Talk:Moors murders

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Recent edits

I'm concerned at the amount of recent changes that have been made to this article over the last day or so. This article is now nowhere near what it was when it was listed for FA in 2009. I would therefore propose the idea that this article is put to WP:FAR so it can be reassessed for its quality. This is in no way a slur towards those conducting these edits. Cassianto^Talk 20:37, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

This was largely Eric Corbett's article; I'd strongly advise waiting until his block expires before any FAR, so he can comment on it. ‑ Iridescent 20:42, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Advice not necessary, I wouldn't do it this side of his block. My concern is that the article has lost a shade under 9,000 bytes in a day. The version we have today is not the version that was reviewed in 2009. Cassianto^Talk 20:51, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Most of the recent edits seem to have been made to condense and summarise, i.e. fewer words to say the same thing. The sourcing and chronology are still perfectly sound, as far as I can see, but I'm not sure there has been a great deal of real "improvement". No one owns any article content, but I really don't see the point in making changes just for the sake of change. My guess is that there would be few problems arising from a WP:FAR. But after 10 years, it would seem a perfectly sensible idea. Happy to hear Ian's views. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:59, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

I would invite a comment here from User:EEng. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:12, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

Blocked? Oh dear – and here I thought everyone was looking on so approvingly. In the meantime, while I confess to being unfamiliar with the esoteric ways of FA, I guess I would have thought that the substance of individual edits, not their byte counts, would be the focus of discussion. EEng 22:36, 9 July 2019 (UTC) P.S. For the record, the article's been slimmed down by about 10K in seven days (not one day as stated above). All of this is in text changes along the lines of what ME123 just said -- tighter text saying the same thing, with occasional detail dropped here and there.

Yes, seems to be Gunfight at the Arbcom Corral. *Lower-priced matinee showings, bookable now, for the coming month, get your ticket while stocks last.... Martinevans123 (talk) 22:44, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

One day/nine days, it's still a lot of slimming down in a short space of time. If you're that confident it's improved, you won't shy away from a FAR? As Iri points out above, I think we should wait and see what Eric says, if and when he returns. Cassianto^Talk 23:12, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

I know nothing about the FA process, but why not start reviewing the edits right now? They'll all bite-sized. My intention was to tighten the exposition with no change in content except (as already mentioned) the occasional dropping of what seemed to me obvious or extraneous detail here and there. ME123 and Arid Desiccant have apparently been watching and have pushed back a few times, for which I'm grateful. EEng 23:26, 9 July 2019 (UTC)

I now see that EC is blocked until August (!) so I think I'll leave things be until he's had a chance to look at changes so far. In the meantime it would certainly be nice for someone to step through them, or even just sample them. EEng 03:11, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

You're "leaving things be" now? Perhaps he has now looked and has told you privately that he's in full agreement, yes? Martinevans123 (talk) 14:16, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

EEng, I'm begging you to stop or at least pause your rewrites, as you're trimming too enthusiastically and starting to introduce errors and ambiguities with edits like this. ("Released from prison" and "released" most definitely do not mean the same thing under English law, as evidenced by this very article given that Brady was released from prison in 1985 but wasn't released from custody until his death decades later.) This is a complicated and ultra-contentious topic, and one that even people familiar with the nuances of English law and English culture struggle with, and just going through all your edits up to now cleaning them up and reverting/restoring where necessary is going to be a mammoth undertaking. ‑ Iridescent 14:24, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

(adding) Plus, you're adding outright errors, and using misleading edit summaries so it's very hard to see where you're adding them—it just took me a good ten minutes to work out where you'd added "her bids for release after confessing made her a figure of hate in the national media" (it was Longford's campaign that was responsible for the continued media obsession with her, not anything Hindley herself said) with an edit summary of "resulted in her becoming" is a long way of saying "made her". To be honest the more I see of this the more inclined I am to rollback to the status quo ante and then go through your edits one-by-one to see if they're valid, as this is already going to be a serious timesink to clean up. ‑ Iridescent 14:44, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Absolutely go through the edits one by one. That's what I've been asking for, though the fact is that since you and two other editors had made occasional reversions and comments as I was working over the last week, I had thought you were already doing that.

