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Tasks

The following backlogs require the attention of one or more editors.
NPOV disputes, Images on Commons, Overpopulated categories and Copyright Problems.

General

Advice requested Part Two

I would very much appreciate more input from admins on this matter, as otherwise this can just turn into a back-and-forth litany of accusations between Giovanni and me. The Christianity article has now been protected. I would like to answer some of the accusations made against me, and then to request advice as to what should happen now.

I seem to be accused of having driven SOPHIA away. I disagreed with SOPHIA about some of her edits (while agreeing with others). I respected her and have never at any stage suspected her of anything dishonourable. At one stage, she said on the Christianity talk page that it had been "scary" to have me and two others "at" her at the same time. Following that statement, Str1977 left her a message saying that he was sorry if we had scared her, that it had not been our intention, and that he appreciated her efforts at calming down tension. I followed that with a post saying that I also regretted if we had scared her off, although I didn't recall having done so, and that I respected her as a genuine editor, here to improve the encyclopaedia. Our posts (Str1977's and mine) are here. She replied here that she had expressed herself badly, and that she had been trying to explain that the process of trying to reply to three simultaneous editors who agree (and can type a lot faster than she!) was scary when she was new. She also said that Str1977 had left her a nice message and that she regarded us both and KHM03 as serious, thoughtful editors, and that she admired the patience that we had shown towards Giovanni33.

SOPHIA

SOPHIA was extremely hurt and angry when the checkuser result came through, showing her connection to TheShriek. It was I who requested a check, and I did so in consultation with other editors. I did not include SOPHIA in it. When Giovanni arrived, he engaged in massive edit warring. I don't mean an accidental slip into a fourth revert (as I did myself on one occasion) — I mean six and five and eleven, ignoring warnings and pleas from other editors. It was unfair because none of the "older" editors had a history of running to WP:AN/3RR to report an opponent, especially not if he was new, and we were all trying to stay within the rules ourselves. At least four new redlinked users appeared and said on the talk page that they agreed with Giovanni. Most of them began reverting to his version, and also following him to other pages, voting where he voted, claiming that there was consensus, etc. These users were BelindaGong, Kecik, MikaM, and TheShriek. All except TheShriek have been blocked for 3RR, and again they were not reported for a first, accidental slip into a fourth revert. When I requested the check they were all fairly new. The contributions of the first four would probably show that at least 95% of their contributions are agreeing with Giovanni on the talk pages of various articles, voting where he votes, and reverting (or doing partial reverts) to his version. The fact that the checkuser showed Giovanni to be the same as BelindaGong certainly justified requesting it, since Belinda and Giovanni constantly took double votes, took at least six reverts, made claims about the number of editors who agreed with their version, and set up an elaborate pretence of not knowing each other. TheShriek was also shown to be the same as SOPHIA. However, when that result came through, I saw that there was no evidence of gaming the system, taking double votes, or multiple reverts. I sent SOPHIA a polite message here, telling her about the result, and asking if she would like to clarify anything, as there was now a statement (not an image) on TheShriek's page that he was a sockpuppet for SOPHIA. She posted a rather angry reply here, saying the TheShriek was her husband. We all accepted that, and were sympathetic, but she could not be pacified. I posted two more friendly messages on her talk page, and some one the Christianity talk page (e.g. this one), explaining that we respected her, and that nobody thought she had done anything wrong, and that I had personally removed the sockpuppet notice from her husband's page. When she complained that the would be permanently in the edit history, I told her that I had used my admin powers to remove it from the history, and asked her to let me know if there was anything else I could do. KHM03 was also sympathetic to her, and Str1977 posted a very friendly message to her. So much for the accusations made by Giovanni and his supporters that she left because she was persecuted and hounded for her POV by the Christian editors.

With regard to Freethinker99 (talk · contribs), he arrived at the Christianity talk page while Giovanni was blocked, and told us that he was a new user and that he agreed with Giovanni. His writing style and arguments were simlilar to those of Giovanni. His second edit was a revert to a Giovanni version. He reverted three times in a little over two hours (like Giovanni/Belinda).

• At 20:24 on 14 February, KHM03 posted a message to Giovanni33's talk page, asking him to clarify if he had any connection with Trollwatcher, John1838, or Kecik. [1]
• At 23:08 on 14 February, KHM03 added "And User:Freethinker99".[2]
• At 23:59 on 14 February, Giovanni answered "I'll . . . state for the record that these users are not in any way associated with me, present or past." But he signed his post while logged on as Freethinker99.[3]
• At midnight on 15 February, Giovanni logged on as Giovanni33, and replaced Freethinker's signature with his own.[4]
• At 00:04 on 15 February, Freethinker99 posted a comment with little relevance to anything being questioned on Giovanni's talk page. It would give an ostensible reason for Freethinker still to be in the edit history after the telltale signature had been replaced.[5] I'm sure many Wikipedians who have been away from a talk page for several hours just check the difference between the last version they were familiar with and the current one, rather than going through each diff.
• At 00:11 on 15 February, Freethinker posted that he had written that message for Giovanni and had signed it by mistake.[6]
• At 00:19 on 15 February, Freethinker claimed that he had let Giovanni write a post to his own talk page on his (Freethinker's) computer.[7]. (Eight minutes earlier, he had claimed that he had written that post for Giovanni.)
• At 00:23 Giovanni posted to his talk page that he had not seen KHM03's question about Freethinker when he answered that he had no connection to any of those users, and that he did, in fact, know Freethinker.[8]

I did not attack Freethinker. I did not block him. (I don't block people I'm in dispute with.) Nor did I add the sockpuppet template to his userpage (though I support the admin who did). I did say that his story, if true, makes him a meatpuppet.[9] I stand by that remark. If he really is a different person, he arrived at Wikipedia to revert to Giovanni's version, and to argue for it on the talk page.

Giovanni recently followed me to Jdavidb's talk page, and saw a message I had posted there thanking Jdavidb for bringing me to Wikipedia, as I believed it was he who had posted someething on some blog asking people to join Wikipedia if they were prepared to respect NPOV. On discovering that post, Giovanni posted to several talk pages and project pages that I, despite saying that it wasn't allowed to invite friends to join Wikipedia, had joined in exactly the same way. For the record, I have never met Jdavidb, and have never, as far as I know, reverted to his version of any article. We very seldom edit the same articles. That is now being compared to Giovanni's friend and wife (if they're not Giovanni himself) reverting constantly to his version, while pretending to have no connection to him.

I apologize for boring everyone with such a long account, but I really would appreciate some input, as BelindaGong and Freethinker have now both been unblocked, and the Christianity and Adolf Hitler articles will presumably soon be unlocked. I really have no idea whether Giovanni, Belinda, and Freethinker are one person, or two, or three; but their connection to each other (which they tried not just to keep secret but actually to mislead people about) has been shown. What is their position now? WP:SOCK says that "Proven sock puppets may be permanently blocked if used to cast double votes." Well, Giovanni and Belinda have taken double votes, (see [10] [11] [12] [13]) but Giovanni is now insisting that Belinda is his wife, and is therefore not a sockpuppet.

Can someone clarify what the situation is now? I seem to recall that it came up in the case of Hollow Wilerding, but am not sure where to look for information regarding that case. Was there reference to some policy or some ArbCom ruling that a family under one roof is officially one single user for voting purposes, or am I imagining that? I'd like some reassurance that Giovanni and Belinda are not entitled to 6 reverts between them every day. And to anticipate his likely statement that I have reverted to Str1977's version, I'd like to say that I have never met Str1977, and we both have a long history editing articles in which the other user has no interest. We do have some overlap of interest and of POV in Christianity-related articles. Before Giovanni and his sockpuppet(s?) arrived, I would say my average was lower than one revert per day.

We now also have new users John1838 (talk · contribs) and Trollwatcher (talk · contribs). I certainly don't want to imply that every new user who supports Giovanni is a sockpuppet or a meatpuppet. (I was once a new user with a POV!) But these two users seem to be just criticizing editors, rather than making helpful contributions. In particular I'd like someone to take a look at John1838's user page.

Any help would be appreciated. AnnH ^(talk) 22:04, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

The content and style of John1838's posting matches those of Robsteadman - both the WIKI user and the TES contributor.Crusading composer 00:02, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Facebook moving

Recently, a vote was held on Talk:Facebook (website) on whether or not to move the page to Facebook. The vote was four in favor of moving and four not. User:Nightstallion closed the vote as "no consensus." A couple of days later, User:Savidan, one of the users who wished for it to be moved, went to Nightstallion himself and convinced him that the page should be moved, so he did. My grievance is that I feel the vote on requested moves was for nothing, especially if the user is going to disregard the opposing voices and get the page moved whether there is a vote or not. Someone please keep an eye out on the situation, because I am absolutely livid that the user has gone behind my back as well as others' just to get what he wants. Mike H. That's hot 08:22, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

(Move was reverted by FCYTravis. —Quarl ^(talk) 2006-02-20 10:34Z)

I don't understand this; why was a vote needed? There's no article at Facebook, only a disambiguation page in which there's only one link to an actual article: Facebook (website). Isn't a move pretty automatic, given naming conventions? --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 11:32, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Since there was disagreement, clearly discussion was/is needed. WP:AN is the place for process discussion, not content discussion, so I suggest this discussion be continued at Talk:Facebook (website). —Quarl ^(talk) 2006-02-20 13:44Z

I would agree with Mel on this. The only other links are to a Wiktionary page and to a Wikipedia: project namespace page, and it's my understanding that interwiki and cross-namespace links are not exactly compatible with mirror sites, even if self-references weren't an issue. — Feb. 20, '06 [20:17] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

It didn't used to be a Wiktionary page, there was actually stuff written there. My point is that there was a vote, there was no consensus, and a person went behind the backs of others and got the page moved anyway, which is wrong. Mike H. That's hot 23:25, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Since significant changes (transwikification) were made after all votes had been cast in the first vote (and since the original vote was not listed at WP:RM until after all votes had been cast), another vote was held. The result of the debate was move. As far as the earlier actions of savidan, it appears he noticed that there was no longer a namespace conflict and believed that exsisting guidelines allowed for a move; please remember to assume good faith. --L1AM (talk - 'tribs.) 11:01, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

God of War trolling

Whilst some POV declaring on your userpage might be good for the project, WP:NOT a webhost for politial essays. User:God of War has been hosting User:God of War/Tyranny and Fascism - Past and Present (previously User:God of War/Was REVENGE worth it President Bush?. This is an abuse of userspace. I would have sent it to MfD per process, but the page in question has the bold header Warning! The following contains a Point Of View that will tempt some to censor it by listing it at WP:MFD. clearly trolling for someone to do that and make him a 'free-speech martyr'. This I attempted to reason with him [14] and [15] but was met only with [16]. I am sorely tempted to speedy this as patent trolling and block him for disruption - but I've had enough calls of 'admin abuse' for this week. Perhaps someone else could take this up and try either reason or deletion. --Doc ^ask? 09:48, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

You're not going to believe this, but I will actually try to talk to him. Better if it's a user (especially a pro-free speech one like me) than an admin, which will just upset him and others (quite understandably as I see it). I agree that that essay has no place on wikipedia and crosses the line of allowing political and social info on a user on their userpage. The Ungovernable Force 09:55, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Userspace exists as a scratchspace, a personal office if you will, to help with building the encyclopaedia. It's not a free patch of land that anyone who registers a free account can regard as their entitlement, and it's not somewhere where one can put inappropriate content and hide behind a kind of "userspace privilege" to protect it. I've spoken to God of War (talk · contribs) — or someone claiming to be him — many times on IRC, and, as near as I can determine, he's intelligent, and fairly cluey on what Wikipedia is and what it's for. He knows better than to write inflammatory personal essays and then bung them in userspace and say "NPOV doesn't apply! I can do what I want!". God of War has the potential to be a good contributor to our encyclopaedia, but at the moment he appears too busy being childish and abusing his userspace privileges. fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 13:24, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

I have listed it at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:God of War/Tyranny and Fascism - Past and Present. Sjakkalle (Check!) 13:32, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

That's a mistake, if you read my initial post and the offending article's header, you will see that this is exactly what the troll user was hoping for. --Doc ^ask? 14:53, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

• Relax with the personal attacks there doc. If I was trolling I would be posting this everywhere. As it is, I was keeping it quartered off in a sub-page until I finish working on it.--God of War 19:16, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, it needs to go, somehow. Which would be worse, trolling at MfD or trolling on ANI when someone speedies it? android79 15:11, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

• Hey guys, Has anyone here actually tried reading it? It's not a rant and it's not an essay.

It's only a copy/paste of the declaration of independence with a few factual statements with news stories referenced under each line of the declaration. I was going to get to it eventually but until then I moved it out of my main page and into a sub-page.--God of War 18:43, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

So what does it have to do with Wikipedia's goals? Move that kind of thing to your own homepage/myspace whatever. Heck, I don't care, link to it from your WP user page, just keep junk that doesn't have any useful contribution to WP off WP. Please focus on what we're here for and not spend so much time on what we're not. You're wasting significant resources. - Taxman ^Talk 10:26, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

That is the most ridiculous thing I've heard all day. The MFD discussion and this section of the noticeboard are taking up just as much minimal hard-drive space as my little sub-page.--God of War 20:10, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

And if you followed what I wrote above we wouldn't have had any of it. To prevent more disruption and waste of resources we have to deal with it when we see it. If you don't want to focus on what Wikipedia is here for then spend time instead at places that are set up for what you're trying to do. - Taxman ^Talk 14:16, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

This takes up a fraction of a cent's worth of hard drive space. I'll donate an extra 25 cents to Wikimedia if you let God of War have his subpages. —Guanaco 02:02, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Doc, Doc, Doc... a couple points:

1. It's a copy of the Declaration of Independence reached by a vague link at the bottom of a userpage.
2. We'd all be more sympathetic if your statement "I am sorely tempted to speedy this as patent trolling and block him for disruption - but I've had enough calls of 'admin abuse' for this week." instead read more along the lines of "I am sorely tempted to speedy this as patent trolling and block him for disruption - but I all the calls of 'admin abuse' this last week have caused me to reflect and realize that perhaps there is yet room for growth in my understanding."
3. How about this as a compromise: you let the dude keep his little essay, I'll donate the two following userboxes, and the user agrees to display one of them on his userpage. That way balance is achieved. Mmmmkay?Herostratus

This user recognizes that userboxes are the #3 cause of death, right behind cancer and heart disease.

This user believes that Wikipedia administrators are incapable of error when speaking ex cathedra.

Siflige

I need some assistance from my fellow admins. I placed a prod tag on the article Siflige, as I considered it a non-notable gaming community. The prod tag was contested by User:Erik Navkire, so I attempted to change the prod to an AfD nomination. When I did this however, I discovered that the article had previously been deleted through AfD, so the AfD tag automatically linked to the old Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Siflige discussion. How can I renominate this article, without it linking to the old AfD discussion? There are some arguments for the article to be kept on its talk page. Cnwb 03:04, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Siflige 2 or Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Siflige (second nomination) would work. Then just change the target in the tag. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 03:11, 23 February 2006 (UTC)

That's also what {{afd2}} is for. Superm401 - Talk 15:11, 24 February 2006 (UTC) Never mind. I wasn't thinking at all. Superm401 - Talk 18:27, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Fair use images

I recently told users at Wikipedia:WikiProject Star Wars that they cannot use fair use images in their templates because it is in violation of WP:FAIR policy. A user removed them. However, he also asked what is the policy on one person's artistic impression of something that is copyrighted (the example he was referring to was someone drawing an image of the Rebel Alliance logo and using that). I replied that I wasn't sure what the policy is. What is the policy on that exactly? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Deskana (talk • contribs) .

IANAL and all that, but copying is copying, whether you use a photocopier or a scanner or you trace it. If the original is not eligible for fair use, a copy will not be either. --bainer (talk) 01:20, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

The user in question has recently pulled up Image:Small NES controller.png. He's asking that since this is an original work based on the SNES, why can't he create an original work based on the Rebel Alliance logo and give it to Wikipedia for free use in the WikiProject Star Wars? Deskana (talk) 08:46, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

IANAL, but one difference is that the NES controller is a three-dimensional object, while the Rebel Alliance logo is two-dimensional. Thus, a picture of a NES controller is not a substitute for an actual NES controller, whereas a picture of a Rebel Alliance logo is a Rebel Alliance logo. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 09:15, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

IANAL either, but you can not copyright most three-dimensional objects. The controller may be trademarked, but it is not copyrighted. The image is almost certainly trademark fair use if the controller is a trademark at all. Superm401 - Talk 15:20, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if a particular nation's laws are preferred here, but in the United States, artistic derivative works, in particular, artistic pieces making use of other works -- whether the original work was copyrighted or not -- do not generally require approval from the original copyright holder -- it's typically considered fair use. See Andy Warhol's Campbell Soup Cans as a reference. If you like, I can dig around WestLaw to find a case or two on the issue to finalize it. Jkatzen 08:34, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

It depends on how the derivative is being used: it's fine to make derivations for artistic purposes (e.g. Warhol) or to satirize; it's not ok to use them just as a means of getting around copyrights. — Asbestos | Talk (RFC) 15:43, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

IANAL, but not all artistic derviatives are appropriate, and most satires aren't. It's most likely to be fair use when the derivative is parodying the original. Note the difference between parody and satire. Superm401 - Talk 00:28, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

the appropriateness of signing posts under another user's name

Recently, SoothingR (talk · contribs) was promosted to an administrator. It seems that it is a Wikipedian custom for newly-created administrators to personally thank each supporters with a fancy message. However, it seems that he forgot to acknowledge MONGO (talk · contribs), and MONGO copied SoothingR's message onto his talk page, as if SoothingR posted it.

I know that registered users who don't feel like logging in will sometimes sign their posts under their registered name. But I'm not sure if posting a message under someone else's name is so appropriate.

Any thoughts on this? --Ixfd64 07:21, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Copying someone's full message, including signature, is quite common; however, in situations like that, where the context where it's posted is important, a small note to the effect should be added. --cesarb 09:42, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

User:Ixfd64...thanks for asking me?...SoothingR (talk · contribs) posted his/her thank you to my USERPAGE and all I did was move it to my TALKPAGE...next time, WP:AGF.--MONGO 10:25, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Ah, no wonder. I didn't think of that. --Ixfd64 10:26, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Ixfd64, if we can assume good faith of suspected sockpuppets of prolific vandals, then surely we can assume good faith of MONGO? — Feb. 24, '06 [10:30] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

I think this quite clearly shows why edit summaries are important. --cesarb 10:28, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

My thoughts exactly. --Ixfd64 10:29, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Edit summaries I usually don't do on talk pages or especially in my own usersapce areas...maybe a bad habit...next time you assume I am up to something how about simply asking me? Thanks in advance!--MONGO 10:37, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

MONGO, I know they didn't assume the best of you, but I think we could all do without catty comments like "if you think I'm doing something bad, why don't you just ASK me." Mike H. That's hot 10:39, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Is that a fact...since when is it not appropriate to ask someone up front what the deal is rather than posting incorrect commentary about them in this manner behind their back. I didn't capitalize ask as you did...so don't overemphasize a simple request on my part.--MONGO 10:44, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

If you are going to "quote" me make sure the "quote" is what I have written...thanks!--MONGO 10:46, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. I'd like to think you should have brought this to MONGO's attention before reporting it the noticeboard as if it were disruption, without prior discussion. Please assume good faith, Ixfd64. Don't do that again, it's utterly violating of trust and sneaky. Quite beyond belief. -Zero^Talk 11:54, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

MONGO's request is quite a reasonable one. I'd expect the same. — Feb. 24, '06 [15:17] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Yes, I also have the same bad habit of not using edit summaries on my own userspace; I've been trying to avoid it. Sorry for not noticing the paired edit to your user page; if you were a vandal or a new user, checking the contributions would quickly spot the other part of the move; however, I remembered seeing your name before, and went the "old user, probably did a small mistake, no need to even look beyond the diff" route. --cesarb 13:31, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

I wasn't accusing MONGO of anything - I was just curious about what happened. I apologize for the misunderstanding, though. --Ixfd64 22:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Adding a whole chapter of a book

User:Magdalenadaly recently left an interesting proposal on my talk page. She would like to add to Wikipedia a whole chapter from a book, for which she says she has the blessing of the author. The chapter is about the Irish psych-folk band Mellow Candle. I haven't the time to take care of it, so if someone wants to get in touch with her and answer her questions, please feel free. Her request if located here. Cnwb 22:32, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

