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Another instance of a hatchet job by "insiders" on the unsuspecting

If you would like to see what sort of hatchet job can be done by Misplaced Pages "insiders" on unsuspecting "outsiders" who happen to stumble upon bogus articles concerning their field of expertise, have a look at the recent AfD discussion: http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Myrzakulov_equations_%282nd_nomination%29

Carefully read, the history of the event should be pretty clear, although this is only the end result as it appears after numerous deletions and other manipulations by User: Cheeser1, involving contributions to the debate that had been provided by well-meaning and well-qualified "outsiders" who had only their expertise in the subject to offer, but no Misplaced Pages experience, skills or history. The criticism by the shocked Nominator for Deletion of how the debate was proceeding: by bullying, unauthorized deletions of valid comments of experts; false accusations of "sock-puppetry" and every other dishonest manipulative technique in the book were systematically deleted, re-ordered, and scrambled by User: Cheeser1, who seemed well-trained and experienced in these skills. All this was witnessed by, and supported by no less than seven Misplaced Pages "administrators", despite the nominator's repeated (unheeded) pleas for assistance. The "talk" page for the AfD , in final form, consists mainly of the attacks by User: Cheeser1 on the nominator's integrity, and that of other experts in the field who had volunteered their opinions. Besides this, there was a "behind the scenes" campaign to impugn the nominator's good intentions, and integrity, on the "adminstrator's notice board" that is now so buried in the innards of this site that it is probably unrecoverable. All of this, needless, to say, was going on till the very end, without the Nominator's knowledge, but with the apparent approval of various "administrators" involved in this "back yard" discussion of tactics and process.

In the end, the debate was cut off without the Nominator being given the opportunity to make the summary of his argument for deletion, which had been announced since the very beginning of the discussion. Instead - perhaps more appropriately, given the circus that had been created by User: Cheeser1 - and blamed by him, and others, upon the nominator - the last words were those of the author of the AfD article, who called upon God to support her in her cause, since she had been under attack previously by the "Russians" and had already endured two wars!

I was the Nominator for Deletion of the article, and I know of no "Russians" to have taken any part in the debate, but Iearned a great deal about Misplaced Pages from the experience. More generally, I learned much about the sinister consequences of anonymity combined with aggressive instincts, and ignorance. I immediately deleted my user acccount, and have no intention of making further contributions to Misplaced Pages that would expose me to the machinations and dishonesty of such experienced "insiders", whose skills and aggressions seem to have been honed mainly by playing out fictional battles in video games.24.202.238.172 (talk) 13:23, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Replies and Comments

Previous AN/I discussions have been recovered from the innards for any interested (1, 2) --Onorem♠Dil 13:31, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

(EC) Although you are logged out, you have identified yourself as User:R Physicist. It appears that you are disappointed by the results at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Myrzakulov equations (2nd nomination). Much of the chaos there appears to have been caused by your tactics, which had a very disruptive effect. Rather than blaming others, I suggest you look at your own actions, hear the feedback that others have provided, and think about better strategies for the future. No administrative action is required at this time. Jehochman 13:32, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

I see no "attacks" and only see your disruptive editing styles and practices. What administrative action is required here? seicer | talk | contribs 13:43, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

After making the above comment I noticed that R Physicist has exercised the right to vanish. That right does not include returning as an IP to take pot shots at content adversaries. Perhaps we should block this IP for a while to aid the user in vanishing. Jehochman 13:46, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

The IP address is now taking a much needed one-week vacation. seicer | talk | contribs 13:52, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Wait. I'm confused. If someone exercises the right to vanish, does that mean we block them automatically if they return? I don't see that anywhere here or on meta. --Relata refero (disp.) 14:25, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

No, but if they return only to disrupt and accuse other editors of crap, then yes. You can't exercise your right to vanish, then return and abuse the process and try to hide. seicer | talk | contribs 14:32, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

How does identifying himself as the moderator mean he's trying to hide?

Has he made this point elsewhere? If not, how does reporting something at AN/I count as disruption? He's reported it, other people can express their disagreement, we don't have to then block the IP, particularly not saying "much needed vacation." Would you rather he went off to Misplaced Pages Review? --Relata refero (disp.) 14:37, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Inappropriate block - he's not banned, and I don't see what's disruptive about this section. --Random832 (contribs) 15:15, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Seconded, after an initial statement of 'no admin action required' and without further warning an questionable admin action. It also raises the question if we want to hear feedback ourselves or just give that advice to others.--Tikiwont (talk) 15:23, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Wow, that was just a terrible, terrible, terrible block. Simply shameful. You probably can't begin to imagine how bad that looked to an ordinary user such as a myself. It certainly did far more harm than either simply directing him to the PUMP or genuinely considering his criticism, constructively responding to it, and thanking him for his contributions. My hat is off to the admins who disagreed. Jpmonroe (talk) 00:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• I watched that AFD and it seemed to me that User: Cheeser1's interference with the communications of User:R Physicist was too uncivil and bitey. User: Cheeser1 subsequently removed a 3RR warning that I placed on the talk page of another inexperienced editor involved in this fracas. User: Cheeser1 seems to think he can amend the comments of others as he pleases. This seems disruptive since, if we are unable to communicate, then much confusion and frustration will result. It seems apparent that User:R Physicist is still boiling with rage about his treatment here and, as he seems to be a senior academic, this seems a poor outcome for this project. Colonel Warden (talk) 14:53, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

• "I think we really need to much more strongly insist on a pleasant work environment and ask people quite firmly not to engage in that kind of sniping and confrontational behavior. We also need to be very careful about the general mindset of "Yeah, he's a jerk but he does good work". The problem is when people act like that, they cause a lot of extra headache for a lot of people and drive away good people who don't feel like dealing with it. Those are the unseen consequences that we need to keep in mind." That quote, by Jimbo himself, adequately explains that just because he is a "senior academic," that does not excuse his poor behavior. I'd rather see a lot of diligent, polite editors who may not be as "intelligent" than one "intelligent" editor driving away many or causing disruption. seicer | talk | contribs 14:59, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

• Both Cheeser1 and R Physicist behaved poorly. The latter should have been extended more courtesy since he is new here - this is the point of WP:BITE. I suppose that there are technically better ways of dealing with someone who is too prolix, e.g. condensing their comments into a show/hide toggle. I'm not sure how to do this technically myself. The technical details of this place require a huge learning curve aand this is especially true of forum-type threads which the software seems to support poorly. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:07, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

  They're not the only ones who behaved poorly - "Ngn" - who appears to have a conflict of interest - really _was_ making implications that the attempt to have it deleted was some kind of russian conspiracy. --Random832 (contribs) 15:23, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

  Oh, CW, your laziness belies your disingenuity. If you'd bothered to look at what ACTUALLY happened here, you'd have realized that instead of doing things that you can oh-so-justly criticise me for (mister has-previous-undisclosed-disputes-with-cheeser), you would have noticed that I was doing EXACTLY WHAT YOU SUGGESTED. Apparently, by doing so, something you suggest but are incapable of doing, I garner harsh criticism from you. Pathetic. --Cheeser1 (talk) 01:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• (ec)Quite so. That's no reason to drive him away, however. I too watched that AfD, and found it extremely confusing, but with inappropriateness on both sides. We aren't supposed to be pushing experts away, we should go the extra mile to keep them. On the one hand we tolerate enormous rudeness in areas where we believe anti-science editors have to kept in line, and on the other hand this... Not good. Incidentally, who has been driven away by User:R Physicist?

I note also my concerns above are still unanswered. --Relata refero (disp.) 15:10, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

Seicer's comment appears well-intentioned, but more concern with consequence and the darker side of human motivation seems necessary. From my perspective, User: Cheeser1 behavior just gets winks or is at least ignored by otherwise respectable math/science editors. MIT's current User:Stevenj and MIT's former User:Michael Hardy are good examples of such math/science editors who engage in debates with Cheeser, who never, ever tell Cheeser to stop. To me, Jonson's and Hardy's silence on User:Cheeser1 amounts to him or her being a teacher's pet sanctioned bully of theirs. --Firefly322 (talk) 15:19, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

If they have exercised their right to vanish, then return, they have waived the right to vanish, and the User and Talk pages should be restored. Corvus cornix_talk 17:16, 11 April 2008 (UTC)

The new user did a number of things in a way which he apparently did not realise did not fit our practices. People tried to guide him, and he unfortunately thought his ways were better, and ignored the initial guiding. Then a few people came down a lot to hard to stop the incipient disruption, and did so with such a heavy hand as to cause a great deal more disruption. The experienced people here have the responsibility of knowing when to use discretion. I don't think all of them used it, and this turned the simple matter of discussing the article into the much more complex one of how we treat people. Some of our ways do look a little unforgiving under scrutiny by those not accustomed to us. DGG (talk) 07:58, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

What are 'our' practices. It turns out this guy is a prize-winning physicist, has 200 articles to his name, and leads a respected research institute. The article he wanted deleted was a piece of cruft by a student. Now some nutcase (Seicer) has blocked him with the words "The IP address is now taking a much needed one-week vacation." This may turn out interesting. So what actually are 'our practices'? The points he made in the AfD were actually quite good and coherent. A little pointed, and he made some admins look foolish (as indeed they were). The Rationalist (talk) 15:03, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

It does not help to call other users "nutcases." but as for me, perhaps you didn't notice I was--though more gently--telling the admin involved that he did it wrong? DGG (talk) 21:00, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

It can often help to call people nutcases if that is the case. I agree you were 'gently' telling the admin he was wrong. Sometimes it helps to say it in a way that is not so gentle. I don't see him apologising yet. The Rationalist (talk) 14:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I am quite dismayed at how we have handled and continue to handle this one. I might be somewhat neutral about whether this poorly written article should be kept or not, but I think we were not very welcoming to a newbie. And given that WP:BITE is such a mantra around here, why was it not applied in this case? Wow.--Filll (talk) 15:39, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd like to put in my broad agreement with the sentiments of the last few comments. This was a serious loss to article quality, and one made worse by the fact that a valuable person has been sent away thinking that we're a bunch of nutcases. An all-round failure. I'd say an apology on both R Physicist and the IP's talkpage would be a good idea. --Relata refero (disp.) 15:44, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I so agree. A little more careful work should have been done on the article (rather than Googling references to the paper), a little more attention to the professor's arguments (which were good) and a little less obsession with the strange process that constitutes 'AfD'. We should truly be ashamed. And Seicer should apologise for the remarks made in the block comment. Unforgiveable. 86.133.181.100 (talk) 15:45, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks to all of the people complaining about me here for notifying me! I'm not even going to comment on this absurdity. R physicist DESTROYED that AfD with rants, soapboxing, personal attacks, etc. I tried to clean it up, and got scapegoated for my trouble. Everyone laments, after the fact, that nobody stepped in, fixed it, kept things in line, well that's why - clearly, trying to do so makes you the subject of absurd, frivolous retribution like this from people like R physicist. Weeks after the fact, and now he's back to pick at that same bone one more time. Let's not point out that I took extensive and often unreasonable measures to demonstrate to R physicist that I was attempting to clean up the AfD and keep it streamlined - trying to keep the process rolling, a process that he was trying to use, but failing miserably in letting it run its course. And of course, I did vote delete, so I can't even comprehend what would make him so upset, considering I agreed with him on the only thing he's done on Misplaced Pages. --Cheeser1 (talk) 21:09, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd say that Cheeser1 went too far, but not far too far, and completely understandably. Several people, including Cheeser1, tried to explain to R Physicist that he wasn't following the conventional form of AfD, and that AfD was in no case the place for fundamental debates on the nature of wikipedia. R Physicist responded to this by doing those things more. The AfD was closed as a train wreck largely because of the disruption of process from R Phycisist, and while being new would excuse any mistakes that happened before he was told they were mistakes, they don't excuse the snotty behaviour on being told that they're mistakes, or continuing to make them. While losing an "expert" might be a bad thing, losing someone who can't listen to the community trying to guide them and help them isn't. SamBC(talk) 10:08, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

So he wasn't following the "conventional" form. So what? The day we block a genuine expert giving us the benefit of his opinion on an issue he feels strongly about in a discussion on how to handle that issue on-WP was a sad day for the project. And I think we need to note that not following the "conventional form" of an process we invented for ourselves is hardly "a mistake". I know that if I came here to try and correct an error that I saw in something I was an expert on, had never edited before, and kept on being told that I was indenting incorrectly or that my general remarks on the misapplication of notability are unwelcome "mistakes", I would hardly appreciate it. And its not just losing an expert that's a bad thing, its pissing him off in the process. --Relata refero (disp.) 10:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

May I second that: And I think we need to note that not following the "conventional form" of an process we invented for ourselves is hardly "a mistake". . The mistake was to lose a potentially valuable contributor to the project. Who is going to put their hand up for that? The Rationalist (talk) 14:22, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

If the secretary general of the UN, the president of the USA, or queen of England came here, they'd be expected to follow community guidance and follow procedures that we've worked out. When a user is told, politely, that they're doing something incorrectly or in the wrong place, their reaction shouldn't be to argue about that as well. If a user hasn't the humility to accept such feedback, I'm really not convinced that they'd be a valuable contributor if they stayed. It's sad, and I wish they could've been a valuable contributor, but a valuable contributor who insists on eveything being done their way is something of a contradiction. The way that AFD was closed indicates why it's good to stick to the process and form we're used to; so that admins can easily discern consensus. It's also a matter of things being on-topic or not. Now, I'd be more than happy to see the wide-ranging issues brought up in that debate debated in a more appropriate venue, some of them are things that probably need a good discussion about them, but that wasn't the place for it, for many reasons. SamBC(talk) 14:40, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Look, the bottom line is that a prize-winning physicist has been shown the door from Misplaced Pages by a 21 year old student, for remarks that weren't particularly impolite and for some contributions that were informed and valuable. His remarks weren't very well understand (lots of point-missing and the like). That is a bad thing and should perhaps cause us to question how good our process is. It was after all something put together by amateurs and still has an amateur feel. You say The way that AFD was closed indicates why it's good to stick to the process - sorry, what is your point here? And you say If a user hasn't the humility to accept such feedback, I'm really not convinced that they'd be a valuable contributor if they stayed. - perhaps we should have the humility to understand that a 'process' that has had this particular result is deeply flawed, and should be evaluated again. Also, if the Secretary general or Queen of England did come here I hope someone would have the good sense to show a little tact and diplomacy and make whatever capital could be made out of it. This particular incident, by contrast, makes us look like idiots. The Rationalist (talk) 14:53, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• This from someone at my old university. Also noticeable that the major author of the article appears to be a co-author of the original papers proposing these equations, but I guess that's been debated. Guy (Help!) 22:47, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Comments by other Users

I have reviewed the AfD. R Physicist argues politely and cogently throughout, his only "crime" being ignorance of our AfD standard operating procedure. Cheeser1 refers to R Physicists comments as ""wackopedia" essays", "your rants and polemical essays", "A pathetic display", "R Physicist has so throughly disrupted this discussion", "coming from the guy who has no freaking clue how AfDs work, let's just pretend you didn't open your mouth and make yourself look even more foolish." Our response? A pat on the back for Cheeser1, and a block on R Physicist! I am disgusted. Hesperian 01:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I couldn't agree more with Hesperian, Rationalist and some of the other recent remarks. I've been struck with the contrast between how this physicist was treated and another case on this page, where administrators and editors discussed and debated for days whether another newcomer's blatantly anti-Semitic and racist remarks were "uncivil" enough to warrant a block. I'm beyond disgusted, I'm fed up. Woonpton (talk) 01:58, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and unblocked the IP based on the apparent consensus here. Now, back to the substance. What drew my attention to this thread was the inflammatory heading. We really need to educate newcomers that using excessively strident rhetoric does not go over well with our community. Hmmm. We may need to educate some of the regulars as well. What else needs to be done here? Jehochman 01:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

What else needs to be done? Well, instead of blaming the newcomer, it might be more appropriate a few old-timers would educate themselves on WP:BLOCK and WP:BITE. This was just a completely inexcusable farce of a reaction, yet you think the "substance" is that a newbie displayed some emotion? It took 3 days to overturn that block? It's beyond pathetic; it's absurd. But, since I have expressed my opinion "stridently" please feel free to block me for disruption. Jpmonroe (talk) 03:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Did you even READ the AfD? You see the little box there? You can what he wrote. Read it, then read WP:SOAP. Okay? It wasn't "displaying a little emotion" - it was systematic, repeated disruption of an AfD, based on non-valid AfD rationales, delusions of self-expertise outweighing our guiding principles, and a complete lack of respect for how AfDs are conducted and how consensus is built. And it was done over the explicit objection of several people involved - those who had participated in the AfD tried to stop it, by asking him to stop and by removing comments that were unproductive and/or irrelevant to the AfD. People outside the AfD began to ask "why is this a horrible fucking wreck?" to which the answer is squarely and unequivocally "because R physicist will not let anyone clean it up or make it manageable." Is it my fault that his reaction to standard AfD practice - removing inappropriate comments to the talk page, labeling SPAs, etc - was so terrible? It was his reaction. I'm not responsible for that. WP:BITE doesn't cover "don't do normal things to the newcomers that make them mad." --Cheeser1 (talk) 13:32, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hesperian, since you clearly haven't read any of our friends, umm... works of prose, let's drop one right here so none of you have the excuse of "oops I didn't check the history!" How's that? I hate to invoke WP:SPADE, but if his polemical anti-Misplaced Pages essay, which he dropped in the middle of an ongoing AfD, is titled "Misplaced Pages or Wackopedia" - can you honestly muster the cajones to bitch at me for using the term "Wackopedia"? Seriously? --Cheeser1 (talk) 01:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I do not think that screed was helpful in the AfD discussion. Perhaps this editor has such strong feelings about the subject matter that an online collaborative project is not the right hobby for them. Jehochman 02:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Don't say that! You will chase a way an EXPERT! God knows, if anybody should be disrupting Wikipeidia, it's expert physicists with nothing but contempt for Wikipeidia! Or wait, according to Hesperian, I got a pat on the back. Hesperian, please point out where my pat on the back was, because between ANI complaints against me, insults, and condescending, do-nothing criticism from people who ought to have stepped in, I must have missed the pat on the back. --Cheeser1 (talk) 02:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I thought the rant was pretty good value, and it comes at a point when RP's patience had clearly been exhausted. His point from the beginning was that the article was a piece of cruft that was not notable. Everyone else ignored this, because they didn't understand the mathematics, nor the surrounding subject.

Before this, he made some very cogent points. For example, some people objected that a Google search showed the equations had been mentioned. RP correctly replied A great deal gets published in this field, and not all of it is of the first calibre. The fact that an author has published some papers in respectable journals is certainly not an adequate reason to have a wikipaedia article devoted to them, or to identfy them by the author's name as though this were common usage, and as if the equations had some established importance. and Work of genuine notability is, sooner or later, recognized within the expert community on its own merits, and not by such primitive self-promotional devices as enshrining them in a wikipaedia article that consists of little more than a listing of obscure equations to which the author has attached his own name and a number.

This is a good point. Previously we have allowed articles as long as they appear to have some scholarly content, and can be referenced in the literature. As RP cogently points out, any notability criterion has to reflect whether the scientific community thinks it notable.

It did not help that Cheeser accuses him of ranting. Which he was generally not. Ranting is going on in some tendentious and repetitive and generally incoherent way. RP's comments were 95% cogent and helpful. He has raised some very good points like the one above (how do we recognise the notability of academic work, how do we prevent self-promotion of academic's own works in Misplaced Pages, and so on. The Rationalist (talk) 06:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I also just noticed the 'Wackipedia' blog comment that Guy linked to above. All the points there are cogent, they deeply challenge our ways of working, and we should think about them. The blog is signed by 'Harnad', who is of course the prize-winning physicist R Physicist who was recently evicted from Misplaced Pages for supposedly uncivil remarks. And as Guy correctly points out, the main author of the AfD article appears to be a co-author of the original papers proposing these equations. Obvious self-promotion. Guy says 'I suppose that has been debated'. Well R Ph pointed this out early on, and then immediately got accused of a COI. That's when he really got mad. The Rationalist (talk) 06:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

We really need to educate newcomers that using excessively strident rhetoric does not go over well with our community. - I sense irony here. The Rationalist (talk) 06:36, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

My mistake. The author of the blog post is in fact Stevan Harnad, a Hungarian-born cognitive scientist, who is in fact the brother of John Harnad who is the prize-winning physicist summarily evicted from Misplaced Pages for 'ranting'. Also I see that they both seem to have done work with the eminent logician Peter Suber, who is also a WMF board member. This is getting really interesting. The Rationalist (talk) 06:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Response to the above by "R Physicist"

First of all, I would like to acknowledge the supportive response expressed by a large majority of those who posted their opinions above and the indignation at the abuse of administrators' powers by Seicer and Jehochman. (I only wish that that those expressing these opinions had also been there to express their views while the AfD discussion was going on. And most importantly, that just ONE administrator at least had stepped in to halt the abuses that were being perpetrated throughout the process by our friend User: Cheeser1, who has here returned to try once again to justify his conduct. Perhaps User: Cheeser1 thought that it would be safe to do so, and to sow some further confusion, because he could not be contradicted once again, now that I was "banned" from expressing myself within this forum.)

It is painful to return to the "scene of the crime" - and I had no desire or intention to do so. (A decision made easy by the additional fact of having been blocked from saying anything further within this forum). But, in fairness, I think that the above version of my "rant" (using our above friend's typically offensive terminology), which was extracted out of context, and displayed as though it had been the final version of what appears in the record, should be compared with what actually appears, which was modified after some of the anger that had been engendered by User: Cheeser1's abusive remarks (not to me, but to another highly qualified contributor to the debate) had subsided.

Now, admittedly, this was still a pretty angry statement, but to make clear what had provoked this degree of anger, let me fill in the immediately preceding remarks by our above friend User: Cheeser1. A very pertinent exchange took place between the author of the article under consideration for deletion and a physicist with considerable expertise in the field, who had identified himself under the user name "Proscience", and provided information on his user page that he was a researcher at a major U.S. Laboratory. It was carefully pointed out by him why the equations that formed the basis of the article did not merit the recognition that had been given by the author of the article. These two discussants, who were addressing the core of the issue, were then subjected to the following insulting sequence of remarks by User: Cheeser1, made more sinister by the interposed remark of "administrator" Scarian. These attacks were enough to make User: Proscience decide to withdraw completely from the debate. Shortly thereafter, he closed his "user" account.

"This is a fairly rude response that doesn't even have much to do with the matter at hand. This is a deletion discussion. Please confine your contributions here (which are, indeed, your only contributions) to the matter at hand. --Cheeser1 (talk) 21:28, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

Note to closing admin - User:Proscience is a new account. Possibly suspicious. Scarian 21:53, 22 March 2008 (UTC)

This and others duly noted on talk page. --Cheeser1 (talk) 22:01, 22 March 2008 (UTC) "

Then, after a further brief scientific exchange between the same pair of discussants (who at least knew the subject they were talking about), there came the following:

"Stop it now. Both of you. You've made your points in this AfD. Cut the side-commentary/bickering. --Cheeser1 (talk) 00:20, 23 March 2008 (UTC)"

I don't know what standards of courtesy and civility are required in the "Misplaced Pages rulebook" for good behaviour. But by the standards of civility in normal society, the above would be regarded as plentiful reason for outrage. Who is speaking here, in this rude and arrogant and peremptory way, referring to the remarks of an accomplished researcher in physics as "your only contributions", ordering the author of the article under discussion and this highly qualified expert to cease their discussion, while hiding behind this absurd masque of anonymity?

It is no use rehearsing the other insults and abuses that had been thus far, and were subsequently, hurled against the Nominator and others who shared his views within this debate, and a waste of time to do so, since those so inclined are unlikely to change their ways. (It is certainly not all evident from the much manipulated, and partly repaired record of the debate that is now available for viewing; but no-one would like to reconstruct the unseemly details from the fragments.) It should be mentioned however that, prior to this, and subsequent to the introductory rationale for deletion, the above exchange had been the ONLY detailed discussion of the topic at hand that had yet occurred between two people who knew what the issue was actually about. The rest mainly consisted of: 1) accusations of "bad faith" against the Nominator (myself) by "administrator" User: Jerry - purely on the grounds that he didn't agree with the rationale for making the deletion nomination, followed by a remark that he was the administrator who had closed a previous AfD about this article (presumably, so we could all fully appreciate his importance); 2) A detailed listing of the edit history and origins of the article, in reply to a request by administrator User: Michael Hardy for evidence of COI; 3) A gratuitous "in principal" attack on the very idea that "expert opinion" was of any use to Misplaced Pages, again by administrator User: Jerry (in which I took no part, but learned a great deal). Notable quote:

"Experts should go off somewhere and be experts, and common, normal, ordinary, non-special, everyday, average wikipedians should build wikipedia."

and 4) a "head count" of those in favor of "delete" or "keep", with opinions registered mainly by those who openly admitted to not having read the article, or being able to comprehend its contents.

User:Cheeser1 spent most of the remainder of the debate alternately erasing, hiding, altering and displacing my contributions, as well as those of User: Proscience while simultaneously trying to undermine the legitimacy of votes for delete by unsubstantiated accusations of "sockpuppetry", Russian conspiracies, etc. in an effort to throw into question all remarks by people who were actually qualified to comment on the scientific merits of the case. He finally had the "satisfaction" of discovering that, in fact, two of these experts, both highly trained physicists with pertinent knowledge of the subject, "Proscience" and User: Antignom were in fact husband and wife, and hence necessarily held the same opinions on scientific matters, and could be dismissed as forming a dishonest conspiracy.

The icing on the cake was the closing administrator's discussion, in which User:Cheeser1 was included, without the Nominator ever being informed. User:Sambc concluded that User:Cheeser1's action's which included: removing, collapsing, displacing and re-ordering both the Nominator's and other participants input at least eight times, while hurling countless insulting epithets at the Nominator and at other well-qualified participants, were "perfectly reasonable", while the Nominator, in labelling this conduct "vandalism" and restoring these and other unauthorized deletions and machinations to their original locations was "behaving unreasonably". User:Sambc also opined that the Nominator was guilty of having made a "very uncivil and inappropriate original submission to AfD". Administrator User:Hersfold (mis)counted the 12 votes for delete as 10, and dismissed 5 of these purely on the grounds of User: Cheeser1's verifiably false accusations, and also miscounted the 11 keep votes as 9, while ruling them all valid. Two of the most strongly tendentious participants in the debate User:Cheeser1 and User:benjiboi (neither one an administrator) were included in the closing debate as though they had been there as neutral commentators. All present decided that the debate had been derailed, apparently accepting User: Cheeser1, User:benjiboi and User:Sambc's assertion that this was largely due to the Nominator's disruptive conduct, and agreed that it be closed as "Trainwreck/inconclusive"". The closing administrator User: TravisTX concurred, and cut it off with the author's appeal to the Almighty to intervene on her behalf, without giving the Nominator a chance to give the summary that had been promised since the first day of the discussion.

Two weeks after the drama had a chance to subside, I thought: "Perhaps this was just a statistical aberration. After all, only about thirty "users" (including some ten "administrators") plus three or four "outsiders" had taken part. Maybe I should make a final posting at the "Administrator's Notice Board / Incidents" to call other Misplaced Pages "regulars'" attention to what had occurred, and see the reaction." Within 29 mins. of doing so, I was blocked by administrators User:Seicer and User: Jehochman from further expression at Misplaced Pages, and treated to a couple of gratuitous taunting remarks in parting.

Conclusions

The case is now over. The evidence is in, the closing arguments have been made, and the judgment is clear.

The modern notion of Encyclopaedia was a product of the Enlightenment and intended as an educational vehicle to raise the level of the masses. The Encyclopaedists included some of the greatest thinkers of their time. They valued, above all: knowledge, understanding, truth. The "scientific method" was based upon the same foundations: empirical knowledge, verifiability and careful reasoning. These were the ideals of the Enlightenment , together with a belief in justice in society.

Misplaced Pages is an embodiment of the opposite. It is a return to the Dark Ages, with an element of chaos that is greatly enhanced by the mass communications tools available in the internet. It involves a reduction of all genuine achievements to parity with the very basest, most primitive notions of the ignorant and undereducated. The encyclopaedists would never have proposed that their work be an equal collaboration of the ignorant and the educated. It was to be a vehicle for raising the former from their ignorance by making the most valuable achievements of human endeavor available to all.

Misplaced Pages, on the contrary, is the enshrinement of contempt for learning, knowledge and expertise. It is, for many, a diversionary hobby to which they are prepared to devote a great portion of their time, as others do to computer based video games. Unfortunately, it has led also to an inner cult, shrouded in anonymity, with structures and processes of self-regulation that are woefully inadequate. Many of these tools and procedures are reminiscent, in parody, of those of the Inquisition: secret courts, an inner "elite" arbitrarily empowered to censor and exclude all those perceived as a threat to the adopted conventions of the cult; denunciations, character assassination, excommunication. An arbitrarily concocted "rulebook" and language rife with self-referential sanctimoniousness give a superficial illusion of order and good sense, but no such thing exists in practice.

It is truly a "Tyranny of the Ignorant". 24.202.238.172 (talk) 15:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC) (alias "R Physicist")

Comments on the above

You have pretty much been the only commentator. I gave up trying to follow along your long-winded soapboxing pieces, where you have deliberately kept the thread alive for far longer than it needs to be, so that it's not archived. Perhaps if you can condense your posts and get to the point, others would have voiced in their opinions eons ago. seicer | talk | contribs 21:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

In fact there were, to date, over twenty (20) commentators, most of them making multiple postings, and mainly to protest, with indignation, your actions, which were a clear abuse of administrator's privileges. You were well advised to disappear, as you did, for some time, but ill-advised to return to the discussion if you were incapable of learning something from the comments made, and incapable of making more pertinent or intelligent remarks than these. I understand that you have difficulties understanding the arguments and the issues raised, but perhaps if you try carefully to read through the main points, you may eventually be able to understand better. You might start by reconsidering your own abusive action, and apologizing for it. 24.202.238.172 (talk) 07:16, 16 April 2008 (UTC) (alias "R Physicist")

Well Seicer, you could simply have offered your regrets for escalating the situation with a bad block. But, you chose to offer that gratuituous parting tweak instead. I can see that quite a few people have voiced their opinions, and not one has endorsed your lousy judgement or cowboy actions. R Physicist is not the problem here; no one is forced to read this thread archived or not. However, there is a problem around here — admins making bad blocks (just recently mongo, giano, r physicist) and then getting defensive and snarky instead of gracefully admitting their own error. That said, r physicist should just let it go. I learned long ago that Misplaced Pages is not a place that values or respects expert contributions, so experts should simply steer clear of their subjects or expect incredible aggravation. User:Raymond arritt/Hobbyist has it about right, and this farce is yet another perfect example of the wikipedia worship of form over actual substance. Jpmonroe (talk) 23:52, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:OR, WP:AGF, WP:V, WP:NPoV, WP:N, WP:COI, WP:CIVIL, WP:SMITE. Only kidding. There are notions here we might heed and think about. Thanks for sharing your thoughts so straightforwardly. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:38, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

These are the constructive contributions to the AfD that I oh-so-tyrranically collapsed in a collapse box. God forbid these essays get hidden so that someone could try to read an AfD without getting 7/8 of the page covered in essays about the elite administrators lording over the Wiki with their Dark Age ideals. --Cheeser1 (talk) 16:24, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This is an example of how bonkers/tendentious RP has let things get. That or his newest gigantic essay above. --Cheeser1 (talk) 17:26, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Will you stop already? You're making yourself look more foolish than someone who has posted a long rant on this page. Imagine how much effort that takes.

As for the rant itself, I find it both amusing and interesting, and may put it up on my userpage on days when I am inundated by the ignorant adding nationalist sources published in 1922 to support some absurd irredentist claim. --Relata refero (disp.) 19:10, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Since I'm on my way out of the Wiki, I might as well just be frank. Shut up. Just shut up. This is obviously something you don't care enough to actually consider, and you've clearly already got your agenda about this one decided. You're perfectly happy to chime in and criticise, but you know what, if you came across an AfD as fucked as that one, you probably don't have the brains or courtesy to try to clean it up. I'm sure it makes you really good to advocate for science and experts and all of that, and I'm glad you found such deep philosophical meaning in RP's rants, but ANTI-WIKIPEDIA RANTS DO NOT HAVE AND NEVER HAD ANY PLACE ON AN AFD. WP:SOAP isn't vague - ranting about elite Misplaced Pages administrators using Dark-Age reasoning to dismiss one's expert opinion and destroy science is absolutely not appriate. Fucking up an AfD repeatedly, when people step in and try to fix it, accusing them of being a part of some vast conspiracy to undermine your good name... that's how we work on a collaborative, community-built encyclopedia? I'm glad you've found your bandwagon, but none of that changes the fact that this is simply a SPA, expert or not, who's using the AfD process (and now the ANI) as a forum for unchecked anti-Misplaced Pages rants, and an opportunity to lash out at people that he imagines are attacking his character or destroying science. I will also point out that, for the record, several of the people chiming in on this ANI have had previous undisclosed disputes with me, one of whom (Colonel Warden) actually suggested that I should have done exactly what I did (collapsing RP's long rants to make the AfD manageable), instead of some other horrible thing he has fabricated that I might have done. --Cheeser1 (talk) 19:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

You know, I look at that AfD, and I don't start seeing the rants until after random accusations of CoI and collapsing of discussion...

Anyway, how hard is it anyway to say "sure, perhaps I over-reacted"? Presumably harder than to type that last little -er- rant. --Relata refero (disp.) 21:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Because no one has said I over-reacted. No, I have been accused of destroying science, besmirching someone's reputation, driving away experts, etc. The moment you downgrade your baseless do-nothing accusations against the only person with the presence of mind to try to salvage that AfD to "over-reaction" and I will be happy to apologize and let RP go be an expert in his fancy physics research, while the rest of you can get back to collaborative, cooperative Misplaced Pages-building, without interruption by ranting anti-Misplaced Pages "experts" with persecution complexes. --Cheeser1 (talk) 21:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Etc.

