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Contents

[edit] Categories' order within an article

I was quite certain there was a guideline—or at least a consensus—that categories should be arranged in alphabetical order within articles, in part because sorting by relevance is a subjective exercise at best. Does this ring a bell with anyone? Darned if I can find it... RadioKirk (u|t|c) 00:06, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I know that's the procedure for interwiki links, but I don't specifically remember seeing anything like that for categories. Couldn't hurt though. --Daniel Olsen 00:40, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
Okay, it appears there isn't one. I've begun a discussion toward that aim. RadioKirk (u|t|c) 00:46, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

I've always thought it was alphabetical too, but I can't remember if years categories (like Category:1945 births are sorted before or after the alphanumeric categories. Hbdragon88 01:01, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

Definitely before; but I don't want to search for it again ;) RadioKirk (u|t|c) 01:03, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
Anyone want to make a Bugzilla feature request for this? howcheng {chat} 21:34, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
I'd oppose that. Category order should be flexible; see the discussion at Wikipedia talk:Categorization of people#What is the issue here?. Chick Bowen 22:06, 10 November 2006 (UTC)
I'd also oppose it for similar reasoning. While sorting by relevance may be subjective, the same can be said for any authorial decisions regarding structure or content of an article. The times when sorting alphabetically makes sense is when no reasonable order of relevance exists or when an item in the list is likely to be searched for. In the case of categories, I'd argue that they are more likely to be looked at to find related categories of articles, and for this purpose it would be more useful to put the most "relevant" categories first. If need be, an editor comment explaining the rationale behind the ordering should help when consensus on relevance is desired or to assist editors in maintaining the ordering. —Doug Bell talk•contrib 21:32, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
"Relevance" is POV based on the person editing or reading the article, nothing more. The very next person will most likely disagree with the ordering, and change it. If it's alphabetical, you won't have anyone saying "but B should come before A". --Kbdank71 21:56, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
"Relevance" is POV — pretty much total disagreement here, at least if this was intended as a sideways reference to WP:NPOV, unless we want to say the entire encyclopedia is POV. We constantly have to make subjective authorial and editorial judgements regarding relevance in order to create the encyclodedia. If we're not making these judgements, then how do we decide what articles to include and not to include; what to include in the article and what not to include; and what order to discuss items in an article (or maybe we should just sort the subtopics in an article alphabetically?) The fact is, we can't create an encyclopedia without continuously making judgements regarding relevance. Now what I do agree with is that the next person to come along might have a different idea regarding relevance and change it—gee, that sounds kind of like how the whole editing and article creation process here works. Using order of relevance is not only acceptable, but I would say it is often preferred. —Doug Bell talk•contrib 22:09, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Relavance may be POV, but it sure is useful. Look at Yao Ming. Would you rather have "Chinese basketball players" or "Basketball players at the 2004 Summer Olympics" be the first category? I say the former is a lot more crucial than the latter, so I'd want it earlier. --Mike Selinker 09:01, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unprotected Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry

I just unprotected Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry. This page has been the scene of a rather nasty edit war. Particularly, a member of CARM claims to have initiated legal action and then subsequently used sockpuppets and/or meatpuppets (the meatpuppets at least are confirmed) to continue editing the page while banned. I have unprotected the page because it has been protected for more than two weeks. However, I fear that people will resume the edit warring and perhaps try to bias the article as a result of the unprotection. If some other admins could monitor the page, I'd much appreciate it. I have no opinion as to the current level of bias in the page and frankly, I wish I had never heard of the page. But what I'm saying is that I'm not claiming the current page is unbiased, only that it is guaranteed to swing one way or another if the edit warring resumes. Particularly watch for people removing criticism from the article, or for other people inserting additional duplicated criticism. --Yamla 04:48, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

User:Diane S was caught using more sockpuppets to get around a ban placed in response to her legal threat. --Yamla 03:01, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Operation Gladio

seabhcan (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves) has misused his admin tools by reverting and then fully protecting an article that he is an active editor. He has decided that his version is the "final" version and reverted a differing version before protecting. This article should be unlocked immediately. He does not own this article. Tbeatty 00:32, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

  • Operation Gladio (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) links for convenience. Thatcher131 00:47, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Well, for one thing the article is generally deficient. I learned more from the opening paragraphs of this than I did from the article. Since the stay behind networks were real, a hoax tag over the whole article seems dishonest. The question seems to be whether or not these stay-behind groups committed acts of domestic terrorism. There should be a way of covering all of this in the article, i.e. a) what is known and not disputed about the stay at home networks; b) what is alleged, noting the sources on both sides of the forgery question. If there is any violation in protecting the version without the hoax tag it is minor; an uninvolved admin would have a 50/50 chance of picking that version anyway. Thatcher131 00:58, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
    • What are we protecting it from? I can't implement your suggestions when the article is completely protected. The article will not change from being deficient in this state. --Tbeatty 02:39, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I've reprotected the page due to revert warring between User:Derex and User:Tbeatty. -- Steel 12:03, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

A revert war that didn't even rise to 3RR by either side. Please unprotect it so that it can be improved.--Tbeatty 06:32, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
3RR is not a license to revert war so long as nobody goes over three a day. Revert warring considered harmful. Sort it out like civilised people on the Talk page please. — Saxifrage ✎ 23:42, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Possible vandalism only ID

Please take a look at the edits by User:Leftistguerrilla contribs (talk). Judging by the edits and by the user ID, it seems to be a vandalism only ID and possibly worthy of a block. Hu 01:27, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

There are good-faith edits mixed in with the vandalism, so I've left him a stronger warning for now. If he realises that he can't continue editing properly when he feels like and vandalising when he feels like, good. If he doesn't take any notice, then he should be blocked. --Sam Blanning(talk) 03:13, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] White people

Some conflicts related to this article and its editors have produced a slew of requests at WP:PAIN and WP:RFI. I've backed off from taking action because there's an open mediation case and another administrator has already gotten out the mop for the editors involved, probably due to postings at other noticeboards. I'm one step away from recusing myself on the whole affair, yet am unsure what to do about all these overlapping requests. Would it be out of line to close and archive the whole lot? DurovaCharge! 05:05, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I've been one of the involved admins (I don't know if you are referring to me above) but I'm very confused by the situation. If you want to deal with it, feel free. JoshuaZ 05:07, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually I worry that my beliefs would affect my judgement. The point where I put that in writing must be the point where I do recuse myself. If anyone wants to take this I'd be very grateful. DurovaCharge! 05:19, 11 November 2006 (UTC)
I am having similar issues. JoshuaZ 06:26, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

This looks like it's going to end up at ArbCom. Can we refer it there while mediation is ongoing? DurovaCharge! 22:32, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

  • Technically yes, but it would be preferable to continue mediating anyway, given that arbcom cases may last awhile. (Radiant) 13:31, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Capitalising "web"

Would appreciate another admin taking a passing look at this, since I'm involved... UBeR (talk • contribs) has made edits to website to replace every occurrence of "web" or "website" into the capitalised and split "Web site". Following that edit a request has been made to move the article to Web site. Both forms, "website" and "web site", are in widespread usage and the forced capitalisation just baffles me. Smacks of the numb US vs. UK English issues normally seen...

Relevant links:

Glancing at UBeR's contribs there are many other similar edits and a discussion at Talk:Web page. Thanks/wangi 20:46, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

I think we would do well to define preferred usage for select terms and phrases to promote consistency, create a central place to debate/discuss preferences, and have a style guide that can be referenced to settle these style disputes. The Web vs. web vs. Web site vs. web site vs. website is a perfect example. In 1996, Tim Berners-Lee said the Web should be capitalised to distinguish it from a spider’s web. Common practice and style guides have diverged from the initial practice of capitalisation of World Wide Web, the Web, the Internet and the Net and use of Web site, on-line and e-mail. I would propose creating Wikipedia:Manual of Style (preferred terms) or some similar page to hash out preferred styles for these and other similar terms that can have one or more styles in common usage. I am not talking about trying to choose between terms that are have fairly definitive but localized usage (such as US vs. UK vs. Australian English). At any rate, until such a style guide addition is undertaken, Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Disputes over style issues should probably govern editor behavior. —Doug Bell talk•contrib 05:42, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:24.52.114.146 Harrasment

After I warned User:24.52.114.146 for vandalism link, User:24.52.114.146 vandalized my user_talk, page link, as well as this and this. The IP has only been used for vandalism on Wikipedia. Since then, he has tried to change my password by entering my user name and clicking the "E-mail new password" link. As a result, I've received emails saying:

Someone (probably you, from IP address 24.52.114.146)
requested that we send you a new Wikipedia login password for en.wikipedia.org.
The password for user "Kungming2" is now "******".
You should log in and change your password now.

As my IP address is 69.107.54.131, the request for a password change was not submitted by me. I have also placed a message on his talk page regarding this, but to no avail. I respectfully request that administrators review this notice and help me. –- kungming·2 | (Talk·Contact) 23:45, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

  • As you can see the new password was mailed to you, not them, such attempts at hijacking a user name do more to reveal a deliberate vandal than to actually threaten your account. I've reblocked that ip#. -- Infrogmation 18:25, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Thank you! –- kungming·2 | (Talk·Contact) 07:24, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] idont know where to post vandalism

the article on Jake Lloyd has some very obvious vandalism could someone fix it or tell me where i should be putting this —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 75.35.147.17 (talk • contribs) 20:00, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for noticing that. I've removed it. In the future, you should feel free to remove any vandalism that you find in an article on your own. Picaroon9288 01:14, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Is it just me, or did the title of this well-intentioned section provoke other chuckles? As an administrator, I recommend you post your vandalism this way... ;) DurovaCharge! 06:07, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Heh. I'm so used to seeing vandalism reports on here that I didn't even think of your interpretation. But if recommendations of where to post vandalism must be given, I recommend Wikipedia:sandbox! Picaroon9288 18:40, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] George W. Bush protection

Hey, if we must have articles such as this in a virtually permanent state of semi-protection (I'm not convinced we need to - but I accept that's not the consensus), but if we must - could we consider not placing the {{sprotected}} on them. This template is fine for the short-tern, but on our most prominent articles it a) is ugly b) says to every passer-by 'Hey, Wikipedia has a problem with vandals. We aren't going to let you vandalise this exceptional article, so please go find another to disrupt'. It isn't exactly a great advert for wiki-pedia WP:BEANS--Docg 01:45, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

  • Well, I wouldn't mind... for whatever that's worth. IPs can tell it's protected a glance because it will just say "view source". We don't put protection notices on the main page and so on for roughly the reason you describe. --W.marsh 02:00, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
    • And the information about what do regarding protected pages is in the text they see when clicking to edit, on view source. —Centrx→talk • 02:39, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
      • I agree, but the article still needs to be in CAT:SEMI. Perhaps a new template could be created that includes the category and indicates in a more subtle fashion, a la {{administrator}}, that the article is semi-protected. Alternately, the template could be removed and replaced with the category alone--that would be fine with me too. Chick Bowen 04:39, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
        • Seeing this discussion, I created User:Moe Epsilon/Semi2. It puts articles in the same category as the big bulky template and this aligns itself in the top right corner so it's more "out of the way". Feel free to use it. semper fi — Moe 05:36, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

This discussion should be continued here. Chick Bowen 17:31, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Improper threats made by User:Fred Chess

In the page Talk:Treaty_of_Fredrikshamn, Fred Chess is at least threatening to use admin tools, such as blocking, in a dispute he is himself participating. Such is actually conduct that should mean banning of User:Fred Chess. Suedois 02:30, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

This was already taken care of at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive60#Jaakko Sivonen (talk • contribs). Khoikhoi 02:45, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Was Fred Chess banned? What were the sanctions of his improper admin conduct? Suedois 04:07, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Um, we don't ban because of one case of admin misconduct. I don't know what measures (if any) might be taken though regarding this. --210physicq (c) 04:09, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Fred was blocked for 24 hours and made a clear acknowledgment of error and apology. That's more than enough to make up for the offense involved. This issue is closed, absolutely and without a doubt. Chick Bowen 04:24, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

To which it must be added that User:Suedois has just repeated the Jaakko offense and moved the article without trying to reach consensus at talk. The user needs warned against taking such inflammatory actions that may easily spark fire. --Irpen 23:36, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Blog to earn more

Regarding his user page (the user has done only contributions to it since October), would a blanking be justified? I know he has done nothing "wrong", but it kind of tickles me name of the user and the fact that the only example he gives is blog2moneyblog.blogspot.com. -- ReyBrujo 07:12, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, see WP:UP (specifically - What can I not have on my userpage: A weblog relating your non-Wikipedia activities). semper fi — Moe 08:29, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Userpage deleted and user blocked indefinitely. --Slowking Man 17:52, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't see that anyone has discussed any of this with the User in question. User:Zoe|(talk) 20:59, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Spam is speedy deletable, wherever it's put, and I don't believe there's a requirement to inform creators when deleting such pages. Particularly when they created the page a month ago and haven't been back since. --Sam Blanning(talk) 02:59, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Persistent sockpuppet

Following this checkuser request Wikipedia:Requests for checkuser/Case/...And Beyond!, I blocked all of the sockpuppets involved. However, the user persists in editing using anon IPs. All the ones I have spotted are in the range 141.211.*.* or 141.213.*.*; their main activity is to delete references to Jewishness from biographical articles and names from lists of Jews. Please block any such activity that you see, or let me know. Thanks.--Runcorn 14:02, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Feel free to check the contributions of all of these "banned sockpuppets" and take note that they are not vandalizing any pages in ANY way outlined WP:VANDAL (civil TALK page-oriented "edit warring" is not a form of vandalism), are responding in talk page with valid arguments, have sources to back up all their arguments for removal of references to Jewishness, and are generally being ignored and even sometimes harassed by Runcorn. Every single name deleted from a list of Jews AND every single mention of Jewishness deleted from an article, has a valid reference or source backing it up. If it does not, then it is because no references exist to suspect any of these people are Jewish. Runcorn fails to provide an pretext for his bans. His reason for each ban is "sockpuppet of whoever" yet, interestingly, it states nothing of the need to ban non-abusive "sockpuppets" in WP:Sockpuppetry solely on the basis that they are sockpuppets. Users being banned for persistently vandalizing pages may be a different story. Furthermore, Runcorn actually SUPPORTS the edits of sockpuppets of other banned users. Specifically ones who are prone to add reference-less mentions of Judaism to people's articles. Finally, for those of you wondering why I'm editing as an anon, if a choose to make an account, Runcorn will simply ban the account as a "sockpuppet," so I can't see a reason for even trying.
Oh, and to give you an example of Runcorn's accusation of "deletion of references to Jewishness from biographical articles" please take a look at TALK:Tadeusz Kantor and Talk:Krzysztof Kamil Baczyński. It will show exactly how these changes are researched, referenced, and explained.141.213.31.230 16:43, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

The user has clearly not read Wikipedia:Sock puppetry: "Users who are banned or blocked from editing may not use sock puppets to circumvent this."--Runcorn 22:29, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted Wiki

I came on here and created a new account. I then started a Wiki on the band, Hundredfold. It was instantly deleted and protected. Why did this happen? Can we undo this so that I can post information about this band? This is a band that tours all over the world and I think people would want to talk about them. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Hundredfold (talk • contribs) .

In the first place, what you created was an article, not a wiki. Wikipedia as a whole is a wiki. Secondly, you created the article under the user name User:Hundredfold, which indicates that you have a vested interest in the band which would tend to violate our WP:VANITY guideline. Thirdly, the article had previously been deleted twice before due to lack of notability as outlined in our guideline at WP:BAND. Fourthly, such sentences as Take one listen to Hundredfold..s VIA SIRENS (Listen Well) and you will understand the industry buzz that has been generated over this talented foursome. does not an encyclopedia make. If, after all of this, you still somehow think your band deserves an article, you can appeal the third deletion of this article (by three different admins) at WP:DRV, but please read WP:SNOW. User:Zoe|(talk) 21:03, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
My colleague might also have mentioned WP:BAND, our policy on the inclusion of music-related articles and WP:N, our policy on the inclusion of any subject. Both are worth your time in reading. When your band is famous enough to not need a Wikipedia article, then we would welcome one. But thanks for your contributions in the meantime! ➨ ЯEDVERS 21:09, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Me again, adding to projects

Hello, Its me again. I wish to be agged to the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_Space project. I am quite knowledgable (not in spelling) about space exploration and have spent meany a night up until 2 am reading books and websites reguarding Space. I tried to add myself but was not able to. -Jeffrey- 22:54, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

No evidence you have tried to join[1], unless you were using only an IP account or another username.--MONGO 22:56, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
There's no reason why you should not be able to edit that page - it's not protected in any way. However please remember that listing yourself on a project doesn't really "do anything" - the best way to help a project is to get out there and edit! Thanks/wangi 22:57, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Mitsos

Hi,

I didn't see another category for my concern, so I'm posting it here.

Mitsos' user page really disturbs me - I'm not entirely sure how I found it, but I did.

He has a long article on his user page that's a racist polemic. He also has a userbox that declares him to be a white nationalist. Is this allowed?

I know there was a lengthy and controversial discussion on the use of a pedophile userbox, but I never saw the final judgement.

I'm....uncomfortable....

Thank you, NinzEliza 23:16, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Also see this. Khoikhoi 23:29, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pedophilia userbox wheel war - case decided in a record four days. Hbdragon88 23:31, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

After reading I am also umcomfortable... more so about the government box -Jeffrey- 23:34, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Apart from ranging from inappropriately political to overtly racist, they're all copyright violations. I've removed them and warned the user. --Sam Blanning(talk) 03:08, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] CAT:CSD

Hi guys, we're currently running at 199 CSD articles and it's just hit 0100 here in the UK. Can anyone lend a hand, please? I have to sleep sometime! (aeropagitica) 01:00, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

My mistake, it is really 289 articles :-( (aeropagitica) 01:14, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

377 by my count. --Calton | Talk 01:28, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Now down to just 14, and a couple of images. Wow. Daveydweeb (chat/patch) 00:42, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:203.143.254.76

This user vandalizes continuously but has never been blocked due to it being registered to Padua college and because the we can never really go through all the warnings before another person may be editing under this IP. Should someone contact the college? --nkayesmith 04:49, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Academic_Challenger

This administrator has been noted for acting with malicious intent, deleting every other article/stub before a significant amount of information can be added to them or simply deleting them whenever he sees fit. Please have a look at the user's talk page and take action.Daham.wick

Nothing seems out of the ordinary here. Is there something more specific you're talking about? – ClockworkSoul 05:56, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

This user also posted a message on my talk page and I responded on his. Academic Challenger 06:03, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

The user is referring to this deleted article. A single line about a non-notable student seems like a perfectly reasonable target for deletion to me. – ClockworkSoul 06:05, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
The user ought to read WP:CSD A7 and WP:AGF. Alphachimp 06:11, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
  • You can challenge deletions on deletion review. A better option might be to find a couple of reliable sources and use those to recreate the article. Note that encyclopedias in general are not in the habit of writing about an undergraduate student, unless there's something extraordinary about him. (Radiant) 13:24, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
After checking the thread of conversation, it seems pretty clear this is indeed a vanity piece - can I suggest that the Daham.wick gets a blog - I'm told those are all the rage for young people. --Charlesknight 22:42, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] vandalism-like page moves

Is there some bot that can prevent page moves that are obvious attempts to "revert" i.e. circumvent admin decisions based on RMs and community consensus? E.g. Someone reverted the admin page move http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Finlandswedes&diff=84847660&oldid=84803373 by using a spelling almost identical to the original page name. It should be easy to use technical means to detect such nearly identical spellings of old page names. --Espoo 05:56, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] IP inserting news story to articles

I just came across this, but haven't the time to deal with it - could someone please review the contributions of User:124.157.245.100? This IP's been inserting a long rant and an apparent news story into numerous Singapore related articles. I'd start fixing it, but I just don't have the time right now. Thanks. Tony Fox (arf!) 06:44, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I reverted them all. If he continues, I'll give him a stern warning. – ClockworkSoul 06:46, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
He wouldn't stop after two warnings, so I blocked the IP for 24 hours. – ClockworkSoul 06:50, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Deleting, Reverting, and Blocking IPs.... sounds like an academic at work.--Daham.wick 07:17, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
An academic?? Er, it sounds like quite a normal thing to do to someone adding inappropriate content, refusing to stop when asked, or acknowledge others. -- Chuq 07:25, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] 7th Lambgina Cavalry

I believe that 7th Lambgina Cavalry does not meet the notability requirements of Wikipedia. It seems like a gaming clan, of which there are thousands, and is of minimal cultural importance. Can other people please provide feedback? I've already marked the article with db-group, but the single editor who's creating the page deleted it. Thanks! Jonemerson 09:04, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Deleting a db-group tag from a page you created yourself is vandalism - perhaps you should explain this to this single editor, telling him to: add {{hangon}} to the top of the page, and explain why the page should not be deleted on the talk page. (I am not an admin) --nkayesmith 09:26, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
He did add {{hangon}} to the article, and then removed it shortly afterwards. I don't want to play games and re-add {{db-group}} just to have him delete it, though. It'd be great if an administrator reading this could just handle the situation directly. :) Jonemerson 09:30, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Done. Joyous! | Talk 11:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wiarthurhu

Wiarthurhu is using his talk page to troll, and talk about all the classic stuff he is known for, such as talking abotu how we are all evil bitches wanting to ban him for no reason. Why don't we just protect his talk page to put an end to this? Karrmann 11:28, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Blocked indef by Cowman109. -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 13:33, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Essays on user pages

User:Kmarinas86 is using his/her user page as a way to display a theory of theirs on the universe (which has already been posted on academia.wikia). I hesitated before asking him/her to remove it because the user does contribute constructively to the encyclopaedia, and, while it isn't science, it isn't really offensive. Do you think we should heed the guidelines on this or let things pass? yandman 16:37, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that appearing on Wikipedia might give it some (apparent) legitimacy in some people's eyes. We could of course post a disclaimer explaining the situation; but should we bend the rules for every (otherwise useful) contributor? Fourohfour 17:53, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
In the past one solution has been to put {{userpage}} on top of the page, which can be quite a useful disclaimer in cases such as this. --ais523 18:17, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
I'd leave it... the user-page template might be a good idea, but since this is an active user in good standing I wouldn't worry about it. ---J.S (t|c) 20:54, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
We could always ask him nicely to add it himself. Guy 22:34, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Done. yandman 08:56, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Issuing a requested block

I appreciate that according to WP:BLOCK we don't do user requested blocks to enforce wikivacations. That said, I've had a request made of me and I've fulfilled it, I'm ignoring all rules. The request was made in these diffs, and I found it hard to refuse. I don't think anyone's work or home life should suffer because of Wikipedia, and I don't think Wikipedia needs the bad publicity if someone loses their job or home through such an addiction and Wikipedia did nothing to act. I also think it's best to assume such requests are made in good faith. Hence I'm ignoring all rules because I believe that not doing so may be harmful to Wikipedia. Now I'm bringing it here because I may be too close to the user to make an objective opinion on the situation, because I've worked with the user on a number of articles, and also because I may be wrong, there may be consequences I've missed or I may be being gamed. If people want to unblock, I am willing to accept that, and any other censure. Okay, that's what I did and why, so what's the score? Steve block Talk 19:25, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

  • It seems to me you made the right decision. After all, rules are made to be broken. What I might have done is directed him towards the Javascript hack that disables logon, but I can't remember where the silly thing is. Mackensen (talk) 19:32, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
It's also in the history of your own js file, Mack. Template:Smiley Thatcher131 20:53, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
As if there aren't several really obvious ways to bypass that... --Interiot 01:51, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
As long as it becomes more hassle than it is worth, this will work for those who don't know how to easily bypass that. Though I'd be scared of accidentally typing in the wrong year. Imagine typing in 3006 instead of 2006... Carcharoth 02:01, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Admins can edit other's monobook.js files, so you only need to login as a sock or IP and contact an admin, so no biggie there. --Interiot 02:39, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Homey as "Nick Cockburn" and User:Roncey Valley

Homey has e-mailed an editor asking him to edit for Homey by proxy. An editor on Talk:Animal liberation movement received an e-mail on November 11 from someone calling himself Roncey Valley/Nick Cockburn. The e-mailer told the editor that I had removed Homey's "the animal rights movement is fascist and anti-Semitic" edits (which Homey had added to various articles as User:Farnsworth J and User:Farnsworth J.), and asked the user to restore them, saying "I can't get involved publicly (so please do not respond on my talk page) but could you look at the page and see about either restoring the stuff she removed or moving it to another article like Animal welfare?" [2]

"Nick Cockburn" is Homey. I know this because I've received e-mails from Nick Cockburn before, repeating very unpleasant, supposedly personal, material that was being published about me on Wikipedia Review and on an attack site run by WordBomb. There's no question that the e-mails came from Homey. I won't repeat the evidence here for obvious reasons, but I've forwarded it to a number of admins who've been dealing with this situation.

The person set up an account on November 11 as User:Roncey Valley in order to be able to use the Wikipedia e-mail system. [3]

I'm posting about this here in case anyone else receives e-mails from "Nick Cockburn" or User:Roncey Valley. SlimVirgin (talk) 02:44, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] danism

i would like to ask that my wikipedia post 'danism' be restored,
i havent been given a reason for its deletion but i assume
because it was very short it was for lack of content, i can
provide further refrence material if that is necisary and make
it a more complete article, thank you

Danism was delete before, and since it is not a notable group, it was deleted again. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 06:02, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
According to the deletion log, it was deleted as a conflict of interest and then again as nonsense. If you can somehow reference it, you're welcome to try, but it might be better if you provided the reference links here before posting the page to avoid its being deleted again. --tjstrf talk 06:09, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Wouldn't it be better to provide the reference links on the talk page? —Doug Bell talk•contrib 06:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Special:Undelete/Danism. Deleting this was the appropriate response. JDoorjam Talk 07:14, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Doug Bell:No, because then you'd have to delete the talk page. Less work if it's dealt with in one page. --tjstrf talk 07:38, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
An unequivocal case of vanispamcruftisement with a dash of complete bollocks for good measure. As Jimbo said in one recent deletion, "abject nonsense on a stick". Guy 14:29, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Discuss, don't vote

I would like feedback on whether the currently proposed wording of this guideline is an accurate description of the status quo in Wikipedia. Please respond on its talk page. (Radiant) 12:43, 14 November 2006 (UTC)


[edit] User:Ghirlandajo created an edit history to prevent reverse move

I observed that User:Ghirlandajo has at [4] created an edit history in order to prevent reverse move, as these Viipuri names seem to be his battleground. After his movement, he made reverting impossible without using admin tools by adding history to the redirect. According to Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/AndriyK#Reversal_of_irreversible_page_moves such act deserves block.

I request that edit history to be deleted.

In addition, Girlandajo erased my warning against his undiscussed moves of controversial pages (see [5]) and by its edit comment, accused me of nationalistic trolling. Which is inconceivable. (And of course a grave personal attack.)

