Revision as of 04:17, 30 December 2008 view sourceCrossmr (talk | contribs)Pending changes reviewers18,925 edits →User:Betacommand's statement← Previous edit | Revision as of 04:18, 30 December 2008 view source Sceptre (talk | contribs)Autopatrolled, Extended confirmed users, Page movers, Pending changes reviewers, Rollbackers, Template editors79,225 edits →another grumpy admin Request for AssistanceNext edit → | ||
Line 872: | Line 872: | ||
:Drat! You missed his best posts! <g> ] (]) 21:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC) | :Drat! You missed his best posts! <g> ] (]) 21:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC) | ||
ZOMG OPPOSE BLOCK YOU'RE CENSORING PEOPLE WHO LIKE SARAH PALIN, ELEVEN. Uh, rather, endorse block. Incidentally, someone might want to look into meatpuppeteering beteen Bedford, Writegeist, and Die4Dixie. They seem to be banding together a lot, and the Confederate/Palin4President/anti-Obama trifecta of userboxes (the third, presumably, either because he's black or they buy into the bullshit about him being an Arab terrorist, rather than genuine concern, but I digress) is a bit worrying... ''']''' <sup>(])</sup> 04:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC) | |||
== The main page picture is not protected == | == The main page picture is not protected == |
Revision as of 04:18, 30 December 2008
Noticeboards | |
---|---|
Misplaced Pages's centralized discussion, request, and help venues. For a listing of ongoing discussions and current requests, see the dashboard. For a related set of forums which do not function as noticeboards see formal review processes. | |
General | |
Articles, content | |
Page handling | |
User conduct | |
Other | |
Category:Misplaced Pages noticeboards |
This page is for urgent incidents or chronic, intractable behavioral problems.
- Before posting:
- Consider other means of dispute resolution first
- Read these tips for dealing with incivility
- If the issue concerns a specific user, try discussing it with them on their talk page
- If the issue concerns use of admin tools or other advanced permissions, request an administrative action review
- Just want an admin? Contact a recently active admin directly.
- Be brief and include diffs demonstrating the problem
- Do not report breaches of personal information on this highly visible page – instead go to Requests for oversight.
When starting a discussion about an editor, you must leave a notice on their talk page; pinging is not enough.
You may use {{subst:ANI-notice}} ~~~~
to do so.
Closed discussions are usually not archived for at least 24 hours. Routine matters might be archived more quickly; complex or controversial matters should remain longer. Sections inactive for 72 hours are archived automatically by Lowercase sigmabot III. Editors unable to edit here are sent to the /Non-autoconfirmed posts subpage. (archives, search)
Start a new discussion Centralized discussionAdministrators' (archives, search) | |||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
349 | 350 | 351 | 352 | 353 | 354 | 355 | 356 | 357 | 358 |
359 | 360 | 361 | 362 | 363 | 364 | 365 | 366 | 367 | 368 |
Incidents (archives, search) | |||||||||
1158 | 1159 | 1160 | 1161 | 1162 | 1163 | 1164 | 1165 | 1166 | 1167 |
1168 | 1169 | 1170 | 1171 | 1172 | 1173 | 1174 | 1175 | 1176 | 1177 |
Edit-warring/3RR (archives, search) | |||||||||
472 | 473 | 474 | 475 | 476 | 477 | 478 | 479 | 480 | 481 |
482 | 483 | 484 | 485 | 486 | 487 | 488 | 489 | 490 | 491 |
Arbitration enforcement (archives) | |||||||||
328 | 329 | 330 | 331 | 332 | 333 | 334 | 335 | 336 | 337 |
338 | 339 | 340 | 341 | 342 | 343 | 344 | 345 | 346 | 347 |
Other links | |||||||||
User:Skomorokh
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 16:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Whatever the other merits, he certainly appears to be well beyond 3rr ] 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. ] ] ] ]Bali ultimate (talk) 17:17, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- A pattern he apparently carried on from previus days as per ] and ] 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 is a clear revert. In Skomorokh moved a statement to a different place. In (s)he removed a citation from the lead, because it is not necessary there. And in (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 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Skomorokh added a "maintainer" template for himself at the top of the talk page of Stormfront (website) . He seems to be behaving aggressively to other editors (warnings to Orangemarlin and Verbal 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 18:00, 27 December 2008 (UTC)
- Comment I restored this section after it was prematurely archived. Enigma 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.
- 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)
- I agree. Enigma 05:34, 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✰ 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)
- 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 Misplaced Pages- 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 Misplaced Pages. 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 Misplaced Pages. 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)
- Guy: It's just a header for a logfile. It seems neutral to me. Once I finish this post, I'll even get rid of everything except the explanation. And since there will be a nice, neutral, explanation, I don't think we'll need noindex, do you agree? ST47 (talk) 13:49, 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)
- Thank you - much appreciated :). TalkIslander 14:26, 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)
- Updated with a neutral explanation. ST47 (talk) 13:55, 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)
- Oh, for some reason I thought ALLCAPS was how you wanted it, to denote botness or whatever. I always like smallcase better. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 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)
- If it's not indexed I see no meaningful worries with the name and header as they are. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:48, 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" should not go unrewarded in my opinion. --DIREKTOR 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 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 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 Misplaced Pages (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. --DIREKTOR 12:47, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm sorry, I just don't feel comfortable blocking a user who hasn't edited since his last warning (being notified of this thread). Maybe another admin here doesn't share my qualms? l'aquatique |✡| talk 19:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think L'Aquatique's approach is the best one here: there's no harm leaving a final warning on this user's page, then giving him a "holiday" if he returns with an unchanged agenda. Because (1) we gave him a chance to change -- which ought to appease anyone who may be tempted to revert a permanent block/ban, & (2) if he doesn't return ... then the whole issue is moot. -- llywrch (talk) 20:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Very well, all the best in 2009 :) --DIREKTOR 21:05, 29 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 Misplaced Pages. Is Ottava still under mentorship? If so, could the mentors please advise him/her on disengaging? BuddingJournalist 16:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. — neuro 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: 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: SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:44, 28 December 2008 (UTC)
- Until any are given, here is a stack to look through. No opinion on subject matter. — neuro 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[REDACTED] 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 02:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Seconded. –Juliancolton 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)
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. --Smashville 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 Misplaced Pages.
- 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 Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience which dealt with Eric Lerner's vocational conflict of interest and Misplaced Pages: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 Misplaced Pages 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 Misplaced Pages. 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)
- (Note: It's become apparent that ThuranX had me confused with User:Tom Butler.) --Jim Butler (t) 01:10, 30 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]. 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 Misplaced Pages 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 Misplaced Pages 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 Misplaced Pages 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)
- OK, issue resolved: ThuranX apparently had me confused with User:Tom Butler. (duplicate note from above since thread is so long.) --Jim Butler (t) 01:10, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I do have Jim and Tom conflated, and that's been resolved. ThuranX (talk) 01:28, 30 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. Durova 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. 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. Durova 17:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks Durova. I still don't understand the logic re recusal. SA has been extremely disruptive: virtually no one disputes that. If Jehochman is familiar with SA's conduct, and has sought to improve it, why would recusal be a good choice? It's better to have admins involved who are familiar with the history. Is there evidence of misconduct by Jehochman with respect to SA? That's the question. If not, and SA just feels annoyed that Jehochman has been trying to rein in his excesses, then the recusal request sounds like WP:GAME to me. regards, Jim Butler (t) 23:15, 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. Durova 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)
- Guy - Per WP:DR, probably Talk:Acupuncture would be a good place to start, where there are already editors familiar with each other's work. As a matter of fact, over the last few months there have been more skeptic-type editors than acupuncturists there (3:1) ratio, and we've been satisfied with each others' work (see my talk page, e.g. here and here). There isn't some longstanding conflict hinging on my pigheaded refusal to see the light, or something. Collaboration is the rule there, not heavy-duty conflict (the tendentious and rightly-banned User:Mccready notwithstanding). With all due respect, I don't think we need to go further up the WP:DR ladder merely on the basis of a quick glance at my edits. You're trustworthy and level-headed, Guy, but are not familiar with my contributions, or how the acupuncture article has evolved over the last couple years. regards, Jim Butler (t) 23:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hasn't an ArbCom case Misplaced Pages: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 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, Durova 17:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
(undent) Um, maybe the best way to deal with any perceived issues of bias on my part would be to start at the beginning of WP:DR, and just talk to me? That is, on relevant talk pages? There is a narrative developing here that I'm a POV pusher, solely because SA wrongly asserted a COI, and two other editors chimed in and then couldn't produce a single diff. (One later turned out to be a case of mistaken identity.) IOW, the idea that I'm POV-pushing happens to be incorrect and unsupportable. (BTW, I didn't read Jehochman suggesting that I get caught up in this RFAR.) --Jim Butler (t) 23:15, 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 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)
Bambifan101 related protection requests
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 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, including undoing merges that have been in place for months, and reverting attempts to restore them,, restoring Bambifan101's IP sock edits, even adding a WP:COPYRIGHT violating link to one reverted article, 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. 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.. Unfortunately, CW's responses were less than encouraging.
