the edit summary: "Put it in alphabetical order or don't bother."

    I have no problem with a bit of ownership if the article is high quality or heading in that direction; I understand wanting to stop an article from deteriorating and on some pages reverting a lot is the only way to do that. But the situation at List of vegans is that people are being stopped from improving it, and it's not currently in a good state. For example, there are lots of notable names missing, the ref formats are inconsistent, and there are three sections, one called "active" (without indicating what that means), then one each for UK and US, which makes no sense. Betty Logan has maintained it in that transitional state (he is changing it from country-of-birth sections to no sections) since August 2012. It would be good if others could now be allowed to get it in shape. SlimVirgin (talk) 21:38, 24 April 2013 (UTC)

It's true it was a terrible edit, and I did apologise for it at the time, it was a moment of frustration at a stressful time in the article's development, and I haven't done it since I was asked not to in over a year. An admin had to step in because Slimvirgin was trying to remove all the citation templates under the cover of fabricated edit summaries: [53]. Admin User:kww had this to say: refusal to participate in dispute resolution and false edit summaries ... render SlimVirgin's edits highly problematic. I did try to take the issue to dispute resoultion but she refused to participate, so there you go. Also I don't agree I am keeping the article in a transtional state. It is in a transitional state because there is a consensus to transition it and all the work has been left to me. I don't mind, but it just takes time. This was the state it was in before it went into "transitional state": [54]. I disagreed with this direction for the article so I opened an RFC to remove the images from the tables, and there is a clear consensus to remove the images and sort the table alhphabetically]]. As a result I am merging the tabels and sorting: List of vegans. It is not finished yet, but it's been a big job. I have completed the List of vegetarians if anyone wants to see how the List of vegans will look. The problem everything takes so long is that Slimvirgin disrupts development at every stage she can. Despite the fact that there is a clear consensus to order the table alphabetically (every one of six neutral editors agreed with my proposal) she still won't accept the consensus: Talk:List_of_vegans#Active_list. I really don't know what to do when an admin refuses to accept the decision of six neutral editors. All I can is push on. There is an agreement to add section breaks to the table if it becomes too large, and I am happy to do that. Obvioysly, a clear consensus from an RFC is not proof of "ownership", and an admin fabricating edit summaries to cover up her removal of citation templates is, not least because they shouldn't have been removed, nevermind the dishonesty. Betty Logan (talk) 23:26, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
I could spend hours finding diffs to show that what you're saying is wrong, but there's no point. The point is twofold: first, that several people have been upset by your editing of that article for some time, and secondly, that it's not in a good state. If you'd managed to get it to FL quality (or at least improving) despite the upset, I wouldn't be complaining, but here we have a behaviour problem and a quality problem, so no one is benefiting. You've said elsewhere that you don't care about the article that much anyway, so please allow other people to help fix and maintain it. That's all that's being requested: that you relax your grip a little. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:40, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, there is one point in Betty Logan's post that is so absurd I have to correct and draw attention to it, because it illustrates the problem. He wrote of his maintaining the article in a transitional state regarding the subsections (which have looked odd for months): "The problem everything takes so long is that Slimvirgin disrupts development at every stage she can. Despite the fact that there is a clear consensus to order the table alphabetically (every one of six neutral editors agreed with my proposal) she still won't accept the consensus ..." Betty Logan started changing the sections in August last year and still hasn't finished. I didn't edit the article or talk page from 20 July 2012 to 23 April 2013. Yet it is my fault the article is in poor shape because I am disrupting development at every stage. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:54, 24 April 2013 (UTC)
"Relaxing" my "grip" to you essentially means removal of citation templates, and abandoning the consensus I obtained from the RFC to order the table alphabetically. I am not going to back down on that when I have the backing of the community for that particular development. I am also not going to back down in regards to source vetting. When we had this dispute last year, I was forced into taking many of yours to the RS/N where they were ruled not reliable. This discussion is to determine whether I have an ownership issue. Actually, the only clear evidence of ownership was when I reverted some of the non-alphabetic additions, since that was not in accordance with any guideline or policy, and I have not done that since I was asked to stop over a year ago. Every other action on there I take in accordance with the consensus from the RFC and verifiability guidelines:
  1. There was a consensus to remove images from the table, so I removed them.
  2. There is a consensus to merge the tables and order the list alphabetically, and I am undertaking that. The trouble is I only get a large chunck of time off in the summer, so while I got List of vegetarians merged I didn't complete List of vegans. But the merge will be completed this summer if it isn't completed by then.
  3. I have no problem with your suggestion to add sections breaks to the table. But they will just be section breaks, not a compeletely different ordering section contrary to the one agreed at the RFC.
  4. The guidelines do not permit the wholesale removal of citation templates, so I will revert you every time you try to remove them. Most articles have them, and it encourages editors to include the correct bibilographic details.
  5. If an entry is added that I do not consider reliably sourced, I will revert the edit. I carry out a lot of assessment and have fairly good judgment when it comes to assessing sources. It's worth noting that whenever I do take a source to RS/N to question it my instincts are proven right 9 times out of 10. However, if this really is a problem, I will agree to move each one I feel is inappropriate to the talk page, and someone else can check them besides me.
  6. If someone removes a sourced entry without good cause, then I will restore it. I simply don't think it is appropriate to remove sourced content, and the onus is on the remover to give a valid reason why the source is incorrect or not reliable, if the entry really is to be removed.
The only real objection I see is to how I vet the sources, but that is simply my interpretation of sourcing policy. I do object to the insinuation that undertaking development that an RFC delivered consensus for is "ownership" though. Even if someone unilaterally undertakes development it is is not ownership if it clearly adheres to a consensus from an RFC. The RFC is above; does anyone feel that my development of the article has gone beyond the remit of what was agreed? Betty Logan (talk) 00:34, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Break[edit]

  • I also want to draw attention to the focus in List of vegetarians on images of women wearing little clothing. I raised the issue on the talk page here, pointing out that of the 13 images of women in the article, 3 are of "Playmates," 1 is an erotic dancer/porn star, and 1 is a glamour model, meaning that 5 out of 13 are women known for taking off their clothes (it was six until Pamela Anderson, photographed in a bikini, was moved by Betty Logan to List of vegans). Part of Betty Logan's response to my post was: "And if we can show a good looking guy with huge muscles or a pretty woman with huge jugs then why not?" [55] That kind of response really isn't acceptable. SlimVirgin (talk) 01:48, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
This is getting plain childish now. Yes there is a discussion about the images on the article. And no, I have never actually prevented editors from adding images, or replacing images if it extended the demographic range of the gallery. My comment has been unfairly taken out of context, and yes, I see no problem with having a muscular guy and a woman with huge jugs among the images any more than there is of having a photo of a statue of a dead philosopher. A female academic has no more right to be in the gallery than a porn star. Pamela Anderson's photo was part of PETA campaign where they remodelled her Baywatch bikini out of vegetables. This is a vegetarianism article, after all. To be honest I don't see how this relates to an ownership discussion. Does anyone see me in that discussion saying "you can't have this image, we're having this oen instead"? So far you have dragged up a couple of unacceptable edits that I apologised for last year and promised no to do it again; the reason you had to go back a year is because the issue was reolved then and I kept my word not to fo it. You have brought up my revelopment of the lists which I obtained a consensus for in an RFC, and no evidence has been put forward of me deviating form that consensus. Now you you are claiming that I have ownership issues because there was a photo of Pamela Anderson in a bikini as part of a PETA campaign on the list. In fact, if anyone is summoned the will to be still following this witch hunt, please go over to the discussion yourself. If the view is that I am being unreasonable in that discussion I will drop it and give her complete control over the images. Betty Logan (talk) 02:16, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
If your aim is to drive people away from Wikipedia, please do continue talking about "women with huge jugs." SlimVirgin (talk) 02:23, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
I didn't particularly welcome your description of an erotic dancer as a "woman that takes her clothes off". It's a discipline, and she is a skilled professional. There is a sparse dress code, but your comment was derogatory. Women who work in erotic entertainment, glamor modelling and the sex industry don't deserve the stigma attached to those professions, and they certainly shouldn't be getting judged on Wikipedia. Betty Logan (talk) 02:31, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment: Though I do not know the particular circumstances that surrounded the revert, this particular does look an aweful lot like ownership to me. My 2 cents if it is worth anything. No comment on any of the other revisions. I've not really looked at all of them. Zell Faze (talk) 02:04, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, but there is a background there you need to be aware of. The table is slightly mis-labelled, because we used to document what people were notable for when it was just a list. If you go through that chart, it doesn't really list the "occupation" in most cases, and should probably be changed to "notability". If you google "Paris Hilton"+"socialite" and "Paris Hilton"+"sex tape", it is clear she is mostly notable for appearing a sex tape. However, when it was reverted back to socialite again I left it in view of the new table heading, but in truth many of those "occupation" entries need to be changed. I prefer the old notability style, since we now have Hitler down as a "politician". Betty Logan (talk) 02:26, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment: The problem isn't Betty Logan, who in my opinion is a fine editor with a proven track record of improving Wikipedia. The problem is that the list of vegans attracts problem editors, and the list itself isn't very encyclopedic and is best handled as a category. If Betty made some mistakes or didn't use an edit summary, I'm sure she'll make an effort to improve, but she isn't the problem here. Viriditas (talk) 03:59, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • With respect, Viriditas, if you look through his edits going right back to the beginning, they're really problematic. The article doesn't attract problem editors; it attracts new editors, as these lists often do because they're entry level. New editors see a name or source missing and feel they can add it without too much difficulty, except here they can't because Betty Logan almost always reverts, and is invariably abusive when challenged. And his response about "women with huge jugs" in reply to a concern about the preponderance of Playmates/porn stars isn't something that any female Wikipedian should have to put up with. SlimVirgin (talk) 04:18, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Viriditas and I continued discussing sexism on Wikipedia here for anyone who's interested. SlimVirgin (talk) 18:57, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I'm not going to get back into this dispute for various reasons (and you and I have argued about this enough so there's no need to start that up again), but I will offer some advice to Betty instead: start a new thread on the list talk page and make your concerns known. Then, take this list off your watchlist and find something else to do. If it doesn't improve in a year, revisit your old concerns and address them again. I will say, SlimVirgin, that I feel you are misrepresenting Betty Logan to score a few points, and I find that unfortunate. Viriditas (talk) 04:23, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I took the page off my watchlist for almost a year, from around July 2012 to April 2013. When I looked again it had deteriorated, because Betty Logan had reverted Andomedium's work making the ref formats consistent (and it was a lot of work, reverted without discussion three months after he did it). Some editors would like to take the article to FL status. We shouldn't have to keep taking the page off our watchlists because of one editor. His edits speak for themselves if any of you take the time to go through them, and his behaviour is considerably worse than the editor who brought this complaint realized.

    More to the point now, I'm disappointed that his "huge jugs" comment is allowed to stand as though it doesn't matter. That is very discouraging. That's all I have to say about this. SlimVirgin (talk) 05:06, 25 April 2013 (UTC)

Do the references here look any more consistent than how how they are now? All entries that were added in the meantime were put back by me, so no information was lost despite the revert. This was just part of your ongoing campaign to eliminate citation templates from articles. The one editor who was most committed to this article User:Muleattack actually quit because of you ignoring his concerns, conveniently hidden by you ratcheting up the archiving process. Betty Logan (talk) 05:22, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
  • A few points:
  1. Slim clearly has an issue with me, and the fact she keeps referring to me as "he" is actually very derogatory and she should have been pulled up on it by now. I have never actually identified myself as male or female so she has no basis for applying this descriptor, but since my name is of female gender I can only assume it is an attempt to disparage me. If you are unsure of someone's gender then the gender neutral descriptor "they" is available to use. Someone having a problem with an editor, does not mean the editor is the problem.
  2. Admin intervention has been required precisely once on the List of vegans, and it was taken against Slim at my behest. Whether she was wronged, misunderstood or out of order are irrelevant because the issue is done and dusted, but she has an axe to grind clearly. She is far from impartial in judging my actions.
  3. I hold my hands up to OWN in respect to the non-alphabetic reverts I made a year ago. Usually I just sorted non-alphabetic additions, but got cheesed off with editors just not bothering, so I reverted a few. And admin called me out on it and I promised not to do it again, and I haven't. That's why Slim has had to go back a year to dig an example out. This behavior clearly approached OWN since I set my own criteria for editing the article. That is basically what OWN is. Restoring removals of unsouced content, or removing poorly sourced or unsourced names is an application of policy.
  4. I am slightly perturbed at my words at Talk:List_of_vegetarians#Images of women being grossly taken out of context. My argument is for a representative visual demographic, and I think this is clear from the discussion. This is what always happens when Slim joins a discussion, and it is symptomatic across all animal rights articles where she is involved. She undermines, takes things out of context and tries to manipulate. I stand by all my points at that discussion about the images of women by the way. Betty Logan (talk) 04:46, 25 April 2013 (UTC)
Sideshow collapsed
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Since the editor now known as "Betty Logan" has edited under both male and female names in the past [56], it would be best to refer to the editor using neutral, non-gendered language. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:07, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Which was an allegation that was brought by you and chucked out. I have more overlaps with other editors, and most importantly there is no common activity on the vegetarian articles. But if socking is a concern here then it is easy enough to run an IP check. Betty Logan (talk) 06:36, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
Yes, you've been quite adept at creating that false reality, a good example of the Big Lie technique. In point of fact, that SPI was not "chucked out", the finding was that it was likely you had previously edited under the IDs I reported, but since your "Betty Logan" ID had not edited disruptively, the reviewing admin did not see fit to block you. You have were not cleared of socking, despite your routine insistence that you were, and the evidence that User:WalterMitty and User:Melody Perkins were you is quite robust. At the time, I believed that the choice to not block you was a mistake (and actually outside of policy: since both of your previous IDs were blocked, any editing you did was block evasion, and therefore "disruptive" by definition), and the ramifications of that mistake are playing out now, in this and other threads. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:23, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
It obviously was chucked out BeyondMyKen because otherwise the Betty Logan account would have been blocked also. Besides. See below. This discussion is not about supposed past indiscretions but current accusations. -- MisterShiney 08:00, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Once again, MS, your understanding of the situation is in error. Beyond My Ken (talk) 17:27, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
The ramifications of not blocking me are several good and featured articles. His understanding of the situation is that you are an obvious troll who obstructs development on every single article you appear on, as your disgraceful block log demonstrates. Betty Logan (talk) 23:26, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
As his "disgraceful block log demonstrates?" He has been blocked only three times, all in 2010. The first was for having another account but it was lifted after half an hour, and a discussion determined the accounts hadn't been used abusively. Then he was blocked 11 months later for 24 hours for edit warring, and stayed blocked for four hours. And one month later for 24 hours for 3RR.
BL, which featured articles and good articles have you written, as a matter of interest? I'd be interested to read them in light of our discussion about the sourcing policies. SlimVirgin (talk) 00:17, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
SlimVirgin, don't stress over BL's description of my block log, the editor habitually... um .... misrepresents the facts when backed into a corner. He or she has been ... mispeaking about his or her past for years, and about the results of the SPI that TheRetroGuy filed, which couldn't be CU'd because of the age of the other IDs, and was supposed to be re-evaluated using behavioral evidence, but was never re-listed. I refiled it for that reason, and provided the pretty irrefutable evidence that the editor currently known as "Betty Logan" had previously edited as "WalterMitty" (indef blocked after extensive disruption) and "Melody Perkins" (indef blocked as a block-evading sock). The evaluating SPI clerk agreed that it was likely, but, unfortunately, misunderstood policy and wanted evidence that Betty Logan was editing disruptively, when the edits of a block-evading sock are by definition disruption. A passing admin came by and rubber-stamped the clerk's mistaken conclusion - so Betty Logan can now claim (erroneously) that the SPI was "chucked out", when, in fact, it was considered to be "likely" that he or she is what the evidence indicates, a block-evading sock.

Of course, no admin is going to go out on a limb and re-open the case, risking the approbation of those who for some reason believe that the passage of time make a egregious policy violation less blockable. Of course, that being the case, the Betty Logan editor could admit to her past identities, and apologize for their past disruption, and their continued lying, and it's almost a certainty that they wouldn't be blocked. That's certainly the kind of action that someone with a strong sense of personal ethics would take. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:28, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

With due respect, this guy currently keeps reverting a photo of topless identifiable woman to the top of the Exhibitionism article with no regard for her privacy, just because her photo is in the public domain. Betty Logan (talk) 00:31, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
With all due respect, I have been totally upfront about my past history, while you continue to lie blatantly about your past, and about the findings of the SPI about you, apparently without an iota of shame.

And since we're talking about block logs, how about your block log when you were editing as WalterMitty, which is quite extensive, or as Melody Perkins, both of which were blocked (after only 186 and 136 edits, respectively!!!) when you began editing as "Betty Logan" to avoid the blocks. No wonder you feel it necessary to throw out some BS about "trolling" to distract from your own dirty past. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:54, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Let's talk about "dirty". You are trying to publicly humiliate a young woman who was probably drunk and did something silly? Why not just back down for once and let the lady have her privacy? Betty Logan (talk) 05:01, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
More persiflage from a deeply dishonest person who must distract others from the strong evidence of their own egregious misdeeds with hyperbole and lies, a perfect example of the maxim that if you have no defense... attack. It doesn't matter if the attack is topical, or true, or even makes any sense at all, the simple fact that one has mounted an attack muddies the waters and gets people looking somewhere else beside your own misbehavior. Classic stuff, pure battleground behavior.

Wouldn't it be easier to get that monkey off your back and come clean about your past? I doubt any admin will block for your years of block evasion if you admit to your past identities and apologize for not having been honest about it before. Certainly, it would remove the taint that surrounds your editing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:09, 28 April 2013 (UTC)


There has been no admin intervention at List of vegans that I know of. Last year you persuaded an admin (Kww) to revert work that Andromedium and I had done there, and this year another (Crisco 1492) helped you revert Helpsome's edits, but they were acting as editors. Someone having the tools doesn't mean everything they do is admin intervention.

You asked why I refer to you as he. First, Betty Logan is a character from a film, and lots of editors choose names not related to their real lives, so I judge nothing by a user name. But your contribs made me assume you're male (particularly restoring the images in Bikini waxing, the focus on nude scenes of actresses, the porn stars in List of vegetarians, the "huge jugs" remark). And also the comments you made at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/WalterMitty when you were accused of editing as WalterMitty (another character from book and film) and Melody Perkins (name of an actress). But I can use gender-neutral language in future to avoid the issue. SlimVirgin (talk) 16:43, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

With due respect Slim, you are being selective and focusing on edits with regards to female sexuality, yet you overlook my edits on male sexuality, for instance in which I voice my support for an image of a human penis at the Penis article. None of these edits have been troublesome: it would be quite absurd to not have images showing the different styles at the bikini waxing article; I don't think I even added them, I just restored them when they were removed. I don't have a problem with naked men and women, vaginas and penises, or even sexual imagery being present on Wikipedia, provided it is informative. And like I said, I have huge edit overlaps with other editors, since sometimes people I know from other areas pop up on articles that are usually outside their normal editing ranges, and I have no control over that, and sometimes I do the same back; I guess people just get curious about each other. The problem isn't edit overlaps, the problem is repetive problematic behavior within those overlaps, especially if someone is socking to evade an editing block to repeat those edits. Now, this is a discussion to address ownership, not whether I restore a bikini wax photo to a page, or whether I was involved in an SPI (something from three years ago where the editor who made the allegation was subsequently blocked for socking himself!); I have been accused of being other editors since then and no doubt will again since it is par for the course for regular editors, but if you honestly think I am socking file an SPI and request a user check, you have my blessing to do that. If you think the images I have added to articles are inappropriate then maybe there should be a separate discussion for that, because this is a discussion about whether my edits in one particular area constitute ownership. Betty Logan (talk) 18:49, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I don't know which editor you mean who was subsequently blocked for socking. The SPI against you was opened by Paul McDermott, previously TheRetroGuy, who's still editing. SlimVirgin (talk) 19:07, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
I was referring to User:Beyond My Ken, who is currently embroiled in yet another edit war. Betty Logan (talk) 19:12, 26 April 2013 (UTC)
SlimVirgin, no one had to persuade me to revert your edits. At the time it was clear to me that you had taken ownership of the article and were not permitting good faith edits by anyone that disagreed with you.—Kww(talk) 07:20, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Then with respect you misread the article's history. SlimVirgin (talk) 00:22, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

State of development on the vegatarian and vegan articles[edit]

It's pretty obvious there is a lot of bad blood between Slimvirgin and myself over the development of these two articles, and that some of my edit summaries have been left wanting, and that I apply the verifiability guidelines rigoroulsy, but the real question I suppose is whether my participation has hindered or aided development. Here is the course of development (I am going to leave out all the disputes because I just want to plot the course of development on these articles):

Now, these articles were around for years before I became involved, and have come on substantially in the three or four years that I have been involved with them. I don't think it is fair to claim I have "held up" development, and while I am not going to say all the improvemnets were down to me (there are editors who have put in just as much work and possibly more) I think I have been a catalyst to some extent, if you compare the 3/4 years prior to my involvement to the 3/4 years since. It's a very simple question really: is the community happy with the trajectory of development on these articles or is my stewardship really harming this article? Yes, I revert a ton of edits because frankly they do not benefit the article (roughly a 20% rate — the revert rate on the article is more like 50% because other editors beat me to it), while many others I allow through. I am more than capable of developing articles to a high standard (my most recent GA success was Gone with the Wind (Before and After, and while I am not a regular list developer I have got one to FL standard and that was List of highest-grossing films (Before and Today). Now, as someone pointed out above these articles are watched by plenty of editors, but crucially it is only seems to be new editors (besides Slim who I have history with) that ever have a problem with my reverts, so really, whose judgment would you rather rely on? If the community is confident that these articles will continue to evolve while maintaining neutrality and an acceptable standard of sourcing then yeah just topic ban me and I will restrict myself to other areas, otherwise you should take a hands off approach and just let me exercise my judgment. If there is a genuine dispute then that is what RS/N and RFCs are for, and I do use them frequently in regards to these articles, so there is plenty of evidence of me seeking community opinion. Betty Logan (talk) 10:31, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

Lets get back to the point of the original ANI shall we...?[edit]

Right, having spent the last 15/20 minutes of my life reading through this it is clear to me on 2 points.

  1. No way is Betty Logan saying or implying that she owns any article. Granted, she could do with perhaps using Edit Summaries a bit more...but when do we all use an Edit Summary for EVERY edit/change/revert?
  2. Secondly, It is quite clear to me that SlimVirgin has some issue with Betty Logan because he/she/they have gone back over a year to bring up "evidence" against Betty Logan which quite frankly bears no relation on the current ANI. I am of the opinion that unless it is evidence of repeated behaviour in a short period of time, then past indiscretions should not be used as evidence for a current discussion.

