Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive228

Creation of page

Resolved

 – — Joseph Fox 10:56, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi could you create MediaWiki:abusefilter-warning-AFC-wrong-title and put inside text from http://test.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Petrb/message2? Petrb (talk) 09:36, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done — Joseph Fox 10:56, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Vensatry234

I really have problems with this user, he is certainly angry because I listed the page he created at AfD. I did that with a reason: no relevant sign of notability. However, he started fighting with me (and even threatening me that I will be blocked), I just ignored that, and gave him friendly advice to come down. He constantly removes AfD tag, admins please tell me what to do! Alex ^{discussion ★} 12:00, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I am attempting to set him right. If it's any comfort, he's now yelling at me instead :( Favonian (talk) 12:16, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I just saw this ANI after already reaching out to them ... they need a lot of guidance apparently (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:24, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

I have unfortunately provided them a 24hr break from the project while they read, and we clean up the carnage. Aleksa ... if there are more issues, either let me know or bring this to WP:ANI ... and don't forget to notify the other editor whenever they are brought to AN or ANI (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 13:04, 15 October 2011 (UTC)

Don't bother, he's  Confirmed as indefinitely blocked user Padmalakshmisx (talk · contribs), along with about a dozen others which have just been discovered and blocked. –MuZemike 17:30, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Unprotection request - review

I'm not familiar with the situation here, and the protecting admin apparently hadn't responded, could another admin that might have some familiarity with this area take a look at the request to unprotect Genetics and archaeogenetics of South Asia made here. Thanks! Skier Dude (talk) 20:01, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:RFUP?? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:42, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Whitelisting of article titles written in Thai alphabet

Why article titles written in Thai alphabet being SALTed? This would likely create them as redirects. Thai + Thai article titles are not constituted as mixed script. --Kungfu2187 (talk) 04:29, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I would request creating these articles as redirects:

เพลงชาติ/เพลงชาติไทย redirects to Thai National Anthem

เซเลน่า โกเมซ (link) redirects to Selena Gomez (In some Thai-language channels, "เซเลน่า โกเมซ" is used aside from using Selena Gomez name in Latin.)

กองทัพบกไทย redirects to Royal Thai Army

กองทัพไทย redirects to Royal Thai Armed Forces

กองทัพเรือ, ราชนาวี redirects to Royal Thai Navy

เดมี่ โลวาโต้ (link) redirects to Demi Lovato (In some Thai-language channels, "เดมี่ โลวาโต้" is used aside from using the name in Latin.)

ยิ่งลักษณ์ ชินวัตร redirects to Yingluck Shinawatra

กองทัพอากาศไทย redirects to Royal Thai Air Force

Thank you.

Since this is English Wikipedia, and English is written with the Latin alphabet, why would be the reason for us to have redirects in another language, written in another script? Should we have redirects in every other language here? Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:01, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I have to imagine this has been discussed before, but the most recent thing I can find is this essay. I wonder if there's more current guidance on this? 28bytes (talk) 05:06, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

We commonly create redirects from the official name of a non-English entity to the English title when the page is at that title. For example, someone might encounter that title and search for it, not knowing what it means; if we have it as a redirect, that person will go directly to the correct page instead of having to wander around for a while. Nyttend backup (talk) 05:58, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Not really guidance, but Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2011 January 30#13 Април dealt with the same issue relatively recently. Anomie⚔ 01:59, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I know redirects are cheap, but this seems a pretty silly idea, that people would come to English Wikipedia and expect the search engine to support foreign language inputs. Rather, aren't they better off going to the Wikipedia in that language, and using the Interwiki link? Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:02, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

The consensus seems to be: if the language of the redirect has a strong tie to the target page, it's OK, otherwise not. E.g. a Thai redirect to Thai National Anthem would be fine, a Thai redirect to Selena Gomez, not so much. This seems like a reasonable balance to me. 28bytes (talk) 06:25, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Not unreasonable at all, but (IMHO), still somewhat silly. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:32, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I've left a message at MediaWiki talk:Titleblacklist about this. The blacklist allowed me to create เพลงชาติ with my non-admin account, but not เพลงชาติไทย. 28bytes (talk) 06:46, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

A bunch of really random Selena Gomez redirects were recently deleted at RfD here (Lao, Arabic, and Tamil, among many other languages); they were created at AfC/R, and the only one that wasn't was the Thai one. This might explain what happened. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 05:00, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I think these are just inadvertent blacklist victims, not salted... I've asked User:NawlinWiki to take a look since an NW edit is what blacklisted these. 28bytes (talk) 06:25, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Sockpuppet query

I am just wondering, is it worth opening\reopening a SPI case if those suspected sockpuppets have not edited in over two years? Simply south...... playing tunes for 5 years 19:13, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I would say no because the result will be stale. But if the sockmaster or its associate puppets become active again then list out the entire list (including those that aren't active). OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 19:30, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Sure, while it will acheive nothing in terms of improving the encyclopedia, it'll give at least a few editors a laugh. And isn't that what's really important? Egg Centric 19:31, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

A checkuser would be stale, yes; but at least the behavioral evidence can be better scrutinized by some more experienced eyes, no? --64.85.216.116 (talk) 01:24, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

It really depends on how serious the misbehavior is. If someone was banned three years ago, and now there is a newly registered editor who is behaving himself or herself and editing properly and avoiding the behaviors that he or she got banned for, it sometimes may not be worthwhile to spend a lot of time and effort worrying about whether the two users are the same or not. If the editor is seriously misbehaving again, then it may be more worth people's time to make the connection so that everything can be taken into context. But it should always be remembered (including by me) that the whole back-office apparatus of SSI, ANI, dispute resolution and everything else exists to serve our primary purpose of writing an encyclopedia in a collegial atmosphere, and not as an end in itself. Newyorkbrad (talk) 03:09, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

As one of the 'oldies' of the project, I too sometimes forget that SSI and RFCU are now SPI. But to clarify, I think Newyorkbrad meant SPI when he said SSI. With regards to Simply south's complaint, if you have in mind a casual editor, then I would not open an investigation, because an account that edits infrequently has probably not generated a broad enough contribution history to make a link - and, of course, checkuser data will be unavailable. If an account has begun to be considered established, but you suspect it may be tied to a long-term (but inactive) sockmaster, perhaps an investigation could be worthwhile; there have been cases in the past of editors becoming well-established, and even being elected as sysops, before it later became apparent that they abused multiple accounts in the past, and did not disclose this to the community. In general terms, if you won't name the account, I guess the answer is: it depends. AGK [•] 11:27, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Just to clarify, it was not a complaint, just a question. The sockpuppets I am thinking were only active very briefly. The master in question I am thinking about is Loshgr. There hasn't been any recent activity, the last one in the suspected accounts dating back to September 2009. Simply south...... playing tunes for 5 years 15:03, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

USER:Rubbins

This user first vandalized vandalized Newsmax, I reverted, and they vandalized again. I reverted and warned and then they vandalized my personal page. Please block. Arzel (talk) 01:37, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

User has been notified. They have also reverted the personal attack on my page. Arzel (talk) 01:40, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Blocked. 28bytes (talk) 01:55, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. Not quite sure I understand the enjoyment that some people get doing that. Arzel (talk) 01:57, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Meta:Friends of gays should not be allowed to edit articles should give you some insight; if not, it'll still make you laugh. The Blade of the Northern Lights (話して下さい) 03:37, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Made my day, you have. Thank you.  :-) — Coren ^(talk) 16:30, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 8#Equestria Daily and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana

Would an admin (or admins) close Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 8#Equestria Daily and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana?

Please also close Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Flora85, Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Trinidad and Tobago/On this day, and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Eu-151. The MfDs have been open from two weeks to a month. Thanks, Cunard (talk) 10:10, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I closed the Equestria Daily one. I dont feel qualified to close the rest.--v/r - TP 15:45, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, TParis. Cunard (talk) 16:15, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I got Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:37, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Qwyrxian! Cunard (talk) 04:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Timotheus Canens (talk · contribs), for closing two other MfDs. Save for Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Eu-151, the other MfDs listed here are closed. Cunard (talk) 04:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 8#Equestria Daily and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana

Would an admin (or admins) close Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 8#Equestria Daily and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana?

Please also close Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Flora85, Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Portal:Trinidad and Tobago/On this day, and Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Eu-151. The MfDs have been open from two weeks to a month. Thanks, Cunard (talk) 10:10, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I closed the Equestria Daily one. I dont feel qualified to close the rest.--v/r - TP 15:45, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, TParis. Cunard (talk) 16:15, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I got Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Santana. Qwyrxian (talk) 03:37, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Qwyrxian! Cunard (talk) 04:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Timotheus Canens (talk · contribs), for closing two other MfDs. Save for Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Eu-151, the other MfDs listed here are closed. Cunard (talk) 04:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

A proposed amendment to several arbitration cases

A motion has been proposed that would amend several decisions made by the Arbitration Committee and the community over the past several years. It would replace the remedy originally issued—one that allows administrators to unilaterally apply sanctions to editors within the designated topic area—with a standardized remedy that essentially allows for the same thing. Any extant sanctions or warnings made according to the older wording found in those decisions (as applicable) remain unaffected. To comment on this proposal, please go to Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Motions. NW (Talk) 20:43, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Sockpuppetry from Blocked user

User:George SJ XXI was blocked several months ago by User:Beeblebrox for persistently advocating an opinion and general disruptive behaviour both to one specific article, its talk page, and his own usertalk page. The article in question Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (talk page) states that Wellington is "Anglo-Irish", although George persisted in stating that he was "Irish" despite consensus both on Wiki and from various sources to the contrary. Since his block there have been no further disruptions until the past few days (history) when IPs from the same ISP (iiNet) started changing, undoing and reopening discussions on the talk page regarding the matter. This leaves little doubt that it is George again, up to his old tricks. I have flagged each message as an {{spa}} (which you may note he pointlessly reverted as "vandalism" a couple of times) left warnings and listed the IPs on Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of George SJ XXI. Have spoken to Beeblebrox who dealt with the matter originally suggests requesting action, possibly a rangeblock. I think also semi-protection of the article in question for a few weeks might be prudent, and not unreasonable, as these iiNet IPs are clearly dynamic, and change daily, sometimes twice a day, it seems. Other than that, what with the main account being blocked, I do not know what else can be done to discourage this idiot from continually pursuing his own ends.

I have not left a {{subst:AN-notice}} anywhere as I do not know if it is required for sock IPs.

Thanks, Ma®©usBritish ^{[Chat • RFF]} 01:11, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Simply put, a range block is not an option in this case. He is using some mobile ranges and other heavily used ISPs (many of which have administrator accounts editing via them). That said, I did find an alternate account: GSJ XX1 (talk⁺ · tag · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log · CA · CheckUser(log) · investigate · cuwiki) of his which is now blocked. Sorry, there really isn't a whole lot that can be done besides playing whack-a-mole. Tiptoety ^talk 01:26, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm aware most Aussie ISPs are dynamic and that it might cause a problem for more than it's worth and blocking each IP would be futile seeing as he only has to reset his modem. Would semi-protection of the article appropriate for a month, at least? Thanks, Ma®©usBritish ^{[Chat • RFF]} 01:30, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Well...I am only seeing a few edits a month by George SJ XXI and his socks which I'm not sure justifies semi protection at this point. If you can convince another administrator otherwise I won't throw a fit though. ;-) Tiptoety ^talk 01:36, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

That's okay, I can wait.. something tells me this muppet will dig his own grave, soon enough. Thanks, Ma®©usBritish ^{[Chat • RFF]} 01:42, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Request temp block of 124.169.86.130 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) for disruptions to Talk:Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. Thanks, Ma®©usBritish ^{[Chat • RFF]} 05:31, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Removal of insult from edit summary

Hi, I'm not sure whether it requires mere revision deletion or something stronger, but I want to request an admin please hide this edit summary. Thank you! Hekerui (talk) 15:16, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done. Edit summary revdeleted. Slurs are called slurs for a reason; using one in an edit summary is just not on. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 16:01, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

No great cause for concern, I think, but I feel this particular use might be stretching RD2 a bit further than it should, even taking into account that this is a BLP. — Coren ^(talk) 16:40, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Hm, really? To me, it seems the same as revdeleting an edit summary calling a Jew a "kike" or a black person a "nigger": namely, it's extremely insulting, not fit for company that has any sensibilities, and it reflects poorly on us to have such things hanging out at the top level of page histories. Is it your feeling that "fag" isn't insulting, or at least not as strongly as racial slurs are? Consider also that the user in question has been blocked for repeated hate-speech-esque edits to the same article; his intent was quite clearly to insult and belittle. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 16:51, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not making a comment on "fag" itself, or of any relative offensiveness. I'm just not certain that "just an insult", however poorly worded, justifies revdel (unlike, say, accusations of criminal behavior for instance). I'm thinking that was intended more for "X rapes little children"-like slurs (as we have often seen in the past).

I'm not making a statement about the propriety of your revdel, really, mostly just thinking out loud whether we are being too liberal with the use of the tool in general. — Coren ^(talk) 18:36, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I would always remove hate speech and very offensive comments about women (never come across one of a woman disparaging a male in similarly offensive language, but I suppose it happens), because both of those have a threatening and humiliation aspect that 'you write like a camel, smell like one too' doesn't really have. That said, there is a current request on WP:ANI to take action because someone called Sarah Palin an airhead, so I do see your concern. Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:14, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Is it just me, or is there incidentally nothing actually in the cited source wherein he explicitly says he's gay? Evidently somebody did realise this; I misunderstood the linked revision to be the current one. Sorry. Jay _{Σεβαστός}^discuss 20:17, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Good call; no need for petty bureaucracy here. If someone says that they're black, that does not justify someone referring to them as a nigger. If someone says they are gay, that doesn't mean it is acceptable to call them a fag. We should have zero tolerance for this type of thing.  Chzz  ►  01:01, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Coren: I must say that I disagree. My view is that we currently draw a sensible line between what is deserving of RevDeletion and what isn't. If the edit is unconstructive, it should be reverted, and if it is also flagrant it should also be removed from the edit history: our readers are becoming increasingly aware that we keep a history of article edits, and our tolerance for drivel in the history should be decreased accordingly. A professional organisation would not allow the exterior of their office to have "pen1s" written over it, would it? If you're subscribed to Oversight-l, there's a discussion on a similar topic (suppression v RevDel v no action) that you might be interested in. AGK [•] 13:46, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Someone, please close this RFC

Category talk:Anti-abortion violence - discussion on this issue has been going on for months and it would be nice to have an uninvolved admin close the RFC. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 00:04, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Anyone? :( –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 07:01, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

I had intended to close (as a non-admin), but felt the right outcome involved a rename so I commented/!voted instead. It is a fairly simple case folks. Pretty short, pretty much one-sided. Hobit (talk) 13:23, 12 October 2011 (UTC)

Closed] by Mike Selinker (talk · contribs). --Mkativerata (talk) 20:17, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Closure of merge discussion

Can someone please review the merge discussion at Talk:Yadava#Proposal_to_merge_articles_Yadav_.2C_Ahir_and_Yadava, given that the proposer has withdrawn. I will do my best to notify all involved. Fowler&fowler has removed the template from Yadav. - Sitush (talk) 00:21, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 9 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done --Mkativerata (talk) 19:51, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Giving Sfan00 IMG back file mover?

Resolved

 – User right restored. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:19, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi there. I'm not sure where to place this, as there really isn't a good board for file related stuff, but here goes:

Sfan00 IMG, one of our more prolific file gnomes, apparently had and then lost the file mover user right. I'm not entirely sure of the story behind this, but I'd like to see if there is a consensus for letting him have the user right back. My reasoning is simple: Sfan00 IMG has demonstrated, through several hundred recent rename requests (the ones that I haven't already done are still in Category:Wikipedia files requiring renaming), that he a) knows which files are in need of renaming, b) knows how to choose a suitable new new name, and c) knows all the steps in the renaming process (in a public IRC conversation where I was unaware that the person I was speaking to was Sfan00, he described these steps and lamented that too often people missed some of them, mainly updating articles with the new file name).

In short, he's more than qualified for the user right, and I see no reason why he should be relegated to filling out requests for other people to act on (especially since most of the 200+ people with the file mover right either haven't noticed that a backlog has popped up or noticed and decided to ignore the fact).

Is there a consensus for handing him the right again? Sven Manguard Wha? 12:39, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
P.S. He did not ask me to do this, he dosen't even know I'm asking yet.

Obvious support Pretty much the most profilic file "worker" on Wikipedia. Why not give it back? He can be trusted, I don't see the slightest reason not to give the right back to him. HurricaneFan25 12:53, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

He asked for removal [4], so there is probably no need for a noticeboard thread to have it restored unless there is some kind of backstory. It should not be re-added to his account if he does not want it. –xeno^talk 13:34, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

The other side to that coin, though, is that he could request to have it re-added at any time. If there was no controversy surrounding the removal (and I can find none), then the request should be granted automatically. But the key is that it must be his request in that circumstance. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 14:53, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

I've got no objection to having file-mover back, if the consensus is that I can be trusted with the tools. My recall is it that I asked for it's removal when there were a number of concerns expressed about my level of competence on file issues. As such my understanding was that it was established consensus, that when an issue of competence had been raised it was reasonable to remove rights where competence would be an issue. If consensus has now changed however... Sfan00 IMG (talk) 15:53, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

If my reading of the discussion that lead to this was correct, the issue of moving files was never discussed, in fact your competence in files overall was never discussed, it was only that you were somewhat controversially tagging Commons files with local categories CSD F2. I fail to see what one has to do with the other, and I certainly fail to see how your competence in moving files could be questioned. Sven Manguard Wha? 16:05, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• - Can someone provide a link to the relevant discussion the preceded the removal of the right? Off2riorob (talk) 16:09, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Here you go. That's all there is. The spin off discussion dosen't really talk about SFan at all. Sven Manguard Wha? 16:12, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Well it seems that the user is responsible for most of the current backlog - is it him that is tagging them all for renaming? Its like this one - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CIMG0889.JPG - an unused file that more wants deleting than renaming. Is there a link to the discussion that resulted in this request? - scrap that I see he didn't ask for it S Manguard has took it upon himself to ask for him. I don't get that at all. Off2riorob (talk) 16:24, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

@Off2riorob: I am asking here because my conversations with Sfan in the IRC indicated to me that the only reason that he dosen't have file mover now is because he thought that he didn't have community support behind having it. Clearly, this is disproving his assumption, and will more than likely result in him getting the user right back. I suppose it isn't standard procedure, but I didn't just start this thread completely out of the blue. Sven Manguard Wha? 16:46, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Ah, thanks for the details. Off2riorob (talk) 18:00, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

That he's responsible for the current transfer backlog is precisely why I'm looking to get him reinstated. You're right, that's an utterly useless file, but the current name is still bad; the rename request is within the guidelines of the file mover policy. I personally flag things for deletion as I do renaming sprees (Chzz assembled, before his retirement, some lists of images with unacceptable filenames). Some users don't, they rename the files and let other people make value judgements. Considering that Sfan's confidence is clearly a bit low at the moment, I can see why he might have taken the latter option. Sven Manguard Wha? 16:39, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, he's clearly a intelligent user that isn't going to make the wheels drop off, there doesn't seem to be much objectionable in the history - so it he wants it back it seems a reasonable position to grant it to him. Off2riorob (talk) 16:43, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Agree. I don't see any reason he shouldn't be trusted with file mover, and he obviously needs it. It's admirable that he willingly gave up a tool due to perceived community concerns, but it seems like it was an unnecessary step in this case. Swarm ^X 16:59, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done. 28bytes (talk) 17:14, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Rev del

Hi, do we rev del this sort of addition/edit summary http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Betty_McCollum&diff=prev&oldid=456306987 ? Its a shame on the project that it published that for twelve hours - users that opposed pending protection should think again - Off2riorob (talk) 17:47, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

I revdel'd the edit summary in addition to the revision text.--v/r - TP 17:57, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks TP. Off2riorob (talk) 17:58, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

This article Libel reform vows to slay anonymous trolls and the British draft defamation bill - http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt201012/jtselect/jtdefam/203/20302.htm - seem to reflect the current rash of legal proposals to stop the publication of such potentially libelous and defaming anonymous user-generated material. Off2riorob (talk) 20:25, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Off2riorob, the current draft defamation bill reduces the stringency of British libel law. Ironholds (talk) 22:01, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

My interpretation was that the specific details relating to the Internet and anonymous postings and take down notice and take-down procedure and the recommendations of the committee that if put into practice would appear to relate to the the current model of en wikipedia - The committee argues that the law has not kept pace with the development of modern communication culture. It outlines a new notice and take-down procedure for the internet, designed to provide a quick and easy remedy for those defamed online and better protection to online publishers. Internet hosts gain the protection of the law provided they act responsibly by following the new procedure. Any anonymous postings must be taken down upon complaint, unless authors are prepared to identify themselves or there is an overriding public interest in publication. The committee recommends changing the law to promote cultural change so that, over time, the credibility of anonymous postings - and the damage that they can cause - is limited. - anyways - as per the recent Italian attempts to make defense of individuals reputations cheaper and easier failure to make it to the statute books I imagine most of these recommendations are unlikely to either. Personally I see it as reflective of general rise in anger against defaming trolls and I would like to see many more of them tracked down and charged or civil suits taken against them.. anyways, I saw and still see pending protection as a legal protection for the project and a tool that would have raised trust in the reputation of content in our articles, anyways, its not an extended discussion topic for this noticeboard, regards, - Off2riorob (talk) 05:15, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

user: Cossde domination

Discussion already ongoing on ANI
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
Hello. This message is being sent to inform you that there is currently a discussion at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard regarding an issue with which you may have been involved. Thank you. FYI - Wikipedia Administrators [Cossde and Nalanda College Colombo](Masu7 (talk) 07:11, 18 October 2011 (UTC)). This is also at AN/I. Yay! Doc talk 07:14, 18 October 2011 (UTC) You do not have to be a genius to understand what my initial issue is. According to my research on wikipedia there should only be one Royal College in Sri Lanka. Below paragraphs are found on Royal College, Colombo that say (without any credible references): Royal and other Schools - Royal College's maintains a century old rivalry with S. Thomas' College, Mount Lavinia as well as close ties with Trinity College, Kandy. Royal has long had a familial relationship with C.M.S. Ladies' College, Colombo : several families who chose to send their sons to Royal also chose to send their daughters to Ladies College, and many Old Royalists over the years have married alumni of C.M.S. Ladies' College, Colombo. In 1945, Minister of Education C. W. W. Kannangara began the establishment of central colleges (Madhya Maha Vidhyala) as part of the Free Education policy to provide secondary education for the rural masses, he modeled these schools on the general structure of Royal College. Although there are several schools in parts of the island that have adapted the name Royal College in the post-independence era; none have links to Royal College Colombo nor have been received formal permission to use the Royal prefix. This makes sense why editors like Cossde are trying their best to make any school coming up as Royal on wikipedia to be renamed as Rajakeeya (this is the name in Sinhala for Royal) or to isolate from Royal College Colombo. On Cinnamon Gardens page it tries to isolate Thurstan College that is located just closer to Royal College (when a map searching is done on Google Maps) being added. If such a statement is added to one of the other schools it will be deleted immediately saying that "Wikipedia is not for promotional activity". Why double standards and policies ?. Who monitors activity on Royal College, Colombo ?. (Masu7 (talk) 08:52, 20 October 2011 (UTC)).

Block explanation, please

I've blocked User:Eminentchess as a role account per its userpage, but I have to run; could someone please give them a decent explanation of why they've been blocked? Nyttend (talk) 12:17, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done - I deleted the userpage User:Eminentchess - it is enough that admins can check the old contents, there is no need that this keeps visible - and added {{spamusernameblock}} to the talkpage (not strictly spam, more promotional, but it the explanation given is saying just that). --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 12:23, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Hmm, you're right; sorry for the confusion. Thanks for the help! Nyttend backup (talk) 14:27, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Need an SPI clerk for closing a case which seems to have slipped through the cracks...

See Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Passionless. The case needs to be split because of a misidentification of the sockmaster. Otherwise, everything else has been taken care of. Thanks! --Jayron32 18:33, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Ken Mora

Kenmora (talk · contribs) has been adding a significant number of external links to actor's articles. He seems to have a conflict of interest since many of the links have to do with a real person named Ken Mora. See this search at one of the web sites that they have been spamming on articles. Could I get an admin to take a look at their contribs and help me with clean up? I'd like to get to bed and don't want to stay up for another hour cleaning all of this user's edits. Thanks, Dismas|^(talk) 02:12, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

That was a very nasty spam-only account. I indef'd it. I've also gone through a few of the contribs and rollbacked the most recent.--v/r - TP 18:20, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Dismas|^(talk) 22:17, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Heads-up: eyes wanted at Men's rights

• This leads me to expect an influx of newer editors, who may need some guidance regarding our policies, especially as regards OR, V and SYNTH. Article is under community probation. Thanks for adding it to your watchlist - KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:10, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Threats of edit warring

Hi, I'd like advice on how to handle an IP that states that once the semi-protection on the article about Zachary Quinto, which was made, according to the IP, by a "drive-by Christian administrator", expires, it will restore an earlier revision and then revert to keep that revision it likes. There were lots of personal attacks made (bizarrly all revolving around Christianity) by the IP and it looks like the only intention is to be disruptive. Ideas how to deescalate this (before it begins)? I hardly ever post here, so please inform me if I'm in the wrong spot. Thanks! Hekerui (talk) 15:34, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I've watchlisted - not much to do right now as long as the IPs are only kvetching on the talk page. If the disruption continues, I don't mind giving it a non-Christian admin to complain about. Tony Fox (arf!) 16:48, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

What about a Christian admin that acts non-Christian in the bedroom certain situations?  :-P (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:23, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, the replies I could make that would get me pilloried by any number of groups... Tony Fox (arf!) 18:57, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to volunteer as a peacekeeper there if that's ok?

I'm in a Wikiproject covering the Zachary Quinto and can probably have a positive effect or at the least test my knowledge of WP policies =]

Thanks Jenova20 08:46, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Request for redirect

I am requesting a redirect from the non-existing page 'All Coppers are Bastards' to the page A.C.A.B A.C.A.B is a well known acronym, and has its own page. It seems odd that this redirect is blacklisted. Chaosandvoid (talk) 11:07, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Weird. I'm a non-admin, but I just created All Coppers are Bastards no worries. Are you sure you hit the title blacklist for that exact phrase? Jenks24 (talk) 11:18, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

On a slightly related note, I see you recently created New York Art Book fair – is that intended to be a redirect? Jenks24 (talk) 11:21, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Seems obvious enough to me that I converted it — but I had to copy/paste the coding from an existing redirect. How again am I supposed to get the redirect coding to appear? When I click the #R button above the edit window, nothing appears; I vaguely remember reading somewhere that this button isn't working in Internet Explorer in the latest edition of MediaWiki. Nyttend (talk) 12:39, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Proposed community ban for JAT6634

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Community ban enacted. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 16:19, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

---

I propose a community site ban for user:JAT6634, a fifteen-year-old persistent nuisance who creates several new socks a week, the total now over 200, mostly for fantasy football pages. See Wikipedia:Long-term abuse/JAT6634 for details. Most of his hoaxes are on user pages, but he also creates articles; a ban would make clear that these can be deleted at sight, and might also help in possible action via his ISP by the Abuse Response team. JohnCD (talk) 10:52, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support. It's been a long time coming. — HelloAnnyong ^{(say whaaat?!)} 12:17, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support. I generally don't like ban proposals for indef-blocked sockers, since we shouldn't sanction someone for 3RR with someone like this (we don't need the bureaucracy generally), but contacting the ISP is a good reason for the formal ban. Nyttend (talk) 12:34, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

• I.e. we shouldn't sanction someone for 3RR if they're edit warring for the sole purpose of reverting socks of blocked users. Nyttend (talk) 01:43, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support. An editor who is so deliberately wasteful of other editors time over such an extended period has closed the door on themselves. RashersTierney (talk) 12:44, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support per the above.--v/r - TP 14:24, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support - I agree with the above comments. Also per the ever-expanding size of this page. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 15:57, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support I hope this behaviour will change when he gets older, but right now this is out of order. Minima© (talk) 16:35, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support Anyone with a Long-term abuse report should be banned automatically. If they've reached that level, there's no other viable option for handling the situation. Sven Manguard Wha? 16:47, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support banning all serial sockpupeteers. When they are this crazy and persistent WP:RBI is the only effective approach, a full siteban makes things very simple in that regard. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:58, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support I am not an admin here and don't know if its out of line commenting here but anyone who is a serial sockpupeteers should never be unblocked. (Ruth-2013 (talk) 17:36, 21 October 2011 (UTC))
• Support, per the obvious reasons expressed above. Swarm ^X 17:38, 21 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support, a no-brainer, contacted school 2 times even. Ain't goin' to stop. ~~Ebe123~~ (+) ^talk
  _Contribs • 10:44, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I made a list of the socks.

~~Ebe123~~ (+) ^talk
_Contribs • 12:22, 22 October 2011 (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.

Current pages for un-protection/ Conflict of interest notice board.

Has something been changed recently on the Current pages for un-protection on the page protection notice board. Because I have now tried to submit 2 pages for un-protection reports using twinkle. Twinkle is currently giving an error message off when attempting to use the tool to submit unprotect requests and is not posting at all to the page. Also I was wondering if someone when they get chance can have a look at the COI report board as I have had a report sitting on that board since the 19th October without any response. If I have submitted this on the wrong board as I did not know where to put it can someone move it please.(Ruth-2013 (talk) 00:54, 21 October 2011 (UTC))

I'm not sure what (if anything) threw off Twinkle, but would recommend you take that issue to WT:TW (FYI I'm seeing the same error). Swarm ^X 01:11, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the response. I have re-posted the information about the twinkle error on the page you suggested. So I will await a response on that pages about this. Only thing here now is if someone can check out the COI board when they get chance then this can be closed off on this page (Ruth-2013 (talk) 01:25, 21 October 2011 (UTC))

Twinkle should be working, now (longer explanation at WT:TW). – Luna Santin (talk) 04:07, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Everything on here is now sorted if someone want to close it off(Ruth-2013 (talk) 21:09, 22 October 2011 (UTC))

List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming

Resolved

 – Is being discussed already in the proper venue. Please don't WP:FORUMSHOP. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 06:18, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

This is ridiculous. 13 screens of quotes from WP:FRINGE-proponents, with the only attempt at balance being a one-paragraph presentation of a very small part of the mainstream view, poorly summarised, not including any of the reasons scientists believe the conclusions stated, and conveniently leaving out all information on how the mainstream has dealt with the supposed challenges to it.

It's probably the worst article on Wikipedia. It's nothing but a WP:POVPUSHing WP:COATRACK. Every single one of the arguments presented in it as if they were unanswerable is discussed in context in Global warming controversy, explaining the mainstream challenges to it. It has WP:BLP and other issues, since it's nothing but WP:OR, WP:SYNTH, and all of this based on WP:Primary sources, very few of which rise to the level of reliable sources.

Something needs done. Or do Wikipedia's core policies not actually matter? 86.** IP (talk) 01:41, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

This is being actively discussed at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 19 AND the article's talk page, which you are well-aware of. It isn't even as if the editors who are commenting on that talk page are single-purpose climate change denialists; you have well-respected administrators (e.g. Dragons flight, who is a physicist who does geoscience work) and editors there. Wikipedia:Arbitration enforcement is available if you believe that any of the enforceable matters in WP:ARBCC have been breached. (Also, could someone either close this or move this to ANI) NW (Talk) 02:10, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Use of false text and/or false source or citation by user WLRoss

On two articles, Forrest River massacre & Forrest River massacre: Investigations and Royal Commission, WLRoss has made unsupported claims about a source, tagging it as "unreliable source". He seems determined to prevent material from this source being included in the articles or to minimise its use. Another user 180.149.192.132 suggested that it required more than a personal opinion, that he should cite a reliable source for the claim that the Moran book was an unreliable source. When WLRoss continued with this conduct on the Forrest River massacre: Investigations and Royal Commission, I removed his unsupported claims and seconded 180.149.192.132's request that he cite a reliable source.

He has responded by using what is clearly a false citation for an article allegedly by a Sylvia Hallam in the Australian Aboriginal Studies journal which appeared to support him. I say it is clearly a false citation as the text that WLRoss has based on this alleged source is clearly false. The Hallam article allegedly refers statements in the preface of the book Hallam was allegedly reviewing; these statements do not exist. I have removed this falsely cited material and am referring this on. One thing that Wikipedia cannot afford to tolerate is the use of false sources.

Should WLRoss be blocked for this kind of conduct?121.208.25.30 (talk) 03:02, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

"he should cite a reliable source for the claim that the Moran book was an unreliable source". Umm, no. Without going into the details of this particular case (I've not looked at it yet), this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the way Wikipedia works - if you want to include something, and someone questions the reliability of the source, it is for you to show that it is reliable, rather than the other way round. The correct approach would have been to ask about the source at WP:RSN, rather than insisting on proof that it isn't. As for the rest of this, you don't provide the necessary information. What 'false source' is WLRoss supposedly citing? And what is he citing it for? AndyTheGrump (talk) 03:20, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

The source he is citing is Hallam, Sylvia (2004) who apparently reviewed "Sex, Maiming and Murder: Seven Case Studies into the Reliability of Reverend ERB Gribble, Superintendent, Forrest River Mission 1913-1928, as a Witness of the Truth" in Australian Aboriginal Studies 1: 111-112. which I have just found out is apparently a genuine source but one making a fraudulent claim. WLRoss's revised text (he took out an error) includes "Sylvia Hallam states that Moran's preface throws some doubts on his claims of impartiality. He also explicitly states that he is following the methods of fringe historian Keith Windschuttle". Moran doesn't state anything of the kind. The only mention of Windschuttle that I can find anywhere in the book is in Professor Geoffrey Bolton's introduction where he writes that Moran has been bracketed with the Windschuttle school of controversy but that Moran comes at the issue from a different perspective, i.e. that it is unfair to brand people as murderers when there is no credible evidence that anyone was killed (and the chief accuser was a pathological liar). Where does Wikipedia stand where someone can cite as a source a review by someone who has made obviously false claims. As for the reliability of Moran's work; he's been mentioned favourably by Professor Geoffrey Bolton (historian) who agreed to write the introduction, he's been cited favourably by Josephine Flood who is an archaeologist and author of number of books on aboriginal history and Professor David Day has incorporated changes to the latest edition of his book Claiming a Continent: A New History of Australia based on Moran's research. And yet someone can use a grossly inaccurate review to try and discredit him? 121.208.25.30 (talk) 03:54, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I would like to make several points, the Hallam article is peer reviewed so we should accept that it is reliable. Moran is on the revisionist side of the History wars and is considered fringe by academia so WP:UNDUE comes into play, especially as his books are self published. I originally deleted User:180.149.192.132's edit as undue in the FR massacre article where it definitely is. Despite Moran having far too much mention in the FR Royal Commission article per WP:UNDUE, a point made by several other editors, I accepted it in this article but deleted a quote by jurist Sir Francis Burt; "I would not have thought that anyone looking at the evidence or lack of it relative to the so-called Forrest River massacre could possibly believe that it took place. No one has ever claimed beyond reasonable doubt evidence, The Royal Commission made it's findings on the balance of probabilities and the acceptance of a lack of evidence by academia is already mentioned several times in the article. The accusations of using a fraudulent citation without doing any research to verify the cite did or did not exist is not assuming good faith. I note that User: 121.208.25.30, edits from Canberra but outside of working hours while his supporter User:180.149.192.132 is editing from a government building in Canberra during working hours, considering their vehement support of, and grammatical similarity to, each other in promotion of fringe theory, can they clarify their relationship? If my asking is innapropriate I apologise. Wayne (talk) 06:17, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

WLRoss seems to like to make use of false claims.

1. I do not edit from Canberra, I'm in Brisbane and I believe that there is a way of confirming that from my IP address. Anyone who knows how, feel free to do so and to post your findings here. That being the case, and assuming that WLRoss is right about User:180.149.192.132 editing from Canberra, and assuming anything he says is right is a big ask, that would make it a little tough for me to be both users. I generally edit out of working hours because (a) I'm in the field most working days without computer access and (b) when I'm working, I'm not editing Wikipedia.

2. There is no relationship between me and User:180.149.192.132, I don't know who they are and unlike WLRoss don't consider it to be my business. I did jump into support User:180.149.192.132 on the article in question and he/she has acted to support me because I observed User:180.149.192.132 continually coming up against WLRoss knocking out properly sourced material he had put into the article in question using false claims about those sources. The primary false claim he has been making is that Moran's work is 'fringe'. I've cited him a number of sources to show that he's not. WLRoss has cited one book revue which makes claims that are easily proven to be fraudulent, to try and support his claim that Moran's work is considered to be 'fringe'.

3. Any similarities between my grammar and that of another user, I'm inclined to assume is due to us both using colloquial Australian English and from having read the same sources which we are then using to support our arguments about the same subject matter. A certain amount of similarity is inevitable in those circumstances, I think. But if anyone wants to bother looking into it, as I said above, please feel free to check out the IP addresses if you know how.

4.One more thing, Sir Francis Burt didn't refer to the existence of beyond reasonable doubt evidence, he referred to evidence, in particular to the lack of it. 60.225.253.209 (talk) 10:28, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Terrific, it looks like Telstra has just reconfigured my IP address and I'm no longer User: 121.208.25.30. I'm confused now. 60.225.253.209 (talk) 10:50, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

OK just done some Googling and found this website http://whatismyipaddress.com/ip-lookup. Anyone who wants to use it can check both my current and former IP addresses and establish that they are both in Brisbane, one says Brisbane one says Newstead but Newstead is just a suburb of Brisbane and I think that's where Telstra's servers are. Amazingly WLRoss was half right and User:180.149.192.132 is in Canberra. Ah well a stopped clock shows the right time twice a day. Don't take my word for it, verify. 60.225.253.209 (talk) 12:21, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

One final point. I did initially do some searches and the Hallam review didn't turn up. I later changed my search parameters and found a reference to it. But frankly I assumed that it was a false cite because the claims quoted from it by WLRoss / Wayne about the book were so blatantly false i.e. that Moran "explicitly states that he is following the methods of fringe historian Keith Windschuttle" when Moran stated nothing of the kind, that I assumed that it had to an invented review. I'm afraid I assumed an Australian academic historian wouldn't resort to such false claims. My mistake on that point.60.225.253.231 (talk) 07:34, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Multiple issues

Resolved

 – KestevenBullet blocked indefinitely as yet another abusive sockpuppet of indef blocked User:Richard Daft. Moondyne (talk) 15:14, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not sure which admin board to use as I have multiple issues with the person currently posting as User:KestevenBullet. His early contributions make clear that he is the banned User:Richard Daft and if you look at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Richard Daft/Archive you will see a long list of problems caused by him. I would particularly draw your attention to recent malicious attacks on User:AssociateAffiliate using a number of IP addresses which are listed in the SPI archive. In one of these IP sessions he identified himself as KB. Although the SPI admin rightly pointed out that the KB ID had been stale, it is now very much in use again and he is effectively edit-warring on the following articles, both as KB and also as the IP address 86.149.110.193:

• 1697 to 1725 English cricket seasons
• 1726 English cricket season
• 1727 English cricket season
• 1728 English cricket season
• 1729 English cricket season

You will note that I reverted his initial edits for the reasons stated in the edit summaries and on one of the talk pages. He has responded to this by commencing an edit war, to which I have not reacted, and by conducting personal attacks on my talk page and on WT:CRIC where he is trying to justify a book of which I and at least one other member of WP:CRIC have not heard. It may be a good book, as he says, but part of the problem is the incoherent and destructive way he edits the articles to try and make his point. I should add that a Google search for the book's author Ian Waun is totally unproductive with Google suggesting a redirect to the footballer Ian Woan. Until some experienced and competent editor can verify the book's worth, I believe we should cite the established sources.

Can an admin please investigate and take appropriate action? If you would like me to raise the matter at WP:SPI or on another board, please let me know. Could you also please decide which versions of the five cricket articles should stand and apply accordingly? Thank you. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 17:34, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

KestevenBullet (talk · contribs) cannot be tied by technical evidence to Richard Daft (talk · contribs) at this point. Behavioral evidence is obvious between the two users. KestevenBullet is not abusing any other registered account. When it comes to the IP complaint, the quacking is obvious. I'll leave it to another admin to process blocks as they see fit. Keegan (talk) 06:19, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

That's fair comment, Keegan, as we only have the WP:DUCK to go on and the continuous thread that runs through all Daft's memberships, the changes of userid always being seamless in terms of what he has to say and how he says it. I should add that, after reading the advice at the top of this page, I've taken the matter to WP:SPI as well although there are additional issues here such as the edit-warring, destructive edits (i.e., removing content without explanation or good cause), disruptive posts on the project talk page, wanton abuse (admittedly via IP in the main) and deliberate flouting of WP policies and guidelines. ----Jack | ^{talk page} 15:19, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Jediforce and copyright problems

I wasn't sure whether to call this an incident or not, as this editor has been inactive since November 2010, but I think it's worth showing just in case.

Recently I received an e-mail from new user DeBelne stating that the article John Bell (bishop) had plenty of text copied from his work (In which I have been received an attachment showing all his published text). I soon found out that the suspect who added this material was Jediforce. This editor has a large history involving copyright concerns, not just involving text but images too. I have given him a strict notice on the derivative work that he added. As this editor doesn't seem to understand much about copyright I would prefer if his editing privileges would be suspended, although on second thought he has been inactive, and might not edit ever again. Minima© (talk) 05:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Indefinitely blocked; with copyright concerns, we can't risk it, inactivity or not. Have you posted it at CCI? Ironholds (talk) 15:28, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Main Page features

Would admins close the various proposals at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Main Page features? Started on 14 July 2011, the discussion has occurred for over 30 days. RFC bot (talk · contribs) removed the expired RfC template on 13 August 2011.

Perhaps admins can use Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Account security as a template for closure. Admins close the different proposals on the page with summaries of the consensuses, and when the all the discussions have been closed, the entire RfC is closed with an archive template. Cunard (talk) 09:30, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 25 August 2012 (UTC)

Thank you, MER-C (talk · contribs), for closing many of the proposals. Many of them remain open. Cunard (talk) 23:14, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Current timestamp to prevent archiving by Cluebot. Cunard (talk) 10:35, 27 September 2011 (UTC) Thank you, Happy-melon (talk · contribs), for closing many of the discussions. Cunard (talk) 04:53, 18 October 2011 (UTC) Consolidated to #RfCs close requests – October 2011. Cunard (talk) 19:02, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Closures needed on citation-related discussions

Would an admin (or admins) close Wikipedia:Village pump (policy)#RFC on the bot-addition of identifier links to citations and Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers#Proposal: date formats in reference sections? Both discussions are listed at Template:Centralized discussion. The first one is a stale discussion, having not received any comments since 22 August 2011. The second discussion has lasted for over 30 days.

If either of the RfCs result in "no consensus", a closure like that in Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)/Diacritics RfC, where the opposing arguments are summarized, will be helpful to the participants. Thank you, Cunard (talk) 08:34, 7 September 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 7 September 2012 (UTC)

Current timestamp to prevent archiving by Cluebot. Cunard (talk) 10:35, 27 September 2011 (UTC) Consolidated to #RfCs close requests – October 2011. Cunard (talk) 19:02, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Backlog at WP:SFD

Can some admins please come and help out at Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion? The backlog there is out of controll again. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 08:30, 14 September 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 17 September 2012 (UTC)

Would admins close the following SfD discussions:

1. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/6#Cricket-admin-stub - already handled
2. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/11#Czech-*-stub templates - Needs action, see below
3. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/11#Category:Northern Ireland election stubs/Template:NI-election-stub
4. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/18#Rail -> Rail transport- Needs action, see below
5. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/20#Retail companies- Needs action, see below
6. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/21#Template:US-transport-company-stub- Needs action, see below
7. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/August/28 - already handled
8. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/2 - already handled
9. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/6 - already handled
10. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/8#Madagascar province categories - already handled
11. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/8#Old German district categories - already handled
12. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/9#Several new English football stub types
13. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/14#Ivory Coast sport templates
14. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/14#Template:China-road-stub
15. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/14#Category:Pakistan rail stubs
16. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/15#American football offensive lineman, pre-1900 birth stubs
17. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/16#'Pre-' category maintenance
18. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/22#rail station -> railway station
19. Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/23#Portugal geography by District/Region categories

Thank you, Cunard (talk) 10:23, 17 September 2011 (UTC)

Closed, but left unactioned as I didn't know what to do :3 Stop by my TP if you can tell me what specific action is needed. :) -- DQ (t) (e) 06:09, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Agathoclea (talk · contribs), Fastily (talk · contribs), and DeltaQuad (talk · contribs), for closing many of the discussions listed above. I've added several more SfDs, which have become overdue. Cunard (talk) 06:10, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

I did all the new categories and templates for the rail transport but found a few categories and templates that were not nominated at that I recorded at User:Agathoclea/AWB#strays Agathoclea (talk) 09:17, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. Cunard (talk) 23:38, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Nabla (talk · contribs), for closing Wikipedia:Stub types for deletion/Log/2011/September/14#Category:Pakistan rail stubs. Cunard (talk) 23:30, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp removed because there is no longer a backlog. Cunard (talk) 19:02, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland Collaboration#Poll on extending ArbCom resolution for two years and two other RfCs

Would an admin (or admins) close Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland Collaboration#Poll on extending ArbCom resolution for two years, Wikipedia talk:Proposed deletion of biographies of living people#Nominating articles with unreliable sources for BLPPROD, and Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Content dispute resolution?

For the Ireland discussion, participants requested a closure at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland Collaboration#Closure. Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ireland Collaboration#Poll to see if people want to retain the status quo. appears to be a related discussion that should probably be considered and closed by the admin who assesses the "extending ArbCom resolution" discussion.

All three discussions were listed at Template:Centralized discussion and archived to Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Archive. Thanks, Cunard (talk) 22:47, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Ireland is  Done. I'd rather not do the other two, one of which I've been involved in as a discussion participant some months or years ago. --Mkativerata (talk) 21:09, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Mkativerata, for closing this difficult debate. Cunard (talk) 22:49, 21 October 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

Consolidated to #RfCs close requests – October 2011. Cunard (talk) 19:02, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

History-merge needed

Resolved

 – Move-log entries deleted, edit summaries deleted, user blocked, page-move articles deleted, etc. HurricaneFan25

Page-move vandalism's been going on at 2011 Van earthquake, so the history needs to be merged with KurdistanForEver and FreeKurdistan. Thanks! HurricaneFan25 19:10, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Can my userpage be deleted, my talk page deleted and then restored without the page move? Thanks. HurricaneFan25 19:16, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I really don't want to look at my talk page's history (hint...) HurricaneFan25 19:24, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Zzzuuuzz. (I'm not sure how many z's are in your username :P) HurricaneFan25 19:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Also, can the move log entries be deleted? Thanks. HurricaneFan25 19:27, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Userfying articles at AfD

User:Bernard-Zeidan recently created three articles – A Play Entitled Sehnsucht, Celine Abiad and Badran Roy Badran – all of which have been nominated for deletion ([5],[6],[7]) for lack of referenceable notability. In discussion with the editor, I suggested that the articles be userfied so they can continue to be worked on until such time as the notability of the subjects can be shown with second-party sources. Bernard-Zeidan seems interested in this, but I was unsure if userfication while an AfD discussion was ongoing was a problem, or else I would have moved them myself. Any advice would be appreciated. Beyond My Ken (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 20:45, 23 October 2011 (UTC).

This is covered at Wikipedia:Userfication (although this is a consensus-reflecting essay, not a guideline or official policy). Basically, it says to wait until the AfD process has run its course before userfying an article that is currently the subject of an AfD. Cheers! bd2412 T 02:42, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

@Beyond My Ken, I believe a nominator can withdraw their nomination at anytime (i.e. withdraw nomination and usserfy) as long as there are no ther issues (copyvio, attack, etc,). However, if others have commented, the AfD should run its course per Wikipedia:Deletion process#Withdrawn nomination. I believe that's how it works, but I'm no expert. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 03:01, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

As all of the discussions have delete !votes, those would need to be withdrawn as well. Copyvio, as asserted at one of the discussions is probably a deal breaker for the userficiation of that article. Monty₈₄₅ 03:17, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you all for this guidance, which is very helpful. Beyond My Ken (talk) 03:51, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

The delete votes do not have to be withdrawn. Not sure where that user got that idea, many things not appropriate for article space are fine in userspace. However they are correct about copyvios, they must be deleted if proven. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:05, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Request for Edit Notice

FL Studio (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) is continually edited by IP editors who unrelentingly add links to artists (who don't always even have a Wikipedia article) to the notable users section as well as the last sentence in the lead. Most of these edits go against consensus, which has been reached and documented on the talk page for some time. There are huge, hard-to-miss comments in both sections about the criteria for the addition of artists with a direction to read the talk page, but these comments are continually ignored. I don't feel the article needs protection, but a very-visible edit notice to anonymous editors may be helpful. It is obvious to any editor who checks the page's history or uses their watchlist, or after the fact to any editor who checks their talk page, that the page is closely monitored and their spammy edits are not acceptable and are always reverted, usually very quickly. But anonymous editors do not have watchlists and often do not pay attention to page histories or even see their talk pages, so the frequency of these reverts has no impact on unexperienced anonymous editors. Ideally, such an edit notice would communicate:

1. The criteria for adding an artist/link to either section.
2. That these types of unsourced/non-notable additions are very visible and will be removed quickly with a warning to the editor (hence it is futile to try to spam the article).
3. That consensus can be discussed on the talk page.