• That should go in wikisource.--God of War 22:54, 24 February 2006 (UTC)
• This shouldn't be on the admin noticeboard...but it's not necessarily a bad idea for Wikipedia. If someone is willing to wikify it and the author specifically releases the chapter under the GFDL, it could be useful (however, I haven't looked at it). Superm401 - Talk 01:12, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
  • My apologies. Cnwb 01:40, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
• Not that I think this is necessarily a bad idea, but would this fall under WP:NOT an indiscriminate collection of information? After all, would you expect to find an entire chapter of a book in an encyclopedia? Also, after looking at Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources, I imagine Wikisource is probably the best place for this as well. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 01:36, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
• It is understood that the text will be freely edited, isn't it? I don't see a problem with incorporating portions (depending on its length) of the chapter into the article about the band, but it certainly should not be added to the article "as is" or made into a stand-alone article. The portions of the text used will need to be written in a neutral point of view, if it is not already, and formatted. -- Kjkolb 02:47, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I think it sets a bad precedent. Whilst the offer is a nice one, there's a better place for an entire chapter rather than within an encyclopedia. Quotes from sections of the chapter would be fine. Others above have suggested contributing the information to Wikisource, which I think is a good idea. -- Longhair 02:53, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

• Wikipedia:Don't include copies of primary sources doesn't apply here since the chapter doesn't sound like a primary source. If the chapter is released under a free license, I see no reason not to include it. It would need to be wikified and edited for NPOV -- and possibly edited for length, depending on how much information the chapter includes. Christopher Parham (talk) 19:18, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
• Such material belongs only in Wikisource. If it were included in an article, I, for one, would delete it at once. User:Zoe|^(talk) 22:48, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
  • How about doing that at Matthew 1 then? --Victim of signature fascism | There is no cabal 19:51, 26 February 2006 (UTC)
• Perhaps we should look at the material before deciding what should be done about it. I can think of many book chapters that would be good encyclopedia articles and many book chapters that would be terrible ones. I don't think there can be any overarching policy beyond those of being an encyclopedia. --best, kevin [kzollman][talk] 23:21, 25 February 2006 (UTC)
• I'm not an admin but I'd oppose putting this into Wikipedia for reasons mention. I'd also oppose putting it into Wikisource because IMO, Wikisource was not intended to be a marketing platform for nonfree books and should not host "sample chapters". If the author is willing to have the entire book (not just one chapter) on Wikisource then that would be great. But it's all or nothing. Phr 05:30, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Protection of user talk pages

The protection policy says: "User talk pages should only be protected in cases of persistent vandalism". But I see that some admins protect the talk pages of banned users to prevent them from editing them, even when they are not writing anything which is objectionable in itself. Good idea? Bad idea? Haukur 18:12, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

He's complaining about me protecting User talk:Dschor. In this case, the banned user is continuing to edit his talk page (with Huakurth's encouragement) in direct violation of his ban. This has resulted in the ban being reset for, now, the 3rd time. Dschor is banned, and as Dmcdevit has clarified, this includes a ban from his talk page. Non-objectionably in this case appears to include complaining about the ban, a favourite topic of bannees, and one which often gets their ban extended. My protection here follows protection by arbitrator Dmcdevit who protected because the banned user was using it, which was peculiarly reversed by Haukurth. I have reprotected it for Dschor's own good: he cannot now extend his ban by editing it. For reference see Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Pedophilia userbox wheel war#Log of blocks and bans, and in particular [17], [18]. -Splash^talk 18:17, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm interested in the general issue, not just this particular case. If people generally want to have a policy that says the talk pages of banned users are protected then I'll certainly abide by that. Then it should be codified and applied consistently, which is not the situation now. I notice, for example, that SPUI commented extensively on his talk page during his ban and yet the page was not protected and the ban was not extended (both of which I'm fine with). Haukur 18:24, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

My take would be that normally, such pages should not be protected, as protection prevents other people adding notes to them. If the ban is short, those notes and questions may be important. Protection is always a last resort, and should never happen as a matter of course. However, if a banned user is using his page to troll, carry on the dispute, or continue to fight the case, then protection may be better than extending the ban. --Doc ^ask? 18:32, 25 February 2006 (UTC)

(indent) A ban need not mean the protection of banned users' talk pages. It can, for instance, just mean a blanket revert of any and all edits that banned users make to their own talk pages, regardless of value or content. --Deathphoenix 16:12, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Why revert all edits, regardless of value or content? Isn't the point of banning a user to prevent contributions that lack value and content? Protecting a banned user's talk page does not help build an encyclopedia, does it? --67.168.241.139 03:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Fair use being misapplied

I am getting increasingly concerned about the overuse and abuse of fair use on Wikipedia. The latest thing that I noticed was the use of a {{TIME}} template license that was using weasely words and allowing us to upload almost all the TIME covers (copyrighted material no less!) under the banner of fair use.

I have started off the Wikipedia page Wikipedia:Fair use review to discuss this issue further. My goal is to remove all invalid fair use images from Wikipedia, and those that should be on the site should be fully reviewed and a rationale given.

There are two reasons for this review:

On Wikipedia:About we have written:

All of the information in Wikipedia is free for anyone to copy, modify for their own purposes, and redistribute or use as they see fit, as long as the new version grants the same freedoms to others and acknowledges the authors of the Wikipedia article used (a credit or backlink to the original article is sufficient for this). For full information see the copyright page or the text of the GNU Free Documentation License.

Fair use does not necessarily allow us to redistribute the content we have tagged as fair use, especially to commericial enterprises such as about.com. As such, fair use should only be used when absolutely necessary - see also Wikipedia:Fair use criteria.

The second reason is that we are increasingly opening ourselves up legal liability. You can't just upload an image and slap a fair use tag on it! This, however, is what some editors have been doing, pissing off many in the process.

Even should my Wikipedia page not take flight, something must be done about fair use on Wikipedia! Please join me in fixing this issue.

Ta bu shi da yu 03:44, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Ta bu about the importance of this issue. The quality, timeliness, insightfulness, and striking nature of the illustrations in TIME, like any other popular media, are a primary factor in the commercial value of their work. It is due, in part, to such illustrations that the public chooses to purchase TIME's product (both new issues, and access to archival copies) when they desire information about events both in the world today and in the past. We must accept that, to a non-trivial extent, Wikipedia is in direct competition with TIME (as well as any other form of popular media), and that our careless use of their copyrighted works to improve the value of articles unrelated to TIME's product is an unacceptable violation of copyright law. Fair use is intended to protect public discourse, so the use of time covers to discuss TIME is usually acceptable. Fair use is not intended to give us an easy way to obtain fantastic illustrations for our articles at no cost. This is a subject matter not likely to be understood by our general userbase without education and support. Ta Bu needs your help. --Gmaxwell 04:33, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

There's an issue of principle beyond the legal issue. This is "the free encyclopedia." 100% free content is neither realistic nor desirable. But the closer we can get the better. Chick Bowen 05:06, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I question this. What non-free images do we actually need? I'd argue that we need none of them. If Debian can produce a 100% free operating system, Wikipedia can produce a 100% free encyclopedia. Our tolerance of non-free images only creates problems. We would be better off deleting the whole lot of them. --Tony Sidaway 15:33, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:WikiProject Fair use has been trying to deal with this problem for some time. You might want to join rather than duplicating effort.Geni 05:27, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

To an extent WikiProject Fair use has created some of the problems, including the one that Ta Bu is complaining about here. The most notable and pertinent flaw in the approach favored by the active members of Wikiproject fairuse is the over reliance on vague boilerplate justifications, and a lack of any concern over the replacablity of the works in question. As far as I can tell, the state of Wikiproject fair use is much like the effort which was made in late 2004/early 2005 to run around and tag unlicensed works as gfdl-presumed: well intentioned but misguided. They've made an effort to improve things, but it seems that most of their actions have as an unstated starting requirement that they don't disrupt the longstanding abuse of fair use on Wikipedia. Unfortunately, a stronger approach will now result in the deletion of tens of thousands of images and *few* users are willing to commit to that sort of effort or the angry response it will draw from uninformed users angered by the loss of pretty pictures.--Gmaxwell 05:55, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I am willing to take on angry editors, if they have been uploading images as fair use when the images are patently not being used correctly. - Ta bu shi da yu 09:27, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Copyright problems/Fair use claims too. --Duk 05:41, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I think that the current tolerance of such images is due in large part to the fact that some editors, including admins, have uploaded a large number of them and that they, and their allies, have thwarted any attempt to delete them. -- Kjkolb 09:57, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes. I believe you've made an important point here. It can also be said that we too often allow these people to continue speaking as though they were authortative on the subject... thus spreading the misunderstanding. --Gmaxwell 17:45, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

There is a huge amount of effort required just to get our fair use images to a state where we can monitor the fair use claims. Wikipedia:WikiProject Fair use isn't there yet, there's so much to do. If you have a problem with that, please come over there and help us, don't criticise us. And whatever you do, stop deleting things out of process; whether it's correct or not, it just causes ill will. Orphan the images and tag them as orphans, list them on WP:CP or WP:IFD, whatever, but don't do things out of process. Thanks, JYolkowski // talk 16:22, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

In my opinion, WikiProject Fair use isn't there because it rejects the assistance of users whos idea of correcting fair use problems on Wikipedia involves removing large numbers of images rather than creating lengthy chains of process and pretzel logic in an attempt to justify a fair use claim for almost every image we're already using. Although that is only my personal opinion based on my own limited interaction with Wikiproject Fair use, I believe it is quite clearly supported by fact that the only mention of any form of removing content on the project page is in the context of adding more justifications to prevent the removal.

Since there is no mention of removing violations in Wikiproject Fair use's goals, I'd say that this entire discussion is outside of the scope of your project. Please stop trying to obstruct the work of others. --Gmaxwell 17:45, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

More the case that we asssumed that once people understood what was allowed under fair use they would stop uploading stuff which was not.Geni 23:37, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure if deleting all these covers will do any good, because different people will just upload them again. If you have a template for Time covers, people will assume Time covers are okay to use, and then to delete them later just causes hard feelings in the people who took the time to upload them thinking they were doing something kosher. We should figure out a way to easily prevent people from violating fair use in the first place, otherwise this will be a permanent cycle of upload and delete. Gamaliel 23:44, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

In that case, I encourage admins to start speedy deleting any new images that have existed on the site for more than a day without fair use rationales. The one day limit will give people a chance to upload the image and then add the fair use rationale: I know that it sometimes takes this long to add it when I upload a fair use image. - Ta bu shi da yu 07:48, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I am personally going through my past image uploads, by using the image upload log, and based on the new copyright criteria and other things that were instituted, I got rid of about 30-40 of my uploads. Some of them were FU orphans, some were formerly tagged with licenses such as CanadaCopyright. I encourage all admins to repeat this, with their own files, and see not only how many image/copyvios we could solve, but also reflect on what we did in the past. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 07:53, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

TabWiki Links

Myself and other member of tabwiki.com (a mediawiki based tableture site) were wodering if it would be against Wikipedia policy for us to add links to tabwiki tabs on the songs and album templates of wikipedia. I realize your rules are much more complex then tabwiki's and as such I felt it would be polite to ask before taking any action on the subject. Please let us know here or on tabwiki's main page's talk page.

PS. we are in the process of linking to wikipedia on tabwiki artist pages (see Pink Floyd's page on Tabwiki for an example)

--Diploid 21:29, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

My only concern here is the fact that the RIAA is targeting lyric and music tag sites citing copyright violations. Mike _{(T C)} 23:06, 26 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes we're going to have to deal with that when it comes around, we think we'll stand a better chance of survival the other tab sites because we are Gnu copyrighted. Anyways, a law suit against TabWiki would only cause the links to stop working, and as they'd be part of your templates this would be easy to fix. I'm not a legal expert, but I don't think theres any way they could draw Wikipedia into any legal battles. maybe someone knows more on this subject? --Diploid 15:38, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm not a lawyer and not at all certain about this, but it could be contributory infringement, however unreasonable this seems. I believe that's why the DMCA offers safe harbor to information locating services, like Google. Having your site under the GFDL will not help you defend against lawsuits. It's still a violations and it's going to make the copyright holders even more frusturated because GFDL sites tend to be reproduced widely (see Wikipedia:Mirrors and forks). Superm401 - Talk 00:34, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

So, according to my understanding of the Contributory Infringement page (thanks for the link btw) wikipedia would be performing a indirect patent infringement if online tablature was proven to be in patent violation. And in that if we have our problem, there has yet to be a tablature site that will risk taking the RIAA to court (to my knowledge). Powertabs and Mxtabs, two of the largest tab sites, were the first of many to be shut down by intimidation by the RIAA. On another note I've done some homework and I think tablature could be considered legit in the USA (where both wikipedia and tabwiki are based) since it's definition of a equivalent device includes the statement:

"A doctrine of equivalents analysis must be applied to individual claim limitations, not to the invention as a whole."

which would also suggest onine tabbing's legality because although the overall sound of many online tabs is similar to the song, the bars and individual frets ("elements") that make up the song are generally different from the origonal tab (in that they are transcribed from one string to another, or flat out wrong). Basicaly I think the online tabbing community's inaccuracies and newbisms could be our savng grace. Just a disclamer that once again i am not a legal expert, if anyone is please help us out on this one! --Diploid 03:04, 1 March 2006 (UTC) (excuse my spelling, it comes from engineering)

I apologize. I should have noticed that page only dealt with patent infringement. Copyright and patenting are very different things. A patent protects a method, invention, or device while copyright protects a work of artistic expression (book, painting, computer program, music). Unfortunately, that means most of your comment is not applicable. See Chilling Effects for a useful discussion of contributory copyright infringement. Superm401 - Talk 06:47, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Ok, so according to Chilling Effects:

"Storage of material on a system at a user's request. (e.g. pirated software, serial numbers or cracker utilities posted on message boards or in chat rooms)"

is protected by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act’s “Safe Harbor”. Since the site owner has never posted a tab it may be arguable that TabWiki is legal and that therefore a link to Tabwiki would also be legal. --Diploid 16:21, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Since there has been no further comments on this I will take it apon myself to be bold with editig and create a link to the Tabwiki artist pages within the next 24 hours unless there is further discussion here. I want to create a link from your artist template to tabwiki's artist pages, in such a style that is is hidden on all pages except those that have the variable tabwiki set to true. Also, it would make sence that if the TabWiki community ever learned of a copyright ifringemet warning that it would be our duty to inform wikipedia so that links may be removed as the wikipedia community deams necessary. --Diploid 21:57, 6 March 2006 (UTC) (TabWiki Admin)

Political userbox undeletion vote statistics

I compiled the number of article edits and date of first edit for those who are voting on the undeletion of political userboxes at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Userbox debates. There are probably mistakes in my tally, feel free to correct.

Undelete

1. Piotrus - 13147 - 2004/04/10
2. Halibutt - 10669 - 2003/11/27
3. The Tom - 7067 - 2003/06/01
4. Enochlau - 4610 - 2004/01/04
5. CesarB - 3948 - 2003/02/13
6. Revolución - 3456 - 2005/05/21
7. Radagast - 3244 - 2001/12/13
8. Thryduulf - 3211 - 2004/12/26
9. Mike Rosoft - 3127 - 2004/06/11
10. Ombudsman - 2743 - 2005/02/26
11. Ynhockey - 2619 - 2004/11/08
12. Siva1979 - 2081 - 2006/01/06
13. Karmafist - 2058 - 2004/08/09
14. D-Day - 2001 - 2005/07/21
15. JDoorjam - 1734 - 2005/07/04
16. Locke Cole - 1608 - 2005/09/25
17. E._Brown - 1281 - 2005/01/10
18. Palm_dogg - 1130 - 2005/10/11
19. RadioKirk - 1026 - 2005/06/14
20. Cuivienen - 1021 - 2005/11/15
21. StuffOfInterest - 991 - 2005/05/24
22. Cynical - 690 - 2004/05/22
23. SushiGeek - 651 - 2005/09/04
24. Blu Aardvark - 655 - 2005/07/08
25. Ian13 - 576 - 2005/10/30
26. Ian3055 - 533 - 2005/10/27
27. Mike McGregor (Can) - 485 - 2005/10/11
28. Rogue 9 - 433 - 2005/09/01
29. Weatherman90 - 371 - 2005/10/01
30. Hossen27 - 355 - 2005/11/09
31. Pjetër Bogdani - 349 - 2005/12/24
32. MiraLuka - 346 - 2005/09/18
33. Dtasripin - 343 - 2005/04/15
34. Keithgreer - 340 - 2005/06/16
35. JSIN - 336 - 2005/04/02
36. Guðsþegn - 260 - 2005/06/15
37. Sjeraj - 151 - 2005/12/28
38. Colle - 181 - 2006/01/21
39. God of War - 156 - 2005/12/03
40. Mostlyharmless - 83 - 2005/12/26
41. The Ungovernable Force - 65 - 2006/01/01
42. AlbertW - 25 - 2006/02/10
43. Fkmd - 7 - 2006/01/26

Keep deleted

1. Bkonrad - 19790 - 2004/02/13
2. Tony Sidaway - 7449 - 2004/11/26
3. MONGO - 5784 - 2005/01/18
4. MarkSweep - 4893 - 2004/04/09
5. Doc_glasgow - 4399 - 2005/04/11
6. JWSchmidt - 2214 - 2003/02/27
7. Dalbury - 1870 - 2005/08/09
8. Cyde - 1645 - 2002/12/22
9. Improv - 1046 - 2004/10/28
10. Trödel - 944 - 2005/01/17

Those who want to have political userboxes have been cast as a crowd of n00bs with almost no article edits. This is not supported by the facts. I don't personally feel that political userboxes are useful, I just want to remind everyone that there are many experienced productive Wikipedians who think they are and we should be careful to respect them. Hopefully we are about to reach a compromise. Haukur 12:19, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Mostly what you've done here is give an excellent example of why voting is evil and stupid. NPOV and root aren't up for votes either. Just because a polling mechanism exists doesn't oblige anyone to use it or take notice of it when its results are irrelevant - David Gerard 12:29, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I like me some root! Can I vote me some root? :) Haukur 12:33, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Saying that to an Australian may be inadvisable, shurely? Shimgray | talk | 21:50, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Are you sure that they haven't just made hundreds upon hundreds of edits adding and modifying their userboxes? ;-) Kjkolb 13:16, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

:-) This is why I counted only article edits. By the way - anyone who votes to give me root will also get root once I've got root. ;) Haukur 13:41, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I vote to give you a carrot and a yam. Potatoes, the other hand are stem tubers, not root tubers. Guettarda 16:21, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

*grr* This happened to me the other day too. I was going to buy crisps at the shop but noticed that they were selling variants made from other root vegetables and I decided to get adventurous. It tasted horrible. su potato for me, please. Haukur 19:56, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

What this really shows is that most people reallize there's an encyclopedia to write and didn't bother to show up for the poll. Per David, you can't vote out NPOV. - Taxman ^Talk 00:05, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

This was exactly the kind of rhetoric I was trying to counter; i.e. dismissing the views of people who have hundreds or thousands of article edits with a facile soundbite argument ("you can't vote out NPOV") while implying that they're a bunch of wankers who don't "reallize there's an encyclopedia to write". Haukur 23:18, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

What you've done is wallop hell out of a straw man. See Greg Maxwell's meta-analysis for a more complete picture of the demographic breakdown of those supporting regulation of userboxes and those opposing it. --Tony Sidaway 14:58, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Link for said analysis? (Forgive me if it's staring me right in the face; morning coffee has yet to kick in.) android79 15:01, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Userbox policy poll#Results, so far has a link to it. --cesarb 15:51, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Greg's analysis is indeed more complete and quite interesting. Haukur 09:36, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Collateral damage, again

Sigh. I have just been autoblocked again for happening to share an AOL dynamic IP (in this case 152.163.100.204) with a suspected vandal. Although this is usually already extremely frustrating, in this case insult was added to injury, because the autoblock was under the signature of Lucky 6.9, an administrator who, according to their own talk page, no longer wishes to be affiliated with Wikipedia! I try not to lose my temper that easily but I should very much like to know how the clucking bell being autoblocked by an absentee admin who has apparently just packed up and gone is any different from vandalism perpetrated by an anonymous hit-and-run vandal?! As I have noted before, I think the collateral damage issue has gotten to the point where the autoblocking is more disruptive than the vandalism it is supposed to combat Vremya 16:16, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Related to the famous Bug 550, is there any reported bug to take the autoblocker off AOL or similar massively-shared IPs? - David Gerard 16:20, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

<devil's advocate> Or we could just ban anon edits from AOL and the like... flood of complaints might just get them to change their IP allocation policy... Ban anon editing from such IPs, but allow people to register if they supply a validated email address... is that a bird? is it a plane? no, it's a pig! </devil's advocate> Rd232 ^talk 21:17, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

That's an amazing idea, and after providing their email addresses, how exactly do they edit from a blocked iP? Oh yes, wonderful plan! Hey, here's an idea, maybe even though AOL 100% ignores its own paying customers, maybe they'll be more responsive to an administrator from an online encylopedia! That will certianly inspire them to radically overhaul a server system that hasn't been updated since the 1990s! Now if only we had some sort of {{template:sarcastic emoticon}}, that I could place at the end of my sentance, maybe AOL will make one for you if you ask nicely!--64.12.116.200 22:37, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, please, can we ban all AOL IP addresses with an explicit request for them to email AOL's support and policy making people for long enough to get a change made? I'd like to think it wouldn't take too long, but can we at least try for a week or two to get some press out of it? - Taxman ^Talk 00:02, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

