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Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Hkelkar 2

I am publicly soliciting, the unbiased and honest opinion of the esteemed members of the community in this case. Some of the ArbCom members seem bent on closing the case prematurely. Please take time to view the on-wiki evidence that was produced by me – , and the rest of the pages as well.

• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Hkelkar 2/Workshop
• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Hkelkar 2/Evidence
• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Hkelkar 2/Proposed decision

Please take time to comment on the pages, your opinion would help avoid a grave and serious miscarriage of justice. Sincerely, — Nearly Headless Nick 17:25, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

It seems the best thing to do in this case is discuss your issues on the arbitration talk pages, if the arbs wish to comment, they will do. Sorry, but bringing it here seems like your canvassing to get admins desysopped. I strongly disagree of your ascertaion that there's a grave and serious miscarriage of justice about to happen. Regards, Ryan Postlethwaite 17:31, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Kindly review WP:CANVASS. — Nearly Headless Nick 17:36, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

I just get the impression over the past 2 days that you are determined to see Ramas arrow desysopped, and the only way to do that is on the arbitration pages - on AN, you were leading people to your evidence and therefore your personal view on the matter - that's why I see it as canvassing, and it's certainy not unbiased with your active role in the case. Ryan Postlethwaite 17:39, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Our actions should determine our future and nothing else. As for your canvassing allegations, I must remind you to review WP:CANVASS again, this is a neutral venue and the community can comment in an unbiased manner. — Nearly Headless Nick 17:46, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Whilst I respectfully disagree that this isn't canvassing (if this was an RfA or AfD then I'm sure you would see it as canvassing), I'll let others comment instead. Ryan Postlethwaite 17:51, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Given that Rama's Arrow (who's on the other side of the case) also seems to be claiming the case is being closed prematurely (correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks clear from the discussion here), I don't see Nick's post as out-of-line. - Merzbow 18:58, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I'm sure none of you will like me for saying this, but I can understand the Arbitrators' rationale. As far as I can see, it was either a case of banning the lot of you or letting you all off the hook. I also rather think this is meant to be regarded as final warning.

And this silly nationalist bickering is a waste of time. Find some adorable ladies and fight over them instead, much more worthwhile. And do it off-wiki. Moreschi 19:04, 27 May 2007 (UTC) And don't propose motions congratulating yourself in ArbCom workshops, either, it doesn't come across well.

I'm all for desysopping RA.--D-Boy 20:55, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Rama's Arrow blocked Anwar saadat, three days ago, for no reason at all, citing edit-warring as a reason, when there was no edit-war. Rama's Arrow also reverted Anwar on the pages on which he alleged that Anwar was edit-warring. The community ought to take a serious view of this. — Nearly Headless Nick 03:28, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Inflammatory Blockage Template

User:Can't sleep, clown will eat me is one of the finest anti-vandalism Admins active today, but I must comment that the account blockage template used on User talk:82.7.200.10 is perhaps amusing, but is inappropriate in tone. Admins should not be mocking vandals -- they should try to educate them, and encourage them to return to the Misplaced Pages fold post-block as positive contributors. BTW, I am not permitted to leave messages on User talk:Can't sleep, clown will eat me, so I decided to comment here. WikiBully 20:17, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Sometimes a little humor is a good time. The template doesn't bother me.--Alabamaboy 20:19, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Of much greater interest to me is why you're not permitted to user CSCWEM's talk page, to be perfectly honest... the template is fine. EVula // talk // ☯ // 20:23, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

WikiBully can't edit that page yet because the account was just registered two days ago, and CSCWEM's talk is semiprotected. Newyorkbrad 21:42, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah, alrighty. I thought there may have been some sort of history between the two editors, which would suggest that this might be a bad faith post. If we dismiss my paranoid ramblings as just example that I shouldn't go off my meds (*twitch*), my opinion that the template was fine still stands. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 21:50, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

There is zero history. That's why I made sure to say that User:Can't sleep, clown will eat me is a great editor, though I think the blockage template is unwisely provocative. WikiBully 00:28, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

It harks back to a few years ago when block messages were frequently of that nature. Viridae 14:03, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I hate to say it, but I had a wikistalker that wouldn't hesitate to publicly praise me, yet still harass me. However, we're going off on a major tangent that is largely my fault, so I'm gonna just drop it... EVula // talk // ☯ // 21:01, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

<shrug> You know, I'm aware that it doesn't matter much, and it's a bogus argument but... about that template... ILIKEIT. Philippe 21:13, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I can see how that template might be annoying to the person receiving it, but I can also see how it wouldn't be, so I guess I'd have to hear it from one or more of them. It is a little odd, at first glance, to act like we're rewarding people for vandalism...but then, if they thought not editing Misplaced Pages was such a relief, they could just not do it in the first place. Instead, it may have the effect of instilling in people a sense that Misplaced Pages is a fun place and rewarding community to be a part of, so it might be a handy reforming tool. Anyway, speculation. I think the template is harmless, even sort of cute, but you don't have to agree with the cute part if you don't want to. --Masamage ♫ 21:18, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Rbj blocked

I have indef blocked User:Rbj per this. He has not edited logged in since then but has been using IPs to continue to harass Orangemarlin. KillerChihuahua 21:33, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

How unfortunate. I had some hope this editor might be redeemable but using anon IPs to insult and vandalize other users seems to be pretty over the line. This user has exhausted community patience. JoshuaZ 00:31, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I think Rbj took the news that he was near banning, and instead of using it as an opportunity, he decided to abandon the account and get even. It would appear he's chosen to be irrecoverable. The block makes sense. Prepare for a few more weeks of IP whacking, though. ··coelacan 03:48, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I am reviewing Rbj's unblock request, in which he claims it was not he that committed the alleged IP harrassing. To evaluate these claims, could someone please post some diffs of Rbj's prior harrassments and the new IP harrassments for comparison? Thanks, Sandstein 05:07, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I need them also. I'll run checkuser if I get them. Fred Bauder 05:14, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Here's a couple: this bit of incivility, calling other editors' work "dog-shit", saying "you guys think your own shit don't stink", threatening meatpuppetry, and characterizing another editors' arguments as "bullshit". These are all completely over-the-top and just a sample of what the community had to put up with; his comments to Odd Nature/151. are clear harrassment. There was broad support a full indef ban after several discussions here: and here: If he's unblocked I and a number of his other targets will restart that discussion to secure an indef ban. FeloniousMonk 05:43, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I've had no previous experience with this editor, but it appears clear that he has been highly incivil and disruptive in the past, as per the diffs provided. Now, though, I am reviewing a block based on recent harrassment as an IP. Can someone provide diffs for that, please? Sandstein 06:21, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I thought that these comments were characteristically similar. Take these IPs for checkuser: 70.108.92.189 (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) 68.100.207.219 (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki). Also, I suggest establishing contact with Killerchihuahua before making any move. ··coelacan 07:49, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I've left them a note on their talk page. In case the checkuser is inconclusive, it would help to hear why the blocking admin assumes this IP trolling originates with Rbj, apart from the fact that its target is a user Rbj has apparently previously attacked. Sandstein 09:01, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Hang on, I haven't had coffee yet - I will do what I can. Pls be patient. Also mentioning there was no opposition to an indef in this thread unless you count my hesitation in indef blocking without giving him one last chance. EVula took that as sufficient doubt about indef blocking, and reversed his indef of the editor. I state now for the record I personally think he should have been indef'd some time ago, and regret even mentioning a Last Chance, as this editor has been nothing but hateful and disruptive. If your look at the diffs provided in the earlier thread, and the posts on his talk page ], you will see the statement that "i have little respect for the authenticity of Orange's religious sense of offense. <snip> this "offense" he takes here is a pretext." Basically, Rbj edited OM's post on an article talk page in a manner calculated to be a swipe at OM's religious beliefs. He then said he didn't believe OM was actually offended, and made it a case for further attacks on OM, more or less weirdly saying OM was only pretending to be Jewish, so he could pretend to be offended, as some kind of setup for Rbj - completely ignoring that multiple editors were expressing horror at the edit Rbj had made, and an anti-semitic edit is offensive on its own, whether or not the target is a practicing Jew of whatever level of othodoxy. "i have little respect for the authenticity of Orange's religious sense of offense". He characterized the outrage at his actions "phony" several times and showed no appreciation for how unacceptable his actions were. I can dig out more diffs, but most of it is linked in the this thread previous ANI thread, which links an earlier thread, as well as his talk page at the place linked above. Any brief perusal of his contribs will show multiple nasty personal attacks within a few clicks. He's shown no remorse, no intent to even consider being more civil, and I have no idea why anyone would consider unblocking this highly disruptive, anti-semitic, hostile and accusatory troll. But hey, if you decide to unblock I'm not worried. I disagree, strongly, but I'm not worried about much further damage to the project or its volunteers. I'll just keep blocking the IPs when they make their hateful posts, which make the same kinds of attacks Rbj has made against OM, and eventually even the DC area will run out of IPs Rbj can use to continue his hateful harassment of this editor. According to cu, he's always edited from a range of IPs, so cu cannot confirm - but tellingly, cannot clear. A formal cu was not run, feel free to do but you'll get a "likely" or an "unable to deterimine" and not a postive yea or nay. Who else would be making identical attacks to the ones Rbj made, from multiple IPs? this isn't rocket science. Calling OM a fake jew, a POV pusher, and a liar is Rbj right down the line. I will go for coffee now and return once my brain is working: if I've been unclear or more diffs are desired, or there are any questions, I will be happy to address them. Apologies for the pre-coffee disorganized nature of this response. KillerChihuahua 12:20, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a girl... I'll blame it on the coffee. :P EVula // talk // ☯ // 15:48, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

My deepest apologies. KillerChihuahua 16:36, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

You're not the first person to make that mistake, and sadly, probably not the last... I've been dealing with it for, oh, about nine years now (damn "a" at the end of my name!). Don't worry about it. :) EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:39, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Everyone keeps calling me "he" too - do you think we should switch unames for a week, see how that works out? (This is a joke, for those of you who worry about such things) KillerChihuahua 17:41, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I support the block - it's long overdue. Guettarda 14:17, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

As suggested checkuser, does not produce useful results. I might support hearing an appeal of his indefinite ban in order to consider an alternative remedy (I favor frequent short blocks rather than indefinite bans for his sort of behavior) but will not unblock him at this time. Fred Bauder 14:53, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I've been enjoying my holiday weekend, so I'm embarrassed that I didn't offer more information. I was attacked by several anonymous editor whom I believe are sockpuppets of RBJ. Here and here, I was attacked by User:70.108.92.189. This was an attack by User:68.100.207.219. And finally, another attack by User:80.213.213.126. Much of what was written fits into Rbj's anti-Semitic rants, rude and profane language, and other activities. Block him forever. Orangemarlin 14:57, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I'll refrain from reviewing Rbj's still-open unblock request in favour of an admin with some experience with his user. Lacking that, I can't fairly determine whether it is sufficiently probable that Rbj is behind the IP attacks that have triggered the contested block. Sandstein 15:06, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

They might be meatpuppets rather than Rbj editing anonymously, but Rbj must have had something to do with this, probably making a complaint in a chatroom or forum or something like that. (I tried to google for it, but it's difficult: I keep turning up Misplaced Pages mirrors but don't want to exclude "Misplaced Pages" since it may well be mentioned in the thread.) Anyway, I think Rbj has had his share of chances and then some, and we don't need to give him any more. Mangojuice 15:25, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

What about excluding "en.wikipedia.org" instead? That might work to take out some of the mirrors, but not exclude a passing reference. EVula // talk // ☯ // 16:39, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Support the block. Considering his 19(!) previous blocks, Guettarda is right, this was long overdue. FeloniousMonk 15:43, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

19, eh? I don't recall seeng anything indicating that Misplaced Pages needs to undertake massive reclamation projects regarding disruptive editors (as seems to have been the case here). The time for an indef passed about 10 blocks ago. &#0149;Jim62sch&#0149; 18:46, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

for your convenience:

Rbj, in his unblock request, points to an edit he made while evading a previous block: 71.161.209.24 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). This IP resolves to Verizon in Reston, VA. The IP I noticed, 70.108.92.189 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log), resolves to Verzon in Reston, VA. The posts made by 70.108.92.189 consist of ten attacks on OM, which include:

• 22:56, 15 May 2007 Replacing page with "What a loser you are"
• 23:00, 15 May 2007 "Orangemarlin is a sockpuppet of a Misplaced Pages administrator who pretends to know much more than he actually knows."
• 10:39, 20 May 2007 Warning. "If you deal with Orangemarlin and his aliases, you're dealing with a liar, a jerk and an imposter."