Some examples of such edits: [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] —danhash (talk) 16:13, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

 Done. Template:Editnotices/Page/FL Studio. Feel free to tweak the wording. You might also try adding hidden comments in the most frequently disrupted areas of the article. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:35, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you! —danhash (talk) 20:42, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Revocation of talk page access for TreasuryTag

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 whole thing reminds me of WP:ROPE, sorry to say. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:55, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

• TreasuryTag (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log)

TreasuryTag was recently blocked, and the block was upheld on this noticeboard. (See his userpage for information.) On his talk page, he continues to engage in discussion, and frankly is exhibiting precisely the same kind of behaviour which led to the block. I request that an administrator revoke TT's talk page access. AGK [•] 21:11, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Can't you just avoid his talk page? Beyond My Ken (talk) 21:16, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

From my post above, I'm doing so. But I suspect that the next user who is not totally subservient to his views will receive the same attitude that he has shown me (and that led to his ban in the first place…). YMMV, AGK [•] 21:19, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I think then they can just avoid his talk page as well. He's a banned user. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:21, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there is anything to be gained by continuing to talk to him, you'll note I stopped after he simply removed comments of mine he didn't like. He's certainly not helping his case with this attitude, but that is hardly surprising. How is talk page is formatted or what it says on his user page are hardly the most relevant issues here so best to just let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:33, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

• He's not formally banned - unless his talkpage gets stupid, leave him and it alone. I anticipate his return in about ... 4 months. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:36, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
• Sure - thanks for your input, everybody. Just a note that I meant to post this to ANI, not AN, though I guess that isn't terribly important. AGK [•] 21:52, 24 October 2011 (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.

Cross post for Δ

On WP:PUMP/PROPOSALS, we have 2 sections at the bottom with the first for many editing proposals, and the second for a change in the ban. They are at WP:PUMP/PROPOSALS#Requests for various Δ tasks, and WP:PUMP/PROPOSALS#Altering the editing restriction #1 imposed on Δ (Betacommand) respectively.
~~Ebe123~~ (+) ^talk
_Contribs 21:58, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Another merger requires an uninvolved party

Merge proposal regarding "2005 Ahvaz unrest" requires the attention of an uninvolved administrator to close an outdated discussion. Thank you.Greyshark09 (talk) 20:15, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Restored unresolved request from archive. Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

Outstanding AFD from September

Can someone please adjudicate the Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Billy Ruane one way or the other. It appears to be the only remaining one from September still open. Thanks. Quis separabit? 23:32, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

•  Done Black Kite (t) (c) 23:49, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Salted move help

Hello, could someone please move Warface (video game) to Warface (deleted musical artist page)? It has been salted and I can't move it myself. ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 00:33, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

•  Done--Floquenbeam (talk) 00:40, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Thanks! ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 00:42, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
    • You're welcome. --Floquenbeam (talk) 00:44, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

TfD on Template:World_Series_Year

Resolved

 – tfd closed. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:03, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Any thoughts on completely disabling transclusion of the {{TfD}} template on Template:World_Series_Year, given its inherently high visibility until Monday edit: the 27th or 28th? I set it to tiny, but it's still fairly disruptive in things like Template:World Series or in paragraphs like the lead of Boston Red Sox and many of the other pages in Special:WhatLinksHere/Template:World_Series_Year. As of this writing, the TfD's leaning toward keep, but I don't wanna IAR the TfD, itself. So yeah... thoughts? --slakr^\ talk / 05:38, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm not an admin so take this with a grain of salt, I don't know what all the details are for TFD discussions, but I'd say hide that note if possible until the end of the series, explain on the talk page that you've done so, and invite continued discussion on the talk page as if the TFD notice is still there. Pine^talk 05:52, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I've added 'noinclude' tags around the tfd notice,[15] as it was disrupting highly visible articles. The discussion is snowballing anyway. Swarm ^X 07:10, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

An admin for closing a "let's just try again and again until they get tired" RfC

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.

---

Resolved

 – This is a content dispute. The fact that RfCs are being ignored and restarted is a symptom not the problem itself. Mediation would be a good way forward. Arbcom if you have to. But not this noticeboard. --Dweller (talk) 10:56, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

A very lenghty RfC was closed saying that a nude image should be used in Pregnancy. A few editors didn't like it, so they started yet another RfC, asking the exact same thing. The people supporting the nude image have refused to participate because they feel this is gaming the system. another RfC was already closed because it was asking the same question in a different manner. This is just gaming the system, and it shouldn't be tolerated. Please close the RfC as an attempt of gaming the system by asking the same question again and again until the argument is won. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:44, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

If the same argument is being repeated over and over it sounds like a conduct issue. Possibly arbcom is the right venue? -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:58, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the characterization made by Enric Naval is unfair. What happened is that the lenghty RfC was originally closed as consensus to change the image for several reasons, one of which that it was unclear whether there was consent. The closer later changed his close to no consensus when the consent issue was resolved, reverting to the original image. A new RFC was then started to see whether there was truly no consensus now one of the major issues has been resolved. Yoenit (talk) 20:49, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I won't take any action here because I think I've taken enough action on this issue. I agree to some extent with Yoenit: the close was not "that a nude image should be used in Pregnancy"; it was (or is now), that there is no consensus for either of the proposed images. A "no consensus" outcome is ordinarily an invitation for further discussion to resolve the issue. It is not a "win" for the side that wants to retain the status quo; the status quo is retained only be default. Having said all of that, I'm not sure this required a new RfC so soon and I can understand the dissatisfaction of editors who are being asked to contribute to another discussion almost immediately after the last one was closed. Consensus can change, but it doesn't change in two weeks. --Mkativerata (talk) 20:58, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Why was my close undone? I believe I am an uninvolved admin who can decline this request. If I'm wrong, please point out why. Also point out where a "no consensus" means a new RFC is inappropriate.--v/r - TP 21:59, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

You can't close this TP, you're involved in the discussion.[16]; and, more importantly, I don't think you understand what consensus is.[17]. This is a perfectly valid question, and it should be answered. Just how many identical RFCs in a row are we supposed to participate in? There was no consensus for a change in the just-ended over a month-long RFC, now the person who didn't get his way can immediately open another identical RFC...and another one after that if this one doesn't go his way? That's ludicrious. Dreadstar ☥ 02:36, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

We're in the middle of a discussion. Enric Naval has, in good faith, raised a valid issue that warrants wider input. Your posts on my talk page demonstrate that you aren't fully abreast of that issue, so dealing with it unilaterally and prematurely is inappropriate. --Mkativerata (talk) 22:02, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I like how you've avoided answering my question. I'll ask again in another way, how does a previous no consensus result in hatting of a new discussion? As Enric Naval pointed out "The people supporting the nude image have refused to participate", that is not reason to close the discussion. I'd laugh if I was told that because the "keep !voters in an AFD refuse to participate, it should be closed." That's the silliest argument I've ever heard and I think that warrents this discussion being closed; hence my closure.--v/r - TP 22:05, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

It is more relevant to ask why they have refused to participate, understand their point of view, and consider objectively whether their position is reasonable. I express no view on that other than I think there is more to it than you assert. --Mkativerata (talk) 22:09, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

I would say that it is probably not. When I last took part in that discussion there were all kinds of insults being hurled around by those wanting to keep it and they were extremely short on providing an actual justification beyond "WP:ILIKEBOOBS" as to what a single image of nude breasts academically conveyed about pregnancy, even when specifically and directly asked to do so.--Crossmr (talk) 23:22, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

There were perfectly good justifications given for keeping the image, no one at all even came close to giving your interpretation of "ILIKEBOOBS", that's insulting. And, believe me, the insults were just as scathing from the 'replace the image' crowd, who mostly voted on the "Oh, she's naked, we certainly can't have that" platform. Dreadstar ☥ 02:43, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

After having to repeatedly and directly ask hilo to explain what the educational value of the image was (after them claiming hordes of evidence) all they gave was "the whole woman is pregnant" which is tantamount to "ILIKEBOOBS". By the same logic every article about just about every disease should have full nude images in them as quite often the "whole person" is sick. In fact why don't we have full nude pictures in articles about anything relating to people? I mean John Travolta isn't his clothes, the whole person is him right? After having to drag that answer out of the keep crowd and suffering the insults despite having just shown up to the discussion, I walked away as it was clear those who wanted to keep the article couldn't provide any genuine reason to keep it beyond false policy waving (not censored only covers issues in which its necessary, not a license to put nudes everywhere).--Crossmr (talk) 03:57, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Which image use policy are you quoting when you ask for "educational value"? The current image is a perfect examples of the subject of the article, a pregnant woman. Dreadstar ☥ 04:34, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I was referring to the discussion at the time which was weighing the educational value of one image vs the other. Those arguing to keep the image were harping up and down about the educational value of image and yet even when repeatedly pressed to provide what that educational value was, that was all they could say. That is where I draw my current position from. At the time I was part of the discussion the argument to keep amounted to two points: "Not Censored", and that the nudity had some kind of educational value. After repeatedly being pressed that's all the educational value that could be provided and thus it invalidated the two main arguments for being kept, and amounted to nothing more than "ILIKEBOOBS". Not Censored requires that if nudity or other objectionable images are used, they must be used out of necessity, not just because someone feels like it.--Crossmr (talk) 05:19, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Those trying to close this are wikilawyering in an attempt to overturn a 2/3rd majority. It appears this is nothing more than a concern that now that the copyright issue is resolved we will get a clear consensus rather than "no consensus" and it will not be in their favor. Some seriously need to get more WP:CIVIL, edit warring to stop discussion as done here by User:Dreadstar is very poor form.[18]Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:57, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

James, stop fabricating. The RfC was closed by an uninvolved admin. The admin stated the decision would revert to no consensus if permission for an image was granted. It was. Result :No consensus. You neglected to mention, you were edit warring. The image is not the issue for me. This kind of fabrication and manipulation of process by this admin is.(olive (talk) 04:08, 23 October 2011 (UTC))

"Doc", way to try to poison the well, except you leave out your own edit warring against the RFC findings, and your continued attempts to remove or replace the lead image by RFC after RFC. Don't blame it all on me. What I did may not have been right, but I certainly suggest you look to your own edit warring against consensus: [19] [20] [21]. Dreadstar ☥ 04:34, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

• See, this is exactly what's happening, Doc James disagrees with the results of the recently closed RFC, so he immediately opened another RFC after failing to edit war his preferred non-consensus version into place. It's just one RFC after another, and the participants shouldn't have to be subjected to that. The new RFC should be closed and allow things to settle down. Or Doc just gets his way because no one wants to ivote in RFC after RFC, continually fighting this one editor. Dreadstar ☥ 04:56, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

• Notice how this thread has gotten rather long rather quickly, and no admin has seen fit to intervene? I'm afraid I must agree that it is ArbCom time. Admins do not have the authority to make a ruling on a prolonged content dispute, ArbCom does. File a case or let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 04:02, 24 October 2011 (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.

RfC uninvolved closure request...

...posted at Requests for uninvolved help. The attention of an uninvolved user/admin is solicited. Thanks. JakeInJoisey (talk) 12:56, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Unblock and mentoring of TreasuryTag

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

I am closing this due to a request for closure at WP:ANI. Having reviewed the discussion, my conclusion is that the request to unblock must be denied at this point. Several of the supporters and proposers of the unblock request have acknowledged that TreasuryTag is "beyond the last chance" since the conduct which brought about the current indefinite block has been a problem for a long time. To unblock someone shortly after the "last chance" has been exhausted would require something resembling a consensus, and in this case there is not even a majority supporting the unblock conditions. (About 60% opposed.) A few of the unblock supporters have also expressed serious reservations about whether the proposed mentorship is likely to end well. The main issue cited by the opposers is TreasuryTag's lack of acknowledgement that the block was caused by his own conduct, and that it is therefore likely that he will revert back to the former behavior. Several supporters point out that an unblock will be under rather strict conditions, where a block can be rapidly reimposed, but even those reblockings can be contentious, for instance, there may be disagreement about whether a controversial action or edit was merely controversial or actually disruptive, and those reblock discussions can generate more ill-will. At this point a lack of consensus for unblocking means that the indefinite block remains in place for the time being. There is a general agreement in the discussion that both Worm That Turned and Fastily should be commended for their generous offer and attempts to find a satisfactory outcome, and that the rejection of their request is in no way due to a lack of confidence in these two editors. Sjakkalle (Check!) 12:30, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

---

Hello folks. I come to you today to talk about an editor who I'm sure you've heard of - User:TreasuryTag. Recently, TreasuryTag has been, shall we say, slightly at odds with the community. However, he has been on Wikipedia for many years and has done an awful lot of good work on here. Towards the beginning of this month, an attempt to mentor TreasuryTag failed as TT refused to accept any restrictions that User:Dweller put forward. This lead to TT being blocked and a topic ban being enacted.

I have been in communication with TreasuryTag over the past week and have managed to agree some restrictions that he would be held to whilst being mentored. The details can be found here. More than this, an editor I highly respect, User:Fastily, has also offered to be part of the mentorship team.

I therefore request that the community agrees to the unblocking of TreasuryTag, under our mentorship. I can give details of my mentorship styles, my past mentorships and any other details, should there be any questions. Finally, I know there is a contingent who believes that TreasuryTag should spend a little longer away from the community - however since blocks are designed to be preventative and re-blocks are easy to do, I do ask people to consider what a longer block would prevent that the mentoring wouldn't. Worm^TT · (talk) 16:40, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

Taking a look through the previous content on Treasury Tag I don't believe he has been specifically given a final chance over this - at least not recently - in which case I would be happy to accept an unblock under the conditions of mentoring, with any violations leading to an immediate indefinite block or a timed block of at least a month.

I would also be inclined to say that he should stay away for at least a month (which would be appropriate as per HJ Mitchell's unblock conditions). Poorly behaving popular users often seem to get lots of short blocks before eventually getting indefinitely blocked after too much effort - its not fair to anyone for the block terms to never appropriately escalate.

If we are going to do escalating blocks they need to start at a minimum duration of one month - this should not be treated as an excuse to go back to square one. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 16:59, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

• Those restrictions seem like they have a reasonable chance for facilitating effective work here. Agree to unblock. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:05, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Switch to oppose per 28bytes. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 22:37, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Switch back to support per Worm's post.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:14, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• I have to agree with Eraserhead. TT should chill out for at least a month before trying to come back. By which I mean this request, though well-intentioned, is highly premature. → ROUX ₪ 17:06, 16 October 2011 (UTC) edited to add: TParis makes an excellent point. → ROUX ₪ 17:58, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose for now TT has had restrictions and blocked in the immediate weeks leading up to his block. I can't support when attempts were made to help him, he ignored them, he got blocked, he made agreements for unblock, he violated the agreements, he got blocked, agreed to mentoring, ignored his mentor, got blocked.--v/r - TP 17:09, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose per TParis. User will likely break another agreement. Binksternet (talk) 17:17, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• (Copied from TT's talk page. Paul Erik ^{(talk)(contribs)} 17:23, 16 October 2011 (UTC)): I'd like to thank Fastily (talk · contribs) and especially Worm That Turned (talk · contribs) for putting such dedicated work into the negotiation and agreement of the proposed mentorship conditions. I would like to point out that, should I stick to those conditions, plus the topic-ban, it will be literally impossible for me to cause any of the troubles that others have accused me of. And if I don't stick to them, I'm sure that there are plenty of admins around who will be more than happy to take the appropriate action. I would therefore support the proposal (obviously) and ask others to extend me the credit and the benefit of the doubt by doing the same. ╟─TreasuryTag►Captain-Regent─╢ 17:13, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• I support giving it a shot. Per the blocking policy, blocks are not for punishment, nor are they for WP:COOLDOWN. It would only be unfair to unblock him without making him sit through a certain duration of block if the block is supposed to be a punishment. I trust Worm That Turned will monitor him closely and reblock if TreasuryTag returns to disruption. Monty₈₄₅ 17:38, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
  • That policy is a lie, and the sooner people stop paying lipservice to it, the more honest Wikipedia will be. → ROUX ₪ 17:58, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

    Until the policy is changed, we should at least try to respect it; but I would certainly support changing the policy to reflect reality. Monty₈₄₅ 18:14, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I've been bold and removed the line about punishment - if people object I'm happy to discuss on the blocking policies talk page and legitimate issues should be covered by the other points. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:19, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

I've started as discussion here and invited wider community input here. - Hydroxonium (T•C•V) 19:55, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

• Given the history, especially the circumstances that led to the last indef block I oppose an unblock at this point. I would support the block being reduced to 1 month, followed by mentoring. Yoenit (talk) 18:05, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• I would support this now as the risk seems minimal; departure from the terms would be swiftly followed by a longer block and the time served so far seems appropriate to me. I have to say, looking at TT's block log I am not in fact optimistic that we have seen the last entry there. But he CAN be a positive contributor and I would love him to prove me wrong... Kim Dent-Brown ^(Talk) 18:09, 16 October 2011 (UTC) Changed to oppose per clarification of context in links below. Kim Dent-Brown ^(Talk) 21:24, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Will it? According to the conditions agreed between TT and HJ Mitchell at the beginning of September this block is supposed to be for a month. So I don't think its obvious that a longer block will necessarily swiftly follow - and that's part of the problem. TT needs to understand that he will be removed from the project if he is disruptive, and making sure this block isn't reversed until a month has passed is an important part of that - and one which will make future disruptive behaviour less likely. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:25, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
    • I've been trying and failing to find the conditions agreed between TT and HJ Mitchell at the beginning of September. If indeed they specified a month as the next block then I'd agree, that needs to be the time period. Could someone link that agreement as I think it would be helpful context here? Kim Dent-Brown ^(Talk) 18:57, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
      • Here's the diff and here's the page at the time. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:05, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
        • Thanks for those links, they make it very clear that the original agreement from September was that blocks should escalate from one week to one month. We are now on a one month block and I can see no reason to reverse what was originally signed up to. Kim Dent-Brown ^(Talk) 21:24, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• (ec, x3)Begin timed block of one to four months  Not enough time has passed for behavior change.  Unscintillating (talk) 18:12, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support unblock - This unblocking will not require community babysitting nor further ANI drama. Worm and Fastily are the best mentorship team a user could get, and neither will hesitate in reblocking him if need be. We don't impose blocks for users who need to "chill out", and blocks are not punitive— and even if you feel that's a lie in practice, I would hope our administrators would be supportive in principle of this longstanding concept. If this user's mentors are confident in an unblock now, then to hell with HJ's conditions (and I say that with nothing but respect to HJ :P). Let's not prolong this drama. Let Worm and Fastily give it one last shot. Swarm 19:16, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
  • How is the drama prolonged by waiting another two weeks? Currently there doesn't seem to be any drama at all. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:31, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

• Let me put it this way: I don't feel an unblock in two weeks will yield any advantages whatsoever over an unblock now. Swarm 21:31, 16 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support Let's give it a go, should be amusing. 86.135.48.148 (talk) 19:27, 16 October 2011 (UTC) <=== That was me Egg Centric 19:28, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose, anything good he may do is offset by all the drama he causes. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 19:42, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Reluctant but strong oppose. I negotiated a list of fairly lenient restrictions with TT a few weeks ago in return for his unlock. Since then, he has made no discernible effort to stick to the terms of the agreement except to dictate to other admins how long he can be blocked for violating them. That's why he's indef'd. Again. Therefore I have no confidence that he will honestly attempt to stick to any new restrictions proposed, and, frankly, TT has been around long enough to know how to play the game—he doesn't need a mentor, he needs to follow the rules that all the rest of us have to follow. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 20:09, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Cautious support If it turns out not to work, the block can be enforced again. But if we don't try it, we will never know if it works. Night of the Big Wind _talk 21:03, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose per HJ Mitchell and others. WP:NOTTHERAPY applies to this editor as much as anyone that I have observed here in six years. MarnetteD | Talk 21:08, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• I'd like to see TT return to editing here, but what dissuades me from supporting this proposal is TT's implication above that he has been blocked for stuff "others have accused [him] of" rather than stuff he did. 28bytes (talk) 21:10, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I missed this. Beyond the parameters I've already specified I oppose until TT takes responsibility for his own actions. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:26, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support But I would like a an extra super strong civility agreement as well. Arkon (talk) 21:11, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose per HJ Mitchell. It doesn't seem that the last set of unblock restrictions had any effect and I see no evidence that this set will be any different. Hut 8.5 21:48, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Strong oppose I am doubtful (no offense Worm) that TT will cooperate even with the slightest restrictions. Look at how Dweller's reasonable mentoring went. If he hasn't done it before even though they've tried, there's no chance at all, and I'm not sure TT would be willing to stop his involvement in Doctor Who articles, regardless of restrictions. HurricaneFan25 21:50, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support If editors like Worm and Fastily are willing to mentor, I can't see why anyone here would not be prepared to rely on them to do so, They may or may not be effective, but certainly they can be trusted to o re-block if there was insufficient cooperation. DGG ( talk ) 22:33, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support as co-mentor with Worm. Anyone willing to improve and better themselves deserves another chance. -FASTILY ^(TALK) 22:35, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• oppose mentoring really isn't for long time users. He either plays well with others or he isn't here. Currently he doesn't and he isn't here.--Crossmr (talk) 22:40, 16 October 2011 (UTC)
• weakest of supports as a mentoring experiment, given that we have two (2) mentors and a dedicated mentoring board. However I very nearly voted oppose as this is most likely a waste of time and has been for months, and agree with the oppose comments. I am curious to see how mentoring with two mentors goes. Casliber (talk · contribs) 01:07, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose, per HJ Mitchell. At some point enough is enough. T. Canens (talk) 02:42, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Very weak support, per Casliber. I hold out very little hope that this time will be any different, especially per TT's "accused of" comments above, but if both mentors are willing to be fastidious about blocking at the first sign of out-of-control-ness, I'm willing to accept the possibility that TT might go off the rails in exchange for trying to give a useful contributor another chance, in the spirit of AGFing. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 03:18, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  For crying out loud, how many chances is this guy going to get? This isn't so much to you as the support in general, but this sums up in a nutshell why there are so many problems on wikipedia. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 03:35, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  Oh, I can think of a couple users who have far outpaced TT, doesn't mean he should be given another, but the community's propensity to enable problem users shouldn't come as a shock at this point.--Crossmr (talk) 04:29, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  That's the reason I have been quite strong at opposing this. We need to stop enabling problem users. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 06:54, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  The irony is that I'm not at all happy about having !voted as I did, because I, too, feel that he's been given a million "last" chances and I'm sick of it, especially as he seems to have come to believe that blocks simply can't stick to him. However, tight mentoring with Worm and Fastily has just enough chance of not ending in disaster that I can't quite bring myself to fully oppose an unblock with those conditions. A fluffernutter is a sandwich! (talk) 14:48, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose - Much too soon, given TT's history of disruption. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:57, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose now Once an editor gets the wrong message (along the lines of "blocks are not punitive, so just climb down a little way and we'll carry you") there is no motivation for the editor to change. An unblock now is too early and will do TT no favors since it sends the wrong message as (I think) there is no public acknowledgment from TT that any conditions are accepted or that any previous behaviors were unacceptable. If unblocked, what would happen if a situation like that which arose at this talk page be handled? Johnuniq (talk) 06:47, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  That's a good point. I'll be adding a 1RR to the restrictions. Worm^TT · (talk) 08:46, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• support per DGG though personally I think the month block should stay because A) we said it would and B) I think TT has had some kind of recent issues and being away a for a bit might actually help. Hobit (talk) 07:56, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose I was actually unaware of TT's recent blocks, as a number of unpleasant exchanges between him and I have led me to adopt the "minimize conflict by consciously avoiding the other party" tactic. However the fact that I have had to adopt that tactic, something that I've only ever considered necessary once before, is an indication of just how bad every experience I have had with this editor has gone. That such a large swath of the community is expressing that they have had similarly bad interactions indicates to me that TT, regardless of any other contributions he has made, is doing more harm than good by his participation here. While personal experience ranks low on the hierarchy of convincing arguments, my own experience and judgement tell me that there is no way that an unblock could end well here. I have great respect for Fastily, who I've worked with a great deal, and my experiences with Worm have been positive, but I respectfully disagree with the idea mentorship here. Mentorship is something that needed to be done months ago, it is too late now, too much damage has been done. Sven Manguard Wha? 09:13, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• I don't see why not. If he has lots of good contributions then let him come back. I understand there are a few he hasn't been able to get along with. In tht case, he is to agree not to communicate with those people. –BuickCenturyDriver 09:18, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. TreasuryTag is a drain on our resources and should not be unblocked, especially so soon after the failure of an exhaustive attempt at mentorship. AGK [•] 11:19, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Unless and until TT stops deflecting responsibility for his blocks onto others, any mentoring is less than pointless. → ROUX ₪ 10:29, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Conditional and hard thought-through support I'm a big believer that leopards can change their spots. But they do need to be leopards that want to change their spots and understand that their spots need changing. TT previously successfully managed to get through a period of my mentoring and returned from a long block. What worries me is that he backslid then and might backslide again. I think the mentors need to take a good look at what has gone wrong subsequently and the recent-ish editor review provides a wealth of material, not mention the alphabettyspaghetti of AN and ANI threads about TT. I do think that some of the above editors have it right, that TT's attitude to his current status is unhelpful. His response to my offer of mentoring was combative. I'm not sure he has the right approach, which, in my opinion, should be as follows: I have a lot to offer, I seem to be upsetting a lot of people, sorry for the problems I've caused, I'd like to stop doing this, please help me. Until we see evidence that he feels that way, as opposed to just wanting to edit Wikipedia once more, mentoring would seem to be a waste of time. If he does give such evidence, I think a topic ban from any deletion discussions (including listing for XfD, prod and speedy) would help remove TT from many of the catalysts of his style of disruption. And I'd recommend that that ban be permanent. --Dweller (talk) 13:58, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• That editor review may be recent-ish, but he's been blocked 6 or 7 times since. Considering his volatility, I think that a month is the minimum amount of cooling-off time he needs before he is unblocked. --Orlady (talk) 15:26, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• conditional support If TT gives a statement to the effect that he is aware that his own conduct and not that of others caused the block then I will support per the reasons given by DWeller.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:20, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - unless whoever unblocks and mentors him will also take responsibility and block themselves for assisting in any disruption he creates. Off2riorob (talk) 14:55, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I don't think that your suggestion is reasonable. We might disagree with them on the desirability of mentorship, but they are doing what the believe to be the right thing. Sven Manguard Wha? 15:35, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Your right, no one's going to take responsibility in that way so its an unreasonable suggestion. I struck my vote/comment. Off2riorob (talk) 17:57, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose unblocking him He wasn't around being perfectly civil and doing only good work for years, before suddenly deciding to act up. The block was a long time coming. Those who have never had to interact with him, or seen his work over a period of time, may not be aware of the true nature of this person. Dream Focus 18:26, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose. No progress, per HJ Mitchell's comment. I also agree with Roux's first comment in the section below. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 20:32, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose Dealing just with this narrow issue: mentoring is a suitable remedy for new users only. Experienced users who have received considerable input from the community, and who can be presumed to understand Wikipedia policies and procedures, are not suitable candidates for mentoring. A better remedy for cases like this would be the standard offer: go work on a sister project and demonstrate an ability to work constructively without the problematic behaviors which led to the ban.   Will Beback  talk  20:42, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support He will be on such a tight leash that it doesn't matter. It will either end in a quick block or in a reformed editor. Either way good for the pedia. I'd rather see the TT show himself one way or another than not giving him that chance. Agathoclea (talk) 22:34, 17 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support This editor, whatever his faults, has produced over 46,000 edits. I'm sure the great majority of them were constructive. This body of work deserves some additional leniency IMO, even in the form of stretching/contorting agf and giving him the dignity of one last last last etc. chance. After this last chance expires I'm not sure if we can still agf, but let's give him this one at least. Finally I don't buy the argument that experienced users don't need mentoring because they are supposed to know the rules. This is not so IMO. Someone who knows the rules only too well might interpret them in a unique way. His interpretation of policy may differ from other people's, depending on how strictly or narrowly he wants to adhere to the letter of the policy. The people who disagree with him may view the policy less strictly and adhere to its spirit rather than its letter. But that doesn't make TT's perspective on policy automatically wrong. In TT's case the challenge of the mentoring would be to reprogram him to at least accept the majority view and perhaps persuade him not to adhere to his sometimes strict interpretation of policy. Or at least TT should be assisted to see the writing on the wall whenever it appears. Finally it wouldn't hurt if any sarcastic comments on TT's part during discussions were kept at a minimum. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 03:35, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

• How can you be so sure of the quality of TT's 22,000+ article edits (53% of his total) without actually looking at them? Beyond My Ken (talk) 22:32, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

• I can answer you on many levels: First are you seriously telling me to check all 22,000 edits one by one? Second: Why only pick the 22,000 article edits and not the rest from the over 46,000? Third: I did not vouch for the quality of TT's contributions, I just assumed the majority were constructive. Do you seriously doubt that? I wouldn't. Fourth: How are you so sure I haven't looked at a reasonable sample? Fifth: Don't you think that if TT had made thousands of mistakes/bad faith edits he would have been caught by now, especially in an open editing environment? It only takes a few vandal edits out of the 46,000 for TT to be discredited. So far, noone, including his detractors, hasn't found any sign of unconstructive/vandal edits. That says something, does it not? Sixth: Would Worm That Turned, Fastily and others try to save TT by mentoring him if they had not examined TT's non-controversial contributions? Seventh: As I stated, sure or not, this was my opinion. If you disagree with it is fine. I just don't appreciate the presumptuous tone of your question. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 04:29, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• Of course I'm not suggesting that you look at all of TT's article edits one by one, but if you're not familiar with his editing, then there's little weight behind your statement that the "great majority of them were constructive". I don't know that one way or the other, and neither do you, so it's pretty irrelevent here -- even more so because TT's disruptiveness, as far as I am aware of it, comes in his talk page interactions. The only persumption here is yours - you are presuming that TT's article edits are good, and presenting that as a reason to give him another chance. I, on the other had, presume nothing about the quality of his article edits, but instead base my !vote on my direct knowledge of the disruptivness of his talk page interactions, which is significant and ongoing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:39, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• There is no presumption on my part. It only takes a few vandal edits out of the 46,000 for TT to be discredited. So far, noone, including his detractors, has found any sign of unconstructive/vandal edits. That says something. I agf on that and that is it as they say. Anyway I can see where you are coming from and considering your criteria your !vote is understandable. The criteria I based my opinion on are simply different from yours. And by the way I am somehow familiar with his editing. I have seen him around, opposed him a few times, became a target of his comments in the past, but that didn't stop me from gauging his grasp of deletion policy as high, although narrow and sometimes unyielding. So yes, I am reasonably familiar with his style. In fact now that I remember it was quite a story back then. What with all the ANIs and heated discussions involving many editors. Quite an event. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 06:10, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• I agree that TT's article edits have never been a cause for concern, and that no one (as far as I am aware) has ever accused him of vandalism, the issue has always been the disruptiveness of his editing on talk pages and in Wikipedia space. Beyond My Ken (talk) 07:45, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• Having seen TT in action, so to speak, at a past AfD and elsewhere I completely understand your point. It is simply a judgment call that I made here by supporting the unblock, a last chance type of deal. On the other hand you have an equally valid point to support your opinion. I respect that. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 07:59, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• Here is a list of unconstructive article edits, helpfully supplied by the editor themself, removing easily citable and/or plainly obvious facts. This edit in particular is almost laughably bad. Yes, it's not vandalism, vandals understand tyhat they are damaging the articles. Franamax (talk) 08:59, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• That last diff is pretty horrible, and it wasn't that long ago. This diff is even worse, after a source was provided. Hmm... I may rethink my vote if an editor who's been here this long makes edits like that. Doc talk 09:15, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• ... but, of course, TT did revert that edit within the same minute, so had presumably recognised the error. - David Biddulph (talk) 13:06, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• Interesting. As I said, in an open editing environment this information is bound to come up if it exists. This causes some concern. Technically speaking my statement above about the majority of his edits being constructive still stands, since obviously these edits are just a handful of bad edits and nowhere near a statistically significant number. But it does show potentially concerning trends. As I also said before I am still willing to contort AGF but this stretching is indeed approaching its upper bound. Dr.K. ^{λogosπraxis} 13:20, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose per Wizardman and others. Simply, a net negative and not worth all the DRAMA.  Chzz  ►  04:05, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
• Normally, I'd support mentorship, but in this case I'm not so sure that will work. I'd like to see a little bit of work on other wikis before I could support something like this. Perhaps a modified version of the standard offer, say three months editing at another wiki, where we can see TreasuryTag do positive work elsewhere, will put to ease some of our concerns. Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} 04:39, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - TT seems to want to dictate his own terms than agree to long-standing policies that the majority of the community respects. Why should there be exceptions to this degree? If there have to be "terms" against the norm, which require many admin man hours to uphold, Wiki loses out. And why does he keep score of his blocks and critics if he is not amused by attempts to kerb his attitude? Quite the little Napoleon, in his superior attitude. Time would be better served mentoring others with more promise, than trying to make an omelette out of one bad egg. Leave him blocked - 46,000 contribs mean nothing - when good intentions turn sour, and remain sour despite attempts to improve his attitude, he deserves to lose his privileges indefinitely - making blocking a justified sanction, not a punishment. Ma®©usBritish ^{[Chat • RFF]} 05:30, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - too soon, in my opinion. TreasuryTag has been issued with many, many blocks in a catalogue that stretches back years (including three indefinite blocks within the last two months alone). I believe that any mentorship programme, no matter how well structured, is far too premature at this stage, and that the standard offer is the only realistic solution. Moreover, as others have pointed out, mentorship is geared primarily towards users with a relatively short editing history - TreasuryTag is not one of those users. SuperMarioMan 12:57, 18 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support I'm willing to give the guy the benefit of the doubt (again), although I have concerns and reservations regarding it. It needs to be clarified whether or not the mentors, both of them sysops, can block/unblock/both/neither TT. Also, the mentoring conditions and topic ban need to be red lines; with any violation resulting in an immediate block to prevent damage to the encyclopedia. TT also needs to show a genuine attitude change here. Wikilawyering/scorekeeping cannot be tolerated. I'd like to see him delete some of his "particular achievements" from his userpage. N419BH 03:13, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose TT produces More heat than light --Guerillero | My Talk 05:58, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support If they are willing to live under the microscope and continue on, knowing it's sink or swim at this point, with a ton of watchers scrutinizing: good luck. I agree that mentoring is pointless for editors that are "well-seasoned", but this could be considered a last chance in the face of so much opposition to unblocking. Doc talk 07:41, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose I have completely lost faith in in TT's ability to interact collaboratively in the Wikipedia environment. I cannot imagine a scenario where the mentoring will result in anything positive and I have no desire to be back here tomorrow, next week, or next month when the inevitable failure of the mentorship of an editor who has no desire to be mentored, and who essentially dictates the parameters of their mentorship, occurs. Jezebel'sPonyo^{bons mots} 14:55, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• Support. per a lot of supporters, but especially DGG. My main nagging concerns is that the resources of Worm and Fastily are finite, and it isn't perfectly clear this is the best use of those recourses, but if they are willing, it is worth a try.--SPhilbrickT 19:10, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Replies to some opposers

I hope people don't mind me putting up a section break to reply to the opposes which largely run along a few themes.

• 28bytes points out that TT appears to believe that his blocks were the product of others, not himself. I agree, it is a very large issue, and it will be a focus of a large part of the mentoring, especially in the early stages. As you can see from the "mentoring board" (a term I quite liked), one section is discussing "what went wrong". It is certainly an issue with TT, but it is one that I believe mentoring can tackle
• There are a few suggestions that TT has had enough chances. This isn't really a chance for self reform, as many of his last ones were - including HJ Mitchell's. There is a very large difference between being allowed to edit unmonitored with a few restrictions that most people will forget and what we're suggesting here. The restrictions are harsh, considering what TT edits and he has two mentors who are both experienced admins (admittedly, the other one is more experienced), and are both willing to block if he steps out of line.
• Some people believe he hasn't been blocked for long enough. Well, my view is similar to that of Swarm, I don't see that if he was blocked for 2-3 weeks more, anything extra would be achieved. The mentoring should prevent anything that the block is currently preventing. However, if we want to use this block as a punishment (which I think TT will just ride out and not learn anything from), then so be it.
• A few people have stated they don't trust TT not to break the conditions. That's understandable, he's hardly given them a reason to. However, if he does - what happens - his "beyond the last" chance dies. No one will unblock him. What's more, there's little that he can do that cannot be undone...

Overall - I have no idea if TT will stick to the restrictions or not. If he doesn't, and I see him breaking them - I will block him. And I will be watching. What's more, if he doesn't actually improve - and just bumbles along within the restrictions, I will block him. I'm not going to waste my time on someone who isn't trying to improve. I've done it before, it was one of the hardest things I've had to do on here, but I know when to say enough is enough. Worm^TT · (talk) 06:39, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• Unless and until TT stops deflecting responsibility for his blocks onto others, any mentoring is less than pointless. → ROUX ₪ 10:29, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  Catch-22, almost. As I say in my first point - this is specifically something that would be tackled. Expecting it to be fixed before we start is a bit difficult. Worm^TT · (talk) 14:20, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• On the contrary, TT's clear understanding of who is to blame must be a necessary precondition before unblocking should even be considered. Otherwise he's just going to wikilawyer around it. → ROUX ₪ 16:36, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• Regarding your second point, you raise an interesting point which is in and of itself a double edged sword. On the one hand, yes this time there would be dedicated admins actively monitoring the problem user, meaning that problems are likely to be snuffed out quickly. On the other hand, the very same active monitoring of which we speak is an, in my opinion, unnecessary waste of resources (i.e. the monitoring admins' time.) To me, you're making the argument that TT should be taken from the level of consuming an inappropriately large quantity of the community's time to consuming an inappropriately large quantity of two admins' time. The status quo, i.e. the block, consumes an inappropriately large quantity of no one's time, thus making it, from a resource use prospective, the best option. Sven Manguard Wha? 12:20, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

  Yes, it is a double edged sword, but I (and Fastily, who I almost feel guilty speaking for!) are willing to spend that time. Yes, keeping him blocked would mean zero time from us, but that time doesn't automatically turn into doing something else. For example, I manage my time well enough to file an RfC/U, work out this mentorship of TT, offer mentorship to someone else, review a few people for RfA and all those other little WP bits. Dropping one won't make me take on more, but equally keeping that one on won't make me drop others. Worm^TT · (talk) 14:20, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• @Worm: I think that the comments concerning TT not having been blocked long enough are not about whether he has been "punished" sufficiently for his past disruptions, but are, instead, made vcout of concern that the only real chance that mentoring will work is if TT really wants it to work, and that he's more likely to reach that conclusion if he's been deprived of the privilege of editing for enough time to make him aware that editing Wikipedia is something he really does want to do, and is worth pursuing changes in his behavior. His past history with short blocks has indicated that these do not bring about the necessary change in attitude, and a longer block is certainly not guaranteed to do so, but it does seem like the only reasonable pathway to get his attention. Beyond My Ken (talk) 15:30, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

• Interesting way of looking at things - and certainly one that makes sense, if he was unblocked after 1 months with the same restrictions. However, since this is a different situation, there are tight restrictions, which if violated would have consequenses and crucially would be monitored. From my view, he rejected mentorship and said he'd be able to cope alone and the community disagreed, hence his current predicament. I would hope that the community's view was sufficient to make him understand how stuck he is and I don't see that 2 weeks will change that. I think I'm in the minority on that viewpoint though - which is fair enough. Worm^TT · (talk) 15:38, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Worm, you said that expecting TT to show improvement in behavior or to take responsibility for his actions while is blocked is something of a catch-22; I'm afraid I can't agree. While I don't endorse or expect any sort of 'demonstration of remorse', 'acts of contrition', 'ritual abasement', or other general humiliation, when an individual has been blocked as many times as TT has (under this account and his previous accounts) the community does tend to be leery of "just give me another chance", because we've tried that, and it hasn't resulted in sufficient improvement. Just telling us that it will be different because he's being watched isn't quite sufficient; he's been watched before.

What TT and his mentors should be doing during his block is not make repeated requests on this board and attempt to negotiate an immediate return. The community has pretty clearly spoken on this issue—they see TT as a net negative for the project, and the fact that it's taking such an elaborate monitoring regime for a return to be even considered speaks volumes. Frankly, a good portion of the community probably sees this extended discussion as an ill-considered further waste of resources, and wants to know why we can't get just a few weeks of peace and quiet. Instead, you three should be spending the time in quiet, reflective – and probably private, off-wiki – consultation with TT. The three of you need to be able to clearly elucidate how TT returning to the project will be a substantial and significant net benefit to Wikipedia. Figure out specific areas where he has contributions to make. Clearly identify past problems, and how those will be avoided or addressed. Your page User:Worm That Turned/TreasuryTag is a start, but the "What went wrong" and "Suggested tasks" sections are devoid of content. You've suggested editing restrictions, but they don't flow from a clearly-stated understanding of where they arose or why they are needed. The proposal tells us what TT won't be allowed to do, but it doesn't tell us what he plans to do. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:26, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi TenOfAllTrades. I prefer my mentoring to be on wiki for a number of reasons - I don't have sufficient access to off-wiki forms of communication (due to where and when I have time to spend on this) to mentor off wiki. I would rather there was transparency in my discussions, which allows the community to see how much the mentee has participated in the mentorship. Finally, as a mentorship team - on wiki mentorship works best.

The sections you mention are currently empty because the actual asking of the questions is an important part of the mentorship process. It makes it more of a discussion, so I'm not telling him what went wrong, and am including his perceptions in with it. What he will do, I cannot yet tell you. I can steer him in positive directions, but no more. The editing restrictions were based on my immediate understanding of the issues. They were based on Dweller's restrictions, but tweaked to my style.

As to waiting, I don't mind. I have mentored a few blocked editors and generally when I suggest it, the block was soon overturned. I didn't expect this to be different, and it says a lot for the challenge that will be faced. Worm^TT · (talk) 18:37, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

If you come back in a few weeks and TT is prepared to take responsibility for his actions I'm sure you'll get a consensus to unblock. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 18:50, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

The two major concerns with putting everything on-wiki are that a) all of the participants are are aware that the page is widely watched, and frankness may be discarded in favor of 'playing to the crowd'; and b) third parties may be tempted to involve themselves into the process (either directly, or even through comment and actions taken elsewhere on Wikipedia) in ways that may inflame disputes or have counterproductive outcomes.

If you are resolved to do everything on wiki, it's not clear to me why you can't carry out 'the asking of the questions' on TT's talk page (or transfer his responses to your userspace, or some similar compromise). It strikes me that knowing what went wrong in the past, and what steps will be taken in the future, are issues best cleared up before an unblock, instead of after. Leisurely discussion at TT's convenience is unlikely to ever actually reach a conclusion.

Finally – and I don't mean to be too brutal with you, since have no doubt you are acting here in good faith – I find it worrisome that you weren't able to anticipate the level of concern and resistance a request to unblock TT might encounter. It suggests that you haven't yet acquired a comprehensive understanding of the situation that faces TT, and you risk doing a disservice to TT, the community, and yourself when you act without a full grasp of that context. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 19:00, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, I was well aware that this was a possible, if not likely outcome. What's more, when it was mentioned at AN last week, there was a large contingent who voiced the exact concerns. I knew this was contentious, and that's why I didn't unblock straight off, but instead came to the community. I did think, and still think this was worth putting my neck out for. I guess "expect" was the wrong word - "hope" would be a better one.

I've been watching TT for quite a while, and have commented on a few of the discussions regarding his behaviour. I even turned down an unblock request from him about a month ago. I do understand the problems with doing things on-wiki, but I think it's worth it. If TT does 'play to the crowd', he'll come unstuck if he goes the other way. If he genuinely improves, people will see it. Likewise if he tries to get on without changing.

Indeed, the initial parts of TT's mentoring can take place whilst he was blocked. However, on a sub page, the majority of people won't watch - just people who are interested and certainly not the 275 people watching his talk page. On his talk page, I'd have less control, you never know who's going to turn up and interject into a thread.

To me, it still hangs on the one question - do I trust TT not to bugger this up? I'm willing to put that as a yes. Worm^TT · (talk) 19:19, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I think that TT needs to convince more than just you that he isn't going to bugger this up. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 19:22, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

I doubt TT could convince me either way. This isn't about what he says, it's about what changes he actually makes. Worm^TT · (talk) 19:24, 17 October 2011 (UTC)

Worm, you said 'That's understandable, he's hardly given them a reason to. However, if he does - what happens - his "beyond the last" chance dies'. Isn't this fundamentally what was said on "the last" chance as well? But we're here, discussing a "beyond the last" chance. Given we're already past "the last" chance here, how can you say confidently that there won't be a "beyond the beyond the last" chance, or a "beyond the beyond the beyond the last chance"? Fundamentally, the last chance is the last chance. There shouldn't be a "beyond the last chance" if that idea is to have any meaning. If TT was told this was his last chance and he still screwed up, that's it. That's what "the last chance" means. If he was serious about improving his behaviour, he would have done it then, not now and not later. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 01:31, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. I think that 'last chance' is a phrase which is too often thrown around. My reasoning is that if this fails, there would be no one left to bring him back, making this a geniunely final chance. I've been told many times that I have an almost inexhaustable amount of good faith - I don't think there are many users who would try where even I have given up. Is it arrogance to state something like that, even when such a quality has such negative consequences, I wonder.Worm^TT · (talk) 14:12, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

How Disappointing

It's disappointing to see the lack of faith the community has shown towards both Worm and me. We have already put in a lot of time and effort in volunteering to perform community service that nobody wants to take part in. With our combined experience (Worm as an expert mediator, me as a tenured admin familiar with TreasuryTag), I believe we can successfully mentor TT. I assure you all that TT will be carefully monitored and that any infarctions shall be, and will be remedied with swift rebuke. I understand that many of you have had negative experiences with TreasuryTag and do not wish for his return. This is perfectly logical and is quite normal. I know it is a big favor to ask, especially from those of you who have been offended by him, to allow for his return to editing. I ask you however, to please look beyond your own self interests and candidly consider all the good TT can do for the project: he is an excellent content contributor and is knowledgeable in the media file namespace, which, as many of you know, is drearily understaffed. While content contributions and policy knowledge certainly do not outweigh past offenses, I am happy to announce that TT has has expressed a desire to reform before a return to editing. His return as a reformed editor would be undeniably beneficial to the project. TT is aware that he has exhausted the community's patience and will do his best to meet everyone's expectations. I humbly ask you to allow him this final opportunity to prove himself. I cannot say in certainty that we will be successful with TT, but I do believe he deserves one last chance to prove himself. As I see it, "you lose 100% of the chances you never take". Thanks, and sincerely, FASTILY ^(TALK) 20:54, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

Fastily, I do not think this is in any way a reflection of you. I would suggest that it's TT's fantastic history at the root of the issue. I may have successfully raised a dog from a puppy, but that does not mean I'll be successful at walking into a den of hungry wolves, and turn them into Alpo-eating lapdogs. There's an old joke: how many social workers does it take to change a lightbulb - one, but the lightbulb has to want to change. TT shows no signs of wanting to change. He shows no desire to do anything but Wikilawyer. Neither of these reflect on you, they reflect on him - it takes balls to want to walk amongst the wolf pack, but none of us trust the wolf right now. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:07, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Bwilkins; please don't take this as a slight on you, but instead that the community feels your time and effort would be better spent with other, more motivated editors. KillerChihuahua^?!? 21:14, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

+1. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 21:29, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

I confess I was surprised at the number of opposers, and my first inclination was to think it reflected a lack of faith in Worm and Fastily, but as I thought through my own decision to support, I reached a similar conclusion as BWilkins. Indeed, even if it is a success, if it does so at the expense of consuming all of the onwiki time of both, it will be a net loss for the project. While I came down on the side of support, my hesitance should be interpreted as a measure of respect for what both do.--SPhilbrickT 19:19, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

• (e/c) Wait; if someone doesn't think this is a good idea, it demonstrates a "lack of faith...towards Worm and [you]"? Let's not get carried away.

