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::::"Undoing redirect" is beyond your ability to type?—[[User:Kww|Kww]]([[User talk:Kww|talk]]) 18:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC) |
::::"Undoing redirect" is beyond your ability to type?—[[User:Kww|Kww]]([[User talk:Kww|talk]]) 18:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC) |
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::::: I have consulted the [[edit summary|relevant guideline]] which says, "''Also, mentioning one change but not another one can be misleading to someone who finds the other one more important; add "and misc." to cover the other change(s).''". This is what I did - I summarised the changes which seemed important to me - the addition of sourced material - and appended ", etc." so that editors with other priorities could consult a diff if they wanted to know more. [[User:Colonel Warden|Colonel Warden]] ([[User talk:Colonel Warden|talk]]) 18:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC) |
::::: I have consulted the [[edit summary|relevant guideline]] which says, "''Also, mentioning one change but not another one can be misleading to someone who finds the other one more important; add "and misc." to cover the other change(s).''". This is what I did - I summarised the changes which seemed important to me - the addition of sourced material - and appended ", etc." so that editors with other priorities could consult a diff if they wanted to know more. [[User:Colonel Warden|Colonel Warden]] ([[User talk:Colonel Warden|talk]]) 18:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC) |
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:::::: You can't seriously expect people to believe that you find the redirects unimportant. If they were unimportant to you, you wouldn't spend so much of your editing energy searching them out and undoing them. As usual, your response to criticism is to attempt to be evasive and glib. I don't think that you fool anyone.—[[User:Kww|Kww]]([[User talk:Kww|talk]]) 18:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC) |
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== Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler == |
== Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler == |
Revision as of 18:46, 29 December 2008
Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents |
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This page is for urgent incidents or chronic, intractable behavioral problems.
When starting a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page; pinging is not enough. 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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Aggressive comments and reverts from shifting IP user
In the last few weeks, some on my posts have been reverted with comments using unwarranted language ("stop vandalism" and implicit accusations of deceit) on the part of a couple of IP editors, all of them based at RIPE Network Coordination Centre, RIPE, P.O. Box 10096, Amsterdam. Two of these IPs are 84.139.199.8 and 84.139.198.95. There may be more; this is difficult for me to track. The coincidence seems to great to me; it is probably one editor hiding behind distinct but related IPs so as to make his edits more difficult to track (while he tracks mine; he seems to have some sort of German agenda, but the articles are unrelated).
When will a line be crossed? Can the user be convinced to adopt a consistent username? May I request that a search be done so that it can be ascertained whether this is somebody with a username who does not want his edits tracked even to his Wikipedia identity? Feketekave (talk) 20:32, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
Here is another one: 84.139.235.50. Enjoy. Feketekave (talk) 20:35, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
- Please provide diffs of the behaviour. If you truly believe that the IP is the sockpuppet of an established user, you can visit WP:RFCU and follow the directions there. Else, provide warnings for uncivil behaviour and report to WP:AIV as necessary. Cheers. // roux 20:37, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
These IPs all have between one and three edits each, all related to the topic; diffs seem unnecessary. Here are two more IPs that are presumably the same: 84.139.243.190, 84.139.241.103. The first IP posted on the topic, the second one answered to me; neither intervention seemed wrong to me at the time (though the edits were arguably slanted), but they may be relevant.
The user seems knowledgeable of some Wikipedia-related language, though possibly not of Wikipedia's actual rules. It seems clear to me that he has spent some time here, but I cannot myself tell which established user he is likely to be. How should I proceed?
Also - if his IP keeps shifting, how can I leave him a warning? Feketekave (talk) 20:49, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
Some other IPs that are almost certainly the same: 84.139.245.108, 84.139.205.82, 84.139.199.195. The ones that I mentioned first were the ones I felt had made uncivil remarks (to say the least). These just make this individual's agenda clearer. Feketekave (talk) 21:07, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
- The IP will only shift when it is asked to. Try whichever IP you think they last edited from. — neuro(talk) 21:09, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
- Will do. Should I make a search request for a sockpuppet, then, or can I do that only when I have a (justifiable) suspicion of which established user he or she is? Feketekave (talk) 21:14, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
- PS. I just left a warning at User:84.139.199.8. Is this fine? How can I tell whether it has been received? Feketekave (talk) 21:25, 26 December 2008 (UTC)
Please note: These IP addresses are not "based at RIPE". RIPE is the Regional Internet Registry that assigned the 84.136.0.0 - 84.191.255.255 IP address range to Deutsche Telekom. -- The Anome (talk) 00:46, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Throwing stones in the glashouse. Feketekave called it "racialist" to add a category "French people of German descent" [[1]] for someone, who was born in Berlin as a German citizen and reverted even sourced content [[2]] by calling it a "Nazi fake"[[3]]. His last addition to Ilya Ehrenburg was a "translation" from German WP, but instead of naming the head of the soviet Secret Police (Viktor Semyonovich Abakumov), he described him as "frontline soldier", which is an euphemism, to say the least.
- P.S. I don't use shifting IP's in bad faith, it works like that, I don't know why. I don't contribute a lot to the English WP, that's why I use IP's. I can't see any "aggressive comments" yet, it wasn't my intention. 84.139.209.53 (talk) 11:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
About every single remark made by the anonymous user above is inexact. (On the issue of Ehrenburg, they are outright lies against me.) Mind you, his overall line is quite outside of the mainstream in the German wikipedia. Would he care to state the username he uses in de.wikipedia.org, if he is indeed a regular contributor there? Feketekave (talk) 19:34, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
PS. From wikipedia.de: "Im letzten Kriegsjahr erhielt Ehrenburg kritische Briefe von Frontsoldaten, die ihm vorhielten, er habe sich gewandelt und trete nun plötzlich für Mildtätigkeit gegenüber den Deutschen ein." - This means "In the last year of the war, Ehrenburg received critical letters from front soldiers, stating, that he had changed and now suddently stood for softness towards Germans." Grothendieck, as the son of a Russian father (later killed at Auschwitz) is unlikely to have been granted German citizenship automatically at birth; German citizenship is based on descent, not place of birth (jus sanguinis). And so on, and so on. Feketekave (talk) 19:45, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
Also: as you can see from his diff above, both of the citations I removed were unsourced at the time, and had already been labelled as such. As for one of them: "Die Forschung ist sich seit langem einig, dass es sich um ein Gerücht der deutschen Propaganda handelt.[78] Und Lew Kopelew hat als Zeitzeuge mittlerweile vielfach bestätigt, dass ein solches Flugblatt Ehrenburgs nie existiert hat und weder sprachlich noch inhaltlich in Ehrenburgs Produktion passe. „Es scheint nur bei den deutschen Truppen bekannt gewesen zu sein und war wohl ein Versuch der Goebbels-Kader, auf diese Art den Widerstandswillen der Wehrmacht zu stärken.“[79]" - "Researchers have long agreed that this is a rumour [put around] by German propaganda. And Lev Kopoelev, as a contemporary witness, has stated numerous times that such a pamphlet of Ehrenburg's never existed and would not fit either in language or contact in Ehrenburg's work. "It seems to be known only by German troops and was most likely an attempt of the Goebbels cadres to strengthen the will to resistance on the part of the German army."[79]".
In other words: we are dealing with an anonymous user whose Teutonic agenda would be well outside the mainstream in the German wikipedia, and who attempts to change the English-language wikipedia to suit his bias. Feketekave (talk) 20:16, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- You should learn something more about German law of citizenship, your statement is simply wrong. Somebody who calls a long established category "racialist nonsense" [4] shouldn't expect to be treated with kid-gloves. The Ehrenburg problem should be discussed at the proper talk page, you're mixing up the leaflet with truly existing and sourced articles in different newspapers and you reverted the whole part instead if clarifying. 84.139.211.23 (talk) 08:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
You should get a username so that you can read other people's warnings. You are obviously thinking of current German law; jus sanguinis was modified very recently - during the Schroeder government. (We were discussing the life of somebody born well before WWII.) I am mixing nothing up, your use of (ill-defined) categories follows your agenda, and you are making blatantly false statements in the Ehrenburg talk page. There, you now claim that "nobody has claimed that Ehrenburg advocated raping German women"; in fact, the diff you have given above contains exactly such a claim. Feketekave (talk) 23:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Here is the diff this IP user linked to above: [[5]]. There, he complained precisely about my having removed an alleged quotation of Ehrenburg's supposedly about raping German women (and about my calling it a "Nazi fake", which is exactly what it seems to be; see above).
The point is not that he is wrong again, but that either (a) his memory of his own claims lasts only a few hours, or (b) he is making deliberately false statements about my and his edits in order to spread confusion.
The point is also not how I or anybody is not being treated with kid gloves by some abstract entity, but what this user's behaviour is towards others. Feketekave (talk) 23:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
More to the point: what should be done? If this user does not react to further warnings, can anonymous edits from the range of IPs he uses be blocked? Feketekave (talk) 00:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
"Emotional Freedom Technique"
Administrative eyes would be welcome at "Emotional Freedom Technique". (See its history page first.) My own eyes are bleary as it's my bedtime. -- Hoary (talk) 15:06, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Removed the OR section again, and left the editor a note. Black Kite 15:12, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- See this related thread at EAR: Wikipedia:Editor assistance/Requests#Edits rejected as "opinion". – ukexpat (talk) 16:11, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Paging SA. He'll solve this one. the new editor is clearly a biased proponent, and not any particular scientist, all her edits are to remove qualifiers which erode the positivity of the idea, and to spew caveats against negative results. SPA, topic ban her and be done.ThuranX (talk) 16:23, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sarcasm always helps, eh?
In any case, this editor is proposing text which is, while written as personal opinion, a solidly mainstream personal opinion: the EFT is blatantly unscientific and credibly identified as pseudoscience. Guy (Help!) 16:58, 27 December 2008 (UTC)My bad, read it upside-down, as noted below. Guy (Help!) 17:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sarcasm always helps, eh?
- I might've read this wrongly, but isn't the editor trying to add a section claiming not that EFT is unscientific, but the opposite - that a piece of research critical of EFT is unscientific? Black Kite 17:29, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- You've read it correctly, Black Kite, which makes Guy a bit off in his little outburst at me. Like I said, the editor adds text discrediting scientific reports discrediting the EFT ideas. Apologies can be sent to me care of my talk page. ThuranX (talk) 22:25, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Meh, that wasn't an outburst. But your comment was sarcastic, and I don't think that helps when that editor is actively being discussed on WP:RFAR. But you're free to ignore me, I am a bit sensitive about users who are pushed to the edge and beyond by relentless civil POV-pushing. Guy (Help!) 17:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- You've read it correctly, Black Kite, which makes Guy a bit off in his little outburst at me. Like I said, the editor adds text discrediting scientific reports discrediting the EFT ideas. Apologies can be sent to me care of my talk page. ThuranX (talk) 22:25, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Bottom line: more eyes would be great. Please watchlist, all of you. I've been on the case at this article for awhile, and this is hardly the first proponent of Emotional Freedom Techniques to make an appearance. While you're at it, take a look at the associated article on Thought Field Therapy. MastCell Talk 06:09, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- A challenge to this whole series of articles on 'alternative' psychological treatments and similer follderoll, is that most of the editors are spa's on one side of the topic or another (except for a few fringe studies folks such as MastCell) and they really don't understand how wikipedia works very well. Some will become full fringe nutters that are impossible to work with, most will not if we educate them about how wikipedia works. The talk page of EFT is instructive, a couple of long time users have patiently tried to work with a number of spa's over the last year with moderate success in getting them to either edit to our guidelines and policies or move on and waste time somewhere else (the long soapboxing at the top of the page, goes away by the end). It does not need to be confrontational (though that is sometimes where it ends up). --Rocksanddirt (talk) 08:11, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Skomorokh (talk · contribs) These are false accusations here and here. I consider this editors activities to be disruptive, lacking in good faith, and borderline racially based. This editor's support of whitewashing the Stormfront (website) article is not acceptable. I ask that this editor be blocked or permanently banned from the project. We don't need his type around here. OrangeMarlin Talk• Contributions 16:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Whatever the other merits, he certainly appears to be well beyond 3rr [[6]] and certainly doesn't seem interested in the fact that his POV is being soundly rejected by the other participants on talk.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:08, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Here are difs from today when he undoes others work on the article. [[7]] [[8]] [[9]] [[10]]Bali ultimate (talk) 17:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- A pattern he apparently carried on from previus days as per [[11]] and [[12]] I don't think he can argue that he was unaware that there was, at best no-consensus on his edits and in fact an overwhelming majority opposed to them.Bali ultimate (talk) 17:20, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Among the diffs only [39] is a clear revert. In [40] Skomorokh moved a statement to a different place. In [41] (s)he removed a citation from the lead, because it is not necessary there. And in [42] (s)he simply merged 3 successive refs. I do not see evidence of a violation. Ruslik (talk) 17:30, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just noting my agreement with Ruslik. 3RR appears to be intact. — neuro(talk) 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Skomorokh added a "maintainer" template for himself at the top of the talk page of Stormfront (website) [13]. He seems to be behaving aggressively to other editors (warnings to Orangemarlin [14] and Verbal [15] on their talk pages about using the category "Neo-Nazi website", wikilawyering on the talk page pf the article) and adding racially sensitive material, out of context, to the mainspace article, based on newspaper reports of postings on the forums of Stormfront. He has written that on google "my method is simply to search for the word "Stormfront" and take information from the sentences in which the word appears". In view of the problem of WP:OWN shown by the maintenance template and his failure to understand the controversial nature of this article (as well as a likely COI), he should probably receive a topic ban of some sort: he does appear to be disrupting the editing of the article and causing needless offense on talk pages. Mathsci (talk) 13:24, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just noting my agreement with Ruslik. 3RR appears to be intact. — neuro(talk) 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Comment I restored this section after it was prematurely archived. Enigma message 18:26, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Bot-assisted incivility
Last month, STBotI (a bot belonging to ST47) posted a warning on my talk page regarding a non-free image that I'd uploaded without supplying a fair use rationale. The image in question was a Wikimedia project logo (which obviously didn't require a fair use rationale), so I rolled back the bot's edit and thought nothing more of it.
Earlier today (my time), an anonymous editor posted a message on my user page (and that of several other Wikipedians) informing me that my name had been listed on the page User:STBotI/BADUSER and that this was visible via search engines. Curious as to why I'd apparently been publicly labeled a "bad user," I read through STBotI's documentation to no avail.
So I headed over to ST47's talk page, where I found a couple of existing threads on the subject (including someone else's inquiry as to the page's nature). I joined the discussion, and then I noticed that DragonflySixtyseven had moved the page to User:STBotI/LEFT-NOTE-FOR-USER with the summary "as per OTRS". But because the bot's code still directed it to the old page title, the next data dump automatically restored all of the content to that location. DragonflySixtyseven rolled back the edit, and I perceived this as the beginning of a tug of war between human and script (until the latter could be updated with the new title). For this reason (and because the redirect's existence ensured that the page would remain indexed by search engines), I deleted the redirect and protected the page against re-creation. (I noted this on ST47's talk page, indicating that "if anyone feels that these actions were inappropriate for any reason, please feel free to undo them or request that they be undone.") At the time, I didn't realize that DragonflySixtyseven already had blocked the bot (so my steps made no difference).
A short time later, ST47 restored the single deleted data dump (labeling my deletion "vandalism") and merged it into the main history at the original name. He/she then updated the bot and moved the page to User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS (edit summary: "Happy?"), leaving behind the redirect at User:STBotI/BADUSER (which he/she later explained must be temporarily retained for technical reasons).
In the discussion that followed, Gwen Gale complained about an addendum, referred to by ST47 as "a nice notice on top of the new page in case someone decides to take offense." This "nice notice" was worded as follows:
This page is updated regularly by the bot. It's purpose is really none of your business, but some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time. One of them in particular even blocked the bot over this page. Divas.
This page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by the aforementioned exceedingly nosy users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.
ST47 partially reworded the message, but not in a manner that eliminated the incivility. When Gwen noted this and I expressed agreement, ST47 ignored our posts (while replying to someone else's unrelated post) and reverted to the earlier (more uncivil) text.