The edits are all on the dates 15 May 2007, 19 May 2007, and 20 May 2007. 15 May 2007 was when Rbj was blocked and unblocked by EVula, and Rbj was informed he would be indef blocked if he made another personal attack.

68.100.207.219 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) resolves to COX in Atlanta. Starting on 13 May 2007 a series of attacks were placed on OM's talk page, including three, on 19 May 2007, to the section User:Wendyow) - where 70.108.92.189 also made several posts. The posts were:

• 68.100.207.219: 13:57, 19 May 2007 "No, people hate you. They think they hate Jews, but they actually hate you. I don't hate you. I pity you and the Jews who are the victim of your intolerant arrogant overbearing attitude. Your actions elicit a reaction in others who wrongly think you are representative of Jews. That's sad. (P) My question is why do you pretend to be something you are not on your user page?"
• 68.100.207.219: 16:11, 19 May 2007 "Ad hominem attacks are your trademark. Stick to name calling. It's quite amusing because no matter how long you keep up the charade, you can't fool yourself."
• 68.100.207.219: 17:08, 19 May 2007 "Why don't you just admit you're an imposter?"

19:57, 19 May 2007 Firsfon of Rochester stated that he's blocked 68.100.207.219 for one week.

• 70.108.92.189: 10:38, 20 May 2007 "This has nothing to do with a Jewish cabal or anti-semitism. It has to do with Orangemarlin being a jerk, an imposter and a sockpuppet."
• 70.108.92.189: 10:39, 20 May 2007 "Warning. If you deal with Orangemarlin and his aliases, you're dealing with a liar, a jerk and an imposter."
• 70.108.92.189: 10:42, 20 May 2007 "You're fighting a losing battle. This guy is a raging fanatic who oppresses all viewpoints other than his own. No rational persone questions whether Jesus lived or not. Rather, such talk is just an attempt to diminish the spiritual beliefs of others. His motive is simple and obvious. The dude you are fighting is so devoid of any spiritual life and empty inside that he feels the need to attack others to better convince himself of his own righteousness."

15:55, 20 May 2007 Firsfon of Rochester protected OM's talk page. Looks to me as though it was the same person in the DC area on the 19th, and in Atlanta on the 20th. Compare the insults to those Rbj himself made:

• 01:33, 26 April 2007 tell the other editors to stop misrepresenting me. tell them to stop lying.
• 15:49, 2 May 2007 "except for abusive admins and naked POV pushers, i am not too worried about my reputation here." ... " i have little respect for the authenticity of Orange's religious sense of offense. indeed, he makes it pretty clear that he is not. this "offense" he takes here is a pretext. it's as phony as the myriad statements of "fact" he makes (which are just his opinion) and insists on giving the status of fact. he can take refuge in his Mercedes driven by his chaffeur (if that really is the case). in fact, i would expect anyone alledgedly trained in a hard science to have a bit more critical thinking. "
• 21:46, 2 May 2007 "... i have some serious disrespect for Orange ... he is just one of a bunch of POV-pushing editors that will stoop to any level of misrepresentation to obscure the fact that they want their heavily biased anti-ID POV (which he admits to freely) represented in the article. this is a phony little pretext that i regret offering to this bunch of POV-pushers."

He also states he's going to appeal to Jimbo: " if it were indefinite, i guess i'd have to bug Jimbo again" + " Jimbo has reversed the action of the admin (the count is 3 to 0 now)" this on his previous block, for 24 hours - this would be the one by JoshuaZ, before the indef EVula made and undid.

Hope this helps. KillerChihuahua 17:35, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Deletion concern

Would it be possible to implement the ability for regular users to view the history and past revisions of articles even after they are deleted? I've been frustrated lately at editors for nominating articles like this one for deletion due to a lack of sources, because by deleting them, all that is being done is preventing editors from being able to add reliable sources and improve the article, while destroying editors hard work. If it were possible to view old revisions of the articles, I wouldn't be so against the deletion, because this way, editors would still be able to look over the article's content, make improvements, and eventually recreate it, without just having to start from scratch, when the quality of the content wasn't in question to begin with.--Azer Red Si? 01:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• If all users could see deleted articles, then what would be the point of deleting them? The point of deletion is to hide things, because deletion is literally just flagging revisions to hide them, and undeletion is unflagging them, making them visible again. Plus, those lucky two dozen or so people with oversight would have a lot more work to do: if copyvios were still visible, they might as well have never been deleted, and this would neutralize the deletions of all the tens of thousands of unfree images and articles admins have deleted over the years. All attack pages, too, would need to be oversighted, to assuage libel concerns. To put it simply, letting everybody see deleted articles soundly defeats the purpose of deletion. If you must see things, the Google cache is quite available, and there are admins who will email you copies. Picaroon (Talk) 02:02, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • There was also a lengthy discussion here as well. Sr13 03:03, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• Replied on the deletion discussion. What you describe is more like userfying, the article gets restored in user space to be worked on (and it has to be worked on, not just indefinite free web hosting), that way the issues of the AFD can be addressed and potentially moved back to mainspace. Clearly the outcome of the AFD will determine how easy it is going to be to address the issues the AFD raises. --pgk 07:58, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I note that at the aforelinked AFD discussion Azer Red states that the "majority of articles are made up mostly of OR" and uses that to argue that our Misplaced Pages:No original research policy should not apply. I also note that sources were requested for this article over 3 months ago, contrary to the assertions that editors have "not had the chance to try" to find sources. It appears that Azer Red's lack of agreement with our fundamental content policies and name-calling of other editors is the actual problem here, not deletion.

  Always work from, and cite, sources. Encyclopaedia content must be verifiable and free from original research. This is not an issue for the administrators' noticeboard. Uncle G 13:31, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

"Deletionist" is a derogatory name. There's a whole category of editors who call themselves "deletionists", but you're right, I agree that I shouldn't be lumping all of the people who support these deletions into the same category. Also, I didn't say that the no OR policy shouldn't apply, but I said that if it does apply, it should apply in full, not just in random cases like this. I personally think that OR alone shouldn't be enough to allow for an article to be deleted, but I don't understand why those who do think so don't enforce the policy consistantly. --Azer Red Si? 19:02, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Comment - Could it be made so that admins can choose whether or not to allow the history of deleted articles to be viewed by regular users? I understand concerns about seeing past revisions of copyvio stuff, so if admins could choose whether or not to leave the history, this could solve that problem while still solving the problem of editors' work being lost.--Azer Red Si? 19:18, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

I believe WP:USERFY does everything you want. ··coelacan 21:19, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Merkey

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Folks, I have blocked Jeffrey Vernon Merkey (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) to prevent further disruption to the project. It is clear from Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey2 that (a) pretty much everyone but Merkey thinks he's a problem and (b) Merkey thinks that's because everyone but him is wrong about that. Points suuch as his claim on the RfC that being a financial contributor to the Foundation gives him special rights, and his ludicrous (now deleted) Misplaced Pages:Right to Edit make it perfectly plain that anything which conflicts with his belief in his inalienable right to do what he wants, is necessarily wrong. And he will pursue that agenda everywhere he can find an audience - I have rarely seen more blatant forum shopping. So: I have blocked him for the purpose of containing his disruption to a single locus, his talk page, where we can talk to him or ignore him as we each see fit, until such time as he chooses to stop the nonsense. Please don't protect his Talk unless he makes a real nbuisance of himself with {{unblock}}. Guy (Help!) 10:59, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• Unfortunately, I have to support this, even with the massive shitstorm this could potentially unleash, because it's the right thing to do. He. just. Does. Not. Get. It. He's drifted more and more off the plot with each and every edit he's made. SirFozzie 12:12, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I state no position on other matters. But I endorse the speedy deletion of Misplaced Pages:Right to Edit. Had it come to MFD, there would have almost certainly been a unanimous chorus of opinions to delete from all experienced Misplaced Pages editors, with much discussion of why it was wrong. We can do without the additional drain on everyone's time that that would involve. The issues that the editor clearly wanted to raise therein have are already been raised by xem at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey2 and can be (and are being) discussed by the community there. Uncle G 12:43, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• Misplaced Pages:Right to Edit was one of funniest things I've read for a long time - please, someone, send it over to Uncyclopedia - but Misplaced Pages is not solely designed for humour, lamentably. Merkey's edits have become so far divorced from the reality of what you can and cannot do that I don't think we've been left with any option other than ridding ourselves of the disruption he causes. Moreschi 13:39, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I agree the block is necessary to prevent his continued disruption. A corollary is that anyone who has come to Misplaced Pages to fight with him should be shown the door. Tom Harrison 14:48, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• As one of the original proponents that he be unblocked, I agree that he should probably be blocked indefinitely again. He deserved the chance he was given, but he was disruptive. I understand that there are other users who have been bothering him; that doesn't excuse his actions and attitude in conflicts. Ral315 » 14:56, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• He was given a second chance to be a constructive Wikipedian and has spent almost all his time arguing (badly) rather than actually improving Misplaced Pages. I support this block and strongly advise against any third chances - it's not worth it. --Tango 15:34, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I endorse this block and commend Guy for having the common sense to see that Merkey's presence was much more of a hindrance than a benefit. His comments showed that he had no interest in following policy and was using every possible opportunity for rather incoherent soapboxing. Blocking him again is no loss to the project. --YFB ¿ 16:11, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I didn't get a chance to see Misplaced Pages:Right to Edit. Could someone please undelete it and send it to BJAODN? *** Crotalus *** 16:12, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • That would just be asking for trouble ... I strongly advise against that. --BigDT 16:15, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I personally don't think such trolling should be glorified by BJAODN, though perhaps Uncyclopedia might be interested? Moreschi 16:16, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
    • Uncyclopedia does not use a GFDL-compatible license. Copy from Misplaced Pages cannot be copied there. At any rate, I don't think anything good can come from restoring this page anywhere ... we don't need a "poke fun at a blocked user's idea" forum. --BigDT 16:22, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Given what Jeffrey has written on his talk page about possible off-wiki actions and his previous agreements with the foundation, perhaps we should just protect his talk page and let him deal with the foundation by private communication from here on out. There is nothing else us mere wiki-mortals can do here. NoSeptember 18:55, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Page protected. Yall can clean up anything you think should not be there. User:Zscout370 19:02, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, reading his comments on his talk, I'd say this block was absolutely justified, beyond question. My word. He can talk to the Foundation privately if he so wishes, but until told otherwise, we really don't need him wasting our time here. A couple of real gems: "18 year olds who live in their mom's basement and who are taking a free ride off my money and chat room trolls who talk about inappropriate topics don't tell me when I am right or wrong. In fact, no such concept exists on this site", followed by "community == trolls", and "Never mind, I saw the Noticeboard and the comments from all the trolls and strong arm groups. This block violates just about every assurance from the Foundation. It also interferes with my investments".

