Misplaced Pages

Revision as of 00:21, 14 November 2007

I am here for some very limited purposes, because some people have asked me to help in some specific cases. I am prepared to do this. I am not intending to be here much, at present. I have not yet decided whether to start using this account actively again. No, I don't want to talk about any of the foregoing, thanks, the people concerned know who they are and how to get hold of me. This is about some ongoing unresolved issues being discussed on one or more mailing lists, when that debate comes to fruition I will take a view. Guy (Help!) 12:45, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

• Please see User:JzG/Harassment links.

• Bored? Looking for something to do? Try User:Eagle 101/problem BLPs.
• Replies are packed by intellectual weight and contents may settle in transit.

Cypri

We may have another problem related to that issue, and articles that link there. Next time we're both on IRC, remind me, and I'll explain. DS 00:49, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Your post on Billy Hathorn's page

In fairness, the BLP policy isn't likely to be of much use to him, since his usual MO is to cut & paste every obituary that appears in his local paper. Ever since this piece of idiocy I've given up even trying to keep his mix of copyvios & ludicrously non-notable biographies (if you look through some of his articles, you'll see "phone call to subject" as a reference in at least 25% of them) in check, and I think the other editors who were watching him have given up as well - this might have given him the idea that policy's changed as more of his articles are slipping through the net than before. When DGG is nominating your articles for deletion, you know something is seriously wrong somewhere. — iridescent 00:57, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

• Yes, I think you are right. Guy (Help!) 09:42, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

• Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/Billy Hathorn.

I'll reply properly on the RFC when I have more time free. If you haven't already, I'd suggest contacting User:Mwelch, User:DGG and User:Dhartung for comment, as they're the other editors I'm aware of who've tried (and failed) to push Billy towards policy in the past. — iridescent 16:57, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Too late for exactly what?

Nice edit summary. the_undertow 20:40, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

WP:ANI

Guy, what on Earth did this guy do that you blocked? He apparently now has some massive vendetta against me - I'd appreciate knowing why this guy wants my sysop bit. It's a major pain in the ass. FCYTravis 20:48, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

• Christ knows. A grade 1 kook, no idea what his beef is, but well worth ignoring, I'd say. Guy (Help!) 22:42, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

How tired?

Guy: This is Andrew. I want you to look at this http://wikidashboard.parc.com/User:JzG . I am not pleased with it. Please nominate an FA and get onto this list: Misplaced Pages:List of Wikipedians by featured article nominations . --88.26.75.119 07:33, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

--MONGO 09:09, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, yes, but to be fair I would love to be able to get together the shrubberies necessary to get Giovanni Punto through FA. Guy (Help!) 11:34, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

With... a herring! El_C 11:35, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Just so. Guy (Help!) 11:44, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages:Anything to declare?

Hi JzG, how are you?? You OK?? I've only been able to edit sporadically due to being on the road a fair bit recently. This Privatemusings business is hard to follow, please can you give me the gist of it on my talk page??

Also, have a look at my essay Misplaced Pages:Anything to declare? which is (almost) a mirror of the discussion at Misplaced Pages talk:Sock puppetry.

Thanks, --Solumeiras 22:27, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

us versus them

On WR there are many people who make no effort to conceal their desire to utterly destroy Misplaced Pages by any means necessary. But not everyone there feels that way; in fact there are recent efforts there to become less of a garbage-pit. Some there argue in favor of Misplaced Pages.

On Misplaced Pages, there are people who get away with being uncivil and make no effort to conceal their belief that they have a right to be uncivil up to and including the absurdity of being uncivil while blocking another for being uncivil. But not everyone on Misplaced Pages feels that way; in fact there are recent efforts to tone down the disruptiveness of such things and to encourage civility even to uncivil persons.

WR and Misplaced Pages both have people such as yourself that continually group everyone at the other site into a single bin. Reality is more complex than that. It is not WR versus Misplaced Pages. There is a broad spectrum of interests and motivations and beliefs and knowledge-levels and intellectual-abilities at both sites.

Your "us vs. them" mis-characterizations fuel overly aggressive words by you and defensive "witch-hunt" counter-claims.

Misplaced Pages would be better served by greater discrimination in your terminology. This indicates an inability to see that WR consists of individuals, some of whom like Dan are arguing and fighting for wikipedia. His presence there is a counterbalance. The influencing of minds is not all one direction. That sells Dan short. WAS 4.250 22:35, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

• See Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Alkivar. Right now, being a good Misplaced Pages is fundamentally incompatible with active participation on WR. It is incompatible because the WR crowd - most prominent among whom are a number of banned users - are manipulating those Wikipedians who are active there. They need to go away, clean up their act, and then I'll think again. I like Alkivar, and I am deeply disappointed that he was sucked in in this way. Brandt's stated aim is to bring us down, and WordBomb, Looch and Jonny Cache are all long-term abusers of Misplaced Pages. JB196 (Looch) and Jonny Cache have both had socks banned this week. When they stop, then we can talk again. As for the notion of a battle or fight - well, when the bullets are incoming, it becomes futile to pretend that there isn't a battle on, really. But it's not only WR. Amorrow is also active and a problem, and there are others as well. We have people threatening legal action because we removed their conflicted, POV-pushing edits. If you're not on the receiving end of any of this crap, you're lucky. Guy (Help!) 22:45, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Both great Wikipedians like yourself and some people at WR have pointed at Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Alkivar and I have looked and I can't find anything interesting. Please spell out what I am supposed to find there worth reading. That someone was mislead? People are mislead all the time by sites all over the web; including sometimes people are mislead by comments they read at wikipedia. How you go from "person X was sucked in" to "being a good Wikipedian is fundamentally incompatible with active participation on WR" is beyond me. Are you sure that it is not an emotional response instead of a logical response, since I see zero logic in the assertion that you present as if it were an argument. Perhaps what you mean to say is that WR should be labeled "for mature audiences only". I would agree with that. I think Dan is mature enough to handle the garbage there. I also think wikipedia has no business setting itself up as a censor of what mature adults read or participate in. Yes, there is a battle, and Dan is sitting at a campfire where many who are sharpening their swords for use against us are gathered, and Dan is on our side. In any conflict, there is usefulness in talking to the opposition. (This last could have been expressed more neutrally and with greater precision in a non"us-versus-them" way; but all communication must choose to emphasize some aspects while remaining silent about others.) WAS 4.250 23:20, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

