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Pages recently put under extended confirmed protection (80 out of 7954 total) () WATCH Page Protected Expiry Type Summary Admin Rajputs in Gujarat 2024-06-27 05:12 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry Abecedare Agri (caste) 2024-06-27 05:09 indefinite edit,move Persistent disruptive editing and sockpuppetry; WP:GSCASTE Abecedare Other Backward Class 2024-06-27 05:04 indefinite edit,move Persistent disruptive editing and sockpuppetry; WP:GSCASTE Abecedare Monashee Spirits 2024-06-27 04:36 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Robertsky Thakor 2024-06-27 03:14 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; various sock farms; WP:GSCASTE Abecedare Thakur (title) 2024-06-27 03:14 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; various sock farms; WP:GSCASTE Abecedare Chhokar 2024-06-27 00:58 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; potentially several sockfarms including Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Chokar Kalan 2024-06-27 00:57 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Mehr (Clan) 2024-06-27 00:53 2024-06-29 00:53 edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Mehr people 2024-06-27 00:51 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Domaal Rajputs 2024-06-27 00:31 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; multiple sockfarms Abecedare Laur (clan) 2024-06-27 00:07 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Makwana Kolis 2024-06-26 23:39 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Chauhan (Clan) 2024-06-26 22:33 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Chauhan Kolis 2024-06-26 22:32 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Abecedare Hezbollah armed strength 2024-06-26 19:23 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA; in addition to existing community sanctions Daniel Case Module:Fiction-based redirects to list entries category handler/RedirectType 2024-06-26 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2501 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II Module:Fiction-based redirects to list entries category handler 2024-06-26 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2501 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II Proposed states and union territories of India 2024-06-26 13:19 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement: WP:ARBIND; upgrade to WP:ECP, maybe not indefinitely, but for a considerable time El C Khanpur, Gujarat 2024-06-26 05:04 indefinite move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Punjabi Muslims 2024-06-26 03:12 indefinite edit,move Community sanctions enforcement: per RFPP and WP:GS/CASTE Daniel Case Punjabis 2024-06-26 02:25 indefinite edit Community sanctions enforcement: per WP:GS/CASTE and recent disruption Daniel Case Haganah 2024-06-25 20:59 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: per RFPP and ARBPIA Daniel Case Jewish fascism 2024-06-25 20:27 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:ARBPIA Ymblanter Antarpat (TV series) 2024-06-25 18:18 2024-12-25 18:18 edit,move Persistent sockpuppetry Ponyo Abeer Gulal 2024-06-25 18:18 2024-12-25 18:18 edit,move Persistent sockpuppetry Ponyo Template:Warning antisemitism Arabs 2024-06-25 17:01 indefinite edit,move Arbitration enforcement Theleekycauldron Siege of the Mikhailovsky fortification 2024-06-25 13:55 2024-07-02 13:55 create Repeatedly recreated Bearcat Killing of Benjamin Achimeir 2024-06-25 01:27 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:PIA, WP:ECR El C BIRD Foundation 2024-06-25 00:50 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:PIA, WP:ECR El C Beirut–Rafic Hariri International Airport 2024-06-25 00:35 indefinite edit,move Contentious topic restriction: WP:PIA, WP:ECR El C Armenia 2024-06-25 00:23 indefinite edit Community sanctions enforcement: One of the A's in WP:GS/AA El C User talk:Master Jay/Archives May 2007 - July 2010 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:NinjaRobotPirate/Archive2019-2 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:MastCell/Archive 27 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Pedro/DFTT 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:MBisanz/Archive 1 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Alexf/Archive 3 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:PhilKnight/Archive28 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Future Perfect at Sunrise/Archive 12 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:ST47/Archive7 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:SirFozzie/Archive 8 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Sir Nicholas de Mimsy-Porpington/Archive/Archive07 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Ks0stm/Archive 5 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Keilana/Archive2 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Alexf/Archive 45 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Reaper Eternal/Archive 4 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Ryulong 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Ks0stm/Archive 16 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Marine 69-71/Workshop 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Future Perfect at Sunrise/Archive 18 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:JaGa/Archive 10 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:JBW/Archive 37 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Fish and karate/Archive 19 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Tinucherian/Archives/2009/September 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:MBisanz/Matrix 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Halibutt/Archive 18 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Chrislk02/archive19 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Marine 69-71/Workshop2 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Flyer22 Frozen/Awards and gifts 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:AmandaNP/Archives/2014/November 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Marine 69-71/Workshop3 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:JBW/Archive 54 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Ks0stm/Archive 17 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Tinucherian/Archives/2009/August 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:SirFozzie/Archive 6 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Future Perfect at Sunrise/Archive 10 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:JBW/Archive 30 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:Timotheus Canens/Archives/2010/11 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User talk:JBW/Archive 47 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac User:Ronhjones/Awards 2024-06-24 23:47 indefinite edit drop protection to fix WP:LINT errors Primefac Punjab 2024-06-24 19:56 2024-12-24 19:56 edit Persistent disruptive editing: Regular semi-protection ineffective, persistent block evasion and additions of poorly sourced material. Yamaguchi先生 Battle of Lachin 2024-06-24 19:54 indefinite edit,move WP:GS/AA enforcement Firefangledfeathers Draft:Taron Andreasyan 2024-06-24 19:04 indefinite edit,move Created in violation of WP:GS/AA's extended-confirmed restriction. Any EC user should feel free to assume responsibility for this content and move it back to mainspace. Firefangledfeathers Koli Dance 2024-06-23 18:05 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Bapaiya 2024-06-23 18:00 indefinite edit,move Persistent sock puppetry; see Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Thakor Sumant Sinhji Jhala Abecedare Template:Lowercasetitle 2024-06-23 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2502 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II Template:Talk Header 2024-06-23 18:00 indefinite edit,move High-risk template or module: 2528 transclusions (more info) MusikBot II All Eyez on Me 2024-06-23 13:21 2024-09-23 09:04 edit,move Persistent sockpuppetry: restoring original protection; if it was semi-protection, I'd have extended the duration. Not sure about extended-confirmed protection being needed. ToBeFree Anisha Singh 2024-06-23 08:21 indefinite create Repeatedly recreated Newslinger

Topic ban appeal

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

---

I would like to ask for the lift of my topic ban on policy discussion on the draft space put in Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive292#Topic Ban for TakuyaMurata (see also Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive314#Topic_Ban_Request for the latest thread on this ban.)

The reasons are

1. The topic ban was brought in the context of my dispute with other editors (Legacypac and Hasteur) who actively work on the draft space for cleaning up. Since they seem no longer active, hopefully, the same dispute will not arise.
2. Lifting the topic ban will allow me to communicate better regarding some of my activities in the draft space; see e.g., Wikipedia:Miscellany_for_deletion/Wikipedia:List_of_draft_pages_on_science_and_engineering
3. I have one proposal to make on the draft space. It’s minor but I hope it would streamline some maintenance work.

(In the thread the topic ban was put, some editors mentioned I having made a death threat. This is a misunderstanding, plain simple and so shouldn't factor in the determination of the lift.)

@Primefac: -- Taku (talk) 15:19, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• Support lifting the topic ban. It seems that it was put into effect in 2017, and was modified in 2019. I never fully understood it, having not been involved in the 2017 controversy, which apparently resulted in a ban on User:TakuyaMurata discussing drafts, which required him to engage in preterition so as to talk about them without talking about them. It seems that it was partly the result of conflict between Taku and User:Hasteur and User:Legacypac, and Hasteur and Legacypac wanted to keep draft space clean. That objective seems to me to go against the purpose of draft space, but I'm a computer scientist. It was revised in 2019 to be a general topic-ban on draft space by Taku, a somewhat more extensive but less convoluted thing. Hasteur has tragically died of covid, and Legacypac has been de facto banned. Unless anyone wants to reopen these quarrels that Taku has honorably avoided for five years, I suggest that the topic-ban be lifted. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:59, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
  • One small clarification: it is not my understanding that the topic ban was modified in 2019. There was some discussion that ultimately ended in non-consensus. I still routinely work on the draftspace (because, as I understand, there is no general topic ban on the draftspace). -- Taku (talk) 17:07, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• Question Taku, could you please explain why this should be considered a "misunderstanding," and not something far more egregious? JoJo Anthrax (talk) 17:18, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• First of all, it was not taken as a death threat by the other party (RH); he has confirmed that. Second, the quarrel I had with RH was unrelated to the dispute on which the topic ban is about. If the community thinks that comment (which was obviously a mistake) was problematic enough, the community should decide on some other measure not the topic ban on the policy discussion. -- Taku (talk) 17:27, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

  I'd like to point out that this diff was from 2016, amidst a discussion accusing the administrator of overzealous speedy deletion. Some years later the same admin was desysopped for, among other things, overzealous speedy deletion. This is not to excuse the comment, but to put it in context. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:27, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

• I'm not particularly impressed with the allocution above. Point 1. is summarized as "They made me do it", which is not particularly in the vein of taking responsibility for improving one's own behavior. Taku chose their own words when in conflict with others, and I see no sense that there is any evidence that they understand why what they did was wrong, and how they have changed and modified their behavior while the ban was in effect. Point 2. and 3. are entirely about Taku's own needs and desires, and nothing about the effect of the disruption they caused on the project, and how they will modify their behavior to not do that anymore. Sorry, but I'm not seeing the kind of changes necessary to remove a ban. I just see a lot of blame shifting and how this ban affects Taku personally. That's not a sign of change. --Jayron32 17:26, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• I can promise the disruption will not arise again in part because, after getting my Ph.D., I am much busier in real life. I simply don't have time to keep making policy proposals (except one minor one I want to make). The topic ban clearly taught me to be careful about not disrupting the project too much; so my behavior on making policy proposals will certainly change and I will be more careful about choice of words (so not cause death-threat misunderstanding). About Point 2. It's not entirely my need but also for others who want to engage me on the draftspace topics. Point 3. is also not just my desire; I still routinely work on the draftspace and, lifting the topic ban will allow me to make a propose that help the community maintain the draftspace. -- Taku (talk) 17:41, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

  Support removal of the topic ban, per WP:ROPE. The above makes it clear that the disruption is unlikely to continue. --Jayron32 17:53, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