When an editor works hard on articles and makes constructive changes and pointers to other editors, then they have immediately "put their head above the parapet" for people to make pot shots at. Betty Logan as far as I see does nothing but make constructive edits to pages left, right and centre. She is a warm, welcoming editor with a good sense of humour and an editor who is not afraid to ask for outside help when it comes to resolving disputes. The fact that SlimVirgin is trying to bring up old indiscretions, which we are all have some of, just shows how much she does not like Betty Logan and how long he/she/they hold grudges. Especially when they take comments - such as the huge jugs comment - completely out of context in an attempt to sway other editors to their way of thinking which reeks of Meat!!. That's my 2 pence. I am available for comment. -- MisterShiney 21:53, 26 April 2013 (UTC)

I have to say that SlimVirgin accusing others of having article ownership problems would appear to be a WP:KETTLE violation.—Kww(talk) 07:17, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Update: Slim and I are making some headway. The biggest problem for her is how I remove entries when I feel the sourcing is not adequate, and I generally do feel the sourcing is sub-standard across both articles, but we have proposed a system for this. From now on I will remove all entries I am dissatisfied with to the talk page, and if we can't address the problems we'll take them to RS/N where we will both abide by the outcome. I've invited Helpsome to the discussion to see if they would be ok with the system. Slim and I are never going to agree on much, but if we can find an approach for resolving these conflicts then that will take the heat out of our collaboration. For her part she has agreed to retain the alphabetical ordering of the list, and there is an RFC open in regards to the selection of the images. Betty Logan (talk) 11:22, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Uninvolved Observer here: I applaud you, Betty, and Slim for trying to work out your differences. Having read through most of this dispute (hey, it's a slow day), I would not have expected this to happen as there was a lot of mutual animosity. Kudos for cooling off and working to improve the Pages. 63.143.218.107 (talk) 21:42, 28 April 2013 (UTC)

Help: move fail[edit]

I performed this move but the talk page did not move as it normally does. I'm thinking its a permission thing; could an admin (try to) move the associated talk page? NE Ent 14:54, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

It was FMPP'ed. I moved it. Please check what you want to do with the archives. :) ·Salvidrim!·  16:11, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. NE Ent 16:17, 27 April 2013 (UTC)
I've redone the move, this time with the "Move subpages ..." check box checked. Graham87 05:20, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Thanks ... I don't think I get one of those. (move subpage checkbox). NE Ent 21:33, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, I think the checkbox is only available to admins. Nyttend (talk) 04:40, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
Indeed it is, thanks to page move vandals. Graham87 07:26, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

I have no idea if this is in the correct place or not,[edit]

but could someone please move User:Launchballer/Don't Let It Die on top of Don't Let It Die? Thank you.--Launchballer 05:54, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

 Done. For next time, you can just use {{db-move}} on the target page if the move is uncontroversial. The response time is usually pretty quick. Best — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 09:58, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

RB/Reviewer[edit]

If someone could remove my rights I'd appreciate it. Thanks. gwickwiretalkediting 00:54, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Done. Nyttend (talk) 00:56, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Need an uninvolved admin to assess whether article probation has been violated with the closure of a discussion, an incorrect assessment of consensus, and subsequent article edits--please see Talk:Men's_rights_movement#Removal_of_SPLC_section_and_material_in_the_lead. Since I spoke out in that discussion I consider myself a bit too involved, certainly as far as appearances are concerned. Thank you. Drmies (talk) 04:46, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

Eek - that's a real minefield you have walked into. Can you summarize your involvement thus far, and give your personal assessment of the state of play? Manning (talk) 04:25, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Prepare for changes to Wikipedia:Changing username and related templates[edit]

This is quite a big task. All templates need to be rewritten and pages marked as historic. The first would be to draw up a list of affected pages and templates. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 05:00, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

In the news[edit]

Hello,

the item "Italian PM" that has been nominated for the "In the News" section of the main page, has already been tagged as ready to be posted for two days. Unfortunately, no admin has realised this request until now (probably because it is not close to the top of the candidates page). So, could you please? Thank you! --RJFF (talk) 13:42, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Help with user name[edit]

Hi, I dont know if this is the right place to ask for this, by the way sorry if my english isn't perfect. I have accounts in Spanish Wikisource, Spanish Wikipedia and Commons since 2008, those accounts aren't unified (although they all are the same "User:Freddy eduardo") then I created this one here, but at the time when global accounts already existed, this has been very problematic for me, because every time I want to edit here I have to open a "New incognito window" because otherwise logging here logs me off of all the other projects (because this is account is global, the others are not) I thought I could ask for help with this someday but time just went off, now I saw a noticeboard on Meta saying that all accounts will be unified on 27 May, this will leave out any possibility to merge my other account with this one, so my question is: can someone rename my account here in English Wikipedia to "User:Freddy eduardo" so I can merge it with the other accounts before the deadline of May 27? I only use "User:DrkFrdric" here, so I don't care about edits in other projects with this account (maybe I have one or two who knows, probably did it mistakenly thinking I was in my other accounts). Can somebody please help me with this? It's really problematic to open new windows so I can just edit in multiple projects at the same time, I want this account in the English Wikipedia to be locally renamed to User:Freddy eduardo so I can merge it :( --DrkFrdric (talk) 17:28, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

This isn't the right place; username changes are done at WP:CHU. Since your English isn't perfect, I've filed the request for you and linked to this comment, so you won't need to do anything. Nyttend (talk) 17:43, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Request to delist featured image should not fail because voting closed with only two votes[edit]

RfC Close?[edit]

 Done - Manning (talk) 09:08, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm fishing for a friendly admin to close an RfC for me! NickCT (talk) 18:08, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Edit-warring noticeboard backlog[edit]

There is a backlog at the Edit-warring noticeboard. TFD (talk) 00:38, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

I've tackled a few of the oldest cases, but any additional administrative input would be helpful as a backlog remains. MastCell Talk 17:13, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

User:Prince of Peas[edit]

Prince of Peas (talk · contribs) 's whole contribution history is copy-and-pasting things out of the Article Incubator into mainspace. Most of those articles have been articles previously deleted via AfD. The incubator versions are substantially the same as the deleted versions, since they were moved into the incubator at the time of deletion. The issues brought up at deletion were not addressed. For the ones that were not under deletion, the attribution is missing for the copying of material. He persisted in this course of action after being warned by the copy-checking-bot. -- 65.94.76.126 (talk) 17:38, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

This probably should have been posted at WP:ANI, not here. Regardless, I've dealt with the situation for now — I've left him a message saying that they don't belong in mainspace, reminding him that he's committing copyright infringement with his copy/paste moves, pointing him to Help:Move, and clarifying that he'll be blocked if he continue. Nyttend (talk) 19:31, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Administrators needed at WP:AE[edit]

Hi, there are several enforcement requests open at WP:AE that need to be addressed by an uninvolved administrator. (I've closed several of these in the last few months, but don't currently have the time or inclination to sort through these latest rounds of bickering.)  Sandstein  04:53, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Request for creation/redirect[edit]

Nigger pool is a once commonly used term for a Numbers game. [60], [61], [62], [63] I would like to create a redirect to Numbers game, however this can only be done by an administrator. --Hirolovesswords (talk) 23:25, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Done. Nyttend (talk) 23:51, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Request for uncontroversial deletion[edit]

A user mistakenly performed a cut and paste move from habitable zone to Circumstellar habitable zone. I've reversed it to fix this, and I've placed a CSD G6 on the target (Circumstellar habitable zone). Could an admin please delete it so we can complete the page move intact? This is pretty important considering how many pages currently link to it. There's no need to delete the talk page as that was successfully moved by the user. Thanks. Viriditas (talk) 09:21, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done, and I have done the move while I was at it. JohnCD (talk) 09:42, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks. Viriditas (talk) 09:47, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

I think someone uninvolved needs to step in and close this. It is pretty obvious that this is probably closing as "no consensus", and it cannot be that such an important thing would default to "keep". There obviously needs to be a larger discussion on how to categorize people. There are clear advantages to "gendering" these articles, I won't deny that--there are reasons pertaining to doing research on gender, for instance, as in someone might want to know what women writers were active (but really, those should intersect with geography and gender, for instance). "Woman writers from the middle ages", for instance, or "Women writers from Japan" can be very useful. But to divide the larger, parent category in this way has raised a predictable shit storm (well, predictable to anyone with some common sense) that is dividing the community. I read in the CfD that, basically, the NYT and other media outlets and all the readers who go to Wikipedia from there, are dumb for not understanding the category system. Maybe, but it's hardly our mission to be snooty here. There is a clear appearance, found all over the internet, that this is an essentialist move that ghettoizes women writers, and one can't simply shrug off the arguments proposed there. And categorizing by gender (they do this in the German wiki, uselessly) begs the question of what to do if someone doesn't want to be gendered (in the way someone might not want to be categorized as Jewish or Catholic), or if someone is transgendered, or whatever--or we just don't know. Where do we put the Pearl Poet? I'm willing to bet money that he was a boy, but this is not a betting game.

In short, keeping the gendered categories is, at this moment, divisive and a lack of consensus should not default to keeping it that way. We need a larger discussion to determine how we're going to handle this, what the pros and cons are, what perceptions are, and whether it might not be smarter to allow double categorization and/or gendering only at the lower level categories. This CfD needs closing and the disruptive (good-faith, maybe, but nonetheless disruptive) categorization needs to be reverted. Drmies (talk) 16:12, 27 April 2013 (UTC)

I've posted some relevant comments on User talk:Jimbo Wales. Not that that's where the discussion belongs, but meh. Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:26, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
In a related discussion, Category:Male film directors now has two different CfD discussions on it; one that was opened a while ago, and the new one I assume created by the newspaper kerfuffle. I don't handle CfDs, and my own personal opinions on the matter preclude me from closing either one neutrally anyway, but I'm sure that having 2 CfDs isn't correce. Qwyrxian (talk)
It's fine ... the older one (about a month old) is an actual delete and the more recent a general rename consistently discussion. NE Ent 21:35, 28 April 2013 (UTC)
The irony... we should create a category for media reports that misunderstand wikipedia's category system, which of course would be a subcategory of media reports that misunderstand wikipedia. Digressing though, I reluctantly think Drmies is right, at least for the short term, but I don't understand why we're so passive in the face of these arguments when they have clear responses; the most obvious of which being 'quit painting all of wikipedia with one brush'... one or two editors is editorialized as "wikipedia", while it's is absurd that gets past editors, I suppose it's an editorial. (Note: I'm not passing judgment either way on the editors involved in this or any other dust up.) We really need to have a better education campaign for the media (or actually, it appears to me, authors, who occasionally bend the ear of a journalist). Shadowjams (talk) 02:13, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
Short term, yes--that's what I was thinking of. This needs larger discussion, but not in a CfD on one (and then a lot more) individual categories. As for educating the media and the occasional involved party with access to such media, that's a tough nut to crack. I agree in part with Filipacchi's argument: at least the appearance of sexism is there (and is noted in many, many reliable sources, not just in op-ed pieces), though misunderstanding is part of that. At the same time I must object to the persistent gendering (in only two genders) that's part and parcel of these categorization efforts. What to many may seem natural is a. not so natural at all and b. outdated--the world don't work that way anymore. Drmies (talk) 04:43, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

So, basically, the discussion isn't going the way you like it, so you ask someone "uninvolved" to close it the way you would prefer instead. How is this an acceptable use of WP:AN and not an example of Wikipedia:OTHERPARENT? Fram (talk) 06:47, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Fram, what a shitty comment, and what a way to avoid the issue. Drmies (talk) 18:17, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
    • I don't avoid the issue, I have participated in the discussion and given my opinion there, where it belongs. You are, however, avoiding the issue of your forumshopping here. If you don't agree with my comment, you could try to argue why not, instead of simply dismissing it. What is wrong with my conclusion that you don't like the way consensus seems to be going, and are trying to get some admin to overrule consensus and implement your prefered version instead? Fram (talk) 16:29, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Long time disruptive. Warned enough. Tagremover (talk) 17:03, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Educational facility, not a lot of edits but enough to be obvious it's kids playing and not likely to be productive any time soon. (hey, I remember how these block thingies work!) Tony Fox (arf!) 17:37, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Trolling user?[edit]

New user Nesmith74 (talk · contribs)'s contributions to date have been rather exceedingly questionable. His (presumably) first edits to various Weird Al articles include facts that are likely not true (I would have likely heard these myself) with no sources to back them up, and he's adding this tale about his personal life which is hard to take seriously (claiming he was hired as a WP editor, for example). After others removed what he posted on talk pages as off rants, I had done the same and added a talk page message to avoid acting like a troll. He replies on my talk page with his story (again, a hard time believing to be true, but AGF...) saying he's not trolling and then subsequently goes and leaves more weird talk page stuff, including somethign that is 100% factually wrong for Wreck-It Ralph, on other articles I've edited. [64] [65] [66].

I want to AGF, but at the same time, WP:DUCK seems to apply. Can anyone take a look at this and see if admin action is needed? (Will notify him after posting here). --MASEM (t) 19:48, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Nah, he's just trolling you. Blocked indef. --Floquenbeam (talk) 19:56, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks - if I wasn't involved I'd have done the same. --MASEM (t) 19:59, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Innocent iwbot[edit]

I did not find any bureaucrats noticeboard so I write here, feel free to move the thread if you like.

You may revoke the botflag of Innocent iwbot. He has been unemployed since the installation of Wikibase. -- Lavallen (talk) 08:39, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

It's at Wikipedia:Bureaucrats' noticeboard. I have put a note there with a link to this request. JohnCD (talk) 11:16, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
 Done by WilliamH. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 13:51, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Multiple-ID-abuser[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


The person behind Ali15uk (talk · contribs) and Reddony (talk · contribs) is a sockmaster and vandalist creating new names and then illegally uploading copyrighted images. If someone can investigate this please.--39.41.191.51 (talk) 11:57, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

WP:SPI Ansh666 07:31, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
I've removed the sockpuppet templates from the user pages, as no evidence has been provided. Peter James (talk) 21:43, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

I uploaded the pictures its a mistake, this does not means you can accuse me of vandalism, If you can provide any evidence, that would be quite helpful. --Reddony (talk) 21:53, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Peter James, both upload non-free images the same exact way [67] [68], share the same interest, POV, behaviour and everything else. I cannot file SPI. If admin runs a CU there will be more IDs connected to him.--39.41.145.115 (talk) 14:18, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
That's because they both use the File Upload Wizard and you can open an SPI, there is a box specifically for IP users. Callanecc (talkcontribslogs) 14:27, 3 May 2013 (UTC)
I am not used to these technical terms you guys are using in this discussion, so can you please describe in detail what I did wrong here else than uploading images and why is this IP address is filing a complain against me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Reddony (talkcontribs) 02:30, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
Reddony, I'm filing a complain against you because you are uploading non-free images [69]. Plus, there are young Pakistani sockmasters creating many Wiki IDs to edit Pakistani pages, and they are making a real mess with their extreme POV-pushing on the Pakistani related pages. I feel that you are one of those young Pakistani sockmasters because everything that you do matches the actions and behaviours of the others.--39.41.136.105 (talk) 17:59, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
So, it has been explained to you by Callanec above that you can in fact file an WP:SPI. That is what you should do if you want an actual investigation into this. Very few admins have access to the checkuser tool so an open request here is unlikely to get their attention. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:37, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

IPblockexempt no longer needed[edit]

Will no longer be using the network that was giving me trouble; this flag can be removed from my account. Regards, The Interior (Talk) 20:53, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done Basalisk inspect damageberate 20:55, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Problematic admin closes[edit]

An incident. Please go to WP:ANI, same section. Nyttend (talk) 22:02, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Echo (Notifications) released[edit]

Hey all :). Just to let you know that Notifications, or Echo, has now been released on the English-language Wikipedia. You should start seeing things now: let us know on the talkpage if you see any bugs or have any feedback! Thanks, Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 20:03, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

Notifications?! this is where is starts... Basalisk inspect damageberate 20:21, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
Seems like you need a cookie. I've given you one. :) Rd232 talk 20:41, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
It's quite easy to opt out. GiantSnowman 20:49, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
On a serious note: maybe there could be some documentation. A watchlist notice (mentioning the customisation options now in Prefs), and maybe an amendment to MediaWiki:Echo-none to link the word notifications to Wikipedia:Notifications, so that people clicking the new "0" aren't left bemused. Rd232 talk 21:04, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
Or possibly a new, simple Help:Notifications, as Wikipedia:Notifications is quite ... developery projecty. Or Wikipedia:Notifications/FAQ. Rd232 talk 21:11, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
Never mind - I'm not getting to MediaWiki:Echo-none any more - zero messages instead gives the same Echo flyout (with links to the FAQ and preferences). Rd232 talk 10:44, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

This is a disaster! I did not realise the notification system involved doing away with the orange bar. New users have enough trouble noticing that, and will surely overlook a small red dot. Much more seriously, IP users do not get notifications, and no longer get the orange bar, so IP users now do not get told at all that they have a talk page message. The whole system of IP vandal-warning messages has become useless. We need the orange bar back NOW, at least for IPs. Please comment at the talkpage. JohnCD (talk) 12:00, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

It seems to be an oversight, that will hopefully be rectified soon (not that I'm excusing it). I've done a bit of testing, and blocked IP addresses to get a link to their talk page in the default block notice they get when they try to edit. This will direct them, albeit belatedly, to the reasons why they've been blocked, and instructions for requesting unblocks. In the meantime, I suggest being lenient on first time blocked anon vandals, remembering that they probably haven't seen any warnings. An optimist on the run!   12:19, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
I have been experimentng, too. Even if, as an IP, you suspect you may have a talk page message, it's not easy to find, because there is no "My talk" link. I had to type ~~~~ in the sandbox to find what IP I was, and then type "User talk:xx.xx.xx.xx" in the search box. JohnCD (talk) 12:55, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • No more orange banner? ... cool. We kin haz Plausible deniability now. — Ched :  ?  12:22, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I didn't realise the orange banner was gone for good; I don't mind notifications for reverts etc. but the banner for talk pages messages should be brought back for all. GiantSnowman 12:24, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I really hope the orange banner comes back. Frequent users will probably manage fine without it, but noobs (not just IPs!) seriously need it, as does anybody who only edits occasionally. Please make the removal of the orange banner opt-in! I'm sure some of us, for instance Jimbo, would like to be rid of it. But Ched makes a good point about plausible deniability, though in a very naughty way. I don't want people I've warned to have plausible deniability, because I want to block the suckers! Block, block!! Wham, biff, urkkk!! [/me is led away shouting ecstatically.] Bishonen | talk 14:11, 1 May 2013 (UTC).
    • I'm already not noticing messages. Banner opt-in, please. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:12, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
        • "Banner opt-in"..? Not sure whether you're agreeing with me or not, Crisco. Do you want the banner to be default and the removal of the banner opt-in, like I do? Bishonen | talk 14:24, 1 May 2013 (UTC).
      • Or better yet, banner opt-out please, since IPs can't opt in or out of anything. I already missed some messages and didn't notice them until I checked my watchlist. Nyttend (talk) 14:20, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
        • I think I like this idea even better. — Crisco 1492 (talk) 14:29, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
        • Yes, banner opt-out, definitely; new users need it most, they don't know about talk pages or know their way about the screen, and are very likely to miss a small red blob. JohnCD (talk) 14:30, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • (multiple ec) As an admin who regularly works in areas involving fringe medical notions and conspiracy theories, I regularly encounter new and/or infrequent and/or single-purpose editors who have a...very tight focus to their interests coupled to an...idiosyncratic worldview, and who often have trouble assimiliating basic concepts like 'edit warring is bad', indenting comments, signing comments, the existence of article talk pages, etc. Some can be slowly guided into being useful Wikipedia contributors, but I suspect that most wouldn't even be aware that they had a user talk page if it weren't for the big orange banner. Without that really clear signal, it may become literally impossible to communicate with some new editors, whether to help them acculturate or just to explain to them why they have been blocked. The banner needs to be the default behavior, because messages from other editors are very important things – particularly for new editors – to be aware of. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:32, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Agree with Ten, the implementation choice of removing the big orange bar was very ill-considered. Orange bar should be opt-out only, with that capability for registered users only. I would actually support adding a new technical capability for admins to leave "Acknowledgement required" messages - the editor would not be able to proceed with any editing capabilities without being shown the message and clicking on "I acknowledge receipt of this message", and with a user log record of having done so when acknowledged. Zad68 14:49, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
    • Ha. What a good idea. Why don't we already have this? Please take it to the Village Pump, Zad! Bishonen | talk 14:59, 1 May 2013 (UTC).
      • Glad you think it's a worthwhile idea! Opened Village Pump proposal here, please comment. Zad68 15:37, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • The little red blob is far too discreet for any but registered, autoconfirmed accounts, preferably with opt-out for the orange bar. There will be a lot of bitten new users and blissfully unaware vandals and edit-warriors if they're expected to notice the little red number and figure out what it signifies. Acroterion (talk) 14:55, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment; thanks for all the reasonable comments :). It's great to have constructive feedback! I've left an update here which hopefully helps clarify what we're doing around these problems - and I agree that they're problems. Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 15:00, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Cross-posted from (i.e. also spammed at) the notifications talk page: Hey, all, I've created a cookie-based user script at User:Writ Keeper/Scripts/orangeBar.js to try and replicate some of the OBOD functionality. Obviously it's not as good as the real thing, but it's not totally awful. Let me know if there are any bugs y'all find. (Obviously, it requires cookies to be enabled in your browser.) Cheers! Writ Keeper  15:41, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
Many thanks. I want my Orange Bar... so I've installed this... and (thanks for the test!) it's working... Orange goodness...Begoontalk 16:18, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
NO FACEBOOK. I WANT MY ORANGE BAR BACK. And why weren't we told about this? PumpkinSky talk 21:09, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
👍 Like .... sorry, just had to! Zad68 02:15, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment. With the orange bar, we knew there was a new user talk-page post, and a diff was offered to the last change, so we could get there with one click. Now, we see the little number has changed, but don't know why. One click tells us it's the user talk page. A second click takes us to the page. We then have to scroll down to find the new post or posts. I'm now checking my user talk-page history to make sure I haven't missed one. It would be great to have the orange bar back. I think the bar is probably better for new users too to make sure they see people are trying to contact them. SlimVirgin (talk) 21:31, 1 May 2013 (UTC)

Too subtle for newbies. Orange banner back please. NE Ent 02:09, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Agreed, bring back the big orange bar, until and unless people opt out. Jclemens (talk) 05:32, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Agreed; bring back the orange bar, preferably as an opt-out thing. If editors like Notifications, fine, let them have it; but (a) as with any UI change, some established editors will prefer the old way, and (b) the orange bar is much more obvious - we need to be sure that new/inexperienced editors are actually reading messages on their talkpages. Obviously a thread on WP:AN is likely to attract lots of people falling into group A but I think group B is actually more important for enwiki as a whole. bobrayner (talk) 08:12, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Defaulting to having an annoying orange bar of some sort is a good idea as long as we have the option to opt out of it in preferences. I don't care for it, but for new users it is likely to be the best way to wave your arms in their face and tell them they have a message. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 14:15, 2 May 2013 (UTC)

Yeah this is proving to be a pain.—Ryulong (琉竜) 10:15, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

Just to let everybody know, there already is an ongoing RFC regarding the orange bar with some Wikimedia staff involved as well. Chamal's sock SockMasterC 10:33, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

An update: I've improved the Orange Bar script such that it no longer relies on cookies; it should be much more robust now. If y'all are still interested, please feel free to give it a shot and give me any feedback you like; it's still located at User:Writ Keeper/Scripts/orangeBar.js. Writ Keeper  18:29, 3 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Also, I believe I just fixed a bug in older browsers, notably IE8. As ever, send me any bugs y'all find. Writ Keeper  06:30, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
  • By popular demand, I've restored the "last change" functionality in the script. Writ Keeper  06:25, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

First off, I'm putting this here not because it affects administrators, but because it requires their attention.[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Where I've been porting userspace drafts into mainspace, there are redirects everywhere. Please delete the following redirects:

Thank you.--Launchballer 07:58, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

 Deleted all but Wikipedia talk:Articles for creation/Alvin Risk. It's customary not to delete the redirect when you move an AfC draft into mainspace. Next time, however, you can just use {{db-u1}}. Cheers. Salvio Let's talk about it! 08:54, 4 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

On 23:03, 2 May 2013, GotR requested full protection of New York, New York. I declined that request 01:08, 4 May 2013. GotR requested pending changes for Boston marathon bombings at 19:09, 4 May 2013. HJ Mitchell (talk · contribs) declined that request 10:07, 5 May 2013. Not satisfied with the answer to his requests, GotR resumbitted both requests today, adding that IP editors are scum and it isn't a problem to inconvenience them.[70] I declined both requests. I warned GotR at 19:10, 5 May 2013 that his behavior was not okay and that referring to IP editors as "scum" was not acceptable. He used popups to revert my decline of his requests (19:14, 5 May 2013). I warned him at 19:16, 5 May 2013 that this was not acceptable and continuing would lead to him being blocked. He continued at 19:24, 5 May 2013 and I blocked him at 19:30, 5 May 2013 for 24 hours. I don't consider this an issue of WP:INVOLVED, but figured others might disagree. Any admin who sees fit should take whatever action they deem necessary to confirm/reduce/remove the block. Thanks, --auburnpilot talk 19:35, 5 May 2013 (UTC)