• Alkivar was enabling and working on behalf of JB196. So was Burntsauce. Never forget, they want all admins who stand uyp to them gone. Guy (Help!) 23:21, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

The more a conflict is characterized as a "battle", the more we've already played into their agenda. Calling it a battle is a Bad Idea, which tends to increase drama, distracts from our project, and causes otherwise reasonable people to make damaging generalizations. That's the way I see it, anyhow. -GTBacchus 23:23, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Various people and groups pursue a variety of goals using a variety of means. When the people are organized and the methods are planned; the term "battle" is accurate. Those pursuing the goal of a NPOV 💕 are organized and getting millions of dollars in donations for that purpose. Those who wish to twist wikipedia into a propaganda organ for themselves have had organizations fighting actual wars from before Misplaced Pages existed. WR is the least of our challenges. WAS 4.250 23:37, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, you could make an argument for it being a "battle", but that would be a Bad Idea. We shouldn't enter into that paradigm at all. It's not part of our job here. -GTBacchus 23:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes. and WR is where a few banned users are organising and coordinating their attacks on Misplaced Pages. We want to build an encyclopaedia, they want to either knock us down or get their POV on here. Guy (Help!) 23:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Keeping POV out is part of our job as encyclopedists. Making it into more than that is folly. The fact that they may be organized doesn't matter. We still do the same thing: RBI, and be very, very boring about it. Drawing battle lines isn't very boring. -GTBacchus 23:41, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

• It will stop being a battle when we stop playing whack-a-mole with Awbrey and Barber's sockpuppets. I'm all for WP:RBI and a quiet life, but if you remember the original Burntsauce block that's not working very well. According to Barber, blocking his socks is in and of itself abuse of admin tools, and he sees to ave persuaded some others of this. Like I say, I'd rather not have a fight, but if they insist on pursuing it then I will insist on doing my best to stop them. Guy (Help!) 23:30, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

  But if you agree that it's a fight, you're not stopping them; you're conceding their main point. Our strength is in our boringness, and our refusal to be anything but encyclopedists. Pursuing justice here, or engaging in crime-and-punishment thinking, is antithetical to our purpose on this wiki. -GTBacchus 23:34, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

  Passive resistance only works up to a point. And actually what we do is mostly passive resistance: unlike them, we are not invading the others' territory or harassing them in real life. Guy (Help!) 23:36, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

  Passive resistance only works up to a point? I'd like to see evidence of that claim. All of the world's greatest spiritual leaders that I've studied would disagree with you. -GTBacchus 23:40, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

  Didn't work too well for Hitler's victims. (Does this end this line of thought :) ). WAS 4.250 23:43, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

  Pfft; I'm immune to Godwin's law. Many Indians were killed obtaining independence from the British. Are you actually coming right out and saying that Jesus, Buddha, Tolstoy and Gandhi were wrong, and you're right? That's rather bold.

  More to the point, nobody is being killed here. Let's keep our eyes on the prize, shall we? I'd like to see evidence that WP:RBI is in any way inadequate to deal with vandalism and POV-pushing. -GTBacchus 23:46, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

I think the analogy has broken down, actually. On Misplaced Pages, passive resistance is pretty much what we do. We block the sockpuppets, revert them and write it off as yet more stupidity. But what we're talking about here is people actively participating in the forum where these people are organising themselves. What happened to Alkivar is a perfect illustration of why I think this is wrong. It's an old Usenet tactic, to move the debate to your website where you can control the medium and the message; I think the Wikipedians who are active on WR have fallen prey to a particular piece of fallacious reasoning. Individuals like Kohs say "look, this x% of what I did was good, therefore I am not a bad person" and he's right, Kohs is not a bad person, but he's a bad Wikipedian because he can't check his bias at the door and because he is not onside in respect of conflict of interest. We didn't ban him for being a bad person, we banned him because he's not able to abide by the community's mores. Sure, he might have written one or two articles that weren't blatant spam, but he engage din enough COI editing to be a problem, and above all he made it perfectly clear that he sees no problem with COI editing. He's entitled to that view, but he's not entitled to pursue that view when the community has decided that actually yes, there is a problem with COI editing. Same with Awbrey - he can talk all four legs off a donkey, but when it comes right down to it what he wants (and is still doing with sockpuppets) is to slant the content of one article in the direction of his personal interpretation. We didn't ban him for being a bad person, we banned him because he proved, over a long period of time, that he was completely incapable of accepting any answer other than "yes" when it came to inserting his original research into Misplaced Pages. And so on. So we have a group of disgruntled people, banned with regret because in the end we could not help them to work the Misplaced Pages way. As far as they are concerned, the fact that they can't get their content on Misplaced Pages without violating policy, means that policy is wrong. And they's spent an awful lot of time arguing that. Over on WR you get their side of the story, and as Lenin pointed out "a lie told often enough becomes the truth".

