Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 19:31, 18 April 2015

Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Request reason:

I'm sorry for disrupting Misplaced Pages. I came here to improve the article on Gunther Holtorf. Having read this BBC article http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/special/2014/newsspec_8703/index.html I thought it would be a valuable addition to Wikiepdia to put some of that into the Misplaced Pages article https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Gunther_Holtorf&oldid=651511593, which appeared to be below par at best when compared to the BBC piece. Obviously I was wrong. Obviously on this collaborative project, it doesn't matter if you spend many hours of your free time reading, interpreting and adding information from that BBC article and creating a much better one https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Gunther_Holtorf&oldid=656850534 I was obviously completely wrong to be angry at Drmies ripping out half of that work on the basis it was made up/promotional "facebook chit chat". And it was obviously myself who was being impolite in that interaction. I'm so sorry for "vandalising" the original poor article in my anger. I can see now why the few minutes that message remained on Misplaced Pages would have been every bit as damaging to your reputation as having my facebook chit chat version in place for the few minutes it was allowed to exist as well. I am truly shocked at my failure to realise that the way people collaborate on Misplaced Pages is that one person spends hours on adding material, another spends seconds removing it, and the thanks and praise should go to the latter not the former. I'm so sorry also for not living up to your high standards of citing sources, I see now the error of putting the BBC link at the bottom under a heading called References and clearly identifying that it covered everything, obviously I was not counting on experienced Misplaced Pages people like Ian not noticing that. I must do better next time with my few hours of rigourous training. And finally I am extremely sorry for trying to improve the version you restored it to https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Gunther_Holtorf&oldid=656852120 . I tried to take your advice to heart, and remove all the bits of that version that I know were wrong having read the BBC source, and were also pretty poorly worded for an encyclopedia. My efforts were clearly so bad, so disruptive, so vandalistic https://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Gunther_Holtorf&oldid=656854756 that the original version just had to be restored I guess. I'm sure all my fellow Facebook chit chatters would be suitably embarrassed if they were ever caught trying to add the most basic information to this article or trying to remove the most basic errors. Lastly, I'm extremely sorry for calling Drmies a jerk, he's clearly an extremely nice and thoughtful person. It is of course entirely my fault for not understanding the minimalist form of communication he decided to employ on me. I am of course totally negligent in not realising which part of my improved version was made up or promotional as he claimed. Oh what a foolish and reckless person I was for calling this man an explorer. And even though that's quite literally the only piece of information I even remotely came up with myself rather than relying on the BBC source, I'm sure it's entirely my fault for not going to Drmies to politely ask what else I had made up. I'm sure he had a very long list of inventions, distortions, promotions and general chit chat crap that I had added, it must have just got lost in the post.

Decline reason:

No sensible reason to unblock given. If you apply again do not give us a wall of text, and avoid both sarcasm and irony. --Anthony Bradbury 13:00, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Request reason:

The Gunther Holtorf article is poorly written, 95% incomplete, and more importantly wrong on several points of fact. As I appear to be the only person here who cares about that, and has actually researched the subject enough to expand the article, I should be unblocked so I can get on with that task. It's a complete disgrace that such an epic journey gets such a poor writeup here. And no, Drmies, he's not my uncle and I'm not here to promote his memoirs. Have you ever considered just how arrogant and condescending you come across as? If it is deemed to be disruptive to get angry when someone like Drmies treats me with such complete and total disrespect as he did, and continues to do, then I guess I'll have to try and not let him aggravate me and work around him, if he insists on continuing to block improvements. How long that lasts depends on how willing he is to explain how my version is the trash he claims it is. So far it seems to be the case that I should simply accept his judgement. Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (talk) 16:31, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Decline reason:

There's nothing in this request that indicates that you understand why you were blocked. See also WP:NOTTHEM. OhNoitsJamie 16:51, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

If you want to make any further unblock requests, please read the guide to appealing blocks first, then use the {{unblock}} template again. If you make too many unconvincing or disruptive unblock requests, you may be prevented from editing this page until your block has expired. Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Request reason:

If you need a specific reason, I suppose I got blocked for replacing the article with a message, that's really all I can see is indicated by the 'disruptive editting' page - point making as it's described there. But I don't see how me saying that is any different to me saying I got blocked because I got angry and reacted poorly? Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (talk) 17:19, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

Decline reason:

What edits would you make if unblocked? PhilKnight (talk) 22:07, 17 April 2015 (UTC)

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Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Request reason:

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{{Unblock on hold |1=blocking administrator |2=I want to improve the ] article based on the BBC source I found (and was clearly identified in the article as a Reference), plus any others I might find in future. I thought it was pretty obvious this is what I wanted to do here, so I'm not sure why I'm being asked this question? If you want to know what specific edits I will be making, (which I think would be unreasonable, not to mention impractical), I guess I could give you a list of the first few changes, if that's what you need. I would start by correcting the obvious errors in the version I found here and which is still being displayed, such as the claim they only briefly interrupted the journey, or they became famous for their worldwide within two years of starting it (even though their original plan was a two year tour of Africa). I would remove the mention of grants, and instead clarify that while not seeking sponsorship or advertising, they did receive other assistance from Mercedes-Benz and the various governments, and clarify that it was financed both through savings accrued from a career with Lufthansa, and through sales of an atlas of Jakarta (the first one ever published) which he had produced initially as a hobby before the trip, and continued to update as a business during it. And of course I would add the most important fact which goes someway to explaining why they are "famous", that they visited X number of countries and travelled Y number of miles (as soon as I clear up which one of the various figures out there is the definitive one). I would also find another word or phrase to replace the awful use of "famous", which is entirely redundant (or should be in a well crafted article). Those are the first few edits I plan to make, which would only go so far as correcting the wholly inadequate version that currently exists. Obviously there is much more to be added before this can even hope to be called a good article. I hope there's nothing in those proposed edits that is any cause for concern. I have read everything linked about verifiability and neutrality, and I maintain I did not, and am not, violating these terms in any way. If Drmies (or anyone else) thinks otherwise, the Civil way to approach that would be to present some evidence of this (such as by pointing out specific wordings used), so that I might be able to defend myself against what appear to be serious accusations here. Similarly, in spite of the inferences made by Drmies, my interest in this article is not borne out of some personal or financial connection with either Gunther or indeed anyone else involved in it - in case that's your concern. The Civil way to approach that if you have absolutely no evidence, is to simply not say it and Assume Good Faith. I will go further and present my evidence to the contrary - every single thing I added to the article, in terms of both basic fact and sentiment, can be found in one of the two sources I clearly identified at the bottom as "References". If that's not the perfect method, then the Civil way to approach that is to help me figure out how to do it properly (but I will need someone's help, as I cannot understand the instruction pages at all). ] (]) 14:20, 18 April 2015 (UTC) As a follow up, if you're looking for general evidence that I'm not a complete incompetent and would be of value to Misplaced Pages, this might be of interest.... While trying to confirm something I'd heard recently, I just spotted some ambiguity in the ] article which could do with updating with some carefully worded changes. These would be fully verifiable (since I wasn't able to answer my question using the article here, but did find it elsewhere in a recent Guardian newspaper article). If it pleases the court, and if someone can tell me how you properly format the link part (I assume on an article as large and controversial as Clarkson's, people will rightly have a fit if I just put the url at the bottom under 'References'), I will present here the edit I would make. I have every confidence the edit is correct and would not be removed by anyone, for any reason. If it isn't, if it passes muster, then hopefully that will demonstrate that, contrary to Drmies accusations, I am not here to peddle Facebook chit-chat and am not likely to be inserting irrelevant, untrue, biased or misrepresented information into any article in future (and until such evidence is presented to the contrary, I maintain that I haven't so far either). ] (]) 15:50, 18 April 2015 (UTC) |3 = ~~~~}}

If you decline the unblock request, replace this template with the following code, substituting {{subst:Decline reason here}} with a specific rationale. Leaving the decline reason unchanged will result in display of a default reason, explaining why the request was declined.