  I do have a question, though. If TT does something disruptive, is it your intention that any admin would be able to re-block him indefinitely on their own initiative (like we would do with anyone else with a long history of being disruptive), or that the admin should defer to one of you, or must gain your agreement, or that we should have yet another community discussion about whether the mentoring failed or not? I'm worried that this will end up being an unwarranted level of protection against being blocked. If I see TT being disruptive again, and there is any obstacle whatsoever against me blocking him, then I would oppose this. If there are no obstacles, then ... not because I think it's wise, but as a favor to you and Worm ... I'd support. (if this question has been addressed above, my apologies, it's a long thread and I have a short attention span.) --Floquenbeam (talk) 21:15, 19 October 2011 (UTC)

• After speaking with Worm and your statement above, Fastily, I'll support this proposal, on the condition that if TT fails to comply with any of the terms of his mentorship, consciously violates any of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines or fails to show respect for the essential principles of civility and collegiality, that he is given an indefinite block as a matter of due process, without dragging the matter once more through what is clearly a community very weary of dealing with this issue. As is the criteria in any unblock, TT needs to acknowledge and understand why he was blocked (hint: it wasn't because other people complained); this is an essential first step to reform and I don't believe mentorship can succeed without it. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 22:05, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I can support per TechnoSymbiosis' conditions. -- Eraserhead1 <talk> 22:11, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• To be honest I find it rather disappointing that when not getting your way you took it upon yourself to create a new sub-section just to lament your fellow editors. I'd say I definitely made the right call above. Not really the kind of behaviour I'd want displayed by a mentor.--Crossmr (talk) 22:31, 19 October 2011 (UTC)
• Fastily your one of the admins that I trust the most here; however I can't see TT's return being a net positive for the project at the moment based on Bobrayner's Law of Mentoring:

Mentoring is a bad investment decision when: $(P^{reform}.W^{lc})-(W^{supervision}+W^{mentor})<-W^{RBI}$, where:

• • $P^{reform}$ is the likelihood that mentoring actually works,
  • $W^{lc}$ is the future good work done by [the person],
  • $W^{supervision}$ is the time that people still spend looking over the reformed editor's shoulder,
  • $W^{mentor}$ is the effort by the mentor, and
  • $W^{RBI}$ is the ongoing effort of RBI in the no-change scenario. (And we treat the latter three Ws as negatives; they're time that good editors could spend doing something else instead) --Guerillero | My Talk 05:40, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

Fastily, I also agree that the opposers don't show a lack of good faith in you and worm. I think the opposes here are an expression of just how much community patience TT has exhausted. He's done so much damage and alienated so many people that at the present time the majority of the community sees his contributions as a net negative and feels he needs to remain blocked to prevent damage to the encyclopedia. Considering all the drama that he's recently caused, it's a view that has a good deal of merit. Perhaps you and Worm need to consider mentoring TT off wiki or in his userspace so the main issue the opposers have raised, TT's attitude, can be addressed. When he's demonstrated a genuine behavior change perhaps the community at large will be more inclined to give the topic ban and mentoring a shot. N419BH 06:41, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

• Fastily, I'm fairly certain I've made my respect for you abundantly clear and I am not sure of many folks on here who don't have similar respect. My opposition is based on TT's behavior only and is not a reflection at all on the great respect and admiration I have for both you and Worm as administrators, editors, and just people.--v/r - TP 20:47, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

• My own reluctance to indicate a preference at all was based on the "we have negotiated" wording of the mentorship proposal, and the yawning empty spaces here, at the "What went wrong" and "Suggested tasks" sections. The community problem with TT is the endless denial of having done anything wrong, using deep wikilawyer skills; and most recently the refusal to do anything in response to Dweller's proposed mentorship arrangement other than reject all proposals and call for an acceptable proposal. Nowhere did TT make their own offer, and it's not clear at all that you obtained that either. There is simply no substantive basis to judge what will happen. I disagree with any notion that the community has decided that your own (Worm and Fastily) time is better spent elsewhere, it's a volunteer site, so knock yourself out - but other members of the community will have to deal with the fallout if (/when) your bet goes wrong, right up to the minute before you (or another admin(?), another thing not made clear) decide to reblock. Given the lack of detail or actual comment from TT themself, there's simply no way to judge how much trouble could occur. I certainly don't doubt your good faith here, but yeah, I do think it relies a little too much on too many unknowns. Franamax (talk) 21:06, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
• Fastily/Worm. I think quite highly of both of you (even if we butt heads), but I think there is little reflection on either of you. This is an issue with TT, not you personally. Buffs (talk) 22:00, 20 October 2011 (UTC)
• I agree with those above. Worm and Fastily are good folks, and the intention is good to try and recover the aspects of TT's editing which everyone (I think) agrees were positive. But fundamentally, mentoring is about taking someone who has problems understanding problems or has problems avoiding problems and helping them understand and avoid. Someone who rejects the premise that their behavior is the root cause - and TT did, and has in ongoing public statments done so - is not ready for mentoring. I agree with the concept of TT not being beyond redemption, but being willing to accept some responsibility for things in depth has to be a precondition. If you want to start mentoring him, the first step should be to get him to agree to admission of responsibility in such a way that he establishes credibly to the community that there's basis for success going forwards. That mentoring doesn't require an unblock. I don't know the private conversations so far, but the public ones haven't given me hope on this point yet. That can change. Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 22:32, 20 October 2011 (UTC)

• I recall a phrase about "one sinner repented" and since, like every other editor, we choose what we to do with our time so I support the mentoring. That said, I understand that should the mentoring fail to work the magic or for other reasons the net benefit of permitting TreasuryTag to edit again is negative then the community may need to act promptly - and so long as the terms of reinstatement of editing privileges are clear that should be not be much of an issue. GraemeLeggett (talk) 11:56, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Is TT Banned?

Please see here for a question of nuance. 140.247.141.149 (talk) 00:31, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps we should open a formal banning vote, given the information in the section below. Is thirty-four chances enough WP:ROPE? Have mörser, will travel (talk) 09:23, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Addendum to the above discussion

I don't wish to re-open that thread, but I would ask that everyone who commented have a look at this [22] and remember it if and when TT asks to be unblocked again. 34 blocks is a bit much, and the fact that he had operated three other accounts does not seem to have been noted during any of the recent discussions. Beeblebrox (talk) 03:41, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Either the template that links TT to the List of banned editors is wrongly placed because TT is not on that list, or the list itself needs to be updated. An easy fix. Doc talk 04:12, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

(copied over from TT's user talk page) I have not used "three other accounts". I have undergone renaming, which is a transparent process. Each of my block-logs contains a link to the previous username. My userpage clearly states my previous usernames. I don't know why Beeblebrox has taken it upon themselves to try and smear me in this way but it's distinctly unimpressive given that it's simply based on fact and personal attacks of absurd accusations – ╟─TreasuryTag►international waters─╢ 07:47, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

Whatever. My edit to his talk page makes it perfectly clear that I understood that he was renamed three times. What I find alarming is that the block logs of all four put together adds up to 34, and the fact that this was apparently overlooked in the recent discussions. I did also remark that the renames may have been done to avoid scrutiny. TT is free to disagree with that speculation, only he knows for sure if it is true or not and I certainly wouldn't expect him to ever admit to any wrongdoing. Again, not trying to re-open the discussion, just making a note of the massive number of blocks for future reference. Will happily refrain from commenting further on the matter. Beeblebrox (talk) 15:46, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

The renaming seems to have been transparent (although following the block logs back I only see 2 "other" accounts, for a total of three - Rambutan, Pocupine and Treasury Tag; am I missing one?) so I don't think that's particularly an issue. The total number of blocks, however, is significant in showing a consistent pattern of disruptive editing. Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:17, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, I see it now in the history of TT's user page, "Circuit Judge". Beyond My Ken (talk) 18:21, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Request to close RfC/U

Could an uninvolved admin please close Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Kiefer.Wolfowitz, before he says something that has unintended consequences. I don't mind if he calls me a [Norwegian Hun], but I think it's a sign that productive interaction has ceased, and we plainly can't agree how to close it ourselves. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 19:58, 23 October 2011 (UTC) I suppose if the Norwegian allegation is true, it might indicate the need for fish --Elen of the Roads (talk) 20:04, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd prefer that we came to an amicable solution on "closing" but I expect that's not going to happen. If an uninvolved admin could step in and summarize the salient points, that'd be great. Have fun! Worm^TT · (talk) 20:06, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi!

I did mind Elen's expressed and needlessly provocative statement that I am "out to lunch" and jab about "showing up in polite society", as well as her repeated insinuation that Lihaas be a national socialist. Will she resign from ArbCom and from being an administrator, or will she be held accountable?

Back to business....

WTT, Demiurge1000, and I are talking about issues, which has not happened before. Thus, a close is premature.  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:09, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

YOu just cannot stop can you. Lihaas has a userbox on his userpage that says he is a supporter of National Socialism. Go look at it. Pointing this fact out can in no way be a personal attack on him even if you have spent the last two days claiming that it is so. Elen of the Roads (talk) 23:28, 23 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll take a look at closing. I don't think I am involved but someone can point it out if they think I am.--v/r - TP 15:32, 24 October 2011 (UTC)

"In before the lock" as some would say. Someone should make the small print in that {{closing}} template larger and also prune some of the excessive text in it because frankly few read it as it is today... Have mörser, will travel (talk) 07:49, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Good comment. I and several other users failed to read the suggestion to avoid posting. (The "closing in progress" template has been removed, I note.)  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 23:38, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

IP hoard

A group of IPs, obviously coordinating off-Wikipedia, have decided to flood Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion with requests to undelete Brian Reichle (Brian Redban). Check out the history. I have blocked all of the hoard who have appeared for 31 hours each—24 users thus far. I have to go offline and would appreciate it if someone would keep an eye out.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 02:05, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Never mind trying to block them all...I was about to semi it, but MuZemike beat me to it. That should keep them at bay for the time being. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 02:12, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

How interesting. Now I understand why I got this message (although the IP confusingly left it at my Commons talk page!), even though I'd never deleted Brian Reichle. Nyttend (talk) 03:11, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Back. I had decided against protection until seeing if it the flooding was going to continue apace because it's the type of page that should remain open for requests. Anyway, that wraps it up for the moment.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 03:51, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

If it does continue, see if someone can dash off an Edit Filter to head it off at the pass. This should be an easy edit filter to set up. --Jayron32 04:31, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Sockblock template

I would like to revise template:Sockblock so that the basic message states: This account has been blocked indefinitely as a sock puppet that was created to violate Wikipedia policy. Note that multiple accounts are allowed, but using them for illegitimate reasons is not. If this is not a sock puppet account, and you would like to be unblocked, you may appeal this block by adding the text {{unblock|Your reason here ~~~~}} below, but you should read the guide to appealing blocks first. Currently the message incorrectly uses the word "you", as in "you have been blocked as a sockpuppet". This is incorrect because sockpuppets are accounts, not people. I have also found that editors are less likely to take things personally if admins refer to the behavior of accounts and minimize use of the word "you". Because of the high impact of the template, I'm bringing this here for discussion rather than acting boldly. Note that the template should always be subst'ed, so existing block messages would not be affected. Looie496 (talk) 17:45, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Support - assuming the block is correct, "you" isn't the sockpuppet - the account is. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 20:06, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Support – and perhaps we could also add another tweak: "[...]and you would like it unblocked", this way we would indicate that it is this particular account that would be unblocked; I mean, even if the account isn't a sockpuppet one, it may be an alternate account used for legitimate reasons. I believe this thread should be posted at Wikipedia talk:Template messages/User talk namespace, not here. HeyMid (contribs) 20:32, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

I thought it was important to bring it up where admins would see it. Looie496 (talk) 21:02, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

Sounds good. I'd say go for it. – Luna Santin (talk) 22:08, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support, I'd never thought about the issue before, but Looie's reasoning makes complete sense. This probably should have gone at the template talk page; you could have posted a notice here asking people to go there. Definitely a good idea to make sure that admins are aware, since we're the ones using this template., Nyttend (talk) 00:32, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
• Go for it. --Jayron32 04:37, 26 October 2011 (UTC)
• I've gone ahead and  performed the edit in question. However, I'd like some clarification here: is there support for my suggestion that "and would to be unblocked" should be modified to "and would like it unblocked", so we abide by the purpose of Looie496's edit request? Also, what about tweaking "If this is not a sock puppet account" to "If this account is not a sock puppet"? HeyMid (contribs) 09:17, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Blocklogentry

Discussion has been moved to WP:Village pump/Technical#MediaWiki:Blocklogentry

Hello. I'm trying to report with a CVN bot the blocks of every wikis, essentially for stewards to check blocked people to know if there is cross-wiki vandalism or only local vandalism. But what is reported on irc.wikimedia.org is translated, so there are different patterns for each projects. For enwiki, the MediaWiki message is blocked $1 $3 with an expiry time of $2, so I have no possibility to distinguish $1 and $3... If you could change it to blocked [[$1]] $3 with an expiry time of $2, blocked «$1» $3 with an expiry time of $2, or at least blocked $1 with an expiry time of $2 $3 (which is really a minor change), it would be very helpful. Thanks by advance. -- Quentinv57 (talk) 08:19, 26 October 2011 (UTC) Makes sense, so I've copied it to WP:VPT for a wider technical audience. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 11:43, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Ra - One movie - biased response section in Wiki

Discussion has commenced at WP:DRN#Ra One - Response section

Hi All, This thread has been started to discuss and resolve the conflict regarding Ra - One movie's response. Reviewers like Yahoo and Rediff have 2 out of 5 and declared it a flop, the users Ashermadan, Ankitbhatt and Shshshsh are vandalising the article by inserting incredible reviewers like Hungama on the top. Below is the diffs of the article. http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ra.One&action=historysubmit&diff=457461123&oldid=457460504 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Guru coolguy (talk • contribs) 10:31, 26 October 2011 (UTC) This sounds like a content dispute, which is not handled here. Please come to WP:CONSENSUS on the article talkpage, or follow the dispute resolution processes. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 10:36, 26 October 2011 (UTC) Nothing is biased there. You are the one who's actually being biased. Most of the reviews are positive and it's clear as day. You said (in the edit summary), "The reviews should go by top rated critics first followed by biased / regional reviewers" - so, this is your total POV if you think that a Yahoo critic and a Rediff critic are the top critics and the other, as you say, are "biased" (and they come from newspapers and happen to be the most famous critics in India). I can't see why you insist on bringing the two negative reviews to the top of the section and changing it to "negative" if it's clearly not. And I personally interfered only because you were edit warring. Shahid • Talk2me 10:42, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

RPP backlog

Resolved

 – From 30+ entries to about 3. – Luna Santin (talk) 18:07, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

There's a long backlog at RPP - could some admins deal with it? Thanks! HurricaneFan25 14:53, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Closer requested

Can one of you (someone who is not me or one of my socks) please have a look at Wikipedia:Administrators'_noticeboard/Incidents#User:Joefaust? Consensus has been reached, but it needs to be acted on. Thank you. Drmies (talk) 15:50, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Done. Swarm ^X 18:30, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Arbitration motion regarding Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change

Resolved by motion at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment that: The Climate change case is supplemented as follows:

The topic ban imposed on William M. Connolley (talk · contribs) in the Climate change case is modified, effective immediately. William M. Connolley is permitted to edit within the topic area of Climate change, but is prohibited from editing relating to any living person associated with this topic, interpreted broadly but reasonably. William M. Connolley is reminded to abide by all applicable Wikipedia policies in editing on this topic and that he remains subject either to further action by this Committee or (like all editors in this topic-area) to discretionary sanctions should he fail to do so.

For the Arbitration Committee, Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 21:31, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

Discuss this

Backlog at RPP

WP:RPP has an enormous backlog (virtually no answered requests that have not been moved to the "answered requests" section). I just needed to bring this to admins' attention.Jasper Deng (talk) 04:30, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Omnibus motion amending past arbitration cases

Resolved by motion at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Motions:

To simplify enforcement of older sanctions that are, substantively, discretionary sanctions, the committee hereby amends and supersedes the remedies listed below with the following:

Discretionary Sanctions

The topic is placed under discretionary sanctions. Any uninvolved administrator may levy restrictions as an arbitration enforcement action on users editing in this topic area, after an initial warning.

where "The topic" is specified in the list of amended remedies below. Any extant sanctions or warnings made according to the older wording found in those decisions (as applicable) remain unaffected.

• Remedy 1.1 of Palestine-Israel articles (All Arab-Israeli conflict-related articles, broadly interpreted)
• Armenia-Azerbaijan 2 as amended. (Topics related to Armenia-Azerbaijan and related ethnic conflicts, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 1 of Macedonia (topics related to the Balkans, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 1.2 of Climate change (The Climate change topic, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 1 of Abd-WMC (Cold fusion and related articles)
• Remedy 12 of Digwuren (Topics related to Eastern Europe, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 1 of Gibraltar (Gibraltar or other articles concerning the history, people, or political status of Gibraltar)
• Remedy 1 of Homeopathy (Homeopathy and related articles)
• Remedy 4 of Martinphi-ScienceApologist and remedy 12 of Pseudoscience (Articles relating to pseudoscience, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 1 of September 11 conspiracy theories (Articles which relate to the events of September 11, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 3 of Transcendental Meditation movement (Transcendental meditation or other articles concerning Transcendental meditation and related biographies of living people, broadly interpreted)
• Remedy 13 of Ayn Rand (Ayn Rand or related articles or pages)
• All extant remedies of The Troubles, as amended and clarified (Articles relating to The Troubles, as well as the Ulster banner and British baronets)

For the Arbitration Committee, NW (Talk) 14:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Discuss this

Closure needed

Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Music_to_Raise_the_Dead. Been open for 2 weeks. I think the consensus is pretty clear for deletion. I should also note that I want the title "All Your Life" freed up for a notable song by The Band Perry. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 22:44, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

As another participant in the discussion, I think the lack of consensus is evident, particularly since several of the "delete" !votes are based on an application of WP:NOTINHERITED contradicted by WP:NOTINHERITED as well as WO:OSE. Hullaballoo Wolfowitz (talk) 22:52, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

• Another closure needed at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/LGBT rights in the Commonwealth of Nations, please. It's been open for a month and the last !vote was almost two weeks ago. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 03:57, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Not sure about the first one, but Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/LGBT rights in the Commonwealth of Nations does not appear to be listed at WP:AFD. Any thoughts, before it gets relisted again - if it gets relisted again? UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 20:55, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC uninvolved closure request...

...posted at Requests for uninvolved help. The attention of an uninvolved user/admin is solicited. Thanks.

...and why is this archive bot set at 2 days? JakeInJoisey (talk) 18:24, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I think it would help if the exact nature of the conflict were spelled out more clearly. The whole discussion seems a bit vague. Hobit (talk) 00:59, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Indefinite block review: Colofac

Would an admin assess the consensus at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Indefinite block review: Colofac? Thanks, Cunard (talk) 23:00, 26 October 2011 (UTC)

I see the discussion was closed with no summary. Uʔ (talk) 08:06, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes. I've asked uninvolved admin Sjakkalle (talk · contribs) to take a look. A close as "keep blocked" or "unblock" is needed to determine whether WP:CBAN #2 is met. Cunard (talk) 08:18, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Right, a consensus in support of an indef block means that a user is community banned, and that's a far different situation than simply closing a discussion and saying "request unblock normally" (as Jehochman evidently did). Swarm ^X 08:29, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

WikiProject Film

Hello, I am scrubbing several lists of participants at WikiProject Film and its related task forces. There was a list of admin members that is outdated, and I have reduced it to two people. The majority of WikiProject Film's members are not admins, so I am looking for admins who are willing to list themselves as points of contact. They do not have to be members of WikiProject Film; I have revised the admin list description. In general, the requests will be to edit protected templates like {{WikiProject Film}} or {{Infobox film}}, protect highly vandalized film articles as needed, and being familiar with sockpuppets of banned editors who edit film articles. If you are interested in being a point of contact, I invite you to add yourself to the list here. I recommend adding a brief description of what issues you can help address. Thanks! Erik (talk | contribs) 21:14, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Deletion request

Resolved

 – all deleted. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:04, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Could someone delete all the pages on Wikipedia:Database reports/Orphaned talk subpages? Thanks! — Train2104 (talk • contribs • count) 20:27, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Normally we require at least some hint of a reason why we should delte a page before going ahead and doing it. So, why should we delete this page? Beeblebrox (talk) 20:32, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Please delete only the pages listed, which, as the name implies, are orphaned subpages. — Train2104 (talk • contribs • count) 20:35, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Oops, I misread that as a request to delete the report itself. Time for a coffee break... Beeblebrox (talk) 20:39, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

DRV backlog – 28 October 2011

Would admins close the following DRV discussions:

1. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 18#List of publications in law
2. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 19#List of important publications in sociology
3. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 19#List of scientists opposing the mainstream scientific assessment of global warming
4. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 19#Jenna Rose
5. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 20#Aaron Livesy and Jackson Walsh
6. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 20#Donald Braswell
7. Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2011 October 20#Stephen Palmquist

Thanks, Cunard (talk) 07:38, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Courcelles (talk · contribs), for closing #5 on the list. Cunard (talk) 22:14, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I've closed two more; I've either commented or am otherwise involved in the others. Black Kite (t) 23:35, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Black Kite. Cunard (talk) 23:42, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, Courcelles (talk · contribs), NuclearWarfare (talk · contribs), and Spartaz (talk · contribs), for closing the remaining DRVs. Cunard (talk) 05:09, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

User:Joseph201

Resolved

 – blocked for one week by Kww

Joseph201 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
I am unhappy to report that user Joseph201 has come back from his/her block and went right back to copy and pasting from external sites like thebiographychannel. Its clear we have a user that has not read what has been shown to them or simply does not care about our polocies that have been pointed out to them and was the reasons for the longer 3 day block.

Previous info at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/3RRArchive171#User:Joseph201 reported by User:Moxy (Result: 72h). Moxy (talk)

This actually belonged at ANI, but I had already blocked Joseph201 for a week when I saw this in Moxy's contributions.—Kww(talk) 02:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you (next time at ANI).Moxy (talk) 02:47, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Bulk creation of redirects

I have a plan to create many redirects (probably up to 1300) in line with Template:R_from_alternative_language for the Māori language (language code 'mi') based on an official source [23]. The creation would be manual, but relatively speedy, so I'd discussing first rather than being WP:BOLD. The plan is outlined with a sample of redirects at User:Stuartyeates/Ngā Ūpoko Tukutuku. I've already talked about it at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand (and got useful feedback). I've asked at Wikipedia:Help desk and it was suggested that I mention the work here. I've started to create the redirects in small numbers. Stuartyeates (talk) 08:43, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Hi. I notice that a lots of the targets on your example list are redlinks at the moment, so presumably you're not going to be creating redlinks to them yet? Or have I misread the table? - Jarry1250 ^{[Weasel? Discuss.]} 08:47, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Where the link in the first column is a red link, I'm creating redirects. The second column contains candidate targets for those redirects. Sometimes there are several candidates, commonly there's just one. Also commonly all the candidates are red links themselves, in which case I'll be casting around for a suitable target. There are some where I'm confident that there current exists not useful candidate (such as E mākū i te rangi, which is particular shape used in facial tattoos); I'll probably add these to the Wikipedia talk:WikiProject New Zealand list of requested pages, with a note as to their origin. Stuartyeates (talk) 09:03, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Oh, please don't do this. I have no objection against Maori or New Zealand specific redirects, like Arokehe, but we shouldn't have redirects like Aronganui, Arorangi-iti or Atamira which point to (very) general concepts, not specifically related to Maori or New Zealand. Fram (talk) 09:11, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

More specifically, from Wikipedia:Redirect: "In particular, redirects from a foreign language title to a page whose subject is unrelated to that language (or a culture that speaks that language) should generally not be created." Fram (talk) 09:12, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I've stopped creating redirects. Stuartyeates (talk) 09:18, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm planning to restart creating redirects for specific terms. These are generally (a) species names (there are lots of these, few are linked) (b) cultural practices (many of these already have pages) (c) items or tools (d) crafts (some of these have pages) or (e) mythological figures. Creating these non-controversial redirects will give me time to cogitate on what to do with the controversial ones while at the same time giving me exposure to them. Stuartyeates (talk) 06:04, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

That idea sounds quite reasonable to me. Nyttend (talk) 11:41, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Can you tag the other ones you already created with {{db-g7}}? They shouldn't have been created, and letting you do the cleanup is probably the fastest way to achieve this. Fram (talk) 11:53, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I've tagged about 16 early ones with {{db-g7}} and continue working on the specific terms. The specific terms appear to be largely common names of plant or animal species so far. I'm planning a Portal-like layout for this content as well (but still reading up on Portals since I've never had anything to do with them in the past). Stuartyeates (talk) 01:55, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Mini proposal for this board

Just want to make sure this is ok with everyone, because it would make my life easier, and probably everyone else's, but I was wondering if maybe we could have 1 section at the top of this page where all RfCs, AfDs, etc....that need closing go, it would be a no comment section, and that way admins can just clear it when it's done and not have to worry about archiving or random stuff like that. Comments? (I'm just looking for a small brief consensus to do, if people disagree i'll just move on) -- DQ (t) (e) 01:26, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I support this proposal, but for transparency purposes, I recommend that the close requests are signed. Cunard (talk) 05:25, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely agree, i'll wait a full 24 hours before doing so if no one objects. -- DQ (t) (e) 06:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I do not object. But I find the practice of closing some XfD - RM, whatever... - sooner than others simply because someone comes in here to push for it a little odd. Closings should happen when their 'natural' time comes, accepting suggestions in here opens the door for us to be gamed (IF a close call seems like gonna fall for 'my side': go and poke an admin to close ELSE let time run and hope for a couple 'good' extra votes before an admin closes it) - Nabla (talk) 11:48, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

The issue isn't closing things early, it's that many RFCs and so forth aren't being watched by anyone who is not a participant, and so they sit there open after they have reached a conclusion. Admins can and should be expected to be able to tell if someone is tying to game them into pushing a close through early. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:23, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

As proposed earlier, there is a new template {{request close}}, with Category:Requests for Close as well as the older {{Uninvolved}} with Category:Requests for uninvolved help that can be used to request closes. I would suggest that we try to transition to using those first, and reduce AN posts to closes that have still not been made after having had one of the templates for a reasonable amount of time. Monty₈₄₅ 17:20, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I though the whole reason people were posting here was to remind us of overdue-for-closure debates. Are many of these requests actually for alleged SNOW situations? Nyttend (talk) 22:20, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't know, I think most would be "overdue-for-closure", not snow. Any way there are "overdue-for-closure" that get posted here and there there are "overdue-for-closure" that get even more overdue. There should be a better process than poking at admins. And there is already some: wait and someone will pass by or tag as backlog if needed. - Nabla (talk) 23:52, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Poll in need of closing

A poll was started on 20 September at WikiProject Ireland Collaboration as part of the ongoing discussion of Ireland article titles. It was not started as an RfC or an RM, and people in the project are probably too involved to be closing it. If an uninvolved admin could close it, it would really help to move the discussion along. It shouldn't be difficult and I wouldn't anticipate anybody disputing the result. Scolaire (talk) 11:03, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Just so the closing admin is aware, this poll was opened very shortly after another poll which was very widely advertised. The 2nd poll was not advertised widely, and there is a very distinct pattern of users appearing on the WT:IECOLL page, contributing to the 1st poll, and ignoring the 2nd poll. I'm not sure what the reason for this was, but I'm not convinced that the state of play necessarily represents the will of the community at large. Fmph (talk) 11:18, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Anyone? Bueller? Bastun^{Ėġáḍβáś₮ŭŃ!} 10:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:RFPP

Resolved

 – for now anyway, backlog is cleared. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

(honestly not sure if this is the right place to post this, but it is probably something that admins would have to be part of at some point)

Seems we have been getting a good influx of protection requests; can we get some more admins patrolling WP:RFPP? The RFPP clerk script that I use has been showing there being over 10 reports pending pretty much every time I use it for the past couple days. We probably just need one or two more admins patrolling this, to help keep it down. Again, sorry if this is the wrong place to post this. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 17:14, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

For the record, yes this is the proper place to post such messages. Beeblebrox (talk) 18:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

saw a page from ages ago

looked at optometry just now, I saw the previous revision. I have never looked at that page before so the caching was on wikipeida. went to fix it and saw it had been fixed - 18 hours ago!

wazzup? 86.174.111.59 (talk) 17:17, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Soooo, why does this need to be reported to admins? I see nothing that even remotely needs an admin in this situation. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 17:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't know where it should be reported to so was hoping someone would pass the message on 86.174.111.59 (talk) 17:20, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

It didn't say what the problem was. Per the editnotice:

This noticeboard is for issues affecting administrators generally – announcements, notifications, information, and other matters of general administrator interest.

LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 17:29, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

WP:IAR and if you expect casual users to bother with all wikipedia's bueracracy... well let's say you're wrong 86.174.111.59 (talk) 17:36, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

This looks like something better suited for WP:VPT, which is for technical questions about glitches and so forth. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:32, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you 86.174.111.59 (talk) 17:36, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Ah, I guess I misunderstood you. Sorry. LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 18:16, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

No worries, I am lazy :) 86.174.111.59 (talk) 18:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Actually, you did solved the question very perfectly. --Mohamed Aden Ighe (talk) 18:28, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC on "verifiability, not truth"

There is an RfC here on whether to remove from the lead of Wikipedia:Verifiability that "the threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth—whether readers can check that material in Wikipedia has already been published by a reliable source, not whether editors think it is true."

The RfC is likely to close in a few days so if you want to comment, please do so soonish. Many thanks, SlimVirgin ^{TALK|CONTRIBS} 23:47, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Note: the link in the first sentence above should read that the RfC can be found at Wikipedia_talk:Verifiability#RFC - Compromise proposal re first sentence  Unscintillating (talk) 19:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nicolas Plott

A sudden flood of "keep" votes, all parroting one another, several SPA IPs, and one account that came out of retirement just to participate, and then there's this [24]. I smell offsite canvassing and/or socking. I am the nominator so I can't take any admin actions, although I'm not sure we're at the point where they would be needed just yet anyway. More eyes as the debate continues would be great. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:20, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Make that 2 accounts out of retirement just to comment in this AFD, SPA IPs adding new "keep" votes at the top, at the bottom, and sometimes inside other people's remarks, plus a watermarked image just uploaded to Commons, and the removal of the AFD notice from the article [25]. It's pretty clear there is some sort of offsite coordination going on here. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:13, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

For what it's worth, there are also a few more established users who also support keeping the article, so let's not jump the gun and paint with too broad of a brush. –MuZemike 19:46, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

For the sake of an even-handed approach, it would be helpful if someone could go back over the history of Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Nicolas Plott and at least put the comments into some appropriate chronological order.  Chzz  ►  20:43, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Chronological order.  Done Sir Armbrust ^{Talk to me} _Contribs 22:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

This is actually the 2nd AFD nomination, as Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Tasteless was the first one (for his nickname). –MuZemike 22:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for fixing the order. I'm not suggesting that all the keepers are canvassed or socks or whatever, but some of them certainly are. The idea that that many clueless new users would randomly choose to comment on this particular AFD within hours of each other is not believable, and the two accounts that hadn't edited in years suddenly returning just to participate is also highly suspicious. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:27, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Now up to four inactive accounts that have seemingly returned just for this AFD. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:30, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Here's the apparent source of the problem [26]. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:57, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

You'd think that people would be inclined to vote for deletion of tasteless Wikipedia articles...Nyttend (talk) 01:12, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Request for unblocking

User:Pennedinthemargins requested an unblock about 2 weeks ago and has no response as yet. Thanks Span (talk) 06:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

That's probably because that is an account here to spam and create articles about otherwise non-notable individuals through a very questionable source. Just a guess, of course. How does one need their userpage preserved "...because I often get confused with someone else of the same name (a journalist here in the UK)." It's not confusing at all. Doc talk 06:39, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

The editor has made five edits in the last four years. The remaining edits, made in 2008, were to one page. I suspect PITM means that the article about Tom Chivers should remain. There are two notable 'Tom Chivers' in the UK. One is a journalist for the Telegraph and one is a publisher. I'm not why anyone would assume he knew and understood the guidelines better than other new users. Why not assume good faith? I think he at least deserves a reply to his request, no?. Span (talk) 07:27, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Heck: unblock him then! My sense of AGF is always helped when editors "turn it around" - though I've been "burned" enough to know better sometimes. It's always fun to watch a good show, in any event... Doc talk 08:55, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Probably no one responded because he didn't use the unblock request template. Besides, he's blocked for having a spam username. He should just follow the very clear instructions on his talk page to get unblocked. You could've just told him that rather than post here.--Atlan (talk) 09:27, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I've put a message on the talkpage (and exited rapidly because I should be somewhere else...). Peridon (talk) 14:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Requestion Deletion Of Wikipedia:WikiProject Science pearls/List of publications in philosophy

There seems to be 2 copies of essentially the same material, the article above and List of important publications in philosophy.

List of important publications in philosophy was originally under a userspace draft, which I've moved to mainspace. I've found this wikipediaspace article so I don't think it is necessary.Curb Chain (talk) 15:27, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

So nominate it for deletion at WP:MFD or use an appropriate WP:CSD tag. Beeblebrox (talk) 15:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I can't nom it under A10 b/c it hasn't been recently created.Curb Chain (talk) 15:47, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I have redirected it, which is commonly done for stuff developed in User or WikiProject space once it's moved to article space. There didn't seem to be much difference between these lists. The WikiProject list didn't have any substantive edits since its creation in 2007 (just some minor spam removal and category fixes). ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 16:16, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

RfC for enabling extension to track when editors read Wikipedia pages (to report online status)

At Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Online Status. It should probably be announced on WP:CENT and the watch-list as well given the privacy implications. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 16:46, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

MoodBar, NPA policy, and admin work

See WP:VPR#Proposal to add a warning or link in the MoodBar that feedback text is subject to community policies. I'm leaving a note here, because few admins know that they can and should police the feedback dashboard, which is publicly visible. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 17:30, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Request uninvolved admin to close large scale rfc at wp:ver

Resolved

 – Closed as successful proposal for change.--SarekOfVulcan (talk) 17:40, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

This is a request for an uninvolved admin to close a large scale rfc at wp:ver.

Wikipedia talk:Verifiability#RFC - Compromise proposal re first sentence

Thanks

Sincerely,

North8000 (talk) 14:44, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'll second that request. The RfC has been up for almost a month, and most people who are likely to comment have done so. Time to close, but it would be improper for those of us who have been heavily involved to do so. Blueboar (talk) 12:54, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I have asked for uninvolved admins on AN/I to close this when the 30 days is up, though I also note no one had added the RfC tags for the bot (I have just added them), so this was not advertised the way RfCs normally are. Some extra time would be appreciated for that reason. SlimVirgin ^{TALK|CONTRIBS} 23:15, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

What evidence do you have that the RfC was "not advertised the way RfCs normally are"?  Unscintillating (talk) 19:21, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I'd guess that SV simply hasn't had the time to crawl through the history yet. The RFC was first added on 06 October (notice the malformed text summary that was produced; I fixed it a few days later).

The bot (correctly) removed it on 28 October ago when Sarek closed the RFC. When the closure was reverted, the bot promptly re-listed it. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Requesting reversal of topic ban against User:Wikid77

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

Moved from WP:ANI User:Wikid77 here, requesting an admin to reverse the indef topic ban against me (issued 4 June 2011: here), while I was on wikibreak and blocked for 1 month (by User:Fram), regarding the "Murder of Meredith Kercher" affair. Now that the appeal trials of Knox and Sollecito have found them "innocent" (on 3 October 2011), and the re-created article "Amanda Knox" has survived the 2nd WP:AfD nomination, I feel that I can return to editing, or discussing, the topic after the contentious appeal trials and WP:AfD of the Knox article have ended. I have waited these 5 months, to delay reversing the topic ban, while editing hundreds of other articles (contribs), to allow other users to debate the issues without posting messages to influence their decisions. The jury in Italy ruled on the murder charges as "innocente" and other WP editors discussed the AfD of "Amanda Knox" and concluded the article should remain, as I had noted when I created the prior version in June 2010. As I had stated in June this year, the next time I think that people are mounting extreme personal attacks against me, I will take the matter to WP:WQ (or another notice-board), rather than directly reply to attacks which would likely escalate the conflict into a further disruptive mode. I apologize that I did not report the prior attacks to WP:WQ and realize that my replies caused additional anger, where going on wikibreak to escape attacks was too late in the prior matter. Thanks for taking time to review this topic ban. -Wikid77 (talk) 18:05, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Background: The ANI topic, which led to 1-month block & indef topic-ban, is ANI section: WP:ANI of 10:44, 4 June 2011. The indef topic-ban was proposed by involved admin User:John at 16:02, 1 June 2011, supported by 14 usernames, opposed by 1, then moved to close by involved User:SuperMarioMan at 14:52, 3 June 2011 (within 2 days), and closed after 2 days 18 hours by User:Future Perfect at Sunrise before other users could oppose the ban or notify me. I was shocked when I got the topic-ban email notice, while on wikibreak, after just 2 days. The closing admin insisted the rushed topic-ban was valid, even though I was in the 1-month block and edit-banned from all article edits at the time. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, that's being rather economical with the truth, as I'm sure you know all too well. For an alternative interpretation of what actually happened, see this message from the administrator who closed the topic ban discussion. Oh, and just for the record, about half of those who supported the ban had not (to my knowledge) previously interacted with Wikid77 at MoMK (therefore being firmly WP:UNINVOLVED) and the one user who opposed it was an SPA who declined to explain their reasoning for their opposition (going against the principle of WP:NOTAVOTE). SuperMarioMan 13:03, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. I'm afraid I can't see much in your request other than "the Italian courts have decided I was right all along, so I should be un-banned", and feel that if you were to resume editing in this area further disputes would ensue. Perhaps it would be better for you to look for other topics to contribute on? Better than risking becoming involved in further conflicts. Basalisk ^{inspect damage}⁄_berate 18:16, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for warning me, as I unaware of the recent conflicts during the 5 months I was gone. I generally tried to warn new editors that they risked being taken to WP:ANI if they wrote angry posts against editors who reverted their changes or who ridiculed a new editor's views about the Knox/Sollecito trials. Formerly, I hoped that if I avoided the Kercher/Knox articles, which I did for months in 2010, then I imagined the hostilities would end there, but I found that it wasn't just me being fought, and instead prior editors kept getting into disputes with newer editors. So, I asked prior editors to also take a 3-month hiatus from the topic to reduce conflicts, but I guess they did not stop, and now the Kercher article has been proposed for "article probation" to be full-protected for a 7-day period and 1RR restrictions. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support. I'm assuming that Wikid77 hasn't caused trouble editing other subjects during the topic ban. The fact that Knox has been acquitted is relevant. The issue of what weight to give to sources that argue that she is innocent obviously isn't the hugely contentious issue that it used to be. You could say that after the acquittal, this isn't the same topic anymore. Count Iblis (talk) 18:49, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

It does seem the climate has improved, and the October 2011 AfD was closed "Keep" for re-created article "Amanda Knox". I have had little trouble in other areas, as I can see from the last 70 posts to my talk-page:
  http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User_talk:Wikid77&action=history&limit=70
It was mostly some of the regular, 2-year editors of the Kercher article who opposed me. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose, for reasons that should be fairly obvious. In fact, far from "allowing other users to debate the issues without posting messages to influence their decisions", I'd argue that with edits such as this, you've come pretty close to breaking the conditions of your topic ban more than once already (it was supposed to be broadly construed, applying across namespaces on Wikipedia, as far as I can remember). You mention the recently recreated Amanda Knox article - it reminds me of a certain older version (written by you, as it happens) that was swiftly redirected (again, for reasons that should be quite obvious - WP:SYNTH and bizarre illustration using an obscure German painting being just two of many apparent problems). For reference, here is a link to the ANI discussion documenting the events that led to the indefinite topic ban. Since most of the arguments presented in that discussion would seem to be just as applicable now, I recommend that other editors set aside some time to read through that first and then consider whether the statement above demonstrates any clear commitment to keeping that kind of behaviour in check from now on. Personally, I don't see it. SuperMarioMan 19:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Furthermore, considering some of the insults that this user directed at others just before the block and topic ban were imposed, any talk of "the next time I think that people are mounting extreme personal attacks against me" is rather disingenuous. SuperMarioMan 19:43, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose per SuperMarioMan. --John (talk) 20:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - Users who have not only expressed a vested interest in a particular side of a conflict, but also edited disruptively, aggressively, and tendentiously in said topic to support that interest provide a double-barreled reason as to why they should be kept at arm's length away from it. Note, beware of SPAs showing up here to "vote"; this topic area has been infested with them over the years, unfortunately. Tarc (talk) 20:49, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Procedural Note These sorts of proposals are supposed to be discussed on WP:AN, not this board. 140.247.141.165 (talk) 21:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Please, no. Per SuperMarioMan. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 22:02, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Question - The case is effectively over. What vital information does the OP need to post to the article that someone else won't be able to? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:08, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

My main focus is to discuss the issues, on various talk-pages, without having a topic-ban as a "gag order". But the expansion of the article "Amanda Knox" has been slow, and I would like to suggest some quick additions. -Wikid77 (talk) 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Furthermore - Wikid77's topic ban had nothing to do with the outcome of the recent successful appeal, and everything to do with xys editing. It is difficult to see the relevance of any verdict in the case. pablo 22:16, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose per Basalisk. Sorry, but unless you can prove that you've learned from your mistakes, I see no reason to support. Action, not rhetoric is what's needed. WikiPuppies! (bark) 22:23, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The reason is called "WP:Assume good faith" and the other mistake I made was thinking that being blocked for 1-month while on wikibreak, there would not be a discussion to indef topic-ban me which would be rushed to close in 2 days, 18 hours, when I had not responded to the charges. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support - since his topic ban I have found him to be quite level headed - there are so many SPA and POV editors in relation to Knox that his re-entry to the topic won't even be noticed. Under those circumstances and considering her innocence now which has totally altered the environment in regard to the topic, imo it's unfair and unnecessary to single him out any more. Off2riorob (talk) 22:31, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

  Once Knox skipped outta town and back home, I had also assumed that the shitstorm surrounding this topic would die down. Alas, it seems to have ramped up even more as they go into "I told you so" mode. One long-time WP:SPA, CodyJoeBibby has just been indef'ed for harassment while a "new" face, Overagainst, has recently been ramping up the heat and rancor, well on his way to a similar fate. This is a terrible topic area to edit in, and I see no reason to let a former miscreant tap in and return to the ring. Tarc (talk) 00:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Using the term "former miscreant" sounds like a WP:NPA vio (a personal attack), so should I report that remark to another notice-board? -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

As your miscreantness (I totally made that word up) will be easily demonstrable, I am not sure how much mileage you're going to get out of such a complaint. You do what you feel is best for you, bro. Tarc (talk) 14:28, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• • Since the topic ban Wikid77 has spent much of his time soapboxing on Jimbo's talk page about how fundamental changes are needed to the community, policies et cetera in ways which would conveniently absolve Wikid77 of any perceived wrongdoing. I've seen little to suggest he's seriously taken on board the reasons for the original ban. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:08, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Link specific posts, please. Explain the use of term "soapboxing" and specifically note which posts would "conveniently absolve Wikid77 of any perceived wrongdoing". Perhaps there is some misunderstanding of the wording, so let's discuss specific messages. Thanks. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Comment. I'd just like to point out that the fact that Amanda Knox has been acquitted makes no difference to this issue. The OP wasn't banned because the community thought he had a stupid opinion on Amanda Knox which has since been proved correct, he was banned because of the way he conducted himself in regards to the topic. Knox's acquittal changes nothing about Wikid's previous behaviour; he'd be better off himself to find something else to do that he feels less emotional about. Basalisk ^{inspect damage}⁄_berate 23:00, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - The fact that the real world has suddenly reversed course and aligned with the editor's opinion is irrelevant, the topic ban was not imposed because of his beliefs, but because of his behavior. The reversal of the Knox verdict does nothing whatsoever to change that. Beyond My Ken (talk) 23:36, 30 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Hey, it wasn't like he attacked the living subjects of our articles, he was a little rude to other users in a heated editing environment. Give the guy a break , he can easily be re-blocked - he knows what he did wrong and he served a few months topic ban with no socking - allowing him to re enter the topic field under such a situation seems reasonable. Off2riorob (talk) 00:05, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Well. It might be worth searching the MoMK talk archives on that one. Even if Wikid77 did not directly violate WP:BLP (notably against the prosecutor, Mignini) then he certainly enabled those that did (notably User:PhanuelB). Black Kite (t) 00:52, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
      • Yes, often by posting long walls of text onto other users' talk pages for little apparent reason other than to stir things up. Here's an example from 9th October (less than a week after the end of the Knox appeal; again, a clear breach of the topic ban conditions is cleverly avoided by simply alluding to certain people rather than directly naming them): "People learn more when court is done: As I suspected, once a person is released from prison, then the general public learns more about what really happened. Perhaps during a trial, many people feel that they need to keep quiet and let the court make the crucial decisions, but after court, more of the issues get clarified, and people understand better ... News reveals that a suspect in Italy plans to visit his former girlfriend in Seattle during Christmas, but perhaps that is beyond the scope of the trial article." With comments such as this, Wikid77 shows no sign of acknowledging mistakes made in the past – rather, it's just a subtle promise to pick up exactly where he left off. SuperMarioMan 10:48, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose per SuperMarioMan and others; it is clear that Wikid77 can be a productive editor elsewhere; it would be better if he concentrated on those areas. Black Kite (t) 00:51, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Its been a good length. Nothing wrong seeing if he will still have that problem by unbanning him from it. So long as he doesn't repeatedly revert me removing protection templates from it if it is unprotected, I have no problem with it. Though I must note that I only looked at the edit Wikid77 linked to, and therefore have no knowledge so far of the discussion that ended in a topic ban and the exact reasoning for the topic banning itself. Doesn't mean I can't have a say in this, right? LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 01:28, 31 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Editors are supposed to familiarise themselves with situations before commenting on them. So yes, entering into this discussion to undo a community-imposed topic ban without bothering to check why it was actually imposed is not at all helpful. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:03, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Since I was not notified of the topic-ban discussion, and did not reply, then the information is slanted by omitting my views at the time. However, that closed ANI topic, with indef topic-ban, is ANI section: WP:ANI of 10:44, 4 June 2011. The indef topic-ban was proposed by involved admin User:John at 16:02, 1 June 2011, then moved to close by involved User:SuperMarioMan at 14:52, 3 June 2011 (within 2 days), and closed after 2 days 18 hours by User:Future Perfect at Sunrise before other users could oppose the ban or notify me. The accusation was that I was hopelessly disruptive, claiming I had called editors "unintelligent" when I noted they were "slow" to improve the article, but due to all the disputes. I was shocked when I got the topic-ban email notice, while on wikibreak, after just 2 days. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose per several others. The facts of the murder case were not why the user was banned. Behavior was. I don't see evidence from the user that behavior will change. --Jayron32 01:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. This would not help the situation at the article and may just be pouring more gas on a fire. Wikid encouraged disruptive behavior from new accounts (one of which was just indef-blocked) and I can't see where this would help at all. As Black Kite has stated, if Wikid has talents and is making good, positive contribs elsewhere then that is how the project would best be served.
  ⋙–Berean–Hunter—► 03:29, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I think the concept, "Wikid encouraged disruptive behavior from new accounts" is a straw man invention, hinted in prior ANI discussions, so evidence of that is needed. I was not notified of the prior indef-topic-ban discussion, so I had no time to refute such invented claims during the 2-day period the topic-ban was rushed to closure. What specific messages did I send which seemly "encouraged disruptive behavior"? -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose This topic ban was placed due to your behaviour - the topic itself was effectively irrelevant. To suggest that now that things have kinda changed with the article, then you should be allowed back is a clear sign that you do not understand your behaviour. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:51, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Wait, the topic ban was placed due to people commenting on insinuations of my behaviour, and remember that I was not notified of the proposed ban, so did not respond to refute the insinuations, during the 2-day discussion. I stated at the outset (at top) that the next time people issue personal attacks against me, I will report the incident to a message board, rather than attempt a direct reply. -Wikid77 12:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

What you were properly notified of was the ANI discussion that preceded the vote on the topic ban. The fact that you decided to go on a WikiBreak immediately after receiving that notification, while fully aware that your behaviour was still under discussion at ANI, is hardly a fault on anyone else's part. SuperMarioMan 13:15, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose, also taking into account Wikid77's comments in this thread, that show a total lack of understanding why the ban was placed. Instead, he once again claims a combination of misrepresentation of facts by the other side of the conflict and foul play by those involved in the ban discussion, is why the ban was enacted. It is mind-boggling to see that despite the firm opposition still here to lift the ban, he still blames the ban on "people not having enough time to oppose the ban". Apparently, opposing a ban takes at least 2 days longer than supporting it. Also, you went on a "wikibreak" as soon as the ANI discussion was started, in a transparent attempt to dodge possible sanctions. Obviously this didn't work.--Atlan (talk) 14:11, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose. Apart from one in 2006, all of Wikid77's blocks — sockpuppetry, personal attacks, disruptive editing, battleground mentality — have been for edits in this subject area. Clearly this area is a problem for Wikid77. It is difficult to imagine how his return to editing in this subject area would be of benefit to either the encyclopaedia or to him.  pablo 15:53, 31 October 2011 (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.

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011 to close shortly, uninvolved admins needed to assess

Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011 will be closing within 24 hours, and we could use some uninvolved admins to close all parts of it and assess the consensus for the main parts of the RfC (as this will pretty much determine the rules for WP:ACE2011).

Note that one admin doesn't have to do the whole thing; one can close a part of it, while others can close other parts to split the work, if necessary. –MuZemike 04:16, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Some advice to any admin wishing to close parts of the RfC:

• Try and close those issues that have been the most inactive; there are a few "last minute" comments coming in (though it may have tapered off), and I feel it's best to let them in as opposed to slamming the door in those editors' faces.
• Look at which statements are "opposing statements" (i.e. for "How many arbitrators should we have for 2012?", the statements by Risker and Cerejota would be considered "opposing statements"). Some are standalone statements that have garnered quite a bit of support to be implemented in the ArbCom election. Use your good judgement on those.