Another example: I think that Bagley sincerely believes the ludicrous conpiracy theory about SlimVirgin. That is one of the most absurd claims I've ever come across. Almost all conspiracy theories involving intelligence agencies are bunk, and this one especially so. The idea that a particular journalist was employed by MI5 is the product of a brain that was in terminal decline at the time (the guy died shortly afterwards, I think); it was a "dog=cat" style deduction. MI5 support this theory (really? evidence?); this person supports this theory; therefore this person is part of MI5. The extension to SV is even more tenuous: it builds on the evidence-free and unsupportable theory: X supports the official view; X is employed by MI5; Misplaced Pages's article supports the official view (per WP:NPOV), therefore the editor who was responsible for ensuring that the official view is reflected as such on Misplaced Pages is X. It would be laughed out of any court in the world. The only reason it's gained any traction is because SV has actively engaged in pushing back against the people who tried to abuse Misplaced Pages - that makes SV evil, and fair game as far as they are concerned. Bagley, then, has picked up on this rumour and decided to use it in order to undermine someone who was part of preventing him from pursuing his commercially-driven agenda on Misplaced Pages.

Now, the problem with that lot is that the ethos of WR - assume bad faith - seems to infect those who post there. As we saw with Alkivar, the insidious influence of one-sided portrayals of the situation leads good people to subtly shift. I am completely with Alkivar on the issue of trivia and unsourced junk. But Alkivar fell for the trap of flattery and manipulation by someone whose interest is not to improve Misplaced Pages by removing junk, but to damage Misplaced Pages and twist it to reflect his own biases.

I've seen and removed links to statements on WR inserted into content debates, bringing the banned editor's opinions into the mix. Sorry, no. Banned is banned. We banned them because even when they seem reasonable, there is always an agenda. You have to work quite hard to get banned on Misplaced Pages, and a key part of it has to be a failure to accept Misplaced Pages policy. People who don't accept or buy into our core values, have no place here. It doesn't make them bad people, it just means that this is not the project for them. Bringing their influence back through the back door is wrong on many levels, even before you get tot he point where they are pursuing baseless attacks and conspiracy theories.

Much is made of the possibility of "critique" rather than attacks on WR. The problem here is much the same as with the SV situation. I've read through a number of threads on WR along the lines of "X is bad; therefore X must be the work of one of the people we hate; let's see which of them we can pin it on." They speculated long and hard on the real identity of Privatemusings. I know PM's main account, there is no evidence that it is any of the people they suggested. CheckUser says it is not even from the same continent as their suggested candidates. But they speculate anyway, and they count this as another black mark against someone. It's madness.

So I think they need to straighten out their act. When WikiAbuse was online, Barber added manuy examples of "abuse" to my profile. I checked all of them, all of them seem to me to be justified. A user whose sole contribution was an article Paki bastard (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) with the content "==== Sweaty Cunt ==i hate them all, they are all paki bastards, and they fucking smell like curry" really does not seem to me to be a controversial block. Would you have blocked that account?

It's time, I think, to recognise that Misplaced Pages admins are, fundamentally, here for the encyclopaedia. It seems right now that once you get the sysop bit you are immediately an evil bastard and fair game for any kind of trolling. We are expected to put up with endless abuse and never snap back. Well, yes, we shouldn't, but neither should the abuse be endless. WR at its best right now is a hostile mob shouting form the sidelines, and at its worst they are agents provocateurs actively working to undermine us. Guy (Help!) 10:17, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Guy, thank you for your considered reply. I agree that the metaphor has broken down, but perhaps for different reasons. I don't think that what we're doing here is anything like passive resistance, because I don't think we're engaged in that kind of struggle at all. Wrong paradigm. We're writing an encyclopedia.

I agree with you entirely that admins are here for the encyclopedia. As for the evil bastard bit, I don't know... I don't get any of that, and I don't think it's that hard to avoid. It's simply a matter of treating everyone with perfect courtesy, respect, dignity and honor, even while blocking them for disruption, if necessary.

You wonder whether I would have blocked User:Paki bastard; I invite you to inspect my block log. I have blocked many users for similar (and sometimes lesser) reasons. I never, however, made a block summary such as this, which I find juvenile and embarrassing. Why stoop to his level while blocking him? Why not show that we have more class than they do?

You say that "We are expected to put up with endless abuse and never snap back. Well, yes, we shouldn't, but neither should the abuse be endless." I agree that the abuse shouldn't be endless, but that's not necessarily within our control, and it's certainly no reason to exacerbate the situation by "snapping back". That's a double edged sword: not only is it unprofessional, but it's ineffective.

You protest repeatedly above that we don't block people for being bad people - I agree entirely. However, we do not always succeed in coming across that way. We often come across as belligerent, heavy-handed and thuggish. I'm not trying to lay blame in any way, but I am suggesting that this is something we could, and must, get better at. The solution is to behave more professionally, more classily, and more focused on the encyclopedia and not on giving energy to "battles" that arise around it. -GTBacchus 11:03, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, yes, exactly. Of course you would have blocked that user. My point is that according to the people currently most active and influential on WR, doing so was an abuse of my administrator power. When WikiAbuse was up, Barber posted dozens of similar examples of admin "abuse" by me, and as far as I can recall pretty much every one of them was baseless. They accuse me of racism, sexism and being cruel to kids, based on gross misrepresentation of entirely uncontroversial actions. That's their view of me; we know what their view is of SV. Stepping back a couple of paces a pattern emerges: an abusive admin is, to a good first approximation, one who blocks or participates in the banning of a Misplaced Pages Review regular. Hey, they can carry on that way if they like, but the flat-out refusal to modify a position in response to evidence (or even correct an outright factual inaccuracy in said statement) indicates to me that this is a site whose relevance to the process of building an encyclopaedia is, at present, zero. An unbending refusal to admit you are wrong in applying a false characterisation to someone, means that whatever else you say about them is necessarily tainted and likely to be dismissed. So we disengage. Except that some people seem reluctant to do so. And those of us who do not participate there are still faced with the daily task of tracking and blocking the abusive sockpuppets of those Misplaced Pages Review regulars who then go on to characterise this as admin abuse.