{{unblock reviewed |1=I want to improve the ] article based on the BBC source I found (and was clearly identified in the article as a Reference), plus any others I might find in future. I thought it was pretty obvious this is what I wanted to do here, so I'm not sure why I'm being asked this question? If you want to know what specific edits I will be making, (which I think would be unreasonable, not to mention impractical), I guess I could give you a list of the first few changes, if that's what you need. I would start by correcting the obvious errors in the version I found here and which is still being displayed, such as the claim they only briefly interrupted the journey, or they became famous for their worldwide within two years of starting it (even though their original plan was a two year tour of Africa). I would remove the mention of grants, and instead clarify that while not seeking sponsorship or advertising, they did receive other assistance from Mercedes-Benz and the various governments, and clarify that it was financed both through savings accrued from a career with Lufthansa, and through sales of an atlas of Jakarta (the first one ever published) which he had produced initially as a hobby before the trip, and continued to update as a business during it. And of course I would add the most important fact which goes someway to explaining why they are "famous", that they visited X number of countries and travelled Y number of miles (as soon as I clear up which one of the various figures out there is the definitive one). I would also find another word or phrase to replace the awful use of "famous", which is entirely redundant (or should be in a well crafted article). Those are the first few edits I plan to make, which would only go so far as correcting the wholly inadequate version that currently exists. Obviously there is much more to be added before this can even hope to be called a good article. I hope there's nothing in those proposed edits that is any cause for concern. I have read everything linked about verifiability and neutrality, and I maintain I did not, and am not, violating these terms in any way. If Drmies (or anyone else) thinks otherwise, the Civil way to approach that would be to present some evidence of this (such as by pointing out specific wordings used), so that I might be able to defend myself against what appear to be serious accusations here. Similarly, in spite of the inferences made by Drmies, my interest in this article is not borne out of some personal or financial connection with either Gunther or indeed anyone else involved in it - in case that's your concern. The Civil way to approach that if you have absolutely no evidence, is to simply not say it and Assume Good Faith. I will go further and present my evidence to the contrary - every single thing I added to the article, in terms of both basic fact and sentiment, can be found in one of the two sources I clearly identified at the bottom as "References". If that's not the perfect method, then the Civil way to approach that is to help me figure out how to do it properly (but I will need someone's help, as I cannot understand the instruction pages at all). ] (]) 14:20, 18 April 2015 (UTC) As a follow up, if you're looking for general evidence that I'm not a complete incompetent and would be of value to Misplaced Pages, this might be of interest.... While trying to confirm something I'd heard recently, I just spotted some ambiguity in the ] article which could do with updating with some carefully worded changes. These would be fully verifiable (since I wasn't able to answer my question using the article here, but did find it elsewhere in a recent Guardian newspaper article). If it pleases the court, and if someone can tell me how you properly format the link part (I assume on an article as large and controversial as Clarkson's, people will rightly have a fit if I just put the url at the bottom under 'References'), I will present here the edit I would make. I have every confidence the edit is correct and would not be removed by anyone, for any reason. If it isn't, if it passes muster, then hopefully that will demonstrate that, contrary to Drmies accusations, I am not here to peddle Facebook chit-chat and am not likely to be inserting irrelevant, untrue, biased or misrepresented information into any article in future (and until such evidence is presented to the contrary, I maintain that I haven't so far either). ] (]) 15:50, 18 April 2015 (UTC) |decline = {{subst:Decline reason here}} ~~~~}}

If you accept the unblock request, replace this template with the following, substituting Accept reason here with your rationale:

{{unblock reviewed |1=I want to improve the ] article based on the BBC source I found (and was clearly identified in the article as a Reference), plus any others I might find in future. I thought it was pretty obvious this is what I wanted to do here, so I'm not sure why I'm being asked this question? If you want to know what specific edits I will be making, (which I think would be unreasonable, not to mention impractical), I guess I could give you a list of the first few changes, if that's what you need. I would start by correcting the obvious errors in the version I found here and which is still being displayed, such as the claim they only briefly interrupted the journey, or they became famous for their worldwide within two years of starting it (even though their original plan was a two year tour of Africa). I would remove the mention of grants, and instead clarify that while not seeking sponsorship or advertising, they did receive other assistance from Mercedes-Benz and the various governments, and clarify that it was financed both through savings accrued from a career with Lufthansa, and through sales of an atlas of Jakarta (the first one ever published) which he had produced initially as a hobby before the trip, and continued to update as a business during it. And of course I would add the most important fact which goes someway to explaining why they are "famous", that they visited X number of countries and travelled Y number of miles (as soon as I clear up which one of the various figures out there is the definitive one). I would also find another word or phrase to replace the awful use of "famous", which is entirely redundant (or should be in a well crafted article). Those are the first few edits I plan to make, which would only go so far as correcting the wholly inadequate version that currently exists. Obviously there is much more to be added before this can even hope to be called a good article. I hope there's nothing in those proposed edits that is any cause for concern. I have read everything linked about verifiability and neutrality, and I maintain I did not, and am not, violating these terms in any way. If Drmies (or anyone else) thinks otherwise, the Civil way to approach that would be to present some evidence of this (such as by pointing out specific wordings used), so that I might be able to defend myself against what appear to be serious accusations here. Similarly, in spite of the inferences made by Drmies, my interest in this article is not borne out of some personal or financial connection with either Gunther or indeed anyone else involved in it - in case that's your concern. The Civil way to approach that if you have absolutely no evidence, is to simply not say it and Assume Good Faith. I will go further and present my evidence to the contrary - every single thing I added to the article, in terms of both basic fact and sentiment, can be found in one of the two sources I clearly identified at the bottom as "References". If that's not the perfect method, then the Civil way to approach that is to help me figure out how to do it properly (but I will need someone's help, as I cannot understand the instruction pages at all). ] (]) 14:20, 18 April 2015 (UTC) As a follow up, if you're looking for general evidence that I'm not a complete incompetent and would be of value to Misplaced Pages, this might be of interest.... While trying to confirm something I'd heard recently, I just spotted some ambiguity in the ] article which could do with updating with some carefully worded changes. These would be fully verifiable (since I wasn't able to answer my question using the article here, but did find it elsewhere in a recent Guardian newspaper article). If it pleases the court, and if someone can tell me how you properly format the link part (I assume on an article as large and controversial as Clarkson's, people will rightly have a fit if I just put the url at the bottom under 'References'), I will present here the edit I would make. I have every confidence the edit is correct and would not be removed by anyone, for any reason. If it isn't, if it passes muster, then hopefully that will demonstrate that, contrary to Drmies accusations, I am not here to peddle Facebook chit-chat and am not likely to be inserting irrelevant, untrue, biased or misrepresented information into any article in future (and until such evidence is presented to the contrary, I maintain that I haven't so far either). ] (]) 15:50, 18 April 2015 (UTC) |accept = accept reason here ~~~~}}