AP is not involved; block isn't horrible. NE Ent 20:23, 5 May 2013 (UTC)
Seems a good example of the first sentence of the second paragraph of WP:INVOLVED: "One important caveat is that an administrator who has interacted with an editor or topic area purely in an administrative role... is not involved and is not prevented from acting in an administrative capacity in relation to that editor or topic area." Nyttend (talk) 20:42, 5 May 2013 (UTC)
Good block. In fact, you probably would have been justified in blocking him earlier. Hopefully 24 hours off will give him time to cool off. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 21:23, 5 May 2013 (UTC)
Cool down? Hopefully GotR will post an appropriate unblock before then so they can get back to editing. NE Ent 22:09, 5 May 2013 (UTC)
  • In my view the block was appropriate, but an unblock at this time would also be appropriate. This is an editor who shows good signs of being capable of learning from harsh experience. Looie496 (talk) 22:37, 5 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Thanks to everyone above for the review. GotR has requested an unblock and I have commented there. --auburnpilot talk 00:28, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Final note. After engaging with GotR on his talk page, I do not believe an unblock would be appropriate. It is clear he does not grasp the reasoning for his block or what is necessary to avoid blocks in the future. I am disengaging and will allow other admins to address his request. --auburnpilot talk 00:53, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Appeal of community restriction[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Restriction was imposed following this discussion and, per the terms of the restriction, subsequently modified here. The restriction was imposed due to several ANI filings I made about the Article Rescue Squadron and my efforts to re-open an MfD on the project's rescue list. As it stands, the main reason for my actions was that I wanted to have an open discussion about the project and its activities with significant community input. I feel that was largely satisfied with the RfC on the group and a second MfD another editor opened up regarding the list late last year. Under no scenario can I envision myself returning to such noticeboard filings as I feel that, if the project should remain a concern, it will have to be handled in a more managed process such as another RfC or arbitration. Even there I see no present cause for such action as the group has seemed to decline in activity to the point of effectively being a non-issue. So the restriction at this point is moot in my opinion and I would rather not have the black mark.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 01:04, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Support removing topic ban NE Ent 01:47, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Since I weighed in at the original ANI thread, I'll respond here as well. I see no reason to avoid assuming the best or doubt the sincerity of TDA's request. This was over a year ago, and I am usually supportive removing "black marks" and reducing restrictions when an honest attempt is made to work within the rules we have here. I therefor support this removal, and note that the closing admin. in that determination is not currently active. I also note that TDA did approach that closing admin. as well. Also: "per NE Ent". — Ched :  ?  02:20, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Whatever the merits of the original ban proposal it's unavoidable that it was a politically contentious issue, and it's been long enough, and the issues moot enough, that there's no need for any continued restriction. Shadowjams (talk) 02:31, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Do you mean "...ban proposal, it's unavoidable..."? Not trying to be picky; I'm just having a mildly hard time understanding the first part of your sentence. Nyttend (talk) 04:16, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Your punctuation is much better than mine :). The first was politically (wiki politics) charged. Shadowjams (talk) 10:54, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Mainly because I see no reason to maintain the ban at the present time. :) ·Salvidrim!·  04:40, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose There have been plenty of folks topic banned on both sides, and things have calmed down appropriately. I see no reason to monkey with success, and a topic ban that a user does not intend to violate is no particular hindrance to their editing. Without a desire to reengage, there is no compelling reason to remove a working restriction. Jclemens (talk) 05:46, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Per (NOT Jclemens) & NE Ent, Ched. No need to keep restrictions that a user does not intend to violate - judge next on their own, not by default. --Dirk Beetstra T C 06:03, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Actually, there IS a good reason to keep them: users who say they will not go back to the same topic area have, eh, I'll give it a generous 50% chance of following through with their promises, in my experience. I'll withdraw my oppose if he'll stipulate that I get to block him and/or discretionarily reinstate the topic ban, previous INVOLVEment or not, if he goes back to what I perceive to be battlefield involvement in the topic area. I have no particular reason to think that he will be one of the 50% who make campaign promises they never intend to keep, but if some teeth were put into those campaign promises, I'd be happy to accept them at face value. What says the appellant? Jclemens (talk) 06:55, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    ".. I'll give it a generous 50% chance of following through with their promises ..." .. and that is exactly the problem, Jclemens, and exactly why I have not a single bit of confidence in you anymore (I guess that got reflected in the last ArbCom elections), in ArbCom, and actually, in almost all of Wikipedia. Restrictions for the sake of restrictions, restrictions which are just way beyond reasonable, etc. etc., and make sure that they stay, and make sure that they get enforced. But I still hope that other editors have more faith in the editors that make this encyclopedia than in the ones that think that they need to police it (and seen the other !votes here .. I don't think that that hope is completely futile). --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:43, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Yep, I think Jclemens' approach is exactly the wrong one, and is diametrically opposed to the Wikipedia ethos. We should be aiming for minimum sanctions, maximum freedom, and maximum support for our content creators - not authoritarianism and high-security containment based on assuming the worst of people. (But I do have significantly more faith in the current ArbCom than I did in the previous one - I think the last election achieved an overall positive result) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:21, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Boing! said Zebedee, I have lost so much faith in ArbCom over the last couple of years that I can only hope that the 'new generation' will be able to restore some of my faith. As I said, I think my hope is not completely futile (I even saw positive changes in some of the old ArbCom members...). Anyways, lets examine restrictions for what they are supposed to do. --Dirk Beetstra T C 12:52, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    The problem isn't restrictions for restrictions' sake, it's that users who have actually gotten to the point of community or arbcom sanctions, as opposed to a spat with a single admin or a 3RR sanction, have already demonstrated inability to behave in a collegial manner. Thus, when lifting them, we're faced with the question of "does this user really get it now, or is he deluded and/or lying?" What so many of those of you who like to second-guess Wikipedia's pale attempts at governance ignore is that often, it is one of the latter issues. I won't list unrelated cases here, but anyone who doesn't understand the problem of recidivism hasn't been paying attention. Jclemens (talk) 14:21, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
    So your approach is to just assume "once bad, always bad"? I think that's an appalling attitude (and it's part of what got you kicked off ArbCom) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:32, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
    No, more like once restricted, show me a real reason for removing the restriction. "I promise not to go anywhere near the topic again" isn't a real reason. I've repeatedly voted to lift sanctions as an arbitrator when users demonstrated that the sanctions themselves were actually harming their ability to do encyclopedia-building work. There is no such argument advanced in this case. Jclemens (talk) 05:30, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support I closed the RfC on ARS last summer and at that point I wasn't certain that the topic ban was required. At the time I erred on the side of caution and left it in place. I'm happy that sufficient time has passed and attitudes have changes sufficiently that this topic ban primarily serves as a blot on TDA's record and I would support it being lifted. WormTT(talk) 07:40, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support. The whole thing was some time ago and it's all settled now, and I see no need for any ongoing topic ban. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:16, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support per Ched and others. I am not even sure this ban was really needed from the beginning. My very best wishes (talk) 18:55, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support with the specific proviso that TDA will undertake no actions which could conceivably be viewed as "pointy" about the topic in future without incurring the possibility of renewed sanctions. Collect (talk) 21:06, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I get the idea of not wanting to have a topic ban over one's head. But I also don't see any advantage to TDA getting involved in ARS issues. Eh, support with the same note as Collect. I think TDA is wise enough to stay away on their own. Hobit (talk) 02:33, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support I'm all about extending an olive branch to people who have seen the light, however if you get back into deliberately disrupting ARS, then expect the resumption of sanctions and more restrictive sanctions. Hasteur (talk) 14:51, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Neutral Support I have no vested interest either way, but I have no problem with second chances. The twisted one formerly known as balloonman. 21:44, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I closed this as rescinded but TDA objected to a condition on the close and argues that I'm involved as I opined on the original restriction. I don't remember doing so but appearances are important so I'm voiding my close and recusing from this discussion. Spartaz Humbug! 17:49, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Request closure[edit]

Could an uninvolved admin close the appeal? I think there is clear consensus for lifting my restriction without any conditions, and I feel such conditions would basically be new and unnecessary restrictions.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 19:57, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

After reading, I agree. If I may editorialize for a moment (without it affecting my close), I think you're probably better off steering clear from shenanigans with respect to the ARS, just in case, but I don't see any consensus that you be formally restricted from anything. The proviso that Collect mentions is close enough to the expected standard for everyone (we don't like POINTy behavior in general, no matter who it's from or against) that I can't imagine formalizing it is necessary, and there isn't consensus to do so anyway. So, un-topic-banned without conditions. Writ Keeper  20:13, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Block[edit]

Please block Ulv80. He always inset interwiki in articles, templates and category who already are in wikidata. When people removed he edits he just put it back again. --109.232.72.49 (talk) 05:46, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Ulv80 (talk · contribs) doesn't appear to be blocked. EVula // talk // // 05:55, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
I think the IP is asking for Ulv80 to be blocked, not unblocked. -- King of ♠ 06:24, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
I clearly should have gone to bed sooner than I did. EVula // talk // // 15:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
Posted a message on their talk page. I don't think a block is called for here yet. If anyone speaks Polish, though, a message at pl:user talk:Ulv80 probably wouldn't hurt. Jafeluv (talk) 06:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Closure needed[edit]

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:TheListUpdater/Northland Center has been open since April 17 with no votes. Can this be closed as an uncontested WP:STALEDRAFT? Ten Pound Hammer(What did I screw up now?) 06:29, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done closed delete.--Salix (talk): 10:46, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Satan unsearchable?[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


In the midst of a research on fallen angels and other biblical matters, I found that if I click on any link on satan, or I search the word "satan" in the wikipedia search, the wikipedia page become blocked in an eternal loop. I don't know were to signal this problem, I hope this is the right section.

I thinked it was some form of censorship, or maybe someone blocked it on purpose? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.231.42.154 (talk) 20:04, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Mhhh should be a demon in my pc, now it seems ok after I searched again O__o

delete this post please ^_^ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.231.42.154 (talk) 20:06, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

To me, this new "article" by User:Dash.tastix looks like a hoax, possibly with intent of defamation, especially when regarding the picture of a fully identifiable minor labelled as "elder brown". --Túrelio (talk) 20:28, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Even if it's not a hoax, it's just a Youtube thing that does not assert any importance - I've speedy-deleted it as CSD:A7 -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 20:41, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

RFC regarding the scope of the Ombudsman Commission[edit]

The Ombudsman Commission is currently holding a request for comment. Currently, the Commission only hears complaints regarding the privacy policy. We propose to change the scope of the Commission to also include hearing complaints about the global Checkuser and m:Oversight policy policies.

For more information please visit the RFC, which can be found at m:Requests for comment/Scope of Ombudsman Commission. Please direct all questions and comments there.

For the Ombudsman Commission,

--(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 21:24, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Advice request for WP:SPA who is whitewashing Jack Kemp[edit]

There is an WP:SPA who is whitewashing Jack Kemp's article by removing negative opinions of experts like Newsweek journalists. I don't want to get into a reversion war. What should I do?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:53, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Someone else already reverted back. I just left a message on their talk page. You didn't notify them that you brought up an issue with them here, something you should do now, as it is required even if you don't mention them by name. Normally, just leaving them a message like I just did is enough to get them talking, or to demonstrate they won't talk. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 00:07, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Appeal of community restriction[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Restriction was imposed following this discussion and, per the terms of the restriction, subsequently modified here. The restriction was imposed due to several ANI filings I made about the Article Rescue Squadron and my efforts to re-open an MfD on the project's rescue list. As it stands, the main reason for my actions was that I wanted to have an open discussion about the project and its activities with significant community input. I feel that was largely satisfied with the RfC on the group and a second MfD another editor opened up regarding the list late last year. Under no scenario can I envision myself returning to such noticeboard filings as I feel that, if the project should remain a concern, it will have to be handled in a more managed process such as another RfC or arbitration. Even there I see no present cause for such action as the group has seemed to decline in activity to the point of effectively being a non-issue. So the restriction at this point is moot in my opinion and I would rather not have the black mark.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 01:04, 29 April 2013 (UTC)

  • Support removing topic ban NE Ent 01:47, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Since I weighed in at the original ANI thread, I'll respond here as well. I see no reason to avoid assuming the best or doubt the sincerity of TDA's request. This was over a year ago, and I am usually supportive removing "black marks" and reducing restrictions when an honest attempt is made to work within the rules we have here. I therefor support this removal, and note that the closing admin. in that determination is not currently active. I also note that TDA did approach that closing admin. as well. Also: "per NE Ent". — Ched :  ?  02:20, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Whatever the merits of the original ban proposal it's unavoidable that it was a politically contentious issue, and it's been long enough, and the issues moot enough, that there's no need for any continued restriction. Shadowjams (talk) 02:31, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Do you mean "...ban proposal, it's unavoidable..."? Not trying to be picky; I'm just having a mildly hard time understanding the first part of your sentence. Nyttend (talk) 04:16, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Your punctuation is much better than mine :). The first was politically (wiki politics) charged. Shadowjams (talk) 10:54, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Mainly because I see no reason to maintain the ban at the present time. :) ·Salvidrim!·  04:40, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose There have been plenty of folks topic banned on both sides, and things have calmed down appropriately. I see no reason to monkey with success, and a topic ban that a user does not intend to violate is no particular hindrance to their editing. Without a desire to reengage, there is no compelling reason to remove a working restriction. Jclemens (talk) 05:46, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - Per (NOT Jclemens) & NE Ent, Ched. No need to keep restrictions that a user does not intend to violate - judge next on their own, not by default. --Dirk Beetstra T C 06:03, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Actually, there IS a good reason to keep them: users who say they will not go back to the same topic area have, eh, I'll give it a generous 50% chance of following through with their promises, in my experience. I'll withdraw my oppose if he'll stipulate that I get to block him and/or discretionarily reinstate the topic ban, previous INVOLVEment or not, if he goes back to what I perceive to be battlefield involvement in the topic area. I have no particular reason to think that he will be one of the 50% who make campaign promises they never intend to keep, but if some teeth were put into those campaign promises, I'd be happy to accept them at face value. What says the appellant? Jclemens (talk) 06:55, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    ".. I'll give it a generous 50% chance of following through with their promises ..." .. and that is exactly the problem, Jclemens, and exactly why I have not a single bit of confidence in you anymore (I guess that got reflected in the last ArbCom elections), in ArbCom, and actually, in almost all of Wikipedia. Restrictions for the sake of restrictions, restrictions which are just way beyond reasonable, etc. etc., and make sure that they stay, and make sure that they get enforced. But I still hope that other editors have more faith in the editors that make this encyclopedia than in the ones that think that they need to police it (and seen the other !votes here .. I don't think that that hope is completely futile). --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:43, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Yep, I think Jclemens' approach is exactly the wrong one, and is diametrically opposed to the Wikipedia ethos. We should be aiming for minimum sanctions, maximum freedom, and maximum support for our content creators - not authoritarianism and high-security containment based on assuming the worst of people. (But I do have significantly more faith in the current ArbCom than I did in the previous one - I think the last election achieved an overall positive result) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 11:21, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    Boing! said Zebedee, I have lost so much faith in ArbCom over the last couple of years that I can only hope that the 'new generation' will be able to restore some of my faith. As I said, I think my hope is not completely futile (I even saw positive changes in some of the old ArbCom members...). Anyways, lets examine restrictions for what they are supposed to do. --Dirk Beetstra T C 12:52, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
    The problem isn't restrictions for restrictions' sake, it's that users who have actually gotten to the point of community or arbcom sanctions, as opposed to a spat with a single admin or a 3RR sanction, have already demonstrated inability to behave in a collegial manner. Thus, when lifting them, we're faced with the question of "does this user really get it now, or is he deluded and/or lying?" What so many of those of you who like to second-guess Wikipedia's pale attempts at governance ignore is that often, it is one of the latter issues. I won't list unrelated cases here, but anyone who doesn't understand the problem of recidivism hasn't been paying attention. Jclemens (talk) 14:21, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
    So your approach is to just assume "once bad, always bad"? I think that's an appalling attitude (and it's part of what got you kicked off ArbCom) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 17:32, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
    No, more like once restricted, show me a real reason for removing the restriction. "I promise not to go anywhere near the topic again" isn't a real reason. I've repeatedly voted to lift sanctions as an arbitrator when users demonstrated that the sanctions themselves were actually harming their ability to do encyclopedia-building work. There is no such argument advanced in this case. Jclemens (talk) 05:30, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support I closed the RfC on ARS last summer and at that point I wasn't certain that the topic ban was required. At the time I erred on the side of caution and left it in place. I'm happy that sufficient time has passed and attitudes have changes sufficiently that this topic ban primarily serves as a blot on TDA's record and I would support it being lifted. WormTT(talk) 07:40, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support. The whole thing was some time ago and it's all settled now, and I see no need for any ongoing topic ban. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 08:16, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support per Ched and others. I am not even sure this ban was really needed from the beginning. My very best wishes (talk) 18:55, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support with the specific proviso that TDA will undertake no actions which could conceivably be viewed as "pointy" about the topic in future without incurring the possibility of renewed sanctions. Collect (talk) 21:06, 29 April 2013 (UTC)
  • I get the idea of not wanting to have a topic ban over one's head. But I also don't see any advantage to TDA getting involved in ARS issues. Eh, support with the same note as Collect. I think TDA is wise enough to stay away on their own. Hobit (talk) 02:33, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Support I'm all about extending an olive branch to people who have seen the light, however if you get back into deliberately disrupting ARS, then expect the resumption of sanctions and more restrictive sanctions. Hasteur (talk) 14:51, 30 April 2013 (UTC)
  • Neutral Support I have no vested interest either way, but I have no problem with second chances. The twisted one formerly known as balloonman. 21:44, 1 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I closed this as rescinded but TDA objected to a condition on the close and argues that I'm involved as I opined on the original restriction. I don't remember doing so but appearances are important so I'm voiding my close and recusing from this discussion. Spartaz Humbug! 17:49, 4 May 2013 (UTC)

Request closure[edit]

Could an uninvolved admin close the appeal? I think there is clear consensus for lifting my restriction without any conditions, and I feel such conditions would basically be new and unnecessary restrictions.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 19:57, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

After reading, I agree. If I may editorialize for a moment (without it affecting my close), I think you're probably better off steering clear from shenanigans with respect to the ARS, just in case, but I don't see any consensus that you be formally restricted from anything. The proviso that Collect mentions is close enough to the expected standard for everyone (we don't like POINTy behavior in general, no matter who it's from or against) that I can't imagine formalizing it is necessary, and there isn't consensus to do so anyway. So, un-topic-banned without conditions. Writ Keeper  20:13, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Block[edit]

Please block Ulv80. He always inset interwiki in articles, templates and category who already are in wikidata. When people removed he edits he just put it back again. --109.232.72.49 (talk) 05:46, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Ulv80 (talk · contribs) doesn't appear to be blocked. EVula // talk // // 05:55, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
I think the IP is asking for Ulv80 to be blocked, not unblocked. -- King of ♠ 06:24, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
I clearly should have gone to bed sooner than I did. EVula // talk // // 15:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
Posted a message on their talk page. I don't think a block is called for here yet. If anyone speaks Polish, though, a message at pl:user talk:Ulv80 probably wouldn't hurt. Jafeluv (talk) 06:26, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Closure needed[edit]

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:TheListUpdater/Northland Center has been open since April 17 with no votes. Can this be closed as an uncontested WP:STALEDRAFT? Ten Pound Hammer(What did I screw up now?) 06:29, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done closed delete.--Salix (talk): 10:46, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Satan unsearchable?[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


In the midst of a research on fallen angels and other biblical matters, I found that if I click on any link on satan, or I search the word "satan" in the wikipedia search, the wikipedia page become blocked in an eternal loop. I don't know were to signal this problem, I hope this is the right section.

I thinked it was some form of censorship, or maybe someone blocked it on purpose? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.231.42.154 (talk) 20:04, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Mhhh should be a demon in my pc, now it seems ok after I searched again O__o

delete this post please ^_^ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.231.42.154 (talk) 20:06, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

To me, this new "article" by User:Dash.tastix looks like a hoax, possibly with intent of defamation, especially when regarding the picture of a fully identifiable minor labelled as "elder brown". --Túrelio (talk) 20:28, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Even if it's not a hoax, it's just a Youtube thing that does not assert any importance - I've speedy-deleted it as CSD:A7 -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 20:41, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

RFC regarding the scope of the Ombudsman Commission[edit]

The Ombudsman Commission is currently holding a request for comment. Currently, the Commission only hears complaints regarding the privacy policy. We propose to change the scope of the Commission to also include hearing complaints about the global Checkuser and m:Oversight policy policies.

For more information please visit the RFC, which can be found at m:Requests for comment/Scope of Ombudsman Commission. Please direct all questions and comments there.

For the Ombudsman Commission,

--(ʞɿɐʇ) ɐuɐʞsǝp 21:24, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

Advice request for WP:SPA who is whitewashing Jack Kemp[edit]

There is an WP:SPA who is whitewashing Jack Kemp's article by removing negative opinions of experts like Newsweek journalists. I don't want to get into a reversion war. What should I do?--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 23:53, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Someone else already reverted back. I just left a message on their talk page. You didn't notify them that you brought up an issue with them here, something you should do now, as it is required even if you don't mention them by name. Normally, just leaving them a message like I just did is enough to get them talking, or to demonstrate they won't talk. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 00:07, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Backlog[edit]

WP:RPP has nearly 20 protection requests not tended to yet. Get to work. Ten Pound Hammer(What did I screw up now?) 06:47, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

There has been a tendency for editors on Talk:Syrian civil war to engage in conversations about the conflict itself without suggesting any edit. I've taken it upon myself to {{cot}} sufficiently derailed discussions, discussions about editor bias, etc. Ironically, there's a discussion about me cotting the discussions (eg here). Would an experienced editor care to weight in and see if any of my cots were inappropriate? TippyGoomba (talk) 15:34, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

  • I have outlined the problem on the page in question. TippyGoomba is arbitrarily removing sections that discuss the validity of sources and content[71][72][73] (other examples have been de-"hatted"), which is a very valid use of the talkpages, and other regular editors of the page have complained too. TippyGoomba also has a tendency to hide blocks of comments in the middle of discussions, including valid comments within this block, thereby completely destroying any cohesiveness and readability. Talkpages are not only for suggesting direct edits of the article, but also for discussion about what to include in it. No one elected TippyGoomba for policeman/judge, yet that is all he does on that talk page, and does not contribute to the content discussions other than just asking "what changes do you suggest" after every other comment. The talk page worked just fine before his recent entry out of nowhere, and it is a given that debate will get heated on controversial pages. TippyGoomba's own talk page notifications are testament to this. FunkMonk (talk) 15:38, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
The first two cots were right on target, the talk page was being used as a forum, so cotting it as "not a forum" was right,

the third one, was cotted as not a reliable source, that wasn't too cool, however, TippyGoomba didn't comment on it at all, still, a bit much, I think.  KoshVorlon. We are all Kosh ...  16:11, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Again, the most pointless "hattings" have been reverted, so I can't show all of them. FunkMonk (talk) 22:41, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Agree with FM. Discussion on the talkpage can get tangential and even ugly, but on a contentious topic that's to be expected. Now and then, I have hatted a few particularly egregious subthreads, but the frequency with which TG snaps things shut is honestly pretty damn annoying and even counterproductive. It hasn't proven effective in curbing "hattable" material, only in making the talkpage a mess. Discussions are best brought on-topic by introduction of source material, not by hiding slightly off-topic exchanges. ~~ Lothar von Richthofen (talk) 16:14, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • TippyGoomba, you wanted the opinion of an uninvolved admin, well, here it is: please stop hatting threads. You have demonstrated that you do not yet fully understand when hatting is warranted and when it's pointless or, worse, counterproductive. Salvio Let's talk about it! 12:02, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Bot?[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Something doesn't look right. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 15:39, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Seems likely but you never know, Firefox on lin can hold like 2k+ tabs and one could preload all of them and then go thru and submit en-masse. I suggest contacting the user rather than discussing it here, unless there's a problem with their creations that necessitate an immediate block. Snowolf How can I help? 15:43, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
I've pinged them when I put it here. The main reason I brought it here (rather than ANI) was to get schooled a bit, as this was unusual and not something I usually run across in my daily activities, but the nature and odd linkage in some of their creations were such that I felt it needed more eyes immediately. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 15:52, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Just to add that Dennis's original link is somewhat deceptive, in that it shows the user's oldest contributions. If you look at the user's newest contributions, you will see that User:BS1923 has created over 500 new articles in the space of less than 3 hours. --DAJF (talk) 23:26, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
For those keeping score at home, that is one article per 14 or 15 seconds, which means it is likely an unauthorized bot. I meant to link the recent, but still, this has been ongoing for a while today. Someone familiar with bots and policy might take a look. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 00:03, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
None of the new articles are referenced. Their title's are all wrong... For example, instead of Yamaha Motors S.C., it should be Júbilo Iwata. Plus, they all have some minor problems. Bgwhite (talk) 00:42, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
That is exactly what I thought, but I'm not familiar enough to know for sure. All of them are like that, and link off to each other that way. Not sure if this is a nuke situation or not, but it is a problem. I'm pinged someone familiar with bots to take a look, but I don't know if they are around. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 01:10, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Good faith edits? Probably. Massively wrong bot? Yea ... massive delete ... yea. (But with a really nice talk page message). NE Ent 01:17, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, a mass delete seems to be the best solution. Articles like 1975 Eidai Industries S.C. season, with very little information, no source, and a rather obvious expression error (which also appears in e.g. 1973 Eidai Industries S.C. season) make it clear that no real checks were done. No idea what the "other pages" empty section on these pages is meant to be (a "see also"?). Fram (talk) 07:07, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Hold off on mass deletions for now. The information looks legitimate but it seems some minor errors have crept in and I'd agree that national year seasons are not appropriate. The tables should be moved into e.g 1970 in Japanese football and sourced. Urging the creator to source/correct them would be better than the belligerent all guns blazing approach which might cause the creator to leave wikipedia. If he refuses to do so, then delete.♦ Dr. ☠ Blofeld 08:14, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Anyone an opinion on whether he may be a sock of User:Japan Football (an indef blocked sockpuppet)? That was also a rapid-fire contributor with very similar interests. They e.g. both created Makoto Rindo. Perhaps someone more familiar with that user can comment? It's just a hunch, the evidence isn't really overwhelming so far. Fram (talk) 08:27, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