It's amazing how R Physicist can accuse me of taking his stand-alone rants out of context, but snipping things out of conversations/exchanges is perfectly fine. I called Proscience rude when he threw WP:SKILL out the window. Taking a cheap-shot at someone for speaking English well, but apparently not well enough (in an already tendentious AfD) is not appropriate. I told Proscience and Ngn to stop bickering when it got to the point that Proscience was threatening to expose "this situation" (the AfD) to "the media" - a threat to "expose" Ngn (IRL) as some sort of bad scientist. That's not appropriate either. I won't comment on the rest of RP's above, except to say that the SSP case was right and my suspicions were confirmed, and only then did the two come forward and mention that they're married (SPAs in an AfD who are married? classic meatpuppetry) and in addition to the SPA status, they both seemed to expect that their opinions be counted twice and with special weight because they are "experts." --Everyone's favorite scapegoat, Cheeser1 (talk) 13:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

It's a shame that you've run into some of the odder -harder to use- bits of wikipedia so quickly. Although people bold comments an Article for Deletion discussions they are not voting. The tally of votes shouldn't really sway the closing admineditor's mind - just the numbers of people making reference to WP policy. Dan Beale-Cocks 14:36, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Um, I'm not an admin, never claimed to be one... and I recall that I was pretty even-handed in my appeal to this noticeboard in not singling anyone out (or rather, singling out several and not saying anyone was to blame). SamBC(talk) 14:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

One thing I will say now, with hindsight and looking back on things with calm consideration, is that the nominator seemed unsatisfied with the idea that the article be considered in terms of wikipedia's established criteria (such as notability and verifiability), but the criteria that the nominator felt we ought to be using. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with such a suggested change in criteria; there may or may not be, I've not considered them deeply. It's just if we've got our ways of determining what merits an article, we shouldn't bait-and-switch just because an expert says so. SamBC(talk) 14:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

One may be an expert in one's field, but not an expert in collaborative, volunteer development of an open encyclopedia using wiki software. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Which is exactly why we should not bite newcomers, as was done so dramatically here. No one starts as an expert in wikiminutiae. Jpmonroe (talk) 03:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, let's see what I told R physicist, shall we? . The response to this was a section "Desist from vandalism and bullying" even though I explicitly and deliberately made it clear to him that I was making every effort to AGF while keeping the comments that don't belong in the AfD off the AfD. For this, he launched into numerous tirades (including this ANI thread) because he has decided that I am a usurper, a vandal, an evil upstart bent on destroying his scientific credibility and besmirching his name. So who did what? WP:BITE? I think not. More like WP:AGF on a non-BITE. --Cheeser1 (talk) 13:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Cheeser1, I'm not talking about you. The big issue here is not a quarrel over an AFD, whatever the merits of the specific case. The big issue is the apalling way administrators here chose to respond to criticism, with the banhammer. AFD disputes come and go, but if we cannot make constructive use of criticism, if we habitually drive away knowledgeable people so pointlessly (3 established physicists in this case alone), then this pretence to be an 'encyclopedia' instead of a tome on pop culture is pointless. You're just some random editor; you can't do much harm. Admins can, and in this case have. Jpmonroe (talk) 00:08, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

this whole mess has shades of the drama of ScienceApologist to it, only this time, years of effort were pre-empted and we went right to the ban of someone whose skill and expert knowledge ina subject frightened some editors into killing that which they didn't understand right away. I'm sorry, but R Physicist should be unbanned post-haste, and this stupid self-promotional article resubmitted to AfD. I know how I'll vote. ThuranX (talk) 04:01, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This comment is not helpful at all. R_physicist can be excused for making mistakes like this, where shortly after being unblocked by Jehochman he accuses him of having blocked him. That's exactly the kind of confrontational behaviour based on mere conjectures that caused the original situation in the first place. (I am not trying to say that the other side was any better.) But someone with your Misplaced Pages experienced should know better than to confuse a very ill-considered and undiscussed block by a single admin, already undone by Jehochman based on consensus, with a ban.

As to the article. Normally I would have voted for deletion. I didn't vote at all, because R_physicist, with some help by Cheeser1 and me, had ensured that the AfD was a complete mess. One of the reasons it was such a mess was excessive repetition of personalised arguments such as the article being "self-promotional" (note I am not saying it isn't). In such a situation there are always strong non-personal arguments that you can use instead. And if it's a particularly egregious case, normally you won't be shot for a single sentence in which you make it clear how much you have constrained yourself. The same holds for expert authority. If you demonstrate it by showing insight into the matters that nobody else has, then you will be taken seriously. It's a bit less efficient to say "as a physicist working in the field it is my professional opinion that", but that would still work. But trying to win the discussion by shouting louder than all the others and repeating your opinion each time someone else has expressed the opposite view will never work; if it did, the Pokemon crowd would have taken over the science articles by now. This strategy won't work for R_physicist, and it won't work for Cheeser1, either. It's counterproductive. --Hans Adler (talk) 08:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The preceding remarks are the views of a person who ought to have better judgment, but who is incapable of distinguishing between the actions of a bully and manipulator and those of the ones trying to defend themselves against such attacks. 24.202.238.172 (talk) 08:31, 16 April 2008 (UTC) (alias "R Physicist")

In an online community it is much more important than in real life to take cognitive biases into account, because some of the correctives that we have in real life are missing. If we don't do this, and don't follow some of the other correctives that have been established here instead, then we cause a lot of unnecessary drama: Two people who can't stop "defending" themselves against each other. Do you think that when Cheeser1 goes to bed he thinks: "Today was a successful day. I have defended a worthless article against a distinguished physicist, and I have shown him his place."? Nobody thinks of themselves in such terms, but everybody is ready to act as if others did. This is called actor-observer bias, and it's a universal fact about human nature.

As far as I can tell Cheeser1 saw that you were messing up an AfD, against your own interest, and he tried to help. When he saw your reaction he attributed it to your character more than to the specific circumstances under which you acted. That made him behave as he did. It became a problem when it was clear the strategy wasn't going to work and he continued anyway. He did not continue because he liked doing it, but because he felt that someone had to do it.

It was the symmetrical situation for you. You saw Cheeser1's actions, and you attributed them to his character rather than to the fact that he found himself in a very unusual situation. I guess that normally your word carries a lot of authority in interactions not only with other scientists, but also with ordinary people. At least that's how you come across here. The problem with this kind of authority is that it does not carry over to Misplaced Pages because once it is filtered through the wiki it is not sufficiently distinguishable from the behaviour of those half-educated bullies who we don't want to give control of the wiki. So you get the treatment that is intended for them. You are writing long rants about how Misplaced Pages has to change in order to solve the bully problem. What you don't understand is that Misplaced Pages already has rather good strategies to deal with the problem and that that is exactly what you have tripped over.

If better judgement means not seeing both sides of the coin, then I don't want it. Of course I could have shown better judgement by being quiet altogether. All I seem to have achieved is that both you and Cheeser1 are angry at me. But I am used to this kind of situation. In my experience here, when one side of a conflict thinks I am right it's a good indication that I am wrong. --Hans Adler (talk) 09:28, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Since my actions are being discussed on a public forum, I find it necessary to clarify a few points. This is a singular contribution to Misplaced Pages, as I have no intention to reverse my decision to inactivate my account. I am making these comments ``sine ira et studio", for the sake of accuracy.

First, on the issue of (what I consider to be a very offensive terminology) ``meatpuppetry": as mentioned above, my spouse and I are both scientists, with established credentials and a common interest in promoting scientific truth. We share the same opinion on some issues, and disagree on others ... for instance, she does not approve of my returning to this discussion. From what I have seen on this board, people in our situation are automatically suspected of collusion and dishonesty when casting a vote. It was said above that we ``did not come forward" to disclose the fact that we share the same IP but after we were ``discovered". What is the point of this statement? Each of us could have used a different IP from work (as I do now, mind my full disclosure of this fact). It is precisely because we saw no issue at all with expressing our views from the same IP, that we did not bother to broadcast a warning! If you are innocent, you take no steps to ``defend" yourself pre-emptively. At any rate, based on the reaction of User:Cheeser1, we would have been suspected regardless of such actions. As a novice contributor, leaving in the real world, I have to say that this point of policy is extremely offensive: there is no presumption of innocence - which makes you feel that Misplaced Pages is (in that sense) like a typical oppressive society.

Second, on the issue of my ``exchange" with the author of the article nominated for deletion, which led to the intervention by User:Cheeser1. For those who participated to this debate and are not trained scientists (it is clear that several of the contributors fall under this description), I will make the following analogy: experienced Misplaced Pages editors are proud to follow policy and rules which apparently rule this enterprise. They criticize, rebuke, and collaborate with other editors in accordance with said policy, and reject ``other rules" from outside Misplaced Pages, in case of a conflict. We, scientists, have a similar code of rules that we adhere to, which takes precedence over any alternative. For example, we are supposed to use only proven facts, invoke scientific methods, use logic, reasoning, and make arguments within clear boundaries. Without these rules, there can be no consensus and no progress. Moreover, it is a duty for any scientist to ensure that she knows what she is talking about before arguing - or else indicate her ignorance and ask for instruction. I pointed out to User:Ngn, assuming her to be a fellow scientist, that her argument was illogical, and that is much more relevant than her less-than-perfect command of written English. In fact, I never considered her lack of linguistic abilities a negative factor throughout these debates: her knowledge of English is completely irrelevant at this stage. Her lack of logic when responding to my argument, her attempt to present to the general public those equations as part of established scientific literature, her claim that criticism aroused by the article is due to a conspiracy with specific national overtones, these are important issues, and - as a scientist - she should be held accountable for it following the established rules of communicating science. Just as you, editors experienced in points of Misplaced Pages policy, criticize and hold accountable other editors for violating policy. However, rules of science take precedence over rules of Misplaced Pages at this point, because (however far-reaching and wonderful the influence of Misplaced Pages over the general public), the importance of scientific truth is much more fundamental for all of us. Billions of dollars in grants, millions of jobs, entire industries and military entities, all rely of scientific truth. Of all people, we scientists have a duty to point out fallacies, inadvertences, fraud and self-promotion - wherever they might occur. This is the point of my exchange with User:Ngn. If she is (as I assumed with no prejudice) a scientist, she will respond to my constructive criticism (lack of logic is something any scientist should very worried about, and thankful for being warned about). If she is not a scientist, then she should, by all means, write about any notable subject, in Misplaced Pages, or any other non-scientific (i.e. not peer-reviewed) medium. However, at that point I (and others) have a duty to warn my fellow scientists about such claims. It is not personal. I care not about what User:Ngn stands to lose or gain from this. What I care about is setting the scientific record straight. Every month, I am invited to peer-review 3-4 articles submitted to scientific journals, I do it (sine ira et studio), to set the record straight. In that sense, the debate has never belonged exclusively to Misplaced Pages, and my warning of ``exposing" incorrect practices to the scientific community was not a threat, not an attempt to intimidation, just a fact. As you must surely realize from the caliber of other scientists involved in this history (myself not included), the scientific morality aspect of the discussion has already crossed into the academic world.

(Retired user Proscience). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.165.96.184 (talk) 18:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

New AFD

Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Myrzakulov equations (3rd nomination). The purpose of the restrictions is that the fact that we allow an unspecified degree of threaded discussion, repeated comments, etc, on an AFD normally has led to strife in this instance because of people disagreeing on where the line is drawn. This is not an attempt to suppress discussion, it can still carry on without interference on the talk page. --Random832 (contribs) 17:57, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Igorberger harrassment

User:Igorberger is harrassing me.

Most of his dislike for me stems from disputes in Talk:Anti-Americanism. The problem is that recently he has taken his "battle" to other articles. He is obviously checking my contribs and following me around to get involved with whatever I do.

At the Village Pump, I proposed a general policy that anti- articles follow the naming convention (identity), e.g. only self-identified anti-Americans should be called anti-American. He made no contribution there, but announced (dishonestly) in anti-Americanism Talk page that I wanted to delete all these articles .

Then he took the issue to the Talk page of an article I've never read, edited, or discussed, and used the same technique to rabble-rouse against me. He told editors there, none of whom I know, to watch out for me. Talk:State_terrorism_and_the_United_States#All_anti-country_articles_are_POV. Again, he misrepresents (can I say "lies about"?) what I said (I haven't said anything should be deleted).

I recently made a small edit to the article on Phillip K. Dick. Within hours Igor showed up, and started editing that article, including reverting my edits.

He filed a sockpuppetry case on me, in which he compares me to Hitler, with a The Final Solution reference (it is hard to follow):

In the anti-Americanism article itself, his comments toward me are always dismissive and often personal. I would ignore them, but when he follows me around to other articles, it becomes impossible to ignore.

Here he says he can't assume good faith because I am "trying to influence and change Misplaced Pages policy." He also doesn't refer to me by name but by as "the SSP & SPA" I don't even know what SSP means (I'm sure it's not good) but I think SPA is single-purpose account.

Here he continues belittling me:

Here he belittles my attempt to explain my position:

More dismissive comments:

There is more, but I won't go on. The main problem is that I cannot ignore him, because he has decided to follow me around Misplaced Pages. Life.temp (talk) 12:15, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, back when Life.temp started the Village Pump discussion, Igor advised people to consider Life.temp's status as an "SPA" before considering his suggestions . I had reverted that comment on the grounds that it was harassment , to which Igor responded by leaving me this on my talk page. I then responded on his talk page . I've had my own long-term problems with Igor and short of blocking him for being a general nuisance, we should at least make sure he doesn't engage in blatant harassment. Equazcion •✗/C • 12:29, 13 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Igor has just posted a Wikiquette Alert for Life.temp: Misplaced Pages:Wikiquette alerts#User:Life.temp. This was done after he was notified of this ANI. Equazcion •✗/C • 13:03, 13 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Igor has always been a "problem" editor, and he's got into bother before but this is too far, following someone around harrrasing them is wikistalking--Phoenix-wiki 13:33, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Agree, and he was been warned far too many times. Tiptoety 19:27, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

This needs to wait until the RFCU is processed. Life.temp is certainly displaying a lot of well known sockpuppet tendencies. Jtrainor (talk) 01:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(From my entirely civil interactions with) User:Igorberger, they can be difficult to understand at times. From other observations I have made (concerning previous posts to this page), this can be a problem. And Igor also may be inclined to state suppositions as if they were already proved. If Igor can refrain from such inflation of language which can easily be percieved as incivility in the heat of the moment, then Igor's concerns may be able to be addressed. The other user should not be the subject of incivility from Igor. There seems to be a need for further processes to proceed however. And hopefully Igor can come to understand how to engage in discussion with a user if possible, rather than rushing to judgement. That is my understanding, I just happened to have found this thread, though I have not been involved. --Newbyguesses (talk) 02:16, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• His last comment directed at me: "Sorry the current version looks like shit. Definiton this definiton that, la, la , la, blah, blah , blah! Get it together and make an article, not a dictionary definion as it looks now that it have become!" . It's not that any one comment is extreme. He's not abusive. It just disrupts the consensus process by never stopping, and there's a red flag when he takes it to other articles.
• I requested informal mediation for the anti-Americanism article, but I'm not optimistic. Right now, people are trying to en masse revert every edit that's been made in the last week.
• The acronyms are confusing. Using the Help Page search told me what SSP means, but returned no results for RFCU. Life.temp (talk) 13:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Igor Berger, Igor the Troll...

• Igor apparently trolls as a hobby. He has a Web site and a blog dedicated to blogging about his well-spent time in troll-dom: http://www.igorthetroll.com/
• The "About Me" link identifies him as Igor Berger: http://www.igorthetroll.com/i-am-igor-the-troll.php
• The"My Company" link contains the same profile as his Talk page, and includes Misplaced Pages as a "project.": http://www.ivbsolutions.net/

Ban please. Life.temp (talk) 14:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Apparently, this and an editor named John Gohde are hot topics in the blogosphere....
• http://naturalhealthperspective.net/2008/01/26/gohdes-apprentice/
• Somebody put this guy on a gerbil treadmill and use the energy for something useful. He's probably User talk:ArthurMongli too.

Life.temp (talk) 14:57, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd say he describes himself pretty accurately on his website: "a really nice troll". Well, nice as long as you tolerate his trolling. If you express any discontentment, he bites. He seems to talk incessantly regardless of whether he knows what he's saying or even has anything to say. This is probably the one individual at Misplaced Pages who can influence what I do here, in that I've come to avoid anything he's involved in. He's just that difficult. Equazcion •✗/C • 15:32, 14 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Yes, we should all be allowed to give him the inattention he deserves. Ban. One more then I quit wasting time with trolls...

In his profile at another site, he lists his contributions to Misplaced Pages under the heading "Internet Troll.":

http://www.londonfetishscene.com/wipi/index.php/User:Igorberger

Life.temp (talk) 15:38, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Speaks for itself. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The possibility of Life.temp sockpuppeting needs to be dealt with at the same time. Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Bsharvy (2nd). He appeared on Anti-Americanism just after the last sock was shown the door and has shown much the same tendencies. Marskell (talk) 17:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, a lot of us have reason to believe that 'Life.temp' is yet another incarnation of the banned user Bsarvy, aka 'Rachel', aka 'Bshanvy'. After Bsharvy was banned he vowed on the Anti-Americanism page to come back to edit the page using different identities and so far he has been as good as his word. About every week at Anti-Americanism we get a brand new user editor who homes straight onto that page and who despite being new always displays an in depth knowledge of wikipedia procedures, and is especially adept at launching complaints procedures against anybody who opposes his edits - like what we see here. Bsharvy edits from Seoul, Korea and I have no doubt that 'Life temp' is from the same exactly the same place. Ask him. Colin4C (talk) 19:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

"A lot of us" who have the suspicion strangely seem to consist only of those who've been in disagreement with him at Talk:Anti-Americanism.

For the record though, I have the same suspicions, I just doubt the existence of any actual evidence, or the need to devote any energy to the pursuit of this suspicion. Life.temp hasn't actually done anything wrong yet, aside from disagree with Marskell, which as you can see from Talk:Anti-Americanism is not a good idea. Life.temp revert-warred with Igor a bit, but that seems to have been a one-time thing. This seems to have more to do with him being in disagreement with the majority there, than with the compulsion to be ever-vigilante in prosecuting sockpuppets of blocked users. He hasn't actually done anything wrong yet. He's not even being disruptive, unless being in vocal disagreement with the majority counts, and it doesn't.

Anyway, whether Life.temp is a sockpuppet or not, the fact remains that this is a circumstantial suspicion, and Igor should be keeping the suspected sockpuppet discussion to the suspected sockpuppet page, not following the user around reminding people of the suspicion at every turn. Equazcion •✗/C • 23:12, 14 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Convenience break

Igor mainatins a hitlist of Misplaced Pages editors at the londonfetishscene.com site I mentioned earlier:

BuzzKill

1. DogMeat WikiPedia:User:Gohdeilocks
   
2. RoadKill momojp
   
3. Marked for Tribunal for the crimes
   

   of: insighting discontent and instigating a mutiny WikiPedia:User:Equazcion
   

   As the court appointed counslor for the Queen, Country, and God, I recommend WikiPedia:WP:CSD pardoned

4. Marked for Assassination for being a Spam Malware to the Kabal

   WikiPedia:User:Mr.Z-man decreed by Grand Pupa. pardoned

5. WikiPedia:User:WilyD subversive and destructive to WikiPedia. WikiPedia:WP:COI
6. WikiPedia:User:VirtualSteve sleeper.

http://www.londonfetishscene.com/wipi/index.php/User:Igorberger#BuzzKill

I wonder what the admins are doing... The only admin I can see is User:Marskell, and he seems to think this page is for sniping at me over a SSP Igor (who else?) filed against me. It's a case without a single diff, and barely any claim that I disrupted anything. User:Marskell has made no comment there, where such comment belongs. I'd like to know policy about a user who brags about trolling and who calls User:Mr.Z-man "marked for assasination." That's what this discussion is for. Life.temp (talk) 09:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• I would be curious to know why I'm on this guy's shit list. He links to the Wipipedia page on his userpage here, so they would seem to be the same guy ... WilyD 13:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That page looks like a joke to me. I shall ask him to add me to it. Jtrainor (talk) 20:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Trolling is a joke. If you mean he probably hasn't actually hired Jason Bourne to kill User:Mr.Z-man, I agree. The point is that he comes to troll, and says so. (Additional comment: some editors will feel intimidated if they find themselves on that list.) Life.temp (talk) 21:55, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• I see today that I am also on this list - this is because I have often questioned Igorberger's edits and I have had the audacity to block him for his foul play previously. Interestingly - for those that feel the need to assume good faith under any circumstance - actually checking through all of Igorberger's editing history will reveal that he has been questioned, warned and blocked by many, many other editors for his consistent trolling, his tenacious editing style, his blatant refactoring, his conflict of interest edits, his attempts to use the wikipedia name to further his personal businesses and his intimidation of other editors. His edits have been taken to task many times at ANI, MFD, and of course on his talk page. Igorberger uses the same methods for this always - simply substituting the name of his latest out of favour editor or administrator into his usual nonsensical diatribe. He then curries favour with other editors who through lack of time, interest or vanity support him because he called them his "brother" or "a good man" etc on their talk page. For those that feel the need to support - that is a matter for you to deal with, however trolling at this level is not a joke whether it is on wikipedia or off it. That said Igorberger knows that I am never intimidated by him and that I will as necessary block him again - and for considerable length of time if he steps over the line in the future - and I am not involved in that matter. For this matter - another administrator should act appropriately and quickly to again rein in this very poor representative of the wikipedia community who feels the need to belittle and user name/shame his fellow contributors.--VS 00:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

To ban or not to ban

I was || this close this blocking this guy indefinitely. As far as I'm concerned, this kind of long-term trolling has no place on our 'pedia. But I want to make sure it has consensus, so, what are your thoughts? Grandmasterka 03:07, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not neutral on this, as he and I chat on my talk page. I've seen him do disruptive things, but don't follow him around, so I evidently don't know the worst of it, but he's always seemed basically OK to me. He appears to contribute at least semi-productively at, for example, State terrorism and the United States (I don't follow that article much, so I can't quantify it more than that, but he seems to be working with other editors there).

If I was to talk with him about his future here, as someone he seems to respect, what would you like me to say beyond:

1. removing lists of WP users from his off-wiki page,
2. letting the SSP run its course without following life.temp around,
3. perhaps some kind of mentorship (if he's open to it, which I suspect, but don't know, he might be open to).

Again, I haven't followed his every move, but from what I know of him, the descriptions above seem a little too harsh, and (again acknowledging my COI here), indef blocking seems like too much. --barneca (talk) 03:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

As it happens, Igor and I have gotten along in our interactions but I had grown rather wary, since although we tended to agree more or less on edits, I never seemed to agree with the unencyclopedic reasons he gave for agreeing with me (so I began thinking it might only be luck). Igor's behaviour as outlined above, about which I became aware only lately, is utterly blockable. However, the other day, he seemed to take my thoughts on his uncivil comments about others to heart. Hence, I strongly hope Igor at least shares his thoughts about his own behaviour before someone drops an indef block upon him. Gwen Gale (talk) 03:35, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Hi Barneca & Gwen - not to throw water on your (and indeed our) general AGF principles but Barneca, Igor has been through this process of requesting he listen to someone he respects before. He has a history of jumping from one person he respects to another. See here for example his last ANI thread Gwen his "point taken" comment (like the one you diff) are exactly what he does every time he gets into hot water like this - for example this one where he apologises for being dickish after appearing to post an incorrect signature, or this one where another editor provides a very detailed summary as to why his editing is problematic and Igor thanks him for the evaluation but then continues to edit in the same style. Given that I have been watching his history for some months I hope you will understand why I support absolutely an indefinite block ... and if I was not attempting to remain non-proprietary at this time because he has slightly involved me in this issue by including my name in a rather cowardly off-wiki attack - I would do it myself.--VS 05:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, at least I understand why I'd gotten wary. I see strong support here that Igor knows he's using this account for something other than building an encyclopeda. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with VS's take on this. Igor tends to act as if he respects someone and is taking in their advice, but when it comes to practice he ignores it. Then, if pressed, he bites back. Just like everyone thinks when they first encounter him I used to believe that Igor genuinely wanted to be mentored, but I no longer hold that belief. I think he's going to keep on doing what he does despite what anyone tells him. He's not interested in changing -- but he will act like he is, just to get on people's good sides. Equazcion •✗/C • 06:07, 16 Apr 2008 (UTC)

That is an excellent summary of my experience with this editor. Jehochman 06:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Just do it. We don't need to subject good-faith contributors to this nonsense any longer. Some people are here to write, others notso much. --Haemo (talk) 06:23, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Has anyone done an Rfc then, (on Igor)? Wouldn't that be a reasonable procedure, and require two (2) users to endorse it, that they had tried and failed to resolve particular issues. (Not for or against, if there is evidence of particular transgressions that other editors wish to pursue.) --Newbyguesses (talk) 08:48, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Huh? Why in heavens name would be doing a request for comment? This is the appropriate procedure for transgressions to be considered and dealt with by Administrators--VS 10:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Igor said something yesterday that implied he wasn't going to participate in "life.temp's thread". If true, he may not know an indef block is being considered; I've notified him that he might want to say something here. How he handles that response will strongly affect my own opinion on whether this is the correct thing to do. Like I said, I haven't been following his every move, so it's possible the "mild" disruption I've seen myself has actually been significantly more. But based on my interaction with him, I'm just surprised. --barneca (talk) 10:44, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Maybe it's just me, but I'm just seeing someone frustrated, who wants to call a spade a spade but feels he is prevented from doing so by the bureaucracy here (don't deny it...we all know it is overwhelming for newcomers). I would like to see an RFC, with specific issues raised (and hopefully dealt with, if he can be convinced to participate in good faith) before the banhammer is applied. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 10:54, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The guy nicknamed himself "Igor the Troll." He registered igorthetroll.com. He keeps a list of articles he's edited titled "Internet Trolling." And here we are trying to figure out if he is a troll. I mean...gee. Life.temp (talk) 11:14, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Wants to call a spade a spade? What does he want to say that he's been prevented from saying? Igor's behavior hasn't exactly struck me as reserved. From what I've seen he's been rather open, and overly so.

• You're missing the point. This user has been given constructive criticism before. It's no longer a matter of identifying the problematic behavior and communicating it to him. That's been tried many times, by many different people, many of whom Igor thanked and came back to with further questions and praise. But all the while he never actually took any of the advice he was given. If you started an RFC for Igor, he'd say he's sorry a few times and tell everyone how much he appreciates their help, and then keep on doing what he does. More dispute resolution would just delay the inevitable. Igor has been the subject of extensive community discussion before, and he's been given advice, warnings, and finally ultimatums as a result. It's all been done. There's no reason reason to go through it all over again expecting different results.

• Besides which, an RFC, being a "request for comment", would be redundant with this discussion. We've got all the comments we need right here. Whether this discussion were carried out at ANI or RFC makes no difference, and this one is already started, so there's no point in beginning anew. If you have thoughts about Igor that you would have expressed at RfC, please feel free to state them here. It's all pretty much the same. Equazcion •✗/C • 11:41, 16 Apr 2008 (UTC)

• Exactly stated - Equazcion - Of course one of the problems is that only those editors that have spent time over many months trying to understand and assist Igor actually have the background to know what damage he is doing to the project. To see that damage extending to off-wiki sites compounds the evidence. Quite frankly drive by comments from editors that have not experienced this editor's real reason for being here or who have not checked through all or at least a large quantity of his edits are not of any assistance because this is the very game that Igor hopes the community will play on his behalf.--VS 11:53, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• No, comments from "outsiders" is pretty much the point of WP:ANI. Otherwise it's just a big self-reinforcing echo chamber. --barneca (talk) 11:59, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• No, it was not my suggestion to not allow "outsider" comments Barneca - it was my suggestion to editors not to comment unless that editor had made him/herself very familiar with Igor's editing history. I think you actually were the first above to suggest similarly that such a lack of familiarity makes any comment less than complete?--VS 12:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Comments from outsiders are appreciated, but educated comments based on an examination of the editor's past contributions and exchanges is what would truly be helpful. There are some cases at ANI that are glaringly obvious to "outsiders" and therefore might not require such an in-depth look. This unfortunately isn't one of them. The fact that this user acts so outwardly-agreeable is part of the point here. Drive-by commenters who don't look any deeper than that and come to the obvious conclusion that this is a misunderstood soul looking to reach out to someone are just perpetuating the very problem we're attempting to address. Equazcion •✗/C • 12:08, 16 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Igor's been up on AN/I before, and I've commented on him before. Equazcion has it about right. Igor plays games. I'm one in the 'supports a community ban' column. ThuranX (talk) 12:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I am reminded of the parable of the Blindmen and the Elephant. That ancient Hindu tale goes something like this. Once upon a time in a small village in India there lived seven Misplaced Pages editors. A report came that a strange new beast had come to the village. The editors, as seekers of knowledge, went to learn what they could. On Monday, the first editor felt the beast's wet nose, and came back to report: "It is a new editor in need of guidance." On Tuesday, the second editor felt the large forehead, and returned saying "No, this is a very wise editor." On Wednesday, a third editor felt the beast's long teeth, and said "No, it is an editor who likes to fight." Thursday, the fourth editor felt the rear of the beast, and said "This is a beast with bad manners." On Friday, the fifth editor felt the creature's hairy ears, and told the others: "This is an editor eager to listen." On Saturday, the sixth editor felt the small chin, and said "This is a coward." Now the seventh editor listened closely to the others all week long. When Sunday came, he felt the creature's rear end, its hairy ears, and weak chin, its long teeth, wet nose, and large forehead. The seventh editor returned and told the others: It is not any one of those things. It is Igor the Troll. But the other editors felt this lacked consensus and nothing was done. I feel the title of this ancient Hindu parable is a misnomer, though. Those editors weren't really blind, were they? Life.temp (talk) 14:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

If I weren't already ID'd as one of Igor's "friends", I'd remove this personal attack. Life.temp is trolling, and it is NOT helping. Makes me wonder if the "to ban or not to ban" section needs to be expanded to include more people. Life.temp, if you remove your comment above, feel free to remove this one too, and we'll pretend it didn't happen. --barneca (talk) 14:48, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I tried to stay away from this mess at ANI, because I do not think it is the right place to address all these issues, but I was requested to comment here. A lot of these has been started because the article anti-Americanism, but some of it goes back even before this article. Who is right and who is worng and why who did what is not a simple thing to address. I really feel ANI, fuels drama, and no good to Misplaced Pages project and all its editors. I feel all the conserns need to be addressed in proper venues of dispute resolution. Igor Berger (talk) 15:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Igor, none of this has anything to do with content dispute resolution and it seems to have been going on for much longer than since you began editing anti-Americanism. Either way, I don't understand why you're not responding to all these things being said about you. Have you given this any thought? Is there anything you can do to skirt stirring up these kinds of complaints about your behaviour from now on? Gwen Gale (talk) 16:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Gwen, I think ANI is the wrong place to address these conserns. Why has this escalated to this wikidrama in the first place? Could it be that dispute resolutions raised by me about editors and editors conserned with me were not addressed in proper dispute resolution venues? But yes, with regards to your consern, I will do my best not to flame the situation and be extremly civil in talking to other editors to address any problems that I or they may have. Igor Berger (talk) 16:33, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Why do you say talking about it here is wikidrama? Gwen Gale (talk) 17:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Because it flames things up, instead of addressing editors' conserns! There are times when ANI works but it really needs to be NPOV, or it gets derailed to a point where editors are playing football with one editor, using him as a ball. Then the audiance just jumps on the bandwagon, and more wikidrama. It is not healthy psychologically for anyone, and does not fix problems, but just brushes things under the rug. Also right now there are no WP:DIFFs but just accusations. I prefer to address all accusations in a more humane - stable - not flamed - atmosphere like RFC/U Igor Berger (talk) 17:53, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

There many diffs to your edits in this thread. Why did you say there aren't any? Gwen Gale (talk) 17:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

East718 is running an adminbot

I just tried to post a message here laying out irrefutable evidence that you're running an adminbot on this account. Ended up in an edit conflict with mrg3105. Following the thread led me to where you openly state on mrg3105's talk page that you're running a bot on your account to delete pages.

I don't understand. When last I checked, running an unauthorised adminbot on your admin account was about as forbidden as it gets. Grounds for an emergency desysop even. Has the bot policy changed? Have you actually been given permission to run an adminbot on your account?

Hesperian 12:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I frankly don't see what the problem is. I know this is verging dangerously close to rules-lawyering, but if your definition of "unapproved" is "approved by BRFA and RFA", then no, this robot is not approved. That said, there are circumstances under which normally untoward behavior may be acceptable, but only when the full implications are understood and considered carefully. This is exactly what I've done - this bot has been vetted and run by several other admins in the past to the tune of over 130,000 deletions with absolutely no error rate. Considering that removing useless pages is a reasonable thing to do in my eyes, I figured since the job can be done and there's no reasonable process within which to do it (an adminbot policy), I might as well go ahead. I also don't see why running this robot is inherently evil; I have been trusted by the community to use my buttons and I'm making a good use of them - I take full responsibility for my actions and am prepared to face the consequences should something mess up. Lastly, it's not as if I write adminbots with some devious intent to damage Misplaced Pages - quite the contrary. It's performing a task that I'd do manually anyway with an accuracy most flesh-and-blood administrators would envy.

That said, here's why I'm deleting all these pages: being orphaned, they serve absolutely no internal value, as nobody will ever arrive at it from a link and being how we don't search in the Talk: namespace. They only amount to clutter that is prone to all sorts of foolishness - I recently went through all Image talk: pages and found tons of vandalism; those I passed off to another administrator to delete. More unwanted effects of these pages existing is that they may prevent future pagemoves, and also waste resources in fixing whenever the target changes. Also, since these pages have no history, no discussion ever took place on them at any time.

