Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents

Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents
This page is for urgent incidents or chronic, intractable behavioral problems. Before posting: Read these tips for dealing with incivility If the issue concerns a specific user, try discussing it with them on their talk page Try dispute resolution Just want an admin? Contact a recently active admin directly. Be brief and include diffs demonstrating the problem Do not report breaches of personal information on this highly visible page – instead go to Requests for oversight. When starting a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page; pinging is not enough. You may use {{subst:ANI-notice}} ~~~~ to do so. Closed discussions are usually not archived for at least 24 hours. Routine matters might be archived more quickly; complex or controversial matters should remain longer. Sections inactive for 72 hours are archived automatically by Lowercase sigmabot III. Editors unable to edit here are sent to the /Non-autoconfirmed posts subpage. (archives, search)
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Review of unblock request and discussion of possible community ban

Unresolved

See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/CCI

This conversation concerns the handling of a prolific editor who has been found to have infringed copyright in multiple articles. Discussion is ongoing about the potential handling of this review, which will involved tens of thousands of articles. Participation in brainstorming solutions or joining in clean-up would be much appreciated. Moonriddengirl ^(talk)

WT:BISE and User:Triton Rocker: indef block review request

Unresolved

Entire section has been moved to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/BISE to reduce space on the ANI page and to centralize discussion. Please do not add a timestamp until this reaches the top of the ANI page. –MuZemike

A call to cleanse Windows Phone 7

Resolved

 – No edit warring apparent, appears a significant article revision is being discussed. --WGFinley (talk) 01:13, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

It has been brought to my attention that some Windows Phone 7 fan sites have been putting out a call for fans to go to the Windows Phone 7 article to "fix" it or remove text perceived as being negative.

The largest of all Windows Phone 7 sites is WMPoweruser.com, which recently wrote this article, asking fans to edit the Wikipedia article. Yes, the fan site attacked me, labelling me a troll against Windows Phone 7.

Recently, there have been more attempts at removing referenced content in the article, often by editors who edit no other articles or subjects. So I ask for advice on what can or should be done. Can some admins keep the article on their watchlists for a while?--Lester 16:37, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

There's nothing we can do about the external article, but if edit warring happens on the article, it can simply be semi- or fully-protected as appropriate. In the meantime though, I'd just ignore that article. GiftigerWunsch [TALK] 17:08, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

There is a major reconstruction beginning on the article. The only obstacle is lester (talk · contribs)--intelati^(Call) 18:41, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

the community agrees with CalumCookable (talk · contribs) but he's afraid of a edit war with Lester.--intelati^(Call) 18:43, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

There has obviously been a content dispute going on for some time. Which of the processes at WP:DR have you been through? David Biddulph (talk) 18:53, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Calumcookable has just begun the community consensus part. So far me and one other editor, have agreed with his changes.--intelati^(Call) 19:00, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm that other editor. What are we supposed to do if there aren't many people (including Lester) contributing to the discussion of changing the article? We already posted up templates that gives the readers and other editors indication that there are multiple issues with the article being discussed on the talk page. Our ultimate goal is to simply make the article have a neutral point of view, and actually have the article discuss the product itself in a NPOV. Currently, that isn't that case. --Interframe (talk) 20:08, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

'Interframe', you can't complain about not many people coming to the talk page when you make uncivil comments such as this one.--Lester 05:10, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The problem is that Lester is reversing many of the changes I and some other reader made. There are lot a of people actually edition the article, but it's being reverted. If I reword the section, Lester would revert it right away. Illegal Operation (talk) 03:18, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:RFC. Templates on the page itself help, but only catch the attention of people visiting the page. -- Atama頭 21:19, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Done. Now we wait. (Jeopardy theme song:)--intelati^(Call) 21:34, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

All of the proposed changes are in the talk page. can someone change the wording (of the WP:RFC) so that it is a place for the people to place their views on the article and the changes?--intelati^(Call) 01:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC) never mind. :)--intelati^(Call) 02:02, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Is it possible for fan websites to change the consensus out of shear numbers? Does Wikipedia have any defenses to avoid this sort of thing? --Lester 10:43, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Consensus isn't meant to be based on numbers. - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 11:11, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I am not a windows 7 Fan. Right now, the article's title SHOULD be called "Criticizem of Windows Phone 7" The only thing I have read of the windows phone 7 is on www.maximumpc.com. Thanks.--intelati^(Call) 15:46, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

What I am trying to do is to get uninvolved editors in the conversation and remove the fancruft and Balance the article for a Neutral POV. (added later) Ok, now this is a user problem is now that CalumCookable (talk · contribs) is threating lester (talk · contribs) to revert back his additions until he is blocked. I want someone to intervene on the conflict before it is out of control.--intelati^(Call) 15:48, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I have been involved in editing this page and consider it to be very biased (against the Windows Phone 7 platform). Many changes to improve it are promptly reverted. A lot of the controversy has been because of a "missing features" section that some insist has to be there. It's a phone and a feature can't be "missing" if Microsoft knew of it and decided to not put it in the device. For instance, the phones don't transform into a jet and fly you to an island they create for you even if some tech reviewer somewhere thinks it should. My proposition is that there should be a section for announced features, features removed from Windows Mobile 6.5, and a reception section (this has been added but is very poorly structured and written). I'm tired of contributing because most of what I add gets removed in hours. This article needs someone to step in. CaptainStack (talk) 18:16, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The article is very biased against Windows Phone 7. In fact, it's more of a list of what Windows Phone 7 isn't rather than what Windows Phone 7 is. More emphasis is being placed on what WP7 doesn't have than what WP7 does have. Illegal Operation (talk) 03:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

'Illegal Operation', it may help your credibility if you were not making derogatory edit summaries such as this one.--Lester 04:56, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The only thing is that with Lester, is that his actions are very annoying.--intelati^(Call) 15:39, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Incredibly stupid comment by myself.--intelati^(Call) 02:39, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

He didn't call himself a troll, it was just an IP edit; nothing to see there. Ryan Norton 22:27, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

For the record, I haven't been commenting on WP7 because Lester (and occasionally some confused or SOCK random IP) just reverts a lot of productive changes made and is a classic case of WP:OWNing this article. He's just completely ignoring the countless people who have changed and commented about that article. Also, "missing features" - that is all. Ryan Norton 20:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I haven't been commenting either because of Lester. I have absolutely no problem with mentioning "missing features" in the article, but many of the points are debatable and whenever we try to discuss things like this, Lester is often the only editor to disagree with changes. Now I'm sure Lester has good intentions, but he believes everyone editing the article is a fanboy, and there have been many cases of this, but some editors only wish to have a NPOV in the article, and have the article just actually discuss the product instead of focusing on other things, like the Android and [Apple iOS]] articles. --Interframe (talk) 21:18, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm going to close this out, I don't see any major edit warring going on, there was a disagreement about one section being removed it was put back and being discussed. Review of the discussion appears reasonable on the talk page, I encourage the editors working the article to continue the work there. --WGFinley (talk) 01:13, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Request Administrator Oversight

Can this case be re-opened, please? The article needs administrator oversight. Talk continues, but it is not in good faith. Entire sections get blanked, even though discussions continue. One editor (User:Salilshukla) in those discussions has resorted to repeated vandalism of the article:

• Vandalism 1
• Vandalism 2
• Vandalism 3

Thank you for your assistance.--Lester 08:16, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

That is better dealt with over at WP:AIV :) --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 08:27, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment): Agreed, nothing there seems to need Oversight or even RevDel. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 08:33, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Pretty sure he's using "oversight" in the normal, English sense of the word, not in the specific and confusing Wikipedia sense. ~ mazca ^talk 12:05, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

User:Zaspino and user:Theobald Tiger and IP'S

The two following threads are really one thread; I've joined them up so as to make them easier to discuss. Bishonen | talk 21:18, 6 September 2010 (UTC).

Zaspino

I would hereby like to report the user User:Zaspino as I feel harassed. This user has not made any edit which was not in an attempt to prevent me from editing (see). This user is continuing an argument that was present on nl.wiki here. Since the account has apparently been created simply to counter my edits I definitely feel harassed. Since the user is asking for ridiculous things and thinks these are solid points no argument has convinced this user of the correctness of my claims in the articles morality and teleology. The user insists on retracing steps and is asking for references of the references I made and is furthermore insensitive to any changes I made, explanations I offered and references I left.

Now, I am willing to listen to most everybody, but my patience has run out with this user since there appears to be no reason in him. Unfortunately it shows that my patience has run thin, but I hope this matter will be properly dealt with since this user is not editing here to benefit the encyclopedia in my opinion, although he claims otherwise.

--Faust (talk) 20:08, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Calling people trolls is not nice nor does it help your situation. —fetch·comms 20:49, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I am being advised to offer evidence of the attempts I have made to resolve the dispute. First of all I have given a reference (Which is what this mess is about according to Zaspino). Second I gave a reference of my reference and then I decided to continue that argument on the users talk page. Finally I repeatedly asked the user not to repeat our steps. After that I took some time off in the weekend and arrived right back into the same mess. Seeing as it is withholding me to edit here with any kind of nice feeling or idea that this will end at some point I decided to ask for a block. The examples are only taken from the morality article. It is the first case ever that I have heard of a reference being needed for a reference... If evidence is needed of this mess on the nl.wiki, just ask.. --Faust (talk) 21:04, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

• It would be clearer if you would refer to the specific differences link for the places where you feel that Zaspino has been harrassing you. Pointing us just at the whole talk page doesn't make it clear which particular action it is to which you are taking exception. One problem was that you got confused as to who said what, as shown at this diff; the words in question had been added in a section heading in this earlier edit by an IP, and not by Zaspino, but you refused to accept it when Theobald Tiger explained it to you. David Biddulph (talk) 21:35, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

This is simply ludicrous. Faust's arrogance gets in the way of his judgment, causing him to consider any objection to his edits as being inspired by a non-knowledgeable team of conspiring users. Zaspino (talk) 09:22, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I am not an arrogant man. I undid yet another attempt of Zaspino's to push his POV without consensus here. --Faust (talk) 21:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Theobald Tiger

I would hereby like to report the user User:Theobald_Tiger as I feel harassed. This user has come to en.wiki to prevent me from making any edit here, after a dispute I have had with him on nl.wiki. Not a single edit since he has 're-awoken' on en.wiki is about anything else. Apart from that this user is insensitive to any and all arguments I have given in favor of my edits, including references, references of my references, explanations, dictionary suggestions, etc. I see no reason to continue discussion with this user since the user is clearly only interested in preventing my edits. That is why the user keeps retracing our steps and shows no recognition of changes I made on behalf of edits, nor recognition of clear sources........and worldwide recognition... --Faust (talk) 20:18, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

• you will get a lot more sympathetic response if you quit calling them trolls and be more constructive in presenting your issues. Please provide some specific diffs where you believe admin action is required. Blocks are not punitive, rather they are invoked to stop future disruption. For that to be apparent i think you need to provide diffs of poor behaviour and examples where you have tried to go through the various dispute resolution stages :) --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 20:26, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I am being advised to offer evidence of the attempts I have made to resolve the dispute. First of all I have given a reference (Which is what this mess is about according to Zaspino). Second I gave a reference of my reference and then I decided to continue that argument on the users talk page. Finally I repeatedly asked the user not to repeat our steps. After that I took some time off in the weekend and arrived right back into the same mess. Seeing as it is withholding me to edit here with any kind of nice feeling or idea that this will end at some point I decided to ask for a block. The examples are only taken from the morality article. It is the first case ever that I have heard of a reference being needed for a reference... If evidence is needed of this mess on the nl.wiki, just ask..

NOTES: 1)I have requested both FTOWR and Shell Kinney for advice and help, but both seemed to be too busy to assist. However, in the emails I sent I predicted this chain of events. That fact, I think, counts strongly towards my point. 2)For me the primary reason I feel harassed is because this very same activity has been going on on nl.wiki. Since no realistic points are made by the users and no recognition of sources is shown there is no more reason to discuss matters further to me. --Faust (talk) 21:25, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

NOTES: 1)I have requested both FTOWR and Shell Kinney for advice and help, but both seemed to be too busy to assist. However, in the emails I sent I predicted this chain of events. That fact, I think, counts strongly towards my point. 2)For me the primary reason I feel harassed is because this very same activity has been going on on nl.wiki. Since no realistic points are made by the users and no recognition of sources is shown there is no more reason to discuss matters further to me. --Faust (talk) 21:26, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

Faust, by "FTOWR" do you mean me? We've talked a bit recently, so it's possible, but I don't recall anything about this. Do you have a diff? I'll have a dig through my talkpage archives but a diff would greatly help. TFOWR 21:29, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

• I went look at the Teleology talkpage to see the two famous "trolls" Zaspino and Theobald. I found two users who seemed knowledgeable and bent on improving the article. And one user, Faust, who was behaving in an uncivil and inappropriately condescending way: "I have adapted the above in a way that I think will be more comprehensible to Zaspino"... "Theobald, you are interrupting a discussion that might prove a learning experience to Zaspino... please stay out of this." Here is an appropriately critical post by Zaspino, and here Faust's response to it. If anybody there is to be called a troll (which we're not supposed to do anyway, yada yada), it's not Zaspino, nor Theobald. Advice to the community: it would be good if somebody kept an eye on this article (unfortunately I don't have the time myself). Advice to Faust: don't be so bloody rude. Wikipedia is not a battleground. Going by your posts on their talkpages, apparently you regard this ANI posting as a "request for blocks". I don't think Zaspino nor Theobald are in the slightest danger of being blocked. But you might be, if you carry on in the same way for much longer. Bishonen | talk 21:31, 6 September 2010 (UTC).

@TFOWR, Yes, I meant you, apologies for the miswrite. I sent you several mails, but never got a reply. I also alerted Shell Kenny, but she is short on time I think. @Bishonen: I can understand your opinion, but I ask you to bear in mind that I knew I was being harassed from Zaspino's first edit here since it was a continuation of events on nl.wiki. That simply makes me lose my patience. Apart from that neither Theobald, not Zaspino are knowledgeable in the field, as is obvious from ALL comments they have made. They are only good at rhetorics. My case is made by the fact that I alerted TFOWR and Shell Kinney to what was going on at the very first post Zaspino made and predicted this chain of events. --Faust (talk) 22:02, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

So you were in battle array from the very start? No... I'm afraid I don't see that as making your case. Bishonen | talk 23:19, 6 September 2010 (UTC).

Ah, email! That would explain it. Let me have a dig... apologies for not looking into it, I suspect yours isn't the only email I've missed. TFOWR 23:17, 6 September 2010 (UTC)

OK, caught up with me email. Faust sent me two emails on 27 August and 30 August which raised concerns Faust had with one of the editors discussed here. Faust subsequently sent me two emails on 2 September which additionally raised concerns with a second editor discussed here. Basically, I can confirm that Faust's comment above re: alerting me is correct. Beyond that, I'm way out of my depth: this is - as far as I can see - a content dispute involving philosophy. If I were to reply to Faust's emails now I'd basically say: ask the experts. TFOWR 16:39, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

@Bishonen: Actually, it proves that I am not the one who was in battle array from the beginning and that I have been very patient without any reason for that. In an attempt to get through to Theobald, for instance Theobald clearly states that he has no intent to get to an understanding. This explain his unreasonable denial of my references and his continual stating of falsities quite clearly. It shows that no matter what he will never accept anything other than his POV and is not interested in building an encyclopedia based on truth. Since Zaspino and Theobald are in a tagteam together, continuing a dispute from nl.wiki here I cannot understand why this would reflect negatively on me.--Faust (talk) 07:00, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

IP'S 157.242.159.225 and 76.168.95.118 and 79.182.17.168 and 173.58.234.86

I would like to report the Ip's stated above, which are used by the same user. This user insists on places his personal definition in the morality article, without reaching consensus. I have undid the revision four times now and I think an edit-war is just not done. Although a majority is in favor of a revision, I am not convinced this should be done since the thoughts outlined in that revision are POV's explained elsewhere in the article, now being trumped as a general definition. I cannot escape the thought that they are in a tagteam with Zaspino and Theobald, since I can think of no good reason why such a user who would be interested in moral ethics would not have a user page, but suddenly come to the rescue of Zaspino and Theobald. --Faust (talk) 07:09, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

The revisions I undid are 1, undone because of a POV posited as a definition, 2, undone because of the same reason and requested to discuss first on the talk page, 3, same reasons, 4, same reasons. Although the IP's vary I think this is the same user, if not, it is a tag team.

NOTE: if you want them, ask for the 'whois' queries I did. They are seperate companies, but the user has acknowledged to be at least two of these IP'S and any more random browser appearing saying the current version is not correc after months of never being under dispute just when there is a dispute with is transferred from the nl.wiki would make this story even more (if possible) unlikely. --Faust (talk) 07:50, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I can clearly see Faust's indignation, but I fail to see what I actually did wrong. As far as I know I have broken no policy here and I have treated Faust respectfully. My concerns are with the content of en.wiki and I cannot help but notice that Faust's edits and proposals often show faulty reasoning and wobbly and untidy wording. The last few days my criticisms have been directed at precisely those defects. I have been careful not to refer to nl.wiki issues. I am not here to quarrel as my edit history amply testifies. I am definitely not the same editor as any of the above mentioned IP's (I have never contributed to en.wiki anonymously) - the anons actually know a lot more about the taxonomy of ethics than I do. By saying "In an attempt to get through to Theobald, for instance Theobald clearly states that he has no intent to get to an understanding" Faust refers (without my consent) to an e-mail exchange with me. His conclusion is an outright lie. Furthermore, I do not form a "tag team" with Zaspino or with any of the anons mentioned above. On his talk page Faust states: "I am a horror at following policies, but a miracle at seeing what is going on..." To cut a long story short: I think Faust's ability to see what is going on as well as his ability to communicate leave something to be desired, to put it mildly. Theobald Tiger (talk) 08:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

I know I am just an anon IP, so I ask you to WP:assume good faith and hear me out. I am not any of the other IP addresses and I find it a little premature that the conclusion is that I am especially when the user that is multiple anon IP's has disclosed his conflict of interest. I am a anon user who generally performs wikignome activities, primarily stubbing and copy-edits by solely using the Random Article tool. Prior to my edit, my ISP made the unfortunate decision to change my IP rendering my past edits inaccessible to Faust. I know this is not a standard way to edit Wikipedia, but it is the way I chose to give back here. The cleanup tag on the page made me decide to investigate the talk page and I felt that a consensus existed that Faust was not interested in as well as brought the article into conformity with Amorality. However, I also sought greater consensus with an RfC. As for the Whois, I decided to check that out too. Interestingly, one of the multis that Faust is claiming is not even on my side of the world and does not appear to be a proxy either. Also I fail to see a WP:3RR violation for edit warring at least if I am figuring out the times correctly and good faith is assumed. I wish to state that I only edited the part in question a single time.--173.58.234.86 (talk) 14:59, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Also, Faust never warned me with {{subst:ANI-notice}} upon my mention at the noticeboard and only mentioned seeking blocks in passing in the Talk:Morality page. I had to dig this page up myself and I find this the wrong way to offer constructive criticism of a user on Faust's part.--173.58.234.86 (talk) 15:03, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

If indeed you are none of the other IP's and you arrived at the page by sheer coincidence I owe you an apology. I find that hard to believe though. It would be a one in a million chance, but even those occur. Your argument that one IP is an IP from somewhere else on the globe is one I do not take seriously since you might as well have a server somewhere. Since you are making the exact same -incorrect- claims the others do and wish to make your case by ad hominem remarks I must remain at my prior conclusion though. Tag team comes to mind. --Faust (talk) 15:05, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Please do take note of my RfC however, which I do hope can eventually solve this problem once and for all. You don't have to believe me if you choose, but know that I am trying to do good.173.58.234.86 (talk) 15:07, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

If indeed you are none of the other IP's and you arrived at the page by sheer coincidence I owe you an apology. I find that hard to believe though. It would be a one in a million chance, but even those occur. Your argument that one IP is an IP from somewhere else on the globe is one I do not take seriously since you might as well have a server somewhere. Since you are making the exact same -incorrect- claims the others do and wish to make your case by ad hominem remarks I must remain at my prior conclusion though, especially since you seem to be watching my edits, as is the MO of the others. There are just too many similarities to be a coincidence, also the MO you are displaying is one that can easily be considered harassment. Tag team comes to mind, but, as said, I may be mistaken, in which case I apologise. --Faust (talk) 15:05, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Faust, your pomposity seems to be very much out of proportion when compared to the quality of your editing and your comments. Your user name gives rise to the suspicion that you are aware of that fact. If you are roleplaying, please stop. This is an encyclopedia, not a game. Hans Adler 16:06, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