Almost definitely a sock of Japan Football, who I encountered in the past. I fully support mass deletions and will deal with (i.e. delete) these articles/templates/categories in a few hours when I have time, unless somebody wants to do so in the meantime. Editor should also be indeffed as a sock. GiantSnowman 09:13, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Japan Football was previously blocked as a sock of User:依頼人 (have to look at deleted contribs to see the resemblance), who would be the master. I've filed at SPI as I wanted another clerk to review and consider renaming the case to the newer account for ease of future use. It looks like a match to me as well. Once blocked, even after considering Dr. Blofelds' concerns, I would likely request a mass nuke. It would take longer to fix all these than it took to make them, and there are hundreds and hundreds of these. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 10:30, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Mmm, if he is a confirmed sock, and his contributions are more problematic than their worth then naturally I'd support a mass nuke. But I think it is worth checking over his material just to be on the safe side as editors adding content on Asian countries especially further back in time are sadly lacking on wikipedia. I'm sure we'd all approve if articles like 1970 in Japanese football were being worked on and written into a proper article instead of rapid fire data articles with errors. ♦ Dr. ☠ Blofeld 10:55, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
The old account is too stale to get a CU to look, so we can't get a "technical" confirmed. Salvio (who we all agree is very experienced in this) had declared him an obvious WP:DUCK and blocked/tagged, however, so I do recommend someone nuke. I don't have the nuke tools installed. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 12:29, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Salvio giuliano has deleted the pages. Dennis, for next time, the nuke tool is installed by default for all admins, and I'm not aware of any way to turn it off. You can access it at Special:Nuke. It's mass rollback that requires some javascript magic. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:11, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Ah, thanks. I knew there were some fancy scripts around, but I'm not inclined to use either and will leave it for someone else more adventurous. Very useful, but dangerous tools. I suppose we can close this up now that all is settled. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 13:21, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Seems to have suddenly attracted a bunch of "new editors" each of whom seems to be pretty much the same - though seemingly unwilling to stick to the stated topic of that article. I doubt they will actually hang around, but semi-ing it would likely help. Collect (talk) 18:17, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Problem is that all those edits seem to be in good faith and with sources. Shouldn't really protect an article just because it gets busy with what seems to be good faith edits. That falls under content dispute even if they are straying somewhat, thus it isn't 3RR immune unless there is something in those edits I'm missing (BLP/Vandalism). Dennis Brown - © Join WER 01:24, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Based on the comments made by one of the editors at my talk page, this appears to be a class project from UC Berkely. Maybe someone at Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination or Wikipedia:School and university projects can help out? Singularity42 (talk) 02:39, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Sounds like a job for User:Drmies or User:LadyofShalott, or some other kind soul. A bit out of my league. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 12:33, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

2013 Cleveland, Ohio missing trio‎[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


2013 Cleveland, Ohio missing trio‎ needs a rollback to a stable state and temporary semi-protection. Multiple IPs are making changes while there is an ongoing discussion on the talk page about whether to make the changes. --Guy Macon (talk) 16:12, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

  • This is more than NEWS, so NOTNEWS does not apply. GiantSnowman 16:46, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Wow. That one sure kicked over a hornet's nest! The good news is that AfDs last long enough for it to become evident whether there is lasting notability before a decision is made. Assuming, of course, that nobody jumps the gun and forces an early close... --Guy Macon (talk) 17:50, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Which, of course, someone just did. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:06, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • No. This is why we shouldn't wildly misconstrue NOTNEWS as some sort of prohibition on current-events articles. I can think of few other types of article that see so heavy a deletionist bias against them. — PinkAmpers&(Je vous invite à me parler) 01:32, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
  • We have Wikinews specifically to cover news stories. Once enduring notability is established, then they can be moved into en.wiki. In rare cases (eg the Boston Marathon bombings) it can be very apparent it will be important, but something like this is not something that necessarily has value in permanence in an encyclopedia. It might, but we should be slow to add until that's determined. --MASEM (t) 01:34, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I'm confused as to why this discussion is here, on the page for discussing the admin noticeboard itself? Beeblebrox (talk) 17:52, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • My error. It should be moved. (Note to self: next time, smoke crack after editing Wikipedia...) --Guy Macon (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:02, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
And off we go on yet another OR-churning BLP-violating exhibition of journalism-by-hysteria. Or rather, off they go. I'm staying out of this one, as I've seen quite enough of this garbage, and would rather wait around until the WMF gets sued for allowing this sort of nonsense to happen. Which seems a sure-fire certainty at some point unless there is a significant change in policy. Presenting uninformed speculation and drive-by-pseudojournalism as encyclopaedic content would be fraud if we were selling it... AndyTheGrump (talk) 18:31, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
I agree with Andy on this one. I am unwatching the whole mess. One of these days we need to decide to be an encyclopedia and not a poorly moderated current-events blog. --Guy Macon (talk) 23:12, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Why do we have to have this debate every single time there's some crime story that gets national coverage in the US? Why is there this presumption that "omfg this is huge news its obvious this will have lasting repercussions its not crystalball its the biggest thing since HEY Look at what Justing Beiber just said what were we talking about?" The presumption should always be that any given crime is not notable, and that only hindsight and ongoing coverage can possibly deem it notable. Exceptions should have to prove themselves, not vice versa. Qwyrxian (talk) 02:12, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Maybe we could avoid it if we started enforcing the requirement that coverage be completely independent to count toward notability: independent chronologically as well as other ways. Wait until they get coverage in books or academic journals, or until newspapers report them as other than news. Nyttend (talk) 02:27, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
The story has had. at this point, a fair bit more than just national coverage. Regardless of the unseemly rush to create this article, I think that anything which leads the coverage of broadcast, print and online news media throughout the world can be assumed by default to be notable, verifiable, and supported by reliable sources, even bearing in mind WP:NOTNEWS. It can always be deleted later, if there's really a problem. -- The Anome (talk) 09:10, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Well, we have Portal:Current_events on the front page, so it's not surprising folks think that Wikipedia is a newspaper of sorts. NE Ent 10:01, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Hollywood romances and the subsequent babies make front page news, even in reputable journals and internationally. That criterion must never be used to justly inclusion here. HiLo48 (talk) 10:08, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
No, it really doesn't. It makes short notes in entertainment sections of reputable news sources. Insisting that because a news source may note a Hollywood romance deep within its entertainment doesn't make the reporting of legitimate news as a top headline invalid. I struggle to find the relevance between the two. --Jayron32 14:06, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Use of controversial name as userid[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


A new user, Osama is Obama, See <[[74]]> in the choice of a userid name, perpetuates the controversial urban mythology of President Obama being secretly Osama bin Laden, a staple of the right wing echo chamber. Should this name be allowed to be used on Wikipedia? FWiW Bzuk (talk) 13:00, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

I was thinking "Usernames that seem intended to provoke emotional reaction", but either way, it's seriously unsuitable. I've indef-blocked and left a username block message; they are welcome to choose a new username and carry on editing. Yunshui  13:26, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Woah, an indef? I think a friendly note and a pointer to WP:CHU would have solved the problem just as well. OiO's contribs look constructive to me, and I imagine an "Osama is Obama" joke might go down better in Germany (where OiO says they are from) than it would in the US. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 13:56, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Well, this isn't the German Wiki so that's rather irrelevant; it is offensive here is what matters. Someone creating a username of "GasOvens" on en.wiki might not get any guff for it, but try heading to de.wiki with that one. Tarc (talk) 14:12, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
(edit conflict) A username equating a political figure to a well-known terrorist is intentionally inflammatory, no matter what figure it is or what country they are editing out of. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 14:16, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
I am sorry, I did not create the name to cause offence or attack anyone. I chose the name because it rhymed well and was funny. Is it possible to change the name if it is offensive? I would really like to edit Wikipedia with my account and my edits. Will my edits to be removed from Wikipedia? 194.46.175.165 (talk) 14:22, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Log into the account and post {{unblock-un|your new username here}} on your talk page, adding in your proposed new username. If acceptable, you'll be unblocked to go change it at WP:CHU. You keep your edits and history. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 14:26, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
@Moe and Tarc - I agree that the username isn't appropriate. The point is that it looks to have been created in good faith, so it would be nicer to let the user change it at WP:CHU rather than block straight away. Giving a hard block with no warning to a good-faith editor seems like a case of biting the newcomers to me. — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 14:43, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
I've accepted OiO's unblock request, because their requested new username seems uncontroversial. If they don't make a request at WP:CHU within a few days, you have my permission to reblock. (But make it a soft block, please. :) — Mr. Stradivarius ♪ talk ♪ 14:51, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Interesting point about SUL, though - if all usernames are now to be universal, do our username rules control? Or de.wiki's? Or someone else's? Or some hybrid at meta? UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 15:11, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Eventually, all renames will be handled at Meta-Wiki because local renames are not going to be available to local bureaucrats. So, the policy for renaming an account will be some kind of hybrid on Meta-Wiki because they will be handling it. Of course we still would have a local policy though, because we can still deem a username as unacceptable and block it. Regards, — Moe Epsilon 15:14, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Blocking will still be local, so we could presumably block an account that breached our username policies even though they could continue to edit other projects. The user would have a choice, either: (a) get renamed globally to something acceptable on all projects; or (b) create a second account with an acceptable name to edit enwiki. WJBscribe (talk) 15:16, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
the controversial urban mythology of President Obama being secretly Osama bin Laden, a staple of the right wing echo chamber - really? That's a new one on me. Rd232 talk 15:00, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
Me too - but lots of really smart and articulate people last year seemed to suddenly have trouble saying "Obama" without slipping in that "Osama" occasionally. Seems to be more of a "just another reason to hate Obama" thing than a "hurr durr terrorist in White House" thing. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 15:09, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

I have renamed the user to Languid Scientist (talk · contribs) at their request. WJBscribe (talk) 15:13, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

I am perfectly satisfied that the user acted without malice. Looking at the edit history, the user was an active and important contributor to aviation articles, and has chosen an appropriate substitute userid. Thanks to all. FWiW Bzuk (talk) 15:48, 8 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Request[edit]

Could an admin please deal with Category:Wikipedia files missing permission as of 15 April 2013? Because of its age and the fact that no categories exist between this and 26 April, it is not showing up on the main list. In fact, most of the entries on {{CSD backlogs}} are backlogged. — Train2104 (talk • contribs) 22:12, 8 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done--Ymblanter (talk) 12:58, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

WP:CFD badly backlogged[edit]

Wikipedia:Categories for Discussion has a backlog going back two months. I see that many of these old discussions have achieved consensus and are waiting for admin attention. Mangoe (talk) 02:11, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

Before I start doing smth: Do we have a bot I can routinely ask to carry out the moves? I am not sure I want to change the cat in hundreds of files by hands.--Ymblanter (talk) 13:00, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
There's a holding pen; put the category name and various other code into the pen, and a bot will do all the moves for you. Can't remember where it's located, but I'll look for it and then come back. Nyttend (talk) 13:33, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
You want Wikipedia:Categories for discussion/Working. If you close a category as "delete", just copy/paste and modify the code from the New Zealand knighthoods in the current revision, and then change the details; if you close it as something else, modify/copy/paste the code to whatever the appropriate section is. Nyttend (talk) 13:44, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Great, thanks.--Ymblanter (talk) 13:45, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

CAT:EP badly backlogged[edit]

...in the same vain, Category:Wikipedia protected edit requests is also badly backlogged, with latest unanswered request dated 25 April. No such user (talk) 06:41, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

I've been working on it. — Martin (MSGJ · talk) 07:43, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

User restoring edits of banned user and 4 years old sock-puppeteer[edit]

Hello! I want to ask the administrators about the assist given by different users to the 2-times banned user User:Stubes99, This editor had tens of socks but many times some users (in the last case User:Norden1990 [75] [76] [77]) restore the information inserted by him (sometimes we talk about mass illegal editing - entire paragraphs added by this banned user - [78]). What is the opinion of the admins about this situation? How is User:Stubes99 penalized if his edits are validated by his supporters and remain on the site? Stubes99 defies our community and can create a new account whenever he wants (because he owns several IP ranges) to continue his work. He is socking for 4 years - the original account is Celebration1981 [79] and the earliest known sock account is User:Celebration81 - and no one and nothing was able to stop his editing in illegality. His status is only formally of a banned user, because in practice he can activate like any well-behaved contributor. The never ending cycle is the following: he creates a account, makes edits, he is blocked, his edits are reverted for being illegal, and then his edits are reinstated by his friends. Users like User:Norden1990 who support his edits simly encourage him to go on in his socking. I am requesting a solution for solving this.

It seems that User:Norden1990 started acting like a meatpuppet of User:Stubes99. Some days ago they started e-mail communication [80][81][82] and now he began restoring his edits and now they very likely communicate and cooperate via e-mail.

User:Stubes99 also posted a message in Hungarian language on User talk:Hobartimus, which can be translated as "Hello! Why do not you set your profile to wikis by e-mail, which could communicate with you? Thanks for your response!" [83]. Hobartimus is old friend of Stubes99 [84].

Another question: Why does not Celebration1981 a.k.a. Stubes99 appear here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Long-term_abuse_-_Active after 4 years of continuous socking?--Omen1229 (talk) 09:48, 6 May 2013 (UTC)

User:Newnou, who reverted the sockpuppet's edits, was also banned, so I just brought back the article to stable version. It was strange for me that a sockpuppet remove long details from an article before banning. "It seems that", "they very likely communicate and cooperate via e-mail" - there are not appear to be evidence. I cooperated with Balkony (I did not know that (s)he is a sockpuppet, maybe I only suspected) in tha case of Central Europe where I helped to him to add statement from Western European historiographical works. --Norden1990 (talk) 10:31, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
What stable version? The stable (the last valid version) is the version before-Stubes99 and before-Newnou. User Newnou only removed the ilegal edits made by the other banned user: Stubes99 added text, Newnou deleted added text going back to the previous version, and you restored the ilegal edits. Take this example: Stubes99 added text [85], Newnou reverted to Fakirbakir's version [86] and you reinstated Stubes99 edit [87].
The problem is that you validated the content added by a banned user, encouraging his activity. Tomorrow he will create a new account and resume his editing, knowing that you are behind him to restore his edits in case someonw will revert him.--Omen1229 (talk) 11:24, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
Would you stop this hysteria? Newnou was also a sockpuppet, so he had no right to delete someone else's edit. Anyway, Balkony additions were sourced and referenced, using Western historiographical publications, so I checked these modifications. Indeed, in the case of Vona, I made a mistake accidentally, but it is very interesting that edit was not reverted by you, unlike the others, proving that the contents of the edits that bother you and not the user itself. --Norden1990 (talk) 12:23, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I didn't block Balkony as a sock until 28 hours ago, if that makes a difference. I might have just missed it, but I didn't see where you have discussed the issue with the other editor before bringing it here, so I naturally have to ask if this can be handled on a talk page, particularly since we have one set of socks reverting another set of socks, so it is possible for an editor to revert to the "wrong" version, all in the best of faith. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 22:18, 6 May 2013 (UTC)
I did not contact Norden1990 directly, because this user has done a lot false personal attacks against me and a constructive discussion([88][89][90] etc.) is really very difficult with this user: he called me recently "chauvinist user" [91] or named my edits as being frustrated or chauvinist... [92]
It seems that Norden1990 continues restoring information added by the banned user [93].
Unfortunately Stubes99 sockpuppet factory is working at full capacity. He created 4 new accounts in the last days: User:Drickler, User:Sovietsco, User:Rightfullruler, User:Antisockpuppeterer to restore his deleted contributions and it seems nothing can stop him. Isn't posible to find an antidote against this man? On Austria-Hungary article he has new supporters (who in fact probably don't know Stube99), who reinstated his lawless additions [94] (full paragraphs, and tens of thousands of letters).--Omen1229 (talk) 11:09, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
It is also important that we find a solution against Iaaasi, whose activity is harmful for the Wikipedia. Dear Omen, a constructive discussion is not difficult with me, see lot of cases in my talkpage. I reserve the indicatives about you, I'm sorry, but your activity is very similar to Iaaasi's. --Norden1990 (talk) 12:15, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Note - Norden1990, comparing any other editor with a sock is not constructive. If you have anything to complain about Omen1229 please use the wikipedia channels(boards or similar) to clear that up, otherwise your comment can be interpreted as an act of bad faith. Also you are not a new user not to know that you should NOT preserve SOCK edits. It is important to stop all socks, but in this case User:Stubes99 since he created this problem. Adrian (talk) 19:23, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

About this problem (sock edits) as according to wikipedia rules (WP:SOCK and [[95]]) should be reverted. Because if we let this edits remain, in fact we are allowing a banned user to contribute and participate as a legitimate user. As for this particular case I am a little torn, because this is one of the few User:Stubes99 constructive, non-partisan edits. But this may be the case of "good hand - bad hand" (WP:GHBH). If we were to respect the wikipedia rules the data should be removed immediately, but in this case I don`t know what to do. The best way is to let some experienced administrator decide what to do. Greetings. Adrian (talk) 19:23, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

I would like to hear some administrator clarifying this situation because this is starting to became and edit war on many articles. Some users are adding some SOCK data, some removing. If someone could explain clearly what to do in this situations. Thank you. Adrian (talk) 21:28, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

  • If reverting one sock's edit will just put another sock's edit back into place, just use your best judgement. Reverting socks is a goal, but the bigger goal is having a correct and proper article. The best rule of thumb to use is "what is best for the article?", then do that. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 15:29, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Agreed about this. There is usually little point in trying to determine the exact history. In a situation like that being described, edits that are good should be kept, and bad ones reverted. Whoever in getting the article to a satisfactory state is responsible for ensuring that it is in fact satisfactory. DGG ( talk ) 03:02, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Admin dashboard stats box[edit]

It contains 'Users blocked' and 'Users reblocked'. Is there any good reason why it doesn't contain 'Users unblocked' as well? Peridon (talk) 17:27, 9 May 2013 (UTC)

That's a damn good question. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:22, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
The person to ask this damn good question of is User talk:cyberpower678, who runs User:cyberbot I which is used to update the Admin stats box. --Jayron32 19:41, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
He's looking into it. Peridon (talk) 14:32, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
Yes I am. After I'm done the things that need to be done in real life first. I've actually considered adding a bunch of new things.—cyberpower ChatLimited Access 17:48, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
As long as they're damn good. Drmies (talk) 18:58, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
It's so damn good, that you would give a damn about it. :p—cyberpower ChatOffline 19:38, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
Hey, I just have a reputation as a big meanie, so I wouldn't mind having a admin stat that lets everyone know how nice I can be (if there's a damn good reason to be) Beeblebrox (talk) 20:44, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Problems with apparent attack account[edit]

An account User:SamEAntar appears to have been created as an attack on Sammy Antar, who was apparently involved in criminal dealings with the defunct Crazy Eddie electronics chain in New York. The account made some edits to the article, which I do not know the accuracy of (also made some edits under an IP address, which was mentioned in a comment on the article talk page that I deleted). The person behind the account claims to be Sam Antar, however based on what he posted to his own userpage, I think that is extremely dubious and the person is perhaps either a disgruntled former employee or stockholder of the company. In any case, it is extremely unlikely the account is operated by Sammy Antar, which makes the whole thing a massive BLP violation. So can someone look into the accounts edits, revdel any BLP violating edits, delete the userpage and block the account? - Who is John Galt? 15:16, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

  • I've deleted the user page--that was easy. Thanks. The rest of your charge will have to be addressed by someone smart; also, I'm clocking out for now. Drmies (talk) 15:32, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
The account hasn't edited in 2 years. Yeah, probably an impersonation account, but because of time-since-editing, what protection are we doing? I'm all in favour of revdel'ing BLP-violating things if you give us diffs to ones that need it (✉→BWilkins←✎) 16:12, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

Abuse and disruption[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


User:CTF83! Alt just came out of literally nowhere a few moments ago. He didn't like particular edits that were sourced on an article and removed extensive amounts of material by referring to it all as crap, spelt "grap" mind you, as shown here [96]. Before I could even send him a polite message that the extensive amounts of material he was removing as "grap" was all well sourced (which was my original intention), he came to my talkpage and initiated a discussion about it with the following: "Please stop adding the list of disguise, it's unnecessary crap that clutters the page!" (as shown here: [97]). That's when I literally lose it and tell him to stop coming to my talkpage with the funky attitude and that I was reporting him immediately for abuse and disruption. He told me to 'go for it.'

I'm a little confused by this user and his talkpage because it reads: "This account is a legitimate sockpuppet of User:CTF83!, for use on mobile and other computers. If this account misbehaves or acts suspiciously, please have it blocked, immediately!"

Is he a sockpuppet of another user? AmericanDad86 (talk) 00:41, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Notice that user's highly rude edit summary here and especially this one with a personal attack added on. If someone asking you to please stop adding crap sets you off, you need to go somewhere else. You clearly need to read Wikipedia:Fancruft. Oh, and learn the difference between a talk page a user page. CTF83! 00:58, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

I didn't know what your talkpage was. This user has talkpage speaking on himself or his account as a sockpuppet and that he may or may not abuse accounts; then his talkpage has something about no internet at home with nothing else on it. If you'll look at his talkpage and userpage, surely you'l l see overwhelming abnormality leading to confusion.

Anyways, if you are removing material, especially large amounts of material here at Wikipedia, you take it to the talkpage first and initiate a discussion with the proper respect. Not only that, you are to make legitimate edit summaries with legit reason. Relying on bratty remarks like 'that's crap' then coming to my usertalk page with those same remarks is unacceptable. And if you think I'm going to sit idly by while you talk crazy to me, you're sadly mistaken. Anyways, I had actually intended to start a discussion on the article's talkpage with this user before I got this crazy message sent to me talking about remove crap and all this other business. He's clearly begging for attention and desired this quarrel.AmericanDad86 (talk) 01:22, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

I'm not required to discuss any edits, WP:BOLD. You have a lot to learn here CTF83! 01:50, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Also I've never been blocked for a personal attack, like you, 3 months after you joined, so you clearly have a problem with that, I haven't gotten one block for that in almost 7 years on here. CTF83! 01:56, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I've looked through this user's editing history and it looks like he delights in a rude, off-putting approach to his editing: [98]. He has deleted and archived much of his talkpage so it's hard to tell beond his editing history. As I said, stop talking crazy. You will not come to my talk page talking about 'don't put crap' on Wikipedia, you will not tell me what I have to learn about about, etc. You do not disrespect me. Now I don't know the manner in which you're used to editing with others around here, but you'll revise it when you deal with me. Otherwise, you can expect to find yourself right back here on the Administrative Noticeboards each and every time and that's a promise.AmericanDad86 (talk) 02:02, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
You talk big for someone who doesn't know anything about Wikipedia...again personal attack blocks on me in 7 years? 0 Personal attack, blocks on you in 5 months? 1...who has the real civility issue here? CTF83! 02:17, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I'm actually quite surprised the edit I found in the user's editing history didn't lead to an immediate block. The issue in question is now quite irrelevant to me. I'm now even more outraged over this: [99] where he uses racial slurs against Black people and Jews because someone had the "nerve" to edit the word homosexual into a page referring to people who are attracted to the same sex. His edit summary response was: "homosexual is an offensive term, you wouldn't allow nigger or kike would you." I'm actually an African American and am extremely outraged by this user's edit summary slurs and over someone saying something like 'homosexual' which is not a slur. And not only that, but not even used in an offensive fashion if you look at the edit. His response was gross. AmericanDad86 (talk) 02:21, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Yea, the discussion closes when I find something blatantly offensive about Black people that deserves a block. Figures. Another complaint I'll be taking up with higher authority. Blatantly racist edit summary ignored. AmericanDad86 (talk) 02:38, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Community ban for 50.72.161.19[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I am requesting that a vote on a siteban of 50.72.161.19 be put in place for threats and personal attacks. --72.65.238.157 (talk) 00:35, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

IP addresses are not banned. A registered account may be banned, and an IP sock of a banned editor may be blocked, but an IP, standing alone, is not banned. In this instance, you're talking about a dynamic IP address who is currently blocked for personal attacks.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:47, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Technically, they can be but they usually aren't. To clear things up, this is an old IP (50.72.161.19), and they are using 50.72.139.25 now, which is already blocked by Drmies. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 00:52, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
  • When has an IP ever been banned without being connected to a registered account? I looked at WP:BAN, and it addressed the issue only by implication. I also looked at the list of banned users and couldn't find any banned IP addresses (perhaps I missed one?). It also makes no sense to me for a dynamic IP, although I suppose it makes a little more sense for a static IP.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:56, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Editors, not accounts (registered or not) are banned. NE Ent 02:13, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Wasn't an editor with a dynamic IP address banned as a result of a discussion here a few months ago? Nick-D (talk) 02:40, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I can confirm that this has indeed happened, though it is rare. -- King of ♠ 02:50, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
There were two as far as I remember. One was the German ref desk troll and the other was one know as Tailsman67 who only used IPs but would sign with that name. Both were banned without ever having an account to ban. Blackmane (talk) 08:27, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Is this IP going to be site banned? There's no LTA report, no sockpuppet reports: nothing. No evidence that a site ban is even worth discussing here, really. Let's move on, shall we? Doc talk 09:46, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Besides the ban some months ago, an IP editor even had his own arbitration case and got banned as a result. Nyttend (talk) 10:40, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I'm too lazy to look it up, but I argued the same thing "you can't ban ips", but was told we can, and they did ban the editor behind the IP. I still don't see the advantage. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 10:42, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
This is for the talk page on the banning policy. Start the ban vote here based on the IP's suggestion. That's why the thread is here. Doc talk 10:51, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Temporary notification system[edit]

I am going to enable a default gadget that will pop up when you receive a notification. I do this because there is a valid concern new editors may not notice the standard red blip on top of the screen. While there is consensus that some form of notification alert is needed, the current discussion at Wikipedia talk:Notifications/New message indicator is going downhill fast.