I'm puzzled, though, by your complaint about the particular diff you linked. The old text (grammatically fractured, BTW) said

Hindley's gender, her repeated insistence on her innocence, followed by her attempts to secure her release after confessing her guilt, resulted in her becoming a figure of hate in the national media.

and I changed it to

Hindley's gender and repeated insistence on her innocence, followed by her bids for release after confessing, made her a figure of hate in the national media

So if as you say it was Longford's campaign that was responsible for the continued media obsession with her, not anything Hindley herself said, the article's failure to reflect that has nothing to do with me, and there's nothing misleading about my edit summary, thank you very much. As for "release", if the intent is for the reader to appreciate the subtleties of release-to-freedom versus release-to-medicine versus whatever else, the article needs to do a much better job of that.

As ME123 noted earlier, most changes condense and summarise, i.e. fewer words to say the same thing. Emblematic of these changes, I'd say, is the change of

Such was the public interest that the courtroom was fitted with security screens to protect Brady and Hindley. The pair were each charged with three murders, those of Evans, Downey and Kilbride

to

The courtroom was fitted with security screens to protect Brady and Hindley, who were charged with murdering Evans, Downey and Kilbride‍

When the murderers of three children go on trial, it's hardly necessary to explain to the reader why the courtroom is fitted with security screens (though "public interest" is a rather euphemistic way of putting it), nor do they need a list of three names previewed by the information that it contains three names. A great deal of the article is like this; its research seems impeccable, but while the writing is very good it's not immune to improvement. The total time I've spent on this is several hours and it wouldn't take half that time to step through them. They're almost all very small diffs, and most are very straightforward. EEng 15:49, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Actually The pair were each charged with three murders, those of Evans, Downey and Kilbride looks better, i.e. more accurate to me. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:43, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

How so? EEng 16:45, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Only insofar as the condensed version has the slight ambiguity that the pair were charged with a total of three murders between them. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:51, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I'd say homeopathically slight. EEng 20:47, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

"Homeopaths are kissed frogs too, you know!!" Martinevans123 (talk) 20:58, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

@Ianmacm, Martinevans123, Cassianto, and J3Mrs: Do any of you fancy going through diff-by-diff from here onwards checking them all and reverting where necessary? I'm not wildly keen to spend however many hours it will take to go through 166 edits, but given that this is such a high-profile and high-traffic topic (and a BLP minefield to boot) we shouldn't be leaving errors in place any longer than necessary. The alternative is reverting to the status quo, but that will understandably annoy EEng who's been making what he thought were improvements in good faith, as it will mean throwing out the baby with the bathwater. (We'll leave to one side my opinion of jumping in to start a total rewrite on the day the main author of the article is blocked.) ‑ Iridescent 15:44, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

For the record, I had absolutely no idea EC had been blocked. I've worked on this article here and there for a year or two, and it's simply a cosmic coincidence that I really got into it the other day. Added later: In fact, EC was blocked that day after I started this round of edits, which was stimulated by this [1] pretty-awful edit by an IP. No need to apologize, Arid Desiccant. EEng 03:53, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

It is my view, Iri, that we restore to the version before EEng started on their bloodbath and discuss any of the major changes on the talk page. Sure, any glaringly obvious grammar fixes can be addressed, but I don't think we should just fix for the sake of fixing, as pointed out by Martin, above. Hopefully, Eric will return and he can also take part. This looks to be the most stable version that goes back to late-June. Cassianto^Talk 15:48, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

How about if, before condemning another's hard work as a "bloodbath", you actually look at the changes and undo or modify any you find problematic? I'm not married to any of them. EEng 15:59, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I am referring to the amount that's been cut away, not the quality of the edits themselves. I've not the time to trawl my way through them – there's nine days worth to get through. But based on the few Iridescent has highlighted, I'm pretty confident that there will be more. Cassianto^Talk 16:09, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