• Support - I had reservations about supporting mostly for the same reasons as Jayron32 (i.e. no promise to not continue disruptive behaviour and no statement of understanding why the topic ban was imposed), but the above comment clears all that up. — Golden ^{call me maybe?} 18:11, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support removal of the topic ban per WP:LASTCHANCE, an essay that avoids the rope metaphor. I supported the topic ban five years ago but it is time to lift it. Cullen328 (talk) 19:00, 23 February 2022 (UTC)
• Comment - TakuyaMurata's comments on Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Math-drafts appear to violate this topic ban. Since the comments so far would have not seemed out of place if I hadn't noticed the topic ban, I and other editors have been discussing the question with TakuyaMurata anyway. But I worry that in situations like this where an appeal is pending but not granted, not doing something to enforce the ban like a block or removal of comments just encourages bad behavior and not taking topic bans seriously, creates a bit of a loophole for violating the ban. -- Beland (talk) 22:51, 23 February 2022 (UTC)

  Sorry but how did I violate the topic ban? For one thing, I have abstained and have provided some context. Do you mean to say "I do prefer drafts to be placed in the draft space" is a violation? (note I am talking about drafts not how the draft space should be used). This is one of the reasons for me to asking for the lift of the ban since it is unclear if just expressing some personal preference is a violation of the ban, and hiding my personal preference can hinder an effective communication (Point 2). I am quite willing to remove the comment if necessary, but removing the comment right now seems to give an impression it was a ban violation (so I am not doing that). It would be nice if the community can clarify this (by lifting the ban altogether or modifying it somehow). —— Taku (talk) 04:14, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

  • Comment - The above discussion illustrates that the current topic-ban is confusing and difficult to apply. It interferes with the ability of Taku to engage in discussion without having an obvious purpose. But I have already supported removal. Robert McClenon (talk) 16:23, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
  • Eh, this is pretty confusing. I'm not really convinced a violation has occurred. He's talking about a weird userspace page, not how and under what circumstances pages should be deleted from draftspace, which (as best as I can tell) is the dispute for which he was topic banned. Maybe he rather indirectly violated the letter of his ban, but not the spirit of it. AFAIC, if there was any violation, it was good faith confusion not requiring sanction. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 17:10, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
    • The topic ban includes "any policy discussion regarding Draft namespace (broadly construed)," "discussing the applicability of policies and procedures regarding Draft namespace (broadly construed)", and "participating in any MfD discussion for which there is a discussion of Draft namespace suitability (broadly construed)". I broadly construe Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/User:Math-drafts to be part of the topic of draft namespace because it was specifically created to do the same thing as draft namespace without having the same deletion policy, which seems to be vexing TakuyaMurata. The policy question here is whether this shared user account is redundant to draft namespace. This is also an MfD concerning whether the draft namespace is more suitable for these files than userspace, so that seems to be pretty clearly subject to the ban. Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Wikipedia:WikiProject Mathematics/List of math draft pages is an MfD which concerns whether it's appropriate to use lists to track drafts, once again because TakuyaMurata is experiencing friction with the Draft namespace deletion policy. Being topic banned doesn't mean you can participate in a discussion as long as you obstain from voting. Being banned means you cannot participate, and you must let other editors make the decision. Yes, such a ban prevents you from sharing your personal opinion and prevents you from communicating effectively with other editors in this area. That's the point of the ban, to stop your communications, because presumably the editors who enacted the ban decided that in the past your communications were so disruptive they prevented other editors from working efficiently or were abusive enough to editors they were creating a toxic working environment for some people. If editors want you to communicate effectively about drafts and think you have demonstrated that you are willing and able to be civil and constructive, they need to repeal the ban. If kept, perhaps it would be helpful to clarify that being banned from discussions means not posting to discussion pages at all, and that it applies to anything to do with drafts, whether in draft namespace or other namespaces. My recommendation would be just to create useful, reader-ready stub articles on the topics you think should have articles rather than continuing to argue about drafts or argue about arguing about drafts. -- Beland (talk) 07:37, 27 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support - I've been following these discussions for half a decade and I still don't really understand what was the problem that led to the ban in the first place. Regardless, the two editors who so adamantly pushed for these sanctions are no longer around to be disrupted (one has tragically died and the other pulled off a suicide by admin) so I don't see what purpose these restrictions can possibly serve. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:48, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
• Comment. Since there's some confusion on this point, let me try to explain how we got here in the first place. Taku abandoned any number of incomplete stubs in draft space. These articles were completely unsuitable. When they were inevitably tagged for deletion Taku's reaction was often disruptive, at best. See Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2016 January 24 for a good example of this. Taku also, at times, moved articles that were in mainspace, and had been worked on by multiple people besides himself, back into draftspace. The net effect of these behaviors was to create unnecessary friction and waste lots of time, hence the topic ban. Like Jayron32, I see no real acknowledgement of the problems that led to the topic ban in the first place. Mackensen (talk) 22:26, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

  I object to the false narrative that I "abandoned any number of incomplete stubs" and the drafts "were completely unsuitable". The fact is that the drafts started by me have since been worked and most have been moved to mainspace (ask my fellow math editors). (In particularly, Principal orbit type theorem now exists in mainspace.) Also, I didn’t move articles in mainspace to the draftspace (which articles are you referring to?). There was a friction in that there was an attempt to mischaracterize these drafts as abandoned mainly by two editors (Legacypac and Hasteur). After they become inactive, it seems there has been a lot less friction. By the way, it is true, in hindsight, that I have created too many drafts. That’s a regret. We, including I, now know that would create a lot of maintenance issue. So, for the past few years, I have started very few drafts, if any; that’s the acknowledgment of the issue (I doubt the too-many-draft problem will arise again). —- Taku (talk) 02:25, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

• Support per the sentiment I expressed at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive292#Willfull and persistent disruption of Draft space by TakuyaMurata, a precursor discussion to the one that implemented a topic ban. Around that time perception bending was nigh; while Taku may have not behaved perfectly, I doubt that they behaved in a manner to deserve a sanction (if they did, then they may have been pushed there {and to wits' end} by forces attempting to subvertly accomplish noncanonical draft and userspace "cleanup" {a dispute which is overarchingly dead due to G13 changes and the ideas expressed at DUD}). — Godsy ^(TALK_CONT) 21:00, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

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

Is creating an account evasion of an IP block?

Let me start by emphasizing that this is not a complaint about @Kinu:'s action. I'm just seeking clarification of what our policy is.

This came out of my investigation of Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Haneywonders. Kinu blocked an IP. Apparently, the person they were trying to block then created an account and continued to edit using that account, and then that account was blocked for block evasion.

But, is that really block evasion? The IP talk page was left a message which said, ...consider creating an account for yourself.... So, they did exactly what the message told them to do. I think it's hard to call that block evasion. Maybe our messaging is just disfunctional? -- RoySmith (talk) 13:59, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Personally I'd say not, for that very reason; they have literally just done what we have asked them to, which would seem like entrapment otherwise. On the other hand, policy is more vague, and takes a slightly Cadite eos approach: User accounts or IP addresses used to evade a block should also be blocked, seemingly without discrimination. I suppose it comes down to whether they continue the disruptive behavior that got their IP blocked in the first place... SN54129 14:07, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

(Non-administrator comment) Surely the point is that the "consider creating an account" is prefixed by If this is a shared IP address, and you did not make the edits referred to above, which means you didn't make the edits that got the IP blocked? FDW777 (talk) 14:10, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

I would say yes, it is evasion. The message is for someone who just happened to get a blocked IP assigned to them. The block is for the person who's editing disruptively, not their handle. Regards! Usedtobecool ☎️ 14:12, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

It is 100% block evasion. The shared IP notice reads: "If ... you did not make the edits referred to above, consider creating an account ..." (emphasis added). And yes the messaging is dysfunctional: /64 IPv6 ranges tend not to be dynamic, but there is no way to disable Twinkle automatically inserting the shared IP notice. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 16:44, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

I agree it's block evasion. But while I often say indefinite is not infinite, this is IMO one of those cases when it would have been better to not impose an indefinite block. I'm assuming what the IP did wasn't enough to earn an instant indefinite block which wasn't done because it's an IP and so this block was only for evasion. If so, if the editor moving to the new account that will probably be better for everyone. And creating a single account and continuing to edit is the sort of thing which could easily be done in good faith through misunderstanding. And it's not like the editor editing after 1 week is guaranteed to be a problem. So a better solution, rather than indefinitely blocking them until they make a successful appeal, block the account for a week, it imposes the original block with a little extra and warn them that blocking applies to them whether they edit as an IP or account. Nil Einne (talk) 04:40, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Well nevermind, the SPI shows multiple accounts. Even without looking at the timing, creating so many is unreasonable and cannot be blamed on anything we did. It still looks to me like based on what was known at the time, it might have been better not to indefinite, in the end it didn't matter. Nil Einne (talk) 04:47, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

A user on a blocked IP making their first ever account will surely be looked after when they explain themselves. SmokeyJoe (talk) 08:38, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

I really think it is a bad idea to tell people that creating one (1) account is automatically block evasion.

Also, how are you going to enforce this without asking new editors to publicly disclose their IP addresses, which is something we should never encourage? WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:44, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

There is the WP:DUCKTEST.—Bagumba (talk) 06:39, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

I believe editing while blocked somewhere else, even another IP, falls under the spirit of the WP:ILLEGIT policy: Evasion of sanctions: Sanctions apply to individual editors as people, not to accounts.—Bagumba (talk) 06:37, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

• RoySmith, It appears Kinu blocked a IPv6 range /64, I’m in agreement with Ivanvector I do not believe the IPv6 /64 to be dynamic, but AGF, the IP is following instruction and creating an account as the message they received directed, There is the duct test, to determine potential problematic edits. The problem is really everything, even the very message left on their address. Celestina007 (talk) 14:44, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

Action review: Geo Swan and imissdisco

Background: [[1]]

• Geo Swan (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• imissdisco (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• User talk:Geo Swan (edit | subject | history | links | watch | logs)

Today I noticed a back-and-forth between these two editors at Geo Swan's talk page. Per the background link above, evidently Geo Swan was blocked almost a year ago for creating an article about Dan Trotta while involved in a dispute at commons with imissdisco, which claims to be Trotta's account (I have no way of confirming this). About two weeks ago Geo Swan began posting a "plan for reinstatement" to their talk page. imissdisco, who has not edited this wiki except in relation to this dispute, began to challenge various things that Geo Swan was adding to their "plan", and their conversation became hostile.

Reviewing the talk page, I came across a diatribe in which Geo Swan threatened to ping the blocking admin daily until getting a satisfactory response. Admins are required to be accountable but there is no requirement to be publicly flogged until the offended party is satisfied, particularly in this case where the blocking admin's action was already discussed by the community (background link above). As such, I revoked Geo Swan's talk page and email access, standard practice for overt threats of harassment.

