Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive525

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Hi,

I don't know if it is the right forum but I have a demand : I had a somewhat hot debate with Srobak (talk · contribs). I might have been a bit fast in removing the term "sled" from the intro in the Snowmobile article, as it was put many times by an IP without reference, but Srobak (who has not even filled up his User page) threatens me right off the bat with sanctions, multiple times, and even write it in my own Talk page, as he was an administrator.

He goes even so far as to reverse my erasing of his comment in my own Talk page. He denies being a bully but you can make your own idea by reading the Snowmobile Discussion. He even have threaten Threeafterthree (talk · contribs) who was just trying to defend my right to use my Talk page as I want and reverse his editing two times. I feel this user is harassing me and has a bad attitude. Could anyone calm him down and tell him he is not WP's ultimate judge ? Pierre cb (talk) 14:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Please see my responses and accounts of the situation at User_talk:CIreland#Another_3RR_violation_by_Threeafterthree.2C_as_well_as_editing_users_talk_pages and User_talk:CIreland#User:Srobak. No further reversions to his deletion of my comment will be conducted by me, however administrators need to be fully aware of the entire situation. Thanks. EDIT: No threats were made, contrary to above. Srobak (talk) 15:28, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
After reviewing all of the relevant postings in the past few days, I must say that this is a tempest in a very small teapot. Both Srobak and Pierre cb were edit warring on Snomobile, but I only see two reverts apiece in one day there. Srobak's actions on Pierre cb's talk page were out of line. Both editors need to walk away from this. -- Donald Albury 16:13, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I was walking away from the whole thing, and I would not have pursued further, when Srobak kept melding with my own Talk page. I don't mind the Snowmobile article, but accusing me of an edition war on my own page is a bit too much. As for the threats, I consider beginning a section by a warning as a threats and a very impolite behavior. I consider too that warning of blocking every user that is not of your opinion as a threat. I've just seen the user CIreland has talked to Srobak about this case, telling him to back away but his reply was definitively harassement :
{{... I will keep tabs individually for further violations and act upon them accordingly without violating, or harassing. If you continue to conduct yourself in the fashion in which you were warned however, I will assist those who comment and warn for it in having you sanctioned, so please mind your edits and always discuss prior to conducting destructive edits. My issue with Tom is separate and is addressed below, as he has a long history of editing talk pages. Thanks Srobak (talk) 15:24, 27 March 2009 (UTC) }}.
He plan to follow all my editions and according to his superior knowledge of the rules slap me with warnings after warnings. If this is not harrassement, I don't know what it is ? I'm not vindicative and I don't want to pursue further but Srobak should be reminded how to live in the WP society. Pierre cb (talk) 17:42, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
You need to read (and edit the above) better. You are making false statements about what I say, mean, and will do. Relevant links have already been posted. Those notes were made prior to both Donald Albury's message here, and CIreland's on my page, but thanks. Read for effect, not bias. This issue was dropped after both of their posts, leave it as such. End of line. Srobak (talk) 18:08, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) Just to be clear here. Everbody is going to leave everybody else alone here and play nice? Keep talk on the appropriate article talk page and yadda, yadda?? Sounds good to all? --Tom (talk) 18:24, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Tom, this discussion is not only already over, but it does not pertain to you. Please immediately stop following me around, and acting as a 3rd party cop, or I will put forth a note regarding your continued harassment and seek sanction. As mentioned before - your talk page clearly demonstrates a lengthy history in an extremely short period of time of acting in such a role and receiving warnings and sanctions to that effect (the deletion of which from your talk page are in bad faith) - mostly on talk pages. Your contribution above serves absolutely no potential gain or purpose to anyone already involved in the conversation, and you needlessly inserted yourself into it. Administrators have already stepped in and put the issue to rest at both points. Enough. Srobak (talk) 18:33, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

And pay attention to who you're messaging, Srobak. You just warned me and I have nothing to do with this. HalfShadow 18:29, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I did not issue you a warning, I sent you a request to refrain from making minor edits in talk pages per WP guidelines - namely the ones in this discussion, which I agree - you have nothing to do with. Please do not confuse a warning with a polite request. Had I sent a warning, it would be quite clear. Srobak (talk) 18:37, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Actually, in this case that's allowed; using wikicode in topic titles messes up the 'goto' arrow. The standard [[]] links should be used, and I and others tend to clean those up as we see them. Also the rule in question only applies to physically changing the text of the comment; fixing links is allowed.HalfShadow 18:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I was also looking at where he moved a comment by you down with an edit summary of "... and fixing poor formatting by halfshadow". Looking again, he was swapping the order of his comment and yours, and it looks like he was moving his comment up as a reply to the comment before yours, which is not a problem, but the edit summary was. -- Donald Albury 19:16, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Oh marvy, now he's blaming me for his changes, too... HalfShadow

Everyone please cool it! Srobak, please do not edit or otherwise modify other users' postings on talk pages; that is disruptive to discussions. Srobak and Pierre cb, I am asking you both to stop responding to, otherwise interacting with or making comments about each other or anyone else involved in this incident for 24 hours. If I think this interaction is becoming too disrupting to Wikipedia, I am willing to hand out blocks to stop it. -- Donald Albury 18:48, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

BatterBean again with his Jake Gyllenhaal fetish[edit]

Resolved
 – Article deleted, sockpuppet investigation started. Papa November (talk) 22:10, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Paparazzixox (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has once again created an elaborate hoax article about an imaginary Jake Gyllenhaal tour. We've been through this before [1][2] [3]Kww(talk) 19:52, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Sadly, the user's search'n'replace only got as far as the "Critical response" section. After that, it's all about a Madonna tour. Nice try though. And it's nice to see a proper fetish on ANI. Last one I can remember was feet - without socks, ironically. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 19:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Kww, can you write up a long term abuse incidents page on this one? You seem to be the person spotting these most clearly. we should identify a root account, set up sockpuppeteer / sockpuppet links, etc.
Thanks. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 20:02, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
A hoax article like that is, in my opinion, a clear and deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia, i.e. vandalism. I have... what is the term now... summary execution? - anyway, it's a G3. Also, the account is blocked indef as vandalism-only. This seemed like a better approach than saying IAR everywhere. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 20:05, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
It's speedy execution again ;-) SoWhy 20:09, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Paparazzixox created.—Kww(talk) 20:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I'll spend some time tonight trying to tie additional info in. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:29, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

User: Bigweeboy removing redlinks[edit]

Resolved
 – Content dispute. Please seek dispute resolution instead - Papa November (talk) 22:04, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Bigweeboy has been persistently removing redlinks despite warnings against doing so. I've been told this doesn't qualify as vandalism, so I expect it needs to be dealt with here. Here are some examples from after I started giving personal and templated warnings: 1 2 3. I started out assuming good faith (see here and here), and behavior didn't stop or even change. tedder (talk) 21:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Content dispute. No admin action needed. Please consider dispute resolution instead. Papa November (talk) 22:04, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Talk Page Spam[edit]

I left a warning. Gwen Gale (talk) 13:12, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Another one! :) I agree he doesn't deserve a block, but I don't want it to seem like I'm just picking on him. Thanks! --Yankees76 (talk) 13:18, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
They're probably good faith edits, but you're probably in safe territory just removing these sorts of postings from the page, and quoting WP:NOTFORUM or something in the edit summary. Lankiveil (speak to me) 13:42, 27 March 2009 (UTC).
The worry isn't whether the edits have been in good faith, but all the bygone warnings. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:11, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes, but if the user keeps getting their comments removed, then they'll hopefully give up. They can always be blocked if it becomes disruptive, as well. Lankiveil (speak to me) 14:35, 27 March 2009 (UTC).
Given the string of pleas and warnings on the user's page, along with it showing up here, I'd say the edits have wended their way into the outskirts of disruption, hence my warning. Gwen Gale (talk) 15:30, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Okay, this guy just doesn't get it. Even after your warning, he's reinserted the material [4], and left you a nice message on your talk page too [5]--Yankees76 (talk) 22:54, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
  • That material is fine, since it is something the article could benefit from. He wishes to add it, but doesn't know how to make the wording proper, so he left the information on the talk page. If you looked up information about this subject, you are most likely seeking a way to treat the problem. Dream Focus 23:34, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Possible death threat?[edit]

Resolved
 – Not a death threat. User warned about vandalism - Papa November (talk) 21:59, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

[6] Dyl@n620 21:52, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism. Rklawton (talk) 21:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
That's just silly. Everyone knows nannerpusses can only be summoned by a tenth-level hypercaster. HalfShadow 22:01, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Please stop. -Jeremy (v-.-v Cardmaker) 22:39, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Fred Eisenberger and Hammer2009[edit]

I'm handing this off to someone else before someone blasts me for 3RR - Hammer2009 (talk · contribs) seems to have a thing for fluffing up Fred Eisenberger (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (see the history), including removing cites, referring to the subject by first name, and removing a sourced section describing violations this particular mayor has had while in office [7]. Could I get some eyes on this?

(DISCLAIMER: I am American and could give a care less about Canadian politics, but I do not wish to have my political preference for American politics known on WP.)-Jeremy (v^_^v Cardmaker) 22:50, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Block needed[edit]

Resolved
 – reported to WP:AIV and blocked

IP 208.105.110.139 has been spending quite some time today continually removing content from the Shining Time Station article. I believe that a block is warranted. (Regarding Jeremy's comment above; if you were telling me to stop posting at ANI, I apologize, as I did not understand the basis of your argument.) Dyl@n620 23:28, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Please post vandals to WP:AIV. Majorly talk 23:32, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I need some assistance with this contributor in regards to the Daybreak (Battlestar Galactica) page and the inclusion of a simple statement about a ship bearing the resemblance to on found in the game Command and Conquer. Myself and and another editor, Edoktor, removed this entry as original research, but did leave the option open for its addition once a reliable source has confirmed that it is in fact an Easter egg.

Shaheenjim has argued that it should be included despite this, using "ignore all rules" as a basis for his argument and stating that common sense says it can be added.

The problem is not the argument, but the way in which he has been doing so. He has repeatedly violated WP:Civil when making his point.

My issues with him include:

  • Profanity
  • Accusatory tone
  • Personal attacks on myself and others
  • Making threats on my talk page
  • Overt hostility
  • Abusive language
  • Rude and offensive comments

Because I did not wish to refactor his comments, twice I removed his comments on the talk page because of these issues while leaving clear notes or edit summaries explaining my actions. I have also left a message on his talk page regarding this, once telling that I will report him for the threat, and a second message to him in regards to the civility issue. His response was to delete one of his hostile remarks and leave another in its place (diff). I was mistaken, he had moved the comment when he cut and pasted the discussion to my page. The comment was still a violation of civility. I have been trying to maintain my composure in this matter, however I did loose my temper and leave a curt message in reply to a comment he had made on the article talk page.

I realize that I have not been a saint in the matter, but I have tried to present my argument using policy based reasons for my position and maintain a professional and productive tone in my correspondence on the page.

I would like an opinion on that matter from a neutral observer who can help sort the whole mess out, and will gladly accept the conclusions and actions of those who do look into the matter.

I would also like to note after reading his talk page that he seems to have a history of problematic interactions with other contributors with whom he disagrees.

--Jeremy (blah blah) 19:59, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Here's my side: I'll summarize my side of the argument, since it's been a pretty long discussion on the talk pages. Someone tried to add something to an article that is obviously and definitely true. No one is disputing that it's obviously and definitely true, but some people (like Jeremy here) are saying that it shouldn't be added anyway, since it's OR and doesn't have a RS. I said that the rules against OR and requiring a RS are intended to prevent people from adding things that are false. But since this addition is obviously and definitely true, those rules weren't intended to prevent it from being added, and it can be added to the article per the IAR rule and the Use Common Sense policy. But Jeremy here has some problem with using Common Sense. I have asked him, on several occasions, which part of my argument he's disputing, as you can see here. But he refuses to respond. That is, he refuses to follow Wikipedia's policy on dispute resolution. Instead he just wants to have an edit war, repeatedly deleting the edit without discussing why he thinks it should be disputed.
And now, in addition to refusing to discuss his problems with my reasoning, he's started deleting my comments, claiming that they're in violation of the policy on civility. They are not. I haven't ever used profanity, or made a personal attack on him or anyone else, or been hostile, or used abusive language, and it's not surprising to me that he didn't give any examples of those allegations. He's also claiming that I'm making "threats." The only threat I made is to ask an administrator to block him if he continued to violate Wikipedia's policies. That's hardly a threat that warrants me being blocked. And I've only accused him of things he actually did, or been as rude and offensive as was warranted based on his conduct.
The latest development is our discussion on our own talk pages, rather than the talkpage of the relevant article. I invite you to read it here. I think it speaks for itself.
Finally, he's claimed above that I deleted one of my own remarks and left another in its place. If you look closely, you'll see that I didn't delete anything, I merely merged the comments from both of our talk pages by inserting his first comment in between my first and second comment. - Shaheenjim (talk) 20:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm disputing something. Essentially, we don't know whether it's the same ship, or a different ship that was made to look the same. I've posted on the Talk page to this effect. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 21:05, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Also, putting "I haven't ever used profanity, or made a personal attack on him or anyone else" in the same post as "Jeremy here has some problem with using Common Sense." is just too obvious. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 21:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Are you alleging it was profane, or a personal attack, or both? If the former, then which part? And if the latter, then that's not what personal attack means. If you're attacking someone on the substance of the issue at hand, that's not considered a personal attack. A personal attack would be if I attacked his looks, for example. - Shaheenjim (talk) 21:26, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

::::While we're on the subject of wikilawyering, would you care to comment on this remark of yours? Based on my experience on Wikipedia to date, I have absolutely no doubt that the people who comment will be little kids who will disagree with me because they're petty bureaucrats with no common sense. In particular, please explain why you think it is not a "personal attack against Jerem43 or anyone else". SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 21:47, 26 March 2009 (UTC) Scratch that, it's pointless. Blocked for 72 hours (considering previous block record) for disruption, personal attacks, and edit warring. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 21:52, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Unblock requested[edit]

  • Declined, for obvious reasons. Black Kite 01:27, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Despite the continuing personal attacks against blocking/reviewing admins, and admitted abuse of the unblock template, I think it might be best for admins not to further sanction this editor. The ideal outcome is Shaheenjim seeing that their conduct was outside the bounds of what we want in a collegial editing environment... but for now, I'll gladly settle for no further damage being done to their standing. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 15:01, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I respectfully disagree in view of [8] and have indef-blocked the user (see rationale at [9]). I do not object to this block being removed or shortened by any admin who believes this user is ready to contribute productively.  Sandstein  23:53, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I unfortunately have to agree with your decision. It seemed that the discussion at User_talk:Shaheenjim was incapable of reaching any other conclusion. I also agree with the unblock provision. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 03:30, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Second opinion needed about recreation of deleted material[edit]

Resolved
 – Deletion review has been started. Further discussion should take place there. Aleta Sing 02:53, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Buddhism and the body, Buddhism and the body was deleted. Prior to the close, User:Spasemunki had begun a reworking of the article in his userspace. After the article deletion, he moved his work back into the main space. I am concerned that this may be a violation of GFDL as well as recreation of deleted material. I wanted another opinion before speedy deletion though, as I am involved. Aleta Sing 14:51, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

That would depend on whether it's a rewrite, or substantially the same (but corrected to address the failings at the AfD). If it's the latter, then a simple history merge will fix all ills. — Coren (talk) 14:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
A history merge would be good but the result of the AFD should then be recorded as Keep or No consensus. Note that the recreating user User:Spasemunki !voted delete in the discussion and this influenced other !voters but, given events, this should now be understood as keep. Colonel Warden (talk) 15:05, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
If the material is substantially rewritten with respect to the problems, it does not violate the AfD close. The AfD close--unless the decision was to salt the article--does not prevent re-creation of an article on the topic. 15:34, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I nominated the original article. As far as I can see substantial portions of the re-created article are the same or closely similar. Note the clumsy English in some sections, e.g. "...the Buddha words were not stated on what he thought about this topic...". There is definitely some new material, but what concerns me most is that an important issue that emerged in the AfD was that the entire notion of the article was flawed, and this re-creation seems to be simply a better quality version of something that shouldn't exist in the first place - a rewrite of someone else's OR. andy (talk) 15:48, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
My understanding of what emerged in AfD is that 1) the current focus of the article was flawed, but that 2) there were a very small number of elements in the article worth keeping (I did deleted 80-90% of the old article), and 3) that an article that was re-focused would be an appropriate topic. I attempted to do this by creating a new intro and creating essentially a 'sample' outline structure based on the topics discussed in the article 'Body, Buddhist Perspectives on the' in the MacMillan Encyclopedia of Buddhism. But please see my comments below for a more complete explanation. --Clay Collier (talk) 21:20, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I 'voted' delete, however I think Spasemunki's actions are ok. Obviously, the new article could be listed at AfD, but I don't think a speedy would be appropriate. If the new article isn't going to be zapped, then I guess a note should be appended to the AfD close explaining what's happened. PhilKnight (talk) 15:51, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I idsagree - just got an edit conflict, and what I was posting under Andyjsmith's edit was that I was about to say the same thing. A number of things that people said should not be in the article are in the recreated article. This still reads like a personal reflection on the subject, not an encyclopedic article. I'd amend Andyjsmith's comment to say a "slightly better quality version" and that may be generous. It is basically a recreation of a deleted article. Dougweller (talk) 15:53, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
IMO the easiest course of action is to take the new article by User:Spasemunki to WP:DRV and ask the community if this new version brings enough new information to the table to overturn the old AFD. MBisanz talk 20:26, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
So here is what happened: I created the 'new' version of the article as an exercise to see how much of the old article could be saved if it were cut down to fit the rubric of an article on the same topic in an academic encyclopedia. I intentionally avoided doing things like rewording the awkward wording that User:Andyjsmith mentions and left almost nothing but the referenced material. The 'Suicide' section still contains some essay-like material because I was undecided at the time about how much of it other editors would want to move into the 'Religious views of suicide' article. I also omitted the references for the new material I was adding (most of them from the MacMillan article) for expediency. My aim was to quickly put something together that the editors involved in the AfD could discuss to make clear that the article in its form as taken to AfD was inappropriate, but that there was potential for a proper article covering the topic, in which a few elements of the current article might still exist. It was an attempted compromise. My hope was that we would get some more feedback on the article I created, replace the content of the article with it, and then close the AfD. Unfortunately, the AfD was closed before more than a couple of other editors had commented, so I wasn't sure what to make of it. Thus the move last night, which I realized later probably needed a history merge or other solution to preserve proper attribution for the portions of the old article that survived. My personal suggestion for a remedy is to restore the old article and re-open the AfD, and see if the involved editors are open to the 'rescue' option that I floated above. If most editors think that even in the new form, the information from the old article makes this one unrescue-able, then we create a completely new article covering the topic at some later date, otherwise we just preserve the history of the old article and replace it with the new version. --Clay Collier (talk) 21:20, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
That would be a bad precedent. And it doesn't really address Aleta's question which started this discussion. Your re-created article should be considered on its merits which are, IMHO and unfortunately (despite your good faith), that it's a rewrite of OR. andy (talk) 23:03, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm fine with deletion review if that's the procedurally correct thing to do. --Clay Collier (talk) 23:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
(EC) MBisanz's suggestion makes a good bit of sense. Taking Clay's current version to DRV, either the deletion will be upheld and his version will go too, or the deletion decision wil be overturned, and Clay's version can be the next edit after the last version that was deleted. Any merits and faults of the version Clay has produced can be evaluated there. Aleta Sing 00:04, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I went ahead and requested a history-only deletion review of the article here. Please add feedback there. --Clay Collier (talk) 02:14, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

User Wikidemon[edit]

Resolved
 – What administrator action is required here? seicer | talk | contribs 05:01, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


This isn’t the first time that Wikidemon has stooped to removing other editors comments from article's talk pages [10], but Wikidemon's attempt to cover up criticism of his persistent Biting of new users should be addressed [11].

There are 69 ANI threads involving Wikidemon, clearly he's not the innocent editor that he has portrayed himself to be. CENSEI (talk) 02:33, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Note to admins who are reading this thread as much as some other editors would like to make this ANI thread about CENSEI this is about Wikidemon his BITING of newbies, rudeness on talk pages and his repeated drama here at ANI.

:That's a deceptive retributive report by a problem editor - I'll describe the problem in a moment. Wikidemon (talk) 02:35, 28 March 2009 (UTC) Removing the comment now that I've posted my account. 69, huh? Wow. Think of me as Baseball Bugs' more polite cousin. But really, I do a lot of article patrol and wikignoming... those threads have resulted in dozens of blocked sockpuppets, a bunch of indef. banned vandals, etc. The majority of complaints about me were from a single puppet master, and the second-biggest issue is procedural game playing.Wikidemon (talk) 04:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes. "69 threads involving wikidemon" verges on outright lying, if the intent was to imply that there were 69 threads "complaining" about wikidemon or "opened to discuss wikidemon's disruptive behavior." Instead, these 69 threads appear to be ones he contributed to that ended in the indef blocks and bans of a handful (maybe just one or two) abusive sockpuppeteers, and otherwise commenting on disruption by others. To be clear: Censei -- you should be ashamed for trying to take the good, productive efforts of an editor to stop disruption, and spinning it into a false accusation of disruption against that editor himself. The real pity of all this is the pup axmann got blocked (a racist, to be sure, but much less disruptive to editing here than censei) while the far more disruptive Censei is to be allowed to carry on because he will, now that the heat is on and hackles have been raised to satisfy his need for drama, back away for a few hours or a few days.Bali ultimate (talk) 05:02, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Teleprompter usage by Barack Obama and Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive524#Allegedly Racist comments by CENSEI for a little background. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 02:40, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • No interest in this dispute, but Wikidemon, why did you alter CENSEI's title?[12] Since you're the subject of the thread and he is not a vandal, do not change other's comments unless they are yours.--Caspian blue 02:44, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Could you please change it back? AN/I titles should fairly and neutrally reflect the subject of the dispute. This is a behavior problem involving CENSEI (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and ChildofMidnight (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) at the Drudge Report article - CENSEI, after being warned, filed this report preemptively against me. I'm not going to defend my actions - I get dragged here too often by disruptive editors, and my work here speaks for itself. Wikidemon (talk) 02:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I did not change it. CENSEI did--Caspian blue 02:51, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
You're funny, CENSEI. Do you remember when you changed the title of the last dispute you were involved in here? [13]Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 02:58, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


There are 68 ANI threads involving Wikidemon Methinks somebody doesn't know how to read very well. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 03:02, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Nope. Not by a long shot. My experience with you at Martin Luther King, Jr. showed me that you're just as sloppy in citing sources, sometimes not even bothering to read them. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 03:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Looks like another attempt by CENSEI to attack WD again after he got banned from Obama articles. Remember, this was his sole purpose for editing. Why do we still deal with this, again? Grsz11 03:04, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


  • CENSEI had no recent activity at that talk page until he began harrassing WD and opened this discussion. His wikistalking needs dealt with. Grsz11 03:10, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Which is supposed to mean something relevant, I presume? KillerChihuahua?!? 03:17, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, CENSEI, but there's a growing consensus that your behavior is disruptive (see here) and so, yes, this is about you. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 03:30, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I would just ask that Wikidemon give a little more leeway to new editors who are often misguided and unfamiliar with the peculiarities of Wikipedia procedure. He should also try to show more respect and consideration of other good faith editors who express viewpoints and perspectives he doesn't agree with. Especially on political subjects, people can be a bit emotional and passionate, but a gentle nudge is a better response than to attack them. My opinion is that Wikidemon comes on VERY strong and is a bit aggresive with his comments and templates etc. On the other hand I know he thinks I act inappropriately (although I rarely template anyone except to respond in kind), so there you go. I don't really see the need for any administrative action here, even though I'm a target of Wikidemon's unhappiness. Hopefully we can all do a better job of cooperating and getting along in the future and commit to diligently avoiding comments that aren't content and article related. ChildofMidnight (talk) 03:25, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Are you asking for leeway, or thinking Censei needs leeway? KillerChihuahua?!? 03:31, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Between CENSEI, Wikidemon, and User:Chipdouglas whose Talk:Drudge Report comments started this, I have a hard time avoiding a conclusion that 3 disruption blocks are appropriate at the moment.

(CofM appears blameless so far...)

CENSEI and Wikidemon - please calm down and stop pushing each others buttons for a while. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:32, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

It takes two to tango into a mess this deep. A report could have been made, by you or another editor, which didn't exacerbate the problem. A dozen of your edits in this thread exceed the threshold for disruption, however.
The report's made - the topic's visible. The edit history of what started this is in people's review thresholds. Step back and let us review. Further disruption is not acceptable. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:41, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
With all due respect, GWH, although usually there is plenty of blame to spread around, sometimes there really is one aggressor and one innocent party. I have seen no evidence Wikidemon has done anything at all wrong. I'm not saying he hasn't, mind you - merely that its not true that it "takes two to tango" - and that I have yet to see a dif which shows Wikidemon acting inappropriately. KillerChihuahua?!? 03:46, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
From the second diff posted by CENSEI as an example of biting the newcomer: I'm aware of the rules; I've been a user for several years now with [limited] contributions and discussion on controversial and non-controversial topics This is the poster child newbie that Wikidemon is supposed to have bitten? I must be missing something. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 03:42, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I concur with Georgewilliamherbert's assessment. I would add that taunting, baiting and the pursuit of vendettas is a wholly inappropriate use of this noticeboard and far more likely to be cause of sanctions than the original storm in a teacup that begun this nonsense. CIreland (talk) 03:43, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Comment: The edit summary Wikidemon left was "taking it to the editor's talk page" and in his very next edit he did just that[14]. This is completely acceptable and appropriate when the topic is an editor (Wikidemon) and not the article. There is no validity to this complaint. CENSEI, you're stirring the pot here. KillerChihuahua?!? 03:42, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I am on article patrol, acting in good faith to help calm disruption. I am not one of the parties to the long-term edit warring on that article. I have not caused, and will not cause, disruption. Please do not equate me with CENSEI. I have no vendettas and bear no grudges, and do not taunt other editors. I would appreciate a retraction of any warnings on the subject. Also, please give me time to post a description of what's really gone on. Wikidemon (talk) 03:47, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
It is at the very least highly controversial to remove someone else's talk page comments - even if they're disruptive in some way. Taking it up on their talk page is great - removing it and taking it up on their talk page is stretching the rules. Asking them to strike it is fine.
If people don't object there's no harm or foul - but people objected. I agree that the comments you removed were misuse of a talk page for advocacy etc - but removing them, as opposed to asking the poster to strike or remove them themselves, is a high drama and high disruption probabilty response.
IAR has experienced users doing stuff like that at times, yes. But none of us experienced users have any excuse if we do something like that and it blows up in our faces...
When that happens, we really have no choice but to take our lumps. Getting aggressive in response to it blowing up is not a reasonable or acceptable response. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 03:56, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Now I strongly disagree with you - moving a comment is not the same as deleting it, and you know it. Its not that different from moving a comment from a user page to a talk page, or from an article to a talk page. It was in the wrong place; it got moved. And where is this "aggressive in response" of which you speak? I don't see it. KillerChihuahua?!? 04:00, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
That practice is not well supported, no. And nor is changing someone else's ANI filing name.
I don't want to beat up on Wikidemon - I see why he did that in the first place. But he's taken several steps that were polite but escalated drama rather than calming things down, and that needs to stop.
It would be easy to point at CENSEI and say "Disruptive" here because of the tone and demeanor and volume, but it wasn't just him, and he's made a couple of good points. I AGF about Wikidemon, but he muddied the waters. That's gotta stop while we sort it out. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 04:09, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
While I take your point about changing the title, I still disagree on the post move. I'm not sure what you mean by "point at CENSEI and say "Disruptive""; I'm not certain to whom you're addressing that comment. I myself have only said that Censei is stirring the pot by his post here, which is surely true. His "bite" is not a bite, and the talk page move is at the very least debatable, and is between Wikidemon and CoM anyway. Censei bringing it here is also pot-stirring. KillerChihuahua?!? 04:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
If i understand -- in one case Wikidemon removed a talk page post of childofmidnights without permission. It looks to me like that was uneccessary, and has had the effect of disruption. However, Wikidemon is one of the more even keeled editors I know, and the description of his actions here by CENSEI is ridiculously over the top (and designed to cause disruption and distraction by Censei). Wikidemon would have been more than happy to discuss this, and avoid potentially upsetting behavior per such discussion. What i'm quite sure of was that disruption and drama were not Wikidemon's intent, and that he is almost always amenable to discussion and efforts to calm situations (in fact, in my opinion, too amenable; he often suffers fools by extending good faith farther than it should be stretched). I'm also quite sure that disruption and drama were the sole intent behind CENSEI's posting here. He's a relentless game player seeking relentless drama. I believe wikidemon may have made a small procedural error, and CENSEI has sought to make a federal case out of it as a way to strike out at a responsible editor who does lots of good work here, but in the process thwarts the efforts of POV pushers whose intentions are not in line with building an encyclopedia. If any admin action is needed, it isn't in Wikidemon's direction.Bali ultimate (talk) 04:19, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
He did not remove he moved - to Childofmidnight's talk page, where he responded. Otherwise I concur with Bali ultimate's succinct summation and statement. KillerChihuahua?!? 04:33, 28 March 2009 (UTC)


Summary of Drudge Report[edit]

I was going to call it "the long and short of it" but anyway...

