Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 10:28, 21 February 2014

February 2014

You currently appear to be engaged in an edit war according to the reverts you have made on Debian. Users are expected to collaborate with others, to avoid editing disruptively, and to try to reach a consensus rather than repeatedly undoing other users' edits once it is known that there is a disagreement.

Please be particularly aware, Misplaced Pages's policy on edit warring states:

1. Edit warring is disruptive regardless of how many reverts you have made; that is to say, editors are not automatically "entitled" to three reverts.
2. Do not edit war even if you believe you are right.

If you find yourself in an editing dispute, use the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes; work towards a version that represents consensus among editors. You can post a request for help at an appropriate noticeboard or seek dispute resolution. In some cases it may be appropriate to request temporary page protection. If you engage in an edit war, you may be blocked from editing.
In addition, please note that Misplaced Pages is not the place to carry out a campaign, or to try to expose or publicise what you regard as wrongs that need to be righted. JamesBWatson (talk) 13:58, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

• Also, please make sure that references you give (a) actually do support the statements in the article that they are supposed to reference, and (b) are from reliable sources: the unsubstantiated opinion of a person writing in a forum or similar place is not normally a reliable source. JamesBWatson (talk) 14:08, 19 February 2014 (UTC)

I would appreciate if you could take a look at the Debian Talk page, "7 Debian private practices and Debian Women activities" section, and tell me if your previous notices still apply. 84.127.80.114 (talk) 01:54, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

Certainly they do: why did you think they might no? JamesBWatson (talk) 13:46, 20 February 2014 (UTC)

I would appreciate if you could show that you have read the talk page.

• Could you tell me why do you think I have not tried to reach a consensus?
• Why do you think I am the one not using the article's talk page to discuss controversial changes?
• Did you see my edit summaries (Please see the Talk page/use it/User refused to talk)?
• If you believe I am carrying out a campaign, why do you think so?
• Since the references notice still applies, which ones do not support the presented statements or are not reliable?
• What check was done to make sure mthinkcpp's claim about my alleged vandalism accusations to several users is true?
• What check was done to make sure the other part was behaving correctly? 84.127.80.114 (talk) 02:45, 21 February 2014 (UTC)

The main substance of the message I sent you was about edit warring. Whether you were edit warring or not depends only on whether you were repeatedly reverting edits, not on other issues, such as what other editors were doing, whether the edits you were making were justified, whether or not you have made accusations of vandalism, etc etc. I also mentioned the need for care over use of sources, and the use of Misplaced Pages to carry out a campaign. Likewise, neither of those is remotely affected by the other, unrelated, issues which you mention.

Perhaps the notice about edit warring which I incorporated in my message could somehow be rephrased to emphasise even more than it does the point Do not edit war even if you believe you are right. It gives advice on how to deal with disagreements, but it does not say "...and as long as you follow the recommended steps to try to reach agreement, it is OK to edit war", but for some reason many editors read it that way, as you appear to have done.

It seems to me that any uninvolved third party reading your edits both to the article and to the talk page would see them, as I did, as being made by someone who believes that there are things wrong with the way things are handled within the Debian community, and who is trying to use Misplaced Pages to publicly expose what is going on. If that is not what you intended, then you should carefully re-read what you have written, and try to see how it would look to an outsider, as you have inadvertently given a highly misleading impression. If, on the other hand, that is indeed what you intended, then that is what I meant by using Misplaced Pages to carry out a campaign.

I will give you just one example of adding content that is not supported by the reference you cited for it. In this edit you wrote, among other things, "Debian makes many non-security decisions not available to the public, via debian-private". As a reference you cited https://lists.debian.org/debian-private/. However, that page makes no mention whatever of "non-security decisions", let alone stating that "many" of them are made via debian-private. A source cited as a reference needs to actually state the fact which it is cited to support, not merely mention something related, as a basis for a Misplaced Pages editor adding further commentary which is not mentioned in the source.

Have the issues you have been repeatedly trying to air in the article been given substantial coverage in significant independent sources, such as major newspapers, or books? If so, then please give citations to such sources. An encyclopaedia does not contain detailed accounts of internal disagreements within an organisation, documented only in internal documents. For example, I don't expect the article Microsoft to contain details of internal memos discussing how the company organises its management, and there is no reason why Debian should be treated differently.

No, I will not "show that have read the talk page". I have, and you may make your own choice as to whether to believe me or not. In any case, it is of limited relevance, since the issues that I have mentioned in my attempt to help you better understand why your editing is not considered acceptable are all to be seen in your editing of the article. JamesBWatson (talk) 10:28, 21 February 2014 (UTC)