Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive56

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Noticeboard archives

v • d • e
Noticeboard archives
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68
Incident archives
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40
41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50
51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60
61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70
71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80
81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100
101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110
111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120
121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130
131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140
141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150
151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158
3RR archives
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20
21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 32 33 34
Other links
Talk | Checkuser | ArbCom enforcement | Backlog

Contents

[edit] User:TruthbringerToronto and page deletions

I just wanted to make a note of this user and their usage of removing of deletion templates/opposing pretty much any deletion request. This user keeps removing speedy delete templates on grounds such as "possibly notable" or removes them and adds stub tags to articles or an external link while not expanding the article. The articles themselves still maintain no sense of notability but the user believes that by adding stub tags it makes them notable.

Contributions here: [1]

More specific examples are available at Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/TruthbringerToronto#Oppose

I was wondering what the administration view of this seemingly willingness to save any article? --- Lid 13:13, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Anyone can challenge speedy deletion or WP:PROD. If deletion is challenged, take it to AfD. Yes, uncritical inclusionists are a bore, but sometimes they are right and the cost to the encyclopaedia of thinking about a deletion rather than just doing it is relatively small. Once at AfD the articles will either be rapidly fixed up or nuked, either is acceptable. Just zis Guy you know? 13:22, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
TruthbringerToronto typically expands or sources the articles that he removes speedies from, which is very useful. I hope he continues: he helps us not delete notable topics and his research can only improve the quality of an eventual AfD discussion about the articles. Kusma (討論) 13:37, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
As I mentioned on his RfA, he'd do better to explain why he's done something when he pulls a tag off an article, rather than just saying "probably notable." That cost me 45 minutes of research and things to get the (since successful) AfD Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/MetaPhase organized. Scattershot tag removal can cause more problems than help, I suggest. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:54, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
I took a look at TruthbringerToronto's contributions and it seems like he's saved a lot of valid articles from being deleted. Some of the users who originally posted the CSD tags on some of the articles acted rather hastily (he recently removed CSD tags from articles on an author with multiple published works, a professional basketball player, and a high school). hoopydinkConas tá tú? 13:53, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for your comments, now I have a view of the situation and the admins view. --- Lid 14:30, 22 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User page

Will someone take a look at this page User:Kingstonjr/Work Gallery--85.164.243.67 13:53, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

Not safe for work, btw - Syrthiss 13:59, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it's very nice. Anything in particular you wanted us to see? Powers T 14:03, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Why the picture of Ataturk in the middle of this pr0nfest? User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 23:15, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Anybody care to go through all of those images to verify that they're not fair use? If so, he's violating it by having them on a User page. User:Zoe|(talk) 01:58, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
The first two rows check out as having acceptable tags, as do a few random ones in the middle and towards the end. JoshuaZ 02:32, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Someone contacted me and said I should check out this page since I was recently in a dispute with this user about the Images. As I did before, I checked every Image for copyright violations and linked the ones at the bottom per the section headers on the sub-page. If he reverts, kindly revert back, because he has a tendency to think I am vandalizing when I'm really just trying to remove the violations. Off topic, I also removed some deleted Images (red-links) for cosmetic purposes to the page. Regards — Moe Epsilon 03:22 August 24 '06

Useful page for image vandals whom want to choose a nice picture.--Andeh 08:58, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
don't put beans in your ears. JoshuaZ 18:45, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Koavf's pages moves

Koavf (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) is moving lots of pages from A.B. Foo to A. B. Foo according to "manual of style" that names should have spaces in them. I think he is violating WP:POINT, and the "if it ain't broke don't fix it" rule. (And I personally prefer the A.B. Foo form).

Despite my telling of him that he needs to get consensus for such mass changes, he's going ahead with them anyway, so perhaps someone can try to talk with him. — Dunc|☺ 15:55, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

It appears that the manual of style agrees with his moves. As long as he is fixing the redirects and accepting input about mistakes (e.g. C.C. Chapman, I don't see a problem here. --Nscheffey(T/C) 20:23, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Well I do. In particular I would want to know where such consensus for such a strongly-worded WP:MOS was formed. If I remember correctly, and this was from a couple of years go, somebody unilaterally decided that this was to be the case, citing Chicago, and then there were others who pointed out that Chicago wasn't gospel, and either usage was okay, and it ended that there was no consensus either way. It is quite possible that something like this has slipped in under the RADAR. In which case WP:POINT applies, as it is not making worthwhile edits. — Dunc|☺ 21:43, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Dunc here, although technically he doesn't need concensus. If the rules were unilatereally decided, they should be changed, per Dunc's suggestions, In my opinion HawkerTyphoon 21:58, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Since this appears to be a contentious issue, perhaps we should continue the discussion here: Wikipedia_talk:Naming_conventions_(people)#Proposal_on_spacing_of_initials_in_names. --Nscheffey(T/C) 23:06, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Huh So, I found this by accident, as Duncan didn't bother informing me that there is some discussion going on behind my back. If you want to know my rationale, and the Byzantine arguments that Duncan and I have exchanged, see our respective talk pages. If you have questions for me, please feel free to ask me. In short, I would like to point out:
  1. There is already a standard for this.
  2. Most articles are already named "X. Y. Lastname," rather than "X.Y. Lastname."
  3. All well-written and most-edited articles are named this way (e.g. H. P. Lovecraft, C. S. Lewis, E. E. Cummings, H. G. Wells, etc.)
More can be found on the talks. -Justin (koavf)·T·C·M 19:00, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Continuous reintroducing of uncited sales figures

Back to Basics (Christina Aguilera album) has just achieved a number one position on many charts and there seems to be a 84K sales figure circulating the internet and it keeps on getting reintroduced in the page despite hidden text about citing chart and sales data, comment on user pages and moving of the entries to the talk page. They keep on ignoring it and keep on reintroducing uncited figures. Don't know what to do about it anymore. KittenKlub 10:59, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

The saga was finally solved. KittenKlub 22:31, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Poweredby mediawiki picture missing

Not 100% sure where to put this, but in the lower right corner of the page where I normally this picture, I now have a picture of some matrix. Something needs to be fixed somewhere...--Peter Andersen 13:33, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

The yellow flower? it displays fine here.. maybe.. a local problem there? -- Drini 13:49, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Fine here as well. -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 13:51, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Question about unblocking policy/process

I blocked User:The Shimmick indefinitely as a vandalism only account. (See User talk:The Shimmick##Your_edit_history). The user has requested an unblock. Two questions:

  1. Is it acceptable for the blocking admin to respond to the request to unblock, or is that supposed to come from a "neutral" admin?
  2. What is the usual blocking time for this type of behavior?

— ERcheck (talk) 22:28, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

An indef block appears perfectly appropriate here. I haven't actually checked the history of the articles, but the one remaining contrib [2] seems to suggest this might not be someone who is very sorry... It is probably a good idea to let a second admin deny an unblock request, so I've done that here. Of course if the blocking admin thinks an unblock is appropriate that doesn't require a second admin to review the request, but I assume that's not what you were thinking of here? Petros471 22:38, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Correct. I was not inclined to unblock as the rapid succession of vandal edits indicated an editor without plans to become a contributor. Thanks for the response. — ERcheck (talk) 22:56, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Small request

  • Can someone blank User:Đ and add {{indef-user}}? As all the userboxes are becoming a nuisance for bots updating userboxes. Ta.--Andeh 09:56, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Done. Petros471 10:00, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Ta.--Andeh 10:03, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
About time. pschemp | talk 10:04, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Another request, can someone revert Eon8 back to last the revision as it redirects to List of Internet phenomena where there's no information on it there at all. Ta.--Andeh 14:07, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Done. Didn't someone mention that you should be an admin so I don't have to keep doing your work ;) Petros471 14:12, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Could someone also edit Template:Userpage as it's on A LOT of user pages, it should look clean. So could you please add
<span class="plainlinks"> so it looks like
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Andypandy.UK
instead of
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Andypandy.UK
--Andeh 14:18, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Done. --cesarb 18:05, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Ta.--Andeh 01:14, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

You can request on Template talk:Userpage next time. —Quarl (talk) 2006-08-25 09:33Z


[edit] Blocked IP in UAE on proxy

This message appears occasionally on computers in the UAE when attempting an edit:

"Your user name or IP address has been blocked from editing. You were blocked by Mike Rosoft for the following reason (see our blocking policy): Blatant vandalism, shared IP Your IP address is 213.42.2.21."


UAE internet connections go through a proxy server administered by the ISP Etisalat and IP addresses frequently change (usually one refresh click is enough to get to edit page after seeing above message) so it is rather pointless blocking an IP, and mildly annoying when legitimate edits are attempted.

Suggestion is to refrain from blocking IPs on proxy and to unblock the one listed above please.

Thank you

195.229.241.187 11:14, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Thus the issue with having an entire country's IP space going through one "public IP" (as it appears to every other country). Maybe instead of repeatedly blocking this IP totally as time and time again the IP keeps getting blocked due to vandalism and other issues, why not indef block without enabling the autoblock for logged in accounts, or make people use the AOL style solution if that's easier and/or works better. Cat-five - talk 07:51, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] israelisms article deletion

I would like to start a request for the undelete of podcast entry israelisms. I believe this has been an unfair censorship of this Article, I also believe that another 5 to 7 days will bring more comments from outside the small amount that were made at 1st sign of deletion/defacement of the Article. Feel free to email me.One more rousing round Please.....--John M. 16:37, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

The AfD took place just the other day and, as was pointed out then, this is not a vote. I say keep it deleted.--Alabamaboy 16:44, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Israelisms. Please see Wikipedia:Deletion review if you want to argue that the deletion discussion was closed incorrectly. I suggest, however, that it is unlikely that you are going to get consensus that this podcast meets our criteria for inclusion. Jkelly 16:47, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


I did not come here to make an arguement. Those are your words not mine. I came and made a request. Yes as far as votes ,the very 1st person to nominate the page for deletion and only person said the same thing in one reply and the exact opposite in another reply. This also happened with another contributor of the discussion page - so which is it? I don't see the need for any condescending remarks; this only hurts the Wiki. I don't think notability is the issue here considering a lot of the Fodder that makes up the Wiki. After all this isn't relied upon by academia. I don't know of too many institutions that would let the Wiki be an accepted reference.--John M. 23:27, 24 August 2006 (UTC)
Certainly they won't if we don't apply verifiability and notability criteria. I don't take the above remarks to be condescending, but rather good advice - to fulfil your request, you need to gain a consensus that the AfD was improperly closed. The place to go is Wikipedia:Deletion review. Slac speak up! 23:37, 24 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/8bitJake

This case is closed and the result has been published at the link above. 8bitjake is banned from editing articles about poltical figures from Washington State, and he is placed on Probation. These remedies also apply to Bazzajf and 62.77.181.16.

For the Arbitration Committee. --Tony Sidaway 20:36, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Abuse of User Pages?

I did some compiling of statistics about what I view as wide-scale abuse of Wikipedia User Pages, as well as my concerns about one particular admin -- RHaworth (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves) -- and his poor judgment in enabling this abuse. My comments grew too large (1500 words -- you've been warned), so I've posted them at User:Calton/User Page Abuse. The Table of Contents, so you can get a sense of what's on that page:

  • Inappropriate userfication
  • RHaworth's moves
  • Eye-glazing statistics
  • Random samples
  • Actual contributions?
  • More eye-glazing statistics
  • Poor judgment
  • RHaworth's response & reverting userfications
  • Actions needed

Data can be found at User:Calton/Userfied pages.

Comments would be appreciated. --Calton | Talk 07:12, 25 August 2006 (UTC) --Calton | Talk 07:12, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

  • Interesting issue, but I think it's more systemic than one administrator -- I've userfied in a similar fashion many times. Have you contacted these users about the content of their user pages? -- Samir धर्म 08:11, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
  • No -- in almost all cases, the users disappear after their initial attempts to add their articles or to insert references to themselves into other articles, so it seemed pointless. --Calton | Talk 01:47, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
  • I don't userfy much, but I'll point out this defense, which Calton didn't respond to (on that special page, at least): "In these cases, userfication has prevented the authors trying to recreate the article in the (Main) namespace." This may be preferable to the deletedpage template. Part of what I don't like about those things is that they actually come up when you hit the "Random article" button. In contrast, userpages don't. So while neither look good, one's semi-invisible and the other is visible. CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 08:33, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
  • apparently, RHaworth is unacquainted with the {{deletedpage}} tag. isn't a response? --Calton | Talk 01:47, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
  • I've commented at [[User talk:Calton/User Page Abuse; I won't copy it here because the noticeboard is big enough already and I think the talk page is a better place for discussion. Graham87 09:49, 25 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Policy Change Proposal:

Thread moved to talk page. --Doc 23:45, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] anon page creation

Isn't it about time that this be restored? supposedly this was restricted in the first place to help cut down on page creation vandalism, which after about 2 or 3 days simply meant page creation vandals had to login to vandalize.. The only thing the current ban on anon page creation really helps to do, is make it almost impossible for anons to use things like AfD and other things that depend on page creation. If anything, this coupled with newer features like sprotection, anon only blocks, AntiVandalBots with "angry modes", and RC filters that target just anon edits, really hurts the anon friendliness that wikipedia had way back when. Couple that with the fact that Registered Users more and more getting the idea that anons don't matter anymore. Not to mention the recent trend of "RC Patrol" only accounts, who view anons as an obstacle to their RC patrolling. Not to mention, as anyone who has ever tried to run anti vandalism tools as an anon knows, many people would rather restore vandalism than fact that an anon with a high edit count isn't a vandal. Is there anyway that the page creation ban could be reexamined, maybe even lifted for a trial period?--172.130.227.58 16:02, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

New page creation vandalism is a lot harder to clean up then normal vandalism, as it requires a sysop. Can't "new editors" start creating pages immediatley now? (But not move them) — xaosflux Talk 12:37, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Three AFD's may have slipped through

Just a heads up that Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Manatee meat, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/ModTheSims2, and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Bitweaver2 have all been open for seven days now while other AfDs around them have closed. They haven't been relisted for consenus or posted to in a while. Could an admin take a look and make a call (relist, no consenus, delete or keep)? Thanks --Brian (How am I doing?) 16:05, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Two of the AfDs are closed, apart from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/ModTheSims2, it's a 50/50 keep/delete afd so leave it to a bold admin to decide after reading all the arguments.--Andeh 11:11, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Was just closed as no consensus. --james(talk) 12:49, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Username?

Does anyone else feel that Tess Tickle (talk • contribs) should be asked to pick a less sophomoric name? Just zis Guy you know? 18:02, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Blocked. Naconkantari 18:39, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Disagree, left note on admins page. — xaosflux Talk 12:35, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Complex Unblock request on behalf of user

Neverending Drumbeat (talk • contribs) appears NOT to be blocked by claims they cannot edit. May have something to do with the indef block of This Is The Neverending Drumbeat Of What To Come (talk • contribs), but I don't know. Requesting admin help with this case. (|-- UlTiMuS 00:39, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, they're obviously the same person, so it's probably an Autoblock. It should expire in 24 hours, or an admin can unblock it early. --Mr. Lefty Talk to me! 01:04, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
In case someone wants to let him edit, his autoblock is #236131. --Mr. Lefty Talk to me! 01:12, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
I removed the autoblock, they appear to be using a shared IP. — xaosflux Talk 12:30, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! LOL SNRUBBED FOO'

An obviously productive and caring user, this one, whom an administrator should give a special gift vacation to, especially for the epilepsy-inducing talk page. Tony Fox (arf!) 05:26, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Until an admin gets around to blocking the account, I have blanked the user talk page. -- tariqabjotu 05:33, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
Somedays we need a bat signal.--Crossmr 05:34, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
I sent him packing. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 05:35, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
IRC works well for getting admins' attention quickly.—WAvegetarian•(talk) 11:05, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Children posting personal information

Regarding the problem of self-identified children posting personal information, I have created WP:COPPA for discussion. It is early and rough; please whack away at it as needed. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:09, 26 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:218.185.0.83 - vandalism only

All of the edits by User:218.185.0.83 have been vandalism. Special-T 14:40, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

This IP is already blocked. Not all of the edits are vandalism (though most are). This would have been better reported at the vandalism noticeboard. Thanks, Gwernol 14:44, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:WikiWoo unblock request

Could an uninvolved admin please take a look at User:WikiWoo's unblock reuqest. This user has a history of blocks for WP:POV-pushing, WP:POINT violation, incivility and personal attacks. In my opnion he is on the edge of exhausting the community's patience, but he insists he is the innocent party - he claims he is the vicitm of "Eager administrator blocking with a manifested bias and a partiality to one side in an editing dispute. Initially attempted to entrap editor into making a personal attack and then interpreting subsequent responses as personal attacks". He believes there is a conspiracy of corrupt government officials in the Ontario Regional Government who are bilking billions of dollars from the public and who are consipiring on Wikipedia to suppress these allegations. He continues to insert these allegations into articles and won't source them (the consipiracy has apparently suppressed all information). He is currently on a seven day block for continued personal attacks against editors who have reverted his POV pushes, but he is objecting at length to this.

He clearly has no intention of stopping his campaign when he returns (as he says on his talk page "Though I know policy, I choose to ignore them.") and despite many specific warnings he continues to make what I consider to be egregious personal attacks on editors in good standing ([3], [4], the unblock request itself etc.). Could someone take a look at his unblock request and either decline it or unblock him? Thanks, Gwernol 14:04, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I've been tangentially involved on this one through working on a couple of the articles he's tried to sway, and have to agree that he appears to be pretty well recalcitrant at this point. Do note that he's been through an RFC already, he's been blocked once before, has had a member advocate try to give him guidance to little effect, and really needs some encouragement to drop the conspiracy, the attacks and the POV. Tony Fox (arf!) 18:09, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks Tony, I wasn't even aware that he had a previous history on Wikipedia, let alone one as congtentious as that. I appreciate the heads up. Gwernol 03:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Nikkicraft

Concerning:

  1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/Nikkicraft
  2. "Wikipedia is not a soapbox" from Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not
  3. "There is nothing wrong with adding one or more useful content-relevant links to an article; however, excessive lists can dwarf articles" from Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not

I find the following excessive: [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] WAS 4.250 09:59, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not seeing Wikipedia as a soapbox. I'm not even trying to influence most of the content of the proporn/pros articles. However, if you look right before my post in the first link, for example, you can see how a person attempted to post one single link of a reference critical of prostitution and it was removed. The censoring user deleted the one single link and labeled it "spamming". Unbelievable and this sort of thing is the standard of what is happening on all the prostitution and pornography pages. Opposing positions are most often not allowed on them. Essentially the Wikipedia section for prostitution and pornography is a portal. The bias there needs to be corrected. I have compiled a variety of articles, links, audio speech files and resources and am posting them to remove the POV from these pages and provide a balance. If you look at the previous versions of the articles many of them had absolutely no other viewpoint expressed. I don't think it should be necessary, but if I must I will cut some of them out and remove them from the pages at your request, but some need to remain. --Nikkicraft 11:47, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
You say "I'm not even trying to influence most of the content of the proporn/pros articles" as if that were a good thing. Wikipedia is trying to be a great free encyclopedia, not a link farm. We encourage people to add sourced encyclopedic content to the articles and discourage simply adding links. You are in some ways a POV warrier, which is normally bad, but your point of view is, I believe, a minority position as you are for censorship and Wikipedia is all about the opposite. If you refrain from deleting content and concentrate on adding content sourced from unbiased trustworthy sources (specifically not from you or your friends sites, but from others citing you guys is fine) then you can make wikipedia better. And about the links ... how about deleting in each case I listed above all but the three that are most relevent to the article? For example, you added "Andrea Dworkin: Why Men Like Prostitution So Much Andrea Dworkin Keynote Speech at International Trafficking Conference, 1989. (Audio File: 22 min, 128 Kbps, mp3)" to Prostitution in Thailand. Is that really specific to the topic of the article . Tell the truth, its spamming an opinion, isn't it? Needs to go. You also added "Prostitution and Male Supremacy by Andrea Dworkin" to that same article. Isn't NoStatusQuo your site? Which you also use to "source" the article on you? There are serious issues here that need to be dealt with in a way that lets you help us make wikipedia better. WAS 4.250 12:57, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Some of that content may be useful in some of those articles, but not all. For just one example, it seems hard to believe that the article Comfort women, about women being forced to serve in military brothels, can be described as supportive of prostitution, and needing an opposed to prostitution view for balance. I don't think the link to the speech "Why men like prostitution so much" is appropriate there; that topic is not at issue in the article. It looks like the same links were pasted in to the articles blindly, regardless of the article; spam seems like a good description of that process. A bit more selectivity is called for. AnonEMouse (squeak) 13:29, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure where you get the idea that I'm in favor of censorship. I'm not. But what I believe or don't is not on trial here, I don't think. To reply to your concerns, yes, I posted the audio speech Andrea Dworkin: Why Men Like Prostitution So Much Andrea Dworkin Keynote Speech at International Trafficking Conference, 1989. (Audio File: 22 min, 128 Kbps, mp3) to Prostitution in Thailand. I did so because it's relevant to any page about prostitution because it's from an international conference and it answers the questions of why men buy women and what many of them do after the purchase. No, I absolutely and honestly would not consider it spam. In fact, I would ask any administrators who might have the time to please listen to it then say to me specifically why it has no place in the pornography and prostitution section. Dworkin, no matter how much one may disdain her is an expert in this topic and it's really biased to have any encyclopedia without speeches and articles by her.
Yes, the No Status Quo is my domain. The article comes from the Official Website of Andrea Dworkin which has her articles which I, and others html coded, and we had no control whatsoever over the content. It's a library. The fact that I'm the librarian and archivist there should not prohibit me from sharing that valuable resource with Wikipedia. If that is the case I don't understand.
I am not interested in deleting content in the articles. I have spent a whole day recently alphabetizing sections and cleaning up pages. I even got thanked for doing so on one of the pages. However, at this time it's a lot of work and all I can do to update the articles and resources section and reply to people's concerns. After I'm done with this then I will certainly want to work on articles more.
Please notice that I could be posting anonymously and I'm not. I'm taking responsibility for what I'm doing which is way more than many around here are doing. I am sincerely trying to improve resources for Wikipedia and make the pornography portal less biased and with less of a POV which apparently the editors already here are not able to accomplish with the information they have available on the topic. What I posted was a variety of well chosen articles and audio speeches. If the administrators don't agree that it's a valid contribution, upon your request, I will cull down the resources and remove what I posted and repost a smaller selection. But if I were doing so I would continue to believe that Internatinoal Trafficking Conference audio speech should go first among them, then followed up by Dworkin's testimony before the Attorney General's Commission on Pornography. How could any encyclopedia wish to turn down such contributions I would never understand. --Nikkicraft 14:07, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
The other thing that's really ironic is that you're accusing me of being a censor when you're the one who deleted the resources and are censoring this information. --Nikkicraft
Per Wikipedia:External links, links on the page about Prostitution in Thailand should be specifically related to prostitution in Thailand, not general links related to prostitution. It's about the same as putting a link to the CIA World Factbook entry on Thailand on that article. If the reader of the Prostitution in Thailand article wants to know more about the causes of prostition, he/she needs to go to the Prostitution article; if he/she wants to know more specifically about prostitution in Thailand, he/she needs external links that are more specifically relevant. It's nothing personal; that's just how we do it here on Wikipedia in order to avoid having articles that are overflowing with external links. Powers T 15:44, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Then will someone kindly replace this article as it is a 42 page report on a nine country study and Thailand is one of the countries. Can that work for everyone? --Nikkicraft 16:03, 25 August 2006 (UTC) *
Prostitution and Trafficking in 9 Countries: Update on Violence and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder by Melissa Farley, Ann Cotton., Jacqueline Lynne, Sybile Zumbeck, Frida Spiwak, Maria E. Reyes, Dinorah Alvarez, Ufuk Sezgin 2003 Journal of Trauma Practice 2 (3/4): 33-74.
Another interesting aspect of this is that I'm being accused of conflict of interest for posting library and article entries that sell nothing and Wikipedia is facilitating international trafficking which profits the most unscrupulous slave traffickers of human beings all over the world, and it's all done under the protection of pseudonyms and protecting actual identities; and nobody seems to be bothered by a thing. Folks, the whole pornography and prostitution section with all it's sprawl is what is spamming and that same picture of that German hooker that's on all the different countries doesn't seem to bother anyone as being not related to the country she's posted on. That's the spam. She just lays there all splayed out for the consumer and no comment about what bias that represents. Anyone thinking that supplying hookers for men isn't exactly the purpose that an internet encyclopedia ought to be performing? Or is it? You want to vilify me? Go ahead I won't be able to stop you. You want to take out the bias and POV out of your prostitution portal and I'm willing to help you and please don't think I wouldn't rather be doing something else.
P.S. Thanks for your explanation Powers T. I do understand what you are saying better than I had realized that the links on that page are really very specific to Thailand. But will you now agree that the nine country study belongs there as well as the agency that did that research which is Prostitution Research and Education? And also once we establish these links are relevant and they are added can they be protected in some way?
And of course I will continue to disagree that an audio speech on internation trafficking discussing why men buy prostitutes and how they are abused is relevant to all those pages, but I'm sure y'all will invisibilize it if you wish. Would it be more appropriate for me to move my entries off this page to my own talk page to keep it from taking up space over here? --Nikkicraft 17:10, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Coming in late view: All I can say is that we have segmented articles for a reason, to help users find specific things. I looked at the diffs that WAS provided and I don't see the relevance of them to the specific articles they were added to. I can't see readers seeking to learn about prostitution in a specific country finding a speech by Andrea Dworkin of any relevance at all. Our purpose here is to hew to the NPOV, not to advocate, and those links don't support that when placed in the articles they were placed in, in my view. ++Lar: t/c 16:44, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, take the Thailand article. Yes, the material about Thailand is meant to be specific to Thailand. My take on it is this. If Dworkin made a specific and notable claim about Thailand that belongs in the article, and if it was in a published and publicly-accessible speech, then the article should say something like this: "Radical feminist Andrea Dworkin once argued that Thailand has too many exploited prostitutes as an outcome of colonialism [or whatever she actually did argue]." There should then be a specific reference to her speech, citing the page number of the published version where she makes this point about Thailand. OTOH, if she had nothing in particular to say about Thailand, but merely included some data relating to that country among others in a general discussion of prostitution, then she did not make a notable contribution to any debate about prostititution in Thailand in particular. In that case, it would not belong in the article. This is the sort of standard of specificity and sourcing that is supposed to apply to all articles. We don't allow editors to put together bits and pieces in a creative way to support a position or interpretation of their own. We definitely do not take editorial positions on which there could be controversy. However, we are supposed to report the significant positions that have been taken by others to date, with precise attribution and referencing. I hope this helps you work out what material you can use and in what articles. It might also help you hold others to similar standards if you suspect a double standard is being applied. Metamagician3000 05:49, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] RfC/Name