It seems to be well-known that Ghirlandajo makes page moves and wages edit wars, without discussing at all. The history of [6] is just an example of edit and move wars wage by Ghirlandajo, and the article's talkpage displays that Ghirlandajo has never bothered to discuss anything about that article.

I request that Ghirlandajo be blocked from editing Wikipedia for some time. Marrtel 18:52, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

Just noticed this discussion. I advise User:Marrtel to check what double redirects are and how they should be eliminated. WP:AGF is also helpful. As a sidenote, it was me who created all the pages on early Russo-Swedish wars. During half a year that passed there has been intensive revert warring on the part of several nationalist Finnish editors (most of them banned by now) but not a single new sentence was added to my text. --Ghirla -трёп- 07:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Simply moving the article back would constitute edit warring. Please discuss the move at Requested moves and see if there is a consensus of other editors for one version or the other. Thatcher131 20:54, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Taipei American School

Hi, I believe the page on Taipei American School is largely vanity and should be appropriately streamlined into a article of size proportional to the school's importance. Will a neutral admin please check in on this? Nr9 01:49, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

This is not an admin function. Any editor can prune the vanity out of an article. User:Zoe|(talk) 02:52, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
So if I prune it out I won't get banned? Last time I try pruning it out and they said i was vandalizing Nr9 07:54, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Explain your edits on the Talk page. User:Zoe|(talk) 21:19, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Articles kept on userspace

I just noticed that User:Alyeska, who had opposed the deletion of several articles (that were in fact deleted after AFD discussions), has decided to keep them in his userspace (see User:Alyeska#Wikipedia_is_a_Failure and User:Alyeska#Restoration_Projects). I've never encountered this situation before, so I would much appreciate comments on this rather unorthodox procedure which in my opinion not only appears to dodge the whole deletion concept, as also seems to open a path for the recreation of the respective articles. Thank you.--Húsönd 03:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, I nominated one of them at WP:MFD. He doesn't seem to have taken it well: [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] --Calton | Talk 07:07, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
And this, for good measure. --Calton | Talk 07:09, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
If a deleted article isn't imminently going to be used to create an encyclopaedic article, then it should be suggested to the user that they take it offline until they do actually intend on working it; otherwise it should be MfDed. Wikipedia isn't a free webhost. --Sam Blanning(talk) 16:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
It's a judgement call, and obviously we usually err on the side of assuming good faith even if it's been there a while. But keeping deleted articles in one's userspace has attracted negative consequences in arbitration cases before. If the articles being in the userspace aren't being a problem, then it's not being a problem - e.g. if the article content is noncontroversial. If the content is somehow controversial or problematic, then probably the first thing to do is to ask nicely what their plans are for them, perhaps offering editorial help. Heck, bring a deleted article back to a good condition is a very nice use of userspace - David Gerard 20:21, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Users adding {{user admin}} to their user page

I have seen some (vandalism-inclined) users adding {{user admin}} to their user page. I asked on Wikipedia:Help desk and they suggested I ask here. What should be done in these circumstances? The most recent one I saw I just blanked the userbox. Here is an example and history. -- Dgies 03:49, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

The best thing to do is just explain to the user that it can confuse people (i.e. if someone asked him to protect a page or block a user, he obviously wouldn't be able to do it). Khoikhoi 03:55, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I disagree. Adding that template, when you're not an admin, is a form of vandalism itself. I'd leave a note, remove the template, and then report them on the vandalism project. It's hard to imagine anyone clueless enough to do that as a mistake being clueful enough to know how to do it as a mistake. Therefore, the improper placement is somewhat proof of bad intent. Geogre 11:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
and let's face it - if you remove it (with a note) and they put it back it just confirms what you already think. --Charlesknight 11:27, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Agree, usage of the template when you're not one is disruptive. I've come across such users before, and they have only proved to be disruptive. There is no reason for the template to be on. – Chacor 11:38, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Nargis and Nargis (Actress)

We have articles about two different actresses who apparently have used the same single name. Any ideas on better disambiguation? We definitely need an Nargis (disambiguation) page, but other than that, {Actress) doesn't seem right. User:Zoe|(talk) 04:06, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, for what it's worth, the Nargis article talks about an Indian actress, where the Nargis (Actress) article talks about a Pakistani actress. The Nargis article also has a warning about a French city of the same name,Nargis, Loiret. I don't know if there are other references to Nargis or not. But as for the two actress articles, it may be best served by going with Nargis (Indian Actress) and Nargis (Pakistani Actress). Torinir ( Ding my phone My support calls E-Support Options ) 04:23, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Since the Indian actress was a superstar and the Pakistani one isn't, that would justify covering the more popular one at Nargis and the lesser known one at Nargis (Pakistani Actress). But for cultural harmony, I suppose you could compromise and go with going with Nargis (Indian Actress). Nargis (Actress) also had several statements that violated WP:BLP so I removed them. Finally, Zoe, this isn't an issue requiring administrator attention, a film or Bollywood Wikiproject page would have been better. This just requires regular input from any reasonable editors. Can you move this whole section please? - Taxman Talk 00:12, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Commons needs patrollers and admins

Commons is currently suffering a problem of a metric shitload of rubbish and copyvios, and not enough admins to do the cleanup work. Can anyone here help?

Patrollers who speak multiple languages are particularly valuable in this regard, but I expect anyone good would be reasonably welcome to adminship once they can show a reasonable amount of work on Commons itself.

Spanish and Portuguese speakers are particularly encouraged at present, because es: and pt: only allow image uploads directly to Commons.

Commons:Commons:Administrators

(I whined enough about it on commons-l myself that I'll be diving into shitwork on Commons soon as well ...) - David Gerard 20:16, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted content request

Could some admin copy the last version of Áine Chambers before deletion (now a redirect) to here, to try to make it into a more suitable article than the deleted version. Thanks - Рэдхот(t • c • e) 21:29, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I would normally, but I think in this instance you are better off asking the deleting admin David.Monniaux. He seems to have deleted it based on WP:BLP criticism, no independent sources, OTRS complaint. I'm not sure what OTRS complaint means, but it might be something official or legal, so I think it's best to check with him first. I'll post him a note to come here and comment. Steve block Talk 21:46, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Suggest that you start over from scratch. There is nothing worth undeleting I think. FloNight 00:24, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
For an explanation of OTRS, see Wikipedia:OTRS. It sounds as if someone complained to the Wikimedia Foundation about the article. --TruthbringerToronto (Talk | contribs) 00:32, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
The chances of a decent article emerging from this are slim. The subject appears to be notable solely for wearing short skirts and liking her native town, much to the delight of the Beavis and Butthead tendency among bloggers. Guy (Help!) 08:02, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A really odd one

A while back we deleted Patrick Buri (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs), deletion debate (blanked by Jimbo I'll get to that in a moment). A user, Amoona (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) and numerous invisible friends, created this article and reacted with what I can only describe as hysteria to its deletion, subsequently recreating it, demanding that the deletion debate be blanked, asked that the protected-deleted page be removed, editing every mention of the name Patrick Buri to P****** B*** on talk and project pages - the user clearly has a very close connection to Buri and has a real problem with the fact that the top few of the extremely limited number of Google hits are these debates (top 2 right now: [12]). From an "articles for creation" request [[13]], a day after the fifth of the eight deletions of this article, we see that Buri is a shareholder in Veritee, which markets a "neutraceutical wellness drink" (marketing bullshit for green tea). Seems that the AfD for Veritee was subject to the same nonsense: [14].

So now we have Netquantum (talk • contribs) posting on my Talk about Buri [15], saying that he is in contact with Buri's main company, Bankset, and working on an article which "should prove satisfactory" (which is unlikely since Bankset Investments gets only 110 ghits, as noted at AfD. Looking at the user's other contribs, he has attacked a user (User talk:Petegranger) as part of an apparent campaign to boost Veritee in an article on a competing product at Enviga (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) (which article, incidentally, sucks royally); see, for example, [16] and [17]. We also have the usual unarchived removal of incivility and controversy from the Talk page, and some really strange edits (e.g. [18]). So: is this Amoona returned? Or some other oddball? Guy 22:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Does it matter whether the accounts belong to the same person or not? Jkelly 22:41, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
It matters for two reasons: first, Amoona is indef-blocked, so if it's the same person then it's block evasion. Second, if it's the same person and they start agitating to re-create the article, then they probably need slapping with the Wikitrout. Guy (Help!) 23:03, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Another one of these? Is this going to be one of those things where the page gets deleted because it's pure bullshit (as per WP:ROGUE), and the author goes on a tantrum, with messages to Jimbo Wales and all (e.g., the Linda Christas International School hoax). I'm sorry if this is overly strong a response, bordering on uncivil, but I have to call them like I see them. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 03:46, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
The subject exists alright, but there appear to be next to no sources for an article and no evidence at all of significance. Guy (Help!) 07:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] James Hol

Anybody, I noticed this user was accusing me of rubbish, that I don't understand. Could you please check this out. James Hol has also vandalized my user page, check it out Kelvin Williams.

Could you please fix this probalem for me Kelvin Williams 01:37, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Indefinitely blocked. All edits were attacks on other Users. User:Zoe|(talk) 03:31, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] incorrect 3RR report

Can someone look into the admin actions of User:Sasquatch, in blocking User:Anarcho-capitalism for 3RR, while an incorrect 3RR report was filed by User:Donnachadelong. See WP:AN3RR#User:Anarcho-capitalism_reported_by_User:Donnacha_.28Result:12h.29. Intangible 13:57, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

  • Anarch was definitely edit warring; it appears to be an issue over the definition of the term "capitalism" as employed by several people. The fourth edit was different from the first three, but seems to serve the same purpose. It's also telling that one of the first actions Anarch took after his half-a-day block expired was to make a similar edit, albeit with weaker wording than he originally made. After this was reverted once more, he has now added {{pov-section}}, which seems like a reasonable solution. (Radiant) 16:33, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
    • If the user is edit warring, he should have been blocked for that. Blocking someone for 3RR should be based on WP:3RR. If the admin would have blocked User:Anarcho-capitalism for edit warring, User:Donnachadelong could and have been blocked as well. What's good for the goose, is good for the gander. Intangible 10:07, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
      • It appears that Sasquatch may have considered the fourth edit to be substantially similar to the first three. However, I notice he hasn't yet responded to your query. The other side of the edit war appears to consist of Donnacha and Libertatia, which explains why they have less reverts individually. Of course, two against one doesn't mean the two are right; it may have been better to protect the page rather than block the one party, but that's hindsight. At any rate, an RFC has now been opened, which may help. (Radiant) 11:05, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Criterion Collection infoboxes

It was suggesteed that I post this here so here goes. One of the pages on my watchlist is The Seven Samurai, I have noticed that in the last year, on two seperate occasions (Jan 29th and Sept 28th), the category "Criterion Collection films" were deleted. On Oct 22nd User: Cop 633 went around the category designation by creating an info box listing the CC's films in the order of their original release and began applying it to the films in question. On Nov 8th an anonymous user began removing them and yesterday User: Doctor Sunshine began putting thm back in. I am simply trying to get an administrator to take a look at this situation so that we can avoid an edit war. I understood the reasoning for taking the categories out, but, I have to say that they were less obtrusive than these boxes and they gave one a chance of seeing all of their releases on one page. Thanks for your assistance. MarnetteD | Talk 14:26, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Boxes are inherently less useful than categories, IMO. They add bulk without adding content. That's just me, though: I really am no box fan. (Don't fence me in, either.) If the purpose is to make finding common elements easy, then a cat works best. If the purpose is to advertise for Criterion, then the box, which forces you to see every film whenever you look at information for one film, is better. I regard the latter to be outside of our purpose. Geogre 17:35, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Ugh! Talk about your box hell: that article is worse than a UPS wharehouse. It occurs to me that people are sometimes looking for information about the thing at the top of the page, not about "films of Kurasawa," "budget," "preceded by/followed by" in the Criterion Collection, etc. You know a box is one thing, but five is a bit much, and I worry that our poor reader will have so many voices shouting at her eyes, saying, "Read me!" that she won't learn anything about that particular film. Geogre 13:33, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
As some dick once said: "When I retire I'm going to spend my evenings by the fireplace going through those boxes. There are things in there that ought to be burned.". (Geogre, I enjoy being on the side of the angels for once!). --Docg 14:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalizing personal page & Death threat issued to Tamilians and WP:NCSLC members

A vandal who has vandalized my page twice with personal attack phrases and also other pages many times has been caught. Poor guy he forgot to turn off his signature script and the user is none other than a registered user who previously vandalised the Velupillai Prabhakaran page - SnowolfD4. Note the ones below:

1). Please check this topic "F..ing Demalu, we want you all dead. Your and your NCSLC bull. Need some good 'ole lynch. --snowolfD4( talk / @ )". He has vandalized my userpage and talk page with foul language and racist remarks. He had to do two changes, one with his signature and the other with his signature removed and both of them from this IP 208.101.4.34. He is caught redhanded trying to vandalize pages with his signature turned on by mistake.

2). His post in my talk page which is clearly personal attack/vandalism

3). FYI, the user has already been blocked thrice in Wikipedia. He has resorted to using abusive language and 'Demalu' means 'Tamilians' and he basically wants all 'F** Tamilians to die, which quite evidently is a bad racist remark and also my WP:NCSLC project closed, which goes completely against Wiki policies.

4). Please notice that the same IP/User has involved in anonymous IP Edits Killing Wiki editors, abusive language and blanking out in another page and also killing of all Tamilians in another usepage as evident from his contributions page

I kindly request you to step in and take stern action so that it can be avoided in the future. Thanks, and expecting your prompt action to maintain Wikipedia norms. If he is continuing even after three warnings including a 24-hour block, I think he is really going berserk. Thanks Sudharsansn (talk • contribs) 17:26, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Blocked indef pending checkuser verification. Naconkantari 17:28, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks for your help. I am not sure if the IP has been blocked or the user as the case seems to be the user masking his IP and mistakenly posting his signature. Can someone please help me with the Checkuser procedure? Thanks Sudharsansn (talk • contribs) 17:47, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
This discussion is continued on WP:AN/I. Please reply there. Naconkantari 17:54, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Question about publishing information..

Hello, I wanted to ask what about adding a page about in important character in my country Palestine.. who has huge contribution and foundation for many institutes and a university, as he's one of the executive commette members in the palestinial liberation organization.. I wanted to ask about that.. so can i or not? (nothing offensive, this person has many published papers and many discoveries written under his own name, he's a Prof.Dr in geology and he's a member of a number of international water resource institutes and the head of the Palestinian Water Delegation) please help me..

Since I don't know the exact detials the best answer I can give is probably. Just make sur the article says why he is significant.Geni 20:49, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Ok I will add it then i will inform you to check it out and see.. if it violates i will remove it immediately.

[edit] Speedy deletion candidate?

Could someone look at Peter cramp and its associated AfD and decide whether it's a speedy deletion please - its obviously going to be deleted but it doesn't quite meet {{db-bio}}, {{db-nonsense}} or {{db-attack}}, though it borders on all three. Thanks. – Tivedshambo (talk) 20:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

I removed the questionable material, meaning the entire article, but I've left the page up for the AfD to run its course. Melchoir 20:51, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
And I speedied it, problem solved -- Tawker 21:03, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rafaella Biscayn-Debest

Hi, I need some help from an admin to sort out the Rafaella Biscayn-Debest page; it is the result of a move of User talk:Rafaella Biscayn-Debest, but I can not move it back because the redirect has been blanked. What I think should be done:

  • Delete User talk:Rafaella Biscayn-Debest per CSD G6 (make way for a noncontroversial move)
  • Move the page
  • Delete the redirect Rafaella Biscayn-Debest per CSD G3 (nonsense redirects that are created from the cleanup of page move vandalism).

Thanks in advance for any help ! Cheers, Schutz 23:01, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Concur with your analysis, and done. (Note that admins can move a page over a non-trivial history, so that the first two actions can be one admin action.) — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 23:25, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
I did not know about this, obviously, but it makes sense. Thanks ! Schutz 09:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/Pflanzgarten (5th)

This case went untouched for way more than 10 days, so I'm posting here so an Administrator can close it. All the users were blocked already I believe. I c e d K o l a (Contributions) 23:45, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to follow up on bv template

This turned up on AIV:

Its talk page has just one warning template, but a final one, {{bv}}. After vandalizing again, is it immediately blockable? Melchoir 00:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Look at the contribs. This person is obviously just testing and needs to be directed to the sandbox... {{bv}} wasn't appropriate here. Jkelly 00:15, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree, but it would look quite strange to follow {{bv}} with {{test}}. Melchoir 00:21, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
So delete the bv boilerplate and overwrite it {{test}}, or with something handwritten. {{bv}} should really be reserved for malicious vandal accounts. Jkelly 00:22, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I had added a test template but I just looked again and he has been blocked by another admin... Cbrown1023 00:31, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Okay, well, I'll do that next time. Thanks! Melchoir 00:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
bv might have been a little harsh, but there are a few diffs like this one; I'm not sure jumping to test2 would have been wholly out of order. Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 01:26, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I saw that the editor had made negative and uncyclopedic edits to Ottawa Senators and I gave them a 31-hour block. If anyone felt this isn't justified, feel free to change the block duration. Nishkid64 01:30, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Endorse block. -- Samir धर्म 06:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jeff Bowden - request for speedy handling of copyvio

Yesterday, I tagged Jeff Bowden as a {{copyvio}}. The article initially was nothing but an attack page [19]. Then, it was replaced with a copy/paste of Bowden's official bio from FSU. The current version had changed very little and was still mostly a carbon copy. As there was no good version to revert to, I tagged it as a copyvio.

I have started on Jeff Bowden/Temp and I would like to request that an administrator "speedy" handle the copyvio version. Jeff Bowden is in the news right now and he is one of the top 10 hottest topics in college football this week. Could an administrator go ahead and delete Jeff Bowden and replace it with Jeff Bowden/Temp, rather than waiting the full seven days? Thanks. BigDT 12:46, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Done. Morwen - Talk 13:09, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks! Much appreciated! BigDT 13:12, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More regarding Bobabobabo

This is an e-mail I received from a person alleging herself to be Bobabobabo (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log)'s teacher:

Dear user,
Many of my students at my Private School called the "Learning Community School" are complaining about being blocked from the internet site called "Wikipedia The Free Encyclopedia". I don't know the reason for this six month ban. The private school IP is 72.177.68.38, which is located in a residential area of Austin.
I has asked some of the student if they vandalized Wikipedia, many of the students are bullying a student, which was a contributor of Wikipedia under the name Bobabobabo which what she told was having problems with some users over Pokamon articles which looking up articles not school related is against the rules, so the three students began creating user names and began vandalizing the pages that Bobabobabo editted. She and I talked about the bullying. I restricted the three students from using the computer until next year.
I hope you can reconsider unblocking the IP and Bobabobabo because what she has told was she being made fun.
Thank you,
Lisa
6th Grade Social Studies Teacher

It seems to have a ring of truth to it, but is sent from an yahoo.com address, which can of course be faked by anyone. It also doesn't boost my confidence that just a day earlier, Bobabobabo had (as far as i know, falsely) told me that Centrx (talk • contribs) agreed to have her block lifted. However, I agreed to post the e-mail here to ask for consensus on this. I still do not particularly endorse granting or denying this request. --Nlu (talk) 16:43, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

This is a joke. The spelling (and grammar) is awful, and she would have sent it from a school email address, not yahoo. yandman 16:46, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Let's just wash our hands of this Bobabobabo business and be done with her and her school. Nlu, if you wish, I can disclose to you the email address of Bobabobabo and compare it with the email address from "Lisa Mercato." Just send me an email, and I will get back to you once I am out of my Marine Bio lecture.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 18:14, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
An idea: why not ask her to send an email from her .edu address in order to verify her title? I don't think that's asking too much; if we're dealing with a 6 month ban, and just considering ignoring her anyway, I don't think another day or two hastle in getting her to send it from an official address would be a problem. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 18:27, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Based on that email, I wonder why the teacher is asking for the block to be lifted. The teacher realizes Bobabobabo was using school computers to edit Pokemon articles, which is against their rules. Why would a teacher ask us to lift a ban that would allow a student to go back to breaking school rules? Because she feels bad the student was bullied? Hmm...Metros232 18:34, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

I think you might want to talk to Can't sleep, clown will eat me - he says he blocked it long term becuase it was an open proxy. I might point out that the teacher's claims hold up - there were a lot of Pokemon changes, but little vandalism. But as a teacher, I can understand why she would be frustrated that her class was blocked. In any case, I def advise talking to Clown. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 18:50, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Haha, you got that email too? I got the email last week because I blocked some of the sockpuppets of Bobabobabo. They claimed it was a 6th grade student, and I still said no. I later received an email from the teacher, and then another one from "Bobabobabo". It's all BS. Nishkid64 19:32, 7 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, one of the IPs was an open proxy (the website claims that it allows you to use MySpace at school). The other IP Raul654 said (when we double checked the massive sockfarm listed somewhere above) was a residential IP address, which is more than likely her own (unless the school uses Roadrunner/Comcast, whatever it was).—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 22:16, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

The "IP Info" button on the IP's talk page is a wonderful thing. I've got the school's contact e-mail and I'm writing to them myself. DurovaCharge! 16:57, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Never mind, open proxy. What school would use that? This is nonsense from start to finish. DurovaCharge! 17:00, 8 November 2006 (UTC)
Two were open proxies, and then there was 72.177.68.38 (talk • contribs • WHOIS) which belongs to Road Runner. I am not sure about the fourth... —Ryūlóng (竜龍) 22:55, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Latest sock unblock attempt from this most persistent vandal. (aeropagitica) 18:51, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Two more admins have contacted me today saying they have received similar emails and wanted to know what was going on. 19:57, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

I got one today from Bobabobabo begging to be unblocked. (Can you say "delete button"?) --Ginkgo100 talk · e@ 20:24, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Just for the record, I also used to get e-mails from Bobabobabo (as well as some spammage on my talk) after I blocked some of supposedly Interrobamf's socks (that turned out to be Bobabobabo's per CU), but pretty different in nature - he/she asked me to protect a few Pokemon articles, block users like Ryulong, User:Interrobamf, A Man In Black etc. Needless to say, I have promptly ignored these requests, but the e-mails came from 2 different @lycos.com addresses. Misza13 16:58, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

With all 81 sockpuppets, and various attempts to forgo process on the Pokemon articles, I would heavily suggest not giving this one heed. If he/she wants to contribute constructively, he/she can create another account, and handle things better with them. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 07:55, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
The question is, how do we deal with this issue? --SunStar Net 18:39, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Maybe create a page for admins who receive e-mails from idiots who incessantly ask to be unblocked under various false pretenses, telling them it's all bogus. —Centrx→talk • 19:09, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Yes please, put it on his/her main userpage, perhaps? I just recieved an email, substantially the same as above, with the inclusion of "Johan has a spirit partner named Ruby Carbuncle, who he affectionately nicknames "Ruby."" which I cannot make heads or tails of, maybe its a Pokemon thing? At any rate, a boilerplate email to send upon receipt might be in order at this point. I wonder, however, if this 13 year old might be worth a second chance, after a detailed explanation of socks and not to use them, along with a We Shall Know type warning? Or am I being too optimistic here? It is clear that regardless of whether this person created multiple accounts, or has some bad friends, Wikipedia is very important to him or her. KillerChihuahua?!? 19:22, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Done. I suppose I should not add "This person has pretended to be a 6th-grader, then the teacher, then the principal, but the whole time he was actually just an ass. —Centrx→talk • 20:24, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh damn, that's a tough call.... Looks like you chose to be Civil, I'm proud of you. KillerChihuahua?!? 23:14, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Hmm, I feel like starting at new category: 'Admins who have been emailed by Bobabobabo'. Just out of interest, has anyone tried to contact the school itself? Surely that would be the quickest way to confirm for certain that this is nonesense? --Robdurbar 17:41, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

I also received an email from Grace (Bobabobabo) asking me to unblock her. From the poor level of English it seems obvious to me that Grace (Bobabobabo) and Lisa Mercato who sent the email above are the same person.--Húsönd 18:23, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Have you compared the IPs used to send the e-mails? Headers can be forged of course but especially if these are from Yahoo or other webmail providers, the IP used should be obvious Nil Einne 17:49, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Seems that this user may have tried to go to the Japanese wiki Ja:利用者:Bobabobabo. But was promptly blocked when someone recognised the username. If it's the same person, s/he appears to understand Japanese or perhaps s/he was either copying and pasting or used babelfish etc Nil Einne 18:14, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Proposal for independent board

Certain editors of wikipedia, most notably User:Tobias Conradi, have repeatedly expressed misgivings about what they see as being possible collusion among administrators. The downside of this is that, unfortunately, the only people who have the authority to really discipline administrators are in fact other administrators, whom these individuals can then accuse of colluding with the administrator whose possible discipline is at issue. To date, I seriously doubt that this is a major issue, but it could become one, particularly as the individual mentioned above seems to possibly be heading for a long-term ban from wikipedia, which he would then, of course, blame on the collusion of the admins. On that basis I have created a proposal for a group consisting of admins, non-admins, and possibly even Wikimedia beaureaucrats and employees which might take complaints regarding admin conduct which they either feel other admins might not be competent to judge and/or as a alternate process, or possibly a higher or lower step in the same process. Basically, something like the police boards of most areas. The proposal is at User:Badbilltucker/Admin Oversight Board, and I would welcome any input, positive or negative. Badbilltucker 15:07, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I like the concept and the idea. However, this would clutter the work of Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard. Is there any detail concerning what and when to refer to the AOB instead of the AN? -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 15:23, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Sounds like it would act as an Administrators's Noticeboard for the paranoid in practice. The rest of the time, it would be a duplicate of WP:RFC/ADMIN. --tjstrf Now on editor review! 15:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree with both of the above. Personally, I think it would work best if it were created as a secondary, or appeal, step for someone who has already applied to the administrators and not been satisfied with the response, or been the subject of administrator action which s/he feels isn't justified. The person presenting the case would be obliged to provide all the evidence for their claim when presenting it. The oversight board could then review the case and either agree to "take on" the case or decide not to take it on. In the latter event, they would be indicating that they substantially agreed with the original decision by not taking on the case. Also, in the rare instances when an admin actually is being considered for discipline, it could potentialy function as the jury in the case. Also, with any luck, the non-admins on the committee would be individuals specifically chosen on a case-by-case basis, maybe from a list of potential members. This might consist of people whose RfA has failed for reasons not related to conduct and/or long-time generally respected editors who for whatever reason have chosen not to seek adminship. Such individuals would probably be most likely to be considered least inclined to automatically support administrator action. Of course, as it is only a proposal, any alternative suggestions are welcome. Badbilltucker 16:03, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Sounds good. I'll maybe suggest that only non-admin users under Wikipedia:Esperanza/Admin coaching would join. This is to encourage non-admins to learn adminship before RfA's. It is just like hitting to birds w/ a single stone. -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 16:54, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
An interesting idea, but would letting only people who are undergoing admin coaching stop any user who simply never wishes to be an admin from being part of this? Thε Halo Θ 17:09, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

You're proposing a board consisting of trusted non-admins. AFAICS, there are three categories of candidates from this board:

  1. Trusted users who could be an admin, but who are not interested in adminship;
  2. New users who want to file an RfA in the future;
  3. Users who failed an RfA (or who would fail an RfA if they would be nominated).