I also par-blocked imissdisco from Geo Swan's talk page, given their unreasonably aggressive tone and threats of their own, because the dispute at commons that started this whole thing seems to still be ongoing and is spilling over here again, and because Geo Swan won't be able to respond anyway.

I understand that the situation between these two editors is somewhat sensitive because the deleted page I won't link to was characterized as an attack page and because one of the parties is allegedly the target of that page (in other words it began with harassment) and so I'm requesting a review of the situation and my actions. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 17:10, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

Cat o'nine tails for HJ Mitchell obviously. But, seriously, that looks fine ((Non-administrator comment)), obvs); notwithstanding Geo Swan's plan for reinstatement, I would say he was more likely to be heading towards a site ban than away from it. It's a shame imissdisco has to be blocked from the talk, but they have absolutely no reason to be editing it that I can see. Although if GS is also harassing her on other wikis (did I see her say that?), that makes her ire very understandable, although not something we can address on en-wp. SN54129 17:24, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse. This looks like a reasonable response to an unpleasant and disruptive situation. --Jayron32 17:30, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
• (Non-administrator comment) Partial endorsement. I've been observing this for some time. It seems to me that imissdisco has been poking Geo Swan with a sharp stick. I am steering clear of the origfinal infraction. I consider, however, that all parties in a dispute are expected to conduct themselves with decorum. Perhaps the original issue was sufficient to cut the stick wielder some slack, but I wonder if the administrative action has gone far enough. My expectation is that, whatever the provocation they should avoid the talk page where they are poking with sticks. Fiddle^Timtrent Faddle^Talk to me 17:55, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
• A clarification. HJ Mitchell is not the blocking admin. He gave a warning, and Drmies subsequently blocked. The block was overwhelmingly confirmed at a discussion here at AN [2]. Geo Swan seems to want to argue about the warning first, before requesting an unblock. I don't know if HJMitchell was even aware of the the posts: it doesn't seem required to watchlist a page almost a year after giving a warning, and the first actual ping was yesterday, I believe, though does it even work if you add a ping to previous text? In any case, Geo Swan continuing to argue that he was right, including ramping up the situation by asking for the undeletion of the contested picture at Commons (apparently in order to force Imissdisco to self-identify officially), seems very, very unlikely to convince editors to unblock him here. Slp1 (talk) 17:58, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

A ping only causes a notification if you sign the same edit that you add it with. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 19:37, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

And if you go to Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-echo-blocknotificationslist and fill in a harasser's username, you won't see those pings no matter how often they're sent. WhatamIdoing (talk) 19:54, 26 February 2022 (UTC)

• Geo is incapable of collegiately editing, which is a shame because he has also provided good content. I don't know the IP, but agree with them in the request that Geo's response warranted further eyes, although I don't fault anyone in opting not to. Engagement with them is unnecessarily hostile, which is why I asked them not to email me. They had talk page access and did not need to resort to off wiki communications because they believe others need to be at their beck and call. Star Mississippi 18:01, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

• Wait, Geo Swan is still writing about Trotta and still using the photo Trotta objected to elsewhere on the Internet as recently as this month? It seems like we're moving closer to Trust & Safety territory than an unblock. The summary Imissdisco posted at Geo Swan's talk page seems helpful. As he admits, he's not a Wikipedian and made the initial photo request without understanding how things work simply because he didn't like the photo. That's something we see every day. Yes, it can be annoying when you're oriented towards building a free knowledge resource and someone wants to remove an illustration just because they don't like it, but from the subject's standpoint it's completely reasonable. So when it wouldn't hurt much, or when there's something unusual about the case, we try to accommodate those requests. But Geo Swan went to great lengths to ensure it would never be deleted and, moreover, spread the photo to even more locations. It's wildly inappropriate, and I really don't see a way forward for Geo Swan without owning up to that, without pointing fingers, doing everything they can to undo the harassment, volunteering for a topic ban about Dan Trotta, and probably some other BLP restrictions. Given the current situation, I support the actions at the top. (And btw I'm not even saying the photo should've been deleted. It was two years old, was just a crop of a group photo that wouldn't have been deleted, and Commons errs on the side of preservation both due to its broad scope and to protect anyone who may have used that photo outside of Wikimedia projects and is counting on Commons documenting the license.) — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 18:23, 24 February 2022 (UTC)
• I participated at GeoSwan's talk page, but my advice was not taken. As I wrote there, he's an amazing editor and I hope he can eventually get over himself and be allowed to return here. In general we allow blocked users understandable latitude in expressing their frustration on their talk pages, so I hope we can avoid ourselves doubling down here, and at least avoid removing that; he's not doing a very good job of advocating for his return, but he is trying. --GRuban (talk) 18:34, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

  In general we allow blocked users understandable latitude in expressing their frustration on their talk pages In the immediate aftermath of the block, yes. Not almost a year later.-- Pawnkingthree (talk) 18:45, 24 February 2022 (UTC)

• Maybe I'm looking at the wrong deleted article, but the last deleted article of GS doesn't look like an attack to the naked eye. imissdisco did look like they were wholesale deleting sections they didn't like. What about it is attack? What am I missing? Dennis Brown - 2¢ 01:20, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
  • It was created for the purpose of bothering the BLP subject, while the GeoSwan was actively arguing with and insulting the subject on Commons. GeoSwan said ahead of time that it would be a dick move to create the article, and did so anyway. Cullen328 (talk) 01:50, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
    • Ah, thank you. For what it is worth, the article itself was fairly benign. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 13:46, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
      • Possibly, but blocks are for behavior and not content. The act of using the creation of an article as a weapon against another user is certainly a novel way to attack them, but it's still an unreasonable thing to do. --Jayron32 13:50, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
• GeoSwan's behaviour over the last few days suggests they need a community ban, and certainly not unblocking at any point. Black Kite (talk) 19:09, 25 February 2022 (UTC)
• I support any block or ban of Geo Swan that we have the power on en.wiki to implement or endorse. A year later, Geo Swan is still acting in an emotionally reactionary way, unable to control their temper in the way that I would expect a Wikipedian to be able to do were the incident something that happened yesterday, and making threats of harassment (to HJ Mitchell). They display no understanding of why they were blocked, and Imissdisco (whose comments are quite tame) alleges continued off-wiki harassment. Geo Swan says that they were drunk while committing harassment against Imissdisco, but that is a matter for more concern, not less. This is becoming a T&S matter, as Rhododendrites says.
  Lastly, while my condolences go to anybody who is experiencing grief, editing Wikipedia is a privilege and not a right, and we have precedent of not lifting blocks/bans that were issued after impulsive behaviour by a person experiencing serious negative life events due to the pandemic. The question here is "will this person be a net positive if unblocked?", not a question of fairness. — Bilorv (talk) 13:50, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
• Considering GeoSwan is using their Talk page to argue about the block, rather than attempting to appeal, I'd suggest revoking Talk page access & making them use UTRS. This obsession of his is getting out of hand. — The Hand That Feeds You:^Bite 20:59, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support full-fledged site ban of Geo Swan, and I'd probably support a T&S ban too. I do not recall crossing paths with Geo Swan, but I do recall having a high opinion of his past work, and being shocked to find he'd been indef'd... and then disgusted after reading why. We must reject and act against any forms of harassment; Imissdisco does not deserve this treatment. If Geo Swan is still obsessing over this matter nearly a full year on from the imposition of his indefinite block, then I think we can safely say that he is no longer "here". --Dylan620 (he/him · talk · edits) 00:10, 27 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support ban GeoSwan has been repeatedly counselled over many years for a range of BLP issues relating to their editing (e.g. creating negative articles on people for what appear to have been WP:COATRACK purposes, creating articles on non-notable people accused of terrorism, etc - see the various reports via [3], Wikipedia:Requests for comment/Geo Swan and the list of articles they created which have since been deleted at [4] - most of the 708(!) are BLPs). As they are continuing problematic behaviour related to BLP while blocked for this, a ban is clearly in order given there appears to be no likelihood they will be ever adhere to the key BLP policy. Nick-D (talk) 00:35, 27 February 2022 (UTC)
• Support per my original comment. SN54129 13:21, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• This action seems entirely appropriate to me. There have been problems with Geo Swan's editing, especially concerning BLPs, for a very long time. It should not be necessary to explain to an editor of GS's experience why weaponising Wikipedia in such a way is abhorrent, and that he still doesn't get it a year later shows that the block is clearly still necessary. His conduct on his talk page unfortunately necessitated the removal of his ability to edit that as well. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 22:58, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Endorse admin action and support site-ban. I take a very dim view of using our internal processes to harass someone, regardless of good work that they did. Reminds me of Tenebrae, but arguably milder. Still, harassment is not to be tolerated. Jip Orlando (talk) 15:57, 3 March 2022 (UTC)
• Support Site-Ban. We don't need an editor who seems to have spent a year seeking vengeance. I haven't researched their record as a content editor, but we don't need editors whose desire for revenge appears to be greater than their desire to contribute to the encyclopedia. Robert McClenon (talk) 23:39, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Ukrainian localities allegedly under Russian control

I see today a lot of edits like this. The edits are not acceptable, since this information must be verified by reliable and independent sources. This is not possible at the moment, with the possible exception of large cities (and even there we have problems, for example the information added to Odessa is reliably cited but is most likely incorrect). All sources which report on the actual engagements are either Russian or Ukrainian and thus are not independent. Even if both Russian and Ukrainian sources report the same it still does not mean the information is verified. Would it be possible to stop this by edit filters (for example to prohibit similar additions to non-extended-confirmed users)? --Ymblanter (talk) 13:22, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Almost as if an encyclopedia shouldn't cover events in real time and should only document them AFTER the fact. Oh and support any technical means to limit misinformation but with thousands of reliable sources regularly churning out rumor as fact, I don't see howSlywriter (talk) 17:01, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Disinformation reproduced by reliable sources is indeed a problem (see my example of Odessa above), but a lot of information is now being added without any sources at all, or cited to clearly affiliated sources. This should be stopped by edit filters and/or reverted.--Ymblanter (talk) 17:12, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

I'm trying to wrap my head around the how. Could a version of edit filter 180 be tweaked to flag unsourced statements in specific existing articles? Copyediting would get flagged, but at least there would be a list for editors to work through.Slywriter (talk) 17:42, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