As I think further escalation of the conflicts between me and Faust can no longer be avoided, I have asked an administrator who has been involved to a certain degree in conflict resolution for advice. (I am prepared to leave the judgment of Faust's edits and proposals to the en.wiki community minus myself, as did one of the anons.) See Ask for Advice. Theobald Tiger (talk) 09:24, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
P.S. Of course, I could have simply quit the scene without bothering an admin. I am not important, and though I am not completely unfamiliar with ethical and philosophical issues, I am not a specialist either. The reason that I doubt whether my exit is desirable or not is that an extremely mild-mannered, well-read and knowledgeable editor as Pfhorrest, who writes clear, unambiguous and with precision about ethics and philosophy, is left alone in fighting the dragon (if not supported by the community). See for example [1]. Theobald Tiger (talk) 12:33, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have already explained to Faust that this IP and 157.242.159.225 are the only connected with me. He continues to accuse me of edits made by different IPs. I and several other IP-users have already complained about his grouping us together with some conspiracy theory to do with nl.wiki, which I have never even visited. Now he's doing whois lookups and still alleging we're the same people? Mention this again and I will report you or harassment. 76.168.95.118 (talk) 23:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I think this is getting ridiculous. The users Theobald and Zaspino have no interest, nor knowledge on the matters discussed. They are merely trying to block well referenced edits on behalf of their own POV. I can understand that some people share that POV and that, perhaps an objective statement on the subject is undesirable to them. However, I will need at least ONE source to support this POV. As to the knowledge of Pfhorrest, I do not think this is so tremendous. The only thing that I was happy with, until recently, was his ability to argue his points. However, he has chosen to edit an article which is in dispute without giving a source as well, which disappointed me greatly. --Faust (talk) 06:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

There are now five sources, and clear consensus. If an admin reads this, can you please advise as to how I can prevent Faust from harassing me and vandalizing the article at morality? See that article's history and talk page for clear evidence of Faust's single-POV filibustering against a consensus reached by at least half a dozen other editors, with sources. 76.168.95.118 (talk) 01:49, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Murder of Meredith Kercher, again, uninvolved admins please

Entire section has been moved to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Murder of Meredith Kercher to save space on this page and to centralize discussion. Please do not add a timestamp until this reaches the top of the ANI page. –MuZemike

Deletion of Transformers articles

I need advice. In the last week about a half dozen editors have taken on the task of "cleaning" up the Transformers ficiton related articles. By cleaning I mean deleting without even trying to improve them. I don't know if this is an organized effort of just happenstance that all of them suddenly started nominating different Transformers articles at an amazing rate, and then voting to 'DELETE for each other's nominations, but it has gotten become near impossible for us few working in the Transformers wiki project to keep up with (many of us just started school and are busy). What bothers me is not a single one of these deletionists has offered any improvements in any of the articles they work to delete, and just today about 30 articles were nominated for deletion by this crew. I don't know that anything can be done get them slow them down as nominating articles is their right, but the limited resources of the wiki project (many of us just started fall classes) means we can respond to their demands for proof of notability quickly enough. I'm sure a lot of the articles being nominated deserve to be deleted or merged to larger articles, but others do not. Is there any thing I can do for couple of articles I know just need additional citations and work, and shouldn't be deleted quickly? Often times I don't even know an article has been nominated for deletion until after the fact as these guys often forget to list the nominations at the wiki project. Would it even be okay to ask the Transformers Deletion Patrol to voluntarely limit their nominations for deletion to a certain number a week to be polite? Mathewignash (talk) 21:03, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

• Can you provide links to some of the articles in question please? --Selket ^Talk 21:11, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I'm not involved with any of the deletion debates, but this recent discussion at the reliable sources noticeboard may be informative. If these Transformers-related articles up for deletion are sourced with the sort of sources up for evaluation at the RSN thread I've linked here, they deserve a lot of scrutiny. — e. ripley\^talk 21:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
• Here's some advice: stop throwing around words like 'deletionist'; all you're doing is painting someone who wants an article deleted as someone trying to destroy the project. Placing you as its saviour, I suppose? There is nothing wrong with deleting articles that don't belong here. → ROUX ₪ 21:19, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
• You can see the nominations for deletion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Deletion sorting/Fictional elements. Meanwhile, it is my experience that tagging Transformers articles for improvement hardly ever results in them actually being improved. I tagged a large number for non-free image overuse a long while ago and practically none of them have been fixed; indeed in some cases the tags were actually removed. Some of these articles have been unsourced for years, and many have been tagged as such, as well as having other long-running maintenance tags. There are well over 1,000 (yes - one thousand - that's not a typo) Transformers articles (as an example, Category:Autobots has 357 on its own) and the vast majority are non-notable on their own - some might qualify for inclusion in "List of minor characters in..." type articles. But no-one seems to want to do the work there. Sometimes the only way to get the attention of editors that articles are deficient is to nominate them for deletion, unfortunately. And I haven't seen a single article yet nominated that was at least dubious in its notability. Ha, just saw the two very poor nominations mentioned below. Black Kite (t) (c) 21:21, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
  • In question here is the sudden constant bulk deletion nominations in such a short period of time by a couple editors, who all vote with each other to delete. It's CLEARLY meant to get the articles deleted without any chance of fixing those worth saving. There are articles worth saving as a couple that have had work done to them have been kept. Deleting so many so quickly is clearly not in the best interest of writing good articles. Mathewignash (talk) 21:37, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
• I'm guessing that the ones being deleted, happen to be stubs that haven't been expanded in months or more. GoodDay (talk) 21:34, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
  • You are wrong. Jazz (Transformers) and Soundwave (Transformers) got nominated today. Mathewignash (talk) 21:35, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
    • Wowsers, those articles shouldn't be deleted. Has Wikipedia decided to do away with fictional or animation based articles? GoodDay (talk) 21:37, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
      • Bumblebee (Transformers) and Grimlock now too.
      • (edit conflict) Please correct me if I'm wrong, but last I checked I was pretty sure Wikipedia isn't run by one person. Please, tell me what's wrong about nominating articles for deletion if you (reasonably) think they should be deleted? Isn't that the whole point of the discussion part of AFD? --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 21:44, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
        • I admitted in the opening that editors have a right to nominate. My question was as to whether politeness can be expected in nominating only articles that deserve it (instead of the seemingly random nominations) and if this is an organized effort (it seems to be the same guys over and over) whether they can be asked to voluntarily limited their nomination to those that can be addressed in time, for the sake of improving the articles over trying to get deletions. Mathewignash (talk) 21:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
        • Shirik is right, but I agree those two are two very poor nominations - probably two of the most notable Transformers articles. Black Kite (t) (c) 21:46, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
        • Mass nominations tend to catch people eye. Were these nominations brought to WP:TRANS? GoodDay (talk) 21:54, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
          • Although I feel that the notice on my talk page is enough, the nomination for the Transformers article was not meant to be disruptive. Just thought I would say this before someone left a message. Nilocla ^{♈ ☮} 21:55, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
            • It's not funny. Don't use the AfD process to make a point. For the record, I could care less about Transformer pages in any way, I'm just speaking on policy and common sense points. Nate • (chatter) 03:18, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
• Please remember to assume good faith and refrain from personal attacks both here and on the AfD pages. Otherwise, I'm inclined to think that the AfD process is working. There is healthy debate on those AfD entries and the consensus on several seems to be to keep. If I'm missing something, let me know but it looks like the debate should really be on those AfDs and not here. -Selket ^Talk 21:56, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
  • User talk:Mathewignash flocculated mediocrity of Transformers articles when others try to remove fansites or fancruft. He puts it back and says the article is OK and the sources are too. How are the articles ever to improve if the inclusionist cliché keep putting ever useless piece of fan cruft and saying its ok. He probably objects to my adding Dinobots sources which is alot more than the inclusionist cliché have done. Dwanyewest (talk) 21:59, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Seeing as the nominator of these article, has nominated them in good faith. This ANI report should be closed. GoodDay (talk) 22:01, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

• • • ...and hereby is. --Selket ^Talk 22:04, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, but I don't think I got an answer. If there seems to be a concerted effort by a small group to delete a project's articles so quickly the project cannot respond, can anything be done by it? Is it considered suspect that suddenly a couple guys all started nominating articles together, and voting for each other's deletions? I know I'm to assume good faith, but I'm not seeing it here. Mathewignash (talk) 22:15, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

• Unless you can prove editors have specially have ASKED to vote a certain way or some other method you accusations are baseless Mathewignash. Dwanyewest (talk) 22:24, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
• There are any number of consensuses that can be achieved through the AfD process. Some examples are:
  • Keep all
  • Delete all
  • Keep some, delete others
  • Keep some, merge others
• etc. But AfD is the place to work that out. -Selket ^Talk 22:25, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Thanks for the direct answer.Mathewignash (talk) 22:30, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
• Mathewignash, your repeated characterization of other editors as a "Transformer Deletionist Patrol" is unacceptable. You are going wrong in two places:
  1. You are tarring everyone with the same brush. There's a gulf of difference between Blest Withouten Match (talk · contribs), for example, and other editors.
  2. You are ignoring the warning rumbles about this that were on your talk page years ago.
• I've gone back through the history of User talk:Mathewignash, and in amongst the reams of warnings about non-free content, I find that in September of 2009 you had a conversation with TTN about transformers articles. Instead of thinking "I'll stop TTN dead in xyr tracks and cite sources showing that xyr claims are wrong." you just carried on blithely, regardless, for another year. (I notice, given that these articles are now being nominated for deletion, that Black Kite came to your talk page to talk to you about list of characters articles with too much non-free content back in February 2008. You had another conversation about these multi-character list articles in August 2009.)

  You talk of "writing good articles". Good Wikipedia article writing involves using and citing sources. You've had conversations about that on your talk page in August 2008 and January 2009. You had a further relevant conversation about sourcing for fiction on your talk page in January 2010.

  This is far from being a "Transformer Deletionist Patrol" versus all the poor put-upon editors who are being surprised at suddenly have a lot of work to do. This is you having over two year's notice that there were problems here, including from some of the editors who have now made deletion nominations, not doing pretty much anything about it, and then complaining when the rest of the world runs out of patience waiting. You shouldn't be surprised that you're in the pickle that you're in now. You had at least a year, after you knew without question that there was a problem looming, where you could at leisure have rectified this situation and prevented this from happening. That you are now pressured into working hard to cite sources at a time that you find personally inconvenient is a bed of your own making. Uncle G (talk) 22:46, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

  • If you have a problem with me, that's fine. I'm only a so-so editor at best. This still fails to explain the sudden deletion nomination of 10-30 articles a day for the past week by a small group, which is the subject of this talk. Sadly it's been explained to me that there is nothing I can do but ask that some of the editors slow down so we can address issues. Some have. I appreciate that. Some have even sided with keeping and improving some of the major articles. It's a nice change, knowing they want to improve, not just delete the articles. Thanks everyone for that! Mathewignash (talk) 23:23, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
    • You don't get to dictate a narrow discussion focus in your favour, here, Mathewignash. This is very much also about you, and your continuing failure to do something about a problem with the articles that you've been contributing to that you knew was coming for years in advance. Even now, when someone points out sourcing that xe considers problematic, you utterly fail to get the point and completely fail to address the actual issue. You've had years of warning about this. Learn! Or the discomfort and pressure will continue. Uncle G (talk) 23:39, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
      • Whether Mathewignash fails to get the point does not justy the mass nomination of over 90 articles in a very short time. That seems rather WP:POINTy to me. —Farix (t | c) 23:43, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
        • This isn't about justification. It's about how this could have been prevented altogether by taking action a year ago, and gross mischaracterizations of a "Transformer Deletionist Patrol", that you, too, appear to be erroneously buying into. Uncle G (talk) 23:51, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
          • I'm not buyinG into anything. I'm just point out that these mass nominations are very disruptive, if not WP:POINy. No one is going to "improve" the articles if they have to go through over 90 articles at once. It doesn't matter how much "time" Mathewignash was given, there is simply no excuse for nominating so many articles at once.

            And please stop refactoring my comments into a format you prefer. Plain indents are less trouble to work with and looks neater —Farix (t | c) 00:09, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

          • You're buying into it right here. You're still assuming that there's one editor, or an organized group of editors, with an organized campaign to "nominate 90 articles all at once". In reality, there are at least two separate, and as I pointed out above very distinct, groups of editors here. Uncle G (talk) 11:42, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

My issue here is that so many articles are being nominated in such a short time. Is there really an immediate need to nominate over 90 articles in just two or three days?[2] This is simply too much for anyone to deal with and salvage content that is worth saving. The nominators should be told to "back off" for a while. 10 articles per week is a lot of articles to have to cleanup and search for reliable sources, but it is workable. However, 90 articles at once gives noone a chance to look for reliable sources or determine which articles are better suited to be merged into a list. While I do support the cleanup of the Transformer articles, there is no deadline here and there should be no rush. —Farix (t | c) 23:27, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

• I have seen that these deletions seem to be planned. One editor will nominate, then post on the other user's talk page that they "may be interested" in these nomination. Now these are to pages that the second editor has never edited before. I thought you were supposed to notify Wiki projects, article creators, and maybe those involved with the editing of an article about a deletion nomination. Why are people notifying those whose only interest seems to be a history voting DELETE with them on other articles? If you look here User_talk:Dwanyewest#Transformers_AfDs you will see an example. someone nominate a bunch of Transformers articles for deletion, then notifies the user with a history of deletion votes about how they may be interested (in an article they never edited before!) a few memoents later votes for delete have been added. What was the provocation to tell this individual about the deletions besides their history of voting delete? Mathewignash (talk) 23:54, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

[3] These kinds of comments are extremely unproductive and uncivil.--Crossmr (talk) 00:05, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

So I have been told. It was a reaction to coming home and finding 30 articles nominated for deletion by the same group of guys who have been at it all week. Mathewignash (talk) 00:14, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• Is there any good reason the article for Sideways (Transformers) is under TWO nominations for deletion at the same time? Mathewignash (talk) 00:15, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
  • That would be called an error--looks like a double click on the tool. :-) I've administratively closed the "first" one, the "second" one is ongoing. Jclemens (talk) 00:50, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
    • Danke shane. Mathewignash (talk) 01:05, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• My problem with Mathewignash and like minded inclusionist when someone tries to remove fansites or fancruft. The immediately cry "notable" and claim fansites are good sources of information. I also the resent the what seems like an accusation that there's some sort of cabal of deletionists or the insinuation I just started editing Transforemers. What about about the inclusionist who go notable but will have a article which merely mentions a subject once in a sentence and call it significant coverage as evidence of notability. I have added alot more actual reliable third person sources on Transformers than alot inclusionists have see the edits of the ones I did below if you doubt me. Dwanyewest (talk) 00:20, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

1. The Transformers (TV series)
2. Transformers: Armada
3. Beast Wars: Transformers
4. Dinobots
5. Transformers: Energon
6. Transformers: Cybertron

I still don't understand why the other editors who nominate for deletion are notifying you on your talk page that you may be interested in those nominations, when these are articles you have never edited in your life. Why would they think YOU are the person to notify? If it walks like a organized effort to delete, and talks like an organized effort delete... Mathewignash (talk) 00:29, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• • • I can't speak for others motivation maybe it like you say there think I will vote a certain way. I neither endorse or encourage others to vote a certain way. Dwanyewest (talk) 01:11, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Focus on outcomes...

What do we really want to see for transformers? I doubt there's really one answer, but a consensus answer is probably going to look something like...

• Separate articles for the most important characters, as demonstrated by reliable sources, with as much real-world commentary (e.g., how Bumblebee was bought by GM) as possible.
• List articles of the fictional characters not notable enough for their own articles, with verifiable content.
• Less plot information than what we currently have, by a long shot.

But for the life of me, I'm really not seeing how a mass deletion crusade is actually accomplishing any of this. I mean, sure, I suppose it's possible to raise the quality of Wikipedia by deleting poorly written articles... but that's like expelling the struggling students to improve a school's average performance. What I really don't see in all this name calling (cruft, deletionist... they're all pejorative) is a way forward to improve the Wikipedia coverage of Transformers characters. Sure, there's some excision due, but this much? In this haphazard a manner? There's gotta be a better way, really. Have we remembered nothing of POKEMON? Jclemens (talk) 00:16, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have to fully agree Jclemens. I can't for the life of me see why we would delete an article on the character Jazz. Pokemon, betacommandbot... i guess we don't learn. —TheDJ (talk • contribs) 00:42, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Based on some of the comments above, I believe that the rapid-fire nominations are the results of personal vendettas against Mathewignash. That's not to excuse Mathewignash's unwillingness to bring these articles in line with Wikipedia policy and guidelines, but two wrongs don't make a right. —Farix (t | c) 00:48, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I did think I was bring the articles in line - I just don't want them deleted out of hand, and I don't discount every sites as easily as others seem to. You may notice my voting history isn't to always KEEP, I often vote to redirect or merge minor articles. One of the users who is usually pro-deletion just made a suggestion to me as to a source for many of the articles I might use to help improve them. This was helpful. THANK YOU! Perhaps we can keep some of these articles by actually improving them. Mathewignash (talk) 01:03, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

That does it. I can't stand it. I'm not going to keep quite about this any more. I have no vendetta against Mathewignash, and I take offense to such a statement Farix. I only to fix what is dealy broken. I've asked for his help and incite on my proposed edits on the Megatron and Starscream articles, but they turned a blind eye. Second, can't you see why anybody delete or redirect Jazz, DJ?? Is everybody blind??? A lot of the sources there come from fansites like TF2005 and their message board which as I recall fansites are unreliable sources. So what, are we now going to look away cherry pick guidelines that suits us? Sakes alive the articles damaged goods and you know it. How am I or anybody suppose to clean up this mess form and push the usable stuff to GA or FA if everybody's making excuses for such sorry pieces of work? I'm sorry, but I can't take this molycodling of bad articles anymore. Sarujo (talk) 01:15, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have seen when others to reorganise or make some editors will object and say its fine the way it is. In regards to sourcing and removal of info. Besides User:Mathewignash you seem partly responsible for some of the proliferation of mediocre articles such as Transmetal Driver, Mutant (Transformers),Longhorn (Transformers). Besides I am sceptical if any improvements can be made because recommendations were made a year ago, [4] but no action seemed to made. We need to have a minimum agreement of what format Transformers articles should take and what needs to removed. Dwanyewest (talk) 01:27, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay, lets look. Transmetal Driver, an article I wrote as a newbie 4 years ago, and have not touched in over 3 years. What is stopping anyone from improving it? Not me. Mutant (Transformers) is a page I created 3 years ago to explain a category, and the category was deleted. Then the page was nominated for deletion, I voted to get rid of it! I don't have the authority to delete old pages, even ones I made. Longhorn (Transformers) is also a page I created 3 years ago and have not touched in 2 years. I created as basically a stub when the character was introduced. The company dropped him as a character, so he never got any coverage since then. I never added anything to it, and it's probably deserving to be deleted or merged, as was proposed. I did not vote to keep it. Why are you complaining? Mathewignash (talk) 01:50, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Wait are you addressing me?? I have no memory of ever editing those articles. Sarujo (talk) 01:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I was addressing Mathewignash. I should have been more explicit. Dwanyewest (talk) 01:41, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Here is a suggestions for Transformers character articles layout which is shown, divide them into categories. Because certain characters have multiple biographies. What does everyone else think. I would definitely eliminate things like toys and unofficial releases because they are supported by fansites. What is anyone else view on my proposal.? Dwanyewest (talk) 02:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

--Cartoon-- Sub catogory 1980s Beast Wars Armada -- Comics -- Marvel Devil Due -- Film -- -- Video Game -- Below will others like popular culture

I might go along with this look. A discussion I had with the user named Eh! Steve we were planing a rewrite to the Megatron article. Wouldn't my proposed format be any good? Also you might want to use a No Wiki format for those proposed sections. Sarujo (talk) 02:53, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Your format or mine is good either way the fancruft such as toys and unofficial toys definitely have to go whatever direction is gone needs to be universally agreed. Dwanyewest (talk) 03:05, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

It it actually an older format similar to one we used before, but we moved to the current one years ago due to the fact that many times a character from one story will share a name, but not really be the same character. First we seperate the character into the different continuities of the character, we do this since many times the characters are completely different characters from one continuity to another.

• Generation 1 character named Ransack (An Insecticon thief!)

• Armada character named Ransack (A Mini-Con truck who is a sidekic!)

• Movie character named ransack. (An ancient Bi-Plane Decepticon!)