- 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)
<-- It is my experience that Collectonian knows what she is doing here. As far as I'm concerned, when she makes protection requests or sock reports, I take them seriously. Tan | 39 18:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks, and to note, I primarily did protection requests on those sub-articles which have been merged for quite awhile and which he seemed to be amusing himself by un-doing the merge, then redoing, then undoing. Protection seemed the best route. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 18:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- To be fair, whilst Kww is quite right about the "sneaky" undoing of redirects by certain users, this one is undoubtedly independently notable. The edit summary should've noted it, though. Black Kite 18:54, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Even if it is notable, does it really need its own article when all there is to say about it is what is there? That same information was already merged to the main article over a month ago, with no issues at all. Sometimes, even notable stuff can and should be combined into a more notable piece. And shouldn't a discussion have occurred before just arbitrarily undoing it under false edit summaries? -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 18:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It seems I'm a little late to this party, my invite must have been lost in the mail. I'm the one who tried to get pages blocked in order to obstruct and bore the Bambifan socks. I still don't quite understand the resistance to this idea. This banned user's latest blocked sock was using their talk page to "suggest" changes they might like to see. That is ban evasion and a clear abuse of multiple accounts. I let User:AGK convince me to drop it while he tried to reason with the sock, and when he saw how this banned user was talking one thing and doing another, he suddenly quit the project. So, now that we've lost a valued admin (at least partially) over this, you'll have to forgive me for feeling that we need to do everything within our power to stop this person. This conversation has wandered slightly off that topic, but it is my main interest here is to stress that I think with a concerted, prolonged effort they could be stopped, but only if admins don't take a defeatist attitude, saying it's not possible to stop this user, they'll never go away, etc. This user is not like other vandals, who move on to new territory when their "favorite" articles get blocked. They are obsessed with a small circle of articles on children's TV and films. If we can take those away from them, they won't have any "fun". And I don't see why any talk page of a known named sock of this user shouldn't be indef protected to prevent them from evading their ban and causing more disruption, like this whole episode. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:59, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- My question is why we haven't dealt with this at the ISP level. Can't someone from the office call whatever the ISP is and notify them of the continued abuse? They should be able to track down who the user is and throttle their WP access at the source. // roux 20:27, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I filed an abuse report months ago, no one did anything with it. I also emailed the ISP abuse line and got no response at all. One of many reasons I got tired of dealing with the mess, seeming impossible to really do anything about him. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 20:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- The abuse reports seem worse than useless. Isn't there someone at WMF who can handle these things at an 'official' level? One would think a letter on WMF letterhead from Godwin would be enough, no? // roux 20:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Semi-protection's a definite here--the only question is how long? I'd personally go indef, given the level of disruption. Blueboy96 20:40, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agree. Collectonian, can you post a list of currently unprotected, Bambi-sock-target articles to my talk page, and I'll indefinitely semi-protect them? Tan | 39 22:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- List posted. In the last AN/I thread I participated in about this, I also posted a basic summary of his editing style and indicators its probably him. -- Collectonian (talk · contribs) 02:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agree. Collectonian, can you post a list of currently unprotected, Bambi-sock-target articles to my talk page, and I'll indefinitely semi-protect them? Tan | 39 22:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Semi does nothing. I've seen it happen on Simple. One of his original targets was The Fox and the Hound, which Majorly protected. Once Cassandra semi-protected WALL-E and Charlotte's Web 2, Bambifan jumped around to Teletubbies (those had to be protected as well). It's been so long ago that I can't remember all the targets that he's hit. Synergy unprotected those articles about a month ago, and I haven't been back to check to see any history of disruption. Indef semi will only block valid anonymous user edits and really doesn't stop him. He also puzzlingly became productive with his Touchpath account (riddled with typos, but he was creating articles where none existed) and was only blocked by Majorly when Collectionian informed them that he was, in fact, the Disney vandal. hbdragon88 (talk) 00:30, 30 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 49a 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
- 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,
- I'm new to all of this and wondering if instead of AN/I I should have gone to RFC? It honestly doesn't REALLY matter what we call the article in the interim while we wait to decide about the long term name. Both names redirect to the same page.Lot 49a 00:32, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
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)
- I had to explainmy behavior, from my perspective. My intent was not to raise a content debate, but address my behavior. I am sure you are capable of understanding the difference. (no thanks! because you find them sarcastic) --Cerejota (talk) 01:13, 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[REDACTED] 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)
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 Misplaced Pages 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: 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.
- If Sephiroth_BCR was threating with hitting me with the old ban hammer on editing just because I removed the words "designed to be cool", a member telling someone to never edit entirely including disscusion and talk pages, seems more serious.--MahaPanta (talk) 08:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
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) |
---|
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 Misplaced Pages. *sigh* - ✰ALLST☆R✰ 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)
|
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 Postlethwaite 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 . 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[REDACTED] 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. Misplaced Pages'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)
- The ongoing lack of civility (saying other editors are trolling and so on) also won't do at all. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:41, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse per Islander MikeHobday (talk) 15:02, 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)
(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)
- I totally agree with the assessment; one or two people complaining is (more often than not) just someone whining, whereas three or more complaints is indicative of an actual problem. EVula // talk // ☯ // 17:16, 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 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)
- Endorse indefinite block. Betacommand's conduct in the discussion leading up to this is a textbook illustration of the "I am right, everyone else is the problem, fuck off" approach that is a characteristic of long time problematic users, but profoundly disruptive to our collaborative work – even if pursued (as here) with good intent. Since there's no indication that he's ready to change his attitude, or even adhere to his community-imposed restriction, a block until such time as he is ready is approppriate. Sandstein 18:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not to be rude by butting in, but if there's near-if-not-totally unanimous support for Betacommand's indef block; can we consider Betacommand banned? --Dylan620 Contribs 18:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No. Indefinite block means it could end tomorrow, or it could end next year. I for one have hopes that Betacommand can contribute productively. // roux 19:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse indefinite block. I think he has tested the limits of the community's patience too long.--Berig (talk) 19:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse block, BC has been given chance after chance after chance, and still continues to engage in the sort of poor behaviour that caused the problems in the first place. The real tragedy is that if he'd just asked to make these automated edits, we probably would have given him permission to do so. Lankiveil 23:37, 29 December 2008 (UTC).
- Endorse I do not think that a block was inevitable here. If Betacommand had simply responded to the concerns raised on his talk page in a reasonable manner, we probably wouldn't even be here. But because he responded with incivility and a declaration that he wasn't going to follow the restrictions, he escalated the situation to the point where a block was necessary. If Betacommand were to acknolwedge that his actions violated the sanctions and further acknowledged that he is, in fact, bound by the sanctions, I would support a reduction of the block to 1 month, continuing with the course of increasing sanctions for violation of the restrictions. -Chunky Rice (talk) 23:56, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Endorse After over a year of this I think the community's patience has been well and truly exhausted, as amply documented by others above. I am of the "indefinite doesn't mean infinite" school of thought, if BC was able to demonstrate he had moved on from the behaviour which got him here at some later point I wouldn't be averse to his unblocking. But to be honest I wouldn't really protest much if it remained in place, he's probably had more chances than anyone else on this project to reform. Orderinchaos 01:58, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
strong objection to off-wiki/IRC this time
Discussion is stale. LessHeard vanU (talk) 00:42, 30 December 2008 (UTC) |
---|
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)
|
Discussion Location
Discussion is stale (and a bit off topic). LessHeard vanU (talk) 00:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC) |
---|
Out of interests of space and navigation shouldn't all this dissucsion about Betacommand be moved to Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Betacommand and contuined there? Peachey88 13:13, 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)
- Oppose, Beta has in the past ignored restrictions placed on him like this, I see no reason to believe that he'd pay attention to these ones. Lankiveil 23:31, 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
- The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
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 17:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "every little violation". Lawl. Tan | 39 17:41, 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)
- Perhaps Betacommand's most significant incident of bot-assisted disruption was his removal of the edit links from thousands of stub templates, which required an extensive and tedious effort to reverse. See, for example, . The most recent incident may have been more minor, but presents issues of the same nature. John254 18:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well, not at all actually. The (year-old) diffs you present were problematic; the latest edits were not problematic at all, save for the fact that their automatic nature violated Beta's restrictions. Black Kite 20:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose, per my block endorsement above, absent any very convincing change of attitude by Betacommand. Sandstein 18:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose Unblock at this time. Betacommand has had an incredible number of last chances, last last chances, absolutely final last chances, and "oh yes indeedy, this really is your final chance (honest) this time". Repeatedly, a large number of editors spend a great deal of time and effort trying to formulate a framework that Betacommand can work within, so as not to cause disruption. Repeatedly, we find Betacommand adopting an attitude that the restrictions mean something other than what everybody else thinks they mean. It is abundantly clear that Betacommand is disruptive when he is running bots, or automated processes. It is also clear that every attempt to formulate a restriction that would prevent him running bots and automated edits has floundered, because he simply hunts for an interpretation of the restriction that allows him a loophole. In this current case, we find that he argues that the restriction requiring him to get explicit consensus in favour of any repeated series of edits doesn't apply because such actions are supported by policy (and consensus is therefore implicit). It is, in my view, not what was intended, or envisaged by those who drafted or endorsed the restrictions. Until we have an absolutely bulletproof set of restrictions, I cannot endorse and unblock. Mayalld (talk) 19:00, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock Regarding the claim that "There is no evidence anywhere that these edits, if they had been committed by anyone not named "Betacommand", that they would even get noticed." I disagree entirely. The latest run came in the middle of a contentious RfC and were counterproductive. Had anyone else made these edits, I would have asked them to stop and wait until the RfC dust settles because they will necessarily be perceived as hostile. Betacommand's persistent inability to defuse situations is the core of the problem. Pascal.Tesson (talk) 19:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock, mostly per my comments here and here. Beta has had far, far too many chances. At some point we have to say "no", and stop bending over further, whether the action that makes us stop is a Misplaced Pages-destroying action, or something smaller. Betacommand has already been given the very strong message that "it doesn't matter how many times you 'break the rules', or are unacceptably rude to people, you will always be unblocked" - we need to change this message. Like I've said before, Betacommand is now (and in my opinion has been for a while) a net negative to this project - the problems he causes us vastly outweigh any potential benefit he can bring us. TalkIslander 19:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock. There's a limit to how many chances a disruptive editor can get.--Berig (talk) 19:43, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock - Beta has had enough chances to change his ways, but he has not, and from what I can tell he would not do so in future. This worries me, and as such I feel that this block is indeed preventative, not punitive, and also is warranted. — neuro 19:46, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock at this time - Beta can and has done a lot of great work on Misplaced Pages, but there is community consensus that some of what he's done and was still doing is not ok. He's been warned, talked with, blocked repeatedly then unblocked, and keeps coming back to doing stuff that there's consensus is not helpful / disruptive. Unblock should happen under one of two circumstances - One, community consensus on what he's been doing changes, and we decide that it's ok again, or Two, Beta agrees to change his ways and stop doing the stuff he keeps getting in trouble over. I see no sign of 1 - consensus here seems to be firm (not unanimous, but very strong). I see no sign of 2, so far. So I regretfully believe he needs to stay blocked for now.