I welcome whatever other comments you have, provided they don't contains threats of emergency desysopping, something we reserve only for compromised or vandalizing accounts. :-) east.718 at 13:08, April 13, 2008

More and more it seems that people here actively seek to read benign comments as threats or personal attacks. Perhaps we should give this trend a name: "The Mikkalai effect" has a nice ring to it.

I have no opinion or comment on this issue except that if it is now considered acceptable to run an unauthorised adminbot, then community standards on this point have altered beyond recognition in the last year or so.

This requires wider discussion. I'll move this discussion to AN/I.

Hesperian 13:33, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

As far as I can see, all that are being deleted are orphaned talk pages. This is utterly uncontroversial maintenance, and I'm glad someone is doing it. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:37, 13 April 2008 (UTC) I was mistaken. — Carl (CBM · talk) 21:14, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec)I have a small problem with it, though. Images that have been moved to commons shouldn't have their local talkpages deleted, because they sometimes contain important information and discussions. If bots are doing it, later, when asked, the deleting admin has no idea what happened. That's happened to me twice. (If East's bot only deletes pages with no history, that's not a problem.) e--Relata refero (disp.) 13:44, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

They are not all orphaned. Carcharoth (talk) 13:41, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

He seems to have defined "orphaned redirect talk page" as the talk page of a redirect. They are not orphans and we normally leave (want) these so I don't understand why these are being deleted. -- JLaTondre (talk) 13:44, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll need to look into this more. I was under the impression they were all orphaned pages with no edit history. — Carl (CBM · talk) 13:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

No, these are not orphaned talk pages in the sense that the "front page" has been deleted, but orphaned in the sense that very little points towards them ("what links here"). I suspect a confusion in terminology here. Carcharoth (talk) 13:51, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, I was asking questions on Hesperian's talk page, but I'll ask them here instead. I did ask East to stop the bot when objections were raised, and he did so. Thanks to East for doing that. I personally have no problems with the "not-so-open-secret" adminbots, but only when there are no objections, and only when they are needed. My main concern though is the lack of discussion. If this had had the stamp of approval at WP:RfD, then fine, but it seems that adminbots can't be discussed openly, and so they end up doing things that cause objections due to lack of advertisement and discussion. Carcharoth (talk) 13:41, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

You know, I just don't really see the huge issue. He's only helping Misplaced Pages and doing tedious work (regardless whether or not it's being done by a bot) that most admins wouldn't feel like doing, while refraining from producing errors. I'd rather thank him than expect an explanation, at this point. However, I'd ideally prefer all who use bots in general to make sure it's known to the community & make sure there's no opposition, and make it known a bot's being used on his/her userpage if it's not on a seperate account. нмŵוτнτ 15:29, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I have no problems with the adminbots doing stuff that has approval. I have seen no sign that this has approval, and JLaTondre who, unlike me, is active at WP:RFD, has objected, and so have I. Carl first said he has no objection, then realised he had misunderstood what was happening here. My wider concern is that Misza, who wrote the original script, added a line or two to exclude backlinks from Misplaced Pages: and User: namespaces when considering whether a talk page was orphaned, and seemed to think he could do that without needing to discuss that anywhere. He effectively redefined what "orphaned" means, and that is over-reaching. Carcharoth (talk) 15:35, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

As far as I am concerned, if JLaTondre is of the opinion that a redirect's deletion requires discussion, it requires discussion. His expertise on redirects predates mine and his judgment is sound. I am frankly annoyed by the view that deleting stuff is helping Misplaced Pages by doing tedious work. Some seem to have expressed that view without giving any thought to what exactly is being deleted. Deleting the right thing is valuable work, deleting the wrong things is not... WjBscribe 02:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Some questions

• "this bot has been vetted and run by several other admins in the past to the tune of over 130,000 deletions" - could you expand on that bit. Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Misza13 created a bunch of bots. They're open source. Other admins use them... --Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Should the actions of such adminbots be discussed before they are used? Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
      • If you use an adminbot, the admin in question knows what he's doing. I think discussion is unnecessary bureaucracy and waste of time. I prefer not to have long, circular discussions. Maxim_(talk) 15:22, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
        • That's a fairly horrible argument to make - "it must be okay, if he knows enough to use it, he knows what he's doing, so lets let him as he will". I really hope "we're going to presume you know what you're doing" is never adopted as policy in something like this. Achromatic (talk) 19:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• Do you check that there are no redirects pointing at the redirects (ie. double redirects)? If there are, then you are creating work for User:RedirectCleanupBot, and if one of your deletions is incorrect, then the subsequent deletion by RedirectCleanupBot will be wrong as well. Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Aren't double-redirects bad and are usually fixed? Secondly, won't creating work for RCbot be a good thing? It's a program designed for that use. A few dead redirects in Talk: namespace don't hurt anyone that urgently. --Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Are double redirects usually fixed? I don't know. RCBot assumes that the deletions creating the dead redirects were correct. Your line of argument is "not relevant here", which may be correct. "A few dead redirects in Talk: namespace don't hurt anyone that urgently." - so why do this at all then? Weigh the pros and cons, but to do that you need to openly discuss things first. Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• The talk page redirects are not all orphaned. The majority are links to WP1.0 assessment pages (which update themselves) or other bot-generated {{log}}s (which don't always update themselves), but there are other lists (manual ones) and other pages linked as well. It would be better to fix those links before or just after deleting the redirects. Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • I don't understand you... how can a talk: page be both a redirect and one that has useful information? :-/ Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • It takes people from an old link to the correct location. The information contained in the redirect (indeed in any redirect) is the correct location. If the correct location still exists as a page, the redirect may be needed. Misza, as can be seen below, saw that many "Misplaced Pages:" and "User:" links are not very useful, or are from bot-generated lists, and then extended from that to assume that all such links are not needed. Many are not, but not all. Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• "since these pages have no history, no discussion ever took place on them at any time" - um, these are redirects left behind by page moves. The reason they don't have history is because the pages got moved and the edit history is in a new location! <takes deep breath> Maybe you mean redirects that were edited and then turned back into a redirect? Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • The redirects as a result of pagemove are redirects that are deleted. Such redirects are completely useless. Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • You are completely and utterly wrong. Read Misplaced Pages:Redirect. Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • The community has repeatedly shown at WP:RFD that your statement is incorrect and against consensus. In most cases, pagemove redirects meet all the criteria of when not to delete a redirect. -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:30, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• "I recently went through all Image talk: pages and found tons of vandalism; those I passed off to another administrator to delete." - could you provide examples and more details? Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Random vandals see an image, go to its talkpage and post random comments. A bot that has a strict set of conditions, like for example (Anonymous users only edited that page, contains a filtered word, and has one edit) can clean these up easily.
    • Thank you. I asume they blank the page, rather than deleting the page? Just in case they make a mistake, you know? Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• "More unwanted effects of these pages existing is that they may prevent future pagemoves" - really? How? (I genuinely don't know what you mean here). Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Non-admins can't move a page to a page with an edit, even a redirect, unless it's a revert. For example, I tried to move User:Maxim's JS test account/t to User:Maxim's JS test account/s using that account. It didn't work. Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Yes. And this is standard knowledge. What I question is whether they really prevent future page moves. That is actually highly unlikely in my opinion, and should be dealt with at the time of the initial move, or when the problem arises. Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• "and also waste resources in fixing whenever the target changes." - I agree with this - you are referring to double redirects, right? I have a horrible feeling I have only ever fixed article double redirects when moving, and have never checked for talk page double redirects... Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • If the page the talkpage redirects to gets move, double redirects may ensue. You got this right. Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Does the page that asks us to check for and fix double redirects, after we do page moves, also ask us the the same for the talk page? Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
• Finally, where has this been discussed before? This is the most important of the questions! Carcharoth (talk) 13:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • See my comment right below. Maxim_(talk) 14:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Which one? This is an important question, so please try and provide a sensible answer and not "not everything needs to be discussed", which is a complete non-answer. Carcharoth (talk) 15:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Carcharoth, why do you think that everything needs to be discussed? East's only helping the project. Many other admins run adminbots (MZMcBride, DerHexer, Quadell, Misza13), to name a few. I don't officially run an adminbot, as javascript isn't considered to be a bot, for all intents and purposes, it is one. It's never been bureaucratically approved or anything, yet it causes no harm and only helps. Maxim_(talk) 13:57, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Completely agree with Maxim.--Phoenix-wiki 14:05, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Me too. Oh, wait, me too answers have no content. Strike that. Carcharoth (talk) 14:14, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Get some class, Carcharoth. Srsly. Maxim_(talk) 14:50, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Hesperian objected to the adminbot, not me. I've actually made an admin bot request on East's talk page. This sort of thing is precisely why admin bots should be brought out into the open. Sometimes, regardless of the merits of this case, adminbot actions do need to be discussed. Carcharoth (talk) 14:14, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't have problems with the bot issue. I do, however, see that pages were deleted that shouldn't have been. While deleting the talk page of a redirect is not really harmful, it is our normal standard to leave these and consolidate the discussion at the target article. I don't think these should have been deleted. -- JLaTondre (talk) 14:09, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I've never run an admin bot. I've used a JavaScript code and a bookmarklet. Regards, —DerHexer (Talk) 22:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The pages that should be deleted are discussion pages with one edit, which aren't needed for redirects. Maxim_(talk) 14:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

They only have one edit because they are redirects!! Did you not read the qusetions you objected to? Carcharoth (talk) 14:15, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Examples

• - includes Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Pseudoscience/Articles attracting pseudoscientific edits/publicwatchlist - the talk page now no longer shows up on the watchlist (it didn't when it was a redirect either, but that's not the point here).
• - includes Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Ice Hockey/Articles/Page3 - automatically regenerated list, so no problem.
• - includes Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Films/Articles/Page6 - used to be maintained by User:WatchlistBot, but now an archive.
• - includes User:Joan-of-arc - an old warning linking the user to the talk page.
• - includes User:Will Beback/Things - could be being used as a watchlist, but regardless, the appearance is that Talk:Island Oak got deleted, when in fact it is alive and well at Talk:Quercus tomentella.

More available on request. Nothing really major so far, but redirects are cheap and this is not really needed. Carcharoth (talk) 14:06, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Redirects are cheap. But they also should some use. Discussion pages with one edit, aren't needed for redirects, they're wholly useless. And for example, with the Island Oak example, you seem to be implying it's a vandal target. That's quite a good reason to delete, as it has no use but being a vandal target, no? Maxim_(talk) 14:10, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Talk page redirects do have value. The consolidate discussions and avoid someone inadvertently placing a conversation on the redirect's talk page (where it will probably languish unnoticed) when it should have been on the target's talk page. -- JLaTondre (talk) 14:16, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

In this case, as talk page redirects created following page moves, that shouldn't be a problem, I don't think. Carcharoth (talk) 14:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Incorrect. People do not always get to talk pages by clicking the "discussion" button. Sometimes the bookmark it or manually type the "Talk:" in front of the article name if they want to go there directly. -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

You are right. Anyone who wants to test this, click on Island Oak (10 links from other articles), and then look at the URL in the browser bar. It says http://en.wikipedia.org/Island_Oak. Now type "Talk:" in front of that and hit return. Oops! Not very likely, but because redirects are cheap we tend to leave them in place unless there is good reason to delete them. See, I told you that JLaTondre knew about redirects. :-) Carcharoth (talk) 17:04, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Maxim, what are you talking about? I'm not talking about vandal targets at all. Could you please get the distinction clear between a talk page redirect created following a move (these redirects have "one edit" by definition) and a normal redirect created from scratch. Redirects are complex things sometimes. That's why we have WP:RfD. Carcharoth (talk) 14:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

That's the point of these deletions... to alleviate more bureaucracy. Maxim_(talk) 14:20, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

We alleviate bureaucracy by deleting pages that shouldn't be deleted? I don't follow... -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:23, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Just a note. Dunno what's the exact code that east718 is running, but the one I wrote has an explicit exclusion in line 55 that ignores backlinks from User: and Misplaced Pages: namespaces. Why? Because when I was writing it I noticed nearly all of these are lists of articles (more often than not automatically generated reports, rarely user lists) and as such can safely be discarded from the count. Миша13 14:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

That is exactly the sort of thing that should have been discussed somewhere first! "I noticed nearly all of these..." That is the sort of over-reaching that happens if things are not openly discussed. And no, publishing the bot code doesn't count. There is no way I would have known what that bot code meant. Carcharoth (talk) 15:29, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I beg to differ here. You don't discuss ever single deletion you perform, do you? You rather apply your best judgment, some common sense and perform the action. And that's exactly what I do when writing adminbots - analyze a broad set of examples, determine what I'd do in each case (the tell-tale admin judgment plays its role here), then translate those rules and patterns into a machine readable code. At this point I might rule that the task is not applicable to a bot and drop it or narrow its range. If it's done however, I just make triply sure that everything behaves as expected and let it loose. As a result of this careful design cycle, I don't have many complaints to handle on my talk page. Миша13 15:43, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

True, but the idea of "99% is OK" kind of falls down when you are talking thousands of edits. 1% of 10,000 is 100. You are also assuming that 100% of the errors are detected. Let me put this bluntly - are you prepared to start a discussion on Misplaced Pages to get approval for your "exclusion in line 55" in your code? Carcharoth (talk) 15:49, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Srsly, UN:N much? Where did I say 99%? It was so long ago I don't even remember if there were any non-lists in those backlinks (remember that templates like {{article}} add backlinks too, which are entirely useless when the article itself has been moved). This might've been as high as 99.99% but again, who cares? By doing what I did I understand that I'm personally accountable for all and any of those 40K+ deletions I did back then. Did I get any specific and substantiated complains to any of the deleted redirects? Not to my memory. If it were "oficially approved" and stuff, would it be any different? Not really; the operator is still held accountable for his bot - responsibility doesn't get diluted just because the bot was widely discussed. What follows from this reasoning is the current status quo of adminbots (operated secretly, discussed privately among trusted tech folks). Миша13 16:10, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

As I said to Maxim, it looks like no-one cares because you are using bots to take actions on obscure pages that no-one cares much about. Try and do this to redirects to articles in main namespace and you would get a different reaction. If you would discuss the one first, why do you not feel any need to discuss the other? The 99% was me hypothesising a quote, not directly quoting you - sorry about that. As for official approval, I read somehere recently that you are the archetypical example of the kind of bot operator that doesn't need to go through WP:BRFA because your bots are so good. Well, I'm not so sure any more. What I would like to do, as a test, is to generate a "what links here" list for the 40K+ "talk page redirect" deletions you carried out, and see what percentage of those links are to WP1.0 pages (many of which will have updated now and no longer be a problem), how many are to other lists, and how many are legitimate links from the Misplaced Pages and User namespaces that should have been updated before the redirect was deleted. Carcharoth (talk) 16:33, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Have you noticed you seem to be one of the only ones that want to discuss this on and on and on? No one has displayed such an acute desire for such discussion. Maxim_(talk) 15:36, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, that is more because redirects are boring. Very boring. Have you ever been to WP:RFD? Misunderstanding has always bee rife about redirects and what they do and why we need them and why they are cheap. My jaw literally dropped when I saw that you had written: "The redirects as a result of pagemove are redirects that are deleted. Such redirects are completely useless." I see you haven't responded yet to what I wrote up above: "You are completely and utterly wrong. Read Misplaced Pages:Redirect." I can't drop this while people (in this case you) say things that are completely wrong and misleading. Carcharoth (talk) 15:53, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

It's a simple page in projectspace, it can be broken. Please point out why my statement is illogical, and not sending to read some guideline that half of us have never read nor consciously follow anyhow. Maxim_(talk) 15:58, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Maybe Misplaced Pages:Candidates for speedy deletion#Redirects and WP:RFD will be more helpful? I'm sorry if I was a bit sharp earlier, but there are some basic misunderstandings being made here: (1) That redirects created following a page move are not needed (that is only the case if they are orphaned, and not always even then); and (2) These redirects have "no history" - well of course they don't! They are redirects left behind after a page move - the edit history has moved. These two misunderstandings are so basic that I find it alarming that people are writing bots to deal with redirects without knowing this. Carcharoth (talk) 16:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm only saying that discussion pages aren't really needed. Maxim_(talk) 16:15, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Redirects point people to the correct page. Page locations are not only captured in internal links, but also in bookmarks, external links, search results, etc. Counting internal links in no way determines the real usage of any redirect. Redirecting talk pages serves a purpose and they should not be arbitrarily deleted. If some think they should, then they should recommend a change to our CSD policy vs. applying IAR across this many pages. -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:23, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Is this the "no history" thing again? The talk pages do exist. The articles do exist. What has been deleted here is the redirects to the talk pages (I presume the redirects to the articles are still intact). I still think this might be a misunderstanding here, does this make it any clearer? Carcharoth (talk) 16:33, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Policy

I think it is clear from User:WJBscribe's redirect bot's RFA that the community wants adminbots to be run on a separate account, and that each adminbot has to go through RFA. What's going on here seems to be problematic and should stop until things are clarified. I suggest discussing this at WP:BN. If it is determined that a broad community discussion is required to change policy, then we can come back here. Jehochman 15:25, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that the community is paranoid of adminbots. For example, I once tried to get a separate account at Commons; I was denied, and the reasons included just the fact of what it is. Maxim_(talk) 15:30, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

It looks like East decided to ignore our rules about admin bots when they prevented him from maintaining Misplaced Pages. The rules really do get in the way of maintaining Misplaced Pages's administrative requirements in the specific area of automation. Perhaps we should ask ourselves, how can the rules be changed so that using IAR to do this is not needed? _(1 == 2) 15:34, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Please stop characterising this as "he was doing the right thing". There are clear, logical points made above, by me and others, that these are not orphaned talk page redirects (redirects with nothing linking to them), but are redirects where there are incoming links from Misplaced Pages and User namespace that were ignored due to the code being written to ignore links from those namespaces. Misza (who wrote the original code) and all the other admins who ran the code, deleted pages that they had redefined as orphaned when they in fact were not. I do realise what Misza means by WP 1.0 assessment pages, and other bot-generated lists, but I disagree with the assumption that "nearly all" such links in those namespaces (Misplaced Pages and User) are from such "list" pages. And even if it was nearly all, the presence of other links means that a bot is not suitable for the task, much as I'm sure that people will sleep easier in their beds tonight because 35,000 redirects are gone. It may not matter an awful amount in this case, but it is the attitude of "I know best and I'll write the code and do it without discussion (or only with a few people)" attitude that really gets me. It goes against the whole Misplaced Pages ethos. Carcharoth (talk) 15:44, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

In your opinion, this might go against the whole Misplaced Pages ethos. I disagree. And few agree with you here. If it were such a big deal, it would be a. raised earlier and b. many more people would be discussing this. Maxim_(talk) 15:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I fancy as people catch on that what we have here is a case of ignore-all-consensus-that-adminbots-require-RfA there will be a little more concern expressed. --Relata refero (disp.) 15:55, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

In this case the community has approved an adminbot for redirect work - User:RedirectCleanupBot. If its role is to be expanded, the community should be involved. Some time ago, I asked East718 to cease the use of his account for the deletion of redirects but it seems my request fell on deaf ears. That is disappointing. I have long felt that the goal of having repetitive tasks automated is a good one - but some sensitivity is required. Finding out what tasks require human feedback and evaluation requires consultation. That has been sadly lacking in this case. Where the community has clearly delimited a task, going behind its back in this way undermined trust in the approval of adminbots. It is completely contrary to the goals I had in mind when I openly proposed an adminbot and received the community's blessing at RfA. I am saddened to find that a redirect deletion script has been run in such a cavalier manner without consultation with people like JLaTondre or Rossami - admins heavily involved in redirect discussions. Expediency in deletions is not necessarily progress. WjBscribe 02:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

What's the point of this thread?

Honestly, what is it? Carcharoth, what are you aiming for? Maxim_(talk) 15:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

To get you to understand what a redirect is? Look, I've said above, most people don't really deal with redirects. That is why it looks like it's only you and me here. My main points so far are:

• Misza should either discuss or remove undiscussed "namespace exclusions" like the one he described above.
• All admin bots should have their source openly discussed to avoid future problems like this.
• People should read Misplaced Pages:Redirect.

Is that short enough? Carcharoth (talk) 15:57, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The title of the thread is East718 is running an adminbot, not "Carcharoth's private playground for acting like a condescending know-it-all using the excuse of an admin invoking IAR to do some good". Maxim_(talk) 16:00, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

a condescending know-it-all?? Please try and keep your comments civil and focused on the subject at hand. We've had users blocked recently for less incivility than that. RxS (talk) 16:41, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Maxim, do you really think it is acceptable to say that? Did I deserve that from you? Carcharoth (talk) 16:03, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Your comments above haven't exactly been very angelic-like, either. But I hope I have somehow made my point here. Maxim_(talk) 16:11, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, the more I read it, the worse it makes you look. You are free to retract it at any time. I hope the summary I just wrote is enough evidence for you of my good faith in all this. I'm trying to improve things around here as well, you know? Maybe think about that next time, hmm? Carcharoth (talk) 18:24, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

In my humble opinion, this is one of the better cases for ignore all rules. WP:BRFA and WP:RFA on a bot is, at least from what I've seen, rarely a completely rational discussion about the bot and/or its owner, but rather turns into a long, drawn out referendum on trusting technology as a whole. That said, the benefit of successfully passing both is that doing so provides the operator with "legal cover" should something go horribly wrong with the bot's operation; for, the community would have presumably said, by approving the bot, that "we'll explicitly take the risk." So, while running a bot on a sysopped account is highly discouraged due to likely ineptitude in coding (e.g., take a look at quite a few scripts on the tool server that needlessly bring it to a screeching halt), if, on the other hand, a particularly skilled coder is convinced that an incident is unlikely to occur due to implementing extremely good checks to prevent them from happening, then it's within the realm of ignoring all rules to run one in order to clearly make the encyclopedia better.

That said, it's still risky for a bot owner to run a bot on an admin account unless he's/she's 100% percent certain how it works, why it works, and if/how badly it can go wrong as well as how often. However, since both misza and east don't usually need to be beaten with the proverbial cluestick when it comes to coding, I'd say it's okay to simply "let it slide" until something demonstrably causes damage or disruption to a significant degree, again, per WP:IAR. After all, this thread was started because someone found it— not because it was actually causing problems. --slakr 15:55, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't mind adminbots if, like all bots, their actions are discussed. I have objections to the specific actions of this bot (see above) and it seems there is precious little I can do about it because people are ignoring that and focusing on the general adminbot issue. Carcharoth (talk) 16:01, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Yup, East isn't actively harming the project. Go make ANI theads about those who do, like nationalist trolls. Sceptre 15:58, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Among the pages he's deleted are ones that shouldn't have been. I hardly see this as helping the project. -- JLaTondre (talk) 16:25, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I've got nothing against his adminbot, and I'm speaking as someone who's been blocked by it - the advantages of it outweigh the disadvantages vastly. Sceptre 17:02, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

has anyone ever brought 40K+ redirects to DRV in one go before? Carcharoth (talk) 17:07, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe a DRV is necessary. The value of the talk page redirects outweighs their deletion, but I don't believe their value outweighs the hassle of restoring them. I think a discontinuing of the deletions is sufficient. -- JLaTondre (talk) 17:22, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

You've lost me. It's irrelevant to me how the talk page redirects were deleted. I just don't want to see any more deleted. -- JLaTondre (talk) 17:13, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, if the developers hadn't changed the logs recently so that deletions show up in the watchlists, no-one would have spotted this. I expect a lot more "adminbot deletions" threads to show up in future because people will now see the deletions on their watchlists. Carcharoth (talk) 16:01, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed more people will notice what has been going on for a rather long time now, due to a change in how the same information is presented to them. Go dig through the logs and you will see this is not an uncommon practice. The rules should describe not prescribe our best practices, and IAR is a safety measure to make sure that happens. Right now the rules prevent automated maintenance of even the most non-controversial admin act. This is a tempest in a teapot. _(1 == 2) 16:05, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

If it is, I fail to understand why there's a problem in changing the rules. --Relata refero (disp.) 16:08, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that what people are doing right now, out there, is not always best practice. There is a tension between describing what is "current practice" and correcting what is wrong about "current practice". It is my assertion that Misza dropping the "backlinks from Misplaced Pages and User pages" from his adminbot's definition of an "orphaned talk page redirect" is an example of an under-discussed practice that went under the radar mainly because most people don't care about redirects, and because deletions didn't show up in watchlists until recently. And if anyone reading that didn't understand it, that is why it needs to be discussed, not left to a group of bot operators to make edge decisions about obscure pages. Carcharoth (talk) 16:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

With all sincerity, it is because people act like skynet is going to take over Misplaced Pages. That is not hyperbole, they use those very words when the idea is brought up. The rules will catch up with practice eventually though. _(1 == 2) 16:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

And the specific question of redirects? What about them? Hmph. Only Spiderman cares about redirects. Carcharoth (talk) 16:21, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Spiderman is a very caring person. _(1 == 2) 16:22, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I completely agree with Maxim and Until here. I participated in the discussions for the last couple adminbot RFAs and the discussion to give the anti-vandal bots rollback. Many of the reasons for opposing are downright paranoid, pure policy wonking, or other complete nonsense like the belief that any action that requires admin tools requires a full manual review. I'm still amazed that RedirectCleanupBot was able to pass an RFA. Mr.Z-man 18:15, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps one of the reasons admin bots get a bad name is because of (in my opinion) pointless and not-clearly-defined tasks like this, where backlinks from Misplaced Pages/User namespaces are ignored (still not convinced by the explanation), and from which one might assume bots are simply not capable of doing admin tasks. I'm quite fine with adminbot tasks, even without a bot flag – but when one has a history of not-too-thought-out unilateral admin actions and desysopping suggestions from a Wikimedia system admin, I'd expect that IAR might be applied a little less quixotically. Gracenotes § 19:29, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I've got to agree here that East is guilty of the crime of trying to improve the encyclopedia. This issue of admin bots has been brought up so many times in the past, and looking at admin action statistics, its obvious that many admins use such things. When there have been issues with deletions, East is usually the first person to undelete any pages and if you look at his talk page, goes out of his way to help recover images and what not. I think this current run was a good idea and only attracted attention since it happened to watch page's talk pages. So lets move on and keep writing please? MBisanz 23:55, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

No, this last run was not a good idea. It deleted things that should not have been deleted. I also agree that he was trying to improve the encyclopedia, but that was not the result with these particular deletions. If anyone believes talk page redirects should be speedy deleted, then they should be seeking community consensus for that. Hopefully, when East is next active, he will agree with my request to not continue in this practice. -- JLaTondre (talk) 01:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Also not seeing the problem. If people can find cases where East is wrong (and they will be fairly isolated), I would trust him to revert himself on those. There really is nothing for anyone to do here - a whole stack of the deletions appeared on my watchlist but they were all correct ones. Orderinchaos 02:23, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree. I'm not sure what your basis is for deciding that the incidents where he has been wrong are isolated. Neither he not you have reviewed the deletions in question. A lot of them contained only one revision - in due course those redirects to deleted pages with only one revision clarifed... WjBscribe 03:57, 14 April 2008 (UTC) would have been deleted by RedirectCleanupBot. A bot approved by the community for that purpose. The one revision limit was because it was felt other such redirects deserved human review. Deletions do not appear on watchlists, they go largely unchecked. I think it is time the extend of East718's script aided deletions is properly scrutinised. Redirects are on a cursory inspection the tip of the iceberg. WjBscribe 02:34, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't believe RCB deletes talk pages. And deletions do show up on watchlists now. seresin ( ¡? ) 02:57, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Deletions now show up on watchlists? What a lot changes when one goes away for a bit... And RCB does delete talkpages that point to deleted pages. If their destination hasn't been deleted, well "redirects are cheap" or we have RfD... WjBscribe 03:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

All logs do. But East is deleting the talk page of redirects, not the redirects themselves. seresin ( ¡? ) 03:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Uh, no. He is (or was) deleting talk pages that have become redirects. I admit this is confusing, so will post a quick guide to terminology below. Carcharoth (talk) 03:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec) I think we're talking at crossed purposes here. The problem is that these talkpages (whether presently redirects or not) may contain useful material that should be moved/merged to the correct place - that automated deletion is inappropriate and that human review should have taken place. WjBscribe 03:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

As far as I am aware, no talk page content got deleted. These all seem to be redirects created by pagemoves, rather than redirects created by blanking the page and inserting the redirect markup, thus the content end up at the new destination. What did get lost was the information linking the old title to the new one - what we call a redirect. Carcharoth (talk) 03:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for clarifying. It is taking me a little time to catch up - I've been tracking a few related issues... WjBscribe

there seems to be a bit of a misunderstanding... your bot deletes only broken redirects, not useless ones. 195.242.221.60 (talk) 02:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

You seem to have forgotten to log into your account... WjBscribe 03:04, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

No-one has bothered to comment on the specific examples I provided earlier. Maybe you would like to comment on them? They are not the best examples, and it is rather difficult to find good examples when clicking at random among 10,000 redirects, but I would point out that around 10 of the redirects have already been restored or otherwise turned 'blue' again, for various reasons. I posted these to East's talk page, but I think it will be useful to post them here as well:

• Talk:Axis powers talk page reconnected with its page
• Talk:IKEA Ampere Way tram stop moved and then moved back
• Talk:Hetmans of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth you restored this one
• Talk:Grand Duchy of Lithuania talk page reconnected with its redirect
• Talk:Fort William, Highland you got someone very confused
• Talk:Father Divine moved back over redirect
• Talk:Brookfield High School (Ottawa) article moved back over redirect
• Talk:Bleimor (Breton Scouting organization) restored by another admin
• Talk:Ajax (automobile) strange...
• Talk:Kiev tumbler recreated followed by me doing this

Some of these were correct, but some are debatable. The point is that no debate took place. Carcharoth (talk) 02:31, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Summary (so far)

I think this is an accurate and fair summary, please correct anything I get wrong.

• Various admin bots exist, and are operated by various admins to clean up various areas of the encyclopedia where admins tools are needed, usually areas that are too mundane for mere humans to bother with. The existence of admin bots is to some an open secret. To others it is a surprise.
• User:Misza13 has written and openly published the code for several of these admin bots.
• Others also use the code published by Misza13, such as (it seem) in this case, by User:East718.
• Following the example set by previous deletion runs (I'm not sure of the date or extent of these), East718, using a list obtained from a toolserver request, initiated a run of deletions of talk page redirects using the adminbot code. Most of these talk page redirects appear to have been created following the move of a page and its associated talk page. The edit summary used was: "orphaned redirect talk page (x days old)" (where x was presumably how old it was). These orphaned talk page redirects should not be confused with orphaned redirects (that is dealt with by User:RedirectCleanupBot) or 'orphaned' talk pages (a sloppy but common way to refer to WP:CSD#G8 deletions of talk pages without an associated page).
• Between 03:22 and 12:57, 13 April 2008, East718 deleted around 10,213 such redirects (the total on the list was apparently around 35,000 but he stopped before the list was complete). The list can be seen at the following log links in reverse order (warning, pages may load slowly): first 5000; second 5000, last 213). This list includes various image deletions as well, and a run of deletions and restorations where the bot seems to have made a mistake and self-corrected? There are also currently 10 talk pages that are blue links - I'll take those to East718's talk page.
• Exact details are not clear because I don't have a clue how to interpret the bot code, but it seems that various checks were carried out to see whether the redirects are suitable for deletion. One of these was to check for incoming links (backlinks, which can be seen by using "what links here"). An "orphaned" redirect is one that has no incoming links
• However, many such incoming links are to manually or (more commonly) bot-generated article lists or logs (WatchListBot and the WP 1.0 Bot). These lists are usually placed in either the Misplaced Pages namespace, or the User namespace. When writing or updating the code, Misza13 decided (with some justification) that these links were not sufficient reason to keep the redirects, and that other links from these two namespaces were too few to worry about. It now turns out that others disagree, but, because this was an admin bot, it was not discussed widely enough for this sort of counter-opinion to be expressed.
• During East718's latest maintenance run, these deletions suddenly started appearing on people's watchlists, as can be seen by the responses on his talk page. This is because the developers recently changed the software so that deletions show up on people's watchlists.
• I asked East718 to stop the bot to allow discussion. Hesperian started the ANI thread. This is the result so far, with opinion divided (as far as I can tell), and people arguing over what exactly has been going on.

What needs to happen next (if anything)? The two main questions that need answering concern: (1) how to handle the redirects in future and what to do with the deleted redirects; (2) whether admin bots need to be more widely discussed to avoid issues like this in future? My views should be clear so far, including my prediction that now deletions show up on watchlists, the actions of adminbots will be subjected to more scrutiny than in the past, but I'm going to step back now and let others say stuff. Carcharoth (talk) 18:17, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• Sorry to be a pain, but I've not come across this before. What's the 'list'? Could anyone link me to it (if applicable). Thank you. Regards, Rudget (review) 20:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• The clearest explanation seems to be here:

  "Hi, Mrg3105! I'm using a robot to delete these pages; 35000 deletions straight probably wouldn't be too good for my mental health. :-) Thanks for the heads-up anyway. First, I had a friend with access to the toolserver generate a list of all redirect talk pages for me. When I run the bot, it systematically goes through the list of pages, testing each to see whether it has no history, no incoming links, and is more than a week old. If all of these criteria are met, the page gets deleted, otherwise, nothing happens." - User:East718 - 12:33, 13 April 2008

  It was this open admission of using an admin bot (which I'm not opposed to in principle - it is doing tasks without discussion that I oppose) that attracted Hesperian's attention and led him to eventually (after some talk page discussion) to say he was moving it to ANI, which he did here. Getting lists from toolserver queries is not controversial. Doing redirects deletions like this is (and should have been in the past as well, if anyone had spotted it back then). But it looks like most people are too busy discussing the Tango-MONGO drama above to care much about this. Carcharoth (talk) 20:31, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Ugh

East is clearly in the wrong here. If this were Betacommand, this thread would be ten times longer. The fact of the matter is, admins have to follow policies and procedures, just like everyone else. They don't get to ignore them because they find them inconvenient.