–MuZemike 02:15, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Dr. Blofeld mass creation

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Not a bot, just a prolific editor. No policy violations, nothing for admins to do. 28bytes (talk) 17:22, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

---

I believe Dr. Blofeld is mass creating pages without proper approvals/consensus/etc, and likely using his account via a bot to do so. I have attempted to discuss it with him on his talk page, but have gotten very terse and rude reponses. I also mentioned this on the notability notice board before I was able to discover the mass creation policy. Gaijin42 (talk) 20:20, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

There is a page in the archives I think which should dismiss these accusations and an explanation of what is happening is given on my user page as to their purpose and cleanup intended is mentioned to User talk:Fram. Nothing more I can say. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 20:25, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think there should be any problem here, we can create as many articles as we like if they are notable enough. Jaguar (talk) 20:34, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Out of curiousity, how exactly did you manage to create over 100 articles in about 20 minutes? I realize literally no work went into any of them, but still... Resolute 20:36, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Me? Don't want to be part of the discussion but I've done over 100 in six minutes on Serbia and Hebei, China. Jaguar (talk) 20:40, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that is something to be proud of. Karanacs (talk) 20:42, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, maybe so but I'm just saying that Dr. B can't be using a bot script if I don't to create those articles. Jaguar (talk) 20:45, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, it seems to obviously be a semi-automated script, at least. I was just curious. that said, I agree with Karanacs. I realize that some do believe the creation of sub-stubs is a good thing. I don't myself, but if they are going to be created, think about the reader and have the article say something. Copy the infobox over from the foreign language projects at least so that a reader is actually given some useful information. Resolute 20:48, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

It's certainly doable - having a fast browser helps. I've managed a rate similar to this, though not recently. As to the why...I've been involved in that debate before, and I've always held that seeding the encyclopedia with stubs, while not ideal, does encourage some expansion via translation. --Ser Amantio di Nicolao^{Che dicono a Signa?}_{Lo dicono a Signa.} 20:49, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Frankly, if it is manual, its pretty impressive! (Not that I approve (obviously)) but impressive none the less. Gaijin42 (talk) 20:50, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

As has been mentioned elsewhere, nobody really likes sub-stub mass creation. However there is also no rule prohibiting it that I am aware of and named rivers are generally condired to be automatically notable encyclopedic topics. Beeblebrox (talk) 22:38, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

I, for one, think that there should be a "rule prohibiting it". Has there ever been a centralized discussion of the matter? Deor (talk) 22:46, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Don't know, but its probably worth discussing. Beeblebrox (talk) 23:05, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

As a new pages patroller, I have noticed the amount of articles DR. Blofield creates and I have to say, I am suspicious on the number of them he can make. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:18, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

How about you start assuming good faith and trust me when I saw I do not run a script or bot. Hell if I did do you not think I'd be creating 10 times the amount of content at 10 times the rate?♦ Dr. Blofeld 13:27, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• It's a fools game to guess whether another editor is using a bot or script. I deleted over forty pages in the span of a few minutes earlier today without the benefit of any such tools. I lined them all up in tabs, opened the deletion interface on each one, and went down the line deleting them in rapid succession. (they were all related, uncontroversial deletions of course). Besides, if the articles are ok, who cares how they are made? I believe that is what should be being discussed in a general manner as opposed to trying to catch a user using a script or whatever. Beeblebrox (talk) 00:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
  • See WP:MEATBOT and WP:MASSCREATION. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 11:21, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

We should NOT be bothering Blofeld about this. Editors who are working on creating content should not be stopped or bothered with. It is your responsibility to show that he's being disruptive or generating bad content; speed is not in itself any evidence that he's doing anything wrong. That's the whole point of WP:AGF and WP:BOLD. If you have found something wrong with his creations, insofar as you think that the articles, ignoring how quickly they were created, should have been so obviously deleted, then we can discuss the problems Blofeld is creating. But quickly creating good content is no more disruptive than slowly creating good content. If you have nothing wrong with the articles themselves, then there is nothing to discuss here.--Jayron32 13:46, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I wouldn't have an issue if he was actually creating content. All he is doing is turning a red link blue by putting barely enough info into the page to pass CSD A3. I get, and accept, why he is doing this, but I'd rather see him create 50 articles per 20 minute span, including a fleshed out infobox than 100 articles in a 20 minute span that tells the reader virtually nothing. Resolute 18:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• I've been in disputes with Dr. Blofeld before about his enormous creation of articles of less than ideal quality. But I have to say that it is basically a valid choice to put quantity over quality - and he is one of the only editors who is undertaking real efforts to counter the systemic bias. If some of the articles are deleteable I say delete them, but let him do his thing.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 14:09, 29 October 2011 (UTC)
• I don't see any problem with it, really. I doubt he's using a script, probably all "magic words" - something like

{{Infobox blah
|param1 = {{subst:PAGENAME}}
|param2 = 
|param3 = {{subst:PAGENAME}}, Sweden
}}
'''{{subst:PAGENAME}}''' is a [[river]] in Sweden.

{{Sweden-geo-stub}}

I'd probably think it's just a redlink elimination attempt, or just another mass creation. HurricaneFan25 14:12, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

It's a problem when we have articles of dubious notability or otherwise lacking a demonstration of why they should exist. Substubs about obviously-notable topics with interwikis and "translate" tags are vastly different and not at all a problem. Nyttend (talk) 18:36, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Though it would be common decency at point of creation to add {{unreferenced |date=October 2011}}. There may be editors who like to go around adding references to river articles. GraemeLeggett (talk) 19:01, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Its sort of a drive to try to do something towards systematic bias by trying to start to bridge the gap with other wikipedias. The translate templates are crucial in this aspect. Basically its a way of saying this content exists you can google translate link in the template and access it even not a perfect translation and hopefully they can add to it and transfer it and even expand it further using reliable sources. I agree its a tall order but I would never start a stub which I didn't believe couldn't be fully expanded. In my opinion ransacking categories on notable topics from other wikipedias and trying to get the same level of coverage in english is exactly what needs to be done on here if we are to build a truly comprehensive english wikipedia. I agree at face value initially they are rendered "useless" but we can't ignore 700 rivers in one state of Germany for instance. They are too important to the physical landscape of the real world.. And why wouldn't we want articles like this in english? While I would like to magically create every article at GA level I simply do not have the time to write everyone as fully as I'd like. And when there is a sheer amount missing quality tends to be at bare minimum. Any one though could be instantly expanded in minutes by anybody unhappy with the current lack of content and information given. An explanation on my views on this are given on my user page.♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:37, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• This is the Wikipedia that most seem to want, so as long as people brag about how many articles we have as a selling point at fundraiser time, Dr. Blofeld's stub-a-palooza will be viewed as a valued contribution to the project. if you want to change that, then change the culture that alues quantity over quality. Otherwise, this is pointless griping. Tarc (talk) 21:44, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

When the stub count per category is reasonable rather than in the hundreds it is fine to add length and basin area and photo like Peršėkė... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:19, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Well, everything should be ok if it wouldn't be erorrs at these articles. User:Dr. Blofeld takes only one district ignoring that most rivers passes more than one district or even country. Also, I think it's very imporant to write at least with what bigger river it joins. If these things would be fixed I think such articles can be created. Hugo.arg (talk) 08:25, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

That's not so easily done by a script, so the answer is {{sofixit}}. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 10:11, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• Perhaps start with list-of-area articles: Although it is great to have stubs to capture every notable river, valley or town, those stubs alone will risk the danger of "Can't see the forest for the trees" as too many tiny articles which fail to describe the whole region. This is covered in new essay "WP:Aggregate data into lists rather than stubs".
  There are list-of-area articles which can be translated, first, such as from German WP. This is the concept of "List of tiny stuff" where not all items in a list have separate articles. For example, the valley in Germany, noted above (article "de:Zschonergrundbach"), is a small part of a list of 147(?) river valleys in Saxony (German: Sachsen), as one list for the 16 Bundesländer (federal states) in Germany:

• de:Liste der Landschaftsschutzgebiete in Sachsen - one of 16 lists of valleys

Before creating hundreds of stubs for valleys, start with the 16 list articles (for 16 states in Germany), with tables of valleys showing the location and area (in ha/acres) for each entry. Even in the German WP, a list of 147 valleys has red-links for dozens of valleys (no articles yet), and perhaps some valleys are so minor that there are no sources which focus on a tiny valley as separately notable in "continued coverage". Let's avoid stubs for every tiny thing listed in a book of geographic areas.
Remember that WP's current 2,000+ asteroid-list articles began at Harvard (Boston) as 37 large data-files, listing thousands of asteroid names in each of the 37 lists. A notable, yet obscure, asteroid number can redirect into a list of related "minor planets" where we figured 200 lists of numbered asteroids was "efficient" and 2,000 lists were perhaps too small.
Similarly, using lists of rivers in each county (parish), or district, is a much easier way to cross-check the length, flow, depth, etc. of many rivers in a list of 100 small rivers, rather than using 100 stubs needing to be edited to describe each river and set the river-size data. WP's unfortunate hatred of lists, in earlier years, thwarted the reality that lists are the way of the future. So, we can consider the initial genius concept behind Harvard's 37 lists of numbered asteroids, with similar lists of hundreds of smaller items (+data columns) and redirect titles into those lists, rather than start with 999,000 stubs to be updated with specific data in the next decade. Always consider WP:LISTSTUFF, rather than creating thousands of hollow stubs. -Wikid77 (talk) 10:24, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand this user. I warned him not to create articles with errores but that was simply reverted [27]. Hugo.arg (talk) 21:29, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I would like to affirm this work as part of Wikipedia:WikiProject Countering systemic bias. To be useful, however, stubs need to have enough information to allow other editors to identify which topic the page is about and locate sources. I recently started a thread at Wikipedia_talk:Articles_for_deletion#AfD_templates_and_non-Latin_names about a related problem—where stubs are being nominated for deletion by non-native speakers because stubs are missing the topic name in some or all of the languages in which sources are likely to be found. Bearing this in mind, where-ever possible these kinds of stubs need to have the name of the topic in as many languages and scripts as possible. Stuartyeates (talk) 22:22, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Quality vs quantity is a false dichotomy.The creation of these articles has no negative effects on anyone who wants to write a few high quality articles, whether in that field or any other. It's like arguing whether we should concentrate on biographical or geographical articles; one does not exclude the other. DGG ( talk ) 22:55, 30 October 2011 (UTC) .

All encyclopedias have entries for distinct geographical entities such as rivers. I looked thru Dr. B.'s recent Lithuanian river creations - they do all have articles in the LT Wikipedia. I don't think incompleteness - such as missing the info that a river that flows mostly thru LT but probably rises in Latvia - is a sufficient reason to inhibit this process. (It's different from biographies of living people; no one is hurt by an omission or error or even passing vandalism.) On the LT WP, most of them are ref'd to extremely expensive books, so I can't personally verify most of them immediately. But I think it's safe to say at this point that they are very unlikely to be hoaxes, copyvios, promotional, or any other of the things that call for speedy deletion. I appreciate these articles' existence and I think future generations will too. Novickas (talk) 00:09, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Mass creation of articles is one thing, mass creation of unsourced articles is another. The only verification done before creating e.g. Vabala is the check that it exists in another unreliable source, Wikipedia. The article there[28] has no sources at all. Can we at least put a stop to the creation of unsourced (or wiki-sourced) articles in such a manner? I have also asked Dr. Blofeld in the past to start articles on rivers with "The X is a river" instead of "X is a river", but I notice that this simple change isn't implemented.

The mass creation also contains errors, e.g. the article Weser (Ourthe) already existed as Vesdre for some years here. There also need to be checks on translations, e.g. do we want Église Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Bastia or Saint-Jean-Baptiste Church, Bastia (and there are quite a few of these church articles created already)? What with the names of rivers that run through different countries? Now, the first country Dr. Blofeld tackles gets priority, even though that may not be the best name for it? The Wisznia runs for 15 km in Poland, and for some 85 km in Ukraine. But our article uses the Polish name for it.

I think it would be better if these articles were created by a bot (run by Dr. Blofeld) with some control and some agreements, e.g. the need to have at least one reliable source, and the need for a better starting layout (it is a bit ridiculous that someone is going to correct all disambiguated articles like Bieke (Bigge) to remove the disambiguated part from the body of the article and the infobox). By having prior agreement before a run starts, things like the naming of French church articles can be handled before these are created. Fram (talk) 08:41, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

What difference would it make it a bot started creating hundreds of articles? I think I know; a human user would get in trouble for it at AN(I) and the bot wouldn't. Also the user could spot any errors in creating articles and fix them quickly, so having a user to do it might be better off. Jaguar (talk) 12:02, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Good point Fram and I had forgotten about the The thing, not that I ignored you. Although any article which says river of lithuania is still not erroneous as it is true but in a minority of cases may be cross border. Overall I'd say the benefits outweigh the negative. The Ukraineian name for the river you mentioned google translates as Cherry which is too literal. When I started the articles as Eglise I was using the current system used for many churches in Paris. We have tens of articles as Eglise in the same way we have them with Gare de for railway stations. Overall the positives outweigh the negatives I think especially if we view wikipedia as a project which will be around for future generations. What I want, and this was proposed at WP:INTERTRANSWIKI long ago, is to create an Interntranswiki bot which ransacks categories on other wikipedias and creates a missing directory where there are no en: links and attempts then to create them extracting some basic facts. I am clueless about coding though, if I was I'd have been running a bot for years and we'd probably have 10 million articles by now and most of the stubs of decent quality.♦ Dr. Blofeld 12:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

He's at it again! More geo articles have popped up from DR Blofield. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 18:31, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I second the idea referenced above about making a list page "List of rivers in germany", that could be full of red links. If someone wants to flesh out one of those they can. Im not an admin, am I allowed to comment here?Gaijin42 (talk) 18:36, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

WTF are you on about? We have List of rivers of Hesse etc by state and a general List of rivers of Germany. Given that the vast majority could be written into full length articles how exactly would this be productive? @Shakinglord, and you're surprised? People just please stop moaning and let us get on with developing wikipedia s a website. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 18:53, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

It is my position that your stubs (as currently being created) are providing no value beyond what is in the list. If someone actually wants to make the full article then that is fine. Gaijin42 (talk) 18:56, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Most wikipedia articles, especially in the early days began as "providing little or no value". Do you think we have developed to what we are today in size by everyone article being generated fully as you see it today? You are missing what building an encyclopedia collaboratively actually means and what wiki technology entails and that as a resource we are still in our infancy. If you start to view wikipedia as a long term project which will be around for generations and we are to truly achieve wonders you will see the eventual purpose of what I'm doing. If we want a "complete" encyclopedia NOW then unless this site grossly changes its way of editing and purely focuses on quality then I am not willing to bow down on a whim to those who don't like it. As I say on my user page if we were a seriously scholarly encyclopedia we would build wikipedia GA quality article at a time and only permit that level of content.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:09, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

For example, look at this almost useless article about a clearly notable subject that has since been converted into a GA. Or this two-line page with a speedy deletion tag that's currently Today's Featured Article. I'm not a fan of tiny stubs on notable topics either, but the way to get rid of them is expansion, not sanctions for the creators. Nyttend (talk) 19:28, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• It is disruptive to create thousands of completely unreferenced articles. If Dr. Blofeld wants to create an article, or 1,000,000 articles about rivers, hills, creeks, films made in Elbonia, or whatever possibly notable subjects ha has found in a database or a Big Book with directory listings, he should provide at least the database or book from which he learned that said subject exists. That eliminates the need for an "unreferenced" tag, and satisfies at least verifiability, if not Notability. It would not take the bot or the semi-automated script that much longer, since the pattern has been to find some list of hundreds of things and create a hundred cookie-cutter stubs which say something like "X is a Y in Z" all from the same source. As long as the "Xs" fall within the guidelines for notability, this is an activity which improves the encyclopedia and is meritorious. The bot or script could also add a reference section, rather than just an external link, to make it more convenient for follow-up editors to add more references, but that is less of a requirement. Edison (talk) 19:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I either provide a reference or include a intertranswiki link for verification. If you disagree that a decent article on another wikipedia directly linked is not enough to verify it then that's your problem. There would be no point in referencing a one line stub just for the sake of it.♦ Dr. Blofeld 19:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia (in any language) is not a reliable source, and that is your problem if you're creating articles which only cite other Wikipedia articles as sources. If the articles you're citing are referenced, just take the references from there (after checking them of course) - Kingpin¹³ (talk) 19:46, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

It is inappropriate and disruptive to create a mass of English Wikipedia article without any reliable source, linked only to some article in a Wikipedia article of another language. It would be comparably pure vandalism if I were to create articles in the Spanish or German Wikipedias, which I have edited, and just linked to vanispamcruft hoaxilicious articles in the English Wikipedia. Dr. Blofeld is a highly skilled editor, familiar with the guidelines for editing, and is quite capable of clicking on the references in the non-English Wikipedia to confirm and verify the fact cited, then link to the source reference directly, rather than linking to the nonreliable non-English Wikipedia article. No Wikipedia is a reliable source. There is no excuse for an experience editor to claim that "decent articles in other Wikipedias are reliable sources." It is not "my problem," it is disruptive editing, contrary to our guidelines. Articles should have reliable sources, and creating masses of non-reliably sourced articles is disruptive editing, which should be stopped. Edison (talk) 03:49, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Nyttend - I think the human centipede article comparison is very constructive. Someone individually chose to write that article, even as a stub. That implies a level of interest in that particular article that will give a greater likelihood of future expansion. Blofelds articles do not have that level of editorial filtering going on. If he was walking by a river and said "gee id like to start a stub about this river", then that initial level of interest is there. Of course stubs can grow into full GA/FA. But those articles that are interesting enough to become FA/GA would get created even if the stub wasn't there. Whoever put the effort into the first "non-stub" article likely had that level of interest anyway. What % of these stubs will ever be edited again, or in many cases even looked at! Gaijin42 (talk) 19:36, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

It was all Magic 8-Ball when the project started. Many articles are still being created by translating from other wikis, there’s a presumption - not proof, but strong presumption - of existence and verifiability there. You can't know when any new stub will be edited again or how much. And Dr. B did choose which to create. To demonstrate the uncertainty, I'll add a sentence about drainage basins and a reference to all of Dr. B's new LT river articles over the next week, making them 2-sentence referenced stubs. There is a very comprehensive LT Ministry of Environment page for this [29]. I imagine there are similar pages for other countries and maybe other country project editors will contribute similarly. (An announcement at country project pages would be nice, Dr. B, since probably not everyone reads Alex's New Article Bot entries.) Creating unreferenced stubs on encyclopedic topics using other language WPS, with context, like ‘x is a river in Lithuania’, is not explicitly deprecated AFAIK. If it is, let me know. I don’t see it in Wikipedia:Stub. Novickas (talk) 22:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

You can't know when any new stub will be edited again or how much - actually you CAN if you're willing to go out there and get some data. I got a small sample (via clicking Random Article and taking down info on stubs I come across) at this point of about 40 but on average, an article that is a stub TODAY, was created almost THREE AND A HALF YEARS AGO with none or only a single subsequent meaningful edit (i.e. not counting bots or automated (and apparently quite frequent) re-categorizations etc.) since. So yeah, for the most part, stubs stay stubs. And so will these. Volunteer Marek  22:29, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Just like this eh?. And please stop shouting in capital letters, we hear you...♦ Dr. Blofeld 22:50, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Are you familiar with the concept of an "average"? I think Wikipedia might have an article on it. Sure, you can find some stub (and almost all articles start as stubs) which winds up as an FA. But that is not the TYPICAL (I'm sorry, but the use of capital letters to emphasize something predates the internet, it is not shouting and it is perfectly valid) "history" of a stub. You can always find you a high school drop out who makes billions, but most high school dropouts are going to be in the lower end of the income distribution. I can find you a smoker who lived to be 100 years old, but most smoker's life expectancy is well below that of non-smokers. Same thing here. Volunteer Marek  22:55, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

nobody is contesting the fact that some stubs can become good pages. We are just saying that it is statistically unlikely, especially for mass created pages, and those stubs that are turned into good pages likely would have been created as good pages even had the stub not existed. Please stop making straw men arguments, and doing personal insults. (not this comment but one previous). Gaijin42 (talk) 22:57, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I couldn't give two hoots what you or anybody else thinks Gaijin. This is my last post here. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 23:23, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Although your obvious stubborness and comtempt for other people may convince SOME people in this world to believe you are right. However, here we can obviously see you are simply blowing hot air, and your action both in mass creation and towards other users should be called into serious question. I cordially invite you to calm down and assume good faith. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:35, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't have contempt for editors like Beeblebrox, Jayron, Novickas, Jaguar or Nyttend, in fact I have much respect for them all because they actually contribute to the encyclopedia themselves or are at least constructive with their approach to the project. But the most opinionated anti-development people on here seem to be those who do nothing to actually contribute to wikipedia and forum shop moaning about people. If you had some valid points that my articles actually were not notable or there were massive errors in my work then you'd have a point. But our purpose on wikipedia is to identify notable topics and try to cover the world evenly. At least the article existing is surely a step in the right direction. I will try to add a fact and reference if possible that's fair enough. There certainly should be no problem or complaints with new stubs like Gbégourou which I am creating enmasse. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 09:18, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Have you noticed that no admins have as yet seen fit to intervene in this situation? That's because this board is not part of the dispute resolution framework. There is no clear-cut policy violation in what Blofeld is doing, so there is not really anything for an admin to do about, whether they want to or not. Take it to DR or let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I think the obvious solution would be to have (at least) one ref per new stub created. All these articles are clearly notable and are good to have as a starting point to fill in the gaps. Has anyone looked into a study as to why new users don't create much content, but will happily edit existing information? Lugnuts (talk) 08:59, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Two arguments against creating stubs that have no useful information, perhaps no more than "Xrabt is a community in Ruritania"

• Someone reading about Ruritania sees a bluelink to Xrabt, clicks on it, and finds no useful information. Irritating.
• Someone who is proud of the number of articles they have started sees that Xrabt is already present, and moves on to another topic

If there is some information, doesn't have to be much, that is different. Aymatth2 (talk) 15:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't see what the problem is. The articles created by Dr. Blofeld are stubs, but the subjects are all notable. Why does the rate he is doing it matter? Alpha_Quadrant ^(talk) 15:42, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

move to close this thread and the one below regarding Merovingian. If I hadn't participated already I would do it myself as it seems obvious that this is not a subject that fits the criteria for this page, which is clearly defined as "issues affecting administrators generally – announcements, notifications, information, and other matters of general administrator interest." This is not WP:RFCU or any other form of WP:DR. No admin action is called for, and none has been or is likely to be taken. Beeblebrox (talk) 15:48, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Yup, time to let go. No breach of policies here and some people consider creating basic stubs a good idea. --Tone 15:49, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't see a problem with the rate of creation, just the downside of stubs with no useful information. I am not even sure this is true of the Blofeld stubs. Still, maybe the guideline at WP:Stub should include something like: "As a rule, a stub should provide some information about the subject that will be useful to readers, even if that information is minimal. It should also give at least one source for the information provided. Bulk creation of stubs that provide no useful information or include no sources is deprecated". This discussion could then be continued on Wikipedia talk:Stub. But I am surprised that there is no clear guideline yet. Is this just one of those subjects that keep getting raised and never get consensus? Aymatth2 (talk) 15:51, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Agreed that the discussion here should be closed - no policy violation. Aymatth2 (talk) 15:55, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

There's no breach of policy per se, or maybe even anything wrong with mass creating one or two line stubs. However, at some point we should change the Wikipedia main page. Instead of having it say:

Welcome to Wikipedia,
the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
3,784,548 articles in English

basic honesty would suggest something like:

Welcome to Wikipedia,
the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.
3,784,548 articles in English, more than half of which are mass created stubs

 Volunteer Marek  15:54, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Can someone explain to me just what the problem is with creating all of these stubs? It's not as if they are denying space to other articles -- Wikipedia is not written on paper. If people need for them to have content, someone will add it -- or they will be ignored. And if they remain stubs for years, someone will find which rivers they are tributaries to, & merge them into those articles. The only issue I see withe the evil Dr. B's efforts here is that some people don't like stubs, but instead of turning them into longer articles, they would rather delete them. -- llywrch (talk) 16:25, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

The problem, from my viewpoint, is the careless waste of the time of other productive editors by anyone bent on mass creation of stubs. If I find an unreferenced stub "Xyrot is a commune in Italy," while doing random article patrol, it will take me several minutes to go to (paper)world atlases and then Google Books looking for some reliable source to confirm that it is not just a hoax edit. Since geological features and hamlets are defacto notable, all that is really needed is one reliable source to satisfy verifiability. When someone takes "The Big Book of Communes in Italy" or "The Big List of Museums in Greece" or "The Big List of Films made in Nicaragua," and creates a stub for each, they waste the time of other editors who are expected to follow them around and find the reference they used (or another reliable source). It would take a tiny fraction of the time to add the reference which is the source for the stubs, compared to the time for a followup editor to find a reference, or to take it to AFD if he cannot find the reference that the mass-creator used. There actually have been many thousands of hoax biographies, as well as hoax articles about roads, geographic features, communities, and battles. We should not accept that every article about a hill, creek, village, movie, or person is valid when no reference is provided. The quality of an encyclopedia diminishes as there are more and more articles introduced without at least one reliable source for verification. Edison (talk) 17:20, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• 2nd move to close this topic: No action against Dr Blofeld has been decided in 4 days of discussion, and it would be rude to keep this topic open, in questioning his behavior further, where many have noted there have been no policy violations found. Close this thread, and perhaps continue stub-usage discussions at related project pages, linked back to here. Thanks. -Wikid77 17:18, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
• So there is a long tail in article growth and most of Wiki is stubs. What's new? And where's the problem? As somebody said early, as long as the article are acceptable per various policies (from notability to unplagiarized), and nobody has proven they aren't, their creation is to be commended. There is nothing here for admin attention, folks, move on. --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:20, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• reason the reason for the notification here was not the articles themselves, but the method of creation. Blofeld was creating 7-10 articles per minute on a steady basis (not 10, then an hour pause, etc, 10 every minute). That made me suspect he was using an unapproved bot/script which was the reason for my original notice here. the discussion largely shifted to the merit of the articles. Gaijin42 (talk) 17:23, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• The larger problem is more a social issue than a content one. It is very difficult to calm down a person that has just their article on a non-notable fictional character or tv episode or garage band or the like deleted via AFD due to lack of notability when they are pointing to these stub articles on tiny (but recognized) villages in some country that lack any sourcing at all and that they are kept. WP:OTHERSTUFFEXISTS isn't an allowable argument within AFD, but that doesn't stop people from pointing out the "inconsistency" in the idea of notability. I've been a long time proponent that we should really have a sister project, WikiAtlas or the like, to have this type of geographic information, and only having articles on WP when that feature becomes notable. --MASEM (t) 17:25, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• If this thread is closed, what venue is appropriate to start discussion toward compelling him to include the source as a reference when he mass-creates articles? A mass-creator of articles needs to include a reliable source in each for verification. Edison (talk) 17:28, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
  • WP:Village pump (proposals). 28bytes (talk) 17:31, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps if you quit being an a-hole Edison and started talking to me instead of about me on various forums and launching AFDs like Diez segundos I'd be more likely to listen. As for a lecture about referencing, p-lease, tell me something I already don't know. Occasionally, just occasionally WP:Ignore all rules is neccessary... ♦ Dr. Blofeld 17:48, 1 November 2011 (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.

Merovingian mass creation

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Creating articles – even lots of small ones – is not a violation of policy. Nothing for admins to do here. 28bytes (talk) 17:28, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

---

User:Merovingian continues to make articles about astrology, sometimes a single minute apart, likely a an automated bot. This may be a violation similar to DR. Blofield's mass creation incident's. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 00:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

1. Astronomy, not astrology.
2. Please see previous discussions on my and other users' talk pages as to the developments regarding minor planet articles. Precedent has been to keep these articles.
3. I am not a bot. --Merovingian (T, C, L) 00:17, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

Would it be possible to increase the information in the first sentence of the lede, to make it more intelligible? Something like: (37852) 1998 DG₃₂ is a main-belt minor planet, an asteroid not visible to the naked eye. Stuartyeates (talk) 01:08, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I can mention the absolute magnitude... and anyway, as far as I can tell, minor planet is preferred over asteroid. --Merovingian (T, C, L) 06:33, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I am not upfront against the articles you created -I am a 'space fan' so, I like them - but I note the existence of: wp:MASSCREATION - Nabla (talk) 11:40, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I have no doubt that within astronomy circles minor planet is preferred over asteroid, but the proportion of readers who know what a minor planet is is very low. To quote WP:AUDIENCE Wikipedia is an international encyclopedia. People who read Wikipedia have different backgrounds, education and opinions. Make your article accessible and understandable for as many readers as possible. Assume readers are reading the article to learn. Stuartyeates (talk) 21:54, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• I am of the same opinion here as above. If you have a problem with the content (rather than the method or speed) of what he is creating, we can make that a matter of dicussion. Making good content really fast is still making good content, and we should not, in any way, ever discourage people from creating good content at Wikipedia. If it is bad content, it should not be created at any speed, but I have not, as yet, seen any evidence that this content should not exist. Ergo, leave him the eff alone and let him create Wikipedia content. --Jayron32 18:05, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

I have a problem with the content. With very little effort the stubs being created could be made much more intelligible to non-astronomers, as per my comment above. While normally the fix it with editing rule of thumb applies, with the mass-creation of so many stubs it makes sense to put some effort into the text being put on every stub beforehand. Stuartyeates (talk) 09:01, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Had the articles been created as more than a stub, would they have been deleted? That is, is there anything about the subject of the article that makes it an inappropriate subject for an encyclopedia article? If not, there's no need to stop someone from creating them. If you think they need more content, then no one is going to stop you from adding it. --Jayron32 01:44, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• The mass creation of trivial minor planet stubs initiated a lengthy discussion at WikiProject Astronomy. The result of this long discussion was to create a notability criteria for astronomical objects. After much back and forth, language was agreed on and a draft article for notability criteria was produced. As the main co-author of the draft, I will be putting it up to a RfC this week. Astronomy editors at the project have already weighed in on this issue, and the vast majority of these stubs will not likely survive scrutiny under the proposed criteria. Merovingian, and others here, are welcome to make a comment about the notability draft here. Perhaps the mass creation of these stubs should be placed on hold until adoption of the notability draft. AstroCog (talk) 16:35, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

"This may be a violation similar to DR. Blofield's mass creation incident's.". "Violation". LMAO. Who is this guy? Why don't you actually do something for wikipedia Olaf instead of, well, hanging around here like an annoying little git.. ♦ Dr. Blofeld 21:56, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Do I sense some hostilities from Dr. Blofield? Surely an expirienced editor such as he is knows to avoid personal attack. Olaf the Shakinglord: Mailbox, ??? 23:04, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

(Copying from above as this is essentially the same issue) Have you noticed that no admins have as yet seen fit to intervene in this situation? That's because this board is not part of the dispute resolution framework. There is no clear-cut policy violation in what Merovingian is doing, so there is not really anything for an admin to do about, whether they want to or not. Take it to DR or let it go. Beeblebrox (talk) 02:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Violation of what, for the crying out loud? When has this project became unwelcoming of content creation?? --_{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| talk to me} 17:21, 1 November 2011 (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.

Cross-post for CVU

So on Wikipedia:Counter-Vandalism_Unit/Re-formatting, we have a proposal that includes merging some noticeboards that need administrators to the CVU. ~~Ebe123~~ (+) ^talk
_Contribs 21:46, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Kosovo article content removal

I am asking for a opinion. Is this removal of Serbian Cyrillic alphabet, official letter of both Republic of Serbia and disputed Republic of Kosovo legitimate? User who removed it two days ago, (without discussion, by the way) Majuru (talk · contribs) think that "Serbian language is well represented" without Cyrilic, while i think that cyrilic must be restored back, as "Country uses two letters, as equal, and both Cyrillic and Latin alphabet are in equal use." Kosovo page is under ARBMAC restrictions. I appreciated advice, thanks in advance. --WhiteWriter ^speaks 22:25, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

While it is reasoanble to indicate both alphabets are used in the body of the article, use in the first sentence with reference to the name of the article appears to have no actual use nor benefit use for readers of the article. Cheers. Collect (talk) 12:39, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Massive cross-article edit-war in the brewing

• Kyrenator (talk · contribs)
• Matt Downey (talk · contribs)

I'm going to be away in a little bit, and so won't be able to monitor what appears to be a massive edit-war brewing over a set of articles dealing with UK members of parliament. Kyrenator appears to be advocating a paragraph (sourced) that highlights a vote from December 2010 regarding an increase in tuition fees. Matt Downey is against the inclusion, citing undue weight and other concerns. Near as I can tell, no discussion has taken place. Three typical articles in this edit-war include Edward Davey, Sir Robert Smith, 3rd Baronet, and David Ward (politician); there are at least a dozen others, maybe more. The contribution histories of these editors are instructive here, as this appears to be all they've done today.

I've warned both editors, and will notify them of this thread once I've posted it. I have not blocked anyone, yet, in the hopes that they stop reverting and actually discuss the matter. But since I won't be about to follow up on this... Boy, I hate to drop the AN bomb on someone, but this is getting bad fast. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 20:43, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm pleased to say that discussion is actually going on about this issue at the following page (under voting patterns)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_Politics_of_the_United_Kingdom#Voting_patterns

Matt Downey has not (as far as I'm aware) taken part in this discussion. Of course, he is more than welcome to do so. I would actually dispute the claim that I have been edit-warring, since reversing vandalism is not edit-warring - and I would argue that the mass blanking of factual sourced content without a clear consensus is vandalism.

Nevertheless, it is of course obviously preferable to discuss this issue and to reach a mutually acceptable outcome - and that is what I have been doing (and hope to continue doing) with others.

Kyrenator (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:20, 1 November 2011 (UTC).

No, it isn't vandalism, especially since he's explained why he's removed the content in his edit summaries. You'll end up blocked if you repeat the claim that a good faith disagreement is vandalism. But you've done the right thing by stopping the edit-warring and entering a discussion on the project talk page. 28bytes (talk) 22:27, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Well it's hardly good faith behaviour is it - I notice that he's undertaken another round of mass content blanking after being warned not to do so, instead of actually engaging in the discussion.Kyrenator (talk) 22:56, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

As best I can tell, neither of you have added or removed the content in question since being warned by Ultraexactzz, which is why neither of you are blocked. If I'm incorrect in this assessment, please let me know. 28bytes (talk) 23:00, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

content discussion, which is better suited for the project talk page. 28bytes (talk) 23:19, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
- Norman Baker for example you are repeatedly adding there that, "On 9 December 2010, Baker was one of 28 Liberal Democrat MPs to vote in favor of Government proposals to increase university tuition fees.[1] The vote was particularly controversial for Liberal Democrats as many Lib Dem MPs had previously signed an NUS pledge promising to vote against tuition fee increases. (cited to the nus.org.uk list) - Norman Baker didn't sign the list and as such the fact that some lib dems did is absolutely not relative to him. At the most this is only worthy of addition ot the people that signed the list and then voted in the opposite position and even then its an unexplained factoid - why did they do that, what had changed in the political environment, without such additional details its a worthless factoid. Your comment also has other undue. and opinionated leading issues. Off2riorob (talk) 23:01, 1 November 2011 (UTC) Discussion of the merits of the edit are probably better suited to the project talk page than here. 28bytes (talk) 23:03, 1 November 2011 (UTC) - Firstly, Norman Baker did sign the pledge, as did every single Lib Dem MP who was subsequently elected. Secondly, and more importantly, you continue to display the same bizarre attitude that I pointed out on the discussion page and which you sadly seem reluctant to respond to - namely that of seeking to find excuses to remove material instead of building on and improving it. If, as you say, the current text is an unexplained factoid (which I would dispute) then do you have any suggestions on how to improve it - any material we could add for instance to make the context clearer or to remove any bias in the wording? If not, then I have to ask why you seem so keen to censor any kind of reference to this important issue. Kyrenator (talk) 23:15, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm hatting the content discussion, which is not what this page is for. Discuss on the project talk page, please. 28bytes (talk) 23:19, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

The important bit here is that this issue is under discussion - and that the reverts have stopped. I'm concerned about Kyrenator's conduct, however, given this edit, which confirmed their stance that Matt Downey's reverts were vandalism - and which came about 30 minutes after being told very clearly on this page that they were not. But if discussion is ongoing, that's good enough for me. I'm watchlisting the discussion and many of the problem articles, as well. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 13:33, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

Requested Move Of Bibliography of crytography to Bibliography of cryptography Per Correct Spelling

I realize when I moved the page I moved it to the wrong target.

Bibliography of cryptography is currently a redirect to Books on cryptography so the page will need to be deleted before it gets moved.Curb Chain (talk) 21:20, 2 November 2011 (UTC)  Done Black Kite (t) 21:24, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

ThanksCurb Chain (talk) 21:27, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

A copyright loophole...?

I have recently found many images, which should have been tagged F11 - no permission, but because the original author added {{OTRS pending}} at upload time, no one has tagged them at all - obviously thinking that OTRS would be applied soon. Some of them are over 12 months old (it sad that the OTRS template does not show the date of creation). Now it is possible that some OTRS e-mails failed to get through, but the number of authors is surprisingly a rather small subset, and a couple of them have uploaded many images, quoting many different sources, and in all case the OTRS pending has not been replaced. If one was being cynical, one would think that the OTRS pending was just added as a ruse to keep the image. Anyway, I'm busy tagging those that should be tagged - it should spur the authors to ensure their OTRS request has been received.  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 02:22, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

it would be trivial to add a date function to the template, I also have the ability to write a bot to auto-tag and date the pending requests. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 02:24, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Since it's the user adding the template, I would guess they would probably forget to add the date parameter - I guess a bot would be a better option.  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 02:34, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

A missing date parameter could place the page in a special undated category, but perhaps a bot makes more sense. Monty₈₄₅ 02:58, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

We really need to implement a firm standard saying that OTRS pending for more than a specific period of time gets converted into a NPD tag. Nyttend (talk) 03:08, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

How would that work outside file space? Also, when checking to make sure there are actually such transfusions, the first one I checked was 2 years old! Monty₈₄₅ 03:18, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Any bot would be limited to the file namespace. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 03:20, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I've made a proposal at WT:CSD to edit the OTRS pending templates to make them like {{npd}}, except that they would have a one-month lag between tagging and deletion rather than four days. Nyttend (talk) 03:21, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Im running a report to see what was tagged when. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 03:24, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

See User:Δ/Sandbox 4 ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 03:38, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Much appreciated, Δ. I don't have OTRS access, so there's nothing I can do with these, but I suppose eventually someone with OTRS is going to have to clear them out. As for how long we should let one of those tickets stay in, I would advocate 14 days. Businesses work slowly, so we don't want to cause needless chaos by making it something absurdly short, like 2 days. If it dosen't come in by 2 weeks, it probably ain't coming. Sven Manguard Wha? 04:39, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Two weeks? Businesses in some parts of the world close for that long over their main holiday period. I know they do here in New Zealand (i.e, Christmas eve to Jan 7th or 14). Stuartyeates (talk) 05:29, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Two weeks is an unreasonably short period -- the simple OTRS interaction I was involved in took about that long, between correspondance with the copyright holder, explanations of how Wikipedia's licensing system works, and then direct (and indirect) discussions with OTRS, and thst's without any particular complications, dealing with an individual and not a company. I would think that two months would be a better period of time, after which it would reasonable to conclude that no effort was being made. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:05, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

That might be a good timeframe to close a pending OTRS request as inactive, but it's a little excessive for the files themselves considering that a) until the OTRS request is complete we cannot assume that we have permission to use the file and b) in any other case where we don't have permission and aren't claiming fair use the timeframe is a hard seven days. This really needs discussed somewhere other than AN. Chris Cunningham (user:thumperward) - talk 10:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

The elephant in the living room here is that I don't think it's even appropriate to have images for which permission might be acquired in the first place; let alone keeping it around for weeks or months without that permission! First get permission, then upload. (And, I should point out, {{OTRS pending}} is for that scenario: permission has already been gotten and all that's left is for the email to percolate through OTRS). — Coren ^(talk) 12:45, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Agree with Coren here. Please date these according to upload date, and set it to be categorised for deletion if no permission is noted in 7 days. If there is a request on OTRS, then there is also email contact between uploader and OTRS, and if OTRS does get the paperwork correct, then the original uploader can be re-contacted to re-upload the image before the ticket is closed. It is not like these are non-free images for which the uploader is impossible to contact, and for which no replacement can be found and where the source is unknown etc. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 12:48, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm uncomfortable with just a 7-day time: I've uploaded several images with OTRS permissions, and sometimes it's taken several days to get the permission processed. I'm not excited at the possibility of a relatively small delay in the OTRS process resulting in the deletion of an image for which valid permission has been received. Per Coren's comment — I doubt that any of us think it's appropriate to have such images; the important thing about keeping them around for a specific period of time is that we need to be sure that the OTRS-pending tag is fraudulent. Moreover, if an OTRS agent finds that permission is lacking, s/he could tag the image with {{npd}} without waiting whatever period of time we set. Nyttend (talk) 13:03, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

OK, I know WP:AGF - but now it is just WP:BEANS to upload an image and tag it with 'OTRS approval pending' - and just ignoring to ask for that. There is no need to first upload and then ask for permission in the first place, and secondly, there is no feedback mechanism to see which ones do not pass OTRS. So, and obviously that happens, images stay around 'forever'. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Look there are about 118 problem images, some old, some new. They all now have a CSD#F11. I've added a note to the top of every one to ask it be left until 1st December (I think that's fair - some uploader's may not know that their OTRS e-mail has not arrived or not been approved - we should allow them time to sort it out - and they now have a deadline. I've added a similar note to Category:Wikipedia files missing permission as of 31 October 2011 (I tagged them all on same day). Let's not worry too much about these 118 images, some will stay and some will go. Let's move on and firm up what needs to be done for the future - maybe we add a date to the OTRS pending, maybe we insist that OTRS is obtained before uploading. Whatever we do, we need to make sure no one "games the system".  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 13:40, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

P.S. I've not even had a look at the text pages showing on Category:Items pending OTRS confirmation of permission - yet...  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 13:45, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

P.S. to my earlier comment - I think I assumed that people would use the loophole, though there will also be images which are in good faith given a wrong tag, and some where the image got tagged, but the uploader in good faith simply forgot to go to OTRS, or where the uploader in good faith did not know what to do next - though seeing that there are only 118 it is indeed not a big issue. Regarding the other items .. I think the same should apply, and for non-file-items, they can always be undeleted. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 13:52, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

I just logged into OTRS. The permissions-commomns backlog is currently 9 days; the permissions-en backlog is. In recent memory the backlog has been twice as long. I think that 30 days is a fair deadline, with the understanding that it can and should be adjusted based on OTRS' ability and needs. NW (Talk) 14:44, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

We should keep them out of articles until verification of permission is received. What is applied presently is the opposite, as long as I claim to have sent permission I can keep it in the article. Can we change that? I have seen many users upload a copyright violation which if not a speedy sits in the article for seven days and then they add an otrs sent template and by the time its deleted they we have published a copyright violation for at lest three weeks. We could keep such unverified pictures in a holding pen where the pictures are not deleted but not allowed to be published in articles until the permission is verified. Off2riorob (talk) 15:17, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Would it be technically feasible to display an image which said "Image in process" rather than the real image while the verification of permission is processed? Stuartyeates (talk) 17:30, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• If the OTRS backlog can be more than seven days, then we can set a longer default timeframe. Automatically sending them for deletion at 14 days would be far preferable to letting them hang out for months, and if we know that the permissions group is moving faster, then we can send them for deletion manually at an earlier date. The point behind the automatic deadline is to make sure that we don't exceed it, not to set a guaranteed grace period. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:38, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

Exactly. My only reason for opposing a one-week limit is that good images might be deleted due to backlogs or other human problems/errors; if we were able consistently to process OTRS permission tickets in one day, I'd say that seven days would be excessively long. Nyttend (talk) 21:20, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

A good image is one that is clearly uploaded with all its copyright and meta data. Others should be kept out of our articles until verified. We don't need a time limit if we don't publish such disputed pictures and keep then out of our articles and in a holding pen - they can stay in the holding pen for six months, seven if you like, but they should not be published by the project while awaiting verification of permission. Off2riorob (talk) 22:03, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

They've still been published in the sense that they're on our servers and lookable-atable. You speak as if the large majority of {{OTRS pending}} templates are instances of abuse; this solution simply is too restrictive of the large number of us who use the template legitimately. Nyttend (talk) 02:35, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

O2RR, I just uploaded a good image, by your definition, with all its copyright and metadata. However, it's in the OTRS queue, because I needed to document permission from the copyright holder. Why should it be kept out? --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 13:39, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I need to agree with Sarek and Nyttend and everyone else. "You can edit this page right now" is a big deal; the fact that your edits show up immediately is a big part of the reward. Explaining the required permissions to the copyright holder, getting the permissions from the copyright holder, uploading an image, and sending the permissions to OTRS, is, in itself a noticeable effort. If we then having to wait an additional 9 days before the image can appear in the article, we don't even get that little reward. Even fewer people will do it. I don't know how many OTRS permission images you've uploaded like that, but I've done a few. It is a pain, let me tell you. The entire Wikipedia is built around the idea that more people will be adding good data than bad, that's why it works. Wikipedia:Assume good faith isn't just a policy, it's a good idea. --GRuban (talk) 13:54, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I thought claim of ownership was more related to evidence of permission than assume good faith, at least that should be the case imo after the copyright ownership is disputed. These are not comments added to articles they are peoples property illegally uploaded with false licenses. I realize the majority of them are ultimately verified but there does appear to be a lot of illegal uploads that sit in our articles for weeks before deletion - some thousands upon thousands of false uploads are still there on commons right now. Personally I remove dubious ones on sight, perhaps we can keep out until verification of ownership is received, any picture thats license is disputed? Off2riorob (talk) 17:28, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand your initial or final sentences. Nyttend (talk) 22:40, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

I presume that Rob means that any image which is disputed should be removed from articles until the permissions are verified. Black Kite (t) 22:53, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

That presupposes that any image marked with "OTRS pending" is "disputed", but that's not necessarily the case - in Sarek's example, for instance, there's no dispute, just a process that needs to be worked through. Others are saying that the required process is complex enough that some AGF ought to be applied, at least for a short amount of time -- two weeks was the original suggestion, I brought up 2 months, I believe others have said a month (which doesn't seem unreasonable to me). Certainly, for any editor who is shown to have a history of abusing "OTRS pending", extending GF would be silly and an earlier grace period deadline, or no grace period at all, would make sense. Beyond My Ken (talk) 00:35, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

as per BK's interpretation of my comment - I was not including OTRS pending, only disputed pics, some OTRS pending pics you look at and as per Sarek's comment, they are totally fine but some are clearly not and I, and others I have seen, still tag them with a request for permission template just to declare that doubt and as an attempt to put a time limit on the OTRS verification. For undisputed OTRS waiting for verification templates I suggest, six weeks after the template is added, if not actioned, a bot note to the OTRS noticeboard and to the user that added the OTRS template so they can also follow it up, that these pics have been waiting an undue length of time for resolution and to please seek out the related email and action asap. - and perhaps if still unactioned, an automatic deletion two weeks after the nudge, eight weeks after the OTRS sent template was added. - Off2riorob (talk) 11:30, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

That seems like a sufficient timeframe to work through most issues -- as long as OTRS isn't backlogged for more than two weeks. :-) --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 14:03, 2 November 2011 (UTC)

[unindent] Now tha I understand Off2riorob's ideas better (thanks for the clarification), I agree with them. I was opposing because I thought the idea was to prohibit all images with OTRS-pending templates from appearing in articles. The remove-if-actively-disputed clause is better than I would have thought of by myself, as is the idea of the bot for the noticeboard. Nyttend (talk) 01:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree, this seems workable to me, and a fair compromise between AGF and protecting the 'pedia. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:30, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Long-open AfD

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Azarbaijani Kurds was opened on October 19, and is still open (without having been relisted). This makes me wonder if it were never listed properly, but I don't know what/how/where to check. WOuld someone see if this was listed properly and either close it add the proper listing as appropriate? LadyofShalott 11:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

You can check Special:WhatLinksHere/Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Azarbaijani_Kurds, and then you notice that it was only placed on a daily log today and so should stay open for the next seven days (at least). Fram (talk) 11:58, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

e/c It had never been listed so I listed it for today. GB fan 12:00, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. LadyofShalott 12:14, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

RFC close review: Category:Anti-abortion violence

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.