There's been long-term trouble at Drudge Report and Matt Drudge over whether to call them "conservative" in the article leads: revert warring, IP-hopping block evading WP:SOCKs, and two page protections in the last 1+ months.[15][16] I've made 18 talk page edits this year to offer my $0.02, none on the main page. The most active editors are probably Ratel (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), CENSEI (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), ChildofMidnight (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), soxwon (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), Collect (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), and a bunch of IPs. There were at least 7 talk discussions about "conservative" this month alone and the discussion continues.

Tonight Chipdouglas (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log), made his first edit there to start a new section about "MOB RULE", "liberal editors wearing the thinnest facade of concern for truth--RATEL, this one is apparently your baby--really feel good about this, or about the self-aggrandizing comments, or about BANNING conservative editors?"..."liberal editors who revel in asserting their INTERNET TRUTH..."). The only substance in the post was that it was unbalanced to call it "conservative" if articles about liberal-leaning news sources did not follow suit.

I've dealt for some time with similar threads at Talk:Barack Obama and after some trial and error found the best thing to do is collapse them with {{hat}}...{{hab}}. It avoids deleting anything or declaring it resolved, lets people who really want to carry on do so by uncollapsing it in their browser, and cleans the page of distraction and incitement. You may or may not agree with the approach but it's a fair call, and a standard practice on some high-volume contentious Wikipedia pages. There's an Arbcomm case at the moment on how this applies vis-a-vis Obama article probation.

This time I think it worked! After I collapsed his new thread[WP:TALK|drudge report]][17] Chipdouglas left an initial sarcastic message on my page accusing me of censorship and something about dishonesty,[18] for which I issued a caution.[19] Chipdouglas toned it down[20] and was friendly and polite thereafter[21] while sticking firm to his opinion. So, disruption avoided, no chilling effect, and that should be the end of it.

But not so fast. ChildofMidnight[22] and then Chipdouglas[23] re-opened the discussion. When I asked that it be closed[24] ChildofMidnight scolded me on the article talk page.[25] I took the matter to ChildofMidnight's talk page and left a demand there,[26] (which ChildofMidnight deleted as "trolling")[27] because we really needed to avoid behavioral complaints on the article talk page.

Finally, CENSEI moves ChildofMidnight's comments back to the talk page,[28]. I tell CENSEI to revert or I will bring the matter here,[29] and he files a preemptive report against me.[30] The rest you can see here.

That's what happened. Wikidemon (talk) 04:47, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Chipdouglas (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is not a newcomer, he's an obvious sock or sleeper account with the same "chip" on his shoulder attitude displayed by users such as CENSEI and Axman. His last edit was in 2006, then he suddenly pops up here, a day after Axman's indef-block, spouting the same rants as those two. That situation suggests some need for some admin attention, at least. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 05:06, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Anyway, after thinking this over I know I can do a couple things better. First, although I think I was correct in closing the discussion I could have been more proactively friendly with Chipdouglas. I assumed the worst based on his liberal-bashing on the talk page, and (unles Baseball Bugs is right) he exceeded my expectations and was the one who reached out to me. And I should have moved ChildofMidnight's complaint to my talk page rather than his. I'm not sure how much more or less firm one should be in cautioning editors over inappropriate talk page edits. The incident was brief and harmless. I think ChildofMidnight and Chipdouglas have shown good sense and restraint here, and whatever CENSEI is doing right now is not in itself a cause for action. So... exactly what are we talking about now? Wikidemon (talk) 05:07, 28 March 2009 (UTC) oops - didn't see the discussion was closed. - Wikidemon (talk) 05:09, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm not necessarily claiming he's a sock of either of those two, it's just odd that a user who registered 4 years ago and has been dormant since 2006 suddenly turns up. During the siege against the Obama article by the WND mushrooms a few Sundays ago, a lot of sleeper accounts starting turning up, although most of them hadn't been dormant for 2 1/2 years like this one. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 05:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Montaj13 has been warned about copyright violations multiple times (see User talk:Montaj13) but just today has created three articles by lifting text from other websites.— TAnthonyTalk 02:36, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

The editor has also been blocked multiple times previously for this behavior.— TAnthonyTalk 02:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
That's enough of that. Blocked indefinitely. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 03:59, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Shiham K[edit]

Resolved
 – Already at WQA. 03:45, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

(cur) (prev) 17:01, 27 March 2009 Shiham K (talk | contribs) (55,658 bytes) (Every hamam needs a tellak) (undo)

Shiham K is doing vandalism and personal attack.

see http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Developed_country&curid=78255&action=history

This is another Greek vs Turkish dispute -- they are arguing about whether sources justify calling Turkey a developed country. The offensive edit summary seems to mean something like "every Turkish bath needs a sex worker". Looie496 (talk) 03:18, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Um, this was already raised at WP:WQA and the user was already warned about the edit. Nothing new, so why the new thread? The Seeker 4 Talk 03:45, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
What Seeker4 said. If there's any recurrence of this, let us know. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 03:48, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Scott5307 evading a block/recreating deleted material?[edit]

Resolved
 – Gogo Dodo indef blocked them. Pretty poor effort at a sock really. --GedUK  12:51, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I suspect Scott5307 (talk · contribs) is actually Scott5306 (talk · contribs) who is evading a block and recreating material deleted via discussion. See Feces Bandits (created by Scott5307) and Feces bandit (created by Scott5306) which was deleted per Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Feces bandit. Since I'm a brand new admin, I want a second opinion on this before doing anything. (I'm not even sure I'm posting this in the right place.) — LinguistAtLarge • Talk  07:29, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Blu83fir3 repeatedly deletes "speedy deletion" templates[edit]

Resolved
 – Article now deleted.  Sandstein  14:18, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Blu83fir3 has been repeatedly deleting the "speedy deletion" template at Shed loose the armor. He has been warned numerous times by multiple editors, but continues to do it. He has also been told that he needs to place a hangon tag instead, but he deletes that as well as the deletion template.WackoJackO 09:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Legal threats by User:CSGV[edit]

A few nice cups of tea needed here.

Incident regarding Coalition to Stop Gun Violence article and a conflict of interest and legal threats by editor

CSGV (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log)

who has disclosed being Director of Communications for CSGV (here).

Editor CSGV was then notified of the WP:COI policy here.

Editor CSGV has now threatened legal action against Wikimedia staff and Wikipedia editors here.

-- Yaf (talk) 17:16, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

This is the full text of that 'legal threat':
We very much look forward to taking the matter up with Wikimedia staff, and to offering primary source evidence--including public statements, testimony, and documents--for every revision we have made to this page in order to ensure its accuracy. We also greatly look forward to reviewing the activity of Wiki Firearms Project members on this page and on the pages of other organizations that advocate for strengthening gun laws to prevent gun violence in order to see if their activity has reflected a "conflict of interest" or not. And since you have been involved in defending content on this page (and others relating to gun issues) that is clearly biased, it would be an appropriate point to review your activity as well. CSGV (talk) 18:55, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Looks like they want to strengthen gun control laws--which is their stated mission after all. He or she is offering to discuss sources, which is what we encourage new editors to do. No legal threat there. Is there another statement that contstitutes one? DurovaCharge! 17:38, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Sorry, but that's not a legal threat. —bbatsell ¿? 17:40, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
(edit conflict) Does anyone think that This page has been overrun by individuals from the Wiki Firearms Project that vehemently oppose the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence's mission (and gun control in general). Is painting a broad brush a little bit? Looks like user will keep fighting until his editing privileges are taken from his cold dead hands. MuZemike 17:44, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
OK. But, "public statements, testimony, and documents" are all what is usually requested/required in a subpoena, as part of litigating a legal case. "Primary source evidence" is more of a legal term than a preferred method of documenting on Wikipedia. But, if no legal threats are seen here, that is certainly one interpretation. It is not the interpretation that I read, though. Yaf (talk) 17:48, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
WP:NLT exists for very specific reasons, which are outlined clearly on that page. This instance does not come close to matching those reasons and there's really no alternate interpretation. That's not to say there isn't a problem with the user's editing (I have no idea if there is or not). I'll be honest, though: throwing around baseless claims of legal threats to try to get an instablock is very bothersome to me. —bbatsell ¿? 17:59, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Actually, this is a case of WP:NPLT, based upon the litany of items expressed in somewhat rather precise legal terms. Having been subpoenaed for precisely these type of documents previously, in real life, perhaps I have a lower threshold of sensitivity to these specific terms. Yaf (talk) 18:04, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
User:CSGV also accuses other editors of "slander", another precise legal issue, here, which causes further perceptions of legal threats. Libel, slander, and similar terms carry definite legal threats. Yaf (talk) 18:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Many people who are new to Wikipedia misunderstand our site standards and policies. How about a referral to WP:ADOPT? If this person is interested in contributing collaboratively that should help, and if improvements don't occur then this board could review developments at a later time. DurovaCharge! 18:02, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
WP:COI is not a policy, but a guideline, not intended to revert people's edits out of hand. I suggest that you help the user contribute rather than get into a back and forth, constantly escalating, edit war. Bastique demandez 18:14, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
By WP:COI wording here, though, "This section of the guideline is aimed at editors who may have a conflict of interest. In keeping with Wikipedia's neutral point of view policy, edits in mainspace where there is a clear conflict of interest, or where such a conflict can be reasonably assumed, are strongly discouraged. Significantly biased edits in mainspace are forbidden." All content cited from other sources that was the least bit critical of the organization was removed by User:CSGV editor. Are significantly biased edits in mainspace forbidden or are such edits simply discouraged? Forbidden doesn't sound like a guideline. Yaf (talk) 18:27, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
WP:COI states it's a guideline. You're citing it as a revert reason, as if it were a policy. Why don't you cite the policy that discusses biased edits, rather than the guideline that talks about conflicts of interest? And why don't you address my last comment, about helping the user rather than getting into a constant edit war? Bastique demandez 18:33, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
That policy is applicable, too, but clear violation of the "forbidden" act of making significantly biased edits with a self-admitted COI through removing all content that, although cited, is the least bit critical of the organization, while adding copyvio content from the website of the organization, all without engaging in discussions on the talk page other than to make veiled legal threats involving accusations of slander and mentioning other legal terms common in acquiring evidence through subpoenas, does make working with the self-described Director of Communications for CSGV difficult. His admitted phone calls to the San Francisco office of the Wikimedia Foundation to complain also don't help, but sound instead like more veiled legal threats. Yaf (talk) 18:56, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
CoI is a guideline, not a policy. You can edit an article in which you have a vested interest, but it's best to a) disclose that interest and b) not be obnoxious about it. DS (talk) 18:41, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Suppose for a moment that this person means well. He or she has disclosed the conflict of interest, as recommended in the guideline. Other statements express either misunderstanding or confusion about our site standards. This is normal for any new editor. How about slowing down and perhaps opening mediation? DurovaCharge! 19:17, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Not under that username, though. That username has been blocked as a spamusername, for obvious reasons. I take no position on the COI edits, etc. --Orange Mike | Talk 19:26, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Fair call regarding the username. DurovaCharge! 19:32, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
WP:USERNAME states "Use of a company or group name as a username is not explicitly prohibited, but it is not recommended, and depending on the circumstances may be seen as a problem." It is not a broad call to block a user based on the name. The reasons for blocking are not "obvious" to me, and doing so in the middle of this discussion was not a very good call. Bastique demandez 19:39, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I think they're fairly obvious - I left a message for them recommending that they provide us an alternate individual account name and we can unblock and name change.
For a normal user they're on the margin of advocating a bit much - there's a back and forth, that needs neutral input, and I think the pro- and anti- people are oscillating around something that has a neutral enough center. But using organization named accounts for that is something I would block for and I've seen a lot of other people block for... We probably should tighten up the username policy going forwards, it seems to lead to far too many cases like this where people think they should do this for their organization under its name. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:56, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
On second thought, Cary makes a strong point. Let's try to work with this individual rather than taking a punitive approach. Let's all pause for WP:TEA DurovaCharge! 19:59, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Given the sequence, they would probably perceive it as unfair. The name issue isn't blatant enough to hardblock. We can be flexible... Unblock with a note that they need to change username fairly promptly and ask them to do so as soon as possible? That lets them continue to contribute while we sort out the name. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 20:07, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I see no 'legal threat' here. I encourage Yaf to strike out, <S>Legal threat</S>, his false accusation against another editor. This looks more like a behavior and content dispute and I see bad behavior by both of the involved editors. One editor with a couple dozen total edits needs help learning how things work around here, the other editor with many thousands of edits should know better. SaltyBoatr (talk) 20:08, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
(deindent) I don't see the legal threat either. A look at the way the discussion went on the talk page of the article in question is kind of disappointing; while I'm strongly against anyone with a COI editing related pages personally, this editor seems to have been leaped on with little in the way of actual discussion of his/her concerns. The username thing needs to be done, for sure - Georgewilliamherbert's suggestion above looks good. Unblock for a username change, and encourage the editor - and the others on that page - to work on the talk page collegially to clarify any of the issues being raised. Tony Fox (arf!) 20:19, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
editor CSGV was certainly not shy in being uncivil, not assuming good faith, slinging personal attacks, and expressing sentiments consistent with believing he owned the article. while i became mildly heated after multiple verbal harangues by this user, i hardly think CSGV was 'leaped on with little in the way of actual discussion of his concerns'. he was advised politely (for the most part) that he was way out of line in scrubbing material from the article that was not favorable to his organization. he also violated 3RR it should be noted, and was quite adamant that he would continue reverting and removing material that was not favorable to his organization. this was hardly a case of an innocent newcomer being lept upon by experienced editors, i think. Anastrophe (talk) 21:56, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I left a message for OrangeMike, but lacking response after a decent waiting interval I have gone ahead and unblocked with a request that they change usernames. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:14, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

The "threat" was a statement of his intention to contact "Wikipedia staff". As someone not familiar with Wp, he may not realise the extent to which Wikipedia staff is a rather vague term. He may use legal terminology because he's familiar with that, not with our unusual nomenclature. Since he is making accusations of COI, the Wikipedia staff I will charitably assume he has in mind are the Wikipedia administrators. The appropriate place for this would be the COI Noticeboard. If it gets there, I'll look at it. People are encouraged to complain here. If he would prefer, there is OTRS, but I think they'll refer it back to us. DGG (talk) 01:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

MuZemike: please avoid phrases like "are taken from his cold dead hands", as they may be construed as a violation of WP:NPA. Coppertwig (talk) 15:50, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

*blink* Huh? When it links directly to the originator of the phrase, Charlton Heston, there's really no way this can be even half-heartedly considered against WP:NPA...unless his hands are cold. Or their hands are dead. (talk→ Bwilkins / BMW ←track) 16:28, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Bizarre deletion of talk page comments[edit]

Resolved
 – blocked for 24 hours

-- Donald Albury 15:34, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

This user is consistently deleting a comment on the talk page of an article despite numerous reversions and warnings (example diff). Protecting talk pages seems kind of silly, but this appears to be a WP:SPA and blocking it may not be very productive. SDY (talk) 15:00, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I gave a level 3 warning, then he blanked his talk page. He appears to have gotten the message for now anyway, but will still keep watch. Momusufan (talk) 15:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Well that was short lived, he is still up to no good. Momusufan (talk) 15:21, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Potential death threat[edit]

I'm not taking it too seriously at this point, but this could be of concern. Thoughts? –Juliancolton Talk · Review 14:30, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Hm, we could call the FBI, or the CIA, or CTU. But perhaps calling CVU might be more apt.--Scott Mac (Doc) 14:37, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
It's almost certainly nothing, but it couldn't hurt to drop a note to the relevant authorities. The IP in question seems to enjoy vandalising Harding Charter Preparatory High School. Lankiveil (speak to me) 14:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC).
I agree with Lankiveil. I scanned some of the contribs too and it seems to be a vandal account but it is concerning that the edit names people so maybe contacting the school to inform might be a good idea and/or the local officials just to be on the safe side. Obviously the editor should be indefinitely blocked to stop the disruptions. --CrohnieGalTalk 16:28, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
An indef block would be fairly impractical, as the vandalism originated from an IP address. –Juliancolton Talk · Review 16:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Sorry I didn't think of that when I suggested it. Has anyone contacted anyone about the threat though just to be in the safe side of things? I'm just curious as I know that usually someone makes contacts to make sure it's not a serious threat though I agree it's probably just a vandal edit. I am just concerned with the use of specific names in the threat which might be RL. Thanks, --CrohnieGalTalk 17:59, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Please see Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive523#Officeworks123 from March 24; it is probably best to contact the local authorities and WMF (info at wikimedia dot org). This is probably good protocol, and then there is not much need to follow up once the contacts have been sent. --64.85.216.213 (talk) 11:29, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Above stuff is good, but I'd also suggest a Checkuser. It can't hurt to see if the account is a sock. Ceranthor 20:30, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Other eyes please[edit]

Ks64q2 (talk · contribs) recently returned after a recent 3RR block and a sockpuppet investigation which was closed and archive with the conclusion:

9Nak (talk · contribs) who initiated the 3RR, "welcomed" Ks64q2 back with what I see as disingenuous interest and went about reviving a sock search and prodding Ks64q2 to essentially confess beyond what has already occurred. Without excusing inappropriate use of socks, I feel this is essentially intimidating another user who has already been through the ringer. Perhaps this is borderline but to me it really feels uncivil. I would feel the same about any editor who had conflicts with another posting similar messages. Essentially I'd like to invite 9Nak to leave Ks64q2 alone since there does seem to be some animosity there. Any suggestions on what course to take would be appreciated, I'd like to nip this in the bud and if a second sock case needs to happen then so be it; all of this can be accomplished while remaining civil to one another. -- Banjeboi 08:38, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

It looks like intimidation to me. If the sockpuppet case has been properly and acceptably closed as settled by an admin (which it seems it has) then 9Nak has no business stirring up trouble or browbeating Ks64 like that. I'd suggest a firm message on his talkpage to that effect. ╟─TreasuryTagcontribs─╢ 08:42, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Also, looking at the exchange on 9Nak's talkpage (section "Socks and leggings"), he is being very passive-agressive, with comments such as again, a lack of ambiguity would be of considerable help here - seemingly portraying himself as some sort of official investigator. ╟─TreasuryTagcontribs─╢ 08:45, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Sheesh. Now I stand accused of intimidation, bullying *and* pretexting – without a single word of complaint from Ks64q2, the other party a two-party conversation. If Ks64q2 asks to be left alone I would honour that request without thinking twice. But outside of that, and absent a broach of policy, what exactly are we discussing here? 9Nak (talk) 17:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Intimidation is bullying. Three times now, twice by myself and previously on your talkpage, you've been encouraged to drop this and move on yet here you are defending your right to essentially broach WP:Civility. Really, I see little good coming out of this. If the user opens the sock drawer again then post here for an uninvolved admin to sort it out - if you're wrong it's a mistake but made in an effort to stop abuse, if you're right then an admin can suss out how to adjust the user accordingly. -- Banjeboi 21:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
In short: Drop it. You may appreciate closure but others don't appreciate kicking when a person is down. x42bn6 Talk Mess 21:13, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I have this burning desire to protest, but clearly I'm on the wrong side of the consensus. So, without conceding a civility breach, I'm topic-banning myself from everything Ks64q2-related, just to be on the safe side. Though I can't promise not not gloat (just a little) when the sockpocalypse hits ;-). 9Nak (talk) 23:18, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Suspicious AfD'er[edit]

Resolved
 – Blocked. — Coren (talk) 18:44, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Deletion Mutation is a new account who just joined today. Given his username, I think it's awfully funky that all of his contributions so far have been to AfD or have been about the deletion tag on articles. Looking through, I don't know if he !voted to keep anything yet and he doesn't scream n00b like most new users at AfD in that he argues notability and original research instead of his opinion. Anybody else smell a sock/meat puppet here? At the very least he's trying to make some sort of point. ThemFromSpace 16:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Probably sock of User:Juvenile Deletionist, see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive524#Disruptive AfDing by user Juvenile Deletionist. --64.85.223.59 (talk) 16:24, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Makes perfect sense. It would also explain the animosity towards black kite regarding the deletion tags. ThemFromSpace 16:30, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
No animosity there. The articles are still discussed, so why remove the tags? James Burns did the same with some other articles. Deletion Mutation 16:39, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm just going through Category:AfD debates (Media and music) at the moment, as I went through Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Log/2009 March 28 before. What's wrong with this? Deletion Mutation 16:39, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, the patterns are very suspicious. I've started an SPI, with a request for Checkuser evidence. Blueboy96 16:50, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Checkuser  Confirmed. Still unblocked, though. — neuro(talk)(review) 18:37, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

All the AfDs this user participated in should be revisited and checked for validity. — Becksguy (talk) 18:56, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I have been through all his contributions and struck out any !vote that have not already been struck through or reverted. Unfortunately, two AfDs[31][32] have already been closed but I don't think it's worth taking any action on these. --Malcolmxl5 (talk) 00:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I agree. The two closed AfDs are not worth reopening since no one argued to keep and both were re-listed for a more thorough discussion. Case closed. — Becksguy (talk) 00:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Somebody please block User:DavHam and delete his Talk page?[edit]

Resolved

Could somebody please block DavHam (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and delete his Talk page? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 01:00, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Done, by multiple people at once. Grandmasterka 01:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
And now tagged with {{uw-voablock}} to add it to Category:Temporary_Wikipedian_userpages so the botfairy can delete it in a month. Tonywalton Talk 01:38, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

POV tag on Homeopathy article[edit]

Resolved
 – Not an admin issue.  Sandstein  14:17, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

We need a POV tag on the Homeopathy article, but some people are against it. There presently is no consensus on the contents of the article, but it is policed by the skeptical critics. I hope y'all can insert the POV tag and keep it till a consensus is reached. Thanks in advance for the help.-NootherIDAvailable (talk) 13:55, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

This issue does not need admin intervention.  Sandstein  14:17, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Homeopathy is quackery, so putting a POV tag on it seems a tad redundant. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 18:24, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
? -GTBacchus(talk) 05:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Possible merge discussion canvassing?[edit]

Resolved
 – Disengage, boys. The requirements of WP:CANVASS have been met, nothing here requiring administrative action. —bbatsell ¿? 23:20, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Not sure what to make of this, but a user has posted a message on various users who participated in a recent AfD's talk pages of a merge discussion. See [33], [34], [35], [36], [37], and [38]. As of the time that I am typing up this message, ONLY those who expressed an interest for the merge in the AfD were notified of the merge discussion and not those who argued to outright keep the article, i.e. DGG, Jclemens, Peregrine Fisher, and Dream Focus were not notified. Isn't per WP:CANVASS an editor required to notify potentially dissenting opinions as well? I am also somewhat concerned that the same user in question may be approaching AfDs as jokes and possibly insulting inclusionists in the process. Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 21:55, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I was directed by closing admin to start a merge discussion,[39] which you yourself agreed with: "A merge discussion can take place on the article's talk page". As you evidently oppose this merge and decided to "report me to ANI" instead of just informing the parties you may feel are interested, I can only assume you're attempting to slur my character in attempt to oppose an editorial decision. Hence the linking to a comment I made in a completely unrelated AFD over a absolutely rubbish article. Ryan4314 (talk) 22:31, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Starting a merge discussion is perfectly fine; however, canvassing support for the merge by notifying only those who are likely to agree with you is usually frowned upon here. Now, if you notified everyone who participated in the AfD of the merge discussion, that would be totally acceptable. Seeing the comment in the other AfD about notifying inclusionists for "lulz" is needlessly mocking of your fellow editors and only raises tensions. One can say, "Delete due to verifiability concerns" without having to make a dig at your colleagues. Now seeing such a comment and also noticing what appears to be canvassing as well, my concern is that these may reflect a larger pattern of disregarding or not seeing any value in what inclusionists have to say. Another example is having an "lol" in an edit summary and in another comment and in still another comment. I may disagree with deletionists, but I certainly wouldn't say to keep an article and then toss in a comment about how if we notify deletionists it would be funny and similarly if I only contacted those who argued to keep an article on their talk pages of a discussion, beleieve me, someone would take issue with it. Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 22:36, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Wow just read those links you put up, there is absolutely nothing wrong with the comments I made and I urge any "concerned" parties to read the entire AFD themselves. Ryan4314 (talk) 22:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Everyone who commented on the AFD has now been notified, also I'd like to point out that I also add the usual merge tags to both the article and intended merge destination (hardly a secret way of pushing through a merge).
Also I highly recommend to anyone reading this to check the edit history of "A Nobody's" Editor review and also find out his previous username, it's not well hidden and will allow you more insight. Ryan4314 (talk) 22:46, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I appreciate that you have now notified the other editors in question, althought it really should not have taken a thread here for that to have happened. Please be sure in the future to not exclude those with whom you may disagree and I again urge you to refrain from these Encyclopedia Dramatica-style mocking of those with whom you disagree in AFDs. We are here to edit in a constructive and collegial fashion. Take care! Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 22:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I obviously was not attempting to canvass a discussion as I put up merge tags for all of Wikipedia to see. Yes it is a pity that you attempt to use slur tactics such as "reporting to ANI" and linking to unrelated comments, to try an achieve your goals. Anyone who looks at my edit history when compared with your "colourful" past will see what you're like, I really regret giving you such a nice review now. I'm not going to comment on this matter anymore as I know you also happen to enjoy long threads. Ryan4314 (talk) 23:16, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes, you put up the tag, but then only contacted those of a like mind from the AfD with talk page announcements and only contacted the other participants in the AfD after this thread was started here. Please just keep in mind as well with AfDs to avoid escalating tensions by laughing at fellow editors or making irrelevant references to an off-wiki attack site that seriously slurs many of your fellow editors. Anyway, please just keep all this in mind and yeah, since you did subsequently contact everyone, no need to beat a dead horse here. Have an enjoyable weekend! Sincerely, --A NobodyMy talk 23:21, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I agree that the original notifications were a clear violation of WP:Canvassing#Votestacking, rectified by Ryan4314's subsequent notifications of the remaining editors. A Nobody, was there a particular reason why you immediately escalated to AN/I without contacting Ryan4314 first? Flatscan (talk) 23:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
The first merges by User:Ryan4314 were around: 19:50, 28 March 2009, conviently all to one side.
A Nobody posts this ANI at: 21:55, 28 March 2009.
User:Ryan4314 only starts posting to those who probably will oppose the merge at 22:40, 28 March 2009.
User:Ryan4314 then tells everyone that everyone is notified here at 22:46, 28 March 2009.
Let me get this straight: Editors can canvas one supporting side, and only when they are caught, they then must notify everyone else? Ikip (talk) 06:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I don't really care if he was "caught" or not, all that matters is that the situation was rectified, which could have happened with a simple note on his talk page. (If it becomes a habit rather than a simple mistake or unfamiliarity with WP:CANVASS, then that is a different story.) There's no reason at all that I can see for the merge discussion to be closed. This situation is resolved. Step away from the horse. [edit conflicted, but I see you've removed that request. good.] —bbatsell ¿? 06:35, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Could an administrator block some socks real quick?[edit]

User:Stezie2 has gone and created a bunch of accounts in numerical sequence. Likely a sockpuppeteer. Could somebody look into this? Inferno, Lord of Penguins 03:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