LOL - AOL is part of one of the largest media conglomerates on the face of the earth, they can't get bad press unless they want it and literally choose to write it themselves; AOL/TIMEWARNER/ABC/CABLEVISION/SONY/NEWSCORP/PARAMOUNT, if you can find a press/media outlet that AOL isn't affiliated with, then by all means, take it to them - LOL -152.163.100.200 00:22, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

• Interesting that out of all the times people complain about AOL, no one ever mentions that having or not having a unique sharedip is a choice made by a given user, AOL not withstanding, the only time AOL actually applies it's bizaire sharedip system is if you're one of those idiots who thinks that AOL is a perfectly good web browser, the second you exit the AOL shell you are assigned a reasonably unique IP in the 172.128.0.0 - 172.191.255.255 range, yet I don't think I've ever seen a single AOL user on wikipedia actually fess up to this, the only inention I can gather from that is that all the AOL sharedips are either idiots, or harboring some sort of malice against wikipedia, and since 10 minutes on an AOL message board will clarify that it is in fact the former, not the later, there's little than can be done about it--172.149.179.164 00:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

• I mean look at me, yes I'm using an AOL sharedip, and yes theoretically someone else could eventually wind up on this very IP, but chances are so small that I can assure you, I will never be faced with a sharedip autoblock, as long as don't use AOL's native browser--172.149.179.164 00:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Thank you so much for calling me an idiot. Now that we know where we stand, could we cut down on the sneering and actually explain how to exit AOL without being unceremoniously signed off? Don't think I haven't tried; I just haven't managed to stay online in the process. Not all of us whose parents weren't smart enough to pay for a PhD in computer science are vandals, you know Vremya 02:49, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

(Deep breath) Okay, I probably should not have lost my temper. The only excuse I have to offer is that in the last week I have been autoblocked every single time I was trying to contribute, any edits I succeeded in making only being lucky enough to make it in before I got the door slammed in my face (yes, it's that bad). Having said that, I apologize if I hurt anyone's feelings. Insert your favorite picture of Vremya munching humble pie here. However, I would still like an answer to my question, so let me try to frame it less abrasively: The statement of User:172.149.179.164 that "no one ever mentions that having or not having a unique shared IP is a choice made by a given user, AOL notwithstanding" may be technically true in the same sense that having or not having a French-Latvian dictionary is a "choice" made by a given user, but just try to buy one at your corner bookstore. Note the operative phrase "no one ever mentions." I assume that 172.149.179.164 has not realized that one likely consequence of the fact that no one ever mentions this is that for the vast majority of AOL users for whom, like myself, computers are not their field of technical expertise but tools to do something else with (like, say, contributing to an encyclopedia), the fact that unique IPs are available to AOL users under certain technical circumstances amounts to a well-kept secret. So: What is the secret? How exactly does one obtain a unique nonshared IP from AOL? As far as I could gather, it involves shutting down the AOL browser. Unfortunately, I have no idea how to do that without effectively losing my connection (and I have tried); as far as I with my lack of technical training can tell, AOL's dial-up program is the browser. Could someone please give a more extensive, less technical, and (pretty please) less sneering explanation? I promise I won't snarl again if it means chewing my own arm off (which I've nearly done in frustration at the constant blocking anyway :-( Vremya 04:17, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I know this is probably completely unhelpful, but... have you considered switching ISPs? android79 04:25, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know if this is true, but I've heard that running an application that requires a continuous connection to the Internet (e.g. an IRC client), will force AOL to keep you with that IP for the session. Also, I believe that the AOL IP means that if you run Internet Explorer or Firefox instead of AOL's built-in browser, you're assigned an IP in that 172 semi-dynamic range. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 04:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

That's exactly what I mean, the second part anyway, more or less, the trick is that of course, you can't actually close the AOL shell because it's what's providing your interent access, but you certianly can open a new window, the part about a continuous internet connection however, is, creative.. but nothing more than a rumor, and I'm sorry if I offened, to be fair my harsher comments were directed at the unregistered users who are always going "oh I'm not a vandal, that other guy who looks like me is", sorry if I offended

The only drawback, is that editing like this, AOL behaves like a true rotating IP address, so you have to contantly explain to people "yes I know how to use wikipedia and only have 2 contributions but I'm not a sockpuppet" which gets tiresome--172.145.206.190 04:51, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I use AOL, and I have never once been involved in a collateral block. I run an IE window separate from AOL's Internet connection. I used to use Firefox, but there seems to be an incompatability between Firefox and AOL which keeps causing Firefox to freeze up. User:Zoe|^(talk) 03:33, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

• Yeah I used to get into autoblocks alot, now I do the same thing Zoe do, it's better off to run a IE window seperate from AOL, I gives the 172 semi-dynamic range instead of the three problem ones. --Jaranda ^{wat's sup} 02:36, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Given that the discussion seems to have focused on AOL (naturally enough, as AOL users are among the most common victims of collateral damage), it may be worth recalling that dynamic IPs vulnerable to collateral damage are not confined to AOL users. Solutions for AOL users only, though helpful, do not solve the deeper problem that autoblocking is arguably a loose cannon Vremya 23:24, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Page swapped to hide vandalism?

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Critique_of_Finno-Ugric_and_Uralic_language_groups&diff=prev&oldid=41311270 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Critique_of_Finno-Ugric_and_Uralic_language_groups&diff=prev&oldid=40315740

show, that User:Dbachmann twice vandalized the page in short time intervals. Today suddenly his vandalisation disappeared from the history, and my impression is, that the page was manipulated, swapped with a page, that was deleted about a year ago. Could please someone check this? Thanks, Adam88 20:48, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

I see no vandalism, and both diffs are visible on the page history. --cesarb 00:09, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Critique_of_Finno-Ugric_and_Uralic_language_Groups&action=history This is the history page, the both diffs are not visible. Can you please tell me exactly, where are listed the deletions on that page? Also the discussion page belongs to the deleted page and not to the current one. Adam88 19:46, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks a lot for pointing out that duplicate. Both pages should be redirected. And don't go around calling a disagreement over content "vandalism". Lupo 20:21, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

none of the pages may be redirected. Redirection = vandalismus.

There are two different pages; one has "groups" in the name (lowercase g) and the other one has "Groups" in the name (uppercase G). This is why you are not seeing the changes; you are looking at the history for one page and expecting to see the changes on the other. --cesarb 20:25, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

this is just User:Antifinnugor back from his ban with a year-old axe to grind. I protected the redirect now. I'm a bit tired of being called vandal by various trolls, consensus was and is clear as day on the issue. dab (ᛏ) 20:50, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

if you do not vandalize "redirect", you won't be called vandalizer, and won't be tired because of that. Does anybody force you to vandalize? It is that simple.

cesarb, thanks for the clarification. Now I found both pages. Adam88 08:20, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

User talk:Why you so hawny? and User:Waya sahoni

Accusations of ban avoidance and sockpuppetry but I don't know what is going on here. Anyone familiar with this? Rmhermen 02:50, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I don't know about other issues but it looks like the first one you listed is a fairly obvious username policy vi9olation. Pegasus1138^{Talk | Contribs | Email} ---- 03:02, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

If the first is a username violation, so is the other, being a phonetic variation. Joyous | Talk 03:50, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

The second one has been accused of being another account of Jeffrey Vernon Merkey. Looking through the history of his other accounts should quickly tell the rest of the history. --cesarb 03:47, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Requests for CheckUser#waya sahoni (talk • contribs) and Gadugi (talk • contribs). --cesarb 03:49, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

And the first one does look like a sockpuppet of someone else, created to be able to chase the second one without fear of retaliation. --cesarb 03:52, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

The two seem to be in the middle of a massive revert war right now on a talk page. *Dan T.* 04:48, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Would anyone object if I {{usernameBlocked}} blocked both for being needlessly offensive? Superm401 - Talk 00:41, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

No objections from me, both appear to be violations. Pegasus1138^{Talk | Contribs | Email} ---- 02:05, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

As someone familiar with this soap opera, I feel I have to point out that Why you so hawny? was a phonetic variation on the second, and has been banned already for stalking/username violations. waya sahoni is almost certainly a sockpuppet of a blocked user, Gadugi, which happens to be the account of an irritating and disruptive net.kook called Jeffrey Vernon Merkey, and there's some sort of bizarre edit war going on over the article which bears his name.

To be fair, 'waya sahoni' is probably something meaningful in the Cherokee language and (assuming it's not offensive in Cherokee) probably shouldn't be blocked for that particular reason. I recommend finding some sort of excuse to get waya sahoni blocked or banned from Wikipedia though, because Jeff just won't stop being a disruptive influence and making a mess all over the place until he has complete control over his article. Sigh. --Aim Here 07:41, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

This user User:Aim Here is an SCOX role account that comes through an anonymous proxy and is shared by multiple users via a VNC server. I have been quietly editing Cherokee articles. I added Jeff's article to the Indigeneous People project because it appeared on the Cherokee People category page. I have ONLY been placing the {{NorthAmNative]] tag and flagging the article for POV cleanup on the Talk page and a revert war ensued. THESE editors resort to Sock puppet and fantasy banned user allegations when they loose their arguments. They started this by creating multiple sockpuppets and vandalizing my user page. I opened an RFC on moving the LKML content to LKML where it belongs and this is the result. Aim Here is a meat puppet for SCOX and a role account. I listed ALL the SCOX meat puppets on the RFC page. These accounts are duckblinds for POV pushing, stalking, and harassent of Wikiepdia editors. They operate these other accounts for DOS attacks on people they really don't like, I guess we should feel lucky. Waya sahoni 07:52, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Talk about your abusive post.

* SCOX role puppet - whatever that is, it doesn't sound nice

* allegations of sockpuppetry without proof

* fantasy banned user, ugly perjorative for 'lie'

* more unproven allegations of sockpuppetry

* unproven allegations of vandalism

* multiple unproven allegations of being a meat puppet, sounds ugly

* unproven allegations of POV pushing, stalking, harassment.

* unproven allegations of Denial of Service attacks. This is a charge of criminal behavior...

Vigilant 08:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Also check the SCOX mailing list on Yahoo. There are several hundreds of posts where Aim Here, MediaMangler (i_s_p), Pgk (Pgk, pgk PG_King), Vyrl, saltydgmn, Kebron, and Neal_r_Hauser (Why you so hawny?) list VNC SPAM access points to these proxys to spam this article as well as others on Wikipedia. One of them is operated out of Washington State, One is in San Jose, and another is in the UK. There are three others that use anonymizer.com and the-cloak.com. They hand out logins and use them with Instant messenger to spam and vandalize Wikipedia, then discuss their forays and Wikipedia's reactions on the SCOX mailing list. Waya sahoni 08:05, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

These are serious allegations Waya sahoni. Do you have any proof? Otherwise these might seem to violate the WP:NPA rules?? Vigilant 08:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

You know, documents and posts on the SCOX board speaks for themselves. Wikipedia should search through warmcat for the searchable listing. Search on "Wikipedia" in the message bodies. Very interesting. Waya sahoni 08:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Using Warmcat's Yahoeuvre I cannot find any proof for your allegations. Just 'wikipedia' gives lots of hits, and all I see is discussion and speculation about edits occuring here on WP. Granted, many of the posters there do not hold very flattering views of Jeff Merkey, but such opinions outside of WP have no bearing on what happens here, right? I then tried combining 'wikipedia' with various keywords, such as 'msn', 'proxy' or 'anonymizer' and can not find any relevant hits. There are posts discussing how to access Jeff Merkey's website 'merkeylaw.com' through proxies (such as [19]), mostly because Mr. Merkey was in the habit of publicizing IP addresses that accessed that site. --MJ^(☎|@|C) 14:28, 2 March 2006 (UTC).

Well, we don't allow the use of anonymous proxies on Wikipedia. Mostly are already indefinitely blocked. Which makes it a bit more difficult to use an open proxy here (but then, as long as you are logged in, only developers and a few select people can see your IP address, so there's not much need). --cesarb 15:20, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Why you so hawny? was created to harass Waya sahoni. I blocked that account. Waya sahoni has stated that he has no intention of making legal threats or suing anyone at Wikipedia, so even if he is Jeff, he is not banned for making legal threats. I object to the blocking of Waya sahoni unless he violates policy in the future. —Guanaco 21:20, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Blocking summaries

I notice that many users are blocked with cryptic summaries like "User...". Since the summary is shown to the user as the reason for their block, these are totally useless. Please use "Inappropriate username" or another wording that provides a valid reason for the block to the user. Zocky | picture popups 05:11, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Many of the usernames that get blocked are just throwaway sockpuppets or vandals playing denial of service games or username creation performance art and watching the block log and never even triggering a block (for instance the "block me" accounts... but if we ignore them and don't block, they sometimes go ahead and vandalize anyway, for instance [20]). In other words, much of the time when "user..." is used, the user who actually created the username will never even read or see the block message.

Because of autoblocking, meaningful block summaries very often do more harm than good. In cases of vandalism, I do put "vandalism" in the block summary, but every single day I get e-mail from one or more collaterally damaged AOL users asking "why are you accusing me of vandalism?"

The way that the Mediawiki software handles autoblocking is entirely inadequate and often harmful. At the very least, "established users" (non-throwaway accounts) should be immune from all forms of IP-based blocking, and since autoblocks almost never make sense for AOL addresses, the software should internally detect AOL IP ranges and silently not autoblock them.

Perhaps it's time to get rid of autoblocking altogether. Half the time it doesn't work because the vandal can shift IP addresses, and most of the rest of the time it causes more harm than good because it blocks everyone stuck behind an ISP or school or corporation proxy IP. -- Curps 06:43, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Every single day I get e-mail from one or more collaterally damaged AOL users asking "why are you accusing me of vandalism?"

Well, at least as to that point, I have been working on a template that might not necessarily diminish the volume of such messages but would at least ensure that they are less confrontational :-) Vremya 07:41, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Zocky. Undescriptive block summaries are not helpful at all. Unless the blocked accounts were created in bad-faith, I will usually reset the blocks and use more descriptive summaries. Even other administrators may be confused by undescriptive block summaries. Sometimes I will check the block list and I would have no idea certain accounts were blocked. I'm pretty sure that we have lost several good contributors this way. --Ixfd64 22:15, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Curps is assuming bad faith, which is against the ideal of Wikipedia. Robust Physique 01:33, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Curps's block performs a vital service though I agree about the block summaries, maybe someone should ask him if he can change the summary from username... to innapropriate username or some variation of such. Pegasus1138^{Talk | Contribs | Email} ---- 02:10, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Ted Wilkes has again violated his probation

User:Ted Wilkes has again violated his probation, although he had been blocked for doing so yesterday. He is still calling me a liar. This is certainly a personal attack. He has deleted some passages concerning Nick Adams's supposed homosexuality and an external link from the Nick Adams page, although he is banned from making any edit related to a person's alleged homosexuality or bisexuality. See [21] and [22]. See also his aggressive behavior on the Talk:Nick Adams page. This is unacceptable. Onefortyone 19:30, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I have two things to say.

• While I agree User:Ted Wilkes has violated his ban, Onefortyone is also violating his probation with all these dubious edits to the sexuality section of the article. I humbly suggest that both be given clear warnings to cease and desist from any sort of editing in the article for now and that neither be blocked unless it becomes necessary as a preventative step to enforce the existing ruling (which I strongly disagree with but respect in terms of process).

• I think the RfAr should be re-opened, there is much to discuss and resolve. The last RfAr has not worked. Wyss 19:46, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

The main problem is Ted Wilkes, who is aggressively continuing edit warring with me. Onefortyone 19:53, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Wilkes has repeatedly violated the arbcom ruling. I banned him for 24 hours some days ago because of a number of violations, but treated them collectively as one breach. He has now committed two more unambiguous breaches. I have imposed a 1 week ban for the two breaches and am treating them as two clear and deliberate breaches. He is now up to three. If (and given his behaviour it seems a case of when) he hits five as per the arb ruling he will be banned for one year. He seems to treat arbcom rulings as a joke. They aren't. If he doesn't get the message then he will soon have a year to cop himself on. FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 20:09, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Wyss (talk · contribs) emailed me to say you had blocked her by mistake. Tom Harrison ^Talk 04:27, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

No mistake. She deleted lines of another article dealing claims about someone's homosexuality. That breached the arbcom ruling which says that she and Wilkes are banned from making any edit related to a person's alleged homosexuality or bisexuality. The clauses "any edit" and "related to homosexuality or bisexuality" shall be interpreted broadly. This is not the first time she has broken the ruling. The first time I judged given past behaviour to be unintentional. In this case however she unambiguously disobeyed the arbcom ruling at least 3 times. breach 1 breach 2 breach 3 As a result there was no choice but to block her. I have to say that while Wilkes seems a complete nutcase (who is strongly suspected of being a notorious multiple hardbanned user from some years back) Wyss normally acts more responsibly. But in this case the enfringments were clearcut and necessitated a block. Indeed she is very lucky that she only got a 24 hour block having made three clear breaches. She could have been blocked for longer. Some users would have imposed longer for three clear unambiguous breaches like those. To breach the ruling once is wrong. To do it three times in the one article smacks of giving the two fingers to the ruling.

Here is just one of the bits of text she deleted. According to a theory by Professor Machtan, which he explained in his book The Hidden Hitler, August Kubizek had a homosexual relationship with Adolf Hitler. Both Brigitte Hamann and Professor Machtan wrote that after meeting Hitler during the latter part of 1905, the two quickly became close friends and lived together, sharing a small room they rented on the Stumpergasse in Vienna. In Young Hitler, the Story of Our Friendship, Kubizek wrote that during their time together Hitler "always rejected the coquettish advances of girls or women. Women and girls took an interest in him in Linz as well as Vienna, but he always evaded their endeavors." Kubizek also wrote that Hitler had a great love for a girl named "Stefanie" and wrote her countless love poems but never sent them. Instead, Kubizek says Hitler read his poem "Hymn to the Beloved" to him. Professor Machtan stated that while the Stefanie girl definitely existed, some of Kubizek's 1953 writing was a deliberate "heterosexualizing" of Hitler in retrospect (p. 43).

She replaced the above text with William L. Shirer, in his book The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich cites a letter dated August 4, 1933, six months after Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, in which he wrote his boyhood friend, "I should be very glad . . . to revive once more with you those memories of the best years of my life."

Deleting that was a clear and unambiguous breach of the prohibition "from making any edit related to a person's alleged homosexuality or bisexuality". FearÉIREANN\^(caint) 05:18, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks; I can't see any basis for disputing the block. Tom Harrison ^Talk 14:24, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Special:Statistics

Special:Statistics has a typo in it saying "of which 829(or 0.08%) belong to administrators", when it should say "of which 829(or 0.08%) are administators", could an admin please fix this here.

Prodego ^talk 22:40, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

"belong to" is correct. You don't say the account is the administrator; you say the person using the account is the administrator. --cesarb 22:46, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Indeed. Much of the necessity for this page and WP:AN/I is that those one million-and-change accounts are not one per person. Chick Bowen 22:51, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

No, he's right: there is an error in that sentence. I am an administrator, and there are two accounts that belong to me (the other one is for bot edits).I have heard there are over 800 admins; if they collectively own 829 accounts, less than 29 own two accounts. I don't believe that. Eugene van der Pijll 22:53, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Well, no, only the accounts that have admin rights are counted. I assume your bot account doesn't. Maybe it should be "of which 829 have sysop status," but that's less elegant. Chick Bowen 23:07, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

You are right, I didn't notice the word "accounts". Sorry, Prodego ^talk 00:03, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Not all of the accounts owned by administrators are accounts with administrator rights. It should say "... are administrators" because it is the account not the individual that has the administrator rights, sockpuppets owned by the same user are unlikely to also have admin rights. --Victim of signature fascism | Do people who don't think Jesus existed exist? 00:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Weird event

Could someone smarter than me explain what happened with Miles provance? I came across it through the Random article button and deleted it. As you can see (if you're an admin) it was tagged speedy, but it had been tagged in December and was obviously not in the CSD category. Why is this? Are there likely to be more of these floating around? Chick Bowen 23:09, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to guess that it was subst'ed and thus the category code was in <noinclude> tags. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 23:13, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it was probably that (I think the subst: code was fixed to act the same as transclusion, but only recently). --cesarb 23:16, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

And, if you want to find more of these, they should all be visible on the Special:Whatlinkshere output for the speedy deletion templates, since they have a hidden link back to the template itself. --cesarb 23:19, 28 February 2006 (UTC)

Central parole violation

I blocked Central (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) for violation of his personal attack parole. His repsonse was, erm, less than kind [23]. In my opinion it constitutes a further, even more blatant violation of his parole than the initial attack he was blocked for. However, since I was the subject of the attack(s), I'd be more comfortable if someone else could look into this and block if they feel it's necessary. Thanks.--Sean Black ^(talk) 00:15, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

While that comment is certainly offensive (and unfair), I'm not comfortable blocking based on it. Superm401 - Talk 00:50, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I am, and have. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 01:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Central speaks the truth. Robust Physique 01:30, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Excuse me? Are you saying that his insulting and demeaning comments towards me are true? If so, I'd appreciate an apology.--Sean Black ^(talk) 21:27, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Is there some way to help 66.99.13.253?