There appears to be a bit of a backlog at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/User names, though I could be wrong. =) Maybe a couple of admins could take a look when they get a chance? Powers T 00:41, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Most of these have already been dealt with. I am clearing them and looking at some new ones. —Centrx→talk • 06:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Announcement

I am moving house, will probably have no access for up to 4 days. Feel free to revert any admin actions of mine. Please keep an eye on St Christopher Iba Mar Diop College of Medicine, which is currently sprotected; VoA unprotected it as per usual, and it took only a few hours for the usual suspects to find out and start having at it. If VoA unprotects it it may be nobbled again. Just zis Guy you know? 22:05, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

I suspect you're merely moving the contents of your house to another house, but either way, good luck. Thatcher131 (talk) 23:23, 23 August 2006 (UTC)
Given that the contents of my personal timber yard occupied the larger of the two trucks, I think the movers might lean to my version here :-) We're in, but no broadband yet. Plus, I have never seen so many different keys in my life! An order for a set of suited locks is on the way. Just zis Guy you know? 17:50, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Vigil for Katefan0

Seeing as how vigils were set up for Radiant! and Redwolf24, I've decided to set one up for Katefan0. I don't know whether it's necessary, but I'm going to give it a try and see how long it lasts. Scobell302 16:14, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

And this requires admins how? 216.78.95.224 17:23, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
And this is your concern...why? --Calton | Talk 18:03, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
Nothing wrong with it at all, but I still wonder why the original poster is bringing this to our attention. Unless something strange is happening at said page, there is really nothing I could do about it, let alone administrators. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 00:35, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
If this is going to become common, we need a category for it :). NoSeptember 01:11, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
I'll sign the vigil but she's not returning. Trust me on this. She's extremely busy and as much as I'd love to have her back, it's just not going to happen. Sorry folks. --Woohookitty(meow) 00:00, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Apology and Request

I am currently an active and stable user here on Wikipedia, but that was not always the case. Before June, I was a pretty immature person, and did not take Wikipedia seriously at the time. Someone from some school vandalized my page, and I was angry (I really don't know why). I thought that the person was going to return to my page (to my knowledge, they never did), but I wrote a threat to them. It was an immature and a dumb thing to do, and I am truly sorry I did it. Here is the difference and my threat to them. I never changed my username after I did that, and now that I am a productive user I really don't want to change my name now (I probably should have been blocked for doing this, but no one noticed). However, I believe such an threat could insult someone reading the page history, simply by it's very nature. Therefore, I am requesting that the edit be deleted from my history (I'll keep the vandalism. It's a reminder for me to never do something like this again). I am really really sorry for who I was, but it is not who I am now, and I am trying to make amends. --Clyde Miller 22:37, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Couldn't it be just as, if not more, effective to post this apology alongside the threat, rather than attempting to have it deleted from the record in what could be considered a form of cover-up by some of our more paranoid users? (note: I'm not an admin, just an infernal busybody.) Your apology shows an additional level of maturity, and could not be taken the wrong way. --tjstrf 22:49, 26 August 2006 (UTC)
Well hasn't this more or less backfired? This is not a big scandal and is not news. Furthermore, it will not die (as it would in real life), unless the section is deleted. Finally putting an apology like this in public does nothing more than make people want to look at the threat (makes them curious), which is putting a bad light on Wikipedia, something I didn't want to do. If I had kept it quiet, no one would have noticed. Not that I don't apprciate what you've done to make this a complete aplology, but I think I'd be best to keep some sort of apology on my page but delete the entry itself. It would almost seem easier just to leave this account, but that would be running away, something I don't want to do. I think the best sourse of action would be to leave an apology for my bad behavior on my user page or talk page, but get rid of the entry. Can someone throw in their two cents on what they think? I really don't know what is proper, correct, and what would give me some sort of honor (by exposing this I have essentially destroyed my honor and word, something I have worked hard to upkeep).--Clyde Miller 00:29, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
To remove something from the history itself, you need someone with oversight permission. Look at Request for oversight. Thatcher131 (talk) 05:28, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
No, he doesn't need oversight. It's a simple and routine history deletion; oversight is only necessary if we want to purge it to the point of not letting admins read it, and for something as minor as this that's like killing ants with artillery.
And since he asked so nicely, I've done it. Shimgray | talk | 00:13, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Thank you so much. I feel really bad about what I did, and the fact that I have been forgiven has lifted a weight off my chest. Shimgray, thank you for being so understanding. You have made me feel better, and made my day. Many thanks to you and to all. --Clyde Miller 00:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Requesting comments on questionable use of article talk page

Anon IP 84.183.213.226 had edited VHCS, adding his consumer complaints about the software. Likewise, he added more detailed complaints on the article's talk page. Is it appropriate to either (1) delete the comments or (2) delete the talk page? — ERcheck (talk) 14:51, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I think that you should respond and teach him about notability requirements of sources and how to find notable sources for consumer complaints. Anomo 06:02, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User censoring an AfD

Alright, I admit it, I left a somewhat whimsical comment on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Jeremy Kyle Show. It's an obvious keep anyway. However, the nominator has persistently struck through my comments and left notes on my talk page warning me to 'maintian a professional tone to the discussions'. Surely this can't be right? --Nydas 15:26, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I've commented to the user. JoshuaZ 15:39, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks.--Nydas 16:38, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Human Imprinting

Please reinstate this deleted stub as it is such an important issue. The concept helps mothers who are trying to breastfeed as they are then better able to direct the behaviour of the newborn in a more helpful direction. There is no evidence that I have found in >30 years. Freud, Piaget and Lorenz (all males) did not quite understand thumbsucking because they had never had the 24/7/365 care of the newborn. Elsiemobbs Elsiemobbs 16:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I think you're looking for deletion review. Tony Fox (arf!) 19:59, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Images with urls on them

I'm not sure where to post this, and I so I'm posting this here. User:Dmwime has been uploading images that have www.visitbeforeyoudie.com branding on them, and he tags them with the This image is copyrighted. However, the copyright holder has irrevocably released all rights to it, tag, and then adds the images to some pages. Examples include Image:London_eye88.jpg and Image:Pszczew88.jpg. I see two potential problem; the first being that the copyright may not be the correct one (Note: he states that the owner of the website has given him permission, but doesn't that require some written statement to Wikipedia?). The more important problem that I see with it is that in many ways this type of action (having the URL in the image) seems like advertising to me, and I don't know if Wikipedia has any policy regarding this type of action. -- Jeff3000 18:44, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

First clarify the licensing. If these images really are freely licensed, then we just edit the URL out of them and put it on the image description page. Jkelly 18:47, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Community ban on User:WikiWoo?

User:WikiWoo has been trying to push a very specific WP:POV into articles related to regional government and particularly Ontario, Canada for sveral months now. His POV is neatly summed up by the Government of Ontario "...are the most corrupt governments on the plannet and the people running them both elected and appointed should all be executed for treason for their gross betrayals of public trust and that such people are not worthy of any respect or admiration from anyone". He claims to have been fighting against said government for thrity five years.

He has been pushing this POV into a series of articles under at least three different usernames: User:WikiRoo, User:WikiDoo, under the IP User:216.154.134.91 and now User:WikiWoo. He refuses to provide verifiable reliable sources for any but the most minor of his edits and regards any and all Wikipedia policies as non-applicable to his editing: see his statement on his talk page "Though I know policy, I choose to ignore them.". He not only inserts POV into existing articles, but also creates articles to push his POV; see: Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Public_Procurement and Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Prequalified Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Public_Tendering for examples of not only his creations but also his incivil justifications that ignore all policy.

Despite frequent warnings and blocks for disruption he refuses to modify his POV warring in any way - see the lengthy discussion on his talk page. He believes he is on essentially a "holy mission" to get this information into Wikipedia at any cost. He shows no understanding of basic rules of verifiability or maintaining a neutral point of view.

In addition to his use of Wikipedia to push his (I'm guessing) libellous point of view about the Ontario government, he is convinced that a group of editors (including myself) are paid agents of the Ontario government conspiring to keep his views out of the encyclopedia, for example: here. He continues to make frequent unjustified personal attacks on any editor who attempts to remove his POV-waring and has been blocked for this as well as WP:POINT and WP:POV violations. Every time he comes back he continues exactly where he left off.

After lengthy attempts to explain policy to him, it is clear he has no intention of stopping his diruptive editing. I and several other admins and editors are wasting too much time trying to work with him. I believe that this user has exhausted the community's patience and a community ban should be enacted.

Please also note the RfC on WikiRoo. Thanks, Gwernol 19:37, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

  • I see increasing evidence that WikiWoo is not going to change. We have been nice, we have been firm, we have been patient, and his response in every case is to carry on precisely as before, ignoring any policies, guidelines and comments which fail to support him, looking in every case for the half-sentence which might support him if only he was able to cite a reliable secondary source. He is on a crusade to Right Great Wrongs, and in doing so he is introducing uncited material critical of living individuals he considers evil and criminal. His response to deletion of biased articles is to create new biased articles or introduce bias into other articles. Lost patience is a pretty accurate description here; one feels that any comment not supportive of his actions (and I have to say I can't remember the last one which was supportive) is simply added to his mental "vast conspiracy" and rejected out of hand. We really ought to have something in WP:BP about editors who accuse everybody who gainsays them of conspiracy. Anyway, it's my view that there is little if any hope of any useful contribution form this editor, who has reacted to mild rebukes and brief blocks by becoming more obdurate, not less, and has now got to the point of personal attacks. Frankly we should probably have given up on him when he accused us of being the Gestapo and wouldn't accept that this was offensive. Just zis Guy you know? 20:12, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Many of us have tried to offer constructive advice - but WikiWoo follows very little of it. I see a total ban as pretty drastic, but his comments indicate that he doesn't intend to follow the advice. I'd be inclined to give Wiki one last chance to show that he understands that accusing other editors of conspiracy and of being "Gestapo" is just not acceptable. Perhaps an unblock but with a warning that continuation of previous behavior will lead to a complete ban? I do think he has something to offer than can be done in a NPOV fashion - but I can certainly understand other editors running out of patience. Brian 20:38, 27 August 2006 (UTC)btball
  • I second JzG. I find WikiWoo quite uncivil, and everything else mentioned. Computerjoe's talk 09:51, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
  • To paraphrase the Requests for Adminship cliché, I thought he was banned already. I've gone ahead and blocked him indefinitely. As far as I'm concerned it's quite reasonble to expect three blocks to be enough of a chance to reform. It's quite inconceivable that anyone who posts this kind of rant after his fourth block could be here to write an encyclopaedia. --Sam Blanning(talk) 14:28, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Cheers to that. Now I guess we can all get back to work in our positions with the regional governments of Ontario, huh? </sarcasm> Tony Fox (arf!) 16:01, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
  • Material on WP needs to have a reliable source. In WW's world, all such reliable sources have been co-opted into the evil conspiracy of the Ontario regional municipal governments and their lackeys (who apparently have an on-wiki presence). Irresistable force, meet immovable object. Hence, his declared intention to just ignore policy that would stop him from putting his unsourced rants onto Wikipedia. Now that the inevitable has happened and he's been indefblocked, I just hope WW has more success as a blogger or even talk radio host. After all, he's not that much worse than Rachel Marsden. JChap2007 17:09, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Mulatto Union

Could somebody look at the edit history of this article? I deleted it as absolute nonsense, but then looking at the history, it has a long history with 120 edits, so I restored it. The restoration said it restord 120 deleted edits, but when I look at the history, it says it has no edit history. It looks like before the last two vandalistic edits, this was a valid article, but we already have an article at Mulatto. What's going on, and why can't I see the article history any more? User:Zoe|(talk) 21:46, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, I re-deleted the page, then went back in and checked every version except for the last two and restored, and it took. Is this necessary? Why didn't just restoring the whole thing take? User:Zoe|(talk) 21:51, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

  • I've seen similiar issues caused by undesirable caching. Try hitting shift-reload when you get unexpected results. Sometimes it worked just fine and only appears to have no worked. Friday (talk) 16:04, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
    • I did a couple of Control-F5's, but that didn't do any good. User:Zoe|(talk) 20:02, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
  • The page was actually redirected on the day it was created, December 14, 2005, and was only unredirected on July 17, 2006. Since then it's been garbage in several forms. Currently all it is is a little bit about Mulattos and an image gallery. It was PRODed, and that was removed, so the suggested merge probably won't work. I'll AfD it. └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 16:12, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Done, although I think you were right in the beginning, and it should have just been left deleted without an AfD. └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 16:33, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Vandalism of templates

A new cute form of vandalism is perhaps emerging. See for example the edits of 24.178.78.17 (talk • contribs • WHOIS • RDNS • RBLs • block user • block log). His latest contribution is to edit a template for speedy deletion with an edit summary that impleis something different and the speedy deletion tag immplies it is an admin action only in the course of doing something else. Cute. Can I please suggest all admins who are speedy deleting things, check who added the tag and that it wasn't vandalism. I know we do but sometimes we assume good faith and are hurrying ... Other template edits from this IP address were less than savoury too.--Arktos talk 23:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma

I was wondering if I could get some opinions from other admins, and people who are knowledgeable about the topic, about this move request, as I have gotten a complaint on my talk page. The survey result was 2 to 1 in favor of a move, and there is a conflict in the naming conventions, whether the most common name should trump a specific convention about naming royal consorts, see number 9. From the naming conventions page, "...use the most common form of the name used in English if none of the rules below cover a specific problem.". The latter convention was made so that the names would not be ambiguous. I do not know enough about the topic to know whether ambiguity is a problem in this case. If an uninvolved admin wants to move the page or reopen the debate, he or she should go for it. -- Kjkolb 02:30, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Number 9 does not apply to Queen Anne as she is currently living. When Queen Anne dies, her article title will be Anne of Bourbon-Parma. Charles 16:19, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I think in this case Kjkolb it is regardless, since a majority is a majority. That means of course that not all majorities are always right, however a legitimate vote was held, anyone could vote on it, and if only three users chose to do it, well then... I don't see the proposal and the result as a conflict with existing conventions either, because in this case number 10 clearly applies. She is still living, and she is still queen consort, regardless what the status of the monarchy is. See the example of Queen Anne-Marie of Greece. Admittedly the case is not so clear, however queen is queen. Gryffindor 20:30, 29 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Admin needed to examine Talk:Anabolic steroid

I have been posting and contributing to the Anabolic steroid article for about 2 months now and from the start I have had to deal with a user called User:Skookum1 I have tried being as patient as is possible with this user however he continues to make edits to the page without explanation as to why he made the edits. He continues to insist upon adding "expert needed","Worldview bias","Content disputed" tags to the article without explaining the specifics as to why he wants to add them. He shouldn't be able to add tags or remove tags to an article unless he explains exactly why they should be added or removed. However he has continued to do this. Not only that but he resorts to personal insults such as "arrogant fool" or "stinking liar" in his posts refering to me. I would like an Admin to review the talk page and review this users contributions to the talk page to see if he needs a warning of some type or an explanation of wikipedia policy.Wikidudeman 07:58, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] CAT:CSD

Is heavily backlogged - nearly 350 items to be exact. ViridaeTalk 09:04, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

And I can see a reason for it, unfortunately. I went to CAT:CSD and picked three at random, and all three were incorrect uses of the speedy criteria.
  • Ed Comix Inc. - a corporation nominated as {{nn-club}} under CSD-A7, which is for people, clubs and bands.
  • INSZoom - a cut-and-paste job nominated as {{db-copyvio}} under CSD-A8... but no evidence that the original website was directly involved in using the content for commercial gain.
  • Whittaker World cup 2006 - nominated with the reason "no context, no verifiability. Not "nonsense" the way we use the term here, but nonsense in the sense that it makes no sense to the average reader. Possibly BJAODN if someone else feels charitable enough". If you need to make an argument for deletion, speedy delete is not for you.
As long as people keep abusing speedy delete in this way, CAT:CSD will remain overfull and the speedy method will slow down. People can't nominate 350+ articles a day, a good 100+ of them wrongly, and expect the couple of admins who look after this category to send the abused ones to AfD for them.
When the speedy delete criteria are abused, the user in effect is asking an admin to act out of process and to take the flak for it. We can't have it both ways. Either we abuse the CSD but make admins immune from scrutiny in their decisions on deletions or we change the CSD and leave admins accountable.
We all prefer the latter, obviously. ➨ ЯEDVERS 09:26, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Absolutely agree. I cleaned out a bunch of stuff yesterday, but had to leave a heap of questionable ones as I only had time to work "speedily" and not devote the time to research the others fully. Often they are proper speedy candidates, just tagged with the wrong reason. It's about educating users really, maybe we need a CSD for Dummies page ... any volunteers? The same problem exists at WP:AIV. Half the reports there are either not vandalism, user not properly warned, content disputes, extinct activity from hours or even days before etc, etc. It's very frustrating, still, that's life I suppose. --Cactus.man ✍ 09:37, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
It's a good idea, but we have one already. It's not specifically about CSD, but it would help: Wikipedia:Introduction to Deletion Process. Mangojuicetalk 16:47, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
If you do NP patrol for a while, I find the threshhold of what you are willing to speedy decreases. We have too much junk coming in to be as process-driven in the screening of it. --Doc 09:50, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Sure, junk is junk, no problem deleting that whether it's properly tagged or not. A lot of the material is borderline though, worthy of some research to validate and thus controversial for speedying, hence → AfD. This is almost a deletionist / inclusionist topic. I'm somewhere between the two. And please don't call me a wonker or I'll throw a hissy fit, stamp my feet and go to my room :-) Wonking has a legitimate function here, just don't overdo it in case you damage your health, but make sure you do enough to maintain a proper balance. --Cactus.man ✍ 10:17, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


Back when I used to help out a little with the CSDs, when I saw incorrect CSDs, I, like most admins, nominate them for AfDs instead. I think it would be much "speedier" to simply remove the tag without AfDing, and leave the onus of AfDing back to the person who wants to see the article deleted in the first place. Or heck, maybe create a new template or category, something like our {{unblock reviewed}} template so we know which speedies have already been reviewed and rejected by other admins. And heck, no longer being accused by defenders of the article of being a rabid deletionist (for moving the article off CSD and into AfD instead) would be nice too. --Deathphoenix ʕ 15:40, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
A new category for reviewed speedies is unnecessary, the denied speedy should be in the edit summary, and checking the history is part of reviewing a speedy deletion request. I don't AfD articles that I remove speedies from unless I really care about that deletion. I leave that to the original proposer of the speedy, and leave an edit summary that says "does not meet WP:CSD - take it to WP:AFD if you need to". Kusma (討論) 15:47, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Yeah, god forbid an adminstrator be forced to actually administer. --Calton | Talk 15:52, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
It's a matter of how efficiently things get done. When I deny a speedy, I very often will put a prod tag on it, but I rarely start an AfD unless I'm personally interested: if I don't think PROD would be appropriate, I'll let someone else do it. My take on this is that admins (or anyone else) reviewing speedy deletions should take the time to inform users who have used it wrong: occasionally this would be a waste of time, say, if someone was just trying speedy once and wouldn't go back to it. But for users who make lots of speedy nominations, they need to understand when they're using it wrong. Also, I really think we should get rid of {{nn-club}}, {{nn-bio}}, and {{nn-band}}, because they perpetuate a misuse of speedy deletion, namely, "nn" or "non-notable" does not mean the same thing as the A7 criterion which talks about not describing the importance or significance of the topic. We have db-club, db-bio, and db-band (which those redirect to), which work fine. (I tried nominating nn-bio for deletion a while back but people didn't understand what I was trying to do.) The same comment goes for PROD: I was looking at the PROD backlog today and found at least a few instances in which someone had reverted the removal of a prod tag because no justification was given for deprodding. They'd probably done it in many cases across many different articles, but no one had told them they were doing something wrong. Mangojuicetalk 16:06, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


I went to CAT:CSD and picked three at random, and all three were incorrect uses of the speedy criteria.