No evidence of misuse, and WP editors are not actually prohibited from using multiple accounts. However, based on the username he could be related to User:Stezie. Somebody to keep an eye on his contributions page and look for any edits that look off, maybe? Ironholds (talk) 05:42, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Resolved

This user has been repeatedly removing a reasonable dablink from sleeved blanket with snarky comments (example). I've made an attempt to explain why it's there, but the user seems determined to remove it. May I ask for some help?--Father Goose (talk) 21:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

To be honest if I'd seen the diff that added this "reasonable" dablink I'd have reverted it. It looks mad as a box of frogs to me. I can see Google hits on "Snuggie wedgie", but a number of them are merely commenting on the fact that "Wikipedia thinks a snuggie is a wedgie". This gives an alternative (though I suspect it's at best a neologism, more likely a protologism). Rather than simply reverting this removal it might be very advantageous to discuss it on the talkpage; I agree on the snarky reply but the removal itself does seem to be in good faith. Tonywalton Talk 21:32, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
As it happens the point's moot, as the IP was blocked for a month for NPA earlier today. Tonywalton Talk 21:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Ah, didn't even spot that, in the absence of a block template. Works for me!.
As regards the dablink, I should've gone with more reliable sources to prove the point; Google Books substantiates it better.--Father Goose (talk) 07:45, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Can someone please indef block this user PRONTO? He's only been creating malicious racist redirects to Barack Obama. Check out his contributions. --Whip it! Now whip it good! 02:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC) Screw it, he was blocked as I was typing this report. --Whip it! Now whip it good! 02:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a persistent vandal that is creating BLP violating redirects to Barack Obama like this. Is it possible to add something to MediaWiki:Spam-blacklist or some other filter to block this? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 02:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Or maybe the WP:ABUSEFILTER? --Jayron32.talk.contribs 02:53, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I remembered that that after I made my post. Cheers. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 02:57, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
It appears that Deskanna is using the CU bit to preemptively block accounts... LessHeard vanU (talk) 03:10, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Someone should give Deskanna a cookie for that useful bit of mopping up then! --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:36, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
This guy is one of his socks, you can't tell me that it's pure coincidence that two separate users are creating racist redirects to Barack Obama. --Whip it! Now whip it good! 05:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Who knew? (Sizable percentage of WP editors raise hands...) At least there is another potential sheath for The Sword of Kahless, if it is ever found. LessHeard vanU (talk) 09:39, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

IP abuse on British Isles by User:78.16.116.115[edit]

We have a problem with the above user and other IPs on British Isles. As can be seen here] it is a case of 3RR from a single purpose IP, however we are also getting abusive (possibly racist) edits such as this. Similar edits were made by another IP address here and here. For these reasons we also need semi-protection for a period of time and possibly a range block. It has been a persistent problem for some time. --Snowded (talk) 05:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Deal with them per Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/The Troubles#Final remedies for AE case. LessHeard vanU (talk) 09:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Resolved
 – contributions blocked indef for WP:NLT violations. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 07:21, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Greatdivine (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This user got so mad because i tagged his page for deletion and it got deleted he left death threats, he threated to "sue" me, and saying that i am a racist and other thing as you see with this edit. I have removed the personal attack and have given him a warning, but i really think it will just get him more mad and indouse more personal attacks i would be greatful if some one could look in this. The page that got deleted was Ruic productions. Cheers Kyle1278 07:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

He has also sent the same message to my e-mail.Cheers Kyle1278 07:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Done - and e-mail privilege removed. Rklawton (talk) 07:19, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Edit war at Ryan Moats[edit]

I'm bringing this one here because the report has been untouched at the edit war board for an hour and a half, and the editor is still very active. On the Ryan Moats article, IP 70.128.85.90 (talk · contribs) has removed the section on Moats' well-publicized (and properly sourced) encounter with the Dallas Police Department now fourteen times over the last two days. I've reverted him twice, but he continues to revert and since he doesn't care about 3RR, he's just outlasting the other editors. He's finally talking on the article page, but not productively. Will someone please either block the IP for the edit war, or semi the page to force consensus? Thanks in advance. Dayewalker (talk) 23:43, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

A Texas IP, probably the officer himself, lol. Needs taken care of though, yes. Grsz11 23:48, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Nah, it can't be Texan; he spells coherently. (ZING!) HalfShadow 23:50, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
bbatsell ¿? 00:59, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm guessing it's a colleague or friend of the officer involved. And why do they always come here? EPSN ran the story,why not take it up with them? We're simply reporting it. Sarcastic ShockwaveLover (talk) 04:54, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I left a note on the talk page questioning the value of even including the name of the officer at this point, per WP:BLP. --64.85.214.246 (talk) 12:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

New vandal team?[edit]

I've just deleted this, it contains a few words that might be worth looking out for. ϢereSpielChequers 11:01, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Hmmm! They picked a name for themselves that is already taken on the Internet for a legitimate project. -- Donald Albury 12:43, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Slow edit warring and vandalism by User:Macromonkey[edit]

Formerly:

User:Macromonkey has now turned to vandalism of my user page and talk page using deceptive edit summaries, (and has been warned about it). After being blocked for 48 hours he has returned and vandalized the talk page of the Cold reading article by first removing a comment of mine and then removing a large part of the page's contents.

The history that precedes these activities is one of a new user User:Phallicmonkey, who has a religious belief in mediums and psychics, and who tolerates no inclusion of sources and facts that are negative about them. This brought the user to the cold reading article where edit wars ensued, and after some time the editor was blocked and appealed:

You are using this template in the wrong namespace. Use this template on your talk page instead.

Later the user was ostensibly indef blocked for an improper user name, but the real reason is worth reading carefully:

This user's request to be unblocked to request a change in username has been reviewed by an administrator, who declined the request. Other administrators may also review this block, but should not override the decision without a good reason (see the blocking policy). Do not remove this unblock review while you are blocked.

Administrators' noticeboard (block logactive blocksglobal blocksautoblockscontribsdeleted contribsfilter logcreation logchange block settingsunblockcheckuser (log))


Requested username:

[[User:Ok, so I seem to have been blocked for having an inappropriate name. I apologise profusely for this, I didn't realise at the time of creating this account that it could be taken offensively. So i would like to keep my edits etc, as I have put a lot of effort and time into edits I have made. I suggest the username 'Acromantula'|Ok, so I seem to have been blocked for having an inappropriate name. I apologise profusely for this, I didn't realise at the time of creating this account that it could be taken offensively. So i would like to keep my edits etc, as I have put a lot of effort and time into edits I have made. I suggest the username 'Acromantula']] ([[User talk:Ok, so I seem to have been blocked for having an inappropriate name. I apologise profusely for this, I didn't realise at the time of creating this account that it could be taken offensively. So i would like to keep my edits etc, as I have put a lot of effort and time into edits I have made. I suggest the username 'Acromantula'|talk]] · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Request reason:

User:Acromantula is taken; please consult Special:Listusers to search for usernames to find one that isn't taken. While we're on it, if you username had been available I would be rather hesitant to unblock you. Yes, your username is (somewhat) offensive... but you were really blocked because you are POV-pushing. Admins are generally hesitant to block for POV pushing, because it's a judgment call. But I'm firm in my judgment, that's what you were doing. No one has been buying your argument that the Cold reading article should say that it is only "claimed" that people use cold reading. Your basis of argument is your own beliefs, rather than external factors like sources. And you continue to hammer the same points regardless of how many people have opposed them. In other words, you lost the argument and you should stop; it's crossing the threshold into disruption. So, if you find an available username I'm willing to unblock, and view this block as only about your username, but this POV-pushing behavior is a serious problem and if you don't address it you'll soon be blocked again. Mangojuicetalk 16:11, 20 February 2009 (UTC)
Please include a decline or accept reason.

Unfortunately the user obtained Rollback, Twinkle, and possibly other rights, and began to make a big thing of deleting new articles, often before the editors were given a chance at all. For a new user to be engaging in this activity is just plain wrong. This caused quite a bit of trouble.

The user has been warned many times for various activities, including page blanking. The user has removed the warnings from the page, but they can be found in the edit history.

Currently the user has insisted on including one unsourced statement into the LEAD of the Cold reading article, one which isn't just unsourced, but isn't even included in the body of the article first, which is a violation of WP:LEAD. The edit war is a repeat every day of the same edit, reverts by various editors, reinclusion, reverts, ad libitum, ad nauseum. The user is apparently so frustrated now after the latest block that they have turned to vandalizing, as stated above. I'm tired of it. The user isn't contributing anything of real worth and is just a disruptive waste of time. The user was originally blocked for edit warring at the Cold reading article and has resumed edit warring at the same article. Something needs to be done.

Unfortunately this user has Rollback, Twinkle, and possibly other rights and they are being used to further their editwarring abilities. The editor needs to have their tools removed and be banned. Previous blocks have not worked, and the user is now turning to vandalism and is now an SPA, vandalism only account. -- Fyslee (talk) 07:50, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I've reblocked them for disruptive editing, and removed their rollback access. If they continue to edit disruptively after the block expires, usual procedures can be followed. Following usual practice, this block is longer than the previous block; after this, I would expect the duration of any subsequent blocks for disruption, if necessary, to escalate quite rapidly. -- The Anome (talk) 11:10, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Thank you. I can understand the reblock for disruptive editing, but what about the vandalism and resumption of the forbidden behavior immediately after being blocked? I'd think that already at this point that deserves an indef ban, especially since the editor contributes nothing of worth. -- Fyslee (talk) 14:55, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
They've not yet done anything bad enough to merit an immediate indefblock. They've had a first and second chance, they now have a third chance to reform their behavior. But fresh chances are not in indefinite supply, and the act of using them up rapidly in the presence of clear warning messages is not lost on potential blocking admins... -- The Anome (talk) 15:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Fan wars, racism, non compliant editing etc[edit]

Resolved
 – Quack, quack, block. //roux   19:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Is the comment on here racist ? User:CiaraLovingFan3.

CiaraFan4Ever (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) Continues to ignore WP policies and guidelines and countless 'final' warnings to the detriment of good editors left to clear up the mess. Possible Amazon referral links abuse. Please can you monitor and block on each re-occurance. Be aware of previous evasion attempts - Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets/CiaraFan4Ever. Has similar editing pattern to abovementioned User:CiaraLovingFan3, so please could you checkuser. Thanks 212.84.101.220 (talk) 19:25, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

IP editor messing with talk pages[edit]

[40] "contributions" by an IP editor that at first could be construed as good faith edits. However, after comments on his talk page continues to make inappropriate edits to talk pages. Not your classic edit warring but generally being a PITA and making a lot of work for others to clean up. Would you call this edit warring? Justin talk 19:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

IP seems to have broken 3RR. I'm not sure if this clearly constitutes vandalism as the IP's edits seem to be in good faith. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 19:46, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Seem to be in good faith but after dealing with them for the last 30 minutes, no they're not, he is just dicking us around. Justin talk 19:50, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

SgtAvestrand1956 again[edit]

(see Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/IncidentArchive517#User:SgtAvestrand1956 for history)

I blocked User:SgtAvestrand1956 for 48h (he'd previously been given a 24h 3RR block for the same article by another admin) for tenditious/disruptive editing on Physician assistant. He immediately registered User:TheMedicated and continued. I've blocked him for a week for obvious sockpuppetry. If anyone feels the evidence is insufficient and/or this user should be given another chance before the week's up, you have my blessing to either request an SPI on him, or unblock him and take responsibility for his edits. Cheers, Jclemens (talk) 20:13, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Resolved
 – User has been blocked indef for continued personal attacks.— dαlus Contribs 23:28, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Iliijapavlovich (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This user has made it apparent on their talk page that they do not wish to follow policy, besides that, they appear to have been trolling several users pages, not to mention the article space with inserting NPOV violating content. When made not of this, they did not seem to care. This was taken over from AIV. Anyone feel like blocking this obvious SPA?— dαlus Contribs 01:22, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

24 hr block, along with explanation on NOT, BATTLE, NPA, NPOV. If they repeat after this, longer block to come... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:40, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Check the user's talk page. They apparently disagree with you, wikipedia is censoring the truth, blah blah blah blah blah. Soapboxing, POV pushing, etc. He obviously doesn't want to abide by our policies here, I believe a block is in order to prevent further damage from him. He has made it quite apparent what he's going to do by the time his other block ends.— dαlus Contribs 20:27, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I would really appreciate if someone could block this guy with the ability to edit his talk page taken away. He is continuing to soapbox, and is now personally attacking us.— dαlus Contribs 02:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I'd just leave him alone on his own talk page for now, Daedalus. He's only got a 24 hour block, but he seems like the kind that won't last too long as soon as he's able to post again. No point in scrimmaging with him while the clock's not running. Dayewalker (talk) 02:13, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
The user continues to personally attack others and use his talk page as a soap box. Can someone please block him with the inability to edit his talk page? Wikipedia is not a blog, and we are letting him treat it as one the longer he goes without a block.— dαlus Contribs 21:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Before totally blocking his talk page, maybe he could have 1 day deducted from his indefinite block, if he could explain how his user ID is pronounced. An English approximation would do. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 23:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Probably "Iliija Pavlovich", with a less common spelling in English of what's normally "Ilya".
This case didn't make me feel good - I hate to indef someone this fast, but they really were just running around insulting people for no good reason and no good edits. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 00:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The user is contiuing to attack and insult on the talk page: the first objection came from some Chris who was found to be a Nazi on at least three prior occasions, (along with) Not to say that Daedalus has problems with essential English and the exotic art of spelling happens to elude him. Someone please blank his user talk page except the block, and take away his ability to edit it.— dαlus Contribs 00:49, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:66.229.250.178 3RR violations and legal threat[edit]

This IP has edit warred Menudo (band) by putting a blog link in the article as a source but was reverted because it violates WP:External Links. I put up a whois template on his page identifying the ISP and he reverts that saying it's private when everyone knows that whois information is public and it can be looked up. While trying to restore the whois tag, he makes a legal threat over the whois information. Momusufan (talk) 17:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Note: I made a report to WP:ANEW about this user, but seeing that this is probably a static IP and considering the new legal threats, a longer sanction outside the one expected for the 3RR violation might be a good idea. Regards SoWhy 18:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Blocked him for making a legal threat, per WP:NLT. He can sick his lawyer on the Foundation all he wants, but if he is going to do so, he can do it without editing. --Jayron32.talk.contribs 18:05, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks everyone for your help! Momusufan (talk) 18:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Part 2[edit]

IP has been unblocked for retracting legal threat, but he has gone to a user asking for a review of Menudo (band) saying he actually used a newspaper for a source. But looking at the DIFF of the edit, he actually labeled the blog as "Globe" and "New York Daily News" respectively for editors to believe that they are clicking onto those real sites. Momusufan (talk) 19:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Let's assume good faith here. Those links have scans of the actual newspapers. Those links need to be tweaked, but I wouldn't call them deceptive in purpose, just a newbie mistake. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Ok, Thank you for the clarification. Momusufan (talk) 23:35, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Sockpuppet investigation question[edit]

Resolved
 – //roux   00:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't do SPI's very often, so I'm wondering if Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Axmann8 is set up correctly, and whether there's a corresponding checkuser case somewhere that I can't find? Thank you all for your help. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 22:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I added in the CheckUser request (code E) for you and moved it under the list of SPI cases awaiting CheckUser. You probably submitted the case without the checkuser request likely by axcident :) MuZemike 22:39, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
By axcident? Hey, that's my schtick! Well, I don't do these kinds of cases very often, although if I'm ever proposed for adminship again, maybe I had better learn. Thanks for your help! Now I have to go take some pun-ishment. :) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 22:42, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I was around there quite a bit in 2007 regarding some socking and at the time I noticed that the procedure for raising a checkuser was quite difficult. I'm glad things have improved since then. Tonywalton Talk 00:29, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Themightylubu246, in a space of two days, has been creating a bunch of biographical articles supposedly about the Three Kingdoms period in China. The problem is, his creations are not referenced and anyone with some knowledge of that period would not recognize any of those supposed characters. This leads me to believe they are hoaxes and should be deleted (I'm wondering if a mass-AfD is appropriate), but the user created them at such a rate I think further sanctions are required. Can someone help look into this? _dk (talk) 00:08, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I've left a note on his talk page warning that he stop; if he does not, I will block so that he will engage in discussion. —bbatsell ¿? 00:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
*sigh*. Continued editing, so I softblocked and left another note on the talk page. If I step away and the user begins discussing the articles and edits in question, any admin should feel free to lift the block. —bbatsell ¿? 00:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
*sigh* x2. Well, softblocking was a poor choice, as the user simply logged out and continued editing. I blocked for a month since the IP is static (see contribs), though, like above, any admin is welcome to lift both blocks if the user begins discussing the edits in question (or if they think I've blocked inappropriately). —bbatsell ¿? 02:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Whoops, the IP is 66.68.247.104 (talk · contribs · 66.68.247.104 WHOIS). —bbatsell ¿? 02:23, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I am very concerned about this user's ownership behavior on Kobe Bryant. On one occasion, he removed a paragraph about Kobe's sexual assault allegation [41] in the lead without discussion. I added it back citing WP:LEAD. But he removed it again [42] even saying that "if [I] have problems with this undo please contact an administrator". [43] A discussion on the talk page then ensured and most editors agreed with me. But he still disagreed as evident by these comments [44] [45] and later removed again [46]. Now, he escalated the dispute to images by removing one he disliked [47] and create another discussion which he announced that "the image will not be used in any Kobe Bryant related articles." [48]

I think a warning by an admin is warranted to prevent further ownership behavior from this user. Thanks.—Chris! ct 20:43, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I too am concerned about the tone of debate with JJ2. In my experience at WP, I have never had such resistance against the inclusion of PD images. His thinking makes little sense to me.--TonyTheTiger (t/c/bio/WP:CHICAGO/WP:LOTM) 21:27, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
This probably is not the best forum for this since no admins have commented -- this is not really a matter that requires an admin. You will probably have better luck at a more appropriate forum. After reading the talk page, I think Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard is ideal for this type of content dispute. --64.85.214.246 (talk) 13:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
But he exhibits ownership behavior, not just involving in a typical content dispute - doesn't that require admin attention?—Chris! ct 18:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Ownership of articles states problems of ownership should be handled via Wikipedia:Dispute Resolution unless it involves admins using their tools improperly. --64.85.211.242 (talk) 05:44, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Resolved
 – User been asked to stop. henriktalk 06:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Psb777 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

This user apparently has an axe to grind as well as the one that Axeman apparently had. After Axeman's indef block was issued, this user promptly decided to go to the talk pages of admins complaining, instead of heading to ANI and starting a thread about it. So far, the edits this user has made to the said talk pages don't appear to be anything but disruptive, not to mention that it looks like that was his/her intention(Maybe I am hitting a nerve. Good!). Could someone possible tell him to stop? Mayhaps issue a warning? I don't see him stopping otherwise anytime soon. I, along with others, are growing tired of this.— dαlus Contribs 05:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I do have an axe to grind. Several. I want a good encyclopedia where editors, especially new editors, feel welcomed. Where admins behave properly and courteously, and where they too follow the rules and guidelines. I have discussed the Axmann8 issue in several places. I note that Daedalus has followed me about trying to turn the arguments I am making into ones about me or about my supposed disruptive conduct. I admit being disruptive, and deliberately so, but not in the sense that Daedalus means. I am disappointed in the way the Axmann8 matter has been pursued, and I am glad that what I have said has struck a nerve with some. I ask that Daedalus be admonished not to relentlessly respond to almost every post I make with an unsubstantiated accusation of bad conduct: That he be politely and ever so gently be reminded to AGF. Thanks. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Psb777 certainly appears to be in the midst of some tenditious editing. In addition to the above admission of pointy editing [49], he's also just flat out refused to get the point above in the Axmann8 case. He's made false assertions of consensus [50], and reopened a thread closed 24+ hours prior [51] just because he was unhappy with other editors making their opinions known [52] on Jeske's page. For several days now he's been asking for explanations, and refusing to acknowledge them. He's quite draining to talk to, because nothing satisfies him and he doesn't make any positive contributions to the discussion. Dayewalker (talk) 06:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Tendentious is good, or can be. I wish Dayewalker would not engage with me if he finds me tiresome. Paul Beardsell (talk) 06:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
(EC)Tendentious is not good when trying to build consensus. After trying to discuss things with you days ago, I realized you're asking questions with no intent of listening to the answers, so I disengaged. Tonight, you came back to ANI and opened a thread 24+ hours old simply because you refuse to get the point. Then, I saw you had gone to other pages with the same non-consensus bulding attitude. Dayewalker (talk) 06:27, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
He has been torturing everyone the last couple days, yet he has not stated what he wishes to accomplish. I have told him to come here and state exactly what he thinks should be done, and let others comment on his suggestion, and then to drop the stick and move on. I don't know if he is being so on purpose, but his comments are creating conflict, and disruption. Landon1980 (talk) 06:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

This user was the topic of a thread on here a few days ago as well. Ironically enough started by none other than axeman, complaining about his behavior. See here Landon1980 (talk) 06:36, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I have posted a polite note asking User:Psb777 to stop. But you also need to disengage from him, simply not replying if you find the discussion tedious is one the best ways to avoid issues dragging on forever. So, in that spirit: Unless there are any more events, I don't think dragging this thread on any more will help. henriktalk 06:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
If you are talking to me, I have ignored him on many occasions. I just wish that you, Henrik, would have left well enough alone regarding axeman. I know you meant well, I just find the whole mess frustrating. My account was compromised during this whole ordeal, and I have my suspicions that axeman was tangentially involved with that. Landon1980 (talk) 06:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Axmann isn't involved in this issue, except very tangentially. One thing I've found that helps alleviate frustrations if you're getting stressed is answering questions on the help desk, or doing some substantial article writing. Really, try it: It does wonders when you've been caught up in some conflict. henriktalk 06:58, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I know he isn't. Thanks for the advice. Landon1980 (talk) 07:00, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec*272!)

Perhaps the main reason I got involved with the Axmann8 case is that a short while ago I was rude to Axmann8 who had just deleted an article I had created one minute before. But Axmann8 had made an honest mistake, of that I am now sure, and he reacted very badly (as we know he can) to my rebuff, complained about me here but found his argument swatted aside. He presumably expected to be on the giving rather than the taking side of WP discipline. So I had left him annoyed. But he had been behaving quite well around that time. So when he got pissed off with WP I felt somewhat responsible for an editor going bad whom Henrik had been coaching into being a rational deletionist (if there is such a thing!).

I am very comfortable about my conduct during the Axmann8 case. Seems to me everyone deserves to have someone on his side. But no one was, not even me, all I've been arguing for is due process. That some fail to appreciate that, I contend I am not wholly responsible for! However, I know not at least three of you do not agree. I appreciate deeply Henrik's as always constructive approach, and I do not mean to be seen to be demanding the last word. And I'm not.

Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:01, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

You keep saying this over and over, yet you still have not said what you want done. What, exactly what, do you think should be done? Consensus appears to be that Axeman has been banned from editing wikipedia, so you need to let it be known what you want or either drop the matter. Landon1980 (talk) 07:10, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I think Landon has hit the point, and I've also said previously that the way this indef-block was executed was not exactly a sterling example of how to conduct such things. The question at this point is what administrative action, if any, does Psb777 think should be taken?
Axman kind of put himself in Groucho's defiant shoes in this dialogue from Duck Soup:
Angry Minister of Finance (Wikipedians): "Sir, you try my patience!"
Groucho (Axmann8): "I don't mind if I do! You must come over and try mine sometime!"
Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 07:19, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
One man show? Not funny though.--Caspian blue 07:25, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
You had to be there. In any case, wikipedians said they had had enough, and Axmann came back with more (i.e. sockpuppetry) and some of us who had been trying to defend him against a somewhat ambiguous block finally said, "See ya!" So the question is simply what administrative action Psb777 thinks should be taken, if any. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 07:35, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
(ec) I was there and read it but did not comment. Thanks for the summary it a bit.--Caspian blue 07:39, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I meant it would have helped to have seen Duck Soup. Meanwhile, I haven't seen any new socks from Axman yet. Even puppetmasters have to sleep sometime. :) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 07:47, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Your joke is sometimes too sophisticate for non-native speaker like me to follow up (but I get it now, Quack, Quack? )--Caspian blue 07:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
That works. But I admit my jokes are sometimes too obscure. :) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 07:53, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Due to the notability of the film, I have to spend too much time correcting linked articles after I made the page as a dab. But you inspire me to create Oritang, a duck soup.--Caspian blue 16:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Yummy! I just hope you're making enough for everyone here. >:) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 20:47, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I have been asked by Henrik to stop. So let me talk about horses.

I know not what to do. I have been criticised for beating a dead horse. I disagree, I am standing over the dead horse saying this horse has been very unfairly put to death. Some of those who (coincidentally?) put the boot in disagree, and say I won't listen to reason. They present their hastily post hoc constructed case. The evidence is not what they say it is. They could have chosen better evidence, perhaps, but the evidence they show to me is of the horse kicking after they improperly started to chastise it for having an inappropriate horsebox. Now the horse struggles to its feet - it wasn't dead - but it's shitting all over the place so they shoot it. And I'm asked what to do?

I think we should be more careful with our horses in future.

Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:53, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Ok, then please do stop. The blocking admin weighed in all the history and found that in the end that this project was not helped by his user. We sometimes have to make judgments on the totality of the situation, not just looking at individual events. A ban isn't a judgment on a person, it simply means that Wikipedia was not an ideal site for him to help with. In many cases we are too hasty, but I'm not sure that was the case here.
Next person to post in this thread gets a 24 hour block! (no, not really, but wouldn't it be great if I could do that? :-) ) henriktalk 08:34, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Henrik makes excellent points and shows great wisdom. 0:) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 08:37, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • For the record, I felt that Axman was blocked largely due to his personal opinions. I honestly believe that if the same situation (posting a reasonable post on a talk page after a self-imposed topic ban) had been done by someone without the "wrong" opinions and userbox this block wouldn't have occurred. That said, I strongly suspect the user would never have been much of a constructive editor. But I don't think that had been shown clearly yet. I'm not going to debate the topic beyond this one post here. But I feel the whole thing was poorly done. My 2 cents. Hobit (talk) 18:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

He has made 2 more socks today, the latest of which he even added himself to sockpuppet report. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 20:46, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Note from Jéské[edit]

From what I can gather, he's wonking because I took offense to Axmann saying that "blacks got [their] President", and demanded a response from me - about two or three hours after I had left for the weekend. I only just got back on to find the thread here and on my talk page, and, honestly, I'm a bit agitated - the last thing I wanted was an Axmann thread. As the thread on my talk page indicates, he's missing the point - I said only that I do not object to the block because of that statement, because I see that as blatant racism and a polemic political statement (which his topic ban did still disallow). I apologize for this. -Jeremy (v^_^v Cardmaker) 03:11, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Could someone uninvolved please talk to User:Amolz about having an actual discussion not creating content forks? He's been edit warring at List of television stations in India and created a fork, Indian Satellite Television Channels, and refuses any discussion beyond this page move. The first report resulted in me speaking to him and I just got so angry with him that I blocked him which clearly looked bad. Could an outside admin help? -- Ricky81682 (talk) 03:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Link spam on Conficker[edit]

Resolved
 – Inspire007 (talk · contribs) indef blocked as spam/advertising only account, IP blocked for 1 week Dougweller (talk) 09:38, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Hi there. I've noticed that 1nspire007 (also 24.110.250.120) has been persistently link-spamming the Conficker article in an attempt to drive traffic to their site. What can be done? —78.46.104.168 (talk) 05:19, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

1nspire007 has been warned somewhat as has the IP address. They can be blocked if they continue again. The articles could be protected but I think a better solution may be to add them to the spam blacklist. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 05:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

compromised account[edit]

 – no biggie

Ched ~ (yes?)/© 09:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Steve_Crossin has informed me on IRC that his account has been compromised. — Ched ~ (yes?)/© 08:22, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Hi. Midom has helped me secure my account again. Apologies that this happened. Steve Crossin Talk/24 08:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Manhattan Samurai IP socking[edit]

Resolved
 – Blocked by Gwen. —bbatsell ¿? 13:56, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Our old indef-blocked buddy Manhattan Samurai (talk · contribs) is back as 82.195.149.119 (talk · contribs). His very first edit (and most of his content) has been to the William Monahan article (which MS has promised to continue editing even while blocked), which admin Gwen Gale quickly locked [53] as "ongoing, unending edits by banned user." His comments on the Monahan talk page have also been reverted by Gwen [54] and Bali Ultimate [55], both of whom easily recognized him as a sock.