So pleased we've got a bloodbath, not a nasty Jo Brandish acid bath. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:13, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I'd have preferred a Cleopatraish milk bath. Cassianto^Talk 16:26, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Except that, as I explained above, of the two issues my good friend Arid Desiccant highlighted, one (re who's responsible for the "continued media obsession") turns out to have nothing to do with me, and the other (change of "released from prison" to simply "released") could hardly be said to be anything I, or most other readers, could have possibly been expected to understand from the article's presentation, and so is arguably an existing problem with the article which I have inadvertently brought to our collective attention.

When a good-faith editor puts a lot of work into an article, you have two choices: either check out the changes and undo or adjust them individually, or just trust that the editor's changes are, if not each individually improvements, at least improvements on balance in toto. Not an option is to say you don't have time to review what's been done, so it'll all just have to be thrown out. Maybe you guys could split the changes among you – three groups of 50. EEng 16:31, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

It looks like User:J3Mrs may have given up, after making a last edit to this very article, over a year ago. So I'd not be too hopeful of a response. You might want to try User:Kieronoldham who has edited here previously. As I said above, most of EEng's edits seemed reasonable to me, if a little pedantic. But I've certainly not checked methodically through them all. I must say, Iridescent, that you can spot errors, or potential errors, far more easily that me. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:03, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm all for bold edits and improving things where improvement is needed, but in my opinion, while FAs are not off-limits, they should be afforded extra care and not be allowed to be changed so freely, and to such an extent, that a GA can, for instance. If I had my way I'd lock all FAs up and anyone wishing to change them would have to request it on the talk page. Cassianto^Talk 16:20, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Except that's not the way it is. For all this discussion, no one's actually looking at the changes. EEng 16:31, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Quite right, we're too busy discussing. Martinevans123 (talk) 16:36, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Precisely. EEng 16:39, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

In hindsight, EEng, do you not think that it would've been better to copy the entire article (less cats) into a sandbox and to do what you've done here, there? A link on the talk page could've then been added in a discussion where your version could've been scrutinised. To now expect someone to go through and proof read 150 edits is, to me, an example that even you are unsure of your changes. The English language has not changed that much over the last 10 years and with Eric and Tom as the authors, I doubt that any of the problems you saw, even existed in the first place. Cassianto^Talk 16:45, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Like I've said over and over, there was every reason to believe other editors were following along. I am not unsure of my changes, except to the extent that everyone makes mistakes. There don't have to be "problems" for the writing to bear improving. EEng 17:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Basically, you've had the misfortune to stumble onto a topic that's far more complicated than it appears at first glance, as it's one that led to significant and profound changes to English and British laws and culture (one can trace direct lines from the Moors Murders to the rebranding of Manchester as a tourist destination, to the current tabloid-fuelled paedogeddon currently ripping through the British establishment, to the boom in conceptual art in the 1990s, and to the legislation regarding life sentences). Because it's such a complicated and confusing topic, changes that appear minor can have a radical and unintended impact on the meaning, and if you're not familiar with the quirks of English culture things that are significant can appear trivial. (This is one I raised previously; Hindley's dyed hair is arguably the most iconic British image since the war.) Given how many errors I've noticed just from ultra-quick skims, I assume there are likely to be more. As I've said above, if nobody else is in a position to do so I'm willing to go through diff-by-diff at some point repairing your inappropriate removals and changes of meaning, but it will be time-consuming and complicated; this being an article which averages around a million views per year and is on a highly sensitive topic, the issue is what we do in the meantime. ‑ Iridescent 16:53, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

