Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 01:35, 18 January 2010

Historical References

Historical Back Pointers

Rather than create archive pages which use up additional space I have decided to instead keep a list of back pointers to permanent links within the history of this talk page at various points in time.

Raul's Attack Page

• User:Raul654/GoRight
• Misplaced Pages:Miscellany_for_deletion/User:Raul654/GoRight

My Response Page

• User:GoRight/Raul654

Users Requesting to be Informed of Topics of Interest

The following users have explicitly requested that I keep them informed of topics I believe that they would be interested in:

• User:Abd
• User:John G. Miles

December 2009

Valid NPOV defending effort by GoRight. I support any appeal. Admin Tedder corrupted my intent for placing the POV-tag. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:19, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Zulu, if you have issues with me, please take them to my talk page or to WP:ANI. tedder (talk) 21:33, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

GoRight (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

Request reason:

The simple fact of the matter is that I have not committed any blockable offense here. There is a valid WP:NPOV dispute occurring at the article in question. I am well within my rights to post a NPOV tag on that article, I was following the requested steps outlined by User:William M. Connolley who is one of the primary editors from the other side of this dispute. I have been making extensive use of the talk page in support of my position both prior to and subsequent to my placing the NPOV tag on the article. While I have reverted the NPOV tag a few times so have my opponents, and I have not committed any WP:3RR violations. There is no emergency requiring that I be blocked. There is no danger to the encyclopedia by my placing an NPOV tag on that article. I can only assume that Tedder means for this block to be punitive, not preventative, which makes it inconsistent with WP:BLOCK. I therefore request that I be unblocked.

Decline reason:

Edit warring is not permitted. The reason for this is that edit-warring is an ineffective way to solve disputes. The use of repeated reversion rather than discussion is only permissible in emergency situations, such as those caused by defamatory content. Unless you can explain why you felt that there was an emergency that meant that you needed to revert immediately, this block would appear to be valid. CIreland (talk) 14:02, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

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

Unblocking admin, and GoRight, you were blocked for edit warring with the NPOV template, against this: Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change#Cease-fire on POV template. This was not punitive, you have clearly been edit warring with the template, which is actively being discussed on the talk page without consensus. tedder (talk) 02:54, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

I refer you to the complete text of Misplaced Pages:NPOVD#What_is_an_NPOV_dispute.3F, but I wish to highlight the following portions thereof:

"By linking to this page from an article, a dissenter can register his or her concern without unduly upsetting the author(s) or maintainer(s) of the article, and without starting a flame war. Others would maintain, however, that linking to this page only postpones the dispute. This might be a good thing, though, if a "cooling off" period seems required."

"Sometimes people have edit wars over the NPOV dispute tag, or have an extended debate about whether there is a NPOV dispute or not. In general, if you find yourself having an ongoing dispute about whether a dispute exists, there's a good chance one does, and you should therefore leave the NPOV tag up until there is a consensus that it should be removed."

I also refer you to Template:POV and note that I was merely following the instructions described there. I also highlight the following text from the template itself:

"Please do not remove this message until the dispute is resolved."

which clearly indicates that the intention is for the NPOV tag to be left on the page until the dispute is resolved. Note that the dispute is not yet resolved. tedder's actions are clearly at odds with both the letter and the intent of the NPOV tag as described in the essay linked above. I can only assume that the existence of the essay suggests that there is some level of precedent for how these situations are normally handled, and that I am acting in a manner consistent with those precedents. --GoRight (talk) 03:14, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

How can one side in an edit war be blocked, and not the other? Sounds punitive to me. Having said that, GoRight: even if you are in the right here, you of all people should know the playing field is not level on these pages. A POV tag is not worth giving them an excuse to block you. ATren (talk) 03:03, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Tedder, given this result I intend to raise this issue at WP:AN because I while I accept that you are merely attempting to contain the edit war you are also using your admin bit to prevent me from utilizing the NPOV tag for its clearly intended purpose, and are thereby, in effect at least, aiding one side in what is fundamentally a content dispute. I wish to seek guidance at WP:AN related to the proper use of the NPOV template as well as the community norms for such use.

If I agree not to restore the NPOV tag until the matter is discussed at WP:AN and I further agree to abide by any decision that arises out of that discussion, will you agree to unblock me? --GoRight (talk) 16:02, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

GoRight, I'll happily unblock you given those limitations. Additionally, please leave this section on this page until the AN/ANI discussion is over, okay? tedder (talk) 17:42, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Please don't forget about the autoblocks that typically get setup as well. Thanks.

Just to be clear on what we are agreeing to, I will also be free to edit elsewhere (i.e. other than just WP:AN) and to continue the discussion on Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change subject to the usual WP:CIVIL rules, correct? --GoRight (talk) 17:51, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

I've unblocked you and I think I cleared the autoblock- let me know if that doesn't appear to be the case. You are free to edit anywhere, including Talk:Scientific opinion on climate change, paying special mind to WP:CIVIL and the aforementioned NPOV tag on the article in question.

Let me know when you've posted to AN- link to it here and on my talk page. tedder (talk) 17:59, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. --GoRight (talk) 18:03, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Is There Any Chance of Getting Some Balance in the Global Warming Article?

I have tried to put a little balance in the first paragraph of the Global Warming article. Anyone reading this would be left with the impression that AGW is a more solid scientific theory than Newton's Laws of Motion. I had added the following:

"However, a number of highly respected scientists dispute the consensus view. Recently, leaked emails reveal that the leading Global Warming scientists, at the Climatic Research Unit, University of East Anglia and elsewhere, have been concealing or altering the raw data, which shows the world has been cooling for the past decade. These Global Warming scientists have admitted in their emails, that none of the climate models can account for this lack of warming in the real world."

Not unsuprisingly, it was deleted a minute later. I note that despite the strong impact of the recent revelations of Climategate, this has failed to find any mention in the article. I have asked for advice on how the editors controlling the article would recommend I rewrite these facts so that they wouldn't object to their inclusion. I received the following reply:

Roughly, the only things that are correct is the name of the university, and that emails have been leaked. The rest is somewhere between obviously wrong and egregiously wrong, with a bit of WP:PEACOCK thrown in for good measure. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:11, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Any suggestions? - Brittainia (talk) 11:38, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

AfD nomination of Stephan Schulz

AfDM| page=Stephan Schulz|logdate=2009 December 10

I thought you might be interested in this vote. Vanity Pages for Admins really have no place on Misplaced Pages and it is high time to clear this detritus. ~ Rameses (talk) 11:10, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Blanking of An Article While it is AfD

Goright, I had written an article "Wikipropaganda on Global Warming" recently. It was quickly AfD'd by Zvn, which I have no Objection to. However, while the AfD process is underway, William M. Connolley acting in concert with Verbal have effectively blanked the article reducing it from 4,734 bytes to just 567 bytes - just one line! This is clearly blanking and one of the two behind it is the subject of the article so it's also clearly motivated. Any advice on how to get some justice here? ~ Rameses (talk) 14:55, 10 December 2009 (UTC)

Daily Mail news, special investigation

(FYI, if you're interested in the Climategate article, this information needs to go in and otherwise due weight restored when it's unblocked on Dec. 18th -- Flegelpuss)

The Daily Mail has a news Special Investigation with an excellent analysis, including an excellent description that references among others McIntyre's analysis of the "trick...to hide the decline" which I previously submitted above. So this is an unquestionably RS that describes that analysis. The graph and a summary of the description should be included in the article. Here are some excerpts:

Derived from close examination of some of the thousands of other leaked emails, he says it suggests the ‘trick’ undermines not only the CRU but the IPCC.

There is a widespread misconception that the ‘decline’ Jones was referring to is the fall in global temperatures from their peak in 1998, which probably was the hottest year for a long time. In fact, its subject was more technical - and much more significant...

Briffa knew exactly why they wanted it, writing in an email on September 22: ‘I know there is pressure to present a nice tidy story as regards “apparent unprecedented warming in a thousand years or more”.’ But his conscience was troubled. ‘In reality the situation is not quite so simple - I believe that the recent warmth was probably matched about 1,000 years ago.’...

Finally, Briffa changed the way he computed his data and submitted a revised version. This brought his work into line for earlier centuries, and ‘cooled’ them significantly. But alas, it created another, potentially even more serious, problem.

According to his tree rings, the period since 1960 had not seen a steep rise in temperature, as actual temperature readings showed - but a large and steady decline, so calling into question the accuracy of the earlier data derived from tree rings.

This is the context in which, seven

weeks later, Jones presented his ‘trick’ - as simple as it was deceptive.

All he had to do was cut off Briffa’s inconvenient data at the point where the decline started, in 1961, and replace it with actual temperature readings, which showed an increase.

On the hockey stick graph, his line is abruptly terminated - but the end of the line is obscured by the other lines.

‘Any scientist ought to know that you just can’t mix and match proxy and actual data,’ said Philip Stott, emeritus professor of biogeography at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies.

‘They’re apples and oranges. Yet that’s exactly what he did.’

...as McIntyre points out, ‘contrary to claims by various climate scientists, the IPCC Third Assessment Report did not disclose the deletion of the post-1960 values’.

On the final diagram, the cut off was simply concealed by the other lines.

Flegelpuss (talk) 06:44, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Don't...

... fall into the trap of thinking they care about anything but protecting their POV. Focus on the issues, not in trying to build brides with those who have never shown one inkling in trying to find common ground. ATren (talk) 02:58, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Typical, but disappointing from SBHB. He has occasionally shown signs of rationality and we have had some good exchanges in the past. Lately he has been aloof. I guess he must have fallen under the influence of some bad apples or something. --GoRight (talk) 06:18, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

KDP

GR, you stated in the Lindzen talk that KDP has made precisely the same arguments from weight and undue that I am presently making in defense of other pages, something I find quite believable. Can you give me any examples? Thanks. Alex Harvey (talk) 05:09, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

I'll try to dig some up, but to be honest you can probably go to just about any skeptic's page, look for something I have tried to add, and read his comments. On the warmers side of things he uses the mirror image of the arguments. He then tries to claim that cross article consistency arguments are moot and that every article has to be judged on its own merits. I suspect that argument is the lynch pin that prevents his cognitive dissonance from spinning out of control. --GoRight (talk) 06:13, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Regardless...

Regardless of how worthless individuals may or may not be, let's retain the pattina of civility and avoid commenting on other contributors, rather their contributions. Thanks! Hipocrite (talk) 21:25, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Heh. I appreciate your being even handed about it. You correctly caught the meaning of that post. I would like to likewise acknowledge that I saw your change to the POV template as being a legitimate attempt to find a compromise position and I commend you for it even though I would have been unlikely to support that specific change. --GoRight (talk) 22:10, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Wow, your still here

I'm surprised you are still active here. I don't know how you can take it. I had given up long ago on this place.

Hey dude, how's it going? Send me an email using the wikipedia email service so we can catch up. You may have to setup one on your account first. I assume you can remove it after you send the email or just use a throw away one. --GoRight (talk) 23:33, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

disruptive editing

Edits like your latest set at Richard Lindzen don't help your case. It's obvious from the Iris article that the hypothesis is not generally accepted. Rather than delete, you could have added a fact tag or even (gasp!) tracked down a cite yourself. I've seen lots of wikilawyering in support of WP:FRINGE POV's, most notably at Passive smoking. It has some effect in disrupting the Misplaced Pages project, but it never helps advance the POV. JQ (talk) 08:31, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I will raise this issue on Lindzen's page in due time. But for now let me just point out the following:

1. Your source is NOT a peer-reviewed source.
2. Your source is NOT even a WP:RS on a BLP since it is a blog.
3. Your source does NOT support the claim being made (i.e. that the Iris effect is not widely accepted). No discussion of the acceptance level of that hypothesis is even mentioned in the article to which you link.

--GoRight (talk) 19:10, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Labeling edits as vandalism.

No good faith attempt to improve the encyclopedia should be labeled as vandalism. You have been here long enough to know that this was not appropriate. Do not repeat this behavior. Hipocrite (talk) 18:34, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

The fallacy in your point is, of course, that Verbal removing properly sourced material that no one will disagree is something that Singer would actually say represents a "good faith attempt to improve the encyclopedia". It represents exactly the opposite and as such it is vandalism by definition. --GoRight (talk) 18:48, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Verbal is attempting to improve the encyclopedia, though you believe his actions harm it. I believe you are attempting to imrpove the encyclopedia, though many believe your actions harm it. If you continue to assume bad faith of other long term contributors, I will request that you be prevented from further disrupting the encyclopedia. Hipocrite (talk) 18:49, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Where have I assumed bad faith? I am arguing from the content of the change. Removal of that section which is properly sourced does nothing to improve the encyclopedia but most definitely accomplishes exactly the opposite because it removes material pertinent to the subject of the article and the views of a notable skeptic with respect to a notable incident. --GoRight (talk) 18:56, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism is a bad faith action. It assumes the intent of the vandal was to harm the encyclopedia. You have been around long enough to have read WP:VAND, specifically Misplaced Pages:NOTVAND "NPOV violations," "Unintentional misinformation," "Disruptive editing or stubbornness," or "Lack of understanding of the purpose of Misplaced Pages." Like I said - don't accuse long-term users of vandalism for disagreeing with you about what should be in an article. Hipocrite (talk) 18:58, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I'll just quote from the first two sentences of WP:VAND, "Vandalism is any addition, removal, or change of content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Misplaced Pages. Vandalism cannot and will not be tolerated." Now, I will clearly acknowledge that YMMV on this point, but as far as I am concerned Verbal's edit was "a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Misplaced Pages." And at this point I suspect it is best if we simply agree to disagree and move on. Feel free to have the last word. --GoRight (talk) 19:06, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I'll take that last word right here - "If you suggest another long term contributor has comitted vandalism by disagreeing with you in good faith, I will sugest you be provided a break from the encyclopedia to prevent further disruption." Hipocrite (talk) 19:08, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

This is a silly dispute. I have to go with Hipocrite on the merits here, though - it's clearly a content dispute, rather than a deliberate, malicious attempt to sabotage Misplaced Pages. The reasons provided by Verbal in his edit summary, as well as his associated commentary on the talk page, indicate pretty clearly that he feels the content violates content policy and guidelines. If someone is providing those sorts of policy-based arguments for their edits, then they may be wrong, misguided, stubborn, POV-driven, biased, ignorant, abusing Misplaced Pages as a venue for advocacy, etc... but they are not committing vandalism. Just argue the case on its merits and let the vandalism thing drop - it's an overreach, and you're not going to convince anyone of anything except that you're misapplying WP:VANDAL. MastCell  19:44, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

Best I can offer at this point, folks. See . --GoRight (talk) 19:59, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

"Involvment" checker

Since the GUI version was so bloated, I went ahead and put together/commented up a trimmed-down command-line version of the tool at User:MastCell/ContribCheckerCL. Works pretty well for me, and it's handy since it spits out a set of tab-delimited rows that can be sucked up by Excel or other data-crunching utilities. Let me know if you find it useful. MastCell  00:25, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Coatrack

I'm seeing pretty clear consensus that Fred Singer is being used as a coatrack. Unless I'm overlooking someone, you're the only editor that doesn't agree. At this point I'm ready to start removing non-biographical information from the article. Will you respect the consensus, or do we need further dispute resolution? --Ronz (talk) 17:08, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I believe that you are overlooking Q Science. In any event, I disagree with your assertion that any consensus exists. --GoRight (talk) 17:13, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Ronz, count me among the dissenters if coatrack is applied unevenly on that article. I believe the ClimateGate quotes belong in some form, though probably only in a short summary sentence, not full quotes. I also feel that there are several coatracks that have been there for a long time but haven't been removed. I think there needs to be an overhaul there (long overdue) and I might support what you are doing, or I might not, depending on how you apply the standard. Perhaps you can outline your intentions in a new section on talk and I can comment further; or, perhaps be bold, apply the edits, and realize that some of us may object and try alternate versions. ATren (talk) 17:25, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the thoughtful comments, ATren. I'm continuing the discussion here for now in the hope GoRight will explain further. After that, it would be best to continue the discussion on the article talk page.

Yes, there are a lot of coatrack/BLP/NPOV problems across the global-warming-related articles.

Yes, we need to apply these policies evenly. I'm hoping that if we explain the problems and solutions clearly, it won't be nearly so hard to clean up other, related articles along the same lines.

Yes, a summary sentence would be a good solution for this (and perhaps most of the non-biographical information). Ideally, we'd have an independent, reliable source that's noted how widely he's been quoted that also summarizes these quotes. That way we are clearly following NPOV and SYN. If we can't find such sources then we need to be more careful, paying close attention to the pov of the source and their willingness to summarize rather than just provide a quote. --Ronz (talk) 18:00, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

If the whole point of the "Views" section of the Fred Singer article is to articulate what the man's views are on a given topic (i.e. climategate in this case), I fail to see how we (or some secondary source) is better able to do that via paraphrasing than the man is with his own words. Can either you or ATren please explain to me how that makes any sense?

As to the applicability of the section in general, Singer is being vilified for being a skeptic of AGW. Indeed, his stance on AGW is a significant component of the man's career at this point in his life. Like it or not, climategate is a significant event in the history of the whole AGW debate of which Singer is a prominent figure. So to argue that his views on climategate are not germane to his BLP appears, on the surface at least, to be somewhat disingenuous IMHO. Clearly a discussion of his views on climategate belongs in his BLP, and as I have stated multiple times on the talk page I am perfectly willing to try and address people's concerns once they have been articulated. Generically citing NPOV and COATRACK does not an actionable issue make. Please state the specifics of your concern. Simply, "I don't like Singer's stance on AGW or climategate" is not a sufficient response. --GoRight (talk) 18:19, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. My solution to the Views section is to rely upon sources such as I mentioned so that we're not violating SYN or NPOV (or BLP, which is a possiblity as well). If we simply select quotes, we ignore NPOV. If we present such quotes as a summary of his viewpoints, we're violating SYN. We should instead rely upon reliable sources that do the summarizing/synthesizing/analyzing for us, and present them with appropriate weight.