In each section we list an infobox, personality, abilies, and the major appearances of the character by the company, in chronological order by when the company started. Therefore Marvel Comics is first, then the TV series (started a few months later than the comic), then the Dreamwave comics, then IDW Comics, etc. Then a list of the toys for the character. If we didn't do this then we'd end up with some mishmash infobox that says Ransack is a insect/truck/biplane who steals thing, is very old, yet is a sidekick... Mathewignash (talk) 03:09, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Biggest problem I have with what Dwanyewest did is he didn't talk about it just, he just came in one day (under an anon IP) and re-wrote the Optimus Prime page, deleting major sections without ANY talk. I just reverted him as if he was some vandal, and asked that his proposals be moved to the talk page. He seems to have taken GREAT offense at me as some sort of Transformers article dictator. He did not propose any changes to the Wiki project, he just came in and did a major rewrite to a page in a manner that wasn't the way we had agreed to write the articles in the wiki project - so of course I reverted it! Mathewignash (talk) 03:12, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Okay, just what is the point of talking about such drastic changes to an article when you, Ignash, the sole editor available on the project, won't even give your incite on the proposed change? Have you forgotten the time I tried editing Starscream and Megatron? You reverted my attempts to improve those articles told me to to discussion. When I gave my proposal, you fail to respond. So again I ask, what's the point to discuss something when somebody only responds to something that happens that they don't agree with? Sarujo (talk) 03:32, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

To be more specific I made an attempt to edit those articles on September of 2008 [5] [6] I made some drastic changes to the Megatron and Starscream articles. You came in and cluster reverted them shortly after. [7][8] Then I did a cut and paste of the two. [9][10] After doing this twice, you came to both Megatron, Starscream, and my asking to discuss the with you the edits. So I complied, and wrote a response figuring that you would respond at my talk page as it seem like the right place to do so. When I got no response after seven days as I didn't realize at the time an editor needs to post a "talkback" template on said poster's corresponding talk page, I went to the Megatron talk page to mention that responded in my talk page. Six days pass, so I cut and pasted my proposal there. Finally, you respond and make a sugestion. Okay so I did. I created my own sandbox and started working on a potential Megatron article uninterrupted. So in April of 2009 (seven months later), I sent word on your talk page for your thoughts on my current progress. No response. It's been over a year now. So again, I ask, what the point? You seem to only care when the article aren't being edited your way. So why should I or anybody do a consensus discussion with any editor who's going to turn the other way on any proposition they just don't like? It seem that mass editing, is the only way to get editors, such as yourself Mr. Ignash, attention. Sarujo (talk) 05:15, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

About that Megatron thing, I'm prey sure listing the Predacon alligator as a version of G1 Megatron falls under fancruft, since that's from interpreting the on-package bio which was written without knowledge of the Beast Wars TV show. It's just a minor, unintentional thing. It doesn't belong on Wikipedia. NotARealWord (talk) 20:00, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Alot of this is gonna be needed to be started from scratch. Guidebooks must be useful GI Joe use it for characters I imagine Transformers have it for their characters. Dwanyewest (talk) 03:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Transformers does have a lot of guidebooks. See here. NotARealWord (talk) 11:54, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

CU results

 Confirmed:

• Claritas (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Nefesf9 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Anton dvsk (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Blest Withouten Match (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

If I have not mentioned an account, consider it  Unrelated unless a reason comes up to justify running a CU. I will leave to uninvolved admins and the community as far as blocking is concerned. –MuZemike 01:29, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

er...how is this related to the transformer thing?--Crossmr (talk) 02:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Look at the recent edits of all these users. Very sad, I often disagreed with her but this is shocking to say the least Weaponbb7 (talk) 02:20, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Man, that's what I get for following WP:AGF. I'm too much of a softy. Anyway, I think there are still problems with a lot of the articles. What would people think about consolidating the AfDs? That way the community can have the discussion in one location. --Selket ^Talk 02:59, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The new sock needs to be blocked; two are already indeffed for socking, so no worries there. Claritas is already retired, but if he/she decides to come back they will need a stern warning about this sock history. Maybe a mentoring from Jack Merridew or something. BOZ (talk) 03:08, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Incredibly disappointing; I always found Claritas to be a rationale, leveheaded writer. —fetch·comms 03:10, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Like any other editor with a pretty firm agenda, it is disappointing, but hardly surprising, that this conduct has transpired. Jclemens (talk) 03:56, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Very disappointing that someone will be so hell bent on getting rid of "low risk" articles that they would pull a stunt like this. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 04:14, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

It is what it is though. We still need to focus on outcomes. Not everyone who argued for deletion was a puppet. --!!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Selket (talk • contribs)

True, but when people start socking in AFDs, it's going to taint the outcome, even if it turns out to be the correct one. --Ron Ritzman (talk) 04:28, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• I blocked Blest Withouten Match. What length block is appropriate for Claritas? Spartaz ^Humbug! 04:32, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
• To what extent was the socking disruptive? On a crude search I can't see any use of the socks to !votestack, but of course I might be looking in the wrong places.--Mkativerata (talk) 04:37, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I think it has more to do with the fact that the socks were waging a crusade (essentially) against Transformers articles and nominating a heck of a lot of them for deletion. Thus, some of the accusations made in above sections about a "secret plot" to delete them seems to be accurate. Silverseren^C 04:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
    • Which causes bad feelings for those arguing for deletion, because they all get tarred by the brush of one cheater. And bad feelings for those arguing for retention, because they wonder if more people are stacking the deck against them. And bad feelings for those of us who just want the whole mess to result in better Wikipedia articles, because none of that will be forthcoming due to all the stupid, avoidable drama. Aaaargh. Jclemens (talk) 05:03, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
      • Can't believe Claritas has been socking. I knew they were nominating lots of fictional articles but socking? And s/he currently has an an article at FAC. Christopher Connor (talk) 05:18, 8 September 2010 (UTC)
      • I haven't followed this situation at all, just kind of stumbled upon it yesterday. On the surface, disruption may not be apparent. From the looks of things, it seems that the Claritas account was arguing for deletion/merging/whatever to reduce the amount of Transformers articles (and I had seen them going at fiction-related articles from a few other franchises in the past few months as well). Then, the account "retired" about a week ago. When the apparently previously innocuous sock account picked up right up with Claritas' work, I think that's the point where it became disruptive. The community tends not to like that sort of bait and switch scenario. "Ooh, I'm gone, but look here, my good friend is ready to pick up where I left off, so there must be more people out there who feel the same way I do!" If I were to make four sock accounts, and spend 10 hours per day editing with all five accounts (two hours per day each, or whatever) on the same thing in the same way, why it would seem that there was a small army of active, like-minded editors out there doing the same thing - and, if that thing "we" were doing were to rub people the wrong way, then that would be a problem, wouldn't it? It taints the water in any discussions where people are trying to determine consensus. BOZ (talk) 12:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Reading this news makes me feel like I just wasted my time. Sarujo (talk) 05:34, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• This is the point where it is important to not give up. This is the point where the single person with the disruptive agenda has been spotted and stopped. This is the point where you should be concentrating upon the other discussions, and the points raised quite properly by other, quite independent, people, not part of any sinister "patrol", who have been trying to discuss and rectify problems for years. Uncle G (talk) 11:42, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I said that Blest Withouten Match (talk · contribs) was distinctive, above. (Mkativerata, this is what is known as a bad-hand account. Fetchcomms, this wouldn't be the first time that someone good at writing about subjects that xe likes takes a slipshod and cavalier approach in nominating for deletion things that xe doesn't like, with boilerplate rationales and no research. Good content writing and tunnel vision about what subjects are "worthy" have gone hand in hand before.)

I also pointed out that Mathewignash, TheFarix, and others were making the error of tarring everyone with the same brush. Jclemens' analysis of why that leads to further problems bears re-reading. There's no way that Black Kite and Blest Withouten Match are part of a "Transformer Deletion Patrol", and this insidious and entirely wrong-headed idea needs to be stamped out before it further affects discussion and editor relationships. One person deciding to go on a crusade (as was clear from the Blest Withouten Match account alone) is quite different from the other people such as Black Kite, J Milburn, and so forth, who have (as can be seen from Mathewignash's talk page) been discussing the problems here for years. The two should not be confused in any way.

Selket, consolidating the discussions was tried. See Wikipedia:WikiProject Transformers/Proposed centralized transformers discussion. Yes, Claritas closed and moved the discussion. Perhaps, in light of the above, you should see how many editors are now in favour of re-opening it. Uncle G (talk) 11:42, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The person behind the accounts has only made it tougher for him/herself. If a new account comes along & re-nominates those articles for deletion? it quite obvious who it'll likely be. GoodDay (talk) 13:46, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Claritas marked the discussion as closed, but was already withdrawn by the nominator due to gathering no support, and somebody else would probably have closed it within minutes anyway. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 13:47, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Conditions for block reduction of the Claritas account

Ok. Claritas has screwed up. Royally. But I'm not certain that this (apparently) one-time going off of the rails is enough to consider them banned. They are indefinitely blocked, but as is often said, indefinite != infinite. OTOH, a block of some duration is definitely in order IMHO. So, the question in my mind are, what are the conditions under which Claritas would/could be unblocked? (And, of course, *only* the Claritas account, not the socks.) A length of time? Some sort of restrictions? What are people's thoughts as to what would/could/should be required for an unblock of Claritas? - TexasAndroid (talk) 20:23, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• See what they say in a year. They were socking with the clear intent to deceive and stack discussions. That is not acceptable, and we need to draw a really bright line. → ROUX ₪ 20:33, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• I'd say nothing less that the standard offer would be acceptable to allow a return. -- Atama頭 20:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• WP:SO specifically says it's not for extremes. I'd say deliberately messing around like this is an extreme. → ROUX ₪ 20:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• I don't think it's an extreme the way the essay is meant to take it, as an example of how "extreme" a situation would have to be, it mentions law enforcement involvement. But my opinion is that nothing less than the standard offer should apply, I'm not against a stronger restriction. Wikipedia inevitably has an Achilles heel in regards to sockpuppetry; it's such an easy way for people to manipulate the encyclopedia in very disruptive ways and nearly impossible to prevent beforehand, and we can't be very proactive against that kind of abuse. The only kind of deterrence I can think of is to maintain that we have little tolerance for that behavior so that editors might want to think twice before doing it. -- Atama頭 00:30, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Isn't the block length kind of moot until (or really, if) Claritas returns from retirement? I say put it as an indefinite block with an explanation for the block on Claritas' talk page and, if Claritas returns by indication on the talk page or some other means, then a review can be made of the block and a decision for the future worked out then. Silverseren^C 21:20, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• Claritas isn't retired, s/he is merely using sockpuppets. → ROUX ₪ 21:25, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I received an email from Claritas earlier today (before her indef):

Email

Hey, I saw the thread at ANI. I've had a lot of problems with good-hand/bad-handing and socking from the start (several previous accounts - check Adorno rocks). I've coupled the creation of good content on one set of accounts (this one, Adorno rocks, Blest Withouten Match) with outright hoaxing and deception on others (check the article on Paulius Galaune). I've decided to come clean (demonstrated hoaxes on Nefesf9). The principle reason I'm retiring is that I don't think I'm positively contributing to the project, but I'd like, as a token, to get William H. Prescott's article to FA. Could you exempt me from the auto-block so I can answer questions in the candidancy ? I don't mind being indeffed afterwards, and you can check that I don't edit any other page. I'm not going to come back in the near future, because I need to learn to treat the project in a mature way. I'm an aspie, and tend to be obsessed with "gaming systems" (I know about NOTTHERAPY). I hope the Wikipedia community has enough faith in me not to question my contributions on this account. I'm emailing you because from your comment at ANI it seems that you've appreciated my previous work, but you can put this up anywhere if you think anyone else might want to read it. All my previous alternate accounts have been blocked, apart from Claritas-test, which you might want to (just used to see what welcomecreation looks like). Many thanks, Claritas.

I do not think that, based on the consensus here, unblocking would be a good idea, especially due to this admission of using even more socks. I have also blocked Claritas-test (talk · contribs). I am just posting this message on here as xe indicated on xyr talk page that xe was unable to communicate due to the block. Thank you, —fetch·comms 22:21, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• Standard offer (that is, one year with no socking) seems to be the best that could be done for this account now. You might want to add other conditions (full disclosure of all socks, etc...) but i haven't looked into it enough to say more. As for his desire to bring an article to FA -- well, if he has a friend in goodstanding here, they can proxy for him if they care enough. But the kind of socking involved shouldn't be tolerated -- ever -- and his personal desire to "just do one more thing, so please conditionally unblock me" should be refused.Bali ultimate (talk) 22:41, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• SO is an essay and one with many issues, can't support it. The block is indefinite and any unblock discussion needs to be had in a central place and a consensus formed. The community was abused, the community can decided at some future time if they want to let her back in.--Crossmr (talk) 00:07, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Based on the email provided, there is no choice but to permanently ban this user unless and until they undertake to not do what they did. In a year let's revisit this. As to the FA... this is one of those cases, I think, where the good of Wikipedia is best served by allowing Claritas to comment. Use a specific section of their talkpage and transclude into the FA nom as needed. → ROUX ₪ 00:56, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think we should prejudge. Let her conduct during the FAC be a test. I am glad she has come clean, if indeed she has. Then, if she asks for an unblock at some future point, we will have evidence of conduct after the block to help us make a determination.--Wehwalt (talk) 01:03, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The articles so far claimed to be hoaxes created by the bad-hand accounts, in the above electronic mail quotation and in discussions elsewhere, are:

• Paulius Galaunė (AfD discussion) — cleaned up by Renata3 (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA)
• Jonas Asevičius-Acukas

Uncle G (talk) 05:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• If Claritas has willfully disrespected the project in such a way, why are we entertaining giving this user the undeserved respect of allowing them to fulfill a personal desire within the project? I think exploring this road leads to exceptionism. With the long history of deception shown by this user, admitted to above, what guarantees do we have that this opportunity would not lead to further unforeseen abuses? What message does it send to other disruptive puppetmasters if we grant this exception? I feel this is a demonstration of one of the most severe abuses on the project; a user who tries to sneak their vandalism (see hoaxes above)and bad faith (see AfD nominations and discussions) behind our backs by creating a good editing history on selected puppets. It's shameful and makes a mockery of the project. It's not just disruption, but disruption beneath layers, cloaked by the protection of WP:AGF. I see no reason, no matter how good the contributions of the puppetmaster were, to allow her the privilege of her request in light of the evidence.--Torchwood Who? (talk) 11:59, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• I'm rather disturbed that Claritas' screed on their talkpage talks of how the project is broken and seems to shift responsibility for their own actions away from themselves. Until they can show some internalization of why their socking was a bad thing instead of some attempt to show up "the man" I don't think even the SO should apply. Syrthiss (talk) 12:26, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• At least standard offer. Sockpuppeting is bad and we should not tolerate it. Also, looking at User talk:Anton dvskit seems like he/she was disrupting as part of some "experiment". I'm pretty sure that's not allowed here.NotARealWord (talk) 13:21, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Albsolutely no unblock under any circumstances. This is not a silly newbie mistake. This is an experienced account who knew exactly what they were doing and chose to use several accounts to actively and deliberately disrupt and sabotage Wikipedia. I'm especially unimpressed with the talk-page rant, the gist of which essentially blames Wikipedia for letting them get away with it, and the email quoted above which tells of an "obsession with gaming systems". Well, no thanks. This user is poisonous to the project and should not be allowed to return under any circumstances. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 13:44, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• No No way, no how. I can live with people vociferously arguing to delete things--there are plenty of people who do that all the time, they're called deletionists. I can live with people "crossing the line" to sock once--I expect we've all been tempted to do so at one point. I can even live with people who disparage our good-faith editors who've lovingly invested in trivia and plot summaries for fictional elements. But I cannot countenance the willful falsification and game-playing that has been admitted above. I don't care what mental defect Claritas' human has: he doesn't get to return, ever, based on his . Jclemens (talk) 16:14, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• Initially I was fine with Claritas getting off with a stern warning, but given the attitude that has come to light since then, I'd prefer if they stayed gone. Disrupting Wikipedia for fun is even worse than disrupting it to prove a point. We'd have to see some real demonstration of a change of heart, and at some distant point in the future for my feelings to change on that. BOZ (talk) 19:25, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• No. I dealt with 2 socks (Nefesf9 & Anton dvsk) who created hoaxes. I am a "softy" and I do believe in second chances, but not this time. Even when the user decided to "come clean", s/he still lied in subtle ways. The hoax was also subtle -- hard to notice even if you tried and you were specifically looking for it. After revelation that these were Claritas' socks, I lost any trust in anything the user says. I would not be surprised if there were hoaxes/questionable material added under the main account also. Someone should go thru a sample of edits with a microscope. Renata (talk) 19:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• Comment Per this comment at his talk page, I think that two years without touching the project with any socks while making good content as an extended standard offer is a reasonable enough request. If socks are found during the two years, or if he does not abide by any editing sanctions after the two years, he can be blocked without another chance. Claritas has done quite a bit of harm recently, but he has also done quite a bit of good writing, and has recognized what he has done wrong. Two years is a long time, and if the community will try and have a little faith in 2012, this could end up very well, like Jack Merridew has. Claritas seems already to be telling the truth (no sleeper socks or AfD votestacking seems to have been found so far per my quick skim of the below section), and he at least is not so incompetent that he doesn't know what he did was wrong. —fetch·comms 04:01, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Sockpuppet-created AfDs

Should the AfD discussions started by Claritas and sockpuppets be closed? NotARealWord (talk) 14:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Some of them probably can, like Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bumblebee (Transformers), which is practically a SNOW keep case. But there are others that are renning towards delete consensus and shouldn't be closed. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 15:40, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

 Done --Ron Ritzman (talk) 23:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Yes, they should be closed with no prejudice to renominating them in small groups after a weeks time (to give the other TF AfDs time work through AfD). —Farix (t | c) 16:14, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• More importantly what about the AfDs that Claritas has previously started which have since been closed? Given the admission of widespread socking above, is that sufficient probable cause to checkuser Claritas vs. everyone else who ever participated in any AfD in which he !voted? Jclemens (talk) 16:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • That would definitely fall into the  CheckUser is not for fishing category. T. Canens (talk) 17:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • No. There's an admission of widespread sockpuppetry. If there's no socking, there's no problem, and no changes needed. On the other hand, the abuse of process appears to have serious ramifications. Jclemens (talk) 17:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• Closing now based on that would be a needless invocation of bureaucracy. The bulk of this stuff is unsourced, non-notable fancruft, and apart from 2-3 actually notable subjects, the bulk of the lot is headed towards certain deletion. Tarc (talk) 17:33, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • So you're excusing his behavior and discounting the damage it's done to the process, just because you don't think the material is appropriate for Wikipedia? Jclemens (talk) 17:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • That's not what he said and don't you think reinterpreting someones words to cast their views in a certain light is hardly behaviour that will reduce the temperature round here? Spartaz ^Humbug! 18:12, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • (ec)I'm employing common sense. Please give us one good reason why, say, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Jackpot (Transformers) should be aborted just because of who the nominator was? Several users have weighed-in with policy/guideline-based reasons to delete the article. The nominator's ulterior motives, if any, have no bearing on that. Tarc (talk) 18:18, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I agree with Tarc, the processes have run long enough that it would be stupid to stop them at this point. --Cameron Scott (talk) 18:21, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Doing a spot-check on some of the underlying IPs (keep in mind I am currently pressed on time), I'm not really coming up with anything else aside from the four accounts I reported above. I am also reluctant to "fish" indiscriminately through every account who participated or even !voted a certain way in AFDs. If I get time later, and I'm in a good mood, I'll make a more-detailed sweep, but I'll tell everyone right now not to expect anything more.

To comment neutrally on the deletion discussions in which Claritas or socks have started or participated in, as Jclemens noted on my talk page, will the discussions have made any difference with her removed (i.e. did the socking/deception make a difference in the outcomes of the AFDs)? I'm sure the question will come up: would the articles in question ever have been sent to AFD if they weren't nominated by Claritas or any of her socks, despite said discussions that resulted in consensus for deletion (i.e. what Tarc mentioned above)? Traditionally, we tended to let go discussions initiated by banned users (in violation of ban, of course) especially if others have taken the reins of said discussions; this is consistent of our policy of deleting pages created by banned users, i.e. we don't delete said pages if they have had substantial edits by others because of the fact that the community has absorbed the stuff into its collective bloodstream. –MuZemike 18:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for not being clear, that is an appropriate clarification and what I had in mind: If socking is found to have affected the outcome of AfDs, those should be reopened and revised. If the CU's say that there's been an appropriate level of scrutiny and that they're satisfied any actual damage has been dealt with, I'm good with that. I would never advocate that an XfD be thrown out based on the existence of socking which didn't affect the outcome, and agree that would be an unreasonable result. Jclemens (talk) 18:43, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

When dealing with this kind of stuff before (Ocean Mystic Researcher and his attacks against RAN come to mind), I've always closed discussions that had not received a delete argument. If someone else has argued for deletion, it seems parallel to the case of a significant edit made by an unknowing user to an article created by a banned editor: to delete the AFD would deprive that editor of his voice.—Kww(talk) 18:44, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

As MuZemike says, it's standard practice to reopen any closed afd where the socking affected the result. In this case the socking is so extensive that is had affected the atmosphere in dealing with articles on the topic. This discussion has certainly affected all current AfDs . I think that is certainly enough reason to close all ongoing AfDs without prejudice to relisting. It might well be reason to revert any previous deletions on this general topic area. The original idea of having some common discussion remains a good one, though I';d suggest we wait a few weeks. Even though I have usually been opposed to complete deletion for these articles, Claritas was certainly right that something must be done about them. They're overelaborated to the point where even the game fanatics should realize that for Wikipedia, they must be combined and contracted. The misbehavior should't interfere with finding a solution. (And, in a general solution, those article that need to be undeleted to be merged etc. can be dealt with also, thus eliminating the need to reopen them all. ) — Preceding unsigned comment added by DGG (talk • contribs) 2010-09-09 19:23:54 (UTC)

• The sockpuppetry is extensive, but it is not specific to transformers. The Nefesf9 (talk · contribs) account has contributed to exactly three AFD discussions, none of which were Transformers-related, and two of which were a blatant attempt to wave the bad hand actions in everyone's faces. The Anton dvsk (talk · contribs) account has no AFD discussion contributions at all. That leaves the Claritas (talk · contribs) and Blest Withouten Match (talk · contribs) accounts. Pietrodn's tool at the toolserver reports that their contributions intersect at only two user talk pages.