I do not know how to select the set of articles in the best way. An obvious solution would be every article in any subcategory (of any level) of Category:Ukraine, but this is possibly too broad.--Ymblanter (talk) 18:56, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

@Slywriter and Ymblanter: Logging at 1188 (hist · log). Might be too spammy to be useful but it can be refined once we see what people are actually doing. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:20, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

Great, thanks a lot.--Ymblanter (talk) 22:21, 25 February 2022 (UTC)

• I used to police "hot spot" articles, and then as now, wish we had a 72 hour rule, where info can't be posted in rapidly changing political events until 72 (or some other number) hours after the source publishes. Part of this is like a game to some editors, mad dash to wedge their edit in before others, and it just creates a cluster-fudge of edits and reverts. We aren't a newspaper, our articles are supposed to be reflective, not reactive. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 17:55, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  I would support such a rule if a proposal has been made.--Ymblanter (talk) 21:05, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  I wouldn't. The WP:READER doesn't care about a cluster-fudge of edits and reverts; that's sausage-making stuff. What's the end result? Articles that are sometimes wrong, but usually fixed. With this limit, articles about current political events would be almost always wrong, and couldn't be fixed, because rules. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 21:14, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Wikipedia is not a newspaper and people coming here for current breaking information are sadly in the wrong place. We should focus on making sure our articles deal with quality enduring coverage of an event like this, and that means making sure we have it right about if and when certain territories are occupied rather than rushing to add it. That is, there is no DEADLINE to get it right. --Masem (t) 05:37, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

  It's roughly the WP:RSBREAKING guideline:

  Breaking-news reports often contain serious inaccuracies. As an electronic publication, Wikipedia can and should be up to date, but Wikipedia is not a newspaper and it does not need to go into all details of a current event in real time. It is better to wait a day or two after an event before adding details to the encyclopedia, than to help spread potentially false rumors. This gives journalists time to collect more information and verify claims, and for investigative authorities to make official announcements.

  —Bagumba (talk) 05:49, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of feature films with LGBT characters

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I don't know if this is the right place to post this, but the discussion at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of feature films with LGBT characters has been going on for more than seven days, which is the usual length of a deletion discussion, and a final statement on this discussion by an administrator, or another user, would be helpful. Thanks! --Historyday01 (talk) 00:54, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

AfDs are not required to be closed exactly at seven days. That one is complex and lengthy and probably takes more than the normal time for any admin to close. It should not be an NAC. Star Mississippi 01:06, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

I know they aren't required to close after exactly seven days, but it could be helpful, that's all. I'm guessing by NAC you mean non-admin closure (I don't know every acronym) and sure, it can be closed by an admin. I think that could help. Historyday01 (talk) 02:47, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

I agree with @Star Mississippi. Sure, it's been running for a few days past the normal 7, but there's still constructive discussion going on, so there's no hurry to close it. And, I also agree that this one is complicated enough that it needs to be closed by admin. -- RoySmith (talk) 03:33, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

I can agree it should be closed by an admin, sure. But, I also think the discussion is starting to peter out, so I'd say it should be closed at least in the next couple days, if not today, then maybe Monday or Tuesday. --Historyday01 (talk) 06:04, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

@Historyday01 There is a specific place, Wikipedia:Closure requests. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 09:20, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

Ok, thanks. I submitted a closure request there. Historyday01 (talk) 14:21, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

• I left a message on closure request page. Basically: stop worrying about closing it. Some AFDs run 2 or 3 weeks. The speed of the close isn't an objective. Getting wide input from the community is, and complex issues like this (ie: is it better as a CAT only, not List article?) often take extra time. There is no legitimate reason to rush to close based solely on $x days having past, that isn't how we determine closing times. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 15:49, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Contrary to the statement that discussion is starting to peter out, I see a half-dozen new participants in the past 24 hours. Probably due to the added visibility of being mentioned here. Since people obviously are still interested in discussing this, I've relisted the AfD to give them the opportunity to do so without the clock ticking so loudly. -- RoySmith (talk) 16:03, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Good job, I should have done that. Discussions like this, we WANT it to be long enough and visited enough so that at the end of the day, we are confident the consensus is truly global. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 16:33, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Not a great idea to have one editor bludgeoning the process, though... Primefac (talk) 16:40, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Indeed. Apparantly Historyday01 thinks it was a wierd decision ([5]). Combined with random aspersions at the same time (those who support this deletion will definitely try to apply to the knife to the Lists of LGBT-related films category), it's not a great look for someone who !voted to keep the article to then come here demanding an immediate close of the discussion, as those prone to such suspicions might suspect an attempt at walling-off any further delete !votes. SN54129 16:45, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  I'm not bludgeoning the process and I didn't "demand" any close to discussion (I only suggested it), it just seemed like the right thing to do. I don't care about looks or anything else, SN54129. The usual suspects, Primefac in this case, accuse me of "bludgeoning." I am not surprised at all. I only wanted the discussion to end so we could move on with the page and not keep in the lurch. Those in favor of deletion, merging, and keeping the page have all made good points, and I would like to put those into practice, but feel that is not possible until the discussion comes to an end. Its that simple. Since the discussion is continuing, who am I to disagree with administrators who have more power on this site than I do? That's the gist I'm getting out of this discussion.Historyday01 (talk) 17:19, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  I'm not sure how I've become one of the "usual suspects", but I made my point specifically because you have added the most text (27% at current) and the second-most number of edits (~30%, only behind the nominator, and their count is high only because of a back-and-forth with editors #3 and #4). Then you ask for the discussion to be closed, then question the admin that relisted. Maybe "bludgeoning" is too strong of a word, but "seems to be more invested than is strictly necessary" is a bit of a mouthful. Primefac (talk) 17:31, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  I can admit I am invested in this topic and I thought posting here could do some good, although I admit it was somewhat misguided and I probably shouldn't have posted it in the first place. In any case, since the admins have made their decision, I don't have any power to challenge that, and their decision is final. Historyday01 (talk) 17:38, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Anyone can relist an AFD, so that isn't even an admin decision, although it is in our realm. The key takeaway should be that several people here don't care what the outcome will be, but they do care that it continues as long as their is interest in the AFD. That is how you build a strong consensus, and in the end, no matter how it ends, if it ends with a strong consensus either way, it likely won't need to be revisited. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 17:49, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

  Ok. I do think it is foolhardy to continue it, as I'd rather have some certainty in terms of the future of the page, but it has been re-listed, and the discussion goes where it goes. At the same time, I find it very unlikely that a strong consensus will appear in the next week. Pages can revisited for AfDs all the time, so I don't think a consensus would stop anyone, they would just nominate it anyway. I've had a number of pages I created be nominated for AfDs and it can be very nervewracking. This is one of those times. I have learned from this discussion to not post about AfDs on here in the future, as this discussion has been, in my opinion, mostly fruitless. Historyday01 (talk) 20:00, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

By your own admission, sort of, the main reason you didn't want it relisted is you thought it would be closed a keep if you got it closed early. You're so invested in this article, you seemed to have forgotten that what we try to do is what is best for the encyclopedia as a whole, not just one person or group. If you think giving more people the ability to participate is a bad thing (and that is exactly what you are implying in the totality of your comments), then you need to work on your collaborative skills. You need to just walk away and ignore the discussion; when it is over, it is over. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 00:42, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

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RfC close review: Fox News RfC

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An RfC was held at Talk:Fox_News#RfC_about_Fox_being_described_as_Conservative, where the final tally was 10 in favor of retention of the text in the lede, 5 to remove. User:Compassionate727, appallingly, sided with the 5 and found a "rough consensus against inclusion". Am aware of WP:NOTAVOTE, but, there were quality opinions all-around. No trolls, no socks, no I-don't-like-it. One cannot just toss a 2:1 on its head without a darn good reason, and there isn't a good reason here. FWiW, I did not participate in the RfC. Zaathras (talk) 05:09, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

