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WP:REALNAME issue

There is an issue of a Wikipedian who has the same name as a member of the Finnish Anti-Fascist Committee (SAFKA). It is getting quite confusing and problematical discussing the views of "Petri Krohn" of SAFKA as there exists User:Petri Krohn, as the bottom of Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/Finnish_Anti-Fascist_Committee indicates. A potential COI was reported on Misplaced Pages:Conflict_of_interest/Noticeboard#Johan_B.C3.A4ckman earlier.

As I understand Misplaced Pages:REALNAME, "If you share the same name as a well known person, or you are a well known person, and you wish to edit under your own name, then your userpage should make it clear whether you actually are the well known person or not". User:Petri Krohn has participated in the discussion in Misplaced Pages:Articles_for_deletion/Finnish_Anti-Fascist_Committee, so he is well aware of the requirements of Misplaced Pages:REALNAME, but he hasn't indicated on his user page if he is the same person as "Petri Krohn" of SAFKA. Could some resolution to this be found. Thanks Martintg (talk) 20:31, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

Have you asked the editor? You may wish to advise them of this section, in any case. LessHeard vanU (talk) 20:53, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

I thought that was apparent in the AfD dicussion referred to above, which he is aware of, but appears to be ignoring the issue. I have explicitly advised him of this section. Martintg (talk) 22:21, 7 April 2009 (UTC)

I apologise, I meant "have you asked the editor on a talkpage" - I didn't see anything on the user talkpage so was enquiring if it had been brought up elsewhere; you note he has avoided or ignored the query on the afd, but I would be surprised if this had not been brought up previously in a more less confrontational environment. LessHeard vanU (talk) 12:35, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the misunderstanding. WP:USERNAME is policy, right? Alll I am asking for is assistance in clearing up this confusion. Martintg (talk) 20:32, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

It is indeed, as is Misplaced Pages:Assume good faith. Another request to clarify the situation is probably the best initial response - and only if the requests continue to be ignored, and the account continues to edit in areas which may be of interest to the RL Petri Krohn, should we conclude that it is likely the two same names are linked. At that point we can act under WP:Username and any other relevant policy. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:06, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Okay, thanks for the advice, done. Martintg (talk) 21:20, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

What is a "well known person"? Surely, one who is notable enough to have own WP article, which is not the case with Petri Krohn the Anti-Fascist Committee member. Thus Petri Krohn the WP user doesn't owe anyone an explanation. Óðinn (talk) 20:19, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Petri Krohn of SAFKA is appearing in the television media, so certainly he is becoming well known. Martintg (talk) 20:32, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Doesn't matter. He's not notable. If it is the same person, what he does off-wiki is of no relevance on-wiki. So long as he abides by the same content policies that everyone is under obligation to follow, he is under no obligation to respond to what can be construed as constant attempts of WP:OUTING and WP:HARRASS. --Russavia 21:22, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Uh, the user Petri Krohn has been contributing to Misplaced Pages since August 2005. He might be the same person as the SAFKA member, or someone who happens to have the same name -- but he didn't join Misplaced Pages just to promote SAFKA, & presumably has been around Misplaced Pages long enough to understand the problems inherent in conflicts of interest if he is a member of that group. As well-meaning as Martintg is, it appears that he's needlessly stirring up trouble & possibly offending an otherwise constructive member. Let's give Petri the benefit of the doubt here. -- llywrch (talk) 18:53, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Is this really relevant, yes Petri has made a very good contribution, but do we also want to drag up the really negative stuff too? The only one that appears to be needlessly stirring up trouble is Russavia, see here. This is purely a conflict of interest issue. If Petri chooses to edit a topic that mentions a person that has the same name as him, he has to declare his interest. He hasn't done so, yet continues to edit the article. Martintg (talk) 21:31, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

A person named John Smith is not required to stop and make a COI disclaimer every time he edits another John Smith article. policy is meant to provide guidance, not become a crutch to whack other people with.

Potential legal issues with real names

Estonian Ministry of Justice has prepared a bill making it a felony to create a website account in another person's name thereby creating a false and damaging image of that other person. The bill was delivered to Riigikogu yesterday ().

If the Petri Krohn of SAFKA is not the User:Petri Krohn of Misplaced Pages, the bill might apply to one of them in the future, provided that he enters Estonian jurisdiction. I'm not sure which one would be the victim and which one the evildoer, however -- both have repeatedly behaved in rather peculiar manner that might damage the image of the other.

In any case, it's obviously best to clear up the potential confusion as soon as reasonably possible -- not because of the law, but because of common sense and collegiality. Διγουρεν_{Εμπρος!} 18:32, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Gee, I wouldn't want to be named "John Smith" there, or whatever the Estonian equivalent of that name is. Lankiveil 23:52, 11 April 2009 (UTC).

There are several problems with your interpretation of the law. One, we aren't bound by Finnish law. Two, Petri Krohn may be his real name. Three, no evidence has been provided of him being the same person and any attempt to discover his idea is a violation of OUTING. Geoff Plourde (talk) 17:26, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

User:Zouavman Le Zouave

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Content dispute. No personal attacks and no admin intervention needed. – Toon 21:38, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

This user has been repeatedly attacking other editors for not sharing his own opinions, and has been trying to push his own opinion in Misplaced Pages articles. Editors who do not share his opinions are referred to as if they were ignorant or stupid, particularly here and here. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 14:00, 8 April 2009 (UTC))

I see an ongoing discussion and Zouavman asking for additional input at WikiProject Music. I see nothing that is even close to an attack, not even any real incivility, in any recent edits made by Zouavman. What specific diffs by Zouavman do you believe merit administrator action? The Seeker 4 Talk 14:29, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

I am not going to comment on the accusation of personal attacks. On the other hand, I will comment on the fact that Ibaranoff24 is the only user in the discussion to push for his point of view on the article, despite the fact that three users have already stated in this discussion their disagreement with the removal of a genre from the infobox. It's about respecting reliable sources and consensus. I have tried to prevent an edit war by letting Ibaranoff24 edit the article as he wishes, despite the fact that none of his, sometimes controversial edits are not backed by community consensus. For a walkthrough of the edits made on the article and the talk page, see User:Zouavman Le Zouave/Ibaranoff24. If an administrator believes I have violated WP:NPA or made any other block-worthy edits, I will see no objection to a block. Zouavman Le Zouave 15:33, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Except that your list is inaccurate. I made some corrections to your list which you reverted to keep your own point of view readily viewable. How convenient. I've never made any controversial edits. In actuality, I have done my part in improving the quality of the article by cleaning up its text, adding relevant content and sources, and removing unreliable sources. Do you really think that questioning user-edited biographies, biased promotional articles, or correcting the link on one of the news articles to point to the author's page which lists the full interview cited (the title, in fact, does not refer to the band by the genre which you are trying to push, but in fact is simply They're an Armenian band) are "controversial" edits? I've never pushed any opinion. I only want to present what is considered factually accurate by the majority of sourced material. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 17:48, 8 April 2009 (UTC))

• Right now this is a whole lot of "He did this!" "Did not, the other guy did that!" "I never, but he did the other thing!" Please, both of you, provide diffs. Links to talkpage sections aren't particularly helpful. As it is, this just looks like a content dispute, which may be better handled here. //roux   18:04, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

• Zouavman Le Zouave: "I'll be the smarter one and not revert him"
• Zouavman Le Zouave: "...especially one that understands the concepts of verifiability, neutrality, and consensus, it would be greatly appreciated"

Both of these statements imply that editors who do not agree with Zouavman's opinions are idiots. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 18:30, 8 April 2009 (UTC))

That last statement was not at all implying that Ibaranoff24 did not understand those concepts. I was rather asking for other users to give their input on the discussion, and asking for preferably experienced users that understand those concepts. One would agree that without understanding those concepts thoroughly, discussions are generally less constructive. This had absolutely nothing to do with Ibaranoff24's understanding of those concepts, which I do not make judgement upon. Zouavman Le Zouave 18:47, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

Fair enough. But I have seen quite a few statements made by you which come across as being negative towards editors who do not share your opinions. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 19:35, 8 April 2009 (UTC))

Then show them to me. My disagreement with you in no way equates a feeling of superiority from my part. Now until you find an edit which exemplifies this supposed negativity, please refrain from accusing me of making such comments. Zouavman Le Zouave 14:28, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

When you imply that you will "be the smarter one", refer to another person's edits as "controversial", and claim that they are "unable to respect consensus" when none exists, you come across as being negative. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 01:57, 11 April 2009 (UTC))

• This user has recently removed sourced material from the article System of a Down. (Ibaranoff24 (talk) 21:10, 12 April 2009 (UTC))

I will just summarize my explanations which I have just given here. The source used does not explicitly mention what is being said in the article. You have interpreted it to say this, maybe, but the passages are not sourced properly. This is an illegitimate usage of a source. Zouavman Le Zouave 21:21, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

There's no need for admin intervention here; head to dispute resolution for content disputes, if necessary. I'm archiving this discussion. – Toon 21:38, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Something untoward in Egypt Austria relations