One big problem with using quotes is that journalists often use them in place of analysis. Such sources should be avoided, especially in biographies. --Ronz (talk) 19:05, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

I mean no disrespect here, but this is nonsense. The section is about Singer's views on climategate. To be a NPOV violation in this context Singer would have to hold multiple distinct views on climategate and we would have to be excluding one or more of them. As far as I know, we are not. So, for example, which of Singer's multiple views on climategate are we not including? That's what NPOV means for that section.

Neither is this WP:SYN. I am not synthesizing anything. To synthesize something you have to be combining multiple things or creating something out of whole cloth. In each of these cases there is only one thing, namely Singer's quote as reported by a secondary source.

If we try to paraphrase him, THEN we are doing synthesis, but merely including his quotes directly as reported by the secondary sources clearly is not. What will I have changed or introduced via the quote? Nothing. In both of these cases I am merely including what secondary sources have reported which is precisely what I am supposed to be doing.

Now, if we want to add something else into that section to provide the POV of someone else we better have a secondary source that is specifically commenting on Singer's views on climategate or THAT would be a fine example of synthesis, or WP:OR if you prefer, as well. --GoRight (talk) 21:45, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Not at all. I said, "If we simply select quotes." The NPOV violation is from our selection of what quotes/viewpoints are mentioned in the article, and the resulting emphasis on those viewpoints. The selection should be based instead upon reliable sources.

On the SYN issues: You claim we aren't making any with regard to the quotes. This misses the point. This is an encyclopedia we're writing - a biography in this case. This requires that we have summaries, synthesis, and analysis. We need to find and use references that provide them, since we are restrained from making them ourselves per WP:OR.

Once again, "Ideally, we'd have an independent, reliable source that's noted how widely he's been quoted that also summarizes these quotes." --Ronz (talk) 22:39, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

"The NPOV violation is from our selection of what quotes/viewpoints are mentioned in the article, and the resulting emphasis on those viewpoints." - You are quoting the standard argument at me, which under other circumstances in a non-BLP context would make sense. I would agree with you. But in this context there IS only ONE point of view, Singer's. No one can better represent Singer's POV that Singer himself.

"This requires that we have summaries, synthesis, and analysis. We need to find and use references that provide them, since we are restrained from making them ourselves per WP:OR." - While in general what you say is true, nothing in it precludes the use of quoted material in a biography. The two are most certainly NOT mutually exclusive. To argue that they are is to argue that one could not quote the text of the Gettysburg Address in a biography about Abraham Lincoln. Such a position appears absurd on its face, at least IMHO.

"Ideally, we'd have an independent, reliable source that's noted how widely he's been quoted that also summarizes these quotes." - So to use the Lincoln analogy, you would argue that we cannot actually quote the text of the address itself but should instead only use some secondary source's paraphrasing of it? And we cannot provide excerpts from some of Ronald Reagan's speeches such as the Tear down this wall speech? I'm sorry, but I'm not buying it. (And no I am not trying to equate Fred Singer with Abraham Lincoln or Ronald Reagan, but the point remains the same.) --GoRight (talk) 23:22, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for your patience with this. I think we're making some good progress here.

You're correct with Lincoln and Reagan, but I am too. In both the Lincoln and Reagan cases we have countless references that provide the analysis we need. I'm simply asking for similar sources that give us the type of summarized information that is appropriate for a biographical article in an encyclopedia, and that give us information with which we can determine what weight to give it as notable information for such an article.

More specific to Singer: I'm sure he's made multiple statements about his viewpoints on various topics, and multiple statements on the e-mail hacking incident. If he hasn't made multiple statements, then we need to be sure we don't give it undue weight compared to other life events we're reporting. If he has made multiple statements, then we have the problem of which to select, plus the need to give it proper weight in respect to his other life events. --Ronz (talk) 23:37, 17 December 2009 (UTC)

Given the size of the current article I don't think that we have to worry about thinning things out just yet. If you feel that some aspect of his life has been neglected relative to the existing content then, by all means, please help to improve the article by including it. That some aspects of his life may be in neglect is NOT an argument to exclude properly sourced material that we have already at hand. By that argument you could never even start an article and incomplete stubs would be disallowed. --GoRight (talk) 00:17, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for continuing the conversation.

"By that argument you could never even start..." Thankfully, no one is making any argument like this. All I'm arguing is that disputed information in biographies should be sourced by the highest-quality sources, per BLP, NPOV, OR, and NOT. --Ronz (talk) 01:55, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Do you dispute that Singer made these statements? --GoRight (talk) 05:23, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry for the delay getting back to you.

I don't see anyone arguing the point. It's simply not relevant to the discussion. --Ronz (talk) 17:38, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Number of Scientists

Hi GoRight. I tried finding the "number of scientists in the world" a few weeks ago, but all I was able to find were some unreliable webpages. I saw you mentioned the number at 2,500. I don't dispute your number and I have no clue what the number is. I am interested in where you arrived at that number though, since I never found a satisfactory answer. I suspect the criteria used to define a "scientist" is also important. Airborne84 (talk) 06:58, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, that was merely a flippant comment on my part. The 2,500 was the oft cited number of scientists represented by the IPCC reports, but this number is quite controversial. Why are you in search of this figure? Depending on your intended use I could try to see if such a number could be found, but it is likely to be elusive as you point out. --GoRight (talk) 15:02, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

No need to do extra research on my behalf. I was looking for estimates based on curiosity. I didn't know about the IPCC number, so that's useful anyway. Thanks and cheers! Airborne84 (talk) 17:25, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

It's pointless because a) you would widely disparate numbers depending on your definition of "scientist", and b) science isn't a popular vote in any case. The way these things usually go is: scientific majority says: "No real scientist believes your minoritarian view." Minority group says: "Yes they do - here's a list of a zillion scientists who think the way we do!" Majority responds: "Well, here's an even bigger list of scientists who agree with us." It played out this way with AIDS denialism, and it's sort of pointless. MastCell  19:04, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, as you have framed it (scientist v. scientist) you are correct that the number becomes sort of pointless. But when weighting the value of public v. scientific opinion, strictly speaking the coverage in Misplaced Pages is completely out of whack with the scientific side of things receiving hugely WP:UNDUE weight. I'm not sure I really intend to press this point, but it IS a valid WP:WEIGHT argument.

If you don't buy the "size of general population" v. "size of scientists" rationale for weighting then another might be "number of public domain media, editorial, and blog stories on GW" v. "number of peer-reviewed science papers". I suspect that in that case the scientific POV on GW is hugely over represented here. Perhaps this does bear some additional thought. I might be on to something .... --GoRight (talk) 21:00, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

Nah, newspaper coverage is sort of an artefact of the way journalists cover science. They cover it like politics, as if there were two sides engaged in an even debate with no a priori assumption of correctness on either side. If you were to survey the popular press, you'd come away thinking that there is a robust scientific debate on the topic of whether vaccines cause autism, or whether secondhand smoke causes cancer. There isn't - those are matters where a robust scientific consensus exists without serious dissent. But the media tend to cover them as point-counterpoint "debates" with the WHO/Surgeon General on one side and a tobacco-company spokesresearcher from the American Society for Smokers' Rights (A wholly owned subsidiary of Philip Morris Inc.) on the other.

Since we're not in the news business, but rather in the business of trying to summarize the current state of human knowledge on a subject, it would seem to make sense that we focus on current scientific understanding when we cover scientific topics. Misplaced Pages's overview of the science of global warming should be in line with respected, mainstream scientific thought. If we want to cover the politics of global warming, then we could do so, but it should be clear that we're talking politics and not science. MastCell  22:23, 18 December 2009 (UTC)

The above is NOT an argument about the weight within the context of the scientific debate. Rather, it is an argument that far too much weight (i.e. far too much coverage) is being dedicated to scientific views overall relative to the political ones. So, for example, we should have (for the sake of discussion) 100X the number of political articles as we do scientific ones on GW ... based solely on the weight given to each by verifiable RS, and since we are discussing opinion here obviously editorials published in the MSM count as well. In other words, in the GW articles the scientific opinions are given far too many column inches relative to the public/political ones IF one truly wanted to assess the relative weights of each in terms of volume of publications. In even OTHER words, using the very same argument that the AGW promoters use to delete skeptic's views from the encyclopedia based on WP:UNDUE why should the scientific articles not be deleted entirely in favor of public/political ones? The scientific opinion is, after all, a minority of opinion in this larger context, right? --GoRight (talk) 00:00, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

Apologies if my contribution is disruptive in any way...

Scientific consensus is a necessary and required pov to have in all scientific matters. We are, after all, writing an encyclopedia here. --Ronz (talk) 17:41, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

How strange...and interesting. GoRight, I had no intention of lambasting you on your talk page, I was simply trying to get at the "truth" of the matter, and not trying to support an opinion either way for me. A man/woman's home is his/her castle, after all...

I will say that a few months ago I had absolutely no opinion on climate change/global warming whatsoever (due to my lack of knowledge about it). However, I started hearing things on the news about it, heard Al Gore say things, etc. I did what I thought was the logical thing to do, I started researching what scientists said about the subject. I saw what Al Gore said about the topic. He's just as bad on some of the points as the sceptics are in politics and the news shows I've seen. My interest in determining the "truth" of the matter (a slippery term) resulted in scientific opinions and research. Why did I eschew other sources?

1. Politicians. They all have agendas. On both sides. And their information on the subject comes from others.

2. News media/talk shows. Some have agendas. And their information on the subject comes from others.

3. Economists. Irrelevant to the subject of whether global warming is occurring and if it's caused by man. The costs of addressing it are a huge issue to be sure. I'm not sure I want to accept a huge impact on my life to address this immediately - without considered thought. However, that's a separate issue.

4. Public opinion. Amazingly irrelevant from my point of view. Without research, the public knows only what it hears. Most of the public in western Europe believes global warming is a fact and it's caused by humans. That doesn't mean they're right. If I wanted to find out if the Great Wall of China could be seen by the human eye from space, I wouldn't go take a poll at the local shopping complex (I bet the majority answer would be wrong). I'd ask an astronaut - or someone that worked at a space agency - in other words, someone with some knowledge of the field that didn't require research to get the answer.

Anyway, I'm not saying that scientists are right on global warming (on either side). I'm just saying that a few months ago when I wanted to do research on this subject, my first thought was "what do scientist say about it"?

Again GoRight, no intent to disparage you on your own talk page. Just responding to what looked like an interesting conversation that I (unintentionally) sparked. You're certainly entitled to your opinion, and if you can improve the articles on this subject and others on Misplaced Pages - more power to you.

Cheers! Airborne84 (talk) 02:54, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Climategate

Hi there. Can you help me here-Mariordo (talk) 19:04, 19 December 2009 (UTC)

About your editing of my edits :)

With regards to this article ] Do you believe i acted correctly and used reputable sources to validate the post? And if so why was it removed by willy connolley. It has been redone now about six times with different users re-adding it and other users using different excuses to delete it. Most confusing :) Why are people so worried about the truth? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Marknutley (talk • contribs) 02:29, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Your sources were fine. I just added a couple more. The editors you ran into just don't like Monckton so they were trying to keep his views off the page. Watch the page as they will likely continue to try and remove the material despite it's being properly sourced.

Are you aware of ? P.S. Please remember to sign your edits. --GoRight (talk) 04:09, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I`m a sock puppet :) Is that allowed if all i did was edit a few posts to reflect the truth? How stupid is that, sheesh.

How does one sign his edits btw? o assumed it was four tildes but have been told this is not the case for anything other than talk pages. Thank you. mark nutley (talk) 09:04, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

WMC Harrassment

If you really think WMC is harrassing ZP5 (I haven't followed the recent edits) but don't know where to post put your case on my talk page and I will look at them. If you convince me and I agree I will raise it with WMC. Agreed? (Except I may not be online much over Christmas itself with lots of family around)> --BozMo talk 07:31, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, what's your threshold for harassment? I can try and dig up some diffs but don't want to bother unless we are in the same ballpark. I can cite things like WMC following ZP5 around and repeatedly calling for him to be banned, constant criticism and a total unwillingness to try and afford him any courtesy, repeated incivility, general bullying, repeatedly removing his comments or redacting them, etc, etc. Now a lot of this is just WMC being WMC but in ZP5's case he appears even more pointy than usual. For example, he lobbied for 2/0 to block ZP5 and after he had been blocked he couldn't just leave well enough alone he went to ZP5's page to make even more in your face comments and proddings. He's clearly walking the thin line of trying to provoke ZP5 into lashing out so he can call him unhinged or whatever.

Then there is the issue of whether it would even do any good. What makes you think you can get WMC to listen to you anyway? My experience suggests that he is fairly impervious to any outside "attitude adjustments".

I'll try to dig up a few of the examples that stick out in my mind tomorrow to give you a more concrete idea of what I am thinking of ... thanks for even taking the time to bring it up. --GoRight (talk) 07:57, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

My experience with WMC has always been pretty positive in terms of engagement on criticism so the upside from your standpoint would be convincing me that his behaviour is as you describe. What I have seen of you is a puzzling mix so I am quite open minded to listen to your perspective more. Sometimes you are completely dismissive of other good faith editors and sometimes you engage positively. My experience with ZP5 has not been completely positive though. He seems to have a limited ability to put his edits into a wider context, and I have twice told him to be careful about harrassing WMC but I don't really have the time to engage with ZP5 constructively for a few weeks because I sense it would be a time intensive process. --BozMo talk 14:25, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

I appreciate the well intentioned offer to mediate. I assume that you have seen the list of diffs that ZP5 put up related to this discussion. I will simply defer to ZP5's perspective on when and where he may feel harassed. That having been said, and given the time of year, perhaps it is best to just let things pass at this point in an effort to embrace the spirit of the season. We can always resume this next year if things continue or escalate from here. Have a happy holiday season. --GoRight (talk) 18:51, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks/ yes lets work toward peace breaking out in the new year.--BozMo talk 22:05, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Refactoring comments

Do not edit my comments. Not ever. If you have a problem with any of them, ask me to refactor them. Reverted. -- Scjessey (talk) 23:30, 22 December 2009 (UTC)

Well, don't make personal attacks and people won't have to remove them. And if you continue to make them I will continue to redact them, this is you final warning on the subject. --GoRight (talk) 04:32, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

GoRight, your latest personal attack against Scjessey on the article talk page is totally unacceptable. Consider this a warning. Please remove your personal attack from the talk page or I will formally request its removal. Thanks. Viriditas (talk) 08:09, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Oh please ATren (talk) 14:45, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Re: Take your evidence to SPI

The evidence was taken to SPI, where myself and another editor noted the similarity. Furthermore, I provided diffs and evidence linking the two editors. GoRight, is there a reason you are always defending sock puppets on climate change-related articles? Viriditas (talk) 01:33, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

So where is this evidence? I looked at SPI but couldn't find it. --GoRight (talk) 15:52, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

GoRight, if your definition of "find" is to "ignore" something, then I don't know what to say. This was discussed extensively on the SPI investigation page. In any case, the user is now blocked. Indefinitely. Viriditas (talk) 20:13, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Thank you

Thank you for the 3RR reminder. Honestly hadn't noticed, so warning appropriate and appreciated. :) -- Scjessey (talk) 18:12, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

You're welcome. --GoRight (talk) 18:36, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

BTW, my use of profanity was for emphasis. It is not a matter of civility. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:35, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

While I myself am not offended by such things, others most certainly can be. I don't mind a good heated debate but for some profanity simply crosses the line, that's all. I don't mind you removing the section from your talk page but that language IS getting dangerously close to actionable I would think if taken to a noticeboard. This will be especially true if it is repeated. As sign of good faith perhaps you would consider refactoring your own comment to be just slightly less emphatic? --GoRight (talk) 19:40, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

I've been involved in umpteen noticeboard discussions concerning profanity, including variations of "fuck", and they have only been actionable when directed at an individual. It's hard for me to feel charitable in the current... er... climate. Nevertheless, I will refactor. I will also politely warn you to avoid interacting with TheGoodLocust (see below). Nothing but trouble will come of it, as a glimpse at his edit contributions will reveal. -- Scjessey (talk) 19:44, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

"It's hard for me to feel charitable in the current... er... climate." - Believe me, I understand. Perhaps a focus on a few other articles for a day might help. Just a thought. --GoRight (talk) 19:52, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

I need an outlet for my rage. This is just the place! -- Scjessey (talk) 19:57, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

I see wikipedia hasn't changed

Recent experiences have demonstrated that wikipedia is just as bad as ever, if not worse, the Real Climate blog, cited by and partially produced by William Connolley thousands of times on wikipedia is apparently acceptable, but citing a newspaper article (or "blog" since it is online) by an atmosphere scientist, an actual scientific article, and an article from Science (the magazine) is unacceptable.