User 66.99.13.253 (talk for user 66.99.13.253) has been reverting one of the facts in the article for Niles North High School repeatedly for about a month now. The user apparently disagrees with the filming locations of Sixteen Candles. Twice now he/she has posted somewhat grumpy comments about it in the article itself, which makes me suspect that he/she does not know how to look at the page history or talk page, or even his/her own talk page. I can't send the user an email of explanation because he/she is anonymous. It seems inappropriate to try to debate the factual dispute with this person within the article itself. Is there any way to handle this other than continuing to revert the page (and continue to research the information) until he/she either gets bored and gives up or figures out that there is a more appropriate place to discuss this factual disagreement? Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks. Crypticfirefly 05:02, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I had a similar problem once, and did "debate within the article" by using HTML comment tags. Jkelly 05:09, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh, good idea! Crypticfirefly 05:16, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

List of sovereign states

A few in-favour-of-Georgian-POV editors are currently discussing with a few Abkhazia-and-South-Ossetia-are-sovereign-the-same-way-that-Transnistria-and-Northern-Cyprus-are editors, and I'm currently a bit stressed out and don't want to participate too much in the debate (since I tend to violate WP:CIVIL when I'm under stress, which I don't usually do). If debate doesn't quickly lead to a solution, would calling a straw poll be acceptable to see whether the majority of interested users considers Abkhazia and South Ossetia to belong on the list? —Nightstallion (?) 07:09, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I believe Nightstalion either misunderstood or misinterpreted or misrepresented the position of some of the editors (including myself). They are not in-favour-of-Georgian-POV only. They are, using Nightstalion's terminology, Abkhazia-and-South-Ossetia-and-Transnistria-and-Northern-Cyprus-are-not-sovereign. And I am not sure what he means by "If debate doesn't quickly lead to a solution" since he and User: Jiang appear to be the only ones opposing the reasonable NPOV resolution. Any help would really be appreciated since this is not going anywhere despite kilobytes of valid arguments. (PaC 10:34, 1 March 2006 (UTC))

The "reasonable NPOV resolution" is simply your version of the article. Abkhazia and South Ossetia have been in the article since 2004. Come on. --Khoikhoi 02:47, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Could another admin look at this?

Could another admin look at Mgarard's contribs. It's a whole slew of book pages. He had created an article called Gravity by Mark Garard Gravity by Marc Garard [-Jeff], which was literally just pictures of the book pages. I have a feeling that all of the images should be deleted, but I'm iffy on image policy. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 10:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I came accross Gravity by Marc Garard and started to load each individual book page with intention of nuking them, but it nearly crashed my browser. He claims copyright on the material, though, but they have no useful encyclopedic purpose and should be deleted, I think. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 10:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Simple. Either this is original research, in which case we don't want it. Or it's a copy of a primary or secondary source, in which case we don't want it either. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 11:45, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

• Besides, he claimed copyright on the material. He would first need to release it under the GFDL to make it admissable at all. - Mgm|^(talk) 13:13, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

If he had copyright, he automatically licensed the images and text under the GFDL by uploading them. Superm401 - Talk 08:19, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Content dispute

Right, my first foray into resolving a dispute in an article, as an admin. (I'm surprised it took this long) I'd like for more experienced users to scrutinize my actions with regards to this protection and this advice that I gave to help resolve the dispute. KnowledgeOfSelf 11:40, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Seems pretty standard. Be prepared to answer complaints about protecting the "wrong version". See {{wrong version}}. --MarkSweep (call me collect) 11:51, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

You'll do fine, KoS. Mark's right about the wrong version - I myself have never protected anything else. See m:The Wrong Version also. KillerChihuahua^?!? 13:15, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Aye it just happened too! Thanks for the feedback :) KnowledgeOfSelf 13:37, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Main page redesign vote

The Main page redesign official voting has started and will continue until March 18th. We put a notice of the vote on Talk:Main page, Wikipedia:Community Portal, and it's been mentioned in the Signpost. While we don't want to blanket Wikipedia with notices (to the point of annoying people), were else do you think we should put a notice to make sure people are aware of it? Thanks. -Kmf164 (talk | contribs) 16:14, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

On the Village pump. --cesarb 17:21, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Are there major objections to a notice (such as {{Template:Mainpagevote}} on the village pump pages, beneath the {{Template:Villagepumppages}}. Maybe just on the policy, proposal, and news village pump pages. The main page redesign is somewhat cross-cutting of those topic areas. -Kmf164 (talk | contribs) 19:47, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Even if you do it, please post a normal message on the village pump. Wikipedia has so many colorful boxes already that some people will not even notice another one. --cesarb 20:39, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Administrators acting bad

Administrators are acting really naughty recently. I got warned. I want a link. This poop is not tolerable. I want links! Crowbaaa 16:27, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Why didn't you ask the admin who warned you? In any case how about this link, or perhaps this one. Leithp 16:43, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

A Few Questions

Well I was just wondering how you become an admin and please don't delete this, my last notice was deleted. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Crowbaaa (talk • contribs)

You were warned by me for this particularly unhelpful set of edits. I fail to see how warning you about this is being "naughty". Before you even think about becoming an administrator, you need to figure out what it means to be an effective editor first. android79 18:01, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Generally, you need about 3,000 edits and 3-4 months (or preferably more) of good effective edits before you should even consider becoming an admin. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 03:42, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Racist edits on Woodridge, IL

Somebody has made repeated racist edits to the Woodridge, IL article. For a long time all the edits were coming from 24.15.173.210, to the point that I left a comment on the user talk page. Whoever it is now seems to have switched to a different IP address. Can we get the page semi-protected, or something? For more info, see the talk page and history for the Woodridge article. 134.173.65.34 17:42, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Post this request to: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Requests_for_page_protection there are admins there who actively monitor the page and will apply protection if they feel its needed. Mike _{(T C)} 20:25, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

MediaWiki:Spamprotectiontext

I just added information to MediaWiki:Spamprotectiontext telling users what to do when the blocked text wasn't added by them (and, mostly important, mentioning that one of the causes can be spyware, since link-adding spyware have their links added to the m:Spam blacklist to prevent false accusations of spamming). However, I'm not 100% happy with my wording (particularly, I'm not sure it's clear enough for J. Random User), and would like for someone else to improve it. --cesarb 17:59, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

I have tried rewording the message, though sure it could still be worded better. -Kmf164 (talk | contribs) 19:17, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Did you notice you reworded everything except the very paragraph I had added? ☺ --cesarb 20:41, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Cutting and pasting

User:Tnikkel has raised on my talk page an ongoing issue he's been dealing with, regarding frequent cut-and-paste moves done by the following users:

• User:Mackintosh Blues
• User:Cockadoodle
• User:Good vs. Bad
• User:Blackbone 5000
• User:Jumbo Juice
• User:Li'l Bean
• User:The Arc of Fame

It's not entirely clear whether this is deliberate vandalism or simply a lack of awareness of Wikipedia's rules regarding page moves. Tnikkel has raised the issue with them, but the editors never acknowledge his talk page posts, and mostly seem to stop editing after his post (at which time a new one starts doing the same thing). Based on this editing pattern and the fact that all of their edits pertain to cartoons (every single one of them has made edits to some combination of Curious George, The Fairly OddParents, SpongeBob Squarepants and/or The Pink Panther), Tnikkel suspects that it's the same person editing under multiple usernames. But other than the ongoing cut-and-paste problem, their edits tend to be valid and legitimate. And even the moves are legitimate disambiguation (i.e. this isn't a Willy on Wheels scenario); they just use the wrong procedure and then fail to acknowledge any discussion about it.

Any assistance in figuring out what can be done about this would be helpful. Bearcat 18:50, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

This user appears to be currently in another editing session, this time as User:Railroad Runners. I again left them a message, they have edited since the message, but no response yet. Tnikkel 23:30, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Have you tried blocking one of the accounts for a short period (e.g. 15 mins) and then making the warning? - this would fire off autoblocks for any additional accounts. That way you may be able to get them to talk somewhere, and they probably wouldn't realise that the block was released so quickly unless they actually read what you wrote. --Victim of signature fascism | Do people who don't think Jesus existed exist? 00:16, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I haven't because I'm not an admin. Tnikkel 00:25, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Railroad Runners is still making edits, so if someone wants to try that now they could, but so far that user account hasn't made any cut-and-paste moves, so that account hasn't done anything wrong, but if I'm right, they are the same person. Tnikkel 05:47, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I believe this person is back and editing right now and now using the account User:Floodwall. Tnikkel 00:12, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

And again I believe the same person is now using User:Kingdom Wealthy. Tnikkel 03:58, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

If there is an admin who wants to try a short block to try to get this user's attention then right now I believe this person is editing with the account User:USA 5000. Tnikkel 23:45, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

And now I think this person has moved on to the account User:The 100% Grand Guy. Tnikkel 21:47, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

And now its User:Claws 'n' Jaws. Could an admin do a temp block to try to get this users attention? It's getting tiring looking through the hundreds and hundreds of edits this user makes looking for the few bad ones to undo. Tnikkel 23:51, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

User:John cruthers and Caucazia

I noticed an odd link that went into the Kwanzaa article, and followed it up. What I found was an attack page for a made-up holiday, Caucazia, and an edit history that indicated that the user had been moving it around for nearly a month, see Special:Undelete/Caucazia. The user also linked a number of pages (his user page, his talk page, the talk pages for several other articles) to that page.

As near as I can tell, this account has been used for nothing but vandalism and disruption. I deleted the attack page, blocked the account for 24 hours while deciding what to do, and cleaned up after the hideous, tangled mess of redirects this user left in her or his wake. I'd like to solicit opinions on what the appropriate block length for this user is. As always, if any admin feels I have overstepped my bounds, feel free to review or reverse my changes.

Thanks, Nandesuka 22:26, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

Email confirmation - IMPORTANT

(copied from Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Mail server blacklisted by SpamCop --cesarb 04:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC))

For some lovely reason our new mail server has been blacklisted by SpamCop, allegedly for sending mail to spamtrap addresses. (They provide no details by policy, of course, so there's no way to verify it.)

Since there's a tiny possibility that the user-to-user email feature actually could be abused, I've gone ahead and enabled the e-mail confirmation requirement for using email features. This is a bit annoying for the moment since you have to do it separately on each wiki.

I've disputed the listing, so hopefully we'll get it removed soonish and those who aren't getting email will, uh, start getting it again. --Brion 22:42, 1 March 2006 (UTC)

---

What this means for most users: You must go to Special:Confirmemail and tell it to email you a confirmation code. If you don't, you will not receive Wikipedia email. You have to do it with all your accounts, if you have more than one. --cesarb 04:11, 2 March 2006 (UTC) (link changed. Superm401 - Talk 06:22, 2 March 2006 (UTC))

---

Confirmation has worked for me on every wiki except Meta and Wikisource, even though I tried twice and waited a day for the emails. I tried again today with the same results. Is there a problem with those sites? I could not find anything about it on Meta or Wikisource, but I am not very familiar with them. -- Kjkolb 11:38, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

GFDL retraction issue

I and others are getting into a reversion battle with User:Thepcnerd over three images contributed by User:Thepcnerd. The images were relicensed to GFDL by him but since he had a pet page of his afd, he now claims he never granted GFDL and wants the images deleted or put under a more restrictive copyright. You can see the main to and fro on my and his talk page. He has been told by more than one admin that his argument is nonsense but he continues to push his case and revert the GFDL flag on the images. I'd say delete images and be done with it but that sends the wrong message. Garglebutt / (talk) 05:33, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The images are:

• Image:Lakeokeechobee.jpg
• Image:FloridaTrailSign.jpg
• Image:Contents of MRE.jpg

I have indefinitely blocked him for legal threats. Before undoing the block, please explain here. Superm401 - Talk 06:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Also discussed at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#Thepcnerd, revocability of the GFDL, legal threats. —Cryptic (talk) 11:56, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

User keeping copyrighted image on talk page

A user added Image:Fireworks.jpg to a few user talk pages in celebration of the millionth article. The problem is, this image is fair use and no source. I notified that user (also the uploader), and removed it from all usages. Karmafist accused me of copyright paranoia, added the image, and threatened to revert me if I removed it again. I'm involved in another dispute with Karmafist, and so I'm not going to take any more action by removing it. But if someone could at least tell me if I'm right, or if it is unnecessary copyright paranoia, this would be appreciated. Ral315 (talk) 05:34, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Yep, you're right.

1. We can't claim fair use without citing a source for the image;
2. We can't claim fair use without citing a rationale supporting the fair use claim;
3. Our policy forbids fair use images outside of article space anyway;
4. Celebrating a million articles in our free encyclopedia by taking someone else's artwork without credit just doesn't seem like a good idea.

Are we likely to get caught or face a lawsuit? Nope. Was the uploader's heart in the right place? Probably. Should we pull the image because it isn't ours, isn't free, and because we have lots of other fireworks images available on Commons? Yep. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 06:09, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I've replaced the two remaining instances of the fireworks images with (what I think) are attractive fireworks from Commons. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 06:17, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

That's what I thought, and I understand that the uploader shouldn't be caught in the crossfire. Thanks for substituting another image. Ral315 (talk) 06:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Ongoing POV war

As some of you may already know, there's been an ongoing war of POV edits on a number of articles relating to political figures in Vaughan, Ontario, with a number of users asserting that User:pm_shef is inherently biased because of his own family connections. While admittedly there may be some truth to that, these people have not directly addressed any specific examples of what they believe to be biased editing on pm_shef's part; instead, they engage almost entirely in ad hominem attacks and reversion wars. In truth, pm_shef really hasn't broken any conduct rules, while several of his accusers (a handful of newly registered usernames who've never edited anything not directly related to this dispute) have already had to be blocked for 24 hours for page blanking, 3RR, etc. Because I've already been involved to an extent in the discussion, however, I'm asking if somebody neutral can assist in reviewing and resolving the situation. Thanks. The main articles in question so far are Simon Strelchik, Alan Shefman and Susan Kadis. Bearcat 05:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I've been watching this too: I just wanted to mention that the main offenders are User:VaughanWatch and User:70.29.239.249, and the dispute also extends to the article Sandra Yeung Racco. pm_shef may have broken the 3RR rule in combating this, but he seemed to have been merely confused about it; see User talk:Mangojuice. Mangojuice 05:53, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Look at this. That's User:Hars Aldens one and only edit to Wikipedia. CambridgeBayWeather (Talk) 07:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Toms River, New Jersey

The edit history of this article appears to have changed. If this is an accident of memory, please let me know; if there was partial deletion, who was responsible? Septentrionalis 06:00, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

There have been no deletions on that page. You can check the log yourself. Superm401 - Talk 07:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

history seems to go back pretty far and there haven't been any page moves there. What was the problem Pmanderson?--Alhutch 16:45, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Shortly before my most recent edit to the article, sometime early 1 March or late 28 February, there was an edit with moved the local embarassment "below the fold" (in the words of the edit summary). I reverted it. It's not in the edit history now. This may have been a glitch, showing a preview of which the editor thought better as a real edit. There may have been a rollback. Or my memory may be failing. I'd like to know which. Septentrionalis

Special:Confirmemail

A message popped up in my watchlist that "Wikipedia email confirmation has been enabled." I hadn't seen any Wikipedia talk pages about this, and it's always best to take a "better safe than sorry" stance on stuff you are potentially clicking on on the internet. Can anyone confirm that this is legitimate? EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 06:10, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

It is. -- Derek Ross | Talk 06:12, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

About four threads up is a post about it from Brion, the lead developer. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 06:16, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, both of you. Can never be too careful. :o) EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 06:18, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

What, you think Wikipedia does illegal stuff????? Crowbaaa 14:06, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Warning:

I got warned and I want links, please, I think there is a slight misunderstanding DS. Crowbaaa 14:03, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

How about this for a link [24]? --Syrthiss 14:07, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm sorry but I cannot see what is wrong with that. Federal and the other words do have articles, so why not have links? What do some innocent links do. Rid Wikipedia of members? Noooo. Make people smarter? Yeeees. So what's wrong?Crowbaaa 12:41, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Appeal of VeryVerily

This arbitration case has closed. The one-revert per page per day remedy from Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Gzornenplatz, Kevin Baas, Shorne, VeryVerily, and its associated enforcement, are vacated with respect to VeryVerily. However, the other still applicable remedy, namely that pertaining to discussion of reverts, and its associated enforcement, remain in force. Ruy Lopez is banned from using sockpuppets, and is placed on probation. VeryVerily may appeal to have the remaining remedy lifted in four months. The remedies will be enforced by block. For further details, please see the arbitration case. On behalf of the arbitration committee, Johnleemk | Talk 15:23, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Copperchair violating ArbCom ban

User:Copperchair has edited Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi today despite being banned by ArbCom (see his talk page) from editing any articles related to Star Wars. This user has already been blocked four times since the ban was enacted. While the edit does not necessarily appear to be in bad faith, it is still a violation of his ban. --BinaryTed 18:37, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

And he still is. The second edit appears to be a valid statistical correction, however, so it need not be reverted. Septentrionalis 20:02, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

I thought that after long dragged out experiences with other problem editors (in which they should have been banned much sooner than they did; I think you guys know what I'm talking about) that it was settled that Arbcom sanctions on editing a class of articles were irregardless of the merits of any particular edit. I'm tempted to read it rigidly since Copperchair keeps reverting his user talk (which is very annoying, but not covered under the Arbcom decision)- but I will hold off on the year block until I get some feedback here. --maru (talk) contribs 22:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The ArbCom decision says he's banned from editing Star Wars articles; there is no distinction made as to whether "meritorious" edits are allowed, so I'd have to say they're not. He was actually blocked just two days ago for making basically the same edit he made today. --BinaryTed 21:00, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

As I recall, I was the one who did that ban, so it's probably not a good precedent. --maru (talk) contribs 22:04, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Understandable. Is there another admin who would like to take a look at this, or do we actually have to wait for a "bad faith" edit? --BinaryTed 18:21, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

We could ask Nufy8 or A Man In Black to take a look. --maru (talk) contribs 18:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

That was fairly obviously just violating the ban on purpose, so I blocked for a week. The enforcement says for up to a year, but that's not required. I'd suggest a month or more for the next one though. - Taxman ^Talk 05:25, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually I'd like an explanation for why this user's talk page was being reverted and why it is protected. User's have the right to edit their talk pages and blank them if they like. They can't remove vandalism warnings, etc, but everything else is fair game. I'm unprotecting unless some really good policy points are brought up that I'm missing. - Taxman ^Talk 21:08, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Fully-banned users are not entitled to edit anything at all, talk pages included. If he's only banned from Star Wars articles, then he can of course edit his own talk page. -Splash^talk 21:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I think his motive, in reverting to the "welcome to wikipedia" version, is to make his condition less evident to any johnny-come-lately users that with whom he might find himself in conflict. The fewer people aware of his restrictions, the more likely a couple violations thereof will slip through the cracks, especially if four out of ten mistake him for a clueless newbie. — Mar. 7, '06 [21:28] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Of course that's his intent, but don't kid yourself that many people are fooled by it. The first links on what links here is the arbcom decision. You could interpret the arbcom decision as a warning that needs to stay, but the rest he can change as he wants. Really there's so many people watching his edits that he's not going to get any vandalism in just because his talk page looks clean. Please stop reverting the talk page unless to replace the arbcom warning. - Taxman ^Talk 16:52, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

ADMIN Alert!

The user Rasterman has created a page entitled Charles Lee (BAPE Master). This page is very obviously a vanity or vandal page. Could an admin take care of this please? (I currently can't find the templates for warnings to put on talk pages, and I have no idea how to delete the page.) Thank you. Filmcom 18:42, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

If you put a speedy delete tag on the article, an admin will see it. Gamaliel 18:50, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Request to have multiple external links for the good of measuring traffic

In the Ajax (programming) article anon 71.198.121.203 (talk · contribs) from IBM has for the last weeks been repeatedly inserting multiple links to IBM tutorials on the topic. I replaced the links with one common link to all their Ajax tutorials as I believe that should be sufficient. But he now asked me to let all the links be listed as they (interestingly enough) "are trying to determine the traffic and interest of each one, to help determine future commitment by IBM for this type of content." [25]. I told him that I don't think this is a good enough reason to bloat wikipedia articles with extra links, but I also said I would ask for other admins opinions on this which I hereby do. He has previously asked to let the links contain extra strings in the URL, "tracking tags to find wikipedia in server logs easier", which I don't really mind as long as it's clearly not affiliate/profit motivated. And I don't think it is in this case. Shanes 20:13, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Keep it at the one link. The tagging isn't really a problem as long as he is not profitting from it (although this case is arguably advertising), but multiple links where one is better is a problem. --maru (talk) contribs 20:43, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

66.210.38.254

He has been vandalizing quite a bit and blocked twice already. He last had activity vandalizing Hedgehog. He defintely needs another block. Raintaster 21:24, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Taken care of. -- Psy guy ^Talk 21:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

• And do use Wikipedia:Administrator intervention against vandalism in future. Thanks! :) - Mailer Diablo 03:38, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Mark Bourrie

User:Mark Bourrie, an admitted online friend of Rachel Marsden, persistently removes whole swaths of sourced material from the Rachel Marsden article, see this for instance. Homey 21:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Eastern Front (World War II)

We are haveing problems resolveing our differences in opinion.

