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• Blocks for promotional activity outside of mainspace

Review of A Man In Black's block of Jtrainor

A Man in Black has been in a content dispute with multiple parties over his claim of a copyvio for general information in a infobox on Gundam (mobile suit). He has threatened and followed through on blocking Jtrainor in blatant violation of our blocking policy in the following manner: You do not block those who you are involved in a content dispute with. I would suggest that Jtrainor is unblocked immediately and AMIB be reminded that you do not use the tools to gain an advantage in a content dispute and that blocking is not to be used in a purely punitive manner. There was no other dispute resolution tried other than AMIB threatening this user. Thank you. Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 09:37, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure that "this is a copyvio" constitutes a content dispute. Misplaced Pages is not a bureaucracy, and citing "policies" will get you nowhere. Admittedly, it might have been a better idea to ask somebody else to block, but I'm not sure that an immediate unblock is warranted.

Also, it's a long-standing practice to block people who insert copyvios – it's not necessarily punitive, but deterrent (which is, of course, a legitimate preventative purpose for a block). — Werdna • talk 09:49, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I understand that he claims it is a copyvio, however, claiming that a character has blonde hair or a spaceship has laser beams does not seem to be copyvio, but simply a ploy to hide the fact that he's attempting to camouflage his violation (which is threatening to use the mop to quell dissent and gain advantage in a simple content dispute). Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 09:54, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm having a look at this. The relevant diff seems to be here. The website in question is here. The next few edits to Gundam (mobile suit) were reverts of this information about the character. One of the reverts was by Kyaa (who started this thread and should have mentioned that she was involved in this). Kyaa was carrying out the same edit as User:Jtrainor, but Jtrainor was the only one to re-add the information more than once. Presumably that is why User:A Man In Black blocked, but I need to check the user and article talk pages and the block logs, and check they've been notified. I'll do that now, as well as consider the copyvio claim. Carcharoth (talk) 11:10, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Initial follow-up: there is another article involved: MSN-03 Jagd Doga. See this diff and this website and then step through the page history from there. Kyaa mentioned this thread on Jtrainor's talk page, but didn't link to the thread, so I've left a link there, and at AMIB's talk page. Looking at the block log and contributions now to find out if this is being discussed elsewhere. Carcharoth (talk) 11:21, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I've found another article where this dispute has erupted. See RGM-89 Jegan, where with this edit AMIB says " All of this is copyvio from mahq.net" (). The root of the dispute seems to be at Template:Infobox Mobile Suit. It seems to go back as far as November 2007. See here (compare with Infobox MS Gundam, now a redirect). There was an edit war over that infobox back in November 2007. Then things started up again a few days later with this edit and this edit ("Why do we have two infoboxes for the same thing?" - from User:TheFarix), which led to this edit by AMIB ("Because I never finished converting them to dump all the in-universe nonsense"). The diffs for that infobox from here to here seem to sum up what is happening:

• AMIB - "Dumping a bunch of unencyclopedic in-universe detail; a lot of this still needs to be retooled to better emphasize RL, but hey"
• TheFarix - "rvt; given past opposition. The fields previously removed where those suggested by proponents as unnecessary"
• AMIB - "It's still highly in-universe, unencyclopedic, and wholly unsourced"
• L-Zwei - "oh, then exclude heigh as well. I think weapons are actually more important in represent mech's characteristic"
• TheFarix - "I agree, the height and weight doesn't really tell you anything about the mecha while aremaments and special equipmenet does"
• AMIB - "It's not the most important facts about the subject as an object in the real world. If a weapon or special system is important, it's in the body of the article. If it isn't, it doesn't bear mention"
• TheFarix - "rvt; You are not going to dictate what can and cannot be included in the infobox without discussion and consensus. You don't WP:OWN this template"
• AMIB - "Offer a single non-licensed source discussing the armaments in the detail that these infoboxes go into and I'll relent"
• Jtrainor - "rv vandalism by someone who has no interest or knowledge about the subject matter and insists on inserting his version anyways against consensus"
• AMIB - "Reverted edits by Jtrainor (talk) to last version by A Man In Black"

OK. That's enough for now. I think I've uncovered enough of the history for something sensible to be decided. Hopefully AMIB and Jtrainor will add more if I missed anything. Carcharoth (talk) 11:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Missed a few. See Template talk:Infobox Mobile Suit and Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Gundam. Particularly the sections Ahem (from the November 2007 dispute), and Redesign (the October 2008 dispute). At the WikiProject, we have numerous threads showing clashes between AMIB and the WikiProject. Starting from around here (June 2007). More clashes are here, here, here, here, here, here (what is the "I believe the differing parties are engaged in a resolution process occupying their attention right now" referring to - from November 2007?), and here (the latest dispute in October 2008). So what we seem to have is a long-running dispute over in-universe and possible copyvio stuff, running from at least June 2007 through July 2007, November 2007, and now October 2008. Anyone have any ideas how to handle this? What was the resolution process back in November 2007? The first "Characters and Episodes" arbitration case? Carcharoth (talk) 12:06, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

And more to point, was the block justified? I'm not entirely convinced that the copyvio case is not debatable, but I do see a long running attempt by AMIB to clean up an in-universe area (the Gundam anime articles), along with dealing with copyright issues (non-free images and possibly character information - if that turns out to be copyrightable - see for example the note AMIB left for Kyaa ), and a long history of resistance at the WikiProject and poor interaction between AMIB and Jtrainor, culminating in the confrontational exchange here: Copyright warning by AMIB, "Why yes, please do block someone you are involved in a content dispute with. I am utterly underwhelmed by your threats." (Jtrainor), followed by "Well, okay. You're blocked for 24 hours. Please don't do that again." (AMIB). The block is due to expire 08:47 UTC, 2 November 2008, which is around 20 hours from now. No response yet from either side. I would hope AMIB manages to answer here before the block expires - someone should also keep an eye on Jtrainor's talk page for any response there. Carcharoth (talk) 12:22, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I've seen blocks overturned, due to the block being done by "involved admins" - overturned on far flimsier grounds than this. It looks to me like AMIB simply doesn't like that info being in the article, and is using whatever reasons he can come up with, to keep it out. It looks like blatant abuse of admin power. Baseball Bugs 12:14, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict) The simple fact is that AMIB is POV pushing in template and article space. His claim that listing the armaments and other statistics of fictional elements amounts to a copyright violation is simply the latest argument he has used in order to remove these statistics. Originally, it was that the statistics overwhelm the page giving WP:UNDUE weigh to in-universe details, that they violate WP:WAF, or that no reliable third-party sources list such information. At no point has he ever sought a third opinion or any other dispute resolution procedure, instead preferring to use his administrative tools to enforce his preferred version.

If you also look at WT:GUNDAM who will see a long history of AMIB and the Gundam WikiProject bumping heads over various issues. At times, I do think that AMIB is deliberately antagonizing them. As a result, the WikiProject has lost its focus in cleaning up and improving Gundam-related articles. This is one of the reason why I've suggested that WP:ANIME absorbs WP:GUNDAM as a work group. --Farix (Talk) 12:23, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I saw that. AMIB does make some good points though. There is a point at which sourcing/copying character information from a website probably can become a copyright violation. The essential points are whether the basic elements of the information is copyrightable (probably not), and whether the information as a whole for a character, or set of characters, is copyrightable (a bit like a database copyright, but not quite the same as here we have artistic content). If Misplaced Pages is presenting the information here in the same way as it is being presented on the official websites, then we are, in effect, directly competing with them for web traffic, even if some of our readers follow the links to the sources and to the official website. It is also easier to justify including such information when it is discussed and placed in a real-world context in the main text of an article (using third-party sources) rather than just repeated verbatim as in-universe information in an infobox. One final point - it is possible for different editors, working over months and years, to separately add stuff from a source, and for the final article to end up being a copy of all the information from that source - this is a problem of unintentional "piece-by-piece" copyright violation that is peculiar to the wiki-model, and that Misplaced Pages will have to address at some point. Carcharoth (talk) 12:38, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

You're generously making AMIB's argument for him, whereas it would be much better if he himself would comment - if he decides it's worth bothering with, since there is currently no hint of any sanction against him. While his claim of "copyright violation" is pretty lame, it would have more credibility if he hadn't been all over the map with his previous arguments against it, which simply add up to "I don't like it". Baseball Bugs 12:42, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Those are actually my arguments, not AMIB's arguments (though he may agree with me). I will say that I'm not impressed with AMIB's flippant "well, OK" response to Jtrainor's "this is a content dispute". As I've laid out above, AMIB does have a long history of disputing what should go in that infobox, and in the past, AMIB has started from trying to clean up in-universe stuff, to switching to copyright stuff. He may be right in both cases, but it does feel like another stage in the same long-running dispute. AMIB is clearly heavily involved here, and should have requested a second opinion, instead of allowing Jtrainor's 'block me if you dare' comment to bait him into blocking. Carcharoth (talk) 13:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Whether AMIB has a point does not justify him enforcing that point by edit waring, blocking one editor, and threatening to block a second editor involved in the dispute. --Farix (Talk) 12:57, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

Sure. You've said that. I'm waiting to see what others say. I think there are two issues that need resolving here. The immediate issue of the block, and the wider issue of the long-running festering issues at the Gundam WikiProject. Carcharoth (talk) 13:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

• Update - it seems that the previous dispute resolution wasn't an arbitration case. It was a mediation. See Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for mediation/Gundam. See Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for mediation/Gundam/Archive 1. Not sure how far that got things to improve (seems to have been withdrawn when things started to improve), but it is clear that things have taken a turn for the worse again. I've also noticed that the dates of Jtrainor's other two blocks (July 2007 and November 2007) coincide with the dates of Gundam-related disputes. Unfortunately, the blocking admins did not specify the articles that were involved in the blocks. I could dig through Jtrainor's talk page history, but will drop a note off for the blocking admins as well and see what they can remember. Carcharoth (talk) 13:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Final update for now - there is quite a history of this on Jtrainor's talk page. See here, here, here, here, here, and here. This is a mess. Jtrainor has filed an unblock request under the latest section. See here. I have to go out now for the rest of the day, but I hope there is enough here for others to review and sort out what needs doing. As I said, it is a mess and a long-running dispute. I'll check back in the evening and see what has happened then. Carcharoth (talk) 13:50, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
    • • FYI the November 2007 blocks probably revolved primarily around Gundam Mk-II, Psyco Gundam and MSN-03 Jagd Doga (disputes over "in universe" content and sourcing) and Jean Carry Talia Gladys (along with all the other characters in the ZAFT / OMNI / PLANT alliances) re: copyright material. GundamsЯus (talk) 14:49, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
        • For what it's worth, I was also blocked my A Man In Black (my first block on Misplaced Pages) over almost the same thing, though things were more civil back then. I had hoped that that big mediation process we went through with AGK had resolved some disputes, but obviously that is not the case. This is an old issue. MalikCarr (talk) 18:46, 1 November 2008 (UTC)
        • Addendum, interested parties ought to review Jtrainor's unblock appeal, in which interesting and relevant points are made on the topic of copyright violation. See here. This issue has also been addressed before, wherein some consensus was gained and to which A Man In Black was opposed to, in the infobox template's talk page which has been previously addressed above. MalikCarr (talk) 19:32, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

The request for mediation on Gundam was exclusively for edit warring on in-universe-like items in one of the Gundam infoboxes. At its worst, they were repeatedly reverting each other without discussion. Then they seemed to be getting better at talking more than reverting, and so I didn't think mediation needed to be pursued. hbdragon88 (talk) 19:41, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

This is very similar, except what AMIB is saying is not just that they are in-universe, but that they are copyright violations as well. I haven't looked closely enough into this 18-month-long dispute to work out when the copyright concerns first surfaced (a few days ago, six months ago, a year ago?). Hopefully AMIB will turn up and clarify that. There have been more developments on Jtrainor's talk page, by the way. Carcharoth (talk) 20:01, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I do have a question. If Jtrainor is going to remained block for edit waring, should AMIB also be blocked for the same violation? --Farix (Talk) 20:00, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

That would be punitive and unhelpful. A warning would be justified if consensus finds that AMIB did anything wrong. I personally would warn him not to block in cases like this where he has a long history of clashing with Jtrainor. If someone wants me to explicitly put that on his talk page, I will do so. But a block would not prevent anything here. Carcharoth (talk) 20:03, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I've unblocked based on the discussion here and on the user talk page. If Jtrainor resumes the edit war, he can always be reblocked. PhilKnight (talk) 21:12, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

And if AMIB also resumes edit warring, I assume he will be blocked as well? After all, it wouldn't be appropriate to give such a stipulation to one party but let the more aggressive party in the dispute off the hook. --Farix (Talk) 21:43, 1 November 2008 (UTC)

I would certainly hope so. Policies should apply to everyone, sysop or no. MalikCarr (talk) 00:59, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

-undent-

The locus of this dispute is based around whether it is acceptable to include some of the fictional statistics of the items in question. AMIB's latest position on this issue is that it is not, because they are a copyvio. This is clearly false, as the information falls under fair use, and is not as detailed as in, say, model kit manuals and so forth, as well as the official guides on the matter. The current material in virtually all cases serves to better describe the items in question, similar to the stat blocks on, say, Star Destroyer, or USS Enterprise (NCC-1701), or Battlestar Galactica (ship), or Andromeda Ascendant, or . It provides additional information in a concise form that is of interest both to fans of the subject and to people who are seeking information about an item. Certain items in these lists of equipment are even linked elsewhere, to better provide understanding about the subject to those who may be unfamiliar with it. For example, in the previously mentioned MSN-03 Jagd Doga article, there are links on the words Newtype, psycommu, mobile suit, and funnel, to points in the appropriate article which explain what these things are. Likewise, the name of the designer, the series it appears in, and the fictional pilot of the unit in question are highlighted as well in case one wishes to find out further information about them.

It is unclear what AMIB's actual position on this material is, other than he doesn't like it and wants it to go. It is very clear that his dislike is not truely based on policy and a desire to better Misplaced Pages, as he has changed this reasoning several times over the years concerning the same material, and has displayed erratic behaviour when he hasn't gotten his way, including blocking those who disagree with him, such as myself and User:MalikCarr. Jtrainor (talk) 04:03, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Previously, I was pretty sure much of the content in question was copyvio from somewhere. Now I know specifically where it's copied from. I removed it as such, was reverted, warned the users, and blocked the one who reverted copyvio into an article the second time. Jtrainor didn't attempt to defend himself, he just removed my comment from his talk (which is the typical acknowledgement of a warning) and replaced the copyvio content.

This is not the first time MalikCarr and Jtrainor have engaged in brinksmanship over copyright to affect an aggrieved posture. I am not interested in playing political games over copyright.

The dispute over in-universe content is being discussed at Template talk:Infobox Mobile Suit. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 11:09, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

So, if they properly attributed those bits of trivia as being from would that fix everything? Baseball Bugs 11:18, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

It would not satisfy WP:FUC #2 (Bandai and its licensors publish their own guides, either for sale or to guide people to their promotional websites), #3b (we can discuss the weapons with encyclopedic prose, so there's no need for blocks of stats), or #8 (the blocks range from somewhat to entirely trivial detail). Copyrighted material requires not only a source, but a valid fair-use rationale.

It is important to note that these are not uncopyrightable statistics, like the weight of an aircraft or the caliber of a firearm, but instead copyrighted fiction that affects the style of a technical readout.- A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 11:26, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

So if the editors re-stated that info in prose style, and properly attributed it, then it would be OK? Baseball Bugs 11:35, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

This is getting into the actual content issue. Personally, I don't think it would be okay using a stat dossier as a source, because parroting fiction of lesser importance only serves to obscure the important facts, like the object's role in the story, artistic development, impact on licensed goods, etc. Disagreeing about this is a content dispute.

That said, I'm not blocking anyone because they disagreed with me on that; I'd have blocked dozens of users by now if I blocked people because they disagreed with me about how to present fiction in an out-of-universe way. I blocked Jtrainor because he replaced a block of text copied verbatim from a copyrighted source after being warned. That's not a content dispute. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 11:42, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

A Man In Black continues to edit war

AMIB has once again reverted an edit that restored the disputed text. Since he has reengaged in the edit war, I expect another admin to take appropriate actions. --Farix (Talk) 11:37, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

The "disputed text" was copied, verbatim, from here. That's not a content dispute, that's copyvio.

I also removed a section immediately below it, apparently since my first edit; this was in error, and has since been corrected. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 11:43, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

He also added a "primary source" template to try to pre-empt bringing the information into the article directly from its source. This is nothing more than a content dispute hiding behind a claim of copyright violation. The claim of the info being "trivial" was AMIB's original complaint, and that's what this is really about. Baseball Bugs 11:51, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

The material I removed was copyvio. I don't like a lot of things about that article, but I excised only the portion copied directly from a copyrighted source, despite the fact that the history is riddled with copyvio at this point.

If someone were to rewrite the block as prose, I would be unhappy and would disagree for the reasons above, but I wouldn't treat it as a copyright violation because it wouldn't be. I would rather the article be written based on sources that aren't fiction, yes, but, like I said, not blocking people over it.

I don't really appreciate these accusations of bad faith, especially immediately explaining directly to you that I understood the difference between what I would like and what the rules are. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 11:58, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

And I don't appreciate being accused of bad faith, especially since you yourself originally brought up triviality as the complaint, and have since gone looking for "legitimate" reasons to delete it. And you yourself blocked someone with whom you were having a content dispute, which is a gross violation of your authority. I don't know anything about you except what you write. And you're all over the map on this one item. Maybe you should leave it alone for awhile. There are plenty of other articles that need improvement. Baseball Bugs 12:34, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

I would like trivial information to be marginalized or removed. Copyvio needs to be removed on sight. The complaint I have always had is that the blocks made the articles too much like a fansite, and being copied exactly from an official fansite is a pretty excessive example of that.

On top of all of this, I had moved on. Someone reopened the issue, I limited my edits to the template, and for the last several days limited my edits to the talk page of the template. Someone suggested that the stats were copied verbatim from somewhere, and after checking two articles I'd edited a year before, I found them to indeed be copied verbatim from there. So I removed the copyvio, tagged one of them for style, and moved on, until my removal of copyvio was reverted with undo or edit summaries of "rvv". I warned, saw the warning ignored in one case, and blocked in that case.

I have more or less abandoned what I would like, save in the limited case of not cramming things into infoboxes, where I've been discussing it on a talk page. This vague suggestion that I'm trying to muscle my way through a content dispute makes no sense considering that Jtrainor, Kyaa, and until today MalikCarr hadn't even commented on Template talk:Infobox Mobile Suit, the only place I was pursuing what I would like. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 12:52, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

So if they rewrite it as prose, with proper attribution, that removes the copyright issue, and takes it back to your original complaint, as stated in your first sentence: That you don't like it. Hence, it still comes down to a content dispute, and you were out of line blocking someone in that circumstance. Baseball Bugs 13:26, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Jtrainor didn't rewrite it as prose with proper attribution. He reverted copyvio into an article. He was warned, and then blocked.

Farix rewrote as attributed prose, and got no warning and no revert.

So if people are rewriting as prose, I'm not much happy, but, for the third time, I'm not warning or blocking people for making me unhappy. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 13:38, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

And yet again, you revert changes to Template:Infobox Mobile Suit (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) because you don't like them. Even though the reason part of the template was collapsible no longer exists because the articles that had problems with overly long infoboxes were merged a few days ago. --Farix (Talk) 15:18, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

You were bold, I reverted, you reverted, discussion ensued. I didn't even revert to a version I liked; I just reverted a change that didn't seem to make any sense until you explained it. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 22:50, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

You are still edit warring on the infobox. LEAVE IT ALONE. You are not the arbitrator if which fields are legitimate and what fields are not. If you want to ask about changes in the infobox, ask them on the discussion page instead of undoing them. I am aghast that another admin has not blocked you yet for continuing to edit war. --Farix (Talk) 00:11, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Reverting an unrelated edit once, to a version I don't like, is not a revert war. If you're aghast that someone might revert an edit you made because they disagreed with it, you might be interested in reading this. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 00:25, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

And yet you revert again. What I am aghast about that you haven't been blocked for continuing to edit war over Gundam articles. But if that's not edit warring, then there is no such thing as edit warring. But since you are not discussing your reverts on the template's talk page, then you are simply vandalizing the template. --Farix (Talk) 01:07, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

You reverted some style changes to the infobox as vandalism, so it wasn't clear what you had done. Perhaps if you didn't revert good-faith edits as vandalism, but instead asked about them on the talk page instead of undoing them, you might get a better response. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 01:22, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I you've been the one removing good faith changes to the template without explanation because WP:YOUDONTLIKEIT. I think we call see that you are edit warring/vandalizing the template. --Farix (Talk) 01:26, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Let's look at the history.

1. AMIB - "rm forced italics; not every work is longform (for example, a suit that appears in only one episode, in a short story, or in a single volume"
2. AMIB - "When did a last appearance field get added? That's not a very good idea; most designs continue to appear in licensed works, in guides, in spinoffs, etc."
3. Farix - "rv vandalism" - This was apparently reverting edits #1 and #2.
4. Two edits - I change some template code, Farix changes it back. Stylistic difference, essentially no practical difference.
5. - Two edits by AMIB - I wasn't clear what had happened to the ital change and the removal of the last appearance field from #1 and #2, figuring that they were lost in the fiddling with the title. Farix reverted them as vandalism in edit #3, for reasons he hasn't felt the need to share with me.
6. Farix - "rvt vandalism"
7. Two edits by AMIB - I revert with a snarky comment, then self-revert, thinking better of it.

Vandalism? Ownership? IDONTLIKEIT? I'm not seeing it anywhere in the history. I'm seeing you edit war to revert my good-faith edits as vandalism, ignoring my edit summaries and making wild accusations.

So. Where are your good faith changes again? Where is my vandalism? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 01:38, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

You conveniently left out this edit where I originally added the italic and the last field. That was the edit you kept reverting because you didn't like them. The documentation of the template states that the series was for the name of the series the Gundam came from, not the name of a episode. That is what the first field is for. And the last field, it is standard on pretty much every infobox for fictional elements. Yet you kept removing them for no reason what so ever other then not liking them. Which is funny because you were the one originally complaining about the lack of out-of-universe field in the template. --Farix (Talk) 01:50, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

When your edit summaries don't explain what your edits are, how can I hope to know what you're doing in an edit? What part of "rvt; I perfectly know well why this was made collasable as I was the one who did it. It is no longer an issue" implies that you're adding a new field or changing the formatting of one? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 01:56, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

See what we have had to deal with, ladies and gentlemen? Changing reasons and a complete refusal to negotiate in any way, shape, or form. He's now taking advantage of the fact that I am not allowed to revert him without being blocked. I should hope you now block him for edit warring, as he is clearly interested in continuing it. Jtrainor (talk) 18:33, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

What you need to do is start a wider discussion on whether or not the text in question is a copyright violation. You say AMIB is enforcing his view of things. Equally, you are merely stating that you think you are right and he is wrong. Get a wider discussion started on this. That's the only way it is going to be resolved. Carcharoth (talk) 02:52, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

And now A Man In Black has protected the Jagd Doga page on his revision. Why bother editing articles in the first place when having a fundamental disagreement with a sysop simply results in being blocked and the pages protected from editing? MalikCarr (talk) 08:34, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

As long as copyvio is being accused relevant to the Jagd Doga article, (e.g. "lifted verbatim" from websites/books) I'm going to plaster the Google test into the relevant discussions. If, as AMIB claims, these figures are "lifted verbatim" from a given source, wouldn't they show up when pasted verbatim (and cleared of Misplaced Pages formatting, obviously) into Google? MalikCarr (talk) 08:51, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

• "beam saber with heat knife, stored in recharge rack in right hip, hand-carried in use" - The version Malik reverted to before the page was protected.
• "beam saber with heat knife, stored in recharge rack in right hip, hand-carried in use" - The first version with the infobox Malik added in February '07. Note the copy-pasted stat block at the bottom of the page.
• "beam saber with attached heat knife, stored in recharge rack in right hip armor, hand-carried in use" - MAHQ's profile.