The bilateral relationship between Egypt and Austria has been the subject of no less four academic conferences, with published proceedings: . This was noted after the article on the subject had been nominated for deletion on grounds of notability: Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Austria–Egypt relations. Afterwards, at least two editors continued to argue for deletion on the grounds that the subject failed the inclusion criteria of WP:N. While I cannot say what inappropriate thing is going on here, it should be obvious enough that something is rotten. There is some problem that needs addressing. If these were less established accounts, one would probably conclude sockpuppetry or external co-ordination without any further evidence, but given the circumstances the situation certainly requires tact and some "less involved" opinions. So I am soliciting them here. WilyD 11:40, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I have no opinion whether this topic is notable or not, but after all the borderline insane cruft-pushing that has been going on, you shouldn't be surprised there is a backlash. Of course it doesn't take a coordinated effort for this to happen. --Hans Adler (talk) 12:12, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I can confirm that no, there is nothing rotten here (at least on my part): I simply expressed my opinion that as Austria and Egypt did not exist in their current form until the 1920s, and as the book we were asked to accept (on faith, it seems) as evidence for a notable relationship deals with the 19th century, WP:N still has not been demonstrated for that article. Please stop raising frivolous objections here, and try to argue persuasively at the AfD. - Biruitorul 14:36, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

One can't persuad the unpersuadable, but when one observes highly suspicious behaviour, this is the correct place to request less involved admin(s) review the situation. WilyD 15:05, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

You argument hasn't convinced them. This could be conspiracy on their part. Something tells me it has more to do with deficiencies in your argument. Assume the latter. - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire - past ops) 16:15, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't see anything terribly sinister here. By way of Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Croatia–Uruguay relations closing as "delete" there obviously exists some group of like minded individuals who have formed a consensus that relations between countries do not warrant an article by their mere existence. I don't see bad faith editing on either side of this issue... just two sides to the argument with credible positions. Hiberniantears (talk) 16:35, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Err, Croatia-Uruguay was pretty marginal. It is not a comparable situation. The problem is not that there are editors who believe "relations between countries do not warrant an article by their mere existence" , but editors who believe "relations between countries can never warrant an article, regardless of the circumstances". WilyD 21:00, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I see what you're saying. This just led me to another thought: Are these articles considered unnecessary because of articles that focus specifically on the individual countries (such as Foreign relations of Algeria)? Hiberniantears (talk) 21:07, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I think that's an important factor. Some people consider every article of the type relations between Andorra and Tuvalu automatically notable. For simplicity let's assume there are 200 independent states. (The UN has 192 members.) Then we are talking about (200 x 199)/2 ≈ 20,000 such articles. Some editors have been mass producing such articles, with uniform structure and a very clumsy, uniform first sentence. There are similarities to the situation with human habitations, for which we have a consensus that they are all automatically notable, but I don't think it follows automatically that we have to treat them in the same way. In fact, there seems to be a majority against these articles.

A reader who is interested in the relations between Andorra and Tuvalu is likely also interested in the relations between Andorra and other countries, or between Tuvalu and other countries. Since there isn't much to say about these relations, it would be much better to treat them in foreign relations of Andorra and foreign relations of Tuvalu. The little content that we have is usually of the type: date of establishment of diplomatic relations and location of embassy. The former is best handled in tabular form. The latter information could be part of the same table, or for countries with only few embassies we could simply list them, and for each embassy list the countries which it covers. By contrast, this kind of overview is hard to get when the information is fragmented.

Some such articles are definitely notable, e.g. relations between North Korea and South Korea. In addition we could have articles such as relations between European countries, or relations between African and South American countries. I think there is a lot of potential in such articles, and they may eventually spin out subarticles. But starting with tiny articles whose content is better discussed elsewhere is not OK.

I don't agree with WilyD that there is a problem with editors who believe that such articles can never be notable. A natural reaction to mass production of articles which are mostly notable and almost empty is to delete them almost all without prejudice. Unfortunately we have no proper process for this, and the processes we do have are being filibustered by editors who are far on the inclusionist side of the spectrum. Obviously this creates bad feelings and puts people on the other side of the spectrum into "defending the integrity of the wiki against cruft" mode. So we have the usual polarisation caused by reactance (psychology): both sides become more and more radical. --Hans Adler (talk) 22:11, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

What troubles me about these deletions is that the nominator has never shown any attempt to investigate the bilateral relations & determine whether there evidence that these are notable; the nominations that I've voted against all fall in a repackaged version of the old, discredited "n.n., d." formula. For example, to people who don't know Ethiopian history, Belgium-Ethiopia relations or Ethiopia-Japan relations both might appear to be speedy deletes, when in each case there is ample evidence that would persuade anyone to keep them -- events which include Belgium's role in setting up one of Ethiopia's military schools, & the role of Japan's first constitution on Ethiopia's 1935 constitution. On the other hand, if faced with something like Ethiopia-Syria relations, I would be far less supportive due to my knowledge of Ethiopian history. (Have they even exchanged ambassadors?) I'd like to see evidence that these articles proposed for deletion are not notable, based on some amount of research. -- llywrch (talk) 23:42, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

So, we're just doing it in reverse. If it's notable, it will be kept, or it'll come back, better than before. If it's not, no loss. --BlueSquadronRaven 00:15, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Not always. Subjects covered by articles that have been deleted after the AfD process face a stiffer challenge for creation, whether the deletion was correct or not. Sometimes its due to an understandable concern over troublemakers, but sometimes its simply due to the attitude that if a topic has been deleted once, the argument has been settled & Misplaced Pages never needs an article about it. Since I started editting here in 2002, people have been growing less flexible over rules & guidelines despite the expected growth in institutional experience & sophistication. -- llywrch (talk) 16:01, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Personally, I always do some research before making a nomination. I'm not going to waste people's time by nominating obviously notable articles. And two points for WilyD: 1) if "Croatia-Uruguay was pretty marginal", why did you vote to keep it? 2) Can you name even a single editor who believes "relations between countries can never warrant an article, regardless of the circumstances". I'm certainly not one of them and that sounds awfully like a straw man. - Biruitorul 00:36, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

It has frequently been requested that WP:BEFORE be made formal policy, and that nominations for lack of notability or the equivalent that do not show a relevant search be rejected--or at least that nominators say what they have searched. It would seem to me that doing otherwise is both failing to improve articles and wasting the time of the community. If no sources were found in at least the obvious places to look, saying so will either facilitate the deletion, or give a guide for where someone supporting the article should try next. This group of articles illustrates it well. That said, it was a shame the people making them did not try for better content in the first place, which would really have saved an immense amount of trouble all around. theirs' was the first failure. DGG (talk) 06:32, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:BEFORE as a guideline (I suppose that's what you meant when you said policy) might have helped in the present situation, but perhaps not in the way you think. As a guideline it would have more freedom and more incentive to evolve, and I am sure it would soon contain exceptions for mass creations that might even become clear instructions what to do when hundreds of mostly non-notable articles are encountered. Our current processes are clearly not working, mostly due to the filibustering that you are in part enabling. --Hans Adler (talk) 08:24, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Using words like "filibustering" does not help us find a consensus here. Please limit your comments to what is being said. -- llywrch (talk) 16:01, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

My intention is not to prevent action, but to take action by finding a coherent way of dealing with this sort of overly sketchy article. To continue to make them, and continue to delete them, is a way of proceeding which will continue conflict but not solve anything. I will just mention that multiple bulk creation of even larger numbers of even briefer articles ( eg. on species of living organisms), were at first objected to but eventually accepted. Incidentally, "marginally notable" is still notable. DGG (talk) 04:27, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

"Passes WP:N, though not by country miles" is still a good reason to keep, especially on such an important, encyclopaedic topic. I haven't commented at all on those articles I can't show pass WP:N, because while I suspect by and large they do, I don't know so, and without speaking the languages of those countries I'm typically unable to do an even vaguely exhaustive search. There are several AFDs I've let pass without comment, don't think I haven't looked at them, and even spent two or three minutes trying to see if I could figure out if they're notable. WilyD 00:57, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Problem with recurring sock puppetry.

• Huntdowntheconpiracists (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Cs32en (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• IrFactor (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Counteraction (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• Redandgraychips (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)
• No Time Toulouse (talk · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki)

The above account is an example of the stead stream of redlink accounts (recycled banned users) coming to disrupt Collapse of the World Trade Center‎ and World Trade Center controlled demolition conspiracy theories . Could a checkuser please watchlist those pages. It takes one minute to create an account, and at least ten minutes to file a report at WP:SPI. Obviously, the balance of time if we go that route is not good at all. Jehochman 17:51, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

At least one conspiracy theorist with an interest in that article has recently been banned on other grounds. I'm wondering if she might be behind some of these socks. --Orange Mike | Talk 18:54, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Anything is possible. Here's another sock (added above). Could we get some help here please? We need a clueful admin, or a checkuser, to start blocking the socks until the user gives up. Jehochman 20:05, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The two accounts listed as possible socks were both newly created on April 9. Semiprotection would keep them from editing the WTC articles. EdJohnston (talk) 21:10, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Great would somebody help please with this. I am not using my bit in this topic. Jehochman 01:39, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Let me be clear. HELP FROM UNINVOLVED ADMINISTRATORS IS NEEDED NOW. WP:UNINVOLVED is a two way street. If you ask administrators to hold back where they are involved, you need to pitch in an help when help is needed. Jehochman 01:44, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

I've semi-protected World Trade Center controlled demolition conspiracy theories for one month, citing this thread as the reason. Other admins may modify this protection as they think best. Let me know if more abuse is going on. User:Cs32en managed to get himself blocked for 24 hours over an AN3. He also has an account on the German wiki, where he takes an interest in 9/11 matters. He does not have very many contributions in either place. He is at present requesting unblock, so other admins may go check out User talk:Cs32en if they wish. EdJohnston (talk) 03:09, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