- It's always terribly unfortunate when this happens with someone who's done so much good for Misplaced Pages, but none of us are above the rules. Beta needs to understand that and abide by them better. BOLD is one thing - he's gone beyond that into disruption, and until he understands that and backs off he's doing more harm than good overall. I hope that he decides to change his behavior... I want him back. But not right now, without some sign of real change. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 20:56, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose - nobody not named BetaCommand would be given free reign to violate editing restrictions. He has been instructed not to make unapproved bot-like edits. He has ignored this restriction and says that he has no intention of following it. A block is the community's only recourse to enforce a rule that someone just doesn't feel like obeying. --B (talk) 21:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose yet again. This is just another in a series of moves by him to disrespect the community. He has been given a thousand chances and its done. His repeated failure to even acknowledge the restrictions he agreed to shows an utter lack of respect for the other members of this community. This community does not need members who don't respect it, regardless of what "good" someone thinks they might do.--Crossmr (talk) 22:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock. BC can find something else to do with his time. At best he's a marginal contributor with few social skills; at worst, he's a time sink & an example to countless newbies that the way to getting noticed here is to annoy lots of other Wikipedians. And didn't he hand over his copyright bot responsibilities to someone else months ago? For the record, I don't use a bot, & find it a challenge to make 25 non-trivial edits in a day, so I have to wonder about his protests that he's not using a bot. -- llywrch (talk) 22:27, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- The community restrictions were put in place as part of a previous breach of community trust. Betacommand decided to abide to them, then subsequently decided that he would ignore the restrictions, because he is following policy. There's plenty of other users who have offered to perform Betacommand's tasks, so he's not filling a unique niche. The main issue is that he is he has decided that his interpretation of policy supersedes a community restriction. We've let him have carte blanche in the past, and we know where it ended. Unblocking him will probably result in more drama and another probable ANI thread 3 months down the road. His attitude regarding this entire event has been uncooperative, and as a result, I think the block is a net positive to the encyclopedia. Fraud 22:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I have resolved this part of the thread, as there does not appear to be much support for unblocking Beta at this time. Thank you all for your input. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 22:53, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Betacommand's statement
Betacommand has made a statement on this talkpage. He can obviously see the discussion here, so any comments should - I feel - be made here and any responses copied over from his talkpage. LessHeard vanU (talk) 00:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Copy of my response to Betacommand: No offence intended to Roux, but he's had a fair few problems in the past here as well (). At one point he was verging on the brink of exhausting the communities patience altogether so he seems far from an ideal choice to keep watch over things. Should you be unblocked, you would really need an experienced and trusted administrator to keep watch over things. I'll have a think of some people who might do the job well - I like the idea of have 2/3 users taking on that role so they can be as much help as possible and so that there's always someone around for the members of the community to go to should they have concerns. If you were to be unblocked, that would be last chance for sure - I think you might have passed that point anyway as far as the community is concerned, but there's still a possibility that something can be worked out. I'll work on getting some names together for people that can be put to the community as formal mentors. Ryan Postlethwaite 00:25, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Given this statement, which strikes me as both reasonable and temperate, I would support changing Betacommand's block from indef to a fixed time frame of 1-4 weeks. Especially if quality mentors can be found, I still think that he will be a net positive to the project after some time to reflect on the level of frustration he has caused in the community and why. Eluchil404 (talk) 00:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I agree with a shortened block term like Eluchil404 suggests, provided the mentors are set up like Ryan wants to do. But Beta, please, if you're reading this... not again? :( rootology (C)(T) 00:36, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agree with shortened block term once suitable mentors have been found. Agree with Ryan that this is really his last chance. —Locke Cole • t • c 00:37, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- "The Community" rejected mentors last time. Gimmetrow 00:42, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That was last time. Consensus can change (and so far seems to be). Is there a reason mentorship would be bad (has it even been tried before)? —Locke Cole • t • c 00:58, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Quite. The strange rules and lack of mentors was obviously going to lead to the current situation. It was seemingly designed to fail. Gimmetrow 01:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That was last time. Consensus can change (and so far seems to be). Is there a reason mentorship would be bad (has it even been tried before)? —Locke Cole • t • c 00:58, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- "The Community" rejected mentors last time. Gimmetrow 00:42, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Clarification: shortened block term should be at least a week given the ongoing issues. That should be enough time for things to cool down and for off-wiki discussion with his mentors to prepare him for returning to editing. —Locke Cole • t • c 00:58, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Though reluctantly, I also agree with the shortened block term, providing a) that suitable mentors have been found, and b) we actually actually agree as a community, preferably including Betacommand, that this is well and truely a final chance, i.e. any further incident that escalates this far is met with an immediate indefinite block or even ban, no questions asked. I'd like that point to be added to Beta's restrictions, really. TalkIslander 00:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- As I said above, I'm comfortable shortening the block to 1 month with an acknowledgment of wrongdoing and a promise to adhere to a strict reading of the restrictions going forward. I'm not really concerned about mentors - I mean, I don't see what they're going to tell Betacommand that he doesn't already know. I do want peoeple keeping an eye on him, though. -Chunky Rice (talk) 01:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Support - though Ryan, I'm not terribly pleased with your characterisation of me. Especially since Betacommand's statement is directly due to a long conversation I had with him. Anyway, I would support a reduction in the block to 1 week. Mentors I think would be good... Durova, FutPerf or JzG/Guy (for general cutting-through-bullshit talents), Newyorkbrad, bibliomanic15. In addition to the reduction, I would also suggest:
Adding the words "Blatant vandalism is not covered by this restriction" to the restrictions. I know, I know, he's unlikely to be blocked for reverting a massvandal spree. But I think blatant vandalism is an exception to the restrictions, and it's reasonable for a clear exception to be noted.- A mass-vandal spree can be undone by someone else. This is just handing him a semantic loophole. He already considers any little violation of any sub-part of the NFCC to be "blatant vandalism". rspεεr (talk) 02:09, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hmm, fair enough. Striking. // roux 02:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- A mass-vandal spree can be undone by someone else. This is just handing him a semantic loophole. He already considers any little violation of any sub-part of the NFCC to be "blatant vandalism". rspεεr (talk) 02:09, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- The community should revisit the restrictions three months after the end of this block. If Betacommand has stayed within his limits, I would advocated that they be loosened or removed entirely at that time. // roux 01:50, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- At the very least his restrictions should last as long as his disruption. I believe his incivility goes back at least 2 years. 3 months of good behaviour is a drop in the bucket.--Crossmr (talk) 01:54, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- oppose any shortened block. Sorry but an 11th hour apology (which we oddly don't have an article on) doesn't cut it for me this time. When multiple users beat their head against the wall trying to explain to you that your edits are bound by policy AND your editing restrictions, that you agreed to, and you basically act like they're trolls and the editing restrictions don't exist, suddenly being sorry when the chain is finally yanked after all this time isn't sincere to me. As was repeatedly said above, we've had last chances, final chances, last last last last last x10000 chances, and it has done nothing. There is absolutely zero evidence that another chance would make any difference. What has changed since last time? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. He still violated his restrictions because he thought he was right, he attacked those who called him on it and he stubbornly ignored the community until indefinitely blocked and there was support for it this time. Now he's sorry?--Crossmr (talk) 01:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Actually, most of the conversation I had with BC was prior to the block. I believe that he really did think he was acting within policy and within his restrictions. Was he wrong? Yes. Did he break his restrictions? Yes. Should he have been blocked for that violation? Absolutely. But I do think, based on that conversation with him, that he is genuinely apologetic for the mistakes he has made, and is genuinely going to knuckle down and stay within the narrowest application of the rules possible. We maintain the idea here that all people can be made into productive contributors. I think BC is no exception to that idea. Yes, his behaviour needs a lot of work--and I am among the first to say that good contributions do not excuse rude behaviour. But one final chance, with the very clear understanding within the community and especially on BC's part that this is it', gives him a chance to continue being productive for the project. // roux 02:00, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- But we've been through this so many times before. I've lost count of the number of absolute last chances he's been given. Orderinchaos 02:06, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- How could he possibly think that? He edited more than 25 pages and didn't put it up first. There is no reasonable way anyone could think they were editing within those restrictions. I see nothing here from any statement he's made to give me any indication that his behaviour will change. A lot of people focus on his mass edits, but lets not forget the years of civility issues and this is just another example. His being productive to the project is not a net benefit, so us giving him another super duper ultimate final chance is not a positive move here. If I thought this was the last discussion we'd ever have to have about betacommand, I'd support a reduced block. But I don't even have to ask Kreskin on this one.--Crossmr (talk) 02:09, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- It seems as though he was under the impression that existing consensus was enough. This has been abundantly clarified to him. I dunno.. I know he's screwed up a bunch of times. I also think--and yes, I have been over the history, which took hours--there is an element of sincerity in what he has said both to me privately and to the community publicly that has not been there before. And yes, believe me, if he is given this chance and screws it up I will be the first calling for a permanent, it's over, immediate ban. // roux 02:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sorry that doesn't fill me with confidence nor is it a compelling argument. So what if you'll change your position next time? If next time someone else says the same thing do we let him back in again? Do we just keep going until there isn't a single body left willing to stand for him?--Crossmr (talk) 02:29, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- It seems as though he was under the impression that existing consensus was enough. This has been abundantly clarified to him. I dunno.. I know he's screwed up a bunch of times. I also think--and yes, I have been over the history, which took hours--there is an element of sincerity in what he has said both to me privately and to the community publicly that has not been there before. And yes, believe me, if he is given this chance and screws it up I will be the first calling for a permanent, it's over, immediate ban. // roux 02:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Actually, most of the conversation I had with BC was prior to the block. I believe that he really did think he was acting within policy and within his restrictions. Was he wrong? Yes. Did he break his restrictions? Yes. Should he have been blocked for that violation? Absolutely. But I do think, based on that conversation with him, that he is genuinely apologetic for the mistakes he has made, and is genuinely going to knuckle down and stay within the narrowest application of the rules possible. We maintain the idea here that all people can be made into productive contributors. I think BC is no exception to that idea. Yes, his behaviour needs a lot of work--and I am among the first to say that good contributions do not excuse rude behaviour. But one final chance, with the very clear understanding within the community and especially on BC's part that this is it', gives him a chance to continue being productive for the project. // roux 02:00, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
You guys understand you are being set up for another fall? BC has repeatedly demonstrated over months, maybe even years, that he does not have the temperment and self-discipline necessary to make this work. I think you're making a mistake - but good luck I guess(?). Wiggy! (talk) 02:00, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sadly, agree with you (and Crossmr above) - he's made promises and undertakings and broken them before. No user is bigger than the community, ultimately. Orderinchaos 02:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oppose unblock, keep it indef and make it a official community ban. He has one more chance at least half a dozen times and failed to behave every single time. He can't even abide by restrictions he agreed to (which are not onerous). Viridae 02:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- How much more time and energy are we going to waste on BetaCommand??? For the last two years, his actions have been a regular topic in this forum. He does something that annoys one or more people to the point he gets blocked, another group step up to defend his actions, make promises for him, he gets unblocked & he repeats his objectionable behavior. And why do they keep supporting him? Has he done anything to improve Misplaced Pages that no one else has or can do? His contributions seem to be nothing more than a rapid succession of ill-considered edits which as often as not need to be fixed or reversed.