---

Extended content

This RfC close review should be closed seven days after the first timestamp: 06:40, 30 October 2011 (UTC) Category:Anti-abortion violence (talk|edit|history|logs|links) (NPOVN|RfC) Mike Selinker (talk · contribs)'s closure of Category talk:Anti-abortion violence#RFC on supercategory as do not subcategorize Category talk:Anti-abortion violence to Category:Christian terrorism was contested by Roscelese (talk · contribs). Note: They agreed to bring the closure to the administrators' noticeboard for community review using the following review format (adapted from Wikipedia:Deletion review/Discussions#Commenting in a deletion review): In the RfC closure review discussion, users should opt to: Endorse the original closing decision to disallow subcategorizing; or Reopen the RfC for further discussion; or Overturn the original decision and allow subcategorizing. Remember that the closure review is not an opportunity to (re-)express your opinion on the content in question. It is an opportunity to correct errors in process (in the absence of significant new information), and thus the action specified should be the editor's feeling of the correct interpretation of the debate. Admins and non-admins are allowed to participate in this review process. After seven days of discussion, this RfC review will be assessed by an uninvolved admin. If the closing admin determines that there is no consensus to overturn the closure, it is endorsed by default. Nomination statement While I appreciate Mike's stepping up to close an RFC that had been languishing for a while, I do not believe that his close was a correct reading of the discussion, even taking into account previous discussion at NPOVN. It's generally acknowledged that the role of a closing admin is not merely to count heads, and that a close must also take into account the strength and policy basis of arguments presented. In this discussion, we saw: four "categorize" editors who all pointed out that many reliable sources categorize the topic this way. a "don't categorize" editor who claimed that he had many sources which said it was not Christian terrorism, but refused to provide even a single source after being asked to do so repeatedly. a commenting editor who said that there might be anti-abortion terrorists of other religions that are not mentioned in any sources. a "don't categorize" editor who argued that domestic violence and government penalties for abortion, unlike anti-abortion terrorism, were not always religiously motivated - never mind that the article does not cover either of those things and that there will never, ever be consensus to conflate the three topics - and subsequently explained that he opposed the categorization because he believes it is wrong for pro-choice activists to say that anti-abortion activists are trying to press their religion on others. a "don't categorize" editor whose (incorrect) argument was that the topic was not mentioned in the Christian terrorism article. a "don't categorize" editor whose argument was that clinic protesters have many different motivations and that Islam, unlike Christianity, is evil. two other "categorize" editors and one more "don't categorize" editor (I'm lazy) several editors whose opinions were ambiguous (eg. requesting sources, but not returning to comment or !vote once said sources were provided) and who should perhaps be asked to clarify, or who otherwise commented without making a clear preference known. Going by numbers alone (and setting aside the ambiguous !votes), there's no consensus, which makes the close iffy to begin with. But looking at the actual arguments, it's clear that most or all of the "do not categorize" !votes are JDLIs that have little to do with the topic and nothing to do with Wikipedia policy, and the closing admin simply failed to weigh these !votes appropriately. One side presented a large number of sources, as consistent with policy, and the other, when it offered relevant arguments at all, engaged in original research about what anti-abortion terrorists might exist without being mentioned in any sources and what might be in their heads in contradiction to sources. And the latter is the argument Mike went along with, writing in his closing rationale that "just because [anti-abortion violence] is primarily perpetrated by [Christians] is not a statement that others cannot join in the act" and "there are many possible reasons to oppose abortion, and many possible reasons to murder," again ignoring the fact that, as the "categorize" side pointed out, reliable sources trump speculations about what's going on in people's brains or about what might happen in the future. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 06:40, 23 October 2011 (UTC) Closer's response: While I appreciate Roscelese's opinion and courtesy, there was more going on here. There is a risk with any highly charged subject that we will make our opinions appear as facts, and the category system is particularly vulnerable to that. In this case, the evidence provided was that many anti-abortion violent acts were perpetrated by Christians. But they were not as clear on the subject that they were motivated by Christianity. For example, if you read the article for Scott Roeder, you will not find much mention of Christianity. You will find that he was a member of the Sovereign Citizen Movement, which is an anti-tax group that was founded by a minister, but it's a massive leap to get from there to "Christianity inspired Roeder to violence." It's not that there isn't association; what we're missing here is one-to-one correspondence and causality. About half the people commenting on these two discussions were uncomfortable with the position currently backed by Roscelese, and so I ruled on the side of not committing to tag the religion with the terrorism label in this broad case. YMMV.--Mike Selinker (talk) 15:41, 24 October 2011 (UTC) I'm sorry, but if you think that the primary force of the "categorize" argument was that these acts were perpetrated by Christians, you read the discussion even less carefully than I originally thought. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 18:31, 24 October 2011 (UTC) I read the discussion plenty carefully, thanks. As I said on my talk page, I hear you, I just don't agree with you.--Mike Selinker (talk) 05:34, 25 October 2011 (UTC) You're reading your own opinion into the discussion. Rather than the "categorize" argument being that Christians perpetrate these acts, the bulk of the argument was that many sources describe this phenomenon as Christian terrorism. It was the "don't categorize" argument which claimed that it is not Christians who perpetrate these acts, but this was refuted both through the aforementioned sources and through pointing out that it is original research to speculate about people's reasons for opposing abortion or the religious identity of people who may bomb abortion clinics at some point in the future. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 19:53, 25 October 2011 (UTC) I think there's very little to be gained by you and me continually arguing over it. Let's see what other people say.--Mike Selinker (talk) 20:47, 25 October 2011 (UTC)

At this level of abstraction, we are far removed from considering the actual underlying question (whether Category:Anti-abortion violence should be a subcategory of Category:Christian terrorism). Arguments here that take the form "I (dis)agree with the position taken by the closer therefore it was an (in)correct close" are not relevant. Four of the endorses and one of the overturns below fall into this category. Of the remainder I see four coherent arguments to endorse and four to "overturn", but two of those are actually asking for "reopen". Overall, something of a mess.

The purpose of RfC is to establish consensus, and consensus is found through discussion and collaboration. The five commenters here who expressed opinions related to the RfC topic itself should have done so (and should have had the opportunity to do so) during that original discussion; they would have caused a nearly 50% increase in its level of participation, and probably an increase in its clarity. Faced with a muddled and unclear RfC to close, an admin should be looking to obtain as clear a sense as possible of the underlying consensus of the community. In a relatively low-participation discussion such as that (or this, for that matter) an obvious way to gather more data is to extend and advertise the discussion. There is no value to the project in extending this discussion, we need to get down off our meta pedastal and get back to the coal face where the actual issue is. To benefit the project, the original RfC needs the opportunity for more editors to get involved, and with the prominence this discussion has given it, it stands every chance of doing so. To benefit the project, this discussion needs to get out of its way. Based on the lack of clarity below, the existence of a middle ground position, and a touch of IAR, I'll close this discussion as reopen. And everyone here, including Mike and including me, should get ourselves over to Category talk:Anti-abortion violence#RFC on supercategory and give the issue that actually affects the project, the attention it deseves. Happy‑melon 15:06, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Discussion

• endorse POV pushing by categories. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 07:12, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
  • This is not the RFC; the discussion is about whether the closing admin read the discussion correctly, not about your own opinion of whether the category belongs. If you want to be able to vote in a currently closed RFC, the solution would be to suggest re-opening it. Then, if it was re-opened, you would be able to provide your opinion on the category, which opinion has no place here. (And when you do, why not produce some sources or make a policy-compliant argument, since the whole point of this review is that the closing admin gave too much weight to non-policy !votes?) –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 15:07, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn The categorize arguments were better founded in policy. Binksternet (talk) 15:30, 23 October 2011 (UTC)
• Question Should this RfC close review be advertised at other pages to allow for more independent input? Perhaps this discussion can be linked from Wikipedia talk:Categories for discussion and other pages watched by users experienced with categories. Cunard (talk) 23:37, 24 October 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse The closing admin has sufficiently explained the rationale behind his decision. As I understand it, this discussion is not to evaluate the merits of the points raised in the original discussion, but to identify any irregularities in the process and to apply any appropriate remedy. I see no irregularities in the process, nor the decision. The point of contention seems to be a simple disagreement over the outcome. That IMO is not grounds to overturn.– Lionel ^(talk) 07:54, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
  • As already stated, the irregularity in question was that the closing admin completely failed to evaluate the merits of the points raised. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 14:18, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
    • I think you mean "purported" irregularity. JakeInJoisey (talk) 22:27, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
      • No, I mean irregularity. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:20, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse Closing admin's rationale is adequate. The admin does appear to have properly evaluated the merits. NYyankees51 (talk) 15:05, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn and relist. The "don't categorize" arguments were poorly supported if not downright laughable, but it seems the RfC will attract more participation now that it has been de-facto advertized here. Have mörser, will travel (talk) 17:03, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse Close Use of categorization to make any "point" is a misuse of categories, and the close was correct. Collect (talk) 22:09, 25 October 2011 (UTC)n
• Endorse ...and observe (as a newcomer to this subject) that I'm also altogether uncomfortable with the conflation of anti-abortion violence with "terrorism". JakeInJoisey (talk) 22:59, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Neither of these address the review rationale. This is not RFC round 2, and your political opinions are yet more irrelevant here than they would be in the RFC; in particular, Collect, you're making the same argument you made earlier, rather than anything to do with the close. –Roscelese (talk ⋅ contribs) 23:20, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
    • • I stated that the close was correct. This board is a very bad place to seek debate points by saying that a person repeated a position, by the way. What counts here specifically is whether editors find the close to be correct, and a strong consensus is required to overturn a close. I fear you have not that consensus. Cheers. Collect (talk) 09:43, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
    • On the contrary, I found the following to be quite persuasive...It's not that there isn't association; what we're missing here is one-to-one correspondence and causality. ...and, BTW, editorial judgement, even if arguably independent of WP policy, can trump anything. JakeInJoisey (talk) 23:42, 25 October 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse per Lionel, who seems to have sussed and succinctly stated the facts. Cheers, Lindsay^Hello 17:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
• endorse it would be an excessively generalized and contentious classification, that is not compatible with NPOV. DGG ( talk ) 18:38, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn: Maybe I'm reading a different RFC than some of you, but Mike's closure doesn't mention policy anywhere, nor justify why policy-based support votes were devalued in assessing consensus. Mike's response, rather, is his own opinion on the content of the RFC, which effectively makes it a vote, not a proper closure. I have no opinion on the subject, and my reading of the RFC is that the comments in support of categorisation were stronger and better grounded in policy. On a side note, can categories not have multiple parents? If they can, Mike's justification that the category can't have that parent because it might also be categorised under other parents would be invalidated, and the category could simply be parented to all relevant categories. TechnoSymbiosis (talk) 03:23, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn for procedural reasons. As with TechnoSymbiosis, I don't see where Mike summarized the results of the RFC anywhere in his closure; he seems to mostly be giving his own opinion. Note that voting for overtuning here doesn't mean I think the closure should have gone the other way; I would have no problem if another admin closed it again in short order, and left a proper summary. Even if (and I am not saying it will happen this way, just noting the possibility that it could) the second closure came out with the same result as the first, we should be careful about dotting our t's and crossing our i's when doing this. A proper closure with a proper summary of the discussion should be done, regardless of the outcome, and even if the second closure reaches the same conclusion as the first. --Jayron32 03:51, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
• Endorse looking at the two discussions a valid case was made that A) not all violence in this context is terrorism and B) not all terrorism in this context is Christian. I supported the categorization change but missed the first discussion (linked to above) where valid objections had been raised. Mike's closing correctly reflected the comments made in the NPOV discussion which, as it covered the same topic, quite reasonable to consider here. Hobit (talk) 13:05, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
• Overturn Perhaps I'm just ignorant, but when the subcategorize arguments cite reliable sources and the don't subcategorize arguments rely on vague assertions, it seems like the result should be subcategorize. eldamorie (talk) 13:33, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Close request

Would an admin assess the consensus in this discussion? Thanks, Cunard (talk) 07:37, 1 November 2011 (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.

2nd call: remaining closes for Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011

We still need a few more closes at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011, which will determine the procedures for the upcoming 2011 ArbCom elections. If any uninvolved admins are available and willing to close the remaining sections in that RfC, it would be appreciated. –MuZemike 02:22, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It is urgent that this be closed now, because if my math is right, the nomination period would have to start tomorrow in order for everything to run full time and be done by Dec. 11th. Sven Manguard Wha? 06:00, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Maybe, I'm missing something bigtime, but I see that the nomination period as 10 days, the "inbetween" period as 5 days, and the voting period is likely to be 14 days on current consensus. Unless I seriously miscalculated on something, if the figures stay the same as I mentioned, we would have another 9 days. –MuZemike 06:31, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh my... whoops. I was working on the assumption of a 21 day voting period because I switched the support levels for 21 and 14 in my head. Never mind folks. Sven Manguard Wha? 07:03, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I received this message

This message came up whilst I was editing a page: "Hello! Due to your recent edit war on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, Aaron Muszalski, an administrator here on Wikipedia, has flagged your account for one more chance. Your edit below was not saved, but will be saved if you use the "Save Page" button again; if you think your edit may be against Wikipedia policy, please re-think your actions. Wikipedia always welcomes constructive contributions, but we are required to block your access to editing if you violate policy. You may back out of this page without saving your edit by clicking here. Thanks, Aaron Muszalski (talk) 18:55, 4 November 2011 (UTC)"

I've never edited any of the pages listed and certainly I am not involved in an edit war of any kind, let alone these subjects. I clicked to Aaron Muszalski's talk page and user page to leave a message, but I am confused by what I found there. Is this just some spam message and not a real administrator? It would be nice to know. TVArchivistUK (talk) 19:05, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I was going to write virtually the same thing. Any idea what that was about? Sergecross73 msg me 19:07, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Sounds like an edit filter gone wrong. –xeno^talk 19:09, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

See this for an explanation. HurricaneFan25 19:10, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Vandal account, username

Immashootu (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) This shouldn't happen. —Justin (koavf)❤T☮C☺M☯ 20:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

It looks like they were already blocked. Also, the best place for reporting this would be WP:AIV. Wildthing61476 (talk) 20:29, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Also blocked: Immakeelu (talk · contribs). –MuZemike 22:24, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Re-creation of previously deleted page

Blackwater_(novel) was just recently created by someone, but it appeared on my watchlist, so it's been deleted before. Could an admin please check the history to see if the re-creation is legit and not/act accordingly? Thanks. → ROUX ₪ 09:30, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

It's a different book. The previous one was apparently by C. D. Blizzard. Often in the case of G4 the most informative thing to do is to simply find the previous AfD from what links here. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 09:49, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

...and either way, this one has an award, which likely improves notability (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:51, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/IncidentArchive726#Community Discussion of Topic Ban and Interaction Ban

Shouldn't this be closed by an administrator? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 09:53, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Um, see two threads above this ... (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 10:11, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Closure Required

A discussion about Chesdovi and Debresser just archived for a second time. Significant enough progress was made in the "moving forward" that I believe someone would be able to step in a close the discussion. I personally do not wish to de-archive myself, and was hoping some wise (or otherwise) soul would determine consensus, and enact the fair proposals. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 08:51, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm working on this close. Gwen Gale (talk) 20:23, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

• Done, done and logged. Gwen Gale (talk) 21:27, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Request for page creation: Template:Did you know nominations/Michael Hishikushitja

I have no idea why this has been salted blacklisted, but please create this page for me. I created the article today without any problems: Michael Hishikushitja, and I would like to nominate it for T:TDYK. Thanks a lot, Pgallert (talk) 19:11, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done. 28bytes (talk) 19:28, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Delete userbox

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Joyson_Noel/my_userboxes/Fernandes_Prabhu_Moodubelle

Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 19:31, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done. 28bytes (talk) 19:33, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

More stuff to delete

Category:Redwall characters. At CFD for 7 days with consensus to upmerge. I've already done this, so the category can be safely deleted. Also, Category:Redwall locations is now empty, so it can be flushed via G6. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 21:57, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Expired PRODs

Noonvale, Bloodwrath, Conqueror's Quest, Sword of Martin, Tears of All Oceans and Silvamord have all gone 7 uncontested days at prod. Can someone delete these? Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 17:37, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done for all except Conqueror's Quest, which you'll need to take to AfD. 28bytes (talk) 19:44, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

There's a lot more. 55, to be exact. — Train2104 (talk • contribs • count) 19:46, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

this sort of backlog at that process is rarely much of an emergency. DGG ( talk ) 00:49, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Overdue RfC

There's an RfC overdue for closure to do with astrology, here.

Appreciate that an RfC being overdue is not necessarily something to panic about too much, but there is still some discussion and maybe a hint of edit-warring there which could potentially be stopped in its tracks.

Thanks. --FormerIP (talk) 23:15, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done --Jayron32 01:50, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Help urgently needed on unblock-en-l - barnstars available

Who wants to earn some barnstars?

The unblock request mailing list, [email protected] , is around for blocked users to appeal blocks when they do not know how or are unable to do so on-wiki. Unfortunately, and despite the fact that there are over 100 people subscribed to this list and receiving email from it, I am handling the vast majority of the requests this list receives completely by myself. It's been this way for a few weeks, before which User:DeltaQuad was the only one actively reviewing appeals. In short, we really really really need some help!

If you are not subscribed to this list and would like to assist with reviewing block appeals, please go to https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/unblock-en-l and sign up. Why should you do so? Many of the people emailing us are trying to edit Wikipedia for the first time, but are unable to due to a rangeblock or autoblock on their IP address. By reviewing these appeals in a timely manner, you're helping new editors get started on Wikipedia. Furthermore, there's an added incentive for you...

For the remainder of the month of November, I am offering an Admin's Barnstar to anyone who handles at least 15 appeals send to this list. It may sound like a lot, but this list often receives more than a dozen appeals each day, so you're sure to get there quickly if you check your email regularly. Furthermore, the three admins other than myself who respond to the most appeals for the remainder of November will receive Bronze, Silver, and Gold Wiki Awards for their exceptional service. Fine print follows my signature.

If you want to help but aren't sure how, don't worry - subscribe and stick around for a bit. You'll find a lot of the emails we send are boilerplate text that you can copy from previous responses and then edit as needed. So sign up and help today! Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 00:24, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Fine print: In order to receive credit towards either award, any response you send must be cc'd to the unblock mailing list per standard procedure. Each admin may only get credit once per appealing user; i.e., if you respond to an appeal asking for more information, you don't get credit for two appeals by responding again when they user sends the information you need. Also, except where replies are sent within a few minutes of each other, only the first admin to respond to a given stage of an appeal gets credit; i.e., if Admin A responds to a user's request, then Admin B sends another response an hour later, only Admin A is going to get credit because it had already been dealt with. List-only emails do not receive credit. You receive credit just for sending a useful response; you need not unblock (or decline to unblock) a user. Currently subscribed users are also eligible provided they actually start helping like DQ and I have been asking them to do for weeks :-P.

EDIT I will also back this up with my Sectional Dedication Award for anyone who handles 20 in a month (from beginning to end of the month in question) on the same terms that Hersfold is using above. -- DQ (t) (e) 18:15, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I actually have to echo this request, because the situation hasn't gotten better since I started to go on wikibreak. (And I don't have the tools anymore, so my help is sometimes not enough) I see unblock requests on wiki dealt with in hours, where as just later yesterday (and no pressure on Hersfold here) I saw a backlog of about 15-20 emails that had not been responded to in 4 days. This is really shocking personally that there is such a backlog. As Newyorkbard echoed just a while ago on ANI, this list needs attention, and we have gotten new members, but very few have stepped up for the few emails that have been handled by others. I have a statistical document that I have upload that shows just how bad things are getting. This file is not 100% accurate, but add or subtract a bit of salt to these numbers and they should be fine. Also note the last page is not specifically unblock-en-l requests, but all emails (not that the numbers would be affected much without). Some of the ridiculous statistics include:

• In october, there were 34 requests that took over a week to respond to. (That's from when I started to take a break from the list)
• ~21% of requests are taking over 3 days to get responses.
• Since May 19th, 157 requests have been left not responded to.

Please any admins who can help at this time, we need you! Not sure how to start replying to emails? use the templates. -- DQ (t) (e) 14:09, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Also note the cross-thread @ ANI. -- DQ (t) (e)

Doesn't this use respondent's own email addresses? I'd be a lot more willing if it was an OTRS queue, because my email address isn;t necessarily something I want to give out to blocked users. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 14:29, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Is there some reason {{unblock}} can not be used on these requests? Jeepday (talk) 14:41, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Like he said, some people don't read the instructions, or don't understand them, or are caught in rangeblocks that they don't get ... and then there are those whose talkpages get locked due to abuse of the process (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:53, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

@HJ Mitchell: Yes, it does, and were trying to get an interface going but the programming only started just recently, and people still have day to day lives. The problem is the the Foundation (well Legal more directly) has turned down an OTRS queue (and they've been asked a few times) because of the privacy policy and retention of data policies, because the list contains IP addresses.

@Jeepday: You would have to tell that to the users making the requests...but Bwilkins is right + again special security measures for a user that is caught in a hardblock, needing an IPBE, but doesn't want to post their IP, or most often of what we get, autoblocks or anon-vandal blocks (collateral damage) asking for accounts. -- DQ (t) (e) 17:11, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Tell me how I can help with the interface. --Shirik (Questions or Comments?) 18:01, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll get you on the list and give you an update when Hersfold rolls in tonight. (Or sooner if I figure out a few things) :) -- DQ (t) (e) 18:15, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I won't be properly online until tomorrow, but the first requirement for helping with the interface is a toolserver account, and a basic knowledge of one or more of the following: PHP, HTML, CSS, SQL. If you aren't familiar with any of these languages, we can still use beta testers (later on), and you won't need an account for that. :-) Once you have a toolserver account, send me or DQ a note and we'll get you in. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 05:48, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

user:rozitaa

Some one hacked user:Rozitaa password in en.wiki and writes some spam in here page. she is active in fa.wiki and she doesn't access to here account to write in this page. is it possible to reset here page to here password that is in fa.wiki? if it is not please block here user page and her pageDiscussion until some one could solve this problem. Reza1615 (talk) 09:20, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

please block user:Rozitaa Some one hacked this name.Roozitaa (talk) 09:48, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Blocked by User:Closedmouth as compromised. — Moe ε 10:27, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Problem with WP:V watchlist msg

Any Admin available to look at this please? [30] Leaky Caldron 18:20, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

This should be fairly straightforward, has it just been overlooked? Leaky Caldron 11:50, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done. Cheers. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 12:16, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Jesse Dirkhising

I don't know where else to ask this so I'll ask it here. The image of Jesse Dirkhising was deleted without an explanation. Nothing on the talk page of Murder of Jesse Dirkhising mentions it. I left a post on the talk page but recieved no response. I have no idea as to why it was deleted because I see no discussion in regards to it being up for deletion. Can someone tell me why it was removed or who nominated it to be taken down? Why was Jesse Dirkhising's picture deleted and not those of Matthew Shepard and Larry King? Why keep two but not three? I'd like to see the image of Jesse restored. Caden ^cool 20:57, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

The image removal bot left an edit summary linking to the deleted image, which mentions Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2011 July 17#File:JesseDirkhising.jpg in the deletion log. --Onorem♠Dil 21:03, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you but I don't see consensus for it being deleted? I don't understand it. Caden ^cool 21:09, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

This File:Matthew Shepard.jpg and this File:LawrenceFobesKing.jpg are not free images. Why keep these images and not Jesse's? Something is wrong here. Caden ^cool 21:23, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't know...because the nominator missed them? --Onorem♠Dil 21:28, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I doubt that. Something else is going on. Caden ^cool 21:32, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

(e/c with Onorem and Caden) If you want to challenge the deletion, the correct forum is deletion review. Alternatively, if you want to start a community discussion about the use of non-free images of people who are deceased, you may want to consider starting a discussion at WP:VP/P. I do see the inconsistency here and, frankly, I believe that images of deceased people, in articles about them or about their deaths, has long been accepted fair use on Wikipedia. --Philosopher ^{Let us reason together.} 21:38, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks. I didn't know about WP:VP or deletion review. Caden ^cool 22:51, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

I have tried unsuccessfully to engage in conversation with the nominator User:SchuminWeb (an admin no less) who deleted the image. I tried here [31] and here [32] and all I got was this [33]. That's unacceptable behavior from an admin to refuse to explain what appears to me as a double standard. He has no problem keeping non-free images of Shepard and King but found it necessary to delete Dirkhising? He and his actions make no sense. It's a double standard and it's plain wrong. Caden ^cool 00:42, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

SchuminWeb did not delete the image. The image was was deleted by Fastily. If you disagree with the close of the discussion you should discuss it with the admin who deleted the file. If you are not satisfied with the outcome there, the next step is asking for it to be reviewed at WP:DRV. There are files and articles that are deleted while similar files/articles are kept. This is a byproduct of the way wikipedia is set up with discussions and different editors taking part in different discussions. It is not necessarily a double standard by any editor. GB fan 01:29, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't have a strong opinion on the matter but clarification is always good, thus Wikipedia talk:Non-free content/Archive 52/Archives/ 41#RFC: Clarifying policy on pictures of deceased persons. Herostratus (talk) 02:45, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

@GB Fan. Okay so Fastily deleted it. Well although I disagree with his closure when there was no consensus to do that, I'm unable to do anything about it. We bumped heads about a year ago over his mass deletion of images and he told me to never contact him again. So the option to communicate is impossible. In regards to the main topic, I still see a double standard practice. I asked multiple times as to why Shepard and King's non-free images remain and I have yet to be given a realistic explanation. @Herostratus. I do agree that clarification is good and that was what I was asking for but in this case I don't feel that SchuminWeb was willing to do that. Instead he decided to ignore me on his talk page. Not good at all when he's the admin who nominated the image of Jesse Dirkhising for deletion in the first place. Had I read his talk page in the first place I wouldn't have bothered contacting him to begin with. Two editors questioned his abuse of power on his talk page. Had I seen that I would never have bothered to contact him. Caden ^cool 20:39, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

So then the next step is WP:DRV. It isn't here and it isn't at WP:REFUND. GB fan 22:54, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Never heard of either and honestly I wouldn't know how to do that. Even if I did I would be accused of forum shopping. Funny how all the rules on wiki are quite literally set up as one road block after another. Caden ^cool 23:09, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

You would certainly not be accused of forum-shopping if you took a disputed deletion to WP:DRV, because that's exactly the right place to take it. Black Kite (t) 23:40, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Maybe you don't recognize the shortcut WP:REFUND, but you have posted there asking for this file to be undeleted. But as that page states it is not for anything that is deleted do to a discussion. No one should say you are forum shopping by going to deletion review to have a deletion that you disagree with reviewed. GB fan 23:48, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I filed for undeletion thingy yesterday and as yall know I also came here to the noticeboard and I attempted to communicate with the nominee on his talk page, so even if I understood how to file a DRV, I'd be accused of forum shopping. Caden ^cool 23:56, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

No, you wouldn't. In fact, DRV suggests that you contact the closing admin first, so you've already done that. Filing a DRV isn't actually that difficult; I will post on your talkpage. Black Kite (t) 23:59, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Okay thanks Kite. Caden ^cool 00:01, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

RfC summary update

Resolved

by self revert. Dualus (talk) 01:07, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I would like to reverse this deletion of updates and clarifications I made to an RfC header, but I have been accused of disruptive editing so I am asking that an administrator revert that instead, please. Dualus (talk) 00:55, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

User protecting own talkpage

Saravask has protected their own talkpage to stop users leaving messages. Is this allowed? I was trying to leave a message regarding an orphaned image but could not do so. Cloudbound (talk) 01:39, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Left a note on their talk page--Jac16888 ^Talk 01:44, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Admins, more then anyone else, should never be allowed to have a fully protected talk page. Monty₈₄₅ 01:47, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Saravask has posted on his userpage that he's currently on vacation and won't be online. Perhaps this is simply an attempt to avoid people leaving messages that he won't be able to respond to? (Not the best way to handle it, but more understandable than it would be otherwise.) Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:49, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Saravask has been editing since protecting the page, and judging from some of the edit summaries, engaging in disputes. Disputes are an important reason communication channels like a user talk page should remain open. Monty₈₄₅ 01:52, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm. This is true. Newyorkbrad (talk) 01:56, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for your replies. Cloudbound (talk) 01:55, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I'd like to hear Saravask's explanation; he did take about 36 hours off of editing; maybe he just forgot to remove the protection when he became active again. Still, it doesn't look good, and I don't see where his user talk page was a target of vandalism even before his "vacation." --Jayron32 02:01, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

• Unprotected. –xeno^talk 15:51, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Re-instating Structure101

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.

---

Hi,

I am posting here as it appears Cirt who deleted the original article is no longer an administrator.

I would be grateful if you could review the decision to delete the Structure101 page.

As I don't normally log into Wikipedia I only recently became aware of the deletion.

The article was deleted because apparently Structure101 was not "notable". In terms of notability let me just point you at our many customers and what they have to say.

As for the notability of the award itself referenced in the article, let me first point you at the specific award granted. The JOLT awards are widely regarded as the 'Oscars of the software industry'.

As it turns out, our latest product, Restructure101, has also won a JOLT award in this year's architecture and design category.

Best regards,

Pth81 (talk) 12:26, 18 October 2011 (UTC)

Oppose - Cirt nominated the article for deletion, but that's where Cirt's role ended. Several others reviewed the article and elected to delete it. Cirt's change in status has no bearing on anyone else's work. Rklawton (talk) 13:33, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I think that User:Cirt was not the proposer but was the deleting admin - so after having asked, or disputed the decision, the user has the option to go to WP:Deletion review ? Also I notice that, as per a discussion on User:Cirt's talkpage User:Ron Ritzman is an agreed place to discuss WP:Refunds and such like in this respect. If there have been updates and additional notability then Ron might be agreeable to userfy-ing it for the user to improve and expand and possibly replace to article space at a later date. Off2riorob (talk) 13:44, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

• This editor appears to have done nothing in three years on Wikipedia other than promote this product, suggesting WP:COI. No thanks. Guy (Help!) 18:18, 7 November 2011 (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.

Foreign relations questions

I have several questions:

1. Should the dash between countries in foreign relations be with space or without?

Uzbekistan – United States relations (with space, if you ask me, better looking, United States have this for all articles of relations)

Greece–Iceland relations (without space, a majority of articles)

2. Should we create redirect for articles in both ways?

Israel–Japan relations default article

Japan-Israel relations missing redirect

3. Should we have articles about relations of all states with all other states? Isn't the international relation notable for its self for separate article, if its referenced?

4. Do we have some Manual of Style for these articles?

Thanks in advance, and i would love to hear at least several different opinions. All best! --WhiteWriter ^speaks 17:03, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

These questions are not admin-specific -- the proper place to ask them is WT:MOS. Looie496 (talk) 17:24, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

RfC closure needed

Could someone please take a look at the RfC regarding names a few color-related articles. The RfC is over 30 days old and needs to be closed one way or another. Or perhaps changed into a request for move. Thanks. --Noleander (talk) 12:37, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I closed the RFC. I'm not sure the impact this has on the articles that it covers so I've left it up to someone else to do the grunt work. I just don't have a particular interest in colors, sorry.--v/r - TP 21:50, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Request

Hi, please revert the redirect to it's original title. The subject Radu cel Frumos has three English nicknames, and there is an edit war currently going on in the article regarding it. The name was changed without consensus. Joyson Noel ^{Holla at me!} 20:23, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done page move protected for a week. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 20:39, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Backlog at CFD

Can some admins please help out at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion? Backlog there includes one discussion from October 3, 1 from October 6, and over 100 later ones, all of which should be closed already. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 11:44, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

IP error using wikibreak enforcer

(re-posted from User talk:Fastily)

Hi there, this is User:Basalisk. I'm editing as an IP as I messed up my configuration of the wikibreak enforcer and have managed to lock myself out of my account until next week. Would you mind sorting things out on my java page? Thanks 46.64.86.194 (talk) 13:33, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I think the page that would need amending is User:Basalisk/vector.js - I can't see why this request would be made maliciously by someone posing as the user, so it should be done, but I'm not very good with java so don't fancy trying to change it in case I lock him out until 2099 or something daft like that. fish&karate 13:52, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I've removed the enforcer entirely. Don't forget to put it back in with the right date if you still want it. — Coren ^(talk) 14:05, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Discussion of admin help template - is it useful, and can it be more effective?

I've started a discussion regarding the {{admin help}} template here. In short I am concerned that it is not as effective as it should be and/or as editors who invoke it may expect it to be, and what steps can be taken to make it more so. Any thoughts are appreciated. Doniago (talk) 14:51, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Categories for discussion backlogged again

If someone has the time, can you stop by and consider closing some of the old discusions? The oldest are from October 3. Vegaswikian (talk) 20:30, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Village pump (proposals) closures needed

Would an admin (or admins) close Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#RfC: Structure WP:WQA conversations and Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Remove ability for new users to create other accounts? Both discussions were listed at Template:Centralized discussion and delisted to Wikipedia:Centralized discussion/Archive owing to inactivity. Thanks, Cunard (talk) 10:14, 25 September 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, DeltaQuad (talk · contribs), for closing the WQA RfC. Cunard (talk) 05:54, 27 September 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 23:59, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

 Done Closed the Account creation one also, changed timestamp to today. -- DQ (t) (e) 17:04, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, DQ, for closing and summarizing this lengthy debate. Cunard (talk) 22:40, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Bugzilla request to enact the consensus found in this closure

Would an admin or editor who is experienced with Bugzilla file a request to enact the consensus found in this closure? Please provide a link to the Bugzilla request at the Village Pump as a postscript to DQ's closure. Thank you, Cunard (talk) 22:44, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Future timestamp to prevent archiving. Cunard (talk) 22:44, 22 October 2012 (UTC)

mediazilla:32234. Don't hold your breath. — This, that, and the other (talk) 08:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, This, that and the other! Would you provide a link to mediazilla:32234 at Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)#Remove ability for new users to create other accounts and remove the future timestamp I placed there? In March 2011, I moved Ruslik0 (talk · contribs)'s post-close comment about the Bugzilla filing directly below the close: Wikipedia:Village pump (proposals)/Archive 69#Transferring over "filemover" tool. Cunard (talk) 09:59, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for the addition, This, that and the other. Cunard (talk) 00:45, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Second opinion on discretionary sanctions

Resolved

 – sanctions retracted, N/A Magog the Ogre (talk) 01:14, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry for the long post - I'll try to keep the wording simple:

I would like some feedback on discretionary sanctions regarding Genesis creation narrative. I noticed a lot of edit warring there, some of it from editors who have been blocked in the past for edit warring on Bible related issues. In this specific case, the edit war appears to be about defining creation account in genesis as a "narrative" or a "myth" (the latter term being more controversial, as the term "myth" in modern parlance often connotes an event which never occurred).

Thus I was planning to give out some notifications about possible sanctions under the guise of Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pseudoscience, which includes creationism vs. evolution. In fact, I have already given a warning to User:PiCo. I was also considering giving out warnings to User:Til Eulenspiegel and User:Obsidian Soul, all for having three (not more) reverts to the article within a 24 hour period.

However, this may have been a stylistic edit war more than a scientific one. PiCo and Til Eulenspiegel are more concerned with the history of the Bible, rather than the scientific merits surrounding it. As such, this may technically deal with an issue covered by pseudoscience, but only by accident, in that the two fields happen to overlap in this area. Were I to apply sanctions to the editors in this case, it might open up the possibility of applying the pseudoscience sanctions to all debate regarding the history of religion (e.g., did Mohammad really bless God immediately upon birth? Did Samson really kill 1000 men with a donkey's jawbone?)

I would appreciate some thoughts and feedback. Thanks. Magog the Ogre (talk) 10:44, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Update: PiCo informs me the edit war was not even surrounding the term "myth" but was entirely stylistic. Magog the Ogre (talk) 10:45, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Not quite (but thanks, Magog/Ogre) - so far as I'm concerned the question is stylistic, but others have been more concerned with the meaning of the word "myth" and the need to include, or not include, it in the first line of the lead. This article is a notorious minefield. PiCo (talk) 11:06, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

No need, I have already declined from making further reverts or edits to the article itself, though I still find myself drawn to the discussion. I was unfortunate enough to have been one of the first people to see the edit by the original author of the proposed change and found myself drawn to what apparently is a long-standing issue with the article.

I admit I reported User:Til Eulenspiegel by mistake to WP:3RRNB as I thought he had reverted four times, but it seems I miscounted and accidentally included an earlier revert by User:PiCo. I objected to the fact that the three editors were acting against the current discussion and changing the wording despite being the obvious minority without any valid policy-based arguments in the discussion. And I obviously disagree with User:PiCo that it is merely stylistic (if it were, the attempts to change "myth" wouldn't be this concentrated). It is quite obvious that the attempted changes result from objection by Christian (creationist?) editors about labeling something they believe in as literal truth as a "myth".

A myth in academic usage is a specific type of story (narrative) that involves the origins of man and the world in religion and folklore, obviously treated not as literal truth but culturally and religiously important nonetheless. A "myth" in common usage however means an untruth, and that is perhaps what they are objecting to. The question here is due weight, not mere semantics. "Narrative" implies a possibility of being literal truth, and that goes against our policies on neutrality and our adherence to the scientific consensus.

That said, the current RfC in the talk page is reaching consensus, and I think any further action is unnecessary at this point. -- Obsidi♠n Soul 12:17, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

• As a strictly personal opinion, I think that applying the Pseudoscience discretionary sanctions to that dispute is a stretch I'd be hard-pressed to support even though I understand and agree with the intent. Efforts would be best focused, I think, on the RfC in progress (which seems the be the case). — Coren ^(talk) 13:59, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm marking this resolved, as sanctions retracted. Magog the Ogre (talk) 01:14, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

A little help - history merge

I closed and moved an article to Sega Genesis based on WP:RM. Sega Genesis was a previous title with a history. History preserved at Sega Genesis/History. Tried to follow instructions on History merge but got stumped. How to proceed from here? Thanks --Mike Cline (talk) 00:51, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll take a look... 28bytes (talk) 01:37, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

OK, this was a tricky case because Sega Genesis had too many revisions to do it the normal way. Normally, we'd move Sega Genesis/History to Sega Genesis, deleting Sega Genesis in the process, then restore the deleted Sega Genesis revisions. In this case, I had to do things in reverse: move Sega Genesis to Sega Genesis/History with redirect (deleting Sega Genesis/History in the process), then restoring the deleted Sega Genesis/History edits, then moving (without redirect) Sega Genesis/History back to Sega Genesis. It should be all sorted now. 28bytes (talk) 02:03, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Vilmar eddy hilberg-jacobsen

Could someone please sandbox Vilmar eddy hilberg-jacobsen for me for a moment? The article was speedied almost exactly at the same time that its editor asked WHY WAS THIS DELETED on the talk page, and I'd like to have the courtesy of telling them what they did wrong. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:34, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Userfied last version to User:Onlinelondon/sandbox. Number 57 19:37, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done, you can re-delete now. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 19:44, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done Number 57 20:11, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

ArbCom RFC Threshold Change

I am sure I am going to upset some folks, but it has been brought to my attention that I misunderstood the consensus on the threshold for Arbcom. I've made this edit to correct the mistake and lower the threshold to 50%. I'm sorry to cause the confusion and the drama that I am sure this will cause.--v/r - TP 14:28, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

"88.2% of Statistics are made up on the spot" - Vic Reeves  Chzz  ►  06:07, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Old AfD

I opened an AfD on October 27 and it still hasn't been closed. Would an admin take a bit of time to close it? Thanks. HurricaneFan25 18:29, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

•  Done Black Kite (t) 19:00, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Community Discussion of Topic Ban and Interaction Ban

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

A bit of background can be found here, amongst many other troublesome interactions between User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser found throughout ANI and Wikipedia.

In the link above, there was pretty consistent belief that both a topic ban and a interaction ban would be needed between these two editors. Both edit in highly provocative areas that are subject to closely border AE enforcement. Due to an WP:AN/3RR report, I have blocked both for a 2 week period (matching blocks).

At this point, I think it is important to formalize the rather informally-closed (it faded off the page) discussion of topic ban/interaction ban.

Proposal User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser are topic banned from all Israeli/Palestinian topics, broadly construed, for a period of 6 months. User:Chesdovi and User:Debresser are also indefinitely banned from interaction with each other on Wikipedia. Violations will be met with escalating blocks as per the blocking policy

Note: Both parties have been advised of this thread, and how to make their comments to this thread even though they are blocked (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:19, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• Support as proposer (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 18:07, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I dont think this is related to "Israeli/Palestinian topics", at least what that phrase is commonly understood to mean. It is in motivation, at least I think so, but not in execution. Whether a 12th century rabbi in Safed should be called a "Palestinian" is not in the scope of the "Israeli-Palestinian conflict". nableezy - 18:38, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• My impression of the long running conflict between these two is that it is theological in nature within the realm of Judaism, and not directly related to the IP conflict. It may be best to have an interaction ban alone. Either can edit whatever they want, but neither should approach, follow, or engage the other. Any sort of provocation or gaming should be met with a block to enforce the prohibition that Wikipedia not be used as an ideological battlefield. Jehochman ^Talk 19:32, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
  • I agree it's not IP related; I am concerned with just an interaction ban alone, as that gives first-mover advantage in areas they both already participate in. I don't know what the best solution is off the top of my head, though. I think that pausing the specific proposal while some thought goes into how to pose it in a most constructive and effective manner is a good idea, personally. This is not a rejection of the basis for the proposal (I support doing something at this time), just fine-tuning what we try to do... Georgewilliamherbert (talk) 19:39, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

I'm up for some fine-tuning. We have two weeks while they're both blocked :-) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 20:17, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• (Copying across from talk page) I think this block should be reconsidered, for the reason mention on my talkpage. As for a permanent solution, I don't know. The community has not been able to convince Chesdovi to stop his disruptive edits until he can show consensus. And I am getting blocked for trying to stop him. Makes me feel very appreciated by the community. Also in view of my other over 60,000 edits over a period of many years. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs) copied by Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} 21:46, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

Debresser was advised more than once to leave Chesdovi alone, and an interaction ban should have been implemented the last time this was at ANI. Debresser knew he would be blocked if further conflict between the 2 of them occurred. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:08, 27 October 2011 (UTC)

• There are 343 articles (not including talkpages, categories, etc) that both have edited - someone is clearly following someone - indeed, probably both are following each other, which they were both told to stop (hence the blocks) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:14, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
  • (Copying across from Debresser's talk page)Dwilkins, you have not addressed the concerns I mentioned on my talkpage. (in random order) 1. There was no WP:AE edit restriction involved. 2. A block is overkill and counterproductive. A topic ban, or even a mutual promise of a far more restricted nature would be enough here. 3. You do not distinguish between the aggressor and the defender. 4. Many editors have stated in a previous discussion that they would not like to see us blocked.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs) copied by Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} 22:54, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
    • Debresser, if you're trying to paint yourself as the "defender" in your point 3 above, contrary to even a cursory look at your edits and your interaction with other editors, good luck getting anyone to swallow it. pablo 15:30, 28 October 2011 (UTC)
  • Cool though the intersect tool is, since both editors are active in the same area, assuming that "following" is going in is a slight leap. Moreover we know that historically (WP timeframe, not South Levant) category deletions were involved in this dispute, so we should not be surprised to see this overlap per se. Rich Farmbrough, 13:14, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
    
• I've been involved here before as well. Whilst both editors are productive and a block is unfortunate, we do need to sort the issue out. The problem is that you can't have an interaction ban without a topic ban, as mentioned above that would just give the first person to edit an IP (or any other) article the immediate advantage; also it's too messy and vague - what would be the delay between both editors editing an article that would be acceptable? Black Kite (t) (c) 23:30, 27 October 2011 (UTC)
• Can't this be resolved by them agreeing to refer disagreements to WikiProject Judaism? Rich Farmbrough, 01:53, 28 October 2011 (UTC).
  
• (copied from usertalk) I'd agree to an arrangement where both of us voluntarily abstain from making the problematic edits (adding nationality and locality to any of the Jewish sages and anything closely related to this according to either one of us), till such time as the issue is resolved on WP:CENTRAL or WP:JUDAISM (where we could participate, of course, perhaps with a limit of one post per day) (but Rfc's on article pages are not the venue to solve project wide issues). That would be something like a topic-ban until the issue is resolved. But this two-week block I find unjust, and I ask Bwilkins and other admins to reconsider in view of the compelling arguments above (which he yet has to reply to) (see at length my unblock request on my talkpage). — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)
  • I think Debresser has made a very good suggestion here. As far as I can tell, the entire dispute stems from a single issue. Chesdovi's previous attempt to solve the problem was an RfC at Talk:Palestine, which I believe was undertaken in good faith. I agree with Debresser that this issue needs a centralized discussion. (I offer no opinion about lifting the block.) — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 21:35, 28 October 2011 (UTC)

Unfortunately, the entire dispute runs for months (if not years) ... a simple search above for Debresser or Chesdovi on either AN or ANI provides a wide range of issues, accusations, concerns, problems, poor interactions all brought forward by both sides. I'm not saying that any of the editors is worse or better than the other, it has to be resolved so that future BS does not occur. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:15, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

(Copied from user talk page) BWilkins, unbeknowst to yourself, I am currently topic banned from I/P for a year (on some spurious basis), and I have a self-imposed interaction ban with the "other" annoying, arrogant and despicable editor, as I indcated to you a while back. So your proposal in in fact truly ineffective. This will never be resolved until some willing Admin actually involves themsleves in the knitty-gritty issue at hand, instead of implementing useless blocks. I have tried everything possible, two RFCs, two DRNs, appeals at wikiprojects, etc. etc. So don't blame any of this on me. While consensus to keep Palestinain rabbis has been reached umpteen times, Debresser will not accept it. It is further just not possible to concrete that "consensus" while Debresser reverts each time! Debresser thinks he is right. I know I am right. Now you sort it out. Threatening us we blocks and sanctions will not get the project, or your reputation as an effective and fair Admin, anywhere. Chesdovi (talk) 22:23, 29 October 2011 (UTC)

• For well over 24 hours nobody has looked into my unblock request. Where I think I make a strong case that my block is based upon a misunderstanding, unjust and overkill. I am quite unpleasantly surprised that nobody, including the blocking admin has yet replied to the arguments I mention> Just saying that the situation is problematic, is not a reason to block me. In reaction to Pablo: if you'd care to do some research, you'd find that I am indeed the defender. I have, with very rare exceptions done nothing but protect this project from the aggression of Chesdovi, who has been trying to push his opinion with hundreds of edits throughout all namespaces. Just check all those 349 pages that Bwilkins mentions, and see for yourself, who made the first edit on them. Debresser (talk) 23:29, 29 October 2011 (UTC) copied by Jab7842 (talk) 00:44, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

What are you talking about? Your unblock request was declined two days ago by a wholly uninvolved admin. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 09:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I can see that, in general, (ie not just in relation to Chesdovi), you probably do see yourself as defending articles. The problem is, that you appear to be displaying ownership of these articles. pablo 12:56, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I think unblocks with broad six month AI topic bans along with an interaction ban for both of them would be the next step. Gwen Gale (talk) 04:37, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Interaction bans—by all means. But the problem isn't related to the Arab–Israeli conflict. It has to do with whether to refer to ancient and medieval rabbis as Palestinians. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 05:03, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Wouldn't ancient rabbis just be Israelites? - The Bushranger _{One ping only} 05:08, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

I don't think they'd have haggled over this for so long if not for the IP/AI conflict. Only as an aside, Jewish and Palestinian folks lived side by side and mostly peacefully in Palestine for more than two thousand years. I understand why someone might want to call the rabbis Palestinians and I understand why someone might want to call them Israelites, let the sources have sway and if there are sources which say either or, let the editorial content echo that too, it's not hard. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:18, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

The problem with letting the sources have sway is that the word "Palestinian" changed meaning considerably in 1948. Before that time, it was frequently used to refer to Jews who lived in Palestine. Today the word is used almost exclusively to refer to Palestinian Arabs.

The only topic ban that would make a dent here would be one that prohibits either editor from adding or removing the words "Palestine"/"Palestinian" or "Land of Israel", pending a centralized discussion. I think that's the only thing, short of banning one editor or the other, that's going to put an end to this. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 05:39, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

Yes, so let editorial content echo that too. A narrower ban on them making edits carrying any form of the words Palestinian or Israel, broadly construed, along with an indef interaction ban, may be enough. Gwen Gale (talk) 05:51, 30 October 2011 (UTC)

• (copied from user's talk by User:Bwilkins) Malik is correct in saying that the meaning of "Palestinian" has changed to refer soley to non-Jews nowadays. But when discussing history, we use historic terms. The words Palestine still is used to refer to pre-1948 Israel. That will never change. It is therefore valid to term people from that period "Palestinian". The more I read on this subject, the more I see the term is used to refer to such people. The latest book I read was published in 1978 and was a collection of scientific discourses. It was editied by two leading Orthodox Jewish personalities, Aryeh Carmel and Cyril Domb, and ancient rabbis are called "Palestinian". Now Debresser may want to burn this book due to that offending word, but it is crystal clear that the term "Palestinian" is used by contemporary mainstream neutral Jewish RS, just as "Palestine" is used to describe the historic region. Who can claim to the contrary? Even the chief rabbi used to term to refer to Levi ibn Habib. But Debresser will just not accept these facts. As he so idiotically stated: To use such a word to describe a Jewish person is, wait for it: "anti-semitic". Can you now begin to understand his mindset? He said he would "fight will all his might" to stop the word being used. Is that normal expression for a wiki-editor or does it indicate a strong POV related to the I/P conflcit? For Debresser, this indeed is associated with the conflict, but for me, coming purley from a historical viewpont, this has little to do with it. Debresser's opposition to this is a clear case of politically inspired POV which has no place here and I find it very hard why other editors do not recognise this. Debresser can state as much, and as hard as he wants, that there was never a place called "Palestine", but any person with a grain of intellect will just smirk at such a stupid assumption. The Encylopedia Judaica calls Daniel ben Azariah "Palestinian", but God forbid for us to use it here. I find Debresser a disruptive, arrogant and foul-mouthed menace. He has lost any credibility in my mind. Wikipedia should not be pandering to the views of such people. Every fickle argument Debresser has forwarded on this subject, I have refuted. As far as I am concerned, the majority of the communtiy concede usage is valid, but Debresser continues to reject it and enforce his own opinion. There have been enough centralised discussions on the matter. The conclusion, believe it or not, is that "Palestinian" can indeed refer to people of historic Palestine, be they rabbis or christian monks. Any one who wants to help out here should try and convince Debresser of this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chesdovi (talk • contribs)

  Well, as far as I can see, within certain temporal boundaries, there may be synonyms (Palestine and Land of Israel, Palestinian and Israelite) which would be invalid outside those temporal boundaries. That doesn't mean that the choice of terms is arbitrary. If one term is clearer than the other then that should be used. If one term is more accurate than the other then that should be use. If those two edicts are in significant conflict then accuracy should be followed with appropriate explanatory text. We are not writing WP primarily for the historical scholars who will have their own sources, but for a far more general readership. This is not so hard to resolve, surely. Rich Farmbrough, 12:48, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
  

  Reading through Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2011_July_2#Category:16th-century_Palestinian_rabbis it appears that terms both more accurate and more clear exist. I also think that discussion will inform anyone trying to take a view on this situation, although of course it is only part of the wider context which is very TLDR. Rich Farmbrough, 13:07, 31 October 2011 (UTC).
  