*Ed Comix Inc. - a corporation nominated as {{nn-club}} under CSD-A7, which is for people, clubs and bands.
Perhaps you should have actually READ the article in question before complaining about incorrect tagging, as it was about a group of 13-year-olds which the article itself said was (paraphrasing) "not an official company". A little common sense goes further than worshipping policy for its own sake. --Calton | Talk 15:52, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I actually READ the article - and it wasn't CSD-A7. I also deleted the article - out of process - for CSD-A7 as that was what it was nominated for. In fact, it was CSD-G4 from an old VfD, or it might just have scraped CSD-G1. But CSD-A7 it wasn't. And this is typical: admins are damned if we do and damned if we don't - the complaints about deleting stuff and the complaints about not deleting stuff - both from misinformed users - just pour in. ➨ ЯEDVERS 19:26, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I actually READ the article I'm not seeing any sign of that -- particularly since you referred to it as a "corporation" above, clearly false. Also, explain to me how deleting under one valid set of criteria instead of another makes it "out of process": if it were so, I have to wonder why exactly you would delete it out of process and then use it as an example when complaining about other people deleting things out of process. --Calton | Talk 01:43, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, I'm going to plead guildy to one of the incorrect tags and I apologise to Redvers for wasting his time. The essay on deletion linked by mangojuice is very useful. Wish I had seen it before. As a frequent NP watcher I personally agree that admins should simply deny the speedy and leave it for the proposer to take it to AFD if they wish. --Spartaz 18:29, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
The notion of "Either we abuse the CSD but make admins immune from scrutiny in their decisions on deletions or we change the CSD and leave admins accountable." is a false dichotomy. I "abuse" CSD all the time- the specific criteria do not account for all kinds of delete-on-site junk, and I suspect they never can. I'd rather see admins using actuall human judgment than blindly following exact rules- how does following an exact rule without interpretation amount to being more accountable? The deletion logs holds us all accountable, whether we want to be or not. Friday (talk) 18:36, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
You've missed the point here, Friday. Actually, you've missed two of them. The first one is: when a user asks an admin to delete out of process, who takes the flak? Answer: the admin, who has to defend an out-of-process deletion without the help of the original nominator and, on one memorable occasion for me, with the original nominator being amongst those castigating me for deleting the article out of process!
The other point is that, whilst admins act out of process, nobody needs to look to see if the process is broken. Nobody is campaigning, for instance, for spam to be added to the CSD, because everyone assumes that it is one of the CSD already. If admins stop deleting spam out of process, the community will rise up and demand it as a criterion. Then, when it gets deleted in process, the complaints from the spammer can be dealt with easily. But whilst spam gets deleted out of process, nobody calls for "CSD-A10: Pure advertisment" to be created and admins are left figuratively naked.
The problem here is that the number one cry of Wikipedia's critics is that admins are a law unto ourselves. We make the rules, act out of process, push people around, yada yada yada. We all know that that isn't true... yet here we are, having a discussion where people are saying "we expect admins to act out of process". Where is the line drawn? If admins are allowed - nay, expected - to act out of process on this subject, day in, day out, what's to stop an admin/some admins deciding "rights, it's time to delete all Pokemon articles/block all AOL users/play god in some way". After all, we've got the precident right here: we're expecting admins to regularly act out of process and we're even requiring them to do it for a quiet life. This is very odd. ➨ ЯEDVERS 19:26, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I think that you're listening to different critics than I am. Regardless, we shouldn't be promoting admins who cannot figure out when to apply WP:IAR and when not to. I'd like to make an actual on-topic suggestion while I'm here, though, which is that it would be good to encourage people doing new page patrol to make heavier use of creative redirects than CSD templates. Jkelly 19:31, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
You mean like this? :) Yanksox 19:34, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Exactly like that. Jkelly 19:35, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Perfect. More userfication would be good, too. If the article at Peter smallpecker is a {{db-bio}} and it was created by User:Petersmallpecker or the like, move it to User:Petersmallpecker. One less problem. ➨ ЯEDVERS 19:39, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I actually don't think we should encourage people to userfy articles that could be deleted, unless they're obviously a mistakenly created user page... plus a speedy would still be required for the remaining redirect. Mangojuicetalk 23:56, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I only ever userfy if the user has some edits and some indication of being about - otherwise all we create is a perpetual vanity page for someone who may never edit again. --Doc 23:58, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
In quite a few cases, what we end up userfying is actually an attackpage, which is never good... Shimgray | talk | 00:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

You can always place a {{hangon}} but would it be helpful to have an "assert incorrect speedy" template that took the same parms as "{{db}}" did? people could then just move the article there by adding a couple of letters to the template invocation and then examine at leisure to see if it qualifies. yes it adds a process, ick. But I agree, right now I tend to come into CSD and I often look at 5 articles and quit, after having found none deletable. That's probably wasting effort. PROD is not a bad suggestion though as an alternative. Is there a variant of PROD that takes exactly the same parms as db? ++Lar: t/c 17:35, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Perfect. More userfication would be good, too. Yeah, just what Wikipedia needs, more permanent (for all intents and purposes) vanity/MySpace/webhost pages disguised as User Pages. No, adding more garbage to Wikipedia is not good. More stuff like this (one edit, in October 2005), this (ditto), this (ditto), and this (two edits, counting the big image) -- these are not User Pages and these people are not Wikipedia editors. See User:Calton/Userfied pages for many more examples.

Or take [[Ed Comix Inc., the alleged corporation article: it was originally a recreation of an AFD'ed article, userfied by an admin in July 2005 and remaining untouched until I reverted the move and slapped on the (entirely appropriate) speedy tag.

More userfication isn't a solution, it's mostly a way of shifting responsibility for making a decision or (gasp) employing judgment. --Calton | Talk 01:43, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

The problem isn't really the few incorrectly tagged articles. It's a combination of that plus the editors who don't look at the history first to see if a valid article was vandalised. Then the talk pages of valid articles with nothing more than an anons comment, such as "This is crap". They don't need deleting just blanking. Then you have to go and check to see if the article was recreated but without the speedy tag. Follow that up with having to answer questions as to why you just deleted Peter smallpecker and why you wont restore it. But the real problem is the images. Nobody ever seems to want to delete them. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 05:35, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Tribe (TV series) / Going Tribal

Hello, it appears someone's effort to reverse the name/redirect relationship between Tribe and Going Tribal ended up splitting the article history. I'm guessing they copied the content rather than performing a page move. Could an admin please come in and kill off Tribe, revert back Going Tribal one version, and then perform a proper page move. Not being an admin prevents doing the first step so I don't want to create a bigger mess with the other steps. Thanks. --StuffOfInterest 20:40, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Let me withdraw this request. I've switched it back so the history is still with the article content. If the original mover wants the name change to occur then let him go through WP:RM to get it done. Sorry for the extra pixel use here. --StuffOfInterest 21:48, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Now we seem to have a round robin circle of redirects. User:Zoe|(talk) 21:57, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Hmm, I see what you mean. It appears NeilEvans decided to move the article to Tribal (TV series) now, as opposed to "Tribe". In the process he created a nice set of double redirects. I'll give him a minute to see if he cleans it up. If not I'll grab a mop and clean up the redirects. --StuffOfInterest 22:01, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
OK, it is a little dinked up but he is working on it. I tried to give him some help with this post. Unfortunately, I'm going to be away in a few minutes for the rest of the evening. If someone would be kind enough to keep an eye on it and lend him a hand if he needs help I'll really appreciate it. Thank you. --StuffOfInterest 22:18, 28 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] NEED DESPRATE HELP FROM AN ADMIN

Ned Scott (talk • contribs) gave me an invalid warning after TheFarix (talk • contribs) slandered, belittled, insulted and harssed me. No one helped me on WP:PAIN. I don't mean to be dramatic, but my feeling are shattered. I can feel tears in my eyes as I type this. PLEASE HELLP! -- Selmo (talk) 00:24, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't feel his warning is invalid, you acknowledged that you were likely harsh in your reply. Regardless of how another user treats you, its not okay to respond with uncivil or otherwise inappropriate behaviour.--Crossmr 00:43, 29 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] An old AFD still open

Could someone please either close or relist for further discussion Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The J Curve: A New Way to Understand Why Nations Rise and Fall? It's 10 days old already. Thanks! —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 12:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Closed as delete, as per reasoning on the AfD. — FireFox (talk) 12:38, 29 August 2006
Thanks! —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 12:46, 29 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Issue with cached version of pages

A problem was reported with footnotes yesterday at 19:20 (UTC) at WP:FN. The problem is that the cached version of article pages on the WP server is messed up, causing the list of references to be repeated twice. Current examples at Miniclip and Conservative Judaism. This problem can be fixed with a WP:PURGE of the page, forcing the WP server to rebuild the page, with ?action=purge as described in various places at WP:VPT. (This is not just a browser cache clear, and I'm intentionally leaving those articles not purged so people can see the issue.)

There is also an issue with the template transclusion database. Some articles will list hundreds of trancluded templates that are not used in the article. Eg, numerous articles are listed as having Template:Comic book reference transcluded. This can be fixed by editing the article. This might have something to do with the recent WoW vandalism, as a number of templates were moved around.

These problems have been around for almost a day. Is someone looking into them? Gimmetrow 14:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Hi, I'm Dragonball1986

I'm trying to completely move "The Double Dutch Bus" to "Double Dutch Bus (song)". THis is the only thing left to do and I'd appreciate your help. Thank You. My reason is that on my Children of Tomorrow album, it is titled simply "Double Dutch Bus". (song) was me that added it to differentiate it from disambugations.

Looks like you've done it - Double Dutch Bus (song).--Andeh 19:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Añoranza

This case has closed and the final decision has been published at the link above.

To summarise, Añoranza is banned for one week and the principals in this matter are encouraged to enter into good faith negotiations regarding use of propagandistic operational codenames for which there are neutral alternative names in common use.

For the Arbitration Committee. --Tony Sidaway 22:00, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Añoranza (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) has been blocked for one week. --Cyde Weys 22:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Clyde Wey (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log)

This editor has been name blocked as an impostor of User:Cyde (Cyde Weys). They've explained on their talk page that Clyde Wey is their actual name. I've done a bit of research and found this to be entirely plausible. Because this is true I think we should assume good faith and unblock this person's user name and subsequently keep an eye on their edits for any disruptive behavior. Thanks. (→Netscott) 14:54, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

The user has been allowed zero opportunity to make a contribution to Wikipedia. Considering the User's comments on his talk page and the Wikipedia's official Assume good faith policy, I agree that we should give Clyde an opportunity to contribute under his chosen (and real user name). (Note that I was also able to find evidence to support his claim that this is his real name, though in the interest of privacy, I'll not post it here.)
Note that admin Cyde goes by Cyde, notwithstanding his label of Cyde Weys on his user page.
— ERcheck (talk) 15:46, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Since there seems to be little consensus for the block, I have decided to unblock the username. If anyone disagrees, feel free to reverse my action. JoshuaZ 15:51, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for responding with an unblock JoshuaZ. (→Netscott) 15:53, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

I've had a name imposter going after me for awhile now ... everytime one of his accounts is blocked, he plays the old "I'm innocent" card and gives some implausible excuse for why the name, which happens to look a lot like mine, happens to be valid. And every so often, someone falls for it ... Cyde Weys 16:56, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Sorry did you mean implausible or plausible there Cyde? (→Netscott) 16:57, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
I mean implausible. He googles the new name he makes up and "establishes" his new identity around the one hit that does show up ... someone in West Virginia who wanted a quit-claim deed authorized. --Cyde Weys 17:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Problem would be solved if your sig properly reflected your username ... Cyde. Everybody's sig should reflect their username IMO. I support the unblock, just keep an eye on the users contribs. --Cactus.man ✍ 17:07, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Cyde, if this user's editing becomes nefarious I'll be the first one to apologize but given the facts to this matter I still think an assumption of good faith is warranted. (→Netscott) 17:10, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
I think I'll take that apology now ("Clyde Wey" has been confirmed as an impersonation sockpuppet of another user by CheckUser). I just wish you guys would trust my judgement more often ... Cyde Weys 17:33, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Fair enough I apologize. So perhaps in the future this should be standard policy to CheckUser seemingly impostor accounts? (→Netscott) 17:37, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
How about we just use common sense? It's not like 'Cyde Weys' is as common a name as "John Smith". Nandesuka 17:40, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Which other user please, and who logged the RFCU? Apology will then gladly be forthcoming ... :-) --Cactus.man ✍ 17:39, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
See Dmcdevit's post to WP:ANI, everything is explained there. --Cyde Weys 17:42, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, that answers part of my query - from AN/I: "...account was very likely created by Syphonbyte (talk • contribs)". Can't see any evidence of a request at WP:RFCU though. --Cactus.man ✍ 17:58, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
When dmcdevit says "A CheckUser I have just run" shows something, that is a checkuser. WP:RFCU isn't what makes it official, it's just an organizational scheme. —Bunchofgrapes (talk) 18:04, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
RFCU is just a way of managing the large demand for checkuser runs. --Tony Sidaway 18:05, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that much is self evident. I'm merely asking who requested a checkuser on this account, somebody requested it or Dmcdevit decided to do it off his own bat. Simple question begs a simple answer. --Cactus.man ✍ 18:42, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
I requested it, naturally. --Cyde Weys 23:17, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
This impersonator's puppetmaster account has been indefinitely blocked. See this ANI thread. (→Netscott) 12:28, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Ban of Sheynhertz-Unbayg

I have blocked Sheynhertz-Unbayg (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) indefinitely. It makes me sad to be forced to do this, but I don't see much else to do after his non-participation in this and this MedCabal case and this RfC. To any comments about his editing activities (see the RfC or category:Onomastics he typically reacts abusively or not at all, and just continued the creation of problematic pages that had led to the RfC. To recent blocks by several different editors (some for uncivility or disruption of MfD, mine for not reacting to repeated complaints), he reacted by using sockpuppets. See 61.112.94.154 (talk • contribs), 61.112.95.194 (talk • contribs), L.Kugelman (talk • contribs), L.Kugelmann (talk • contribs), 61.112.197.233 (talk • contribs). I suggest to community ban him until he cooperates in the cleanup of his pages and understands that he needs to communicate with others. If Sheynhertz-Unbayg engages in meaningful discussion of his activities and promises to answer to his RfC, he should be unblocked. Until then, none of his IPs and sockpuppets should be allowed to edit. Kusma (討論) 07:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

  • Endorse. Sheynhertz is an extremely problematic editor. His continual messing up of the encyclopaedia, including unfinished articles (many containing German) dumped into articlespace and rapid-fire page moves creating double redirects is unacceptable, and attempts to clean it up are met with instant reversions and bizarre reactions ranging from baseless accusations of vandalism to suicide threats. (All documented in the RfC, so I'm not going to go diff-digging.) I have less confidence than Kusma that unblocking will do any good, though. I have no idea how Sheynhertz' mind works and little inclination to try to find out. I applaud Kusma for taking on this extremely tiresome editor and suggest leaving any decision about whether Sheynhertz should be unblocked up to him. Note that Sheynhertz, whose native language is Japanese, is already banned from the Japanese Wikipedia. --Sam Blanning(talk) 08:13, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
    By the way, I'll try to help with some of the cleanup of 'his' articles once I'm assured that he won't be misguidedly unblocked. --Sam Blanning(talk) 08:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
    Thanks for the offer! We should probably try to organize the cleanup a bit so we don't have to check all of his 20k edits more than once. Kusma (討論) 13:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
My hope of a good end of this is fading -- I just blocked three evading IPs: 61.112.89.145 (talk • contribs), 61.112.103.242 (talk • contribs), 61.112.86.254 (talk • contribs). One of them told me You are my enemy, and I'll grudge strongly you!!. Please help me to either (a) solve this issue by reforming Sheynhertz-Unbayg or (b) blocking all 61.112 IPs that edit onomastics articles or add lots of redlinked names to disambiguation pages. Kusma (討論) 13:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
He is now editting out of Schönherz (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) Ryūlóng 19:30, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I have rangeblocked 61.112.0.0/16 for 3 hours after getting tired of blocking his IPs individually. I hope I don't inconvenience too many other users of his ISP with this anon-only, no account creation block, but his insistence on his edits is getting silly. Kusma (討論) 20:45, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I am absolutely appalled at what has happenend. I used to have friendly contact with Sheynhertz-Unbayg on a number of topics, especially articles on Judaism. However I lost touch and he seemed to have disappeared. I noticed later that there were some strange fall-outs from the Japanese Wikipedia that spilt over, which really made me wonder since it was surprising. I wish I knew how to help to defuse the situation, however reading the comments of users that have had other dealings makes me wonder if it is actually the same user? Reading through the comments I trust Kusma's judgement, but to me this is just nevertheless really bizarre, highly unfortunate and saddening. Gryffindor 21:02, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Kosovo article captured by Serb nationalist editors and admins

It is a month now that the Kosovo article looks like Serb propaganda. A certain administrator ChrisO and several Serb or pro-Serb editors are clearly editing on bad faith. I tried to change that but they seem to be furthering a Serb nationalistic agenda and don't want to cooperate. I would appreciate if any other administrators who are neutral on the issue come there and change the Serb propaganda pamphlet, that the entry on Kosovo has now become. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Vezaso (talk • contribs) 09:22, 30 August 2006.


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Eternal Equinox

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

Eternal Equinox (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) is placed on Probation and personal attack parole for one year.

Jim62sch (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) is cautioned to avoid teasing or taunting sensitive users.

For the Arbitration Committee. --Tony Sidaway 13:37, 30 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Expunging block entries

This thread on Village Pump(technical) discusses the idea of making it easier to expunge block log entries. I had heard that there have been instances of block log entries being expunged, but that it was very rare, because it was difficult to do (developers had to be involved directly) and because it is not something to be done lightly. I think there have been instances of blocks that ought to be expunged, and so I raised the idea there, to make it easier to do, but not necessarily to make it something to be done more lightly. Your input there is solicited. ++Lar: t/c 14:52, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Would expunging blocks also expunge any record of an admin performing an improper and unnecessary block? -- tariqabjotu 02:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] About biographies of living people and schools

Many complaints on OTRS are allegations on libel on our part, especially in:

  • biographies of living people (typically, semi-famous persons such as writers of self-help books, "alternative scientists", radio hosts on local stations, etc.)
  • articles on highschools (typically, some student or former student has written something insulting for staff).

Often, the people whose reputation is sullied have tried to remove the inflammatory content have been reverted, or even blocked for doing so.

Please read WP:BLP if you haven't yet done so. Wikipedia's official policy regarding biographical details of living persons is to err on the side of caution. Potentially libellious information without serious sources should be deleted, not flagged as "unsourced". Users, even anonymous ones, who delete such unsourced information should not be blocked - 3RR does not apply. Users who repeatedly reinsert such information despite warnings should definitely be blocked.

On a similar line, we also have a privacy policy regarding living persons, especially people who are not public figures. The same applies: if personal information such as names of relatives (who are not themselves public figures) etc. is removed, please do not reinsert it nor block whoever removed it.

The Wikimedia Foundation daily gets legitimate complaints about such behaviours. David.Monniaux 15:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to reject several parts of this:
  1. If a random editor comes along and removes perfectly good information from an article, without explaining that it is a result from an OTRS complaint, then another editor is entitled to reach the conclusion, in good faith, that it does not need to be removed.
  2. Thus your direction that we may not reverse it is wrong. Your edits are subject to reversal, no matter your superglue-like adhesion to one of the most damaging policies we have, unless they are potentially libellous and poorly sources (Note the conjunction. We can include negative information if it's well sourced. Until their lawyer telephones Danny, anyway.)
  3. The policy does not provide for indefinite removal and 3RR circumvention of things like names of relatives. It is not "on a similar line" at all. You don't get yourself an exception from being blocked for removal of such information. It is a matter of interpretation of the policy and the material.
  4. Wikipedia's official policy regarding biographical details of living persons is to err on the side of running screaming with our hands in the air.
  5. Since when was a school a living person? If someone is vandalising the article, revert them and block them.
Splash - tk 16:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Woah, Splash. Firstly, you don't get to reject this since it comes from on high. Secondly, it is common sense. When someone is insistingly blanking or removing sections from a bio, don't just scream 'vandal - kneejerk revent and block'. Instead, ask 'could there be a reason for thisact?'. It is always possible that the aricle is crap or libelous, and the anon IP is an angry injured party who doesn't understand how wikipedia works. Take a look at the material that he's removing - consider it - does it look fair? Are negative comments ballanced and referenced? Should the article in fact be deleted or rebuilt from scratch. Admins should not be on autopilot. --Doc 23:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I doubt anyone thinks that removing paragraphs in biographies should always be reverted, and I doubt anyone thinks that they should never be reverted. I think we have one of those imaginary arguments between positions that no-one wishes to defend brewing here. Just use common sense. Before reverting a paragraph removal, scan it to see if it says "Joe Bloggs was recently sentenced to a billion years for being a third-degree cretin" - likewise, check the previous edits, and see if before blanking the 'Controversy' section, the same IP blanked the paragraph immediately before it (indicating straightforward blanking testing/vandalism). --Sam Blanning(talk) 23:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. --Doc 23:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Doc, if you're referencing the "divine passage" I believe you are, "If you read something negative about someone, and there is no source, then either find a _legitimate_ source (and make sure that WE do not make the negative claim, but rather than we merely report neutrally on what the claim is), or just remove it... and insist that anyone who wants to put it back, do so with a legitimate source!", that would support deleting the information. However, you'll notice the emphasis is to make sure that it's sourced, not to simply remove it because it's negative. This is about WP:V, not "being nice", so what we need is proper case-by-case judgment, not a blanket guide about being unable to revert people who are removing negative information. --tjstrf 23:47, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
In an ideal world where WP:V was the only relevant issue, an unsourced paragraph that said that the subject won an award recently would merit just as much scrutiny as one saying he was arrested for drink-driving. However, obviously this isn't an ideal world, people like to sue, RC patrollers have limited inclination to fact-check articles on people whom they don't care about, and if people are going to fact-check anything we should make sure they check negative information first. --Sam Blanning(talk) 00:27, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The major problem here is your first point. People are reverting "vandalism" without ever stopping to read it, without ever noticing that what was being blanked was the unsourced section saying the subject was a child molestor or an embezzeler (yes, I have seen both such cases in the past). People assume anything in the article was "perfectly good" and revert without thinking, and so we end up with the problem that we're essentially protecting the defamation. This is bad from an encyclopedic standpoint, from an ethical standpoint, and from a not-getting-our-asses-sued standpoint. I'm not sure what order you rank those three in, but it's not good for any of them. Shimgray | talk | 00:56, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, after all, one should take one's responsibilities. When you revert libellious claim, you are, effectively, inserting it yourself. When you block somebody who was removing unsourced, libellious claim, you are, effectively, exercing editorial control to maintain this claim. (*) You then put yourself as a prime target for the possible lawsuit, especially if the Foundation tries to dodge responsibility by claiming it's the responsibility of whoever inputted the entry. You may also find that some people would like to sue us in various locales (I'm thinking of England here, among other places), and may also prefer to have some local identifiable defendant rather than a foundation in Florida. And I'm ready to bet that the Foundation will be eager to hand over your connection data to judicial authorities if it avoids it some legal trouble; actually, as far as I know, it has already done so.

(*) Ask User:Soufron. David.Monniaux 00:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Of course you take responsibility for your own edits. That's why you should verify it from an outside source. (If you can cite the negative claim to someone else, then you can pass the legal buck on to them.) Would legal responsibility actually apply to reverts of unexplained section blanking though?
What confuses me about your initial statement, though, is that there are people complaining about negative information about the staff of highschools. Wouldn't most of those be your traditional teenage "Mr. Smith sux!" vandal, and easily dealt with? Or has it gotten beyond that, to vandals writing believable libelous claims? --tjstrf 00:54, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
You'd be surprised how many are "$school employs three known child molestors"; "$school recently came under controversy after beating pupils"; "$school is a haven of drug use"; "$school is currently under investigation for X", etc, etc. Common abuse is one thing, but vandals often don't stop there. Shimgray | talk | 01:06, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Ooooh! A nice little injunction because of, guess what, yet another school libelled in WP! Schools make up a significant proportion of the libel allegations received in OTRS. And guess who they're after? The last person who inserted the content!

Not all school issues are straightforward stuff like "Mr Smith sux". In some instances allegations are made that Mr Smith is a pedophile, or a pervert, or a fraudster, or a known racist.

As for responsibility, Soufron (the former chief legal officer of the Foundation) seemed to believe that it fell upon the people who had exerced an editorial power — thus including those who had reinserted litigious content after it was deleted. David.Monniaux 00:58, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Humor and Wikipedia

Is humor appropriate for this format ? Would it be incorrect for two Wikipedians to tell jokes to each other ? Any references, clarification ? Martial Law 04:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

If I did'nt ask, someone else may, and not be so polite about it. Martial Law 04:43, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
What are you talking about? What "format"? Anyway, humour has long been an accepted part of Wikipedia culture, just not in article space. See Category:Wikipedia humor and WP:BJAODN. There's nothing wrong with two users telling jokes to each other inasmuch as it may help relieve wikistress and therefore help the project, just as long as it doesn't go overboard since Wikipedia is not a blog or myspace. CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 04:47, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
If two Wikipedians who substantially contribute to the encyclopedic want to tell a couple of jokes to each other from time to time on their User talk pages there is nothing wrong with that. If it is more than that, though, then other means of communication, like e-mail, should instead be used. —Centrx→talk • 04:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Indefinite block and a warning about OTRS permissions

Earlier this evening, Bastique and David.Monniaux discovered across a particularly nasty form of copyright abuse on Commons; someone had uploaded two photographs using a username the same as that of the original author, given the legitimate (non-free) source, marked them as free-licenses... and added an OTRS-confirmation template on the end with a nonexistent ticket number. The net result, we have something saying "oh, yes, the source is unfree but the Foundation confirms it's released as GFDL". The first we knew of this was when the author wrote to us complaining about it!

This seemed pretty clear evidence of bad-faith intent to us, and the user was accordingly blocked (as well as another, with identical modus, from back in March). A little detective work by Bastique found someone on en: using the images immediately after they'd been uploaded; checkuser by Kelly Martin and Arnomane confirmed that the user on en: and the user on Commons were the same, so the local user (Jcmurphy (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log)) got blocked too. Whilst he hasn't apparently violated policy on en:, we felt that something of this magnitude deserved an indefinite block, pending a very good explanation.