For more information, see Wikipedia:Notifications/Popup documentation. Edokter (talk) — 00:31, 7 May 2013 (UTC)

Is someone also going to bring back typewriters, the quill and ink, messenger pigeons, and horse and buggies? That's the kind of mentality we are dealing with here. With a community as afraid of change as this, it's really a wonder they can use a computer. I'll be awaiting a reply with a coconut shell tied to a string... Wikipedia is going to be left far behind if they keep up this stubborn, "I won't allow any changes" attitude. Viriditas (talk) 01:18, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
(ec) It's a wonder we're not still using the classic skin. Edokter (talk) — 01:19, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
If you are interested in what's really going on here, see Resistance (philosophy). Viriditas (talk) 01:24, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
You're still walking on two legs, no? Have you tried breathing through your ass? It's different so it must be progress. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:32, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
You've missed the point by a few light years. We did not always walk on two legs. The opposition to creativity on this site will be its downfall. Viriditas (talk) 01:43, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Absolutely no creativity in that move. Just the urge to change for change's sake. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:48, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
It's one of the most creative acts in proto-human history. Necessity is the mother of invention. You appear to be using a different definition of creativity than I am. Viriditas (talk) 01:50, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Removing the orange bar on wikipedia is proto-human history? Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:51, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Whatever are you talking about? It was very clear what I was talking about. Viriditas (talk) 01:54, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
And it was very clear what I said. Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 > haneʼ 01:55, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, if you were speaking dolphinese to a chimpanzee underwater riding a whale. Totally clear. Viriditas (talk) 01:58, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
For the record, this new gadget has very little to do with the orange bar... Ignatzmicetalk 01:20, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
It's even uglier than the bar, if that were possible :) But it does the job. --Bongwarrior (talk) 01:29, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
I wanted to keep it as simple as possible by using the exixting mw.notify framework, which does not allow extensive styling. Edokter (talk) — 01:34, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
No complaints. Sometimes ugly is good. --Bongwarrior (talk) 01:47, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
And, sometimes ugly is beautiful. Or as it is usually known, "exotic". :) Viriditas (talk) 01:54, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
Appreciate that it comes with easy to follow instructions to turn off, and hopefully will address the OBOD concerns. NE Ent 09:18, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment I am one who uses Classic view on XP, and Monobook here. I do so because I find them the clearest and easiest to use. I am all in favour of progress. I just wish that people would stop equating change with progress. Hitler's appointment as Chancellor certainly initiated change. Was it progress? Vista was change. was that progress? Progress requires change. But not all change IS progress. Peridon (talk) 17:39, 9 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks, but I don't smoke. That was deliberate, as was the bringing in of Vista... Peridon (talk) 20:28, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Facetiously pretending to be extremist and being misinterpreted as genuine? Yet another internet law holds true. If you can work Rule 34 into this somehow, you get the Triple Crown and earn the utter respect of all who kneel before you... --Jayron32 23:55, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Speedy deletion candidates not showing up in maintenance categories[edit]

Could one or more administrators please re-assess/delete Template:Infobox People, Template:INFOBOX PERSON, Template:Infobox KVOE-AM and Template:8TeamBracket-Best of Five Playoffs Except F, all of which are looping templates either redundant or not usefully employed, and which I nominated under CSD T3 two weeks ago, but which are strangely absent from Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as unused redundant templates?
Also, near the top of my category namespace edits, there is a collection of about 30 categories that I tagged for C1 at the end of last month, and which are still empty, but which don't seem to have made it as far as Category:Candidates for speedy deletion as empty categories. Could these also please be processed? SuperMarioMan 17:56, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

I deleted {{Infobox KVOE-AM}} since it was unused. Vegaswikian (talk) 18:51, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

3 month backlog[edit]

Just wanted to let people know that there is a 3 month backlog over at Wikipedia:Possibly unfree files#Holding cell. Ramaksoud2000 (Talk to me) 02:05, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Well, after six years on Commons I consider myself kind of experienced with files, but the in the first five discussions I opened in this backlog I could not come with any reasonable decision.--Ymblanter (talk) 20:20, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Indeed, debates about the freeness of an image can drag on for months on Commons. -- King of ♠ 08:25, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Sofort and WP:OUTING | attacked by cross-wiki trolls User:Tehranpizzaparlor[edit]

Tehranpizzaparlor (talk · contribs)

Akhshurush (talk · contribs)

Lavasooni (talk · contribs)

Lavasoon (talk · contribs)

پسر کوهستان (talk · contribs)

2.176.36.62 (talk · contribs)

2.176.30.119 (talk · contribs)

2.176.3.175 (talk · contribs)

and ip...,...,

Hello, I was attacked by cross-wiki trolls for what I did in Persian Wikipedia, (all this user and all IP here) - (1) and (2) and all ip and user edit (Here) The IP range is so big that global blocking isn't possible (as one of stewards said) and these links contain my personal information and very insulating swears (In Persian). so please hide these revisions and protect my user page for except autoconfirmed users

Diskussion: (My En.wiki history) - (Admin En.wiki Request) - (Fa.wiki Request) - (History) - (Lavasani ID)

Thanks.فلورانس (talk) 13:11, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

There has been some cleaning up, some blocks, and some protection. Possibly enough. We probably need someone who speaks Farsi to identify any remaining unwanted edits. -- zzuuzz (talk) 08:22, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks a Lot فلورانس (talk) 19:26, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia bug in category statements in templates[edit]

Resolved

Graham87 11:58, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Help please! Second opinion(s) requested, from uninvolved admin(s)[edit]

In February my tendentious editing behavior on talk pages was the subject of an AN:

I recognize I continue to have an issue with this, as I have difficulty limiting my contributions to discussions that I'm interested in. Anyway, that AN was closed by TParis (talk · contribs) with the following fair and reasonable decision:

Born2Cycle is under a limited discussion ban at the discretion of an uninvolved admin when his behavior becomes counter productive to the discussion. Meaning: An uninvolved admin may ban him from a particular discussion he is involved in on a case by case basis after a warning that can be enforced with a block between 24 hours and the duration of the discussion he is disruptive in. This includes discussions about the close of a move or article titles discussion anywhere on Wikipedia.

I thought that was very fair because then if I engage in my problematic behavior again in some discussion, I can be notified with a warning from an uninvolved admin, and will stop.

So, I have been going along with no issues, or so I thought. That is, no uninvolved admin has issued any warnings to me. However, my behavior at a recent RM discussion became discussed, and now another admin is considering blocking me for 30 days from all RM discussions, even though that discussion was closed weeks ago, the block would go far beyond the parameters set in that AN, and there is no current issue. This seems purely punitive to me. Is that fair and appropriate?

This admin is going to go through with the block unless he hears objections from uninvolved admins. Hence my plea for help here. The discussion where the 30 day block of me has been proposed is here:

My attempts to discuss this with the other admin are here:

Thanks in advance. --B2C 21:42, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Quoting: "Born2cycle made 69 comments over the course of ten days at Talk:Suicide of Kelly Yeomans", which is kind of why WP:Don't bludgeon the process was created. It might be hard to get sympathy here considering the amount of bludgeoning you did, and the way you brought it here likely violates WP:CANVASSING. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 22:36, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
    • I had hatted the comment as canvassing, but User:MisterShiney undid my edit, for no good reason. (MS: Non-admins can close discussions here, there's no restriction on it.) Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:33, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Only because it was up for just over half hour before you slapped it with a canvassing label - incorrect in my opinion, rightly so the user is asking for a second opinion on the actions of an admin which is well within their remit. I am aware of no such policy/guideline that says as a non admin §you are allowed to close a discussion before it has been addressed. Hence the revert. MisterShiney 23:51, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Hate to disagree with both of you, but non-admin can close discussions. And it was hatted, not closed, something we usually reserve for WP:DENY, offtopic threads or really long evidence. We admin are immune to Jedi mind tricks, so seeing the plea won't poison our minds. Actually, hatting makes it more likely to be read by more people. None of us can resist Pandora's box. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 00:14, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
    • Good point, but what does that say about the effectiveness of WP:DENY? Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:56, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
      • "We admin are immune to Jedi mind tricks." I made you say that. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 01:06, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
      • That it has limited utility. It's only done to hide the "trophy" of their actions, since it will then always be out of plain sight. It is just to remove the troll's and/or sock's incentive, which is part of why some do lolz. It is a Jedi mind trick that is a little better than not hatting it. The only reason we don't outright delete it is that we want the info in the archive, so we can search for it in the future, if needed. That is my experience anyway, there are some other perspectives and uses, too. I sometimes hat offtopic subthreads, (this subthread might qualify) to keep the continuity of the merits intact. Particularly in long, complicated reports. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 01:10, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

If anyone is interested in the original problem the editor posted about, please note I have posted a comment at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement. -- Dianna (talk) 05:06, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Well posting at AE should solve the problem all right. Sandstein will ban them for life! Kumioko (talk) 10:19, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Fair enough Dennis. Apologies Ken. -- MisterShiney 17:49, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

RFC/U for Arzel[edit]

There is currently community support for a topic ban for user:Arzel, here. During the topic ban discussion it was suggested that RFC/U might be a good idea. The main issue, editing for the tea party movement, became an WP:Arbitration case. During the workshop, it was also suggested that WP:RFC/U might be a good idea, here. However, while I have engaged him on his talk page, I can't think of an issue in which another editor has engaged with me on an issue. Therefore, I don't think I can meet the minimum standards to file a dispute. However, since there is community support for a ban and because it was suggested this might be a good option, is there anyway to do a RFC/U on user:Arzel without meeting the standard.Casprings (talk) 22:21, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

No. Multiple venues for such arguments are a chronophagous exercise. If ArbCom does not see fit for a sanction on a specific user, then the "multiple lines of attack" system is a tad unfair. Collect (talk) 23:30, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
There is a very clear consensus for a topic ban among editors. The edits that are problematic are a much wider range than simply the tea party. One should not ignore community consensus. However, the current case only deals with the tea party. However, Arzel's edits should be examined in full and not just his edits that deal with the tea party. With such a strong community consensus, we have need to explore his edits. Casprings (talk) 03:19, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
You probably can open an RfC/U without meeting the "minimum standards" if the user agrees to it. In this case, I don't think it's wise though. -Nathan Johnson (talk) 01:43, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Why?Casprings (talk) 02:12, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment I went ahead and started a conversation on it at the Arbitration case, here.

This appears to be a retaliation for this. Arzel (talk) 05:27, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment At the Arbitration request page, User:AGK, a member of the arbitration committee responded with, "we are broadly trying to confine our examination to the TPM article and very closely related pages. You are therefore correct to suggest that more general problems with the conduct of a party should be dealt with outwith this case and in the usual venues." If it isn't to be a WP:RFC/U than it should be something. A community consensus that is as large as the one against Arzel cannot simply be ignored. Casprings (talk) 12:17, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Comment It has been suggest the WP:RFC/U is the wrong tool to use here. I would think something that did this,

What RfC/U CANNOT do is:

  • Impose/enforce involuntary sanctions, blocks, bans, or binding disciplinary measures;

What RfC/U CAN do is:

  • Allow a number of users to collaborate in discussing wider issues they see with a particular editor's conduct.
  • Allow an editor who is the subject of an RFC/U to understand the problems, and change or explain their conduct.
  • Allow users to share information which might be relevant for later steps in the dispute resolution process, should that become necessary.
  • An RfC is a tool for developing voluntary agreements and collecting information.
  • An RfC may bring close scrutiny on all involved editors. In most cases, editors named in an RfC are expected to respond to it. The Arbitration Committee closely considers evidence and comments in RfC if the editors involved in the RfC are later named in a request for arbitration.
  • See also RfC/U rules.
would be just what the doctor ordered. Flush out if there are actuall problems, help Arzel understand the problems, and go from there. Am I missing something?Casprings (talk) 12:32, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
I would support the RFC/U on the basis of his (tag-team) revert of one of my edits to the TPm article and refusal to engage on the Talk page regarding his assertions in the edit summary[100].--Ubikwit 連絡 見学/迷惑 16:54, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Vandalism[edit]

User:Beseoz contributions are obvious and clear vandalism. --TheShadowCrow (talk) 16:44, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

For all the Mothers out there[edit]

Happy Mother's Day

I'm not sure how much it is celebrated around the world, but here in the United States, today is Mother's Day. I know that this is generally a drama-board reserved for Wikipedia's unpleasant business, but I think that we can make an exception in this instance. It is true that not everyone of us has been blessed with a good mother, but hopefully those of us who have been realize how precious and valuable they are. I trust that all of us would recognize that without mothers, neither Wikipedia or the people who edit here would exist. However, I'd venture to guess that as a group, mothers probably receive very little (if any) recognition from this community (although I would be happy to hear it if I'm wrong about that). In defiance of the usually negative tone of this page, I'd like to wish all of the mothers here a Happy Mother's Day. AutomaticStrikeout  !  C  Sign AAPT  20:04, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Site ban discussion for User:Evlekis[edit]

WP:RFPP is blowing up with requests to semi-protect articles by now-indefblocked Evlekis, who appears to have more IPs at their disposal than you can shake a stick at; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Evlekis. Besides the usual Balkanist disruption, they're also hounding Peacemaker67 and Bobrayner. I think a formal ban would be a nice signal that this behavior is unacceptable; in addition, I would like that self-congratulatory MySpace social networking thing they put up in the place of a talk page deleted: an editor with such a blatant disregard for the rules here has no right to put a family album (children, exes, resumes, their life's work) on our beautiful website. Drmies (talk) 15:07, 10 May 2013 (UTC)

  • I've been very active with the case, reverting, protecting, blocking, tagging and deleting, which is easy enough since his edits are hard to miss. Keep in mind, he has a one year AE ban for violating his topic ban concurrent with his indef for socking the first time, via User:Sandstein. This is a bit earlier than usual for a site ban, but it is rather unusual circumstances, with a large amount of collateral damage. He does seem to have gone to the dark side of the force, to which there is no return. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 15:37, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
    • I appreciate the blanking, Dennis. Drmies (talk) 18:57, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
there is certainly more than enough scope for an ARBMAC discretionary sanctions site ban (given he topic banned under ARBMAC before he was indefinitely blocked and began evading) or even a community site ban. It might make it clearer to him that his behaviour in evading his block and topic ban is completely unacceptable. Peacemaker67 (send... over) 15:44, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Commenting as the administrator who imposed the recent AE sanctions and the block for their violation via socking, it does appear to me that the sockpuppetous block/ban evasion by this user has reached the degree at which a community site ban is normally imposed, though it doesn't have any substantial additional effect. My understanding is that a site ban can't be imposed as a discretionary sanction, only a topic ban, which already exists.  Sandstein  15:49, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
my mistake. I thought that even a site ban was available under the "or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project" provision, but I'll butt out. Regards, Peacemaker67 (send... over) 15:54, 10 May 2013 (UTC)
No need to butt out, its hard enough for seasoned admin to keep up with all policies on this. Even I called in Sandstein because he knows Arb issues better than I ever will. Site bans are only enacted by a motion by Arb (long, time consuming, etc.) or by a formal proposal here at WP:AN. As Sandstein has pointed out, there is little practical difference since he is already indef blocked for socking, concurrent with a Discretionary Sanction block for a full year. Anyone can automatically revert his edits on site without violating 3RR, we automatically mass nuke his new articles and edits as soon as we find them, which is very quickly. If you see other socks, file at SPI and feel free to ping me. I've worked all his sock cases so I'm familiar enough to take rapid action blocking/protecting/nuking/denying. That is the most effect method of dealing with it, removing all rewards in the behavior. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 00:42, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Copy that. Peacemaker67 (send... over) 01:48, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

The blatant socking is, at this point, essentially trolling and a site ban discussion is just feeding the beast. And the page blanking is obviously punitive and petty. Whoever closes this should count this vote as either a support or oppose (whatever allows us to declare consensus and move on sooner.) NE Ent 02:10, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

  • Nothing petty about it, Ent. Thank you for your insights. Also, Zwarte Riek is still, despite your best intentions, a red link. Drmies (talk) 02:16, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
    • Imagine you're a non-editor reader browsing Jelena Dokic. You notice the talk tab, and, out of curiosity click. You see a note signed "Evlekis 11:54, 30 October 2006 (UTC) Евлекис", and click the hyperlinked name. You can either end up at previous or current. Which is going make you more interested in being part of the Wikipedia community? It's like taking an exit off the highway. Will ending up in a neighborhood with chain link fences and bars on the windows or one with open lawns and kid's bikes lying on the lawns make you more inclined to stop for a bite to eat at the corner? The fact that Zwarte Riek is redlinked doesn't concern me nearly as much as the quarter million "unreferenced" templates. Doc M and I could both edit every day for the rest of our lives and never get through the list. If a sock is messing with content and targeting a fellow editor I'm more than happy to do some rolling back [101], but when it comes badge o' shame and threads about how horrible an eight year, 22,000 mainspace editor is -- not interested. Think about what messages what we say and do to imperfect editors sends. NE Ent 11:42, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
      • OR it lets a new editor know that WP takes proper editing seriously and he should obay the rules. If we never let editors start down the path of vandalism they never become vandals. Has it ever occured to you that if we let editors get away small problems they begin to think they can get away with large. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.143.205.142 (talk) 16:28, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        • Those tags are used daily, multiple times, by SPI clerks. I rely on them for the links to get to cases and lists of socks. Seriously, I use those every single day, they aren't put there as a badge of shame, they are an administrative tool. And what does having 22k mainspace edits have to do with anything? Are you suggesting we treat someone with 100 mainspace edits differently? Dennis Brown - © Join WER 12:44, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Ent, I'm disappointed that you would call my actions punitive and petty. If you go and look, I put the standard SOCKMASTER tag on his page, as I do every Master who has confirmed socks at SPI. It is built into our scripts for clerking there, and automatically blanks the page and adds that tag. Every single master is always tagged, as is every single puppet on every single case I've ever worked, and clerks are instructed to do exact this. I've even gone out of my way discussing with the master, trying to resolve the issue, on my talk page. Your assumptions are way off base here, and are a bit of a slap in the face. Dennis Brown - © Join WER 10:54, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I'd agree with editors above that the behaviour has reached the point where the community would be talking about a ban; but there's a second point; a ban wouldn't actually make much different to how we treat disruptive editing. As the target of hundreds of venomous Evlekis edits (I'll skip the usual string of diffs), my gut feeling might be to say "We need a site ban! And a community ban! We need super-duper stricter sanctions!" but that cannot improve on the status quo, where disruptive edits are rolled back or revdel'd, attack pages are speedy-deleted, and socks are blocked. bobrayner (talk) 13:37, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
  • A typical site ban discussion. The case itself is turned into a "discussion" of how really pointless banning any editor truly is. Politics. Doc talk 13:51, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
On the contrary, his activity has completely subsided following the range blocks I set yesterday. Had someone pinged me about range blocks (I never add SPI cases to my watch list), this discussion almost certainly wouldn't have arisen, yet no one even asked if they were possible, regrettably. WilliamH (talk) 14:01, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I for one think its a shame that it came to indefinitely blocking a longterm editor who seemed to edit positively until this all went down. Perhaps this is a lesson that more care needs to be taken before imposing indefinite blocks. More often than not it turns the user into a vandal or sock. Frankly from what I have seen in this case there was a lot of negative actions done by the individual and several of the admins involved. Kumioko (talk) 16:01, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Had this not been an AE, necessitating Sandstein get involved, then I likely would have talked with him (as I have since the block) and tried to work out a way for him to come back in short order. He still can come back, but it is up to him to pull back, cool down, and start a dialog about how we move forward from here. That he has DS block does complicate things, however, as only Sandstein or Arb can really lift that. As long as he is venting, it isn't likely to happen. Lifting the socking portion of the block isn't problematic and could have been done by any admin. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 18:11, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I agree it would have been better if it wasn't taken to AE. Nothing good ever comes out of an AE discussion unless the person is an admin and/or is completely uninvolved in the case at all. Since my opinions of Arbcom and AE are well known to be extremely low it shouldn't surprise you when I say that I I have no faith at all that regardless of the users conduct Arbcom, Sandstein nor anyone else related to AE (which is really only Sandstein anyway) will lift the ban. Sandstein nor Arbcom are known to be forgiving and once they make a decision they treat it like a prison term with no parole. I have a lot of respect for some of the Arbcom members as individuals and editors but no respect whatsoever in the process of AE or Arbcom and I think WP would be better off without it. With that said, I agree that I hope that the user cools down a little and takes a break. No good will come from them turning into a vandal (something all too tempting when one has been expelled from the community). Kumioko (talk) 19:08, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
If it hadn't been taken to AE, then the pov-pushing (and every tool used to support pov-pushing: Deception, BLP abuses, misuse of sources, sockpuppetry, canvassing &c) would have continued as before. In what way would that be a better outcome? The main problem started long before the AE case; AE just documented it and brought it to the community's attention. Subsequent vandalism is more visible - and less harmful - than the systematic distortion of many articles. There are a couple of other editors in the Balkans who might also have earned a trip to AE, but I'm not keen on starting drama right now. bobrayner (talk) 21:15, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
I'm sorry you feel that way. There is nothing good that AE does for the project. For what its worth I have been reading over it for the last couple hours and I don't like the way you handled it either. Your comments are a clear exhageration of the case but unfortunately no one here is going to take the time to look into it so it appears you win. Kumioko (talk) 21:52, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

For what it's worth, per my comment here, the original suspicion behind the case appears to have been entirely vindicated. WilliamH (talk) 16:45, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Please take a look[edit]

I'm at a bit of loss to understand why no action has been taken on this and this over on ANI. The former (which I !voted in) seems like it has reached an actionable consensus, while the latter appears as if some kind of warning would be appropriate.

Could some bold admin please take a look before these two items scroll off the board? Thanks, Beyond My Ken (talk) 20:57, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

No takers? Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:06, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Daniel L. Barth[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I think I need some help here... Daniel L. Barth — Preceding unsigned comment added by Scientific Alan 2 (talkcontribs) 20:04, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

Deleted, editor indef'ed. WP:LTA->WP:RBI. DMacks (talk) 20:08, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
Alan Greger likes this Scientific Alan 2(Click here to talk)(What have I done?)(Me) 20:18, 11 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

I hate to put a damper on AS's kind words above, but this article has just sprung up about an event that occured about half an hour ago. Just bringing this up for extra eyes on since this is going to be rapidly evolving. It currently has no content, however, news reports are currently coming in. I'm not tagging it for CSD just yet; I'd be more comfortable with someone else making that call. Ishdarian 20:59, 12 May 2013 (UTC)