• (Copied over from User talk:Debresser by User:Gwen Gale: Yes, adding the words "Palestine" and "Palestinian" or "Land of Israel" - in general not adding any ethnic or geographic description - to articles (main article namespace only, I mean) about Jewish sages - and more generally Jews - should do it. There simply is no reason for a broader ban, because Chesdovi is already topic banned under WP:ARBPIA, and I don't edit such articles, as my contributions show. The ban should last until centralized (really central, not like before) discussion has reached a consensus. I think that discussion should be opened by somebody other than us. Perhaps Malik Shabazz would agree to open it. In order to avoid that discussion turning into a debate between the two of us, I think we should be restricted to 1 edit a day in that discussion. In addition I'd ask for my (or our) block(s) to be lifted, because from that moment on the block(s) would be only punitive. (That is in addition to the arguments I have mentioned before. In all earnest, I would really like to know how editors like Bwilkins and Pablo think I should have acted to defend the project from Chesdovi's edits in a way that would not have lead to my being blocked here repeatedly. You are invited to write me on my talkpage about this.) into the discussion at WP:ANI. Debresser (talk) 20:13, 31 October 2011 (UTC)

• Well you might consider editing only subjects and articles in which you have less of an investment, and on which you able to work collegially with other editors, tather than feeling that you have to defend "your" articles quite so much. pablo 09:28, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
  • (copy/pasted from User talk:Debresser by User:Bwilkins Pablo, please be a little less hostile and accusing. The accusations of WP:OWN are strange in view of the fact that I hadn't edited almost any of those articles before Chesdovi came along and made his usual (read tendentious) edits on them. Did you do your homework? I recommended you to check all those articles and see who of the two of us made the first edit. Perhaps after that, you'll change your tune. Debresser (talk) 13:32, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Er...so, you're just admitting that you're following a user around, even though you have been told in the past to not do that? (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

(copied by User:Bwilkins) No, Bwilkins. I ran into his edits in various places. Some of them he posted triumphantly on WT:JUDAISM, until people told him in no fine language that they had enough of that. Other articles I had on my watchlist. His talkpage was (and is) on my watchlist as well, since I posted there a few times. Sometimes I would notice an edit in one article, and check his contributions to see whether he made any more such edits. But I would not regularly check his edits, no. I have a distinct feeling there is a lack of assuming good faith from a few editors here... And in view of your lack of good faith and the unjustified block (you have not replied to any of my arguments), let me add. When will you understand I was (and am) only trying to protect the status quo on this project from the onslaught of one disruptive editor who has made many attempts to push his tendentious edits, but never gained consensus for them? Have you checked that such is indeed the case? Please do. Never in all the discussions he started (and I won't even go into his behavior in those discussions) has he gained consensus for his point of view. Always a majority of editors have preferred other expressions. So why did WP:ANI admins allow him to go unpunished when I posted here all those times before now. So in a way you yourself (including a few of the other admins who have partaken in this thread) are responsible for this escalation. So please be so kind, and do not turn me into your scapegoat. I have posted a fair proposition above. Let's go with it, and move things from their present unfortunate state — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)

If I was a prosecuting attorney, I'd blink and say "wow, you proved everyone's case better than I could have myself" :-) Thank you for proving the block was necessary, valid, and just. WP:NOTTHEM might just be a good thing for you to read while you're blocked. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 16:19, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• (Copied over from User talk:Debresser by User:JohnCD: Have you checked what I asked you to check, or haven't you? Instead of asserting you did the right thing blocking me, perhaps you start looking into what happened. You have never defended your decision to block me, although I have been implored you to look into the facts, point you to the relevant places. After all, admins are supposed to give account of their actions as well, when asked to do so. Other admins are likewise invited to see the facts for themselves. Also I find it less than helpful that you do not reply to my proposal about how to get out of this mess. That is what I would expect an impartial and wise admin to have foremost among his priorities, rather than gloating about his blocks. Debresser (talk) 17:04, 1 November 2011 (UTC)
• (Copied over from User talk:Chesdovi by User:JohnCD: Why can we just not rely on RS to use the word "Palestinian" to describe medieval rabbis? Claiming that the term is confusing holds no credibility in the face of widespread contemporary usage in mainstream RS. Further, 3RR reports on Israel ben Meir di Curiel. He is described at Palestinian rabbis, as "a rabbi who lived in the region known as Palestine", yet the region he lived in is removed by Debresser because it is "controversial". What is that supposed to mean? Why is it "controversial." Is adding "Israel" not "controversial?", besides from being a absolute untruth. The AFD and rejection of two "potential renames" supports the fact that using such a classification for such rabbis has been accepted. It is now up to the community to impress upon Debresser that any removal of the word "Palestine/Palestinian" from any "Jewish" pages will be dealt with accordingly. Chesdovi (talk) 17:15, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

(de-archived (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 21:12, 2 November 2011 (UTC))

Example of the English "Palestine" being used by a rabbinic school in "Eretz Yisrael". How can we say that the Torath Chaim Yeshiva was not in Palestine?!! (Image copied over from User talk:Chesdovi by User:JohnCD) :

• (Copied over from User talk:Chesdovi by User:Excirial) : How unfortunate Dweller suggests we are "unsuitable for editing in a collaborative system like Wikipedia." Instead of castigating editors who are locked in a dispute over term usage, he should try suggesting a resolution to the dispute in the true spirit of Wikipedia. The community is marvellous at suggesting bans and implementing blocks very swiftly. There’s never a dearth of Admin input in those situations. But when it comes to sorting out sticky points to help the project move forward, that’s a different matter. DRN’s are closed without comment. RFCs are left “unclosed”. CFDs are closed with the wrong conclusions. Nevertheless, I can provide a list here of a majority of editors who have commented about this and have supported using “Palestinian” for rabbis. So what more is there to discuss? To gain consensus, one has to make edits and see if they stick. How can I go about doing if every time I do, Debresser comes along and reverts immediately? I cannot come to an agreement with him because his arguments are in my view irrational and I know very well indeed this this is not about “confusion” at all, but rather about not mentioning the supposedly offensive “Palestine” on “Jewish” pages. What clearer evidence is there that this is a thinly veiled “pro-Israel” manipulation? It is not “anti-Semitic” to call a rabbi “Palestinian”. Neither is it inaccurate or offensive. It is 100% correct and proper. That is why its use is so widespread in reliable sources, many of them written by contemporary Jewish academics. Now, unless there is a rule on wiki that we not use terms which are deemed offensive to certain individuals, I see no reason why unless those editors provide a convincing argument not to use such accepted terms, they cannot be used. Ed suggests: "Both editors should be banned for six months from any naming issues concerning 'Palestine' or 'Palestinian' in both articles and talk pages." Why is this necessary? I am quite capable of not using the word while the matter is "sorted out." On numerous articles, I purposefully blanked out the offending word, pending the outcome of the discussion on the matter: [36]. When the outcome was clear that using the term was okay, I added it. There is similarly no reason why I cannot edit in pages such as Palestinian synagogues, Palestinian Patriarchate, Palestinian minhag and Palestinian Gaonate. An uninvolved editor should try explaining why we cannot use "Palestinian Rabbi" on bio pages even though Palestinian rabbi exists as a self-contained article. That is a very intriguing question, don’t you think? Chesdovi (talk) 12:28, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I think we have to acknowledge a problem with Wikipedia: we do not have a large enough numer of editors who are well-informed and interested in these articles to produce stable consensuses. Whenever an article, or in this case a pretty specific issue (the proper name ro use), is of interested to n<3 editors, we invariably end up with an unstable situation.

In this case I think there are two problems: an interaction poblem etween Debresser and Chesdovi that calls for some cooling-off period (which a topic ban can also serve — the important thing is to give both editors a chance to cool down). But I also think there is a content issue.

I admit I have had conflict with Debresser in the past; also I generally like Chesdovi's reasoning. But not in this case. I think Chesdovi is wrong to favor systematically Palestine/Palestinian. I agree with Chesdovi that when refering to historial events we should use historically appropriate terms. The problem is, we should not do this in a way that will mislead our readers, and I think Chesdovi is applying this good principle inappropriately. First, it is not quite accurate to say that Palestine was the name for the place back then. As shown by the piece of evidence provided, even at the time Jews in their own language efered to it as the land of Israel. Calling it "Palestine" is correct, but incomplete; to do justice to the sources the articles must explain that the place was identified in different ways in different languages. There is a Hebrew word for "Palestine" and it is not "Eretz Israel;" this means that we are not looking at a translation issue, we are looking at two names contemporaneously. Second, even in cases where I would prefer to identify the lace as "Palestine," it is misleading to identify Jews as Palestinians. The contemporary meanings of these terms are so profoundly distinct that to do so will only cause unnecessary confusion for our readers. In short, Chesdovi is mistranslating terms. In the first instance, she is suggesting that Palestine is the English translation for Eretz Israel, when it is not, it is not a translation, it is a case of two different names in two different languages. In the second instance, she is refusing to translate when translation is called for: "Palestinian" back then mant something different, so it needs to be translated into its contemporary meaning in this case anything other than "Palestinian" - there are multiple choices, "Jerusalemite," or "resident of Palestine" for example. I have no questions about Chesdovi's good faith and intentions, but in this particular case the edits cause unnecessary confusion and are bound to be reverted. But what do we do when Debresser is the only person willing to make corrections?

AN/I is not the right place to resolve this, but whnever the number of well-informed editors is so low, content problems invariably become personal conflict problems, and WP does not have a good clear mechanism to handle this. I would support a cooling off period, but this will be pointless unless we can also suggest to Debresser some constructive suggestions for how to fix these mistakes without getting into a personal conflict, or suggest a mentor for Chesdovi, or mandate mediation between Chesdovi and Debresser after the cooling-off period. Unless we suggest some mechanism for handling these edit conflicts, the cooling-of period is pointless. Perhaps eventually it would go to ArbCom, in which case the sooner they find a mediator, the better. But there is a content issue that won't go away and I do not think either Debresser or Chesdovi should be banned from editing these articles. Slrubenstein | Talk 09:45, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Moving forward

So, are we going to enact an interaction ban or a topic ban or are we going to pass the buck? — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 02:05, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

Let's fine-tune the topic ban:

• Both editors should be banned for six months from any naming issues concerning 'Palestine' or 'Palestinian' in both articles and talk pages
• In general, they can make no edits that assume any particular answer to the following question:

  What term should be used to designate the country of people who were from the region of what is today called "Israel and the Palestinian territories" from Antiquity, thru to the Middle Ages and up to 1948?

• These editors may add no categories to articles that assume that either 'Palestinian' or 'Israeli' is the correct answer. They are allowed to pose neutral questions to others as to the tagging of articles that *they create themselves*. Except for that, they must be silent on the subject.
• If this ban is adopted either by consensus here or by voluntary agreement, the blocks on these two editors might be lifted at that point. EdJohnston (talk) 02:49, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to slightly disagree: this does need to be a combination of topic ban (or agreement as per above) plus an interaction ban. Debresser has admitted to following Chesdovi around. When that happens, stupidity (not people-wise, but action-wise) ensues. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 14:06, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

That looks good to me. I'm tired of these WP:LAME edit warriors. But I do worry what they'll turn their attention to next, as both seem to me to be unsuitable for editing in a collaborative system like Wikipedia. I suggest that the threat of community ban be made explicit if they rescind or enter new fields of fray. --Dweller (talk) 11:32, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

If others believe that a six-month interaction ban is also needed, I'd be OK with that. EdJohnston (talk) 20:04, 3 November 2011 (UTC)

• I agree with this proposal; and also with Wilkins' suggestion that an interaction ban be proposed. Since the others are for six months; this one should be too Purplebackpack89≈≈≈≈ 20:12, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support EdJohnston's topic ban proposal as well as the proposed WP:IBAN between these two editors. If these measures fail to be adopted by the community, the matter should probably be kicked upstairs to ArbCom. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 20:48, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support with interaction ban. — Malik Shabazz ^Talk/_Stalk 20:46, 3 November 2011 (UTC)
• Offwiki canvassing alert: Chesdovi emailed me, alerting me to this thread and asking me to contribute to it. I've been generally supportive of Chesdovi's side of things at DRV in the past and he may see me as a sympathetic editor. No such luck, I'm afraid, Chesdovi: I'm a mean, nasty editor who doesn't approve of offwiki canvassing at all. But with that said, I don't think the answer will involve blocking either of these two otherwise-productive editors. I like Ed Johnston's idea.—S Marshall T/C 01:13, 4 November 2011 (UTC)
• neutral I do not think that a topic ban is the long-term solution, even if it is necessary in the short term. And I definitely owuld support a cooling-of period. But as I explain below unless the block is followed some better mechanism (e.g. a combination of mentoring and mediation) I don't see a point to the cool-off period. Slrubenstein | Talk 09:45, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

• (copied across from users talk by User:Steven Zhang)(moved down from the previous section by User:John of Reading per talk page request) This post is very unfortunately belated because I made a typo in the adminhelp template. This is more or less what I proposed as well. With one exception. I see no reason to exclude us from talkpages. To the contrary, I think a centralized discussion about this subject should be started by some editor other than us. And after that discussion has come to a conclusion, the topic ban can be lifted. The only restriction I would think fair is that we should not be allowed to post more than one post a day in such a discussion, to avoid it becoming a discussion of two people only. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Debresser (talk • contribs)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Request and protest

A notification of unblocking and bans has been posted on my talkpage. Please see there that I ask to reconsider, that the ban should not include talkpages. Arguments there. See also my protest against an additional injunction against me in comparison with the injunctions against Chesdovi. Since the notification was posted on my talkpage, not here, I have replied on my talkpage, and kindly ask you to see there. Debresser (talk) 01:44, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I have moved this discussion back from the archives per Debresser (talk · contribs)'s contesting of the close. Cunard (talk) 03:35, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

To the extent this is an appeal of a discretionary sanction, it must be appealed to WP:AE and not here. T. Canens (talk) 03:41, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I see. Thank you. In the mean time, all who care, please feel free to read the gist of my problem with this sanction on my talkpage. Debresser (talk) 07:37, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that protesting against a sanction preventing you from calling others "anti-semitic" by claiming that the restriction itself is anti-semitic was not the brightest thing you've ever done; however, as T.Canens says above, this is the wrong venue. Black Kite (t) 11:49, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

It did appeal to my sense of humor. See also Jewish humour. And of symmetry. In any case, if I think it is true, I have a right to say it on talkpages. Restricting this right because I might (stress that, since I admit to no such thing) have misused the term once, is unjust. And I find that especially strange (and that is a very large understatement) in view of the fact that none of the proposals above included such a clause. Anyway, your interest in this case is appreciated. Debresser (talk) 14:02, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Posted at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Enforcement#Request_concerning_Debresser. Debresser (talk) 14:12, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

He doesn't want to play within the rules, indef him and be done with it. This is a rabbit hole that none need to go down - we've wasted enough time on an editor who fails to see/accept the repercussions of their own actions. How frustrating to see a reasonbly good editor implode. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 16:19, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

It is only your opinion of me that has imploded. As has my opinion of you. But I say, let things be. You don't like my behavior, I don't think you handled this case well. I deplore this, but hey, I like editing on Wikipedia, and that is the main thing.

There is no such thing as blocking an editor because he disagrees and appeals a sanction. I am within my rights to go to WP:AE. Debresser (talk) 15:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Another question is: what does an interaction ban between Chesdovi and me mean. To give a likely example. What if one of us posts or reacts to a post on WT:JUDAISM, where we both are active. How should the other one behave? Debresser (talk) 15:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, it would clearly have been better to topic ban the both of you indefinably in regard to anything to do with Arabs and Jews then you wouldn't need an interaction ban with the other user. Off2riorob (talk) 15:51, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

According to the wording of WP:IBAN, Debresser and Chesdovi are allowed to edit the same discussions so long as they avoid one another. They can't reply to the other person in the discussion. If they find this advice too tricky to follow in a specific case, I suggest avoiding the discussion completely. EdJohnston (talk) 03:47, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

EdJohnston, thank you. This is clear to me, and doable by all means. Off2riorob, thanks forthe hostility. Why should anybody be banned from a whole WikiProject because of some small disagreement? Debresser (talk) 17:25, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

My comment was in good faith and at least you would have been free to edit 95 percent of the project totally freely. That would be imo a much better option for you than the one month project wide block that you now have. Off2riorob (talk) 23:17, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit by Chesdovi

Isn't this edit a violation of the interaction ban? In addition, by what right is Chesdovi slowly removing the usage of a template which is in use on hundreds of article, calling it in the edit summary "rm clutter"? See also this edit. (And no, Bwilkins, I am not following him around. These pages are on my watchlist.) Debresser (talk) 17:08, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Blocks suggested

Debresser has clearly violated his ban against interaction in his edit above. Chesdovi has clearly violated his subject ban. Unless I'm missing something, we will all be better served by immediately blocking their accounts per the terms of Gwen's decision above. Rklawton (talk) 17:44, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

You are missing somwthing. But I will only speak for myself: By which edits have I violated? Chesdovi (talk) 17:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Reporting an interaction ban violation is not itself a violation, or those bans would be impossible to enforce. The commentary on matters unrelated to the interaction ban is, however, a violation. Both blocked a month. T. Canens (talk) 18:54, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

This edit by Chesdovi was a straightforward breach of the interaction ban because it was an undo of an edit by Debresser. In reporting that Chesdovi had strayed beyond the bounds (above), Debresser breached the same ban by going further than the topic of an interaction ban with the comment on Chesdovi's editorial behaviour (In addition, by what right is Chesdovi slowly removing...). Gwen Gale (talk) 19:36, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Two university projects

Project 1 -- Wikipedia Bhutan

I happened across these when investigating 12 user accounts creating 10 userpage drafts with near identical content within a narrow timespan. These are below:

See here and here. I don't know who is in charge here, but it's prudent to note this somewhere just in case there's a flood of crap related to Bhutan.

As a Regional Ambassador for the US division of the Global Education Program (see my comment, project 2 immediately below), I checked into this a bit, thinking it might be a US University class in my region. Not so. As far as I can tell, it is not related in any way even to the Wikipedia Global Education Program (WGEP). This is good news, actually, as it's further evidence of an international interest in Wikipedia being taken by institutions of higher education. I think the appropriate staff person of the WGEP about this Bhutan project, and I'm sure she'll do what needs to be done. Again - is all good new, across the board. Go Bhutan! Tom Cloyd (talk) 22:09, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Project 2 -- University of Washington Info 101 - Social Networking Technologies

I poked around Special:Newpages in the user namespace (to find more Rigsum\d{2} related accounts) and identified another university project by the creation of very similar userpages. The external project is here and the coordinator is User:Bob Boiko. I have several concerns with this including the unit name ("social networking technologies"... really?) and the project seems to encourage nonsense like User:Jonas nocom/My sandbox, User:Babak Dabagh/My sandbox and User:Grace jang/My sandbox. The page creations seem to be concentrated at midnight UTC on the 8th of November. MER-C 11:52, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

So, find the professor's accounts and leave them a message, asking them into dialogue to clarify their assignments, and refer them to WP:SUP and WP:WOA for additional guidance. Beyond that, what extra administrative help do you need? --Jayron32 14:16, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

This appears to be a bona fide course that has been registered as part of the WP:United States Education Program. I've left a pointer to this discussion for User:Tomcloyd who is the Regional Ambassador. EdJohnston (talk) 15:00, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Hi - I'm the aforementioned Wikipedia Regional Ambassador for the Wikimedia Global Education Program's United States Education Program (whew! what a mouthful - but it's the full specification). It's understandable that not everyone is aware of the Global Education Program, or of its US Branch. It's an important project, promising both to bring substantial new quality content to Wikipedia and also some new, quality editors (we hope!). Pro. Boiko's class (150 students!) at U. of Wa. was introduced to Wikipedia yesterday. You can expect a herd of new account registrations, and then editing activity, as a result.

The USEP is shepherding this class, along with many others, and has a trained Campus Ambassador specifically assigned to it. The students are learning the ropes, and there will be problems, to be sure, but the account creations, etc., are legit, I assure you - these folks are all college freshsmen who are brand new editors. Just respond to them as you would any new editor - that's part of their learning experience. AND remember - we do want to have a good experience, to learn how to edit well, AND to hang around and contribute. The survival of Wikipedia depends upon it, yes?

The WGEP has a few other very large classes, in other parts of the world (including Canada, and other parts of the English speaking world), so mass invasions of new account creations may be seen on other occasions. Most of our classes are not this large, however. In the case of Boiko's class, we have one Campus Ambassador (but would like to have 3-4), and will be immediately asking for help from our Online Ambassadors, who will be most helpful in doing quality monitoring, etc.

Until then, expect things to be a bit rough. But...we'll steady things out and move forward as quickly as possible. I thank you in advance for your patience, and for notifying me of this whole matter so that I could appear here to explain it.

Tom Cloyd (talk) 21:42, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Being involved in cleaning up after the utter trainwreck that is WP:IEP (zero community consultation, not checking CA/OA's prior edits for copyright violations before appointing them, inaccurate and hence useless student lists, etc.) has dashed my confidence in the WMF's ability to run these programs competently. The three userspace pages and the unit title do nothing to counteract that. I'm hoping that this is only a notice and calls for a spare bulldozer or five will be unnecessary. I wish you success in this program. MER-C 10:59, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Tom, if you glance at WT:IEP you will see why there is a certain nervousness here. One particular point: we very much hope that all goes smoothly, but in case problems do arise, it is extremely helpful if for each project or each class there is a project page with an accurately updated list of usernames of all the students involved, and an indication of who to call in in case of trouble. Do you have those? The lack of them has not helped the IEP and is still hindering the clean-up. Ideally the students' user or talk pages should link back to the project page. JohnCD (talk) 23:00, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

The India program is a foundation project, running beyond the scope of any one language WP. But for people working on the enWP, though the foundation started the project, I think it is basically up to us here to deal with it and support it, as we would support all new editors here. This is only the second year--they are continuing support for it at this point and apparently are prepared to do so next year also, but I think they had hoped we would be handling it ourselves by now, as indeed we ought to. It does take work--I'm involved with three (possibly 4) classes now, which is too many for one person to handle, The students are the people who will be involved with Wikipedia in the future, at least as users, and normally we can expect about one from each class to become an editor after the class is over. Compared to some of the things we spend immense amounts of time over on various project pages, this is a more important thing we should be doing. My experience is they are initially very puzzled, but respond very well to a little attention. DGG ( talk ) 16:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Requesting evaluation of consensus (if not premature) for an ANI topic ban thread

The thread is Wikipedia:ANI#User talk:Ludwigs2 on Talk:Muhammad/images. The topic ban sub-thread is Wikipedia:ANI#Topic Ban Proposal. Thank you, ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:10, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Some support. Some oppose. There's no consensus; that's obvious. Rklawton (talk) 03:23, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about that, with 20 support !votes and 7 opposes. Just on the numbers that's 74% support. Beyond My Ken (talk) 05:31, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Polling is not a substitute for discussion  Chzz  ►  05:59, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree, and I wasn't suggesting that it was, merely pointing out that, superficially, without evaluating the quality of the arguments, there does appear to be the possibility of a consensus. That, in itself should be enough to have an uninvolved admin do a thorough and serious close of the proposed topic ban, taking into account the entire secion and L2's history as described there, not simply the comments in the topic ban sub-thread. Beyond My Ken (talk) 06:27, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Move topic ban thread here?

User:Chzz has also expressed concern in the WP:ANI thread that no admin action is sought. While this may technically be true, the policy on community bans, including community-imposed topic bans demands that the discussion take place here, on WP:AN. If this notice is not sufficiently close to the letter of the policy, perhaps the entire thread should be moved here. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 01:20, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

General practice seems to be that if a topic ban discussion arises naturally from an ongoing discussion on ANI, it's left at ANI instead of being moved here. Topic ban suggestions which start from scratch should be moved here if posted there. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:06, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Multiple accounts

Resolved

 – No worries. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:29, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Dieselfumes (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Exhaustfumes (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Robbie.Bednark (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Not sure if anything needs to be done here - while moving images over to Commons, I noticed that all three of these accounts use some identical images of pets (File:Robbie.jpg and File:Jaybird.jpg) which seems to indicate all are the same person. However, the only one recently active is Exhaustfumes (talk · contribs). Didn't dig very deep but I don't see any obvious signs of disruptive editing. Kelly ^hi! 22:19, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

No issues here. Robbie.Bednark appears unrelated, the version of File:Robbie.jpg that he used on his user page is an old version with the same name, now deleted, and has nothing to do with the bird. Dieselfumes and Exhaustfumes are the same person, but there was no overlap in edits, and the info on their user page shows they aren't trying to hide anything. Just a low budget self-rename. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:29, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Two of those accounts haven't edited in several years, so I'm sure we don't need to worry about this. Well spotted, though. AGK [•] 00:01, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm glad Floquenbeam found that user:Robbie.Bednark was unrelated: my first assumption, just looking at the date range of the accounts' contributions, was that this was someone who had decided to stop editing with their real name and later started a new pseudonymous account. I'd hate to think that someone's real name would be outed on a public noticeboard like this, especially if they'd made no disruptive edits whatsoever. 28bytes (talk) 00:06, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Unnecessary Deletion on Gilbert Gottfired

Boing! Said Zebede deleted Gilbert Gottfired, a redirect to Gilbert Gottfried, stating that it was an implausible typo. The fact of the matter is that it is a common misspelling. I believe that the page should be recreated, and policies be reviewed before such deletions are made. 17:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by BusyBlacksmith (talk • contribs)

That redirect got about 2-3 hits a month on average, Gilbert Gottfried gets about 1200 hits a day. Monty₈₄₅ 18:05, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I responded to and agreed with a Speedy Deletion request stating that as the reason - it seemed like a silly name to me ("got fired") rather than a likely misspelling. But I have no objection to its resurrection if that's the consensus. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:07, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree. I'd rather get fried like KFC than fired like Joe Paterno.--v/r - TP 18:14, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Joe Paterno didn't get fired, he resigned. Gilbert Gottfried got fired though. BusyBlacksmith (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 18:34, 10 November 2011 (UTC).

No, he said he would retire at the end of the season, but he got fired a few hours after that.--v/r - TP 19:19, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Recreated: a plausible misspelling especially by dyslexics, sarcastics, and non-native English speakers. —EncMstr (talk) 19:15, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

"Sarcastics" - nice :-) -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:47, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Nominative determinism  Chzz  ►  08:50, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

User Durneydiaz

Durneydiaz (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has created an innumerable number of articles that fall outside guidelines. Someone ought to decide whether the user should receive special counseling or a final warning.    Thorncrag  18:20, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

When you look harder, most of his articles are OK. He's working through http://www.bdfa.com.ar to add football players that have the required notability. Some patrollers are not noticing that bdfa (or the other site he uses) is always provided as a reference but not an inline citation, which is not necessary in these stub articles. His communication skills seem totally lacking, but he's not actually churning out BLP vios, and his subjects do seem to meet the standard of notability required for footie players. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:29, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Deterence

There was already a discussion of this user soapboxing at WP:ITN/C, a month ago. The user does not seem to have gotten the message, as the soapboxing ([37]) and incivility ([38]) continues. Pantherskin (talk) 09:51, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

See also this one week old warning [39]. Pantherskin (talk) 12:00, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• FFS, you're still trolling through my history, over 2 hours later? Get a bloody life, you pathetic twat! Deterence ^Talk 12:10, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, the above earned Deterence a 72 hr break from the project. Hopefully it's a deterrence. Pantherskin, please remember that incidents go on WP:ANI (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 12:27, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Copyvio

Nola Darling (Music Duo) is a blatant copyvio. Tell me why it should get to rot in CAT:SD for more than 12 hours. Isn't a copyvio something we should, you know, be kinda QUICK about?! Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 06:04, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Deleted. —EncMstr (talk) 06:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Hammer, be glad you're not tagging Commons images for deletion as copyvios; I've often seen a gap of several days between when I tag an image as a copyvio and when it gets deleted or challenged. Nyttend (talk) 00:53, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

This article is under G12 of the criteria of speedy deletion becuase there is copyrighted information. --Mohamed Aden Ighe (talk) 19:33, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I think we figured that out when it was deleted two days ago. Did you have a point in there somewhere? Beeblebrox (talk) 19:46, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Nominations for the 2011 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee elections are now open

Nominations for the 2011 English Wikipedia Arbitration Committee elections are now officially open and will run until Monday 21 November at 23:59 UTC.

• If you are interested in running for the Arbitration Committee for 2012 and meet the requirements for candidacy, please go here.
• If any other editors are interested in coordination, please go here.

–MuZemike 00:01, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Quick admin assistance on a non-controversial page move

need to move Florida Marlins to Miami Marlins. Can't do it myself. Team officially changed its name a few minutes ago. Some are simply redirecting, which I revert because page history has to move with the article.--JOJ ^Hutton 02:31, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done by MuZemike, I filed the request on IRC. CRRaysHead90 | ^{We Believe!} 02:39, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Unblock discussion User:Kci357

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

Although there is some scepticism over whether Kci357 will return as a productive editor, there is no consensus to keep him blocked. Floquenbeam points out, "in cases where there is no consensus either way among the declining admins ... the default should be to unblock". As such, I will unblock Kci357 presently, on the understanding that he will be swiftly reblocked if he returns to past behaviour. Worm^TT · (talk) 04:39, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

---

User:Kci357 (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

Well over a month ago, Kci357 contacted me asking about an unblock. Since then, I have been in discussion with him, and I did explain that I couldn't simply unblock him, but I did talk to him about what he could do to receive an unblock. In my talking to him, I do believe he is sincere about wanting to contribute constructively if he is unblocked. I have the following points to mention:

1. Kci357 has told me that there will not be any socking.
2. He has promised not to edit-war, and instead, he will discuss in future.
3. He knows that there will be plenty of people watching him if he does slip, and another chance after another block is very, very unlikely.
4. I e-mailed the original blocking admin, Fox, and he is okay with an unblock. However, since Kci357 has had unblock requests declined since then, I've contacted a couple of the admins declining those requests rather than overrule them.
5. There hasn't been any strong agreement with those admins to unblock or keep blocked, so now I'm starting a discussion here, with Kci357 being okay with me doing that.

Personally, I don't see the harm in giving Kci357 a second chance. If he immediately goes back to the behavior that got him blocked, he will just be reblocked, and I will be very disappointed after the all discussion I had with him. If he is unblocked, keeps his promises, and edits constructively, then a positive outcome will have been achieved. Acalamari 10:53, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Acalamari did contact me, as one of the admins who had declined an unblock. To me, the editor just didn't get it. It was so bad, that his talkpage access was removed. Apparently, it was restored to allow the editor to, in his own words, make his unblock request - which he has not done. Although I WP:AGF, if the editor cannot follow WP:GAB, cannot express his own request sincerely, cannot show that they recognize their behaviours that led to the block (and later talkpage locking), and relies on others to express these things on their behalf, I'm not sure that the editor has either the sincerety nor WP:COMPETENCE to edit Wikipedia. (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 13:12, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• To be honest, I would say the odds of this working out are almost zero, and I wouldn't unblock myself. However, in cases where there is no consensus either way among the declining admins, I strongly feel that the default should be to unblock, not leave blocked. I don't see any irreparable harm in deferring to Acalamari's judgement and giving it a try.

  Assuming that the sock tag on his user page is correct (and behavioral evidence leads me to think it is), you should also make it a condition for unblocking that he not abuse the reference desks. Needs to be on his absolute best behavior every edit he makes, though. --Floquenbeam (talk) 13:34, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• I'm inclined to agree with BWilkins on this. If the user is not sufficiently competent to explain for themselves why they should be unblocked and must resort to doing it by proxy I can't see any benefit to unblocking them. A look at the few edits they have made on their talk page since access was restored re-affirms that feeling. Beeblebrox (talk) 16:12, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• Floquenbeam says above "I don't see any irreparable harm in deferring to Acalamari's judgement and giving it a try" and that's pretty much how I see it as well. Let's give him a shot, and if it doesn't work out, it's simple enough to reblock. 28bytes (talk) 16:41, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

• • I do accept the concerns here, especially given Kci357's short editing history, talk page, and blocks (I'd have no problem with a condition in an unblock for him to keep away from the reference desks, too). I thought of all that myself, but then I thought again that in cases like this, the unblocked editor is always watched, and with one wrong move they're blocked again. It goes without saying that I'll be someone watching him.
  • As for Kci357 not requesting the unblock himself, he contacted me just before the time his talk page was unblocked, and I think the reason he has not requested anymore unblocks is because of him discussing his block with me (I also told him that I would do the contacting, as I have done). If anything, I consider it a good thing he hasn't posted more unblocks, but that's just me.
  • Assuming he is unblocked, it would be very embarrassing for me and an error to have helped if Kci357 did get himself reblocked, but again, I'm hoping he won't do that. Acalamari 17:17, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

@Acalamari: giving an editor a chance is a worthy goal, and should not result in your embarrassment no matter the outcome. There is just no way to get a realistic vibe from someone typing. It's hard enough to do it in person and humans are much better at that than constrained mediums like this.

I say unblock him, and reblock on the first significant violation. Lesser violations like etiquette and guideline confusion can be ignored or for any interested editor to educate. He has been warned adequately. It should be quickly apparent if he will be a benefit to Wikipedia or a time waster. —EncMstr (talk) 20:51, 1 November 2011 (UTC)

Unarchiving as this was archived without resolution. 28bytes (talk) 14:11, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support unblock on the basis of a rope.

• If he is found socking, then a week-long block should do; if a second sock is later found, indef block.
• If he engages in an edit war, he will be warned the first time, but blocked immediately for a short duration the second time.
• If unblocked, they must display competence and cooperate. If a similar situation arises again, instant-indef block.

HurricaneFan25 14:23, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

I certainly wouldn't quite agree to that pattern of blocking. A new sock? Indef, done, finit. Edit-warring would typically continue a pattern of escalation, as required. It's admin's reading of the situation (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 22:26, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, if a new sock appeared, that would be a blatant return to old behavior and clear grounds for an indefinite block, so I agree completely with Bwilkins. After reading Nil Einne and Brammers' comments, if Kci357 is unblocked, I definitely think an RD ban should be one of the conditions, too. Acalamari 20:32, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

No comment on the unblock request but just as a note, this user's problems stretch back further then the Kj650 account. They are the same as Thekiller35789 and had a whole host of other identites which were never blocked, they tended to give up on accounts after they got enough complaints and another easily recognisable account would appear. They were annoying on the RD, but the far bigger problem was their tendency to remove source info or add stuff to articles without sources, apparently to better reflect theirPOV. However for a while, it was low level enough that those of us who recognised it couldn't really be bothered persuing it. Nil Einne (talk) 18:04, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

• As an RD semi-regular (lurking if not posting), I agree with Nil Einne's points. I tried to interact and guide some of the user behind Kci357's other accounts, receiving one reply to a questioned, unjustified removal of article content. To the best of my knowledge, I can't remember any other successful interaction attempts, which has left me with a rather low opinion of the user in question. Some of the accounts were quite sharp in their interactions with people who undid the unexplained (and very messy - sentences left hanging, words chopped in half) deletions of article content. The user had a habit of posting an unusual mixture of questions about carpentry, building codes and internet gore videos on the ref desk, and never seemed satisfied with the response, continually asking for clarification when a clear and concise answer had already been given. It has been demonstrated time and time again that this user is not interested in engaging with others, taking care in their edits to the mainspace or being beneficial to this project in any way. He's been given enough rope in the past to rig a man-o'-war. I don't think any benefit will come from an unblock, but if the problematic behaviour returns then a swift – and final – indef has all the justification it needs. Brammers (talk/c) 23:07, 5 November 2011 (UTC)

Request for resolution

I've pulled this one back from the archive a second time... could an uninvolved admin close this one way or another? It seems to me the general consensus is pessimistic about the chances for success but willing to cautiously toss some WP:ROPE with an unblock since re-blocks are cheap, but as I've commented to that effect myself I obviously can't close it. Thanks, 28bytes (talk) 04:12, 12 November 2011 (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.

Please delete copyvio pictures

A picture File:Kanishta-.jpg has been deleted twice from commons, see articles history. Please delete this copyvio--Musamies (talk) 11:31, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Done. Camw (talk) 11:44, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Redirect for deletion

Please delete Talk:Theophosostic counseling/Archive 1 under G7. I'm making the request here because my reason for deletion is too long for a template, and I'm using my public-computer sock account.

Off2riorob created the page as an archive for Talk:Theophostic counseling, but as the page history will show you, he almost immediately moved it to Talk:Theophostic counseling/Archive 1, because "Theophosostic" is a typo. Off2riorob has since come to believe that it should be deleted, so he's left a request for deletion on my talk page. This should be enough for an author-requested speedy. Nyttend backup (talk) 18:55, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Further research needed on subject

Wasn't certain where exactly should go with this new found information. Mainly because the info comes from a forum discussion, which is, saying the least unreliable, however after seeing that the voice artist Joan Gerber's page is lacking a lot of things(sources, updates, infobox), decided to bring this discussion to Wikipedia. After vandalism on another famous voice artist's wiki page was made earlier figured it be a much better idea to discuss the information here as opposed to on her wiki page or talk page, out of respect to the person and her relatives, in case info turns out to be false. Here is the information on the Toon Zone Forum [40] (which doesn't appear anywhere else on the internet). — Preceding unsigned comment added by BHillbillies (talk • contribs) 22:46, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Discussions on the content of the article do belong on the talkpage for the article. If there are serious issues surrounding the biography of a living person, then the BLP noticeboard is a good place to head (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 23:11, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Could somebody please protect Montel Vontavious Porter?

There's a concerted attack coming from Twitter to add nonsense to the BLP Montel Vontavious Porter. Could somebody semi-protect for a while? It's at RFPP, but we probably should nip this in the bud. The Mark of the Beast (talk)`

Somebody, please? I'm dealing with the BLP attack by myself. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 02:24, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Subtle and polite request.

I have not notified the other party because I don't want to offend him. He has done nothing wrong.

Editor Saddhiyama made a revert to a discussion page (List of Riots). He is using Twinkle and I think he made two reverts when he intended one.

I went to his personal page. His english is much better than my hindustani, but MAYBE someone could encourage him to get more experience before thinking a fairly innocuous (by MY standards) was a personal attack and removing it from the talk page.

I don't want to do it because I'm not much of an editor and REALLY don't want to start something.

I hope this is a legit matter for you folks.Aaaronsmith (talk) 00:03, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

He didn't use twinkle, and he didn't revert [41]. He removed your edit, and Sine Bot's edit signing your edit. The article talkpage isn't the place for snark about other editors. This board is for issues affecting administrators generally. To request an administrative action, use WP:ANI. --Elen of the Roads (talk) 16:28, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for notifying me of this thread, Elen. I remember that I did consider posting a friendly message on Aaronsmiths talk page, linking to WP:No personal attacks. But I noticed the messages on their talk page going back to 2008, and gathered from that that it was probably an experienced editor, who probably already knew the basic policies, and that it was just a simple case of tempers flaring in a heated dispute (which happens to the best of us), and that my edit summary would be sufficient for the editor to know they should probably cool off a bit before replying again in that particular dispute. --Saddhiyama (talk) 10:18, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:RFPP again

Lots of RFPP requests currently; any admins about that could help by doing some? (Not that admins are completely needed, but regular users can't protect pages) LikeLakers2 (talk | Sign my guestbook!) 03:49, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Working. Cheers. lifebaka++ 03:56, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I took care of the vast majority of current requests, but the one for Francis Poulenc is a bit beyond my depth. Someone might want to take care of that before it blows up into a full-on edit war. Cheers. lifebaka++ 05:09, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I made the Poulenc request. I don't think there's much danger of a major war as, if nothing else, I've stopped reverting since requesting protection. User:EdJohnston posted a message about the issues on my Talk page. I wrote a long response, which I won't repost here.--Bbb23 (talk) 15:42, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Buckshot06

User:Buckshot06 makes uncorrect undo here: -- [42]; Kamal44 added new information about sister-cities, but Buckshot06 blocked all of edits, Also Almaty on kazakh & russian means - Almaty, not Alma-Ata... 95.56.150.140 (talk) 14:44, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

There is absolutely no reason for namecalling. New information must be sourced. Please discuss your edits on the talk page. Page protected for 24 hours. — Edokter (talk) — 14:53, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Blocked 95.56.150.140 (talk · contribs · WHOIS) for block evasion (Kamal44 (talk · contribs)). — Edokter (talk) — 15:03, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Incivility not resolved at Wikiquette assistance, and disgraceful admin behaviour.

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The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. { Not an issue for Administrators' noticeboard. Referred elsewhere. This page is not used for dispute resolution Trying to force an apology is pretty much always a waste of time These users simply need to back away from one another and find something else to do. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:39, 13 November 2011 (UTC) Firsty User:Ankitbhatt fails to apologise for a comment on my talkpage. I raise this at your chocolate fireguard forum, but with no joy. And then User:Stephan Schulz (who I believe is an admin!), tells me to "shut the fuck up". This is utterly disgraceful and certainly not what an admin should be doing. What is anyone going to do about both of them? Thanks. Lugnuts (talk) 14:48, 13 November 2011 (UTC) No matter how much of a fuss you make over this matter, you won't extract anything even close to an apology from me. Please get that straight. And Stephen is an Admin, and has performed his actions as he see fit. If you so pompously feel that you are so great to question it, fine. And I suggest you stop collaborating with your partner Gerardw by telling him to stop vandalising my talk page. The matter is closed according to me, and no amount of show off and arrogant ego-show is going to change it. Please, get a life Lugnuts. AnkitBhattTalk to me!!LifEnjoy 15:07, 13 November 2011 (UTC) You should both have listened to Stephan Schultz.·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:10, 13 November 2011 (UTC) I think my actions and comments speak for themselves. Please see WP:SPADE. Civility is more than skin deep. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:21, 13 November 2011 (UTC) (ec) Previously posted at WP:ANI, moving for consolidation: Ankitbhatt (talk · contribs) has shown a recent history of personal attacks. A discussion at Wikipedia:Dispute_resolution_noticeboard/Archive_11#Ra_One_-_Response_section, which included warnings by several editors, not to engage in personal attacks was closed when Ankitbhatt stated their intention to leave Wikipedia [43]. User has previously been warned on the their talk page User_talk:Ankitbhatt#October_2011. Most recently, user called another editor "a prick" [44]. Adminstrator User:Stephan Schulz collapsed/closed current Wikipedia:Wikiquette_assistance#Incivility_by_User:AnkitBhatt. Had this been a single incident, I would concur, however given the continued pattern of behavior, including Ankitbhatt's responsed at WQA, I'm requesting additional review by the admin community. Gerardw (talk) 15:14, 13 November 2011 (UTC) [Moved my comment up where it belonged. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 16:32, 13 November 2011 (UTC)] Nope, simply not good enough. Why say it in the first place? Lugnuts (talk) 17:57, 13 November 2011 (UTC) Wow. Partners in crime. Go on, Gerard and Lugnuts. Let's see what your next collaborated move is. AnkitBhattTalk to me!!LifEnjoy 16:24, 13 November 2011 (UTC) Can I assume, with full assurance, that this matter is fully closed? The way this so-called discussion is going, events are becoming amusing rather than helpful It is a clear case of misplaced feelings about one's importance. "Disgraceful behaviour", ho ho ho! And a sidekick to boot. Tsk Tsk. This is not what I expected from an editor who nominated himself for Co-ordinator position in WP:Film. AnkitBhattTalk to me!!LifEnjoy 17:40, 13 November 2011 (UTC) May I point out that I was referring to BOTH of you? Let it rest. No dancing on graves. No "you were wrong". And there is very little "I was right" to go around here. And no, there is no guarantee that this is the last of it, unfortunately, although most of us sincerely hope so. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 17:51, 13 November 2011 (UTC) "Can I assume, with full assurance, that this matter is fully closed?" Oh god, no. You continue with your snide personal attacks, despite saying your are "too busy". And you completly missed the point of my Co-ordinator nomination. Read it again. And read it again. Then repeat it back to me, speaking very, very slowly, so I know you understand. Lugnuts (talk) 17:56, 13 November 2011 (UTC) Why did an admin try to close this instead of addressing the issues of incivility by two people, including another admin? Lugnuts (talk) 19:14, 13 November 2011 (UTC) I think that we should go to MedCab for this. But anyways, it seems like canvassing. ~~Ebe123~~ → report ← Contribs 19:33, 13 November 2011 (UTC) There must be someone out there who is willing to block Malleus for an admin telling an editor to "shut the fuck up". SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:36, 13 November 2011 (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.

What is the next step after sockpuppetting has been confirmed?

Resolved

Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Bubblegumcrunch confirms that User:Bubblegumcrunch is using multiple accounts, but the investigation was closed without anything being done. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 20:47, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

It's my understanding another admin will address the issue at some point, (" A CheckUser completed a check on relevant users in this case, and it is now awaiting administration and close"). (Sundays can kind of be slow as far as admin activity, compared to weekdays.) Gerardw (talk) 21:31, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, the case is not closed yet, and someone will deal with it before it is. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 21:40, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I went ahead and took care of it myself. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 22:01, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you, DoRD. I was confused since the discussion had been hidden. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 23:02, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:RPP backlog

Resolved

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

Quite a huge backlog of unanswered requests there.Jasper Deng (talk) 22:53, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

• You owe me and a couple of other admins a beer. Thanks for the reminder. Drmies (talk) 02:47, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Well then you get one, since you asked for one.Jasper Deng (talk) 03:02, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
    • Good man. Please pour User:EdJohnston one as well. Thanks. Drmies (talk) 03:23, 14 November 2011 (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.

Richard Arthur Norton copyright violations

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

After a long and mostly thoughtful discussion, consensus is very much in favor of a topic ban. We are talking about thousands of articles that are potentially problematic. And Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) has certainly been slow to acknowledge the extent of the problem. It's worrying that despite being warned about these issues more than once before, it is only the prospect of a ban that has led to his taking them more seriously.

On the other hand, there's some confusion as to what that ban would entail. Plus I take into consideration FeydHuxtable's argument that there's no point in what could seem to be a simply vindictive punishment. (And I can say that, in appearing to seek such punishment, LibStar didn't cover himself in glory in the course of this discussion.) We are looking for collaboration, not penance. If we were to seek penance, RAN would most likely walk away from the project, and we would lose someone who could be (and in many ways still is) a valued contributor. He could be a valuable contributor not least if he helped to rectify some of the problems left in his wake as an undoubtedly prolific creator of new articles.

My proposal is that Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) has a topic ban for a period of one month. During that time, he is banned specifically from creating new articles and from page moves. (I think that the prospect of banning "content additions" is too vague and in any case counter-productive; improving articles that have copyvio issues inevitably entails adding content in one form or another.) At the end of this month-long period, I propose that the ban is revisited: if Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) has shown that he understands the issues and has put effort into dealing with them, then I see no reason why the ban should continue; if not, it can be made indefinite. --jbmurray (talk • contribs) 10:51, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

---

Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk · contribs), one of our most prolific editors with over 100,000 edits to the mainspace, turns out to be a prolific copyright violator as well. At first, I noticed that two very recent articles, Job Male and August Howard, were copyright vioolations, and speedy deleted them (and noted this on his talk page). His only reaction was a request for userfication at my talk[45], and after I refused on the talk page of Fuhghettaboutit, who refused as well.

Meanwhile, I did some spotchecks of other contributions, and found worrying trends of copying or too close paraphrasing of sources, and of excessive quoting of (copyrighted) sources. Not sure how to proceed, I started a discussion at User talk:MER-C#Advice on whether a CCI or other action is needed, which was joined by User:Moonriddengirl (both probably our most active and well-versed copyright violation investigators). I learned here that there already was a CCI about Richard Arthur Norton's images at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20100822. After they checked my findings and made some additional checks, a new CCI, Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20111108 was set up. This, while only barely started, revealed further copyright violations strectching from 2006 to 2011, and (when using older sources) failure to properly attribute things. But considering that Riachard Arthur Norton created or expanded many, many pages, and that even that lenghty CCI only lists his largest additions, and not many smaller ones, this appears to be only the tip of the iceberg.

Bad as all this is, I wouldn't have brought it here if there was any indication that Richard Arthur Norton sufficiently cared about the problem and would give some help in cleaning up the older violations, and some realistic assurance that no new problems would occur. However, apart from the two requests for userfication, Richard Arthur Norton has not made a single reply to either the talk page discussion or the CCI, and has not attempted to check any of the pages on the CCI. All he has done is immediately recreate any pages that are deleted or blanked (recreated without the copyright violations of course, or he would have been blocked by now), indicating to me that all he cares about is having the information on Wikipedia, no matter if it is done by violating copyright (or attribution rights).