Two reasons for posting this. First, to run the block by the community, since blocking for dodgy behaviour on another project is unusual. Secondly, and more importantly, please be alert if you run across someone adding OTRS permission tags. If someone is adding them when they upload a file, or is adding them whilst apparently a new user, be suspicious. m:OTRS has a list of people with access to the queue; we're all happy to do quick lookups on the system to check that, yes, there is a permission filed. If you see one that looks unlikely, please feel free to challenge it - we want to stamp on this sort of thing hard. Shimgray | talk | 00:52, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Seems to me that he misused the image on Wikipedia-en so a block is warranted. Indefinate is a good starting place for this sneaky offense. Reconsider if the user makea a good arguement for why he deserves a second chance. FloNight 01:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I'd stand behind the indefinite block. This type of abuse runs directly contrary to all of our attempts to respect and maintain copyright laws and should be dealt with severely. alphaChimp laudare 04:38, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Agreed. Ral315 (talk) 07:11, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Good block. Could be released with a very very very very very very very good explanation, but thats a lot of verys. Syrthiss 12:35, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Agree as well. Folks who knowingly mistag images and put Wikipedia in a position of legal jeopardy should be dealt with very strictly. Legal issues are not laughing matters. (→Netscott) 12:48, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Pileon strong support for this block. Commons is sort of another site, and sort of not, though, so even if the user hadn't messed around on en: I'd probably still support the block. ++Lar: t/c 15:04, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not in favour of indiscriminate indefinite bans, but here I think we have an especially egregious case of bad faith, quite difficult to catch, and that poses real legal risks for both the Foundation and whoever tries to reuse our content in good faith. Moreover, impersonation is a crime in many jurisdictions. Thus, I think a cross-wiki indef ban is justified for such behaviour. David.Monniaux 15:33, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Agree. Tyrenius 08:35, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] CAT:CSD

Heavily backlogged again - mainly images. ViridaeTalk 04:09, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm trying at it right now (especially with great caution in images, I'm okay but not nearly the best). It really is a neverending backlog. Yanksox 05:18, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
It would really help if there was a script or tool to automatically comment out images used in articles. alphaChimp laudare 05:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Wouldn't be nice if we could always use scripts? Then it wouldn't take so long. Yanksox 05:27, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I think images should have their own CSD section, but that's just my 2 cents. --Woohookitty(meow) 10:59, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I agree, Woohookitty. That would really keep clutter out of CAT:CSD. Perhaps Category:Images for speedy deletion is a good name. »ctails! =hello?=« 23:03, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
To be honest, that wouldn't be the best idea. The images in CAT:CSD get ignored as it is already, we don't need them shuffled off elsewhere. We need to draw attention to it so that the issue can be resolved. Yanksox 23:33, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I strongly support dividing images from the main CSD category. They delay loading the page, they require different skills than the articles that make up most of CSD, and they are far more of them. We(well, me and some other people) handle {{no source}} fine; we can do the same with CSD images. If necessary, we can put the backlog tag on, just as we do for any other backlog. Just get them out of CAT:CSD for the love of all that is holy. JesseW, the juggling janitor 07:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I agree with moving them out. It would be good to have them in a page which also included full instructions on how to deal with them. Tyrenius 08:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Telefacts deleted content?

The article link on Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Log/2006_August_4#Telefact links to this page. Don't know if its recreated or missed content that should have be deleted. Telefact seems to redirect to Telefacts. Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 01:04, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I haven't seen the original article, but reading the AfD indicates that it had something to do with the university of Pittsburg. The current article Telefacts is about a completely unrelated matter, an existing and popular TV program in Flanders (Belgium). A legitimate article, and a reasonable redirect, so no problems there. On an unrelated note, when I tried to edit this section, I came at a completely different one (humor something or other). So I'm editing this by going through the whole way too long page... Fram 13:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Category:Wikipedia protected edit requests

Just a quick heads up; this has 17 items as of this timestamp (I've seen a backlog tag with just 8!). --ais523 10:51, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Disclaimers

The disclaimers, linked to in the footer of every single document in the project (others too), are in a state of horror. I've (a) made formatting changes and (b) removed what I considered junk; the results are at User:PseudoSudo/Disclaimers/Wikipedia:General disclaimer (diffs: general, risk medical, legal, content). I'd appreciate if a sysop reading this could copy them over to their respective projectspace pages (changing {{../Template:Disclaimer-header}} to {{disclaimer-header}} and [[:Category:Wikipedia disclaimers]] to [[Category:Wikipedia disclaimers]]); I also invite anyone with concerns to comment here and/or reverse the copy if it's been performed.

Although it's an improvement, in my opinion the pages have quite a ways to go. A goal I'd personally like to see is one single disclaimer, free from rhetoric and irrelevent comments (wikilinks gone, too). ~ PseudoSudo 20:01, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Completed by JzG; thanks. ~ PseudoSudo 01:24, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Forgiveness on Wikipedia

I've just read some of User:Giano's comments at User talk:Lar#Carnildo, who (Giano) continues to have hard feelings about a block comment that User:Carnildo wrote when blocking Giano a while ago. This may be a problem that has affected more than one user.

My first instinct was to say we'd need block and edit summaries to be editable by the blocking/editing party, but that means either accepting that when the block comment is removed, the offense is forgiven, or adding another layer of revision control, presumably without summaries. Such an additional layer of r.c. would add too much complexity for my liking (and may not meet with much enthusiasm from the developers).

There is potential that if implemented without r.c., such a facility would undermine the value we currently derive from block comments as a log of past objectionable actions, because there is potential that admins give in to blocked parties too easily upon unblocking, and remove this important information in cases where the user continues to be disruptive. On the other hand, it would be a way of building forgiveness right into the system. It does, however, assume that users understand that if they quote edit summaries, the quoted content becomes, in all but very rare instances justifying oversight, embedded in the edit history, thus remaining visible to those willing to put in the effort to dig it up.

An alternative would be a spam filter for edit, upload, block etc. summaries that gives a warning about the use of typically derogatory words - a warning that could be overridden by a second click (as may be important for articles about anatomical parts or derogatory terms, for instance). This could (?) be easier to implement, but will not catch every offensive instance.

Thoughts? Samsara (talk • contribs) 09:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I love the idea, after all:
  • "Repent therefore, and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out" (Acts 3:19)
  • "when he forgave us all our trespasses, he erased the record that stood against us" (Col 2:14)
Unfortunately, Wikipedia isn't God, so I think you'll need to 'forgive but not forget'. Not even the blood of the Jimbo would expunge your block record. But rather "I know my iniquities, and my sin is ever before me" (Psa 51). --Doc 11:11, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
A good idea to have a technical facility to do so but probably best used only by decision of ArbCom: e.g. they could have decided in the pedophile wheelwar case that the 'bad' blocks could be struck from the log. Just a thought. The Land 11:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Well spoken, Samsara. The technical facility has been proposed, or one close to it. See Wikipedia:Village_pump_(technical)#Expunging_block_log_entries ++Lar: t/c 11:55, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Except where defamatory statements or private information are included, it wouldn't really be appropriate (and we can't easily filter those out automatically). It's important on Wikipedia to have a sense of proportion; those who don't may pose a problem, but this can be dealt with using normal, human methods. Writing yet more complex software won't help. --Tony Sidaway 12:13, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
If we need the ability to wipe a long, the more more urgent one would be the deletion log. I've at least once deleted an article with a libelous or privacy violating title and then though 'woops'. I suspect that happens more often than unfortunate blocking summaries. --Doc 12:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Right. The auto-deletion summaries are often very bad, including birthdates of real people or even attacks. It would make sense to change some of them, much more than the block log. Kusma (討論) 12:53, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Agreed here also. I've had this problem also. JoshuaZ 21:46, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Whatever happened to the idea of, "Once a criminal, always a criminal"? If someone screws up once, they're likely to screw up again. Even if they don't screw up again, the people who violate policy once still deserve extra scrutiny. (Except, perhaps, for people who have expertise in highways.) It's like that old "permanent record" they threatened kids with in school: "This is going to go on your permanent record!" Removing notifications of blocks, or removing vandalism warnings, is an all-too-convenient way of erasing one's permanent record. --Elkman - (Elkspeak) 20:02, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Nice cite of unreasonableness to encourage reasonableness, Elkman! However, it was all summed up better above: "forgive but don't forget". That's a good policy that guards against people falling back into old ways. However, it rarely applies in real life. Those who made a genuine mistake go away and reappear under a new username and never mention their old identity. Those who set out to destroy Wikipedia and changed their minds demand forgiveness but only allow about 8 minutes for it to be granted before they start destroying again, "justified" by not being believed (cf User:Lir). Those who are seriously deranged - and I mean "water tower-rifle interface error" - scream for positions of power in return for returning as "an ordinary user", then start to vandalise in a complete "help me! help me! I need pills and a rubber room!" way (qv User:Blu Aardvark).
Wikipedia as a whole has bags and bags of forgiveness, beyond anything that would be found reasonable in Real Life. And still we tend to be caught out by it. Huh. ➨ ЯEDVERS 20:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The problem with this analogy is that, at least in Giano's case, there was no initial wrong. He wasn't hate speaking. His block needs expunging. Elkman would it be OK with you if I blocked you with the notation " indef block, major wanker, eats children in his spare time, runs down old ladies in crosswalks " ?? That's an exaggeration but it's just as unjust and unwarranted a block entry as "hate speech". I think it would be a lot easier for Giano to forgive Carnildo if that smirch were removed. Of course I could be wrong and he would never forgive him but that's my theory. ++Lar: t/c 20:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Regardless of the block log, one cannot force forgiveness or amend lost trust by decree. Especially when there is seemingly so little incentive to do so. But since Giano is bothered by his block log, I'm blocking him for 10 seconds with an appropriate block log note attached. I, at least, was immediately resysop'd so as to be able to make such a note, plus Essjay added his own. El_C 21:39, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I want to expand on my own block log note (which is indeed harsh) because I consider it closely tied to my approach toward Carnildo, who in his responses, draw the comparison that preemptively blocking pedophiles is similar in nature to preemptively blocking homosexuals. My antipathy toward his stance is largely based on the fact that, in the realm of ideas, he has yet to address these notions. So, intellectually, as far as I can understand, that remains his position, which is a pitvotal problem for me. El_C 21:56, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Copyrighted information from a municipality's page being added by an employee who wrote it

Hi, sorry if this is the wrong place for a question like this--please redirect me to the right place if it is not.

A user recently added a dump from this site to the Brampton, Ontario page, which I twice reverted as copyrighted information. He then emailed me stating that he worked for the City of Brampton and was the author of said information. I'm no expert on copyright, so I told him I'd contact someone here, but I assume he'd need to prove that the city itself (that is, someone who has legal authority to speak on its behalf) has given permission to use this copyrighted information on Wikipedia (and in essence release the copyright through acceptance of the GFDL). If he can provide this information, where should it be directed to? └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 18:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Email to permissions@wikimedia.org, explicitly stating a) what the page in question is and b) that they're willing to have the material licensed under the GDFL. Email should come from an address clearly recognisable as the operator of the site. Shimgray | talk | 18:46, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
You should also let them know that licensing under GDFL also means they are giving up copyright and control over their text. Sometimes these places don't realize the implications of allowing this. You can direct them to Wikipedia:Confirmation of permission for more info and instructions on how to do all this.--Alabamaboy 18:50, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Additionally, in most Berne countries, the copyright of a creation made during the course of employment by and as part of the duties of a body vests the copyright in the employing body, not the employee. That's how Wikipedia gets to use NASA images and US National Parks photos as Public Domain - the copyright goes to the person paying the wages, not the person earning those wages (and, in the case of this example, US Fed Gov stuff is generally PD). ➨ ЯEDVERS 19:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Thanks, I let him know all of the above. └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 20:00, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
They aren't giving up the copyright; users retain the copyright to any text they contribute, presuming that a copyright would apply. Christopher Parham (talk) 06:26, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] An addition to watchlists

Greetings, just an invitation to all here to please add the new Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons noticeboard to eveyone's watchlist:

Wikipedia:Biographies_of_living_persons/Noticeboard.

Thanks. (→Netscott) 19:43, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Image:00050113hg1.jpg

*sigh* I find this is incredibly bad timing considering the issue with User:Publicgirluk and all.. — The Future 21:04, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I will try and see if I can determine the copyright status later, but IMHO, it should stay deleted. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 21:20, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I was actually suggesting for it to be deleted, but I never got to post a update before Drini deleted it. :) — The Future 21:30, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
The uploader has uploaded a fairuse (orphaned ready for deletion) and a fairuse trying to pass a gfdl-self. So I assumed trolling and copyvio -- Drini 21:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Troll has created deleted attack page and I'm not taking the bait

(There is a User:kross they are defaming.)

user:SuperMayan Has recreated the deleted attack article Kross and is taunting me with it. User:IncredibleJake had originally created this and I gave him a test 3 for it. User:Incredible Jake had earlier taunted me with a note on my talk page about similar posting on unencyclopedia which I reverted because it contained an external link and I don;t care about unencyclopedia. Rather than taking the bait, I'm posting here as it does not have a db-attack on it yet and I don't want to feed the trolls. Oh dear, oh me, another taunt from User:Incredible Jake as I'm typing this note. I'm not so worried about the stalking as the defamatory attack article on Wikipedia. Cheers. :) Dlohcierekim 06:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Cheers, :) Dlohcierekim 06:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Speedied and protected against re-creation. -- Vary | Talk 07:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Csd again

There is another major backlog on the Category:Candidates for Speedy Deletion, which I have been working on for the last hour. However, I really need to go to bed now and there are still about 200 items left, mostly images. Academic Challenger 08:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Still a problem, I've spent half an hour and deleted around 100 images and articles. About 240 items in there now. --Robdurbar 10:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
The category was getting full of images because a bot, PoccilScript (talk • contribs), was using {{db}} rather than {{NowCommons}}. The bot was blocked by Geni. --bainer (talk) 11:38, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma, again

I am inviting a review of my move of the article Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma to Queen Anne of Romania, as I am still getting complaints about it. It is a rather complicated situation. Queen Anne of Romania is the most common usage, but there are also good reasons why Princess Anne of Bourbon-Parma should be used (see Talk:Queen Anne of Romania, User talk:Kjkolb and this section of the Administrator's Noticeboard for discussions). The survey results were two to one in favor of a move. At first, I did not move the article because of an apparent conflict in the naming conventions, the most common usage vs. a rule for the naming of consorts. Then another naming convention seemed to apply, so I moved the article based on that and the survey result. However, the other convention may not be relevant, either. Still, I did not move the article back because of the survey result and Queen Anne of Romania being the most common usage. Also, moving the article back and forth does not seem like a good idea. Finally, while I would not call two to one (or three to one) a consensus, requested moves usually get little participation, often it is just the nominator, so going by the majority is more practical (barring any reasons why the majority position should not be followed, such as a relevant naming convention or having weaker arguments than the minority). -- Kjkolb 09:04, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Help wanted

We are now up to 689 links to chabad.org ([12]), which is far beyond what can be justified by this small though significant organisation. I'm sure many of these are valid and appropriate, but I'm equally sure that we are being spammed. Can a couple of helpful individuals pop along to my Tal;k page and see if we can work out how to approach this? I am really not convinced that we need to have the Chabad-Lubavich perspective on every single subject which touches on Judaism, but it's not a simple case of nuke-on-sight, and it's rightly been rejected at the spam blacklist as having at least some legitimate uses. Just zis Guy you know? 17:01, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I went through a number of the links but could only delete a few. Many of them are relevant to the articles in question but some are merely links to other collections of links. The ones I deleted were the links to more link of links :-). I do wonder, though, if there is a faster way to deal with this (like a bot)?--Alabamaboy 18:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive55#Spam-a-rama copy/pasted below for relevant discussion the last time JzG brought this up. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 19:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for pasting the info below. As I said, the links that are to useful articles are no-brainer keeps but I personally don't believe the links to further links should be kept. However, while I removed a few of the most blatent of these I'm not going to spend any more time doing so. Best, --Alabamaboy 20:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
You deleted two types of links, one was a link from the weekly Parsha of Matot [13] which has links to every viewpoint in Judaism's commentaries on it and there should be not reason why chabad's should not be included. Another example is this edit [14] which was a relevant link to the customs of the Priestly Blessing. In regards to your point about linking to further links. The links on chabad.org which have links to more articles are a collection of articles on one topic and is far better than linking to each individual article from wikipedia, as it covers many aspects of one subject. In the future please be more carefull before you mass remove links. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 20:37, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Copied from Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive55#Spam-a-rama

See this list [15] of links to chabad.org, a polemical website. Many of these links are inappropriate (in Christian topics, for example, where the Hasidic view is not really relevant). I am not sure what to do about this. Hundreds of links always lights up the spam radar. Just zis Guy you know? 12:33, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Zap the lot of them, and enjoy it! --kingboyk 12:43, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
First of all it is not a polemical website. It is one of the largest Jewish websites out there. Each link is an important resource which belongs there under WP:EL. An example of a link which he removed is this link from the Psalms article, which is the Judaica Press (Non-Hasidic) translation with the commentary of Rashi. I have restored those links. Which christian topics does it have links by? I could not find any. The Problem of evil which you removed a link [16] is applicable in Judaism as well. etc.--PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 12:47, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Do you deny that it carries heavily politicised pro-Israeli editorial content, then? Just zis Guy you know? 13:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
It has a few article which are very pro-Israel, but that is to be expected from a Jewish site. In fact every Jewish site out there has pro-Israel articles, are we going to start removing links to all of them? The links that are in the articles are to specific sections of the site that deal with the content of that article. For example in the Psalms article it links to the transalation and commentary of Psalms, not to any Israel related content. The Israel content is a tiny fraction of a percent of the site. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:14, 22 August 2006 (UTC) In addition its Pro-Israel articles focus less on politics and more on prayer, charity, and good deeds. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:16, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Do you deny that it carries heavily politicised pro-Israeli editorial content, then? And the translation with commentary is indeed problematic, as is the fact that the copyright status of the commentary is somewhat unclear, and the fact that it is surrounded by adverts selling off the page (see the shopping cart icon?). Oh, and the text "at chabad.org" is weblinked not internally linked. Just zis Guy you know? 13:06, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
About the Pro-Israel content see above. Why is a third party commentary Rashi problamatic? There is no problem with copyright. You can write to Judaica Press to ask them. and a small advert on the side offering someone to buy a hard copy is quite reasonable when you are making the entire copy available online for free. I don't know, but perhaps Judaica Press asked them to place a link there as part of the agreement. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 13:27, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
Chabad-Lubavitch is a popular and well-known Jewish movement, and chabad.org is a popular Jewish website - for example, it gets an Alexa ranking of 10,786, significantly higher than other popular sites about Judaism like askmoses.com (15,200), aish.com (15,930), ou.org (66,439), and jewfaq.org (68,141). I daresay it is the most popular site about Judaism on the internet. The fact that it carries a small amount of material about Israel is almost inevitable (just about every Jewish site does), though it's not clear what makes this content "heavily politicised". In any event, most of the links appear to be not to content that has anything to do with Israel at all, but rather to relevant pages on Jewish thought on various topics. In particular it's hard to imagine what is objectionable about the links to Jewish translations of various books of the Bible, along with Rashi's commentary. The Judaica Press translation is generally recognized as one of the most scholarly Jewish translations (it's not a translation done by Chabad, btw), and Rashi is the pre-eminent Jewish commentator - observant Jews almost never read the Bible without using his commentary. All in all, these links are a rather valuable service provided to the Wikipedia reader. Oh, and regarding "copyright" issues, Rashi wrote the commentary in Hebrew in the 11th century, so I suspect his copyright has expired at this point. Jayjg (talk) 17:44, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm with Jay on this one. That said, the chabad.org site does not in every single instance represent the mainstream Orthodox Jewish viewpoint. In those cases, alternatives may need to be sought. But I don't support blanket removal of all links simply because an editor (an admin in good standing) once added them many months ago. JFW | T@lk 22:39, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
The issue here is that we are in many cases representing the Chabad-Lubavitch POV as the Jewish POV, which is not exactly correct. If we don't do that, but don't have the mainstream Jewish POV, then it's undue weight. I think in many cases the Chabad link could be replaced with a link to the article in the Jewish Encyclopaedia. Just zis Guy you know? 13:53, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
There are 5,013 links to the Jewish Encyclopedia [17] if you know of any articles that still need a link, feel free to add it. However probably due to the outdated language that they use they are one of the less visited sites according to alexa [18]. --PinchasC | £€åV€ m€ å m€§§åg€ 21:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Legal Threats by User:Stirling Newberry

This might be a complex underlying issue, however, I am concerned by Stirling's overt legal threats made against me with no evidence whatsoever to support them here: [19] and here [20]. Request administrative intervention to remind Mr. Newberry that he should keep his head cool and not resort to accusing me of "illegaility" and "slander/libel." T Turner 21:21, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

T Turner is obviously not a new editor. The account T_Turner (talk • contribs • logs • block user • block log) has been used solely to attack and edit war with Stirling Newberry. (It's first edit was to criticize Stirling on another editor's talk page.) I warned Turner earlier today that if he couldn't find a positive and non-Newberry-related way to contribute to Wikipedia he would be blocked. I have just issued a final warning to Turner to find something useful and non-Newberry to do. If he fails to take heed, I intend to block him indefinitely as another sock of the editors who have been harrassing Newberry. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Even though I have not said I was a "new editor" you automatically side with Stirling Newberry even though he falsely accused me of spamming his cell phone? What you are saying is that Stirling is allowed to violate WP:NPA, whereas when I bring up a valid point, I get threatened with a block. That is obviously unfair, and I feel that your "friendship" with Stirling is clouding your impartial judgement on this issue. If I am blocked by you related to my non violation of Wikipedia policies, I will pursue RFC. T Turner 22:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I welcome the comments, advice, and scrutiny of any other admin. I would ask that T Turner not re-delete my comments to him from his talk page until this complaint is resolved. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 22:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

A checkuser request might prove fruitful. On the other hand, banning a troublemaker is faster. Mackensen (talk) 23:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm all for speed.
All of his edits are attacks on Stirling. I blocked it indefinitely as a harrassment account, and welcome review of this action. Antandrus (talk) 02:56, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
based on a quick review: support. ++Lar: t/c 15:11, 1 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Talk page move question

Normally I'd not concern myself with posting a relatively trivial question here but both my own page move and that of an admin have been reverted concerning an image's talk page. This image had to be reuploaded due to the fact that its original name was completely out of accord with NPOV. Since the image is identical save for its new name shouldn't the original talk page be moved to correspond to the image's new name? Thanks in advance. (→Netscott) 23:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This is one of a number of attempts by Netscott to cause trouble over this issue. First, it's a content dispute and therefore not appropriate for AN/I. Secondly, it's BLP-related, and therefore I won't go into detail on-wiki. Anyone wanting to know the background is welcome to e-mail me. SlimVirgin (talk) 23:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Nothing like a bit of transparency to allow for a proper review of the matter I always say. (→Netscott) 23:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
This in fact is a WP:BLP issue as User:SlimVirgin rightly says. It involves Wikipedia implying (through lack of a reliable citation in the text of the concerned article) that an individual is an anti-Semite. But that is besides the point. Save for "ignore all rules" what is standard policy regarding the moving of image talk pages? (→Netscott) 23:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
If an uninvolved party could review this that'd be appreciated. My valid concerns are now being deleted by SlimVirgin (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log). Thanks. (→Netscott) 23:45, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
As SlimVirgin rightly said this is not the place to discuss content issues. This thread was started relative to the question of moving a talk page of an image under the image's new name. Also please note that there is an AOL user trying to move the comments and SlimVirgin's has used here rollback tool to undo this anon's edits. (→Netscott) 00:07, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
This is not for WP:ANI. It is a content dispute. Please take it to talk page ≈ jossi ≈ t • @ 00:09, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for responding Jossi but my question still remains about moving an image's talk page. I think we both can agree that's not a content issue no? (→Netscott) 00:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The BLP question is now being discussed in the proper place over here on WP:BLP/N. (→Netscott) 01:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Could I ask editors wishing to refer to the blocking policy to use the words "blocking policy"? Using arcane abbreviations as some kind of shorthand does not help the readability of these often complex discussions. If you expect people to spend time reading your words, please spend the extra quarter of a second or so it takes to type the words. --Tony Sidaway 14:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Actually, I believe they are referring to "Biographies of living persons", but your apparent confusion is another example of why we should not use shorthand in normal conversation. --Deathphoenix ʕ 14:56, 1 September 2006 (UTC)



[edit] KarlV unblocked

I have removed the indefinite block on User:KarlV, which had run for a month, based on the prior discussion showing no community consensus/support for an indefinite block. I'd urge all involved to refrain from further inflammatory accusations or actions and see if Karl's repeated promises of good behaviour are born out. --CBD 17:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Beligerant User Blanking his talk page