These people are truly unbelievable - I have no idea how you put up with them. I think this might be a decent website if the rules were applied consistently and it wasn't simply a matter of sending a private message to one of your friends on facebook for backup every time you needed to overcome the 3r limit. TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:50, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

I might need some help

I half-expect to get blocked for 24 hours for my edits here, because, during my last edit, I clicked "undo" but it wasn't really an undo. I just wanted a convenient way of getting my text back. Anyway, I'm sure "they" have an admin on standby to block me so I'd better keep this short. If you can, and I'm unable to, can you explain that it wasn't really a 3r violation? Thanks if you can. TheGoodLocust (talk) 23:13, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

If this happens again simply self-revert the revert with an explanation of hitting the wrong button. I'll point them to this comment and to your talk page but beyond that there isn't much I can do. Sorry. --GoRight (talk) 00:08, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the advice (and the defense!). Unfortunately I'm sure I'll ignore a lot of it since I'm far too honest for wikipedia and all the behind-the-scenes machinations. We all know what is going on, but anyone who says it out loud will likely get banned. I suppose I like to test the waters every now and then and see if the honesty levels have improved. TheGoodLocust (talk) 02:16, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Can i get some advice please

I have come to the conclusion that the usual suspects will not engage in debate on this article. ]

i have also noticed an increase in reverts since it`s protection was removed which leads me to suspect another lock out on the "right version" will soon happen. How do i create a new section in the article for new text? (as seen in article talk) Whom should i speak to about this refusal to debate and then reverting of edits for no just cause? I have also asked user the good locust for his advice. Thanks. --mark nutley (talk) 14:13, 26 December 2009 (UTC)

The only way to break the stonewalling, and you can't always prevail obviously, is to get other neutral editors involved. The only acceptable way to do that is to follow WP:DR. The exact option you choose will depend on the circumstances. For example, mediation is only an option if both sides agree to participate. Stonewalling, therefore, is likely to continue. In most cases the best option is an WP:RFC posted at the appropriate noticeboard. It is usually bad form to WP:CANVASS unless you do so in a neutral way, such as using noticeboards or neutral notices left at related pages.

You can also inform people who have explicitly asked to be informed of such things previously and/or who indicate on their user page that they like to receive friendly notices (see my user page at the top right). I have not looked at the details of your issue but I suspect that an WP:RFC is a likely next step. --GoRight (talk) 22:26, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Scjessey disruption

There's no support for this edit anywhere, and your edit summary fails to assume good faith. Please stop your agenda-driven editing. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:09, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Ha. Your attitude is amusing to say the least. (a) My edit enjoys more support in terms of the number of editors involved in arriving at the content in question than does your revert, and (b) you were the one that started with the labeling people as "tendentious". Don't throw stones and you might find less coming back at you. --GoRight (talk) 06:18, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

That's complete bullshit. The disruption is from you, and there has been no consensus for using the word "scandal" in the article - a loaded, POV term. -- Scjessey (talk) 06:20, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

See regarding whether this is POV or not. It is widely referred to as a scandal. --GoRight (talk) 06:25, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

IPCC Article

Hi i see you made a comment in this talk ] As the consensus was for inclusion user the goodlocust reverted the artilce to include the disputed text. However User:William M. Connolley reverted ignoring the consensus and reverted to his prefered version with the note #rv: nope: talk page consensus is to leave it out. Please don't misrepresent reality" I reverted and explained "William look again, 6 say in 3 say out. If you have an issue please take it to talk and not revert like the project rules state" Once again he ignore the rules and the consensus and reverts this time with "rv: please see comments in talk. This version is fatally flawed." What am i to do? If i revert again i will be accused of an edit war and get banned again :( Any advice would be great thanks. mark nutley (talk) 18:09, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

I have a few pieces of advice for you:

1. Patience. Lots and lots of patience. The RfC will run for like 30 days. Let it run its course to see if you get any other neutral voices (WMC and KDP will not consider me neutral) to swing things your way. If the neutral voices go against you then consider whether it is worth pressing on, or not. Pick your !Battles and accept that sometimes you will lose.
2. WMC and KDP will WP:TAGTEAM any one of you to keep the material they don't like out. If needed some of their friends will likely just "happen by" to help out. Since the list of people supporting inclusion have already weighed in on this topic AND because they are now being discussed regarding that support, contact them in a neutral way and ask them to confirm or refute their support in this matter. They may then choose to help. Be aware of WP:CANVASS before taking any such steps.
3. Since it is just WMC and KDP right now they are likely simply waiting and hoping that you (collectively) will simply grow tired and go away. This is how many of their !Battles are won. They are in this for the long haul.
4. I discourage edit warring as a means of trying to get something into an article, and I definitely encourage individuals to stay well within the rules on this point. However, I note that if those who are listed as supporting inclusion where to collectively assert their position that WMC and KDP would have a hard time maintaining theirs without more support for their side of the issue. --GoRight (talk) 18:49, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

--GoRight (talk) 18:49, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Thanks, i have left a short note with the others involved in the talk including kim, i`m assuming he will let the others know :) mark nutley (talk) 19:30, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

If I may chime in here .... also listen closely to the suspected taggers (it is important to stay content and sourced focused) However, when folks attempt to define what bounds qualify as a reliable source for an article, herein may lay the ownership concerns. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 19:36, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

zulupap5, the sources are reliable but i am confused by the use of the word ownership what does that refer to? mark nutley (talk) 19:51, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Ownership is a property issue. Owners define the boundaries and rights to the property. At the heart of the wiki ownership matter is WP:5P where it says .... "Misplaced Pages is free content that anyone can edit and distribute. Respect copyright laws. Since all your contributions are freely licensed to the public, no editor owns any article; all of your contributions can and will be mercilessly edited and redistributed." .... So any editor who defends the POV boundaries as if they may have copyrights, can be considered as behaving like an owner, when in fact they have no copyrights to the POV because it is ever openly changing to adjust the NPOV as new sources are included. If an editor enforces like copywriter ownership, then a serious COI issues may be in the works. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:10, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

To bring it home, an editor(s) who unreasonably and repeatedly claim "no consensus" may be effectively saying, I don't give you permission (consent) like they own the content copyright. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:21, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Ian Plimer

I've posted at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Ian_Plimer because I think the unresolved BLP problems and edit warring at this article merit administrator involvement. --TS 19:28, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

Survivors

This is an incredibly poor idea. Please tell me that you're just messing around and plan to ask that it be deleted. If you want a technical, policy-based reason, it seems clear that this category does not "aid in facilitating coordination and collaboration between users for the improvement and development of the encyclopedia.". But surely you see why this is an incredibly bad idea without reference to specific policies, right? MastCell  21:33, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

I actually have a reason for doing this that is related to "aid in facilitating coordination and collaboration between users for the improvement and development of the encyclopedia." The Scibaby sockpuppet investigations are being used as a rubber stamp to run check user against anyone expressing a skeptical POV with respect to AGW. This is plainly true as many of the accounts being checkusered only have a single edit to their credit. I have raised this issue with the Arbcom audit subcommittee and expect to hear back from them in January on whether checkuser is being abused in this case, or not.

In the mean time I have created this category to simply keep track of how many accounts have been falsely accused so that we can better assess the actual impact on unrelated accounts ... at least for the period for which we actually have a trackable SPI history. Raul wasn't very good about keeping a paper trail for these as you may know ... hmmm. That is, unless of course, there is a paper trail the predates the SPI page that I am aware of. Do you know of any way to verify what happened prior to the SPI history?

I am aware that this is likely to be viewed as controversial, but invasion of people's privacy is also an important consideration, IMHO. Having been the target of some of this nonsense I can attest to the fact that the impact isn't minor.

Why specifically do you consider keeping track of the survivors to be an incredibly poor idea? I mean there is a category to keep track of the puppets, why not the survivors? If there is something I have missed I am certainly open to deleting the whole thing. Enlighten me please. --GoRight (talk) 21:56, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

User categories are not intended to help craft complaints about checkuser usage. The Audit Subcommittee is the proper venue to do that, and it sounds like you've already availed yourself of it. If you need to collect data, then there are any number of ways to do that without creating a user category. The way you've approached it (labeling them "survivors", for example) guarantees that the category is not likely to foster constructive collaboration.

Furthermore, the category is useless as a data-collection tool. Since you have no way of knowing how many checkusers were actually run looking for Scibaby sockpuppets, you have no idea what fraction of checkuser investigations are represented in the category, nor how complete your dataset is. The people with access to that data are other checkusers, because they can see a log of every access to the checkuser database. Queries should be logged with a clear rationale, so someone with access to the log should be easily able to see how many checkuser queries were conducted looking specifically for Scibaby sockpuppets. The category does not provide those data, which are the numbers of interest, so it's useless for that stated purpose on top of its divisiveness.

I'd like to ask that you drop the "invasion of privacy" line, at least in discussion with me. It may be effective in some venues, with some people, but to me it only suggests that you're grandstanding. I know you're technically savvy, so you know as well as I that even people who are checkusered here have vastly more privacy than visitors or contributors nearly anywhere else on the Web. IP and user-agent data is logged by every web server - anyone who knows anything about the Web knows that. It cannot reasonably be considered "private" in any meaningful sense. Misplaced Pages chooses to provide additional safeguards in the form of the privacy policy. One could debate whether Misplaced Pages's privacy policy has been breached here - that is one role of the Audit Subcommittee - but to cast this as a general "invasion of privacy" is ludicrous hyperbole. I have no idea what Scibaby's IPs or user agents are, nor do I know any supposedly "private" information about them, nor does anyone else outside a small group of checkusers who are bound to keep that knowledge private - and even if they weren't, those details are exposed every time you view any website anywhere in the world, so it's hardly appropriate to go on about the FBI and unreasonable search and seizure.

Anyhow, I digress. If you want to keep a list of people who were publicly identified with negative checkuser results, then keep them on your computer, or even on a user subpage I suppose, but don't misuse user categories. I'll probably move this over to WP:CfD at some point for wider input if you really think I'm off-base here, because this seems obvious as 2+2 to me. MastCell  23:24, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

My list is driven off of the current history of the SPI archive for Scibaby. So while I cannot use my category to determine the hit rate for all time, I can certainly use it to compute the hit rate over the period of time for when the publicly viewable SPI archive covers. All of that information is available to everyone. In retrospect, however, I will accept that this is more controversial than I had anticipated and agree to have it removed in preference to some other mechanism for tracking such things. This will also have the benefit of being less intrusive on the user's involved because I won't have to add the category to their pages.

I'll put up a speedy delete here in a bit once I have captured the information elsewhere. --GoRight (talk) 00:23, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

The thing is that only a fraction of checkuser queries are performed in response to public SPI filings. Some are performed on the basis of an email request that a checkuser deems reasonable, and some are performed on the checkuser's own initiative. At best, you're catching the first set while missing the latter two, which could only be seen by someone with access to the checkuser logs.

Like I said, I don't have a problem with you collating this information, only with the use of user categories to do so. Thanks for taking my concern into consideration, and I apologize for the testiness of my posts. MastCell  00:32, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

OK, I put up the speedy delete template as the sole author of the category. Feel free to remove it. Should I go remove all the category tags or does that happen automagically when a category is deleted? --GoRight (talk) 00:57, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

It occurs to me that a list page would be perfectly fine for the purpose. Categories are fiddly and you can't tell when a page has been added to or removed from your category unless you're watching the page added or removed. --TS 23:30, 28 December 2009 (UTC)

GoRight's standing up for privacy invasions is a noble cause. Keeping a list of survivors is a valid method. Where exactly to keep and present that list, is beyond me at this point. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 04:11, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Personal attacks

As you are well aware, our policy forbids personal attacks such as this one of yours. Your attacks are especially egregious given that your claim that it's not a blog post is contradicted by all available evidence. Guettarda (talk) 05:14, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Follow the wikilinks I have been providing like

THIS ONE ---> Pajamas Media <--- (Hint: Click on it.)

And where have I made a personal attack? I see no personal attack in that statement. KDP is telling a known falsehood (aka a bald face lie). --GoRight (talk) 05:20, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Calling a statement a "lie" imputes motive. One can always make a mistake. For example, you are almost certainly wrong in your claim that Plimer's article was not a blog post. But I am willing to assume that you are simply speaking from ignorance, and that you are not deliberately fabricating falsehoods. To do otherwise, to call something a lie, is a violation of our policy on personal attacks. Of course it's all the worse because the thing you are calling a "bald faced lie" is, on the face of it, accurate, while your assertion is, per all evidence that I have seen, untrue. Guettarda (talk) 05:25, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

As for the link to the Misplaced Pages article - Misplaced Pages articles are not reliable sources. And they clearly are not worth much when you use them to contradict the Pajamas Media website. Guettarda (talk) 05:27, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but PM is a well-funded media operation not just some guy's blog. RealClimate is an actual blog. PM is not given the capital, expenditures, numbers of people involved, etc. I suppose there is some very slim chance that we are arguing over the semantics of the term "blog" but KDP is well aware of who PM is, and in knowing and continuing to spread known falsehoods his motive seems quite clear. --GoRight (talk) 05:32, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

It's still a blog, and your claims to the contrary are simply untrue. HuffPo is also a blog. It has nothing to do with how much money is behind it, it has to do with editorial standards and editorial control. It counts as a blog for the purposes of SPS. This isn't a semantic argument, this is a policy argument. Kim is absolutely correct. Your distinction is nothing but semantics, yelling, and personal attacks. Guettarda (talk) 05:38, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) See :

"The PJM Portal now provides exclusive news and opinion 24/7 with correspondents in over forty countries. Its distinguished line-up of XpressBloggers is widely respected for their punditry. Pajamas Media also has its own weekly show on Sirius satellite radio – PJM Political."

Exclusive news and opinion. Do they have bloggers as part of their infrastructure? Sure, those are their political pundits. Every media outlet has them to write their guest editorials. This is no different than if Plimer had written an article for the NYT or the Wall Street Journal. Do you deny that Plimer wrote the piece? --GoRight (talk) 05:41, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Seriously, do not engage in personal attacks. Guettarda (talk) 07:14, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Seriously, it's not a personal attack. Let's review the offending (from your perspective) statement:

"and it is to all extents self-published" - This is a bald faced lie as you are well aware. What is the connection between Plimer and Pajamas Media that makes this a self-published editorial? Where's your evidence that Plimer has any control whatsoever over what Pajamas Media publishes?

Is Pajamas Media published by Ian Plimer? --GoRight (talk) 07:20, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

A lie is an intentional falsehood. Which is a comment on the person, not the content. So it's a personal attack, it's a comment on the character of the person involved.

As for the other part - you aren't a new user. You're well aware of what we consider "self published sources". The post is labelled as a blog, and there's no evidence that the site exerts editorial control or fact-checking. So yes, for our purposes, it's a self-published source. Guettarda (talk) 07:35, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

See , specifically definition 1(b). --GoRight (talk) 07:43, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Or, perhaps, see 1(a). Or are you claiming that 1(a) doesn't come before 1(b), or that is doesn't exist? Guettarda (talk) 07:47, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

In future, you should try to find sources that don't totally undermine your argument. But thanks for making my point. Guettarda (talk) 07:48, 29 December 2009 (UTC) Also note that, all else aside, your qualifier "bald faced" pretty much eliminated 1(b) in favour of 1 (a). Guettarda (talk) 07:49, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Silly, Guettarda, I am saying that as the speaker I intended definition 1(b). Are you saying that I didn't?

"Also note that, all else aside, your qualifier "bald faced" pretty much eliminated 1(b) in favour of 1 (a)." - I fail to see how "bald faced" is mutually exclusive with 1(b). --GoRight (talk) 07:55, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Your use of the qualifier rules out 1(b) in terms of meaning. As goes intent, sure, your intended meaning might not have been what you typed. But having been informed that your edit was a personal attack, you re-inserted it. You also reiterated the "bald faced" aspect here. First time might have been a mistake. Second, third, fourth time...no. Guettarda (talk) 08:05, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

"Your use of the qualifier rules out 1(b) in terms of meaning." - I fail to see how. I refer you to which in turn refers you to and specifically definition 2(a). --GoRight (talk) 08:13, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

So, just as a reminder:

1. Making negative comments about the character of other editors is unacceptable per NPA (and, of course, it's a failure to assume good faith, which you are also required to do). Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Obviously, but I didn't do such a thing as discussed above. --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Not true. You most clearly did. As I said above, once might be a mistake. Repeatedly isn't. So just stop doing it. Guettarda (talk) 08:09, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   You need to brush up on the English language, my friend, see the definition I pointed you to above and stop assuming that the meanings I intend are the bad faith ones. --GoRight (talk) 08:26, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

2. Misplaced Pages articles are not reliable sources. Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Obviously, but in the context I referred you to them a WP:RS was not required. Even so, follow the supporting links if you want the WP:RSs. --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Again, that's not true. You were citing the source in response to people pointing out that Plimer's article was a blog post. The article explained that PM had changed from a blog aggregator to a news site. But, as is obvious in this case, the article is misleading, since the site still publishes blog posts - like Plimer's. And clearly identified it as such. Guettarda (talk) 08:14, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   "The article explained that PM had changed from a blog aggregator to a news site." - Ah, so you did see the point made in Pajamas Media. If you want WP:RS for that assertion follow the ones provided in that article. So, now that we have established that it is a news site and not a blog, and we combine that with and viola ... I am right and you are wrong.  :) --GoRight (talk) 08:26, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

3. Misplaced Pages articles are not reliable sources. Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Repeating yourself is redundant. --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   And yet, it would seem, you still don't get the point. So no, it's not redundant. There's still hope that if you see it a few more times you'll get the point. Guettarda (talk) 08:15, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   I fear it is you who are still failing to get the point. --GoRight (talk) 08:26, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

4. We cannot use blogs to accuse people of criminal behaviour or professional misconduct. Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   We can if they are published by reliable media and attribute the source as opinion. --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Nope. This is simply untrue. Guettarda (talk) 08:16, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Misplaced Pages policy descriptions say otherwise. --GoRight (talk) 08:17, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

5. We call blogs (and similar posts) "self published". That does not imply that the author of the blog post is the actual publisher of the website in which their blog post appears, much the same as we describe a book as "self published" even if the author does not own the vanity press which publishes the book. It's a comment on editorial oversight. Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   This is incorrect. Self-published means, well, published by the author of the piece. It has nothing to do with whether the source is a blog or not. Media published in the "blog" format is still considered reliable, at least for the opinion of the author like any other editorial on more "traditional media". See . --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Have you actually read WP:SPS? Especially the footnote? It disagrees with what you have to say. Guettarda (talk) 08:19, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

   Incredible. Let me quote the footnote for you:

   ""Blogs" in this context refers to personal and group blogs. Some newspapers host interactive columns that they call blogs, and these may be acceptable as sources so long as the writers are professionals and the blog is subject to the newspaper's full editorial control. Where a news organization publishes the opinions of a professional but claims no responsibility for the opinions, the writer of the cited piece should be attributed (e.g. "Jane Smith has suggested..."). Posts left by readers may never be used as sources."