From there, the IP has also edited MS's old talk page [56] and his own (MS's) article about Google [57]. For some reason, he's been reverted and recognized, but not blocked. Can someone please slap a block on the IP, he's starting to troll user talk pages now. Thanks in advance. Dayewalker (talk) 07:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I've been having troubles with Dayewalker for a few hours now. He's been erasing questions I'm asking on William Monahan's entry. This is the first time I've seen him actually talk to me and its some gibberish. I verified the article about Bruen's film by William Monahan and it was truthful. Now I've been trying to find out why the quote was erased from that article. ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )
You can see the facts on the www.kenbruen.com site and on the Daily Mail newspaper. ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )
And for those of you who don't recall MS, this fits his MO exactly. He adds to the Monahan article (and related ones, such as Bruen). Some of what he adds is true, some is fabricated. From there, he tries to lure WP editors into reverting his "proper" edits so he'll be able to trumpet how wrong we were to remove his "truths." He once described himself as the "Lex Luthor" of wikipedia, and has sent conflicting emails to editors on many occasions just to confuse us. Dayewalker (talk) 07:21, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I haven't had any troubles with other articles like this one. ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:22, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )
Dayewalker did it again. I asked him a question and he erased soon after. It's just been going on like this. ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:23, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )
WP:RBI. Dayewalker (talk) 07:25, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm writing an essay about how the Celtic Tiger shows up in Bruen's novel. Bruen's early novel is actually being made into a film right now. I found this out on Bruen's site. There was a really smart comment about his novel and how the movie is going to be different in William Monahan's entry... there was yesterday. ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:30, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )

If he's a sock (and I don't know enough of the pattern to confirm it), someone should set a short block to stop his continued disruption here. -- Ricky81682 (talk) 07:52, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

What just happened on the Celtic Tiger's entry? ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 07:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )

Looks like another editor who's spotted you as an obvious sock reverted you. Really, MS, this one was beneath you. Dayewalker (talk) 07:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

What are you donig? How do I get back the references? ( 82.195.149.119 (talk) 08:06, 30 March 2009 (UTC) )

Enough quacking, blocked. Gwen Gale (talk) 11:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Anon has too much free time[edit]

Resolved
 – Blocked by Henrik — Becksguy (talk) 11:29, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Needs admin assistance to seek other outlet: 86.143.158.108 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log). See the last 20 or so revisions - going through my contributions history and reverting, apparently at random. Possibly as a result of my removal of material added contra to WP:BLP (see [58] for example, or [59] for general theme of edits). Orpheus (talk) 10:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried reporting him to WP:AIV? Its comments always say "unexplained..." yet the latest one, for example, was in fact explained by in the edit summary, so it's just vandalism or trolling of some kind. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 11:16, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
It's not current, so a block wouldn't be helpful - it's more of a "heads up", awareness raising type thing. Not current enough for AIV, not long-term enough (yet) for LTA, so I thought I'd get a few more eyes on it as a bit of a check. It's definitely trolling - his edits (see also these IPs, same person) are along a theme. The "unexplained reversion" is a result of the last little contributions trawl he did, which I reverted with that summary. Basically it's your run of the mill little teenager loose on the web, who throws a complete tanty when somebody says something about it. Orpheus (talk) 11:26, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I warned him with uw-vandalism4im for several vandalism edits, including to American Family Association. However, it's now moot, as the IP was blocked a few minutes ago for 31 hours for edit warring. — Becksguy (talk) 11:29, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Resolved
 – Sent to WP:DRV which was probably the right venue in the first place.

This article was deleted by a rather overwhelming consensus at AFD two weeks ago [60]. It has just been quietely recreated. I've put a speedy tag on it etc... but this article has always been attended to by great drama, since it's creator and main guardian in the past was found to have a large sock farm (which he has vowed to use to fill the encyclopedia up with disinformation). The recreator is not this puppetmaster, but i suspect he'll be along shortly. This is a preemptive requrest for eyes.Bali ultimate (talk) 11:46, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Oh yeah, the sock user who managed to cause so much trouble was User:Manhattan Samurai who is still very active (there's a current thread on this page about him a little higher up).Bali ultimate (talk) 11:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Hmmm. I agreed that this was a completely different article and removed the speedy tag, but it was then deleted G4 anyway. Having said that, DRV would probably be better anyway. Black Kite 11:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Was exactly the same sourcing with some cosmetic changes. At any rate, gone now.Bali ultimate (talk) 11:55, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Unfortunately, the only thing that truly was the same was the dislike for the subject of the article. Black Kite did recgnize that it was sunstantially different... however that was not the opinion of the person who speedied it, and who then did not note nor care that it did indeed have new sources... Newsday, Billboard (magazine), The Jewish Press, and the book "Our Gods Wear Spandex". Repeating over and over that it "Was exactly the same sourcing with some cosmetic changes" is quite pointedly incorrect. I agree that a DRV of the unusually fast speedy, even after a correct removal of the tag, is perhaps a correct course. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 12:09, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Before the removal of the tag from my point of view - yes, technically the tag was removed just slightly before I deleted, but I was in the process of deletion when the tag was removed, the version I saw before I clicked delete had the tag. I looked at the old and new articles, I looked at the talk page, and made a judgement call. DRV is the way to go now and in my opinion would have been a better option than recreating it two weeks after the AfD. Dougweller (talk) 13:41, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Those have all been brought up and chewed over at the previous three AFD's. But this really isn't the place. DRV is.Bali ultimate (talk) 12:11, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

That is an unfortunate error of statement. The only ones brought up previously in AfDs were Our Gods Wear Spandex and The Jewish Press... and for some mysterious reason, The Jewish Press was ignored and Our Gods Wear Spandex was curiously dismissed even though it was a book published by a reputable published with its own Wikiepdia article: Weiser Books. Newsday and Billboard (magazine) were never discussed nor presented. Finding new sources and fresh ways to interpret old ones was kind of the reason to try to fix all the stuff claimed as wrong. But yes... this is not the place to decry events. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 12:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

And isn't WP:CLEANUP all about the "cosmetic changes" that make articles properly encyclopedic? Just a thought. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 12:23, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
No. The mcallaster newsday (nassau county and suffoulk edition) with the passant mentions about his role in the band were examined and present in the past versions of the article, as was the passant billboard mention of the band. "Our God wear's spandex" and his support for holocaust denier Zundel covered in the Jewish Press were, as you noted, already examined. So what do you mean when you write "indeed have new sources" and then list these four items? Did you mean "indeed don't have new sources, but i really feel this article should be recreated without going to DRV?" See when you write "for some mysterious reason, The Jewish Press was ignored and Our Gods Wear Spandex was curiously dismissed" that's insulting to other editors assessed these things and found them wanting, and built a consensus on that basis. What you find "curious" and "mysterious" is that a consensus of editors disagreed with you.Bali ultimate (talk) 12:26, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Excuse me yet again, but you are incorrect. Neither the Newsday nor the 2 Billboard articles were in the earlier versions, nor were these three presented at or discussed at AfDs. They are most definitely new. Heck, it was my finding them that made me decide to try making a silk purse out of an onerous sow's ear. I listed these 3 as new sources above, because they were new. And that reliable sources can be dismissed and ignored is always a curious mystery. I am sorry if you feel my surprise at this is insulting. ANd yes... this is not DRV. Sorry to have bothered the wrong venue. Schmidt, MICHAEL Q. 12:53, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Muscovite99 evading block[edit]

Muscovite99 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is currently blocked; initially for repeated edit-warring, and then whilst serving his initial block he had his block extended for evading the block with a sockpuppet User:MastM. He has now evaded this extended block as Special:Contributions/217.26.6.12. Please note this in which the IP editor removed dispute tags, which User:Offliner has almost instantly reverted, only to be almost instantly reverted by Muscovite. The aggressive removal of dispute tags is the first indication. Then note this history in which Muscovite and the IP editor are the only contributors - the IP editor adding interwiki link to the ru article which Muscovite worked on during this time. Then note this removal of information, which Muscovite also aggressively removed from the article (I am certain Offliner or User:Ellol could provide specific diffs there). Note at ru:Википедия:Заявки на арбитраж/Muscovite99 he was found to be socking with the IP 217.26.10.144 (amongst others), which is in the same range and also belongs to Tascom. This is obviously Muscovite99, and this has occurred whilst he is under an extended block for sockpuppeting/block evasion, a further block (even indef given history evasion of blocks and sockpuppetry) is warranted. --Russavia Dialogue 10:41, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Seems pretty clear. Re-blocked for 2 months. Fut.Perf. 10:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Question if I may, just so I can understand how such blocks work. On 2 March he was blocked for 2 weeks, then on 4 March this block was extended to 1 month, and you have just now extended to 2 months. Does this mean that he has in effect been blocked for 3 months 2 weeks? Or does it work differently to that? --Russavia Dialogue 11:18, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Technically, the new block I put in today replaces the old one, and the two months start counting from now, so in the end he will have been blocked from 2 March to 28 May. Fut.Perf. 11:23, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for clarifying that. Cheers, --Russavia Dialogue 11:31, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Muscovite99 was blocked for a further 2 months for evading a block he was currently under. An IP editor has now made the same edits that were made (edit here). This edit was made by Special:Contributions/62.118.179.114, and it should be noted that he was also found to be socking on ruwiki (ru:Википедия:Заявки_на_арбитраж/Muscovite99) with 62.118.179.117 and 62.118.179.115. A further block, if not indef, is now in order here I think. --Russavia Dialogue 20:04, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Ruwiki is irrelevant, blocks are preventive and not punitive, and unlike some others here he is not disruptive in his edits, quite to the contrary. Indefblocking a productive user for evasion of a block, not a community ban, few days before its expiration, is a bad idea. He is blocked for two months now, what's the problem? This is not a venue to win content disputes forever. Colchicum (talk) 21:02, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Well I suggest you look at his block log -- blocked for 2 weeks for edit warring, then blocked for a month 2 days later for socking, then whilst blocked for a month, he is blocked for 2 months for evading that block, and now this. This is more than enough to show that he does not take blocks seriously, and hence should be indef block as a disruptive editor. Just how many concurrent blocks is an editor entitled to here on enwiki? And as blind freddy can see, the ruwiki has only been mentioned to demonstrate that this is in fact Muscovite99; and whilst what happens on ruwiki stays on ruwiki, evidence raised there as to IP's used to evade bans and engage in sockpuppeting can clearly be used and taken into account. --Russavia Dialogue 21:10, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
(ec)I have actioned the indef block, since the last sock ip edited after Fut.Perf had extended the sanction above - there seems to be no apparent desire by this editor to comply with WP policy, so there is no need for the named account to be able to contribute. I see that they use a reasonably stable range (62.118.179.11X) to sock from; is it worth contacting a CU to see what collateral damage potential there would be in placing a range block to cover these addresses? LessHeard vanU (talk) 21:12, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Disagree. I believe this is block shopping by Russavia (talk · contribs). Muscovite99 previously came to my talk page with complaints about Russavia [61]. The indefinite block is not justified taking into account the long-term animosities between these two users.Biophys (talk) 01:53, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
BTW, was the sockpuppetry confirmed by Checkuser? If not, the indefinite block is not justified.Biophys (talk) 01:55, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Honestly, what part of Wikipedia:Blocking policy, Wikipedia:Banning policy and Wikipedia:Sock puppetry don't people understand? If one is blocked, they are NOT permitted to edit WP. People are blocked not without good reason, and when one ignores this block not ONE - not TWO - but THREE times, then in my mind an indef blocked is warranted. I also find it funny, because I guarantee that if I were to have been blocked and did what Muscovite did, Biophys (joined by some others) would be the first to run here; the difference being, I am not stupid enough to even try and evade a block, and if I were that stupid I am certainly not stupid enough to make the same edits to the same article. --Russavia Dialogue 02:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
      • Take it down a notch everyone. Issue number one is that Muscovite has broken a completely seperate policy, which is the use of multiple accounts against policy. The new two month block is for that action and for no other. Don't pretend that this is about extending the edit war block. There was a new rule violation, and we need to enact a new block to prevent those rule violations. If Muscovite wants to edit again, he will stop vioalting the rules. It is that simple. Issue number two is that the blocking admin will give whatever length block he feels like. Not to be blunt about it, but there is no point in argueing over length. If Muscovite abides by his 2 month block, there will be no more problems. If he socks again, someone may or may not block the main account for longer. In any event, it is not anyones position to beg for a longer block here. He's not editing now, and that is all that matters... --Jayron32.talk.contribs 03:16, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I would clarify that I blocked indefinitely as Muscovite99 evaded his block immediately after Future Perfect had increased it. When I reviewed the block log prior to placing the sanction I found that I had previously blocked this editor for edit warring on the Putin article, and then reblocked for longer since they immediately evaded the block by socking many months ago. Several blocks later, all for edit warring on Putin or for block evading, it seems that this account has no intention of abiding by Wikipedia policy in pursuit of their singular mission to have the Putin article reflect their viewpoint. On that basis I decided that the editor had shown no effort to comply with WP policy and that they no longer had any reason to expect that they would be permitted to return as a regular editor. As such, Russavia's report was properly appropriate and I stand behind my subsequent block. If Muscovite99 wants to seriously return to the community, then they had best stop breaking its rules. LessHeard vanU (talk) 09:29, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Muscovite99 is back with yet another IP: Special:Contributions/213.221.0.102. He made this series of edits: [62], and launched a personal attack against Russavia: [63]. Offliner (talk) 15:33, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

  • If only these IP edits were really made by him. This should be supported by Checkuser. In fact, even the previous investigation was inconclusive. And we are talking about indefinite block here. Biophys (talk) 16:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I think the diffs provided here should put the matter beyond any reasonable doubt. The IPs are doing the exact same edits as Muscovite99. Given the latest personal attack by Muscovite99, it is quite disturbing that Biophys is trying do defend such horrible behaviour. Offliner (talk) 16:19, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Unfortunately, this is not obvious at all, taking into account the previous claims by Muscovite99 and Russavia. I am not judging who is right, but that could easily be done by other people if there is any truth in claims by Muscovite99.Biophys (talk) 16:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I would draw your attention to WP:MEAT, point 3. It is the basis of WP:DUCK. Even CU cannot prove two accounts are linked, but only draw conclusions. On my review of the edits, my opinion is it is likely that the ip address is Muscovite99 evading their block again (and now engaging in NPA violations). Since the account is indef blocked there is little to do except block the ip, and take into consideration these further incidents should Muscovite99 request unblocking, and consider semi-protecting Putin related articles. LessHeard vanU (talk) 22:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Drawing conclusions is also not as simple as it seems. On the basis of WP:DUCK, if the next time when, say, Russavia or Offliner get blocked, within hours a new user (an impostor, I mean) pops up making a couple of edits imitating their habits, will the block be automatically extended? And then again? And how far could this go? And will this be taken into consideration should they request unblocking? I am just curious. Have you ever heard the story of Bogorm (talk · contribs)? Colchicum (talk) 00:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The fact this IP has also taken to editing Bulgarian Exarchate, WP:DUCK would tell one that this is clearly Muscovite99. Whilst I might have agreed that a reduced (yet still lengthy block) may have been warranted, given the latest round of block evasion and attacks, I say good riddance. Plain and simple. --Russavia Dialogue 08:44, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I have also requested semi-protection of the article in question at Wikipedia:Requests_for_page_protection#Putinism_.28edit.7Ctalk.7Chistory.7Clinks.7Cwatch.7Clogs.29. --Russavia Dialogue 09:07, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I took a look with CheckUser, with the reasoning that regardless of he duckhood exhibited by the IPs, it's worth checking if he also created accounts to circumvent the blocks. I can confirm that the IPs cited above are indeed block evasion by Muscovite99. No obvious accounts sighted. Dominic·t 09:03, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Maybe need usury rules for such blocks: only so many percents may be added for block evasion. In any case, restarting the block upon evasion seems to be the maximum reasonable action; extending the blocking period for block evasion is certainly too harsh. ΔιγουρενΕμπρος! 17:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Is it appropriate for a User who is editing in the English Wikipedia to have their Talk page redirect to a page on another language Wikipedia? 216.93.215.181 (talk) 23:56, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Not according to Wikipedia:USER#What_may_I_not_have_on_my_user_page.3F. I'll remove the redirects and leave a message explaining the policy. -- Donald Albury 00:41, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Eh, I thought that was OK. Perhaps this user isn't very active on the English Wikipedia and is more active on another language Wikipedia (bit like, say, me and the French Wikipedia), although a cross-wiki redirect acts more like a soft one. x42bn6 Talk Mess 00:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Agreed. The policy reads, to me, to disallow redirecting to other pages on Wikipedia, so that people aren't confused when they try to leave a message and get redirected to some random place. Redirecting to a user talk page on another wiki so that the comments will be seen seems harmless enough to me. —bbatsell ¿? 01:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Cross-language redirects between a user's talk pages are common on several other language wikipedia. What is the harm? --Una Smith (talk) 05:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Well, soft redirects says it's discouraged! Oddly enough. I don't think it really does any harm and the redirect rule, to me, reads to prevent users from redirecting their user (and/or user talk) pages to articles in mainspace (like I think there was a case where a user whose username was similar to a celebrity redirected their userpage to said celebrity, causing lots of unnecessary drama). x42bn6 Talk Mess 16:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Daeg Faerch editing his article[edit]

Daeg admitted on a (now deleted) post on his MySpace that he was editing Wikipedia under User:75.33.204.197, which he is still doing. Should anything be done about this?--CyberGhostface (talk) 03:18, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

My take on this is that WP:COI says it's not really a problem. Is he inserting problematic edits? If not, then this isn't a real issue. We don't disallow editors writing about themselves, we just strongly discourage it. Having an underage actor's static IP address publicly available might be an issue, though... Flopsy Mopsy and Cottonmouth (talk) 09:03, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Well, a lot of the information he's adding is unsourced. Also, there's this issue with his role in the Halloween sequel. He was originally cast to reprise his role from the first film as young Michael, but was recast after some shooting because he was too big. Because of this, he keeps on adding that they might use his footage anyway because the studio still retains the rights or something.--CyberGhostface (talk) 16:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

WP:OUTING[edit]

Could somebody have a look at this? I used to edit under my real name until bogus accusations regarding my editing started appearing in my own google hits. I changed my user name and purged my old pages so that this would not happen again.

Note that my previous user-name has nothing to do with the dispute being discussed on that page and is mentioned gratuitously. This is, in my opinion, a clear-cut case of bad-faith outing. Could an admin please purge this from the page and history as soon as possible?

Cheers and thanks, pedrito - talk - 30.03.2009 06:24

It can't really be described as outing; the information (your name) was already made available by you. Ironholds (talk) 07:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC) Changed my mind; WP:OUTING should cover this sort of thing. Ironholds (talk) 13:44, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Yup. And subsequently purged when I realised what a bad idea that was... The editor in question knew that this used to be my user name and knew that I had changed it. Since my real name (or previous user name) had nothing to do with the debate, I can see no other reason for him mentioning it other than to out.
Cheers, pedrito - talk - 30.03.2009 07:43
P.S. To quote WP:OUTING, "It also applies in the case of editors who have requested a change in username, but whose old identifying marks can still be found. Edits attempting to out someone should be promptly reverted, and a request for oversight made to permanently delete the edits from Wikipedia. [..] attempted outing is grounds for an immediate block." Cheers, pedrito - talk - 30.03.2009 10:35

I have informed the powers that be (those who can delete revisions). Pedrito, there actually is a good-faith reason as to why Jaakobu made the mistake he did. There is another, well known editor, User:Pedro. The edit summary in question is "Undid revision 201429048 by Jaakobou (talk) Stop it, you're becoming a pain. Pedro, your turn next if he does it again ;}." It is very feasible to believe that Jaakobou was trying to show the connection between your account, now named User:Pedrito and the party engaged in edit-summary repartee with User:Nickhh. I agree that it was not wise, and this information should have been sent to ArbCom via e-mail as opposed to onwiki, but I do not think it was a deliberate attempt to "out" you as much as it was trying to show the source for his claim. I will drop him a note about this, and, as I have said, I have contacted the revisions deletion unit. -- Avi (talk) 17:01, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

  • I have been a tad bold and performed a "poor admins oversight" on the page. The details are no longer available in the generally accessible history. -- Avi (talk) 17:05, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Hi Avi, While I disagree with your analysis of Jaakobou's motives (after the JIDF issues, Jaakobou knew very well why I had changed my username and any cursory glance at the year-old edit history in question would have made it obvious who "Pedro" referred to -- I also call him "Nick" and not "Nickhh"), I thank you for clearing that up. Cheers, pedrito - talk - 31.03.2009 06:15
P.S. Would it be possible to get a second set of eyes on this? Cheers and thanks, pedrito - talk - 31.03.2009 15:48

Star trek online[edit]

Star Trek Online (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) Can we get some eyes on this article - I've just become aware of it in the last ten minutes and even a cursory glance suggests that either there is an off-site campaign to get certain (unsourced) information into the area or it's someone using a lot of sockpuppets. --Cameron Scott (talk) 18:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Semi is probably the best bet. Set for 24 hours for now. –xeno (talk) 19:19, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks - as best as I can determine they are pissed off over a competition to win a beta key where the winner actually run 200 words more than the rules allowed and they see the entry as being important to "get the truth out there!" and so on.. --Cameron Scott (talk) 19:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)


Frankly, I find it bewildering that you went to such lengths as to report this factual and accurate account of what transpired between the STO developers team and the community members and enforced its deletion on the strict, absolutely riduculous, in this situation, policy and standards of 'reliable sources' (official game forum is as reliable a source as it will get, it might be a petty and circumstantial matter to the exterior observer but it was a huge deal to many of the folks involved). Also, at the same time, you seem to trivialise the whole situation in which you otherwise acted over-zealously, particularly our motives behind editing the entry. What's more you got your facts wrong (you didn't research the source, i.e. the STO official website and its forums); it was a "maximum 300 word" writing contest, the STO team picked one with 609 words claiming they liked it the best and hadn't noticed it was twice the length of their own requirements. Then they tried to blame the perplexed and disappointed contestants and other community members and accused them of bad sportsmanship and as a punishment they stated that there will be no more creativity competitions. Faced with rising outrage they issued an apology and eventually, the next day, they awarded another first place to the guy who had actually abided by the rules. So it did have a happy ending. And it is all there, on the forums. I think that anyone interested in STO would be better off with knowledge of all this, even if it is trivial or insignificant in the long run. It is knowledge nonetheless, first hand. There is no vendetta here, no petty remorse. I am truly sorry that you decided to act upon this with strict, completely unnecessary, in this case, "by the book" approach. Shame, real shame, especially as one can see how much spiteful, innaccurate, fictional, unfounded stuff, that really requires attention and immediate action, there is on our dear wikipedia. GoGolan (talk) 01:33, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

"it might be a petty and circumstantial matter to the exterior observer but it was a huge deal to many of the folks involved"
Er... that'd be fancruft, right?. Lychosis T/C 03:45, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Oh dear. See, I know you didn't read the whole post of mine. Well done. GoGolan (talk) 01:35, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Let me see if I have this right: the Star Trek Online people didn't act according to the rules, and that's bad. We are acting according to the rules, and that's bad too. Would that basically be the gist here? //roux   11:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Again, please read my post before posting your oh-so-neat repartees. THank you. GoGolan (talk) 20:46, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I did. Get over it. The incident is, in your own words, trivial and meaningless. In other words, not notable. There are no third-party independent references. And again: you're bitter that they didn't follow their rules, so in return you want us to not follow ours. Guess how much it doesn't work that way. Yeah, you're butthurt that you lost the competition. We get it. That doesn't mean this belongs in Wikipedia at all. Everyone except for you is in consensus about this. Start paying attention to that. //roux   21:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

5 things:

1) Do you have any third party sources to demonstrate the notability of this incident outside the STO fanbase?

2) In what sense does this require 'attention and immediate action'?

3) Will this have any effect on the game itself, and will it matter if people don't know about it?

4) Can people find out about it without using Wikipedia?

5) Why are you bringing this to here? It's the developer's contest, they can run it however they want to. If you have an axe to grind, or feel hard done by, tell it to someone who cares. It`s highly unlikely that this little (yes, little) incident will feature prominently in the game's history.

Sarcastic ShockwaveLover (talk) 04:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

You have to remember that MMO players are a fickle bunch; a minor incident like this could result in a 5% loss in subscribership, or more. That said I don't feel it merits inclusion in the article Riffraffselbow (talk) 19:19, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Rice University residential colleges dispute becomes a Facebook cause[edit]

I have disputed the notability of individual articles for residential colleges at Rice University rather than there being a list of residences as is the practice at many universities: New York University residence halls, University of California, Berkeley student housing, List of MIT undergraduate dormitories, House System at the California Institute of Technology. I initially boldly merged these articles into the list, but a number of editors reverted on various grounds, so I began the bold, revert, discuss process in good faith. However, after the editors exhibited characteristics of ownership and conflict of interest in their discussions, I began the dispute resolution processes such as WP:3O and WP:RFC. However, it has been brought to my attention that these editors have now gone to Facebook to rally support to their side rather than engaging in consensus formation such as commenting on the RFC. The facebook group includes personal attacks such as "This guy who knows nothing about Rice has declared war on all of us through wikipedia; and unless we make the articles more professional, he will succeed." "Look at all the b.s. being shot around",

List of articles affected:

Other editors involved:

Facebook rallying support:

I'm obviously not opposed to these articles being improved, but I frankly am at wit's end with how to deal with editors who have no interest in having meaningful consensus-formation and view this as a cause to the point of recruiting meatpuppets. I don't know if page protection is in order until the RFC closes or what, but I need other editors' advice and assistance in dealing with this escalating issue. This notice was also posted at WP:EAR and WP:COIN. Madcoverboy (talk) 14:17, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Immediate admin intervention is needed because...? —kurykh 20:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Editors are engaged in WP:COI editing, recruiting meatpuppets, engaging in personal attacks on an external website, all to undermine good faith consensus formation? Madcoverboy (talk) 21:06, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
If new editors can improve these articles in line with our policies and expectations then they're welcome to do so, even if they were originally directed here by a silly, over dramatic Facebook group. It sucks that you've been singled out but I don't think it's worth worrying about unless something bad happens as it appears to be a ridiculous over reaction (and I suspect that many involved know that already). --ElKevbo (talk) 22:05, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Broadly - you are shit out of lucky, they will just edit-war to keep the articles as they like them and you'll get no support here. --Cameron Scott (talk) 22:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment Why was I listed on this incident report? I don't even have an account on Facebook. Madcoverboy, you have made an accusation with no proof or evidence - a direct violation of WP:NPA. I have participated in the discussion just as you and the other editors here. Please remove me from this incident report. Postoak (talk) 22:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Without commenting on the individual notability of the articles, many of them are stuffed with unencyclopedic crap which needs to be removed. Doing that (which I will start now) is not controversial, and should be a starting point. Black Kite 22:16, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I tried to remove unsourced trivia from Sid Richardson College but I guess not. To say an editor is SOL who reports coordinated editing patterns of meat puppets doesn't seem the best approach. Anyways, we'll see what happens I guess. --Tom (talk) 17:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Rice's "college" system is unique in American universities. They serve a dual role as residence and fraternity. Indeed, Rice students sign a contract promising not to start or join a fraternity while enrolled. Non-alumni would not necessarily be aware of this, so the confusion is easily understandable. On the other hand, the article's editors can not ignore our standards of verifiable, reliable sources for encyclopedic content. I strongly support the cleanup of these articles. I am a Rice alumni, so I'm familiar with the subject. However, as a graduate student, I was never a member of their college system, so I have no stake in any of their college-related articles. Rklawton (talk) 18:14, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

These should probably all have short articles (given wikipedia's current low bar for notability -- i'd personally prefer these to be short sub-sections of the Rice article). However, coordinated groups of WP:SPAs insisting on keeping in unsourced trivia about the "Sid Finch residential college 80s party is the wrawkingest on campus LOL" (i'm only slightly exageratting for effect) should not be tolerated. If they continue to reinsert, let's give short blocks to the SPAs, clean the articles down to what's citable, and semi-protect for a week until things settle down.Bali ultimate (talk) 18:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
It's actually not unique - there are probably several colleges in the US and a number internationally that have residential colleges, e.g. Category:Colleges of Princeton University. If the university is at all prominent then all the colleges are likely to have at least some minor notability. Wikidemon (talk) 18:25, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Rather than hashing out the notability debate here, there is an RFC on the issue of (1) how to establish the notability of individual residences at universities/colleges, (2) the notability of the residential system, (3) what to do with this content. I would encourage editors who have opinions on this matter to leave comments at the RFC rather than here. Madcoverboy (talk) 18:38, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Disruption of on-going RfC[edit]

Please, there is a now-active, ongoing RfC here on date linking. An editor, User:Pmanderson has disrupted the voting via struck text and this {disputed} tag on month-day and here too on years. Please also note that this issue had been thoroughly addressed by Ryan, the clerk, here on his talk page as well as (in depth) here on the RfC talk page. The structure of the RfC was made the way it was by Ryan’s hand in the last 12 hours. Ryan is asleep right now. I ask that PMAnderson’s disruptive edits be reverted, my counter response deleted, and that PMAnderson be blocked until Ryan can get back. Greg L (talk) 00:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

This RfC has a format widely opposed in the discussion, now archived. That format is chiefly the result of this edit-warring of GregL himself. Links follow. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:06, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
For what's it's worth, I have protested, and struck; I may respond to Greg's comments, but that's about it. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:14, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Please don't strike other user comments and leave that for an administrator to handle. Thanks, seicer | talk | contribs 01:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
They weren't his comments. GregL unilaterally inserted instructions into the poll; and they were objected to on talk by three other editors, almost immediately. They have now resurfaced, and I think editors should have their choice whether or not to follow Greg's whims. Having said so, and !voted as best I could, I am now done. Septentrionalis PMAnderson 01:23, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I strongly urge all contributors who have been involved in this dispute to not make any further modification to the RFC page. None! You have had your chance to have a say in how the RFC is conducted. If you have concerns, please voice them on the talk page and let someone who is uninvolved make any changes deemed necessary. John Vandenberg (chat) 01:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not going to edit the page, but it's untrue we have had a chance to say how the RFC is conducted. The "vote for one" section was added less than 6 hours before the lockdown, after Ryan had had second thoughts about it being appropriate; his (Ryan's) last comment on the archived talk page was that it wasn't appropriate. — Arthur Rubin (talk) 19:09, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Does this apply to anyone, or are these edits by Ohconfucius exempt?