If you know of any inappropriate removals and changes of meaning that haven't been fixed, why haven't you fixed them? I'm really surprised at you. I've been working on this for two weeks. You and ME123 and IanM knew I was doing it, because occasionally you corrected something I did – very occasionally, which gave me confidence. You could have just followed along, ten edits per day, and instead of you now imagining all the terrible things I must have done, the bad would be corrected and the good would remain, and the article would be the better for it. But turns out you weren't after all, I guess. So now do it. You'd be 1/3 of the way through in the time we've been discussing this. It won't be particularly time-consuming and certainly not complicated. They'll almost all little diffs. EEng 17:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Iridescent, I can assist, but would it not be easier to go back to the version before EEng started their edits? EEng, you can then do the edits again, more slowly, and they can be checked. Again, this isn't a slur on you, and thank you for your time, but there's more than one way to skin a cat (cue Martin and a link to a skinny cat, or something). Cassianto^Talk 17:07, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I did go slowly -- two weeks! In the name of God, just start here [2] (the latest edit) and click Previous from there. (For reasons I probably don't need to explain it usually makes more sense to work backwards.) If you don't like what you see, fix it. I keeps saying this over and over: they're almost all very small, local changes. To the extent there's anything bordering on a substantive (as opposed to stylistic) change, those were mostly in the last day or two, so you'll run into them earlier -- as you press on you'll find very little of that. EEng 17:25, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

EEng, in my view 150 edits over a two week period is not taking things slowly. It is the kind of edit count I'd expect to see on an article that is under construction, or one that is being brushed up for a review of some kind. Cassianto^Talk 17:45, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Oh for heaven's sake -- some people make a few, giant changes and others make a lot of little local changes. It's water under the bridge, as no one suggested I stop or slow down or change course or anything else, even though they knew I was doing it. Are you going to look through the telescope, or not? EEng 17:53, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

150 local edits can be as bad as one giant change; in fact, I'd say that the local edits are more problematic as proof reading them can be confusing and time consuming. There's no point in getting out of your pram over this; it's been done and now the work begins. I'll do what I can, but I really think Eric should be involved, if he wants to be. Cassianto^Talk 18:00, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

EEng, I trust that you've made all your edits with careful reference to what's actually written in the original sources, i.e. principally Ritchie (1988), Topping (1989) Staff (2007) and Lee (2010)? This was (and currently is) an FA and I seem to remember quite a lot of rather painful argument with the principal contributor over what certain phrases actually meant. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:57, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Since this is a WP:FA, it would have been better to tinker around with a sandbox version rather than the real thing. It is putting a lot of strain on the time of other editors to check through a huge number of diffs.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 17:58, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

Credit where credit is due... he does some of the best non-breaking spaces around. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:41, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I didn't need the sources because I didn't introduce any new assertions. If there's any shade of meaning you suspect was upset, by all means revert that. EEng 18:06, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

"I didn't need the sources" is not a phrase that one encounters too often here. Given that we're obliged to paraphrase everything, to avoid copyvio, I suspect this is a strategy that may have some degree of risk. But yes, what we see as errors of grammar, or even poor sentence construction, can be tackled like that. Martinevans123 (talk) 20:24, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

To a first approximation, copyediting might be defined as everything you can do to an article without looking at the sources. The article has precious little in the way of grammar errors or "poor" sentence construction, but those aren't the only opportunities for improvement: very good writing can still be made better. The possibility that I'll accidentally copyedit a passage into an exact wording that also happens to be in some source doesn't keep me up at night. EEng 20:47, 10 July 2019 (UTC)

I was thinking more of "Chinese whispers" (if one is still allowed to use that phrase without being accused of racism). Martinevans123 (talk) 10:08, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

"The possibility that I'll accidentally copyedit a passage into an exact wording that also happens to be in some source doesn't keep me up at night." -- all the more reason why these articles should be locked. Cassianto^Talk 07:07, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

I'm sorry, Cassianto, I'm afraid I don't understand. What is your concern in this regard? EEng 13:40, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

My concern is that FAs are open to such vulnerabilities as you mention above, and that you don't really seem to care. Cassianto^Talk 19:31, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Cassianto, we were discussing the risk that an editor who has never seen any of the sources might insert into the article a phrase that, by complete coincidence, matches phrasing in one of the sources. Are you seriously proposing that that's a "vulnerability" we're supposed to worry about? Or are you talking about something else? EEng 20:12, 11 July 2019 (UTC)