- He doesn't have supporters -- he has enablers.
- As for mentoring, why didn't he agree to this long before this? Why not when he lost his Admin bit? Or the first time he was blocked for running his bot? Or the second? Or the fifth? It's commendable that someone wants to step up & mentor him -- but wouldn't that effort be better spent on something else? I'm not making the assumption that volunteer energy is fungible -- an hour spent on BetaCommand is an hour taken from writing a FA -- but if a tenth of the time spent arguing over banning BC were spent supporting other Wikipedians who are doing the heavy lifting around here, maybe we wouldn't be losing these folks. Like AGK, who recently left. Or might leave -- like Guy, SandyGeorgia, or maybe dab (I keep wondering when he'll toss in the towel). And then there's the message sent with all of this bickering to keep BC from being banned: there are a lot of Wikipedians who are quietly disgruntled, but remaining civil & respectful, who see how that is not getting them any attention -- but being a jerk gets BetaCommand all sorts of second & third & tenth chances.
- He's been a black hole that has sucked up too much time & effort from everyone here. I bet more words have been written about him than all of the Pokemon characters, tiny settlements in the U.S. no one has heard of, or internet memes -- combined. It's time to end this, write-protect his Talk page & move on to something completely different. -- llywrch (talk) 02:50, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- People have offered to be mentors before, and Beta has accepted them in the past. Why did "The Community" refuse these mentorship arrangements before this? Gimmetrow 03:08, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Oppose per Viridae and Llywrch. Enough is enough. Jtrainor (talk) 03:06, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Support per Roux and Ryan. Beta does useful work here. He's a bit incivil and forgets to run his edits through consensus sometimes. If we keep him held back with quick blocks at the hint of any problem, we should be able to end this problem. NuclearWarfare My work 04:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- What evidence is there that any quick/short blocks etc would fix the problem further? He's been uncivil for years and blocked countless times. His useful work doesn't outweigh his problems.--Crossmr (talk) 04:17, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Copyright violations
I just warned User:Savolya about inserting copyrighted text into Misplaced Pages, 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 Misplaced Pages)
- 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
- The following discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
Resolved – Not the right page for this discussion
As Durova notes, this topic ban was not imposed by the community but by the Arbitration Committee. The correct venue for an appeal of that restriction is WP:RFAR. Marking this thread "Resolved" although "Closed and directed to appropriate venue" is more accurate. Avruch 00:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Follow-up: If an arbitrator wants to turf the appeal of an AC remedy to the community, they should do it on-wiki, with the understanding that this sort of thing should have the general agreement of the rest of the committee. Avruch 00:02, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
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 09:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Have you got a link to the original topic ban discussion handy? I have vague recollections of disagreeing with this ban myself, but I can't readily find the original sanction. ~ mazca 12:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Firstly, this is not a block, this is a ban. Also, as for "he does not wish to edit the article in question" - then what is the problem? Is this some sort of attempt to gain back respect or something? — neuro 14:08, 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. Misplaced Pages 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)
- Muchas gracias. Skomorokh 15:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- More relevant is the discussion which immediately preceded it: Misplaced Pages: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'll get links, but, as stated, at the ArbCom case I brought up, they only went off of evidence from his past behavior, not only that, but when some arbitrators said that they would change their decision if shown that the user in question was capable of changing, they would. Once that happened, they didn't follow through. But then again, I was alerted by another arbitrator, that, if other methods of dispute resolution have not been followed, that they would always reject it period.— Dædαlus 19:13, 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)
Benjiboi was topic banned at arbitration enforcement, not by the community. This request is in the wrong venue. Could go to RFAR clarifications, but this action has already been appealed there and the Committee has upheld it. So unless there's a new basis for raising an appeal it probably wouldn't be worth the time. Bear in mind that as the editor who originally raised the AE thread that led to this action, I've kept an open mind about possibly supporting an end to the restriction. If there are new grounds for reconsideration then I'd be interested, but this is the wrong board for discussion. Recommend closure to this thread; am willing to resume dialog in a more appropriate place. Durova 22:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page, such as the current discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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 14:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I thought namespace subpages had been disabled on English Misplaced Pages - see WP:Subpages - or has that recently changed? – ukexpat (talk) 20:40, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- They are discouraged by policy, but technically there is no way to prevent their creation. MBisanz 20:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's not a sub-page. It's simply a page in the main namespace that has a forward slash in its title. Uncle G (talk) 23:25, 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)
- Well Todd was completely off about Mongrain; he's highly notable - and as one would expect, others better informed were able to correct him at the Afd. (Should have at least googled, Todd.) However, this all reads a little like you're in a disagreement and want Todd censured - please show if and where he ever abused his admin tools. Otherwise, its just two editors disagreeing, and does not belong here. KillerChihuahua 20:48, 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 Misplaced Pages: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 Misplaced Pages: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)
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 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)
- Just to clarify - I never said it wasn't an NPA violation. It is. — neuro 14:34, 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)
- Good grief. I blocked the IP for a while, as I agree with the analysis that it is a returning blocked user harassing people. Miacek, LHvU is right, next time please take it to WP:SSP which is there for that exact purpose. Happy New Year, everyone. Guy (Help!) 14:37, 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)
- So the problem with lack of civility on the part of LHVU is not to be addressed? Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 01:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not taking a side but asking...It looks like he apologized above and realized his mistake?? What more do you suggest or are you looking for? --Tom 01:28, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
User:BalLightning
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 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)
- Seems my ec was Crossmr fixing the username. I agree that no admin intervention appears to be required immediately - uw is probably the best course of action. — neuro 16:12, 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. --Smashville 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". --Smashville 17:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Stop this requirement creep at once. Policy is clear on this matter. Skomorokh 18:15, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I think another one is, "Likes to argue with brick walls". --Smashville 17:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oh... I get on pretty well with Baseball Bugs - and Duncan Hill, for that matter... LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:04, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- So do I, but it sure doesn't stop him arguing with me. I guess if you haven't had an argument with BB, one with Smith Jones would be an acceptable substitute. – iridescent 21:41, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "Arguing" with Smith Jones would be akin to arguing with Gabby Johnson. Baseball Bugs 22:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've never been in an argument with Bugs (well...not a real one that I can recall), but I've read enough of Smith...someone should've given him spell check for Christmas. Bugs is at least well-liked enough to have his own stalker. --Smashville 23:22, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- That's when you know you've arrived. Baseball Bugs 23:38, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've never been in an argument with Bugs (well...not a real one that I can recall), but I've read enough of Smith...someone should've given him spell check for Christmas. Bugs is at least well-liked enough to have his own stalker. --Smashville 23:22, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- "Arguing" with Smith Jones would be akin to arguing with Gabby Johnson. Baseball Bugs 22:28, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- So do I, but it sure doesn't stop him arguing with me. I guess if you haven't had an argument with BB, one with Smith Jones would be an acceptable substitute. – iridescent 21:41, 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. --Smashville 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 ]. 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. ] 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)
I urge the parties involved to take a chill pill. This looks like an edit war / content dispute, and a minor one at that. The sock/coi concerns are that Syntacticus added several sourcing links to contentious claims made by a think tank that he/she may be affiliated with, and is editing articles in a way that supports their position. Those concerns are not unfounded and are not answered by the checkuser's inconclusive result. There was an improper attempted outing, which was already handled here with a warning, but that is a separate matter - voicing sock/coi concerns is not outing. However, absent any blatant trouble, even if they are true Syntacticus is free to make good faith, anonymous edits here, and seems to be sincerely interested in participating in Misplaced Pages. When faced with a simple content question, and a murky question behind that of the legitimacy of editor accounts, perhaps it's better to stock to the content question. Wikidemon (talk) 20:04, 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?