Turn off the bot, submit it to the BAC folks, and then if they approve it for the tasks you want, turn it back on. That's how the rest of us peons have to do it and that's how you have to do it too. Jtrainor (talk) 01:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The impression I am getting is that there are quite high volumes of such deletion (or other maintenance) runs, and most of them are fine because they don't appear to cause any problems or objections. When they do, though, or they become more visible because of changes in the way watchlists work (unsurprisingly, people don't actually hover over Special:Log/delete - though maybe that might not have been such a bad idea in the past), then people do raise objections. What I do feel the bot operating community need to do is get a handle on admin bots, and for admin bot operators and their supporters not to react so defensively. It is exactly the same reaction as seen with Betacommand, though East, to be fair, has generally been much more responsive to questions. It is indisputable that, with the volume of mundane maintenance required, admin bots are needed to do this work. But, as with ANY bot operation, there is a need to change and adapt to the wishes of the community, rather than using bots to force a default result. That may not be the intention, but it is rare for people to be bothered to contest borderline cases, and so bit-by-bit admin bot operation seems to have expanded its role, and inevitably this will lead to questions and objections. What is not acceptable is to try and suppress or divert such discussions with the cry of "we can't discuss admin bots because the community will reject them". I stand by my claim that with deletions more visible on watchlists, we will see more threads like this unless the bot operating community actually bring admin bots within the bot policy and begin to set limits and oversee open on-wiki discussions about them. At the same time, the wider community should probably try, once again, to get the issue of admin bots settled once and for all. It is not helpful to have them being "open secrets". User:RedirectCleanupBot managed it. Some of the more mundane admin tasks could similarly succeed as well. Carcharoth (talk) 02:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I am also concerned by the situation here. About a month ago I asked East718 privately to stop the automated deletion of redirects. I felt that the community's views on the RedirectCleanupBot RfA were clear as to the circumstances in which redirects were to be deleted. East718's script in my opinion deletes redirects which should be evaluated by hand. WjBscribe 02:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

There are only limited times fully automated bots should be used, especially with admin rights. This isn't one of them, imo. It should go to RfA really, if anything. And I supported the RCB RfA because it's a bot that really can't go wrong at all. This one can, and has done. Majorly (talk) 02:34, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Now would be an excellent time for East718 to state that they will not run the script again without community approval. This is not a situation where WP:IAR can be applied, because there was a long and thorough discussion of what would be needed to run a redirect deletion bot. That consensus was fairly recent and needs to be respected. If necessary, we can have another RFA for a new bot. Jehochman 02:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately it is not limited to East718. MZMcBride runs a similar script for genuinely internally-orphaned redirects (though this doesn't avoid the issue that links from outside will break). There are many admin bot scripts running, and I saw a comment somewhere that Misza13 has written the script for many of them. The sources are publically available. Some quotes from elsewhere in this thread: "Misza13 created a bunch of bots. They're open source. Other admins use them...", "Many other admins run adminbots (MZMcBride, DerHexer, Quadell, Misza13), to name a few. I don't officially run an adminbot, as javascript isn't considered to be a bot, for all intents and purposes, it is one. It's never been bureaucratically approved or anything". So this needs a much wider discussion. Carcharoth (talk) 03:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

As a member of the bot approvals group, I must state unequivocally that all bots must be approved by the proper process, which is that way. I am disappointed that this is not the first time east718 has abused an unapproved bot for what he considered a case of ignore all rules, but actually ended up requiring half an hour of developer time to fix up the mess he made. Might I suggest that we have an approvals mechanism for bots for a good reason, and, in both situations, east718 has circumvented this approvals mechanism, and, consequently, caused damage to the encyclopedia.

I recognise that there are issues in approving adminbots because some people have silly ideas about them, but a culture of quietly running them, and turning a blind eye to them is not the way to resolve these issues, and probably serve to detriment the cause of adminbots. — Werdna talk 03:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Werdna makes a good point - this is not an isolated incident of misjudgment on east718's part (yet another springs easily to mind ). East's mistakes are starting to outnumber his correct decisions... WjBscribe 03:25, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm gonna go with Werdna here, as another member of the bot approvals group. If this had been an unapproved editing bot, making 10,000+ edits in 8 hours (about 20epm), it probably would have been blocked long ago. The delete and block buttons have the potential to be far more destructive than the edit button, and far harder to clean up in such massive numbers. Performance wise, a deletion "costs" a lot more than an edit. Adminbots should, in my opinion, need to be at least documented, and discussed with the community. SQL 11:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Agree with Werdna, Majorly, SQL and WJBScribe. The approval process exists for a reason. I don't think these redirects ought to be deleted in the first place, and I'm not seeing the process for cleaning mistakes up (one of my beefs with bots, especially unauthorised bots, is that their operators tend not to clean up the messes made) when discovered. ++Lar: t/c 14:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'll be blunt. I don't see the problem with what he's doing. Seems like maintenance to me. If the redirects aren't needed, then they're not needed. If he touched mainspace to mainspace redirects, that's one thing. But he just got rid of talk page clutter that is never needed and was never going to be useful. If there were problems, then let's try and fix them in order to be able to do what he did more effectively rather than bashing him unjustifiably. Wizardman 03:11, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

What was on the talk page was moved to the new location when the pagemove took place. Thus what is being deleted here is not what was on the talk page, but the redirect. In other words, this is "redirect clutter", not "talk page clutter". Whether orphaned redirects should be deleted is a matter for WP:RFD, and is not covered by WP:CSD. That is long-standing practice, and it is increasingly clear that some admins did an end-run around that. Maybe with the best of intentions, but still an end-run around redirect deletion policy. Carcharoth (talk) 03:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

So, the right thing to do would've been to bombard RfD with this orphaned redirects? It is a run around it, but with the sheer number of ones to be dealt with I can see why they did so. Wizardman 03:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The right thing would have been to leave them alone. Redirects are cheap and I've yet to see a convincing argument that they were causing any harm. 35,000 versus 2,500,000? Maybe someone could give figures for the total number of redirects we have, and whether deleting 35,000 of them really would have helped. In the end, only 10,000 or so got deleted, but tens of thousands were deleted previously. Carcharoth (talk) 03:45, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

True, the redirects weren't harmful, yet them being "cheap" isn't necessarily a reason to keep them. If no one's going to see them, then why have them? Wizardman 04:02, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Good. We are getting somewhere. Now, where is the right place to discuss this? WP:RfD, WT:CSD or a discussion within a small group of bot operators? Carcharoth (talk) 04:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Tough to say. Could an extra CSD criterion be added for instances such as this? Would such an option be a problem? That would be a good discussion to have, I think. Wizardman 04:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

There are presently 1,857,524 redirects, according to the toolserver, whomever asked. SQL 11:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

It doesn't matter how purportedly useful the bot is. The facts are, East has no authority to run it and hasn't submitted it to BAC for approval, as is required. The policies are really quite clear on this. "It's useful" or "It doesn't seem to be doing anything harmful" are not valid reasons to ignore the rules we all have to follow. My concern is with the violation of process more than with what the bot itself is doing. Jtrainor (talk) 06:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Terminology confusion

Some people are getting very confused over terminology, so a quick refresher might be in order:

• (1) "Orphaned" talk pages (CSD#G8) are talk pages where the corresponding page does not exist or was deleted. This is an imprecise use of the phrase "orphaned".
• (2) Broken redirects are redirects pointing at deleted or never-created titles. Sometimes these are called "orphaned" redirects. As for type (1), this is an imprecise use of the phrase "orphaned". User:RedirectCleanupBot deals with these providing they have no edit history beyond creation (see type C).
• (3) True orphaned pages are pages not linked to from anywhere else (ie. "what links here" shows nothing). This usually refers to articles not linked from other articles, but can refer to other namespace pages as well. These links from somewhere else are also called backlinks. Redirects can be orphaned in this sense (looking backwards at what connects to it) as well as in the other sense (looking forward at what it connects to, though this is more commonly called a "broken redirect").
  • (3a) Sometimes orphan status can be delimited by namespace. Thus it is possible for a page to be orphaned with respect to several namespaces, but still be linked from other namespaces. This is relevant here because some namespaces (in this case Misplaced Pages and User namespaces) are densely populated with links from article lists, such as the various bot-generated watchlists, wikiproject article lists, user lists, and the WP 1.0 assessment lists.

Also, redirects can be created in several ways and have a varied history.

• (A) Redirects can be created from scratch. These generally never have a talk page, and the edit history usually only shows creation, but in theory a talk page could be created for such redirects.
• (B) Redirects are created by the pagemove function. If the page has a talk page and the talk page is also moved, a redirect is created for the talk page as well. The edit history will only show creation of the redirect at the time of the page move.
• (C) Redirects can also be created by blanking a page and inserting the redirect markup. This is known as "redirecting" and is also a step seen in merging. This can also work the other way round, with a redirect being turned into a normal page, usually when undoing a merge, creating a disambiguation page following a page move, or just creating new content where previously only a redirect existed. These redirects are easily distinguished from others because they have an edit history that is more than just the creation of the redirect. When talk pages exist for these type of redirects, they are sometimes left alone, and sometimes redirected or merged to the talk page of the redirect destination.

Thus you can have a talk page for a created redirect, a pagemove talk page redirect, and either of these types can be orphaned or broken, and talk pages, as always, can lack the corresponding page. I think that covers the basics. Carcharoth (talk) 03:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• So which one was he deleting? Q 03:25, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• A variant of Type 3a-B. Carcharoth (talk) 03:32, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I would argue that A and C should generally not be done in "talk" namespaces except for obvious shortcuts such as WT:RFA or maybe Talk:USPS to Talk:United States Postal Service would be reasonable but the red link and the emptiness of the deletion log suggests that this isn't often done deliberately. — CharlotteWebb 14:29, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps "widowed talk page" would be a better name for type 1. Bovlb (talk) 00:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Bot or no bot, why were these being deleted?

See #Mass deletion outside of RfD or CSD. In all the talk about an admin bot, we seem to have overlooked something.. the deletion itself. -- Ned Scott 03:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree the deletions are really the topic of interest. If an admin makes a list of pages and then uses an automated tool to avoid clicking 'delete' a thousand times, that isn't a "bot" in the ordinary sense of the word, it's just a loop around a deletion button. Bot approval would only be needed for scripts that edit in an ongoing way and make decisions on their own.

I find myself very neutral about the deletions. On one hand, I don't see any strong argument for keeping these redirects (I have both read the above conversation and thought about it myself). On the other hand, I don't see a real need to delete them, although I understand the desire to keep things tidy. — Carl (CBM · talk) 04:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the opposite is true. I opened this thread to get community input on whether it has now become acceptable for admins to run unauthorised adminbots on their account; but the bulk of the discussion has been about whether we like what the adminbot was doing. Hesperian 04:11, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I have been convinced by the comments of primarily Carcharoth that these deletions are not all appropriate. I notice that MZMcBride is making similar ones. Aleta 04:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

So, if I make a list of pages, and use an automated tool to avoid clicking 'save page' a thousand times, that wouldn't be a bot either right? It's really just a loop around the edit button. IMO, if you're performing an action at a high rate of speed, without looking at the current content of the page you are performing the action on, you are running a bot, at least as I know it. SQL 11:20, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I've left him another message. Carcharoth (talk) 04:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

He replied at my talk page and wants to discuss it there instead of here. Carcharoth (talk) 05:19, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

That might be my fault. It was my impression that people were saying (at least at first) that "there's nothing wrong with admin bots", and were not focusing on whether the deletions were appropriate. I agree the two issues (admin bots vs the deletions) should have been separated. I apologise for that, and would suggest trying to separate the debates or restarting them away from ANI. Carcharoth (talk) 04:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the proper purpose of the talk page of a redirect would be to discuss issues regarding the redirect. Let's suppose that due to some (possibly long-forgotten) page-move, "A" redirects to "B" and "Talk:A" redirects to "Talk:B". If somebody wanted to say "Maybe A should redirect to C instead, what do you think? ~~~~" they would probably post it at "Talk:A", thereby removing (or otherwise breaking) the "#REDIRECT ]" code, seriously. Deleting (or at least blanking) the talk-page redirect saves such commenters the one step of clicking on the "redirected from Talk:A" link to get to the "title=Talk:A&redirect=no" address before editing. Arguably not really worth the trouble of doing this en masse due to the sub-triviality of it all, and definitely not worth undoing. — CharlotteWebb 14:13, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Before doing the "breaking the redirect" step you mention above, it is polite to click "what links here" and repair any links to the old talk page so that they point to the new talk page. This is a large part of what the above mess is about - the talk page redirects East718 deleted were not fully orphaned - they still had links from Misplaced Pages and User namespaces. In contrast, MZMcBride's deletions were of fully orphaned redirects, and that is why I discussed at his and my talk pages, whereas with East I asked him to stop until it was discussed (though it was Hesparian who brought it here). In hindsight, I should have taken the redirect-specific issues elsewhere, and let Hesperian's thread concentrate on the admin bot business (which while it can't be resolved here, is still relevant). A subtle nuance to the above "not fully orphaned" point, is that the original writer of the code (Misza13) deliberately excluded the Misplaced Pages and User namespaces when checking for backlinks, because he (correctly) observed that most of these links are from article lists that include talk pages links (eg. WikiProject lists, user lists, WP 1.0 lists). However, "most" is not "all", and it was this silent extension of the definition of "orphaned" that I objected to most strongly. How many people, when they see "orphaned redirect talk page" in the deletion log entry actually bother to check that it really is orphaned? Carcharoth (talk) 06:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh, and a more logical place to discuss a redirect is the talk page of the destination page (or the destination if it is a talk page). In other words, "do we want this redirect pointing here?". Carcharoth (talk) 09:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

What is this about??

There are so many issues being discussed in parallel here, this whole section is almost worthless, because no one knows who is talking about what and many of the discussions don't belong here. As far as I can tell, there are at least 4 issues here, only one of which is really appropriate for this board.

Adminbots in general

This is a discussion for a different board, one more suited to long term discussions.

Deleting redirects

Again, far too broad for this board to address. The general topic of deleting redirects is not an incident requiring immediate admin attention.

East718's adminbot

As much as I hate the user-conduct-RFC format, its still better than this mess for discussing long-term issues with a user.

East718 deleting redirects

This is really the only topic I can identify that is appropriate for this board and for a short-term discussion.

If we want to get anything remotely close to a resolution, can we stick to discussing things that can actually be resolved here? Mr.Z-man 16:46, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

OK, I've been adding some points above, but you are quite right. This has too unwieldy to deal with here. I freely admit I was the "prime mover" at the start the thread (with a bit of help from Maxim), though Hesparian started it (I was happy to discuss on talk pages, but that gets difficult after a while). My summary section above was an attempt to keep things under control, but didn't really work. I am prepared to start moving the discussions out to other places, if people will suggest suitable locations. Any suggestions? Carcharoth (talk) 09:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

One such discussion started at Misplaced Pages talk:Criteria for speedy deletion#CSD G6 clause "cleaning up redirects". I've also proposed that anyone who wants to expand the current criteria for speedy deletion of redirects do so over there. Carcharoth (talk) 10:23, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

ESCStudent774441 and legal threats

Yesterday I blocked ESCStudent774441 (talk · contribs) for legal threats. He was blocked in the past for disruptions including accusing people of taking away his "legal rights to free speech" (see Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive389#ESCStudent774441). I just received an email from him (that I will happily provide to whoever) saying that he will not seek unblock "within" Misplaced Pages but that he will appeal to a legal system to have them reserve my block (through court order) and have the court enjoin me and everyone else from blocking him in the future. Do I just ignore this kind of behavior? Do I pass it on to anyone in the Foundation? Metros (talk) 17:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

You could pass it on to Mike Godwin, the foundation's legal counsel, but I don't know what he would do with it. Hut 8.5 17:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Discussion over at WP:NLT emphasized that such incidents are channeled through the Foundation. However, it is normally the one who issues the threat as needing to channel the threat. If he follows through with the threat, he would need to contact Wikimedia to find out who you are, so they will find out eventually. However, I doubt that will be the case. Ottava Rima (talk) 17:54, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

No, let him do his thing. He has no legal basis for that request anyway, but if he wants to punt his head into a brick wall, he's more than welcome to email OTRS. I'm tweaking the block to prevent email (if it hasn't already been done)⇒SWATJester 17:56, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I would pass it onto Godwin just so he is aware in case anything ever does come of it, and then ignore the user. KnightLago (talk) 18:07, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

We can't pass every single worthless legal threat on to him, otherwise he'd be overwhelmed. That's what we have a legal-en queue on OTRS for. Especially when there's no actual suit either, or an official letter from an attorney. ⇒SWATJester 19:14, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok, then send it to OTRS, I was just saying send it to someone related to the foundation so they have it. KnightLago (talk) 19:34, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

WP:RBI... He's not taking this to court. Really, he's not. He's just puffing and being a general PITA... Block email access and move on... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 19:56, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• Not in the least bit surprised. He will be sorely missed by almost nobody. Guy (Help!) 20:12, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Those who feel an "I told you so" directed to me is appropriate are now free to do so :) ++Lar: t/c 18:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• For those unaware, he returned as User:RogueKnight774441. I notifed the blocking admin and he's been blocked, but as an FYI. There's also an IP he's using. This one was an easy spot with the screen name similarity but it's worth keeping an eye out for further incarnations TRAVELLINGCARI_{Tell me yours} 15:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Request for more eyes

Can some un-involved admins help (perhaps explain what I am missing) over at Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed and it's talk page. I'm being accused of Point of View violations, but I am lost. Assistance would be greatly appreciated... even if it means telling me I'm wrong (with a better explanation). Mahalo. --Ali'i 19:01, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Holy shit, that's possibly the worst article I've ever seen in terms of blatant POV violations (not referring to your edits, I'm referring to whatever the version I just viewed 5 minutes ago was). ⇒SWATJester 19:19, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Which specific parts do you have a problem with? FeloniousMonk (talk) 19:25, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

I was called to take a look at this article over concerns by a number of others about what appeared to be tag teaming and POV promotion by Ali'i and Ferrylodge. In my view Ali'i has been ignoring consensus and edit warring to promote the intelligent design POV and then rules lawyering over quoting the source when his reverts don't stick. This taken with what appears to be a POV campaign to whitewash the article, I've informed him there that 3 reverts in 30 minutes while ignoring consensus and POV deletions are likely to be seen as disruptive editing per WP:DE. Add to that now campaigning to drive away productive contributors through forum shopping, and now you have the complete picture. FeloniousMonk (talk) 19:23, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Not forum shopping... this is the only place I asked for more eyes. I am not tag teaming with anyone... I disliked Ferrylodge's edit as much as the others. If you look at my edits and see me trying to "whitewash" towards a certain point of view (especially the pro-intelligent design view), then I have no idea what is going on. I didn't come here asking for back up (in fact, if I was wrong, then I requested uninvolved admins to assist me in understanding how I was violating our core principles). Rules lawyering is trying to have a quote state what was actually said??? Now I think I've heard everything. --Ali'i 19:29, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

You do seem to be edit warring, I suggest you hold off on any further back and forth. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:34, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Trust me... I'm done. I was only trying to copyedit an article and now I've been accused of neutrality violations, personal attacks, tag-team editing, forum shopping, driving other editors away from Misplaced Pages, and disruptive editing. I'm wary to get back into that article now. --Ali'i 19:40, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

It appeared to me that Ali'i's revert warring was solely to correct a misquotation, that others kept reinserting. It shouldn't have amounted to a revert war, but I'm not sure Ali'i is at all to blame. Otherwise I tend to agree with Swatjester and Relata refero, that the article has significant problems, and that this persists largely because of incivility on the page. Mackan79 (talk) 20:37, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The primary source looks a bit unreliable either way, as has been pointed out here and on the talk page. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:42, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough, I think that was decided afterwards, however. In replacing it, some appeared to argue that changing the quote was ok as long as it was generally representative. I think possibly several people just weren't aware it was actually placed in quotes. Mackan79 (talk) 20:48, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

And were less likely to notice, maybe, because of all the incivility and edit warring. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:52, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I've never seen it help to argue that something could be considered vandalism, to the extent that was a part of it. Mackan79 (talk) 20:56, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• I gave up on Expelled long ago, the subject of the article is something that would be laughed out by any rational audience and the whole history of the article has been of ever-increasing bloat as the warring factions try to gain an advantage by having more of their sources quoted. I also find it offensive that blatant propaganda like this and "what the bleep" is called "documentary". I would call Michael Moore's films satire, and these propaganda, but neither is a documentary as I would understand it. Guy (Help!) 19:41, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

The problematic section was introduced in a worthy effort to cut down on the bloat and streamline the structure, but unfortunately it introduced a situation where the views of the film producers and their backers were reported uncritically with the context of third party analysis being separated away to later in the section. Ali'i made a good point in that the film producers' statement could not be sourced by the link given, the continually changing news page of the promotional website. Whether the statement had changed on that site or had been modified when inserted in the WP article is unclear, but to me that reflects an underlying problem of an unreliable primary source being used rather than reliable outside expert opinion. .. dave souza, talk 20:35, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• I'd love to help, but the constant incivility from all sides in that environment has driven me and editors like me away. No, wait, apparently that never happens, at least when we're discussing whether to enforce WP:CIVIL when people are fighting off trolls. --Relata refero (disp.) 19:54, 13 April 2008 (UTC)

• I think you've mis-identified the problem. The problem is the trolls, and the need to fight them off al the time, plus the long-term trench warfare on some articles. Take away the trolls and the trenches and I don't think there would be a "civility problem". Guy (Help!) 22:38, 13 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Guy, I think I can identify the reason why I am not editing an article, thanks. --Relata refero (disp.) 08:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• My point is that I believe you are confusing cause and effect. Guy (Help!) 11:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• No. The cause is incivility (block threats, accusations of disruption, etc.) of the type Ali'i describes; the effect is I'm not going to edit there and fix the problems SwatJester describes. The cause is our firm belief that our articles must remain free of pseudoscience; the effect is that extraordinary soapboxing and viciousnes is permitted by those we believe are doing that. Neither cause needs to lead to the corresponding effect, but they do. We need to fix this. --Relata refero (disp.) 12:49, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed - is a controversial documentary film and It is due to be released on April 18, 2008. This page is 109 kilobytes long. There are 146 footnotes and the film has not been released yet. --Newbyguesses (talk) 05:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The article is a truly awful POV screed. I tried editing it some months ago, but was forced to withdraw after being reverted and heavily criticised on the talk page. Comparatively little of the article is even about the film; it's just basically one long anti-intelligent design rant.

I am a little fed up with the way articles on the evolutionism-creationism controversy are treated. The fact is that there is a genuine controversy, and as an encyclopedia committed to the goal of NPOV, we should not paint one side of the controversy as undisputed scientific fact and the other as pseudoscience. And an article on a film should be about the film, presenting the facts and giving all points of view in a balanced way. It does not need to be a detailed discussion of the film's topic, and it should not be a detailed scientific rebuttal of every claim made in the film, or an attempt to discredit intelligent design. The article really needs to be stubified and restarted from scratch, and it should be nowhere near its current length.

I am not a scientist, and I'm not the best person to deal with this topic. But I think we need to have a sensible discussion about this. We need to stop automatically labelling creationist editors as trolls, and we need to stop making block threats. Walton 12:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Not all creationist editors are trolls, of course. However, the "controversy" should not be permitted to permeate into our science-related articles. That there is a "controversy" is a political artefact, and should be treated neutrally as such. To say that this is a science-related article is a bit much. Its an article about a polemical film, and needs to be treated on par with all other such. As Moreschi says about What the Bleep's problems, what we are faced with here is a category error. Which is, of course, ironic. --Relata refero (disp.) 12:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The fact is, one side of the controversy is undisputed scientific fact and the other side pseudoscience. The scientists have spoken definitively on the matter; when asking about the history of life from a scientific perspective, Reliable Sources agree on evolution.--Prosfilaes (talk) 00:34, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

You're quite possibly right (and I'm not qualified to argue with you about science in any case). However, this article is not a science article; it's an article about a film. Therefore, it is original research for Misplaced Pages editors to use scientific sources to criticise the film - and this is what most of the article currently consists of. Most of the sources cited have nothing to do with Expelled; they are about intelligent design in general. It is OR by synthesis. Basically, it's constructed in this way:

The film makes claims X and Y. However, this is not consistent with the view held by the overwhelming majority of the scientific community.

Certainly, the article should contain criticism. But it should be criticism of the film, not intelligent design in general. Walton 15:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Possible stalking of blocked user

User blocked for harassment for one month. Orderinchaos 04:23, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

A blocked user, Robert Young, has complained to me off wiki that User talk:Mentality#A new case for you is a case of continued stalking and harassment of him by User:NealIRC. User:Mentality replied to the second point with "I don't know what you're expecting me to do...?", so he does not seem to be involved. The material is now two weeks old. It certainly looks unacceptable to me. Robert says "This is a gross misuse of Misplaced Pages, and the above comments should be deleted. Not only have I never met this person, I don't want to be associated with him either, yet he continues the myth that I am his 'friend'. I am not bipolar, and my sexual orientation and religious beliefs are none of his business. I would ask that you block Neal to send a message that he needs to stop this." I would welcome advice about what action to take. Remove the material and/or block NealIRC? --Bduke (talk) 03:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Ya, that's creepy. I removed the comments. I'm not sure why Mentality didn't have the sense to do it himself two weeks ago. Grsz11 04:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Robert Young has also e-mailed me about this yesterday (I picked up the e-mail today). I had previously noticed the comments (Neal himself pointed them out to me) and I then mentioned them to someone else (I will remove that comment now, as that diff shouldn't be advertised). I should have removed the comments from Mentality's talk page at that point, and I apologise for not doing so. Someone uninvolved should talk to Neal about what is acceptable and what isn't, as a brief look through his contributions and edit summaries shows other problems. Carcharoth (talk) 04:25, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. Removal of the material and someone having a word with Neal seems the right approach. I think I have had too many arguments with him over several issues to be the person to have the word though. --Bduke (talk) 04:42, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I left a brief comment. I'm thoroughly creeped out by this incident. Grsz11 04:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. I have also left a talk page note. If he keeps that sort of stuff up I wouldn't think he's the sort of user we would want to have around. Orderinchaos 05:42, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I've blocked NealIRC for harassment. —Moondyne click! 02:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

So, I just received my very first death threat via WP's email system...

So, what's the normal procedure for dealing with this kind of situation? --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 09:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Well, according to WP:TOV, you should consider posting at WP:ANI. Oh. Was it from a recognised account? Black Kite 09:58, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Yep. Someone I blocked recently who isn't too pleased with me, by the sound of it. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 10:01, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
    • Just delete the email and reblock them with email block enabled. That's what I always do. Neıl ☎ 10:04, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
      • Yup, agreed. Black Kite 10:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
        • Done. Thanks for the input, guys. :) --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 10:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
          • No problem. That usually resolves things - if a user is particularly incensed and starts creating new accounts solely to send more emails, you can always contact a checkuser and get their IP blocked. Neıl ☎ 11:04, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Death threats are illegal in most jurisdictions, and in most communities you would be strongly advised to report the fact that you got one to your local law enforcement agency. Why Misplaced Pages treats them so lightly is beyond me. Hesperian 11:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Probably because we really can't do anything about them. Since we generally don't know the user's actual name, we have absolutely nothing to give law enforcement officials to go on; and even then, you'd need a checkuser's help to make sure the report went to the right place, and that's assuming it's not some horrible ISP that can't be easily traced. Hersfold 12:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Interesting though, a legal threat gets an indef block and a death threat gets....Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

A death threat would get the user banned, forever and ever. A legal threat would see the user indefinitely blocked as if they are pursuing legal action relating to Misplaced Pages, they cannot continue to edit Misplaced Pages - if the user retracts it, they are frequently unblocked. Neıl ☎ 12:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Well that's what I would have thought but yer note above suggested merely reblocking...Cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 12:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

See below - an indefinite block nobody would ever consider undoing is the same, for all intents and purposes, as a ban. Neıl ☎ 12:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

It is just not true that there is nothing can be done. Law enforcement can request IP information. I don't think Misplaced Pages can volunteer it. Death threats are ... not okay! And they do create a hazard to Misplaced Pages, even more serious than legal threats. At least legal threats will presumably be followed through in the arena of law, which is designed for that. --Abd (talk) 12:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Casliber is right, its appaling that legal threats and BLP violations are treated with upmost speed and force and death threats are all the fun of the fair. A Death threat should get a perm ban full stop. 12:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't think there is a single administrator who would consider unblocking an account that had made a death threat - an indefinite block that nobody is willing to undo is, de facto, a permanent ban. Neıl ☎ 12:55, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If its is "de facto, a permanent ban." why not just be done with it and go the whole hog. 14:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately, 100% of my numerous death threats (and, I suggest, the majority of most of them) come from throwaway dynamic IP addresses. Black Kite 12:57, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

"come from throwaway dynamic IP addresses" Hence why we need to get law enforcement involved. I can only talk about the UK but the police take online threats very seriously and convictions have resulted. ISP's in the UK are required to keep information on their traffic for 6months including emails, as such if your dynamic IP was from the UK wikipedia can't do anything but the police can. 14:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm in the UK (I'm pretty sure that anyone would be able to find that out by looking through my contribs or seeing the style of English I use) but I'm pretty sure that the user who sent the threat isn't. Not on the basis of the other IP addresses he's been using onsite, at least. If I *was* to report it to my local pollis (whether they'd take a threat from another country seriously or not), would WP be prepared to release the relevant logs if requested? --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 17:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

This is why I urge all admins, or any user who edits controversial areas or even just fights vandalism not to reveal any identifying information about themselves. If you already have just remove it, only about 4% of crazy people bother searching one's history. It does not take much, I was once harassed over the phone at work and home for two weeks because I would not let some punk spam his blog all over. You will be more effective if people cannot resort to attack against your true person.

Also, if you call the police and tell them you have an internet stalker but don't have any actual information about who they are, then they will open a file, take your statement, then do exactly nothing. _(1 == 2) 14:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Exactly why the Foundation should fulfill its Duty of Care and get its Lawyers to do the contacting the police. 14:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Uhh, the police don't do nothing because of who called them, it is because you can't track people through the internet practically. I know from first hand experience that the Foundation works with the police the best they can in situation like this, it it is not their place to make the complaint. _(1 == 2) 17:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

"Uhh, the police don't do nothing because of who called them" Yes, a call from a $1000 an hour lawyer has more what the police call "Stingers" ie ways it can hurt you, than that of an average joe. 21:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Since you have received a death threat, I would HIGHLY suggest you contact your local police informing them of it and the police where the IP is located. I am certain a checkuser can assist you in revealing the IP. Bstone (talk) 16:12, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

In addition to my comment above - if a checkuser was preformed, would WP be able to release the relevant information to me in order that I might make the report? I'm thinking that his ISP should probably be informed too (it was a particularly nasty threat - against myself *and* my family and would almost certainly be a violation of the TOS of any ISP I've ever had dealings with) - would WP be prepared to do that on my behalf? Thanks. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 17:10, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Not without the approval of Mike Godwin, the Foundation attorney. Thatcher 17:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

So, how might I go about contacting Mr. Godwin? --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 20:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Isn't there a way to extract the IP from the e-mail details? John Reaves 20:46, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The mail headers don't seem to contain the IP of the original sender - just references to WPs servers. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 20:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

FYI Kurt, you can contact Mike via the instructions on his user page. Pedro :  Chat  20:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks very much, guys. I've just emailed Mike Godwin to inform him of the situation. I'll see what he has to say before I do anything else. It would certainly be easier if I were able to provide my local police with the sender's IP when I make the report. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 21:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Admin abusing his powers in content dispute

• Relevant policy violation: Misplaced Pages:BLOCK#Disputes policy. I think others need to know about this abuse and warn the admin to stop abusing his tools to gain an unfair advantage in this content dispute.

• Synopsis of facts:

I opposed an admins massive changes after he locked the article to make changes he wanted, himself. I did not violate any policy, but he blocked me when I pointed out his abuse and reverted the massive changes against consensus. He blocked me on a very spurious reason, singling me out when others have reverted too. This is unfair and abusive. Admins should not be abusing their admin powers to gain a content advantage in an article. As a party to the content dispute, (and he is edit warring, too) he should not be using his admin powers to block those who oppose him, esp. when I have not even violated 3RR--yet he blocked me. If he was wrong, someone needs to rebuke his conduct for the sake of the probject.

• Details with diffs to prove what I said above is accurate:

Admin William M. Connolley (talk · contribs) puts a full protection on page. See:

Then, after he protects the page, he starts making his changes to it, by blanking sections. There is no chance given for participation on talk page about what he wanted to do before he did it. No discussion. Its just his unilateral use of admin powers. See:

He continues to make massive changes he wants after he protected the page. See: And, again, he continues, making his mass deletions after he protected the page:

He then unprotects the page and editors restore most of what he has removed without consensus. Then, another admin Rlevse (talk · contribs), comes in and protects the page again for a short period:

But as soon as it gets unprotected,William M. Connolley (talk · contribs) comes in again and does a super mass deletion of this article. See this:

I then complain about this on the talk page, and explain my reason for reverting him. See:

Then he uses his admin powers to block me. Right after blocking me, he reverts back to his version, having rendered his opponent silent. See:

Its not proper for admins to use their powers to protect the article and then edit it: it gives them a content change advantage. I read policy pages and this is not allowed. Since he became involved in content dispute, he should have abstained from using any admin powers on the article to gain an advantage, seeking a non-involved admin. Blocking the editor that he is in a content dispute with is a clear cut case of admin abuse. Just like when he protected the article and then started editing it to his own views--against consensus, and without even bothering to allow for a chance to discuss the massive changes. Also admins should not be edit warring, either, esp. not when they are using their tools to protect and block other editors there.