I don't know how to address this situation. Editing the message would be futile (because it would be reverted during the next data dump), and ST47 has withdrawn from the discussion and evidently restored the worse version out of spite. I honestly don't know why he/she has responded in this manner, and I find it quite disheartening. —David Levy 04:06, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Note that I've directed ST47, DragonflySixtyseven and Gwen Gale to this thread via their talk pages. —David Levy 04:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- There's also this on the bot's user page:
Admins: Getting to block a bot is not a trophy you get. If you block this bot, you had better have a good reason.
Ed Fitzgerald t / c 04:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- There's also this on the bot's user page:
- I know the editor hasn't been particularly responsive to queries about the page, but it seems like getting him to add {{noindex}} to the page would help? Then his bot could still keep its list and you and the other editors who've angered the bot won't have to worry about a page called 'Bad Users' (or whatever it ends up being called) turning up in web searches for their user names. -- Vary Talk 04:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, that would help. It was suggested to ST47, whose reply was rather unhelpful. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- There's also a threat of violence on the bot's talk page (User_talk:STBotI) - "Oh, and if you say rational instead of rationale, I am going to hit you over the head with a large fish." Exxolon (talk) 04:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm inclined to interpret that as facetiousness. —David Levy 04:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Quite possibly, but there seems to a problem with WP:CIVIL here too. "small-minded fool", "some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time.", "Divas.", "aforementioned exceedingly nosy users," are hardly the sort of phrases an admin should be throwing around. I'm also somewhat unhappy with this statement - "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again." - does this mean the bot will revert removal of a warning template from a user's talk? Exxolon (talk) 04:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- So, out of curiosity, are ST47 and Betacommand the same people? It sure seems like it... - ✰ALLST☆R✰ echo 05:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- By that, ST47 means that the bot will drop the warning on the user talkpage again if the user just reverts the warning and doesn't fix the image. Which is of course correct. Black Kite 10:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Quite possibly, but there seems to a problem with WP:CIVIL here too. "small-minded fool", "some people are exceedingly nosy and seem to have this innate desire to waste my time.", "Divas.", "aforementioned exceedingly nosy users," are hardly the sort of phrases an admin should be throwing around. I'm also somewhat unhappy with this statement - "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again." - does this mean the bot will revert removal of a warning template from a user's talk? Exxolon (talk) 04:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- [outdent] I don't pretend to understand a thing about what the bot does or for that matter why, but it seems to me that the behavior displayed by the bot owner has been somewhere between stubbornly unhelpful and outrightly uncivil. WP:OWN applies to all pages on Wikipedia- even if (s)he owns the bot (s)he doesn't own the pages and this sort of snide remarkery shouldn't remain hosted on our servers. I say remove anything borderline from the bot pages, block the bot if necessary to prevent it overwriting until we can get this sorted out, and surely ST47 has something to say for him/herself? l'aquatique |✡| talk 07:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I concur with L'Aquatique. Sandstein 09:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- FYI, STBotI is an important bot that tags uploaded media with no copyright information for deletion, and also non-free images that have no valid fair-use rationale. It also informs the uploaders what is happening. Black Kite 10:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Do important bots follow different policies than unimportant bots? rspεεr (talk) 10:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- By "important", I was pointing out that blocking the bot would be a bad idea when the problem isn't directly related to the bot's main tasks, which it appears to be performing mostly correctly. Black Kite 10:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Blocking bots is no big deal. They can catch up later and they don't have feelings to hurt, and the temporary absence of one bot will not harm Wikipedia. Blocking a bot is just something you do when it's making undesirable edits. The problem is that ST47 seems to be taking these blocks of his bot personally, and getting angry instead of addressing the problems people bring up. rspεεr (talk) 10:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, my point being that the bot's actual main task is not being affected at the moment. I think this is a bit of a storm in a teacup to be honest, but yes it would be useful for ST47 to address the issues raised. Black Kite 11:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Blocking bots is no big deal. They can catch up later and they don't have feelings to hurt, and the temporary absence of one bot will not harm Wikipedia. Blocking a bot is just something you do when it's making undesirable edits. The problem is that ST47 seems to be taking these blocks of his bot personally, and getting angry instead of addressing the problems people bring up. rspεεr (talk) 10:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- By "important", I was pointing out that blocking the bot would be a bad idea when the problem isn't directly related to the bot's main tasks, which it appears to be performing mostly correctly. Black Kite 10:50, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Do important bots follow different policies than unimportant bots? rspεεr (talk) 10:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- On top of the incivility, ST47 should disabuse himself of the notion that he can intentionally edit-war using his bot by acting as if it's out of his hands. It is within ST47's power, and his responsibility, to change the bot's code if it is making undesirable edits. rspεεr (talk) 09:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- The notice needs to include {{NOINDEX}} - OTRS tickets 2008122610019734 / 2008122710016502 / 2008122710016682 for reasons why. I suspect in the end that some people will never be happy with anything other than uncritical acceptance of any unfree image however tenuous the justification, but the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page hardly helps. I would put money on the anon being the self-same user who created the three OTRS tickets listed above, all of which must be very important and serious complaints because they HAVE LOTS OF CAPITALS and inform us that the BADUSERS page is ILLEGAL. Guy (Help!) 11:21, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
You see, there were at least two or three points in there that I was actually interested in replying to. Unfortunately, it's just a jumble of text now. Good job.
- The page was moved. The new page has a brief explanation as to what its purpose is. Far more explanation than a simple logfile should need, but heh. It was called baduser because it was the dump file for a subroutine meant to locate potential bad users. Aptly named "sub checkbaduser". Here is the current text:
- $badusertext="This page is updated regularly by the bot. There used to be an explanation here of why it was moved, but some overly sensitive users have requested that it be taken down.\n\nThis page contains a list of every user the bot has warned as part of it's live IMGBot2.pl task, along with the number of times they have been warned, since the last time the page was cleared. Probably a long time ago. When I first wrote the bot I used the terse name BADUSERS for this page, as it was the dump page for the BADUSERS sub, which reported users who had uploaded over 10 bad images to an IRC channel. Unfortunately, due to meddling by several users, it was moved to this name, which sort of screws up anyone who is trying to actually review the bot's code, since it's got a nice logfile for NFCC10C issues called NFCC10C, a logfile for notag issues called notag, etc, and now the wikipage WARNEDUSERS for the BADUSERS sub. This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption, is in no way guaranteed to be accurate, and is really best ignored - it needs to be on wiki so it is shared between STBotI's various host servers.\n\n";
- I didn't 'revert' my change when I went from the older message to the newer one, I just hadn't let that change propagate. Now it has, and the bot has been restarted, and the notice will stay.
- Guy: You must be behind on sleep if you think you can justify deleting this page on legal grounds, especially in its new state. I see no reason to add templates or notices or documentation or pretty colored boxes or flying ponies to what should be a simple log file.
- If you try to move one of these pages and the bot ignores you, DO NOT block the bot. Let me know, and if you're clever enough to justify moving it, then I will shut down the bot, edit its config, force propagate the changes, and restart the bot.
- The redirect needs to stay for now. Do not delete the redirect. The IRC portion of the bot running on some faraway server will not function without the redirect. Once everything has been updated, I will delete the redirect. If I have not done so in a week, you may remind me then. It shouldn't take any longer than that.
- Vary: The page called Bad Users is no longer in use. It is now called Warned Users. This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary.
- Ed Fitzgerald: What, is asking admins to think before they block such a horrible crime? What is so wrong with sanity?
- Exxolon: Right. It's a threat because I'm actually going to find every user who misspells rationale and go to their house, break in, bring a tuna, and attack them. It's far more plausible that I didn't actually mean that.
- Exxolon again: "Do not revert the bot's edits to your userpages or templates, because the bot will just do it again" means that if you revert the bot's removal of fair use images from your userpage, from a template, from a portal, from anywhere else, then the bot will just remove the image again on it's second pass.
- Rspeer: At the time that I made the note saying that the bot would ignore any change to it's log file, noone had actually made a coherent case as to why. As a matter of fact, the same is true if we substitute 'now' and 'why there's still a problem now that it's at /WARNEDUSERS'. ST47 (talk) 12:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Cut that message short because I was looking for an iridium flare, unfortunately it's a bit too cloudy. I first became aware that someone was complaining when that user vandalized my talk page, the bot's userpage, and the bot's logfile, all in CAPS, while logged out. Obviously a user with an account who had to log out to vandalize. He was blocked for 24 hours, the damage was reverted. When I got there, I believe I reverted one more edit to the logfile from a while ago and then I semied it. I also left a message on the IP's talk page, which I really think was rather nice of myself after he came and acted like such an ass. Anyway, I think I then received an email, let me check. No, maybe not. I heard from someone that there was a rather incoherent OTRS request up from a user who was, their words, not mine, 'mentally unstable'. Around this time the first message on my talk page was left. The user didn't justify their request, didn't ask me to add the template, didn't give any reasons, just pretty much asked what would happen if he added it to the page. The answer to that is "The bot would ignore it, and on the next update it would be removed". Then lots of stuff happened. He msged me at 5PM yesterday, my time, and told me the page would be a problem. I was at a calculus study group, away from my computer, and could not respond. Despite the fact that the page had been up for over a year, Dragonfly6-7 couldn't wait 15 minutes and moved the page at 5:10. Sometime in this period the bot probably reuploaded the log, because it's nowhere near clever enough to see what DF67 did. Less than a half hour later, he blocked the bot. He could have protected the page: the bot is not an admin, and could not have edited through protection, and would have been able to continue to run. People have this innate desire to rack up trophies or something like that by blocking the bot rather than taking the more effective, more sane, less exciting approach. When I got back, I probably shouted at people a bit, had the bot unblocked, then I histmerged the page and moved it to /WARNEDUSERS. This is a perfectly fine title. It is truthful. It is a list of users who the bot warned. The message at the top is more truthful than incivil, for sure. 'Meddling' is entirely accurate: rather than wait for me to reconfigure the bot, people had to try to do it themselves, wound up failing, then blocked the bot. ST47 (talk) 12:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Finally, Guy. The second half of your comment appears to be sarcasm, but you also seem to be using it to support the use of that template. Are you being sarcastic about that as well, or are you actually suggesting that since the user has used enough capital letters, we should add some random template? Also, if you do have some request to make of me, then you really need to support it with the actual tickets that explain your supposed "reasons why", rather than some arbitrary timestamps. Being that I don't have OTRS access, I can't evaluate an argument that is hidden behind a timestamp. ST47 (talk) 12:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- "...This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary" - would it hurt to add noindex, though? There's no need for the log of a bot to be publically searchable - as you yourself state, "This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption..." TalkIslander 12:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- No need for it not to be. ST47 (talk) 12:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well, but in a way you're contradicting yourself there. You can't state one minute that the page isn't for the general populus, but then the next refuse a request to hide it from search engines. Apart from all else, it's a tad stubborn. Adding it would not be at all detrimental to you or your bot, yet you refuse. Why? TalkIslander 12:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- No need for it not to be. ST47 (talk) 12:45, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- @ST47: I'm afraid your comments to me above don't actually address what I said. I did not say the page should be deleted, I said we should add {{NOINDEX}}, I think we should do that with any page where bots make records of usernames - in this case the username is the user's real name, so the fact that one of the first page of Google hits is a page about BADUSERS is a bit of an issue for him, for all of his (IMO) rather hysterical over-reaction to it. I am sure he'd have got the result he was after much more quickly and with less drama if he had left the caps lock off and just asked nicely, since I don't believe that anyone is setting out to e actively evil. But the tone of the message on the WARNEDUSERS page is pretty inflammatory, and I don't think it would hurt to tone it down a bit - do you? Guy (Help!) 13:33, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's no longer called BADUSER, it's called WARNEDUSERS, therefore the title is factual (list of users who have been warned) therefore it's no reason to exempt it from the whole searchable openness of knowledge thing. The message has been changed once again. Still waiting on a good reason for noindexing. ST47 (talk) 13:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just to set things straight here, I appreciate the change to use the editable header text (I assume it uses it direct, but whether it does or whther you copy-paste it periodically probably isn't relevant at this point). You've been given what several users think is a good reason to use NOINDEX, which I see you currently do. Do we still need to have any further debate about that or not? Guy (Help!) 17:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's no longer called BADUSER, it's called WARNEDUSERS, therefore the title is factual (list of users who have been warned) therefore it's no reason to exempt it from the whole searchable openness of knowledge thing. The message has been changed once again. Still waiting on a good reason for noindexing. ST47 (talk) 13:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- "...This has the benefit of being factually correct, and therefore noindex is really unnecessary" - would it hurt to add noindex, though? There's no need for the log of a bot to be publically searchable - as you yourself state, "This page is absolutely not intended for human consumption..." TalkIslander 12:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Page protected
We seem to have consensus here that User:STBotI/WARNEDUSERS should not include the objectionable commentary directed at other users, and should include {{NOINDEX}}. I have made these changes and, according to ST47's suggestion above, protected the page to stop the bot from overwriting it. I ask all administrators to only lift that protection once the bot has been reconfigured so as not to undo these changes. Thank you. Sandstein 13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I also suggested that you first come up with a good reason why. I've made the changes to the bot to use noindex, and if you have a good reason to, I'll keep it that way. ST47 (talk) 13:31, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I would suggest that the commentary should be neutral, and perhaps transcluded from a protected page that can be tweaked without having to get specific users to make code changes. By neutral I mean something like: "this is a list of all users warned by the bot, being listed here does not imply that there is an issue with the user, this is purely for maintenance purposes." Or something. Some of those usernames are real names. Guy (Help!) 13:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- The reason why, apart from the fact that you do not own that page and appear to be the only user here not to want it noindexed, are our policies regarding civility, personal attacks and, as Guy points out, the biography of living persons. I strongly recommend that you follow Guy's advice with respect to transcluding the commentary. Sandstein 13:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I certainly don't agree. You still haven't explicitly stated why you refuse to add 'noindex' - it seems to me that you're the only one here against including it, so unfortunatly consensus is against you. I'll just add that I think the transclusion idea is a good one - as you're well aware, you don't own the page, so you shouldn't be the only one able to edit its contents (which, by having the bot overwrite it, you effectively are). TalkIslander 13:55, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- All I really want is a reason why we have to take the step of noindexing the page. Now that there's an explanation as to why the page exists and why it should not be used by anyone or anything like that, and that the title isn't inflammatory, anyone who finds it would see "oh look, a bot's log page, nothing interesting here" and move along. No reason to hide it from google. ST47 (talk) 14:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well, put it this way. If I were warned by your bot, I would be added to that list (quite legitimately). Now, it could be that I was warned for uploading a fair-use image for which I forgot to write a rational - as soon as I got your bot's warning, I'd write one (not the best example, as I never upload fair-use images without rationales, but humour me :P). I wouldn't then want a result for a google of 'Islander' to bring up a page entitled 'WarnedUsers'. Yes, it's not really inflammatory, and yes, it's miles better than 'Badusers', but still, it's a blot in my copybook. You won't find anyone that wants to be labeled a 'bad user', but equally I think you'll find very few that are quite happy being labeled a 'warned user'. Being a 'warned user' implies that you've been a bad user, and warrented a warning. In short, though the new title is much better than 'badusers', it's still not great, however factually accurate it is. TalkIslander 14:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- User:ST47/WUHead. Feel free to add a comment to the header explaining that. You can also use User:ST47/WUTitle. If you do, then please also move the existing page to the new address so as to preserve history. ST47 (talk) 14:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sand: If we ignore the commentary, and assume that I make it nice and neutral. A list of users who have been warned is in no way uncivil, it's not a personal attack to say "STBotI warned you", and I don't even see where BLP comes into play. If we treat this as a mainspace article and apply that policy, then we really just need it be unbiased and sourced. If it would make you happy, I can add a link to each users' talk page history as a source? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks so much for taking care of the worries editors had about how things were worded. I don't think anyone was being nosy or untowards, although from your outlook, in the thick of things trying to run the bot, I understand how the page name seemed utterly straightforward and harmless to you, a scripting artifact and nothing more. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you. I really would like to keep it not noindexed, and I've put the header and title into a template at User:ST47/WUHead and User:ST47/WUTitle. If you have any suggestions, feel free to update them. ST47 (talk) 14:27, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- How about calling the dump something like TEMPLATEDUSERS or NOTIFIEDUSERS instead? I see nothing wrong with keeping the page open to SE bots if the pagename along with any header text are wholly neutral. On the Internet, it's so easy for folks to take things wrong at a quick glance. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:34, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Either one of those is fine with me. Perhaps we can not make it ALLCAPS? User:STBotI/Notified users? ST47 (talk) 14:38, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Why is it important that a bot's logfile be indexed by search engines? DoubleBlue (talk) 14:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm fine with the page as it now is, but I think the NOINDEX should stay, as the page is of no use to the general public and would needlessly clutter up search engine results. Sandstein 14:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- The reason for including NOINDEX is simple: some of those are real names, and some others look like blameless users who made trivial errors in NFC rationales. There is no reason why it would ever need to be indexed, so adding NOINDEX makes good sense - it removes an identified problem without apparently creating any further problems of its own. Anyway, all sorted now, thanks. Guy (Help!) 15:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Precisely. No matter what the page's title is, an incorrect inference can be drawn by someone who sees such a list (containing names added due to issues ranging from blatant image vandalism to "a bug in the bot's code," the latter of which resulted in my name's inclusion). The new explanatory message certainly helps to counter such misinterpretations, but I see no reason why a page of this nature should be publicly indexed.