I don't believe that an editor who creates dozens (hundreds?) of copyright violations over five years or more, even continuing after a CCI is opened for his images, and who gives no indication at all of caring about the problem and of being willing to work on it (reactively and proactively), should be left around any longer. If someone believes strict mentoring has a chance and volunteers for it (and Richard Arthur Norton accepts), then that might be a solution. Otherwise, I suggest an indefinite block (not a time-limited one, as long as there is no indication that this will stop). Fram (talk) 08:27, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

having interacted with Richard in the past, I'd be interested to see his response to this. Yes he is one of the most prolific editors so fully understands WP rules. One thing I'd note is he never ever admits he is in the wrong, and plays fake innocence when presented with evidence of wrongdoing or gross incivility or clear bad faith assumptions especially of inexperienced editors.This stubbornness is reflected in his non ability to reply on this copyright issue. He knows it's wrong but still continues. This is not in WP spirit. I don't think Richard can be mentored, he is too proud and stubborn for that. LibStar (talk) 09:26, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I would just like to point out the Libstar is not the most objective person. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elbert Adrian Brinckerhoff and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Charles William Floyd Coffin and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mayor of Englewood, New Jersey and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Davis Ticknor (New Jersey) and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Krebs Pigments and Chemical Company where he was nominating almost every new article I created over a short period of time a few weeks ago. All were kept with almost total support. I would like to think that he is objective, but he appears to have some antipathy toward me. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 00:43, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Kind of supporting Libstar's point, this is nothing new. --Mkativerata (talk) 09:54, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Is he autopatrolled? --Kittybrewster ☎ 10:37, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Autopatrolled status revoked. Bencherlite^Talk 10:43, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I have to agree with LibStar that I have doubts that Richard will work well with others in addressing these problems. I began working with Richard after his first CCI was requested, and LibStar sums up the attitude I have encountered well. I assumed at first that he may be hostile due to the way in which copyright problems were approached (see these, threads), but by the time he filed this complaint about CCI processes realized this may not be situational. He brought a complaint against the editor doing the heavy lifting at his CCI for not giving him notices when files were tagged for problem, even though I had twice explained why notices are not generally given in CCI ([46], [47] - in the second instance, I even asked him to let me know if he'd like notices, but he never said a word about it until launching his vitriolic complaint about the CCI cleaner at ANI). During that conversation he referred to the CCI as "harassment" and made false accusations. (I've never touched that image) It seemed from that certainly that he's unwilling to work directly with those attempting to do mop up. I believe Richard takes an adversarial stance to others, and I think his userpage may reveal part of the problem, where it says, "Every Essjay on Wikipedia thinks they are an expert on copyright law, and knee-jerk delete everything and anything." As Mkativerata points out, I tried to explain the issues with text to Richard months ago, but he evidently paid no more attention to that than he did any of my other efforts to work with him. (ETA) I don't believe I have ever seen Richard proactively work to address any problems with his uploads or edits unless these were tagged for deletion or removed by others, and (as the ANI complaint I linked above shows) he seems strongly instead to believe that others should clean up after him. I'm not sure he understands the seriousness of this issue. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 11:34, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Its very frustrating when the four images of me used on my user page get deleted. The current image of me in Sweden was tagged for deletion twice. The argument was that if I appeared in the photo, I could not have taken the image, and therefor I cannot claim a copyright. That is the frustration when everyone is an expert on law. While some images needed an updated license tag and others needed the newest FUR template and a longer FUR, most images were kept. Over 500 images were tagged as violations by Treasury Tag after he and I argued at an AFD. Those included images I took, or images that were from the Library of Congress and in the public domain. Most of the images that were deleted just needed an updated license or an updated FUR template and could have been saved if I was notified on my page. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 18:19, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I understand that the work can be frustrating. It is frustrating for all involved. However, with respect to notices, you were explicitly asked to let me know if you'd like notices, even though these are not the norm at CCI (as you knew [48]; [49]), but you never responded. Instead, you launched an unfair accusation at ANI against a good-faith user trying to help make sure that the images were all sorted and straightened out. We have tried to be accommodating. I have tried to be accommodating. The lack of communication makes that quite difficult. There is cleanup to be done; it would be great to have you part of that, in both CCIs. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 18:29, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Question Is copyright a problem for him other than images? If so, I fear that Fram is right. If not, why can't we ban him from uploading images? I don't see a reason to get rid of a good editor of text if he is one. Nyttend (talk) 12:21, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Yes. It has recently been verified that Richard has been violating copyright policies with text he has placed on Wikipedia from 2006 to the present day. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:33, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Another problem with his images was his refusal to use FURS - he would add the template, but without any content. I did (as you'll see from the exchange Moonridden girl added diffs to) accidentally delete images of himself for which he had provided no licensing information so I assumed they were not free, I also spent many happy hours writing rationales for images he had uploaded, which he refused to do. Elen of the Roads (talk) 13:00, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

In the past I was using a text based rationale for FUR, until I was shown the newest FUR template, which I now use consistently. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 15:53, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Richard has edited Wikipedia since being notified of this AN discussion, but has not replied here. The case for an indefinite block appears strong. EdJohnston (talk) 17:13, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I've poked him [50] to try again to get some sort of response. Beeblebrox (talk) 17:22, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

If he continues editing without response here, I'll indefblock him myself later today. The further in I look the worse it gets; unacceptable on all levels. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 17:23, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Give him 24 hours. --Kittybrewster ☎ 17:52, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

As people point out things that need to be worded differently to avoid copyright infringement, I am making the changes. Please continue to point out things that you feel are too close to the source document and I will change the wording. Some sources that on first assumption appear to be public domain by age, or by government creation and not eligible for copyright protection, or seemed like uncopyrightable facts, can be incorrect on my first look and closer scrutiny is always welcome. I will be more careful to paraphrase and cut down on long quotes or enclose them in quotation marks. I will also work to use more sources per article, a single source, even when paraphrased and reworded can still have the same look-and-feel as the original material. Most obituaries are a chronological list of facts and even when reworded will still retain the same look-and-feel, unless disparate sources are combined. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 18:01, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Since you've created a gigantic problem, this does not seem to be an adequate response. How about offering to work through the CCI item-by-item and do the fixes that Moonriddengirl would recommend? There are 660 entries in Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20111108. EdJohnston (talk) 18:06, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Just the first page, I'm afraid. There are actually 6,539 articles involved. If nothing else, it would be fabulous if he'd go through to identify which of these were splits or merges and make sure they are fully attributed. (There are plenty of other ways that he could help substantially lighten the cleanup work there.) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 18:09, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Thats quite a big ask and I dont think RAN should be under any preasure to do that unless he wants to. Its simplistic to say RAN created this mess. RANs learning period was years back when community norms were much more concerned with sticking closely to sources and avoiding OR - concerns which conflict with the need to avoid copyright infringements. Part of the reason for the mess is the way the project has evolved. Most of us are volunteers and ought not to be accountable for not keeping up to speed with changes in policy, even less so if we failed to anticipate future changes. Blocks in these cases should only be needed if someone keeps creating further problems once policy has been explained. Clearly RAN has got the message about the need to avoid copyright infringement and will be more careful in future, plus up to a point he's willing to help fix previous issues. We are very lucky a talented scientists like RAN spends so much time improving our content, please dont risk making him want to leave the project by pushing too hard. FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:32, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I wonder if you've read through all the material here. Richard was well aware of the need to avoid copyright infringement and has been notified of this repeatedly throughout the years. He was told as recently as December of last year how to avoid these issues (given a clear example of the problem and pointed to several documents meant to help him learn to avoid them), and yet on 3 November 2011, he produced this:

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August Howard: Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) Source He was a public affairs officer of the National Council of Boy Scouts of America from 1928 to 1970. In 1934 he founded the American Polar Society for people involved or interested in polar exploration and research. Mr. Howard was a public affairs officer of the National Council of Boy Scouts of America from 1928 to 1970[...] In 1934, Mr. Howard founded the American Polar Society as a forum for people involved or interested in polar exploration and research. Job Male: Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) Source Job Male was born in Somersetshire, England on August 24, 1808. He came with his parents to America in 1816 and worked as a toll collector on the turnpike between Jersey City and Newark, New Jersey. He worked for the Union Ferry Company to build their ferry houses in New York and Brooklyn from 1838 to 1845. He was the superintendent of construction for the New Jersey Railroad and Transportation Company from 1853 to 1859, and built their docks, ferry houses, and depots at Jersey City. He was a member of the board of education in Jersey City from 1803 to 1807. For twenty years, he was a director of the Hudson County National Bank and president from 1873 to 1878. Job Male was born in Somersetshire, England on August 24, 1808. He came with his parents to America in 1816 and began to earn his livelihood by attending the toll gate on the Turnpike between Jersey City and Newark. [...] He was employed by the Union Ferry Company to build their ferry houses in New York and Brooklyn from 1838 to 1845. He was the superintendent of construction for the New Jersey Railroad and Transportation Company from 1853 to 1859, and built their docks, ferry houses, and depots at Jersey City. Mr. Male was a member of the board of education in Jersey City from 1803 to 1807. For twenty years, he was a director of the Hudson County National Bank and its president from 1873 to 1878.

Besides the explicit explanation I left him in December of last year, he had been told in October of last year. There are more. (Some of the human notes I see in a casual scan of his talk page history: June 2010; December 2007; July 2007. There are others, and there are plenty of CorenSearchBot notices, not all of which may be accurate but each of which offered him a link to the copyright policy. I see copyright concerns being raised with Richard (text and images) at least as far back as 2006.

To say that Richard should be excused from assisting with cleanup for not knowing policy is, well, simply extraordinary. People may in fact be required to help clean up as a condition of continuing in such cases, as per Wikipedia:Copyright violations: "Contributors who have extensively violated copyright policy by uploading many copyrighted files or placing copyrighted text into numerous articles may be blocked without warning for the protection of the project, pending satisfactory assurances that infringement will not continue. In extreme cases administrators may impose special conditions before unblocking, such as requiring assistance with cleanup by disclosing which sources were used." I would much rather Richard help with the cleanup voluntarily. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:15, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Just today, i.e. after the CCI started, you made this edit: [51]. Your full text: "One of the largest food recalls in United States history.". The sources text: "one of the largest food recalls in the nation’s history". That doesn't give me any confidence that you really understand (or care about) the problem at all. Fram (talk) 18:19, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

You cannot copyright that fact. You either are "one of the largest food recalls in United States history" or your are not. Facts cannot be copyrighted. While some of my earlier edits used too much text as fair use and sometimes I have applied government public-domain to quasi government organizations incorrectly, this is not an example. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 16:45, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Fram, how many different ways are there to state that something was one of the biggest food recalls in US history? I don't think that edit is problematic, especially given that he links to the source and includes the quote. --SarekOfVulcan (talk) 18:28, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed. Fram, please read the section 'What is not plagiarism' in Wikipedia:Plagiarism. It makes exactly Sarek's point: the advice on fairly direct copying of simple sentences being allowable as long as one includes a cite also seems applicable to copyright concerns. FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:32, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

<ec>*I'm not a great content editor, and I must say these copyright discussions are part of why I've been leery of doing much in the way of significant edits in mainspace. That said, are we really claiming that is a copyright problem? It's pretty clearly fair use and it's certainly clearly cited. Would "This recall was one of the largest in the United States" have been acceptable? Does the fact that he included the exact quote in the cite matter? I did look at RAN's contributions and saw some serious problems (large amounts of text more-or-less taken word-for-word). But I really don't see a copyright problem with the quote you give. It's well within fair use. And I'm not sure where the line of "not being too close" falls for such a short bit of purely factual text. Hobit (talk) 18:38, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I am somewhat sympathetic towards Hobit's and RAN's position here. I also think there are two issues. A the past and B the future. I suggest we lean heavily on Moonriddengirl's views on this. What I don't like is the failure to recognise and respond to the problems. --Kittybrewster ☎ 19:21, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Attorney/expert help needed? Does an attorney need to evaluate the alleged violations here? I see everyone talking about obvious copyright violations, but when I looked at the August and Male examples at User_talk:MER-C#Advice_on_whether_a_CCI_or_other_action_is_needed nothing tells me that slight changes to the few sentences of sampled text from a source for the article is actually going to be considered a copyright violation. When I write articles I personally try to avoid any 'copying' at all, but frankly sometimes there is only one or two good ways to relate basic facts. This is an art, not a science. If whole paragraphs are lifted word-for-word (though single paragraph attributed block quotes are surely fine), I agree that is likely a problem. When I research articles on historical events, you often see how the various authors who wrote on a subject over time all relied on many of the same original sources (as well as any subsequent sources which predated their addition), and you see how they do the same basic thing as is alleged to be a problem in RAN's August and Male examples, i.e., fragments would seem to come directly from the original sources. But the ultimate product was not the same due to minor changes. Of course, it was almost impossible to catch such activity in the pre-Internet age, I suppose, but it is far from uncommon. Also, when one endeavors to alter text by simply dropping in potential synonyms and reordering of phrases, sometimes you change the meaning of the original sources in unintended ways, and thus introduce error in your product. This is also seen in scholarly writing, where you can tell that the subsequent author clearly relied on a prior source for a particular fact and then made clumsy word substitutions to make it sound different when ultimately the intent was to convey the same exact piece of information. E.g. if I wrote, "Abraham Lincoln was born in 1809 in a log cabin in Kentucky." Now go look around and see how many sources say the same basic information. In fact, the same exact text appears here [52] in a book (lucky me, I hoped that would happen!). I could rewrite the sentence to say "In 1809, in a log cabin in Kentucky, Abraham Lincoln was born." But that's just bad writing. Or I could say "Abraham Lincoln entered this world in 1809 in a log cabin situated in Kentucky." Also not as good. So my point here is we need to be reasonable and calm in doing this examination, and apply the same standards that apparently apply to writers outside Wikipedia. If anyone can find examples where RAN wholesale used identical paragraphs word-for-word, I would like to see that because that is wrong. But to extent there is agreed to be a problem, I will help volunteer to correct any problem articles. Because I am armed and dangerous with a thesaurus and the passive voice.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 19:35, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

If you change "He attended Harvard University" to "He graduated from Harvard University" you have changed the meaning and add an error. While Bill Gates attended, he did not graduate. You have to be careful to balance fair-use and copyright with clarity-of-meaning. When people change the language they are changing the meaning and can introduce errors. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 18:31, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

One avoids this by using careful language in different structure. For instance, "An attendee of Harvard University, Subject other fact" works well. Even better if one can say, "After X years at Harvard University, Subject other fact." Of course, if the only text taken were "He attended Harvard University," we might not expect to encounter problems, but the more content closely follows the greater the risk becomes. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 18:44, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Your help would be certainly much appreciated. :) But I'm afraid that direct copying is not the only way to infringe copyright. Minimally altering text so as to create a derivative work is also potentially a problem, as the right to authorize derivatives is reserved to the copyright holders. Wikipedia's copyright policy requires that content be written from scratch, aside from directly marked quotations used in accordance with WP:NFC. This is the same standard applied to all of us. Certainly we may sometimes find ourselves producing text similar to that used in other sources; the problem comes in as the amount of taking increases. One sentence that coincidentally resembles something in a book one has not used is not likely to be marked as a problem. Multiple sentences that follow closely in language and structure on the accessed source are. For example, it's unlikely that Richard inadvertently produced a list so similar to this one (which most definitely predates us). The greater the proportion of this content to the article or the source, the more likely we are to have a problem. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:48, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Hmmm, well this certainly sounds like a legally grey area where most editors are not competent to judge anything outside clear wholesale copying. If we over-enforce U.S. copyright law, we are affording more protection than that intended by the U.S. Constitution, which stifles the free exchange of information. If we under-enforce, I guess at some point we are risking legal action. Frankly, I highly doubt in a million years that any of the content RAN works on would generate more than a gentle request to amend if he did do something wrong. As to the (somewhat concerning, I admit) list example, for instance, he made minor modifications but essentially adopted a list of key dates. One might argue that the significant events on that list are obvious and not copyrightable. So, though there may be some problems here, I hope editors don't make this into a drama-fest against RAN as if he's destroyed the whole project or something.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 06:06, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

We do routinely over-enforce U.S. copyright law. This has been written into our policies since well before I became involved with copyright cleanup. WP:NFCC notes that policy is constructed "To minimize legal exposure by limiting the amount of non-free content, using more narrowly defined criteria than apply under United States fair use law." For one huge example, we are a non-profit organization and could accept content licensed for non-commercial use, but we don't, because this is inconsistent with the mission of Wikipedia to generate free content that can be used by anyone, anywhere. Furthermore, this is built into the model to the point that we do not have the option to change this by simple consensus; this is a Board level decision.

Whether or not content constitutes copyright infringement is a legally gray area; it is highly subjective. But Wikipedia's copyright policies are a bit more clear: information taken from copyrighted content must be written from scratch except for brief and clearly marked quotations used transformatively. (I think anyone arguing that list was not copyrightable would be way off base and can explain why, but this is probably not the best place for it. If you want to know more about copyright in lists, please drop by my talk page.) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:39, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the additional detail. Clearly you are well-versed in these issues!--Milowent • ^hasspoken 13:11, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• I've still got the OrphanBot code from the first time RAN's images came up on AN, if anyone wants me to run it. --Carnildo (talk) 03:18, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• I would strongly oppose an indefinite block for such a dedicated and knowledgeable editor. Edison (talk) 05:30, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
  • And how do you suggest that we solve the mess he has created? He is clearly not interested in actively helping to cleanup up after himself, and with admins basically supporting him like you did here (we shouldn't delete a massive, 7K identical copyvio because the subject is notable? Notability is irrelevant for copyvio discussions), this isn't likely to change. Being dedicated is no excuse for severe policy violations stretching five years back. Opposing a suggested solution is fine and good, but perhaps you could offer an alternative instead? Fram (talk) 08:18, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I have cooperated fully and changed the wording where it has been pointed out, and rewrote the four articles where the wording was too close to the original referenced source. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 17:32, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Your definition of "cooperated fully" differs apparently from that of most other editors. You have recreated articles that were deleted or blanked as copyright violations. You have not checked or corrected a single instance otherwise, you have not asked how you can be of help, you have not asked how you can avoid further problems. You are not cooperating at all, you only replied to this when you were threatened with an indefinite block. There are thousands of pages that need to be checked, and you haven't done a single one of them. What you are doing is damage control, not cooperating. Fram (talk) 19:44, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Side discussion about RAN's moves

Moved to a separate section so as not to distract from the bigger issue. Calliopejen1 (talk) 18:39, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

This is may be a slight aside but it adds to the mix. Last year I noticed and undid this user's move of Willie Hoppe to William Frederick Hoppe with no explanation. This was not a close call. Willie Hoppe, known almost exclusively by that name, is one of the more dominant figures in sports of the twentieth century (though sadly many of you may not know of him today). When I moved it back I left a note on Richard's talk page which was not responded to. I now see a dispute on the talk page with Good Olfactory about his many poor moves. Having just taken a quick survey of his move log, this user appears to have moved a vast number of pages with little or no regard for our naming conventions, and yet at the same time seems to be aware of them. For example, here he moves Thomas J. Scully to Thomas Joseph Scully specifically citing the common naming policy. After being reverted he moved it back, again citing common names and says it "is the commons name in the most reliable sources, take it to talk page if you disagree". Normally you might think the users are just looking at different sources but the margin here is so wide that this just appear to be a lie: Google Books and News Archive combined return 3 results for the moved title and about 48,000 for the original title. Spot checking, I just moved William Weaver Bennett back to William W. Bennett, which suffers from a similar overwhelming disparity when checking reliable sources for the common name. This user has over 5,000 page moves.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 12:52, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Here is the problem with that. Good Olfactory blocked me when we each decided on a different name for an article. His argument is that moves must be discussed at WP:RM, yet he does not use WP:RM as can be documented on my talk page. In this case when you search for "William W. Bennett" you pick up all the other people with that initial like William Wallace Bennett and William Walden Bennett and William Woods Bennett. In each case we are both arguing what is best under commonname policy which suggests to rely more heavily on what other reference works use rather than a Google search which picks up everyone with that name. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 17:47, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I happen to agree with that but it should be discussed on the talk page where bold is contested and this issue seems peripheral. --Kittybrewster ☎ 17:56, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

(ec)While this problem is subordinate to the copyright violations one, and I'm wondering why you chose to answer to this one first, I still wanted to point out that this (fairly non notable) person gets 9350 Google hits for "William W. Bennett" Teaneck[53], and "William Weaver Bennett" Teaneck gives, well, 6[54]. Normally I rely more on Google books and the like, but due to the non-notability of the person, comparing 1 and 2 hits is meaningless. Fram (talk) 18:00, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

(e/c) Richard, I'm sorry but that doesn't even begin to pass a smell test. Nothing I've seen leads me to believe you are not smart enough to know how to do the most basic due diligence. Here you make a positive assertion that one name is more common than another and move a page based on that. Do you really need me to point out that on an amended search, as compared with the three total results for Google Books and New Archive for the name you took action on, a search of Google Books for <"Thomas J. Scully" "New Jersey" democrat> returns 1,140 results? What about the other moves? As for your dispute with Good Ol’factory, I have not looked at any other page than yours, but from what I see, you don't have a leg to stand on. He's taking action on these utterly improper moves to revert them and asking you to use WP:RM before making such moves in the future. As a party reverting your unilateral and patently bad moves, he does not need to use WP:RM for his reverts, as you argue. This implicitly equates the unilateral move with the revert. They are not equal acts.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 18:17, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

LOL! You've made blatantly incompetent insinuations that RAN has been lying. Then you make sweeping judgements about a complex dispute while admiting you only looked at Richards talk. And you have the gall to bleat about due diligence! Jesus wept! FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:50, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

The evidence speaks for itself. If you have something of actual substantive to say, as opposed to snarky assertions, I'll be happy to address that.--Fuhghettaboutit (talk) 23:52, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I have tried working with RAN on the moves issues and have come to conclusion that one of two things must be true: (1) he does not understand WP:UCN and there is no perceptible chance that he will figure it out any time soon; or (2) he understands WP:UCN but chooses to ignore it after many, many requests and several blocks. I honestly don't know which is the case. For a long time I thought it was probably just a confusion issue—a more hopeful version of (1)—but now I'm leaning towards (2). When he states that "Good Olfactory blocked me when we each decided on a different name for an article."—well, that's just a blatant misrepresentation of the facts behind that incident. He either does not understand at all why he got blocked or yes, he is lying. Take your pick. And to suggest that I need to use WP:RM to reverse his controversial moves to the status quo ante is near the height of either stupidity or chutzpah. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 21:59, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

We all have the best interest of the encyclopedia as our goal. As I have argued early, I have been giving more weight to the most reliable sources such as how the name appears in other reference works such as their official congressional biography for congressmen. A simple Google search for "John Smith" picks up all the people with that name, but when you search "John Aloysius Smith" you find just the one in question. In that way Google searches can give skewed results. I am not moving articles to nonsense names or moving J.R.R. Tolkien or C.S. Lewis. I have very rarely opposed someone moving the article again to what they feel is the best name, and have not overridden, that I am aware of, a !vote taken to decide the best name. If deciding the best name for an article was easy Wikipedia would have a program that did it automatically. But since there isn't an automated naming program, good people will always disagree on the best name. As in the examples on my talk page, what we have are two people deciding the best name, and one cementing their choice by blocking me. For example: User:Good Olfactory has trouble here deciding on a name change for an article I moved. He moved the article on Andrew F. McBride saying "moving back: it looks to me as if he is most commonly known as "Andrew McBride"; the initial was not and is not now commonly used" He then moved Andrew F. McBride to Andrew McBride (politician) and then moved Andrew McBride (politician) to Andrew F. McBride (politician) and then finally moved Andrew F. McBride (politician) to Andrew F. McBride. If article names were easy to decide and clearcut Good Olfactory would not have to move the article multiple times. What we have in this example are two people using their best judgement to find the best name for an article using the same resources and coming up with different answers, but one has the ability to block the other and cement in their choice. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 17:02, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

That's a complete mischaracterization of the situation, and I think you know it. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 21:39, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Then I guess he needs to be prohibited from making page moves until he satisfies the community that he gets the point and will abide by consensus. Kittybrewster ☎ 22:18, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Pages moves is a minor tangent - If he isn't prepared to help at Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/20111108 he should be banned immediately . Off2riorob (talk) 00:28, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree that the page move issue is minor when compared to the copyright violation issue. When it's all rolled up together, however, it makes a convincing case for an indefinite block until he figures things out or chooses to do so, in my opinion. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 02:30, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Some of the page move reverts earlier this year were done solely because the original page move had been made by RAN.  These are ad hominem reverts, and do not by themselves provide any information about the quality of RANs moves.  I tried researching one of the moves, and it was far from simple to get a clear answer.  Unscintillating (talk) 08:03, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

topic ban?

Obviously this is a wide-ranging set of issues. Given the scope I wonder if a topic ban on creating articles and performing page moves is in order so that the problem at least does not get any bigger. Beeblebrox (talk) 21:14, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support - User:RAN should be banned from any further content additions on en wikipedia and picture uploads until he has assisted in resolving his previous copyright violations. When he has resolved those he will have a clear understanding of where the en wiki policy line is and moving forward won't create the same issues. - Off2riorob (talk) 00:16, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  Question What would that leave him to do, besides removing his own copyright violations? Not a criticism: I just want to know what (if anything) you'd like him to be able to do besides cleaning his own past problems. Nyttend (talk) 00:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  Vandal reverts, discussion threads and suchlike would be no issue, but no content additions or uploads at all while working with the copyright investigation until its all resolved. Off2riorob (talk) 01:04, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  Makes sense to me. I thought it useful to have the clarification, because someone might construe "content additions" to include adding significant chunks of text to a discussion or un-blanking a page that a vandal had attacked. Nyttend (talk) 01:44, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Comment anyone noticed that Richard still refuses to admit any wrongdoing. if people want to give him a chance to continue on the future, there needs to be full admittance of a range of improper practices and an acknowledgement this will never occur again. Until we get this unambigious guarantee from Richard, how can we trust him in future? LibStar (talk) 00:58, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I would just like to point out the Libstar is not the most objective person. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elbert Adrian Brinckerhoff and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Charles William Floyd Coffin and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mayor of Englewood, New Jersey and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Davis Ticknor (New Jersey) and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Krebs Pigments and Chemical Company where he was nominating almost every new article I created over a short period a few weeks ago. All were kept with almost total support. I would like to think that he is objective, but he appears to have some antipathy toward me that leads him to harass me with nominations like these. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 23:08, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

RAN, you've said so before, and it's clearly a non-starter. Do you admit wrongdoing? Are you going to help? Having read through the discussion this far, I don't see any evidence of any awareness of the problem and its scope and of your responsibility in cleaning it up if you wish to stay active here. I will grant you that it can be difficult to judge whether something is paraphrased properly or too closely, and in such cases one tries to err on the side of caution. You don't seem to accept the caution in the first place. I'm not LibStar, I haven't been involved with you in years, I think we used to get along fairly well, I've certainly not hounded you as far as I'm aware--so please stop beating around the bush and answer the question! I also don't want to lose a content contributor, but the scale of this is very serious. Are you even aware of the scale? A yes or no will do. Drmies (talk) 20:32, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Nevermind: this very question is a non-starter. Below RAN suggests that there may be 8 articles with problems, so clearly the answer to my question is no. Drmies (talk) 20:48, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

• Question for Richard Norton Richard, in the interests of knowing where you stand. Would you be willing to admit that you have deliberately flaunted flouted WP rules despite repeated warnings especially relating to copy violations and page moves? And in doing so, would you be willing to cease all such violations in future and respect warnings from other editors for future transgressions if they occur? LibStar (talk) 01:56, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
  • Did you mean "flouted" when you typed "flaunted?" See [55]. There is a difference. Edison (talk) 20:06, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

agree, my mistake and I have corrected. LibStar (talk) 23:59, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• • I would have to say in this case that both words are appropriate descriptors. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:13, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• • • On the other hand, Wikilawyers are noted for "flaunting" guidelines and policies in discussions, to the distress of Wikianarchists. Edison (talk) 15:38, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• I don't agree with Off2RioRob unless Moonriddengirl proposes this. It does not incentivise RAN to cooperate or help. I would like her to propose a schedule of constructive things for him to do, including acknowledging past transgressions and an apology to the community for de-dusting. Don't rub his nose in his stuff because it won't benefit the pedia. Alternative may be that we lose an editor whom some might prefer to keep. Kittybrewster ☎ 01:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  Users come and go - but their copyright violations remain. Perhaps your his wiki friend and don't want to hear what MRG said - seems to me to have been quite clear as to the seriousness of the violations from User:RAN - Personally I doubt if he can survive and carry on adding content while the copyright team trawl through his copyright violations over the next months - and why should he if he is not prepared to help them. Off2riorob (talk) 01:16, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  No I am not his wiki chum; I think we have never rubbed noses. But I don't think he is a vandal and I would like to keep him aboard to help in the de-dusting. I think blaming him and finding fault will not help much. But he needs to take responsibility for past deeds and what happens from now on. Kittybrewster ☎ 01:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  A copyright violator or even someone that just either doesn't understand or refuses to accept the projects copyright policy is on another level from a vandal - copyright is a legal issue. If he is not to be blocked he needs to be banned from adding any content at all until this and his previous violations are fully resolved. Off2riorob (talk) 01:42, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  So we need him to stay with us, constructively helping to launder the doilies. Without pay. And even lawyers eat honey; it encourages them. This is not about crime and punishment. I have 3 questions. 1 Is MRG prepared to work with him and create s plan for the past and the future? 2 Is he prepared to agree to it? 3 Will the community buy it? Kittybrewster ☎ 02:03, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  I don't want to weigh in on whether or not he should be topic banned at this point, but I do want to say that I would be happy to try to help Richard work within our approach to copyright. Particularly in images, he's done some excellent work finding rare and usable materials and getting them online, and it would be great to keep him as a productive contributor. I can also draft some suggestions for how he could help with the CCI, since this is going to consume a lot of time from other volunteers. I don't have time to monitor or work with him closely, though; I am only able to work on Wikipedia as a volunteer generally for an hour or so in the mornings and weekends at this point, and I'm trying to keep up at WP:CP as well as pitching in at WP:CCI. Prior experience mentoring prolific contributors with similar issues suggests it can take quite a bit of time. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:46, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose both measures as extremely premature. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:25, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• Comment towards Richard - Massive copyvios, image issues, refusal to acknowledge the issue... this could be you. In fact, if you don't bust your ass to fix this, it probably will be. Sven Manguard Wha? 03:44, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• General question about WP:CCI. For example near the top there I found Wikipedia:Contributor copyright investigations/Epeefleche, right next to the one for RAN, in the other column. The investigation appears pretty old and rather stalled. But the user in question seems to be happily editing elsewhere. Is this how CCI usually works? ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 03:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Editors who have been subject to a CCI and are not blocked are informally "on probation" (so to speak), any more copyvios will typically result in an indef block. The stalled investigation is a direct consequence of the lack of manpower in this area. MER-C 08:31, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Seconding this. There are a few cases where editors were blocked at or just before the CCI started, but it is separate from the CCI process which is only about cleaning up past mistakes. They've either been blocked by consensus at AN or ANI or by ordinary admin intervention. I have blocked several editors who continued violating copyright policies after the CCI began, as by this point people are well informed of the issues. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:50, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• Comment even as we speak Richard's belligerent I know best attitude continues. [56]. LibStar (talk) 06:32, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I would just like to point out the Libstar is not the most objective person. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elbert Adrian Brinckerhoff and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Charles William Floyd Coffin and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mayor of Englewood, New Jersey and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Davis Ticknor (New Jersey) and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Krebs Pigments and Chemical Company where he was nominating almost every new article I created over a short period a few weeks ago. All were kept with almost total support. I would like to think that he is objective, but he appears to have some antipathy toward me that leads him to harass me with nominations like these. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 23:08, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Like I say there, two people deciding the best name for an article. One has the power to block the other, the one with blocking power always wins. That isn't community consensus, or winning the argument by force-of-logic, it is winning the argument with overwhelming force. If the rule is we should be using WP:RM for moves, then set an example by using it too, when you do not like the name of an article I created. Editors respect other editors that follow the rules they are enforcing. The examples there are well documented. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 15:52, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  When did he rename an article you created, RAN? Kittybrewster ☎ 16:49, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

  Lib, anyone paying a little attention knows you loathe RAN. E.g., User_talk:Richard_Arthur_Norton_(1958-_)#Barnstar. So its comical to see your glee in this thread.--Milowent • ^hasspoken 13:15, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

• This thread should come to a definite result. So far four editors appear to support a topic ban while one is opposed. The situation can't go on forever as it is now, with the copyright people struggling to keep up with RAN as he creates more problems. RAN has made no concessions, criticizes those who see a need for cleanup, and seems oblivious to the damage done. One editor, User:ASCIIn2Bme has opposed a topic ban as extremely premature. I hope he will explain what further steps have to occur before the situation becomes mature. EdJohnston (talk) 17:23, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support topic ban until, with RAN's assistance in rewriting, the whole mess of his CCI is cleaned up, and he then understands the line between copyvio and non-copyvio and commits not to make further copyvio contributions. Calliopejen1 (talk) 17:42, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose any form of ban. In various recent edits including to this board RAN has clearly conceded there have been issues, displayed a good understanding of what he need to do to avoid further infringements, and said he is willing to help with clean up efforts. The mutliple comments in denial of this blatant fact seem a little surreal, to put it politely. Suggest closing down this whole thread and giving him time to consider whether he wants to actively assist with the CCI or just help with individual articles as others point out the need. RAN is far too excellent an editor for us to risk losing by not showing due consideration and respect. FeydHuxtable (talk) 18:34, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
  • "said he is willing to help with clean up efforts." He only came here after being threatened with an indef block, and hasn't helped in cleaning up the problems one single bit so far. All he has done is recreate copyvio-free versions of pages that have already been deleted or blanked: this doesn't remove a single copyright violation he created: finding and removing these is left to others. He doesn't even suggest to help with this, or ask how he can be of use in the CCI, he only paid some lipservice to not continuing the problems. Whether he is an excellent editor or not is debatable, he certainly is one of the most prolific and good at finding sources; but that doesn't excuse the five or six years of continued copyright violations, even after this was repeatedly pointed out to him in the past; and neither does it excuse his total inactivity in the correction of these problems. I have another suggestion: we indef block him until he decides that "he wants to actively assist with the CCI"; if he decides that he doesn't even want to that, he has no place here. How about him showing a little bit of respect for our policies, and helping out with solving problems he created without the need to apply extreme pressure like blocks? What is there to consider for him? Fram (talk) 19:54, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

I came here when you wrote on my page you were going to block me for making the corrections asked of me. You were using the fact that I was correcting articles as evidence of some sort of bad faith. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 00:07, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• • Feyd would have us believe Richard is some babe-in-the-woods who made an innocent mistake. That is obviously not the case. The more experienced an editor is, the more they are expected to be aware of important policies like those on copyright infringement. This has been going on for years and involves thousands of articles that will now need to be checked and scrubbed or deleted. That is not ok, and a user who created such a huge problem should not be treated with kid gloves. The topic ban would obviously serve a preventative purpose as it would stop him form continuing to create infringing articles as he obviously either does not understand or does not care about WP policy on copyright. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:04, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

When did it become a "huge problem"? I have agreed to rewrite the 6 instances pointed out to me, out of almost 120,000 edits. I agreed that the timeline should be removed, and that I should cut down an fair use content, and put in quotes anything that is 100% unchanged from the source material. As Wikipedia rules on fair-use have changed and been tightened so has my writing style. What would a topic ban serve? --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 00:53, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia's rules on fair-use have not changed or tightened since my note to you last year. Yet you created two articles on 3 November 2011 that were speedily deleted as copyright violations. The comparison text is included in collapse box above; I'm not sure how to perceive that as changing and tightening your writing style. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 01:29, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Well said. It is RANs attitude that makes it necessary to impose a topic ban. He is unwilling to even admit that he has been simply ignoring copyright policy despite the fact that he has been aware of it for years and has been advised specifically about it before. Asking him not to ignore the policy clearly didn't work, he won't even admit that is what happened, so a topic ban is the next logical step. If the message still doesn't get through then its time for a block. Hopefully nobody (besides Feyd) is fooled by his innocent/ignorant routine, which falls in the realm of WP:BALLS. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:41, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support a topic ban. The fact that this has been pointed out to RAN before and yet he continued to violate copyright makes this a lay-down case, in my view. That he continued to create copyright violations after earlier warnings demonstrates that he either completely disregards copyright policies or that he does not have the competence to comply with them. Either is more than a good enough reason for a topic ban of this kind. --Mkativerata (talk) 20:09, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• I would reluctantly support a topic ban for this editor. He has been around a long time and knows Wiki policies very well. The copyright abuses are staggering and shocking. Topic ban him until we can trust him. 140.247.141.165 (talk) 21:38, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• The copyright investigation has not investigated much. It also started on November 8. What other copyright violations has RAN made since then? In Epeefleche case, the investigation started roughly a year ago, and still has not made much progress either. I don't see what's the pressing emergency here. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 23:17, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• Call it topic ban if you wish but at least informally, it should be made clear that RAN's sole priority should be cleaning up his mess. So yes, I want RAN to avoid any page move. Not because he can't make one without creating conflict but because he should be working on the much more serious, much more pressing issue of the copyright violations. I frankly find it quite annoying that RAN's contribution to the AN thread is so focused on the page moves issue. If this thread was about page moves it would be on RAN's talk page, not on the administrator's noticeboard. Pichpich (talk) 23:11, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• I greatly appreciate and respect the time and energy RAN has put into this project, and have no doubt that many of his additions to the 'pedia are fully within policy. However, priority #1 has to be analysis of existing content for copyright compliance; allowing more content to be added while the existing concerns remain unaddressed is simply unacceptable. As such, I absolutely support a topic ban on content addition until the CCI is complete. In the meantime, let's leave him unblocked to allow him to revert vandalism, add supporting RS references, correct errors, and (ideally) help resolve the CCI himself. Once the CCI is complete, then this prolific editor can return to work adding content, with an improved appreciation of the copyright policies we all must adhere to. 28bytes (talk) 23:44, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support a temporary topic ban on new uploads/new content creation (if RAN's in a copyvio hole, then he needs to stop digging—or even risking accidental digging), but also firmly support RAN remaining unblocked as long as he's cleaning up the copyright messes he's made. WhatamIdoing (talk) 23:54, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
• support topic ban and one month block in light of the far from satisfactory responses from Richard on this issue, and his continuing attitude to even concede wrongdoing. An enforced wikibreak is essential to make sure Richard understands the gravity of the issues. Lastly, this is the very last chance for Richard, further violations should be immediate indef block. LibStar (talk) 00:09, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

I would just like to point out the Libstar is not the most objective person. See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Elbert Adrian Brinckerhoff and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Charles William Floyd Coffin and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Mayor of Englewood, New Jersey and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/William Davis Ticknor (New Jersey) and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Krebs Pigments and Chemical Company where he was nominating almost every new article I created over a short period a few weeks ago. All were kept with almost total support. I would like to think that he is objective, but he appears to have some antipathy toward me. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 00:43, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Richard, this ANI is about you not me. could you please advise others if you have deliberately flouted copyright rules for WP. and that you have done this despite repeated warnings? And in doing so, would you be willing to cease all such violations in future and respect warnings from other editors for future transgressions if they occur? still waiting if you'll actually reply or just ignore? LibStar (talk) 00:58, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

As proposer of the topic ban I must say I don't see any point to heaping a one month block on top of it. The goal of the topic ban would be to stop the problematic edits, so no purpose would be served by blocking as well. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:00, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

agreed, I've changed my statement. LibStar (talk) 01:49, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support topic ban. MER-C 02:22, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

As people point out things that need to be worded differently to avoid copyright infringement, I am making the changes. Please continue to point out things that you feel are too close to the source document and I will change the wording. Some sources that on first assumption appear to be public domain by age, or by government creation and not eligible for copyright protection, or seemed like uncopyrightable facts, can be incorrect on my first look and closer scrutiny is always welcome. I will be more careful to paraphrase and cut down on long quotes or enclose them in quotation marks. I will also work to use more sources per article, a single source, even when paraphrased and reworded can still have the same look-and-feel as the original material. Most obituaries are a chronological list of facts and even when reworded will still retain the same look-and-feel, unless disparate sources are combined. I have made over 120,000 edits and so far 8 edits have been pointed out to me and corrected as quickly as possible. Banning me from creating new articles will just end the collaboration with the Library of Congress. After the page move controversy I stopped editing which only resulted in no public domain images from the LOC going into articles by me, and no new entries for those people in the images. Even the best editors can disagree to what is an infringement, for instance Fram says that writing: "One of the largest food recalls in United States history." and "one of the largest food recalls in the nation’s history". doesn't fall into the non-copyrightable fact category. Good editors will disagree. If it was clear-cut a bot could determine what is an infringement and what isn't, and what is fair-use of attributed text and what isn't fair-use. If Fram was correct [https://www.google.com/search?gcx=c&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&q=%22one+of+the+largest+food+recalls+in+the+nation%E2%80%99s+history%22%22 then 3,659 of the 3,660 instances online would be an infringement. -Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 08:06, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

We should also be deeply concerned with the quality of your prose if you incorporate public domain material wholesale, or paraphrase sentence by sentence and closely borrow. Many, if not most, of your articles will need to be rewritten from scratch to survive the rigorously requirements for encyclopaedia quality at FA or A classes. Close paraphrase has been considered a knock back issue at Military History A class for some time now, and the duplication of "look-and-feel" and the absence of disparate sourcing are deep quality concerns for any article you've touched. Fifelfoo (talk) 08:35, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

That RAN isn't writing class FA or A articles isn't really something to be deeply concerned about at this time in my opinion. Direct quotes from cited public-domain sources is, I think, not a copyright problem (though feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). Hobit (talk) 22:26, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

Close paraphrase and structural paraphrase amount to plagiarism—even when the text is Public Domain; a misconduct against the encyclopaedic process but not against copyright law. Similarly large scale quotation to the point of structural significance, even when the original work is PD, approaches plagiarism. Close and structural paraphrase can also amount to copyright abuse, but my concern here is to note that the behaviour demonstrated has impacts on the encyclopaedic project beyond copyright. Fifelfoo (talk) 22:38, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

You may note that Wikipedia migrated the entire Congressional Biographical Directory over as well as the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica at points in the past. If people are presenting those sources as their own thoughts then that is plagiarism. If the citation template is used then Wikipedia is not offering it as original writing and it is not plagiarism. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:25, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

"use or close imitation of the language and thoughts of another author and the representation of them as one's own original work" is a pretty standard definition of plagiarism. If he's not citing the source, I agree we have a plagiarism situation. But if he is citing the public domain source and using a close paraphrase, that is neither an issue of copyright violation or plagiarism (as it is commonly defined). I think doing so is certainly non-ideal (better to quote directly and make it clear if the PD source's style is to be used), but again we don't chastise people for close paraphrase in the case (AFAIK). Hobit (talk) 03:41, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Hobit that's incorrect. When something isn't a word for word copy you do enter into a subjective realm in which someone has to determine whether or not it is plagiarism based on how close it is. However, the fact that something is cited has no bearing on that. Plagiarism is about not crediting another author for how they presented something in written form and not about the substance of what they presented. At the college level, for instance, we consider it plagiarism even if the student cited the source. Now if they did, we often also feel that they may not understand what plagiarism is or what our policies are in regards to plagiarism (resulting often in warnings), but it is still plagiarism. Cheers.Griswaldo (talk) 23:38, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

• Question for Moonriddengirl Do you support a topic ban? Kittybrewster ☎ 11:40, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• I know I'm slow, but I have not yet completely decided. :) If called to commit now, after his puzzling statement yesterday that he has evolved to address changes to fair use policy when he had not addressed a problem pointed out clearly to him almost a year ago, I would say I do support a topic ban. This is particularly the case because fair use policy has been stable as regards these issues for years and Richard has been notified by both bots and people of our policies regarding text since 2006. It leads me to worry that he either does not understand the problem or is not as open to correcting his behavior as he sounds. :/ Too, the fact that he has thus far resisted bringing his own work up to standards concerns me. The reason we have CCIs that have been open for over a year is that we have a very few people working them; it is time consuming to clean up behind copyright problems in the best case. With dead links and print sources (we've already found copying from one book) as well as dubious sourcing (such as this, although I'm unsure whether those are inappropriate links or actual sources) or no sourcing at all (such as this), this is not the best case. This one is going to take a while. Willingness on Richard's part to proactively and responsibly clean up after himself (rather than waiting for other contributors to sort out for him when he did it wrong) would certainly be a big show of good faith. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:59, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Sigh. I'm going to stop waffling. Yes, without some compelling reason to reconsider, I support a topic ban. Although I am still convinced that Richard has a lot to offer, at this point I am concerned that he either does not understand or does not respect our copyright policies. As Rob points out, some time working to clean up these issues will make sure that he has no misunderstandings moving forward. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 13:14, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Richard and I are talking via email about cleanup processes in CCI. Moving back to neutral pending outcome of that conversation. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 20:40, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Neutral per MRG.. Kittybrewster ☎ 20:45, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support the topic ban. Richard doesn't seem to acknowledge or understand the seriousness of the issue, at least not well enough to be proactive in addressing it. He has stated a willingness (of sorts) to assist; a topic ban allows him to focus his efforts on the CCI, while not foreclosing the possibility that he may return to normal editing in the future. Nathan ^T 19:20, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support the topic ban, but if and only if it's just until the copyright investigation is over. If someone continually causes a lot of work for other users, they really should be obligated to help clean up the mess rather than continue to go on their way. But further action should only be needed if there's continual flouting of copyright guidelines. Until there are more clear terms as to what this topic ban would consist of, I really don't feel comfortable supporting or opposing anything.--Yaksar (let's chat) 21:58, 11 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose I think this is way too open-ended. If it had a clear means of ending the ban (who decides when it's all cleaned up?) I might be okay with it (depending on the who/method). I've looked over the problems and only seen a handful that are really troubling. That's not an excuse, but I do (currently) think this is being blown out of proportion. A serious problem yes. And if there are significant problems again, a full ban might be reasonable. But for now, as long as RAN focuses on cleaning things up, I'm fine. Hobit (talk) 03:47, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support Either we support the CCI team, or we don't. Telling a bunch of volunteers that they need to suck it up for an editor who was indef blocked in 2006 for copyright violations would be telling the CCI crowd that we do not value them or their work. Johnuniq (talk) 06:48, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
• I was looking at the this with a view to close it, but I thought it might be better to comment. I do Support a topic ban, but similarly to Hobit, I would feel uncomfortable with the open-endedness of the ban as is. I would suggest that if Moonriddengirl can create the "schedule of work" or a "task list" that she would expect from an editor who is in good faith trying to clear up the mess. If RAN shows that he is then following that schedule, I would have no problem with him appealing the topic ban. Worm^TT · (talk) 07:12, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• That's a good point, given that CCIs can remain open for quite some time. This weekend I hope to get some time to look through Richard's CCI more deeply, and that may help determine the best ways that Richard could contribute. I already know that one of the best things he could do is identify when he copied content from one article to another. His attribution habits there have in the past been haphazard. Sometimes he has mentioned the copying and sometimes not. If he could look at the articles in the list and determine when content has been copied from another article, making sure that attribution issues are repaired, he would save reviewers the needless work of evaluating those edits (like this) for copyright problems as well as honoring his contract with other users to attribute their text (which is not public domain, of course). While copyright violation policy permits for blocking users until they identify the sources from which they've copied, I don't really think that's a reasonable request in a case like this, because I think that there's very little chance Richard would know what source he copied from in 2006. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:32, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Oppose  If RAN won't cooperate with Moonriddengirl, then Moodriddengirl should make a proposal.  The current proposal doesn't seem to be results oriented.  Unscintillating (talk) 08:39, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
• SUpport topic ban. RAN has caused a massive problem and is being coy when confronted with it. A topic ban to stop the disruption is appropriate. Reyk _YO! 10:04, 12 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose This seems to be blatant harassment of a good faith editor. Warden (talk) 10:49, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

good faith?continually violating copyvio despite repeated warnings is not good faith. LibStar (talk) 13:42, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

After seeing your very aggressive confrontation with Richard on his talk page, and given your long history of conflict with him over bilateral relations deletions nominations, in which you proudly tout barnstars awarded for deletionist efforts in this department on your user page, I don't think that you are an objective voice to speak on Richard's good faith or lack thereof, LibStar. You are a long term philosophical opponent of his. Carrite (talk) 06:06, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

• Going through 6,500 + articles could take RAN years if his heart isnt in it. If hes not allowed to do the work he loves until the CCI is finished, he'll very likely just leave. Wikipedia isnt the only project competing for the services of talented content creators like RAN. There are plenty of other projects where anyone is free to create content, many of them give more authorial independence than we do and even allow one to earn an appreciable revenue stream. (Albeit youre doing less of public service contributing to the other projects as they have less readers). Granted, RAN was slow to recognize copyright concerns, but now he's clearly done so , its seems best not to risk a ban. If there are any new clear transgressions of the sort MRG detailed above, then of course he can be topic banned or even perma-banned - please dont think anyone here is denying that copyright concerns are serious. For now he should be left to help with the CCI at his own discretion. The loss of an editing titan like RAN would be equivalent to the deletion of hundreds of GA class articles, please lets not risk it! FeydHuxtable (talk) 11:45, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