Also, despite other editors reverting, he singled me out for a block, after I challenged his abuse of admin powers, and calling for discussion to occur before the massive deletions. Other editors agreed with me and have protested his actions.

Thank you in advance for taking this seriously. I hope he stops and follows policy just like the rest of us do.Supergreenred (talk) 10:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• It's a rather extreme way of dealing with a problem, but what he did was absolutely the right result for the encyclopaedia, removing a series of edits which served to advance a POV. It's also stale. The protection summary was "the usual", which absolutely sums it up. People need to stop edit warring at that article. For values of "people" that explicitly includes you. Guy (Help!) 11:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I just want to add my own opinion that has been extremely abuseful of his administrative powers. He repeatedly erases huge amounts of stuff in many articles even when it is well sourced, and then he threatens to suspend or ban uers who try to put them back in. He has a long history of doing this huge amounts of times, in many different articles. He is trying to censor points of view that disagree with his own. He is against letting articles be balanced. Grundle2600 (talk) 17:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Why do we even have that article anyway? Like the Allegations of X arpetheid articles, it's a hive of POV violations and never will be the contrary. ~Frankly, I'll be surprised if it was kept for anything other than wikilawyering. Sceptre 11:37, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

  Because its a well-defined subject extensively studied in academia. Sorry. --Relata refero (disp.) 12:20, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah but it's been AfD'd many times and last was a speedy keep. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Number of AFDs mean nothing. Daniel Brandt (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) was effectively deleted on the 14th. (and the last speedy keep had nothing to do with AFD number). Sceptre 11:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yep (come to think of it)... hmmm... Gwen Gale (talk) 11:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• It is hard to avoid characterising this complaint as an unjustified rant. I agree with JzG, the conduct of the admin looks strong but about right and those who were engaged in the edit war have to expect admins to intervene without being so argumentative even to the admin. --BozMo talk 11:59, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, and once admins become involved it's likely one side is going to complain. I think William made a good choice in trying to make some bold changes. It was ridiculous to then expect him to go find another admin to deal with someone edit-warring.

I have also reported Supergreenred for a 3RR vio. 4 reverts within 26 hours is not abiding by the spirit of the rules, especially given he'd just been let off the block early. John Smith's (talk) 12:05, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Regardless of the fact that WMC was probably removing nonsense - I haven't checked, but its a safe assumption - why on earth was he editing through full protection? Was there a BLP problem or a consensus on the talkpage? I don't see any other reason why that would be acceptable. --Relata refero (disp.) 12:20, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Lets not assume. Cause you know what happens then.TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 12:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

AFAICT (and I wasn't around) it was done in direct response to requests for an admin to intervene and do this on the talk page . He even did what was asked and handed it back. --BozMo talk 12:30, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Asked by one person. I approve of the Liancourts Rocks solution, but its absurd to claim that unilateral editing through protection is a reasonable response in each case. --Relata refero (disp.) 13:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Are you sure about that? There are pages and pages of talk and I don't really have the appetite to go through it. However pruning to basics for a restart seems reasonable to me especially as there wasn't any obvious POV issue in the prune. --BozMo talk 14:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• Repost of my statement on the talk page: I too feel the need to express concern that the admin who locked the article proceeded to make unilateral edits without prior discussion. Such actions would appear to be contrary to Misplaced Pages's spirit of Concensus. In Addition, I will point out that none of the Administrator's edits were due to violations of WP:V, WP:OR, WP:RS, or WP:BLP which would require immediate action. TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 12:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)
• I have to add that this sentiment and view toward the article bring even more concern to the admin's previous actions which I initially assumed were simply a minor lapse of judgment. TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 20:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I guess that comment on the talk page might have earnt you becoming one of five chosen people whom Supergreenred canvassed about this unhappiness? Are the others wanting to comment too? --BozMo talk 13:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

:::I cannot know the reason Supergreenred made the posts s/he did, nor can I know what actions any of the other users will take based on those posts. But, perhaps WP:AGF would be applicable? 144.15.255.227 (talk) 13:35, 14 April 2008 (UTC)TheRedPenOfDoom (talk) 13:46, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Indeed. That's why I said it would be interesting to see their comments. Otherwise we might as well close this. --BozMo talk 13:41, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Edit-warring by Supergreenred

I filed a 3RR report as I mentioned above. The reviewing admin deemed there had been no violation because there "has" to be at least four reversions within 24 hours. However, as I explained, there are many cases where people are blocked for reverting four times within 24+x hours. SGR is not a new user as he admits, so I think he should have known better.

The reviewing admin said he was happy for other admins to review the matter, so I would appreciate another admin/some other admins to take a look. I think reverting 4 times in 26 hours is not good, especially given he just got off a block and then came filed this report. If he was advised to resolve the dispute through means other than edit-warring by the admin that unblocked him, why should he be allowed to carry on reverting?

The report can be found here. John Smith's (talk) 15:48, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The question here IMO is whether one of the reasons applies for editing protected pages, as specified at WP:Protection policy, which says in part, "Pages protected due to content disputes should not be edited except to remove inappropriate material or to make changes for which there is clear consensus." It would not be "ridiculous", as John Smith says, to get another admin to do the blocking; it would be the right thing to do IMO if the exceptions noted in this policy don't apply, and might be a good idea (though not required) if it's not very clear to everyone whether they apply. I think an admin should be even more careful about editing after blocking an individual than about editing after protecting a page. ☺Coppertwig (talk) 12:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

There were two different reports at WP:AN/3RR by different submitters. The second report led to a 48-hour block of Supergreenred by Jehochman. JEH noted that S. had made 4 reverts in 24 hours and 9 minutes. EdJohnston (talk) 20:52, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This has been rendered academic-- Supergreenred has been indef blocked as a sockpuppet per ]. Jtrainor (talk) 05:38, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Please reinsert that New York Times article to every point it supports

I found a New York Times article supporting four points of the Treaty of Trianon. Two users decided to delete it from two points without acceptable reason given on the talk page while keeping the text of the Treaty which is obviously not a third party source (even if it's OK, that's no reason to remove better sources). As I don't want to break rules, I would ask an administrator to reinsert the reference to all four points of the article that it supports.
The NYT is reliable, neutral, English language reference, most of the times requested for Featured Article Candidates. Squash Racket (talk) 12:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Done. Thank you. Squash Racket (talk) 12:54, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Please take further/future questions of this sort to WP:RS/N. There is a reason why you might have been reverted in this case: a recent newspaper article, even if in the most highly-regarded newspaper I know of, is not preferred sourcing for a major historical article, especially as compared to peer-reviewed scholarly work. I doubt the NYT is used in historical FAs; if it is, it says less about the NYT and more about some FARs. --Relata refero (disp.) 13:00, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

It simply got removed. If peer-reviewed, possibly English language academic sources will be added with inline citations, it's OK. Even then I wouldn't remove a NYT article, leaving it as a complementary source. Right now the article is full of citation tags and a bunch of sources of different qualities are mentioned only at the end.

Also don't forget The New York Times was founded seven decades before this "historical event". Squash Racket (talk) 13:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Provided the content accurately reflects the source it is citing, it seems clear that no one should object to the use of The New York Times as a source. The one possible exception I could see would be if there were already two or three sources supporting a fact that were of an even higher quality than the NYT article, in which case it might be deemed superfluous to use the article as an additional source, but that doesn't appear to be the case here. Everyking (talk) 03:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I've only seen now the discussion from here. I'm one of the two users that thought that the NYT article is not an appropriate reference for some of the 4 points that was initially used for by the user Squash Racket. I'm not going to repeat in here everything I've already said on the talk page of the article. Please just have a look in there. No, it's not true that the citation simply got removed. Everything was done only after giving reasons on the talk page. And, at least in my opinion, these were valid reasons. Anyway, after a short trip to the library, I found 4 English-language books (2 by American writers and 2 by British writers) that at least for me look a lot more appropriate to cite (in support of the fact the Treaty of Trianon was concluded at the end of WWI) than a 2008 newspaper article that actually talks about something else (and not the Treaty itself). And in any case, the NYT article was not entirely deleted as a reference. It's still in there to support other statements from the article. Alexrap (talk) 13:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

, , , . No valid reason was given on the talk page for the removal. Squash Racket (talk) 13:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That seems fine to me. It's not necessary to include such a reference, as long as you're willing to do the research and find even better references. Everyking (talk) 15:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

It appears that several not-otherwise-involved admins have added the article to their watchlists. This is probably a good thing since this deletion has an edit summary of "Misplaced Pages is not a linkfarm." I do not recall ever hearing a New York Times citation described as being a "linkfarm," which is all that much more suspect when you see that the reference was replaced with nothing at all. I am not saying that POV-pushing is happening here, but when citations to a reliable, third-party, published source are apparently deleted out of hand, it certainly makes one wonder what is going on. Or put another way, how is leaving something completely uncited better than citing the statement to what is widely regarded as one of the leading newspapers in the United States? --Kralizec! (talk) 15:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Racist Comments

I have removed racist comments here by Gibnews. What is the procedure for dealing with racist remarks? And is it a blocking offence?BigDunc (talk) 13:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

A lot of Welsh people are called 'Taffy', Scottish people 'Jock', and Englishmen 'John'. It's a cruel world out there. --Major Bonkers (talk) 14:17, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Put another way, I am not sure that referring to nationalities by common first names there is generally considered to be racism? --BozMo talk 14:19, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

So the whole of Algeria are potential terrorists. And the use of derogatory terms to describe people should not be accepted anywhere.BigDunc (talk) 14:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Ok; treating this complaint at face value: firstly; how do the remarks that you complain of actually fall within the definition of racism (see here): secondly; we've been here before, with an editor trying to promote his own view and shut down discussion by claiming racism. I don't mean to be rude, but most of us survived childhood despite worse insults than this. Wouldn't all our time be better spent if you and Gibnews actually tried to reach a consensus over the Mairéad Farrell article? --Major Bonkers (talk) 15:03, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

What consensus would Gibnews and I need to reach as I have no dispute with this editor. Maybe it's an attempt to deflect away from the matter at hand by suggesting I am in a content dispute hey major.BigDunc (talk) 15:20, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I came here after a message on my talk page from BigDunc, and I'm kind-of-in-the-middle on this one. Gibnews appears to have been making a point about perceived threats of terrorism, and whether or not any of us agrees with that point or even with the way that the concept of "terrorism" has been constructed to apply only to non-state actors, in substance it's the sort of comment which can be found in many places. However, the glib use of the stereotypical labels "Paddy" and "Mohammed" is unneccessary and will be offensive to many people. I'm not sure whether it's actually racist to use that sort language, but it's certainly unhelpful because the offence it may cause can raise tempers. Those tags make for easy glib phrasing, but editors who actually want to reach consensus shouldn't use lazy glib labels like that, because they can raise tempers and impede dialogue.

However, a polite request to desist would be quite sufficient unless this sort of thing is persistent. At this stage, I see no need need for admin intervention, and would suggest that all the editors involved try to de-escalate the dispute, and to try to build a climate where they might reach consenus. Perhaps taking a short break from the subject might help? --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC) --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 15:21, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The remarks were deliberately designed to be provocative, therefore WP:AGF need not apply. While offensive they are also I suggest illustrative. They point to low intellect and ignorance, usually derived from dependency, or being a dependant i.e. colonist. That they lack self esteem, is obvious, having to adopt the colonial mentality, not being seen as native in the first insistent, they adopt comfort in the term subject. A subject not being a citizen they ape the ways and customs of another nation, further strengthening the ignorance and retarded intelligence. Common sense would dictate that this type of attitude should not be encouraged or dismissed but challenged. Which can be difficult when dealing with the intellectually challenged within our community.--Domer48 (talk) 16:56, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

"Low intellect", "ignorance", "colonial mentality", "retarded", intellectually challenged". Have you ever actually read WP:CIVIL?. Regardless of the provocative nature of Gibnews' comments, please don't post anything like that again. Black Kite 18:15, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The remarks I made were not 'designed to be provocative' simply to reflect a geographical shift in the perceived threat of terrorism. The over reaction looks to me like an excuse to censor other valid points made. I have reverted that taking out any generic references. My IQ has been above average on all tests since the age of 11 and I do not live in a colony. On balance the comments and actions from Domer48 seem to be much more offensive than anything else. Nobody mentioned this to me before complaining here. --Gibnews (talk) 19:40, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Major Bonkers informed you 30 mins or so after I posted here. I was about to but he had done so.BigDunc (talk) 19:45, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I believe the procedure would be to mention it first before here rather than relying on someone to tell me. Reading the highly abusive posting by Domer48 he seems to have some issue about my nationality, which is for the record a British Citizen the apes live up the rock. In respect of Algeria, prospective visitors should read this --Gibnews (talk) 20:07, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

In reply to Black Kite, I was putting forward my view in relation to Racist Comments, if it is not correct I'm open to alternatives. Maybe you could suggest something. Now I have no time for Racist Comments, or those who make them. I have not addressed my remarks to anyone, other that to state quite clearly that the remarks were deliberately designed to be provocative. I get the impression that you view the comments as being of a provocative nature, and I sure you would not like anyone to post anything like that again, but just forgot to mention that? You may not agree with my view of a Racist, but we both agree they have no place in our community. --Domer48 (talk) 21:08, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Your comments here seem to be more offensive than anything I have innocently said - your reference to apes does seem to be a specific racial slur of the worst kind. Anyway I have removed any of my contentious remarks and restored the part censored under the pretext of 'racism'. A simple request on my user page would have been enough. --Gibnews (talk) 21:50, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

If I offend people who make Racist Comments frankly I could not give a toss. Since you are offended by my view of them says more about you than me. As to ape or put another way mimic, obvious in the context it was used, displays your poor attempt at misdirection. I'm saying out stright that your remarks were not "innocently said," but were deliberately designed to be provocative, therefore WP:AGF need not apply. So cop onto yourself, now have I made myself clear. --Domer48 (talk) 22:01, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I suggest you read

• WP:FAITH
• WP:CIVIL
• British Citizen
• Censorship

And desist from trying to insult people because its not nice. --Gibnews (talk) 01:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I have removed the {{resolved}} tag which I added earlier, evidently prematurely. I'm very disappointed that to see how this has escalated, quite unnecessarily. --BrownHairedGirl (talk) • (contribs) 01:49, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This seems an overblown complaint to me, and I say that as an Irishman. Points off Gibnews for sounding like Kipling crossed with Colonel Blimp, but really, grow a thicker skin. The dude is oblivious to the finer points of your delicate sensibilities and is being generic about a generic shift. That he is doing so in a style more suited to one or two centuries ago should be deserving only of your gentle pity. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 05:35, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Grow a thicker skin thats is BS, that attitude is what helps racists prevail. It must be stopped and challenged at every turn. Would you say that to a an African, Mexican, or any other person who has had to endure racist quips. The apologists IMO are as bad if not worse than idiots who use such words.BigDunc (talk) 08:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Sir, I have marched against racism in the streets of this country. Doubtless you can say the same. I haven't protested against an archaic use of a generic proper name to stand in for a country's peoples. It wouldn't fit on the placard, for one thing. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 20:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Well thats where you are wrong I have protested against racists in Ireland when there was a big march all around the country in April 25 1998 and lately protested against racist deportations from Ireland, and I have marched in England with the Anti Nazi league too, so unless you have something to say without making assumptions about people you dont know dont say anything. BigDunc (talk) 20:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Read my comment again. I assumed the opposite of what you think I assumed. I meant to make it clear that I did not expect that this put me in a separate category to you. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 20:34, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I my be wrong on what I assume a Racist to be, I would not mind being informed. I have not called anyone a rasist, what I have said twice now is that your remarks were not "innocently said," but were deliberately designed to be provocative, therefore WP:AGF need not apply. Now that is the issue! We have had the Troubles ArbCom, and comment like the one that created this issue are at the hart of it. Now we can bury our head in the sand and hope it goes away, or address it, simple really. One question to the great and the good, if any on us involved in the Arbcom said it were would we be now? --Domer48 (talk) 08:09, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Domer, sadly your remarks were hardly as innocuous as you say they were. To label someone as exemplifying "low intellect and ignorance" amongst an assortment of other slurs is grossly uncivil and has taken WP:NPA one step too far. Just for the record, WP:AGF always applies. We are here to build an encyclopedia, not wage war. Your bad faith accusations are without substance. Comment on the content, not the contributors. Chris.B (talk) 10:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This is being sidetracked the issue at hand is Gibnews using racist comments not on Domer. Domers comments were not directed at any editor they are IMO his attitude to people who make these comments. Gibnews ludicrous assertion that it was an attempt to censor him is laughable. Could I point editors to WP:AAGF. BigDunc (talk) 12:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Dunc they know full well what I WAS SAYING, but its more fun to carry on. What I do know, is that the next time they try this crap on and the remarks were deliberately designed to be provocative, something will have to be done. NO EXCUSES next time. So I happy that they backed themselves into a corner, and claim they are innocent. All good IMO. Will it be addressed as part of the Troubles ArbCom, because I think it should. --Domer48 (talk) 12:40, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The comments from talk were clearly directed at me and were designed to be offensive. There are more productive things to do than this. --Gibnews (talk) 14:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Domer48, what Gibnews wrote was certainly in bad taste, and this kind of thing can make me angry as well. However. You said the remarks were "deliberately designed to be offensive." Then Gibnews denied it, and you repeated it four more times. Please read WP:AGF and make sure you understand what it means. It's about enabling communication, by not saying "You are a bad person, and you know it." Nobody thinks of themselves as a bad person, so at least the second part of that sentence is always wrong and makes constructive debate impossible. Several times when I was myself in a situation where I could hardly restrain myself and thought something can only be explained with bad faith, eventually, I had to thank AGF for preventing me from making a fool of myself. --Hans Adler (talk) 15:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

And again more castigation of Domer but what of the racist remarks he still does not think and again claims that the Irish are all terrorists.BigDunc (talk) 15:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

He does not claim that "the Irish are all terrorists". It would be closer to the truth if you said he claims "the Irish once were all terrorists", but still completely wrong. Even "the Irish are no longer all terrorists" is not what he said. Unfortunately we have to live with socially constructed nonsense such as "nations", "races" etc. We can't ignore these ideas when talking about terrorism that is motivated by them. The way Gibnews is talking about these things now is perhaps not optimal, but it looks to me as if he is expressing himself if a normal and socially accepted way. When you attack him for that, it's similar to accusing someone of sexism for using "he" as a gender-neutral pronoun.

As far as I can tell, Gibnews has replaced the racist language with a considerably less offensive version and is not using racist language any more. So what else do you want? A formal apology? I think you are extremely unlikely to get a block at this point. --Hans Adler (talk) 17:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

While Dunc may have confidence in BHG, on this issue I must disagree. First of, it was pegged as resolved way to early. Second, the editor claims they innocently used those comments, and then says they removed their contentious remarks, but we see them continue to maintain the comments are not contentious or offensive, illustrated by Dunc in the link above, despite this discussion. Now their latest pearl of wisdom is “I said that the Irish were no longer a concern.”? If we are not in Troubles related ArbCom jurisdiction here, there is definitely something amiss. The glib use of the stereotypical labels "Paddy" and “Mohammed" is unnecessary and will be offensive to many people, and unless it is resolved it will persist. As illustrated by this editor. --Domer48 (talk) 17:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

...the Irish were no longer a concern im Irish am I a concern to the people of that colonial outpost? Also he still feels and has stated that it is ok to use as he says ...common forenames are not seen as any kind of racial insult He is totally wrong in this assumption the use of Paddy to discribe an Irish person or Muhammad a muslim is wrong. An apology and acknowlegement from this editor would be helpfulBigDunc (talk) 17:49, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

He didn't quite do that, he used them as generic proper nouns. Yes, it smacks of the colonialist mentality to me, but on reflection he has removed them. I expect no repetition. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 20:47, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Moreschi

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Enough. The civility issues are not going to require admin action. I suggest filing a RFC if you're actually concerned about getting some input into this. Take the content dispute to the content pages. --Haemo (talk) 05:50, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I ran across User:Moreschi with this diff, where he blatantly violates Misplaced Pages:CIVIL#Engaging_in_incivility. "Judgmental tone in edit summaries ("snipped rambling crap") or talk page posts ("that's the stupidest thing I've ever seen")."

I saw that many more of his edits were in violation of WP:CIVIL such as here, here,

I attempted to bring his attention to the policy on his talk page, but his response was to pretend that he does not have to abide by this policy, made clear in the edit summary and gives the actual posted response the feel of a threat. More startlingly, it appears that he is making administrative actions without showing that on the user page or being in such a category. If this is an administrator acting like this, much more civility should be used by an admin at all times. If an admin can discuss this with him, it would be much appreciated. KV(Talk) 17:14, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

While there certainly has been a poor demonstration of civility here, I will point out that admins do not need to mark ourselves in special ways. It really does reflect poorly on Misplaced Pages's public image when admins don't act in a civil fashion. _(1 == 2) 17:19, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Since your comment seems to have been dismissed as resulting from some sort of involvement, I have made an comment as an uninvolved person on the users talk page. _(1 == 2) 17:24, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps I didn't phrase that clearly. It's not worse that he does not display adminship, but that it's an admin being uncivil. KV(Talk) 17:26, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you btw. KV(Talk) 17:27, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

• I think Moreschi's edits were right though. I've tagged that article, it needs a serious overhaul. Black Kite 18:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I agree the edits were correct. _(1 == 2) 18:28, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

See also WP:FTN#New project on hermetism. --Relata refero (disp.) 18:44, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Moreschi's being correct doesn't mean he ought to get away with being incivil. Neıl ☎ 18:51, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it would be more convenient for us all if he didn't say what we were thinking. --Relata refero (disp.) 19:18, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

No, it would be more convenient for us all if he said it courteously. It isn't difficult. Neıl ☎ 20:39, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Of course being correct does not allow this user to be uncivil. The user has been told just that, and unless there are further problems I think this is resolved. _(1 == 2) 19:22, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

I tend to agree the discussion is resolved. John Carter (talk) 19:33, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

The resolved tag on this says "try to be correct and politically correct, in future, please", but "civility" is not the same as "political correctness". Is there a reason why "civil" couldn't have been used? Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 19:53, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

Because some of us don't find Moreschi's edit summary uncivil. --Akhilleus (talk) 21:43, 14 April 2008 (UTC)

But if that's the case, it's not resolved. If it's marked "resolved" then it has reached a resolution, in which case a carping comment is not called for. Ed Fitzgerald (unfutz) 01:21, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I did correct it two edits after you complained, you know. Its resolved to the degree that Moreschi was reminded not to do it again. Please see the relevant edit comment as I changed it. --Relata refero (disp.) 18:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Second Issue

It appear my worries that the dismissal was a threat (Misplaced Pages:Harassment#Threats) was not misplaced. Soon afterwards, there was a complete onslaught of what I was working on by those working at Misplaced Pages:Fringe theories/Noticeboard. Though unlikely to be intentional to be worked this way, the board is working as an informal platform for meat puppetry. Those who frequent the page decided that Hermetic thought in general is a fringe theory and so only the very minimal should be included in Misplaced Pages and coverage of the subject should be scaled back rather than expanded. Like minds gather there intending to scale back coverage of subjects they consider fringe, even in articles exclusively about them. I want to stress that I am not accusing any user here of concerted meat puppetry, just pointing out that the subsequent actions were effectively the same as meatpuppetry. Concern was displayed over at Misplaced Pages:Fringe_theories/Noticeboard#New_project_on_hermetism that a project, of which I am the founder and unfortunately still sole member, would be a threat because it is trying to expand the material. As a result, we have multiple users engaging in what can be called Wikistalking. It started with very reasonable edits, such as this, this, and I can certainly see even this NPOV tagging as productive as the article did and still does need a lot of work.

Not that I disagree with him, but we have the same Civility problem popping up here from User:Moreschi, and though I am looking for time to rewrite the section so it does not rely upon the questionable claims of Manly P Hall, which was discussed in the prior deletion discussion, this and this show the same malicious tone. Then he decides to delete uncontroversial material, that has already been gone through by many critics and discussed, claiming the source to be unreliable here. He does not explain how the source is unreliable, and I questioned him on it in Talk:Hermetism#NPOV_tag only to get a statement that completely ignores a large section of Hermetic belief today, which stems from those who read that exact text, which is why it was considered a reliable source for that subject in particular the last time. He also suggests that certain people (which I certainly took to imply me) don't belong on Misplaced Pages at all. There's many more similar edits by him following that, which one patroller identified as vandalism because of the tone and rapid deletion without discussion.

We also have actions by User:Dbachmann (signs "dab") which were to propose merge and then decide that it is immediately necessary because of an outdated deletion discussion, and does it himself. Of course, the old deletion discussion is noneffective here seeing as it was at the urging of a friend and two sock masters User:Hanuman Das and User:999 who were both banned for sockpuppetry. The third, my friend, User:SynergeticMaggot is the one who recreated the page and dragged it on, telling me to just fix it up, once I found the necessary sources to show that Hermetism was not a term made up by Manly P Hall and peer-reviewed academic sources printed by a University Press at that. Unfortunately, he cannot explain this further currently as he lost his working computer a few days ago, and perhaps the only time we'd be on the same side of a debate on these issues he's muted by fate. However, I will say that when I discussed it with him he did say that the prior AfD was of no consequence at this point. Of course, this is not the only brash action by this user, who decided to edit Hermeticism as well, reverting the page back from before I added a template and rewrote the intro using that university source to cite the difference between the two theories, and reverted to an edit that was in violation of the MOS by a new user who simply didn't know better, and reverted the long established CE/BCE to AD/BC here. He also decided to go and without discussion change the template to include only the offshoot Hermeticism here.

Now, there were many more rapid deletions by Moreschi of course on that article as well. The only other user from there to be involved, User:John Carter, has been relatively a breath of fresh air. Though he is proposing a merger I strongly oppose, he has been very civil and seems willing to have an actual discussion in the interest of improvement as so far as of yet. I applaud him for that.

The totality of what I call wikibullying though, more or less, though it felt like a lot more, comes from User:Moreschi and User:Dbachmann. It's rapid, forceful changes without discussion, at least not on Misplaced Pages, that strongly appear to me to be the result of me bringing up civility issues here. It is definitive of Wikistalking. I am trying to remain calm here, however the last time I took an extensive wikibreak and thought I would never return to Misplaced Pages was from actions just like this from two sockmasters and a friend I never agree with. KV(Talk) 03:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

the "rapid forceful changes without discussion" are entirely yours. We are just reverting them because your material as you present it has no place on Misplaced Pages. Please try to understand what this project is trying to do in the first place. What you want to do is write essays on your personal views on Hermetism. That's great, but not something you should do on Misplaced Pages (WP:SYN, WP:DUE). dab (𒁳) 05:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I sympathize with how you're feeling. Dbachmann and Moreschi can be extremely uncivil, perhaps having no notion of the personal effect it has. Your phrase wikibullying is most appropriate. They get away with it, by and large, because the perception is that they are right enough on content issues, therefore taken as a whole it is a net gain for the encyclopedia. Your calling them sockmasters and wikistalkers does not help, and is itself uncivil, and you would do well to strike those remarks. I note your appreciation of John Carter's manner, and hope that Moreschi that and Dbachmann note it too. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 06:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

is this all Misplaced Pages administration cares about these days, tone and civility? How about some appreciation for defending encyclopedicity? Misplaced Pages isn't myspace, remember? This is a non-issue. KV is perfectly welcome to present his evidence and engage in meaningful debate. Instead, he goes forum-shopping as soon as his {{essay-like}} contributions are touched. Anyone interested in discussing encyclopedic coverage of Hermeticism is welcome at Talk:Hermeticism. AN/I is not the venue for that. --dab (𒁳) 06:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Also, I must disagree on the "civility" issues. Compared to what I have to put up with, I deserve a medal for civility. I must maintain that it is civil to tell somebody "please clean up your nonsense and stop trolling" if the person in question has, in fact, been posting nonsense and trolling talk, it is simple WP:SPADE, with a please thrown in for WP:BATTLEGROUND. An incivil comment would be "stop posting your idiotic drivel you loser": something like that would be justly chastised as violating WP:CIVIL. I do make a point of being curt but civil even in the most hopeless cases. But civility should never stand in the way of calling actual content for what it is: "civility" means, discuss content, not the editor, and treat the editor with detached correctness even if they behave like a four-year-old. --dab (𒁳) 06:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hermetism had certain things wrong with it, which were already acknowledged and intent to fix that up with academic sources has been stated already; and the deletion of things such as what bands mention "as above, so below" added by various random IPs is something I just didn't want to bother with. However, the articles were quite encyclopedic for the most part. Various long-standing sources were simply removed without discussion, at least not discussion on Misplaced Pages. We have a couple editors who can quite justly said to be of the same group coming in at once to start trying to create havoc as the result of a threat. You have removed peer-reviewed academic sources from a university press without discussion, removing a helpful template without discussion, and changed the CE/BCE scale to AD/BC without explanation or discussion. That is a clear violation of Misplaced Pages:MOS#Longer_periods, and not once, but twice so far. Drastic changes like this should be discussed first. I did state that I didn't care what you did to the history section of Hermetism, because I knew that that was unencyclopedic as it stood and needed a complete rewrite as soon as I had the opportunity to sit down and do so. Of course, instead of spending time doing so, I find myself in conflict with you and Moreschi. You have had to deal with someone who has added 70 plus academic sources into Hermetic-related articles over the past couple weeks and has deleted large sections of the unencyclopedic parts during that period and rewrote entire sections. Someone who is looking to improve the articles and improve verifiability, and who was in the act of doing just that. Discussion before undoing large parts of cited work from what Misplaced Pages considers the best possible sources would be expected. The same goes for rewording them to mean something completely different, that the source is not saying there, because you wish to put your own view onto the page without providing any source and without allowing the cited view onto the page. That's what you have to deal with; why should you get a medal for that. How was I posting nonsense and trolling talk? Can you show us diffs, as I have shown for what you have done? KV(Talk) 13:38, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I could only be called wikipedia administration in the widest possible sense of the phrase, being an IP. And even I, in my way, indicated that you had the general support of the community. But take it as an opportunity to display your condescension, by all means. 86.44.28.245 (talk) 06:51, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I would like to quote myself:

Of course, the old deletion discussion is noneffective here seeing as it was at the urging of a friend and two sock masters User:Hanuman Das and User:999 who were both banned for sockpuppetry.

Unless Dbachmann is claiming to have run one of these two accounts, I did not call him a sockmaster. And I suppose I would be wrong to call them sock masters as well; it seems they were both sock puppets of User:Ekajati. I did not call Dbachmann a sock master unless he claims relation to these accounts. That was commentary on the deletion review that had been satisfied. KV(Talk) 11:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This is ridiculous

My patience is rapidly running out. KV is now revert-warring to try to retain some of the crummiest, fringiest material I've seen on Misplaced Pages in months (not to mention here, some of the most POV). He clearly has no idea about WP:SYNTH, nor a number of other equally important policies such as WP:RS. In the meantime he's trying to derail the process of cleaning out the rubbish from these articles with pointless, wikilawyerish ANI threads querulously complaining about perceived incivility from myself and Dbachmann, who are devoting hours of our precious time sorting out a mess he has created when we both have much better things to do. He keeps on going like this and he's on the fast track for a block for disruption - or, at least, he should be. This nonsense about sockmasters and wikibullies is also far more uncivil than any wording Dbachmann and I have used. Thank you. Moreschi2 (talk) 13:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Your patience is running out? When have you shown any patience at all? You've just went through arbitrarily deleting, claiming that you can violate WP:MOS without a good reason for change, and you've deleted much cited text without discussion, and that includes citations from scholarly sources. Where am I violating WP:SYNTH? I have not sythesized anything except where the two subjects do come to the same conclusion, and there I even show criticism of those conclusions. How is the article POV at all? I have been very conservative in my reverts. Which include you deleting the template for discussion of a merger proposed by User:John Carter, well cited text, and violating MOS. Am I disrupting Misplaced Pages by trying to keep policy the same? The articles were being steadily improved before you came deleting everything, and that included me deleting parts of it myself so I could replace it with more suitable text. Yet, you threaten to use your administrative power to win a disagreement. And if you believe that it is nonsense that User:Hanuman Das and User:999 were sockmasters, how about you explain why they are banned for being sockpuppets? KV(Talk) 14:07, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I disagree that DBachmann is as rude on wiki as people often claim- he just knows when stuff is not suitable for wiki and deals with it via merges, removal etc. Merkin's mum 19:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment. The "civility" issues being seen here are an understandable frustration over a long-running issue. King Vegita has been stumping on this issue for quite some time. If recent responses are less-than-complete, that's indicative of nothing more than refusing to repeat oneself to someone who has had the principles and issues involved explained to them many times. The long ongoing nature of the problem shows that the discontentment with KV's advocacy on this issue is not limited to a small swath of "informal meatpuppetry". It is seriously disruptive to have such a long-ongoing issue generated by a single user and it's well past time for KV to work within the content rules that he surely groks by now (or never will). Vassyana (talk) 22:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Giano II

Moved to subpage at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents/Giano II. Signed w/o timestamp to prevent archiving. MaxSem

User:Navnløs adding vandalism warnings for non-vandal edits

Navnløs (talk · contribs) has a bad habit of issuing vandalism warnings for edits that clearly aren't vandalism. against JzG, against Rockismorethanmusic, against Nouse4aname and against SqueakBox Navnløs issued vandalism warnings for edits that were nothing more than content disputes with the other editors. Navnløs has a lengthy block history for edit warring and violating 3RR. I do not see where this evenings edits/warnings are an attempt to shade 3RR but he's come close on at least one. Perhaps someone could have a discussion with the editor on what vandalism really is and what type of edit deserves a vandalism warning. Anger22 (Talk 2 22) 00:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I can endorse the above statement. I can't be searching for diffs of the past months right now, but i can confirm that the user has done so many times before. Also, the user is fully aware of the criticism shown towards his actions. ~ | twsx | _cont | ~ 10:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Argh. I do a lot of vandalism protection, ok? And sometimes I admit I do pass out a few vandalism warnings too hastily when I'm not understanding what a user is doing from their edit summary or edit. I usually don't do this much, though (almost not at all), but yesterday people have been going crazy over the Eric Greif page (there is a COI issue there being discussed) and I was quite busy with many things and so a few of my vandalism warnings may have been misplaced. My bad, sorry. My past indisgressions do not represent who I am, mostly. I've improved my editing over time, and yes I do edit on an edge/thin line sometimes and therefore have been blocked when editing the way I think wikipeida should be (there is a rule that says ignore all rules, when appropriate, which caters to people like me "living on the edge") and sometimes rules do need to be broken and I have witnessed many an injustice on wikipedia. Perhaps I do not assume enough good faith (I can get sorely pissed when I see a huge amount of vandalism) and yesterday I ussed some unwarranted vandalism warnings (though I issued others that are not being complained about). As for twsx's comment, both he and I have been known to have had a long dispute on wikipedia and so his words must be weighed carefully. I have not issued vandalism warnings easily, though and there are only a few instances when I gave one too quick. I have many people who can endorse my comments as well...it means little. Nor am I aware of "the criticism shown towards actions." Only a few editors have ever complained about me, twsx usually being one of the first. Blizzard Beast 23:09, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Not to mention, of those four edits, only one of them was really a bad judgement call. Blizzard Beast 23:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

IAR does not justify anything, it merely tells you to ignore a rule if you can justify the action otherwise, as Misplaced Pages:What "Ignore all rules" means states. I would bet that either Misplaced Pages:What "Ignore all rules" means or Misplaced Pages:Understanding IAR also states that you should not use it as an excuse to do anything controversisal, but, honestly, i am too lazy to read those pages right now. Also, if you are really not aware that people are unhappy with some of the things you do (i am SO assuming good faith here!), you should probably read through your talk page. :-) PS: You still haven't managed to get your indenting right! I fixed it for you. ~ | twsx | _cont | ~ 12:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Adambro vs. Crimsone

Adambro (talk · contribs) vs. Crimsone (talk · contribs)

• I want an apology. This is not acceptable, and should be acknowledged as such

The first encounter ( ] ) I have had with an admin named Adambro has resulted in repeated incivility. Adambro, rather than commenting on my contributions, decided to comment on me personally in a negative sense regarding my memory of an obvious and unforgettable wikipedia principle (namely, the whole "be bold" thing). I find this to be unacceptable on it's own but would usually let it pass. However, Adambro opted to do this in the third person while replying to the comment I had just made, before once more referring to me directly - " Crimsone seems to forget this is a wiki where users are encouraged to be bold whilst of course remembering our key polices and guidelines."