(Deng 22:08, 2 March 2006 (UTC))

This isn't where this goes. The Administrator's noticeboard is typically used for admin to admin communication. You just need to go to the request for mediation or mediation cabal pages and make a request. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 10:55, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

You are ofcurse wrong when you say that

To be able to post on the meditation page one must first pass the requirments of the Template:RFMR

Read the Template:RFMR and you will see that you are wrong.

(Deng 23:07, 3 March 2006 (UTC))

No I am not. It is not required to post here before you put up a RfM. What is on that template are suggestions for how to list the request. And besides Deng, even if you were required to follow it, you posted in the wrong place anyway. The template says WP:AN/I. This is WP:AN. The steps you want to follow are on the Wikipedia:Dispute resolution page. First step is to talk and there's been alot of that. Next is one of 5 choices: Informal mediation, discuss with third parties, conduct a survey, mediation and requesting an advocate. The dispute resolution page clearly states that any of them can be picked. There is no required order. I suggestion informal or formal mediation because I'm not sure that the other choices would help here. Both sides are very entrenched. Do me a favor and don't tell me I'm wrong with policy. I've been doing this for 15 months. I've been an admin for 9. I have 20,000 edits. I know the steps. "Of course you are wrong". Of course? Please be civil. Please. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 12:32, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

But you are wrong one MUST follow the template. If I hade done as you would have said and directly posted on the meditation page it would have goten denied. Why I chose to post here I simpley because other on the meditation page have posted here. You are wrong in saying that one can just post on the meditation page. The template is something one MUST follow. And it is good that I chose to make an extra post because this one has ofcurse goten dissrupted and has lost its purporse. Now if I would have only posted on the suggested pages and then you would have posted and dissrupted on of them also then perhpas the meditation people could have said; well you didnt really make an attempt to post on the other pages.

Also AND THIS IS THE KEY didnt you just say that the things on the template are suggestions? Well if they are suggestions then ofcurse there is no problem in posting here?

And how long you been doing this is irrelevant. I just proved you wrong, now didnt I? So learn to live with it.

(Deng 21:35, 4 March 2006 (UTC))

If you will notice in the HTML comments in that template, it says that "If the issue was raised on the Administrators Noticeboard or other similar page, provide a stable link" (emphasis mine). It also states in the actual text that you should bring it up on Administrators' noticeboard /Incidents, not here. And be civil. Telling people "I'm right, you're wrong, any questions?", which is basically what you have done above, is not likely to get you anything. Hermione1980 22:44, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

No no this was a good test run and when I post on the 2 pages that are suggested in the template then ofcurse I hope that I can avoid all the problems that we have experienced here. Fact is Fact and the Fact is my post here hasent accomplished what is was sent out to do but has gotten bogged down and has floated away from what its purpose was. So the actions of others has proven that I was correct in posting here because in doing so I possibly avoided the same incident on the intended pages.(Deng 23:07, 4 March 2006 (UTC))

The ends do not justify the means. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 07:09, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Robert Steadman Composer

I have been proved right - despite being mocked by some administrators. The article about Robert sTeadman is essentially a vanity article created by the subject in a shameless attempt at self promotion. The subject used sockpuppets to block any attempt to edit the article and to smear anybody who attempted to do so. The subject attempted to get the article protected - and cheekily wished to have access whilst everybody else was blocked. When the article was referred for deletion, the subject privately contacted administrators to discredit those voting against it and to canvass support. The subject then went on to vote for himself. This is a shameful business. I did point all of this out to the administrators at the time and was dismissed as a troublemaking crank. Ironically, the subject of the article has proved himself to be a much more troublesome user.Crusading composer 00:02, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Request Relist of Amal Mavani AfD

Please relist the AfD discussion for Amal Mavani. There have been several additions which appear to be "goofs". If this request is not appropriate here, please refer me to where I should place it. Thanks. --Bugwit grunt / scribbles 00:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

It doesn't need 'relisting' since it's still an open debate. -Splash^talk 01:07, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

• And AfDs are automatically 'relisted' if there is insufficient consensus to determine the outcome of their debates. - Mailer Diablo 03:36, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

A message from the Squidward vandal

Today I received this email from User:Projects (the Squidward vandal):

we have all the proxies we need and this statement:

So now we know that his name is Gogi Cvika, he lives in Chicago and he is the president of a chess association called WCA. Mushroom (Talk) 05:55, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

Only first name is correct, we use many IL proxies (legal access)and I was never a member and president of any club, lol. I was an international tournament director for 2 years 97-99, only, however, I never give my exact name exact, anywhere, including on your 'great finds' lol and there are many mistakes there, I want to let you know we contacted phroziac asking for assistance what to do, because many posts were being reverted automatically, even those where they eventually were prooven to be concise/exact and true and to the best of our knowledge. But Phroziac and others gave us trouble. There are three of us. I am a historian, not a vandal, but I am working on a program that will autmoticlly catch on your site and change many pages without any of us being present. By loosing us, you lost huge knowledge of sports and much more, all the things we said e.g. about 1998 1999 nba season, eventually, reverted, and on many other topics. I will not go into the details here. And no,

I do not live in Chicago, but use Chicago proxy, I am from Indiana, I contacted certain lady at wikipedia, then she passed on info to that whore phroziac, did you honestly think i would give my real name and even if u do find, that makes no difference, we will keep on bothering you all, just so you know. But it's inappropriate to post any names, even if they are half correct, because they were written to one party, THE WIKI ADMINISTRATION, Ms. Carter, she forwarded our concern to that whore phroziac, carter said it's best for us not to post here, since many sites will automatically be reverted, you have codes you inserted which automatically notify aholes like curps, i am a computer programmer and I know all the codes in the world, you could have had a top commander and anti vandal guard in your sects, if you just allowed us to talk normally, now you have chosen war, a war, which we intend to continue one way or the other. I demand that you enforce the rules and not user people's names, because I do not want members of any club to be on vandal list, if they are, even better, we can not wait to sue you.

And again, you are all hypocrites, you do not follow your rules...

I think that you may only have his alias, but I won't post his alias or real name here, as per the privacy policy. -- Kjkolb 09:21, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

One way or the other, you guys have no life, we do.

Mushroom (Talk) 01:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I got this on my talk page. It was reverted by another editor, I probably would have ignored it since I'm less likely to get in trouble that way. I gave the information I had to an editor trying to stop the vandalism, but all of the names I found may have been aliases. If they were, it probably means that he uses aliases offline in day-to-day life. The name above was taken from an email. I also found names that he used for his websites, chess tournaments, newsgroups and a newspaper article. I have not had any contact with him and I have not been involved with the case in any other way, so that's all I can say. -- Kjkolb 03:01, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

After posting this, I found an email from him. I informed him of my intention to stay out of this from now on. My focus is on writing and improving articles. Thanks, Kjkolb 03:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Triumph of the Will

Requesting that we get as many people as possible watchlisting this today. It's the featured article...and given it's subject, I'm expecting high amounts of vandalism. I just had to sprotect it because of a penis vandal...and it's only been the FA for 2 hours. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 01:59, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Watching, and adding "nasty penis vandal" to my list of inherently funny phrases. android79 02:10, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Do not protect or semi-protect. This is today's FA. Please read User:Raul654/protection for more information. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 02:20, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

99.9999% of the time I agree with you. But I protected it for 15 minutes to try to ward off a penis vandal. Of course. It didn't work. :) It's going to be a rough day I'm afraid for us vandal fighters. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 03:06, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Jeffrey Liu

This appears to be an article about an entirely different subject, the use of the word "gay" specifically, for a long time back in its history. Am I missing something? -Splash^talk 02:33, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, it was target of a pagemove vandal. NSLE _(T+C) at 02:36 UTC (2006-03-03)

Redirects deleted, move reverted. NSLE _(T+C) at 02:41 UTC (2006-03-03)

210.11.188.13 and 210.11.188.16

Multiple warnings, I issued a last warning after reverting an article twice, he vandalized again. Last vandalism on Bayeux Tapestry. The IP is registered to a school so they can be only temporarily blocked. This is also why it seems to be multiple IPs. Thanks. Raintaster 03:08, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, I blocked the first IP for 48 hours. But if there are multiple Ip's involved a range block may be needed. --Ragib 03:14, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Now with semi-protection available, I generally prefer to semi-protect articles rather than to impose a range block. Obviously, range blocks may still be necessary if more than one or a few articles are being targeted. --Nlu (talk) 07:35, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Drawer full of socks (talk · contribs)

A while back, this user was blocked probably for an inappropriate user name. Drawer full of socks put the unblock template on his talk page but I removed it later and explained about his user name to him. Every day now, a new anon IP addresses keep adding the unblock template back to his talk page giving the edit summary "request for unblock upheld". Can someone look into this? Moe ε 04:57, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

sprotected, and added a notice about the reason for the block. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 07:40, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

User:joshbuddy

Please do NOT block this user for squidward, hes testing an anti-squidward bot. Thanks Tawker 07:35, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

SQUIDWARD!! bot testing

I'm currently testing a bot to revert SQUIDWARD attacks. Please note this. Thanks. joshbuddy^talk 07:36, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Is this bot approved? WP:BOT states: Sysops should block bots, without hesitation, if they are unapproved

It's MY bot and its approved running with a bot flag Tawker 07:52, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

yes and i belive your flag is for {{subst:}}ing templates, and thats all your bot shoud be used for tawker until you have permison from wp:bots Benon 09:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

NPOV suggestion

Lots of time is wasted on NPOV disputes. I suggest a new category of protection. If a minimum of five admins decide to protect a section of an article (particularly the intro) then it remains protected until a minimum of five admins object. We might then move to greater stability though I acknowledge the downside of preventing editing. Kevin Mccready 15:57, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

No. Admins aren't supposed to use their administrative position to endorse specific positions in a NPOV dispute; the protection policy, in fact, forbids that in no unclear terms, and admins have ended up before the ArbCom before for violating it. A successful vote for adminship represents community support for an editor's restraint, stability, and committment to the project; it does not represent, in any way, community support for their views. Therefore it does not confer any special right to impose their view on articles, not even if they can find four like-minded admins to agree with them. An article where five admins are in dispute with five good-faith regular users should be considered a normal content dispute between users, and it should be settled like any other dispute. --Aquillion 21:22, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

You've perhaps misunderstood me here. I had no intention of 5 supporting one view over another. My point was that five admins should be able to agree on a NPOV statement that encapsulates a controversy, particularly in an introduction. i doubt that 5 vs 5 would waste anywhere near the huge amount of time and effort WPians can devote to revert wars. The point of my post was to suggest something new that could cut down on wasted effort. The "something new" is the suggestion that individual sections of an article (introductions for example) may be protected in special cases for perhaps a limited period of time. Mccready 13:40, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Earl of Stirling, anon editor and legal threats

68.179.175.185 (talk • contribs • page moves • block user • block log) is claiming to be (the) Earl of Stirling which is being disputed on both his talk page and the article talk page. In the course of those discussions 68.179.175.185 has made clear legal threats against Hansnesse. I've given a him couple short blocks but he has continued to make them. He has a block ending now and depending on his attitude I'm going to block him for a longer period of time. thanks Rx StrangeLove 16:43, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Will repeated blocks shall deter him from initiating legal action, if he chooses to do so? As legal threats are not tolerated here a permanent block may be in order. Apart from this, contents may require suitable modifications, about which I do not have any idea. --Bhadani 16:54, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

We don't block in order to convince someone not to go to court. We block for legal threats because once a legal threat has been made, it removes any possibility of reasonable discussion towards consensus. The block should be indefinite; at least until the issue is settled. Jkelly 17:14, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I doubt it, the best we can do is to keep him from making them here. I was thinking about a month. As he is editing from an IP I won't block indef. A month should cool him off, and if he keeps it up on his talk page I'll protect/semi it. Rx StrangeLove 17:16, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Let me make certain I understand this correctly: He's the Earl because he claims to be, not because of any other reason; he lost his only court case about it against the UK according to him (although no-one else has been able to find the case)[26]; and now he's threatening to sue WP? The mind boggles. KillerChihuahua^?!? 19:51, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

We get these noble impersonators now and then. It's their bad luck that the British peerage is remarkably well-documented, and that a fairly high level of knowledge (to say nothing of pedantry) is required to fool those who know the subject. Earl of Stirling indeed. Next he'll claim he's the Duke of Cleveland! Mackensen (talk) 21:32, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I blocked him for a month (before I read the above discussion) as noted on AN/I. I regret only failing to block him after the first (very clear and unambiguous) threat; decent wikipedians shouldn't have to suffer under the veil of threats. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 21:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Holy Chickens (from outer space 2, the movie remember?)

Soooooooooo, I think that the Notability test is chicken fried in water. It says that it is not a guideline, why should my article be deleted because of someone else's religion, i think it was a good article that I poured a lot of work into! Crowbaaa 17:22, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Discussion about deletions is conducted at deletion review. Thanks. Chick Bowen 19:19, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

If only I had the faintest idea what Crowbaaa was talking about I'm sure I would be really interested :-) Just zis Guy you know? 19:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

First Council of Nicaea and Council of Jerusalem

There's some disagreements underway about the status of Ecumenical Councils or some such nonsense. There may also be some 3RR violations, but I'm not sure. As I've just nominated FCoN for Featured Article status, I'm loath to step in and start knocking skulls... can anyone poke around and see if there's anything that can be done from a procedural standpoint to quell the chaos? --Dante Alighieri | Talk 19:46, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Removed U2 criteria from CSD

I removed a criteria from CSD: U2: Recycling IP pages. User talk pages of non-logged in users where the message is no longer relevant. This is to avoid confusing new users who happen to edit with that same IP address. since there was no need for deleting the whole page to achieve such effect. The suggested procedure is just blanking the page (as agreed on csd talk page) and not deleting it, so the old versions get archived on the history. The complete deletion was uncalled for. -- ( drini's page ☎ ) 20:14, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Doesn't blanking a talk page cause the system to treat it as a new edit to the talk page, and so bring up the "You have a new message" dialogue? Shimgray | talk | 00:49, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

If so, perhaps a template could be made explaining that the page is just being blanked should be made to avoid confusion. After blanking the page, the template would be placed on it before saving. -- Kjkolb 10:47, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Naja Haje (talk · contribs) and Jobe6 (talk · contribs) confirmed to be compromised

Recently, those two accounts were blocked for page-move vandalism. I originally guessed that those accounts were compromised, and I turned out to be right. The owner of the accounts also played the online game RuneScape, and he just contacted me in-game to discuss this issue. He says that the hacker changed too much information in his account that he cannot recover it. Is there any other ways that hacked users could recover compromised accounts? --Ixfd64 20:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Off-hand, I'd say no. They'll have to start new accounts. Ral315 (talk) 18:51, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Confirm the new accounts, promote them if they were admins and block the old account. The new accounts can have an edit contrib list. Alt: A developer could hack the password, change it, and email it to the true owners.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 18:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

The edits won't be re-attributed, though, and the devs won't hack the pass, since there are legal/licensing implications involved. Neither were admins, for what it's worth. Ral315 (talk) 11:02, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Mac and Rachel Cory

I'm hoping another admin can give me some fresh insight. I've reverted the page twice and redirected to the show the characters were on, Another World, on the grounds that all the information in the article is already at the AW page, and that having a daughter article solves nothing as it's not telling anything new or in-depth, just stating the exact same things that can be found at the article on the series. The user, MrKing84, is not great at discussion from what I've gathered. I think it should be one way, and he thinks it should be his. Rather pigheaded, both of us, so hopefully someone else can mediate on the Mac and Rachel talk page. Thanks! Mike H. That's hot 21:41, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Why not take the info out of the parent article and let him keep it in the daughter article? User:Zoe|^(talk) 21:51, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Template:Libel

Reporting myself for an out-of-process speedy deletion of a template here. Here's a copy of my explanation (on Wikipedia:Libel):

I've removed the {{libel}} template. It is a serious problem if we find libellous material and don't deal with it. The correct thing to do, is to remove the text until it can be verified, sourced, put into neutral language and replaced (or forgotten never to be seen again if that's more appropriate). Just tagging it is a Bad Thing. I speak as one of those that deals with the angry emails from people reading that they are actually monstrous, murdering child molesters and not an average headmaster. -- sannse (talk) 21:47, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I fully support this decision, although perhaps a note could be added to the template explaining why it shouldn't be used? Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:55, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

SVG Request

Could another administrator (who can upload and save SVG files) upload Image:Flag of South Africa.svg, tag it as {{c-uploaded}}, and protect it? I've gone ahead and changed the In the news image to Image:Flag of South Africa.svg.png, a more appropriate image, after a request on the talk page. Once the SVG is uploaded and protected, then the template's image can be changed and the .svg.png can be deleted. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 00:44, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Never mind; the news item has been removed and the previous image replaced. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 02:17, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Woer$ and templates

Relatively new Woer$ (talk · contribs) is creating some kind of main-page-like templates. His talk page history shows some prior warnings for vandalism (categories and possibly templates). I'm not sure what the purpose of those templates is, he's not really answering questions in any detail. Possibly just paranoid, but maybe someone else can take a look. -- Curps 02:59, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Most of them appear copied from Wikinews. I'm not sure what purpose those templates would serve here; I would say if he doesn't respond, go ahead and delete them unless they prove to be serving a useful purpose. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 03:14, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

The templates actually seem to be verbatim copies of the Wikinews main page templates, with some minor changes and after having lost their various CSS styles on account of having been moved. They aren't linked to anything. My only guess is that he wants to perform some kind of bizarre mix-up in vandalising articles to look like the Wikinews main page, although that seems tenuous and I can't possibly see why he'd be creating them as templates. Note he's used identical nomenclature to the Wikinews main page templates. I can only fathom that he may well actually just not understand that the main page isn't editable, or thinks he can somehow get around it. I'll leave a talk page message and if he doesn't respond within 24hrs satisfactorily I'll delete them. --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 03:15, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Advocate Cabal

Hello all: I've recently started a new initiative, Wikipedia:Advocate Cabal, which aims to provide informal advocate services to assist Wikipedians in solving problems. I would be most grateful for comments, flames, &c., and indeed if people would be so good as to help out that would be brilliant. Anybody who wants an advocate might also like to make the monumental first request. :) Best regards, --NicholasTurnbull | (talk) 03:08, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

If you can make it more responsive and helpful than AMA, I'm all for it. --Woohookitty^{(cat scratches)} 03:42, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Impersonation

I'm not sure where to report this, so I post it here. I think that user:Kayabusa_futura is impersonator of user:Hayabusa_future and user:*brew is impersonator of user:*drew. borgx ^(talk) 07:32, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Kayabusa futura has a good number of legitimate edits and therefore is less likely to be an impersonator, I think. *brew only has two edits so far, both seemingly legitimate, but due to the few edits is more problematic, but I'd suggest only keeping watch at the moment. --Nlu (talk) 08:46, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Inf3rn0

Could someone help me get rid of this? It's supposedly by a minor (or someone trying to troll a pedophile) and I'll have to come "out of the closet" and say I don't have the procedure down for speed deleting and would like some assistance/education. --DanielCD 16:17, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Nevermind, User:Mushroom got it. --DanielCD 16:20, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

It just looks like run-of-the-mill vanity article. User:Zoe|^(talk) 23:38, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Merkey RFC?

Without solicitiing comment on the actual content of the debate, can I ask someone who knows what he's doing to take a quick look at this quasi-RFC?

Jeffrey_Vernon_Merkey/Request_for_comments

There are two problems:

1. it's not listed anywhere under WP:RFC that I can see, so it's not clear to me that it's really an RFC
2. the namespace is confused: the page is in the article name space, but its discussion page Wikipedia talk:Jeffrey Vernon Merkey/Request for comments (as linked to from the "All signed comments and talk not related to an endorsement should be directed to this page's discussion page" note at the end) is in the Wikipedia talk namespace (meaning that on both pages, the "project page" and "discussion" tabs don't work as expected). —Steve Summit (talk) 20:06, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

I've taken a quick look, but you should be aware that I am one of the editors that the raiser is taking issue with. Looking in the page history the page was originally created as Wikipedia:Jeffrey Vernon Merkey and moved to it's current place, there is no indication it has ever been listed on RFC. Secondly it's inescapable to mention the content in relation as to if it's a valid RFC, the positions listed are in fact written by the same person, rather than as per the RFC that editors should only edit one opinion. Secondly the use of a list of authors with a vague assertion of some wrong doing is of course inappropriate for an RFC. --pgk^(talk) 21:01, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Moved to Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey and Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey. --cesarb 17:02, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

vandalism on my user page!