   What part of that says blog = self-published? You're simply wrong.

   Note also that the next to last sentence of this completely agrees with MY side of this argument. Let me quote something that someone once told me: "In future, you should try to find sources that don't totally undermine your argument."

   Whether something is self-published, or not, is completely independent of whether it is a blog, or not, and whether all things called blogs are equivalent (hint: they aren't per policy).  :) --GoRight (talk) 08:51, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Bear these things in mind. Guettarda (talk) 07:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Check your facts. --GoRight (talk) 08:04, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I have done so. It would be nice if you did the same. Guettarda (talk) 08:20, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Cabal

I don't know how good your memory is but perhaps you might like to reread this official statement written by ArbCom here:

• There is no evidence of collusion or other improper collaboration among the various users Abd has alleged to be part of a cabal, nor did Abd attempt to provide any such evidence.

If you make any further statements on wikipedia about a cabal involving me or others, it might be necessary to ask that some official sanction be taken against you. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 06:35, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

You should reread my comment. I didn't claim you were part of a Cabal, the term I used was !Cabal. --GoRight (talk) 06:45, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

That would be just like a cabal but with more !? Shot info (talk) 09:07, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Heh. The construct mirrors the now common construct "!Vote" which is clearly understood to mean "not Vote". Thus "!Cabal" should be literally interpreted as "not Cabal". The etymology of the constructs comes from computerese wherein the "!" exclamation point is used as the logical negation operator in some programming languages. Strictly speaking, !Cabal is very much akin to the "TINC Cabal Approved" stamps many of these folks keep on their user pages. TINC is an acronym for "There Is No Cabal".

In the case of Mathsci, I linked to the now infamous Arbcom case wherein he was accused of being a member of a Cabal but of course the committee ruled that he was actually a member of the !Cabal. --GoRight (talk) 22:26, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Now that's an interesting interpretation of that finding. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:59, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Mathsci, there must have been some misunderstanding, GoRight is a meticulous and sensitive. For sure, you haven't self-selected to this list Special:WhatLinksHere/File:Cabal_approved.svg However WP:Cabals says even jokes can be taken too far to adversely affect a project Misplaced Pages:Cabals#Conclusion. I suggest you two make amends. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 15:49, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

There is no Cabal and if you continue to speak of it the cabal will punish you. WVBluefield (talk) 20:00, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

There is No Cabal and there is a Cabal of No.  :-) Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 20:52, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Hi Goright. A joke is a joke, but inserting an exclamation mark before a word in an accusation doesn't exempt you from the No personal attacks policy. Follow the dispute resolution policy. Note that the absence of smilies, exclamation marks, ironic italics, scare quotes, or facetiousness. You have no option. Follow the policy and stop poisoning the well. --TS 21:05, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

See the explanation for the construct above which should be clear to anyone familiar with the english wikipedia, such as for example Mathsci. --GoRight (talk) 22:26, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Your edits seemed to have had the aim of causing offense. The link for Cabal that you gave, now in the ANI archives, is to the the Abd&WMC case. I have no idea what !vote you have in mind: perhaps you can jog users' memories with a diff or two? Allowance can be made for the fact that, as a WP:SPA, you have had relatively little experience of editing mainstream WP articles (575 edits, 12% of your total edits). But only up to a certain point. Please do not engage in gratuitous personal attacks or smears in future. Thanks, Mathsci (talk) 22:39, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I have referred to no specific !vote so there are no specific diffs to provide. I have explained my usage of the term !Cabal above. Whether you like it or not, you were included as a member of group accused of being a Cabal. This is a matter of record. The Arbcom case ruled that the group was NOT a Cabal, so logically that group should now be referred to as the !Cabal. My usage is consistent with the outcome of that case. --GoRight (talk) 22:58, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Isn't this a bit like saying you didn't refer to somebody as a "troll", but a "!troll", or you didn't mean they're "assholes", when you called them "!assholes." It seems somewhat disingenuous to deny the obvious implication of your words. --TS 23:08, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I have explained my usage above. It is consistent with the outcome of the case. --GoRight (talk) 23:12, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

P.S. As for your stats on my edits, I make no secret of the fact that I am (predominantly but not exclusively) an SPA. There is no prohibition on contributing to the project as an SPA. If you look at my ratio of Article space to Talk space edits it is completely consistent with an account that seeks to influence content predominantly through discussion which is central to finding consensus. --GoRight (talk) 23:04, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Hello again. I now notice that in some discussions you refer to "Team AGW" and link this term to an essay called "Misplaced Pages:Tag team" . This seems to be a new variant of your "Cabal" accusations (whether with or without an exclamation mark). Please cut this out. --TS 06:35, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

I decline your request. Have a nice day. --GoRight (talk) 06:43, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

If you intend to stand by your accusation, would you like to clarify which individuals made the accusation you describe in this edit?

How do you identify this individual or individuals with "Team AGW"? Am I a member of the team? Like most scientifically literate people I believe the scientific evidence for anthropogenic forcing to be very strong, but I'm on fairly good terms with Tedder to the best of my knowledge and I don't take him for anybody's "meatpuppet". --TS 07:00, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Must I do all the work? , . As for the membership of Team AGW it varies but there is a core of people who are widely recognized as being associated with the GW pages. I decline to be more specific. --GoRight (talk) 07:24, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

So this chap Verbal, who says that you "tried to recruit Tedder as a meatpuppet", is a member of "Team AGW" (which you imply by a link to an essay are up to some jiggery-pokery involving the subversion of consensus by edit warring).

Now looking at Verbal's article edits in the past two months, and 500 article edits, I see just 3 edits at Fred Singer, 2 edits at Scientific opinion on climate change, 5 edits at Climatic Research Unit e-mail hacking incident. The other 490 edit seem to be on unrelated topics. And he's a member of "Team AGW"? This seems like a very loose criterion for membership of such a group. --TS 07:41, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Meh. Like I said, membership varies. There are also greater and lesser players. In this case I guess Verbal was pulled off of the bench for some reason (we can't all be first stringers). Read the full discussion, . He was clearly acting in close concert with WMC to implement a scorched earth crusade against Tedder over the flap at SOoCC. That puts him pretty solidly on the team for the purposes of this discussion. Well, that and his WP:TAGTEAM behavior regarding the POV template that started the whole mess. --GoRight (talk) 08:01, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

"Pulled off the bench?" You're joking, of course. I don't imagine you really believe there is coordination of the type that phrase seems to imply at first sight.

I'm not sure what you mean by "scorched earth" here. Obviously both were upset at Tedder's combined use of edit warring and protection. And to be fair the issue was addressed and Tedder conceded that his actions were less than ideal. Could you explain why you use the term "team" here? If two editors agree that an administrator is in error, are they not permitted to present their similar opinions in an appropriate place? Not that I agree with the use of WP:ANI by non-admins, because I think it should be kept for admins only, but that's another matter.

As for Misplaced Pages:Tag team, it's an essay. I've always regarded accusations of this sort as rather suspicious because they typically come from a person who for whatever reason finds himself reverted by numerous others. The possibility that this is a sign that he is editing in the absence of consensus seldom seems to occur to such people.

Should Verbal and William M. Connolley have been directed to Misplaced Pages from some external website or recruited by word of mouth or email, and come for the express purposes of subverting an existing consensus or thwarting the making of consensus on global warming articles, I might be more sympathetic to the accusation, but this obviously isn't the case. This is why I think you should avoid talk of Cabals and Meat puppets. You're talking about well established editors who have long and respectable editing histories. --TS 08:42, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

This is all well and good. I am sure that both editors appreciate your perspective here, I simply don't see things the way that you apparently do. WP:TAGTEAM is not considered pejorative, and neither should !Cabal be considered pejorative per my explanation above. Perhaps I should start a dictionary of such terms so that confusion on these points is reduced. I'll consider that ... --GoRight (talk) 15:52, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

The essay you point to refers to "editors coordinate their actions to circumvent the normal process of consensus." That implies betraying the spirit of Misplaced Pages. Of course it's pejorative. If you didn't know that, now you do. Stop engaging in these personal attacks. Follow the dispute resolution policy. It isn't optional, it's mandatory. --TS 18:56, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

breach of 3rr

i believe William M. Connolley has broken the 3rr rule on this article ] That and the fact he won`t go with the consensus. I have no idea on how to report someone for breaking this rule, can you do it or advise me on how to? --mark nutley (talk) 21:42, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Go to WP:AN3. But he is not even close at this point. --GoRight (talk) 22:02, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

You need to be familiar with how reverts are counted:

1. A revert is any edit that undoes anything by anyone (except yourself) on a given page.
2. WP:3RR allows, but does not guarantee, 3 reverts per page per user in a 24 hour period.
3. Consecutive edits by the same user are counted as one for the purposes of reverts.

--GoRight (talk) 22:07, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and if you realize that you have inadvertently lost count and technically violated WP:3RR you can always self-revert your change (as long as no one else beats you to it) which then becomes no harm no foul (generally speaking, again no guarantees). --GoRight (talk) 22:13, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, you sure, i`m counting from 10.52 yesterday to 21.16 today 5 reverts? am i not looking at the history right or something? --mark nutley (talk) 22:19, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

I see the following for the history of that article:

1. 21:16, 29 December 2009 William M. Connolley
2. 21:15, 29 December 2009 William M. Connolley
3. 20:55, 28 December 2009 William M. Connolley

The first two are consecutive so they count as one. So he has only 1 revert to the article in the 24 hours preceding his since his last revert. How are you getting 5? Note that the article itself and the talk page are considered different pages from a revert perspective. --GoRight (talk) 22:33, 29 December 2009 (UTC)

Two count as one? sheesh these rules are weird lol, well my bad. I`ll be more careful in future :) mark nutley (talk) 07:06, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

It is because they are right next to each other with no intervening edits by another user. This means that, in theory anyway, they could have all been accomplished in one big edit all at once instead of piecemeal if that makes sense. It's not too bad once you understand the rules. The big thing is the sliding 24 hour window within which 3RR applies. --GoRight (talk) 07:18, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

arbitration notification

You are involved in a recently-filed request for arbitration. Please review the request at Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration#Climate Change and, if you wish to do so, enter your statement and any other material you wish to submit to the Arbitration Committee. Additionally, the following resources may be of use—

• Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration#Requesting Arbitration;
• Misplaced Pages:Arbitration guide.

Thanks, Please comment at the arbitration case or on my talk page- I'm notifying a large batch of editors. tedder (talk) 02:34, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Caution regarding your topic ban

I am notifying you that I believe your edits to Lawrence Solomon and Talk:Lawrence Solomon are in violation of your topic ban on editing "William Connolley-related pages". While I do not feel that the entire article is off-limits to you, the section regarding his Misplaced Pages commentary probably is, and content related to his extensive blogging about William Connolley certainly is.

I have posted () a similar notification at the Solomon talk page.

I do not feel that any enforcement action is required at this time and I am willing to assume that your violation of your topic ban was inadvertent, however I strongly encourage you not to continue to edit on this topic. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 03:26, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm. While your concern is duly noted and your honorable intent here is duly acknowledged, you have none the less outright stated that I have violated my ban so, before we let this matter drop and I agree to simply move along, let us examine the details of your claim so that the truth can be made perfectly clear here. I would like to tie up a few loose ends which have been created by your statements above, so please bear with me and we can clear this matter up promptly, I should think. Let me address these points one at a time.

Point 1: My edits at Lawrence Solomon.

I assume you are referring to , correct? I do not believe that this particular edit can in any way be related to my topic ban as it is wholly unrelated to William M. Connolley. That edit merely updates an external link to an index of Solomon's Denier's series of articles.

Would you agree that this is unrelated to William M. Connolley and therefore not a violation of my ban? If not, please explain. --GoRight (talk) 03:59, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

I did indeed misspeak. It is only your edits to the talk page (regarding Solomon's blogging about Connolley) which violate the terms of your topic ban. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:08, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

OK, thank you for clearing that up. --GoRight (talk) 04:23, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Point 2: My edits at Talk:Lawrence Solomon

I assume you are referring to this discussion , correct? A couple of simple clarifications if you please:

(a) Did my edits there make any direct mention of William M. Connolley?

(b) Is it fair to say that my comments there were narrowly focused on a discussion of the policy issues being raised by Stephan and Tony and did not make mention of or rely upon the specific content in question? In other words, our discussion there could be characterized as a meta-discussion about policy and not about the specifics of the content, correct? If not, please explain.

--GoRight (talk) 04:23, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Your arguments about policy, however you wish to frame them, were specifically aimed at the inclusion of content related to Connolley. No, that's not acceptable. If you wish to seek broader consultation at AN/I or another venue, you may — but I don't see any ambiguity in the terms of your topic ban. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 04:34, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

As I said, your well intentioned caution is well received. My only concern here is your direct assertion that I have actually violated my ban, which I dispute. So, again, please just give me a direct and honest response to the two questions above. Depending on your responses I then have one additional point which summarizes the situation and may frame things in a way that we can both live with. --GoRight (talk) 04:42, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

"were specifically aimed at the inclusion of content related to Connolley." - I dispute this claim. The section in which the article is currently referenced deals specifically with Solomon's criticism of Misplaced Pages, not William M. Connolley. Do you agree or disagree? --GoRight (talk) 04:48, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Your objection is noted, but your interpretation is incorrect. 'Solomon's criticism of Misplaced Pages' and 'William Connolley' are not mutually exclusive topic categories. Solomon's blog entry, which you argue should be added to the article's External links section, is focused on Connolley. Again, if you wish to review the terms of your topic ban in a broader forum then you may do so. I don't believe that further argument here is likely to be productive. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:22, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

"'Solomon's criticism of Misplaced Pages' and 'William Connolley' are not mutually exclusive topic categories." - True enough, but I was only arguing from the criticism of Misplaced Pages perspective since that is the only thing mentioned in the article.

"Solomon's blog entry, which you argue should be added to the article's External links section, is focused on Connolley." - Actually, this is incorrect and if my phrasing suggested this I apologize. I was NOT arguing for the inclusion of anything. I was merely pointing out that the policy based arguments being used to exclude material that had been introduced by someone other than myself were flawed. I am not barred from arguing policy positions, especially not on pages that are NOT William M. Connolley-related as you, yourself, acknowledge.

Look, the bottom line here is that your well intentioned point that I was on dangerously thin ice in this instance was well received and I will move along which was your main objective here. But I dispute your accusation that I had actually violated my ban. --GoRight (talk) 20:45, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

My 2cents here: Imho, you can edit the Solomon article, and comment on it - but whenever one of the WMC related Solomon articles come up (in discussion or edit): recuse from that section. Just as an article by Solomon shouldn't be able to "veto" out editors by writing about them, the reverse shouldn't be the case :) --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:36, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Since topic bans are now being extended to talk pages of sorta-kinda-related topics, why don't we just take this to its logical extreme and implement a full thought ban. GoRight, you are hereby restricted from thinking about WMC in any way, shape or form. Any violation of this ban will result in a block or ban from editing. ATren (talk) 20:57, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

No PA intended, with karma, such a "thought ban" could result in WMC being reborn as GR's parental being or maybe the other way around. Just another frivolous thought. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:50, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Advice

Please be more careful with both your edits and your edit summaries. You have already added a motion to the current RfAr which a clerk has later declared to be unactionable. Mathsci (talk) 18:39, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

To what specifically are you referring? I have done nothing inappropriate. I made a motion. If the motion is not acted upon there is no harm. As for the other aspects of Abd and his mentorship I have taken no direct action to include anything from him, I have only argued the specifics of the actual Arbcom decision as written. I appreciate you taking the time to be concerned, honestly I do, but you will need to clarify your meaning a bit more. Thanks. --GoRight (talk) 18:56, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Ryan Postlethwaite has already written that your motion is unactionable, so I don't understand why you write in the conditional. You are not Abd's mentor in any official way, certainly not as far as the interpretation of Abd's editing restrictions are concerned. You may of course ask ArbCom for clarification if you think there's any doubt about it. Mathsci (talk) 19:18, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Ryan Postlethwaite can post as many proclamations as he wants, that doesn't carry any weight. He doesn't make the final decision. As for being Abd's mentor, I am as official as any mentor is required to be. --GoRight (talk) 19:43, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Falsly accused of being Scibaby?

User:Thegoodlocust/InnocentUntilProvenGuilty

I'm collected evidence of those falsly accused/banned of being scibaby. This is still in its infancy (I've only made the skeleton), but if you get a chance then please add your own story and any others that you feel need mentioning. I'll work on it slowly as well. TheGoodLocust (talk) 19:25, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

See discussion at User talk:GoRight#Survivors. I can provide the list of names but it would be better to make another pass through the available history an keep permanent links to the individual cases. --GoRight (talk) 19:49, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

One of the things I'm also doing is providing a quick summary as well as links to the evidence. These things are often quite big and drawn out - I want to condense the information so people can quickkly get a grasp on what actually happened. I think I might make start including other "sockmasters" beside scibaby - make the list about those banned from global warming articles as "socks." TheGoodLocust (talk) 20:31, 31 December 2009 (UTC)

Talk:Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change#RfC: What does WP:DUE indicate regarding errors in an IPCC report?