This left me inclined, in my reply to Adambro, to point out the incivility inherent in that remark, which one would assume is likely to leave anybody with the realisation that it did not amuse me, and I infact found it offensive - apparently it was intended for the discussion as a whole, though at that point there were only the two of us discussing it. However, rather than apologising for any unintentional offence, or even just plain ignoring it, what I got in reply involved yet more incivility through a complete failure to assume good faith...

"You're welcome to stand up for a "better way" but perhaps consider avoiding suggesting other editors are not being civil whilst you do so. Certainly annoying other editors who you happen to disagree with is not going to make the Wiki any better, better for you perhaps but not better for the readers."

... whereas all I'd done was to argue a point without getting anymore personal than to point out that to negatively and without very good sound cause, refer personally to an editor who's comment you are responding to in the third person is incivil, and certainly should be done merely because you disagree with someone. It should be fairly clear that making personall suppossitions about people publically is not ok. I did my best to make it clear, but apparently, I am out for me and my own ego rather than the good of the encylopedia - lets not forget here that if Adambro has seen my other contributions, he'll have realised that I've been a member here since 2005, am a rollback user (granted to me by complete suprise by the way... I didn't ask, but was one of the first to get it seems) have contributied significantly to, and nominated an FA which was accepted... blah, blah, - and if he hadn't seen my other contributions, he had no business making such remarks, having no good grounds on which to make them.

This is where I demanded an apology. The emphatic answer came back "No", the reasoning roughly being that he's an administrator, and so has substantial experience thus clearly knows better than I do about all these things, and I am the one that's wrong for being offended. You know... up untill that second insult, I could almost have ignored it had it not come from an administrator, but administrators aren't supposed to be administrators unless they are inclined to follow the rules and guidelines as best as possible and set an example. I somehow doubt that WP:IAR really aplies to me getting an apology... yet it was all but implied, in that I was categorically told that he would discuss it no further because it was all getting in the way of making the encylopedia better, and simply wasn't going to apologise. Apparently, debating the issue of him offering an apology for his incivility is a "waste of time". In the process of which, I get my command of my mother tongue (English) insulted - where, I do believe, I have a userbox clearly on my userpage, quite clearly stating I am a native speaker - not to mention that I've used it pretty well, and the only possibly cause he had to assume my english to be anything but a first language is that he couldn't apparently see (after I'd explained it) why I should make note of his original incivility. Fact is, I'm sick of the incivility on her, and I'm sick of being personally slurred by implications and suppositions, and patronised as though I only arived todat when I mention something wrong with an article on a talk page... I'm not about to let it go unchecked from an admin, because if an admin is free to do it, then what's to stop anybody else?

So... after explaining again why it was incivil, and that I want an apology for the lack of good faith and the incivility, and the insult over my command of my mother tongue... And in fact I demand that apology (and in the process agreeing that the venue for the continuing conversation was wrong, and pointing out that thus without an apology to end it, I would bring the issue here)... and finally making the point "one further thing... what makes you think it's in the slightest way OK to get personal with me at all, let alone in the third person to the rest of the discussion as you say? Whatever happened to "discuss the contribution, not the contributor?", I get...

"Well considering that English is your first language then it surprises me even more that simply referring to to you in the third person was enough to start upsetting you to merit you mentioning it. I will once again inform you that I will not be apologising for what you perceive I may have done wrong and your threats of raising this at ANI will not prompt me to. Good night.!"

...in reply. Apart from the obvious dissatisfaction with that response, and apart from the obvious fact that what I "percieve" is in fact what is there... namely, ...

• A third person supposition of my inability to remember and recall key Misplaced Pages principles
• An assertion that I'm damaging the encyclopedia through being out for myself rather than the encyclopedia
• An insulting comment suggesting poor command of my mother tongue to the point it would be suprising if it were my first language
• An assertion that I am being unreasonable in being offended at the original third person supposition
• An assertion that all of this incivility is in my mind, and that I don't know what's incivil as well as he does, as he lorded his administratorship as though that meant I couldn't possibly surpass his experience (whatever happened to administratorship not being a big deal?)
• A failure to assume good faith

... I finally get ...

• An accusation that my mention of ANI was some kind of threat, thus suggesting a lack of integrity n my part, a sense of untouchability on his, and once more demonstrating a lack of good faith

...when in reality it was merely a run of the mill fact, and here I am, on AN/I, taking to discussion to a more appropriate venue (which is the reason I'm here with it now and not there - and the only reason). All I want, and all I wanted after the second round of incivility, was an apology for it. And that's still all I want now... and administrator or not, after that behaviour, I rather feel I deserve one. In fact, after that lot, I'd demand an apology of any editor. It's not, in my view, something that is excusable in someone who cites their administrator status as evidence of some manner of superiority in understanding of wiki's basic rules in the least though. I want a simple apology, that's all - is it really so much to ask? I do believe it's even mentioned as a recommended course of action by the relevant policy. Crimsone (talk) 00:28, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Looks to me like both of you are being petulant and combative. He should stop being a prat and accept that you want an apology; you should stop being a prat and accept that he doesn't feel like apologizing. Failure to assume good faith is not a fault of one party, here, but both. Sometimes civility means being the bigger person and moving on. – Luna Santin (talk) 00:40, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No... I'm just demanding an apology for invivility. Originally, I merely noted the uncivil comment. If was th proceeding, worse, instance of incivility with it's inherant lack of good faith that's got me demanding an apology, and his insistance that he's done no wrong and that I'm being unreasonable in being offended that's got me entrenched in said position. All I want is all I asked for - a simple apology for failure to AGF. That there has been a gfailure to AGF is evident, and that there has been incivility is evident. I have not failed to abserve AGF, but rather, no sooner did I mention that I considered the original comment incivil, no good faith has been shown. Quite simply, all I've got is a string of further incivility and insults, when a simple apology would have sufficed (and indeed, had there not been that second instance of incivility, not even an apology would have been required. I see little unreasonable in that. Whether he meant to be or not, he was uncivil, and on seeing it pouinted out, the next course of action is ignorance (ie, moving on) or apology - not further incivility and insults. I was prepared for the moving on option.) Crimsone (talk) 00:55, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Taking an off-the-cuff remark as a "slur," demanding an apology for it, demanding further apologies when your counterpart doesn't suddenly reverse their position or stroke your ego at the expense of their own, implying several times that the other user is a terrible Wikipedian and a stain on the community, repeatedly inferring nefarious motives, compiling a growing list of your counterpart's offenses even as you lecture them for failing to assume good faith... yeah, obviously you are a paragon of AGF, here. :p 76.114.18.153 (talk) 01:26, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hello IP 76.114.18.153. If you read what I wrote here (and indeed, perhaps if you read the original discussion), you will find that that off the cuff remark (which was indeed incivil, though I did not call it a slur, but good call - it was a slur of sorts, intentional or not) was merely noted with the same half-serious off the cuff tone that the remark was given in... a sort of "touche" at the very worst. It was only after the second round aimed my way that I demanded an apology. At NO point did I call Adambro a terrible wikipedian, or a stain on the community. I didn't imply any nafarious motives (and if I felt they were particularly there in an admin, I'd be suggesting more than a demand of an apology), nor did I compile a growing list. That was indeed the list as I compiled it for this post, at this point in time, as a summary of incivility recieved to this point in time(ie, the basis for complaint). The thing is, Assume Good Faith doesn't mean that after somebody insulted you and was generally incivil to you repeatedly, then says "good night, I'm not apologising.", clearly assuming the worst of you by suggesting you are threatening AN/I (the implication of threat being of hostile intent in the hope of sanctions of some sort)... Well, AGF doesn't mean that you assume it as all because he was trying to be nice to you. It might suggest that perhaps originally the offence was not intended (which doesn't mean the comment wasn't incivil - it was), but it doesn't mean that that event and all that follows it should go unnoted. Crimsone (talk) 01:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec)Compiling a list of offenses is what anyone does, and is supposed to do, when filing a grievance. That's not an AGF violation. And I'm glad this user is merely demanding an apology rather than suggesting a de-sysop, as many users often do when their conflicts involve admins. I think an apology would be reasonable in this situation. Equazcion •✗/C • 01:44, 15 Apr 2008 (UTC)

Oh gawd no! The whole "off with his/her head!!!" de-sysop thing is infuriating - and in some ways worse than that which I'm seeking an apology for. I don't really know why it happens, but I do know it's kind of beyond a joke at times - mostly when it's beyond all reasn. I think people tend play the de-sysop card either for politics or revenge (save for occasions where it's actually justified of course, but they are comparatively few) Crimsone (talk) 01:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

"If you read what I wrote here" So the only reason someone might disagree with you is poor reading skills? :)

"I did not call it a slur" "some manner of slur"

"It was only after the second round..." Fair enough, that's a point in your favor.

"At NO point did I call Adambro a terrible wikipedian" Never said you did. Wonderful word, "imply."

"I didn't imply any nafarious motives" Except that you've repeatedly and apparently willfully taken the worst possible interpretation of Adam's actions. You were offended by his post, he replied (tersely) that no offense was intended and expressed confusion, and you took more offense at his unintended offense in a wonderful sort of chain reaction.

"The thing is, Assume Good Faith doesn't mean that after somebody insulted you" That's missing plenty of chances to AGF, though. Adam's already stated no insult was intended, and didn't understand why you took offense. Confused people say stupid things from time to time. It can be important to know when you're speaking with a non-fluent counterpart (granted, he could have asked more gently, if he needed to ask at all, and that sort of question is more likely to cause offense if the speaker is fluent). Likewise, we could AGF and wait to see if he continues this sort of behavior in the future, or if he learns from it.

For what it's worth, I do think he might as well just apologize to you, but I don't see the productive end in getting too caught up in it, either. 76.114.18.153 (talk) 16:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Mr. IP, sarcasm is what got us here, so saying things like "Wonderful word, 'imply'" and "...poor reading skills", well, let's just say "I don't see the productive end" in that. Equazcion •✗/C • 17:36, 15 Apr 2008 (UTC)

I wrote a rant here. It was huge. then I decided not to post it. And now I'm deciding not to post. No apology, no more contribution. I'd like to say it was nice being here, but, sadly, as you can tell, for the most part, including this incident now, it wasn't. A few of you have been great - thanks. The rest of you, I have no words for. Quite soimply, I've had enough, and I will not accept that it' OK for admins to behave like this, clearly have caused opffence, whether intentional or not, and fail to apologise for it.

By the way Mr. IP, clearly your knowledge of Misplaced Pages is great, which isn't bad for an ip whose only 2 contributions are in fact to this discussion, over the course of a good many hours (making it very unlikely that the IP is dynamic). How about you sign in, eh? Crimsone (talk) 18:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec) I've had plenty of my own encounters with editors who like to use the "seems to forget" phrasing. That seems to have been where this started. It's not exactly uncivil, but it is snide and sarcastic. About 90% of the times it's used, the person saying it doesn't actually think anyone "forgot" anything. There's simply a disagreement, and the person saying it wants to get their shots in, rather than simply voicing their disagreement.

The comment about English possibly not being your first language was harsh and completely uncalled for.

I'm not sure if an enforceable apology is in order though. I'd say probably not. I understand you're peeved, Crimsone, but you really need to develop a thicker skin. Unfortunately, people do resort to sarcasm often here, even though it's really, really unhelpful. This isn't the first time you'll encounter situations like that on Misplaced Pages (or anywhere), and it might be wiser to try and come up with ways of dealing with it on your own, because running to ANI each time will become tiresome (WP:WQA is a possibility, though).

That having been said, I think Adambro might do well to decide to offer an apology of his own accord, in the interest of settling this, even if offense wasn't intended and this was a misunderstanding. Equazcion •✗/C • 00:52, 15 Apr 2008 (UTC)

I had a thick skin once, but when it got to the point where I had to walk away from just about any article I edited owing to this sort of behaviour, it caused me to leave... shortly after that FA I mentioned was promoted actually. It got to me, so I left... I tried again, (and see the result of that on my talk page! accused of comparing rape to politics of all things!!! and other stuff!) I know a thinck skin would be the easier answer, but one of the reason I'm being firm on this, is because it's this sort of behaviour that drove me away in the first place, and drives other editors away. It's not on, and even for the lighter remarks, it's about time wikipedia got back at the very least to a policy of commenting on the contribution, not the contributor. Especially for admins, who are looked up to, and are the ones that tend to be responsible for any actions dealing with such behaviour - what kind of example and hypocrisy does that set up if admins are free to partake f such behaviour themselves without apology? Crimsone (talk) 01:06, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Adambro was short with you but it sounds to me as though you're dealing with some wider worries (which is ok). You might want to keep in mind, this is an encyclopedia and you weren't discussing something which had to be sorted out straight off. Gwen Gale (talk) 01:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

76.114.18.153 makes some good points. As I've already said elsewhere, I will not be apologising. Adambro (talk) 05:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Couldn't you just say you're sorry and not mean it? I do it all the time. It would be very adminly of you to give an apology in the interest of peace even if you don't think you did anything wrong. Equazcion •✗/C • 09:24, 15 Apr 2008 (UTC)

The IP makes no good points, because the points the IP makes up are all invented... they claim I said things I didn't (another thing I'm sick of)... and you will note that I answered them. Crimsone (talk) 13:55, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Good grief. Demanding an apology from an administrator who is under no obligation to do so, and has stated he will not do, is only fueling more hysteria in your case. seicer | talk | contribs 18:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think lots of unhappiness with Misplaced Pages has been funneled into this wish for an apology, which seems to be sought for a lot more than the brush with Adambro. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

← It appears the user has retired over this. That is a shame. This could've been resolved with a simple apology, regardless of where the fault lay. Pride got in the way of resolving this, and now a user who's been editing for about 2 and a half years has left. Again this is independent of the specifics of the conflict. If you're an admin and a simple apology would resolve a dispute, you don't say "but I wasn't wrong". You just do it. You've failed an important test here in my mind, Adam. Equazcion •✗/C • 12:50, 16 Apr 2008 (UTC)

I would strongly dispute any suggestion that this user leaving Misplaced Pages is directly related to this incident. Just days ago, before I began discussions with this user, they stated that they were effectively retiring from the project.

Whilst it is of course disappointing when editors leave the project, I'm not convinced that attempting to retain this user by apologising to them where I feel no need is the right way of going about things. It isn't a precedent that I want to be setting, that by threatening to leave the project people suddenly bow down to whatever demands you make. Adambro (talk) 16:35, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Having reviewed the comments I made which prompted this discussion, I remain happy that my comments were appropriate and feel that Crimsone's reaction to me referring to her in the third person couldn't reasonably have been expected and her reaction and subsequent raising of the issue here was disproportionate and unnecessary. Adambro (talk) 16:55, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Sickoflies22 and Rachel Z's birthdate

I'm routing this here instead of the BLP noticeboard because of the latest development.

Sickoflies22 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has made—other than a comment on my talk page—no edits other than to the Rachel Z article. Based on her edit summaries ( ) she has implied that she is Rachel Z. She has been encouraged to email the Foundation so this can be verified/addressed by Foundation personnel.

Her concern is with her birthdate appearing in the article. This was initially deleted because of lack of reliable sources. However, it has now been found in two sources (Rochester Jazz Festival bio and ENotes ), so it was re-inserted into the article in the grounds that it was "widely published".

The problem is she has now made legal threats against the Foundation , so this is beyond a simple BLP issue. Hence, I'm bringing it here for other admins to review. —C.Fred (talk) 04:01, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Clear legal threat. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(edit conflict)I was reporting this when your report popped up. Seems a clear violation of WP:LEGAL. I'd say block them as per WP:LEGAL, with a talk page note explaining how to get in touch with the foundation. Redrocket (talk) 04:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

...and indefinitely blocked until this issue can be resolved or the threat is recanted. seicer | talk | contribs 04:07, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Both those bios are exactly the same, so it's hardly "widely published". WP:BLP specifically states "When in doubt about the notability of the subject, or if the subject complains about the publication of his or her date of birth, err on the side of caution and simply list the year of birth." - so why is it still in there? One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 04:08, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

It isn't the day that is the problem, it is the year that the alleged subject is complaining about. --Daniel J. Leivick (talk) 04:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Ah my bad for not checking the diffs, I assumed it was a common day and month privacy affair. One Night In Hackney₃₀₃ 04:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Probably because she hasn't emailed the foundation to try and establish that she is actually the person in question. Unless she does that, this user could be anybody. Redrocket (talk) 04:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I'd be inclined to assume good faith on the part of the now-blocked account, and remove the birth date entirely. Any objections? Antandrus (talk) 04:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Why? Because of the legal threat, or of some other reason? seicer | talk | contribs 04:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I've removed it because I'm not sure two websites meet the notion of "widely published." However, please feel free to revert me. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(ec) Agree with Gwen, and two reasons from me, mainly: 1) that I think it really is Rachel Z, and if she says it is wrong, it is reasonable to take her at her word; and 2) it's not widely published/known, and it is reasonable to presume the date found elsewhere on the web is in error. Antandrus (talk) 04:17, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Third source at The Rough Guide to Jazz Google Book Search page image. Though I'll concede that all the sources in question could be coming from one erroneous listing, so we can't rule out that the year is wrong. —C.Fred (talk) 04:24, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Looking into this more deeply, I'm finding lots of wide and sundry support for a 1962 birth date. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Her Berklee alumni blurb also says 1962. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:32, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Well it would, it's an old copy of our article. CIreland (talk) 04:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(EC) I was JUST writing about the possibility that this entire mess is a propagation of errors situation ,where one old error is being spread via citation. It would seem so. Until a serious cause for inclusion is demonstrated, I support removal per BLP, the above cited policy/guideline, and general good sense. She's not demanding whole control of the article, just some accuracy or privacy. the above error CIreland shows demonstrates that in this particular case, verifiability over 'truth' fails. Let's assume the subject knows her own age, remove it from article, and in absence of overwhelming need for inclusion, drop the matter. ThuranX (talk) 04:42, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm all for dropping it from the article, but no error at all has been shown. As it happens, this date has been widely published for years and in sources which are clearly not derived from our article. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:48, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

SO... everyone else doing it, let's do it too? How many of those sources have reliable sources? Clearly, one you brought up does NOT. So we're back to OUR article, which is being refuted by the subject. I'm not arguing for her to get control, but I am arguing for facts, and for BLP. neither supports inclusion right now. I'd suggest instead explaining OTRS to her, letting her and her lawyer has it out with the OFFICE, and until then, keep it off the article. This is NOT an urgent issue, and shes' not a world-stage level personage. IF she says she can prove her age, let her and her lawyer do that. I've yet to see a convincing reason for inclusion. This is a good case of BLP not being robust enough. Delete the info until the OFFICE weighs in. ThuranX (talk) 04:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think I'm being very misunderstood here. I don't think her birth date should be in the article if she objects to it (privacy, WP:BLP), nor do I think it should be included in any way until this has been resolved. However, I find neither support for the notion this date was propagated only by a single error in our article beginning four years ago, nor any other cited birth year (so far), yet she's a demonstrably notable musician. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(OD)If I may suggest a compromise, let's take down the year of birth for a week, and unblock her account to give her a chance to contact the foundation and verify that she is who she says she is. It's not an emergency situation or a clear case of a WP:BLP violation, but I think assuming good faith with her would help this get settled amicably. After a week if she hasn't tried to prove her case, we'll put the properly sourced original birthdate back up. Redrocket (talk) 05:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

She's retracted the remark and happily, has been unblocked. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

There's an open OTRS ticket, and per that, the date has been removed. I think this is settled, and it's good to see someone being sensible and straightforward about this. That she had to resort to considering legal action, and our first response is a block... BLP needs work. ThuranX (talk) 05:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes. I mean, the block was lifted fast but why put her through that drama? Might it be reasonable to implement some kind of a block delay on legal threats made by WP:BLP contacts? Gwen Gale (talk) 05:38, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That's roughly the sentiment that underlies WP:DOLT. It a sentiment with which I strongly disagree (and one that is inconsistent with WP:NLT, which exists for a few important reasons and at least in part at the behest of the Foundation), but DOLT does well to encapsulate it in any case and would, I suppose, provide the framework for any changes to NLT that one might, per BLP, essay. Joe 06:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Legal threats are legal threats. The standard procedure is to block and let it go through the proper channels. There was a very fast turnaround and the matter is now resolved. seicer | talk | contribs 12:33, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

And, as it turns out, this was, apparently, a justified and sustainable threat. The Foundation backs her. Odds are, her lawyer did the talking. Legal Threats, is, first off, a bad way to view all comments about legal action, as it lets ANY mention of getting lawyers involved become a bannable offense, even 'how do I direct my lawyer to the right contact' becomes a 'vague, unsettling implied legal threat', when it's quite possible the person simply intends to 'escalate' to a person whose clout and power mean that clear reasoning and accountability exist. There's a hell of a difference between 'That's libel, and since you won't help me, I'll get my lawyer to make a call to the WMF' and 'if you don't take down my article, i'll sue you and rape your mom while pouring sugar in the gas tank'. One's rational calm people doing what all of us do all the time: Ask to speak to the manager. The other's an irrational moron, nad can be blocked. Our policy needs revision to account for the REAL world. ThuranX (talk) 21:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The Foundation may back her at this point, but even after an editor told her on her talk page who to email to start the process, she responded with "If you do not remove-legal action shall ensue very soon due to the fact that you are ruining my career and my personal lofe and you have no right. I have retained Ken Hertz -a very influential lawyer and will press charges." I think we're looking back on this problem with the information we have currently, and making judgements. When she started editing here, we had no proof that she was actually the subject of the article. She was just an editor who was threatening to bring charges against wikipedia for giving out information that's available other places on the web. To me, the initial block was sound, as was the unblock and removal of the information once the situation calmed down and proper channels were followed. Redrocket (talk) 17:50, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Having become aware of more details about this, I believe following existing policy with the block was ok. Gwen Gale (talk) 01:59, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

OTRS has rm'd the date from the article altogether. I suggest closing this thread. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Jeremiah Cheatham outing users on outside page

The initials of this were discussed further up the page, but the user in question is now 'outing' various users at the front page of . I dont mind for my details up there, mostly because he got a bunch of it wrong (I am an actor, but thats not my profession) but also because im open with all of that on my userpage. The other users mentioned, well, maybe them notsomuch as I. -M 06:26, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Is it time to tell the foundation? This is fast getting out of hand and we need to act careful so as not to set a precedent. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

He's just getting pissed. His article is going to be deleted, which is what he wants, so all will be well. --Haemo (talk) 07:33, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

And I have sped the process up. Myah OS is no longer on Misplaced Pages. It seems that should solve all of the problems presented here. Cheers! « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) 07:38, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

While I agree in principle, I just hope we haven't created a precedent that these kinds of actions will be rewarded in the future. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I dont think any precedent was created here, I deleted the article because it was a completely non-notable entity, not because someone requested it. I also took into consideration the ongoing deletion discussion which was overwhelmingly delete, and what I felt were the best interests of the project. And I am sure that if a situation like this ever arises again, that it will be judged by itself, not on this discussion. « Gonzo fan2007 (talk ♦ contribs) 07:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Yes and for what it's worth, I was starting to nom the article for AfD myself when I saw Fredrick Dayton had already done. Gwen Gale (talk) 08:01, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No precedent. It was non-notable, and he only wanted it deleted after he wasn't allowed to use it in the manner he wanted — which some felt was promotional in tone. --Haemo (talk) 08:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This is just one of many (and one of the more pathetic attempts I've seen) "outing" pages people have created. There's nothing we can do about them. John Reaves 08:10, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

(reset indent)

Pathetic it may be, but it's serious nonetheless... I won't ask how he found out all that stuff, but is it not worth running a WHOIS query, tracing the ISP and complaining to them? It's illegal under most jurisdictions, I'm guessing... and the chances of the website-owner being in a country where open harassment is legal (Sudan? Zimbabwe?!) are minimal. —TreasuryTag—t—c 08:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I don't see how it's illegal. If you want to complain, go ahead, but this has no on-wiki relevance. It'd be best handle this as clandestinely as possible if you are truly concerned for people's privacy. John Reaves 08:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I mostly see it as an odd yet rather fit heads up to whatever's left of his user base. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Vintagekits and the blanked userpage

{{archivetop}} Page protection permits the retrieval of useful material from the page history, which would not be possible if the page was deleted. Page protection prevents unhelpful edit-warring, and renders blocking of editors perceived to be disruptive as unnecessary. The consensus favors protection as the solution least damaging to the project as a whole. DrKiernan (talk) 08:18, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi all. As this was archived before it could be resolved, can I ask an uninvolved, non-"Troubles" admin to review this archived ANI thread, make any decision they deem appropriate per discussion and close this issue before it comes back again! - Alison 07:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Leave it the way it is, that's what we do for other blocked/banned users. John Reaves 08:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Yeah. What exactly do you want us to do, Alison? Herostratus (talk) 08:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

{{archivebottom}}

(edit conflict) There's been an ongoing battle over that page and its contents since VK was indefblocked. As this isn't covered by policy (show me where), I'd like this issue resolved once and for all, or the matter will recur. I've no interest in this myself but would like the issue closed fairly so everyone can move on - Alison 08:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Resolve a matter on wikipedia? When we can have perpetual drama? That would be new. Generally, the only resolutions of an issue is where one side gets exhausted by the war of attrition.--Doc 12:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• The content Giano wants is now at User:Vintagekits/projects. I hope this is a compromise acceptable to everyone. Guy (Help!) 11:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No, not really. Personally, I think that it would be better to discuss the matter first, and then go with the consensus and normal practice rather than impose your own preferred solution. --Major Bonkers (talk) 12:46, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I am in complete agreement with Guy on this. It is a good compromise. It acknowledges VK's use as an editor without in any way condoning some of his more regrettable actions. Giano (talk) 12:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Looks like a reasonable compromise, Guy; a nice bit of thinking out of the box. Normal practice wasn't working because, as Alison points out, there is no genuine normal practice. It's very rare that a prolific contributor is banned, so this is pretty well a one-off situation. This is Misplaced Pages, and we don't need to be unnecessarily hidebound. It seems silly to limit creative thought to bot and content development when it can also resolve something as simple as this. Risker (talk) 12:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm unhappy at the way this is being dealt with. Leaving aside the (considerable) issues involving this editor and the way in which this 'compromise' has been imposed against the emerging consensus, I raise the following questions: (1) in what way is this page notable (in fact, it's just a list); and, (2) in what way is this page not a memorial?