- Thanks for calming down and addressing the problem, ST47. —David Levy 16:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Why is it that all the operators of these copyright tagging bots always seem so grumpy? 203.35.135.133 (talk) 12:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think in this case nobody gave him any time at the start to actually do changes. Something about an anon shouting at him, telling him to put noindex without explaining why. Then other users (including myself from my blackberry) try to put noindex on the page, and one even tried to move it. Of course it is a bot, so none of that worked as the bot was just putting the same text in the same spot every time.... overwriting whatever was there originally. I do think the whole thing could have gone better then this... but *shrug* —— nixeagle 14:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Offensive language and personal attacks by User:AP1929
User:AP1929 is a pro-Ustaše user that has been roaming on Ustaše-related articles ("AP 1929" is an abbreviation of "Ante Pavelić 1929", "1929" being the year the fascist "Ustaše" Croatian ultra-nationalist movement was founded). His IP is 99.250.48.35, which can easily be confirmed. While his constant fascist comments can be tolerated, his description of an established User like Thewanderer as a "communist piece of shit" [16] should not go unrewarded in my opinion. --DIREKTOR (TALK) 08:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- User was topicbanned for six months from these articles by FutPerf. Perhaps it's time to do it again? // roux 08:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Seems like it... --DIREKTOR (TALK) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- His contribs show him to be essentially a SPA- blocking him would have the same effect as topic banning him, but with the added bonus that it's actually enforceable without a whole bunch of dramaz. l'aquatique |✡| talk 19:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
On second thought, topicbanning would hardly be an appropriate response to calling a User a "piece of shit" on his own talkpage. Such action is not really related to any particular topic. --DIREKTOR (TALK) 22:35, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- He hasn't made an edit since this thread was posted. If he comes back and is anything but a sweet flower in the spring rain, I'll give him a little vacation, how does that sound? l'aquatique |✡| talk 05:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
I don't think that means anything, he edits from time to time only. I doubt he thinks he's been noticed at all, in fact, I think he's under the impression he may do whatever he likes on non-article pages of Wikipedia (he's led me to believe that in any case). I'm not pretending to be 100% objective, but in my view he's been asking for a holiday for quite a while now when we add his persistent section-blanking to the equation. [17] [18] --DIREKTOR (TALK) 12:47, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Possible range block (3)?
- First ANI report - 2 week block.
- Second ANI report - 1 month block.
The "truth" is once again being preached from the 168.187.176.xxx range. --Onorem♠Dil 13:14, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- In addition to spouting nonsense the guy from this IP range is typing in all caps, which makes the nonsense even larger. However, he apparently lives in Kuwait. Isn't that punishment enough? Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? 13:22, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Nice xenophobia there. Act upon content not location, unless a desire to throw out such comments fills an empty void in your life. Minkythecat (talk) 18:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, I was beginning to think I had to evade my indefblock at ANI once more just to ask why nobody is calling Baseball Bugs on this utterly stupid and xenophobic comment. Thank you for doing so. Everybody else who read this please be appropriately ashamed that you did not challenge BB's BS for over five hours. 78.34.133.168 (talk) 20:04, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Nice xenophobia there. Act upon content not location, unless a desire to throw out such comments fills an empty void in your life. Minkythecat (talk) 18:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- 3 months this time. Doesn't seem to be much (if anything) productive from that range, so rangeblock is better than semi-ing a number of articles, I think. Black Kite 13:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Assume good faith
An anon editor has just nuked the page of WP:Assume good faith can someone revert it as I cant seem to find the revert button on my screen as it is covered over with hacked by china or something along those lines. Corruptcopper (talk) 15:41, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Done. Allowing position:fixed is a bad idea. Algebraist 15:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hm. Hacked by "China" seems to be in Canada. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 20:48, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Pediapress
I stumbled upon User:Pediapress when a template I was working with was linked to a subpage User:Pediapress/TemplateBlacklist and thought it a rather strange situation. The user is advertising pediapress.com so I thought is was a promotional user and reported it to UAA, and was instructed to report it here. After looking at it closer, the WMF does appear to have a collaboration with this website, but the userpage and its monobok instructions, and the afformentioned subpage, still seem unusual. Maybe some additional eyes can take a look and see if this user, userpage and subpage are all on the up and up, or if any action should be taken. Rgrds. --Tombstone (talk) 16:36, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- User:Pediapress/collection.js was deleted as G11, maybe we should notify the foundation though, as they should probably be the ones to inform the company that they are not exempt from policy just because they have an affiliation. — neuro(talk) 19:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Ottava Rima, et. al. at WT:DYK
Could some uninvolved admins please step in at WT:DYK? The constant sniping and hostile atmosphere between Ottava and other editors at DYK has driven contributors away and is a detriment to Wikipedia. Is Ottava still under mentorship? If so, could the mentors please advise him/her on disengaging? BuddingJournalist 16:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Diffs, please? Protonk (talk) 17:59, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] — neuro(talk) 18:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I haven't been able to keep up with the DYK issue, but my understanding is that Ottava Rima ended the mentorship a few weeks ago: [34] [35] [36] [37] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thats about right, except for the mentorship actually ending here, 5 days before. Ottava Rima (talk) 19:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I haven't been able to keep up with the DYK issue, but my understanding is that Ottava Rima ended the mentorship a few weeks ago: [34] [35] [36] [37] SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] [30] [31] [32] [33] — neuro(talk) 18:15, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Two hours and not one notification that I am put at ANI? And this is some how supposed to quell my claims that people at DYK are not following community standards anymore? >.<!!! Ottava Rima (talk) 18:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I apologize for not informing you. I was merely trying to flag down administrators to calm the waters at WT:DYK, not start a discussion here. BuddingJournalist 20:13, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Here is a good diff to look at. I tell Politizer to get involved with other aspects of the community: Village Pump, GA/FA, MoS, etc, in order to get a greater sense of people's opinions and issues, because DYK has been making some proposals that seem to run counter to how people outside of the rarely viewed WP:DYK talk page feel about various issues. What is the response? "You can go fuck yourself, Ottava Rima". I have a lot of DYKs. I have half of the DYK 5+ hook awards. I know about making complicated DYK, and I defended DYK for a long time at ANI. Now I am being dragged through the mud because I defended Blockquotes as counting as prose, as even MoS and WP:SIZE states it is. Then I am criticized because I stated that translations and simply taking what another wiki says and copying and pasted it into wikipedia is not new. What is this world coming to? I stated before that Village Pump or RfC should be used to get wider consensus on an issue and certain members called for me to be banned from DYK because of it. Is this really fair? Is this right? Ottava Rima (talk) 19:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
To be honest, looking at this from afar, all of the parties need to disengage here. I've avoided DYK while this furore is going on... Sceptre (talk) 02:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Seconded. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 02:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thirded. This is needless drama- everyone needs to put on the big girl panties and walk away. l'aquatique |✡| talk 05:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Hungupbg - Hasn't improved since last block
The above user is continuing to cause disruption by adding unreliably sourced information to articles. Despite multiple warnings he/she will not listen or communicate. The editor was blocked previously, but this had no effect. Please help. — Realist2 17:56, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- No improvement and no communication = blocked indef. If they want to communicate via unblock and explain how they are going to improve their editing, then they can. Black Kite 18:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks. — Realist2 18:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- And now Netherlands2304 (talk · contribs) has picked up Hungupbg's mantle. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 20:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks. — Realist2 18:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Revert over protection.
Why are admins editing over protection. What I see here is a protection, then a reversion. Should pages be protected in the condition they are found? page history. The protection policy does not call for full protection at user request, but only semi after vandalism. NonvocalScream (talk) 19:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- No. You can't protect and revert in the same edit. Please note it is the same editor who protected that reverted. --Smashvilletalk 19:16, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- And it was at user request. NonvocalScream, may I respectfully suggest that you drop this matter? It's over, done with. // roux 19:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- It was still very much against what we do. We don't protect a user's preferred version of disputed content. As for your suggestion -
- And it was at user request. NonvocalScream, may I respectfully suggest that you drop this matter? It's over, done with. // roux 19:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
A single title was removed from your watchlist:
* User:Bstone (Talk)
I'm not watching that page anymore.
Respectfully, NonvocalScream (talk) 20:01, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well umm... the ANI you started had a consensus to leave it alone. The MFD you started and withdrew had a clear consensus to leave it alone. So it's not about protecting the user's preferred version, it's protecting the consensus version. Cheers. // roux 20:28, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Your right. I guess I am having a hard time with a message on a userpage that brings a user and the project into disrepute. As if the userpage belongs personally to the user. I guess I had better get over it before I start exhausting the communities patience. I, personally don't have alot of patience for troll like behaviour, but as above, the page no longer appears on my watchlist, and is also protected against my editing. I've already asked for opinions here, and subjected it to MFD. There is not anything else I can do. It saddens me a bit that the page can continue to exist in its form. It is a bad faith page, and one that would sully the project and an editor. NonvocalScream (talk) 21:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Leave it be, mate. This falls into the same category as uncertified RfCs. People can vent, but we are not compelled to host the venting especially if they choose to leave. Bstone's complaint was discussed and consensus was that he had outed himself; I knew his RWI already due to past comments and commentary, he was not exactly working hard to retain anonymity so it's hard to condemn Avi for what looks very much like a simple slip. Guy (Help!) 14:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Conflict with Jehochman
Jehochman (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has been actively advocating for a community ban/block/etc. of me for more than a month. I'm fine with this, but when he takes unilateral actions to stop my attempt to deal with problematic situations:
what am I supposed to do? This was an inappropriate close of the COI report. Similar to User:Pcarbonn whose report was closed by the same user leading indirectly to us having to escalate the condition all the way to arbitration, Jehochman is cutting off process and not letting people comment. His claim that people's "vocations" don't make for conflict-of-interests is false on the face of it. I am accusing this particular user of editing articles which have a direct financial connection to a business that he runs.
Imagine if we had a person who was selling snake oil editing the article. By Jehochman's arugment, we could say that he wouldn't have a conflict-of-interest editing that article because it was his "vocation". We could make the similar argument for nearly anybody.
As such, I submit that this early admin-close was inappropriate for two reasons:
- It was done by an admin with a stated vendetta against my involvement at Wikipedia.
- It was done inappropriately. The claim that you get out-of-conflict-of-interest-free simply because it is your "vocation" is false on the face of it pursuant to various rulings including Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience which dealt with Eric Lerner's vocational conflict of interest and Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Cold fusion which dealt with Pcarbonn's vocational conflict of interest.
I would ask that an administrator remove the "close" remarks and simply allow discussion to occur. I think the premature closing of this discussion was rude and opposed to our desire to get consensus. Jehochman is not the be-all and end-all of conflict-of-interest discussions.
ScienceApologist (talk) 19:42, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Probably be best to leave out the vendetta bit and other accusations so the question of how best to handle the COI report can be focused on without all the other drama. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:23, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- SA, the complaint was closed because the editor in question is quite open about his bias and therefore it does not need to be brought to the COI noticeboard. Whether there should be a user RfC or a motion to ArbCom under the terms of the homeopathy arbitration is another matter. Guy (Help!) 20:32, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think the problem is that Jim Butler never ever stops his advocacy, and while the direct benefits may be low, they might not be; we can't guess how often he sends people unsure about Acupuncture to the Wikipedia article as a 'good introduction to the subject', knowing that his highly biased edits populate the article. I've seen discussions of his NPOV-violating edits to scientific articles before, but note that once again, this has become about SA, not the people who constantly sell bullshit as 'essences of roses' on Wikipedia. If WP:COI isn't appropriate, then we need a WP:ADVOCACY reporting system to deal with this sort of behavior. Until then, COI makes more sense than any other location. ThuranX (talk) 20:47, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hm, we actually have had people selling snake oil editing the article on snake oil - it's a fringey mess ATM. As for COI, not sure here. I occasionally contribute to general articles involving chemistry (my academic background). I would think twice before editing articles involving my specific area of research - not sure if I could be unbiased when I've reviewed papers by the "other guy" I think are horseshit. That's a grey area. I would never edit any article involving my employer, as that would be a clear COI. So I think this is closer to the grey area than a direct violation of COI, and is probably best described as advocacy.
- The closest comparison to Mr. Butler's behavior is probably, I hate to say, Dana Ullman[[39]]. I would suggest that Mr. Butler step back from active editing of acupuncture articles and restrict himself to talk pages in light of this. Arbcom has not looked kindly on dedicated advocacy.
- As for Jehochman, I urge him not to bring any administrative action against SA at least until the conclusion of the impending arbitration. There's some pretty harsh rhetoric from both sides in the RfAr that makes me question if Jehochman can be impartial here. In any case, it's like dumping gasoline on the fire. Skinwalker (talk) 21:49, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Totally disagree re Jehochman. He, like all admins familiar with SA's misconduct, need to bear down harder on SA, not cut him slack because of false equivalencies. That's the right thing to do with chronic problem editors. SA is the bad actor here, not the admins he complains about. There's plenty of evidence to back that up; start with SA's block log, not to mention this. --Jim Butler (t) 03:41, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Do you guys complaining about my edits actually read them? I write for all sides of the argument (e.g. adding a whole "criticisms" section, or updating evidence showing less effect for osteoarthritis, or adding a source re cultural bias in studies). If I put in a "pro" position I source and weight it carefully, engage on talk pages, compromise, etc. IOW, I wear my WP editor hat first. I've been accused of this stuff before, and the evidence never backs it up; e.g. this ANI thread on another disruptive editor, Mccready (whom ScienceApologist closely resembles in his disruption). Thuranx and Skinwalker, this is the first time I've heard of you; if you have issues with my editing, why haven't you discussed it with my via usual channels (talk pages)?