  I agree with Starblind and Tarc. Whilst there's the obvious case of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bumblebee (Transformers), a mass closure would throw the baby out with the bathwater in some of the other cases, especially a mass closure that isn't even limited to just the single disruptive sockpuppetteer. Yes, the misbehaviour shouldn't interfere with finding a solution. But closing "all ongoing AFD discussions" because of it would be to let it have a disruptive effect. Tarring discussions started by Black Kite, NotARealWord, and others with Claritas' brush would be letting the disruption succeed. Uncle G (talk) 20:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

  • I don't see any vote stacking; wikistalk shows no unpleasant overlap. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 22:24, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • My point was to go back to Jclemens earlier suggest at the head of the section: Focus on outcomes. Regardless of the socking, we still have to deal with the transformers articles, and a centralized discussion remains the only reasonable way to do this, no matter who started or contributed to any previous or past AfD. A degree of inconsistency cannot be avoided with Wikipedia processes, but we should seek to minimize this. DGG ( talk ) 22:51, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • I agree that Wikipedia:WikiProject Transformers/Proposed centralized transformers discussion bears revisiting. Uncle G (talk) 00:40, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

VolkovBot overly eager to remove interwiki links

VolkovBot is an interwiki update bot run by ru:User:Volkov in a reckless manner. It should be blocked unless and until its operator is willing to run it in a more responsible manner.

See its recent contributions - removing some or all interwikis, some to articles that are redirects to the right topic, others that appear to be completely correct. Particularly egregious was the removal of almost all interwiki links on Input. Apparently it is being run in -auto and -force mode, despite the general feeling that this is a bad idea.

Volkov has been contacted in the past about this and merely created a note arguing that it's up to other bots or humans to repair the links it breaks.

I am sure there are some good edits in there. However, it is not worth the cost. One incorrect action means someone has to figure out how to restore links on any number of languages and somehow figure out what is annoying it lest it do it again - and that assumes a person with the skill to do so is watching.

The bot is currently making about one edit every two minutes on the English Wikipedia (and of course more elsewhere). GreenReaper (talk) 03:12, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have blocked the bot for now. It's an indefinite block but other admins are welcome to unblock as soon as this problem is resolved. --A. B. ^{(talk • contribs)} 03:30, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Thank you. I would also note that VolkovBot's bot flag was speedily approved three years ago with no discussion and with obvious errors in the submission ("X edits per TIME", no mention of period). It also says it is to be run in "automatic supervised" mode. The 24-hour operation suggests otherwise. GreenReaper (talk) 03:33, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The BAG request, which was approved.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 03:32, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have reverted some of the bot's edits, including the one above. ~NerdyScienceDude 03:41, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• That's right, the bot is run in auto-force mode but ONLY when it processes interwiki conflicts. In some cases multiple redirects or article status mismatch (normal article vs. disambig, like here) cause complex interwiki conflicts and the bot is unable to resolve them in a single run. In this case it tries to restore valid direct links later based on it's removal log. Interwiki conflicts are in fact multiple and have accumulated over the years. I feel like fixing errors is in no way reckless, and bot's edits are in fact analysed and manually fixed whenever possible (e.g. like here or here). Simply reverting bot's edits is not a good idea since all problematic links are restored and the conflict remains preventing the bots from keeping valid interwiki links up to date. My or any other bot will then restore valid links. You may see e.g. this page history where the links were reverted and restored back by different bots until they were manually fixed. I suggest unblocking the bot. It may seem to be overly eager - that's because it's processing the list of conflicts from the English wikipedia (NB: large page!) right now. Please let the bot do it's job and be a bit more patient and bot-friendly ;-) --Volkov ^(?!) 05:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

What seems strange to me is that your bot was approved with zero discussion, and that request wasn't even filed correctly(as noted above).— Dædαlus ^Contribs 06:08, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I cannot be sure why there was no discussion. It was 3.5 years ago. The bot was already active and approved on several other wikis at that time. Maybe this was the reason for the prompt approval at en.wiki. --Volkov ^(?!) 06:48, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Just like disputes at other wikis have no place here, neither should bots, just because they are in use on other wikis, be approved without any discussion.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 06:53, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

That was not my fault ;-) --Volkov ^(?!) 07:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Not really commenting on this specific case, just giving some background. Generally interwiki bots using the pywikipedia framework are speedily approved, since they are all essentially the same, and it's been proven to be uncontroversial. Normally they aren't approved quite as quickly as this bot, since there are still come things which each individual bot needs to sort out (e.g. the force/auto mode, editing templates, exclusion compliance). These days I doubt you'll find a request approved after 30 minutes. Also, with interwiki bots, the bots edits on other wikis are considered, in fact, bots with global flags are automatically approved to do interwiki here (don't think this bot has a global flag, but just an example of the bot's global edits having an effect on if it's approved here) - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 08:22, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Actually, it has. --Volkov ^(?!) 08:39, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Why are there multiple bots doing this interwiki stuff instead of just one? This is not "the encyclopedia that every bot can edit". When they said "everyone" they weren't thinking of bots. 75.57.241.73 (talk) 09:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Because one bot wouldn't be able to handle the load. –xeno^talk 15:13, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Processing the conflict list with a bot is missing the point. The articles were placed on that list because pywikipedia couldn't figure out how to handle them without potentially removing useful information. That indicates human interaction is required. A more appropriate solution would be to use a bot to drop a note on the talk page of the articles in question informing them that there may be an issue. Bear in mind that many things marked as "conflicts" may make perfect sense, since articles are arranged differently in different languages (see below). GreenReaper (talk) 18:36, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• I don't see the problem. VolkovBot removed article interwikies from a disambiguation page. That's right because such cross links cause interwikiconflicts. Articles should link to articles and disambigs to disambigs. The block of the bot doesn't solve the problem in any way because all pywikipedia bots work that way. Please unblock. --Obersachse (talk) 16:29, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Just because everyone has access to the same axe does not justify giving it to an idiot (pywikipedia) and letting them run around unsupervised 24 hours a day in a busy street. :-)

You have a particular idea of how the wiki should be setup. But in the real world, this is not the case. Two related topics that have a disambiguation page in English may be covered in a single article on another language. And even if there is a correct non-disambiguation article, it is better from the reader's perspective to link to the disambiguation page than not to link to anything at all, which is what happens when the bot removes the link.

There is also the matter of removing links from "detail" articles in one languages pointing to a more general article that combines two or more topics in a different language; for example, from en:Galactic Civilizations II: Dread Lords to de:Galactic Civilizations#Galactic Civilizations 2: Dread Lords (which naturally links back to en:Galactic Civilizations). These links are correct from a reader perspective because that is where the topic is covered, and removing them because Pywikipedia cannot understand the situation is not an acceptable solution. GreenReaper (talk) 18:22, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

What is better for the reader? Less, but right interwikilinks or more links, but partial wrong? I prefer less but absolutely right. You may have another point of view. --Obersachse (talk) 18:50, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Hmm when you are running interwiki conflicts is the exact time you should definitely not be running -auto with -force. Because that is when it will make mistakes. -DJSasso (talk) 18:28, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

-force with -noredirect. This is the only way to clean up multiple interwiki conflicts and restore valid direct links afterwards. The very same situation was discussed in detail today on the German Wikipedia and also on my talk page. Keeping the bot blocked, or locking the pages, or making edit wars with bots is not helpful at all. Problems remain for ages and what is affected first is the quality of Wikipedia. --Volkov ^(?!) 20:50, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

No that isn't the only way, what you do once you have a list of conflicts is you fix them by hand. That is the whole point of the list, its that pywikipedia can't fix them so you need to do it manually. -DJSasso (talk) 15:07, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I guess you're kidding. Or simply do not imagine how serious the situation is. Just have a look at these lists. There are literally hundreds of thousands pages with interwiki conflicts. Fixing them all manually is not feasible, it will take ages. Some conflicts may be resolved by bots, other more complicated cases in fact do require human intervention. But blocking the bot doesn't help resolve this problem at all. --Volkov ^(?!) 16:25, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

No I fully realize, the problem is as has been shown, numerous "fixes" your bot has made have been incorrect, so of those hundreds of thousands, how many thousand are actually correct, and with human intervention we would see that. So quite simply put your bot is creating more issues as it goes. Blocking your bot is helping as it is keeping it from creating more issues. -DJSasso (talk) 17:01, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Please don't speculate, just give examples of "incorrect" fixes and "more issues created". I have many examples of resolved conflicts. German Wikipedia had the same concerns and they have blocked the bot for a while yesterday but after analyzing real examples of bot's fixing the conflicts, they lifted the block. And you prefer keeping the bot blocked and having things disorganized for ever? No human would be able to resolve all these conflicts manually. Just try to fix a couple yourself, and you'll probably be convinced. --Volkov ^(?!) 17:52, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Many mistakes are commited by humans and the bots automatically follow them, there are many bots that do that, everything has a sollution, I write to the bot owner and he repairs his damages, that's enough, for me, Volkov is a very efficient bot, he has done multiple connections, I don't know a bot as good as him--Jaguarlaser (talk) 18:44, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Grammar nit-picking on discussion pages

Resolved

 – User blocked for one week by Fram and cautioned against future similar behaviour. –xeno^talk 16:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

There's been an ongoing kerfuffle involving Cuddlyable3 (talk · contribs) at the Reference Desk, where any errors of grammar or spelling draw him to offer sarcastic corrections, disingenuous questions feigning confusion, or even long-winded tirades wherein he insists that other editors are deliberately misusing "it's" versus "its" (or is it the other way around?) in their writing. C3 has been encouraged to vent his grammatical spleen on Wikipedia articles to his heart's content, but advised to leave minor errors in discussion pages and talk page posts alone: User talk:Cuddlyable3#Reference-Desk woes. Currently, he's actively harassing User:APL on his talk page (User talk:APL#Bottle shape) where he has continued to post on APL's talk page despite being twice told not to (in that thread). APL made a third, explicit request yesterday to C3 to either cease and desist or take the matter to a higher-level forum ([11]); I was hopeful that that would settle the matter. Unfortunately, today C3 instead decided follow up with another salvo on APL's talk: [12], [13].

While I would normally just write this off as a contributor being silly over nothing and encourage him to have a cup of tea, this particular case is part of a pattern. In the last week or so, C3 has started at least three threads on Wikipedia talk:Reference Desk, bemoaning the state of grammatical knowledge among Wikipedia editors in general, or specifically attacking and belittling other Reference Desk volunteers.

• 30 August: Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#IT'S is the contraction of IT IS
• 1 September: Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#In the beginning was the Word (uncollapse the box for absurdity).
• 6 September: Wikipedia talk:Reference desk#Unpopular guideline? (uncollapse the box for more absurdity).

Additionally, on 30 August I asked him not to make snide posts on the Ref Desk itself when other editors made minor (but utterly comprehensible) errors of grammar. The thread is currently at User talk:TenOfAllTrades#Please don't post snide comments about other editors' grammar on the Ref Desk, as C3 is unwilling to retain any posts critical of his conduct on his own talk page.

Despite being told repeatedly to just move on, he just can't help trying to keep making a disruptive WP:POINT. I was on the receiving end of attacks from C3 in July (in yet another, similar overreaction, C3 responded to an editor calling him a "grammar nazi" by slapping up pictures of Gestapo victims, called another editor who removed a non-free image a "Holocaust denier", issued a timed ultimatum for another editor to consent to mediation over unspecified issues, and called me a "Nazi trivializer") so I don't feel it would be appropriate to issue blocks myself.

Regrettably, C3's grammar obsession has reached the point where it is disruptive to the Reference Desk — not only is he repeatedly clogging the talk page with long screeds on the same topics, but he is also harassing the other volunteers who offer a great deal of their own time and effort to help respond to visitors' queries. Asking him over and over to stop hasn't worked; I am now asking for a block. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 12:37, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Have you pointed them to the talkpage behaviour guideline section, where the first two sentences are, "It is not necessary to bring talk pages to publishing standards, so there is no need to correct typing/spelling errors, grammar, etc. It tends to irritate the users whose comments you are correcting. "? As it is part of the WP collegiate environment not to harrass other editors on grammatical lapses, then it might be pointed out that they are being disruptive rather than just pointy - and that sanctions are a real possibility. Personally, I think they should be given one more chance, now being aware that it is they that are in violation of WP practice, to amend their behaviour. LessHeard vanU (talk) 13:00, 8 September 2010 (UTC) I issued such a warning. I should think that if it continues, any admin may enforce a short block in the first instance. LessHeard vanU (talk)

He is well aware of that guideline. He reads it as only prohibiting outright editing of others comments, while providing unlimited license for snide remarks and ranting tirades. Algebraist 13:08, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I likewise don't feel I'm in a position to act as an administrator, but I think we're easily past the point of initial awareness. C3 knows, and has known for some time, that the community disapproves of his behavior, finds it disruptive, etc, etc. His response has been to escalate the conflict, twisting policies to support his crusade. I'm not objecting particularly to "one more chance", just noting that the rationale LHvU has offered is (while worthwhile) not terribly applicable. — Lomn 13:09, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

((edit conflict) I am slow to post; I had written this in response to LHvU's note.) Not to mention that this is a serious problem under the civility policy: "belittling a fellow editor". For one example, "I can guess what you tried and failed to write in English". This is absolutely unacceptable. I agree with LessHeard vanU, but if this contributor has already been specifically advised of WP practice would think immediate sanctions not amiss. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:11, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

(ec) He has posted at least twice a selected quotation from elsewhere in that guideline (the 6 September thread on WT:RD, and the thread linked on my talk page); I don't think the problem is a lack of policy awareness. He reads the passage "Do not edit apparent mistaken homophone contractions in comments of others. One may only ask the poster what they meant to say" as meaning that he can and should post an snide question in response whenever he sees a grammatical or typographical error, no matter how unambiguous the meaning of the passage might be from context. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:14, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Ten... please tell me the section title was meant as sarcasm?  :-) — Coren ^(talk) 13:21, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Oh, good lord — I wish it were. That's what I get for typing before coffee. The worst part is that C3 will think I was being an idiot deliberately. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:23, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Fixed, with an anchor so I don't break any incoming links to the section. Gah. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Administrators may refer to the talkpage guidelines from which LessHeard vanU has correctly quoted.

It is not necessary to bring talk pages to publishing standards, so there is no need to correct typing/spelling errors, grammar, etc. It tends to irritate the users whose comments you are correcting. The basic rule – with some specific exceptions outlined below – is, that you should not delete the comments of other editors without their permission.

Never edit or move someone's comment to change its meaning, even on your own talk page. Striking text constitutes a change in meaning, and should only be done by the user or someone acting at their explicit request. Do not edit apparent mistaken homophone contractions in comments of others. One may only ask the poster what they meant to say.

If anyone feels I have violated "Never edit or move someone's comment to change its meaning" then I offer my abject apology, which they may have directly if they will be kind enough to provide a diff that shows the offence. A separate subject of apparent mistaken homophone contractions, or more lucidly "messed up apostrophes", is addressed in the last two sentences of the guideline quoted above. I think it would be good now for any admin who is not involved in work at Ref Desk to advise whether the guideline is adequate. Until that happens, it is a guideline that was kept up to now by consensus. I have no argument with that. Cuddlyable3 (talk) 13:37, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

That guideline should be understood in context with other policies and guidelines - such as WP:CIVIL, which asks us to participate in a respectful and considerate manner - deriding other editors with rude and disrespectful commentary about minor grammar isn't really on board. Kindly cease out the behaviour in question. –xeno^talk 13:46, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

There are several issues here. Firstly you seem to be being awkward and violating the spirit of the community. It could even be judged as uncivil. Secondly the first line states: so there is no need to correct typing/spelling errors, grammar, etc. This is quite clear in not referring just to editing but to correcting someone generally. Persistent correction of their grammar in the wrong forum is definitely uncivil and in violation of that guideline. Is what you are saying adding to the conversation? Is it helpful or constructive? Is their meaning unclear when you make these comments? From a quick review the answer is no, not really. Such action is, again, against policy. Finally, there seems a strong consensus for you not to do this, I advise you stop. --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 13:47, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I feel you have violated the policy Wikipedia:Civility by belittling fellow editors and have linked to an example above where you said to an editor "I can guess what you tried and failed to write in English". Contributors are not required to be perfect in writing; however, we are required to deal respectfully and civilly with other contributors. In addition, your persistence seems problematic under the policy Wikipedia:Harassment, as it "appears to a reasonable observer to have the purpose of adversely affecting a targeted person or persons". --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:51, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I have blocked this editor (Cuddlyable3) for one week for harassment and disruptive editing (including continued wikilawyering). His comment in this discussion makes it clear that no change in behaviour is to be expected, despite the multiple discussions about this and the fact that many editors have indicated that his behaviour is unacceptable or at least very unproductive. As always, if there is consensus to overturn this block, or if someone feels that a reasonable unblock request is made, then I have no objections to any admin changing this block. Fram (talk) 13:56, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Unless there's some indication of understanding the issue, that seems reasonable to me. Previous history of harassment blocks suggests that this is not a new approach to working with others. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:59, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Reference desk (the main refdesk project-space pages, not just their WT: counterparts) are discussion pages, visited by lots of non-fluent English speakers (including some very knowledgable mathematicians at the math desk) and nobody should care about imperfect use of English there. If someone ask an English grammar question at the Language desk, that's the right place to address the fine points. Otherwise don't worry about it. There's enough trolling at refdesk already without this extra nuisance. Endorse WP:TROUT with admin sanctions to follow if the problem goes on. 75.57.241.73 (talk) 14:02, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Follow-up: Fram's block (with the conditions specified) is fine. 75.57.241.73 (talk) 14:02, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Cuddly's argument seems to be that we need to respond to questions in perfect English, in order to (subtly) better educate the questioner. I think that's a laudable goal in theory, but that he carries it too far in practice. As discussed on the ref desk talk page, he should take his complaints to the responder's talk page rather than doing it on the ref desk, and he should be much more gentle about it. And if someone tells him to stop correcting his usage, he should stop, with that particular user. Correcting other people's usage "in public" is extremely rude. I'm also kind of a stickler for usage, at heart, especially my own, but I almost always let it slide when I see it in others. I'm always glad to hear from Cuddly when I make an error. But some others would just as soon be left alone, and that's their right. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:53, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

That argument sounds close to trolling. I'm a mathematics refdesk regular, and several math experts answering questions there are non-native English speakers who make English errors all the time, but their mathematical advice is invaluable no matter how bad their English is. Bugging folks about their English in contexts like that is about the dumbest thing anyone could do. 75.57.241.73 (talk) 22:19, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

"When pages in other namespaces are used for discussion and communication between users, the same norms will usually also apply." –xeno^talk 19:37, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Usually, yes, surely; I merely plead that we not robotically slave the RD rules to whatever policies have been agreed upon for article talk pages, which exist for a very different purpose. Comet Tuttle (talk) 19:43, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

In any event, WP:CIVIL and WP:HARASSMENT are universal. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:45, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes; as I wrote above, I'm not disputing any measures taken above. I'm only trying to head off any future classification of the Reference Desk as an article talk page. Comet Tuttle (talk) 19:57, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

The ref desks are kind of a special case. They are clearly not articles. They're structured like talk pages. But they're not quite talk pages either. Cuddly's error is in his notion that the rigors of English usage in articles should apply to the ref desks just because they are technically not talk pages. But they are closer to being talk pages than to being articles. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 20:10, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I strongly support this block. Pages and pages of interminable pointless conversation have made it clear to this user that his behavior is disruptive, and she's been warned to stop by several people, including myself. Since neither discussion nor warning has been effective in stopping the unpleasant behavior, the block is necessary. (To be honest, I had rather thought she would stop, and stopped reviewing her edits after a few days past my warning. I'm disappointed to have been wrong.) -FisherQueen (talk · contribs) 22:30, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

She? --Chemicalinterest (talk) 12:05, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I propose a novel solution. Unblock the user, and allow them to continue on their former path. If any of their posts contain a grammatical error or spelling mistake - even the most trivial typo - block them for a week, and then a month, two months and so on. That'll learn 'em. -Ashley Pomeroy (talk) 14:52, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

That is actually a fantastic idea. → ROUX ₪ 14:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

User:Meeso- personal attacks gone too far?