Would you mind taking a look at that section? I reworded the RfC to something hopefully a little more neutral in the hopes of attracting outside editors and did some reorganizing. I left your opening comment under strikethrough, as I am not sure what you would like done with it at this point - unstrike, remove, move, or whatever. - 2/0 (cont.) 00:15, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

I have chosen to leave my original comment as I think it stills applies even given the reorg, at least close enough. I created two section headings to clearly delineate uninvolved editors comments from involved editors comments. See if you agree.

Thanks for actually ASKING before editing my comment. You might consider having a word with WMC about editing other people's comments without their permission. Such behavior only encourages retaliatory responses and creates a toxic atmosphere for others. --GoRight (talk) 00:30, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

That looks like a good solution to me, thank you. If you can think of a better title describing the remaining content of the Grossly biased subsection that started off discussing the original RfC wording, that would be good as well (in compliance with WP:TPG, of course).

I ordinarily check talkpage diffs in blocks of however many posts have been made since the last time I checked (reading the edit summaries and checking the file sizes, of course). I missed WMC editing your comment, but will go look for it now. Thank you for mentioning this. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:52, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

WVBluefield

Your request for a review of the evidence and block is perfectly reasonable. After all, I do have a belly button and make mistakes!

I sent the following message to the functionaries list thread where I detailed the evidence:

"GoRight has requested a review from three CheckUser enabled editors:

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=User_talk%3AVassyana&action=historysubmit&diff=335216367&oldid=335179280

http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:WVBluefield#December_2009

If some people could review the case and provide feedback, it would be sincerely appreciated. If you need any further details or have any questions, please let me know.

Pete"

User:MastCell and User:Dougweller are also aware of an evidence summary. I left a message asking them to chime in with their opinions and impressions.

I believe that should fulfill your request for additional review. If I can be of further assistance in this regard, or if you feel another venue or method is necessary or more appropriate, please do not hesitate to let me know. Vassyana (talk) 02:02, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, thank you for your prompt action in this case. --GoRight (talk) 02:20, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

No problem at all. Again, if I can be of further assistance or you have any further feedback, please feel free to leave me a message. Vassyana (talk) 02:23, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

Request for article probation enforcement against you

A request for the enforcement of article probation has been made concerning your editing of William M. Gray. Please see Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement#Request concerning User:GoRight. -- ChrisO (talk) 04:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

This comment was well said GR. Unfortunately, the uninvolved reviewer may come with their own unknown POV. So each comment must now clearly represent 2 or 3 aspects of wp:five. Although well intended, the sanctions may diminish the fifth, by creating arbitrarily enforced rules, from folks with little appreciation for fair justice. Be kind and open to flexibility when correcting them. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 07:18, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Just to make sure you're aware, the complaint's result was:

GoRight (talk · contribs) is warned that further edits of a battleground-like nature will result in sanctions.

--TS 20:04, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Your comment at ANI

Regarding : This sort of sarcastic comment doesn't cast you in the best light. Climate change articles have a lot of trouble with tenacious editing, and these sanctions are designed to bring that to an end. Therefore, you should strive to cast yourself in the best light possible. Consider this a new beginning, and where it takes you, is up to you. Prodego 08:00, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

. Better? I didn't want to remove it since others had replied. That being said TS was just there to cause trouble over the current wrangling about the CC Probation. He had participated in a discussion with this user on the enforcements page. --GoRight (talk) 08:09, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I was there to see whether completely uninvolved, independent admins who had no prior experience of this user's editing would have the same feeling that something funny is going on with this user. His discussion style is quite unusual, and my best guess was that he was trying for parody. --TS 08:32, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) was just there to cause trouble? Please take a step back to consider your edits more carefully before pressing Save page. I currently have no comment on the minor brouhaha around the article probation. - 2/0 (cont.) 08:35, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

I reserve the right to speak plainly and freely on my own user talk page. If other editors are not able to deal with that then I invite them to not come here. --GoRight (talk) 08:40, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, I know that William had started to write up the proposed policy WP:Waste of Time but he never finshed it :) . Count Iblis (talk) 23:24, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

lol! --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:27, 2 January 2010 (UTC)

Regarding WP:GS/CC/RE#Multiple_Editors

This enforcement request has been closed. You are hereby warned that you are

"not to file any further frivolous or vexatious enforcement requests, or else "

you

"may be blocked without further warnings".

This warning will be logged at Misplaced Pages:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Log. ++Lar: t/c 17:42, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Comment

Hi, if I was you I would take all the climate change articles and some of the involved editors talkpages off your watchlist, nothing good will come of it for you. I don't understand the whole case, or want to for that matter, but there does appear to be a whole lot of baying for your blood, and as usual as I have seen unless you are very careful and cease any of the disputed behavior, they will get it, take six big steps back and leave them to it. Off2riorob (talk) 21:03, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Thank you for your comment. I do understand what you are saying and under other circumstances I would heed your advice. If they are going to create a new process they have to expect that people will make use of it. If I am blocked for following due process as they themselves have defined it then there is always an arbitration request that can be filed. Either way, the new process needs to be put through its paces by someone for the benefit of all involved. --GoRight (talk) 21:11, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Collapsebox at Talk:Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change#Possible Sources for Criticism Section

Could you describe in a bit more detail why you collapsed part of the discussion here? I (obviously) favor a fairly strict interpretation of the Talk page guidelines on heavily-edited contentious articles, but that looks like they are sticking fairly well to the topic of what direction editing the article should be taking. Thanks, - 2/0 (cont.) 22:31, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I would be happy to. Please see my description for when I opened that section:

"Let's start gathering some possible sources. Feel free to add yours here too. Please just include the sources and a brief excerpt in this section. Discussion of the proposed use of these sources can be addressed elsewhere. --GoRight (talk) 07:48, 3 January 2010 (UTC)"

Also note that I invited people to continue the discussion inside the collapse box, so it was not an attempt to shut down the discussion. I simply want that section to be exactly what it is labeled as, a list of possible sources to be used for discussions held elsewhere rather than a jumbled mess of intervening comments. I am actually trying to be helpful here. If you find this use of the collapse box to be inappropriate I have no objection to you removing it (the collapse box). Alternatively we could use a new section heading just in front of it to hold that discussion. I defer to your preferences in this respect. --GoRight (talk) 22:39, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

Alright, that makes sense; collating sources separate from the chatter about them can be helpful. I converted it into a new subsection instead - good idea. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:11, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Hello--I've never left a comment before, and I hope this isn't ~too bad of a spot. But---Question; why do you bother? Really? You seem interested in the truth and are a very logical thinker, but--has the logic of 'There Is NO WAY Reality Will Enter This WikiInsanity' entered your mind?

I've never seen such blatantly biased and unbalanced articles. You CAN'T WIN MAN!!! If anything, I think it would be better if you and a few other simply left for a long hiatus. The house of cards if falling, it will fall. There is no point to what you try to do.

If I were to become a contributor, how can I find user names? Some names I was considering are: ManBearPig/AlGore/AlGored/DrinkTheGrapeKoolAid/DrinkTheKoolAid. Heck, I guess I don't really want to contribute to this farce of an insincere WikiJoke. 66.90.155.99 (talk) 07:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)ManBearPig

Talk:Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

Hi. I have tried to stick up for you in the past. I hope you won't let me down. This comment at the above-named talk page seems to be an evasion coupled with an intimation that you consider Kim's question to be tendentious. In the light of your recent warning I think this is sailing very close to the wind. Please respond to Kim's reasonable question, which I also would like to see answered. We cannot discuss our differences with a view to eliminating them and reaching consensus if you will not make your meaning clear. --TS 04:26, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Hopefully this will clear things up ...

"I have tried to stick up for you in the past." - Thanks, I appreciate that.

"This comment at the above-named talk page seems to be an evasion ..." - No, that comment was meant to indicate that I had already answered his questions and did not want to do so again.

"with an intimation that you consider Kim's question to be tendentious" - No, I was merely pointing out that it "could be considered" tendentious (i.e. by anyone, not necessarily me), not that it was tendentious. In fact I went on to indicate that I personally didn't feel any sanctions were warranted.

"In the light of your recent warning I think this is sailing very close to the wind." - What warning would that be? The one that says I should not be filing frivolous or vexatious enforcement requests? I fail to see any connection between that warning and this comment. I am not filing an enforcement request.

"Please respond to Kim's reasonable question, which I also would like to see answered." - I have already answered the question. I have nothing more to say on the topic. Further discussion is likely to only go in circles so I decline to proceed further on that basis.

"We cannot discuss our differences with a view to eliminating them and reaching consensus if you will not make your meaning clear." - There is nothing whatsoever to clear up. WMC's conclusion based on the sources he cited was unequivocal. I agreed with his conclusion and endeavored to be so WP:BOLD as to include it unambiguously in the article. KDP has already argued/implied that I have not substantively altered the meaning of the text so I fail to see why we should go on any further about it. --GoRight (talk) 04:50, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Can you explain this?

I'm sorry but I just don't get this. Is it because you appealed one of Jehochman's decisions that you now consider him to be involved? That cannot be right. Or is it because he has now advocated that you be blocked? That cannot be right, either. Perhaps it's because of something else, but because you cite only an old revision and not a diff it's impossible to pinpoint at what stage you consider Jehochman to have become an "involved" admin. It looks to me as if he's just doing his job. --TS 05:40, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

It just means we have a prior history and I am notifying him that I consider him an involved administrator. It the notification turns out to be meaningless there is no harm done. Given the current climate (no pun intended) I am just starting to keep track of such things. I wanted a diff to record that I had notified him. That's all. --GoRight (talk) 05:45, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

In one of my past lives I was an arbitration clerk, and from that experience I can only strongly urge you to reconsider using arguments like this. See WP:UNINVOLVED for a description of what "involved" actually means. To quote part of the policy:

One important caveat is that an administrator who has interacted with a user or article in an administrative role (i.e., in order to address a dispute, problematic conduct, administrative assistance, outside advice or opinion, enforce a policy, and the like) or whose actions on an article are minor, obvious, and do not speak to bias, is usually not prevented from acting on the article, user, or dispute. This is because one of the roles of administrators is precisely to deal with such matters and if necessary, continue dealing with them.

Not that I expect that Jehochman will ever need to use his tools against you--I hope it doesn't become necessary. It's just that this kind of argument is a bit of a ted light. It will tend to predispose admins to regard your behavior as disingenuous. Because that speaks to motive, they are less likely to give you the benefit of the doubt. Really, you're better off keeping on good terms with uninvolved administrators, even when you disagree strongly with their decisions. --TS 06:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for the link to the policy. I was looking for that. You are probably right about Jehochman given that he was acting in a normal admin capacity. Although I can probably dig up other interactions with him, but nothing too significant. I think that Lar is a bit different in that we were, theoretically at least, in a dispute not over his action against me but rather someone else. I had called for him to be desysoped. It could be argued that this would give him motive to be biased against me, but even that is admittedly a crap shoot. I suspect that you are correct and that this was ill-advised. Live and learn. --GoRight (talk) 08:55, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I hereby call for every admin I've ever had an argumnt with to be desysopped. There I just made myself immune from sysop action from dozens of admins because they each have a motive to want me blocked. No, it doesn't work that way. --TS 09:02, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, that's a little different than filing an actual request for enforcement, but point taken. So what in your opinion constitutes "involved" with respect to a user? --GoRight (talk) 09:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

There's no definitive list, so check the link I gave you for guidance. As a rough guide, "involved" usually means "in a content dispute with user." If a sysop who had edited climate change articles recently blocked you, that might be enough to raise concern. --TS 09:28, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I paid so little attention to your call for my desysopping that until you mentioned it, I had completely forgotten about it. It wasn't really something I'd taken at all seriously, I'm afraid. So, GoRight, it'd be a fairly strong assumption of bad faith on your part to assume that I'd be biased against you just because you made some foolish statement in the heat of the moment. But just as a note, see User:Lar/Accountability. THAT'S how to get me to take a call for my head seriously. ++Lar: t/c 14:38, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Climate change probation enforcement commentary.

I am content to sit on the sidelines for a bit longer but I did want to make some comments here for the benefit of anyone that may be watching. I see some cases are being sent through the requests for enforcement page. Here are some observations:

Psb777

Regarding this timeline:

• 16:01, 4 January 2010 - This case was filed by Viriditas
• 16:05, 4 January 2010 - The user was notified
• 16:21, 4 January 2010 - Ryan passes judgment (at least the first one)
• 16:55, 4 January 2010 - The accused enters their initial statement

is it just me or is there an obvious problem here?

I can certainly understand Ryan feeling as though he is all empowered by a (contested) community consensus and a all, but shouldn't there be some basic common sense controls in place here? Things like the judgment is not passed before the accused has had a reasonable opportunity to speak on their own behalf? I'm actually quite shocked that this has to be pointed out and it is clearly indicative of the problem on these pages, not the solution, IMHO. --GoRight (talk) 00:26, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

William M. Connolley

If I were Mark, who is a new and inexperienced user BTW, I would ask for more time to better prepare his case, or alternatively as that the case be closed with the understanding that it would be reopened after you were better prepared. There are many troubling aspects to this user which could be raised here with a little effort, but since this is a well respected editor in some circles and there will be a general resistance to taking action against him for that reason the case would have to be much more substantial IMHO to be effective. I think that this is echoing some of the other comments I saw in this case. Seek the advice of more experienced editors in such matters before proceeding.

A nit pick:

• KDP states: "digressed into GoRight making an edit that he claimed WMC supported, which he didn't"

  Firstly, this was not a digression it was a wholly unrelated edit on my part. Secondly, he is misrepresenting (whether accidentally or by intent I do not know nor do I take a position) my actual statement and position. I never claimed that WMC supported my edit. I said that WMC made an argument on the talk page that I agreed with and so I was WP:BOLD and made the corresponding change to the article. Those are not the same things. --GoRight (talk) 00:41, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

  • Are you not supposed to be banned from commenting on WMC GoRight? Spartaz 06:33, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    Let me take a moment to clarify things for you at this juncture: I am NOT, repeat NOT, banned from commenting on WMC (the wikipedia editor). Please be certain to have your facts straight on this point in the future. Willfully misrepresenting these facts moving forward will be considered harassment. --GoRight (talk) 14:15, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    Perhaps now would be a good time to revisit that sanction and see how it has worked in practice. --TS 14:25, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    I am unclear on your meaning and intent here, please clarify. --GoRight (talk) 14:41, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    Seems plain enough to me: evaluate the sanction and see how well it has worked. You've previously argued for assessing the efficacy and neutrality of sanctions. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 14:46, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    I have honored the conditions of my editing restrictions, so what would be the point? In fact I have gone out of my way to honor them by specifically requesting advice on whether RealClimate falls under those sanctions and , based on the community advice given there, I have continued to avoid that article. Are you suggesting that if such a review reveals that I have honored the conditions thereof that the community might choose to lift them? I have nothing to hide in such a review. --GoRight (talk) 14:51, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

    I'm thinking in particular of your recent odd behavior, such as your "Cabal" accusation, which you were evasive about when tackled on your talk page (apparently the use of an exclamation mark was supposed to turn the word that followed it into a kind of fnord and stop us noticing its evident and plain meaning). You referred on that occasion to Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley in which you falsely claimed that Connolley and others had been found to be members of such a cabal (with an exclamation mark in front of course). In fact the Committee found that "There is no evidence of collusion or other improper collaboration among the various users Abd has alleged to be part of a cabal, nor did Abd attempt to provide any such evidence." That would be a "no." Then there was your decision to make an edit, claiming that Connolley himself had argued for the edit, and evading all requests by other editors asking you to explain this. So you do seem to have fixated on this Misplaced Pages editor, and I've provided two instances of very tendentious behavior focussed on William M. Connolley, the Misplaced Pages editor. Perhaps the editing restriction should be expanded a little. --TS 15:12, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

  That sounds like a capital idea. Alternatively, GoRight could simply stick to discussing the edits rather then the editor. And GoRight, I asked you a question and did not make a statement. I thank you for the clarification but its unfortunate that you chose to be snippy and unpleasant in your response. I can't say I expected better but it's still a shame. Spartaz 15:22, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

  Well, if I misread your intent I apologize. Hopefully you can understand my "sensitivities" here, not that this excuses my apparent rudeness. So, you are clear on the details of my editing restriction now? As to your first point, "Alternatively, GoRight could simply stick to discussing the edits rather then the editor", where have I been inappropriately commenting even on WMC the editor? The above commentary was related to a request for enforcement under the new sanctions. Such requests are about the user's behavior and so commentary on the user in that context is not inappropriate, is it? --GoRight (talk) 15:52, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) @TS: Please keep your facts straight if you want to go down this road:

"You referred on that occasion to Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Abd-William M. Connolley in which you falsely claimed that Connolley and others had been found to be members of such a cabal (with an exclamation mark in front of course)." - Please provide diffs to support this. (a) In any use of my term !Cabal, which has been duly explained above BTW, I never once mentioned WMC, and (b) In the case itself I never took a position either way.

"Then there was your decision to make an edit, claiming that Connolley himself had argued for the edit ..." - As I explained above regarding KDP's comment, I never made this claim. Please provide a diff to where I claimed that WMC supported the edit.

"and evading all requests by other editors asking you to explain this." - This is incorrect. When asked why I had made the edit I provided an explanation, citing a argument that WMC had made on the talk page. Citing his argument is not the same thing as claiming he supported my edit. You are misrepresenting my claims, as explained above. I am not required to run around and around a particular topic just because some editors fail to understand the point the first time around. --GoRight (talk) 15:33, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

You know as well as I do that Abd's false Cabal allegations (as seen in his section of the evidence page) centered around William M. Connolley. If mathsci was a member of this cabal (with or without an exclamation mark), then Connolley was at the very least a senior member. And to cap it all, you cited the Abd-Connolley arbitration case and blatantly misrepresented the findings.