Doesn't seem like any fatalities yet (thankfully). Why do people need to feel the need to rush and create articles about every little news event before details are known? --MASEM (t) 21:06, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Dropped in a source. Masem, I concur wholeheartedly. Theopolisme (talk) 21:23, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Don't know, but again why I wish we would adopt of policy of not using a source for at least 6 hours after it is published during current events. It is always a rush of print/wiki/retract/debate, rife with BLP violations. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 21:25, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Your desired venue is thataway. ;) Theopolisme (talk) 21:28, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
(edit conflict)For events like this, I'd say: create, place a template saying information will be added once it is confirmed, and FPP for 24 hours. *shrugs* :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:28, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
The very people that want the articles to be a real time news channel always outnumber everyone else. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 21:29, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
I wonder if it even makes sense to consider the possibly of a CSD criteria where after 24 hrs have passed (enough time that impacts of the event should be clear to judge if it is a true event for an encyclopedia or just a story on a slow news day) that such articles on events can be judged. We need to siphon those that want to report on breaking news to Wikinews - it exists for that reason. --MASEM (t) 21:32, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
Ping me if you ever get anything going that will slow down the newsiness of these articles. I hate to image how many times people have been misled when coming here and the version of the story they loaded was in the middle of an edit war with a BLP warrior on these. Full protection with a blank page is better than our current lack of policy on these. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 21:36, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
My point exactly. Enough news article are published that a blank article for a day or two will not negatively impact anyone, really. :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:43, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
And needless to say, the 'article' was flawed from the start. I've just removed 'mass murder' from 'type' in the infobox. Sheer incompetence... AndyTheGrump (talk) 22:00, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
The final line in the Infobox says "Injured (non-fatal)". Does that really make sense? How about simply "Injured"? HiLo48 (talk) 22:11, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Sorely tempted to send this ridiculous nonsense to AfD. Though I'm becoming a bit jaded lately regarding the intelligence, or lack thereof, of the average Wikipedian lately, and their ability to judge notability and event importance. Tarc (talk) 22:29, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
That would be a violation of WP:POINT. When 11 people get shot, there will be enough news coverage to create a well-verified and detailed article. There's no problem with creating a placeholder stub early on to start gathering info. Jehochman Talk 22:30, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
If I feel it is unencyclopedic and not in line with Wikipedia guidelines on notability, it would not be pointy to nominate such a thing. I would be nominating it because it is routine news and not worthy of an encyclopedia, not to make a statement about anything else. Save your finger-waving for someone who'd actually be intimidated by it, hochman. Cause I ain't that guy. Tarc (talk) 22:42, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
No, that just means there's lots of primary sources. We should have enduring coverage to assure an event is worthy of an encyclopedic article. When there are just a lot of sources, Wikinews fits that bill perfectly. --MASEM (t) 00:55, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
    • The problem is that sending it to AFD causes drama. I've already pushed one new article into a redirect to it, and the pace is slow so far, might be better to just ride it out for a day and see how the news cycle runs. If it needs AFD, it is almost better to wait until it isn't fresh news, else someone just recreates the article, and creates drama if you delete it. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 22:32, 12 May 2013 (UTC)
      I think the problem is- and it's only going to get worse, and should be dealt with on EnWiki sooner than later- is that usually reliable sources (CNN, Fox News, ABC News, etc) jump the gun to get the lead. It's an unfortunate reality in the media these days, that the major outlets value "first" over "fact," but it's not going to get any better. WikiNews is a bit of a mess, but it's a mess that is slowly improving, and with better defined policies on breaking news than we have here, so I think a template that links to the WikiNews article, fully protected for a set time (24-48 hours), and with a message that encourages interested editors to discuss and, more importantly, collect sources on the talk page as events unfold, would be beneficial steps before going "live" with an article. The thing is, in situations like this, you are going to inevitably draw in people who are only interested in the event, and not interested in learning our confusing policies. If nothing else, just being able to avoid the whole constantly repeated discussions about why or why not Wikipedia is WP:NOTNEWS every single time this happens would be a time-saver, and reduce the headache. Ditch 00:46, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
      WP:NOTNEWS needs to be deprecated immediately as it is no longer accurate, and Wikinews needs to be shut down as it is no longer relevant. It's time to face the fact that Wikipedia does a far better job covering news stories than Wikinews and we need to vocally recognize this state of affairs rather than trying to sweep it under the rug and shift the burden over to the dysfunctional Wikinews site whose only purpose seems to be hosting original research like interviews with fringe politicians and unknown people that the mainstream media won't cover. Viriditas (talk) 01:10, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
      • I would support that, although it would be a hard sell to those newsy that love the drama these articles sometimes create. You could have to carefully craft a criteria for it as well, which isn't as trivial as it sounds. I won't hold my breath, but I strongly support anything that will put the breaks on breaking news articles, so we have time to reflect and cover just the facts, which I think is what we are supposed to be doing to begin with. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 00:58, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        Viriditas is a bit more harsh in his assessment of WikiNews than I was, but only because I was trying to be nice. I actually whole hardheartedly agree with him, though I am pessimistic that consensus would reflect this view in a discussion. That aside, could the answer simply be that a "reliable" source (regardless of the source) should only be considered "reliable" after a certain amount of time, in order to ensure the vetting process? i.e. a source is not deemed reliable until 24 hours (or some arbitrarily agreed on time frame) following its original post? This would surely be a simple inclusion to the WP:RS policy that would result in much improvement on how we handle breaking news stories. Ditch 01:18, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        And just as an aside, after further thought, I think it's a good idea that a source should not be considered reliable (and not just for breaking news), until some time has passed for the author to make retractions or correct mistakes. No one is perfect after all, and don't we expect, occasionally, that, whether it be CNN or a scientific journal, that sometimes mistakes will be made...and shouldn't our policies reflect that admission? Ditch 01:30, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
          • This was the idea behind my previous statement about requiring sources to be "aged" at least 6 hours before use in article that fit the criteria of being "breaking news". I'm thinking that is long enough for most situations, without being an undue burden. But again, I would go for anything that would slow it down. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 01:40, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
            Then I would suggest that the discussion that needs to be had is: What amount of time needs to elapse following the publishing of a source before it can be deemed as "reliable" for inclusion in a Wikipedia article? I am neither skilled nor experienced enough to start that discussion- or even know where to start it- but I think it would be a good starting point to resolve this seemingly unending problem. Would someone ping me if they do this, please? Ditch 01:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        There's no reason to be polite about the waste of time and resources that Wikinews is. It's worthless and its shuttering will allow the foundation to redirect resources to projects that serve their purpose. As to articles like this, there's no hope of getting it deleted during the news cycle. A spree shooting is hopeless to delete as long as we have run of the mill murders like this, this and this. Resolute 01:48, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        There would be if there was a BLP-like mandate that allowed quick delete if the source(s) is not of a certain "age." Even with Dennis's (some what conservative, in my view) suggestion of 6 hours, this article about the New Orleans Mother's Day shootings (even though currently it appears legit) would not currently be live on EnWiki. Ditch 01:58, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        In truth, I think that simply blames the sources for an editing failure on our end. We shouldn't be claiming news reports as fact ("17 people were shot"), but as a report ("CNN reported that 17 people were shot") until official confirmations occur or the sources settle. But in fluid situations, facts are going to change. Our focus should be on reinforcing that in these articles and avoiding BLP traps. Resolute 02:04, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
        True. But at what point do we stop being an encyclopedia and start being a news aggregate? Or are we both? Ditch 02:09, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
                • Not only that, but in the end, it is about us managing the information and having a bit more control over what we publish. A delay better allows verification. It isn't about blaming the source, it is about recognizing that the source is first concerned with timeliness, and our job is to reflect on the available information and summarize it, not to simply parrot the latest tidbit. Our timetables are different because our goals are different. Dennis Brown - - © - @ - Join WER 02:12, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
                  • It is a lot more work to enforce "no use of <6hr news articles on current events", but rather simply to say, "Okay, we don't encourage you creating new articles on a news event just because it happened but urge caution, but if you do, and the event doesn't show clear importance within 24-48 hrs, it can be (speedily?) deleted." --MASEM (t) 02:39, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
                    I don't follow. Could you explain how it would be more trouble to enforce a strict time-based rule on sources use to create an article, rather than an arbitrary one that simply "urges caution" otherwise the article may be deleted? That solves the problem of Transformers articles, how does it help with breaking new stories that are a mess of inaccuracies? Ditch 03:10, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
                    • The "please don't create until you're sure" is basically the status quo today, with only a bit more formality on sending news events that this is shaping up to be (an unfortunately spat of violence but nothing encyclopedic about it) to deletion, while having a "don't use <6hr sources" would require monitoring, can be easily gamed, and would be subject to a lot of IAR (like in the case of the Boston marathon bombing, where it was clear it was an important event). Basically, the less we tip the boat, the better. --MASEM (t) 03:32, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The article is now at AfD: Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/2013 Mother's Day Parade shooting. Thryduulf (talk) 13:48, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

The answer to the question of why people rush to create articles is that people rush to read them. Wikipedia exists to serve encyclopedic knowledge to the public. It does so for all topics, recent or not, and no policy prohibits that. The more people are interested, the more people begin to write. There is no policy that says that articles have to be out of date, nor that we should disbelieve reliable sources because they might, possibly, turn out to be wrong. Wnt (talk) 22:34, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
That's a pretty rose coloured view given the way the media (of all kinds) initially reported the Boston bombing and the Cleveland kidnappings. HiLo48 (talk) 23:17, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
So, there were errors. We only present a topic as we know it. Guess what, there's probably all kinds of errors in our articles about cancer and aging, errors that it would be really really really nice if somebody could correct, but we can't because science hasn't found them out yet, so we keep spreading the misinformation we have until the situation changes. This is no different. So, every now and then we have to change a statement that so-and-so was the high school shooter to that it was really his brother but he was incorrectly identified by the press. That's a shame, but it's not as bad as not covering what we have when we have it. We don't have a legal or ethical duty to do anything but that. We can't right every wrong, we can't undo when a newspaper incorrectly smears someone; we can only make sure we include the rebuttal when it becomes available. Wnt (talk) 23:29, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
I think it's interesting that you highlight articles on medical topics, and I agree that it is a fruitful area for comparison. Many of our most experienced and knowledgeable editors working on medical topics recognize that the primary scientific literature is often...less reliable than we would like in its conclusions, and that lay press coverage of medical research or discoveries often ranges from 'somewhat frothy' to 'bats--t insane'. One consequence of this recognition is WP:MEDRS, our widely-applied, widely-accepted guideline for sourcing medical content. When we present something as 'fact' in Wikipedia's voice, we demand very high standards for sourcing: typically peer-reviewed, secondary sources that examine and summarize the breadth of research in an area, rather than single papers. Does that mean that we don't always publish a cutting-edge result as soon as it appears in print? Yep. Does it mean that we don't have to backtrack and remove the vast bulk of cutting-edge claims when they don't pan out, a few months or years later? Yep. Using Wikipedia as a news aggregator is abdicating our editorial responsibility as encyclopedia writers. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:36, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Agree, absolutely. This conversation with Wnt is picking up a theme we had a few weeks ago at WT:MEDRS. In addition to TOAT's point about it being less likely that we will publish incorrect information we will later have to retract, by waiting until independent secondary sources cover the topic, we are less likely to publish on topics that do not end up demonstrating a lasting impact. Lasting impact cannot be demonstrated by primary sources published the day the event happens. Independent secondary sources with historical distance from the topic can evaluate the primary sources in context, and emphasize which primary sources have proven to be well-accepted and meaningful. I think this is what makes Wikipedia different from WikiNews, and it's an important difference. Zad68 14:48, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
We know full well that scientific secondary sources are also wrong about many things - as are secondary sources in history. How many things have we been taught in school as incontrovertible fact only to learn they're not so -- brain cells can't replicate, acquired characteristics can't be inherited, RNA exists only to make proteins. Worse, the near-mythical divide between "primary" and "secondary" is pursued by some to the total disregard of the divide between "good" and "bad". With MEDRS I had somebody telling me that he wouldn't believe a result published in Nature until it showed up in PubChem! With that debate going on now I seriously have somebody telling me that we can't trust the New York Times and CNN as reliable sources, but it's OK to have a Featured AdArticle SummerSlam (2003), an event almost nobody heard of, sourced almost entirely to "WrestleView" and "PW Torch", because those are secondary sources! It is fair for an observer to look at things like this and decide that Wikipedia is stark raving nuts. Wnt (talk) 19:33, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Sorry, why the forum shopping? The article has been nominated for deletion, simply direct people there to centralise the discussion. Your original ideas about how Wikipedia may or may not be perceived are "fascinating" but nothing more than that. Please continue this discussion at the deletion discussion, where it belongs. The Rambling Man (talk) 19:49, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
If you look more closely, I am responding here to a general discussion about secondary vs. primary sources - your deletion discussion is a splendid example of things gone wrong, but as I have not asked for the result to be overturned here at ANI, I am not forum shopping. Wnt (talk) 20:21, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Adminstats Update deployed[edit]

Some of you have requested that the unblock field be added to adminstats. I am now deploying an update to add this field. I also made several updates to the SQL queries in adminstats that should permanently resolve a bug that arose and went unnoticed. This bug fix corrects several incorrect counts, such as deleted and restored pages. You may see numbers drop, like here in a controlled test. This update will go into effect in the next scheduled run. Enjoy, and please report bugs to me if you find any.—cyberpower ChatOnline 02:58, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I imagine my account is a good example of how bug-prone large-number, old accounts are. MBisanz talk 03:09, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
How did you know I was linking to your stats? :p Your the first editor I thought of when doing the controlled test and so naturally I used you as an example. :p—cyberpower ChatOffline 03:13, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Haha, I'm just very observant. MBisanz talk 04:16, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks for that. Peridon (talk) 09:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Yes, thank you, you're a damn fine Wikipedian. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:41, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • And another addition for the crats. I added renames.—cyberpower ChatOnline 00:23, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
    User:MBisanz, this applies to you, almost personally.—cyberpower ChatOnline 00:33, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Why does pages imported say {{{import}}} instead of a number (in my cases, probably zero)? Is this simply in progress?--SPhilbrick(Talk) 14:40, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes Cyberbot is working on it.—cyberpower ChatOnline 14:53, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Vandalism[edit]

What's "Own Research" on this fact?: "Czechia - this wordfirst documented in 1866 (Latest from Prussia. The Mercury, page 4, Saturday 21 July 1866)"?? http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Name_of_the_Czech_Republic&action=history Block, please, user User:Yopie for vandalism. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.168.13.98 (talkcontribs) 08:45, 13 May 2013

Finding an example of a word in a source and asserting that this is the 'first documented' usage is original research. As for 'vandalism', read WP:VANDAL - edits made in content disputes aren't vandalism. AndyTheGrump (talk) 10:07, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

1 person - more users[edit]

I think, that's users User:Yopie, User:Mewulwe and User:Cimmerian praetor is the same person. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.168.13.98 (talk) 08:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

See above. AndyTheGrump (talk) 10:07, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Where "above"?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.168.13.98 (talk) 10:44, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Above, where I explain that you had posted original research. The reverts were perfectly valid. AndyTheGrump (talk) 13:27, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Ban requested for User:Johnpacklambert[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


User:Johnpacklambert whose work was instrumental in garnering us such negative press as Wikipedia’s Sexism Toward Female Novelists, Wikipedia’s shame , and Sexism on Wikipedia Is Not the Work of 'a Single Misguided Editor' (where is is mentioned by name), is now edit-warring on Amanda Filipacchi over categories such as Category:American women journalists. (As I read it, that category actually breaks the guidelines laid out in WP:CATEGRS, since gender has no specific relation to the topic, but that's another discussion.) Johnpacklamber has not added Filipacchi to Category:American journalists, but has simply added her to the subcategory. A quick look at Category:American journalists shows that female journalists are generally included in that category as well as the subcategory (Karen Abbott, for example, is the first listing in both categories). This deliberate ghettoization is precisely what caused the issue to erupt into the media in the first place. Johnpacklambert seems unable to (a) get the point, and (b) stay away from Amanda Filipacchi despite the media reports. I propose that Johnpacklambert be banned from adding or removing categories from biographies people living or dead, or making any edits to categories which contain biographies of people living or dead. He would be free to work on categories involving other subjects. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 21:33, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