Recommendations for how to deal with this? Septentrionalis PMAnderson 21:55, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Borderline disruption by User:WilyD[edit]

Resolved
 – Compromise reached (I hope). henriktalk 19:49, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

For about a year (hopefully) ending in February, hundreds upon hundreds of articles on bilateral relations (eg Bulgaria–Thailand relations) were created, either way too short or simply not notable, by User:Groubani and his sockpuppet User:Plumoyr. Consensus has generally been moving in favour of deleting ones where the mere existence of such relations is all that can be said about them (eg, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Laos-Romania relations). However, User:WilyD has found it fit to stand in the way of this consensus, though he has received no traction at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Albanian-Moldovan relations despite his insistence of notability there.

Some days ago, after prodding a few of these random articles, I was upset to notice WilyD had removed the prod tags, with a rather dismissive edit summary, no less: "rm silliness" - [65], [66], [67], [68], [69], [70]. Well, I was not being silly, I was being perfectly serious and I resent being accused of silliness. However, he's now ratcheted up the rhetoric: "Don't be crazy" ([71], [72]) he says while de-prodding two more ridiculous "articles". Even if he isn't actually accusing User:Yilloslime of being mentally ill, these edit summaries are inflammatory and should be policy-based, as he at least had the decency to do during this earlier spree of prod removals. We are not silly or crazy; we are simply applying common sense and doing our best to avoid flooding AfD with long and tedious deletion discussions that routinely end up in deletion.

I thought seriously of taking this to WP:WQA. However, the incivility combined with rigid defiance of increasingly clear consensus is starting to border on disruption, and so I have taken my complaint here. - Biruitorul Talk 06:55, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Have you tried discussing this with User:WilyD before bringing it here? henriktalk 08:24, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
We've met in repeated discussions, but he seems fairly impervious to my arguments. You're right, though. - Biruitorul Talk 14:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
These articles contribute more to the encyclopaedia than I could ever hope to. If people decide to lynch me over it, I know perfectly well the loss will be insignificant compared to the damage Biruitorul is raining upon the project in this area, so it can be thought of as no loss at all. WilyD 10:35, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
WilyD, no one is trying to "lynch" you; let's relax a bit. And let's pretend neither that "these articles" as a body contribute much at all (consensus says otherwise), nor that I am "raining damage" - I'm working well within the bounds of consensus. The issues here are your edit summaries and the repeated, counterproductive prod removals. Granted, you are within your rights to do the latter, but just how long are you intending to stand in the way of consensus? - Biruitorul Talk 14:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Whether the articlles in question are appropriate for this encyclopedia is a question for a different forum. But that doesn't change the fact that removing PROD tags with no other explanation than "Don't be crazy"[73][74] is inappropriate, poor wiki-etiquette, and a borderline personal attack. Yilloslime TC 15:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
While it could perhaps be expressed better, calling it a "personal attack" seems to be stretching it quite a bit. It's not really helpful to look for insults wherever one can possibly find one; it's usually more productive to discuss the issue itself and ignore any real or perceived slights unless and until they become obvious.
As for the issue itself, it does really seem to be a fairly firm consensus that not every country relation is notable from the AfDs. Deprodding when the conclusion at the AfD seems fairly given beforehand could perhaps be avoided? henriktalk 15:29, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I said it was a "borderline" personal attack, acknowledging that to call it on full on PA would be stretch.  ;-). Yilloslime TC 15:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The conclusion at AFD is far from given. The AFDs I've seen have been decided something like 50-50. Most bilateral relations are probably notable. Depending on the countries, sourcing is sometimes harder (if neither are english-speaking countries, how much their news makes it onto the internet, et cetera), but the pairings are generally notable (per WP:N, at least - there're a handful of editors who really want to see them deleted for reasons I can't puzzle out, which's skewed the AFDs) WilyD 15:36, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I searched for a bit, and only found delete afds. Would you mind sharing a few links to keeps, just for my curiosity? In any case, there doesn't seem to be a consensus that they are automatically notable, so maybe handling them on a case by case approach is the right answer (unless someone is willing to write down some kind of notability guideline). henriktalk 15:45, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Argentina–Holy See relations closed as keep, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Argentina–Singapore relations closed as no consensus, Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Canada–Mongolia relations closed as keep - I can't recall others specifically, but I think there are some. WilyD 15:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
When such a consensus exists, one might be able to ask that seriously. Many bilateral relation articles have been kept at AFD, since most bilateral relationship pairs are notable, and if someone has the time to defend them, it becomes very difficult to fool enough people into thinking they should deleted. Beyond this, I'm volunteering to help write an encyclopaedia, and aim to improve the project, this necessarily involves opposing attempts to damage/degrade it - I'm not sure why I'd just go with the flow when someone out to wreck up a bunch of the project. WilyD 15:33, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
And that's the problem right there. You're assuming people are "out to wreck up a bunch of the project," as opposed to what they see as improvement. //roux   15:38, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Err, it's pretty clear Biruitorul and whose-have-you are not hitting the wrong keys or clicking the wrong buttons. Biruitorul is very clearly taking deliberate actions to achieve a specific end, and that specific end is an enormous negative for the project. WilyD 16:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
It may result in what you perceive as a negative to the project, but your wording indicates that you think they are actively and deliberately trying to harm the project. That is precisely why this issue was brought here, your assumption that they are deliberately working against the project's aims. //roux   16:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I haven't assumed anything. It's transparently obvious the actions are being deliberately taken, and it's transparently obvious they're a large negative to the encyclopaedia. Whether they're motivated to do it because it's harmful is not something I've speculated on. WilyD 16:12, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Disingenuousness doesn't become anyone. Oh well, I should have known that anything which attempted to get you to actually look at your own actions through the eyes of others was an exercise in futility. //roux   16:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
And you're ascribing far greater powers to me than I have: I'm not "fooling" anyone into supporting deletion; my fellow editors are perfectly capable of thinking for themselves. - Biruitorul Talk 15:46, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Anybody who spends a few minutes thinking about it and a little time investigating it will find that the articles are very notable. WilyD 16:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I find that presumptuous. You find these "articles" to be "very notable"; but many others, having done their own thinking and investigating, have come to a radically different conclusion. - Biruitorul Talk 16:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Okay guys, isn't the solution to this obvious? (1) Everybody stop bickering. (2) Wily, please don't remove PRODs with inflammatory summaries. (3) Biruitorul, please don't PROD further articles of that sort, since you now know there's likely to be opposition; instead bring them to AfD directly (where many will probably end up deleted). No admin action needed. Fut.Perf. 16:25, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

  • This is probably all true. I can't think of any essay to cite that says "When everyone is irritated with everyone else, ratchet up the bickering", so unless anyone else can find it, we may have to do as Fut.Perf. suggests. WilyD 16:48, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I find WilyD's obstructionism on the most obvious of cases to be rather tendentious, but be that as it may. This thread has probably run its course. - Biruitorul Talk 16:55, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Help needed - important[edit]

Resolved
 – BLP violations have been reverted, and the reporting user has been blocked for sockpuppetry. JamieS93 18:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

This is a serious issue, needs quick response.--For you whose eyes were open wide (talk) 11:36, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

  • As I noted at the BLP noticeboard entry (linked above), all of these BLP violations (now reverted) were inserted in the last 24 hours by users with no other edits. That's odd, and it's even odder that User:For you whose eyes were open wide's first action on registering a new account was to report all of these. Seems like a checkuser might be in order. NawlinWiki (talk) 11:52, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Please add a lock to Master Exploder![edit]

Resolved
 – editor blocked. Also, wrong venue. Also, insufficient recent vandalism to justify protection. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 21:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

To prevent others from adding lyrics to this article. Can you please add a lock, thanks —Preceding unsigned comment added by Motorheadfan7707 (talkcontribs) 16:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment: Wrong place. Please report to RFPP and please remember to sign your posts by adding four tildes (~~~~) at the end. -- Alexf(talk) 17:07, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Thats it I have something to admit[edit]

Resolved
 – Wrong venue, should use {{unblock}} — neuro(talk)(review) 21:13, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Ok, i am sorry to all the admins that I broke hearts to but I'll admit this right now so I don't keep it in, I am motorhead69, you know that guy blocked indef for vandalism, you can give me a ban if you want but I think i have changed. David S. (talk) 17:11, 30 March 2009 (UTC)Motorheadfan7707

Editing patterns show this is probably true. I've blocked for block evasion, but I'll leave a note on his talk page explaining the correct way to ask for unblocking (creating a sock is not it.) Anyone who wants to unblock go right ahead; just drop me a note after the fact to let me know.--Fabrictramp | talk to me 18:30, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The second declined unblock on User talk:Motorhead69 gives good advice, David: Follow the directions at {{2nd chance}} carefully, remembering that we are looking for very substantial improvements to an article, not just spelling checks or minor changes. Remmber that you may still edit your own talkpage despite the block (unless you really screw up and we have to protect it). Tonywalton Talk 18:33, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Buaidh in a blanking rampage of redirection pages.[edit]

User:Buaidh has been doing hundreds of page blankings on a suppossed redirection endeavor. All are List-of... redirection pages. When asked to stop and explain, he answered "We have many articles being moved around" (whatever that means). User has been advised to stop and take it here for discussion. Comments? -- Alexf(talk) 17:01, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Alexf may be a wee bit deluded. The only article I've moved in the past month was within my own user area. I have no idea where these hundreds of articles I've supposedly rampaged through may be. The only work I've done today is to clean up some double redirects that have been created by other users moving articles twice. Yours aye, Buaidh (talk) 18:17, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Are you sure you've got the right username there, Alexf? (I just looked up "cromach" on Wiktionary by the way, Buiadh. That's a relief ☺) Tonywalton Talk 18:24, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm a bit slow moving about, but I get there eventually. --Buaidh (talk) 18:40, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Yes, I'm sure about the username. Please look at today's contributions for user User:Buaidh. I used AGF and did not block outright, but asked the user about the blanking behavior (actually mass replacing redirects in article space with a comment and a signature). The behavior continued and then there was some explanation which was not satisfactory. A case was opened here for him to comment. The blanking has not stopped. -- Alexf(talk) 19:14, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Buaid, Alexf did not state that you were moving articles. You were going through a number of List of some-county-related Topics articles and replacing redirects with signed comments. For future reference, that is not the way to prepare for a change, and you should never leave your signature on an article page. -- Donald Albury 18:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Mikeedisson and his sockpuppets[edit]

Resolved
 – Deleted and blocked. — neuro(talk)(review) 21:12, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Indefinitely blocked user Mikeedisson continues to recreate a deleted (through AfD procedure) article Tarek Khalil Atallah. His latest reincarnation is user Jjexport, who created an article Tarek Khlil Atallah. Beagel (talk) 17:14, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

New article deleted, current sock blocked. You may wish to wander over to get a checkuser done to see if there are any other accounts involved. Tony Fox (arf!) 17:34, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Suspension bridge[edit]

Resolved
 – Speedy closed. — neuro(talk)(review) 21:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Would someone please close Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Suspended deck bridge? Deleting that article would delete over a thousand edits over the last almost seven years. While you are at it, you can move it back to Suspension bridge, where it has been for all but 5 hours of its 7 years, but that is not as urgent. 199.125.109.126 (talk) 19:03, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Speedy closed. Further discussion should be on move, not delete.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 20:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Probable sockpuppeting at William F. Schultz[edit]

A series of single purpose accounts have been making one or two edits each to William F. Schultz, mostly of removing content that is not sourced or which they say the sources don't support (I have not yet checked that). This pattern began in December, but seems to have escaladed. User:Amnesty2009, User:JammyBear, User:Paulist, User:Bennieandthejets01, User:JAKO09, User:2008Bhutto, and User:Welch52 have all made one or two edits only to the Schultz article. Could we get some more eyes on this, please? Thoughts? Aleta Sing 13:42, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

The subject of the article appears to be still living, so WP:BLP applies. I see no problem in removing unsourced material from the article. If properly sourced material that does not violate WP:BLP is being removed, then that issue should be dealt with at Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons/Noticeboard. Sockpuppeting allegations should go to Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations. -- Donald Albury 14:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks for the suggestions. KillerChihuahua semi-protected the article. I have opened a sockpuppet case at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Amnesty2009. Aleta Sing 23:13, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

The template Template:Defunct_national_football_teams is up for deletion, and this user is trying to supress discusion by limiting it to only a few participants, and has been repeatidly hiding the Template:TFD notice on the template, that was placed their to encourage others to participate, I feel that these actions are contrary to the community nature of wikipedia Fasach Nua (talk) 20:07, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

You're kidding right? Your reputation as uncommunicative and tenditious hardly puts you in a position to be tagging Chandler for this. I note that beyond calling his edits vandalism and posting a threatening warning template you haven't made any meaningful attempt to communicate with him on this issue. Merits of this particular template aside, your inability to talk to other editors and do little more than engage in a serial edits without comments attached is helping foment this problem. Trying talking to him in a meaningful manner instead of engaging in a silent duel. You're causing your own problem. Wiggy! (talk) 20:45, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Wiggy, please don't make accusations like that without diffs to back them up please, otherwise you are just sitting on a ball of personal attacks, really. — neuro(talk)(review) 21:08, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
It's his style, always has been his style. Just have a graze through his talk page. You can't just perpetually stonewall other editors and refuse to answer legitimate pleas for help or clarification. Have a peek at my talk page here. That was my introduction to this guy and I'm not some sort of clueless newbie. That's pretty much his approach to every other editor in the place. Just a bully cloaking himself in what he perceives to be the rules. My concern is not baseless. Standing up to that kind of stuff is necessary. Wiggy! (talk) 21:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Merged from a separate section - it's the same issue. Black Kite 23:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Fasach Nua[edit]

Fasach Nua (talk · contribs) is currently vandalizing {{Defunct national football teams}} through edits like [75] and [76] just because the TfD he filed don't seem to go the way he'd like. And after that go on to harassing [77][78][79]. So I would appreciate some help. chandler · 22:24, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Is it just me feeling some deja vu here, or have we not had precisely this problem before with FN? - Arcayne (cast a spell) 23:54, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Search the Incidents archive for "Fasach" and you'll see where that deja vu feeling might be coming from. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:06, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Axmann8[edit]

Resolved
 – Ban enacted.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
Userbox discussion belongs at WP:MFD. –xeno (talk) 23:33, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I asked Axmann8 (talk · contribs) about his "This user is a proud skinhead" userbox. He compared it to other users displaying political party, "commie" and "prosecute Bush" userboxen. With the potential offensiveness, not feeling his explanation substantially adequate, and previous issues from this user, I've brought it here. Grsz11 19:17, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

My question would be whether his topic ban from politics include a ban from political content on his user page? Not sure what the answer to that is, but if it does, he is in violation and either needs to remove it or face sanctions. The Seeker 4 Talk 19:22, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I say let it go. The fact that we do allow userboxes of this sort, probably means this should be allowed. It isn't an attack, i.e. it's not a userbox that says "I hate insertgroupofpeoplehere" (though one could argue that's implied). As far as editing around him, i'd rather know that he's a proud skinhead than not know. And one needn't ever visit his userpage. The problem is we've allowed all kinds of user boxes that are upsetting to some people ("Support Israel" "Support Hamas" etc...) so until that changes, probably stuck (i think almost all these userboxes should be disallowed, but that's not current practice).Bali ultimate (talk) 19:24, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Want a substantial explanation? Here. I believe that is substantial enough. -Axmann8 (Talk) 19:25, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
You have no right to free speech here. WP:NOTFREESPEECH. However, see below. Black Kite 19:27, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
The 1st Amendment? Oh dear me, no. That's of no relevance here whatsoever. The private website wikipedia can decide to limit speech in any way it sees fit on the private website wikipedia. The 1st amendment does not address these sorts of things. You really don't know that? It's like this -- the amendment protects your right to be a "skinhead" and to publish a skinhead website, or whatever, but if you came into my house I'd immediately kick you out for spouting that racist garbage, and you would find no legal protection to remain.Bali ultimate (talk) 19:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Of course I know this. It would be nice if Wikipedia followed the supreme law of the land, though, instead of ruling out free speech on user namespaces, which is a bit oxymoronic. I am a skinhead, and proud of it. If I cannot declare it in my personal page, frankly, I'd rather not be a part of a website that refuses constitutional concepts. -Axmann8 (Talk) 19:43, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
? What part of "Congress shall make no laws..." and/or the 14th amendment makes this private website subject to restrictions put in place to diminish the power of governments? --Orange Mike | Talk 19:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Also of note is Axmann's recent agreement with the phrase "chocolate messiah". Grsz11 19:34, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Isn't he simply quoting CENSEI? --Ali'i 19:37, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Fixed. Grsz11 19:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Whilst he's being typically pointy with this one, given his previous "interesting" edits, if you take this userbox in isolation it's not technically offensive. As our article points out, skinheads are not necessarily associated with any particular viewpoint. My own opinion is that we shouldn't be wasting our time with any non-collaborative userboxes, but we've been here before. I suspect an MfD would be a waste of time. Black Kite 19:27, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I am inclined to let it go. It certainly fulfils the primary purpose of userboxes, which is to inform the reader about the editor in question :-/ SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 19:38, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec x 2) Sigh...why is it that every time we get dragged in here over a really blatantly inflammatory WP:POINTy userbox 9 times out of 10 the author is someone with mediocre contributions, a recent block log and an "axe" to grind? This is why I hate the damn things. We should be operating under a "likely to cause disruption and drama" cut off for these boxes. This box neither materially improves the encyclopedia nor aids in fostering the editing environment that is beneficial to the construction of an encyclopedia. In fact, its sole purpose appears to be a combination of soapboxing and juvenile negative attention seeking. Anyone who shows up, names himself after the Commander of the Hitler Youth and brags about being a skinhead is probably not here to edit harmoniously. Bullzeye contribs 19:42, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

He removed it once, and I myself urged him not to do so, since it's a simple declaration of a fact about him, no worse than many other userboxen out there and in fact pretty darned innocuous. --Orange Mike | Talk 19:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
It doesn't bother me at all, personally. But that doesn't mean its not a useless piece of self-aggrandizing Nazi crap. "Impeach Bush" or "commie", while polemic and potentially cause for drama, simply don't cause the same universal revulsion that advertising an affiliation with a Neo Nazi group does. Imagine trying to have an article discussion on Judaism or The Holocaust with somebody sporting that kind of an agenda on their user page. Also, it's feeding the trolls. "If I cannot declare it in my personal page, frankly, I'd rather not be a part of a website that refuses constitutional concepts." Bluster all you like, but threatening to take your ball and go home doesn't work well around here. Bullzeye contribs 20:00, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Sigh...why is it that every time we get dragged in here over a really blatantly inflammatory WP:POINTy userbox 9 times out of 10 the author is someone with mediocre contributions, a recent block log and an "axe" to grind? Selection bias. If a quiet, well-behaved editor who spent most of their time on Wikipedia copyediting and improving sources had such a userbox on their user page, what would be the chance of anyone starting an ANI thread about it? None whatsoever. But if it's a user with questionable and annoying behaviour, the userbox will be noticed by more people and provoke more outrage than it otherwise would. Reyk YO! 22:23, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

As a side, where I live, "skinhead" literally means "bald person". I guess I'm missing something.  GARDEN  19:57, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

The technical difference is whether being hairless is voluntary. Terminology is slippery. When I see something that says "proud to be a skinhead", I wonder how that differs technically from "proud to be an idiot". (As with this live-action mockup of a Gary Larson cartoon: [80]) But everyone is proud of something, ja? :) Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 23:00, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Considering the disruption that Axmann8 has created in his career, why are we being so indulgent? Tony Fox (arf!) 20:02, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
No formal community consensus that they're disruptive? SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 20:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
It's a funny little dance. Not only is he some sort of white supremacist (the Axmann name is a giveaway), but he wants to rub everyones faces in it. Why? He'd like to be blocked, to justify his rage, the feeling that the world is out to get him and is "censoring the truth." In his quixotic crusade, a block would show that he's on the right path. It would affirm him. Best just to ignore him at this point, and if his editing is disruptive (he seems to spend all his time in userspace, so who cares?) he can get blocked for behavior then (rather what he imagines is some ideological crusade at the moment).Bali ultimate (talk) 20:07, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Given that he had doubts himself and asked an admin about it and was told by Orange Mike that it was ok[81] it would not be fair to hold that userbox against him. henriktalk 20:08, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Why bother talking about the userbox? Whatever makes him just go away is what's good. We don't need editors like this. Friday (talk) 20:15, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Given that a) he's not very old, b) his conduct has improved considerably with coaching, I disagree with your assessment. henriktalk 20:17, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
His behaving like a child is the problem, not an excuse for his behavior. Friday (talk) 20:20, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I have to respectfully disagree with you henrik. I am unfamiliar with this user (this being the first day I ever saw him). I decided to review his edits outside this thread as a non-biased third party and it is a little troubling. Besides the rude comments about the Skinhead userbox and saying he will leave if he can't invoke the First Amendment, other edits like the ones on User talk:CENSEI where he stated: "All he did was call Obama a "chocolate messiah" ... which, personally, I agree 100% with" [82] , attempting to override his own topic ban with edit summaries like "Constructive, good-faith suggestion, topic ban overridden by WP:IAR". [83] and calling for the Geocaching article to have more anti-geocache opinions he likes to call "Geotrashing" [84]. And these contributions are from just today. If his conduct was worse than it is at present as you seem to imply, it's a miracle he wasn't indefblocked for whatever he did. — Moe ε 20:47, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Having followed this from the beginning, this edit is highly troubling. The strict condition of his unblocking was an agreement to stay away from such topics and blatantly violating it whilst snidely quoting WP:IAR should be grounds for immediate and lengthy reblocking. It shows complete disrespect for the community and the good faith he has been repeatedly, and perhaps over generously, shown. Mfield (Oi!) 21:09, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Hah. Yes, it's indeed a miracle he isn't indeffed (take a look at his block log). One of my motivations for trying to work with Axmann instead of just taking the easy route out and banning him is that we're creating a monoculture of editors here; those who instantly know to not express unpopular opinions and argue, those who readily grok how all our myriad of intricate policies work and how things are done here thrive, those who take longer to learn are met with a, frankly, pretty hostile environment. I think that, once in a while, we should take a chance on some users who don't fit the usual mold and see if we can help them become productive editors. Countering systematic bias isn't just to write more about non-American topics. henriktalk 21:05, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Geez, his block log is lengthy for someone who has been here for only little more than a month. He does have some productive edits outside of the ones I pointed out, where he navigates newly created articles and tags poor articles for speedy deletion. It's a start, I suppose.. I agree, there can be productive editors with alternative or unpopular opinions, but the difference between Axmann8 and those kinds of editors is being able to accept changes to articles, talk about topics civilly and cooperating with the community without pushing a particular agenda. From his block log he seems pretty intent on editing controversial articles like Ann Coulter, Neo-Nazi topics like Skinheads and the like, which is fine unless he is topic banned (which he appears he got himself a 5 month long one). Wikipedia is a pretty hostile environment indeed, but I think he is making it more hostile than it has to be. When disruption outweighs the good edits, thats when indeffing the account is needed. If he continues down this path, he will probably end up being there soon. I commend you on your willingness not to use the banhammer, henrik, but if he is going to seriously change, I recommend you use the rainbow trout firmly. :) — Moe ε 21:44, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

The only topic for which we walk people right out the door with a permanent disinvitation is pedophillia. I personally find racism offensive, however, a racist who is generally abiding by Wikipedia policy and not trying to soapbox, advocate improperly, etc. is not someone we need to push out the door.