• Revert closure - Classic WP:BADNAC: "A non-admin closure is not appropriate... [when] the outcome is a close call (especially where there are several valid outcomes) or likely to be controversial. Such closes are better left to an administrator." Obviously, deciding whether Fox News is a "conservative" media outlet or not is clearly always going to be controversial 100% of the time. And, closing an RfC in favor of the 2-to-1 minority voter is often going to be controversial as well. Additionally, Compassionate727's closing statement brings up points and policies that were never brought up in the discussion, implying that there are some WP:SUPERVOTE aspects going on here. I've read through the discussion and I don't see any reason to close this against the numerical majority. Both sides had valid policy-based arguments. One side had a 2-to-1 majority. At best, if the closer was unconvinced by the arguments to keep the word "conservative" in the lead, they could have closed it as "no consensus" and retained the status quo. I'd recommend reverting the closure and allowing an uninvolved administrator close this RfC. —⁠ScottyWong⁠— 05:48, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Not an admin here. I think we should have given him a bit of time to respond to his talk page and reconsider the close before we just brought it here, but besides that I agree it was closed incorrectly. The correct decision was probably to rule in favor of inclusion, but no consensus would have been the only other acceptable option. Closing in favor of exclusion in this case should almost never be done. Definitely would recommend admins to overturn this. Iamreallygoodatcheckers (talk) 06:21, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• I too think that the close focuses on points that weren't really raised in the discussion, and certainly weren't part of the RfC basis. The opening comment conceded it was conservative, and it was just whether it should be noted in the first line, and thus, unsurprisingly, later participants didn't spend much time trying to prove what wasn't up for dispute. Advise reclose. Nosebagbear (talk) 09:54, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Points for a gutsy close, despite an inevitable challenge. It was indeed surprising to see. I don't think I would've come to that conclusion, but I get what C727 is saying. C727 didn't think people adequately oriented their arguments and evidence to MOS:FIRST, and looked for arguments which did. The issue is, there's room for interpretation, and many of the people supporting inclusion did talk about the order of words, presence in the first sentence, defining characteristics, main features, distinctive feature, etc. Some of the arguments for retaining it are understandably exasperated, because brand new users like the person who started this RfC remove the "conservative" label or challenge it with WP:FALSEBALANCE arguments all. the. time. It's a tough situation, because it's hard to think "oh, another new user making the same arguments -- I definitely need to bring my A-Game in articulating a procedurally watertight response to this" and yet it's possible that a closer will come by in the end and dismiss mostly-relevant-but-half-hearted arguments like e.g. Gamaliel's per FormalDude, BobFromBrockley, Valjean, and over a decade of consensus. Like, yeah, it doesn't specifically address MOS:FIRST, but to what extent is he really expected to reiterate an argument that's been made so many times? It's tough, granted. I wouldn't trout C727 for the close, but don't think it's a good close, all things considered (I wasn't involved with this discussion, but am involved in several others at that page FWIW). — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 14:13, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Recommend revert closure per Scottywong et al. soibangla (talk) 14:35, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Ensorse closure. The NAC did focus on the points raised in the RFC and relevant policy like MOS:FIRST (even if that wasn't directly mentioned), so it wasn't like this decision pulled in novel aspects not at all brought up. But central to the closure, and which justifies this specific close, is this statement from it: "it is not clear from what little evidence has actually been cited during this discussion that this particular claim (rather than the much less contentious claim that Fox News has a conservative bias) is widely enough supported by RS to constitute due weight in the first sentence"...that is from the RFC there wasn't many in support of keeping it shoeing that Fox News was routinely called a conservative news channel, only that it was well established to have conservative bias. As the close suggests if a source survey was done and found that Fox was routinely called a conservative news channel that would have better supported that editors' arguments for keeping that word in the lede. The close gives an out that if this can be shown in the future, the RFC could be reversed. Thus this seems to be a valid closure. --Masem (t) 14:52, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Revert close – Clearly fits WP:BADNAC, and should be reviewed even if closed by an admin. Just a humorous aside, not an argument, I turned on Fox this morning and was informed that the reason Putin attacked Ukraine is because of radical, Green New Deal, Congress people pushing the Communist, climate change agenda. O3000, Ret. (talk) 15:01, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Any specific reason why you couldn't wait for the closer's response to your challenge at their talk page, Zaathras. Per WP:CLOSECHALLENGE, you should first discuss with the closer and see what is their response to the challenge, which could lead to a reclose or self-revert, exactly to avoid the drama boards. You waited less than two hours, and the editor hasn't edited since yesterday. Isabelle ^🔔 15:45, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
• Wow. I'm not surprised this was controversial, but I wasn't expecting to wake up to an AN thread in the morning. I briefly mentioned during my closing statement and Rhododendrites has here expounded well why this was a particularly difficult consensus to assess: half-hearted arguments, a couple votes where I wasn't certain the editors understood that the RfC was only about the first sentence, salient policies that weren't cited but which I felt a couple of editors had alluded to. At some level, many of the votes felt more like habitual, absentminded quibbling than a serious attempt to produce a quality first sentence. Like I said in the close, the first sentence is supposed to define the topic, and I didn't feel like editors had adequately demonstrated that Fox News' conservatism defines it to the same extent as its being a television news channel―but as Rhododendrites observed, they weren't exactly trying, either. Moreover, I felt like the current first sentence is unwieldy, as one or two other editors had noted, which isn't many, but I wasn't convinced that I could interpret the lack of commentary from others as a positive consensus that it's okay as it is. Like I said in my closure, the consensus I found was quite rough; perhaps I should have said that there was no consensus at all. Moreover, as I hinted at the end, I wasn't expecting my findings to be remotely final; in a sense, I was hoping to prod the article's regular editors to draft some serious, substantial proposals to improve the first sentence (and the lead as a whole), rather than just making the placement of the word "conservative" a flashpoint. I suppose I may have accidentally supervoted in doing so, although I'm halfway convinced that the only difference between a supervote and a valid closure is whether or not you like it. —Compassionate727 ^(T·C) 15:47, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

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Potential SNOW delete of AfD related to Russia/Ukraine war

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I recently started Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Magomed Tushayev and it appears to be swiftly heading towards a WP:SNOW delete result. I know that the AfD hasn't even been up for 24 hours yet, but there are some concerns that the article is potentially spreading misinformation related to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, which I'm trying to be particularly sensitive to lately. Since I created the AfD, I obviously can't close it. I'd ask that some admins keep an eye on it and consider closing it early per WP:SNOW if you think that's the right call. —⁠ScottyWong⁠— 05:34, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

I support a SNOW delete although I'm not confident enough to do it myself without further feedback here. Johnuniq (talk) 06:13, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

• I got it. I felt very comfortable deleting it after such a strong and unanimous turnout. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 01:31, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

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Please create Template:Location map data documentation

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I am looking to revise some of the wording (and to disable the auto-hide things for previewing, and... the list snowballs!) at Template:Location map data documentation for an edit request, but I cannot even start working on it in a sandbox. Would a sysop kindly mirror that template to the sandbox page for me? Artoria2e5 🌉 14:06, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

 Done @Artoria2e5: Template:Location map data documentation/sandbox has been created. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:04, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

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(Talk) page Martin Heidegger

Duplicate discussion of thread at WP:ANI. --Jayron32 15:27, 28 February 2022 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
There's currently a long discussion active on the talk page of Martin Heidegger considering the lead section of the article. At the moment Martinevans123 is doing everything in his power to escalate things. He's making edits on the talk page without discussing the matter. He doesn't have consensus. And more importantly: he's making edits of which he knows they're completely ridiculous; which is simply a form of vandalism. Can a neutral admin please intervene? Cornelis Dopper (talk) 14:20, 28 February 2022 (UTC) OP has already raised this at WP:ANI#User Martinevans123 ignoring discussion & instigating edit war; I don't think there's any need to have this discussion over two separate noticeboards. Caeciliusinhorto-public (talk) 15:17, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

RfPP

is a mite backlogged, and my dog has ordered me to drop the keyboard and step away from the computer. --Deepfriedokra (talk) 19:07, 28 February 2022 (UTC)

 Done. Everything there is now dealt with. --Jayron32 16:53, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Isaiah Brown Wikipedia Page

Hello,

I am writing to create an article about artist/musician 'Isaiah Brown.' I have created a draft in my sandbox and am willing to share it! Here is the name of the article. User: IsaiahBrownMusic/sandbox

As an independent artist, I'm struggling to figure out how this works, but open to learning and adding to my page, so listeners/fans can find more info on me seamlessly.

Thank you, Isaiah Brown — Preceding unsigned comment added by IsaiahBrownMusic (talk • contribs) 05:46, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

@IsaiahBrownMusic: Welcome to Wikipedia. You can refer to Wikipedia:Articles for creation. Good luck.—Bagumba (talk) 06:50, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Sandbox deleted for copyright violation and editor advised on own Talk page and at Teahouse. David notMD (talk) 08:54, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

My report was archived without any action from admins

• Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/3RRArchive448#User:Mikythos reported by User:Mann Mann (Result: )

Is this[6][7][8] kind of behavior acceptable?! Mann Mann (talk) 07:08, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Looking at the page history, they were edit warring, but so were you. I suspect you were following the WikiProject conventions, but that doesn't warrant an exemption to reverting. Follow Wikipedia:Dispute Resolution e.g. re-establish that consensus had not changed at the WikiProject, while inviting the other party to discuss.
They haven't edited in the days since, so we wouldn't block at this point per WP:BLOCKNOTPUNITIVE. The assumption is that they understand the rules on edit warring and civility at this point.—Bagumba (talk) 07:46, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

I concur with the above; you were both edit warring, and there is no "being right" exemption to edit warring. Also, the situation is stale, the reported user seems to have voluntarily withdrawn from the edit war, which is what we want to happen rather than issuing blocks. --Jayron32 16:38, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

User page and user talk page move

Hello, User:Mksabbir appears to have tried to rename their account by moving their user/talk pages to User:Mk Sabbir Rahman and User talk:Mk Sabbir Rahman. It needs admin permission to move them back, because there was an intermediate move to draft space. The user is also asking on that talk page to be unblocked, on the basis of accidentally creating multiple accounts, but there's nothing in Mksabbir's log about a block. Could someone with the right permissions please move the pages back? Thanks. Storchy (talk) 10:10, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Looks like a draft to me. I've moved the draft page to draft and returned the user talk to its original location. Primefac (talk) 10:15, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

I commented on their talk page that they dont seem to have been blocked.—Bagumba (talk) 10:53, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

The plot thickens! Mksabbir007 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · page moves · block user · block log). Please see User talk:Mksabbir . --Deepfriedokra (talk) 20:16, 1 March 2022 (UTC)

Mksabbir Blocked per Wikipedia:Sockpuppet investigations/Gazipurnewsmk‎ --Deepfriedokra (talk) 07:06, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Administrators' newsletter – March 2022

News and updates for administrators from the past month (February 2022).

Administrator changes

Modussiccandi

BOZ • Brookie (deceased) • Jackmcbarn • Jamesday • Jonathunder • Master of Puppets • Saravask

CheckUser changes

Callanecc

Oversighter changes

Callanecc

Guideline and policy news

• A RfC is open to change the wording of revision deletion criterion 1 to remove the sentence relating to non-infringing contributions.
• A RfC is open to discuss prohibiting draftification of articles over 90 days old.

Technical news

• The deployment of the reply tool as an opt-out feature, as announced in last month's newsletter, has been delayed to 7 March. Feedback and comments are being welcomed at Wikipedia talk:Talk pages project. (T296645)
• Special:Nuke will now allow the selection of standard deletion reasons to be used when mass-deleting pages. This was a Community Wishlist Survey request from 2022. (T25020)
• The ability to undelete the talk page when undeleting a page using Special:Undelete or the API will be added soon. This change was requested in the 2021 Community Wishlist Survey. (T295389)

Arbitration

• Several unused discretionary sanctions and article probation remedies have been rescinded. This follows the community feedback from the 2021 Discretionary Sanctions review.

Miscellaneous

• The 2022 appointees for the Ombuds commission are Érico, Faendalimas, Galahad, Infinite0694, Mykola7, Olugold, Udehb and Zabe as regular members and Ameisenigel and JJMC89 as advisory members.
• Following the 2022 Steward Elections, the following editors have been appointed as stewards: AntiCompositeNumber, BRPever, Hasley, TheresNoTime, and Vermont.
• The 2022 Community Wishlist Survey results have been published alongside the ranking of prioritized proposals.