Of course we should worry about copyvios, innocent or otherwise. It's realising that it is a copyvio, that's the tricky part; and we won't know that until we have lawyers knocking at the door. That would be enough to keep me up at night. Cassianto^Talk 00:09, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

I cannot tell you the sense of inner serenity it gives me to know that I am able to relieve your anxiety and grant you untroubled slumber. Copyright infringement can only take place if the infringing party actually makes use of the copyrighted work; independent creation of material that happens to be similar to copyrighted material cannot be copyright infringement no matter how striking the similarity. Since, as I keep saying, I've never seen and never intend to see any of the sources, by definition I cannot infringe their copyright. EEng 02:47, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

That's not my experience with regard to Wikipedia policy. I'd invite User:Diannaa, who recently left a warning with a threat of a block on my Talk page, to clarify for us here how close, to the original, text is allowed to be. Or is the key distinction that one does not have (or in other cases can simply claim not to have) access to the existing or non-exiting sources? It's assumed that editors who have access to an existing source will need to check. Martinevans123 (talk) 07:58, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

You were warned because you inserted material – while, according to your own edit summary [3], you were working from a website – which too closely matched the text on that website (apparently – I can't see the revdel'd edits). When you're working from source material, it's your job to be sure you don't draw too much water from the well. That's not the hypothetical we're discussing here, which is that an editor, never having seen a particular work, happens to come up with a phrase that turns out to be in that work. As explained above it's black-letter law that that cannot be copyright infringement, period – the legal phrase is "independent creation". I really know this stuff because intellectual property was my bread and butter for quite some time.

Of course, being innocent and proving you're innocent are two different things, so Wikipedia may very well say to an editor, "Look, even if it's entirely coincidental that you came up with a phrase that matches Source X, in order to avoid any question we need you to tweak that wording a bit", and that makes perfect sense, if someone happens to notice the situation. But the idea that every time an editor makes any edit they're supposed to scurry about checking all sources just in case one of those sources contains a similar phrase by sheer chance, is lunatic.

One of the 10 woks listed under Bibliography

Look, the article lists 10 woks under Bibliography, so the idea would seem to be that I'm supposed to get all those from the library and check each of my recent 150 edits against them. Not clear how I'd even do that, but since this is a lunatic discussion we'll let that pass. OK, well, Further reading lists another 12 works; am I supposed to check those too? And a search of a handy university library catalog for moors murders returns 1719 general articles, 1302 news articles, and 1182 books; I guess I'm supposed to check all those too. And why stop there? Why not check all true-crime literature unrelated to Brady and Hindley, on the chance that a general phrase relating crime in some way might appear somewhere? In fact, why not check the entire literary and journalistic output of humankind over the ages (or at least those falling under copyright protection in the US)? How would one even do that?

Oh, wait. There is in fact a way of doing that. It's called a copyvio detector. I believe we even have one or two kicking around the project somewhere. My impression is that someone runs it now and then against all articles, or against recent changes, or something like that, and brings similarities to editor attention for remedying (or in cases of chronic problem, scolding I guess – I don't know your history on this, ME123). Good. I'm glad someone's doing that, and no one expects me, or any other editor, to duplicate that effort individually. To have such an expectation would be, as mentioned, lunatic. EEng 12:51, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Ouch, seem to have touched a nerve here. Sorry if you think I'm "scolding". Like I said below, yesterday, I was thinking more of "Chinese whispers". Hence the 10 woks, I guess. Of course it's not so easy to run copyvio detectors with print sources. I'll await clarification from Dianaaa. Martinevans123 (talk) 12:59, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