I have tried to help by setting an archive page up for him per a passing comment he made on an article talk page but anything typed on his talk page is removed. I left a message on WP:OWN and that blanking a talk page is generally frowned on unless you are archiving it. I stopped short of the the 3 Revert rule and decided to come here instead to have this sorted out. I didn't care for the message...STOP EDITING MY PAGE YOU SOCIALIST NAZI PIGS!!!! when I was trying to help...or add the section about vandalism. Talk page is located here. User talk:Dwain —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Bschott (talk • contribs) 17:18, 15 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Remove comment from Windows Mobile history

Please remove the comment at http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Windows_Mobile&diff=70751273&oldid=70608195 from Bonsai8 - which is me. It simply states a user keeps deleting links. The comment is true, but could be considered a personal attack and therefore should not be there. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Bonsai8 (talk • contribs) 00:55, 21 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Images that aren't there

Shavian alphabet has a large number of images depicting the various letters of that alphabet. For example, Image:Shavian-ado.png. If you click on that, you will see that the "image" tag in the upper lefthand corner is red. There is no "history" tag, and there is no "delete" tag, even if you're an admin. Neither is the image taken over from Commons (because I just deleted a copy from Commons for not having a source or license, but the local version is still present). Now, these letters were designed by Ronald Kingsley Read, who died in 1975, so they aren't in the public domain yet. They have no source and no license, but with no "delete" tag, how do we get rid of them? —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 19:15, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The letters were created then, but are these images themselves the creation of Read? Can you really copyright an alphabet that was intended to replace the Latin alphabet in English? If you're worried about the images themselves, it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult to create new ones and just update the images with the new versions. └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 22:18, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
But under what license? I don't think they're {{PD-ineligible}} the way normal letters are, because they are the creation of a specific, identifiable author. And there's no knowing what the source of these particular .png files is. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 06:39, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm contacting the author of a Shavian font right now (and it's possible that he's the author of the font that the images were taken from, if they were taken from a font), asking for permission to create image files from them for Wikipedia. Is there anything particular I'm supposed to ask/say regarding the copyright situation of the images outside of Wikipedia? Does his granting us permission mean that all subsequent providers of content taken from Wikipedia have the right to use the images as they see fit? └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 13:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, granting Wikipedia permission to use the images isn't good enough. He will have to agree to license them under a free license like the GFDL or CC-BY-SA. However, since the Shavian alphabet is a recent invention and has an identifiable author (unlike most writing systems), I'm still not convinced that the letters aren't covered by R. K. Read's copyright. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 14:01, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Where do we go to find out otherwise? I can't even conceive that an alphabet created for public use and which was hoped to replace the Latin alphabet was copyrighted. If anyone owned the copyright, I would think it was Shaw's estate, since Shaw commissioned the alphabet in his will, and so paid the creator for rights to the work. I would assume, with good faith, that Shaw didn't want copyright (and probably stated so in the will). But then, assumptions don't mean a whole lot here, eh? └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 14:08, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I doubt that Shaw's estate would own the copyright to this alphabet. He only commissioned the development of some phonetic alphabet; he had nothing to do with the development of this alphabet. There was a contest, which Read won. But it was Read, not Shaw's estate, who went on to develop QuikScript out of the Shavian alphabet, so I think any moral rights to the alphabet belong to Read. I suppose the question really comes down to whether or not these squiggles meet the threshold of originality necessary to being copyrighted. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 18:50, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm the creator of the Shavian font mentioned above. I've decided to provide images of my font under the GFDL to replace the images in the Shavian article. I can identify the current images by their shape, and they are taken from an existing font which has been copied much but I don't believe the author has given permission for any of these copies. We really do need to have a properly licensed set of images, and that's why I've decided to provide them.

As for the issue of possible copyright by Kingsley Read, I don't see how it can possibly be copyrighted by him. There was a contest and several people's designs were accepted, and money was paid to the creators. Read's was chosen as the best of them, then additional modifications were made. The alphabet is mostly Read's creation but not totally. I've researched Shavian for several years and have never heard of any copyright. I don't know if an alphabet such as this can even be copyrighted. Unless someone can provide evidence of copyright, we must assume it's public domain, since all the information we have at least implies that. EthanL (talk) 08:19, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User talk:David Sneek

David is asking to have his talkpage delete and cites his right to vanish. I can understand having his userpage deleted, but believe talk pages should be retained for historical purposes and to ensure discussions aren't broken on one side. Has this been discussed already? I appear to have a distant memory of a similar discussion in the past with a more famous Wikipedian. - Mgm|(talk) 11:40, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Generally I think the talk page can be blanked (and protected if necessary) but is not actually deleted. Thatcher131 (talk) 12:28, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like a reasonable idea. It leaves the edit history in tact, but still allows him to disappear. - Mgm (not logged in) 12:55, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Actually, in this case since there are no warnings he would be allowed to delete it per meta:Right to vanish. However he has already had his user talk page deleted twice before (check the page log). I would suggest looking at the deleted versions to see if he has ever previously claimed "right to vanish" or if he was previously hiding administrative warnings. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:50, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
A blanked page is still a page - no vanishing there. Meta:Right_to_vanish mentions neither previous deletions nor administrative warnings (not that there were any), so those objections are beside the point. David Sneek 15:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
It is my understanding that the notices on such a page may be archived, but not deleted. Particularly if the user name is still functional. Kukini 16:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
I agree that it's odd that a user should repeatedly have a page deleted under 'right to vanish'. RTV really only applies if the user intends to leave the project, I believe. If David is really through with Wikipedia, it would be appropriate to delete his userpages under right to vanish, but perhaps with the understanding that all revisions should be restored if he resumes editing? The last time those pages were deleted was on August 19, and David has edited more or less continuously since then, so RTV wouln't have applied. -- Vary | Talk 16:05, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
I didn't appeal to "right to vanish" before, I just asked for the page to be deleted and this was done. I am planning to vanish this time. David Sneek 16:10, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
This is my understanding as well. David will need to stop editing under this user name alltogether. Administrators do the task of "vanishing" you David. Kukini 16:14, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
The deleting admin should check the prior deletions to see what reasoning was claimed then; as long as David is not a "serial vanisher" then we should assume good faith and let him vanish this time (but maybe watchlist it too). Thatcher131 (talk) 16:16, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
As an administrator, I am able to delete the user upon his request, I believe. I will do so now. Please contact me if you have any concerns about the process. Kukini 16:19, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Deindenting. No concerns about the deletion, but should David resume or continue editing wikipedia, I do think that all revisions of the talk page should be restored, per Thatcher's comment about 'serial vanishing'. If David wants to start over, he should do it with a new account. Other than posting of personal information and similar extenuating circumstances, I think the history of an active editor's talk page should be available to all editors, not just admins. -- Vary | Talk 16:29, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
I am in complete agreement with Vary on this. Kukini 17:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

User talk pages are supposed to be kept. They can be blanked, but the history must be intact. The only times that they are deleted is when the user has only a couple of edits and is leaving forever or has already been blocked indefinitely and requests deletion to make a clean break, when the user is being harassed or when Jimbo deletes it, which is rare. I think that the page should be restored and blanked. -- Kjkolb 19:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

The user requested to "vanish" and was afforded this opportunity. Right to vanish does not apply selectively to user talk pages and not the actual user account, but to the entire user account. In the service of helping this user vanish, the IP and account creation options were both left available. If this account is to be restarted,the user talk page needs to be brought back in its entirety. Of course, the user has the right to archive it, but not to delete notices such as "test 1." Kukini 22:02, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
FWIW, I concur in Kjkolb's analysis, which seems quite consistent not only with that which I've long understood to be our practice but also with that which is plainly sensible. Joe 03:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Re-Deletion of Halo Vehicles List

The article List of vehicles in the Halo universe has recently been recreated. It was successfully deleted on 13 July 2006 primarily as a violation of WP:NOT, section 1.9.4 (WP is not a game guide). Two notable precedents were cited [21] [22]. The page was recreated 1 September without malicious intent. I do not believe it falls under criteria for SC or PROD (as it does contain factual information). Being unsure about the best way to redelete the article, I moved to standard AfD, where I could not figure out just how to correctly list an article for deletion that had already been deleted. By bringing it to administrative attention, my hope is that the article can be deal with properly, as opposed to me taking a stab at random and hoping it works. --Ourai (т • с) 08:56, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

To nominate where an article with the same name has already been nominated, you need to substitute {{afd}} onto the page, then edit the AfD message and replace the link "[[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pagename]]" with something like "[[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Pagename (2nd nomination)]]". Then follow the new redlink to create the page as you would normally. --bainer (talk) 10:40, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
This would be a clear-cut speedy deletion, per WP:CSD#General criteria #4: "Recreation of deleted material. A substantially identical copy, by any title, of a page that was deleted as a result of a discussion in Articles for deletion or another XfD process, unless it was undeleted per the undeletion policy or was recreated in the user space." -- ChrisO 11:14, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Odd AFD close

At Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/A Poet's Life, the article creator, User:Worthlessboy1420 has closed the debate as a speedy keep, after also advocating for the article to be kept. Notwithstanding a number of keep votes, I think that's a bit odd. Could someone take a peek? Tony Fox (arf!) 20:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

  • It did not meet the speedy keep criteria, and the article's author should not speedily close the discussion. I am not certain that the concerns of everybody commenting "delete" were adressed. Kusma (討論) 20:23, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
    • WP:IAR is one of the five pillars... --Kbdank71 20:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
      • No it isn't. "We have no firm rules" is, but that's not an endorsement of IAR as much as an endorsement of how our policies evolve. Regardless, it looks like the close was thankfully reversed. --badlydrawnjeff talk 20:59, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
        • Your assertion doesn't become true just because you constantly repeat it, you know. --Calton | Talk 07:23, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
          • The truth, however, will set people free. --badlydrawnjeff talk 18:47, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
            • No doubt. Completely irrelevent to anything you've actually said, of course, but a wise and a pithy saying. Did you bring it up for a reason? --Calton | Talk 19:01, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
  • Yeah, let's all do whatever the fuck heck we want, IAR! Who needs common sense, anyways? --Conti|✉ 21:23, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
  • I have dropped the user in question a note asking him not to do it again. Article deletion procedures should be followed unless there is a very good reason. The Land 21:49, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
It was an overwhelming keep. This was an appropriate action. --Tony Sidaway 14:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
It's appropriate for the creator of an article to close the AfD on that article as a keep in less than a day of it being up? I haven't a problem with the article myself, but that seems to set a fairly dangerous precedent. Tony Fox (arf!) 15:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
It's not a precedent. Since there's been no jiggery-pokery the close was obvious and appropriate. --Tony Sidaway 18:46, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
People involved in the discussion should not do the closing. Period. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Second or third editor to quit

I'm the second or third long-standing, good editor to quit Wikipedia as a result of the situation with the anarchism-related articles, even though my editing expanded far beyond them. Anarchism is listed as one of the subjects on which every Wikipedia should have an article on; yet, it is probably one of the worst and most unstable articles on the English-language Wikipedia. It draws to it a myriad of ideological warriors, from both sides of the spectrum, who have no problem gaming the system to get what they want. Some of them (like RJII or Thewolfstar) have been banned, but have also admitted or been proven to have numerous sock puppets.

While most of the editors of these articles, regardless of partisanship, are reasonable and intelligent people who are willing to compromise, there have always been two or three (an interesting number, considering that two or three have been banned indefinitely) editors who have thrived on throwing matches into the powder keg. These editors know well how to game the system, and some administrators, probably unwittingly, play right into their hands. They wait for the slightest violation of Wikipedia policy by editors they disagree with and then report it immediately and vindictively, and a few administrators are always more than willing to come barreling in to block so-and-so without actually attempting to understand the context of the situation. I have been blocked three times in the three years that I have spent on Wikipedia, all within the span of the last month or so, as these users have learned how to better game the system. I am not typically a hot-headed or edit-warring type of editor. The second time, it was a mistake (later admitted by all involved). The last time, it was a mistake, but then again, Woohookitty does seem to be incapable of error (and quite rude -- but then again, as a long-standing and active administrator, he deserves the respect of a soldier on the front lines, God bless him, I could never comprehend his travails).

Since I no longer see any reason to put any time into Wikipedia, and now see my thousands of edits and time spent trying to improve particular articles as rather pointless, I've decided to quit along with the two or three editors who have also recently quit as a result of this very same problem. I am posting this, as my last message to WP:AN, only because I hope that people will actually put some time into this problem and attempt to fix it. That is all. I don't want any sympathy, and I don't care whether or not anybody agrees or disagrees with my last block. It just needs to be recognized that there is a huge problem, and that that problem is not me, or Two-Bit Sprite, or Blahblahblahblah, or infinity0, or The Ungovernable Force, or any of the myriad of other editors involved in these articles, but rather two or three editors with too much time on their hands. --AaronS 13:45, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I haven't looked into the specifics of this case. However, I have already seen practices of "gaming the system": using the formal rules of Wikipedia (3RR etc.) to get rid of people of different opinions who have less time to spare or who are less organized. There's something flawed there; essentially, a group of decided POV-pushers with time to spare can effectively lock out good contributors.
I'm personally in favor of applying 3RR sensibly. David.Monniaux 17:27, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
I do appreciate your comments, Aaron. What dispute resolution steps have been tried with that article? Might be time for an RfAr to try to get things under control. That article has been "trouble" for a long long time. And I might've been hasty with the blocks and comments. We admins can make mistakes too. Not making excuses for myself but it reminds me of Neuro-linguistic programming when it was at its worst. It's so complex that it's hard to adjudicate anything. --Woohookitty(meow) 12:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
Just to answer your question, that article has been through a great deal of dispute resolution (RfAr, MedCab, etc.), and it hasn't helped one iota. The most troublesome editors are not interested in compromise. To compromise, for them, is to lose the great struggle. RJII, for instance, really believes that he is on the front lines of a revolution. Also, thank you for your comments. I appreciate that. --AaronS 21:38, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:Dbiv

We don't want to lose Dbiv. I blocked him for a few days after he resumed defiance of his arbitration ban from Peter Tatchell after warnings. In the interests of continuing dialog I have unblocked him for the purpose of engaging in editing from which he is not banned. --Tony Sidaway 22:39, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

His talk page makes it sound like he was sockpuppeting yesterday to get around the block. Is this true? I'm all for de-escalation, but I'm not sure I like the idea of unblocking someone who was just evading their block yesterday. Friday (talk) 23:49, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
He was sockpuppeting on a related note - leaving messages on talk pages etc but not particularly attempting to engaged in tendentious editing. I unblocked his sockpuppet for similar reasons as Tony has jsut unblocked his main account. I would describe Dbiv as behaving oddly; there is a chance he is being manipulative; however given the quality of his contributions I think we should extend every opportunity for him to regain our trust. IF he continues to either breach the ArbCom decision, or otherwise wind people up, it is little hassle to reblock him. The Land 23:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
Seems reasonable- I have no idea of the background here, so I'll certainly defer to those who've been previously involved. Unblocking a recent block-evader just struck me as usual, and I suppose it is, but that doesn't mean it's always a bad idea. Thanks for the clarification. Friday (talk) 23:58, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Irishpunktom. --Tony Sidaway 18:44, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] The Strange History of Doctor Octagon

I've posted a "History of Doctor Octagon" on User_talk:David.Mestel. I'd appreciate it if admins would read it, and be aware of the pattern for when a new Gilliland sockpuppet appears. Thanks! Nandesuka 17:50, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Request for Help

Perhaps you can help me. I have been working on some embryology and congential heart defects. There is a page dedicated to truncus arteriosus(embryology) and truncus arteriosus congenital outflow tract anomaly. I was able to change Truncus arteriosus to a more exact term Persistent truncus arteriosus, but when I cross reference in embryology it still sends me to the congenital defect. It needs to be Truncus arteriosus for embryology and PTA for congenital heart disease.GetAgrippa 14:39, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You might have been better off using the Wikipedia:Help desk or Wikipedia:New contributors' help page, as this doesn't sound like it requires admin intervention. In any case, are you looking for [[this style of|link]]? If you do that link ( link ), it sends you to "this style of", but has the text "link". It might also be useful to change that redirect that you created into a disambiguation page. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 14:59, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Israeli apartheid

This case has closed and the final decision has been published at the link above.

To summarize: Discussion of global issues which concern use of "apartheid" and all polls shall be at Wikipedia:Central discussions/Apartheid with subsidiary dialog on the talk page of affected articles. Based on the difficult and controversial nature of this matter, with the exception of Zeq (talk • contribs), who remains banned from editing the article, the principal participants in this dispute shall be granted an amnesty for past actions, but are strongly encouraged to engage in negotiations. All involved administrators are admonished not use their administrative tools without prior discussion and consensus. - Mgm|(talk) 20:48, 2 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] A thought about Vandalism

One tenet that reassures all of us that Wikipedia never will be overrun by vandals is that people inherently want to be "good" more than "evil," so the number of people reverting and fighting vandalism will always be higher than the number of people vandalising -- no matter how much Wikipedia grows. It has occurred to me, however, that the more notorious Wikipedia becomes, through either media hype of its supposed inacurracies from minor misinformation to libel (Siegenthaler), or god forbid, if any mishaps should happen to children preyed upon by pedophiles here. I'm sure you can imagine the massive media coverage that would get.

Therefore, if Wikipedia becomes notorious in the media for its real or supposed "evils," the number of people using Wikipedia to vandalise and wreak havoc would increase faster than the people fighting vandalism. New vandals would see harming Wikipedia as a crusade in taking down something seen as malicious, something with a bad reputation, and a bloated factory of internet evil. And thus Wikipedia would finally be overrun. Its just a thought I had. Wiki Mirabeau 03:45, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image deletion backlogs

As it currently stands, the image categories for deletion, such as CAT:NS, CAT:NL, CAT:ORFU, CAT:NR are backlogged from between 5 days and 9 days in the case of NS. In short, for those which are 7 days old, they can be deleted under WP:CSD, if they have not been rectified by the addition of source info, copyright info, used in a a fair use manner or had a fair use rationale supplied. User:Kimchi.sg aka User:Awyong Jeffrey Mordecai Salleh has been the mainstay recently with 16,000 deletes in his 2 months of sysophood, but he is currently busy in real life. Anyone care to lend a hand? Blnguyen | rant-line 04:11, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

CAT:ORFU really needs help, there are thousands of iamges (I?ve been trying to clear it for a week) and they are all speedyable (2 or 3 not really orphaned anymore for each hundred, those are just delisted, all others removed ;) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Drini (talk • contribs) 05:22, August 28, 2006 (UTC)
They're all backlogged heavily. So is PUI and IFD. Kevin_b_er 06:26, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
With the advent of image undeletion, would it be acceptable at this point to blindly delete whatever is in the category without checking for the 2 out of 100 that are mistagged, and then mopping up afterward? That strategy worked rather successfully with the Category:Images with the same name on Wikimedia Commons where thousands were cleared to zero, with relatively little collateral damage.I think we need a way to get rid of these much more quickly. Dmcdevit·t 06:52, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Indeed. It would probably be easier to deal with the handful of false positives by hand than the accumulated days of backlog. -- Rune Welsh | ταλκ 11:39, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
I agree fully with this strategy. One of the things that makes image deletion ponderous (for me) is the manual nature of having to check and count the 7 day period. Given that we can undelete images, I think it's time to update the policies so we can speedy these, making a notification period a valuable, but not required, courtesy. Nandesuka 12:27, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
It doesn't take time to do it properly. You use Recent Changes and that tells you which ones have been altered since it was tagged and you can see if there was an incomplete detagging by checking about 10 edits. Then you can swamp the rest.Blnguyen | rant-line 06:54, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Use related changes/recentchangeslinked on the individual categories too, will alliviate the need to extensively check history of each image. Kevin_b_er 15:31, 28 August 2006 (UTC)
Hey, at least we're better off than Commons. Commons has a backlog for unsourced/unlicensed images dating back to June 19! —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 13:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

Time for a bot? Yes, I know that admin bots aren't very welcome around here however some of these image categories can be blindly deleted without any human intervention whatsoever. A bot which deletes the day's worth of unlicensed and/or unsourced images (and while we're at it, expired prods) would save a lot of admin time. MER-C 10:04, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Expired prods warrant a human checking to make sure they are not legitimate articles tagged. —Centrx→talk • 06:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Indef blocked userpages - new policy

We block hundreds of accounts with either nil or just one or two edits. Many of these are blocked at creation either for inappropriate usernames, or just trolling 'User:jimbo wales sucks' 'Doc glasgow on wheels' etc. I've been concerned for a while that there is a whole cottage industry of people going around creating userpages for these accounts, and taging and categorising them by whose sock they are thought to be (most are willy impersonators)- or which admin they are impersonating (although they are attacking rather than impersonating). Per WP:DENY I've been tryign to discourage this practice.

I always thought the taggers were simply misguided wiki-criminologists with an obsession with pseudo-law enforcement. However I'm now very suspicious that the same people creating these troll/vandal accounts are involved in tagging them. Many of the taggers are brand new accounts with no edit history e.g. User:ZIN, User:UJonk. Others have been specifically confirmed by checkuser to be creating socks as well e.g User:TheM62Manchester. I'm sure checkuserers could shed more light on this, but as a more general fix I’m proposing the following policy:

Userpages should not be created for indefinitely blocked accounts with an insignificant number of edits. Administrators may delete any userpages so created.

I'd interpret significant as 10+, but that's details. I intend to enforce this policy immediately, unless there are factors I have failed to consider. Thanks. --Doc 13:21, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I suggest that be 10 good faith edits; a user who manages to blank ten pages doesn't need a userpage any more than a user who blanks one. Otherwise, I wholeheartedly support the idea per DenyRecognition; the criteria for speedy deletion can be tweaked, so an entirely new policy wouldn't be needed. // [admin] Pathoschild (talk/map) 13:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

WP:DENY never had a consensus of the community and is still just an essay and not a policy so I'm curious as to why you are calling it one. I'd prefer this to become a policy through our normal process before people start enforcing it. pschemp | talk 13:27, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

DENY is a principle not a policy - but usual process is to codify good ideas that work. So I'm putting this forward now as a response to the immediate situation. What other process do we have for policy. If there are reasoned objection, I'll wait and discuss. --Doc 13:31, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Most of the policies on Wikipedia were principles or common practices before they were written down. In fact that's why they were written down: so that we could let new users know what principles and common practices the existing users were enforcing. WP:DENY merely describes what many of us are already doing since it is a matter of common sense and best practice. As with previous policies many of us are enforcing it long prior to its codification. And I am curious as to why you believe that WP:DENY doesn't have a consensus. Surely we can't know whether it has one or not until we ask the community. -- Derek Ross | Talk 08:01, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Good idea. I think {{indefblockeduser}} should only be used by admins or for the blocks of real editors. All usernameblocked vandals' pages should be deleted, there is no reason to have pages with vandalistic titles. Kusma (討論) 13:28, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I think one of the main issues related to this, is that if someone creates an account along the lines of "Bobby Boulders on Wheels loves General Tojo who killed FireFox", somebody will have the great urge to tag the userpage with masses of tags covering all angles of the username. This has certainly been an issue in the recent past, at least. — FireFox (talk) 13:30, 29 August 2006

Creating the above bolded language as a policy has my full support. Leaving these pages up just gives incentive to these vandals for "upping their count". Yes, they'll come up with more creative ways of gaining notariety. But each time they do something like this they provide us with more and more information and bring us closer and closer to identifying them. Bastique▼parler voir 13:40, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I support the principle of WP:DENY, let's not give each and every internet malcontent their 15 minutes of fame on Wikipedia by creating their own generic Sockpuppet Template. That much is good, but this is not a policy Doc, it's only your idea for a policy. At the moment, it's only a personal policy. Fine, run around deleting these pages at will if you must, I'm not going to complain, but let's have some semblance of discussion on this. I think it would be useful to keep only the generic {{indefblockeduser}} for userpages, whether applied by admins or not. We don't all have checkuser access or immediate responses from any informal requests (wherever or however those are done). Keeping the generic template would help in the fight for the "non priveliged". This debate should probably go to WP:DENY. --Cactus.man ✍ 13:41, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I don't mind getting rid of userpages, but I think the separate categories are useful when dealing with onslaughts of socks and should stay at least while socks are active so efforts tostop thme can be organized and apparent and so other admins don't come behind you unblocking socks. After a particular vandal has gone away, it is fine to get rid of them. pschemp | talk 13:45, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm not suggesting the deletion of any template or categories at this stage - and yes it is a personal policy. Actually, I've been doing it and there's been no objections. But I'd like to encourage others to do the same, and I'd like a little consensus so I can point it out to the taggers when I discourage them from their activity. This is more a case of me saying 'any objections?' in an open way. Call it policy, guideline or whatever you like. --Doc 13:48, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
WP:DENY suggests the deletion of categories, so if that is what you are using, you are suggesting that. Besides, its the tags that help organize socks with their respective categories. (I'm talking about the generic sockpuppet tag, not user specific ones. Those should go)pschemp | talk 13:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Please don't tell me what I'm suggesting, rather let me tell you. Yes, I like WP:DENY and I'm certainly happy to ask people to consider it. But what I am suggesting as a policy here is simply the words that I bolded in my initial post. Nothing more. --Doc 10:16, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
No objection from me. I think it's a good idea. --Kbdank71 18:32, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
All these stupid pages show up in Google. Why should we have 250 Google hits for "Jew Aardvark"? Especially for usernames that attack other usernames or real people, I prefer to have nothing offending showing up. I support the tagging of real vandals that have actual edits, but username stuff just encourages the impersonators. Kusma (討論) 13:49, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Cactus.man that users blocked without a significant edit history should only have either of three templates applied to their userpage:

Someone needs to write a bot to replace substed sockpuppet templates with the appropriate username block template. I might have a go if this is the community consensus.