---

• Discuss this newsletter
• Subscribe
• Archive

Sent by MediaWiki message delivery (talk) 01:47, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Attempts to hack into admin accounts

I have received a notification that there have been multiple failed attempts to log into my account from a new device. The last time that happened it also happened to numerous other administrators' accounts. I have the following suggestions:

1. Any administrators, please make sure you have a secure password, not something easy to hack, such as an English word, or a password only five characters long, etc etc.
2. If anyone else has recently had the same experience then I suggest they post here to say so, so that we can tell whether it is another mass attack or not. JBW (talk) 15:49, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Isn't 2FA mandatory for admins? If not, it should be. GiantSnowman 15:53, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

No, 2FA isn't mandatory. Hog Farm _Talk 16:02, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

@GiantSnowman strong, unique, passwords are mandatory for admins. 2FA is only mandatory for interface admins. Unfortunately the 2FA system lacks sufficient support to make it mandatory for larger groups of users so far. — xaosflux ^Talk 16:05, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Sage advice. I'd point out for JBW's benefit, that this is SOP for anyone who has gone near a sock of User:Projects, such as 5.229.128.166. It's intended as an annoyance. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 16:06, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Thanks for that information, zzuuzz. If that's all it is then it's not too bad. In the context I can tell what you mean, but I have no idea what "SOP" stands for. Just out of interest, would you like to enlighten me? JBW (talk) 18:25, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Standard operating procedure; routine, normal. I see our article also says, "practices that are unconstructive, yet the norm". -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 18:31, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

I use 2FA on my account, and recommend it for those that have the means to enable it. See WP:2FA. --Jayron32 16:09, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

He tries again and again and again and again (yes, this person, also known as "Projects") -- one day this week he tried just under 200 times to guess my password. I know it's him. He'd probably stop if he realized I'm more amused than annoyed. Antandrus (talk) 16:40, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Nothing on my Wikimedia account, presumably since I have 2FA, but someone tried to reset the password to my VRTS account (which has access to restricted CU queues) this morning. Could be a coincidence, but... – Joe (talk) 16:55, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Nothing, but I also have 2FA, enabled when I decided to run RfA. I think any admin who doesn't is nuts possibly not giving enough consideration to the possibilities. :D Yes, it's a minor extra step when you need to login again. Yes, the whole scratch codes thing sounds scary. But I would feel so frickin' idiotic if I got hacked because I crossed my fingers instead of acknowledging that as an admin I needed to be more careful. For those who haven't enabled because it feels daunting: the good folks at Help talk:Two-factor authentication won't make fun of you even when you ask the stupidest question they've ever heard. Believe me. valereee (talk) 18:07, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Scrath codes are not really scary. I recently had to reset the 2FA because I switched to a new device; I just disabled 2FA and then re-enabled it; this generates the new set of codes.--Ymblanter (talk) 19:11, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

That's exactly what I did. If you can work a smartphone, you can figure out 2FA. The instructions are wordy and full of scary-looking warnings but it's actually pretty simple. HJ Mitchell | Penny for your thoughts? 19:19, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

This has been said a million times, but there's no harm in saying it again. Don't use the same password as you use on any other site. You might be really proud of yourself for remembering "l+0r@NLngf^#G2amVm~;", but if you also used that on another site that does something idiotic like storing passwords as plain text (and how would you know?), it might as well be "12345". Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 18:50, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Password managers are pretty great. Ed ^{[talk] [majestic titan]} 20:20, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

• Last I heard, people whose technical opinions I respect were of the opinion that MediaWiki's 2FA was not fit for purpose. Has something significantly changed in how it's implemented, compared to what it used to be? This isn't a bank; if you have a long password unique to WP, I can't imagine a realistic scenario where 2FA is actually important. The one use I can think of for 2FA on Wikipedia is it helps me identify people who take this place too seriously; they're the ones who tend to mock/patronize the people who choose not to use it. --Floquenbeam (talk) 20:50, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

  Because people vastly overestimate their ability to choose high-entropy passwords. You tell them to choose a 10-character passsword, and they use "opensesame". Tell them to include a mix of uppercase, lowercase, and numbers, and they use "OpenSesame1". Tell them to include punctuation too, then it's "OpenSesame1!". Eventually you just give up and use a system that doesn't give them any options. Other than that, it protects against casual shoulder-surfers, and maybe provides some minimal protection against malware and eavesdropping.  2FA is not magic pixie dust. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 21:41, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

  I understand the benefits of well-implemented 2FA in general. What I don't understand is why I should bother with (what I understand to be) poorly-implemented 2FA on a random website like Wikipedia. If someone does manage to break into my admin account, their ability to cause anything beyond fleeting problems for anyone besides myself is, to a first approximation, zero. 2FA on a bank account? Yes. 2FA on a WP account? Meh. Demanding admins use 2FA on their WP account? Obnoxious. --Floquenbeam (talk) 22:29, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

  I agree. 2FA should not be mandatory for admins. However, as much as I'd like to believe that checkusers, oversighters, and intadmins are all using strong, unique passwords, that's probably not the case. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 22:58, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

• Just changed my password to "12345679", just to be safe. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 21:13, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
• I have been receiving such notifications regularly for the last two years. Most of these notifications come from projects where I don't know the language. However, I have 2FA on my account. —Yahya (talk • contribs.) 21:17, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
• If 2FA becomes compulsory for admins, you'll definitely lose my services, which won't break Wikipedia — but still, I may not be the only one. (I can't work a smartphone, HJ Mitchell. What do you think of that?) Not sure which would come first — me accidentally locking myself out, or me being too pissed off to stick around. Do not be concerned for my security, though; I have a very secure password that's not even a little like "opensesame". Admittedly Bishzilla uses "Bishonen" as her password, and thinks she's being very clever. But then she's not currently an admin, fortunately. Bishonen | tålk 22:50, 2 March 2022 (UTC).

  

  A YubiKey

  @Bishonen: Just out of interest Bish, would you feel the same way about WebAuthn? Instead of relying on a code generated by your smartphone, you'd (probably) use a hardware key (this YouTube video might make a bit more sense). At the moment, the WMF's implementation of WebAuthn apparently isn't great, so I can't recommend it, but on principle would that be more palatable? -- TNT (talk • she/her) 23:11, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

• I'm waiting for 3FA to come out. If I have this crooked, I should buy a smartphone (don't own one) and jeopardize my privacy every time I use it so I can protect my password on Wikipedia. Got it.--Bbb23 (talk) 23:00, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

  There's nothing stopping you from using whatever device you're using right now to generate the token. Arguably, that's no longer exactly "two factor" and won't protect at all against malware, but hey, no one will ever know. Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 23:06, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

  @Bbb23 3FA, even 4FA are actual things - but don't expect WMF integrations to them any time soon! — xaosflux ^Talk 02:12, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• If WMF makes more than a lazy hand wave in the general direction of providing support for their 2FA system, I will respond in kind. I guess I'm just a nutter, eh Valereee? Anyway, back to your regularly scheduled security theater programming!-- Jezebel's Ponyo^{bons mots} 23:04, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Bbb23, there are a variety of apps you can run on your desktop that implement 2FA (actually, time-based one-time passwords), so you don't need a smartphone. I can't recommend specific ones, though. In case anyone's unsure if it is safe to reuse your password on another site, HaveIBeenPwned should quickly convince you otherwise. A good password manager should be in everyone's toolkit, especially admins. Not just on Wikipedia, everywhere. I freely admit I haven't been able to set up my partner with a good password manager, though, so take my advice with a grain of salt. Some of those password managers even implement 2FA, though an argument could be made for doing that separately. I'd love to demand admins enable 2FA, but I do have to admit the user experience, both here and on other sites, just isn't up to snuff yet. --Yamla (talk) 23:09, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

@Ponyo, just pointing out that I struck that word in its original appearance and also gave a laughing emoji after the statement. No, I don't actually think you're a nutter. valereee (talk) 15:38, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Like Bish and others, I would be inclined to bail on the Project if they forced admin to use 2FA. Their current system is butt ugly with virtually no way to recover a lost token. And I never use a smartphone for Wikipedia, even to just read. Surely there are better ways to add security than the current 2FA system. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:19, 2 March 2022 (UTC)
• Just for fun, I created a password strength estimator. For obvious reasons, please don't enter your real password. -FASTILY 23:20, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

• Thanks User:Fastily! I tried it with a password constructed on similar principles as mine, and got told it was "very unguessable - great", plus something about centuries that I didn't altogether understand:

• centuries — 100 attempts/hour (one machine, rate limiting in place)
• centuries — 10 attempts/sec (one machine, no rate limiting)
• centuries — offline attack, assumes multiple machines
• centuries — 10 billion attempts/sec, assumes aggressive attacker with access to many machines

Meaning it would take centuries no matter what..? I don't use it for any other purposes than Wikipedia, nor outside my home at any time - so no shoulder-surfing - and have complete faith in the discretion of my family. (My AI-professional son indeed advised me on how to construct a good password, that I can remember and nobody can guess.) TheresNoTime, I therefore don't really feel the need to get my head round WebAuthn at least not at this time. Sorry, but there was just a lot of thorny reading. Bishonen | tålk 23:45, 2 March 2022 (UTC).

It means you have a very strong password :) "centuries" means that it would probably take literal centuries for a hacker (of sufficiently advanced capabilities) to guess your password. -FASTILY 23:50, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

Oh, interesting! I did the same thing as Bish (created one from the principles I use) and came up with "safely unguessable", although I only got "centuries" for the first one. After that it was 31 years/12 days/1 sec. valereee (talk) 15:43, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Fastily, thank you -- I like the "centuries" it says to me (if that particular deranged LTA wants to spend centuries trying to guess mine, it's fine with me -- it's certainly a better use of his time than spewing his usual cringey sputter). Antandrus (talk) 00:58, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

I don't know, Fastily. According to your password strength estimator, setting your password to "This is my Wikipedia password." would be a great idea, as it would take centuries to guess. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 16:53, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

It would, because no one actually guesses passwords, they try dictionary attacks, or of the have the hash they try and solve it locally. Length of really the best security for a password. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 17:07, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Indeed. There are 30 characters in the phrase "This is my Wikipedia password.". If we assume a limited character set of [A-Za-z.], that's 53 possible characters per position, which means that there are a total of 53³⁰ possible passwords. Using Power of 10 notation, this comes out to ~5.349 × 10⁵¹. For reference, the Earth contains 1.33 × 10⁵⁰ atoms. -FASTILY 00:12, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Another way to look at that, from a dictionary attackers point of view, is that it's just five of the most common words in English, in a somewhat predictable order. A dictionary attacker would eat it for breakfast. At least add some random stuff. Thanks. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 01:15, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Maybe, but I think that's still a step up from the average person who most certainly isn't choosing passwords like that. Obligatory xkcd. -FASTILY 01:32, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Let's say someone did that - everywhere they went their password was "This is my Wikipedia password." "This is my Facebook password." "This is my Hotmail password." "This is my bank account password." Technically, they are using a different password everywhere. It's a difficult password for a computer to guess, easy for them to remember. But all it takes is for one of those passwords to appear on a list of hacked passwords somewhere and it would be easy for hackers to guess all the others because of the obvious formula. ~ ONUnicorn^{(Talk|Contribs)}problem solving 21:38, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