- I do not see any problems. Have you cautioned the user yet? Bearian'sBooties (talk) 19:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- New editor? I doubt it. dougweller (talk) 19:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- WP:SOCK does not disallow unnamed alternative accounts, so this is not actionable as such straight out just because it appears to be a sock. Actions done by the account, however, may well be blockable, although I certainly don't think it has reached there yet. — neuro 19:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- New editor? I doubt it. dougweller (talk) 19:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
another grumpy admin Request for Assistance
- Clarification: I am NOT editing the article, nor have I been involved in any of the discussions, except to give my $.02 when an editor asked for input as to the notability of a certain poll. KillerChihuahua 19:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
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 and posted a rather snippy warning and templated (yes, I templated) Writegeist and warned Factchecker atyourservice 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." 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 and inquired elsewhere about me (from Bedford, of all misbegotten trolls to ask) 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 Misplaced Pages Review. Please also feel free to read my attempts at some kind of discourse here on User talk:Writegeist, as well as this (since removed) section from others to Writegeist, primarily regarding his ANI posting - 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 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 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)
- Allow me to also offer thanks for rational behavior in a somewhat strange environment over there (even with the weird comments from WG et al <g>) I consider the BLP flagging issue as something for which the time has arrived. Collect (talk) 18:35, 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)
- The user seems intent on a suicide mission: was enough for me to block them until they can satisfy people that they are not going to behave like that any more. Anyone is free to unblock if they think the user has returned to rationality, but that is just not on. Anyone who feels motivated to co-sign the barnstar I just put on user talk:KillerChihuahua should also feel free to do so, policing that ocean of toxicity is a tough job and I'm glad someone's doing it. Guy (Help!) 21:39, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Drat! You missed his best posts! <g> Collect (talk) 21:45, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
ZOMG OPPOSE BLOCK YOU'RE CENSORING PEOPLE WHO LIKE SARAH PALIN, ELEVEN. Uh, rather, endorse block. Incidentally, someone might want to look into meatpuppeteering beteen Bedford, Writegeist, and Die4Dixie. They seem to be banding together a lot, and the Confederate/Palin4President/anti-Obama trifecta of userboxes (the third, presumably, either because he's black or they buy into the bullshit about him being an Arab terrorist, rather than genuine concern, but I digress) is a bit worrying... Sceptre 04:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
The main page picture is not protected
The commons version is transcluded... please change ASAP! --84.125.135.8 (talk) 19:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I protected the Commons version temporarily. Can someone do a local copy please? rootology (C)(T) 19:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (ec)File:Thylacinus.jpg is now also locally protected. Sandstein 19:09, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- is also currently unprotected, and transcluded into the main page. John254 19:08, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Sandstein got that one. Why are all these commons ones sneaking on there? I thought we always did local copies. rootology (C)(T) 19:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
If I'm not greatly mistaken, protecting an image locally, without uploading it locally, will not prevent vandalism of the commons version from appearing directly on the main page, in which case the problem with File:Domestic goat kid in capeweed.jpg hasn't actually been remedied. John254 19:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I personally find it less time-consuming to just protect both the Commons file and the corresponding Misplaced Pages page for a day or so. That's what I have now done. Sandstein 19:18, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- If an image is protected at Commons, there's no need to also protect the corresponding Misplaced Pages page; non-sysops cannot upload a new local file under the same name as one at Commons. (And when the image is on our main page, the cascading protection will prevent creation/vandalism of a local description page.)
- In other words, if a main page image is transcluded from Commons, protecting it at Commons is sufficient. —David Levy 22:01, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Protecting an image file housed on Commons, though, because it's on en.wp's Main Page isn't appropriate, though--we just did that since no one uploaded a local temp copy here that was locked down. rootology (C)(T) 22:03, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- On the contrary, it's entirely within Commons policy to temporarily protect an image for exactly that reason; we even have a template for the purpose. —David Levy 22:10, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Really? That seems... backwards, since this is one site out of many. And that's not the template on File:PreityZinta.jpg. When did we go away from doing a local copy? rootology (C)(T) 22:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- 1. Neither protection method has superseded the other. The two have long been used interchangeably, depending on whether the protecting English Misplaced Pages sysop happens to also be a Commoms sysop (which is more likely to occur with TFA, OTD and TFP images than it is with ITN and DYK images, as the former usually are known much further in advance).
- 2. Commons protection arguably is preferable, as local protection can insulate the English Misplaced Pages from important developments at Commons (such as improvements to the image and copyright concerns). If an image is protected at Commons, such an issue must be addressed by a sysop there, who should notice that the image is on the English Misplaced Pages's main page and respond accordingly.
- 3. The template to which I linked is used at Commons. File:PreityZinta.jpg has been locally uploaded, so it's tagged with an English Misplaced Pages template. —David Levy 22:56, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Ideally, that bot would be turned back on or some new one drawn on to automatically upload these locally and protect them, so that there is never a long period of time where any Main Page content is unprotected, is my point. Doing it by hand still relies on someone paying attention at the right time to do it, which isn't that efficient, and protecting it on Commons still prevents people from improving the images in any event. :) rootology (C)(T) 00:25, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I agree that an automated process would be good, but I've cited reasons why it's debatable whether local or Commons protection is preferable. (Commons protection only delays improvements for a short time, but local prevention can prevent all sorts of important developments—including legal issues—from reaching the English Misplaced Pages while the image is transcluded on our main page.) —David Levy 00:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Since they're locked down coming and going now, it's sealed off till someone replaces the transcluded commons versions with locally protected ones. rootology (C)(T) 19:19, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not quite. is still transcluded onto the main page, and unprotected at commons. John254 19:26, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I didn't check them all, but I protected that one now on commons and left a note on the main talk page. Do we always do these right from commons...? rootology (C)(T) 19:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Well, we usually bring them in from commons, if that's what you mean. If something is going to be on the main page someone always seems to think of transferring to commons beforehand. — neuro 19:42, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Oh, really? I always thought for our main page we used a local temp copy that was protected here. rootology (C)(T) 19:50, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I thought we did too. Did we once do that, but now have changed, or are both Rootology and I senile? KillerChihuahua 20:52, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- (outdent) I think you have misunderstood. Usually people are attentive enough to transfer PD images to commons before they go to the main page, I didn't say that they should be at transcluded from commons when on the main page - they shouldn't. We should have a local copy. Hope that clears it up. :) — neuro 20:54, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
For example, see File:PreityZinta.jpg with it's transferred from Commons temp-protection template. Some of the upcoming images on Misplaced Pages:Today's featured article/December 2008 are not locked down however, so this will just come up again. Did someone change this process and forget to send out a memo? rootology (C)(T) 22:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- They are only uploaded a few hours before it goes live, AFAIK. — neuro 00:11, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Unprotected images displayed on the main page, again
, , and are currently displayed on the main page directly from the Wikimedia Commons, without being protected there. While any local content displayed on the main page is automatically protected, cascading protection does not extend across projects. Could these images be uploaded locally by an administrator, or protected on the commons? Thanks. John254 00:10, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- All protected, and the previous batch unprotected by me. We need a more efficient way to do this. rootology (C)(T) 00:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I initially believed that I could remedy this problem by uploading, say, tomorrow's picture of the day locally, so that once it was transcluded into the main page, it would be protected. While non-admins are apparently not permitted to upload images at the same filenames as existing images on the commons, I was able to improvise a solution by uploading a local version at a modified filename, then changing the image in the picture of the day template before is to be protected. Specifically, I uploaded File:ChampagnePool-Wai-O-Tapu rotated MC.jpg at File:ChampagnePool-Wai-O-Tapu rotated MC LOCAL COPY.jpg, then edited Template:POTD/2008-12-31 to use the local image. John254 00:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Also, note that the main page templates are set up so as to prevent most cases in which images could be locally vandalized immediately before being displayed on the main page. For instance, the picture of the day template transcluded into the main page tomorrow is not Template:POTD/2008-12-31, but rather Template:POTD protected/2008-12-31, which is currently protected via transclusion into Misplaced Pages:Main Page/Tomorrow. John254 00:51, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Therefore, I CANNOT do anything to protect and , which are both already transcluded into Misplaced Pages:Main Page/Tomorrow, but displayed directly from the commons, and not currently protected there; an administrative remedy is requested. John254 00:57, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've protected both at Commons. —David Levy 01:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thanks. However, it appears that you may have missed -- please see . John254 01:13, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I've protected both at Commons. —David Levy 01:03, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
This is not by any means an uncommon occurrence. About 30 days ago, I uploaded images with {{c-uploaded}}
nearly every day for quite some time, as this is the only way a user who is an admin here and not an admin on Commons can protect images from vandalism. I eventually gave up because it is extremely tedious and time-consuming. It is far, far easier from the Commons end, because all they have to do is it. To do it from this end, you have to download the image from Commons, upload the image to en.wp, fully protect it, copy all the licensing and sourcing information from the commons page onto the en.wp page, add the c-uploaded template, and then the next day, you have to delete it off en.wp, and restore any legitimate local revisions, such as featured picture designation, categories, or whatever. Tedious, and extremely annoying, because there are so many people who are incredibly active on this project who are also admins there, who could do it, but no.... J.delanoyadds 02:07, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- If only we had things that automated this stuff with no user interaction! ;) rootology (C)(T) 02:56, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Beta just pointed out Misplaced Pages:Bots/Requests for approval/Main page protection robot which is the bot for our troubles. rootology (C)(T) 03:21, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Biophys
It appears that Biophys (talk · contribs), unsatisfied with the direction that this AFD appears to be taking, is now going around to random talk pages of "Criticism of" articles and misrepresenting the discussion as "a discussion to remove all "Criticism" articles: Everyone is welcome to participate.". Appears to be blanket canvassing by way of misrepresenting a single AFD discussion as "removal of all criticism articles". Wasn't sure how to handle it, so I'm bringing it to ANI. Thanks in advance! //Blaxthos ( t / c ) 22:02, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I am sorry, but it was another user who suggested deletion of all "Criticism" articles: , and perhaps he is absolutely right. If this article will be deleted, one can reasonably argue that all other "Criticism" articles must be deleted -simply based on the precendent. Therefore, I informed other users who might be interested in this discussion.Biophys (talk) 22:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And a lot of them are, like "in popular culture" articles, spun out by people who don't like the fact that the sections keep getting justly pruned down to manageable proportions. Almost every "criticism of" article I've ever seen has been a POV-fork to at least some extent, and nuking a bunch of them probably would improve the encyclopaedia quite a bit. Guy (Help!) 22:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not all, though. The O'Reilly article, for example, was simply spun off from the main article because the section was getting too large in the main article. Baseball Bugs 22:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Right, that was precisely my argument why all such articles have every right to exist. But there is nothing wrong to mark all such articles for deletion, if someone thinks otherwise.Biophys (talk) 22:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Blaxthos provides no edit differences, so thus far his accusations are baseless.travb (talk) 22:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- , . // roux 22:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- My message was neutral and non-partisan. Hence this is not canvassing.Biophys (talk) 23:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Your message was wildly inaccurate and WP:POINTy, and yes it was canvassing. You were attempting to get people to support keeping the Putin article by falsely implying that all Criticism Of articles would be deleted if that one was. // roux 23:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- My message was neutral and non-partisan. Hence this is not canvassing.Biophys (talk) 23:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- , . // roux 22:49, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- There was nothing false in my message. It was not me who indeed suggested to remove all such articles . I did not suggest to keep or delete anything specific in the posted messages, but only to participate in discussion, as obvious from the diffs.Biophys (talk) 00:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- And he is now being WP:DISRUPTive. On Criticism of McDonald's there was consensus on the talk page to merge into McDonald's. Following WP:MERGE, I did a selective merge, only merging that information that was referenced (unsourced information can be removed at any stage). He has undone my compliant merge claiming I have partaken in a unilateral deletion, and when undone, he is now claiming to take it to AfD. Is there any other word for this but WP:DISRUPT? --Russavia 23:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No. Instead of merging, the content of this article has been effectively deleted by User:Russavia, apparently to prove his point. Nominating this article for deletion however would be fine.Biophys (talk) 23:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Unreferenced statements may be removed by any editor at any time. // roux 23:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- But deleted text was sourced.Biophys (talk) 00:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- As per WP:BURDEN, the burden is now upon yourself to provide sources for all of the unsourced WP:OR which you have re-instated, which is why it was not included in the merge. Additionally, 5 editors have expressed their opinion on the talk page over a period of some months, with no objections (meaning the article is not watched by many, or they don't care), and I have simply gone by that consensus on the talk page, and done the merge. Can you see how you have now been WP:DISRUPTIVE? --Russavia 23:17, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- But deleted text was sourced.Biophys (talk) 00:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Unreferenced statements may be removed by any editor at any time. // roux 23:14, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- No. Instead of merging, the content of this article has been effectively deleted by User:Russavia, apparently to prove his point. Nominating this article for deletion however would be fine.Biophys (talk) 23:11, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And he is now being WP:DISRUPTive. On Criticism of McDonald's there was consensus on the talk page to merge into McDonald's. Following WP:MERGE, I did a selective merge, only merging that information that was referenced (unsourced information can be removed at any stage). He has undone my compliant merge claiming I have partaken in a unilateral deletion, and when undone, he is now claiming to take it to AfD. Is there any other word for this but WP:DISRUPT? --Russavia 23:06, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Blaxthos provides no edit differences, so thus far his accusations are baseless.travb (talk) 22:33, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Right, that was precisely my argument why all such articles have every right to exist. But there is nothing wrong to mark all such articles for deletion, if someone thinks otherwise.Biophys (talk) 22:23, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Not all, though. The O'Reilly article, for example, was simply spun off from the main article because the section was getting too large in the main article. Baseball Bugs 22:21, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- And a lot of them are, like "in popular culture" articles, spun out by people who don't like the fact that the sections keep getting justly pruned down to manageable proportions. Almost every "criticism of" article I've ever seen has been a POV-fork to at least some extent, and nuking a bunch of them probably would improve the encyclopaedia quite a bit. Guy (Help!) 22:16, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Russavia:"It became necessary to destroy the town to save it" I find it incredibly ironic and Orwellian that an editor who deletes well referenced material by misquoting established guidlines is accusing the very editor who is attempting to stop such misconduct of being disruptive.