"The loss of an editing titan like RAN would be equivalent to the deletion of hundreds of GA class articles" what a ridiculous assertion. Continual copy violation destroys the integrity of WP. LibStar (talk) 13:42, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Feyd, may I ask why you think Richard has no responsibility to ensure that content he has added is legally usable under our licenses? I am encouraged by Richard's more recent comments here (the one you linked above doesn't reassure me much considering that he followed it up by claiming that he had altered his practices to meet changing fair use standards when (a) fair use standards for text have been stable for years and (b) he demonstrably had not), but I don't really understand the position that others should have to do this work with his helping if he feels like it. Helping to clean up from copyright problems isn't some kind of punishment; it protects the project, our articles, our reusers and other editors from issues that arise when copyrighted content has been introduced to our work. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:23, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Sure, actually I do think the most ethical choice is for RAN to actively cooperate with the CCI to whatever extent you're happy with. But thats just me, no one has the exactly the same ethics. What Im against is RAN being banned from the work he loves doing until hes completed what could be a very lengthy and arduous CCI. There's some grey issues here that Im going to send you a quick email about, as it might be problematic if I write frankly on here. FeydHuxtable (talk) 12:38, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Okay. I'll look for it in a bit. I'm glad you mentioned it, as I don't typically check that email very often. :) --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 12:52, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

• Support the view that RAN needs to clean up the problem he created. Whether an outright ban on creating new articles is necessary depends on RAN's response. His statements that he'll only look into problems if someone else goes to the trouble of identifying them are inadequate. He needs to be proactive about reviewing his own contributions and bringing them into compliance. If he refuses then he is more of a liability to the project than an asset.   Will Beback  talk  22:00, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support topic ban until we can verify that RAN isn't going to create any more copyright violations. There are far more problematic articles than he's indicating here and it will likely take years to find all of them. The least we can do is ensure that no more are added. Hut 8.5 00:19, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support, painfully obvious that there's a problem that needs to be rectified. Once it is, the ban can always be lifted. Wizardman _{Operation Big Bear} 23:43, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support, per Wizardman and the fact that the people at WP:CCI do an utterly thankless job and really need to be supported. Black Kite (t) 23:47, 13 November 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose - Honest content creator getting a deletionist kneecapping, as nearly as I can tell. Cherry picking a line or two out of a massive edit history does not prove an ongoing problem, still less provide justification for a topic ban. Carrite (talk) 05:56, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

See, this I just don't get. I can see why you might think that people are being overly reactionary because of some deletionist scheme (obviously this isn't true, but it's possible to think that way). But the idea that, because RAN is a so-called "inclusionist", people should rush to defend him and act as though a copyright issue brought up by an editor with basically no stake in AfDs is not an issue at all seems absurd to me.--Yaksar (let's chat) 07:03, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

This is not a small isolated problem of a handful of articles. I spent an hour poking around at the CCI and despite no previous familiarity with RAN's editing history found four copyright violations. Nor was the problem confined to edits made by RAN years ago, he created two copyright violations less than a fortnight ago. Hut 8.5 09:09, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Close please

Looks like we have a pretty firm consensus here. As proposer it would be inappropriate for me to do the close, if an uninvolved admin or other user could step in close it, and inform RAN of the result that would be great. Beeblebrox (talk) 19:29, 11 November 2011 (UTC)

• There is no firm consensus here - just a typical ANI lynch mob. Please take the matter to RFC/U if it seems to warrant more attention. Warden (talk) 10:49, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

really despite a long record of copy violation and ignorance of several attempts by several editors to correct Richard, one should not be examined in a ANI? consensus seems pretty strong here. LibStar (talk) 13:46, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Quite so Colonel, this is starting to look like a witchhunt. FeydHuxtable (talk) 11:45, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm going to disagree. There are serious problems where large blocks of text were copied with minimal changes. These need to be fixed and RAN should be helping, both to identify problems and to fix them. I do think you made a good point that an article creation ban might push RAN away. And, as noted above, I think that the CCI process is too open-ended to base a topic-ban on. But it's not a "witch-hunt" if there is an actual and serious problem. Hobit (talk) 13:15, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Your opinion has weight Hobit, but our article on witch-hunt says, "The term 'witch-hunt' since the 1930s has also been in use as a metaphor to refer to moral panics in general (frantic persecution of perceived enemies)."  RAN has long reported being Wikihounded.  Unscintillating (talk) 14:33, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Name-calling against either "side" isn't helpful. We have a fairly large number of opinions; it would be useful to have need someone else offer an opinion about what the balance of those opinions is. This is a standard process. Saying that the other "side" is engaging in a witch hunt is not only unhelpful, it's going to convince the closer that the name-caller believes his "side" is the losing side. WhatamIdoing (talk) 20:59, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I am already going through my articles and repairing article splits with the newest template, and I am changing wording that is too close to the original or uses too long of a quote. I can see that my earliest articles made some errors where I treated information from quasi-governmental agencies as de facto PD-US-gov where the question is still open to debate. I am removing larger quotes from those articles or enclosing them in quotation marks. If you want you can look at my most current style of writing such as Krebs Pigments and Chemical Company or Mayor of Englewood, New Jersey. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 21:15, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

Richard, I just want to be clear for everyone: will you commit to help with evaluating the CCI and to collaborating to correct issues either with older articles or with your practices? If you will, again, I would think this a very encouraging sign of good faith, and I would support your being able to also work in other areas while you do so as I can understand that being restricted to working only on this might be demotivational. What is most important to me here is that any outstanding issues be cleaned and that we make sure that all processes and practices are clear so that you can continue contributing without future concerns. I'm happy to that end to work with you if you have questions or concerns. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 23:48, 12 November 2011 (UTC)

I think a future topic ban appeal with copyvio cleanup diffs of (say) 75 articles would have some legs. MER-C 04:19, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I puzzled as to why the ARS crowd is coming out to support someone who is a serial copyright violator. Don't see the connection, but thanks for the typically overblown hyperbole. Beeblebrox (talk) 06:26, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Yep the ARS use the same tactic of "no consensus" to avoid action against their friend Richard. The case for " oppose" topic ban is very weak indeed. LibStar (talk) 13:57, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I agreed to look over my articles starting with the earliest ones. I have been editing previous articles and reading ones I have created in the past, look at my contributions page. Of the over 5,000 articles I have created and 120,000 edits we have found 8 instances in the week of having a dozen people search. In those cases I worded too closely to the original attributed source, or used more text as fair-use in quotations than other people would have used, or I applied "pd-usgov" standards to quasi-governmental organizations that may not be eligible for the "pd-usgov" exemption to copyright. I think if you were to go over any contributor from Wikipedia authors you find a similar ratio, especially looking at early articles before Wikipedia policy was codified. When I first contributed there were no citation templates and no references in almost every article on Wikipedia until the Wikipedia biography controversy of late 2005. Fram sees the world in black and white, but the issue of properly attributed fair-use v. copyright infringement is mostly composed of greys. Fram deleted an entire biography because I wrote: "He founded the American Polar Society for people involved or interested in polar exploration and research." using the properly attributed source: "Mr. Howard was a public affairs officer of the National Council of Boy Scouts of America from 1928 to 1970 ... In 1934, Mr. Howard founded the American Polar Society as a forum for people involved or interested in polar exploration and research." The proper thing to do you would have been to put the phrase "involved or interested" in quotations. I even provided the exact phrase in the "quote=" section of the citation, that is how Fram was able to compare it. This is what User:Edison has been pointing out to Fram, that simple editorial work is better than the nuclear-option of deleting an entire biography over a perceived copyright violation. Fram also finds fault with: "One of the largest food recalls in United States history." as a violation of the source which uses: "one of the largest food recalls in the nation’s history". There are 6,600 uses of the exact phrase: "one of the largest food recalls in the nation’s history" indexed by Google with 14 appearing in GNews. If it is an infringement it is being performed by 6,599 people, if one of those people using it is considered a copyright holder. Remember, you cannot copyright a fact, that has been held up by all United States Courts. The only exemption I can think of is Barclays v. TheFlyOnTheWall.com --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 18:49, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Richard, I don't think a dozen people have been searching your contributions for a week. I have myself put no more than an hour into your CCI so far, as I haven't had time. And it can take an hour to review a single article when the history is complex and particularly when you have copied from print sources. But I'm appalled to hear you continuing to defend your practices: "I think if you were to go over any contributor from Wikipedia authors you find a similar ratio, especially looking at early articles before Wikipedia policy was codified." Wikipedia's policies have been codified for years. You violated our copyright policies 10 days ago. That your defense completely ignores the considerably more extensive content you took at the same time from this clearly copyright source leads me to believe that you are still attempting to deny the seriousness of concerns. --Moonriddengirl ^(talk) 19:17, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

I am not denying that copyright violations are serious nor am I defending them. They are always bad and should always be reworded or removed. I have agreed to look over every article I contributed to. I am just pointing out examples where Fram sees black and white, and others see gray. I also believe that stubifying an article down to the lede, and keeping the categories and birth dates, is better than deleting the entire article when copyrighted material is found in the article. And I do think a dozen people have been looking though my articles based on changes in my watchlist. --Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ) (talk) 20:39, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

There's apparently some misunderstanding about why I discussed the "food recall" example earlier in this thread, and seeing all the confusion about it, I should beter not have used it. I didn't introduce it as being a severe example of copyvio (there are much better ones to be found in the CCI articles), but as an indication of how I didn't feel that Richard Arthur Norton was really taking this seriously. If I would be involved in a CCI and discussion about blocks or topic bans, I wouldn't edit an article in such a way that the one line of text I added (it can't even be called a sentence) was taken nearly literally from a copyrighted source, even when there aren't many ways to state the same thing. I would have done my utmost to stay as far away from copying text as possible, while Richard Arthur Norton apparently tested the limits of what was acceptable. Anyway, as I said, I shouldn't have used that example, since it muddied the waters and is apparently now used as a reason to cast doubt on the whole of the copyright violation issue[57], which is obviously nonsense. The deleted articles were pure copyright violations, not attribution errors or minor subsentence copies. Fram (talk) 21:49, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

• Question.: key components of a topic ban should include both the exact scope of the ban and, crucially, the expectations placed on the subject editor to successfully have their topic ban lifted. I read 3 different proposed topic areas above: new article creation; new image uploads; and page moves. The arguments and support/oppose indications above are more or less strong for temporary bans in each of those areas, but I'm not clear on the path forward for the subject editor. How will they successfully demonstrate recognition of the problems if a community topic ban is enacted? Franamax (talk) 02:06, 14 November 2011 (UTC)
  • I'm not too worried about the page moves, to be honest. I think it's a little silly that anyone would force him to go to RM on a page he's the sole author of. As best I can tell, most people's concerns here are regarding the copyright issues. A duration of "until the CCI is resolved" is what I'm supporting; if problems recur after that, we can revisit them then. 28bytes (talk) 02:29, 14 November 2011 (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.

AfD needs closing

WP:Articles for deletion/Azarbaijani Kurds was first nominated on 19 Oct. Because it wasn't initially listed on the logs, it stayed for a while; it's now been over a week since it was listed on the daily logs. Would some uninvolved admin please put that discussion out of its misery? LadyofShalott 00:00, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

Oddly enough, there's still a debate going on, and the article has been moved around a couple of times, and only today we saw some sourced improvements. Maybe leave it open for a little longer? It seems it has attracted some editorial attention after this notice here. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 01:03, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

On the other hand, the recently added references don't support the text cited, so I don't think the article got any better. ASCIIn2Bme (talk) 01:20, 13 November 2011 (UTC)

We're pushing a month that it's been open, and well past the needed seven days since it's been on a daily log. Somebody please close this mess. LadyofShalott 11:21, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done I've closed it and await the inevitable complaints. Number 57 11:44, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Thank you!! LadyofShalott 13:05, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Close request

Resolved

Could someone close Wikipedia:Files for deletion/2011 November 4#File:Lenna.png? Thanks, 28bytes (talk) 18:18, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Closed as keep. --RL0919 (talk) 18:51, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! 28bytes (talk) 18:52, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Ditto

Talk:C._S._Lewis#Nationality_RFC. --FormerIP (talk) 21:01, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Election administrators needed for WP:ACE2011

Three election administrators are needed who are Wikimedia Foundation-identified editors who can oversee the election, including the SecurePoll voting system. Anyone who is interested, please indicate below. This can include any of the functionaries or any of the WMF-identified WP:OTRS volunteers, but this does not apply to any current arbitrators or ArbCom clerks.

Anyone interested in being an election administrator should please indicate so at Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011/Coordination#Election administrators. –MuZemike 17:33, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Bubblegumcrunch

Resolved

• Bubblegumcrunch (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I blocked this user per an SPI report (see #What is the next step after sockpuppetting has been confirmed? above) and struck their sock's !votes from Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Chancellorpink. Shortly thereafter, I began receiving email messages to which I replied on their talkpage.[58] Now that the AfD has been closed as delete, the user has posted a message filled with personal attacks against the deleting admin. My message warning them about NPA was responded to with a message that could be considered legal threats. As I am the blocking admin, and have been involved in discussion with them, I ask for another admin to please take a look at the situation. Thanks ​—DoRD (talk)​ 17:19, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

• Update: The legal threat has now been removed[59]. ​—DoRD (talk)​ 17:32, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Ugh, what a misguided WP:SOAP/WP:NPA (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 17:44, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Reading their talkpage right now is a bit of a chuckle. Wikipedia will not miss this person. --Jayron32 20:12, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Note that the User has self-identified as the artist's manager. The Mark of the Beast (talk) 01:25, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Would someone uninvolved mind removing talk page and email access?--v/r - TP 02:59, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Done, complete with a hat for the rant. If he can calm down and make rational points... well, he'll likely still be shot down due to the sockpuppetry and the COI. But we'll see. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 03:52, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Relist an AFD for me?

Resolved

Could I have a relist on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Olivia Scott? It appears to have been omitted from the AFD log, and I commented on it without checking. Thanks, UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 14:53, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Done.--v/r - TP 03:03, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 13:03, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Advice for Rjmains

Could someone please write up a short response to User:Rjmains for me? This user wrote an article that I speedied as a copyvio; he now says on his talk page that it wasn't a copyvio because he's a client of the copyright holder that's been hired to manage the social media relating to the article's subject, which is itself the copyright holder. I've pointed him to WP:OWN and WP:COI (due to those issues, I've not addressed WP:IOWN), but I need to get to work, so I didn't have time to give a fuller response. Please reply here: I told him that I didn't have time and that I was going to ask someone else to make a fuller response, instructing him to come here to look for the response. Nyttend (talk) 12:22, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Rjmains needs to have the actual owner of the copyright file an OTRS in accordance with the instructions at WP:Donating copyrighted materials or (assuming that this is Web material—from somewhere on this site, perhaps?) replace the "©2011 Jerusalem Prayer Team" on the site with a notice that releases the material under a WP-compatible license. That said, such material usually is not written in an encyclopedic manner and lacks references; so Rjmains would do better to write the article in his or her own words, as an encyclopedia article rather than a puff piece, and include references to third-party sources, both to establish notability and to satisfy WP:V. Not being an admin, I can't see the deleted article in question, but that's my advice. Deor (talk) 13:05, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

It occurs to me that I should add that the actual copyright holder needs to be completely aware of exactly what releasing the material for WP purposes, whether via OTRS or via a CC or GNU license on the Web site, entails—basically, anyone can alter and reuse the material in any way, for any purpose, without the copyright holder's having any recourse if he or she doesn't like the use to which the material is put. Deor (talk) 13:44, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Yourname LTA

I would like someone to help me create a long-term abuse report for User:Yourname, a vandal who has been blocked since April 2009 and in recent days has resurfaced on a botnet using many different IPs. His trademark: A suicide note with text as follows: "HELP ME I FEEL LIKE IM GOING TO KILL MYSELF". One IP vandalized my talk page today, causing it to be protected. On ANI, there is a discussion about a ban being placed on this user, which was thought of by User:Jasper Deng. (I was the one who thought of filing the LTA report)--1966batfan (talk) 21:26, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Or we could ignore him and not glorify him.—Ryulong (竜龙) 21:54, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Has any one notified emergency@ per Wikipedia:SUICIDE#Treat_all_claims_seriously ? ~Alison C. (aka Crazytales) 01:11, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

That would really be a waste of everyone's time. Open proxies used by known trolls threatening to kill themselves and sue Wikipedia at the same time should not be taken seriously. An LTA report won't do much either, other than give the recognition he's seeking. Most IPs are open proxies, please just get them checked after they've been and gone. Then ignore it as Ryulong suggests. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 09:29, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Emergency has been notified. --Maggie Dennis (WMF) (talk) 19:51, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Please help me

Hi.I am not opposer of any government, or any ethnic, I only had to show here [60] Human rights violations in Iran accoring to reliable sources, but User:Kansas Bear and probable sockpuppet User:In fact[61] has accused me as opposer of Iran's government[62], I was furious about this unfounded claim and here[63] I accused User:Alborz Fallah as an agent of Iran's government but I deleted it soon, but they want admins to block my account.User:Kurdo777 has already accused me as ultra-nationalist here [64], because I wanted to show his accusations are non-sense and materials of this article are historical realty, not showing enemity to other ethnics,I was forced to rename that article, and it was deleted.With Respect--Orartu (talk) 19:26, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

SAQ-related merge discussion needs closing

Two articles relating to the Shakespeare authorship question are:

• Oxfordian Theory – Parallels with Shakespeare's Plays (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)
• Oxfordian theory of Shakespeare authorship (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

Would someone please close the discussion here which asks whether the first above article should be merged with the second (the poll mentions Oxfordian Theory which is a redirect to the second article above). The SAQ issue was the subject of an ArbCom case, see the final decision. Johnuniq (talk) 22:59, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Histmerge needs fixing

Can somebody move Africa/North Africa to North Africa? User:Graham87 did a histmerge but apparently something weird happened. (see move log) thanks Tachfin (talk) 23:54, 16 November 2011 (UTC)

Why? Graham87 already has done everything that needs to be done. Look at the page history for North Africa (which shows Graham moving the page, then reverting the move after completing the history merge). Then look at the second item from the top of the log for Africa/North Africa to confirm (if confirmation was still needed) that the move back you want to be done already has been done: the move log to which you linked shows only page moves from the title "North Africa", not page moves to to the title "North Africa". Then check the page history for "Africa/North Africa". It is simply a redirect to North Africa with four items in the history (the redirect created in 2001, the addition of a "see also" link and its removal, and Graham's importation of an old revision from the Nostalgia wiki). All the "real" page history is at North Africa and there is nothing to fix or to move back. Bencherlite^Talk 00:27, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Tachfin was right; something weird was going on with the title. It was located at North Africa, but the title was still displaying as Africa/North Africa. I made a null edit and the problem went away (at least for me). Someone who understands about caches and server hamsters and such could possibly explain why that works. --Floquenbeam (talk) 00:39, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Strange, I wasn't having that problem but perhaps that's because my ISP pays its server hamsters more than your ISP does.... I left a message on the talk page recommending people bypass their cache if they still have problems. Bencherlite^Talk 00:46, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

In my experience, purging the page always fixes the problem, but the dummy edit worked, too. Graham87 00:58, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for explaining. Tachfin (talk) 01:05, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Rangeblock request

Resolved

 – , temporarily, by semiprotecting the target and blocking a few IPs (Tiptoety and myself). However, this is a hopper over proxy/tor servers who will hardly give up that easily. Materialscientist (talk) 05:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I am requesting a rangeblock of 89.185.249.0/24, because 89.185.249.125 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) is block evasion of banned user Yourname (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). The range is not big, and being a DSL service there is no use in blocking the single IP.Jasper Deng (talk) 03:17, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Quick comment: only one IP edited from that range; they edited briefly and gone, and thus might even be a proxy. Thus rangeblock is not warranted. Jasper, it is easy to find the IPs/accounts of that editor. If I were you, I would make a list so that we could see the whole picture and (maybe with a little help from CU :) find the best option. Materialscientist (talk) 04:09, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

It's not a proxy (I checked, and even sent an HTTP request to it), and this guy hops around a lot.Jasper Deng (talk) 04:12, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

which is why I said about a list. I don't have technical evidence for a proxy - just a hint from geolocation (though I don't remember his past IPs). Materialscientist (talk) 04:19, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

He's a pretty good marker for open proxies, but this one just happens to be regular DSL, though it appears to be static, from what I see from visiting the address' web page.Jasper Deng (talk) 04:23, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't know what you see. I see some server, through which many websites exit as 89.185.249.0/19. The hint comes from nearby IPs in robtex and range contribs - you might recognize 89.185.234.135 there. This might not matter, as he jumped to 109.192.63.185 (talk · contribs), which looks like a tor. A regular proxy maniac. Hold on and semiprotect. Materialscientist (talk) 04:45, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I didn't see it as a proxy, but I'll trust you on that.Jasper Deng (talk) 05:00, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Not really a proxy, a tor. See [65]. Blocked anyway. Materialscientist (talk) 05:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Not a lot of point blocking a /24 in DSL land. They are generally either (semi)-static or from a more substantial pool. Rich Farmbrough, 19:25, 17 November 2011 (UTC).

Arbitration motion regarding Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Climate change

Resolved by motion at Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Amendment that: The Climate change case is supplemented as follows:

The editing restriction described in remedy 16.1 ("Scjessey's voluntary editing restriction") of the Climate change decision is terminated, effective on the passage of this motion.

For the Arbitration Committee, Alexandr Dmitri (talk) 12:54, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Discuss this

Help request: deleting old version of an image

At File:Lot b763 sp-lpc warsaw 111101 1-1-.jpg, a fair use image, I uploaded a smaller version successfully earlier. I came back and tried to delete the original, large image, without removing the original uploader's revision (i.e. to keep the attribution). However it gave the impression that I'd deleted the entire revision. So I tried to undelete it and that failed as it was already undeleted. Now the logs show that I deleted it, and didn't undelete it, but the original large version is still there so I am mighty confused!

See Wikipedia:Non-free content review#File:Lot b763 sp-lpc warsaw 111101 1-1-.jpg for relevant discussion. Thryduulf (talk) 16:02, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

You can't delete a file without deleting the corresponding entry in the file history. Since this image is not the work of the uploader, there's no attribution concerns anyway. T. Canens (talk) 16:10, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Interesting Statistics

I was just fooling around and running some numbers but I think Admins by mainspace percentage Report will be rather eye opening. How far down the list are you? ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 02:00, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Not sure how it was produced, but when I checked the first two entries on the list, the numbers shown disagreed significantly with X!'s edit counter tool. The stats shown indicated 99.682% and 98.867%, while X!'s edit counter says 87.15% and 71.66%. Looks like the article edits are counted the same in both, but this report isn't showing the full number of total edits. --RL0919 (talk) 02:09, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

It pulls the total edit count from the database (user_editcount). Its the same value that you see if you go to your preferences. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 02:12, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

example edit count ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 02:16, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

That's nice, I'm not sure why you find it so interesting though. Is the implication that the admins that aren't high up on the list not being constructive? Because I'll note that a lot of the admins at the bottom half of the list do good work in other namespaces. Sven Manguard Wha? 03:12, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Pfft. That lazy-ass ProcseeBot needs to go write some articles. 28bytes (talk) 03:24, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

It's fairly meaningless. Apart from what Sven said...Some editors prefer writing an almost-ready-GA/FA in a single edit; others make 50 edits just 'wikifying' a tiny stub. My own mainspace-edits-ratio is about 32% [66] because I spend most of my time helping new users on talks. Would it be better if I didn't? After all, I only have 33,000 mainspace edits. If I hadn't been helping users, would that make me a "better" Wikipedian?

Stats can be interesting, but I'm worried some people will misinterpret this completely.  Chzz  ►  04:11, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Despite being rather high up on the list, I do most of my work in big edits or in tiny spellchecks. I'd be higher up if I hadn't done tons of template creation in past years; 'twould seem purely from this page that template edits are also less significant than mainspace edits. Another (smaller) problem with this page, despite what's said above, is the fact that it's technically unable to catch username changes; the person who goes by Department of Redundancy Department has far more mainspace contributions as TravisTX, a username that he's abandoned, according to his userpage. Nyttend (talk) 05:12, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

And I, in addition to my main account, have an alternate account called Od Mishehu AWB, which is mostly a mainspace editor. Adding its edits based on X!'s tool would bring the numbers up to 58390 edits and 28100 mainspace edits, which is around 48.125% - does that make me any better? עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 06:41, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

This is a pretty meaningless statistic. I'm pretty low on the list, but I see that I have some very good company indeed. T. Canens (talk) 07:14, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

I actually pride myself on maintaining a nice even distribution of edits in all the namespaces, while still keeping my mainspace edits above 50%. -- œ^™ 07:26, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

This table is grossly inaccurate, because the "user_editcount" field of the database does not count page moves or other actions that appear in a user's contribution list. The only reason that I'm at place #2 is because I do so many page moves. The only accurate way to make this list would be to count the number of edits in each admin's contribution list. Graham87 08:22, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

Same would appear to be true about the first place - your table says that in all namespaces but the mainspace, Tassedethe has about 1000 edits; however, this user has over 25000 Talk: namespace edits, and over 1000 edits in each of 4 other namespaces. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 09:00, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

The list is inaccurate only because it compares admins to other admins. The percentages are interesting, but the rank is meaningless. Someone has to be at the bottom and someone has to be at the top. If the range of the highest mainspace contributions to the lowest mainspace contributions was equal to the number of ranked admins, than the ranks would be exactly the same even though the percentages would show much higher mainspace contributions by the lower half of the ranks.--v/r - TP 15:16, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

What would be even more interesting would be to scatter-plot % non mainspace against wiki-age of admins. We know that the % of non-content edits has risen massively over the years to the point where it is now somewhere around half (40% I think) of all edits. While it is "all important" on one level, if that energy could be channelled back to content.... Rich Farmbrough, 19:22, 17 November 2011 (UTC).

I can get you that data if you can create the scatterplot. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 19:25, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

The whole list would be a lot more interesting if inactive admins weren't on it. I looked for my name for a few minutes and then gave up. In any event is not a particularly useful metric. Responding to CSD nominations is mainspace work, but if you delete the article nothing will show from it on your edit count. Closing an AFD requires a minimum of one edit to project space, and again if the decision is to delete nothing shows. If the decision is to keep the admin will make one edit to the article to remove the notice, and another to the talk page to add {{oldafdfull}}. So, I don't see this as particularly helpful or illuminating in it's current format. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:35, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

IP needs no talk access

Resolved

 – Materialscientist (talk) 00:50, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

• 31.25.23.98 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log)

No talk page access because this is Yourname (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log).Jasper Deng (talk) 00:41, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Edit filter request backlog

Can some edit filter managers take a look at Wikipedia:Edit filter/Requested?Jasper Deng (talk) 01:27, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

RPP backlog

Yet again, WP:RPP is massively backlogged.Jasper Deng (talk) 03:31, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Oh dear. I've cleared the backlog, for now at least. I'll try to keep a closer eye on it. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 04:11, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Request article block of 완젬스

The following is a quote from 완젬스 found here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Occupy_Wall_Street#Criticism_Section :

"It makes Wikipedia look bad if the temporary agenda we had over-extends the original purpose, in our shaping the article into its future & current form Think of an architect building a tall structure--you put temporary scaffoldings until the article reaches the optimal pov. Then you remove the scaffoldings and now the article is "invisibily pov" through subtle tactics like the direction we took early on, to help set the tone of a very progressive-leaning article which is very facilitative to the OWS movement. I wouldn't be here on this article unless I knew it could make a difference to the readers who need an encyclopedic alternative to the propaganda machines known as cnn, fox, abc, nbc, cbs, new york times, etc..."

This is not a farse because he has made "about 8% of all edits to the OWS article". Probably not quite as much at this point, but the fact remains. I request that this user be blocked from editing the Occupy Wall Street article along with Occupy movement. He has disrupted the talk page with a play-by-play of his facebook exploits and self-righteous rants about how he has done the article good or successfully made it "invisibly pov".--Jacksoncw (talk) 02:00, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

He also frequently edits under the IP 67.77.174.6 for some reason. I don't know why he would do that but thought it deserved mention.--Jacksoncw (talk) 02:43, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Are you accusing me of editing under two accounts? Here and here will exonerate me because I've never edited under my old ip address (except for 6 edits on October 9th while I wasn't signed in, by mistake). I don't like wiki-drama, and this is not pleasant to sit here defending myself, when I'm unable to devote myself to a long drawn-out process of WP:AN, just because you disagree with my politics. 완젬스 (talk) 06:15, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

this also I feel like we're going to have to do some more censuring/white-washing/damage-control on this page after the bad stuff they plan on doing today. What can you do really, but try to dissuade them? 완젬스 (talk) 14:04, 17 November 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.2.81.177 (talk)

@Jacksoncw: What other steps in the dispute resolution process have you attempted before asking for a topic ban? Have you attempted to use any of the other noticeboards such as WP:DRN to get outside opinions and the like? --Jayron32 03:05, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Thanks Jayron32, I helped you out a long time ago in Korean and I'm the one who stood up for you when you were in a tough spot, like the one I'm in today. The only good thing I got from seeing this was remembering your name--you're an excellent admin and I made it my personal mission to reverse your discouragement a couple years ago and empower you to pick yourself back up, dust yourself off, see the situation as just a minor hiccup, and to not let small things dissuade your passion. I honestly don't know what the big deal is behind Jacksoncw's disagreement with me, but I assure you I'm happy to work the problem out with him either on a talk page or on this WP:AN page, if I'm underestimating the seriousness. I will wait to see how this plays out before I start investing the due time & diligence needed to resolve the matter, and clear this problem up, so you admins can quit wasting time on WP:AN and go back to the science ref desk and/or building the encyclopedia, where your true talent lies. Wikipedia is a great place and I hope your tenure here spans several more years. All the best, 완젬스 (talk) 06:39, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

So the guy has made a lot of edits to the article. Have you pointed out any of them which are habitually disruptive? He's digressed into some forum style posting on the talk page, but he doesn't seem alone in that, and having a PoV isn't grounds for a topic ban or block. So, where is the evidence of on-going disruption that necessitates a block let alone a topic ban at this time?--Crossmr (talk) 04:31, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

RFC

WP:Block protocol. Please discuss on Wikipedia_talk:Block_protocol. Gerardw (talk) 21:17, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Jerry Sandusky sexual abuse scandal page move discussion

Apologies if this is the wrong place for this. Would an uninvolved admin be willing to review and close the discussion on renaming this article? The thread is more than seven days old and it's pretty clear to several editors that no one is adding anything new to it anymore, just going 'round and 'round.--~TPW 16:52, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Done. If I've screwed up the move, it's going to take more skills than I have to untangle it. Rklawton (talk) 17:47, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that Rklawton's move was proper. According to his closure statement, he approved the move because of his own opinion that it ought to be moved, not as a reflection of the consensus. Further, citing his own "quick internet search on these two phrases" is not a reflection of any kind of consensus. With all due respect, this is a clear case of Wikipedia:Supervote. I'd ask that the move be reversed until a real consensus is developed.--GrapedApe (talk) 20:07, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Where is your evidence, in the discussion, that the article should not have been moved? What about the discussion to you indicates that, in light of the 23:8 in support of the move, the article should not have been moved? --Jayron32 20:18, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

• I feel that User:Rklawton correctly gauged consensus and performing one's own due diligence does not, a supervote make. Crazynas ^t 20:45, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I read the article. I read the discussion. I saw progress was at a standstill. The evidence in favor of moving the article was overwhelming. Afterwards I checked with Google and saw that this was a no-brainer from the the beginning. Rklawton (talk) 21:22, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Well, I did !vote yes, so I'm a bit biased (although I think the Penn State/Jerry Sandusky dual name would have been better), but I want to congratulate on making a difficult choice but gauging a) the consensus of the community while also b) not ignoring the facts on the ground. Magog the Ogre (talk) 00:54, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Unfulfilled edit requests

There are a few edit requests from WP:BASEBALL that need to be fulfilled fairly quickly, not urgent, but quickly.

One

Two

Three

Four

Thanks. CRRaysHead90 | ^{We Believe!} 18:19, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

The ones above are filled, now I need these filled

One

Two

Three

Four

Thanks. CRRaysHead90 | ^{We Believe!} 21:53, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done all but this one. Cheers. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 00:24, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

AIV backlog

WP:AIV is backlogged. Most of it is uncontroversial.Jasper Deng (talk) 06:20, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Sock abusing talk page

• TattelTales1 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Just wasting time on talk page. Revoke access please.Jasper Deng (talk) 06:50, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

 Not done. If he's only wasting your time, just stop replying. On this user's part I see nothing egregious enough to warrant removing his ability to edit his talk page. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 10:43, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikiproject English needs additional eyes

Could some admins keep some eyes on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikiproject English. It's getting a bit snippy. --Jayron32 14:37, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Gosh, that's a tricky one. A wikiproject to "consolidate the efforts of all Wikipedians concerned about the proper naming of articles on the English Wikipedia" - sounds fine, in theory, but the current practice there seems to be a very specific drive to push for one particular angle of something that's style/debatable, not policy or even really guideline-based. I'm not sure MfD is the best venue for it, because the project itself could be a good thing, if any editor interested in any views of naming were welcome; but it does seem to be a battleground. Maybe it's more of user-issues, for canvass/battleground-mentality/tendentious edits? I find it extremely hard to evaluate it in terms of an MfD. Also, yes, it's 'snippy' at the very least.  Chzz  ►  14:48, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, I'm not concerned with the outcome of the debate (in this post, at least, that's not why I want eyes). The debate is spiralling well afield of the purpose of an MFD, and it needs to be refocused. --Jayron32 14:52, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think this particular MfD is a problem. The underlying dispute has been going on for weeks now, and I think the only thing that is new is that due to the new venue (MfD rather than Requested Moves, Jimbo's talk page and various policy pages), a lot of new editors have become aware of it. Hans Adler 14:59, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes...that's the point I guess I was awkwardly trying to make; the actual issue isn't the MfD as such, but I'm not sure how to fairly evaluate the MfD, due to all the background.  Chzz  ►  15:35, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

• Honestly, I think it needs to get closed ASAP on the grounds that Jayron32 has said-- that the debate seems hopelessly unfocused on the initial reason the project was nominated. I, Jethrobot ^{drop me a line} (note: not a bot!) 17:23, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

RFC/U needing attention

Can as uninvolved admin take a look at Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Alexsautographs. Its been open for over a month. While there is consensus expressed in the views, there is no endorsements of the reported users response.—Bagumba (talk) 07:35, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

As an aside, the user involved just mildly threatened me with "outside administrative" action. — KV5 • Talk • 22:28, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Edvin Hebovija

Resolved

This 9-day old AfD, which has not been relisted since its initial nomination, and has had sufficient participation (in my opinion), should probably be closed by now. Thanks, I, Jethrobot ^{drop me a line} (note: not a bot!) 17:34, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

This mess should have been speedily closed the moment the inappropriateness of the bundling became apparent. Anyway, closed. T. Canens (talk) 00:42, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Filename-prefix-blacklist

Resolved

Hello, could an admin please add a listing to MediaWiki:Filename-prefix-blacklist for KIF and IMAG? KIF is the prefix that Kyocera uses (File:KIF 6335.jpg, File:KIF 0576.JPG, File:KIF 7272.jpg, etc.), and IMAG is used by many companies (File:IMAG0001.JPG, File:IMAG0002.JPG, File:IMAG0003.jpg, etc.). Also, on MediaWiki:Filename-prefix-blacklist, the word mobile is spelled mobil. Thanks! ▫ JohnnyMrNinja 03:09, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Done ~Alison C. (aka Crazytales) 04:18, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

User:Euclidthegreek

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

We have an unblock request from Euclidthegreek. Euclid was indefblocked in August 2009 following a string of bad joke articles and other shenanigans. Their first unblock request was unremarkable, and the user was admonished to stop socking and come back after a year, at which time their remorse might be more credible. It's now been 26 months, and we have a fresh unblock request - one that lists multiple sockpuppets. Given the length of time, I might be inclined to give this editor a shot, but for the socks. Any thoughts on this one? UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 14:31, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I'll also notify the blocking admin, as well as the one who declined to unblock back in 2009. UltraExactZZ ^Said ~ Did 14:36, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm not opposed to an unblock, if that's what the community/other admins would feel is best here. I will note though, that while constructive, they were using multiple accounts up until a few months ago. Tiptoety ^talk 17:54, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

If I'm reading his user page correctly - he has said that User:Lanthanum-138 and User:4 are also his - to me they look like unblocked accounts. Should we not block them first, then discuss unblocking... Maybe point the user to the terms in WP:Standard Offer.  Ronhjones  ^(Talk) 19:58, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Yep. He was still evading the block as recently as last month. I can't see any reason not to block the admitted sock accounts, I'll do that now. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:29, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

 Done. So, what we have here is a user who is saying "I evaded my block for two years and didn't vandalize with my various sock accounts, so let me back in." Not sure I get why he chose to proceed this way, but he clearly has never respected the block he rightfully received at his main account and I agree that WP:OFFER should be considered at this time instead of unblocking a serial sockpuppeteer who was active so recently. Beeblebrox (talk) 20:35, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

The user could have just carried on socking, but has voluntarily decided to come clean about it, and ask for a clean start. I am inclined to unblock, but will wait to see if anyone has any more to say. At the very worst this would be a WP:ROPE unblock, and we could reblock easily if problems recur. JamesBWatson (talk) 17:57, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps with a one account restriction, and a zero-tolerance restriction on the behaviour that got they, and any socks, blocked previously? Resolute 18:00, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

We can't determine (via checkuser) one way or another (and won't be able to, most likely) if he has or hasn't been socking; his IP is highly dynamic and in a range shared with hundreds of other users. I'm inclined to unblock as well, with no restrictions. He seems to have good potential. --jpgordon^{::==( o )} 18:27, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I support an unblock, with the suggested one-account restriction. While the sock situation is a little unusual, I think his confessing to undiscovered accounts in this way is positive. We can easily block again if it goes wrong. -- Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 18:41, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I also support unblock with the one-account restriction, with the proviso that any recurrence of any kind of socking would result in a new block of at least a year. EdJohnston (talk) 03:55, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

• Just unblock already. (1) his editing with the other accounts indicates he is competent (2) the disclosure of the other accounts indicates good faith. JORGENEV 05:47, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• I support unblocking 1 account, of this user's choice (it would seem to be Lanthanum-138), on condition that the user edits only under tat account (that is, neither creates other accounts nor edits anonymously) and 0 tolerance for vandalism. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 07:17, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• I would support unblocking under the conditions as stipulated; single account, no IP editing, no vabdalism, with the understanding that any violation of these conditions would render the editor liable to an immediate block, by any admin, and without further warning. --Anthony Bradbury^"talk" 16:06, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

I have unblocked, specifying those conditions, as there seems to be a substantial consensus in favour of doing so. JamesBWatson (talk) 16:41, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Prod categories

A user just brought up an expired prod to me, and it caused me to notice something odd about the Prod categories (or maybe it's not odd, and I just never noticed it before). As of the moment of me writing this, Category:Proposed deletion as of 9 November 2011 contains 49 pages, and Category:Proposed deletion as of 10 November 2011 contains 41 pages. All of these should appear on [[:Category:Expired proposed deletions From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia]]; however, the latter has only 16 pages. Even stranger (for me) is that the Expired category contains items tagged on both 9 and 10 Nov--that is, some of those ended up on the expired list, but some did not. I guess my questions are, how do items get added to the Expired category in the first place, and is there something wrong with this underlisting? Qwyrxian (talk) 22:32, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

Have you tried flushing cache of all the affected categories? Maybe someone forgot to feed the server gerbils. ~Alison C. (aka Crazytales) 23:47, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

That isn't sufficient, you have to purge all of the pages in the affected categories. MER-C 10:46, 19 November 2011 (UTC)

I try not to push links/buttons with scary words like "purge" when I'm not actually sure what they do. I mean, I figure it probably isn't "too" dangerous, given that it's right there, with no major warning signs...but, then again, so are those buttons that say "pull in case of fire" that suddenly dump out hundreds of kilograms of white, icky powder. So, you're saying that said links/buttons are safe to push? Qwyrxian (talk) 00:07, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

WP:PURGE. Yes, it's safe to push. T. Canens (talk) 00:43, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Purging won't do it. Null edits will probably be required. — Train2104 (talk • contribs • count) 22:46, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

DRV closure

Resolved

Could someone close Wikipedia:Deletion_review/Log/2011_November_7#File:JesseDirkhising.jpg, which appears to have been forgotten? (and it's an easy close). Black Kite (t) 23:31, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Done.--v/r - TP 01:34, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Yourname edit filter

An edit filter for banned vandal Yourname (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) is badly needed, and my request here has not received any answers in a whole week.Jasper Deng (talk) 04:07, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

I have a test filter (filter 358), which is currently testing a Yourname filter out. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 12:48, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Admin help needed in Bhutto

An IP is reverting to inaccurate text on Bhutto article [67]Traditionally there has been vandalism in reverting from the Rajput to Arain tribe. The IP should probablybe blocked for multiple reverts and or the page protected. Thanks for the help.(olive (talk) 00:09, 22 November 2011 (UTC))

Thanks. That was fast.(olive (talk) 00:54, 22 November 2011 (UTC))

Propose community ban on User:Realhistorybuff

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

Community ban enacted. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 14:32, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

---

Unarchiving for now. Please close or rearchive if necessary. 16:02, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Hi everyone. I would like to propose a community ban on Realhistorybuff. You can find his/her sockpuppetry report at Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Realhistorybuff. To summarize things, this user is a disruptive editor, socker, and POV pusher/warrior who has no intention of working with others. He/she has been persistently trying to accomplish their goal of showing the real history (hence the username) and magnificence and greatness of India by socking and denying socking (you guys can probably tell this sock's motive from their first 10 edits) or stating he/she's been doing nothing wrong.

This edit summary is an example of them not working with others. You can find a related thread regarding the dispute and more here. He/she has also been edit warring with multiple users, similar to what happened on India, on pages such as Asia and Economy of Asia.

This was clearly an inappropriate comment about Chinese people. There's definitely some ethnic issues here. That comment he/she made also shows that he/she doesn't take criticism well. Please also see Quigley's comment on the ANI thread I posted previously regarding his editing. He/she's posted inappropriate warnings such as this and this. There is also no assumption of good faith since he/she has been saying that the people who don't agree with him/her are vandalizing. His/her latest sock made personal attacks further showing that he/she is not here to cooperate or create a good editing environment.

I don't see any net benefit to encyclopedia coming from this user. Elockid ^(Talk) 22:43, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

• I would say this user is already de facto banned, but for what it's worth, support. Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Realhistorybuff/Archive is compelling enough. Beeblebrox (talk) 01:28, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support per Beeblebrox Nick-D (talk) 06:38, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support and concurr Beeblebrox and Elockid. The combination of IDHT, OR, socking, and using non-scholarly sources for history while pushing revisionist lines outside of the scholarly literature are not needed. The depth of behaviour (aggressive IDHT + OR + non-scholarly revisionism) is sufficient. Socking is icing. Fifelfoo (talk) 07:17, 18 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support per all above. The SPI says it all. JohnCD (talk) 20:50, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
• Strong Support. We don't need racist and unworkable people like him clouding the project. The socking is already obvious. --Eaglestorm (talk) 00:36, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support - Racists ought to be banned on sight. Night Ranger (talk) 01:34, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
• Strong Support Honestly. This editor's behaviour is never going to change at this rate. Too shouty as well as becoming a prolific sockpuppeteer. Minima© (talk) 19:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
• Support per being a prolific sockpuppeteer, and a history of personal attacks. 173.167.229.53 (talk) 19:51, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

  Oops, forgot to log in when I posted that ~Alison C. (aka Crazytales) 00:14, 22 November 2011 (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.

Sockpuppets/block evading

Smiisk (talk · contribs · email) was indef blocked because he only vandalized, and is now back as Smärd (talk · contribs · email), Smäärd (talk · contribs · email) and 83.233.225.74 (talk · contribs · email). I take it up here instead of WP:SPI as no investigation seems needed to me. The new users are just repeating the exact same childish vandalism mainly on Bamse. --OpenFuture (talk) 14:22, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Both accounts indeffed. Salvio ^{Let's talk about it!} 14:29, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Can an interwiki link take users somewhere else?

Let me ax you a question.

Is it possible for a different language wikilink to redirect you to a harmful page? I got curious that the Vietnamese version of Stonewall riots was posted (diff. I clicked the link to sate my curiosity and got a brief flash of a Vietnamese Wiki page, then it went blank. Is it my browser not loading Vietnamese (Firefox)? Or something more...sinister? I really hope it's sinister. --Moni3 (talk) 23:19, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I'm no techie but, assuming that all the interwikis are on wikimedia servers, nothing sinister should happen. (I had no issues on chrome.) --regentspark (comment) 23:23, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I got a flash of some sort for less than a second, and then the page loaded. It appears to be a machine translation of sort, the foot note is still in English. Neither adblock or no-script threw a fit.--Tznkai (talk) 23:26, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Sounds more like a JavaScript problem, possibly related to the MediaWiki software update that deprecated some code that used to work before. Does any page on vi.wiki work for you? Jafeluv (talk) 23:29, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Fo the record, everything is fine here, albeit that I'm running an unstable version of Firefox (Security release, 8.0) - but I click the link, get taken straight to the page, it stays there, end of. I'm not entirely sure what is wrong, but it appears to work for some people but not others.  BarkingFish  23:31, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

At least vi:MediaWiki:Common.js/edit.js seems to use document.write, which according to the migration guide causes blank pages in some cases. Anyone who has dealt with these migration thingies before? Jafeluv (talk) 23:42, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

I poked a dev in #wikimedia-tech and they fixed the issue. ΔT _{^{The only constant}} 23:43, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Big Prod backlog

Category:Proposed_deletion_as_of_14_November_2011 has a ton of articles that can be safely deleted. Ten Pound Hammer • ^{(What did I screw up now?)} 00:41, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Indeed, the PROD log is pretty big indeed. So is the rest of the items listed in CAT:SD. Steven Zhang ^{The clock is ticking....} 00:43, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Last call for candidates for Wikipedia:Arbitration Committee Elections December 2011

This is a last call for any candidates to step forward for the 2011 ArbCom elections; nominations close at 23:59 today, less than 24 hours from now. If anyone is still interested in running for the Arbitration Committee and meet all the requirements, please nominate yourself here. –MuZemike 01:14, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Just to add to that, there are 7 available seats and only 11 candidates currently running. Hersfold ^(t/a/c) 02:14, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

One might ascribe this either to the abuse that Arbitrators receive, as well as the heavy workload, or to the divisive attitude at WP:RFA, which prevents many long-term editors from standimg to be administrators. Personally, I see no reason why a non-adsmin rank & file editor shouldn't be an arbitrator, since the necessary access can be provided. Beyond My Ken (talk) 09:05, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

There's no rule, as far as I know, saying that non-admins can't run. Any well established user (defined as having at lewast 1500 mainspace dits as of November 1st) who meets the Wikimedia Foundation's criteria for access to non-public data (being legally an adult in one's own juristiction, and at least 18 years old) is allowed to run for ArbCom. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 12:28, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

It's a 150 mainspace edits. Hot Stop talk-contribs 12:45, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Yeah, that was a typo on my part. Anyway, the point still stands - for example, you are running. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 12:47, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

There are currently three non-sysops running, although one of them is a former sysop. There isn't anything stopping non-sysops from running. --Michaeldsuarez (talk) 14:27, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Don't forget, the threshold for becoming an Arbitrator has historically been lower – in terms of degree of community support required – than we require of admins at RfA. Last year's ArbCom elections seated three candidates who each received less than 60% support from the community, and three more who received between 60 and 65% support. Of the twelve new members elected, only three garnered sufficient support (>75%) to have unambiguously passed RfA, and three more fell into the 70-75% gray area. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 14:35, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

That's true, but also a little misleading, since it assumes that "the community" in one case is roughly equivalent to "the community" in the other case, but many more people vote in the ArbCom election than vote in RfAs, so you're getting much larger absolute numbers of support with 60% in an ArbCom election than you are with >75% in an RFA. Given that, I think it would be fair to say that the Arbitrators are seated with more support than admins get. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:22, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

That seems like an unwarranted assumption about the sampling of "the community"—we have always assumed that in these broad consensus processes "the community" is spoken for by "whoever shows up". For better or for worse, the tiny fraction of 1% of Wikipedia editors who vote at RfA or in ArbCom elections represents everyone. While the sample of the community that votes is not random (it will be skewed towards editors with an interest in Wikipedia processes, with higher levels of project activity, and with more experience in general), there's no reason to assume that the skew is overall toward easier or tougher evaluation of the candidates. In other words, there's no evidence that the 'silent majority' holds an opinion different from the vocal and voting minority.

Moreover, that argument falls down even when confined to the single process of RfA. A contentious RfA candidate who receives 60% overall support on 200 total votes (120 support, 80 oppose) would – by your reasoning – have "more support" than a candidate who draws 80% support on 100 votes (80 support, 20 oppose). 'More supporting votes' is not something that should be equated to 'more support'. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:07, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

Turnout for Arbitrator elections is larger than turnout at RfAs by a least an order of magnitude, that makes the difference. Roughly speaking, RfA are all equivalent in size. Beyond My Ken (talk) 02:58, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

This may be welcome news to many, but you won't see my name on the nom list :-) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 13:49, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Given your "Clueful" box - no one should be surprised. I see no reason why anyone shjould trust you better than you trust yourself - and I'd expect all Arbs to be in the green section, not the blue. עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 15:34, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

heh ... there are those who would argue that "blue/clueful" is higher than many current Arbs (not me though) (talk→ BWilkins ←track) 16:10, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Update - there are currently 14 candidates - still too few (2 candidates for every seat), but better than the 11 (approx 1.5 for every seat). עוד מישהו Od Mishehu 15:30, 21 November 2011 (UTC)