(edit conflict) I apologise - I was responsible for about half of those Blu Aardvark sockpuppet templates. MER-C 13:54, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I once put "kitten vandal" in the block summary and regret giving them recognition ever since, I don't make any userpage for them and am peeved when others do unless noting 'proxy' or 'sock by checkuser'. Block summary - "vandal only account", subst: the usual vpblock on the talk page, next please. I support Doc's view here. --Alf melmac 13:55, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry I think the sockpuppet tag is useful when dealing with a current onslught of socks and suspected socks so that checkuser can easily find them in one place to run. The category it creates is useful at the time. after that sure fine, delete it, but removing a tool useful in the heat of battle is silly. pschemp | talk 13:57, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
The checkuserers I've spoken to say otherwise. --Doc 14:01, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
The checkuser I worked with on EnthusiastFRANCE (Mackenson) used the category a lot to identify open proxies and go through and tag. That would indicate it is useful. Did you ask Mackenson specifically about that case? pschemp | talk 14:04, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Good point. The pages could still be deleted after the vandals have been checkusered and their proxies blocked. Kusma (討論) 14:07, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
When the onslaught is done, deleting is fine, then there is no permanent memorial. Certainly these categories are easy enough to find later to delete. pschemp | talk 14:10, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
Another option is to simply blank the page. The sockpuppet information would still be in the article history. --Deathphoenix ʕ 14:17, 29 August 2006 (UTC)
I support not tagging vandals with specific user names or templates, and deleting such that exist. Blanking is a viable second option. Vandals should not be rewarded with notariety, should not be googleable. FWIW, Mackensen has weighed in at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:Long term abuse/Willy on Wheels 2 on a similar topic. Thatcher131 (talk) 15:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

The divider for me is: does this glorify the vandal (and at most only incidentally help the admins deal)? Lose it. Or does it help admins deal (and at most only incidentally glorify the vandal). For now, it seems to me that tagging accounts with names that attack or disparage may not be productive (although I tag them with the base {{username}} when I spot them, is that something that is perhaps not productive as well?) but that tagging accounts as socks often is ( perhaps not for WoW or WiC, perhaps but for some of our other sockfesters like PoolGuy for example). It seems that placing them in the category requires that either the userpage or the usertalk page not be deleted (so that the category has a place to be put). But that doesn't mean the page needs more than that category tag. On balance I think DENY ought to be considered to become policy, perhaps with some tinkering but agree it's not yet. Nevertheless it's a good practice. Qualified support of this idea. ++Lar: t/c 17:24, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree, some are useful in the short term (and it should be short term), we just need to apply some common sense. Many of these tags are basically irrelevant. On the point of policy regarding WP:DENY, I think it should also be noted that there is no policy saying we plaster tags over the userpage of every user who is blocked... --pgk(talk) 19:23, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I think Doc Glasgow's proposal is reasonable. WP:DENY is a good idea in principle, subject to implementation. As pgk suggests, it doesn't require a policy change to not add a template, or to blank a userpage, maybe leaving the category. I'm going to start doing this whenever it makes sense. Tom Harrison Talk 20:26, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] arbitrary section break for editing purposes

Note Werdnabot will orphan this subsection when it auto-archives unless the latest time stamp is the same as the last time stamp in the section above. Suggest refactoring when the discussion cools off or switching to a different archival bot. Thatcher131 (talk) 15:55, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

ah ok, didnt know that limitation... I'll come back and remove this if the discussion lapses Syrthiss 16:07, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Can someone recover the deleted WoW long term abuse page so I can export it to my MediaWiki installation?? --Whitmarewood 08:49, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, normally I'd consider such a request, as I do userify deleted pages on request, but um... in this case, click on the user and you'll know why I'm declining. ++Lar: t/c 15:41, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

An example right here of where a LTA page was helpful. Admins with no prior knowledge are reluctant to block what was an obvious sock: example. Getting rid of all this stuff is going to cause more confusion. pschemp | talk 14:02, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree that LTA pages may need to be kept for more subtle vandals who require investigation as in your example. So far though we're mostly talking about Willy, Squidward, and other types of flagrant abuse. Thatcher131 (talk) 14:11, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
And Doc has expressed his opinion that all of the pages and categories are useless and this proposal is the first step. The next one will be to get rid of all of them. I don't have a problem with getting rid of WOW crap. What I fear is that this will be expanded to everything. In fact I'll be extremely surprised if it isn't. That's the direction off-wiki discussions about this are going. pschemp | talk 14:18, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
If this proposal goes so far as to get rid of a useful page like the MasgotGuy page (which, if you review it, will clearly demonstrate enormous utility to admins trying to deal with the problem, and no glory to the vandal) then it's going too far. I'm having trouble figuring out where to address this concern though as it seems there are many places where parts of this are being discussed. ++Lar: t/c 15:15, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
If there are off-wiki discussions going on, imo they should be brought back here (or some centralized location). I hate to think that people are being denied input because they don't use IRC. (reply to pschemp, not reply to lar ;) ) Syrthiss 15:24, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Note that there are related discussions to this at WP:ANI#WP:DENY-driven deletion spree and Wikipedia:Categories for discussion#Category:Wikipedia blocked imposters and all subcategories. Syrthiss 15:29, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a bit too early to be deleting vandal pages as there isn't any consensus to delete them. Furthermore, some of them contain useful information, like which IP range do you block when Blu Aardvark shows up? If the relevant vandal page gets deleted (which it hasn't because it's in my userspace), admins are going to have to sift through the checkuser evidence while he vandalises away. I reckon such pages should be moved to Essjay's wiki where they are of use but don't give vandals recognition and have been trying to do that, but Essjay seems to be on a wikibreak. MER-C 09:37, 31 August 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Copyright question related to lists

Modern Library List of Best 20th-Century Novels

Is this list, prepared by a Random House and published here with a notice "Copyright 2003", exempt from copyvio? To the best of my knowledge, a list, with its precise ordering of information, is a creative effort, and hence fall under copyright. Or am I wrong in this? --Ragib 07:26, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

If the list is objective like best selling books or tallest buidings or oldest people, then the list can not be copyrighted in america regardless of the effort used to create the list. This is the law we go by even tho other nations may have different copyright laws. If the list is subjective such as based on a poll of a few select people (as opposed to a poll representative of public opinion thus representing objective fact - you can't own a fact) then the list as a whole can be copyrighted but specific facts about it like what was number one on the list can not be copyrighted (like you can not copyright the individual words in a sentence but the sentence as a whole might be copyrightable). WAS 4.250 13:23, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

So, can anyone look into the article I've mentioned above and see if it's a copyvio or not? thanks. --Ragib 17:51, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
I am most certainly not a lawyer, but there appear to be two lists on the source page: one for "the board's list" (which sounds more like the poll of a select few) and another for "the readers' list" (which sounds more like the poll of a larger number of people). The article here only contains "the board's list". In my view, this is not something at all like a list of the hundred tallest buildings, and should probably be removed. —ptk✰fgs 18:13, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Copyvio, plain and simple. It's an "expert compiled" list and unless it's been released into the public domain/GFDL it's under copyright. Factual lists may be free of copyright in the US, lists like this are not and have been deleted on numerous occasions. --kingboyk 18:19, 30 August 2006 (UTC)
Even poll results that purport to represent the opinion of everyone is copyrighted--taking a poll involved formulating questions, performing statistical correction and such other activities so that a poll can not be fairly considered a fact in the way that the number of people living in Ann Arbor is a fact. Thatcher131 (talk) 00:41, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Good spotting. Source is marked as copyright; I suggest listing the article on Wikipedia:Copyright problems. -- Infrogmation 01:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the clarification. I've listed the article in Copyright problems. --Ragib 04:51, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

By the way, can anyone direct me to the Wikipedia policy page on such external lists, and the associated copyright issues? I tried looking it up but can't find it. Thanks. --Ragib 02:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

If this is copyvio, then we should either notify all these libraries http://www.google.com/search?q=modern+library+best+novels+%22reader%27s+list%22&start=0&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official or figure out what exception they're using in order ot be allowed to publish the lists on their sites. Mateo LeFou 00:00, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Prime Minister Move

I submitted a move request regarding moving Prime Minister to Prime minister, per reasons given on Talk:Prime Minister#Requested Move. After the standard five days, there were three other users in agreement with the move and no objections. Thus, I performed the move. Jtdirl moved the page back saying the move is fundamentally incorrect and against policy because prime minister either has both of its words capitalized or both of its words not capitalized. He added that "it was decided long ago, on this and similar cases, that there was no option but to use the title in uppercase" and that "indeed if the RM proposal had been spotted in time, admins would have aborted it as the vote is invalid under WP rules," but I saw no discussion of this on Talk:Prime Minister. Is Jtdirl indeed correct about this discussion or can the page (as I and, presumably, the other supporters believe) be moved to Prime minister and a {{lowercase}} template (if necessary) be added to the article? -- tariqabjotu 01:47, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This issue has come up a few times all over the place. There are certain titles involving a number of words which can be lowercased or uppercased, but which must be done in unison. A mixed upper-case/lower-case title for certain offices is fundamentally wrong in English. (It is the equivalent of writing United states or George w bush, or indeed President of the united states.) Because of this the requirement for full uppercasing or full lowercasing was explicitly spelt out when it comes to prime minister/Prime Minister in the Naming Conventions and elsewhere. In the past, when the page was moved to a mixed upper & lower case, the move was instantly undone by admins under the IAR rule, on the basis that to put an office under such a illiterate form of name would be to bring ridicule on Wikipedia, because it is such a fundamental error. (It is the sort of error that students, if they replicate it in exams, are instantly failed on. It is what is known in the academic trade as a "nuclear error" because if you do it, nothing else counts.) While the RM procedure normally functions smoothly, the wisdom of Wikipedia's rule about decisions not being based on votes is shown here.
Where there is a valid argument for either uppercasing or lowercasing, for technical reasons we cannot an entirely lowercased version. Rather than make ourselves a laughing stock, it has long been precedent in these and other cases to use the only other alternative then available, using the uppercase version of the title. As with precedent in this and similar cases, to avoid embarrassment to WP and going by the rules laid down in the MoS and NC, I used IAR to overrule the RM vote and reinstate the page to a correct format. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 02:02, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Even if you are correct here, Fear, you are exaggerating significantly. I certainly don't appreciate the suggestion from an admin that I am making Wikipedia a laughing stock and attracting the ire of the international media by a simple article move. I hope the hyperbole was intentional.
Nevertheless, the advertisement for the WP:RM backlog is impossible to resist here. -- tariqabjotu 02:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Something to consider is that the input of three people might not be sufficient for a move of such gravity. For example, in cases where only a few people have weighed in on an AfD it is relisted in the hope of attracting more attention. In this instance, a note on the village pump, or at WP:PEER, or anywhere else where interested parties lurk would not have been amiss. Mackensen (talk) 02:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
That might have been a good idea in 20/20 hindsight, but there was no reason to believe that was necessary as no one objected to the move or mentioned this precedent. Many move requests don't get much input and, as Wikipedia:Moving guidelines for administrators says, In general there is a consensus that there is no minimum participation, unlike with AfD. -- tariqabjotu 02:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Correct, as far as process is concerned everything was by the book. This doesn't change that fact the more people should have been consulted, and that the article ended up in the wrong place. Mackensen (talk) 02:29, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Alright; I'll keep that in mind for the future. -- tariqabjotu 02:34, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I support Jtdirl's interpretation of the situation. Had I been aware of the proposed move, I would have objected in the strongest terms. Mackensen (talk) 02:07, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
On a further note, the title "Prime Minister" became an official one in the United Kingdom in 1905 or thereabouts, when Campbell-Bannerman took office. It could be argued that prior to 1905 the office was a notional one in the UK, and that the First Lord of the Treasury (or Foreign Secretary in the case of Salisbury) was the monarch's "prime minister." Of course, this ignores the Continental usage, where the office was established in law far earlier than that. Mackensen (talk) 02:12, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I don't think, Tariq, you realise how big a mistake it is. Saying it would make WP a laughing stock is if anything understating how ridiculous it would look. It is the equivalent of writing United states, of calling Berlin the capital of France, or of writing about a "Prime Minister of the United States". It is the sort of mistake that would lead readers to ask "how could an encyclopaedia make such an elementary mistake?" If the article had remained at Prime minister I can pretty much guarantee that the mistake would make the Sunday newspapers in Britain next Sunday with "and they call this an encyclopaedia?" articles. It is a cringemaking mistake that a first year politics student would get pulled up for. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 02:26, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
This is about the capitalization of a letter right? And there is still a redirect to the article, which wasn't demolished, right? It is the equivalent of only the first thing you described, "United states", the other two are plainly different and it is ridiculous to equate them. "United states" doesn't look that bad, by the way, and "united States" was the capitalization used in the united states declaration of independence. —Centrx→talk • 03:05, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
No. It is about accuracy. The office can either have both words uppercased or both lowercased. It can never ever ever have one uppercased and one lowercased. That is idiotic, akin to writing President bush. As WP cannot for technical reasons have both words lowercased the only option is to go with the uppercased version. A RM vote (of 3!) decided to ignore the rules of grammar and all the rules of Wikipedia as laid out (and the case of prime minister/Prime Minister is explicitly spelt out as an example where half-upper and half-lower is not an option) and move to a made-up name that is quite simply illiterate bullshit. As admins have done in the past (on this article in particular) I used to IAR rule laid down by Jimbo to overrule the application of a move which would make WP a laughing stock. And yes, Centrx, Prime minister. as Mackensen and anyone else who deals with current affairs, political science, history etc will tell you, is illiterate nonsense. It is one of those elementary faux pas taught to students as a "you must never ever . . ." It also features in style guides worldwide as an example of what never ever to do. BTW united states, lowercased, means an informal, unstructured group of states. United States, uppercased, means a formal country by that name. United states, mixed, means either that the person who wrote it had been drinking, or had an English teacher so bad they should sue them for incompetence. Prime minister means the same. FearÉIREANN\(caint) 04:13, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I certainly hope you are joking. —Centrx→talk • 04:20, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

This is beyond ludicrous. First off, to quickly deal with User:Jtdirl's utterly ridiculous example: "United States" is a proper noun, a name; "prime minister", isn't. If you have a reality-based example, bring it out, but this isn't one. If you can't tell the difference, don't spout off nonsense about "illiterate bullshit".

Second, since "prime minister" is the proper form for the job, Wikipedia page titling -- and standard English orthography -- demands the page be called "Prime minister", just like every other two-word title would be in every other similiar situation. Since this is absolutely standard, the only people likely to be confused by this are morons -- and while I realized that Wikipedia is not edited for the protection of minors, I didn't realize it was edited for the protection of morons. Make "WP a laughing stock"? Only among complete idiots.

It also features in style guides worldwide as an example of what never ever to do. Fine, give an example, one that explicitly says that using "prime minister" at the beginning of sentences demands that both words be capitalized. --Calton | Talk 09:28, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

In order to stop this ridiculous wikilawyering, should we propose the move from Prime Minister to prime minister instead? In that case, morons will be protected as well and everyone happy. (Yeah, I do know what will be the page's title in that case, in case mor someone didn't get the sarcasm.) Duja 11:25, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I've moved the page back to Prime minister, in accordance with both Wikipedia's naming conventions and the consensus on the talk page. —The preceding signed comment was added by Angr (talk • contribs). 12:33, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Style wars are silly. Find something more useful to do. --Tony Sidaway 12:16, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
I will be reserving a spot at Wikipedia:Lamest edit wars. If this continues this way, we will be having some administrators blocked, a couple of RFCs, and a lot of stress for a single letter. -- ReyBrujo 12:42, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
Glad I brought my hip waders today, as I'm going to get knee deep in it here... I don't have my Canadian Press stylebook handy today, but I know that in referring to Stephen Harper, when I'm not using words that aren't repeatable in polite society, I capitalize Prime Minister, and I have one style reference that says that it should be capitalized depending on the importance of the person being referred to - suggesting that as federal government policy. [23] Here's another guide that suggests it's capitalized in conjunction with a name, but not otherwise. [24] This guide says only capitalize if it's after a name when referring to a head of government. http://www.yorku.ca/gcareers/grammar/capital_letters.htm#RULE%206:] A discussion we had at the office here last week on titles brought forward that if we're putting it before a proper name, it should be capitalized all the time, but if it's after, we can use lower case. Personally, I'd still capitalize Prime Minister if I'm referring to Harper or Blair, but that's the joy of being an editor - you can bend things occasionally. However, we might also want to look at our own manual of style, which, under the second section on Titles discusses capitalization of prime minister depending on various uses. All in all, I think we should follow the initial suggestion: move to "Prime minister" and add the un-capitalized note at the top. Tony Fox (arf!) 15:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I made a long-winded comment on the talk page. Basically, it comes down to a pragmatic decision about what does or doesn't "look funny" that has to be made in some pragmatic way. If it's a question of what is technically correct, then we should write "prime minister" throughout the article except when it begins a sentence. The title of the article should then be "Prime minister" because it is our publisher's house style always to capitalise the first letter of an article's title. Surely, though, we make some pragmatic exceptions to this, don't we? Metamagician3000 10:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

To be clear, that doesn't mean that I think the circumstances justify a pragmatic exception being made here. I have no opinion about that. I just think that it would be good if both sides realised that the other side has a point. In one case it's grounded in consistent application of house style; in the other it's grounded in the risk of public misunderstanding. At the moment, consistent application of house style seems to be the majority approach, and I can certainly live with that. Metamagician3000 23:21, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:Kirbytime 's "gotcha"

User:Kirbytime makes a personal attack but it was only one and that is not why I am posting the situation here. He states, Are you done being a tool of Scientology already? [25] So, I attempted to get into communication with him. But leaving a signed message on his user page causes a "you've got a new message" to appear and when clicked that then redirects the unsuspecting user to this page: [26] This "gotcha" template which appears when a person gives him a communication and signs it with four tildes is why I post here. I believe administrators should be notified because it is a mis-use of a user's discussion page. Terryeo 00:53, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Terryeo, I think it is intended as a joke, sort of like R2-45 was, so I suggest you lighten up and stop your pouting.--Fahrenheit451 01:24, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
Some editors disfavor the practical joke new messages, but their use is widespread and not something over which to quibble. In any event, there is no nefarious process by which Kirbytime leaves the new messages message for users who have written on his talk page; in fact, the template appears on his user page, as it does on the user pages of many editors. The question of the propriety of Kirby's initial remark aside, this ought to be quite far down on the list of on-Wiki items about which one should be concerned. Joe 03:02, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
I've given him a warning about the attack on Terryeo (which in my opinion was particularly blatant). The so-called "practical joke" seems to amount to wikilinks at the top left of Kirbytime's user and talk pages, which are presumably intended to resemble the "new messages" notice in some skins. Childish but not particularly problematic. --Tony Sidaway 15:17, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Kitty Pryde article

I've been trying to protect this page only against moves, since a minor page-move war is going on, but think I've stuffed it up. Sorry to admit my technical incompetence. Could someone check and fix this? Some clearer instructions on how to do it in the guide for admins would be welcome, too, if anyone has a moment. To me at least, it's not intuitive. Metamagician3000 07:36, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I fixed it. If you want to have different settings for editing and moves, click on "unlock move permissions". Then set each to the appropriate level of protection. I think they tie them together as the default because pages are usually blocked due to editing and not moving, and if no one can edit the page, it does not make much sense to allow the article to be moved. -- Kjkolb 12:05, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your help. Metamagician3000 07:01, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Negative or harmful material about living persons

I would like to have a clarification about the wikipolicy that material that could be construed as critical, negative or harmful about living persons should be removed immediately. [27] @ Talk:Controversy over racial characteristics of Ancient Egyptians, one editor wrote that Hawass is a "liar": "Hell, if liars like Zahi Hawass can pronounce to the world [...]" [28] I removed the word "liar" [29] but it was reinserted immediately with the comment: "restored. do not alter my posts. And if you're going to refer to Wiki policy, provide a relevant link. Hawass is a public figure; he's fair game" [30] Comments? CoYep 12:11, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

The ascription of liar to a biographical subject is probably less-than-helpful, such that one might reasonably strike it out, I suppose, but this situation seems quite insignificant relative to those that BLP seeks to address; not only is liar almost surely not potentially libellous, but such appellative is mentioned on the talk page of a and quite plainly a subjective assessment not advanced as unsourced fact (toward which, see mistake of fact and opinion; of course, neither unsourced facts nor personal opinion be introduced into articles [or appended to talk pages], but it is worth noting that there are, at the very least, no legal issues here). The fair game formulation does seem to reflect a misunderstanding of BLP (although perhaps the editor means to refer to the distinction in United States law as regards libel between those who are public figures and those who are not [New York Times Co. v. Sullivan], but I imagine that a note on his talk page as to BLP would suffice, even as such note might not be necessary. Joe 15:56, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I don't quite understand the above explanation, but I've refactored to remove the epithet and left a note on User talk:Deeceevoice. Regardless of law, we don't allow unsourced negative material about living people, out of sensitivity to them for one thing. Talk pages are on search engines. Tyrenius 01:05, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I would doubt that talk page comments are a big deal legally (I sure hope they're not). But, this seems like an issue we might want clarification on from the Foundation (they might wanna consult their PR people or lawyers). Until such clarification is made, I'd think we want to be conservative on issues like this. Since such invective is irrelevant to working on the articles, removing unflattering opinions of living people seems harmless and might help save somebody's ass. Even if it's legally alright, it could turn into bad publicity for the project. Friday (talk) 02:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Talk page comments are the same deal legally as comments posted anywhere, unless you mean these particular comments, which are cause for prudence, not panic. Tyrenius 02:52, 4 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Grigori Perelman

I have protected this high-profile article due to an edit war. The issue is that despite good references that he is Jewish, people keep removing this information on grounds that clearly violate WP:V, WP:NOR and WP:NPOV. There is evidence of sockpuppetry. Can an admin not previously involved review this please.--Runcorn 17:00, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

  1. First there is no proof if there is show it the only "proof" is a russian article where they themselves only go by his name
  2. Why is the alleged religion mentioned at the very top of the article why isnt Arnold Schwarzeneggers religion mentioned at the very top or Bill Clintons or Bill Gates or Richard Nixons or Jimmy Wales of their articles.
  3. Has he had a bar mitzvah is he even a member of the religion?
  4. Even the article about Einstein dosent mention the religion at the very top at the very beginning of the article.
  5. So why is the alleged religion mentioned at the very start at the very beginning of the article. When it is extremly hard if not impossible to do so with the vast majority of wikipedia articles about persons.
  6. And what is the most interesting is that the Admin has himself violated the 3rr rule which if anything proves that the alleged religion shouldt be mentioned at the very top at the very start of the article and why even mention it at all

Ramand 17:32, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I've been looking into this situation. There appears to be some heavy-duty sockpuppetry/meatpuppetry going on here. Kelly Martin (talk) 18:33, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Also, for what it's worth, Jewish is a lot more than merely a religion, it is also a heritage and culture. Although I am atheist by "religion", when someone asks me what I am, I am likely to respond Jewish, because that is my culture and my heritage. Grigori Perelman is clearly Jewish in this regard even if he doesn't have a personal belief in a deity. --Cyde Weys 00:48, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

There was repetitive removal of a properly referenced statement (from The Daily Telegraph a reputable UK paper) of his Jewish origin ("Jewish family", meaning immediate family), because of a POV assertion that this didn't count, according to the removers' criteria of Jewishness. Several of the removing editors were blocked as socks. In the meantime Runcorn got blocked for 3RR restoring the material. Tyrenius 00:43, 4 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Revert, block, ignore

I welcome everyone to take a gander at a new essay entitled RBI. These games we've been playing with the vandals have long since gotten tiresome and it's time to simply revert, block, and ignore. Remember, we're here to write an encyclopedia, not play cops and robbers. --Cyde Weys 00:50, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Yeah I think we tried that on the PWOT mob. Strangly talking to them worked better.Geni 01:32, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Comments posted on talk page of the essay. Newyorkbrad 03:03, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Looks similar to Wikipedia:Vandalism is not a game.--Andeh 07:31, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ericsaindon2

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

  • Ericsaindon2 is required to choose one username and edit only with that name.
  • Ericsaindon2 is banned from Wikipedia for one year due to a variety of disruptive activities.
  • Ericsaindon2 is placed on Probation. He may be banned for an appropriate time from any article or set of articles which he disrupts.

For the Arbitration Committee. --FloNight 06:05, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Ericsaindon2 (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) has been blocked for one year as per ruling number 2. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 06:53, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Deleting the talk pages of editors with a significant edit history

Since administrators are the ones who fulfill or deny requests to delete user talk pages, I wanted to make sure that they are aware of the discussion about modifying the policy here. -- Kjkolb 10:27, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] New Lanark

Just a minor issue, Hi,

 this is srujan.Iwant to get little information about the following,like,

how can i know about the university and how to apply for the university.even i wanted to know how islife when i come over ther and wht would be my expenses for my staying and my tution fees,can u pelse help me whith this information .

                                        Thanking you ,
                                                        yours faithfuly,
                                                         Srujan Pudhota has been reverting good faith edits of mine on New Lanark without comment and I beleive he holds a certain sense of ownership for the article. I'm just off for a couple of weeks holiday, so would appreciate it if somebody could keep an eye on thigs. Thanks/wangi 11:49, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Heqong

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

  • Heqong is placed on Probation. He may be banned for a reasonable period of time by any administrator from an article or set of articles which he disrupts by tendentious editing. Should Heqong violate a ban he may be blocked for a reasonable period of time. All blocks to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Heqong#Log of blocks and bans.
  • Heqong is banned for one month for personal attacks.
  • Heqong is placed on personal attack parole.

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 14:25, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Blocked for one month per above. JoshuaZ 14:31, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/CoolKatt number 99999

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 18:05, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Pages by prefix link. I'm not sure how we determine which subpage violate that guideline though, since they could all be "a work in progress". Or is the idea just to delete everything that looks like an article? --kingboyk 18:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Does he finish serving out his 3 month block for violating the preliminary arbcom injunction? Also how does this ruling address his incivility and behaviour that exists outside of TV Station articles, like where he went on a spurious campaign of labelling everyone and their dog a sockpuppet for speaking out against a particular pokemon article (and went so far as to put obviously false sockpuppet tags on user pages to further that campaign), would that be considered a disruptive behaviour?--Crossmr 18:23, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] three files mysteriously deleted from my user space

Several files have been mysteriously deleted from my user space recently.

I am not aware of anything in these pages that was a violation of policy. But, if, for the sake of argument, someone else felt that they were in violation of a policy I think that whichever administrator felt they had the responsibility to delete them should have at least left an explanation on my talk page.

Cheers! -- Geo Swan 18:55, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Looks like they were only redirects. You still have a complete page at User:Geo Swan/working/Guantanamo related articles which have been nominated for deletion.

Deletion logs: [31] [32]

--kingboyk 19:00, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Shutting down Universe Daily for good.

Hi everyone, we've come to a fork in the road where WP:DENY is being fully implemented and most of the Wikipedia:Long term abuse subpages are being deleted.

So, before Wikipedia:Long term abuse/Universe Daily gets deleted we need to figure out whether to shut down the linkspammer once and for all at the risk of forcing him to change tactics and risk making it harder for us to track him.

"Universe Daily" is an abusive SEO who is known to have posted redirect-spam links Wikipedia to 40 known domains of his in the past. For example, stephenhawkingsuniverse.com (whois) is one such domain which has been linked to at the Stephen Hawking article. His links aren't noticed for some time because they are actually an invisible frame redirecting vistors to an official site. In this example, stephenhawkingsuniverse.com was a redirect to Hawking's official documentary site at PBS. After having establishing an external link in any article for some time, "Universe Daily" would then either turn on his own ads in his domain's frame or redirect his domain to an ad/link farm as he did with universetoday.net at Universe Today (their official site is .com).

This spammer has continued doing this since May of this year and has been banned many times for using sockpuppet accounts and random IPs as well as the odd open proxy. There's also a debate as to whether we should blacklist all of his known domains. If we blacklist all his domains, we run the risk of him purchasing a whole new set of domains to start all over again and it may become even harder to pick up his trail again.

"Universe Daily" has also switched to a new tactic where he is directly redirecting his sites back to the revisions of the Wikipedia articles that he inserted his own domains into. Could it be possible to oversight every reversion of every article he's ever edited to sabotage whatever SEO technique he is trying to use?

I just don't know what the best course of action dealing with this spammer is anymore. Through my investigations, I have noticed that the Registrant's contact details are publicly available. Is there anyone from the Wikimedia Foundation has the official capacity to ask him to cease and desist from spamming Wikipedia? -- Netsnipe ► 19:19, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

As an aside, and a significant one, this person left 469 hate mail messages in my e-mail box on Friday, two days ago. Four different messages, advertising an anti-semitic hate site he built himself, and bragging that his vandalized version of the Israel article could be found there. He must have spent a lot of time at his computer copying and pasting the hate-mail text into the little box and hitting "send". Unbelievable. (I deleted them all with about six mouse-clicks.)
He's not just a spammer: he's a fierce anti-Semite, and is the most hateful single person I've met in two and a half years of vandal-patrolling.
I know his real name, and he edits from a library terminal in Queensland, AU.
I think he needs to be shut down for good. No question about it. Antandrus (talk) 19:26, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

WP:DENY really only applies to people vandalizing Wikipedia. If someone is abusing Wikipedia for other reasons, in this case to make money, WP:DENY doesn't apply, because denying attention is irrelevant; he's not editing to get attention. However, it's probably a good idea to move it into private all the same; if we try to put together our defense against him in public where he can read it, he can easily stay one step ahead of it. --Cyde Weys 19:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Block his links, then he can't spam them. Agathoclea 19:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Has he been spamming lately? I knew all of his linkspam sites, and I kept that list private until he started putting his pages as framing to real websites. He sent me close to 2000 mailbombs from wikipedia email until I sat down and noticed it and put an autodelete filter on his emails. I know his real name too, including several details about his spamming activities that is not on the LTA page. That being said, the issue with the LTA page is WP:BEANS, where we don't want to help him improve his activities. However, the links almost look 'useful', because several of them are just framing to actual (and useufl) websites, but at any time they could go back to his phpbb fourms he's spammed so much. Kevin_b_er 19:41, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I'd be happy to place all the sites on the blacklist. You can either email me or leave a message on my meta user talk page. Naconkantari 21:08, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
Naconkantari's option is the way to go. It's simply denying him what he wants. There is an issue here, however: the URLs we have for the foul-mouthed little mailbomber are all liable to change, so this isn't a permanent solution as we will have meta admins AGFing and not adding his filthly little sites to the list without many and several hoops being jumped through. And rightly so. But this is the way to go if we want to stop Wayne and his spamming activities on our side. On his side, we're going to need Oz Wikipedians to get in touch with his ISP if it can be found; Canadians to talk to Doteasy Technology, his registration agents, and the Foundation to talk to Google (his ultimate aim) about a hard blacklist.
The one thing Mr Smith should not expect is for Wikipedia admins to be put off by mailbombs and persistance. We've all had bigger things than him free with our breakfast cerials of a morning, and his death-threatening mailbombs are usefully futile, amusing... and slowing the idiot down. :o) ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:32, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
I have added all of the links provided to me to the blacklist. Naconkantari 21:34, 3 September 2006 (UTC)
domians cost money. Shut them down fast enough and what he doing becomes finacialy unviable.Geni 23:26, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Naconkantari. Could you also add fuckisrael.org to the blacklist as well? I forgot to add that link to the LTA report, but seeing as it also belongs to him, we definitely don't need it on Wikipedia. -- Netsnipe ► 00:47, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Mauberley (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs)

Disrupting Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/The Following Follows. Tracker/TTV (myTalk|myWork|myInbox) 21:37, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/His excellency

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

  • His excellency is placed on personal attack parole, should he engage in personal attacks directed at individuals he may be briefly blocked, up to a week in the event of repeat offenses. Should he engage in attacks directed at ethnic groups such as "The Jews" or "The Kikes" he may be blocked for extended periods of time, up to a year.
  • His excellency, having made one personal attack directed at "The Jews" and another directed at "those kikes" is banned for one month for the first offense and 3 months for the second offense, to run consecutively.
  • His excellency has continued to make anti-Semitic attacks on other users [33] during this proceeding. An additional ban of 6 2 months is imposed to run consecutively with other bans.
  • Traditional Muslim usages such as "Salam, brother" or (PBUH) may be used on talk pages at the discretion of the user; however, care should be taken to not create a hostile atmosphere for non-Muslims.

For the Arbitration Committee. FloNight 21:43, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

Question: does that also apply to his second account, Amibidhrohi (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) ? If it does (I hope so) it should be blocked too... -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 22:09, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

All arbitration remedies apply to the person, in any guise, unless the remedy says otherwise. The remedy is intended to address the problematic behavior. --Tony Sidaway 22:15, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the quick answer :) -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 22:28, 3 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Legal threats, I really need help

Please, I can't deal with this; I'm not a lawyer and I can't really understand much of what this user is writing. The user has left me a variety of messages which I have moved to User talk:Mets501/Hans Henning Atrott for convience, and has threatened to bring in a lawyer. I do not want to anything wrong, so I don't really want to act. The only thing I have said to this user is remind him that by submitting any information to the English Language Wikipedia, he is publishing it under the GNU Free Documentation license (GFDL), and that cannot be "withdrawn", as the user wanted to call it. Thanks in advance for anyone's help. —Mets501 (talk) 02:26, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Legal threats = not appriciated. First admin to see this, I would block the person making legal threats for a little while. — The Future 02:29, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
kick it upstairs. Legal threats are mostly for the foundation to deal with.Geni 02:31, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
User is currently blocked due to sperate issues.Geni 02:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Which user? I noticed a User:Merryhobby mentioned something about a lawyer on Mets' talk page, and he is not blocked. CanadianCaesar Et tu, Brute? 02:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
yea, I think the one who was talking about this whole legal thing was User:Merryhobby. I would suggest a temporary block on Merryhobby, FWIW. — The Future 02:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Ah I was talking about user:172.176.81.14.Geni 02:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
By the diffs provided in the history of Mets501's talk page, Merryhobby was the one who posted the things found on User talk:Mets501/Hans Henning Atrott. — The Future 02:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Merryhobby made the legal threats, but User:Joerg Atrott (his son) also wrote on the talk page, but not with legal threats, as did 172.180.82.139. —Mets501 (talk) 02:51, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Per previous incidents, I've deleted most of it which was unreferenced (apart from a couple of points referenced only in German) and reduced it to an acceptable stub, so that solves the immediate problem. Anyone making legal threats gets to be blocked indefinitely, till they withdraw them, as we can't function with another editor in those circumstances. You might like to warn the complainant of that. The article will need to be built up carefully and closely referenced. Tyrenius 02:49, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Does a representative of WP:OFFICE monitor this page? If not, someone should bring this thread to their attention quickly. Newyorkbrad 02:56, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

No need. There's nothing (as far as I know) contentious left in the article. Besides, the preferred option is that problems are tackled by editors/admins. Tyrenius 03:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Copied from my talk page: Since Mets501 said that Merryhobby was the one who made the legal threats, and you said that anyone who makes legal threats should be blocked, could/should you block Merryhobby? — The Future 02:57, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

If the user is making legal threats they should be blocked from editing immediately. However, I suggest that as they are in the sensitive position of complaining about BLP, it might be politic in the first instance to explain the article has been amended, and ask them if they withdraw any legal threat, or else we will be forced to block them. Perhaps Mets501 could have a go there. Tyrenius 03:07, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
That would certainly be the appropriate reaction to an off-hand probably-not-meant-seriously legal threat, but this does not fall into that category. It's a serious situation that needs to be dealt with by very senior admins or by the office. Tyrenius, you have mail. Newyorkbrad 03:14, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I've just dealt with something similar in another very serious situation. The preferred route is to deal with it ourselves. However, feel free to contact anyone you think should be contacted. No mail has arrived. Tyrenius 03:27, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Mail just sent. I'm not an admin, so give my thoughts whatever value you think they deserve. Newyorkbrad 03:32, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Got it. I'll reply. Meanwhile I've left the message for the user and given them the options, so no problem. Tyrenius 03:35, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Article and talk page histories deleted to remove any and all possible defamation. Tyrenius 04:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proxy problems

Okay, I'm not technical, so bear with me: Keybounce, a legitimate user, has been autoblocked through a proxy-IP problem, or summin' like that. Anywho, he can't contact either administrator who wrote the program that blocked him, so I'm trying to help out. I've left a message on one of the admin's pages, but he and the other have not been editing lately. Help? --172.193.194.250 02:52, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Advice to Tor users in China —Mets501 (talk) 03:37, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
As I indicated on my user:talk page, I had to change my Tor configuration. And, I think it's a valid question: If an IP address is blocked because it's a single abusive user, that's one thing; if it's blocked for being an open proxy, why not let the test for "is the user logged in" override "is this an open proxy"? --Keybounce 00:17, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Role accounts are not permitted

Please see this new policy proposal, feel free to edit it further... I've just started it. --Langwath 09:37, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

already covered by WP:SOCK.Geni 10:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Isn't User:Langwath himself also "already covered by WP:SOCK"? Obvious trolling-only account. Fut.Perf. ☼ 11:19, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I am inclined to believe so. I blocked the account indefinitely, but since he apologized, I have unblocked the account. But please keep an eye on. Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:41, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
I nuked the article as WP:POINT, an attack on named users and redundant anyway. Guy 12:30, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
Since the user's indefinite block has been undone, I've restored his userpage, which I'd deleted. We'll see how this goes. Metamagician3000 12:36, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
And as always, the user campaigning to get himself unblocked to do "good contributions" has yet to do any. Such is normal it seems. Oh yes. --Lord Deskana (talk) 21:21, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Langwath is the M62 vandal/troll - David Gerard 22:15, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Libellous remark

Sorry if this is the wrong forum - I am very new to Wikipedia. The comment within the second paragraph of the Carreer section of the article on Kate Garraway is surely libelous - could somebody remove it?

AMPY 16:15, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Removed. Welcome. Haukur 16:28, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
And in the future, if you see something like that, you can remove it yourself. You won't get in trouble. ;) --Mr. Lefty Talk to me! 00:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Usually but in this case the article was semi-protected with the penis-vandalism in place. D'oh! Haukur 07:11, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Sathya Sai Baba

This case is now closed and the result has been published at the link above.

  • Negative information in an article or on a talk page regarding Sathya Sai Baba or organizations affiliated with him which is poorly sourced may be removed without discussion. The three revert rule shall not apply to such removal. This includes links to critical websites which contain original research or which consist of personal accounts of negative experiences with Sathya Sai Baba or organizations affiliated with him. It is inappropriate for a user to insert a link to a website maintained by the user (or in which the user plays an important role).
  • Information in an article or on a talk page regarding Sathya Sai Baba or organizations affiliated with him which is poorly sourced may be removed. This includes links to websites which contain original research or which consist of personal accounts of experiences with Sathya Sai Baba or organizations affiliated with him. It is inappropriate for a user to insert a link to a website maintained by the user (or in which the user plays an important role)
  • Andries and SSB108 are forgiven any offenses they have committed by introducing unreliable information into the article and encouraged to edit in compliance with Wikipedia:Reliable sources and Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons.

For the Arbitration Committee. 03:54, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Caffeine

Could someone please close the caffeine FA page? According to the caffeine talk page it's already been promoted to FA but the page is still open and people are still voting. Thanks. Anchoress 05:03, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Not an admin specific task... And there is no closing template for FACs, they are simply removed from the main FAC page, which anyone can do after promotion/failure. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 11:53, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Template:Notability

It is requested that one of the esteemed sysops speedy close the pointless CfD debate over this highly-visible template. - CrazyRussian talk/email 05:40, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I see no reason why this debate should be speedily closed - indeed I've added my 'delete' argument to it. It is a debate worth having. See Wikipedia:Templates for deletion#Template:Notability. --Doc 08:41, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Inappropriate usernames

Wikipedia:Username says obviously offensive usernames (including Wikipedia community terms or profanity) should be listed at Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism but the latter page says it should not be listed if the user hasn't vandalised. Also, I can't put Template:UsernameBlocked on because I can't block, so I don't know what warning template would be appropriate. So I decided to take it here. Found these on Special:Log/newusers.

[34]

[35]

[36]

[37]

[38]

[39]

Please advise re: these usernames and what should be done in the future. TransUtopian 13:20, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

  • um, you can just send those to WP:AIV--AOL account 13:24, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
    • Thanks. Of course, it didn't occur to me to look at the Block log first. They're already blocked. TransUtopian 13:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Semi-protect

an anon with a dynamic IP is breaking 3rr on MySpace. He keeps reverting my good faith edit, saying I must discuss changes on the talk page, yet they make huge copy edits on their own with no discussion. You can't change them cause the anon will revert you! Can you protect or semi protect the MySpace article so that we're forced to discuss changes instead of just having some anon constantly reverting me? -- Chris chat edits essays 14:04, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Guidelines do not allow semiprotection for editorial disputes but we can protect a page. I have done so and am also willing to help mediate any dispute on the article. Best, --Alabamaboy 20:04, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Do realize, though, this doesn't mean I support your edits or version of events. In short, there appears to be an edit war building up at the article and I think this will help stop it.--Alabamaboy 20:14, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Where is a good place to put a new template?

{{Usersign}} is new, and needs to be shown around some where. --Foilwarp 14:10, Tuesday September 5 2006 (UTC)

This template is redundant with ~~~~ and {{unsigned}} --Deathphoenix ʕ 16:32, 5 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:King Dracula - Odd Edit Patterns

I was looking at the article Mercury Pookkal which was oddly written. I checked for copyright infringements and found it had been copied directly from an article about the star of the movie in another wiki article. When I checked into the contributions of the original author User:King Dracula, he has recently created this account, and has left behind a spray of articles that are copyright violations, or badly written / copied stubs. This is the same pattern I saw with User:Zhangshou working on Romanian articles (Dracula was possibly Romanian). I contacted Can't sleep, clown will eat me, who asked me to post a notive here for other admins to review. -- Whpq 17:13, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

After speedy deleting several of King Dracula's one-liner articles, I received a note to my talk page which was very weird indeed [40]. I guess some could consider his message to myself as a death threat. I brushed it off at the time but thought it best to bring it to the attention of others here. One to watch for sure. -- Longhair 01:30, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

"7 days" is a ref to The Ring, which is so 2002-like. Hbdragon88 03:57, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] possible copyvio?

See Image:WikiProject_Sharks_by_Lenny.PNG... it was my understanding that incorporating the puzzleglobe requires WMF approval. Is that correct or am I (ahem) all wet? Or worse, "trolling" because this isn't actually a fishy logo at all? If it is, where should such a thing be brought to? Meta? Thanks, if you know, please drop me a line, old chum... ++Lar: t/c 18:28, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Generaly the position we appear to be moveing towards is that the globe should only be used with the permission of the foundation.Geni 18:35, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Ok, so what to do? take it to meta (where)? Tag it with a copyvio tag? nom it for deletion? ++Lar: t/c 19:32, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Well it appears to have been speedy deleted but at this time "do whatever" appears to be the order of the day. I doubt there are that many problem images (ok that isn't quite true but most of the porblem images already have fair use templates on the).Geni 21:12, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

An additional images with the same problem from the same user:

  • Image:WPS full size by lenny.PNG
  • Image:Shark debait logo by lenny.PNG
  • Image:New fellow project logo by Lenny.PNG
  • Image:WikiProject Shark logo 2 by Lenny modified.PNG
  • Image:WikiProject Shark logo 2 by Lenny.PNG (may also have tag issues)
  • Image:WikiProject Shark by Lenny.PNG (may also have tag issues)

--TeaDrinker 23:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

And one more, this one by a different user, but on the same theme: Image:Example wikiproject sharks logo v2.png.--TeaDrinker 02:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Made by me, it is not used anyway, please delete! I assumed that the globe was GPL, my misstake. Stefan 05:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Publicgirluk

From User talk:Lar:
Is it possible that she was telling the truth about her in the pictures? [41] This thread apparently was created back in February long before she joined Wikipedia. This thread also gives a picture of her, which looks, seemingly, identical to the pictures posted on Wikipedia. Any thoughts? — The Future 20:22, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

I have no idea. I'm not sure I'm the right person to bring this information to, though. ++Lar: t/c 20:25, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Ok, I'll cross-post this at WP:AN to see if anyone has any additional thoughts. Thanks! — The Future 20:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Any thoughts? — The Future 20:59, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Buried somewhere in the various threads, it has been pointed out before that the screen name "publicgirluk" has been witnessed online in various venues, including a number of sexuality related online groups. Unfortunately, this doesn't resolve the underlying ambiguity. Either the real publicgirluk contributed those photos, or someone familiar with that identity impersonated her and uploaded the images (which the real publicgirluk may have posted to some web forum). For the moment, I would encourage people the let the issue lie until we have an agreed upon policy for verifying unusual licensing claims. Once we do have such a policy, I intend to reach out to the person using that persona online in the hopes of ultimately resolving this issue. Dragons flight 22:49, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Eminently sensible, and thanks for offering to do that. ++Lar: t/c 00:01, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Of course she was for fucking real. Sadly we don't have the apparatus or the maturity as an organisation to accept that kind of contribution yet. So yes, the deletion was appropriate. --Tony Sidaway 00:25, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

All you would have to do to verify that it was her would be to have her take a picture of herself in front of her computer displaying the Wikipedia home page or her user page. Another option would be for her to hold up a sign saying "Wikipedia can have my pictures" or something. Don't have her write it on her body, that's just degrading.