I really can't be arsed to go through line by line, but every line but the first is copied from MAHQ, with slight shortening to go into an infobox. The whole "mounted on whatever" is MAHQ's trademark in these profiles; generally, rather than just copying from an original guide they're also adding commentary based on watching/reading the work in question. It's difficult to accept "synthesized from a variety of sources" when there are two sources: sites like Gundamofficial or Japanese equivalents or licensed guides (or unauthorized fansites), all of which will have exactly identical blocks of weaponry, or (the unauthorized fansite) MAHQ, which has these same blocks but also adds some commentary. Reviewing a "variety of sources" and then producing something with commentary identical to MAHQ's strikes me as unlikely.- A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 05:49, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Review of A Man In Black's block of MalikCarr

I've had to block MalikCarr (talk · contribs) under essentially identical circumstances, in MSN-03 Jagd Doga. This brinksmanship over copyright is not appropriate.- A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 23:00, 2 November 2008 (UTC)

Really? You absolutely had to do this? I'm not impressed with either side here. The Gundam editors should be discussing this, not reverting, but equally you should be getting a second opinion on whether this is a copyright violation and whether you are too involved here. I laid out above the long history here. You should have made a report here that MalikCarr (talk · contribs) was violating copyright and asked for someone else to block him. That is one way to find out if anyone else agrees with you. For the record, I agree that there is an issue here, but I think what needs to happen is for there to be a wider discussion about this. You talk about fair-use rationales for text. That's confusing things terribly. We have non-free-use rationales for images and other media, but the issue of how Misplaced Pages:Non-free content (and the associated policy) applies to test is covered at Misplaced Pages:FU#Text -

"Brief quotations of copyrighted text may be used to illustrate a point, establish context, or attribute a point of view or idea. Copyrighted text must be attributed and used verbatim. Any alterations must be clearly marked, i.e. for added text, an ellipsis (...) for removed text, and emphasis noted after the quotation as "(emphasis added)" or "(emphasis in the original)". Extensive quotation of copyrighted text is prohibited."

There is no mention of use rationales there, and quite rightly so, since Misplaced Pages articles are primarily text-based. We must attribute the use of texts as information sources and quote them when using short extracts of text. Use rationales don't apply here, unless you want people to supply a rationale everytime they quote something - please tell me you didn't mean that. Don't get me wrong here - I think you have a very valid point about the copyright issue, but I don't think it is black-and-white enough for you to be handing out blocks over this, especially not give the history here. I'm not going to dispute the specifics of the block you made here, but I will note that you have twice blocked MalikCarr before over copyvios (back in July 2007), so you need to get this resolved one way or the other. If MalikCarr's previous copyvio blocks were also valid and over the same issue, then you are not resolving the situation merely by issuing blocks. Carcharoth (talk) 01:43, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

The previous blocks over copyvio were over misuse of a non-free image after having been warned by multiple people, followed by repeated uploading of the same image after it was deleted. Again, MalikCarr ignored warnings that what he was replacing violated copyright policy and he continued to do so.

There may be a possibility of rewriting the copyvio text or quoting it properly or some other alternative, but no such effort was made. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 01:54, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying the previous issue. It is a pity that block logs are not more descriptive - there is usually room available in the block log to provide a diff to an explanation, but the explanation usually gets written after the block is applied (so you have to go look at the user talk page history instead). You haven't responded to my point that you have a long history here with the Gundam WikiProject and copyright and in-universe issues and that you might need to ask for opinions from others to see whether you are judging things correctly here. Do you think that your long history here means outside opinions would be helpful? I'm finishing off a post about this in more detail on your talk page. I've also added a link above to the bit where you talked about fair-use rationales for quoting text. Would you like to respond to that point as well? Carcharoth (talk) 02:00, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

We could get into a lengthy discussion of how to properly deal with copyrighted text here. However, it'd be in the wrong place and not germane to the issue at hand.

Copyvio needs to be dealt with swiftly. I had no reasonable way to be assured that copyvio would not be reverted into these articles after a warning; in fact, after a warning, copyvio was twice reverted into articles with no explanation at all.

There exists the possibility that I'm wrong, that none of this is copyvio, that I'm completely off my rocker. But there was no "This isn't copyvio," no "This could be reformatted," not even "I think you're wrong," just "rvv" and "revert to last good version." Faced with that, at some point I was trusted enough to use my discretion to block people who act in a way that can harm Misplaced Pages, so I exercised that discretion. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 02:28, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough. I'm satisified with that. I'll continue the discussion on your talk page about where to get a second opinion. Carcharoth (talk) 02:50, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

This block is patently ridiculous. AMIB has still provided no proof whatsoever that there actually is copyvio, he is most definitely an involved admin, and now he's adding a citation needed tag to the Gundam (mobile suit) article over whether the Gundam... is the Gundam. I've displayed extensively that the practice of using a summary of a unit's fictional equipment in an infobox is widespread and accepted, so he has not a leg to stand on. This is nothing more than an admin abusing his tools in order to push his POV. Jtrainor (talk) 16:37, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

So where's the bit where I'm blocking people over that, or in any way using any administrative tool? My talk page, the article talk, the project talk, WP:RFC, and any other appropriate place for dispute resolution remains unfilled with your comments on that article. This is not the "Burn AMIB in effigy" discussion; I have a talk page for that. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 09:45, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Seems to me there's a page where copyright violations are to be discussed. In fact I think it's mentioned somewhere below this section. Here: Why isn't MIB bringing these issues there instead of setting himself up as judge and jury of copyright matters? And why is he allowed to continue to get away with blocking users with whom he has disputes? Baseball Bugs 17:10, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

That is a very good question and one I'd like to see answered. I started this thread due to AMIB blatantly pissing on the blocking policy and now he's moved on to the protection policy. When will he stop rampaging over[REDACTED] policy and being a one man army to enforce his preferred version? There is no consensus that the material that is being added is a copyvio other than AMIB's repeated "because I said so" rants. Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 08:37, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is inappropriate admin conduct. Instead of performing blocks when he is involved in the dispute, he should raise the issue for consideration by other admins, and blocks should be performed if other administrators agree that copyright-violating edit warring is taking place. Everyking (talk) 23:40, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

It would seem that there is no room for discussion on this matter, as A Man In Black has established that he is the arbiter of what content should and should not be allowed within the articles in question. Circumstances such as this are why I have been taking an increasingly inactive role in editing articles as of late - there is no compromise, and as a great statesman once wrote, compromise is the essence of diplomacy. I believe the bitter and caustic history of these content disputes and edit wars (I cannot count how many 3RR violations I have filed - are not policies enforced equally on all Wikipedians?), which anyone can review with a bit of digging, will speak for themselves as to the level of diplomacy that has existed here.

Or, if that's "tl;dr" as was once ascribed to my position, I am not trying to damage Misplaced Pages, and I would be very pleased if you would stop insisting that I am. Thank you kindly. MalikCarr (talk) 23:48, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Jtrainor comes back from block and resumes replacing copyvio into articles

Jtrainor has returned from block and immediately resumed replacing copyvio into articles. The most egregious case is in RGM-89 Jegan. It's 6K of text copied directly from a fan site (which in turn copied it from licensed guides, but their notation, such as the weapon mount locations, is particular.)

Compare this edit and this, this, this, etc. It's blatantly obviously copy-pasted. This was part of reverting every single edit I made to Gundam articles, so I'm inclined to say he doesn't really care.

If it is inappropriate for me to be handling this, I would appreciate if someone else could. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 03:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Jtrainor's attitude here is absolutely unacceptable. After the recent set of blocks, I asked AMIB to not get involved and to start a wider discussion (see his talk page). I don't think AMIB has done that, but he has been discussing things more. I also told Jtrainor above, to start a wider discussion to settle the question of what is and isn't a copyright violation (in fairness, I should have explicitly stated that on his talk page - he may not have seen my comment above). Still, in my view the edits by Jtrainor above are clear copyright violations, and Jtrainor is, as AMIB said before, engaging in brinkmanship and has resumed edit warring. More to the point, Jehochman and Phil Knight clearly warned Jtrainor on his talk page that he would be blocked if he resumed edit warring. In my view, as Jtrainor has gone back to the disputed articles and reverted the disputed content back in, a block for 48 hours is warranted here. I will double-check what has happened here and then block. Any admin should feel free to unblock or increase the block length following discussion here, as I won't be around in the day tomorrow. Carcharoth (talk) 03:45, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It's on WP:CP, and the Jagd Doga article (which has a much smaller amount of copyvio content) is currently in discussion here. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 03:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

OK. I didn't actually block, as that might send things off the deep end. Jtrainor's last edit was 12 hours ago and he did seem to stop after Jehochman warned him at 17:00 (this was a warning in response to the edits you pointed out above, I think), and none of Jtrainor's copyvio edits have survived, as far as I can see. I am going to leave him a stern warning instead, and insist that he stop reverting and discuss these edits before making them. If he starts edit warring again tomorrow, someone should block him. If things get out of hand, the articles might need protecting as well. Carcharoth (talk) 03:57, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I cannot vouch for Jtrainor (unlike GundamsRus (talk · contribs) once alleged, he is not my sockpuppet) as far as the Jegan goes, but equating him to be a villain in this regard (which he may well be, all things considered) while A Man In Black's continued insistence on his position in the Jagd Doga is overlooked strikes me as being rather one-sided. We've tried mediation before, we've tried civil discussion, and zero ground has been made between the relevant parties. MalikCarr (talk) 07:37, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

And MalikCarr reverts copyvio into an article a third time, immediately after coming off a block for doing so. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 08:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I see you still use your admin tools in conflicts in which you are a party.... Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 08:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I took the least disruptive route to prevent replacement of copyvio, and even reverted my own incidental edits. You'd rather I block MalikCarr? - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 09:22, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

No, I'd rather you walk away from the articles. You don't seem to get that your stubborness over this has passed beyond annoying and is bordering on disruptive. Your complete disregard of Misplaced Pages's blocking policy, by blocking two users that you were involved in a content dispute with, should cause anyone to question whether you should continue to carry the mop. You don't use the tools on a page where you are involved on. Don't they teach that first in the newbie admin school? Kyaa the Catlord (talk) 12:46, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

What a suprise, more edit warring on AMIB's part, and now protecting the article. There have been people hauled before Arbcom for less. Also, now there are two admins on my talk page yelling at me. It's nice to see that the rules only apply to us peons, while admins are allowed to do whatever they want as long as they're only screwing with nobodies. Jtrainor (talk) 13:46, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'll repeat what I said on your talk page: What we are trying to do is get the two of you to talk and stop edit warring. Part of that was me telling AMIB to stop blocking people where he was involved in a long-running dispute, and to post at ANI instead. That is what he did. I realise he also protected a page, but at least other options are being explored. At the end of the day, if me, Jehochman and Phil Knight had not got involved, AMIB would have blocked you again. You may feel we are preventing you from editing the way you want to, but what we are saying is stop, take a deep breath, and go and discuss the issues involved here. If you and AMIB can't get anywhere with discussion, then try and get others involved in the discussion, or take the discussion to a noticeboard or request for comments. What is not acceptable is to either carry on reverting and edit warring, or to just let thing lie for a bit and then carry on reverting and adding in the disputed text and stats. Carcharoth (talk) 20:40, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what other venues are open to us. We've gone through official mediation before and that produced absolutely nothing. If we just wanted to stop the edit war, then we should stop questioning AMIB's edits and give him discretion over the articles. I do not believe there's a virtue in peace that is obtained by compromising on the greater values at hand, that being to make the best encyclopedia articles possible, which I do not believe AMIB is producing. Let it not be said that I think he's a bad person on Misplaced Pages - I simply find it frustrating that this content dispute has resulted in Jtrainor, myself, and other members of WP:Gundam branded with the worst accusations of being destructive to the project because there are contrary opinions to a sysop. MalikCarr (talk) 21:47, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

(unindent) The absurd part of all of this is that the edit war, and claimed copyvio issue, could have been solved by simply rewriting or reformatting the armaments stats. The fact that AMIB's reaction was to simply delete them outright gives evidence that he was purposely antagonizing the Gundam Wikiproject. But Jtrainor and the others were also partly responsible for not reformatting the stats as well. --Farix (Talk) 22:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

And, for what it's worth, I have been rewriting the stats so they're as generic as possible, and more importantly, aren't directly lifted from any one source. MAHQ and MS Illustrated 2003 like to have these ridiculously long strings of model numbers and power outputs and crap and making it abundantly clear which weapons are default and which are optional, while GundamOfficial.com and Gundam: The Official Guide use very minimalistic blocks that don't even mention where the fixed armaments are on the MS' body. I felt that some middleground between the two, while reducing space as much as possible to fit nicely in an infobox, would be the best course of action for the generalist Misplaced Pages. But what do I know, I'm a copyright-violating, POV-pushing, Misplaced Pages-hating vandal. MalikCarr (talk) 22:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

AMIB has now messed with an article in my sandbox. This is a clear attempt to escalate matters and provoke me. Jtrainor (talk) 14:56, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Again? If I remember correctly (it has been a while), this wouldn't be the first time that's happened. I'm not sure if we can conclude he's trying to provoke you, but it does cast some shadows on his motivations and objectives in this dispute if you ask me. Something is surely afoot, though. MalikCarr (talk) 23:58, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Are you both still at the "he's wrong and I'm right" stage? I advised Jtrainor at least, and AMIB as well, to talk to each other about why you disagree over what is and isn't a copyright violation in these cases, and if you still disagree to get opinions from other people. I know you don't think AMIB will listen, but as Jehochman said on your (Jtrainor's) talk page, you won't get anywhere until you have tried talking to AMIB. If you have talked before and got nowhere, please provide detailed diffs. FWIW, I think AMIB should have left you a courtesy note explaining why he was removing text from your sandbox. Communicating via edit summaries is not going to get either of you anywhere. Carcharoth (talk) 00:38, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

DYK hoax article?

I reviewed the article John R. Smith, and I believe that it may be a hoax. This article is well crafted and looks authentic prima facie. However none of the online external references make any mention of the subject whatsoever - (United States Colored Troops Resident in Baltimore at the time of the 1890 Census - nothing to do with the Civil war?? ), (Article alleges he was on station at Fort Sumter - also in the hook - once again no mention in the source ) (Book preview contains no mention etc. . ). Most disturbing however, is the allegation that John R. Smith was the "first soldier to receive the Silver Star" (apparently during the Civil War). However, the Silver Star was first awarded in 1932 (more than 31 years after the subject's death) as per these sources . It turns out that the user deliberately inserted factual errors so that it corroborates with his own article. I've left a note on the article + user's talk page. Could someone more experienced with the US Civil war confirm/dispute these claims. If I'm wrong, then I apologize in advance, however I'd rather be whacked with a trout for false accusations than see a hoax appear on the main page. Peace --Flewis 09:31, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Note: Article was nominated in DYK on October 27 - Currently under the "expiring noms" section. --Flewis 11:08, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Ive removed it from DYK nominations. MaxSem 11:36, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Google search for 'John R Smith silver star' brings up nothing related to him but the wiki page in mention. Skinny87 (talk) 11:31, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

I would say that I cannnot, using the sources or google, corroborate a single fact in that article. I would say that this definately looks like a hoax. If you want to get wider opinion on it, start an WP:AFD discussion. Given that it looks, on its face, like a hoax, it should probably be deleted... It would also not be the first time someone went through this much trouble to create hoaxes. Anyone around 1-2 years ago should remember the "Estland" hoaxes... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 11:35, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

No mention in OR or in other online sources I've checked. Pretty dubious assertion that an African-American was able to enlist in the U.S. Regular Army in 1860. Would that it were true, but this seems very unlikely, and certainly not proved by online sources listed. BusterD (talk) 11:53, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Now at AfD; Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/John R. Smith. Iain99 12:01, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Not a single fact... well, there was a Civil War ;-)---Balloonman 20:53, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

• Article was created by a brand new user, who appears to be fully aware of rules like WP:CENSOR and signing on talk pages. I wonder if it's a troublemaker, or simply someone who didn't realise we write about facts here, not imaginary characters. – How do you turn this on (talk) 12:06, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Can any users knowledgeable in the American Civil War or Pennsylvanian African-American lawyers prior to 1870 give this a look?
    Also, after further inspection, it appears that sections from the article are copied directly from here. --Flewis 12:16, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
    • Never mind - Already speedied --Flewis 12:19, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
      • Has the creator been blocked? – How do you turn this on (talk) 12:21, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
        • Although we tend to presume that the user is a troublemaker, it's quite possible that they're acting in good faith with a purpose. For instance, I remember the Orange bellied pike hoax incident from several months ago and how the author ended up explaining why they created the article. At this point, I don't think we know about this user's intentions. JamieS93 12:28, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Agree. Also, thanks to Flewis's alertness there are now many eyes on that account and nothing he does would go unnoticed. Everyme 12:46, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

It is unwise to delete an article on a purported topic in U.S. history after a mere 21 minutes' AFD discussion in what, in most U.S. timezones, is the middle of the night. We don't speedily delete hoaxes, and it is unwise to "snowball" delete articles after just 21 minutes of discussion. We don't want all of the holes in the Swiss Cheese slices to line up just because only editors who live in a single timezone have been involved in the discussion.

Having said that, I was researching the article whilst it was listed for deletion, and at least one of the book citations was fake. Hardie Grant Books published no books in 1977 according to its own (somewhat poor and hard to search) catalogue and the other book catalogues that I checked. Uncle G (talk) 12:34, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

• When it is clear, as in this case, that the article is a hoax, I can't think of any possible purpose in keeping such an article any longer. This is what IAR is for - we don't want hoax articles here. I don't see the point in having a long discussion about it either. Also, there are people, other than those who live in America, who are familiar and are experts on U.S. history. That this was deleted at an unfavorable time for them is unfortunate, but not an issue. – How do you turn this on (talk) 12:46, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Actually, it is very much an issue. I suggest that you look at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Principle of Swiss Cheese Management for a particularly apposite example of how it takes several pairs of eyes, and more than 21 minutes of discussion, to determine whether something is a hoax or not. What may be "clearly a hoax" to you may well prove to be a viable subject. (The canonical example of this is Jamie Kane (AfD discussion), but there are many others.) I suggest that you read about the Swiss Cheese model, too. We don't want the collective holes in the knowledge and abilities of a 21-minute sample of editors in a single timezone lining up so that we end up making the wrong decision at AFD. Uncle G (talk) 14:01, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
• In general, I would agree. Closing debates that early is usually improper. But in such a clear case, there's no need to keep the article around. Hoaxes is one of those areas that can be very damaging to WP, so I applied a bit of IAR. But if you feel strongly about it, feel free to undo my closure and let the debate run longer. henrik•talk 12:53, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • I was actually coming to point where I was about to add an opinion to delete myself, based upon finding no sources when I looked, and the citation that turned out to be fake. But the point to remember is that we don't speedily delete hoaxes, and we let AFD discussions proceed for a reasonable length of time. We aren't in such a hurry to delete hoaxes that cite sources that we cannot afford at least 24 hours so that editors around the world, with different areas of expertise and different access to sources, can check things out. We want AFD to make the correct decision. Bad decisions at AFD usually happen when editors sheep vote without doing any research themselves or when not enough editors participate. We want to avoid that. If something is a hoax, we want multiple editors to check it out independently, so that we can be confident that the AFD process has come to the right decision.

    This is all explained in the Misplaced Pages:Guide to deletion#Discussion. Uncle G (talk) 14:01, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

  • Well, since it was tagged with a {{hoax}} template, I don't think keeping it for longer would have been a problem. That said, it would be really dumb for someone to undelete it now --NE2 14:17, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
    • I was just about to say the same thing. As long as it's clear to the casual reader that the article is bogus, it's not really an issue; in fact to the casual reader it speaks well of wikipedia, by letting them know that[REDACTED] editors don't just sit around. Baseball Bugs 14:22, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
    • In watching my non-editing friends using wikipedia, I've seen that nearly all of them invariably scroll past any and all maintainance templates without really reading them. I'm not sure {{hoax}} is 'scary' enough to deter a user from not relying on the information. Ideally, I'd like to see the hoax template look more like the text of {{Copyviocore}}. henrik•talk 15:05, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
      • That's a good point. I find myself asking my wife what templates are on the articles she sees and she says (usually) some variation on "dunno" Protonk (talk) 15:12, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
        • That is exactly my experience as well. The last time I asked my wife about the banners at the top of articles, she said they were "just for wiki-wonks and other people who care about the site's arcane rules and wiki-process." She might have read the first few banners on her initial visit to Misplaced Pages years ago, but I doubt she has even glanced at a single one since then. --Kralizec! (talk) 15:25, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
          • That's because the banner is an essay. It should be a single, bold-faced, large-print sentence saying THIS ARTICLE IS MOST LIKELY A HOAX. Then you could have another sentence in normal font that points to where the discussion is. Baseball Bugs 16:06, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
• Uncle G is usually right on the money, and his citing of Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Principle of Swiss Cheese Management is a good reason to not speedy delete hoaxes. However, for this particular case there is a critical difference. For the John R. Smith case, the evidence proves that there is a hoax, the anachronism surrounding the Silver Star award makes the statements in the article impossible. In the Swiss Cheese case, the nomination was "seems to be OR essay", and the problems were of the "I cannot find sources" variety. Although these are verifiability issues as well, it is not active proof that the content is a hoax. There is a difference between things which seem to be a hoax because its hard to find sources, and things which are proved to be a hoax because the sources were found and actively contradict the article. In the latter case, just getting rid of it and being done with it is not something I will lose so much sleep over. Sjakkalle (Check!) 15:34, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • While personally I think it was, at the very least, likely to be a hoax, I didn't see any sources that contradicted the article being raised - if you're refering to the Silver Star being created in 1932, the award was handed out retroactivly. So without further sources, I see it as still possible. Personally, I think the account of the battle of Fort Sumter may have been enough to show it was a hoax, but that's a different issue. - Bilby (talk) 16:15, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
    • The whole point is, we had to hash these things out in open discourse to show that the article was a hoax. While it showed itself to be patently a hoax, it was certainly helpful for people to enumerate exactly why they thought it a hoax. That discussion needs to happen before articles such as this are deleted. For the record, the discussion happened (albeit, mostly here rather than AFD where it belonged), and the right decision was made; however for more subtle hoaxes (and this one WAS quite subtle, but I have seen many worse, cf. the Estland debacle), the important thing is that the opportunity is given to investigate. This wasn't what speedy deletion was created for; it was created in situations where people create articles about their cat, so that we can just delete those without comment. However, there is no impending destruction that befalls the earth if we discuss these issues before the deletion. In some cases, it turns out that it wasn't a hoax after all; and its worthwhile to have the talk. Misplaced Pages is in no rush, and doing the right thing is much more important than doing something NOW... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 17:23, 3 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Yes, there is that difference. But that difference also applies to the case of Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Thomas Winter, 2nd Baronet, which we are happy to calmly discuss for the full AFD discussion period, and not rush to close. After all, I might be wrong. Someone could come along with sources that very well do contradict the Burkes, and with authority. Even here in this case, as you can see, Bilby has raised an argument against the initial "it's obviously wrong" diagnosis.