  • The editing and the talk page discussions, and crap like this make this forty year old white male emberassed to be assosciated with this website. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:04, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support: pbp 22:08, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • This is one of the most useless votes i've seen ever, except for all the votes identical to its argument (of nothing), which are similarly useless. It should also be noted that this user was recently blocked for hounding Johnpacklambert. SilverserenC 03:51, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • CommentWeak oppose editing an article about a columnist who is repeatedly writing comments about your editing strikes me as a sort of WP:COI "revenge editing". Shamefully, the category system still has not totally resolved its dispute about edits like [102], but I think he should know by now that the consensus is not to dink around with these sex-dependent categories which sooner or later will be dustbinned. There is only so long that we can blame bureaucratic inertia and bad programming for a system where we say that being female deserves a subcategory but not being male. That said, any administrator action that bans or topic-bans this user without quickly determining whether a consensus about the issue exists or directing one to be determined if it does not yet exist would be a mistake. We shouldn't be looking to shoot the messenger here but to fix the problem, and the problem is the lack of clarity about when to sex-separate categories. Wnt (talk) 22:27, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
    • All I did to the article was add Category:American columnists and Category:American women journalists. I did not change the text of the article, nor did I remove Filipacchi from any category at that point. My goal is to expand Category:American women journalists as much as possible to avoid false accusations of wikipedia being sexist by giving more treatment to women in certain occupations that some deem "disreputable" than women in more "reputable" occupations. I do not think this can be said to be "revenge" editing at all, and I think my motivations have been needlessly maligned.John Pack Lambert (talk) 22:31, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
(ecxN)After those articles, did you really think she was going to have no reaction to adding that category? And out of all the myriad articles on Wikipedia, why did you pick that one to edit? Note that my 'vote' above was not actually to ban, but you do really seem to be poking the hornet's nest on purpose, and it is hard to assume good faith otherwise. Your motivation about respectable versus not may be a well-intentioned response to some other complaint which may well have been less well founded. But current category guidelines call for separate categories for certain professions that have more to do with sex, and you should know by now that that's what people want. So you're editing the article of someone you have a personal dispute with against consensus, and that is a recipe for trouble. If you step back right now maybe you'll get out of this, I don't know. Wnt (talk) 22:47, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Based on further statements below, I think it is best to continue to AGF about your actions, but if I were you I would not want to touch that one article for a good long time going forward. Wnt (talk) 04:24, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
    • Imposing this ban on Johnpacklambert will not address the larger issue, but it may help reduce the risk of even more bad press about how one particular living person is being treated by WP editors. Johnpacklambert will be free to contribute to any discussions about the larger issue. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 22:37, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
Bad press is a bad argument. According to him he got into this trying to avoid bad press! Our priority needs to be making the articles the best that they can be, including a useful and unbiased category system, and implementing our policies and guidelines fairly, regardless of outside pressures. As long as we know we're right that's what matters. Wnt (talk) 22:50, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • In fact, the whole tenor of this argument fails. I am the person who put Karen Abbott in Category:American women journalists. However, the nomination is also built on a fauly understanding. Most people in Category:American women journalists are not in Category:American journalists directly, they are like Eve Arnold and in Category:American photojournalists or in Ann-Marie Adams and in Category:American newspaper reporters and correspondents. There are other people in Category:American columnists and in Category:American women journalists such as Cindy Adams. The categorization of Filipacchi was exactly how other people in similar circumstances have been categorized.John Pack Lambert (talk) 22:42, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support - agree. A serious case of WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT that's been ongoing for weeks (another long and unresolved thread at ANI). I'd like to see all categorization of American novelist cease/freeze immediately and allow time to establish consensus. In the meantime, agree completely with Delicious carbuncle. Truthkeeper (talk) 22:43, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose This is a tad silly on all sides. Only a few people are still stuck on this whole category issue and all are being petty. Such a broad ban would be unduly punitive for something so trivial. We should just full-protect Filipacchi's page for a month or so and then see what happens after it expires.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 22:45, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment. JPL has done some good work in his gnome niche regarding categories. Rather than banning him from this area in which he has done some of his best work, might I suggest that we give him a 10- to 30-day timeout from editing categories instead, with the further instructions to stay away from the "American novelists" category and its subcategories (and other gender-related subcategories, too) until consensus on point is determined? A semi-permanent ban on all biographical category work seems too harsh by far. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 22:55, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
    • Read the proposal. It is not a complete ban on category work, only on category work involving people (living or dead). Delicious carbuncle (talk) 22:58, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
      • Thank you, sir, I did read it, and I apologize if my comment above was not specific enough. To be precise, a semi-permanent ban on all biographical category work seems too harsh by far. I have amended my comment above (in bold) so that my meaning is clear. Dirtlawyer1 (talk) 23:07, 13 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose especially given the context of the nomination, which is deeply flawed. As noted, JPL added Filipacchi to both a gendered sub-cat of journalists, and a non-gendered sub-cat: Category:American columnists. Thus, this category work was completely in line with current guidance and current policy per WP:EGRS. This is a massive waste of time. It is true, JPL was amiss in the previous days, but he now understands the guidance in place and recent edits I've seen him make have cleaved to policy completely. The nominator, Delicious Carbunkle, obviously doesn't understand how diffusing categories work, and that Category:American columnists is diffusing on Category:American journalists. This nomination would have been laughable a month ago, and it should be laughable today. This is standard, by-the-book categorization efforts. Now, it is debateable whether Filipacchi is indeed a journalist, and the cats have for now been removed - but that is really besides the point. DC is making a charge of ghettoization, which is PROVABLY FALSE. Finally, this whole post is at the wrong forum - it should be at ANI - if someone wants to move it please be my guest.
  • To be clear - if we want to fix the ghettoization problem at wikipedia, JPL is going to be one of the important players in that effort. I don't see any of you above signing up to recategorize thousands of bios. He is, frankly put, a categorizing machine. This proposed ban, on specious/false/bogus/invented/not true/totally fake/imaginary/misguided grounds is quite ridiculous, and I can see a WP:Boomerang swinging back to DC for wasting people's time on this. If DC was really concerned with ghettoization, they would be de-ghettoizing people instead of bringing lame complaints to AN. Look at DC's edit history - I don't see any de-ghettoization. If you look at JPL, he has categorized hundreds of bios in the past few days - for example look at his work on the American women poets' category. This nomination is flawed at the heart.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 00:10, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support. This categorization [103] is simply inexcusable, and demonstrates a fundamental lack of competence. If he is "a categorizing machine," he's been improperly programmed. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 01:18, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
    • So now someone wants to ban me because I categorized someone in a category that exists based on the opening line "[name redacted per BLP -HW] (born June 8, 1958) is an American singer and pornographic actress." So now for adding someone to Category:American female pornographic actors I should be banned. This does not even make sense.John Pack Lambert (talk) 01:25, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
support trout for Hullaballoo for tragic misinterpretation of history. How come you aren't bringing out the pitchforks for the original editor, who did this [104] in December? Now, JPL should perhaps be chastised for not verifying sources more carefully, but if the lede says (and has SAID SINCE DECEMBER) that she's a porn actress, shall we string him up? Categories are supposed to be based on the article. We should also probably string up Hullaballoo for not noticing this BLP violation in the lede, that, again, was there since December. I recommend a wet, and juicy trout across the cheek of Hullaballoo for bringing a silly diff to this discussion that was not at all the fault of the accused and has nothing to do with the accusation at hand.--Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 01:31, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
What a fine display of blithering idiocy. The claim that the BLP subject is a "pornographic actress" was unsourced, and an obvious BLP violation. That JPL not only did not remove such an obvious BLP violation on sight was bad enough, but that he went on to repeat and reinforce it, in violation of both the category guideline and BLP policy requirement that "the case for each content category must be made clear by the article text and its reliable sources" is exceptionally poor editing. That JPL has not once but twice today repeated the unsourced, false and defamatory statement, including the name of the living person involved (which I have redacted) shows a lack of appreciation for basic BLP requirements. JPL, it is your fault that you violated BLP policy by categorizing an article subject in a defamatory fashion based on a claim that conspicuously not only lacked reliable sources, but lacked any sources at all. That you won't accept responsibility for such inappropriate behavior is clear evidence that you shouldn't be editing BLPs at all. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 02:44, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Hullaballoo has outdone themselves with a wonderful display lack of reading, googling, and basic internet skills. A few seconds googling and I found a clip, from Scorned 2, which the actress in question starred in: "Description: (name redacted to avoid BLP violations!) naked showing her huge fake breasts and booty while having hot sex with some guy in various poses. From Scorned 2." So, well, did she do X-rated movies, or just softcore porn? That's a debate for another board. But she has clearly starred in a number of movies, naked, having fake or real sex onscreen. So Hullaballoo, are you willing to take back your vicious attacks? --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 04:44, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
The edit was a good faith attempt to reflect the lead in categorization. It is not my fault that the lead was faulty. I did not change the lead. I just changed the categorization to reflect it. This has gone beyond ludicroous.John Pack Lambert (talk) 01:38, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Looking over her credits, I imagine at best the change to the lede was an unfair generalization of her work and a technical BLP violation, rather than an egregious falsehood. One film where she had the lead role was categorized as "softcore" and most of the films have the kind of provocative titles that suggest, even if they are not strictly pornographic, that they are close enough for most to consider them porn. She undoubtedly specializes in erotica.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 03:27, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
So this is not even as clear cut a case as some have made it out. I have to admit that if I had read the actual titles, I would probably have decided that the ones I knew were not pronographic, and reassigned her, but I figured whoever wrote the lead knew what they were talking about.John Pack Lambert (talk) 03:32, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment I agree. Why are we stringing up JPL for this? It isn't even clear if it was a BLP violation, and even if it was, it was clearly an honest mistake. If we start banning people for making good faith edits that violate BLP, then we should ban countless users, not just JPL. Asarelah (talk) 03:40, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose, this doesn't appear to raise to a level needing a ban. Diffrent choices can make things improve but banning is way over the top. Hell In A Bucket (talk) 01:53, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Let me try this one more time Category:American women journalists has existed since May 29, 2010, and existed before that under a different name. No one has ever proposed it be deleted. Filipacchi was put in Category:American columnists, a sub-cat of Category:American journlalists and then in Category:American women journalists. Only the false claims that she was not in a gender neutral part of the tree even made this possible actionable. If someone does not like Category:American women journalists they are free to try to delete it at a CfD, but they should not try to ban editors for adding people to it. Considering Filipacchi's columns have been the focus on multiple discussions here, and seem to be the most important thing on many people's minds, it made sense to me that they would be enough to make her notable as a columnist. I have admitted I was wrong, and removed both categories, however people now want to punish me for that, although I would say the first user to join in on this just wants to punish me for other things, and has been overruled twice along other lines.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:04, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
      • Comment I agree! If you're going to ban people for supposedly ghettoizing women, then why on earth are you going after JPL and not the person who made the category in the first place? This reeks of a personal vendetta on your part, and I'm appalled. Asarelah (talk) 03:42, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
    • And let me try once more to to get the point across. Aside from the other things that you did, you also removed Filipacchi from [[:Category:American novelists]. Do you not recall how all of this started? I have no idea why you think it is a good idea for you of all people to be doing anything with that article, but if you can't stop yourself, you need to be stopped in some other way. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 02:25, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Do you realize, DC, that Filipacchi remains in Category:20th-century American novelists, which is a DIFFUSING SUBCATEGORY of Category:American novelists? Do you understand that every novelist south of F has already already been moved in the same way? If you want to stop this, the venue is CFD - try to delete the category, or at least have it rescoped to be non-diffusing. Or, start the RFC everyone has been talking about. But banning an editor for diffusing a cat? This a witchhunt, and you have a massively flawed argument that doesn't prove he's a witch! Your nomination is, seriously, laughable, and belies your admitted lack of understanding of the category system. This is like Monty Python "burn him, he's a witch!!!" --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 02:36, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
I agree. I've never seen anything so outrageous in 8 years that I've edited Wikipedia. Asarelah (talk) 03:42, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
You can keep telling me how categories work and I will keep telling you I understand what you are saying. And I do. You may have an inkling by now that the current way that categories work is not working for readers. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 03:46, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
JPL has been asked for weeks to slow down and to wait until consensus is established. I agree that categories are not working for readers but we haven't been able to discuss in a broad sense what to do because JPL and others have taken it upon themselves to solve WP's woman problem under the guise of diffusion in the meantime by emptying the American novelist category, which in my mind is equally sexist. Until we have a strong and broad consensus to the contrary, all American novelists should be kept in the American novelist category and not diffused out. Moreover, JPL has made similar mistakes in regards to adding subcats based on reading the lead of an article (will add diffs tomorrow if required). WP is not a source and though the other instances I've seen have been far less egregious, they show a pattern of carelessness. If he won't stop, and he appears to still be editing despite this thread, then, yes, a temporary ban is a good temporary solution. We really need to consider the readers. Truthkeeper (talk) 04:37, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Hi TK. What exactly are you doing to consider the readers? What productive proposals do you have? Please don't say "keep novelists in American novelists", as before this whole thing started, there were 3,000 novelists who weren't in Category:American novelists. What were you doing about the deeply flawed category system back then, before this all came to light? were you actively moving bios up from genres to Category:American novelists? Probably not.
Secondly, what do you mean by consensus? You keep on saying this, in various forums - at ANI you asked that I be topic banned until "consensus" formed and asked that all categorization stop - but you never answered the question - consensus on what, and what categorization should stop? Where do you see lack of consensus? All I see is a few people who don't understand diffusion fighting against a well-formed set of diffusing categories. The avenue - CFD - remains open to those who oppose - but no-one has pursued that. So far, I also don't see much energy around the proposed RFC. If there's no RFC, and there's no CFD, what consensus are we supposed to wait for, and which activities should be excluded in the meantime?
Secondly, you state that JPL is trying to solve a "woman" problem - actually he's just trying to correctly categorize people - including filling up gendered cats when they exist. What basis do you have for using the term "sexist" here - and I remind you, sexism means discriminating against someone based on their gender. Can you give some hard, precise, specific, detailed evidence of something JPL has done in the past few days (ignoring the pre-media-mess, where JPL was indeed IMHO categorizing incorrectly) - but can you provide more recent diffs that show that his edits discriminate negatively against a BLP? Please provide diffs, or stop making baseless, false, misguided, untrue accusations. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 05:24, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
The categories were working just fine and dandy for the readers for years until that stupid newspaper article misrepresented them and started all this ridiculous drama. And besides, even if the category system is fundamentally flawed, that's still no reason to ban Lambert for making good faith edits. Asarelah (talk) 03:51, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Good faith edits to the biography of the person who wrote some those articles? Good faith but incorrect categorizations as a jounalist and a columnist? Good faith removal of the very category which is was at the heart of the first op-ed? No, I'm not suggesting banning JPL for those particular edits, but for the complete lack of judgment that they demonstrate. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 04:11, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
"Good faith but incorrect"? She's already in Category:20th-century American novelists, which excludes her being in the parent category of Category:American novelists. Category:American columnists is a subcategory of Category:American journalists, and while it is clear you disagree with that category, her own article says she writes columns and thus the category is not unreasonable. JPL's edits were not incorrect, there were perfectly reasonable. And furthermore, even if JPL's edits were wrong, that alone isn't a valid reason to ban him in light of all of his other perfectly good contributions. Since when do we allow concerns about controversial press to guide our policies on Wikipedia? By that logic we should take out all the sexual pictures. Asarelah (talk) 04:22, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. When you see reasons in support like the one raised by Hullaballoo Wolfowitz, there is no case. While JPL and I commonly have different positions, he still does offer valid points in a lot of discussions. Vegaswikian (talk) 02:07, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Just why do you think that an editor who ignores the requirement that categorization, especially potentially defamatory categorization, be based in reliable sources, per both policy and guideline, is editing "validly" or appropriately? Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 02:51, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • The original attack ignores the fact that we have the article Women in journalism and media professions, so we clearly have fulfilled the having a parent article requirement for having Category:American women journalists. People are still free to nominate the category for deletion, and argue why it should or should not exist, but it seems there are valid reasons to have the category.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:13, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Question Does it have any bearing on this discussion that a-the person who brought the complaint did not discuss the issue at all with me before bringing the complaint, b-I have since reverted my edits removing Filipachi from both Category:American women journalists and Category:American columnists, c-I brought up the issue of whether Filipacchi is indeed a journalists for disucssion on her talk page.John Pack Lambert (talk) 02:21, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose The brouhaha and ballyhoo regarding this whole escapade has escalated wildly out of control. This, along with the [[matching AN/I case by Tarc (which failed miserably, and was subsequently Miszabotted after 10 days) really shows how this has gotten out of hand. As an uninvolved editor, I am particularly appalled. Alles Klar, Herr Kommisar 03:15, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Strongest Possible Oppose What happened to assuming good faith, people? Why is Lambert being scapegoated for all the negative publicity surrounding Category:American women novelists? It was a clear hatchet job done by idiot reporters who have no idea how subcategories on Wikipedia work and wanted to do a little muckraking by making baseless accusations of sexism against Wikipedia. To accuse Lambert and anyone else who put women int that category of "deliberate ghettoization" is to show that not only do you not assume good faith, which is one of the core tenets of Wikipedia, but that you also don't even understand how categories work! If someone is in a subcategory, then they don't go into the parent category, because the subcategory is PART of the parent category. I made the same mistake years ago as a new editor when I started adding people in Category:Native American leaders to Category:Native American people, and it was explained to me and I have been pruning off subcategories since. How can anyone call putting women into gendered subcategories "ghettoization" when the whole reason we even HAVE those gendered subcats is to direct people to articles specifically about women? ITS FOR WOMEN'S STUDIES! Lambert is a good editor who has made excellent contributions, and this is absolutely ridiculous! Asarelah (talk) 03:27, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose So basically you're saying that he should be banned for putting specific sub-categories in an article, but not also putting every single parent category into the article, which would make categories useless? Just stop, DC. You're wasting everyone's time here. SilverserenC 03:48, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment Agreed. By D.C.'s logic, I should also be banned for "ghettoizing" articles about medicinal plants by moving them into regional categories. What is the point of even having categories if we don't trim off the redundant ones? Asarelah (talk) 03:53, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose I have often disagreed strongly with many of JPL's edits and opinions in category world. So what? He acts in good faith, explains his actions and works in a collegial fashion. That individuals inside and outside have interpreted his actions negatively is not a justification for a topic ban or any other such punitive action. Alansohn (talk) 04:24, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose as per above. Lambert's edits have been clearly good faith attempts to deal with what is apparently an intractable and growing problem. I'm strongly tempted to send Wikipedia:Categorization to MFD if all it gets us is this drama. Hardly worth it. UltraExactZZ Said ~ Did 13:03, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support: I can see this isn't going to be successful at this point, but interacting with JPL on this whole novelists incident has soured me on editing lately. His obsession with screwing with the Filipacchi article -- even coming back yesterday again to add her to "American Women Journalists"??? -- as well as on articles on obscure female writers I have written, has greatly upset me. I tried to maintain good humor in the face of his uncivil refusal to see the problems he was causing and still continuing to create new categories and categorize women (or men when necessary) in them during the heat of the controversy. He is not collegial - he's stubborn, and refuses rational requests to delay controversial edits. That's why his behavior has been extensively written about in the press -- something extremely rare to see happen. I even got dragged by him to ANI for calling out his bullshit. Of course nothing happened to me there, but the lack of any admins with the balls to put a stop to this with at least a stern warning bummed me out. The proposal here is not radical, its a limited editing ban. Any rational manager of editors would tell JPL to stay away from this area for a while. When respected users like User:Hullaballoo Wolfowitz are supporting a ban for BLP violations in the midst of this, and gets ignored, I don't know what else to say. I guess editing categories is such a sub-specialty around here that few admins, or editors generally, care. I guess I'll stop caring too, since I hadn't in the last 4 years I've been here, and nothing happened when I tried.--Milowenthasspoken 13:15, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Comment: Looking over the admin noticeboard, it would seem that you, Milowent, I can only conclude that even if JPL was in the wrong, you were out of line and he was right to call you out for it. We don't empty categories that are under discussion, and we certainly don't call the previous editor the "He-Man Women Hater's Club president", especially when he did nothing more than add in the category Category:American novelists. This only serves to strengthen my conclusion that this call for a ban is unfair, based on personal conflicts rather than valid reason, and is serving to scapegoat JPL for bad publicity. Asarelah (talk) 14:22, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment: It does not seem to be a good idea to have women's categories that correspond only indirectly with gender-neutral categories. Having a woman columnist in "American female journalists" but not "American journalists" creates the impression of institutionalised sexism, even if it can be shown that male columnists, too, would only be in the "American columnists" subcategory of "American journalists", rather than in the parent category. At this point, Wikipedia must care about appearances on this issue, as appearances define thinking for contributors and readers alike. To anyone not familiar with the intricacies of the category tree, it simply looks like institutionalised sexism if a woman is in "American female journalists" but not also in "American journalists". The solution may be to rely less on genre categories for diffusion, but to prefer time-based (birth date-based) subcategories instead; and if a genre-based subcategory is unavoidable, then a directly corresponding women's category should be created too. The same applies to subcategories based on ethnicity, sexual orientation and religion, where realities and appearances can be equally damning. Andreas JN466 13:41, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose This looks like a political wrestling match. Those voting to ban seem to be searching for more reasons as if the nominator's reason isn't strong enough. I could go on but others above me have said it much better. Soap 14:02, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose: It seems to me there are two issues being discussed here - one is User:Johnpacklambert's behaviour and the other is the wider issue of gender subcategories. This is not the place for the latter discussion. I think User:Johnpacklambert would be well advised to avoid moving any biographical articles into gender subcategories for a while. But equally it's important that we don't allow trial-by-media to sway our judgement. Wikipedia's guidelines are, as they should be, decided by consensus and not by media lobbying. We do need to establish a clearer position on gender subcategories and I have my own view on what that position should be, but meanwhile the existing guidelines stand and to penalise an editor for trying to implement them would be nonsensical. WaggersTALK 14:04, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Prefer a voluntary stop but could support a 1 week ban from categorizing related to gender, I see a request by those who contend that the system is "not working" to start discussion of solution(s) -- they should start those now and Lambert should step back because he is being asked to. Alanscottwalker (talk) 14:35, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • The basic fact is that categories should reflect articles. In fact, if something is mentioned in the lead, it should be categorized. People should stop trying to shot the messenger. If people have put things in the lead that do not belong there, go after them. The fact of the matter is I have been attacked on multiple occasions for removing categorization that has no mention anywhere in the article. There is no justification for attacking me for categorizing things that are in the lead. If you disagree with the lead and the categorization that comes from it, you are free to edit these things. But there is no reason to attack someone for following the lead.John Pack Lambert (talk) 16:59, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. JPL has been following our guidelines in these matters, such as they are. I prefer that category policy not be made to fit the whims of a certain New York Times op-ed writer, who must remain nameless lest I unleash another another torrent of abuse like the one above: crap, embarrassment, etc. May I suggest that there is someone who can benefit from reading WP:CIVIL? Kauffner (talk) 17:20, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose in the name of reason; how fundamentally detrimental to the project is it? Bytes of discussion with no convincing arguments in my -impartial but pretty irrelevant- book... Basket Feudalist 17:22, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • For what it is worth we also have an article Hispanic and Latino American women in journalism. I am sure that we could write the article American women in journalism. Among other things we could speak of the work of Emmeline B. Wells in running the Woman's Exponent and other similar sufragist papers.John Pack Lambert (talk) 18:17, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • I suppose I would be remiss if I did not point out Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Johnpacklambert. I was the closing admin, and the conclusion reached was that there was no merit to the filing parties concerns. The reason was that their concern was simply that he was making too many edits to categories and they wanted him to move on to some other area. That concern was not seen as valid by the community, but it appears there may now be valid concerns and I would suggest that Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Johnpacklambert 2 might be in order so that we can have a non-torches-and-pitchforks discussion about these issues and hopefully come to some voluntary solution. I have no doubt Jon is acting in good faith, but some of these recent edits do seem problematic and more clueless than I would expect from an experienced user. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:28, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
no, different person, no relation to me. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 19:14, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose Johnpacklambert is clearly not the only editor that has been 'ghettoizing' articles about women. Judging by his User page and his recent editing activity, he is not removing any general categories. I also think it would be wrong to fall into a 'trial by media'. As a recent recruit to the Gender Bias Task Force I'd like to see some more general activity undertaken to educate editors in good practise. Sionk (talk) 18:38, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment This whole thing is essentially an attack on me for populating a category that exists. If people really think that we should not have Category:American women journalists, they are free to nominate for deletion that category which I did not create.John Pack Lambert (talk) 19:04, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose per Asarelah. Johnpacklambert did nothing wrong.--В и к и T 19:09, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. At worst, JPL has made mistakes. Who hasn't made mistakes? Witch-hunting went out of style in Western society about three centuries ago; let's not revive the practice. --Orlady (talk) 19:27, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose. This is merely scapegoating for a much wider problem that Wikipedia has had for a long time. Deli nk (talk) 19:33, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Oppose - per Orlady and Deli nk above. What is needed is an RfC on cats, not an AN to ban a user who has been editing in GF. Wikipedia categorisation is a mess - even I don't understand the system. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 19:52, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • !admin !vote oppose While the categorization issue has gotten press recently, JPL used the columnist subcat appropriately. If we want to change policy do so, but dont attack him ex post facto with new rules. Gaijin42 (talk) 20:17, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Comment. I have nothing against this user, who seems good-natured and well-intentioned, but I think he's having an effect on categorization that's deleterious to the encyclopedia for various reasons, and I'm curious about why so many want to indulge his preoccupations. I'm not convinced he fully understands subject categorization as it pertains to humanities topics (this is a mere grammatical faux pas, but what concerns me is the desire to impact the decision whether or not it's based on sound information). At times he seems to be applying his own taxonomies that have not been shown to have any particular net benefit. In fact, they've stirred up all sorts of unnecessary crap. The questions raised about the handling of women's history are important and require a nuanced approach. I'm not liking the impulse to close ranks and put our fingers in our ears about what went wrong and why people outside the world of Wikipedia (that is, the people for whom we're supposed to be creating the encyclopedia) had the reaction they did. While I sympathize with the intentions of this proposal, I would prefer not to scapegoat a hardworking editor if he would back off editing areas that he surely knows by now are contentious. Cynwolfe (talk) 21:28, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
  • They had the reaction they did because the diffusion was not being done equally for men and women. If Miss Filipacchi had seen Lambert moving women into that category, but then saw that the parent category was being systematically emptied of both men and women she would have been all "Cool, cool cool" and gone on her merry little way. Mischief managed.--The Devil's Advocate tlk. cntrb. 22:50, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Is User:Isis really banned?[edit]


WP:NOTHERE[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


It is apparent that User:Jay Myers (Hurricane Jay) is not here to contribute to an encyclopedia. Out of over 3000 edits, exactly one is to article space, one is to a category, and three are to a user talk page. All the rest are to his own userpage, which consists of an enormous and ever-evolving autobiography and the largest collection of userboxes I've ever seen. There is also an exhaustive set of URLs and external links to Facebook profiles, etc. I posit that this person is WP:NOTHERE. The Master ---)Vote Saxon(--- 03:35, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

  • I'm not seeing the big whoop, sorry. Since he isn't vandalizing or adding bad content, I don't see why we can't let him do whatever he wants on his userpage pbp 03:47, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
wow. Is there a barnstar we can give him for most userboxen? Give that man an award. However, I do Think that page and the subs could be safely and brutally trimmed, as he is going beyond the bounds of what A user page is supposed to me. --Obi-Wan Kenobi (talk) 03:50, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
I seem to recall WP:MFD per WP:UPNO in such situations. But that may be redundant given we're already here. TippyGoomba (talk) 03:55, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Has anyone read WP:NOTHERE? Is Wikipedia now a vanity page webhost and social networking site? Yes, UPNO would seem to apply as well. The Master ---)Vote Saxon(--- 04:06, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
We should not take an action on a page that harms no one, does not offend, and is a small zen garden in someone's mind. Should we encourage this sort of thing? No. Should we go over and tramp on a sand castle just because we can? No. If you act to wipe this page out, only reveal your own nature you will.StaniStani  04:38, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
That might be an appropriate attitude for a free web host, but Wikipedia isn't that. These resources have been made available to us so that we can develop an encyclopedia. It should be obvious from an editor's contribs that the editor is here to that work, and if it's not obvious after 3,000+ edits over 2 1/2 years, intervention is required. Wikipedia's resources are limited and we should not make Wikipedia a hospitable environment for stuff like what that editor is doing. Zad68 15:15, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
The age on other planets is cool. --SPhilbrick(Talk) 14:28, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
  • It's a pretty cretinous thing to join WP for but would be pretty bleeding Stalinist to get rid of it as it's so harmless. Basket Feudalist 17:33, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

Proposed topic ban - User:Gaba p and User:Wee Curry Monster on the Falkland Islands[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I propose that User:Gaba p and User:Wee Curry Monster be topic banned from any topic concerning the Falkland Islands. To see why take a look at the history of Falkland Islands sovereignty dispute‎, its talk page and my talkpage. By their constant back and forth they have made discussion to reach a consensus almost impossible - indeed other editors have walked away from the discussion due to these editors. Both appear to see nothing wrong with their actions and entirely blame other parties yet the article history clearly shows that both parties have been acting in ways likely to provoke the other. I recently protected that article in an attempt to force discussion on talk page. The most notable response to this was comments on other's editing and discussion styles. Now the disagreement has spilled over onto Reassertion of British sovereignty over the Falkland Islands (1833). I think it's impossible to reach a consensus on these issues while these two editors are involved and so propose a topic ban. These two editors are the main protagonists although others have also not helped. However as a first step I suggest topic banning these two users and so see if the other editors can discuss things more amicably without the disruption caused by these editors. Dpmuk (talk) 22:11, 13 May 2013 (UTC)

Sadly Support These two users have a long history both here and at AN/I regarding their feud over the Falkland Islands. Topic Bans have been proposed before, but they have all fallen through. This time I believe the disruption has gone too far. Other editors are now becoming discouraged and concensus cannot be reached. This nonsense has gone far enough. If nothing is done, the situation will grow worse and worse. We've seen it in the past, and it will undoubtedly happen again if any administrative action is not taken. Alles Klar, Herr Kommisar 12:32, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Support. It should help matters, but sadly I think that a couple of others will probably need to be topic-banned in the long run to stop this nonsense. Number 57 12:48, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Support. Should help, and should send a message to any others. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 15:32, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
Support. If there is any way to avoid another (potential?) edit-war, it's because two individual editors perhaps would want to compromise? Don't see much sign of it with them two. Basket Feudalist 17:29, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
[106] 30 April 2013, I agreed to step away from the article, Gaba p supposedly agreed to do the same. I have kept to that as far as reasonably practical and confined my editing to adding citations requested. He didn't. When I stepped away from the article, Gaba P switched to attacking both User:Apcbg and User:Kahastok, much as he previously did with User:Mugginsx who also crossed him. And the sexist abuse he heaped on Muggins was appalling, even stretching to him accusing her of only commenting as she obviously had feelings for me.

Gaba p has been pursuing a single minded vendetta against me for over a year. It stems from his block, ironically an indefinite block that was only lifted because I gave information to User:JamesBWatson that left sufficient room to give him the benefit of the doubt. I have been cyber bullied by the guy for over a year and every time I have tried to get help or advice to make it stop, I have found that no one is prepared to actually do anything. I have moved from article to article and he has followed me every time; his excuse being his supposed interest in Falklands topic but in which he has repeatedly demonstrated a basic ignorance of the subject. The whole objective of his campaign is to stop me contributing. Congratulations you're now proposing to give him exactly what he wanted.

In the face of some very bad behaviour, I have remained civil and on several occasions at WP:ANI it was commented that I had in fact remained civil despite some severe provocation. Its not me and Gaba p, its anyone who gets in his way, except I've just been targeted specifically by him. I am not feuding with the guy, he simply won't leave me alone. I have repeatedly asked for an interaction ban to stop this and its fallen on deaf ears. Instead, you propose to reward me for remaining civil, trying to follow NPOV by topic banning me from an area in which I have made a huge contribution. Can you point to a POSITIVE contribution that Gaba p has made in the last year of editing, I can point you to plenty of mine.

To be blunt, I have reached the point of such complete and utter despair that I am ambivalent as to whether you topic ban or block me or whatever, because that guy has drained any and all pleasure I used to get from editing wikipedia. And in all honesty I find the unwillingness of you guys to tackle the abusive editing from that guy to play a major role in that. Wee Curry Monster talk 18:33, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

To be fair, WCM, this ban proposal concerns both of you. That should get you off the hook. There are plenty of other places to edit. Kudpung กุดผึ้ง (talk) 20:06, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
There are so many half-truths and downright untruths in WCM's comment I don't know where to start. On April 30th we both agreed to step away from a content discussion in the article [107] which we both did. You saying that you stepped away from the article is not true, as can be seen by anybody by checking the article's history. Your accusation of appalling sexist abuse is so far out, it's just beyond me. Just in case anybody wants to check, here's my appalling sexist abuse on that editor. She called this a sexist remark and called me sleezy. I immediately asked for a sanity check to an admin. Unfortunately it's not rare for WCM to make such serious accusation against me.
The one pursuing the vendetta is actually him. After the block he requested on my account more than a year ago (accusing me of being a sock puppet of a blocked editor) he never stopped referring to me as a sock-puppet, even though in order to lift the block I had to resort to giving away my right to anonymity to an admin, so he could check I was not the same person than that blocked editor. After the last ANI I tried resolving the matter between the two of us and even asked him to take me to SPI with my full blessing to put his mind at ease [108]. He refused.
He always accuses me of hounding him when it's precisely the other way around. Just look at my contributions from the last couple of months: I edit one article, he's there to revert me, I edit another article, he reverts me there too, I edit yet another one, the same; I could go on. He presented absolutely no diffs to prove I hound him because they don't exist.
I have never asked for WCM to be either blocked or banned while he has asked that I be several times since I started contributing to Falkland articles [109]. The campaign to stop another editor from contributing is his, not mine. And accusing me of having trouble with multiple editors (not true) is quite ironic given his record [110][111][112][113][114][115][116][117].
WCM was banned from editing Gibraltar-related articles (another high profile former British colony) for pretty much the same behavior he has shown in Falkland-related articles. When in September 2012 an admin suggested we both adhered to a 4 month voluntary topic ban I completely agreed as a sign of good faith. He on the other hand insulted the editor and made one of his exits from WP [118].
To see the contributions I've made you simply need to go to my user page. Sadly I can point to very little contributions to Falkland related articles because he kept deleting every little contribution I dare make. I've tried every angle I could think of to work with him but he is so convinced that I'm advancing an agenda that absolutely every edit I make is automatically blanket-reverted by him. I asked for an interaction ban during the last ANI but it was not granted. I believe an interaction ban could resolve the issue in a less drastic way then a full topic ban. Regards. Gaba (talk) 20:39, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

It perplexes me to see these two put on the same level. Curry Monster has been a good and productive editor on Falklands topics for six or seven years now. Those articles have benefited greatly from his knowledge and experience of the topic and his willingness to put up with the crap that sometimes comes with editing controversial topics. Removing him would do great net harm to the topic and the project, but would be typical of Wikipedia's longstanding habit of either throwing the baby out with - or sometimes instead of - the bathwater.

The problem has come because article progress has totally stagnated, and it is no accident that the stagnation started with Gaba p's arrival on the scene. We have experienced such stagnation before - believe it or not, for eighteen months in 2009-10 a couple of editors refused to allow any progress on the topic unless we accepted their POV as overriding WP:UNITS - but this has been particularly bad.

My experience is that, in order to reach consensus that includes Gaba, you have to accept his position uncritically and unquestioningly. He will not accept anything other than his first proposal on the article, and will not accept that anyone could in good faith find his first proposal unacceptable. Any objection is ignored outright or dismissed out of hand, even if strongly grounded in policy. He has been known to continue to insist that no objection has been made to an edit of his even when good policy-based objections have been raised half a dozen times by different editors. And bear in mind that all of this is in a shrill and highly aggressive tone that inevitably gets those other editors' backs up.

If you disagree with Gaba, you should further expect to be outright accused of bad faith (for example). Gaba does not assume good faith in other editors - I don't think he ever has. He has also been warned and blocked at ANI for repeatedly accusing other editors of lying, though this has not deterred him from continuing to do so (for example). And my impression has been at past discussions at AN and ANI that Gaba is willing to accept whatever it takes to remove Curry Monster from Wikipedia.