On your claim that Connolley had argued in favor of your edit, these are your words: "My references are WMC's references and my argument is WMC's argument. If you feel that either are found wanting, please take the matter up with him." Now it was obvious to everybody that you were being disingenuous, but you cannot now switch streams without confirming that you were being disingenuous. --TS 15:58, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

"You know as well as I do that Abd's false Cabal allegations (as seen in his section of the evidence page) centered around William M. Connolley." - Note that they were Abd's claims, not mine. I did not take a stand either way on their validity. Note also that I don't believe that the claims in that case singled out any particular person from the whole group. So to say that they centered around WMC seems incorrect. Perhaps you could point to such a claim (ideally made by myself, if possible) that the purported Cabal "centered around WMC"?

"And to cap it all, you cited the Abd-Connolley arbitration case and blatantly misrepresented the findings." - I have not blatantly misrepresented anything. The ruling was that this group of people were "not a Cabal", in the negative sense of the term (as opposed to how it had actually been defined in that case). As I clearly explain above the term !Cabal is equivalent to "not a Cabal" so I fail to see how that is a "blatant misrepresentation of the findings".

"Now it was obvious to everybody that you were being disingenuous, but you cannot now switch streams without confirming that you were being disingenuous." - Ah, I see now. Let me point out that misunderstanding on your part does not constitute disingenuous behavior on mine. So, for the sake of clearing things up on a now totally moot point, I shall explain things one more time.

"my argument is WMC's argument" - This refers to "I would read that as clear evidence that while P-R lit is preferred, non-P-R lit, provided it is internationally available, is permitted.", . Do you deny that this is WMC's own argument?

"My references are WMC's references" - Given that my argument is WMC's argument above, I am implicitly appealing to the same sources that WMC appealed to when he made that argument. To wit, the following passage:

"This article says The IPCC reports are a compendium of peer reviewed and published science and links to which is broken (argh, I hate this stupid orgs that can't even maintain a website). However, it now seems to be at . This includes Contributions should be supported as far as possible with references from the peer-reviewed and internationally available literature, and with copies of any unpublished material cited. Clear indications of how to access the latter should be included in the contributions."

I note that WMC failed to actually provide a link to his source, but I have no reason to doubt that he knows what he is talking about in this instance. So, if you find fault with his sources (i.e. you find them wanting) then I would again direct you to WMC.

Now, the gist of his argument is that the IPCC reports are actually a compendium of both peer-reviewed and non-peer-reviewed internationally available sources. My edit merely made this point explicit in the article. So, as I said, my argument is WMC's argument and my sources are WMC's sources and my explanation was in no way disingenuous. --GoRight (talk) 16:47, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

JettaMann

The current proposed restrictions in this case are impractical and biased in some respects. Specifically, they include "interaction banned from User:William M. Connolley" while still allowing the editor to edit on global warming pages. We all know that such interactions will be inevitable. For example, is "regarding the comment by WMC above ..." a violation of that restriction. This is the same issue that come up during my own extensively reviewed and commented on edit restrictions where the community made an explicit distinction between WMC the off-wiki person and WMC the on-wiki editor.

This restriction is also biased in that it leaves open to WMC all manner of disruptive poking and prodding while restricting the editor in question from even responding. If you wish to include a non-interaction provision then you have to apply it to both sides to prevent the possibility of one-sided sniping. --GoRight (talk) 16:05, 5 January 2010 (UTC)

Blocked

You are blocked. Basically for being a complete waste of time, but your block log gives more specifics. Come back when you have something constructive to add. Viridae 06:18, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Please read Viridae's response to me on his talk page before doing anything hasty. --TS 06:43, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I'll say what I said there, here for ease of reading. This isn't supposed to be an infinite/permanent block, just indefinite because the length depends on GoRight shaping up and treating this place like a collaborative project. When he indicates he would like to edit again in a collaborative manner, I will quite happily unblock or someone else can do so for me. Until then though, he is not worth the time being wasted on him by countless volunteers with better to do. Viridae 07:10, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

I am sure you are aware, but for the sake of convenience, here is a link to {{unblock}}. If an unblock is requested, I would not mind if whoever answers the request were to consult at my talk/email if Viridae is not around. - 2/0 (cont.) 07:26, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Resetting. OK, upon further reflection and off-wiki advice, message received. I hereby agree to be more constructive. --GoRight (talk) 19:48, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Your request to be unblocked has been granted for the following reason(s): per behavioural promises Request handled by: Viridae Unblocking administrator: Please check for active autoblocks on this user after accepting the unblock request.

Can you please expand on what you mean? and understanding of the behaviour that got your here is key. I am looking for promises to stop treating the place like such a battleground. Throwing around accusations of involvment at all and sundry and making a huge fuss and drama is incredibly disruptive. Some good faith, a lot less drama and a bit more understanding of those around you would make the place a more collaborative environment. Viridae 21:03, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Dude, seriously? You haven't even been able to state with -specifics- that YOU understand the behaviour that got him here. Unblock, this is embarassing. Arkon (talk) 21:06, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree to address the specific behavior you identified, however I reserve the right to make use of the available WP:DR and appeals processes that have been established here for various purposes in a reasonable manner. It should also be noted that my new found position is in line with one of your main points which was wasting the community's time, or rather a desire that I NOT waste it.

I will even go so far as to say that I acknowledge that you, Lar, and Jehochman have all had the best interests of the project in mind throughout this entire regrettable incident and that I shall bear none of you any ill will because of it. End of statement. --GoRight (talk) 21:23, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight was vexed for harmless appeals. How can one answer for disruptions without specific diff to educate all ... without starting with bad faith assumptions. It's like a spanking without clear reason. A frivolous block made worst, just so the blocker can justify themselves with further inquisitional demands. Move on both of you. Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 21:35, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Viridae, the behavior on the GW pages has been terrible for at least a year now, and I'm not talking about GoRight. GoRight might have crossed a line here, but many other editors have been crossing lines for quite some time. As an example, I've seen a bunch of cases where the same 4-5 editors tag team to enforce their own POV and create a hostile environment for whomever disagrees with them. Their behavior includes frequent egregious violations such as removing talk page comments they disagree with, then edit-warring to keep them removed. I've seen it at least half a dozen times just in the last few months. So singling out GoRight for "wikilawyering" seems a bit over the top. In any case, I hope you (as an uninvolved) will take the same strong stance when others in this debate cross lines, even if they are long term editors with high edit counts. ATren (talk) 00:52, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks you. Please remember the autoblocks. --GoRight (talk) 22:02, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

One more quick item. Can you unprotect my user page please. Thanks. --GoRight (talk) 22:12, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

All set. Happy trails. You could help with John James Powers if you are looking for something to do. Jehochman 22:17, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

Is this allowed?

] It is obviously not an attack page like chriso is saying, were do i appeal it? --mark nutley (talk) 14:44, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Unfortunately it appears the ChrisO is stalking me, something that we will have to address, and I brought him to your doorstep. You should go to and provide a pointer to the discussion of the page on your talk and not that several well respected editors and administrators were already aware of the page and seemingly had no problem with you working on it. --GoRight (talk) 14:59, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Slow down

Look, just 22:00 last night, less than 18 hours ago by my reckoning, Viridae unblocked you "per promises to improve behaviour". This followed an indefinite block for being, to paraphrase Viridae, an unproductive drain on Misplaced Pages's limited resources.

Now in the space of a few minutes you have engaged in disingenuous wrangling about the plain meaning of a common acronym, participated in an edit war on an article you know to be under probation, made not just one but two false accusations of stalking, and then edit warred to remove a speedy deletion tag.

This is not acceptable behavior from anyone, let alone somebody coming off an indefinite block for their history of unproductive and combative editing.

Please as a matter of urgency act to dampen down the hostility and alarm that has been caused by your behavior over the past hour or so. If you do not, I will have to submit a request for enforcement on the Climate change probation page. --TS 15:33, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Tony, i asked goright for assistance in warred this as i did not know what to do. I request you remove that from your list above thank you mark nutley (talk) 15:42, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight has been around the block. He knows you don't remove speedy templates and he definitely knows you don't edit war. --TS 15:46, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

"engaged in disingenuous wrangling" - Please WP:AGF. Calling my comments disingenuous is not civil, that is of course unless you either have some proof or are a known accurate mind reader.

"participated in an edit war" - Actually I gave a valid rationale for my revert which does not violate the terms of the probation. If it does, please indicate how. My action was in response to the warring that is occurring against policy and Arbcom decisions.

"false accusations of stalking" - I have made no accusations of stalking. I clearly indicated that I believed that it was POSSIBLE that I am being stalked and that appropriate resolutions would only be pursued of the problem continued to manifest itself. I believe that in my statement regarding my recent indefinite block that I indicated that I reserved the right to make use of established WP:DR and appeals processes in a reasonable manner. If I am being stalked I have every right to seek to have it stopped.

"warred to remove a speedy deletion tag" - (a) it takes two side to edit war, (b) I never even approached 3RR on that user space talk page, and (c) when the more sanctioned response to a speedy tag was pointed out it was made use of. --GoRight (talk) 15:50, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight, the wolves are circling, don't give them anything they can use against you. The playing field is tilted, you have to be better than them. ATren (talk) 16:09, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Or GoRight could take my previous advice and engage in areas he is a real expert in: The Law. Count Iblis (talk) 00:43, 8 January 2010 (UTC)

I`m gonna get blocked

I just reverted chriso`s revert on the pachauri article so i reckon a block is coming my way, i had to do it, his reasons for reverting were most insulting. Might i ask you to appeal the deletion of my gore effect article as i will be unable to if blocked, thanks. --mark nutley (talk) 15:55, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Keep a cool head and go back and self-revert. --GoRight (talk) 16:00, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Mark, I agree, self-rv your last edit. There is active discussion on the talk page and that's where we should focus. I suggest, rather than editing the article itself, present your proposed edit on talk and get approval first. There is no deadline; the claim can stay out of the article for a few days while this gets hashed out. You are being baited by an editor with a long history of aggression towards those he disagrees with. Don't take the bait. ATren (talk) 16:05, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Done, however connolley did two reverts in less than 24 hours so why can`t i? i suspect they will still go for a block though. They have lost the argument on the talk page whic his why they are doing this. Chriso has it in for me now cos i used his own argument against him, this is why he got my gore effect article deleted and now insults my style of writing and my command of english :)--mark nutley (talk) 16:07, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Mark, WMC does what he wants and gets away with it. That's the way it's always been and you're not going to change that by mimicking his behavior -- that will just get you blocked because that's the way it works here. See this essay - the reason that essay exists is because double standards are rampant here, some editors are more "equal" than others, and nobody has the guts to do anything about it. If you want to make a difference, be the bigger man, be patient, be civil, follow procedures, and change will happen gradually. ATren (talk) 16:14, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Just think of yourself as the flowing river that slowly erodes the mountains of crap that is created here. --GoRight (talk) 16:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Agreed. You can't let the fact that you are being pressured on two fronts simultaneously cause you to make silly procedural mistakes. We know that we have a neutral set of material to work with. We know that we have reliable sources. We also know that there will be a small group of editors who will never agree no matter what. So the only option available is to get more voices to agree to inclusion so that the dissenting voices become a small enough minority to claim consensus. The typical means to trying to do this is an RfC. But we want to have a really cleaned up version before filing the RfC. Personally, I actually prefer the version that was on the page for some time. It was short, concise, well sourced, and balanced because it included P's response.

Let's start with that version and ask the regulars to put up argument for why it is objectionable. I suspect the usual WP:UNDUE war horse to be trotted out eventually, but let's try to focus on getting a clean setup of text first. That's my $0.02. --GoRight (talk) 16:18, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

An enforcement request has been filed

As I warned you earlier, and in view of your unsatisfactory response, I've gone to the enforcement stage. Please see here. --TS 16:16, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Stalking

I don't think the stalking accusations are appropriate. Every editor has the right to examine another editor's history, and if they see something worth acting upon, that's their right. Stalking is a much overused term; it should be restricted to cases where there is actual threatening pursuit of another editor, either on or off wiki, and I've seen no evidence of that from ChrisO here. So, please drop the stalking charges unless there is something threatening that I've missed. ATren (talk) 18:02, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I think people are generally over-reacting here. The only reason I am even mentioning this again is because you have raised the question. Let's review the substance of my edits, a total of 3, that even touch on this point:

- In the edit I merely ask him to review WP:STALK and to stop following me around. That merely suggests that I suspect that he may be stalking me. I have not accused him of such outright.

and - In both cases I clearly use the terms "possible" and "MAY" (emphasis included in the original).

Your points are well taken, ATren, which is why I have not made any outright accusations. It surely might be a coincidence as you suggest. When he shows up on prominent pages just after I do accusing me of all manner of impropriety I take it as pure coincidence. But on an out of the way page like a sub-page in Marknutley's user space? Then I become a little more suspicious. So fine, I accept it may be nothing but it may also have been something. As long as the obscure coincidences don't keep happening there is nothing more to be said. --GoRight (talk) 18:21, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

• You need to read my reply to you on the article probation enforcement page and send the black helicopters back to base. -- ChrisO (talk) 18:25, 7 January 2010 (UTC)
• You may be the most annoying twit on Misplaced Pages. Look, no accusation! And your mother smells of elderberries! --Stephan Schulz (talk) 18:26, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

• No, his mother possibly smells of elderberries. Let's get the terminology right, Stephan. ;-) -- ChrisO (talk) 18:28, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

• Well, now that you've had a similar go at my dear ol' mum, I'd say we are even on all accounts. Please make a note of it. --GoRight (talk) 18:36, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Copyright

Copyvios are major concerns. I don't believe, right now, that we have appropriate evidence that File:Gore-freezing.jpg is free to use or CC-SA-3.0. I'm trying to figure out exactly what MN did to upload that file. If he dosen't get his story clear, I'd have to ask the file be deleted. If you'd prefer that I stop trying to clarify it with him and just start blasting through his contributions, that's fine, but I'm about to reach the end of my patience with your constant attempts to turn wikipedia into a battleground by accusing people of "baiting you" and "fishing for things to use against you," and reccomending that people "leave well enough alone" when asked about the copyright info on their images. Hipocrite (talk) 19:19, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Firstly, let's see if the article even survives the MfD and a rewrite. Unless and until the article is actually being moved to article space discussions over the images seem premature to me, that's all. But yes, the copyright issues have to be resolved before the article is moved to main space. Or perhaps I misunderstand, are you wanting to delete his existing images immediately based on it being a copyvio? If the latter then sure, I guess sorting through it now is necessary. --GoRight (talk) 19:40, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Notice

Wikipedia_talk:General sanctions/Climate change probation/Requests for enforcement#GoRight.2C_again William M. Connolley (talk) 00:01, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Flickr and BLP

How would you feel about using a less-unflattering, CC-licensed image from Flickr if it was uploaded by Lord Monckton himself? Would you still have the same objection under BLP? If this was to occur, it would be a shame if we couldn't use it... Thparkth (talk) 01:51, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

If Lord Monckton himself uploads the photo under a suitable license this is clearly allowed under WP:BLPSPS since he is the subject in question. --GoRight (talk) 01:57, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

So would you argue that we should not include a user-generated photo of Pamela Anderson in her article, then? And all the other BLPs where user-generated photos are used? There are thousands, you know. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:05, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

That's just a picture of a dress shop dummy. There are some pictures of real people, such as Drew Barrymore. --TS 02:09, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Unless Pamela Anderson sent along a dress shop dummy to represent her at "the 6th Annual Hollywood Style Awards, Beverly Hills, CA on Oct. 10, 2009", as the caption says, I rather think it really is Pammy in that photo... -- ChrisO (talk) 02:13, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I guess it could be botox. --TS 02:15, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. I've emailed Monckton to ask if he would consider making a neutral picture of himself available under a free license. Thparkth (talk) 02:20, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Excellent, I was wanting to do something similar but I didn't know how to contact him. He may, or may not, be willing to do so, however. If he grants free license then all manner of vandalism can be committed to the image once it has been released. This is why celebrities tend to want to control the use of their images. --GoRight (talk) 02:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Based on the current policy, yes these are not allowed. The number does not matter as WP:BLPSPS makes no provision for an exception based on the convenience, or lack thereof, to wikipedia editors. Should any of those images be challenged as this one is, then yes they should be removed. I am not calling for a full review of such images, only this one. As KDP likes to say, every situation is different and each case must be decided on its own merits.

In any event if the discussion at ANI decides that I am wrong, I shall abide by that decision. And Tony should stop trying to close the discussion. That is the job of a neutral party. --GoRight (talk) 02:17, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

ANI is the place to ask for admin assistance. They don't adjudicate, they just use the tools if it's necessary. No admin assistance was required (as I remarked earlier in the discussion). If you're serious about not allowing photos taken by Wikipedians, I wish you the best of luck. You'll need it to push that policy home. --TS 02:21, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

The relevant policy is Misplaced Pages:Image use policy#User-created images. Misplaced Pages has always had a policy of "encouraging users to upload their own images". BLP has, in my experience, never been used before to argue against user-created content, and the authors of BLP certainly never meant it to prevent what has been standard practice on Misplaced Pages since the project was founded. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:23, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I take no position on this other than to say that if the policies are in conflict then they need to be reconciled in an appropriate venue and by neutral parties. In this instance, my good friend ChrisO is not a neutral party. --GoRight (talk) 02:26, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight, you're on your own on this one. Nobody is going to agree to a major change in Misplaced Pages's standard practices that would force the purging of thousands of completely innocuous images from thousands of articles. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:32, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

If this is true, then the neutral administrators at ANI will inform me of such. Until then you shouldn't be editing policy pages after the fact. --GoRight (talk) 02:35, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Neutral administrator here. ChrisO is correct. AniMate 02:38, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

You are certainly within your rights to close the discussion if you feel it is best to do so at this time. I would ask that you reconsider and leave it open for long enough to at least get a few others to consider the topic. --GoRight (talk) 02:46, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Give it up, it's a complete waste of time. You're effectively arguing to overturn a founding principle of Misplaced Pages - the use of free, user-generated content. You could spend a few days being told "no" by everyone in various ways or you could move on now and do something more productive. -- ChrisO (talk) 02:49, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Your last block was for "Wikilawyering, wasting the community's time, forum shopping, inability to edit collaberatively, general waste of time." You are currently under discussion at Misplaced Pages:General_sanctions/Climate_change_probation/Requests_for_enforcement and on the talk page. I urge you to let this go and find a more productive use of your time, because my observations of you today are starting to make me understand why you were indefinitely blocked. AniMate 03:06, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

True but no evidence of most of those charges was ever provided by the blocking admin when specifically asked multiple times which actions supported those allegations. I agreed to address the specific items that he had cited which I have done and not repeated.