(ec) I think you already know my opinion on copyvio; the amount of copying permitted is essentially zero. The odds of someone inadvertently duplicating what's in sources that they have not seen is vanishingly small and should not in my opinion be used to justify throwing out a weeks' worth of work. Expecting a copy editor to have access to all the sources and use them while working is not practical nor is it done in practice, not even at the FA level. If you're having trouble assessing EEng's changes I suggest making a giant diff like this one and then using wikEdDiff, which highlights additions in blue and removals in yellow. This situation reminds me of my work on Nazi Germany, where I spent 5 hours a day for a month working on it without anyone commenting or complaining or interrupting, and then spent the following month answering questions and responding to queries on the talk page about what I did. No one presumed that it would be necessary or desirable to throw all my work away and start over. I admire EEng's calmness at the suggestion that his work might all have been in vain — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 13:10, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for the link to that tool. I certainly haven't suggested just "throwing out a weeks' worth of work." Martinevans123 (talk) 13:18, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Not you specifically; but others on this talk page did make that suggestion. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 13:31, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Thanks, Diannaa. Shall I wire the money to the usual numbered account? EEng 13:33, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Great to see some real collaboration at last. Martinevans123 (talk) 13:45, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Followup comment: a drawback of a single giant diff, as linked by Diannaa, is that you don't see the edit summaries (which in some cases explain changes that might otherwise not be obvious). EEng 17:08, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

You might find the Wikiblame tool helpful for locating the particular diff for any addition or removal. For example, hunting for removal of the phrase "first victim was 16-year-old Pauline Reade" finds it was removed with this edit, which does include an explanatory edit summary. You can get at the Wikiblame tool from the revision history page of any page - click on "Find addition/removal" — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 17:40, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

As I'm sure you know, we wiki-snowflakes do not tolerate the "b-word", as I'm sure the original "toxic tinkerer" EEng will testify. But yes, it is useful. Martinevans123 (talk) 17:59, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Those wonderful tools do come in handy when you're trying to untangle some puzzling change lost in the mists of time, but in this case by far the easiest thing to do would be to simply STEP THROUGH THE GODDAM EDITS SEQUENTIALLY. In the past 3 days there have been an incredible 110 posts to this thread, totaling 40K of text, all to discuss the abstract existence (but not the substance) of my 150 edits to an article which itself consists, in total, of a mere 65K. Most of these edits are no more complex than

One hundred and fifty officers were drafted to searchsearched the moor, looking for locations that matched for locations matching the photographs. Initially the search was concentrated, initially concentrating along the A628 road

and

Brady returned alone, carrying a spade that he had hidden there earlier. When Hindley asked how he had killed Bennett, Brady said that , and told her he had sexually assaulted the boy and strangled him with a piece of string

and

sexually assaulted the boy Bennett and strangled him

and

The examination involved an analysis of the dog's teeth, which required a general anaesthetic from which Puppet did not recover, as he suffered from an undiagnosed kidney complaint.

and

Superintendent Bob Talbot of the Cheshire Police arrived at the back door of 16 Wardle Brook Avenue, wearing his uniform covered by a borrowed baker's overall to cover his uniform.

and

Brady and Hindley offered 12-year-old John Kilbride a lift home on the pretext that saying his parents might worry that he was out so late

and

Twelve-year-old Keith Bennett vanished on his way to his grandmother's house in Longsight, Manchester, early in the evening of 16 June 1964, four days after his birthday.

There, that's seven of them – 5% of the total – right there. They can be reviewed in 15 seconds each, and if you think officers were drafted to search is better than just plain officers searched, or that readers will benefit by knowing about the dog's teeth and kidney complaint, or about how many days past his birthday Keith Bennett was when he was killed, go right ahead and change those things; I'm not married to anything. But in the name of Jesus, Mary, Joseph and all the saints and apostles, at long last you bunch of old ladies stop pearl-clutching and hand-wringing (you gotta love the imagery there) and either look at the edits or shut the fuck up now. I've spent far more time in therapy with you lot responding to your hypothetical anxieties than I did making the changes themselves. Really, it's unbelievable.