Up with this we must not put. For obvious reasons. Moreschi 19:18, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• I think we can handle this without actively taking the piss. Merkey is wrong, the problem is that he does not believe it. We need to find a strategy to get him down off the Reichstag so we can let him edit. I don't think anybody here believes he is evil or a troll, just... odd. And that oddness creates a problem. The trouble is, nobody else I can find to talk to about him has the faintest idea how to de-escalate this either. And yes, I have asked Jimmy. Consensus appears to be that we should be nice to him (fine) but not let him bring his battles here (also fine). All suggestions gratefully received. And I think we should adopt a zero-tolerance approach to trolling of Merkey, here or on his Talk as and when we unprotect it. Guy (Help!) 19:56, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• While I dont have any solutions myself but I do think that (a) we should unlock his talk page and (b) change the block from indefinite to 24 hours, SqueakBox 20:00, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• I'm not averse to an expiring block, but 24 hours is way too short. A lot of time has been wasted. Maybe the best thing is just to walk away and come back when he's calmed down - he's in email contact with the foundation guys, we'll know soon enough when he's likely to be productive. Guy (Help!) 20:13, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • FWIW I would recommend a fixed block so he knows when he is going to be unblocked (and I speak from an experience (of being blocked) you dont have). It would be nice to see the talk page unlocked so I and others can leave a message there given he isnt being disruptive there from what I can see, SqueakBox 20:17, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• Ther,e now you've proved me wrong. I said cooling off blocks don't work - but with you actually they do, don't they? I remember I blocked you a while back, you handled it with remarkable equanimity. The problem with Merkey, though, is that he is much less self-aware than you are. I think you are commendably aware of your own biases and enthusiasms, and I think that you fundamentally accept things about which Merkey is still in denial. Included among these is the fact that editing Misplaced Pages is just a hobby, and if the power went out the world would continue to turn. Guy (Help!) 20:52, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

We're probably seeing differently, cuz I see quite a lot of disruption. I can't see any rationale for an unblock. Since being debanned, he has not contributed productively in the slightest, just bounced back and forth between edit wars, ANI, and RFC. Second chances are great, but why a third? Moreschi 20:22, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Has Jeffrey opened any threads at rfc (no) or AN/I? I get the impression Guy wants to see Jeffrey contribute constructively and to that extent I am willing to support Guy's actions, SqueakBox 20:25, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

You know what I mean. In a very short space of time he's been the subject of an RFC and plenty of threads at ANI (always a bad sign). We'd all like to see Merkey contribute productively but is this really likely third time around, and does he want to contribute productively anyway (productively meaning playing by the rules, our rules)? Moreschi 20:30, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• Guy -- thanks. The only thing I find more vexing than vandals are editors who come to promote personal agendas. No mere vandal can waste contributors' time on that sort of scale. Poindexter Propellerhead 21:05, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Look closely at User:Poindexter Propellerhead's contribution history, created 24 May, with two and only two interests: 1) hundreds of reverts against vandalism, and 2) !voting and commenting against Jeffrey Merkey. Nothing else.Proabivouac 02:49, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Look more closely, and you'll find some significant edits. When I'm doing a hundred vandalism reverts a day, I know it's easy for them to get lost in the noise. Also lost in the noise are actions I took against other bad editors, as when I reverted one (now indef blocked) calling their edit "hate speech." I don't single out any editor who has a huge POV axe to grind, and is willing to revert war to get their way. They're all the same to me. I kind of expected this, though, having seen how everyone who ever complained about Merkey's editing was labelled as a bad faith cabal member -- Lulu, Hipocrite, Tom, etc. Think what you will, but I'm going to keep putting in a thousand worthwhile edits a week, and I'm going to keep on complaining when people come here to try and force a POV on the world. Whether Merkey is editing or blocked won't change that a bit. Poindexter Propellerhead 07:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Recommendations

I recommend the block be changed to a month for a cooling off period and his talk page be unprotected for him to continue his work. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 20:38, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• Cooling-off blocks don't work. He's blocked to stop the drama, when we are confident he won't cause more drama we can unblock him. I have no real opinion on protection of his talk page. Guy (Help!) 20:47, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Cooling-off blocks have worked in the past for many Wikipedians. You stand corrected. Have a nice day! :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 20:59, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Many? Which ones? And this is his second time to be banned...for the same exact reason. Are you saying that there is a realistic chance of him to suddenly change his mind? We might give second chances, but that's pretty much it. The policy is assume good faith, not assume blind faith. —Kurykh 21:03, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

There are literally thousands of editors who have been blocked for various reasons. The blocks were a good cooling-off period. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don't work. What in the world do you want him to do? Put something in writing? Make some sort of oath? For some people it takes a little longer for them to understand the rules when no guidance has been given. How much help has he been given? Please provide him with the policies he should read up on and understand. Thanx. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 21:17, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

We're not here to wait for people to grow up. He has been provided with x number of lists of policies he should read up with, and has refuted them all with his dismissive attitude. If he really wants to start editing constructively (and can prove that he can, will, and remain so), then he can e-mail an administrator, ArbCom member, or Jimbo, and maybe have his block overturned. It's indefinite, not infinite. The indefinite block is essentially telling him that we will not accept him back unless he accepts our terms of editing. But right now, he's only disrupting the encyclopedia, and the encyclopedia's existence is more important than keeping trollish editors in the fold. —Kurykh 21:22, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Please provide him with the specific, most helpful policies for him to read to be productive here. Lets move forward on this. Lets start somewhere. Please be specific with your terms. What are your terms? Misplaced Pages has a tradition of an open-arm acceptance. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 21:34, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Easy. For him to unconditionally contribute positively to the encyclopedia and the community, without demands or assertions of nonexistent rights and/or benefits. This is a term that you, me, and every editor in good standing accepts, and the only social condition imposed by Misplaced Pages and the collective community. —Kurykh 21:51, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

And you are right on the fact that Misplaced Pages has a tradition of an open-arm acceptance, but it does not require it to accept those who seek its exploitation and/or destruction. —Kurykh 21:52, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Is that it? I recommend for you to transfer that to his talk page and put it in bold and tell him to read it over and over again until he understands it thoroughly. And for him to understand what lessons he has learned. Moving forward, he must understand that this is his last chance. He must also understand even if he is correct in a content dispute he must go by consensus and can request for comment on an article and try other avenues. Tigers are welcomed here but they must not growl. Understanding is the key. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 22:17, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

JzG already posted something similar to the above there. However, I still assert that the indefinite block should remain in place. —Kurykh 22:19, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• It's not as if this is only Merkey's second block. It's his second indefinite block. Before he earned his first "indefinite" block, he had already been blocked numerous times for shorter periods because of the same sort of behavior. In fact, he had been blocked under a score of sockpuppet accounts back two years ago when he first began active disruption. I know that editors and admins who weren't watching the first rounds of bad behavior want to assume this is a passing mood; but from what I can see, confrontational trolling and unsubstantiated vehement personal beliefs is Merkey's entire life history, both on and off Misplaced Pages.

Frankly, even Merkey's allegedly polite request to be unblocked contained exactly the same kind of arrogance his subsequent edits showed: First claiming that he has more money than other editors; then claiming (certainly falsely, as well as irrelevant) that he has contributed some huge money to Wikimedia; and finally advancing the fanciful claim that he has "an IQ of 190" as alleged evidence he should have greater rights (btw. if you know how IQ is defined, you know that fewer than 20 people in the USA are at that +6 sigmas). Please, please, please don't give him an Nth chance to make us go through this ordeal again, with a certainty of the same outcome. LotLE×talk 21:54, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

• Given that this user's very first block was indefinite, I would support changing to a one-month block unless there is a much clearer indication of the nature of the problem in the RfC. This user clearly currently has a beef with the community and is very angry; I wouldn't take into consideration anything the user is saying in the present angry state; the whole point of a block is to enable a cooling down period to get past anger and allow calm to set in before making decisions. For a first block, I would allow time for a cooling-down period -- a month is plenty for this -- and then give the user an opportunity to decide, calmly, to either play by the rules or not play. I wouldn't block for longer than is necessary for this. I wouldn't indefinitely block as a first block. Best, --Shirahadasha 22:01, 28 May 2007 (UTC) Withdrawing this support in light of user's history of blocks and other trouble when editing under prior user names. Best, --Shirahadasha 05:06, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Looking back over the block logs, it's not exactly the second time. Three of his IP addresses had a 24-hour, a 1 month, an indefinite and one other unspecified (temporary) block. His other accounts, Gadugi and Waya Sohoni, had a 1-hour, an 8-hour, three 24-hour, a 14-day, and four indefinite blocks. Other accounts which were almost certainly his (Asgaya Gigigei, Sint Holo and PeyoteMan) were also blocked indefinitely, which gives him grand total of 9 temporary and 10 indefinite blocks (counting the two already mentioned).

• • Regarding LotLE's comment that this user has been blocked before: Could you post links to evidence of this? This makes a big difference. The present block log shows only two blocks, one on May 2 resulting in an unblocking after a few hours, and one today, suggesting a medium-duration block has never been tried. If the reality is that this user has had a long history of past blocks under sockpuppet accounts, would it be possible to post evidence of this here and/or under the RfC? I would agree that if this is true my previous responses would be off the mark. Best, --Shirahadasha 23:03, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
    • I agree this issue has been satisfactorily addressed per the discussion at Misplaced Pages talk:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey2#Is this guy a sockpuppet of a previously banned user? Best, --Shirahadasha 05:06, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
• I agree wholeheartedly with LotLE...enough is enough.--MONGO 22:45, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
• I disagree with you completely. MONGO has rewarded an editor who was hounding Mr. Merkey with a barnstar. What is going on here? Hmmm. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 05:58, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Sock, get your drawer in order, before coming after mine. I have hounded no one. Hipocrite - «Talk» 13:05, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Proposal

I've given this some thought and propose the following as a "strategy" of sorts:

• Leave the block indefinite for the time being. If we impose a time-specific block and then allow him back with his attitude unchanged, we'll just go through exactly the same palaver in a month or so's time and end up having this debate for a third time.
• If Mr. Merkey emails an admin expressing a fundamental change in his attitude regarding the assumption of bad faith, caballery, conspiracy theories etc. and avowing an intention to adhere rigidly to Misplaced Pages policies as written (rather than his own interpretation), he could be unblocked. If that were to happen it should probably be on a zero-tolerance probation basis, i.e. one personal attack, edit war, unwarranted content removal etc. and he's reblocked.
• In the mean time, he should be allowed to use a section of his talk page as a sandbox for article editing, conditional on the page being re-protected at the first sign of soapboxing. If he makes reasonable edit proposals at his talk page, they can be enacted at the articles themselves, or proposed for further discussion at the relevant talk page with Jeff allowed to take part in the discussion by proxy. I wouldn't be averse to acting as an intermediary there if that was acceptable to Mr. Merkey.
• I would also suggest that, if they haven't been already, obvious Merkey-baiting accounts such as Al Petrofsky are blocked indef on sight. We do at least owe Jeff the same level of protection from trolling as anyone other editor. That said, we don't need anyone making "troll-watch lists" and Mr. Merkey should be prohibited from making any accusations of trolling whatsoever - established editors should be able to identify troll SPAs without much difficulty, so if a couple of neutral parties are prepared to keep an eyeball out, Jeff should have no need to resort to finger-pointing and personal attacks.
• There should be (at least while these conditions are in effect) a moratorium on RfC, AN(/I), CSN, ArbCom etc. proposals/threads relating to Mr. Merkey. These only seem to serve as troll magnets or venues for argument, so they might as well be eschewed since while he's blocked and only editing his talk page under probation conditions, Jeff can't really do anything that might warrant recourse to any of these processes anyway.

Comments/suggestions welcome. --YFB ¿ 22:03, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Talk page

Why was Jeff's talk page protected? That strikes me as counter-productive. Chick Bowen 01:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah, I see now where this is discussed above. Well, it doesn't strike me as a big deal either way, but I'll leave it. Chick Bowen 01:15, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The talk page should be unprotected because it was done without any justification. Lack of response by administrators is compelling. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 05:26, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The justification above was that he was using it to pretty much asail the Foundation for not letting him edit. He has the ability to email the Foundation; so he can ask to have his page unlocked if he agrees to not use the talk page for that purpose. User:Zscout370 05:29, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

He just got blocked. I would be pisted too. The reason to block his talk page is still unjustified. I request his talk page be unblocked right away. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 05:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Its unblocked now, SqueakBox 16:21, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Sophisticated anti-Merkey attack machine

At least three obvious (obvious when you actually look at contribs) anti-Merkey SPA's participated in the RfC's.

• User:Kebron is the most obvious. Interests include Groklaw, SCO, Cherokees, and threads against Jeffrey Merkey. Only in the past few days do we see an attempt at camouflage with a number of innocuous but trivial Canada-related edits..
• User:Nyet is another. See how he blithely pretends not to know what is going on here, but earlier wrote this, which Jimbo called trolling. Even the username Nyet intersects with Merkey, recalling a memorable moment in the now-infamous GNAA call (which happened sometime last year - I'm not certain when.)
• User:Poindexter Propellerhead as referenced above.
  

Make no mistake, this is a coordinated - and sophisticated - attack machine. Merkey's not getting away with anything, his problems are all out in the open, but these guys (as Merkey says, you can find them over here) are playing Misplaced Pages like a cheap flute.
Poindexter and Kebron's userboxes, Poindexter's mission statement, and the vast number of camouflage edits speak to the wikisavvy and determination behind this effort to game and exploit the community's assumption of good faith.
No wonder he's paranoid: people are out to get him. He's done a horrible job of distinguishing good-faith editors with good-faith requests for improvement from the trolls which plague him, but then so have we, for these are still among us, participating in this thread.
If protecting Merkey from being stalked, harassed and trolled is to be more than an empty statement of intent, the assumption of good faith for users we've never seen before may have to be a little less forthcoming in Merkey-related threads than it usually (and rightly) is.Proabivouac 03:17, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure that we really need to relax assumptions of good faith at all. There is almost certain to be something up when a new user jumps straight into a user conduct dispute. Whether or not the something justifies blocking varies, but I can't imagine a situation in which someone who truly is new could go straight to railing against another user for their actions. -Amarkov moo! 03:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree about all three of those users and was somewhat surprised not to have seen any of them blocked already (particularly Kebron, who is blatant). Al Petrofsky is still blockless, too, despite obviously being here only to spam dispute pages with his accounts of Merkey's past conflicts. "Relaxing AGF" might be putting it too strongly, but there's certainly room for a bit of background checking of those who get involved with Merkey issues seemingly out of the blue. --YFB ¿ 03:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I gave Al a block last night, but based on an email conversation with him, I decided to unblock. User:Zscout370 05:31, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I quote part of one recent SCO post (the remainder is too vile for this noticeboard):

"PWNED!…How come your named account is indef blocked and my SPA account is stall active? Check out user:CatchFork…"Proabivouac 03:50, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I am sickened to realize that my endorsement of the substantial complaints laid forth in the RfC played a part in this hate-filled fellow's orgasm of sadism.Proabivouac 03:50, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Does an 'Anti-Merkey' cabal exist?