If he's editing in a problematic manner, that's actionable, but he seems to be working with the community here. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:24, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Clearly, he's been editing in a problematic manner. Check the block log; check the concerns given above. Personally, I've already seen enough to know that nothing good can come from keeping him around. Whether we've reached the point where this is generally apparent to others is debatable. Friday (talk) 21:29, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
This blowup is entirely caused by his userbox and not any new actions he has taken. His userbox is not evidently actionable. If his userbox isn't actionable, and he's abiding by currently in force behavior restrictions from his last unblock, there's no justification for us to be doing anything about him at this time. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 21:57, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Would you block someone who states pride in being black? If the answer is no, then you're being blatantly racist against whites. -Axmann8 (Talk) 21:36, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Bogus argument. "White pride" is code for "white supremacy". It's akin to "male pride", which is code for "male supremacy". Those terms do not correspond to the concept of minority pride. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 22:12, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Proposal to Block indef[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.
Resolved
 – with an earth-shattering 'Kaboom'... HalfShadow 01:46, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I personally don't see a conscructive contributor here, and I realize I can only speak for myself, but really, his actions speak louder than words. He was topic-banned away from articles, and then he goes to blantantly violate it with the edits noted above using WP:IAR. IAR is not some kind of tool to circumvent solutions found by the community, it's not meant as a catch-all to get yourself out of any situation, it's meant to be used to improve the encyclopedia. To make bold edits, not snide remarks in violation of one's topic ban. If he can't learn to follow policy, and his own topic ban, he needs to be shown the door.— dαlus Contribs 21:31, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Oppose, considering that I originally removed the userbox, even stating that it was probably "too polemic". Then, Orangemike (an admin, mind you), advised me that it was not too polemic, and he suggested I should put it back, since it's a stark statement about the person I am (which is the purpose of userboxes). An admin giving advice to re-add the userbox, then an admin blocking me for having it, would seem highly hypocritical and a lose-lose. Also, per Henrik's statement that I am, in fact, improving. -Axmann8 (Talk) 21:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Conflict of interest. This user is the subject of the proposal. Grsz11 21:55, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I don't think a block would be for a userbox, rather, treating Wikipedia as your battleground. Grsz11 21:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Conflict of interest here as well, considering you complained about the userbox initially. Also, treating Wikipedia as my battleground? Lol. You're the one who complained initially, or that comment would have never been added. Stop trying to find loopholes to get me banned, kthx. -Axmann8 (Talk) 21:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Also, I'm waiting for someone to pull out WP:NOSKINHEADUSERBOXES or WP:NOSKINHEADS, of which I see are both redlinks. -Axmann8 (Talk) 21:57, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Yes, it's time. He won't stop grinding his axe long enough to listen to a word anyone says. It should be clear from his conduct that there's precious little chance he'll ever become a constructive contributor. Friday (talk) 21:48, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I'd like to note this user's conflict of interest, considering he's been critical of me before this proposal. -Axmann8 (Talk) 21:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I wonder why?  GARDEN  21:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • cmt axmann. You violated your topic ban. You're stirring the pot now. I advise you to either A. Apologize for violating the topic ban and promise not do so again, for any reason. Or B. Just back away from the carcass and be quiet here. Further attacks on the motives of other editors may sway more people into supporting a block of you just to get rid of the disruption. Up to you.Bali ultimate (talk) 21:54, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose, though if Axmann doesn't shut up pretty soon, he'll dig a deep enough hole that I'll change votes. I like the people who 'open their mouths and prove it', to take half an adage; those are the people who can easily be evaluated for their agendas. Axmann's on a short enough leash now, far better to have him wreck himself on actual content realted problems than this stupidity. -- ThuranX 21:55, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Ditch him. He's not worth the trouble. He's not a fabulous researcher, he has zero FAs to his credit, and if he tried to so much as fix grammar or phrasing on one of our really good articles I daresay he'd be reverted due to making the article worse, not better. In short, I believe in leeway for good contributors; I believe in more leeway for truly outstanding contributors, but this jerk? No, he gets no leeway at all. In short, Delete as antiencyclopedic. KillerChihuahua?!? 21:55, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think I've every been involved with this editor so have no COI as far as I am aware - all I see here is a timewaster, I know we have our cadre of social workers ready and willing to leap in to enable people like this but come on.. He knows he's taking the piss, we all know he's take the piss. Let's just get it over and done with. --Cameron Scott (talk) 21:56, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Reblock, but not indef Administrator henrik is willing to work with Axmann8 so his problematic behavior can be corrected. He was unblocked and given a topic ban of five months so he could continue editing Wikipedia. However, given his recent conduct and him violating the topic ban, he should be blocked for a set amount of time for violating it. Give henrik a chance to continue working with him and if he doesn't improve, then indefblock him. — Moe ε 21:57, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Where did he violate the topic ban? I don't see any article space edits which are problematic. Please provide diffs. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I believe it's these admissions: [85], [86]. "Per IAR" is a slap in the face to the admins who were willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Grsz11 22:09, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Indeed, per his own admission, he was violating his topic ban 'per WP:IAR' with the diffs above and [87]. He was topic banned from editing articles and discussion (which he agreed to) related to politics in exchange for a unblock. Why bother setting topic bans at all if the disruptive users can go and violate them willingly? Either he gets a block for violating the topic ban, or there shouldn't be any pseudo-restriction (which ultimately turns out to just be a threat) at all. — Moe ε 22:16, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Why the heck is henrik willing to waste his time? Wikipedia is not therapy, last I checked. henrik, you have better uses for your time than trying to talk sense into a neo nazi skinhead who seriously seems to think the US Constitution grants him the right to piss in our living room. KillerChihuahua?!? 22:00, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • As much as I despise polls, from his conduct in this thread and his block log longer than Gatsby (one block for every 300 edits? No thank you) I don't believe that this user will be beneficial to the project if he stays. We don't need a toddler rubbing crayons on the couch with both hands over his ears, singing "lalala" loudly.  GARDEN  22:00, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose and close - WP:IDONTLIKE objections notwithstanding, this user hasn't come anywhere near our normal threshold for community patience exhaustion. His viewpoint being offensive to many (me included) is not grounds to block or ban him. Barring specific evidence of more severe ongoing behavior problems, this ban proposal should be closed. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:06, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
    • It's not based solely on this issue.  GARDEN  22:38, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
      • There's nothing he's done in the last few days that justified more blocking, as far as I can tell. The only reason further action is being discussed is the userbox - and the userbox appears to meet our current policy. If he manages to take more disruptive actions and gets himself indef'ed and it sticks - so be it. But this call to ban him is based on ... nothing, since he was last unblocked. We don't ban people for behaving themselves after being given another chance. If he stops behaving himself I or another admin will apply appropriate sanctions up to and including a block. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:00, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
        • If your assumption on why this indef blocked is being discussed is in regards to why I brought it up, you're wrong. I did not bring it up in regards to the userbox, but in regards to his violation of his topic ban.— dαlus Contribs 23:08, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
          • Would someone please provide the diffs for what he did that violated the topic ban? People keep saying that, but I've been through his edit history and I didn't see it. Evidence, please? Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 23:22, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
            • Please see the links by myself and Grsz11 where he even self admitted it was a violation of his topic ban. [88], [89] [90] The topic ban, if you review his talk page history and his block log, is on all articles and discussions related to politics which he was the one who proposed himself in exchange for an unblock. [91]Moe ε 23:40, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose - You guys have already indef'd him twice and you keep letting him off the hook. He's under a topic ban, so...
    Enforce the topic ban already. Anything that violates it in an article, revert it on sight. And let him keep his white supremacist garbage on his page, so that there's no doubt where he's coming from. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 22:12, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
    Idef'd twice shows that he's been given two more chances, not that he's somehow immune to indefing. Your argument supports re-instituting the indef rather than not. KillerChihuahua?!? 23:49, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
    If it were me, I would have blocked him for good the first time. This episode needs to serve as an object lesson to overly-lenient admins. This guy came in here with guns blazing and a mind full of Limbaugh mush, but the youngsters running this place somehow couldn't see it. So he needs to stay on here until he's unwound enough rope to hang himself and stay hanged, i.e. so that no admin would be foolish enough to trust him again. But he's not there yet, and he shouldn't be blocked yet. And, who knows? Miracles still happen. He might wake up some morning and become productive. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:18, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I'd like to move to close this, an admin said it was ok for him to have the userbox, so that issue belongs at MFD and henrik has already addressed him about the topic ban issue which is self-imposed.xeno (talk) 23:33, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
    Object to closing. Its not the ubox. Its not even the violation of topicban, altho that's bigger than the ubox. KillerChihuahua?!? 23:36, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • (ec) Wait a While. The box is annoying, but he is allowed to have it. It's a good thing to the extent that it gives insight into his character.
I'm impressed by henrik's dedication, and I hope, sorta, that it isn't misplaced. But Axmann is going to keep getting in trouble until he (at least) 1) respects the topic ban, and avoids nibbling lagomorphically around its edges, and 2) comes to understand that all the trouble is not the result of a cabal of leftist editors drooling for his scalp, but a product of his own intransigence and churlishness.
My feeling is that there's no way he'll last five months. PhGustaf (talk) 23:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose - Move to close this, as it is leading no where, and is only wasting time. Landon1980 (talk) 23:41, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • You are under no obligation to participate further, or even to read. Kindly do not prematurely close this while others are still discussing. It is very rude. KillerChihuahua?!? 23:46, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
If you are talking to me I wouldn't dare close it, I was just rendering my opinion. You are wanting him blocked for past behavior, not how it works. Landon1980 (talk) 23:50, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
I was talking to you, and you are completely wrong about what I "want". KillerChihuahua?!? 23:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
Well its pretty obvious that its a play on Artur Axmann, but since its just Axmann8 it isn't much of a problem, (not to mention Artur Axmann has been dead for 12 years, and WP:U is only applied on living peoples names). — Moe ε 23:58, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Block, not necessarily indef. It seems odd to indef over a userbox - which is clearly some people's view of the debate here. It's also confusing to think that a user, whose indefinite block was replaced with a topic ban, would not be indef blocked again for blatantly violating that ban - which is the view that others are taking of this. I'm inclined to split the baby down the middle and issue a short-term block as a means of ban enforcement, since this editor obviously isn't respecting the ban voluntarily. IF henrik wishes to continue mentoring after the block, then that's fine. SHEFFIELDSTEELTALK 00:02, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Am I missing something here? He should have most definitely been blocked the second he violated his topic ban. The only reason he was unblocked is he voluntarily agreed to it. I think his unblock was premature to begin with, and was asking for further disruption, but he was unblocked. There are plenty of people watching him, and he if he makes so much as a single mistake he can be swiftly reblocked. I feel blocking would be rather punitive now, as he stopped violating the topic ban. Some have said it is not for the userbox, or the violation of the topic ban, so what then. Can you list some diffs (dated after his last unblock) that will reasonably justify a policy-based block, that is preventative in nature? Can we not assume good faith and give him another chance? Landon1980 (talk) 00:10, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
  • (after ec) Well clearly I'm of the "he was indef'd; indef was replaced with topic ban; he blatantly violated topic ban ergo the indef goes right back up" opinion. I see no benefit to splitting the baby, but as so many here seem to be confused about the issue, I won't object too darn much either. However, if he violates again after his last,last,last,really truly last chance, I suggest we indef. Enough already. KillerChihuahua?!? 00:15, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I agree with you more than you know. I just think that Henrik should have blocked him the second he saw he was violating his topic ban. I am reasonably sure that Axeman will inevitably land in the indef block zone though, so maybe it is better to get it over with. After all, the best predictor of the future is the past. Landon1980 (talk) 00:21, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
You've got it right. Hey, you're conservative, and you've been on here more than a year now without getting blocked. Maybe, if you're in a masochistic mood, you could visit with Axman and 'splain a few things to him. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:29, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Ignore the userboxes, they're just a smoke screen that's distracting us. He was unblocked under a condition, and he willingly violated that condition soon after. He should be blocked for a substantial time at least, probably indef. Seal the vault. Dayewalker (talk) 00:42, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Wow... Anyway, in my defense, this whole convo started over my userbox, which has already been ruled by an administrator as compliant with Wikipedia policy. I followed another policy, WP:IAR, by ignoring a rule to make a constructive edit to Wikipedia to make it more neutral, therefore I completely complied with WP:IAR, which is a policy. It states, "If a rule prevents you from improving the encyclopedia, ignore it". I did just that. I made an edit to the warning on the politics userbox page, in order to make it more neutral, therefore improving the encyclopedia. If you don't want people to follow WP:IAR, then why don't you get rid of it as a policy? I haven't violated a thing, so I am not very clear about why we are having this discussion. -Axmann8 (Talk) 01:17, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
WP:IAR is a rule for the improvement of wikipedia, not a way to get around an agreement you made with an admin to get unblocked. Dayewalker (talk) 01:22, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
What takes precedent: an admin's topic ban, or the need to make the encyclopedia a more neutral, intelligent website? It's like someone under a politics topic ban reverting a correction to a spelling mistake on a political article. Does bureaucratic policy, or the need to make this a better encyclopedia, take the front seat? -Axmann8 (Talk) 01:29, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Your topic ban takes precedence. Dayewalker (talk) 01:31, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Addendum comment to Baseball Bugs' comment about White pride: So, by your argument, "female pride"=female supremacy and "black pride"=black supremacy? Interesting. Correct me if I'm wrong, "bugs", but don't we allow "Feminist" and "Masculist" userboxes? Okay, don't correct me, because I'm not wrong. Anyway, why are people allowed to express "black pride" and "female pride" if we're not allowed to express "white pride"? I'm proud to be white, and I'm sorry if that offends anyone, but that doesn't change the fact. Blocking me would only show the persistent insecurity of the black race, which is pretty pathetic considering "they" got their President. Why is the chip on their shoulder still? I'm proud to be white, and I'm not ashamed to say it. -Axmann8 (Talk) 01:26, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Blocked indef for this comment alone. Why on earth are we still putting up with this editor? If anyone can be bothered to provide a fair unblock reason after this, feel free, but this is an encyclopedia, not a playground for racists. Black Kite 01:30, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
      • Endorse.xeno (talk) 01:33, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
      • Thanks Black Kite. Now we can all go back to what we were doing. Grsz11 01:39, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Okay, now, we can close this. HalfShadow 01:46, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I really hope no one is willing to unblock axeman in the near future, just because he tells some story as to how bias we are and how this proves it, and that he will blah blah blah ....... if unblocked. Every bit of this disruption could have been, and by all means should have been prevented. If nothing else, this is the "proof" axeman was looking for. Landon1980 (talk) 01:49, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Axmann8 late intervention[edit]

Hate to bring this up, but... When I brokered the topic ban, I deliberately did not mention talk pages as off-limits, as I had assumed he knew how to use them properly. I am indeed concerned about him invoking IAR, but I'd rather give him the best chance to work constructively. I clarified it in a thread up top, which has since been archived: The topic ban did not extend to talk pages unless he started being disruptive on them, and it doesn't apply to AN/I unless the thread he's editing applies to a political article. Apologies, my friends. If you want anyone to blame, I'm your guy. I did not speak here because I've been busy with El Machete Guerrero and the harassment of another user and haven't had the chance. Please see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive524#Allegedly Racist comments by CENSEI. -Jeremy (v^_^v Cardmaker) 19:24, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, there you have it. There is no valid example cited here of Axmann8 breaking his topic ban. He has been banned by popular acclaim, because we don't like his political views, not for doing anything wrong. Injustice writ large. Paul Beardsell (talk) 20:11, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Note I made the above comment before I saw his comment above about "blacks getting their President". I have no objection to the block given that racist comment. -Jeremy (v^_^v Cardmaker) 22:58, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I don't understand why that should be seen as an unacceptably racist comment. What WP rule has been broken? Paul Beardsell (talk) 04:55, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Disruptive editing. Check out the proposal to ban him below, as he has now started to sockpuppet in order to evade his block.— dαlus Contribs 05:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I am not arguing that he should be unbanned/unblocked. I am simply trying to impress on everyone (or anyone who will listen) that we have not gone about this in the best way, far from it. I am trying to have a discussion about the process. I believe that the charges made against Axmann8 should have been explicit, and that they should have been valid. The possibly valid charge, of disruptive editing, was made after his unwise/intemperate response to a false charge, of having an illegal userbox. I suggest that therefore he was, in some small way, provoked. Now we scrabble about looking for the reason we blocked him, as all now agree he did not break his topic block, and it appears what he is guilty of his the racist(?) remark "blacks getting their president". But I cannot find that an egregious example of any racism, one that breaks any rules. Paul Beardsell (talk) 05:16, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

(OD)PSB, this section was closed more than 24 hours ago. There was no discussion on the details from anyone else in that time because everything here was wrapped up. We don't "all agree" he didn't break his topic block, you're assuming consensus when one absolutely does not exist. You're the only one making your case that you don't understand why he was blocked.

The discussion has turned now to a permanent ban on Axmann8, as seen below. If you still want to talk about the process here, I'd suggest opening up a new thread at another point on the page, as everyone else seems to have moved on and this topic was about to be archived. Dayewalker (talk) 05:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

And the motion has passed. Hey, fourth time's the charm! Dyl@n620 12:28, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Comment on Axmann8 block[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Consensus has been reached, no need to drag this out any further.


I come to this late, not realising it was going on, and I realise that it's all labelled as resolved. But what has happened seems more than a little unfair. Having recently rubbed up against Axmann8 I understand truly how annoying he can be, but he ought not to be blocked just for being annoying. Seems to me what has happened to him is pretty close to entrapment. He puts his skinhead userbox up (and identifying as a skinhead is not against any WP rule I have seen) but someone here asks him what he means by it, he says it's a statement of a political view. We identify that as being a racist view. Once again, being a racist isn't against any WP rule I know. The seeming nail in the coffin is the "chocolate messiah" remark which is not, in itself, uncontroversially a racist remark, and not even his. [In some circles "blackboard" is seen as a racist remark for a teaching aid, but that would widely be agreed by us to be ridiculous.] Essentially Axmann8 hasn't identifiably done anything wrong on this occasion that he hasn't been pushed into by our questioning of him, and even then, I'm not sure I understand what it is specifically he has done, it's difficult to see what rule he has broken. Certainly any prohibition from political articles here cannot really include a userbox on his own page. His userbox in support Cain is political but no one is bothered by that. No, this all seems summary justice by a lynch mob. Unless you think the only lynch mobs are right wing racist ones. What I want to know is: What precisely have you blocked Axmann8 for. That plain statement of wrongdoing is missing. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:28, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

The problem, as I see it, is that he came here with a specific agenda, and he kept coming back to that agenda, because that was his reason for coming here. He repeatedly pushed the envelope to see how far he could go. He would promise not to do politics, but then would do so anyway and try to justify it based on "someone else can do it, so can I" until finally the preponderence of opinion was, "enough, already." I didn't want him blocked yet, because I'm almost certain that's what he was hoping for, in order to use it in some way to dis wikipedia further on some other venue. Of course, that's a fairly good-sized club by now, so maybe that's not important. And I can't disagree that the apparently wishy-washy responses of the admins did not help matters. But he can't use the "look what you made me do" argument. He was given plenty of chances to straighten up and fly right, and he just wouldn't or couldn't do it - because he was, at the end of the day, either a single-purpose account, or else the latest poster child for "doesn't get it". There are other conservatives here that are not blocked or topic-banned. Maybe he could have looked up to them as models of behavior. But somehow that just wasn't in the cards. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 02:50, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
This wasn't (or shouldn't have been) a discussion about his user box. He was indef blocked and agreed to stay off of political topics, then a week later he invokes WP:IAR and goes back to one. Then in the ensuing discussion, he makes an edit that indicated to Black Kite above he had no desire to get along with others, so he was blocked. He wasn't "pushed" into anything, he was the one who chose to claim IAR over his own promise to stay away from political articles. Dayewalker (talk) 02:37, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
So, you've blocked him over his conduct defending against a proposed block? What you're saying is this: The proposed block should never have been proposed as having the userbox is not against the rules. During his defence of the block-which-should-not-have-been-proposed he says something else you do not like, so you block him anyway. It's the Salem witch trial all over again. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:43, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Please take the time to read. I never proposed anything to do with his userbox, my proposal had to do with the fact that he purposely violated his topic ban.— dαlus Contribs 02:44, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Please drop the stick and move away from the horse. Axeman was blocked for being disruptive, it has nothing to do with his userbox. It was for his racist comments, and for repeatedly violating his topic ban, either of those are more than enough to justify an indef block given his block log. Landon1980 (talk) 02:57, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
You see, the two posters above do not agree why he is blocked. All I am trying to do is get a clear statement as to why it that is. A consensus. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:58, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I deny that anyone has cited edits where Axmann8 violated his topic block in article space. Daedalus has not done so in his recent post above. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:58, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

Frankly I am glad Axmann8 has gone. I want us to be clear why that is. Paul Beardsell (talk) 02:58, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

(editconflict)And I say you are are being disruptively lazy by not taking the time to read through this thread. I proposed the block in regards to his violation of his topic ban, which was cited in several diffs in the thread above the proposal. Either take the time to read all the material or don't comment.— dαlus Contribs 03:04, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Address the argument. Assume good faith. I think I have followed every ref given. I can't see anything political except HERE where we trapped him into a defence of his views. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:09, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Well then why don't you read the above threads? "I deny that anyone has cited edits where Axmann8 violated his topic block in article space" what gave you the idea the topic ban only applied to the mainspace? Here is not the place to drag this out, as consensus has been reached. Landon1980 (talk) 03:02, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
Provide the refs. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:09, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


The only consensus was "block". The reasons for the block are not consensual. Everyone deserves to have stated, plainly, what rules they broke. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:12, 27 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what your agenda is, and why you insist on dragging this out, but if you have a problem you should take it up with the blocking admin(s). The diffs you are asking for are posted multiple times in the above threads, axeman even admitted to violating it and used IAR as an excuse. You are being disruptive, take it elsewhere. Landon1980 (talk) 03:16, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I don't know what your agenda is. The silencing of dissent? My agenda is to make sure we are being seen as better than a lynch mob. The diffs are cited but they are not what those citing them say they are! Essentially there are three. One I discuss below. The other two are back here to this proposal to block. Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:23, 27 March 2009 (UTC)


This is the diff [92] where he clearly, cleanly, purposefully violated his topic ban. He's well aware of what he did. Rather than just repeatedly asking for the ref Paul, you could have looked it up yourself. It appears four times in the above discussion. Dayewalker (talk) 03:17, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
I'll quote your citation: I think the "controversies" should be on a different page, possibly as a "See Also" link. I don't believe that all of these criticisms should make up the bulk of her article. This article is about her, not her controversies. What's wrong about that? Paul Beardsell (talk) 03:23, 27 March 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Query on Axmann block[edit]

I concede his actions are certainly pushing the limits, but that is also part of the learning process to learn your limits. I agree the comments are, at least, racially tinged. I also agree with Paul Beardsell in that his reasons for a block don't seem to be clearly and explicitly delineated. Commenting about another user is not within his agreed upon topic ban. His incivility (racist comments will not be tolerated) certainly needs to be addressed, but that doesn't mean he should be indef blocked due to another unrelated matter. I also support a temporary block (a week or two) to emphasize this point. But what if this were a WP:3RR situation? Would we indef block him because he had another issue? Of course not. They are separate things. I also don't think his agreed upon topic ban explicitly included talk pages (if it did, then I am in error and a long block is in order here). The edit in question doesn't seem to be problematic in any way other than he agreed not to contribute to the article (which he didn't). This could also have simply been handled by pointing out that WP:IAR doesn't really apply to agreements made between users and politely asking the user to remove said post instead of immediately going to WP:ANI.

I would also like to unequivocally state I do not share this person's views. I find the general concepts disgusting with regard to white supremacy, but that doesn't mean he should be blocked/banned. I also agree that this appears to be a lynch mob (amazingly ironic given the context) descending on a single individual.

In short, I think the block should be for 1-2 weeks for incivility. — BQZip01 — talk 08:04, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

I'm not even sure that's necessary. We don't block just for racism. If he's going to be a productive editor than let him be a productive editor. Having a reprehensible viewpoint isn't a reason to block. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:30, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
He's not blocked solely for racism.  GARDEN  17:34, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
His civility issues would not by itself have earned him an indefinite block. Maybe a few hours at most. The racism is what is pushing that to an indefinite block and that's not ok. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:39, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Nobody is / should be punished for being a racist in their hearts. However, it is fair to adopt a zero tolerance policy for acting on racism around here, particularly in a way that belittles, incites, or threatens other editors. Racism is, along with some other ills (violence, legal threats, sexism and sex abuse, various forms of persecution) one of the more traumatic forms of victimization that one group can inflict on another. It has no place in a civilized project. Wikipedia is an egalitarian, international, cross-cultural project open to all in the world. We are all equal here, judged only by our abilities and contributions. We give a little room on the user page to express some pride in your differences, but if it ever crosses the line to making others feel intimidated, harassed, or put down because of who they are, allowing for that to fester would be a serious break-down in the function of the project.Wikidemon (talk) 17:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
With all due respect, sexism and racism are viewpoints. Legal threats and threats of violence are not viewpoints. We cannot maintain an NPOV encyclopedia if we block people solely for their viewpoints. Racism that is not directed at editors is just like any other prejudice. It shouldn't be treated any differently than a user who thinks that everyone of other religions is going to hell, for example. JoshuaZ (talk) 17:54, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
What Wikidemon and JoshuaZ said. Endorse block. Shall we WP:BAN Axmann? It's a stretch, but it's a proposal I wouldn't mind seeing. Dyl@n620 17:57, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
The problem is not so much the isolated fact of his extremist point of view, it's that it was totally consistent with the point of view he was pushing in his edits to articles. He demonstrated that he could not adhere to a topic ban - and the reason he could not adhere to it is that he was a single-purpose account - that purpose being to push his extremist point of view. Now, having said all that, I opposed the block yesterday when it was being debated, because it was not clear, and still is not clear, just precisely what it was he was being blocked for. The racism charge itself, while obviously having factual basis, was not sufficient, especially given the wishy-washy nature of the complaints about the userbox and so on. Rather than getting mad and blocking him, you all should have simply enforced the topic ban. Telling him the racist userbox was OK was a big mistake. Anything he did that violated the topic ban against politics should have been removed. End of story. His argument that he was "baited" by various users, which is a stereotypically liberal "look what you made me do" game, nonetheless has some merit to it. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 18:20, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

(OD)I endorse the block whole-heartedly. This was a twice-indef-blocked editor who couldn't keep to his topic ban for more than a week. Although I couldn't care any less about his userbox, the fact he felt so strongly about it (in the face of multiple prior bans) shows he wasn't here to get along with everyone else on a long-term basis. Lately here at ANI, we seem to be bending over backwards to offer olive branches and multiple chances to people who are only here to push their POV and create drama. Dayewalker (talk) 18:40, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Which is why I said the right answer was to strictly enforce the topic ban, to revert anything he wrote of a political nature (including any politically-related complaints on this page), and see if he had anything else to contribute, which I seriously doubt. But that approach was not taken, so he's blocked, and I don't agree with how it was handled, but unless the block is reviewed by an arbitration process, it's probably a done deal. The folks here just need to learn something from this and do better the next time one of those characters comes along. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 18:49, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
My proposal goes ahead. Dyl@n620 18:47, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

Medias del hacha[edit]

In a somewhat amusing twist, either Axman himself or an admiring troll has twice today (so far) tried to create apparent sock synonyms: Axmannate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Hombre ocho del hacha (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) (Spanish for literally "Man eight of the ax/hatchet"). Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 20:05, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

And in a possibly unintended coincidence, "hacha" is also akin to "hack". Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 20:11, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
Add Hatchetguyfed (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) to this list. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 23:15, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
I've seen Hatchetguyfed come up on WP:AIV and to be honest I don't see any evidence, apart from what may be a coincidental username (and I don't see where "fed" becomes "8"), that they're a sock. No edits at all apart from removals of sockpuppet tags from their user and talk pages. OK, I'm naïve, but isn't a checkuser called for? Tonywalton Talk 00:20, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
There's this - Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Hombre ocho del hacha - which Ched began a few hours ago. The point is, this guy either is Axmann8, or he's a troll trying to make us think he's Axmann8 - and either way, he's serving no purpose except disruption. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:25, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
And I'm a little slow, but I do catch on... "Fed" is like a synonym or cousin of "Ate", which he used earlier today as a homophone of "8". Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

::And now Hatchetguyfed (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). This guy is unbelievable. — Malik Shabazz (talk · contribs) 23:16, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

And now, there's Naxenamight (talk · contribs) to take up his cause. Dayewalker (talk) 18:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC) An interesting edit by Ax. Grsz11 00:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Boy howdy I wish I had more eyebrows to raise! //roux   00:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
And now it's 3-up, 3-down today. So far. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:58, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
And apparently the checkuser confirmed they were indeed his socks. Está pan tostado. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 10:46, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Community ban proposal[edit]

Resolved
 – Ban enacted. Ncmvocalist (talk) 11:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


For incivility, edit warring, pushing his own personal agenda, failure to abide to his topic ban, and racist attacks/threats, I believe that Axmann8 (talk · contribs · block log) has reached the community ban threshold. Thoughts before I get back to RC patrolling? Dyl@n620 18:47, 28 March 2009 (UTC)