This obviously isn't directed at you, Diannaa. Looks like that calmness you were admiring above ran out. EEng 21:10, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Last week: Diannaa (airborne) confronts another copyright violator

-EEng

This week: Diannaa helps a copyright violator to see the error of his ways

-EEng

I guess that was my point about my story about GA prep of Nazi Germany: if people had a problem with specific edits, they could have challenged as you were going along rather than waiting a week. Or they could (like happened with my big project) post particulars of any additions or changes here on the talk that they think need to be addressed. But the ways of FA are a mystery to me; that's why I have zero nominations to FA-class. I gotta go; there's still a lot of copyvio reports to assess before dinnertime. — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 21:29, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

No one needs to "challenge" anything. Just revert or adjust. It's no big deal. EEng 21:45, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

... "pearl-clutching and hand-wringing"... I just lolled. Oi vay. It's like Jimmy McGill paid a surprise visit to 16 Wardle Brook Avenue. But deep desire to re-add a detailed footnote on the Fablon tablecloth and formica sideboard, already. Martinevans123 (talk) 22:24, 12 July 2019 (UTC) p.s. your image makes Diannaaaa look too cuddly.

You are correct; no need to challenge or discuss on the talk page, just quietly fix it with a suitable edit summary. No huhu. By the way the attack dog approach is sooo last week. Do it at your peril — Diannaa 🍁 (talk) 01:06, 13 July 2019 (UTC)

• I would be all in favour of this article being taken to WP:FAR. My view is that simplistic, childish edits, based on word count rather than nuanced meaning, have eviscerated it to the point where I doubt it would now get through FAC. Eric Corbett 23:12, 3 August 2019 (UTC)

• I would agree. These recent edits have been a backward step for this article and they need to be scrutinised. I'm sure you've meant well, EEng, but I really wish you'd left well alone. Cassianto^Talk 06:14, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

+1. Although nobody is banned from editing a WP:FA, wholesale changes need consensus, and there is little sign of it here.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:19, 4 August 2019 (UTC)

One of the FA criteria is stability. I can see discussion going back over a month. It would would appear might be an issue that requires addressing.....Cas Liber (talk · contribs) 03:40, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

To avoid a WP:FAR, I am tempted to revert all of the edits by @EEng: over the last month or so, and allow these changes to be made in a WP:SANDBOX version of the article, so that others can comment on them. It's clear that they haven't gone down well.--♦IanMacM♦ ^{(talk to me)} 06:05, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Oh bullshit. It's been a month and there hasn't been a single specific comment about any edit. Edits don't get reverted because the article's owners are too busy wringing their hands to review them. Repeat: either say something specific about one or more particular edits or shut the fuck up. Pinging Diannaa since it looks like some not-in-the-club level heads will be needed before this is over. EEng 09:21, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

"Edits don't get reverted because the article's owners are too busy wringing their hands to review them." and there it is, right there, EEng resorting to the cliched "own" ad hominem when challenged about their edits. Cassianto^Talk 09:34, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Yeah, sure, right, whatever. You've challenged nothing about these edits, simply whined endlessly about their very existence. Repeating again: either say something specific about one or more particular edits or shut the fuck up. EEng 18:01, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Your edits are shit, all of them. There. The best version was the one at the beginning of July before you started mucking about with it. Cassianto^Talk 18:40, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I would have to agree with Cassianto. I wonder if anyone else remembers the story of the boss who used to weigh any report before he read it? I am similarly not a great fan of EEng's style of editing, which simply boils down to fewer words are better. Such Brutalism has some merit when it's done sympathetically, but that hasn't been happening here. Eric Corbett 19:35, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Your edits are shit, all of them – he said pretending he'd actually looked at them, which you clearly haven't since at least a few correct straight-out grammatical errors and examples of the text contradicting itself. You lot are so transparent it's laughable. EEng 20:57, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

And your request that I "shut the fuck up" is contrary to what you want me to do which is to look at each and every edit you made and comment. As you say, so transparent. Cassianto^Talk 22:27, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

No, I told you to say something specific about the edits or shut the fuck up. Instead you keep whining but still say nothing specific about the edits. EEng 09:18, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