This illustrates a problem with any password quality checker: If well-implemented, then you can trust any answer of "this password is bad". But you can't always trust "this password is good"; all it takes is for the attacker to be using a different dictionary than the tool. For example, Fastily's checker says that "correct horse battery staple" is a good password. No, not a password I generated using the CHBS method. The actual string "correct horse battery staple". Suffusion of Yellow (talk) 23:43, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

My situation is like Yahya, every week I get notifications that someone is trying to log into my account. It's been going on for years, always a few every week. And often on other language Wikipedias. I think in part it's because I have a short username. But it seems random, it's not repeated attempts from a determined troll, that would be alarming. Liz

Read! Talk! 01:40, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

I have a specific determined troll targeting me almost daily, both with login attempts (across multiple projects) and with death threats. My password is strong, I have 2FA enabled, and I filter the emails. They aren't getting my account and I don't see the emails unless I check. Oh, the joys of volunteering at Wikipedia. --Yamla (talk) 02:26, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Is there a reason WMF doesn't have a system for email or SMS 2FA? It seems like email would certainly be simple enough, and the SMS 2FA isn't exactly going to break the WMFs bank. That tends to be a lot more comfortable for users than a dedicated app to provide a code. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:46, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  Email is already the recovery mechanism for passwords, so making it also the recovery mechanism for 2FA would mean one compromised email account would meet both factors. — xaosflux ^Talk 15:48, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  Set a second email address for 2FA. I assume most everyone here already has one email address they use for Wikipedia, and another for personal. You're just never going to get buy-in on using 2FA with apps or an external key. My place of work can't even get buy-in for it, and they pay us. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 15:59, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  Email and SMS 2FA are notoriously insecure. Most security conscious services are phasing them out. MrOllie (talk) 15:54, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  Yeah, we're talking about Wikipedia though, not actual secure information. Here's a totally unreliable source that says SMS 2FA only stops 76% of attacks... is susceptible to man-in-the-middle attacks, social engineering and SIM swapping. So 76% percent of what attacks? Who knows, but it's still leaps and bounds more secure than no 2FA. No reason to let perfect be the enemy of good. If someone is doing MITM SMS attacks, or cloning your SIM to get your Wikipedia password, well what the fuck. You're probably a spy using Wikipedia talk pages for one way blind coded messages, and should have better security anyway. Can also break MITM attacks by having a user text the code to Wikipedia, rather than the other way around, vastly improving the security. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:11, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  A bad actor doesn't even have to bother with SIM cloning these days, they just have to gin up a fake letter of authorization on the proper letterhead to get a copy of SMS messages forwarded in real time, as well as ability to spoof outgoing messages. There's no sense in building a system that we know will be junk before the first line of code is written. I'd rather see the foundation use some of their bloated budget to mail out hardware keys for admins. MrOllie (talk) 16:24, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  For all the admins that will willingly disclose their mailing address to WMF? You're assuming that someone A) Wants to access AdminX's Wikipedia account, B) Already has AdminX's Wikipedia password, C) Has AdminX's mobile number, D) Is willing to forge documents and get involved with a telecom company to try and get realtime access to SMS messages and access to spoof outgoing SMS messages. That's the use case you're designing against? Rather than something that exists now, will prevent the vast majority of the already vanishingly few admin account compromises, and is much easier for people to use, so will have a much higher use rate? Sure you can mail individual hardware keys to every admin willing, and replace them as they get lost and such, and the foundation can maintain an list of people's addresses, usernames and hardware assigned to them so that 20% of admins will take part. Or, OR, you set something up that almost everyone can use very easily, isn't quite as secure, but has a much higher use rate resulting in a more secure environment than the more secure design. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 16:33, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Like a few people above, the WMF would be losing my services if they made me use the utterly useless Heath Robinson 2FA system that they currently claim to be useful. You'd think that we'd currently have developers working hard on crap like this, or the fact that a large amount of people using mobile devices don't even receive talk page messages, but apparently "Growth features" and fancy skins are far more important that people actually being able to use or administrate the project. Black Kite (talk) 18:57, 4 March 2022 (UTC)
• As I'm one of the admins whose account was compromised back in 2015, I am quite shocked that the community focuses more me having weak password, not the hacker who committed the criminal act of Computer Fraud and Abuse Act by accessing my account. I'm Canadian and I don't know how this applies when the perpetrator (in any country), committing the act in the US (since WMF server is in the US) on a Canadian victim. But whoever hacked my account could have been sentenced up to 10 years in jail for that stunt according to the Canadian law. The community seems quite intent on blaming the victim. I draw the analogy that someone's house is being broken into. Instead of calling the police, the neighbours blamed the victim for installing a cheap lock that enabled the breaking in. To this date, I don't think CU (which would have IP address of the person committing the unauthorized access in a timely manner) has notified the police for this on-wiki crime. OhanaUnited^{Talk page} 07:11, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Universaladdress/ComicsAreJustAllRight 3X-banned

This is to notify the community that Universaladdress, also known as ComicsAreJustAllRight, Forensic Kidology and RiverCityRelay, has been de facto community-banned per the three-strike rule; they were first blocked as ComicsAreJustAllRight following an ANI discussion, followed by sockpuppetry blocks in December ([9][10][11]) and today ([12][13]). Please see the SPI for details. --Blablubbs (talk) 16:34, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

RfC needing closure

This RfC has been going on for over a month, and most discussion has stalled. I posted a request at WP:CR, here, but that hasn't been acted upon yet in over a week, and in any case this might need some more experienced editor for the more contentious elements of it. It might seem daunting at first, but every individual subproposal can probably be treated independently from the rest; and there's no obligation for one person to do it all at once. It would be good if this could finally be closed and efforts be made to implement whatever outcome has been decided upon. Cheers, RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 19:11, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

• Lot of comments in the last couple of days, which is probably why no admin has jumped on it yet. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:21, 2 March 2022 (UTC)

This is an RfC where, no matter what the decision, there will be some very unhappy editors. I can understand the hesitancy to dive in to this squall. Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 01:29, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

@Liz: At least some of the proposals seem to be less contentious than the others (in terms of degree of support/opposition they have received). RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 14:16, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

@RandomCanadian: I can volunteer to close over the weekend if there are no takers by then. — Wug·a·po·des​ 21:36, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Skepticism and coordinated editing closed

An arbitration case regarding Skepticism and coordinated editing has now closed and the final decision is viewable at the link above. The following remedies have been enacted:

• Rp2006 (talk · contribs) is warned against a battleground mentality and further incivility.
• Rp2006 is indefinitely topic banned from edits related to living people associated with or of interest to scientific skepticism, broadly construed. This topic ban may be appealed after six months have elapsed and every six months thereafter.
• A. C. Santacruz (talk · contribs) is reminded to remain collegial in editing and interacting with others.
• Roxy the dog (talk · contribs) is warned to remain collegial in editing and interacting with others.
• GSoW is advised that a presence on English Wikipedia, perhaps as its own WikiProject or as a task force of WikiProject Skepticism, will create more transparency and lessen some of the kinds of suspicion and conflict that preceded this case. It could also provide a place for the GSoW to get community feedback about its training which would increase its effectiveness.
• Editors are reminded that discretionary sanctions for biographies of living people have been authorized since 2014. Editors named in this decision shall be considered aware of these discretionary sanctions under awareness criterion 1.

For the Arbitration Committee, –MJL ‐Talk‐^☖ 05:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Discuss this at: Wikipedia talk:Arbitration Committee/Noticeboard § Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Case/Skepticism and coordinated editing closed

Closure review: Merge Wikipedia Star Trek Into Darkness controversy to List of Wikipedia controversies

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

---

The discussion was closed by Slashlefty (talk · contribs) and does not meet the requirements of WP:RMNAC. They have been notified here and their only response was archiving the comment here. Given the clear lack of any effort by the closer here, I think the close should be vacated and left for an experienced editor or admin. ––FormalDude talk 08:03, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

 Comment: We also had a dispute with this user, where, one user has stated that this user does not want to participate in any discussions. So maybe, he archived the discussions because he doesn’t want to follow you and participate in the discussion. —Ctrlwiki (talk) 08:18, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Failure to respond to a civil query is very poor behaviour indeed, and no-consensus closes almost always necessitate provision of some detail in the close. And yes, non-EC editors are unlikely to count as highly experienced NACs. Overturn, reclose by experienced editor Nosebagbear (talk) 10:15, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  I told the user he could revert my edit. I archived the discussion as another user modified the close. I couldn't even revert it even if i wanted to, because of conflicting edits. sl (talk) 10:39, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

  its opened sl (talk) 10:48, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse close as participant. The closer has been around long enough to recognize and put an obvious and lingering no consensus discussion out to pasture. Per WP:RMNAC criteria: "The consensus or lack thereof is clear after a full listing period (seven days)." - this merge discussion was up for 40 days (and 40 nights) and the last comment was almost four weeks in the past. Randy Kryn (talk) 10:30, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• You can reopen it i really don't care. I can't revert my close when others have made edits after me. sl (talk) 10:36, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

It's opened again. sl (talk) 10:42, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

"They should have sent a poet" Randy Kryn (talk) 11:04, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

• Overturn. Inadequate close, ADMINACCT failure, editor is too new to know the expectations?

Why raise WP:RMNAC when this was not an RM? Go to WP:NAC for relevant good advice. —SmokeyJoe (talk) 12:26, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

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

Bad faith edit-summary comments by User talk:Bramhesh Patil

• Bramhesh Patil (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log)
• Maratha Empire (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs)

In general, User talk:Bramhesh Patil has made POV edits pushing Maratha empire in historical articles. While many are ok, others are blatant and they have so many warnings on their talk page (all throughout 3 years of activity) but for some reason no short or long-term blocks were sanctioned.