The duration of the block is ludicrous. This is totally unacceptable. I recommend to Guy to stop playing with the buttons. Here is a link I find interesting to read. Come to your own conclusions what is really happening here. Was it coordinated? The above new evidence provided makes everything a bit more clear. Hmmm. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 05:51, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• And I recommend to you to read the discussions. Indefinite <> permanent, it means until things have calmed down. I am actively engaging with Mr. Merkey by email, in pursuit of a resolution. There is no point setting an arbitrary expiry date, that would be nonsensical under the circumstances, but I will unblock when I think the time is right, and that judgement is completely dependent on the conversations I am having with Merkey and others right now. If you are hearing a subliminal and not wholly complimentary message underneath that, congratulations on your perspicacity. "Playing with the tools" my arse. Guy (Help!) 10:35, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

No consensus

There is no consensus for the controversial block. Therefore, the resolution is an unblock. One administrator cannnot overide consensus. The community has spoken on this. :) - Mr.Gurü (/_contribs) 19:53, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Huh? -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 20:00, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Mr. Merkey has posted a request to be unblocked, and the discussion on the unblock request is on ANI. SirFozzie 20:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Delete the RfC pages?

Would there be any objection if we deleted the RfC page relating to Merkey and its talkpage? The initiating party, User:Hipocrite, has said at User talk:Jeffrey Vernon Merkey#Bye, that he wants nothing further to do with the matter; several of the threads were poisoned by the above-mentioned attack accounts; Merkey's own comments were, to say the least, unhelpful to himself or to the project; and nothing useful was resolved. I suggest that deleting the pages would be a good step for everyone. Newyorkbrad 03:42, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't object to deletion, so long as it doesn't mean that we end up arguing over the extent of Merkey's unhelpfulness at a later date. Archival with an appropriate closing note (much like what you've posted here) might be a more transparent way of bringing an end to the debate, but I don't consider deletion OTT. The RfC quickly got mired in pointless squabbling and personal attacks, so it's hardly going to be very useful to anyone in future. --YFB ¿ 03:51, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

We can blank it, but deletion would be a bad idea, I think. There are issues there which remain unaddressed. Guy (Help!) 10:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Anti-Merkey poster claims passed RfA, threatens bio

The individual behind User:CatchFork claims to have another account which has recently passed RfA, and declares his intent to use this position to harass Merkey: See also this response:
This SCO noticeboard has proven to be a font of frank admissions. The very strongest action is warranted: a logged checkuser involving all the anti-Merkey socks, and if necessary a comparison of User:CatchFork to recent successful RfA candidates.
We also have a threat to attack Merkey's bio: "I think the first thing I'll do is offer to edit your personal bio article under good faith to reflect this last hilarious meltdown and your completely ridiculous history with wikipedia."
As if this all weren't enough, there is the claim that this is being decided on IRC:"Your name is mud there and the admins are circulating reports of your actions on IRC."Proabivouac 07:37, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I think that liberal use of checkuser would be an excellent idea. I recall an allegation that the poster who is claiming to have an admin here was identified with an account (now indef blocked) that was blatantly trolling Merkey, and I would not be AT ALL surprised to find out that he's been half a dozen or more other such accounts. We need to clear the air around here, and checkuser is the surest way to do it. Poindexter Propellerhead 08:01, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like a self request.Proabivouac 08:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

By all means, checkuser me too! I had been wondering what your problem was with my fighting vandalism, but when I read the links you posted I realized that you must be taking me for that poster who said that he'd been doing the same. He also said that he was using IPs he got from his university, so I'd like someone to verify that I'm on private, unproxied DSL connection. The only way to stop the finger-pointing is to weed out the actual bad apples, so let's get it done. Poindexter Propellerhead 08:36, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

"I had been wondering what your problem was with my fighting vandalism, but when I read the links you posted I realized that you must be taking me for that poster who said that he'd been doing the same."

Please. I have no problem with you fighting vandalism, except that per contribs and context it's obviously camouflage. Come back to me after a month of this and I might apologize. As of now, to put it quite plainly, I think your claim to have been lurking all this time and contributing thousands of useful edits, but just now opening an account, to be a lie. Your actions are designed to deceive the community's standard diagnostics of good-faith editors vs. attack SPAs, and your posts here aim to exploit the community's assumption of good faith.Proabivouac 08:47, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm really sorry that you feel that way, but those posts go a long way towards creating an air of paranoia, so I can understand why you do. And I don't mind waiting a month for my apology. Poindexter Propellerhead 09:02, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Has Poindexter Propellerhead broken any WP policies by arguing on a RfC and here? That's all his Merkey related activity so far (and hopefully it will stop here as the Merkey is blocked indefinitely). Please note that even if Poindexter Propellerhead came here because of Merkey, he is doing useful work. This way we may have acquired another productive user. Now when (hopefully) Mekey vanished from our radar screens, Poindexter Propellerhead has an opportunity to do only the anti-vandal job he says he likes. Maybe even start editing the articles? Let's assume good will here. -Friendly Neighbour 09:15, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I am compelled to observe, Friendly Neighbor, that your very first contributions to Misplaced Pages were related to Mr. Merkey. I do not presume to judge anything else you've done here, as I've not surveyed the whole of your contributions, but from that fact alone, the appearance of a vigorous and longstanding conspiracy - and I use this term advisedly - against Mr. Merkey becomes stronger and stronger at every turn.Proabivouac 09:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I posted a long reply on your Talk page because this section has been archived just after your edit. A short abstract goes here: you did not get the point. I wrote the above exactly because my account is an example that coming here because of Merkey may lead to productive work. And Merkey tends to create "enemies" on every article he edits so one needs any WP:CABAL to explain why so many users are interested in his future here. Let's stop the witch hunt, especially as the real anti-Merkey trolls (yes, I admit that such do exist) usually stop editing WP when Merkey is not an issue here. -Friendly Neighbour 10:07, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

So, in short, anti-Merkey attack-only accounts are potentially valuable future contributors who should be encouraged to stay.Proabivouac 10:11, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Please, be reasonable. I explicitly wrote about users who are doing useful work. One purpose personal attack accounts are not useful by definition. -Friendly Neighbour 10:23, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

So you came here to begin with to attack Merkey, and your most recent actions were to endorse the RfC against him, right alongside none other than myself, and now to post here in support of an attack SPA. I don't know what happened between then and now; I suppose I'll have to check.Proabivouac 10:30, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

No, not to attack. Rather because I was worried by what he was doing to this open source project (and some other too but this is irrelevant here). I never attacked him, unless by "attack" you mean comments on RfCs or reporting his sockpuppets after he was banned. If you want, please dig to find one personal attack or revert war by me against any of his many accounts. You will not find one. And if you want to continue thi discussion, please take it off WP:AN as it does not belong here. I started a thread on your Talk page. Please reply there if you wish. -Friendly Neighbour 10:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Whatever else happens, I will personally raise an arbcom case against any of those listed above who pursues any kind of harassment against Merkey on Misplaced Pages. And I have every reason to believe it will be accepted. I strongly advocate a zero-tolerance approach to trolling of Merkey, who handles trolling even worse than I do (which is saying something). If these individuals identified above are serious about contributing to the encylopaedia then that's fine, but leave Jeff Merkey alone. Guy (Help!) 10:53, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Arbcom should not even be needed. Any account not used to advance the project should be blocked. Tom Harrison 13:27, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

True and correct. I'm simply afraid that reporting a Merkey sock (if one appears) will now lead to accusations of Merkey trolling. I never trolled him, unless you count commenting on RfCs or reporting some of his multiple socks on ANI (I'm talking of spring 2006) as trolling. I may sit quietly seeing Misplaced Pages rules broken (being afraid to speak up) but it is not what should happen here according to our own rules. -Friendly Neighbour 13:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

A report made in good faith, without hyperbole, calmly and with cited diffs, does not constitute trolling. Provided that you are then content to let others make the final call. Like I said above, as long as you are seen to be here to build the encyclopaedia, you should be fine. Just be sure that any personal antipathy you may harbour to any particular editor is not evident in your reports, should such reports become necessary. Thank you for asking for clarification, are we on the same page now? Guy (Help!) 13:57, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Yes. We've been for a long time. My "Merkey anger" melted long time ago. Now, I find it simply sad that he cannot grow up. If we could find a way for him to edit here without disrupting the project, I would not mind. However, the recent experiment was not a good portent for his future on Misplaced Pages. -Friendly Neighbour 14:13, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Checkuser is here to fail to scatter magic pixie dust over the situation! Poindexter, people look askance at you because you're clearly an experienced Wikipedian who's magically reappeared out of nowhere in a controversy, so people are obviously going to wonder who the hell you are. CatchFork is trolling us, well done. Everyone else, please STOP trying to poke Jeff with sticks. You will not advance discussion in any way - David Gerard 15:48, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Reply to Guy above. I started investigating and collecting information for a dispute resolution case, but was accused of making an "enemy list" of people "whose only offense is disagreeing with me", by an administrator no less. So I stopped. There are a lot more accounts like those mentioned above, including sleepers registered a long time ago with a handful of edits that magically became active when Jeff was unblocked and follow him around. I'm saddened that more admins aren't aware of this, are unwilling to get involved, and actively prevent efforts to address it or prepare dispute resolution cases. --Duk 16:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

  I'd suggest that Jeff does have a tendency to be involved in conflict. He's famous and controversial, and there are lots of people across the net who are really upset at him for various reasons. (Note that I'm not addressing here whether that's justified or not - only saying that they are sincere.) As such, some are popping up now that it's an issue because they're quite sincere about it. Again, I suggest the best thing to do is to leave it - Jeff will likely stay blocked while the problems persist, and RFCs etc aren't going to help matters for anyone - David Gerard 17:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

  Yes, I agree. However, it's these difficult cases where we need to work harder to create a fair atmosphere, no matter which editor happens to be a target. In fact, the more unpopular an editor is, the more we have to be careful that prejudices don't interfere. The easy path is just to let these hoards of angry people post never ending ad homineums, personal attacks and links to unrelated off-site attacks. I've seen a few people with the simple minded and very wrong attitude that protecting Jeff from outrageous attacks equates to supporting his misbehavior, or being "for" him and "against" everyone else. Just because an admin blocks trolls pestering Jeff, or any other editor for that matter, does not mean that that admin is "Jeff's pittbull". --Duk 18:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

  Agreed in general with Duk. I would keep in mind that there is a good possibility exists that the user at the top of this section who is blocked for trolling is just trying to make more work for us, and that there is no substance to the threat. Considering the amount of eyes this has generated, I'm fairly sure that any subtle vandalism will be caught. SirFozzie 19:19, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

  To clarify my earlier statements, they were general comments and not specific to the Anti-Merky RFA claim (thanks noting, SirFozzie). --Duk 19:49, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Removing vandal logs from hacked account

A while back, User:Eternal Pink had his account hacked by a friend from college, User:Darkhero17. Pink has been around for a while and I know him pretty well as a very helpful contributor to WP:SM. Darkhero has also been in and out, and I'm confident that they really are different people; they behave differently, spell different words wrong, have different skill-levels with regard to using WP, etc.

Apparently what happened was that Darkhero watched Pink log in and memorized his password. After his own account was blocked, he used Pink's to create new accounts with which to vandalize, as seen here. All of those accounts followed Darkhero's behavioral patterns, not Pink's. He was imitating the "Dust King" vandal that caused us WP:SM so much trouble, as well as trying to frame Pink for misbehavior.

Darkhero has confessed his involvement (), and Pink has changed his password, so I'm satisfied that most of the problem is dealt with. However, Pink is unhappy about the vandal account creation that still shows up in his permanent logs.