No, this would take a considerable amount of time, which I don't have, frankly. You do not seem to understand that your butchering of this article, to the tune of 8,000 bytes, has taken it so far away from the FAC version in 2009, that an FAR is almost inevitable. Take this version there and see what folk think. Cassianto^Talk 09:25, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

No, this would take a considerable amount of time, which I don't have, frankly – Well, then, we're back to what I said earlier:

When a good-faith editor puts a lot of work into an article, you have two choices: either check out the changes and undo or adjust them individually, or just trust that the editor's changes are, if not each individually improvements, at least improvements on balance in toto. Not an option is to say you don't have time to review what's been done, so it'll all just have to be thrown out.

EEng 09:34, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

What about the good-faith editor(s) who got this article up to FA in the first place who spent time and money writing the damn thing? We are not here to wipe your backside after each and every edit; we all have other things to do. A decrease of 8,000 bytes is too far removed from the 2009 FAC for the FA status to be left in situ. If you insist on having your version, go ahead, but I will be seeking its removal from the FA library. Cassianto^Talk 09:39, 7 August 2019 (UTC)

Reverted back to 26 June 2019

I have Reverted on the back of EEng's Boldness so the two versions can be Discussed. EEng, I'm sure there are other ways in achieving what you think is a better version, rather than simply using the live version to display it. I'm sorry, but I cannot sit back and see an FA trimmed by over 8,000 bytes and not feel a pang of sorrow at all the hard work that achieved it its gold star in the first place. Sure, I get the Orwellian style of using fewer words rather than many, but this really has gone to a whole new level. Cassianto^Talk 21:14, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I support this action. Cassianto is right.BabbaQ (talk) 22:23, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Discuss! El_C 22:31, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

El_C, could you please revert back to Cassiantos last edit as it is that we are discussing. Right now it is a version not agreed on. Thanks.BabbaQ (talk) 22:33, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

El_C here, perfectly demonstrating utter incompetence. Cassianto^Talk 22:40, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Because it's on the wrong version? Are you serious? El_C 22:44, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

In your opinion. Strange how quiet EEng has been, then suddenly a sock emerges and you're very quick to protect everything, even the troll. Hmmm... Cassianto^Talk 22:48, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I don't think we can attribute EEng having gone quiet to the emergence of this new account. That connection is another aspersion you're making. El_C 22:54, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Coincidence though, isn't it, made all the more suspicious by your apparent protection of the sock and the locked version of the sock's (and EEng's) preferred choice. Cassianto^Talk 23:00, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

You can't keep casting aspersions like that. It's both untrue and offensive. El_C 23:01, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I suggest you go your way and I'll go mine. How very disappointing. Cassianto^Talk 23:09, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Since you removed my comment on your talk page, I'll reiterate it here. The protection timing was purely random. I have never, to the best of my recollection, ever even had a conversation with EEng. Why would I favour their version over an FA version? What reason is there for me to do this? Anyway, if you suspect foul play, SPI is the venue for that. El_C 23:15, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

My version was the poxy FA version! Jesus. And there's also a bloody consensus on this very talk page for my version. Do the math, above. Cassianto^Talk 23:16, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I have very little leeway in making content decision with my protection at the outset. Though when disputes become truly protracted, I sometime go with the status quo ante until consensus emerges. El_C 23:22, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Consensus has emerged and you've just questioned why you'd protect a non-FA version, which is what you've done. Your actions here tonight have been nothing short of a pantomime. Cassianto^Talk 23:26, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

I just didn't immediately see two people as constituting consensus. But if I mistepped, I apologize. El_C 23:30, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

There's actually five, but never mind. Not a great amount, but it is the consensus at the moment. I appreciate your restoration, thank you, and I too apologise for getting too heated. I take FAs very seriously and this seemed like an injustice. Cassianto^Talk 23:34, 5 August 2019 (UTC)

Worth noting perhaps that the editor who was re-reverting is now blocked for sockpuppetry. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk, contributions) 16:35, 6 August 2019 (UTC)