They have purposefully and blatantly made threats (WP:HOUNDING?) against User:Adhonorium for alleged POV pushing (may be it is true I didn't check, but this harrassment is unwarranted/uncivil). On the same edit summary, they promise to counter-vandalize wikipedia, specifically vandalizing pages about Mughals (Muslim rulers). Kiran_891 ^(TALK) 18:10, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

72-hour personal-attack block on User:Bramhesh Patil for calling someone an 'apparently Hindu-phobic editor' in their edit summary and, to add icing to the cake, promising to retaliate by doing 'vandalism' to the articles about Muslim rulers. EdJohnston (talk) 18:51, 3 March 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Requests for adminship/Un'stopableZed

Close needed. --Minorax^«¦talk¦» 15:07, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I G1ed it. Obvious vandalism is obvious. --Jayron32 15:48, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Massive (vile) quote

Hi all - I couldn't quite think of the right place to bring this - it's a mixture of copyright concern, concern about NPOV, and a general 'good judgment' question. Please see Elliot Rodger#Videos, where there is an enormous chunk of transcript from one of his videos. Is this amount of quoted text reasonable from a copyright perspective? Does it serve any encyclopedic purpose? Other opinions would be very welcome. Girth Summit _(blether) 18:04, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I don't think it belongs, and as of this writing it's been removed. A link to the transcript elsewhere would be sufficient. I agree with your points (length, copyright, encyclopedic purpose, judgment). Antandrus (talk) 18:29, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Frankly I'm unconvinced that Rodger is notable outside 2014 Isla Vista killings (indeed, until 9 January this year, his article did not exist even as a redirect, and there is little useful in his article that isn't in the main article). Black Kite (talk) 18:45, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

@Black Kite: I agree, and it seems our usual tactic is to include a brief bio in the main article. BLP1E applies, as he never attained wiki-notability any other means. A BOLD redirect suggests itself. (Btw, it's a good article nomination at the moment.) SN54129 18:58, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Boldness may be contraindicated given the likelihood of low-number, but high-intensity objection; though if someone were to start a merge discussion, I'm pretty sure the votes would go in favor of such a move. --Jayron32 19:01, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

The history can be deceptive. The redirect has existed for nearly 8 years, since the day after the event.[14] -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 19:38, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

Fair enough, but it hasn't existed as an article (for any time) until is was suddenly created on 9 January without going through AFC. Black Kite (talk) 19:40, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I had started a discussion beforehand, to try and achive consensus. After a month of discussion, with no objections, I had split the relevant parts of the article to create Rodger's article. There was nothing outside of standard procedure, that I'm aware of. Also, the article can and will be added to include other information, in due time. Since it required consensus to create it, it should require to delete it. TheWikipedian05 (talk) 1:40, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Indeed. I don't think it adheres to our main tenets—copyright (massive quotes are against fair use) and neutrality (draws WP:UNDUE focus on one particular source)—or our mission; I don't think we should encourage the posting of misogynistic tirades, manifestos or anything else potentially against WP:NOTMEMORIAL. It was added here, and I note that that editor is suggesting a degree of WP:OWNership towards the article at the moment; hopefully it will not be re-added. SN54129 18:50, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I have revdeleted the offending revisions per WP:RD1. Ivanvector (^Talk/_Edits) 18:56, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

It looks like Girth Summit has failed to notify the editor who added this text of the existence of this discussion. I don't think you can sidestep this requirement by framing your post as only a policy/content question. (As Serial Number's comment above shows, discussion quickly turns to the topic of the editor's behavior.) Modulus12 (talk) 23:59, 4 March 2022 (UTC)

I didn't actually dig through the article's history to find who added it - I wanted other opinions on whether the content violated policy, I wasn't calling for any action against an individual. Girth Summit _(blether) 07:14, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Fair enough, but surely it would be good to include something like I haven't dug through the page history to find out who it was. If anyone starts discussing an editor's behavior, please notify them of this discussion. in your post. But they have now been notified, so all is fine. Modulus12 (talk) 18:25, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

It was absolutely correct to remove the text. Not only was it too long, thus serving no real encyclopedic purpose, but also obscene, too obscene to justify a place on the article. Reading it now, it just felt out of place. I had seen an earlier version of the article which only featured part of the transcript and I wanted to complete it. I realize that was a mistake. We should have left it as it was or removed it entirely TheWikipedian05 (talk) 1:33, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

I see that TheWikipedian05 has been blocked for 72 hours for edit warring. Doug Weller talk 12:54, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Battle of Techno House 2022

• Battle of Techno House 2022 (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views)

This newly created article is becoming a small nest of disruptive editing. Not surprising if you mix a meme with the Russian-Ukrainian war, but it'd be nice if others watched it. My initial involvement was declining a blatant hoax tag, but since then, I feel like I'm defending the article. I don't want to get into a battle (sorry) with others on whether the article is notable or whether it's well-written (it's not). I don't even like memes.--Bbb23 (talk) 00:19, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Oy. Looks like a classic case of WP:RECENTISM that will be kept if it's taken to AfD before the recentism passes. – Muboshgu (talk) 01:21, 5 March 2022 (UTC) You know, as an American football player, I am always paying attention to what is recent.-55Body (talk) 04:24, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Deleted a page in error

Sorry for being such a doofus, but I clicked the wrong page and deleted World Government (rather than the intended Draft:Word Government Movement, see User talk:MichaelMaas1986) and now restoration failed with a message including, "this transaction was aborted because the write duration (12.169790267944) exceeded the 3 second limit." Is there anyone reading this here who can get this done properly? I promise never to be this careless again, I can hardly say how embarrassing it is. – Athaenara ✉ 11:25, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Working on this. The page has thousands of revisions, so I guess the server choked on their number. Thus, I'll restore the history piecewise. Jo-Jo Eumerus (talk) 11:31, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I think you can do it if you restore in batches as opposed to all revisions at once; looks like Jo-Jo Eumerus is already on it. :) --Blablubbs (talk) 11:31, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

It's back, bless your heart, Jo-Jo. – Athaenara ✉ 11:34, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Stuff happens. At least you didn't delete the front page. ;) Dennis Brown - 2¢ 13:59, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

I've re-connected the Wikidata item. Sometimes weird stuff happens if a Wikidata item is disconnected from a prominent topic for a relatively short amount of time (e.g. more than half an hour or so). Luckily, that didn't seem to be a problem here. Graham87 03:48, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

911 (the DAB page) mystery

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

---

Can anyone figure out what caused 911 (the WP:DAB page) to have its 2017 indef semi lifted? (See also RfPP permalink.) El_C 16:42, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

The protection moved with the article when it was moved to a new page title. The new redirect didn't have any protection to start with. --Floquenbeam (talk) 16:56, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Floq, the protection was applied after the move, though. El_C 17:20, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

after one move; before another. —-Floquenbeam (talk) 17:53, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Oops, sorry, I had opened the full log of another page by mistake. Thanks for bearing with me! El_C 18:12, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

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

Challenging a closure of RfC

Talk:Francisco_Franco#RfC:_"Fascist"_categories_and_sidebar

1. Closer should have discarded irrelevant arguments: those based on personal opinion only, and those that show no understanding of the matter of issue. Too many editors voting yes backed up by sources that say no.
2. Closer ignored the weight of the sources. When available, academic and peer-reviewed publications, scholarly monographs, and textbooks are usually the most reliable sources. But in this closer acknowledged that "Those in favor of keeping the categories and template first pointed to sources that are both recent and quite reliable, but not academic" and ignored the Franco's main biographers who clearly say no. (Preston, Payne, Tusell)
3. Closure was not a reasonable summation of the discussion, The Closer interpreted the consensus incorrectly. There was no consensus at all. "The closer’s role is solely to find out what the participants have decided", in this case closer decided to take sides and vote.
4. Closer acknowledged that the Categorization should generally be uncontroversial but closer thinks that there is no controversy, but rather scholarly disagreements. Now, the Oxford dictionary says that a controversy is a public discussion and argument about something that many people strongly disagree. Merriam Webster says that a controversy is a discussion marked especially by the expression of opposing views. So closer is wrong. Whether Franco’s regime was actually fascist is contentious and subject to an ongoing debate in the academic world.(Aleksandra Hadzelek, Spain’s ‘pact of silence’ and the Removal of Franco’s Statues)
5. Closer does not understand the topic nor the discussion that took place. Closer says "that it's clear to me here that the disagreement seems to be one of personal interpretation of the sources." and this comment is wrong. Paul Preston one of Franco's biographers says that "If you’re asking an academic political theorist what constitutes a fascist then you’d have to say Franco isn’t." There is not much room for interpretation in this statement. Filipe de Meneses says "Franco was not a fascist. " what is the other possible interpretation of this source?J Pratas (talk) 21:22, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse. Well, this is a blast from the past. J Pratas, how is it that, after all these years, you're still skirting the line of WP:TEND RE: definitions of Iberian fascism. You go to the closer's page, where you essentially try to re-argue the RfC, trying to go over the sources and so on. That's what the RfC was for. And now here, you bring definitions of the word "controversy" from two dictionaries for some reason. What is happening? Again, a WP:CLOSECHALLENGE is not a do-over. El_C 22:34, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

Yes it is a long discussion in the wikipedia and in the academia. Pretending that there is no controversy, but rather scholarly disagreements does not make much sense. I am not repeating the arguments, I am questioning the closing. Closer is basically taking sides on the dispute while playing with semantics to avoid the guideline. Furthermore closer claims there was a consensus where there was none. But last time didnt you say you did not know this topic enough to make a judgement? and advised to get another administrator?J Pratas (talk) 23:14, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

JPratas, as I recall, I did that because you and your opponent just kept going and going, which I felt was going nowhere, so I wanted to cut to the chase. Granted, I don't know a ton about this particular subject matter, though I have covered it in some general history courses I taught, albeit to undergrads. The point, though, is that you need to identify a policy or guideline that the closing overlooked. Instead, you seem to want to re-argue the content dispute that was the focus of this RfC. Again, that's not what a CLOSECHALLENGE is for. El_C 23:49, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

• Endorse close, as it summarizes the discussion sufficiently. Dennis Brown - 2¢ 23:28, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
• Endorse. This reeks of wanting a do-over because J Pratas didn't like the outcome. ♠JCW555 (talk)♠ 23:33, 5 March 2022 (UTC)
• Endorse, despite the fact this puts me on the same side El C, which I hate. After closing about two hundred edit requests on that page as get consensus, I'm glad it's done. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 23:55, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

I love you, bwo! El_C 23:58, 5 March 2022 (UTC)

If you really loved me you'd block DF112233 for vandalism and hoaxing. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:08, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Took too long, not good enough. ScottishFinnishRadish (talk) 00:14, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Damn, El_C can't catch a break :P ♠JCW555 (talk)♠ 00:16, 6 March 2022 (UTC)

Goodbye officer! El_C 00:18, 6 March 2022 (UTC)