Since Pink's account was compromised, is there any way to remove those records and give him a clean slate? Who do we talk to about that? --Masamage ♫ 19:06, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

It is really difficult to go about expunging block logs. It is a developer's job, and also his prerogative.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 19:31, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

In this case it's not block logs but user creations logs. I suppose those are probably equally difficult. How would Masamage or Eternal Pink go about putting this request to a developer? ··coelacan 21:25, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

That is the question, yeah. --Masamage ♫ 03:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

It can only be done by someone with direct access to the database, in this case, developers. Developers have been quite unwilling in the past to modify or remove logs, because they form a historical record, but you can try contacting one at #wikimedia-tech. Titoxd 04:04, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Frankly, given that he was stupid enough to let someone else find out his password, I'm not sure he should have those logs removed from his account. Neil (►) 13:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree. If your account is compromised, that's your problem. I wouldn't expect much sympathy from the devs. --Tango 13:59, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Logs are there to show what an account did, that account did those things. People are responsible for their account. 14:06, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

he was looking over my shoulder and I didnt see him until its to late so it wasnt stupidity ♥Fighting for charming Love♥ 14:10, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

"I didn't see him" is an excuse that doesn't usually work. By all means you can ask the devs, but given that you got your account back fine, and no real harm was done, I would suggest they will agree with me - just leave it be and find something better to do. Neil (►) 15:26, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Good point or not, going around calling people stupid is bizarre and totally out of line. --Masamage ♫ 15:31, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Describing an act as stupid doesn't necessarily equate to calling someone stupid. Neil (►) 17:10, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

True, but that's not what happened here. Saying that "he was stupid enough to let someone else find out his password" isn't describing the act as stupid. --OnoremDil 17:17, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

"Frankly, given that HE was stupid enough to let someone else find out his password, I'm not sure he should have those logs removed from his account." the fact you said he referring to me means you where calling me stupid ♥Fighting for charming Love♥ 17:19, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I disagry that "no real harm was done" If people who dont know what happened see the logs they will think im a evil sock puppeteer ♥Fighting for charming Love♥ 22:47, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

No, they will see that you failed to properly secure your account, which they should. My user creation log looks wacko, but its just because I volunteer on the unblock-en-l list signing up accounts for people behind school and isp blocks. Just tell people who wonder whats up and no one will care. -M 02:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

From my side, I can add a note in every created account stating they were created while your account was compromised. Not much, but at least if someone thinks you were abusing sockpuppets, it would prevent them from doing so. -- ReyBrujo 03:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Hey, that sounds like a great idea to me. --Masamage ♫ 03:56, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Me two that would automatically people who read it straight thanks ♥Fighting for charming Love♥ 10:06, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Paul W. Bryant Museum

Paul W. Bryant Museum is up for AfD. Someone removed the AfD template from the page and I then edited to make substantive improvements in hope of saving the article. Is it possible to re-add the AfD template without losing the changes I made and without messing up the pending AfD page? I don't want to foul things up. Thanks! JodyB _talk 23:37, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Just add another AFD template at the top and it'll be fine. Luigi30 (Taλk) 19:19, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Username blacklist

I just saw a user blocekd with something like this, so it made me think that it wasn't on it: Can an admin add on wh3els, on whe3ls, and on wh33ls to the username blacklist? --R Contribs_@ (Let's Go Yankees!) 01:57, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

There are plenty of legitimate usernames that could be created with wheels in the name... I'd say no. alphachimp 04:16, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

But matching the string "on wh33ls"? -Amarkov moo! 04:23, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

It's possible. The there's nothing against that in the username policy. We should be really careful about what we add. alphachimp 04:37, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

But if people are getting blocked for it... --Masamage ♫ 04:39, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

People will be getting blocked for names intended to imitate a known vandal, other names containing wheels etc. which aren't rather transparent attempts to troll won't be. --pgk 06:22, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

The list should only be used for names which should always be blocked, not even for names which are usually blocked. If there's a chance of a legitimate name containing the text it shouldn't be on the list. -- zzuuzz 09:30, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

But "on wheels" is in the blacklist. --R Contribs_@ (Let's Go Yankees!) 11:10, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Might I point out that if we are talking about the same bot/blacklist (HighInBC's bot) then being blocked is up to the admin who deals with the report anyway. Viridae 11:21, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• "Enumerating badness" doesn't work. The blacklist can never account for every contingency, and we should not fall over ourselves trying. >Radiant< 12:15, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm talking about the Mediawiki black list. Not HighinBC's. On wheels is in the mediawiki blacklist. --R Contribs_@ (Let's Go Yankees!) 21:45, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

DavidYork71

See User talk:DavidYork71 and this. This user has been banned for about a month and would now like a second (more like final I guess) chance to contribute to Misplaced Pages constructively. User:Matt57 has suggested a one month probation (I'm not sure that that means...), and has additionally stated that David York says he won't use sockpuppets again. I was inclined to (and did) deny his unblock request but I'm open to suggestions. Thoughts? -- John Reaves (talk) 05:30, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

We caught a DavidYork sock yesterday. If he's trying to get unblocked, he's not going about it the right way. Riana ⁂ 05:01, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I didn't know that...this is probably a waste of time then. -- John Reaves (talk) 05:33, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Posted on his talk page...

I put this for people's info on his talk page...

Admins other editors considering this request may be interested in the following:

• Check user-confirmed socks of DavidYork71
• Suspected socks with compelling contributions evidence.
• DavidYork71’s apparent sudden acceptance of WP:SOCK after dozens of socks over months, is interesting, given the Sockpuppet action (even over the last 24hours):
  • This and another from two weeks ago and this one were simply for trolling and wiki-stalking purposes.
  • This one was in the last 24hours.
• Unanimous community patience ban (ie, not just a blocked) for continued abuse.

--Merbabu 04:29, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

User:John Reaves, my first suggestion is to sign your posts. (Grinning wickedly!). This user was banned after a discussion at the Misplaced Pages:Community sanction noticeboard. See . According to Misplaced Pages:Banning policy community bans can be appealed to the arbitration committee. I think the continued sock puppetry makes this a non-starter. Jehochman 05:07, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Sorry, I didnt know as well that this sock puppetry was still continuing rampantly. I agree, the user should at the least not sock puppet for a good amount of time before an appeal can be made. I'll talk him to him more and maybe we'll reappeal later. Thanks for your attention, John and others. --Matt57 14:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Agree with everyone. As proven repeatedly by Checkuser, David York has engaged in sockpuppetry and block/ban evasion since before he was first blocked right up until at least as recently as yesterday. For no period of the ban has he actually accepted or respected the ban. Moreover, the edits he has made while banned have been disruptive and abusive and it has wasted an incredible amount of time of numerous admins and editors who have had to clean up and chase after him. As I said on his talk page, I don't think any admin will or should give consideration to his appeal until such time as the sockpuppetry and block evasion has stopped and a reasonable period of time has elapsed where David has honoured the ban and not tried to edit under any account or IP. David needs to understand that he is not merely blocked but community banned and that he has bridges to mend with the community before his request can even be entertained and until that happens, his appeal should be rejected and his ban endorsed. Sarah 16:05, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Based on edits like this, I have protected his talk page again until the 5th. If anyone wants to extend that or take other actions, I have no objection. Metros 01:43, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I completely agree. I did not know about these editing behaviors of DavidYork and that he would ever edit war with an admin over a Swastika. This is definitely trolling and we're better off without users like him. If he does this while he's already on an indef block, there's no way he'll ever proabbly be reallowed here. I doubt his sock puppets will stop then, he's definitely going to continue that behavior. I will not reappeal his case again, he's on his own. I will join in the hunt to stop his sock puppets wherever I can. Thanks.--Matt57 04:01, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with what you've just said, Matt, but you should also understand that David isn't just indefinitely blocked, he's community banned for exhausting the community's patience. An indefinite block and a ban are two different things. Also, this isn't the first time he's edit warred with an admin over swastika images. He was doing the exact same thing on Jimbo's talk page the other night. Sarah 04:27, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I see, I didnt know there was a difference between a block and a community ban. I agree this kind of editor deserves the strongest ban/block possible. He just praised Hitler in email to me, which obviously didnt sit well with me. These are the kind of editors against whom the swiftest action should be taken. I'm glad he's out of here. --Matt57 04:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the community ban. I became even more convinced once I realized he made a sockpuppet entitled User:What Holocaust2. This draws the past what is acceptable in my opinion. This name inplies Holocaust denial, and that, in my opinion is just antisemitic and unacceptable.--Sefringle 05:28, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Douglas Carswell conflit of interest

Lately, Douglas Carswell (talk · contribs) has been editing Douglas Carswell. The edits aren't obviously inappropriate, but I'm not sure that they're encyclopedia-grade either. They've been told about the autobiography guidelines on their talk page; they haven't responded. Veinor 16:37, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

I just removed some completely unverified hyperbole.--Isotope23 16:40, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Posted at WP:COIN. RJASE1 16:47, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

By the way, this is a British member of Parliament. RJASE1 21:00, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Merging and moving pages BOLDly guidelined

Though it clearly already met the WP:POLICY definition of a guideline, I have someone rules-lawyering with me that WP:MERGE wasn't official policy because it didn't have policy or guideline tags.

I believe that it won't be controversial or inappropriate to simply acknowledge its community consensus status and promote it to officially labeled guideline, so I have boldly done so. In the spirit of "BOLD ends where others object loudly", I'm floating it here for feedback, though that probably should go to Misplaced Pages talk:Merging and moving pages as well. Georgewilliamherbert 17:48, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Actually, from reading your comments at User talk:Apostrophe#Undiscussed merges it is not xem who is rules lawyering, but you. You appear to be insisting that all mergers be discussed first, because it is "proper procedure". Proper procedure is that one can boldly perform a merger without discussion — just as WP:MERGE tells you outright, in fact. (A point made on that page that I see Apostrophe has already pointed you to.) Apostrophe's bold merger of a whole load of individual articles on minor characters into List of minor characters in Pirates of the Caribbean is not only wholly in accordance with WP:FICT, it is even in accordance with the "proper procedure" in the "rules" that you keep trying to bash xem over the head with. That you are abusing the vandalism rollback tool to edit war over this (see edit history of Endeavour (Pirates of the Caribbean)), and have threatened to abuse your other administrator tools to get your own way in an editing dispute, is even worse. Please stop rules lawyering and abusing your tools. Uncle G 20:00, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I rolled him back once by accident; I've undone the rest as any user can. Please don't turn a molehill into a mountain. Additionally, while a bold merge (or bold anything, in general) is fine per policy, WP:MERGE rather explicitly says "If the merger is controversial, however, you may find your merger reverted, and as with all other edits, edit wars should be avoided. If you are uncertain of the merger's appropriateness, are not sure where or how to merge, or believe it might be controversial, you should propose it on the affected pages." Anyone undoing it and asking you to put it up for comment constitutes controversy, much less an admin. Reverting that without then following the WP:MERGE procedure as listed is disruption. I'm not the only person who's reverted his merges; there's obvious controversy. Failing to discuss it at this point is inappropriate. I would ask on ANI rather than block myself, but it's clearly blockable if he keeps it up (more than that, he's at 3RR on all of them...) Georgewilliamherbert 20:50, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
    • You abused the vandalism rollback tool in an edit war more than once: diff diff diff. And your logic is circular. The only reason that you have stated this merger to be controversial is that you object to it; the only reason that you have stated (several times) for your objection is that it didn't follow "proper process", and the only reason that you give for it not having followed "proper process" is that you claim that it is controversial. You have built a circular chain of logic and are beating an editor over the head with administrator tools for no reason. The editor was not being disruptive. It is you causing the problem here, by needlessly making an editor jump through hoops and then wikilawyering over the definitions of policies and guidelines in order to attempt to justify your requirements for jumping through those hoops. And yes, according to the edit history of the article linked to above and of Dauntless (Pirates of the Caribbean), you are the only person to have reverted the mergers. Uncle G 22:50, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
      • See thread on AN/I about editor (and admin) behavior; I am not the only one to have reverted one of the merges, I don't recall the other rollbacks (though the record is what it is), and this is all besides the point for the policy discussion here. Georgewilliamherbert 23:15, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Latecomer support for Jeffrey. Sorry, folks, he's absolutely right. Guy (Help!) 06:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
• Concur with Uncle G - Let's not turn a molehill into a bureaucracy. Yes, controversial merging should be discussed, but no, following WP:FICT is not controversial. To quote, if your only argument is that something was out of process, you don't have an argument. >Radiant< 10:43, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
  • For the interested parties - WP:MERGE has acquired quite a lot of cruft and creep since I first wrote it, so I'm simplifying and copyediting it. Comments welcome. >Radiant< 10:56, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Not very fun TfD/image license request