As for not being ready for the pictures, don't we have pictures of guys masturbating and ejaculating on Wikipedia? So what, people don't want women involved? -- Kjkolb 01:14, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Actually we don't have actual photographs. Not in masturbation or ejaculation. Nice try though. Doesn't matter anyway, its the legal issues that are the problem. Those are getting worked on by our lawyer, so arguing about it is silly until then.pschemp | talk 01:20, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
commons:Category:Masturbation. ~ PseudoSudo 01:31, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
those aren't on the English wikipedia. That's what I'm talking about, and that's what Kjkolb said, "on Wikipedia", not "on commons". pschemp | talk 02:17, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Well, they aren't in articles, but there's some sort of blacklist in the project namespace somewhere that lists taboo images on wikipedia. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 02:51, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Ah, I must have seen them on Commons, not a big difference to me as all of my pictures are there. Anyway, my comment was taken a bit too seriously. ;-) Kjkolb 03:55, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
You might like to check out this image linked from Autofellatio, and Jimbo's transition from "completely unacceptable" to "decent compromise" regarding it. Following discussion on Facial (sexuality), Publicgirluk's photo was similarly linked as a compromise. Tyrenius 08:54, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
On the Talk:Masturbation page we are discussing which image to make the lead image. I have a Klimt drawing there currently, but I seem to be in the minority wanting it to remain there. There are several candidates of pictures of men or women masturbating. As for the "publicgirluk" photos, I've been concerned that it was not her, but her boyfriend who uploaded the image. But of course, there has been no way to tell. At any rate, it is just a matter of time before the no censorship policy results in explicit photos of people. We need to find a way to be sure that the real person does consent to the use of their image. The creampie article is another example of where that is avoided for the moment. Atom 03:17, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
The issue as I understand it is not so much the explicit nature of the photos, but that nature combined with the fact that the subject of the photo was clearly identifiable. Wikipedia has plenty of penis and vulva pictures, but generally speaking seeing that doesn't really tell me anything about who it is. Once you can identify the subject, we have to worry about model release issues. Nandesuka 03:23, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I like the anatomically accurate drawings that some texts use. However, in some situations a photograph is best. When graphic pictures are used, I think that it should be either a very small thumbnail or a link. I have no problem with nudity or pornography, it just seems classier and it is easier to read an article without an explicit photograph right next to the text. This goes for non-sex articles with explicit photographs, too.
Nandesuka, I would worry about model release issues even when the person is not easily identifiable. Also, some photographs on Wikipedia that are unidentifiable close-ups identify the subject in the caption or on the description page, sometimes the person who is posting the picture and sometimes not. If the photograph is not of the person posting it and the subject is identified, it would be close to the same issue as you are talking about ("close" because, to me, being identifiable in the photograph itself is different than being identified in the caption or description page). It would be also be a problem if a poster submits a picture of someone else and claims that it is him or her, especially if the poster has a username that could be used to identify the real person or if the real person's name is given in the caption or on the description page. -- Kjkolb 04:40, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Emmalina

Biographies noticeboard seems to be a little bit slow on it, so I'm going to request it here. Emmalina is a non-public figure and her birthday should be rmoeved per WP:BLP. A message on my talk page [42] affirms that the subject herself has not revealed it for privacy reasons. In short, I'm requesitng an admin to delete the article and only restore the revissions that do not contain her birthdate. That means that all revissions from 2 July on (this [43] one specifically) should be deleted. Hbdragon88 03:53, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

If she is notable enough to have an article on Wikipedia, then, if her birthdate can be proven, there is nothing wrong with including it in the article. If she is a non-public figure, then remove the article. User:Zoe|(talk) 04:12, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Let's see WP:BLP#Privacy of birthdays:

Wikipedia includes exact birthdates for some famous people, but including this information for most living people should be handled with caution. While many well-known living persons' exact birthdays are widely known and available to the public, the same is not always true for marginally notable people or non-public figures. With identity theft on the rise, it has become increasingly common for people to consider their exact date of birth to be private information'. When in doubt about the notability of the person in question, or if the subject of a biography complains about the publication of his or her date of birth, err on the side of caution and simply list the year of birth rather than the exact date.

I think this qualifies as a deletion. No, her birthdate cannot be conclusively proven either, it's not on any of the subject's profile pages. Hbdragon88 04:32, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

See Talk:Emmalina#Date of birth. Maybe she forgot. The article has been taken to AfD twice before with both resulting in the article being kept. I don't think she's that notable either IMHO. -- Longhair 05:36, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Replied there. Please note that I'm not trying to take this to another AFD, just expressing concern about the birthday. And BLP clearly states that we should err on the side of caution. Hbdragon88 05:54, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I tried to delete the edits with the birthdate. I thought that it had only been added today based upon an edit summary. However, it actually existed since the edit after EmmalinaL's edit at 05:54, July 2, 2006. I did not want to delete all of those edits without more input. However, I think I got the rest of the personal information out of the history, like the nude picture links (they all may have been removed in the first two deletions, though) and her email address. -- Kjkolb 08:04, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Single purpose account

DrGladwin (talk • contribs) is a single-purpose account whose main function on Wikipedia is to whitewash the unaccredited University of Health Sciences Antigua (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs). DrGladwin refuses mediation: Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/UHSA. Per the emerging consensus in ArbCom, as expressed in the substantially similar case of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/St Christopher/Proposed decision (SPAs editing an unaccredited medical school in order to obscure problematic status)), single purpose accounts may be restricted from editing articles where they have a material interest. I therefore propose a community ban on DrGladwin from directly editing this article, the List of unaccredited institutions of higher learning and related pages, ban to be enforceable by blocking if necessary. Just zis Guy you know? 09:23, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Unnecessary. My main purpose was to prevent Robo doc and Azskeptic from spamming the article with foreign links with disregard to the overall structure of the article. Since they both are gone, I have no problem now. --DrGladwin 12:09, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
So you say. However, by all appearances and judging from your contributions history your actual purpose appears to be to prevent them highlighting the problematic status of the school with which you are associated (e.g. [44]). Guy 12:34, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm not preventing anyone from doing anything. See the medical school entry now. I totally agree with what everyone has posted especially you and Leuko and a few others. There is a proper way of posting things and you should have seen what Robo doc did to the article - he started the good ol foreign medical school defaming here (using words like "fake medical school" "nigerian fraud" without citations) then completely changed the formatting! If you really think what Robo doc did is ok, then go ahead, block me. By the way, beginning next week, I'm no longer associated with the school so I will no longer post in that area; (I got accepted elsewhere). --DrGladwin 15:55, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

The Dr. has been adding criticism at the Quackwatch article. When it was specificed who these people are, and what their businesses are an anon. removed it.[45] Arbusto 21:24, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

I did nothing wrong while adding criticism. That's what that section is meant for: Add criticisms. --DrGladwin 14:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

N.B., the user in question has made at least one legal threat: [46]. A.J.A. 22:33, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

That threat is just a spoof. We both do that to each other on all forums for fun. Plus, I cannot "drag" him to court because he's a big, really heavy guy, and I have weak hands (That happens when you spend 25+ years in school). --DrGladwin 14:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Threats on Wikipedia are not "spoofs", they are taken seriously. Don't make legal threats, or comments which might be construed as such, ever. Guy 20:05, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] vandalism related to Steve Irwin's death

The article about short tailed stingrays which has been frozen due to recent vandalism contains the statement that Steve Irwin was stung in the scrotum, when in fact he was stung in the chest. Thanks.

That's what we get for locking out the good as well as the bad. -Splash - tk 01:41, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Indeed, two threads in a row here. Haukur 07:12, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
You know I'm usually with you Splash, but how much vandal reversion did you do on that article? I don't see any. All you did was unprotect the page a few times. If you are that big on not protecting articles that are on the main page, then help out and revert vandalism on those articles. You can't have it both ways. Have I removed sprotect tags from main page articles? Yes. But then I usually help out with the reversions a bit. --Woohookitty(meow) 11:01, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:JB196

There is a war at Vic Grimes that doesn't technically fall under 3RR that needs attention by an admin. The story so far is: JB196 wrote an article gathering info from various sources and creditted hismelf as the author of the article in the body, this previously had been discussed back in April of 2006 and he was told not to do. I removed the line about him being the "author" of the article and he reverted it and over a few days I got frustrated and brought it to the attention of WP:PW. What happened from then is that JB196 is attempting to constantly revert the article to its state before his edits, removing all the information and updates, unless he gets creditted with being the author of the article. We've tried to explain that wikipedia is a people's encyclopedia and that anyone can contribute and there are no article "authors" but this has not let up.

Can an admin take a look at this and give a ruling? The result is slightly important as he has done this to several other articles and the ruling would be sort of binding to how we deal with it.

(The reason I didn't take this to mediation or informal mediation is that it's a fast moving situation and that a consensus would be pretty much impossible as it's an all or nothing situation in that either he is creditted for "writing" the article or isn't.) --- Lid 03:17, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Note to mod: I have tried to work this problem out with bullet yet he is intent on writing nasty replies about my integrity. At the very least, he has violated both WP:AGF and WP:3RR. I do not see how that could possibly be up for argument. My concerns have been fully documented on the Vic Grimes: Talk page. Could a mod please tell me how bullet's violation of these Wikipedia policies will be dealt with? I take great offense to his comments about my personal integrity and my intents in editing Wikipedia. Thank you.JB196 03:25, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Note to "ADMIN": Please see Talk:Vic Grimes. If any nasty replies made by me towards JB196 are found, then the right measures must be taken against me and I should be blocked indefinably for my so called "Blatant Vandalism". -- bulletproof 3:16 03:30, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Constant reverting is disruptive and really not needed. Wikipedia is for everyone (as long as they follow the guidelines/rules). Reverting so much is simply rude and not needed. Hopefully something is done about this matter. The Vic Grimes page (or any other page for that matter) shouldn't have constant reverts, period. RobJ1981 03:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
User 3bulletproof16 also continues to remove constructive comments from his talk page. I agree with RobJ1981's reply; that is why I am leaving it as it is until the admins get involved. Keep in mind that the majority of my edits did not fall under the definition of a traditional "Revert" (most of them included wrestling content editing as well) whereas bullet's did fall under the traditional "Revert" definition.JB196 03:36, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
The discussion has progressed towards being address on Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Professional wrestling. There is no need to confuse editors by having an unorganized discussion. -- bulletproof 3:16 03:40, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
JB196 partially blanked Texas Wrestling Academy [47], another article in which I removed an "author" credit because he compiled most of the information (not all). He claims it was "condensing" but it removed most of the article. --- Lid 03:34, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
I made the TWA article. Your point doesn't stand, sir. To the admins: I think the main issue here is that bullet, Lid, and maybe even one or two others are applying double standards to their reasoning, and saying that when I make a revert its vandalism but when they make a revert its reverting a vandalism and therefore legal. That contention doesn't fly any more than my goldfish flies (bad joke but you get the point...). How do you know I didn't just make up all those wrestler names and that HBK didn't train any of them? You're arguing that I don't have integrity in my Wikipedia edits so by your logic I may've just made up most of those wrestlers. So I am warranted in removing the list and I am correct that "your point doesn't stand."JB196 03:36, 5 September 2006 (UTC)JB196 03:36, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
What you fail to realize is just because you made an article doesn't mean that you own it. Please see WP:OWN -- bulletproof 3:16 03:41, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
User 3bulletproof16 continues to vandalize his talk page by removing constructive comments.JB196 04:33, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

This is basically the issue here. The article Vic Grimes was being reverted by JB196. This was the previous version of the article before it was reverted [48]. This is the version that JB196 made afterwards [49]. Please Note the major reduction of the article's quality made by JB196's reversion. Please read JB196's comments regarding his reversion [50]. "revert then; you may not use my bio if I am not going to be credited." -- JB196 14:20, September 4, 2006. It is because of his reversions and his comments to the article that JB196 was accused of WP:OWN and also of compromising the integrity of Wikipedia by deliberately attempting reduce the quality of the article. From WP:Vandalism -- "Vandalism is any addition, deletion, or change of content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia.". How he claims these accusations are false I have no idea. There you go Admins. The facts have been presented. -- bulletproof 3:16 04:36, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

You need to learn that when you present an argument you should stay consistent with your contentions. You've flip-flopped back and forth so many times I can't even keep track of what your current contention is. Nobody is arguing that WP:OWN applies here. I am in agreement with that. You're wasting time arguing that. Now what's left is for you to stop violating WP:AGF, Wikipedia: User page, and WP:3RR, and as a courtesy try to stay consistent with your contentions.JB196 04:52, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
This is the case that I presented to you. If you misunderstood it in any way shape or form I apologize. However I must thank you for agreeing that you do have an WP:OWN problem. -- bulletproof 3:16 04:56, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I blocked JB196 for 3RR violation, if he carries on then a longer block is in order. Edit warring over a vanity namecheck is ridiculously lame. Guy 11:41, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
I suppose we could cite the guy's name as per the style guide WP:CITE (e.g. Barber, Jonathan), if that would stop the edit war. --Jtalledo (talk) 12:39, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Then can I start citing myself in articles? I mean I did the research I want authorship rights. No rights? Then I retract all contributsions i've made to an article. This falls under WP:VAIN and shouldn't have even needed posting here but as this has been going on for months I felt compelled to move it to a higher forum. The simple answer is that giving him "credit" for something he caims is his and then revoking it because he doesn't like that wikipedia is a free encyclopedia and giving yourself author credits in articles is against the rules. --- Lid 13:15, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
lol Just trying to settle this crazy thing once and for all. Then again, you could make a slippery slope argument that this will encourage the user to do the same for other articles as well. --Jtalledo (talk) 18:31, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm not trying to rag on the guy, but JB316 has done this to a number of articles. Either he doesn't get the point of Wikipedia or he doesn't care and thinks the rules don't apply to him. - Bdve 15:09, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
Believe me, i brought up this issue with him whe he first arrived... note my additions to his talk page..... but he is relentless when it comes to this position on crediting himself within articles.. between us here we have written 100's of articles and contributed to 1000's more.. people cant go round and add there names to articles its rediculos... plus isnt his name on the pages edit history doesnt that give him enough credit!???... he has to be stop there is no question there --- Paulley 15:58, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

JB has changed his modus operandi and is now spamming [citation needed] tags through articles he himself has written. Examples can be found at [51] [52] (both articles done by JB in which he provided most of the material). JB tends to add numerous templates to articles when he doesn't get what he wants (see: 411mania, Extreme Warfare and Wrestling Spirit). Can an admin please intervene? This stuff has gone on for too long and he has shown no signs of stopping. –– Lid(Talk) 06:18, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Um...

Improv deleted my vandalizm page without so much as a warning or message to myself, passing it off as "garbage" in the edit summary. I've seen them all over the Wiki, so I assumed they weren't taboo. I brought it up on his talk page, and he responded with:

"I believed it to be patently inflammatory and harmful to the community. You may request review at WP:DRV if you wish. Other vandalism pages may also merit deletion."

But he didn't inform me he was going to delete it, nor was it listed as a speedy delete. It was done without so much as a message on my part, and I am unable to create pages to list this on DRV. I'm not angry with him, just curious as to whether or not that was really an acceptable move.

And it would be nice to have the page back. 69.145.123.171 Hello! Wednesday, September 6, 2006, 01:42 (UTC)

Sorry. Repeating "FUCK YOU CYDE" over and over again is not valid use of your User space. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:10, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
You seem to be operating under a couple of mistaken impressions. First, you appear to have been mistakenly informed that anonymous IP addresses have any sort of ownership over or claim to the associated user, talk, and sub-pages. They do not. Second, 'vandalism' pages may in some cases be tolerated – or perhaps just not noticed – but they're not encouraged and may be deleted if they are deemed unhelpful to the project's aims. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 02:14, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I'm sorry, all, I guess it's been longer than I thought since I saw the page. :( it was never meant to be a PA on Cyde or anyone else, and I did have guidlines. They got screwed up during of the edits. I didn't even realize that it had turned to such crap-I thought it was still the way it was when I left. 69.145.123.171 Hello! Wednesday, September 6, 2006, 02:27 (UTC)

Per WP:DENY we should get rid of all vandalism subpages. They're juvenile, they have no legitimate purpose, and although some people seem to think of them solely as jokes, they do normalize and encourage vandalism. "Sandbox" is a much better term to use. --Cyde Weys 02:58, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

  • Meh, the "DENY" thing is, IMHO, sort of a mixed bag. The less info that is provided about vandalism, the harder it is for new editors to deal with it and understand it. I don't like the fact that the long-term abuse pages are being deleted, it makes it harder for newbies to identify it. </rant> The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 19:15, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Cyde, don't you think it would be a better use of your time to write some articles than to hunt down people's userspace pages? --Ryan Delaney talk 19:20, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Which can then be turned into "Don't you think it would be a better use of your time to write articles than criticize Cyde's deletion of blatant vandalism?" That's getting to be the Godwin's Law of Wikipedia. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 19:22, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
How about just erasing the T1 content in the box? You don't knock down a building because it has ugly upholstery. If the box really bothers you, you can file an MfD. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 19:35, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I concur with Ryan on this one... unless you plan deleting all the vandalise this subpages to show that you actually mean it... start with freakofnurtures.. then maybe Shanel's... after that, why don't we delete anything in the userpages that actually could be remotely interpreted as funny as aparently they wouldn't have a legitimate purpose on Wikipedia. Because we're a deadly serious encyclopedia we are. Not laiden with drama, bureaucracy or any of that bullshit that could spoil it for all of us. Or we could just restore the subpage, delete the offending content and Let It Be. Sasquatch t|c 05:01, 7 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] racism by User: Khoikhoi on Turkish people

This part added by user: Khoikhoi "The term Turk had negative connotations in Europe that were established during the Crusades and the period of Ottoman expansion. In medieval christian european circles, it was used interchangeably with the term Muslim and generally had such derogatory connotations as infidel and savage." I leave it to your judgement. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.232.51.9 (talk • contribs) .

That's not racism by User:Khoikhoi, that's racism by the medeival Europeans. Shameful as it may be, it's true, and WP:NOT a politically correct compendium of revisionist history. Why are you bringing this to the Administrator's Noticeboard in the first place? Just ask him to cite the claim on the talk page, and you're done. --tjstrf 03:27, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
sorry to see that its not only done by "medeival Europeans" —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 88.232.51.9 (talk • contribs) .
Excuse me, did you just imply I was a racist for saying that if a claim about a prior usage of a word was citeable, it could remain in the article? --tjstrf 04:13, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
I see nothing wrong with the article text and would caution the anon against incivility and personal attacks. The quoted text describes the existence of racism. It in no way endorses or encourages such. --CBD 10:53, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
This is a historical fact. If the claim is sourced, it has every right in the world to be on the page. -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 11:03, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Turk is still used in for example the Netherlands as a degoratory term to say someone is stupid. The continued usage is just an unfortunate fact, neither a opinion of me, and nor endorsed by me. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 14:32, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Yep, same thing's true in Russian language. -- Grafikm (AutoGRAF) 14:41, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


The fact that a term has been used in a racist context, is not an excuse for continuing to use the term, and propogating the term, and/or the racist context. There are isolated cases of why a term that has a racist connotation by some might be used legitimately, but few. Under what situations would it be appropriate, and legitimate for an article to use the term "Whitey, Coon, or Kike?" In my opinion, almost none, unless it was directly quoting some source, and that quote had important relavence to the quality of the article. Atom 15:47, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Well, Coon and Whitey do point out the racist uses; "Kike" has nothing but racist use, so isn't comparable. We report what is here, not what we want things to be. --jpgordon∇∆∇∆ 16:11, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
The negative connotations did exist (in Czech language the old colloquial phrase "Turkish economy" (turecké hospodářství) means something chaotic and defunct). During 16-18th century, at least in Czech lands, "a Turk" was a synonym of menacing threat (border of Ottoman Empire was very near). I have doubt whether Turks were widely known during crusades. And btw, labeling something as racist has devaluated to nothing but stupid offense. Pavel Vozenilek 17:54, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Is there a policy on retrieving deleted content?

Note, alert, warning: I don't want to see Everyking depate reopened, at least not in my :-) paragraph.

If a user contacts me and requests a deleted version of an article, am I allowed to hand it to him? Some administrators have a notice on their user page stating that they "will make the text available" if "it's not a copyright violation, personal information, libel or similar", and further state: "Note that using the text to [...some things you're not supposed to do...] But that's your problem." Well, is it? If I give away some deleted content which I do not consider "copyright violation, personal information, libel or similar" (since text doesn't come with declaration saying "libel" I have to rely on my own judgement) and it ends up on, say, news.bbc.co.uk for all the world to see, is it really not my problem, as this note states? --Dijxtra 08:16, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

The WP:UNDEL policy currently contains, "Non-sysops who wish to see the content of a deleted article, either to use its content elsewhere, or alternatively, because they cannot tell if it was wrongly deleted without seeing what exactly was deleted. (temporary undeletion)". The second clause about undeleting so non-admins can better judge whether it was deleted properly implies that this can be 'temporary undeletion' prior to a DRV and that is my understanding of the way it have been applied in the past... individual admins just temporarily undeleting and/or userfying deleted content on their own without any sort of more formal process. So, unless someone is gonna be out at the barn wall with a can of paint over this latest brouhaha I'd say it's ok, with the caveats (copyright, privacy, et cetera) you noted. --CBD 10:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
The issue wit EK was (as far as I was concerned), providing deleted revisions to a banned user. If the user who has asked you for help is an editor here in good standing, and there are no personal/privacy reasons to keep the material deleted there should be no problem. Thatcher131 (talk) 11:17, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
And if it is a newly created user who requests that info? --Dijxtra 16:44, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
  • I guess not anymore; The precedent is set. I think no one wants to run similiar risks if the newly created user might just turn out to be a sockpuppet (which is increasingly common these days). - Mailer Diablo 18:47, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
Yes, that's what I had in mind, if a newly registered user asked me for some deleted content, I'm 99% sure he's a sock. Now, about the precedent. Shouldn't it be formulated in some sort of a guideline? I mean, now, can we or can we not give away deleted content we assume is not libel and private info and stuff? --Dijxtra 20:58, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Regardless of the motives or the people involved, we must constantly be aware that any information on Wikipedia is subject to GFDL, and if we are going to reveal it to other people for publication elsewhere, we must make them aware that they have to abide by the GFDL requirements for republication. If it's an admin doing the republication elsewhere (as with the Everyking possible copying of deleted material), the admin must follow the GFDL requirements, as well. User:Zoe|(talk) 18:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

To avoid such issues, I would recommend making the information available on wiki only, as a restored article or user subpage. What the user does is his own business; by keeping it on-wiki, the admin has no such GFDL issues and the situation is kept open to inspection. Regarding Mailer Diablo's point, one needs to use discretion and common sense, and if there are any questions, refer the person asking to the deleting admin. (In the Everyking case, one of the things that should have tipped EK off to the fact that this was going to be a sensitive issue is that he was afraid to deal directly with the deleting admin.) Thatcher131 (talk) 19:25, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] TheM62Manchester has left

TheM62Manchester troll group/role accounts have left Wikipedia, permanently, under right to vanish. It was not one person, but a group of schoolkids who registered this username, creating sockpuppets and imitating WoW. Now they find Wikipedia incredibly dull after I told them that Wikipedia is not an online game. I'm not a vandal, and never will be, I'm just doing my duty and reporting them. I am a single purpose account.

These are the facts as I know them; I hope we can close this sorry chapter of Wikipedia history and move on; they did, with my assistance. --Polewood 08:47, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Not that I'm not happy, but I don't understand what 'right to vanish' has to do with this. That has to do with established people who want to depart. --Golbez 09:34, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, this group (TheM62Manchester/Sunholm/et.al) have left Wikipedia and decided never to come back again, after me telling them that Wikipedia is not an online game. Most people here will be glad of this news; and anyhow, they're back in school now, and have moved on to the next craze no doubt... anyhow, they're not coming back again!! --Polewood 10:34, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

But are they coming back again? --Golbez 10:38, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
No, they're not coming back again. No way, nada, not after a new WP:NOT that we should add to WP:NOT - Wikipedia is not an online gaming arena. Anyhow, I'm here to revert vandalism and help the encyclopedia. --Polewood 10:40, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Something about this thread leaves me a little worried. Looking at Polewood's contributions, it seems all the edits so far involved: this thread, getting an autoblock removed, and placing templates on the user's page. The first and last is what concerns me. Why would a newly established user come directly to here to report a user that left before this user joined? Also, adding templates and modifying them to fit their own needs was a favorite of TheM62Manchester (I can't provide diffs for this because the user's account page was deleted). I don't know, something seems a bit odd to me. Metros232 16:54, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


Normally I'd say "AGF" but my spidersense is also going off. --Charlesknight 17:30, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Proposal re. RFCs

Please see Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Closure of RfCs. Guy 10:10, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Consider banning IP address 216.20.1.212

Upon noticing vandalism to the Grafton, Massachusetts page, I went to place a non-registered user vandalism warning on the talk page for 216.20.1.212 only to notice a large number of them have already been placed. Please consider blocking this IP address for a greater period of time (perhaps a year?) to eliminate it as a source for Wikipedia vandals. Thanks. --CPAScott 16:56, 6 September 2006 (UTC)

Taken care of. --Pilotguy (roger that) 20:13, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] WP:BLOCK proposed policy clarification

In light of the recent foofara here I have initiated a discussion on "calm down" type blocks, and would really be interested in hearing other people's thoughts. I know this doesn't require admin intervention, but since much of what I'm talking about took place here I thought it'd be the easiest way to let everyone know. If someone strongly objects to this posting being here feel free to remove it. --Nscheffey(T/C) 23:37, 6 September 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Ali Sina page

Ali sina page has become a target of constant vandalism by anons/new users. They are not exactly evading 3RRs. basically because i cannot revert more than a few times. See an example. I request an administrator to keep this page on his watchlist, because an admin has unlimited reverts. I also request him/her to revert this last change. Thanks.nids(♂) 09:54, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Nobody has unlimited reverts. You could take this to WP:RFPP and someone will perhaps lock it at the wrong version for you. Guy 11:04, 7 September 2006 (UTC)
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org../../../a/d/m/Wikipedia%7EAdministrators%27_noticeboard_Archive56_24fc.html"