Regardless, was my reading of WP:BLPSPS inaccurate in some way? If not, how is that wikilawyering? As I said, if the issue is closed at ANI with myself being told that I was wrong I would abide by that advice. I have done nothing to contradict that pledge. --GoRight (talk) 03:15, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

It has been closed, and there is unquestionable consensus that you were wrong. Given the history and the extensive discussion the image had already received on the article's talk page, I have no doubt that this was a case of wikilawyering as an excuse for violating wp:3rr in a content dispute. I strongly suggest that use more appropriate tactics, such as WP:3O and WP:RfC, in the future. Rvcx (talk) 03:29, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

I appreciate your perspective, but I am more interested in the opinions of neutral administrators (owing simply to the fact that their opinions and viewpoints on policy have been vetted to some level by the community). As for the WP:3RR I don't believe that I actually violated that, did I? --GoRight (talk) 03:36, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Not one, but two reversions where you explicitly claimed immunity from WP:3RR, effectively declaring the right to edit-war to the death over this. That's not a productive way to engage other editors. Rvcx (talk) 03:42, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

That's not what I asked. I asked whether I had violated WP:3RR. The propriety of my edit summaries is another matter entirely, and one that can certainly be debated. I acted according to what the policies said I should do. --GoRight (talk) 03:48, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

As another neutral admin comment: AniMate is quite right. Both about the interpretation of RS with respect to images, and about his warning against disruptive wiki-lawyering. Fut.Perf. ☼ 09:33, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

• GoRight, you don't have a leg to stand on with your assertion that we can't upload properly licensed images from Flickr to biographies. This is pure tendentious, frivolous nonsense and you'll get yourself restricted if you continue along this path. Jehochman 13:53, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

  Please don't use biased language like "pure tendentious, frivolous nonsense". I was making a good faith argument firmly grounded in WP:BLP as it was written. Since that policy appears to have been in conflict with the policy on images, and it is apparently common community practice to allow such SPS to be used, my good friend ChrisO was kind enough to update WP:BLPSPS to resolve this conflict and several independent editors appear to have confirmed his interpretation. As I have said all along, if the ANI discussion determined that I was wrong I would abide by that decision. It appears that ANI has so determined and I have done nothing to challenge that decision once it was properly closed. I feel it is inappropriate to call me to task for asking the neutral administrators at ANI to render a decision when my actions were so clearly and directly in line with an important policy such as WP:BLP as it was written at the time I raised the issue. Do you disagree that WP:BLPSPS disallowed all manner of self-published material as it was written at the time I raised the issue? --GoRight (talk) 16:12, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. Your concerns were reasonable and I was glad to see them discussed and resolved in a mostly collegial fashion. It's too bad that some editors use every dispute as an opportunity to attack those they disagree. The discussion was actually quite interesting and the issues worth considering. Cheers. ChildofMidnight (talk) 17:02, 10 January 2010 (UTC)

Oops

Before you embarass yourself too much, you might care to read the Copied here from "requests for clarification" per arb request. bit William M. Connolley (talk) 23:03, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Well done William M. Connolley (talk) 23:11, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Tillman

Ref your comment on Tillman, If you think Hipocrite has broken the terms of the article probation you are welcome to report him. CRU is not an article I even watch but looking through his today I agree there are several parties out of line but I am not going to play cluedo I am only prepared to look at complaints made. Where is a case I would certainly feel happier dealing with the worse offenders on both side. --BozMo talk 00:12, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Given that my prior warning was not overturned I am somewhat reluctant to file a case on this specific issue. This is precisely why I appealed the warning and I believe that the neutrality of the application of the sanctions may suffer because of it (note that this statement should not be construed to mean that I am accusing the admins involved of not being neutral). However there are plenty of other editors who have no such warning that could equally well make the case that H is using the enforcement page as a weapon in his WP:BATTLE over a content dispute, along with his own edit warring over the topic in question. --GoRight (talk) 01:31, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

This refers to some things I don't know about so I don't really understand it. --BozMo talk 10:20, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I think GR is referring to his restriction against wikilawyering, or however it is phrased. Hence, he is reluctant to risk filing a case against H but would like someone else to William M. Connolley (talk) 11:07, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I have no restriction against wikilawyering, don't be absurd. Where is any such restriction stated or recorded? I am referring to the warning I received here, and appealed here.

Since I have been warned not to file frivolous or vexatious requests for enforcement and that warning was not overturned I feel the need to be very careful in any such filings. As a result I am reluctant to file a request against H over something as flimsy as WP:BATTLE given that the evidence for such would be completely subjective, although obvious in this case IMHO. If the other editors involved don't feel sufficiently strongly about doing so given the advice just pointed out to them above, then why should I? Either way, the filing of such requests is now in danger of being skewed and, therefore, the neutrality of application of these sanctions is as well. At least IMHO. --GoRight (talk) 19:02, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Pcarbonn

I'm worried that you're no longer taking seriously the promises you gave recently. Your extended attempt to wikilawyer away overwhelming consensus for a permanent topic ban on Pcarbonn is, at best, ill-timed. --TS 20:35, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm worried that your motives here are not as pure as you might like others to believe. Either way reviewing the statements and evidence, or rather the complete lack thereof, is not wikilawyering in even the broadest sense of the term. Anyone is free to challenge a ban and I specifically reserved the right to make use of WP:DR and appeals processes in a reasonable manner, so why are you going on about this? --GoRight (talk) 20:39, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Above you give the appearance of imputing bad faith to me. Please reword your point to avoid this, and then we'll be able to focus on the subject at hand. --TS 20:43, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Above you give the appearance of imputing bad faith to me. Please reword your point to avoid this, and then we'll be able to focus on the subject at hand. --GoRight (talk) 20:45, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Please point out where I did that, and I'll happily comply. --TS 20:47, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

"you're no longer taking seriously the promises you gave" --GoRight (talk) 20:59, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I'll say instead that I don't think you're adhering to your promises to avoid wikilawyering.

Tznkai says it well:

Ban discussions are not served by lengthy point by point analysis of one editor's opinion, and arguing supposedly topical minutiae is in fact, off topic, as it is minutiae. Additionally, your tone in this subsection is condescending and unhelpful.

Not counting replies and follow-ups, your comment on this occupies nearly 1000 words--a mini-essay--and is divided into four distinct subsections, making coherent discussion on that thread almost impossible. You've been warned about this kind of behavior before, Please keep your promises. --TS 21:45, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

"is divided into four distinct subsections, making coherent discussion on that thread almost impossible" - You must have a different definition of "coherent" than I do. The subsections are necessary to keep the discussion of individual points on-topic which will increase the coherency of the discussion, not detract from it. Why exactly do you consider subsections a bad thing? They are merely a scoping mechanism which has the added benefit of allowing easy editing of individual points. --GoRight (talk) 22:00, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

All four of your points can be economically addressed in a single comment comprising a couple of sentences: Pcarbonn has not changed his behavior during or after the ban and is still abusing Misplaced Pages. There is consensus to make the ban permanent. All you have achieved with your essay and its subsections is to bifurcate the discusssion and clutter it up with comments by individual editors playing shoot-the-fish-in-the-barrel. --TS 22:21, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

So you assert. Your assertions are not policy nor do they a community consensus make. --GoRight (talk) 22:24, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Dwell on this a while: The objections here amount to demands for an ever-increasing quantity of shrubberies. I think you're letting your zeal for legalistic argumentation, which has been remarked upon previously once or twice, get the better of common sense here. -Mastcell.

So I'm certainly not the only one to remark on this. To reach a decision, it is not necessary for Misplaced Pages to arrive at an exposition of evidence that will satisfy your personal standards. The reference to shrubberies is from this Monty Python sketch. --TS 23:26, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I was familiar with the reference to shrubberies. --GoRight (talk) 00:00, 13 January 2010 (UTC)

Circle the wagons and shoot the messenger

Thought this might amuse. JPatterson (talk) 22:44, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Warning

You were recently blocked for "Wikilawyering, wasting the community's time, forum shopping, inability to edit collaberatively, general waste of time". Your behaviour today seems to me to fall pretty closely under the same description. That means it may very easily lead to a renewed block. I strongly recommend you drop the stick and back off now. Fut.Perf. ☼ 23:50, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

All I am after is a fair hearing based on actual evidence before a ban is declared. The present discussion made no such examination and, as a participant in that discussion, widely established community practice would say that you should not be the one to issue the ban nor to close the discussion as you have.

Regarding my previous block it is also worth noting that when asked for specifics regarding those allegations the blocking administrator only raised two points were fell far short of substantiating them. However, per my agreement with the blocking admin, I have already addressed them publicly, and I have not repeated them. This is all easily verified and can be quickly resurrected if you wish to dredge through the past. --GoRight (talk) 23:58, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Hi, I'm worried about this intervention by you in a case that does not concern you directly. You make a serious allegation about an uninvolved admin, in effect trying to turn a routine warning about conduct into a personal attack on the admin. This is very worrying in view of your recent promises. --TS 08:42, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Well your assessment of whether I am to be considered involved is rather moot, . And while I generally try to be as accommodating as possible I view your action here as being rather provocative and in my face too, so perhaps it would be best if you stayed off my talk page for a couple of weeks. I accept that your intentions are probably good but they are not being well received just now. Thanks. --GoRight (talk) 08:52, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight is a Wiki Hero

For the record I am damn impressed with GoRight. He tirelessly plays underdog, points out faulty logic, takes on user cabals with gusto and generally seems to have a great time doing it.

What our bitter complainers don't seem to understand is: He makes this entire site better! This is because if you dare post anything poorly sourced or smacks of groupthink in his area of interest, he's going to nail you to a board in public.

Yes, you're not going to like it. Yes, you may be embarrassed. But in many cases this is the only thing that will work with certain users. ...and it does work! GoRight is helping to crystalize your thoughts, challenge your ideas and get you to question your own ideas and their veracity. This is why we're here! While I don't know GoRight personally, I do have a strong feeling that he is from the school of "Truth will out" and, bless him, he has the energy to make it happen consistently.

What GoRight is doing is so important for Misplaced Pages. It really pains me to see constant efforts by bitter, chastised ones to attempt to shackle him. I hope they eventually learn to embrace and appreciate what GoRight is doing, 'cause it ain't easy.

Anyway GoRight, I want you to know that I appreciate it very much and I am sure there are a great number of others who do as well.Lexlex (talk) 10:58, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Thanks so much for the kind words. You'll never know how appreciated they truly are. --GoRight (talk) 16:37, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Yes, sticking it to the man is a worthwhile pursuit, but remember that too much of a good thing can be...too much. It is best to balance one's activities and keep things in perspective. Also, the strongest criticism is based on fact and refrains from excessive rhetoric. Jehochman 14:22, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

"remember that too much of a good thing can be...too much." - And this is a fair comment, especially of late. But these are not ordinary times as you know, and desperate times call for desperate measures or something like that. On the other hand recent events have caused me to start giving back to the community in ways I haven't up to this point so there is a silver lining amongst our current storm clouds.

"Also, the strongest criticism is based on fact and refrains from excessive rhetoric." - I fully agree and somewhat to my shame this is something I seem to have strayed from of late. I shall endeavor to do better on this front. --GoRight (talk) 16:37, 14 January 2010 (UTC)

Documenting Standard Climate Change Arguments.

I have been thinking for some time that it would be beneficial to document the commonly raised arguments to get things into and remove things from GW articles, and especially GW BLPs. There are so many examples of people arguing both sides of a policy, myself included unfortunately, depending on which side of the GW fence the article sat on. I envision a page that somehow highlights, policy by policy, how the arguments are used in a side by side pro/con fasion. It would include a template of the core argument used in each case and then provide a set of pointer to historical examples of their use.

It seems to me that this might be a good vehicle for demonstrating the whole double standard and how it is being maintained. Thoughts? --GoRight (talk) 05:30, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. If you're familiar with them, it would be fantastic to have as a resource for both sides. In fact, you might consider giving them standardized numbers. That way, when something starts, rather than rebutting or going into an endless back and forth with the same, tired points, you could just say: "You're doing a number 12, please see rebuttal 22. You are checked, sir." Lexlex (talk) 08:34, 15 January 2010 (UTC)

Blocked (2)

Despite numerous warnings, lengthy detailed discussions with friendly and neutral editors, and formal sanctions, you have chosen not to abandon your apparent determination to be a drain on the volunteer resources of the community rather than an asset to the project. You have been editing in spurts since late 2007, and have amassed nearly five and a half thousand edits. You have a fine mind, a keen eye for detail, and an admirable willingness to stand against the tide. You could have chosen to be a great boon to this project. Instead, you have chosen to devote your efforts to stirring disputes in restraint of collaboration, making unreasonable demands in questionable faith on the time of your fellow volunteers, and grandstanding and tilting at windmills of minutia without evincing a serious interest in the productive creation of content. Serious discussion is one way to contribute to quality articles, but frivolously disputatious bickering is not. Your top-edited articles and talkpages include not a single page that would not serve as a forum for argument for its own sake. Spreading every sliver of contention across as many project pages as will feed the flames of drama shows an unseemly disinclination to contribute to a free high quality encyclopedia, or even let other people get on with building it. I even spent my own social capital in your defense here, but the promised reforms have not materialized.

You usually maintain at least a veneer of courtesy, but far too often you make comments that are snide, sarcastic, condescending, or similarly only superficially polite. The term civility is often hyperlinked to Misplaced Pages:Civility, but it is really not being used as a term of art with some byzantine Misplaced Pages-specific definition unrelated to the societal norm of treating people with basic respect even in the face of serious disagreement. Accusations of collusion, insinuations of bad faith negotiation, and intimidation by intimation are never civil.

There follows a sampling of problematic diffs from the preceding week. Many of these are in context of discussions where other editors are also behaving disruptively, but the behaviour of others is immaterial to this sanction. It is worth noting that your participation in a discussion rarely has the effect of calming an inflamed situation or restoring a productive focus, though it often has rather the opposite effect. Some of my comments below include reference to guidelines or essays rather than policy; this should be taken as shorthand for the points laid out at those pages, not as indication that they are being used to justify this block.

1. accusation of gross misconduct outside of a dispute resolution process
2. accusation of perfidy
3. needlessly inflaming an already passionate discussion
4. sarcasm and accusation of bad faith
5. violation of WP:POINT
6. accusation of partiality and collusion
7. accusation of abuse and bad faith (diff includes edits by other editors to include the mitigating factor that you later struck part of a comment)
8. inflaming an already passionate discussion
9. unproductive sarcasm
10. uncivil insinuation
11. violation of WP:POINT and unevidenced accusation that other editors have failed to show due diligence in reviewing a serious matter.
12. demand that other users expend their time and effort to your satisfaction
13. referring to people as "my good friend" is actually a bit annoying; this is just my personal opinion, not part of the blocking rationale, especially given your explanation here
14. incivility
15. Here you state at 01:17 on the 13th server time that you had dropped the matter of Pcarbonn's topic ban after a neutral administrator closed the discussion. Here an hour earlier is your back-handed acceptance of the clear community consensus. Here at 20:49 on the 12th, however, is another close by an uninvolved administrator, followed by, well, some of the diffs above ... then the close you acknowledged ... then another half dozen edits here. Really, choosing to insert yourself into that discussion at all given your recent block and sanction was particularly ill-advised. Other editors are capable of raising questions of due process (as, indeed, they did).
16. snide incivility
17. accusation of bad faith
18. includes: placing an unreasonable burden of evidence (very few people state that they are here to advance a personal agenda, it must be inferred from their edits); accusations of bad faith (saying AGF is not a shield to then proceed to fail to any more than stating "with all due respect" is a free pass to insult someone); and condescension.
19. accusation that other editors have failed to show due diligence in reviewing a serious matter
20. failure to show due diligence. You could easily have contributed productively here by adding the omitted log entry yourself.

For this wanton disrespect for the time and efforts of others, lack of basic consideration for the norms of constructive discussion, unacceptable focus on using this website as a forum for unduly burdensome and unproductive discussion at the expense of improving content, and following discussion at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard#GoRight, I am blocking your access indefinitely. Thank you for your contributions.

Administrators: Please discuss this block with me before modifying or lifting it unless there is a substantial community consensus or the action is otherwise obvious or non-controversial. I prefer open review, but my email is enabled if you would prefer to discuss off site. Thank you, - 2/0 (cont.) 23:54, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

An interesting array of diffs, all of which are taken completely out of context and the majority of which are involving matters already settled and abandoned or otherwise explained where they were made. Most of these are reminiscent of Raul's attack page which I actually find disappointing in you, 2/0.

I believe that my edits over the past day and a half speak for themselves in refutation to the picture you are wanting to paint here. I could address each of these points individually, and may be forced to do so in due time, but this would only feed the perceptions of wikilawyering that I assume are being bolstered here. Raising good faith concerns about things that I perceive as being injustices in a public forum which is precisely where I am expected to raise them cannot possibly be considered a blocking offense. Nor was I the only on voicing those same concerns so I fail to understand why I am being singled out in this case. JzG raised most of these issues in a timely fashion at which decidedly shows no consensus for your action, so I find the timing of this block some days later curious.