  • Support. He's creating socks like crazy now. He has no future here. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 23:17, 28 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support. Common sense would have seen him indefed as a garden variety troll and total negative for the Project right from the start. But hey, 5 ANI threads spent feeding and caring for yet another painfully obvious troll is always good for a lol. I bet he's having it right now. Bullzeye contribs 00:15, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support. In addition to my comments above, he's now socking to disrupt and attack. Dayewalker (talk) 00:19, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Endorse ban per my nom. Dyl@n620 01:09, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support. The man is toying with us. Not once in this whole adventure has he considered, even briefly, the notion that it's mostly his fault. Given a free ride and a topic ban, he almost immediately started nibbling at the edges of the ban to see what he could get a way with. Given a helping hand, he bit it, and the next one too. Fuck him and throw him to the wolvesEase him gently yet permanently from the wikipedia environment he hates so much. PhGustaf (talk) 01:42, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Fuck him and throw him to the wolves? I wish for Axmann to be banned, not killed! :P Dyl@n620 01:50, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support Landon1980 (talk) 03:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Supportdαlus Contribs 05:01, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support - for all the reasons given PLUS uploading copyrighted images for use in his skinhead userbox. In addition, the retaliation against me for !voting to delete American College of Pediatricians in said article's AfD, by trying to have an image on my userpage deleted, and then his AfD nomination of a highly notable individual really put me off to even remotely being able to work with him on Wikipedia as it was so painfully obvious that he has an agenda against gay and lesbian related articles. All of that said to say he's obviously only here for 1 reason and it isn't to build an encyclopedia. - ALLST☆R echo 05:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support Sweet merciful heaven. I've gone to great lengths to bend over backwards for this guy, but this is too much. I think a ban is certainly appropriate here with a long-term block on the IP address as the only way to go to prevent further problems. — BQZip01 — talk 06:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose but not against a longterm block for incivility and pointy behaviour. His argument here was logically valid and nobody refuted that other than with a swift block. I'm sticking my neck out here but minority/fringe points of view of editors shouldn't be abolished from the encyclopedia as long as they are presented in a way which is in accordance to our civility policy. The issue of "white pride" is notable enough to have its own article here and the link to double standard in the "see also" section is highly relevant to what Axmann's point was. That being said, his general pattern of editing before that comment was highly disruptive and pointy and he deserves to be reprimanded for that. This community ban would be akin to saying "we don't like any of your type here" and would be reverse discrimination. A block for his long-term conduct, and not his viewpoint or his response to Baseball Bugs would be much more welcome. ThemFromSpace 06:20, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I must disagree, the very comment you linked to has "Blocking me would only show the persistent insecurity of the black race, which is pretty pathetic considering "they" got their President". That is not just advocating white pride, but attacking other races. There is nothing logical or valid about that. Chillum 06:26, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I'm not saying I agree with him but using power to silence him instead of explaining what is so erroneous about his claims isn't the way to go about dispute resolution. ThemFromSpace 06:31, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Have you ever tried to explain to a racist why racism is wrong? Have you ever succeeded in changing said racist into someone that openly welcomes other races?— dαlus Contribs 06:39, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • No, nor do I feel the need to. Different strokes, different folks. If I don't like somebody I don't become friends with them. If they continue harrassing me I call the cops; not gather a torch mob in the village square and declare a witch hunt. That's what I feel is happening here. He's already been blocked indefinitly, we don't need to go any further than that. ThemFromSpace 06:43, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support Bad behavior is one thing, but making all those socks is a strong indication this person is not willing to change. Chillum 06:23, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose because not every charge is true, and we must take care to see that justice is done and seen to be done. The socks thing is a "might as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb" behaviour, in my view, and was irrelevant to the result here, in my opinion. Paul Beardsell (talk) 07:08, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Endorse Ban Skinny87 (talk) 09:26, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I already thought they were banned. Support. Steve Crossin Talk/24 10:35, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
    • Ban and block are not the same thing. Blocks can be done or undone unilaterally. Bans and un-bans require consensus. That's one major difference, and there are others. For example, Axmann8 was already topic-banned, but was still allowed to edit otherwise, until he was indef'd recently. However, an admin could overturn that indef on a proper appeal by Axmann8. But once he's fully banned, it's a lot more permanent. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 10:43, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I would have been fine with a block, to be fair. An unblock request might have been accepted in a few months time. But he has single handedly blown this whole incident out of proportion. I can't believe he has the audacity to create all of these socks when it could be argued he hasn't done much wrong. I'm going to abstain from this discussion although it looks like he's clearly going to be banned anyway.  GARDEN  10:41, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support - regardless of race, gender, class, cultural identity or socio-political ideology, the conduct exhibited was grossly unacceptable. Ncmvocalist (talk) 10:48, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Strongly support indefinitely banning this user, especially after the blatantly racist remark they directed at myself in a private medium only two days ago. Daniel (talk) 10:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Weak Support Some say racism is a POV, others say it's a sickness. Science says, that all of mankind traces its roots back to some folks in Africa, some of whom stopped in India on their way to Australia. In order to counter the "less" sunlight, skin colours changed - and those that eventually moved even further north got even paler. As such, racism is a lack of knowledge of mankind's history, and we rarely block or ban for sheer stupidity. That said, we do block or ban for actions and activities that are detrimental to the development of an encyclopedia. Some of those actions may indeed be stupid - and stupid actions are blockable/bannable. Initially, a long block would have been the most appropriate choice based on the actions. Indeed, I feel a couple of months off might be the best choice for this editor. However, the layers of bad actions are getting too deep, and it should be clearly noted that he is not being blocked/banned for being racist, he is being blocked/banned for the additional activities contrary to good relations and contrary to building an encyclopedia, and indeed outright hostility to others, no matter what its genesis. (talk→ Bwilkins / BMW ←track) 11:06, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Endorse ban along the lines of BMW; blocking and banning for racism on its own likely detrimental to the project and its goals, but when (any) personal beliefs fuel disruptive and tendentious editing, there's no place in the community for such a person. The sockpuppetry is just the final nail in the coffin, so to speak, that push this from an issue whose remedy is temporary blocking or topic banning with mentorship into a full community ban. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 11:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Axmann8 - Email[edit]

Axmann8 has sent me this following email:

Subject: I'm not using sockpuppets.‏


I'm not sure about his statements, but they do have a point. -download | sign! 03:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Yes, the point that the socks are not at all in Axmann's style has been raised at the SPI case, which is awaiting a checkuser to clear things up. —bbatsell ¿? 03:50, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Socks or not, the place is doing fine without him. HalfShadow 03:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Note: I've copied my above post to WP:Sockpuppet investigations/Axmann8. -download | sign! 04:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Now, that e-mail is consistent with his editing style - assuming it's also genuine, of course. But this is why we need the checkuser. If it's not him, we need to find out. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 04:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Gotta love the "trash language" bit. "I'm too much of a jerk to be guilty." Yes, that's Ax, or a really good impersonator. PhGustaf (talk) 05:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
It's endorsed for CU, so just as soon as a CU gets a tuit. Mayalld (talk) 08:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I'm now fairly convinced he's not the guy creating the sockpuppets. But his capacity to make that fairly convincing argument, while at the same time deepening my belief that his POV is so strong and ridiculous (spanish a "trash language") that he could never be a productive editor here, is stunning.Bali ultimate (talk) 12:42, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Every time he speaks, it's another nail in his wikipedia coffin. He contributed nothing here as an editor, except the waste of a lot of people's time. That, at least, he has in common with the real-or-fake sockpuppets. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 12:51, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
According to a comment on the checkuser case, it is doubtful that Axman created these puppets. The question then becomes, would the ban discussion have turned out any differently? Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 13:08, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I don't see any admins stepping forward to offer another unblock. Therefore, he is de facto banned anyway. –xeno (talk) 13:14, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Unfortunately, alot of the commentary above speak of the socking as "the final nail in the coffin", or similar sentiments. It may be a bit like setting OJ free because a court clerk forgot to dot an i and cross a t, but the indef seems to have been tainted by the impostor. Tarc (talk) 13:22, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The indef block was already there, so the issue is whether the ban question should be raised again in light of the apparently fake socking. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 13:32, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Why waste our time? He's indef'd. Whether it's a block or a ban isn't important. If an admin feels the urge to unblock, then a discussion about that should be initiated. If not, we've already wasted enough kb's on this SPA. –xeno (talk) 13:42, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed. Promotion from banned to indef'd with no talk page is just fine. Good call asking for the CU, Bugs. PhGustaf (talk) 14:19, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I've boldly enacted my suggestion, removing the suspected sockpuppetry and ban notes "promoting" to indefblock'd. Again, I see no need to waste our time going over the community ban proposal again because of the poisoned well, in fact, I thought about saying "why bother" when it was originally proposed. –xeno (talk) 14:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
He said it's out of his style to sock, and yet one was found to be related to him, Nut25 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Anyone have anything to say in regards to this?— dαlus Contribs 21:52, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Who cares? Per xeno he's indeffed, it's over, drop the stick etc. //roux   00:01, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Indef can be undone pretty easily. A ban requires community consensus to undo. I say we go for the ban. It certainly had support. — BQZip01 — talk 04:14, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
I refer you to xeno's comment of 13:42, 30 March 2009 (UTC). Let's all stop wasting our time. //roux   04:25, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
(edit conflict) As xeno said, the well is poisoned. Many of the endorsements (including my own) mentioned the socking. While I understand that a CU cannot prove a negative, I think it's safe to wait until everyone's forgotten a bit about this before discussing it again. What's the harm in waiting, anyway? If Axmann is caught socking, he's considered banned. If he's unblocked and engages in disruptive behavior, we can start a new discussion. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 04:26, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Location for ban and unban discussions[edit]

Some time ago (before the ArbCom elections), I changed the header for AN and ANI to indicate that ban discussions (and presumably unban discussions as well) were better suited to take place at WP:AN, rather than ANI, on the basis that ANI is for immediate incidents that require speedy attention, and that AN is for discussion that can take longer, or may need to take longer, to reach a conclusion. However, the change had little effect. I suspect most of the ban discussions (some present on this noticeboard right now, including an unban discussion) have still taken place here. Given that some of the bans appeals that come to ArbCom (see here and here) are of community bans, and that one response by ArbCom might be to examine whether the community ban discussions took place for long enough and had adequate input, and that another response (if sufficient time had elapsed and certain conditions had been met) might be to ask the community to reconsider the ban, where would be the best place to start a discussion on the mechanisms of community bans and unbans? One question I would raise would be whether an unban discussion is an incident or not, and whether AN or ANI is best as a location. Carcharoth (talk) 01:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

It seems to me that most ban discussions arise from incidents, and become subheads of the parent thread, so anyone with an interest is going to be watching specific sections on a specific page, and won't necessarily think to look elsewhere. Conversely, unban discussions are rarely the product of a specific incident, and so probably AN is the best place. The only thing I can think of is to create WP:AN/B-UB (or similar) to centralise all ban/unban discussions. Unfortunately that doesn't much address the fact that ban discussions arise organically out of other concerns, but it does create a single place where these things can be discussed. And may also lower the drama content of such threads, due to being (hopefully) slightly less well-travelled. //roux   02:06, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Maybe someone can take a new look at WP:RFBAN and see if it can be adapted to those concerns, I agree the current method is quite unsatisfactory. MBisanz talk 02:21, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I was surprised to see that change in the header, because I think it's exactly the wrong way to go. AN/I is for specific incidents, AN for general concerns. Dealing with particular problem editors goes in the incidents category. The one thing we do not need is to divide up noticeboards further. There are already too many to keep track of, Large as this is, its easier following just one or two. DGG (talk) 02:26, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
But consider the timescale. A ban discussion can take days, and even a whole week (it certainly shouldn't be over in less time than we take to discuss, say, deletion of an article). If a ban is so obvious that it doesn't need discussion, then a block and de facto ban is a better way to deal with it than a ban discussion that takes up people's time. An incident can be dealt with in less than a day sometimes. ANI is archived rapidly. AN, not so rapidly. So where is it more logical to have the longer discussions? Here, or there? A notice can be left here, certainly, but ANI should have a rapid turnover and things should be dealt with efficiently and quickly, rather than with longer discussion (as there should be in a ban discussion). Carcharoth (talk) 02:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I wish that WP:CN was still around, as that made infinitely more sense than moving ban discussions here (since community bans are supposed to come from the entire community of editors, not just administrators), but it seems to me that anyone who watches WP:AN would watch WP:AN/I, so the distinction is largely without a difference. Is my impression incorrect? —bbatsell ¿? 02:28, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Most ban discussions may arise from incidents, but not all do. There may well be a triggering incident (the straw that broke the camel's back for the person who decided to take the step of proposing a community ban - though there should, incidentally, be consequences for frivolous or excessive failed proposals of community banning - it is not a step that should be taken lightly), but it is rare for the reason for the community ban proposal to be one single incident. A single incident shouldn't be what leads to a community ban (a single incident can lead to a block, maybe even an indefinite block and de facto ban), but rather, a range of unrepentant and unacceptable behaviour over time should be what leads to a community ban. And those that participate in a community ban discussion should be a wide representation of the community, those aware of the background, but not just those directly involved on either side of a disputed area, and there should be an agreed timescale (rather than an open-ended discussion that is closed when someone thinks consensus has been reached), and the person closing the discussion must be completely uninvolved. Oh, and the paperwork should be completed and the list kept up-to-date at Wikipedia:List of banned users. The subject of the current unban discussion doesn't seem to be listed there for some reason. Carcharoth (talk) 02:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

(ec) (big big friendly wink) Is this a suggestion that WP:CSN might not have been such a terrible suggestion? Carcharoth, you're a new arbitrator. Please search the archives for a proposal I sent in late November last year. You arbs get a substantial amount of traffic that consists of ban appeals, more by accident than by design. Appeals of community bans would be one of the simplest things for you(plural) to delegate in order to address other priorities. Intuitively, it makes sense for the people who were involved in the implementation of a ban to have a hands-on role in reviewing the ban: people who know the history don't have to be brought up to speed. If you see the proposal you'll know there's a special example I don't want to turn into a poster child, which is the only reason that solution hasn't been presented to the community at large. Warmest regards, DurovaCharge! 03:01, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Following up: there's a draft outline here. DurovaCharge! 05:36, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Curesearcher[edit]

Resolved
 – for now as a new editor learns about Wikipedia. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:51, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

New user registered, somehow creates userpage and uses edit summary on first edit [93], then proceeds to spam user talk pages [94]. Claims to be "a graduate student with the University of Colorado Boulder", and yet for a "graduate student" this comment contains multiple spelling errors and also grammatical errors. I would like to assume good faith - but would like to get others' thoughts on this. Cirt (talk) 03:25, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Looks quite fishy. Misstates the name of the university, posts a gmail address instead of a university address. Goes directly to specific user pages to request information, rather than posting to Village Pump. DurovaCharge! 03:30, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

funny...no one has contacted me through my colorado e-mail adress... just saying that may add credibility, especially if you link through your own google search rather than the link I provided.Curesearcher (talk) 03:38, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Again, another comment in all lowercase, if anything I'd think "Colorado" as a proper noun should be capitalized. Also note that the user misspells "adress" (again). Cirt (talk) 03:45, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
(copied from Curesearcher's user talk) Respectfully declining the offer. It's a bit unsettling to see this approach, particularly where people who have recent or ongoing involvement in a sensitive arbitration case appear to be preferentially targeted for no explained reason. It does not impress that the editor posts to the admin boards while failing to note that he provided a university email only after concerns arose. DurovaCharge! 03:46, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
I smell an attempt at scamming going on... --Whip it! Now whip it good! 03:51, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Alright, so maybe he's not scamming but it's definitely spamming, whether he realizes it or not. Asking users to fill out a "questionnaire", provide contact info, I don't think that's allowed on any basis around here. Maybe the user is a teenager who thinks he might be taken more seriously if he says he's from college. Or maybe he's from a rival encyclopedia. Or maybe he's a user who previously had an account that was blocked for persistent spamming, who knows, but this isn't something to be ignored, that's for sure. --Whip it! Now whip it good! 04:07, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
durova, no offence is taken at your decline. I would like to clarify the order of events in order to show that it was good faith errors on my behalf. my plan was to e-mail the editors from wikipedia, but that link disappeared from the last time I saw the user pages. so plan B was to post the survey on my user page but then I realized that posting my Colorado account e-mail was probably not the brightest thing, so I set up a g-mail account (you are not the only guys who don't want to be spammed, I am sure that you understand why I wouldn't want my Colorado e-mail on wikipedia for all to see...) for the purposes of this survey. Then I hit the random page button, and started asking users who where participating in discussions.
Some users where not random, but I have no idea about an arbitration hearing (although looking at your talk page, you are frequently involved in higher level discussions, so I assure you that it is coincidence). In casing Wikipedia a few editors discussions showed a higher proficiency in Wikipedia rules and their comments tended to steer the discussion, so I made sure to ask those editors as well. The choice however rested entirely on talk pages.
Some of the not random came from:
Scientology
Alcoholics Anonymous
Since those tend to be heated topicsCuresearcher (talk) 04:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I am sorry curt, again this feels more like everyone taking out their grammar ruler and whipping me, than anyone wanting to actually contact me and find out the truth. I don't think I have broken any Wikipedia rules...I am sorry I don't spell well (you fret at peoples spelling, I fret at people using fallacies in logic and not understanding how to critically asses their mediated politics...everyone's educational bias comes out). I do understand that in an electronic medium that bad spelling and form provide the same visual clues that dressing up in a dirty suit does in real life, and I made some mistakes...I wish people could look past that, but evidently that is not the case. again I ask you that if you are conserned about a spammer, you could contact me...if you want to use this as a forum to make an example of a poor speller...well that is what is going on...Curesearcher (talk) 04:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)


something has really been bothering me...and I figured out what it was. in good faith, I have placed my personal information on Wikipedia, including my employer, my friends names and faces, the town I live in, and enough information that anyone who logs on can find out who I am...and because I made a typo... well what??? under the guise of "he may be a spammer" I was personally slandered, had my integrity questioned not because anyone really cared, but because some editors thought it would be fun to make fun of a typo.

you could have e-mailed me but you didn't because that would have probably cleared things up and stopped what I can only call a grammar Nazi orgasm... the thing was I am not on wikipedia only as "Cu Researcher" but as my real identity...I am not hiding behind an anonymous screen name, I was personally slandered...and there was no "good faith" involved. I know I put myself out there, but I feel like you guy's fished personal information from me, then spent time making fun of me (you didn't check the e-mail, just poked at my spelling) and now what??? what are you going to do with my real identity now?Curesearcher (talk) 06:54, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

this last comment is a poor caricature of what actually happened, in writing it I was attempting to excuse myself of any wrongdoing. The truth is that I gave every editor many reasons to be suspicious, and while I may not like the result that happened, it was justified and I understand why. I am sorry for the trouble that I caused.Curesearcher (talk) 04:56, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:School and university projects (also known as WP:SUP), Wikipedia:WikiProject Classroom coordination. Post there and follow their advice and the recommendations it gives. It's intended to help students and to teachers to avoid exactly the problems that you are having now. Sorry if nobody pointed you before at those, they are not very well known. --Enric Naval (talk) 12:32, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Have a look at WP:CANVASS too. Aside from that, when someone opens a new account and straight off shows some understanding of how Wikipedia works, along with making blatant spelling mistakes whilst saying they're from an educational org, it'll stir up some worries and some editors will want to look into why this is happening. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:44, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Bear in mind, Curesearcher, that some editors have actually been targeted by phishing attempts and other problems, because of their editing. DurovaCharge! 17:18, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Yeah, that's why Curesearcher needs to go to WP:SUP and WP:WPCC and get his research "oficialized". Unfortunately, any researcher trying to investigate wikipedia has to either go through these hoops or be subjected to harassment lots of questions and proddings and being nailed with strict interpretations of policies that don't take into account the needs of their research project, and risk blocking (too long to explain here why, I ought to, for example, search the ANI thread for the last incident where a teacher asked his students to write articles here and the poor kids almost got all indef blocked for sharing their accounts instead of having one account per person, or something like that, it was decided that it was a special circumstance and WP:IAR was applied for the good of the encyclopedia, I think). The members of the wikiproject will also advice him on to avoid giving the wrong appeareance and point him to past surveys to see what methods they used. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Please avoid hyperbole. Last year, due to Wikipedia volunteer work, I was the target of genuine harassment: the FBI actually opened an investigation. It cheapens that serious term to use it loosely. It hardly constitutes harassment to question the authenticity of a new account that claims to be soliciting information from particular individuals, on behalf of a university whose name the user misspells. Given the circumstances of the initial approach, our skepticism was very reasonable. DurovaCharge! 20:58, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Enric speaks English as a second language and the French verb harasser, while cognate, means "wear down" rather than the English meaning of to harass, to torment or persecute. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:10, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Thank you for the clarification. DurovaCharge! 21:14, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks to Hans too, I struck that verb and made a more accurate description. --Enric Naval (talk) 21:49, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
No problem then. Striking through post. You write so well that I never checked to see your native language. Good faith on all sides, and best regards. DurovaCharge! 23:39, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
first off Durova, I am wondering when I misspelled Colorado...Cirt's complaint was I didn't capitalize it...but I have checked all the spellings and they appear to be correct...my complaint is that 1. you asked for valid credentials those credentials were given...including my personal identity, a verifiable e-mail address that is tied to a educational institution, My personal photograph, list of classes I teach, my office hrs. all of my friends in the department, the faculty who I learn under, my home town, and you can even find my address with a small amount of searching...and then I am placed through the ringer including a AIN (whatever this is) not because any of these things are in depute (they weren't, no one even questioned if they were valid), but because I made some typo's. why was that? you guy's came up with the following theories 1. I am a blocked spammer who has hacked into the CU e-mail system and am going to get e-mail addresses from you once you e-mail Marc Rich and I fish them off his account, 2. I am a teenager working with a school project who wants to give himself validity so he hacks into the CU system, somehow comes to the comm department homepage and places a picture and name on there and sets up a CU e-mail account to gain access to those survey results for his high school class, 3. I have some interest in a Wikipedia review and am fishing for information about your edit history and personal opinions in the form of a medium that I will not be able to tie to Wikipedia identities but I am still looking for that information for some unspoken but hostile purpose so I use my real name and e-mail account that is traceable and monitored through CU. (you guy's who spell so well didn't do well in critical thinking did you)
so...either 1. good faith, you really did question my identity and set this review up because you are trying to protect the Wikipedia community from spammers, and since you doupted that I was really who I claimed to be this investigation was justified...but if this was the case you would have questioned the credentials, or checked the e-mail address because it was a valid university e-mail (exactly what you asked for), and if you recieved a responce from me through that address it would tie a name and employer to the address which NO REAL SPAMMER WILL EVER LET HAPPEN!
2. you just don't like surveys...so why didn't you just delete the comment and move on with your life besides harass me?
3. I unknowingly violated some rules of wikipedia...but you didn't mention that in your opening e-mails, in fact you appeared to want to help out until you got my personal information and then you proceeded to harass me (no it wasn't like the FBI, just because it isn't the extreme that proves the rule doesn't make it not harassment).
so based on this, my conclusion is that some Wikipedia administrators fished my personal information (note the pleasant tone and "well we would like to help you, but we need to trust you more...will you please give us the following information") and then proceeded to employ tactics designed to hurt me personally for no other reason than you don't like people with dyslexia (another reason people have trouble spelling...but still get into grad school...there are those critical thinking skills showing up again). Curesearcher (talk) 21:27, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
striking through unjust caricature of what actually happened. I gave the community many reasons to be suspicious and shouldn't paint them out to be villains when I started the ball rollingCuresearcher (talk) 04:56, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

←Please calm down. Nobody is trying to hurt you personally. If you could take a look at some of the comments made by idiots who are trying to hurt editors personally you would see the difference - try "Then im (sic) going to fill a sack with swallows and throw it at your car while you are driving to work [so you crash]", aimed at an editor by an idiot some time ago.

The comments made about your unorthodox spelling and capitalisation meant no more than "here - this is odd". As you said yourself, "the equivalent of dressing up in a dirty suit". If you were approached in the street by someone who claimed to be a bona fide market researcher but was wearing torn jeans, a holed "I ♥ John Prescott" sweatshirt and a stained baseball hat you might feel justified in having a degree of suspicion, however much they claimed to be from Gallup, mightn't you?

As for placing your personal information, and that of other people, on here that's your choice (and a particularly bad one, if the other people aren't aware of it); if you later decide that doing so was inappropriate then following the instructions on WP:OVER might be appropriate. As you've already been told, there are channels for researchers - WP:SUP - which exist for the mutual protection of all parties. Using them would be a good idea. Regards Tonywalton Talk 21:53, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

...ok, I am not helping this at all by venting my frustration at this incident, and I am probably trying to slander some good editors who are in truth just doing what they can to help Wikipedia, and that is just unfair for them. While I still do think that there was probably a better way to go about this and get the same results (quicker I might add), that would be a personal opinion, and Curt, Dorvia, and the others know a lot more about wikipedia and its policies than I do and I should assume good faith rather than hostile intent. I am truly sorry for my comments, they were obviously designed to hurt people which is not what this is all about.
no one has done anything with my information so far (haven't checked the Craigslist M4M casual encounters section for my picture yet, but I trust it isn't there) so I shouldn't be too worried. It is funny how much more electronic debate becomes personal once it is actually you on the medium though...
in conclusion, I am sorry and will work with the wikipedia community decisions in my research.Curesearcher (talk) 22:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
What's odd about the comments Curesearcher directs at me is that either s/he hasn't read the links already provided here and at user talk, or else is deliberately ignoring them. On a previous occasion when the community in general reacted poorly to a request for information, I approached that individual in a friendly manner and offered to introduce them to site standards. Two years ago I founded WikiProject Classroom coordination. The fact is that Curesearcher's request was done in the least credible manner of any such request I observed in three and a half years of editing. If Curesearcher really is a serious graduate student, then there is a lesson in this worth taking to heart for the future: when one's approach is so weak that normally cooperative people become worried about possible phishing, then greater professionalism is advisable. DurovaCharge! 02:05, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
you know, I am really really trying to not fight anymore Durova, so I am sorry I hurt your feelings with my comments. I did deserve that last comment based on the tone of my comments up till now (in fact it was a lot less harsh than I have treated you...so I will accept it as the cost of my temper).
I actually did follow the links (have taken a lot away from those e-mails actually)you can check it out if you likeWikipedia:School and university projects# University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, Colorado (Spring 2009) and what I found out is that the Wikipedia school community isn't geared for research outside of teaching people how to edit the encyclopedia, and while I didn't really find this information prior to doing the survey, it wasn't offered either until this whole thing blew up. I think that this entire situation is why wikipedia suggests to assume good faith, to try and avoid these problems were we all get so caught up in our paranoia and conspiracy theories when we could have been helping each other out instead (that comment is directed at me as much as anyone else).Curesearcher (talk) 04:29, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Striking through in good faith. It isn't paranoia or conspiracy theorizing, though, for the most active volunteers on controversial areas to get skittish in this way. Last summer another editor and I went public after the FBI opened separate investigations into serious harassment we were both receiving (not just took reports, but opened investigation). P2PNet News ran a pretty good story about it. The two of us stepped forward publicly, but we weren't the only ones to encounter serious problems as a result of our volunteer work. Best wishes with your research; let's mark this thread resolved. DurovaCharge! 05:47, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Disagreement over YouTube links[edit]

TPTanque (talk · contribs) has added/replaced a number of links to music videos on YouTube, all posted by the account LosCangriInc, which claims to be the account of El Cartel Records. El Cartel's main artist is Daddy Yankee, and the label's website is DaddyYankee.com (and here's the label's MySpace page). The label's website links to (scroll to the bottom of the page and wait a few moments for the flash to load up) a different YouTube account, DYNATION, and the videos on the label's MySpace page are also all linked from that account, too. While the LosCangriInc account might be legitimate, there is no indication that it is. Since that's in doubt I feel that including links to those videos would be potential copyright violations. I replaced the links with ones from the DYNATION account where possible (most of them) and removed the links where no legitimate substitute could be found. I have explained this to TPTanque on my talk page but the editor has reverted my edits, accusing me of bad faith. I really don't want to get into an edit war over this. TPTanque is also guilty of spamming links to this one YouTube account. Please advise; thanks, TheJazzDalek (talk) 17:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Did you try going to the conflict of interest noticeboard? MuZemike 17:21, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I didn't really think this was a case of conflict of interest. TheJazzDalek (talk) 17:23, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
How do you know that is the labels website? It is the website of it's owner and main artist Daddy Yankee (daddyyankee.com), but how do you know it is the record labels website? The website for Daddy Yankee links to his youtube account DYNation. But I am adding the record label's account which is the first time I have come across it and it seems to only now be active. The videos on the myspace are infact linked to DYNation but this may change in the following days as it looks to be a newly active channel. Jazz says there is no proof it is legitimate, but there is also no proof it is not. And there is no proof the website or myspace are lehitimate either, but aswell there is no proof there are not legitimate. And why is this a conflict of interest? Is it because I like Daddy Yankee? TPTanque (talk) 17:40, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
From WP:COPYVIO: "media which is not available under a suitable free license, and which does not meet the non-free content criteria, should be assumed to be unacceptable"
From WP:EL: "Linking to a page that illegally distributes someone else's work sheds a bad light on Wikipedia and its editors. This is particularly relevant when linking to sites such as YouTube, where due care should be taken to avoid linking to material that violates its creator's copyright."
It is safe to assume that a YouTube account linked from an artist's official website has permission to upload those videos. A random account that you just happened to "come across" cannot be given that same benefit of the doubt when it comes to copyright. And considering that you started adding links to these videos immediately upon creating your Wikipedia account, and only a few of your edits are not related to adding links to these videos is also suspect behavior per WP:SPAM. TheJazzDalek (talk) 19:10, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