Resolved

 – User warned of Macedonia sanctions and admonished not to make further threats. --WGFinley (talk) 18:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I've been concerned about Meeso (talk · contribs) for a while. I gave him a 3R warning two weeks ago [14] and noticed his uncivil behaviour then. Edit summaries such as "go fuck yourself !! deleting bullshit on my talk page" (on his talk page) and " IT IS NOT ANY LESS SIGNIFICANT THAN OTHER INFO! STOP YOUR IGNORANT BALLYRAG! OTHER PEOPLE MIGHT LIKE TO KNOW ABOUT THIS!" [15] are clearly not acceptable. I was considering going to WQA but then found an odd message on his talk page [16] from an IP which was clearly a response to a request for the name of an editor/Administrator editing Kosovo. His request is at [17] and says " Please tell me his name and I shall put him down for ever! I assure you if what you say is true, this admin will be lost from this article and maybe Wikipedia altogether!". I'll notify him now. Note that his sig reads 'Maysara'. Dougweller (talk) 15:00, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I think that his threat is probably just shooting the breeze, but it's still unacceptable. He needs to retract it or be blocked. I can put up with a lot in the way of incivility, but threatening editors is beyond the pale. And Eastern Europe articles are already volatile enough. Heimstern Läufer (talk) 15:06, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

His personal attacks and incivility are not just restricted to Eastern Europe. This (both the comment and the edit summary) is typical of his pattern of incivility and personal attacks at Talk:Egyptian Arabic. While not of the magnitude of his threats against Dbachmann, it is still indicative of his overall attitude. --Taivo (talk) 15:15, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Kosovo is protected by general sanctions I have warned him[18] and logged the warning.[19] I've also directed him to withdraw the threat or risk being blocked. --WGFinley (talk) 16:40, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

• I retracted my statement (which was not a threat, although of course it is understandable to be thus interpreted by the admin). Maysara (talk) 17:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but any reasonable legal proceeding would determine that to be a threat. --Chris (talk) 17:52, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

So, what happens when a user warned of discretionary sanctions moves to a topic area not covered by them? Is it just regular content dispute again? --Selket ^Talk 18:25, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

He's been warned about his behavior here and even if it went outside of sanctions that would still be looked at. If he acts in a simiar manner again free free to report it. --WGFinley (talk) 18:49, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Outing

Unless I'm mistaken(and granted, I haven't done much digging), the IP's post is outing and should be deleted/reverted, and rev-deleted.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 19:50, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Considered that but the user he named edits under his real name and no other information was revealed I don't think it's outing. --WGFinley (talk) 21:20, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Last I checked, 'D' was not his first name.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 21:24, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

There is a post on Dab's talk page referring to the old thread with the full name that's still there. However deleting it seems a bit pointless to me since I find plenty of discussions which include Dab's first name including ANI itself 203.184.61.141 (talk) 08:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

And you are posting anonymously here because? Dougweller (talk) 08:48, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Unless Dab is the one that posted that name, it's still outing.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 18:39, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

User:Langston Bonasera - Image issues

Langston Bonasera (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is a troublesome editor who just doesn't seem to get the message about uploading non-free images. As of right now, I have counted 47 unheeded warnings that have been posted to his talk page, most about images that he's uploaded. He has also been involved in several content disputes but the main issue here is images. Editors have tried to provide advice over that provided in warning templates,[20][21][22][23] but he has ignored the advice, going so far as to place a warning on his talk page to other editors, telling them not to complain about the pictures he's uploaded.[24] Most recently, he uploaded a new version of File:Homicide life on the Street.jpg without updating the source information for the file. I reverted the change and warned him.[25] Instead of following my advice, he simply reverted the to the image he'd uploaded, still without updating source information.[26] With so many similar warnings over the seven months that he's been editing here, he should have gotten the message now but hasn't. It seems that he needs a more firm advice push in the right direction than I can give him. --AussieLegend (talk) 01:13, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Having reviewed their contributions, I'm seeing a general lack of willingness to communicate overall, despite being warned multiple times that this isn't appropriate. If Langston continues to be unresponsive to discussion about the issue (including this thread), I think a block may be in order, but I'll leave some time for them to weigh in. Seraphimblade ^{Talk to me} 01:25, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm seeing over 10 uploads of images without providing any source - CSI NY & CSI Miami. I'll work at reverting and deleting them under F4 (no source). My opinion is that a block would be in order given the ongoing response to the multiple warnings. Skier Dude (talk 04:35, 8 September 2010 (UTC)

Langston Bonasera has been conspicuous by his absence since this discussion was commenced and this discussion fell off the page without being resolved. I hope I've restored it to the correct position. --AussieLegend (talk) 15:02, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I apologize for any inconvienience, but from the site that is using the FBI Seal illegally I don't think you have the right to critisise, so in the words of Bonasera, "I'm gonna make this easy for you. I Quit." I'll hand my badge (user account) in ( leave it abandoned ). Langston —Preceding undated comment added 19:00, 9 September 2010 (UTC).

The "FBI seal" isn't an issue. It's all of the other images that you've uploaded that are of concern. As for quitting, I'm not really convinced that your claim is genuine based on recent edits. Not long ago you created a new account and said you were going to use that instead.[27] After using it for a short time you "abandoned" it and returned to the old account. Today, less than half an hour after confirming that you're quitting,[28] you're back to using Rizzoli Isles again.[29][30] --AussieLegend (talk) 23:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I've dropped a note on the talk page of the new account. If they continue with problematic uploads, they should be blocked. Fences&Windows 02:07, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Gypsydog5150: Threats of violence, block evasion, sock puppetry, 3RR, vandalism... and other abusive behavior.

Last night an admin made this block of the IP account that made this edit directed to me on a talk page: "I didn't, you fucking piece of garbage. I hope you get shot in the face."

At about the same time, the articles from which this all arose (the PA gubernatorial election and candidate Tom Corbett) were protected by other admins: here and here and here

Page protection (and perhaps the block) forced the blocked IP user to emerge from his IP sockpuppets and begin using his registered account Gypsydog5150, and he has resumed the abusive behavior - despite the block imposed by an admin.

He's done a 3RR on the Tom Corbett page: here and wiped out the talk page (reverting again to the wipe after I restored it) here

These are clearly all the same editor, based on the edits on the articles in question, his various other editing patterns, and his location in Pittsburgh.

All of the IP addresses (which appear to be dynamically assigned) trace back to Verizon in Pittsburgh.

Note Gypsydog5150's contributions show an interest in:

Greensburg PA (a suburb of Pittsburgh)

A Pittsburgh company called Owens and Minor

Van_Halen

Poison

The Pittsburgh IP accounts in question show some of the same interests (and even at least one of the same edits):[31] [32] [33] [34] [35]

I note Gypsydog5150 has a history of abusive editing: [36] [37] [38] [39] [40]

It seems to me that it would be appropriate to take some stronger acction and perhaps a permanent ban, regarding this editor. I take the "I hope you get shot in the face" comment pretty seriously.

I suspect you don't want to get into the substance of the editing dispute, but I'd like to point out that after he was blocked and the pages protected, I restored the Tom Corbett page to a version closer to what he wanted than the revert imposed by the admin. here. I was trying to be fair about it.

His alteration here of the election polling numbers was pure vandalism.

Thanks. John2510 (talk) 03:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Umm, you are accusing me of things I didn't do. And somebody saying "they hope you get shot in the face" is not a threat or illegal in any way. Do you realize how many people are on the internet? And also why didn't you bring up you edit wars that you started? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Gypsydog5150 (talk • contribs) 21:05, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Gypsydog, to say in an edit summary what was said using the ip account is a gross insult, a violation of WP:NPA, and a threat of violence--you are presumably saying the violence was only a metaphor, but we tend to take statements as wildly excessive as this as written. No conceivable editing dispute can justify it. I gather you are also denying that you are that ip. The only question in my mind is do we need Checkuser before blocking you, or whether the behavioral evidence is sufficient. If any other admin will agree with me that the behavioral evidence is sufficient, I will do the block. DGG ( talk ) 22:56, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I have done an indef block based on my own review of the situation. This was simply not vaguely OK behavior, and there's little doubt that the IP and editor are one and the same. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:11, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

He's not getting the basic message. See his responses here and here. He's now involving family members of admins addressing his behavior.

On the first one, the IP traces back to the same Pittsburgh Verizon origin per here.

Thanks for getting involved in this. I'm thinking my blood pressure would be better served if I stuck to editing... I dunno... geography articles, and steered clear of political articles. I doubt I'll follow my head on that. John2510 (talk) 02:54, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

FYI - I also got a phone call claiming "This cost me $6,000" and a large number of incoherent threats before I hung up. I have disabled talk page access and revdel'ed the threats against myself and my wife on his talk page, and blocked the IP for a year.

The claim that this cost six thousand dollars is interesting - do we have known paid editors in Philadelphia? Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 04:02, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I will note that the IP range Gypsydog5150 is on is fairly busy, but I would say that the edits are mostly his. If this continues to become an issue file and SPI case and we can look into the option of rangeblocks. Tiptoety ^talk 04:11, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry you had to get this involved. It really makes you wonder sometimes if it's worth it... John2510 (talk) 04:15, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I have stepped up to handling problematic and potentially vengeful Wikipedia problems with the full knowledge that I'm using my real name, that my contact info is out there, etc. I didn't do that by accident or without expecting a certain level of stuff to come flying as a result.

With that said, the particulars here are most unfortunate. The apparent paid editing, the on-wiki abuse against a number of editors, etc.

If there's more onwiki problems I concur that a rangeblock is reasonable. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 04:32, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

use of pages in userspace

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

WP:STICK, heat >>> light --Jayron32 04:10, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

---

This section is a good example of something that needs to be addressed. I warned user about not using Wikipedia as a social network and user tells me to "get off my back and fuck off!" Meanwhile, user has continued to use talk page as a forum in follow-up edits. Civility and policy issues with this one. Atlantabravz (talk) 04:15, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• More neutral title and, given the context I see no reason for admin intevention here. If I were in the same situation I would undoubtedly react to your unwarranted lecture in similar ways. The user is contributing to article space and has wide lattitude, as does every other user, to use their userspace as they will within reason. This was well within reason. Spartaz ^Humbug! 04:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Concur. You left a rather abrupt template on her talk page, and then complain when she doesn't take it with a thank you? There's a reason WP:DTTR is good advice, and you needed to have followed it here- or even better, to have investigated the situation some more before inserting yourself into it. If you have a problem with an experienced editor, some discussion goes a lot farther than a newbie template. Courcelles 04:51, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Indeed. Editors will sometimes communicate in a social or friendly manner in their userspace. I have editors I know IRL or off-wiki, and discussing things of a personal nature, from time to time, does not violate WP:NOTMYSPACE. The issue is the number of social edits as relative to the number of project-relevent edits. This is I don't see where this user is any kind of a problem at all. This user is a good content editor, and I see no reason they should not be left alone. --Jayron32 05:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • Especially given the sensitivity of the post referred to. Spartaz ^Humbug! 05:11, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• I would also have told you to fuck off, and stop templating people who are in mourning for sharing their feelings with their friends on Wiki. I'm disgusted that this was your response to reading that post. If you had to say anything at all, words of sympathy would have been appropriate. -- Jrtayloriv (talk) 05:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• I'd be spitting fire and venom if someone did that to me; I'd probably use even stronger language than that. I don't like sympathy (directed at me) much, but templating me would be far worse. I can AGF that the OP was just taking NOTMYSPACE a bit too seriously, but I hope that they don't do this again. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 05:23, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• WP:NOTMYSPACE, as I see it, was created for people who appear to regard this place as a place to network— beyond that, I'm fairly sure we're allowed to have lives that interfere with editing once in a while, and to express that. We're a community. sonia♫ 05:33, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• I should also point out WP:IAR. A little friendly communication once in a while can go a long way towards cooperative editing, which leads to improvement of the project. I'd say as long it's not a user's primary purpose on this encyclopedia it's more than acceptable. elektrikSHOOS 05:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• I know this is marked "resolved", but I think there's maybe an opportunity for another bit of resolution. I once templated a good-faith content editor. They'd requested article protection at WP:RFPP, I lectured them about something entirely different, there was a heated exchange, and then I stepped back and thought about things. I went back to the editor's talkpage, apologised, and suggested we start over. We started over. I learned a huge amount of background stuff about serious issues on-wiki that the editor was dealing with in the course of her content work. Embarrassingly, the editor forgave me, and came to regard me very positively. I still have to remind her that I was a WP:DICK. She doesn't care. The editor? DocOfSoc. My point, obviously, is that this can end positively for both parties. Atlantabravz has behaved far better than I did, so I'd suggest an amicable resolution is a very real possibility. TFOWR 08:38, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Retired

It appears, unfortunately, that the sound advice expressed in some of the replies above has fallen on deaf ears. It's a shame, really, because I know that it wasn't the intention of any of those that commented for Atlantabravz to reach this conclusion. —DoRD (talk) 10:24, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Shame. Clearly templating was a very bad idea but (s)he did have a reasonable point to make. :( --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 10:34, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Reasonable point, yes, but the choice of place, time, and method for making that point couldn't have been more poorly-chosen. Nonetheless, Atlantabravz seems to be a rather productive editor so I hope that, in time, he rethinks his decision. —DoRD (talk) 12:16, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

He made a report that didn't go his way. Who here hasn't? To "retire" over it... this is past the "fourth grade", and no one needs to "coddle" him back here. He's been here since March of 2007. Please... Doc9871 (talk) 12:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

This is terrible. Getting told to "fuck off" is unacceptable, and not only did AN/I not reasonably address his complaint, more than one commenter said they would've said worse(!) No wonder he left, this is like going to the police to report a rape and having the police chief say "Too bad, I would've raped you twice." Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

A better analogy would be if you walked up to someone and punched them in the face, they punch you back, and you go crying "assault!" to the police. Atlantabravz has some serious fucking nerve IMO dropping that warning template into the middle of DocofSoc's talk page comment about autism; it was rude, terribly inappropriate, and the response was exactly what he deserved. I'd have to wonder just how Atlantabravz came upon this talk page topic in the first place. Have these two had prior interactions? Given this bit of harassment by a banned user not long after, something doesn't sit well here. Tarc (talk) 16:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

We can walk around with analogies all day but at the end of the day Atlantabravz did something silly, Doc responded in an unacceptable way, Atlantabravz went on and took it to AN/I inappropriately and... AN/I failed to AGF and swung an axe. Lets just let it lie. Doc is now aware of the accepted policy on the use of user space (even if not in the best way) and Atlantabravz is chastised (even if not in the best way). [EDIT: FWIW I agree with/support Atlantabravz's point] --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 16:26, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think it should be let lie. We lost a valuable contributor because ANI failed to respond appropriately to a perfectly reasonable complaint. Andrew Lenahan - Starblind 16:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I regret that Atlantabtavz decided to retire, but he absolutely was *not* in the right here. Doc left a post on his own talk page, noting that his granddaughter has died (from a seizure induced by her autism). Atlantabravez responded by dumping a "not a social network" template on it, which is appalling. Yes, Doc should not have dropped the f bomb in his response, but Atlantabravez got flamed at AN/I for being in insensitive clod. Retiring is a disproportionate response, but obviously others disagree. Horologium (talk) 16:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Clearly this is a terrible event for Doc (she has written about it before on her user page a number of times). But Wikipedia is not the place for grief therapy. We should be willing to support members suffering, but this entire episode is a reason why updates/commentary such as Doc's should be discouraged. I recommend off-wiki contact via email as the best way to go and a slap on the wrist to Atlantabravez for insensitivity :) --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 17:16, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Let me see if I've got this straight. An editor posts a few graphs on their own talk page commemorating the death of a granddaughter 10 years ago, speaks a little bit of their grief and the difficulties imposed by the deceased child's extreme lack of empathy (as a consequence of autism)... and gets a "not a social" network template slapped on them by some jerk (completely lacking empathy themselves, it seems).. do i have this right? And then the template slapper storms off in a huff because they got a rough response for their thoughtless intervention on the other editors talk page? Good riddance, I say.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:25, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

This. Tarc (talk) 17:34, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I still think the AN/I response was inappropriate. Telling him he acted like an insensitive jerk is fair; what was said is not. Atlantabravz had correct advice to give; (s)he was not particularly insensitive about it, but the whole reason for having such guidelines is born out in this thread. It is sad and silly. It is inappropriate to abuse a good faith action, even if it was a mistake --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 18:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Yes it was a good faith action - an incredibly stupid, insensitive, and nasty good faith action. The sort of action that makes us look like martinets and bullies. A fuck-free response might have been more appropriate, but the mood and tenor of the response was entirely appropriate. I certainly wouldn't have wasted more than two words to communicate my response to such an insult. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 19:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I realize you're doing your best here, but do understand that in any adult, professional environment, Atlantabravz would be facing the full wrath of HR. and Starblind's rape metaphor could have serious consequences. No society, workplace, environment, or project can sustain itself while actively punishing people for a moment's grief. 70.120.174.67 (talk) 19:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

This is all a perfect example of why the civility policy matters. Most of the time the little throwaway unkindnesses are just that; sometimes, they lead to grossly exaggerated drama and people seriously hurt and sometimes leaving.

Original (now departed) poster failed to understand that their message was brusque and rude and violated civility. Response was rude, however justified it was, and that made it worse. A number of people up above were rude.

To those of you who were casually abusive above - Think about what you did. The messages could have been communicated in a non-abusive manner. You didn't have to go push someone off Wikipedia to make the point you were making.

Him leaving was not a predictable result, and you're not at fault for that (his decision), but you all certainly contributed by creating a hostile environment for him.

Casual abuse is never good. Please don't. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The casual abuse was the template. And cruel. And thoughtless. The response -- telling the abusive templater "to fuck off" in a moments grief was no big deal.Bali ultimate (talk) 20:35, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

In the absolute nicest way possible; it appears Doc's niece died several years ago, and her sister in March. I am sure she still feels awful grief for those moments, and my sympathy goes out to her - but the ongoing updates to WP are inadvisable, for exactly this sort of reason. Atlantabravz just picked completely the wrong way to raise that point. It does not excuse the responses above which were extremely uncivil (Doc's response can be excused, the above certainly can not). --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 20:52, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Anniversaries still hurt. So what if time has passed? This is a classic case of valuing civility over common sense. If you behave in a hurtful and insensitive way and them ask for feedback you can't complain when people are honest in response. Spartaz ^Humbug! 21:01, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I might misunderstand, but you appear to be arguing that the ongoing updates to WP are inadvisable because someone might abuse her for them. The ethical response is not to silence DocofSoc, but confront the user who placed that abusive template, and then the admin who compared her to a rapist. I do agree that the situation is not best served by the "casual abuse" of Atlantabravez; a formal, final warning, followed by a lengthy block if the templating was repeated, would be best. 70.120.174.67 (talk) 21:15, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

(ec)I'm sorry but I have no sympathy. The OP acted in an insensitive and careless manner that would have inevitably brought the recipient pain. Their reaction to this arrant stupidity was human and understandable in the circumstances and prattling on about civility completely misses the point that human interactions lead to human responses. What if the original template had driven off the recipient? No-one would have cared then because decorum would have been maintained but it would (unfortunately) be further evidence of what a po-faced over serious and self-important place we have become. Spartaz ^Humbug! 20:39, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I think that sums up nicely why the civility policy as it's currently policed is such a childish waste of time Spartaz. It might as well be renamed the naughty words policy. Malleus Fatuorum 20:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Having rules requiring civility and avoid personal attacks is a good idea, but the policies aren't as black and white as you make out. WP:NPA has this sensible advice: "Sometimes the best way to respond to an isolated personal attack is not to respond at all." If the OP had simply realised that their templating was insensitive and had backed off, then they'd not have retired in a huff. Instead, they made no attempt to discuss it as advised ("If you feel that a response is necessary and desirable, you should leave a polite message on the other user's talk page") and came here demanding sanctions. To retire based on this incident is totally disproportionate - but we can't legislate for poor judgment. Fences&Windows 01:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Enacting Community Bans

I just banned Libb Thims after a discussion at AN. Ryulong raises an interesting point about whether my block notice should include the boilerplate about how to appeal a block. I'm not sure what the policy is on that and would appreciate views on whether this should be removed and whether banned users are allowed to post unblock messages. Spartaz ^Humbug! 08:03, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Err on the side of mercy. Should he request unblocking, let it be assayed on it's merits. MtD (talk) 08:19, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I was under the impression that banned users were not welcome to edit here at all, which includes their former user talk pages. Ban appeals can be made by email to Arbcom. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 08:21, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Yeah this isn't a ban imposed by ArbCom, it's a thing that has been done by a handful of worthies on AN. All I'm suggesting is that should he post a block appeal, we should consider it. Just coz. The quality of mercy and all that. MtD (talk) 08:27, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Bans imposed by "handfuls of worthies" are not in a different category from Arbcom bans (or indeed Death By Jimbo). They're just bans, and in this particular case good ones; the user apparently devotes his online life to pushing his fringe science, so it is beyond unlikely that he's going to be able to edit constructively here. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 09:12, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Except it would be misleading to tell a banned user that they can only appeal to ArbCom by email when (in fact) they are not the only body that has standing to consider such appeals (see also banning policy). Ncmvocalist (talk) 09:19, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I didn't say "only", I just said "can" - which is basically what the ban review policy says. It's one of multiple options. The point was that editors who are not welcome to contribute here don't need to keep their user talk privileges for the purpose of appeal. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward: not at work) - talk 09:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Well why don't we see what the wretch does? Should he decide to appeal to ArbCom, so be it. Should he decide to throw himself upon the mercy of the community -- well let's hope he can throw that far. Whatever we should not be punitive, rather we should give in to our gracious selves. MtD (talk) 09:32, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• In regards to community bans, ban appeals are not limited to AC, and users are permitted to post unblock requests - but administrators are not permitted to accept them in the absence of a community consensus to lift the ban. The reason for this is if the user wants to appeal the ban, it's usually the administrator who notices the unblock request who will need to forward the appeal to the community. This part may not be clear from the theory outlined in policy.
• All that said, in regards to the talk page notification, a polite and less bot-like message ought to be typed and a standard block notice should probably not be used. The talkpage notice should mention the duration of the ban (if it is a definite duration), the link to discussion, and must refer the banned user to Wikipedia:Ban#Review_and_reversal_of_bans on how to appeal the measure taken (unless there are additional appeal terms in the text of supported ban - for example, some bans specifically include "may not appeal before 6 months of the ban has passed" in which case this should be specified in the notice too). Ncmvocalist (talk) 08:23, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Community bans have a number of procedural problems on their own, but we shouldn't make it worse by denying them basic due process. Notice and a chance to be heard are basic principles of any fair system (and a few not fair ones). We'd be a joke if we didn't allow a reasonable opportunity for an editor to be heard.