It is this continual necessity to block and block and block again the ban-evading abusers that is contributing to making us look heavy handed. A banned user can engage in dialogue, or they can engage in abuse and ban evasion. Dialogue gives all concerned the opportunity to be and look good, ban evasion contributes to escalating and entrenching the dispute. I sincerely wish they would just go away and leave us alone. But JB196 is now at something like 540 known sockpuppets and counting. Do you suggest we simply allow him to continue unabated? I guess not :-) So I advocate disengaging, rather than attempting to treat with him, because as we saw with Alkivar, that way lies madness. Guy (Help!) 14:43, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Ok.... so what exactly is our disagreement here, Guy? Naturally I don't suggest we "allow someone to continue unabated" with abusive socks. Have I hinted that I might possibly take such a position? All I advocate is resisting the temptation to act heavy-handedly, or to insult, or to let our professionalism drop, or to stoop to their level. You block their socks; cool. Who cares whether they characterize this as admin abuse? Why are you reading what they say about you, anyway? If you're simply doing your job here well, then what's the problem? -GTBacchus 20:20, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Ha! Great question. No idea. I think we probably both agree that as of right now, making no judgements about past or future, WR is inimical to Misplaced Pages and active engagement with WR is fundamentally incompatible with being a good Wikipedian (see the Jehochman farce on ANI). we both agree that these banned users can get lost (in a kind and loving way). Beats me why we're arguing - and I'm not even sure if we are, at that :-) Guy (Help!) 00:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Huh. I'm not sure I agree that active engagement in WR is incompatible with being a good Wikipedian, but that might just be because I don't know much about the forum. I've read a couple of threads there, but not enough to get a real feel for the place, and I've never posted there. I can imagine that some people could participate there while maintaining good faith here. People are capable of some pretty amazing things.

The only point I would really press, based on what you just said, is that I don't think it's a good idea to say that "active engagement... is fundamentally incompatible...". It seems to be a position that, if you hold it, isn't really relevant to what we're doing here, and does have the potential of generating drama, and misleading people into thinking that we're pursuing agendas other than simple encyclopedia work. -GTBacchus 02:34, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Hardly bold to disagree with Tolstoy, Gandhi et al while, as it happens, agreeing with Churchill, our modern judiciary systems etc. Thanks, SqueakBox 23:58, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

You're welcome. When the best people who've ever lived say one thing, and I say another, I assume I'm the one who's mistaken. YMMV. Again, on topic? Any evidence that WP:RBI is insufficient? -GTBacchus 00:02, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Surely, if we don't stop them, they won't just get bored and stop attacking this website and it's contributors. You seem to think that everyone is inherently decent, but that isn't the case...some people simply cannot give up a fight, especially those that for some odd reason, fail to understand why they have been banned from this website. It is pretty hard to reason with the unreasonable...and as far as DTobais...I see a recent post he made there regarding me was just simply silliness..surely, he could see I am human and made a simple mistake when I reverted what I saw as trolling...then I restored it later after I saw who I had reverted...I guess for the really really bored, or those with an axe to grind, that website serves as a place for those people to vent...and that is fine...but there is a core element on WR that seems to be hell bent on digging up every little piece of nothingness and making a mountain out of it. If DTobais is so interested in making Misplaced Pages better, there are millions of articles he can edit, add references to...clean up...if editors such as him did a lot more of that and a lot less arguing about why linking to WR and similar sites is important, then surely I would be willing to reexamine his arguments from a different perspective. There are way too many "editors" on this website that seem to confuse our mission here.--MONGO 06:39, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

MONGO, you and I might disagree as to fundamental human nature, but I'm determined that we don't need to go down that path in order to have this discussion. It simply comes down to this: we need to behave professionally. No matter whether or not you think someone is "inherently decent", letting on that you look down on them is a recipe for trouble.

You say that "if we don't stop them", they'll keep attacking us... two problems there. First of all, you seem to think that "stopping them" is an option. How is that supposed to work? Hunt them down and kill them? If your strategy doesn't point to an actual solution, I think it's time to seriously consider another one.

Secondly, I've had plenty of conversations with, and understood, plenty of "trolls", and I know that certain reactions to their provocation tend to reduce the desire to provoke, whereas others tend to inflame that desire. You've never shown any willingness to believe me on this point, but you truly can reduce harassment and abuse almost entirely by rising above it. Fighting back does create more drama than being very boring, impersonal, professional and encyclopedic does. I can cite specific cases where your reactions have been the direct cause of more harassment; why are you unwilling to learn about this from me, someone who has been there and who knows?

I would plea with you, MONGO, to at least try a different approach. Please, give it a week or a month - try refraining from making any comments about anybody's motivations for any reason. I promise, you'll find that you can still get all the work done that you want to get done, and that you run into considerably less static. Please give it a try, MONGO. I care about you, and it hurts me to see you unintentionally exacerbate something that you would gratefully be rid of. -GTBacchus 11:03, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

MONGO is right here. They are determined, they are making it a battle when we'd be happy if they just went away and left us alone, and they are resourceful and manipulative, as we saw in the Alkivar case. It is that which persuades me that complete disengagement is the only sensible move right now. If they want to clean up their act, then great. I'm all for informed critique, I participated in WikiAbuse until it was taken over by the same idiots and got shut down. As long as WR is dominated by people who think that admin abuse is blocking an account whose sole contribution was to create Paki bastard (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) I don't think we have anything much to learn from them, and the noticeboards show that there is no shortage of querulous complaints without going to sites that add a dose of harassment as well. Come back when they've cleaned up their act - and particularly when the influential posters there have stopped their harassment campaigns and stopped using sockpuppets to evade their bans. Guy (Help!) 07:56, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I wholeheartedly agree that complete disengagement is the solution. Drawing battle lines is not complete disengagement. Insulting people is not complete disengagement. Reading their site to see just how "bad" they are is not complete disengagement. Creating special policies about links to their site is not complete disengagement. Complete disengagement looks like us being boring, impersonal, professional encyclopedia editors. It also entails our never insulting anybody, anywhere, for any reason. We have to rise above the mud, or we'll never get out of it. -GTBacchus 11:03, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm not drawing battle lines, I'm pointing out that we are under a sustained attack. We should disengage - and so should they. That is exactly what I'm advocating: I am saying that active participation on WR right now is not compatible with being a good Misplaced Pages. This is not to say it was not in the past or will not be again. Dan fundamentally misunderstands me on this; it's not about links being added to Misplaced Pages (there are very few being added anyway), it's about what WR is doing and saying "OK, if that's how you feel, you can get along without me". The past and present behaviour of the influential posters at WR is an important part of this. Jonathan Barber is a persistent, manipulative vanity spammer with a huge grudge and he misled Alkivar, to the point of losing him his sysop bit. This is not attacking Barber, it is stating a documented fact. That is the kind of person we are dealing with, and I contend that the best way of dealing with people like that is not to try and engage them, because lengthy experience shows that he does not actually want the same thing out of this project that we do. When you have somebody who fundamentally does want the same thing but does it in a clumsy or inarticulate way, you can work with them. It's the difference between Giano and JB196. Guy (Help!) 14:33, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