Mikkalai vandalized my user page. Stefan cel Mare 20:42, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

That seems to be a real problem these days [27] [28]. Respected admins vandalising userpages, just awful. --Sean Black ^(talk) 21:10, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

It is not vandalism, it is part of the procedure to tag sock puppets or suspected sock puppets. We will wait and see what CheckUser says. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 00:44, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Usnewslink

I've blocked this user indefinitely for legal threats made on Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Judith Haney and Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/USNewsLink. --InShaneee 21:59, 4 March 2006 (UTC)

Jobe6 is WoW?

This might be a done and finished topic as of February 21 but I hardly think that Jobe6 is WoW. I don't disagree with his block because what he did was wrong but that doesn't necessarily mean he was telling the truth when he said "I am Willy on Wheels". Maybe it's just be but does anyone remember User:Purplefeltangel? She moved the article Internet Relay Chat to Internet Relay Chat on WHEELS and I'm almost 100% sure she wasn't Willy on Wheels. My point is, she just wanted to leave Wikipedia and so could Jobe6. Although I do agree with his block, maybe in the near future Jobe6 should be unblocked and see if he wants to contribute constructively again. Moe ε 01:34, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Willy on Wheels has spawned many imitators; in fact, the vast majority of people who move articles to pages "on wheels" are probably not the original Willy on Wheels. Regardless, anyone who vandalises or claims to be WoW will not be tolerated, and the account was rightly blocked by Curp's bot for page moves. However, given Jobe6's history of decent contributions, we can only hope that there is some other explanation; we all should assume good faith here. Until there is some indication, though, that Jobe6 requests to be able to edit again, wishes to be unblocked, or provides some other explanation, I think the block should stay. Thanks! Flcelloguy (A note?) 02:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The best information we have right now is that the account is controlled by a vandal, and so should remain blocked. -- Curps 03:43, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

See the above section, where it's said that Jobe6 was hacked, and all info changed. Ral315 (talk) 11:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Cat:CSD is overflowing again

We've got 55 pages and 20-something images in CAT:CSD. I'd clear it out myself, but I'm exhausted and have got to go to bed. Somebody? Anybody? Hermione1980 01:34, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm on it, btw. NSLE _(T+C) at 01:57 UTC (2006-03-05)

Mostly cleared out, wih a little help. Some unclear ones I've left. NSLE _(T+C) at 02:05 UTC (2006-03-05)

I'm sort of monitoring it, but there aren't more than 10 articles in there. — Ilyanep (Talk) 02:49, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Know a good way of keeping CSD low? New Page Patrol. (Just sayin'....) --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 06:29, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

And again, just cleared out most of the 30-or-so articles in there. NSLE _(T+C) at 06:33 UTC (2006-03-05)

55 pages isn't really that much. I've seen it with 200+ at one point (though that was back when anons could make new pages). Coffee 17:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Not really the best place for this (but I'll put it here anyway, since I want some feedback)

I was recently looking the for this disambig page, and mistakenly typed centurian, which rather than yielding no results, gave me this instead, the question being, now that I've discovered that there are 13 entire articles with rather obvious typos in them, do I have some sort of responsibility to hunt through those articles and fix the spelling, or is there place I can take this where other people, or maybe some sort of bot, could do it for me?--172.155.253.112 03:28, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Nope, not the best place at all, I'm afraid--we only deal with admin issues here--but why don't you list it at Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings? Chick Bowen 03:33, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Strange, I decided to fix them all myself, but they're still showing up on a search for centurian, even with the misspelling removed--172.155.253.112 03:38, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Updating the search index is a very slow process, so it's only done once every few months. --Carnildo 08:17, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

upcoming revert war on Jeffrey Vernon Merkey, beware

User Waya sahoni conducted an ill-formed RFC (Jeffrey_Vernon_Merkey/Request_for_comments) which he now says justifies removing several sections from the article; see Talk. Others have repeatedly promised to revert. Expect a battle. —Steve Summit (talk) 03:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Moved to Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Jeffrey Vernon Merkey. --cesarb 17:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

CAT:CSD and Wikipedia:Hangman

This game is still obviously on-going, I can't find any reason why Hangman is in the CSD category. Anyone else? NSLE _(T+C) at 04:30 UTC (2006-03-05)

There is no reason for speedy deletion when the game is still on-going. Can't Wikipedia games just stay on the project? --Terence Ong 04:43, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure why it is in the category either. There certainly isn't a deletion tag on the page, and I can't find anything that would be causing it to appear in this category. Not that I'm a wiki code expert or anything, but from the look of it the page shouldn't be appearing in the category. Raven4x4x 06:24, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Fixed. When I took out an extra period, it took it out of CSD for me. Odd. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 06:40, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Strange case. It seems to have manifested itself sometime around February 14, based on these diffs ([29], [30]) with a comment between the two ([31]). No clue what happened, but figured I'd point that out in case someone wanted to try to track down the glitch. EWS23 | (Leave me a message!) 06:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

My guess is that a template got tagged with the deletion template, and due to caching issues, and not using noinclude tags on it, the page appeared to be in the category (just a guess...) Ral315 (talk) 23:50, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Template:CURRENTDAY

Deleted {{CURRENTDAY}} for some unknown reason, and won't divulge that reason with anyone, even went as far as blocking an aol ip block just to make the point that he can delete whatever he wants, without giving any sort of reason--64.12.116.200 06:56, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

There are no such templates. See the deleted history of Template:CURRENTDAY (edit | [[Talk:Template:CURRENTDAY|talk]] | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) (and the others) to see why Improverist (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and SaviorOfGrace (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) were blocked. -- Curps 06:59, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• O'RLY, then what are {{CURRENTDAY}}, {{CURRENTYEAR}}, and {{CURRENTMONTH}}?? are they all figments of my imagination? Or maybe just real templates? That actually exist--64.12.116.200 07:01, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Interesting. Deleted page histories that include images entitled penisflaccid. This valuable content must be undeleted immediately. · Katefan0^(scribble)/poll 07:05, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

You realized non-admins can't see deletedpage histories right?--64.12.116.200 07:06, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

This is an administrators' noticeboard and that information is useful to other admins. Since you yourself are the vandal the reply wasn't intended for you. -- Curps 07:07, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

See m:Variable. These are built-in variables, not templates, as no page exists to define them. Creating templates at these titles, will only be seen as a trollish attempt to indirectly vandalize the main page and any templates that depend on these variables. Anything created there should be deleted on sight, no exceptions. — Mar. 5, '06 [07:08] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

If there is no Template:CURRENTDAY, then why does {{CURRENTDAY}} have a value? Doesn't putting something inbetween {{these}} automatically reference [[template:these]]?--64.12.116.200 07:11, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

It's handled differently by the software, as it is a variable. Titoxd^{(?!? - help us)} 07:13, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

You do realize that this "concerned" anon (using AOL IPs) is the vandal himself. If the vandalism actually worked for its intended purpose (I haven't checked if that's the case) the software would need to be changed. -- Curps 07:10, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• You realize I created the later of the two accounts, because unregistered users can't create pages either so i had no way to undelete what looked like the deletion of {{CURRENTDAY}} without registering an account??--64.12.116.200 07:13, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
• I agree completely. If the vandalism does work, you should auto-delete by bot until the software can be changed. Creating a list of "bad titles" in MediaWiki: namespace would also be useful for other purposes, such as making {{deletedpage}} obsolete. — Mar. 5, '06 [07:14] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

  It doesn't work. Such templates can be called, but only using unusual syntax like -----. As for {{deletedpage}}, the best way to obsolete that would be to allow nonexisting pages to be protected. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 09:44, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Charlemagne the Hammer

User:Charlemagne the Hammer recently began removing significant content from Federalist No. 1 and Fiduciary. Apparently, he has become disenchanted with Wikipedia and wishes to remove the content that he has added. I blocked him for 24 hours after he failed to heed several warnings and continued to blank the aforementioned articles. I also pointed him to WP:OWN. I would appreciate it if another admin or two would take a look at the situation, particularly, User talk:Charlemagne the Hammer. Thanks. —Wayward ^Talk 08:14, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Sigh. IMO, looking at it, it'd be a waste of time. I think only Jimbo or the ArbCom will make him understand, he won't listen to anyone else I don't think. NSLE _(T+C) at 08:18 UTC (2006-03-05)

Sigh2, I tried to ask him why he was unhappy but he wouldn't even start to talk about his issues, I checked on #wikipedia and he's not blocked, so I really don't know what to say about that one -- Tawker 08:30, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

It looks like being banned from Wikipedia's IRC channel was the trigger. It is not clear precisely what he was banned for, but he says that he was just discussing his views about the wiki nature of the encyclopedia. He also claims that he was ridiculed. Here is an excerpt from his talk page.

"So, you can imagine how upset it makes me to see groups of Wikipedians with plans to make Wikipedia a moderated site. I even saw one group proposing a parliamentary Wikipedia. In my mind, this takes away from the concept of Wikipedia being not just an encyclopedia, but a wiki as well. I voiced these concerns on the Freenode #Wikipedia channel and was promptly banned." "...I do not want my material being used by a foundation that ridiculed and banned me from its IRC channel merely because I was expressing ideas that are supposedly fundamental to its ethos. Banned for supporting the wiki ethos, banned for supporting the "you can edit this article now" ethos. It's a shame, but that's what happened, and that's why I want to leave."

Is there a record of IRC discussions? -- Kjkolb 13:12, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Two points:

• The #wikipedia IRC channel is not an official channel
• Publishing of logs from said IRC channel is not permitted

Rob Church (talk) 01:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

That is unfortunate. Thanks, Kjkolb 08:43, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Freakofnurture is abusing his admin tools!

I read on the Wiki mailing list about Freakofnurture abusing his tools. The complainer said the following:

Almost immediately after creating account for what would be my first time editing wikipedia an admin blocked me indefinitely.

username : Let's Get High And Edit Wikipedia

IP : 69.60.118.148

Reason given "stoner..." by

This admin describes himself as pissed off and also proudly displays a widget that says he does not do any drugs. I had the impression, perhaps wrongly so, that wikipedia was supposed to be more of an open atmosphere where there isn't such a heavy hand with admin powers. In other words, a place where someone's first visit isn't met with an insult (stoner) by someone claiming to be angry, pissed off and a judeofacist (whatever that is, but it doesn't sound too nice). I really do not see what the problem with my username is. It is silly, perhaps, but not offensive. Thank you

I asked the admin for his reasoning and he replied on my talkpage with the following statement:

It's a username that promotes illegal activities and can be seen as an invitation to vandalize the site. Also closely resembles the disruptive "let's vandalize wikipedia" and "let's fuck and rape admins" accounts which are typically blocked automatically within seconds of creation. Basically I'd block anything that started with "Let's" on general principal, because it's probably another sockpuppet of the same select few individuals.

I believe this admin abused his tools, because:

1. He is not a police officer, thus, he should not enforce the law on Wikipedia, unless it explicity states so in the Wiki policy; 2. I don't believe that this illegal activity relates to Wikipedia, because, this activity might not be illegal elsewhere; and also, because this falls under free speech. One is allowed to say that he likes drugs; and, 3. Because the admin said he would ban anything that starts with the word "Let's" based on assumption that it is a sockpuppet (I have some problems understanding that argument).

I believe the user in question should be unblocked and offered an apology, while the admin should be dealt with accordingly. --Candide, or Optimism 08:25, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• Are you implying that this username is somehow appropriate? — Mar. 5, '06 [08:29] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Yes, I am. --Candide, or Optimism 10:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• I see nothing Freakofnurture did wrong. I agree it is an inappropriate username, and was rightly blocked. NSLE _(T+C) at 08:30 UTC (2006-03-05)
• I see no error in judgement in freakofnurture's actions, the username does follow a common pattern of vandalizing usernames all of which are blocked on sight -- Tawker 08:32, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
  • That is, of course, not to say that the user would have vandalised, but it is a precaution many admins take, usually leaving a note to the user about their username. This username, while not offensive, is inappropraite. There is no abuse of admin tools. On the other hand, you have a very nice history of blocks. Perhpas you should heed your January block and lay off harassing others. NSLE _(T+C) at 08:34 UTC (2006-03-05)
    • Perhaps you should mind your own business, if you can't stay on topic and be constructive. --Candide, or Optimism 10:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
      • I think the point NSLE is making is that, yes, I have POVs, yes, I'm not afraid to express them on my userpage. However, unlike the complainant, my POVs have no bearing on my edits to article namespace, and I do not participate in disruptive edit wars. If that doesn't make me a model Wikipedian, what would? — Mar. 5, '06 [10:54] <freakofnur_xture|talk>
• This username was also blocked by Curps, perhaps you wish to crucify him as well? — Mar. 5, '06 [08:47] <freakofnur_xture|talk>
• I think that while he could have explained it better as to avoid biting the newbie, his block was entirely appropriate since that username is blatantly innapropriate. Pegasus1138^{Talk | Contribs | Email} ---- 10:04, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

According to whom? To you? Why is it inappropriate? Is he not allowed to say that he likes drugs? --Candide, or Optimism 10:47, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

• To wit, also try searching Special:Ipblocklist for "Let's" or, more commonly, "Lets" and tell me these names do not follow a pattern. I refuse to believe this is a "newbie". — Mar. 5, '06 [10:15] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

I don't know, but if you blocked him for another reason than his nickname, then that should have been the reason for the block — not the other reason that you used. All I'm saying is that I disagree with the block based on your justification of it; i.e., that he "promotes illegal activities", etc. --Candide, or Optimism 11:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Actually, we do block for usernames that promote of illegal activities [32], and even for statements to that effect [33], though I disagree with the appropriateness of the latter. — Mar. 5, '06 [12:01] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

• I was going to do something about this terribly unjustified block by a ROUGE ADNMIN of a user who would obviously be a wonderful Wikipedian but only under this username and no other possible username whatsoever, but I got high, but I got high, but I got high - David Gerard 12:31, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
• The block was fully justified.--MONGO 12:36, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
• If I had noticed this username before freakofnurture, I would have blocked it. If you don't want to be blocked for picking a stupid username that violates our policies, then don't pick a stupid username that violates our policies. Nandesuka 12:55, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I've checked the inappropriate user names policy. let's get high etc doesn't violate. drug use is perfectly legal in some parts of the world - a point made early in this discussion but not addressed. why don't re just relax and get on editing? Mccready 14:05, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Check it again, because you didn't check closely enough: No usernames that closely resemble notorious Wikipedians' usernames. (emphasis in original). Nandesuka 14:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I did read the policy closely before I posted. I considered that of the word "Let's" was not sufficiently close. Apology in order? Mccready 12:45, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The appropriate action is to put an Rfc against Freak of Nurture for abusing his admin powers to promote his POV, and then see what the arbcom makes of the case. Nandesuka is right that consuming cannabis is not illegal in many parts of the world, merely because it is (if it is) illegal in the States is totally irrelevant unless we are starting to promote US laws as standard in the world, not appropriate activity for an international encyclopedia. There may be other stuff behind this particular case but to block someone solely for encouraging what is in parts of the world a fully legal activity, and concerning a law whopse validity is questioned almost everywhere but at least a substantial minority has no justification, SqueakBox 14:21, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I realize that Freakofnurture cited the illegality of recreational drug use, but an account created under the name "Let's Get Drunk And Edit Wikipedia" would be blocked too (rightfully so). —David Levy 14:33, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, and "Let's Edit Wikipedia Using A Stolen iBook G4" would similarly be blocked on sight. Actually, I can't think of anything combining "Let's" and "Wikipedia" that would be acceptable. Such names are obviously intended to insult and/or mock the project. — Mar. 5, '06 [16:24] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

• In all fairness, Freakofnurture should have provided an explanation along the lines of "inappropriate username" (instead of "stoner...") and should have left a note on the user's talk page. The block itself, however, was entirely justified. —David Levy 14:33, 5 March 2006 (UTC)
  • I suppose "user..." would have been more tacit. — Mar. 5, '06 [16:24] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Yes while it would be entirely wrong to block an entirely new user (which freakofnurture doesn't believe this user is) for saying "lets get stoned" there clearly is more than that to this case. The block looks ok but the reasoning (stoner) is clearly not, people with a pro cannabis POV must be made as welcome here as anyone else. Cannabis use is neither universally illegal nor universally condemned and using doesn't hurt others so to class someone who says I love pot as we (rightly) would condemn someone promoting paedophilia or thuggery (though I can think of one user who hasn't been blocked yet claiming he is a gangster while threatening another user). I can confirm that neither freakofnurture or this lets get high user are involved in the cannabis (drug) articles and in that sense his anti-pot beliefs have not intruded on the main space, SqueakBox 14:49, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The username was not nearly so objectionable that a block was warranted. We should block "offensive" usernames only in extreme cases, not as a matter of course. —Steve Summit (talk) 16:01, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh, for Pete's sake. Someone created a deliberately trolling username. Freakofnurture used a bit of humour in his block message. Should he have stuck with the by-the-book boring-as-dry-toast log entry "Username block"? Oh, probably. Is it not unreasonable to expect someone who creates a trolling username like that to have a sense of humour, and accept that we caught them? I think so.

Freakofnurture isn't trying to enforce some crazy anti-cannabis policy. There are any number of Wikipedians with pro-marijuana slogans and boxes on their user pages; FoN hasn't blocked any of them. I'm a Canadian editor, and FoN hasn't blocked me. :D We've now wasted an absurd amount of time and effort discussing what just about everyone agrees was a good block, just because Freakofnurture had a bit of harmless fun in the block log. I will smack with a rubber chicken anyone else humourless enough to post in this thread, myself included. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 16:09, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Exactly. I don't block users whose overall presence is a positive one, regardless of what they believe in. I blocked an inappropriately-named account within seconds of its creation, then released the IP autoblock, so he could create a new one and forget the whole thing ever happened. In the event that this user intended to make positive contributions to Wikipedia (which I seriously doubt) he's probably registered another name, and we may never know who he is (which would be a Good Thing, considering the quantity of bullshit being generated over this issue). Furthermore, I will note that SqueakBox's argument is akin to claiming that IsWayneBradygonnahavetosmackabitch (talk · contribs) is kosher on the basis that Saudi Arabia has no laws against bitch-slapping. — Mar. 5, '06 [16:41] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

TenOfAllTrades smacks Freakofnurture with a rubber chicken for continuing to post in this thread.

TenOfAllTrades then smacks himself with a rubber chicken for posting in this thread. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 17:17, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Might I add that since the WMF is based in Florida, it is governed by the laws of the States. — Ilyanep (Talk) 17:30, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

US law clearly says one has the right to say that he likes drugs. Plus this incident shows admins' clear contempt for WP:AGF Robust Physique 19:42, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

And yet the act is illegal. Either way, it's not like we're telling the person he can't edit at all. He can come back under any other username. Experience shows that such usernames are used for trolling and vandalism. — Ilyanep (Talk) 19:46, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Just to clear something up - getting high is not illegal. All that matters is what you get high with. --Golbez 20:09, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm so high on life right now, I can barely type. -GTBacchus^(talk) 20:30, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm high on this stupid, stupid discussion! - A Man In Bl♟ck (conspire | past ops) 01:47, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Zeq

This arbitration case has closed. Zeq is banned from articles he has disrupted and placed on Probation. Zeq and Heptor are cautioned regarding sources. Zeq is cautioned regarding removal of well sourced information. Others are cautioned to use the procedures in Wikipedia:Resolving disputes. Where applicable, these remedies are to be enforced by block. On behalf of the arbitration committee, Johnleemk | Talk 09:48, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Now Hold Up

Okay I'm wondering when the maker of wikipedia made wikipedia did he make any articles? Did he make the administrator's rules? At first I thought he left the whole wikipedia empty but then I noticed that only admins can edit the main page so admins are a real official position. Crowbaaa 16:37, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The main page was not protected initially. It was only protected after a long time, and even then there was a backdoor way to edit it without being an administrator if you knew the trick. The full protection of the main page is very recent. --cesarb 16:50, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Ooh, what's the trick? Assuming it doesn't work anymore, there's no harm in sharing it. I'm curious :) --Golbez 20:08, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The majority of the content on the main page is not on the page itself, but via transclusion and templates (Like {{DYK}}, {{ITN}}, etc.), which were left unprotected for quite a while. See also Wikipedia:Wikipedia_Signpost/2005-02-07/Main_page_protection.--Sean Black ^(talk) 21:01, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, Jimbo left Wikipedia empty and intended it to remain so, but we administrators intervened--our puissance is our own.
We know no time when we were not as now;
Know none before us, self-begot, self-rais'd,
By our own quick'ning power. Chick Bowen 17:05, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Argghhhh!!! 2

Also I noticed that on the Notability page a text box was covering a few words and i tried to edit it so that it wasn't. I failed but then I got in trouble for vandalising. I am mad at the person who did this and will ask for an apology, does anyone think this is fair? Come on, people are too grumpy on wikipedia nowadays. Crowbaaa 16:37, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

If this is the edit to which you are referring [34], I would never have known that you were trying to repair a text vs. box collision; in fact I can't tell what you were attempting to do. I suggest using edit summaries. Had you done that it is unlikely you would have been accused of vandalism. Thanks, Antandrus (talk) 16:44, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Linkspam by new user

A new user, User:Polzer, in addition to some good edits, has added vanity literature references to several dozen film-related pages: Special:Contributions/Polzer. Not being an admin, I have no way of easily editing them out, so perhaps an admin can check it out. (I gave a welcome and a warning on Polzer's talk page, so that is taken care of.) --Janke | Talk 18:03, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Cleaned up now.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 18:12, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

Template:Album

Looks like an apparently accidental edit to this template causes the most recent outage. I've preemptively protected it as a high-risk template. --cesarb 22:44, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

More detail: if I understood the conversations on #wikipedia-tech correctly, the cause was that changing the template to remove the image caused the problem while updating the file links for the image. --cesarb 23:14, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

If it is protected, how is someone going to modify the "to-do" list that is also on the template? Zzyzx11 (Talk) 06:03, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Never mind, seems that it was removed already. [35] Zzyzx11 (Talk) 06:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

If it's usually anonymous and new users who mess with templates, which seems to be the case in my experience, though it may not be representative, why not semi-protect it and other high-risk templates instead? -- Kjkolb 11:58, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The high-risk templates are protected against vandalism, which can also come from logged-in users. This template in particular could bring the whole house down, so I went for full protection until the developers say the bug has been fixed and it won't happen again (however, if some other admin wants to unprotect it, I won't complain or revert; I'll just later point and say "I told you so."). --cesarb 14:25, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

That is why I used the qualifier usually. :-) For a template that can bring the whole website down, I would not argue against letting only admins edit it, or creating an even greater level of protection. Still, for templates that are not as critical, I don't think semi-protection is unreasonable, especially when what is high-risk is ill-defined, which leads to non-admins being excluded randomly. -- Kjkolb 12:04, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/John Bambenek (2nd nomination)

I think there is a lot of ballot stuffing, both for and against, this AfD. Hoardes of anons, with 1 or 2 or zero prior edits, are flocking together to vote, with a lot of personal attacks. The subject has complained on of being accused of sockpuppetry (which he denies), (and also linked the afd in his blog). With this type of acrimonious comments flowing back and forth, I suggest others to take a look at it. Thanks. --Ragib 01:06, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't worry about it, plus it's not something we should be posting to AN. The closing admin will take into account any sockpuppetry and the weight of the votes. Mike _{(T C)} 01:17, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Re: Appropriateness of posting it here, I don't mind a pointer to anything that might become disruptive.
brenneman^{T}{L} 01:42, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

This is a pretty extreme case; I've just done a count, and the figures for genuine versus fake or dubious contributions to the discussion (omitting those marked "comment") are:

• Keep
  • Definitely genuine: 0
  • Fake or dubious: 5
• Delete
  • Definitely genuine: 5
  • Fake or dubious: 8

Most of the "fake or dubious" are in fact pretty clearly fake, being editor's second, third, or only edit. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 11:38, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

• Closed as a "delete" now. Sjakkalle (Check!) 11:09, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

RfC/All needs editing

Can I ask an admin to edit Wikipedia:Requests_for_comment/All? It has three problems, one of which is significant.