I might also add that I agree with some comments earlier this week that there are way too many block first and ask questions later. Editors that aren't clearly pure-vandals deserve a chance to respond. This kind of decency shouldn't be new to most of the regulars here. Shadowjams (talk) 09:30, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

It stands to reason that community banned editors should be able to appeal to the community, as Ncmvocalist discusses above; if allowing them to edit their own talkpages as an exception to the ban would encourage gaming, perhaps they should be directed to email unblock-en (or whatever the exact address is), at which point those monitoring that list could post the ban appeal here. Skomorokh 14:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Banned users have an option to appeal, via e-mail to ArbCom. They can also communicate with other editors via e-mail or IRC and ask those editors to post an unban request here or at WP:AN on their behalf.

"Fairness" does not require multiple outlets for appeal, simply that appeal be possible, and banned means banned - a banned user's contributions are not welcome anywhere on Wikipedia. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:22, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, I wasn't clear about this... There's a distinction between whether or not the banned user has an opportunity for appeal early on in the process, before the ban (or immediately after it) and appeals some time later, weeks or months. The former needs to be in a less cumbersome, and more open, method than arbcom emails. If you're point's only about the latter then I agree with you. But it would be a mistake for the only avenue for appeal at any time to be arbcom. That method is not open, doesn't involve the wider community, and simply won't generate the attention required. As big as this encyclopedia and community have become, the farflung policy pages don't always get a very wide selection of editors willing or able to comment, and that's a serious problem, especially when things move quickly. That is, fundamentally, my main hesitation regarding community bans. Shadowjams (talk) 19:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Beyond My Ken, I think you have missed the point of my comment and some of the discussion preceding it; community bans ought to be able to be appealed to the community. ArbCom should not be involved unless something has gone awry with our standard methods of handling matters. Skomorokh 22:08, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I have not missed the point, I have disagreed with you. It is sufficient that community bans be appealed to Arbcom, or that an appeal to the community be brought up by a third party. I see no necessity for a banned editor to be allowed to directly appeal their ban to the community. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:10, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I think that sweeping sort of approach isn't helpful. It would be another story if user was trying to circumvent the ban (testing limits), or has misused their talk, or it's an exceptional thing (eg personally identifiable information, other privacy issues), or the user needs/wants to use another appeal body or off-wiki venue. But where none of that is applicable, and the user has complied, I see it as needless bureaucracy if an user is forced to use an off-wiki means to simply appeal to the community. That is, where we are asked by a subject to modify/remove something we ourselves imposed, it's we who should consider the matter due to procedural fairness. In those circumstances, there is no reason to make us less accessible by forcing users to use email/IRC; I don't see any wisdom in discouraging on-wiki transparency in favour of secrecy and mouthpieces. Ncmvocalist (talk) 11:26, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Suggestion for this page?

Please excuse me if this is the wrong venue. My rationale for posting this here is that it would affect those(meaning admins) that commonly check this noticeboard.

.. To the topic,

I notice that time and time again, users post here when there is an AIV backlog. What if we simply used a template to post a notice to the top of this page when AIV became a certain size in bytes?— Dædαlus ^Contribs 08:08, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

That sounds like a good idea. Mjroots (talk) 09:07, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Without dismissing this idea, it is not a case of administrators simply being unaware that backlogs exist; we already have WP:BACKLOG for that. In many cases, a personal plea, for all its admitted faults, is a lot more effective in drawing volunteers (speaking from personal experience). On another note, the header sections of these noticeboards are bloated at least five times more than is appropriate; if there were an automated digest, I'd rather it was added as a section or footer. Skomorokh 15:01, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:BACKLOG doesn't appear to contain lists for administrative-based things, like AIV.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 20:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

How often is it really backlogged though? They may pile up every so often, but does it ever get out of hand to the point of being truly backlogged? Jmlk17 20:32, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

See the administrative subcategory and linked pages. Skomorokh 20:59, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I think Daedalus raises a good point, even though those other mechanisms exist, it's clearly not preventing the frequent backlogs that arise.   Thorncrag  21:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Which is precisely my point above; ceteris paribus, no amount of automation will. Skomorokh 22:05, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

You're probably right, but that doesn't mean we should just ignore it  :-)   Thorncrag  22:08, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

You are also probably right, but I'm not convinced this is a better way of not ignoring it than the existing method as described by the OP. Cheers, Skomorokh 22:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

What if we used a div to float a box in the bottom left, or right, displaying the notice?— Dædαlus ^Contribs 05:09, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

With a hide option?— Dædαlus ^Contribs 05:15, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Sounds like there are already places where the backlog notifications get posted--the backlogs happen anyway because nobody looks in those places. That includes the headers of this page (which probably don't get looked at much either). So they get posted as ANI threads, because people do notice those. Main alternative I can think of is a subscription bot that delivers notices to usertalk pages of admins and others who want to receive them. 75.57.241.73 (talk) 06:18, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

User:213.33.31.120 @ Gaza War

I am requesting the rollback of IP User:213.33.31.120 and a short preventative block on editing from the address. The IP has made very questionable edits:

• [41] (removal of sourced info with additions of unsourced info contradicting it)
• [42] (what appeared to be more trolling)
• [43] (some more with the removal of a source)
• [44] (the only edit that isn't blatantly terrible. The POV is a little much, though)

I have asked the IP to provide reasoning numerous times.[45][46][47][48][49] It might be a troll, it might be a sock (he appears to know about templates), or it could just be a new IP. Regardless, the edits are just too questionable.Cptnono (talk) 08:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

And now the IP is edit warring to get something he deems as most important to the top of an article regardless of general layout practices.[50][51] The whole Yesha Council thing was his provided reasoning over at Gaza War.

This is an obvious case of disruption and needs to be taken care of.Cptnono (talk) 09:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

And this one doesn't even make sense [52]. Obvious disruption is obvious. As the diffs pile up I might just take it to the vandalism board.Cptnono (talk) 09:44, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

You are starting a vandal witch hunt. It is way past midnight your time, go to sleep. It will clear your mind. --213.33.31.120 (talk) 09:47, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• I've blocked the IP for vandalism. Competency and POV may also come into it, but vandalism works for me. The IP's comment above sealed the deal. TFOWR 09:58, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • He is back now to try avoid his block. [53] LibiBamizrach (talk) 04:16, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:SPAM on Taobao

Would it be possible if http://www.esybuy.com was added to the list of prohibited spam URLs? A number of users keep adding the URL; note how they've piped it so that it appears as www.china.org.cn/english/business/239421.htm, which seems to be an attempt to fool people who click the link, anticipating a reference. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 13:17, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Follow the instructions at WP:SBL. –xeno^talk 13:18, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

new type of personal attack tactic

User:Dr. Dan made this IMO very uncivil personal attack [54] quote: "You see, Loosmark has a penchant to appear in the most unusual and untimely manner whenever I make a post on WP some have suggested that there's a schoolboy crush involved, others have suggested that he's stalking me." Just by examining my edit history and that of Dr.Dan one can see that his claim that I appear whenever he makes a post on WP is blatantly false: [55], [56]. Further, nobody ever claimed that I am stalking him or that I have schoolboy crush(!?), in fact this seems to be "clever" attempt at passing a personal attack under the radar: The formula is "some have suggested that {insert heavy insult}, but I don't think that's the case". Just imagine somebody saying "some have suggested that you are beating your wife but i don't believe that's the case". IMO that's nothing but a covert personal attack and IMO totally unacceptable.  Dr. Loosmark  16:25, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

WP:WQA is thataway... Jclemens (talk) 16:38, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Appeal by GregJackP

Appealing user

GregJackP (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) – GregJackP Boomer! 17:01, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Sanction being appealed

Article ban on Climate change alarmism, imposed at GregJackP's talk page, logged at WP:GS/CC/L#Log of sanctions

Editor who imposed or found consensus to impose the sanction

NuclearWarfare (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) / NuclearWarfare (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Notification of that editor

NuclearWarfare notified [57], William M. Connolley notified [58], Wikispan notified [59].

Statement by GregJackP

NuclearWarfare imposed a sanction that was in error. His sanction stated:

"This is ridiculous. You are going probably going to cite this action as an example of my abusing my admin tools or something, but: consider yourself banned from Climate change alarmism. When the author of a source says that you are wrong, you should step back and listen, not continue to edit war because you read the paper differently. Doing so otherwise is blatant disruption. NW (Talk) 12:33, 9 September 2010 (UTC)"

First, my only edits to the article as to this matter were:

• [60], reverting a removal by William M. Connolley and adding a source from a peer-reviewed article and which was reverted by WMC;
• [61], reverting WMC, with a request to discuss and come to a consensus; and
• [62], adding material and a source from a peer-reviewed article and which did not revert any other edits, nor remove any material.

Following the last edit (which was subsequently reverted by Wikispan and which I did not contest) I had made no other edits to the article, confining myself to discussion of the material on the article talk page and on the ArbCom PD talk page. At the time of the sanction, NW had not complied with the requirements of climate change probation, which states:

"Prior to any sanctions being imposed, the editor in question shall be given a warning with a link to these provisions; and, where appropriate, should be counseled on specific steps that he or she can take to improve his or her editing in accordance with relevant policies and guidelines." (emphasis added)

NW did not provide any warning (a prerequisite for a sanction in this area), nor any steps to take to improve editing in the area. Additionally, this ban seems punitive, stating that I was "continuing to edit war" when I had not touched the actual article at all since it went to discussion on the talk pages the day before NW imposed the sanction. I was under the impression that we were supposed to go to the talk pages for discussion, rather than continuing to edit the article when there was a dispute. This seems punitive in nature, and my actions violated no established rule or policy as there were only 2 reverts on my part. It also seems as if the sanction was biased, as WMC had made 4 reverts [63] and was continuing to edit war, but without being sanctioned.

@Count Iblis. I appreciate your efforts to come to a solution for this. In this case, I made two reverts and then confined myself to talk page discussion. The problem I have with this is that I was banned from the article for disruption/edit warring when I had in fact gone to the talk pages for discussion. I just want to be treated the same as everyone else. Am I not supposed to go to the talk pages for discussion? Should I have continued to revert WMC? Does that mean that I should have just shut up when WMC disagreed with me? All I was doing in this case was presenting my view on the matter on the talk pages. I really don't understand how making 4 reverts is OK, but merely discussing it on the talk pages is not. It seems that it is encouraging one to go straight to the article and edit war, and this is very troubling to me. It smacks of groupthink, where no opposing opinion is allowed. GregJackP Boomer! 17:48, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The following copied from the 3RR page.

"Without commenting on the actual content dispute, I don't think William M. Connolley's edits alone warrant sanctions. Discussion is ongoing in (multiple) places on the use of sources, and blocking anyone at this point is only going to hinder discussion. I'm watchlisting the page, and won't hesitate to impose a 1RR restriction per WP:GS/CC if y'all can't work it out. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 17:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)"

Note the comment that "blocking anyone at this point is only going to hinder discussion..." I have asked him to comment here. GregJackP Boomer! 18:05, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

@TenOfAllTrades. Please re-check the history of the article and the diffs. WMC removed global cooling which was sourced by another reference. I reverted that, and added the peer-reviewed source in question. He removed it, and I restored it one time, at the same time asking for discussion on it. That's it. One restoration of reference with a request to discuss. The remainder of my involvement was on the talk page. I did not restore it further. Please correct your comment to show the facts. GregJackP Boomer! 18:44, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment - I can't say this any better than TGL said it at the ArbCom PD page, so I'm quoting him here:

"Okay, am I missing something here? I'm only going by the diffs that WMC provided and from what I can tell he is upset that Greg added the words "or global cooling" to the article? Is that a fair assessment?

If those were the words added then they are clearly supported by the source[64]:

"Despite active efforts to answer these questions, the following pervasive myth arose: there was a consensus among climate scientists of the 1970s that either global cooling or a full-fledged ice age was imminent (see the “Perpetuating the myth” sidebar). A review of the climate science literature from 1965 to 1979 shows this myth to be false. The myth’s basis lies in a selective misreading of the texts both by some members of the media at the time and by some observers today."

"The new data about global temperatures came amid growing concerns about world food supplies, triggering fears that a planetary cooling trend might threaten humanity’s ability to feed itself"

For heaven's sake the paper has a sidebar listing a lot of literature at the time and trying to debunk their findings, but you can't debunk what they were saying. Here is a quote from the siebar about some more literature at the time:

"The Cooling (Ponte 1976), predicts that cooling could lead to billions of deaths by 2050"

I didn't even read through the entire paper, and scanned through the first part and found dozens of examples of "climate change alarmism" from the 70's based on global cooling. That WMC and his friends are arguing that there wasn't alarmism in the 70's is ridiculous to anyone with half a brain, but fully expected by those with fully functioning equipment. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I reinserted it and asked for discussion. The entire paper was about dispelling the myth of scientific consensus of global cooling, and cited the above examples of popular media alarmism in that regard. That is what the paper said, and I'll be happy to provide a copy to any admin that wishes to read the entire paper, including sidebars. I wasn't even looking for anything by WMC, but an Ebsco host search using the term "Global cooling" brought it up. It wasn't until I began to format the {{cite journal}} template that I even noticed who wrote it, and I will admit that I thought it was humorous, since WMC had been steadily removing global cooling material. I was attempting to follow the appropriate rules, had not 3RR'd, went to the discussion page and stayed there - this is what the policy required, or so I thought. The block was a day later and punitive, but I don't guess it matters since the lynch mob is forming. GregJackP Boomer! 21:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

@TOAT: I read what the paper said, in plain English, and asked for discussion. I find it hard to believe that we go on an editor's personal knowledge and opinion instead of what is actually written in the paper. I took it to talk for discussion. GregJackP Boomer! 21:31, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

WMC deleted "global cooling" and its associated source. I did an Ebsco host search and found a peer-reviewed source. It happened to be co-authored by WMC, which I did not even notice until I was preparing the cite journal template (and which I thought was funny). There is an entire sidebar that covers the alarmism about global cooling in the popular media. I put "global cooling" back into the article, WITH A FOOTNOTE that the article was about debunking the myth of global cooling scientific consensus, and that the article cited numerous examples of alarmism in the press. THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT THE ARTICLE SAYS. I did not misrepresent it, and anyone that says that I did is intellectually dishonest. I'm not the only one that thinks that this is what Peterson, Connolley and Fleck said, see Bedford, Daniel (2010). "Agnotology as a Teaching Tool: Learning Climate Science by Studying Misinformation". Journal of Geography. 109 (4). The National Council for Geographic Education: 159–165. ISSN 0022-1341. Writers of syndicated opinion columns in leading news publications occasionally quote the scientific literature in such an egregiously selective manner that only the most charitable interpretation could see the mistake as a genuine oversight rather than a deliberate attempt to misrepresent (examples are provided by Peterson, Connolley, and Fleck 2008). See also Hufbauer, Gary Clyde; Charnovitz, Steve; Kim, Jisun (2009). Global warming and the world trading system. Peterson Institute. p. 115. ISBN 9780881324280. In reviewing the earlier literature on climate change, Thomas C. Peterson, William M. Connolley, and John Fleck (2008) note that in the 1970s there was widespread concern about global cooling (escalating to fears of another ice age) I used the same examples as noted by Bedford and Hufbauer! Please also note that since WMC's article has only been cited 13 times, I find it hard to believe that he was not aware of the fact that his article had been used to support the material in exactly the same way that I was doing. Of course, that won't matter, you are looking to lynch a skeptic. GregJackP Boomer! 12:36, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Statement by NuclearWarfare

TenOfAllTrades seems to have gone into sufficient detail about why I chose to ban GregJackP, so I won't waste people's time in repeating his words. GregJackP is well aware of the standards in this area, having been heavily commented on the Proposed Decision for the Climate Change Arbitration Case. While he may not have been formally sanctioned before, this would be akin to someone who had extensively commented at WT:IPCOLL being blocked under Arab-Israeli discretionary sanctions and then complaining that he had not been notified about the existence of discretionary sanctions or how to improve his behavior. I recognize that I usually take a more hardline approach than most administrators, which is why I shall be stepping back for now. Whatever other administrators wish to do is fine with me, but I do want to say that I am seeing far more wikilawyering than usual in this case, which I certainly think should be taken into account. NW (Talk) 18:52, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Shell Kinney's comment on this may be of interest. NW (Talk) 19:13, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Comments by others about the appeal by GregJackP

Comment by Count Iblis

I wrote about a possible voluntary restriction GregJackP could stick to:

I don't think blocking editors is a good solution because other editors with the same behavior will then step in. It is better to think of an agreement for the editors who find themselves in frequent disputes along these lines. If Cla68, GregJackP, William and a few of the other involved editors would stick to a variant of this, then what would have happened is that e.g. Cla68 could have made the edit about global cooling and William could have responded on the talk page. Then others could have continued the discussion and continue editing. GregJackP could have made his comments too, but he could not have reverted back to Cla68's version if others had changed the text. By keeping Cla68, William and GregJackP involved, you actually prevent an influx of new editors editing in a disruptive way, because any such editor watching the discussion from a distance can see hat his/her points are already discussed. Count Iblis (talk) 15:47, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Note that my point of view on this issue is supportive of what most other editors wrote in that section. So, I share the sentiments that make some of them say that GregJackP should be topic banned from the climate change area. However, as I explained, that doesn't really solve the editing disputes in these pages on the longer term. From GregJackP point of view, it seems to me that the choice on the longer term is between eventually getting topic banned when the community is fed up with his editing style (most likely to happen after the ArbCom case concludes and the discretionary sanction regime comes into force), or putting himself under some voluntary restrictions now and getting used to editing under that regime. Count Iblis (talk) 17:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment by A Quest for Knowledge

Without commenting on the content issue (which I didn't look into), I am concerned that this appears to be a punitive sanction by NuclearWarfare. WMC was clearly edit-warring.[65][66][67][68][69][70] yet NuclearWarfare chose to only sanction GregJackP. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
@Jehochman: How did you arrive at a 6 month topic ban? I'm not mistaken, for the past nine months, the established consensus of uninvolved admins in the CC probation area has been to give a warning or 24-hour block for a first time sanction. If you're trying to change the sanctions regime so that they are tougher, I think that's good news. In fact, I've been saying for some time now that the admins should be crack down on both warring factions. But in all fairness, some advance notice should have been given that the sanctions regime was going to be changing. Further, I hope that tougher sanctions are applied consistently. I note, for example, ScienceApologist is also misrepresenting a source.[71] Except that it's in a BLP which is even worse. That request has been open for two weeks now and still no action has been taken. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 20:16, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

It should be pointed out that I asked Jehochman on his talk page to respond to my post here,[72] and he responded by deleting my post on his talk page.[73] The larger issue why Jehochman is arguing against existing consensus remains unresolved. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 02:29, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Observation by TenOfAllTrades

Let me see if I understand this. The source in question (T.C. Peterson, W.M. Connolley, & J. Fleck. "The Myth of the 1970s Global Cooling Scientific Consensus", Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc. 89:1325–1337) appears to be used in the article as a source to support the opening sentence of our article, which purports to define the term 'climate change alarmism'. On examining the source, it doesn't use the term 'climate change alarmism' anywhere. The sole use of the word 'alarmists' is where the paper reports the words of a politician, as part of a description of how that politician had engaged in selective (and deceptive) quotation from published literature.