So... you believe it's impossible to participate at WR and be a good Wikipedian... what do you want to do about that? Anything beyond your encyclopedic job of reverting bad edits and blocking disruptive users? Am I suggesting engaging them? What exactly are we talking about here? -GTBacchus 20:23, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• Update: Here's a great example of what I mean: Durova's talk page. Banned editor Gregory Kohs has outed anonymous contributions to a newsletter, and then tried to insinuate that simply writing to SEO people on how not to be spammers is a conflict of interest. It's a bizarre notion. Durova is not paid for this, it's done in order to try to prevent a problem instead of having to spend a lot of time fixing it. And maybe it's levelling the playing field, preventing a few smart SEOs from getting away with something their competitors can't. Peple have fallen for Kohs' line. Kohs is a charming fellow, and very plausible. So people fall for something that's not only not true, it's specifically designed to undermine an admin and at the same time excuse what Kohs did that was wrong, which was blatantly conflicted editing - "if Duriva can do it then why not me?". But Durova has never, to my knowledge, edited for pay. She is, however, one of the most effective rooters-out of abuse on the entire project, and having Durova weakened would be of incalculable benefit to a small group of banned users whose MO she knows well and identifies rapidly and repeatably. Guy (Help!) 17:52, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Guy, now you are the one being "sucked in". Please don't contribute to the meme that there is something wrong with being paid to write or lecture about wikipedia. Durova's activities whether paid or not do not constitue a COI. Her activities both in writing about Misplaced Pages and in fighting to help wikipedia at wikipedia (including editing our COI policy, if she has done so) are beneficial to wikipedia and there is no conflict of interest there. She should get paid for her efforts outside of wikipedia; and I hope she does. You are aware that 20,000 dollars are going to be paid to Wikipedians for creating copy-left copyrighted illustrations for WikiMedia/Wikipedia, right? WAS 4.250 21:02, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Anonymous IP constantly reverting changes

Hello;

I was going through AN/I and saw your posts in a few different topics, which leads me to believe you are there a fair bit. Would you mind taking a brief look at WP:AN/I#Nonconstructive reverts and edits to ancestry templates by IP address 24.57.196.130? It seems to be getting very little attention. Thank you! Charles 00:07, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Hi Guy, there is another user doing the exact same thing after I make changes. I think this user is the same person as the anonymous IP address, or a meatpuppet. He or she is following the changes to the ancestry templates and switching them back. I've posted about it again, same link as above. Thanks for swiftly dealing with it earlier! Charles 22:29, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

FYI

"unlike them, we are not invading the others' territory or harassing them in real life"

Guy, you said "unlike them, we are not invading the others' territory or harassing them in real life". Perhaps this merely indicates a broad brush distinction between the best of Misplaced Pages and the worst of WR; if so, then I agree. But I think it represents a lack of knowledge on your part with the actual stated beliefs and stated experiences of people at WR who have expressed exactly what they wish to change at Misplaced Pages and why.

A few are dismiss-able as people who simply wish to push a POV: experts who think we should publish OR, the delusional who think we should publish the "truth" as only they know it, non-notables who are trying to be noticed, people and organizations that want us to carry their spin on the facts for profit-enhancing reasons. This category I'm sure you know all about.

Even more show up there (and then usually leave after a while) who felt deeply hurt emotionally by their experiences of how they were treated at wikipedia: rudeness; deletion of well intentioned hard work; outright incivility; being inaccurately accused of being a sock; being talked down to; being officiously handled with templates and unintelligible jargon. These largely feel betrayed and angry over being asked to edit and contribute to a 💕 that anyone can edit and finding themselves emotionally attacked and abused and accused of things they don't even understand. Some want to get even. Guy, some of us are worried that in "doing battle" with the POV pushers, wikipedia creates even more enemies who just want to get even for how emotionally hurt they were made to feel.

The last class who are organizing there to change or destroy wikipedia is they class that I find makes WR worth reading as I believe they have an intellectually interesting set of arguments - each of which has evidences for and against - some of which are so valid as to have been made official policy here and recommended to be made policy on other WikiMedia projects. This last class of people find Misplaced Pages to have significant real world effects and believe those effects to have such potential for good or evil that it needs to be improved or destroyed.