1. The "Policies, guidelines and proposals" section is missing. At the very least, these lines need adding:

==Policies, guidelines and proposals==

{{Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Policies}}

2. The "Mathematics, natural science and technology" section is in a different order.

3. The cross-reference to Wikipedia:Current surveys is slightly garbled and hiding at the bottom.

I've got a modified version, incorporating all three fixes, tempoarily sitting at User:Ummit/Sandbox, if you want to cut-and-paste (and if you trust me not to have sneakily made any other changes :-) ). —Steve Summit (talk) 02:09, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I did this. Please make sure it's right. For one thing, at the moment the toc seems to be in a very weird place. I'll have to fiddle. Chick Bowen 02:13, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Wow! That was fast. Thanks. The TOC looks fine to me. —Steve Summit (talk) 02:16, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Well, I changed it again--sorry. I didn't like having the Current surveys link at the top, so I moved it back to the bottom but gave it its own section so it will appear in the table of contents. Thoughts? Chick Bowen 02:17, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Wait--now that I've changed it, I'm confused. Wasn't the math section in alphabetical order before, and not now? Why did you want it moved (sorry, should have asked that before)? Chick Bowen 02:20, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I hadn't noticed the alphabetical order. My intent was to make the order match the order at WP:RfC#List, simply because that makes it easier to verify that the two lists are in sync. If the former order on the /All page makes more sense, obviously WP:RfC could be changed instead. (Sorry; I meant to mention that.)

As for the survey link, my feeling (as a dumb user) was that it "ought" to be transcluded onto the page and appear in the ToC like all the others. Obviously it's different and wants to stay that way, so my thinking was that by putting the "See also" link at the top, right under the ToC, it was almost as if it was in the ToC, as a 14th item. It seemed a waste to actually put it in a ToC'ed section, since it's essentially a stub, and it seemed ever-so-slightly obnoxious to make the user click through a second time. (Make sense?) —Steve Summit (talk) 02:34, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I understand what you mean, but when I had "Current surveys" up there, my eye went right past it. I'll leave it as it is for now, I guess, and see if anyone else comments or changes it. Maybe there's more that should appear in the "See also" section, like WP:RFAR perhaps. I've now made both /All and WP:RFC#List alphabetical--thanks for pointing that out, and thanks for all of the suggestions. Chick Bowen 03:05, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

This is a good example of why protected pages are considered harmful. Shall we unprotect it? Protecting against confusion as the log implies doens't seem like a great way forwards to me. -Splash^talk 03:49, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

You're probably quite right. I raised the issue at Wikipedia talk:Requests for comment. If no one there objects, I'll unprotect it, but I figure people who watch that page are likely to be more familiar than I am with the day-to-day operations of RFC. Chick Bowen 04:00, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

If you look at thr protection log, it was protected in the first place to stop people from accidently adding new issues to that page instead of the more specific sub pages.[36] Therefore, do not be surprised if the page is protected again if the problem re-occurs again. Zzyzx11 (Talk) 05:59, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I think it's a good idea to leave it protected, since it's not a "real" page, and inadvertent edits to it seem very, very likely. Actual edits to it are rare, so are reasonably confined to admins. Asking an admin to make the change I had in mind was absolutely not a problem (at least in this instance). —Steve Summit (talk) 23:27, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Username Block Needed

User:Nazi Vandal — Preceding unsigned comment added by God of War (talk • contribs)

Done. Antandrus (talk) 03:37, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm surprised that wasn't blocked by Curps automatically. Pegasus1138^{Talk | Contribs | Email} ---- 04:59, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Sockpuppets on Macedonia (region)

Recently there have been some POV pushing sockpuppets on the above article.

• Macedonian876 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Andropolus (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

Andropolus recently admitted to being Macedonian876. Macedonian876 has been blocked but only for 24 hours and that was on February 3. Could someone review thier edits and see if these 2 need to be blocked for being abusive sockpuppets of each other? Moe ε 03:36, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The Andropolus account, leaving aside some weirdness about the choice of the account name, seems to mostly be devoted to agreeing with the Macedonian876 account on Talk pages. It does not seem to have been used to evade WP:3RR. WP:SOCK does prohibit the use of multiple accounts "to create the illusion of broader support for a position", which is what seems to be happening here. I am going to leave a note at User talk:Macedonian876. Jkelly 23:43, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Amanojyaku

The user is creating a series of new pages with good intent. But they're stubs, and they link to private forums and userpages. He needs advice more than the Welcome message, and I'm not any more experienced than the user at making articles. Anyone want to lend a hand? TKE 05:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I've left a message on that user's talk page encouraging him/her to check out Wikipedia:How to write a great article with the conclusion that I'm available for any questions the editor might have. --Zsinj^Talk 05:20, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Range block

I've just tried my first range block, woth the help of user:Gnetwerker, who seems to know about these things. I read through m:Range blocks, and I think that I'm OK — but following the advice there, I'm posting waht I've done here so that it can be checked. --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 11:59, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

11:55, 6 March 2006 Mel Etitis blocked "80.138.128.0/18 (contribs)" with an expiry time of
1 week (persistent vandalism from rotating IPs within this range; decalration on 
Talk:Asian fetish of determination to continue.) 

It's a pretty large block. And a week is a long time for a rangeblock. You may get some collateral damage. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 15:49, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

That resolves to *.dip0.t-ipconnect.de. In other words, this is the dialup pool of Deutsche Telekom, the largest internet provider in Germany. 82.26.165.46 16:04, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

We generally like IP bans to be 24 hours because of the risk of collateral damage. A block of a week on a single dynamic IP address is too much - a block of them much more so. Secretlondon 16:15, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. Too many innocent bystanders are going to be hit by this block. It needs to be lifted within 24 hours at the most. -- Derek Ross | Talk 16:19, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

If bystanders are hit I'm sure they'll let Mel know in no uncertain terms! I wonder how many Deutsche Telekom customers actually edit the english wikipedia. I wonder if a semiprotect of the article may be a better option. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 16:24, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Ir didn't seem that any of the addresses had been used for anything except vandalism of this article. The week was because the editor (or editors) in question have been doing this for some considederable time, ignoring blocks. The article was protected and then sem-protected for a while, but they just came back. I hoped that the week-long block might be enough to make them lose interest... --Mel Etitis (Μελ Ετητης) 16:34, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Move this to 24 hour block if not less, you have just blocked 16,382 IP addresses. Mike _{(T C)} 17:30, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

18!!!!!! Good God, use 24 only if you must, preferably 26+ if you can. A rule of thumb: If you 24 does not do it, then don't range block (and I have even recieved a SourceForge email to undo a 24-range block for unplugging 1/3 of a city). Another rule: if you are not sure how to get the range block right, then don't do it. Range blocks get out of hand very easily, so just be careful.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 22:18, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Well how is he ever to be sure how to do one if he never tries? Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 06:50, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I do not wish to meddle in the affairs of wizards, but I have detailed all of this vandal's activities on this page: User:Gnetwerker/My Notes/Asian fetish vandal, including going through all of the edit summaries to determine whether anyone else was using that IP range. There were not. The IP range that defines the vandal is 80.138.128.0/18 (i.e. a netmask of 255.255.192.0). I don't know how these things work, but I also don't want Mel to get in trouble for something I researched. -- Gnetwerker 23:22, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

I will risk one question -- what is wrong with a /18 block on a German ISP's dial-in lines, with no record of non-offending use and no complaints? -- Gnetwerker 23:24, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

The fact that there may be registered users editing from that /18. If you believe that not to be the case, at the very least ask someone with CheckUser privileges to confirm it before blocking such a huge range for any significant time. —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 02:20, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

What is wrong is you take out 16,000 IP addresses who many belong to registered users. You could wipe out whole ISP's, heck even whole cities with that range!!! A /24 takes out 254 IP addresses. Look at http://www.intermapper.com/docs/imhelp/07-troubleshooting/ipaddressing.html#subnets Mike _{(T C)} 05:16, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

There may. No doubt they will email the mailing list if that's the case. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 06:50, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

A lot of users don't know how to access the mailing list. Blocking a /24 is a lot, but blocking a whole /18 is ridiclious. Mike _{(T C)} 19:21, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I would certainly agree if it were a ISP of an english speaking country. I do wonder however if a german isp would have that many editors if this wiki. I dunno. Theresa Knott | Taste the Korn 20:28, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

A lot of people from non-english-speaking countries edit this wiki. Some even are administrators. --cesarb 21:10, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

You are allowed to speak english if you live in a non-english-speaking country. Plus the largest american hospital outside of the states is in germany, plus a lot of north americans work/teach/study in europe, plus english is the language of business these days meaning a lot more people learning english. Range blocks should not be treated lightly, especially when its anything above a /24. Just be careful is all, when in doubt as for advice on the AN or from one of your admin friends. Mike _{(T C)} 03:04, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

OK, I defer to the wisdom of the more experienced editors and admins: how does one deal with a persistent vandal originating from a /18 set of dial-in IP addresses? It would appear that the answer is you can't. -- Gnetwerker 07:16, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Put the page on your watch list. Consider semi protecting if necessary. Secretlondon 11:25, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

That is probably the best/only way, blocking it is just ridiclious IMO. Mike _{(T C)} 17:39, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Dyslexic Agnostic final decision

This case has closed. Full details are in the final decision at the link above.

In brief:

• T-man, the Wise Scarecrow banned for six months Held off during the mentorship
• T-man, the Wise Scarecrow placed on personal attack parole
• Dyslexic Agnostic placed on personal attack parole
• T-man, the Wise Scarecrow placed on Probation
• Dyslexic Agnostic placed on Probation
• T-man, the Wise Scarecrow placed under Mentorship

Two to three mentors, administrators knowledgeable in the case, to be chosen at a later date.

For the arbitration committee. --Tony Sidaway 15:03, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

im sorry but didnt t-mans 6 month block, pass only with second choice votes included therefore making it a second choice resolution to the mentorship, an admin should verify the decison before enforcing the 6 month blockBenon 00:10, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I'll have to add my voice here, I'm concerned that it was considered passed 8-0-0 (if anything, it should be only 6 (2)-0-0). If mentorship works, I have to question why a ban is needed? NSLE _(T+C) at 00:42 UTC (2006-03-07)

As I noted earlier, the ban passed as well, but is superceded by the mentorship, until such time as the mentorship breaks down or the mentors decide the ban is appropriate. To be clear: T-man should not be blocked at this time. Dmcdevit·t 00:48, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

The two conditional comments under the 6 month ban are phrased in a confusing manner. This is the 3rd draft of this comment, and I'm still working out what Dmcdevit and Mindspillage meant! I think they mean that if the probation passes then their votes to ban become second choices. If there is no probation, then they are simple supports which are further conditional among the 3 options presented for bans. The probation passed, so the ban is 1 vote short of majority. I think. -Splash^talk 00:53, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, here goes (and I think I speak for Mindspillage as well): There were multiple banning proposals on the table. Midway through, the mentorship proposal was made, so we each made the 6-month ban our last choice in the case that the mentorship passed, (which it did), while still supporting both it and the lesser ban proposal. So, even giving our votes precedence, the lesser bans failed due to lack of support, but the supports on the longer ban still hold (even as second choice), so it passes. We did not oppose it. 6 month ban and mentorship pass (and the other remedies). Regardless, the ban is put on hold for the mentorship. Dmcdevit·t 01:05, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I think Dmcdevit's clarification is fine. We go with the mentorship and the ban is waiting in the wings. I think that what is missing from the proposed decision page is an implementation section, a summary by a clerk of what he understands the final decision to be. From now on I'll make such a summary in any case that has entered the vote to close, and I'll also recommend this to my fellow clerks. This summary will be a subsection of the Vote to close section, and can be edited by any other clerk or arbitrator during the voting to close period. When the case is closed, that summary will be copied verbatim to the talk pages of all participants and commentators, to this page (WP:AN) and to WP:AER. Any arbitrator who signs off on the decision will also, therefore, sign off on the implementation. --Tony Sidaway 01:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

That's fine for future cases, but what about this case? The wording of the final decision still isn't clear, and Dmcdevit's clarification isn't represented anywhere on the final case page. Indeed, since the final case page says "All remedies that refer to a period of time, for example to a ban of X months or a revert parole of Y months, are to run concurrently unless otherwise stated", it seems to indicate that T-man's mentorship doesn't begin until after the 6-month ban. I understand that that's not the committee's intention here, but the page should reflect that. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 01:22, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Well the thing about Wikipedia is that it's a wiki. I've modified the implementation of the decision on WP:AER and (in this edit) here. I'll add as implementation section to the final decision in this case, and such sections will be rolled in to current cases as they approach a motion to close. --Tony Sidaway 02:05, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I would have made the edits myself, but I wasn't sure whether it was appropriate for someone not affiliated with the ArbCom to edit a decision. —Josiah Rowe (talk • contribs) 02:10, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Chinamanjoe

Opinion requested: should Chinamanjoe (talk · contribs) be blocked as an inappropriate user name? (The edits appear to be legitimate so far.) --Nlu (talk) 01:24, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I'd say no. Chinaman was a name for several 19th century ships, at least one of which I belive survives, and is also a cricket term. Chick Bowen 02:31, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

We even have an article on the cricket thing: Left-arm unorthodox spin. Chick Bowen 02:33, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Unless there's evidence to suggest that he's not a Chinese guy called Joe, racist or questionable edits, or somebody stating they are offended by it, I don't see why we should. --kingboyk 04:21, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Anon edit war on Taking Sides

Can someone protect and split this to prevent the revert war over which band the article is about? Alphax ^τεχ 01:59, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Split. -GTBacchus^(talk) 02:13, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Anyone else appreciating the irony here? KillerChihuahua^?!? 02:17, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

LOL --KimvdLinde 02:20, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Shared IPs

My brother complained to me today that he was blocked from editing Wikipedia. It turns out he was editing from one of 7 indefinitely blocked OzEmail proxies. This prompted me to take a closer look at blocked shared IPs on Wikipedia. I compiled a list of long-term blocked IPs with the {{SharedIP}} template on their user talk page. I then searched for attempted saves in the last approximately 24 hours of logs. Three sets of IPs stood out:

• The aforementioned OzEmail IPs (203.166.96.234 - 203.166.96.240)
• Two proxies from Saudi Arabia's national NetNanny (212.138.47.15 and 212.138.47.24) -- we were probably blocking everyone in that country
• A proxy from TPG Internet (220.245.178.132)

I've added all three sets to the trusted XFF list now, so they shouldn't be a problem in the future. The point I want to make is: please don't block ISPs or entire countries indefinitely without researching the alternatives. I'm all for blocking non-compliant ISPs like AOL, but we shouldn't block well-behaved internet citizens for no good reason. If you're having trouble with an ISP proxy, come and talk to me about it on #wikimedia-tech and I'll see if it's eligible for a trusted XFF listing. Blocking whole countries is especially poor form, imagine what the media would do with it if they found someone willing to allege that our Saudi Arabia article was biased. -- Tim Starling 03:42, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I think the KSA situation was more to do with the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy. NSLE _(T+C) at 04:00 UTC (2006-03-07)

I see. Well, you're free to range-block the entire Islamic world if you feel that would solve the problem more completely. I'll compile a list of IPs for you. -- Tim Starling 04:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

How about we just range-block 0.0.0.0/0 and be done with it? --Carnildo 04:18, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Some of those proxies mentioned above (including one of the Saudi ones) were involved in "SQUIDWARD" vandalism. Lately, we've been getting several dozen SQUIDWARD vandalizing IPs every day, and we block them. When we block these, we block indefinitely, because when we tried blocking for 24 hours the same IP usually comes back the next day for more. "Researching alternatives" is not a particularly helpful suggestion. If you can work some "XFF" magic, it would be better to do so proactively and systematically, before a particular ISP proxy becomes a problem. -- Curps 04:26, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough. Has anyone done any work on identifying these squidward IPs? I'm running a few portscans myself, I'll see if I can turn anything up. -- Tim Starling 04:47, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Vandalism in progress/Squidward, some of the IPs in question are listed there. Offhand, I recall some are definitely well-known open proxies widely listed on various proxy lists, some appear to be ISP proxies, some may be botnet zombies. The range 203.186.238.128/25 (now unblocked) is a Hong Kong ISP, see User_talk:Rayleung2709#helpme, they may use AOL-like IP address jumping. -- Curps 05:00, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

In general though, we need a better solution to the problem of IP blocks and autoblocks causing collective punishment, a practice more closely associated with <godwin>Nazis</godwin> than free encyclopedias. There's no other message board or forum site in the world where established users and even moderators or administrators get blocked because of the actions of some hit-and-run third party. Many school IPs are very frequently blocked by necessity, which is bound to permanently discourage many of our most promising young would-be contributors (and in many cases is likely the result of school bullies harassing nerds by effectively creating a denial-of-service situation).

One suggestion would be to create a database flag that gives a user immunity from all IP-based blocks and autoblocks: such users could only be blockable explicitly by username. Maybe this flag could be settable by anyone who places blocks, ie administrators. When you get an e-mail from some legitimate user complaining about being autoblocked, it would be nice to be able to check their contribution history, verify that it's not some throwaway account or vandal, and then turn on the flag and give them the good news that the problem won't recur. -- Curps 05:19, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Blocking everyone who hasn't been verified by an administrator seems unnecessarily restrictive to me. After all, how does one get verified, if one has never edited wikipedia before and is never likely to in the future because their entire country is blocked? Would you have joined Wikipedia if the only way to do so was to plead with someone by email? I'd prefer it if blocking code were developed in a direction which as much as possible does not favour established users over newbies. The complaints of regular users give us insight into the effect our blocking patterns are having on new users, and that will be lost if implement a whitelist.

None of the IPs I listed above appear to be open proxies. There was some squidward vandalism from them, but as far as I can tell, it came from ordinary residential computers using those ISPs -- probably a zombie network. -- Tim Starling 05:50, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

You make it sound like "Blocking everyone" is something I'm advocating, when in fact it's merely an accurate description of the existing status quo. Surely it would be better to have an escape hatch where we can avoid blocking everyone who is forced to use the same IP.