Now, Gaba's other habit is his absolute insistence on getting the last word - he has been known to filibuster his own RFCs rather than leave a point that he does not agree with standing, so doubtless he will post a lot after this. So be it. Kahastok talk 21:55, 14 May 2013 (UTC)

No need for a long post Kahastok, I'll just say a couple of things. First of all I note that Kahastok is known to team with Wee Curry Monster to enforce their view. I'm not the first one to comment on this behaviour. He was also banned along with WCM from Gibraltar related articles, again for teaming with him in bulliyng other editors out of contributing.
Finally, let me make a quick comment on this "in order to reach consensus that includes Gaba, you have to accept his position uncritically and unquestioningly. He will not accept anything other than his first proposal on the article, and will not accept that anyone could in good faith find his first proposal unacceptable". Please see this discussion still open at the Falkland Islands sovereignty dispute article. There you'll find this middle ground proposal of mine, on an issue that started between editors User:Andrés Djordjalian and WCM. It was rejected immediately by WCM. So I made another proposal taking into account WCM's concerns. WCM rejected that one too and Kahastok echoed that rejection. So I came up with yet another proposal, once again rejected by both these editors. So I make a fourth proposal, which of course is also rejected by WCM. I am quite certain I can find other examples of this just by digging up a little further, but I believe the point is proven. Regards. Gaba (talk) 02:02, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
I beg you review at least the discussion mentioned by Gaba before deciding. It is a good example of WCM's and Gaba's contributions vis-à-vis. I believe Gaba is an asset for the Falklands/Malvinas WP articles, because he is a good editor that can partially counteract the pro-British majority that occurs naturally in them due to our different native language (I am one of the few other Argentinean editors there.) This is a hard topic to edit, it will rarely be chosen by editors without a position regarding the sovereignty dispute, so we depend on those who, despite having one, can interact productively with others who have a different POV, to produce a fairly-neutral text. I think Gaba is such an editor. As you probably agree, engaging frequently in debate is not proof that he isn't. IMHO, these articles require cleanup, as they rely heavily on WP:SPS and reproduce many tendentious points, so the amount of discussion in their talk pages is not the worst thing that is happening there, and I don't think that engaging in discussion per se is as disruptive as it is sometimes claimed (e.g., see my comment dated May 14 in this thread). -- Andrés Djordjalian (talk) 03:47, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
Addendum: Just now I saw the discussion at Reassertion of British sovereignty over the Falkland Islands (1833) that Dpmuk brought up when proposing the ban. Gaba focused on content with remarks that, imho, were civil and topic-wise correct. If the exchange was long it was due to WCM's unreasonable insistence. What was Gaba supposed to do? Shut up? I think that exchange deserves praise, not condemnation. If there is a better way to act, please let us know how. -- Andrés Djordjalian (talk) 05:53, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Support topic ban for Gaba p, and voluntary break for WCM I've had some involvement with this matter as an admin, mainly responding to sockpuppets of one editor (I actually blocked Gaba p as as sockpuppet, but another admin looked into this and decided to give them the benefit of the doubt, and unblocked with my agreement). From what I've seen WCM's recent conduct is not helpful (especially the edit warring), but also isn't outright bad as his talk page posts generally include attempts to reach a consensus on disputed topics. As such, I think that it would be best for all concerned if if he took a voluntary break from Falklands Islands-related topics for a few months (I'd suggest at least three months) and work in other, less heated areas; from personal experience, being involved in a long running dispute can lead to getting overly caught up in the matter. On the other hand, Gaba p's edit warring is much more sustained, and his talk page posts tend to be absolutist positions which other editors are expected to agree with rather than attempts at reaching a compromise on what's a sensitive and controversial topic, so I think that a topic ban of indefinite duration is entirely justified. Nick-D (talk) 08:27, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
That is a profoundly unfair comment Nick. You ask for an indefinite ban on me and a slap on the wrist for WCM? I guess you didn't check the talk pages of the last two articles I attempted to contribute where it was always me the one making middle ground proposals and WCM always fighting to maintain the status quo (ie: automatically rejecting every edit, not only mine, but pretty much any other editor). It is even more unfair because the only exchange you and I had ever had (on yet another article I attempted to edit and WCM appeared to hassle me) was completely amicable. Please note the tone of that conversation where every editor is polite except for WCM whose sole comment is to accuse me of WP:SOAPBOXING and please note that I even end up removing a big part of my edit following the consensus on the talk page. Furthermore, it was you who said to WCM, after he attempted to discredit my edits to that article, that my edits were "sensible" and that my requests for citations "generally seem reasonable". To me your comment is a perfect example of how lots of admins in WP treat editors differently according to how long they've been here. The amount of battles with another editors, constant edit-warring and overall attitude of ownership WCM displays would have never been tolerated for a relatively new editor. In case you aren't aware, this asymmetric treatment only translates in new editors being discouraged and eventually dropping out of WP. Regards. Gaba (talk) 14:19, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

DYKadminbot down[edit]

Can an administrator please update the DYK section from the queue. The instructions are at the bottom of the page listed.--Gilderien Chat|List of good deeds 21:20, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Restoration of Dan Stec[edit]

Back in 2010, Dan Stec was deleted as a result of an WP:AfD (see Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Dan Stec). Fast forward three years and the article's subject has been elected to the New York State Assembly, where his is one of the few WP:REDLINKs to be filled in. The complication is that the deleting admin, User:Cirt, has apparently retired, and, given that development, pointed me to this noticeboard. Now that the subject of the article meets WP:POLITICIAN criterion #1, how can I find someone interested in restoring it? Thanks. -- DanielPenfield (talk) 15:32, 11 May 2013 (UTC)

No idea why you were pointed here, this is normally something for WP:DRV - however I am happy to restore without bureaucracy. GiantSnowman 08:48, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
I will respectfully defer to the judgment of admin GiantSnowman (talk · contribs), thank you for your assistance, — Cirt (talk) 16:08, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
While this kind of thing is mentioned at DRV, you could probably also go through the WP:REFUND process; REFUND generally doesn't include undeletion of AFD-deleted material, but that's because it's meant for uncontroversial stuff. When the page got deleted on notability grounds and has been recreated with a clear claim of notability, a simple undelete-the-old-history request would likely be accepted there without the paperwork needed for DRV. Nyttend (talk) 05:04, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jax 0677[edit]

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jax 0677 has been open for two months. Will this be dispositioned any time soon? --Jax 0677 (talk) 17:28, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Unless a request for closure has been made, it won't likely be. However, given that there has been little activity on that page, I've gone ahead and dropped a request for closure on the noticeboard to get an admin to check it out. Blackmane (talk) 12:15, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

move over redirect[edit]

Resolved

Graham87 14:55, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Could someone move TonyTheTiger/sandbox/Old Nassau over Old Nassau.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 14:47, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

 Done Graham87 14:55, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Thanks.--TonyTheTiger (T/C/BIO/WP:CHICAGO/WP:FOUR) 15:39, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

article: "Visočica"[edit]

Resolved

The English version of Wikipedia contains an article titled "Visočica" This article contains information about a certain hill in the Bosnian town of Visoko, allegedly containing a pyramid. The content of that information is widely disputed - but that is not my concern. My concern is that in Bosnia the toponym "Visočica" primarily refers to an entire mountain range located further southward within the country - which has absolutely nothing to do with Visoko, pyramids or whatever is mentioned in the present article! But because of the fuzz around the pyramid issue presented in the present article it seems to have become impossible to write anything in Wikipedia that refers to the name "Visočica"; not even a disambiguation page. The mountain range is however increasingly becoming a hikers destination. Information about the specifics of these mountains (f.i. the presence of land mines, etc) is therefore becoming important for the general public: it really deserves to be detailed in Wikipedia just like the other major Bosnian mountain ranges. And there are other places that go by the name of "Visočica": notably a river in Serbia and a town in Croatia. Can we please be allowed to establish a disambiguation page? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Frfincon (talkcontribs) 15:33, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

Why is it impossible? Are you saying someone is actively stopping you, or is it simply that there isn't currently a disambiguation page? The latter is easy to fix; the former needs some kind of evidence before admins will take any action (which is what this noticeboard is for). Cheers, LindsayHello 06:35, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
So easy to fix, i've done it (at Visočica (disambiguation)); now it needs filling, and an article on the range needs writing. On the second point, in fact, this is the wrong location; i thought we were at ANI, not AN, so this should probably have been moved rather than answered. Sorry. Cheers, LindsayHello 06:44, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
I've nominated it for deletion per CSD criteria G6, because it only has one page blue-linked (the article itself.) If there are more articles to add that have the same name, feel free to remove that notice. Epicgenius(talk to mesee my contributions) 16:50, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Yeah, it may not meet the criteria exactly at this instant; how about giving the obvious newbie a bit of time to discover we're trying to help him out? Doesn't this feel a bit bitey? Cheers, LindsayHello 17:01, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Classic geographic namespace pollution, I tidied it up a bit, but it's a regular gazeteer matter (WP:5). Nothing more for admins to do here really other than the page move back over the redirect, feel free to continue any discussion at the relevant talk pages. --Joy [shallot] (talk) 19:32, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Cut/paste move advice[edit]

Need some advice on what to do to fix a cut/paste move. See the history of Cincinnati metropolitan area and Cincinnati-Wilmington-Maysville, OH-KY-IN Combined Statistical Area; the former page was always a redirect until last March, when it was given the contents of the longstanding latter page. I agree with the cut/paste mover that "Cincinnati metropolitan area" is a better title and that the contents should be there, although obviously I disagree on the method. However, both have a long enough history that I don't want to see either one deleted, and histmerging them would produce a complete mess with diffs like this. What should be done, and how should I do it? Nyttend (talk) 23:39, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Since the original page hasn't really changed since the copy/paste this March, and Cincinnati metropolitan area didn't have any real content before the copy/paste, I think you can do a regular history merge, but then only restore the edits at Cincinnati metropolitan area that were made since the cut-and-paste; leave the 2007-2011 redirecting edits that currently exist there deleted (and maybe even delete the 01:57, 22 March 2013 redirect currently on Cincinnati-Wilmington-Maysville, OH-KY-IN Combined Statistical Area). So,
  1. move Cincinnati-Wilmington-Maysville, OH-KY-IN Combined Statistical Area to Cincinnati metropolitan area, deleting what is currently Cincinnati metropolitan area,
  2. delete the new Cincinnati metropolitan area, and
  3. restore everything except the 19:56, 15 January 2007, 09:30, 15 December 2008, 12:05, 1 December 2009, 05:33, and 13 December 2011 redirects and the 01:57, 22 March 2013 redirect.
Pseudonymous Rex (talk) 02:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

War edit?[edit]

Hi, the user AZZIO insist in to do it (almost) radical changes in the List of films based on DC Comics. What can I do?

Thanks.OscarFercho (talk) 03:04, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Please accept this article.[edit]

Resolved

Deleted copyright infringement. Editors should not be appealing here for AfC acceptance EVER. Hasteur (talk) 19:46, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

Please accept this article. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_creation/Tambov_State_University&oldid=555222380 Александр Граф (talk) 12:38, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

On the contrary, old fellow, I've nominated it for speedy DELETION on the grounds of being a blatant copy-vio of this site http://www.racus.ru/entrant/universities/tambov-state-university which is related to the one you reference but has just been copied word for word. Too bad. Basket Feudalist 12:57, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
I have deleted the article. GiantSnowman 13:12, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
...and that's the money shot. I bet he wished he kept quiet now Cheers. Basket Feudalist 13:14, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Wow, so much for "don't bite the newbies". — Scott talk 15:48, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Deleting a blatant copyvio is not "biting". GiantSnowman 16:08, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
I spose legally it's effectively theft or fraud... Scott was probably referring to my sarcasm rather than your deletion, Snowman!Basket Feudalist 16:09, 16 May 2013 (UTC)
Yes. New users may not understand our licensing policy, or even copyright at all. While copyright violations should be removed immediately, that doesn't excuse anyone being rude to a new user. — Scott talk 12:07, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Old orphaned XFD's[edit]

I came across these in a database report. Could an admin decide what to do about them?

Extended content
  1. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/broadcast communication network
  2. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Crystal Athena Steverson
  3. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Doosan group
  4. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Food fiesta
  5. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Françoise Dorleac
  6. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Frazer Brown(2nd nomination)
  7. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Freddy Thomas
  8. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Gingopolis
  9. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Go Goodwins
  10. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Hillnerds' Lan Party
  11. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/HT (band)
  12. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ian McDonald (King Crimson)
  13. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/James T Campbell
  14. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jetty (web server)
  15. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jonas Rathgen
  16. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Kenneth J. Hsu
  17. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/LanDrive
  18. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Leon Garland
  19. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of monuments in the United States of America
  20. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Little Eversden
  21. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2006 day, 22 December 22
  22. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2006 sday, 26 December 26
  23. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mirza Masroor Ahmad
  24. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/NogFest
  25. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Oobie
  26. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Poopdick
  27. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Project Red
  28. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Ramirez gang (2nd nomination)
  29. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Rocker panel productions
  30. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Runner's roost
  31. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SGAUS
  32. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SOx
  33. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Swaptree.com
  34. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Talk:Inform.com
  35. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Talk:Metal Slug series
  36. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Talk:Paignton Zoo
  37. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Talk:ReViSiT
  38. Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tamil Eelam
  39. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Amitsekhri
  40. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Aquafantasy666
  41. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Dolly 135
  42. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Ganeshsai.a
  43. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Hjorten/sanbox
  44. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Jak Inn Thee Been Stock
  45. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Jentzen841
  46. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Kpbrawnygp45
  47. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Lonesnake13
  48. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Nighthawk2
  49. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Umedard
  50. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:WearyCorpse
  51. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Wrlockwood
  52. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/H.S.C.

— Train2104 (talk • contribs) 23:30, 16 May 2013 (UTC)

  • I'll take an hour of my time and cleanup. Cheers! :) ·Salvidrim!·  20:10, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Messed up the first one a bit, but I'm trying to integrate them to the relevant articles via "official" closes and oldafdmulti templates., and I am trouting myself for good measure. :) ·Salvidrim!·  20:17, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Alright. Most of those could've arguably been G8'd as uncontroversial housekeeping but I preferred closing or redirecting as needed. They should all be ok now (I didn't check the already deleted XfD pages). :) ·Salvidrim!·  21:28, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I've had a momentary blank. It's been a while since I regularly used this side of my admin tools. But I deleted this as a copyvio, as it is a direct copy and paste from the company website. It's been created by a blatant role account that also violates username policy as such. Cut and dried case, but I've suddenly thought: Oooh, is a non-submitted AfC still capable of being a copyright violation? Or does it have to be submitted and then declined through the AfC process? I don't know if I circumvented established protocol because I've never deleted an AfC before, but I was bold and my rationale was 'it's copyrighted content, and it's been put on Wikipedia, article space or otherwise it ought to go'. Did I act correctly? S.G.(GH) ping! 15:35, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Yes, you did, G12, with the G standing for "general", and even though it is noindexed. Lectonar (talk) 15:38, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
And I have spamusernameblocked the account for good measure. Lectonar (talk) 15:40, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Thank you. S.G.(GH) ping! 15:47, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

Emergency protection needed on Rob Ford[edit]

Gawker Media has released a "news story" in which they allege that the Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, has been caught on video smoking crack, according to an unnamed source. They say in the article they cannot prove it until they can purchase the video from the source. This is bordering defamation, but that's Gawker problem and I assume they are pretty much lawyered up. The issue is that now people are adding these "facts" (again, unproven) into Wikipedia's Rob Ford article. These very serious allegations have yet to be proven and carry a massive libel potential. This article needs to be protected ASAP. UpstreamPaddler (talk) 07:35, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

This especially true considering the subject is a WP:BLP. UpstreamPaddler (talk) 07:37, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
On WP:ANI as well, seems to be taken care of. SQLQuery me! 07:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
I think there may be a good case for WP:REVDEL of every mention of a specific allegation about a named living person, including this very thread itself. Your thoughts?--Shirt58 (talk) 11:00, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
Very reputable media such as the CBC are reporting extensively on the existence of the allegations, so revdel of this thread and any mentions of them in the history seems overkill.Slp1 (talk) 11:48, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
I agree; highly-reliable news outlets are now covering the "story", and while unproven, the claims are certainly notable. There are claims and they are generating heavy media coverage. :) ·Salvidrim!·  23:54, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
d'accord.--Shirt58 (talk) 14:23, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Suspicious editing by IP[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


I have a high level of suspicion regarding the editing from the following IP addresses I believe them to be one and the same. 94.2.4.145 94.9.98.107, 2.120.46.143 and 130.88.52.43 are all one and the same editor. I originally had a dispute with IP 94.2.4.145/94.9.98.107 who then became 2.120.46.143 which is not suspicious in and of itself. That dispute went away and now today all of a sudden a brand new IP 130.88.52.43 appears and begins to rubbish me as an editor and back up the positions of 94.2.4.145/94.9.98.107 as if they were a separate user. They have also made identical edits of 94.2.4.145 and used identical language such as to maintain "consistency" and only editing County Council articles. If specific diffs are required just ask and they shall be provided. Sport and politics (talk) 17:15, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

You should probably move this to ANI. Shadowjams (talk) 17:25, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
I can confirm that I am not the same person as 94.9.98.107. However I do feel that it is important that I am open and honest in saying that I am editing from a public Library and that this therefore not my own IP address. I have however picked up where 94.9.98.107 has left off. I waited a few days for the page to go cold before doing so. Given Sport and politics' recent edits and reporting to this page, I sincerely hope that they are not taken seriously. many Thanks 130.88.52.43 (talk) 17:27, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
Discussion moved to here. Sport and politics (talk) 17:39, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

is unbelievable. The idea of warnings is to warn people that their actions are unacceptable, not to keep on welcoming obviously mal-intent editors. I don't know what the standard procedure is for this (I would assume 1 [if not already welcomed via formal Welcome template], 2, 3, 4, block, 4im, block, block, block etc), but I want some opinions on this, because twelve reminders cannot be right.--Launchballer 20:04, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

The normal way is levels 1, 2, 3, 4, then a report to AIV. What I sometimes do with these 'mal-intent' editors is that if they are shared IP vandals with a history of disruptive edits (Like school vandals for example) I'd usually start on level 2, and progress up to report when vandalising after a level 4 warning. I'd usually up the level no matter which day of the month if it's that kind of vandal. Obviously if the bot warns the vandal for a particular edit you can't really warn them again. However, I think 2.102.18.125's talk page is OK, as it hasn't been disruptive since October, and even it hasn't been blocked yet because of not enough disruptive edits to warrant one. Also, for 24.104.128.10's talk page if I was rollbacking I would've given it a level 3 warning rather than a last warning. I hope I've explained all of this clearly. Minima© (talk) 20:35, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
Sheepinacup certainly should have been blocked by now, particularly with their incessant violations of BLP. On the face of it, they seem to be working on the Chris Hart article, but a vandalism warning each month is more than enough. Hard to say about the IPs, they might be dynamic or it's some random spree. Blackmane (talk) 20:42, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
24.104.128.10 appears to be static, possibly a shared IP. 2.102.18.125 is probably User:Blacklisting evading a block[119]; although the geolocate link says it's a static IP it's probably dynamic. Sheepinacup appears to be a single-purpose account and I've given a final warning. Peter James (talk) 21:25, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
Sheepinacup (talk · contribs) has made this edit after the warning and should be blocked. Peter James (talk) 11:44, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
Blocked indefinitely. Black Kite (talk) 12:38, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

blog spam from Milon333[edit]

Edits consist entirely of spamming their blog. Can someone direct me to the part of wikipedia that deals with link spam for future reference (if any). TippyGoomba (talk) 06:09, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

  • WP:SPAM Generally. I've rolled back his latest advertising link, and will keep an eye on him for a bit. Thanks! SQLQuery me! 07:26, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
  • Pure spam, if it persists, blocks, or WT:SBL, might be suitable options. --Dirk Beetstra T C 08:26, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

request block of imposter sock[edit]

is another imposter sock of

Blocked by Future Perfect at Sunrise. -- Ed (Edgar181) 12:29, 17 May 2013 (UTC)}}

And we have more:

I will be opening a check user for additional sleepers.-- TRPoD aka The Red Pen of Doom 16:21, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I blocked one, Ponyo blocked the other. -- Gogo Dodo (talk) 16:32, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
The guy's IP hoping across ranges, so I'm not sure anything useful can be done range-block wise. Perhaps an edit filter could be cobbled together to stifle creation of the obvious impersonation account names? --Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 16:47, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
I did end up blocking one range and posted the CU results here. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 19:28, 17 May 2013 (UTC)
I already added Jayakrishnan\.ks.* to the blacklist. An private filter might be a good idea to obfuscate our regexes and give them a harder time, and plus it has more features if we need them. -- King of ♠ 07:06, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
Special:AbuseFilter/556. -- King of ♠ 07:21, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
Great work! Cheers, --Jezebel'sPonyobons mots 17:16, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Technical Move Request[edit]

This is a technical move request. At Wikipedia Talk: Child protection, there were 7 archives. I have created an Archive 0, which predates the page itself, from a previous page that was differently numbered. I tried to renumber Archive7 as Archive8, and that worked. However, now I can't renumber Archive6 as Archive7, because there is a redirect. Can the redirect be deleted, and the rest of the archives renumbered without redirects? Thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:16, 17 May 2013 (UTC)

I see no Archive 0. You want to move 6 to 7, 5 to 6 and so on, until 1 to 2; ok. But what will then be moved to 1? :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:00, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
Found it; doing it. :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:01, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
  •  Done. Please inspect the pages and correct the text in the headers which refer to specific Archive numbers. Please also template Archive 1. Ping me if anything's broken. Thanks for your cleanup efforts! :) ·Salvidrim!·  00:05, 18 May 2013 (UTC)
Thank you. Robert McClenon (talk) 17:22, 18 May 2013 (UTC)

Hiring Community Liaisons[edit]

Cross-posting here:

"For the last 18 months, the Engineering & Product Development department has been experimenting with the role of “Community Liaison, Product Development” - a staff member embedded in the Product team and tasked with factoring community concerns into our software development process, keeping editors informed about what we’re doing, and maintaining a dialogue between those who write code and those who write articles.

While there is always room for improvement, I think this role has shown a lot of promise. We have a number of large projects coming down the pipeline (e.g., visual editor, discussion systems) and we need more help reaching out to our contributor communities, especially our non-English speaking projects, as our outreach there has traditionally been challenged. We’d like to recruit a small number of English-speaking or multilingual editors to do the Community Liaison job with different development teams and focuses.

In particular we’re looking for people with a strong history of contributions to our projects who can provide sound and reasoned judgment and are trusted to do so by their community. Speaking other languages in addition to English is a major plus, as one of the objectives here is to ensure we can properly interact with and support non-English projects. I’ve included the full job description below."

Our immediate need is for help with the Visual Editor. We’d like to hire a few community liaisons to help inform different Wikipedia language communities of the upcoming launch, create spaces for feedback and discussion, synthesize feedback for the Visual Editor team, and other activities required to support the Visual Editor launch later this year. If this is a role that would interest you, please e-mail Philippe Beaudette at pbeaudette@wikimedia.org, and if you know someone else who might fit the role, let them know about it :-). We’re provisionally interested in hiring 2-3 liaisons, at an hourly rate commensurate with experience. This can be a part-time role, but we’ll need at least 15 hours/week for the length of the engagement (minimum 3 months). Please do apply if you think it’s a role that suits you, and if you find places we haven’t notified, spread the word! Thanks, Okeyes (WMF) (talk) 16:04, 18 May 2013 (UTC) (and apologies for the TL;DR below)

The job description:

Background The Wikimedia Foundation’s Engineering & Product Development Department is looking at ways to more effectively incorporate broad community perspectives in decisions and hold dialogues with our editors about the scope, pace and features of upcoming changes to Wikimedia projects. As part of this, it is hiring additional Community Liaisons from our volunteer community.

Scope of Work Support and improve our ongoing software development projects, in particular:

  1. Building up a network of volunteers from both English language and non-English language wikis, increasing the number of projects we can interact with;
  2. Engaging the community in the software development process, by acting as a conduit for community questions, bugs and and feature requests, talking to editors about our work and how they can participate in it effectively, and recruiting them for workgroups and studies;
  3. Being available from time to time to provide expertise and knowledge about our projects, including but not limited to training externally-sourced staff in the way our projects work, answering their questions, and providing expert advice on an ad-hoc basis;
  4. Ensuring that our community is represented in the decision-making process and that our planned software adequately reflects user needs;
  5. Monitoring Wikimedia projects, with the assistance of a network of volunteers, for emerging issues that have an impact on Engineering programmes; and
  6. Other duties as needed

Requirements Effective Community Liaisons will be:

  1. Experienced users of Wikimedia projects, capable of representing our community within the Foundation and vice-versa.
  2. Strong communicators (both verbally and with the written word), able to explain our products to different groups of users with different levels of technical understanding.
  3. Able to focus on the larger picture, understanding which concerns and views are widespread and which are marginal or individual.
  4. Approachable, as both users and product developers must be able to trust these people for the relationship to function.
  5. Self-motivated - they will be given important projects and expected to execute with little to no supervision.
  6. Strongly empathetic - they excel at understanding the perspectives of others and bridging the gap between different approaches to the world.
  7. Willing and able to remain resilient in the face of frustration from our users, in order to get the job done.

Pluses

Other positive attributes or areas of knowledge include:

  1. Diverse language skills. While the Wikimedia Foundation communicates internally in English, we aim to be able to talk to our different communities natively.
  2. Experience with the software development process. You will be thrown into teams that are actively working on new features; having a background that reduces the slope of your learning curve is a plus.
  3. Familiarity with multiple Wikimedia projects is a major plus; we are about more than just Wikipedia.