1. WP:BLP I started this policy proposal because of a comment that Brandt made. Misplaced Pages is better off now that we recognize the real world effects we can have on living people.
2. Some argue BLP does not go far enough. There is a lot of talk on WR about how to improve BLP; allowing people to "opt-out" is popular there. (I disagree with opt-out; but it is an interesting proposition.)
3. Changing laws to make Misplaced Pages to be a publisher rather than a service provider s that it is accountable for its content. Guy, this is serious talk about what laws our democracy should make to provide better accountability on the web. That guy Misplaced Pages said was suspected of being part of the JFK assassination promotes this opinion. (I disagree, bit it is an intellectually respectable argument.)
4. In service of trying to make Misplaced Pages to be a publisher legally speaking; there are a variety of schemes afoot at WR. Brandt backs ones more based on spreading bad publicity hence his participation in the Essjay affair; while others back fairy brain-dead schemes that amount to little more than vandalism.
5. There are attempts to increase accountability; principally though providing the real life names of administrators. There is a key difference between trying to get someone fired and to do so needing to identify him first and trying to increase accountability through knowing who is doing what. This gets lost in epic battles in which even linking to "the enemy" is verboten. Society has a right to regulate its institutions and WikiMedia is a legal institution that is regulated. The importance of Misplaced Pages means that people outside of our community care about accountability within it - just as you and I care about accountability within, say, the Red Cross. Red Cross volunteers are not allowed to say, "Go away, we self-regulate."
6. Some believe Misplaced Pages is evil and must be destroyed. Nuts, huh? Well, follow the logic here ... (I disagree, by the way, but the point is that the position is not nuts, just wrong.) The idea is that Misplaced Pages and other free-culture products of the copy-left movement are destroying traditional higher-quality expert-based software, books, commentary, newspapers, and encyclopedias. The idea is that the infrastructure for creating these higher quality products is being destroyed along with the careers of those in those industries. A world without reliable encyclopedias, newspapers, and political commentators is painted. I am entirely in favor of copy-left, the free culture movement, Linux, and WikiMedia. But it is important to know that there are people who are scared of our success. Some are even losing their jobs due to the competition of free copy-left products like wikipedia. Losing their jobs. Shoe on the other foot? Can you see now that your claim of ""unlike them, we are not invading the others' territory or harassing them in real life" displays a lack of understanding of what the world looks like through their eyes? WAS 4.250 00:44, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

All this would make sense if Misplaced Pages suppressed dissent (which it doesn't) or if there were no independent forum to discuss what people would like to change (which there is: wikien-l). It's not just that the worst of WR is very bad, the policy and ethos is bad. On Misplaced Pages, harassment and attacks are not acceptable. On WR, they are. What happens on WR is dominated by vendettas a number of people have against those admins who have prevented them from abusing the project. Some of what goes on there is pretty sinister, and the prominence on WR of WordBomb, Looch, Jonny Cache and others ensures that the dominant ethos is one of undermining admins enforcing righteous bans. If Daniel Brandt has an ideological objection to Misplaced Pages that's fine, he's entitled to that view, but we don't need Wikipedians going to his forum, picking up on his ideas, and then coming back here with them. We don't need any more Alkivars. Guy (Help!) 07:50, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Bans aren't "righteous"; they're encyclopedic. Adding a moral color to the issue is probably the worst way we can talk about it. -GTBacchus 11:08, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

The word righteous means morally justified. These bans are morally justified. Justified by policy, and by reference to a conflict of underlying philosophy: our philosophy is a neutral encyclopaedia, theirs is promotion of a certain POV. This is not to disrespect them as people, I happen to think that Brandt, for example, is a clever man. What's a better word for a block which is fully supported by policy, and enacted because of fundamental and irreconcilable differences in philosophy? Guy (Help!) 12:21, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I'd call it "consistent with policy" or "necessary" or "encyclopedic". I would stringently avoid moral language of any kind, around here. Making it out to be about right vs wrong or good vs evil is like wishing for unending drama. All we're doing is boringly writing a reference work. -GTBacchus 20:11, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Political prisoner? In your above comments you make a misstatement (Daniel Brandt is not in charge of Misplaced Pages Review), and you contradict yourself; you say that Misplaced Pages doesn't suppress dissent, and then you advocate restrictions related to WR on the grounds of keeping "Wikipedians going to his forum, picking up on his ideas, and then coming back here with them." In other words, you're explicitly trying to suppress ideas, not just people. *Dan T.* 12:51, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Daniel, Misplaced Pages does not suppress dissent. Neither does Misplaced Pages extend an indefinite license to dissenters. I have not advocated restrictions related to WR on the grounds of keeping "Wikipedians going to his forum, picking up on his ideas, and then coming back here with them.", I have stated that in my view based on the evidence I have seen in the Alkivar arbitration participation on WR right now is incompatible with being a good Wikipedian. Please stop misrepresenting my position and arguments. Guy (Help!) 12:56, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

It may be the case that participating on WR is inconsistent with being a "good Wikipedian", and it may not be the case. Either way, you can't control what people do on the Internet when they're not here. There will be people participating at WR and here; we can't control that, stop it, or wish it away. Trying to do so sounds like a bad idea, just as it's always a bad idea to try to exert control where you can't.

If somebody makes bad edits, then you revert the edits because they're not constructive. If somebody acts disruptively, then you block them for disruption without ever calling them names or saying anything judgmental or insulting about them. I'm still waiting to hear what's insufficient about this approach. Have you addressed this point? -GTBacchus 20:15, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

The Spade

As much as I enjoy wielding and (allegedly) abusing the spade, it distresses me when others use the shovel with impunity. Though I must admit this user has called me much worse than a schizophrenic. Perspicacite 03:13, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Grathwohl