There are reasons other than just copyright questions for not providing links to YouTube, per WP:EL. Focusing solely on this one issue misses the point that we generally don't link to them at all. We do some videos, but normally only on official sites and for encyclopedic information purposes, not merely for entertainment/promotion. At any rate, if we already link to the artist's professional site and that site links to their own YouTube then we certainly don't need to provide another link to it. DreamGuy (talk) 21:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Per DreamGuy. Don't link to YouTube. Jayjg (talk) 05:06, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Even after being warned to stop by an admin, the user continues to violate policy. I'm rollbacking all his edits as blantant spam and vandalism.— dαlus Contribs 05:15, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
They are not vandalism and spam so you don't have a right to rollback my edits as such. And once they officially link it on the myspace and other such pages you should all apologise to me. TPTanque (talk) 05:19, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
You have been told by several users who have been here much longer than you that they violate our policies here. Either stop or get blocked, it's your choice.— dαlus Contribs 05:21, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Just because they said it violates policy doesn't mean it does. I assume it doesn't because Jazz is basing his edits assuming this is not the official youtube channel. But I am basing my edits assuming it is the official youtube channel. When they officially link it on the myspace and other such pages you can apologise to me. TPTanque (talk) 05:27, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I am not going off of them, I have read policy myself, I have been here longer than you, just because you, a new user here, say they do not violate policy, that does not mean the don't. We know policy much better than you, and per our policy, these links to youtube are a violation.— dαlus Contribs 05:30, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Maybe you misread. I am not saying I know policy better than you as I know nothing about policy honestly. I am saying that I don't think it violates policy as Jazz is assuming it is a copyvio. This is my argument. Please direct me to the policy then so I can inform myself. TPTanque (talk) 05:37, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
I suggest you read DreamGuy's post above, it clearly outlines the problem.— dαlus Contribs 05:45, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
No it doesn't that is why I asked you to direct me to it. He only said generally youtube videos aren't linked, which doesn't make sense to me as I have seen them linked on featured articles. Which are meant to be the best of the best to my understanding. And he mentioned that links to youtube channels shouldn't be included if they are already linked via the official website. But El Cartel Records doesn't have an official website I think. It the myspace and youtube aren't linked because there is no website to link them. TPTanque (talk) 05:53, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
TPT, the problem is that you are making the assumption that these are legitimately uploaded by the label. Wikipedia can't work like that. Linking to potential copyright violations exposes the site to liability. Until it is explicit that these are uploaded and approved by the label, we don't link. That's why we generally frown on linking to YouTube: we require evidence of legitimacy, not guesses. — The Hand That Feeds You:Bite 12:52, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

(OD) I gave TPTanque a final warning about adding links to YouTube. Jauerbackdude?/dude. 12:48, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Could an administrator...[edit]

Do something about User:Dico_Calingal, this particular user keeps readding fair use images to his userpage, despite both getting warned more than once (see his talk page). NanohaA'sYuriTalk, My master 19:52, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I have removed the images from the user page and left the user a personal message asking them to refrain from doing it again and also to refrain from uploading any more images until they have read and understood the relevant policies on copyright, licensing and fair use. Will watch also. Mfield (Oi!) 20:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
And they have been restored by 121.54.32.71 (talk · contribs), who I think is the same user. I removed them again and gave him a more final warning. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:31, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Vandalism-only account remains unblocked[edit]

Resolved
 – blocked

RohirrimRider (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log) logs in every few months and makes such constructive edits as inserting Adolph Hitler images in Pope and creating articles like Semie Durrani. Shouldn't this guy be indef-blocked so he doesn't have an autoconfirmed account to vandalize semi-protected articles when he returns again in a few months? --Enric Naval (talk) 12:32, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Blocked. Gwen Gale (talk) 12:47, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Thank you. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:18, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

April Fool's is not the comedy hour[edit]

Resolved
 – WP:BEANS to the extreme.

I've been quite disappointed by the April Fool's presentation this year. The main page today is covered with statements like "an antiques dealer came across a painting of astonishing power and compositional incompetence that had been tragically discarded" ... "has since inspired a collection of 500 masterful pieces of art so awful they prompt viewers to appeal loudly for divine intervention" ... "German scientists unearth a row of suckers belonging to an ancient order" ... "Henry Allingham of the United Kingdom credits cigarettes, whisky and wild, wild women for his seemingly impossible longevity."

It seems as if users are forgetting that April Fool's is fundamentally about fooling people into believing something that isn't true, it's not about trying to write gags. The main page today just looks like amateur comedy hour to me, it screams "JOKE!" which is the last thing one should be trying to do on April Fool's day. I hope we don't get a repetition of this sort of thing next year, but I fear this phenomenon is only going to get worse if it isn't reined in. Gatoclass (talk) 10:05, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Regardless of today's date, do you really think it is appropriate here of all places, to deliberately insert false information in the hope that our readers will believe it? C.U.T.K.D T | C 10:39, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
We certainly should never be inserting false information. Misleading information on April Fool's day is fine I think, as long as it isn't taken to extremes. Gatoclass (talk) 10:53, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
The main page to me just looks like someones attacked it with a thesaurus so it all looks okay.  rdunnPLIB  10:44, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Well since it is April 1st, I will follow all my signatures with this...

C.U.T.K.D T | C 10:51, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

poke  rdunnPLIB  10:56, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
I wish it to be known that I have become charming, delightful and tolerant of idiots. Giano (talk) 11:00, 1 April 2009 (UTC) Hhohohohohohohoho!
Giano, you always were charming and delightful, no foolin. As for that last bit? ya right. :) ++Lar: t/c 11:23, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Lighten up Gatoglass, Wikipedians have been doing this for years. And today's the special day. The Pink Phink :  Text me!  2009 11:08, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
I knew someone would accuse me of taking this too seriously. But I am not at all against having a fun April Fool's day page. I just want it to be quality fun. The current page reads like OMG APRIL FOOLS DAY JOKE EVERYONE!!! Is that how you are supposed to present an April Fool's day trick? I don't think so. Gatoclass (talk) 11:26, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
I agree, I'm quite mocking of the project at the mo, and when I saw the main page I didn't realise it was a joke, as most articles are a joke. I just thought it was another article that was !*%!.:) It's really dire looking to any outsiders who view the wiki, they don't know our level of internal silliness, presumably think we are, albeit lamely, trying to be a proper encyclopedia, and may well think like me that the featured article is just dire, rather than a deliiberate joke. Sticky Parkin 11:50, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Let me guess; you're one of those types who occasionally gets duped into thinking news reports from The Onion are real? I think the main page looks great, personally. If anyone gets fooled into thinking that it is real, or "dire looking", especially given what day it is, then they need to head to the ER for a funny bone transplant, stat. Tarc (talk) 12:33, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
I have a funny bone, but readers who don't contribute to WP might not know we are like that. It's supposed to be an encyclopedia, not a load of saddos thinking they are hilarious, having a circlejerk and laughing at their own jokes, whilst claiming to the real world, and educational facilities too, that they're attempting to write an encyclopedia.:) Sticky Parkin 12:37, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
My sentiments, exactly! — Kralizec! (talk) 14:09, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
IMHO, the notes on the main page are basically harmless fun and are patently obvious as a joke. People will take it as that given the date... FWiW Bzuk (talk) 12:44, 1 April 2009 (UTC).
Parkin, you've made your anti-Wikipedia stance abundantly clear here now, and this is starting to look more like an excuse to rail against the project that you despise (which begs the question, "why are you here?") rather than a legitimate commentary on the April 1st nature of the main page. If anyone is fooled into thinking the main page is anything but a joke, on April 1st, then the problem lies with them. There is no "in joke" that people will be running afoul of, as many other places do this sort of thing too, from Google to EGM. It is expected, it is natural, it is fun. Lighten up, Francis. Tarc (talk) 12:57, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Oh come on people, are we going to argue about a damned joke now (or is this a joke too)? Sticky Parkin just says it might give a bad impression and Gatoclass merely said that the jokes were too obvious. None of them are trying to stop the jokes or trying to take the fun out of things. Chamal :  Chat  13:05, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
The statement "I fear this phenomenon is only going to get worse if it isn't reined in" certainly seems like an attempt to stop it. Tarc (talk) 13:31, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
I so wish some of the joke articles were more clever and witty but then, I wish some mainspace articles weren't PoV jokes, either :D We do what we can. Gwen Gale (talk) 14:04, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
If you don't like the main page this year, you could always help with next year's page. :) (Personally, I very much enjoyed today's DYKs) --Fabrictramp | talk to me 14:17, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Oh, I didn't mean the DYK section. I contributed to that :b Gatoclass (talk) 14:49, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

ANI is not a general discussion forum for cabal insiders. The village pump is that way. Unfunny jokes is not an incident, no matter how you put it. --Apoc2400 (talk) 14:25, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

People! Now is not the time for joviality and shenanigans! It is time for complaints given during acute bouts of acid reflux! Mock articles and hooks at DYK on the main page will only lead to poking one's eye out with scissors. Should this pursuit of buffoonery one day a year continue, there is simply no other alternative than to start an ArbCom page, wherein the responsible parties should be banned from Wikipedia. Nay, let it not stop there. All of the Internet. Those who are expressing concern are only thinking of the children. Why doesn't anyone think of the children??? --Moni3 (talk) 14:43, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Request for deletion of Jimbo Wale's user page[edit]

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Jimbo, who is Jimbo? I though Al Gore created this ab initio with teh intertubes? Anyway, Checkuser shows that everyone below is the same editor and they will all be kickbanned and made to write "I will not hack into NewYorkBrad's computer" 1000 times on the nearest blackboard. The management :  Chat, I don't think so! 

Resolved

Now keep in mind this is an April Fool's Day joke and since other silly stuff is happening (main page gags, users copying Pedro's signature, J-delanoy is banned, Juliancolton Alternative runs for admin, etc.)‎ i'm sure it's appropriate. What do you think should Wikipedia's co-founder have a user page? The Cool Kat (talk) 01:45, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Surely this belongs over at WP:MFD? --Tango (talk) 01:54, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Done: Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Jimbo Wales. rootology :  Chat  02:04, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

proposal[edit]

Anyone posting an April Fools joke to ANI will be community banned from ANI. Unless consensus forms that the joke is particularly novel or funny. Wikidemon (talk) 02:08, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

I tried too hard? rootology :  Chat  02:10, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Wikidemon, you're headed for a ban if you continue like this :) BTW, we can delete Jimbo himself at WP:EFD. Chamal :  Chat  02:12, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Seriously, thats just stupid. CENSEI (talk) 02:25, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Does anyone here not want a community ban from ANI? NuclearWarfare :  Chat  02:42, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Speaking for the community I hereby ban all administrators from AN/I. Only uninvolved administrators may reverse this ban.Wikidemon (talk) 03:23, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
What about the Daily Fool's Day jokes? -- GarbagEcol :  Chat  04:11, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
You mean the Israel-Palestine articles? I hereby ban them too. Henceforth there will be no fighting on or off Wikipedia between Israelis and their neighbors. Wikidemon (talk) 06:27, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
That's it. Everyone posting in this thread is banned. Go now. Go. LEETSDLEIFFEHSTALK 14:10, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

User GlassCobra hijacked?[edit]

Resolved
 – Blocked as ban-evading sockpuppet of LaraLove aka Jenna. –xeno (talk) 13:19, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

I do not know if GlassCobra (talk · contribs) has been hijacked or simply does not understand what April 1st is about but I believe someone should intervene. --Friendly Neighbour (talk) 13:06, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

What's wrong? He's posting the message "I love you all" to a load of user talk pages, but it's not hurting anybody (although a bit weird). Chamal :  Chat  13:15, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Why is it weird? I luv u. :D GlassCobra 13:32, 1 April 2009 (UTC)
Wrong holiday. That was February 14. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 13:45, 1 April 2009 (UTC)

Ban review for Guido den Broeder[edit]

Resolved

Being bold and closing this per WP:SNOW. It would take a groundswell of 20 or 30 supports to change the outcome of consensus, and with this type of discussion that is very unlikely to happen. It would be a very good thing on all sides if a more orderly process existed for reviewing community bans: banned editors want to know how to return to good standing, arbitrators have other duties, and the community doesn't like to get ambushed with these things. What we call drama is often another name for disorganization. Two months ago Wikipedia:Standard offer became a first step away from our current norm of simmering chaos. Since the Committee has had proposals to reform community ban reviews for at least four months and has not acted upon any of them, the community can take initiative. Editors, administrators, and arbitrators who wish to move forward productively and collaboratively are welcome at my user talk page. DurovaCharge! 02:35, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I have reverted his user talk page to the previous state, and reprotected it, so that we are back at the situation before this section started. Fram (talk) 13:33, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Guido gave some answers to comments in this thread, those answers can be read here (perm. link to pre-blanked user talkpage). --Dirk Beetstra T C 15:45, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.


Guido den Broeder was community banned in December 2008 and his user talk page was protected. Generally in this situation editors direct their appeals to the Arbitration Committee. He has done so, and apparently has been having difficulty getting a response. A similar situation happened late last year with another editor (banned, not getting replies from the Committee), and the fellow made a quiet and successful return after community discussion. Not certain whether we can duplicate that success, but opening discussion.

Guido asked me to post the following statement on his behalf:

"In December, I was community-banned after a discussion on AN/I. The procedure did not satisfy the criteria recently suggested by ArbCom member Carcharoth at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Administrators%27_noticeboard/Incidents#Location_for_ban_and_unban_discussions. It was cut short, and users that were working with me did not got the chance to participate, so certainly the community was not widely represented; there were mostly passers-by. As a consequence, both an essay that I wrote and my block log got misinterpreted, and calls for evidence remained unanswered.

The ArbCom has subsequently promised me a ban review after 3 months if I would show good editing on another project. When I met their criteria on nl:Wikibooks (as well as on various non-foundation projects) I asked for this review. Unfortunately, it seems that the ArbCom is currently tied up, and they did not respond to my request.

Since December, many users that have worked with me expressed their disagreement with my ban when they found out. Administrator Seicer has apologized to me for repeatedly blanking my user page. My essay has sat at meta without complaints for all this time.

I repeat here what I said to the ArbCom: I will not try to break or circumvent any restriction that is imposed as a condition to my unbanning. My goal is to collaborate constructively with other good-faith users. I do not expect to have many dealings with the users that banned me, since they contribute to entirely different sections of Wikipedia, but if I do meet them, I will do my best to get along.

I believe that I have always acted with the good of the project in mind, even while I criticize the way it is set up. I fully intend to continue thus, as I do on various other projects to everyone's satisfaction. If there are any remaining concerns, I suggest to put me on probation, monitored by former administrator Durova if she is willing, and restrict me to 0RR during that time."

These are the other WMF projects where he is active:

He is in good standing with a clean block log on three of those projects; at Dutch Wikipedia his record would charitably be described as spotty. Due to unrelated considerations I would request that another Wikipedian step forward as official mentor, although I would gladly asssist that mentor if the need arises. Guido den Broeder and I have had no contact before this week, and I was uninvolved in the disputes that led to his siteban. Submitting for discussion and consideration. DurovaCharge! 21:45, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

I've asked for an Arbitration Committee member to comment here, because I know for a fact that his unban requests (he sent quite a few) were received and discussed by the Arbitration Committee. --Deskana (talk) 21:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
He sent me copies of those emails. This came to my attention a few days ago because he was petitioning the unblock IRC channel for a hearing. Reminded me of a specific instance that I was involved in last October-November; while the community's unblock discussion was ongoing an administrator in good standing stepped forward to announce that he had been advising that other editor through seven months of attempted ArbCom appeals: four different arbitrators and a clerk had each responded with initially positive signs, then failed to follow up. The community unbanned the other fellow in three days and I gave him a resilient barnstar recently for a drama-free return. Was a bit concerned a similar problem might be brewing here. So since he appears to have satisfied the conditions set by the Committee (and my own standard request), it seems reasonable to take it back here. The community doesn't need the Committee's permisson to review the community's own bans. DurovaCharge! 21:57, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
A few more thoughts on the prior instance: it was quite an unpleasant surprise to discover the Committee had let a valid request slip through the cracks for over half a year, and although I promptly submitted a proposal to prevent such things from happening again, the Committee has apparently taken no action to remedy that problem. A problem obviously does exist: at least two arbitrators had drafted similar proposals, neither of which have been implemented. The only reason I didn't take my proposal directly to the community was because I didn't want to make a poster child of that individual, who had been through the mill already. Now I don't know whether Guido's request is equally meritorious, but he does deserve a hearing. DurovaCharge! 22:06, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Excuse me, Durova, but you are being quite inaccurate in your assessment of the situation. His request did not "fall through the cracks", it was responded — several times — in the affirmative, with a topic ban. That Guido chose to dispute and refuse that condition does not mean that he was not replied to promptly. He did not get "no answer", he got a "no" answer. — Coren (talk) 22:37, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
The above description refers to this person and is quite accurate. He did indeed fall through the cracks for one month that I observed directly, and others independently confirmed the rest. He approached me on October 20, 2008--very politely. I promptly wrote to the Committee in support of his request, got a request for details from one arbitrator, and followed up immediately with the requested information. Exactly one month later that editor followed up with me: nothing had happened. Since I was the original blocking administrator in that case, if any one of the five people who were supposedly reviewing his case had looked into it seriously at all, it is reasonable to suppose they would have contacted me. None did; shall I also post their usernames? Check your facts, sir, before you accuse me of misrepresentation.Thank you, Coren. :) DurovaCharge! 22:55, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I had not noticed the shift in subject; "this user", when discussing a specific user, is inherently ambiguous when you mean some other user than the one under discussion. At any rate, I did not "accuse" you of misrepresentation but simply stated that your assessment of the situation (if it was Guido's) would have been inaccurate— which it would have been. — Coren (talk) 23:02, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Durova, I do not believe Coren is disputing what you are saying about Bus stop, but he is disputing what Guido has said about his case, and I can confirm what Coren is saying regarding that is accurate. --Deskana (talk) 22:59, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
If Guido has misrepresented the sequence of events then I withdraw support for his appeal. DurovaCharge! 23:01, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • (edit conflict) Support unban - Per Guido's voluntary probation and mentorship. I firmly trust Durova's judgment (and STRONGLY think that she should be resysopped, if not made an arbitrator or bureaucrat); if she's standing for Guido, then so am I. (Although, I will admit that if I had participated in the ban discussion, I would have endorsed a ban.) Just please, Guido, drop the social experiment. Dyl@n620 22:08, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Should be noted that Durova doesn't appear to take a firm position on the question of unbanning Guido, more that the process of appealing to ArbCom is flawed and she would like a community re-review of the prior ban. It does seem like this ArbCom is as swamped as the last one, but they've been making some good strides in improving workload management and perhaps this will inspire them to take steps on Guido's request to them.
What I would like to see from Guido is some allocution to what led to his December ban. His request makes no mention of his actions that lead to it, and without some admission that his conduct played a role I'm not sure a probation agreement will really cut it. Avruch T 22:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Just a comment - I would hardly call his record at nl.wiki "spotty" - [95]. Black Kite 22:20, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Would someone unprotect Guido's user talk please so that he can respond to the questions that are being posed here? DurovaCharge! 22:34, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
    • That much I'm prepared to do (and have). I also have serious reservations about the "spotty" record on nl, though. Tonywalton Talk 22:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
      • Could be charitably described as... is normally prelude to understatement. I share your concerns, of course. But if what he's told me is honest and he hasn't socked or anything else, then this does fall within the realm of reasonable discussion. It's been three months since the ban, not three weeks, and he's done what he's been asked to do. DurovaCharge! 22:45, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
        • Actually, you accidentally unprotected the user page, and not the talk page (presumably because you didn't notice the redirect). Fix't. — Coren (talk) 22:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

Clarification on "not getting replies from the Committee" this is not true. He got a response, a "No" response, which is different from "no response" and kept submitting repeated and frequent emails as that is not what he wanted to hear. RlevseTalk 22:42, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

May I ask how recently that was? He led me to understand that he was instructed to make positive contributions to another wiki, so he joined Dutch Wikibooks. DurovaCharge! 22:47, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Less than a month ago, although there is a more recent email from him (4 days or so) which may not have been answered yet. — Coren (talk) 22:56, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Is it not true that he was asked to contribute constructively to a WMF site where his editing privileges had not been restricted, and asked to wait three months from the time of his ban? When I approached him I told him the one thing that was absolutely necessary was for him to be totally honest with me, and if he hasn't then we can mark this thread resolved. DurovaCharge! 23:00, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
I really would not consider 134 edits to prove he has reformed from his problems on enwiki, maybe 1,034 edits would be more convincing, but I have about 120 edits on Wikisource from fixing broken redirects alone. MBisanz talk 23:04, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
That, indeed, is one of the conditions (there was also the alternative of waiting six months overall instead). I don't think there were misrepresentations more than partial disclosure. — Coren (talk) 23:06, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
Well, what I advised him was to be totally forthcoming and anticipate any possible objections to his return. Also that the longer he waits without taking an appeal live, the better his chances that it would meet acceptance. An unsuccessful ban review would likely push the timetable back for an eventual return. So it looks like we can let this run until the community has spoken. DurovaCharge! 23:15, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • I participated off and on in some of the discussions surrounding this user, so I'm not really a fresh set of eyes. In my opinion this was a classic case of exhausting community patience. He was on an apparent crusade to get the Truth out about a few issues and when stymied by unpleasant restrictions like UNDUE and RS, proceeded to wikilawyer endlessly, causing avocational editors to abandon his preferred stomping grounds over time. I don't think that he should be unbanned. Protonk (talk) 22:49, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
(ec) I agree with Protonk. I ran into him once and had pretty much the same experience: a lot of WP:IDHT. From what Rlevse is saying, that personality hasn't changed. I didn't have much experience with him, though, and I can be unpleasant at times as well, so my opinion may not carry much weight. SDY (talk) 23:05, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose unban. This user has been contentious on more than one wiki. Why should we believe he will change here? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 22:58, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. GdB's entire career at en.wiki was an obnoxious breaching experiment (c.f. User:Guido den Broeder/Wikipedia, the Social Experiment), if he himself is to be believed. Not to mention his repeated legal threats. Skinwalker (talk) 23:11, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Guido's entire MO was far too contentious for Wikipedia. Additionally, his insistence that anything provocative, pointy, or just plain wrong was due to the experiment he was conducting failed to be convincing, especially after it was repeated several times. Hermione1980 23:39, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. Let him go conduct his experiments somewhere else. Like maybe conservapedia. That could prove interesting. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 00:01, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
    Not really. They would just summarily block him and move on with no further discussion. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 01:30, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
    Or shoot him. They all have guns over there. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 16:23, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Comment. Here is a quote from Guido's previous ban appeal: I am however not aware of having caused any kind of disruption and have seen no evidence to substantiate such a claim. On the contrary, I believe that I have been extremely patient with users that have incessantly harassed and stalked me and purposely keep adding false information to medical articles to promote their opinion that a whole range of neurological diseases don't really exist or are psychosomatic in nature. If he still believes these claims, as I think he does, he needs to remain banned or the disruption will resume. Looie496 (talk) 00:12, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Support unban: In all honesty, we've given unbans for conditionally releases that were less than what Guido is offering. If unban is not supported at this time, then I would like the community to review within a few months time. seicer | talk | contribs 00:44, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
    What about his breaching experiment? Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 01:30, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose I know nothing about this fellow, have never crossed paths with him, but have now looked at the history, the lies, the evasions, the failures to own up, the game playing, the disruption, the apparent deceptive claims in regards to Arbcom's responsiveness to him, and can't see any possible good that could come by unblocking him and a great deal of harm.Bali ultimate (talk) 01:41, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Keep banned - No evidence of a change of heart. Shot info (talk) 01:46, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose Guido den Broeder claimed to be using Wikipedia to conduct some type of social experiment, this is seriously disruptive behavior and he has yet to acknowledge this issue in any way. --Leivick (talk) 02:04, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
  • Oppose. We're an encyclopedia, not a bunch of lab rats in a cage. Ironholds (talk) 02:09, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Vegetarianism and Sikhism[edit]

talk to me 15:17, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
 – wrong venue, and not within policy anyways--Fabrictramp

Hi, Could I request that this page be stopped from editing while the mediation cabal is underway?--Sikh-history (talk) 09:27, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, but there is no reason within the protection policy to do so. Also, please make future requests at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection. Regards SoWhy 10:52, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Important template broken and protected[edit]

Resolved

Template:By whom was broken and protected immediately afterwards. Would an admin please revert quickly. See the long redlinks on List of common misconceptions for an example of the problem. --Hans Adler (talk) 15:48, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

I've reverted the edit (and maintained the protection). I've put a message on Rich's talkpage about it. Tonywalton Talk 16:11, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Thanks a lot. --Hans Adler (talk) 16:13, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Block of Jjcenterprises[edit]

  • After well over a year of inactivity this User:Jjcenterprises has done nothing but wage wars on the Mercedes and Rear End articles. JJ and his anon address have done nothing but vandalize both articles and he still continues to put a grossly oversized image of the album cover on the article when a much smaller one already exists. I'm calling for a block of both Jjcenterprises and his anon address and a speedy deletion of the image. Live and Die 4 Hip Hop (talk) 02:13, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
With a username like that, and this file summary, it seems that this is at least a role account. However, the edits do not seem to be vandalism by our definition- "any addition, removal, or change of content made in a deliberate attempt to compromise the integrity of Wikipedia" (c.f. WP:VAN). While there may be WP:OWN or WP:PROMOTION issues, I don't think an immediate block is necessary. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 02:26, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
While considering what to do, you may want to take note that the purported "CD cover" that he claims to have designed himself for the release isn't a CD cover. That 4x3 ratio screams "desktop wallpaper". CDs are square.—Kww(talk) 03:49, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
It looks square here. [96][97] What you're seeing at 4x3 is the typical way pictures look on a TV or laptop screen that attempts to fill in the picture by stretching it. What kind of gave it away was that the Parental Advisory sticker looked a bit broader than normal. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 05:26, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
It's still too high res for fair use though, it should be 300 pixels or so to limit adequate reproduction. Mfield (Oi!) 05:31, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
True. The quality of the second of the two items I linked to, would be more like it. Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots 06:17, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
I hadn't seen the smaller ones. File:Mercedes_CD.jpg was uploaded at 1024x768, and there's an 800x600 version laying around somewhere, too. The small one may well be a CD cover scan, but the large one isn't.—Kww(talk) 13:08, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
An anon reverted the image on Rear End. It may need to be deleted. Who then was a gentleman? (talk) 06:36, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Looks like the deletion's been handled. Judging from said anon's edit summary (partially in terms of grammar), it's probably someone related to JJC. It's also geographically close to the other anons involved in the article. Might merit semi-protection if it keeps up. —/Mendaliv//Δ's/ 20:23, 31 March 2009 (UTC)
Semi protected it for a while to remove the reason to upload copyrighted imagery without a compatible license. Mfield (Oi!) 20:31, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Bombing of Bremen in World War II[edit]

Resolved
 – as you requested...

There is a slow revert war taking place on Bombing of Bremen in World War II with one party not taking part in a conversation on the talk page, even though the editor has been asked to do so on their talk page.[98] Can an administrator please protect the page until a consensus is reached on the talk page. --PBS (talk) 19:46, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Fully protected for a period of 1 month, after which the page will be automatically unprotected.--Jayron32.talk.contribs 20:28, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

User:Roux 's verbal attacks and threat[edit]

Resolved
 – Caspian blue blocked 24 hrs Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 01:19, 1 April 2009 (UTC). Roux blocked 12 hours Prodego talk 02:23, 1 April 2009 (UTC)