Blocking will always affect users unevenly: some users must share a proxy with a million other users, while some vandals have /16 ranges to play with. Given this reality, blocking by IP address can never be democratic. The only democratic and fair thing to do is to judge users by their own merits, make them accountable only for their own actions and not those of any third party, avoid collective punishment... the only way to do that is to let good users bypass all IP-based blocks and autoblocks.

Many users already have de facto immunity from all IP-based blocks and autoblocks! (ie, with trivial effort they can evade the ones they themselves caused, and in practice they never encounter the ones caused by any other user). Only this is not based on any kind of merit, but mere random accidents of geography and ISP. And good users who are second-class citizens (many students, AOL users, residents of certain countries, etc) currently have no opportunity to earn the same status that is the birthright of even some vandals. The current blocking code has consequences which are perverse and simply insane.

Yes, what I'm suggesting would treat anons and very new accounts differently than more established users, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Treating all users exactly the same sounds good in theory, but in fact it's repeatedly been shown to be a source of failure in social software: see Clay Shirky: A group is its own worst enemy. Established users are a little more equal than newbies, but that's OK if becoming established is readily attainable.

Wikipedia is still an experiment in progress: it is still possible that history's ultimate verdict will be that it was a failure. Consider what Usenet was in the late 1980s... arguably it was the Wikipedia of its era... today it's largely a spam-ridden sideshow.

-- Curps 07:11, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

PS,

If someone has never edited Wikipedia before, there are still various ways we could get them verified... all we really need is some demonstration of non-bot human effort, to prove that it's not a throwaway account. Ask them to go perform a quest... tell them to go look up the names of the spouses of the Finance Ministers of half a dozen European Union countries, for instance, or ask them to wikify three pages from the {{wikify}} category and post the result to their talk page. Maybe something that combines useful work with a demonstration of their ability (literacy, etc) to usefully contribute to Wikipedia (research and editing skills).

This would only really be needed in extreme cases (eg, a campus where we truly need to keep the proxy IP permanently blocked 24/7, to pick one real-life example). In most cases, users can still edit some of the time, so they'd be able to build up a portfolio of contributions in the intervals between blocks and autoblocks. -- Curps 07:24, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I really like the idea of the immunity flag if it is workable. That would at least create a tool to undo additional collateral damage. It's related to the infamous bug 550, speaking of which, can anyone explain why that one is taking so long? I thought I heard patches have been submitted. - Taxman ^Talk 22:22, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

It's taking so long because there's no consensus as to which of the many proposed solutions should be used. --cesarb 23:43, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Please add 203.166.99.233 - 203.166.99.252 to the XFF list. These are also Australian high school proxies. See Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Incidents#NSW/Ozemail proxies. Rhobite 23:20, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Logging

I may not be the first to figure this out, but I've figured out a way to ad an article without it getting on New Page patrol. (That is not to say the action is not logged in another place...) I don't want to spill the WP:BEANS, so see the history at Paleofecalphiliology. I'd like to suggest a change in software (I think?) that would log such an action at Newpages, but really haven't an idea how to file a bug (let alone know if my suggestion is viable). Suggestions? --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 05:45, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

http://bugzilla.wikipedia.org/enter_bug.cgi to submit bugs my friend, and yes it's probably a good idea to submit this, I can't look into it since im not an admin, but I am taking your word for it. Mike _{(T C)} 06:33, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

I have the technical acumen of a caveman, but I've managed to file a bug at bugzilla. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 08:31, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

If it's what I think it is, it'll show up quite nicely on Recent Changes. --Carnildo 07:47, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

And in one other (far less watched) log, yes, but its very sneaky and easy to miss if you aren't really looking for it. I don't use a bot on RC patrol, so I do not know if this would stand out or not. But there is also the logic that if a new article appears in the article namespace, it oughtta be in the New Page log. --Jeffrey O. Gustafson - Shazaam! - <*> 08:30, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Leyasu case closed

A final decision has been reached in this case and it has been closed.

The full details are in the case at the link above.

The remedies are:

• On Danteferno (talk · contribs)
  • Revert parole
  • Warned not to engage in incivility or personal attacks
• On Leyasu (talk · contribs)
  • Revert parole
  • Probation
  • Personal attack parole

Enforcement of paroles and probations is by blocking.

For the Arbitration Committee. --Tony Sidaway 19:51, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Category:Semi-protected user and user talk pages

...is very full of 110 semi-protected user talk pages. Many of these have been protected in a vandal flurry and forgotten about. Since we have at least a couple of anon vandal fighters and it's entirely reasonable that an anon may have legitimate cause to edit the page, including if it is 'theirs', I would ask that admin please i)remember to reverse their own protections and ii)take a look through their own protection log and see what needs doing. Thanks. -Splash^talk 21:21, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

A what if..

I found myself pondering this one day, what would happen if it was confirmed that someone who has a long valued history of positive contributions, under one user name, were in fact one of the more despised, and long hated running vandals?? And this could be confirmed to beyond a shadow of a doubt?? Would they be blocked on sight, or would their +s be allowed to be balanced against their -s?

A second but related what-if, suppose that one day Jimmy Whales woke up only to find that he had a nervous breakdown, and was in fact out of his mind, and decided to use his own account to move pages to completly random titles with the words "cheese" or "on wheels" in them? Is there anything that could be done, or would wikipedia as we know it simply collapse under the mad emperor, page-moving as wikipedia burns...

These two questions seem like two potentially interesting loopholes in established disciplinary practices--Whistle blower 22:56, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

In the first situation, I would welcome them with open arms, but some people might not be so forgiving. In the few cases this has happened (Wik), the person was discovered because he started exhibiting the same behavior that got him banned in the first place, even though he'd clocked up thousands of legitimate edits in the meantime. If they've completely avoided the old fights and have shown themselves to be good editors, I see no reason why they should not be welcomed.

For the second one, we'd be SOL until a developer could maybe lock down the system. However, that's as likely as Tampa being destroyed by a hurricane, so.. .. .. ok, maybe less likely. --Golbez 23:02, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Jimbo's actions can be overridden by the Board, so he's not a SPOF. A developer going insane would be far more damaging (since they have root), but that's even more unlikely IMO. --cesarb 23:37, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

You could ask the same question in any situation. I'm a teacher--what would my university do if I went nuts and suddenly started failing all of my students and destroying their exams so no one could go back and grade them? The answer is, of course, that I wouldn't. What's the point of speculating? Chick Bowen 00:08, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

And if you did, something would be worked out. Let's "cross that bridge when we come to it". --kingboyk 00:13, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Also, the data is more or less backed up from time to time, and anyone can save a copy (and modify it per the GFDL), so, just like wiki-vandalism, it doesn't really matter how hard any single person tries, they can't really impact the existing information. --Interiot 00:28, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Of course, more subtle degradation over time is still problematic, as you'd then have tradeoffs between accepting a more comprehensive up to date work, or a crappier work, with the alternative of a merge being impossibly time-intensive. --maru (talk) contribs 00:38, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

This discussion violates WP:BEANS, please close it. — Mar. 8, '06 [10:09] <freakofnur_xture|talk>

Nonsense Secretlondon 11:21, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

User:TheBobT

This user vandalized twice, and was blocked indefinately by Curps. I wonder why? He sent me an apologetic email so i reblocked him but only for 3 hours. If he vandalizes again then reblock him, but what's with this indefinite blocking business? — Ilyanep (Talk) 02:22, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

(PS: Prevent blocking wars. I won't unblock again if he is reblocked but please be careful — Ilyanep (Talk) 02:22, 8 March 2006 (UTC))

According to Kate's Tool he has one deleted edit, so he probably created a page which, no doubt, had something bad enough on it for Curps to block him. Too bad we can't browse deleted edits anymore. Chick Bowen 02:27, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

[This] was his deleted edit. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 13:26, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

It's hard to recall nearly two weeks later what the circumstances were. It's also worth pointing out that no genuine newbie starts out his Wikipedia career by vandalizing another user's userpage, so this could be a sockpuppet of some returning troublemaker, perhaps circumventing an earlier block. It's likely there were some deleted articles, so perhaps the userpage vandalism could have been misguided retaliation for speedy deletion of his article(s). Who knows, perhaps I mistook a genuine misguided newbie for a throwaway sockpuppet account created for the sole purpose of vandalism. Anyways, go ahead and unblock. -- Curps 03:03, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Alright, cool. Let's keep an eye on him and hope he turns into a good contributor :) — Ilyanep (Talk) 04:07, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

If anything, TheBobT should thank Vegaswikian for deleting his article: it had his full name, those of his immediate family, his birthday, his address, and nothing else. —Cryptic (talk) 04:48, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Doesn't seem like anything too horrendous though. How did you find the deleted article? — Ilyanep (Talk) 23:02, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Just for the record, I normally indicate on the User's Talk page what deleted article I am talking about when I request they not vandalize or add nonsense. That way, when somebody comes back and says, "What are you talking about?" I can look at the article title I put on the user's page and go look at the deleted article to see what my concern was. Sometimes I forget to do this, but I do try to remember. User:Zoe|^(talk) 17:05, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Yet another edit war, complete with possible sockpuppets

Someone emailed OTRS saying that the article Juice Games was biased; on investigation, there appears to have been an edit war between SNAFCUK (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) and Bobbins (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) ([37], [38], [39], [40], [41]). Now, despite the fact that this all happened back in September, there also appears to have been personal information posted on the user and talk pages of Bobbins; to top it off, an IRC log posted on the talk page of SNAFCUK appear to indicate that this is a sockpuppet of banned user Irate (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log). Can someone investigate further and let me know what's going on here? Thanks, Alphax ^τεχ 04:39, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Whether sock puppet or not, shouldn't SNAFCUK be blocked as an inappropriate user name? --Nlu (talk) 07:36, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Image:Lohan lindsay 350x.jpg

This image was uploaded as a {{promophoto}}. I believe this tag is incorrect as the image is of a paid advertisement by, according to answers.com, "a joint project of The Milk Processor Education Program (MilkPEP) in Washington, D.C., and of Dairy Management Inc., Chicago." Am I correct in calling this a copyvio? RadioKirk talk to me 06:27, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

It could qualify as both but either way we can conceivably claim fair use on it. 155.43.145.84 14:32, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

First off, it's orphaned, so fair use doesn't apply as currently, there is no use, and thus the whole question of whether is might be "fair" is moot. Secondly, it just might be fair use in an article on that advertising campaign, if that article discussed the campaign in some detail. It would not be fair use in Lindsay Lohan; and is not needed there. Now off to check the license claims of the images that are used there. Lupo 14:54, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Hi, Lupo! It's orphaned because I reverted its inclusion in Lindsay Lohan immediately prior to this notification. As for the other images in the article, they should be up to snuff per the article's successful WP:FAC. :) RadioKirk talk to me 15:17, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes, they are. Indeed exemplary application of "fair use". I only wonder whether the last image is really necessary. Lupo 08:35, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

User:TruthCrusader

This user has violated WP:HAR in several cases by claiming that my real name is "Chad Bryant" in his edit summaries (see his contributions) and in his actual edits. As stated in WP:HAR:

Posting another person's personal information (legal name, home or workplace address, telephone number, email address, or other contact information, regardless of whether the information is actually correct) is almost always harassment. This is because it places the other person at unjustified and uninvited risk of harm in "the real world" or other media.

I request that this user be dealt with accordingly for repeatedly violating this rule, in spite of several warnings. Master Of RSPW 08:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

He has been stating he believes you might be a sockpuppet of User:ChadBryant, and if your complaint here is that he is "outing" personal information, this is awfully strong evidence that you are a sockpuppet of ChadBryant. If you are not a sockpuppet, you have no complaint to make regarding personal information. I fail to see what you hope to accomplish by this complaint. KillerChihuahua^?!? 02:32, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

I was dealing with this dispute for a while, and I'm exhausted. Every user involved in it, including Chadbryant, deserves a long timeout. There are personal attacks on both sides. They do nothing but put sockpuppet tags on each other's userpages, and attempt to get each other blocked by gaming the 3RR. These are grown men involved in a years-long dispute about a pro wrestling newsgroup. Rhobite 02:36, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Advise needed

I would like to have some advise in how to deal with a user at Natural selection who does not really participates in the discussion, and after consensus is reached about changes, goes his one way and makes changes to that version resulting in bad english and factuall errors (an anom came along and edited his text with the edit summary: Read a biology book!). The old page was not good, and several attempts have been made to improve the page, generally ending in the withdrawl of most editors. At the moment, it is not edit warring, but he does change about twice a day now, the content back to his preferred version. I have invited him again to come to the talk page and discuss proposed changes there, but until now, most discussion takes place in the edit summaries, and I do expect it will be different this time. --KimvdLinde 10:07, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

This is marcosantezana (talk · contribs). He reverted 4 times in just over 24 hours, I blocked him for 24 hours for this infraction [42] [43] [44] [45]. --best, kevin [kzollman][talk] 05:57, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I should have mentioned that I previously warned him about exactly this edit war and he responded basically by claiming the rule didn't apply to him because he was "right". --best, kevin [kzollman][talk] 06:29, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I have posted a question on the Natrula selection talk page whether there are other editors who want to make this a good page. If not, I am going to leave it, and in that case, he has the effective ownership of the page. --KimvdLinde 06:42, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

User:Bugger off

I have blocked this as an inappropriate User name Brookie :) - a will o' the wisp ! ^(Whisper...) 12:44, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Fair use images in sigs

I have been notified by Mushroom (talk · contribs) that fair use images are not supposed to used in sigs. The citation provided by the user appears to bear this out. However, the user appears to be in the early stages of removing the image from all my previous posts. Is this proper? RadioKirk talk to me 17:48, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Yes. You don't own your sig, and it's perfectly appropriate for others to edit instances of it if it contains a fair use image. Chick Bowen 17:54, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

If a copyrighted image is being used in a manner not consistent with fair use, then that particular use of the image ought to be removed ASAP. I don't see why your signature should be immune to that. android79 17:56, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay, thank you for your time. :) RadioKirk talk to me 18:02, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Monobook.js page

I recieved an email from Haza-w, who has damaged his monobook.js page, and needs it reverting to the last version titled "unbeta". Unfortunately, not being an admin, I can't edit another user's .js page, so could an admin please carry out the revert. smurrayinchester^{(User), (Talk)} 18:14, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Hehe...I remember when I skrewed up my monobook with a redirect trigger on every page, even the page it was redirecting to because I forgot to put in a valid "if". Anyway, I reverted it.Voice-of-All^T|@|ESP 18:17, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks VoA. Much appreciated. haz _(user talk)^e 19:09, 8 March 2006

Trick for next time: append ?useskin=standard (or some other skin internal name) to any page. This is what the option of previewing a skin on your preferences does, and, unless you have broken user javascript for every single skin, is a way of avoiding the issue long enough to either change to a working skin or revert the broken change. --cesarb 23:34, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

64.141.95.17 (talk · contribs) tried to hack my account

I just got like 25 automated e-mails saying that this IP has requested my password. Anything I can do about this? --Ixfd64 20:31, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

That user is currently blocked, so they can't edit here anyway, but you might want to change your password just in case, and also possibly e-mail abuse@bigpipeinc.com (the company to which that IP belongs) and let them know the details. Chick Bowen 20:47, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Hum, that's not really hacking--64.12.116.200 21:46, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

The only actual effect is that you get a lot of annoying emails. :-S FreplySpang (talk) 21:48, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

Except information is sent in cleartext by e-mail, where it could be sniffed (of course, all logins are non-SSL, so that particular horse has long since left the barn). And apparently that information remains valid indefinitely (it never expires). And there's no preferences setting to turn off this nonsense, short of disabling e-mail altogether. -- Curps 21:57, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

You mean turning off all email on the internet?--64.12.116.200 00:00, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

No, disabling it on Wikipedia. ~MDD4696 23:03, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Hah! — Ilyanep (Talk) 23:13, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

FourthAve (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · nuke contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)

I've made this edit on the talk page of User:FourthAve. The tone is strong. I am very concerned that such edits are being misguidedly accepted as genuine attempts to write an encyclopedia article. I believe that the editor knows what he's doing when he enters the word "corruptly" into a sentence describing a political officer-holder, or makes frequent references to adultery, and what he does has the effect of bringing Wikipedia into disrepute.

I propose to watch this editor, having sternly warned him, and give him short blocks in the hope of deterring him, One to three hours, perhaps. Many of his other edits are of relatively poor quality, but useful. Comments welcome. --Tony Sidaway 06:46, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

For this edit to University_of_Dubuque, I have blocked him for one hour. --Tony Sidaway 08:28, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I have lengthened this block to 24 hours. One hour is far too lenient, but good work from Tony for not over-reacting. On the other hand, I will not tolerate (nor would any other admin) these sorts of edits: [46] [47]. Harro5 08:35, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Oh he was just trolling a bit. I still think the shorter block was better. If he doesn't cooperate, a longer block is always possible. --Tony Sidaway 09:19, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

24 hours would be appropriate given the guy's history. Stifle 13:07, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

In any event,the second block didn't take (when my initial block expired he was free to edit again). He has continued with the personal attacks, but his article edits since then are not vandalistic in nature. I think that in this case it's better to encourage the improvement in article editing. I really don't mind being called silly names, for now, as long as the articles are improving. Of course his personal attacks will have to be addressed, but first things first. --Tony Sidaway 20:43, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Bad usernames? User:Assmuncher

What is the policy/procedure for a user with a potentially offensive username? I'm looking at User:Assmuncher here. Is there a template or other automated mechanism to flag such a user for an admin to review? The account also seems to have so far been vandalism-only, but it remains to be seen if that will continue to be the case. Ryanjunk 15:40, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

We do have a policy against inappropriate usernames, and since this one is potentially offensive and the account has been used only to vandalize articles, I have indefinitely blocked the user. _└ ^UkPaolo/_talk^┐ 15:47, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

PS, you mentioned templates: {{indef-user}} is the only one I know of, which is to be placed on the User page after blocking. _└ ^UkPaolo/_talk^┐ 15:51, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

You can report other instances to WP:AIV, where an administrator will see it and block. Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 15:49, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

The main template to be used in something like this is {{Usernameblock}}. User:Zscout370 ^{(Return Fire) Fair use policy} 21:19, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Can I create a template that will add a userpage into a bad usernames for blocking category. A while ago I reported a User:Nazi Vandal here. A template could make reporting these names a little easier.--God Ω War 23:23, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

If you do so, please let me know what the template is; the CVU channel has a bot that watches for additions of certain templates ({{unblock}}, for example), and this would be a good one to add to the list. (The bot is the same framework that the Bootcamp channel uses to track {{helpme}}). Essjay ^{Talk • Contact} 02:36, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Unblock Bonaparte

Regarding the unblock of Bonaparte his blocking was a mistake. It was user:Uapatriot, http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia_talk%3ARequests_for_adminship%2FAlex_Bakharev_2&diff=40083793&oldid=40080624, that made vandalism as impersonator of Bonaparte. Also, Bonaparte was the victim of User:Mikkalai who has Anti-Romanian feelings. Yes, User:Mikkalai was blocked for Anti-Romanian discrimination. Please see [48]. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 125.248.136.26 (talk • contribs) .

Bonaparte was indefinitely blocked by Jtkiefer, not Mikkalai. See log. Chick Bowen 17:32, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Mikkalai was blocked for 24 hours for violating 3RR apparently. Are the Romanian nationalists happy now they've got rid of the Moldovan Wikipedia? I can't see your main man being unblocked any time soon. Secretlondon 17:34, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Mikkalai made a lot of Anti-Romanian edits. A sick man that makes sick vandalism on other countries's pages. Sick Anti-Romanian vandal. His father had died in Romania in WW II. This explains his Anti-Romanian feelings. Sick person.

Bonny, go away. Your recent trolling here or here was one of the worst nightmares Wikipedia experienced this year. You'd better find some helpful activity outside Wiki. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 17:50, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Civil as all get-out. w00t! Is there no honour amongst administrators? fuddlemark (fuddle me!) 01:22, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

Anti-Romanian discrimination edits by User:Mikkalai

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Republic_of_Moldova&diff=42998819&oldid=42987259

Why is that so? Why did User:Mikkalai made harassments on Bonaparte? Why was not blocked Mikkalai?

Personal attack made by user:Goethean against user:Andries

user:Goethean is making a personal attack against me on his user page by linking to a webpage "Andries bias" www.saisathyasai.com/baba/Ex-Baba.com/sathya-sai-baba-wikipedia-bias.html that contains defamatory comments about me. Andries 19:02, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

I have requested user:Goethean to remove the link to the defamatory webpage. Andries 19:07, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

Temporary ban from Shiloh Shepherd Dog

This temporary injunction has been passed in the Shiloh arbitration:

1) Until the resolution of this case, Tina M. Barber (talk · contribs) and ShenandoahShilohs (talk · contribs) are banned from Shiloh Shepherd Dog.

This injunction has received the requisite four net support votes. If breached, it can be enforced by a short block. The ban does not apply to edits on Talk:Shiloh Shepherd Dog.

Enacted on 20:59, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

On behalf of the Arbitration Committee. --Tony Sidaway 21:07, 9 March 2006 (UTC)