The end result of allowing this page to stand will be for every banned User to demand similar 'rights' (and I see from a discussion on Alison's Talk page that one banned user has around 400 sock-puppets). It's common knowledge that this page belongs to the community (see: WP:UP#OWN). With the departure of Vintagekits the question should be: does the content that he has left behind advance the cause of the encyclopaedia sufficient to warrant its retention. No, alas, in this case it doesn't. Avid readers can easily access the page through the 'History' tag and there is insufficient reason to make an exception to various policies, guidelines, and norms, even if he was, in his own way, one of Misplaced Pages's more - extraordinary - editors. --Major Bonkers (talk) 17:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Bstone vs IZAK

On 23 Feb 08, User Bstone (talk · contribs) opened a RfC against me, User IZAK (talk · contribs), at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/IZAK2 based on his dislike of comments at Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Judaism/Archive 20#Deletion of synagogue articles on Feb 15, after he (Bstone) had nominated a number of synagogue articles/stubs for deletion, but which were saved after User:IZAK improved them enough. Neither the improvement of the articles he had nominated for deletion nor waiting for the motions at Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/IZAK2, where the vast majority of editors including a number of admins support me, that he had started and had not been brought to closure (it's still open), on 1 April Bstone proceeded to complain at ANI but was rejected there as well. Still not satisfied he then went on to launch a RfA on 2 April which was rejected by the ArbCom. Ignoring my request on 10 April that Misplaced Pages:Requests for comment/IZAK2 be brought to closure first, on 14 April Bstone stone applied for a RfM which was also rejected and being unable to accept that either, he proceeds to question the admin involved. As of April 15, he has stated he intends to head to the MedCab not taking "no" or "stop" for an answer. At this time, seeing that Bstone (1) refuses to accept the decisions of the ArbCom and (2) the rejection of the Mediation Committee (3) has no regard for discussions and advice at ANI and (4) ignores the motions and function of RfA, (failed actions 1 to 4 all initiated by Bstone himself) and (5) he refuses to respond to my requests to talk to me directly in a meaningful way , one can only conclude that User:Bstone is violating WP:POINT, WP:LAWYER and WP:HARASS, aka WP:STALK and a number of other policies that he cites against others, such as WP:AGF and WP:NOT#BATTLEGROUND, and that he should be warned to stop his pattern of unrelenting calculated attacks against IZAK and/or blocked for his violations of these policies, for his unbecoming stubborn and rude conduct, and for his unwillingness to accept the decisions of the ArbCom, ANI, the rejection by the Mediation Committee of his trumped up cases against IZAK, and for his ignoring of the still open RfC. Thank you for your help in this regard. Yours sincerely, IZAK (talk) 08:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Bit of a mis-description here. Bstone is not the only editor to have found your behaviour troubling at times - see the RfCs for details. Even your supporters have asked you to reflect on the criticism. Plus the person who instigates an RfC is not permitted to close it (even if they wanted to) - that happens when the discussion is deemed by the community to be exhausted. Probably it could now be closed, but I suspect attempts to close it in the initial days, when discussion was still ongoing, and concerns still being expressed, have probably backfired here in making any attempt to close it look inappropriate.--Doc 08:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Doc: Two wrongs do not make a right and I will gladly discuss anything about myslef with anyone, but that does not mean Bstone has a "right" to pursue a vendetta (what else is it?) against me or anyone if he sees that his calls are being rejected by the ArbCom, by the Mediation Committe and right here at ANI. I was not asking Bstone to close the RfC, but he just skipped over it even claiming he "forgot" about it. Let a neutral uninvolved admin decide, and let people take their time. Whatever was being discusssed and negotiated at the RfC should have remained there, and we were arriving at concrete agreements at the time, something that Bstone also overlooked in his failed quest to attack me at ArbCom, mediation Committe and here at ANI. My main point is that I was expecting movement and discussion at the RfC, or ideally direct discussions on his or my talk page or at WP:JUDAISM, when instead Bstone went on to instigate other failed actions against me, and it is for that misbehavior of his that I call for sanctions against him. Thank you, IZAK (talk) 09:21, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Asking for mediation between parties is hardly against a party, indeed it shows a willingness to find a resolution. No?--Doc 09:24, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Doc: I agree, I was all for it, but I asked that he pause for the RfC to be brought to closure finally because that too was a major piece of mediation and negotiation involving quite a few interested parties, but he skipped over that, as he skipped over many things in his quest to attack me. I was not the one that closed the RfM, I was not even involved in setting it up, and if it had been accepted I would do my good share, but if an admin and member of the mediation committee rejects Bstone's request, then Bstone must accept that decision, rather than go fighting it. He evidently has trouble with rejection and unless he gets his own way he seems to feel that he must continue to attack me in yet another forum. So how long will that go on and how many times must Bstone be rejected before he stops disrupting the community with his frivolous actions? Even "civil" disruption is disruption! Thanks. IZAK (talk) 09:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

My criticism of you in the past is that you see everything as a battle and then accuse people of "attacking you". Looking at the RfM, the Medcom did not suggest that Bstone drop it, indeed they suggested he pursued other avenues of dispute resolution including arbitration. Isn't that what he did? I really can't see what you want admins to do now, block him?--Doc 09:38, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Doc: I didn't know you knew every detail of my "past" on Misplaced Pages, almost five and a half years of it, that you were so expert to judge my reactions. I admit to having an acerbic pen, but it is no more than that, not everyone can speak in one tone 24/7, sometimes we write more and sometimes less, my output is ten thousand times more than Bstone on Misplaced Pages. Anyhow, looking at one or two points in isolation seems perhaps like nothing, but Bstone has now tried to attack me DIRECTLY at least FOUR times: Via a RfC, at ANI, a RfA and now RfM and EACH time he loses his bid and is told that he has no case at the present time. Now taken together what would YOU call that if not a series of calculated and unrelenting attacks, all in reponse to discussions at articles Bstone nominates for deletion. The man cannot take even a minor disagreement and feels that everything I say in regard to "him" is a "violation" of "WP:CIVIL" or "WP:AGF" when people at ANI thought he was actually joking, take a look at what they said: Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive394#IZAK not assuming good faith and the ArbCom told him "Bye Bye" see and he still goes on and on, and then you turn around and say that I am wrong to feel "attacked" -- really now? I may be tough, but I have feelings too. IZAK (talk) 09:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Doesn't look like the arbcom quite dismissed him as "bye bye", it looks like they hoped that arbitration and sanctions would prove unnecessary at this point - and that some other resolution might be found to the complaints Bstone brought. I think the hope was that further sanctions against you might prove unnecessary. I think that was the hope of the RfC too: that you'd listen to the critics, modify your tone accordingly, and that would hopefully be all that was necessary. I'm afraid I didn't follow events to see if that happened on not.--Doc 11:07, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

This is completely mindboggling. I was specifically told by ArbCom that the case was premature and we had not exhausted attempts at mediation. Ryan Postlethwaite told me if I filed a request with the Mediation Committee to assist IZAK and I with the issues we have been having it would be speedily accepted. Since when is asking for mediation in order to help two editors work out their differences grounds for a complaints on ANI? I was told by administrators and arbitors to ask for mediation and I did. My head is spinning and I am really wondering how I can continue being part of the project when IZAK continues his unending attacks. Bstone (talk) 13:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I believe Ryan offered to mediate informally rather than through the mediation comittee. Try contacting him directly. Best, --Shirahadasha (talk) 14:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Ryan specifically stated that it would be speedily accepted by the Mediation Committee. Yet they have rejected it. It seems Ryan is on vacation right now so might not respond to this issue. So, what's next? Can this thread please be closed and archived? Bstone (talk) 18:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I cannot speak for the MedCom or for Ryan, but the case that was rejected seems like a perfectly normal rejection. A bare list of user conduct issues is not an acceptable foundation for mediation of any sort. MedCab, MedCom and other forms of mediation are not a stick with which to beat an opponent. They are groups and individuals that offer outside assistance in reaching an agreement. "User X violated Y&Z policies and they need to be told they're wrong," is not going to be helpful in mediation, and cannot be the basis of a mediation. A user demanding to be proven right, even when content issues are involved, is often a point of note and concern for a mediator. When it's a simple list of accusations lacking context and missing any real description of the dispute, it's almost a textbook example of a case to be rejected. A mediation request with any hope of being fruitful must at the very least describe the dispute. Being a neutral as possible in the description and providing some context are also extremely helpful. Vassyana (talk) 22:30, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Understand, I filed the Mediation case because Ryan told me to, said it would be speedily accepted, ArbCom was pointing me to Mediation Committee, etc. As such I had no idea it would be rejected. Furthermore, since when it asking for mediation between two parties grounds for a complaint? IZAK should instead be working with me in finding a mediator to assist in helping us work out our professional and personal conflicts. I seriously want to resolve this dispute. Does he? Bstone (talk) 23:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I understand that Ryan encouraged you to file a case, but I doubt it was a blank check. If you truly wish to seek mediation and settle the dispute, simply asserting the other party is wrong with a list of policy violation accusations is most certainly not the way to go. You've been around and active long enough to know better. I don't condone that way IZAK has approached things, but your approach is not helpful or productive either. You both need to start addressing the issues in dispute and avoid making broad accusations towards each other. Vassyana (talk) 00:27, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I feel inclined to comment here, as the Committee member who rejected the RfM. There was virtually zero material in the way of prior attempts at constructive discussion and dispute resolution, short of some very heated discussion that wasn't heading anywhere fast. Most importantly, I felt, the filing party had not considered filing for informal mediation with the MedCab, which indicated to me that formal mediation was not warranted at such an early stage in the dispute's life-cycle. Whilst I will not make any comment with regards to the questions of incivility on the part of certain parties, I will say that this dispute's resolution seems to have been hampered by some bad blood between the parties in question, and that begs the question of whether or not administrator intervention is necessary, both to prevent further disruption as a direct result of this "bad blood"'s manifestation, and to aid the resolution of this dispute, by eliminating a major sticking point of it (the ill-feelings). Anthøny 01:14, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Anthony and Vassyana: Notice how unrelenting Bstone is in his attacks against me and how he totally does not register what you are saying and how he disregards what does not suit him and only wishes that things go his way, even after all the measures he has tried have failed and admin after admin and editor after editor do not agree with his opinions. He needs a much stronger wake up call to pay attention to the professional opinions of other serious editors and admins. IZAK (talk) 07:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I think it would be best if these editors avoided each other, and avoided commenting about each other. Jayjg 01:35, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• Hi Jayjg: That is easier said than done because this entire trail of discussions goes back to early February when Bstone started to work towards deletion of synagogue and Jewish school articles articles/stubs, and even after I improved and saved them from deletion, he does not acknowledge that good work but only seeks ways, all in the name of "WP:CIVIL" and "WP:AGF" to launch new attacks and criticism of my efforts to counter his misguided nominations of Judaic articles for deletion. IZAK (talk) 07:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment on content, not on the editor. I couldn't agree more. Bstone (talk) 03:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Um, Bstone, if that were true, you would have long ago given up your quest to attack me with all you failed efforts against me at ANI, the ArbCom, Mediation Committee, and the unclosed RfC. IZAK (talk) 07:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I second Jayjg's suggestion. Misplaced Pages is a big place and there's plenty of room for IZAK and Bstone to work without "bumping into" one another. — ] (] · ]) 04:07, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree as well. I think some admin should archive this thread as soon as possible. Yahel Guhan 04:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Yahel Guhan: I understand your well-meaning words, but Bstone is now into his third month of a vendetta to undermine and derail me on Misplaced Pages, and in the process he has violated many policies such as WP:POINT, WP:HARASS and WP:NOT#BATTLEGROUND (and more) by ignoring rulings of the ArbCom, the Mediation Committee, advice at ANI and leaving a RfC that he started in limbo because it has not gone his way, and each time he has approached admins asking them to explain and justify their actions wasting everyone's time in the process, and he needs to be blocked or warned to stop his wasted and wasteful elongated WP:EDITWAR as he attempts to nominate articles about synagogues and Jewish schools for deletion (with the last one cited here Bstone even went to Deletion Review to get an article re-deleted after it was kept but he was turned down, and naturally he cannot stand being rejected so he proceeds to the next battleground, and the next, and the next...) but I saved most of those articles. So that is what it is -- a huge drawn out edit war with Bstone resorting to all these outside appeals like RfCs, RfAs, RfMs and appeals at ANI and now he plans to waste the MedCab's time when he disagrees with my opposing comments at AfDs, since in recent times he has nominated quite a few articles/stubs about synagogues and Jewish schools for deletion, something that I opposed him on very strongly and which caused him to rage at me until now albeit in a "civil" way ("civil" rage is still rage) and he has also troubled many editors associated with WP:JUDAISM and not just me. Thanks for caring, but cutting the discussion short will not solve anything. I have called for Bstone to talk to me directly in a meaningful way on his or my talk page or at WP:JUDAISM but he refuses to do so, and on the contrary he maintains his own "watchlist" of me listing my past "transgressions" at User:Bstone/rfcuizak (is that legal?) as he pays no attention to his own multiple violations of Misplaced Pages's policies as they pile up. IZAK (talk) 07:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Threat by User:SeattleJoe

SeattleJoe has just posted this and this, targeting myself and ErgoSum88 over edits made to the Incest article.

I think these warnings are wholly unacceptable; threatening to 'call the cops' on editors you disagree with is practically a legal threat. I don't appreciate being compared to a child molester, either. The way, the truth, and the light (talk) 09:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

He states, in a admittedly very melodramatic way "If anyone insists on expressing, or even implying, the "opinion" that sex between adults and children is ever not criminal, that it is not always sexual abuse, in this article, or anywhere else I may become aware of, allow me to hereby notify them to cease and desist. If they do not, I will, literally, call the cops." Well, I trust that the "if anyone description doesn't apply to anyone. Factually, such acts are normally criminal, and abusive. Who'd argue otherwise, that wasn't here to troll or advocate fringe nonsense? Too hypothetical to be a real threat. But he should calm down.--Doc 09:17, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I initially blocked based on the diffs, but reversed myself and am engaging in dialogue. I read it as a threat of police action; I'll watch his reaction. Hopefully this doesn't open a can. -Jéské 09:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think it's just a case of getting a little over-passionate about the topic for one reason or another. It's easy to do, and doesn't really warrent a block, and even if a block was place, it shouldn't be a long one. See if calms down first, and see how he interects before thinking about blocks. A caution wouldn't go amiss though. Lradrama 10:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

A little over-passionate is an understatement. A simple look at this editor's contribution history shows he or she is pushing a POV and does not wish to back down. Not only is SeattleJoe trying to own the Incest article, as seen here and here, but this user has clearly issued a legal threat (in addition to attempting to dictate to others how to edit) on Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Pedophilia Article Watch. I'd say a block, or at least a strong censure, is more than warranted. ~ Homologeo (talk) 11:52, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I was about to report this user myself but see someone beat me to it. SeattleJoe has clearly violated WP policies against making legal threats. He's also openly stated on the talk page at Incest that he will make changes to the article whether anyone likes them or not and pretty much promised that he would edit war if anyone changed it back. He told people to "go fuck themselves", he;s violating WP:SOAP, WP:OWN, etc. WP is not therapy. This person shows no sign of listening to anyone outside of his shrill soapboxing and deserves to be blocked. The Quiet Man (talk) 15:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Further discussion on the user's talk page seems to show that the user is convinced (and quite paranoid) that people are trying to "downplay the seriousness of child abuse". I don't know where he got this from but it's ludicrous, absurd, not based in fact and whatever other fancy terms I can come up with that mean WRONG. And he doesn't show any sign of letting go of it. As noted at the top, I also do not appreciate being compared to a child molestor just because of style disagreements. The Quiet Man (talk) 16:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I've been watching this thread and I think the user has all the signs of a fixated SPA with who-knows-what in his thoughts. The notion users are trying to "downplay the seriousness of child abuse" is codswallop. The threat to call the police if he sees any text he doesn't like is more or less hollow but will have a chilling effect on any general interest editor's willingness to put up with such disruption in discussions and editing. After some thought, unless he can be reasoned with (which may not be too likely), I would call for a block, for both the legal threat (which could easily turn into some kind of general threat of civil action) and disruption. Gwen Gale (talk) 16:36, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That analysis seems dead on, and I too would support a block should the user not readily demonstrate himself to be willing to comport his editing with our conduct policies and practices. Joe 17:52, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Not every "threat" involving the law is a blockable legal threat.

• "If you post text-X I will sue you" is a clear legal threat, blockable per WP:LEGAL
• "If you threaten violent-act-Y I will report you to the police" is not a blockable legal threat, indeed it is the recommended course of action according to WP:VIOLENCE.
• "If you commit crime-Z I will report you to the police" is not a legal threat at all; it is an affirmation of responsible citizenship.
• "If you post text-X I will report you to the police" is what SeattleJoe actually said. It's somewhere in the middle. If he sees the act of posting the contentious material as being criminal, of course he would feel justified in calling the police. This isn't a matter for blocking, but for discussion. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 18:06, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The worry would be, it seems likely he'll read something worded in a way he doesn't like and go on about it. Reporting a crime (or advocacy of a crime) to the police is a given, there's no need to specifiy it on a talk page, that's disruption. It's like announcing on a talk page, "If any editor here reveals, or attempts to reveal, any identifying personal information about me, I'll call the police, call their ISP, post it to ANI and have them blocked." Un-needed, unhelpful. Gwen Gale (talk) 18:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I have reblocked SeattleJoe for making the same type of post after I had told him in no uncertain terms not to and for promising to war over it if it were removed. -Jéské 18:48, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Fair enough; even if it doesn't entail legal problems, even if it isn't intended to produce a chilling effect, it's still tendentious. SHEFFIELDSTEEL 22:35, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

He's just posted a long screed on his userpage, announcing that he's reported us all to the FBI and warning us to purge the kiddie porn from our hard drives and then discard them to avoid prosecution. --Orange Mike | Talk 14:48, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Nice, might it be time to lock down his page and stop feeding him? Wildthing61476 (talk) 14:54, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Looks like it was locked last night , and trimmed of troll-bait just a couple of minutes after Orangemike posted his message here. --Kralizec! (talk) 15:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Horizon Press spammer who also adds content sometimes

http://en.wikipedia.org/Special:Contributions/Touchstone42 appears to be a Horizon Press spammer. http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Horizontal_gene_transfer&diff=205764788&oldid=202213337 caught my attention. My first three samples of his edits all show Horizon Press links.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bacterial_conjugation&diff=prev&oldid=205764340
• http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Vibrio&diff=prev&oldid=202796323
• http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Zinc_finger_nuclease&diff=prev&oldid=205762331

But some might be valid additions. This should be looked at carefully without knee-jerk acceptance or reverts. WAS 4.250 (talk) 12:03, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

http: //spam.horizonpress.com

• horizonpress.com: Linksearch en (insource) - meta - de - fr - simple - wikt:en - wikt:fr • Spamcheck • MER-C X-wiki • gs • Reports: Links on en - COIBot - COIBot-Local • Discussions: tracked - advanced - RSN • COIBot-Link, Local, & XWiki Reports - Misplaced Pages: en - fr - de • Google: search • meta • Domain: domaintools • AboutUs.com

Accounts

Touchstone42 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · blacklist hits · AbuseLog · what links to user page · count · COIBot · Spamcheck · user page logs · x-wiki · status · Edit filter search · Google · StopForumSpam)

It's definitely spam. The user has not cited any other references than Horizon Press books and it has not occurred to the user in 8 months of editing = 300+ edits just to use the ISBN. Cross-posted to WT:WPSPAM. MER-C 13:20, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I add content to Wiki from scientific books published by Horizon Scientific Press. For Verifiability I understood that the correct citation would be the book that the material comes from. I do not have access to any other published material so the only references I cite are to Horizon Press books. In future I have three options:

1. Stop adding content to Wiki
2. Add content without references
3. Add content with references to Horizon Press books

I welcome any help or suggestions and will take your advice seriously. Many thanks Touchstone42 (talk) 10:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I've heard that excuse before (oddly enough, the pattern of spamming in that case is very similar to what we have here). Google is your friend. So is your local library. You also didn't read what I said above - you could just use the ISBN instead of adding links to the publisher's website, like this: ISBN 978-0-12-345678-9 produces ISBN 978-0-12-345678-9. Or simply cite other material. MER-C 12:01, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm trying to edit the page on Cholera, which contains three references to books by Caister Academic Press aka. horizonpress.com. The links seem valid. The references could be kept without URLs, but having a direct link to the books in question seems ok to me. Why not? BTW. the ISBN is also included, the url is simply "extra info". Pvanheus (talk) 12:12, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

See my comments at MediaWiki talk:Spam-blacklist#horizonpress.com about the urgency of resolving the issue of >200 articles with now-blacklisted links. To minimize disruption for our regular editors, they either need to be removed ASAP or else the domain needs to be temporarily removed from the blacklist. --A. B. 13:15, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

In future I will only use the ISBN as suggested by MER-C. Thanks for all your helpTouchstone42 (talk) 14:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Users Agenda Pushing & recreating articleBrandon Lang/Brandon lang

User:JPMcGavin has recreated the previously deleted article at 14:42 on 14th April above using nearly the exact same wording that was deleted recently. I've tagged the article but, am not sure I used the right tags for this category. Could someone look into that and into the reason the user recreated in the first place. If he wants the article reinstated it needs to go to deletion review (or at least that is my understanding) Thank you. Jasynnash2 (talk) 13:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Whoever it is, I had discussions a couple of days ago with User:Vince1973 about the recreation of this article - he and his friend (by his own admission) User:JPMcGavin seem to want to out Brandon Link's allegedly dubious business practices despite my telling them that Misplaced Pages is not the correct forum for their views. _{The public face of GB} 13:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• Maybe just digging myself a hole but, Users User:JPMcGavin and User:Vince1973 seem to be pushing somesort of agenda against some possibly real person that may or may not be participating in unsavory practices. Their only contributions center on the above and recently to editing the Two for the Money article. Personally; I don't gamble, have never seen the movie, and don't consider myself particularly sporty but, I'd really appreciate it if these two Users could be pointed in the direction of making constructive non-agenda pushing edits. If they really believe that the person they are trying to reference is committing a crime they should go to the police. If they simply want to push the website associated with the name they should pay for the appropriate advertising. If they want to push an anti-"whoever" agenda they should send letters to the appropriate people and places. Misplaced Pages is not the place for what they are doing and it is proving disruptive. I don't want to push a block agenda but, someone needs to help these two be constructive or show them the door. Thanks. Jasynnash2 (talk) 14:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)Originally posted as a second section, moved here by me — Gavia immer (talk) 14:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

For the time being I've reverted to the previous per WP:BLP and fully protected until this is looked into. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 08:17, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• They've done it again. JPMcGavin @ 01:59, 16 April 2008 -or- have I just read your post wrong Rodhullandemu? Jasynnash2 (talk) 08:23, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

No, it's just I hadn't got round to deleting and salting the latest Brandon lang. Now I have. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 08:49, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

wargs.com

Misplaced Pages has 84 or so links to wargs.com for ancestry. An example of this is the article on John Kerry, which links to here. In every case I have checked, the wargs.com content says, "The following material should not be considered either exhaustive or definitive, but rather as a first draft." As such, I believe it fails WP:RS and so should not be used to cite information. What are other people's thoughts on this? What's the best way to prevent this being added in the future, if people agree? --Yamla (talk) 14:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Seems correct, it's not reliable. Expunge links with the Special: tool and add it to the spam-blacklist... —TreasuryTag—t—c 14:16, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

It looks self-published; we should probably assume that whomever is adding the links is related to the web site owner and leave a very polite note about reliable sources and that we would welcome his contributions once they have been independently reviewed and published. Thatcher 14:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

If there will be no objections, I'll remove all such links with my bot. MaxSem 16:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No objections to removal but I don't see at this point a compelling reason to add this to the spamblacklist. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Comment: You mentioned 84 or so links, but Special:Linksearch shows over 300 links; or are some of those okay (I honestly haven't checked them all - but the ones I have viewed have the same issues outlined above). --- Barek (talk • contribs) - 17:30, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Template:European Americans

I do not know if this is the right place to post this, but there is an edit war, of which I am not a part but a mere observer, in Template:European Americans. I believe and administrator should look into it. Thank you. The Ogre (talk) 14:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• I've watchlisted. I'm not quite ready to act yet, but there is quite a bit of editing/reverting there lately, just not all on the same points. For some but not all of it, Misplaced Pages:Requests for arbitration/Armenia-Azerbaijan 2 applies. GRBerry 14:39, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Personal attack

Note of personal attack ...

• 10:38, 15 April 2008 ScienceApologist (Talk | contribs) (9,595 bytes) (bad sourcing and more Reddi nonsense

"Reddi nonsense" is substitutes abusive remarks for evidence when examining another person's claims or comments. Comment on content, not on the contributor. This is a comment not on the content. Thisis not civil. J. D. Redding 15:47, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• Thank you for bringing your edit war and original research to administrator attention. Guy (Help!) 15:56, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
  • Don't know the history (and probably don't want to) but... there are definitely some civility issues with User:ScienceApologist and his recent posts to User:Reddi's talk page and to WP:FTN. I think despite editwaring and original research that the matter of civility is still a valid one. Just my two cents Jasynnash2 (talk) 16:03, 15 April 2008 (UTC)
    • I'm not excusing any incivility, but it would seem that if you remove the edit warring and OR, there would be no incivility problems. --Kbdank71 16:07, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

ScienceApologist pushes his POV through incivility and edit warring. Will there be anything done about this? J. D. Redding 16:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No, because it has been rehashed out at literally every public venue at Misplaced Pages so many times, that any new reports generated have a diminished impact and value, especially when such reports are frivolous. seicer | talk | contribs 16:59, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Put another way, nonsense is more or less another word for codswallop. I don't see a personal attack here. Gwen Gale (talk) 17:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Codswallop? Now I've got use my OED again. Sheesh! OrangeMarlin 17:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I can help you there...

Codswallop. n. the action of being smacked in the face by a wet fish. eg. That was one hell of a codswallop. Orig. Anc. English - it's akin to a troutswallop, but a codswallop is generally more expensive than a troutswallop (and only employed by those who don't care about sustainable fish stocks). _{The public face of GB} 17:19, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Truth be told that's an older, now mostly deprecated etymology. The word is slang (UK) for nonsense. Erm, but troutswallop's kinda fit too :) Gwen Gale (talk) 17:23, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

You're right, of course. The edition I'm working on is so old that I think the definition of codswallop contained therein may have been one of the ones contributed by William Chester Minor. _{The public face of GB} 17:28, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

So Dr Minor stumbled upon his own Misplaced Pages back in the day then :P Gwen Gale (talk) 17:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Presumably, yes. Right before he cut off his own penis... _GB 18:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh. Had he gotten a civility block? Gwen Gale (talk) 19:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No, I think that was the punishment for a repeat 3RR offence back in those days - rather than a block of indeterminate length you ended up with a co.....well, I'm sure you get the idea. _GB 20:29, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Blah blah JzG blah blah ScienceApologist blah blah thin skin... come back when you're not rehashing this debate again. Sceptre 17:14, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

• I know the true story behind the term "codswallop" (no, I really do!) but have no references or cites and if I were to tell you, you would have to edit yourself out for fear of Original Research... LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

J.D., if ScienceApologist is incivil with you, leave a polite notice on his talk page to stop the behavior. Keep doing this every time he is incivil with you if he doesn't stop. Then, if it keeps happening, come here and state briefly what is going on and provide the diffs. If it is repeatedly incivil behavior, an admin may do something about it. If it's just one time, probably not. Cla68 (talk) 23:45, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I will try. Thanks Cla68. J. D. Redding 05:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Violation of Misplaced Pages's NPOV policy

User 140.129.62.51 keeps on adding that same weasel paragraph on the LJN article despite been warned to stop doing so.

Anybody who' ve heard of LJN already know the company had a repulation of making bad video games. Putting such statement in the article doesn't bring anything informative since this is something everybody already knows and it adds no value to the article. Plus it violates Misplaced Pages's Misplaced Pages:Avoid weasel words and Misplaced Pages:Neutral point of view policies. I'm requesting for the account to be indefinetely blocked. Farine 12:28, 15 April 2008

Checking - there are no warnings on the user page. You should add those from user template messages when you identify vandalism. Then the matter can be taken to vandalism reporting. I think most admins would not accept warnings in the history as sufficient. There's nothing on the talk page either. I would put a note on the talk page, template the IP user page and see if you can engage them in not doing it again.

The IP is registered to the Taiwan Ministry of Education computer center (sic). An indefinite block would not be justified without a consistent record of vandalism. At this stage, I'd say, they're just doing it to annoy you - so, go through the process and if it continues, go to the vandalism forum. HTH Kbthompson (talk) 16:47, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The fact that "everybody already knows it" is not a good reason for not including a fact - in fact, if everybody agrees, the fact is undisputed and neutral. But such a fact, like the whole article, needs verifiable sources. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Just because the company developed a bad reputation for making video games, it doesn't mean that they indisputely made bad video games. Some people could just say that they love their games and not agreeing with a paragraph flaming the company. That's why, unless the paragraph can include something which is balanced in both sides, such statements should not be mentionned in the article because it would reflect POV.

Farine 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Oversight Needed

This user appears to of released personal information in his 2 edits, including a telephone number. I think it may need to be oversighted. D.M.N. (talk) 17:54, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I emailed Oversight right after I removed the section. Aecis 17:55, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Accusations related to Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Poyoyloar

If someone could go and have a look at Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/Poyoyloar (and if necessary the related case Misplaced Pages:Suspected sock puppets/ArchieHall)? Normally, I'd be perfectly happy to let these work themselves out, but we're getting to the point where I'm being accused of making legal threats and failing to assume good faith. I think/hope I haven't, but a neutral disinterested voice here would be great, and I won't consider myself above reproach at all, if that turns out to be the case. Thanks in advance, Nsevs • Talk 18:05, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Koalorka and Turkey-related material

. Ok, not resolved, but dispute resolution is that way, third door on the left. Don't forget to flush. Keeper | 76 | Disclaimer 21:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

User:Koalorka seems to be making edits in relation to Turkey that express a strongly political POV and is reacting uncivilly when contradicted or reverted. See for example this edit. Can an admin have a look and perhaps please have a word with him? --Pleasantville (talk) 18:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

From his recent contributions, he seems to be sweeping through articles that have any mention of a Europe - Turkey connection and removing that info on the spot without editorial discussion. Looks like it could be a bigger issue than just incivility. I'm not sure bombarding his talk page with warnings will help. For now I'll post on his talk page about this thread and ask him to respond here. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 19:07, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Hello, what is the issue? ETA, "I'm not sure bombarding his talk page with warnings will help" am I to understand I am being setup for a ban? Koalorka (talk) 19:11, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I think the issue is well-summarized by Gwynand. --Pleasantville (talk) 19:13, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

What type of bigger issue could this be? I'm simply removing incorrect information. Would it be reasonable for me to start editing Denmark as an Asian nation and then demand discussion and consensus building though the claim has no factual basis and is utterly ridiculous? No, it would not be reasonable. That is why I removed the uncontroversial and incorrect content. Koalorka (talk) 19:17, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

OMG, why are you so against Turkey being defined as a European country? Seriously, looking at your edits, you're so fanatical about it. Onur (talk) 19:21, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Because I'm pedantic and do not tolerate misinformation and slanted propaganda. Koalorka (talk) 19:22, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

What's so misinformative and propagandic about it? Its a widely accepted fact that some Turkish territory lies in Europe. Onur (talk) 19:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Context: There is some debate about the proposed entry of Turkey into the European Union. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:28, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The European Union is completely irrelevant in this context. What our argument is about is whether Turkey is classified as a European country or not, because Koalorka keeps on removing the Turkish American article from the Template:European Americans. Onur (talk) 19:30, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for posting that Gwen, although I am not sure if it is relevant. Just to point out that this notice is in no way established to prove that Koal is wrong regarding Turkey, rather this is dealing more with correct ways to go about making mass changes in articles. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 19:35, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I can understand why Onur says there's no link but keep in mind, this has been argued edit warred about at least since Constantine I moved there, though I think much longer. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:43, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Well, I don't mean it's not relevant to a content dispute, I just mean it's not relevant to this incident which has to do with civility and editing procedures. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 19:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Spot on what I was getting at. Gwen Gale (talk) 19:46, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Please, Onur and Koalorka, remain civil. This noticeboard is not for discussing content disputes. Koalorka, I agree with removing propaganda on the spot, but that does not encompass everything. Sweeping through pages and removing the same info even if it is wrong is not the best way to go about improving articles. I am unaware of the specifics of the dispute and will not get involved, but if you believe you have factual information and believe articles should be changed as such, bring up the info on respective talk pages to gain consensus. Also provide sources. As always, remain civil with other editors as this is the only way to truly be able to discuss the factual points of an issue. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 19:32, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

10-4 on that. I do believe in consensus. I'll do my best. Koalorka (talk) 19:33, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

No, I do not accept that! Look, administrators, could you please read mine and Koalorka's debates (here and here) and actually TRY to understand what the hell's going on, please?! Onur (talk) 19:41, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

And that love-hate debate has been going on since the 14th century. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:02, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Does this template apply here:

There is currently a discussion at Misplaced Pages:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you.

Avruch 20:49, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Judging from a look at his most recent summaries, it appears that Koalorka has not taken yesterday's advice to heart. --Pleasantville (talk) 17:10, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I recommend, because this is a content dispute, to bring it to dispute resolution. Bring the diffs of his recent activity. Keeper | 76 | Disclaimer 17:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Oversight not done yet...

I reported a couple of diffs for oversight yesterday via the http://en.wikipedia.org/Special:Emailuser/Oversight link. Just checked now and the edits containing someone's phone number ('for phone sex ring...', yada yada) are still visible. Is there currently a problem with submitting reports via that method or some other backlog? Cheers. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 20:48, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Send another e-mail to oversight-l@lists.wikimedia.org, and ask for an update. It may be that someone decided it wasn't worthy of oversight, or they could have just missed the e-mail. Avruch 20:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Okay, emailed them again... Thanks. --Kurt Shaped Box (talk) 20:57, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Fox News Channel Edit blocking

The Fox News entry has been blocked to editing because one or two editors continually revert entirely any changes to the lead entry. The majority of editors in an RfC have expressed disapproval with the POV status of the lead. Yet because of "edit wars" that occur when these two editors continually revert changes, an administrator has blocked the page indefinitely. The effect is that an extreme minority of editors and one administrator has ensured that the version the majority of editors has agreed needs to be changed will not be changed... indefinitely.

The admin says to pursue dispute resolution and form a consensus before editing. Now I may be mistaken, but the highest form of dispute resolution I see for content disputes is mediation. I have asked the warring parties to mediate with me, and they have refused. The discussion has hit a standstill as they have made it clear they simply do not accept the reliable sources the majority approves. The primary reverter has never once compromised to to find a common ground, yet the editors in the RfC majority who disapprove of the lead have offered up multiple versions. I don't see how blocking this page is going to solve this problem. Editing is a critical part of consensus building according to wp:CONSENSUS. The "consensus" that is allegedly the goal of this indefinite blocking is a literal impossibility. At least one of the editors in favor of keeping the current version has refused to give any ground and has made it virtually certain he will oppose any changes to the that attempt to create NPOV. Since the admin who blocked the page has said he will not unblock it until there is consensus, this page is the equivalent of one of those ridiculous "locked for editing" pages over at conservapedia.com that the site owners worry might actually have some balance introduced if they let people edit. It cannot be right that one editor and one admin can, in theory, prevent the development of a page indefinitely.Jsn9333 (talk) 21:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps you didn't read the template and rushed to conclusions. At the top, it reads: "This protection is not an endorsement of the current version..." And to request an edit, to use {{editprotected}}. Try doing that first. seicer | talk | contribs 21:46, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

As the admin who protected the page, I wish to note that indefinite doesn't mean permanent. The edit warring is quite severe on the page so I have chosen not to set an expiry date to the protection. Stifle (talk) 08:59, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Just a heads up. The owners of this article are pretty militant when it comes to keeping their POV in the article. Good luck anyways. --70.109.223.188 (talk) 16:36, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Arcayne

Hi, I'm just trying to get along and do my best here, civilly and with reason.

I posted a question at the Reliable Source Notice Board, "Are a Films credits a reliable source for a Movies InfoBox?"

I received an answer, 'A films credits are a reliable source and are the preferred use for an InfoBox.' I marked the thread as Resolved. Arcayne changed my edit marked it as Unresolved. After a couple of additional comments by Arcayne and no change in the answer to my question, I marked it as Resolved. This is in accordance with the instructions on the Reliable Source Notice Board which state: If you are satisfied with a response, please tag your thread at the top with

Resolved

.

Arcayne then removed my entire comments and marked it as Unresolved while stating the following:

"do not ever in you life alter the content of one of my posts, or I shall see you blocked so fast your kids will be dizzy" Arcayne

• Suffice it to say, I am not comfortable with his obsession with me, and do not feel particularly welcome here, is this just Misplaced Pages and do I need to toughen up? I'm really not sure what has made me his latest target, I honestly just think he saw me as a soft target of opportunity as I'm just a lowly public editor. Irregardless, he has brought me before more forums, reverted me, followed me and discussed me on more pages than I can possibly count at this point without any evidence that I have done any of the numerous specific

things he has tried to pin on me. Can someone respectfully request that he try to abide by the bare minimum of Wiki standards?75.57.196.81 (talk) 22:44, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I have now been reverted and a second, nearly identical threat has been left for me by Arcayne: "Do not ever alter (1, 2) the content of my posts in a discussion page again. I take significant exception. If it ever occurs again, I will have request to have you blocked so fast that your kids will get whiplash. This is your only warning in regards to this topic, so I would urge you not to test my resolve on this particular subject. Arcayne"

Sorry to use your time on this. 75.57.196.81 (talk) 22:50, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I have informed User:Arcayne of this conversation, as we usually try to do here. - Philippe 22:53, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you, I missed this one that came with the second one - " if you are looking to get blocked, you are going about it in the right way."75.57.196.81 (talk) 23:00, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

With respect, manipulating my posts to alter my intent is refactoring. We don't do that here. Yet you seem to feel (1, 2) that you are exempt from this behavioral guideline. You don't refactor another user's comments to alter intent or content, though you can fix indenting and the like (and even that is open to debate). However, after wrning you that this is an unacceptable practice, and my offense to it, you did it again. I subsequently warned you that you were well on the path to being blocked for it, as it is a part of a history of harassment on your part.

Additionally, you have a rather long-standing habit of marking as resolved those conversations where discussion is still occurring. If you feel that the moment you get the answer you are looking for marks the end of a multi-user discussion, you are mistaken. This is why you have been counseled (and, unfortunately, warned as well) to await the conclusions of discussions before taking action.