I cannot really see why the first group would want to be a member of the board; they are either more interested in writing an encyclopedia. I wouldn't encourage the second group to join such a board: if the board would be effective, they would antagonize a lot of sitting admins. And I don't understand why we admins would trust the third group with overseeing us, when we don't even trust them to be an admin themselves. And without approval of the majority of our admins (who are, by and large, a very reasonable bunch of people), your board will not have the authority it needs to deal with problems.

The AOB would only have as much authority as admins would allow it to, and I don't think it will have very much. A better idea would be to create a board of (say, 15) trusted admins and non-admins, elected not only by admins, but by everyone with a low minimum number of edits. That board would then have the authority to arbitrate in conflicts between admins and non-admins, and perhaps also between two admins or two nonadmins. Perhaps we could even involve Jimbo in the selection, to be sure the board has the authority it needs. -- Eugène van der Pijll 17:31, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

According to WP:1000, I am the most prolific member of Wikipedia who has never applied for adminship (and who never would) and is still active in the project. But it does not mean that I would not volunteer to take part in the board if its activities make sense to me. Regards, Ghirla -трёп- 15:21, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
That would work, as it is a large enough number to allow any of the parties on the board to recuse themselves if they are in any way involved in the case. IF we could have one or two of the official staff of wikimedia involved as well, maybe Jimbo and/or anyone else, that would lend even more authority to the decisions, and make it very hard for any admin to ignore it. And it may not be a bad idea to require that any of the non-admins undergo some sort of admin coaching to prepare themselves for being on the board, whether they ever intend to become admins or not. Badbilltucker 17:35, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
My idea was to encourage the would-be admins to do their homework (i.e. AOB). We really need future admins to be more dispute resolution oriented. This would exclude users who failed an RfA. As for the AOB committee, i don't see 15 people enough to handle this. -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 17:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Remember, only those people who failed the RfA for non-conduct-related reasons would likely ever even be considered. So if someone who has been around for a fair time who still hasn't had a featured article, and failed for apparently that reason alone, were to be nominated, they would still have to receive a consensus vote to be on the board. That should exclude any who are too new or "tempermental". Also, as the board's meetings would probably take place in plain sight, either on the channels or on a board, transparency shouldn't be a problem. And, very likely, the majority of these persons would probably still have as many "followers" as "leaders". And if Jimbo or one of the other staff were to agree to take part, something I would dearly love to see happen, then a concern that has been expressed elsewhere could also be addressed by this group. Specifically, the potential legal complications an admin might face if he were sued in court for suspending someone with more money than sense or who otherwise wanted to get attention. If the staff or directors were to themselves be in the group which agrees to the action of the admin, then it's harder to sue the suspending admin for their actions which wikimedia has supported. I don't know how likely this scenario is either, but at least one admin, User:Kingboyk, had expressed concerns about it elsewhere. Badbilltucker 17:52, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
I see this as fine. Now, what would be the difference between the hearings of Arbitration Committee and the AOB's ones? -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 18:03, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Why don't you find people who are experienced in conflict resolution and the like in real life, Magistrates, etc?--ElvisThePrince 18:06, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Answers to the above two: the Arbritration Committee, so far as I understand, acts on things beyond simply questions of admin misconduct. This group would deal with nothing else. Also, if anyone knows of any wikipedians who are real-life jurists who would be willing to take part in such a board, and were to be able to verify their credentials somehow, I imagine that those individuals would be looked upon very favorably as potential members. Badbilltucker 18:15, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
This list may sound funny but it may help...
Wikipedian emergency responders, firefighters, law enforcement workers, lawyers, lay first aiders, psychologists, Wikipedians interested in law. -- Szvest Wiki me up ® 18:36, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

There are over 1000 administrators. What exactly are the chances of collusion?

If the argument is that only a small number of administrators read or edit this noticeboard, or that administrator misconduct gets lost in the other discussions, why not address that, rather than a complicated approach that calls for elections and potentially conflicted "authorities"? In other words, if collusion seems possible in the current processes, why not modify those?

For example, there might be something like a RfRoAA (Request for Review of Administrator Action), where the agrieved party (non-admin) selects (say) two administrators who he/she feels aren't biased, as part of the RfRoAA; two administrators without involvement in the dispute volunteer to join the panel review the actions of the administrator in question; and the four of them select a 5th in some way (for example, from a standing pool of administrators who agree to be available) to fill out the panel. (This is somewhat analogous to arbitration.) If the complaining party has to come forward with two admins (who have agreed in advance to participate), then the process should be underway pretty quickly, and if the issue is simply whether an admin behaved properly, it's pretty easy to get a quick decision. That decision might not be binding in any way, but it at least would address the "collusion" issue, and would provide some help if the issue escalates. John Broughton | Talk 22:18, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

It is a good idea in order to avoid conflict of interests as well i would say. Szvest Wiki me up ® 10:59, 14 November 2006 (UTC)


I agree that this seems to be an unnecessary complication. We see almost every day on ANI how hard it can be to get a consensus on action against a user or admin, so I don't see much likelihood that a few admins will successfully collude to impose inappropriate sanctions. I don't think a review board will satisfy users who complain that they are being abused by some cabal of admins. -- Donald Albury 11:12, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Bad idea built from two flawed ideas.

  1. possible collusion among administrators. Collusion means operating in secrecy. Anything on Wikipedia is in the open.
  2. the only people who have the authority to really discipline administrators are in fact other administrators We have arb-com and Jimbo, who really do discipline administrators too.

This sounds like a case of x disagrees with y, but there is a consenus that y is okay. x refuses to accept that consensus. x needs to accept the consensus or build a consensus the other way or leave or fork or face community sanction. If we geared Wikipedia more to allowing x to be right, how would WIkipedia work, with thousands of x's all being right. Ultimately, Wikipedia has to run on agreement. If you can't learn to agree or compromise, how do you aid Wikipedia? Steve block Talk 11:27, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Just a minor point Anything on Wikipedia is in the open. is not strictly true - I've seen any number of complaints on this noticeboard where one admin will say "and I emailed details about that thing to other admins" or "I discussed it with X in an email". --Charlesknight 11:41, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Plus whilst it may in theory be open there are so many places hidden away on Wikipedia that it wouldn't be too hard to hide any discussion, also isn't the admin email list closed, not to mention IRC channels.--ElvisThePrince 11:53, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Okay, I did anticipate these points, hence my use of the phrase anything on Wikipedia. Now yes, people can attempt to hide stuff, but the problem here seems to be that somebody feels people are complaining that when admin's agree on the admin's noticeboard, that is collusion. Admin's emailing each other can be seen to be collusion, but the place for discussing admin actions is, I believe, the main page associated to this talk page. (Note I'm phrasing carefully now to avoid misunderstanding.) If people think there is a problem with an admin action, they bring it here to be discussed. It doesn't really matter if there has been collusion, since there will then be a discussion of what happened and whether it was right or not. That's what's important, not any claims of collusion. We comment on the issue, not the user. How a decision to act is reached is less important than whether it was the right action to take. I wasn't aware we had an admin mailing list, to be honest. IRC is a whole 'nother ball game, one I have no interest in playing. The point I am making is this. The premise is flawed, because the solution to any problem there may be here is to generate discussion on Wikipedia in a high profile place, and then if there is a problem, act on any consensus or use the dispute resolution process. The problem is not as stated, which is actually a premise born from flaws. Steve block Talk 12:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I think the problem is that some people feel that the there is a certain element of (some) admins backing each other up regardless of the merits of the case. Whilst most of us may consider that view to be wrong the lack of any perceived accountability towards the no-admin community is I think what the suggestion is seeking to "ensure not only that justice is done, but that it is seen to be done", if you get my drift, it's clear to me that many (some) don't consider Jimbo or Arb-Com to be sufficiently "without fear or favour, affection or ill will" because they are all admins and/or establishment in their view.(Note: Not a view I share I should add).--ElvisThePrince 13:19, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I think then that we agree on part of what the problem might be, but not the solution. I do think, however, that what admins do isn't dispense justice, but mop up. So there may be disagreement one whether we need to eat off the surface or whether we use plates. Look, "it is a powerful hard thing to please all of the people all of the time". I'm not sure there is a consensus that arb-com is redundant. What seems to happen to me is that people who can't change Wikipedia to their own ends declare this to be the case. Wikipedia should always be an agreeable place, and a place where agreements are made and respected. Agitation is not helpful and not warranted and not part of our policies.
If 99 admins support an action, is the one not supporting right to throw accusations of "admins backing each other up regardless of the merits of the case" or should they assume good faith? Legitimate complaints will always be heard. If someone has a legitimate complaint, they should air it here. There must, though be a point at which there is acceptance of the fact that their legitimate complaint may prove unfounded, and in cases where it is proved so, there must be acceptance of that fact. We should not endeavour to create forum after forum in which people may complain because they feel the last forum was unfavourable. If people feel Jimmy is tainted, then I think they have to leave or fork, because as it stands Jimmy is at the top of the tree. Now I have a healthy disrespect of authority figures too, and I've had my share of disagreements with Jimmy too, but at the end of the day the place is structured with him at the top. The only way to change that is to fork or leave. Steve block Talk 14:34, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I wrote Wikipedia:Administrator Review with the same goal, but there wasn't enough interest to go anywhere with it. WP:RFC/ADMIN seems to meet all of the proposed goals of this idea, I haven't seen compelling evidence that this offers anything additional. An existing process with community 'cred' should always trump new red tape, in my opinion. One thing that hasn't really gotten air time in this discussion that I'd be remiss to neglect is this: Most people who find themselves on the wrong side of a block or other admin action probably think it was unjustified. There, I said it. It's the 800lb gorilla that everyone has been carefully avoiding making eye contact with. The number of people hit with a block who say "Yeah, I appreciate the vacation, thank you for the block" is microscopic. If too much credence is given to the pencil threat that admins are colluding against the defenseless editors, it'll encourage a specific group of users who see conspiracies everywhere that they themselves are not responsible for any community censure, it's obviously one of the conspiracy admins. This isn't healthy, and would create a real barrier to keeping the signal/noise ratio positive. Tobias Conrad is used prominently as an example of why this new process should exist, but he's also a good demonstration of the deep flaw in the concept, because a review of his actions shows that he appears to think EVERY admin action that he objects to is an example of abuse and is more evidence of some sort of plot against him. We'd be doing both him and the encyclopedia a disservice if we gave him an alternative to assuming good faith, because WP:AGF is the foundation our discussions here must be built on. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 15:42, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

While not disagreeing that the question of collusion and group admin misconduct is a generally fairly ridiculous one, I think that the purpose of having such a board is to hopefully fend off the possibility of the question being asked in the first place. If there is no "higher authority" or independent authority (and the arbitration committee is almost all admins), some irresponsible journalist (yes, there are such things) might be able to create a probably unsubstantiated story out of the accusation which would damage wikipedia, true or not. In practice, the oversight board would really only be called into existence when one of the rare cases which have substantiation is introduced. Otherwise, all that would happen would be rulings to the effect of "insufficient evidence put forward to justify a hearing", which would be given out by the few "clerks" of the board. I would think around 95% or more of the cases presented would clearly fall in this category. That being the case, only those in the "board clerk" group examing the cases would be involved, and then only to the point of reviewing the case and finding it to lack evidence. The number of "cases" this board would actually "hear" would probably be in the range of no more than a few dozen per year, if that. Also, having the spectre of the potential of such independent overview hanging over their head would probably make potentially abusive admins even less likely to engage in misconduct in the first place. If, as I think, two dozen cases per year would be the probable maximum heard, I would think maybe six total non-admins editors would ever be required to "fill out" the board (two or three per case), and we probably have at least half that number of non-admins already listed as agreeing to the proposal. Secondly, as has been indicated above, if an at least somewhat independent group were to rule that a given admin in a given case did not act improperly, the likelihood of an aggrieved party filing a costly civil suit against that admin would be greatly reduced, if not eliminated, on the basis of the board's "not guilty" ruling. I hope it is understood that this would not be a regular active part of wikipedia culture, but just an "emergency clause" brought into play when the situation calls for it. Shutting up now. :) Badbilltucker 16:08, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
I think you're underestimating how much traffic a board like this will attract. —Doug Bell talk•contrib 16:41, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Dramaticaly so. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 17:00, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Possibly, but that would only affect the "clerks" who review the claims, not the total number of cases heard, which would all require substantiation to qualify. Maybe a dozen "elerks" would be required, and they could be gathered from Wikipedia:Esperanza or similar organizations. Badbilltucker 17:04, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
Sorry for the tone here, but seriously, would no journalist think to write a story noting that whilst articles languish needing clean-up, a dozen or so Wikipedians are sorting out what arguments between users should be settled by a committee of grandees? I really do take the points you make Bill, but I don't see the problem. And what sort of authority is this board going to have? And where will it fit in with arb-com? And what's going to happen when a number of users accuse this board of collusion? Do we set up another board and fill it with people the complainant can hand pick? If you think an admin is out of order raise it here. If there are a few of you, start an RFC. We've got a dispute resolution process already, and mostly it asks us to talk about the problem, not create and empower committees and clerks to the committee who get to discuss which issues should be discussed. I'd guess this committee would need a secret mailing list and before you know it, blammo. The arb-com is voted for, and is mandated by the community. If people feel there are too many admins on the committee, maybe those people should stand up and run. Steve block Talk 19:57, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Arbitrary section break and my own random comments

  1. If a user feels he is being ganged up on there is already the AMA. How is this different?
  2. Any findings made by a board of non-admins could only be advisory, one or more admins would have to carry out any actions. If there really is a cabal, what makes you think another board will help? If there is not a cabal, why would review of the admins' actions on the noticeboards not be sufficient?
  3. If your board has an admin or two who carry out findings that are not supported by admin consensus, isn't that wheel warring?
  4. If you start out with a dozen clerks, you might have two active at the end of the first month. I speak from experience.
  5. If you give the clerks screening authority to bring cases before the board then they're not really clerks, at least not in the same sense as arbitration and checkuser clerks, who have no screening authority. Arguably you would need even more stringent selection procedures for the clerks than for the whole board.

Count me as not a fan. Thatcher131 17:15, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I agree with Thatcher and fear such a board would cause more problems then it might solve. Mackensen (talk) 18:15, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I appreciate your effort to help but I have my concerns also. Likely it is another place that I'm going to need to put on my watchlist so I can stay on top of the major issues and problems. Already too many of those. Be prepared for clueless newbies that do not understand dispute resolution and will leave discouraged no matter what you do, experienced users with longstanding grudges against each other, trolls and abusive sockpuppets. You will get plenty of these, our other boards do regularly. FloNight 18:40, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I'd want to see some evidence of actual collusion, as opposed to concerted action against a vandal. I think we already have too many places people have to go to look for help, to the point where I suspect many users never manage to find it. Not that I'm opposed to oversight in principle. Perhaps ArbCom should have fast-track procedure for alleged abuse of admin tools? Most such allegations, though, turn out to be routine "rouge admin abuse", as noted above. Guy 19:36, 14 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I think the proposal has structural flaws, as discussed above. I understand the underlying purpose — to fend off charges of cabalism — but I think that's ultimately a doomed cause. The people who raise the most vocal and vociferous accusations of grand conspiracies are also the sort who engage in vexatious and meritless litigation. A painstakingly independent oversight board isn't going to convince these people to change; they'll just declare that The Cabal has co-opted the board as well and go off to WR in high dudgeon, just as before. Furthermore, I think that expecting journalists to understand all the ramifications of the Wikipedia power structure is over-sanguine. I think we're better off leaving that 5% or whatever of justified cases to go to the ArbCom (whose power to examine all parties is a strong deterrent against vexatious litigation). Accountability is good, but I think this proposal would drain off a great deal of energy trying to satisfy the unsatisfiable, which would be better employed in our present dispute resolution mechanisms. Choess 07:36, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
  • For a long view, the accusations have always been with us. That does not mean that they can be dismissed, but it does mean that the existence of a disgruntled/paranoid (these are poles in the continuum, not a characterization of any one editor) people who are accusing the project of being run by a group of abusers is not, by itself, a compelling argument. There are several problems that have arisen. The first is that every user now has the ability to plead to any "court" on Wikipedia, but users either don't believe it or don't know how or don't believe that the hearing will be fair. The question is whether we have several others to agree and if there is specific illustration of the unfairness. I know that there are groups of people who cover for one another, and I, too, have felt that we have had some animals more equal than others, but that has to be addressed person by person. As for not knowing how to present a case, we are at a loss. Do everyday users know what WP:AMA is, where it is, how it works? Do they know RFAR? Do they know where the mediation pages are? None of that is immediately clear, and none of it is particularly easy to use. Even after finding and reading instructions, users can find lack of action, and if they're really off base with their complaints, they may get convinced that that is part of the problem, too. The credibility (not believing it will work) is another matter. Actions against administrators are becoming slightly more common, and I honestly believe that we are on the downhill side of the effort to get administrators held to the same standard as everyone else. Meanwhile, we have been coming up with a ton of informal processes to help out in these cases, such as the mediation cabal, and I'm not against anything new that relieves the pressures, even though I think we need more education about existing procedures than new procedures. Geogre 10:19, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I hold the opinion that admins are largely not accountable to the user community (would be 'not at all accountable' except that ArbCom sometimes takes action in extreme cases) and that this is detrimental to us as admins and Wikipedia as a whole. As such, I'm very much in favor of making admins more accountable, but don't know that this proposal would particularly achieve that. As the 'review panel' would be no more answerable to the community for their positions than the admins are, the dynamics and outcome would likely be identical. ArbCom is, to an extent, answerable to the community and thus indirectly serves to address this need of admin accountability, but ArbCom is flooded with cases and never takes action against 'minor' admin improprieties... which can have a major impact on the individual users on the receiving end. Every week I see admins calling users trolls and vandals over trivial content disputes... while other admins block users for the exact same sort of statements. I see admins editing and even edit warring on pages and then protecting them - despite this being one of the very few things we are specifically told not to do. I see admins threatening or even placing blocks for users who disagree with them about how to phrase something as NPOV. Et cetera. Nearly every time I point out that an admin has done something which is against policy I get, 'whose side are you on - the admins or the trolls'? Or 'why are you enabling them'? As if it were an 'either / or' situation... rather than the reality where users and admins can do the wrong thing and both ought to be called to account for it. To me it seems obvious that the inability of the community to easily remove an admin who has 'lost their trust' (the standard for becoming an admin in the first place) leads inevitably to community dissatisfaction and anger towards admins. Even if admins didn't often react with hostility to gentle nudges towards civility, and behaved with scrupulous fairness towards the user base... still this would breed considerable dissatisfaction at perceived unfairness. As we are not all saints this is instead magnified to seething hatred in some quarters, to the detriment of the entire project. --CBD 13:37, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree to a certain extent with CBD's concerns. If we admins want to change our own culture we can do it. If we don't, no new committee or board will be able to either. Thatcher131 16:01, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Ah but the problem is that there is a section of the community (although a minority) that thinks that such self-regulation has and is failing, this isn't at all helped by the fact that all the members of the arb com are admins (yes I know the mantra admins are the most respected, yadda, yadda, but your preaching to the choir here it's not me you have to persuade), so it again comes down to "Justice must not only be done; it must also be seen to be done." which this suggestion would seem to address, of course it will never persuade everyone but it's my feeling that it would persuade most (or at least more).--ElvisThePrince 01:36, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Resources of Sheboygan Club

Resources of Sheboygan Club (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log): Single purpose account. m:Role account? John Reid ° 12:21, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

See [20]. John Reid ° 02:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Threats of legal action

An IP address (4.191.245.163) recently removed content from the War Eagle article. After I reverted their change, which was not explained, I received this message threatening legal action if something wasn't done within 48 hours. I know this is an absolutely zero tolerance kind of situation on Wikipedia, but I'm unaware of the process. The link above is a diff to the IP's comment on my page; the content being removed can be seen here. Thanks, -- AuburnPilottalk 16:08, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Looks to me like we need a WP:RS cite on the bit about Shelnutt's dismissal, and the anon needs to be informed of our no legal threats policy. I find it just a bit ironic that the anon is insisting on adding a blatant copyright infringement from AP, with the "do not copy this" note included. Antandrus (talk) 16:19, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
The legal threats are unacceptable, but WP:LIVING as well as RS need to be applied to this portion of the article. Newyorkbrad 16:46, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

This person now seems to be using multiple IP addresses in order to blank the same content: 4.191.246.163, 4.191.245.163, and 4.191.246.28. -- AuburnPilottalk 19:14, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

The information was negative, unsourced, and about a living person. WP:BLP requires that such is removed immediately, without question (and such removals are not subject to WP:3RR, by the way). I have removed the info, so please do not re-insert it unless it gets cited. For reference, WP:BLP actually describes this particular situation (an anon blanking a section with unsourced negative info). Yes, the anon did not explain in the edit summary, but in cases like this, always take a quick look at what's being blanked in case it is a situation like this. Regards, MartinRe 23:53, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
I took much more than a quick look. Considering the anon claimed to be the wife of the Living Person and threatened legal action, there is much more to the situation. I have reverted your change, provided sources, and ask that you not remove entire paragraphs when half of one sentence would do the job. -- AuburnPilottalk 23:58, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
What I removed was uncited negative information, concerning living people, the department in question, and a person mentioned by name. Any uncited information may be removed by any editor at any time (WP:BLP only insists on the immediate removal of -ve info about living people) so my removal of most of the paragraph was perfectly valid. We should strive to remove all uncited information from wikipedia, not just that which people complain about. As a source has been found, it should be sorted now, as I don't regard your latest edit as a "revert", I removed "uncited information", you added "cited information", and the two are completely different. Regards, MartinRe 00:17, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, I can't argue with that. I didn't even stop to think about negative info leveled at a department. Thanks for you help with this, MartinRe. -- AuburnPilottalk 02:29, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to handle Category:Images with the same name on Wikimedia Commons?

A time ago, I deleted images from this category one by one, making sure that edit history was preserved and so on. I did this thoroughly because I remember from when images were first being transferred to Commons, several users were worried that the necessary GFDL edit history would be lost.

In September 2006, User:Dmcdevit cleaned up this category with some sort of script of mass deletion. It is possible that he has done it on more occasions, I haven't checked. I asked him whether it wasn't necessary any longer to take the necessary precations, such as making sure that edit history was preserved, but he never answered me.

So can Category:Images with the same name on Wikimedia Commons be speedily mass deleted or not?

Fred-Chess 20:19, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

with the current conflict going on over what commons should be no.Geni 20:42, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
By "current conflict", do you mean User:David Gerard being baited by that guy on the mailing list? I don't think that qualifies as a real concern as far as moving images over to Commons. To answer Fred, with image undeletion there doesn't seem to me to be a good reason to be rendering duplicate copies of the files here at en. Jkelly 00:21, 16 November 2006 (UTC)-
I was more thinking about the incerdent with wikinews. Moving images over to commons= risk.Geni 00:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree that undeletion makes the procedure rather risk free. However, is it ok to use a speedy delete tool in assisting deletion, i.e. "cleaning out" the category? It has a substantial backlog. I don't want to go through them one by one if there is an acceptable way of doing it much faster. / Fred-Chess 10:57, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I take it, that since no replies, it means no-one objects to having this category speedily cleaned out then? / Fred-Chess 12:29, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I just want to make a comment on this issue. It's understandably frustrating when an image appears on Commons, transferred from another project, where it was never properly sourced in the first place. It would be great if deleting admins could take the time to check the image actually has a valid source. If it doesn't, it should be marked as {{subst:nsd}} which is the same as here I believe. Anyway... if you use bots to clean these categories out, I guess that won't happen. --pfctdayelise (translate?) 13:08, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] CAT:CSD

Yoo hoo, up to 374 now. --Calton | Talk 01:21, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Now down to, hmm, 371. --Calton | Talk 02:44, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
We need to do something with the backlogs, we cannot let these articles sit here for too long. --Terence Ong (C | R) 06:11, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Nothing we can do really. --Woohookitty(meow) 10:50, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
  • You can always do this: find a competent user and nominate them for adminship. That might help :) (Radiant) 10:57, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Make sure he is armed with a shrubbery and capable of chopping down the tallest tree in the forest WITH A HERRING! though ;-)~ Guy (Help!) 12:22, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Hey, some of us like the "squish" noises they make when we delete CSD's. It's always a good thing to associate a .wav with the delete button: makes cleaning out the Augean stables more fun. Geogre 13:29, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

You can always do this: find a competent user and nominate them for adminship Well, I'm an, er, user. Is that good enough?

In any case, up to 198 again. SQUISH AWAY. --Calton | Talk 05:50, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Barony of Barrichbeyan

Well, this is somewhat unusual. I was about to tag Barony of Barrichbeyan for CSD as a repost of content deleted here. However, looking at the article's edit history, I can't tell that this page ever had the AfD notice on it, or see any signs of it having been deleted (if nothing less, it does not seem to be a recreation, as it predates the AfD by quite a bit). The AfD was closed as a Delete, although the page doesn't seem to have been deleted. To further complicate matters, it looks like Barony of Barrichbeyan was moved to Barony of Barrichibeyan and then back to its original location, with both moves having occured shortly after the consensus to delete was arrived at. Given the unusual circumstances, I didn't want to speedy tag it, and am bringing it here for lack of anything better to do with it that I can come up with. Any ideas as to what happened here and what needs to be done would be appreciated. Thanks. ergot 18:28, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the article was moved on 18 April 2006 from one location to the other, using copy&paste. The copy was deleted (properly; an AfD tag was added on 6 September); the current article is the original, which was restored on September 15. It was deleted on AfD, and that was essentially the same conten, so it can be speedied. Eugène van der Pijll 18:35, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Tagged as such--thanks greatly! I was really confused for a minute there! ergot 19:03, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Do you deal with Image deletions / Watch out for the sockpuppets!

There is an abusive string of sockpuppets working to delete legitimate fair use images such as album covers from Wikipedia. I'd assume good faith in that they have erroneously interpreted the need for sourcing, had it not been their use of single purpose throwaway accounts which are discarded after a few hours. The pattern of behaviour is like so:

  1. Create Account
  2. Tag 50-100 images with {{nsd}} (many erroneously)
  3. Disappear
  4. Orphanbot removes images, admins delete without question
  5. Wikipedia loses

Examples of these single purpose accounts, as well as a more in depth look at the situation can be found at Wikipedia_talk:Fair_use#Sockpuppet_Vandal_.2F_Deletion_of_Fair_Use_images. Another example of this user can be seen at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive146#User_adding_.22No_source.22_to_scans_of_album_covers.

Please be careful when dealing with image deletions. If the image is album art/book cover/movie poster/sceenshot, then the source is not important per-se, rather the copyright holder is. - Hahnchen 18:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh bloody hell, that's all we need. Image copyright is bad enough as it is - I hardly ever touch image deletions because of this (although at least we can now undelete) Guy (Help!) 18:41, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
As a stopgap measure, OrphanBot will now ignore images with certain self-sourcing tags. I'll be working on a better solution when I have time. --Carnildo 19:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
When I do CSD (which hasn't been lately, sorry) I focus on images because few others do. I always retag album covers, but good to know we'll be getting more of it. Sheesh. Thatcher131 20:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
If it continues to be a problem, could you maybe run a checkuser on the guy to block his IP? Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 21:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

By the way, over 200 album covers were deleted on 19 November due to a tagging spree by sockpuppet Aujin66 on 11 November. I've notified two admins who did most of the deletions of these images, but I suspect there may have been more... DHowell 00:14, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Offensive edit summaries from Poximol (talk • contribs)

Can an admin please delete Poximol (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log)'s contributions - the edit summaries are obscene, as seen at [[21]]. He's been blocked, but it would be best to delete these edit summaries, seeing as they are a personal attack on administrators here. --SunStar Net 19:50, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that's worth the effort. I certainly don't feel offended. Kusma (討論) 19:57, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Wishing someone gets cancer is plain evil. --SunStar Net 20:05, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I think we can live without this edit history on today's featured article. Newyorkbrad 20:23, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Jgmz's contributions

Someone in IRC suggested me to use the noticeboard here, so here I am. User Jgmz has been contributing with the lack of manual of styles, and he also recently created two biography articles: Darrin "Fletch" Fletcher and Chet Thomas. I formatted the Chet Thomas but not the other one. I have noticed him about such things as using ~~~~ marks to sign names, make use of edit summary input when editing, and several others. However, I seem to be failing to capture his attention, as he continues to edit without edit summary (reason).

Also, I speculated that he might be Darrin "Fletch" Fletcher himself. His uploaded pictures are all in public domain, and are all under the name "Darrin Fletcher". If anyone can help me get his attention of his contributions, please RSVP. Thanks, Vic226 21:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Page Protection Comment

It appears that the article Babur was protected at the request of a user.[22] However the user requesting the protection had been engaged in edit-warring and mudslinging about this particular page.[23][24]

I am concerned that an editor engages in edit wars, then essentially locks in his edits by refusing to be civil in discussions of the page content when the article is protected because of edit wars.

I would simply ask that administrators weigh the refusal of a participant, particularly one engaged in edit wars, to engage in civil discussion of editorial content, when protecting pages.

Thank you, KP Botany 22:26, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Just to clarify, the page was protected before User:Tajik made those two comments on the talk page, and he has already been blocked for them. -- Steel 22:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] small notice for the noticeboard

I got a camera, and will try to fulfill requests for pictures related to Mexico, hoping an article or two will get improved. See commons:User:Drini/requests -- Drini 23:10, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Zoot Enterprises

The Zoot Enterprises page was deleted then placed back without the controversy section resulting in a NPOV article. I cannot find how to get the old content back from the deletion.

The user is supressing the truth about this company.

  • I have restored the deleted versions. Feel free to use them to correct the article Alex Bakharev 06:32, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Brian G Crawford

I have had three or four emails from Brian G Crawford asking if he can be unblocked. You may recall that he was blocked due to some outbursts brought on by personal problems he has; these now appear to be under control. If he is unblocked he will need to be placed on some kind of civility parole, I think. Looking back at Brian G. Crawford (talk • contribs) he has not done much in mainspace to justify the disruption he has sometimes caused, and he has undoubtedly used socks (partly in an attempt at a fresh start), but his recent messages to me have been calm and civil. The most recent sock was Mr Spunky Toffee (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log). I don't mind watching him if one or two others want to join in, I know it's a bit of a leap of faith but maybe worth giving him another chance? WP:NOT therapy, but the outbursts of uncontrolled anger were a documented side-effect of some medication Brian was on he is now on different meds. Guy (Help!) 14:54, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure if anyone else has had the type of consistent issues I had with him, but if my opinion means a thing at all here, I'm very open to it as long as he's clear that it's him and not a random sock and that he knows he'll be under some intense scrutiny. I'm fine with assuming the problems he had were medical, and I think it's worth another shot. Just my two cents. --badlydrawnjeff talk 14:58, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I have had no interaction with this user, but I know all too well the possible emotional side effects of medication. If he is actually using something different that is not likely to cause outbursts, then I support lifting the block to give him a second chance (while keeping a close eye on him). └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 15:20, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I have unblocked. I will be keepin an eye on this to see what happens. . Actually, forget about that, several people have emailed me to protest that. Morwen - Talk 17:32, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I suggest you reblock, now. Point of fact #1: Brian Crawford is banned, indefinitely, from all Wikimedia projects by order of Brad Patrick. Point of fact #2: Brian Crawford has sent emails to Wikipedia editors threatening violence, including deadly violence. Point of fact #3: Brian Crawford specifically seeks to attack people who exhibit sexual or gender expression that deviates from his notion of "normal". His entire participation on Wikipedia is focused toward seeking vengeance against those whose sexuality disturbs him. There is no encyclopedic purpose for his participation on Wikipedia, and given the extremely disturbing actions he has repeatedly engaged in in the past, there is no reason to upset Brad's decision to ban him wholesale across all projects, protestations of his problems with his medications notwithstanding. (He's used that excuse at least twice before.)
I feel strongly enough about this issue that I am willing to break exile and not only edit Wikipedia, but edit a Wikipedia policy or process page, to discuss this issue. I disclose that I have been the target of Mr. Crawford's attacks. His communications to me threatened me with death, and have been submitted to the police as death threats and as evidence of a hate crime. He has also subjected other editors of Wikipedia to public ridicule for the "crime" of having what he feels is an inappropriate gender presentation. Mr. Crawford's communications with the Wikimedia Foundation were so disturbing that Brad summarily banned him from all projects. Jimbo has supported this ban and personally told me at Wikimania that he would do whatever was necessary to ensure that neither I nor any other Wikipedian was affected by this individual. I earnestly implore the Wikipedia community to reinstate this block and not disturb it for any reason. Kelly Martin (talk) 17:45, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
{Personal Attack Removed} Badgerpatrol 15:34, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Already done, when I struck out my comment. I was not aware of these facts. My apologies. May I suggest User:Brian G Crawford be replaced with a salted page noting this? Morwen - Talk 17:48, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I've left a note to such effect and protected the page. Feel free to modify my wording. Mackensen (talk) 17:52, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Kelly, if I knew this, I wouldn't have vouched for a second shot on this, for the record. Interestingly enough, did the deletion of his userpage have any information on it regarding the rationale for the permaban?--badlydrawnjeff talk 17:56, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
See User talk:Brian G. Crawford/Archive 2 if it helps  Glen  18:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Aye, same here. Unfortunately, my sympathy for those whose personalities have been negatively affected by psychoactive drugs (I've seen it first hand) got in the way of getting the facts before I commented. A permaban from all Wikimedia projects for death threats and the like? I don't think that's something you can come back from. └ OzLawyer / talk ┐ 18:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Nothing beyond the standard indefblocked notice. The best thing in these cases is to ask the blocking admin, if they're still around. Mackensen (talk) 18:01, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
The block log [25] is fairly suggestive as well: (Blocking for death threats, personal attacks per WP:AN/I discussion). Mackensen (talk) 18:03, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I screwed up massively. I don't know what much more I can say. Morwen - Talk 18:07, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
No, mate, you just assumed good faith. That's not so very bad, and no harm is done in the long run. My bad, really, I should have spent longer reading up on the backstory. Guy (Help!) 18:38, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I really don't understand why every month or so someone tries to come along and unblock one of the worst offenders we've ever had to deal with. It's like if I turn my back for even a little bit a troll that was sending out death threats is being invited back with open arms. It's ridiculous! Can we please just stop these misguided attempts at reforming people? The risk to benefit ratio is entirely out-of-whack. I can't really think of a situation in which it's succeeded, though of course, I can think of many instances in which it's failed. Our goal on Wikipedia is to write an encyclopedia, not to run a rehabilitation center, and people who've proven disruptive in the past don't get an infinite number of chances to keep coming back. --Cyde Weys 17:51, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, quite. Even the canonical example of Michael's mentorship accomplished little besides teaching him to vandalize and harass with sockpuppets instead of his primary account. —Cryptic 18:12, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
It's because, from my discussions with him, his outbursts are the result of a documented side-effect of medication (for which side-effects the medication is actually not used at all in the UK); he is now not on that medication any more. I don't think I am a soft touch when it comes to disruption and personal attacks, but I do have a small amount of understanding of Brian's illness (which is similar to but much worse than my own). But hey, I just thought I'd ask, to be neighbourly. There was never any chance I would unilaterally unblock him, that's for sure. Seems like opposition is so strong that it's not worth going to ArbCom. Either I didn't know about Brad's comments or I'd forgotten. Guy (Help!) 18:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't give one flying fuck about his claimed illness; you make death threats, you're gone. End of fucking story. --Cyde Weys 19:28, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
While not necessarily agreeing in tone, the question of illness must be largely irrelevant in these matters. Editing Wikipedia is a privilege, not a right, accorded to those who can meet the standards which we've set (and those standards are exceptionally generous). Mackensen (talk) 20:11, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I would point out that the balance of one's mind being disturbed is a legitimate defence in law, and we are usually a bit more forgiving than the legal system. But there is no point beating a dead horse. Guy (Help!) 22:04, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm all for allowing second chances, as we all make mistakes from time to time. That said, I draw the line, a very solid and firm line, once the other party has resorted to making threats. In this particular case, as anyone can see from the block log, this person had more than his second chance and continually lost it; threats of bodily harm were made repeatedly, including death threats, as well as several vicious personal attacks against other dedicated members of the project. Not just on-wiki mind you, but via email and even telephone. Contribution logs won't show that, nor will they show some of the more offensive comments which have since been deleted. Wikipedia needs to be a place where everyone feels safe, and that means not welcoming this person back under any circumstances. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 22:54, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
As a recipient of one of those threatening emails (forwarded to the foundation), I agree completely with the comments from Users:Kelly Martin, Cyde, Clown & Cie above. I don't like to see users blocked and wikipedia by definition needs to be a welcoming place. But at some point the welfare of the overall community of good faith users needs to take precedence. I have a hard time understanding why the question is periodically raised here, but indefinite blocks exist for a reason and death threats, real-world stalking and consistent vandalism would seem to be a good place to start. This users actions were such that I do not believe that wikipedia can ever welcome him back, for any reason and whatever the excuse. --JJay 23:30, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Just to point out, indefinite means with no fixed endpoint. It doesn't (necessarily) mean permanent. Guy (Help!) 00:30, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
That is true and you have been a long-term advocate for this user. But I see no compelling reason why he should be allowed to return now. In fact, based on his contribution history and actions, such as on the Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Catamorphism farce, not to mention the most vicious personal attacks I've ever seen on wikipedia, or the very real on and off-site death threats, a permanent block is more than warranted. --JJay 01:19, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Sigh, this guy should have been shown the door in the first place and never allowed to return, otherwise we run into situations like this. Most of the time it is appropriate to WP:AGF, but not always. Even if he has Asperger's (as do I), he still should have the ability to cool it, especially on the internet. Even if he was on medication (which seems unrealistic) it doesn't grant him amnesty for the activities he did in which he knew better. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 21:03, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How do we fix this?

This does keep happening. Is it time to create a (fully protected) page somewhere and record every perma-block of a well established user, with a record of when and why and who? Block records are a good start, but for cases like this, they don't seem to be quite enough. Or is there some way to move the unblock button to make it more likely that the unblocking admin will read the unblock log before acting? Regards, Ben Aveling 21:01, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I like the idea, but if we can't even trust admins to check the block log before unblocking, what makes you think a separate page would have any effect? --Cyde Weys 23:16, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Better to put it on the user page and protect that. See a similar situation at User:Bobabobabo. —Centrx→talk • 23:27, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

See WP:BU (Banned users) which, by a strange coincidence...oh never mind. Thatcher131 22:47, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] IP's closing AFD's

I was alerted here from bootcamp. Deletion Process says Editors in good-standing who have not been made administrators may close deletion discussions. An IP closed the discussion Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/1 = .9 Repeating. IP's can't be "in good standing" technically because there basically public accounts. Any opinion from admins? (I'm not disputing the decision, but just asking for clarification here). -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 01:53, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

It all seems to be in good faith. Since it was redirected anyway instead of deletion, there isn't anything to worry about. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 02:03, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

It might actually be an IP he's specifically rented. If you look into it traces back to a company that could apparently sell such a thing, and he mentions that he's several layers from the actual IP, which is an unusual setup you might have to pay for. This apparently hasn't been mentioned on his talk page, I suggest seeing what he has to say about it. In this specific case, does not seem like a bad close, so no real point wasting our time undoing it only to redo it. --W.marsh 02:09, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Same user attempted a speedy keep (twice) on another AFD - an obvious result, but slightly premature. Nothing to get in a panic about though. Yomanganitalk 02:11, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
No non-admin can speedy-close anything, unless a nomination is withdrawn and there is no "delete" opinions given. Daniel.Bryant [ T · C ] 13:12, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I beg to differ, especially if it's with obvious cases - I closed both AFDs for Buffalo sentence as speedy keeps. – Chacor 13:19, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm quite happy with allowing anons to close AfDs as 'keep', or any other decision that doesn't require an admin to carry out, if the timespan has elapsed and the consensus is clear. If only admins are allowed to close AfDs, that gives them more priviledges than regular users unconnected to the software, which defeats the point of adminship not being a big deal. --ais523 13:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

After all, we've got a main page saying "Welcome to Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit." yandman 13:40, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Anyone can register :-) (unless their IP is blocked then they can't edit anyway) --W.marsh 15:52, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Should voting be mandatory?

A relatively new user has made a proposal (here) to increase the usage of voting on Wikipedia. Among others, he argues that all AFDs must be decided in favor of the majority (barring sockpuppetry), that campaigning for AFD votes is a good idea, that all policy/guideline proposals require voting to be enacted, and that the Developers must pay attention to majority votes with respect to feature requests.

An alarming tendency is that some people believe that this is exactly the way Wikipedia already works. I would appreciate it if some experienced users chimed in on the talk page to point out whether or not this is true. (Radiant) 10:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I nominated it for deletion. It's a fork of WP:DDV and clearly the debate should be at the existing page not this new one (which in any case seeks to reverse much of Wikipedia practice and some of WP:NOT). Guy (Help!) 15:46, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Backlog at WP:AIV

Currently approaching 20 entries, due to a sockpuppet parade. Please help out. MER-C 12:28, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Backlog still grows instead of shrinking. Some 25 entries. HELP! Femto 15:15, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Backlog will soon be half the size of Texas. yandman 15:17, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
appears to have been dfelt with.Geni 15:53, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
They've eliminated half of Texas? Wow. (...which half?) Femto 16:00, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
  • That was easy. How about we target California next? Especially the southern part... ;) --Durin 16:03, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Input on copyright issue requested

A concern has arisen regarding User:Husnock's tagging of images. A case example regarding this issue has focused on Image:Corpus Christi, Texas flag.svg. The issue has been raised at Wikipedia_talk:Copyrights#Outside_assistance but there's been no feedback in more than a day since it was posted. The matter has also been discussed at Image talk:Corpus Christi, Texas flag.svg. Related matters have been discussed at User_talk:Husnock#Copyright_issues_and_policies_of_Wikipedia. I'd appreciate it if others would review and comment. Thank you, --Durin 14:30, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, other editor input is needed. Durin means well but has lost me with this interpretation of Wiki policy. My main point of confusion is that the source of the flag image has very clearly said it can be posted on Wikipedia and is not under copyright or royalty protection. -Husnock 15:02, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
It's much better if copyright permissions are mailed (ideally directly by the copyright owner, or in this case copyright-disclaimer-person) to OTRS. That way their email is always available to the Foundation in case of a dispute (which isn't true for mails that go to a specific wikipedian, who might well become uncontactable in 10 or 20 years). This also protects the confidentiality of the email (which appears to be an issue in this case). The OTRS people will put a tag on the image page giving the OTRS ticket number. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 15:03, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Agreed. This is the way it should be done. I have concerns that the actual permissions requested and granted are permission for use on Wikipedia, which is not compatible with our policies. I have e-mailed the City of Corpus Christi requesting clarification and specific release under GFDL but have not yet heard back. That addresses this particular case, but the general case of how Husnock is handling such requests to copyright holders remains unresolved and other related issues remain open as well. --Durin 15:17, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Yes, please pass the message on to permissions@wikimedia.org. I agree that the message regarding the Corpus Christi flag does not seem to indicate that it is PD, only that it may be reprinted, which isn't sufficient to claim it is public domain. (And also relating to that discussion, I don't see a privacy problem in giving at least limited contact information for a municipal employee whose job is dealing with the public's inquiries.)
In general, the permissions address exists so that people may be contacted, and that this information may be given without posting names and address on the wiki (though I don't see a privacy problem in giving at least limited contact information for a municipal employee whose job is dealing with the public's inquiries.) We'd like to believe that everyone is acting in good faith and everyone is correct about their assertions. But should there be any question about it, we must be able to confirm this even if you disappear off the face of the earth: who you contacted, exactly what they said, when they said it, etc., or otherwise when we're challenged on it later by someone else we don't have any way to prove that we were told otherwise.
Husnock, you might also be interested in using the boilerplate requests for permissions to be sure you're asking the right questions: Wikipedia:Example requests for permission -- permission to use on Wikipedia is not sufficient. I appreciate your efforts to secure permission for these images, but I think Durin is in the right here; it's important that others can independently verify the information with minimal effort. Kat Walsh (spill your mind?) 21:26, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Mass image removal on Pharaoh and Cleopatra

I need immediate assistance in protecting this article. There is a user who is deleting over 3/4 of the images in the article, claming that the fair use law does not allow them to be there. I tried discussing this with user and asking him to stop until more inputs can be obtained, however the user continued on his campaign of image removal. I ask that the original article be restored and protected. I would do it myself as an Admin, but I am involved in the dispute. -Husnock 14:59, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I see someone has jumped to it. My many thanks. -Husnock 15:00, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Wouldn't have worked anyway generaly trying to use protection as a weapon against another admin doesn't work.Geni 15:51, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I used protection to stop an edit war, not as a weapon. Please calm the tone down and allow me time to research the image problem and correct it. -Husnock 16:24, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
How exactly do you expect an out of process protection to stop an edit war between to admins? I can think of better ways.Geni 16:27, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Because both admins would be mature enough to respect it and not abuse thier powers. I self reverted anyway after reviewing the policy (its been a while since I protected an article, at least several months) -Husnock 16:30, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] San Francisco, California is now {{sprotected}}

I know this isnt recommended when on the front page but its fricken ridiculous when I come to the page after receiving a complaint on my talk page to see this - and to make matters worse the vandal is tag teaming with a sockpuppet (or worse yet another user) to produce this!

I notice the admin who unprotected this hasnt been watching it at all - meanwhile myself and other users are fighting like hell to defend it.

So, simple really - you unprotect it - you defend it. Please.  Glen  19:05, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for protecting the page. To those who disagree with Glen, the page was constantly attacked, replaced with homophobic vulgarities which in one instance did not get reverted for seven minutes. I would suggest that enforcers of blind adherence to official policy check to see what the actual consequences of their actions are.--DaveOinSF 19:12, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Though I'm generally uncertain on the issue of Featured Article semi-protections, I have to say that the accepted wisdom that "if people can't edit the front page they'll be deterred from becoming editors" may be a case of valuing editors more than our readers, despite the fact that non-editing readers vastly outnumber editors and we're creating this encyclopaedia for them, not for us. --Sam Blanning(talk) 19:20, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Tho I think you'll agree that all is outweighed somewhat by the damage done by everyone (new or not) seeing HOME OF DICK SUCKING FAGGOTS WORLDWIDE for a full seven minutes as happened here  Glen  19:26, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Yes, directing readers expecting to read an article on San Francisco, California to a page with a screaming homophobic slur is truly keeping the readers' interests at heart. --DaveOinSF 19:34, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Calm down, guys. Sam Blanning(talk) is agreeing with the decision to semiprotect as a service to readers who far outnumber editors.--Paul 21:13, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
It doesn't have my full support, but I thought it was fairly obvious that the point I was making was for semi-protection to front page articles (or at least against any automatic rejection of it). --Sam Blanning(talk) 21:17, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

This seems to be a coordinated vandal attack... I don't think many people seriously are opposed to semi-protection for this kind of stuff. It's people who want to semi-protect after an article is vandalized twice in an hour... that's being frivilous with protection. --W.marsh 21:20, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Pragmatism is the new dogma :-) Guy (Help!) 21:24, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
While everyone is on the topic, just wanted to add a comment about another example: Tourette syndrome (edit|talk|history|links|watch|logs) recently attained featured status, and I won't submit it for the main page for concern that it would also be severely vandalized with coprolalia jokes (it's vandalized a lot now anyway, and I'm grateful to all the vandal fighters who've kept it on their watchlists). There are articles that could benefit from semi-protection if they are to be on the main page, and SF seems to be another one; this is a good example of when to employ WP:IGNORE. Sandy (Talk) 21:25, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
There is a lot of talk about improving the quality of wikipedia articles. What doesn't get talked about as much, I think, is (a) the percentage of time that good editors spend fighting vandals (not edit wars, but clear vandalism, much if not most by hit-and-run anonymous IP addresses, where warnings and blocks are a waste of time), and (b) the impact on readers if an article is vandalized - every 15 minutes of unreverted vandalism equals 1% of a day's worth of visiters seeing something ranging from juvenile greetings to homophobic ranting. John Broughton | Talk 22:36, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

It was just unprotected and prompty vandalized 13 times in 11 minutes. This is vastly beyond the normal level of FA vandalism, and obviously it's just one person doing it. I'll unprotect shortly... almost off the main page anyway. --W.marsh 23:37, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

If you do unprotect, please watch to see what happens. This person obviously is no longer going through the main page to get to the article to vandalize it. There may no longer be a connection betweeen the main page and the vandalism.--Paul 23:44, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I've noticed this to be a problem more as of late. It also seems the number of sprotected pages is going up, and the admins are having more trouble dealing with backlogs (e.g., #CAT:CSD or [26]). Perhaps we should review a policy of making the FA protections to be discouraged, rather than forbidden. I think Glen hit the nail on the head on this one - how many readers clicked on San Fran and saw "dick sucking" whatever, and were turned away from this encyclopedia? Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 00:16, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Responding to Sandy's concerns about having Tourette syndrome on the main page... If you don't want it on the main page, that's entirely understandable. Though, I have noticed that MP featured article vandalism is at a peak on weekdays when kids are on the computer at school. Sundays seem like good day for having an article scheduled for the main page, with relatively minimal vandalism. I notice the edit history for Tourette syndrome, there was no vandalism last Sunday. Just a thought. --Aude (talk) 01:44, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the thoughts and ideas, Aude, but I'll pass on it - my other concern is that being on the main page would attract long-term, repeat vandals, like SF may have. Regards, Sandy (Talk) 01:53, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Templates for deletion

Do any admins wish to address the backlog on this page? --Bob 23:37, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I made a start, but someone with a bot should chime in to do the orphaning. (Radiant) 00:18, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Give me a week and I'll help out.  :-) —Doug Bell talk•contrib 01:01, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] PUI

I've been working on clearing the backlog at WP:PUI, but there are a couple of contentious issues from Oct. 18 and Oct. 22. Would others mind taking a look at those? Thanks. Chick Bowen 01:14, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Trolling by User: Chowbok

I don't know if this is where I should report this or not. It doesn't seem to fit under personal attacks. Anyway, this editor is deliberately trolling me after I tagged one of his images as having no source specified. He immediately began tagging every image I've uploaded and proiceeded to spam my talk page with notice templates. See my talk page for further details. [27] TheQuandry 06:15, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Chowbok has been doing a substantial amount of image work lately; one way to identify problematic images is to browse through a user's upload log; sometimes the user whose upload log jumps out is someone you've recently interacted with; I don't think that speculating about motivation is ever fruitful in these sort of cases. Having a bunch of their images tagged can be frustrating for the user in question, and the timing in this particular case may be less than fortunate in that regard, but looking at the images in question quickly, most seem to have been tagged reasonably. Sebbeng, I understand that this can be frustrating, but please try to just deal with each case on its merits. --RobthTalk 06:30, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] CAT:CSD

CAT:CSD is overflowing, and overcrowded. Someone care to remedy this? ViridaeTalk 06:37, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Hopping to it. -- tariqabjotu 06:45, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I took care of some, but it's past 2:15am... sleep approaching... -- tariqabjotu 07:22, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Jean-Thierry Boisseau

This case is now closed and the results have been published at the link above.

Jean-Thierry Boisseau and other users affiliated with Musik Fabrik are banned from editing any article dealing with artists or projects listed in their sales catalog. Further, they may not add any such artist or project to any article. There is no restriction on making suggestions or participating in discussions on talk pages. Jean-Thierry Boisseau is placed on probation. He may be banned from any article or talk page which he disrupts. Any bans imposed under this decision may be enforced by blocking the offender for a period of up to a week. All blocks to be logged at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Jean-Thierry_Boisseau#Log_of_blocks_and_bans.

For the Arbitration Committee --Srikeit 06:52, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "JFK" vandalism

It might be a good idea to watch new user logs for anyone using "JFK" in their name - I've been chasing a vandal around for the last hour or so who's gone by User:JFK truth seeker and User:JFK crusader; after the first was blocked, the second cropped up and continued along in the path of the first. It hasn't been blocked as of yet, but has been reported. This one seems persistent. Tony Fox (arf!) 07:41, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions (settlements)

There is debate on the talk page about how to name (and disambiguate) articles on settlements. Should we use our standard to disambiguate only when necessary? Should all cities by default have a qualifier (e.g. state name) attached? Should we make an exception for cities in the USA? Should it be "City, state" or "City (state)"? Since the issue is a deadlock between four or five editors, some feedback on this issue would be nice (and I'm asking it here because this board sees more long-term users than the village pump). (Radiant) 11:42, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Terryeo blocked

(Moved from ANI)

I have indefinitely blocked Terryeo for these two edits: [28] and [29]. Both are flagrant harassment and intimidation - links to Scientologist websites smearing the people he's asking for comments from. Terryeo has already been put on personal attack parole by the arbcom, but this kind of intimidation and threat goes far beyond the pale, and needs to be stopped immediately and firmly. Terryeo has shown himself to be a dedicated POV pusher and bully. There is no sensible reason for his continued participation here. Phil Sandifer 17:44, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Just a comment here to say that Terryeo's blocking is well justified and long overdue. After the Wikipedia community has bent over backwards to allow him to still post to talk pages -- and, of course, he was completely free to edit articles not related to Scientology -- Terryeo spent the past seven or eight months pushing his ridiculous "personal Web sites are not allowed" argument on the talk pages, and even attempting to alter Wikipedia's policy to support his position. His real purpose, of course, was to "handle" the Scientology articles in a fashion that would remove all criticism of Scientology from Wikipedia. (Any of the regular contributors to the Scientology articles will certainly agree with me on this, I have no doubt.) He was never here to work towards NPOV and create a collaborative encyclopedia; hence, I am fully in favor of his being banned. The only down side to blocking Terryeo is the strong likelihood of Scientology following its (unalterable) policy: now that he's blocked, he will disappear from Wikipedia completely and a new sock puppet will arrive. This sock puppet will pick up where Terryeo left off, trying to find a new method of handling all of the entheta here on Wikipedia. --Modemac 18:10, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Unless he takes a crash course in spelling, grammar, logic, rhetoric and common sense, it won't be very hard to spot him. yandman 18:16, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Arbcom provides for "up to" a one year ban Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Terryeo. I'm not necessarily disagreeing with indef, but the ban should be logged on the case page, and you might want to post a request for clarification in prior case, just to be safe. Thatcher131 18:23, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
I concur that the block is well justified, especially so after an entire year of steadily abusive and disruptive behavior from Terryeo. BTfromLA 18:30, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
I think that Terryeo's crude attempts at defamation go beyond that which was discussed at the Arbcom discusson and therefore there is no reason not to indef ban him (although, to be honest, I don't think that changing the block to one year will change anything, and it will please the more pedantic members of the community). However, I think that to avoid any complications, you should put a small paragraph on his user page, where it can be seen more easily (I only found this thread by looking through your contributions). yandman 18:35, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Arbcom can ban up to a year, but the community can ban indefinitely. —Centrx→talk • 22:02, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
Now now - sometimes we trade in for a better model of POV pusher. I've heard no complaints about whatever the latest model from the LaRouchies is, for instance. Phil Sandifer 20:47, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Is there any reason that the edits containing these links should not be deleted? Newyorkbrad 19:18, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Probably should at least stay in the edit history for a bit while people decide whether to be upset that I violated process ZOMG. But probably not, no. :) Phil Sandifer 19:28, 12 November 2006 (UTC)
As far as I'm concerned this kind of thing is utterly unacceptable and he can get lost. Guy 21:28, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Agreed with JzG. It's not entirely necessary to get the edits removed, however invloving ArbCOm is also not entirely necessary as there is a clear cut decision here. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 21:33, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

I'd point out, just to emphasize that the right decision was made, that Terryeo was previously blocked for harassment using exactly this modus operandi (linking to a webpage which contains personal attacks/threats upon the editor, pretending he is simply presenting that link to that editor for information). He knew well that what he was doing was unacceptable, but he thought he could get away with it anyways. To prove him wrong is what Wikipedia needed to do. -- Antaeus Feldspar 02:47, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
Per the MONGO/ED ruling, engaging in or linking to offsite attacks is every bit as unacceptable as personal attacks within Wikipedia. We are better off without the kind of user who gets their jollies this way. Guy 13:58, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I completely missed this fuss - haven't had much time for Wikipedia lately. That was a very creepy (almost stalkerish) thing Terryeo did and incredibly stupid too, considering his probation. I agree entirely with the ban - it's a carbon copy of the MONGO/ED situation. -- ChrisO 21:29, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

It looks to me like Terryeo disapproved of the link, and was hoping that bringing it to the attention of interested editors might get it removed from Wikipedia articles, not harrass other users. Is there any way to discuss a link one disapproves of without linking to it? I think I'm missing something here.  : ( Armedblowfish (talk|mail) 16:47, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

"Terryeo disapproved of the link" <-- do you have evidence that these external links exist/existed somewhere else in Wikipedia? --JWSchmidt 15:03, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Not at the moment. Based on reading Talk:David S. Touretzky#Request_for_a_comment and User talk:Terryeo#Indefinitely_blocked, I got the impression that it was. However, you are right that whether or not these links are or were somewhere else on Wikipedia would be good to know, so I'll try to find out. Thanks! Armedblowfish (talk|mail) 02:15, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] New York meet-up

I hope I'll be forgiven this interruption, which isn't like me, but three New York City-based administrators have indicated unawareness of next month's New York meet-up, so thought I would post the link here for those so inclined. Newyorkbrad 17:00, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

How long is it before some disgruntled nutjob shows up at one of these things? Or a journo, or indeed a process server? (Not really an admin matter, I confess, although admins are rather more likely to be the targets of the above types than the average wikipedian). Shudder. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 17:13, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh, don't worry. I don't have any plans to attend for a good long while. (Not saying which of those I am.) (Oh, and Finlay? WP:BEANS.) Geogre 17:31, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Bah, the LaRouchies showed up at a St. Petersburg meetup ages ago. Ask Raul654 about it, or Mindspillage. FreplySpang 17:45, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
Anyway, it is a Saturday, so that makes it difficult for me image:smile.gif -- Avi 03:37, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
You're at least the second person to say that. I am not one of the people who planned it, but you might want to post under "Regrets" on the page so maybe a different day of the week is chosen next time. Newyorkbrad 03:45, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Is there a new vandal tool out there?

I've seen a number of vandals today who have been replacing articles with the usual variety of vandalism. The interesting thing is all have edit summaries that read "Replacing page with" followed by the beginning of the vandalism text, for example see the edit summaries of [30], [31], [32], [33] and [34] and there are a lot more out there. I haven't seen these before today, and there's a sudden rash of them. Is this the signature of some sort of vandal tool that's come into use, or is this just coincidence? Gwernol 02:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

That's automatic if you blank the entire page and don't leave an edit summary now. Don't ask me where this is documented, I guessed when I saw it earlier and only confirmed it just now by blanking a sandbox page myself. Great idea though. --Sam Blanning(talk) 02:11, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Ah, thanks, that certainly explains it. Thanks, Gwernol 02:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure this is a good idea. This seems to be resulting in a lot more profanity and such in the edit summaries in histories. Whereas without it they simply went away buried in the history. JoshuaZ 02:14, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
What's the problem? I don't get it. Anything that makes vandalism and blanking easier to fix sounds like a good thing. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
The problem is is that it means that people who don't care for profanity and such are much more likely to see it than they would have otherwise since they will see it whenever they look at the history. JoshuaZ 02:40, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Will they die? - CHAIRBOY (☎) 02:42, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
Whoa. I thought this was a new vandal who was out to make a point, by saying what he was doing. It's a new feature? Fooled me. I guess I must be letting too much RC patrol mess with my head. Antandrus (talk) 02:43, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
"Redirecting to $page" has been an auto-summary for a while as well. [35] Is there a list somewhere of all the auto-summaries? It would be helpful to be aware of all of them. --Interiot 03:04, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

(deindent due to table) They're listed at Special:Allmessages. I found three:

Page Text
MediaWiki:Autoredircomment Redirecting to $1
MediaWiki:Autosumm-blank Blanking page
MediaWiki:Autosumm-replace Replacing page with '$1'

I tested them in my sandbox, all are operational. MER-C 04:43, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Great, thanks. I've copied that to m:Help:Edit summary. --Interiot 08:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

It works. Who created all these auto summaries. Autoredirect in edit summaries have been present for a few months. --Terence Ong (C | R) 06:10, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Blame me ;-) r17609 — Werdna (not logged in) 14:02, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I vandalized my sandbox :) the feature works nicely. This will be a help in vandal-fighting. --Aude (talk) 20:34, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
These automated edit summaries are great; much thanks to whoever created them. Although, my favorite new thing (I hope it's new, I just noticed it) is the edit summary preview that appears just below the edit summary now. Helps to see what wikimarkups will/won't work. -- AuburnPilottalk 02:31, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Apparently someone wanted to change this behaviour and put "automatic" in the edit summary that is created automaticially: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Automatic_edit_summaries&action=history and shttp://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=MediaWiki:Autosumm-replace&action=history ... that seems a bad idea to me. ++Lar: t/c 11:57, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid I dislike it as well. It is confusing everyone into thinking sockpuppeting is occuring, and it doesn't seem all that necessary for an automatic summary, especially in this case. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 00:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

It makes perfet sense to me, people are only confused because it is new. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 19:42, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Am I the only one who thinks that arrow looks weird? Titoxd(?!?) 05:22, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Heh, I was also going to ask about this! But then, I figured out myself that this was a new MediaWiki feature. --Ixfd64 06:24, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Bobabobabo (Part 4)

After some final calm discussion with Bobabobabo through email (and vandalism of my new ja-wiki name which she had originally taken from me) I believe that we should send her through RFAr in some way shape or form. — Ryūlóng (竜龍) 04:56, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand. Are you suggesting that this user be un-banned? If so, we can do that here. If not, he is already banned by the community and the Arbitration Committee is unnecessary. — Centrx→talk • 05:01, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't know. I just know she keeps emailing me to get her unbanned, and this is the only way I know how for her to do so (I'm being helpful and assuming good faith with her). — Ryūlóng (竜龍) 05:09, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
She also keeps sending long emails to the unblock list, complaining about you, Centrx, A Man in Black, and Interrobamf and asking us to email her "teacher". It has been proposed that she be banned from emailing the list. She says she wants to be unblocked so she can entertain herself on Wikipedia while she waits for her parents to pick her up from school...I really don't think unblocking is a good idea. Sarah Ewart (Talk) 05:23, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Well, I don't know of these actions on the unblocking email list. I just want her to stop bugging the shit out of me (I've been filtering her emails, and after she started doing anti-semitic bullshit at ja-wiki, she "apologized"). — Ryūlóng (竜龍) 06:00, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
No seriously, they seem to be spamming every sysop w/ a "I demand to be unblocked" message, with that kind of spamming I really wonder what is going on... -- Tawker 06:09, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Bobabobabo has completely exhausted everybody's patience; she's simply a petulant, lying child who has proven herself to be completely untrustworthy. I don't believe she deserves even the slightest of respect. Filter her e-mails and delete any you see on sight. She hasn't earned the right to be wasting anybody's time. Interrobamf 07:17, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Interrobamf said it best. Even if the story of this person wanting to edit Wikipedia while waiting for her parents to pick her up after school were true, WP:NOT a babysitter. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 07:29, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Pardon me to come in on this one late, but even as I've followed this, what exactly did the user did that was so wrong, so as to deserve a permanent ban (other than the 81 sockpuppets and the lying about who she was - this is a serious question). Patstuart(talk) (contribs) 09:07, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
The fact that she used those 81 some odd sockpuppets (if they were or were not her) to edit war, attack other users, violate fair use criteria for several hundred screenshots, impersonate other users, utilize anonymiser open proxies, and exhaust our patience in dealing with her nonsense. — Ryūlóng (竜龍) 09:12, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I've been getting daily emails from her too. I think just ignoring her pleas is fine. I haven't seen any evidence that the contributions she would make if unbanned would outweigh the trouble she has caused. I also don't see any remorse or signs of change in the repetitive messages she sends. I am always open to changing my mind but so far see no reason whatsoever to do so. --Guinnog 09:17, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
Would it be best to give her another chance, not out of deference, but so that we can monitor her rather than not know it's her sockpuppet screwing up? I'm usually not for letting trolls back into the 'pedia, and maybe it's because I didn't receive all these emails, but...Patstuart(talk) (contribs)
Check out the history of my Japanese user page (the sockpuppet bullshit is because she originally registered with my user name and I got that blocked, and then the usernames changed after talking to Suisui, a ja-wiki bureaucrat in IRC; even after the username change, she attempted to reset my password with an IP that she has used here, so I know it was her). Do I deserve any of that when school is over let alone in session? Immediately after those socks were blocked, and I found ja:WP:VIP, she emailed me, and I posted this arbcom question here. Oh, and she also sent me a hate-filled e-mail before she apologized, quoting Hitler and what not. — Ryūlóng (竜龍) 09:35, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm not surprised that she is still this persistent at trying to come back. There's no evidence that this user shows remorse of any nature, I'm open to change my mind too about this issue too (like Guinnog above), but it would take a miracle of some sort. At the moment though, I wouldn't want her unbanned, based on the evidence I've read above. A ban from the mailing list probably wouldn't work as she would just come back with other IPs/email addresses. --SunStar Net 10:27, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

There should be absolutely no question to keeping a user who's attempted to impersonate a teacher blocked. Anyone like Bobabobabo cannot be trusted on Wikipedia to respect policy. If she wants a second chance tell her to come back after she's grown older and hopefully wiser. --  Netsnipe  ►  15:48, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I've been receiving lenghty emails from a person claiming she (as a girl) got nothing to do w/ Bobabobabo. I got the teacher email. I also agree w/ Netsnipe. -- Szvest → Wiki Me Up ® 15:52, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Irresponsible administrators

Administrators who choose to enforce some sort of policy have an obligation to:

1. Learn why policy was not being followed in the first place, and
2. Follow up as to the consequences of their actions.

I am referring, of course, to the situation with the featured article for November 17, San Francisco, California. The page was subject to repeated, automated attacks from a vandal who replaced the body of the page with a homophobic vulgarity, "HOME TO DICKSUCKING FAGGOTS WORLDWIDE". Amid the chaos engendered by the attack, the page was semi-protected. On more than one occasion, another administrator invoked the rule that the day's FA should not be protected and unprotected the page. With the protection removed, the attacks almost immediately recommenced. The administrator who unprotected the page, however, did not hang around to reprotect the page once the attacks had recommenced, leaving it to some other admin.

I would suggest that an administrator who chooses to enforce any policy has an obligation to act responsibly and learn why the policy was not being followed in the first place and then to ensure that there have been no unintended consequences of their actions. I would also suggest that failure to act responsibility in this manner should have consequences.--DaveOinSF 06:59, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Consequences such as what? He made a mistake; let's not run him into the ground over it. -- tariqabjotu 07:06, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
It should all be factored in when (and if) an administrator's performance is evaluated.--DaveOinSF 07:26, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

A minor suggestion here, not questioning your overall judgment which was imo good, but did you consider putting a detailed comment explaining exactly why the page was semi-protected? I've checked the history and it doesn't look like it. Exceptional cases require exceptional measures, but exceptional measures usually need exceptionally clear explanations. --tjstrf talk 07:07, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

If you've checked the page history, it should be abundantly clear why the page was protected. Look at the complete page history for the past day.--DaveOinSF 07:26, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Two things come to mind here: Hanlon's razor and the adage "Nobody reads the manual" (in this case, the page history). There's nothing to indicate malicious intent on the part of the other admin, just human error. Also remember that everyone interpets things differently from the same evidence, so you cannot assume people will see why you decided to ignore the rules at a simple glance. Especially since policies exist because they will make sense in 98 cases out of 100.
If an editor sees you do something which directly contradicts policy, and you have not made it transparently clear why this one case needs to be an exception, the other editor should not be faulted for bringing things back into accordance with policy. While they should assume you are not gratuitously trying to undermine the law, they needn't assume you are right either.
Bottom line: we can't censure an administrator for failing to predict the future. He unprotected the front page, and more vandalism occurred as a result, but censuring him for it makes as little sense as censuring you if it had been unprotected and no more vandalism had occurred as a result. You both acted using your own judgment, neither of you communicated as well as you could have, and at least one of you had to be wrong. Failing to predict the future is not a crime. --tjstrf talk 07:58, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
That's not what I said. Failing to predict the future is of course not a crime. But being disinterested in the consequences of your actions is irresponsible.
The admin who unprotects the page has an obligation to hang out at the page and see what happens. If the admin is not prepared to do that, he/she should find a separate admin who is.--DaveOinSF 08:06, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
FYI - I am not an admin, so the choice to protect or not to was not mine. And I'm not talking about a single admin here. This happened at least twice with two separate admins, plus a third who, rather than helping, posted a patronizing message on the talk page about why we should just live with the vandalism for the time being.--DaveOinSF 08:13, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Indeed, this episode provides ample food for administrator thought.
1. As argued above, the dogma that we use unprotected FA main page articles to attract new editors should be re-evaluated. I haven't done the work, but I'd be willing to bet that the number of IP and new-user vandal and revert edits far outnumbers the positive edits from IP and new user accounts. I'd guess the ratio is on the order of 100 to 1 and it is probably higher. Why does Wikipedia cling to a dogma of openness that needlessly eats up the time of its most dedicated and talented editors?
2. I'd argue that this can be applied to most FA-class articles. FA articles are supposed to be of a sufficiently high quality that only prose improvements are needed. Yet, examination of the history logs for any number of popular FA articles will see a constant war between the vandals and the vigilant. Why aren't FA articles semi-protected as a matter of course to free up thousands of editing hours that could be spent getting more FA articles? Vandals don't put graffiti on already graffiti-laden walls; they are attracted to pristine walls. As more and more quality articles are added the fight against the vandals may eventually reach a stand-off where there is are so many articles needing defense, that reverting vandalism is a full-time job.--Paul 01:29, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Actually, before accusations of admin incompetence are thrown around, remember that at least two official policies (User:Raul654/protection and the Semi-protection policy) specifically instruct admins to not protect articles featured on the main page, and to leave them protected for the shortest amount of time possible. The relevant policy reads, "It has been suggested many times in the past that the featured article should thus be protected or semi-protected. However, administrators are advised never to protect this page and to only semi-protect it under certain extreme conditions." I see you disagree with the policy, by your comments on that talk page; however, this is the modus operandi we have been following for years, so it is not fair to call administrators "irresponsible" for doing what they're told to do. Titoxd(?!?) 01:50, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
"I was just following orders" huh? I do think admins should at least try to make a show of helping out if they unprotect, rather than just leaving the article to the wolves and those suckers who do RC patrol. Sure it might have been fine in 2004 to just cut and run but we see much more vandalism now, and more coordinated, article-threatening vandalism... despite what policy and userpage essays say, it still feels like a slap in the face when an admin unprotects an article and runs away from it, requiring editors of the article to refresh every 30 seconds if they want the article not to be vandalized for long. Yes protection periods of the FA should be short and only in response to extreme cases of vandalism, but admins who unprotect should still try to show some comraderie with the people spending their time defending the article. It shouldn't be required, it should just be common courtesy. --W.marsh 02:03, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
But at the same time, shit happens. In my experience, most admins who unprotect Main Page articles do stick around to make sure nothing happens for a period of time; however, what I'm objecting strongly is the characterization that we have to watch an article or face sanctions. So, let's say, I unprotect an article, but then someone knocks on the door and starts selling me Girl Scout cookies, and I can't get rid of the person until 20 minutes later, when she accomplishes her purpose of selling me an over-priced box. During that period, I'm away from the computer, and the article is vandalized. Should I be demonized for things that were beyond my control to begin with? Some of the changes to the proposed policy appear to give the appearance that such an outcome is desired. Titoxd(?!?) 02:12, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Discussion of a (minor, IMHO change to the policy is now ongoing at Wikipedia talk:Don't protect Main Page featured articles. John Broughton | Talk 02:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
No, it would be silly to try to require it, but I think such situations where you are unexpectedly interrupted are the exception rather than the rule. Admins should actively try to show the people maintaining the articles that we're all on the same side here, otherwise those people might not keep maintaining the quality of those articles. It's just a matter of maintaining a healthy and productive environment. --W.marsh 02:18, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
It's necessary to maintain a degree of openness to allow new editors to begin to contribute; excessive use of page protections on articles would discourage new editors, thereby causing the number of Wikipedia contributors to slowly decrease as editors left the project. That being said, there is a certain level of vandalism at which interests in maintaining the integrity of a particular article outweigh the loss of openness created by semi-protection, even if the article is the day's featured article. In rare circumstances, articles such as Roger Needham that suffer from severe vandalism even after semi-protection are fully protected as a vandalism control measure. In light of the competing interests in allowing legitimate contributions by new editors to the day's featured article, and in preventing vandalism to such a high profile article from being displayed, I propose that the MediaWiki software be modified to implement a new vandalism control measure for the featured article as an alternative to page protection. When a non-administrator edits the day's featured article, the edit wouldn't be displayed immediately. Instead, administrator(s) monitoring the article would immediately be shown the diff produced by the edit, and would have a short period of time (approximately ten seconds) during which to either approve the edit, allowing it to be displayed immediately thereafter, or to reject the edit, thereby reverting the edit before it is ever displayed. Edits neither approved nor rejected during the prescribed period of time would be displayed in the live version of the article by default. Although edits rejected in this manner would never appear as the current version of the article, they would be retained in the page history and in the contributions history of the editors making them. The use of a real-time edit approval process -- which is quite practical for a single, heavily watched article -- would avoid the edit conflicts and/or forking that would be caused by delayed edit approval. John254 02:34, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Ask Brion to code stable versions. Titoxd(?!?) 03:17, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Oh, if only we could use these tags

[36] - David Gerard 15:08, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

lol at that shitty local band one. -- Steel 15:19, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Hysterical :) (and some of them very spot on!) --Durin 15:23, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
The author must be a dedicated user. Shitty local bands rule! – ClockworkSoul 18:29, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I like this very much, spot on. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 20:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I suspect David being an editor at cracked.com! -- Szvest → Wiki Me Up ® 21:03, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Excellent, I agree with the band tag! (aeropagitica) 21:21, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm not sure I like the "little sister" one, but the local band and the "GPA over 1.7" is nice. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 04:39, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
That is pretty damn funny. What'd be great would be to actually whip them up in user space as a reference to the Cracked article. :-) (→Netscott) 04:52, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
The band one is very nice. The little sister one is a little disturbing. Exactly how old is the sister in question and what jurisdiction are we in. IANAL but I presume she would need to be 18 or 19 for it to be legal to upload to Wikipedia. Oh, and it should specify that it isn't necessary if she's not good looking. The JoshuaZster doesn't have time for the fuglies (ok, for some reason it isn't happy wikilinking but that should be linking to number 338 of that webcomic fixed -S). JoshuaZ 04:55, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I liked the protected tag. Hbdragon88 05:36, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

That band one was right on the spot - maybe the author is a newpage patroller. Perhaps it will make a good April Fool's joke when inserted into {{db-band}}. MER-C 05:44, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Does Wikipedia do April Fools Jokes (e.g., google style?) I would be all for that... without the swearing. And with a caveat. In that case, I say go for the sprotect as well, and even the GPA 1.7 (if we can keep it nice). The sprotect might be case-in-point of WP:BEANS, but a little humor could only help things once in a while. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 05:58, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
April Fools Jokes have been tried. Why do you think a significant number of the more seniour admins have no sense of humor?Geni 14:36, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Yeah, we do that a lot. For instance, 127.0.0.1 is a common vandal, AFD has been a featured article, and we've been infiltrated by those upstarts at Britannica. There was an attempt to legislate against this kind of humor, but it pretty much fell flat. (Radiant) 09:18, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:207.63.100.166

A mixture of good and vandal edits. IP resolves to "The Illinois Century Network (ICN) is a telecommunications backbone providing high speed access to data, video, and audio communication in schools and libraries, at colleges and universities, to public libraries and museums, and for local government and state agencies.". Can someone look into contribs and tag/warn user appropiately. exolon 15:31, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Done, Gwernol 15:56, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks - was going to tag as a blatant vandal, but a look at the contrib history said otherwise. 84.64.75.86 17:15, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Administrator abuse

Wikipedia administrator User:NMChico24 has tagged a phrase used for an article redirect for immediate deletion. I had just created the article. NMChico's deletion maneuver seems premature. I had just created it for a redirect and seconds later he moved to delete it. Ten minutes have elapsed and he has not replied to my message to him. This is cavalier to (1) immediately act to delete stubs and then (2) not reply to pleas to be patient and allow the phrase to be posted. Administrators abuse their power when they do not dialog with persons that are targeted by them.Dogru144 18:18, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

He's not even an admin. And, the problem's been resolved, from what I see on both your talk pages.. User:Logical2u/24.89.197.136 18:24, 18 November 2006 (UTC). (uncivil comment removed)

[edit] Motion passed for Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Ulritz

A motion has been passed for the case linked above.

The anonymous editor who edits from the 194.9.5.0/24 range and was also a part to Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Ulritz shall be subject to the same restrictions as Ulritz and Rex Germanus for edit warring at involved articles. See #Ulritz_placed_on_Probation and #Ulritz_placed_on_revert parole for the applicable restrictions.

For the Arbitration Committee --Srikeit 21:26, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How to confirm sockpuppeting?

I just blocked Sonicnukleo (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log) on reasonable suspicion of being a sockpuppet of Dataice (talk • contribs) (see the sock account's Talk page for details). There are several other possible sockpuppet accounts of this user due to some suspicious SPAs surrounding the Salisbury Mall article, The Centre at Salisbury article, and the latter's AfD and multiple subsequent recreations. (Note that the former and latter articles are not the same, which is why the former hasn't been speedied as a repost.)

However, the categories for valid checkuser requests at WP:RFCU don't seem to apply. The SPAs didn't affect the outcome of the AfD and they're not disruptive except for the reposts. The problem is mostly that they are all editing the same set of articles and passing themselves off as multiple editors in an attempt to create an illusion of consensus. The instructions at RFCU indicate that obvious, disruptive socks should just be banned on the judgement of the admin wanting to request a checkuser, but this doesn't seem strongly supported by our blocking policy. Any advice on this, and such situations in general? Mostly I'm thrown off by the recent changes in the CU process and the gap that leaves between what's blockable by an individual admin's judgement and what needs CU. — Saxifrage ✎ 21:58, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hrisi Avgi

Could we get a few more people to watchlist this. Two users (User:Mitsos and User:Spylab) just each got blocked for about 17RR each. Hopefully 24H from now it won't happen again, but it might. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 22:32, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

As well as the two above, I also blocked User:SandyDancer, for the same offence (though I'm not sure it got up to 17 reverts). Another to look out for. Martinp23 00:37, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
I count 8RR for that user over the same period. -Royalguard11(Talk·Desk·Review Me!) 00:54, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
I doubt they're going to reconcile their differences after they come back from 3RR blocks, so I have fully protected the page. Nishkid64 02:22, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image for speedy deletion Question

I went through the criteria for Speedy Delete for images and could not find anything that specifically covers instances of possible child pornography. I did mark the following as db with this reason; but believe that a new criteria should be made ASAP so that images such as this are deleted post haste. A response from an admin on how i would go about requesting that new category be added would be greatly appreciated. SkierRMH,01:13, 19 November 2006 (UTC) [37]

Leave a message at WT:CSD to promote disussion, though realistically, one could just tag the image {{db}}. Martinp23 02:13, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
We don't need a new criteria: common sense is sufficient. --Carnildo 02:43, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Agree. Speedy deleting child porn has been the practice for some time; whether or not it has been written policy it has been discussed here previously with a broad consensus that this is the appropriate action. -- Infrogmation 03:45, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps, but WP:BEANS applies here too. "Please don't upload child pornography" would probably do more harm than good. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 04:30, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
That being said, perhaps an admin would like to indef-ban the person who uploaded the content. I think this would be a minimal punishment, in view of the fact that (as it looks to me) it's federal law to report the offender [38]. Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 04:35, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
It was a drawing, and thus the law in question is not (so far as I know) applicable. Chick Bowen 05:00, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
I don't know the specifics of American law, but in Canada it's unlawful to have pornographic representations of youth, including illustrations. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 05:04, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
User blocked. User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 05:06, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Blockign the user seems uneccessary to me. IANAL but as I understand it such drawings are not illegal. JoshuaZ 05:14, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Child pornography#Simulated (laws differ per country): UK, Netherlands, Canada = big no no. Germany, US = OK. Go figure. Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 05:51, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Ok, so as I see it the servers are in Florida so it isn't an issue in that regard. Its probably best to keep the images off of Wikipedia to prevent problems with other countries and such but blocking still seems uncalled for. JoshuaZ 05:58, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Patstuart's link deals with simulated pornography such as adults posing as minors; this was just a drawing, and it showed no acts. No judge in the US would consider it legally child pornography; it was only mildly worse than the image at Lolicon. I don't disagree with its deletion, since it was borderline, but I'm with JoshuaZ on this one--AGF etc. Chick Bowen 06:31, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Given that, I'm going to ublock and give the user a warning. JoshuaZ 06:35, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Fine. I just personally wish people made up their minds about things like this. Yall said block, and when I did it, yall complained. What gives? User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 07:55, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
The bitch of an adhocracy is that the verdict depends on who happens to be around at the moment. Consistency is not Wikipedia's strong point. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 08:02, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
  • We might want to add a line to WP:CSD to reflect this (since by the initial question here, some people apparently don't know this). Then again, per WP:BEANS we might not. (Radiant) 09:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
    • Actually having thought about this some more we probably should not do that, because if it's vandalism we already delete it for that reason, and if it's borderline or unclear it by definition cannot be a CSD. (Radiant) 14:54, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User:Penguinizer

My userpage is continusally getting vandalized by User:Penguinizer. He got indef blocked, but then he came back as User:Penguinizer2, which is still active and continues to vandalize my userpage. I don't wanna really protect my userpage, but is there any other way to end this? Karrmann 02:20, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Just report to WP:AIV as a sockpuppet with an explanation; if it continues, and you wish, just ask your page to be protected; otherwise, just keep reverting it. Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 04:27, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Infamous index.php spam bot

Should pages created by this spam bot be deleted and protected? I have seen many which had been protected, and many others that had not. I hadn't done so, but I would agree with full protection, as these pages are only used by these bots. Any objection? Here is an extremely quick search for some of these pages. -- ReyBrujo 06:38, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm curious, what's up with this? Any history to read? -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 06:44, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
It's using Wikipedia to up the Google rank of some prescription-meds website. Can't you just block the creation of any "index.php" subpage articles, or set up a bot to delete them? - Hahnchen 16:05, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

There is also a bot that creates pages ending with /. Angela stated in her blog that it is a malfunctioning bot. A pity it is extremely hard to catch them because of our limited search capabilities. In example, see here for a common pattern of these created pages. It would be interesting to have a category for these pages, too. -- ReyBrujo 16:19, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

These pages aren't actually of much use to the advertiser, they're in pages that aren't normally scraped by Wikipedia mirrors. But still, they're a nuisance. I've taken a look at one of the page histories and it shows multiple IPs "contributing", and has some idea of what edit summaries to use to get around RC patrol. What IPs are they, open proxies or just dynamic AOL style IPs that we can't block? Maybe you should give a heads up to the New Page patrollers for them to keep an eye out for new pages at impossible locations. - Hahnchen 16:36, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Might not be a bad idea to list them at WP:OP. Mackensen (talk) 16:44, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
From what I've seen, each IP only spams once or twice then moves on. Usually such IPs have never edited before. I maintain a page which provides search terms for spambots, as well as spammy and useless userpages. MER-C 04:38, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] (Un)Semi protection backlog

I've noticed that the number of semi protected articles has grown to over 600 (Category:Semi-protected has more than 3 pages with 200 entries each page). I think that some of these might have been semi-ed and then forgotten about. E.g. Computer was semi-ed more than one week ago (11th Nov) as is Continental drift (1th Nov) and Failure (30th Oct). There could be a significant portion which fall into this forgotten about status since this I tried six articles at random and they all look like long-term semi for no reason (for reference, the others were China, Animal Farm and Automobile). I know that chashing un-semis is not as satisifying as squashing a vandal, but I would like to make a request for some admins to do a mop and bucket spring clean of the semi-prot category so wikipedia can really be the encylopedia 'anyone can edit'. novacatz 08:57, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

I encourage admins to be responsible and watchlist articles they unprotect, and contribute to dealing with vandalism on those articles. --W.marsh 16:50, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
Just thirding this, I just went through the "J"s and found several articles that had been semiprotected for over a month for what appears to be routine vandalism, as well as many more articles as described by novacatz. A few more people chipping away at Category:Semi-protected would be appreciated. - BanyanTree 21:58, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Neither Animal Farm nor Failure appear on WP:PP for some reason (just to take two that have been mentioned, there's probably more). VoABot should automatically list them on there. -- Steel 23:31, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Orphaned non-free stamp images

There is a huge number of orphaned non-free stamp images at Category:Fair use stamp images. Note that, a lot of them were formerly being used as replacements for portraits in biography article under the claim of fair use, which actually is not allowed under Fair use criteria.

So, what do we do with these orphaned non-free images? Some, especially those from India, are in violation of the copyright terms of India Post, which allows ONLY black and white reproductions of it's stamps ONLY in philatelic articles. So, I think we should remove these copyvio images immediately. I request assitance in deletion of the non-free stamps images. Thanks. --Ragib 09:02, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Tag the orphaned ones with {{subst:orfud}} and they'll disappear within a week. As for the Indian ones, we have fair use on our side. MER-C 10:21, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Uncivil?

On Talk:Mulatto, 216.27.165.170 (contribs) made this edit [39] saying that mulattoes should dominate the media and such, which I'm sure constitutes trolling and should be removed from the page. User:The hobgoblin (contribs) left a response saying that the "mulatto movement" is based on denigrating blacks, that the existance of mulattoes promotes "race mixing", which black men will take advantage of to get into bed with white women, etc. This edit struck me as a borderline personal attack, and doing nothing but "adding to the flames". I removed both edits from the page, and left a message on hobgoblin's talk page saying that his edit violated WP:CIVIL. He reverted my edit on Talk:Mulatto and told me not to delete his personal opinion[40].

He's entitled to his opinion, but is this an appropriate way to express it? How would you handle this? - JScott06 18:03, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

They are discussing the subject rather than the content of the article. This happened on the talk page of Same-sex marriage in South Africa recently. Whether you agree or disagree with the opinion expressed, editors have no right to express it on the talk page. Removing commentary and slapping a {{talkheader}} on the top of the page with personal warnings to those involved should be all you need. I would warn the user again, remove his WP:SOAPBOX again, and give him a short block if he is persistent.—WAvegetarian•(talk) 03:52, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
I have made some more edits to this effect. Hopefully that will settle the issue.—WAvegetarian•(talk) 04:26, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template for long term edit wars

I was thinking about creating {{edit war}}, a template to be put in article talk pages that categorizes articles in Category:Articles subject to long term edit wars or similar, a category where people who like solving conflicts can interact. However, I would also like administrators to drop by and check the articles, as users could be abusing the system. As examples, Natalie Merchant has been in a long term edit war since at least April 2006, with users adding sourced information about her marriage, and IPs removing it, Holly Marie Combs (nowadays semi-protected), where users added and removed details about her second child, or My Story (Ayumi Hamasaki album) (between many other Japanese albums), where users edit the names to fit the different Manual of Style guidelines, while IPs and new registered users change it back to the album caption (in example, changing My Story with MY STORY because the album cover is in uppercase). Anyone else thinking this is a good idea? Also, what to do with these users who revert one or twice per week, through months (as I said, Natalie Merchant has been reverted for over 7 months by now), dismissing achieved consensus? -- ReyBrujo 22:20, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

The situation at Natalie Merchant annoys me after looking at the edit history and talk page. Why hasn't a single warning even been handed out to the anon that keeps removing information without explanation? On the talk page it is unclear whether consensus is that the information should be included or not. I'd recommend sprotecting that article ASAP and 3RR/vandalism blocks be handed out to the anons who keep removing sourced info. VegaDark 00:02, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I believe this might be better served by an RFC (or possibly, one of the various forms of mediation). We have several conflict resolution systems in place, and I am somewhat averse to creating another place where conflicts can be listed. (Radiant) 09:11, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Truthout.org protection

Truthout.org has been protected for more than three months because of legal issues (and at the top of the list at WP:PP#Full protection for quite a while). The problem is that the only connection to these legal issues appears to be Kelly Martin (talk • contribs) who has apparently left the project. Can an update be posted to Talk:Truthout.org? Thanks. —Wknight94 (talk) 01:20, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

According to Kelly Martin (via IRC) this should be forwarded on to User:Brad Patrick. --W.marsh 02:08, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Rachel St. John

This page needs to be protected from re-creation, which has occurred twice. Also... as an admin I would do it myself, but I don't know how... when a page is deleted it no longer has a "protect" tab, so how's it done, thanks (maybe protect and then delete?) Herostratus 02:28, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

You add the {{deleted}} template and then protect the newly created (non-)article. --W.marsh 02:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Why are we doing that? It keeps being recreated by the same user - just block him/her. —Wknight94 (talk) 02:47, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Unless there is evidence of vandalism or other nastiness, I'm not in favor of blocking a user that posts a bit of self-promotion. I believe that if we don't "bite" this user but point xem to some indication of what is good content for an encyclopedia, we could turn this person into a good contributor instead of chasing xem off. (besides, if the user is truly bent on adding this article, this is far better stopped by protection than by a block which can be evaded through sockpuppetry). I urge Wknight to overturn his block. (Radiant) 08:58, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
    • I've unblocked her per your request but I strongly disagree with it. If she posted the article twice or even thrice and showed any inclination towards contributing constructively, I'd agree. But Rachel St. John and Rachel St. john have been posted six times, including once by a sockpuppet (which means this may be a moot point) and four different people have been to her user talk page, all in barely 36 hours, and all while nothing else has come from this account. We routinely indefblock accounts which are so clearly here for disruptive nonsense so she's lucky I went so light. (BTW, if I read the blocked users page correctly, she was autoblocked which means she was probably trying to recreate a seventh time, eighth time, ninth time, ...) I don't see why we should bother with WP:SALT to protect such a user. —Wknight94 (talk) 12:07, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm not an admin but personally I would suggest a block on the user and a prevention of the article being re-created. While this is most likely self-promotion, it's easily possible it's not. We have no way of knowing if the person creating it is Rachel St. John. I've looked at the article via a copy I found on a mirror and while it's definitely not negative stuff, it is personal (apparently even including a photo). No addresses or contact info for sure but still, if the person creating it isn't Rachel St. John, it's easily possible it might not be stuff the real Rachel St. John wants the whole world to know (assuming it's even accurate) Nil Einne 11:52, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Shock site

Hey -- can some other kind souls out there please add this page to your watchlist? People are constantly adding their favorite sites without sources, and I feel like I'm the only one watching, and my life is just about to become much more busy. Thanks! Mangojuicetalk 04:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I second this, it's an absolute magnet for crap off Teh Internets. Guy (Help!) 23:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
    • Added it to my watchlist... (not an admin, but a revert's a revert) Georgewilliamherbert 23:23, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Hmmmm... followed a link to Max Hardcore, which seems to have been vandalised (the birthdates don't match betw the info box and the article, and he's described as a 'blue eyed negro' (sic) weighing 90 lbs in the infobox). TTTT I'm not interested enough to bother looking thru to find when it was done and how it should be reverted. Article also seems to need a bunch of tags but I'm too lazy to add those either. Anchoress 23:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request indefinite block of vandalism-only account

User:Phlap000 has only made two edits, both of which were vandalism. link, link. The latter was vandalism to Jimbo's Wikipedia article, and the edit summary was intentionally misleading: Minor spelling corrections, reverted vandalism when Phlap000 was actually vandalizing the article. –- kungming·2 | (Talk·Contact) 08:03, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Report to WP:AIV, and follow instructions there for warning the user first. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 10:24, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually, I've reported many vandals to AIV before, but I thought as this account was vandalism-only, it might have merited a block. Also, AntiVandal Bot beat me to it, otherwise I would have given a bv warning. Thanks! –- kungming·2 | (Talk·Contact) 00:25, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] How close to copyvio?

How close to the original does a text have to be in order to be copyvio? Stir of Echoes has a synopsis that is almost word for word the same as the IMDb synopsis, but a couple of words in each sentence seems to have been changed ('over' changed to 'because of' etc). Does this make it OK? Anchoress 08:42, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

No. I removed it. —Centrx→talk • 08:49, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] user:tevus, Don King and BLP concerns

I stumbled across the Don King article a couple of days ago. It was, quite frankly, a BLP nightmare with many negative unsourced statements. Not having time to go through the article myself and come up with sources for everything, I reduced the article to a single sentence so that properly sourced information could be re-added to the article. Tevus reverted my edit, restoring all of the negative material. I cautioned him on his user talk page that such action was unacceptable, but he is of the opinion that page blanking of any kind is vandalism and should be reverted on sight. He has stated that he would be willing to listen to an admin's opinion on the matter, so it would probably be a good idea for someone to comment on his talk page before he happens to restore such material in the future and inadvertantly violate BLP policy. Thanks, Mexcellent 09:38, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

It appears that the unsourced negativity has been removed, and I would suggest restubbing this further until reliable citations can be provided. Can't sleep, clown will eat me 09:45, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Tevus has stated that he considers that to be vandalism and that he will revert it, so you might want to leave him a note on his talk page about it. He has stated that he will listen to an admin. Thanks, Mexcellent 09:49, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The index.php spam bot Part 2

Another index.php spambot has been creating pages (however, some won't show up in the contributions, as they were all deleted by
FreplySpang (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves)). The offending IP address is 85.234.150.152 (talk • contribs • WHOIS • RDNS • RBLs • block user • block log).

The IP's blocked for 1 month, but it looks like we need to be more vigilant for pages created by IP addresses with /w/index.php in them. If an admin could salt them that would be appreciated. --SunStar Net 13:52, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't see much point in salting these pages, as they seem to be random talk pages. It is probably a good idea to watch out for funny items in the talk namespaces at Special:Newpages, though. Kusma (討論) 14:08, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree with Kusma. I don't see any reason (yet, anyway) to expect this spambot to come back to the same pages. Digging through my deletion log, it looks like the only spam pages from that particular IP were User talk:FreplySpang/index.php and User talk:JoanneB/index.php. Oh look, no, on November 19 he also added User talk:GraemeL/w/index.php and User talk:SunStar Net/w/User talk:SunStar Net/w/index.php. Dmcdevit (talk • contribs • blocks • protects • deletions • moves) blocked him that time, but his deletion log doesn't show any other pages that this IP creat....wait a minute. Since when can anonymous IP users create new pages?
Edits that this IP has made to its user page show that it is a backslashing proxy. I'll mention it at WP:OP. FreplySpang 14:44, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Anonymous can create pages in the talk namespace (including User and Wikipedia). They can't just create articles. -- ReyBrujo 14:48, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Hm. Learn something new every day. Also, it appears that User:Drubbles and User:66.226.79.49 are related - they all focused on the same small group of spamlinks. FreplySpang 15:10, 20 November 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Crzrussian inappropriate edit war and revert on Israeli Apartheid

According to Wikipedia: "One-click rollback is only intended for vandalism, spam, etc.; if reverting over disputed content, it should be done manually with an appropriate edit summary." Why is Crzrussian, an administrator, abusing admn powers without presenting any discussion? Can someone please review? thanks.Kiyosaki 21:40, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I think the best cource of action is to politely notify the user of his/her error on his/her talk page. ---J.S (t|c) 22:50, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • I did do that.Kiyosaki 05:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Alternate version: why is Kiyosaki, clearly well aware of policy, engaging in POV-pushing? [41]. Note that Crzrussian is not the only person to revert these tendentious edits. Guy (Help!) 23:22, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Please review the edits/discusson in more detail, you will find that is not accurate. This was a revert of new contributions to the article that can be directly sourced, and as the lead stands its highly POV and needs some balancing with more facts about allegations, not endless Criticism. Please see the Discussion revolving around Heribert Adam, that is what Crzrussian rolled back without even reviewing. You have the entirely wrong issue under consideration regarding the Admn. revert. Please review again.Kiyosaki 05:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Kiyosaki, given that you've been reverted on this article by 10 different editors in the past week alone, and during that period been blocked 3 times for 3RR there, perhaps you should examine the possibility that the problem lies with you. Since you appear to have a great deal of difficulty editing within policy, I would recommend proposing all changes on the Talk: page there first. Jayjg (talk) 23:48, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Jayjg, you are quite controversial yourself, I'e been told. Please address the issue regarding the inappropriate use of admn. rollback without discussion, not personal attacks. You have an odd habit of not addressing issues put to you. Please address the Crzrussian edit war rollback.Kiyosaki 05:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

The point of that text is to say, "if you're reverting, let the person know why." It's to avoid simply reverting the page without giving a reason. However, Kiyosaki, Crzrussian probably assumed (and he would be correct) that you knew the reason he was reverting you, because it had been spelt out before. -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 23:58, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, that is not what happened. He didn't let anyone know why. This was a brand new edit that he reverted without looking at it. He didn't tell anyone why and rollback to edit war, not handle spam. Kiyosaki 05:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

For whatever it's worth I did I quick can of Crzrussian's last 100 edits and only saw 3 vandal reverts. 2 were legit and one was of himself. I don't think it's fair to categorize this as "ongoing abuse" ---J.S (t|c) 00:12, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Who called it ongoing? I didn't. Thanks.Kiyosaki 05:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Kiyosaki has been editing disruptively at Allegations of Israeli apartheid since he arrived on October 22 as User:Kyosaki, [42] and one of his first edits was to warn someone about 3RR, so he seems not to be a new user. What's wrong with his edits has been explained many times, so using rollback is appropriate. SlimVirgin (talk) 05:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

SlimVirgin is disruptive! I guess it depends on who is calling the other names and making personal attacks. SlimVirgin, kindly stop making personal attacks. You accused me also of violating WP:NOR and I read through that, and now ask you to prove your accusation. Come already, you have harassed me from Day 1 and my talk page proves it. SlimVirgin, doesn't support WP:RS on that article unless it's Criticism.Kiyosaki 06:32, 21 November 2006 (UTC) Nobody has focused on the rollback edit, and it's easy to see why. It was not correct and it violated WP:RS. Study it anyone, I ask and plead for someone else to do so. Thanks. Let's focus on editing, not personal attacks.Kiyosaki 06:32, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

And how many "new users" can look at an edit summary and figure out that it was made using the admin rollback tool.? Kla'quot 06:03, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Search "revert" and you get to: Help:Reverting right away, Help:Reverting. Itsays "Clicking on the link reverts to the previous edit not authored by the last editor, with an automatic edit summary of "Reverted edits by X (talk) to last version by Y," which marks the edit as "minor."" From what I read Crzrussian's revert violates almost every "Don't" and it wasn't "Minor" Please someone who is not a part of the war, kindly look at this. Thanks.Kiyosaki 06:36, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I think this issue is basicicly closed. This isn't the place to complain about users anyway. ---J.S (t|c) 16:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Users blocked

All users in Dublin, Ireland are now blocked. I tried to edit, but had to log in. Why? Greyduck2 01:26, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

What's the message you get? —Wknight94 (talk) 01:29, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I would have to say this is my guess. CSCWEM really should not have blocked a /16 (65536 ip addresses, even if anon only) Prodego talk 01:35, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Unblocked. Prodego talk 01:39, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
This BT Internet range was temporarily blocked (with anon-only enabled) due to some severe vandalism issues, which have since been reported to the abuse department of the ISP. There are rare circumstances when such blocks are warranted and this was one of them. Thanks, Can't sleep, clown will eat me 23:11, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Location of DCBOCES Proxy Servers and Related Schools

DCBOCES is a BOCES organization that provides resources useful to schools, such an internet access. DCBOCES (Dutchess County Board of Cooperative Educational Services) supports the following school districts:

While each individual school has its own LAN network connecting computers therein, they have no proxy servers connecting the network with the internet. Nonetheless, each school is connected (by means of a WAN) to the DCBOCES servers in Poughkeepsie, where data is sent from the outside world to schools participating in BOCES. Basically, contacting the above school districts (since the students therein vandalize Wikipedia a lot) is pointless because several schools may be using one IP address in sequence, and exactly from which school the vandalism came is occasionally hard to track.

This is just so that this issue might be understood somewhat better. There's really nothing I can do about it, besides dissuade my fellow students from vandalizing. Nonetheless, if an admin wishes to contact DCBOCES about this issue (and encourage them not to block Wikipedia as a solution), that would be ideal, so that people would waste less time on Dutchess County vandalism, and concentrate on... other vandalism. (Although schools should be careful not to WP:BEANS their students.)

Pages relevant are User talk:207.241.244.1, User talk:207.241.242.1, User talk:207.241.243.20, and in general 207.241.240.0 - 207.241.255.255. See Arlington High School (LaGrange, New York) and Union Vale Middle School; the former has much vandalism. Thank you for reading, and I hope that you can take relevant action (if needed). Gracenotes T § 01:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

You might be interested in WP:ABUSE. MER-C 04:47, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Countering vote spamming at CFD

I'm wondering what the best way of handling "vote spamming" at xFD. After proposing categories for deletion, I noticed that a user had contacted four other people with messages like this. Two of those contacted have "voted" as requested. Two others have not been on-line since the message has been left. My first impulse was to counter the arguments, which I did with one person who had already "voted" and another who had not. But this seems to make me just as guilty of spamming. I left a message with the spammer, and I also thought of removing the vote spams. I notice that Wikipedia:Vote stacking is inactive and did not become policy, so what is the policy? More important, what would be the best way to respond in a situation like this? Thanks. -- Samuel Wantman 04:00, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

  • The relevant guideline is Wikipedia:Spam. Vote stacking is a disruptive form of gaming the system, so if he does it again, block him. (Radiant) 09:22, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Anyone else get this troll email

LISTEN HERE I DON'T KNOW WHY I HAVE BEEN BLOCKED I HAVE NOT CAUSE ANY PROBLEMS PEOPLE GO ON MY COMPUTER AND START SCREWING THINGS AROUND AND THEY WERE MESSING AROUND WITH YOUR PAGE I WORK WITH A VERY LARGE INTERNET COMPANY AND YOU HAVE THE FUCKING NERVE TO BLOCK ME LISTEN I WILL MAKE SURE NOTHING BAD HAPPENS TO YOUR WEBAPGE IF YOU UNBLOCK ME AND I WILL TAKE TIME OUT OF MY VERY FUCKING BUSY SCEDHULE TO HEPL TRACK DOWN ON VANDALISM I AM VERY PISSED OFF RIGHT NOW I WANT SOME FUCKING ANSWERS HERE OR I WILL RAISE HELL!!! FROM A VERY PISSED OF MAN Oswald King !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Total trolling, a vandalblocked account. Anyone get this email too... -- Tawker 05:00, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

In light of this letter, I'd say he's completely penitent, and would be a valid contributer to Wikipedia. Granted, his only contributions were changes to articles to say "COCK-SUCKING MOTHER FUCKER", but, as he said, it was an unjust block (note subtle sarcasm). Seriously, if he's got an issue with the fact that his page was deleted, then he can grow up and take it up in a manner that doesn't involve threats. Patstuart(talk)(contribs)
But if we don't unblock him something bad might happen to our webpage! --Ginkgo100 talk · e@ 05:33, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
I'm thinking if he's unblocked he might set up us the bomb. (→Netscott) 05:45, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
Lulz, guys! Wikipedia is seriouzz buzeeness. — Nearly Headless Nick {L} 11:55, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
ZOMG! Rouge admin abuse! Guy (Help!) 15:14, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] A new form of linkspam

User:80.227.102.46 is posting linkspam in edit summaries! Please roll back all contribs. I don't have a rollback button and I'm only now going to put the warning on his page, so I can't post at WP:AVI. Zora 05:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree they're at least intending to be disruptive. Though one has to wonder how effective they'll be. They're not actually hyperlinked, so I don't know if Google will pick them up. And I doubt many humans are going to cut-n-paste the URLs. --Interiot 09:00, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
And peek in robots.txt, what do you see. User-agent: * Disallow: /w/ ... which in turn puts a little bit of a hamper on crawling that "History" thingy. This sounds like a really pointless form of linkspam. Ever wondered why you don't see bazillion different old revisions and diffs in Google results? It's not just because Google's clever crew drops that stuff manually. =) --wwwwolf (barks/growls) 19:22, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
It is probably a malfunctioning bot. I have found similar ones, that insert as summary the same text they are adding. -- ReyBrujo 19:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cristina Odone

There has been an appeal here from Edward Lucas, Odone's husband for a neutral editor to review the article, I'm sure any input would be appreciated. Catchpole 07:38, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Snsudharsan (talk • contribs)

Snsudharsan (talk • contribs) has vandalized the page of Sudharsansn (talk • contribs), and by uploading his photo without Sudharsansn's consent, with the title of Ponnaya [43], which is an offensive term in Shinhala, meaning impotent. He/she is also trying to make confusion by creating a user page almost identical to the latter, who is contributing to Wikipedia constructively for quite a while. --16T 13:54, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

Was indef-blocked last night I believe. – Chacor 13:55, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
Yup, [44] about 21 hours ago the user was blocked. Metros232 13:56, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
The blocked user was determined to be a sockpuppet of User:Lahiru_k RaveenS 13:41, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Please also check [[User:Sl 1986, User:Wiki man2 User:Kaushini, IP: 222.165.175.139 and User:Rukshan also as sock puppets of User:Lahiru_k as they were used to stack votes in a previous AFD and a current TFD. ThanksRaveenS 23:20, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

I strongly agree. I would also kindly request the admins to check is User:Kerr_Avon is also a sockpuppet of User:Lahiru_k because the profile has been active only since the initiation of the TfD w.r.to the Template deletion of the State Spondored terrorism article. Thanks Sudharsansn (talk • contribs) 09:35, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category:Replaceable fair use images

This one is starting to develop a serious backlog. It's slow work to clean out, so a few more eyes on this would be nice. Even if you are not comfortable dealing with the whole "promo photo of (semi)famous person" issue there are still a lot of "slam dunk" cases like photos of buildings, cars and "everyday items". Just remember to check the article to make sure the image is used in a "replacable" way (identify the subject rater than commentary on the work itself, subject is not itself copyrighted, subject still exist etc.), check for any reasonable objections on the talk page and finaly remove the image from the article (if you delete it). As I said quite a bit of work compared to no-source or orphanded fair use images and such, but if "everyone" processed at least a couple of images a day we should be eable to keep it under controll. --Sherool (talk) 12:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I think we are going to be looking at very long backlogs on that one simply because of the amount of work involved per image although the number of images should reduce over time.Geni 03:27, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Delete all contributions?

An IP address has contacted me at my talk page and asked me to delete an entire contribution history.[45] Do we do this? DurovaCharge! 14:38, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

  • Depends on what they are. Usually not. If there are libelous contributions those might get deleted/oversighted, otherwise I'd say not. Mackensen (talk) 14:46, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
    • Looking at the contribution history, this appears to be a lot of work, with no real reason. Morwen - Talk 15:02, 21 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Even if we would do this, we cannot know if the requester is the contributor of all these edits. An IP address can be used by multiple persons. --Ligulem 22:31, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deletion templates

Over at WP:RFI we've got an IP address whose sole participation at Wikipedia has been to add deletion templates to articles. As an IP this editor can't complete the process so there are 20 or so articles that have been tagged without explanation.[46] Investigations have me busy - could someone lend a mop with the AFD side of this? DurovaCharge! 14:50, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] David Pipe and David Pipes

I've tried to delete/undelete/move the appropriate revisions into two articles. I can't find easily instructions for Administrators to separate two different articles being reverted back and forth into two different articles, although they're probably around somewhere. What I did was:

Delete David Pipe
Undelete the revisions which belong in David Pipes
Move David Pipe to David Pipes
delete the redirect
undelete the remaining revisions of David Pipe (leaving the redirect deleted)

(after a few random deletions and undeletions of the talk page, as there doesn't seem to be a way to copy the article in two places with the revision history intact, which is what I would have liked to do in the first place)

Moved Talk:David Pipe to Talk:David Pipes
Moved it back
Replaced the redirect at Talk:David Pipes with a copy of Talk:David Pipe
Added a revision history section to Talk:David Pipes with names and dates of editors to Talk:David Pipe

(and proposed David Pipes for deletion, restoring a previous {{prod}} which I deleted when I restored the David Pipe version. If I deleted it, I can restore it.) — Arthur Rubin | (talk) 17:59, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Looks like you did good. However, I speedied David Pipes as A7, since even if it was all true it was an article explaining that a college student, despite his talent at football, does not play. Chick Bowen 23:57, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] To protect or not to protect...

I recently unprotected DNA as it had been protected since 25 October due to heavy vandalism. It has received mostly IP vandalism since it was unprotected. I dislike having high profile pages like this permanently semiprotected, but I wanted to get others' input as it seems . I have left it unprotected for now. If someone else thinks it should be sp'd please do so.—WAvegetarian•(talk) 02:05, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

7 bad edits on the 21st (GMT)--I think we can handle that much over a 24-hour period. If it escalates considerably beyond that, we should s-protect. Chick Bowen 02:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Template:db-author, deleted?

I noticed the template {{db-author}} was deleted about two hours ago by User:Lucky 6.9. I assume this was an error, but is there a way to bring it back from the dead (or, if it is not a mistake, a ref on the deletion discussion)? Thanks, --TeaDrinker 02:54, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

It makes sense; it was probably in the category "templates for deletion by author". -Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 02:59, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
All {{db}} templates have that <noinclude>'d. It still needs to be restored.—Ryūlóng (竜龍) 03:01, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Does anybody else find it funny that he deleted {{db-author}} because he thought it was up for speedy because of {{db-author}}? Cbrown1023 03:03, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Looking at the reason for deleting the talk page, it appears it may have been a mistake. Since I can't find discussion anywhere else that makes me think it was deleted on purpose I've restored the template. If I missed something, feel free to re-delete. Shell babelfish 03:04, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Two bad faith efforts

There's currently a thread going on at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Violation of good faith by user Shamir1 about users asking for unprotection in a dispute, though it wasn't over, in order to get their version reinstated (at least one was apparently successful). This seems like a severe breach of good faith to me - is there any procedure for this? Patstuart(talk)(contribs) 19:36, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

The same dishonest behavior is continuing. See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Bad faith behavior by Shamir1 and Amoruso (continued). --Zerotalk 02:56, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] YouTube Links discussion (N^2)

A handful of editors and myself have been removing links from Wikipedia to the YouTube website. I think we’ve hit about 2000 or so articles so far.

A user has raised concern that the project doesn’t have enough "admin" oversight. (see my linklist talk page) The user in question is concerned with our methods. Basically what I’m doing (and I can’t speak for the other users) is running AWB with a find/replace function. For each link that comes up I look at the context of the link. If suspect its copyvio (music videos are the most often) I remove the link. If the context implies some reliability (Band’s profiles mostly) I leave the link. After that I keep an eye on my contributions list. If (Top) drops off the list I go see why. If I was reverted I look deeper into the situation, review the movie and make a comment on the talk page. Fortunately, (outside of the previously mentioned editor) happened only a half-dozen times that I’m aware of.

(I’ve been dancing around mentioning the user’s name, and I’m not really sure why. The user is Cindery.)

I have encouraged Cindery to open a RFC (with a promises also to sign it), but Cindery politely refused... So I’m bringing the discussion here. I’d like to verify that I’m acting with the support of the community I had previously assumed I had. (I based that assumption on a post on WP:RS, a post here on WP:AN and several conversations on #wikipedia) ---J.S (t|c) 20:28, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

Yep. No issues. Carry on. JoshuaZ 20:34, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree (but I'm not an admin so who cares). There is too much to be reviewed to make it possible to do this without deleting the odd valid link here and there. As long as we are not saying that every link should go forever and are carefully considering them if restored this should be OK. Spartaz 21:09, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
Since one of the members of the "YouTube project" is Dmcdevit, an arbitrator, I'd say you're covered. Thatcher131 21:46, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
"But I'm not an admin so who cares" - Actually, admins don't get extra consideration over us commoners. :P
I intentionally didn't want to mention Dmcdevit... didn't want to bias anyone's evaluation. (Let me coin a new phrase... "respect bias" :)) ---J.S (t|c) 22:25, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
They do not make barnstars big and shiny enough to reward such heroic work. Carry on and may the face of Jimbo ever shine upon your edits. 23:24, 20 November 2006 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by JzG (talk • contribs).
I disagree ... they make barnstars the size of, well, barns. But I agree that the work is important and should continue. --Cyde Weys 04:28, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I think how the project is being conducted is a clear violation of copyright policy, which states "it is not the job of rank and file Wikipedians to police copyright violations," and that suspected cr vios should be mentioned on talkpages of articles, or reported to copyright problems. The possible YT exceptions, and the steps that need to be taken to affirm that content is licensed under GDFL, are not being explained; a source bias is merely being propagated--the links are being mass-deleted on the assumption that they are not GDFL, not proof that they aren't. I am especially concerned regarding the accusation of OR levelled at the user who verified a GDFL license. Please see discussion at NOR. I think there is a need for adjustment of this project--until last week, they were conducting the purge more slowly--by placing a template first in iffy cases. A new template should be used, which is less biased against YT, and which refers editors to policy pages and boards (where updating is needed re valid uses of YT at NOR, RS and V). Respect for talkpage discussions should also be in effect, when the cases are not clear cr vios, such as recent pop songs. Cindery 19:49, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

You seem to be completely missing the points. This has nothing to do with GFDL. We have a specific policy on external links, see here Wikipedia:Copyrights#Linking to copyrighted works. Also, the policy states "It is not the job of rank-and-file Wikipedians to police content for possible copyright infringement, but if you suspect one, you should at the very least bring up the issue on that page's talk page." It says at least. It doesn't say you are forbidden from removing it yourself without discussion on your talk page. My understanding of the "police" thing is that it means we don't continually monitor articles very carefully to ensure there are no copyrights. This is important because if we do, we would be more responsible for copyright violations. However it is still important that we make resonable efforts to prevent copyright violations and when users identify problems, they are still expected to do something about them. As with all things, it's up to the contributors. Continually removing content without explaination or discussion is usually disruptive, especially if there is no legitimate reason to remove the content. But in this case, it appears the people involved in this project are making a resonable effort to ensure they only remove external links which violate copyright and they have amply explained. Note that wikipedia is by it's nature source biased. We only want high quality, reliable sources. We don't link to jewwatch, except when specifically discussing them for example. In this case, there is nothing specificly wrong with youtube, but a lot of it's content is circumspect. If you can show us a resonable number of examples where the links that were removed are not copyright violations, then perhaps we need to look in to this further but currently, your only concerns appear to be due to a misunderstanding of policy. Nil Einne 11:35, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that the technicality they're using is a recent change to the EL guideline--they're not deleting under C (or looking at the links very carefully). Their edit summaries say, "EL--sites that don't provide licensing information." Instead of inquiring re the GDFL license, they are deleting on the assumtption that the Wiki publisher and the YT publisher are not the same, and that therefore the GDFL license is reasonably doubtful (and giving no info to editors about what to do about that, i.e., how to affirm GDFL license.) The problem with that is GDFL is not reasonably suspect--self-publishers publish on YT under public domain/want their work freely disseminated. So no, they are not making a reasonable effort to to ensure that they only remove links which violate copyright--they are mass deleting on the assumption that they're erring on the side of removing some legit links to get rid of a larger number of illegit links. That would still be fine, if they were deleting under C--but deleting under EL doesn't give anyone with an objection info about how to use YT for the benefit of Wikipedia--EL currently gives the erroneous information that YT is prohibited, period, in contradiction to C and V. The same people who changed EL two weeks ago are conducting the purge. (Dmcdevit and Barberio had a disagreement because Dmcdevit changed the EL guideline while it was protected, and wouldn't revert his edit and discuss--D claims he had consensus on the basis of three editors. Three editors against one doesn't seem to me to be adequate discussion or consensus to railroad a guideline change through for the purpose of immediately enforcing it as policy in mass deletions...) As long as they continue to do it/as long as the EL policy contradicts C and V, I will probably continue to monitor what they are doing--the egregious examples so far I would say are Barrington Hall, Brent Corrigan, and the International Fair Trade Association. In my opinion, Guy Goma was handled very badly, with no assumption of good faith and some newcomer biting. Unfortunately, I think the spirit of the project is unnecessarily hostile, and that as a "raising awareness" about copyvios initiative it's misguided--telling people en masse that YT is prohibited under EL is confusing and erroneous. Copyvios are prohibited under C. Cindery 00:21, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

And regarding policy for doing something about copyvios, I think it is very clear that because some cases will be false alarms, and "if the contributor was in fact the author of the text that is published elsewhere under different terms, that does not affect their right to post it here under the GFDL," deleting without discussion merely on "licensing information" is not appropriate. If there's some evidence--such as an url--that a YT link is a copyvio, the YT link could be pre-emptively deleted as a copyvio. (I think for recent songs/music vids, not even an url is needed.) But licensing "suspicion" is not reasonable doubt for pre-emptive deletion without discussion, and the procedures outlined in C aren't being followed. Perhaps there is a need for an accelerated removal process for music/vids songs?--that should be established at C. Making up a quickie technicality at EL and treating all the YT links as if they were music vids isn't just a hassle for the editors at pages with legit links, and a problem because the confusion might result in the loss of some good legit links, but because it doesn't do anything to enlighten anybody about how to use YT usefully, it just misinforms them that YT is prohibited on a licensing technicality, when it's not.

It is not the job of rank-and-file Wikipedians to police content for possible copyright infringement, but if you suspect one, you should at the very least bring up the issue on that page's talk page. Others can then examine the situation and take action if needed. The most helpful piece of information you can provide is a URL or other reference to what you believe may be the source of the text.

Some cases will be false alarms. For example, if the contributor was in fact the author of the text that is published elsewhere under different terms, that does not affect their right to post it here under the GFDL. Also, sometimes you will find text elsewhere on the Web that was copied from Wikipedia. In both of these cases, it is a good idea to make a note in the talk page to discourage such false alarms in the future.

If some of the content of a page really is an infringement, then the infringing content should be removed, and a note to that effect should be made on the talk page, along with the original source. If the author's permission is obtained later, the text can be restored.

If all of the content of a page is a suspected copyright infringement, then the page should be listed on Wikipedia:Copyright problems and the content of the page replaced by the standard notice which you can find there. If, after a week, the page still appears to be a copyright infringement, then it may be deleted following the procedures on the votes page. Cindery 01:05, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Replaceable fair use

Category:Replaceable fair use images as of 7 November 2006 - all of these images should have been deleted a week ago... Hbdragon88 04:58, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Done. About 250 deleted. There were quite a few that were tagged for deletion that should not have been, as they were fair use (e.g., of someone who was dead, or of a group in the 80s / sportsman playing in the 70s etc), and so not replaceable. Proto::type 10:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Cool. Can someone keep up with it? November 9-15 should also be cleared now as well. Hbdragon88 03:49, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Pat Capponi

Pat Capponi was created as an apparent copyvio. I rewrote it so that it is no longer a copyvio, but another user reinstated the {{copyvio}} tag. Could an admin please delete the original version http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pat_Capponi&oldid=89259235 from the history and the copyvio notice one, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pat_Capponi&oldid=89339906 , and restore the correct version, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Pat_Capponi&oldid=89362805 --TruthbringerToronto (Talk | contribs) 05:29, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I took a whack at it. My first time doing such a delete and restoration. Did that work the way you wanted? Metros232 05:44, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
It was not "apparently" a copyvio, it WAS a copyvio -- period/full stop -- part of a series of a dozen lifted directly from a publisher's website which I tagged as such. And full-on copyright violations get deleted -- period/full stop -- before brand-new articles can be put in under the original titles. If User:TruthbringerToronto would bother to familiarize himself with the policies, guidelines, and procedures -- as he has failed to do often in the past -- BEFORE acting or complaining, he might know this. --Calton | Talk 01:20, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] User talk:NoRCaLD503/Archive

Once an editor (NoRCaLD503) archives their talk page, is it still acceptable for them to use CSD U1 to have it speedily deleted? See the talk page and User talk:Kukini for legal threats by NoRCaLD503. I'm not quite sure what to do at this point, after adding a {{hangon}} tag onto the archive page. --Daniel Olsen 05:43, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

The editor now is also requesting a right to vanish [47]. Kukini 05:46, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
It wasn't moved there, the edit history on the orginal talk page is still intact. I don't see a huge issue with it. -- Consumed Crustacean (talk) 05:50, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
My concern is that the editor archived it then nearly immediately requested it be deleted. The notices should be left available for review. Kukini 06:01, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Page histories remain available, so deleting the archived page won't lose the information. If further assistance is needed in the case, you can reference the history of warnings (most dispute resolution asks you to use diffs anyways). Shell babelfish 07:38, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
If indeed the warnings/notices were still current (such that removal would be disfavored by whatever portions of Wikipedia:Removing warnings command—as promulgated elsewhere—a consensus), then the excision of such warnings on the talk page should be reverted; if not, there seems, per Shell, to be no problem. There are users who elect not to archive their talk pages (by which many in the community are, as I, irked but of which there is surely no proscription) and simply blank from time to time, and, because the archiving here was effected via copy-and-paste rather than via move, the effect of the archive's being {{db-userreq}}ed would be the same (in view of the preservation of the history at the primary talk page) as of the talk page's being blanked. To be sure, the archiving-and-then-speedying bit is a little gauche but, inasmuch as the effect is negligible and as the user apparently intends to leave, we need not, IMHO, to be concerned... Joe 05:35, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Question

Hmmm I came across an admin deleting a bunch of articles straight out. They were almost all all 100% no brainer deletable crap, but they hadn't been tagged. Is this normal? It makes me a bit nervous. But maybe it's necessary to keep Category:Candidates for speedy deletion from being inundated. Is this standard practice, or what? Herostratus 05:58, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Things don't need to be tagged to be deleted. Tagging is just a convenient way to bring them to the attention of admins. Things are eligible for speedy deletion (as opposed to slow and painful deletion) if they fall into certain categories of things which can be deleted without discussion, "on sight" as WP:CSD puts it, and they can be deleted at any time.
Note that some images may need to be tagged for a certain amount of time before they become eligible for speedy deletion (which IMHO is a hurdle for anyone addressing copyright problems, especially now that we have image undeletion) but once they are eligible they can be deleted on sight, regardless of tags. --bainer (talk) 06:48, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Oh. Really. Hmmm I thought that everything had to be tagged first, on the theory that two sets of eyes should see an article before its deleted. I clear out Category:Candidates for speedy deletion now and again and I find that about 5-10% of tagged articles are not properly speedies - of those, some are properly ProD's, some AfD's, some acceptable articles with a few minutes work, some acceptable articles as is. It makes me a little nervous to think of articles being deleted on one person's say-so... but I can also understand the benefit of avoiding needless steps, so if that's the way it's done, OK. Thanks for the reply. Herostratus 07:05, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Yes but those that tag arent admins and therefore may not know policy 100% - those that delete are (and as such are meant to know policy) Glen 07:14, November 22, 2006 (UTC)
Admins can optionally tag as well to request a second opinion from another admin. --Ligulem 09:26, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
There are some admins, IIRC, who hold themselves categorically to the tag and permit another to delete standard, and I can't imagine why such standard shouldn't be propagated generally; whilst admins are surely meant to know policy, it is not inconceivable that every admin has erred as regards speedy deletion at least once during his/her time here, and whilst proscribing an admin's speedying an article not previously tagged by another editor as meriting speedy surely will not serve to remedy most errors, it might serve to prevent some. An editor is generally to be at his/her most circumspect when he/she deals with candidates for speedy deletion, and I would suppose that we'd want admins to be exceedingly careful in the realm of speedy deletion, if only because the fact of a deletion's being wrongly undertaken is not always readily apparent (as against that, for example, of a block's being wrongly applied or an AfD's being wrongly closed). Joe 18:19, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
There's nothing wrong with instantly speedy deleting an article if you're sure; likewise, there's nothing wrong with adding a tag and waiting for a second opinion if you're not sure. Much speedy deletion is housecleaning of utter nonsense or articles to which the words "non-notable biography" don't do justice; such uncontroversial maintenance work doesn't require admins to be "exceedingly careful". --Sam Blanning(talk) 23:04, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I never tag articles for speedy deletion; if they meet the criteria, I delete them outright. I believe this is common practice. The purpose of the tag is to bring the matter to the attention of an administrator; if the reviewer has the technical capability, he may delete the article himself. — Knowledge Seeker দ 09:37, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Admins were speedily deleting nonsense well before there even were categories! I happily delete stuff that is evident nonsense, if I feel it needs another set of eyes, I'll stick it in the category. Morwen - Talk 10:44, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Attention needed - Jack Chick

I have some concerns about this article. Firstly there is a complaint, supposedly by a JC representative, see Talk:Jack Chick#Legal Notice. Although this is obviously in the wrong place and doesn't really give enough info seriously to consider it, I do think someone needs to properly reply to it rather then the sarcasm it has been met with (none of them appear to be admins). Of course, it's probably a joke and may have no merit whatever the case but we should be safe IMHO. However an issue I have greater concern about which doesn't strictly need admin attention but I thought I'd mention here anyway is that the actual article has a notice that most of the biography is from the JC site. Obviously this leads to NPOV concerns but more seriously someone should make sure there is no copyvio. Nil Einne 15:19, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I've replied under the assumption that it is a serious complaint (if it's a joke, then it is of no importance, so it's best to assume otherwise). I've linked to the relevant policy pages and explained why I don't think there is anything we can do to help them. --Tango 15:56, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Image:Heart of darkness cover.jpg, the replaceable fair use deletion criteria and how it works

Okay, I have removed a replaceable fair use tag on the image above, since I don't feel it meets the speedy deletion criteria. As an admin I believe I have been entrusted with the ability to make that call, as I would any other page tagged with a template which makes them a candidate for speedy deletion. The template for replaceable fair use states that an image tagged "illustrates a subject for which a free image might reasonably be found or created". In this instance the claim was made that Since the book is in public domain, it should be possible to find a public-domain cover from an early edition. I dispute this, it may not follow that the image can be replaced. There may not exist public domain editions available freely. Now I have been told I cannot remove the tag, because the template states Do not remove this tag. Now if images are tagged incorrectly, what are we supposed to do? I have again removed the tag after it was re-added with no attempt to discuss the issue with me, but I will now respect whatever consensus emerges here. However, I would like the issues surrounding this explored. Can a speedy deletion template really say that it cannot be removed? As admins, how are we supposed to act with incorrectly tagged articles or images? Steve block Talk 17:00, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

The tag tells you what to do if you disagree: you add the tag {{Replaceable fair use disputed}} without removing the original tag. Same as with non-image speedy tags: if you disagree, you don't remove the tag, but you add {{hangon}} instead. —Angr 17:38, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually, as regards some/most non-image speedy tags, this is quite wrong. See, for instance, {{db-bio}}, which provides, in pertinent part, that, if the page does not, in the estimation of a reviewer, meet the criteria for speedy deletion, he/she may remove th[e] notice; he/she is only enjoined from removing such notice on pages that [he/she has] created [him/her]self, to which the application of {{hangon}} is then appropriate. If an admin engaged in speedy patrol finds an article tagged for speedy that is not speediable but nevertheless might be deficient encyclopedically, he/she ought, IMHO, to AfD it or alert the original tagger in order that the latter might AfD, and so the analogue here, I think, would be an admin's (e.g., Steve's) removing the tag and listing the image at WP:FUR or WP:IfD (see my edit-conflicted post below). Joe 17:48, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
(after edit conflict) I imagine that the tag should be treated as any other the presence of which an admin undertaking proposed deletion or speedy deletion patrol might consider, such that, should an admin find the tag to be wrongly applied, he ought, even in the absence of a {{hangon}} (here, more specifically, {{Replaceable fair use disputed}}), to remove it, having determined the image not to merit deletion consistent with the tag. Just as AfD is often counseled in such situations as an admin reviews a SPEEDY candidate and removes its tag, so too might a listing at fair use review be appropriate where there exists some disagreement apropos of whether a fair use image is replacable with a free image; IfD might even be considered. In any event, though, it seems altogether silly for us to have a template that asserts that such template should not be removed; such provision presumes that the initial tagger is necessarily correct and that, in the absence of a {{Replaceable fair use disputed}} objection, an admin should delete the image consistent with the tag, his/her own conclusions notwithstanding. Most of our speedy tags provide that they should be removed should the articles on which they are applied not qualify for speedy deletion (except by page creators, who are to use {{hangon}}; for a discussion of why removal in the former instances is appropriate, see, e.g., the mailing list thread beginning here), and I think {{Replaceable fair use}} should be styled similarly; certainly it is wholly nonsensical for us to say that a template asserting that a fair use image is replacable with a free one, once applied, can never be removed, and where there is disagreement betwixt admins, as here, some discussion to which members of the community might weigh in ought to be undertaken. Joe 17:42, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps it should say "Do not simply remove this tag" instead. Clearly if there is a real disagreement on whether or not the image violates fair-use policy, the speedy deletion tag shouldn't remain on forever; but neither should the person who disagrees simply remove the tag and not do anything further to address the issue. Adding {{Replaceable fair use disputed}} during the 7-day waiting period is probably the best approach; if the admin going through images at the end of the 7-day period finds an image he considers to have been improperly tagged (as in this case), then removing the tag probably is okay so long as the admin then also does something to address the issue, such as taking it to WP:FUR, WP:IFD, or WP:PUI. But simply removing the tag and not doing anything about the original tagger's concern isn't acceptable IMO. —Angr 17:56, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
With that I agree entirely. Just as I am troubled when an editor removes a speedy tag from an article that, whilst not speediable, is likely irremediably unencyclopedic and neither himself acts to {{prod}} or {{AfD}} the article nor informs the original tagger in order that the latter might so do, so too would I be concerned were an editor to remove the {{Replaceable fair use}} tag and partake of the discussion no further. Where an editor has in good faith and with some justification applied the tag and where another editor has in good faith and with some justification removed the tag, there is clearly a substantive issue to be discussed, and such discussion ought to take place at any of the several pages Angr, as I, suggests. Joe 18:07, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
The tag question is one, the image is another. Fair use applies to book covers when they provide useful information about the book--a reprint does not. This one was not fair use, and I deleted it and replaced it with an image of the author himself. Chick Bowen 19:25, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
I think that might be your reading of fair use, but I now withdraw from the debate. Steve block Talk 19:36, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Steve has pointed out to me that my actions here were rather abrupt. That's true, and I apologize for it. Chick Bowen 20:36, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Possible indefinite block

Noahlaws (talk · contribs · logs · block user · block log) was going around adding links to Noahide laws to every article he could find, reinserting them when they were removed, and ignoring requests for discussion. So I blocked him for 24 hours and told him he had to respond to the complaints on his talk page. He has responded, but as you can see, the conversation has not been productive. So now what do I do? He kind of called my bluff. I'd appreciate others to weigh in before I block him permanently. Chick Bowen 17:07, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

He doesn't seem to be picking up on what we are trying to do very quickly but that doesn't justify a jump to an indefinite block. Give him a chance when the current block runs out, explain to him what is allowed and that he will be blocked again if he can't follow our policies. Then extend the block as justified by the edits. For non malicious edits, step it up to a few days perhaps then a week then more, depending on how he responds. But certainly not right to indefinite. - Taxman Talk 20:26, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Heh, I was going to say the same thing. He's a POV pusher, not a blatant vandal. The temporary link-spamming block seems fine, but I don't think an indef block is in order at this time. Let's see if he can learn to edit collaboratively and follow WP:NPOV. --Ginkgo100 talk · e@ 20:49, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Thanks to you both. I can only request that other admins keep an eye on him. His talk page is getting very long indeed, and it's hard to sort out the advice from debates about the nature of religion, so I think I'm going to wait until the block wears off (in a few hours) and see what he does. Chick Bowen 20:57, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] More on AOL

OK - here are the last 10 pages edited prior to the indef block from the 3 IP's I couldn't edit from today, before giving up and logging in (100% blocked this time)

Special:Contributions/152.163.101.8

  • N/V/? Not vandalism/Vandalism/not sure
  • U/R   edit Unchanged/Reverted from article
  • N * U * 22:42, 16 November 2006 Mary Anderson - added useful information about inventing windsheild wipers
  • N * U * 12:10, 16 November 2006 Talk:Frederik Willem de Klerk - removed own comment
  • N * R * 12:10, 16 November 2006 Talk:Frederik Willem de Klerk - added comment to talk page
  • N * U * 05:28, 16 November 2006 Mark Starks' Martian - added quote
  • N * R * 22:53, 15 November 2006 Ashlee Simpson - added rumor re 3rd album
  • N * U * 03:00, 15 November 2006 Abraham ibn Ezra - properly categorized article
  •  ? * R * 23:25, 14 November 2006 All or Nothing (Cher song) - changed sales from 250->750,000 (could be subtle vandalism or mistake)
  • N * U * 04:47, 14 November 2006 Citric acid cycle - removed own vandalism
  • V * R * 04:43, 14 November 2006 Citric acid cycle - juevenile vandalism re bunnies
  •  ? * U * 22:48, 13 November 2006 All or Nothing (Cher song) - duplicated info already in article Hot 100 vs Hot 100 singles (could be subtle vandalism or mistake)
  • N * U * 21:36, 13 November 2006 Essex County, New Jersey - identified location of park (town)
  • N * R * 10:42, 13 November 2006 InuYasha - remove statement "as he is with her..."
  • N * U * 10:39, 13 November 2006 InuYasha - remove speculation re depression of character
  • N * R * 10:36, 13 November 2006 InuYasha - age 150->15 - article now explains age better
  • N * R * 03:36, 13 November 2006 Lupe Fiasco - reverted own edit - future album name later removed from article
  • V * R * 03:35, 13 November 2006 Lupe Fiasco - added potential vandalism to name of future album

Special:Contributions/152.163.101.11

  • V * R * 02:01, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 01:59, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 01:58, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 01:56, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 01:56, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 01:54, 10 November 2006 Autism - standard vandalism
  • N * U * 02:35, 9 November 2006 Christina Aguilera - change undoubtedly -> possibly - this was a good edit as the phrase is per original research as it draws a conclusion - a better edit would have been to remove the speculation
  • V * R * 01:30, 9 November 2006 United States general elections, 2006 - added image of Burro to article
  • V * R * 00:21, 9 November 2006 Wayne Static - standard vandalism
  • N * U * 23:22, 8 November 2006 Once Upon a Time in the West - added punctuation
  • V * R * 19:51, 8 November 2006 Minor characters from Aqua Teen Hunger Force - removed all the "B" minor characters
  • N * U * 14:59, 8 November 2006 Mary Warren - corrected own grammer
  • N * U * 14:59, 8 November 2006 Mary Warren - added useful information
  • V * R * 08:23, 8 November 2006 Christina Aguilera - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 08:23, 8 November 2006 Christina Aguilera - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 08:22, 8 November 2006 Christina Aguilera - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 05:00, 8 November 2006 Christina Aguilera - standard vandalism
  • V * R * 03:32, 8 November 2006 Carmel High School - copyedit own work
  • N * R * 03:30, 8 November 2006 Carmel High School - copyedit own work
  • N * R * 03:29, 8 November 2006 Carmel High School - added non-notable and not sourced info on a school show
  • N * U * 09:53, 7 November 2006 Talk:Midnight movie - Explained deletion - notably the changes discussed remain as well

Special:Contributions/152.163.101.136

  • No edits - blocked without any vandalism / edits

How AOL works

AOL works in a way that helps stop abuse. When editing with AOL - everypage you edit is delivered through a different IP address. Thus blocking the IP is very effective in that it will stop any AOL user from editing the article they were vandalising. Thus a quick block is very effective against AOL users - I would recommend any IP that makes the same change to any article be immediately blocked.