- You've got to show better evidence of COI or POV-pushing than merely asserting it exists because I happen to be an acupuncturist. Absent such evidence, all you're doing is violating WP:NPA: "Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream." BTW, I also have a very mainstream M.A. in chemistry from Harvard; be assured that I experience no inner conflict at all from also being an acupuncturist. I just try to be as objective as I can, and skeptical type editors who actually collaborate with me, as a rule, tend to say favorable things about my editing (see my talk page, e.g. here and here). I welcome scrutiny of my edits, but let's see some diffs: otherwise, this all sounds like meritless piling-on to me: pure WP:GAME by ScienceApologist, who has made his mission clear: "I promise to continue to attack others within the bounds of Wikipedia rules without violating POINT or BATTLEGROUND until I see every person I'm in conflict with blocked or banned.". What more proof of bad faith do you need? He's engaging this jihad with me and with Jehochman as well. --Jim Butler (t) 00:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And of course, if I edited pseudonymously, this would never come up; but since I edit in good faith with my real identity, and am open about my background, I get slimed. No good deed goes unpunished. What a dysfunctional system. --Jim Butler (t) 01:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, I know about your Harvard MA. You've prattled on about it in multiple posts. Skinwalker (talk) 01:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just to remind casual observers that I have one foot squarely planted in the mainstream. Look, talk is cheap. I've never interacted with you before, yet you claim to be familiar with my edits. Why do you think that the majority of skeptic type editors who do interact with me think my edits are fine? Answer that. And if you're going to criticize my editing, provide the evidence. Let's see it. Go over to the articles I edit, find my edits and line them up with discussion at the time, and come on over to my talk page and show me how biased I am. --Jim Butler (t) 02:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Meh. Q.E.D.. Skinwalker (talk) 02:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- That's exactly what I thought you'd have to offer. --Jim Butler (t) 02:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Meh. Q.E.D.. Skinwalker (talk) 02:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just to remind casual observers that I have one foot squarely planted in the mainstream. Look, talk is cheap. I've never interacted with you before, yet you claim to be familiar with my edits. Why do you think that the majority of skeptic type editors who do interact with me think my edits are fine? Answer that. And if you're going to criticize my editing, provide the evidence. Let's see it. Go over to the articles I edit, find my edits and line them up with discussion at the time, and come on over to my talk page and show me how biased I am. --Jim Butler (t) 02:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, I know about your Harvard MA. You've prattled on about it in multiple posts. Skinwalker (talk) 01:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And of course, if I edited pseudonymously, this would never come up; but since I edit in good faith with my real identity, and am open about my background, I get slimed. No good deed goes unpunished. What a dysfunctional system. --Jim Butler (t) 01:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- You've got to show better evidence of COI or POV-pushing than merely asserting it exists because I happen to be an acupuncturist. Absent such evidence, all you're doing is violating WP:NPA: "Using someone's affiliations as a means of dismissing or discrediting their views—regardless of whether said affiliations are mainstream." BTW, I also have a very mainstream M.A. in chemistry from Harvard; be assured that I experience no inner conflict at all from also being an acupuncturist. I just try to be as objective as I can, and skeptical type editors who actually collaborate with me, as a rule, tend to say favorable things about my editing (see my talk page, e.g. here and here). I welcome scrutiny of my edits, but let's see some diffs: otherwise, this all sounds like meritless piling-on to me: pure WP:GAME by ScienceApologist, who has made his mission clear: "I promise to continue to attack others within the bounds of Wikipedia rules without violating POINT or BATTLEGROUND until I see every person I'm in conflict with blocked or banned.". What more proof of bad faith do you need? He's engaging this jihad with me and with Jehochman as well. --Jim Butler (t) 00:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Jim Butler has now come to my talk page challenging me to prove my point or drop the matter. This sort of childish behavior does nothing good for my opinion of him, and he further lowered my opinion by playing strawman games and changing the goalposts when I replied. This is the sort of 'civil POV pushing' and system gaming endemic to the pseudoscience editors that SA and others work against. ThuranX (talk) 03:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Here's the exchange, which editors can judge for themselves. ThuranX, when challenged, declined to produce a single diff to back up his accusation. And then, ironically, repeated his proven-baseless accusation. Conduct unbecoming any editor, let alone those purportedly concerned with upholding stuff like science and evidence. News flash: I'm not the bad guy here. I don't think ThuranX is either, just a little overenthusiastic. The problem is SA's outrageous gaming and attacks. --Jim Butler (t) 03:44, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (EC)No, I called you a crybaby. The fact that I've noticed your behavior over the past months is enough. 'Prove it' challenges, especially when addressing a pattern of behavior are pointless. Had I replied with two or three examples, he's had dissembled, saying that it was out of context, misinterpreted, or an odd mistake, but not admitted. Had I gone for four to six examples, he'd repeat the context challenge, complained about me not paying attention to the behavior of others in those examples, and had I gone for more, he'd have alleged I was secretly stalking him. This entire arc of behavior, as I predicted, was predicated on eliminating opposition, not about actually addressing the matters at hand. We've seen this sort of bullshit game before, and I for one am sick of being expected to jump through the hoops established by the standard handbook of POV Push tactics. The elimination of editors who participate in this shit would make Wikipedia far stronger than their persistent behaviors. Further, Butlerss above attacks and insults of me and my conduct in NOT going to his page to engage in a pattern of intimidation tactics, and instead, keeping it here where it's appropriate, need a warning, if not a block. ThuranX (talk) 04:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Umm.. actually you don't know that. You're the one making assertions about his behaviour, therefore it is incumbent upon you to provide diffs which prove that behaviour. Trust the rest of us to be smart enough to see if he's shifting the goalposts. Can you provide diffs of the behaviour or not? If you can, then please do. If it's true that he has been behaving in this way, then sanctions are appropriate. // roux 04:58, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Your opinion. I've seen enough pseudo-science editors play this game to see it when it's being played, sorry you can't. I'm not going to indulge him, or you, on this little distraction. essentially the game ends with a 'have you stopped beating your wife yet?' double bind, where either the proof provided is all "wrong", or the proof you provided proves you're out to get the editor in question. It's not worth engaging in, and opting not to play so outrages the pseudoscience types that they react with this' if you're not going to play, you never had anything to show' reaction. It boils down to an infantile defensiveness, in which any attempt to oppose them is met with these games, and as I said before, I'm not playing. ThuranX (talk) 07:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No.. I believe it's generally accepted around here that making accusations without a shred of evidence to back them up tends to indicate a lack of evidence for the accusations. Either way, I don't have a dog in the pseudoscience fight; I'm just seeing you hurl a lot of invective at someone with not a single thing to back it up, as well as a whole bunch of predictions that you also can't back up. Either he did what you're saying or he didn't. If he did, show us where. // roux 07:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Was the COI report closed for a correct reason?
I opened a discussion at WT:COIN: COI report when not promoting oneself? --Enric Naval (talk) 23:19, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Request for recusal
I would like to request, in the future, that User:Jehochman recuse himself from closing threads that I initiate as there is a fairly obvious history of bad blood between that user and myself. The person feelings that will get wrapped up whenever he takes direct administrative actions with regard to me are unavoidable at this point.
ScienceApologist (talk) 02:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- That's rich. You've already stated your intention to attack editors with whom you're in conflict. So, your pattern is:
- disrupt the hell out of WP
- get sanctioned by an admin
- complain that the sanctioning admin is "in conflict" with you, and demand recusal.
- That's cute, if a tad transparent and WP:SOUP-y, but it won't fly. What you should be doing, if you really feel that you're the lone defender of certain science articles, is (a) stop being so grandiose, (b) disengage. What you should not do is state the intention to rampage, and then do so. In good faith, I would recommend that you disengage; however, I must admit that part of me despairs of your ever behaving well on WP, and doesn't mind letting you keep rampaging, because then the community will be forced to act. Sorry, but you've crossed the line long ago into the realm where it's appropriate to call a spade a spade. You have become a seriously disruptive influence on WP, and need to choose between disengaging or forcing others to impose that on you. --Jim Butler (t) 03:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
As some fellow editors may have noticed at RFAR, I've become ScienceApologist's mentor. He made this request at my suggestion. He and Jehochman do have a history, and it's reasonable to at least request recusal. If anyone has an objection that pertains to ScienceApologist's interactions with Jehochman, here would be the place to raise it. Please keep the discussion topical: one's general opinion of any editor (positive or negative) is unrelated to the merits of a recusal request. DurovaCharge! 05:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, Durova, for highlighting the pertinent issue, and sorry for going off track. I'm interested to know about Jehochman's and SA's past interactions; it will help me understand the RFAR better, as well as the recusal request. Could you explain this background a little? Thanks, and I sincerely wish you and SA the best outcomes with the mentoring relationship. I'm glad he undertook it, and afterward I was frankly surprised to see his gratuitous COI attacks on me[40][41]. I don't think they're a very good start for a guy ostensibly seeking wiki-rehab. (That's assuming they were meritless. Now, maybe my edits are overly biased, but it would be nice if someone who knows me and has worked with me could explain specifically how.) regards, Jim Butler (t) 05:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hi Jim, am just getting up to speed on things myself. Basically it's been a tough month for Jehochman and perhaps his intuition isn't quite at its best right now. Also before I ever corresponded with SA I wasn't keen on J's handling of the Pcarbonn threads. There are 1500 other sysops and if SA starts a thread that lacks merit, someone else will close it with less controversy. This is a tough area for all concerned; one step at a time perhaps we can bring things more in line with site norms. DurovaCharge! 17:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- This is going nowhere fast. I suggest that the parties request mediation, or initiate an RfC, or similar. I do not think Jim Butler is evil, but a cursory glance at his contributions does give some weight to the idea that he is writing for advocacy rather than in a truly dispassionate way. This cannot really be resolved by an admin noticeboard discussion, and I don't think that the COI noticeboard is the right place either as I think the dispute is more nuanced than that. So, a dispute exists, impacts neutrality of content so needs to be resolved, involves some people who have personal issues witheach other so probably needs third-party involvement, and is not a simple matter of self-promotion. Let's pick a venue which supports lengthy discussion of details of content and move forward from there, shall we? Guy (Help!) 14:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hasn't an ArbCom case Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Fringe science just started which can address at least some of these problems? Isn't that a good place to start? Mathsci (talk) 16:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
There's an arbitration going on right now. Why are we here? The mentor would do well to guide this matter through dispute resolution rather than encouraging disruptive excursions. I've never blocked or unblocked SA. I've only acted as a fellow editor. I happen to like them, in general, but am very disappointed that they keep pushing the envelope. Jehochman Talk 16:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Jim Butler isn't a named party in the arbitration case. So perhaps mediation would be a good idea? Please slow down a step or two, Jehochman. I didn't encourage these threads or even know about them until last night, at which point the range of potentially useful suggestions was rather narrow. Would you be willing to consent to his recusal request? Best wishes, DurovaCharge! 17:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Move, renames, lost history
I don't know where to post this, but the moves and redirects for the Nazi philosophers article are getting out of control. I don't think there's any ill intent, but this contribution history [42] contains many of the titles and moves. The history is in one place List of Nazi philosophers and the article, with new history, is now in another Nazi Philosophers (at least last I checked) which should probably be Nazi philosophers. Thanks to anyone who wants to help sort this mess out or point me in the right direction. There's also an issue of what the article should be titled and what it should include if anyone wants to weigh in. ChildofMidnight (talk) 20:20, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Savabubble (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) has been renaming these articles. He also managed to get his User talk redirected to an article talk, confusingly enough. I undid this redirection and invited him to comment here. His activities suggest he may not be familiar with how article moves are usually done, or the need to get consensus. He has also started a second user talk page at User talk:Savabubbles which does not correspond to any existing user name. Once we figure out how to get a proper move discussion started, there could be a need for cut-and-paste move repair. Savabubble has been around since December 2007. He appears well-intentioned but has not been catching on to WP policy very quickly. EdJohnston (talk) 16:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
An old conflict of personalities has been renewed
For several years a small number of editors have been editing a set of rather obscure articles revolving around the history of sects in the Baha'i Faith. Because first hand knowledge of the subject is rather limited it seems there are only a few of us who even bother to edit the content of these small groups articles. I happen to be a member of one of the small groups in question, and User:MARussellPESE belongs to the larger group of the Baha'i Faith. Over the year many edit wars have transpired between me and User:MARussellPESE, and unfortunately we've both been guilty of crossing the line of civility at one time or another. A discussion which has only just begun here which was started by User:MARussellPESE yesterday and my objection to part of his edit has elicited a hostile verbal response which seems entirely un-called for; specifically: "Oh, and thanks for being such a jerk. You have my undivided attention now. I see that you've added these filings all over the place. Time to go excise them. MARussellPESE (talk) 15:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)" Not only has his response been insulting and entirely uncalled for, but he has launched an array of edits which are borderline vandalism: [43], [44]. I don't believe this is the way to start a discussion, and the reaction to my objections seems way over-blown; something common to our discussions. We have a history of posting to each others talk pages, challenging each other in discussions, and reverting each others contributions. The days of constructive criticism between us appears behind us, and I believe he's simply become intolerant of my contributions. If this is attitude at the outset of a discussion, I don't believe we can be productive on the page. I would appreciate any input from this board. DisarrayGeneral 21:09, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- There's enough bad behavior to go around, it seems. I think the situation requires someone impartial. JuJube (talk) 21:12, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I also noticed you didn't go through the trouble of notifying User:MARussellPESE so I did it for you. JuJube (talk) 21:18, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you for your quick response. Yes, I agree there's been " enough bad behavior to go around", and I believe I acknowledged that in my opening comments. My apologies, but I wasn't aware I was required to notify him; that kind of courtesy wasn't extended to me when he reported an incident against me here last May. That incident, btw, is still unresolved for the issue arose out of him deciding a biography written by one of Mason Remey's believers "was out" based on his own interpretations of WP:SELFPUB. Removing that well sourced biography has effectively sterilized Remey's bio to a large extent, and now MARussell has again gotten out the hatchet and culled reliably sourced information. I'm not looking to agitate anything further, but rather for resolution and progress. I don't believe name calling and threats fall into that category. We have both demonstrated our resolve to hold fast to our positions, but it's a new development for him to act maliciously at the expense of the pages we edit. He has threatened to and carried out egregious deletions of content without discussion based on me "being a jerk"; something which I believe crosses a new line. I really don't know how to even respond to these deletions which effectively blot out the existence of whole sects of believers in our mutual faith. DisarrayGeneral 22:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I believe your only recourse here is WP:RFC. JuJube (talk) 23:16, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you, but RFC's have never once elicited voluntary comments from 3rd parties to the discussions on these talk pages. I don't know if it's because the subject isn't commonly familiar to editors of religious pages, or what it is, but RFC tags just don't seem to elicit comments. DisarrayGeneral 02:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I believe your only recourse here is WP:RFC. JuJube (talk) 23:16, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Um, the courtesy notice is noted in the first paragraph of this page. This isn't the place for content discussions anyway, Jeff.
- Thank you for your quick response. Yes, I agree there's been " enough bad behavior to go around", and I believe I acknowledged that in my opening comments. My apologies, but I wasn't aware I was required to notify him; that kind of courtesy wasn't extended to me when he reported an incident against me here last May. That incident, btw, is still unresolved for the issue arose out of him deciding a biography written by one of Mason Remey's believers "was out" based on his own interpretations of WP:SELFPUB. Removing that well sourced biography has effectively sterilized Remey's bio to a large extent, and now MARussell has again gotten out the hatchet and culled reliably sourced information. I'm not looking to agitate anything further, but rather for resolution and progress. I don't believe name calling and threats fall into that category. We have both demonstrated our resolve to hold fast to our positions, but it's a new development for him to act maliciously at the expense of the pages we edit. He has threatened to and carried out egregious deletions of content without discussion based on me "being a jerk"; something which I believe crosses a new line. I really don't know how to even respond to these deletions which effectively blot out the existence of whole sects of believers in our mutual faith. DisarrayGeneral 22:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Please read the whole thread. I opened with a discussion of the failings of a particular source. His response was to question my good faith and add a cheap shot at my religious community. This is a typical pattern of his. Calling that out as being a jerk isn't a personal attack as it's directed at his conduct.
- Disarray used to be known as User:Jeffmichaud. Please, take at a look at our respective talk page archives (If you can find his old ones. His username usurpation has certainly cleaned that up.) and block logs to see who's more adept at the personal attacks and edit warring.
- I'm not intolerant of Disarray's contributions. I'm intolerant of his contributions that don't meet WP:V, WP:RS, etc. Unfortunately, given the subject that's legion. That's a huge difference, but Disarray's been personalizing these discussions for years. MARussellPESE (talk) 23:25, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Archives of every single comment to my talk page from my old user name are available on my current talk page. There are several examples there of MARussell issuing "be civil" warnings to me, so I assumed he was familiar with the concept. I wasn't aware there was a distinction between when calling someone a jerk was and wasn't appropriate. If this is in fact justified by me allegedly "questioning his good faith", then I've apparently misunderstood the concept of "Be Civil" all along. I thought it was a unilateral expectation? I have twice acknowledged here that in the past I've contributed to the class of personalities that exists between us, but MARussell seems to honestly feel that it's been entirely my creation, and that his responses to me, no matter how demoralizing and directly personal are entirely justified?