Perhaps if you are not comfortable with having your actions paid attention to, you should consider altering how you interact with your fellow editors within the encyclopedia. As for my so-called "obsession," with you, I think you are forgetting that you have filed (now) three separate AN/I complaints against me, two of which were dismissed with the advice that you seek DR. When approached by myself to pursue DR, you simply ignored it. Subsequent AN/I complaints have indicated that your editing behavior needs somewhat noticeable improvement. If you are concerned with y attention to your personal attacks on me, consider not making htem in the first place. Try leaving my edits be, without altering them. That seems to be an awfully good start improving how your actions are perceived.

And while we are on the subject of your actions, it has been discussed that you might be a former user. Have you ever edited under a formal ID in Misplaced Pages before (before the dozen anons, I mean). - Arcayne () 23:04, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry Arcayne, but I will no longer respond to your empty baseless accusations. I'm here to improve the content of the articles that I edit. That is all. I will not waste my time responding to every McCarthy like thumping of your fist upon the "facts". As was once said so eloquently, "At long last sir ..." 75.57.196.81 (talk) 23:10, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Might I suggest that, in keeping with that brand new outlook, that you perhaps stop filing AN/I reports every time your edits get reverted? Or when you are caught trying to conceal your edit history? Or when someone warns you to stop attacking others? Granted, I responded a bit harshly with having my edits altered, but you were the one who altered them. Twice. After I asked you specifically not to. You want to be left alone. Leave others alone. - Arcayne () 23:25, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I will continue to defend my honest actions and will, as always, abide by the customs and practices here, and I will not stop shining a harsh light upon your actions here when I am your target. I do it not for me, but for the good of the community and in the defense of your future prey.75.57.196.81 (talk) 23:37, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Sigh. - Arcayne () 23:58, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

That's hardly a civil behavior for a thread where civility's the key. Youv'e been on AN/I before for this sort of combative response to newer editors than you, and the cavalier way you dismiss some aspects of opposition while berating opponents in those backhanded manners grates on others. Those who see the good work you do have spoken to you about this sort of problem before, both on the previous AN/I threads, on the relevant talk pages, and on your talk page. As such, I can't say much more than that if not this time, the very next incidence of such persistent behaviors ought to result in a block, so it doesn't escalate into another drama. ThuranX (talk) 01:57, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Prede and Lord Sesshomaru vandalizing wikipedia pages rules and copyrighted pages-Urgent

look at this discussion here http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Tenshinhan#Third_Eye These users are vandals and insist to make copyright violations here http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/3716/gruposraciaisd7oy1.gif and here http://imageshack.us]http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/6541/shishinnokendg6.jpg. plus they vandalize this article information with unsourced personal opinions like this one reference number 30 ^ "Biographies Tien" (2001). Retrieved on 2008-03-14.(-fanboy page) here:http://en.wikipedia.org/Tenshinhan --Saxnot (talk) 22:56, 15 April 2008 (UTC)Saxnot

Note: This may be the same report as the one being responded to here: . The IP 195.23.133.162 appears to be the same as Saxnot; see this edit. Note that that doesn't make Saxnot a sockpuppet -- it's perfectly legit for an IP to register an account -- it just seems that there's some history here. Similar reports were made at various places (, ). Dispute with Prede is something like a month old (see , ) and the dispute with User:Sesshomaru may have something to do with this warning. -- Why Not A Duck 23:27, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

I just wanted to say we are currently in a discusion about what to do with that page in regards to "tiens third eye and if he is human or not". We are not "vandolizing" any page, nor have we broken any copyrighting laws that I am aware of. I have not posted any of those pictures above anyway. This is an attack on us, becuase we have a "dispute" with this user for awhile now. The article is not filled with our personal opinions. In fact we are working on improving the article, although this user has vandolized the talk page on a number of occasions. Check the history of the talk page here http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Talk%3ATenshinhan&diff=204813533&oldid=204051211 and here http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Tenshinhan (bottom of page) . Also this user has attacked me personally a few times I do not understand how either of us could be "vandalizing wikipedia pages rules and copyrighted pages" . We are dont doing any of that. This is all nonsense. We have already agreed that if the proof is there for the Tien page, being an alien, we will put it up there. We are currently waiting for a response from someone who has the information. - Prede (talk) 00:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

What's all the conmotion about? at the very worst this could only be a bit of Original Research wich is not related to the article's content. - Caribbean~H.Q. 00:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you ^ . I do not understand this user. He vandolizes the artciles, and ingages in personal attacks, and then wants us to be banned? Perhaps he should be banned? - Prede (talk) 00:15, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Being so quick to call these users "vandals" really makes you look like the vandal. JuJube (talk) 04:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

He seems more like a SPA, who even has its own version of Nixon's enemies list. - Caribbean~H.Q. 04:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I think it bears noting that before Saxnot posted this ANI, he posted pretty much the same request at Media copyright questions, as well as posting virtually the same thing on eight different editors' talk pages. He's clearly on a mission! -- Hux (talk) 10:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I "vandolize",lol.You are funny Caribbean,lol.I provide official information the only one there is and these guys start to call me vandal FIRST. I tried to talk with them,but they insist to keep information without references in the article,these guys also add personal opinions and avoid other users to edit the article with threats and false acusations like this one ex:Impersonation of other editors here:http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=User_talk:Prede&diff=205531698&oldid=204813978#Re:_Tien_not_Human.3F however i only quoted the user folken here http://en.wikipedia.org/Talk:Tenshinhan#Incorrection. Look these guys are kids i don't have enemies in the net,lol.You have a little world,don't you?,lol. How am i a vandal if i don't edit the article?lol

Hey JuJube these guys called me vandal first,huh. I tried to talk with them.They asked me for proof and i showed them OFFICIAL PROOF the only one available about the article. If they want to improve the article why insist they to show fan made information? They ain't nothing,refuse to discuss the subject,make false accusations,etc.I'm not in a mission. Calm down please.--Saxnot (talk) 10:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)Saxnot

Curious edits from multiple IPs: spambot testing?

The page Talk:Main Page/The Des Moines Register has an interesting set of very similar edits by multiple IPs over the course of the last month: given the word-salad content of many of the edits, and some of the keywords in the edits, they look like someone is testing a spambot to see if it will be caught by the anti-vandal bots' heuristics. Some of the IPs are from Tiscali Italia, others from various Russian providers. In each case, the IPs have done nothing but edit this particular page, which is not linked to anywhere, and does not link to anywhere else.

The last few edits look like they may have been made by humans, but they are clearly not normal edits, and visibly part of the same editing campaign: I'd be interested to know what the Russian text in one of them means. -- The Anome (talk) 23:12, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

The only Russian word I know is отлично, but I can read a bit of Cyrillic—it appears to be about prostitutes in Moscow. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 23:15, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Googling for the unusual word "sincerelykathy" found in one piece of word salad finds a number of similar examples of apparently bot-generated text in user profiles in various sites.

Talk:Main Page/The Register-Guard appears to be another part of the same thing: note the attempt to use BBText-style markup instead of Wikitext. The subject line -- "XRUMER is the BEST!" -- is a dead giveaway. The HTML link embedded there also suggests that Image:XRumer_screenshot.gif may have something to do with this, innocently or otherwise. See Talk:XRumer for more about the misuse of this image. -- The Anome (talk) 23:31, 15 April 2008 (UTC)

Both of the suspect pages have now been deleted and blocked from recreation. -- The Anome (talk) 00:50, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Indefblocked editor Rastishka (talk · contribs) is again circumventing his block with IPs.

Rastishka (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is editing with one of his confirmed IP socks again, almost immediately after its most recent block expired. He is once again getting involved with Jewish-related topics . IP should be blocked again to prevent this person from making abusive edits, which he always ends up making. Nobody of Consequence (talk) 00:14, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Cory Doctorow

Hi folks, some IP's have been playing troll and vandal with this BLP article. Can someone review my blocks and keep an eye on it? If I've made an error, please slap me with a fish. Bearian (talk) 00:52, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Um, you blocked 71.243.188.89 indef; I thought WP didn't block anons? And 3 months seems a little long for a first block on 72.65.2.181. -- Why Not A Duck 01:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I've reset it to 3 hours due to dynamic IP usage. As a guideline, we do not block anonymous IP addresses indefinitely. seicer | talk | contribs 01:23, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. I do block IPs when there is a reasonable danger of repeated vandalism. Bearian'sBooties (talk) 01:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I unblocked the IP with the 3 month block (assumed you wouldn't have a problem with that Bearian, let me know if I'm wrong), since the IP hopping vandal has already moved on to a new one (I blocked the newest one for 3 hours). If they don't get bored, semi protection should o the trick. --barneca (talk) 01:35, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I have no problem with that. Bearian (talk) 17:19, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Improper Deletion

The page, Swift's printers was improperly deleted by user:Geogre. According to here, he claims the following outright wrong items: "he "article" had footnotes to non-existent references, and it contained material that is completely duplicated." The references in the article were completely real and published by verifiable sources. It was also an article just created. The reason why the user deleted it was to make room for his own page, George Faulkner. Did he seek to improve the other page? Did he seek to bother with it? No. He has harassed my talk page and claimed that my writing is horrible, and he goes and deletes things in an improper manner. As you can see from here that he did not bother to even put it up on a deletion board. All that is left is this. This user has abused his administrative powers, has acted in an extremely uncivil manner, and needs to be dealt with. Ottava Rima (talk) 01:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm not sure what exactly should be done at this point to "deal with" Geogre, but I'll note that "Duplicate material in Jonathan Swift and articles on each work" isn't part of Misplaced Pages:Criteria for speedy deletion. Also, saying "Misplaced Pages is not the Special Olympics encyclopedia" is needlessly insulting. If Swift's printers (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) really duplicates material in George Faulkner (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) or in Jonathan Swift (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views), then there needs to be some discussion of how to merge the articles and how to best present the information. The insults and the hostility from both sides needs to be calmed down. --Elkman 01:20, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Really? Well, I find "the purpose of Misplaced Pages is to compliment people" to be insulting, and unnecessarily so, as it insults the work that I and others have been doing for four years. And if you wish to "merge" "he printed for Swift" into an article, then you must really, really want to preserve some contribs, because that doesn't seem like very unique information to me. Geogre (talk) 11:41, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Note - The original purpose for the "printers" page was to have a place to deal with the printing controversy. It was also to discuss the arrest of Harding for printing two of Swift's works and some of the other problems related to the printing. Ottava Rima (talk) 02:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm also failing to see the CSD being used here. This should be undeleted, and it would be very nice if we didn't have to start a DRV just to do that.. -- Ned Scott 04:52, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

If Geogre does not revert himself by tomorrow, I am prepared to do so. I note that this was a clear case not just of using the tools wrong, but of using them to support himself in an content dispute. DGG (talk) 05:09, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

What content dispute did I have, DGG? You know my motivation and my thinking, it appears, and all without the agony of asking me what they were, so I'm sure you're prepared to tell me the content dispute I was in with Ottava Rima over that article. What edits had I made that he had warred over? What did I want in that he wanted out? Either apologize or explain, please. You have accused me of abuse of position and explained why I did it. I would appreciate your supporting that absurd and hideous charge, or I would appreciate your apology. Geogre (talk) 11:41, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• If even Geogre thought it was irredeemable, then I think it's fair to say it probably was. It was a personal essay on the printers used by Swift, apparently forked because osme people thought there was too much detail and too much OR in the section in Jonathan Swift. See WP:BAI. Guy (Help!) 08:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
• Going by this Google Cache, I really don't see a reason for such an article. Having sources does not in itself create notability—there has to be some purpose, and I'm not seeing it here...I'm seeing a list of people who printed books for someone. Nah. Take it to WP:DRV if you truely object to the deletion and want some discussion on it—the deletion was not that bad that it should be overturned via ANI discussion, and I urge DGG not do so. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 09:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC)
  • • Just a note: the article had footnotes, but no references. That was one mangling already. It had footnote 9, when there had been only 2 previous notes. Isn't that a little curious? Additionally, the references were 1) Out of date, 2) Commonplace. A person needs a note to the now-archaic Ehrenpreis to say that Motte was Swift's printer? That is found in every edition of GT, in every encyclopedia, in every literary companion, every biographical dictionary, etc. In other words, a footnote there is nothing but glitter. Like I said, though, the references were in some cases wrong. Geogre (talk) 11:41, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Because the article was in the process of being worked until you came along, constantly harassed me, deleted it while violating multiple rules, and then prevented it from being expanded. And Ehrenpreis as archaic? Oh gesh. You really are a POV pusher in the most absurd manner. Nothing you say is verifiable or accurate. Last time I talked to Dr. Rawson, he still thought that Ehrenpreis was relevant and an important part of Swift criticism. And if you don't understand why Rawson would know such a thing, then you really don't know a thing about the academic circle. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:17, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

• This is pretty silly, if you'll all forgive me. Do I think the author of the article is a dunce? Yes. Did I delete it because of that? No. My deletion reasoning was as follows:
  1. The material was duplicated in other articles, including articles on the "printers" themselves
  2. The members of this "list" share no outstanding qualities except the accidental association with a client
  3. The article was misnamed, as, while each of these were printers, several were also book sellers
  4. Were there to be an expansion possible, it would belong quite obviously in the biography article Jonathan Swift.
• So, because duplicate material fails the deletion guideline, because the potential expansion would be logically placed in an existing article, because the article actually prevented readers from getting information because it limited these people to "they printed for Swift," I did a deletion.
• However, the reason this is silly is that, if people think there is an improper deletion, we need only use WP:DRV. People come to AN/I when they're trying to ring the fire alarm. There is no fire. There isn't even smoke. All is well. Geogre (talk) 11:31, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Except that there were four printers, and you were the only one to make a page on one of the printers after the fact. The article was only about the printing of Swift's books, which you would have known if you would have bothered to read the page. Furthermore, Misplaced Pages guidelines point out that not all biographical detail belongs in the biography page, as there are many separate pages for such things. The problem here is that you violated the conflict of interest, have constantly been incivil, and you delete this. You are abusing multiple Misplaced Pages policies and abusing admin tools in the process. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The above user, user:Geogre, still has no ability to act civil. See here for more of his incivility. "he fact that I also regard the author as a bellicose dunce is irrelevant. I'm not the kind of person who uses teh buttons to win arguments. Instead, the ignorance of the article's creator led him to make something that was unnecessary and duplicate; had he simply checked other articles" There is no reason for such comments like this, and Geogre has made these comments on my talk page, his talk page, and multiple forums. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:11, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

We're allowed to delete content that is not useful. We're also allowed to describe and evaluate content, even if this means saying it's not good. If there is a remaining' content dispute, we have talk pages for that. I don't see any remaining problem here to be solved, unless the deletion is still in dispute. But please don't go to deletion review on a technicality. Friday (talk) 14:20, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Friday, please quote from the speedy deletion criteria that allows him to delete such a thing, especially when it is a stub page that is being worked on? Improper procedure along with using admin tools in a content dispute that he started while insulting an editor is not proper admin behavior. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Hi Ottava Rima, I've listed Swift's printers at WP:DRV.--PhilKnight (talk) 15:07, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I made my initial comment and, as the creator, I will only respond to queries in order to stay objective. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:12, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Block check

I just blocked 71.107.160.155 (talk · contribs) for personal attacks and trolling User:Gavin.collins and myself, including filing a baseless 3RR report and a baseless AIV report. As I am involved with this user, I want some input on this block. -Jéské 04:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Protected his talk page. I would have endorsed a longer block for all of the crap that ensued personally. seicer | talk | contribs 05:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I had half a mind to do so - I believe this is a Grawp IP - but decided against it because as it was I was pushing WP:BLOCK. -Jéské 05:08, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Need Eyes

Have fun! -Jéské 05:17, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh good god, what have you done. seicer | talk | contribs 05:27, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

?? (is honestly confused) I brought it up here because I see two revisions that need deletion; I see an attack in the making. -Jéské 05:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for filling us in... I page protected it for the time being. I don't think the content merits oversight because its not revealing personal information, libelous in any way, or an infringement upon copyright. But if you feel that it does merit it, feel free to submit a request. seicer | talk | contribs 05:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I said deletion, not oversight. -Jéské 05:44, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Osli73 violating parole, repeat violator

User Osli73 http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:Osli73 has a history of willfully violating probations including the use of sockpuppets on articles related to the former Yugoslavia.

One can see at the bottom of this arbitration webpage that he has been blocked repeatedly for willfully violating sanctions placed against his edit warring and sockpuppetry: http://en.wikipedia.org/Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Kosovo#Involved_parties

For example:

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) 3 months per 1 month tthis AE post. Please note this is Osli's fourth block. --wL<speak·check> 07:40, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for 2 weeks for breaking the revert limit on Srebrenica massacre; also banned from editing Srebrenica massacre for 3 months. Thatcher131 02:27, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for two weeks for directly violating his probation and revert parole at Srebrenica massacre. --Jayjg (talk) 01:52, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Blocked Osli73 (talk · contribs) for one week for directly violating his probation and revert parole by using a sockpuppet to edit war at Srebrenica massacre. --Srikeit 10:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

Blocked KarlXII (talk · contribs) indefinitely as a sockpuppet of Osli73 (talk · contribs) proven by checkuser. --Srikeit 10:06, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

On March 19, 2008, Osli73 received the following probation from administrator Thatcher explicitly forbidding Osli73 from more than one revert per week on the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen article http://en.wikipedia.org/Bosnian_Mujahadin , http://en.wikipedia.org/Mujahideen

Your topic ban is lifted and replaced with a revert parole. You may edit Bosnian mujahideen and Mujahideen but for one month (from 17 March) you are limited to one revert per article per week. Obvious vandalism is excepted from the revert limit, but you should take care in distinguishing true vandalism from content disputes. You are permitted to revert the edits of banned users such as Grandy Grandy/The Dragon of Bosnia but you should be extremely careful in doing so, because if it turns out the editor you are reverting is not a sockpuppet of the banned user you will have violated the revert limit. It would be better to report suspected sockpuppets to WP:AE or WP:RFCU. Thatcher 14:05, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

see user Osli73 talk page for the above probation notice: http://en.wikipedia.org/User_talk:Osli73

Despite the explicit probation against more than one revert per week on the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen articles, user Osli73 has again engaged in edit warring, reverting the Bosnian mujahideen and Mujahideen articles repeatedly, for example Osli made the following 8 reverts to the Bosnian Mujahideen and Mujahideen articles from April 8 to April 14:

diffs:

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205563168

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205562519

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205439461

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205437228

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=205144618

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204899529

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204888935

http://en.wikipedia.org/search/?title=Bosnian_mujahideen&diff=prev&oldid=204184557

From his statements, Osli73 has shown that he fully understands the restrictions placed upon him. From his actions, he has shown that he is not willing to abide by those restrictions.

I am notifying the administrators that have sanctioned Osli73 in the past as well as notifying Osli73 of this posting. Especially with articles involving the former Yugoslavia, it is imperative that users respect the limits placed upon their editing. If the more vitriolic editors involved in former Yugoslavia articles see that Osli73 is not held accountable for his his transgressions, then there is greater likelihood of out-of-control edit warring as there has been in the past. Fairview360 (talk) 05:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

U.S. Courts Central Violations Bureau (Federal Tickets)

Creator keeps removing the speedy delete tag, despite warning not to . Aboutmovies (talk) 06:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Page has been deleted, for now. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 08:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Persistent and prolific IP Vandal

• 129.143.4.66 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) Vandalism is the only thing this IP does. Check its Talk page and its contribution history for months and months. Recommend permanent ban in the strongest possible way. If this is a "shared IP", it's shared by either one vandal or multiple vandals. Block til summer would be ideal if permanent is off the table. Kallahan (talk) 06:45, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Block request

I'm requesting that the following accounts be blocked for sockpuppetry actions at Misplaced Pages:Articles for deletion/Baronetcy of Srebrenica, as confirmed at Misplaced Pages:Requests for checkuser/Case/TylerDurden1963:

• User:TylerDurden1963
• User:DrHollisCollier
• User:ThalloczyŠufflay
• User:83.245.110.2
• User:11347TCroa
• User:Prettyblondegirl
• User:Thomasthesnail
• User:Generalseven
• User:Topofthemorning11
• User:BarrieSenior

Cordless Larry (talk) 07:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Blocked most indef. User:TylerDurden1963 is blocked for one week, being the oldest and possibly main account - will adjust if he indicates another account is the main. Also, no block on the IP since I'm not sure its static. Shell 08:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. Cordless Larry (talk) 08:44, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

One week seems lenient, not even one day per sock abused. Also it appears that the purpose was to create (and impede the deletion of) a deliberate hoax. If this is true it would be a greater problem than sock-puppetry and I would recommend a much longer block. — CharlotteWebb 14:16, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

multiple page move vandalism

Wælgæst wæfre (talk · contribs) has moved a load of pages. Could someone with the right set of tools have a look? Mr Stephen (talk) 08:37, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The user would also appear to be another Grawp sockpuppet. - Bilby (talk) 08:46, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The user has been blocked, and his talk page protected (as is custom for Grawps). All looks gone here. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 08:58, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Now all that's left is for a CU on the account. If there's one Grawp sock blocked, I can guarantee you that he's got a whole American football roster's worth of men waiting. -Jéské 09:02, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I have already asked Alison (on her talk page) to do the honours. Bencherlite 09:04, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

And I'll bet you money the IP that was there before it is the source IP. Grawp's tactics have made him all-too-obvious recently... -Jéské 09:06, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The good thing to come out of this is that I now can honestly claim to have deleted the English Misplaced Pages (and Paris, Venus, Vietnam and some other pages we can do without :-) ). Fram (talk) 09:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Unintended damage

Can a admin please undo my moves? I was trying to archive a wp biography peer review page. This was not malicious. 137.195.176.12 (talk) 09:30, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

That was me. Tenacious D Fan (talk) 09:31, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Oops...tried to help and ended up screwing up further. Page in question is Misplaced Pages:Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Biography/Peer review/2007 (double Misplaced Pages:), and I'm totally confused. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 10:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Tamlin Hodgkinson (talk · contribs)

This guy has been doing nothing but making nonsense edits on talk pages. Looks like blog comment spam, but without any links.--Sir Anon (talk) 10:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Might this be related to the discussion here? Wildthing61476 (talk) 12:05, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Death threat?

On this diff User:Camilo Sanchez has stated "Look, you gotta thank god you can hide behind a computer of else I would have provided you with a beautiful Colombian necktie." Personally, I find this slightly disconcerting. Would another admin please warn or block the user concerned. I am far too involved to do anything. Thanks. Woody (talk) 10:26, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I've left a note. dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 10:29, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

So between us, we've left a chord. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 10:37, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Hmm...(no blocks). Thoughts on this? dihydrogen monoxide (H₂O) 10:56, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I've indefblocked this user. Death threats are not allowed under any circumstances. -- The Anome (talk) 11:33, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Kosherfrog

Kosherfrog (talk · contribs) claims to represent an organisation called ACOR (acor.org) that runs forums for patients with particular diseases. Presently, WP:MEDMOS (the medical manual of style) discourages links to closed "support forums" for the obvious reasons. Kosherfrog came to WT:MEDMOS to ask for a revision of this policy, and received much opposition from most editors there. He then made the following threat: "I certainly have gained enough understanding about the mentality of the medical editors of wikipedia to be able to write some really interesting articles in other venues that pay attention to the needs of the long tail of medicine" While this is not a legal threat, I find it very hard to work constructively with editors who threaten to expose Wikipedians in other publications, and claim to represent large organisations to boot.

I asked this contributor to retract his threats. The response was emphatically negative. I was wondering what others thought of this approach. JFW | T@lk 10:33, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

To be direct, is that all? I'd say that first edit reeks more of incivility than any sort of serious "threat". I also think pouncing on this editor over this specific implication would be overdoing it and not good for the project. As long as it can stay civil, opposition to policy can be very healthy. That all being said, if this user continues to support his arguments by claiming he will write on the incompetence of a certain group of editors, then he will clearly be violating wp:civil and should be warned/handled as such. I just don't see us at that point yet. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 11:34, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The policy in question is under continuous scrutiny, and recently there have been several debates on its exact reach and implementation. Other editors made an obvious effort to consider Mr Frog's arguments, and returned with their findings. There is practically consensus that the links in question do not warrant inclusion.

Would you be happy to remind this editor of his duty to remain civil and participate in constructive debate rather than agitate? JFW | T@lk 12:00, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I've done so here. To sum up, I didn't ask Kosher to retract his earlier statement, but asked him to remain civil in his arguments and advised him of the inflammatory nature of certain discussion techniques. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 12:15, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Update: WP:POINT disruption at Talk:Deaths in 2008 - Block review please

You will remember there was some argy-bargy at Mark Speight the other evening due to myself and User:Islander attempting to keep editing within policy, specifically WP:RS, WP:V and WP:BLP as the death hadn't been confirmed. A user made some inappropriate comments on the above page which I deleted per Misplaced Pages:Talk#How_to_use_article_talk_pages and Misplaced Pages:Talk#Behavior_that_is_unacceptable). 62.64.201.155 (talk · contribs), whom I suspect to be the author of the original comments keeps restoring these, citing vandalism, but not policy. Since these edits contain personal attacks on myself, I figure they should be on my talk page or his, but not on a peripherally-related article. I've now blocked the IP for 31 hours but would welcome a review here. Admins need to be able to apply policy without this sort of WP:POINTy disruptions. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 11:14, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I think if you're dealing with angry IPs, you have to expect a certain amount of anger from them. I don't really see where s/he attacks your character in this diff, apart from telling you to grow up; which is not exactly vicious. You could probably have avoided the need to block by rising above it. However, since they were replaced repeatedly, a brief block is in order and since you were there you might as well deal with the minor matter yourself, though I don't really understand why 12 or 24 hours was insufficient. Also not quite sure what your bit about "personal attacks should be on my talk page or his" is about - they occur where they occur and there is no 'proper' venue for them!!

Personally, I think was a rather obtuse interpretation of policy; the subject was dead and the whole world knew it. There is no policy that says Misplaced Pages must be factually wrong. Insisting that edits be made to maintain Misplaced Pages's article in a state of containing overtly erroneous facts was not, imo, the optimal course of action. Splash - tk 12:22, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I take your point but at the time even the BBC were saying "believed to be dead" and I didn't think we should go beyond that. But you try explaining that to an influx of editors who think that Misplaced Pages should (a) be a news service and (b) "lead the pack", to paraphrase one. Perhaps WP:BLP isn't that strong a policy after all and I've misread it. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 12:30, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Deletion of article Karo Parisyan

This article was recently (last night/this morning) deleted by Jeepday as a blatant copyvio of this page. While I respect Jeepday, I believe he made the wrong call. I also believe this merits the attention of more admins, because the copyvio that's happening here is that WIKIPEDIA'S copyrighted material has been lifted wholesale in clear violation of the GFDL.
I posted a fairly thorough explanation for what happened at Talk:Karo Parisyan, but of course that's since been deleted. Hopefully, y'all admins can view the deleted edits. Long story short, our page was in place first, our text developed over time, etc. Furthermore, Karo's official "about me" page contains deliberate factual errors that were demonstrated to have come about via a Misplaced Pages vandal on Karo's page, and the version that was ripped to Karo's site still contained pieces of that vandalism. I found exact diffs of Karo's Misplaced Pages entry that matched various sections of the "about me" page and also explained perfectly why Karo's own page would contain deliberate factual errors and contradictory information. After posting this explanation to Karo's talk page (and noting the dispute here on the Copyright problems board), the user who posted the copyvio notice told me that he agreed with my analysis (diff). Furthermore, a review of the source code of the offending site revealed that it still had Wikilinks in place for each and every single thing that we wikilinked on the article. The copyvio notice got removed, and everything appeared okay. The other day, someone put it back without explanation, and the article was subsequently quickly deleted. For obvious reasons, I cannot provide diffs of that.
Now I'm not doing this to start a wheel war or accuse Jeepday of anything. I just don't think he was correct in deleting the page, and in this situation it's creating a dangerous precedent. Here we have a webmaster who has wholesale ripped off Misplaced Pages's copyrighted material. In response to that, we, the people who created and developed the article, get accused of violating their copyright. That's fundamentally wrong on so many levels. This needs more admin attention, and also the attention of the Wikimedia Foundation.
I ask that someone restore the main page and the talk page, with all revisions intact. The possibility that our Misplaced Pages page is in violation of someone else's copyright is zero, so there is no damage being done by restoring our page. If an admin decides that the copyvio tag needs to remain in place until the issue is further discussed, that's fine. We just need more eyeballs on this so the right thing can happen; that's not going to work if the article remains deleted and the case is considered closed. Gromlakh (talk) 13:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Restored for review, When I did a second look I found earlier versions that did not look like the potential copyvio source. Not sure how I missed them. Lets continue the conversation on the article talk page. Jeepday (talk) 13:21, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

I'm all in favor of that. I just wanted to make sure more eyeballs were on it because of the possible violation of the GFDL by Karo's webmaster. Gromlakh (talk) 14:05, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Per my second review at Talk:Karo Parisyan there is little doubt at this point that karo-parisyan.com is mirroring wikipedia without giving credit per the GFDL requirement. I leave it to others to pursue that if they would like. Otherwise this is resolved, I had wrongly deleted the article, it is now restored and the copyvio tag removed. Jeepday (talk) 14:36, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Inaccurate description of work with the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign

Under career, please change to President of the Muscular Dystrophy Campiagn's Young Pavement Artist Competition.

Source: "Statement on Mark Speight" Muscular Dystrophy Campaign

The President of the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign is Sue Barker MBE

Source found in the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign's Impact Report 2006/2007 "Annual Reports and Annual Reviews" Muscular Dystrophy Campaign —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nilapatel01 (talk • contribs) 15:09, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Done. By the way, when you are unable to edit a page due to its being semi-protected, leaving a message at its Talk page may get a quicker response. Fvasconcellos (t·c) 15:40, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, posting here at WP:DRAMA rather than at an individual talk page almost always guarantees a quicker response. Maybe we shouldn't encourage that though. Mike R (talk) 16:42, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

The Mark Speight article is now unprotected anyway, since his inquest has been opened and adjourned. --Rodhullandemu (Talk) 16:48, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Incivility on Misplaced Pages:List of cabals

I have repeatedly removed a "cabal" listing from Misplaced Pages:List of cabals, but User:Allstarecho continues to add it back, telling me I need to "grow up", and accusing me of stalking. This user has been uncivil about this and refuses to actually discuss, instead, preferring to insults. This stems out of a MfD that resulted in a template of his being deleted as an attack template, him re-writing it, me submitting the re-write for deletion because I wasn't quite comfortable with the re-write and wanting other opinions, which I got and withdrew my nomination. Because of this, he has resorted to declaring that I am stalking him and placing this indirect attack on this page.

I am aware of the big purple box at the top regarding the intended humor of the topic, and that there are bigger things to worry about. However, when one user is the sole subject of the humor, it ceases to be humor and becomes an attack. If I'm wrong in placing this here, that's fine, but this user has a history of incivility and being blocked for it]. I don't want him blocked, I just want this attack against me to stay removed. Justinm1978 (talk) 15:18, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Note: This has also been listed at WP:WQA#Incivility on Misplaced Pages:List of cabals. Grsz11 15:24, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Problems with user 216.234.60.106 a.k.a. E Pluribus Anthony

I'm not sure if this is the place to report this, but there's this one user that I'm almost 100% sure is the same person as known sockpuppeteer E Pluribus Anthony. Like E Pluribus Anthony, user 216.234.60.106 constantly reverts edits of articles that do not conform to his agenda. He does this with very little justification, and it's always on geography-themed pages. I've currently been attempting to resolve a dispute with him over just what constitutes East Africa, but to no avail. I've done an incredible amount of research on the topic, loaded my edits with references that support my case, and painstakingly explained the rationale behind them on the talk page of the article we're at loggerheads over. However, 216.234.60.106/E Pluribus Anthony has made very little effort in return to support his case. He hasn't tried for some days now to find any new references or to address any of the legitimate concerns I've raised. All he has done is revert, revert, revert, labeling my edits "intransigent" along the way. I've explained to him that that does not qualify as a justification, and I've asked him repeatedly to explain his latest edits and to address my latest comments on the discussion page. He just ignores me and/or gives me evasive, condescending one-liners before getting right back to reverting. It's clear he has no desire whatsoever to present a neutral point of view. Please have a look at the article and talk page in question. Please read my dialogue with him and our arguments, and then read the discussion on the same page between the user Aris Katsaris and E Pluribus Anthony. I'm positive that's the same guy. They're both incredibly flippant and condescending, they both are accused of the exact same thing and present the same sort of responses in return, and they both use the same archaic and stodgy expressions like "apropos". I just checked E Pluribus Anthony's sockpuppet profile, and it describes user 216.234.60.106 perfectly. 70.48.96.91 (talk) 16:03, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Such a report should be made here. Gwynand | Talk•Contribs 16:32, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Block of Snookerhorn

I bring most blocks I make here for review even when I think they're probably no big deal. In accordance with that custom, I've blocked Snookerhorn (talk · contribs · count · logs · page moves · block log) for 24 hours for disruption. Please see Misplaced Pages:Administrators'_noticeboard/Archive138#Complex_talk_page_instructions for more information/context. Snookerhorn was counseled by several admins and others that his talk page instructions were so complex as to be unusable (this diff gives a good view), and that he could not place unworkable demands on how others communicate with him, or edit the words of others except to remove them completely, or categorise their attempts disparagingly. His responses (, , among others) show that at present he's not here to contribute constructively, but sees this as some sort of nomic. I've only blocked just the one sock for now... but another (almost certain, per a CU I ran) sock tried to require that all messages left on his page be in latin. Funny ha ha, but not very useful. Comments welcome as always. ++Lar: t/c 17:25, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Everything seems in order. I don't find this particularly constructive nor responsible communication. Rudget 17:36, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Personal Attack

Please refer to article The Golden Age of Cricket to comment on aggressive personal attack by JamesJJames. I am aware who the person is who has a history outside WP of personal attacks.Fieldgoalunit (talk) 18:13, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

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