So, I'm still without AWB. Who would like to remove an image licensing template that's transcluded several hundred times? After the template is removed, I'm sure the images will need a new license or be rendered suitable for speedy deletion, in which case, they should be deleted. The TfD nom is here, if anyone's feeling adventurous. RyanGerbil10(Don't ask 'bout Camden) 18:32, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Finished, who needs AWB to do that kind of work :) — Moe ε 03:34, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

New XFF project

I've started up Misplaced Pages:WikiProject on XFFs. The use is for dealing with ISPs that use only a few IPs but serve thousands of people. The idea is to list the ISP IPs as trusted, which makes the XFF client IP they send count as the user's IP address, allowing for more fine tuned blocks. However not all ISPs may send good/trusted headers, so the point of the page is to have checkusers look over what kind of data it sends to decide whether to list it as trusted or not. Voice-of-All 20:05, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Rspeer

This administrator seems to be making statements that contradict current[REDACTED] policy on Talk:Accelerated Christian Education.--JEF 21:36, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

• Diffs, please. If you're wishing to convince people you're right, you'll need to illustrate the particular behavior you disagree with, in the event that someone disagrees with your assessment and sees nothing wrong. EVula // talk // ☯ // 22:55, 29 May 2007 (UTC)
• I've read the discussion. Rspeer (talk · contribs · blocks · protections · deletions · page moves · rights · RfA) appears to be right on the money. Further comment on the talk page. Uncle G 23:14, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Suspicious contributions

I have my doubts over the legitimacy of the contributions made by Special:Contributions/Belazzur, as he/she is repeatedly cut and pasting page moves, after being warned several times and labelling articles with {{Article probation}}, when quite clearly there is no need to. For example Belazzur inserted the {{Article probation}} template to Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Automobiles, when to the best of my knowledge there was no disruptive editing going on. The fact that the editor has only been making edits for one day does not help the fact either. OSX (talk • contributions) 01:23, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

BJAODN Deleted

I have deleted most of the sub-pages from Misplaced Pages:Bad Jokes and Other Deleted Nonsense as a violation of the GFDL. In nearly every case, the content in the subpages had been copy-and-pasted from elsewhere. In the case of existing articles, content was copied without crediting the author(s) of the revisions. In the case of deleted articles, without fail in the pages I deleted, the content was not properly moved to preserve the history. In every single case, there was no non-infringing content worth saving.

For those interested, the specific GFDL section relevant to the above is Section 4.B of the GNU Free Documentation License. The speedy deletion criteria is CSD G-12. See also Copyrights - Contributor's rights and obligations.

As can be seen, I have not deleted all of the BJAODN subpages - in the case of much of the April Fools pages, content was properly moved by conscientious editors over the years. Now I know that this will upset some folks, but that is not my intent. Nor were these deletions a liberal interpretation of the speedy deletion criteria - in every single case, the deletions were to keep Misplaced Pages in compliance with the GFDL, the license by which every single page in every single article in every single language in this great Project is based. If we cannot abide by our own license, how on Earth can we ensure that those who wish to use our content do the same?

These actions should not be interpreted as a fiat against the existence of BJAODN (although one must wonder if our collective creative energies could be used more effectively and whether or not such content is more appropriate for Uncyclopedia - but that is neither here nor there). As long as content is properly moved to preserve the history of "deleted" content, or proper linking to diffs and authors for specific edits on surviving pages, then it would be in compliance.

Again, this is not a rouge interpretation of policy, this is enforcement of the GFDL, period. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 02:44, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Not a comment on the appropriateness of the deletions, but did you honestly think that people would not view this as a rouge interpretation of policy to do whatever you want if you explained it? -Amarkov moo! 02:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, to the admins reading this, PLEASE do NOT undelete all of these without discussing. Let's not get into a wheel war. No comment on the merits of this deletion. Sean William @ 02:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Has this been discussed at all? It doesn't seem like something that should be or needs to be done hastily, given the length of time it's existed (and the lack of possibility the GFDL will ever be enforced against us in this manner). Also, as has just been discussed here, it's not clear the GFDL should be interpreted this way. The way, the truth, and the light 02:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

We can't follow only parts of the GFDL. We have to follow all of it. Sean William @ 02:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

The GFDL is fairly clear on attribution, as linked above, and in each case there has been an abject failure to attribute. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 02:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

See the last MFD, and it was discussed on ANI at the time too. Also, every time you subst a template without following the conditions of the GFDL (there is even a whole section on this, 5) God kills a kitten. Kotepho 02:53, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• By the way, I'm pretty sure this shot the job queue to hell. It's currently fluctuating between a 30 and 60 second delay. -Amarkov moo! 02:53, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I've slowed it down a bit. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 02:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

IMO, you might as well nuke the whole thing. It's unfortunate; some of it was quite funny and the Upper Penninsula war deserved to be archived somewhere (WP:DENY be damned), but if we are killing a good portion of the content it is probably worth just delete it outright... otherwise it will just get filled again.--Isotope23 03:00, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

(moved my comment over from ANI)

Escanaba vs Marquette? Did Manistique seize the opportunity to occupy the Garden Peninsula? Did Wisconsin push its border up to the timezone boundary? Hell of a fight regardless....Mackensen (talk) 03:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Ah well, I'm glad I got to see it one more time before it got deleted... it still makes me chuckle.--Isotope23 03:07, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Comment. The history of that article, at least the good part of it, seems to reside here. In any case, the main contributor was apparently User:Tjproechel. Can we salvage this? Duja► 10:35, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

AHEM... I just looked at the article and it's a complete riff on Toledo War, an article I contributed a substantial amount to in order to get it to featured status. The Toledo War, involving Michigan's 22-year-old governor at the time, is quite amusing. It also has the benefit of being true. 67.149.103.119 22:24, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Restore what? Just put a link at BJAODN to User:Hanger65/Upper Peninsula War. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 10:39, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and endorse zapping a gigantic GFDL violation and timesink besides. Mackensen (talk) 03:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Theres long been talk of doing this, off and on. Theres no record of authors, breaking GFDL requirements, it's unfunny, fails WP:DENY and in general is just all around stupid. -M 02:45, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

The deed is done. The list of pages I have deleted is here: Misplaced Pages:Bad Jokes and Other Deleted Nonsense/Deleted. Everything else at WP:BJAODN is compliant. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 03:03, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks a lot, Jeff, for not deleting the talk pages and making me go through the list to delete them. —Kurykh 03:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm working on that now. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 03:09, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

>.< why did you change your username? I've been worried that you died or something. -Amarkov moo! 03:10, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Are you talking to me? If so, a 17-year-old admin doesn't die easily. And I changed my username because my earlier one sounded stupid (at least to me...now). —Kurykh 03:18, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

This had to be done. Its a good idea in theory, but there's some pretty nasty stuff about living people there. And Misplaced Pages is based on the GFDL - edits have to be attributable to the accounts that made them. Signed posts are alright to just be moved, but where chunks of text have had many editors we need to preserve the history. That just isn't possible with a lot of BJAODN. WjBscribe 03:13, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

When pages that have existed as long as this, and have been viewed (and presumably enjoyed) by so many people, get deleted suddenly and it supposedly is required by policy, then either policy (i.e. the GFDL itself) is broken or interpretation of it is. The way, the truth, and the light 03:29, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Or maybe because no one interpreted the license like this before. —Kurykh 03:32, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages can't be fun. Got it. In that spirit, I suggest we now delete other non-encyclopedic essays, like BEANS, HORSE, FISH, KETTLE, REICHSTAG, and any other essays which all clearly violate AGF? Thanks. ThuranX 03:30, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

You're confusing humor within policy and licensing and humor that violates it. —Kurykh 03:32, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Once again, these actions do not mean that future BJAODN, properly done, cannot exist. Quite the contrary, there is still a fair amount of material at BJAODN. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 03:33, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I cannot imagine that in most of these cases a solution couldn't have been found that would have satisfied the GFDL and preserved this page. But if not, fair enough. Phil Sandifer 03:34, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

while true in many cases it would have involved an awful lot of work.Geni 01:53, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

No comment for now on the deletions—I've exceeded my quota for controversial deletion activity for one week—but I'll take a link to the Upper Peninsular War, please. Newyorkbrad 03:35, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

- Merzbow 06:39, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Well, I do hope we're going to follow this through by deleting all the articles that have been created by merging and/or splitting other articles, with consequent loss of history. And we'd better get onto the other language Wikipedias about their unattributed translations. We might start with the German Misplaced Pages's featured article de:Yagan, a translation of our Yagan article without any author attribution whatsoever.

Yes I know it sounds like I'm being sarcastic, but I really do think this issue needs to be tackled. I just hope that Jeffrey et al realise that this problem is really really big. It isn't going to be solved just by deleting BJAODN.

Hesperian 03:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Translated articles should have a link saying that they were translated and linking to the revision of the source article they were translated from (either on the article page or talkpage). Where merging happens, the source article must be redirected to the target article to ensure GFDL compliance. WjBscribe 03:39, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Tell Jimbo that; he thinks translated articles on Misplaced Pages are exempt from the GFDL. Hesperian 03:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
    • He opines that the location of the link to the original is not required to be in the article itself, and can be on the talk page or in the edit summary. He does state that there is no GFDL reason to include such links. As an editor who has been through the GFDL requirements for copying things between wikis in meticulous detail, and has been transwikifying articles and fixing other people's transwikifications to be in accordance with the GFDL for several years now, I can tell you that he is wrong about that. The GFDL does require that. The relevant clause is 4(j). Uncle G 10:21, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Indeed. As much as this may shock some people, Jimbo can be wrong, and sometimes the community can be wrong, too. I knew there would be an emotional "oh noes" reaction, but the GFDL is the GFDL, period. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 10:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• A thought as a random user and BJAODN fan -- it seems to me that there's more at stake here than just GFDL enforcement. Misplaced Pages has a wide perception of being a humorless and rule-obsessed place, despite policies such as WP:IAR and WP:OWN (the simple fact that one much of the time cannot type "articles for deletion" into the search box and be taken to WP:AFD because of restrictions on cross-namespace links is telling, since a usability issue has been sacrificed to protocol). Inasmuch as Jeffrey O. Gustafson's actions embody the letter of WP:IAR and the like, they also seem to trample over the spirit of it completely. It seems to me that the elimination of much of such a long-standing Misplaced Pages tradition as the BJAODN archives is a rather hamhanded way of dealing with the attribution problem, as well as contributing to the project's increasingly negative reputation. I propose that the deleted pages be put on ice somewhere pending a community discussion on the issue. Haikupoet 03:38, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

A lot of content is still at WP:BJAODN, so there's still plenty of humour. Its just the elements that are not attributable to the contributors who made them that have been deleted. WjBscribe 03:40, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

How many of these could have been quickly attributed by checking the article histories and doing some digging? Phil Sandifer 03:51, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

And if they're properly attributed, we'll chip them out of the ice, if I may continue your analogy. We can restore what we deleted. —Kurykh 03:43, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

What do we do with this template? I sent it to TfD, unless one of you wants to delete this without going through that pretty-much unneeded process. —Kurykh 03:46, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I dunno. There's such a thing a leaving room in life for some freaken common sense. Taking away one of the little inside jokes rips at the heart of an organization, and we are not doing this for the money. Jeffery I sure wish I had your self-confidence, to be so sure I'm right as to undertake such a task without first consulting my colleagues. Herostratus 03:47, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Again, this is something that has been discussed on and off amongst admins for a fairly long time. And my "self confidence" in this only comes from supporting and upholding not just policy, but the basis of this whole Project. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 03:49, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

If the page contained copyvio, it should not be here. A pity, I am sure we lost some good stuff, but hey, we were doing things right lately, and needed to do something controversial from an outsider's point of view to give them something to talk ;-) -- ReyBrujo 03:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

(Note: not an admin) I grieve over this loss, and I would gladly help to look for diffs for mine and others' contributions to the pages if given a chance. I'm certain other editors would too with BJAODN at stake. --LuigiManiac 03:54, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

This strikes me as an interpretation/application of policy that should require discussion before action. Among many other examples that come to mind, mirror sites often lose granularity of attribution. They often permit an end-user to view only a complete version of an article, not the whole history with all authorship properties, just like BJAODN. Should we shut down/cut off mirror sites that fail to implement this interpretation of the license perfectly? Should we do it instantaneously, because "policy says so", regardless of consequences, agreements, or other policies? Best, --Shirahadasha 04:02, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

GFDL-compliant mirrors should contain a link (or other reference) back to the Misplaced Pages article, from which the full edit history can be retrieved. This is rather different from cutting-and-pasting content from deleted pages into BJAODN. -- Visviva 04:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

(ec) We contact them to suggest changing their methods, many indeed break the GFDL by not linking back to provide a full history attribution. However, we must first and foremost care about Misplaced Pages "health". If we are deleting decorative fair use images from templates, why not decorative texts copied from another source? -- ReyBrujo 04:10, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• perhaps with the bar of keeping GFDL people will, in future, only bother with the genuinely funny ones. Guy (Help!) 06:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• I'm a bit confused.. many people probably didn't know this was even an issue, and would have been glad to help correct the situation had they known. Why not do that now? It sounds like a painfully easy fix. -- Ned Scott 06:51, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I wouldn't have said "Rouge interpretation" anyway, but I would call the deletion a rouge action. WP:BOLD is meant to motivate editors to do things that have not yet been done and/or tried, but it is not meant to flout community consensus. If BJAODN had not been deleted yet, it seems obvious to me that no consensus has been reached. Why not start a process meant to determine consensus instead? -- Renesis (talk) 07:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Because the prior MfDs all failed. --tjstrf talk 07:12, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Fair enough... but that only reinforces my feeling that this was not the correct action to take, no matter the interpretation. -- Renesis (talk) 07:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It reinforces my feeling that MFD's hinge on personal tastes rather than application of policy. — CharlotteWebb 08:20, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Please forgive me for suggesting this, as I'm sure this manpower and resources needed to do this could probably used in a more productive manner, but: maybe we could start a task force of volunteers to go through each BJAODN item one-by-one, find the original diffs, and merge it into the edit history? Krimpet (talk) 07:10, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It would appear that the minimum level of compliance is to list the names of the contributors and the year in which they contributed. A text dump of the history tab would be quite satisfactory, and that is what is usually used for pages transwikied to meta or wiktionary or wikibooks or whatever. In the most common case, a funny article that is quickly deleted, you're probably at about 5 edits by 1-3 distinct users, which really is trivial to document. Also common is a humorous paragraph or sentence or "funny vandalism" if you will, entirely created by one user, and added to an article that still exists (but quickly reverted). For this it is probably adequate to link to the diff of the edit and list the user name and timestamp (like this: Pigsonthewing 20:25, 28 June 2004) directly above the text excerpt. — CharlotteWebb 08:20, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• The GFDL argument is pretty weak, many entries contained at least a link to the vandalized article. These actions seem like they were based on a selective enforcement of a legalistic interpretation of Misplaced Pages licensing to further the goal of getting rid of questionably humorous content. Not that these deletions were a horrible injustice, but I doubt that they will prevent editors from nominating a future, properly attributed and GFDL-compliant version of BJAODN for deletion. Oh how I wonder what excuses will appear then... >:) ˉˉ╦╩ 07:16, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you should assume good faith rather than accusing a long-standing editor of malfeasance - If I wanted to make up some reason to delete BJAODN then there would be nothing there. I have no problem being rouge, but in this case my actions are very clearly spelled out not just in policy, but, again, in the license that forms the foundation of our Project. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 07:26, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Whatever accusation implied was not serious, I have no problem with you or your standing as an editor. As this deletion dealt with BJAODN, it seems only appropriate to bust your chops a little. ˉˉ╦╩ 07:32, 30 May 2007 (UTC) (To clarify: I don't necessarily agree with your interpretation of how GFDL applies to Misplaced Pages, but I don't suspect any malfeasance and I don't think the deletions counted as a significant loss to Misplaced Pages. ˉˉ╦╩ 07:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC))

Again if we lost anything that was actually funny, just do some research, figure out who actually wrote it, and include that information when adding it back it in the next volume. — CharlotteWebb 08:20, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Bringing the license problem to light was a good idea. But this was just the sort of response Misplaced Pages:Don't panic warns against - a drastic and inflammatory action without discussion to gain consensus. There were alternative solutions here that many of us would have been glad to support, such as tracking down sources and citing them properly, that were not given consideration. This isn't impractical; each segment noted the article it was copied from and the history revealed the rough time. I say, undelete these and give supporters a few weeks to find sources. Then kill whatever's left. Dcoetzee 07:46, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I support the idea of undeletion to make it so they are attributed, it only seems fair, although of course it's only sysops who will be able to use Special:Undelete to view deleted pages (which many of them are). --WikiSlasher 10:01, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
    • How many more years do we have to wait before the people who say that they support making the pages GFDL-compliant actually do that? This is not the first time that people have offered to do this. And nothing happened afterwards. Uncle G 10:06, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Not true. There has been quite a lot of discussion, and the "few weeks" that have already been given are nearly reaching double figures. The issue of non-compliance with the GFDL was raised in March 2004 at Misplaced Pages:Votes for deletion/BJODN, raised again in December 2006 at Misplaced Pages:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2006/Candidate statements/Questions for Sam Blanning, and discussed at length in March 2007 at Misplaced Pages:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Close Encounters of the Bad Jokes and Other Deleted Nonsense Kind and then again at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive79#BJAODN. The explanation that one cannot merge content from an article and then delete the original, because it violates the GFDL, was a whole section of the Misplaced Pages:Guide to deletion at one point (one that I think requires restoring at this point, because editors are making this mistake increasingly). Uncle G 10:06, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
    • I would be happy to help out with the BJAODN attribution now and again. Give Wikipedians a certain period of time to get the job done, then delete anything not yet attributed. Then institute a rule in WP:BJAODN requiring attribution with each and every thing. --WikiSlasher 10:13, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
      • Better yet, institute a rule in BJAODN requiring the content to be actually funny. Randomness isn't funny. >Radiant< 10:33, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Here's a thought--how about we focus on the content that we actually want to keep in the encyclopedia? (laughter ensues). Mackensen (talk) 11:23, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages:Good Articles and other Kept Sense? Or perhaps "Widely Informative Knowledge Implicitly Perusable Everywhere Downloable In Articleform"? >Radiant< 11:30, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Let me just say it is a shame it was deleted. BJAODN was an important part of wikipedian culture and history. And there was actually some funny stuff there. :(. It should be brought back, or at least undeleted, copied to a mirror site / user page / or somewhere else so it can preserved for those who DID enjoy it, and then re-deleted. --IvanKnight69 12:25, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Category:Misplaced Pages humor

For those that worry that Misplaced Pages has become devoid of mirth, I should point out that the above category is quite well populated, and unlike the rather aptly named bad jokes and nonsense, most of this category consists of "good jokes and kept witticisms". See also this policy. >Radiant< 09:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Attribution can be found

Forgive me if this has been mention previously. It would be relatively easy to get the attribution information. All you have to do is find when the content was added and from where (in most cases this is given on the BJAODN page) and then look in the history of the article around the time the content was added to BJAODN. It would be extremely easy for an admin to find the stuff from deleted pages. I could do it myself, but I am busy with other things both Misplaced Pages and non-Misplaced Pages related and do not have enough interest in BJAODN to give it priority. To transfer the attribution, I suppose that you could put the usernames in edit summaries, like we have done before in unusual situations. However, since these are BJAODN pages and not articles, it might be better to put them on the page itself, next to the content that each contributed. -- Kjkolb 12:34, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

There's more useful work to be done than trying to find histories for the random junk on BJAODN. If we're going to keep using BJAODN, and I've no reason to believe we shouldn't, histories need to be preserved and BLP crap needs to be kept out. Nick 12:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It's part of Misplaced Pages's history. Yeah a good chunk of it is crap but not all of Misplaced Pages has to be serious :) --WikiSlasher 12:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I do not think it would be too much harder to provide attribution for the deleted content than it would be for new content, especially in the case of joke articles and bad articles that were deleted immediately. -- Kjkolb 13:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Issue is that for old stuff we don't have deleted histories.Geni 01:54, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Seriously, don't people have anything better to do? Like an encyclopedia to write? Misplaced Pages is not a joke shop, nor Myspace. It's an encyclopedia. Our job is to actually write the damn thing. Not to spend hours playing around with 60-odd hours of idiotic subpages of BJAODN. Moreschi 13:01, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

"60-odd hours of idiotic subpages of BJAODN"? Also, as I previously mentioned, I do have better things to do. -- Kjkolb 13:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

If there is a case where the addition of humour sections are harming the encyclopedia and sidelining people from improving the article, nay violating Misplaced Pages policy and the GFDL, then the involvement of humour within Misplaced Pages needs to be discussed within the community, and if necessary, deleted. If the humour sections are harmful to Misplaced Pages in terms of contributions or legally, they will sadly need to go. --tgheretford (talk) 21:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

G12?

How did you reckon G12 applied? Steve block Talk 15:44, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

The contributions of users were being attributed only to whoever copy and pasted the material instead of the actual author in violation of the license under which the original author released the material, thus, Copyright violation twice over. But that is really ancillary to the true reason, which, as noted, is the utter GFDL violations (section 4.B of the license). --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 15:59, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

No, I get all that, but my reading of G12 doesn't allow that as a reason for speedy deletion under G12. Does the material have to meet all the parameters or just one of them? And I think this is important, because if it doesn't meet G12 then you're claiming WP:IAR. Steve block Talk 17:39, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

So if you do not agree with the G12 interpretation (which I stand by), then just go by the GFDL. No matter what, the material cannot stay. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 18:29, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I understand how it violated the GFDL, I just can't see violating the GFDL as being a parameter listed under G12. It wasn't copied from a website with an incompatible license, therefore G12 cannot apply. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. Steve block Talk 19:26, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Somebody has got to revert this idiocy. Copyright paranoia can only go so far, before it becomes an utter and complete farce. WP:IAR, undelete, and ban Jeffrey for being WP:LAME.  Grue  16:57, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Jeffrey, and the failure of MFD to discard this walled garden nuisance does not speak well to our community. Even keeping the current page is questionable, but the archives were without value. -- nae'blis 17:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• It's really too bad... but Jeffery is 100% right. It's form violated our own ethics. ---J.S (T/C/WRE) 17:11, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
• I will resist the temptation to start a deletion review because I know that will only cause more trouble. However, my strong opinion is that Mr. Gustafson should not have deleted anything unilaterally. I really don't see how this is any different from when User:YankSox deleted Daniel Brandt by implicitly invoking WP:BLP, and started a deletion war with catastrophic results. In both cases, the pages were nearly perennial subjects of discussion, but nobody could muster community consensus to get them deleted. Then some admin goes ahead and deletes them unilaterally. Our community dynamics depend on trust, and it's hard to trust administrators who don't reciprocate that trust for those of us who have contributed to BJAODN.

I support the idea of trying to rescue citations to page history so that some of BJAODN can be recovered. This presents technical problems for non-admins like me because I don't have access to deleted articles. I'm referring to the sources for BJAODN items, not to BJAODN itself.

Going forward, I suggest the following:

1. Restore the titles of the BJAODN pages. I find them amusing, and they do not violate GFDL.
2. Recreate BJAODN as a category instead of a list. The category would have three subcategories:
   1. Deleted pages.
   2. Reverted diffs from existing articles.
   3. Special items such as April Fools jokes.

In appropriate situations, a newpage patroller could bypass CSD G1 by adding a template that says "This article is deleted and is viewable only for humorous purposes" and would automatically be categorized by the template. I'm not sure how it would work for diffs. I suppose special items could already go in Category:Misplaced Pages humor, but then, the entirety of BJAODN belongs there.

Let us not confuse GFDL issues with personal preferences. Just because BJAODN violates some rule that most of us honestly don't know about, it doesn't justify unilateral action, and it also doesn't mean that we should disparage any and all attempts at humor, as some of the folks above have been doing. YechielMan 20:44, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Just because BJAODN violates some rule that most of us honestly don't know about — Any administrator — any administrator — who is not familiar with the requirements of the GFDL has been given access to administrator tools too early, before xe is actually ready to use them. Many of the tasks that we use our tools for from day to day, including history mergers, fixing bogus copy-and-paste moves, and renaming over existing articles, involve the requirements of the GFDL. We are required to delete content that is not licensed under the GFDL, and to preserve edit history and not delete when (GFDL-licensed) content has been merged. Our tools are here in part for us to ensure that the project's copyright policy is adhered to, and to repair the errors made by those who have not followed that policy. Not knowing what the requirements of the project's copyright licence actually are is a fundamental deficiency; it is something that one should have learned before becoming an administrator. Uncle G 23:29, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Realisticaly you are going to have to accept that most admins have not read the GFDL. Just as you have to accept that most admins have not read our full disclaimers.Geni 01:56, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Ahem. It is a sad day when BJAODN gets deleted. Amen. - Bagel7 _{what ya say, what???} 02:59, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

vandalism

User:Itham keeps removing a well known fact from the page, despite lot of reverts. Please, someone do something.... --Jollyroger 10:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Yup, I did something. I removed the poorly sourced speculative fancruft you insist on adding. Don't edit war about crap. Guy (Help!) 11:08, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Review of editor spamming article with irrelevant example

Mindys12345 is obsessed with repeatedly adding Fatso the Fat-Ass Wombat Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat to the article "mascot". He adds both a picture and a see also bullet for this irrelevant piece of social commentary against commercialization. It is really not relevant in the grand scheme of things. If Mindy were writing sourced, full explanations of parody mascots as a trend, then such an addition might be warranted.

But considering no specific characters are highlighted in the see also section, and there is no discussion of the character and the larger trend (if indeed it is one), it's simply flaunting a limited happening that wasn't covered in the mainstream media outside of Australia.

Opinions? -- Zanimum 14:36, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Revert once and then walk away. If it's unworthy, lots of people will do this, and the user will eventually give up, or get blocked for WP:3RR. Jehochman 14:45, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It's already happened multiple times. Every time, I not only reverted, but added a bit of relevant extra information.

Ramdrake deleted the image, Evb-wiki brought it back because he feels that there's enough room for everybody. Are Misplaced Pages articles supposed to be littered with images? Hit bull, win streak deleted the image as "inappropriate", Evb-wiki fired back that "your view of what's appropriat is not a valid reason to remove content". This clearly interprets Hit bull's comments as meaning PG-rated content, when he likely meant not appropriate for an article with so few other examples and so little context for the character's prescence.

There's now suggestion that the article is US-centric, which it isn't: the headless mascot appears to be the lion of SG Kronau-Östringen (Germany), the bug is from Canada, meaning only Clutch and the Pets.com puppet are American. Frankly, the whole concept of non-cartoon mascots is completely ignored, which is much worse. -- Zanimum 18:28, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

User:Jeffrey Vernon Merkey

I have unblocked jvm. This may prove to be the stupidest thing I ever did. I hope not. Posting from my blackberry so no proper sig, JzG

I hope it turns out to not be the stupidest thing you ever did. At this point though it is really up to Jeff.--Isotope23 17:32, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Eh, it's better to have tried and failed in such circumstances then not to have tried. Hope JVM takes your conversations to heart, Guy :) SirFozzie 17:35, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Runcorn and sockpuppets banned

After an investigation involving several CheckUsers, myself included, it has been determined based on new, firmer technical evidence, as well as the editing patterns, including similar article interests, reverting to each other, and double voting, that Newport, Poetlister, R613vlu, Brownlee, Londoneye, and Taxwoman, all previous sockpuppetry suspects from 2005, are all the same user, and, further, that the operator of these accounts is also the operator of the newer accounts new accounts including Simul8, Osidge, Holdenhurst, and the admin account Runcorn. On the recommendation of the Arbitration Committee, Runcorn has been desysopped by a steward, and all of the accounts have been blocked indefinitely. Dmcdevit·t 20:37, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Aye. Mackensen (talk) 20:42, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Wow. Nishkid64 (talk) 20:48, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I'm shocked. Pretty shocking when you think about it. This seems as bad as the Wonderfool/Robdurbar incident some time ago. I do know that Poetlister's still active at Wikiquote as q:User:Poetlister. This is certainly one thing I didn't expect to read on Misplaced Pages today. I assume User:RachelBrown is still active, am I wrong?? But, whatever way you look at it, it is shocking. --SunStar Net 20:52, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• ...wow. EVula // talk // ☯ // 20:56, 30 May 2007 (UTC)
• Bravo! ➥the Epopt 21:06, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

No Poetlister and I had email communications, and she has provided me important information about the issue and they indeed proved she is not a sock. I now need a trustworthy admin that I can forward the evidence to. Who wants it? Wooyi 21:08, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Send it to the arbcom list or an arbitrator, but I highly doubt this. Dmcdevit·t 21:22, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Alright, but this needs to be confidential, which arbitrator is the most trustworthy and responsive? Wooyi 21:24, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

They're all a bunch of faithless losers, when you look at it that way. --jpgordon 21:27, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

I respect the ArbCom, so no intention to insult the institution. Anyways, from past experience you seem to be a good arbitrator, Gordon, so I will send it to you. Wooyi 21:31, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Email sent to jpgordon. Wooyi 21:34, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

The above-mentioned e-mail has been received by the Committee. However, I'm afraid that it didn't actually cast any further light on the matter (merely a denial). If there is evidence to bring to our attention, we would most certainly like to see it. James F. (talk) 22:55, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

• Just curious: How did this mass sockpuppetry come to light in the first place? Checkuser, yes, but obviously there must have been some suspicion involved to get to that point. What were the sockpuppets doing that set off peoples' alarms? This is one of the most severe cases I've ever seen — and it makes me wonder just how many other admin sockpuppets might be lurking somewhere out there, just waiting to strike... *** Crotalus *** 23:30, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

  Various people have been tracking them for a while. Finally someone looked at just the right thing - David Gerard 23:54, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

  This page offers a fair amount of evidence. --Calton | Talk 00:17, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

  We e-mailed arbcom with 8 pages of evidence after this AFD, but there was obviously much more to it, people had suspected sockpuppetry for ages, but Runcorn's name hadn't come up (as far as I know) until that AFD just kind of made it obvious what was going on, if you could read between the lines. --W.marsh 05:32, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

  Indeed, I first encountered it there, discovered an administrator behind it, and contacted ArbCom, who were already looking at similar issues. Dmcdevit·t 00:24, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

It's quite true. This was brought to my attention by someone else (I'll leave it to them whether they want their name mentioned or not), but after looking into it, it was pretty clear that the accounts were socks. Seraphimblade 00:19, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Aren't these sockpuppets of RachelBrown or is she unrelated? --MichaelLinnear 00:30, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

There was a user subpage on Zodriac or something about the Poetlister alleged socks. Some admin deleted it a year ago when Zodriac (sp?) got banned. Basically it lined out all the evidence that acquited poetlister. Basically, she and the others are real life friends. I mean they include their pictures. I am sure they can include pictures holding up signs of things to prove they are not socks, just friends. There's a difference between people of similar interests and friends and people who are the same person. Just ask them to provide pictures of themselves holding up signs or something and it'll be proven they are different people. SakotGrimshine 00:46, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

If they are real life friends and they are voting together...how is that not meatpuppetry? IrishGuy 00:49, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Well the accusation was sock puppetry, not meat puppetry. SakotGrimshine 00:52, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

That's rather easy to circumvent. Just get a bunch of random friends to hold up signs for you - they don't have to know why. Snap some pics. Job done! - Alison ☺ 00:56, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Since most of the blocked accounts had uploaded pictures of themselves, you'd have to get all of the same people back together again, maybe not so simple. --MichaelLinnear 01:05, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

If someone actually bothers to take a picture with a sign, to get back an editor account with no powers--not an admin account--instead of just changing your IP and making a new account, then this is likely a legit person. If that's not enough, ask them all not just holding a sign, but doing it in a bikini--which you couldn't easily get a bunch of friends to do. I'm also not sure that everyone who is at their computer a lot has a whole bunch of real life friends. If they are socks, then their photos would be taken from somewhere else and we should find the source... magazines, etc. SakotGrimshine 01:55, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Also.... Has this been finished yet, checkuser being able to read USER AGENT? So checkuser can see what people's browser and OS are? I'm doubtful they all match for every account. I'm sure some of them use Mac's, Windowx XP vs. Vista, etc. SakotGrimshine 00:52, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

That wouldn't prove anything either. I really do have several systems which use different OS's, and it's trivial to spoof useragent headers. Seraphimblade 01:35, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I suggest immediate unblock and exoneration of Rachel Brown, Poetlister, and Taxwoman, absurd sock accusation that amounts to Witchhunt. Wooyi 01:45, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

If useing a different browser makes you different people me and user:User:Genisock2 are different people. Something that doesn't appear to be the case.Geni 01:51, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Come on, they all have pictures of themselves, socks don't have human faces. Have some common sense. Wooyi 01:57, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

How you know they are pictures of them?Geni 02:00, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Because I WP:AGF and assume most Wikipedians are honest, plus my email communications with one of the blocked user. Wooyi 02:13, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Your "important information proving they are not socks" turned out to be nothing more than a rant and unfounded accusations. Dmcdevit·t 02:20, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Um. No. This was the result of extensive investigation and conferring between several CheckUsers. Obviously, I'm not going to give technical details because there is no pressing need to reveal personal information, and there is certainly no good reason to make it easier for future sockpuppets to evade detection by knowing our methods. However, all of the things that are crossing your minds now crossed ours as well, as ArbCom discussed the matter, and the technical information explains it all well. Dmcdevit·t 02:20, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

So you're saying those women, many of which are on the list of the top prettiest Wikipedians, are really actually a man? SakotGrimshine 02:32, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

So it would seem. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 02:36, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Wooyi, since you bring up WP:AGF, you could assume that the checkusers and ArbCom have acted in good faith and performed a diligent investigation before labeling these accounts sockpuppets. But instead you've described their actions as a "witch-hunt", "absurd", lacking "common sense", etc. I don't bring this up to be hard on you, but it's not the first time you've defended an ArbCom/checkuser-identified abusive sockmaster on flimsy grounds (). How about extending some of that good faith to the checkusers and ArbCom? MastCell 04:06, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Speaking of images, what do we do with the images like Image:Taxwoman1.jpg and so on? Since these are all sockpuppets of an editor who at times identified as a male, can we really assume they have any rights to these pictures that were uploaded? --W.marsh 05:53, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Weird category

Allo. I'll admit it, I don't know where to go for this, so I'm just sticking it here. I stumbled on a category that doesn't seem to belong as a category. (But, can you put 'speedy' tags on categories?) Anyways, take a look and see for yourself: Category:How_to_tell_if_a_person_using_one_and_what_to_do Bladestorm 22:33, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

It links to club drug and contains material that someone pasted to the bottom of that article rather than trying to incorporate it into the article in an organized way. Apparently someone was confused about the difference between an article and a category. Michael Hardy 22:41, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Mountain Vista Governor's School

Can another admin please keep an eye on Mountain Vista Governor's School and its AFD. A bunch of school kids have been trying to include some silly nonsense, and even some attacks, in the article. A number of users have vandalized user pages of those who recommended delete at the AFD. I've blocked a bunch them and several IPs, and I would semi-protect the article if it weren't currently at AFD. Anyways...I won't be around for a bit, so an extra set of admin eyes over the next day or so would be helpful. Thanks. --Ed (Edgar181) 23:05, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

Proposal for Change in "Attacking" Policy

In my own opinion, I feel that our policy regarding offenders of the "attacking" policy is a bit too lenient and is often disregarded following appropriate action taken by Misplaced Pages admins. Please note that you do not exactly know where the attacks originated and how far they could go. Even though incidents like these rarely do take place, it is certainly a likely possibility. I propose a punishment of, for a first offense, a permanent ban from editing Misplaced Pages and that comment be either kept or reported to law enforcement depending on the severity of the threat. Please take this into consideration. This punishment may be harsh but is necessary in our pursuit to rid Misplaced Pages of vandals and misuse! Please comment on my talk page ASAP when you have reached an opinion, have a question, etc. Redsox04 23:13, 30 May 2007 (UTC)

We don't punish. We prevent. ⇒ SWATJester 01:46, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

I should follow this up by stating that a) we already block people who personal attack others, at the administrators discretion up to indefinitely. b) Not to mention there's really no way for anyone to actually track you down and cary through on their personal attacks, and law enforcement really can't do much about it. ⇒ SWATJester 01:55, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Ditto to this, we never (in a perfect world, I know, but we get close) block to punish someone. We only block to prevent damage. If a good faith belief is held they wont continue to harm the wiki, no block should be imposed. -M 02:03, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

New at this

I'm a new admin and am just starting to deal with disruptive editors. Would somebody please review my actions regarding User:Horhay Sanchez? It's mostly his talk page; he kept doing weird things to the warnings he'd been given, even after I warned him to stop. I've fully-protected the page for 24 hours. Is that right? --Masamage ♫ 03:15, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

He was a vandal-only account. Ryulong extended it to an indef block which is pretty standard when the account is brand new and has vandalism only edits. Feel free to extend the page protection. He was clearly just trolling. IrishGuy 03:22, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Hmm~, okay. I guess one learns to be less lenient after a while just by necessity. (I've seen three unblock requests today that blamed a friend for hacking the account to vandalize with. Amazing.) Anyway, thank you for the reply! --Masamage ♫ 04:23, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

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