Aren't we all expected to take ownership of our behavior on talk pages. The record shows that when I've been out of line, I've acknowledged it and tried to do right by the situation. I've more than once apologized for things I've said in heated discussions, haven't I? Yet in all of our exchanges, neither of us has ever crossed the line of making a direct derogatory attack like you have now. Yet instead of acknowledging it was inappropriate and out of line, you're here making excuses for it? And yet you wonder why our discussions always seem to bog down? There seems to be no reasoning with you, as you seem incapable of seeing any other point of view but your own (which is always the correct one). I brought this here because I new that marching forward into discussing the edits you just made there was going to be an enormous waste of time if out of the gate you're defensive and name calling. I'm afraid that this too may have been yet another colossal waste of time. If it's always you're right and I'm wrong, then maybe I shouldn't bother engaging you on the talk pages? DisarrayGeneral 02:25, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
There is a bunch of requests for protection regarding targets of banned user Bambifan101 (talk · contribs) at WP:RFPP. I personally would decline all of them for not much activity but I am unfamiliar with the user so I'd like some more input. Regards SoWhy 21:51, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Bambifan101, aka "The Disney Vandal", uses dynamic ip's to attack favourite articles - the ip accounts are quickly stomped upon, but usually not before they are abandoned. If the major targets can be sprotected without too much (preferably no) collateral damage then it would remove a lot of potential damage. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:17, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I would grant the requests. The Disney Vandal is persistent, and does a lot of damage with edits that aren't obviously vandalism, making it difficult to get his accounts dealt with quickly through AIV and other more normally useful techniques.—Kww(talk) 22:26, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've softblocked his /17 range (it's fairly high traffic) for 72 hours. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 22:30, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Bambifan101 nearly exclusively uses named accounts. Soft-blocking is of no help.—Kww(talk) 00:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
It is if the accounts are new. Black Kite 00:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)Meh, forget that - I was having a "softblock"/"semi-protect" senior moment... Black Kite 15:30, 29 December 2008 (UTC)- Softblocking is anon. only, account creation blocked. This block will prevent him from harassing users anonymously and hopefully stymie his rampant account creation. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 02:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- OK, "limited help". An editor that has been this dedicated for this long with this many accounts probably has a nice collection of socks pre-knitted. If soft-blocking only permitted confirmed editors, I'd be a lot more optimistic.—Kww(talk) 02:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I had been reading this as being instead of protection. As an addition to protection, I have no strong objection.—Kww(talk) 03:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Against; last week another user requested a semi of all of the vandal's user talk pages for the simple reason he wanted to deny him ANY pages to edit and thus bore him (No, seriously, that's what he said). This is no different; the only difference is the namespace and the requesting editor. It's pointless to prot every single article a vandal tends to target because it encourages the vandal to target *new* articles, broadening his scope and making ID'ing more difficult. Besides, there's serious WP:DENY issues here as well (though I'm probably the LAST person who should be speaking of that...). -Jéské Couriano (v^_^v) 12:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Softblocking is anon. only, account creation blocked. This block will prevent him from harassing users anonymously and hopefully stymie his rampant account creation. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 02:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Bambifan101 nearly exclusively uses named accounts. Soft-blocking is of no help.—Kww(talk) 00:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've softblocked his /17 range (it's fairly high traffic) for 72 hours. Nishkid64 (Make articles, not wikidrama) 22:30, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Somewhat related to this issue. Despite my attempts to get away from this crap, I ended up doing some reverts of his latest round of vandalism. To my shock, however, established editor User:Colonel Warden is now actively supporting this known vandal's edits and is doing edits for him,[45] including undoing merges that have been in place for months,[46][47] and reverting attempts to restore them,[48], restoring Bambifan101's IP sock edits,[49][50] even adding a WP:COPYRIGHT violating link to one reverted article,[51] etc. He is even using false edit summaries in these edits. I mean, I know he's a big time inclusionist, but this seems very excessive to me, and it seems to be more about attempting to undo something I did rather than a genuine concern for the articles, from his own remarks about why he undid the merge.[52] I asked LessHeard vanU about the issue, as it seemed very inappropriate to me that CW is now basically helping the vandal which seems to go against WP:BAN.[53]. Unfortunately, CW's responses were less than encouraging.[54]
- Comment My interest in this matter arises from User:SoWhy's post at the head of this section which caught my eye yesterday. I looked into the topics in question and found them in need of some content-editing attention. One of them, for example, is a Number 1 hit single in the UK which has sold over a million copies, making it a platinum disk. Furthermore there was some seasonal relevance in that it was nearly a Christmas No.1 which is a perennial topic at this time of year. I have been fleshing this out but Collectionian seems so incensed by this that she has now proposed that the article be deleted altogether - an absurd proposition. Anyway, this is just an ordinary content dispute and the only special feature is that we have this Bambifan chap buzzing around in the background. I have no particular interest in them - it is the topics which concern me. We are here to build an encyclopedia. Colonel Warden (talk) 17:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
This edit summary alone is sufficiently deceptive that it renders Colonel Warden's motivations suspect.—Kww(talk) 17:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hardly. I was adding to the article, working from the previous full version. Collectonian had interposed a redirect and so, of course, this was overwritten in adding additional material to the article. The point here was that another source was being added, so making the redirect moot. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Evasion in response to having your deceptive edit summaries pointed out doesn't help. The major impact of your edit was to undo a redirect. You and User:Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles both try this nonsense of pretending that redirects don't exist and your edit summaries don't need to take them into account. It's disruptive when he does it, and it's disruptive when you do it. I think that behaviour alone is worthy of a block until you agree to stop doing it.—Kww(talk) 18:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I gather that you are an enthusiast for such redirections and so are not impartial in this matter. Please indicate a relevant guideline/policy regarding edit summaries and I will be happy to consider it. Currently I tend to be brief and indicate with words such as "etc" or "&c" if there is more than can be easily summarised. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "Undoing redirect" is beyond your ability to type?—Kww(talk) 18:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have consulted the relevant guideline which says, "Also, mentioning one change but not another one can be misleading to someone who finds the other one more important; add "and misc." to cover the other change(s).". This is what I did - I summarised the changes which seemed important to me - the addition of sourced material - and appended ", etc." so that editors with other priorities could consult a diff if they wanted to know more. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- You can't seriously expect people to believe that you find the redirects unimportant. If they were unimportant to you, you wouldn't spend so much of your editing energy searching them out and undoing them. As usual, your response to criticism is to attempt to be evasive and glib. I don't think that you fool anyone.—Kww(talk) 18:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have consulted the relevant guideline which says, "Also, mentioning one change but not another one can be misleading to someone who finds the other one more important; add "and misc." to cover the other change(s).". This is what I did - I summarised the changes which seemed important to me - the addition of sourced material - and appended ", etc." so that editors with other priorities could consult a diff if they wanted to know more. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "Undoing redirect" is beyond your ability to type?—Kww(talk) 18:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I gather that you are an enthusiast for such redirections and so are not impartial in this matter. Please indicate a relevant guideline/policy regarding edit summaries and I will be happy to consider it. Currently I tend to be brief and indicate with words such as "etc" or "&c" if there is more than can be easily summarised. Colonel Warden (talk) 18:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Evasion in response to having your deceptive edit summaries pointed out doesn't help. The major impact of your edit was to undo a redirect. You and User:Le Grand Roi des Citrouilles both try this nonsense of pretending that redirects don't exist and your edit summaries don't need to take them into account. It's disruptive when he does it, and it's disruptive when you do it. I think that behaviour alone is worthy of a block until you agree to stop doing it.—Kww(talk) 18:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler
I feel uncomfortable closing Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Michael Gottlieb Agnethler due to my involvement, but it keeps garnering discussion even after the nominator withdrawing it. Could someone please remove the dead horse from its flogging. Agathoclea (talk) 22:00, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- ✓ Done – iridescent 22:03, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Interim naming of December_2008_Gaza_Strip_airstrikes
We're having a problem where a fresh set of eyes might help. There is some discussion of what to call the article about the recent events in the Gaza strip. The article began as "Operation Cast Lead" named for the Israeli code name for the operation and some editors felt that this was a violation of WP:NPOV. That discussion (with the requisite renaming wars) began here and then continued here.
At issue is what to name the article in the interim, while we attempt to build consensus about a long term name. Specifically, that User:Cerejota might have overstepped by changing the name of the article to the current name while discussion was still ongoing. It seems to me that there is growing consensus that the article should be changed back for now if not forever, but that could be my own bias on the subject,
The general sense that I'm getting is that people are frustrated and unsure as to how to proceed both on the short and long term. So I'm asking for an admin to take a look and give us some feedback.
Lot 49atalk 23:08, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- What's wrong with Operation Cast Lead? Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 23:20, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- We've had a few arguments raised: that an incident that involves killing civlians shouldn't be named after a poem, that by using the IDF name for it, we're endorsing their view, that no one in the media is using Operation Cast Lead to describe the events etc. There are screens and screens of arguments [[on the talk page in two main places if you want to read more. Lot 49atalk 23:57, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Lot49a, we do not discuss content here at ANI, we discuss behavior needing admin intervention. It is sufficient to mention that you are misrepresenting the views you do not share. Interested editors can see the arguments, for and against, in the talk page. I am responding to your behavioral claims separately, as it seems you do not have the full information available. It is also obvious from your post you do have a side to pick,
which is unfortunate, as I haven't seen you argue in the talk page as one should.Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 00:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Lot49a, we do not discuss content here at ANI, we discuss behavior needing admin intervention. It is sufficient to mention that you are misrepresenting the views you do not share. Interested editors can see the arguments, for and against, in the talk page. I am responding to your behavioral claims separately, as it seems you do not have the full information available. It is also obvious from your post you do have a side to pick,
Article started as Operation Cast Lead, but when I arrived the title was 2008 Gaza Strip bombings here is diff. That is when the discussion that Lot references started. A discussion started to develop, and in the middle of it, User:Wikifan12345 User:RyanGerbil10 reverted to Operation Cast Lead believing, incorrectly, with it being consensus. Then I reverted, and then did minor refactorings for language. Someone suggested that rather than "bombing", "airstrikes" was more correct, and I agreed it was so and changed it. If I overstepped, so did User:Wikifan12345 and User:RyanGerbil10. I believe none of us did, but I believe RyanGerbill is mistaken in thinking he operated with consensus. He didn't.
Yes, I was WP:BOLD and WP:IAR to ensure that an incorrect title didn't remain: Operation Cast Lead makes a great redirect, and should be mentioned in the lead, but both the immense majority of the reliable sources and a need for editorial neutrality make it invalid as an article name choice. Consensus cannot operate against policy on a per article basis: systemic changes on policy are to be by systemic consensus. I stand by the judgment call made, as it makes us a better encyclopedia.
As to a generalized sense of frustration, I disagree. I think we are all discussing this, and we disagree and agree but this is normal. There has been two users I have had issues in particular, User:Wikifan12345 (I can provide diffs upon request) that I have asked to calm down as he was on the verge of personal attacks (this is the same user who moved against consensus himself and who I reverted, and who has in fact launched threats to "get higher authority" over disagreements, personalizing the debate) - and User: Cowmadness who made inflammatory, soapboxy claims in a discussion I WP:SNOWBALL closed as irrelevant, and then posted some stuff about "talking to Jimbo" in my talk page. Otherwise, I have seen no other expression of frustration, just disagreement.
As a reminder this article falls into the Discretionary Sacntions ruling of the ArbCom for all Israeli-Palestinian articles. Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 00:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "we do not discuss content here at ANI", you say just three minutes before posting a comment that... hm... discusses content on ANI. -- tariqabjotu 00:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
The original title was Operation Cast Lead. There were about 6 members discussion the title, resulting in a lengthy 10 paragraph debate. But Cerejota completely ignored the discussion, and unilaterally changed the title to Dec 2008 Gaza Strip Airstrikes. He said the original title wasn't neutral, but even if that were the case (which it clearly isn't), he had no right to change the title without discussing it in the talk page. The title could have been Israel is Evil and he still would have been obligated to look at the rationale. In any case, Gaza Airstrike doesn't even reflect the article, as it now contains heavy infantry and ground-based finding. It's been more than 20 hours and nothing has changed. This is just ridiculous. Wikifan12345 (talk) 04:09, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Uh, sorry, wrong forum. In reponse to Cerejota's bevahior, it was completely unprofessional. Changing the title of an article before a consensus has been reached is a gross violation of wikipedia policy. In addition, the strong claim of lack of neutrality carried no weight, no merit, not even evidence, other than opinion/perspective that doesn't belong in such a controversial article. Wikifan12345 (talk) 04:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Also, whenever I called him out on his behavior, he told me to "Chill out". Lol. Wikifan12345 (talk) 04:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Hidden Vandalism of User Sgeureka
The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
User:Sgeureka for a last 2 months spends his time to vandalize articles of The Outer Limits TV-series episodes. First he has removed (without any discussion), all these articles, merged snippets of text in the useless List of Episodes.
When I called for his explanation, the matter was discussed here. The outcome of the discussion (8:2) was "keep" — i.e. preservation of all individual articles [55].
However, Sgeureka did not started to restore deleted articles immediately, but only after a special reminders [56], and instead to agree with the community's opinion, he immediately thereafter starts a new debate on the same topic at the (discussion page) [57]. After restoring only a small part of deleted articles, he became to wait for additional arguments to restore the remaining articles [58].
This debate once again led to the same result: community again does not agree with his insane proposal to merge all articles into single list — because it meant the removal of original articles that contain many useful information [59].
After that Sgeureka was forced to restore the remaining articles, but all the restored articles contain some additional Templates (see example) that discredits and disfigures the pages and once again questioned the relevance and notability of these articles.
Thus, Sgeureka once again destroys the consensus on the status of these articles — and is going to start a new (3rd) debate on that same theme (and he does not hide this [60] [61]). Even after my regular reminders, he every time returns these puzzling tags, accompanying his own actions by fool comments [62] [63].
This is all the more strange, given that Sgeureka himself acknowledged that he did not watched the series, and so, he is not going to work at these articles [64]. Also, the User is permanently trying to blame others for what he is doing himself — imposing his "endless" discussions [65], as well as placing misleading comments to edits (see example).
In addition, one of the unfortunate results of his actions was that the period between the removal and recovery of articles on episodes there had been deleted all images, illustrated the movies, and he had done nothing for their rehabilitation, although he was warned about it [66], and besides recently he became an administrator [67], and has the appropriate opportunities to restore the images.
Thus, this User:Sgeureka every time violates the agreements reached and undermines the Global policies and goodwill principles of Wikipedia, substituting them by some minor arguments. It seems that becoming an administrator, this User is confident that now his words (and fool comments) have more weight.
And now, I would like to know the following:
- 1. In the Russian Wikipedia (where I came from), there is a rule that after consensus it is forbidden to raise the same question for months (see the template ru:Шаблон:Оставлено). Is there any rules with the same meanings in the English wiki? All I have found here is only WP:GAME and WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT:
Refusal to 'get the point'
Shortcuts:
WP:IDIDNTHEARTHAT
WP:IDHT
In some cases, editors have perpetuated disputes by sticking to an allegation or viewpoint long after it has been discredited, repeating it almost without end, and refusing to acknowledge others' input or their own error. Often such editors are continuing to base future attacks and disruptive editing upon the erroneous statement to make a point.
Wikipedia is based upon collaborative good faith editing and consensus. When a stance passes the point of reasonableness, and it becomes obvious that there is a willful refusal to 'get the point' despite the clear statement of policy, and despite reasoned opinions and comments provided by experienced, independent editors, administrators or mediators, then refusal to get the point is no longer a reasonable stance or policy-compliant — it has become a disruptive pattern, being used to make or illustrate a point.
Note that it is the disruptive editing itself, not the mere holding of the opinion, that is the problem.
- 2. Where can I contact to place the issue on the Prohibition of this User to edit "The Outer Limits" tv-series episodes' articles, as well as to force him to remove all his misleading templates?
- 3. Where can I ask a question about undoing of User:Sgeureka's adminship status?