In this case, William M. Connolley removed the citation of the paper from our article's lede, because he knew it didn't actually support the statement it was attached to in our article. Dr. Connolley is eminently qualified to evaluate this, because he was one of the paper's three authors and is presumably familiar with the words that he wrote and published less than two years ago. What I see is GregJackP twice reverting the author of a source when that author explicitly states – in his edit summaries, and on the article talk page – that the source is being misrepresented.

With all due respect to A Quest for Knowledge, the content issue cannot be neglected if one wishes to understand this situation. This isn't a simple edit war; this is a Wikipedia editor wilfully ignoring a scientist's knowledge about his own published work, and going out of his way to provoke that scientist by misrepresenting his publication on Wikipedia. That's appalling, and GregJackP certainly deserved harsh sanction for it. If GregJackP had found a suitable, peer-reviewed scientific publication which interpreted the paper in his particular (and frankly novel) way, that might be a different kettle of fish. We, as Wikipedia editors, don't go telling the authors of primary sources that they didn't mean what they wrote, or that they didn't write what they meant; that's WP:OR and WP:SYN in the worst way. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 18:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)(corrected 18:54, 9 September 2010 (UTC))

Correction: GregJackP added the source twice, but the first time wasn't a revert. Given his ongoing conflict with WMC during the Climate Change Arbitration, the original decision to add the source citing WMC's work is difficult to see as anything but a deliberate provocation. In any event, he still has failed to explain why he decided to re-add the source, substituting his own judgement for that of the paper's own author in determining what the paper reported. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 18:54, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Observation by FellGleaming

With all due respect, the reliable source here is the paper itself, which has (presumably) gone through a peer review process and been published, to be part of the permanent historical record. We use reliable sources only here, not the opinions of editors, even if that editor happens to be the author of a source. Even ignoring the verifiability issue, there have been many times a person -- even a scientist -- later regrets something they wrote or said, and attempts to mischaracterize or at least minimize their earlier statements. Further, I note in this particular case that there are three authors on the paper, and the lead author is not here editing the article. It is not unusual for multiple authors to disagree on interpretations of their published content. This is why the fact that WMC is one of the authors of this paper is irrelevant to WP policy and the discussion at hand. The sole touchstone here should be whether or not GregJack's summary of the content is correct or not -- not as interpreted by WMC -- but as interpreted by any reasonable person based on the text of the paper itself.

To use an example from my own field, a paper was about to be published that contradicted the pet theory of one researcher. As a courtesy, he was asked to collaborate on that paper, and did so, contributing some data used for the analysis. After publication, he continued to argue to one and all that this paper was misinterpreting the data; a conclusion the lead author (and the majority of the scientific community) disagreed with. If this particular researcher came to Wikipedia and began tendentiously editing the entry on this paper, would we treat him as some reliable authority, when his edits clearly contradict the contents of the paper itself? (Note: I am not implying this is the case here, but simply arguing against granting any special status to any particular editor) Fell Gleaming^talk 18:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment by Spike Wilbury

(ec x2) I declined to sanction William M. Connolley here because I observed that discussion was ongoing and was best for progress. I'd like to see NuclearWarfare's answer to the concerns posted here, especially regarding the "warning" required by WP:GS/CC. I don't see in the log that GregJackP has been sanctioned before or has received prior warnings, so maybe NuclearWarfare can enlighten me. Normally we would not ban an editor from a page for this kind of behavior without community discussion. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 18:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment by Kim D. Petersen

I'll make this short, and only comment on the warning issue:

Despite assertions to the contrary, GregJackP has been warned here per the requirements in GS/CC. He is aware of GS/CC - has commented on several enforcement requests[74], and in fact he himself has warned others here. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:19, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Proposal by Jclemens

Without commenting on the substance of the dispute, GregJackP appears to not have been warned before the sanction was imposed. Thus, it is appropriate to modify the page ban to be a de facto warning of impending page ban should the disputed action continue, and remand everyone back to the talk page to discuss this and similar issues collegially.

Support

1. As author. Jclemens (talk) 18:39, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Opppose

Discussion

• Aside from whether the ban sticks, I should mention that I already informed the participants in this dispute that I will impose 1RR on the page if edit warring ensues. I would much prefer that to blocking or banning participants. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 18:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I basically agree with this. Although I can't really believe it, I'm inclined to agree with FellGleaming as well, at least as far as the RS vs. expert thing goes. We typically do not allow people to edit articles about themselves, much less require deference to them. However, I am curious if GregJackP actually didn't know about sanctions (raising basic fairness concerns) or if this is a purely procedural objection. --Selket ^Talk 19:18, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
    • See my comment above. GregJackP is very much aware of the GS/CC regime. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 19:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
      • Yes, that seems clear now. --Spike Wilbury (talk) 19:29, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
        • GregJackP was obviously aware of the sanctions since he was the subject of an RfE here.[75] A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:31, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
• Greg did not do anything wrong except edit war. This is a content dispute. If the uninvolved editors will look at the discussion on the arbcom page, they'll see that the arguments over the use of the paper are evenly split. NuclearWarfare has been editing the CC articles lately, and is therefore no longer an uninvolved editor in the topic. This ban has no validity. Cla68 (talk) 01:18, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
• Greg performed one revert, WMC performed two. Greg receives a lengthy topic ban; WMC receives nothing. Are you intentionally trying to make a mockery of fairness and balance? Fell Gleaming^talk 01:35, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Result of the appeal by GregJackP

This section is to be edited only by uninvolved administrators. Comments by others will be moved to the section above.

• User:GregJackP took actions that were intentionally provocative: he misrepresented a source written by another editor, and then revert warred with that editor. This is extreme WP:BATTLE behavior and shows that GregJackP is unfit to edit any climate change topics in the foreseeable future. I recommend a 6 month topic ban from all climate change pages broadly construed. We need to come down hard on bad faith behaviors such as misrepresentation of sources and trolling. Let's see what other uninvolved administrators think about this. Jehochman ^Talk 19:26, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I would support that. Spartaz ^Humbug! 20:48, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I would also support that; the original sanction of a ban from a single article was much too specific for the behaviour it sought to address. I would, however, suggest that 6 months is on the long side and prefer a duration of between 6 to 10 weeks . CIreland (talk) 21:06, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • I support this with the 6-month duration. Karanacs (talk) 21:40, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Support 6 month duration (first choice) or 2 months (midpoint of CIreland's proposal; second choice). People need to understand that when something's reached the point of multiple Arbcom reviews, playing silly buggers on content on the articles related to it is absolutely not ok anymore. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:27, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • 6 months sounds fine to me. We can always shorten the duration on appeal if necessary. T. Canens (talk) 07:26, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
• I disagree that GregJackP did anything that was intentionally provocative. Read the information presented carefully. A topic ban is so far over what's reasonable that it's mindboggling. The article ban should be overturned. ++Lar: t/c 22:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Why is this here?

This looks like something that belongs in Arb enforcement, not ANI. Tarc (talk) 17:37, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia:General_sanctions/Climate_change_probation explicitly gives ANI as one of the avenues for appealing sanctions. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 17:45, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Also, Arb enforcement hasn't begun yet. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

(ec)I brought it here for the reasons Boris noted, that it is the specified venue, and I noted that WMC brought the appeal of his last CC sanction here. GregJackP Boomer! 17:53, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

@ GregJackP, are you sure? As far as I can find, the only recent instance of a CC sanction against WMC being appealed was brought here by Bishonen.[76] . . dave souza, talk 18:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I think so. Didn't he bring the block for refactoring comments on his own talkpage here? If I'm wrong, please let me know. Or is that the same one? GregJackP Boomer! 18:15, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

That's the one brought here by Bishonen, check the link. Boris's logic can still apply. . . dave souza, talk 18:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

OK, well that won't be the first (or last) time I was wrong. Same general principle, although I'll strike that part of my earlier comment. Thanks, GregJackP Boomer! 18:25, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

<ec> No problem, just thought it was worth clarifying. . dave souza, talk 18:30, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

If GregJackP takes this matter to ArbCom, he should be aware that ArbCom will not feel any responsibility to address his appeal, but will take it as an opportunity to review any behavior of any kind (real or imagined, germane or otherwise) and act according to their whim upon their perception of the matters that they have chosen to consider. Here's a quote (italics mine): “ArbCom retains jurisdiction over the cases it hears. This may not always be clear, but anyone who fails to resolve matters at the community level and comes to ArbCom is running the risk of not getting the case or result they wanted. We define the scope of the case and the possible remedies, and have wide latitude to impose what we see fit.” Brews ohare (talk) 18:28, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Isn't that a little premature? Let's see what happens here first. GregJackP Boomer! 18:48, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

GregJackP: You may not be considering such an action at the moment. You are nuts to ever consider such an action. Brews ohare (talk) 10:34, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Seriously? I agree with Shell Kinney here. This was a ridiculous edit war, and I believe GregJackP (and Cla68) to be at fault for it. If the author of a scientific paper disputes an editor's analysis of that paper, then the appropriate step is to begin a talk page discussion, not to reinsert the disputed information. By reinserting it, you were edit-warring and being highly disruptive. If I had noticed this first I probably would have blocked for edit-warring and then issued the topic ban. Karanacs (talk) 19:36, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The first revert was carried out by WMC, and it appears he has more total recent reverts on the article than GregPJack. Why are you ignoring his role in this? Fell Gleaming^talk 20:49, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think people are ignoring it. They're just digging a bit deeper into the substance of the dispute as opposed to superficial revert-counting. We generally encourage that. MastCell ^Talk 21:03, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Its already been dealt with at AN3. Whatever happened to double jeopardy? Spartaz ^Humbug! 21:04, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with WMC's specific edits in this case. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:31, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Also note User:Cla68's involvement which he defends here. While we cannot rule out anything deliberately provocative about these actions to influence the ArbCom case, we also have to recognize that these editors do believe what they were editing, otherwise they would know in advance that they were shooting in their own feet. That's why I think a 0RR restriction on climate change related articles for Cla68 and GregJackP is more suitable to deal with this problem. Count Iblis (talk) 23:39, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I didn't edit war, but I stand by my interpretation of the paper as a source for the article. If you check the article's history, you'll see that Count Iblis added text which was contradicted by at least two of the sources. I tried to correct that, but was reverted by WMC which counted as his 4th revert within 24 hours. Also, WMC implied that me and Tillman were sock puppets with his edit summary. WMC has since explained that that wasn't his intention and has accepted a voluntary 48 hour ban from the article. I think there are several appropriate outcomes here, lift the inappropriate ban on Greg from the article, warn him, WMC, and Wikispan not to edit war, and remember that NuclearWarfare is not an uninvolved admin. Cla68 (talk) 02:05, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Conduct of admin Cailil

Resolved

 – Further discussion on this isn't going to help. Disengaging and de-escalating is what is needed here. Fences&Windows 01:00, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Cailil (talk · contribs) posted to my talk page on 8 September to warn me – quite correctly – for borderline incivility in this post to another editor. I immediately struck the offending comment, but I felt that the language used in his warning – "please avoid ad hominem remarks...This kind of comment is unhelpful and violates WP:NPA, WP:CIVIL and WP:TPG" – was totally disproportionate for the rather mild phrase "behave like a grownup", not to mention the incorrect use of "ad hominem", and I told him so.

Cailil responded with a "second warning", telling me that my comment was "tendentious and uncivil" and adding, "I would suggest that is not the best idea to test the limits while operating in an area under probation (as the British Isles naming dispute is)." Now, first of all my comment, while certainly brittle, was not uncivil, and the assertion that I was "testing the limits" was unfounded and unfair, but more importantly, in commenting on his post on my talk page I was not operating in any area under probation, so the implied threat of sanction under Wikipedia:General sanctions is, not to put too fine a point on it, an abuse of admin privileges.

I protested strongly, but in moderate language (not, for instance, using the phrase "abuse of admin privileges"). Cailil responded with an even more outrageous post, telling me I was "repeatedly behaving in a tendentious manner (after being warned for such behaviour)" and that my reply was "inappropriate and would be worthy of a 3rd warning - but I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt not issue a 3rd warning for it." Now, as long as I have been a user on WP it has been accepted practice that an editor may speak freely to another editor on his or her own talk page (as long as it's not outright abuse) without being threatened with sanctions. There is also – I hope and firmly believe – a tradition that admins do not use their position to place other editors at a disadvantage. There's a word for that, but I daren't utter it or I'll be blocked for sure.

Since Cailil concluded by saying, "If this continues I will have another sysop review my conduct and unless they contradict me I will then proceed to continue to enforce site policy", I wish to save him the trouble by asking sysops on this page to review his conduct. I needn't tell you, I am most unsatisfied with it. Scolaire (talk) 20:47, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Read WP:STICK and then go do something productive. Cailil has said they will get a second opinion. Your conduct may have been borderline uncivil and not quite meriting the strength of warnings (or maybe there is more background here that hasn't been discussed yet), but it is silly to argue over a mere warning. Go behave properly and you'll have nothing to worry about. Jehochman ^Talk 20:57, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

First, there is no history between Cailil and myself, or any other background that I am aware of. Second, he did not say he will get a second opinion - that was contingent on "this" continuing. Third, I have said up front that my problem was not with the "mere warning", but with the increasingly heavy threats to block me if I don't kowtow to him. "Go behave properly" is every bit as bad as the phrase I was warned about in the first place. I hadn't expected to be worse abused by the admins here than by the admin I am complaining about. Scolaire (talk) 21:09, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

• Scolaire I'm just going to echo Jehochman. I said I'd get a second opinion - you've already afforded my that opportunity by bringing it here - so thank you for that.
  To be clear there is no exemption from WP:CIVIL and WP:NPA and WP:TPG just because it's on a userpage.
  This is your third escalation of a simple, short to-the-point and accurate warning[77] (for this). In and of itself that is tendentious. While the warnings are perhaps curt they are accurate and appropriate in an area under probation (as the British Isles naming dispute is).
  While I recognize the good faith of your redacting the uncivil remark to LevenBoy your comments to me describing my warnings as "lazy",[78] "pompous" and "groveling>"[79] are inappropriate.
  Jehochamn is now the third editor to tell you to "move on"[80][81]
  For the record you were not threatened and I did not demand you 'kneel before Zod', "grovel" or "kowtow" in any way your above reply to Jehochman[82] is a misrepresentation of the facts of my warnings. Also your reply to Finn[83] looks like (and forgive if I'm wrong) a battle-ground mentality--Cailil ^talk 21:26, 9 September 2010 (UTC)
  • Point of order: the word groveling was not a description of Cailil's warning but a description of the kind of response Scolaire supposed was being looked for by Cailil. At the beginning, Scolaire's "act like a grownup" remark was judged rude by all and it was retracted. Cailil's second and third warnings on Scolaire's talk page were two too much; they were bullying and should be retracted. Binksternet (talk) 21:43, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Binksternet just for clarity there was no 3rd warning. In fact if there is a portion or a phrase you can evidence as inaccurate or inappropriate (considering Scolaire's actions) please do so. As I said to Finn earlier I don't see how I belittled (or bullied) Scolaire. If you can't evidence exactly how you attest I have bullied Scoaire I will ask you to withdraw that remark. Thanks for pointing that out about "groveling" - my mistake--Cailil ^talk 22:10, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Your second warning ("And I'm afraid I have to warn you once more for misuse of the talk space. Please modify that behaviour") is something I interpreted as "stop being a smartass on your own talk page", but I was under the impression that one's own talk page was where one had the most leeway in that regard, and I did not see anything harmful in Scolaire's smartass response. What I take to be your third warning is in your third post to the talk page section, where you end with "If this continues I will have another sysop review my conduct and unless they contradict me I will then proceed to continue to enforce site policy." To me, this statement feels like a third warning, and the pointed absence of a specific named policy enforcement action (page protection, blocking, ARBCOM) made it a veiled threat, and to my eye it constituted bullying, in that the unnamed is the most fearful. Binksternet (talk) 23:41, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Sorry Binksternet, but I interpreted Scolaire's "smartass" response as tendentious and making a mockery of WP:NPA (ie they stated that as their remark to LB worked that they were happy with it). WP:TPG still applies to one's user-space - there is no exemption from site policy as users don't actually own their own talk space the rules still apply there. Scolaire described my short warning as "lazy" because I didn't wikilink policies that I expected them to know - I interpreted that as incivil. What I saw was incivility and tendentious after being warned for incivility - hence warning 2.
Re the third post I clarified at the top of that post that it wasn't a warning (perhaps I should have said "I'd AGF" rather than "give the benefit of the doubt" but that's what was meant) - I would be happy to apologize if that passage, the part you mention, came off as offensive (but this dispute was going with my first warning so that cannot be the point of conflict & Scolaire has never specified what exactly was wrong about my warnings or subsequent post).
To reiterate - that remark wasn't a threat, but I can see how if taken out of context it can be seen as such. However what I said is what I meant - if the behaviour continued I would have asked another sysop's opinion and input on it and then enforced policy accordingly, that's all. There's a bit of a leap to make (even though I agree I could have couched that line better) to saying that that's a threat, or that it could be called bullying--Cailil ^talk 00:03, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• • • (e/c) No, Cailil, it was you who escalated. My response to your original warning was not excessive, or even unreasonable. You could just as easily have said "thank you for your feedback" and let it go. You didn't. You "warned" me simply because you took exception to the tone of my response. That is not acceptable; it is ultra vires, and it is petty. And, for the record, there was a very clear, if veiled, threat. It is there in the diffs for all to see, and to say there was not is less than honest. And (though I forgive you for saying it) if I have a battle-ground mentality, what have you got? You must have seen within hours that I was not continuing any war on the British Isles Task Force or anywhere else, so where was the need for you to be increasingly belligerent in your posts to me over the following days. It comes across as a personal vendetta, and that is not acceptable from an admin. If admins are to admonish others for immoderate language, it is incumbent on them to be moderate in their own language. And thank you, Binksternet, for daring to use the word that would have got me blocked. Scolaire (talk) 21:46, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

No Scolaire you brought it here, you made an issue of the first warning and the second.
And now, I must ask what language exactly is either inaccurate or inappropriate in my posts - how did it infer anything about you? And how is it inaccurate to say that the post you were warned for is in an area under probation?
You intervened in a highly fraught atmosphere with a remark that you have admitted to being inappropriate. When warned you were incivil to me and responded in a tendentious manner - you were warned for that, not for "failing to kowtow"--Cailil ^talk 22:05, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The "behave like a grownup" is more of an inaccurate statement, then an attacking one. Why? No 2 grownups behave alike. GoodDay (talk) 22:09, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Ad hominem remarks like that in a probationary topic area are inappropriate - Scolaire should have addressed the edits not the editor--Cailil ^talk 22:12, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Okie Dokie. GoodDay (talk) 22:15, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Is this allowed?

Resolved

 – It was a mistake in vandalism patrolling, thanks for flagging it up, though you can simply revert such mistakes if you explain what you're doing. Fences&Windows 00:50, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Why are sources being removed from an article about a living person? [84] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.139.19.167 (talk) 21:02, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Probably because the previous edit was made without rationale or explanation, and was tagged "(Tag: possible BLP issue or vandalism)". If one wants to make major changes to a BLP article, one should at the very least use the edit summary to explain or justify the change. ~Amatulić (talk) 21:08, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

That previous edit added sources, is not that ideal for an encyclopedia? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.139.19.167 (talk • contribs) 21:20, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

The IP has a legitimate point. Their additions appear to be good-faith attempts to add references to a BLP that was previously sourced to only a single article. I see no vandalism. The editor who reverted should be more careful to look at edits before reverting just because the version tag brings up "possible vandalism or BLP violation". Burpelson AFB (talk) 21:30, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry folks, that was a big my bad on that one. Burpelson was right, I must have just seen the tag, I'm usually pretty good at these things. Thanks for catching that anon, good save. - Schrandit (talk) 00:45, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

No problem, none of us is perfect! Burpelson AFB (talk) 12:13, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Bubba and 9/11

Should any authorities (Secret service?) be contacted about edits like this? The IP does geolocate to the phone # given. Tarc (talk) 21:55, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Go for it. Probably just a tin-foil-hatter but it never hurts to check anyway. Secret Service, and FBI crime tip form. Burpelson AFB (talk) 22:14, 9 September 2010 (UTC)

Might be tricky to report the edits, as they're now deleted. Fences&Windows 00:47, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

On that note, is there a simple way to get from a suppressed diff to the suppression log? In a case like this it might be handy to get ahold of the oversighter hiding the revisions and I don't really know how to do that. Protonk (talk) 00:50, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

You would have to contact an individual functionary or their mailing list. If it is fully suppressed, the log action will be hidden as well. NW (Talk) 01:04, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Ugh. Protonk (talk) 01:05, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

"Ragusino returns"

Hi all, User:Ragusino has returned in the (very transparent) form of "User:Orsat", has harassed me on my talk [85], started an edit war on the Republic of Ragusa article, and began canvassing others for support [86] (there is no question at all as to whether that's him again, his socks are usually exceedingly easy to spot). Could someone semi-protect Republic of Ragusa and ban "Orsat" please? --DIREKTOR ^(TALK) 00:17, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Done. You might've got a better response at WP:SPI, to find any other sleeper accounts. Fences&Windows 00:43, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Deletion of History

Resolved

 – User:Slp1 revdeled the edits. Fences&Windows 00:45, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I think an admin may want to hide/delete the history of a couple of derogatory edits on the article Antisemitism [87] and [88]. If this is not please redirect me to correct page to post this. Thank you for your time - Mcmatter (talk|contrib) 00:39, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

That's just garden variety vandalism by an illiterate bigot and not really eligible for revision deletion. —DoRD (talk) 00:42, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict). I've both revision deleted and blocked indefinitely. --Slp1 (talk) 00:46, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Hmm... okay then. —DoRD (talk) 00:47, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Hi DRD, I certainly respect comment and your "Hmm", but I'd say that it meets the "Grossly insulting, degrading, or offensive material that has little/no encyclopedic or project value" criteria for revdev. BTW, I've always loved your username. A good linguistic joke is a good linguistic joke!! --Slp1 (talk) 01:03, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for the quick response, was this the right area to ask for this or is there an area that deals directly with RevDel requests?- Mcmatter (talk|contrib) 01:08, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Considering all the dire warnings that came with the extra button, I tend to be overly cautious, but I don't dispute your judgment. Thanks for the username comment! —DoRD (talk) 01:29, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Incivility, personal attacks, and other problems from User:Republic of Texas

Resolved

 – Clear troll. Attempts to intimidate with false claims of being MP, threats of outing, racist and homophobic trolling, lots of lies, etc, etc, etc. Indef is clearly warranted. — Coren ^(talk) 11:26, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Problematic edits and behaviors

• Republic of Texas (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Let me start off by saying that I know this user is(at the time of this post) already blocked for 24 hours. This ANI thread is about a pattern of disruption overall, and how the behavior does not back up the claims.

Incivility/Personal attacks

This user claims to have a Law degree from Harvard, to be 44, and to be an officer in the military. However, their lack of civility with regards to other users causes concern. I would think a lawyer would know not to say such things, such as being held in contempt in a courtroom, for disrupting the purpose. It's the same thing here, insults and incivility do nothing but disrupt. Here are some examples(in no particular order):

• Hypothetical threat of privacy violation and helping in identity fraud(post in their SSN for instance)

What is more concerning about this, however, is that someone who claims to abide by the law, and enforce the law, would shatter the law in such a way.

• Trying to justify said threat, along with other things

• [89]

Self explanatory.

• [90]
• [91]
• [92]
• [93] Racial slur to refer to a person specifically.

BLP violations

Title self-explanatory:

• [94]
• [95]

Restoring the above after having been reverted.

• [96]
• [97] Horrible BLP comparing subject to hitler.

Concerning edits

As I have said, this user's behavior does not back up the claims they made above. Looking into their edits, I find several things of note that concern me:

• [98] (m removed minor typos)

This edit does not 'remove minor typos', but two maintenance templates from the article. A false edit summary, plainly.

• [99] Internet speak.

Referring to the internet as 'internets'. Not something I would expect from a Harvard graduate.

• [100]

Same thing above, again using 'internet speak', such as 'ur' and 'luz'.

• [101]

This is concerning because I've grown to not trust any of the stories they have told regarding their background. But, AGF'ing, this of course could be a typo.

• [102] Inappropriate comment, violating WP:FORUM as well, although I am sure there are others.
• Copyright violation. See history of article and user's talk page.

Looking at this user's talk page, post-block, they don't appear to show any remorse for their behavior, or any understanding why it is problematic, and why it needs to stop. A 24 hour block doesn't seem long enough. In any case, this user's behavior needs to be discussed more in-depth.

The section directly below this is a transcluded statement from the user's talk page, should they wish to address others here during the duration of their block.

User notified.

Please discuss.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 01:20, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

RoT's response

User talk:Republic of Texas

Discussion of RoT's edits

RFC/U is probably were you need to take this Weaponbb7 (talk) 01:24, 10 September 2010 (UTC) On Second look this seems to need immediate attention Weaponbb7 (talk) 01:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Comment. Knowing nothing of the history here, this comment seems to be enough to warrant an immediate indef for personal attack—even if it was "humor" it was in such poor taste that it is grotesque.   Thorncrag  01:29, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• Per WP:OUTING, I support indefinite block unless that threat to post personal info to sites is revoked immediately, strike the above - I support full indefinite blocking for racism, threats to out repeated attempts to justify abuse of the talk space, other users and this project. Agree with rob below--Cailil ^talk 01:34, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I also support an indefinite restriction on this user. User seems to not be listening to any advice that has been offered to him and I am very doubtful he intends to edit in a manner constructive to the community. Unless he was to change his position I don't see anything but disruption and a indefinite block on his near horizon. IMO wikipedia would benefit from a longer restriction on this user. Off2riorob (talk) 01:37, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Seconded. I assumed good faith on his earliest edits to the talk page of Wifey's World but I could see from subsequent activity on his talk page that he sadly just doesn't get it. Should the current block stay? Yes? Should it be extended? Yes. Indefinite block? Sadly, yes. As long as he displays that lack of civility and willingness to follow the rules and regulations that govern Wikipedia, he's not going to be a productive contributor. Tabercil (talk) 02:27, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Just out of curiosity, can anyone point out a single one of his 238 edits that is clearly helpful, constructive, positive, or in any way a benefit to the project? If (as I suspect) not, it seems to me that an indef is obviously the best move here. --Steven J. Anderson (talk) 04:00, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

To RoT, you can clearly post a response fine. To your age, given your edits, it seemed a reasonable assumption that you were lying, you certainly weren't acting it when you insulted people instead of discussing content. To your 'shorthand'. Why is this the first time I've seen you say anything about your mobile? Even if you did that with your phone, it doesn't justify the taunt-like post in reply to that page's AfD.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 04:19, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• Support indefinite block Referring to subjects as "homos" or "negroes" is clearly unacceptable. AniMate 06:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

RoT's User page

Is all of that information on their User page appropriate? Especially the tags that refer to IP accounts, not logged in accounts. Everard Proudfoot (talk) 06:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Neutralhomer

Resolved

 – No administrator attention required. –xeno^talk 02:28, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Template:Formerly

Neutralhomer has recently posted a comment/warning on my talk page that makes no sense. There was a previous discussion here about my requests for rollback rights and I was unclear about something so I asked Fastily [[103]] and Neutralhomer comes on my talk page with [response]. I would like to hear some of your opinions about it.Thanks --Inka ⁸⁸⁸ 01:48, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Since Inka 888 was told, per here from ANI archives, that he would not be receiving Rollbackers access, he has harrassed Fastily (the admin who denied the initial request and brought it to ANI originally) 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 times about Rollbackers (today is marked as #1). This is a nasty case of harrassment and is himself a case of a refusal to get the point (humorous he says that about me). This user in his short time has been to ANI twice, once about Rollbackers and once about TWINKLE misuse (which he has gotten back even though he is blacklisted). There is obvious behavioral problems here and even though I have suggested the user get a mentor (since they feel Wikipedia is a "game" or "contest" with their actions), they refuse. This harrassment is just another case of behavioral problems. - Neutralhomer • Talk • 01:59, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

The thing that Neutralhomer is failing to recognize is that is was just asking Fasily when i was eligible for rollback or at least to ask i never asked him for rollback. Inka ⁸⁸⁸ 02:09, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Looks like a valid, easily understandable warning to me. Inka 888, you do yourself no favors at all by showing up here repeatedly, so if I were you I would simply accept that when Neutralhomer said "don't do that", he intended for you to understand not to do that. Pursuing this is only going to turn attention on you instead. — Gavia immer (talk) 02:11, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• The warning may have been a little OTT and many of those diffs date to before the ANI thread, but Homer's point was valid and bringing it to ANI, Inka, is only going to draw more attention to yourself when someone in your position should be trying to attract as little attention as possible. I'm sure Inka is acting in good faith and not trying to harass Fastily, but, Inka, you're not getting rollback any time soon, so drop the stick, back slowly away from the horse carcass and find something useful to do. I say this because I don't want to see you end up blocked, and if you carry on the way you;re going, it's only a matter of time until you are. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 02:14, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
• Comment - This is absurd that Inka888 is pestering Fastily again. At the unanimous AN/I discussion, two months was the minimum time mentioned before Inka888 was to ask again. It's been four days: and from what I've seen of his editing history, I believe granting rollback to this user would do far more harm to the project than possible good. Of course, I can provide the diffs (if needed)... Doc9871 (talk) 02:18, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Save it for when he requests rollback again, perhaps?--Wehwalt (talk) 02:25, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I was NOT asking Fastily for rollback I was asking him when I could ask anyone again to avoid getting here again for asking before i was supposed to. --Inka ⁸⁸⁸ 02:32, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

You were already told at least 2 months.— Dædαlus ^Contribs 04:55, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Difficulty with User:Hushpuckena

This user has been editing articles about cities, counties, et cetera in what (initially) was probably a good-faith attempt to fix perceived grammar issues: singular versus plural when referring to a measure of area. I have questioned this via the user's talk page because I felt that the grammar was actually being broken by some of these edits, not fixed. I still believe that, and provided supporting information for this in some of my comments; but the main issue here is this user's complete failure to engage in any discussion, and to continue making the questioned edits even after six separate attempts to elicit comments over a period of two weeks. I feel I've made a strong effort to communicate about this politely and to give ample opportunity for the user to respond and discuss; but there has been no response at all, except that the pace of these edits has slowed (which may or may not relate to my queries -- there's no way to tell as there has been no discussion). Certainly the edits have not stopped.

On 25 August, this edit was one of a batch which prompted my initial query. Several more edits were made with no response, and about half an hour later I made another query. A few more edits were made; this edit was the last in that batch. I had hoped that these edits would then stop, despite the lack of response.

On 28 August, another similar edit was made. I queried the user again but got no response, and later proceeded to revert the relevant portions of the user's previous edits as I had stated I would. On 2 September another such edit was made, and I queried again. No response. On 8 September, another edit and another query -- no response.

Later that day, User:Huwmanbeing questioned a slightly different aspect of this user's edits, involving singular versus plural when applied to fractional measures of area. Hushpuckena made another such edit the following day and still there has been no response.

Under the circumstances, I'm not sure what else to do. Thanks. Omnedon (talk) 03:01, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• Comment - Maybe a {{uw-mos2}} warning on his talk page would start to get his attention: but maybe not, apparently. His listed "copyedits" are really just not correct - so just undo them with an appropriate edit summary. Edits like this[104], on the other hand, are entirely appropriate and constructive: maybe a "trouting" for the bad edits? If he simply won't discuss it (or even acknowledge attempts at discussion), and continues in this editing vein, it's pretty obvious what will eventually happen, now isn't it? Yup... Doc9871 (talk) 06:31, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
• Bad news, Omnedon. I think that Hushpuckena has the grammar right, and you are in error here, in all of the edits you mention. That's not reason to ignore you, but I can understand the mindset of someone who corrects a fairly obvious grammatical error only to have it undone, and who concludes that Wikipedia can just suffer from the errors being reintroduced, since xe's done xyr part in fixing them once. I can also understand the mindset of someone who decides that it's not xyr responsibility to teach everyone else on a wiki grammar, or who has no desire to spend xyr time arguing about grammar with pseudonymous people on a wiki. I don't particularly agree with it (such editorial discussions being part and parcel of collaborative writing), but I can understand it.

  "square miles" is more than one "square mile" and takes a plural "are". You misapplied your own authority, moreover. The sentences in question do contain an "of phrase". See the "of which"? That's the "of phrase". ☺ Uncle G (talk) 08:44, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, he is wrong over the singular/plural thing (i.e. changing miles to mile for units less than one) but I think "are" is the correct grammar. Although it was shoddy sentence construction in the first place. For example it is much better to say of which 3,179 square miles (8,233 km²) consists of land and 29 square miles (75 km²) (0.90%) of water --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 08:55, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Block review: User:Wikid77, violation of topic ban

Good morning, Following Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive618#User:Wikid77 canvassing, Wikid77 (talk · contribs) was placed on a three months topic ban enacted on June 11. He acknowledged that his ban would expire on the 11th as recently as 6 September, here.

Yet disappointingly, he returns to Talk:Murder of Meredith Kercher on 9 September here, with several additional edits both on that talk page but also on User talk:Amalthea#Expanding MoMK - which by the way is again phrased in a quite WP:CANVASSing tone regarding the editorial body he disagrees with.

After the latest spat over the Kercher / Knox topic here, the talk page suddenly saw a quieting down with several of the newest editors accepting to try discussing edits rather than attacking others. I fail to see how Wikid77's intervention, 72 hours early, are anything but yet another attempt to disrupt the page, an attempt to game the system like they have done in the past.

Also worth considering are his edits to User talk:PhanuelB (currently indefinitely blocked for disruptive editing himself) while under his topic ban.

As a consequence, I have blocked Wikid77 for a month for a continuation of their same behaviour, but believe at this stage that a wider admin review here would be beneficial. Thank you. MLauba ^(Talk) 08:44, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• Unlike many of the other editors on the MoMK page, Wikid77 is a positive for Wikipedia in his editing outside this arena. Whilst I don't disagree with MLauba's block I wonder if a more productive option for the encyclopedia as a whole is an indefinite topic ban for Wikid77 on any edits related to Kercher, Knox, and the trial. We could then have the benefit of his excellent work elsewhere without the negative of his problematic editing at MoMK. Black Kite (t) (c) 11:11, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• I'd agree to that, provided it is also made clear that the kind of coaching as performed on User talk:PhanuelB is explicitly covered by the topic ban. If there's a consensus to enact such a ban, I'd support lifting the block immediately. MLauba ^(Talk) 11:39, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

• - I think thats a good idea and would be a long term solution. Off2riorob (talk) 11:43, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Odokee

Odokee (talk · contribs) is continuing to be an annoyance when it comes to romanizations of Japanese text which may or may not include aspects of the English language. I am aware that this style issue is currently at ArbCom but as it currently stands, the arbitration committee is not taking the case on those grounds. Odokee has consistently been the least helpful in this whole situation, and has repeatedly removed the romaji on several articles, despite repeated requests to cease. His manners have also devolved. In addition to having used misleading edit summaries the last time I reported him, these activities continued on these articles. When I discovered those two edits, I undid them, and notified him on his talk page that he should cease these disruptive activities. He responded by removing the section and going on a revert spree. Everyone else in this whole debate has been cordial and helpful, but Odokee can't seem to even bring any sort of etiquette to the table. He should not go "lol japanification" or "rinse, repeat, remove bad edit", or "rv japanification vandalism" to edits made in good faith and those that help the project, even if he disagrees with their usefulness as he has plainly exhibited in his contributions to the long and winding discussion on WT:VG/GL and WT:MOS-JA ([105] [106] [107] [108] [109] [110] [111] [112] [113] [114] [115] [116] [117] [118] [119] [120]). I am most certainly tired of arguing with this user, as he does not bother to respond back, and I am definitely tired of edit warring over something as simple as the text "Āru Pī Jī" or "Dī Esu Ai".—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:23, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

More evidence of the impossibility it is to talk to this user.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:30, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

And more. After this, I have truly found that it is pointless to talk sense into this user, as he reverted what he thought was a WP:3RR violation, thereby violating WP:3RR himself. I've posted on AN3, and I sadly expect that I will not be able to respond to this later on because both myself and Odokee will invariably be blocked.—Ryūlóng (竜龙) 09:44, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately you are in violation of 3RR too - so both of you will likely be blocked by AN3. Is there a consensus on which format is to be used? I took a look but it was unclear whether one exists or is still under debate. --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 09:51, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Looks like the inevitable happened. Both editors blocked for 24hrs. Close out? --Errant [tmorton166] ^(chat!) 10:06, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

also Ryu called Odokee an asshole on his talk page I think, or something along those lines.--Lerdthenerd (talk) 10:09, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

I'd recommend a much longer block for Odokee, it's quite obvious he's editing in bad faith and constantly referring to other's edits as vandalism if he disagrees with them. He's uncommunicative and I might recommend a week long block along with a topic ban on any changes relating to changing of romanization/romaji of japanese text.--Crossmr (talk) 11:36, 10 September 2010 (UTC)

Afghanistan article vandalism by user Jrkso

Dear editors, the user Jrkso is blatantly and repeatedly disrupting the content of the main Afghanistan article and deliberatedly distorting the facts about the course of Afghan history. He has been blocked in the past for an edit war on another topic.

I have given dozens of very reliable sources for my Afghanistan edits, but he keeps removing them, restoring his misleading and unsourced version. Here you can see my very well-sourced version from yesterday and this is the version Jrkso was restoring yesterday, removing academic and other sources as well as changing content and flagging "Human Rights Watch" as a dubious source. Until I mentioned it on the content board it went so far that he repeatedly even restored the wrong spelling of names. For example Hekmatyar's surname is "Gulbuddin" see here, he kept restoring "Gulbadin".

Yesterday I once again reverted his vandalism, only to find out today that he restored his wrong version again.see here This time he added additional misleading information together with unreliable sources according to WP:RS. And those dubious sources did not even contain the information he gave. For example, it is a very well established fact, that Ahmad Shah Massoud (a resistance commander in the war against the Soviets) compared to Gulbuddin Hekmatyar or Jalaluddin Haqqani received only minor military aid. I sourced this information with four sources. Three being very reliable ones like Neamatollah Nojumi, Roy Gutman of the United States Institute of Peace and a report of the Defense Intelligence Agency. Along with removing all those sources Jrkso has now misleadingly claimed in the Soviet war section "Leaders such as Ahmad Shah Massoud received up to $200,000 a month along with weapons and other supplies from the CIA." and sourced it.see here His source, however, does not even back up his claims. According to his source he received that money in the time somewhere between 1989 and 1991 (when aid stopped again) but not during the Soviet invasion. Steve Coll, the 2005 Pulitzer Prize winner for general non-fiction for his book "Ghost Wars", (who is quoted and put out of context by the source of Jrkso, RAWA,) writes the following in "Ghost Wars" also see here:

"In their dim meeting room, Schroen handed Massoud a piece of paper. It showed an estimate of just more than two thousand missiles provided by the CIA to Afghan fighters during the jihad. Massoud looked at the figure. "Do you know how many of those missiles I received?" He wrote a number on the paper and showed it to Schroen. In a very neat hand Massoud had written "8." "That was all," Massoud declared, "and only at the end of the fight against the communist regime."

Later, after Schroen reported his conversations by cable to several departments at headquarters, the CIA determined that Massoud was correct . It seemed incredible to some who had lived through the anti-Soviet Afghan War that Massoud could have received so few. He had been one of the war's fiercest commanders. Yet for complicated reasons, Pakistan's intelligence service, the CIA's partner in supplying the anti-Soviet rebels, distrusted Massoud and tried continually to undermine him. Massoud also had shaky relations with the Islamist political party that helped channel supplies to him. As a result, when the war's most important weapon system had been distributed to Afghan commanders, Massoud had received less than 1 percent, and this only

at the very end of the conflict, in 1991."

— Steve Coll, Ghost Wars

The above source plus the sources I gave in the article are more than enough to validate my statement, that Massoud received only minor close to no aid compared to others such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.

The only source Jrkso ever cited in this whole dispute is the internet platform of RAWA (Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan). As the above example illustrates they take shortened quotes and totally put them out of context to create a new "reality". RAWA is not compatible with WP:RS. They do, indeed, very valuable humanitarian work. But, they are a very unsophisticated source for political discussion. They have a communist political agenda and not only have strong connections to other communist movements but also have a pattern of attacking other Afghan women rights organizations or Afghan women who rise to prominence outside RAWA with smear campaigns. That they would do the same with every political person of "greater evil" (as they must perceive it) is a logical consequence. Just to illustrate: RAWA (referring to the Soviet war in Afghanistan) called Massoud "the man who wouldn't fight" when the Wall Street Journal called him "the Afghan who won the cold war" source see at 40:50. And now Jrkso has even added that false information (or propaganda) "but others claim that Massoud staged sham skirmishes with the Russians" by RAWA to the main Afghanistan article. see here

Today I discovered that Jrkso has now started to also remove sourced content from the main Ahmad Shah Massoud article. see here Jrkso seems to have an agenda.

We have had the following discussion, with the attempt of mediation by the user Torchwood Who? see here. Unfortunately, it failed due to Jrkso's unwillingness to cease his vandalism.

This has been going on for days and I do not want to further waste my time with someone obviously keen to engage in an edit war and keen to hide realities of Afghan history or call sources such as Human Rights Watch "dubious". I will have to revert once again, and that ain't no fun.—JCAla (talk) 10 September 2010 (UTC)