You complain that I am wasting people's time but after more than a day and a half of either nothing but silence or Recent Change Patrol on my part you call for yet more discussion of the issues, . Do you consider this block to be preventative or punitive? I mean are you actually seeking to prevent me from performing more Recent Change Patrols which is all I have done for the past day and a half? What is the imminent danger to the project in that?

In the interests of simply being able to move on expeditiously, what pound of flesh are you seeking to extract in exchange for my unblock? --GoRight (talk) 01:45, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Why are you blaming, , this thread, , on me? I didn't start it. --GoRight (talk) 02:06, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight (block log • active blocks • global blocks • contribs • deleted contribs • filter log • creation log • change block settings • unblock • checkuser (log))

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{{unblock reviewed |1=I invite any reviewing administrator to look at the diffs provided above in context before passing judgment. I also wish them to take into consideration that the majority of these examples come from two threads at ] only one of which I started. Since the one that I started was closed by a neutral administrator I have essentially moved on as my contributions will demonstrate if you review my edits since that time. Indeed, for the past day and a half I either stayed away or was conducting recent change patrol which I believe is considered a useful contribution to the community. The only thing that I can see this block preventing at this point seems to be more recent change patrol activity which would seem to be a detriment to the project. I'm trying to move on but and keeps dragging me back into the whole mess. Thank you for your consideration. |decline = {{subst:Decline reason here}} ~~~~}}

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{{unblock reviewed |1=I invite any reviewing administrator to look at the diffs provided above in context before passing judgment. I also wish them to take into consideration that the majority of these examples come from two threads at ] only one of which I started. Since the one that I started was closed by a neutral administrator I have essentially moved on as my contributions will demonstrate if you review my edits since that time. Indeed, for the past day and a half I either stayed away or was conducting recent change patrol which I believe is considered a useful contribution to the community. The only thing that I can see this block preventing at this point seems to be more recent change patrol activity which would seem to be a detriment to the project. I'm trying to move on but and keeps dragging me back into the whole mess. Thank you for your consideration. |accept = accept reason here ~~~~}}

While I am prevented from performing recent change patrol ...

I guess I might as well put these diffs into some sort of context.

Comment from the peanut gallery

GoRight has requested to be unblocked so that he can continue his work with RC patrol. I would support an unblock for this purpose if GoRight agrees to stay away from the venues that led to his block. Given that the stated goal of his unblock is to continue with RC patrol this should not be a problem. Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 03:04, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

"venues" is too ill-specified, as is the required timeframe. I don't wish to be accused of violating promises which I never made, nor do I accept some back door topic ban. But thanks for the thought which was well intentioned. --GoRight (talk) 03:07, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

• I have read through most of the diff's above. A 24 hour time-out might have been appropriate, but if this block stands then about half of the editors you have had problems with should receive equal treatment. It appears that the real problem is that some people prefer to use their "mailed fist" to control which point of view is presented. A better solution would be to allow some POV forks to exist. In that way, all the back and forth arguing could be directed to producing better articles. To be completely clear, a lot of the problem is caused by the current policies. The purpose of "rules" is to reduce the number of issues, not to make things worse. Q Science (talk) 08:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I would oppose such an unblock. A glance through GR's history reveals that the sudden enthusiasm for RC patrol looks more like a token effort than true good faith William M. Connolley (talk) 11:00, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Meh. It is what it is. Since I began the undertaking (which was prior to most of the flap discussed above) I have probably made more recent change patrol edits than other edits, especially if one discounts any edits related to (a) this block and (b) defending myself at this thread which I did not start. --GoRight (talk) 13:58, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

You're smart, but don't think everybody else is stupid. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 14:37, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I didn't call anybody stupid. Like I said, it is what it is. I never said that taking up recent change patrol was a substitute for why I am here. I made that clear on Jehochman's talk page. Still, actions speak louder than words and I have the edits to prove that I was actually putting in the time. --GoRight (talk) 19:34, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Seeing and . So, you intend to continue the disruptive behaviour that caused your block, and you will simply try to compensate the drain on the project by doing RC work?

And you think that nitpicking and wikilawyering diff by diff, which is part of the behaviour that got you blocked in the first place, is going to help your unblock? You still haven't addressed the reason for your unblock: that you were wasting a lot of time of other editors again and again for no benefit or for a exceedingly small benefit.

Sorry, yeah, you must think that we are stupid. Either you stop your disruptive behaviour or you will eventually wind up indef-blocked. --Enric Naval (talk) 19:59, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I never expected my efforts to change the currently flawed status quo on the GW articles to make me popular. Changing the status quo is by definition disruptive. That doesn't make it any less worthwhile of a pursuit. The same can be said of the Cold Fusion article, although I am quite at a loss to explain how that minor piece of wikipedia has managed to gain such prominence. The GW articles are extensive and on a topic of some arguable import, but if we are to believe the scientific mainstreamer's on Cold Fusion the entire topic is a waste of time not even deserving of a minor footnote in the annals of scientific history. --GoRight (talk) 21:11, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

"change the currently flawed status quo" my ass. Errrr, I mean, I have seen a few of your efforts to, ah, change the status quo, and they consisted mostly of raising technicalities to disrupt discussions that were sailing smoothly towards making something that improved the encyclopedia, and then, due to your intervention, the discussions became morasses that didn't accomplish anything useful. In situations like Jed's ban from cold fusion you were raising technicalities to unban an editor that had directly stated that he came back only to annoy us and that he had no intention of helping us to improve the article. How was that supposed to improve the status quo? Then Abd was banned because of disrupting so much the talk page and you did the same. This thing of defending the underdog is fine as soon as the underdog deserves that defense, which was clearly not the case there. You tried to unban two POV pushers that caused disruption, that has nothing to do with helping the encyclopedia or with improving status quos. And then, once they were finally banned for good, you never returned again to the article to improve it. I can't but conclude that you were there only to disrupt perfectly reasonable bans just for the sake of opposing a ban. That's not a behaviour that I want to see around here when trying to disentangle complicated issues in a talk page and POV pushers get in the frigging middle.

Amd I am being harsh because we already had a long long looong discussion where you tried to pull the same crap that you are pulling in your unblock appeal, and that it appears that you have been pulling for months after you left the cold fusion article.

So, you were blocked for disrupting behaviour, you refuse to acknowledge the disruption, and you refuse to agree to stop it? Well, stay blocked then. Nobody will miss you if you refuse to take this last opportunity to do constructive stuff instead of putting sticks in the wheels of the community. Higher trees have fallen, and wikipedia survived without them. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:08, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

The point, Enric, that you fail to get is that you and so many of those you agree with are equally culpable with respect to the sin of POV pushing. You cannot write a NPOV article by extinguishing the unfavorable points of view. This is so glaringly obvious that I am dumbfounded that the banning of those points of view happens so regularly here, and especially on science related articles on controversial topics. --GoRight (talk) 23:37, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

GoRight, why not propose to not edit climate-science related articles and their talk pages for, say, one month? You could write some wiki-essay in which you explain what in your opinion is not working well here on Misplaced Pages and discuss thaty essay with the Wiki-community. So, you can still make your points, stay involvved without being perceived to be disruptive. E.g. I wrote the essay WP:ESCA some time ago and there were many heated discussions about that. Had I tried to edit the relevant policy pages directly and started long discussions on their talk pages then, given the lack of consensus, I would have been perceived to be disruptive at some point. Count Iblis (talk) 15:52, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Count Iblis has a good idea there goright, take a bit of time off from the CC Articles and write up the Documenting Standard Climate Change Arguments idea you had above. I think suh a thing would benefit the community a great deal. --mark nutley (talk) 16:22, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that CI has made a constructive and well meaning suggestion, albeit one with potential pitfalls as articulated by TOAT and TS. In the end, though, I am here for a reason and I have made that reason well-known. The recent change in my behavior, i.e. undertaking recent change patrol, is merely a reflection of a desire to give back to the community in a positive way since some editors feel that I am a net drain. The larger community shall either accept me as I am, or reject me, and temporary adjustments in behavior won't solve anything. With that in mind, however, focusing on one or two weeks out of several years worth of contributions isn't really reflective of the whole either and for similar reasons. --GoRight (talk) 19:48, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Count Iblis, it should be noted – in the interest of full disclosure – that this approach is not necessarily seen as productive or helpful in the broader community. When Brews ohare followed a course of action similiar to that which you propose here (and with your encouragement), it led to further disruption and a broadening of his editing restrictions. (See Misplaced Pages:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Speed of light#Log of blocks, bans, and restrictions.) In other words, it dug him a deeper hole. Encouraging GoRight to (superficially) accept a topic ban and then to begin a process of criticising editors in that topic area and seeking proxy editors would not end well. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:28, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I agree that encouraging GoRight to attempt any further engagement of this type would be counter-productive. His perspective may well be insightful but his manner of expressing it has proven unproductive and problematic. --TS 16:46, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Well, after the ArbCom case, Brews was contributing to the talk pages of some policy pages which some people found disruptive. If you compare Brews to GoRight, then GoRight is where Brews was before the speed of light ArbCom case. If Brews were to have backed off at the time Jehochman raised the issue at AN/I which later led to the ArbCom case, and Brews had instead written some essay about editing and discussing physics articles, then no one would have found that to be a problem. In fact most people would have found that great. Note that 'm not suggesting that GoRight directly contribute to the existing policy pages, rather that he writes up his ideas in his own essay. I don't see what disruption can be caused by that.

It should also be noted that the so-called disruption by Brews when he was editing the policy pages was really due to paranoia. But paranoia or no paranoia, if the wiki-community thinks there is a problem then there really is a problem, that's how Misplaced Pages works. As part of the Wiki-community, I initially told Brews that i.m.o. he could edit policy pages and contribute to my essay. Others said that they are not comfortable with that, and my efforts to make my point to them that he is not disruptive had failed, so I told Brews that he should not contribute to the policy pages (including to my own essay). Count Iblis (talk) 00:27, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

While the admins continue to mull this whole thing over, assuming that they have not already decided to issue a "pocket community ban" by simply refusing to unblock me, we might as well do something useful with the time. Since my behavior has been deemed a problem why don't we turn this thread into a mini-retrospective on that behavior. Why don't you all just tell me what it is about my behavior that you find unacceptable? I invite all manner of responses. --GoRight (talk) 20:08, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Sorry but you've been told and told and told, over and over and over again. I'd suggest that instead of playing this game other editors go off and work on some articles. Think I'll do just that... Short Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 20:15, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Then summarize it for me before you leave. What have I been told so many times? Let's see if everyone agrees with your perspective on the message here? --GoRight (talk) 20:25, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

• Your single propose account type obsession with the global warming issue which is simply an edit war over multiple articles is simply a waste of your time and energy, same goes for all the obsessed single purpose account type editors that are involved in the group of articles. Nothing good will come of it, you are wasting your time and energy there, look out the window nothing is changing, let it go, be man enough to laugh and walk away. You can enjoy editing here if you do this, there is a lot of worthy and rewarding work here that needs editors to help, I suggest you ask to be unblocked and let them know that you have put this time wasting behind you and that you will not edit any global warming articles. Off2riorob (talk) 20:20, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

  Well, you are a new voice of sorts lately so you do offer some fresh perspective. I am not entirely sure how to respond to this. On the one hand you definitely make a sound point that I do expend a lot of time and energy for what appears to be very little gain. So in that sense it is an unproductive use of my time. On the other hand I am not alone in my view that there are serious WP:OWN and therefore WP:NPOV issues with many of the GW articles, and especially the BLPs. If I truly take the principles that are supposed to be the foundation of wikipedia to heart, how can I in good conscience fail to try and right these wrongs? Am I obsessed? Perhaps. Am I resolute in the pursuit of those founding principles? I would like to think yes. So this presents a bit of a conundrum, no? How much effort is too much in the pursuit of what's right? --GoRight (talk) 20:38, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

That is a moot point, you will be but a washed up pebble on the desolated wikipedia shoreline as regards this issue, take this chance you have now to get out while the going is good. All the global warming articles have pov and own issues, your involvement won't change that one bit. Come and join in with the bigger picture of the wiki, you will feel liberated. Off2riorob (talk) 20:49, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Much of problem appears to be related to GR's posts defending himself and others on WP:AN. I for one am bothered with the chilling effect such accusations have on the process. I know I thought long and hard about posting this. But if we accept that part of the case against GR, that, as another admin put it, he is guilty of an "effort to derail imposition of community sanctions", we accept a very Kafkaesque view of the sanctioning process. I can't really speak to the rest of the case 2/0 makes. There's obviously some dynamic at work here hidden to the uninitiated because the diffs by themselves seem pretty run of the mill, especially since only two of them relate to an article. JPatterson (talk) 21:40, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

You are missing the background: he's been doing this consistently for a long time, and many editors have told him what was wrong with his editing. And he has been derailing community sanctions that should have been very clear and straightaway (see my comment on AN, and one of my comments above). --Enric Naval (talk) 23:08, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Community sanctions shouldn't be "on a rail" in the first place. One presumes they're not meant to be show trials with the outcome certain from the start. If one can be dragged into the dock for expressing a viewpoint in that process, either in your own defense or in defense of others, consensus for sanctions will become a forgone conclusion be default because no one will dare speak for the accused. JPatterson (talk) 00:19, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I question whether I single handedly possess the power to "derail community sanctions" through the power of my words, but thank you for suggesting that I do. The processes are there to provide a community discussion. That I have availed myself of that forum and for that purpose should not be a sin, and if it is then then one has to ask why? What is it about my POV that it should be singled out for punishment when worse transgressions are committed by others on a regular basis? --GoRight (talk) 23:29, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

• A suggestion; That where there is an existing consensus dissimilar to the your own pov or interpretation of sources on any topic, not just specifically relating to global warming related articles, that you restrict yourself to one comment every six three months - putting forward your rationale with supporting evidence. I had earlier proposed this at the AN discussion, where it gained absolutely no traction, but I will expand my vision so that you and readers may mull over the possible consequences. Firstly, it would not your interpretation that consensus exists but that of the other contributors (a consensus for the consensus). Your comment may address whatever part of the consensus and its proponents you wish, understanding that it shall abide by policy and that violations of policy will be dealt with severely. It may be of any length you wish, realising that a long polemic is likely to be regarded as WP:TL;DR and will not serve the desired change in the consensus. Lastly, that is it on the article talkpage or the talkpage of other editors (and email) - no further correspondence may be entered by you, although anyone may bring up the matter on your talkpage (but no referencing that at another venue). Obvious exceptions would be ArbCom pages, RfC's or other procedual pages. This gives you the opportunity to have your opinion heard, but without permitting what other editors have found to be the frustrating experience of your continuing return to the subject matter. The major advantage of my proposal is that I think I am the only person who would be happy with it - no one effected is going to much like it, but it is a compromise that might work. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:17, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

  I will truly think about this proposal, but at least initially I must decline. This is not a comment on the worthiness of your proposal as much as it is a stand on principle. I have done nothing other than having availed myself of the very processes and procedures that all editors in good standing are expected to adhere to. If this be a sin then I am certainly guilty. If I as a self-professed AGW skeptic am to be banned for merely following the community practices and participating in good faith then my plight will only serve to bolster the foundation of the claims that wikipedia's coverage of GW topics is horribly biased and my time here will have served its purpose.

  I respect your opinion, LHVU. You have on a few occasions spoken up in my defense and this is both noted and appreciated. I hope having done so will bring you no ill will. --GoRight (talk) 23:07, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

• Sorry, I don't have the full time for this foolishness now. If this gets taken up the flag poll to where folks realize that equitable dispute resolutions are of value to wiki content, as are and persecution of folks who seek to bring real meaning to wiki principles is appreciated, then I'll have better to offer. For now, I'll review seeking answers to this somewhere else. GR, any suggestions where others may help in reforming the attack on you? Zulu Papa 5 ☆ (talk) 00:20, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

  There is a vote on-going at . No lengthy comments required, just a simple !vote. --GoRight (talk) 00:30, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm not really sure of what the message being sent is. Is the problem my behavior and arguments on the GW pages themselves, or my defense of others who hold minority points of view such as Pcarbonn? If it is the former then I guess there is an irreconcilable difference, but if it is mostly the latter I could probably offer some compromise. It could also be both or neither, I suppose, I still haven't had a succinct articulation of "the problem". 2/0 has merely provided a set of representative diffs that he claims illustrates a problem but as I indicate above these appear to me to be standard run of the mill type edits when compared to those of other editors. --GoRight (talk) 00:46, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, in thinking about this whole situation things really seemed to flare up when I attempted to defend Pcarbonn and especially because I was attempting to refute the allegations against him on a point by point basis. LHVU has made here and at AN a suggestion that I only be allowed to make a single edit expressing my dissenting POV. It is unclear to me whether this is meant to apply only at AN and ANI, or other DR fora, or even on article pages and talk pages. Given that the bulk of the issue seems to have erupted at AN and because of my defense of someone holding a minority POV let me make the following voluntary offer:

I agree not to belabor discussions related to community sanctions at AN and ANI specifically, narrowly construed, and will self-limit my participation at any such discussions to a single paragraph expressing my view on the subject at hand. If I wish to comment further I shall confine any such discussion to my user space where other editors are allowed to make reference to it, or not, as they see fit on their own accords. I do expect, however, to be allowed to also include a simple "Support" or "Oppose" (or their logical equivalents depending on the wording involved) in any !votes that occur related to such sanctions and these shall not be considered violations of my one paragraph offer.

Would this help resolve the concerns? --GoRight (talk) 01:35, 18 January 2010 (UTC)

1. http://nicedeb.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/manbearpig1.jpg

• Requests for unblock