User:DawnisuponUS? They have definitely used sockpuppets in the past to promote 9/11 conspiracy theories. Hut 8.5 10:09, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not convinced User:Cs32en is a sockpuppet. de:Benutzer:Cs32 seems to be a long-term editor on de.wikipedia. I suppose we don't know that de:Benutzer:Cs32 is the same editor as User:Cs32en; we'd have to see an acknowledgement there to be sure. If we can find evidence that he isn't the same editor, we should be able to block on a username block basis. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 18:20, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Both accounts are part of the same SUL account, so it looks like they are the same person. Redandgraychips (talk · contribs) looks like a sockpuppet. Hut 8.5 18:48, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

That seems to be de:Benutzer:Cs32en, not de:Benutzer:Cs32. There was a User:Cs32 with two edits in 2006, so de:Cs32 couldn't just unify with en:Cs32. But I was wrong about sockpuppets in pro se, so I could easily be wrong here. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:21, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm just seeing this here, and checked the contributions from User:Cs32. I have indeed created this account, but I didn't remember that, and I also didn't really bother to check the details of the unification process and thought that either unification was only about the projects, but not the language-based accounts, or that something did not work that would be difficult for me to find out. (The two edits of User:Cs32 have no connection to 9/11 issues.) I have also correctly guessed the password that I used for this account, so I can now close User:Cs32 and rename User:Cs32en, if that would be the correct way to proceed. I don't want to do anything that would be difficult or impossible to reverse, or would be considered suspicious. I welcome your advice on this point. --Cs32en (talk) 23:45, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I have added two more accounts to the list at the top of this report. There appears to be a sustained attack by Truthers, possibly sock or meat puppets at World Trade Center controlled demolition conspiracy theories. Could we please have more eyes on the situation, especially a checkuser. The single purpose accounts are coming one after another. It is not scalable to file a sock puppet report for each one. We need uninvolved administrators and at least one checkuser to camp on that page and clear out any sock puppets. Thank you. Please acknowledge if you can help. Jehochman 23:52, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Help? Anyone? Jehochman 13:20, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I've found a few Truther websites which have recently posted criticism of the article: (note the latter is trying to get people to add some text to an article). I think we're dealing with a load of people who read this and decided to edit the articles, which means this is meatpuppetry not sockpuppetry. Hut 8.5 16:36, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Okay, I am watchlisting World Trade Center controlled demolition conspiracy theories for a time. Any opposition to indefblocking new SPAs as meatpuppets with reference to this thread?  Sandstein  21:13, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Given the apparent meat puppetry discovered by Hut 8.5, that seems to make sense. I am an involved editor. Jehochman 04:21, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Locewtus (talk · contribs) has been adding the content suggested in one of those links to large numbers of articles, including some that have nothing to do with 9/11. Hut 8.5 21:12, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

A lot of "truther", and also some non-"truther" sites (e.g. a blog on Huffington Post) report on these issues at the moment (without reference to WP). I don't think that the majority of new SPA editors have seen the two internet sites that specifically report on WP. A meatpuppet allegation is disturbing for every new editor, as many new editors would consider it legitimate to encourage people to get involved here, if they think the WP article is inaccurate. It's even more disturbing to a new user who has not been encouraged by any such web site or other person (and therefore, is not a meatpuppet). --Cs32en (talk) 21:38, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

The Cs32en account has been arguing to include unverified info. This could be dealt with via WP:AE if it can't be resolved through ordinary dscussion. Hut 8.5, could you file a request at WP:SPI with your evidence of meat puppetry? Jehochman 01:16, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I have never argued that unverified info should be included in a Misplaced Pages article. I have proposed to include info that you may consider being unverified. I have presented sources and reasoning with regard to WP:V. If you do not agree, please use the talk page, so that consensus can be built on whether the info should be included in the article. You have simply deleted my proposal from the talk page. Also, I am neither a sock puppet nor a meat puppet, but have been contributing to de.wikipedia.org since 2006 (my account). --Cs32en (talk) 02:39, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

The problem is that you are proposing the same stuff that has been discussed and rejected many times before. You are taking the same position as a bunch of meat puppet accounts that may soon get banned. Please, you are the one who needs to slow down and listen to the consensus. As I have said on a few of the other multitude of threads you've started in a very determined effort to get your way, you can request clarification at WP:RFAR. Meanwhile, can we get an administrator to start investigating the meat puppetry that Hut 8.5 has found evidence of? Jehochman 06:15, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Editor adding many WP:SELFREF-violating entries to reference sections

Ksnow (talk · contribs) has gone on an editing spree that awakes sincere doubts on his mental health. I honestly believe he is insane. For several weeks now he is adding the sentence "Based on the article in the French Misplaced Pages" in every article on a French commune he comes across. Now, i can assure you as the main author of articles like Colmar, Haguenau, Molsheim or even Strasbourg, Rosheim and Sélestat that nothing at all there is based on French Misplaced Pages, on the contrary even, i sometimes translate passages into French (i usually write for the German Misplaced Pages and translate some of my stuff here or ask for the translation of articles i wrote). In other words: User:Ksnow acts for a while now without checking if he actually acts right, which means that he acts silly. You may think that i am very harsh to assume that User:Ksnow has gone genuinely mad, but he definitely needs a reality check. And Misplaced Pages needs him to be checked again, because he has already come under scrutiny in a recent past, for his unconstructive and obsessive edits. In the meantime, could a bot just undo the addition of this senseless, meaningless and f*cking untrue sentence "Based on the article in the French Misplaced Pages" he added almost everywhere? I reverted already in the articles cited above. Thank you.--RCS (talk) 18:28, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

I agree that "Based on the article in the French Misplaced Pages" is an entirely inappropriate self-referential statement. Also fails WP:RS. I shall set to work removing these statements at once. –xeno (talk) 18:31, 9 April 2009 (UTC) someone cleverer than me needs to write a proper regex because sometimes it is the only reference and then we would want the ==References== header removed as well, yes? –xeno (talk) 18:42, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Labelling the editor as insane is entirely unproductive. Comment on content, not the author. See WP:NPA. Further, you've only brought up the subject to the author in the last two hours. While the editor has edited since then, I think a report here is entirely premature. Go talk with him. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:33, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Unproductive maybe, but how would you call an attitude that is 1) disconnected from factual reality and 2)obsessive (it is going on at least since March 27)?--RCS (talk) 18:36, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Anyway, if a bot could undo what he did, i'd be glad enough. I just don't know how to call for one.--RCS (talk) 18:37, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Oh my, it's further back than that. Since Feb 24th at least... AWB returned exactly 1000 results, which leads me to believe there is actually more than 1000 of the articles with this line in it. –xeno (talk) 18:39, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the edits are a big worry, nothing untowards about bringing it up here. I would only say, you don't know that the editor is "disconnected from factual reality" or "obsessive," he may have something quite canny in mind (although whatever this may be, it does seem wholly unhelpful to the project). Don't call other editors insane, stick to talking about the edits themselves and how they blend with policy and consensus. Gwen Gale (talk) 18:42, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Why is it necessary at all to describe him as insane? COMMENT ON CONTENT. This isn't difficult. --Hammersoft (talk) 18:43, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

N.B. header changed. –xeno (talk) 18:54, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Just to add some information here, Ksnow has been editing since 2004 and has over 93,000 edits, virtually all to the mainspace. It looks like a lot of his editing is script-assisted. He was recently blocked for automated date-delinking, and unblocked after promising not to do that any more. So it looks like this is more a case of over-automaticity than an obsessive editor. Looie496 (talk) 19:05, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

There is no reason to label that editor "insane", as far as I can tell he's merely editing many articles about French communes in good faith.

Having said that, while much of his editing seems alright (updating census numbers, minor corrections, links to the website of the communes etc), the references are going to be tricky to fix. On that issue, it's not just the self reference to the French Misplaced Pages, he also adds links to the IGN site and INSEE sites, which would be legit if he linked to actual pages on the specific communes, but the links are just to the main pages, hence not useful. Other alterations might be questionable such as turning "département" into "department", I'm not sure what's the concensus on that if any. Equendil Talk 19:30, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Actually not so tricky as I earlier thought, I'm doing it now (see Special:Contributions/Xenocidic), so is it your opinion that the linkes to IGN and INSEE should be removed as well (in nearly all cases this would leave the article completely refless)? –xeno (talk) 19:37, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Definitively, they all reach to the same front page, nothing specific to the communes edited, so in my opinion, those three lines should go:

''Based on the article in the French Misplaced Pages.''

*

*

Equendil Talk 19:46, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Hmm... I'm still concerned that if information was indeed culled from those sources, the links would at least give the user somewhere to go to verify the data. Anyone else have an opinion one way or the other? –xeno (talk) 19:50, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

The INSEE site appears to contain a separate PDF of population data for each commune (the one for Abbécourt is here, for instance) but I don't know how one would automate the replacement of the links to the home page with these specific links. Deor (talk) 20:01, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

That's a job for a bot-op far cleverer than I. I do note that the direct link to the .pdf is included as a ref for some of the fr.wiki articles, perhaps they could be ported over. For now I'm just going to continue removing the self-ref line. –xeno (talk) 20:10, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Alright, then some more information: the INSEE conducts census, its site is not terribly easy to navigate as there is a ton of information in there as you would expect from census stuff, but filling in the name of the commune in the search box should do the trick. It might be best to make it a ref next to the census number if we keep that. The IGN maintains geographical information, its site offers a number of services, free or paying, however, the link here leads to some sort of portal to several sub sites and a search query seemingly results in a collection of pages where you can buy maps, pictures etc. Might be best to ask Ksnow how he's got his data from the IGN because that link does not seem useful. Equendil Talk 20:15, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

This discussion should probably be continued at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject French communes, and maybe a WP:BOTREQ could be filed to extract the direct links. –xeno (talk) 20:26, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Added a section there. Equendil Talk 20:39, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

From my own editing experience, INSEE is the standard and official reference for populations of French communes, even larger ones than are being discussed here - I'll only give Paris as an example, just to be on the safe side :) It's not that difficult navigating the INSEE site, which contains a lot of useful information. Mathsci (talk) 11:29, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Seemingly bad editnotice idea

I was looking into how editnotices worked earlier, and saw that ANI's editnotice, MediaWiki:Editnotice-4-Administrators' noticeboard-Incidents, just transcludes Template:Noticeboard key, which is only semi-protected. Now, I thought about going to RFPP and requesting to protect the template, but wouldn't the same effect be achieved by just moving the template's code directly to the MediaWiki namespace page? Actually, it'd be technically better since it'd eliminate a transclude that fires untold numbers of times every day. I mean, frankly, I don't see a particularly good reason for the ANI editnotice to be edited by non-admins... —/Mendaliv//_Δ's/ 22:42, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

{{Noticeboard key}} now full-protected, before some of our beanier readers start having naughty thoughts. – iridescent 00:40, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, I guess that handles it, though I still think the whole think ought to be located directly on the MediaWiki namespace page. —/Mendaliv//_Δ's/ 15:44, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

The MediaWiki namespace was getting larger than the software was designed to handle and causing issues; the developers requested that editnotices no longer directly include content but use templates. --Gadget850 (talk) 12:35, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Admin eyes on Talk:Jimmy Wales please -- possibly hot

Please begin your latest round of reading here. After Jimmy removed all discussion of this from user talk page (appropriately) heavy sourcing was dug up to put an end to the pointless "co-founder" battle. Specifically, official WMF literature from 2003-2004, including the first ever official WMF press release. In response, User:SqueakBox is now throwing up NPOV tags and beginning to revert war to keep them in as he's apparently unhappy with the outcome. This one is definitely going to attract press coverage, as several journalists have already stated they're working on pieces about this conflict between Wales and Larry Sanger. We need senior and clueful people to weigh in starting here and in the subsequent section. rootology (C)(T) 16:00, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Dumbest. Edit-war. Ever? HalfShadow 16:39, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Ever. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:42, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Just wanted to be sure. Don't we have a page listing these? HalfShadow 16:43, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:LAME. —Wknight94 (talk) 16:46, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Added. HalfShadow 16:59, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

You all have no idea at all how stupid it is, between weak and pointless revisionist history attempts and people lining up in mutual firing squads for this one. Do a search for "founder" in the search box on the talk page. It's insane, which is why I dug up functionally bulletproof sourcing (the Wikimedia Foundation itself and a Press Release written when Misplaced Pages was still owned by Jimmy himself) to put a fork in the entire mess. rootology (C)(T) 16:47, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

No source is "bulletproof" but at least sundry opinions can be sourced, by those who may care. Getting stirred up about any (or anyone's) outlook/opinion/hopes/fears/agenda on this is lame. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:02, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

We'll have to disagree on the bulletproof sourcing thing. Some things are bulletproof--the written US Constitution, for example, is the bulletproof authority for the specific wording on it's own contents, and trumps any other source on the matter--and by contrast, this is as close to bulletproof as it gets. If the WMF says that from 2005-2009 Brion Vibber runs the computer systems at the WMF, then any other source contradicting it is wrong and loses vs. the official WMF source, the same as any official statement from General Electric saying they've hired Bob Whomever as their new CEO trumps any source or opinion that says otherwise. The WMF saying Jimmy Wales is co-founder is as bulletproof as it gets, as the WMF is the authority on internal WMF matters. But yes, very lame. rootology (C)(T) 17:08, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Even if you're eyeballing a shred of parchment someone has told you is the "original US constitution," how do you know it hasn't been fiddled with? It very likely wasn't, but the pith is, sourcing is all about likelihoods and opinion, there are very strong sources, there are very weak sources. All of them are but snapshots in time. We do what we can. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:16, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

But but but We all know that according to WP:RS, the WMF website can't be used as a reliable source about the WMF! Wow, did that comment get trashed fast... I hope people know I was joking. -- llywrch (talk) 23:31, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

• WP:LAME. I was going to protect it if there was an actual, current edit war, but there doesn't appear to be one. I suggest that we avoid arcane discussions on the inherent validity of certain sources and simply archive this section. I don't think there is anything that someone will be able to accomplish w/ the tools that can't be done without them. Protonk (talk) 18:27, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

protection

• Could we get an unprotection of Talk:Jimmy Wales? It has been protected for over a year... 74.248.164.245 (talk) 03:21, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

• Talk pages should not be semi-protected in article space unless due to persistent vandalism. rootology (C)(T) 03:44, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

• So why then is it still protected? 74.248.178.47 (talk) 14:01, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

It looks like there was some soapboxing being attempted immediately prior to the indefinite semi-protection. But, yeah, indef seems like a lot. Considering the page's logs it certainly should be at least semi-move protected. —/Mendaliv//_Δ's/ 14:27, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Romila Thapar: False Allegations of Sock Puppetry: Please Investigate

Let me highlight the Misplaced Pages entry on Romila Thapar. A few editors with the help of two administrators - Nishkid64 and Regents Park - have monopolized the editing and prevented alternate points of view. Look at the page reversals in the past one month or more. This is a case of administrative abuse and collusion!

Nishkid 64, Regents Park, Abecedara, Akhilleus do not respond to comments on the discussion page. They insist on having their way.

Bharatveer, Nshuks7, Lankaputran, Mrinalini B and Dipendra 2007 are not allowed to introduce their edits even if due justification is provided in the discussion page by Bharatveer and Nshuks7.

Nishkid 64 has indefinitely blocked the accounts of my colleagues Dharman Dharmaratnam, Tolkaapiyanaar, MrinaliniB and Nedunchezhiyan on the allegation of sock puppetry. Five of us work together and use the same internet network. This does not mean that we are one person operating under multiple accounts. Here is an example of an editor - Nishkid64 - who is also an administrator - making a fake case for an attack and preventing the editing of his friends being examined.

The issue is deeper. We need neutral administrators. I created my own account today. I am sure that Nishkid 64 would now accuse me of being a sockpuppet. One can not have an administrator and certain editors acting in cohoots to stifle alternate points of view.

Indefinitely blocking accounts on the allegation of sockpuppetry is one method of blocking views.

Further, an administrator acting as an editor is a conflict of interest.

Please investigate the Administrator conduct and unblock these accounts. The entry on Romila Thapar must be open to editing. It is not beyond investigation. --Naziasultana (talk) 20:18, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Please read WP:SOCK#Meatpuppets and WP:SOCK#Sharing of an IP address. Looie496 (talk) 20:20, 10 April 2009 (UTC)

Also look at BLP. Geoff Plourde (talk) 17:30, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Articles for Deletion time extended to 7 days

A AFD talk page discussion on deletion poll duration just closed with a 3:1 consensus on the AFD talk page to extend AFD durations from 5 to 7 days.

This ongoing proposal / poll had not been notified out to the Village Pump or AN - I am posting a pointer here to make administrators aware of it.

I believe that the poll was reasonable consensus, despite the lack of wider advertising. However, a followup on the AFD talk page may be appropriate if you were not aware and strongly object. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:59, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• I have no strong opinion on the issue itself. However, this poll has been very poorly advertised. It is evident that I'm not the only one totally unaware. Frankly on the basis of a poorly advertised 12 day poll (over a holiday period) with only 45 supports, I'd say this is insufficient for a major change. Why only 12 days? Best to reopen the poll so people like me who missed it can consider - and to advertise it in all available places. Then see where we are in two weeks time.--Scott Mac (Doc) 02:09, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Does anyone else find it humorous that 12 days is insufficient time to determine if 5 days is sufficient time? – 74  05:58, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• I have to echo Doc's sentiments. I had no idea such a proposal was in the pipeline. I don't follow the AFD talk page; I follow specific pages for AFD's in which I participate (none recently). Horologium (talk) 02:14, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• I had no idea it was there, either, until someone brought it up on Wikien-L as it closed. I encourage people to expand the notifications and to open a new thread on Misplaced Pages talk:Articles for deletion. I'm about to log out for a while, so others may want to run with it... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:28, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• I never heard about it. Please lengthen the poll and put the word out. Sounds ok to me though. Gwen Gale (talk) 02:30, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Fritzpoll posted notifications at Misplaced Pages:Village pump (policy) (diff), WT:Deletion policy (diff), and Template:Cent (diff). I think reopening and holding open for a longer period is appropriate. Flatscan (talk) 02:45, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
  • Ah, I see it now. From Village Pump archives: . I didn't see it at the time or when I checked the archive, but it was there. I still recommend wider review, as many don't appear to have noticed. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 02:52, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
    • Eventually, it gets to a point where you have to pay attention at least a little, or else c'est la vie. We do too many do overs over every little (or moderate) decision, and sometimes stuff just has to get done. 12 days on Cent is a ton of advertising since that is transcluded to tens of thousands of pages. rootology (C)(T) 05:24, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Honestly (though I am a supporter of this measure), I can't really understand the need to further advertise this. It isn't a sweeping change in how deletions are done or a change to the scope of what may be deleted. It is simply a change to the suggested length of time for discussion. The motivation for the change is partially wonk-ish (to bring it in line w/ other deletion times) and the outcome is pretty harmless. I know we get bigger every day, but we need to question the mentality of polling every little change that goes on WRT our processes. That way lies stagnation. Protonk (talk) 03:45, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• This might be non-controversial, & there might be no organized opposition to this proposal, but the more people who know about a change & are offered a chance to participate, the stronger the consensus will be to support the change. Yes, it sucks that it has become harder to makes changes around here (I remember when policy was simply a matter of someone saying, "Let's do this for a while & see how it works.") but it's one of the costs of the success of Misplaced Pages. -- llywrch (talk) 05:22, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Why advertise it more? At some point people have to pay attention, and Cent is the de facto main advertising place. That template is spammed across the length and breadth of Misplaced Pages--you have to be blind wandering project space to NOT see it. ;) rootology (C)(T) 05:24, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
• You still have to (IMO) make an affirmative case that more 'polling' or whatever is needed. I'm not convinced that the standard is "maximize discussion for all proposals". If this were controversial, irreversible, or transformative, I would agree with you. but it is none of those things. It is a fairly minor change to a process, nothing more. Protonk (talk) 07:47, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Meh, whatever. This really is a nothing change, as the overwhelming majority of AfD noms are either snowball closed early, or have an initial rush of comments and are then forgotten until closing. The rest would not be harmed by a couple more days. I'd hardly call this a major change. Resolute 06:00, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

agreed, shortening the time might cause concern and need a longer debate period, but lengthening it? It's no big deal.Theresa Knott | token threats 07:51, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

In my defence (I proposed the change) - I put it on Cent, the VP, and the Deletion policy page. I thought Cent would be enough, really for such a relatively minor change, but regardless, it was advertised Fritzpoll (talk) 08:03, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• I never heard about the poll either... it should have been on watchlist-notices, at the very least. ╟─TreasuryTag►contribs─╢ 10:33, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
  • Such a (comparably) minor change shouldn't be on the watchlist. Why don't we all click here to avoid such problems in the future? --Conti|✉ 12:17, 11 April 2009 (UTC)
• There was appropriate discussion on the talkpage after advertising on Village Pump and CENT. Over 60 people took part. It is a minor change that a clear majority of people who had an interest in the topic want to see implemented. We are not a bureaucracy - even so, there was appropriate process with people doing the right thing. No rules are guidelines have been broken, twisted or bent in the process of getting this adjustment done. And even those who are questioning this, are saying that the end result was the right one. However, one aspect of this that is worth looking into, is how we are to ensure that the seven day extension is adhered to, given that the current five day guideline is almost totally ignored! SilkTork * 17:44, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Shameless plug: Misplaced Pages:Advertising discussions (created in response to this, but also to similar incidents over the past year where advertising of discussions has been, or claimed to be (not saying it was here) haphazard). It is an interesting question concerning the appropriate level of advertising for different discussions. Something that might be best discussed before any major discussion starts. Minor discussions, of course, shouldn't be bogged down with such considerations, but the very largest discussions do need structure, carefully targeted advertising, and broad input. Carcharoth (talk) 00:03, 12 April 2009 (UTC)
  • Though it has been pointed out that "publicity" (publicising) is a better term than "advertisement" (advertising). Carcharoth (talk) 00:07, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

User:Fahrenheit451 and Coren

Fahrenheit451 (talk · contribs)

This is concerning a block implemented by Arb Coren against User:Fahrenheit451 for "legal posturing". The statement was:

"I hereby refuse this contract and any hidden contracts or contracts of adhesion connected with it. This is done in accordance with State of Florida Law. I reserve all rights under the Uniform Commercial Code. --Fahrenheit451 (talk) 02:53, 9 April 2009 (UTC)"

which resulted in an indef against Fahrenheit, an editor active since 2005 with one (now two) items on his block log. The last item was in 2006. Xavexgoem (talk) 18:07, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

From User talk:Coren
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Hi Coren (cross posting from Roger's talk page because you implemented the block), curious about this edit. Looking through the user's edits I agree the portion that pertains to Scientology is cause for concern. That said, it is unprecedented (to the best of my knowledge) to indefinitely block someone preemptively in that manner, without arbitration vote at the proposed decision, without an outing or legal threat or other user action that would compel immediate response. He does edit productively to other areas (most recently the copyfraud article, etc.), and he has indeed participated to this case, although before he was named as a party. From this vantage it could very well appear that he foresaw no further need to post, or (at worst) anticipated a topic ban proposal. Could you explain, please? Durova 04:55, 11 April 2009 (UTC) First off, to make things perfectly clear, this was not a Committee block. My action has the support of a number of Arbitrators, and there will be a corresponding finding to that effect on the proposed decision page, but the decision to go ahead with the block is mine alone. That said, the reason I made the block is a fundamentally principled one: a community effort like Misplaced Pages functions because of the social contact to heed and follow the basic rules of conduct that constitute our framework. We routinely block editors when it becomes obvious that they are unable or unwilling to abide those rules; and I can think of no clearer and less ambiguous evidence than an explicit refusal to agree to them (even when it was poorly worded as a pseudolegal disclaimer). Ultimately, what Misplaced Pages has as "terms of service" is the amalgamation of policies, guidelines and community expectations; Fahrenheit451 is correct, at least, in that he is in no way obligated to agree to them— but then all that is left to him is the right to leave. Now, of course, if I have misunderstood his refusal, or if he wishes to withdraw it, then I will be more than glad to unblock him (noting, however, that the arbitration case will proceed with him as a named party regardless of his decision in the matter). I'll not argue that this position is a bit more... hardline than traditional. But I see this declaration of his in exactly the same way that I would see someone stating outright that they will ignore WP:V, or that they will sock around a block— and those also traditionally have led to swift, immediate blocks. — Coren  05:22, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Hardline? Try coercive. His name wasn't even on the proposed decision page and he hadn't been blocked in three years. This came with no warning, and it's completely outside of both process and policy. This isn't a court of law; you don't jail people for contempt of ArbCom. He wasn't even uncivil. Bad block. I'll be glad to discuss and would prefer to handle it this way, but am also quite prepared to take it to the admin boards. Durova 05:33, 11 April 2009 (UTC) I am, however, heading to bed. So let's both sleep on this. Durova 05:37, 11 April 2009 (UTC) As an afterthought, I'm left wondering where his asserted opt-out was taking us if it wasn't to a Florida court, relying on the Uniform Commercial Code. And, by extension, if he doesn't accept being an involved party, is there any realistic prospect of him accepting a topic ban or any other restriction? In the circumstances, on top of the examples mentioned by Coren, I don't see the block as any more coercive or unusual than a NLT block for which there is mountains of precedent.  Roger Davies 11:41, 11 April 2009 (UTC) "Coercive"? That is what any involuntary sanction is. Whenever someone is blocked, or topic banned, or even just warned we are — pretty much by definition — attempting to "compel by force of authority, pressure or force". You've done that yourself thousands of times (and, indeeed, you are attempting to do so to me now). — Coren  13:53, 11 April 2009 (UTC) As for the substance of the block: I disagree with you completely. If an editor states "I don't want to follow your rules", then the only proper response is "Don't let the door hit you on the way out". We are too big, and have too much work keeping the encyclopedia running as smoothly as it is, to take on the malcontents and protesters. We extend every courtesy and every effort to allow people the benefit of the doubt when they are disruptive— in the hope that they do not understand the rules. Someone that doesn't want to play nice? Internet is big enough that they can find some other occupation elsewhere. The block is good, and IMO more blocks like this should be given out. I'm not going to unblock; but if you feel this requires the wider review of a noticeboard, then I'm not going to stop you. — Coren  14:46, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Coren, I have never seen anything like this during arbitration before. Fahrenheit451 had over 6000 edits, was not an SPA, and did nothing worse than civilly decline to give further evidence in a case where s/he had already participated. Even disruptive SPAs don't get indeffed while arbitration is ongoing unless, like Ilena of the Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Barrett v. Rosenthal case, they do something that would be indeffable under any circumstances (in her case outing another editor's real identity). At worst, Fahrenheit451 could be called uncooperative, and as such the remedies when they were posted and voted upon might go a bit harsher than otherwise. This is an unprecedented grab for autocratic power by an arbitrator and I must oppose it. Election to the Committee does not elevate you above the norms of this website. Durova 15:09, 11 April 2009 (UTC) This isn't really a question of being merely uncooperative, though. There's no exemption for threats directed towards ArbCom in WP:NLT; as Roger points out above, Fahrenheit451's statement can reasonably be interpreted as threatening legal action should the case continue, and he may be blocked on that basis alone. Kirill  15:20, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Please explain how that constitutes a threat. Editors routinely invoke spurious legal rationales of what they think their rights are, and if those rationales do not constitute threats of legal action then we ignore the statements. I see no fundamental difference between this and the complaints Commons occasionally gets from editors who want to upload images according to US law only, instead of the stricter site policies there. We explain why our policies exceed their expectations; we ask them to respect that. Many times they change their minds and abide by policy. Did Fahrenheit make any statement beyond what I see on the page? If he emailed the Committee to say I will take you to court, or if he made some onsite post to that effect that needed to be deleted or oversighted then I will strike through everything I've written here and give Coren a barnstar. But if he simply said a longwinded form of 'I think I don't have to give more evidence' (which is what this looks like to me), then off to AN this goes. I'll wait a reasonable period for reply before taking this any farther. Perhaps I misunderstand; what's apparent at this point simply astounds me. Durova 15:56, 11 April 2009 (UTC) And to clarify further, when ScienceApologist announced at his user page that he intended to disregard your topic ban, you did not siteban him preemptively--you waited for him to actually violate the restriction and then voted upon further remedy in an orderly manner. As yet, Fahrenheit451's name still does not even appear on the proposed decision page. Durova 16:02, 11 April 2009 (UTC) I don't recall that SA was invoking any legal rationales in his announcement, though. As far as I'm concerned Fahrenheit451 is merely blocked until he withdraws his legal claim, not banned in any more substantive manner. Kirill  16:16, 11 April 2009 (UTC) (ec) You and I have very differing interpretations of how 'I think I don't have to give more evidence' may be worded, I think. From my perspective, posting a notice that one refuses to participate in arbitration on a contractual level is inherently an implicit threat of taking the matter into the legal system, regardless of whether a specific intent to do so has been explicitly stated at this point; because the statement has no relevance outside of a context of legal action, it seems reasonable to assume that the context of legal action is what the person making it had in mind—and, consequently, that the statement was intended to call up that same context in the minds of the targets of the statement. It exudes a threat of legal action in the same way that "That's a nice house. Would be a shame if anything were to happen to it" exudes a threat of violence, in other words. (That the legal rationale happens to be spurious is not, I think, particularly relevant; one doesn't need a legitimate rationale in order to bring a lawsuit.) Kirill  16:13, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Ah, well then Kirill, look at it this way: it happens that I am a named party to the current case as well. And I don't think I have to give any more evidence either. For all I know the Committee might enter a remedy on me too (although it hasn't happened either, I can't read your minds). So I invoke whatever rationale Fahrenheit451 was citing: note that neither Fahrenheit451 nor I say anything about what we might do if these supposed rights are violated. Now if you intend to indef me for this post, please wait half an hour. I'm uploading a restoration of an Easter egg roll at the White House lawn from 1911 while we discuss this, and I'd like to get it nominated at FPC in time for the holiday. Might take a bit longer to straighten out if you truly do see any threat in this statement. Regards, Durova 16:42, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Just to squeeze a word in here edgeways, he wasn't actually asked to do anything. He just, um, withdraw unilaterally and reserved his rights, citing the UCC as justification. Anyhow I'd better leave you in peace with your egg rolling.  Roger Davies I'm sorry, but you can't voluntarily declare yourself a party and then try to reference Fahrenheit451's rationale, since the substantive point of his claim concerns adding him as a party in the first place. You'll have to come up with a different threat. In any case, I choose to invoke IAR and not block you for your attempts at threatening us, since you're obviously not taking this seriously. :-) Good luck with your restoration! Kirill  17:00, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Lol! Kirill, please check the case. I am named as the filing party. And note that I have not been asked to provide any more evidence either (indeed, have gotten hints from one or two of your colleagues that what I've already supplied is a bit much to read). Now do be nice and unblock this other established editor in good standing of four years' experience. Give him the same chances you gave ScienceApologist; he's been far less trouble. Happy holidays, Durova 17:25, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Durova, have you noticed, during all that, that F.451 has yet to even request being unblocked? If they do so, and withdraw the legalish posturing, he's but one click away from being unblocked. — Coren  17:36, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Down from legal threat to legalish posturing? Which policy are you citing for having blocked him: Misplaced Pages:No legalish posturing? Tsk, tsk. He shouldn't need to ask. Durova 17:39, 11 April 2009 (UTC) No, I'm just stating that their legal threat is poorly stated and based upon a very incorrect pop-understanding of contract and commerce law— WP:NLT has no provision for poor legal arguments and flawed reasoning; "legalish posturing" is an apt description of the nature of their legal threat. — Coren  17:44, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Right, this point is important. Although I am skeptical that there was a legal threat (I described it as "silliness"), NLT blocks are not usually permanent; they're just formally indefinite. They're reversed as soon as the party withdraws the threat. If Fahrenheit451 clarifies that no threat was intended, we would be done here. Cool Hand Luke 17:42, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Fellows, this isn't even a threat: "I hereby refuse this contract and any hidden contracts or contracts of adhesion connected with it. This is done in accordance with State of Florida Law. I reserve all rights under the Uniform Commercial Code. --Fahrenheit451 (talk) 02:53, 9 April 2009 (UTC)" That's all he said; be reasonable about it. Durova 17:45, 11 April 2009 (UTC) When you state that you want X to happen or not to happen according to some law (now matter how incorrect your understanding of the applicability of said law is), then you are necessarily stating that legal action will be forthcoming unless you get the desired compliance. I fail to understand how you could not see this. — Coren  17:49, 11 April 2009 (UTC) We deal with similar situations all the time in copyright disputes, and unless the editor specifically threatens a consequence we ignore the spurious reasoning. Durova 17:55, 11 April 2009 (UTC) Then you are being generous in your enforcement of NTL— I'm supposing here that copious assumptions of good faith on your part are the primary reason. In this case, we are discussing someone who has had years to learn our policies, and who went out of their way to make a legal statement/disclaimer in multiple fora. — Coren  18:00, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

(arbitrary break)

I don't know whether that is a threat, but legal threats do not have to be explicit. See e.g. NLT blocks are indefinite in form only. As soon as Fahrenheit451 clarifies that no threat is intended, user should be unblocked. Cool Hand Luke 18:13, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Agreed - the whole point of WP:NLT is that invoking legal language is not conducive to a useful discussion here. Most of us aren't lawyers, making it hard to assess the legal validity of such comments, and I think we all shudder at the thought of being involuntarily drawn into some sort of litigation. I don't want to interact with someone who's throwing out various legal disclaimers and citing law. Chances are it's just empty intimidation, like 99% of the people who make legal threats here, but who wants to take the chance? This is a volunteer endeavor. You'll find volunteers mighty scarce if disputes degrade into assertions of law. MastCell  18:20, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

It does not look like a legal threat to this lawyer. Bearian (talk)

Thats the problem - No Legal Threats isn't only actual threats under law(suit), but the chilling effect resulting from the perception of legal threat. If it takes a lawyer to figure out it isn't a legal threat, its enough of one to be a problem.--Tznkai (talk) 18:31, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

It didn't look like any threat to me, and I'm no lawyer. Durova 18:33, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

The perception of legal threat rationale does not stick in this case; I would know too well what it covers given that it was the Haines case that precipitated the change in policy. Also, in an instance like this, education and warnings are a must. Ncmvocalist (talk) 19:08, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Ridiculous block.What exactly is the threat presumed to be? I see no threat - the laws in England state "thou shall not slander or libel" it's a statement of fact, it's not a threat. Why block for that? Giano (talk) 18:36, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• • Well said, my good man. Durova 18:39, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

yes, well, agree with this then, it's about time someone had a good look at Coren and half the rubbish he comes out with these days. Giano (talk) 18:41, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

The immediate concern is whether we'll lose an editor of four years' experience who's made over 300 edits to the Borda count article, and whose only previous block was lifted by the blocking admin three years ago. Durova 18:49, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Bad block in the absence of discussion. While I agree with CHL's examples above, per Bearian, this is certainly not one that warrants a block in the absence of some discussion first. Even in all my time here, there are policies/guidelines that I've either forgotten or have not come across before.

More importantly, there is an important fact/circumstance/issue in this case that the blocking administrator should've taken the effort to investigate prior to imposing a block, especially given his position in ArbCom. Namely, if this user has not actually gone through the details in the relevant Misplaced Pages arbitration pages, he may have no idea that Wiki-Arbitration is significantly different to typical "real life" (legal) Arbitration, where contractual consent means everything in order for that Arbitration to proceed. His statement of showing no consent seems to be in line with this (though he clearly needs to do more research too). Discussion was in dire need here, and I consider that the block should be overturned as a matter of priority.

As a btw, everyone is entitled to restate what rights they (think they) have, even if they seem or are legal - repeatedly doing so can be disruptive, but I see nothing that justifies a block in the absence of education and warnings to this effect. Ncmvocalist (talk) 18:50, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Bringing us back to the top. Can we all agree that "As soon as Fahrenheit451 clarifies that no threat is intended, user should be unblocked?"--Tznkai (talk) 19:08, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

This is not a case of here or there; it's a bad block. Even the block message is insufficient in the circumstances, and I see no reason to continue to prevent him from editing or to force an appeal. Good grief; are some arbitrators going to block me for the legalistic language I've used all over the place because they "perceive" something? He needs to do more research; the blocking admin should've done more research. It's inequitable to suggest 2 wrongs make a right, and the block should be swiftly overturned and education/discussion needs to begin. Ncmvocalist (talk) 19:16, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

He hasn't been asked whether it was a threat. here's the block notice. Xavexgoem (talk) 19:19, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

This was a ridiculous decision on Coren's part, and I fear that he doesn't seem to get even the basic idea of what a community like this entails. On his talk page he tries to rationalize the block by saying, "We are too big, and have too much work keeping the encyclopedia running as smoothly as it is, to take on the malcontents and protesters." Apparently he can label anyone he wants a "malcontent" and permanently block them. And, news flash, there are GOING to be protesters of certain decisions on any big site. By his explanation here, anyone who disagrees with him (including those of us here, presumably) should all just summarily get kicked off Misplaced Pages. This is one of the most blatant violations of common sense and common decency I've seen on this site. And this is someone on the Arbitration Committee? Any group that wants to successfully integrate ideas from multiple sources for the better of itself needs tolerance of people questioning them, otherwise they're just going to be a bunch of rubber-stamping yes men running down whatever path catches their eye trampling everyone who gets in the way. It's clear that the supposed pseudo-legal threat wasn't even the real reason for the block, it was merely having the audacity to disagree with someone on a power trip. The Scientology arbitration can continue without Fahrenheit451's direct involvement, and I think he's understandably upset at being accused there of impropriety based upon someone making sweeping accusations that anyone active on Scientology articles that opposes pro-Scientology edits must be too biased to edit there. Come on, people. This is a witch hunt twice over. We need to return to some sanity here. And if Coren can't see why this was a bad decision then he has no business being in any position of power. Let's hope he comes to his senses or someone else has the good sense to overrule him on this. DreamGuy (talk) 19:12, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I gather from reading this that you've not actually been through the 300-odd pages of evidence and workshop, closely examined any of the hundreds of battlefield articles, and examined the thousands of diffs. Summarily lynching the Scientologists is of course one option but as a great many editors on both sides of the war have been involved in, and thrive on, a great deal of impropriety, as you put, that hardly seems fair. I find it personally disappointing that you should characterize a desire to put an end to the problems that have plagued this topic for four years – and, without firm action, show every indication of continuing unabated – as a power trip but, hey, you're entitled to your opinion.  Roger Davies 20:08, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I certainly did not "characterize a desire to put an end to the problems that have plagued this topic for four years as a power trip." The desire to end problems is a good thing. Instantly blocking someone for no good reason -- and claiming that arbitration committee members shouldn't have to put up with protesters -- is completely different. It's quite disturbing that you equate the two. DreamGuy (talk) 20:54, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, but on Misplaced Pages who has the guts or the common decency to do that? Giano (talk) 19:16, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Speaking for myself, I think an uninvolved admin should take over the block, unblock Fahrenheit451, and clarify his intent (reblocking if necessary). I would not have made the block myself, but I understand why Coren was concerned. Cool Hand Luke 19:36, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

I see that User:Roger Davies, the main target of Fahrenheit451's remarks has unblocked with precisely such a note. Thank you. Cool Hand Luke 19:44, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

My thanks go to Roger for this wise decision. Durova 19:51, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you :) And I hope you are able to sufficiently impress upon him the need for circumspection in his response to my questions, otherwise, we'll all be back at Square One.  Roger Davies 20:10, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Indeed, but if that happens nobody will have jumped the gun and I'll have no objection to how you run your race. Enjoy your rabbits and tortoises: I'm off to buy chocolate bunnies for the coming holiday. Durova 20:31, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

The unblock was probably a good idea. I am as puzzled as others here how this edit (yes, I think the actual diff hasn't been provided yet) could reasonably be construed as a violation of WP:NLT. Whatever this legal mumbo-jumbo may mean, it would not have occurred to me – I'm a lawyer, though not familiar with US law at all – to see a threat of legal action in it.  Sandstein  21:03, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

The funniest thing to me, is that—if anything—user Fahrenheit451 seems to be defiantly suggesting WikiMedia to take him or her to court, rather than the other way around. -- C. A. Russell (talk) 21:47, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

• Not a Legal Threat if the statement is a legal threat then anyone making any copyright statements (even GFDL or CC) would be making a "legal threat". Legal threats are threats of litigation or prosecution. Not statements about rights. We cannot prohibit people from stating what their rights are. We can only ask people not to edit when they are pursuing those rights in order to keep from developing either a CoI or dragging Misplaced Pages into a trial. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:34, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, the licensing statement on my userpage must be totally unacceptable. I think I'll go and block myself now... _{joking, joking} Keegan 04:30, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• As Roger said on F451's talk p. before the block, "The case will go ahead with you as a party, whether or not you participate". I note the proposed new policy seems to say otherwise at 2.7.3 "Editors named as parties to an arbitration case and given due notice of the case are expected to participate in the proceeding" but it then continues in 2.7.4, "Should a party to a case fail to respond ... or explictly refuse to participate in the case, the Committee may nonetheless rule on that party's conduct in his or her absence." I would appreciate a statement of just what other members of the committee agreed with this block. DGG (talk) 04:16, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

• What do you mean? Coren made this block in his individual capacity. He informed other arbitrators after he blocked Fahrenheit451. Cool Hand Luke 19:00, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

• Extremely Poor block Whilst the statement maybe postured in what may appear to be legal talk, the spirit of NLT is that the statement must be a threat against another party. In this case it is clearly not and Coren acted in violation of policy, which reflects extremely poorly on himself and arbcom. There is a big difference between a legal statement that isn't a threat that was made out of cockyness (Which in this case it would appear to be) and an actualll threat to take someone to court or sue etc etc. Please use common sense and AGF   «l| Ψrometheăn ™|l»  (talk) 11:33, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Might warrant attention

Shouldn't the blacklist stop things like this? Guest9999 (talk) 18:38, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Deleted the page. Just a Grawp vandal. Xavexgoem (talk) 18:40, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Audit Subcommittee established

To provide better monitoring and oversight, the Arbitration Committee has decided to establish an Audit Subcommittee, which will investigate complaints concerning the use of CheckUser and Oversight privileges on the English Misplaced Pages. The subcommittee shall consist of three arbitrators appointed by the Committee and three editors elected by the community. The Committee shall designate an initial slate of three editors until elections can be held.

The initial membership, the procedures for the subcommittee, and more details on the election process will be published in the near future.

For the Committee, Kirill  22:30, 11 April 2009 (UTC)

Discuss this

Vandalism and trolling

Twiddlebug (talk · contribs) is claiming that this edit was actually constructive, because his contribution was sourced to a "National Enquirer article. It isn't vandalism if it's true" , and has posted a complaint about my reversion of his edit and issuance of a vandalism warning on my talk page . If Twiddlebug genuinely believes that the essentially fictional tabloids like the National Enquirer are credible , and that our biographies of living persons benefit from tabloid-sourced slime, then he lacks the intellectual capacity necessary to edit in a constructive manner, and should be blocked indefinitely. Alternatively, if Twiddlebug actually understands that the National Enquirer is a fictional tabloid, then he is trolling us, and should likewise be shown the door. Erik9 (talk) 01:31, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I wasn't trolling. I know for a fact that the NE article is true and that is why I posted it. I am a librarian, so I understand quality sources. Normally I wouldn't cite NE But I know for a fact that Jeremy Roloff said racist and homophobic things on his MySpace page (and elsewhere). Matt Roloff apologized for it, so he acknowledged it. I do have wonder about your own trolling if you go around falsely threatening new posters with banning rather than letting them know what your issues are with their posts. Twiddlebug (talk) 01:55, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I doubt that you "understand quality sources" if you actually believe "The National Enquirer actually is developing a positive reputation for the truth." Editors who believe that Misplaced Pages is not only a good place for tabloid nonsense, but actually a good place to throw tabloid slime at living people should rapidly ejected from the project. Erik9 (talk) 02:03, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Surely this must have been reported somewhere else, then? Supermarket tabloids are categorically not reliable sources for anything. //roux   02:01, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

I assume good faith; I feel that the edits were not sourced by reliable sources, but should not be considered vandalism. I have been unable to find an RS to verify the facts, so the info shouldn't be added. However, just because something appears in a 'fictional tabloid' doesn't mean it's untrue; it just means it's not an RS.

After discussion with the user, I believe Twiddlebug understands this policy. I am concerned that a new user has been threatened, and I consider the above comment of "he lacks the intellectual capacity necessary to edit in a constructive manner" to be inappropriate.

I hope that this issue will not result in us losing a new contributor, who has been somewhat harshly treated. If, at a later date, they do turn out to be a troll, then I'll feel silly. In the meantime, I like to hope for the best.  Chzz  ►  02:09, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I am disappointed that you hold the biographies of living persons policy in such low regard that you wouldn't even mention it in discussing the issue here. But of course, this isn't a policy or source quality dispute - its a dispute with an editor claiming "The National Enquirer actually is developing a positive reputation for the truth." , and, implicitly, that his contributions therefore meet WP:BLP and WP:RS. It doesn't take a detailed reading of WP:BLP to realize that The National Enquirer has as much "reputation for the truth" as steer manure, and that editors defending its reputation so that they can fill our biographies of living persons with its tabloid venom are not here in good faith. Erik9 (talk) 02:19, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

The simple fact is that I was trying to post something I knew to be true, Jeremy Roloff has made racist and homophobic comments. I know it for a fact independent of the NE article. I wasn't trying to troll and I wasn't trying to vandalize anything and I resent the accusation. The mainstream media has even acknowledged that the NE had beat them out on legitimate stories, which is the reason I made the comment about their reputation changing, much to my own surprise. I made a mistake as a new editor to this board. That is no reason to rake me over the coals. Admin chose to educate me, which is what Erik should have done instead of threatening me. Don't worry chzz, I'm not a troll or a vandal. Twiddlebug (talk) 02:13, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, The National Enquirer has "beat... out" the mainstream media "on legitimate stories" - because the National Enquirer isn't deliberately looking for falsehoods -- they just have no editorial standards. They publish whatever sort of salacious gossip they can dig up, without regard to its truth. However, the mainstream media, who actually worry about being sued for libel because people will actually believe the stories they publish, must ensure the veracity of news before publishing it, sometimes quashing true but unprovable stories in the process. Just because a bit of the National Enquirer's garbage later proves to be true doesn't mean that most of what they publish is credible -- it's simply an example of the infinite monkey theorem in action. Erik9 (talk) 02:29, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

"Knowing something for a fact" is considered WP:original research. Give a reliable source. NE is NOT one, its a tabloid.TomCat4680 (talk) 02:33, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Calling someone a "homophobic racist" is clearly a violation of WP:BLP. Why is this debate still ongoing? TomCat4680 (talk) 02:37, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

and another thing, someone's personal Myspace page is a self published source. Myspace is a blog site. Blogs are NOT considered reliable sources. Especially opinionated or biased ones. TomCat4680 (talk) 02:39, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) Since Twiddlebug has indicated that he understands the guidelines on reliable sources and WP:BLP (see user's comment above), I'm marking this as resolved. --RegentsPark (My narrowboat) 03:03, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Although marked as resolved, this discussion should be deleted as a BLP violation in and of itself. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 21:56, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Assassin's Creed 2

Assassin's Creed II -> see Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Assassin's Creed 2. This is getting tiresome. Crystal-ballery to the highest degree. Logos stolen from previews of game magazine covers, renders "snuck out" by testers. My watchlist is getting sore. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 04:41, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

The Game Informer magazine preview for the game is out (or will be out RSN), and the sourcing is reasonable. Two months ago, yes, it's speculation. Today, not anymore. Image credits, on the other hand.... --MASEM (t) 05:00, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

There's still not that much sourcing, but the AFD was only in February. I redirected both, and protected the redirects for now. It can be broken out later via DRV or an edit requested easy enough. rootology (C)(T) 05:25, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

More defamation by Twiddlebug

Although this thread above was marked as "resolved" , and after I specifically requested that Twiddlebug (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) refrain from further WP:BLP violations on my talk page , he subsequently returned to my talk page for further restatements of his tabloid-sourced slime, supplemented by some new wild accusations against myself. Since, IMHO, protecting living people from defamation is far more important than retaining the hypothetical future contributions of users such as Twiddlebug who have spent months slandering them (without any useful edits whatsoever), I would suggest that Twiddlebug be blocked indefinitely. Erik9 (talk) 13:47, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Since he hasn't edited since before 5am, I've left a final warning on his talk page. If he comes back in the same vein, he will be blocked. – Toon 13:56, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I have enacted a 24 hour block against Erik9, giving my rationale here. I do not condone forum/block shopping, no matter how distasteful the target may be. I have no objection to anyone lifting the block if convinced Erik9 understands what is acceptable in combating BLP violations. LessHeard vanU (talk) 16:24, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Acting on an unblock request, I find this block to be very difficult to understand, and have asked LessHeard vanU to review or undo it (see User talk:LessHeard vanU#Unblock request of Erik9). This looks like a rather well-founded request for admin intervention, and blocking the user who made it appears most questionable to me at first glance.  Sandstein  17:30, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I advised the user to bring the case here rather than AIV, given the complex nature of the problem - there's a thread above in which it was initially raised. – Toon 17:47, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

My full response is at Erik9's talkpage; In brief, after Twiddlebug made inappropriate edits to a BLP article Erik9 made four separate reports in an effort to have the editor blocked - not accepting any other resolution. LessHeard vanU (talk) 19:36, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. Maybe it's because it's late where I am, or because your explanation and Erik9's reply are both a bit long and complicated, but to the (probably limited) extent that I understand what happened I think it is rather likely that Erik9 initiated this thread in good faith and should be unblocked, if consensus here supports it.  Sandstein  20:33, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I have no objection to any sysop unblocking if they feel it appropriate. LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:10, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I never saw any notice from Erik not to post on his page. If I had, I would not have posted. I have not defamed anyone. What I posted was the truth and acknowledge by the family he claims I am defaming. I'm ending this now, but it bothers me that I have come under such vicious attack for something that could have been simply resolved.Twiddlebug (talk) 17:40, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Are there any sources that aren't tabloid magazines? The National Enquirer is an absolutely inappropriate source for material describing a living person, especially negative material. Also, I disagree as well with the block of Erik, I don't see how this thread is an inappropriate response at all. If anything, he should have come here instead of AIV first. But since when is posting a notice to AN unacceptable for combating a BLP issue? Mr.Z-man 18:32, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Wow. The block of Erik was entirely inappropriate. Block the person who's trying to look out for Misplaced Pages, and not the person damaging it? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 21:59, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

It is also worth nothing that the block of Erik was over 2 1/2 hours after his last comment on Twiddlebug in any forum. This block is entirely a punishment, and not an attempt at ending disruption. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 22:02, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm inclined to think that Erik's cross-posting at various noticeboards was more out of confusion and the direction of various editors (including myself), than any malicious attempt at forum shopping. Since LessHeard vanU (talk · contribs) has explicitly stated that he has no problem with the editor being unblocked, I'm going to do just that - on the condition that Erik agrees not to persue the matter further unless Twiddlebug resumes his contentious editing. – Toon 22:18, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

• Support unblocks all the way around. Let's assume good faith on everyone involved. Erik9 does a lot of vandal fighting, perhaps he's become a little cynical and perhaps judged an editor as a vandal a little too quickly. Twiddlebug, being a new editor, should read up on core policy a bit more before continuing to insert information that's been removed at least once. If your information has been removed once, find out why before you try to re-insert it. Maybe Less was a little quick on the block, but an admins task is to prevent disruption, and I prefer to AGF, and look at it as watching out for a new user. Let's call it a draw, disengage, and chalk it up to a misunderstanding, and move along to something productive. — Ched :  ?  22:36, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Ok, the user has agreed and I've unblocked him. Hopefully drama over. – Toon 22:47, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Poll on reviewer autopromotion for flagged protection and patrolled revisions

There is currently a poll on the autopromotion of reviewers at Misplaced Pages talk:Reviewers#Poll on autopromotion, for the trial implementation of flagged protection and patrolled revisions. For information, see general documentation and overview. All users are invited to comment, and to participate in the elaboration of a reviewing guideline as well. Cenarium (talk) 13:48, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll

The date linking and autoformatting poll is due to close at 0:00 (UTC). Could an admin please handle the close? We need the following pages protecting at the end time;

• Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll
• Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll/Autoformatting responses
• Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll/Month-day responses
• Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll/Year-linking responses
• The watchlist notice also needs removing from MediaWiki:Watchlist-details.

I'll most probably be under the influence by that point, so I suspect it's for the best if somebody else handles it! Happy Easter everyone! :-) Ryan Postlethwaite 11:06, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

 Done Happy Easter to you too. PeterSymonds (talk) 02:04, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

That should not have been done. Read the top bit @ Misplaced Pages:Date formatting and linking poll: The poll runs from 00:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC) and concludes 23:59, 13 April 2009 (UTC) - as far as I can tell the poll should still be ongoing. D.M.N. (talk) 08:22, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

That was my mistake. It should have been open for 2 weeks, but I messed up the dates. Now it's going to have to be open for 2 weeks and 1 day which is a rather silly number. If someone could trout me, that would be much appreciated. Ryan Postlethwaite 09:59, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Blogs as sources, WP:BLOGS

Since I still keep coming across issues where people falsely say "blogs can't be sources"--an out and out incorrect statement--I've whipped up Misplaced Pages:Blogs as sources/WP:BLOGS as a quick reference distilled from RS & BLP policy pages to give a quick clue on how blogs are allowed to be used from certain websites, and how on what articles. Any feedback on the talk is appreciated there. rootology (C)(T) 03:07, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

How do you see this page in relation to WP:SPS? Can't anything that's needed be placed there (and perhaps the WP:BLOGS can be redirected there as well) rather than suggesting new guidelines? Oren0 (talk) 04:48, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

WP:BLOGS is just a centralized reference point for the core existing guidelines and rules for blog usage. SPS is a different matter altogether, and falls under the RS umbrella. The bigger problem I'm seeing now is the labeling of "blog" at all; "blog" is just a technical description for that style of website structure. It should be all just about websites in general in our guidelines. A blog just happens to be a website structured a certain way. Does that make sense?

And my page is only tagged proposed guideline since it was suggested as a more appropriate tag. It's meant to be a landing page for when someone falsely says "Blogs are never RS," which is fiction. rootology (C)(T) 04:51, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

I see where you're coming from. The distinction is a difficult one to make for some, but generally a link to WP:SPS sets it straight (though has the language there become more anti-blog recently, with text moving to a footnote). I'd tag this as an essay rather than a proposed guideline though, unless you plan on taking it to WP:VPP. Oren0 (talk) 05:39, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages noticeboards