I started the article on a Grathwohl project. I noticed that on the 8th of November you deleted this article. Why exactly is that? You cited a lack of significance, but he is in fact a musician of rather significant claim in his field. He is attending the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University - one of the best music schools in the world - on a full ride scholarship because of the artistic success he's achieved. The article even points out that other respected musicians like John Zorn have praised his work. Avant-garde composers do not often have large followings, but this should not dismiss his legitimacy. Grathwohl is no less obscure or popular than Jandek, yet Jandek is still featured on Misplaced Pages. There are many more fans of Grathwohl than myself who are disappointed to see this wiki article collapse. It would be great if you could reconsider your actions. 149.159.24.28 10:11, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• It was deleted as lacking a credible assertion of notability (notability is not inherited), advertorial, and an end-run around prior deletions through AfD. Grathwohl has been trying to get on Misplaced Pages for a couple of years at least. It was one of the better written adverts, but an advert nonetheless. And yes I do know that avant-garde composers have a tough life; I don't especially like avant-garde music but I have attended enough "world only" performances to realise that it's a career doomed to endless frustration for all but the very lucky few. Guy (Help!) 10:29, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
• I don't have any knowledge of any previous articles about the musician. I only know that I am the original author of the article that just got deleted. And from your response, it seems rather bitter regarding Grathwohl's profession. It really appears that you did not delete this article for the purest of reasons. The bitterness you display towards the young man's profession shows me that you really have no interest in this field of music. However, I'll let you know that many people do, and that these kinds of composers have quite a place in an encyclopedic setting. Also, there was no "advertising" agenda behind this article; I merely wanted to preserve the impact the composer has had (and will have) on the avant-garde music scene. Would you please restore the article and tag it with a revision tag so I can fix whatever problem you have with the article? 156.56.128.102 14:51, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I deleted it for the purest of reasons. I really don't know how you can say I have no interest in the field of music - how many other Wikipedians have their name on the cover of a piece of music by Peter Maxwell Davies? See Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Andrew Grathwohl; also Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Topographical improvising which I just started.

While we're there, though, I saw Acoustiguide in your deleted history - Acoustiguide was, if I recall, the world's first provider of recorded tours, so I have redone that article. If you know more about that firm please do add sources, they are thin on the ground (it's not an area that excites much other than museum press releases). Guy (Help!) 15:32, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

WP:HOTTIE

Haha, you like this one? I was pretty amused. GlassCobra 16:31, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Looks like it's up for MFD. Oh well. GlassCobra 17:57, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Americans only understand humor. Humour passes them by sometimes. Uncyclopedia's {{british}} tag works well in this context.... Guy (Help!) 23:28, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Evasion advice

We have a case of a user who is continually evading his block, due to using alternate (non-static) IP addresses. Is there a way to deal with this besides just waiting for the next sock? - jc37 22:29, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• Same ISP? Would a rangeblock do? Or semi-protection of some articles? Those are the tools we have in the bag here. Guy (Help!) 23:29, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• User:Pastorwayne - See also User:BrownHairedGirl#PW?. - jc37 12:43, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Cladeal1832

RE: Oh c'mon, relax. Not putting profanity. Just changes what you keep changing on me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cladeal832 (talk • contribs) 22:33, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• Under I don't stand you. Guy (Help!) 23:31, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

• This is a response to this. Cladeal is the meatpuppet/sockpupt I posted about at WP:AN/I. He or she is evading the ban of the blocked IP, I believe. Charles 23:58, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Who is the banned editor in this diff?

You removed this post from WP:AN stating in the summary that it was left by a banned user. But, you didn't say who the banned user is in the edit summary. Who is it? Cla68 07:58, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

• The IP was blocked as a sock of MyWIkiBiz, whihc I dn't necessarily believe, but equally the mad theory in respect of Durova and Jehochman has no other known source. Either way, we don't need any more trolling on that subject. Guy (Help!) 10:37, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
  • Durova is acting in ways that benefit Misplaced Pages both here at this site and in real life lectures/columns (whether or not she is paid). Greg has bragged that he was paid to give a lecture on Misplaced Pages's COI policy and I believe he is trying to take out someone he sees as a commercial rival by harassing her until she leaves the market to him. Anyone harassing Durova with innuendo in this manner needs to be dealt with. Durova has a long history of helping Misplaced Pages. Greg has a long history at wikipedia of caring about nothing but money. WAS 4.250 20:46, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Question

Why does this guy mention you in this edit sumary? --Closedmouth 12:44, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

• Thank you for that. The answer is: because he's disrupting Misplaced Pages to make a point and wants to be absolutely certain that everybody knows it. Guy (Help!) 13:23, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
• Trying to hoist Guy by his own petard, it seems... his oft-stated opinion is that there needs to be a draconian purge of anything connected with a banned user, because "banned is banned", so this sockpuppet army is taking him at his word and blanking out a bunch of articles that were largely authored by banned user Jon Awbrey, for disruptive effect. *Dan T.* 13:25, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

See the banning debate, the suspected sock puppets, the proven sockpuppets, and note that the major problem with Awbrey was his insistence on adding original research, followed by endless argumentation and attempts to rewrite policy in order to allow him to continue adding original research despite numerous editors asking him with, steadily increasing firmness, to stop. Awbrey is banned. Things he added before he was banned do not need to be deleted, but having been banned he is banned and should simply go away and leave us alone. This is garden variety WP:POINT stupidity by a banned user who demonstrated at enormous length his complete inability to work with others whose views were different from his own. You seem to think that this stupidity makes him seem more credible and me less so. Forgive me if I disagree absolutely.

If Awbrey wants to contribute to content, he can appeal the ban to ArbCom. It may be that they will convert the ban to a topical ban or editing restriction. Something tells me that he would not respect an editing restriction any more than he respected the request to stop adding original research, but you never know. Feel free to initiate the ArbCom case on his behalf.