I must admit, User:Russavia, your command of acronym soup is impressive, but as I clearly showed in this AfD, the central guidelines you quote to justify your AfD contradict your reason for the AfD in the first place. As User:Digwuren wrote in the AfD: "...since the nomination is erroneous, there is not even a potentially valid basis for deletion offered -- so a speedy keep would not be out of order."
I believe with a little investigation, User:Russavia's claims that he "did a selective merge, only merging that information that was referenced", will also be found to be lacking.
User:Roux, is an active AfD delete editor (AfDs created: 54 Articles created: 11) along with Blaxthos, who posted this ANI (AfDs created: 72 Articles created: 7). User:Roux, we can go through WP:Canvas line by line if necessary. There is a lot of arbcom rulings on WP:Canvas, and admin actions which will completely nullify this baseless argument of Canvasing. If Cool Hand Luke, a newly elected Arbitor can solicit a number of editors on and offline to vote in his arbitor election, two neutral edits on a similar page is not a WP:Canvas violation.
WP:POINT is "don't disrupt[REDACTED] to make a point". Accusing User:Biophys of disrupting[REDACTED] to make a point based on one entry on a talk page is patently absurd, especially considering User:Russavia much more disruptive actions I mention here. It is not only false, it is a Personal attack. travb (talk) 00:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- User:Roux, is an active AfD delete editor (AfDs created: 54 Articles created: 11)'
- And that has anything to do with anything because? Some articles should be deleted. Some shouldn't. I have made absolutely zero opinion on whether this particular article should be deleted; I was commenting on the canvassing by Biophys. Kindly don't try to... I don't know what exactly you were trying to do, but it's obvious that you were trying to discredit me because I happen to have nominated some articles for deletion. Don't do it again. // roux 01:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- given the general context, and the other articles selected, it does indeed seem like WP:POINT. Given the way the Putin AfD is proceeding, I do not think the article will be deleted, nor will the one of Bush or O'Reilly articles. As for McDonald's, the claimed consensus to merge is based on an old poll with half the supports being anons/SPAs, and no real discussion, so it would seem reasonable to reopen the issue. If anything, like many attempts at canvassing, this will prove counterproductive, so I think no action is necessary. DGG (talk) 01:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My selective merge of only sourced material will be found lacking? Care to back up that statement with a little evidence there Inclusionist? Here's the diff, the only thing that was referenced is the environmental section. The rest is for all intents and purposes WP:OR, as there is not a reference in sight for the rest of it. So do your little investigation and you get back to me. --Russavia 01:31, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My sincerest apologies Russavia, I was absolutely wrong. travb (talk) 02:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Accepted, although it is better if WP:AGF was present beforehand. Now coming back to Criticism of McDonald's, both User:Biophys and User:Martintg have taken it upon themselves to undo that merge. The WP:BURDEN is now on them to completely source that entire article, and I am going to somewhat expect them to do so. As to Vladimir Putin, User:Inclusionist and User:Martintg have reverted a heap of edits of mine to the article, not selective reversion, but wholesale reversion. Within my edits were a change to the date format in the infobox to match the rest of the article, the replacement of a dead link to CNN to a live one to RIAN, removal of unreliable sources (anticompromat.ru), general formatting fixes, wikilinking to various articles, removal of a WP:TRIVIA section, placement of content tags (such as "who", "fact", etc), removal of criticism unrelated to the section in which it is located, adding of information to various sections (such as his meeting with Nashi), re-placement of some information (the brand section), criticism which belongs in Medvedev's article, not Putins, removal of POV terms (such as "teflon image"), removal of a list of names to do with his dacha, removal of the size of the dacha (in the article as 7,000m2, and is unreferenced -- as I stated in the edit summary, that is not a dacha, that's a palace), and removal of unsourced information on the media, and which was left had nothing to do with criticism. As there has been absolutely ZERO assumption of good faith on both the part of User:Inclusionist and User:Martintg, I am now placing the WP:BURDEN on them of sourcing all re-introduced information into the article which is not referenced. I made it clear, that I am working on improvements to the article at the moment (off-wiki), and re-inclusion of things such as media is already being worked on, but these two editors chose to ignore WP:AGF and now that WP:BURDEN is on them, and I expect them all to source the information as per one of the key policies on WP, or they are more than welcome to start assuming good faith, undo their undoing of merges, and wholesale revisions, and instead of working against me, work with me, and get articles up to par. --Russavia 03:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My sincerest apologies Russavia, I was absolutely wrong. travb (talk) 02:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My selective merge of only sourced material will be found lacking? Care to back up that statement with a little evidence there Inclusionist? Here's the diff, the only thing that was referenced is the environmental section. The rest is for all intents and purposes WP:OR, as there is not a reference in sight for the rest of it. So do your little investigation and you get back to me. --Russavia 01:31, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Lindale13 again
This is more or less a pro forma notice, since it involved a lot of pages... Please see User:Lindale13 in the ANI archive 500. This user, as discussed there, was mirroring the user pages of others into their user space, via copy. I don't think any major harm was intended, but it's a GFDL violation, and worse, it was making some categories wonky (any category that a given page was in also had the mirror page in it too). I suggested to the user (at User_talk:Lindale13) that they should reply. They did so, but to the ANI archive, rather than their own user page or mine. Based on what they have said, (about not needing the pages, and about "deleting them" (actually what they did was blank the page that linked to them, making the pages unreachable, but not deleted) and the issues originally raised, I've deleted the entire swath of pages, as can be seen in my deletion log: . I shall notify the user of this discussion. As always I welcome review of my actions. ++Lar: t/c 22:24, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Mmmm... I do hope that he is able to follow course work requirement and project assignments criteria a little better than he does WP:Practice and Principles. Yeah, fine. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:35, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
Error in Fundraiser Headline
I'm sure a lot of admins have suppressed the fundraiser banner, so they don't see it on each page, but there's a rather embarrassing misspelling in one of the messages and I haven't been able to find the page from which to correct it:
Merci et bravo pour votre impartialité !
— Benoit from Luxembuorg, donated 30 EUR
(Thank you and bravo for your neutrality!)