Just so I know, how long do these things usually take to resolve? Should I be checking this page every hour, or once a day? I did not anticipate my participation here being a full time exercise. At what point does the whole concept of appealing a week long block become absurd? If there is confusion on the part of reviewers about what it is for, then why can't Bbb23 provide additional reasoning beyond the perfunctory link to Disruptive Editing? He's clearly monitoring the situation - preventing me from doing anything in anticipation of a return to editing. He obviously wants me to focus only on appealing and nothing else, yet all these appeals seems to be achieving is asking me questions I thought I had already answered - do I know what I did wrong - after I already said it was obviously for getting angry at Drmies and reacting inappropriately (my best guess without further input) - and now what do I plan to do if unblocked - after twice saying I want to improve the horrendously poor Gunther Holtorf article. Should I interpret this interminable delay, or Bbb23's last message, or the general disinterest beyond single one sentence declines to close the appeals, as meaning there's really no point in appealing this block at all? I honestly don't know what I've done to warrant both Bbb23 and Drmies to be making not so subtle inferences that I am simply not wanted here. This is, to me at least, a pretty mean and hostile response given what I actually did wrong, which was just replace the article with a sarcastic message, and insulting Drmies once, all in reaction to his actions, which were not Civil and did not Assume Good Faith. Bearing in mind it all occurred in the space of half an hour, that doesn't leave a lot of room for what constitutes non-"persistent" Disruptive Editing. Or is the block also for the last change, where I attempted to fix the article by removing the poor language and errors in it, without adding all the other text which Drmies claimed was just conversational unimportant crap? Which, by the way, included removing all mention of his wife - which is insensitive to say the least given her part in the story, as reflected by the source, and indeed others when you look around. It's actually pretty galling of Drmies to be claiming I inserted false or misleading information or made the article worse in any way at all. Not only did he remove information like that on spurious grounds (calling mentioning of his wife "very unencyclopedic" is frankly indefensible), he actually introduced errors into the article as he set about hacking out my work and replacing it with his version. Take this particular sentence, which was entirely his own creation - "retired in 1988. Afterward, he made and sold maps of the city of Jakarta, making money for his future travel." It is only because I did a thorough examination of the BBC source before editing the article that I know just how spectacularly wrong that is. He made the map before retiring, as a hobby. He only turned it into a business to fund the travelling after retiring. If my actions warranted a block, what does introducing, and then re-introducing, errors like that deserve? Is that less serious than an allegedly conversational writing style? I wouldn't have thought so. But apparently they warrant no warning at all, although that might simply because nobody cares enough about the article either way. Errors in it are not being corrected even after I have highlighted them here. Drmies invitation for others to improve it because I'm apparently not capable, seem to have fallen on deaf ears. His only interest in it after I was blocked was to critique the BBC journalist's own writing - he apparently read it close enough to find things in it to call "creepy", but not close enough to spot that his version was wrong, nor to spot that none of what I had added was not verifiable. And if he did finally get around to examining it close enough to critique the journalist's style, why has he not provided any examples of where I supposedly misinterpreted it? Mighty Morphin Army Ranger (talk) 19:31, 18 April 2015 (UTC)

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