Best regards & Happy Holydays, Krasss (talk) 23:29, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I can't see anything in the decision to force Sgeureka himself to restore any articles, nor anything preventing you from doing so.—Kww(talk) 23:39, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- The first point is, No, there is no period after a consensus is formed during which a proposal may be revisited. However, unless there are changes in circumstances such new proposals are often speedy closed with reference to the previous discussion. If an individual continues to raise the same questions/requests/proposals then they may be considered as being disruptive, and the various methods of dispute resolution put in place - and if it is particularly disruptive then even warnings and reporting the matter to admin noticeboards (I think this covers you point 2). Re point 3, unless the editor has been using sysop tools to further their editorial preferences there is likely no reason to attempt to remove them. Admin tools are not a reward for good editing, and are therefore not withdrawn for being in a dispute. If there is admin abuse then it can be brought to the attention again of the admin noticeboards, and if severe a request for Arbitration can be filed. Lastly, I would ask if the editor concerned has been notified of this discussion? LessHeard vanU (talk) 23:43, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
Unusual Behavior by User:Matthewedwards
I want to tread lightly here, and certainly do not want to add to anymore drama that is found at AN/I. The last thing I want to do is bring an administrator to this venue. However, this edit coupled with the edit summary does not sit well with me. The discussion can be found here as well as a refactoring another user's talk page.
I understand OWN, and realize that anyone can edit my talk, but since I use my talk page openly, and freely, I do not think it is in good taste to modify another user's signature, nor claim SOAP, nor force archival on another user. On my talk, I have no problems with ideas, signatures, nor inflammatory commentary. It does not bother me. What bothers me is that as discussion or talk pages are here for a reason: to work out issues and freely communicate. This behavior is, IMHO, highly inappropriate and does not better the project. I simply ask, as a resolve, that issues like a signature, or forced archival, are taken to the appropriate forum, instead of unilateral behavior. I appreciate the anticipated time spent looking into my complaint. Law shoot! 23:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Several users had let LOTR know that the sig was unacceptable, and he had shown no interest in changing it. I think this was a good move. // roux 23:58, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- I don't see why this is uncontroversial. LOTR is basically soapboxing every time he posts a message, so such a move is a good thing. — sephiroth bcr (converse) 00:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Rjd0060 just semi-protected User:X!'s user page overruling User:X!'s decision to fully protect it. User:X! obviously wants his user page to be fully protected. Today there was a request for unprotection. I declined that request. Without any previous discussion (Rjd0060 talked neither to me nor to X!) Rjd0060 overruled my decision at RFPP (and thereby of course X!'s decision to protect). Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate Rjd0060's behaviour was highly inappropriate here. Overruling two admins' decisions without talking to them at all is highly inappropriate. — Aitias // discussion 00:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I don't think this is inappropriate at all. Please review Wikipedia:PPOL#User pages and then review the page history and you'll notice that there is no reason for protection. And then coming to AN/I? Wow. - Rjd0060 (talk) 00:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not touching on your other points but "Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate" seems just wrong. Nobody has shown any need to full protect the page. BJTalk 00:59, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict)Note: I emphasised it already above. However, once again: Completely regardless whether the full protection was appropriate Rjd0060's course of action (overruling two admins' decisions without talking to them at all) was inappropriate here. — Aitias // discussion 01:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Your original decline reason ("Declined, Wikipedia:Point. Thanks.") is what was inappropriate. - Rjd0060 (talk) 01:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Could you please stay on-topic? If you wish to complain about my decline reason: you go. — Aitias // discussion 01:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- There is no admin action required in either case, so why is this even here? If you are considering this wheel warring an RFAR is in order. BJTalk 01:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- This is not the complaints department Aitias. Majorly talk 01:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Please see WP:PLAXICO. --Smashvilletalk 01:22, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Could you please stay on-topic? If you wish to complain about my decline reason: you go. — Aitias // discussion 01:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Is there any reason for this other than drama? All he did was reduce it to a semi-protect. X! doesn't own his talk page, so no, it is not his decision whether or not it is fully protected. This has already been explained to you here and here. Just because you don't like the answer doesn't mean you have to shop around til you get one you like. Did you even bother to ask Rjd why he did it instead of chastisizing him for it and accusing him of bad faith and making pointy edits? The real questionable part of this is the bad faith response to the RFUP request here. --Smashvilletalk 01:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
This page is not the complaints department, and Aitias should know better than to come forum shopping. There's no reason for X!'s userpage to be fully protected, so rudely responding to a request with unfounded WP:POINT accusations is pretty poor. Majorly talk 01:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Is there any reason to keep this open? Marking as resolved. // roux 01:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Smashville, that's not my point. What would have been wrong with asking X! first? User:MZMcBride's course of action seems to be far more appropriate: He tried to talk with X! first. That is my point. Why could Rjd0060 not have waited until X! would have replied? — Aitias // discussion 01:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- What admin action are you asking for, here? Consensus is that fullprot isn't necessary, and you've been told the same thing in other venues. RJD isn't going to be blocked for this, as there's no behaviour to prevent. So what action is required? The issue may not be resolved to your satisfaction, but it is resolved. // roux 01:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- We've already closed this. Opening it back up is disruptive. Your complaint is predicated on bad faith and stirring up drama. You didn't even ask the other admin why he had done it, you just came out with guns-a-blazing. There will be no admin action taken here. So unless you wish to start wheel warring, I suggest you put your guns back in their holsters and walk away. --Smashvilletalk 01:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Smashville, that's not my point. What would have been wrong with asking X! first? User:MZMcBride's course of action seems to be far more appropriate: He tried to talk with X! first. That is my point. Why could Rjd0060 not have waited until X! would have replied? — Aitias // discussion 01:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Semi-protect December 2008 Gaza Strip airstrikes
// roux 01:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
A number of controversial edits are being made by anonymous editors, which appears to have to do with the recent and controversial nature of the events. In order to keep vandalism away, it would be wise to semi-protect at least until this is no longer a top news item. This is separate from the move protection. Thanks!--Cerejota (talk) 01:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Harassment
On Talk:List_of_Naruto_antagonists#Quit_saying_Pain_looks_cool I removed where an artists says he drew a character to make him look cool. Sounds like another artist on a soapbox to me.
I am tired of Snapper2 offensive behavior to make editing Wikipedia unpleasant for me. Saying "You are in the minority here, as nobody shares your opinion (which apparently you shouldn't be giving anyway)" to discourage me from editing anything is harassment.
Plus Sephiroth_BCR threat of blocking me for removing an artist's advocacy of one of his characters that belongs in a blog is overkill. Since when is self-promotion protected here? --MahaPanta (talk) 01:26, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Removed piped link to make it clear which page was being discussed CosmicPenguin (Talk) 02:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And this requires administrator intervention how? JuJube (talk) 06:43, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- While a touch rude, it certainly isn't harassment. I'm assuming you're the IP editor on that Talk page? — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite 08:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, I didn't log in at first, since it seemed like a minor case of an over zealous fan. Telling someone you shouldn't be editing, especially on a discussion page, use to deserve at least an administrator's warning, because no one is suppose to "discourage them from editing entirely" as thaken from the WP:Harass page.
Betacommand is making automated edits
This discussion is getting longer by the minute: I see no harm in collapsing it for the sake of improving the readability of the rest of ANI. TalkIslander 15:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC) Shorten area restricted, active sections require easy access. LessHeard vanU (talk) 15:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
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If you recall, Betacommand has promised not to undertake a pattern of edits across more than 25 pages, to manually and carefully review each edit he makes, and to be civil. See the community-imposed restrictions that he agreed to in August. When a couple other users and I brought up on his talk page his recent run of 80 or so image removals, the response followed the typical pattern, which I paraphrase here (the link goes to his last edit in the discussion):
Despite Beta constantly returning to "they're not automated" and "I'm not breaking policy", these are not the point. The decision was worded so that we would no longer have to take Betacommand at his word that he wasn't using an automated tool, because in the past he has claimed not to be using automated tools when he actually was. This is why the decision just refers to "a pattern of edits". Can I get one of those mythical uninvolved admins to weigh in? rspεεr (talk) 04:26, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
So what's an admin gonna do? Another little 24 hour slap on the wrist? By now, Betacommand should be community banned indefinitely from Wikipedia. *sigh* - ✰ALLST☆R✰ echo 04:40, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
The restriction is very clear: Before undertaking any pattern of edits (such as a single task carried out on multiple pages) that affects more than 25 pages, Betacommand must propose the task on WP:VPR and wait at least 24 hours for community discussion. This would be any pattern, such as edits which follow policy and need to be done, which indeed fall under this restriction. Hence, the edits are blockable. Although I can't bring myself to block an editor for following image policy in such a straightforward and clean way (images without fair use rationales should be deleted), I would ask Betacommand to abide by the restriction, take this thread as a warning and not do it again. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:29, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Out of curiosity, have any of Beta's edits since his December 10th block been automated? I mean seriously, given the amount and time frame...he could've easily used tabs and then saved the pages once he was done. Did he admit to this somewhere?--Toffile (talk) 06:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
ProposalThe restrictions are not effective to serve a purpose of preventing disruption. I propose the community imposed restriction here be removed. So long as the automated edits are within policy, Betacommand can be trusted to make them. I also propose a strong caution to Betacommand regarding an effort towards civility. NonvocalScream (talk) 05:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
NotesFolks, I just don't see where this restriction is going short of Arbitration. It seems to me the restriction itself, is the source of the disruption. I'm only proposing we remove the disruption, the restriction that is. NonvocalScream (talk) 06:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
A different proposalI propose to remove the "uninvolved admin" clause from Betacommand's restrictions. Betacommand can be blocked by any admin for incivility or for making a pattern of bot-like edits, subject only to the usual conventions (WP:BLOCK) about admins placing blocks. Admins can be trusted to use their blocking power correctly and responsibly. In the current state of things, Betacommand can blatantly thumb his nose at the restrictions (as he just did in the talk-page thread I linked to) and our hands are tied by the fact that anyone who has paid any attention could be considered "involved". rspεεr (talk) 06:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
More discussionJust wondering, ignoring Betacommand's editing restrictions who here thinks that the edits were outside of policy? --Chris 09:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
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Betacommand indef blocked
Since the discussion between User:Roux and BC appears to be happening off WP, I have enacted an indef block on BC's account in the meantime. I cannot believe that we are having this discussion again; there is rarely an issue on whether the image compliance deletion notifications are outside of policy, but the manner in which they are conducted and especially the responses made to any query. Now, if BC wants to bring this (and me) to ArbCom to resolve then by all means unblock the account so he may commence proceedings - otherwise please do not vary the sanction until the community comes to some sort of decision. LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm sad to say that I now support this. We tried hard to give him chance after chance, yet he's now gone ahead and broken his final set of restrictions. I believe that for right or wrong, Betacommand is a serious time sink to the project and now constitues an overall net negative hence my support for this block. Ryan PostlethwaiteSee the mess I've created or let's have banter 12:05, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Arbitration. NonvocalScream (talk) 12:30, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- There need be no abatement of any subsequent discussion here while the Arbs consider whether to take the case, and I have suggested as much in my statement. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:48, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It can continue here, yes. NonvocalScream (talk) 12:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- There need be no abatement of any subsequent discussion here while the Arbs consider whether to take the case, and I have suggested as much in my statement. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:48, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I believe it's come to this, yes, especially given the ongoing civility issues and apparent unwillingness to acknowledge his community imposed restrictions. —Locke Cole • t • c 13:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I echo Ryan's sadness and also endorse this block. I don't really see any use in arbitration -- until Betacommand comes to his senses, there is nothing much that needs to be done right now. Kusma (talk) 13:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse per BC's statement that he has no intention of abiding by editing restrictions [69]. BC has never understood that while yes, his edits are within policy, there has never been a consensus for bot-like removals of images that don't conform to this aspect of policy. If these images actually do belong in the articles, then it is better to spend time solving the pro forma problems with the image description page (writing appropriate rationales) than it is to blindly remove the images from articles. But either way, human judgment is needed. --B (talk) 13:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I even provided a venn diagram above...--Crossmr (talk) 14:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I endorse this. His utter failure to acknowledge his civility issues shows someone who just isn't willing to change.--Crossmr (talk) 14:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes Wow....having looked this stuff up I have to agree. Every time someone gives him the slightest bit of critism he accuses them of harrasment. "No harrasment" and "no personal attacks" does not mean "no critism allowed" – in fact I'm sure wikipedia would be rather crappy without critism. He also seems to have a rather big ego and viciously harrases those who disagree with him by accusing them of harrasment. Wikipedia's worst enemies are those whose vanity has been wounded and they waste far more of the community's time than vandals. I say we show him the door.--Patton123 14:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Given Betacommand's unwillingness in this thread to acknowledge having strayed from the editing restrictions, I likely would have blocked him by now myself. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse. It's not ideal to have to indef-block someone who admittedly can do a lot of good towards the project. However, the sheer amount of negativity caused by Betacommand and his behaviour is huge, and now definitely outweighs the benefit he brings to the project. Betacommand is unfortunately a net negative to this project. TalkIslander 14:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse per Islander MikeHobday (talk) 15:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
(outdent) If one editor calls you a jackass, screw em. If two ediotrs call you a jackass, screw em both. If three editors call you a jackass, they can all go to hell. If FIVE of more editors call you this, then its time to be fitted for a saddle. Sorry BC, time to saddle up. --Tom 15:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No comment on the block, but this comment is precisely correct - if you have five independent complaints about your behavior, it's time to look at your behavior. In fact, three is probably enough to start wondering. — Gavia immer (talk) 17:12, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse this block. The community has been pushed beyond its tolerance by Beta's truculence. Nandesuka (talk) 16:30, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No endorsement of this block. I will make my rationale below. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Objection - Per precedents. I am someone who doesn't believe in going after people for every little thing they do, a violation of something or not. I personally agree that there has been disruption in this project, but as I always suggest, we should do some mentoring, and probably a long probation period. Blocking never solves anything, it just brings back more problems (e.g. block evasion). Therefore, I object to this indefinite block.Mitch32(Go Syracuse) 17:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse block to prevent Betacommand from engaging in further massive bot-assisted disruption and gross incivility. I strongly disagree with the assertion that "Blocking never solves anything, it just brings back more problems (e.g. block evasion)", since we have many effective tools at our disposal to prevent Betacommand from evading this block, including automated reversion, range blocks, and filing an abuse report with his ISP. John254 18:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Fully endorse the block This has gone on far too long. Since the last community restrictions were put in place, Betacommand has been blocked four times and has never accepted any of them as legitimate. His answer is always of the form "this is bullshit but I'll ride it out" and it is clear that he refuses to abide by the restrictions concerning runs of automated edits. Yes, the runs in question were for the most part in line with policy but I should point out (as I tried to point out to BC to no avail) that a run to remove sports teams logos from tens of pages is unwise when it's done in the middle of a contentious RfC on that very subject. Beta's answer is that since fair-use rationales are not given for each instance of the use of the logo, removal is within policy. This is correct but these automated runs are nevertheless bound to escalate conflicts on the RfC. Betacommand's "shoot first, ask questions later" strategy is detrimental to the project and the editing restrictions were put in place precisely to avoid these problems. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 18:34, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
strong objection to off-wiki/IRC this time
I reject any approach to discuss this off-wiki. That worked for shit last time based on this very series of threads; it has to be done on-wiki. If any parties aren't happy with that, that is a shame. rootology (C)(T) 14:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I don't suppose that we can stop BC from commenting there, but any points made/raised there and not mentioned here should form no part of any decision (IMHO). LessHeard vanU (talk) 14:59, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Of course; he can comment anywhere, but no admin given the huge history here should be unblocking without express consensus on-wiki, and the same with figuring out any editing restrictions. Wasn't there strong consensus last time that his restrictions were compulsory rather than voluntary, anyway? rootology (C)(T) 15:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yes, they were. He was part of the group that worked out the wording of the existing restrictions, so he cannot claim they were enforced without notification (it should be noted that while he had input he had no veto). While I acted upon reading the threads above, I note that I made this commitment regarding the placement of a final set of restrictions. I regret that BC has found himself unable to comply with them, and is reverting to wiki-lawyering over what is policy rather than the conditions he was forced to accept. LessHeard vanU (talk) 15:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Of course; he can comment anywhere, but no admin given the huge history here should be unblocking without express consensus on-wiki, and the same with figuring out any editing restrictions. Wasn't there strong consensus last time that his restrictions were compulsory rather than voluntary, anyway? rootology (C)(T) 15:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yep, editors can talk about what they please, where they please, but anything brought up off-wiki should have no sway here. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I strongly agree that any and all off-wiki discussions are irrelevant to what happens here. The problems here exist on-wiki, so they need to be fixed on-wiki. Nandesuka (talk) 16:29, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Comment - hi all. The conversation I was having with Betacommand was along the lines of trying to help him help himself and help him find a way to productively resolve this situation without getting blocked. It was not an attempt to create consensus offwiki in any way. // roux 17:58, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Discussion Location
Out of interests of space and navigation shouldn't all this dissucsion about Betacommand be moved to Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Betacommand and contuined there? Peachey88 (Talk Page | Contribs) 13:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Heck no. Since when do we have noticeboards for users? Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Betacommand was created solely because the thread about him got too long back then. It's not the "Everything about Betacommand goes here"-noticeboard. --Conti|✉ 13:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No, this needs more eyeballs, not less, and that's exactly what we'd lose if this got shuffled off to an obscure subpage that only the involved might have on their watchlist. —Locke Cole • t • c 13:19, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It may be that it might be copied there for archiving purposes, to keep the subject in one easily referable location, once discussion has ceased on this instance. However, thanks for the link - it may become useful if this does get picked up by ArbCom. LessHeard vanU (talk) 13:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- The best solution would be for Betacommand to hand over his bot code to someone else, and help in a technical way only. Betacommand is bot-savvy and could be very helpful to the bot-development community, but it is entirely obvious that there is a large weight of opinion behind the idea that he should not run the bots himself. It is unfortunate that a lot of this is the result of inevitable kickback about necessary work; it is obvious to me that anybody and especially any bot who polices non-free content policy is perceived as some kind of Antichrist by a certain sector of the Wikipedia community and hounded relentlessly as a result. I think this is almost at the level of being a feature of the community, not a bug, so only people capable of handling that kind of crap with equanimity should be doing it. And that, sadly, does not include Betacommand. Guy (Help!) 14:32, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't think anyone would try to pull off this kind of argumentation at this time. The issue is not that people are perceiving the supposedly angelic Betacommand as Antichrist because he polices fair use. His bots are extremely buggy and poorly programmed, and he has huge conduct issues: note all the "fuck you"s and other swearing on his talk page in response to civil and correct criticism. Betacommand is not being "hounded". Anyone who ran bots as poorly as him would receive the same amount of criticism. But in Betacommand's and some of his supporters' eyes, any negative feedback on his bots, or even well-meant suggestions, is equivalent to incivility, trolling, vandalism and harassment. Note that Betacommand has also been criticised for poor bot work in regards to such mundane tasks as adding articles to categories, changing the formats of dates and so on. Are these also such types of über-controversial tasks where anyone doing them is perceived as Antichrist? Don't think so. The issue is with Betacommand, not with everyone else. Is he back? (talk) 14:44, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- You missed the point, which was: operation of NFC bots requires the patience of a saint, which Beta clearly does not have. Therefore let him do the technical thing (which he seems to do well) and leave the user interaction to someone who does have the patience of a saint. Needless to say that's me out of the frame. Guy (Help!) 17:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Does he do it well, though? I honestly don't know, which is why I'm asking, but there are certainly people in this discussion who have been saying that his bots are poorly programed and full of bugs. I can't really comment - I have near-zero knowledge of bots, hence why I ask. TalkIslander 17:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have already suggested to BC that I would be happy to run the NFCC#10c compliance bot under my own (or a separate) account. IIRC there isn't an alternative to what that bot does at the moment - STBotI polices complete 10c failure (i.e. no rationale at all) but I don't believe there's anything else picking up other 10c problems. Black Kite 15:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Proposal the third
After looking at this thread, the restrictions given, the case opened at arbcom, and so forth, I propose the following solution:
- Beta (remaining blocked until this point is resolved) provides a case per the community restrictions on WP:VPR that involves the removal of images from pages that lack non-free rationale using his seemingly-automated manner (some editor will help post for him due to the block). We follow the community sanctions - that is, should there be opposition to the task, there is discussion and so forth. (Yes, this is what should have been done before Beta started what he was doing).