"Luxembuorg" is spelled wrong, I haven't been able to find any location which is so spelled. It should be "Luxembourg." Pretty sure this is an admin task, but I have no idea where the notice is generated from. RyanGerbil10(Four more years!) 00:19, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- The class is "siteNoticeBig notice-wrapper", if that helps anyone locate it. — neuro 00:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's probably on Meta-wiki. Majorly talk 00:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
The banner is created by the Foundation staff... Shoot an e-mail to foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org? Avruch 00:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Looks like the quote translations are editable by meta admins, has been taken care of by Marybelle. Avruch 00:48, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Abuse of rollback
This is most aggravating. Editors who have been using the tool for a long while should be very well aware when rollbacking should be utilized, but coming from a sysop no less, I expected better. Thoughts on what to do? Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 01:46, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- How about trying a little harder to not be so irritating? older ≠ wiser 01:48, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That gives you absolutely no reason to imply I am vandalizing. Your bad faith revert on that redirect should be undone immediately. You don't deserve the rollback feature as far as I'm concerned. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 01:55, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Nonsense. You were making repeated blatantly nonproductive edits under the mistaken aegis of WP:BRD. older ≠ wiser 02:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- (ec)Bkonrad that comment was out of line, I suggest you retract it. As for rollback abuse, rollback should never ever be used to revert a good faith edit. However I should also point out that both of you are close to breaking the 3rr--Jac16888 (talk) 02:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- OK, I'll concede the comment may have been out of line for this forum. However, this editor, despite knowing full well that his edit is blatantly nonproductive, and even apparently agreeing at least to some extent with me, he has WP:POINTedly once again reverted here and here. I'll stand by my characterization as irritating. older ≠ wiser 02:15, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Stop wikilawyering to justify yourself. Your use of rollback, in an edit war, was out of line, if you refuse to accept that then perhaps your permission should be revoked--Jac16888 (talk) 02:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- What wikilawyering? The edits were blatantly nonproductive and he failed to follow up on discussions that he initiated before reverting while incorrectly invoking WP:BRD. older ≠ wiser 02:41, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Even if your assessment is 100% accurate, in no way does that justify your use of the rollback function, which never should be invoked in a content dispute, regardless of who's right or wrong. You've been a sysop since May 2004, so I would hope that you're aware of this. —David Levy 03:06, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- OK, I'll admit that my use of rollback may have been motivated by a fit of pique. I should have manually reverted the edits and once again attempted to explain to irritatingly deaf ears why the edits were unproductive. older ≠ wiser 03:16, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Thank you. In such a situation, it also can be helpful to consider allowing someone else to revert. The edits appear to be relatively minor (rendering reversion non-urgent), but if you're correct in your belief that they were "blatantly nonproductive," an ample number of users should agree. (I realize, of course, that it's easier to prescribe that type of patience than it is to summon it in the heat of the moment.) —David Levy 03:32, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
I have protected the page for a week. Please settle this dispute on the talk page, either way (talk) 02:24, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Indeed. Thanks for looking into this. Lord Sesshomaru (talk • edits) 02:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Admin help needed at WP:EAR
Over at WP:EAR, there's a situation which needs additional admin input. Please see: this thread, titled "Editing assistance in continuation war". Any admins with special skills in rooting out sockpuppets would be most appreciated. This one has my spidey-sense tingling. Thanks. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
User:Davidx5
Davidx5 (talk · contribs) has already been blocked twice in less than two weeks for repeated disruptive editing. He doesn't like the article at Hispanic, so he keeps putting in contentious edits, which keep getting reverted. He then created Hispanic (updated), which contained his personal point of view, and that got speedy deleted. So he's just re-created it, I've listed it for speedy deletion as db-repost. Somebody needs to take Davidx5 in hand and explain that he can't have his own articles, and if he continues, he should be long-term blocked. Little Red Riding Hoodtalk 04:02, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Questionable block of RMHED (talk · contribs)
I'm moving this discussion here to get it off RMHED's user talk page now that he or she has been unblocked:
- I'm looking at it. Hang on. I think the technical question is whether the first prod removal counts as a reversion.--Wehwalt (talk) 23:48, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Having kept on reverting and thereby violating the 3RR was clearly inapprorpriate and warrants a block for 48 hours given the fact that you have been blocked once for edit warring already. The right course of action would have been to wait for an administrator to decide on that request for speedy deletion. — Aitias // discussion 23:51, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- I would assert that RMHED's removal of the CSD tag was legit and justified (non-admin decline CSD). Further, that re-adding the CSD tag by the IP was inappropriate, and at least disruptive (perhaps vandalism). We don't keep nominating articles for speedy once they're declined. I'd support unblocking, especially if RHMED said war is ended. Toddst1 (talk) 23:55, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Can someone point me in the direction of something that says you can't put the speedy tag back?--Wehwalt (talk) 23:57, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- A couple of things:
I don't see 4 reversions of content, though I don't think WP:EW is as reliant on 3RR as it used to be. Second, if Aitias made this block under the impression that RMHED can't (As a non-admin) remove CSD tags, he should probably reverse it (unless the block was made mostly about edit warring rather than the disposition of the template). I won't reverse the block myself, but I'm leaning toward it being shortened (and come on, the 3rr block was a year ago... not like ascending block lengths applies). Protonk (talk) 23:58, 29 December 2008 (UTC)
- Mmm, I thought I was reviewing it. But if you want to, that's fine.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- See Misplaced Pages:Deletion_policy#Speedy_deletion Toddst1 (talk) 00:02, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
*If you disagree: Anyone except a page's creator may contest the speedy deletion of a page by removing the deletion notice from the page. ...
*Renominations: Either a page fits the speedy deletion criteria or it does not. If there is a dispute over whether a page meets the criteria, the issue is typically taken to deletion discussions, mentioned below.- That doesn't say "you can't re-add the tag", it just says you shouldn't. Protonk (talk) 00:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Additionally, Toddst1, “non-admin decline CSD” is not the proper way. Non-admin closures are right for AfD. However, admins do decide on requests for speedy deletion. If one disagrees, he goes to DRV. — Aitias // discussion 00:11, 30 December 2008 (UTC)- Absolutely false. Non admins (even ip editors) are free to decline speedies. Protonk (talk) 00:29, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That doesn't say "you can't re-add the tag", it just says you shouldn't. Protonk (talk) 00:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- You can feel free to review it...not sure where that comment came from. Consider this a friend of the court brief if you like. Protonk (talk) 00:04, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Mmm, I thought I was reviewing it. But if you want to, that's fine.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:01, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Comment: Wouldn't the IP that reported this be just as guilty of WP:3RR in this case? I suspect that at least a warning should be given there as well. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 00:05, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I wasn't wild about his "That's it, I'm getting an admin" (I paraphrase). Look, I'm inclined to think that the first removal of the tag was not a reversion, since that is the accepted way of contesting a speedy. And the "edit war" did not actually involve content, but rather procedure. Thoughts? Amicus curiae?--Wehwalt (talk) 00:10, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- As a non-admin observer, I'll just add my opinion. This appears to technically be a violation of WP:3RR by both parties involved; but as it's only a dispute over procedure, was relatively minor, and was quickly resolved ... I think a reminder/warning to both parties to use dispute resolution in the future should be sufficient. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 00:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I wasn't wild about his "That's it, I'm getting an admin" (I paraphrase). Look, I'm inclined to think that the first removal of the tag was not a reversion, since that is the accepted way of contesting a speedy. And the "edit war" did not actually involve content, but rather procedure. Thoughts? Amicus curiae?--Wehwalt (talk) 00:10, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- also, it was 4 reverts, not a prod removal and 3 csd reverts. the IP said prod in the edit summary but meant CSD, so the technical violation exists. Protonk (talk) 00:11, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
I've been told not to renom for speedy deletion, as the removal of the tag by anyone other than the article creator indicates it doesn't meet the speedy criteria ie. there is an indication of notability as determined by a good faith editor. My understanding was that the very act of removing the speedy tag is one of disputing the claim, and that allowing it to be restored allows that dispute to go unregistered, and is improper. ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking that removal of a speedy tag is not a revert. Doesn't quite answer the edit war question though.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My suggestion is reduce the block length (warring is warring) and warn the IP. Protonk (talk) 00:17, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I strongly disagree. Policy says non-admins can delcine CSD. I recommend unblocking. Toddst1 (talk) 00:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agree with Toddst. This is an awful block; ten seconds looking at the article shows it's clearly not a {{db-bio}} candidate. A blatantly inappropriate tagging like this is disruption, and removing the tag in these circumstances isn't covered by the spirit of 3RR, whether or not it's covered by the letter. Aitias, please reconsider this one. – iridescent 00:21, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- @iridescent: Well, the policy does just not cover obvious vandalism. Do you really consider this tagging obvious vandalism? — Aitias // discussion 00:28, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Removing the speedy tag, as I understand it, means that there is reasonable doubt about the speedy nom and "where reasonable doubt exists, discussion using another method under the deletion policy should occur instead". So restoring the speedy tag is inappropriate. Asking RHMED to seek outside help if someone reverts his removal of a speedy or prod tag twice (once and then again after being informed by RHMED why we don't re-add speedy tags) seems to me to be enough. And this assumes the act of readding a removed tag isn't inappropriate enough to simply be a kind of vandalism (perhaps not malicious though) and to warrant reversion without considertion to edit warring (is it an edit?). ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agree with Toddst. This is an awful block; ten seconds looking at the article shows it's clearly not a {{db-bio}} candidate. A blatantly inappropriate tagging like this is disruption, and removing the tag in these circumstances isn't covered by the spirit of 3RR, whether or not it's covered by the letter. Aitias, please reconsider this one. – iridescent 00:21, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I strongly disagree. Policy says non-admins can delcine CSD. I recommend unblocking. Toddst1 (talk) 00:18, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Hi, I am a non-Admin - just came across the issue through Huggle noting the page change (and I have since edited the article involved, adding some sources). From the outside it looks as if the 3rr tail is wagging the encyclopaedic dog here. I wonder if it may be better if necessary to IAR rather than try to make a round peg fit a square hole? Springnuts (talk) 00:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- OK, you win on the wiki equivalent of statutory interpretation, but it still was a lousy way of settling a dispute. Better to put a note on the talk page or something. Or put a hangon tag (yes, I know it would have been misapplied), and go seek administrative help. Find a better way next time. And the rollback loss stands, I can't and wouldn't do anything about it as it would be wheel warring, and I think the loss is justified. Go back to square one on that one.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:32, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- My suggestion is reduce the block length (warring is warring) and warn the IP. Protonk (talk) 00:17, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- That's what I'm thinking. I'm thinking that removal of a speedy tag is not a revert. Doesn't quite answer the edit war question though.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:14, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