    We've had plenty of occasions where what have thought to be hoaxes have proven to be viable subjects once other editors, with different abilities, from around the world have been given a chance to contribute to the discussion. Al (folklore) (AfD discussion) springs immediately to mind. Although it looked like a pile of random rubbish accrued in a dusty corner of Misplaced Pages, as editors added random pieces of information over a period of three years, and was suspected of being a hoax, it turned out that everything in the article as it stood at the time of AFD nomination was verifiable. The article was bang on in terms of its informational content. The AFD process involves several days of discussion precisely so that editors have a chance to come to the discussion with the sources that no-one else found. Uncle G (talk) 20:46, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

    • Exactly. As well as what I said below, there is another reason to avoid speedy deletion. I had the idea of asking the US Civil War taskforce at WP:MILHIST about this, and I found that someone had already asked them. See here. I know no-one said anything about that query left there, here or at the AfD, but the (rather rambling) response didn't really provide an answer, and a clue as to why can be found in the first few words of the answer: "It appears that the article is gone." <groan> We've ended up with someone asking a WikiProject for some expert help, and a group of people on an ANI thread short-circuited that process by doing a 20-minute snowball delete at AfD. Excuse me while I silently scream at the inefficiency of on-wiki communication. :-( Carcharoth (talk) 03:01, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
• One more thing. I was about to ask at the reference desk to see if anyone there could help with this (it can take time to gather opinions from far-flung corners of Misplaced Pages, longer than 20 minutes, say...), but I would prefer to have an actual article to point them at to ask them what they think is going on here (and for the MILHIST people as well). Would it be acceptable to undelete, reopen the AfD, and let it run the full five days, to allow people to see the full article? I thought of posting the full article from the deletion logs, but that doesn't really show people the references properly. Carcharoth (talk) 03:11, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Restart Proposal

Seeing as this is causing such a big deal, I propose undeleting the article, and restarting the Afd, so that the article can be scrutinized by the wider community. It's no longer in DYK, and we're all keeping an eye on the article creator - so it cant go anywhere. As I mentioned originally that I have doubts as to its authenticity, so my assertions are not, as yet confirmed. As I'm not an administrator, I'm unable to view the article, and provide any refutations/proofs to it being a hoax. That being said, keeping the article open to the general public for 24 hours, while clearly stating/linking that there's a strong possibility that it's a hoax will only further confirm our sentiments --Flewis 21:01, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

meh... I still think the article was a hoax, and I think there is a general consensus that it was for all of the reasons enumerated above. In the future, I think people need to understand exactly why we don't, as a matter of practice, speedily delete hoax articles, especially well written hoax articles, without discussion. Not one person in the above discussion, even those arguing against speedy deleting, seems to think the article WASN'T a hoax, so I don't see the need to jump through additional hoops, WP:SNOW and all that. However, in the future, lets at least give it a chance for WP:SNOW by opening an AFD on a hoax article. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 22:10, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

It is quite possible that the article was a hoax, but it is also possible to pick holes in the logic of those arguing for deletion:

• "United States Colored Troops Resident in Baltimore at the time of the 1890 Census - nothing to do with the Civil war??" - the article actually referred to an 1860 Census, but linked to an 1890 Census. Strike one.
• the Silver Star was first awarded in 1932 (and websites were cited to 'prove' this). Unfortunately the very same websites carefully explained (if you read the whole page) that the award started in a different form in 1918, and was retrospective to the US Civil War. Strike two.
• "deliberately inserted factual errors so that it corroborates with his own article" - that is only the case if these are errors - it could be a genuine misunderstanding of what the sources are saying. Strike three.
• "Pretty dubious assertion that an African-American was able to enlist in the U.S. Regular Army in 1860" - agreed, with the caveat that enlistment took place from 1862 (see Military history of African Americans in the American Civil War), so again this could be a misunderstanding or unintentional misrepresentation of the sources, rather than a hoax. Strike four.
• "Article was created by a brand new user, who appears to be fully aware of rules like WP:CENSOR and signing on talk pages" - good point - not yet rebutted. The talk page signing I think anyone can pick up first time. The WP:CENSOR link is a bit strange.
• "after further inspection, it appears that sections from the article are copied directly from List of American Civil War Medal of Honor recipients" - many of the citations for gallantry in the US Civil War describe similar actions and use similar language. Strike five.
• "When it is clear, as in this case, that the article is a hoax, I can't think of any possible purpose in keeping such an article any longer." - it wasn't actually clear it was a hoax, as might have become clear if you had allowed further discussion. Strike six.
• "in such a clear case, there's no need to keep the article around" - it wasn't a clear case. Strike seven.
• "for this particular case there is a critical difference. For the John R. Smith case, the evidence proves that there is a hoax, the anachronism surrounding the Silver Star award makes the statements in the article impossible" - there is no anachronism surrounding the award - just confusion over what award is meant when, but no clear smoking gun. Strike eight.
• "obviously, this man coudn't be the first person to receive Silver Star because it was established in 1932 - years after his death" - obviously, because there are no such things as retrospective awards. Oh, no, hang on, there are such things! Strike nine and out. :-)

Sorry for the overtone of cynicism there. As I said above, it may well be a hoax, but it would be nice to actually have the "obvious" stuff checked out properly by each person (rather than accepting what the nominator said), and for people to leave the AfD discussion open until those who know something about military history come along and correct people's misunderstandings about retrospective awards of medals and citation stars. Carcharoth (talk) 02:38, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

As I said above, I have no problems or objections if anyone should decide to undelete and restart the process, if they feel it would be useful. henrik•talk 07:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is less about restarting the process (this thread alone has ensured the article has had enough eyes on it, and if someone does find out something new, the article can always be undeleted - and if I want to ask subject matter experts about this later, I can dig stuff out of the deleted revisions), but more about making sure that everyone who has read or commented in this thread, or who participated in the deletion discussion, understands why we don't speedily (or snowball) delete suspected hoaxes. If you (henrik) and Flewis (who commented "snowball delete") and a few others, state here, for the record, that you've read what Uncle G wrote (and what I wrote) and recognise that speedy (or in Flewis's case, snowball) deletions for suspected hoaxes are not a good idea, and that you won't speedily delete or suggest snowball delete for suspected hoaxes in future (even if you are convinced you've proved it is a hoax), then we are probably pretty much done here. The only reason this is still on ANI is because it involves an administrator action (namely your speedy delete). From what others have said, I might not have been clear enough in what I said last night, so I do have one more long post to make to demonstrate that "Silver Star" and "1932" and "Civil War" doesn't a hoax prove. And that is the final point I want to get sorted out before moving on - that those who said delete because they thought the date for the medal was 'obviously' wrong, acknowledge that they were supporting deletion on a false premise (I've explained that above and will do so again in the other post I'll make at some point this evening). I think it is important that people realise why the medal stuff was more complicated than it looked - so they can remember that for future discussions. That doesn't necessarily have to happen here - I'll point that out as diplomatically as I can on people's talk pages (some people says thanks, others bluster and object to having this sort of thing pointed out). Ordinarily, I could have pointed out the medal misunderstanding at the deletion debate, but, well, that got closed early! :-) Carcharoth (talk) 23:53, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Several points

I'd like to make a couple of points here, both about the article in question, John R. Smith, and about the process by which it was reviewed, discussed and deleted, as well as the quality of the discussion.

• (1) I noticed this discussion early this morning (UK time), but was unable to comment until now (some 16 hours later). There was quite a lot I wanted to say when I got home, but unfortunately things snowballed as I watched. If a deletion discussion is started, I think (as others have said) it would be best to keep the discussion open at least long enough for people in different time zones to comment. Also, the speedy deletion means only admins can see the article, unless you look in Google's cache or somewhere similar (I used a cache during the day, taking a spare moment here and there to look into this). I understand that people thought there was a WP:SNOW delete consensus, but all it takes it for one person to point out something that others have missed, and opinions can change.
• (2) I was rather surprised that no-one at the ANI thread or the AfD debate spotted the distinction between the Silver Star (the medal started in 1932 to replace the Silver Citation Star) and the Silver Citation Star (the citation star awarded from 1918 to 1932, and also retrospectively back to the US Civil War and before). All it takes is for the editor of the article to link to the wrong Silver Star article and confusion will be rampant. See also Award star and Service star - both have silver versions and both can be called "silver star". A misunderstanding like that can incorrectly skew a debate towards deletion. See my next point about how initial misunderstandings were blindly accepted by those arriving at the ANI and AfD discussions (what Uncle G called 'sheep votes').
• (3) There were several initial misunderstandings that affected the way the deletion debate progressed, the most egregious being the claim that the article must be a hoax because the Silver Star medal didn't start until 1932. Eventually, very late in the day, someone (Bilby) piped up and pointed out what everyone should have realised from carefully reading Silver Star: "The Silver Star is the successor decoration to the Citation Star which was established by an act of the U.S. Congress on July 9, 1918. On July 19, 1932, the Secretary of War approved the Silver Star Medal to replace the Citation Star" Now, I presume everyone did what Bilby and I did, right, and went and read Citation Star. If you didn't, you should have done, because that article says: "The Citation Star was a silver star device pinned to the World War I Victory Medal to denote those who had been cited for extreme heroism or valor. The decoration was made retroactive as an attachment to all service medals back to the American Civil War." - now do people begin to understand why it might not be so silly for an article claiming to be about a Civil War soldier to talk about this award? Dig a bit more and you find Civil War Campaign Medal which says: "The medal was first authorized in 1905 for the fortieth anniversary of the Civil War's conclusion." (more retroactive awards stuff - a military historian would pick up on this no problem, but no-one here did except Bilby). And: "several senior military officers, still on active duty in 1905, were veterans of the Civil War. In 1918, for those who had been cited for gallantry in action, the Silver Citation Star was authorized as a device to the medal. Only six Citation Stars were awarded." For more about the Silver Star and it's history, see this website. It only became a medal in 1932. Before that, from 1918 onwards, it was a 'citation star' designed to be affixed to the service ribbon of a campaign medal. "Known in the Army as the "citation star," the award was made retroactive, so that all those cited for gallantry in action in previous campaigns, even as far back as the Spanish-American War, were eligible to wear it" And "It is estimated that more than 20,000 members of the Army received such citations before 1918." (though these were only citations until the star was authorised in 1918. For more on the Civil War Campaign Medal and the 'Silver Citation Star' for that medal, see here and here. This is not really relevant to the presumed John R. Smith, as the article said he died in 1901, but the potential confusion over "silver stars" is there again, and it was possible for the relatives of deceased soldiers to claim such awards on their behalf. The 'silver star' stuff still doesn't quite add up at the moment for John R. Smith, but my point here is that there is enough potential for confusion and misunderstanding, that a more thorough review is needed to make sure nothing else has been missed. Certainly not a speedy deletion. One of the main reasons the article was speedy deleted was because people took the "1932 date for the Silver Star means the article must be wrong" claim at face-value, and didn't check for themselves.
• (4) More of a minor point, but another of the comments on the sources said that the census link was to an 1890 census. If you go back and look at the article that was deleted, you will see that the link says "1860 census". So that could have been the editor linking to the wrong census (the 1860 census for Baltimore doesn't seem to be online). On the other hand, I'm not quite sure why Baltimore is the location here, as the article doesn't mention John R. Smith living in Baltimore.
• (5) The "bits have been copied from List of American Civil War Medal of Honor recipients" argument is more than a bit hollow. Search those pages for "bearer" and you will see many similar descriptions (similar to that in the article that was deleted) of awards for people who did stuff under fire while retrieving or carrying the "colours" (the flags). This means that the similarity has no bearing at all on whether the article is a hoax or not. If anything, using that type of language suggests that it may be genuine, or at least a good imitation.
• (6) If you want editors who know US Civil War history, instead of asking at WP:ANI, why not ask at the Military History WikiProject. That is one of the first things I would have done (or asked at the reference desk). With all due respect to the people that read ANI, you are unlikely to find a Civil War expert or someone who knows Pennsylvanian African-American history, hanging out here. Another thing is that people from the Military History WikiProject might even have some of the books used as references in this article, and they might be able to check them.
• (7) Ultimately, because of the ease with which different John Smiths can be conflated, even by professional historians, what is needed is to track down the claim attributed to the most authoritative source. In this case, I think it is the claim cited to: "McPherson, James M (2003). The Negro's Civil War. Random House Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4000-3390-4." As our article on him says, James McPherson is a prominent Civil War historian, and has written on African-Americans in the Civil War. The possible hoax article said: "Smith's exact date of birth is debated by historians. Prominent historian John Nelson claims that Smith was born as early as 1830. Others such as James M. McPherson hold the mainstream view that Smith was in fact born toward the end of the 1830s." It should be simple for someone to get hold of a copy of McPherson's book and check this. If this is a false claim, then deletion is probably OK, though the other offline sources could be checked as well.
• (8) I did try searching for stuff on the civil rights and lawyer stuff, but drew blanks.

As far as content goes, the medal stuff is complicated and could be a misunderstanding (e.g. accounts that he was given a citation for gallantry got conflated with statements that this could, theoretically, have been retrospectively turned into a 'citation star' and then a 'silver star'). Other parts of the article do not seem to be backed up by the sources. It is entirely possible this article is a hoax, but it is also possible that an amateur historian has mixed up and conflated online sources about different John R. Smiths (there will be a lot of these around). I think for this one, someone should try and get hold of a paper copy of one of these sources and check what it says (some of the online sources are not fully searchable).

Overall, the process wasn't great here. Sure, the article can be undeleted if needed, but equally the article could have been blanked, or the suspect material removed, until the discussion concluded. It is annoying to spot a discussion like this, see that an initial misunderstanding might be skewing the debate, and then find that 20 minutes later the discussion has concluded in a rather sheep-like fashion, not allowing others to add their thoughts when they get home/wake up/log on, or whatever. So can we please leave discussions on "hoax" articles to run the full course in future? Carcharoth (talk) 02:05, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree the discussion was somewhat rushed, however the fact is that none of the sources backed up the claims made in the article, and it really stretches credulity to imagine the user in question got every single one of his references mixed up.

It's also clear the user is very familiar with wiki processes even though he has apparently only made a couple of dozen edits. Wouldn't a checkuser be appropriate in such a case?

Finally, there doesn't seem to have been much discussion of sanctions for the user involved. Creating hoax articles is deliberate sabotage and it seems to me such actions should not be tolerated. Gatoclass (talk) 05:31, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Given that it was never confirmed that this was a hoax, sanctions would be somewhat uncalled for. If the process had run its full course, then yes, we could make the call, but as it didn't there are too many questions left in the air. Keeping a close eye on the user should be sufficient, though. - Bilby (talk) 06:46, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

No sanction for inserting deliberate factual errors into Silver Star? And I agree, the hoax template needs to be blatant. dougweller (talk) 09:13, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

That's a different issue. And yes, that counts as blatant factual errors. I'd add that I'm now happy to call the John R. Smith article a hoax, on two grounds - the McPherson reference doesn't seem to mention Smith, and, as I mentioned previously, the account of the battle at Fort Sumter is extremely questionable, at best. There was, however, a John R. Smith in the 108th out of Pennsyvania, but I'm happy to write that off as a coincidence. - Bilby (talk) 09:36, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't CSD G7 apply? Pure vandalism. This includes blatant and obvious misinformation. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.245.4.252 (talk • contribs)

No, this wasn't blatant and obvious misinformation. It needed a debate to ascertain whether the statements in the article were true or not (and whether the person in question existed), and whether the sources could be used to verify the statements in the article. For the reasons Uncle G gave above, and the reasons I am about to explain again, this needs a wide range of views spread out over an adequate period of time. Not a small subset of editors over 20 minutes. The danger is, if you don't have these sorts of checks and balances in place, that we end up deleting a genuine article because someone incorrectly thinks it is a hoax, and everyone agrees with that person without verifying the conclusions for themselves. Not this time (it looks like it was a hoax, though I have one thing to check on that), but at some other point in the future. Again, this is from past experience, from years of deletion debates, and this past experience is why we (Misplaced Pages) don't speedily delete apparent 'hoaxes'. It's not some process-wonking. There are clear and cogent reasons why we have the debate instead of deleting, and a full debate rather than a speedy or snowball one. Carcharoth (talk) 20:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Examples of pre-1932 Silver Star awards

I did say I was going to post one more thing on this. Don't have time to make a full case now, but the following points were what I wanted to point out to emphasis the point that the "1932" so-called 'start' point for the Silver Star (used as "proof" that the article was a hoax) misses the point.

Look at Charles G. Conn and William T. Harris, and compare to the list at Civil War Campaign Medal#Devices. Conn is one of those listed there as retrospectively receiving a silver Citation Star, though it doesn't say when. Our article on William T. Harris might be about the person who retrospectively received a (silver) Citation Star, but it is more likely, in my opinion, that these are two different people with the same name (more sources needed).

The point is that it is very easy to get things like this wrong. It is possible to write different descriptions of varying levels of understanding and veracity about silver Citation Stars for a particular person. This can also be done for the other awards called "Silver Stars" (at least four that I am aware of). It is thus very easy it is to link to the wrong article. My point here is that a single link from a suspected hoax article to another article (in this case the link from John R. Smith to Silver Star) should be treated with caution. What happened here is that people assumed that the link was correct, and that the reference was to this medal that started in 1932, and given the dates of the supposed John R. Smith, that this "proved" that the article was a hoax. There was another possibility - namely that the link was to the wrong article.

Here is another example: "In 1925, Kress was awarded a Citation, with a Silver Star for gallantry in action at the battle " (which took place in December 13, 1862). See here. Kress is one of the people listed at Civil War Campaign Medal#Devices.

My point here though (and apologies for belabouring it) is: what price now the arguments people were making that the "Silver Star" was started in 1932 and couldn't *possibly* apply to the US Civil War, and therefore (because this argument is so *absolutely* and *clearly* indisputable) that the John R. Smith article *must* be a hoax because the medal stuff is so *obviously* wrong?

.

But I made most of these points yesterday. Why am I having to repeat them today? The argument I'm making here holds whether the John R. Smith article is a hoax or not - namely that those declaring it a hoax on the basis of the medal date being anachronistic were working from a faulty premise. So far, I see no sign that anyone has acknowledged that. What we have is some people weakly saying "but it was a hoax". That misses the entire point of needing checks and balances to avoid deleting articles that turn out not to be a hoax.

The false premise about the medal dates is reason enough to be wary of the speedy deletion and to undelete and restart the deletion discussion (though as I elsewhere above, I'm not actually going to do this - the more important point is that people recognise the need to not speedy or snowball delete, and to check what people say at AfD and not assume others are correct). The secondary reason is to allow the article to be visible to the non-admins who may respond to the current and intended requests at the Military History US Civil War taskforce and the Misplaced Pages Reference Desk.

In other words, it might well be a hoax, but there are good reasons to let the process run for the full time - to get other views, to allow faulty reasoning to be pointed out, and to avoid getting it wrong. Imagine if a troll had written a hoax-like article on a real but obscure historical person using hard-to-find offline sources, and the article had been speedily deleted as a hoax, and then it had been pointed out that the deletion was wrong. Egg on face time. Even if this one is a hoax, the next one might not be, so they should all get the requisite amount of time for discussion. I would move on from this, but there are people above who have failed to acknowledge this. Unless people acknowledge this, it will happen again. So, will the people above who seem to think the above speedy deletion was OK acknowledge this, or shall I follow up on their talk pages? Carcharoth (talk) 09:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Elonka’s ban of ScienceApologist and Martinphi from WP:FRINGE

Elonka (talk · contribs) has issued a 30-day page ban for ScienceApologist (talk · contribs) from editing the fringe theories guideline. Her alleged basis for this action is the concern expressed by "multiple admins" about the editing situation in this thread at WP:ANI. First off, a cursory reading of the entire thread shows widespread support of SA’s actions (with the exception of Elonka quickly calling for a block or ban of SA, of course).

Elonka has been repeated asked to disengage from her mucking about in Pseudoscience arbitration enforcement, and specifically been asked, both by SA and others, to let ScienceApologist alone, yet she refuses to do so. She popped onto SA’s talkpage to drop her banhammer after he made one edit to the guideline in question today, after a three-day break since the long discussion on ANI found that nothing more was needed than a reminder for SA to tone his edit summaries down, which he did.

I ask the editors here to answer two specific questions: (1) should the page ban be vacated, and (2) would you say that Elonka’s ban was even reasonable or appropriate to begin with, or executed in bad faith or poor judgment? HiDrNick! 03:05, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that we want to condone allowing an editor to unilaterally declare that an administrator, carrying out actions with community consensus, or enforcing arbitration rulings, is disallowed from a talk page. That's a bad precedent. That SA was repeatedly warned, and repeatedly removed the warnings is one thing. But to ask that Elonka not post there? No. I have myself wondered if Elonka sometimes is a bit meddlesome and persistent, but in this case I endorsed the warning, and I endorse the ban as well. Martinphi I am not so sure about, as I have asked already at her page. ++Lar: t/c 03:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

PS I am not sure I agree with HiDrNick's characterization of Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive487#Back_to_ScienceApologist as "widespread support of ScienceApologist's actions". Rather I see some admins saying SA needs to tone down edit summaries and some admins (including myself) endorsing the warnings given. ++Lar: t/c 03:27, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

See also: Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive487#Back_to_ScienceApologist ++Lar: t/c 03:20, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

See also Elonka's talk page and my talk page and this. I may have made a mistake, but seriously.... It isn't as if I'm unresponsive to criticism. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 03:19, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Nick, did you see this? _{(Didn't notice it was already posted.)} seicer | talk | contribs 03:24, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Ooof, I should have been more clear. The "widespread support of ScienceApologist's actions" I was refering to was in the superthread, which was the bulk of the discussion there and is in now in a colapse box in the archive. I aggre that no one suported the sort of edit summaries he was using there at the end, but clearly there was no consensus to block or ban there either. I haven't really reviewed Martinphi's contributions to the FRINGE page, and wasn't trying to leave him out per se, I just watch SA's talk page there. HiDrNick! 03:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

HiDrNick!, Elonka has been doing really exceptionally good work in general in the pseudoscience arena. I do not think that anyone should use this as an excuse to go after her. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 03:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'd agree with that. She just missed the mark a bit here with Martinphi. It happens... let's fix it and move on. Or we could have a long drawn out discussion in which everyone defends their positions vociferously and much hard feeling is engendered. It's up to Elonka I guess. ++Lar: t/c 03:32, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is noot an isolated incident. For instance, Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Arbitration_enforcement/Archive26#Martinphi_at_WP:NPOV. I was the last victim of his response to this: a mixture of outing, personal attacks, and attempting to get me banned. I shan't link because of the outing - e-mail me for details. This incident is comparatively minor, but I think that we have been very, very lenient with Martin, and that it is beyond time that something is done. However, every time something is done, he throws a hiuge fit, attacking the admin, or even person wh o has simply scriticised him - the attempt to get me banned was over me saying that that he probably shouldnðt be editing WP:NPOV in ways that increase its friendliness to his views while under a arbcom sanction for POV-pushing (well, soapboxing is the exact word they use.)

I don't like talking about Martinphi, because I get the strong feeling that he wants me to be his next Scienceapologist, so, whatever is said here, I shall say no more. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 03:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Seems a far less wikidrama course of action would simply have been to protect the page for a time until concensus was achieved on talk. Drop the bans and lock the page to a version prior to the current warring. Vsmith (talk) 03:39, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I endorse Elonka's actions here. I see nothing out of order. ···日本穣 03:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Well, I had considered protecting WP:FRINGE; discussion is occurring, but it seems to be in parallel with edit-warring, and a guideline should really be more stable than this. But I don't want to get involved anymore. I don't quite understand the immediate trigger for these page bans, though the long-term history is clear enough. In any case, 1RR might be preferable, but a page ban won't kill anyone. I would like to see more eyes on WP:FRINGE, as I find it populated almost exclusively by editors who are active and opinionated in the fringe subjects in question, whether pro or con. MastCell  03:56, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is absolutely out of line. Protection would have been the standard practice and I see no good reason to do this. Frankly, I'm beginning to think that Elonka should stay away from everything related to fringe issues since her presence creates more disruption than it solves. JoshuaZ (talk) 03:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I am ignoring everything Elonka says from now on including her "page ban". Thank you. ScienceApologist (talk) 04:13, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Instead of risking a permanent block, I recommend that you start keeping a running tab of all the vandalism and POV-pushing and other junk that occurs on that page, and bring it up here or some other appropriate venue, and ask, "Who's going to do something about this?" Baseball Bugs 04:21, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm personally surprised that there is more "oversight" going on with the general discussions in a guideline page. If admins allow an edit war to continue in what hopes to be policyspace, no wonder we have problems in pretty much every sector of Misplaced Pages :-( Shot info (talk) 04:28, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

You do so at your peril, I think. This is an ongoing discussion that will result in the ban being endorsed or overturned, but until that consensus becomes clear I view it as in effect. I'll enforce it, with regret, even if I happen not to agree with it (and I expect I'm not the only admin that will), if your actions are too egregious. So watch out for that. ++Lar: t/c 04:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I think Elonka should stay away from pseudoscience. Since she has decided to unilaterally implement her version of EP, the wikidrama has increased rather than decreased. It would appear that she hasn't learnt anything from her RfC nor her recall notice (other than she can pretty much ignore anything she perceives as "negative" as she has enough "positive" support....much like SA has in fact). I recommend that, if the fringe articles are not properly policed, then some other admins should jump in, rather than leaving it for Elonka to "do the hard yards". Per her RfC and her recall notice it is clear that a large minority of the Community disagrees with her actions particularly when they inflame the situation rather than resolve it. Lar, if you feel that SA has overstepped the mark, then I'm confident that the editors at the coal face would appriciate your more active admining in the necessary areas...rather that leaving it to backing up Elonka attempt to rewrite policy. Shot info (talk) 04:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

That's a fair point. In my copious free time I'll try to see what I can do. ++Lar: t/c 04:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Shotinfo - My experience with Elonka is that she's always reasonable, unfailingly polite when people respect her efforts at keeping things orderly and civil, and completely no-nonsense when people don't. heaven knows she's called me on enough of my own crap, and I've learned to respect her opinion. the main problem in this case is that the signal to noise ratio is utterly dismal. I think you would withdraw your objection if you dug through all the drama-trauma and actually looked at bare facts of the matter. --Ludwigs2 04:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm shocked. OrangeMarlin 04:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not, but OM I'm going to take on board Lar's comments below. Shot info (talk) 05:06, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure I completely agree with that assessment, but it's immaterial. I think it's more important, here, to just stay confined to the narrow question of whether to endorse or overturn these actions. ++Lar: t/c 04:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I think Elonka has been doing a good job. I merely object to being treated in the same manner as ScienceApologist. I also object to the ban because at the very most I made a mistake with one edit (making it into an essay). However, that was just a reaction to what MastCell says above: it should be more stable if it is going to be a guideline. My revert (the other edit in question which was not the reason for the ban) was merely an "agree revert," along with two other editors who reverted first. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 04:20, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Martin, I've been trying to work with you across a number of projects, and I think we've made some sort of peace, despite our divergent views. However, I'm going to strongly disagree with your assessment of Elonka. OrangeMarlin 04:54, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Let me repeat... I think delving into the whys and wherefores of how we all feel about each other may not be the most productive use of our time. Let's stay focused on this action and whether to endorse or overturn it. Whether you come to bury or praise, save it. Not likely to be productive. IMHO anyway. ++Lar: t/c 04:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't often comment on blocks and individual incidents. But, speaking as (IMO, at least) a fairly "middle of the road" WP user with a primary main-namespace orientation towards category:philosophy and category:religion articles, side-by-side with a strong empirical orientation, I think this incident merits comment at the moment. ScienceApologist has for years been a diligent and highly valuable contributor to WP. Admittedly SA is often contentious w.r.t. issues he feels strongly about. And I recognize that a 30-day ban from one page is not ordinarily a :"great-big deal", The recent little brouhaha at WP:FRINGE, however, appears to me to be a very minor conceptual scuffle among good-faith editors with differing POVs about what the content guideline should be w.r.t. "fringe theories" (fundamentally a WP:WEIGHT issue anyway). I'm disturbed that SA is being painted as unusually disruptive, when in fact minor edit wars of the kind cited by Elonka happen very frequently with no more than a reminder to desist and discuss further on the relevant talk page(s). This block thus has the rather odd result of citing prior administrative action as a cause for further administrative action, with nothing else particularly out of the ordinary given in justification for this particular administrative action. The obvious implication is that future administrative action will threaten to draw also on this administrative action. I understand that there may be cases in which such gradual escalation of sanctions are reasonably deemed appropriate where users plainly are unproductive and additionally are chronic violators of WP policy. Here, though, we've got a fairly typical guideline disagreement about which SA evidently felt strongly in the face of edits by other user(s) who evidently also felt strongly about their preferred expression of the WP:FRINGE guideline page. I submit that the block should be immediately lifted and ScienceApologist excused here, at least absent much more extensive evidence that SA is being tendentious or disruptive in a way that can't be handled by the normal range of consensus process with which we're quite well accustomed in WP. ... Kenosis (talk) 04:56, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
..... P.S.: I hadn't noticed that Martinphi had also been blocked, or page-banned, or whatever exactly the case is here. IMO, no one should remain blocked under this circumstance. I've encountered Martinphi before as well, and as with SA, I've had differing POVs with Martinphi. IMO, somewhat similarly to SA, MartinPhi too is often contentious about issues he feels strongly about. But there's nothing here that can't be handled via the normal range of consensus process. Thanks. ... Kenosis (talk) 05:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I am a supporter of SA, in general, but I know he can be direct in his language. Elonka probably is the wrong person to do something about SA's behavior, since Elonka seems to have appointed herself the policeperson of pseudoscience articles. She has unfairly placed blocks on users such as User:NJGW, while ignoring the misbehavior of other editors who might be honestly described as anti-science or pseudoscience supporters. This is completely unfair to SA. OrangeMarlin 05:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

FYI, SA has partially removed part of Elonka's post to his user talk. John Vandenberg 05:09, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I put it back, because I want to go on record as standing behind this action, until and unless consensus develops here to overturn it. I'm not a big fan of going to users talk pages and arguing about whether an action outlined on that talk page is a good idea or not, so even if I were to disagree, I construe this as enforcable until consensus develops that it is not. If SA removes it again, he's within rights to do so, and we can construe the notice as being given, but he doesn't get to say "admin so and so can't talk to me". That's ArbCom's job I think. ++Lar: t/c 05:18, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The consensus does appear to be drifting towards a "drop the block and pursue normal page management practises" - which of course is being obscured by the normal amounts of commentary. Given that I'm prepared to be incorrect. Shot info (talk) 05:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm sensing the same sort of very slow drift you do, yes, but there aren't a lot of different voices here yet, so it's hard to be sure it's a real consensus just yet. I'm on board in any case, whichever way it comes out. If I'm asleep, anyone else should feel free to do the needful (I'm guessing Elonka's asleep since she hasn't commented here once, despite being notified... odd, unless she is away) ++Lar: t/c 05:30, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree that it would be sensible to lift both page bans and lock the main page until some consensus is reached on the talk page. Mathsci (talk) 05:35, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I will also be available to block, and I've not been involved with the "fringe" page at all. Mathsci, I would agree with you, but we should not need to protect a page such as that when the primary disruptor is one individual whose prior histories give indication that he is unwilling to work with others. seicer | talk | contribs 05:38, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Partially resending my comment, I've went and protected the page for one week to see if SA and others are willing to work towards a consensus. If not... seicer | talk | contribs 05:43, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

If you have a large enough number of allies on WP, you can pretty much act with impunity and without fear of reprisal or sanction. Why should this incident be any different from any of the uncountable number that came before it? Dlabtot (talk) 05:46, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It is my feeling that the temporary page bans on these two editors are a justifiable minor restriction, which is helping to stabilize the guideline. To give a bit more background on this: I had warned both ScienceApologist (talk · contribs) and Martinphi (talk · contribs) a few days ago, for edit-warring on the guideline page. I also specifically told both of them to disengage from each other. This is because they've been brought up in more ArbCom cases than I can even name off the top of my head, but try Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Martinphi-ScienceApologist and Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience to start. ScienceApologist was particularly out of line because he was trying to force through major changes to the WP:FRINGE guideline, but hadn't participated on the talkpage for months.

So anyway, things were quiet over the weekend. ScienceApologist was offline, but other editors were engaging in good discussion at the talkpage, and consensus changes were being gradually restored to the guideline. Then today the edit-warring started up again, ScienceApologist came in and reverted everything back to his last version, and Martinphi followed up immediately by trying to downgrade the guideline down to an essay. That last was definitely against consensus since this was discussed extensively in July and the page's status as a guideline has strong community backing.

The reason I chose not to protect the page, is because there are multiple editors working on the guideline, who do seem able to make incremental edits based on talkpage consensus. So I didn't want to "throw the baby out with the bathwater". It seemed that the best way to help protect the editing of the guideline was with a relatively minor editing ban on both ScienceApologist and Martinphi. After all, what does the ban limit? Both editors are still completely free to participate at the guideline's talkpage, and if the discussions there are productive, then other editors will agree, and those other editors can incorporate the changes into the guideline. All the page ban really does, is to prevent ScienceApologist and Martinphi from jumping the gun and making no-consensus edits. Which I see as a good thing. --Elonka 05:49, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Martinphi and Ludwigs2 have just been asking for the guidelines to be completely rewritten "from top to tail", possibly in jest. seicer made a very fair decision in locking the main page to let things calm down and consensus to be reached. The WP:FRINGE page needs far more eyes on it. Mathsci (talk) 06:03, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I support Elonka's page ban of SA. He was edit warring, plain and simple. He felt his version was the best version and rather than engaging in the discussions going on the talk page, he chose to revert to his version with inflammatory/egocentric edit summaries. This is SA's modus operandi. We've seen him do this very tactic many times in the past. Skirting 3RR, by edit warring slowly. Given his history, a 30 day block from editing one policy is extrodinarily lenient, IMHO.

I think MartinPhi's ban is undeserved. Unlike SA, MartinPhi was participating in discussion and I believe he only made one revert to SA's four. MartinPhi's choice to downgrade the policy to an essay - while not a move which I would have made - was something which he discussed on the talk page and when it was reverted, he didn't engage in an edit war.

Mathsci, I agree. More eyes on WP:FRINGE are needed and welcomed!

As a final note, to my fellow American Wikipedians: Be sure to log off from Wiki land today long enough to vote! -- Levine2112 06:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

What elections? Mathsci (talk) 06:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Because that gratuitously non-neutral link was so relevant. I'm going to have to resist the urge to change it to link to that for McCain or maybe a third party candidate or maybe Cthulhu (why vote for the lesser evil?). JoshuaZ (talk) 06:18, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Theres an election?? From media reports here (ie/ not in the US) it's sort of apparent who is going to win....much like in Zimbabwe :-) Shot info (talk) 06:19, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Oh crap. I was going to cast aspersions about Levine's character, intelligence and overall usefulness to the project, and he had to go and be an Obama supporter. But I do disagree with his opinion of Elonka's fairness.  :) OrangeMarlin 06:21, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

OM, check out the The Tale of the Tape; you might be surprised what else I support or don't support. -- Levine2112 07:05, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Elonka says:

"This is because they've been brought up in more ArbCom cases than I can even name off the top of my head"

I've been in exactly two ArbComs.

One "agree revert" is not "edit warring" in the negative sense, but common practice, BRD.

I explained that the downgrade to essay was only meant to be till the guideline resumed a stable form. Thus, if the edit stuck, good. If the edit didn't stick, it was at least a message to others to stop edit warring on a guideline. Again, good. That was my intent. For that I'm given a 30 day page ban? I was aware of the consensus to keep it as a guideline, and my edit had nothing to do with that general consensus.

The argument of "minimum force" is something I'll let others decide. I already addressed that on my talk page , as admin actions are not punitive. Exactly how was I disrupting the guideline such that allowing me to edit there would harm Misplaced Pages? I would like Elonka to explain just how "minimum force" required me to be banned.

She speaks of "these two editors." To equate me with ScienceApologist as if we behave in similar ways is incomprehensible. That this is being done is reflected in Elonka's sentence which I quoted above, though she does seem to draw some minor distinction.

Elonka notes that "things were quiet over the weekend." I was there over the weekend. Working toward consensus. Please don't equate me with ScienceApologist. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 06:21, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This page ban is far more than what Elonka says "All the page ban really does, is to prevent ScienceApologist and Martinphi from jumping the gun and making no-consensus edits." Rather, it is symbolic that our actions were so negative that we can't be allowed to edit the page. Certainly, it doesn't have much practical effect on me, though it does for SA. If it stands it is because the community is saying "Martinphi deserved to be banned for 30 days because of his edit." Is this so? I don't want this on my record. And particularly, I want the community to stop equating me with SA. Were our actions equal? ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 06:27, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

SA was edit warring. There is no doubt about that. WP:EW states:

uninvolved administrators may either block the involved offenders for a period of time or protect the affected page(s). Protection is useful when the involved parties will work to resolve the conflict. Blocks occur when there is evidence that users cannot or will not moderate their behavior, often demonstrated by an inflexible demeanor, incivility, or past instances of edit warring and unchanged behavior

Blocks occur when there is evidence that users cannot/will not moderate their behaviour. It is clear[REDACTED] policy. SA was warned, and has been warned previously about edit warring. That edit warring continued, with his revert to back to his version. That shows that (s)he cannot or will not moderate the edit warring. Martinphi on the other hand, was not blocked for edit warring, but for disruptive editing. I'm not as sure that the downgrade to essay was clearly disruptive. Consensus definitely existed for it to be policy a few months ago, but as we all know, consensus can change - especially when the policy itself has changed to the point where people are edit warring over it. Overall, I definitely support Elonka's rationale for blocks instead of a page protection, and support SA's block. I am unsure whether Martinphi's block was appropriate, as I am unsure whether the edit was disruptive. DigitalC (talk) 06:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This entire situation is belittling to both editors involved, entirely inconsiderate, not to mention lacking in even the most fundamental hint of a clue regarding general human psychology, and can easily be read - with a slight amount of literary indulgence, mind you - as pure and simple bullying, with a mask of civility disguising the sheer contempt for those deemed "beneath" the grown-up alpha bully setting the rules. Business as usual from one of the most considerate, level-headed, uncontroversial and productive administrators who has ever graced this humble project with her exhalted presence. Badger Drink (talk) 06:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

:-) - no support for blocks/bans of either editor. That was unnecessary and unhelpful. dougweller (talk) 09:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I echo the positions of OrangeMarlin, JoshuaZ and Dougweller. Elonka had no business banning/blocking MartinPhi, who was engaging in discussion and did not edit war. Her action was plain and simple abuse of admin powers. Her rationale that MartinPhi was involved in some Arbcom cases is ridiculous — she has substituted her judgment to that of the Arbcom. Furthermore, if we consider long-term positions, like Elonka's doing in the case of MartinPhi, then Elonka is not an uninvolved party in this case. Elonka has adopted conciliatory positions towards fringe theorists, like the recently indef blocked User:Ariobarza, who kept filling Misplaced Pages with his inane WP:OR, while she's shooting on sight editors that try to keep Misplaced Pages an encyclopedia. VG ☎ 10:20, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Also agree with OrangeMarlin, BadgerDrink, JoshuaZ, Dougweller, VG, et al. that this block is a bad block. Verbal chat 10:30, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I have been watching this ongoing debates at multiple boards and watching just a few editing this page. I am an outsider to this whole thing and have no opinion of any of the editors per se. I think the blocks were unnecessary and caused more heat then light. I also think Elonka was aware that this would not be wildly excepted. What I am seeing are editors with strong views and strong headiness. Protection of the page would have brought things to a cooler level and should have been done to begin with instead of the warnings to just these two editor since there were more editors involved in reverting and just popping in to do the revert. Some just did the revert, popped a quick comment on the talk and left, kind of looked to me as a protection to prevent a block even though the action done was done because of which editor made the last edit. This kind of gaming needs to be stopped and now. I am not going to mention names, if you want to see the whole picture read the talk page and the last edit summaries when the warring really started. I have to also say that I do not believe Elonka should be patrolling these articles as mentioned by others above and I have stated this before. There is a lot of bad blood amongst editors with her and I would assume her with them since the RFC and the recall, which a lot was said. So, I am saying, if it matters to anyone, that both editors have there bans/blocks removed, the page stays protected for thirty days or until things on the talk page shows calmness, and other administrators do the patrolling of the different articles including this one. Are there other administrators that are not involved with this that can be useful to helping get better guidance and control over the pseudoscience area? I personally feel that at this point Elonka in involved with conflicts with certain editors or at least there is an appearance of this to make her cause more drama with decisions than needed. I am just trying to give the view of someone who has been watching things for quite some time now and this is how I see things. Thanks for listening, --CrohnieGal 11:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Dougweller, Tim Vickers, Dbachmann, MastCell and Moreschi have a lot of experience with WP:FRINGE and are well aware of the issues involved. Why not be led by their experience? Mathsci (talk) 11:37, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Crohnie's summary is very good and has some very good suggestions in it. I myself did revert, but quickly did a self-revert on realising there was a bigger problem. Verbal chat 13:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:AGF and WP:NPA are essential policies, without which Misplaced Pages will eventually collapse in an ugly heap. So I am dismayed if edits like this can be made with impunity. SamuelTheGhost (talk) 13:30, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Quick two cents here: I had SA's talk page watchlisted when the ban came down from Elonka. I thought that, in light of the ArbCom rulings, SA was really pushing things, and I'm not sure I disagree with the ban per se. That said, if Elonka thought the ban was uncontroversial, she should have asked another admin to make it official. There is way too much history of Elonka taking aggressive administrative action against the anti-fringe crowd, and regardless of whether a given action is valid or not, it invariably leaves one with the impression of retribution, or at least conflict of interest.

SA's reverting was not so disruptive that it required immediate (as in <10 minutes) action. So it seems to me there was plenty of time for Elonka to find another admin lurking about, point out the situation and the ArbCom rulings, and have that admin institute the ban (assuming he or she agreed, of course). This just seems like a no-brainer to me.

Or does anyone here seriously believe that all interactions between SA and Elonka are impersonal at this point, hmmm? --Jaysweet (talk) 14:09, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I am deeply bothered buy the admission from an editor that he has been humiliated. In reviewing Martin’s edits to the Fringe article and in assuming good faith I have to question, while respecting Elonka, the ban on him. His actions were not comparable to Science Apologists, and there is no sense in any of us suggesting that they were. Behaviours following the ban are a further clear indication of how each editor deals with such situations differently. Yet each received equal restrictions.

I think Shot Info and SA are right. We can’t stop SA from editing the Elonka article, and attempting to ascertain why any editor edits an article can only lead to mistakes and frustration. Most of us don’t go there. Whether it was prudent for SA to begin editing this article now is another matter entirely.

As a kayaker if you play in “big” water near the eddy line you are bound to find yourself in the water eventually, your kayak overturned. That’s the risk you take for the excitement you experience, and no intelligent kayaker expects to take those risks and not be faced with the ensuing repercussions that can follow even a small mistake in judgment. SA plays near the “eddy line” on Misplaced Pages, and being intelligent I can only assume he knows the risk he takes. His actions following Elonka’s ban are clear indications that he plays in this slightly dangerous environment, and for reasons of his own. Although nothing stops him from editing the article of the blocking admin., he had to know that this would cause some Wikidrama as it has. There’s no sense in pretending SA is stupid either. I would assume then, that he is fully aware of the risks he takes, and if he overturns his kayak must have expected the possibility.

Martinphi, whatever his behaviour has been in the past seems to be steering clear of this kind of editing. His actions on the fringe article if reviewed indicate efforts to edit in a manner that supports collaboration whatever his POV might be, as do his actions following this ban. These are two very different editors.

I am sorry to see the ban on Martin given his progress. I think its unfortunate and unfair to him. And this is Misplaced Pages. Since we have to assume good faith, we must trust that SA edits the Elonka article for the right reasons, whatever we think, however imprudent we judge that editing to be. We have to also trust Martin made the edit and revert on the Fringe article for the right reasons as he says he did, whatever the results. I can only hope the admins. reviewing this case will very carefully re evaluate the situation, and to remember that Martin is not SA and vice versa.

This isn't about how small a ban this is, but is about fairness and humiliation. Humiliation should not be something that is supported on Misplaced Pages for any editor, for any reason, and however tedious reevaluation is, fairness is of the utmost importance. If a mistake has been made, then it should be fixed. Its that simple.(olive (talk) 16:38, 5 November 2008 (UTC))

Page protected

The page is now protected, so what is the point of continuing the problematic bans? Revoke or undo the ban stuff and nip the drama. Vsmith (talk) 14:54, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I protected the page with the hope that all parties will come together and discuss. So far, that really hasn't happened. The protection lasts for one week. If any of the parties continue to edit war after the protection, the ban will be enforced. I hope that that is not the case, so let's hope for the best. seicer | talk | contribs 15:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

And to clarify: SA or anyone that was involved was not blocked. I don't know where people have been getting that at. seicer | talk | contribs 16:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree, there seems to be some confusion here, so to clarify, I have not blocked anyone. Neither Martinphi nor ScienceApologist has a new block in their logs. I instituted a very minor page ban, which in my opinion was even less restrictive than page protection. When a page is protected, no one can edit it. What I did was to restrict two of the editors on the page, but just from editing that one page, and nothing else. It's a very precisely-crafted restriction, as authorized by WP:ARBCOM, via Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience: "Any uninvolved administrator may, on his or her own discretion, impose sanctions on any editor working in the area of conflict (defined as articles which relate to pseudoscience, broadly interpreted) if, despite being warned, that editor repeatedly or seriously fails to adhere to the purpose of Misplaced Pages, any expected standards of behavior, or any normal editorial process. The sanctions imposed may include blocks of up to one year in length; bans from editing any page or set of pages within the area of conflict; bans on any editing related to the topic or its closely related topics; restrictions on reverts or other specified behaviors; or any other measures which the imposing administrator believes are reasonably necessary to ensure the smooth functioning of the project." Martinphi and ScienceApologist are not blocked. They are still allowed to edit anything else they want, except for exactly one of the 2.5 million pages on Misplaced Pages, which is the Misplaced Pages:Fringe theories guideline. Meanwhile, they can still participate at the guideline talkpage. I have to admit that I'm perplexed as to why people think that page protection is a preferable solution here, since I see that as much more severe, affecting all editors, not just the two who were involved in disruptive behavior. --Elonka 16:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

So now the page is protected you are rescinding the ban, which doesn't have universal support, per Vsmith? I think the block/ban distinction here (in this discussion, not in general) was just "lazy" language (or, more likely, not using wp admin jargon). The ban is a block from that page, and no one said block in this section. Verbal chat 18:06, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I see no reason to lift the ban, especially with ScienceApologist making statements like this. The editors who should be empowered at the page are those who are staying civil, participating in good faith, treating other editors with respect, and willing to work through the normal steps of dispute resolution. Currently, ScienceApologist does not appear to be abiding by expected standards of behavior; therefore his editing is restricted. If he continues with disruptive behavior, his editing privileges should be further restricted. This is not about punishing ScienceApologist, this is about reducing disruption to the project, and allowing other editors to get on with their work. --Elonka 18:17, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm afraid that you are no longer an "uninvolved admin" in regard pseudoscience, especially if you use the same version of "uninvolved" as on your agreement to be subject to recall. Fair is fair. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

As the page is protected, the ban is useless - if, as stated above, it was for prevention of disruption. Maintaining a useless ban would seem "punitive" rather than "preventative". Seicer protected the page (indefinetly according to the log), so until he unprotects in a week or whatever, there can be no disruption on the page. Now, if you are maintaining the bans for other reasons: then state those reasons - else lift them. Starting to look quite bad for your "uninvolvement" stance. Suggest that you rescind the bans and back away - let other admins take action if disruption reccurrs following lifting of protection. Vsmith (talk) 19:01, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

To Verbal: Someone mentioned block in the above section, not here. seicer | talk | contribs 18:57, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Elonka said "The editors who should be empowered at the page are those who are staying civil, participating in good faith, treating other editors with respect, and willing to work through the normal steps of dispute resolution." How is that not what I have been doing?

I'm no longer willing to accept punishment just so an admin, even one such as Elonka who I generally support, may have the topical appearance of justice while actually conflating editors whose behavior could not be more different.

I have two main complaints here:

First, by no stretch could my edits have been construed as deserving of this kind of humiliation.

Second, to give ScienceApologist and myself equal treatment is an intolerable insult. It says our behavior is similar.

I also object to punitive admin action: there is absolutely no justification for saying that I must be banned to prevent harm to the Misplaced Pages process. The ban is therefore punitive.

I have already appealed to ArbCom, but as I stated before, I wanted to work it out with Elonka instead of going that rout. I still do. Here is what I want: I want to be unbanned, and I want it to be acknowledged that conflation of myself and ScienceApologist is wrong. I want it done in a clear way which leaves no doubt. After all this time, I deserve that consideration.

I'll be back some time late tomorrow. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 19:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It's rare for me to agree with Martinphi on something, but his comment that he is "no longer willing to accept punishment so...Elonka...may have the topical appearance of justice", I think that really cuts to the heart of the matter here. This is why Elonka should not be performing administrative actions in pseudoscience- and fringe-related areas. Now it's not just the anti-fringe crowd that is questioning Elonka's motives: Now, Martinphi also has legitimate reason to feel that he has been wronged as the result of Elonka's personal entanglement in this debacle. --Jaysweet (talk) 19:59, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree that Elonka should not be performing administrative actions in pseudoscience and fringe-related areas. She is perceived as having a bias toward editors who advocate fringe theories, which calls into question her role as an uninvolved administrator. If she is biased, that could do irreparable harm to the encyclopedia by placing other concerns over some of our policies. If she is not biased, the perception of the bias causes her actions to contribute to the drama that seems to surround this area. Many wikipedians (including me) expressed doubts about her tactics in the RFC. I encourage Elonka to find other areas in which to use her talents and to stay away from pseudoscience and fringe related articles and the editors who frequently edit there. Karanacs (talk) 18:46, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

A key problem rests with the beginning of the passage Elonka quotes: Any uninvolved administrator may... Suggest in future Elonka refer similar matters to WP:AE, where action may be taken by an administrator whose impartiality is not open to question. That will get the proper result minus drama. Durova 02:05, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Durova, before any of these complaints against Elonka being involved in fringe enforcement have any merit, at least one problem must be solved: those who Jaysweet portrays as "the anti-fringe crowd" break WP rules much more often than others, as is evident by how it's described, "anti fringe." I'm not just talking about WP:CIV and WP:3RR. Naturally, the anti fringe group will get whacked more often, especially when you consider only non-SPAs. Because of this, any admin who starts out seeming neutral, will very quickly be attacked as biased. This will happen even if the admin has made really extreme attempts to be even handed, as in this case: Elonka has tried so hard to be even handed she failed to be just. This general pattern, in fact, has happened repeatedly. By the time the admin has even a whiff of a clue, the admin is under heavy attack, and withdraws. Whatcha going to do? ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 03:38, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

With respect, Martin, this advice comes without judgment about whether Elonka actually is an 'involved administrator'. What you describe is a pattern that's shared by a lot of long-running disputes: one or more editors gets aggressive about raising 'involved administrator' complaints. The simplest way around that is to seek review and action by administrators whose impartiality is absolutely above question. Erring on the side of caution that way is worth it in situations where good faith is already worn thin: it helps settle the matter with far less time and drama. Durova 05:02, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Vssyana, Rlevse, Elonka, Seicer, GRBerry, Thatcher (?), and quite a few others, in several sections of fringe. Then there are others who have been quite involved, but done it anyway. The other problem I didn't mention, cause you can't do anything about it, is that it ain't possible to find a neutral admin, because 1) no one will ask them first if they have a POV on fringe subjects and 2) everyone has a POV. I maintain, that what you say has been tried, and the uninvolved admin goes after whom they go after, they ban a few SPAs and then they start seeing the bad behavior of the regulars. Then they do a few admin actions, and suddenly they're "involved." That's how it goes. There are no uninvolved admins who can stay uninvolved in everyone's estimation. Perhaps they do become involved, but it's a problem. It would also make a good strategy: go after the admin and you can take them down because they're "involved" once you've said some mean things to them. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 05:58, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Conflict of interest

Can another individual, who is uninvolved with the above commentary, provide feedback at Elonka Dunin? If it is not appearant, administrator Elonka is Elonka Dunin, and SA just recently began a push to have the page moved -- which coincidentally occurred after he was page banned from FRINGE by Elonka. seicer | talk | contribs 20:17, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The following was snipped from Talk:Elonka Dunin:

Your block log makes me question your little crusade here. Perhaps you can find another article on Misplaced Pages to improve. There are over a million you can choose from. coccyx bloccyx_(toccyx) 20:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Per comments left at your talk page SA, I strongly encourage you to find another article to edit. Your strong conflict of interest, especially in light that Elonka imposed a page ban on you only yesterday, is giving undue bias towards your commentary here. Lar and others have made this distinction. seicer | talk | contribs 20:14, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Seicer has his own conflict of interest with respect to me and should not be involving himself in this situation. He wikistalked me to Elonka Dunin and has written me very uncivil e-mails in the past. I find it deliciously ironic that he is invoking conflict-of-interest here. ScienceApologist (talk) 20:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I believe Seicer implicitly disclosed his conflict of interest when he asked for an uninvolved party to jump in. --Jaysweet (talk) 20:41, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Which is why I have yet to edit the article, only offering commentary in the talk page in relation to the page move and sources. seicer | talk | contribs 20:42, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Huh? You've definitely edited the article. ScienceApologist (talk) 20:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Elonka's bio is a bit puffed up. But that's mainly due to the sources, e.g. "She knew binary - the language of computers - by heart." With sources like that, what can you expect. OTOH, SA is a bit too aggressive in tagging. The timing is also a bit suspect. I suggest he cools off and, if he's really interested in Elonka's bio, come back when he's less passionate. VG ☎ 20:36, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't mind people discussing the tagging. I'm trying to point out the issues. I think that commenting on content rather than contributors should be exercised here. Why are people refusing to do that? ScienceApologist (talk) 20:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'd also like to point out that Seicer made an extremely poor editorial judgement in this edit which removed tags that were discussed on the talk page, reverted edits by people other than myself (despite his claim that the revert was all about me), and reintroduced formatting errors. Is this above-the-board? Should an administrator with a vendetta like Seicer's be editing in such a fashion? ScienceApologist (talk) 20:35, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

OK, but I have never been involved in any of this, and I have no conflict of interest, and in fact I've sympathized with the crap up with which you have had to put in the past. I'm basically on your side. And I'm telling you that editing Elonka Dunin or Talk:Elonka Dunin right now, whether it be fixing a misspelling or nominating it for deletion or anywhere in between, is incredibly ill-advised, and is going to garner you a block, I'm pretty sure, and more importantly, give more ammunition to the "ban SA forever" brigade. Please don't do it. Please? --barneca (talk) 20:37, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Please explain to me which edits were problematic.... Why would editing that article in an attempt to improve it and Misplaced Pages garner me a block? Under what policies/guidelines? I appreciate this concern, but really, I think because Misplaced Pages is explicit that we should comment on content and not contributors, I would like to be judged on the quality of my edits and not the perceived "risks" associated with my person. ScienceApologist (talk) 20:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not going to spend too much time on this discussion, because I think in my heart I know you know the answer to this, and are asking more for rhetorical effect (if so, let me know in future, so I don't spend time writing something that won't matter). But the answer to your question is, none of the edits themselves, if made by, say, me, would be problematic. But pulling the "contributions not contributor" card isn't going to fly, when the only reason you're editing that article at all is because of your dispute with User:Elonka. You're aware by now, I assume, that Misplaced Pages isn't utopia. It might be nice if you were able to edit that article regardless of your disputes, but the fact of the matter is, it's going to be considered disruptive by enough people that you'll be blocked for harrassment, or being POINTy, or something, and it'll stick. Maybe that's Fair, maybe it's Unfair, but it's true. --barneca (talk) 21:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

No, I'm actually not asking for rhetorical effect at all. I'm not pulling any card. Either Misplaced Pages abides by the principles it stands by or it doesn't. If you wish to ignore all rules and assume bad faith out of me, then yes, you'd have a point. But I know I'm above the board even if you are suspicious of my motives. My dispute with User:Elonka has no bearing on the mainspace. I consider mainspace to be the real reason we're here and when I see problems in mainspace, I fix them. That's what I was doing. If I have harassed Elonka, please show me the diff. Since I'm not the one who has screaming and stamping my feet about editing, I fail to see how I'm the one who is disrupting Misplaced Pages. The rest of the field, including a goodly number of editors and administrators who consistently hound me are responsible for continually taking things to this place and other locations all the time. I am fine with the "unfairness" of Misplaced Pages. I've come to terms with it long ago. I am no more trying to "make a point" than someone who starts to research a subject and begins to edit the article on that subject is trying to "make a point". Since you yourself admit that my edits are fine, I see no reason for the alarm bells that people are clanging with alacrity. ScienceApologist (talk) 21:32, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

SA, you are aware that as soon as I made that edit, that I reverted seconds later with the edit summary: "Whoops, SA did provide a rationale"? seicer | talk | contribs 20:41, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I am, however, that is not the edit I'm referencing above. ScienceApologist (talk) 20:44, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

(ec) As a passer-by, I'm going to echo Barneca's recommendation. The situation and timing is not to your advantage, and in the interest of good relations, you might consider not touching the Elonka article for a couple weeks. -- SatyrTN (talk / contribs) 20:43, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I will consider it, but again, I must ask for someone to explain to me when this became the encyclopedia that everybody but ScienceApologist can edit? ScienceApologist (talk) 20:48, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

There are 2,612,000+ other articles available in the English language Misplaced Pages you can edit. Try one of those instead. coccyx bloccyx_(toccyx) 20:57, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia anyone can edit. I'm anyone and I'm editing an article. No one has pointed out anything beyond "excessive tagging" that is wrong with my edits. I believe the article has improved markedly since I got involved. That's evidence enough to me that I should be involved in editing that article. I appreciate the advice on the number of artiles. I choose which ones I'm interested in, as is suggested by Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines. I have yet to see a policy/guideline that forbids me from editing that article. If you can find one or would like to create one (this is a wiki after all), please let me know. Love and kisses, ScienceApologist (talk) 21:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

SA, this doesn't help your cause much. I recommend you don't touch this article. You are correct that there's no policy reason to prevent you from doing so but it really doesn't look good. JoshuaZ (talk) 21:06, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

My "cause" is to improve the encyclopedia. I am abundantly aware at this point that "it doesn't look good", but I'm not here to "look good". I'm here to improve Misplaced Pages. ScienceApologist (talk) 21:42, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Per WP:COI: "A Misplaced Pages conflict of interest (COI) is an incompatibility between the aim of Misplaced Pages, which is to produce a neutral, reliably sourced encyclopedia, and the aims of an individual editor." It's quite to clear to everyone involved that your aims in editing this particular article are incompatible with the aims of WP. Ronnotel (talk) 21:15, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

If you think that my aims as an individual editor are incompatible with the aims of Misplaced Pages, please let me know. My aims for editing this article, which you must assume I'm telling you the truth about are to improve the quality of the article and, perhaps, the overall quality of the encyclopedia by proposing an eventual merger, redirection, or perhaps deletion (though I'm not sure right yet which one of these options is best, so I've put it to the field). In any case, it would be nice for you to take that to heart considering your own stated aims outside of this website with regards to cold fusion. Hugs and kisses, ScienceApologist (talk) 21:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I do WP:AGF you, with whip cream and a cherry even. However, in response, I simply ask that you have the decency to follow WP:CONSENSUS (which, in fact, you kinda have to do as well). I have yet to read a single commenter on this page say they think it's a good idea for you to involve yourself with article. Ronnotel (talk) 21:55, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

So it's in SA's best interest to ignore Elonka's article? If anything he's pointing out that its a puff piece of a barely notable subject....who happens to be an admin. So because she's an admin her article fall under a different set of standards? Could someone please cite me the rules for editing an article about an admin if they're somehow different? Despite the bad blood between them, the edits thus far are ceratinly well within '...improving the quality...etc...' and I'm sure he knows damn well to stay inside those guidelines with this many eyes watching. Guyonthesubway (talk) 22:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

because she's an admin her article fall under a different set of standards? Absolutely not. But because she is an admin who recently took action against SA, it is in SA's best interests to let other people clean the article, while he waits on the sidelines. The odds of SA wisely choosing to do so: 0.0%  :) For better or worse. --Jaysweet (talk) 22:31, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This looks to me like a Misplaced Pages version of the old game of "I'm not touching you..." so beloved of children on long car trips. For those who haven't witnessed this cultural delight, it involves child A pointing at child B, keeping their fingertip as near as possible to child B's face or body without touching it, while repeating the magic phrase "I'm not touching you..." in a sing-song voice. I await developments with interest. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 22:49, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

SA, your comment "This is an encyclopedia anyone can edit. I'm anyone and I'm editing an article... Love and kisses.", and also, "My aims for editing this article, which you must assume I'm telling you the truth about" ..... You might want to read WP:GAME before telling people what they "must" assume. Wiki policies are not a suicide pact and users often apply judgement rather than being "rules wonks ". Barneca has capably summed up the widely held concerns. If you have a concern on the article, ask an uninvolved user to look at it for you, but this combined with mass tagging and deletion listing, with the subject being someone you have a personal agenda/"history" with, doesn't look like a purely neutral content editor at work. FT2  10:31, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I think I probably knew about GAME before you were ever an editor, FT2. Given that you have a really dodgy history when dealing with the issues that concern me (Nuerolinguistic Programing, OrangeMarlin, etc.) I take your advice with its appropriate cube of salt. I'll also note that you didn't check contribution histories very carefully. I did not create list the article for deletion. The "mass tagging", as you would have it, was justified on the talk page and is still being discussed. I am aware that Misplaced Pages editors are sometimes loath to apply the rules they trumpet when it doesn't suit them. I'm just pointing out the hypocrisy of it all. I'm telling you exactly what I'm doing and being perfectly transparent. If you have any specific problems with the diff you posted, explain it, but making vague judgements like "doesn't look like a purely neutral content editor at work" is innuendo that is probably best left at the doorstep. ScienceApologist (talk) 21:56, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Guys, it's easy, let SA edit the article....if you think that is edits are a problem, then deal with the actual edits. Just because (as discussed on WR) Elonka's own article is a walled garden doesn't mean that editors should be encouraged by all and sundry to leave it alone. Lets face it, SA is policed probably like no other editor and Elonka's article is more than likely on a long list of watchlists. So if anything untoward goes on, I'm sure there is a lot of people who will jump up and down. In the mean time, how about we let a bit of editing to occur???? And like normal, if the long list of people above who feel that SA shouldn't be editing an article....how about you jump in and improve Elonka's rather than leaving it to SA? Shot info (talk) 22:51, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

It does highlight an issue with Elonka being an admin...I suspect she should make a comment specifically encourging folks to hold her article to[REDACTED] standards...its seeming to me that folks are holding editors to a higher standard on her article. Tough to be have two sides of her presence on Misplaced Pages, and not take the appearance of something unseemly. Guyonthesubway (talk) 23:18, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

• I entirely agree that Elonka should not be taking any kind of administrative involvement in this subject area. I also feel very strongly that Martinphi, with his history of trying to rewrite policy to support his years-long campaign to downplay the mainstream scientific POV in firnge subjects, should be topic banned indefinitely from any policy page even tangentially related to fringe and pseudoscience subjects. Whether ScienceApologist's edits were a problem is harder to see, since much of what he was doing was rolling back attempts by Martinphi to either make it easier to represent the fringe views in isolation, or to weaken the guideline in other ways. And frankly I am absolutely sick of Martinphi's relentless civil POV-pushing, so I find it very easy to sympathise with SA here. Guy (Help!) 20:09, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Strong feelings are not a good basis for topic bans. If you feel that strongly about it, you should be able to assemble the evidence to back up your claims and gain support for a topic ban. As for civil POV-pushing, if there is to be any hope for Misplaced Pages, people need to be able to detect and reject POV-pushing whether it is civil or incivil. Representing a POV, and arguing that it should be represented in the appropriate articles with due weight, should, however, not be confused with pushing a POV. Pushing a point of view involves trying to unbalance articles to excessively favour a POV. The big arguments come over where the right balance lies according to WP:UNDUE. The problem is that if you get two people who interpret the sources and WP:UNDUE slightly differently and say the balance lies in one of two positions that are not really that far apart, then the arguments can be never-ending. For my part, I am sick of people arguing over minor differences in weight in articles when there are crap articles out there that need far more attention. Why 10 percent of the articles around here get 90 percent of the edits and arguments and edit wars (stats are examples only) is also rather depressing. It might be better to say that WP:UNDUE should be used to set a narrow range with an upper and lower limit (still balanced and somewhere between two unbalanced extremes), and to have a group of people with slightly differing viewpoint taking a unified stance and agreeing that the article can be somewhere in that range, rather than have groups of people arguing where the balance should fall within that narrow range. In practice, this is what happens on most articles. People edit articles to remove extreme imbalances, but don't stress over the fine-tuning of the balance. But on controversial articles, massive wars erupt over tiny shifts in balance. Which is often a waste of time and effort. In my view, more effort should be spent on other, more pressing issues facing the encyclopedia, but it is difficult to persuade volunteers where to focus their efforts. Carcharoth (talk) 22:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• Mate, have you not been watching the noticeboards? For well over a year this dispute has been rumbling on, with Martinphi and ScienceApologist slugging it out on page after page after page. The major difference between the two is that SA edits in support of WP:NPOV while MartinPhi wants to rewrite WP:NPOV to make it easier to document fringe and pseudoscience subjects in isolation without the intrusion of the cold hard light of reality. And that difference is of crucial importance according to the core goals of this project. I also feel strongly about WP:BLP, does that mean I should not enforce it? Of course not. Guy (Help!) 23:20, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• I've not looked in enough detail at the edits Martinphi does, at least not the recent ones. One day I probably will. I don't think documenting fringe and pseudoscience subjects in isolation is good, obviously, but equally when reading or trying to construct a comprehensive article about a pseudoscience topic (for example, the history of such things, rather than the science), then it is annoying in the extreme to have an insistence that the science be explained and the pseudoscience busted at every turn. Sometimes just a clear statement in the lead that something is not mainstream and is not science, should be enough. Having said that, when people bicker over policies, I'm reminded of what someone once said on a mailing list. Most of the best editors around here make good edits and write good articles in spite of, not because of the policies. In other words, they apply common sense and they already knew how to write good, comprehensive and balanced article before they ever read a Misplaced Pages policy page. The policy pages are more about teaching those who don't know how to write encyclopedia articles, what they need to know. In that sense, they are a means to an end (a means to encouraging production of a good and balanced encyclopedia), not a set of rules to beat each other over the head with. So by all means ban them both from editing the policies. In theory, it shouldn't affect the end result of the articles that get written. As for WP:BLP. As you feel strongly about it, you should be interested in the discussions at WT:BLP. I'm going over there now. Anyone care to join me? Carcharoth (talk) 00:05, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• I also support a topic ban for Martinphi from WP:NPOV, WP:FRINGE, and related policy pages. Carcharoth's comment above is excellent as far as it goes, but seems to have been made in ignorance of Martinphi's attempts to change WP:UNDUE itself. Trying to change article content to get a more sympathetic representation of one's views is fair enough, but trying to move the goalposts is just not cricket. I know, cricket doesn't have goalposts. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 22:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I suggest both Guy and SheffieldSteel read very carefully the talk page for WP:Fringe and provide diffs before you attempt to discredit another editor so extensively. Lynching is not "cricket" either.(olive (talk) 23:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC))

Strongly oppose this ban I've had doubts that an arbcom involving SA was being enforced much, but I don't know enough about it or about MartinPhi. What I will say though is that ScienceApologist is doing a good share of excellent work on fringe topics such as his work from the fringe theories noticeboard, and he should be allowed to continue that work. Sticky Parkin 23:58, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I certainly haven't read all of the above. Carcharoth, I would love for you to review my edits of the last few months. As you would expect, I see my contribution as helping to balance articles, and mainly correcting extreme examples of certain POVs. My changes to WEIGHT were mentioned above. Here they are.; . I find it no surprise that those whose POV I've worked against want me banned. In at least one case here (two?) I testified against these people at ArbCom, and their RfCs, so it's no wonder (I'm not counting ScienceApologist). They've been out to get me for years. I very much value anyone else who would take the time to evaluate my editing and give feedback. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 02:44, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't exactly ascribe to Martin's POV, but I think he can be reasonable in finding the middle ground for improving an article. Orgone comes to mind. I'm trying to work with him on Psychic, but I've been distracted by the election (sorry there). I'm going to give the weirdest opinion here. Martin and SA are both incredible assets to this project. I have a high level of respect for both. But their bickering has reached a level of background noise to me, I kind of ignore it. This isn't going to sit well with anyone, but I vote that anytime one or the other files any form of complaint against the other, that complaint gets deleted. I swear I don't care about their sniping (but I know, I might be alone), but we need both of them on the project. Given them a page somewhere they can complain about each other, we can read it for amusement, let them get it out of their system, and we can move along. These constant ANI's and threats and blocks and threatened blocks are getting boring. They both need to stop involving others, because no one is really (come on who just sighs when they see these long-winded AN/I's about one or the other) listening. I know I should take some drugs and move along. Elonka's involvement here caused it to degenerate. She should also stay away, cause she's not helping. I've got more to say, but this thread is long enough. OrangeMarlin 03:53, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Why, thank you Orangemarlin, that's great of you (: (I'm getting email with the title "Hell has frozen over.") LOL. There is lots of room to find common ground. ——Martin ☎ Ψ Φ—— 06:05, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I have to say I like Orangemarlin's suggestion of deleting any SA-Martin complaints. :-) And I feel very strongly that Elonka needs to stay away. dougweller (talk) 06:58, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

2006 hoax?

Hi, its hard to believe that anyone wrapping their userID in such a venerable garment as a toga could be here with less than serious intent. But I think I've spotted a hoax from 2006, either that or a Rhino subspecies is no longer extinct. There was also a hairy manatee edit from user:TogaParty which I suspect was also a hoax and several other edits many of which have long been reverted. Anyone into US celebrity spotting fancy checking out the remaining edits, and should this party be formally ended? ϢereSpielChequers 13:16, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I wouldn't call it hoax as much as I would call it just plain vandalism. I'll take a look through the other edits to see if anything has "stuck" for 2+ years that doesn't belong there. either way (talk) 15:02, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I've checked all the edits and fixed one that I couldn't find sources for, so I removed it based on his history. Every thing else either checks out, has been reverted, or the article is now a redirect. Thanks for pointing this out, either way (talk) 15:15, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Is it worth mentioning Western Black Rhinoceros (the extinct subpecies) in the history of the countries where it used to exist? Also, the "hairy manatee" edit looked more like a misunderstanding than a hoax. After all, as the fixing edit indicates, this manatee does have whiskers. One final thing - blocking an account that last edited two years ago (and only made a few edits) is a little bit of a waste of time. There are hundreds of such accounts out there that you could block under those criteria. If you are going to block one, you should probably find and block the others as well. Carcharoth (talk) 00:24, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

In several of his other edits, he made BLP violations by naming spouses and children of subjects which didn't exist or by saying they were from other towns. I'm perfectly fine with wasting my several minutes on the .003% chance he ever returns, either way (talk) 00:36, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

And if there are other accounts that are committing/have committed similar offenses, I'm okay with dealing with that as well, either way (talk) 00:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

If there were only a couple of errors amongst some legit edits then I would happily agf, but I brought it here because the pattern seemed to me to be superficially plausible edits that don't stack up. I read several things on Manatees before I found the one I used for the repair, and I think that the idea of the tropical Amazon Manatee being hairier than the sub tropical Florida one looks to me like a deliberate but subtle error. Yes this might be long forgotten vandalism, but there could be someone out there testing us and waiting to see how long their "test" was up for - if so blocking the account makes sense. I wonder if in instances like this we should use checkuser to identify and check other users and IP editors who used the same IP address at around that time? ϢereSpielChequers 13:01, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User talk:Tonyhenrique Last warning

Last warning was issued yesterday, user still reverts and warns all involved against consequences. Please see contribs: . Also uses User talk:189.104.207.232. Needs a block. Thanks. History2007 (talk) 13:33, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

User has not received level 2 or 3 warnings. I suggest a WP:3RR warning instead and a report to WP:AN3 if that does not help. Regards SoWhy 13:43, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

What about User talk:189.104.207.232 which is the same user? History2007 (talk) 14:06, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

How can you be sure it's the same user? Stifle (talk) 14:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

WP:DUCK-and-a-half. Seriously, spend <5 seconds looking at both contribs: . Both SPAs editing the same article, appeared at the same time, both use the same very distinctive tone and poor grammar in their edit summaries, and the IP's very first contrib has the edit summary "Think 2 times before destroy my edit again."

No comment on anything else in this dispute (I haven't read the edit war or checked for 3RR), but this is about the most obvious WP:DUCK I've ever seen... --Jaysweet (talk) 14:47, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

And the IP Geolocates to Brasil, where User talk:Tonyhenrique said he lived on the talk page he edited. History2007 (talk) 15:02, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

If so, you should file it at WP:SSP. Unless there is positive proofs, we have to assume the editor in question to be different from the IP and cannot block them for the IP's actions. SoWhy 17:45, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

That is not true. If an account an IP taken together violate 3RR, then a 3RR report can be made without a CU or confirmed SSP, assuming the degree of WP:DUCKness is obvious enough. I have seen it happen before, at least.

And dude... did you look at the contribs? Seriously? This is not a "Hmmm, looks suspicious..." This is a "user accidentally logged out and continued same conversation as if he was the same person". --Jaysweet (talk) 17:57, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

If you think they violated WP:3RR, why did you not report them at WP:AN3? SoWhy 13:05, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Wait, I was just investigating this spam de-blacklisting request on meta, which seemed to be a larger hole than what we originally blocked. This is not a simple case of vandalism, it is cross-wiki spamming. This user is involved in that, along with a handful of IPs (and possibly other accounts). May I suggest at least a strong final warning about his actions? --Dirk Beetstra 13:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

@SoWhy -- cuz I'm just the peanut gallery here, I'm just watching. Heh, to tell you the truth, I don't know if 3RR was violated because I only spent five seconds looking at the contribs. I am just trying to make sure that History2007 is not getting misinformation here.

That's the reason I keep jumping back in here... I spent all of five seconds looking at the contribs, and it was painfully obvious. In fact, it was so obvious that I'll wager if you asked Tonyhenrique, he would tell you. He made no effort to conceal it whatsoever.

So, telling History2007 "Sorry, as long as a CU hasn't been performed we have to assume they are different people" is bogus. If you want tell History2007, "Sorry, wrong forum, try WP:ANI/3RR", then that's cool. But don't tell him that we have to assume they are different people. WP:DUCK all day long. --Jaysweet (talk) 14:19, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Disruptive school project?

I thought it was odd that two similarly named editors (User:Parker229 & User:Gudhka229) would make similar, consecutive edits to Photography to add Susan Sontag quotes, but didn't look at it too closely. When the third one (User:Choi229) showed up on my watch list with more Sontag quotes, I understood it was related to a school project. After 11 such editors adding quotes and what looks like snippets of textbooks or essays, Photography is now semi-protected.

If you look at other articles edited by these users, you will find a similar pattern of good-faith edits followed (in some cases) by reverts by more experienced editors. In other cases, no one seems to be cleaning up afterwards. See the history of Internet activism where great swathes of text have been added by a series of editors with the same reference, presumably the course textbook.

I'm not sure what to do about this, but it definitely needs some more eyes. Thanks. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 15:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

• How about fixing the problem for good for the Win of all? A Wikiproject "School Projects" with good ways to proceed, sandboxes, curricula for secondary and college courses, and teacher guides? I mean, it would provide (a) a good frame in which school projects can be made good for the school and not disruptive, (b) encouragement for educators to perceive WP as a valuable resource and (c) training for future editors!

  My training in education is minimal, but I'll give whatever help might be needed; I'm sure we can summon some enthusiasm and participation from educators for this. — Coren  15:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

  • There is such a project at Misplaced Pages:School and university projects, but it only works if instructors know about it and follow the suggestions. In this case, it looks like guidance about WP was lacking and students are unfamiliar with WP policies and guidelines. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 16:04, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
    • I'm guessing this is a course in media studies. Some of the hardest hit articles are Broadcasting. Social aspects of television, Telegraphy, Social determinism, and Technological determinism if anyone wants to do some clean-up. Delicious carbuncle (talk) 17:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
      • Might it be a good idea to leave a message on each of these students' talk pages asking them to get their instructor to look at WP:SUP? Better if he does that late than never. JohnCD (talk) 17:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)
        • I hope jbmurray won't mind (especially as I don't think it's finished), but his essay at User:Jbmurray/Advice should be required reading for all educators who want to integrate Misplaced Pages into their teaching. EyeSerene 18:57, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Actually, this project arguably even more disrruptive that Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Global Economics from Marshall University, which was discussed at length on ANI in May. This one involves multiple inappropriate edits in multiple exisiting articles with intervening proper edits by others which makes reversion and clean-up very messy. Several of them edit war as well. At least the Marshall project had a central page and identified themselves so we could get in touch with them. This lot are all anonymous and there are now literally dozens of them. I've left messages on the talk pages of quite a few of them asking them to let their instructor know about this thread and Misplaced Pages:School and university projects. I don't know how effective it will be. Voceditenore (talk) 14:35, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The exact same thing happened with what looks like the same university last year, with similar amounts of less than ideal editing: see here. The instructor was contacted last time, but it doesn't seem to have helped. - MrOllie (talk) 15:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• Hopefully they will see it and get in touch. If the disruption gets out of hand, I reluctantly suggest that the alternative is to start issuing temporary blocks until someone talks to us. I hate to paint Misplaced Pages as an unwelcoming place, but we can't forever be doing damage control for these school assignments. EyeSerene 15:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Most of what they've done seems to have been tidied up. The article Hacker ethic has been considerably expanded with, to my mind, too much detail and too many explanations and references. I think the previous version of 23 October is a better article, but rather than just revert, I have made a proposal to do so on the talk page. Comments welcome. JohnCD (talk) 17:36, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Identification

The course is MAS 229 at Macquarie University. The "G. Meikle" whose book is cited in so many of the edits is the Dr Graham Meikle who runs the course.

Looking at the history of internet activism reveals that this is a problem that has been extant for more than 1 year. Around October 2007, a whole load of users whose names all ended in "MAS 214" edited that article. There are are more at around the same time in the revision history of broadcasting. There are yet more at around the same time in the revision history of photography. There are so many, in fact, that I've had to refactor them out of this text and put them in a table. MAS 214 was another of Dr Meikle's courses.

It appears that Dr Meikle is anually setting xyr students a task of editing Misplaced Pages. You can even read the instructions that the students were given for choosing their account names at User:Wumas214. Uncle G (talk) 16:33, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm really uncomfortable listing all these accounts in a table on the main page of WP:ANI. Many of those names appear to consist of first and last names; putting them in a table listing the specific class they are taking at a specific university essentially "outs" people that may have an expectation of privacy here. I've removed the table; it may or may not be appropriate to put that table somewhere else, I'm not quite sure, but I request a discussion take place before it is re-added here. Thanks, and sorry for the trouble. --barneca (talk) 17:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

No trouble barneca, you're right to err on the side of caution. The table may be useful at some point, but it's probably best if it stays out of sight for now. The thought occurs that a discussion of privacy issues should have been part of these students' preparations for their assignment... EyeSerene 18:13, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Wow. I'm taking it that "G. Meikle" doesn't have a Misplaced Pages account? (Against rule one of my, yes, unfinished little essay.) Ugh. Will try to help out with this tomorrow; I'm simply too busy today. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 19:04, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps no account, but one of his students did create an article for Graham Meikle. Perhaps if we delete it, we will get his attention. Just joking... Delicious carbuncle (talk) 19:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

That (revised) table is really disheartening :( I think that unless we can get some productive communication going, we'll need to close this project down somehow while all those articles are reviewed. Perhaps first though we should allow some time for a response - Dr. Meikle, if you read this thread via Voceditenore's messages on your students' talk pages, could we please ask you to either post here or contact one of us via talk-page/email? EyeSerene 19:22, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure if this has already been done, but I've sent an e-mail to Dr. Meikle alerting him to this discussion and the minor controversy around his students' editing. Avruch 19:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm glad I checked back here first - I just had that same thought and was looking up his email address. Thanks Avruch ;) EyeSerene 20:20, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Antisemitism from User:24.140.104.139

24.140.104.139 (talk · contribs · count) This IP address has been used for several rants to do with the Israel/Palestine conflict. Although I can see their point in some of the rants, the tone has been quite "loud" with "fucking" appearing in all but one of the rants. I think that the line has been crossed in this latest rant . The accusation that Jewish editors are Nazis (with or without the "fucking") is a recognised and highly provocative form of antisemitism and should be dealt with exctremely firmly.--Peter cohen (talk) 17:58, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

The IP is guilty of attacking Jewish editors. I've warned the IP. AdjustShift (talk) 18:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Apologies AdjustShift; while you were warning I was issuing a 24-hr block - I think the invective has reached an unacceptable level, and although I would have preferred to see prior warnings on their talk page, I think this editor needs a short break. Accusing people of being Zionist Nazis also betokens some confusion, I think... EyeSerene 18:26, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Good block. We must not tolerate personal attacks. AdjustShift (talk) 18:29, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Insufficient block. His few edits are days apart. 24 hours won't even be noticed. Baseball Bugs 19:07, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Oops, didn't check the dates. Reblocked for two weeks, and thanks BB, good catch. EyeSerene 19:12, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. 2 weeks is closer to what I was thinking of than the previosu actions.--Peter cohen (talk) 14:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Thorny problem with a newbie

Hi all - I have a problem that may need help from a non-involved admin or two. User:O'delanca is a new user (s/he's been on WP for less than a week). O'delanca's been causing a few problems with a "personal manual of style" that conflicts with Misplaced Pages's, but hopefully a bit of education will help that. that's not the major problem though. Despite being on Misplaced Pages for less than a week, he's adopted about four or five users from Misplaced Pages:Adopt-a-User's Category:Wikipedians seeking to be adopted in Adopt-a-user. I feel that a user who is very much a newbie and is already in dispute with two admins over persistent breaking of WP guidelines (and a plausible future block candidate as a result) is entirely the wrong person to be adopting users seeking help. Since I'm one of the two admins who's already got problems with him, i am also entirely the wrong person to try to sort this out, hence me coming here. Grutness...wha? 23:01, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I've notified the editor of this discussion. Toddst1 (talk) 23:05, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

And tried to explain a few things on the talk page. I agree that this editor seems to be editing in conflict with WP principles if not policy. Toddst1 (talk) 23:18, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I foresee a block in the very near future. This behavior is so strange that a checkuser might already be justified. (Look at this editor's user page. A new user?). Check the talk page. Is it normal to get into this much trouble in only a week? EdJohnston (talk) 23:23, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

Does seem a bit odd to me. ++Lar: t/c 00:43, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Likely sock of Tom Sayle (talk · contribs · count · logs · page moves · block log). Blocked. ++Lar: t/c 00:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I've cleaned up all I could find of his usual cruft and weirdness. Should I add this one to the CU page so they can check how big the latest sockfarm is? I notice he hasn't even bothered with requesting unblock this time...   08:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, sounds like a good idea. It was closed already so I didn't put up a list of the new socks I found. Except for this one, they were all already tagged as his socks though. ++Lar: t/c 14:57, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

 Done case here.   19:10, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Because it isn't specifically outlined by article talk page policy/guidelines,

I was wondering as to the status of comments that are not constructive to the project, (i.e.) comments stating one's personal opinion on the subject of the article who's corresponding talk page is the subject of the comment. May the comment be removed? Last time I checked, WP is not a forum for one's personal opinions, yet these comments seem to be allowed to stay per not strict wording in policy, guidelines, except in the case of BLP.— Dædαlus /_Improve 00:44, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Without knowing specifically what you're referring to, WP:SOAPBOX or WP:NOTAFORUM might apply here. Dayewalker (talk) 00:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I've tried listing those, but it currently isn't helping the matter at hand. If you view the most recent comment on my talk page, you will find a link to what is troubling me. I would really like the opinion of an uninvolved editor.— Dædαlus /_Improve 00:58, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Also, there is no information on what should be done with said comments. In light of BLP, they may be removed, but what about all the other areas of breaks in policy?— Dædαlus /_Improve 01:05, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The only links I see on your talk page are to policies. If you want help provide some links.--Crossmr (talk) 01:13, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

On article pages, I just invoke WP:TALK whenever I see a comment that is not about changing the article. On user pages, I only edit out if it's clear vandalism or a very harsh personal attack, and I use WP:RPA. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:23, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Specifically, I was speaking of the user, User:Jakezing, and in discussion with him, this comment. After a long discussion on our talk pages, he admitted that he knew his comment was disruptive, he also has stated that he thinks the rules of WP are dumb and stupid. As per the diff above where he admits his comment was not constructive to the article, he uses IAR as a reason for posting it, in regards to the policies WP:SOAP and WP:NOTFORUM.— Dædαlus /_Improve 04:46, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Instead of IAR, I suggest we go with a form of WP:RBI instead. Archive (not revert) the threads that don't go anywhere, warn the users, block them if they continue to just making WP:POINTy attempts to distract people, and then go on, ignoring their attempts to poison the well. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:13, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The user's behavior that was mentioned in this topic has been opened in a separate topic, listed below.— Dædαlus /_Improve 11:36, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Donation headline

Sorry but this just looks garish and needs to be shrunk, I for one don't like it at all --Thanks, Hadseys 01:44, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Welcome to the next two months of your life. The button reduces it some. Dragons flight (talk) 01:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Is it just me, or has the site slowed considerably since that banner was added? Cbrown1023 (talk · contribs) appears to be adding a gadget that will hide it for registered users. - auburnpilot talk 01:56, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• If Microsoft can implement "Don't show me this again", so should we. To take a hypothetical case, someone who's had their Incapacity Benefit stopped and is living on even less than the National Minimum Wage as a result, yet still finds time to edit here for 50% of their life, for what it's worth, might find it insulting to be reminded on every page that someone else can spare money for things other than food or heating. --Rodhullandemu 02:03, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

If you put

div#siteNotice {display: none !important}

in your personal CSS file, it will switch off this banner. It will also hide other site notices, but since the last notice (as far as I remember) was the even more horrible and annoying fundraiser banner last year, that's no loss. (Your css file is at Special:Mypage/monobook.css, if you use the default Monobook skin.) -- Eugène van der Pijll (talk) 02:01, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I guess, adblockplus for the win? I had[REDACTED] whitelisted, but since that won't go away, I'll have to change that. Protonk (talk) 02:10, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

How did they get 2 million dollars in donations in 5 minutes, anyhow? :) --Conti|✉ 02:16, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

strange, I'm not getting it for some reason.--Jac16888 (talk) 02:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It has been temporarily removed. Tiptoety 02:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

They probably removed it because it was making all these servers crawl --NE2 02:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Once it is back up, if you want to hide it, use the gadget. It really shouldn't be modified as changes are being monitored and will likely be reverted. - Rjd0060 (talk) 03:00, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It's back up...and we are slow...again. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 05:30

There is a gadget now that removes it. Tiptoety 05:31, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

ORLY? - Rjd0060 (talk) 05:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

That's great, for people who have access to their monobook page. Mine's blocked. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 05:36

Um, you do not need access to your monobook. This is a gadget, and can be found in your preferences. Tiptoety 05:38, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I thought we were talking about the thing above that needed access to your monobook page. My goof. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 05:39

Geez. This is why they invented Adblock. The magic filter is upload.wikimedia.org$script, which I just took the luxury of adding. MER-C 06:28, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for pointing out that it could be removed in preference/gadgets, wonderful, it was quite annoying. Thanks again, --CrohnieGal 13:03, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

A friend of mine who IP-surfs Misplaced Pages wants to know when the banner will be removed or chronically redesigned so that he can, I quote, "use Misplaced Pages for its intended purpose without my eyes exploding". He believes it actually interferes with regular use, and I'm not entirely in disagreement. I've switched it off in gadgets but a more acceptable solution for our readers needs to be found. Orderinchaos 14:35, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The Fundraising Campaign is supposed to run for two months. Whether the banner might be redesigned during that time, I don't know. Last year the initial banner was upgraded twice during that time. Dragons flight (talk) 16:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think anyone wants this one "upgraded" in any way... x42bn6 Talk Mess 21:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Note from Erik Moeller, who asked that it be posted in relevant discussions on en.wp:

Hello all,

I would appreciate it if you could copy & translate this message to your relevant communities; I'll also post it to a couple of the mailing lists.

First: Does Wikimedia have a funding crisis, does it need to ask people for money?

The Wikimedia Foundation is a non-profit organization, and the vast majority of its funding comes from fundraising and grants. It operates more than 300 servers which keep Misplaced Pages alive, the associated hosting and bandwidth, and the staff needed to support it. Its annual expenses for the current fiscal year amount to approximately $6 million. We have already raised $2 million of that, which leaves us with a gap of $4 million which we need to raise through donations small and large.

If we fail to meet our budgeted revenue goals during and past this fundraiser, we will eventually have to lay off staff and reduce our capacity planning for servers and bandwidth, both of which will directly affect your experience of Misplaced Pages. If you feel, for example, that developers are often slow to respond to requests, well, imagine how much worse it will be if we have to lay off some of them. If you feel that editing is often slow, imagine how much worse it will be if we cannot pay for additional servers or needed software improvements.

As you know, the world is in economic crisis. At this point in time, we do not know what the impact of this economic crisis will be on the Wikimedia Foundation. We need to meet our targets to continue to operate Misplaced Pages.

I realize that having a banner on the site you read and/or edit every day is not convenient. We plan to create a smaller (plaintext) version of the banner for signed in users. But we do not plan to reduce the banner size of the standard banner, at least not until we have a better idea of what the online fundraiser revenue will be for this year. We are doing some systematic A/B testing of different banners with different messages, and as we learn more, we will iterate the banners further.

We do need to raise the funds to operate Misplaced Pages, so that you can continue to use it, both as a reader and a contributor. Rather than invite antagonism, I want to invite your collaboration in refining and developing the banners. We are open to community suggestions here -- please feel free to post mock-ups on Meta Wiki at this page:

http://meta.wikimedia.org/Talk:Fundraising_2008/design_drafts

However, if we feel (or measure) that a banner will significantly reduce the number of donations received, we will not use it. So if your primary goal is to make the banner smaller or less "obtrusive", rather than making it more effective or at least retaining its current level of effectiveness, I don't think we'll come up with something that can replace the current banners.

Please let's remember that the Wikimedia Foundation exists to support this project's continued existence, and the Wikimedia movement internationally. This means we need to create awareness for the fact that we need to raise money, just like any other charity. This fundraising drive will run until January 15. Until then, I ask for your patience and cooperation in making it work.

Please feel free to contact me: erik(at)wikimedia(dot)org. Thanks, Erik Möller 22:10, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

-- Erik Möller Deputy Director, Wikimedia Foundation

• • Sounds like it's time for a bake sale. Baseball Bugs 00:28, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Barack Obama

If it isn't already, you might want to protect the Barack Obama page. He is projected to be President by all the major networks. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 04:07

Is there something wrong that the page needs to be protected? Bstone (talk) 04:14, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Not to my knowledge, but normally when a person is the subject of breaking news (like tonight), their page is normally protected to prevent vandalism. That is what I have seen the past, I am just giving the head's up. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 04:17

Weren't the guidelines already violated by locking all the candidate's pages all day for protectionist reasons, with the promise that it would only be til the results were in? Now people wish to keep it going? Madness. Tarc (talk) 04:19, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Madness? THIS! IS! WIKIPED... Yeah, yeah. Okay, okay... HalfShadow 04:38, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't know what the rules and regs are of protecting a page and I don't wish to upset anyone, I just wanted to give "head's up". - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 04:20

It already is locked. otherwise I bet ppl would have removed and reinserted "president elect". YellowMonkey (click here to choose Australia's next top model!) 04:21, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Umm..."Barack Hussein Obama II (pronounced /bəˈrɑːk hʊˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/; born August 4, 1961) is the junior United States Senator from Illinois and president-elect of the United States of America." Risker (talk) 04:29, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

This is a technicality, but there is a discussion on the Obama page regarding whether it is legitimate to call him the president elect before (1) the results are tallied and announced by the states, or (2) the electoral college on December 15. I know this is a simple question I should remember from civics class - presumably there is a simple, definitive answer on what to call him between now and then. People are going around editing all the Obama / election related articles to post election results. Wikidemon (talk) 04:40, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Yes, formally, he isn't President-elect until after the Electrical College meets. Maybe President-In-Waiting or something. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 04:42, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

You do have a point. Even though the electoral college will follow what is being announced tonight, I think perhaps we should wait, just to be on the safe side. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 5, 2008 @ 04:49

"Barack Obama is projected by all the major news networks to be the President Elect of the United States of America." Or you can use the McCain concession. --Tznkai (talk) 04:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

pres·i·dent-e·lect (prěz'ĭ-dənt-ĭ-lěkt') n. pl. pres·i·dents-e·lect (-dənts-) A person who has been elected president but has not yet been inducted into office. (American Heritage Dictionary, Fourth Edition). OK, that's good enough. President-Elect he is. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 05:08, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

He hasn't been elected President until the Electoral College meets. Presumptive President-Elect would work. Mlaffs (talk) 05:09, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. Obama has not been elected, and will not be the president elect until December 15, 2008 (assuming nothing happens between now and then). See Electoral College (United States) for more info. - auburnpilot talk 05:12, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Bah. It's not like the vote of the Electrical College is in the slightest doubt, and plenty of reliable sources are calling him "President-Elect" or saying he "has been elected." Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 05:24, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The reliable sources will all be saying President-elect, and[REDACTED] is required to say what the reliable sources are saying; just as the electors are required to vote for the guy whose name was on the ballot. Baseball Bugs 06:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

(I must admit I got a laugh re electrical college. Maybe a bunch of trainee tradesmen would do a better job of picking the president than the current system :P ) Orderinchaos 06:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It's done this way for what was a good reason, and arguably still is a good reason. Baseball Bugs 07:17, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

(undent) Maybe the articles talk page would be a better place to discuss this. Tiptoety 05:26, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Why is this even up for discussion? The article is semi-protected to stop anonymous IPs from editing the page, and there is clearly no warrant for full protection as the article continues to require constant updating. Timeshift (talk) 05:27, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• It was fully protected at the start of the thread. Since then the discussion has moved on. Protonk (talk) 05:33, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Fully protected? Are you sure? Protection remains semi according to what i see... Timeshift (talk) 05:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It was fully protected earlier. But was just reduced to semi. Tiptoety 05:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It was fully protected, and as I promised I reduced it to semi after the election results were certain. ~ L'Aquatique! 05:55, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Sounds good to me! Timeshift (talk) 06:01, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Magnum Crimen issues

Outside opinion desired. Magnum Crimen has been a mess of edit warring for a while. I think the RFC we tried is a microcosm of the problem. Per this and this section, User:Don Luca Brazzi and User:J. A. Comment have been reverting to the same version (removing fixed ref tags, infoboxes, subheadings) because "Any futher removal of the text 'justified' by pointlessly calling upon some rules - is damaging and unethical." I just went and removed everything unsourced. I am at the point of wanting to block for disruptive edit-warring from them but I have been too involved to do it. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 05:03, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I also gave Don Luca a warning about his reverts, but that is inappropriate, I will strike it from his talk page. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 05:08, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

This is getting farcical. I've lost count of how many times both editors have had Misplaced Pages policies explained to them, and been warned about reverting. I think it's about time we said goodbye to these two, since they are apparently dead-set on turning WP:IDHT into an editing philosophy. Indefblocked both accounts under the WP:ARBMAC provisions; review welcome. I'd strongly suggest that, should one or both come up with a sufficiently convincing unblock request, strict conditions be placed on their editing (I did consider a topic-ban, but since neither of them edit much outside of the Balkans-related articles, it would amount to the same thing as an indefblock anyway). Sanctions recorded at WP:ARBMAC. EyeSerene 08:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Problem with IP user

Within the past 24 hours, an IP (most recently, 210.55.128.254 (talk · contribs)) has taken strong offense to a deletion performed by Bjweeks (talk · contribs), claiming that the deletion reason (that the article didn't assert the person's notability, which I believe is a default CSD template deletion message (A7)) is "slander" and a "personal attack on (his/her) character". When I responded on Bjweeks' talk page in his defense imploring her to take it to OTRS, (s)he made this edit, which I read as tantamount to a legal threat. I've asked him/her to rescind the threat - twice. As I would sooner try and avoid blocking a user who doesn't appear to have any knowledge whatsoever of how Misplaced Pages works, could I get some assistance from a more diplomatic user? -Jéské Couriano 05:59, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It's a bit weird but the IP has sort of a point. Because of the sequence of events, if you Google for his name, the first hit you get is the Misplaced Pages link, which when clicked on gives a message saying that the article about him has been deleted because he is not notable. I can understand why that might seem offensive. What he wants is for the link to go away. looie496 (talk) 06:53, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The problem is a Google cache. If you look at the text, or click the cached version from the Google search, it's clear that their search engine still thinks that the article exists. Following the live link to Misplaced Pages then shows the deletion reason being auto-generated from the log.

From years back, I remember there is a way to request that Google remove the entry from their search results - but I can't for the life of me recall how and I don't have the time or energy to search for it myself right now. But, if someone (either the IP making the complaint, or someone with the Foundation) were to follow-up with Google, it can probably be resolved. Once it's gone from their search engine, it's much less likely that someone would stumble upon the deletion log summary. --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 07:06, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Does anyone else have to suppress a smile when they read that the user claims to be notable because he has been listed in "Who Is Who in the World”? As in, paid the $$x00--not to be included, you understand, but for "processing costs" of their lovely, full-color, leather-bound, gilt-edged heirloom volume??? (Sorry--that "Who's Who in American Poetry" scam still smarts a little, even though I was, like, twelve.) Gladys J Cortez 07:24, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I thought I could fix it by moving it, but I was wrong; deletion logs are trickier than I thought. He does have something of a point; Our default wording for an A7 deletion is rather insulting. I know I will no longer use the default wording when I delete something A7; no need for us to insult anybody, even unintentionally. --barneca (talk) 12:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I've tweaked MediaWiki:Deletereason-dropdown (slap me if I broke anything) to more specifically say that the article didn't assert notability, rather than hinting that the subject is non-notable (a subtle but telling difference). Further tweaks welcomed. ➨ ❝ЯEDVERS❞ a sweet and tender hooligan 15:13, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

A definite improvement, but I'd prefer removing the "importance or significance" and "notable" phrases altogether. Sooner or later, someone is going to scream that a discussion about a change to the notice belongs somewhere else besides this out-of-the-way thread, but until that happens, what would you think of "A7 (bio): Article about a real person that doesn't indicate that it meets the inclusion criteria." I know, WP:BIO is linked twice so it's not terribly efficient, but it makes up for that inefficiency by being pretty clear and non-BITEy for a newbie, IMHO. I hate to play around with the live version of the Mediawiki page, but any objection to trying this out? If it sticks, we could rephrase the other two A7's too. I think it would go a long way towards removing unnecessary and unintended offense. --barneca (talk) 15:40, 5 November 2008 (UTC) p.s. Actually, assuming WP:BOLD was invented for a reason, I've gone ahead and made the change, and started a discussion at MediaWiki talk:Deletereason-dropdown#A7 wording. Feedback welcome there. --barneca (talk) 16:06, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I agree with the basis of this complaint. The phrase "doesn't indicate importance or significance of a real person" could easily be interpreted as "indicates importance or significance less than that of a real person" or as " is of sub-human importance or significance". I find it disturbing that this template-summary has been in place for five months, but upon noticing it now I'm also surprised we didn't get a lot more complaints (count lucky stars). — CharlotteWebb 16:16, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Or even simply (as in this case I think) "this person is not important or significant". I mean, that certainly would apply to me, but I wouldn't want people going around saying that in public, or memorializing the fact for all time on Misplaced Pages. --barneca (talk) 16:23, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Happy with barneca's tweak to my tweak - the reasoning is still firmly displayed and explained, but the potential for misreading (as above) is reduced. ➨ ❝ЯEDVERS❞ a sweet and tender hooligan 16:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm satisfied that this should prevent misinterpretation in the future. However, the other part of my complaint still stands - i.e. that someone needs to tell the person on the IP that legal threats of any sort, such as what has been threatened on User talk:Bjweeks, are inappropriate here. -Jéské Couriano 19:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I was unclear that this was still an issue. I've left a note on the IP's talk page. In the spirit of IAR, though, I'd be inclined to help this person even if they don't jump through our WP:LEGAL hoop; I assume Bjweeks isn't intimidated, and being sticklers on this when the person is already ticked off probably will do more harm than good. --barneca (talk) 20:14, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The IP came back (210.86.47.140 (talk · contribs)) and left uncivil screeds on both mine and Bjweeks' page. Bjweeks has blocked him/her for a week. -Jéské Couriano 02:19, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Sigh. For what it's worth, I really did think I was helping out an upset but otherwise basically decent person. It's unclear to me now if I got trolled, or if this guy is for real but just an asshole. Either way, this AGF crap gets old sometimes. Just block him, and subsequent incarnations of him, from here on out. He pissed away his chance to get treated with respect. --barneca (talk) 03:28, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

User:The Hollabck Girl

The Hollabck Girl (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Per this version of the sockpuppeteer's recent sockpuppet, we have a few facts confirmed: It is a 13-year old middleschooler. Why is this important? Because it may mean they are editing WP from their school. If someone would mind running a CU to see if this is a school, as it would be very helpful, as then a school block might be in order. If not, then perhaps a range block. This user, as demonstrated by viewing the history of Jimbo's talk page, only has one single purpose, to change founded to co-founded. For what reason, I do not know. I guess I come here to request a range-block if one is possible.— Dædαlus /_Improve 06:28, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Requests for CheckUser is that way. Also, I am suspicious of any self-proclaimed information by vandals. If this is or isn't a 13-year old kid is unknown. -- Gogo Dodo (talk) 06:38, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The Cute 1 4 u debacle is still engraved into my mind as if it were yesterday. Block, tag, and ignore, please. bibliomaniac15 06:43, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User talk:76.167.244.204

IP sock of banned user Moleman 9000 (talk · contribs · page moves · current autoblocks · block log). IP was blocked for self-admitted socking. Block has elapsed, and banned user has returned, , , , , , , , Yngvarr (t) (c) 10:21, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Jakezing, civilty and policy violation issues,

This user has shown that he does not care about the rules, and has used IAR as an argument to support his admitted disruption of a talk page to broadcast his personal views on the subject of the article. Here is the user saying that we should ignore all the rules of wikpedia because they are dumb and stupid.

Not listed, but will if asked, he has insulted me several times, while I have not insulted him once. He views a small mistake I made because I missed a word as stupidity, and uses it as a reason to talk in a condescending tone to me.— Dædαlus /_Improve 10:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

After seeing an admin use IAR to defend unilateral deletion of articles, I'm not surprised by anything anymore. Notified him of this discussion and warned him. Notify me if he keeps it up. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 11:06, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Will do. As you can see, I have tried to discuss this edit with the user, and although I finally did get a reply, he repeated evaded my question and blanked his talk page, effectively refusing to explain how the comment was constructive/talk about it/communicate.— Dædαlus /_Improve 11:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Thats because i was questiong your own edits to see how muich of a hypocrite you were.--Jakezing (talk) 11:41, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

My edits are of little importance here. You added a POV comment to a talk page that was not constructive, which you admitted. I then removed said comment, as it was not helping the article, and it had nothing to do with helping the article, it did however have everything to do with you pushing your own opinion on the subject. You then re-added the comment, crying that I should be focusing on others, not you, and finally you accuse me of being a hypocrite. I have not posted that my opinion is the only opinion, as you continue to falsely accuse me of, what I have posted is that my opinion is cited by reliable sources. You have yet to cite a single source. Your edits and behavior are in question here, not mine. So why don't you focus on defending yourself instead of trying to toss blame. Evasion will not work here like you tried to make it work on your talk page.— Dædαlus /_Improve 11:45, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

As I have stated many, many times. The purpose of my edits on the article talk page was to weed out unconstructive edits and remove them. You outright refused to comply with a simple question: How was your comment constructive. If you had answered that instead of evading like you did, we wouldn't be in this mess, but you chose the harder path instead of the easier. True, I should have taken it straight to your talk page, but under the circumstances, that seemed rather impossible, as you deleted my every comment there. In light of this, I should have taken it directly to ANI, I admit a mistake there.— Dædαlus /_Improve 11:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Bickering on ANI will not get either of you very far. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

The user in question fails to understand basic Misplaced Pages policies such as WP:NOR, combative actions on talk pages, and refusing to get the point and edit warring. Apparently the previous two blocks haven't taught him to stop disrupting. If he gets out of hand again, block him. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs 13:04, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Obscene / threatening messages left on User talk:East718

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

WP:DENY Tiptoety 20:32, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I was unsure whether to report this here or as plain vandalism, but I've noticed a large number of vandal edits being made to the above page, all stating "I will have your heart fed to dogs and shat out for my amusement. I will then have your obsequious brain torn from your foul head so that I can use your empty skull as a piss pot." It's probably just empty threats made by some kid with nothing better to do and the vandalism is being dealt with by a bot, but I thought it would be pertinent to report it anyway, given the nature of the posts. Bettia (rawr!) 11:09, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I've semi-protected the page for a while. WP:RBI. EyeSerene 11:22, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Could somebody who understands these things check whether the IPs are open proxies? – Sadalmelik ☎ 11:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

No, it's not likely they are using open proxies, as the below person says, Grawp uses /b/. --Kanonkas :  Talk  14:18, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, crap like this is the hallmark of a Jarlaxle wether stampede. -Jéské Couriano 19:41, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I just saw this on /b/ and thought I would tell you that someone is telling users to vandalize there. Whoever is doing it is a total idiot because death threats are taken seriously but I would hasten to add that none of these threats seem even remotely plausible to me. Whoever is doing it needs to just get a life, not be reprimanded for this.--Smirking waiterboy (talk) 12:00, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Lol, not 4chan again. CWii_(BOO!|Eeek!) 20:28, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Yep, looks a rather frequent 4chan attack, nothing more. They have hit multiple users including myself, and I am sure east could care less. Ass such WP:RBI. Tiptoety 20:32, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Udom_N.

Obvious sockpuppet of Udom N. Tantiprasongchai, who was blocked for editing articles he had a COI with and continually inserted false information (even when references were given). Diffs showing this can be found in this discussion . User needs to be indefinitely blocked again and told he can only come back if he is going to cease disruptive editing and only edit articles he is not personally involved in. 121.216.77.134 (talk) 11:31, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Blocked, kthx. MaxSem 16:28, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Spam attack by user:72.184.247.213

User:72.184.247.213 is engaged in a spam attack. He's hit 19 articles so far and is adding his discussion forum to every firearms article he can see. Please stop him. Here's the dif of the warning: . Thanks. --Nukes4Tots (talk) 11:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Blocked and reverted. Report directly to WP:AIV with a link to this report if it starts up again from another IP or when block expires. ➨ ❝ЯEDVERS❞ a sweet and tender hooligan 11:56, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Will do. --Nukes4Tots (talk) 12:01, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Persisten copyright violations from User:WikiCheckee

WikiCheckee (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Her final warning for persistent copyright violations is here, and her latest copyright violation is at Image:Nokia-Phone-File-Number-6849.jpg. Notice that her reaction to the warning was to erase it with an edit summary of "Back off my page and get a life".—Kww(talk) 12:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Notice her response to this thread was to vandalise the courtesy notice of the ANI discussion, reversion of which was greeted with this by another editor.—Kww(talk) 12:59, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Blocked until they can explain these edits; I also blocked Feelgoodmusic (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) who weighed in with similar attacks at exactly the same time. They can stay blocked until they ("both") explain (although review is of course welcome, as with any indef block). ➨ ❝ЯEDVERS❞ a sweet and tender hooligan 13:12, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Agree they should stay blocked absent an extremely convincing and suitably contrite explanation. --Rodhullandemu 14:26, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Agree, wikichekee should remain blocked for good. I've had a lot of bother with her before. The other guy need to be furthr investigated. Ogioh (talk) 17:31, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Storzandbickel

• Storzandbickel (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) removing content without edit summary or discussion, despite three notices on hisTalk page: 1, 2, 3, 4. Radiopathy (talk) 15:05, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

It appears that he removed material that could violate WP:BLP or is at least rather controversial. Do you have sources for it? JodyB _talk 17:08, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Although edit summaries and responses to talk page comments would be nice, and would have prevented this misunderstanding, I agree with his removals of material for WP:BLP reasons. This wasn't vandalism, just an example of the complications that can arise when edit summaries aren't used. --barneca (talk) 17:21, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

This is kind of mild in contrast to what you say here.Radiopathy (talk) 01:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

The user continues to remove content (uncited or otherwize) in spite of being asked three times to provide edit summaries and has not responded to the templates nor to this discussion. Radiopathy (talk) 00:40, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• I'm pretty confident that username breaches our policies anyway, even if it is merely meant to hint that the user is a stoner. Guy (Help!) 18:38, 5 November 2008 (UTC)
  • Hmmm. Had to do a little Googling on that, I didn't get the reference at all. How out of touch does this make me, exactly? --barneca (talk) 19:34, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Radiopathy (talk • contribs) 01:53, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• • • When Storzandbickel was reported to AIV this morning, I declined to block because I thought this looked like a WP:BLP issue. Specifically, the deletions (, ) appeared to be remove un-sourced (and often poorly written) rumour that I was afraid could be viewed as being potentially libelous. However as BLP is not my forte, I suggested that the issue be brought here for review. Perhaps I am overly paranoid, but after getting burned once, I take BLP issues very seriously. --Kralizec! (talk) 20:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

209.20.66.205 (talk · contribs)

This anonymous editor left this message on my user talk. I believe it violates WP:NPA. What's more troubling is the editor left the comment soon after the expiration of this block just a few hours ago. Please block them. OrangeMarlin 15:03, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

A group of editors are trying to to develop an improved guideline here based on the observations made here . This is a good faith attempt to improve a guideline primarily by clarification and rearrangement. OrangeMarlin has already stated that he will oppose this version before he has even seen it. He has now repeatedly changed the text in the sandbox to the exact same text that is currently in the guideline., , . As you can imagine, if this continues this will make it next to impossible for those trying to develop a potentially improved guideline to do so if every time they look away their version is replaced by the text of the existing guideline. With the best will in the world, OrangeMarlin's edits cannot be seen as constructive good faith attempts to improve the guideline, but are rather disruptive bad faith attempts to obstruct the work of those editors. If OrangeMarlin has nothing to contribute then the least he can do is allow others the time and freedom to try to make improvements. Even once the new version is ready it will still be subject to community appraisal and so it is far from clear why this editor feels the need to act in this childish and disruptive way.209.20.66.205 (talk) 15:43, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I wasn't going to comment but since I did one of the reverts mentioned above I feel the need to clearify. First, I did the revert do to the lack of NPA & assume good faith by the edit summary and the rude comment left at OM's talk page. The IP by my count is now at 4 reverts just today against multiple editors who reverted him. He is leaving messages at others talk pages too that reverted him, the one on mine is Here. I responded as nicely as I could since I found it funny to be told this in this way. Please take note that the editor on my page signed with an account and not an IP. I am just starting to be able to see sock accounts and this sure feels like it but I could be wrong. I also would like to add that after the last edit wars to the Fringe page and the bans that occurred by it, I think the sandbox version should be deleted and the editing should be continued to be discussed at the original article. This is just my opinion of course, I am just bringing it to others attentions. --CrohnieGal 16:49, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Would you please check this account too . Thanks, --CrohnieGal 17:42, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure this is resolved. See User talk:67.220.200.2. They seem to be doing the same thing, and calling me a vandal. They have deleted tags, etc. OrangeMarlin 17:54, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Also blocked as a proxy. I'm strongly considering a brief semiprotection of these pages given the current spike in anonymized IP's and likely IP socking. MastCell  19:01, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Biophys disclosing my background.

On the recent Arbcom request Biophys (talk · contribs) in his statement put the following:

• 1. Following a WP:BATTLE on Chechens this july I was blacked out from editing on wikipedia. When I returned I found out that some justice has been done on User:Folantin, for she was banned for her disruptive behaivour. I responded with an exclamation on my talk page which translates: which reads Well Folantin did you get what you deserve? (i.e. for her very disruptive behaivour) We broke even tougher horns, but its best if someone else does it for us (the saying of breaking someones horns, is quite common in Cossack lands, it even features in our 19th century folk songs (if one cares to listen this one is about the Cossack participation in the Russo-Turkish War (1877-1878)).
  2. However User:Biophys interpreted it as if I am a criminal gangster, then on the RfAR discussion when I posted the link to the song above he claims that, I picked it up from a 1972 Soviet Film (a very good one btw) Gentlemen of Fortune, where he made an assertion that the saying originated there (despite having a different form) and came from Fenya (a Russian criminal jargon): .
  3. On top of that User:Biophys claimed that I am not a Cossack based on a simple edit to this this article. (clarification: there were only two Cossack corps in the Wehrmacht, many of them coming from the White Emerge in the Balkans, at the same time there were 17 Cossack corps in the Red Army by the end of the War. my Grandfather, third row, fourth from the left
  4. On top of that he has publicly stated that I am a member of a criminal gang (i.e. I am a leader of it now).

All I can say is when someone calls someone else a Nazi, a terrorist, when someone uses social and ethnic slurs, all this is not only offensive, but a pretext for stalling any WP:DR process. The irony is that User:Miyokan was permabanned following him publicly trying to disclose User:Biophys' identity with purpose for intimidation. --Kuban Cossack (По-балакаем?) 16:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm not seeing where he says you are part of a criminal gang, or a Nazi, or disclosing anything about your "background" aside from your editing history of Misplaced Pages (which is open to anyone for review). I think you should try to confine your dispute to a single forum, in this case arbitration, until its resolved. Misplaced Pages is not a battleground, either between ideologies or editors in conflict. Avruch 16:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I never said he called me a Nazi he stated that a: only Kuban_kazak openly admitted, using Russian criminal slang, that he belongs to a gang... and b: He is not a Cossack of course.. So in any case those two baseless statements are personally quite offensive and I think WP:NPA clearly states: that Racial, sexual, homophobic, ageist, religious, political, ethnic, or other epithets (such as against people with disabilities) directed against another contributor.... --Kuban Cossack (По-балакаем?) 17:02, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Oh blimey, this is desperate. Kuban Cossack is already subject to an ArbCom so this is just forum-shopping on her part. Moral: don't post bragging edit summaries in foreign languages (or threaten to kill world leaders using same ) if you don't want your statements to be "misinterpreted" on English Misplaced Pages. --Folantin (talk) 17:24, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

My suggestion would be to address such behavior either by requesting ArbCom intervention at the current RFAR or contacting ArbCom at arbcom-llists.wikimedia.org. MBisanz 17:31, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Miyokan was banned for discussing and alluding to the ethnicity of User:Biophys, and it was decided that such behaviour constitutes harrassment and attempts at WP:OUTING. I too was banned for so-called harrassment of Biophys based upon outing of his name and ethnicity; unfortunately I am unable to present the facts in that case, as to do so would constitute of an actual outing of Biophys (let's just say Biophy was caught sock-puppetting on Commons). At the time it was made very clear by User:FayssalF that discussion of other editors ethnicity is an absolute no-no. What Biophys has done, is gone against this direction very clearly, and given that this direction was given as a result of discussion of Biophys' ethnicity, there should be no double standards on WP which give protection to Biophys, but not to anyone else; it's hypocritical to say the least. I too would be asking for some degree of sanctions against Biophys for this. --Russavia 10:30, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

User: Caspian blue (second)

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) edits Woo Jang-choon without citations like that (1.Japanese government attempted to divert the blame to the Koreans about the assassination of Empress Myeongseong 2.Japanese is Racist 3. deleted " {"{fact}"}" and "<"references /">" ). there is my former report abuot this(Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive487#User: Caspian blue).

I was recommended some administrator to go Mediation. so I proposed Caspian blue (talk · contribs) to go Mediation. But Caspian blue (talk · contribs) rejected my proposal.(User talk:Rlevse#Comfort women)

There is Caspian blue (talk · contribs)'s message for me with his source. Then he also told WikiProject Japan's people like that I already provided him links that back up the mistreatment that Dr.Woo suffered and Bukubku ignored the "fact"..

He insists talk in Talk page. However I don't trust him. He distort his Korean source oppositely.

There is his forgery evidences.

The following is Caspian blue (talk · contribs)'s source translation.Caspian blue's source link.

우장춘의 아버지 우범선은 명성 황후가 시해되던 당시 별기군 훈련 제2대대장이었습니다. 그는 일본군 수비대와 함께 궁궐에 침입, 명성 황후의 시해를 방조했습니다. 그리고 이듬해 고종이 러시아 공관으로 피신하는 ‘아관 파천’이 일어나 일본으로 망명합니다.

Father of Woo Jang-choon was Second Battalion Commander of Korean Army when Empress Myeongseong was murdered.He(Father of Woo) entered the Royal Palace with Japanese garrison troops, and he aided the murder. Next year King Gojong refuged in the Russian legation, then he defected to Japan.

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) deleted other user's sourced article Korean King Gojong asserted that he was the criminal. Moreover Korean King Gojong ordered that cutting his head off.

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) added it is apparent that the Japanese government attempted to divert the blame to the Koreans.

그는 여기서 사카이와 결혼, 우장춘을 낳습니다. 하지만 고영근에게 암살 당해 우장춘은 일본 국적을 갖고 살았습니다.

He(Father of Woo) married with Saka, then Woo Jang-choon was born. However Woo’s father was assassinated by Go Yeong-geun. Then Woo Jang-choon grew up being Japanese nationality.

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) added Woo was segregated by other Japanese children for being a Korean.

하지만 배추나 무 등 채소의 씨를 만들 수 있는 사람과 회사는 없었습니다. 일제 강점기 동안 일본으로부터 채소 씨앗을 들여왔기 때문이었습니다. 그런데, 광복 후 우리 나라는 일본과 교류를 단절했기 때문에 채소 씨를 일본으로부터 수입할 수가 없었습니다.

However there was no people and no company which had the skill of making the seed by their own ability. Because the chinese cabbage seeds were imported from Japan when Korea was under the Japanese rule.　After independence, our country severed the relation of Japan, our country was not able to import the vegetable seed from Japan.

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) added The policy was aiming to hinder Koreans from obtaining technological knowledge and to profit from selling the seeds to Koreans at a high price.

No source article

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) wrote Dr. Woo had not changed his Korean name to Japanese -a policy aimed to assimilate Koreans into the Japanese culture. And when he was raised, he was requested to change his name; Woo abdicated from his position at the Konosu examination room.

No source article

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) wrote Koreans were forcibly drafted into the army

No source article

Caspian blue (talk · contribs) wrote Unfortunately, as a Japanese citizen, Dr. Woo was not allowed to leave Japan to Korea.

Please mediate us. We need third persons.--Bukubku (talk) 17:22, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

This looks to me like a content dispute. Since the issues between Caspian Blue and other editors have obviously gone on for quite some time, I would recommend taking it to mediation WP:MEDCAB (Note--I have absolutely NO idea who's right/wrong/anything here; I just know I've seen Caspian Blue repeatedly mentioned at AN/ANI). Also, a word of advice: when you submit issues like this, no matter the forum, it's a very good idea to be as concise as possible. I recognize the language barrier here, but this was tl;dr in any language. Gladys J Cortez 18:33, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Gladys J Cortez -- Commenting concisely on this thread: Caveat lector. --Tenmei (talk) 18:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, as an admin, I would be unlikely to act in any manner in this dispute unless some evidence that one side or the other was acting in opposition to some form of formal dispute resolution attempt. Until outside editors are brought in to mediate this in some way, there is nothing but a content dispute, and since neither side has weight of consensus there is no way to act. If Caspian Blue has been offered and refuses to participate in mediation, you can still ask for help from WP:3O or WP:RFC to get extra eyes on the articles in question, and see if some uninvolved editors can make some suggestions as to how the dispute SHOULD be resolved. Admins aren't here to resolve disputes, but we can help enforce already resolved disputes where one party or another refuses to abide by consensus. Until consensus building is attempted, however, we have nothing to act on... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 21:19, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

This has gone on long enough. File a Medcab. As for Caspian's alleged refusal thereof, he says he did not refuse Medcab. The bottom line is this constant bickering on Japan-Korea articles does no one any good. If attempts at DR have been made and can be proven, not alleged, refused by the other party then a RFAR for harassment and distortion should be filed. — Rlevse • Talk • 22:43, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Bukubku (talk · contribs)'s intentionally making a drama as ignoring normal WP:DR methods. Please stop lying about me. I clearly said such information are referenced by a Korean book attached to the article and other links. You lie again and again that I only took one source for the contested content. Bukubku is the one who has been refusing my suggestion to open a discussion for his claim at the talk page of Woo Jang-choon. Bukubku only left a note linking the previous his ANI report at the page to defame me. Bukubku's behaviors such as resorting to constant lying, defamation, racist/personal attacks against me and WP:Forum shopping to admins and falsification on sources should be reviewed. If you have any conscience, please tell me, what did I say at the end of my note at your talk page? I clearly said "So open a discussion at the Talk:Woo Jang-choon first" to you. Your harassment and fake reports to mock me again seem like your true intention.--Caspian blue 23:10, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

• Oh God, here we go again... Could someone please stuff a cork in Cas? HalfShadow 23:15, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Let's keep it cool, please. Here's a link to a possible solution; Caspian blue and Bukubku may find it helps: Misplaced Pages:Mediation Cabal/Cases/2008-11-06 Woo Jang-choon. Best wishes, Durova 01:00, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

That's a start, but this is way deeper than that one article. — Rlevse • Talk • 03:12, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Why are we here? What administrative action is requested? There is a content dispute. Is there anything that can't be resolved by the dispute resolution ladder? Jehochman 05:19, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

(ec with Jehochman) Understood. In general, it's a good idea to give standard DR an honest try: sometimes the person on the other side of the dispute is reasonable and that settles the impasse. Other times, when somebody is truly disruptive, DR helps clarify that for the community. Durova 05:21, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Should we delete reverted copyvio edits?

In this case it involves links to downloadable versions of books in copyright, on these articles: . Is simply reverting his edits enough, or should we be actually deleting from the history? Thanks. dougweller (talk) 18:52, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Different people have different opinions. My own is that reverting it is good enough. --barneca (talk) 19:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

In general we don't bother to delete revisions that contain infringing text or links to same. The vast majority of our readers wouldn't know how to find the revisions with the offending information, and virtually no one even would know it was there to look for it in the first place. We will of course delete revisions upon request from the copyright holders if they express concerns. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 19:55, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

We are, though, advised to note the removal with an appropriate edit summary and at the article talk, to guard against inadvertent restoration of the material. --Moonriddengirl 20:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

I don't think it's a good idea to put on the talk page the fact that a link to a downloadable copy of the book was deleted. This isn't a question of copyvio material actually being put into the article, but a link being added. Thanks everyone who replied. dougweller (talk) 22:11, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Ragusino revert-warring

I've taken the liberty of bringing this back from the archive as it has received no admin attention. Thanks. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 18:59, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Hi all, I'll cut right to the chase: User:Ragusino has been stirring trouble for weeks now on several Dalmatia-related biographical articles on people or noble families from the Dalmatian Republic of Ragusa , , . He has engaged in revert-warring to push his POV that's based primarily on the "fact" that he, as a supposed descendant of the noble Gondola family, possesses privilege to dictate (without any actual sources) that the articles in question must use exclusively the Italian mode of a family or person's name in the lead. In recognition of the dual culture of the Republic of Ragusa, these articles have been using both the Slavic and Italian names in the lead for a very long time. Now it would appear Ragusino has decided to try and achieve his goal by constant edit-warring, in the hope that his version will come out on top solely due to the relative obscurity of these articles. Frequently asked (by more than one editor) to try and restrain himself from reverting until discussions are finished, Ragusino did not feel the need to extensively discuss his edit-warmongering. I myself stopped reverting his POV-pushing and asked him to try and discuss with his version on top . As a consequence neither the User, or his associate User:Debona.michel (another supposed "descendant" of a noble family) found the talkpage to be of any interest after their version remained in place. In short, the nobility is restless and needs Admin attention. --DIREKTOR 17:30, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Also Ragusino/Debona.michel has been removing Slavic names under the silly argument that they've not been used before the 19th century (where allegedly they were "invented" for the cause of reintegrating old nobility names into Pan-Slavic nationalist currents of the time), even though there are plenty of attestations of Bunić, Gundulić, Palmotić and other noble patronyms in works produced by 15th, 16th, 17th century writers (which can bee seen in e.g. Croatian Wikisource or facsimile editions of their works available in digitised Web editions).

Also, Ragusino has been adding some Romance names as an alternative to Slavic names which I couldn't find anywhere (not in standard anotologies, nothing on the Web), which are presumbly his own "Italianicized" inventions, or which he copied from some old book which just lists it and does not mention whether it is a secondary Italianicization or those people actually used those names.

Ragusino should either be forced to communicate and provide verifiable evidence to support his claims, or articles such as ] should be locked for further edit-warring to be prevented. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 00:01, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

I concur. Plus, I'd add to those concerns logging out and edit warring from your everchanging IP address. See Special:Contributions/190.21.73.216 Special:Contributions/190.21.93.13 Special:Contributions/190.21.93.150 and Special:Contributions/190.21.82.68 to name just a few.
Of additional, perhaps greater concern, is Ragusino's uploading of images with highly questionable licensing rationales. See, for example where he/she says its PD because its copyright has expired in the United States and those countries with a copyright term of no more than the life of the author plus 100 years, yet the family tree in question clearly has a latest date on it of 1956. There's with the same rationale. There's which was painted by Oreste da Molin (1856-1921) (see http://www.orestedamolin.org/opere/satira.php) with the same rationale. Same rationale for an obit notice of someone who died in 1930. There's , where the subject was born in 1893, same rationale. , same rationale. , clearly somebody's own photo with the digital camera details on the image page, same rationale. which has got www.crohis.com written on it, same rationale. Plus (no kidding) with the same rationale on a photo blatantly taken at 00:49, 17 October 2008. So a variety of images, some undoubtedly his own creations, others obviously not his own, with highly questionable use rationales. Moreover, the following images have got extremely dodgy rationales , . There are lots of these, so I'm afraid somebody needs to go through the list of all Ragusino's uploads. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 14:50, 4 November 2008 (UTC)

This is a diffuse and wide-ranging complaint. Consider opening a report about the image copyrights at Misplaced Pages:Media copyright questions. Editors at that noticeboard might advise you on how to nominate the bad images for deletion. The rest of your case seems to be one of long-term edit-warring. An WP:RFC on a particular article might be a way to get started on evidence for that. Find an article where you think the problem is especially blatant. EdJohnston (talk) 21:47, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Commons

If anyone's a Commons Admin, there seems to be an issue over there at present, and I'm not sure it's being dealt with. Cheers. --Rodhullandemu 21:30, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

What sort of issue ? Nick (talk) 21:37, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

If it ain't grog, I ain't interested... LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:50, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

Commons admins fixing the vandalism, meta admins blocked, steward locked account, all clear. MBisanz 21:51, 5 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Ludwigs2

Ludwigs2 (talk · contribs)

Per this stream of personal attacks, I would ask that Ludwigs be blocked for a substantial period of time. He has been warned for civility on a number of occasions, but most recently here. Several editors have suggested I to do an RfC/U, but I find the process so ponderous (probably intentionally) that I'd rather have him blocked, so I don't have to read his continued personal attacks.OrangeMarlin 00:28, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

ah, me... I have asked Orangemarlin on numerous occasions to sit down and discuss whatever problems there are between us (diffs in a moment - (edit) here's a short list, but I can find more if required , , ), but instead he keeps dragging me into one bureaucratic mess after another. I'm happy to talk with him - can someone here get him to respond in kind? --Ludwigs2 00:34, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I'll add, this dispute arose because I was working with some other editors on a sandboxed version of wp:fringe theories: OM came in, reverted a number of other editors' edits for no real reason that I can see, and then nominated the sandbox for deletion, because it was supposedly subject to edit-warring. see the history here. --Ludwigs2 00:47, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I had requested Ludwigs to remove the personal attacks (User talk:Ludwigs2#MfD_nomination_of_Wikipedia:Fringe_theories.2Fsandbox), but he seems unable to recognize this:

in short, this request for deletion cannot be seen as anything except another petty, bureaucratic attack on me by an editor who refuses to discuss or resolve whatever personal issues he has with me. as I said, I'll userfy if need be, but (frankly) it would be sad to see him get away with this crap.

quoted from the summary of his response at the MFD page as an attack. Looks like he's focusing on and attacking the nom here rather than discussing the page in question. Yes, the two have a history - but this was non-productive. Vsmith (talk) 01:21, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I was about to give a Ludwigs2 a warning about his recent misbehavior when I noticed this discussion. I think it's time for him to be blocked yet again. --Ronz (talk) 01:30, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Just to respond to Ludwigs2, but only slightly, this ANI is strictly about his personal attacks as described above. He believes that he has a right to continue these personal attack. OrangeMarlin 01:42, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Sorry. I thought evidence of similar, recent behavior with other editors would be helpful for admins considering blocking him. The hypocrisy of these situations is embarrassing. --Ronz (talk) 01:49, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

so you seem to think, OM. frankly, I have no idea where you get that idea, and since you refuse to talk to me, I'm really at a loss to know what you would like. why don't you tell me what you're looking for, and we can start from there? --Ludwigs2 01:50, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

<- I agree with Vsmith and Ronz. Even Ludwigs2's apology for his earlier uncouth commentary here is backhanded - it ascribes motives ("you and I both know that this issue would never have arisen if someone other than I had made this page") and takes unnecessary potshots ("...find out what exactly has stuck so deep in his craw") - when discussing a compromise, of all things! Their latest post on their own talkpage also contains such thinly veiled barbs: see . I've blocked Ludwigs2 for a week, given that they've already had three previous escalating blocks stick, the last of which was four days long; review welcome. east718 // talk // email // 02:08, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• Considering the block log, that's a good length, I think. Let's hope these attacks stop. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 02:14, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• Considering his block log, he's willing to reform his behavior. Just because someone has x number of entries in a block log doesn't mean anything without context. Please, actually look into some of those situations before generically brining up the block log of an editor. -- Ned Scott 03:27, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• Which isn't to say that I agree or disagree with this block. -- Ned Scott 03:36, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• Editors have to take responsibility for their own actions. I think you're not assuming good faith that several people here have looked at his block log. I personally believe he's been given too many free passes, because hasn't been blocked for a whole host of personal attacks. OrangeMarlin 03:57, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• People coming along and using glances at the block log as a reason to endorse action has long since been a problem on Misplaced Pages. I'm just asking for context. -- Ned Scott 04:25, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Ned, it seems that you may have made a number of faulty assumptions before wading in here. I have things to do in real life, so for now I'll just say that prior blocks are usually a good basis for judging the length of any later block. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 04:31, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

With context, yes, but you provided none and instead you've resorted to personal insults. Here's his block log

Before this thread he has been blocked four times. The first time was for talk page disruption (from what I can make of it, ranting endlessly, arguing with everyone, etc) but the disruption itself was disputed (here), as was the need for any block. But I guess it's ok to count bad blocks.

Then he's blocked for edit warring, and unblocked with a promise to stop. This, however, he still seems to have a bit of a problem with (though it doesn't seem as bad as before, but I haven't looked beyond a couple of cited pages such as this).

Let's skip ahead for a moment here.. he's now blocked for some heated comments on an MFD to a sandbox page which is intended to help avoid things like the edit wars. I think I can understand why he's upset.

He does pretty good for a few months after this, but then BAM a one week block. consensus there showed that the progressive block in this case was overkill, but again, I guess we still count it since it made an entry in his log.

Looking at other pages in his talk archives I see evidence that he gets hot heated quickly, but calms down and can be very corporative. He might need a nudge every now and again before he loses himself, but blocking is not always the best way to do that.

I'm not trying to make a case about this current block. All I meant above was that simply glancing at his block log means nothing out of context. I know I'm not the only one who's noticed a problem with people who just go and say "wow, he's got past blocks" and don't do any investigation into it. I did, and I guess I should have made that better known in my first response. I certainly hope SheffieldSteel gave him the same courtesy that I did, but I have no way of knowing that from his comments here. -- Ned Scott 06:29, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Plyhmrp

I'd like to report a persistently disruptive and ill-tempered editor. Example here, here too, and here as well and more generally here. A third opinion of sorts has already been contributed, and apparently, ignored. Does anyone want to do anything about this? Non Curat Lex (talk) 01:10, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I have blocked Plyhmrp (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) for 1 month for repeated incivility and making multiple threats against other editors. This is the 4th block in less than 2 months for this sort of behavior. I'm un-resolving this for further discussion. Toddst1 (talk) 02:28, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

While much of the user's comments have been "borderline", and I don't know if I would have blocked for them individually, this diff when tied to the rest, gives me pause.

And combined with the tone and tenor of rather bad faith accusatory comments (without even a hint of supporting evidence), I think that this block has been coming for awhie.

In going over the user's contributions, I'm starting to wonder if perhaps we should start to discuss whether indef blocking might be appropriate. - jc37 02:37, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I thought similarly. I had originally marked this as resolved after blocking, but I think this is a pretty problematic editor. Given that he or she has made significant contributions, but seems to have fairly consistent and worsening behavioral problems, I think we should consider it. Toddst1 (talk) 02:49, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I have been getting odd messages from this user for quite a while. It began when I prematurely closed their RfA some time ago. Enigma 03:17, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Or he was just frustrated. A one month block, even with that, seems very excessive to me. Those are a typical response of someone who's frustrated (and most likely of a younger age), and there's better ways to deal with them than just the blunt instrument of a block. -- Ned Scott 03:23, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm inclined to possibly agree with Ned and I must wonder if the length of block is connected to the fact that the individual has a clearly distasteful POV. JoshuaZ (talk) 03:43, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

It's hard enough dealing with civil POV pushers. Why in the world would we cut an uncivil POV pusher some slack because he has a distasteful POV? Block him indef now. Save us the 3-4 more ANI threads in our future. I just went thru all 600 someodd of his edits, we aren't going to be missing much, and we'll be gaining quite a bit. I could not care less if he's not capable of behaving maturely because he's too young, or because of some other reason. A collaborative effort to create an encyclopedia is not the place for him, and the blunt instrument of a block is an excellent tool in this case. --barneca (talk) 04:14, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Eh, that's a very valid point. Indef block. JoshuaZ (talk) 05:20, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I've kept an eye on this user ever since March, when I took down his/her malformed RFA, which brought this objection and this denial that he/she had ever been warned about anything. I suggested that if he/she felt so upset about it, I could relist the RFA. Since then, I've noticed a wide variety of warnings and discussions at Plyhmrp's talk page, most of them revolving around his/her tendentious editing and abrasive manner of dealing with others. I'm not surprised this has happened, so I'll endorse the block. --Elkman 04:04, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Block indef: Hates Jews, hates some sort of people who go by the name of "Islams" (That's his word for people of Muslim faith), hates good faith users who try to help him (I'm gonna be bold and assume it's a he... No lady would ever act like this guy). Awful POV pusher who just doesn't want to understand Misplaced Pages. Scarian 04:46, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Diffs? If what you're saying is true, I'm not sure why we're even bothering with the mild behavior mentioned originally. -- Ned Scott 06:33, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Err, I think I might have read this wrong. I thought perhaps you meant he was talking to jewish editors. -- Ned Scott 06:52, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Comment -- it looks like reasonable minds differ - some thing 1 month is too much block; some want indef. Coincidentally, I am Jewish, but that part doesn't bother me. The thing is... I think we have an editor here who is smart enough to contribute if he wants to, but he doesn't want to, he wants to be, well, a jerk. I think progressive discipline with a bit of mercy should be used to TRY to correct him and TRY to impress him on the need to do things the WP way. He's only been blocked once before as far as I know - and it was a brief one. I look at this strike two. Strike three would definitely call for a "permablock," but the one month block was reasonable at this time. I appreciate the comments of ALL of the above editors and thank the admins for taking care of this situation. Cookies for all. Non Curat Lex (talk) 07:26, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

User:Beanbag2000

Beanbag2000 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log): Vandalism and BLP vio in this edit to Michelle Malkin, with obscene edit summary.

Accompanied by abuse directed to me on my talk , and further BLP vio on my talk .

Blatant vanadlaism warning left , but this was removed by Beanbag2000 and replaced with disruptive fake "you have new messages" link. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:35, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I Blocked indefinitely. Way beyond the pale.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 01:47, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Aryan supremacist as an anon

Would someone please block 68.205.26.191 (talk · contribs) for persistent anti-Jew racist vandalism? Every edit by this anon has been reverted; see this and this for examples. Thanks, WhatamIdoing (talk) 02:40, 6 November 2008 (UTC) (who is not watching this page)

Problem user: 65.254.165.214... again.

This user 65.254.165.214 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) has been blanking the Negima!? article for quite some time now, four times seven hours ago. I can't report this guy in WP:AIV because several hours have past. What can we do against this guy before he strikes again 24 hours from now? I need actions ASAP. - 上村七美 (Nanami-chan) | talkback | contribs 03:21, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I have semi-protected the page for 2 weeks. If he returns after that bring it back here. TerriersFan (talk) 03:32, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

But how about the guy himself? Like I said, he has been doing this several times periodically. He has had himself blocked once for doing so, but does the same thing after the block expired. And no matter how good his other edits are (I'm sure he is inserting misinformation), he always makes a point to blank the article. - 上村七美 (Nanami-chan) | talkback | contribs 03:44, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

He has had a level 4 warning - if he vandalises again (including inserting misinformation) then report it promptly and he will be blocked. TerriersFan (talk) 03:54, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Poss. suicide/death threat

here.   05:24, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

That IP is licensed to Windstream Communications out of Little Rock, AR. I would consider contacting the police there and let them take it from there. - NeutralHomer • Talk • November 6, 2008 @ 05:32

Contacting the ISP... Hersfold 06:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

After having been on hold for 30 minutes with the ISP, we're giving up on that tack and calling Little Rock Police directly. Hopefully they'll be able to find the person. Hersfold 06:42, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Matthewedwards (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) is currently on the phone. Hersfold 06:43, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm told that the police will be working on contacting the ISP for more information regarding who made the edit. That's all we can do. Hersfold 07:05, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Porfirio Díaz and Monroe Doctrine

Could somebody take a look at recent edits at these articles? I believe the editors may be involved with a school project. Grsz 05:32, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

• Reillydowd1 (talk · contribs)
• Lamerica1 (talk · contribs)
• 216.165.24.171 (talk · contribs)
• PoppingBottles (talk · contribs)

All using the same editing style, reads like an essay, no sourcing. Grsz 05:37, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I think the quality of writing is quite good, actually. The referencing style is all wrong, but references are there, and it's a lot easier to fix a bad referencing style than bad writing or wrong information. looie496 (talk) 06:10, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Numerous IPs doing vandal redirecting of User talk:East718

Take a look at User talk:East718. Dozens of IP addresses are being used to redirect this user talk page to I will have your heart fed to dogs and shat out for my amusement. I will then have your obsequious brain torn from your foul head so that I can use your empty skull as a piss pot The redirects are being undone by a bot operated by that user. How can this be dealt with? If nothing else it is loading up the server. Edison (talk) 05:47, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

The redirects aren't being done by a bot, they're being undone by the bot. All you have to do is protect. Grsz 05:53, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

They were being done apparently by someone capable of displaying dozens of different IP addresses. Edison (talk) 05:56, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Ya, so protect the page. Grsz 05:57, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

No point in blocking the IPs or warning them as some editors did. The usage is too transient. What is the mechanism of flipping through so many IPs to vandalize? They trace as various countries. Edison (talk) 06:00, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I imagine it is some kind of proxy network with multiple nodes like Tor. Icewedge (talk) 06:04, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Holy crap! I've given the page a much needed protection. bibliomaniac15 06:27, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Naw, the usual MO is to post an edit link on 4chan/b/ and ask people to click it (and press save) "for the luls". The best way to deal with it is just to (semi)protect as soon as you see it happening. Blocking the IPs doesn't hurt, but isn't very effective either. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 06:56, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Nothing's showing on 4chan's /b/. I guess it could be one of the other chans. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 07:06, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Mario Vargas Llosa is bein' attack'd

Grawp grabbed today's FA quite a few times. Due to his speed, I decided to semi-protect the page for a short bit; he resumed afterwards. Well, the protection I added on just now expires in about half an hour, but I'm going to sleep. If anyone could make sure to protect it again if he reactivates, I'll name my firstborn after you. Thanks much, Master of Puppets _{Call me MoP! :)} 06:28, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Admin editing protected article

Per a request I protected Sofia Shinas - the dispute was about her birthdate. Shortly after this User:DragonflySixtyseven did this edit in which he justifies his change saying 'OTRS', mentioning this also on the talk page. I felt that a bit more was needed than that and asked him for an explanation on his talk page here - another editor has also requested clarification from him (after going to my talk page first). He hasn't responded although he is making contributions. I don't think this is a very acceptable way for another admin to behave, but maybe I just don't understand something. I'd like some guidance here. Thanks. dougweller (talk) 09:22, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm trying to locate the ticket. -- lucasbfr 10:05, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I have no idea how to do that, and had hoped he would respond on his talk page with information about the ticket. dougweller (talk) 10:07, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

I'm guessing he's not around. For reference, the ticket number is 2008110310003125. Someone identifying as Sofia Shinas asked for a correction. DS is trying to ask "her" for an agent contact. There is no more information there (beside a cellphone number), so I would take it with a grain of salt (I got tricked once by an impostor at OTRS). -- lucasbfr 10:14, 6 November 2008 (UTC)

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