And if you would please stop using emotionally loaded terms like "draconian" and "purge" it would be much appreciated. Guy (Help!) 14:10, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

• OK, with due thanks to Awbrey for bringing his original research to our attention (albeit in a disruptive way), I have asked the Philosophy wikiproject to review his articles and assess them for neutrality, potential merging, original research and to add sources where possible. Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Philosophy/To do/Awbrey articles is a list of the articles he identified. Guy (Help!) 16:19, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

New question

Guy, I'm looking for some advice. It may seem like a small thing in the grand scheme of things but it's annoying me, nonetheless. By way of background, there are a number of rare and endangered minnows in the Colorado River basin such as the Humpback chub and the Colorado pikeminnow. The efforts to recover the populations of these fish are, apparently, unpopular with at least one person out there. He's contributing from the ISP Qwest Communications in Denver Colorado. Now, it seems he's on a dynamic IP because most of the almost identical edits are one-hit wonders from slightly different IPs within one or two blocks. As a consequence, I'm forced to wonder whether the several warnings I've given for nearly identical pointy and non-NPOV edits are ever read because the user comes back on a slightly different IP. The IPs I collated without an exhaustive search are: Special:Contributions/70.56.54.39, Special:Contributions/70.56.55.173, Special:Contributions/70.56.59.109, Special:Contributions/70.57.4.112, Special:Contributions/70.57.47.194, Special:Contributions/70.57.57.142, Special:Contributions/70.58.20.124, Special:Contributions/70.58.22.216, Special:Contributions/71.215.89.146, Special:Contributions/71.218.99.55, and Special:Contributions/72.166.224.192. There are probably others but I think you get the drift. Needless to say, the user never actually accumulates enough warnings on any IP to be reported to WP:AIV nor would it likely make any difference because when he next returns it will be from a different IP in any event.

Now, I realise that I can't be the first person to have encountered such a situation so I'm asking if you can advise me as to how one normally deals with something like this. If the answer is to "get a life", well, I can take that, too. But my annoyance is sort of eating at me, if you know what I mean? Comments?— Dave (Talk | contribs) 16:13, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I see you've added semi-protection. That should do it for a while, at least. If I may be so bold, I'd ask that you do the same to the other two pages that are also hit in the same way by the same individual, namely Upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program and Razorback sucker. Oh, and thanks very much for helping. I really appreciate your attention when it's apparent you have much bigger fish to fry than a razorback sucker! :-) — Dave (Talk | contribs) 20:54, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

This is my blunt-instrument fix, please do see if you can engage with the guy and get him to be rational. If there is opposition then we can say so, but only when reliable sources are provided. Guy (Help!) 21:36, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Mentorship

Hey Guy. Not that I want to create more of the wikidrama that led you to semi-retirement but I've replied on WP:AN to your suggestion of having SqueakBox mentor an editor who is unable to keep a cool head when editing child-abuse related articles. Pascal.Tesson 20:37, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Given the indef blocks of XavierVE and DPtersen and that Pol64 is going to go the same way if he doesn't take more care and learn how things are done here I think this is an excellent idea. I have his email address from the mediation and intend to write to him later today. Experienced editors mentoring those without experience who are being problematic is entirely uncontroversial. Thanks, SqueakBox 20:59, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Give SqueakBox a chance, eh? His commitment to the project is not in doubt, and Pol64 should see him as an honest broker. I don't think we'l;l lose anything by giving this a try. Guy (Help!) 21:09, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree, it is certainly better than seeing Pol64 indef blocked or similar. Thanks, SqueakBox 21:25, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Sure, a poorly-chosen mentor is better than no mentor but why not suggest a mentor out of the many active, competent and cool editors of WP:PAW with positive experience in dispute resolution? SqueakBox is active and well-intentioned but few would consider him impartial and level-headed on the PAW articles. Funny thing is that when I started reading the thread on AN, I was thinking: "This Pol64 guy is like the nightmare version of SqueakBox" so I was, ahem, a bit surprised to see you suggest the latter as a mentor. The behavior that Squeak showed in this thread is precisely what we want Pol64 to avoid. And in response to SqueakBox, avoiding an indef block of Pol64 should only be an objective if we think that he can make enough positive contributions to the project. As far as I understand this is currently not the case and there is doubt that this can ever be the case. If Pol64 cannot be an editor without being a crusader, then I'm afraid Misplaced Pages is not the place for him. Pascal.Tesson 21:28, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Because Squeak is British, not a teenager, and has trodden the same path himself. I think he'll help Pol64 to start along the right path. Nobody is saying this should be the only influence, but where Pol64 is right now, I think Squeak will be able to reach him and help him where others may not be able to. If anyone else feels motivated to help as well then they are free to pitch in. Guy (Help!) 21:40, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Is that an invitation for me to help out? :-) Thanks but no thanks. The PAW articles are minefields and although I have deep admiration for those willing to contribute there, I'm certainly not going to go back there and take all the crap I got when I did my tour of duty. But in many ways, this is also why I think we should really consider just giving up on users like Pol64. I think we're doing a relatively good job of throwing out the "man-boy love" whacks (recurrent sockpuppets notwithstanding) but if we look at this from a purely pragmatic perspective, crusaders on any side of an issue should just be invited to find a new hobby. We're not an editing school and if Pol64 is poisoning the already poisoned atmosphere on these talk pages, there's no sense in wasting time and effort to show him the light: the project will be better served by showing him the door. Pascal.Tesson 22:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

IMO if he should go then so should others, such as HolokittyNX, but I think we should bend over backwards to give newer users a chance to conform to how things are done here. What harm can it do?. Thanks, SqueakBox 22:09, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

As I said, I do not wish to go out patrolling PAW but there are admins willing to do so. Anyone contributing to flame wars should be told in no uncertain terms to stop, no matter what side of the issues they stand on. And this is not about fairness or "if you block one of my guys, then block one of their guys", the important thing is to make sure that those who are contributing to these discussions are calm and composed enough to control the heat level. It's important not to bite newbies, it's equally important to recognize that articles about extremely contentious topics such as pedophilia are not an ideal place for newbies to start out. You can't walk an elephant into a porcelain shop and go "aw shucks, he broke a vase". Pascal.Tesson 22:23, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Excuse me for butting into this discussion, but allow me to say that while Squeakbox and I are often on the opposite of disputes, I consider him to be an excellent editor in good standing. In fact, several articles he edits are on my watchlist, and he is one of the few editors whose name brings a sense of relief when it appears. I think Squeakbox could do an excellent job in this situation. Jeffpw 22:15, 13 November 2007 (UTC)