(Maybe a bit outdated, but here is my response, which for some reason wasn't published earlier - Please assume good faith in my actions and do not suggest I was trying to vandalise anything!!) Hi, I wasn't aware that this would end up being such an issue. I am sorry if I am not using the right terms, but after reading policies for over 3 hours now, I am still confused about this: Template:Bio-warn asks that a db-person template is not removed, but instead that the hangon tag is used. I think somewhere else I read that the tag can be removed by anyone (not just admins), but then what's the point of having a hangon tag? In any case, if this is such a issue, then please do remove the ban from RMHED. I did not intent to cause a war, but I would appreciate more constructive discussion (like this), something which RMHED does not do: he never cited any reasons for his actions, he merely kept undoing what I was doing, while I tried to point him to related policies and articles. Based on my understanding of the policies, I fully agree with what Aitias said, but please accept my apologies if I was wrong, and be assured that in no case my efforts were an attempt to vandalism (Toddst1). I will now take the case to WP:AFD. Thanks, Anthony 62.103.147.54 (talk) 00:34, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Basically, anyone except the creator can remove a speedy-delete tag (not only admins, as someone says above); the {{hangon}} tag is for the creator of the article. – iridescent 00:36, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
This is an awful, awful block. The blocking admin seems to not understand CSD policy because he has mentioned more than once that an admin should have removed the tag. Disruptive tagging is tantamount to vandalism. Obvious vandalism is an exception to 3RR. --Smashville 00:39, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- If you consider obvious good faith edits to be vandalism, Smashville,... — Aitias // discussion 00:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- What part of them was obviously in good faith? Edit warring with a tag is clearly disruptive. It's not like it's not disruptive at 3 and suddenly disruptive at 4. --Smashville 02:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
(to Anthony)Thank you. But consider yourself warned, too. Going back and forth, even if technically within the letter of the rules, is a bad way of handling thing. You should have tried to talk it out, or seek help once you realized there was a good faith dispute as well. I've unblocked RMHED, but he loses his rollback privileges unless he persuades the other admin to give them back or reapplies for them after a decent interval. This doesn't reflect well on anyone. I've got two users who should know better, an admin whose probably hopping mad at me for undoing something I'm not saying he was out of bounds to do, even though we disagree, and I don't feel 100 percent about this. Sigh.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:39, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
On what basis is the power of rollback still revoked? Is someone saying it's a policy that inappropriate speedy templating shouldn't be reverted? Is it an "edit" in the "edit war" sense? Isn't it enough to ask RHMED to do a better job on patience and explaining (something I think we're all guilty of at times...)? ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:45, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- What I am saying is that I can only go against another admin where policy allows. Policy allows a blocking action to be reviewed on request by an uninvolved admin. For me to otherwise use my admin powers to reverse an administrative action of another admin, that I know the admin disagrees with, is what is called "wheel warring". The rollback was not part of the block, it is entirely separate and within the admin's discretion. And RMHED shouldn't have used rollback anyway. RHMED must either ask the admin to reconsider or else reapply for it in due course.--Wehwalt (talk) 00:53, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
(to Wehwalt) Thanks, I agree with you and accept the warning, but my problem as a user is that after reading the policies for about 4 hours now, I'm still not sure who is right or not. Again, my issue was that I used the talk page to make my point and tried to refer him to policies, whereas RMHED's only reasoning was that the article asserts notability (with no external references) and that's it. I should have known better, but maybe it would help if policies were clearer and some users a bit friendlier if they see someone not following policies correctly. I understand and accept it's difficult to moderate everything, but my common sense says that someone's plain CV is not fit to be an encyclopaedia article. Misplaced Pages:Notability_(academics) requires independent reliable sources and surely one person's website can't be that! That's what I tried to communicate and I think it would have been better if people would be a bit more open/communicative and it would have saved all of us the trouble. As far as I am concerned this is over, I accept the warning but can't accept that my actions were anywhere close to vandalism. Thanks to everyone for the help/suggestions, sorry for the confusion and Happy New Year. :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.103.147.54 (talk • contribs) 00:57, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Just a last comment by me
The reverts were a blatant violation of the three-revert rule. I don't understand why people keep claiming this would not have been covered by the policy. The policy does not cover obvious vandalism, that's right. However, this edits were exactly the opposite: Evident good faith edits (cf. Anthony's statement above). Therefore this block was completely justified, as I honestly think. Why the double standards? Sorry, I can't understand. However, be that as it may. — Aitias // discussion 01:08, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed. If it were a
{{prod}}
template, there would be basis in repeated removal, as once a{{prod}}
is removed (except in obvious mistake), it should not be re-added. CSD, on the other hand, is just like any other tag except that only the page's creator is restricted from removing it, yet it could be re-added. Thus, repeated removal and/or re-insertion when it's not obvious vandalism is still edit warring, and in this case the two other users, Moeron and 62.103.147.54, appear to be acting in good faith despite also being part of the edit war by re-inserting the tags themselves. --slakr 02:02, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Question: If an admin declined the same CSD template 4 times would they too be blocked for a 3RR violation? Or is it only edit warring when you're a non-admin? RMHED (talk) 02:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- It's pretty clear here that Aitias and Moeron did not understand policy on CSD. (!) Worse, it appears to have been a factor in your being blocked. He or she hasn't admitted it but a pretty decent number of admins have hammered that point home. Several of us have said you shouldn't have been blocked. I recommend you have a beer and call it a day. Cheers. Toddst1 (talk) 02:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- As it's almost 2.30am here a beer probably isn't a good idea. The loss of rollback is a nuisance as I used it occasionally for vandalism reverts but mostly it was a quick way to see if there had been any changes to pages I'd recently edited via my contributions page. Without the rollback option being visible I have to click on the history of an article to see if there's been any new edits. RMHED (talk) 02:29, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Indeed...sometimes it's okay for an admin to simply admit they made a mistake...doesn't appear it will happen here. --Smashville 02:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm just very glad that at least one other admin was impartial enough to see that my block was justified. — Aitias // discussion 02:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Wait...the fact that we disagree makes us not impartial? --Smashville 02:41, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Smashville, you are that good in twisting somebody's words, I can't even believe it. — Aitias // discussion 02:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm confused...all I did was state what the implied statement you made was. It's irrelevant. The mere fact is that I disagree with your block. I don't see what I have to do with anything. --Smashville 02:49, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed. No partiality that I can find on the part of smashville, me irie, etc., other than disagreeing with a bad block. Implying partiality is pretty obnoxious. You know, when you're in a hole, stop digging, Aitias. Toddst1 (talk) 03:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Toddst1, may I kindly ask you to stop putting words into my mouth? I said nowhere that iridescent would be not impartial. Additionally, I'm not in a hole at all and I'm not digging. Unless you consider saying one's honest opinion as digging. — Aitias // discussion 03:48, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- No intent to put words in your mouth. I read what you wrote. Please clarify: If the other admins were not "impartial enough to see that my block was justified", we were ... ___? How am I and Smashville different than irie? Toddst1 (talk) 03:59, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Toddst1, may I kindly ask you to stop putting words into my mouth? I said nowhere that iridescent would be not impartial. Additionally, I'm not in a hole at all and I'm not digging. Unless you consider saying one's honest opinion as digging. — Aitias // discussion 03:48, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Agreed. No partiality that I can find on the part of smashville, me irie, etc., other than disagreeing with a bad block. Implying partiality is pretty obnoxious. You know, when you're in a hole, stop digging, Aitias. Toddst1 (talk) 03:22, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm confused...all I did was state what the implied statement you made was. It's irrelevant. The mere fact is that I disagree with your block. I don't see what I have to do with anything. --Smashville 02:49, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- (edit conflict) Smashville, you are that good in twisting somebody's words, I can't even believe it. — Aitias // discussion 02:44, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Wait...the fact that we disagree makes us not impartial? --Smashville 02:41, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- I'm just very glad that at least one other admin was impartial enough to see that my block was justified. — Aitias // discussion 02:40, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Indeed...sometimes it's okay for an admin to simply admit they made a mistake...doesn't appear it will happen here. --Smashville 02:30, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- As it's almost 2.30am here a beer probably isn't a good idea. The loss of rollback is a nuisance as I used it occasionally for vandalism reverts but mostly it was a quick way to see if there had been any changes to pages I'd recently edited via my contributions page. Without the rollback option being visible I have to click on the history of an article to see if there's been any new edits. RMHED (talk) 02:29, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
RMHED Question
- Aitias could you answer my question above please. If it's classed as edit warring then it applies equally to all users. So would you honestly have blocked an admin and revoked their rollback if they had performed the same edits? RMHED (talk) 02:43, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
- Although I'm obviously not Aitias, I would have definitely done so with an admin. Thankfully, I never get a chance to do that, as admins tend to avoid edit wars like the plague, hence the reason why it's rare to ever see them get blocked for doing so. We would simply simply post to WP:AN, WP:ANI, or ask for a third option to gain consensus. Alternatively, I'd even consider dropping the article to articles for deletion on behalf of the other user even if I thought it should be kept, since that's probably the best venue for deletion discussions. That, or stick a prod on the article also on behalf of the user then let someone else remove it if they want to. If it's obvious it should be kept, either routes would solidify a "keep." For myself, except in cases of clear vandalism (i.e., where a revert is so obvious it actually doesn't require an edit summary, hence the joy of rollback), I stick to the one revert rule and User:Slakr/Let someone else deal with it.
- When it comes to users, though, when it comes to my decisions, there is a double standard that's actually contrary to the one you're positing. For example, while I would consider blocking an admin for edit warring (they're supposed to know better), when it comes to non-admin users, I can't say that I would have necessarily made a block due to the possible confusion of any given user between the nuances of the removing/re-addition guidelines for
{{prod}}
versus{{db}}
versus afd templates unless it was clear they know them to begin with or had been repeatedly blocked in the past. That said, I also try to assume disproportionate amounts of good faith, but at the same time I also have disproportionate bias against all forms of edit warring.
- When it comes to users, though, when it comes to my decisions, there is a double standard that's actually contrary to the one you're positing. For example, while I would consider blocking an admin for edit warring (they're supposed to know better), when it comes to non-admin users, I can't say that I would have necessarily made a block due to the possible confusion of any given user between the nuances of the removing/re-addition guidelines for
- I should also admonish all parties involved for implying bad intentions in either their actions or responses to actions. It doesn't help, in the slightest, to refocus discussion on the person's intentions instead of the action without providing proof of that negative intention.
- (edit conflict) @RMHED: An admin would never decline a speedy without giving any reasons (4 times!). What would have been wrong with talking to the —obviously well-intentioned— user and explaining him why the page does not meet our criteria for speedy deletion? What at all would have been wrong with that? Instead, you simply reverted, reverted, reverted. As you see from Anthony's statements above, this reverting without providing any reasons was a big problem for him. Overall, it was biting. I am entirely sure there would never have been an edit war if you had explained Anthony what he had done wrong. And yes, my decision to block would not have been different if you'd been an admin. I simply can't understand why people enjoy biting newcomers that much. And I can't at all understand this double standards applied here. This was, as I explained above, a blatant violation of the 3RR. As slakr explained, it was an edit-war. The block was warranted. — Aitias // discussion 03:31, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
What is this doing on AN/I?
RMHED was blocked. Block was soundly reversed. IP editor created an account. All is well. I don't think Aitias needs to be raked over the coals here. Protonk (talk) 04:16, 30 December 2008 (UTC)
Category: