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Request for advice

Hi Brad. I understand that you are busy with many things, but was hoping that you'd have time to consider a request for advice. A few days ago we held a discussion regarding WP:RIP procedures.

• Misplaced Pages talk:Deceased Wikipedians/Proposal to establish practices to be followed for deceased Wikipedians

The question of "closing" has yet to be resolved, although I doubt there would be any objections. I've noticed that you tend to be introspective, and respective of multiple view-points prior to making your very deliberate posts. In that regard, I was hoping that you'd be able to provide some suggestions on the steps that should be followed next. I had posted a request on the 'crat Notice board, but it seems to have gone largely unattended to, leading me to believe that I was looking in the wrong places. While consensus appears to be fairly clear in several items, and non-existent in others, Misplaced Pages:Policies_and_guidelines#Evaluating_the_consensus leads me to believe that it would be improper for me to make any determinations. While I have started a bulleted list in my user-space as far as a draft guideline proposal, I think it would not be proper to roll that out just yet, given that the discussion is still open. This is a rather unusual step in attempting to establish something that is technically outside our goals as an encyclopedic endeavor, so I'm as somewhat of a loss on how to proceed. I'll be traveling for a few weeks beginning the early part of next week, but would be grateful for any thoughts you may have on the matter (if you're so inclined). I've considered posting a request to WP:AN, and doing nothing at all. Being that your tenure here is much more extensive than mine, I am hoping you can offer some insight, and perhaps even a suggestion or two. Thanks Brad. — Ched :  ?  21:09, 29 April 2009 (UTC)

Don't you just love being an arbitrator?

There is currently an explicit demand from Future Perfect at Sunrise that an administrator block Avg from further editing of the RfA pages, as can be seen here. I already told him that there are bloody few if any admins who have the guts to block someone who is actively taking part in an arbitration here. He continued to apparently insist here. Oh great and glorious one, you, as an arbitrator, might be able to resolve this matter, and I have a feeling you arbitrators might be the only ones who can. I'm not going to do anything about it myself, because I'm not sure I agree with Future Perfect and I doubt I have the guts to do anything anyway. You however are a different story. Maybe either placing the block yourself or leaving a message on the evidence talk page might be of some use. Thanks, and, believe me, I mean that. Better you than me. ;) John Carter (talk) 21:42, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

I left both Avg and Future Perfect this note. I am hoping this will calm things down for the time being. The talk pages of this case have been a hard to manage, but I am doing my best. KnightLago (talk) 22:00, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Working Group for Ethnic Wars

Now see, loyal minion that I am, I did not question the wisdom of setting up the working group. I figured it was all part of a deliberate strategy of the Ministry of Peace. In defense, before I'm declared an "unperson" over at the noticeboard, it was you who broke the silence and uttered such crimethink!! --JayHenry (talk) 05:14, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for arbitration/Abd and JzG/Workshop

Sorry if I stepped on your toes. I reverted after your initial comment and asked that he just strike to keep the conversation readable. Your solution is probably best after looking further into the situation. KnightLago (talk) 23:17, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

No problem whatsoever. Yours was absolutely the right reaction although I took a different action based only on a combination of circumstances. Please see my notes on the clerks' noticeboard and the workshop talkpage. regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 23:19, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Ah, okay. Seems we are chasing each other all over the Wiki. Thanks! KnightLago (talk) 23:21, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for reverting vandalism

Thanks for reverting my first talk page vandalism. Cheers! Smallman12q (talk) 01:47, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

No problem. I went to block too, but Andandrus beat me. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:49, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

You're invited...

New York City Meetup Next: Sunday May 17th, Columbia University area Last: 03/29/2009 This box: view • talk • edit

In the afternoon, we will hold a session dedicated to meta:Wikimedia New York City activities, establish a membership process for the chapter, review the upcoming Wiki-Conference New York 2009 (planned for ~100 people at NYU this summer) and future projects like Misplaced Pages at the Library, and hold salon-style group discussions on Misplaced Pages and the other Wikimedia projects (see the March meeting's minutes).

In the evening, we'll share dinner and chat at a local restaurant, and generally enjoy ourselves and kick back.

You can add or remove your name from the New York City Meetups invite list at Misplaced Pages:Meetup/NYC/Invite list.

To keep up-to-date on local events, you can also join our mailing list.
This has been an automated delivery by BrownBot (talk) 22:13, 3 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank You

Thank you for your input. Great idea on adding the hidden text to alert other editors - I've added it to the article. My apologies if I'm being overly sensitive to the issue; I can only say in my defense - I do take my reputation here very seriously. Not solely because I edit under my real-life name, but I suppose that does play a part in my desire to keep a good reputation as well. Thanks again for your input. ;) — Ched :  ?  04:48, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

Truly trivial note

You recently asked about WP:TPG's "100 words" bit in the Abd/JzG case.

As the original author of the page, and, in particular, that bit of it, I can tell you right now what was meant: The dreaded WALL OF TEXT THAT NOBODY CAN READ BECAUSE ITS TOO LONG AND RAMBLING. I needed a guidepost for how long was "too long" when not doing things point by point, and 100 words was a crude estimate of when it was time to start thinking about trimming your text down. Note also that regular use of paragraph breaks helps alleviate the problem.

Just your bit of Wikihistory for the day. _{Luc "Somethingorother" French} 22:12, 5 May 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for the information, which I was definitely not aware of, as well as for the confirmation that someone other than the parties reads what we write on the arbitration pages. However, your post contains 107 words. Please shorten it for greater conciseness. :) Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 15:41, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

An essay of yours gathering dust

This page has been gathering dust for almost five months now. Do you intend to blow that dust off in the foreseeable future? TML (talk) 05:52, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I hope to, and thanks for noticing. The delay stems from the fact that two major sections that were going to become part of that page have spun off in different directions. One was going to be some suggestions for improving our practice and performance in the area of BLP, which is certainly the major ethical and practical issue confronting the project today, as I have written about before in various places around the wiki. My thoughts there were sort of overtaken by the polls and RfC on flagged revisions and some other discussions, as well as by the fact that I lack a magic bullet or even a magic novel suggestion for addressing these issues. I've been refining my thoughts on these problems, in part through developing a talk I gave at a New York meet-up and hope to present in a revised form this summer at Wikimania, and will be addressing them further off-wiki through blogging within the next couple of weeks on an external site that attracts a group of contributors who are familiar with Misplaced Pages as readers but (as far as I know) don't edit here, aren't vested in our culture or the way we have historically looked at issues, and might be able to help me think through some of our issues and present thoughts for resolving them. So that piece of the puzzle is on hold for the moment, but I will return to it.

Another "suggestion for improving Misplaced Pages" that has spun off in a different direction was a desire to improve the information available about editing here provided to the younger group of editors. The policy at Misplaced Pages has always been that there is no minimum age for editing, or for becoming an administrator for that matter, and I strongly support the cultural norm here that editors are judged on the quality of their contributions rather than on their ages or other inherent characteristics. That being said, it struck me that there are certain things that the younger editors should be especially careful about, and there are a few types of mistakes that they make more often than some other editors and might benefit from being advised about. (This is not to suggest that all editors of a certain age make these errors, or for that matter that editors of other ages don't make these errors, but it is a generalization caveated as such, made without reference to any specific individual, and offered for what it's worth.) So my suggestion was going to be that someone draft a page captioned something like Misplaced Pages:Guide for younger editors. But in writing up what might be on such a page, the muse got away from me, and I wound up writing the page. I haven't posted it because my attention was drawn to the comments by one of our most respected administrators suggesting that there are reasons that minors (which includes a broader age spectrum than the group I am calling "younger editors") should not edit here at all. I don't agree with that, but I've taken some of the concerns expressed in that thread and worked them into the page. I expect to post that page on-wiki for comments.

Still, I need to write up my other suggestions and finish what I started (as well as the list project I was working on, which also has sat for a couple of months). Thanks for the push. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 00:45, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

		The Barnstar of Diligence
		For impressively clear thinking, reasoning, and articulation. Dlohcierekim 01:08, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Recusal

Hi, Brad. A particular aspect of standards for recusal is addressed briefly here. Bishonen | talk 18:54, 7 May 2009 (UTC).

Thanks for the link. Commented there. Regards, Newyorkbrad (talk) 20:03, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

The Matthew Hoffman case

I'm sorry, I've already reached my maximum level of tolerance for stupidity this month, and it's only the seventh. People arguing that images contemporary to the events should be immediately removed from Misplaced Pages articles because they use the styles of that period was quite enough to put me over.

The Matthew Hoffman case was a farce and everyone knows it. Please withdraw it, delete the damn pages, and replace it with an explanation of how the Arbcom fucked up big time.

And if you don't want to do that, please work with me to make agreed-upon wording for when I take my appeal to the community.

I'm sorry, I'm just not willing to deal with all this crap anymore. I WAS ATTACKED BY SITTING ARBITRATORS ABUSING THEIR POWER IN ORDER TO FUCK OVER SOMEONE WHO DID'T IMMEDIATELY DO WHAT THEY WANTED, BUT INSTEAD ASKED FOR MORE GENERAL ADVICE.

Everyone agrees that's what happensed, it's time the fdamn arbcom admit it and stop acting as if I wasn't the victim of some massive injustice and massive abuse by them, followed by them circling waggons to protect the Arboitrator who abused his power.

So, either do the ethical thing, or help me take my appeal to the community, but don't tell me "nothing can be done" when the Arbcom has only issued a not-pology and never accepted any blame for fucking me over. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 19:25, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I'll probably be calmer tomorrow. You may want to wait to reply until then. Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 19:36, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Point of information

I got your message and I appreciate it, I can't reply easily due to issues with my ADSL connection and firewall changes at work. I'm typing this on the train on the way in for a very long weekend moving 200 people into my office.

Your comments are accurate and fair with one exception: unless I am going mad, I don't think I blacklisted anything on Meta. I requested blacklisting of one domain, this was reviewed and enacted by another meta admin - or that's my memory of it. The log pages are not easy to read always. Also I would note that I posted blacklisting and the topic ban for Jed Rothwell for review at the appropriate venues at the time; I do not really understand why Rothwell was not included in the original case, as he was always the major pro-CF advocate on that article. Subsequent debates endorsed these actions; Abd's main point appears to be that he wants some kind of "recusal" and he interprets that as taking no further action - as editor or as administrator - in respect of that article or dispute, as well as wanting those actions reversed. His main beef seems to me to be that every time he asks for the sites to be removed from the blacklist, I defend my judgment of their (lack of) merit and the problems around their past use. He appears to want this to stop, so that he can get the blacklisting rescinded without my input. All actions were posted for review, were reviewed (several times in several venues) and the conclusion seemed to be that the actions were right even if I was not the right person to take them - I accepted that at the time and have held to that, but that does not mean I am in some way bound to leave the article alone. I am still entitled to have and to express an opinion. I believe your comments make that point well. Thanks, Guy (Help!) 06:38, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Question about the Abd / JzG case

Hi Newyorkbrad, I am hoping you will answer a quick question for me on the Abd / JzG case. Looking at your finding of fact on the nature of the dispute, you refer to three areas. Are these the only areas where the arbitrators will consider evidence? I ask because I think there are grounds for findings on Abd relating to disruption other than his zealous pursuit of DR. However, I have yet to see any post that really puts forward the evidence in a concise and coherent manner. I am willing to put in the effort to try and present such evidence, but only if there is any point in so doing. Obviously I am not asking for any sort of guarantee as to the weight that any such evidence might be given, nor as to whether any sanction might follow. But, if Abd's behaviour and editing in relation to cold fusion and the case more broadly - where JzG is uninvolved - is outside the scope of what the arbitrators will consider then there is no point in my putting in the effort to prepare the evidence. Thanks, EdChem (talk) 07:45, 8 May 2009 (UTC)