- Presuming the task is approved at VPR, Beta is unblocked and allowed to continue though I would state that his edits for a day should be monitored and logged briefly by an admin (involved or not) just to make sure that the seemingly-automated edits in mainspace are appropriate per his proposal and do not go beyond that point. (Spot checking is likely appropriate here). This should be done for at least one month.
- If Beta is using his own programmed tools to do this, this fact should be made exceedingly clear in the edit summaries (even if it is just "removing non-free image without rational, using my automated script"). That is, Beta needs to be upfront that he is using automated tools, even of his own making, for this process to help keep this remedy open. (We're not asking for code, however). A brief summary of this tool should be part of his VPR proposal.
- Should it be found that Beta is doing other seemingly-automated tasks per community restrictions among these NFC image removals and has not discussed it at VPR even if it is completely within policy, he should be indef blocked until that issue can be resolved. (eg if he starts removing images that do have rationales but may not be complete, that is a different proposal than removing images that lack a rationale completely and thus he should be blocked)
The only reason I think this is appropriate is that this is the first time that Beta's found some task that can be actually a long-term one that he can be much more effective using semi-automated tools, and that is very difficult to see as being a contentious issue, as non-free compliance is necessary by the Foundation. As best I can tell, there has yet to be any attempt to use VPR to propose a task prior to undertaking it, so this presents a first good opportunity to do so. --MASEM 15:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- oppose While the long term problems with beta and his bots are indeed long term they are by no means his only problem. The incivility, and pointy behaviour about (his outright refusal to acknowledge that he violated the sanctions and that they mean anything) shows someone who has no interest in working in the best interest of the community. The community decides its best interest, not betacommand. There is absolutely no reason the community should be bending over for someone like that.--Crossmr (talk) 15:29, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose per Crossmr. Beta has had a second chance, third chance, fourth chance, fifth chance etc. etc. etc. At some point, the community must put their foot down and stop. Though certainly well meant, your proposal is just yet another chance - give it a month or two, and we'll be right back here having exactly the same discussion. Enough is enough. TalkIslander 15:32, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose There are already restrictions in place that have consensus and that beta himself agreed to here. rootology (C)(T) 15:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Comment Should a consensus that the block be lifted or varied not arise, nor ArbCom decide to take the case, then perhaps this can form part of a subsequent decision. First, I think we should allow another 24-36 hours to allow in this holiday period for a full provision of opinion. After weighing the community desires, then we can see if amendments or other proposals need considering. LessHeard vanU (talk) 15:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Beta motions at RFAR
I've asked the committee to codify the community restrictions that Beta himself agreed to follow as a full motion of the Arbitration Committee. To codify those restrictions (which again, Beta himself agreed to) as binding with the weight of the Committee as a motion. That would end any nonsense, and any trouble then if it happened would be from Beta not following the restrictions in the future. rootology (C)(T) 15:19, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Unblock proposal
I propose that we unblock Beta based on the following rationale:
- Blocks are not punitive, and this block, even with some apparent agreement from some editors, smacks of punishing Beta for some random transgression.
- That transgression was not, of itself, disruptive. If it could be shown that Beta was intentionally violating existing policy, like he has in the past, then I would be standing in line to endorse this block. I just don't see any of that here.
- There is no evidence anywhere that these edits, if they had been committed by anyone not named "Betacommand", that they would even get noticed. That is plain evidence that this block is simply punitive retribution for Beta's prior transgressions. He has done nothing wrong here. We're not a police force, we're not here to enforce laws. We are here to write an encyclopedia. That an editor is indef blocked for making edits that no one can say are bad edits is rediculous. Yes, I understand that Betacommand has, in the past, used automated tools abusively. The message has been sent. Betacommand is being watched. Have his latest edits actually harmed the encyckopedia? No. All they have done is upset people because he somehow is violating some arbitrary terms of some sanctions. Yeah, he violated them. But as they edits themseleves seem innocuous, I see no reason for any indefinate block here.
If Beta ever does turn rogue, and start doing some actual disruptive editing, I will be first in line to endorse his indefinite block. I just don't see any actual disruption here. Please, lets unblock him, and take this up again when he starts to actually make bad edits... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Support per Jayron's rationale, and mine in the section above. I do believe that we add a small punishment to it. I don't like continuous blocking of people for every little violation.Mitch32(Go Syracuse) 17:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- He is violating the restrictions that were put in place with his agreement so that he was not community banned the last time. What if he does agree a mentor, or a new wording, to the satisfaction of the community? He has said, above, that community restrictions do not supercede policy, and therefore he does not have to comply with restrictions... So what does any sanction short of blocking then mean? Nothing, because BC will say anything to be allowed to edit - and will then edit to his interpretation. Good edits, generally, but in spite of the concerns of the community nevertheless. No editor has the right to edit to the contempt of the majority of the remaining community. LessHeard vanU (talk) 17:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
So the previous restrictions that Beta himself agreed to and are placed on him by the community can be ignored by Beta... why? rootology (C)(T) 17:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
(Edit confict X3) What's the point of editing restrictions if we don't enforce them? This block is not punitive. It's aim is not to punish Betacommand, but rather to enforce a restriction that was placed in order to prevent disruption. -Chunky Rice (talk) 17:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- The automated edits are not the only problem, or even the chief problem. Betacommand should remain blocked until, at the very least, there is a firm committment from him to discuss his edits and maintain all interactions in a civil way. Perhaps after some days vacation he will be ready to do that. I hope. But he should not just be unblocked now without committment to change, or we'll be right back here yet again, as we have too many times already. Jonathunder (talk) 18:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I concur with Jonathunder - there has been no commitment to even discuss, let alone address, Beta's actions. This is indeed preventative; Beta has failed to follow restrictions which he agreed to; he is not even re-committing to that; where is our assurance? There is none. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblocking to prevent Betacommand from engaging in further massive bot-assisted disruption and gross incivility. John254 18:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "Further massive bot-assisted disruption"?? Could you point out the "massive bot-assisted disruption" that has occurred in this latest incident? Hyperbolic missing-the-point bollocks like this really doesn't help the issue. Black Kite 18:43, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Copyright violations
I just warned User:Savolya about inserting copyrighted text into Wikipedia, and noticed he/she had been warned previously in September and blocked. Going through the user's most recent contributions, there are still ongoing copyright problems. For example:
- Three Godfathers (1936 film) from TCM, even with the same spelling errors (e.g. "puruse")
- White Feather (1955 film) from TCM
- Bella Darvi from NationMaster (and cited as coming from NationMaster, so it wasn't mirrored from Wikipedia)
- Virginia Mayo from the actor's website
- Virginia Leith from this website
- Bundle of Joy (1956 film) from TCM
- Susan Slept Here from TCM
I was going to wait for Savolya's reply, but the more I looked at his/her contribs, the more concerned I became because the list above is simply from the last two days. If this has been going on since September, there's going to be quite a lot of mess to clean up... Regards, Somno (talk) 07:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Topic Ban of User:Benjiboi
Benjiboi (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
As to my knowledge, when an editor is showing problematic behavior, said editor is warned of said behavior before further action is taken. If the behavior continues, and a discussion is created, that user is usually notified of the discussion, so at least then, steps can be taken to resolve the conflict before the fail-safe measures must be implemented.
Benjiboi's edits, to the article he was topic banned from were problematic, looking over the history of this, I can agree there, but the topic ban itself, especially when it concerns an established editor, I have a problem with. Whatever happened to WP:AGF? As far as I can see, it was certainly thrown out the window here. At the time of the ban, as stated(but I just need to make sure it's said here), I agree that it was warranted, but, given this user's most recent contributions, it is obvious he has changed, that he has been able to change. The editor has even noted that he is no longer interested in the article he was banned from.
But anyway, I need to ask the community a few simple questions:
- Under what circumstances are established editors banned for an infinite amount of time from a topic or article?
- Under what conditions is the evidence from the past only considered, and the evidence from the present ignored?
The last question has to do with arbcom request I filed, but, before I continue, please note that I was advised to take this course of action(taking the case to ANI, versus ArbCom), by an arbitrator(on pm through IRC). Now that that is out of the way, let me clarify the reasons for the question as noted above. When I originally took the case to ArbCom, there were swift rejects, but all of these rejects were based upon past behavior, despite the fact that the editor had shown that he has changed. In fact, some of these rejects were in fact asking him to show that he was willing to change, and, even after posting on the case section on the ArbCom page, there was zero acknowledgment. This is not an attack, but in my personal opinion, if feels to me like the arbitrators, at the time, simply put in their final say, and then just ignored any new information in the case thereafter, it certainly seems like it anyways.
Also, as a side note, it seems that the subject of the article contributed to the topic banning of this particular user.
For a summery of the above:
User Benjiboi was topic banned from the article Matt Sanchez, in regards to sourcing content to youtube videos. He was never warned that this behavior was problematic, and was banned from the said article regarding a discussion he was not informed of. Several users, including myself, have tried to get this ban taken off, I do not know the others' reasons, but in my opinion, I do not feel that a topic ban with no expiration date is warranted, especially when the user has shown to have changed, and actually stated he does not wish to edit the article in question.
I will post any diffs of material if requested, and finally,
I ask that the community review the above, and any material if linked to(if requested). My goal in this is to place an expiration date, either in terms of time, or editing conditions(say, someone watch his editing behavior), or conditions met, on this topic ban.
Blocks are meant to be preventive, as far as I've learned, not punitive. What exactly is this preventing?— Dædαlus Contribs 09:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- What, again? He was topic-banned because his obsessive interest in the subject, and particularly in certain controversial statements about the subject, became problematic, and led to an extended dialogue via OTRS. Wikipedia has over two million articles and how many hundreds of thousands of editors? We do not need the input of one editor on one article where that involvement very obviously inflames an already volatile article subject. The topic ban was reviewed at the time, and his claim that there was "no warning" has been dealt with multiple times: his editing caused a problem best solved by him simply not editing that article. The topic ban was reviewed as an arbitration motion, and there too it was deemed not to be an issue. Why is Benjiboi still carping on about this? Beats me. He says he does not want to edit the article, and everybody he's asked has said that it is not a problem with him personally, it's an issue between him and Matt Sanchez; hopefully we won't ever need to judge who has the right of that particular issue or to what extent, there are many good-faith contributors who are enjoined to leave other good-faith contributors alone (including one sitting arbitrator!) - this does not mean Benjiboi is evil, or Matt Sanchez is evil. It implies no judgement on either party, and is not a black mark on anybody's record. I really am having great difficulty seeing why Benjiboi incessantly raises the issue of his theoretical permission to edit an article he says he does not want to edit. Nobody cares, except him and Matt Sanchez, and as long as they avoid each other (Sanchez through his restrictions via arbitration, Benjiboi through not editing the article and generally not being a dick, which he isn't, I reckon) then I fail to see what we are supposed to fix. You want us to say that yes he is allowed to edit the article as long as he doesn't? Feh. Guy (Help!) 14:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Has anyone got a link to the topic ban? Thanks, Skomorokh 14:51, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Here. Black Kite 15:05, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Muchas gracias. Skomorokh 15:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- More relevant is the discussion which immediately preceded it: Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Arbitration enforcement/Archive18#Matt Sanchez. Read that to gain a fuller understanding of what happened. Benjiboi was far less disruptive than the (now indef blocked) User:Eleemosynary, but the two together were apparently causing a flood of OTRS complaints from the subject of the disputed article. I am not committing one way or the other towards a recission of the topic ban, but unlike some of the other editors who have been blocked, banned, or topic banned over this article, Benjiboi is a productive editor, and open to reason. Horologium (talk) 15:30, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- But that does not address the vexed question of why he insists that he must not be banned fomr a page he does not wish to edit. Sanchez is an argumentative and prickly type, no possible blame can attach to being required to leave him alone, and if Benjiboi had stepped away when he was originally asked to then we would not even be having this conversation, let alone for the third or fourth time. Guy (Help!) 15:44, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I recommend a trip through these links to see the various venues at which this article has been discussed. Guy (Help!) 15:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- What is actually being asked here? That Benjiboi's topic ban (or is it really just a single article ban?) be lifted? Does Benjiboi want to edit this article or is it more of a clearing of his record so to speak.
Has Benjiboi been made aware of this thread?I have had a little interaction with this user with no real issues. Anyways, --Tom 15:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Beats me. If it's just that Benjiboi wants to trade the topic ban for an agreement not to go near Sanchez then I can't imagine why that would be a problem, but he keeps re-asserting that there was no problem therefore the ban must be vacated, which does not square with the multiple reviews of this including by the Arbitration Committee. Guy (Help!) 15:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I would love to contribute to this discussion, but I am trying to get a response from my local electricity board that they have no problem in theoretically allowing me to use my genitalia as a sub station in the circuit that serves my area. Obviously, I would be foolish if I were to actually consider wiring my testicles to the high power line towers but for some reason the electricity board seem wish to question my sanity (although they are prepared to admit I "have balls", so I have partially won some of the argument it seems) in wanting to have their permission - so I am a little busy... Otherwise I would place my opinion here, too. LessHeard vanU (talk) 16:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not sure what the heck is going on with you, but it did make me chuckle, thanks, I needed that! :) --Tom 18:22, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Complain about Admin Toddst1
Hello administrators, I just want to report an event :
- 19 April : Administrator Toddst1 propose to merge two articles : Everest: A Climb for Peace and Everest Peace Project.
- 5 December : then he propose the deletetion of Everest Peace Project.
- 6 December : I reply : "Anything against this article? Obsession maybe!" :-)
- 7 December : he propose related articles I've worked on (Erik Mongrain/Prophase music)
- I've decide to not react because he's an administrator and obviously looking for troubles.
- 18 december : {{uw-npa3}} is added on my talk page, saying that I'll might be blocked.
I think this is abusive. Thanks a lot and have a nice day! --Antaya (talk) 11:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Actually you also accused him of repeatedly submitting Everest Peace Project for deletion, which didn't happen. Now you've come here and rather than decide not to react, you've accused him of looking for troubles, but I don't see the evidence for that. And of course, anyone who continues to attack other editors is likely to be blocked, do you have a problem with that?
- Meanwhile I'd like to ask others here about Erik Mongrain/medias - this seems a bit unusual, is it ok? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dougweller (talk • contribs) 11:36, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well maybe I didn't express myself correctlty in English, but I don't think I've attack anyone, no need to block me!!! --Antaya (talk) 12:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have notified Toddst1 of this discussion, and nominated the "medias" page page for deletion. I have no opinion on the original complaint. J Milburn (talk) 12:26, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- {{uw-npa3}} might be a bit over the top (3 and above assume bad faith), but yes, the OP is not entirely blameless. — neuro(talk) 14:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well maybe I didn't express myself correctlty in English, but I don't think I've attack anyone, no need to block me!!! --Antaya (talk) 12:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Roobit thread from WP:AIV
- 82.131.73.212 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) - On User talk:Martintg;. this is a sock of the banned vandal and sock puppeteer User:roobit. He is right now harassing his former 'opponents' on their talk pages. Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 10:43, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- This noticeboard is for obvious vandals and spammers only. Consider taking this report to Sockpuppet investigations. (or WP:ANI, if SSP is still backlogged) LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- For God's sake, I didn't need any wiki-bureaucratic discussions on the page you linked here! I wanted this IP (probably an Estonian internet café?), used by Roobit aka Poeticourt1 to be blocked for a few hours, so that the person concerned would be hindered from further disruption in articles and on my and my colleagues' talk pages! Is it too much to ask, eh? --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC) In addition, he theoretically even broke WP:3RR 3 rv rule this time - on other person's talk page. --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Ah, I can see your problem - you are too stupid to be able to read the notice on this page! If it is a sockpuppet problem take it to the sockpuppet page, and if it is 3RR violations take it to the 3RR page, and if it is more complex take it to WP:ANI. This page is for obvious vandalism and spamming (it says so, just above these reports). Not really our problem if you are too lazy or thick to place it on the right page... LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:25, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- For God's sake, I didn't need any wiki-bureaucratic discussions on the page you linked here! I wanted this IP (probably an Estonian internet café?), used by Roobit aka Poeticourt1 to be blocked for a few hours, so that the person concerned would be hindered from further disruption in articles and on my and my colleagues' talk pages! Is it too much to ask, eh? --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC) In addition, he theoretically even broke WP:3RR 3 rv rule this time - on other person's talk page. --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:20, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- This noticeboard is for obvious vandals and spammers only. Consider taking this report to Sockpuppet investigations. (or WP:ANI, if SSP is still backlogged) LessHeard vanU (talk) 11:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- You're reply (unlike mine ;-)) contains violation of WP:NPA. Tell me where should I report you? --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:31, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- In fact, having re-read Wikipedia:Vandalism#Types_of_vandalism, I could easily conclude that the IP's acts fall under two 'Vandalism types': 'sneaky vandalism' in article space and 'Userspace vandalism' on various user talk pages. And according to Wikipedia:Guide to administrator intervention against vandalism, “Obvious and malicious sockpuppets may be reported to AIV”, so that if anyone has problems with reading, it's probably not me. --Pan Miacek and his crime-fighting dog (woof!) 12:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- WP:ANI LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:44, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
The above thread was at WP:AIV, but AIV does not seem like the best forum for it and as it was suggested already by LessHeard vanU (talk · contribs), I have moved the thread here. Cirt (talk) 13:58, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "you are too stupid to be able to read the notice on this page", whilst perhaps not being the most appropriate response, doesn't sound uncivil to myself. In Miacek's position I would have merely taken it as a slap on the wrist, but I guess that is just an interpretation. — neuro(talk) 14:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No, that comment was clear violation of NPA and I shouldn't have done it (Trouts or time off as considered appropriate) so I apologise for that. As for the basis of the complaint, I couldn't see a direct link between the two accounts except for an obvious bias - but one which may be shared by several inclined editors, so folk more familiar with socking or this particular case should review it. As for 3RR, this usually needs more than one editor and I was not prepared to wade through the history to find if one party was more guilty than another (plus, it is AIV!!!) Lastly, I was I admit ticked off with the response; in that period I had more edits to the AIV board than the bot, and I was less than amused with Miacek's first comments - still, as I said, my bad. LessHeard vanU (talk) 14:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think at this point this thread can be marked as resolved - thoughts? Cirt (talk) 14:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Yeah, and done. Black Kite 15:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
BalLightning (talk · contribs)
Just checking this users contribs as I ran in to him again, he's made a total of 5 edits in over 2 years, 1 was vandalism, and 4 have been for promotion. The 4 promotion ones are all in the last month. His talk page shows a deleted contribution that from the looks of it was probably more promotion. It seems that he's not here to do anything besides promote (as slowly and infrequently as it is, but there isn't a good contrib in the bunch).--Crossmr (talk) 14:40, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (ec) I see no contributions at all. Anyone care to clarify? — neuro(talk) 14:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Special:Contributions/BalLightning does seem to list 5 contributions to my non-administrator eyes. I don't think any admin action is required here, the 4-level warning system should suffice as it's possible the editor does not understand the implications of their actions and it's no harm to assume good faith on the part of inexperienced editors. The Spore article has enough eyes on it to prevent any damage. Skomorokh 14:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Edit summary abuse / suspect editing motives
Would it be possible for an administrator to have a quick look at the edits of User:Poncho32323 (a relatively small number). This apparent single-purpose agenda account holder has made a number of edits to articles related to a band called Stratovarius. All the edits have had gibberish edit summaries, despite pleas to stop, making it difficult for RC patrol monitoring. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have blocked the account for 3 hours to permit them to read the welcome message on their talkpage, and to respond to concerns expressed there. Next time, WP:AIV is best suited for a quick response (as long as you don't get the grumpy reviewer that sometimes answers there). LessHeard vanU (talk) 16:41, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Am I the grumpy reviewer? ;-) Tan | 39 16:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't go to WP:AIV because I didn't consider it to be vandalism, or the matter to be particularly urgent. It was more "annoying" rather than "harmful" to the project. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I was referring to the curmudgeon who was the subject of this matter. ;~) LessHeard vanU (talk) 16:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Ah, yes, I'm familiar. At any rate, you could have easily been referring to me - I do get grumpy :-) Tan | 39 17:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I am not aware that "being grumpy" is an impediment to being an administrator. It may even be a requirement. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:05, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It is, actually; I never promote any RfA candidate that doesn't have the correct level of grumpiness. EVula // talk // ☯ // 17:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Kinda like you're not a true admin until you are told you are abusing your power...which in turn gives you an appropriate level of grumpiness. --Smashvilletalk 17:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Nonsense; the prerequisites of adminship are (1) had your talkpage blanked by an IP, (2) been accused of at least three words ending in "ism" and (3) had at least one argument with Baseball Bugs. There's a checklist – iridescent 17:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's like you just went through my talk page archives. Tan | 39 17:51, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think another one is, "Likes to argue with brick walls". --Smashvilletalk 17:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's like you just went through my talk page archives. Tan | 39 17:51, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Nonsense; the prerequisites of adminship are (1) had your talkpage blanked by an IP, (2) been accused of at least three words ending in "ism" and (3) had at least one argument with Baseball Bugs. There's a checklist – iridescent 17:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Kinda like you're not a true admin until you are told you are abusing your power...which in turn gives you an appropriate level of grumpiness. --Smashvilletalk 17:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It is, actually; I never promote any RfA candidate that doesn't have the correct level of grumpiness. EVula // talk // ☯ // 17:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I am not aware that "being grumpy" is an impediment to being an administrator. It may even be a requirement. -- Scjessey (talk) 17:05, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Ah, yes, I'm familiar. At any rate, you could have easily been referring to me - I do get grumpy :-) Tan | 39 17:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Am I the grumpy reviewer? ;-) Tan | 39 16:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Lulu of the Lotus Eaters, Complaint re OUTING and HARASSMENT
I was exasperated to find that Lulu of the Lotus Eaters appears to be continuing the outing crusade of Bali ultimate at [[70]]. Lulu does this despite the exonerating results of the checkuser done against me. I made reasonable edits to the ACORN article and, unlike previous occasions, explained in detail why I was doing so, yet Lulu reverted them apparently just because I made them. As I recall I made several edits one of which was a mass revert of material (deleted previously by Bali) that happened to include maybe one Capital Research Center item and Lulu seized on this to again make allegations about my identity. Other edits to the article included an article from NPR which is considered on WP to be a reliable source. The fact that he is continuing the outing talk begun by Bali and continues to make allegations as to my identity contrary to WP:OUTING itself constitutes harassment against me. [[71]] Also, Lulu tolerates no inclusion of negative legitimate information about ACORN on the ACORN article. I request that action be taken against him for his flagrant disregard of WP rules. As an admin, he definitely ought to know better. Syntacticus (talk) 17:48, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Just here to say i note that my name is repeated again and again up above apparently in some complaint about lulu. My connection appears to have to do with one comment i made a week or so ago (now enshrined in Acorn lore as the "outing crusade"), and other edits i've done about this, that or the other thing. It's all very confusing. If there's an actual reason for my involvement in this, someone let me know (aside to syntacticus: I'm pretty sure that lulu is not an admin.)Bali ultimate (talk) 17:56, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I thought I read Lulu was an admin. I may be mistaken. The reason you are mentioned here is because you made an attempted outing which I subsequently learned is a very serious blockable infraction of WP rules. You desisted after being warned but Lulu appears to have picked up the ball from you and is doing the same (or very close to the same) all because I happen not to agree with his reverts of my edits to ACORN. Syntacticus (talk) 18:05, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
104Serena
New account 104Serena (talk · contribs) has plunged straight into editing a number of articles on contentious issues (such as police action, feminism, porn, depression) and made edits which, while having innocuous edit summaries, remove cleanup templates around neutrality, OR, unreferenced claims, etc. Andy Mabbett (User:Pigsonthewing); Andy's talk; Andy's edits 17:51, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I see two edits which removed templates; one was a revert to a previous version, and the other, well, who knows, maybe it was malicious and maybe it was an accident. Is there a reason you came here first instead of first asking them why they did it, and telling them not to do it again?
another grumpy admin Request for Assistance
On Christmas eve, I slapped the hands of a few people involved in an incipient edit war on Talk:Sarah Palin, involving a long post with no clear explanation of how it might be utilized to improve the article. It read like an essay or blog post; it had excerpts from two offsite articles which also read like essays or blog posts, and the first one was even labeled an essay and the second described as "another" - although I have since been informed that one was a book review, and I have been much maligned and chastised for daring to refer to them as essays. I confess I didn't read the linked sites very carefully; my interest was in stopping the edit war and getting the editors back to discussing the article, preferably civilly. I re-removed the long post[72] and posted a rather snippy warning[73] and templated (yes, I templated) Writegeist[74] and warned Factchecker atyourservice[75] With one exception, this (getting back to discussing the article) has mostly happened. The exception is Writegeist. You will possibly recall that very evening he brought his unhappiness with my actions here, as "User:KillerChihuahuah. Unacceptable behavior by this admin at Sarah Palin talk."[76] Not much happened with that, naturally, as I'd been a bit brusque but not unreasonable, as that article is on what seems to be semi-permanent snipefest, and if it isn't on probation it should be. A campaign of ABF has ensued, in which every little error I make is blown into a malicious lie. He has since posted about desysopping admins on his user page[77] and inquired elsewhere about me (from Bedford, of all misbegotten trolls to ask)[78] and has inquired of Kelly information regarding the "IDCab". Kelly stated s/he prefers to put that in the past, yet helpfully pointed Writegeist to Wikipedia Review. Please also feel free to read my attempts at some kind of discourse here [79] on User talk:Writegeist, as well as this (since removed) section from others to Writegeist, primarily regarding his ANI posting[80] - in which, interestingly, Writegeist states that "Having followed countless ANIs it's pretty clear to me that pandering is in fact exactly the technique for getting admins "on side" and encourage them to break ranks with findings against their co-admins". Hrm. Back on topic: I post this heads up as I fully expect harassment and nonsense from this source, up to and including a renewal of that tired old meme about the IDCab. If anyone has any clue-stick which they think might actually make an impression, I beg you to use it before this becomes Yet Another Lame running war on OMG the Evil Admin (me.) I notify you in advance that I have no patience for another of these bizarre little wars from Wronged Editors. I'd like to avoid Rfc if at all possible. ty in advance, KillerChihuahua?!? 18:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- He continues his campaign to malign my actions and accuse me[81] stating I had "singled out" the user to whom he is posting, when in fact I struck, rolled up, or removed three editor's comments[82] in an attempt to improve civility. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- comment - KillerChihuahua has been trying fairly to play referee in the hornets nest that is the Palin article and talk page with little thanks or support from others. I support this admin for trying to do a thankless job that others have shied away from and will try to abid by his/her oversight and recommendations. Thank you, --Tom 18:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks Tom, I appreciate that, especially as yours was one of the affected comments. I think several editors there have become somewhat heated, and as I've said, its calmed down a great deal - with the one exception. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I got burned at Sarah Palin, and am supportive of KillerChihuahua and any sysop attempting to keep the peace at that place - but I think KC could refactor his comments regarding Bedford (who was also an effective admin, other issues notwithstanding). As for Writegeist... I suggest ignoring with extreme prejudice, such things very rarely produce much in the way of content. LessHeard vanU (talk) 18:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I could indeed refactor my comment regarding Bedford. How would you characterize this: "I have her listed on my excrement list, but I don't recall off the top of my head what her transgression against me was" if not as trolling? I welcome suggestions. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:32, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Also, many thanks for your support as regards T:SP and SP; while I would certainly love to "ignore with extreme prejudice" my experience has shown that when editors seek to involve others in their campaigns, ignoring becomes impossible. KillerChihuahua?!? 18:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Bedford's response didn't exactly do him any favours, to be honest. Black Kite 18:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- comment - KillerChihuahua has been trying fairly to play referee in the hornets nest that is the Palin article and talk page with little thanks or support from others. I support this admin for trying to do a thankless job that others have shied away from and will try to abid by his/her oversight and recommendations. Thank you, --Tom 18:13, 29 December 2008 (UTC)