Additionally, since the IP assignment will remain for a while assigned to a specific page - it allows the AOL user to be responsible for their edits to that page - as well as provides a history that prevents gaming of the system like using differnt IPs to edit the same article.

Finally, users can not easily vandalise in an automated fashion since using the AOL browser limits ones ability to run attached programs through the browser.

Action

I urge the admins to carefully consider this change to the longstanding tradition of not blocking AOL as a proxy. As you can see above - there is vandalism from AOL - but there are many good edits as well. Do not prevent the unsophisticated users from editing wikipedia. I urge you to continue the open nature of the encyclopedia. Abeo Paliurus 18:10, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Like I've said before, these ranges ARE OPEN PROXY RANGES. Your actual IP is masked and it costs nothing to use. This kind of activity is not allowed per Jimbo here. "In general, I like living in a world with anonymous proxies. I wish them well. There are many valid uses for them. But, writing on Wikipedia is not one of the valid uses." (bolding mine) People in that range can either log in or not use the proxy range. Naconkantari 18:37, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
We see helpful edits from open proxies all the time. That doesn't change the fact that they are open proxies. Mackensen (talk) 19:10, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. That fact is you don't know how AOL works any better than the rest of us. What we do know is that these are open proxies (if not, they might as well be), and open to abuse. We are following policy. We are not ignoring it. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 20:31, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Legal threat alert

We have a legal threat sighting here. I haven't dug too deep yet. What is the customary protocol for this? —Wknight94 (talk) 02:56, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I haven't looked either, but if he made the edits then it's GFDL, and he can't do anything. If he didn't, then treat as copyvio, imo. – Chacor 03:00, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Can't find copies on google. Eh find out what the copyright status of the text is would be the first stage.Geni 03:03, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
It appears he made a long unsourced addition with this edit to Malta New York. When subsequent large and unsourced edits to other pages were reverted, he decided he wanted to retract the Malta, New York edit. His retraction was reverted as apparent vandalism and then he made his legal threat basically claiming ownership of the unsourced material. Since it's unsourced anyway, I say let it stay out, eh? Does this get referred somewhere anyway? —Wknight94 (talk) 03:04, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Wait, never mind on the unsourced material being added back in. So basically, I have no idea why he made a legal threat. He just didn't want his unsourced material on Wikipedia but no one was fighting him for it. —Wknight94 (talk) 03:07, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Yes, it looks like he added a paragraph about the town of Malta, New York in August [48], became disenchanted today with Wikipedia for unrelated reasons [49], and now wants his paragraph back. [50] The legal threat was in response to a vandalism warning he got after he made the deletion. Newyorkbrad 03:08, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
From just below the input screen when you edit: "Content that violates any copyright will be deleted. Encyclopedic content must be verifiable. You agree to license your contributions under the GFDL." (emphasis in original) Maybe someone should point it our to him? Daniel.Bryant [ T · C ] 03:12, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
If his edit were useful, maybe. —Wknight94 (talk) 03:17, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
The choices are either to repost the paragraph on the principle that we're not going to allow people to revoke their contributions under GFDL, or live without the paragraph on the ground that as noted above it's unsourced, plus it was never going to be a candidate for paragraph of the year anyway. I would not recommend a block for the legal threat in this instance, at least not at this stage, as it would probably only enrage the user just as he is seemingly heading out the door. Newyorkbrad 03:20, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
I'll second that last part. For the content iself, I vote leave it out. —Wknight94 (talk) 03:21, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I can't let Ta bu shi da yu steal the show...

So here it is...

I'm getting married on December 22, so if anyone is around, so anyone around Guadalajara, Jalisco is more than welcomed. -- Drini 03:31, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

  • I never thought of giving myself as a Christmas present. Pretty creative. Congratulations :) --Durin 03:44, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congratulations to both you and Ta bu shi da yu. Flcelloguy (A note?) 03:55, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congrats, Drini. – Chacor 03:57, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congratulations! Do these WikiMarriages happen often? Or is it just this week? --tjstrf talk 06:03, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
  • ¡Felicitaciones! (Congratulations!) May your relationship always be perfect save for one problem, so that you will always have something to improve. Armedblowfish (talk|mail) 20:51, 18 November 2006 (UTC)
hmm I see love is still only a B-class article.Geni 03:24, 19 November 2006 (UTC)
  • W00t! Congratulations! --Ixfd64 01:13, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congratulaciones! Khoikhoi 01:17, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congratulations Drini! Best of luck in the married life. =) Nishkid64 01:29, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • From one soon-to-be married man to another - congrats! - Ta bu shi da yu 07:18, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Cheers! (Radiant) 15:01, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congrats! -- Szvest Ω Wiki Me Up ® 18:01, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congrats :)! Alphachimp 18:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Congratulations to you Drini, we will be with you in spirit. Yamaguchi先生 04:10, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
  • IS this going to make you a better Steward? :) Congrats Drini! ++Lar: t/c 10:54, 24 November 2006 (UTC)co

[edit] Requesting a block (on yourself)

Some organizations NAT outgoing connections to appear from a single IP and have users who vandalize Wikipedia with some regularity. Is there any policy in place to allow those organizations to request a permanent block on anonymous editing from the IP addresses for which they're responsible? If so, I'd appreciate someone pointing me to it. If not, could such a thing be done? Furthermore, if such a thing were to be done, where would the IP addresses be listed?

Thanks! - Jonathan 07:30, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

It has been done for schools in past. Clearly we need some verification that it is someone responsible rather than just someone trying to be "clever", so I believe they were emailed in originating from an official email account. --pgk 08:11, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
The folks at WP:ABUSE and m:OTRS-en have been involved with this sort of thing at the past, you might want to check with them. FreplySpang 15:12, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
I admit, I'm always rather surprised that this is really a problem. It seems to me better monitoring/logging, good company policies and active enforcement within the company are the real solution. Make it abundantly clear users should not be disruptive on the internet or violate policies of any websites they visit. You can even include vandalising wikipedia as a specific example. If it still occurs, track down the perpetrators (with good logs, it shouldn't be hard) and call them up for violating IT policies. Dock they pay or whatever. BTW, I'm not an admin and have never been involved in this sort of thing, but I assume normal practice would be to contact your organisation via the listed contact for your IP. Nil Einne 11:41, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Our AUP already forbids things like vandalism online, but our IT department can't and shouldn't be responsible for monitoring all web usage and determining what could be vandalism. Wikipedia only contacts the owners of IP addresses in rare cases (the WP::ABUSE referred to me above seems to be a quasi-policy on the subject), and tracking individual cases of vandalism on Wikipedia down to the user would be ridiculously time-consuming anyway. I'm in contact with the IT Dept at the organization in question; it's WikiMedia that I'm trying to reach now. (I think you might have misunderstood my message; if so, sorry for the flame.) Anyhow, I sent a message to the WikiMedia info address, so we'll see what they have to say. Jonathan 19:01, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] SpongeBob Episodes

List of SpongeBob SquarePants episodes was accused of copyvio. Discussion is going on at the bottom of the talk page: Talk:List of SpongeBob SquarePants episodes. I created a Temporary page, am I allowed to move the information back since the Temporary page has all copyvios removed? -AMK152 02:31, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, the copyvio had to be deleted before the good stuff could be moved over, but I've done this. Near as I could tell, the copyvio material was added on Jan. 1, so I restored the edits from before that to complete the history. Chick Bowen 03:04, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Can you restore the history from after the copyvio? -AMK152 03:10, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Not without including the copyvio, which we don't want (even in the history). Chick Bowen 03:24, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Why, was there anything in particular you wanted back? Chick Bowen 03:25, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
WP:GFDL is the only reason. What was the copyvio anyway? -AMK152 03:31, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
There were episode descriptions taken from various websites, mixed in with the others so that it would be very hard to sort out which was which. I don't know if there are more edits that can be salvaged or not--there are 2200 deleted edits, so it's not easy to go through them. Chick Bowen 04:24, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
  • It's possible (but a lot of work) to take the most recent deleted version, remove all parts that are copyvio, and save the page as such - then copy/paste the "deleted" edit history onto the talk page to keep the GFDL-required records. (Radiant) 11:57, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
  • Technically, it's not a GFDL issue at all, because the current version of the article doesn't reflect those edits. This is similar to when an article is transwikied or copied onto a non-wiki website or paper version: you don't need to keep updating the contributions if you're not using them.
  • It is a shame for the good faith editors who contributed to the article after the copyvio was introduced, but they can always go back in and re-add. One way to ameliorate the situation would be to view the deleted revisions and send talk-page messages alerting them to the deletion, and the reason it was done. But as far as restoring them, that's probably not a good path to take. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 16:55, 23 November 2006 (UTC)


[edit] More general question about page histories and GFDL

This type of situation, in which deleting a history due to copyvio, libel, etc. concerns or as the result of a move raises GFDL concerns in some people's minds, comes up from time to time. Obviously we want histories preserved where possible, but we don't need admins driving themselves crazy checking every edit, either. Two questions occur to me:
1. Is the concern that leaving names out of the history could violate GFDL a significant real-world issue, as opposed to a purely theoretical or philosophical one!?
2. Going forward, is there a small tweak that could be made to the license language that would address this issue? Newyorkbrad 15:27, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

My responses:

  • 1. For any Wikipedia article, you need to provide a list of the authors. This doesn't, as far as I know, apply to edits deleted by oversight, but I'm not entirely sure. Of more concern than deletion of edits, in my mind, is people copying and pasting stuff from other Wikipedia articles. The page history makes it look like they wrote the text, when in many cases it was someone at the other page who wrote the text. Technically, the page history only records who added the text to the article, not who wrote it. That is where the lawyering starts.
  • 2. Tweaking licenses after the fact cannot be done if it changes the meaning of the license. You can start a new license and encourage people to use that instead, but you have to get the people that released under the old licence (ie. every person who ever contributed to Wikipedia) to re-release under the new licence.

Anyway, those are my views. Carcharoth 16:13, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

The GFDL requirement is to maintain a certain amount of attribution 4b "...together with at least five of the principal authors of the Document (all of its principal authors, if it has fewer than five), unless they release you from this requirement." Determining the principal authors of heavily edited page is of course difficult there maybe nothing left of one person contributions even if at one time they covered 95% of the text. We maintain the edit history and cover all authors, that means we are in compliance since we list all of them. Oversight is not an exemption (the GFDL wasn't written for us, the term oversight is meaningless in the GFDL context), but since the use of oversight is generally to scrub a contribution in it's entirety that's not an issue, if we aren't publishing material that the person wrote we don't have to credit them. --pgk 16:24, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Ah. But what does "author of the Document" mean in this case? If someone writes a sentence, and then someone else copyedits it, who is the author? Either, neither, or both? I wasn't aware of the "at least five of the principal authors" bit, thanks for that. Am I also right in thinking that "the Document" here only concerns the present version, and not past versions? ie. Wikipedia is only "publishing" the present version and not past versions? And any document could be analysed so you can see who added each letter/word/sentence/paragraph/section, and then list those people. If your contribution got rewritten, you wouldn't be credited, is that right? Carcharoth 17:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Well multiple people contributing makes for joint authorship. Document there refers to the version you are taking to modify. Through history you can get to any version, so wikipedia is of course publishing multiple versions. If your contribution got removed or replaced a credit may not be required, although of course you may have arguably contributed to the version in question in other ways, such as the structure and layout of the document. Because we retain the full history many of these are non issues and if you want to get "good" answers (not definitive) to actually use, then you need to talk to a lawyer (rather than some editor on wikipedia.) --pgk 18:17, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Big backlog in CSD

350 items. Everyone lend a hand at C:CSD. - crz crztalk 12:37, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

I've got it down to 80, but now I'm really bored. Proto::type 16:12, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
I think CSD is long overdue for a radical reform - it appears that having 100+ items pile-up is now a regular occurrence, and I can't even remember the last time it had fewer than 10 items. 05:36, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Found a suicide note posted by a user

I ran across a disturbing post which you should be aware of. The note was posted on the person's user page and talk page (see the fifth item on the list, inside comment markers): [51] and [52]

Trinity Skyward 02:18, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
She has had some problems recently. The Esperanza guys (even though I don't agree in some of their ideas) have been working hard at comforting her. However, I am not really sure what admins would be able to do in this case. -- ReyBrujo 02:45, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Not something the admins can deal with, unfortunately. – Chacor 02:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree here. It seems (s)he's getting as much support as possible from fellow Wikipedians, which is awesome... however I don't think it's necessary nor appropriate for an administrator to intervene here. I think it's best we just let it be seems to be the best course of action here. // Pilotguy (Cleared to land) 02:51, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Agreed, she seems to be getting plenty of support. I think her comment was one of those rare occasions caused by stress when you say something that you're really not considering. Dionyseus 05:34, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Huh? I saw the visible message, and was worried enough by that to add some words of support on the user's talk page, even though I don't know the editor. I never thought to look for hidden comments like that. That's... well, I'm speechless. My general philosophy is to steer clear of things like this, as online interactions can be very difficult to get right in emotionally charged situations (well, that and other reasons), and I now wish I had stuck to that principle. Carcharoth 16:02, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

It's understandable for her, from what happened to her (read the note), but I can assure you, that she isn't suicidal at the moment, she's doing fine. Will (Tell me, is something eluding you, sunshine?) 01:36, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh dear. I... don't quite know to say. Really, I didn't mean for anyone to notice that, let alone post it here! It wasn't really a suicide note, more like a personal acknowledgement of the things going on in my head. Suicidal thoughts are a symptom of clinical depression, and whenever I fall particularly low they certainly do occur. However, they are only thoughts. I have always been a logical person, and always will be; suicide is not a logical thing for me to do when I have people who need me. At this time some of those are other Wikipedians going through tough times, and I will not loose the will to live as long as anybody needs my help.
You may note that I said in the message "Due to recent events and their repercussions I may do any of the following". May, not will... it wasn't a suicide note, I promise you that. I am not currently sucidal, thanks to the Will that helpful Wikipedians have given me. This community is the reason I'm alive and functioning today (suicidal tendencies when I first left because of this, but this pulled me through), and I would never leave you like that.
All I can say is thank you all for caring, and for acting so quickly. Knowing that people care is really extraordinarily helpful at a time when you feel like you are all alone and feel (to quote Kyoko who quotes Grey's Anatomy) "all dark and twisty inside". I can not say enough how much it means to me! Thank you, thank you, and thank you. Your support means the world to me, in a literal sense as well as figurative. My love to all :-) — Editor at Large(speak) 02:21, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I think a nice wikibreak would be in order here; maybe come back after you've sorted out your personal issues. It's just really not productive when we have this kind of thing spilling over onto the administrator's noticeboard. Remember, Wikipedia is not therapy. --Cyde Weys 04:41, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Mr. Weys I am totally shocked and appalled at your lack of sympathy for our friend. How can you suggest to someone that is obviously grieving to naff off, we don't have time for you here unless you are ready to work. You need to apologise. Pynopoulous 05:30, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think Cyde meant to be offensive, he was just thinking with productivity in mind. ★MESSEDROCKER★ 05:38, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
No harm done. I've seen Cyde around enough to know that he's extremely honest, I don't take it personally ;-) I'd just like to mention that I didn't request it be placed here. My comments were in comment markers, hidden within a message at the top of my talk page: I honestly wasn't thinking at the time I added it (depressive episode) and didn't believe anyone would find it. As I stated above, it wasn't a suicide note as much as a personal admission of what was going on inside my head. When editing my userpages I often forget that many people have them watchlisted, or even that other people see all my contributions. I'm a webmaster, I'm not used to that ... plus I'm just absent-minded ;-)
Regards, — Editor at Large(speak) 10:38, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Does wikipedia have import?

An if so, could I get a list of articles transwikied from de.wikipedia? They have an excellent series of articles on phytopathogens (plant diseases), while our articles are rather sparse and in several cases just plain incorrect. I can translate them, but I was wondering if they could be imported to give credit to the contributors on de.wp. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 15:39, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I don't think that's possible. The interwiki link if followed though, will allow people to see the history from de.wp pschemp | talk 16:07, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Special:Import - "No transwiki import sources have been defined and direct history uploads are disabled." --pgk 16:11, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Import on Wikipedia is disabled. Last time I checked the import code in Mediawiki was actually broken, but I'm not sure if that is still the reason or not. Dragons flight 16:14, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
It's not broken... we have it on wikiversity and wikibooks :). Word around the campfire is that they're worried about misattribution before SUL comes into play. I was just hoping it might have been turned on from that project, since the de.wikipedia has so much material in the physical and life sciences that we don't have here. --SB_Johnny|talk|books 16:17, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
I've done one import, but it was entirely by hand -- took an article from the Spanish Wikipedia (Raphanobrassica), dumped it through BabelFish, then copied and pasted to a new article, with whatever editing was needed done. The article has grown some since then, though, so you'd have to look back through the history to see the original version. Haikupoet 06:19, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Those projects have Import because the developers have turned it on at the community's wish. The developers could to the same for the English Wikipedia, if there was support for the action. Dmcdevit·t 07:37, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Is there a way we can set up a discussion to see if the community wants it or not? User:Zscout370 (Return Fire) 07:41, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Simply list as a source a link to the revision you took. This will provide a link to the edit history of the version you used. We have a Cite this article link, they will have something similiar. HighInBC (Need help? Ask me) 15:03, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia is not a telephone directory

Is it really appropriate for all these schools (such as York House School) many of which have no claim to notability, to have telephone numbers listed? We don't exist to provide directory information for every school in Canada, plus the potential for abuse of these numbers is very high. I don't think they should be included, but they already have been on hundreds of pages. Certainly a link to the school website or whatever gives enough info for someone to find the phone number, but our mission here should not be to publish such information. What should be done about this? pschemp | talk 15:49, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I have to agree that telephone numbers, fax numbers, email addresses, and perhaps even the physical address are not appropriate. Unless those data and information are crucial and appropriate to the article (i.e. 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for the White House), then they shouldn't be included. They are not encyclopedic, and as far as I know, none of our other articles on locations (excluding schools) have any of this information, nor do any of our articles on living people. We don't provide contact information; we provide encyclopedic articles. Flcelloguy (A note?) 17:55, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Apply gentle pressure at Wikipedia:WikiProject Education which seems to be in charge of maintaining those infoboxes, and ask how this fits WP:NOT#DIR. If nobody can provide a good encyclopedic reason for including these phone numbers I agree they should be removed. Femto 17:58, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
I think most of the school articles are completely non notable and unencyclopedic anyway, but given that we need an overwhelming consensus to delete, it isn't going to happen. There's nothing wrong with listing the actual address of the school, I'm pretty sure most articles on buildings will have an indication of its address or map reference. There's no need for contact details such as telephone, fax or email though, when a link to their website should suffice. - Hahnchen 18:58, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

No. Physical addresses on casino infoboxes were removed and we were directed to put that kind of stuff on Wikitravel. Hbdragon88 22:33, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm not too sure I'd agree with that, I think the physical location is quite important. I'm not too familiar with articles on building to be honest, but I know King's Cross railway station and Jordanhill railway station both include map references in, why shouldn't casinos? - Hahnchen 00:31, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Ok well, we're actually talking about phone numbers on school articles here, so if people would like to comment, a discussion has been started on the project page here. pschemp | talk 00:35, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Backlog at WT:AWB/CP

There's a big backlog of users waiting to be approved by an admin. -- Chrissperanza! chat edits 20:48, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

  • So I see... I'm not quite familiar with this tool, but the guide on its main page says we should approve users with a clean record and significant (>500) contributions to mainspace? Looking over the nominees I find that their records appear to be clean, but most of them fall short of the editcount criterion. I'm not much for editcountitis, though, so I would like to ask if this is really a problem. (Radiant) 12:52, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] I don't understand why these articles are repeatedly deleted

Articles about ChefMoz (a website at [53]) have been deleted twice, as logged at [| this location].

The second version of the article, which I created, should legitimately have been labeled a stub (I don't recall if I labeled it as such), but I do not see any basis for its speedy deletion, which apparently occurred several months ago (I was not notified, possibly because I apparently had no e-mail address in my profile). Note that I added the article in order to populate a nonfunctional link from [| another wikipedia article]. My recollection (for some reason, there is no log of this contribution at [| my contribution log]) is that the content I added included both an external link to the ChefMoz website and an internal link to the Open Directory Project article.

At the time that I created the ChefMoz article, the [| Open Directory Project article] included a functioning link to an article about MusicMoz, but I see that the MusicMoz article also has been deleted (yesterday!), as logged at [| this wikipedia page]. There is no reason given for deleting that article, and I cannot immediately discern a reason for speedy deletion.

--orlady 23:00, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

I finally found the procedure for disputing deletions. (Earlier when looking for the procedure I found this page instead.) --orlady 00:11, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

  • (this issue is now on WP:DRV). (Radiant) 12:55, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Legal threat?

Would this statement on User:BhaiSaab's talk page constitute a legal threat? (→Netscott) 23:32, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, and blocked accordingly. Naconkantari 23:42, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Naconkantari, thanks for the prompt response. I wasn't sure if that qualified but in the future I will unhesistatingly recognize such statements for what they are. (→Netscott) 23:52, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
Hold on a second, do we know if any of there is any truth to this? I'd be upset too if this were the case. Might even call the cops. — CharlotteWebb 00:07, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Actually I'm not sure if it is true... I just noticed that User:BhaiSaab up and retired today and so I did some back tracking to try and understand it and came up with that. I think Wikipedia:No legal threats doesn't allow for a legal threat on the Wiki regardless... but I'm not super familiar with that policy. (→Netscott) 00:11, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
I think given Hkelkar (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log • rfcu)'s block log that Naconkantari's block duration caps "the final straw". (→Netscott) 00:15, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

I would like to clarify here that I did indeed attempt to call and email a student by the name of H. Kelkar at the University of Texas in order to identify whether or not User:Hkelkar was really him and ask some questions regarding Physics research. The details for the email address and phone number are easily available with a Google search of Kelkar's full name, which he has publically posted on Wikipedia himself, in his first edit here. The contents of the email and call were not threatening at all, and any claims that state such are fallacious or misinterpreted. My primary intention was to establish contact with the person so I could confirm whether or not the Hkelkar on Wikipedia was really who he stated he was. This should be taken into consideration. When an admin told me that conducting such research independently was inappropriate, I stopped. Again, although the contents of the email/call were not threatening, I can understand how a user may feel insecure if anyone tried to establish contact with him or her outside their normal comfort zone, i.e. Wikipedia, and I did not take Hkelkar's threat seriously since neither the call or email were sent in a threatening matter. BhaiSaab talk 00:32, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

{edit con)BhaiSaab has been stalking Hkelkar. See User_talk:Fred_Bauder#HArrassment_by_BhaiSaab . BhaiSaab has a nice block log as well. Now we know he's engaged in stalking. BhaiSaab should be banned, and Hkelkar's remarks were absolutely justified. I have to wonder why Netscott is backing a POV-pushing wikistalker, though given his attacks on me [54] and perpetration of lies its not surprising. All Hkelkar's comment shows is that he was sick of being stalked, and this is another ploy by Netscott on behalf of BhaiSaab to get Hindu users out of BhaiSaab's way.Bakaman Bakatalk 00:37, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
I have asked Nakontari to unblock. Based on the above admission, there is at least room for misunderstanding, and both Hkelkar and BhaiSaab are participants in an ongoing arbitration case that has been extremely unpleasant on both side. Thatcher131 00:40, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
(edit conf.) Lets all calm it down, please? Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Hkelkar/Workshop#Unblock <---- temporary injunction proposal. Daniel.Bryant [ T · C ] 00:42, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Also, I would like to note that that I did not attempt to contact his supervisor - I attempted to contact him directly as the phone number on his website was listed under his name, not anyone else's. Thanks. BhaiSaab talk 00:45, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

In general, it is just a good idea to the first make off-wiki communication foray by e-mail, and respect requests for cessation, regardless of how accessible the user's information, just a courtesy and an implicit nod to the separation of "real" life and wikipedia. At least in my opinion. -- Avi 00:58, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

As some administrators know, I did attempt to do a few weeks ago before and unfortunately received no response. I then attempted the only other means I knew of. BhaiSaab talk 01:01, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Since I initiated this thread I'll take the opportunity to state the same thing that I did here and say I completely agree that attempting to contact someone directly offwiki is inappropriate and particularly so when one is in conflict with that other party. That said I do respect BhaiSaab's forthright admission of his attempt to contact Hkelkar directly. (→Netscott) 01:06, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
I've removed the block after discussion. Naconkantari 01:20, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
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